Delphi Collected Works of W. Somerset Maugham (Illustrated)

by William Somerset Maugham

  Elizabeth. [Smiling.] I don’t believe you’re a very good business man.

  Teddie. [Sharply.] You don’t know what you’re talking about. I’m a first-rate business man, but somehow this is different. [Hopelessly.] I don’t know why it won’t go right.

  Elizabeth. What are we going to do about it?

  Teddie. You see, it’s not just because you’re awfully pretty that I love you. I’d love you just as much if you were old and ugly. It’s you I love, not what you look like. And it’s not only love; love be blowed! It’s that I like you so tremendously. I think you’re such a ripping good sort. I just want to be with you. I feel so jolly and happy just to think you’re there. I’m so awfully fond of you.

  Elizabeth. [Laughing through her tears.] I don’t know if this is your idea of introducing a business proposition.

  Teddie. Damn you, you won’t let me.

  Elizabeth. You said “Damn you.”

  Teddie. I meant it.

  Elizabeth. Your voice sounded as if you meant it, you perfect duck!

  Teddie. Really, Elizabeth, you’re intolerable.

  Elizabeth. I’m doing nothing.

  Teddie. Yes, you are, you’re putting me off my blow. What I want to say is perfectly simple. I’m a very ordinary business man.

  Elizabeth. You’ve said that before.

  Teddie. [Angrily.] Shut up. I haven’t got a bob besides what I earn. I’ve got no position. I’m nothing. You’re rich and you’re a big pot and you’ve got everything that anyone can want. It’s awful cheek my saying anything to you at all. But after all there’s only one thing that really matters in the world, and that’s love. I love you. Chuck all this, Elizabeth, and come to me.

  Elizabeth. Are you cross with me?

  Teddie. Furious.

  Elizabeth. Darling!

  Teddie. If you don’t want me tell me so at once and let me get out quickly.

  Elizabeth. Teddie, nothing in the world matters anything to me but you. I’ll go wherever you take me. I love you.

  Teddie. [All to pieces.] Oh, my God!

  Elizabeth. Does it mean as much to you as that? Oh, Teddie!

  Teddie. [Trying to control himself.] Don’t be a fool, Elizabeth.

  Elizabeth. It’s you’re the fool. You’re making me cry.

  Teddie. You’re so damned emotional.

  Elizabeth. Damned emotional yourself. I’m sure you’re a rotten business man.

  Teddie. I don’t care what you think. You’ve made me so awfully happy. I say, what a lark life’s going to be!

  Elizabeth. Teddie, you are an angel.

  Teddie. Let’s get out quick. It’s no good wasting time. Elizabeth.

  Elizabeth. What?

  Teddie. Nothing. I just like to say Elizabeth.

  Elizabeth. You fool!

  Teddie. I say, can you shoot?

  Elizabeth. No.

  Teddie. I’ll teach you. You don’t know how ripping it is to start out from your camp at dawn and travel through the jungle. And you’re so tired at night and the sky’s all starry. It’s a fair treat. Of course I didn’t want to say anything about all that till you’d decided. I’d made up my mind to be absolutely practical.

  Elizabeth. [Chaffing him.] The only practical thing you said was that love is the only thing that really matters.

  Teddie. [Happily.] Pull the other leg next time, will you? I should have to have one longer than the other.

  Elizabeth. Isn’t it fun being in love with some one who’s in love with you?

  Teddie. I say, I think I’d better clear out at once, don’t you? It seems rather rotten to stay on in — in this house.

  Elizabeth. You can’t go to-night. There’s no train.

  Teddie. I’ll go to-morrow. I’ll wait in London till you’re ready to join me.

  Elizabeth. I’m not going to leave a note on the pincushion like Lady Kitty, you know. I’m going to tell Arnold.

  Teddie. Are you? Don’t you think there’ll be an awful bother?

  Elizabeth. I must face it. I should hate to be sly and deceitful.

  Teddie. Well, then, let’s face it together.

  Elizabeth. No, I’ll talk to Arnold by myself.

  Teddie. You won’t let anyone influence you?

  Elizabeth. No.

  [He holds out his hand and she takes it. They look into one another’s eyes with grave, almost solemn affection. There is the sound outside of a car driving up.

  Elizabeth. There’s the car. Arnold’s come back. I must go and bathe my eyes. I don’t want them to see I’ve been crying.

