The Importance of Being Earnest (28 page)

S
IR
R
OBERT
C
HILTERN
. And you would be happy living somewhere alone with me, abroad perhaps, or in the country away from London, away from public life? You would have no regrets?

L
ADY
C
HILTERN
. Oh! none, Robert.

S
IR
R
OBERT
C
HILTERN
.
(Sadly.)
And your ambition for me? You used to be ambitious for me.

L
ADY
C
HILTERN
. Oh, my ambition! I have none now, but that we two may love each other. It was your ambition that led you astray. Let us not talk about ambition.

(Lord Goring returns from the conservatory, looking very pleased with himself, and with an entirely new buttonhole that some one has made for him.)

S
IR
R
OBERT
C
HILTERN
.
(Going towards him.)
Arthur, I have to thank you for what you have done for me. I don’t know how I can repay you.
(Shakes hands with him.)

L
ORD
G
ORING
. My dear fellow, I’ll tell you at once. At the present moment, under the usual palm tree … I mean in the conservatory …

(Enter Mason.)

M
ASON
. Lord Caversham.

L
ORD
G
ORING
. That admirable father of mine really makes a habit of turning up at the wrong moment. It is very heartless of him, very heartless indeed.
(Enter Lord Caversham. Mason goes out.)

L
ORD
C
AVERSHAM
. Good morning, Lady Chiltern! Warmest congratulations to you, Chiltern, on your brilliant speech last night. I have just left the Prime Minister, and you are to have the vacant seat in the Cabinet.

S
IR
R
OBERT
C
HILTERN
.
(With a look of joy and triumph.)
A seat in the Cabinet?

L
ORD
C
AVERSHAM
. Yes; here is the Prime Minister’s letter.
(Hands letter.)

S
IR
R
OBERT
C
HILTERN
.
(Takes letter and reads it.)
A seat in the Cabinet!

L
ORD
C
AVERSHAM
. Certainly, and you well deserve it too. You have got what we want so much in political life nowadays—high character, high moral tone, high principles.
(To Lord Goring.)
Everything that you have not got, sir, and never will have.

L
ORD
G
ORING
. I don’t like principles, father. I prefer prejudices.
(Sir Robert Chiltern is on the brink of accepting the Prime Minister’s offer, when he sees his wife looking at him with her clear, candid eyes. He then realizes that it is impossible.)

S
IR
R
OBERT
C
HILTERN
. I cannot accept this offer, Lord Caversham. I have made up my mind to decline it.

L
ORD
C
AVERSHAM
. Decline it, sir!

S
IR
R
OBERT
C
HILTERN
. My intention is to retire at once from public life.

L
ORD
C
AVERSHAM
.
(Angrily.)
Decline a seat in the Cabinet, and retire from public life? Never heard such damned nonsense in the whole course of my existence. I beg your pardon, Lady Chiltern.
Chiltern, I beg your pardon.
(To Lord Goring.)
Don’t grin like that, sir.

L
ORD
G
ORING
. No, father.

L
ORD
C
AVERSHAM
. Lady Chiltern, you are a sensible woman, the most sensible woman in London, the most sensible woman I know. Will you kindly prevent your husband from making such a … from talking such … Will you kindly do that, Lady Chiltern?

L
ADY
C
HILTERN
. I think my husband is right in his determination, Lord Caversham. I approve of it.

L
ORD
C
AVERSHAM
. You approve of it? Good Heavens!

L
ADY
C
HILTERN
.
(Taking her husband’s hand.)
I admire him for it. I admire him immensely for it. I have never admired him so much before. He is finer than even I thought him.
(To Sir Robert Chiltern.)
You will go and write your letter to the Prime Minister now, won’t you? Don’t hesitate about it, Robert.

S
IR
R
OBERT
C
HILTERN
.
(With a touch of bitterness.)
I suppose I had better write it at once. Such offers are not repeated. I will ask you to excuse me for a moment, Lord Caversham.

