Speaker 1: In the Lion's Den from Mister Puncher's Dramatic Sequels by
Speaker 1: sin John Hankin. This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox
Speaker 1: recordings are in the public domain. For more information or
Speaker 1: to volunteer, please visit LibriVox dot org. The Lady of Lyon.
Speaker 1: When Lord Lytton provided the conventional happy ending for the
Speaker 1: Lady of Lyon by reuniting Pauline Nay de Chapelle to
Speaker 1: the devoted Claude Melnot, promoting the latter to the rank
Speaker 1: of colonel in the French Army, he seems not to
Speaker 1: have troubled his head as to the divergent social ideas
Speaker 1: of the happy pair, nor as to how the vulgar
Speaker 1: and purse proud family of de Chapelle and the humbler
Speaker 1: Melknots would get on together. The sequel throws a lurid
Speaker 1: light on these points. In writing it, great pains have
Speaker 1: been taken to make the blank Verse, wherever possible, as
Speaker 1: bad as Lord Lytton's Dramatis personi. Pauline Melnott read.
Speaker 2: By by Amanda Friday.
Speaker 1: Claude Melnott read by Lambda James Manservant.
Speaker 3: Read by Elizabeth Klett.
Speaker 4: Missus Melnott read by Karen Savage. Missus de Chapelle read
Speaker 4: by Capricia Page Narrator read by Ruth Golding. In the
Speaker 4: Lion's Den, seen the drawing room of Claude Melnott's house,
Speaker 4: Pauline is sitting by the fire, Claude leaning with his
Speaker 4: back against the mantelpiece. James, a manservant in livery, enters
Speaker 4: with a card on a salver reading card.
Speaker 2: Missus Smith not at home, James.
Speaker 1: Who can never quite get out of his habit of
Speaker 1: speaking in first.
Speaker 5: Why are you not at home? To mister Smith, my
Speaker 5: dear Claude.
Speaker 2: That woman mister Smith kept a greengrocer's shop. Tis true,
Speaker 2: he made a great deal of money by his contracts
Speaker 2: to supply the armies of the Republic with vegetables, but
Speaker 2: they are not gentle people.
Speaker 5: In his most byronic manner, what is it makes a gentleman? Pauline,
Speaker 5: ye is said to have a cousin in the peerage.
Speaker 2: Partly that dear or is to.
Speaker 5: Be honest, simple kind. But I have no.
Speaker 2: Reason for believing mister Smith to have been more honest
Speaker 2: than the general run of army contractors.
Speaker 5: Continuing gentle in speech and action as in name. Oh,
Speaker 5: it is this that makes a gentleman, and mister Smith,
Speaker 5: although ye kept a shop, me very properly be so described.
Speaker 2: Yes, I know, dear, everybody calls himself a gentleman nowadays,
Speaker 2: even the boy who cleans the boots. But I'm not
Speaker 2: going to give in to these unhealthy modern ideas, and
Speaker 2: I'm not going to visit missus Smith. She is not
Speaker 2: in society.
Speaker 1: Off again on his high horse.
Speaker 5: What is society all noble men?
Speaker 2: But mister Smith isn't a nobleman?
Speaker 5: Clod and women in whatever stationed born these only these
Speaker 5: make up society.
Speaker 2: But that's such a dreadful misuse of words, Dear. When
Speaker 2: one talks of society, one does not mean good people,
Speaker 2: or unselfish people, or high minded people, but people who
Speaker 2: keep a carriage and give dinner parties. Those are the
Speaker 2: only things which really matter socially.
Speaker 5: Pauline, Pauline, what dreadful sentiments. They show a worldly and
Speaker 5: perverted mind. I grieve to think my wife should uttern them.
Speaker 2: I wish Claude you try and give up talking in
Speaker 2: blank verse. It's a very bad form, and it's very
Speaker 2: bad verse too. Try and break yourself of it off.
Speaker 5: Again, all noble thoughts, Pauline.
Speaker 2: No, no, no, Clode, I really can't have this ranting
Speaker 2: byronics are quite out of.
Speaker 1: Fashion, relapsing gloomily into prose.
Speaker 5: You may laugh at me, Pauline, but you know I
Speaker 5: am right.
Speaker 2: Of course, you're right, dear, much too right for this
Speaker 2: wicked world. That's why I never can take your advice
Speaker 2: on any subject. You're so unpractical.
Speaker 1: Breaking out again the world, the world?
Speaker 5: Oh how I aid this world?
