JULIE. Why didn’t they then, in Heaven’s name? Oh, if you knew how I long to have a child to console me for all this. If I should never have one. If I should never have one. [_Shudders_]. But I mustn’t even think of that. MME. DUPONT. My dear child, you must look at things more calmly. All this will gradually settle down until at last it passes away altogether. JULIE. Yes. When I am an old woman. MME. DUPONT. Exactly, when you are an old woman. JULIE. Thank you. MME. DUPONT. In any case, you should try to control yourself a little. If only for your father’s sake and mine. JULIE. I will try. [_Antonin comes in_]. Hush. Here he is. Go away, mother. You will only make things worse. [_Madame Dupont goes out_]. ANTONIN [_furious_] Well! This is the last straw. Your father won’t keep his word. You have heard? JULIE [_sitting on the sofa_] Yes. ANTONIN. It doesn’t disturb you apparently. JULIE. He cannot do otherwise. ANTONIN. It will be the ruin of me. But you seem to be all in league together, the whole lot of you. Oh, you’re a pretty family! Your father owes us twenty-five thousand francs. He won’t pay them. The other day your sister promised us fifteen thousand francs. To-day she has changed her mind. As for you, you do everything in your power to compromise my position. JULIE. I? ANTONIN. You. You disobey me. JULIE. In what? ANTONIN. Were you at Mass this morning? JULIE. No. ANTONIN. Why not? JULIE. It is not my fault if I no longer believe. ANTONIN. I don’t ask you to believe. I ask you to go to Mass. The two things are totally different. A woman ought to go to Mass. If she doesn’t believe she should appear to do so. It is usual among people of good position. I wish you to do as others do. Do you understand? I wish it. I have no desire to pass for a Freethinker when all my clients are Catholics, confound them! JULIE. I have not been and I do not intend to go. ANTONIN. What do you say? JULIE. You heard what I said. If you were a believer, if you asked me to do this out of respect for your faith, I would do it. But it is a piece of commercial trickery that you want from me. I refuse. ANTONIN. You wish to do as you like, you mean? JULIE [_breaking out_] Yes. You are quite right. I wish to do as I like. That is it. That is just it. For once in my life I wish to do as I like! All the time I was a girl I had to obey; to submit to authority that was often unreasonable. Now I am to go on obeying, obeying. I have had enough of this everlasting obedience. ANTONIN. Then you shouldn’t have married. JULIE. So that’s it, is it. The sole business of your wife’s life is to be your slave, to help the servant to make you comfortable, brush your clothes, taste your soup, and look up to you with admiring homage. ANTONIN. That’s all nonsense. JULIE. What is nonsense?