The Traveling Companion & Other Plays

by Tennessee Williams

  LOUISE: It’s turned cold in the room.

  NORA: Doesn’t it always after receiving an apparition? To receive an apparition always chills you a little. Always after I have received an apparition, I put on my little pink sweater.

  LOUISE: Oh. I’ve always gone straight to bed.

  NORA: No, no, that’s the wrong thing to do after receiving an apparition. To go to bed makes your mind dwell on it so you might dream about it when you finally fall asleep. No. Put on a sweater, dear, and if you’ve got a light robe, I’ll slip it on for a while, and we’ll talk about other things than the apparition, yes, we’ll chat a little with no reference to the apparition of that foreign painter, he did chill me worse than Mme. du Barry did. About to be executed and begging for one minute more.

  LOUISE: I’ve got three light sweaters, excuse me while I— [She exits though the dark door.]

  NORA: It’s the suicides that chill me most. I don’t know why. Yes, I do know why. Poor Louise. She’s waiting hopelessly for that young drummer to come back for her. Attachments like that are dangerous for widows. Upsetting to the nerves and the system. What am I doing babbling away to myself till she gets back? Ow, the apparition of a lunatic is, yes, it does chill the bloodstream, gives you goose pimples. Brrrr. When she comes back with the sweaters—what’s takin’ her so long? I’ll think of something to change the atmosphere. Ow, I wouldn’t part with my apparitions. I know I could. I know I could keep them out by mental resistance to them, but I wouldn’t do that, no, poor creatures, they feel nothing I guess and think nothing I know but sometimes they’ll have a bit of a conversation with you and that I like since I live alone on a field of clover and wildflowers like dear Louise. Except that she does have her daughter that looks more like her sister. Up to no good at that library. Very hard on Louise. [She rises.] Louise? Louise, dear?

  [Louise returns with a pink and a blue sweater.]

  NORA: Oh, there you are.

  LOUISE: Yes, here I am. Will you have the pink or blue sweater?

  NORA: Either one that’s looser, me being on the heavier side a bit.

  LOUISE: Nora, I bet that you’re a bedtime eater, I bet you eat snacks at bedtime.

  [They are getting into the sweaters.]

  NORA: Ow, that’s true, I do that.

  LOUISE: I—I had to cry a little over that apparition. It’s the first one that we’ve received together. Isn’t that right?

  NORA: We’re not going to talk about the apparition. Ow. I heard something today. You know there’s a good deal of leprosy in this town?

  LOUISE: Oh, yes, I’ve heard there was and still is and I’m still shivering, Nora.

  NORA: Keep your mind off the lunatic’s apparition, he likely feels nothing at all. Yes, dear, in Bethesda there’s an unknown number of leprosy victims, mmm-hmm, hard to be known exactly how many there are, but by the balls of Himself, bless him, bless his heart and his soul, but, yes, it’s estimated Louise, that there’s at least twenty of ’em, the lepers, I mean, in the town of Bethesda. A doctor will change the subject if you bring it up, but there’s about that many, mostly concentrated along Bella Street, y’know, between the white and black sections of town, y’know, and what I was told today is where the families of the lepers keep ’em hidden from daylight.

  LOUISE: Attics and basements?

  NORA: No, by the balls of Himself—excuse me! —I’m not talkin’ proper tonight, it always makes me feel a little unbalanced. No, no, no, no, not in attics or basements, they keep the lepers in old empty cisterns.

  LOUISE: Even in the sweater I feel chilly.

