epub:type="z3998:persona">Vivie
Can’t afford it. I shall put in another six hours’ work before I go to bed.
Frank
Can’t afford it, can’t we? Aha! Look here. He takes out a handful of sovereigns and makes them chink. Gold, Viv, gold!
Vivie
Where did you get it?
Frank
Gambling, Viv: gambling. Poker.
Vivie
Pah! It’s meaner than stealing it. No: I’m not coming. She sits down to work at the table, with her back to the glass door, and begins turning over the papers.
Frank
Remonstrating piteously. But, my dear Viv, I want to talk to you ever so seriously.
Vivie
Very well: sit down in Honoria’s chair and talk here. I like ten minutes’ chat after tea. He murmurs. No use groaning: I’m inexorable. He takes the opposite seat disconsolately. Pass that cigar box, will you?
Frank
Pushing the cigar box across. Nasty womanly habit. Nice men don’t do it any longer.
Vivie
Yes: they object to the smell in the office; and we’ve had to take to cigarettes. See! She opens the box and takes out a cigarette, which she lights. She offers him one; but he shakes his head with a wry face. She settles herself comfortably in her chair, smoking. Go ahead.
Frank
Well, I want to know what you’ve done—what arrangements you’ve made.
Vivie
Everything was settled twenty minutes after I arrived here. Honoria has found the business too much for her this year; and she was on the point of sending for me and proposing a partnership when I walked in and told her I hadn’t a farthing in the world. So I installed myself and packed her off for a fortnight’s holiday. What happened at Haslemere when I left?
Frank
Nothing at all. I said you’d gone to town on particular business.
Vivie
Well?
Frank
Well, either they were too flabbergasted to say anything, or else Crofts had prepared your mother. Anyhow, she didn’t say anything; and Crofts didn’t say anything; and Praddy only stared. After tea they got up and went; and I’ve not seen them since.
Vivie
Nodding placidly with one eye on a wreath of smoke. That’s all right.
Frank
Looking round disparagingly. Do you intend to stick in this confounded place?
Vivie
Blowing the wreath decisively away, and sitting straight up. Yes. These two days have given me back all my strength and self-possession. I will never take a holiday again as long as I live.
Frank
With a very wry face. Mps! You look quite happy—and as hard as nails.
Vivie
Grimly. Well for me that I am!
Frank
Rising. Look here, Viv: we must have an explanation. We parted the other day under a complete misunderstanding.
Vivie
Putting away the cigarette. Well: clear it up.
Frank
You remember what Crofts said?
Vivie
Yes.
Frank
That revelation was supposed to bring about a complete change in the nature of our feeling for one another. It placed us on the footing of brother and sister.
Vivie
Yes.
Frank
Have you ever had a brother?
Vivie
No.
Frank
Then you don’t know what being brother and sister feels like? Now I have lots of sisters: Jessie and Georgina and the rest. The fraternal feeling is quite familiar to me; and I assure you my feeling for you is not the least in the world like it. The girls will go their way; I will go mine; and we shan’t care if we never see one another again. That’s brother and sister. But as to you, I can’t be easy if I have to pass a week without seeing you. That’s not brother and sister. It’s exactly what I felt an hour before Crofts made his revelation. In short, dear Viv, it’s love’s young dream.
Vivie
Bitingly. The same feeling, Frank, that brought your father to my mother’s feet. Is that it?
Frank
Revolted. I very strongly object, Viv, to have my feelings compared to any which the Reverend Samuel is capable of harboring; and I object still more to a comparison of you to your mother. Resuming his perch. Besides, I don’t believe the story. I have taxed my father with it, and obtained from him what I consider tantamount to a denial.
Vivie
What did he say?
Frank
He said he was sure there must be some mistake.
Vivie
Do you believe him?
Frank
I am prepared to take his word against Crofts’.
Vivie
Does it make any difference? I mean in your imagination or conscience; for of course it makes no real difference.
Frank
Shaking his head. None whatever to me.
Vivie
Nor to me.
Frank
Staring. But this is ever so surprising! He goes back to his chair. I thought our whole relations were altered in your imagination and conscience, as you put it, the moment those words were out of that brute’s muzzle.
Vivie
No: it was not that. I didn’t believe him. I only wish I could.
Frank
Eh?
Vivie
I think brother and sister would be a very suitable relation for us.
Frank
You really mean that?
Vivie
Yes. It’s the only relation I care for, even if we could afford any other. I mean that.
Frank
Raising his eyebrows like one on whom a new light has dawned, and rising with quite an effusion of chivalrous sentiment. My dear Viv: why didn’t you say so before? I am ever so sorry for persecuting you. I understand, of course.
Vivie
Puzzled. Understand what?
Frank
Oh, I’m not a fool in the ordinary sense—only in the Scriptural sense of doing all the things the wise man declared to be folly, after trying them himself on the most extensive scale. I see I am no longer Vivvums’ little boy. Don’t be alarmed: I shall never call you Vivvums again—at least unless you get tired of your new little boy, whoever he may be.
Vivie
My new little boy!
Frank
With conviction. Must be a new little boy. Always happens that way. No other way, in fact.
Vivie
None that you know of, fortunately for you.
Someone knocks at the door.
Frank
My curse upon yon caller, whoe’er he be!
Vivie
It’s Praed. He’s going to
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