A Rough Diamond

JOE. I don’t mean to!

SIR W. Your conduct, Madam, is most unbecoming! you forget your station – you forget that you are my wife!

MAR. I’m sure I don’t, and I’m sure you take good care that I sha’n’t.

JOE. You take good care that she sha’n’t.

MAR. Hold your tongue, Sir! how dare you speak? I won’t be tethered so tight any longer, I can tell you – and I will be myself again! I’ve tried to be somebody else, and I can’t, and I’ll go and put on my old country clothes again – for I’ve no comfort in these – and then I can do as I like – kiss Joe, and you, and even that old gentleman – though I shouldn’t much like it.

JOE. (after staring at LORD PLATO) I shouldn’t like to kiss him.

PLATO. Really! (going up)

SIR W. Margaret, I – (turns sharply to JOE, who wears his hat) Take off your hat, Sir!

JOE. Eh?

SIR W. (pointing to his hat) Take off your hat, Sir!

MAR. I don’t want to quarrel, and I won’t quarrel, if you’ll only be kind to me; but I will be myself again, for since I’ve been married I feel as if my head, and my arms, and my legs were all put on the wrong way; and when I am myself again, if you don’t like me I had better go back to my father, he’ll be fond of me if you won’t – so come along, Joe!

    She runs off, followed by JOE, L.H.

SIR W. I give it up! I can no longer pursue my darling theory – it’s all labour in vain!

PLATO. I told you so, my dear Sir William, I told you so when you described the humble person you were about to honor with your hand – that the union could not be a happy one.

SIR W. I admired her simplicity, her frankness – and I fondly imagined that if I could unite such qualities with education, with refinement, that I should create, as it were, a woman of perfection.

PLATO. You now perceive the error of your speculation – the inutility of striving to elevate humanity from its natural position. There must exist separate grades of society – the patrician, the commoner, and the plebeian – seek not to amalgamate, – the process may be very well in a railroad, but with human nature it must ever create incongruities. Where’s Lady P.? Ah, there! could you have found another woman like that, how different would have been your fate! Well, as we have discussed the state of the nation, I must seek her – she’s in the house, no doubt fatigued with her journey. Don’t look so downcast, Sir William, there’s no help for it now – make the best of a bad bargain, for it’s an excellent observation, that there’s no making a silk purse – I need say no more.

    Exit at back.

SIR W. I am sorry, very sorry, to see this sad result of all my labour, and fear that much unhappiness is in store for both of us. How can I introduce my wife to society? how can I pass my leisure in the company of one so utterly uninformed, so incapable of conversation? Ah! my uncle is indeed happy! Blessed with a woman of intellect, whose natural graces harmonise so sweetly with her accomplishments, whose refinement is so exquisite, his life will pass like a dream of bliss – like a – Eh? (looking off R.H.U.E.) my friend Augustus with a lady? with my – no; yes, with my aunt! They are in earnest conversation – she seems embarrassed, is weeping – what does it mean? He clasps her hand, and she does not withdraw it – they come this way. I – I feel in a very awkward situation! I would not for the world let them be aware that I had seen them together – I had better retire, and not notice them. I will; I feel as if I had not the moral courage to face them. (he is about to go off at the back – he stops) They will see me if I go that way. I quite tremble! they’re here! I’ll conceal myself, and slip away as quickly as possible.

    He passes behind the stand of flowers, L.H., and remains there unperceived by BLENHEIM and LADY PLATO, who enter R.H.D. at the same moment.

BLEN. Permit me at least to write occasionally to you.

LADY P. If you will bring every philosophical argument, every delicate sophistry, to prove that one may have a confiding friend to whom one may unfold the heart’s dearest secrets, every emotion of the soul, every joy, and every sorrow, not only with safety, but propriety, you may, if you are discreet, periodically correspond with me.

BLEN. Then I am happy! and, though my blighted hopes must ever be my theme, yet —

    SIR WILLIAM steals from his place of concealment towards a statue near the door.

LADY P. Heavens! what’s that? I heard a footstep!

BLEN. ’Tis no one! – why are you so alarmed, so agitated?

LADY P. Leave me now! you have not been seen; go out again by the gate we saw near the shrubbery – it opens into the road. You returned here on foot?

BLEN. I did.

LADY P. Go then, I implore you! and, when you again arrive, no one need know that we have had this interview.

BLEN. Adieu! for the last time I press your hand to my lips!

Enter MARGERY, L.H.D., in the dress of a country girl

MAR. (entering) Now I am comfortable – now I do feel myself again! (seeing BLENHEIM and LADY PLATO) Oh!

BLENHEIM disappears, R.H.D. – LADY PLATO seems confused

– Oh! don’t mind me! I’m so glad I’ve caught you, though, for if such a well-behaved gentleman as that is, can kiss my aunt’s hand, there can be no harm in my cousin kissing me.

LADY P. Listen, my dear friend. I do not wish it to transpire that I have had an interview with the gentleman you saw just now – it would but cause explanations that must lead to disagreeables, and they had better be avoided. I shall therefore rely on your discretion.

MAR. On my what?

LADY P. Your keeping my secret.

MAR. Oh, I won’t tell, if you mean that.

LADY P. Where’s his lordship?

MAR. (pointing L.H.) With my husband.

LADY P. Remember!

MAR. But stop, Polly – wouldn’t it be better not to mind anybody knowing anything? because it don’t seem loving and cosy to be sly, and to be frightened every minute in case somebody should say something about somebody that would make somebody else angry, and get everybody into trouble, and set everybody quarrelling with everybody. I don’t like it, Polly dear! where there’s secrets there’s no happiness, and no love – ah! and no goodness, if you come to that.

LADY P. Dear Margery, I feel your reproof, sincerely feel it – oblige me but for this once, and never, never will I again place myself in a position that shall cause me to conceal one thought or action – I will not, indeed!

MAR. Then you’re a good girl, and I’ll do my best this time, because I know you’ll keep your word with me. Good bye for the present. (shakes hands with her)

    Exit LADY PLATO at back.

– I just now felt so comfortable when I found myself once more in my old clothes, and was going to be so happy and so free, and now I’m in trouble again! I don’t like there being any secrets, and I know I’m the worst in the world to keep one – and as to my not telling about the Captain and my aunt having seen one another, I may try not to say a word, but it’s sure to slip out after dinner. What’s Polly afraid of? why does she want to make believe not to know her old sweetheart? and I’m to help her in the make believe! I don’t like it! and I feel now as if I had stolen something, and had got it in my pocket, and that somebody was coming to search me.

JOE. (without) I don’t care! I’m as good as you are, any day!

Enter JOE

MAR. Why, Joe, what’s the matter now?

JOE. What’s the matter? why, when you put me in that room full o’ pictur’s, and left me staring at ’em while you went to take off your grand clothes, your fine husband came in. “Hallo!” says he, “don’t stand in the chairs.” “How can I see the pictures if I don’t?” says I. “Sit down,” says he. Well, I did sit down – then he was at me again, and told me to go out of the room, and I said I shouldn’t – that my cousin had took me in, and neither he nor six of his servants should take me out.

MAR. That was wrong, Joe.