She is as neat as if she were one of the army of typists [who are quite the nicest kind of women], and carries a little bag. She comes in through the window, and puts her hands over the COMTESSE's eyes.]
COMTESSE. They are a strong pair of hands, at any rate.
MAGGIE. And not very white, and biggish for my size. Now guess.
[The COMTESSE guesses, and takes both the hands in hers as if she valued them. She pulls off MAGGIE's hat as if to prevent her flying away.]
COMTESSE. Dear abominable one, not to let me know you were coming.
MAGGIE. It is just a surprise visit, Comtesse. I walked up from the station. [For a moment MAGGIE seems to have borrowed SYBIL'S impediment.] How is--everybody?
COMTESSE. He is quite well. But, my child, he seems to me to be a most unhappy man.
[This sad news does not seem to make a most unhappy woman of the child. The COMTESSE is puzzled, as she knows nothing of the situation save what she has discovered for herself.]
Why should that please you, O heartless one?
MAGGIE. I won't tell you.
COMTESSE. I could take you and shake you, Maggie. Here have I put my house at your disposal for so many days for some sly Scotch purpose, and you will not tell me what it is.
MAGGIE. No.
COMTESSE. Very well, then, but I have what you call a nasty one for you. [The COMTESSE lures MR. VENABLES into the room by holding up what might be a foaming glass of lemon squash.] Alas, Charles, it is but a flower vase. I want you to tell Mrs. Shand what you think of her husband's speech.
[MR. VENABLES gives his hostess a reproachful look.]
VENABLES. Eh--ah--Shand will prefer to do that himself. I promised the gardener--I must not disappoint him--excuse me--
COMTESSE. You must tell her, Charles.
MAGGIE. Please, Mr. Venables, I should like to know.
[He sits down with a sigh and obeys.]
VENABLES. Your husband has been writing the speech here, and by his own wish he read it to me three days ago. The occasion is to be an important one; and, well, there are a dozen young men in the party at present, all capable of filling a certain small ministerial post. [He looks longingly at the mower, but it sends no message to his aid.] And as he is one of them I was anxious that he should show in this speech of what he is capable.
MAGGIE. And hasn't he?
[Not for the first time MR. VENABLES wishes that he was not in politics.]
VENABLES. I am afraid he has.
COMTESSE. What is wrong with the speech, Charles?
VENABLES. Nothing--and he can still deliver it. It is a powerful, well-thought-out piece of work, such as only a very able man could produce. But it has no SPECIAL QUALITY of its own--none of the little touches that used to make an old stager like myself want to pat Shand on the shoulder. [The COMTESSE's mouth twitches, but MAGGIE declines to notice it.] He pounds on manfully enough, but, if I may say so, with a wooden leg. It is as good, I dare say, as the rest of them could have done; but they start with such inherited advantages, Mrs. Shand, that he had to do better.
MAGGIE. Yes, I can understand that.
VENABLES. I am sorry, Mrs. Shand, for he interested me. His career has set me wondering whether if I had begun as a railway porter I might not still be calling out, 'By your leave.'
[MAGGIE thinks it probable but not important]
MAGGIE. Mr. Venables, now that I think of it, surely John wrote to me that you were dissatisfied with his first speech, and that he was writing another.
[The COMTESSE's eyes open very wide indeed.]
VENABLES. I have heard nothing of that, Mrs. Shand. [He shakes his wise head.] And in any case, I am afraid--[He still hears the wooden leg.]
MAGGIE. But you said yourself that his second thoughts were sometimes such an improvement on the first.
[The COMTESSE comes to the help of the baggage.]
COMTESSE. I remember you saying that, Charles.
VENABLES. Yes, that has struck me. [Politely] Well, if he has anything to show me--In the meantime--
[He regains the lawn, like one glad to escape attendance at JOHN'S obsequies.