Nanette. Yes, it's the mourning. It's unbecoming.
Robert. I shouldn't say that, Nanette. How is Madame? Tell me. [Nanette gives an eloquent shrug.] I haven't dared to come before. You know how I hate anything—anything like a scene.
Nanette [sitting left]. Sit down, Monsieur Robert. [He sits in a chair forward right.] It was cowardly of you not to come to see Madame.
Robert. Yes, I know. I am such a coward. I cannot imagine how I came to be such a coward, Nanette. I am afraid to do anything any more. Yet my mind keeps so active. How do you account for that? It's my imagination. It seems to run ahead and do things in my place. In these times I am all over the world at once. Nanette, will you believe it, that I suffer actually with every man in the trenches?
Nanette [contemptuously]. Oh, I daresay.
Robert. You don't understand my case. I am fifty-five. I have lived for my work always. Why should I give it up now that the world has gone mad? Some one must stay behind and keep things together. Some one must conduct the dull march of everyday life. We can't all be heroes.
Nanette. Your work!
Robert. Well, to be at the head of a big charity. That is something. Countless lives, numberless families are in my care. I am sort of a father to them all, Nanette.
Nanette. They could have a mother as well.
Robert [with pained eagerness]. Do you really think that?