What Every Woman Knows, Sir James Matthew Barrie [popular books of all time .txt] 📗

/> [The reply is little more than a squeak.]

MAGGIE. John's speech.

COMTESSE. You have written it yourself!

[MAGGIE is naturally indignant.]

MAGGIE. It's typed.

COMTESSE. You guessed that the speech he wrote unaided would not satisfy, and you prepared this to take its place!

MAGGIE. Not at all, Comtesse. It is the draft of his speech that he left at home. That's all.

COMTESSE. With a few trivial alterations by yourself, I swear. Can you deny it?

[No wonder that MAGGIE is outraged. She replaces JOHN's speech in the bag with becoming hauteur.]

MAGGIE. Comtesse, these insinuations are unworthy of you. May I ask where is my husband?

[The COMTESSE drops her a curtsey.]

COMTESSE. I believe your Haughtiness may find him in the Dutch garden. Oh, I see through you. You are not to show him your speech. But you are to get him to write another one, and somehow all your additions will be in it. Think not, creature, that you can deceive one so old in iniquity as the Comtesse de la Briere.

[There can be but one reply from a good wife to such a charge, and at once the COMTESSE is left alone with her shame. Anon a footman appears. You know how they come and go.]

FOOTMAN. You rang, my lady?

COMTESSE. Did I? Ah, yes, but why? [He is but lately from the ploughshare and cannot help her. In this quandary her eyes alight upon the bag. She is unfortunately too abandoned to feel her shame; she still thinks that she has the choice of weapons. She takes the speech from the bag and bestows it on her servitor.] Take this to Mr. Venables, please, and say it is from Mr. Shand. [THOMAS--but in the end we shall probably call him JOHN--departs with the dangerous papers; and when MAGGIE returns she finds that the COMTESSE is once more engaged in her interrupted game of Patience.] You did not find him?

[All the bravery has dropped from MAGGIE's face.]

MAGGIE. I didn't see him, but I heard him. SHE is with him. I think they are coming here.

[The COMTESSE is suddenly kind again.]

COMTESSE. Sybil? Shall I get rid of her?

MAGGIE. No, I want her to be here, too. Now I shall know.

[The COMTESSE twists the little thing round.]

COMTESSE. Know what?

MAGGIE. As soon as I look into his face I shall know.

[A delicious scent ushers in the fair SYBIL, who is as sweet as a milking stool. She greets MRS. SHAND with some alarm.]

MAGGIE. How do you do, Lady Sybil? How pretty you look in that frock. [SYBIL rustles uncomfortably.] You are a feast to the eye.

SYBIL. Please, I wish you would not.

[Shall we describe SYBIL'S frock, in which she looks like a great strawberry that knows it ought to be plucked; or would it be easier to watch the coming of JOHN? Let us watch JOHN.]

JOHN. You, Maggie! You never wrote that you were coming.

[No, let us watch MAGGIE. As soon as she looked into his face she was to know something of importance.]

MAGGIE [not dissatisfied with what she sees]. No, John, it's a surprise visit. I just ran down to say good-bye.

[At this his face falls, which does not seem to pain her.]

SYBIL [foreseeing another horrible Scotch scene]. To say good-bye?

COMTESSE [thrilling with expectation]. To whom, Maggie?

SYBIL [deserted by the impediment, which is probably playing with rough boys in the Lovers' Lane]. Auntie, do leave us, won't you?

COMTESSE. Not I. It is becoming far too interesting.

MAGGIE. I suppose there's no reason the Comtesse shouldn't be told, as she will know so soon at any rate?

JOHN. That's so. [SYBIL sees with discomfort that he is to be practical also.]

MAGGIE. It's so simple. You see, Comtesse, John and Lady Sybil have fallen in love with one another, and they are to go off as soon as the meeting at Leeds has taken place.

[The COMTESSE's breast is too suddenly introduced to Caledonia and its varied charms.]

COMTESSE. Mon Dieu!

MAGGIE. I think that's putting it correctly, John.

JOHN. In a sense. But I'm not to attend the meeting at Leeds. My speech doesn't find favour. [With a strange humility] There's something wrong with it.

COMTESSE. I never expected to hear you say that, Mr. Shand.

JOHN [wondering also]. I never expected it myself. I meant to make it the speech of my career. But somehow my hand seems to have lost its cunning.

COMTESSE. And you don't know how?

JOHN. It's inexplicable. My brain was never clearer.

COMTESSE. You might have helped him, Sybil.

SYBIL [quite sulkily]. I did.

COMTESSE. But I thought she was such an inspiration to you, Mr. Shand.

JOHN [going bravely to SYBIL'S side]. She slaved at it with me.

COMTESSE. Strange. [Wickedly becoming practical also] So now there is nothing to detain you. Shall I send for a fly, Sybil?

SYBIL [with a cry of the heart]. Auntie, do leave us.

COMTESSE. I can understand your impatience to be gone, Mr. Shand.

JOHN [heavily]. I promised Maggie to wait till the 24th, and I'm a man of my word.

MAGGIE. But I give you back your word, John. You can go now.

