JANET. (Jumping up.) Please, there's just one little thing. (To CARVE.) Wait a moment, dear. (To EBAG.) Mr. Ebag, how many of those pictures did you sell to Mr. Texel? EBAG. Fifteen. JANET. And you made a profit of over four hundred pounds on each? TEXEL. (Boisterously--laughing to EBAG.) You did? JANET. Fifteen times four hundred--that makes--how much does it make? TEXEL. Six thousand, madam. Thirty thousand dollars. Great! JANET. (To EBAG.) Don't you think we deserve some of that, as it were? EBAG. Madam, I shall be delighted to pay you five thousand four hundred pounds. That will be equivalent to charging you a nominal commission of ten per cent. JANET. Thank you. CARVE. I won't touch a penny of their wretched money. JANET. (Sweetly.) I wouldn't dream of asking you to, dearest. I shall touch it. Goodness knows what street we shall be in after this affair--and with my brewery shares gone simply all to pieces! Now, dearest, you can take it off. (She resumes her seat.) CARVE. (Lightly.) I'm hanged if I do! ALCAR. But, my dear Mr. X! CARVE. (Lightly.) I'm dashed if I take my collar off. CYRUS. (Triumphant.) Ha! I knew it. CARVE. Why should I offer my skin to the inspection of two individuals in whom I haven't the slightest interest? They've quarrelled about me, but is that a reason why I should undress myself? Let me say again, I've no desire whatever to prove that I am Ilam Carve. ALCAR. But surely to oblige us immensely, Mr. X, you will consent to give just one extra performance of an operation which, in fact, you accomplish three hundred and sixty-five times every year without any disastrous results. CARVE. I don't look at it like that. Already my fellow-citizens, expressing their conviction that I was a great artist, have buried me in Westminster Abbey--not because I was a great artist, but because I left a couple of hundred thousand pounds for a public object. And now my fellow-citizens, here assembled, want me to convince them that I am a great artist by taking my collar off. I won't do it. I simply will not do it. It's too English. If any person wishes to be convinced that I'm an artist and not a mountebank, let him look at my work (pointing vaguely to a picture), because that's all the proof that I mean to offer. If he is blind or shortsighted I regret it, but my neck isn't going to help him. TEXEL. Brilliant! Then we shall have the trial after all. CYRUS. Yes, but your brilliant friend will be on his way to South America before then. JANET. (Sweetly to CYRUS.) I assure you it's quite true about those moles. That's why he wears those collars. CYRUS. (Grimly.) No doubt.... (Repeating.) Nevertheless he'll be on his way to South America. CARVE. (Gaily.) Or Timbuctoo. CYRUS. (Significantly.) Unless you're stopped. CARVE. And who's going to stop me? All the laws of this country added together can't make me take my collar off if I don't want to.