You see, he was really just playing a game. Big game was his speciality (Africa) and this one was to be as big as an elephant. It consisted in the correction of a flaw which he had found in the object of his worship, the lovely young Widow Audley, who had refused in his very presence to receive a woman, an old friend of hers, who had preferred love to reputation. He, the gallant Captain, proposed to amend this error. By his French methods he would reduce the Widow to such a state of helplessness that she would consent to become his mistress. The fact that he happened to be a bachelor, and perfectly free to marry her, should not be allowed to stand in the way of his scheme. He would explain that the exigencies of his vocation as a hunter of big game demanded a greater measure of liberty than was practicable within the bonds of matrimony. He would be "faithful but free."
In the course of a brief month (the interval between the First and Second Acts, for we are not permitted to see how he does it) she has become as putty in his hands. She consents to be his mistress, and is indeed so determined to adopt this informal style of union that when he produces a special marriage licence she is indignant at such a concession to the proprieties. But once again the Captain proves irresistible with his French methods and all ends well.
THE CAPTAIN "EXAMINES ARMS."
Captain le Briquet ... Mr. Gerald du Maurier.
Sir Nevil Moreton, Bart. ... Mr. Franklin Dyall.
Mr. Gerald du Maurier was the life and soul of the play, which would have been a dullish business without him. His reappearances were always hailed as a joyous relief to the prevailing depression. Even Dean Carey—most delightful in the person of Mr. Gilbert Hare—became at one time a gloomy Dean; and Miss Lilian Braithwaite, who played very tenderly in the part of Mrs. Westonry (the lady who had lost her reputation), could not hope to be very entertaining with her reminiscences of a lover whom we had never had the pleasure of meeting.
Mrs. Audley again (treated naturally and with a pleasant artlessness by Miss Emily Brooke) did not take very kindly to the conquest of her scruples and gave little suggestion of the rapture of surrender. Further, the authors paid a poor compliment to English gentlemen by providing the Captain with a dull boor for his rival. The contrast was a little too patent. Even so Mr. Franklin Dyall might perhaps have made the rôle of Sir Nevil Moreton appear a little less impossible. But, however good he may be in character parts or where melodrama is indicated, he never allowed us to mistake him for a British Baronet. The only person (apart from le Briquet) who contributed nothing to the general gloom was the Dean's wife, played with the most attractive grace and humour by Miss Nina Boucicault.
A note of piquancy was given to Mr. du Maurier's part by his broken English. "Broken" is perhaps not quite the word, unless we may speak of a torrent as being broken by pebbles in its bed. There were momentary hesitancies, and a few easy French words, such as pardon? pourquoi donc? c'est permis? alors, were introduced to flatter the comprehension of the audience; but for the rest his fluency—and at all junctures, even the most unlikely—was simply astounding. Few people, speaking in their native tongue, can ever have commanded so facile an eloquence. What chance had a mere Englishman against him?
The action of The Prude's Fall was supposed to take place in 1919, but its atmosphere was clearly ante-bellum. Anyhow there was no sign of the alleged damage done to our moral standards by the War. But nobody will quarrel on that ground with Mr. Besier and Miss Edginton, the clever authors of this very interesting play. And if we have to be taught how to behave by a Frenchman, to the detriment of our British amour propre, there is nobody who can do it so nicely and painlessly as Mr. du Maurier.