The question is, how. Am I not to use my reason to find out why? Isnt that what my reason is for? Well, all my reason tells me at present is that you are an impracticable lunatic.
SOAMEs. Does that help?
HOTCHKISS. No.
SOAMEs. Then pray for light.
HOTCHKISS. No: I am a snob, not a beggar. [He sits down in the General's chair].
COLLINS. We dont seem to be getting on, do we? Miss Edith: you and Mr Sykes had better go off to church and settle the right and wrong of it afterwards. Itll ease your minds, believe me: I speak from experience. You will burn your boats, as one might say.
SOAMES. We should never burn our boats. It is death in life.
COLLINS. Well, Father, I will say for you that you have views of your own and are not afraid to out with them. But some of us are of a more cheerful disposition. On the Borough Council now, you would be in a minority of one. You must take human nature as it is.
SOAMES. Upon what compulsion must I? I'll take divine nature as it is. I'll not hold a candle to the devil.
THE BISHOP. Thats a very unchristian way of treating the devil.
REGINALD. Well, we dont seem to be getting any further, do we?
THE BISHOP. Will you give it up and get married, Edith?
EDITH. No. What I propose seems to me quite reasonable.
THE BISHOP. And you, Lesbia?
LESBIA. Never.
MRS BRIDGENORTH. Never is a long word, Lesbia. Dont say it.
LESBIA [with a flash of temper] Dont pity me, Alice, please. As I said before, I am an English lady, quite prepared to do without anything I cant have on honorable conditions.
SOAMES [after a silence expressive of utter deadlock] I am still awaiting my instructions.
REGINALD. Well, we dont seem to be getting along, do we?
LEO [out of patience] You said that before, Rejjy. Do not repeat yourself.
REGINALD. Oh, bother! [He goes to the garden door and looks out gloomily].
SOAMES [rising with the paper in his hands] Psha! [He tears it in pieces]. So much for the contract!
THE VOICE OF THE BEADLE. By your leave there, gentlemen. Make way for the Mayoress. Way for the worshipful the Mayoress, my lords and gentlemen. [He comes in through the tower, in cocked hat and goldbraided overcoat, bearing the borough mace, and posts himself at the entrance]. By your leave, gentlemen, way for the worshipful the Mayoress.
COLLINS [moving back towards the wall] Mrs George, my lord.
Mrs George is every inch a Mayoress in point of stylish dressing; and she does it very well indeed. There is nothing quiet about Mrs George; she is not afraid of colors, and knows how to make the most of them. Not at all a lady in Lesbia's use of the term as a class label, she proclaims herself to the first glance as the triumphant, pampered, wilful, intensely alive woman who has always been rich among poor people. In a historical museum she would explain Edward the Fourth's taste for shopkeepers' wives. Her age, which is certainly 40, and might be 50, is carried off by her vitality, her resilient figure, and her confident carriage. So far, a remarkably well-preserved woman. But her beauty is wrecked, like an ageless landscape ravaged by long and fierce war. Her eyes are alive, arresting and haunting; and there is still a turn of delicate beauty and pride in her indomitable chin; but her cheeks are wasted and lined, her mouth writhen and piteous. The whole face is a battlefield of the passions, quite deplorable until she speaks, when an alert sense of fun rejuvenates her in a moment, and makes her company irresistible.
All rise except Soames, who sits down. Leo joins Reginald at the garden door. Mrs Bridgenorth hurries to the tower to receive her guest, and gets as far as Soames's chair when Mrs George appears. Hotchkiss, apparently recognizing her, recoils in consternation to the study door at the furthest corner of the room from her.
MRS GEORGE [coming straight to the Bishop with the ring in her hand] Here is your ring, my lord; and here am I. It's your doing, remember: not mine.
THE BISHOP. Good of you to come.
MRS BRIDGENORTH. How do you do, Mrs Collins?
MRS GEORGE [going to her past the Bishop, and gazing intently at her] Are you his wife?
MRS BRIDGENORTH. The Bishop's wife? Yes.
MRS GEORGE. What a destiny! And you look like any other woman!
MRS BRIDGENORTH [introducing Lesbia] My sister, Miss Grantham.
MRS GEORGE. So strangely mixed up with the story of the General's life?
THE BISHOP. You know the story of his life, then?
MRS GEORGE. Not all. We reached the house before he brought it up to the present day. But enough to know the part played in it by Miss Grantham.
MRS BRIDGENORTH [introducing Leo] Mrs Reginald Bridgenorth.
