CRILLY
Won’t you take a glass?

SCOLLARD
No, thanks, Mr. Crilly.  I never touch stimulants.  Good day
to you all.

  He goes out.  Crofton Crilly goes after him.

MRS. CRILLY
Anna, you won’t be deprived of your money.

ANNA
Then what’s the difficulty, mother?

MRS. CRILLY
Let half of the money remain with us for a while.

ANNA
But, mother, if I don’t get all my money, what security have I
that what’s left will be good in six months or a year?

MRS. CRILLY
I’ll watch the money for you, Anna.

ANNA
It’s hard to keep a hold on money in a town where business is
going down.

MRS. CRILLY
Forty pounds will be given to you and forty pounds will
be kept safe for you.

ANNA
Forty pounds!  There’s not a small farmer comes into the shop
but his daughter has more of a dowry than forty pounds.

MRS. CRILLY
Think of all who marry without a dowry at all.

ANNA
You wouldn’t have me go to James Scollard without a dowry?

MRS. CRILLY Well, you know the way we’re situated.  If you insist on getting eighty pounds we’ll have to make an overdraft on the bank, and, in the way business is, I don’t know how we’ll ever recover it.

ANNA
There won’t be much left out of eighty pounds when we get what
suits us in furniture.

MRS. CRILLY
I could let you have some furniture.

ANNA
No, mother.  We want to start in a way that is different from
this house.

MRS. CRILLY
You’ll want all the money together?

ANNA
All of it, mother.

MRS. CRILLY
You’ll have to get it so.  But you’re very hard, Anna.

ANNA
This house would teach any one to look to themselves.

MRS. CRILLY Come upstairs. (Anna goes, left) Three hundred pounds of a loss.  Eighty pounds with that.  I’m terrified when I think. (She goes after Anna)

  Crofton Crilly comes in from shop.  He takes glass of whisky from
  table, and sits down in arm chair.

CRILLY
I don’t know what Marianne’s to do at all.  She has a shocking
lot to contend with.  Can anything be got from the old man, I wonder?

  Albert Crilly comes in by door, left.

ALBERT
Well, pa.

CRILLY
Well, Albert.  What’s the news in the town, Albert?

ALBERT
They say that you’ve backed a bill for Covey.

CRILLY
If your mother hears that kind of talk she’ll be vexed, Albert.

ALBERT
But did you back the bill?

CRILLY
For Heaven’s sake, let me alone, Albert.  Yes, I backed the
bill.

ALBERT
How much?

CRILLY
You’ll hear all about it from your mother.

ALBERT
They say the bill was for three hundred.

CRILLY
It was three or thereabouts.