Plays Political

by Dan Laurence

  BASHAM [sitting down again in Hilda’s chair] Hipney: I may as well tell you that I have had my eye on you for some time. Take care I have no objection to your calling yourself a revolutionary Socialist: they all do that. But I suspect you of really meaning business.

  HIPNEY. I do, Sir Broadfoot: I do. And if Srarthur means business, then let him come out of Parliament and keep out. It will take the life out of him and leave him a walking talking shell of a man with nothing inside. The only man that ever had a proper understanding of Parliament was old Guy Fawkes.

  SIR ARTHUR. But even if he had blown that Parliament up, they would just have elected another.

  HIPNEY. Yes; but it was a sort of gesture as you might say. Symbolic, I call it. Mark my words: some day there will be a statue to old Guy in Westminster on the site of the present House of Commons.

  THE DUKE. Democracy, Arthur, democracy. This is what it ends in.

  SIR ARTHUR [introducing] His Grace the Duke of Domesday, Mr Hipney.

  HIPNEY. Bless you, I know his Grace. About town, as you might say, though weve never been introduced.

  THE DUKE. Very much honored, Mr Hipney.

  HIPNEY. No great honor, your Grace. But old Hipney can tell you something about Democracy at first hand. Democracy was a great thing when I was young and we had no votes. We talked about public opinion and what the British people would stand and what they wouldnt stand. And it had weight, I tell you, sir: it held Governments in check: it frightened the stoutest of the tyrants and the bosses and the police: it brought a real reverence into the voices of great orators like Bright and Gladstone. But that was when it was a dream and a vision, a hope and a faith and a promise. It lasted until they dragged it down to earth, as you might say, and made it a reality by giving everybody votes. The moment they gave the working men votes they found that theyd stand anything. They gave votes to the women and found they were worse than the men; for men would vote for men—the wrong men, but men all the same—but the women wouldnt even vote for women. Since then politics have been a laughing stock. Parliamentary leaders say one thing on Monday and just the opposite on Wednesday; and nobody notices any difference. They put down the people in Egypt, in Ireland, and in India with fire and sword, with floggings and hangings, burning the houses over their heads and bombing their little stores for the winter out of existence; and at the next election theyd be sent back to Parliament by working class constituencies as if they were plaster saints, while men and women like me, that had spent their lives in the service of the people, were booted out at the polls like convicted criminals. It wasnt that the poor silly sheep did it on purpose. They didnt notice: they didnt remember: they couldnt understand: they were taken in by any nonsense they heard at the meetings or read in the morning paper. You could stampede them by crying out that the Russians were coming, or rally them by promising them to hang the Kaiser, or Lord knows what silliness that shouldnt have imposed on a child of four. That was the end of democracy for me; though there was no man alive that had hoped as much from it, nor spoke deeper from his heart about all the good things that would happen when the people came to their own and had votes like the gentry. Adult suffrage: that was what was to save us all. My God! It delivered us into the hands of our spoilers and oppressors, bound hand and foot by our own folly and ignorance. It took the heart out of old Hipney; and now I’m for any Napoleon or Mussolini or Lenin or Chavender that has the stuff in him to take both the people and the spoilers and oppressors by the scruffs of their silly necks and just sling them into the way they should go with as many kicks as may be needful to make a thorough job of it.

  BASHAM. A dictator: eh? Thats what you want.

  HIPNEY. Better one dictator standing up responsible before the world for the good and evil he does than a dirty little dictator in every street responsible to nobody, to turn you out of your house if you dont pay him for the right to exist on the earth, or to fire you out of your job if you stand up to him as a man and an equal. You cant frighten me with a word like dictator. Me and my like has been dictated to all our lives by swine that have nothing but a snout for money, and think the world is coming to an end if anybody but themselves is given the power to do anything.

  SIR ARTHUR. Steady, Mr Hipney, steady! Dont empty the baby out with the bath. If the people are to have no voice in the government and no choice of who is to govern them, it will be bad for the people.