REGINALD. The late Mrs Reginald Bridgenorth.
LEO. Hold your tongue, Rejjy. At least have the decency to wait until the decree is made absolute.
MRS GEORGE [to Leo] Well, youve more time to get married again than he has, havnt you?
MRS BRIDGENORTH [introducing Hotchkiss] Mr St John Hotchkiss.
Hotchkiss, still far aloof by the study door, bows.
MRS GEORGE. What! That! [She makes a half tour of the kitchen and ends right in front of him]. Young man: do you remember coming into my shop and telling me that my husband's coals were out of place in your cellar, as Nature evidently intended them for the roof?
HOTCHKISS. I remember that deplorable impertinence with shame and confusion. You were kind enough to answer that Mr Collins was looking out for a clever young man to write advertisements, and that I could take the job if I liked.
MRS GEORGE. It's still open. [She turns to Edith].
MRS BRIDGENORTH. My daughter Edith. [She comes towards the study door to make the introduction].
MRS GEORGE. The bride! [Looking at Edith's dressing-jacket] Youre not going to get married like that, are you?
THE BISHOP [coming round the table to Edith's left] Thats just what we are discussing. Will you be so good as to join us and allow us the benefit of your wisdom and experience?
MRS GEORGE. Do you want the Beadle as well? He's a married man.
They all turn, involuntarily and contemplate the Beadle, who sustains their gaze with dignity.
THE BISHOP. We think there are already too many men to be quite fair to the women.
MRS GEORGE. Right, my lord. [She goes back to the tower and addresses the Beadle] Take away that bauble, Joseph. Wait for me wherever you find yourself most comfortable in the neighborhood. [The Beadle withdraws. She notices Collins for the first time]. Hullo, Bill: youve got em all on too. Go and hunt up a drink for Joseph: theres a dear. [Collins goes out. She looks at Soames's cassock and biretta] What! Another uniform! Are you the sexton? [He rises].
THE BISHOP. My chaplain, Father Anthony.
MRS GEORGE. Oh Lord! [To Soames, coaxingly] You dont mind, do you?
SOAMES. I mind nothing but my duties.
THE BISHOP. You know everybody now, I think.
MRS GEORGE [turning to the railed chair] Who's this?
THE BISHOP. Oh, I beg your pardon, Cecil. Mr Sykes. The bridegroom.
MRS GEORGE [to Sykes] Adorned for the sacrifice, arnt you?
SYKES. It seems doubtful whether there is going to be any sacrifice.
MRS GEORGE. Well, I want to talk to the women first. Shall we go upstairs and look at the presents and dresses?
MRS BRIDGENORTH. If you wish, certainly.
REGINALD. But the men want to hear what you have to say too.
MRS GEORGE. I'll talk to them afterwards: one by one.
HOTCHKISS [to himself] Great heavens!
MRS BRIDGENORTH. This way, Mrs Collins. [She leads the way out through the tower, followed by Mrs George, Lesbia, Leo, and Edith].
THE BISHOP. Shall we try to get through the last batch of letters whilst they are away, Soames?
SOAMES. Yes, certainly. [To Hotchkiss, who is in his way] Excuse me.
The Bishop and Soames go into the study, disturbing Hotchkiss, who, plunged in a strange reverie, has forgotten where he is. Awakened by Soames, he stares distractedly; then, with sudden resolution, goes swiftly to the middle of the kitchen.
HOTCHKISS. Cecil. Rejjy. [Startled by his urgency, they hurry to him]. I'm frightfully sorry to desert on this day; but I must bolt. This time it really is pure cowardice. I cant help it.
REGINALD. What are you afraid of?
HOTCHKISS. I dont know. Listen to me. I was a young fool living by myself in London. I ordered my first ton of coals from that woman's husband. At that time I did not know that it is not true economy to buy the lowest priced article: I thought all coals were alike, and tried the thirteen shilling kind because it seemed cheap. It proved unexpectedly inferior to the family Silkstone; and in the irritation into which the first scuttle threw me, I called at the shop and made an idiot of myself as she described.
SYKES. Well, suppose you did! Laugh at it, man.
