C.-C. When you ran away from me, Kitty, I was sore and angry and miserable. But above all I felt a fool.
Lady Kitty. Men are so vain.
C.-C. But I was a student of history, and presently I reflected that I shared my misfortune with very nearly all the greatest men.
Lady Kitty. I’m a great reader myself. It has always struck me as peculiar.
C.-C. The explanation is very simple. Women dislike intelligence, and when they find it in their husbands they revenge themselves on them in the only way they can, by making them—well, what you made me.
Lady Kitty. It’s ingenious. It may be true.
C.-C. I felt I had done my duty by society and I determined to devote the rest of my life to my own entertainment. The House of Commons had always bored me excessively and the scandal of our divorce gave me an opportunity to resign my seat. I have been relieved to find that the country got on perfectly well without me.
Lady Kitty. But has love never entered your life?
C.-C. Tell me frankly, Kitty, don’t you think people make a lot of unnecessary fuss about love?