BLADES. Once a little boy and now your most obedient, ma'am.
MISS SUSAN. You have come to recall old memories?
BLADES. Not precisely; I—Charlotte, explain.
CHARLOTTE. Ensign Blades wishes me to say that it must seem highly romantic to you to have had a pupil who has fought at Waterloo.
MISS SUSAN. Not exactly romantic. I trust, sir, that when you speak of having been our pupil you are also so obliging as to mention that it was during our first year. Otherwise it makes us seem so elderly.
(He bows again, in what he believes to be a quizzical manner.)
CHARLOTTE. Ensign Blades would be pleased to hear, Miss Susan, what you think of him as a whole.
MISS SUSAN. Indeed, sir, I think you are monstrous fine. (Innocently.) It quite awes me to remember that we used to whip him.
VALENTINE (delighted). Whipped him, Miss Susan! (In solemn burlesque of CHARLOTTE.) Ensign Blades wishes to indicate that it was more than Buonaparte could do. We shall meet again, bright boy.
(He makes his adieux and goes.)