Bertram monologue (Act 4) — The Big Drum: A Comedy in Four Acts

[_Sitting, haughtily._] Knowing what depended on the fate of your book, I felt from the first that you might be unscrupulous enough to induce your publisher to represent it as being a popular success--in order to impose on us, I mean t'say--though actually it was another of your failures to hit the mark; and when Titterton started blowing the trumpet so loudly, my suspicions increased. [PHILIP _slowly unfolds his arms._] As for desiring to injure you with my family at any price, I scorn the charge. I've had the delicacy to refrain from even mentioning my suspicions to my father and mother, let alone Ottoline. [_Putting his necktie straight and smoothing his hair and his slightly crumpled shirt-front._] Deeply as I regret your connection with my sister, I should have been only too happy, I mean t'say, if my poor opinion of you had been falsified.