J. M. Barrie

“ STEVE. ‘I must say I don’t see that.’
AMY, gratefully, ‘Thank you, Mr. Rollo.’
COLONEL. ‘Go to your room.’
She has to go, but not till she has given her mother a kiss that is a challenge to the world. Then to the bewilderment of Steve two human frames are rocked with laughter.
ALICE. ‘Oh, Robert, look at him. He thinks I worship him.’
COLONEL. ‘Steve, you colossal puppy.’
STEVE. ‘Eh—what—why?’
ALICE. ‘Steve, tell Robert about my voice being softer to you than to other men; tell him, Steve, about your eyes.’
The unhappy youth gropes mentally and physically. ”

“ STEVE, severely, ‘Have you forgotten already how I told you a true lady would answer?’
RICHARDSON. ‘I minds, but it makes me that shy.’ She has, however, a try at it. ‘Do smoke, Mr. Rollo, I loves the smell of it.’
Steve lights his pipe; no real villain smokes a pipe.
STEVE. ‘Smoking is a blessed companion to a lonely devil like myself.’
RICHARDSON. ‘Yes, sir.’ Sharply, ‘Would you say devil to a real lady, sir?’
Steve, it may be hoped, is properly confused, but here the little idyll of the chop is brought to a close by the tinkle of a bell. Richardson springs to attention. ”

“ AMY. ‘Ginevra, what’s to be done?’
GINEVRA. ‘Thank heaven, we know exactly what to do. It rests with you to save her.’
AMY, trembling, ‘You mean I must go—to his chambers?’
GINEVRA, firmly, ‘At any cost.’
AMY. ‘Evening dress?’
GINEVRA. ‘It is always evening dress. And don’t be afraid of his Man, dear; they always have a Man.’
AMY. ‘Oh, Ginevra.’
GINEVRA. ‘First try fascination. You remember how they fling back their cloak—like this, dear. If that fails, threaten him. You must get back the letters. There are always letters.’
AMY. ‘If father should suspect and follow? ”

“ ALICE. ‘We are ready, Robert. Why don’t you come? Robert, what is it?’
COLONEL, darkening, ‘Steve knows what it is; Amy doesn’t as yet. The simple soul has given herself away so innocently that it is almost a shame to take notice of it. But I must, Steve. Come, man, it can’t be difficult to explain.’
In this Steve evidently differs from him.
ALICE. ‘Robert, you frighten me.’
COLONEL. ‘Still tongue-tied, Steve. Before you came here, Alice, I found a lady’s glove on the floor.’
ALICE, quickly, ‘That isn’t our affair, Robert.’
COLONEL. ‘Yes; I’ll tell you why. ”

“ Amy is in evening dress—her only evening dress—and over it is the cloak, which she is presently to fling back with staggering effect. Just now her pale face is hiding behind the collar of it, for she is quaking inwardly though strung up to a terrible ordeal. The room is not as she expected, but she knows that men are cunning. ”

“ ALICE. ‘Robert dear, Amy has come to a time in her life when she is neither quite a girl nor quite a woman. There are dark places before us at that age through which we have to pick our way without much help. ”

“ She cries a little, and when Alice cries, which is not often for she is more given to laughter, her face screws up like Molly’s rather than like Amy’s. She is very unlike the sketch of her lately made by the united fancies of her son and daughter; and she will dance them round the room many times before they know her better. Amy will never be so pretty as her mother, Cosmo will never be so gay, and it will be years before either of them is as young. ”

“ ALICE, smiling through her fears, ‘I was only telling you that nothing could make any difference in my love for Amy. That was all; and, of course, if she has ever been a little foolish, light-headed—at that age one often is—why, a mother would soon put all that right; she would just take her girl in her arms and they would talk it over, and the poor child’s troubles would vanish.’ Still for Amy’s comfort, ‘And do you think I should repeat any of Amy’s confidences to you, Robert?’ Gaily, ‘Not a word, sir! ”

“ ALICE. ‘Oh, I was hoping you knew her well. She goes sometimes to the Deans and the Rawlings—all our old Indian friends—’
STEVE. ‘So do I, but we never happened to be there at the same time. They often speak of her though.’
ALICE. ‘What do they say?’
STEVE. ‘They are enthusiastic—an ideal, sweet girl.’
ALICE, relieved, ‘I’m so glad. Now you can go, Steve.’
STEVE. ‘It’s odd to think of the belle of the Punjab as a mother of a big girl.’
ALICE. ‘Don’t; or I shall begin to think it’s absurd myself.’
STEVE. ‘Surely the boy felt the spell.’ She shakes her head. ”

