Chương Chương 2 · 第1章（2）

ANN. [in a low musical voice] Mamma--

MRS WHITEFIELD. [hastily] Now, Ann, I do beg you not to put it on me. I

have no opinion on the subject; and if I had, it would probably not be

attended to. I am quite with whatever you three think best.

Tanner turns his head and looks fixedly at Ramsden, who angrily refuses

to receive this mute communication.

ANN. [resuming in the same gentle voice, ignoring her mother's bad

taste] Mamma knows that she is not strong enough to bear the whole

responsibility for me and Rhoda without some help and advice. Rhoda

must have a guardian; and though I am older, I do not think any young

unmarried woman should be left quite to her own guidance. I hope you

agree with me, Granny?

TANNER. [starting] Granny! Do you intend to call your guardians Granny?

ANN. Don't be foolish, Jack. Mr Ramsden has always been Grandpapa

Roebuck to me: I am Granny's Annie; and he is Annie's Granny. I

christened him so when I first learned to speak.

RAMSDEN. [sarcastically] I hope you are satisfied, Mr Tanner. Go on,

Annie: I quite agree with you.

ANN. Well, if I am to have a guardian, CAN I set aside anybody whom my

dear father appointed for me?

RAMSDEN. [biting his lip] You approve of your father's choice, then?

ANN. It is not for me to approve or disapprove. I accept it. My father

loved me and knew best what was good for me.

RAMSDEN. Of course I understand your feeling, Annie. It is what I should

have expected of you; and it does you credit. But it does not settle the

question so completely as you think. Let me put a case to you. Suppose

you were to discover that I had been guilty of some disgraceful

action--that I was not the man your poor dear father took me for. Would

you still consider it right that I should be Rhoda's guardian?

ANN. I can't imagine you doing anything disgraceful, Granny.

TANNER. [to Ramsden] You haven't done anything of the sort, have you?

RAMSDEN. [indignantly] No sir.

MRS. WHITEFIELD. [placidly] Well, then, why suppose it?

ANN. You see, Granny, Mamma would not like me to suppose it.

RAMSDEN. [much perplexed] You are both so full of natural and

affectionate feeling in these family matters that it is very hard to put

the situation fairly before you.

TANNER. Besides, my friend, you are not putting the situation fairly

before them.

RAMSDEN. [sulkily] Put it yourself, then.

TANNER. I will. Ann: Ramsden thinks I am not fit be your guardian; and I

quite agree with him. He considers that if your father had read my book,

he wouldn't have appointed me. That book is the disgraceful action he

has been talking about. He thinks it's your duty for Rhoda's sake to ask

him to act alone and to make me withdraw. Say the word and I will.

ANN. But I haven't read your book, Jack.

TANNER. [diving at the waste-paper basket and fishing the book out for

her] Then read it at once and decide.

RAMSDEN. If I am to be your guardian, I positively forbid you to read

that book, Annie. [He smites the table with his fist and rises].

ANN. Of course, if you don't wish it. [She puts the book on the table].

TANNER. If one guardian is to forbid you to read the other guardian's

book, how are we to settle it? Suppose I order you to read it! What

about your duty to me?

ANN. [gently] I am sure you would never purposely force me into a

painful dilemma, Jack.

RAMSDEN. [irritably] Yes, yes, Annie: this is all very well, and, as I

said, quite natural and becoming. But you must make a choice one way or

the other. We are as much in a dilemma as you.

ANN. I feel that I am too young, too inexperienced, to decide. My

father's wishes are sacred to me.

MRS WHITEFIELD. If you two men won't carry them out I must say it is

rather hard that you should put the responsibility on Ann. It seems to

me that people are always putting things on other people in this world.

RAMSDEN. I am sorry you take it that way.

ANN. [touchingly] Do you refuse to accept me as your ward, Granny?

RAMSDEN. No: I never said that. I greatly object to act with Mr Tanner:

that's all.

MRS. WHITEFIELD. Why? What's the matter with poor Jack?

TANNER. My views are too advanced for him.

RAMSDEN. [indignantly] They are not. I deny it.

ANN. Of course not. What nonsense! Nobody is more advanced than Granny.

