_A Month Later._
SCENE:--_An orchard at Mapledurham. Farmhouse at back, C. Paths off,
R. and L. front. A cluster of trees, R., at back. A few stumps of
trees to serve as seats._
_MARGERY discovered, standing on a ladder placed against one of the
trees, gathering apples, which she throws into a basket below. She is
dressed in peasant costume._
_Enter ARMSTRONG, C._
ARMSTRONG.
Margery!
MARGERY.
Yes, dad!
ARMSTRONG [_comes underneath the tree and roars with laughter_].
Here's a slice of luck! That fellow in London wants the grey mare back
again!
MARGERY [_who has come down_].
The grey mare, father?
ARMSTRONG.
Old Dapple! you remember her?
MARGERY.
Of course! but what about her?
ARMSTRONG.
Bless me, haven't I told you? I sold old Dapple to a chap in London.
MARGERY [_reproachfully_]
You sold old Dapple?
ARMSTRONG.
She's too good for hereabouts. True, she's a splint on the off leg,
but what's a splint? I sold her without warranty, and buyer took her
with all faults, just as she stood.
MARGERY.
Well, dad?
ARMSTRONG.
Darn me, if the next day he didn't cry off his bargain!
MARGERY [_thoughtfully_].
Poor Dapple!
ARMSTRONG.
Oh, says I, if you're not satisfied with her, I am. So, there's your
money; give me back my mare. An Armstrong doesn't stand on warranties.
MARGERY.
No, daddy dear, and you don't mind the splint?
ARMSTRONG.
But Margery, you should have seen the screw he got in place of her!
Ha, ha! she was _all_ splints!
MARGERY.
He's found that out?
ARMSTRONG.
And wants the old mare back! at my own price!
MARGERY.
This _is_ good news! For we were getting hard up, weren't we, father?
ARMSTRONG.
Ay, farming isn't what it used to be; and now that you won't let me
take in visitors----
MARGERY.
I never stopped you.
ARMSTRONG.
How about Captain Sylvester?
MARGERY.
Oh, him!
ARMSTRONG.
He's an old customer; and always seemed a civil-spoken gentleman
enough.
MARGERY.
Too civil!
ARMSTRONG.
That's more than you were, Margery. You'd scarce say a word.
MARGERY.
He came for no good.
ARMSTRONG.
There's no harm in trout fishing--unless it's for the trout.
MARGERY.
I was the trout.
ARMSTRONG.
You? Go on! That's the way with you girls! You think all the men are
after you. I'm sure he said nothing to hurt you.
MARGERY.
But he has written since.
ARMSTRONG [_scratches his head_].
I didn't know he'd written.
MARGERY.
Nearly every day.
ARMSTRONG.
Those letters were from _him?_ I thought they were from----
[_Hesitates._
MARGERY.
No! From Captain Sylvester.
ARMSTRONG.
Of course you haven't answered them?
MARGERY.
Only the last.
ARMSTRONG.
I shouldn't have done that.
MARGERY.
Yes, you would, dad!
ARMSTRONG.
Well, you know best. You always went your own way, Margery, and it was
always the right road.
MARGERY.
Where shall I put these apples?
ARMSTRONG.
Nay, I've the broadest shoulders. Give me a hand; I'll take 'em.
[_MARGERY helps him to put the basket on his shoulders. Exit, C._
MARGERY.
Dear old dad! We leave our parents, and we return to them; they let us
go, and they take us back again! How little we think of their
partings, and how much of our own!
[_Sits, R._
_Enter SYLVESTER, L. front._
SYLVESTER.
I saw you in the apple-tree, and took a short cut.
MARGERY.
You got my message then?
SYLVESTER.
How good of you to send for me! So then my letters have had some
effect?
MARGERY.
I sent for you because I want to speak to you.
SYLVESTER.
And I to you. Margery, I've left my wife.
MARGERY.
Yes, so I heard.
SYLVESTER.
She was no wife to me. For years our marriage has been a mockery, and
it was best to put an end to it. Now I am free.
MARGERY.
Because you've left your wife?
SYLVESTER.
It's no use beating about the bush. Things have gone too far, and I'm
too much in earnest. She loves your husband. It is common talk. I've
shut my eyes as long as possible, and you've shut yours; but we both
know the truth.
MARGERY.
That you've deserted her!
SYLVESTER.
What if I have?
MARGERY.
