The Bicyclers and Three Other Farces

by John Kendrick Bangs

Mrs. Perkins. To what am I to attribute this pleasure, Lady Amaranth? I do not presume to think that you have come here without some other motive than that of a mere desire to see me. I do not suppose that even you pretend that since the contretemps of Tuesday night at the Duchess of Barncastle’s our former feeling—

Mrs. Bradley. Ellen, I have come to tell you something. To save you from a vile conspiracy.

Mrs. Perkins. I am quite well able, Lady Amaranth, to manage my own affairs—

Mrs. Bradley. But you do not know. You love Lord Muddleton—

Mrs. Perkins (toying with her fan). Oh! Indeed! And who, pray, has taken you into my confidence? I was not aware—

Mrs. Bradley. Hear me, Ellen—

Mrs. Perkins. Excuse me, Lady Amaranth! but you have forgotten that it is only to my friends that I am known as—

Mrs. Bradley. Then Lady Ellen, if it must be so. I know what you do not—that Henry Cobb is an escaped convent—

Yardsley. Convict, not convent.

Mrs. Bradley. Is an escaped convict, and—