“ ALICE, faintly, ‘Is she not?’
She departs to face her child, and the natural enemy follows her, after giving Colonel Grey a moment in which to discharge her if he dares, that is if he wishes to see his baby wither and die. One may as well say here that nurse weathered this and many another gale, and remained in the house for many years to be its comfort and its curse.
Fanny, with the tea-tray, comes and goes without the Colonel’s being aware of her presence. He merely knows that he has waved someone away. The fact is that the Colonel is engrossed in a rather undignified pursuit. ”

“ RICHARDSON. ‘Oh, ma’am.’
The little maid, bearing the dishes, backs to the door, opens it with her foot, and escapes from this terrible visitor. The drawn curtains attract Amy’s eagle eye, and she looks behind them. There is no one there. She pulls open the door of the cupboard and says firmly, ‘Come out.’ No one comes. She peeps into the cupboard and finds it empty. A cupboard and no one in it. How strange. She sits down almost in tears, wishing very much for the counsel of Ginevra. Thus Steve finds her when he returns. ”

“ AMY. ‘Why are you not in evening dress?’
STEVE, taken aback, ‘Does that matter?’
AMY, though it still worries her, ‘I suppose not.’
STEVE, with growing stiffness, ‘Your business, if you will be so good.’
Amy advances upon him. She has been seated in any case as long as they ever do sit on the stage on the same chair.
AMY. ‘Stephen Rollo, the game is up.’
She likes this; she will be able to go on now. ”

“ ALICE. ‘He has sent Amy to bed already. Try to love your father, Cosmo,’ placing many kisses on the spot where he had been slapped. Try for my sake, and try to get Amy and Molly to do it, too.’ Sweetly to her husband, ‘They will love you in time, Robert; at present they can think only of me. Darling, I’ll come and see you in bed.’
COSMO. ‘I don’t like to leave you with him—’
ALICE. ‘Go, my own; I promise to call out if I need you.’
On these terms Cosmo departs. The long-suffering husband, arms folded, surveys his unworthy spouse. ”

“ If you mention rupees to any one of them he flares up like a burning paper.’
‘I know. I shall take care. But what would you say he was like by heredity?’
‘Quiet, unassuming, yet of an intensely proud nature. One who if he was deceived would never face his fellow-creatures, but would bow his head before the wind and die. A strong man.’
‘Do you mean, Amy, that he takes all that from me?’
‘I mean that is the sort of man my mother would love.’
Cosmo nods. ‘Yes, but he is just as likely to kiss me as ever.’
The return of Ginevra makes him feel that this room is no place for him. ”

“ He is quite a grizzled veteran, and is trying hard to pretend that having done without his children for so many years, a few minutes more is no great matter. His adorable Alice is this man’s one joke. Some of those furrows in his brow have come from trying to understand her, he owes the agility of his mind to trying to keep up with her; the humorous twist in his mouth is the result of chuckling over her.
She flutters across the room. ‘Robert,’ she says, thrilling. ‘I daresay my Amy painted that table.’
‘Yes, ma’am, she did,’ says Fanny. ”

“ She is indeed the bolder of the two. She grips Amy’s hand and says quite firmly, ‘Amy, shall we go to another to-night?’ This does not puzzle Amy, she is prepared for it, her honest grey eyes even tell that she has wanted it, but now that it is come she quails a little. ‘Another theatre?’ she murmurs. ‘Ginevra, that would be five in one week.’
Ginevra does not blanch. ”

“ Then Amy rises, brings her head to the position in which they are usually carried; and she and Ginevra look into each other’s eyes. They always do this when they meet, though they meet several times a day, and it is worth doing, for what they see in those pellucid pools is love eternal. Thus they loved at school (in their last two terms) , and thus they will love till the grave encloses them. These thoughts, and others even more beautiful, are in their minds as they gaze at each other now. No man will ever be able to say ‘Amy,’ or to say ‘Ginevra,’ with such a trill as they are saying it. ”

