[He stops dead. There is a silence. ]
MRS. HOPE. You 've—WHAT? Without consulting me? Well, then, you 'll just go and take them out again!
COLONEL. You want me to——?
MRS. HOPE. The idea! As if you could trust your judgment in a thing like that! You 'll just go at once and say there was a mistake; then we 'll talk it over calmly.
COLONEL. [Drawing himself up.] Go back on what I 've said? Not if I lose every penny! First you worry me to take the shares, and then you worry me not—I won't have it, Nell, I won't have it!
MRS. HOPE. Well, if I'd thought you'd have forgotten what you said this morning and turned about like this, d'you suppose I'd have spoken to you at all? Now, do you?
COLONEL. Rubbish! If you can't see that this is a special opportunity!
[He walks away followed by MRS. HOPE, who endeavors to make him see her point of view. ERNEST and LETTY are now returning from the house armed with a third chair.]
LETTY. What's the matter with everybody? Is it the heat?
ERNEST. [Preoccupied and sitting in the swing.] That sportsman,
Lever, you know, ought to be warned off.