In Mr. Alfred Sutro"s play _The Builder of Bridges_, Dorothy Faringay,
in her devotion to her forger brother, has conceived the rather
disgraceful scheme of making one of his official superiors fall in love
with her, in order to induce him to become practically an accomplice in
her brother"s crime. She succeeds beyond her hopes. Edward Thursfield
does fall in love with her, and, at a great sacrifice, replaces the
money the brother has stolen. But, in a very powerful peripety-scene in
the third act, Thursfield learns that Dorothy has been deliberately
beguiling him, while in fact she was engaged to another man. The truth
is, however, that she has really come to love Thursfield passionately,
and has broken her engagement with the other, for whom she never truly
cared. So the author tells us, and so we are willing enough to
believe--if he can devise any adequate method of making Thursfield
believe it. Mr. Sutro"s handling of the difficulty seems to me fairly,
but not conspicuously, successful. I cite the case as a typical instance
of the problem, apart from the merits or demerits of the solution.
