The Importance of Being Earnest Read Online Free

UCHESS OF B ERWICK . Dear Lord Darlington, how thoroughly depraved you are!
    L ADY W INDERMERE . Lord Darlington is trivial.
    L ORD D ARLINGTON . Ah, don’t say that, Lady Windermere.
    L ADY W INDERMERE . Why do you
talk
so trivially about life, then?
    L ORD D ARLINGTON . Because I think that life is far too important a thing ever to talk seriously about it.
(Moves up C.)
    D UCHESS OF B ERWICK . What does he mean? Do, as a concession to my poor wits, Lord Darlington, just explain to me what you really mean.
    L ORD D ARLINGTON .
(Coming down back of table.)
I think I had better not, Duchess. Now-a-days to be intelligible is to be found out. Good-bye!
(Shakes hands with Duchess.)
And now—
(goes up stage)
Lady Windermere, good-bye. I may come to-night, mayn’t I? Do let me come.
    L ADY W INDERMERE .
(Standing up stage with Lord Darlington.)
Yes, certainly. But you are not to say foolish, insincere things to people.
    L ORD D ARLINGTON .
(Smiling.)
Ah! you are beginning to reform me. It is a dangerous thing to reform any one, Lady Windermere.
    (Bows, and exit C.)
    D UCHESS OF B ERWICK .
(Who has risen, goes C.)
What a charming,wicked creature! I like him so much. I’m quite delighted he’s gone! How sweet you’re looking! Where
do
you get your gowns? And now I must tell you how sorry I am for you, dear Margaret.
(Crosses to sofa and sits with Lady Windermere.)
Agatha darling!
    L ADY A GATHA . Yes, mamma.
(Rises.)
    D UCHESS OF B ERWICK . Will you go and look over the photograph album that I see there?
    L ADY A GATHA . Yes, mamma.
(Goes to table up L.)
    D UCHESS OF B ERWICK . Dear girl! She is so fond of photographs of Switzerland. Such a pure taste, I think. But I really am so sorry for you, Margaret.
    L ADY W INDERMERE .
(Smiling.)
Why, Duchess?
    D UCHESS OF B ERWICK . Oh, on account of that horrid woman. She dresses so well, too, which makes it much worse, sets such a dreadful example. Augustus—you know my disreputable brother—such a trial to us all—well, Augustus is completely infatuated about her. It is quite scandalous, for she is absolutely inadmissible into society. Many a woman has a past, but I am told that she has at least a dozen, and that they all fit.
    L ADY W INDERMERE . Whom are you talking about, Duchess?
    D UCHESS OF B ERWICK . About Mrs. Erlynne.
    L ADY W INDERMERE . Mrs. Erlynne? I never heard of her, Duchess. And what
has
she to do with me?
    D UCHESS OF B ERWICK . My poor child! Agatha, darling!
    L ADY A GATHA . Yes, mamma.
    D UCHESS OF B ERWICK . Will you go out on the terrace and look at the sunset?
    L ADY A GATHA . Yes, mamma.
    (Exit through window L.)
    D UCHESS OF B ERWICK . Sweet girl! So devoted to sunsets! Shows such refinement of feeling, does it not? After all, there is nothing like Nature, is there?
    L ADY W INDERMERE . But what is it, Duchess? Why do you talk to me about this person?
    D UCHESS OF B ERWICK . Don’t you really know? I assure you we’re all so distressed about it. only last night at dear Lady Jansen’s everyone was saying how extraordinary it was that, of all men in London, Windermere should behave in such a way.
    L ADY W INDERMERE . My husband—what has
he
got to do with any woman of that kind?
    D UCHESS OF B ERWICK . Ah, what indeed, dear? That is the point. He goes to see her continually, and stops for hours at a time, and while he is there she is not at home to any one. Not that many ladies call on her, dear, but she has a great many disreputable men friends—my own brother particularly, as I told you—and that is what makes it so dreadful about Windermere. We looked upon
him
as being such a model husband, but I am afraid there is no doubt about it. My dear nieces—you know the Saville girls, don’t you?—such nice domestic creatures—plain, dreadfully plain, but so good—well, they’re always at the window doing fancy work, and making ugly things for the poor, which I think so useful of them in these dreadful socialistic days, and this terrible woman has