Quality Street: A Comedy. Barrie James Matthew
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war was mentioned; the little Quaker suddenly looked like a gallant boy in ringlets.
(A dread comes over PHOEBE, but it is in her heart alone; it shows neither in face nor voice.)
PHOEBE. Mr. Brown, what is it you have to tell us?
VALENTINE. That I have enlisted, Miss Phoebe. Did you surmise it was something else?
PHOEBE. You are going to the wars? Mr. Brown, is it a jest?
VALENTINE. It would be a sorry jest, ma'am. I thought you knew. I concluded that the recruiting sergeant had talked.
PHOEBE. The recruiting sergeant? I see.
VALENTINE. These stirring times, Miss Phoebe – he is but half a man who stays at home. I have chafed for months. I want to see whether I have any courage, and as to be an army surgeon does not appeal to me, it was enlist or remain behind. To-day I found that there were five waverers. I asked them would they take the shilling if I took it, and they assented. Miss Phoebe, it is not one man I give to the King, but six.
PHOEBE (brightly). I think you have done bravely.
VALENTINE. We leave shortly for the Petersburgh barracks, and I go to London tomorrow; so this is good-bye.
PHOEBE. I shall pray that you may be preserved in battle, Mr. Brown.
VALENTINE. And you and Miss Susan will write to me when occasion offers?
PHOEBE. If you wish it.
VALENTINE (smiling). With all the stirring news of Quality Street.
PHOEBE. It seems stirring to us; it must have been merely laughable to you, who came here from a great city.
VALENTINE. Dear Quality Street – that thought me dashing! But I made friends in it, Miss Phoebe, of two very sweet ladies.
PHOEBE (timidly). Mr. Brown, I wonder why you have been so kind to my sister and me?
VALENTINE. The kindness was yours. If at first Miss Susan amused me – (Chuckling.) To see her on her knees decorating the little legs of the couch with frills as if it were a child! But it was her sterling qualities that impressed me presently.
PHOEBE. And did – did I amuse you also?
VALENTINE. Prodigiously, Miss Phoebe. Those other ladies, they were always scolding you, your youthfulness shocked them. I believe they thought you dashing.
PHOEBE (nervously). I have sometimes feared that I was perhaps too dashing.
VALENTINE (laughing at this). You delicious Miss Phoebe. You were too quiet. I felt sorry that one so sweet and young should live so grey a life. I wondered whether I could put any little pleasures into it.
PHOEBE. The picnics? It was very good of you.
VALENTINE. That was only how it began, for soon I knew that it was I who got the pleasures and you who gave them. You have been to me, Miss Phoebe, like a quiet, old-fashioned garden full of the flowers that Englishmen love best because they have known them longest: the daisy, that stands for innocence, and the hyacinth for constancy, and the modest violet and the rose. When I am far away, ma'am, I shall often think of Miss Phoebe's pretty soul, which is her garden, and shut my eyes and walk in it.
(She is smiling gallantly through her pain when MISS SUSAN returns.)
MISS SUSAN. Have you – is it – you seem so calm, Phoebe.
PHOEBE (pressing her sister's hand warningly and imploringly). Susan, what Mr. Brown is so obliging as to inform us of is not what we expected – not that at all. My dear, he is the gentleman who has enlisted, and he came to tell us that and to say good-bye.
MISS SUSAN. Going away?
PHOEBE. Yes, dear.
VALENTINE. Am I not the ideal recruit, ma'am: a man without a wife or a mother or a sweetheart?
MISS SUSAN. No sweetheart?
VALENTINE. Have you one for me, Miss Susan?
PHOEBE (hastily, lest her sister's face should betray the truth). Susan, we shall have to tell him now. You dreadful man, you will laugh and say it is just like Quality Street. But indeed since I met you to-day and you told me you had something to communicate we have been puzzling what it could be, and we concluded that you were going to be married.
VALENTINE. Ha! ha! ha! Was that it.
PHOEBE. So like women, you know. We thought we perhaps knew her. (Glancing at the wedding-gown.) We were even discussing what we should wear at the wedding.
VALENTINE. Ha! ha! I shall often think of this. I wonder who would have me, Miss Susan. (Rising.) But I must be off; and God bless you both.
MISS SUSAN (forlorn). You are going!
VALENTINE. No more mud on your carpet, Miss Susan; no more coverlets rolled into balls. A good riddance. Miss Phoebe, a last look at the garden.
(Taking her hand and looking into her face.)
PHOEBE. We shall miss you very much, Mr. Brown.
VALENTINE. There is one little matter. That investment I advised you to make, I am happy it has turned out so well.
PHOEBE (checking MISS SUSAN, who is about to tell of the loss of the money). It was good of you to take all that trouble, sir. Accept our grateful thanks.
VALENTINE. Indeed I am glad that you are so comfortably left; I am your big brother. Good-bye again. (Looks round.) This little blue and white room and its dear inmates, may they be unchanged when I come back. Good-bye.
(He goes. MISS SUSAN looks forlornly at PHOEBE, who smiles pitifully.)
PHOEBE. A misunderstanding; just a mistake. (She shudders, lifts the wedding-gown and puts it back in the ottoman. MISS SUSAN sinks sobbing into a chair.) Don't, dear, don't – we can live it down.
MISS SUSAN (fiercely). He is a fiend in human form.
PHOEBE. Nay, you hurt me, sister. He is a brave gentleman.
MISS SUSAN. The money; why did you not let me tell him?
PHOEBE (flushing). So that he might offer to me out of pity, Susan?
MISS SUSAN. Phoebe, how are we to live with the quartern loaf at one and tenpence?
PHOEBE. Brother James —
MISS SUSAN. You know very well that brother James will do nothing for us.
PHOEBE. I think, Susan, we could keep a little school – for genteel children only, of course. I would do most of the teaching.
MISS SUSAN. You a schoolmistress – Phoebe of the ringlets; every one would laugh.
PHOEBE. I shall hide the ringlets away in a cap like yours, Susan, and people will soon forget them. And I shall try to look staid and to grow old quickly. It will not be so hard to me as you think, dear.
MISS SUSAN. There were other gentlemen who were attracted by you, Phoebe, and you turned from them.
PHOEBE. I did not want them.
MISS SUSAN. They will come again, and others.
PHOEBE. No, dear; never speak of that to me any more. (In woe.) I let him kiss me.
MISS SUSAN. You could not prevent him.
PHOEBE. Yes, I could. I know I could now. I wanted him to do it. Oh, never speak to me of others after that. Perhaps he saw I wanted it and did it to please me. But I meant – indeed I did – that I gave it to him with all my love. Sister, I could bear all the rest; but I have been unladylike.
(The curtain falls, and we do not see the sisters again for ten years.)
ACT II
THE SCHOOL
Ten years later. It is the blue and white room still, but many of Miss Susan's beautiful things have gone, some of them never