CECILY.
Ah! This is what the newspapers call agricultural depression, is it not? I believe the aristocracy are suffering very much from it just at present. It is almost an epidemic amongst them, I have been told. May I offer you some tea, Miss Fairfax?
GWENDOLEN.
[With elaborate politeness.] Thank you. [Aside.] Detestable girl! But I require tea!
CECILY.
[Sweetly.] Sugar?
GWENDOLEN.
[Superciliously.] No, thank you. Sugar is not fashionable any more. [Cecily looks angrily at her, takes up the tongs and puts four lumps of sugar into the cup.]
CECILY.
[Severely.] Cake or bread and butter?
GWENDOLEN.
[In a bored manner.] Bread and butter, please. Cake is rarely seen at the best houses nowadays.
CECILY.
[Cuts a very large slice of cake, and puts it on the tray.] Hand that to Miss Fairfax.
[Merriman does so, and goes out with footman. Gwendolen drinks the tea and makes a grimace. Puts down cup at once, reaches out her hand to the bread and butter, looks at it, and finds it is cake. Rises in indignation.]
GWENDOLEN.
You have filled my tea with lumps of sugar, and though I asked most distinctly for bread and butter, you have given me cake. I am known for the gentleness of my disposition, and the extraordinary sweetness of my nature, but I warn you, Miss Cardew, you may go too far.
CECILY.
[Rising.] To save my poor, innocent, trusting boy from the machinations of any other girl there are no lengths to which I would not go.