Go back.
SYLVESTER.
Back to a wife who is no wife!
MARGERY.
Back to the woman you promised to protect, and whom you left when she
most needed you.
SYLVESTER.
Because I love you, Margery!
MARGERY.
That love won't last long. Love can't live on nothing!
SYLVESTER.
There is no hope for me?
MARGERY.
No, not a scrap!
SYLVESTER.
Then what do you propose? To sacrifice your life to an idea--to be
true to a phantom? You owe no faith to one who is unfaithful. Think!
You are young--your real life lies before you--would you end it before
it's begun? A widow before you're a wife?
MARGERY.
I am a wife, and I shall not forget it. If I have lost my husband's
love, at least I'll save his honour. A public scandal mayn't mean much
to _you,_ but it means your wife's ruin--it means Gerald's. Gerald
shall not be ruined! You _shall_ go back to her!
SYLVESTER.
Is it a challenge?
MARGERY.
Challenge or not, you _shall!_ It is ignoble to desert her so! You are
a coward to make love to me! If her love was unworthy, what is yours?
Is it for you to cast a stone at her? See! Read your letters!
[_Producing a packet._] Letters to me--love-letters! Letters to a
woman you didn't respect in her grief and persecuted in her
loneliness--a woman who would have none of you--who tells you to your
face you're not a man! Your love's an insult! take the thing away!
[_Turns off. Pause._
SYLVESTER.
Do you propose to send those to my wife?
MARGERY.
No! but I want to make you realize you need more mercy than you show
to her. These letters were written for my eye alone; to open them was
to promise secrecy.
SYLVESTER.
Why have you kept them, then?
MARGERY.
To give them back to you.
[_Gives him the packet. Another pause._
SYLVESTER.
Margery, everything you say and do makes it more hard to go away from
you.
MARGERY.
You're going, then?
SYLVESTER.
Your words leave me no choice.
MARGERY.
Where are you going? to her?
SYLVESTER.
I don't know yet. I don't know if I'm welcome.
[_Playing with the packet, mechanically._
MARGERY.
That rests with you. You say, she's been no wife to you; but have you
been a husband to her?
SYLVESTER.
Why do you take her part? She's injured you enough.
MARGERY.
Yes; she _has_ injured me; but now I know what it is to live without
love, and to want it, I can pardon her. Can't you? [_Goes to him and
gives him both her hands._] Forgive her, Captain Sylvester--freely as
I do you--give her the love that you have offered me--and you will
find your wife's a woman just as much as I am.
SYLVESTER.
Margery--I may call you "Margery?"
MARGERY.
I'm "Margery" to everybody now.
SYLVESTER.
If there were more women like you, there would be fewer men like me.
[_Exit, L._
MARGERY [_looks after him, then goes, R. front and looks again_].
He'll go back to his wife; and if she isn't happy, it's her fault.
[_Exit, R._
_Re-enter ARMSTRONG, showing out, C., LADY WARGRAVE and the COLONEL._
ARMSTRONG.
This way, my lady. I'll send Margery to you.
[_Exit ARMSTRONG, R._
COLONEL.
This must be put right, Caroline.
LADY WARGRAVE.
I mean to put it right.
COLONEL [_severely_].
A Cazenove living apart from his wife!
LADY WARGRAVE.
It is sad--very sad.
COLONEL.
More than that, Caroline--it's not respectable.
LADY WARGRAVE.
That doesn't trouble _you._
COLONEL.
It shocks me. The institution of marriage is the foundation of
society; and whatever tends to cast discredit on that holy "ordnance"
saps the moral fibre of the community.
LADY WARGRAVE.
Did you say, "ordnance?"
COLONEL.
I did say, "ordnance." It was a slip of the tongue.
LADY WARGRAVE.
You are not used to ordinances.
COLONEL.
What do you mean, Caroline? Wasn't I baptized--wasn't I confirmed?
LADY WARGRAVE.
There is another ceremony which, during a somewhat long career, you
have systematically avoided.
COLONEL.
A mere sin of omission, which even now it is not too late to repair. I
am a young man still----
LADY WARGRAVE.
Young man?
COLONEL.
Comparatively. And everything in the world is comparative. What cannot
be undone in the past can at least be avoided in the future.
LADY WARGRAVE.
What is the matter with you, Theodore? You have suddenly become quite
a moral martinet, and have developed such a severity of aspect that I
scarcely know my own brother.
