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A Play in One Act.
elaborately dressed woman of eight-and twenty,
handsome and self-
possessed. She has an easy manner which suggests that she
has
consorted with men rather than with women. JACK RAYNER is
thirty-two;
there is about him a certain weariness as if he had lived
hard and found life
difficult. His face is sunburnt, somewhat lined
and worn.
our
last day of single blessedness?
ing else
for a week.
safely.
I’m so afraid that something will happen.
help being friendly at last.
confidence
in my luck.
will love,
honour and obey me. By Jove, I’m a nice object to
honour.
too.
whether
either of us has many illusions; but we’ll do our best.
back
again.
umbrellas, you no sooner get them than you lose them; and
the loss always leaves a
little painful wound. But don’t let us
be sentimental. . . . How shall we celebrate
the last of
our liberty?
energetic.
on to
the Covent Garden?
it. I’m sick of the Empire, sick to death. I want never to
go
to a music-hall again. I want to live in the country, and
bathe my hands in the
long grass, and gather butter-cups and
daisies.
these sultry years of London. I often think of myself in a
large sun-bonnet,
milking the cows as I did when I was a girl.
they? And
it’s sure to rain when you want to put on your
sun-bonnet.
us try
to be simple. We won’t say smart things to one
another; but just dodder along
stupidly and peacefully.
pitilessly,
I used to think of the green lanes and the silver
mists of England. . . . But don’t
you think you’ll be
awfully bored?
faith in you than in anyone else in this blessed
world; but I’m
afraid I haven’t much in anybody. Ah, Lottie, you must
teach me
to have faith—faith in my fellows.
sake, don’t let us sentimentalise. It hurts too much.
tea, so
that I might introduce him to you?
Did you
know him before you went to the Cape?
sure you’ll like him. He’s the very worthiest chap I know.
ourselves.
you. Allow me to introduce you: Mr. Paton, Mrs. Vivyan.
her hand. He hesitates a moment and then takes it.
I was most anxious to make your acquaintance.
that
the people I like shall like one another.
you.
that I'm
almost jealous.
man.
he
knew your name.
might have
been dreadfully disreputable.
to-morrow? Your preparations have been very rapid.
going to be
quite private, you know. There’ll only be one
person beside yourself.
maid,
Mrs. Vivyan?
it's not usual.
line, Lottie. I’ll be back in two minutes.
things of
you while you’re gone; so don’t be long.
sitting
It
was so good of you to come and see me.
are like
whom one’s friends are going to marry.
see
you.
to have a
little talk with you.
friend?
to like me
too.
at the
’Varsity; and then we shared diggings in London.
mention that
in the catalogue of your virtues.
when Jack told
me he was going to be married. He’s had
rather a rough time of late, and I thought
it was the best
thing possible that he should settle down. I asked him what
on
earth he was going to marry on and he said you had
twelve hundred a year.
Jack lets money slip through his fingers like water; and I'm
sure
he’ll never be able to earn a cent.
ant about
you. He knew your name, and that's nearly all.
did you do
it? Did you employ a private detective?
The
information I sought was all over London. Jack must
be the only person in town who
has not heard it.
safe from the scandalmongers. You see, they can never say
anything about me half so bad as the truth.
Vivyan, how you obtained the money upon which you and
Jack are
proposing to live.
clever you
are!
going to do,
Mrs. Vivyan?
an
utter cad; but I must do it for Jack’s sake. It’s my duty
to him.
duty. I
notice people are always more inclined to do it when
they will inflict pain upon
others.
thing, and you expect me to pat you on the back.
least
animosity towards you. That's why I came here to-day.
Isn’t it
clear that Jack can’t marry you?
Why not?
what I
learnt about you?
Well,
what is it?
spare me nothing. Far be it from the virtuous to refrain from
trampling on the wicked.
was
settled on you by Lord Feaverham when he married.
that it is true?
reason to
do this. . . . Oh, you hate me and think me
a cad and brute; but what can I do? If
you knew what agony
it has caused me? I believe Jack loves you, and I daresay
you
love him. For all I know he may hate me for what I’m doing
now. I wish
with all my heart there were some other way
out of it.
because I
want to be your friend. And even if you’d married
Jack he must have found out
sooner or later, and then it would
have been a thousand times worse.
Don't let
him know the reason. Let us try to save him from
the humiliation and the pain.
