But--but her employer? Is he married? STEVE [_Grunts._] Wife and four children. MABEL Well, then, what good does it do the girl to be told she has a desire for him? There’s nothing can be done about it. HENRIETTA Old institutions will have to be reshaped so that something can be done in such cases. It happens, Mabel, that this suppressed desire was on the point of landing Mary Snow in the insane asylum. Are you so tight-minded that you’d rather have her in the insane asylum than break the conventions? MABEL But--but have people always had these awful suppressed desires? HENRIETTA Always. STEVE But they’ve just been discovered. HENRIETTA The harm they do has just been discovered. And free, sane people must face the fact that they have to be dealt with. MABEL [_Stoutly._] I don’t believe they have them in Chicago. HENRIETTA [_Business of giving MABEL up._] People “have them” wherever the living Libido--the center of the soul’s energy--is in conflict with petrified moral codes. That means everywhere in civilization. Psychoanalysis-- STEVE Good God! I’ve got the roof in the cellar! HENRIETTA The roof in the cellar! STEVE [_Holding plan at arm’s length._] That’s what psychoanalysis does! HENRIETTA That’s what psychoanalysis could _un_-do. Is it any wonder I’m concerned about Steve? He dreamed the other night that the walls of his room melted away and he found himself alone in a forest. Don’t you see how significant it is for an architect to have _walls_ slip away from him? It symbolizes his loss of grip in his work. There’s some suppressed desire-- STEVE [_Hurling his ruined plan viciously to the floor._] Suppressed hell! HENRIETTA You speak more truly than you know. It is through suppressions that hells are formed in us. MABEL [_Looking at STEVE, who is tearing his hair._] Don’t you think it would be a good thing, Henrietta, if we went somewhere else? [_They rise and begin to pick up the dishes. MABEL drops a plate which breaks. HENRIETTA draws up short and looks at her--the psychoanalytic look._] I’m sorry, Henrietta. One of the Spode plates, too. [_Surprised and resentful as HENRIETTA continues to peer at her._] Don’t take it so to heart, Henrietta. HENRIETTA I can’t help taking it to heart. MABEL I’ll get you another. [_Pause. More sharply as HENRIETTA does not answer._] I said I’ll get you another plate, Henrietta. HENRIETTA It’s not the plate. MABEL For heaven’s sake, what is it then? HENRIETTA It’s the significant little false movement that made you drop it. MABEL Well, I suppose everyone makes a false movement once in a while. HENRIETTA Yes, Mabel, but these false movements all mean something. MABEL [_About to cry._] I don’t think that’s very nice! It was just because I happened to think of that Mabel Snow you were talking about-- HENRIETTA _Mabel_ Snow! MABEL Snow--Snow--well, what was her name, then? HENRIETTA Her name is Mary. You substituted _your own_ name for hers. MABEL