MELISANDE (bewildered).  Did you expect me to?

GERVASE.  No. (After a pause) I think that’s why I put ’em on. (She looks at him in surprise.) You see, we had to come back to the twentieth century some time; we couldn’t go on pretending for ever.  Well, here we are—­(indicating his clothes)—­back.  But I feel just as romantic, Melisande.  I want beauty—­your beauty—­just as much. (He goes to her.)

MELISANDE.  Which Melisande do you want?  The one who talked to you this morning in the wood, or the one who—­(bitterly) does all the housekeeping for her mother? (Violently) And badly, badly, badly!

GERVASE.  The one who does all the housekeeping for her mother—­and badly, badly, badly, bless her, because she has never realised what a gloriously romantic thing housekeeping is.

MELISANDE (amazed).  Romantic!

GERVASE (with enthusiasm).  Most gloriously romantic. . . .  Did you ever long when you were young to be wrecked on a desert island?

MELISANDE (clasping her hands).  Oh yes!

GERVASE.  You imagined yourself there—­alone or with a companion?

MELISANDE.  Often!

GERVASE.  And what were you doing?  What is the romance of the desert island which draws us all?  Climbing the bread-fruit tree, following the turtle to see where it deposits its eggs, discovering the spring of water, building the hut—­housekeeping, Melisande. . . .  Or take Robinson Crusoe.  When Man Friday came along and left his footprint in the sand, why did Robinson Crusoe stagger back in amazement?  Because he said to himself, like a good housekeeper, “By Jove, I’m on the track of a servant at last.”  There’s romance for you!

MELISANDE (smiling and shaking her head at him).  What nonsense you talk!

GERVASE.  It isn’t nonsense; indeed, indeed it isn’t.  There’s romance everywhere if you look for it. You look for it in the old fairy-stories, but did they find it there?  Did the gentleman who had just been given a new pair of seven-league boots think it romantic to be changed into a fish?  He probably thought it a confounded nuisance, and wondered what on earth to do with his boots.  Did Cinderella and the Prince find the world romantic after they were married?  Think of the endless silent evenings which they spent together, with nothing in common but an admiration for Cinderella’s feet—­do you think they didn’t long for the romantic days of old?  And in two thousand or two hundred thousand years, people will read stories about us, and sigh and say, “Will those romantic days never come back again?” Ah, they are here now, Melisande, for us; for the people with imagination; for you and for me.

MELISANDE.  Are they?  Oh, if I could believe they were!

GERVASE.  You thought of me as your lover and true knight this morning.  Ah, but what an easy thing to be!  You were my Princess.  Look at yourself in the glass—­how can you help being a princess?  But if we could be companions, Melisande!  That’s difficult; that’s worth trying.