English drama (Comedy); London (England) -- Drama; Marriage -- Drama; Triangles (Interpersonal relations) -- Drama
HE. I never thought of doing so, dearest: I know that these trivialities
are nothing to you. What was I saying--oh yes. Instead of coming
back here from the theatre, you will come with me to my home--now and
henceforth our home--and in due course of time, when you are divorced,
we shall go through whatever idle legal ceremony you may desire. I
attach no importance to the law: my love was not created in me by the
law, nor can it be bound or loosed by it. That is simple enough, and
sweet enough, is it not? [He takes the flower from the table]. Here are
flowers for you: I have the tickets: we will ask your husband to lend
us the carriage to show that there is no malice, no grudge, between us.
Come!
SHE [spiritlessly, taking the flowers without looking at them, and
temporizing] Teddy isn't in yet.
HE. Well, let us take that calmly. Let us go to the theatre as if
nothing had happened, and tell him when we come back. Now or three hours
hence: to-day or to-morrow: what does it matter, provided all is done in
honor, without shame or fear?
SHE. What did you get tickets for? Lohengrin?
HE. I tried; but Lohengrin was sold out for to-night. [He takes out two
Court Theatre tickets].
SHE. Then what did you get?
HE. Can you ask me? What is there besides Lohengrin that we two could
endure, except Candida?
SHE [springing up] Candida! No, I won't go to it again, Henry [tossing
the flower on the piano]. It is that play that has done all the
mischief. I'm very sorry I ever saw it: it ought to be stopped.
HE [amazed] Aurora!
SHE. Yes: I mean it.
HE. That divinest love poem! the poem that gave us courage to speak to
one another! that revealed to us what we really felt for one another!
That--
SHE. Just so. It put a lot of stuff into my head that I should never
have dreamt of for myself. I imagined myself just like Candida.
HE [catching her hands and looking earnestly at her] You were right. You
are like Candida.
SHE [snatching her hands away] Oh, stuff! And I thought you were just
like Eugene. [Looking critically at him] Now that I come to look at you,
you are rather like him, too. [She throws herself discontentedly into
the nearest seat, which happens to be the bench at the piano. He goes to
her].
HE [very earnestly] Aurora: if Candida had loved Eugene she would have
gone out into the night with him without a moment's hesitation.
SHE [with equal earnestness] Henry: do you know what's wanting in that
play?
HE. There is nothing wanting in it.
SHE. Yes there is. There's a Georgina wanting in it. If Georgina had
been there to make trouble, that play would have been a true-to-life
tragedy. Now I'll tell you something about it that I have never told you
before.
HE. What is that?
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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