If: A Play in Four Acts by Lord Dunsany (novel books to read .TXT) 📕

But not before me. I am English. And we are greater than gods.

ARCHIE BEAL

What's that, Johnny?

JOHN BEAL

He won't pay, but I told him we're English and that they're greater than all his bronze gods.

ARCHIE BEAL

That's right, Johnny.

[HUSSEIN looks fiercely at ARCHIE. He sees ARCHIE's hat lying before a big idol. He points at the hat and looks in the face of the idol.]

HUSSEIN [to the idol] Drink! Drink!

[He bows. Exit.]

ARCHIE BEAL

What's that he's saying?

JOHN BEAL [meditatively] O, nothing—nothing.

ARCHIE BEAL

He won't pay, oh?

JOHN BEAL

No, not to Miss Miralda.

ARCHIE BEAL

Who to?

JOHN BEAL

To one of his gods.

ARCHIE BEAL

That won't do.

JOHN BEAL

No.

ARCHIE BEAL

What'll we do?

JOHN BEAL

I don't quite know. It isn't as if we were in England.

ARCHIE BEAL

No, it isn't.

JOHN BEAL

If we were in England...

ARCHIE BEAL

I know; if we were in England you could call a policeman. I tell you what it is, Johnny.

JOHN BEAL

Yes?

ARCHIE BEAL

I tell you what; you want to see more of Miss Clement.

JOHN BEAL

Why?

ARCHIE BEAL

Why, because at the present moment our friend Hussein is a craftier fellow than you, and looks like getting the best of it.

JOHN BEAL

How will seeing more of Miss Miralda help us?

ARCHIE BEAL

Why, because you want to be a bit craftier than Hussein, and I fancy she might make you.

JOHN BEAL

She? How?

ARCHIE BEAL

We're mostly made what we are by some woman or other. We think it's our own cleverness, but we're wrong. As things are you're no match for Hussein, but if you altered...

JOHN BEAL

Why, ARCHIE; where did you get all those ideas from?

ARCHIE BEAL

O, I don't know.

JOHN BEAL

You never used to talk like that.

ARCHIE BEAL

O, well.

JOHN BEAL

You haven't been getting in love, ARCHIE, have you?

ARCHIE BEAL

What are we to do about Hussein?

JOHN BEAL

It's funny your mentioning Miss Miralda. I got a letter from her the same day I got yours.

ARCHIE BEAL

What does she say?

JOHN BEAL

I couldn't make it out.

ARCHIE BEAL

What were her words?

JOHN BEAL

She said she was going into it closer. She underlined closer. What could she mean by that? How could she get closer?

ARCHIE BEAL

Well, the same way as I did.

JOHN BEAL

How do you mean? I don't understand.

ARCHIE BEAL

By coming here.

JOHN BEAL

By coming here? But she can't come here.

ARCHIE BEAL

Why not?

JOHN BEAL

Because it's impossible. Absolutely impossible. Why—good Lord—she couldn't come here. Why, she'd want a chaperon and a house and—and—everything. Good Lord, she couldn't come here. It would be—well it would be impossible—it couldn't be done.

ARCHIE BEAL

O, all right. Then I don't know what she meant.

JOHN BEAL

ARCHIE! You don't really think she'd come here? You don't really think it, do you?

ARCHIE BEAL

Well, it's the sort of thing that that sort of girl might do, but of course I can't say...

JOHN BEAL

Good Lord, ARCHIE! That would be awful.

ARCHIE BEAL

But why?

JOHN BEAL

Why? But what would I do? Where would she go? Where would her chaperon go? The chaperon would be some elderly lady. Why, it would kill her.

ARCHIE BEAL