  HIPNEY. Let em have a voice. Let em have a choice. Theyve neither at present. But let it be a voice to squeal with when theyre hurt, and not to pretend they know more than God Almighty does. Give em a choice between qualified men: there’s always more than one pebble on the beach; but let them be qualified men and not windbags and movie stars and soldiers and rich swankers and lawyers on the make. How are they to tell the difference between any cheap Jack and Solomon or Moses? The Jews didnt elect Moses: he just told them what to do and they did it. Look at the way they went wrong the minute his back was turned! If you want to be a leader of the people, Srarthur, youve got to elect yourself by giving us a lead. Old Hipney will follow anyone that will give him a good lead; and to blazes with your elections and your Constitution and your Democracy and all the rest of it!

  THE DUKE. The police wont let him, Mr Hipney.

  BASHAM [rising and planting himself between Hipney and Sir Arthur] Ha ha ha! Dont be too sure of that. I might come down on your side, Arthur, if I spotted you as a winner. Meanwhile, Hipney, I have my eye on you as a dangerous character.

  SIR ARTHUR. And on me?

  BASHAM. You dont matter: he does. If the proletariat comes to the top things will be more comfortable for Hipney; but they wont be more comfortable for you. His heart is in the revolution: you have only your head in it. Your wife wouldnt like it: his would, if he has one.

  HIPNEY. Not me. I’m under no woman’s thumb. She’s dead; and the children are grown up and off my hands. I’m free at last to put my neck in a noose if I like.

  BASHAM. I wonder should I find any bombs in your house if I searched it.

  HIPNEY. You would if you put them there first, Sir Broadfoot. What good would a police chief be if he couldnt find anything he wanted to find?

  BASHAM. Thats a suggestion, Hipney, certainly. Isnt it rather rash of you to put it into my head?

  HIPNEY. There’s plenty to put it into your head if I didnt. You could do it if you liked; and you know it, Sir Broadfoot. But perhaps your conscience wouldnt let you.

  BASHAM. Perhaps.

  HIPNEY [rising with a chuckle] Aha! [Impressively] You take it from me, you three gentlemen: all this country or any country has to stand between it and blue hell is the consciences of them that are capable of governing it.

  THE DUKE [rising] Mr Hipney: I find myself in complete agreement with you. Will you lunch with me at the Carlton?

  HIPNEY. No: them big clubs is too promiscuous for the like of you and me. You come and lunch with me: I know a nice little place where the cooking’s good and the company really select. You wont regret it: come along. Morning, Srarthur. Morning, Boss. [He goes out, greatly pleased].

  SIR ARTHUR AND BASHAM [simultaneously] Morning. Morning.

  THE DUKE. You would never have got rid of him, Arthur, if I hadnt made that move. Goodbye. Goodbye, Sir Broadfoot. [He goes to the door]

  BASHAM. Goodbye. I wish you joy of your host.

  THE DUKE. You dont appreciate him. He is absolutely unique.

  BASHAM. In what way, pray?

  THE DUKE. He is the only politician I ever met who had learnt anything from experience [he goes out].

  BASHAM [making for the door] Well, I must be off to the Yard. The, unemployed are going to have a general election to amuse them. I suppose youll be off to your constituency right away.

  SIR ARTHUR [rising] No. I am not going to stand.

  BASHAM [returning to him in amazement] Not stand! What do you mean? You cant chalk up a program like that and then run away.

  SIR ARTHUR. I am through with parliament. It has wasted
enough of my life.

  BASHAM. Dont tell me you are going to take your politics into the street. You will only get your head broken.

  SIR ARTHUR. Never fear: your fellows wont break my head: they have too much respect for an ex-Prime Minister. But I am not going into the streets. I am not a man of action, only a talker. Until the men of action clear out the talkers we who have social consciences are at the mercy of those who have none; and that, as old Hipney says, is blue hell. Can you find a better name for it?

  BASHAM. Blackguardocracy. I should call it.

