WASTE

At Shapters, George Farrant's house in Hertfordshire. Ten o'clock on a Sunday evening in summer.

Facing you at her piano by the window, from which she is protected by a little screen, sits Mrs. Farrant; a woman of the interesting age, clear-eyed and all her face serene, except for a little pucker of the brows which shows a puzzled mind upon some important matters. To become almost an ideal hostess has been her achievement; and in her own home, as now, this grace is written upon every movement. Her eyes pass over the head of a girl, sitting in a low chair by a little table, with the shaded lamplight falling on her face. This is Lucy Davenport; twenty-three, undefeated in anything as yet and so unsoftened. The book on her lap is closed, for she has been listening to the music. It is possibly some German philosopher, whom she reads with a critical appreciation of his shortcomings. On the sofa near her lounges Mrs. O'Connell; a charming woman, if by charming you understand a woman who converts every quality she possesses into a means of attraction, and has no use for any others. On the sofa opposite sits Miss Trebell. In a few years, when her hair is quite grey,

she will assume as by right the dignity of an old maid. Between these two in a low armchair is Lady Davenport. She has attained to many dignities. Mother and grandmother, she has brought into the world and nourished not merely life but character. A wonderful face she has, full of proud memories and fearless of the future. Behind her, on a sofa between the windows, is Walter Kent. He is just what the average English father would like his son to be. You can see the light shooting out through the windows and mixing with moonshine upon a smooth lawn. On your left is a door. There are many books in the room, hardly any pictures, a statuette perhaps. The owner evidently sets beauty of form before beauty of colour. It is a woman's room and it has a certain delicate austerity. By the time you have observed everything Mrs. Farrant has played Chopin's prelude opus 28, number 20 from beginning to end.

Lady Davenport. Thank you, my dear Julia.

Walter Kent. [Protesting.] No more?

Mrs. Farrant. I won't play for a moment longer than I feel musical.

Miss Trebell. Do you think it right, Julia, to finish with that after an hour's Bach?

Mrs. Farrant. I suddenly came over Chopinesque, Fanny; ... what's your objection? [as she sits by her.]

Frances Trebell. What ... when Bach has raised me to the heights of unselfishness!

Amy O'Connell. [Grimacing sweetly, her eyes only half lifted.] Does he? I'm glad that I don't understand him.

Frances Trebell. [Putting mere prettiness in its place.] One may prefer Chopin when one is young.

Amy O'Connell. And is that a reproach or a compliment?

Walter Kent. [Boldly.] I do.

Frances Trebell. Or a man may ... unless he's a philosopher.

Lady Davenport. [To the rescue.] Miss Trebell, you're very hard on mere humanity.

Frances Trebell. [Completing the reproof.] That's my wretched training as a schoolmistress, Lady Davenport ... one grew to fear it above all things.

Lucy Davenport. [Throwing in the monosyllable with sharp youthful enquiry.] Why?

Frances Trebell. There were no text books on the subject.

Mrs. Farrant. [Smiling at her friend.] Yes, Fanny ... I think you escaped to look after your brother only just in time.

Frances Trebell. In another year I might have been head-mistress, which commits you to approve of the system for ever.

Lady Davenport. [Shaking her wise head.] I've watched the Education fever take England....

Frances Trebell. If I hadn't stopped teaching things I didn't understand...!

Amy O'Connell. [Not without mischief.] And what was the effect on the pupils?

Lucy Davenport. I can tell you that.

Amy O'Connell. Frances never taught you.

Lucy Davenport. No, I wish she had. But I was at her sort of a school before I went to Newnham. I know.

Frances Trebell. [Very distastefully.] Up-to-date, it was described as.

Lucy Davenport. Well, it was like a merry-go-round at top speed. You felt things wouldn't look a bit like that when you came to a standstill.

Amy O'Connell. And they don't?

Lucy Davenport. [With great decision.] Not a bit.