Write to him and say you don't
love him enough. It’s so easy.
my
marriage with Jack.
necessity. The marriage is utterly impossible—for his sake,
for the sake of his
people. It means absolute social ruin to him.
impertinent,
Mr. Paton.
he must
find out. It’s the only thing you can do if you want
to save your honour in his
estimation.
but not disgraced.
intention of giving Jack up.
dishonour him.
come to my
house and I try to be friends with you, and you
insult me. You dishonour
yourself.
ing from
the engagement without the real reasons being known.
Why yo you come here and interfere with us? D’you think
we’re
fools and simpletons? Why don’t you leave us alone?
Who are you that you should
preach and moralise? You’re
ridiculous, you’re simply absurd.
Vivyan.
choose, Mrs. Vivyan. I've shielded you as much as I could.
But my business is to
stop this marriage, and by God, I mean
to do it.
effort restraining herself
be disturbed by what you say! It's all nonsense. And how,
pray, are you
going to prevent me from marrying Jack?
driven me to
it. I shall tell him everything I know.
Very well. You shall tell him now — immediately.
going to make an absolute fool of yourself, Mr. Paton.
(Herbert
bows,) But perhaps that experience will not be
entirely new.
for the
high character that Mr. Paton has been giving you, I
should fear that you had been
writing love-letters. Mr. Paton
wishes to speak to you on matters of
importance.
want to talk about?
much rather
say ill-natured things of me behind my back.
Mrs.
Vivyan. I am quite willing to say before your face all I
have to say.
of perfect indifference.
surprised to hear of your engagement, Jack.
myself.
The thing was a bit sudden.
indelicately proposed to him.
lamented
Mr. Vivyan was.
the subject?
doesn’t
very much care to talk about one’s predecessor. I
believe he was a merchant.
member now
quite well.
fortune.
lucky chap.
Vivyan if
she had been penniless.
in
asking him.
ately in
love with one another. ... I don't think we are,
Mr. Paton. We’ve both gone through
a good deal and we’re
rather tired of love. It makes one too unhappy. The man
a
woman loves seems always to treat her badly. We’re content
to be very good
friends.
money?
Mr.
Vivyan?
Vivyan’s
discredit.
out sooner
or later.
know what a
horrible shock and grief it must be to you.
When you told me you were going to
marry Mrs. Vivyan I
asked people who she was. I found out—things which made
me
enquire more particularly.
business?
you be
entrapped in a scandalous marriage.
name is
assumed. Oh God, I don’t know how to tell you!
Mrs. Vivyan, please leave us. I
can’t stand it. I can’t say
these things before you, and I must say them. It will
be
better for all of us if you leave us alone.
to go.
Now I want to hear all you’ve got to say.
Vet., Jack. She got mixed up with a man at Oxford, and then
came
to town. Four years ago, she made the acquaintance
of Lord Feaverham. And when he
got married he settled on
her the sum of twelve hundred a year.
to
understand.
you? How can I fail to understand.
which I did not know before.
tell you that you've said nothing which I did not know
before.
the woman was
whom you were going to marry?
man’s cast
off. . .
names, Herbert, because, you know, she’s going to be my
wife.
You say you’re
not passionately in love with her.
whole business. . . .
a rich
woman.
understanding
yourself as she sold herself. Oh, how can you! Why
man,
you're going to live on the very price of her shame.
you no
honour? It’s bad enough to marry the woman, yet do
that if you love her; but don’t
take the damned money. I
never dreamt you could do such a thing. All the time I
was
thinking that this woman had enveigled you; and my heart
bled to think of
the pain you must suffer when you knew the
truth.
public
than necessary.
dearest?
I can
bear it, and I don't want to run away.
If you’ll sit down quietly and not make a beastly fuss, I'll
try
and explain to you how it all came about. I don’t want you
to think too
badly of me.
does it
matter what he thinks?
I
can forget it. To-morrow we bury the past for ever, and
begin a new life.
prodigiously clever. At Oxford I was a shining light. And
when I came to town, I
was eager for honour and glory. It
took me five long years to discover I was a
fool. Oh, what
anguish of heart it was, when the fact stared me in the face
that I was a failure, a miserable, hopeless failure! I had thought
myself so much
cleverer than the common run of men. I had
looked down on them from the height of
my superiority, and
now I was obliged to climb down and confess that I was
less
than the most vulgar money-grubber of them all. Ah, what a
lucky chap you
are, Herbert. You were never under the delu-
sion that you had genius. You were so
deliberately normal.