  Teddie. All right. [As she is going.] Elizabeth.

  Elizabeth. [Stopping.] What?

  Teddie. Bless you.

  Elizabeth. [Affectionately.] Idiot!

  [She goes out of the door and Teddie through the French window into the garden. For an instant the room is empty. Arnold comes in. He sits down and takes some papers out of his despatch-case. Lady Kitty enters. He gets up.

  Lady Kitty. I saw you come in. Oh, my dear, don’t get up. There’s no reason why you should be so dreadfully polite to me.

  Arnold. I’ve just rung for a cup of tea.

  Lady Kitty. Perhaps we shall have the chance of a little talk. We don’t seem to have had five minutes by ourselves. I want to make your acquaintance, you know.

  Arnold. I should like you to know that it’s not by my wish that my father is here.

  Lady Kitty. But I’m so interested to see him.

  Arnold. I was afraid that you and Lord Porteous must find it embarrassing.

  Lady Kitty. Oh, no. Hughie was his greatest friend. They were at Eton and Oxford together. I think your father has improved so much since I saw him last. He wasn’t good-looking as a young man, but now he’s quite handsome.

  [The Footman brings in a tray on which are tea-things.

  Lady Kitty. Shall I pour it out for you?

  Arnold. Thank you very much.

  Lady Kitty. Do you take sugar?

  Arnold. No. I gave it up during the war.

  Lady Kitty. So wise of you. It’s so bad for the figure. Besides being patriotic, of course. Isn’t it absurd that I should ask my son if he takes sugar or not? Life is really very quaint. Sad, of course, but oh, so quaint! Often I lie in bed at night and have a good laugh to myself as I think how quaint life is.

  Arnold. I’m afraid I’m a very serious person.

  Lady Kitty. How old are you now, Arnold?

  Arnold. Thirty-five.

  Lady Kitty. Are you really? Of course, I was a child when I married your father.

  Arnold. Really. He always told me you were twenty-two.

  Lady Kitty. Oh, what nonsense! Why, I was married out of the nursery. I put my hair up for the first time on my wedding-day.

  Arnold. Where is Lord Porteous?

  Lady Kitty. My dear, it sounds too absurd to hear you call him Lord Porteous. Why don’t you call him — Uncle Hughie?

  Arnold. He doesn’t happen to be my uncle.

  Lady Kitty. No, but he’s your godfather. You know, I’m sure you’ll like him when you know him better. I’m so hoping that you and Elizabeth will come and stay with us in Florence. I simply adore Elizabeth. She’s too beautiful.

  Arnold. Her hair is very pretty.

  Lady Kitty. It’s not touched up, is it?

  Arnold. Oh, no.

  Lady Kitty. I just wondered. It’s rather a coincidence that her hair should be the same colour as mine. I suppose it shows that your father and you are attracted by just the same thing. So interesting, heredity, isn’t it?

  Arnold. Very.

  Lady Kitty. Of course, since I joined the Catholic Church I don’t believe in it any more. Darwin and all that sort of thing. Too dreadful. Wicked, you know. Besides, it’s not very good form, is it?

  [Champion-Cheney comes in from the garden.

  C.-C. Do I intrude?

  Lady Kitty. Come in, Clive. Arnold and I have been having such a wonderful heart-to-heart talk.

  C.-C. Very
nice.

  Arnold. Father, I stepped in for a moment at the Harveys’ on my way back. It’s simply criminal what they’re doing with that house.

  C.-C. What are they doing?

  Arnold. It’s an almost perfect Georgian house and they’ve got a lot of dreadful Victorian furniture. I gave them my ideas on the subject, but it’s quite hopeless. They said they were attached to their furniture.

  C.-C. Arnold should have been an interior decorator.

  Lady Kitty. He has wonderful taste. He gets that from me.

  Arnold. I suppose I have a certain flair. I have a passion for decorating houses.

  Lady Kitty. You’ve made this one charming.

  C.-C. D’you remember, we just had chintzes and comfortable chairs when we lived here, Kitty.

  Lady Kitty. Perfectly hideous, wasn’t it?

  C.-C. In those days gentlemen and ladies were not expected to have taste.

  Arnold. You know, I’ve been looking at this chair again. Since Lord Porteous said the legs weren’t right I’ve been very uneasy.