L
ADY
C
HILTERN
. I may come with you, Robert, may I not?

S
IR
R
OBERT
C
HILTERN
. Yes, Gertrude.

(Lady Chiltern goes out with him.)

L
ORD
C
AVERSHAM
. What is the matter with this family? Something wrong here, eh?
(Tapping his forehead.)
Idiocy? Hereditary, I suppose. Both of them, too. Wife as well as husband. Very sad. Very sad indeed! And they are not an old family. Can’t understand it.

L
ORD
G
ORING
. It is not idiocy, father, I assure you.

L
ORD
C
AVERSHAM
. What is it then, sir?

L
ORD
G
ORING
.
(After some hesitation.)
Well, it is what is called nowadays a high moral tone, father. That is all.

L
ORD
C
AVERSHAM
. Hate these new-fangled names. Same thing as we used to call idiocy fifty years ago. Shan’t stay in this house any longer.

L
ORD
G
ORING
.
(Taking his arm.)
Oh! just go in here for a moment, father. Third palm tree to the left, the usual palm tree.

L
ORD
C
AVERSHAM
. What, sir?

L
ORD
G
ORING
. I beg your pardon, father, I forgot. The conservatory, father, the conservatory—there is some one there I want you to talk to.

L
ORD
C
AVERSHAM
. What about, sir?

L
ORD
G
ORING
. About me, father.

L
ORD
C
AVERSHAM
.
(Grimly.)
Not a subject on which much eloquence is possible.

L
ORD
G
ORING
. No, father; but the lady is like me. She doesn’t care much for eloquence in others. She thinks it a little loud.

(Lord Caversham goes into the conservatory. Lady Chiltern enters.)

L
ORD
G
ORING
. Lady Chiltern, why are you playing Mrs. Cheveley’s cards?

L
ADY
C
HILTERN
.
(Startled.)
I don’t understand you.

L
ORD
G
ORING
. Mrs. Cheveley made an attempt to ruin your husband. Either to drive him from public life, or to make him adopt a dishonourable position. From the latter tragedy you saved him. The former you are now thrusting on him. Why should you do him the wrong Mrs. Cheveley tried to do and failed?

L
ADY
C
HILTERN
. Lord Goring?

L
ORD
G
ORING
.
(Pulling himself together for a great effort, and showing the philosopher that underlies the dandy.)
Lady Chiltern, allow me. You wrote me a letter last night in which you said you trusted me and wanted my help. Now is the moment when you really want my help, now is the time when you have got to trust me, to trust in my counsel and judgment. You love Robert. Do you want to kill his love for you? What sort of existence will he have if you rob him of the fruits of his ambition, if you take him from the splendour of a great political career, if you close the doors of public life against him, if you condemn him to sterile failure, he who was made for triumph and success? Women are not meant to judge us, but to forgive us when we need forgiveness. Pardon, not punishment, is their mission. Why should you scourge him with rods for a sin done in his youth, before he knew you, before he knew himself? A man’s life is of more value than a woman’s. It has larger issues, wider scope, greater ambitions. A woman’s life revolves in curves of emotions. It is upon lines of intellect that
a man’s life progresses. Don’t make any terrible mistake, Lady Chiltern. A woman who can keep a man’s love, and love him in return, has done all the world wants of women, or should want of them.

L
ADY
C
HILTERN
.
(Troubled and hesitating.)
But it is my husband himself who wishes to retire from public life. He feels it is his duty. It was he who first said so.

L
ORD
G
ORING
. Rather than lose your love, Robert would do anything, wreck his whole career, as he is on the brink of doing now. He is making for you a terrible sacrifice. Take my advice, Lady Chiltern, and do not accept a sacrifice so great. If you do, you will live to repent it bitterly. We men and women are not made to accept such sacrifices from each other. We are not worthy of them. Besides, Robert has been punished enough.

L
ADY
C
HILTERN
. We have both been punished. I set him up too high.

