SCENE I

_ANN, alone, walks about humming happily. PHILIP is shown in by THOMPSON._

THOMPSON: Mr. Jordan.

[_Exit THOMPSON._

ANN: Philip——

PHILIP: Here I am.

ANN: But you can’t dine——

PHILIP: No, I must be in the House.

ANN: Of course.

PHILIP (_suspiciously_): Why do you say “of course”?

ANN (_smiling_): Because I am so well trained.

PHILIP: You sounded as if you were thinking of something.

ANN: My mind was in that rare and delightful state known as a perfect blank.

PHILIP: You don’t usually say “of course” when I break an engagement with you.

ANN: You told me it was so important to be sensible.

PHILIP: I doubt if the Almighty Himself could make you sensible. It wasn’t part of His conception——

ANN: But I have always known that you ought to go more to the House.

PHILIP (_sharply_): What do you mean?

ANN: That to be young and charming and promising and intelligent means nothing compared to being on the spot.

PHILIP: How practical you are getting.

ANN: It isn’t that I am getting practical; it is that every day you seem to be becoming more and more a part of me. You see, if you are always with me, it doesn’t matter quite so much that you should sometimes be away from me.

PHILIP: I don’t see.

ANN: Loving you used to make me unhappy, but now it makes me happy—now that I am sure. I used to feel “He isn’t looking at me, he isn’t thinking about me, his eyes aren’t even straying in my direction. He is quite happy on that sofa, quite concentrated—if only he were inattentive. But he isn’t.” But now I feel “It doesn’t matter what woman he is with, or what man—his heart is with me. I don’t need any stray looks, any accidental jealousy—he means so much to me now that I don’t want him to be anxious when he’s away from me. I want him to be confident.” When you are a little bit in love you are flattered by doubt, but when you really love you only want trust.

PHILIP: You give enough trust for two.

ANN: You make it so easy.

PHILIP: Ann——

ANN: Yes?

PHILIP (_thinks better of it_): Nothing.

ANN: Did you want to tell me something?

PHILIP: One can’t tell you anything. You have the divine scepticism of all the saints.

ANN: What do you mean?

PHILIP: All saints are unbelievers. They don’t believe in realities. They don’t even believe in mortality.

ANN (_passionately_): One can’t believe in mortality.

PHILIP: You must have seen enough death during the war.

ANN: That is why I can’t believe in mortality.

PHILIP: Doesn’t it let you down, always following your hopes?

ANN: What else can one follow?

PHILIP: Anyway, if it doesn’t let you down, it must let you in for things.

ANN: But I like being let in for things.

PHILIP: I wonder your illusions aren’t threadbare by now—you use them enough.

ANN: Philip, why do you go on keeping up a silly pretence of being hard and cold and cynical and heartless? They are all such foolish things to be. People are only hard because they are frightened, and cold because they are clumsy. As for cynicism, it is so misleading; it keeps you out of touch with life.

PHILIP: That seems an odd remark for a Cathcart.

ANN: Uncle Bill and Aunt Emily aren’t really cynical; they are just a little out of tune with the sort of lives we live. You ought to think of them as delicious museum pieces. You watch Uncle Bill if somebody makes a pun—he glows—not because he very much likes puns, but because they make him feel young. It must be so sad to see the world drifting away out of your ken into a strange new century full of distorted angles and alien values.

PHILIP (_violently_): I don’t understand you, any of you—your uncle or your aunt or Selina.

ANN (_interrupting_): Selina is just very young and uncompromising—a ruthless, fastidious realist. At least she thinks she is a realist, because she can face things, but it is so easy to face things before one has ever been hurt.

PHILIP: Then there is you.

ANN (_laughing_): There is me. (_Tenderly_): Are you glad?

PHILIP (_who is walking up and down_): You are the most mysterious of them all.

ANN: I am simplicity itself. It is only because you love me that you think me mysterious. The person you love is always mysterious because you have encircled them in the great mystery of love.

PHILIP (_who is taking no notice of what she is saying_): They all think you a saint, and they are right, I suppose. You see no evil, in anyone, not even in yourself.

ANN: Philip, how can you say a thing like that? No one knows better than I do that I am riddled with faults.

PHILIP: You are practically faultless, and yet it would seem as if virtue meant nothing to you.

ANN: What do you mean by virtue?

PHILIP: What other people mean by it.

ANN: That one’s body matters more than anything else?

PHILIP: I shouldn’t have put it like that.

ANN: Nor would the other people.

PHILIP: You think nothing of having a lover.

ANN: I think everything of it.

PHILIP: You don’t mind deceiving your husband.

ANN: You know I would have told him long ago if you had let me.

PHILIP (_in despair at her blindness_): Good God!

ANN: Don’t you remember we thought that although he doesn’t love me it would hurt him?

PHILIP (_sneering_): Ninian too is like _other_ people.

ANN: Yes—once one has given one’s heart all other gifts are so small. That is where it seems to me that the moralists go wrong—they seem to think the body so much more important than the heart or the soul.

PHILIP: Moralists aren’t occupied with the heart or the soul. They are interested in the structure of society.