I am sure it is Jack himself who has made all the difficulty. Come,

Jack! Be kind to me in my sorrow. You don't refuse to accept me as your

ward, do you?

TANNER. [gloomily] No. I let myself in for it; so I suppose I must face

it. [He turns away to the bookcase, and stands there, moodily studying

the titles of the volumes].

ANN. [rising and expanding with subdued but gushing delight] Then we are

all agreed; and my dear father's will is to be carried out. You don't

know what a joy that is to me and to my mother! [She goes to Ramsden and

presses both his hands, saying] And I shall have my dear Granny to help

and advise me. [She casts a glance at Tanner over her shoulder]. And

Jack the Giant Killer. [She goes past her mother to Octavius]. And

Jack's inseparable friend Ricky-ticky-tavy [he blushes and looks

inexpressibly foolish].

MRS WHITEFIELD. [rising and shaking her widow's weeds straight] Now that

you are Ann's guardian, Mr Ramsden, I wish you would speak to her about

her habit of giving people nicknames. They can't be expected to like it.

[She moves towards the door].

ANN. How can you say such a thing, Mamma! [Glowing with affectionate

remorse] Oh, I wonder can you be right! Have I been inconsiderate? [She

turns to Octavius, who is sitting astride his chair with his elbows on

the back of it. Putting her hand on his forehead she turns his face up

suddenly]. Do you want to be treated like a grown up man? Must I call

you Mr Robinson in future?

OCTAVIUS. [earnestly] Oh please call me Ricky-ticky-tavy, "Mr Robinson"

would hurt me cruelly. [She laughs and pats his cheek with her finger;

then comes back to Ramsden]. You know I'm beginning to think that Granny

is rather a piece of impertinence. But I never dreamt of its hurting

you.

RAMSDEN. [breezily, as he pats her affectionately on the back] My dear

Annie, nonsense. I insist on Granny. I won't answer to any other name

than Annie's Granny.

ANN. [gratefully] You all spoil me, except Jack.

TANNER. [over his shoulder, from the bookcase] I think you ought to call

me Mr Tanner.

ANN. [gently] No you don't, Jack. That's like the things you say on

purpose to shock people: those who know you pay no attention to them.

But, if you like, I'll call you after your famous ancestor Don Juan.

RAMSDEN. Don Juan!

ANN. [innocently] Oh, is there any harm in it? I didn't know. Then I

certainly won't call you that. May I call you Jack until I can think of

something else?

TANKER. Oh, for Heaven's sake don't try to invent anything worse. I

capitulate. I consent to Jack. I embrace Jack. Here endeth my first and

last attempt to assert my authority.

ANN. You see, Mamma, they all really like to have pet names.

MRS WHITEFIELD. Well, I think you might at least drop them until we are

out of mourning.

ANN. [reproachfully, stricken to the soul] Oh, how could you remind me,

mother? [She hastily leaves the room to conceal her emotion].

MRS WHITEFIELD. Of course. My fault as usual! [She follows Ann].

TANNER. [coming from the bockcase] Ramsden: we're

beaten--smashed--nonentitized, like her mother.

RAMSDEN. Stuff, Sir. [He follows Mrs Whitefield out of the room].

TANNER. [left alone with Octavius, stares whimsically at him] Tavy: do

you want to count for something in the world?

OCTAVIUS. I want to count for something as a poet: I want to write a

great play.

TANNER. With Ann as the heroine?

OCTAVIUS. Yes: I confess it.

TANNER. Take care, Tavy. The play with Ann as the heroine is all right;

but if you're not very careful, by Heaven she'll marry you.

OCTAVIUS. [sighing] No such luck, Jack!

TANNER. Why, man, your head is in the lioness's mouth: you are half

swallowed already--in three bites--Bite One, Ricky; Bite Two, Ticky;

Bite Three, Tavy; and down you go.

OCTAVIUS. She is the same to everybody, Jack: you know her ways.

TANNER. Yes: she breaks everybody's back with the stroke of her paw; but

the question is, which of us will she eat? My own opinion is that she

means to eat you.

