Plays Unpleasant (26 page)

PARAMORE
. I am ready to place my happiness in your hands. Does that prove what I think of you?

JULIA
. Yes: I believe you really care for me. [
He approaches
her eagerly: she has a violent revulsion, and rises with her hand up as if to beat him off, crying
] No, no, no, no. I cannot. It's impossible. [
She goes towards the door
].

PARAMORE
[
looking wistfully after her
] Is it Charteris?

JULIA
[
stopping and turning
] Ah, you think that! [
She comes back
]. Listen to me. If I say yes, will you promise not to touch me? Will you give me time to accustom myself to our new relations?

PARAMORE
. I promise most faithfully. I would not press you for the world.

JULIA
. Then – then – Yes: I Promise.

PARAMORE
. Oh, how unspeakably hap –

JULIA
[
stopping his raptures
] No: not another word. Let us forget it. [
She resumes her seat at the table
]. I havnt touched my tea. [
He hastens to his former seat. As he passes, she puts her left hand on his arm and says
] Be good to me, Percy: I need it sorely.

PARAMORE
[
transported
] You have called me Percy! Hurrah!
Charteris and Craven come in. Paramore hastens to meet them, beaming
.

PARAMORE
. Delighted to see you here with me, Colonel Craven. And you too, Charteris. Sit down. [
The Colonel sits down on the end of the couch
]. Where are the others?

CHARTERIS
. Sylvia has dragged Cuthbertson off into the Burlington Arcade to buy some caramels. He likes to encourage her in eating caramels: he thinks it's a womanly taste. Besides, he likes them himself. Theyll be here presently. [
He strolls across to the cabinet, and pretends to study the Rembrandt photograph, so as to be as far out of Julia's reach as possible
].

CRAVEN
. Yes; and Charteris has been trying to persuade me that theres a short cut between Cork Street and Savile Row somewhere in Conduit Street. Now did you ever hear such nonsense? Then he said my coat was getting shabby, and wanted me to go into Poole's and order a new one. Paramore: is my coat shabby?

PARAMORE
. Not that I can see.

CRAVEN
. I should think not. Then he wanted to draw me into an argument about the Egyptian war. We should have been here quarter of an hour ago only for his nonsense.

CHARTERIS
[
still contemplating Rembrandt
] I did my best to keep him from disturbing you, Paramore.

PARAMORE
[
gratefully
] You kept him exactly the right time, to a second. [
Formally
] Colonel Craven: I have something very particular to say to you.

CRAVEN
[
springing up in alarm
] In private, Paramore: now really it mus t be in private.

PARAMORE
[
surprised
] Of course. I was about to suggest my consulting room: theres nobody there. Miss Craven: will you excuse me: Charteris will entertain you until I return. [
He leads the way to the green baize door
].

CHARTERIS
[
aghast
] Oh, I say, hadnt you better wait until the others come?

PARAMORE
[
exultant
] No need for further delay now, my best friend. [
He wrings Charteris's hand
]. Will you come, Colonel?

CRAVEN
. At your service, Paramore: at your service.

Craven and Paramore go into the consulting room. Julia turns her head, and stares insolently at Charteris. His nerves play him false: he is completely out of countenance in a moment. She rises suddenly. He starts, and comes hastily forward between the table and the bookcase. She crosses to that side behind the table; and he immediately crosses to the opposite side in front of it, dodging her
.

CHARTERIS
[
nervously
] Dont, Julia. Now dont abuse your advantage. Youve got me here at your mercy. Be good for once; and dont make a scene.

JULIA
[
contemptuously
] Do you suppose I am going to touch you?

CHARTERIS
. No. Of course not.

She comes forward on her side of the table. He retreats on his side of it. She looks at him with utter scorn; sweeps across to the
couch; and sits down imperially. With a great sigh of relief he drops into Paramore's chair
.

JULIA
. Come here. I have something to say to you.

CHARTERIS
. Yes? [
He rolls the chair a few inches towards her
].

JULIA
. Come here, I say. I am not going to shout across the room at you. Are you afraid of me?

CHARTERIS
. Horribly. [
He moves the chair slowly, with great misgivings, to the end of the couch
].

JULIA
[
with studied insolence
] Has that woman told you that she has given you up to me without an attempt to defend her conquest?

CHARTERIS
[
whispering persuasively
] Shew that you are capable of the same sacrifice. Give me up too.

JULIA
. Sacrifice! And so you think I'm dying to marry you, do you?

CHARTERIS
. I am afraid your intentions have been honorable, Julia.

JULIA
. You cad!

CHARTERIS
[
with a sigh
] I confess I am something either more or less than a gentleman, Julia. You once gave me the benefit of the doubt.

JULIA
. Indeed! I never told you so. If you cannot behave like a gentleman, you had better go back to the society of the woman who has given you up: if such a coldblooded, cowardly creature can be called a woman. [
She rises majestically: he makes his chair fly back to the table
]. I know you now, Leonard Charteris, through and through, in all your falseness, your petty spite, your cruelty and your vanity. The place you coveted has been won by a man more worthy of it.

CHARTERIS
[
springing up, and coming close to her, gasping with eagerness
] What do you mean? Out with it. Have you accep –

JULIA
. I am engaged to Dr Paramore.

CHARTERIS
[
enraptured
] My own Julia! [
He attempts to embrace her
].

JULIA
[
recoiling: he catching her hands and holding them
] How dare you! Are you mad! Do you wish me to call Dr Paramore?