COLONEL [_aside_].
Shall I tell her? Dare I? Courage!
LADY WARGRAVE.
I think I liked you better as you were. At any rate, I was used to
you.
COLONEL.
How peaceful it is here, Caroline--how sylvan!
LADY WARGRAVE.
Yes, it's a pretty little place enough.
COLONEL.
It might have been created expressly for the exchange of those sacred
confidences which are never more becoming than when shared between a
brother and a sister.
LADY WARGRAVE.
Good gracious! you are growing quite sentimental! I have no
confidences to make.
COLONEL.
But _I_ have.
LADY WARGRAVE.
Theodore! What fresh iniquity--?
COLONEL.
Caroline, I am going to be married.
[_Blows his nose vigorously._
LADY WARGRAVE [_astounded_].
Married!
COLONEL.
To-morrow.
LADY WARGRAVE.
To whom, pray?
COLONEL.
Miss Bethune.
LADY WARGRAVE.
Give me my smelling salts.
COLONEL [_gives her them_].
Enid! Pretty name, isn't it? Enid!
[_Smiling to himself._
LADY WARGRAVE.
No fool like an old fool!
COLONEL.
Fifty-six.
LADY WARGRAVE.
Eight.
COLONEL.
But don't tell Enid, will you?
LADY WARGRAVE.
There are so many things I mustn't tell Enid!
COLONEL.
No, Caroline; I've made a clean breast of it.
LADY WARGRAVE.
_Quite_ a clean breast of it?
COLONEL.
Everything in the world is comparative.
LADY WARGRAVE.
Then, Miss Bethune has renounced her opinions?
COLONEL.
Oh, no; she's too much of a woman for that.
LADY WARGRAVE.
How can she reconcile them with your enormities?
COLONEL.
My peccadilloes? Oh, she doesn't believe them--or she pretends she
doesn't--which is the same thing. She says we men exaggerate so; and
as for the women, you simply can't believe a word they say!
[_Chuckles in his old style._
LADY WARGRAVE.
At any rate, she means to marry you?
COLONEL.
Upon the whole, she thinks I have been rather badly used.
[_Chuckles again._
LADY WARGRAVE.
To marry! after your experience!
COLONEL.
Way of the world, my dear. My poor old adjutant! went through the
Mutiny unscathed, and killed in Rotten Row!
LADY WARGRAVE.
Well, it was quite time that you had a nurse!
[_Rising and going R. front to meet MARGERY._
COLONEL.
Caroline's taken it very well. Nothing like courage in these
matters--courage! "Nurse" was distinctly nasty; but that's Caroline's
way.
_Re-enter ARMSTRONG, R., followed by MARGERY._
ARMSTRONG.
Found her at last, my lady.
LADY WARGRAVE.
Leave us together, Armstrong.
[_MARGERY drops a curtsey._
ARMSTRONG.
Come with me, Colonel. If you'll step indoors, I'll give you a glass
of ale that'll do your heart good.
COLONEL [_putting his arm through ARMSTRONG'S_].
Caroline takes it very well.
[_Quite forgetting himself._
ARMSTRONG.
My lady's very welcome.
COLONEL [_hastily withdrawing his arm_].
No, no, no! I was talking to myself. [_Exit ARMSTRONG, C., roaring.
Aside, glancing at LADY WARGRAVE._] Nurse!
[_Exit, C._
LADY WARGRAVE.
Margery, I've come to scold you.
MARGERY.
Yes, my lady.
LADY WARGRAVE.
Aunt. Come and sit down by me. [_Draws her towards seat under the
tree, L. LADY WARGRAVE sits--MARGERY at her feet._] Yes, Margery, to
scold you. Why did you not confide in me? If you had only told me of
your troubles, this would never have happened. It was undutiful.
MARGERY.
No, aunt. There are some troubles one can confide to nobody--some
griefs which are too sacred to be talked about.
LADY WARGRAVE.
And is yours one of them? You are young, Margery; and youth
exaggerates its sorrows as well as its joys. Nothing has happened that
cannot be put right, if you will only trust me and obey me.
MARGERY.
I owe my obedience elsewhere.
LADY WARGRAVE.
And do you think that you have paid it?
MARGERY.
Yes.
LADY WARGRAVE.
Gerald _desired_ you to leave him?
MARGERY.