HOTCHKISS. At that, yes. But there was something worse. Judge of my horror when, calling on the coal merchant to make a trifling complaint at finding my grate acting as a battery of quick-firing guns, and being confronted by his vulgar wife, I felt in her presence an extraordinary sensation of unrest, of emotion, of unsatisfied need. I'll not disgust you with details of the madness and folly that followed that meeting. But it went as far as this: that I actually found myself prowling past the shop at night under a sort of desperate necessity to be near some place where she had been. A hideous temptation to kiss the doorstep because her foot had pressed it made me realize how mad I was. I tore myself away from London by a supreme effort; but I was on the point of returning like a needle to the lodestone when the outbreak of the war saved me. On the field of battle the infatuation wore off. The Billiter affair made a new man of me: I felt that I had left the follies and puerilities of the old days behind me for ever. But half-an-hour ago—when the Bishop sent off that ring—a sudden grip at the base of my heart filled me with a nameless terror—me, the fearless! I recognized its cause when she walked into the room. Cecil: this woman is a harpy, a siren, a mermaid, a vampire. There is only one chance for me: flight, instant precipitate flight. Make my excuses. Forget me. Farewell. [He makes for the door and is confronted by Mrs George entering]. Too late: I'm lost. [He turns back and throws himself desperately into the chair nearest the study door; that being the furthest away from her].
MRS GEORGE [coming to the hearth and addressing Reginald] Mr Bridgenorth: will you oblige me by leaving me with this young man. I want to talk to him like a mother, on YOUR business.
REGINALD. Do, maam. He needs it badly. Come along, Sykes. [He goes into the study].
SYKES [looks irresolutely at Hotchkiss]—?
HOTCHKISS. Too late: you cant save me now, Cecil. Go.
Sykes goes into the study. Mrs George strolls across to Hotchkiss and contemplates him curiously.
HOTCHKISS. Useless to prolong this agony. [Rising] Fatal woman— if woman you are indeed and not a fiend in human form—
MRS GEORGE. Is this out of a book? Or is it your usual society small talk?
HOTCHKISS [recklessly] Jibes are useless: the force that is sweeping me away will not spare you. I must know the worst at once. What was your father?
MRS GEORGE. A licensed victualler who married his barmaid. You would call him a publican, most likely.
HOTCHKISS. Then you are a woman totally beneath me. Do you deny it? Do you set up any sort of pretence to be my equal in rank, in age, or in culture?
MRS GEORGE. Have you eaten anything that has disagreed with you?
HOTCHKISS [witheringly] Inferior!
MRS GEORGE. Thank you. Anything else?
HOTCHKISS. This. I love you. My intentions are not honorable. [She shows no dismay]. Scream. Ring the bell. Have me turned out of the house.
MRS GEORGE [with sudden depth of feeling] Oh, if you could restore to this wasted exhausted heart one ray of the passion that once welled up at the glance at the touch of a lover! It's you who would scream then, young man. Do you see this face, once fresh and rosy like your own, now scarred and riven by a hundred burnt-out fires?
HOTCHKISS [wildly] Slate fires. Thirteen shillings a ton. Fires that shoot out destructive meteors, blinding and burning, sending men into the streets to make fools of themselves.
MRS GEORGE. You seem to have got it pretty bad, Sinjon.
HOTCHKISS. Dont dare call me Sinjon.
MRS GEORGE. My name is Zenobia Alexandrina. You may call me Polly for short.
HOTCHKISS. Your name is Ashtoreth—Durga—there is no name yet invented malign enough for you.
MRS GEORGE [sitting down comfortably] Come! Do you really think youre better suited to that young sauce box than her husband? You enjoyed her company when you were only the friend of the family— when there was the husband there to shew off against and to take all the responsibility. Are you sure youll enjoy it as much when you are the husband? She isnt clever, you know. She's only silly- clever.
HOTCHKISS [uneasily leaning against the table and holding on to it to control his nervous movements] Need you tell me? fiend that you are!
MRS GEORGE. You amused the husband, didnt you?
HOTCHKISS. He has more real sense of humor than she. He's better bred. That was not my fault.
MRS GEORGE. My husband has a sense of humor too.
HOTCHKISS. The coal merchant?—I mean the slate merchant.
MRS GEORGE [appreciatively] He would just love to hear you talk. He's been dull lately for want of a change of company and a bit of fresh fun.
HOTCHKISS [flinging a chair opposite her and sitting down with an overdone attempt at studied insolence] And pray what is your wretched husband's vulgar conviviality to me?
MRS GEORGE. You love me?
HOTCHKISS. I loathe you.
MRS GEORGE. It's the same thing.
HOTCHKISS. Then I'm lost.
MRS GEORGE. You may come and see me if you promise to amuse George.