OCTAVIUS. [rising, pettishly] It's horrible to talk like that about her

when she is upstairs crying for her father. But I do so want her to eat

me that I can bear your brutalities because they give me hope.

TANNER. Tavy; that's the devilish side of a woman's fascination: she

makes you will your own destruction.

OCTAVIUS. But it's not destruction: it's fulfilment.

TANNER. Yes, of HER purpose; and that purpose is neither her happiness

nor yours, but Nature's. Vitality in a woman is a blind fury of

creation. She sacrifices herself to it: do you think she will hesitate

to sacrifice you?

OCTAVIUS. Why, it is just because she is self-sacrificing that she will

not sacrifice those she loves.

TANNER. That is the profoundest of mistakes, Tavy. It is the

self-sacrificing women that sacrifice others most recklessly. Because

they are unselfish, they are kind in little things. Because they have a

purpose which is not their own purpose, but that of the whole universe,

a man is nothing to them but an instrument of that purpose.

OCTAVIUS. Don't be ungenerous, Jack. They take the tenderest care of us.

TANNER. Yes, as a soldier takes care of his rifle or a musician of his

violin. But do they allow us any purpose or freedom of our own? Will

they lend us to one another? Can the strongest man escape from them when

once he is appropriated? They tremble when we are in danger, and weep

when we die; but the tears are not for us, but for a father wasted, a

son's breeding thrown away. They accuse us of treating them as a mere

means to our pleasure; but how can so feeble and transient a folly as

a man's selfish pleasure enslave a woman as the whole purpose of Nature

embodied in a woman can enslave a man?

OCTAVIUS. What matter, if the slavery makes us happy?

TANNER. No matter at all if you have no purpose of your own, and are,

like most men, a mere breadwinner. But you, Tavy, are an artist: that

is, you have a purpose as absorbing and as unscrupulous as a woman's

purpose.

OCTAVIUS. Not unscrupulous.

TANNER. Quite unscrupulous. The true artist will let his wife starve,

his children go barefoot, his mother drudge for his living at

seventy, sooner than work at anything but his art. To women he is half

vivisector, half vampire. He gets into intimate relations with them to

study them, to strip the mask of convention from them, to surprise their

inmost secrets, knowing that they have the power to rouse his deepest

creative energies, to rescue him from his cold reason, to make him see

visions and dream dreams, to inspire him, as he calls it. He persuades

women that they may do this for their own purpose whilst he really means

them to do it for his. He steals the mother's milk and blackens it to

make printer's ink to scoff at her and glorify ideal women with. He

pretends to spare her the pangs of childbearing so that he may have

for himself the tenderness and fostering that belong of right to her

children. Since marriage began, the great artist has been known as a

bad husband. But he is worse: he is a child-robber, a bloodsucker, a

hypocrite and a cheat. Perish the race and wither a thousand women if

only the sacrifice of them enable him to act Hamlet better, to paint

a finer picture, to write a deeper poem, a greater play, a profounder

philosophy! For mark you, Tavy, the artist's work is to show us

ourselves as we really are. Our minds are nothing but this knowledge of

ourselves; and he who adds a jot to such knowledge creates new mind as

surely as any woman creates new men. In the rage of that creation he

is as ruthless as the woman, as dangerous to her as she to him, and

as horribly fascinating. Of all human struggles there is none so

treacherous and remorseless as the struggle between the artist man

and the mother woman. Which shall use up the other? that is the issue

between them. And it is all the deadlier because, in your romanticist

cant, they love one another.

OCTAVIUS. Even if it were so--and I don't admit it for a moment--it is

out of the deadliest struggles that we get the noblest characters.

TANNER. Remember that the next time you meet a grizzly bear or a Bengal

tiger, Tavy.

OCTAVIUS. I meant where there is love, Jack.

TANNER. Oh, the tiger will love you. There is no love sincerer than the

love of food. I think Ann loves you that way: she patted your cheek as

if it were a nicely underdone chop.

OCTAVIUS. You know, Jack, I should have to run away from you if I did

not make it a fixed rule not to mind anything you say. You come out with

perfectly revolting things sometimes.

