The Essential G. B. Shaw: Celebrated Plays, Novels, Personal Letters, Essays & Articles. GEORGE BERNARD SHAW

In future I may sketch to amuse myself and to keep mementos with which I have pleasant associations, but not to elevate my tastes and perfect my morals. Perhaps it is that change of intention which makes me frivolous, as you say I have suddenly become.

      “And since when,” said Herbert gravely, “have you meditated this very important change?”

      “I never meditated it at all. It came upon me unawares. I did not even know what it was until your question forced me to give an account of it. What an infidel I am! But let me tell you this, Adrian. If you suddenly found yourself a Turner, Titian, Michael Angelo and Holbein all rolled into one, would you be a bit happier?”

      “I cannot conceive how r you can doubt it.”

      “I know you would paint better” (Herbert winced), “but it is not at all obvious to me that you would be happier. However, I am in a silly humor to-day; for I can see nothing in a proper way. We had better talk about something else.”

      “The humor has lasted for some days, already, Mary. And it must be talked about, and seriously too, if you have concluded, like my mother, that I am wasting my life in pursuit of a chimera. Has she been speaking to you about me?”

      “Oh, Adrian, you are accusing me of treachery. You must not think, because I have lost faith in my own artistic destiny, that I have lost faith in yours also.”

      “I fear, if you have lost your respect for Art, you have lost your respect for me. If so, you know that you may consider yourself free as far as I am concerned. You must not hold yourself in bondage to a dreamer, as people consider me.”

      “I do not exactly understand. Are you offering me my liberty, or claiming your own?”

      “I am offering you yours. I think you might have guessed that.”

      “I don’t think I might. It is not pleasant to be invited to consider oneself free. If you really wish it, I shall consider myself so.”

      “The question is, do you wish it?”

      “Excuse me, Adrian: the question is, do you wish it?”

      “My feelings towards you are quite unchanged.”

      “And so are mine towards you.”

      After this they walked for a little time in silence. Then Mary said, “Adrian: do you remember our congratulating ourselves last June on our immunity from the lovers’ quarrels which occur in the vulgar world? I think — perhaps it is due to my sudden secession from the worship of Art — I think we made a sort of first attempt at one that time.”

      “Ha! ha! Yes. But we failed, did we not, Mary?”

      “Thanks to our inexperience, we did. But not very disgracefully. We shall do better the next time, most likely.”

      “Then I hope the next time will never come.”

      “I hope not.” Here they reached the garden gate.

      “You must come in and lunch with us, to save me from facing Aunt Jane after my revenge upon her this morning.”

      Then they went in together, and found that Mrs Herbert had called and was at table with the Colonel and Mrs Beatty.

      “Are we late?” said Mary.

      Mrs. Beatty closed her lips and did not reply. The Colonel hastened to say that they had only just sat down. Mrs. Herbert promptly joined in the conversation; and the meal proceeded without Mrs Beatty’s determination not to speak to her niece becoming unpleasantly obvious, until Mary put on her eyeglasses and said, looking at her aunt in her searching myopic way:

      “Aunt Jane: will you come with me to the two-forty train to meet papa?”

      Mrs Beatty maintained her silence for a few seconds. Then she reddened, and said sulkily, “No, Mary, I will not. You can do without me very well.”

      “Adrian: will you come?”

      “Unfortunately,” said Mrs Herbert, “Adrian is bound to me for the afternoon. We are going to Portsmouth to pay a visit. It is time for us to go now,” she added, looking at her watch and rising.

      During the leave taking which followed, Colonel Beatty got his hat, judging that he had better go out with the Herberts than stay between his wife and Mary in their present tempers. But Mrs Beatty did not care to face her niece alone. When the guests were gone, she moved towards the door.

      “Aunt,” said Mary, “don’t go yet. I want to speak to you.”

      Mrs. Beatty did not turn.

      “Very well,” said Mary. “But remember, aunt, if there is to be a quarrel, it will not be of my making.”

      Mrs. Beatty hesitated, and said, “As soon as you express your sorrow for your conduct this morning, I will speak to you.”

      “I am very sorry for what passed.” Mary looked at her aunt as she spoke, not contritely. Mrs Beatty, dissatisfied, held the door handle for a moment longer, then slowly came back and sat down. “I am sure you ought to be.” she said.

      I am sure you ought to be,” said Mary.

      What!” cried Mrs. Beatty, about to rise again.

      ‘You should have taken what I said as an apology, and let well alone,” said Mary. “I am sorry that I resented your accusation this morning in a way that might have made mischief between me and Adrian. But you had no right to say what you did; and I had every right to be angry with you.”

      “You have a right to be angry with me! Do you know who I am, Miss?”

      “Aunt, if you are going to call me ‘Miss,’ we had better stop talking altogether.”

      Mrs Beatty saw extreme vexation in her niece’s expression, and even a tear in her eye. She resolved to assert her authority. “Mary,” she said: “do you wish to provoke me into sending you to your room?”

      Mary rose. “Aunt Jane,” she said, “if you don’t choose to treat me with due respect, as you have to treat other women, we must live apart. If you cannot understand my feelings, at least you know my age and position. This is the second time you have insulted me today.” She went to the door, looking indignantly at her aunt as she passed. The look was returned by one of alarm, as though Mrs Beatty were going to cry again. Mary, seeing this, restrained her anger with an effort as she reached the threshold, stood still for a moment, and then came back to the table.

      “I am a fool to lose my temper with you, aunt,” she said, dropping into the rocking chair with an air of resolute good humor, which became her less than her anger; “but really you are very aggravating. Now, don’t make dignified speeches to me: it makes me feel like a housemaid and I’m sure it makes you feel 1 like a cook.” Mrs Beatty colored. In temper and figure she was sufficiently like the cook of caricature to make the allusion disagreeable to her. “I always feel ridiculous and remorseful after a quarrel,” continued Mary, “whether I am in the right or not — if there be any right in a quarrel.”

      “You are a very strange girl,” said Mrs Beatty, ruefully. “When I was your age, I would not have dared to speak to my elders as you speak to me.”

      “When you were young,” responded Mary, “the world was in a state of barbarism and young people used to spoil the old people, just as you fancy the old spoil the young nowadays. Besides, you are not so very much my elder, after all. I can remember quite well when you were married.”

      “That may be,” said Mrs. Beatty, gravely. “It is not so much my age, perhaps; but you should remember, Mary, that I am related to your father.”

      “So am I.”

      “Don’t be ridiculous, child. Ah, what a pity it is that you have no mother, Mary! It is a greater loss to you than you think.”

      “It is time to go to meet papa,” said Mary, rising. “I hope Uncle Richard will be at the station.”

      “Why?