HOTCHKISS. I'll insult him, sneer at him, wipe my boots on him.
MRS GEORGE. No you wont, dear boy. Youll be a perfect gentleman.
HOTCHKISS [beaten; appealing to her mercy] Zenobia—
MRS GEORGE. Polly, please.
HOTCHKISS. Mrs Collins—
MRS GEORGE. Sir?
HOTCHKISS. Something stronger than my reason and common sense is holding my hands and tearing me along. I make no attempt to deny that it can drag me where you please and make me do what you like. But at least let me know your soul as you seem to know mine. Do you love this absurd coal merchant?
MRS GEORGE. Call him George.
HOTCHKISS. Do you love your Jorjy Porjy?
MRS GEORGE. Oh, I dont know that I love him. He's my husband, you know. But if I got anxious about George's health, and I thought it would nourish him, I would fry you with onions for his breakfast and think nothing of it. George and I are good friends. George belongs to me. Other men may come and go; but George goes on for ever.
HOTCHKISS. Yes: a husband soon becomes nothing but a habit. Listen: I suppose this detestable fascination you have for me is love.
MRS GEORGE. Any sort of feeling for a woman is called love nowadays.
HOTCHKISS. Do you love me?
MRS GEORGE [promptly] My love is not quite so cheap an article as that, my lad. I wouldnt cross the street to have another look at you—not yet. I'm not starving for love like the robins in winter, as the good ladies youre accustomed to are. Youll have to be very clever, and very good, and very real, if you are to interest me. If George takes a fancy to you, and you amuse him enough, I'll just tolerate you coming in and out occasionally for—well, say a month. If you can make a friend of me in that time so much the better for you. If you can touch my poor dying heart even for an instant, I'll bless you, and never forget you. You may try—if George takes to you.
HOTCHKISS. I'm to come on liking for the month?
MRS GEORGE. On condition that you drop Mrs Reginald.
HOTCHKISS. But she wont drop me. Do you suppose I ever wanted to marry her? I was a homeless bachelor; and I felt quite happy at their house as their friend. Leo was an amusing little devil; but I liked Reginald much more than I liked her. She didnt understand. One day she came to me and told me that the inevitable bad happened. I had tact enough not to ask her what the inevitable was; and I gathered presently that she had told Reginald that their marriage was a mistake and that she loved me and could no longer see me breaking my heart for her in suffering silence. What could I say? What could I do? What can I say now? What can I do now?
MRS GEORGE. Tell her that the habit of falling in love with other men's wives is growing on you; and that I'm your latest.
HOTCHKISS. What! Throw her over when she has thrown Reginald over for me!
MRS GEORGE [rising] You wont then? Very well. Sorry we shant meet again: I should have liked to see more of you for George's sake. Good-bye [she moves away from him towards the hearth].
HOTCHKISS [appealing] Zenobia—
MRS. GEORGE. I thought I lead made a difficult conquest. Now I see you are only one of those poor petticoat-hunting creatures that any woman can pick up. Not for me, thank you. [Inexorable, she turns towards the tower to go].
HOTCHKISS [following] Dont be an ass, Polly.
MRS GEORGE [stopping] Thats better.
HOTCHKISS. Cant you see that I maynt throw Leo over just because I should be only too glad to. It would be dishonorable.
MRS GEORGE. Will you be happy if you marry her?
HOTCHKISS. No, great heaven, NO!
MRS GEORGE. Will she be happy when she finds you out?
HOTCHKISS. She's incapable of happiness. But she's not incapable of the pleasure of holding a man against his will.
MRS GEORGE. Right, young man. You will tell her, please, that you love me: before everybody, mind, the very next time you see her.
HOTCHKISS. But—
MRS GEORGE. Those are my orders, Sinjon. I cant have you marry another woman until George is tired of you.
HOTCHKISS. Oh, if I only didnt selfishly want to obey you!
The General comes in from the garden. Mrs George goes half way to the garden door to speak to him. Hotchkiss posts himself on the hearth.
MRS GEORGE. Where have you been all this time?
THE GENERAL. I'm afraid my nerves were a little upset by our conversation. I just went into the garden and had a smoke. I'm all right now [he strolls down to the study door and presently takes a chair at that end of the big table].
MRS GEORGE. A smoke! Why, you said she couldnt bear it.
THE GENERAL. Good heavens! I forgot! It's such a natural thing to do, somehow.
Lesbia comes in through the tower.
MRS GEORGE. He's been smoking again.