Amy O'Connell. [In her velvet tone.] I was taught the whole duty of woman by a parson-uncle who disbelieved in his Church.

Walter Kent. When a man at Jude's was going to take orders....

Amy O'Connell. Jude's?

Walter Kent. At Oxford. The dons went very gingerly with him over bits of science and history.

[This wakes a fruitful thought in Julia Farrant's brain.]

Mrs. Farrant. Mamma, have you ever discussed so-called anti-Christian science with Lord Charles?

Frances Trebell ... Cantelupe?

Mrs. Farrant. Yes. It was over appointing a teacher for the schools down here ... he was staying with us. The Vicar's his fervent disciple. However, we were consulted.

Lucy Davenport. Didn't Lord Charles want you to send the boys there till they were ready for Harrow?

Mrs. Farrant. Yes.

Frances Trebell. Quite the last thing in Toryism!

Mrs. Farrant. Mamma made George say we were too nouveau riche to risk it.

Lady Davenport. [As she laughs.] I couldn't resist that.

Mrs. Farrant. [Catching something of her subject's dry driving manner.] Lord Charles takes the superior line and says ... that with his consent the Church may teach the unalterable Truth in scientific language or legendary, whichever is easier understanded of the people.

Lady Davenport. Is it the prospect of Disestablishment suddenly makes him so accommodating?

Frances Trebell. [With large contempt.] He needn't be. The majority of people believe the world was made in an English week.

Lucy Davenport. Oh, no!

Frances Trebell. No Bishop dare deny it.

Mrs. Farrant. [From the heights of experience.] Dear Lucy, do you seriously think that the English spirit—the nerve that runs down the backbone—is disturbed by new theology ... or new anything?

Lady Davenport. [Enjoying her epigram.] What a waste of persecution history shows us!

Walter Kent now captures the conversation with a very young politician's fervour.

Walter Kent. Once they're disestablished they must make up their minds what they do believe.

Lady Davenport. I presume Lord Charles thinks it'll hand the Church over to him and his ... dare I say 'Sect'?

Walter Kent. Won't it? He knows what he wants.

Mrs. Farrant. [Subtly.] There's the election to come yet.

Walter Kent. But now both parties are pledged to a bill of some sort.

Mrs. Farrant. Political prophecies have a knack of not coming true; but, d'you know, Cyril Horsham warned me to watch this position developing ... nearly four years ago.

Frances Trebell. Sitting on the opposition bench sharpens the eye-sight.

Walter Kent. [Ironically.] Has he been pleased with the prospect?

Mrs. Farrant. [With perfect diplomacy] If the Church must be disestablished ... better done by its friends than its enemies.

Frances Trebell. Still I don't gather he's pleased with his dear cousin Charles's conduct.

Mrs. Farrant. [Shrugging.] Oh, lately, Lord Charles has never concealed his tactics.

Frances Trebell. And that speech at Leeds was the crowning move I suppose; just asking the Nonconformists to bring things to a head?

Mrs. Farrant. [Judicially.] I think that was precipitate.

Walter Kent. [Giving them Lord Charles's oratory.] Gentlemen, in these latter days of Radical opportunism!—You know, I was there ... sitting next to an old gentleman who shouted "Jesuit."

Frances Trebell. But supposing Mallaby and the Nonconformists hadn't been able to force the Liberals' hand?

Mrs. Farrant. [Speaking as of inferior beings.] Why, they were glad of any cry going to the Country!

Frances Trebell. [As she considers this.] Yes ... and Lord Charles would still have had as good a chance of forcing Lord Horsham's. It has been clever tactics.

Lucy Davenport. [Who has been listening, sharp-eyed.] Contrariwise, he wouldn't have liked a Radical Bill though, would he?

Walter Kent. [With aplomb.] He knew he was safe from that. The government must have dissolved before Christmas anyway ... and the swing of the pendulum's a sure thing.

