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her from something you thought rotten; now we all know it's rotten, you hand her over!

[Turns with a short, bitter laugh, walks up stage, then comes back.]

By Jove! I shouldn't be surprised if you consent to the settlement, too!

PIKE

[solemnly]

My son, I shouldn't be surprised if I did.

HORACE

Is the world topsy-turvy? Have I gone crazy?

[With accusing finger pointed at PIKE.]

I'll bet my soul that'll disgust her as much as it does me!

PIKE

My son, I shouldn't be surprised if it would.

HORACE

[staring at him]

By the Lord, but you play a queer game, Mr. Pike!

PIKE

Oh, I'm jest crossing the Rubicon. Your father used to have a saying: "If you're going to cross the Rubicon, cross it. Don't wade out to the middle and stand there; you only get hell from both banks."

[Enter LADY CREECH from the hotel.]

LADY CREECH

[testily]

Mr. Granger-Simpson, have you seen my nephew?[pg 168]

HORACE

No; I've rather avoided that, if you don't mind my saying so.

LADY CREECH

Mr. Granger-Simpson!

HORACE

I'm sorry, Lady Creech, but I've had a most awful shaking-up, and I'm almost thinking of going back home with Mr. Pike. I rather think he's about right in his ideas. You know we abused him, not only for himself, but for his vulgar friend; yet his vulgar friend turned out to be a grand-duke—and look at what our friends turned out to be.

[Goes rapidly into the hotel.]

[ALMERIC'S voice is heard from the grove. "Come along! There's a good fellow!"]

LADY CREECH

Isn't that Almeric?

PIKE

Here he comes, shamed and bending under the blow!

[ALMERIC enters from the grove, leading a bull terrier pup.]

ALMERIC

Mariano, Mariano—I say, Mariano! I say, Aunty, ain't he rippin'? Lucky I got there just as I did—a bounder wanted to buy him five minutes later.

[MARIANO enters from hotel.]

Mariano, do you think you could be trusted to wash him?[pg 169]

MARIANO

Wash him!

ALMERIC

Tepid water, you know; and mind he doesn't take cold; and just a little milk afterward—nothing else but milk, you understand. You be deuced careful, I mean to say.

MARIANO

[with dignity]

I will give him to the porter.

[He carries the animal into the hotel.]

LADY CREECH

Almeric, really, there are more important things, you know.

ALMERIC

But you don't seem to realize I might have missed him altogether. I think I'm rather to be congratulated, you know. What?

PIKE

I think you are, my son. I have given my consent.

ALMERIC

Rippin'!

LADY CREECH

And the settlement?

PIKE

The settlement also—everything!

[ETHEL enters from the hotel, followed by HORACE.]

LADY CREECH

[greatly relieved and overjoyed, starting toward ETHEL]

Ethel, my dear!

ALMERIC

[cheerfully]

I told you it would all be plain sailing, Aunty. There was nothing to worry about.

LADY CREECH

[continuing, to ETHEL]

All shall be [pg 170] forgiven, my child. I am too pleased, too overjoyed in your good-fortune to remember any little bickerings between us. The sky has cleared wonderfully. Everything is settled.

ETHEL

Yes; it's all over; my guardian has consented.

ALMERIC

Of course I never worried about it—but I fancy it will be a weight off the Governor's mind. I'll see that a wire catches him at Naples—and he'll be glad to know what became of that arrangement about the convict fellow, too.

ETHEL

[very seriously]

Almeric, I think it's noble to be brave in trouble, but—

ALMERIC

[puzzled]

I say, you know, you've really got me!

ETHEL

I mean that I admire you for your pluck, for seeming unconcerned under disgrace, but—

ALMERIC

Disgrace? Why, who's disgraced—not even the Governor, as I see it. You got that chap called off, didn't you?

ETHEL

Whom do you mean?

ALMERIC

Why, that convict chap—didn't you send him away? You bought him off, didn't you, so that he won't talk? Gave him money not to bother us?