LESBIA. So my nose tells me. [She goes to the end of the table nearest the hearth, and sits down].
THE GENERAL. Lesbia: I'm very sorry. But if I gave it up, I should become so melancholy and irritable that you would be the first to implore me to take to it again.
MRS GEORGE. Thats true. Women drive their husbands into all sorts of wickedness to keep them in good humor. Sinjon: be off with you: this doesnt concern you.
LESBIA. Please dont disturb yourself, Sinjon. Boxer's broken heart has been worn on his sleeve too long for any pretence of privacy.
THE GENERAL. You are cruel, Lesbia: devilishly cruel. [He sits down, wounded].
LESBIA. You are vulgar, Boxer.
HOTCHKISS. In what way? I ask, as an expert in vulgarity.
LESBIA. In two ways. First, he talks as if the only thing of any importance in life was which particular woman he shall marry. Second, he has no self-control.
THE GENERAL. Women are not all the same to me, Lesbia.
MRS GEORGE. Why should they be, pray? Women are all different: it's the men who are all the same. Besides, what does Miss Grantham know about either men or women? She's got too much self- control.
LESBIA [widening her eyes and lifting her chin haughtily] And pray how does that prevent me from knowing as much about men and women as people who have no self-control?
MRS GEORGE. Because it frightens people into behaving themselves before you; and then how can you tell what they really are? Look at me! I was a spoilt child. My brothers and sisters were well brought up, like all children of respectable publicans. So should I have been if I hadnt been the youngest: ten years younger than my youngest brother. My parents were tired of doing their duty by their children by that time; and they spoilt me for all they were worth. I never knew what it was to want money or anything that money could buy. When I wanted my own way, I had nothing to do but scream for it till I got it. When I was annoyed I didnt control myself: I scratched and called names. Did you ever, after you were grown up, pull a grown-up woman's hair? Did you ever bite a grown-up man? Did you ever call both of them every name you could lay your tongue to?
LESBIA [shivering with disgust] No.
MRS GEORGE. Well, I did. I know what a woman is like when her hair's pulled. I know what a man is like when he's bit. I know what theyre both like when you tell them what you really feel about them. And thats how I know more of the world than you.
LESBIA. The Chinese know what a man is like when he is cut into a thousand pieces, or boiled in oil. That sort of knowledge is of no use to me. I'm afraid we shall never get on with one another, Mrs George. I live like a fencer, always on guard. I like to be confronted with people who are always on guard. I hate sloppy people, slovenly people, people who cant sit up straight, sentimental people.
MRS GEORGE. Oh, sentimental your grandmother! You dont learn to hold your own in the world by standing on guard, but by attacking, and getting well hammered yourself.
LESBIA. I'm not a prize-fighter, Mrs. Collins. If I cant get a thing without the indignity of fighting for it, I do without it.
MRS GEORGE. Do you? Does it strike you that if we were all as clever as you at doing without, there wouldnt be much to live for, would there?
TAE GENERAL. I'm afraid, Lesbia, the things you do without are the things you dont want.
LESBIA [surprised at his wit] Thats not bad for the silly soldier man. Yes, Boxer: the truth is, I dont want you enough to make the very unreasonable sacrifices required by marriage. And yet that is exactly why I ought to be married. Just because I have the qualities my country wants most I shall go barren to my grave; whilst the women who have neither the strength to resist marriage nor the intelligence to understand its infinite dishonor will make the England of the future. [She rises and walks towards the study].
THE GENERAL [as she is about to pass him] Well, I shall not ask you again, Lesbia.
LESBIA. Thank you, Boxer. [She passes on to the study door].
MRS GEORGE. Youre quite done with him, are you?
LESBIA. As far as marriage is concerned, yes. The field is clear for you, Mrs George. [She goes into the study].
The General buries his face in his hands. Mrs George comes round the table to him.
MRS GEORGE [sympathetically] She's a nice woman, that. And a sort of beauty about her too, different from anyone else.
THE GENERAL [overwhelmed] Oh Mrs Collins, thank you, thank you a thousand times. [He rises effusively]. You have thawed the long- frozen springs [he kisses her hand]. Forgive me; and thank you: bless you—[he again takes refuge in the garden, choked with emotion].
MRS GEORGE [looking after him triumphantly] Just caught the dear old warrior on the bounce, eh?
HOTCHKISS. Unfaithful to me already!
