Page:Heartbreak House, Great Catherine, and Playlets of the War.djvu/106

 CAPTAIN SHOTOVER. There is something in it. Not to wind in generals: they are not dangerous. But one could fire a grapnel and wind in a machine gun or even a tank. I will think it out.

MRS HUSHABYE [squeezing the captain's arm affectionately]. Saved! You are a darling, daddiest. Now we must go back to these dreadful people and entertain them.

CAPTAIN SHOTOVER. They have had no dinner. Don't forget that.

HECTOR. Neither have I. And it is dark: it must be all hours.

MRS HUSHABYE. Oh, Guinness will produce some sort of dinner for them. The servants always take jolly good care that there is food in the house.

CAPTAIN SHOTOVER [raising a strange wail in the darkness]. What a house! What a daughter!

MRS HUSHABYE [raving]. What a father!

HECTOR [following suit]. What a husband!

CAPTAIN SHOTOVER. Is there no thunder in heaven?

HECTOR. Is there no beauty, no bravery, on earth?

MRS HUSHABYE. What do men want? They have their food, their firesides, their clothes mended, and our love at the end of the day. Why are they not satisfied? Why do they envy us the pain with which we bring them into the world, and make strange dangers and torments for themselves to be even with us?

CAPTAIN SHOTOVER [weirdly chanting].
 * I builded a house for my daughters, and opened the doors
 * thereof,
 * That men might come for their choosing, and their betters
 * spring from their love;
 * But one of them married a numskull;

HECTOR. [taking up the rhythm]
 * The other a liar wed;