BURGE. I solemnly declare that this is a false and monstrous accusation.
FRANKLYN. Do you deny that the thing occurred? Were the uncontradicted reports false? Were the published letters forgeries?
BURGE. Certainly not. But I did not do it. I was not Prime Minister then. It was that old dotard, that played-out old humbug Lubin. He was Prime Minister then, not I.
FRANKLYN. Do you mean to say you did not know?
BURGE [sitting down again with a shrug] Oh, I had to be told. But what could I do? If we had refused we might have had to go out of office.
FRANKLYN. Precisely.
BURGE. Well, could we desert the country at such a crisis? The Hun was at the gate. Everyone has to make sacrifices for the sake of the country at such moments. We had to rise above party; and I am proud to say we never gave party a second thought. We stuck to—
CONRAD. Office?
SURGE [turning on him] Yes, sir, to office: that is, to responsibility, to danger, to heart-sickening toil, to abuse and misunderstanding, to a martyrdom that made us envy the very soldiers in the trenches. If you had had to live for months on aspirin and bromide of potassium to get a wink of sleep, you wouldn't talk about office as if it were a catch.
FRANKLYN. Still, you admit that under our parliamentary system Lubin could not have helped himself?