  Lady Kitty. He only said that because he was in a bad temper.

  C.-C. His temper seems to me very short these days, Kitty.

  Lady Kitty. Oh, it is.

  Arnold. You feel he knows what he’s talking about. I gave seventy-five pounds for that chair. I’m very seldom taken in. I always think if a thing’s right you feel it.

  C.-C. Well, don’t let it disturb your night’s rest.

  Arnold. But, my dear father, that’s just what it does. I had a most horrible dream about it last night.

  Lady Kitty. Here is Hughie.

  Arnold. I’m going to fetch a book I have on Old English furniture. There’s an illustration of a chair which is almost identical with this one.

  [Porteous comes in.

  Porteous. Quite a family gathering, by George!

  C.-C. I was thinking just now we’d make a very pleasing picture of a typical English home.

  Arnold. I’ll be back in five minutes. There’s something I want to show you, Lord Porteous.

  [He goes out.

  C.-C. Would you like to play piquet with me, Hughie?

  Porteous. Not particularly.

  C.-C. You were never much of a piquet player, were you?

  Porteous. My dear Clive, you people don’t know what piquet is in England.

  C.-C. Let’s have a game then. You may make money.

  Porteous. I don’t want to play with you.

  Lady Kitty. I don’t know why not, Hughie.

  Porteous. Let me tell you that I don’t like your manner.

  C.-C. I’m sorry for that. I’m afraid I can’t offer to change it at my age.

  Porteous. I don’t know what you want to be hanging around here for.

  C.-C. A natural attachment to my home.

  Porteous. If you’d had any tact you’d have kept out of the way while we were here.

  C.-C. My dear Hughie, I don’t understand your attitude at all. If I’m willing to let bygones be bygones why should you object?

  Porteous. Damn it all, they’re not bygones.

  C.-C. After all, I am the injured party.

  Porteous. How the devil are you the injured party?

  C.-C. Well, you did run away with my wife, didn’t you?

  Lady Kitty. Now, don’t let’s go into ancient history. I can’t see why we shouldn’t all be friends.

  Porteous. I beg you not to interfere, Kitty.

  Lady Kitty. I’m very fond of Clive.

  Porteous. You never cared two straws for Clive. You only say that to irritate me.

  Lady Kitty. Not at all. I don’t see why he shouldn’t come and stay with us.

  C.-C. I’d love to. I think Florence in spring-time is delightful. Have you central heating?

  Porteous. I never liked you, I don’t like you now, and I never shall like you.

  C.-C. How very unfortunate! because I liked you, I like you now, and I shall continue to like you.

  Lady Kitty. There’s something very nice about you, Clive.

  Porteous. If you think that, why the devil did you leave him?

  Lady Kitty. Are you going to reproach me because I loved you? How utterly, utterly, utterly detestable you are!

  C.-C. Now, now, don’t quarrel with one another.

  Lady Kitty. It’s all his fault. I’m the easiest person in the world to live with. But really he’d try the patience of a saint.

  C.-C. Come, come, don’t get upset, Kitty. When two people live together there must be a certain amount of give and take.

  Porteous. I don’t know what the devil you’re talking about.

  C.-C. It hasn’t escaped my observation that you are a little inclined to frip. Many couples are. I think it’s a pity.

  Porteous. Would you have the very great kindness to mind your own business?

  Lady Kitty. It is his business. He naturally wants me to be happy.

  C.-C. I have the very greatest affection for Kitty.

  Porteous. Then why the devil didn’t you look after her properly?

  C.-C. My dear Hughie, you were my greatest friend. I trusted you. It may have been rash.

  Porteous. It was inexcusable.

  Lady Kitty. I don’t know what you mean by that, Hughie.

  Porteous. Don’t, don’t, don’t try and bully me, Kitty.

  Lady Kitty. Oh, I know what you mean.

  Porteous. Then why the devil did you say you didn’t?

  Lady Kitty. When I think that I sacrificed everything for that man! And for thirty years I’ve had to live in a filthy marble palace with no sanitary conveniences.

  C.-C. D’you mean to say you haven’t got a bathroom?

  Lady Kitty. I’ve had to wash in a tub.

  C.-C. My poor Kitty, how you’ve suffered!

