(_Enter_ LIONEL. _He is a handsome, slender young man, very pale, with brown hair brushed straight back._) LIONEL (_lifting both of_ MRS. JOHNSON’S _hands to his lips_) Ah, Miss White! Dear Comrade White! (_This hand-kissing and dearing business leads the audience to think that_ MR. LIONEL MORRIS _is the villain of the play, a destroyer of homes, a desperate character. As a matter of fact, he is nothing of the sort. He is quite harmless, being a sociable young man of limited education who likes to take part in those radical movements which attract women. He writes obscene poetry and paints pictures and makes sculptures that would be disgusting if they were not so funny. He is a rather interesting hybrid, being part donkey and part tame cat._) HELEN Dear Comrade Lionel! See where I put your “Emancipation of Woman.” (_She leads him to the purple statue._) LIONEL Ah! I never can interest myself in any of my work that is more than a day old. A poem or a picture that I have made bores me when the first flush of creation has passed. I feel toward it as I suppose a father felt toward his children, in those mediæval days when one had children. (_He touches the outstretched hand of the statue._) But, dear Comrade White! Why do you make my “Emancipation of Woman” live with a Hiroshige colour print? A Toyokune I can endure, but a Hiroshige absolutely spoils the melody of her composition. Better the soft lyrical wall for a background, or perhaps a simple hanging of passionate black satin. Do you mind if I take this abomination down? HELEN Surely, surely; you are always so right about everything! Do change anything and everything that will make it more comfortable for your wonderful statue. She has meant so much to me since she came.... LIONEL I know, dear comrade. (_He has moved the pianola bench to the wall and is standing on it taking down the Japanese print when_ MAXWELL _and_ JOHN RYAN _come in_. RYAN _is a janitor, and looks like a janitor. He is in his shirt sleeves and wears a battered black derby. He is smoking--no, not a short clay pipe!--a cigarette. He takes off his hat when he sees_ MRS. JOHNSON, _but instantly replaces it_.) MAXWELL (_as he leads_ RYAN _to the dining room_) Come in here, Ryan. Did you bring your monkey wrench with you? (RYAN _mutters something unintelligible. They go out into the dining room, from which come occasional murmurs of conversation and sounds of hammering._) LIONEL (_from the pianola bench_) Do you know, I am not at all glad to see that man. HELEN Who? Max? LIONEL No, indeed! That dreadful janitor! Do you know, Miss White--that janitor-- HELEN