ETHEL

[rising, and turning on him indignantly]

Why, Heaven pity you! Do you think that?[pg 171]

ALMERIC

Oh—what?—he wouldn't agree to be still? Oh, I say, that'll be rather a pill for the Governor—he'll be a bit worried, you know.

ETHEL

Don't you see that it's time for you to worry a little for yourself? That you've got to begin at once to do something worthy that will obliterate this shame—to begin a career—to work—to work!

ALMERIC

[puzzled]

But? But I mean to say, though—but what for? What possible need will there be for an extreme like that? Don't you see, in the first place, there's the settlement—

ETHEL

[aghast]

Settlement! You talk of settlement, now.

LADY CREECH

[angrily]

Settlement, certainly there's the settlement!

ETHEL

What for?

LADY CREECH

Why, don't you understand—you're to be the Countess of Hawcastle, aren't you?

ALMERIC

Why—hasn't he told you?—the only obstacle on earth between us was this fellow's consent to the settlement, and he's just given it.

ETHEL

[dazed and angry]

Do you mean to say he's consented to that!

ALMERIC

Why, to be sure—he's just consented with his own lips—didn't you?

PIKE

[gravely]

I did.[pg 172]

LADY CREECH

Don't you see, don't you hear that—he's consented? He didn't mumble his words—don't you hear him?

ETHEL

I do, and disbelieve my own ears. Yesterday, when I wanted something I thought of value—and that was a name—he refused to let me buy it—to-day, when I know that that name is less than nothing, worse than nothing—he bids me give my fortune for it. What manner of man is this! And you,

[to LADY CREECH and ALMERIC]

what are you that after last night you come to me and ask a settlement?

LADY CREECH

[angrily]

Certainly we do—would you expect to enter a family like this and bring nothing?

ALMERIC

I can't see that the situation has changed since yesterday. I don't stick out for the precise amount the Governor said. If it ought to be less on account of that little affair last night—why, we should be the last people in the world to haggle over a few thousand pounds—

ETHEL

[with a cry of rage and relief]

Oh! That is the final word of my humiliation! I felt that you were in shame and dishonor, and, because of that, I was ready to keep my word—to stand by you, to help you make yourself into something like a man—to [pg 173] give my life to you. That you permitted the sacrifice was enough! Now you ask me to PAY for the privilege of making it, I am released! I am free! I am not that man's property to give away!

LADY CREECH

[violently]

You're beside yourself. Isn't this what we've been wanting all the time?

ALMERIC

But slow up a bit—didn't you say you'd stick?

ETHEL

Any promise I ever made to you is a thousand times cancelled. This is final!

[With concentrated rage, turning to PIKE.]

And as for you—never presume to speak to me again!

ALMERIC

[to LADY CREECH]

Most extraordinary girl—she's rather dreadful, isn't she?

LADY CREECH

[with agitation]

Give me your arm, Almeric.

[They go into the hotel.]

ETHEL

[to PIKE]

What have you to say to me?

[PIKE raises his hands slowly, with palms outward, and drops them.]

ETHEL

What explanation have you to make?

PIKE

None.

ETHEL

That's because you don't care what I [pg 174] think of you.

[Bitterly.]

Indeed, you've already shown that, when you were willing to give me up to those people, and to let me pay them for taking me! You let me romanticize to you about honor and duty and sympathy—about my efforts to make that creature a man—and you pretended to sympathize with me, and you knew all the time it was only the money they were after!

PIKE

[humbly]

Well, I shouldn't be surprised.

ETHEL

Didn't you have the faint little understanding of me enough to see that their asking for money, now—would horrify me? Didn't you know that your consenting to it, leaving me free to give it to them, would release me—make me free to deny everything to them?

PIKE

[slowly]

Well, I shouldn't be surprised if I had seen that.

ETHEL

[staggered]

You mean you've been saving me again from myself, from my silliness, from my romanticism, that you've given me another revelation of the falsity, the unreality of my attitude toward these people, and toward life.

PIKE

[placatingly]

No, no!

ETHEL

[vehemently]

You'd always say that, you'd always deny it—it's like you.

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