ELLIE [turning on her]. Splendid! Yes, splendid looking, of course. But how can you love a liar? MRS HUSHABYE. I don't know. But you can, fortunately. Otherwise there wouldn't be much love in the world. ELLIE. But to lie like that! To be a boaster! a coward! MRS HUSHABYE [rising in alarm]. Pettikins, none of that, if you please. If you hint the slightest doubt of Hector's courage, he will go straight off and do the most horribly dangerous things to convince himself that he isn't a coward. He has a dreadful trick of getting out of one third-floor window and coming in at another, just to test his nerve. He has a whole drawerful of Albert Medals for saving people's lives. ELLIE. He never told me that. MRS HUSHABYE. He never boasts of anything he really did: he can't bear it; and it makes him shy if anyone else does. All his stories are made-up stories. ELLIE [coming to her]. Do you mean that he is really brave, and really has adventures, and yet tells lies about things that he never did and that never happened? MRS HUSHABYE. Yes, pettikins, I do. People don't have their virtues and vices in sets: they have them anyhow: all mixed. ELLIE [staring at her thoughtfully]. There's something odd about this house, Hesione, and even about you. I don't know why I'm talking to you so calmly. I have a horrible fear that my heart is broken, but that heartbreak is not like what I thought it must be. MRS HUSHABYE [fondling her]. It's only life educating you, pettikins. How do you feel about Boss Mangan now? ELLIE [disengaging herself with an expression of distaste]. Oh, how can you remind me of him, Hesione? MRS HUSHABYE. Sorry, dear. I think I hear Hector coming back. You don't mind now, do you, dear? ELLIE. Not in the least. I am quite cured. Mazzini Dunn and Hector come in from the hall. HECTOR [as he opens the door and allows Mazzini to pass in]. One second more, and she would have been a dead woman! MAZZINI. Dear! dear! what an escape! Ellie, my love, Mr Hushabye has just been telling me the most extraordinary-- ELLIE. Yes, I've heard it [she crosses to the other side of the room]. HECTOR [following her]. Not this one: I'll tell it to you after dinner. I think you'll like it. The truth is I made it up for you, and was looking forward to the pleasure of telling it to you. But in a moment of impatience at being turned out of the room, I threw it away on your father. ELLIE [turning at bay with her back to the carpenter's bench, scornfully self-possessed]. It was not thrown away. He believes it. I should not have believed it. MAZZINI [benevolently]. Ellie is very naughty, Mr Hushabye. Of course she does not really think that. [He goes to the bookshelves, and inspects the titles of the volumes].