  SIR ARTHUR. Do you believe in it? I dont.

  BASHAM. It works all right up to a point. Dont run your head against it until the men of action get you past that point. Bye bye.

  SIR ARTHUR. Bye bye. I wont.

  Basham goes out through the main door. Sir Arthur drops into his chair again and looks rather sick, with his elbows on his knees and his temples on his fists. Barking and Miss Brollikins break into the room simultaneously by the private door, struggling for precedence, Sir Arthur straightens up wearily.

  BARKING. I was here first. You get out and wait for your turn.

  ALOYSIA. Ladies first, if you please. Sir Arthur—

  BARKING [barring her way with an arm of iron] Ladies be damned! youre no lady. [He comes past the table to Sir Arthur’s right]. Sir Arthur: I have proposed for the hand of your daughter Flavia; and all I can get out of her is that she is not a gold digger, and wouldnt be seen at a wedding with a lousy viscount. She wants to marry a poor man. I said I’d go over her head straight to you. You cant let her miss so good a match. Exert your authority. Make her marry me.

  SIR ARTHUR. Certainly. I’ll order her to marry you if you think that will get you any further. Go and tell her so, like a good boy. I’m busy.

  BARKING. Righto! [he dashes out through the masked door].

  SIR ARTHUR. Sit down, Miss Brollikins. [She comes round to Hipney’s chair; and Sir Arthur takes the Duke’s chair]. Have you consulted David?

  ALOYSIA [sitting down rather forlornly] Of course I have. But he’s obstinate. He wont look at it the right way.

  SIR ARTHUR. Did he object? He should have jumped at it.

  ALOYSIA. Its very nice of you to say so if you really mean it, Sir Arthur. But he has no sense. He objects to my name. He says it’s ridiculous.

  SIR ARTHUR. But your marriage will change it.

  ALOYSIA. Yes; but he says it would be in The Times in the births marriages and deaths: Chavender and Brollikins. My name’s not good enough for him. You should have heard what he said about it.

  SIR ARTHUR. I hope he did not use the adjective his sister applied to poor young Barking’s title.

  ALOYSIA. Yes he did. The language you West End people use! I’m sure I dont know where you pick it up.

  SIR ARTHUR. It doesnt mean anything, Miss Brollikins. You mustnt mind.

  ALOYSIA. Would you mind calling me Aloysia, Sir Arthur? You can call me Brolly if you like; but I prefer Aloysia.

  SIR ARTHUR. Certainly, Aloysia.

  ALOYSIA. Thank you. I wish I could get rid of Brollikins. I’d never stoop to be ashamed of my name; but I cant deny there’s something funny about it. I’m not to blame for that, am I?

  SIR ARTHUR. But you can get rid of it quite easily. You can take a new name: any name you like, by deed poll. It costs only ten pounds; and David would have to pay it if it was on his account you changed. What about Bolingbroke [he pronounces it Bullingbrook]? Bolingbroke would be rather a nice name for The Times; and you wouldnt have to change your initials. No bother about your clothes at the laundry, for instance.

  ALOYSIA. Thank you, Sir Arthur: thats a practical suggestion. At any rate it will shut David up if he talks about my name again.

  SIR ARTHUR. Well, now you can run off and marry him.

  ALOYSIA. But thats not all, Sir Arthur. He’s such a queer boy. He says he’s never loved anyone but his sister, and that he hates his mother.

  SIR ARTHUR. He had no right to tell you that he hates his mother, because as a matter of fact he doesnt. Young people nowadays read books about psycho-analysis and get their heads filled with nonsense.

  ALOYSIA. Of course I know all about psycho-analysis. I explained to him that he was in love with his mother and was jealous of you. The Edipus complex, you know.

  SIR ARTHUR. And what did he say to that?

  ALOYSIA. He told me to go to Jericho. But I shall teach him manners.

  SIR ARTHUR. Do, Aloysia. Did he make any further objection?

  ALOYSIA. Well, he says his people couldnt stand my relatives.