Ramsden returns, followed by Ann. They come in quickly, with their

former leisurely air of decorous grief changed to one of genuine

concern, and, on Ramsden's part, of worry. He comes between the two men,

intending to address Octavius, but pulls himself up abruptly as he sees

Tanner.

RAMSDEN. I hardly expected to find you still here, Mr Tanner.

TANNER. Am I in the way? Good morning, fellow guardian [he goes towards

the door].

ANN. Stop, Jack. Granny: he must know, sooner or later.

RAMSDEN. Octavius: I have a very serious piece of news for you. It is of

the most private and delicate nature--of the most painful nature too, I

am sorry to say. Do you wish Mr Tanner to be present whilst I explain?

OCTAVIUS. [turning pale] I have no secrets from Jack.

RAMSDEN. Before you decide that finally, let me say that the news

concerns your sister, and that it is terrible news.

OCTAVIUS. Violet! What has happened? Is she--dead?

RAMSDEN. I am not sure that it is not even worse than that.

OCTAVIUS. Is she badly hurt? Has there been an accident?

RAMSDEN. No: nothing of that sort.

TANNER. Ann: will you have the common humanity to tell us what the

matter is?

ANN. [half whispering] I can't. Violet has done something dreadful. We

shall have to get her away somewhere. [She flutters to the writing

table and sits in Ramsden's chair, leaving the three men to fight it out

between them].

OCTAVIUS. [enlightened] Is that what you meant, Mr Ramsden?

RAMSDEN. Yes. [Octavius sinks upon a chair, crushed]. I am afraid there

is no doubt that Violet did not really go to Eastbourne three weeks ago

when we thought she was with the Parry Whitefields. And she called on a

strange doctor yesterday with a wedding ring on her finger. Mrs. Parry

Whitefield met her there by chance; and so the whole thing came out.

OCTAVIUS. [rising with his fists clenched] Who is the scoundrel?

ANN. She won't tell us.

OCTAVIUS. [collapsing upon his chair again] What a frightful thing!

TANNER. [with angry sarcasm] Dreadful. Appalling. Worse than death, as

Ramsden says. [He comes to Octavius]. What would you not give, Tavy, to

turn it into a railway accident, with all her bones broken or something

equally respectable and deserving of sympathy?

OCTAVIUS. Don't be brutal, Jack.

TANNER. Brutal! Good Heavens, man, what are you crying for? Here is

a woman whom we all supposed to be making bad water color sketches,

practising Grieg and Brahms, gadding about to concerts and parties,

wasting her life and her money. We suddenly learn that she has turned

from these sillinesses to the fulfilment of her highest purpose and

greatest function--to increase, multiply and replenish the earth. And

instead of admiring her courage and rejoicing in her instinct; instead

of crowning the completed womanhood and raising the triumphal strain of

"Unto us a child is born: unto us a son is given," here you are--you who

have been as merry as Brigs in your mourning for the dead--all pulling

long faces and looking as ashamed and disgraced as if the girl had

committed the vilest of crimes.

RAMSDEN. [roaring with rage] I will not have these abominations uttered

in my house [he smites the writing table with his fist].

TANNER. Look here: if you insult me again I'll take you at your word and

leave your house. Ann: where is Violet now?

ANN. Why? Are you going to her?

TANNER. Of course I am going to her. She wants help; she wants money;

she wants respect and congratulation. She wants every chance for her

child. She does not seem likely to get it from you: she shall from me.

Where is she?

ANN. Don't be so headstrong, Jack. She's upstairs.

TANNER. What! Under Ramsden's sacred roof! Go and do your miserable

duty, Ramsden. Hunt her out into the street. Cleanse your threshold from

her contamination. Vindicate the purity of your English home. I'll go

for a cab.

ANN. [alarmed] Oh, Granny, you mustn't do that.

OCTAVIUS. [broken-heartedly, rising] I'll take her away, Mr Ramsden. She

had no right to come to your house.

RAMSDEN. [indignantly] But I am only too anxious to help her. [turning

on Tanner] How dare you, sir, impute such monstrous intentions to me?

I protest against it. I am ready to put down my last penny to save her

from being driven to run to you for protection.

TANNER. [subsiding] It's all right, then. He's not going to act up to

his principles. It's agreed that we all stand by Violet.

