Page:Plays by Jacinto Benavente - Second series (IA playsbyjacintobe00bena).pdf/101



. To be perfectly frank, my dear—I beg your pardon, Your Highness…

. I prefer the status of a friend.

. The familiarity will not surprise you. You are one of the women whom a man feels he has known all his life, when he speaks to her for the first time. I am neither innocent nor confiding, as you may judge, yet I feel that I have not a secret in the world which I could keep from you. You are a benevolent fairy, enlivening what you touch; it is a gift. I have never known until this moment what it is to be alive.

. Until this moment? Then I fear that at this moment you are about to become a sadly disappointed man.

. How so?

. Because you will find that ignorance is a prerequisite to enjoyment. However, that was probably not what you were going to say.

. No, I forget… Ah, yes! I remember. It was a roundabout way of telling you something else.

. Let us begin with the roundabout way.

. Before we became so intimate, when as yet I admired you at a distance, I imagined Herr Rosmer to be—how shall I express it so as not to give offense? 77