  SIR ARTHUR. Tut! the young snob! Still, snobbery is a very real thing: he made a point there, Aloysia. How did you meet it?

  ALOYSIA. I said my people couldnt stand his relatives; and no more they could. I said I wasnt asking him to marry my relatives; nor was I proposing to marry his.

  SIR ARTHUR. And what did he say to that?

  ALOYSIA. He told me to go to hell. He’s like that, you know.

  SIR ARTHUR. Yes, a hasty boy.

  ALOYSIA. He is, just that. But I shall cure him of it.

  SIR ARTHUR [gravely] Take care, Aloysia. All young women begin by believing they can change and reform the men they marry. They cant. If you marry David he will remain David and nobody else til death do you part. If he tells you to go to hell today instead of trying to argue with you, he will do the same on the morning of your silver wedding.

  ALOYSIA [grimly] We shall see.

  SIR ARTHUR. May I ask whether this match is your idea or David’s? So far I do not gather that he has expressed any strong feeling of—of—shall I say devotion?—to you.

  ALOYSIA. We have discussed all that.

  SIR ARTHUR. Satisfactorily?

  ALOYSIA. I suppose so. You see, Sir Arthur, I am not like David. I am a reading thinking modern woman; and I know how to look at these things objectively and scientifically. You know the way you meet thousands of people and they mean nothing to you sexually: you wouldnt touch one of them with a barge pole. Then all of a sudden you pick out one, and feel sexy all over. If he’s not nice you feel ashamed of yourself and run away. But if he is nice you say “Thats the man for me.” You have had that experience yourself, havnt you?

  SIR ARTHUR. Quite. The moment I saw Lady Chavender I said “Thats the woman for me.”

  ALOYSIA. Well, the moment I laid eyes on David I went all over like that. You cant deny that he is a nice boy in spite of his awful language. So I said—

  SIR ARTHUR. “David’s the man for me”?

  ALOYSIA. No. I said “Evolution is telling me to marry this youth.” That feeling is the only guide I have to the evolutionary appetite.

  SIR ARTHUR. The what??

  ALOYSIA. The evolutionary appetite. The thing that wants to develop the race. If I marry David we shall develop the race. And thats the great thing in marriage, isnt it?

  SIR ARTHUR. My dear Aloysia, the evolutionary appetite may be a guide to developing the race; but it doesnt care a rap for domestic happiness. I have known the most remarkable children come of the most dreadfully unsuitable and unhappy marriages.

  ALOYSIA. We have to take our chance of that, Sir Arthur. Marriage is a lottery. I think I can make David as happy as anybody ever is in this—

  SIR ARTHUR. In this wicked world. Ah yes. Well, I wont press that.

  ALOYSIA. I was about to say “in the capitalist phase of social development.” I dont talk like your grandmother, if you will excuse me saying so.

  SIR ARTHUR. I beg your pardon. I suppose I do. Have you explained this evolutionary view of the situation to David?

  ALOYSIA. Of course I have. I dont treat him as a child.

  SIR ARTHUR. And what did he say?

  ALOYSIA. He told me to go and—Oh, I really cannot repeat what he told me to go and do. But you see how familiar we are together. I couldnt bear his being distant with me. He talks just as if we were married already.

  SIR ARTHUR. Quite. But does he feel about you as you
feel about him? Has he picked you out from among the thousand ladies to whom he is indifferent? To use your own expression, does he come all over like that in your presence?

  ALOYSIA. He does when I get hold of him. He needs educating in these matters. I have to awaken David. But he’s coming along nicely.

  SIR ARTHUR. Well, if it must be it must be. I shall not withhold my blessing. That is all I can say. [He rises: she does the same and prepares to go]. You see, Aloysia, the effete society in which I move is based on the understanding that we shall speak and behave in the manner in which we are expected to behave. We are hopeless when this understanding is violated. We dont know what to say or what to do. Well, you have violated it recklessly. What you have said has been unexpected to the last possible degree—