ANN: Then why don’t they become county councillors or politicians?

PHILIP: Because they would find difficulty in getting elected.

ANN: You look tired.

PHILIP: I am tired.

ANN: What has tired you? The things you have done or the things you haven’t done?

PHILIP: Both.

ANN: Tell me!

PHILIP (_sharply_): What?

ANN: Everything—anything.

PHILIP: There is nothing to tell.

ANN (_teasing_): You look like a man with a guilty secret.

PHILIP (_startled_): What are you driving at?

ANN (_still gay_): How should I know?

PHILIP: Well, I must be going.

ANN: Already?

PHILIP: Your guests will be arriving in a moment.

ANN: Philip, please say something nice to me before you go.

PHILIP: What do you mean by a nice thing?

ANN: Something obvious and all-embracing.

PHILIP: So you’ve reached the obvious, have you?

ANN: I have always believed in the obvious.

PHILIP: What would you call an obvious and all-embracing thing to say?

ANN: I love you.

PHILIP: Why do women always want to be told that one loves them? They must know whether it is true or not.

ANN: There may be truths that are better left unsaid, but there are no nice truths that are not the better for being repeated.

PHILIP: Do you call love a nice truth?

ANN: A respectable truth.

PHILIP: So long as you change the subject.

ANN: Don’t tease me, sweet.

PHILIP: I’m not teasing you.

ANN (_stroking his forehead_): I don’t want you to be tired or worried.... I don’t want you to have a conscience.

PHILIP: Not any conscience at all?

ANN: A preventive conscience but not a retrospective one.

PHILIP: I think it is better to worry after than before ... a sin followed by a regret is better than a blank preceded by a doubt.

ANN: It might be such a small sin and such a big regret.

PHILIP: Why do you look so happy?

ANN: I am so happy.

PHILIP: How do you manage it?

ANN: You manage most of it.

PHILIP (_showing some faint emotion for the first time_): There are moments when I wish I had managed it.

ANN (_kisses his hand_): Good-bye.

PHILIP: Good-bye.

[_Exit PHILIP._

[_ANN walks about the room singing to herself._

[_Enter LORD WILLIAM._

ANN: Uncle William, how nice of you to come early.

LORD WILLIAM: One never gets you alone.

ANN: I would always be alone if I knew you were coming.

LORD WILLIAM: You ought not to be wasting your wiles on an old uncle; you ought to be ruining some young man with them.

ANN: Is it nice for young men to be ruined?

LORD WILLIAM: Delightful.

ANN: When were you first ruined, Uncle Bill?

LORD WILLIAM: When I was twenty-one. That was, quite properly, the method I selected for coming of age.

ANN: What was she like?

LORD WILLIAM: She was a circus-rider. We did things in style in those days.

ANN: Was she pretty?

LORD WILLIAM: She was dashing—damned expensive too. I will say that for her. Now you could ruin a young man without costing him a penny.

ANN: In fact you are recommending me as an economy.

LORD WILLIAM: I’m sorry, my dear. For a moment sordid financial considerations arose in my mind with the memory of Annette. We were all so affected by Ouida in those days. It never occurred to us to do anything simply.

ANN: And now I suppose you think that we none of us do anything well?

LORD WILLIAM: A little slipshod, a little casual, I find you. And your young men are so lacking in persistence that your young women can’t afford any subtlety. If men go about taking no for an answer they can’t expect to get “no” said to them, and there is nothing like affirmatives for taking the savour out of an affair.

THOMPSON: Lady Emily Cathcart, my lady.

[_Enter LADY EMILY CATHCART. She kisses ANN._

LORD WILLIAM: Emily, do you recollect that year when Molly was first attentive to you?

LADY EMILY: Very clearly.

LORD WILLIAM: Molly was a buffoon in those days.

LADY EMILY: Really, William, you should not betray the secrets of our youth. Ann, who is romantic, believes that Molly was the most tender of lovers.

LORD WILLIAM: Well, even when you lay your _amour propre_ aside you will admit that Molly was, if possible, far more tender than passionate.

LADY EMILY: Fiddlesticks! Molly was never in the least tender, nor for that matter was he in the least passionate either. But he was not more ridiculous than any other young man who adopts an attitude unpropelled by an impulse.

ANN: What was his attitude?

LADY EMILY: In the year ’80, to which William is referring, his attitude was one of affection towards myself.

ANN: I am sure that that was quite sincere.

LADY EMILY: Perfectly. He liked me in private and loved me in public.

ANN: You mean that he was shy when he was alone with you?

LADY EMILY: No. I mean that he was frank when he was alone with me.

ANN: What a divine compliment.

LADY EMILY: The truth is the most tiresome of all compliments.

LORD WILLIAM: When I am flattered I always imagine that I have been told the truth.

LADY EMILY: William has always been vain—whereas I have been selfish, which is a much more artistic achievement. When William was young, he succumbed to every temptation—a sad lack both of fastidiousness and of concentration. I, on the other hand, determined to miss chances and take opportunities. I succeeded.

