why the playwright
should blurt out all his secrets at the first possible opportunity. The
true art lies in knowing just how long to keep silent, and just the
right time to speak. In the first act of _Letty_, Sir Arthur Pinero
gains a memorable effect by keeping a secret, not very long, indeed, but
long enough and carefully enough to show that he knew very clearly what
he was doing. We are introduced to Nevill Letchmere's bachelor
apartments. Animated scenes occur between Letchmere and his
brother-in-law, Letchmere and his sister, Letchmere and Letty, Marion
and Hilda Gunning. It is evident that Letty dreams of marriage with
Letchmere; and for aught that we see or hear, there is no just cause or
impediment to the contrary. It is only, at the end of the very admirable
scene between Letchmere and Mandeville that the following little
passage occurs:

MANDEVILLE: ... At all events I _am_ qualified to tell her I'm
fairly gone on her--honourably gone on her--if I choose to do it.

LETCHMERE: Qualified?

MANDEVILLE: Which is more than you are, Mr. Letchmere. I _am_ a
single man; you ain't, bear in mind.

LETCHMERE: (_imperturbably_): Very true.

This one little touch is a masterpiece of craftsmanship. It would have
been the most natural thing in the world for either the sister or the
brother-in-law, concerned about their own matrimonial difficulties, to
let fall some passing allusion to Letchmere's separation from his wife;
but the author carefully avoided this, carefully allowed us to make our
first acquaintance with Letty in ignorance of the irony of her position,
and then allowed the truth to slip out just in time to let us feel the
whole force of that irony during the last scene of the act and the
greater part of the second act. A finer instance of the delicate grading
of tension it would be difficult to cite.

One thing is certain; namely, that if a secret is to be kept at all, it
must be worth the keeping; if a riddle is propounded, its answer must be
pleasing and ingenious, or the audience will resent having been led to
cudgel its brains for nothing. This is simply a part of the larger
principle, before insisted on, that when a reasonable expectation is
aroused, it can be baffled only at the author's peril. If the crux of a
scene or of a whole play lie in the solution of some material difficulty
or moral problem, it must on no account be solved by a mere trick or
evasion. The dramatist is very ill-adv