Waste | Page 7

Not flirtation.
AMY O'CONNELL. [With an air of self-revelation.] I don't know. To keep one's place in the world, I suppose, one's self-respect and a sense of humour.
TREBELL. Is that difficult?
AMY O'CONNELL. To get what I want, without paying more than it's worth to me....?
TREBELL. Never to be reckless.
AMY O'CONNELL. [With a side-glance.] One isn't so often tempted.
TREBELL. In fact ... to flirt with life generally. Now, what made your husband marry you?
AMY O'CONNELL. [Dealing with the impertinence in her own fashion.] What would make you marry me? Don't say: Nothing on earth.
TREBELL. [Speaking apparently of someone else.] A prolonged fit of idleness might make me marry ... a clever woman. But I've never been idle for more than a week. And I've never met a clever woman ... worth calling a woman.
AMY O'CONNELL. [Bringing their talk back to herself, and fastidiously.] Justin has all the natural instincts.
TREBELL. He's Roman Catholic, isn't he?
AMY O'CONNELL. So am I ... by profession.
TREBELL. It's a poor religion unless you really believe in it.
AMY O'CONNELL. [Appealing to him.] If I were to live at Linaskea and have as many children as God sent, I should manage to make Justin pretty miserable! And what would be left of me at all I should like to know?
TREBELL. So Justin lives at Linaskea alone?
AMY O'CONNELL. I'm told now there's a pretty housemaid ... [she shrugs.]
TREBELL. Does he drink too?
AMY O'CONNELL. Oh, no. You'd like Justin, I daresay. He's clever. The thirteenth century's what he knows about. He has done a book on its statutes ... has been doing another.
TREBELL. And after an evening's hard work I find you here ready to flirt with.
AMY O'CONNELL. What have you been working at?
TREBELL. A twentieth century statute perhaps. That's not any concern of yours either.
She does not follow his thought.
AMY O'CONNELL. No, I prefer you in your unprofessional moments.
TREBELL. Real flattery. I didn't know I had any.
AMY O'CONNELL. That's why you should flirt with me ... Henry ... to cultivate them. I'm afraid you lack imagination.
TREBELL. One must choose something to lack in this life.
AMY O'CONNELL. Not develop your nature to its utmost capacity.
TREBELL. And then?
AMY O'CONNELL. Well, if that's not an end in itself ... [With a touch of romantic piety.] I suppose there's the hereafter.
TREBELL. [Grimly material.] What, more developing! I watch people wasting time on themselves with amazement ... I refuse to look forward to wasting eternity.
AMY O'CONNELL. [Shaking her head.] You are very self-satisfied.
TREBELL. Not more so than any machine that runs smoothly. And I hope not self-conscious.
AMY O'CONNELL. [Rather attractively treating him as a child.] It would do you good to fall really desperately in love with me ... to give me the power to make you unhappy.
He suddenly becomes very definite.
TREBELL. At twenty-three I engaged myself to be married to a charming and virtuous fool. I broke it off.
AMY O'CONNELL. Did she mind much?
TREBELL. We both minded. But I had ideals of womanhood that I wouldn't sacrifice to any human being. Then I fell in with a woman who seduced me, and for a whole year led me the life of a French novel ... played about with my emotion as I had tortured that other poor girl's brains. Education you'd call it in the one case as I called it in the other. What a waste of time!
AMY O'CONNELL. And what has become of your ideal?
TREBELL. [Relapsing to his former mood.] It's no longer a personal matter.
AMY O'CONNELL. [With coquetry.] You're not interested in my character?
TREBELL. Oh, yes, I am ... up to kissing point.
She does not shrink, but speaks with just a shade of contempt.
AMY O'CONNELL. You get that far more easily than a woman. That's one of my grudges against men. Why can't women take love-affairs so lightly?
TREBELL. There are reasons. But make a good beginning with this one. Kiss me at once.
He leans towards her. She considers him quite calmly.
AMY O'CONNELL. No.
TREBELL. When will you, then?
AMY O'CONNELL. When I can't help myself ... if that time ever comes.
TREBELL. [Accepting the postponement in a business-like spirit.] Well ... I'm an impatient man.
AMY O'CONNELL. [Confessing engagingly.] I made up my mind to bring you within arms' length of me when we'd met at Lady Percival's. Do you remember? [His face shows no sign of it.] It was the day after your speech on the Budget.
TREBELL. Then I remember. But I haven't observed the process.
AMY O'CONNELL. [Subtly.] Your sister grew to like me very soon. That's all the cunning there has been.
TREBELL. The rest is just mutual attraction?
AMY O'CONNELL. And opportunities.
TREBELL. Such as this.
At the drop of their voices they become conscious of the silent house.
AMY O'CONNELL. Do you really think everyone has gone to bed?
TREBELL. [Disregardful.] And what is it makes my pressing attentions endurable ... if one may ask?
AMY O'CONNELL. Some spiritual