  NORA: Listen to what I heard today and the chill will disappear, dear. [She speaks loudly, almost shouting.] The families afflicted with members afflicted by the disease of leprosy, keep the members IN OLD EMPTY CISTERNS, that’s how they hide ’em from daylight, but at midnight, out they come from the old empty cisterns to receive their rations and congregate with each other. Oh, I haven’t begun to tell you the shocking part of it, dear. The courthouse clock strikes midnight, out they come from the cisterns for the food their families’ve set out for them in the back yards. If you drive along Bella Street, you’ll notice no dogs along there, just a quiet cat or two, is all you’ll notice along there, because the dogs would bark when the lepers climbed out of the cisterns at midnight, no dogs on Bella Street, dear, oh, no, they don’t want dogs, with lepers rising at midnight for the leftovers set out for them. There’s hardly a sound to be heard, they talk in whispers together under the backyard trees and back of the moon vines on the fences along Bella Street at midnight. You’re still shivering, dear. Are you sure you’re listening to me? Listen to me, Louise. The lepers are out of the cisterns every night from midnight till just before daybreak. Somebody keeps watch on ’em from a dark window and calls “Lepers in!” just before daybreak, she told me. And back in the cisterns they go with their little packages of rations for the next day, by the balls of himself, excuse me, I’m still chilly myself, but the worst of it, dear, I’ll tell you the worst of it, now. Now listen to me, forget the apparition received tonight. The backyards along Bella Street have all big trees, all big shadowy trees, and under the trees, in the shadows of ’em, the lepers not too far gone, they commit fornication together, by the balls of Himself, that they do, they retire to the shadows of the big pecan and oak trees an’ there the young lepers, some, y’know, are comparatively not old, they fornicate together in the shadowy yards of Bella Street, and this, hear this, oh, this is a thing to be told, some of them bear children which are born in the cisterns without attendance by a doctor or midwife and not a cry from them in childbirth since everything must be quiet to keep the secret, y’see. Louise, are you feeling less chilly?

  LOUISE: No, but, Nora, I have to tell you good night, now. I was expecting someone coming from Memphis but it doesn’t seem like Mr. Merriwether—I mean, I mean somebody was going to get back here tonight, so I’d better go to bed.

  NORA: I’ll stay till you’re safe in bed and throw an extra cover over you, dear.

  LOUISE: I’d rather be alone, now, Nora, because it—I’ve heard a banjo all night. Have you heard it, too?

  NORA: Yes, dear, playing away in a field, no harm in that, good night, sleep tight, I’ll let meself out the door and close it behind me, now remember, no dreams— [She exits through the curtains and a door is heard shutting.]

  LOUISE: Oh my lord, how she did go on and on, I wouldn’t call her a person of very good social presence, but she’s a good-natured creature under the skin, for all that. I’ll not turn my lamp out tonight. No, no, what did he say? “Even in my madness I had a passion for light, the wonder and glory of light!” —I’ll hurry to bed, since Mr. Merriwether isn’t apparently going to— [She has exited though the curtains and her voice dies out. The stage is dimmed out.]

  SCENE TWO

  A scrim divides the white room from the forestage. It is delicately tinted violet and rose. Gloria wanders out moodily in front of it and speaks to the audience.

  GLORIA: Yes, I wear light dresses. The school rooms have been so warm lately, and the boys—I suppose it’s their age that makes their bodies fill the rooms with a sort of warm, heavy muskiness in late spring. It’s not offensive to me. It’s a natural thing, as natural as the pollination of plants and—flowers. It makes me feel half asleep, so drowsy, sometimes, that I don’t hear a teacher’s question or my name called to answer it. Questions, they seem to be coming from miles away. And the boys don’t sit up straight in their chairs. They, they—loll in their chairs with their legs spread out or a leg thrown over the arm of the chair and—I think if I didn’t wear light dresses to school I’d fall asleep and wouldn’t hear the bell that ends the class. The teachers are irritated by the lolling and slouching of these older boys. Say to them things like this: “Will you boys kindly make an effort to sit up straight in this classroom, if your spines aren’t broken?” [She laughs a little.
] Sometimes they don’t hear it the first time, the teachers have to repeat it, and the boys will sit up for a while, and then loll back again, fingers fiddling with pencils or—resting in their laps. Yesterday a teacher said to one of the boys “Stewart, where is the Bering Strait?” No answer from him. [She smiles.] His mind was where his— The teacher marched down the aisle that separates the boys from the girls, geographically speaking, and gave him a shaking and almost shouted at him: “Where is the Bering Strait?” [Another light, languorous laugh.] And then his answer was: “Stone Age.” You see, he didn’t know what class he was in. The air seems to hum. A piece of chalk seems almost too heavy to hold, yes, actually, I’m not exaggerating! Good night. I’d better go in, now.

