human
The acting isn't very good,
gpt
What does it signify? What we enjoy or what we suffer depends upon the humour. The acting is not first-rate, but I have listened and laughed and cried, because I have been happy.
human
It has been very jolly,
gpt
And one has so little that is really jolly, as you call it. I wonder whether any girl ever did sit and cry like that because her lover talked to another woman. What I find fault with is that the writers and actors are so ignorant of men and women as we see them every day. It's all right that she should cry, but she shouldn't cry there. The position described was so nearly her own, that he could say nothing to this. She had so spoken on purpose,--fighting her own battle after her own fashion, knowing well that her words would confuse him.
human
A woman hides such tears. She may be found crying because she is unable to hide them;--but she does not willingly let the other woman see them. Does she?
gpt
I suppose not.
human
Medea did not weep when she was introduced to Creusa.
gpt
Women are not all Medeas,
human
There's a dash of the savage princess about most of them. I am quite ready if you like. I never want to see the curtain fall. And I have had no nosegay brought in a wheelbarrow to throw on to the stage. Are you going to see me home?
gpt
Certainly.
human
You need not. I'm not a bit afraid of a London cab by myself. But of course he accompanied her to Islington. He owed her at any rate as much as that. She continued to talk during the whole journey. What a wonderful place London was,--so immense, but so dirty! New York of course was not so big, but was, she thought, pleasanter. But Paris was the gem of gems among towns. She did not like Frenchmen, and she liked Englishmen even better than Americans; but she fancied that she could never like English women.
gpt
I do so hate all kinds of buckram. I like good conduct, and law, and religion too if it be not forced down one's throat; but I hate what your women call propriety. I suppose what we have been doing to-night is very improper; but I am quite sure that it has not been in the least wicked.
human
I don't think it has,
gpt
Yes, this is it, she said.
human
Even about the houses there is an air of stiff-necked propriety which frightens me. She was getting out as she spoke, and he had already knocked at the door.
gpt
Come in for one moment, she said as he paid the cabman. The woman the while was standing with the door in her hand. It was near midnight,--but, when people are engaged, hours do not matter. The woman of the house, who was respectability herself,--a nice kind widow, with five children, named Pipkin,--understood that and smiled again as he followed the lady into the sitting-room. She had already taken off her hat and was flinging it on to the sofa as he entered.
human
Shut the door for one moment, she said; and he shut it. Then she threw herself into his arms, not kissing him but looking up into his face.
gpt
Oh Paul, she exclaimed,
human
Then she pushed him from her and looked away from him, clasping her hands together.
gpt
But Paul, I mean to keep my pledge to you to-night. It was to be an island in our troubles, a little holiday in our hard school-time, and I will not destroy it at its close. You will see me again soon,--will you not?
human
Where the blessed angels have you been?