LOUIS. I want you to look beautiful. I want people to see in your eyes that you were married to me. The people in Italy used to point at Dante and say “There goes the man who has been in hell.” I want them to point at you and say “There goes a woman who has been in heaven.” It has been heaven, darling, hasnt it—sometimes?
MRs DUBEDAT. Oh yes, yes. Always, always.
LOUIS. If you wear black and cry, people will say “Look at that miserable woman: her husband made her miserable.”
MRS DUBEDAT. No, never. You are the light and the blessing of my life. I never lived until I knew you.
LOUIS [his eyes glistening] Then you must always wear beautiful dresses and splendid magic jewels. Think of all the wonderful pictures I shall never paint.
[She wins a terrible victory over a sob] Well, you must be transfigured with all the beauty of those pictures. Men must get such dreams from seeing you as they never could get from any daubing with paints and brushes. Painters must paint you as they never painted any mortal woman before. There must be a great tradition of beauty, a great atmosphere of wonder and romance. That is what men must always think of when they think of me. That is the sort of immortality I want. You can make that for me, Jennifer. There are lots of things you dont understand that every woman in the street understands; but you can understand that and do it as nobody else can. Promise me that immortality. Promise me you will not make a little hell of crape and crying and undertaker’s horrors and withering flowers and all that vulgar rubbish.
MRS DUBEDAT. I promise. But all that is far off, dear. You are to come to Cornwall with me and get well. Sir Ralph says so.
LOUIS. Poor old B. B.
B. B. [affected to tears, turns away and whispers to Sir Patrick] Poor fellow! Brain going.
LOUIS. Sir Patrick’s there, isn’t he?