COMTESSE. ‘You may ask why I do this, John, and my reason is, I think that after a few weeks of Lady Sybil, every day, and all day, you will become sick to death of her. I am also giving her the chance to help you and inspire you with your work, so that you may both learn what her help and her inspiration amount to. Of course, if your love is the great strong passion you think it, then those weeks will make you love her more than ever and I can only say good-bye. But if, as I suspect, you don’t even now know what true love is, then by the next time we meet, dear John, you will have had enough of her.--Your affectionate wife, Maggie.’ Oh, why was not Sybil present at the reading of the will! And now, if you two will kindly excuse me, I think I must go and get that poor sufferer the eau de Cologne. JOHN. It’s almost enough to make a man lose faith in himself. COMTESSE. Oh, don’t say that, Mr. Shand. MAGGIE [defending him]. You mustn’t hurt him. If you haven’t loved deep and true, that’s just because you have never met a woman yet, John, capable of inspiring it. COMTESSE [putting her hand on MAGGIE’s shoulder]. Have you not, Mr. Shand? JOHN. I see what you mean. But Maggie wouldn’t think better of me for any false pretences. She knows my feelings for her now are neither more nor less than what they have always been. MAGGIE [who sees that he is looking at her as solemnly as a volume of sermons printed by request]. I think no one could be fond of me that can’t laugh a little at me. JOHN. How could that help? COMTESSE [exasperated]. Mr. Shand, I give you up. MAGGIE. I admire his honesty. COMTESSE. Oh, I give you up also. Arcades ambo. Scotchies both. JOHN [when she has gone]. But this letter, it’s not like you. By Gosh, Maggie, you’re no fool. [She beams at this, as any wife would.] But how could I have made such a mistake? It’s not like a strong man. [Evidently he has an inspiration.] MAGGIE. What is it? JOHN [the inspiration]. AM I a strong man? MAGGIE. You? Of course you are. And self-made. Has anybody ever helped you in the smallest way? JOHN [thinking it out again]. No, nobody. MAGGIE. Not even Lady Sybil? JOHN. I’m beginning to doubt it. It’s very curious, though, Maggie, that this speech should be disappointing. MAGGIE. It’s just that Mr. Venables hasn’t the brains to see how good it is. JOHN. That must be it. [But he is too good a man to rest satisfied with this.] No, Maggie, it’s not. Somehow I seem to have lost my neat way of saying things. MAGGIE [almost cooing]. It will come back to you. JOHN [forlorn]. If you knew how I’ve tried. MAGGIE [cautiously]. Maybe if you were to try again; and I’ll just come and sit beside you, and knit. I think the click of the needles sometimes put you in the mood. JOHN. Hardly that; and yet many a Shandism have I knocked off while you were sitting beside me knitting. I suppose it was the quietness. MAGGIE. Very likely. JOHN [with another inspiration]. Maggie!