LORD CAVERSHAM. Well, sir? am I to wait attendance on you?
LORD GORING. [Considerably perplexed.] In a moment, father. Do excuse me. [LORD CAVERSHAM goes back.] Well, remember my instructions, Phipps — into that room.
PHIPPS. Yes, my lord.
[LORD GORING goes into the smoking-room. HAROLD, the footman shows MRS. CHEVELEY in. Lamia-like, she is in green and silver. She has a cloak of black satin, lined with dead rose-leaf silk.]
HAROLD. What name, madam?
MRS. CHEVELEY. [To PHIPPS, who advances towards her.] Is Lord Goring not here? I was told he was at home?
PHIPPS. His lordship is engaged at present with Lord Caversham, madam.
[Turns a cold, glassy eye on HAROLD, who at once retires.]
MRS. CHEVELEY. [To herself.] How very filial!
PHIPPS. His lordship told me to ask you, madam, to be kind enough to wait in the drawing-room for him. His lordship will come to you there.
MRS. CHEVELEY. [With a look of surprise.] Lord Goring expects me?
PHIPPS. Yes, madam.
MRS. CHEVELEY. Are you quite sure?
PHIPPS. His lordship told me that if a lady called I was to ask her to wait in the drawing-room. [Goes to the door of the drawing-room and opens it.] His lordship’s directions on the subject were very precise.
MRS. CHEVELEY. [To herself] How thoughtful of him! To expect the unexpected shows a thoroughly modern intellect. [Goes towards the drawing-room and looks in.] Ugh! How dreary a bachelor’s drawing-room always looks. I shall have to alter all this. [PHIPPS brings the lamp from the writing-table.] No, I don’t care for that lamp. It is far too glaring. Light some candles.
PHIPPS. [Replaces lamp.] Certainly, madam.
MRS. CHEVELEY. I hope the candles have very becoming shades.
PHIPPS. We have had no complaints about them, madam, as yet.
[Passes into the drawing-room and begins to light the candles.]
MRS. CHEVELEY. [To herself.] I wonder what woman he is waiting for tonight. It will be delightful to catch him. Men always look so silly when they are caught. And they are always being caught. [Looks about room and approaches the writing-table.] What a very interesting room! What a very interesting picture! Wonder what his correspondence is like. [Takes up letters.] Oh, what a very uninteresting correspondence! Bills and cards, debts and dowagers! Who on earth writes to him on pink paper? How silly to write on pink paper! It looks like the beginning of a middle-class romance. Romance should never begin with sentiment. It should begin with science and end with a settlement. [Puts letter down, then takes it up again.] I know that handwriting. That is Gertrude Chiltern’s. I remember it perfectly. The ten commandments in every stroke of the pen, and the moral law all over the page. Wonder what Gertrude is writing to him about? Something horrid about me, I suppose. How I detest that woman! [Reads it.] ‘I trust you. I want you. I am coming to you. Gertrude.’ ‘I trust you. I want you. I am coming to you.’
[A look of triumph comes over her face. She is just about to steal the letter, when PHIPPS comes in.]
PHIPPS. The candles in the drawing-room are lit, madam, as you directed.
MRS. CHEVELEY. Thank you. [Rises hastily and slips the letter under a large silver-cased blotting-book that is lying on the table.]
PHIPPS. I trust the shades will be to your liking, madam. They are the most becoming we have. They are the same as his lordship uses himself when he is dressing for dinner.
MRS. CHEVELEY. [With a smile.] Then I am sure they will be perfectly right.
PHIPPS. [Gravely.] Thank you, madam.
[MRS. CHEVELEY goes into the drawing-room. PHIPPS closes the door and retires. The door is then slowly opened, and MRS. CHEVELEY comes out and creeps stealthily towards the writing-table. Suddenly voices are heard from the smoking-room. MRS. CHEVELEY grows pale, and stops. The voices grow louder, and she goes back into the drawing-room, biting her lip.]
[Enter LORD GORING and LORD CAVERSHAM.]
LORD GORING. [Expostulating.] My dear father, if I am to get married, surely you will allow me to choose the time, place, and person? Particularly the person.
LORD CAVERSHAM. [Testily.] That is a matter for me, sir. You would probably make a very poor choice. It is I who should be consulted, not you. There is property at stake. It is not a matter for affection. Affection comes later on in married life.
LORD GORING. Yes. In married life affection comes when people thoroughly dislike each other, father, doesn’t it? [Puts on LORD CAVERSHAM’S cloak for him.]
LORD CAVERSHAM. Certainly, sir. I mean certainly not, air. You are talking very foolishly tonight. What I say is that marriage is a matter for common sense.
LORD GORING. But women who have common sense are so curiously plain, father, aren’t they? Of course I only speak from hearsay.
LORD CAVERSHAM. No woman, plain or pretty, has any common sense at all, sir. Common sense is the privilege of our sex.
LORD GORING. Quite so. And we men are so self-sacrificing that we never use it, do we, father?
LORD CAVERSHAM. I use it, sir. I use nothing else.
LORD GORING. So my mother tells me.
LORD CAVERSHAM. It is the secret of your mother’s happiness. You are very heartless, sir, very heartless.
LORD GORING. I hope not, father.
[Goes out for a moment. Then returns, looking rather put out, with SIR ROBERT CHILTERN.]
SIR ROBERT CHILTERN. My dear Arthur, what a piece of good luck meeting you on the doorstep! Your servant had just told me you were not at home. How extraordinary!
LORD GORING. The fact is, I am horribly busy tonight, Robert, and I gave orders I was not at home to any one. Even my father had a comparatively cold reception. He complained of a draught the whole time.
SIR ROBERT CHILTERN. Ah! you must be at home to me, Arthur. You are my best friend. Perhaps by tomorrow you will be my only friend. My wife has discovered everything.
LORD GORING. Ah! I guessed as much!
SIR ROBERT CHILTERN. [Looking at him.] Really! How?
LORD GORING. [After some hesitation.] Oh, merely by something in the expression of your face as you came in. Who told her?
SIR ROBERT CHILTERN. Mrs. Cheveley herself. And the woman I love knows that I began my career with an act of low dishonesty, that I built up my life upon sands of shame — that I sold, like a common huckster, the secret that had been intrusted to me as a man of honour. I thank heaven poor Lord Radley died without knowing that I betrayed him. I would to God I had died before I had been so horribly tempted, or had fallen so low. [Burying his face in his hands.]
LORD GORING. [After a pause.] You have heard nothing from Vienna yet, in answer to your wire?
SIR ROBERT CHILTERN. [Looking up.] Yes; I got a telegram from the first secretary at eight o’clock tonight.
LORD GORING. Well?
SIR ROBERT CHILTERN. Nothing is absolutely known against her. On the contrary, she occupies a rather high position in society. It is a sort of open secret that Baron Arnheim left her the greater portion of his immense fortune. Beyond that I can learn nothing.
LORD GORING. She doesn’t turn out to be a spy, then?
SIR ROBERT CHILTERN. Oh! spies are of no use nowadays. Their profession is over. The newspapers do their work instead.
LORD GORING. And thunderingly well they do it.
SIR ROBERT CHILTERN. Arthur, I am parched with thirst. May I ring for something? Some hock and seltzer?