I hope I don't disturb you. (Candida starts up violently, but without the smallest embarrassment, laughing at herself. Eugene, still kneeling, saves himself from falling by putting his hands on the seat of the chair, and remains there, staring open mouthed at Morell.)
CANDIDA (as she rises). Oh, James, how you startled me! I was so taken up with Eugene that I didn't hear your latch-key. How did the meeting go off? Did you speak well?
MORELL. I have never spoken better in my life.
CANDIDA. That was first rate! How much was the collection?
MORELL. I forgot to ask.
CANDIDA (to Eugene). He must have spoken splendidly, or he would never have forgotten that. (To Morell.) Where are all the others?
MORELL. They left long before I could get away: I thought I should never escape. I believe they are having supper somewhere.
CANDIDA (in her domestic business tone). Oh; in that case, Maria may go to bed. I'll tell her. (She goes out to the kitchen.)
MORELL (looking sternly down at Marchbanks). Well?
MARCHBANKS (squatting cross-legged on the hearth-rug, and actually at ease with Morell—even impishly humorous). Well?
MORELL. Have you anything to tell me?
MARCHBANKS. Only that I have been making a fool of myself here in private whilst you have been making a fool of yourself in public.
MORELL. Hardly in the same way, I think.
MARCHBANKS (scrambling up—eagerly). The very, very, VERY same way. I have been playing the good man just like you. When you began your heroics about leaving me here with Candida—
MORELL (involuntarily). Candida?
MARCHBANKS. Oh, yes: I've got that far. Heroics are infectious: I caught the disease from you. I swore not to say a word in your absence that I would not have said a month ago in your presence.
MORELL. Did you keep your oath?
MARCHBANKS. (suddenly perching himself grotesquely on the easy chair). I was ass enough to keep it until about ten minutes ago. Up to that moment I went on desperately reading to her—reading my own poems—anybody's poems—to stave off a conversation. I was standing outside the gate of Heaven, and refusing to go in. Oh, you can't think how heroic it was, and how uncomfortable! Then—
MORELL (steadily controlling his suspense). Then?
MARCHBANKS (prosaically slipping down into a quite ordinary attitude in the chair). Then she couldn't bear being read to any longer.
MORELL. And you approached the gate of Heaven at last?
MARCHBANKS. Yes.
MORELL. Well? (Fiercely.) Speak, man: have you no feeling for me?
MARCHBANKS (softly and musically). Then she became an angel; and there was a flaming sword that turned every way, so that I couldn't go in; for I saw that that gate was really the gate of Hell.
MORELL (triumphantly). She repulsed you!
MARCHBANKS (rising in wild scorn). No, you fool: if she had done that I should never have seen that I was in Heaven already. Repulsed me! You think that would have saved me—virtuous indignation! Oh, you are not worthy to live in the same world with her. (He turns away contemptuously to the other side of the room.)
MORELL (who has watched him quietly without changing his place). Do you think you make yourself more worthy by reviling me, Eugene?
MARCHBANKS. Here endeth the thousand and first lesson. Morell: I don't think much of your preaching after all: I believe I could do it better myself. The man I want to meet is the man that Candida married.
MORELL. The man that—? Do you mean me?
MARCHBANKS. I don't mean the Reverend James Mavor Morell, moralist and windbag. I mean the real man that the Reverend James must have hidden somewhere inside his black coat—the man that Candida loved. You can't make a woman like Candida love you by merely buttoning your collar at the back instead of in front.
MORELL (boldly and steadily). When Candida promised to marry me, I was the same moralist and windbag that you now see. I wore my black coat; and my collar was buttoned behind instead of in front. Do you think she would have loved me any the better for being insincere in my profession?
MARCHBANKS (on the sofa hugging his ankles). Oh, she forgave you, just as she forgives me for being a coward, and a weakling, and what you call a snivelling little whelp and all the rest of it. (Dreamily.) A woman like that has divine insight: she loves our souls, and not our follies and vanities and illusions, or our collars and coats, or any other of the rags and tatters we are rolled up in. (He reflects on this for an instant; then turns intently to question Morell.) What I want to know is how you got past the flaming sword that stopped me.
MORELL (meaningly). Perhaps because I was not interrupted at the end of ten minutes.
MARCHBANKS (taken aback). What!
MORELL. Man can climb to the highest summits; but he cannot dwell there long.
MARCHBANKS. It's false: there can he dwell for ever and there only. It's in the other moments that he can find no rest, no sense of the silent glory of life. Where would you have me spend my moments, if not on the summits?
MORELL. In the scullery, slicing onions and filling lamps.
MARCHBANKS. Or in the pulpit, scrubbing cheap earthenware souls?
MORELL. Yes, that, too. It was there that I earned my golden moment, and the right, in that moment, to ask her to love me. I did not take the moment on credit; nor did I use it to steal another man's happiness.
MARCHBANKS (rather disgustedly, trotting back towards the fireplace). I have no doubt you conducted the transaction as honestly as if you were buying a pound of cheese. (He stops on the brink of the hearth-rug and adds, thoughtfully, to himself, with his back turned to Morell) I could only go to her as a beggar.
MORELL (starting). A beggar dying of cold—asking for her shawl?
MARCHBANKS (turning, surprised). Thank you for touching up my poetry. Yes, if you like, a beggar dying of cold asking for her shawl.
MORELL (excitedly). And she refused. Shall I tell you why she refused? I CAN tell you, on her own authority. It was because of—
MARCHBANKS. She didn't refuse.
MORELL. Not!
MARCHBANKS. She offered me all I chose to ask for, her shawl, her wings, the wreath of stars on her head, the lilies in her hand, the crescent moon beneath her feet—
MORELL (seizing him). Out with the truth, man: my wife is my wife: I want no more of your poetic fripperies. I know well that if I have lost her love and you have gained it, no law will bind her.
MARCHBANKS (quaintly, without fear or resistance). Catch me by the shirt collar, Morell: she will arrange it for me afterwards as she did this morning. (With quiet rapture.) I shall feel her hands touch me.
MORELL. You young imp, do you know how dangerous it is to say that to me? Or (with a sudden misgiving) has something made you brave?
MARCHBANKS. I'm not afraid now. I disliked you before: that was why I shrank from your touch. But I saw to-day—when she tortured you—that you love her. Since then I have been your friend: you may strangle me if you like.
MORELL (releasing him). Eugene: if that is not a heartless lie—if you have a spark of human feeling left in you—will you tell me what has happened during my absence?
MARCHBANKS. What happened! Why, the flaming sword—(Morell stamps with impatience.) Well, in plain prose, I loved her so exquisitely that I wanted nothing more than the happiness of being in such love. And before I had time to come down from the highest summits, you came in.
MORELL (suffering deeply). So it is still unsettled—still the misery of doubt.
MARCHBANKS.