EGLANTINE. Is the country like that? Handkerchief.
[The word has hardly left his lips before the handkerchief, neatly
unfolded, is in his hand. What a valet!
She has stopped. Put the door ajar so that I see her.
[Harlequin looks at the door. It opens and stands obediently ajar.
A picture of innocence. Putting her hair tidy before my mirror. She is like
a ... [He has almost forgotten those little things that grow so prettily.]
... when I was a boy they grew in the garden.
HARLEQUIN. Flower, my lord?
EGLANTINE. I must give her a guinea. Give me a guinea. Send her to me.
HARLEQUIN. Certainly, my lord.
[He beckons to Columbine, and she dances on.
EGLANTINE. So you are a chambermaid?
[Richardson curtseys. That's a poor way to describe it. It is a bob
rustic indeed, but it veils Columbine very slightly. She is like one of
the flowers of Keats, "all tiptoe for a flight." Into the room with the
arch-valet and the very tired, elegant modish man she has come like the
scent of mignonette through the window.
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