BARBARA No malice. So long, Bill.
SHIRLEY [shaking his head] You make too much of him, Miss, in your innocence.
BARBARA [going to him] Peter: I’m like you now. Cleaned out, and lost my job.
SHIRLEY Youve youth an hope. Thats two better than me.
BARBARA I’ll get you a job, Peter. Thats hope for you: the youth will have to be enough for me. [She counts her money.] I have just enough left for two teas at Lockharts,[68] a Rowton doss{30} for you, and my tram and bus home. [He frowns and rises with offended pride. She takes his arm.] Dont be proud, Peter: it’s sharing between friends. And promise me youll talk to me and not let me cry. [She draws him towards the gate. ]
SHIRLEY Well, I’m not accustomed to talk to the like of you —
BARBARA [urgently] Yes, yes: you must talk to me. Tell me about Tom Paine’s books and Bradlaugh’s lectures.{31} Come along.
SHIRLEY Ah, if you would only read Tom Paine in the proper spirit, Miss! [They go out through the gate together.]
END OF ACT II.
ACT III
Next day after lunch Lady Britomart is writing in the library in Wilton Crescent. Sarah is reading in the armchair near the window. Barbara, in ordinary dress, pale and brooding, is on the settee. Charles Lomax enters. Coming forward between the settee and the writing table, he starts on seeing Barbara fashionably attired and in low spirits.
LOMAX Youve left off your uniform!
BARBARA says nothing ; but an expression of pain passes over her face.
LADY BRITOMART (warning him in low tones to be careful] Charles!
LOMAX [much concerned, sitting down sympathetically on the settee beside BARBARA] I’m awfully sorry, Barbara. You know I helped you all I could with the concertina and so forth. [Momentously.] Still, I have never shut my eyes to the fact that there is a certain amount of tosh about the Salvation Army. Now the claims of the Church of England —
LADY BRITOMART Thats enough, Charles. Speak of something suited to your mental capacity.
LOMAX But surely the Church of England is suited to all our capacities.
BARBARA [pressing his hand] Thank you for your sympathy, Cholly. Now go and spoon with Sarah.
LOMAX [rising and going to SARAH] How is my ownest today?
SARAH I wish you wouldnt tell Cholly to do things, Barbara. He always comes straight and does them. Cholly: we’re going to the works at Perivale St. Andrews this afternoon.
LOMAX What works?
SARAH The cannon works.
LOMAX What! Your governor’s shop!
SARAH Yes.
LOMAX Oh I say!
CUSINS enters in poor condition. He also starts visibly when he sees BARBARA without her uniform.
BARBARA I expected you this morning, Dolly. Didnt you guess that?
CUSINS [sitting down beside her] I’m sorry. I have only just breakfasted.
SARAH But weve just finished lunch.
BARBARA Have you had one of your bad nights?
CUSINS No: I had rather a good night: in fact, one of the most remarkable nights I have ever passed.
BARBARA The meeting?
CUSINS No: after the meeting.
LADY BRITOMART You should have gone to bed after the meeting. What were you doing?
CUSINS Drinking.
LADY BRITOMART What were you drinking, may I ask?
CUSINS A most devilish kind of Spanish burgundy, warranted free from added alcohoclass="underline" a Temperance burgundy in fact. Its richness in natural alcohol made any addition superfluous.
BARBARA Are you joking, Dolly?
CUSINS [patiently] No. I have been making a night of it with the nominal head of this household: that is all.
LADY BRITOMART Andrew made you drunk!
CUSINS No: he only provided the wine. I think it was Dionysos who made me drunk. [To BARBARA.] I told you I was possessed.
LADY BRITOMART Youre not sober yet. Go home to bed at once.
CUSINS I have never before ventured to reproach you, Lady Brit; but how could you marry the Prince of Darkness?
LADY BRITOMART It was much more excusable to marry him than to get drunk with him. That is a new accomplishment of Andrew‘s, by the way. He usent to drink.
CUSINS He doesnt now. He only sat there and completed the wreck of my moral basis, the rout of my convictions, the purchase of my soul. He cares for you, Barbara. That is what makes him so dangerous to me.
BARBARA That has nothing to do with it, Dolly. There are larger loves and diviner dreams than the fireside ones. You know that, dont you?
CUSINS Yes: that is our understanding. I know it. I hold to it. Unless he can win me on that holier ground he may amuse me for a while; but he can get no deeper hold, strong as he is.
BARBARA Keep to that; and the end will be right. Now tell me what happened at the meeting?
CUSINS It was an amazing meeting. Mrs. Baines almost died of emotion. Jenny Hill went stark mad with hysteria. The Prince of Darkness played his trombone like a madman: its brazen roarings were like the laughter of the damned. 117 conversions took place then and there. They prayed with the most touching sincerity and gratitude for Bodger, and for the anonymous donor of the £5000. Your father would not let his name be given.
LOMAX That was rather fine of the old man, you know. Most chaps would have wanted the advertisement.
CUSINS He said all the charitable institutions would be down on him like kites on a battle field if he gave his name.
LADY BRITOMART Thats Andrew all over. He never does a proper thing without giving an improper reason for it.
CUSINS He convinced me that I have all my life been doing improper things for proper reasons.
LADY BRITOMART Adolphus: now that Barbara has left the Salvation Army, you had better leave it too. I will not have you playing that drum in the streets.
CUSINS Your orders are already obeyed, Lady Brit.
BARBARA Dolly: were you ever really in earnest about it? Would you have joined if you had never seen me?
CUSINS [disingenuously] Well — er — well, possibly, as a collector of religions —
LOMAX [cunningly] Not as a drummer, though, you know.You are a very clearheaded brainy chap, Cholly; and it must have been apparent to you that there is a certain amount of tosh about —
LADY BRITOMART Charles: if you must drivel, drivel like a grown-up man and not like a schoolboy.
LOMAX [out of countenance] Well, drivel is drivel, dont you know, whatever a man’s age.
LADY BRITOMART In good society in England, Charles, men drivel at all ages by repeating silly formulas with an air of wisdom. Schoolboys make their own formulas out of slang, like you. When they reach your age, and get political private secretaryships and things of that sort, they drop slang and get their formulas out of The Spectator or The Times. You had better confine yourself to The Times. You will find that there is a certain amount of tosh about The Times; but at least its language is reputable.
LOMAX [overwhelmed] You are so awfully strong-minded, Lady Brit —