Speaker 2: Now, that's silly of you, dear. There's nothing like making
Speaker 2: the best of a bad thing. By the way, Clode,
Speaker 2: didn't you say Missus Melnot was coming to call this afternoon.
Speaker 5: Yes, dear mother, how nice will be to see her again?
Speaker 2: It will be charming, of course, I do hope no
Speaker 2: one else will call at the same time. Perhaps i'd
Speaker 2: better tell James we are not at home to any
Speaker 2: one except missus Melnot.
Speaker 5: Oh no, don't do that. My mother will enjoy meeting
Speaker 5: our friends.
Speaker 2: No doubt, dear. But will our friends enjoy meeting your mother?
Speaker 1: Seeing him about to burst forth again?
Speaker 2: Oh yes, Clode, I know what you are going to say.
Speaker 2: But after all, Lyons is a very purse, proud vulgar place.
Speaker 2: You know how my mother can behave on occasions, and
Speaker 2: if missus melnot happens to be here when other people
Speaker 2: paul it might be very unpleasant. I really think I
Speaker 2: had better say we are not at home.
Speaker 1: To any one rises to ring the.
Speaker 5: Bell, Pauline, I forbid you sit down at once. If
Speaker 5: my family are not good enough for your friends, let
Speaker 5: them drop us and be hanged to them.
Speaker 2: Clode, don't storm. It's so vulgar, and there's not the
Speaker 2: least occasion for it either. I only thought it would
Speaker 2: be pleasanter for all our visitors, your dear mother among
Speaker 2: the number, if we avoided all chance of disagreeable scenes.
Speaker 2: But there, dear, you've no savoir faire, and I'm afraid
Speaker 2: we shall never get into society.
Speaker 1: It's very sad, touched by her patience.
Speaker 5: I am sorry, my dear. I ought to have kept
Speaker 5: my temper, but I wish you weren't so set upon
Speaker 5: getting into society. Isn't it a little.
Speaker 1: Snobbish, wilfully misunderstanding him?
Speaker 2: It's dreadfully snobbish, dear. The most snobbish sort of society
Speaker 2: I know all provincial towns are like that. But it's
Speaker 2: the only society there is here, you know, and we
Speaker 2: must make the best of it.
Speaker 5: My poor Pauline kissing her.
Speaker 2: But you know, Clode, social distinctions do exist, why not
Speaker 2: recognize them? And the late mister Melnott was a gardener.
Speaker 5: He was an excellent gardener.
Speaker 2: One of the lower classes.
Speaker 5: In a republic. There are no lower classes in a republic.
Speaker 2: There are no higher classes, and class distinctions are more
Speaker 2: sharply drawn than ever.
Speaker 5: In consequence, so much the worse for the republic.
Speaker 2: Claude, I begin to think you are an anarchist.
Speaker 5: I I am a colonel in the French army.
Speaker 2: But not a real colonel, Clode, only a Republican colonel.
Speaker 5: I rose from the ranks in two years by merit.
Speaker 2: I know, dear, real colonel's only rise by interest.
Speaker 1: Claude gasps, opening the door and showing in a wizened
Speaker 1: old lady in rusty black garments and a bonnet. Slightly
Speaker 1: awry missus Melnot Pauline goes forward to greet her. Not
Speaker 1: seeing her, Oh my dear son runs across the room
Speaker 1: to Claude. Before the eyes of the deeply scandalized James
Speaker 1: and kisses him repeatedly.
Speaker 3: How glad I am to see you again, and your
Speaker 3: grand house and your fine servants in livery too.
Speaker 1: Pauline shudders, and so does James. The latter goes out.
Speaker 5: My dearest mother.
Speaker 1: Kisses her, beaming on Pauline, how.
Speaker 3: Do you do, my dear, Let me give my Claude's
Speaker 3: wife a kiss.
Speaker 1: Does so in resounding fashion, as soon as she has
Speaker 1: recovered from the warmth of this embrace.
Speaker 2: How do you do, Missus Melnott. Won't you sit down?
Speaker 3: Thank you kindly, my dear I don't mind if I do.
Speaker 1: A ring is heard outside, followed by the sound of
Speaker 1: someone being admitted. Pauline looks anxiously towards the door to
Speaker 1: herself a visitor.
Speaker 2: How unlucky I wonder who.
Speaker 1: It is throwing open the door, Missus de Chapel.
Speaker 2: Great heavens.
Speaker 1: My mother falls back, overwhelmed into her chair in her
Speaker 1: most elaborate manner.
Speaker 6: My dear child, you are unwell. My coming has been
Speaker 6: a shock to you. But there a daughter's affection.
