? 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 assure 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:
"God bless you, dear, but I'm going to get wedded on the sixteenth...."
Oh, damn 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

So you have parted as perfect friends?

COUNT

Certainly. In fact, our leave-taking was quite jolly. 'Pon my soul, I
never suspected at first how tough it would prove. It's only by degrees
it has come home to me. And that's quite a remarkable story, I must
say....

PRINCE

What's remar