Mrs. Farrant. [With her smile.] It's never a sure thing.

Walter Kent. Oh, Mrs. Farrant, look how unpopular the Liberals are.

Frances Trebell. What made them bring in Resolutions?

Walter Kent. [Overflowing with knowledge of the subject.] I was told Mallaby insisted on their showing they meant business. I thought he was being too clever ... and it turns out he was. Tommy Luxmore told me there was a fearful row in the Cabinet about it. But on their last legs, you know, it didn't seem to matter, I suppose. Even then, if Prothero had mustered up an ounce of tact ... I believe they could have pulled them through....

Frances Trebell. Not the Spoliation one.

Walter Kent. Well, Mr. Trebell dished that!

Frances Trebell. Henry says his speech didn't turn a vote.

Mrs. Farrant. [With charming irony.] How disinterested of him!

Walter Kent. [Enthusiastic.] That speech did if ever a speech did.

Frances Trebell. Is there any record of a speech that ever did? He just carried his own little following with him.

Mrs. Farrant. But the crux of the whole matter is and has always been ... what's to be done with the Church's money.

Lucy Davenport. [Visualising sovereigns.] A hundred millions or so ... think of it!

Frances Trebell. There has been from the start a good deal of anti-Nonconformist feeling against applying the money to secular uses.

Mrs. Farrant. [Deprecating false modesty, on anyone's behalf.] Oh, of course the speech turned votes ... twenty of them at least.

Lucy Davenport. [Determined on information.] Then I was told Lord Horsham had tried to come to an understanding himself with the Nonconformists about Disestablishment—oh—a long time ago ... over the Education Bill.

Frances Trebell. Is that true, Julia?

Mrs. Farrant. How should I know?

Frances Trebell. [With some mischief] You might.

Mrs. Farrant. [Weighing her words.] I don't think it would have been altogether wise to make advances. They'd have asked more than a Conservative government could possibly persuade the Church to give up.

Walter Kent. I don't see that Horsham's much better off now. He only turned the Radicals out on the Spoliation question by the help of Trebell. And so far ... I mean, till this election is over Trebell counts still as one of them, doesn't he, Miss Trebell? Oh ... perhaps he doesn't.

Frances Trebell. He'll tell you he never has counted as one of them.

Mrs. Farrant. No doubt Lord Charles would sooner have done without his help. And that's why I didn't ask the gentle Jesuit this week-end if anyone wants to know.

Walter Kent. [Stupent at this lack of party spirit.] What ... he'd rather have had the Liberals go to the country undefeated!

Mrs. Farrant. [With finesse.] The election may bring us back independent of Mr. Trebell and anything he stands for.

Walter Kent. [Sharply.] But you asked Lord Horsham to meet him.

Mrs. Farrant. [With still more finesse.] I had my reasons. Votes aren't everything.

Lady Davenport has been listening with rather a doubtful smile; she now caps the discussion.

Lady Davenport. I'm relieved to hear you say so, my dear Julia. On the other hand democracy seems to have brought itself to a pretty pass. Here's a measure, which the country as a whole neither demands nor approves of, will certainly be carried, you tell me, because a minority on each side is determined it shall be ... for totally different reasons.

Mrs. Farrant. [Shrugging again.] It isn't our business to prevent popular government looking foolish, Mamma.

Lady Davenport. Is that Tory cynicism or feminine?

At this moment George Farrant comes through the window; a good natured man of forty-five. He would tell you that he was educated at Eton and Oxford. But the knowledge which saves his life comes from the thrusting upon him of authority and experience; ranging from the management of an estate which he inherited at twenty-four, through the chairmanship of a newspaper syndicate, through a successful marriage, to a minor post in the last Tory cabinet and the prospect of one in the near-coming next. Thanks to his agents, editors, permanent officials, and his own common sense, he always acquits himself creditably. He comes to his wife's side and waits for a pause in the conversation.

