STAGE HAND. Glad to be rid of her, sir! She has sat in the passage this hour to be tripped over, and nothing budges her. [_Calling_] Will you come this way--this way! [_He disappears._] SHAKESPEARE. Anne? Anne in London? What does Anne in London? STAGE HAND [_returning_]. This way, this way! It’s a dark passage. This way! MRS. HATHAWAY _comes in._ SHAKESPEARE. Not Anne! MRS. HATHAWAY. Is Mr. Shakespeare--? Will! Is it Will? Oh, how you’re changed! SHAKESPEARE. Ten years change a young man. MRS. HATHAWAY. But not an old woman. I’m Anne’s mother still. SHAKESPEARE. I’m not so changed that I forget it. What do you want of me, Mrs. Hathaway? MRS. HATHAWAY. I bring you news. SHAKESPEARE. Good news? MRS. HATHAWAY. It’s as you take it. SHAKESPEARE. Dead? MRS. HATHAWAY. Is that good news, my half son? She is not so blessed. SHAKESPEARE. I did not say it so. Is she with you? MRS. HATHAWAY. No. SHAKESPEARE. Did she send you? Oh, so she has heard of this business! It’s like her to send you now. She is to take her toll of it, is she? MRS. HATHAWAY. You are bitter, you are bitter! You are the east wind of your own spring sunshine. She has heard nothing of this business or of that--dark lady. SHAKESPEARE. Take care! MRS. HATHAWAY. I saw her come from this room--off her guard. I know how a woman looks when a man has pleased her. Oh, please her if you must! I am old. I do not judge. And I think you will not always. But that’s not my news. SHAKESPEARE. I can’t hear it now. I am pressed. This is not every night. I’ll see you to-morrow, not now. MRS. HATHAWAY. My news may be dead to-morrow. SHAKESPEARE. So much the better. I needn’t hear it. MRS. HATHAWAY. Son, son, son! You don’t know what you say. SHAKESPEARE. That is not my name. And I know well what I say. You are my wife’s mother and I’ll not share anything of hers. But if she needs money, I’ll send it. To-night makes me a rich man. MRS. HATHAWAY. Richer than you think--and to-morrow poorer, if you do not listen to me. _There is a roar of applause._ SHAKESPEARE. Listen to you? Why should I listen to you? Can you give me anything to better that? MRS. HATHAWAY. But if she can? Sixty years I have learned lessons in the world; but I never learned that a city was better than green fields, friends better than a house-mate, or the works of a man’s hand more to him than the child of his own flesh.