LORD WILLIAM: Your aunt means that she remained unmarried.

LADY EMILY: On purpose.

LORD WILLIAM: A misguided objective.

LADY EMILY: Why?

LORD WILLIAM: The stationary is no achievement.

LADY EMILY: There was nothing stationary about it.

LORD WILLIAM: Don’t shock Ann.

[_Enter THOMPSON and SELINA._

THOMPSON: Miss Selina, m’lady.

[_Exit THOMPSON._

SELINA: Papa, you are an outrage.

LORD WILLIAM: I hope so, my love.

SELINA: You forgot me.

LORD WILLIAM: How is that possible?

SELINA: I should have hoped it would be impossible.

LORD WILLIAM: Are you suggesting that my delight as a parent has triumphed over my indiscretion as a chaperon? That my desire for your society has prevented me from leaving you at the right moment?

SELINA: I am suggesting no such thing. I am merely mentioning the fact that you went out without me.

LORD WILLIAM: To be sure, that is what comes of living in the same house. One never can remember the other person.

[_Enter THOMPSON and MR. MOLYNEUX._

THOMPSON: Mr. Molyneux, m’lady.

ANN: Mr. Molyneux, Uncle Bill and Aunt Emily have been taking your character away. If you want to find it again you need only come to me.

LORD WILLIAM: Quite right, my dear. At last I have found a profession for you. A pawnbroker of reputations.

LADY EMILY: Remember not to accept stolen goods.

SELINA: And that, failing a payment, the property becomes your own.

MOLYNEUX: I am not putting my reputation on deposit; I am giving it to Ann.

LADY EMILY: You are giving away something you don’t possess.

MOLYNEUX: Won’t you lend it to me?

[_Enter NINIAN._

NINIAN: I apologize, Mr. Molyneux. Forgive me, Uncle William. I have been kept.

LORD WILLIAM: Tut, tut, Ninian, a rich man like you!

NINIAN: I cannot see how being rich can affect the fact that I was sitting late on a committee. And anyway, I am not rich ... you know very well, Uncle William, that it is almost impossible nowadays for a gentleman to be rich.

MOLYNEUX: It was always difficult.

LORD WILLIAM: It is a question of minerals, my boy. There is still coal in the earth.

MOLYNEUX: But, as Ninian would say, there are unfortunately also miners.

NINIAN: There are, I understand, a number of very rich people in this country to-day. I know very few of them.

SELINA: What a pity.

MOLYNEUX: Never mind—as the proverb says, if you fail the first time—and it applies, I imagine, to all of the numerous first times—try, try again.

LADY EMILY: I feel that you ought to make an effort to get into touch with all these millionaires.

NINIAN: I do not know their names.

SELINA: What a shame!

MOLYNEUX: There must be ways of finding out. Somerset House, for instance.

SELINA: Aren’t they all dead there?

MOLYNEUX: It is difficult not to have an heir.

NINIAN: I have no desire to know any of these profiteers. What could they do me? I should, I hope, feel at a disadvantage in their company.

[_Enter THOMPSON and MRS. MARTINEAU._

THOMPSON: Mrs. Martineau, m’lady.

[_Exit THOMPSON._

ANN: Dear Mabel.

[_General greetings._

NINIAN: If you were older, Mrs. Martineau, I should say that you look younger each time I see you.

MRS. MARTINEAU: Please say it—I am not young enough not to have my head turned.

[_Enter THOMPSON and TIM._

THOMPSON: Mr. Carstairs, m’lady.

ANN: Tim....

TIM: I am so sorry if I am late.

ANN: You’re not late—for dinner.

LADY EMILY (_in the other corner_): Why, Mrs. Martineau?

MOLYNEUX: Why indeed? These nursery friendships never come to any good.

LADY EMILY: Even later friendships rarely come to any good.

MOLYNEUX: But they can easily be taken to the bad.

LADY EMILY: Not easily. Believe me, not easily. Going to the bad is very difficult.

MOLYNEUX: Why so difficult?

LADY EMILY: Because one’s roots go deeper than one thinks. You find a lot of odd principles and inhibitions lying about at the bottom of the sea. If the psychoanalysts hadn’t made the term ridiculous I should talk of the subconscious.

LORD WILLIAM: Did I hear you use the word subconscious, Emily?

LADY EMILY: You did, William.

LORD WILLIAM: It has played no part in your life.

LADY EMILY: It has played the same part in my life that it plays in other people’s. It has been the refuge of unwelcome guests.

LORD WILLIAM (_calling_): Ann. Ann! There is something the matter with Emily to-night. She has become a moralist. Everyone is very odd. Selina is silent, Tim is restless, Ninian is absent-minded, and Mrs. Martineau is sunny. Why the devil should they run away from themselves like that? By the way, Ann, what are you?

ANN (_smiling_): I am happy.

MOLYNEUX: Tell us, Ann, is virtue really its own reward? We should so like to know. We need cheering up.

[_Enter THOMPSON._

THOMPSON: Dinner is served, m’lady.

[_General bustle._

CURTAIN _for Ten Seconds_