OCTAVIUS. But who is the man? He can make reparation by marrying her;

and he shall, or he shall answer for it to me.

RAMSDEN. He shall, Octavius. There you speak like a man.

TANNER. Then you don't think him a scoundrel, after all?

OCTAVIUS. Not a scoundrel! He is a heartless scoundrel.

RAMSDEN. A damned scoundrel. I beg your pardon, Annie; but I can say no

less.

TANNER. So we are to marry your sister to a damned scoundrel by way of

reforming her character! On my soul, I think you are all mad.

ANN. Don't be absurd, Jack. Of course you are quite right, Tavy; but we

don't know who he is: Violet won't tell us.

TANNER. What on earth does it matter who he is? He's done his part; and

Violet must do the rest.

RAMSDEN. [beside himself] Stuff! lunacy! There is a rascal in our midst,

a libertine, a villain worse than a murderer; and we are not to

learn who he is! In our ignorance we are to shake him by the hand; to

introduce him into our homes; to trust our daughters with him; to--to--

ANN. [coaxingly] There, Granny, don't talk so loud. It's most shocking:

we must all admit that; but if Violet won't tell us, what can we do?

Nothing. Simply nothing.

RAMSDEN. Hmph! I'm not so sure of that. If any man has paid Violet any

special attention, we can easily find that out. If there is any man of

notoriously loose principles among us--

TANNER. Ahem!

RAMSDEN. [raising his voice] Yes sir, I repeat, if there is any man of

notoriously loose principles among us--

TANNER. Or any man notoriously lacking in self-control.

RAMSDEN. [aghast] Do you dare to suggest that I am capable of such an

act?

TANNER. My dear Ramsden, this is an act of which every man is capable.

That is what comes of getting at cross purposes with Nature. The

suspicion you have just flung at me clings to us all. It's a sort of mud

that sticks to the judge's ermine or the cardinal's robe as fast as to

the rags of the tramp. Come, Tavy: don't look so bewildered: it might

have been me: it might have been Ramsden; just as it might have been

anybody. If it had, what could we do but lie and protest as Ramsden is

going to protest.

RAMSDEN. [choking] I--I--I--

TANNER. Guilt itself could not stammer more confusedly, And yet you know

perfectly well he's innocent, Tavy.

RAMSDEN. [exhausted] I am glad you admit that, sir. I admit, myself,

that there is an element of truth in what you say, grossly as you

may distort it to gratify your malicious humor. I hope, Octavius, no

suspicion of me is possible in your mind.

OCTAVIUS. Of you! No, not for a moment.

TANNER. [drily] I think he suspects me just a little.

OCTAVIUS. Jack: you couldn't--you wouldn't--

TANNER. Why not?

OCTAVIUS. [appalled] Why not!

TANNER. Oh, well, I'll tell you why not. First, you would feel bound

to quarrel with me. Second, Violet doesn't like me. Third, if I had

the honor of being the father of Violet's child, I should boast of it

instead of denying it. So be easy: our Friendship is not in danger.

OCTAVIUS. I should have put away the suspicion with horror if only you

would think and feel naturally about it. I beg your pardon.

TANNER. MY pardon! nonsense! And now let's sit down and have a family

council. [He sits down. The rest follow his example, more or less under

protest]. Violet is going to do the State a service; consequently she

must be packed abroad like a criminal until it's over. What's happening

upstairs?

ANN. Violet is in the housekeeper's room--by herself, of course.

TANNER. Why not in the drawingroom?

ANN. Don't be absurd, Jack. Miss Ramsden is in the drawingroom with my

mother, considering what to do.

TANNER. Oh! the housekeeper's room is the penitentiary, I suppose; and

the prisoner is waiting to be brought before her judges. The old cats!

ANN. Oh, Jack!

RAMSDEN. You are at present a guest beneath the roof of one of the old

cats, sir. My sister is the mistress of this house.

TANNER. She would put me in the housekeeper's room, too, if she dared,

Ramsden. However, I withdraw cats. Cats would have more sense. Ann: as

your guardian, I order you to go to Violet at once and be particularly

kind to her.

