第 8 页

[Taking up a sketch] Theres a little sketch I made of her yesterday.

RIDGEON. She shewed it to me a fortnight ago when she first called on

me.

LOUIS [quite unabashed] Oh! did she? Good Lord! how time does fly! I

could have sworn I'd only just finished it. It's hard for her here,

seeing me piling up drawings and nothing coming in for them. Of course I

shall sell them next year fast enough, after my one-man-show; but while

the grass grows the steed starves. I hate to have her coming to me for

money, and having none to give her. But what can I do?

RIDGEON. I understood that Mrs Dubedat had some property of her own.

Louis. Oh yes, a little; but how could a man with any decency of feeling

touch that? Suppose I did, what would she have to live on if I died? I'm

not insured: cant afford the premiums. [Picking out another drawing] How

do you like that?

RIDGEON [putting it aside] I have not come here to-day to look at your

drawings. I have more serious and pressing business with you.

LOUIS. You want to sound my wretched lung. [With impulsive candor] My

dear Ridgeon: I'll be frank with you. Whats the matter in this house

isnt lungs but bills. It doesnt matter about me; but Jennifer has

actually to economize in the matter of food. Youve made us feel that we

can treat you as a friend. Will you lend us a hundred and fifty pounds?

RIDGEON. No.

LOUIS [surprised] Why not?

RIDGEON. I am not a rich man; and I want every penny I can spare and

more for my researches.

LOUIS. You mean youd want the money back again.

RIDGEON. I presume people sometimes have that in view when they lend

money.

LOUIS [after a moment's reflection] Well, I can manage that for you.

I'll give you a cheque--or see here: theres no reason why you shouldnt

have your bit too: I'll give you a cheque for two hundred.

RIDGEON. Why not cash the cheque at once without troubling me?

LOUIS. Bless you! they wouldnt cash it: I'm overdrawn as it is. No:

the way to work it is this. I'll postdate the cheque next October. In

October Jennifer's dividends come in. Well, you present the cheque. It

will be returned marked "refer to drawer" or some rubbish of that sort.

Then you can take it to Jennifer, and hint that if the cheque isnt taken

up at once I shall be put in prison. She'll pay you like a shot. Youll

clear 50 pounds; and youll do me a real service; for I do want the money

very badly, old chap, I assure you.

RIDGEON [staring at him] You see no objection to the transaction; and

you anticipate none from me!

LOUIS. Well, what objection can there be? It's quite safe. I can

convince you about the dividends.

RIDGEON. I mean on the score of its being--shall I say dishonorable?

LOUIS. Well, of course I shouldnt suggest it if I didnt want the money.

RIDGEON. Indeed! Well, you will have to find some other means of getting

it.

LOUIS. Do you mean that you refuse?

RIDGEON. Do I mean--! [letting his indignation loose] Of course I

refuse, man. What do you take me for? How dare you make such a proposal

to me?

LOUIS. Why not?

RIDGEON. Faugh! You would not understand me if I tried to explain. Now,

once for all, I will not lend you a farthing. I should be glad to help

your wife; but lending you money is no service to her.

LOUIS. Oh well, if youre in earnest about helping her, I'll tell you

what you might do. You might get your patients to buy some of my things,

or to give me a few portrait commissions.

RIDGEON. My patients call me in as a physician, not as a commercial

traveller.

A knock at the door.

Louis goes unconcernedly to open it, pursuing the subject as he goes.

LOUIS. But you must have great influence with them. You must know such

lots of things about them--private things that they wouldnt like to have

known. They wouldnt dare to refuse you.

RIDGEON [exploding] Well, upon my--

Louis opens the door, and admits Sir Patrick, Sir Ralph, and Walpole.

RIDGEON [proceeding furiously] Walpole: Ive been here hardly ten

minutes; and already he's tried to borrow 150 pounds from me. Then he

proposed that I should get the money for him by blackmailing his wife;

and youve just interrupted him in the act of suggesting that I should

blackmail my patients into sitting to him for their portraits.

LOUIS. Well, Ridgeon, if this is what you call being an honorable man! I

spoke to you in confidence.

SIR PATRICK. We're all going to speak to you in confidence, young man.

WALPOLE [hanging his hat on the only peg left vacant on the hat-stand]

We shall make ourselves at home for half an hour, Dubedat. Dont be

alarmed: youre a most fascinating chap; and we love you.

LOUIS. Oh, all right, all right. Sit down--anywhere you can. Take

this chair, Sir Patrick [indicating the one on the throne]. Up-z-z-z!

