can see her clinging round your neck until you fancied you were
strong. But I'll tell you this, my lad, it's a desperate poor
kind of a woman that'll look for protection to the likes of you.

WILLIE. Ada does.

MAGGIE. And that gives me the weight of her. She's born to
meekness, Ada is. You wed her, and you'll be an eighteen shilling
a week bootmaker all the days of your life. You'll be a slave,
and a contented slave.

WILLIE. I'm not ambitious that I know of.

MAGGIE. No. But you're going to be. I'll see to that. I've got my
work cut out, but there's the makings of a man about you.

WILLIE. I wish you'd leave me alone. (_Sits_ R.)

MAGGIE. So does the fly when the spider catches him. You're my
man, Willie Mossop. (_Moves to desk_.)

WILLIE. Aye, so you say. Ada would tell another story, though.

(ADA FIGGINS _enters from street. She is not ridiculous, but a
weak, poor-blooded, poor-spirited girl of twenty, in clogs and
shawl, with_ WILLIE'S _dinner in a basin carried in a blue
handkerchief. She crosses to him and gives him the basin_.)

ADA (C.). There's your dinner, Will.