DOROTHY
But Captain Best is already known as a valiant soldier, and is famous as a man of fashion in London. It is mighty well of you to fight farmers' boys, but to fight an Englishman is a very different matter.
Roderick falls silent.
They come to an old, high bridge, over a stream, sufficiently deep and rocky.
DOROTHY
Suppose, now, Roderick, you, who are such a hero, was passing over the bridge and the enemy on the other side.
RODERICK
I'd draw my sword, and cut my way through them.
DOROTHY
What, with me on the pillion? Would you kill poor me?
RODERICK
Well, then, I'll tell you what I'd do. I'd jump Daisy into the river, and swim you both across, where no enemy could follow us.
DOROTHY
Jump twenty feet! You wouldn't dare to do any such thing on Daisy. There's the captain's horse, Black George, I've heard say that Captain Bes
-She never finished the word for, maddened by the continual recurrence of that odious monosyllable, Roderick shouts:
RODERICK
Hold tight to my waist!
And, giving Daisy the spur, springs with Dorothy over the parapet, into the deeper water below.
The horse's head sinks under, the girl screams as she sinks, and screams as she rises.
Roderick lands her, half-fainting, on the shore.
Various cuts showing illness and convalescence. Roderick feverish: the doctor taking his pulse. Mother brings a tray of food.
RODERICK (V.O.)
I went home, and was ill speedily of a fever, which kept me to my bed for a week.
Dorothy visiting him.
RODERICK (V.O.)
Dorothy visited me only once, but I quitted my couch still more violently in love than I had been ever before.
The air is fresh and bright, and the birds sing loud amidst the green trees. Roderick is elated, and springs down the road, as brisk as a young fawn.
He encounters an orderly whistling "Roast Beef of Old England," as he cleans down a cavalry horse.
RODERICK
Whose horse, fellow, is that?
ORDERLY
Feller, indeed! The horse belongs to my captain, and he's a better fellow nor you any day.
RODERICK (V.O.)
I did not stop to break his bones, as I would on another occasion, for a horrible suspicion had come across me, and I made for the garden as quickly as I could.
Roderick see Captain Best and Dorothy pacing the path together. Her arm is under his, and he is fondling and squeezing her little hand which lies closely nestling against his arm.
Some distance beyond them is Captain Grogan, who is paying court to Dorothy's sister, Mysie.
RODERICK (V.O.)
The fact is that, during the week of my illness, no other than Captain Best was staying at Castle Dugan, and making love to Miss Dorothy in form.
CAPTAIN BEST
No, Dorothy, except for you and four others, I vow before all the gods, my heart had never felt the soft flame.
DOROTHY
Ah, you men, you men, John, your passion is not equal to ours. We are like -- like some plant I've read of -- we bear but one flower, and then we die!
CAPTAIN BEST
Do you mean you never felt an inclination for another?
DOROTHY
Never, my John, but for thee! How can you ask me such a question?
Raising her hand to his lips.
CAPTAIN BEST
Darling Dorothea! Roderick rushes into view, drawing his little sword.