[helping him up: Sir Patrick grunts and enthrones himself]. Here you

are, B. B. [Sir Ralph glares at the familiarity; but Louis, quite

undisturbed, puts a big book and a sofa cushion on the dais, on Sir

Patrick's right; and B. B. sits down, under protest]. Let me take your

hat. [He takes B. B.'s hat unceremoniously, and substitutes it for

the cardinal's hat on the head of the lay figure, thereby ingeniously

destroying the dignity of the conclave. He then draws the piano stool

from the wall and offers it to Walpole]. You dont mind this, Walpole, do

you? [Walpole accepts the stool, and puts his hand into his pocket for

his cigaret case. Missing it, he is reminded of his loss].

WALPOLE. By the way, I'll trouble you for my cigaret case, if you dont

mind?

LOUIS. What cigaret case?

WALPOLE. The gold one I lent you at the Star and Garter.

LOUIS [surprised] Was that yours?

WALPOLE. Yes.

LOUIS. I'm awfully sorry, old chap. I wondered whose it was. I'm sorry

to say this is all thats left of it. [He hitches up his smock; produces

a card from his waistcoat pocket; and hands it to Walpole].

WALPOLE. A pawn ticket!

LOUIS [reassuringly] It's quite safe: he cant sell it for a year,

you know. I say, my dear Walpole, I am sorry. [He places his hand

ingenuously on Walpole's shoulder and looks frankly at him].

WALPOLE [sinking on the stool with a gasp] Dont mention it. It adds to

your fascination.

RIDGEON [who has been standing near the easel] Before we go any further,

you have a debt to pay, Mr Dubedat.

LOUIS. I have a precious lot of debts to pay, Ridgeon. I'll fetch you a

chair. [He makes for the inner door].

RIDGEON [stopping him] You shall not leave the room until you pay it.

It's a small one; and pay it you must and shall. I dont so much mind

your borrowing 10 pounds from one of my guests and 20 pounds from the

other--

WALPOLE. I walked into it, you know. I offered it.

RIDGEON.--they could afford it. But to clean poor Blenkinsop out of his

last half-crown was damnable. I intend to give him that half-crown and

to be in a position to pledge him my word that you paid it. I'll have

that out of you, at all events.

B. B. Quite right, Ridgeon. Quite right. Come, young man! down with the

dust. Pay up.

LOUIS. Oh, you neednt make such a fuss about it. Of course I'll pay it.

I had no idea the poor fellow was hard up. I'm as shocked as any of you

about it. [Putting his hand into his pocket] Here you are. [Finding

his pocket empty] Oh, I say, I havnt any money on me just at present.

Walpole: would you mind lending me half-a-crown just to settle this.

WALPOLE. Lend you half--[his voice faints away].

LOUIS. Well, if you dont, Blenkinsop wont get it; for I havnt a rap: you

may search my pockets if you like.

WALPOLE. Thats conclusive. [He produces half-a-crown].

LOUIS [passing it to Ridgeon] There! I'm really glad thats settled:

it was the only thing that was on my conscience. Now I hope youre all

satisfied.

SIR PATRICK. Not quite, Mr Dubedat. Do you happen to know a young woman

named Minnie Tinwell?

LOUIS. Minnie! I should think I do; and Minnie knows me too. She's a

really nice good girl, considering her station. Whats become of her?

WALPOLE. It's no use bluffing, Dubedat. Weve seen Minnie's marriage

lines.

LOUIS [coolly] Indeed? Have you seen Jennifer's?

RIDGEON [rising in irrepressible rage] Do you dare insinuate that Mrs

Dubedat is living with you without being married to you?

LOUIS. Why not?

B. B. { [echoing him in } Why not!

SIR PATRICK { various tones of } Why not!

RIDGEON { scandalized } Why not!

WALPOLE { amazement] } Why not!

LOUIS. Yes, why not? Lots of people do it: just as good people as you.

Why dont you learn to think, instead of bleating and bashing like a

lot of sheep when you come up against anything youre not accustomed to?

[Contemplating their amazed faces with a chuckle] I say: I should like

to draw the lot of you now: you do look jolly foolish. Especially you,

Ridgeon. I had you that time, you know.

RIDGEON. How, pray?

LOUIS. Well, you set up to appreciate Jennifer, you know. And you

despise me, dont you?

RIDGEON [curtly] I loathe you. [He sits down again on the sofa].

