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Page 3
GERTRUDE. [On the balcony.] Dr. Kirke, I've heard what doctors'
consultations consist of. After looking at the pictures, you talk about
whist. [She closes the windows and sits outside.]
KIRKE. [Producing his snuff-box.] Ha, ha!
SIR GEORGE. Why this lady and her brother evidently haven't any
suspicion of the actual truth, my dear Kirke!
KIRKE. [Taking snuff.] Not the slightest.
SIR GEORGE. The woman made a point of being extremely explicit with
you, you tell me?
KIRKE. Yes, she was plain enough with me. At our first meeting, she
said: "Doctor, I want you to know so-and-so, and so-and-so, and
so-and-so."
SIR GEORGE. Really? Well it certainly isn't fair of Cleeve and his--
his associate to trick decent people like Mrs Thorpe and her brother.
Good gracious, the brother is a clergyman too!
KIRKE. The rector of some dull hole in the north of England.
SIR GEORGE. Really!
KIRKE. A bachelor; this Mrs Thorpe keeps house for him. She's a widow.
SIR GEORGE. Really?
KIRKE. Widow of a captain in the army. Poor thing! She's lately lost
her only child and can't get over it.
SIR GEORGE. Indeed, really, really? . . . but about Cleeve, now--he
had Roman fever of rather a severe type?
KIRKE. In November. And then that fool of a Bickerstaff at Rome allowed
the woman to move him to Florence too soon, and there he had a relapse.
However, when she brought him on here the man was practically well.
SIR GEORGE. The difficulty being to convince him of the fact, eh? A
highly-strung, emotional creature?
KIRKE. You've hit him.
SIR GEORGE. I've known him from his childhood. Are you still giving him
anything?
KIRKE. A little quinine, to humour him.
SIR GEORGE. Exactly. [Looking at his watch.] Where is she? Where is
she? I've promised to take my wife shopping in the Merceria this
morning. By the bye, Kirke--I must talk scandal, I find--this is
rather an odd circumstance. Whom do you think I got a bow from as I
passed through the hall of the Danieli last night? [Kirke grunts and
shakes his head.] The Duke of St Olpherts.
KIRKE. [Taking snuff.] Ah! I suppose you're in with a lot of swells
now, Brodrick.
SIR GEORGE. No, no; you don't understand me. The Duke is this young
fellow's uncle by marriage. His Grace married a sister of Lady Cleeve's
--of Cleeve's mother, you know.
KIRKE. Oh! This looks as if the family are trying to put a finger in
the pie.
SIR GEORGE. The Duke may be here by mere chance. Still, as you say, it
does look--[Lowering his voice as KIRKE eyes an opening door.] Who's
that?
KIRKE. The woman.
[AGNES enters. She moves firmly but noiselessly--a placid woman, with
a sweet, low voice. Her dress is plain to the verge of coarseness; her
face, which has little colour, is, at the first glance almost wholly
unattractive.]
AGNES. [Looking from one to the other.] I thought you would send for
me, perhaps. [To SIR GEORGE.] What do you say about him?
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