Beside the
question
altogether.
Kipling - Poems
Please let it pass.
SHE. This once--yes--and a second time, and again and again, all through
the years when I shall be unable to resent it. You want too much, my
Lancelot, and. . . you know too much.
HE. How do you mean?
SHE. That is a part of the punishment. There cannot be perfect trust
between us.
HE. In Heaven's name, why not?
SHE. Hush! The Other Place is quite enough. Ask yourself.
HE. I don't follow.
SHE. You trust me so implicitly that when I look at another man--Never
mind, Guy. Have you ever made love to a girl--a good girl?
HE. Something of the sort. Centuries ago--in the Dark Ages, before I
ever met you, dear.
SHE. Tell me what you said to her.
HE. What does a man say to a girl? I've forgotten.
SHE. I remember. He tells her that he trusts her and worships the ground
she walks on, and that he'll love and honor and protect her till her
dying day; and so she marries in that belief. At least, I speak of one
girl who was not protected.
HE. Well, and then?
SHE. And then, Guy, and then, that girl needs ten times the love and
trust and honor--yes, honor--that was enough when she was only a mere
wife if--if--the other life she chooses to lead is to be made even
bearable. Do you understand?
HE. Even bearable! It'll he Paradise.
SHE. Ah! Can you give me all I've asked for--not now, nor a few months
later, but when you begin to think of what you might have done if you
had kept your own appointment and your caste here--when you begin to
look upon me as a drag and a burden? I shall want it most, then, Guy,
for there will be no one in the wide world but you.
HE. You're a little over-tired tonight, Sweetheart, and you're taking a
stage view of the situation. After the necessary business in the Courts,
the road is clear to--
SHE. "The holy state of matrimony! " Ha! ha! ha!
HE. Ssh! Don't laugh in that horrible way!
SHE. I-I c-c-c-can't help it! Isn't it too absurd! Ah! Ha! ha! ha! Guy,
stop me quick or I shall--l-l-laugh till we get to the Church.
HE. For goodness' sake, stop! Don't make an exhibition of yourself. What
is the matter with you?
SHE. N-nothing. I'm better now.
HE. That's all right. One moment, dear. There's a little wisp of hair
got loose from behind your right ear and it's straggling over your
cheek. So!
SHE. Thank'oo. I'm 'fraid my hat's on one side, too.
HE. What do you wear these huge dagger bonnet-skewers for? They're big
enough to kill a man with.
SHE. Oh! Don't kill me, though. You're sticking it into my head! Let me
do it. You men are so clumsy.
HE. Have you had many opportunities of comparing us--in this sort of
work?
SHE. Guy, what is my name?
HE. Eh! I don't follow.
SHE. Here's my cardcase. Can you read?
HE. Yes. Well?
SHE. Well, that answers your question. You know the other man's name. Am
I sufficiently humbled, or would you like to ask me if there is any one
else?
HE. I see now. My darling, I never meant that for an instant. I was only
joking. There! Lucky there's no one on the road. They'd be scandalized.
SHE. They'll be more scandalized before the end.
HE. Do-on't! I don't like you to talk in that way.
SHE. Unreasonable man! Who asked me to face the situation and accept
it? Tell me, do I look like Mrs. Penner? Do I look like a naughty woman?
Swear I don't! Give me your word of honor, my honorable friend, that I'm
not like Mrs. Buzgago. That's the way she stands, with her hands clasped
at the back of her head. D'you like that?
HE. Don't be affected.
SHE. I'm not. I'm Mrs. Buzgago. Listen!
Pendant une anne' toute entiere
Le regiment n'a pas r'paru.
Au Ministere de la Guerre
On le r'porta comme perdu.
On se r'noncait a r'trouver sa trace,
Quand un matin subitement,
On le vit r'paraitre sur la place
L'Colonel toujours en avant.
That's the way she rolls her r's. Am I like her?
HE. No, but I object when you go on like an actress and sing stuff of
that kind. Where in the world did you pick up the Chanson du Colonel? It
isn't a drawing-room song. It isn't proper.