Speaker 1: Claude shaking hands with him.
Speaker 6: How wonderful it.
Speaker 2: Is, dear mother. We are delighted to see you.
Speaker 6: Of course I ought to have called before. I have
Speaker 6: been meaning to come ever since you returned from your honeymoon.
Speaker 6: But I have so many visits to pay, and you
Speaker 6: have only been back ten weeks.
Speaker 2: I quite understand, mother, dear.
Speaker 6: And as I always say to your poor father, when
Speaker 6: one is a leader in society, one has so many engagements.
Speaker 6: I am sure you find that.
Speaker 2: I have hardly begun to receive visits yet.
Speaker 6: No, dear, But then it's different for you. When you
Speaker 6: married Colonel Melnott, of course you gave up all social ambitions.
Speaker 3: I am sure no one could wish for a better
Speaker 3: braver husband than my Claude.
Speaker 1: Turning sharply round and observing Missus Melnott for the first time,
Speaker 1: I beg your pardon.
Speaker 3: I said no, and could have a better husband than.
Speaker 1: Claude, dumbfounded, appealing to Pauline, Who who is.
Speaker 2: This person I think you have met before? Mother, This
Speaker 2: is Missus Melnott.
Speaker 6: Oh, the gardener's wife, melodramatic at.
Speaker 5: Once, Yes, the gardener's wife and my mother.
Speaker 6: Of course, I know the unfortunate relationship between you, Claude.
Speaker 6: You need not thrust it down my throat. You know
Speaker 6: how unpleasant it.
Speaker 1: Is for me shocked at this bad taste.
Speaker 2: Mother, Oh, yes.
Speaker 6: It is as I was saying to your poor father yesterday.
Speaker 6: Of course Claude is all right. He is an officer now,
Speaker 6: and all officers are supposed to be gentlemen. But his
Speaker 6: relatives are impossible, quite impossible.
Speaker 5: This insolence is intolerable. Madame Dischival Claude Cloude, don't be angry.
Speaker 3: Remember who she is.
Speaker 5: I remember well enough. She is Madam Deschapel's and her
Speaker 5: husband as a successful tradesman. He was an English shop boy,
Speaker 5: and his proper name was Chapel. He came over to
Speaker 5: Franz grew rich pu de dieu before his name, and
Speaker 5: now gives himself airs like the other parvenus monster.
Speaker 2: My dear Clode, how wonderfully.
Speaker 3: Interesting rising, my son, you must not forget your manners.
Speaker 3: Missus Deschapelle is Pauline's mother. I will go away now
Speaker 3: and leave you to make your apologies to her.
Speaker 1: Claude tries to prevent her going.
Speaker 5: No, No, I.
Speaker 3: Will go really, good bye, my son, good bye, dear.
Speaker 1: Pauline, kisses her and goes out.
Speaker 6: If that woman imagines that I am going to stay
Speaker 6: here after being insulted, by you as I have been.
Speaker 6: She is much mistaken. Please ring for my carriage Claude rings.
Speaker 6: As for you, Pauline, I always told you what would
Speaker 6: happen if you insisted on marrying beneath you, And now
Speaker 6: you see I'm right.
Speaker 2: You seem to forget, Mamma that Papa was practically a
Speaker 2: bankrupt when I married, and that Clode paid his debts.
Speaker 6: I forget nothing, and I do not see that it
Speaker 6: makes the smallest difference. I am not blaming your poor
Speaker 6: father for having his debts paid by Colonel Melnott. I
Speaker 6: am blaming you for marrying him.
Speaker 1: Good Bye, she sweeps out in a towering passion.
Speaker 2: Sit down, Clode, and don't glower at me like that.
Speaker 2: It's not my fault. If Mamma does not know how.
Speaker 1: To behave struggling with his rage.
Speaker 5: That's true. That's true.
Speaker 2: Poor mamma. Her want of breeding is terrible. I have
Speaker 2: always noticed it. But that story about mister Chappelle explains
Speaker 2: it all. Why didn't you tell it to me before.
Speaker 5: I thought it would pain you pain me?
Speaker 2: I am delighted with it. Why it explains everything, It
Speaker 2: explains me, It explains you even and miss Chappelle might
Speaker 2: marry any one. Don't frown, Clode laugh. We shall never
Speaker 2: get into society in Lions, but at least we shall
Speaker 2: never have another visit from Mamma. The worst has happened.
Speaker 2: We can now live happily ever afterwards.
Speaker 1: Curtain end of in the Lion's Den.