MRS GEORGE. I'm not your property, young man dont you think it. [She goes over to him and faces him]. You understand that? [He suddenly snatches her into his arms and kisses her]. Oh! You. dare do that again, you young blackguard; and I'll jab one of these chairs in your face [she seizes one and holds it in readiness]. Now you shall not see me for another month.
HOTCHKISS [deliberately] I shall pay my first visit to your husband this afternoon.
MRS GEORGE. Youll see what he'll say to you when I tell him what youve just done.
HOTCHKISS. What can he say? What dare he say?
MRS GEORGE. Suppose he kicks you out of the house?
HOTCHKISS. How can he? Ive fought seven duels with sabres. Ive muscles of iron. Nothing hurts me: not even broken bones. Fighting is absolutely uninteresting to me because it doesnt frighten me or amuse me; and I always win. Your husband is in all these respects an average man, probably. He will be horribly afraid of me; and if under the stimulus of your presence, and for your sake, and because it is the right thing to do among vulgar people, he were to attack me, I should simply defeat him and humiliate him [he gradually gets his hands on the chair and takes it from her, as his words go home phrase by phrase]. Sooner than expose him to that, you would suffer a thousand stolen kisses, wouldnt you?
MRS GEORGE [in utter consternation] You young viper!
HOTCHKISS. Ha ha! You are in my power. That is one of the oversights of your code of honor for husbands: the man who can bully them can insult their wives with impunity. Tell him if you dare. If I choose to take ten kisses, how will you prevent me?
MRS GEORGE. You come within reach of me and I'll not leave a hair on your head.
HOTCHKISS [catching her wrists dexterously] Ive got your hands.
MRS GEORGE. Youve not got my teeth. Let go; or I'll bite. I will, I tell you. Let go.
HOTCHKISS. Bite away: I shall taste quite as nice as George.
MRS GEORGE. You beast. Let me go. Do you call yourself a gentleman, to use your brute strength against a woman?
HOTCHKISS. You are stronger than me in every way but this. Do you think I will give up my one advantage? Promise youll receive me when I call this afternoon.
MRS GEORGE. After what youve just done? Not if it was to save my life.
HOTCHKISS. I'll amuse George.
MRS GEORGE. He wont be in.
HOTCHKISS [taken aback] Do you mean that we should be alone?
MRS GEORGE [snatching away her hands triumphantly as his grasp relaxes] Aha! Thats cooled you, has it?
HOTCHKISS [anxiously] When will George be at home?
MRS GEORGE. It wont matter to you whether he's at home or not. The door will be slammed in your face whenever you call.
HOTCHKISS. No servant in London is strong enough to close a door that I mean to keep open. You cant escape me. If you persist, I'll go into the coal trade; make George's acquaintance on the coal exchange; and coax him to take me home with him to make your acquaintance.
MRS GEORGE. We have no use for you, young man: neither George nor I [she sails away from him and sits down at the end of the table near the study door].
HOTCHKISS [following her and taking the next chair round the corner of the table] Yes you have. George cant fight for you: I can.
MRS GEORGE [turning to face him] You bully. You low bully.
HOTCHKISS. You have courage and fascination: I have courage and a pair of fists. We're both bullies, Polly.
MRS GEORGE. You have a mischievous tongue. Thats enough to keep you out of my house.
HOTCHKISS. It must be rather a house of cards. A word from me to George—just the right word, said in the right way—and down comes your house.
MRS GEORGE. Thats why I'll die sooner than let you into it.
HOTCHKISS. Then as surely as you live, I enter the coal trade to- morrow. George's taste for amusing company will deliver him into my hands. Before a month passes your home will be at my mercy.
MRS GEORGE [rising, at bay] Do you think I'll let myself be driven into a trap like this?
HOTCHKISS. You are in it already. Marriage is a trap. You are married. Any man who has the power to spoil your marriage has the power to spoil your life. I have that power over you.
MRS GEORGE [desperate] You mean it?
HOTCHKISS. I do.
MRS GEORGE [resolutely] Well, spoil my marriage and be—
HOTCHKISS [springing up] Polly!
MRS GEORGE. Sooner than be your slave I'd face any unhappiness.
HOTCHKISS. What! Even for George?
MRS GEORGE. There must be honor between me and George, happiness or no happiness. Do your worst.
HOTCHKISS [admiring her] Are you really game, Polly? Dare you defy me?
MRS GEORGE. If you ask me another question I shant be able to keep my hands off you [she dashes distractedly past him to the other end of the table, her fingers crisping].