ANN. I have seen her, Jack. And I am sorry to say I am afraid she is

going to be rather obstinate about going abroad. I think Tavy ought to

speak to her about it.

OCTAVIUS. How can I speak to her about such a thing [he breaks down]?

ANN. Don't break down, Ricky. Try to bear it for all our sakes.

RAMSDEN. Life is not all plays and poems, Octavius. Come! face it like a

man.

TANNER. [chafing again] Poor dear brother! Poor dear friends of the

family! Poor dear Tabbies and Grimalkins. Poor dear everybody except the

woman who is going to risk her life to create another life! Tavy: don't

you be a selfish ass. Away with you and talk to Violet; and bring her

down here if she cares to come. [Octavius rises]. Tell her we'll stand

by her.

RAMSDEN. [rising] No, sir--

TANNER. [rising also and interrupting him] Oh, we understand: it's

against your conscience; but still you'll do it.

OCTAVIUS. I assure you all, on my word, I never meant to be selfish.

It's so hard to know what to do when one wishes earnestly to do right.

TANNER. My dear Tavy, your pious English habit of regarding the world

as a moral gymnasium built expressly to strengthen your character in,

occasionally leads you to think about your own confounded principles

when you should be thinking about other people's necessities. The need

of the present hour is a happy mother and a healthy baby. Bend your

energies on that; and you will see your way clearly enough.

Octavius, much perplexed, goes out.

RAMSDEN. [facing Tanner impressively] And Morality, sir? What is to

become of that?

TANNER. Meaning a weeping Magdalen and an innocent child branded with

her shame. Not in our circle, thank you. Morality can go to its father

the devil.

RAMSDEN. I thought so, sir. Morality sent to the devil to please our

libertines, male and female. That is to be the future of England, is it?

TANNER. Oh, England will survive your disapproval. Meanwhile, I

understand that you agree with me as to the practical course we are to

take?

RAMSDEN. Not in your spirit sir. Not for your reasons.

TANNER. You can explain that if anybody calls you to account, here or

hereafter. [He turns away, and plants himself in front of Mr Herbert

Spencer, at whom he stares gloomily].

ANN. [rising and coming to Ramsden] Granny: hadn't you better go up to

the drawingroom and tell them what we intend to do?

RAMSDEN. [looking pointedly at Tanner] I hardly like to leave you alone

with this gentleman. Will you not come with me?

ANN. Miss Ramsden would not like to speak about it before me, Granny. I

ought not to be present.

RAMSDEN. You are right: I should have thought of that. You are a good

girl, Annie.

He pats her on the shoulder. She looks up at him with beaming eyes and

he goes out, much moved. Having disposed of him, she looks at Tanner.

His back being turned to her, she gives a moment's attention to her

personal appearance, then softly goes to him and speaks almost into his

ear.

ANN. Jack [he turns with a start]: are you glad that you are my

guardian? You don't mind being made responsible for me, I hope.

TANNER. The latest addition to your collection of scapegoats, eh?

ANN. Oh, that stupid old joke of yours about me! Do please drop it. Why

do you say things that you know must pain me? I do my best to please

you, Jack: I suppose I may tell you so now that you are my guardian. You

will make me so unhappy if you refuse to be friends with me.

TANNER. [studying her as gloomily as he studied the dust] You need not

go begging for my regard. How unreal our moral judgments are! You seem

to me to have absolutely no conscience--only hypocrisy; and you can't

see the difference--yet there is a sort of fascination about you. I

always attend to you, somehow. I should miss you if I lost you.

ANN. [tranquilly slipping her arm into his and walking about with him]

But isn't that only natural, Jack? We have known each other since we

were children. Do you remember?

TANNER. [abruptly breaking loose] Stop! I remember EVERYTHING.

ANN. Oh, I daresay we were often very silly; but--

TANNER. I won't have it, Ann. I am no more that schoolboy now than I

am the dotard of ninety I shall grow into if I live long enough. It is

over: let me forget it.

ANN. Wasn't it a happy time? [She attempts to take his arm again].

