Louis Creswicke

Miss Hagar Hunch, President; Miss Dora Darlish, Secretary; Mrs Egerton and Mrs Clare Graham, Visitors; and the "Celibates," eight in number.

Scene I.—The Club Room.

Miss Hunch. Oh, Mrs Egerton, you are just in time. We are now to take the oath binding ourselves to refuse all offers of marriage.

Mrs Egerton. Perhaps I had better retire; as wife, and mother of a family, I——

Miss Hunch. Certainly not; we welcome any witness, and, after all, we owe much to married women, since everyone of them is a Curtius who, by a leap into the chasm of publicity, may save a doomed multitude!

Mrs Clare Graham (laughing). Gracious! I did not know I could leap anywhere. Pray tell me how it is done.

Miss Hunch (glaring through her spectacles). The subject is too serious for trifling. Marriage is calculated to pen the free instincts of the feminine community. You know our motto, Aut viam inveniam aut faciam?

Mrs Egerton. I see it all over the room, but that doesn't tell me what it means.

Miss Hunch. It means we will find a road out of our bondage—or make one!

Mrs Clare Graham (giggling). Sail from Scylla into Charybdis, eh? You see I allow the tragedy of both destinations.

Miss Hunch (sarcastically). A kind concession, but a frivolous. Still, we prefer the risk of the unknown to the horror of the known.

Mrs Graham to Mrs Egerton (aside). What on earth does she mean? How many times has she been married?

Mrs Egerton (aside). Hush. You mustn't offend the prejudices of the club. Ah, how do you do, Miss Darlish?

Dora Darlish (joining them). Charming rooms, aren't they? So glad to see you here, Clare.

Mrs Clare Graham. Thank you, but I feel rather like a fish out of water. It takes a long time to cultivate amphibiousness——

Dora. Oh, we're not amphibious—we mean to keep high and dry——

Mrs Clare Graham. I thought you didn't forswear love and romance and all that kind of thing, but——

Dora. Nor do we. We look on love as the divine revelation of life——

Mrs Clare Graham. Oh! And then?

Dora. When love has ceased to be love, we——

Mrs Clare Graham. Scramble to the bank to sun yourselves till ready for another dive? I must tell Charlie——

Dora. Don't. You will put wrong constructions on things. Of course we would merely preserve the right to scramble out in self-defence——

Mrs Clare Graham (laughing). I thought so! How about amphibians? You ought to re-christen the club!

Miss Hunch (speaking above the buzz of conversation). Let us join hands and make oath that, however pressed to marry, we will refuse.

Mrs Clare Graham (clutching Dora's dress and whispering). Dora, don't be a fool. You know Charlie is devoted to you——

Miss Hunch (severely). Let me beg silence while the oath is taken.

Chorus of the "Celibates" (with clasped hands). We solemnly swear that, however pressed to marry, we will refuse.

Mrs Clare Graham (pulling Dora to her side). Dora, I'm disgusted with you. Only yesterday you gave my brother a book with an inscription.

Dora. Well?

Mrs Clare Graham. I read it—there was something about "Pure romance of love, Idyllic and ideal as could be, All policy and prudence far above."

Dora. I'm not ashamed of it. Why shouldn't our love be idyllic and ideal? Why should wedlock of soul mean padlock of individual?

Mrs Clare Graham (angrily). Why, indeed? But don't talk against policy and prudence. Your theory seems the quintessence of both!

Scene II.—Mrs Graham's Drawing-Room.

Mrs Clare Graham. Now I have told you the whole story surely you don't intend to proceed with your absurd courtship?

Charlie. I mean to marry Dora, if that's what you're driving at.

Mrs Clare Graham. It's impossible! However much she wanted to accept she would be bound—as a matter of honour—to refuse.

Charlie (stroking his chin contemplatively). After all, marriage is merely a matter of form, and if it pleases Dora——

Mrs Clare Graham (warmly). To please Dora you'll let Jane's boy inherit the estates?

Charlie. Still, Dora loves me, and she will do anything I ask.

Mrs Clare Graham (rising irately to leave the room). I tell you she won't! Women with convictions are obstinate as Cork pigs.

Charlie. Oh, Dora, here you are! We've been expecting you for hours.

Dora. I'm afraid I've disturbed the conversation; I see Clare is ruffled.

Mrs Clare Graham (abruptly). No, I was going out. Good-bye. (She goes out.)

Dora. She is in a huff with me about something. Why?

Charlie (hesitatingly). No—that is—she was angry with me.

Dora. About?

Charlie. Oh, because you and I agree with each other so well on all subjects, marriage included.

Dora (pressing his hand). My beloved!

Charlie. I said it was a rotten institution—or something of the kind.

Dora (charmingly). An effete conventionality——

Charlie (putting his arm round her waist). Only suited to reckless people who risk the disappointments of the future for the effervescence of the present.

Dora. What did she say?

Charlie. She began to talk about my sister's boy inheriting the property, as though we cared.

Dora. Will he?

Charlie. Of course. It's entailed. But he's a fine lad, and we, who will be all in all to each other, need not grudge it him.

Dora (thoughtfully). I suppose not.

Charlie. I believe that is the source of Jane's affection for me. She knows how safe I am in the matter of marriage.

Dora. Then you have never contemplated it?

Charlie (emphatically). Never!

Dora (horrified). And you made love to me without any idea of proposing?

Charlie. You forget: you explained your creed at the outset.

Dora (paling). Then you deliberately availed yourself of the opportunity——

Charlie (drawing his moustache over the corners of his lips). Of adoring a girl whose theories corresponded with my own? Yes.

Dora (with tears in her eyes). Oh! You mean you would not have loved me if your courtship had involved marriage?

Charlie. I can't say. We both abhor to be handicapped by legalities, don't we? We both enjoy the same rights of independence——

Dora (rising angrily). Then, if loving me had necessitated the surrender of your liberty you could not have done it?

Charlie (earnestly). Could you?

Dora (sobbing). Could I? I would have loved you always.

Charlie (taking her in his arms). I would have loved you in the same way.

Dora. Not if I had wanted to marry you?

Charlie. I won't say. You never put me to the test.

Dora (excitedly). But if I should? Oh, Charlie—tell me, would you—won't you—marry me?

Charlie. Clare! We want your congratulations. Dora has proposed to me, and I am to name the happy day.

Mrs Clare Graham. What! And how about her oath?

Dora (blushing). Oh, I only vowed that, however pressed to marry, I would refuse. But I was not pressed; was I, Charlie?

Charlie (sedately). Certainly not.