Misalliance

consecutive, at all events. I can think as well as talk. Bentley To Tarleton, chuckling. Had you there, old man, hadn’t he? You are rather all over the shop with your ideas, ain’t you? Johnny Handsomely. I’m not saying anything against you, Governor. But I do say that the time has come for sane, healthy, unpretending men like me to make a stand against this conspiracy of the writing and talking and artistic lot to put us in the back row. It isn’t a fact that we’re inferior to them: it’s a put-up job; and it’s they that have put the job up. It’s we that run the country for them; and all the thanks we get is to be told we’re Philistines and vulgar tradesmen and sordid city men and so forth, and that they’re all angels of light and leading. The time has come to assert ourselves and put a stop to their stuck-up nonsense. Perhaps if we had nothing better to do than talking or writing, we could do it better than they. Anyhow, they’re the failures and refuse of business (hardly a man of them that didn’t begin in an office) and we’re the successes of it. Thank God I haven’t failed yet at anything; and I don’t believe I should fail at literature if it would pay me to turn my hand to it. Bentley Hear, hear! Mrs. Tarleton Fancy you writing a book, Johnny! Do you think he could, Lord Summerhays? Lord Summerhays Why not? As a matter of fact all the really prosperous authors I have met since my return to England have been very like him. Tarleton Again impressed. That’s an idea. That’s a new idea. I believe I ought to have made Johnny an author. I’ve never said so before for fear of hurting his feelings, because, after all, the lad can’t help it; but I’ve never thought Johnny worth tuppence as a man of business. Johnny Sarcastic. Oh! You think you’ve always kept that to yourself, do you, Governor? I know your opinion of me as well as you know it yourself. It takes one man of business to appreciate another; and you aren’t, and you never have been, a real man of business. I know where Tarleton’s would have been three of four times if it hadn’t been for me. With a snort and a nod to emphasize the implied warning, he retreats to the Turkish bath, and lolls against it with an air of good-humoured indifference. Tarleton Well, who denies it? You’re quite right, my boy. I don’t mind confessing to you all that the circumstances that condemned me to keep a shop are the biggest tragedy in modern life. I ought to have been a writer. I’m essentially a man of ideas. When I was a young man I sometimes used to pray that I might fail, so that I should be justified in giving up business and doing something: something first-class. But it was no good: I couldn’t fail. I said to myself that if I could only once go to my Chickabiddy here and show her a chartered accountant’s statement proving that I’d made £20 less than last year, I could ask her to let me chance Johnny’s and Hypatia’s future by going into literature. But it was no good. First it was £250 more than last year. Then it was £700. Then it was £2,000. Then I saw it was no use: Prometheus was chained to his rock: read Shelley: read Mrs. Browning. Well, well, it was not to be. He rises solemnly. Lord Summerhays: I ask you to excuse me for a few moments. There are times when a man needs to meditate in solitude on his destiny. A chord is touched; and he sees the drama of his life as a spectator sees a play. Laugh if you feel inclined: no man sees the comic side of it more than I. In the theatre of life everyone may be amused except the actor. Brightening. There’s an idea in this: an idea for a picture. What a pity young Bentley is not a painter! Tarleton meditating on his destiny. Not in a toga. Not in the trappings of the tragedian or the philosopher. In plain coat and trousers: a man like any other man. And beneath that coat and trousers a human soul. Tarleton’s Underwear! He goes out gravely into the vestibule. Mrs. Tarleton Fondly. I suppose it’s a wife’s partiality, Lord Summerhays; but I do think John is really great. I’m sure he was meant to be a king. My father looked down on John, because he was a rate collector, and John kept a shop. It hurt his pride to have to borrow money so often from John; and he used to console himself by saying, “After all, he’s only a linendraper.” But at last one day he said to me, “John is a king.” Bentley How much did he borrow on that occasion? Lord Summerhays Sharply. Bentley! Mrs. Tarleton Oh, don’t scold the child: he’d have to say something like that if it was to be his last word on earth. Besides, he’s quite right: my poor father had asked for his usual five pounds; and John gave him a hundred in his big way. Just like a king. Lord Summerhays Not at all. I had five kings to manage in Jinghiskahn; and I think you do your husband some injustice, Mrs. Tarleton. They pretended to like me because I kept their brothers from murdering them; but I didn’t like them. And I like Tarleton. Mrs. Tarleton Everybody does. I really must go and make the cook do him a Welsh rabbit. He expects one on special occasions. She goes to the inner door. Johnny: when he comes back ask him where we’re to put that new Turkish bath. Turkish baths are his latest. She goes out. Johnny Coming forward again. Now that the Governor has given himself away, and the