MAURY: At last--the perfect definition! Cardinal Newman's is now a back number.
PARAMORE: I think we ought to look on the question more broad-mindedly. Was it Abraham Lincoln who said that a gentleman is one who never inflicts pain?
MAURY: It's attributed, I believe, to General Ludendorff.
PARAMORE: Surely you're joking.
MAURY: Have another drink.
PARAMORE: I oughtn't to. (Lowering his voice for MAURY'S ear alone) What if I were to tell you this is the third drink I've ever taken in my life?)
(DICK _starts the phonograph, which provokes MURIEL to rise and sway from side to side, her elbows against her ribs, her forearms perpendicular to her body and out like fins.) MURIEL: Oh, let's take up the rugs and dance!
(This suggestion is received by ANTHONY and GLORIA with interior groans and sickly smiles of acquiescence.) MURIEL: Come on, you lazy-bones. Get up and move the furniture back.)
DICK: Wait till I finish my drink.
MAURY: (Intent on his purpose toward PARAMORE) I'll tell you what. Let's each fill one glass, drink it off and then we'll dance.
(A wave of protest which breaks against the rock of MAURY'S insistence.) MURIEL: My head is simply going round now.)
RACHAEL: (In an undertone to ANTHONY) Did Gloria tell you to stay away from me?
ANTHONY: (Confused) Why, certainly not. Of course not.)
(RACHAEL smiles at him inscrutably. Two years have given her a sort of hard, well-groomed beauty.)
MAURY: (Holding up his glass) Here's to the defeat of democracy and the fall of Christianity.)
MURIEL: Now really!
(She flashes a mock-reproachful glance at MAURY and then drinks. They all drink, with varying degrees of difficulty.)
MURIEL: Clear the floor!)
(It seems inevitable that this process is to be gone through, so ANTHONY and GLORIA join in the great moving of tables, piling of chairs, rolling of carpets, and breaking of lamps. When the furniture has been stacked in ugly masses at the sides, there appears a space about eight feet square.)
MURIEL: Oh, let's have music!)
MAURY: Tana will render the love song of an eye, ear, nose, and throat specialist.
(Amid some confusion due to the fact that TANA has retired for the night, preparations are made for the performance. The pajamaed Japanese, flute in hand, is wrapped in a comforter and placed in a chair atop one of the tables, where he makes a ludicrous and grotesque spectacle.
PARAMORE is perceptibly drunk and so enraptured with the notion that he increases the effect by simulating funny-paper staggers and even venturing on an occasional hiccough.)
PARAMORE: (To GLORIA) Want to dance with me?()
GLORIA: No, sir! Want to do the swan dance. Can you do it?