MARGARET. I ...? How? I said the heroine of my novel betrays her husband with a baritone. GILBERT. A basso would have been grander--a mezzo-soprano more piquant. MARGARET. Then she goes not to Munich but to Dresden, and there has a relation with a sculptor. GILBERT. Myself, I suppose ... disguised? MARGARET. Oh, very much disguised. The sculptor is young, handsome, and a genius. In spite of all that, she leaves him. GILBERT. For ...? MARGARET. Guess! GILBERT. Presumably a jockey. MARGARET. Silly! GILBERT. A count, then? A prince? MARGARET. No--an archduke! GILBERT (with a bow). Ah, you've spared no expense. MARGARET. Yes--an archduke, who abandons his position at court for her sake, marries her, and goes away with her to the Canary Islands. GILBERT. The Canary Islands! That's fine. And then ...? MARGARET. With their landing in ... GILBERT. ... the Canaries ... MARGARET. ... the novel ends. GILBERT. Oh, I see ... I'm very curious--especially about the disguise. MARGARET. Even you would not be able to recognize me, if it were not ... GILBERT. Well ...? MARGARET. If it were not that in the last chapter but two I've reproduced all our correspondence! GILBERT. What? MARGARET. Yes--all the letters you wrote me, and all those I wrote you are included. GILBERT. Excuse me ... but how did you get yours to me? I've got them all. MARGARET. Ah, but I kept the rough drafts of them all. GILBERT. Rough drafts? MARGARET. Yes. GILBERT. Rough drafts ...! Of those letters to me that seemed to be dashed off in quivering haste? "Just one word more, dearest, before I sleep--my eyes are closing already ..." and then, when your eyes had quite closed, you wrote me off a fair copy? MARGARET. Well, have you anything to complain of? GILBERT. I might have suspected it. I suppose I ought to congratulate myself that they weren't borrowed from a Lover's Manual. Oh, how everything crumbles around me ... the whole past is in ruins! She kept rough drafts of her letters! MARGARET. You ought to be glad. Who knows whether my letters to you will not be the only thing people will remember about you? GILBERT. But it's an extremely awkward situation for another reason ... MARGARET. What is that? GILBERT (points to his book). You see, they're all in there too. MARGARET. What? Where? GILBERT. In my novel. MARGARET. What's in your novel? GILBERT. Our letters ... yours and mine. MARGARET. How did you get yours, then, since I have them? Ah, you see you wrote rough drafts too! GILBERT. Oh no--I only made copies of them before I sent them to you. I didn't want them to be lost. There are some in the book that you never got; they were too good for you--you'd never have understood them.