Lady Windermere's Fan by Oscar Wilde Page A

YOU more than any one else in life.
    LADY WINDERMERE. Why—why me?
    LORD DARLINGTON.
(After a slight hesitation.)
Because I think we
might be great friends. Let us be great friends. You may want a
friend some day.
    LADY WINDERMERE. Why do you say that?
    LORD DARLINGTON. Oh!—we all want friends at times.
    LADY WINDERMERE. I think we're very good friends already, Lord
Darlington. We can always remain so as long as you don't -
    LORD DARLINGTON. Don't what?
    LADY WINDERMERE. Don't spoil it by saying extravagant silly things
to me. You think I am a Puritan, I suppose? Well, I have
something of the Puritan in me. I was brought up like that. I am
glad of it. My mother died when I was a mere child. I lived
always with Lady Julia, my father's elder sister, you know. She
was stern to me, but she taught me what the world is forgetting,
the difference that there is between what is right and what is
wrong. SHE allowed of no compromise.
I
allow of none.
    LORD DARLINGTON. My dear Lady Windermere!
    LADY WINDERMERE.
(Leaning back on the sofa.)
You look on me as
being behind the age.—Well, I am! I should be sorry to be on the
same level as an age like this.
    LORD DARLINGTON. You think the age very bad?
    LADY WINDERMERE. Yes. Nowadays people seem to look on life as a
speculation. It is not a speculation. It is a sacrament. Its
ideal is Love. Its purification is sacrifice.
    LORD DARLINGTON.
(Smiling.)
Oh, anything is better than being
sacrificed!
    LADY WINDERMERE.
(Leaning forward.)
Don't say that.
    LORD DARLINGTON. I do say it. I feel it—I know it.
    (Enter PARKER C.)
    PARKER. The men want to know if they are to put the carpets on the
terrace for to-night, my lady?
    LADY WINDERMERE. You don't think it will rain, Lord Darlington, do
you?
    LORD DARLINGTON. I won't hear of its raining on your birthday!
    LADY WINDERMERE. Tell them to do it at once, Parker.
    (Exit PARKER C.)
    LORD DARLINGTON.
(Still seated.)
Do you think then—of course I
am only putting an imaginary instance—do you think that in the
case of a young married couple, say about two years married, if the
husband suddenly becomes the intimate friend of a woman of—well,
more than doubtful character—is always calling upon her, lunching
with her, and probably paying her bills—do you think that the wife
should not console herself?
    LADY WINDERMERE.
(Frowning)
Console herself?
    LORD DARLINGTON. Yes, I think she should—I think she has the
right.
    LADY WINDERMERE. Because the husband is vile—should the wife be
vile also?
    LORD DARLINGTON. Vileness is a terrible word, Lady Windermere.
    LADY WINDERMERE. It is a terrible thing, Lord Darlington.
    LORD DARLINGTON. Do you know I am afraid that good people do a
great deal of harm in this world. Certainly the greatest harm they
do is that they make badness of such extraordinary importance. It
is absurd to divide people into good and bad. People are either
charming or tedious. I take the side of the charming, and you,
Lady Windermere, can't help belonging to them.
    LADY WINDERMERE. Now, Lord Darlington.
(Rising and crossing R.,
front of him.)
Don't stir, I am merely going to finish my flowers.
(Goes to table R.C.)
    LORD DARLINGTON.
(Rising and moving chair.)
And I must say I
think you are very hard on modern life, Lady Windermere. Of course
there is much against it, I admit. Most women, for instance,
nowadays, are rather mercenary.
    LADY WINDERMERE. Don't talk about such people.
    LORD DARLINGTON. Well then, setting aside mercenary people, who,
of course, are dreadful, do you think seriously that women who have
committed what the world calls a fault should never be forgiven?
    LADY WINDERMERE.
(Standing at table.)
I think they should never
be forgiven.
    LORD DARLINGTON. And men? Do you think that there should be the
same laws for men as there are for women?
    LADY WINDERMERE. Certainly!
    LORD DARLINGTON. I think life too complex a thing to be settled by
these hard and fast rules.
    LADY WINDERMERE. If we had 'these hard and fast rules,' we