“In other words?—pray let me have the interpretation of this fable.”
“In other words, Tom Linley has staked his heart against—against——”
“Against what, sir? Against mine, do you say?—against my heart—my kind heart? And you hold that my heart is a counter—something spurious—something base?”
“Nay, madam, I was not so foolish as to fancy for a moment that your heart had any connection with this game. But that is where you do not play fair. You know that poor Tom Linley’s heart is laid at your feet, and yet——”
“And yet? Pray continue your criticism of the game, sir—I vow ’tis vastly diverting. And yet—— Well, sir?”
“And yet—well, surely with your many conquests, Mrs. Abington, you cannot set any store upon the devotion of Tom Linley!”
“Why should not I?” she cried. “Why should not I do so, if it so please me? He is, I repeat, a delightful boy, and why I should not value his devotion simply because I have had conquests and he has had none—that is your argument, I think—I cannot at this moment perceive.”
“If you had any real affection for him you would not seek to spoil his career at the outset. The manager of the concerts told his father that Tom need never hope to get a hearing in Bath so long as he lives. You took him out driving with you when he should have been playing at the concert. Ah, my dear madam, one who is so strong as you are should be merciful.”
“You come here to tell me that, do you? O Dick, you have, after all, no true sense of comedy, though I fancied that none could surpass you in that respect. Is’t possible that you fail to see how ludicrous is your appearance here to-day pleading to me for—for—what? You have not yet told me what ’tis that you plead for.”
“I plead with you to send Tom Linley back to the career which will surely be his if you set him free. Dear madam, you can have no idea in what anxiety his family are about him just now.”