HOTCHKISS. That settles it. Polly: I adore you: we were born for one another. As I happen to be a gentleman, I'll never do anything to annoy or injure you except that I reserve the right to give you a black eye if you bite me; but youll never get rid of me now to the end of your life.
MRS GEORGE. I shall get rid of you if the beadle has to brain you with the mace for it [she makes for the tower].
HOTCHKISS [running between the table and the oak chest and across to the tower to cut her off] You shant.
MRS GEORGE [panting] Shant I though?
HOTCHKISS. No you shant. I have one card left to play that youve forgotten. Why were you so unlike yourself when you spoke to the Bishop?
MRS GEORGE [agitated beyond measure] Stop. Not that. You shall respect that if you respect nothing else. I forbid you. [He kneels at her feet]. What are you doing? Get up: dont be a fool.
HOTCHKISS. Polly: I ask you on my knees to let me make George's acquaintance in his home this afternoon; and I shall remain on my knees till the Bishop comes in and sees us. What will he think of you then?
MRS GEORGE [beside herself] Wheres the poker? She rushes to the fireplace; seizes the poker; and makes for Hotchkiss, who flies to the study door. The Bishop enters just then and finds himself between them, narrowly escaping a blow from the poker.
THE BISHOP. Dont hit him, Mrs Collins. He is my guest.
Mrs George throws down the poker; collapses into the nearest chair; and bursts into tears. The Bishop goes to her and pats her consolingly on the shoulder. She shudders all through at his touch.
THE BISHOP. Come! you are in the house of your friends. Can we help you?
MRS GEORGE [to Hotchkiss, pointing to the study] Go in there, you. Youre not wanted here.
HOTCHKISS. You understand, Bishop, that Mrs Collins is not to blame for this scene. I'm afraid Ive been rather irritating.
THE BISHOP. I can quite believe it, Sinjon.
Hotchkiss goes into the study.
THE BISHOP [turning to Mrs George with great kindness of manner] I'm sorry you have been worried [he sits down on her left]. Never mind him. A little pluck, a little gaiety of heart, a little prayer; and youll be laughing at him.
MRS GEORGE. Never fear. I have all that. It was as much my fault as his; and I should have put him in his place with a clip of that poker on the side of his head if you hadnt come in.
THE BISHOP. You might have put him in his coffin that way, Mrs Collins. And I should have been very sorry; because we are all fond of Sinjon.
MRS GEORGE. Yes: it's your duty to rebuke me. But do you think I dont know?
THE BISHOP. I dont rebuke you. Who am I that I should rebuke you? Besides, I know there are discussions in which the poker is the only possible argument.
MRS GEORGE. My lord: be earnest with me. I'm a very funny woman, I daresay; but I come from the same workshop as you. I heard you say that yourself years ago.
THE BISHOP. Quite so; but then I'm a very funny Bishop. Since we are both funny people, let us not forget that humor is a divine attribute.
MRS GEORGE. I know nothing about divine attributes or whatever you call them; but I can feel when I am being belittled. It was from you that I learnt first to respect myself. It was through you that I came to be able to walk safely through many wild and wilful paths. Dont go back on your own teaching.
THE BISHOP. I'm not a teacher: only a fellow-traveller of whom you asked the way. I pointed ahead—ahead of myself as well as of you.
MRS GEORGE [rising and standing over him almost threateningly] As I'm a living woman this day, if I find you out to be a fraud, I'll kill myself.
THE BISHOP. What! Kill yourself for finding out something! For becoming a wiser and therefore a better woman! What a bad reason!
MRS GEORGE. I have sometimes thought of killing you, and then killing myself.
THE BISHOP. Why on earth should you kill yourself—not to mention me?
MRS GEORGE. So that we might keep our assignation in Heaven.
THE BISHOP [rising and facing her, breathless] Mrs. Collins! YOU are Incognita Appassionata!
MRS GEORGE. You read my letters, then? [With a sigh of grateful relief, she sits down quietly, and says] Thank you.
THE BISHOP [remorsefully] And I have broken the spell by making you come here [sitting down again]. Can you ever forgive me?
MRS GEORGE. You couldnt know that it was only the coal merchant's wife, could you?
THE BISHOP. Why do you say only the coal merchant's wife?
MRS GEORGE. Many people would laugh at it.
THE BISHOP. Poor people! It's so hard to know the right place to laugh, isnt it?
MRS GEORGE. I didnt mean to make you think the letters were from a fine lady. I wrote on cheap paper; and I never could spell.
THE BISHOP. Neither could I. So that told me nothing.