  Porteous. Really, Kitty, I’m sick of hearing of the sacrifices you made. I suppose you think I sacrificed nothing. I should have been Prime Minister by now if it hadn’t been for you.

  Lady Kitty. Nonsense!

  Porteous. What do you mean by that? Everyone said I should be Prime Minister. Shouldn’t I have been Prime Minister, Clive?

  C.-C. It was certainly the general expectation.

  Porteous. I was the most promising young man of my day. I was bound to get a seat in the Cabinet at the next election.

  Lady Kitty. They’d have found you out just as I’ve found you out. I’m sick of hearing that I ruined your career. You never had a career to ruin. Prime Minister! You haven’t the brain. You haven’t the character.

  C.-C. Cheek, push, and a gift of the gab will serve very well instead, you know.

  Lady Kitty. Besides, in politics it’s not the men that matter. It’s the women at the back of them. I could have made Clive a Cabinet Minister if I’d wanted to.

  Porteous. Clive?

  Lady Kitty. With my beauty, my charm, my force of character, my wit, I could have done anything.

  Porteous. Clive was nothing but my political secretary. When I was Prime Minister I might have made him Governor of some Colony or other. Western Australia, say. Out of pure kindliness.

  Lady Kitty. [With flashing eyes.] D’you think I would have buried myself in Western Australia? With my beauty? My charm?

  Porteous. Or Barbadoes, perhaps.

  Lady Kitty. [Furiously.] Barbadoes! Barbadoes can go to — Barbadoes.

  Porteous. That’s all you’d have got.

  Lady Kitty. Nonsense! I’d have India.

  Porteous. I would never have given you India.

  Lady Kitty. You would have given me India.

  Porteous. I tell you I wouldn’t.

  Lady Kitty. The King would have given me India. The nation would have insisted on my having India. I would have been a vice-reine or nothing.

  Porteous. I tell you that as long as the interests of the British Empire — Damn it all, my teeth are coming out!

  [He hurries from the room.

  Lady Kitty. It’s too much. I can’t bear it any more. I’ve put
up with him for thirty years and now I’m at the end of my tether.

  C.-C. Calm yourself, my dear Kitty.

  Lady Kitty. I won’t listen to a word. I’ve quite made up my mind. It’s finished, finished, finished. [With a change of tone.] I was so touched when I heard that you never lived in this house again after I left it.

  C.-C. The cuckoos have always been very plentiful. Their note has a personal application which, I must say, I have found extremely offensive.

  Lady Kitty. When I saw that you didn’t marry again I couldn’t help thinking that you still loved me.

  C.-C. I am one of the few men I know who is able to profit by experience.

  Lady Kitty. In the eyes of the Church I am still your wife. The Church is so wise. It knows that in the end a woman always comes back to her first love. Clive, I am willing to return to you.

  C.-C. My dear Kitty, I couldn’t take advantage of your momentary vexation with Hughie to let you take a step which I know you would bitterly regret.

  Lady Kitty. You’ve waited for me a long time. For Arnold’s sake.

  C.-C. Do you think we really need bother about Arnold? In the last thirty years he’s had time to grow used to the situation.

  Lady Kitty. [With a little smile.] I think I’ve sown my wild oats, Clive.

  C.-C. I haven’t. I was a good young man, Kitty.

  Lady Kitty. I know.

  C.-C. And I’m very glad, because it has enabled me to be a wicked old one.

  Lady Kitty. I beg your pardon.

  [Arnold comes in with a large book in his hand.

  Arnold. I say, I’ve found the book I was hunting for. Oh! isn’t Lord Porteous here?

  Lady Kitty. One moment, Arnold. Your father and I are busy.

  Arnold. I’m so sorry.

  [He goes out into the garden.

  Lady Kitty. Explain yourself, Clive.

  C.-C. When you ran away from me, Kitty, I was sore and angry and miserable. But above all I felt a fool.

  Lady Kitty. Men are so vain.

  C.-C. But I was a student of history, and presently I reflected that I shared my misfortune with very nearly all the greatest men.

  Lady Kitty. I’m a great reader myself. It has always struck me as peculiar.

  C.-C. The explanation is very simple. Women dislike intelligence, and when they find it in their husbands they revenge themselves on them in the only way they can, by making them — well, what you made me.

  Lady Kitty. It’s ingenious. It may be true.