JOHN (reading).
"And spare you one day from your place At her feet." . . .
Pray forgive me the passing grimace.
I wish you had MY place!
(reads)
"I trust you will feel I desire nothing much. Your friend," . . .
Bless me! "Lucile?"
The Countess de Nevers?
ALFRED.
Yes.
JOHN.
What will you do?
ALFRED.
You ask me just what I would rather ask you.
JOHN.
You can't go.
ALFRED
I must.
JOHN.
And Matilda?
ALFRED.
Oh, that You must manage!
JOHN.
Must I? I decline it, though, flat.
In an hour the horses will be at the door, And Matilda is now in her habit. Before I have finished my breakfast, of course I receive A message for "dear Cousin John!" . . . I must leave At the jeweller's the bracelet which YOU broke last night;
I must call for the music. "Dear Alfred is right:
The black shawl looks best: WILL I change it? Of course I can just stop, in passing, to order the horse.
Then Beau has the mumps, or St. Hubert knows what;
WILL I see the dog-doctor?" Hang Beau! I will NOT.
ALFRED.
Tush, tush! this is serious.
JOHN.
It is.
ALFRED.
Very well, You must think--
JOHN.
What excuse will you make, tho'?
ALFRED.
Oh, tell Mrs. Darcy that . . . lend me your wits, Jack! . . . The deuce!
Can you not stretch your genius to fit a friend's use?
Excuses are clothes which, when ask'd unawares, Good Breeding to Naked Necessity spares, You must have a whole wardrobe, no doubt.
JOHN.
My dear fellow, Matilda is jealous, you know, as Othello.
ALFRED.
You joke.
JOHN.
I am serious. Why go to Luchon?
ALFRED.
Don't ask me. I have not a choice, my dear John.
Besides, shall I own a strange sort of desire, Before I extinguish forever the fire Of youth and romance, in whose shadowy light Hope whisper'd her first fairy tales, to excite The last spark, till it rise, and fade far in that dawn Of my days where the twilights of life were first drawn By the rosy, reluctant auroras of Love;
In short, from the dead Past the gravestone to move;
Of the years long departed forever to take One last look, one final farewell; to awake The Heroic of youth from the Hades of joy, And once more be, though but for an hour, Jack--a boy!