of heart
and brain--Shakespear would have called it liver and wits--is really
schoolboyish. Surely weve had enough of second-hand Schopenhauer. Even
such a played-out old back number as Ibsen would have been ashamed of
it. Heart and brain, indeed!

VAUGHAN. You have neither one nor the other, Gunn. Youre decadent.

GUNN. Decadent! How I love that early Victorian word!

VAUGHAN. Well, at all events, you cant deny that the characters in this
play were quite distinguishable from one another. That proves it's not
by Shaw, because all Shaw's characters are himself: mere puppets stuck
up to spout Shaw. It's only the actors that make them seem different.

BANNAL. There can be no doubt of that: everybody knows it. But Shaw
doesnt write his plays as plays. All he wants to do is to insult
everybody all round and set us talking about him.

TROTTER. [wearily] And naturally, here we are all talking about him. For
heaven's sake, let us change the subject.

VAUGHAN. Still, my articles about Shaw--

GUNN. Oh, stow it, Vaughan. Drop it. What Ive always told you about Shaw
is--

BANNAL. There you go, Shaw, Shaw, Shaw! Do chuck it. If you want to know
my opinion about Shaw--

TROTTER. | No, please, we dont. |
| |
VAUGHAN. | Shut your head, Bannal. | [yelling]
| |
GUNN. | Oh, do drop it. |

_The deafened Count puts his fingers in his ears and flies from the
centre of the group to its outskirts, behind Vaughan._

BANNAL. [sulkily] Oh, very well. Sorry I spoke, I'm sure.

TROTTER. | Shaw-- |
| | [beginning again
VAUGHAN. | Shaw-- | simultaneously]
| |
GUNN. | Shaw-- |

_They are cut short by the entry of Fanny through the curtains. She is
almost in tears._

FANNY. [coming between Trotter and Gunn] I'm so sorry, gentlemen. And it
was such a success when I read it to the Cambridge Fabian Society!

TROTTER. Miss O'Dowda: I was about to tell these gentlemen what I
guessed before the curtain rose: that you are the author of the play.
[General amazement and consternation].

FANNY. And you all think it beastly. You hate it. You think I'm a
conceited idiot, and that I shall never be able to write anything
decent.

_She is almost weeping. A wave of sympathy carries away the critics._

VAUGHAN. No, no. Why, I was just saying that it must have been w