Myra Arundel

Well-dressed, confident, and sophisticated, Myra is invited to the Bliss house by her admirer Simon but coolly rebuffs his advances; her real motive in accepting the weekend invitation is to meet his novelist father, David. Before Myra even appears on stage, Simon's mother, Judith, describes her as a "self-conscious vampire" who "goes about using Sex as a shrimping net." So the audience is not surprised when Myra later begins a flirtatious conversation with David. Myra herself, however, is taken quite off-guard when David asks her directly, "Would you like me to make love to you?" and then refuses to believe that she is offended by the question, saying simply "You've been trying to make me—all the evening."

Although David will not play the game of subtle seduction in the typical manner that Myra expects, he does readily join in the game his wife instigates, pretending that...