So sweet and sad, are they not? Don’t you love sweet, sad things? BILL. Rather. LADY PATRICIA. _Our sweetest songs are those that tell of saddest thought._ BILL. Rather.... I say, hadn’t we better be going? LADY PATRICIA. Bill.... BILL. Yes. LADY PATRICIA. (_Her hands on his shoulders._) Do you love me as you used to? BILL. I say, why d’you—you don’t think—— LADY PATRICIA. No—no—no—ah, no! I know well enough that your love is deeper and stronger than it was. But this sacred love—this hopeless love of ours has swept you suddenly into manhood. You are no longer a boy; you are graver; you are sadder.... And if sometimes you seem to avoid me now, it’s due to no cooling of passion, but to the fear lest the pent-up lava at your heart should overflow and ruin us both. BILL. I say, you do put things awfully well! LADY PATRICIA. Petrarch and Laura—Paolo and Francesca—Lancelot and Guinevere.... Bill—no, William and Patricia.... Ah, my poor boy, put your arm around me, and say those lines of Lovelace that I taught you. BILL. Oh, I say—really, you know—— On my honour, I’ve forgotten ’em.... LADY PATRICIA. No, no! You’re merely shy—bashful—boyish! I love to hear you say that verse. (_She starts him._) _Yet this_—— BILL. _Yet this—yet this_—— What’s the word? LADY PATRICIA. _Yet this inconstancy_—— BILL. (_In a self-conscious sing-song._) _Yet this inconstancy is such_ _As you, too, shall adore;_ _I could not love thee, dear, so much,_ _Loved I not honour more._ LADY PATRICIA. _Loved I not honour more...._ Love—duty—honour—— (_She sighs deeply._) Come, dear.... (_They go out on the left. A pause. The DEAN comes out of the summer-house. He barely conceals his triumph under a mask of outraged propriety. MRS. O’FARREL follows him._) DEAN. H’m.... Cousinly regard!... MRS. O’FARREL. It’s shocking! Outrageous! DEAN. It is indeed. MRS. O’FARREL. —That you shouldn’t even pretend to hide your satisfaction at the scene we have just witnessed. DEAN. Satisfaction! I assure you, dear lady, I’m shocked and grieved—deeply grieved, that your son should prove capable of such depravity. MRS. O’FARREL. My son! You know as well as I do that the foolish boy has been bewitched by that unprincipled woman. DEAN. Come, come, Eileen. In common fairness we should apportion the blame equally—though, indeed, my experience has generally led me to the conclusion that the _man_ is more to blame in these cases than the woman. MRS. O’FARREL. _Your_ experience! Quite so!... I shall give Patricia my plain, unvarnished opinion of herself and forbid her my house. You will tell Michael that he’s a scoundrel and a libertine. DEAN.