Dorothy and Roderick on horseback together.
DOROTHY
Sure it's a bitter night, Roderick dear, and you'll catch cold without a handkerchief to your neck.
To this sympathetic remark, from the pillion, the saddle made no reply.
DOROTHY
Did you and Miss Clancy have a pleasant evening, Roderick? You were together, I saw, all night.
To this, the saddle only replies by grinding his teeth, and giving a lash to Daisy.
DOROTHY
Oh! Mercy, you make Daisy rear and throw me, you careless creature, you.
The pillion had by this got her arm around the saddle's waist, and gave it the gentlest squeeze in the world.
RODERICK
I hate Miss Clancy, you know I do! And I only danced with her because -- because -- the person with whom I intended to dance chose to be engaged the whole night.
DOROTHY
I had not been in the room five minutes before I was engaged for every single set.
RODERICK
Were you obliged to dance five times with Captain Best, and then stroll out with him into the garden?
DOROTHY
I don't care a fig for Captain Best; he dances prettily to be sure, and is a pleasant rattle of a man. He looks well in his regimentals, too; and if he chose to ask me to dance, how could I refuse him?
RODERICK
But you refused me, Dorothy.
DOROTHY
Oh! I can dance with you any day, and to dance with your own cousin at a ball as if you could find no other partner. Besides, Roderick, Captain Best's a man, and you are only a boy, and you haven't a guinea in the world.
RODERICK
If ever I meet him again, you shall see which is the best man of the two. I'll fight him with sword or with pistol, captain as he is.
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.
RODERICK (V.O.)
I pulled out a knot of cherry-colored ribbons, which she had given me out of her breast, and which somehow I always wore upon me, and flung them in Captain Best's face, and rushed out with my little sword drawn.
RODERICK
She's a liar -- she's a liar, Captain Best! Draw, sir, and defend yourself, if you are a man!
Roderick leaps at Captain Best, and collars him, while Dorothy makes the air echo with her screams.
Captain Grogan and Mysie hasten up.
Though Roderick is a full growth of six feet, he is small by the side of the enormous English captain.
Best turns very red at the attack upon him, and slips back clutching at his sword.
Dorothy, in an agony of terror, flings herself round him, screaming:
DOROTHY
Captain Best, for Heaven's sake, spare the child -- he is but an infant.
CAPTAIN BEST
And ought to be whipped for his impudence, but never fear, Miss Dugan, I shall not touch him, your favorite is safe from me.
So saying, he stoops down and picks up the bunch of ribbons, which Roderick had flung at Dorothy's feet, and handing it to her, says in a sarcastic tone:
CAPTAIN BEST
When ladies make presents to gentlemen, it is time for other gentlemen to retire...
DOROTHY
Good heavens, Best! He is but a boy and don't signify any more than my parrot or lap-dog. Mayn't I give a bit of ribbon to my own cousin?