Lady Davenport. I remember Mr. Disraeli once said to me ... Clever women are as dangerous to the State as dynamite.

Frances Trebell. [Not to be impressed by Disraeli.] Well, Lady Davenport, if men will leave our intellects lying loose about....

Farrant. Blackborough's going, Julia.

Mrs. Farrant. Yes, George.

Lady Davenport. [Concluding her little apologue to Miss Trebell.] Yes, my dear, but power without responsibility isn't good for the character that wields it either.

[There follows Farrant through the window a man of fifty. He has about him that unmistakeable air of acquired wealth and power which distinguishes many Jews and has therefore come to be regarded as a solely Jewish characteristic. He speaks always with that swift decision which betokens a narrowed view. This is Russell Blackborough; manufacturer, politician ... statesman, his own side calls him.]

Blackborough. [To his hostess.] If I start now, they tell me, I shall get home before the moon goes down. I'm sorry I must get back to-night. It's been a most delightful week-end.

Mrs. Farrant. [Gracefully giving him a good-bye hand.] And a successful one, I hope.

Farrant. We talked Education for half an hour.

Mrs. Farrant. [Her eyebrows lifting a shade.] Education!

Farrant. Then Trebell went away to work.

Blackborough. I've missed the music, I fear.

Mrs. Farrant. But it's been Bach.

Blackborough. No Chopin?

Mrs. Farrant. For a minute only.

Blackborough. Why don't these new Italian men write things for the piano! Good-night, Lady Davenport.

Lady Davenport. [As he bows over her hand.] And what has Education to do with it?

Blackborough. [Non-committal himself.] Perhaps it was a subject that compromised nobody.

Lady Davenport. Do you think my daughter has been wasting her time and her tact?

Farrant. [Clapping him on the shoulder.] Blackborough's frankly flabbergasted at the publicity of this intrigue.

Mrs. Farrant. Intrigue! Mr. Trebell walked across the House ... actually into your arms.

Blackborough. [With a certain dubious grimness.] Well ... we've had some very interesting talks since. And his views upon Education are quite ... Utopian. Good bye, Miss Trebell.

Frances Trebell. Good-bye.

Mrs. Farrant. I wouldn't be so haughty till after the election, if I were you, Mr. Blackborough.

Blackborough. [Indifferently.] Oh, I'm glad he's with us on the Church question ... so far.

Mrs. Farrant. So far as you've made up your minds? The electoral cat will jump soon.

Blackborough. [A little beaten by such polite cynicism.] Well ... our conservative principles! After all we know what they are. Good-night, Mrs. O'Connell.

Amy O'Connell. Good-night.

Farrant. Your neuralgia better?

Amy O'Connell. By fits and starts.

Farrant. [Robustly.] Come and play billiards. Horsham and Maconochie started a game. They can neither of them play. We left them working out a theory of angles on bits of paper.

Walter Kent. Professor Maconochie lured me on to golf yesterday. He doesn't suffer from theories about that.

Blackborough. [With approval.] Started life as a caddie.

Walter Kent. [Pulling a wry face.] So he told me after the first hole.

Blackborough. What's this, Kent, about Trebell's making you his secretary?

Walter Kent. He thinks he'll have me.

Blackborough. [Almost reprovingly.] No question of politics?

Farrant. More intrigue, Blackborough.

Walter Kent. [With disarming candour.] The truth is, you see, I haven't any as yet. I was Socialist at Oxford ... but of course that doesn't count. I think I'd better learn my job under the best man I can find ... and who'll have me.

Blackborough. [Gravely.] What does your father say?

Walter Kent. Oh, as long as Jack will inherit the property in a Tory spirit! My father thinks it my wild oats.

A Footman has come in.

The Footman. Your car is round, sir.

Blackborough. Ah! Good-night, Miss Davenport. Good-bye again, Mrs. Farrant ... a charming week-end.

He makes a business-like departure, Farrant follows him.