LOUIS. Just so. And yet you believe that Jennifer is a bad lot because

you think I told you so.

RIDGEON. Were you lying?

LOUIS. No; but you were smelling out a scandal instead of keeping your

mind clean and wholesome. I can just play with people like you. I only

asked you had you seen Jennifer's marriage lines; and you concluded

straight away that she hadnt got any. You dont know a lady when you see

one.

B. B. [majestically] What do you mean by that, may I ask?

LOUIS. Now, I'm only an immoral artist; but if YOUD told me that

Jennifer wasnt married, I'd have had the gentlemanly feeling and

artistic instinct to say that she carried her marriage certificate in

her face and in her character. But you are all moral men; and Jennifer

is only an artist's wife--probably a model; and morality consists in

suspecting other people of not being legally married. Arnt you ashamed

of yourselves? Can one of you look me in the face after it?

WALPOLE. Its very hard to look you in the face, Dubedat; you have such a

dazzling cheek. What about Minnie Tinwell, eh?

LOUIS. Minnie Tinwell is a young woman who has had three weeks of

glorious happiness in her poor little life, which is more than most

girls in her position get, I can tell you. Ask her whether she'd take it

back if she could. She's got her name into history, that girl. My little

sketches of her will be bought by collectors at Christie's. She'll have

a page in my biography. Pretty good, that, for a still-room maid at a

seaside hotel, I think. What have you fellows done for her to compare

with that?

RIDGEON. We havnt trapped her into a mock marriage and deserted her.

LOUIS. No: you wouldnt have the pluck. But dont fuss yourselves. I didnt

desert little Minnie. We spent all our money--

WALPOLE. All HER money. Thirty pounds.

LOUIS. I said all our money: hers and mine too. Her thirty pounds didnt

last three days. I had to borrow four times as much to spend on her. But

I didnt grudge it; and she didnt grudge her few pounds either, the brave

little lassie. When we were cleaned out, we'd had enough of it: you

can hardly suppose that we were fit company for longer than that: I an

artist, and she quite out of art and literature and refined living and

everything else. There was no desertion, no misunderstanding, no police

court or divorce court sensation for you moral chaps to lick your lips

over at breakfast. We just said, Well, the money's gone: weve had a good

time that can never be taken from us; so kiss; part good friends; and

she back to service, and I back to my studio and my Jennifer, both the

better and happier for our holiday.

WALPOLE. Quite a little poem, by George!'

B. B. If you had been scientifically trained, Mr Dubedat, you would

know how very seldom an actual case bears out a principle. In medical

practice a man may die when, scientifically speaking, he ought to have

lived. I have actually known a man die of a disease from which he

was scientifically speaking, immune. But that does not affect the

fundamental truth of science. In just the same way, in moral cases, a

man's behavior may be quite harmless and even beneficial, when he is

morally behaving like a scoundrel. And he may do great harm when he is

morally acting on the highest principles. But that does not affect the

fundamental truth of morality.

SIR PATRICK. And it doesnt affect the criminal law on the subject of

bigamy.

LOUIS. Oh bigamy! bigamy! bigamy! What a fascination anything connected

with the police has for you all, you moralists! Ive proved to you that

you were utterly wrong on the moral point: now I'm going to shew you

that youre utterly wrong on the legal point; and I hope it will be a

lesson to you not to be so jolly cocksure next time.

WALPOLE. Rot! You were married already when you married her; and that

settles it.

LOUIS. Does it! Why cant you think? How do you know she wasnt married

already too?

B.B. { [all } Walpole! Ridgeon!

RIDGEON { crying } This is beyond everything!

WALPOLE { out } Well, damn me!

SIR PATRICK { together] } You young rascal.

LOUIS [ignoring their outcry] She was married to the steward of a liner.

He cleared out and left her; and she thought, poor girl, that it was the

law that if you hadnt heard of your husband for three years you might

marry again. So as she was a thoroughly respectable girl and refused

to have anything to say to me unless we were married I went through the

ceremony to please her and to preserve her self-respect.

RIDGEON. Did you tell her you were already married?

LOUIS. Of course not. Dont you see that if she had known, she wouldnt

have considered herself my wife? You dont seem to understand, somehow.

SIR PATRICK. You let her risk imprisonment in her ignorance of the law?

LOUIS. Well, _I_ risked imprisonment for her sake. I could have been had

up for it just as much as she. But when a man makes a sacrifice of that

sort for a woman, he doesnt go and brag about it to her; at least, not