You always did the right thing, and the thing that was
expected
of you. And now, you see, I’m a poor, broken-down scamp,
while you are a pillar of society. And you play golf and go to
church regularly.
You do play golf and go to church?
English girl with fair hair and blue eyes, the daughter of a
clergyman.
she's
strong and healthy, and plays tennis, and rides a bike,
and has muscles like a
prize-fighter. Oh, I know it. Then
you’ll get married and help to over-populate the
island. You’ll
rear children upright and healthy and strong and honest like
yourselves. And when you die they'll put on your tombstone:
"Here lies an
honourable man.” Thank your stars that you
were never cursed with ideals, but were
content to work hard
and be respectable. Oh, it’s a long, hard fall when one
tumbles
back to earth, trying to climb to heaven. . . . And the
result of it
all is, that you have an income and honour; while
I, as you remarked—
I said just
now, Jack.
very much
affects me now. When one has to stand one's own
contempt, it is easy enough to put
up with other people’s. Oh,
if you knew how awful those years were, when I tried
and
tried and could do no good. At last I despaired and went to
the Cape.
But I muddled away my money there as I had
muddled everything in England; and then I had to work and
earn my bread as best I
could. Sometimes I couldn't and I
starved.
so glad to
help you, Jack.
One needs
to have pawned one’s shirt for bread before one can
lend money like a gentleman.
Lottie found out I was in
distress and sent me twenty pounds.
two
months so as not to hurt my feelings, and then returned
it with effusive thanks. I
noticed they were the same four
notes as I sent out.
somehow. I tried farming, I went to the mines, I was a bar-
tender. Imagine the shining light of Oxford debating-societies
mixing drinks in his
shirt-sleeves and a white apron. A
merciful Providence has destined me to be one of
life’s failures.
don’t.
You, with your income and your respectability, what
do you know of the struggles
and the agony of those who go
under? You can’t judge, you don't know how many
tempta-
tions we resist for the one we fall to.
it.
And I had the edifying spectacle of my fellows. Army
men, shady people from the
city, any amount of parsons’ sons,
'Varsity men by the score, and now and again a noble lord.
Oh, we were a select
body, I can tell you—the failures, and the
blackguards, and the outcasts. Most of
them take to drink,
and that's the best thing they can do, for then they don’t
mind.
been only
too glad to drink myself to death, only spirits make
me so beastly ill that I have
to keep sober. . . . Anyhow,
now I’m back in England again, and three or four
weeks ago
I met Lottie.
asked me
to go and see her. We soon were as great friends
as ever. She told me all about
herself, and I told her about
myself. It was an edifying story on both sides. She
spoke
of the settlement, and one day suggested that I should marry
her.
mine. I
was sick to death of being always alone. I wanted
someone to care for me, someone
to belong to me and stand
by me. And it’s so awful to be poor, perpetually to have
starvation staring you in the face, not to have the smallest
comfort or
anything that makes life pleasant and beautiful.
You, who’ve always been well off,
don’t know what a man
can do to get money. I tell you such abject poverty is
madden-
ing. I couldn’t stand it any longer; I would rather have
killed myself. I'm tired of all this effort, I want to live in
peace and
quiet.
as all
that. I've done mean enough things in my life. I
wonder what I haven’t done! I
haven’t stolen; but that’s
because I was afraid of being found out, and I never
had the
pluck to take my chance.
lection
of the past?
for what I am, dear, and you know I have no cause to despise
you.
both rather tired of the world, and we’ve both gone
through
a good deal, I think we shall be forbearing to one another.
I think
she will make me a good wife.
prophesied you would make a fool of yourself?
man, old
chap. Respectability and virtue have turned their
backs upon us.
only
want feeding. You can get a bishop to dine with you if
you give good enough
dinners.
people. Their moral sense isn’t satisfied unless they see the
sinner actually roasting in Hell. As if Hell were needful when
every little sin so
quickly brings upon this earth its bitter
punishment.
when
we have ourselves. Why did you tell Herbert we were
only friends? We’re so much
more than that.
but if love comes let it come very slowly.