[JOHN looks at SYBIL, and SYBIL looks at JOHN, and the impediment arrives in time to take a peep at both of them.]

SYBIL [groping for the practical, to which we must all come in the end]. He must make satisfactory arrangements about you first. I insist on that.

MAGGIE [with no more imagination than a hen]. Thank you, Lady Sybil, but I have made all my arrangements.

JOHN [stung]. Maggie, that was my part.

MAGGIE. You see, my brothers feel they can't be away from their business any longer; and so, if it would be convenient to you, John, I could travel north with them by the night train on Wednesday.

SYBIL. I--I----The way you put things---!

JOHN. This is just the 21st.

MAGGIE. My things are all packed. I think you'll find the house in good order, Lady Sybil. I have had the vacuum cleaners in. I'll give you the keys of the linen and the silver plate; I have them in that bag. The carpet on the upper landing is a good deal frayed, but---

SYBIL. Please, I don't want to hear any more.

MAGGIE. The ceiling of the dining-room would be the better of a new lick of paint---

SYBIL [stamping her foot, small fours]. Can't you stop her?

JOHN [soothingly]. She's meaning well. Maggie, I know it's natural to you to value those things, because your outlook on life is bounded by them; but all this jars on me.

MAGGIE. Does it?

JOHN. Why should you be so ready to go?

MAGGIE. I promised not to stand in your way.

JOHN [stoutly]. You needn't be in such a hurry. There are three days to run yet. [The French are so different from us that we shall probably never be able to understand why the COMTESSE laughed aloud here.] It's just a joke to the Comtesse.

COMTESSE. It seems to be no joke to you, Mr. Shand. Sybil, my pet, are you to let him off?

SYBIL [flashing]. Let him off? If he wishes it. Do you?

JOHN [manfully]. I want it to go on. [Something seems to have caught in his throat: perhaps it is the impediment trying a temporary home.] It's the one wish of my heart. If you come with me, Sybil, I'll do all in a man's power to make you never regret it.

[Triumph of the Vere de Veres.]

MAGGIE [bringing them back to earth with a dump]. And I can make my arrangements for Wednesday?

SYBIL [seeking the COMTESSE's protection]. No, you can't. Auntie, I am not going on with this. I'm very sorry for you, John, but I see now--I couldn't face it---

[She can't face anything at this moment except the sofa pillows.]

COMTESSE [noticing JOHN'S big sigh of relief]. So THAT is all right, Mr. Shand!

MAGGIE. Don't you love her any more, John? Be practical.

SYBIL [to the pillows]. At any rate I have tired of him. Oh, best to tell the horrid truth. I am ashamed of myself. I have been crying my eyes out over it--I thought I was such a different kind of woman. But I am weary of him. I think him--oh, so dull.

JOHN [his face lighting up]. Are you sure that is how you have come to think of me?

SYBIL. I'm sorry; [with all her soul] but yes--yes--yes.

JOHN. By God, it's more than I deserve.

COMTESSE. Congratulations to you both.

[SYBIL runs away; and in the fulness of time she married successfully in cloth of silver, which was afterwards turned into a bed-spread.]

MAGGIE. You haven't read my letter yet, John, have you?

JOHN. No.

COMTESSE [imploringly]. May I know to what darling letter you refer?

MAGGIE. It's a letter I wrote to him before he left London. I gave it to him closed, not to be opened until his time here was ended.

JOHN [as his hand strays to his pocket]. Am I to read it now?

MAGGIE. Not before her. Please go away, Comtesse.

COMTESSE. Every word you say makes me more determined to remain.

MAGGIE. It will hurt you, John. [Distressed] Don't read it; tear it up.

JOHN. You make me very curious, Maggie. And yet I don't see what can be in it.

COMTESSE. But you feel a little nervous? Give ME the dagger.

MAGGIE [quickly]. No. [But the COMTESSE has already got it.]

COMTESSE. May I? [She must have thought they said Yes, for she opens the letter. She shares its contents with them.] 'Dearest John, It is at my request that the Comtesse is having Lady Sybil at the cottage at the same time as yourself.'

JOHN. What?

COMTESSE. Yes, she begged me to invite you together.

JOHN. But why?

MAGGIE. I promised you not to behave as other wives would do.

JOHN. It's not understandable.

COMTESSE. 'You may ask why I do this, John, and my reason is, I think that after a few weeks of Lady Sybil, every day, and all day, you will become sick to death of her. I am also giving her the chance to help you and inspire you with your work, so that you may both learn what her help and her inspiration amount to. Of course, if your love is the great strong passion you think it, then those weeks will make you love her more than ever and I can only say good-bye. But if, as I suspect, you don't even now know what true love is, then by the next time we meet, dear John, you will have had enough of her.--Your affectionate wife, Maggie.' Oh, why was not Sybil present at the reading of the will! And now, if you two will kindly excuse me, I think I must go and get that poor sufferer the eau de Cologne.

JOHN. It's almost enough to make a man lose faith in himself.

COMTESSE. Oh, don't say that, Mr. Shand.

MAGGIE [defending him]. You mustn't hurt him. If you haven't loved deep and true, that's just because you have never met a woman yet,