Plays: Lady Frederick, The Explorer, A Man of Honor - novelonlinefull.com
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HILDA.
It's so nice of you to have come.
BRACKLEY.
[_Nodding at_ BASIL.] Good-bye.... May I come again soon?
HILDA.
[_Looking at him quickly._] Were you serious just now, or were you laughing at me?
BRACKLEY.
I've never been more serious in my life.
HILDA.
Then perhaps I shall be in to luncheon on Thursday after all.
BRACKLEY.
A thousand thanks. Good-bye.
[_He nods to_ BASIL _and goes out_. HILDA _looks at_ BASIL _with a smile_.
HILDA.
Is that a very interesting book?
BASIL.
[_Putting it down._] I thought that man was never going away.
HILDA.
[_Laughing._] I suspect he thought precisely the same of you.
BASIL.
[_Ill-temperedly._] What an a.s.s he is! How _can_ you stand him?
HILDA.
I'm rather attached to him. I don't take everything he says very seriously. And young men ought to be foolish.
BASIL.
He didn't strike me as so juvenile as all that.
HILDA.
He's only forty, poor thing--and I've never known a coming young man who was less than that.
BASIL.
He's a young man with a very bald head.
HILDA.
[_Amused._] I wonder why you dislike him!
BASIL.
[_With a jealous glance, icily._] I thought he wasn't admitted into decent houses.
HILDA.
[_Opening her eyes._] He comes here, Mr. Kent.
BASIL.
[_Unable to restrain his ill-temper._] Don't you know that he's been mixed up in every scandal for the last twenty years?
HILDA.
[_Good-humouredly_, _seeing that_ BASIL _is merely jealous_.] There must be people in the world to provide gossip for their neighbours.
BASIL.
It's no business of mine. I have no right to talk to you like this.
HILDA.
I wonder why you do it?
BASIL.
[_Almost savagely._] Because I love you.
[_There is a little pause._
HILDA.
[_With a smile, ironically._] Won't you have some more tea, Mr. Kent?
BASIL.
[_Going up to her, speaking with a sort of vehement gravity._] You don't know what I've suffered. You don't know what a h.e.l.l my life is.... I tried so hard to prevent myself from coming here. When I married I swore I'd break with all my old friends.... When I married I found I loved _you_.
