Well, there’s your band; and since you are so kind,
To purchase all my flowers, I’ve half a mind
To favour you with, not the Hula, sir,
But something more refined, and prettier.
I’ll teach it to you; ask the band out there
To play the Hula Kui dancing air;
Then follow all I do, and copy me.
This is the way it starts, now one, two, three.
[After the dance ends, Ralph approaches the Girl with tense face and speaks with great seriousness.]
Girl, though I do not even know your name,
Yet here I stand, and offer you my own;
It was for you I came, for you alone,
Across the half world. I have never known
Forgetfulness, since first your face I saw.
In coming here, I but obeyed Love’s law;
I thought it fancy, passion, or caprice;
I know now it is Love.
I pray you, cease;
You do not understand yourself; go, go;
[Urges him towards exit.
Ralph (seizing her hand)
I will not go until I hear you say
That you remember even as I do
That brief encounter on the street one day.
[Flower Girl turns her face away and tries to free her hand.]
Ralph (exultantly)