SHE. Mrs. Buzgago taught it me. She is both drawing-room and proper, and
in another month she'll shut her drawing-room to me, and thank God she
isn't as improper as I am. Oh, Guy, Guy! I wish I was like some women
and had no scruples about--what is it Keene says? --"Wearing a corpse's
hair and being false to the bread they eat. "
HE. I am only a man of limited intelligence, and just now, very
bewildered. When you have quite finished flashing through all your moods
tell me, and I'll try to understand the last one.
SHE. Moods, Guy! I haven't any. I'm sixteen years old and you're just
twenty, and you've been waiting for two hours outside the school in the
cold. And now I've met you, and now we're walking home together. Does
that suit you, My Imperial Majesty?
HE. No. We aren't children. Why can't you be rational?
SHE. He asks me that when I'm going to commit suicide for his sake, and,
and--I don't want to be French and rave about my mother, but have I ever
told you that I have a mother, and a brother who was my pet before I
married? He's married now. Can't you imagine the pleasure that the news
of the elopement will give him? Have you any people at Home, Guy, to be
pleased with your performances?
HE. One or two. One can't make omelets without breaking eggs.
SHE (slowly). I don't see the necessity--
HE. Hah! What do you mean?
SHE. Shall I speak the truth?
HE. Under the circumstances, perhaps it would be as well.
SHE. Guy, I'm afraid.
HE. I thought we'd settled all that. What of?
SHE. Of you.
HE. Oh, damn it all! The old business! This is too had!
SHE. Of you.
HE. And what now?
SHE. What do you think of me?
HE.
Beside the question altogether. What do you intend to do?
SHE. I daren't risk it. I'm afraid. If I could only cheat--
HE. A la Buzgago? No, thanks. That's the one point on which I have any
notion of Honor. I won't eat his salt and steal too. I'll loot openly or
not at all.
SHE. I never meant anything else.
HE. Then, why in the world do you pretend not to be willing to come?
SHE. It's not pretence, Guy. I am afraid.
HE. Please explain.
SHE. It can't last, Guy. It can't last. You'll get angry, and then
you'll swear, and then you'll get jealous, and then you'll mistrust
me--you do now--and you yourself will be the best reason for doubting.
And I--what shall I do? I shall be no better than Mrs. Buzgago found
out--no better than any one. And you'll know that. Oh, Guy, can't you
see?
HE. I see that you are desperately unreasonable, little woman.
SHE. There! The moment I begin to object, you get angry. What will you
do when I am only your property--stolen property? It can't be, Guy. It
can't be! I thought it could, but it can't. You'll get tired of me.
HE. I tell you I shall not. Won't anything make you understand that?
SHE. There, can't you see? If you speak to me like that now, you'll call
me horrible names later, if I don't do everything as you like. And if
you were cruel to me, Guy, where should I go--where should I go? I can't
trust you. Oh! I can't trust you!
HE. I suppose I ought to say that I can trust you. I've ample reason.
SHE. Please don't, dear. It hurts as much as if you hit me.
HE. It isn't exactly pleasant for me.
SHE. I can't help it. I wish I were dead! I can't trust you, and I don't
trust myself. Oh, Guy, let it die away and be forgotten!
HE. Too late now. I don't understand you--I won't--and I can't trust
myself to talk this evening. May I call tomorrow?
SHE. Yes. No! Oh, give me time! The day after. I get into my 'rickshaw
here and meet Him at Peliti's. You ride.
HE. I'll go on to Peliti's too. I think I want a drink. My world's
knocked about my ears and the stars are falling. Who are those brutes
howling in the Old Library?
SHE. They're rehearsing the singing-quadrilles for the Fancy Ball. Can't
you hear Mrs. Buzgago's voice? She has a solo. It's quite a new idea.
Listen.
MRS. BUZGAGO (in the Old Library, con. molt. exp. ).
See-saw! Margery Daw! Sold her bed to lie upon straw. Wasn't she a silly
slut To sell her bed and lie upon dirt?
Captain Congleton, I'm going to alter that to "flirt. " It sound better.
HE. No, I've changed my mind about the drink. Good night, little lady. I
shall see you tomorrow?
SHE. Yes. Good night, Guy. Don't be angry with me.
