[Announcing guests.] Lady Markby. Mrs. Cheveley.
[Enter Lady Markby and Mrs. Cheveley. Lady Markby is a pleasant, kindly, popular woman, with gray hair à la marquise and good lace. Mrs. Cheveley, who accompanies her, is tall and rather slight. Lips very thin and highly-coloured, a line of scarlet on a pallid face. Venetian red hair, aquiline nose, and long throat. Rouge accentuates the natural paleness of her complexion. Gray-green eyes that move restlessly. She is in heliotrope, with diamonds. She looks rather like an orchid, and makes great demands on one’s curiosity. In all her movements she is extremely graceful. A work of art, on the whole, but showing the influence of too many schools.]
·7· lady markby
Good evening, dear Gertrude! So kind of you to let me bring my friend, Mrs. Cheveley. Two such charming women should know each other!
lady chiltern
[Advances towards Mrs. Cheveley with a sweet smile. Then suddenly stops, and bows rather distantly.] I think Mrs. Cheveley and I have met before. I did not know she had married a second time.
lady markby
[Genially.] Ah, nowadays people marry as often as they can, don’t they? It is most fashionable. [To Duchess of Maryborough.] Dear Duchess, and how is the Duke? Brain still weak, I suppose? Well, that is only to be expected, is it not? His good father was just the same. There is nothing like race, is there?
mrs. cheveley
[Playing with her fan.] But have we really met before, Lady Chiltern? I can’t remember where. I have been out of England for so long.
lady chiltern
We were at school together, Mrs. Cheveley.
mrs. cheveley
[Superciliously.] Indeed? I have forgotten all about my schooldays. I have a vague impression that they were detestable.
·8· lady chiltern
[Coldly.] I am not surprised!
mrs. cheveley
[In her sweetest manner.] Do you know, I am quite looking forward to meeting your clever husband, Lady Chiltern. Since he has been at the Foreign Office, he has been so much talked of in Vienna. They actually succeed in spelling his name right in the newspapers. That in itself is fame, on the continent.
lady chiltern
I hardly think there will be much in common between you and my husband, Mrs. Cheveley! [Moves away.]
vicomte de nanjac
Ah! chère Madame, quelle surprise! I have not seen you since Berlin!
mrs. cheveley
Not since Berlin, Vicomte. Five years ago!
vicomte de nanjac
And you are younger and more beautiful than ever. How do you manage it?
mrs. cheveley
By making it a rule only to talk to perfectly charming people like yourself.
·9· vicomte de nanjac
Ah! you flatter me. You butter me, as they say here.
mrs. cheveley
Do they say that here? How dreadful of them!
vicomte de nanjac
Yes, they have a wonderful language. It should be more widely known.
[Sir Robert Chiltern enters. A man of forty, but looking somewhat younger. Clean-shaven, with finely-cut features, dark-haired and dark-eyed. A personality of mark. Not popular—few personalities are. But intensely admired by the few, and deeply respected by the many. The note of his manner is that of perfect distinction, with a slight touch of pride. One feels that he is conscious of the success he has made in life. A nervous temperament, with a tired look. The firmly-chiselled mouth and chin contrast strikingly with the romantic expression in the deep-set eyes. The variance is suggestive of an almost complete separation of passion and intellect, as though thought and emotion were each isolated in its own sphere through some violence of will-power. There is nervousness in the nostrils, and in the pale, thin, pointed hands. It would be inaccurate to call him picturesque. Picturesqueness cannot survive the House of Commons. But Vandyck would have liked to have painted his head.]
·10· sir robert chiltern
Good evening, Lady Markby! I hope you have brought Sir John with you?
lady markby
Oh! I have brought a much more charming person than Sir John. Sir John’s temper since he has taken seriously to politics has become quite unbearable. Really, now that the House of Commons is trying to become useful, it does a great deal of harm.
sir robert chiltern
I hope not, Lady Markby. At any rate we do our best to waste the public time, don’t we? But who is this charming person you have been kind enough to bring to us?
lady markby
Her name is Mrs. Cheveley! One of the Dorsetshire Cheveleys, I suppose. But I really don’t know. Families are so mixed nowadays. Indeed, as a rule, everybody turns out to be somebody else.
sir robert chiltern
Mrs. Cheveley? I seem to know the name.
lady markby
She has just arrived from Vienna.
·11· sir robert chiltern
Ah! yes. I think I know whom you mean.
lady markby
Oh! she goes everywhere there, and has such pleasant scandals about all her friends. I really must go to Vienna next winter. I hope there is a good chef at the Embassy.
sir robert chiltern
If there is not, the Ambassador will certainly have to be recalled. Pray point out Mrs. Cheveley to me. I should like to see her.
lady markby
Let me introduce you. [To Mrs. Cheveley.] My dear, Sir Robert Chiltern is dying to know you!
sir robert chiltern
[Bowing.] Everyone is dying to know the brilliant Mrs. Cheveley. Our attachés at Vienna write to us about nothing else.
mrs. cheveley
Thank you, Sir Robert. An acquaintance that begins with a compliment is sure to develop into a real friendship. It starts in the right manner. And I find that I know Lady Chiltern already.
sir robert chiltern
Really?
·12· mrs. cheveley
Yes. She has just reminded me that we were at school together. I remember it perfectly now. She always got the good conduct prize. I have a distinct recollection of Lady Chiltern always getting the good conduct prize!
sir robert chiltern
[Smiling.] And what prizes did you get, Mrs. Cheveley?
mrs. cheveley
My prizes came a little later on in life. I don’t think any of them were for good conduct. I forget!
sir robert chiltern
I am sure they were for something charming!
mrs. cheveley
I don’t know that women are always rewarded for being charming. I think they are usually punished for it! Certainly, more women grow old nowadays through the faithfulness of their admirers than through anything else! At least that is the only way I can account for the terribly haggard look of most of your pretty women in London!
sir