The Lonely Way-Intermezzo-Countess Mizzie - LightNovelsOnl.com
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PRINCE
What's wrong now?
COUNT
Oh, my dear old friend, it's going downhill.
PRINCE
How? That's a funny way of talking, Arpad. What do you mean by downhill?
COUNT
One grows old, Egon.
PRINCE
Yes, and gets accustomed to it.
COUNT
What do you know about it--you who are five years younger?
PRINCE
Six almost. But at fifty-five the springtime of life is pretty well over. Well--one gets resigned to it.
COUNT
You have always been something of a philosopher, old chap.
PRINCE
Anyhow, I can't see what's the matter with you. You look fine. (_Seats himself; frequently during this scene he glances up at the balcony; pause_)
COUNT (_with sudden decision_)
Have you heard the latest? She's going to marry.
PRINCE
Who's going to marry?
COUNT
Do you have to ask? Can't you guess?
PRINCE
Oh, I see. Thought it might be Mizzie. And that would also.... So Lolo is going to marry.
COUNT
She is.
PRINCE
But that's hardly the "latest."
COUNT
Why not?
PRINCE
It's what she has promised, or threatened, or whatever you choose to call it, these last three years.
COUNT
Three, you say? May just as well say ten. Or eighteen. Yes, indeed. In fact, since the very start of this affair between her and me. It has always been a fixed idea with her. "If ever a decent man asks me to marry him, I'll get off the stage _stante pede_." It was almost the first thing she told me. You have heard it yourself a couple of times.
And now he's come--the one she has been waiting for--and she's to get married.
PRINCE
Hope he's decent at least.
COUNT
Yes, you're very witty! But is that your only way of showing sympathy in a serious moment like this?
PRINCE
Now! (_He puts his hand on the Count's arm_)
COUNT
Well, I a.s.sure you, it's a serious moment. It's no small matter when you have lived twenty years with somebody--in a _near_-marital state; when you have been spending your best years with her, and really shared her joys and sorrows--until you have come to think at last, that it's never going to end--and then she comes to you one fine day and says: "G.o.d bless you, dear, but I'm going to get wedded on the sixteenth...."
Oh, d.a.m.n the whole story! (_He gets up and begins to walk about_) And I can't blame her even. Because I understand perfectly. So what can you do about it?
PRINCE
You've always been much too kind, Arpad.
COUNT
Nothing kind about it. Why shouldn't I understand? The clock has struck thirty-eight for her. And she has said adieu to her profession. So that anybody can sympathize with her feeling that there is no fun to go on as a ballet dancer retired on half pay and mistress on active service to Count Pazmandy, who'll be nothing but an old fool either, as time runs along. Of course, I have been prepared for it. And I haven't blamed her a bit--'pon my soul!
PRINCE
