Oh, that’s it: they won’t come back now. Our house won’t suit them. PROFESSOR (_Taking a chair over near her_) How can we expect them to come into a house that isn’t even built? You know our modern children are very peculiar. They get that from you. MRS. RAY Nonsense. It’s you who are peculiar. Just look at the kind of house you want. PROFESSOR (_Doubtfully_) It _is_ different from yours, I’ll admit. MRS. RAY I don’t object to the architecture. It’s the surroundings you insist on. PROFESSOR You want the city and I want the forest. MRS. RAY (_Shaking her head_) We’ll never agree. PROFESSOR (_As though with an inspiration_) I have a solution. I’ll live in your city house, if you’ll have my forest around it. MRS. RAY I’m afraid, dear, that is a bit impractical at present prices. PROFESSOR (_With a whimsical smile_) But we certainly can’t have the city you love around my house in the woods! I’m afraid of the streets. MRS. RAY Any friendly policeman would help you across them. PROFESSOR Think of me walking arm in arm with a policeman! I must consider my reputation, even though I am seventy. No. (_With a twinkle._) I can’t seem to visualize the house, can you, dear? MRS. RAY It isn’t like your dream or mine. PROFESSOR No. I’d have a hard time finding my birch trees in the moonlight. Have you ever noticed how lovely they are when the leaves have all gone? MRS. RAY Somehow they are no more lovely than the sense of life in the tall ugly buildings man has built with his own hands. PROFESSOR But trees are eternal. MRS. RAY That’s where we differ. I live in to-day: you live in all time. PROFESSOR That’s my profession. You lose count of time when you are a philosopher. MRS. RAY And I am a woman of the world. PROFESSOR (_As he goes to light another cigarette from the candles_) I’d hardly describe you that way, my dear; that sounds so naughty. MRS. RAY I mean I love every minute that passes and everything the moment brings. I love the people who are of that moment. PROFESSOR You still dream of having a _salon_ of celebrities? MRS. RAY (_Smiling_) It’s no worse than the museum of antiquities on your book shelves. But I keep forgetting you want your house in the forest so you can write about the dead. PROFESSOR And you want your house in the city for the living. MRS. RAY I wish we could compromise somehow. PROFESSOR If we only had more money I could do away with the wilderness and content myself with a few wooded acres, I suppose. Only it must be roomy where the winds can speak. And I must have some wild things about. Though perhaps I could compromise on a pet squirrel, if necessary. (_He smiles._) And if I met you that far do you think you would be willing to live an hour or so from the city? MRS. RAY Why, of course. But haven’t we been looking for that sort of place for years; even when we weren’t free to live where we wished? PROFESSOR