THE LUCKY ONE


ACT I

[SCENE.--The hall of SIR JAMES FARRINGDON'S house in the country.]

[It is a large and pleasantly unofficial sort of room, used as
a meeting-place rather than a resting place. To be in it pledges
you to nothing; whereas in the billiard-room you are presumably
pledged to billiards. The French windows at the back open on to
lawns; the door on the right at the back will take you into the
outer hall; the door on the left leads to the servants' quarters;
the door on the right in front will disclose other inhabited rooms
to you. An oak gallery runs round two sides of the hall and
descends in broad and gentle stairs down the right side of it. Four
stairs from the bottom it turns round at right angles and deposits
you fairly in the hall. Entering in this way, you will see
immediately opposite to you the large open fireplace occupied by a
pile of unlit logs--for it is summer. There is a chair on each side
of the fireplace, but turned now away from it. In the left centre
of the hall there is a gate-legged table to which trays with drinks
on them, have a habit of finding their way; it is supported on each
side by a coffin-stool. A sofa, which will take two strangers
comfortably and three friends less comfortably, comes out at right
angles to the staircase, but leaves plenty of space between itself
and the stool on its side of the table. Beneath the window on the
left of the French windows is a small table on which letters and