a splendid position, but it is your splendid position that makes you so vulnerable. You can’t defend it! And I am in attack. Of course I have not talked morality to you. You must admit in fairness that I have spared you that. Years ago you did a clever, unscrupulous thing; it turned out a great success. You owe to it your fortune and position. And now you have got to pay for it. Sooner or later we have all to pay for what we do. You have to pay now. Before I leave you tonight, you have got to promise me to suppress your report, and to speak in the House in favour of this scheme.
SIR ROBERT CHILTERN. What you ask is impossible.
MRS. CHEVELEY. You must make it possible. You are going to make it possible. Sir Robert, you know what your English newspapers are like. Suppose that when I leave this house I drive down to some newspaper office, and give them this scandal and the proofs of it! Think of their loathsome joy, of the delight they would have in dragging you down, of the mud and mire they would plunge you in. Think of the hypocrite with his greasy smile penning his leading article, and arranging the foulness of the public placard.
SIR ROBERT CHILTERN. Stop! You want me to withdraw the report and to make a short speech stating that I believe there are possibilities in the scheme?
MRS. CHEVELEY. [Sitting down on the sofa.] Those are my terms.
SIR ROBERT CHILTERN. [In a low voice.] I will give you any sum of money you want.
MRS. CHEVELEY. Even you are not rich enough, Sir Robert, to buy back your past. No man is.
SIR ROBERT CHILTERN. I will not do what you ask me. I will not.
MRS. CHEVELEY. You have to. If you don’t … [Rises from the sofa.]
SIR ROBERT CHILTERN. [Bewildered and unnerved.] Wait a moment! What did you propose? You said that you would give me back my letter, didn’t you?
MRS. CHEVELEY. Yes. That is agreed. I will be in the Ladies’ Gallery tomorrow night at half-past eleven. If by that time — and you will have had heaps of opportunity — you have made an announcement to the House in the terms I wish, I shall hand you back your letter with the prettiest thanks, and the best, or at any rate the most suitable, compliment I can think of. I intend to play quite fairly with you. One should always play fairly … when one has the winning cards. The Baron taught me that … amongst other things.
SIR ROBERT CHILTERN. You must let me have time to consider your proposal.
MRS. CHEVELEY. No; you must settle now!
SIR ROBERT CHILTERN. Give me a week — three days!
MRS. CHEVELEY. Impossible! I have got to telegraph to Vienna tonight.
SIR ROBERT CHILTERN. My God! what brought you into my life?
MRS. CHEVELEY. Circumstances. [Moves towards the door.]
SIR ROBERT CHILTERN. Don’t go. I consent. The report shall be withdrawn. I will arrange for a question to be put to me on the subject.
MRS. CHEVELEY. Thank you. I knew we should come to an amicable agreement. I understood your nature from the first. I analysed you, though you did not adore me. And now you can get my carriage for me, Sir Robert. I see the people coming up from supper, and Englishmen always get romantic after a meal, and that bores me dreadfully. [Exit SIR ROBERT CHILTERN.]
[Enter Guests, LADY CHILTERN, LADY MARKBY, LORD CAVERSHAM, LADY BASILDON, MRS. MARCHMONT, VICOMTE DE NANJAC, MR. MONTFORD.]
LADY MARKBY. Well, dear Mrs. Cheveley, I hope you have enjoyed yourself. Sir Robert is very entertaining, is he not?
MRS. CHEVELEY. Most entertaining! I have enjoyed my talk with him immensely.
LADY MARKBY. He has had a very interesting and brilliant career. And he has married a most admirable wife. Lady Chiltern is a woman of the very highest principles, I am glad to say. I am a little too old now, myself, to trouble about setting a good example, but I always admire people who do. And Lady Chiltern has a very ennobling effect on life, though her dinner-parties are rather dull sometimes. But one can’t have everything, can one? And now I must go, dear. Shall I call for you tomorrow?
MRS. CHEVELEY. Thanks.
LADY MARKBY. We might drive in the Park at five. Everything looks so fresh in the Park now!
MRS. CHEVELEY. Except the people!
LADY MARKBY. Perhaps the people are a little jaded. I have often observed that the Season as it goes on produces a kind of softening of the brain. However, I think anything is better than high intellectual pressure. That is the most unbecoming thing there is. It makes the noses of the young girls so particularly large. And there is nothing so difficult to marry as a large nose; men don’t like them. Good-night, dear! [To LADY CHILTERN.] Good-night, Gertrude! [Goes out on LORD CAVERSHAM’S arm.]
MRS. CHEVELEY. What a charming house you have, Lady Chiltern! I have spent a delightful evening. It has been so interesting getting to know your husband.
LADY CHILTERN. Why did you wish to meet my husband, Mrs. Cheveley?
MRS. CHEVELEY. Oh, I will tell you. I wanted to interest him in this Argentine Canal scheme, of which I dare say you have heard. And I found him most susceptible, — susceptible to reason, I mean. A rare thing in a man. I converted him in ten minutes. He is going to make a speech in the House tomorrow night in favour of the idea. We must go to the Ladies’ Gallery and hear him! It will be a great occasion!
LADY CHILTERN. There must be some mistake. That scheme could never have my husband’s support.
MRS. CHEVELEY. Oh, I assure you it’s all settled. I don’t regret my tedious journey from Vienna now. It has been a great success. But, of course, for the next twenty-four hours the whole thing is a dead secret.
LADY CHILTERN. [Gently.] A secret? Between whom?
MRS. CHEVELEY. [With a flash of amusement in her eyes.] Between your husband and myself.
SIR ROBERT CHILTERN. [Entering.] Your carriage is here, Mrs. Cheveley!
MRS. CHEVELEY. Thanks! Good evening, Lady Chiltern! Good-night, Lord Goring! I am at Claridge’s. Don’t you think you might leave a card?
LORD GORING. If you wish it, Mrs. Cheveley!
MRS. CHEVELEY. Oh, don’t be so solemn about it, or I shall be obliged to leave a card on you. In England I suppose that would hardly be considered en règle. Abroad, we are more civilised. Will you see me down, Sir Robert? Now that we have both the same interests at heart we shall be great friends, I hope!
[Sails out on SIR ROBERT CHILTERN’S arm. LADY CHILTERN goes to the top of the staircase and looks down at them as they descend. Her expression is troubled. After a little time she is joined by some of the guests, and passes with them into another reception-room.]
MABEL CHILTERN. What a horrid woman!
LORD GORING. You should go to bed, Miss Mabel.
MABEL CHILTERN. Lord Goring!
LORD GORING. My father told me to go to bed an hour ago. I don’t see why I shouldn’t give you the same advice. I always pass on good advice. It is the only thing to do with it. It is never of any use to oneself.
MABEL CHILTERN. Lord Goring, you are always ordering me out of the room. I think it most courageous of you. Especially as I am not going to bed for hours. [Goes over to the sofa.] You can come and sit down if you like, and talk about anything in the world, except the Royal Academy, Mrs. Cheveley, or novels in Scotch dialect. They are not improving subjects. [Catches sight of something that is lying on the sofa half hidden by the cushion.] What is this? Some one has dropped a diamond brooch! Quite beautiful, isn’t it? [Shows it to him.] I wish it was mine, but Gertrude won’t let me wear anything but pearls, and I am thoroughly sick of pearls. They make one look so plain, so good and so intellectual. I wonder whom the brooch belongs to.
LORD GORING. I wonder who dropped it.
MABEL CHILTERN. It is a beautiful brooch.
LORD GORING. It is a