AUBREY.

Listen----!

PAULA.

Listen to _me_! And how do you take her? You pack her off in the care of a woman who has deliberately held aloof from me, who's thrown mud at me! Yet this Cortelyon creature has only to put foot here once to be entrusted with the charge of the girl you know I dearly want to keep near me!

AUBREY.

Paula dear! hear me----!

PAULA.

Ah! of course, of course! I can't be so useful to your daughter as such people as this; and so I'm to be given the go-by for any town friend of yours who turns up and chooses to patronise us! Hah! Very well, at any rate, as you take Ellean from me you justify my looking for companions where I can most readily find 'em.

AUBREY.

You wish me to fully appreciate your reason for sending that letter to Lady Orreyed?

PAULA.

Precisely--I do.

AUBREY.

And could you, after all, go back to a.s.sociates of that order? It's not possible!

PAULA.

[_Mockingly._] What, not after the refining influence of these intensely respectable surroundings? [_Going to the door._] We'll see!

AUBREY.

Paula!

PAULA.

[_Violently._] We'll see!

[_She goes out. He stands still looking after her._

THE THIRD ACT

_The drawing-room at "Highercoombe." Facing the spectator are two large French windows, sheltered by a verandah, leading into the garden; on the right is a door opening into a small hall. The fireplace, with a large mirror above it, is on the left-hand side of the room, and higher up in the same wall are double doors recessed. The room is richly furnished, and everything betokens taste and luxury. The windows are open, and there is moonlight in the garden._

LADY ORREYED, _a pretty, affected doll of a woman with a mincing voice and flaxen hair, is sitting on the ottoman, her head resting against the drum, and her eyes closed._ PAULA, _looking pale, worn, and thoroughly unhappy, is sitting at a table. Both are in sumptuous dinner-gowns._

LADY ORREYED.

[_Opening her eyes._] Well, I never! I dropped off! [_Feeling her hair._] Just fancy! Where are the men?

PAULA.

[_Icily._] Outside, smoking.

_A_ SERVANT _enters with coffee, which he hands to_ LADY ORREYED. SIR GEORGE ORREYED _comes in by the window. He is a man of about thirty-five, with a low forehead, a receding chin, a vacuous expression, and an ominous redness about the nose._

LADY ORREYED.

[_Taking coffee._] Here's Dodo.

SIR GEORGE.

I say, the flies under the verandah make you swear. [_The_ SERVANT _hands coffee to_ PAULA, _who declines it, then to_ SIR GEORGE, _who takes a cup._] Hi! wait a bit! [_He looks at the tray searchingly, then puts back his cup._] Never mind. [_Quietly to_ LADY ORREYED.] I say, they're dooced sparin' with their liqueur, ain't they?

[_The_ SERVANT _goes out at window._

PAULA.

[_To_ SIR GEORGE.] Won't you take coffee, George?

SIR GEORGE.

No, thanks. It's gettin' near time for a whisky and pota.s.s.

[_Approaching_ PAULA, _regarding_ LADY ORREYED _admiringly._] I say, Birdie looks rippin' to-night, don't she?

PAULA.

Your wife?

SIR GEORGE.

Yaas--Birdie.

PAULA.

Rippin'?

SIR GEORGE.

Yaas.

PAULA.