[To FREDA] Is that true?
[FREDA gulps and remains silent.]
BILL. If you want to say anything, say it to me, mother.
LADY CHESHIRE. [Gripping the edge of a little table] Give me a
chair, please. [BILL gives her a chair.]
LADY CHESHIRE. [To FREDA] Please sit down too.
FREDA sits on the piano stool, still turning her face away.
LADY CHESHIRE. [Fixing her eyes on FREDA] Now!
BILL. I fell in love with her. And she with me.
LADY CHESHIRE. When?
BILL. In the summer.
LADY CHESHIRE. Ah!
BILL. It wasn't her fault.
LADY CHESHIRE. No?
BILL. [With a sort of menace] Mother!
LADY CHESHIRE. Forgive me, I am not quite used to the idea. You say
that you--are engaged?
BILL. Yes.
LADY CHESHIRE. The reasons against such an engagement have occurred
to you, I suppose? [With a sudden change of tone] Bill! what does it
mean?
BILL. If you think she's trapped me into this----
LADY CHESHIRE. I do not. Neither do I think she has been trapped.
I think nothing. I understand nothing.
BILL. [Grimly] Good!
LADY CHESHIRE. How long has this-engagement lasted?
BILL. [After a silence] Two months.
LADY CHESHIRE. [Suddenly] This is-this is quite impossible.
BILL. You'll find it isn't.
LADY CHESHIRE. It's simple misery.
BILL. [Pointing to the workroom] Go and wait in there, Freda.
LADY CHESHIRE.
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