L
ORD
G
ORING
.
(With deep feeling in his voice.)
Do not for that reason set him down now too low. If he has fallen from his altar, do not thrust him into the mire. Failure to Robert would be the very mire of shame. Power is his passion. He would lose everything, even his power to feel love. Your husband’s life is at this moment in your hands, your husband’s love is in your hands. Don’t mar both for him.
(Enter Sir Robert Chiltern.)

S
IR
R
OBERT
C
HILTERN
. Gertrude, here is the draft of my letter. Shall I read it to you?

L
ADY
C
HILTERN
. Let me see it.

(Sir Robert hands her the letter. She reads it, and then, with a gesture of passion, tears it up.)

S
IR
R
OBERT
C
HILTERN
. What are you doing?

L
ADY
C
HILTERN
. A man’s life is of more value than a woman’s. It has larger issues, wider scope, greater ambitions. Our lives revolve in curves of emotions. It is upon lines of intellect that a man’s life progresses. I have just learnt this, and much else with it, from Lord Goring. And I will not spoil your life for you, nor see you spoil it as a sacrifice to me, a useless sacrifice!

S
IR
R
OBERT
C
HILTERN
. Gertrude! Gertrude!

L
ADY
C
HILTERN
. You can forget. Men easily forget. And I forgive.

That is how women help the world. I see that now.

S
IR
R
OBERT
C
HILTERN
.
(Deeply overcome by emotion, embraces her.)
My wife! my wife!
(To Lord Goring.)
Arthur, it seems that I am always to be in your debt.

L
ORD
G
ORING
. Oh dear no, Robert. Your debt is to Lady Chiltern, not to me!

S
IR
R
OBERT
C
HILTERN
. I owe you much. And now tell me what you were going to ask me just now as Lord Caversham came in.

L
ORD
G
ORING
. Robert, you are your sister’s guardian, and I want your consent to my marriage with her. That is all.

L
ADY
C
HILTERN
. Oh, I am so glad! I am so glad!
(Shakes hands with Lord Goring.)

L
ORD
G
ORING
. Thank you, Lady Chiltern.

S
IR
R
OBERT
C
HILTERN
.
(With a troubled look.)
My sister to be your wife?

L
ORD
G
ORING
. Yes.

S
IR
R
OBERT
C
HILTERN
.
(Speaking with great firmness.)
Arthur, I am very sorry, but the thing is quite out of the question. I have to think of Mabel’s future happiness. And I don’t think her happiness would be safe in your hands. And I cannot have her sacrificed!

L
ORD
G
ORING
. Sacrificed!

S
IR
R
OBERT
C
HILTERN
. Yes, utterly sacrificed. Loveless marriages are horrible. But there is one thing worse than an absolutely loveless marriage. A marriage in which there is love, but on one side only; faith, but on one side only; devotion, but on one side only, and in which of the two hearts one is sure to be broken.

L
ORD
G
ORING
. But I love Mabel. No other woman has any place in my life.

L
ADY
C
HILTERN
. Robert, if they love each other, why should they not be married?

S
IR
R
OBERT
C
HILTERN
. Arthur cannot bring Mabel the love that she deserves.

L
ORD
G
ORING
. What reason have you for saying that?

S
IR
R
OBERT
C
HILTERN
.
(After a pause.)
Do you really require me to tell you?

L
ORD
G
ORING
. Certainly I do.

S
IR
R
OBERT
C
HILTERN
. As you choose. When I called on you yesterday evening I found Mrs. Cheveley concealed in your rooms. It was between ten and eleven o’clock at night. I do not wish to say anything more. Your relations with Mrs. Cheveley have, as I said to you last night, nothing whatsoever to do with me. I know you were engaged to be married to her once. The fascination she exercised over you then seems to have returned. You spoke to me last night of her as of a woman pure and stainless, a woman whom you respected and honoured. That may be so. But I cannot give my sister’s life into your hands. It would be wrong of me. It would be unjust, infamously unjust to her.