HE. Angry! You know I trust you absolutely. Good night and--God bless
you!
(Three seconds later. Alone. ) Hmm! I'd give something to discover
whether there's another man at the back of all this.
A SECOND-RATE WOMAN
Est fuga, volvitur rota,
On we drift; where looms the dim port?
One Two Three Four Five contribute their quota:
Something is gained if one caught but the import,
Show it us, Hugues of Saxe-Gotha.
--Master Hugues of Saxe-Gotha.
"DRESSED! Don't tell me that woman ever dressed in her life. She stood
in the middle of her room while her ayah--no, her husband--it must have
been a man--threw her clothes at her. She then did her hair with her
fingers, and rubbed her bonnet in the flue under the bed. I know she
did, as well as if I had assisted at the orgy. Who is she? " said Mrs.
Hauksbee.
"Don't! " said Mrs. Mallowe, feebly. "You make my head ache. I'm
miserable today. Stay me with fondants, comfort me with chocolates, for
I am--Did you bring anything from Peliti's? "
"Questions to begin with. You shall have the sweets when you have
answered them. Who and what is the creature? There were at least half
a dozen men round her, and she appeared to be going to sleep in their
midst. "
"Delville," said Mrs. Mallowe, "'Shady' Delville, to distinguish her
from Mrs. Jim of that ilk. She dances as untidily as she dresses, I
believe, and her husband is somewhere in Madras. Go and call, if you are
so interested. "
"What have I to do with Shigramitish women? She merely caught my
attention for a minute, and I wondered at the attraction that a dowd
has for a certain type of man. I expected to see her walk out of her
clothes--until I looked at her eyes. "
"Hooks and eyes, surely," drawled Mrs. Mallowe.
"Don't be clever, Polly. You make my head ache. And round this hayrick
stood a crowd of men--a positive crowd! "
"Perhaps they also expected"--
"Polly, don't be Rabelaisian! "
Mrs. Mallowe curled herself up comfortably on the sofa, and turned her
attention to the sweets. She and Mrs. Hauksbee shared the same house
at Simla; and these things befell two seasons after the matter of Otis
Yeere, which has been already recorded.
Mrs. Hauksbee stepped into the veranda and looked down upon the Mall,
her forehead puckered with thought.
"Hah! " said Mrs. Hauksbee, shortly. "Indeed! "
"What is it? " said Mrs. Mallowe, sleepily.
"That dowd and The Dancing Master--to whom I object. "
"Why to The Dancing Master? He is a middle-aged gentleman, of reprobate
and romantic tendencies, and tries to be a friend of mine. "
"Then make up your mind to lose him. Dowds cling by nature, and I should
imagine that this animal--how terrible her bonnet looks from above! --is
specially clingsome. "
"She is welcome to The Dancing Master so far as I am concerned. I never
could take an interest in a monotonous liar. The frustrated aim of his
life is to persuade people that he is a bachelor. "
"0--oh! I think I've met that sort of man before. And isn't he? "
"No. He confided that to me a few days ago. Ugh! Some men ought to Be
killed. "
"What happened then? "
"He posed as the horror of horrors--a misunderstood man. Heaven knows
the femme incomprise is sad enough and had enough--but the other thing! "
"And so fat too! I should have laughed in his face. Men seldom confide
in me. How is it they come to you? "
"For the sake of impressing me with their careers in the past. Protect
me from men with confidences! "
"And yet you encourage them? "
"What can I do? They talk. I listen, and they vow that I am sympathetic.
I know I always profess astonishment even when the plot is--of the most
old possible. "
"Yes. Men are so unblushingly explicit if they are once allowed to talk,
whereas women's confidences are full of reservations and fibs, except"--
"When they go mad and babble of the Unutterabilities after a week's
acquaintance. Really, if you come to consider, we know a great deal more
of men than of our own sex. "
"And the extraordinary thing is that men will never believe it. They say
we are trying to hide something. "
"They are generally doing that on their own account. Alas! These
chocolates pall upon me, and I haven't eaten more than a dozen. I think
I shall go to sleep. "
"Then you'll get fat dear. If you took more exercise and a more
intelligent interest in your neighbors you would--"
"Be as much loved as Mrs.
