No, she was not. Enter MAGGIE, who is not good-looking. When this is
said, all is said. Enter MAGGIE, as it were, with her throat cut from
ear to ear. She has a soft Scotch voice and a more resolute manner
than is perhaps fitting to her plainness; and she stops short at
sight of JAMES sprawling unconsciously in the company chair.]
MAGGIE. James, I wouldn't sit on the fine chair.
JAMES. I forgot again.
[But he wishes she had spoken more sharply. Even profanation of the
fine chair has not roused her. She takes up her knitting, and they
all suspect that she knows what they have been talking about.]
MAGGIE. You're late, David, it's nearly bed-time.
DAVID [finding the subject a safe one]. I was kept late at the public
meeting.
ALICK [glad to get so far away from Galashiels]. Was it a good
meeting?
DAVID. Fairish. [with some heat] That young John Shand WOULD make a
speech.
MAGGIE. John Shand? Is that the student Shand?
DAVID. The same. It's true he's a student at Glasgow University in
the winter months, but in summer he's just the railway porter here;
and I think it's very presumptuous of a young lad like that to make a
speech when he hasn't a penny to bless himself with.
ALICK. The Shands were always an impudent family, and jealous. I
suppose that's the reason they haven't been on speaking terms with us
this six years. Was it a good speech?
DAVID [illustrating the family's generosity].
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