The Footman. A telephone message from Dr. Wedgecroft, ma'am. His thanks; they stopped the express for him at Hitchin and he has reached London quite safely.

Mrs. Farrant. Thank you.

[The Footman goes out. Mrs. Farrant exhales delicately as if the air were a little refined by Blackborough's removal.]

Mrs. Farrant. Mr. Blackborough and his patent turbines and his gas engines and what not are the motive power of our party nowadays, Fanny.

Frances Trebell. Yes, you claim to be steering plutocracy. Do you never wonder if it isn't steering you?

Mrs. O'Connell, growing restless, has wandered round the room picking at the books in their cases.

Amy O'Connell. I always like your books, Julia. It's an intellectual distinction to know someone who has read them.

Mrs. Farrant. That's the Communion I choose.

Frances Trebell. Aristocrat ... fastidious aristocrat.

Mrs. Farrant. No, now. Learning's a great leveller.

Frances Trebell. But Julia ... books are quite unreal. D'you think life is a bit like them?

Mrs. Farrant. They bring me into touch with ... Oh, there's nothing more deadening than to be boxed into a set in Society! Speak to a woman outside it ... she doesn't understand your language.

Frances Trebell. And do you think by prattling Hegel with Gilbert Wedgecroft when he comes to physic you—

Mrs. Farrant. [Joyously.] Excellent physic that is. He never leaves a prescription.

Lady Davenport. Don't you think an aristocracy of brains is the best aristocracy, Miss Trebell?

Frances Trebell. [With a little more bitterness than the abstraction of the subject demands.] I'm sure it is just as out of touch with humanity as any other ... more so, perhaps. If I were a country I wouldn't be governed by arid intellects.

Mrs. Farrant. Manners, Frances.

Frances Trebell. I'm one myself and I know. They're either dead or dangerous.

George Farrant comes back and goes straight to Mrs. O'Connell.

Farrant. [Still robustly.] Billiards, Mrs. O'Connell.

Amy O'Connell. [Declining sweetly.] I think not.

Farrant. Billiards, Lucy?

Lucy Davenport. [As robust as he.] Yes, Uncle George. You shall mark while Walter gives me twenty-five and I beat him.

Walter Kent. [With a none-of-your-impudence air.] I'll give you ten yards start and race you to the billiard room.

Lucy Davenport. Will you wear my skirt? Oh ... Grandmamma's thinking me vulgar.

Lady Davenport. [Without prejudice.] Why, my dear, freedom of limb is worth having ... and perhaps it fits better with freedom of tongue.

Farrant. [In the proper avuncular tone.] I'll play you both ... and I'd race you both if you weren't so disgracefully young.

Amy O'Connell has reached an open window.

Amy O'Connell. I shall go for a walk with my neuralgia.

Mrs. Farrant. Poor thing!

Amy O'Connell. The moon's good for it.

Lucy Davenport. Shall you come, Aunt Julia?

Mrs. Farrant. [In flat protest.] No, I will not sit up while you play billiards.

Mrs. O'Connell goes out through the one window, stands for a moment, wistfully romantic, gazing at Kent are standing at the other, looking across the lawn.

Farrant. Horsham still arguing with Maconochie. They're got to Botany now.

Walter Kent. Demonstrating something with a ... what's that thing?

Walter goes out.

Farrant. [With a throw of his head towards the distant Horsham.] He was so bored with our politics ... having to give his opinion too. We could just hear your piano.

And he follows Walter.

Mrs. Farrant. Take Amy O'Connell that lace thing, will you, Lucy?

Lucy Davenport. [Her tone expressing quite wonderfully her sentiments towards the owner.] Don't you think she'd sooner catch cold?

She catches it up and follows the two men; then after looking round impatiently, swings off in the direction Mrs. O'Connell took. The three women now left together are at their ease.

Frances Trebell. Did you expect Mr. Blackborough to get on well with Henry?