sensible---scientific---everything that you wish me to be. But---but---
oh, don't you see what you have set to work in my imagination?

GLORIA (with indignant, scornful sternness). I hope you are not
going to be so foolish---so vulgar---as to say love.

VALENTINE (with ironical haste to disclaim such a weakness). No, no,
no. Not love: we know better than that. Let's call it chemistry. You
can't deny that there is such a thing as chemical action, chemical
affinity, chemical combination---the most irresistible of all natural
forces. Well, you're attracting me irresistibly---chemically.

GLORIA (contemptuously). Nonsense!

VALENTINE. Of course it's nonsense, you stupid girl. (Gloria
recoils in outraged surprise.) Yes, stupid girl: t h a t's a
scientific fact, anyhow. You're a prig---a feminine prig: that's what
you are. (Rising.) Now I suppose you've done with me for ever. (He
goes to the iron table and takes up his hat.)

GLORIA (with elaborate calm, sitting up like a High-school-mistress
posing to be photographed). That shows how very little you understand
my real character. I am not in the least offended. (He pauses and puts
his hat down again.) I am always willing to be told of my own defects,
Mr. Valentine, by my friends, even when they are as absurdly mistaken
about me as you are. I have many faults---very serious faults---of
character and temper; but if there is one thing that I am not, it is
what you call a prig. (She closes her lips trimly and looks steadily
and challengingly at him as she sits more collectedly than ever.)