East of Suez: A Play in Seven Scenes

Daisy. Have you told him about the house?

Harry. No. [To George.] You know the temple the Harrisons used to have. We've taken that.

George. Oh, it's a ripping place. But won't you find it rather a nuisance to have those old monks on the top of you all the time?

Harry. Oh, I don't think so. Our part is quite separate, you know, and the Harrisons made it very comfortable.

[Harold Knox comes in. He has changed into tennis things.

Knox. I say, Harry … [He sees Daisy.] Oh, I beg your pardon.

Harry. Mr. Knox – Mrs. Rathbone.

[Knox gives her a curt nod, but she holds out her hand affably. He takes it.

Daisy. How do you do.

Knox. I'm sorry to disturb you, Harry, but old Ku Faung Min is downstairs and wants to see you.

Harry. Tell him to go to blazes. The office is closed.

Knox. He's going to Hankow to-night and he says he must see you before he goes. He's got some big order to give.

Harry. Oh, curse him. I know what he is. He'll keep me talking for half an hour. D'you mind if I leave you?

Daisy. Of course not. It'll give me a chance of making Mr. Conway's acquaintance.

Harry. I'll get rid of him as quickly as I can.

[He goes out accompanied by Knox.

Knox. [As he goes.] Good-bye.

[George looks at Daisy for a moment. She smiles at him. There is a silence.

George. Why didn't you warn me that it was you I was going to meet?

Daisy. I didn't know what you'd say about me to Harry if you knew.

George. It was rather a risk, wasn't it? Supposing I'd blurted out the truth.

Daisy. I trusted to your diplomatic training. Besides, I'd prepared for it. I told him I thought I'd met you.

George. Harry and I have been pals all our lives. I brought him out to China and I got him his job. When he had cholera he would have died if I hadn't pulled him through.

Daisy. I know. And in return he worships the ground you tread on. I've never known one man think so much of another as he does of you.

George. All that's rot, of course. Sometimes I don't know how I'm going to live up to the good opinion Harry has of me. But when you've done so much for a pal as I have for him it gives you an awful sense of responsibility towards him.

Daisy. What do you mean by that?

[A short pause.

George. I'm not going to let you marry him.

Daisy. He's so much in love with me that he doesn't know what to do with himself.

George. I know he is. But if you were in love with him you wouldn't be so sure of it.

Daisy. [With a sudden change of tone.] Why not? I was sure of your love. And God knows I was in love with you.

[George makes a gesture of dismay. He is taken aback for a moment, but he quickly recovers.

George. You don't know what sort of a man Harry is. He's not like the fellows you've been used to. He's never knocked around as most of us do. He's always been as straight as a die.

Daisy. I know.

George. Have mercy on him. Even if there were nothing else against you he's not the sort of chap for you to marry. He's awfully English.

Daisy. If he doesn't mind marrying a Eurasian I really don't see what business it is of yours.

George. But you know very well that that isn't the only thing against you.

Daisy. I haven't an idea what you mean.

George. Haven't you? You forget the war. When we heard there was a very pretty young woman, apparently with plenty of money, living at the Hong Kong Hotel on very familiar terms with a lot of naval fellows, it became our business to make enquiries. I think I know everything there is against you.

Daisy. Have you any right to make use of information you've acquired officially?

George. Don't be a fool, Daisy.

Daisy. [Passionately.] Tell him then. You'll break his heart. You'll make him utterly wretched. But he'll marry me all the same. When a man's as much in love as he is he'll forgive everything.

George. I think it's horrible. If you loved him you couldn't marry him. It's heartless.

Daisy. [Violently.] How dare you say that? You. You. You know what I am. Yes, it's all true. I don't know what you know but it can't be worse than the truth. And whose fault is it? Yours. If I'm rotten it's you who made me rotten.

George. I? No. You've got no right to say that. It's cruel. It's infamous.

Daisy. I've touched you at last, have I? Because you know it's true. Don't you remember when I first came to Chung-king? I was seventeen. My father had sent me to England to school when I was seven. I never saw him for ten years. And at last he wrote and said I was to come back to China. You came and met me on the boat and told me my father had had a stroke and was dead. You took me to the Presbyterian mission.

George. That was my job. I was awfully sorry for you.

Daisy. And then in a day or two you came and told me that my father hadn't left anything and what there was went to his relations in England.

George. Naturally he didn't expect to die.

Daisy. [Passionately.] If he was going to leave me like that why didn't he let me stay with my Chinese mother? Why did he bring me up like a lady? Oh, it was cruel.