MAGGIE [again]. What is it, John?

JOHN. What if it was you that put those queer ideas into my head!

MAGGIE. Me?

JOHN. Without your knowing it, I mean.

MAGGIE. But how?

JOHN. We used to talk bits over; and it may be that you dropped the
seed, so to speak.

MAGGIE. John, could it be this, that I sometimes had the idea in a
rough womanish sort of way and then you polished it up till it came
out a Shandism?

JOHN [slowly slapping his knee]. I believe you've hit it, Maggie: to
think that you may have been helping me all the time--and neither of
us knew it!

[He has so nearly reached a smile that no one can say what might have
happened within the next moment if the COMTESSE had not reappeared.]

COMTESSE. Mr. Venables wishes to see you, Mr. Shand.

JOHN [lost, stolen, or strayed a smile in the making]. Hum!

COMTESSE. He is coming now.