“ Oh, Ginevra, what things there will be to put in my diary to-night.’
II
Night has fallen, and Amy is probably now in her bedroom, fully arrayed for her dreadful mission. She says good-bye to her diary—perhaps for aye. She steals from the house—to a very different scene, which (if one were sufficiently daring) would represent a Man’s Chambers at Midnight. There is no really valid excuse for shirking this scene, which is so popular that every theatre has it stowed away in readiness; it is capable of ‘setting’ itself should the stage-hands forget to do so. ”

“ ALICE, whose mind is still misgiving her about Amy, ‘In the meantime I want to have a word with Steve alone, Robert.’
COLONEL. ‘Very good.’ Stealing towards the nursery, ‘Then I shall pop in here again. How is the tea business prospering in London, Steve? Glad you left India?’
STEVE. ‘I don’t have half the salary I had in India, but my health is better. How are rupees?’
COLONEL. ‘Stop it.’ He is making a doll of his handkerchief for the further subjugation of Molly. He sees his happy face in a looking-glass and is ashamed of it. ”

“ AMY, nestling still closer, ‘What are we to do now, dear dear mother?’
Alice has a happy idea; but that, as the novelists say, deserves a chapter to itself.
III
We are back in the room of the diary. The diary itself is not visible; it is tucked away in the drawer, taking a nap while it may, for it has much to chronicle before cockcrow. Cosmo also is asleep, on an ingenious arrangement of chairs. Ginevra is sitting bolt upright, a book on her knee, but she is not reading it. She is seeing visions in which Amy plays a desperate part. The hour is late; every one ought to be in bed. ”

“ Cosmo is a cadet at Osborne, and properly proud of his station, but just now he looks proud of nothing. He is plunged in gloom. The cause of his woe is a telegram, which he is regarding from all points of the compass, as if in hopes of making it send him better news. At last he gives expression to his feelings. ‘All I can say,’ he sums up in the first words of the play, ‘is that if father tries to kiss me, I shall kick him.’
If Amy makes any reply the words arrive upside-down and are unintelligible. The maid announces Miss Dunbar. ”

“ RICHARDSON, with the old sinking, ‘A chop!’ She departs with her worst suspicions confirmed.
STEVE, as they pull their chairs nearer to the fire, ‘Is Alice coming on from home?’
COLONEL. ‘Yes, that’s it.’ He stretches out his legs. ‘Steve, home is the best club in the world. ”

“ Ginevra takes Amy in her arms. ‘My ownest Amy, if they are not both on their knees to you for the noble way in which you have striven to prepare this house for them—’
‘Darling Ginevra, all I ask is to be allowed to do my duty.’
‘Listen, then, Amy: your duty is to be able to help your parents in every way when they return. Your mother having been so long in India can know little about Life ”

“ There is indeed a little cupboard where his crockery is kept, and if Amy is careful she might be able to squeeze in there. We cannot even make the hour midnight; it is eight-thirty, quite late enough for her to be out alone.
Steve has just finished dinner, in his comfortable lodgings. He is not even in evening dress, but he does wear a lounge jacket, which we devoutly hope will give him a rakish air to Amy’s eyes. He would undoubtedly have put on evening dress if he had known she was coming. His man, Richardson, is waiting on him. When we wrote that we deliberated a long time. ”

“ Their intention is to kiss. They do so. Cosmo snorts, and betakes himself to some other room, his bedroom probably, where a man may be alone with mannish things, his razor, for instance. The maidens do not resent his rudeness. They know that poor Cosmo’s time will come, and they are glad to be alone, for they have much to say that is for no other mortal ears. Some of it is sure to go into the diary; indeed if we were to put our ear to the drawer where the diary is we could probably hear its little heart ticking in unison with theirs.
It is Ginevra who speaks first. ”

“ It should be a handsome, sombre room in oak and dark red, with sinister easy chairs and couches, great curtains discreetly drawn, a door to enter by, a door to hide by, a carelessly strewn table on which to write a letter reluctantly to dictation, another table exquisitely decorated for supper for two, champagne in an ice-bucket, many rows of books which on close examination will prove to be painted wood (the stage Lotharios not being really reading men) . ”

“ ALICE, with a terrible look at Steve, ‘Just a dark little cupboard.’
Steve, not aware that it is her daughter who is in there, wonders why the lighter aspect of the incident has ceased so suddenly to strike her. She returns to the fire, but not to her chair. She puts her arms round the neck of her husband; a great grief for him is welling up in her breast. ”