ALGERNON.
I haven’t heard any one call me.
JACK.
Your duty as a gentleman calls you back.
ALGERNON.
My duty as a gentleman has never interfered with my pleasures in the smallest degree.
JACK.
I can quite understand that.
ALGERNON.
Well, Cecily is a darling.
JACK.
You are not to talk of Miss Cardew like that. I don’t like it.
ALGERNON.
Well, I don’t like your clothes. You look perfectly ridiculous in them. Why on earth don’t you go up and change? It is perfectly childish to be in deep mourning for a man who is actually staying for a whole week with you in your house as a guest. I call it grotesque.
JACK.
You are certainly not staying with me for a whole week as a guest or anything else. You have got to leave . . . by the four-five train.
ALGERNON.
I certainly won’t leave you so long as you are in mourning. It would be most unfriendly. If I were in mourning you would stay with me, I suppose. I should think it very unkind if you didn’t.
JACK.
Well, will you go if I change my clothes?