the modern
Judas.

ANABEL. Don't you think he likes Gerald?

OLIVER. I'm sure he does. The way he suns himself here--like a cat
purring in his luxuriation.

ANABEL. Yes--I don't mind it. It shows a certain sensitiveness and a
certain taste.

OLIVER. Yes, he has both--touch of the artist, as Mrs. Barlow says. He
loves refinement, culture, breeding, all those things--loves them--and a
presence, a fine free manner.

ANABEL. But that is nice in him.

OLIVER. Quite. But what he loves, and what he admires, and what he
aspires to, he MUST betray. It's his fatality. He lives for the moment
when he can kiss Gerald in the Garden of Olives, or wherever it was.

ANABEL. But Gerald shouldn't be kissed.

OLIVER. That's what I say.

ANABEL. And that's what his mother means as well, I suppose.

(Enter GERALD.)

GERALD. Well--you've heard the voice of the people.

ANABEL. He isn't the people.

GERALD. I think he is, myself--the epitome.

OLIVER. No, he's a special type.

GERALD. Ineffectual, don't you think?

ANABEL. How pleased you are, Gerald! How pleased you are with yourself!
You love the turn with him.

GERALD. It's rather stimulating, you know.

ANABEL. It oughtn't to be, then.

OLIVER. He's you Judas, and you love him.

GERALD. Nothing so deep. He's just a sort of AEolian harp that sings to
the temper of the wind. I find him amusing.

ANABEL. I think it's boring.

OLIVER. And I think it's nasty.

GERALD. I believe you're both jealous of him. What do you think of the
working man, Oliver?

OLIVER. It seems to me he's in nearly as bad a way as the British
employer: he's nearly as much beside the point.

GERALD. What point?

OLIVER. Oh, just life.

GERALD. That's too vague, my boy. Do you think they'll ever make a
bust-up?

OLIVER. I can't tell. I don't see any good in it, if they do.

GERALD. It might clear the way--and it might block the way for ever:
depends what comes through. But, sincerely, I don't think they've got it
in them.

ANABEL. They may have something better.

GERALD. That suggestion doesn't interest me, Anabel. Ah, well, we shall
see what we shall see. Have a whisky and soda with me, Oliver, and let
the troubled course of this evening run to a smooth close. It's quite
like old times. Aren't you smoking, Anabel?

ANABEL. No, thanks.

GERALD. I believe you're a reformed character. So it won't be like old
times, after all.

ANABEL. I don't want old times. I want new o