TANNER. Sit down and behave yourself. [He makes her sit down in the

chair next the writing table]. No doubt it was a happy time for you. You

were a good girl and never compromised yourself. And yet the wickedest

child that ever was slapped could hardly have had a better time. I can

understand the success with which you bullied the other girls: your

virtue imposed on them. But tell me this: did you ever know a good boy?

ANN. Of course. All boys are foolish sometimes; but Tavy was always a

really good boy.

TANNER. [struck by this] Yes: you're right. For some reason you never

tempted Tavy.

ANN. Tempted! Jack!

TANNER. Yes, my dear Lady Mephistopheles, tempted. You were insatiably

curious as to what a boy might be capable of, and diabolically clever at

getting through his guard and surprising his inmost secrets.

ANN. What nonsense! All because you used to tell me long stories of the

wicked things you had done--silly boys tricks! And you call such things

inmost secrets: Boys' secrets are just like men's; and you know what

they are!

TANNER. [obstinately] No I don't. What are they, pray?

ANN. Why, the things they tell everybody, of course.

TANNER. Now I swear I told you things I told no one else. You lured me

into a compact by which we were to have no secrets from one another. We

were to tell one another everything, I didn't notice that you never told

me anything.

ANN. You didn't want to talk about me, Jack. You wanted to talk about

yourself.

TANNER. Ah, true, horribly true. But what a devil of a child you must

have been to know that weakness and to play on it for the satisfaction

of your own curiosity! I wanted to brag to you, to make myself

interesting. And I found myself doing all sorts of mischievous things

simply to have something to tell you about. I fought with boys I didn't

hate; I lied about things I might just as well have told the truth

about; I stole things I didn't want; I kissed little girls I didn't care

for. It was all bravado: passionless and therefore unreal.

ANN. I never told of you, Jack.

TANNER. No; but if you had wanted to stop me you would have told of me.

You wanted me to go on.

ANN. [flashing out] Oh, that's not true: it's NOT true, Jack. I never

wanted you to do those dull, disappointing, brutal, stupid, vulgar

things. I always hoped that it would be something really heroic at last.

[Recovering herself] Excuse me, Jack; but the things you did were never

a bit like the things I wanted you to do. They often gave me great

uneasiness; but I could not tell on you and get you into trouble. And

you were only a boy. I knew you would grow out of them. Perhaps I was

wrong.

TANNER. [sardonically] Do not give way to remorse, Ann. At least

nineteen twentieths of the exploits I confessed to you were pure lies. I

soon noticed that you didn't like the true stories.

ANN. Of course I knew that some of the things couldn't have happened.

But--

TANNER. You are going to remind me that some of the most disgraceful

ones did.

ANN. [fondly, to his great terror] I don't want to remind you of

anything. But I knew the people they happened to, and heard about them.

TANNER. Yes; but even the true stories were touched up for telling.

A sensitive boy's humiliations may be very good fun for ordinary

thickskinned grown-ups; but to the boy himself they are so acute,

so ignominious, that he cannot confess them--cannot but deny them

passionately. However, perhaps it was as well for me that I romanced a

bit; for, on the one occasion when I told you the truth, you threatened

to tell of me.

ANN. Oh, never. Never once.

TANNER. Yes, you did. Do you remember a dark-eyed girl named Rachel

Rosetree? [Ann's brows contract for an instant involuntarily]. I got up

a love affair with her; and we met one night in the garden and walked

about very uncomfortably with our arms round one another, and kissed at

parting, and were most conscientiously romantic. If that love affair had

gone on, it would have bored me to death; but it didn't go on; for the

next thing that happened was that Rachel cut me because she found out

that I had told you. How did she find it out? From you. You went to her

and held the guilty secret over her head, leading her a life of abject

terror and humiliation by threatening to tell on her.

ANN. And a very good thing for her, too. It was my duty to stop her

misconduct; and she is thankful to me for it now.

TANNER. Is she?

ANN. She ought to be, at all events.

TANNER. It was not your duty to stop my misconduct, I suppose.

ANN. I did stop it by stopping her.

TANNER. Are you sure of that? You stopped my telling you about my

adventures; but how do you know that you stopped the adventures?

ANN. Do you mean to say that you went on in the same way with other

girls?

TANNER. No. I had enough of that sort of romantic tomfoolery with

Rachel.