You have lied enough upon
your word of honour.
[SIR ROBERT CHILTERN goes out. LORD GORING rushes to the door of the
drawing-room, when MRS. CHEVELEY comes out, looking radiant and much
amused.]
MRS. CHEVELEY. [With a mock curtsey] Good evening, Lord Goring!
LORD GORING. Mrs. Cheveley! Great heavens! . . . May I ask what you
were doing in my drawing-room?
MRS. CHEVELEY. Merely listening. I have a perfect passion for
listening through keyholes. One always hears such wonderful things
through them.
LORD GORING. Doesn't that sound rather like tempting Providence?
MRS. CHEVELEY. Oh! surely Providence can resist temptation by this
time. [Makes a sign to him to take her cloak off, which he does.]
LORD GORING. I am glad you have called. I am going to give you some
good advice.
MRS. CHEVELEY. Oh! pray don't. One should never give a woman
anything that she can't wear in the evening.
LORD GORING. I see you are quite as wilful as you used to be.
MRS. CHEVELEY. Far more! I have greatly improved. I have had more
experience.
LORD GORING. Too much experience is a dangerous thing. Pray have a
cigarette. Half the pretty women in London smoke cigarettes.
Personally I prefer the other half.
MRS. CHEVELEY. Thanks. I never smoke. My dressmaker wouldn't like
it, and a woman's first duty in life is to her dressmaker, isn't it?
What the second duty is, no one has as yet discovered.
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