  SCENE THREE

  The white room, altered slightly by lighting and the removal of the table, now represents a room in the public library. A big unabridged dictionary is on a metal stand.

  The Librarian, a tense little woman in a pink linen dress, appears from the wings and calls out—.

  LIBRARIAN: Oh, Miss McBride, may I speak to you for a moment?

  [Gloria enters the white room from the opposite wings.]

  GLORIA: What is it, Miss Calhoun?

  LIBRARIAN: I’m afraid you’re not using the library for the purposes it’s meant for. And the way that you’re dressed!

  GLORIA: Is there something wrong about the way I’m dressed?

  LIBRARIAN: You’re dressed like a girl, like a dancer, playing a nymph in a ballet.

  GLORIA [turning away]: I don’t think the way I’m dressed is your concern, Miss Calhoun? [She starts back to the wings.]

  LIBRARIAN: Hold on a minute!

  GLORIA: Hold on to what?

  LIBRARIAN: What I have to say to you.

  GLORIA: What do you have to say to me?

  LIBRARIAN: I’ve wanted to speak about this for several weeks now. And I think you know what it is. You come in the library every evening. Go into the reference room and sit at the big table and immediately afterwards all those boys that sit outside till you get here follow you in and sit about you at the big table and sometimes one and sometimes another sits in a chair touching yours, as close as he can get, and I have seen, I have seen! Now if this continues, I will forbid you to enter this library ever again at any time at all!

  GLORIA: This is a public library open to everybody in Bethesda and you are just employed here and the reason I come here in the evenings is to write my English themes and if a bunch of boys come in, that is no fault of mine and no business of yours.

  LIBRARIAN: Abuses of the library, the purposes of the library, are my business.

  GLORIA: Miss Calhoun, the reason that I come here is to use the reference books and the Webster’s Unabridged Dictionary.

  LIBRARIAN: Oh, I’ve seen you go up to the big dictionary, and right away a boy comes up there beside you and you exchange whispers with him while you pretend to look something up, oh, I’ve seen and I know. And it will go on no longer!

  [A Romantically Handsome Youth, in white shirt and trousers, comes from the wings. He speaks with a stammer. His stuttering should only be suggested intermittently as indicated in the lines.]

  YOUTH: Gloria, let’s go.

  [The Youth and Gloria leave.]

  LIBRARIAN: Yes! Go! And never come back here again!

  GLORIA: [Turning back to her.] I will speak to the library superintendent!

  LIBRARIAN: So will I!

  GLORIA: I’ll ask him if you have any right to tell me not to use the public library and to insult me as I have never been before in all my life!

  YOUTH: Gloria, shhh, let’s go. [They exit.]

  LIBRARIAN: [She gasps, presses a fist to her month, and turns distractedly this way and that way.] Phone, yes, call! Immediately report it!

  [The scene dims out.]

  SCENE FOUR

  There is a pin-spot on Louise as she holds a telephone of the period.

  LOUISE [in a hushed voice, almost a whisper]: I want to speak to Mr. Merriwether.

  VOICE [off]: Would you say that louder, please?

  LOUISE [still in a hushed voice]: I want to speak to Mr. Merriwether.

  VOICE [off]: I’m sorry but you’ll have to speak louder than that.

  LOUISE [raising her voice a little]: Mr. Merriwether.

  VOICE [off]: Did you say Mr. Whether?

  LOUISE [now almost shouting]: I said I wanted to speak to Mr. Merriwether.

  VOICE [off]: Oh, Mr. Merriwether?

  LOUISE: Yes!

  VOICE [off]: Mr. Merriwether has asked not to be called after midnight.

  LOUISE: He won’t mind if I call him. Please, please, call him.

  VOICE [off]: How do I know if he would mind or not?

  LOUISE: It’s not long after midnight, only half an hour. It’s necessary!

  VOICE [off]: Well, if— [Ringing, off. —then a male Voice.]

  MERRIWETHER’S VOICE: Hello? Hello? Who is it? I said who is it, who’s calling?

  [Louise draws in a loud breath and replaces the receiver of the phone on its hook as if it might cause an explosion.]

