Eileen monologue — The Straw

(_assertively_) Well, I know! You needn't waste pity on him. He'll be only too glad to get my letter. He's been anxious to be free of me ever since I was sent here, only he thought it wouldn't be decent to break it off himself while I was sick. He was afraid of what people would say about him when they found it out. So he's just gradually stopped writing and coming for visits, and waited for me to realise. And if I didn't, I know he'd have broken it off himself the first day I got home. I've kept persuading myself that, in spite of the way he's acted, he did love me as much as he could love anyone, and that it would hurt him if I---- But now I know that he never loved me, that he couldn't love anyone but himself. Oh, I don't hate him for it. He can't help being what he is. And all people seem to be--like that, mostly. I'm only going to remember that he and I grew up together, and that he was kind to me then when he thought he liked me--and forget all the rest. (_With agitated impatience._) Oh, Stephen, you know all this I've said about him. Why don't you admit it? You've read his letters.