Theodore! What fresh iniquity--?
COLONEL.
Caroline, I am going to be married.
[_Blows his nose vigorously._
LADY WARGRAVE [_astounded_].
Married!
COLONEL.
To-morrow.
LADY WARGRAVE.
To whom, pray?
COLONEL.
Miss Bethune.
LADY WARGRAVE.
Give me my smelling salts.
COLONEL [_gives her them_].
Enid! Pretty name, isn"t it? Enid!
[_Smiling to himself._
LADY WARGRAVE.
No fool like an old fool!
COLONEL.
Fifty-six.
LADY WARGRAVE.
Eight.
COLONEL.
But don"t tell Enid, will you?
LADY WARGRAVE.
There are so many things I mustn"t tell Enid!
COLONEL.
No, Caroline; I"ve made a clean breast of it.
LADY WARGRAVE.
_Quite_ a clean breast of it?
COLONEL.
Everything in the world is comparative.
LADY WARGRAVE.
Then, Miss Bethune has renounced her opinions?
COLONEL.
Oh, no; she"s too much of a woman for that.
LADY WARGRAVE.
How can she reconcile them with your enormities?
COLONEL.
My peccadilloes? Oh, she doesn"t believe them--or she pretends she doesn"t--which is the same thing. She says we men exaggerate so; and as for the women, you simply can"t believe a word they say!
[_Chuckles in his old style._
LADY WARGRAVE.
At any rate, she means to marry you?
COLONEL.
Upon the whole, she thinks I have been rather badly used.
[_Chuckles again._
LADY WARGRAVE.
To marry! after your experience!
COLONEL.