e are no new tricks. And if there were we shouldn't want
'em discussed.

DUKE. I'm afraid you're not _really_ advanced. Are you interested in
modern progress?

CONJURER. Yes. We are interested in all tricks done by illusion.

DUKE. Well, well, I must go and see how Morris is. Pleasure of seeing
you later.

[_Exit_ DUKE, _leaving the programmes._

CONJURER. Why are nice men such asses? [_Turns to arrange the table._]
That seems all right. The pack of cards that is a pack of cards. And the
pack of cards that isn't a pack of cards. The hat that looks like a
gentleman's hat. But which, in reality, is no gentleman's hat. Only my
hat; and I am not a gentleman. I am only a conjurer, and this is only a
conjurer's hat. I could not take off this hat to a lady. I can take
rabbits out of it, goldfish out of it, snakes out of it. Only I mustn't
take my own head out of it. I suppose I'm a lower animal than a rabbit
or a snake. Anyhow they can get out of the conjurer's hat; and I can't.
I am a conjurer and nothing else but a conjurer. Unless I could show I
was something else, and that would be worse.

[_He begins to dash the cards rather irregularly about the table.
Enter_ PATRICIA.

PATRICIA. [_Coldly_] I beg your pardon. I came to get some programmes.
My uncle wants them.

[_She walks swiftly across and takes up the programmes._

CONJURER. [_Still dashing cards about the table._] Miss Carleon, might I
speak to you a moment? [_He puts his hands in his pockets, stares at the
table; and his face assumes a sardonic expression._] The question is
purely practical.

PATRICIA. [_Pausing at the door._] I can hardly imagine what the
question can be.

CONJURER. I am the question.

PATRICIA. And what have I to do with that?

CONJURER. You have everything to do with it. I am the question: you....

PATRICIA. [_Angrily._] Well, what am I?

CONJURER. You are the answer.

PATRICIA. The answer to what?

CONJURER. [_Coming round to the front of the table and sitting against
it._] The answer to me. You think I'm a liar because I walked about the
fields with you and said I could make stones disappear. Well, so I can.
I'm a conjurer. In mere point of fact, it wasn't a lie. But if it had
been a lie I should have told it just the same. I would have told twenty
such lies. You may or may not know why.

PATRICIA. I know nothing about such lies.

[_She puts her hand on the handle of the door, but the_ CONJURER,