SHE. This once--yes--and a second time, and again and again, all through
the years when I shall be unable to resent it. You want too much, my
Lancelot, and. . . you know too much.
HE. How do you mean?
SHE. That is a part of the punishment. There cannot be perfect trust
between us.
HE. In Heaven's name, why not?
SHE. Hush! The Other Place is quite enough. Ask yourself.
HE. I don't follow.
SHE. You trust me so implicitly that when I look at another man--Never
mind, Guy. Have you ever made love to a girl--a good girl?
HE. Something of the sort. Centuries ago--in the Dark Ages, before I
ever met you, dear.
SHE. Tell me what you said to her.
HE. What does a man say to a girl? I've forgotten.
SHE. I remember. He tells her that he trusts her and worships the ground
she walks on, and that he'll love and honor and protect her till her
dying day; and so she marries in that belief. At least, I speak of one
girl who was not protected.
HE. Well, and then?
SHE. And then, Guy, and then, that girl needs ten times the love and
trust and honor--yes, honor--that was enough when she was only a mere
wife if--if--the other life she chooses to lead is to be made even
bearable. Do you understand?
HE. Even bearable! It'll he Paradise.
SHE. Ah! Can you give me all I've asked for--not now, nor a few months
later, but when you begin to think of what you might have done if you
had kept your own appointment and your caste here--when you begin to
look upon me as a drag and a burden? I shall want it most, then, Guy,
for there will be no one in the wide world but you.
HE. You're a little over-tired tonight, Sweetheart, and you're taking a
stage view of the situation. After the necessary business in the Courts,
the road is clear to--
SHE. "The holy state of matrimony! " Ha! ha! ha!
HE. Ssh! Don't laugh in that horrible way!
SHE. I-I c-c-c-can't help it! Isn't it too absurd! Ah! Ha! ha! ha! Guy,
stop me quick or I shall--l-l-laugh till we get to the Church.
HE. For goodness' sake, stop! Don't make an exhibition of yourself. What
is the matter with you?
SHE. N-nothing. I'm better now.
HE. That's all right. One moment, dear. There's a little wisp of hair
got loose from behind your right ear and it's straggling over your
cheek. So!
SHE. Thank'oo. I'm 'fraid my hat's on one side, too.
HE. What do you wear these huge dagger bonnet-skewers for? They're big
enough to kill a man with.
SHE. Oh! Don't kill me, though. You're sticking it into my head! Let me
do it. You men are so clumsy.
HE. Have you had many opportunities of comparing us--in this sort of
work?
SHE. Guy, what is my name?
HE. Eh! I don't follow.
SHE. Here's my cardcase. Can you read?
HE. Yes. Well?
SHE. Well, that answers your question. You know the other man's name. Am
I sufficiently humbled, or would you like to ask me if there is any one
else?
HE. I see now. My darling, I never meant that for an instant. I was only
joking. There! Lucky there's no one on the road. They'd be scandalized.
SHE. They'll be more scandalized before the end.
HE. Do-on't! I don't like you to talk in that way.
SHE. Unreasonable man! Who asked me to face the situation and accept
it? Tell me, do I look like Mrs. Penner? Do I look like a naughty woman?
Swear I don't! Give me your word of honor, my honorable friend, that I'm
not like Mrs. Buzgago. That's the way she stands, with her hands clasped
at the back of her head. D'you like that?
HE. Don't be affected.
SHE. I'm not. I'm Mrs. Buzgago. Listen!
Pendant une anne' toute entiere
Le regiment n'a pas r'paru.
Au Ministere de la Guerre
On le r'porta comme perdu.
On se r'noncait a r'trouver sa trace,
Quand un matin subitement,
On le vit r'paraitre sur la place
L'Colonel toujours en avant.
That's the way she rolls her r's. Am I like her?
HE. No, but I object when you go on like an actress and sing stuff of
that kind. Where in the world did you pick up the Chanson du Colonel? It
isn't a drawing-room song. It isn't proper.
