In a room, Sybil, I go to you as a cold man to a fire. You fill me like a peal of bells in an empty house.
[She is being brutally treated by the dear impediment, for which hiccough is such an inadequate name that even to spell it is an abomination though a sign of ability. How to describe a sound that is noiseless? Let us put it thus, that when SYBIL wants to say something very much there are little obstacles in her way; she falters, falls perhaps once, and then is over, the while her appealing orbs beg you not to be angry with her. We may express those sweet pauses in precious dots, which some clever person can afterwards string together and make a pearl necklace of them.]
SYBIL. I should not ... let you say it, ... but ... you ... say it so beautifully.
JOHN. You must have guessed.
SYBIL. I dreamed ... I feared ... but you were ... Scotch, and I didn't know what to think.
JOHN. Do you know what first attracted me to you, Sybil? It was your insolence. I thought, 'I'll break her insolence for her.'
SYBIL. And I thought... 'I'll break his str...ength!'
JOHN. And now your cooing voice plays round me; the softness of you, Sybil, in your pretty clothes makes me think of young birds. [The impediment is now insurmountable; she has to swim for it, she swims toward him.] It is you who inspire my work.
[He thrills to find that she can be touched without breaking.]
SYBIL. I am so glad... so proud...
JOHN. And others know it, Sybil, as well as I. Only yesterday the Comtesse said to me, 'No man could get on so fast unaided. Cherchez la femme, Mr. Shand.'
SYBIL. Auntie said that?
JOHN. I said 'Find her yourself, Comtesse.'
SYBIL. And she?
JOHN. She said 'I have found her,' and I said in my blunt way, 'You mean Lady Sybil,' and she went away laughing.
SYBIL. Laughing?
JOHN. I seem to amuse the woman.
[Sybil grows sad.]
SYBIL. If Mrs. Shand--It is so cruel to her. Whom did you say she had gone to the station to meet?
JOHN. Her father and brothers.
SYBIL. It is so cruel to them. We must think no more of this. It is mad... ness.
JOHN. It's fate. Sybil, let us declare our love openly.
SYBIL. You can't ask that, now in the first moment that you tell me of it.
JOHN. The one thing I won't do even for you is to live a life of underhand.
SYBIL. The... blow to her.
JOHN. Yes. But at least she has always known that I never loved her.
SYBIL. It is asking me to give... up everything, every one, for you.
JOHN. It's too much.
[JOHN is humble at last.]
SYBIL. To a woman who truly loves, even that is not too much. Oh! it is not I who matter--it is you.
JOHN. My dear, my dear.
SYBIL. So gladly would I do it to save you; but, oh, if it were to bring you down!
JOHN. Nothing can keep me down if I have you to help me.
SYBIL. I am dazed, John, I...
JOHN. My love, my love.
SYBIL. I... oh... here...
JOHN. Be brave, Sybil, be brave.
SYBIL. ..........
[In this bewilderment of pearls she melts into his arms. MAGGIE happens to open the door just then; but neither fond heart hears her.]
JOHN. I can't walk along the streets, Sybil, without looking in all the shop windows for what I think would become you best. [As awkwardly as though his heart still beat against corduroy, he takes from his pocket a pendant and its chain. He is shy, and she drops pearls over the beauty of the ruby which is its only stone.] It is a drop of my blood, Sybil.
[Her lovely neck is outstretched, and he puts the chain round it. MAGGIE withdraws as silently as she had come; but perhaps the door whispered 'd--n' as it closed, for SYBIL wakes out of Paradise.]
SYBIL. I thought---Did the door shut?
JOHN. It was shut already.
[Perhaps it is only that SYBIL is bewildered to find herself once again in a world that has doors.]
SYBIL. It seemed to me---
JOHN. There was nothing. But I think I hear voices; they may have arrived.
[Some pretty instinct makes SYBIL go farther from him. MAGGIE kindly gives her time for this by speaking before opening the door.]
MAGGIE.