city--I'll
make her--

GEORGIANA. [_Interrupting._] Sam, stop! [_He rises._] I can't hear any
more!

[_A pause--she sobs; he waits._

COAST. I won't stop, not till you say you'll marry me! If I let up
to-day, I'll begin again to-morrow, and when I stop to-morrow it'll be
to go ahead the day after! I've never failed yet in getting anything
I've set after, and this is the biggest thing I've ever made up my mind
to.

GEORGIANA. And this time you _will_ lose. Because I can never love you.
[_He tries to interrupt._] No, let me finish. I'll tell you why I can't
love you. I'll tell you, only just you, Sam, remember that. I could
never love you because I love now, with every bit of love there is in
me, the man who has just left this house, who has gone to fight and
perhaps will never come back.

COAST. Has he asked you to be his wife?

GEORGIANA. I love him all the same!

COAST. And I love you the same way you love him--ain't you a little
sorry for me?

GEORGIANA. Yes--

COAST. That'll do to go on with--

GEORGIANA. [_Laughs hysterically._] Oh--Sam, can't I make you
understand?

COAST. No, nor make me give up. I'm coming to see you again to-morrow;
when will you be in?

GEORGIANA. Not at all.

[_She moves about the room._

COAST. What time in the afternoon?

GEORGIANA. I shall be out all afternoon.

COAST. I'll call at five.

GEORGIANA. Very well! You'll find Louise and mother.

COAST. _Coleman_ thinks you'll have me!

GEORGIANA. He couldn't! Why should he?

COAST. He congratulated me, when he was here just now!

GEORGIANA. For what?

COAST. For you!

GEORGIANA. Oh! [_Laughing hysterically._] That's what he meant by his
happy marriage--

[_Laughing and crying._

COAST. If he mentioned marriage, that's what he meant.

GEORGIANA. But didn't you tell him he was wrong?

COAST. No.

GEORGIANA. But why not?

COAST. I wanted him to think it!

GEORGIANA. But it was wrong of you--it can never be true, and I don't
want him to go away believing it. [_Music of a military band is heard
in the distance._] Here they come! [_Going to the balcony, he follows._]
No, please don't come out with me! Sam--I don't want him to see me
standing there with you. [SAM _starts towards_ GEORGIANA.] Let me go out
on the balcony _alone_, Sam! Please, alone!

[_He looks at her a moment and then deliberately goes past her out on to
the balcony._

MRS. CARLEY. [_Hurrying in from the Right._] They're coming! I've tol