No; but I read his thoughts--just as you used to say I could read
yours--and I obeyed his wishes.
LADY WARGRAVE.
Then if he wished you to return, you would come back?
MARGERY.
Not if he'd been talked over; not if he asked me to go back to him
because he thinks it his duty, or I want him. I don't want duty; I
want love.
LADY WARGRAVE.
You wouldn't see him, if I sent him to you?
MARGERY.
What is the use of seeing him? You can send Gerald, but not Gerald's
heart. I have done all I can--I can't do any more. I've saved his
honour--I've resigned his love. All I ask is, to be left alone with
mine.
[_Turning away._
[_LADY WARGRAVE rises, and as GERALD advances, retires into the house,
C._
GERALD.
Margery!
MARGERY.
Gerald!
GERALD.
I am not here to ask you to come back to me. How can I say what I have
come for? I have come--because I cannot keep away from you. To ask for
your forgiveness----
MARGERY.
You have that.
GERALD.
And, if it's possible, some place in your esteem. Let me say this, and
I will say no more. If, for a little space, my heart strayed from you,
Margery--if, for a moment, words escaped my lips which cannot be
recalled, that is my only infidelity. You understand me?
MARGERY.
Yes.
GERALD.
That's what I came to say--that's all!
MARGERY [_giving him her hand_].
Thank you for telling me.
GERALD [_holding her hand_].
Not all I want to say, but all I must. I am no longer a free man. My
lips are sealed.
MARGERY.
What seals them?
GERALD.
Haven't you heard? Sylvester's left his wife--and it is all my doing.
MARGERY.
No, it is his.
GERALD.
His?
MARGERY.
I may tell you now. He left his wife, not through your fault or hers,
but to make love to me.
GERALD.
He has been here?
MARGERY.
But he has gone.
GERALD.
Where?
MARGERY.
To his wife. I sent him back to her.
GERALD.
Then, I am free!
MARGERY.
Yes, Gerald.
GERALD.
Free to say how I love you--how I have always loved you! Yes, Margery,
I loved you even then--then when I spoke those unjust, cruel words;
but love's so weird a thing it sometimes turns us against those we
love. But when I saw you, there upon the ground, my heart turned back
to you--no, it was not my heart, only my lips that were unfaithful! My
heart was always yours--not half of it, but all--yours when I married
you, yours when you said good-bye, and never more yours, never as much
as now, now I have lost you.
MARGERY.
You have not lost me, if you love me that much!
[_Throwing her arms round him._
GERALD.
Margery!
_LADY WARGRAVE and COLONEL re-enter, quietly, C., and stand, looking
on, at back, amongst the trees._
GERALD.
My wife again!
MARGERY.
But, Gerald, remember I am nothing more. I don't think I shall ever be
a lady.
GERALD.
Always in my eyes!
MARGERY.
No, not even there. Only a woman.
GERALD.
I want you to be nothing less or more--only a woman!
[_About to kiss her. LADY WARGRAVE, at back, bows her head, with her
fan half spread before the COLONEL'S face. GERALD kisses MARGERY._
CURTAIN.
CHISWICK PRESS:--CHARLES WHITTINGHAM AND CO., TOOKS COURT, CHANCERY
LANE, LONDON.
Transcriber's Note
This transcription is based on images scanned by Google from a copy
made available by the Princeton University Library.
The following changes to the text were noted:
- Throughout the text, dashes at the end of lines have been
normalized.
- p. 31: _Re-enter MARGERY, R., she goes straight..._--Changed comma
after "R." to semicolon.
- p. 46: We musn't make so much noise.--Changed "musn't" to "mustn't"
as "mustn't" is the preferred spelling elsewhere in the text.
- p. 63: _Enter MRS. SYLVESTER, she hesitates, on seeing LADY
WARGRAVE._--Changed comma after "SYLVESTER" to semicolon.
- p. 78: Yes, Mrs. Sylvester, its best--Changed "its" to "it's".
- p. 84, last line: It was enough--Added period to end of sentence.
The html version of this etext attempts to reproduce the layout of the
printed text. However, some concessions have been made, particularly
in the handling of stage directions enclosed by brackets on one side.
When these fit on a line, they were printed flush right. When they did
not, they were printed on the next line. For the purposes of this
transcription, these stage directions were all placed on the next
line, indented the same amount from the left margin, and coded as
hanging paragraphs.