LADY TORMINSTER. And you will be gone? SIR GEOFFREY. I shall be gone. There is a train at 7.45--which will be packed with husbands. I shall breakfast in town. LADY TORMINSTER. Why? SIR GEOFFREY. Well, one must breakfast somewhere. It's a convention. LADY TORMINSTER. Sir Geoffrey, I want you to tell me what this means. SIR GEOFFREY. Give your decision, said the judge to the arbitrator, but never your reasons. I go, because I go. Besides, has one reasons? Why do people die, or get married, or buy umbrellas? Because of typhoid, love, or the rain? Not at all. Isn't that so? LADY TORMINSTER. I wish you'd be serious. SIR GEOFFREY. I'm fearfully serious. When Jack shot that tiger he had to go so near the brute that he held his life in his hands. Do you know what was my chief impression as I lay there, with the ugly cat's paw upon my chest, beginning to rip me? LADY TORMINSTER. [_Shuddering._] Horrible! What? SIR GEOFFREY. I resented his having eaten something that smelt like onions. LADY TORMINSTER. [_Smiling._] A tiger! SIR GEOFFREY. Onions may have been his undoing. That's the beggar's skin on the floor. But you should have seen me rub Jack's nose! LADY TORMINSTER. [_Warningly._] Sir Geoffrey, there's very little cigarette left-- SIR GEOFFREY. There are lots more in the box--and dawn is a long way off. Hang it, Lady Torminster, don't be in a hurry! Do you hear the sea out there? It's breathing as regularly as old Jack. And don't you think this is fine? Here we are, we two, meeting just as we shall meet on the other side of the Never-Never Land. It's a chance for a man to speak to a woman, and tell her things. LADY TORMINSTER. What things! SIR GEOFFREY. That's just it--what things? What have I to say, after all? I am going to-morrow because I am a fantastic, capricious ass. Also because I'm lonely. LADY TORMINSTER. How will China help you? SIR GEOFFREY. They colour it green on the map--and there _is_ such a lot of it! LADY TORMINSTER. You should get married. SIR GEOFFREY. [_With a sudden burst of passion._] _You_ say that--you! [_He starts back, ashamed, and hangs his head._ LADY TORMINSTER _throws a quick glance at him, then looks ahead of her, puffing quietly at her cigarette._ LADY TORMINSTER. [_Quietly._] So that is why you are going? SIR GEOFFREY. [_With a great sigh of relief._] Now, that really is fine of you! Every other woman in the world would have seized that chance for a melodramatic exit. "Good-night, Sir Geoffrey; I must go to my husband." "Good-night, Lady Torminster." A clasp of the hand--a hot tear--mine--on your wrist. But you sit there. Splendid! LADY TORMINSTER. I ask you again--is that truly why you are going? SIR GEOFFREY. Well, yes, that's the fact. I apologise humbly--it's so conventional. Isn't it? LADY TORMINSTER. I suppose it's difficult for human beings to invent new situations.