At this point Irene begs Jacques to marry her or even to take her as mistress. She has been invited on a long cruise with Mme. d’Aiguines and knows that to go will mean her complete ruin. Whether her adored is cruel, or whether Irene fears social ostracism, is never clear—she merely implores her fiancé to “save” her. “It’s like a prison to which I must return captive, despite myself.” As a result Jacques makes her his wife, in spite of his friend’s warning and his own recognition of the other man’s wretchedness and premature aging. The couple spend a year away from Paris, but with their return the struggle begins anew. Irene has been a devoted wife and has severed all connections with her former love, but she has been able to feel no passion for her husband, and when an appeal comes from Mme. d’Aiguines, who is ill, Irene returns helplessly to the old bondage. As for Jacques, he is fortunate enough to discover his former mistress still unattached, and as she responds to his kisses he says merely, “How beautiful!! A _woman_!” Despite the hints above that Irene’s captivity is purely physical and that she would like to escape it, all her symptoms throughout the play are those of romantic and imaginative love. Every moment apart from her friend is misery, and the violets she constantly receives become a romantic fetish. Bourdet has been skillful in portraying the effect on a number of persons of the conflict engendered in Irene by a love she feels to be guilty. But her own actual feeling for and relation with Mme. d’Aiguines are never made clear. It is, of course, easy to see why this play, even with such evasion of a major psychological issue, swept the western world while the superior efforts of Rolland and Lacretelle raised only slight critical ripples. Chiefly, it condemned lesbianism. But also Bourdet exhibited sheer inspiration in avoiding the direct presentation of a lesbian on the stage. For it is difficult to find an artistic middle ground between the unconvincing monster of hack writers and a character perhaps too sympathetic to please the strait-laced. Later his results will be compared with other plays appearing on the American stage. * * * * *