  LOUISE: Don’t follow. Don’t call. There’s nothing to do but wait, with fox-teeth in my heart.

  [The pin spot goes out.]

  SCENE FIVE

  The white room is now the English classroom at the library. The English teacher, Miss Yorke, sits at a small desk with a bunch of marigolds in it. The weather outside the window is fair.

  MISS YORKE: All but one of you turned in a sorry lot of themes yesterday. As usual the one who turned in a good one was Gloria McBride. Gloria, will you come up here and read your theme to the class.

  [Gloria enters from the wings and goes up to the desk.]

  MISS YORKE: Oh, my, where is it? It was so good I may have left it home. [She fumbles through a large bunch of themes at her desk.]

  GLORIA: Let me help you, Miss Yorke. I’ll look through half and you look through the other half.

  MISS YORKE: Thank you, yes. We’ll do that.

  GLORIA: This is it, here it is.

  MISS YORKE: Oh. Good. Read it.

  [Gloria faces the audience and reads her theme to the class.]

  GLORIA: “Yesterday afternoon my geology class went on a field trip up Hinkson’s Creek to look for fossils. We didn’t expect to find any along the creek, of course, but our objective was the old, abandoned rock quarry. Almost as soon as we arrived there I discovered five or six fossils in the rock walls of the quarry and with my little chisel and hammer and the kind assistance of a boy in the class, I chipped them, or to be more accurate, he chipped them out of the rock. Two of them were fossils of ferns and three were fossils of very early and primitive kinds of organisms that existed in water millions and millions of years ago, you might say an incalculable time ago in the oceans and seas of the earth, which at that time were steaming like huge tea-kettles. I and the boy in the class that chipped the fossils out of the rock quarry for me were so absorbed in our five discoveries that the class went back down Hinkson’s Creek without us, and we—”

  [At this point there is snickering by the boys in the classroom. Miss Yorke rises indignantly.]

  MISS YORKE: Stop that right this moment! What are you laughing over? The next one that laughs will go to the principal’s office and explain why he did it. Gloria, go on.

  GLORIA: I’ve lost my place. Where was I?

  MISS YORKE: You were so excited over the five fossils that you became separated from the rest of the geology class.

  GLORIA: Oh. Yes. There. —“We found ourselves alone with our five immeasurably old mementos of the earth’s first vegetation and simple one-cell organic beings. The afternoon was fading but still so clear and lovely, and for some reason that I can’t analyze and explain, I began to cry and tremble. No, I don’t know why. The boy wh
o had chipped the fossils out of the quarry wall for me was mystified by my trembling and crying. I was trembling so that he had to lead me, support me, back up Hinkson’s Creek to Indian Road and help me onto a streetcar that took me home, and even when I entered the house and said hello to my mother, I was still trembling and crying a little. She noticed my condition and asked me what had happened. I said to her, “Oh, mother, look at these rocks, these little fossils on them! They give us evidence that there has been life on this earth for more time than we are able to estimate.” But she wouldn’t look at the rocks, she wasn’t interested in them. Then the phone rang. She said, “Oh, that’s for me!” She had been expecting a call from a friend in Memphis. But the call wasn’t for her. The call was for me and it was a call from the boy who had chipped the fossils out of the quarry rock for me. “Are you all right?” he asked me, “Are you all right now?” I said, “I’ve almost stopped trembling and I will be at the public library tonight to write an English theme about the geology field trip and I hope by that time I’ll know why I trembled and cried.” [She turns to the dark door.] —I’m sorry, Miss Yorke.

  MISS YORKE: I believe I can tell you why the fossils disturbed you. They made you think of how transitory things are. In their living state.

  A VOICE FROM THE WINGS: What is “transitory”?

  MISS YORKE: Things that pass, things of brief duration. Take these flowers, these marigolds, for instance. They’re so lovely today, but tomorrow they’ll begin to wither.

  THE VOICE: And turn to fossils?

  MISS YORKE: Possibly, during the passing of several million years.

  THE VOICE: All of us will be fossils by that time.

  MISS YORKE: If we have a rock quarry to record our—long—past existence.

  [Gloria, facing the dark door, makes a gasping sound and lifts her hands to her face, turning her head.]