CHARTERIS
. Call everybody, my darling – everybody in London. Now I shall no longer have to be brutal; to defend myself; to go in fear of you. How I have looked forward to this day! You know now that I dont want you to marry me or to love me: Paramore can have all that. I only want to look on and rejoice disinterestedly in the happiness of [
kissing her hand
] my dear Julia, [
kissing the other
] my beautiful Julia. [
She tears her hands away and raises them as if to strike him, as she did the night before at Cuthbertson's: he faces them with joyous recklessness
]. No use to threaten me now: I am not afraid of those hands: the loveliest hands in the world.

JULIA
. How have you the face to turn round like this after insulting and torturing me?

CHARTERIS
. Never mind, dearest: you never did understand me; and you never will. Our vivisecting friend has made a successful experiment at last.

JULIA
[
earnestly
] It is you who are the vivisector: a far crueller, more wanton vivisector than he.

CHARTERIS
. Yes; but then I learn so much more from my experiments than he does! and the victims learn as much as I do. Thats where my moral superiority comes in.

JULIA
[
sitting down again on the couch with rueful humor
] Well, you shall not experiment on me any more. Go to your Grace if you want a victim. She'll be a tough one.

CHARTERIS
[
reproachfully, sitting down beside her
] And you drove me to propose to her to escape from you! Suppose she had accepted me, where should I be now?

JULIA
. Where
I
am, I suppose, now that I have accepted Paramore.

CHARTERIS
. But I should have made Grace unhappy. [
Julia sneers
]. However, now I come to think of it, youll make Paramore unhappy. And yet if you refuse him he would be in despair. Poor devil!

JULIA
[
her temper flashing up for a moment again
] He is a better man than you.

CHARTERIS
[
humbly
] I grant you that, my dear.

JULIA
[
impetuously
] Dont call me your dear. And what do you mean by saying that I shall make him unhappy? Am I not good enough for him?

CHARTERIS
[
dubiously
] Well, that depends on what you mean by good enough.

JULIA
[
earnestly
] You might have made me good if you had chosen to. You had a great power over me. I was like a child in your hands; and you knew it.

CHARTERIS
. Yes, my dear. That means that whenever you got jealous and flew into a tearing rage, I could always depend on its ending happily if I only waited long enough, and petted you very hard all the time. When you had had your fling, and called the object of your jealousy every name you could lay your tongue to, and abused me to your heart's content for a couple of hours, then the reaction could come; and you would at last subside into a soothing rapture of affection which gave you a sensation of being angelically good and forgiving. Oh, I know that sort of goodness! You may have thought on these occasions that I was bringing out your latent amiability; but I thought you were bringing out mine, and using up rather more than your fair share of it.

JULIA
. According to you, then, I have no good in me. I am an utterly vile worthless woman. Is that it?

CHARTERIS
. Yes, if you are to be judged as you judge others. From the conventional point of view, theres nothing to be said for you, Julia: nothing. Thats why I have to find some other point of view to save my self-respect when I remember how I have loved you. Oh, what I have learnt from you! from you! who could learn nothing from me! I made a fool of you; and you brought me wisdom: I broke your heart; and you brought me joy: I made you curse your womanhood; and you revealed my manhood to me.
Blessings for ever and ever on my Julia's name! [
With genuine emotion, he takes her hand to kiss it again
].

JULIA
[
snatching her hand away in disgust
] Oh, stop talking that nasty sneering stuff.

CHARTERIS
[
laughingly appealing to the heavens
] She calls it nasty sneering stuff! Well, well: I'll never talk like that to you again, dearest. It only means that you are a beautiful woman, and that we all love you.

JULIA
. Dont say that: I hate it. It sounds as if I were a mere animal.

CHARTERIS
. Hm! A fine animal is a very wonderful thing.

Dont let us disparage animals, Julia.

JULIA
. That is what you really think me.

CHARTERIS
. Come, Julia! you dont expect me to admire you for your moral qualities, do you?

Julia turns and looks hard at him. He starts up apprehensively, and backs away from her. She rises and follows him up slowly and intently
.

JULIA
[
deliberately
] I have seen you very much infatuated with this depraved creature who has no moral qualities

CHARTERIS
[
retreating
] Keep off, Julia. Remember your new obligations to Paramore.

JULIA
[
overtaking him in the middle of the room
] Never mind Paramore: that is my business. [
She grasps the lapels of his coat in her hands, and looks fixedly at him
]. Oh, if the people you talk so cleverly to could only know you as I know you! Sometimes I wonder at myself for ever caring for you.

CHARTERIS
[
beaming at her
] Only sometimes?

JULIA
. You fraud! You humbug! You miserable little plaster saint! [
He looks delighted
]. Oh! [
In a paroxysm half of rage, half of tenderness, she shakes him, growling over him like a tigress over her cub
].

Paramore and Craven return from the consulting room, and are thunderstruck at the spectacle
.

CRAVEN
[
shouting, utterly scandalized
] Julia!!

Julia releases Charteris, but stands her ground disdainfully as
they come forward, Craven on her left, Paramore on her right
.

PARAMORE
. Whats the matter?

CHARTERIS
. Nothing, nothing. Youll soon get used to this, Paramore.

CRAVEN
. Now really, Julia, this is a very extraordinary way to behave. It's not fair to Paramore.

JULIA
[
coldly
] If Dr Paramore objects, he can break off our engagement. [
To Paramore
] Pray dont hesitate.

PARAMORE
[
looking doubtfully and anxiously at her
] Do you wish me to break it off?

CHARTERIS
[
alarmed
] Nonsense! dont act so hastily. It was my fault. I annoyed Miss Craven – insulted her. Hang it all, dont go and spoil everything like this.