| |
TARLETON. | [_to Percival_] You never told me-- |
| |
PERCIVAL. | I hadnt the least idea-- |

_An embarrassed pause._

PERCIVAL. I assure you if I'd had the faintest notion that my
passenger was a lady I shouldnt have left you to shift for yourself in
that selfish way.

LORD SUMMERHAYS. The lady seems to have shifted for both very
effectually, sir.

PERCIVAL. Saved my life. I admit it most gratefully.

TARLETON. I must apologize, madam, for having offered you the
civilities appropriate to the opposite sex. And yet, why opposite?
We are all human: males and females of the same species. When the
dress is the same the distinction vanishes. I'm proud to receive in
my house a lady of evident refinement and distinction. Allow me to
introduce myself: Tarleton: John Tarleton (_seeing conjecture in the
passenger's eye_)--yes, yes: Tarleton's Underwear. My wife, Mrs
Tarleton: youll excuse me for having in what I had taken to be a
confidence between man and man alluded to her as the Chickabiddy. My
daughter Hypatia, who has always wanted some adventure to drop out of
the sky, and is now, I hope, satisfied at last. Lord Summerhays: a
man known wherever the British flag waves. His son Bentley, engaged
to Hypatia. Mr Joseph Percival, the promising son of three highly
intellectual fathers.