FRANK. Eh?
VIVIE. I think brother and sister would be a very suitable relation for us.
FRANK. You really mean that?
VIVIE. Yes. It’s the only relation I care for, even if we could afford any other. I mean that.
FRANK [raising his eyebrows like one on whom a new light has dawned, and rising with quite an effusion of chivalrous sentiment] My dear Viv: why didn’t you say so before? I am ever so sorry for persecuting you. I understand, of course.
VIVIE [puzzled] Understand what?
FRANK. Oh, I’m not a fool in the ordinary sense: only in the Scriptural sense of doing all the things the wise man declared to be folly, after trying them himself on the most extensive scale. I see I am no longer Vivvums’s little boy. Don’t be alarmed: I shall never call you Vivvums again—at least unless you get tired of your new little boy, whoever he may be.
VIVIE. My new little boy!
FRANK [with conviction] Must be a new little boy. Always happens that way. No other way, in fact.
VIVIE. None that you know of, fortunately for you.