MRS GEORGE. One thing I should like you to know.
THE BISHOP. Yes?
MRS GEORGE. We didnt cheat your friend. They were as good as we could do at thirteen shillings a ton.
THE BISHOP. Thats important. Thank you for telling me.
MRS GEORGE. I have something else to say; but will you please ask somebody to come and stay here while we talk? [He rises and turns to the study door]. Not a woman, if you dont mind. [He nods understandingly and passes on]. Not a man either.
THE BISHOP [stopping] Not a man and not a woman! We have no children left, Mrs Collins. They are all grown up and married.
MRS GEORGE. That other clergyman would do.
THE BISHOP. What! The sexton?
MRS GEORGE. Yes. He didnt mind my calling him that, did he? It was only my ignorance.
THE BISHOP. Not at all. [He opens the study door and calls] Soames! Anthony! [To Mrs George] Call him Father: he likes it. [Soames appears at the study door]. Mrs Collins wishes you to join us, Anthony.
Soames looks puzzled.
MRS GEORGE. You dont mind, Dad, do you? [As this greeting visibly gives him a shock that hardly bears out the Bishop's advice, she says anxiously] That was what you told me to call him, wasnt it?
SOAMES. I am called Father Anthony, Mrs Collins. But it does not matter what you call me. [He comes in, and walks past her to the hearth].
THE BISHOP. Mrs Collins has something to say to me that she wants you to hear.
SOAMES. I am listening.
THE BISHOP [going back to his seat next her] Now.
MRS GEORGE. My lord: you should never have married.
SOAMES. This woman is inspired. Listen to her, my lord.
THE BISHOP [taken aback by the directness of the attack] I married because I was so much in love with Alice that all the difficulties and doubts and dangers of marriage seemed to me the merest moonshine.
MRS GEORGE. Yes: it's mean to let poor things in for so much while theyre in that state. Would you marry now that you know better if you were a widower?
THE BISHOP. I'm old now. It wouldnt matter.
MRS GEORGE. But would you if it did matter?
THE BISHOP. I think I should marry again lest anyone should imagine I had found marriage unhappy with Alice.
SOAMES [sternly] Are you fonder of your wife than of your salvation?
THE BISHOP. Oh, very much. When you meet a man who is very particular about his salvation, look out for a woman who is very particular about her character; and marry them to one another: theyll make a perfect pair. I advise you to fall in love; Anthony.
SOAMES [with horror] I!!
THE BISHOP. Yes, you! think of what it would do for you. For her sake you would come to care unselfishly and diligently for money instead of being selfishly and lazily indifferent to it. For her sake you would come to care in the same way for preferment. For her sake you would come to care for your health, your appearance, the good opinion of your fellow creatures, and all the really important things that make men work and strive instead of mooning and nursing their salvation.
SOAMES. In one word, for the sake of one deadly sin I should come to care for all the others.
THE BISHOP. Saint Anthony! Tempt him, Mrs Collins: tempt him.
MRS GEORGE [rising and looking strangely before her] Take care, my lord: you still have the power to make me obey your commands. And do you, Mr Sexton, beware of an empty heart.
THE BISHOP. Yes. Nature abhors a vacuum, Anthony. I would not dare go about with an empty heart: why, the first girl I met would fly into it by mere atmospheric pressure. Alice keeps them out now. Mrs Collins knows.
MRS GEORGE [a faint convulsion passing like a wave over her] I know more than either of you. One of you has not yet exhausted his first love: the other has not yet reached it. But I—I—[she reels and is again convulsed].
THE BISHOP [saving her from falling] Whats the matter? Are you ill, Mrs Collins? [He gets her back into her chair]. Soames: theres a glass of water in the study—quick. [Soames hurries to the study door.]
MRS. GEORGE. No. [Soames stops]. Dont call. Dont bring anyone. Cant you hear anything?
THE BISHOP. Nothing unusual. [He sits by her, watching her with intense surprise and interest].
MRS GEORGE. No music?
SOAMES. No. [He steals to the end of the table and sits on her right, equally interested].
MRS GEORGE. Do you see nothing—not a great light?
THE BISHOP. We are still walking in darkness.
MRS GEORGE. Put your hand on my forehead: the hand with the ring. [He does so. Her eyes close].
SOAMES [inspired to prophesy] There was a certain woman, the wife of a coal merchant, which had been a great sinner . . .
The Bishop, startled, takes his hand away. Mrs George's eyes open vividly as