DOROTHY. Wild roses, love and chocolate--aren't they sweet?
DOROTHEA. Yes--well ... I do hope nobody will call.
We've not been introduced, but is it true
That you're my own Subconscious?
DOROTHY. There, you see
The insolence of the Conscious! Part of you!
Really! And why not you a part of me?
How much of Time have _you_ known? Twenty years;
But I, whom not ten thousand can make old,
Have worshipped trees, loved naiads, boxed the ears
Of mountain satyrs, touched the Fleece of Gold,
And ridden great centaurs. When I catch the strain
Of Homer's verse I hear his very lyre
Trembling: for me Hector is newly slain,
And it was yesterday Troy fell in fire.
They who at last have found me little guess
Whither I lead. They fancy that one blow
Has brought down Heaven in fragments. Nonetheless,
I shall build what they think I overthrow!
And you? You're just a weir that tames my power.
I am the rushing car and you the brake
That checks me: I the root and you the flower;
I the true girl----
DOROTHEA. Please try another cake.
No doubt you're right, but Freud says----
DOROTHY. Not a word
Against my good Columbus!
DOROTHEA. Hardly! Still,
I always thought from what I read and heard
That you were quite a monster.
DOROTHY. As you will,
I have my faults.
DOROTHEA. You do seem--shall I say
A trifle--crude?
DOROTHY. I'm what you'd like to be.
DOROTHEA. Oh, really! I'm not prim--I'm rather gay--
But that's no frock for going out to tea.
I _should_ blush!
DOROTHY. Little hypocrite! Why, look--
What's that--oh you that have no eyes for men?
DOROTHEA. The 'Life of Gosse'--a very proper book.
DOROTHY. And underneath? La Vie Parisienne!
(_Turning to the bookshelves._)
Then, here's Boccaccio, Havelock Ellis, too,
James Joyce rebound to look like Samuel Smiles,
Montaigne, Pierre Louys----
DOROTHEA. Any one but you
Would know I read them only for their styles.
I've stood enough. Please go!
DOROTHY. But where to go?
We two make up one girl.
DOROTHEA. Behind the screen.
DOROTHY. Not yet!