SHE. Mrs. Buzgago taught it me. She is both drawing-room and proper, and
in another month she'll shut her drawing-room to me, and thank God she
isn't as improper as I am. Oh, Guy, Guy! I wish I was like some women
and had no scruples about--what is it Keene says? --"Wearing a corpse's
hair and being false to the bread they eat. "
HE. I am only a man of limited intelligence, and just now, very
bewildered. When you have quite finished flashing through all your moods
tell me, and I'll try to understand the last one.
SHE. Moods, Guy! I haven't any. I'm sixteen years old and you're just
twenty, and you've been waiting for two hours outside the school in the
cold. And now I've met you, and now we're walking home together. Does
that suit you, My Imperial Majesty?
HE. No. We aren't children. Why can't you be rational?
SHE. He asks me that when I'm going to commit suicide for his sake, and,
and--I don't want to be French and rave about my mother, but have I ever
told you that I have a mother, and a brother who was my pet before I
married? He's married now. Can't you imagine the pleasure that the news
of the elopement will give him? Have you any people at Home, Guy, to be
pleased with your performances?
HE. One or two. One can't make omelets without breaking eggs.
SHE (slowly). I don't see the necessity--
HE. Hah! What do you mean?
SHE. Shall I speak the truth?
HE. Under the circumstances, perhaps it would be as well.
SHE. Guy, I'm afraid.
HE. I thought we'd settled all that. What of?
SHE. Of you.
HE. Oh, damn it all! The old business! This is too had!
SHE. Of you.
HE. And what now?
SHE. What do you think of me?
HE.
Beside the question altogether. What do you intend to do?
SHE. I daren't risk it. I'm afraid. If I could only cheat--
HE. A la Buzgago? No, thanks. That's the one point on which I have any
notion of Honor. I won't eat his salt and steal too. I'll loot openly or
not at all.
SHE. I never meant anything else.
HE. Then, why in the world do you pretend not to be willing to come?
SHE. It's not pretence, Guy. I am afraid.
HE. Please explain.
SHE. It can't last, Guy. It can't last. You'll get angry, and then
you'll swear, and then you'll get jealous, and then you'll mistrust
me--you do now--and you yourself will be the best reason for doubting.
And I--what shall I do? I shall be no better than Mrs. Buzgago found
out--no better than any one. And you'll know that. Oh, Guy, can't you
see?
HE. I see that you are desperately unreasonable, little woman.
SHE. There! The moment I begin to object, you get angry. What will you
do when I am only your property--stolen property? It can't be, Guy. It
can't be! I thought it could, but it can't. You'll get tired of me.
HE. I tell you I shall not. Won't anything make you understand that?
SHE. There, can't you see? If you speak to me like that now, you'll call
me horrible names later, if I don't do everything as you like. And if
you were cruel to me, Guy, where should I go--where should I go? I can't
trust you. Oh! I can't trust you!
HE. I suppose I ought to say that I can trust you. I've ample reason.
SHE. Please don't, dear. It hurts as much as if you hit me.
HE. It isn't exactly pleasant for me.
SHE. I can't help it. I wish I were dead! I can't trust you, and I don't
trust myself. Oh, Guy, let it die away and be forgotten!
HE. Too late now. I don't understand you--I won't--and I can't trust
myself to talk this evening. May I call tomorrow?
SHE. Yes. No! Oh, give me time! The day after. I get into my 'rickshaw
here and meet Him at Peliti's. You ride.
HE. I'll go on to Peliti's too. I think I want a drink. My world's
knocked about my ears and the stars are falling. Who are those brutes
howling in the Old Library?
SHE. They're rehearsing the singing-quadrilles for the Fancy Ball. Can't
you hear Mrs. Buzgago's voice? She has a solo. It's quite a new idea.
Listen.
MRS. BUZGAGO (in the Old Library, con. molt. exp. ).
See-saw! Margery Daw! Sold her bed to lie upon straw. Wasn't she a silly
slut To sell her bed and lie upon dirt?
Captain Congleton, I'm going to alter that to "flirt. " It sound better.
HE. No, I've changed my mind about the drink. Good night, little lady. I
shall see you tomorrow?
SHE. Yes. Good night, Guy. Don't be angry with me.
HE. Angry! You know I trust you absolutely. Good night and--God bless
you!
(Three seconds later. Alone. ) Hmm! I'd give something to discover
whether there's another man at the back of all this.
A SECOND-RATE WOMAN
Est fuga, volvitur rota,
On we drift; where looms the dim port?
One Two Three Four Five contribute their quota:
Something is gained if one caught but the import,
Show it us, Hugues of Saxe-Gotha.
--Master Hugues of Saxe-Gotha.
"DRESSED! Don't tell me that woman ever dressed in her life. She stood
in the middle of her room while her ayah--no, her husband--it must have
been a man--threw her clothes at her. She then did her hair with her
fingers, and rubbed her bonnet in the flue under the bed. I know she
did, as well as if I had assisted at the orgy. Who is she? " said Mrs.
Hauksbee.
"Don't! " said Mrs. Mallowe, feebly. "You make my head ache. I'm
miserable today. Stay me with fondants, comfort me with chocolates, for
I am--Did you bring anything from Peliti's? "
"Questions to begin with. You shall have the sweets when you have
answered them. Who and what is the creature? There were at least half
a dozen men round her, and she appeared to be going to sleep in their
midst. "
"Delville," said Mrs. Mallowe, "'Shady' Delville, to distinguish her
from Mrs. Jim of that ilk. She dances as untidily as she dresses, I
believe, and her husband is somewhere in Madras. Go and call, if you are
so interested. "
"What have I to do with Shigramitish women? She merely caught my
attention for a minute, and I wondered at the attraction that a dowd
has for a certain type of man. I expected to see her walk out of her
clothes--until I looked at her eyes. "
"Hooks and eyes, surely," drawled Mrs. Mallowe.
"Don't be clever, Polly. You make my head ache. And round this hayrick
stood a crowd of men--a positive crowd! "
"Perhaps they also expected"--
"Polly, don't be Rabelaisian! "
Mrs. Mallowe curled herself up comfortably on the sofa, and turned her
attention to the sweets. She and Mrs. Hauksbee shared the same house
at Simla; and these things befell two seasons after the matter of Otis
Yeere, which has been already recorded.
Mrs. Hauksbee stepped into the veranda and looked down upon the Mall,
her forehead puckered with thought.
"Hah! " said Mrs. Hauksbee, shortly. "Indeed! "
"What is it? " said Mrs. Mallowe, sleepily.
"That dowd and The Dancing Master--to whom I object. "
"Why to The Dancing Master? He is a middle-aged gentleman, of reprobate
and romantic tendencies, and tries to be a friend of mine. "
"Then make up your mind to lose him. Dowds cling by nature, and I should
imagine that this animal--how terrible her bonnet looks from above! --is
specially clingsome. "
"She is welcome to The Dancing Master so far as I am concerned. I never
could take an interest in a monotonous liar. The frustrated aim of his
life is to persuade people that he is a bachelor. "
"0--oh! I think I've met that sort of man before. And isn't he? "
"No. He confided that to me a few days ago. Ugh! Some men ought to Be
killed. "
"What happened then? "
"He posed as the horror of horrors--a misunderstood man. Heaven knows
the femme incomprise is sad enough and had enough--but the other thing! "
"And so fat too! I should have laughed in his face. Men seldom confide
in me. How is it they come to you? "
"For the sake of impressing me with their careers in the past. Protect
me from men with confidences! "
"And yet you encourage them? "
"What can I do? They talk. I listen, and they vow that I am sympathetic.
I know I always profess astonishment even when the plot is--of the most
old possible. "
"Yes. Men are so unblushingly explicit if they are once allowed to talk,
whereas women's confidences are full of reservations and fibs, except"--
"When they go mad and babble of the Unutterabilities after a week's
acquaintance. Really, if you come to consider, we know a great deal more
of men than of our own sex. "
"And the extraordinary thing is that men will never believe it. They say
we are trying to hide something. "
"They are generally doing that on their own account. Alas! These
chocolates pall upon me, and I haven't eaten more than a dozen. I think
I shall go to sleep. "
"Then you'll get fat dear. If you took more exercise and a more
intelligent interest in your neighbors you would--"
"Be as much loved as Mrs.
