by Tom Stoppard
r
SCENE SEVEN
valentine and CHLOE are at the table. GUS is in the room.
CHLOfi is reading from two Saturday newspapers. She is wearing workaday period clothes, a Regency dress, no hat.
valentine is pecking at a portable computer. He is wearing unkempt Regency clothes, too.
The clothes have evidently come from a large wicker laundry hamper, from which GUS is producing more clothes to try on himself. He finds a Regency coat and starts putting it on.
The objects on the table now include two geometrical solids, pyramid and cone, about twenty inches high, of the type used in a drawing lesson; and a pot of dwarf dahlias (which do not look like modern dahlias). chloE: 'Even in Arcadia- Sex, Literature and Death at Sidley
Park'. Picture of Byron. valentine: Not of Bernard? chloE: 'Byron Fought Fatal Duel, Says Don'... Valentine, do
you think I'm the first person to think of this? valentine: No. chloE: I haven't said yet. The future is all programmed like a
computer - that's a proper theory, isn't it? valentine: The deterministic universe, yes. chlo?: Right. Because everything including us is just a lot of
atoms bouncing off each other like billiard balls. valentine: Yes. There was someone, forget his name, 1820s,
who pointed out that from Newton's laws you could predict
everything to come -1 mean, you'd need a computer as big as
the universe but the formula would exist. CHLOE: But it doesn't work, does it? valentine: No. It turns out the maths is different. chloE: No, it's all because of sex. valentine: Really? chloE: That's what I think. The universe is deterministic all
right, just like Newton said, I mean it's trying to be, but the
only thing going wrong is people fancying people who aren't
supposed to be in that part of the plan.
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valentine: Ah. The attraction that Newton left out. All the way
back to the apple in the garden. Yes. (Pause.) Yes, I think
you're the first person to think of this.
(HANNAH enters, carrying a tabloid paper, and a mug of tea.) hannah: Have you seen this? 'Bonking Byron Shot Poet'. CHLOfi: (Pleased) Let's see.
(HANNAH gives her the paper, smiles atGUS.) valentine: He's done awfully well, hasn't he? How did they all
know? hannah: Don't be ridiculous. (To chloE) Your father wants it
back. CHLOfi: All right. hannah: What a fool. CHLOfi: Jealous. I think it's brilliant. (She gets up to go. To gus)
Yes, that's perfect, but not with trainers. Come on, I'll lend
you a pair of flatties, they'll look period on you -hannah: Hello, Gus. You all look so romantic.
(gus following CHLOfi out, hesitates, smiles at her.) CHLOfi: (Pointedly) Are you coming?
(She holds the door for GUS and follows him out, leaving a sense of
her disapproval behind her.) hannah: The important thing is not to give two monkeys for what
young people think about you.
(She goes to look at the other newspapers.) valentine: (Anxiously) You don't think she's getting a thing
about Bernard, do you? hannah: I wouldn't worry about Chloe, she's old enough to vote
on her back. 'Byron Fought Fatal Duel, Says Don'. Or rather
-(sceptically) 'Says Don!' valentine: It may all prove to be true. HANNAH: It can't prove to be true, it can only not prove to be false
yet. valentine: (Pleased) Just like science. hannah: If Bernard can stay ahead of getting the rug pulled till
he's dead, he'll be a success. valentine: Just like science... The ultimate fear is of posterity... hannah: Personally I don't think it'll take that long. valentine: . . .and then there's the afterlife. An afterlife would
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be a mixed blessing. 'Ah - Bernard Nightingale, I don't believe you know Lord Byron.' It must be heaven up there.
hannah: You can't believe in an afterlife, Valentine.
valentine: Oh, you're going to disappoint me at last.
hannah: Am I? Why?
valentine: Science and religion.
hannah: No, no, been there, done that, boring.
valentine: Oh, Hannah. Fiancee. Have pity. Can't we have a trial marriage and I'll call it off in the morning?
hannah: (Amused) I don't know when I've received a more unusual proposal.
valentine: (Interested) Have you had many?
hannah: That would be telling.
valentine: Well, why not? Your classical reserve is only a mannerism; and neurotic.
hannah: Do you want the room?
valentine: You get nothing if you give nothing.
hannah: I ask nothing.
valentine: No, stay.
(valentine resumes work at his computer, hannah establishes herself among her references at (her> end of the table. She has a stack of pocket-sized volumes, Lady Croom's *garden books9.)
hannah: What are you doing? Valentine?
valentine: The set of points on a complex plane made by -
hannah: Is it the grouse?
valentine: Oh, the grouse. The damned grouse.
hannah: You mustn't give up.
valentine: Why? Didn't you agree with Bernard?
hannah: Oh, that. It's all trivial - your grouse, my hermit, Bernard's Byron. Comparing what we're looking for misses the point. It's wanting to know that makes us matter. Otherwise we're going out the way we came in. That's why you can't believe in the afterlife, Valentine. Believe in the after, by all means, but not the life. Believe in God, the soul, the spirit, the infinite, believe in angels if you like, but not in the great celestial get-together for an exchange of views. If the answers are in the back of the book I can wait, but what a
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drag. Better to struggle on knowing that failure is final.
(She looks over valentine's shoulder at the computer screen.
Reacting) Oh!, but. . . how beautiful! valentine: The Coverly set. hannah: The Coverly set! My goodness, Valentine! valentine: Lend me a finger.
(He takes her finger and presses one of the computer keys several
times.)
See? In an ocean of ashes, islands of order. Patterns making
themselves out of nothing.
I can't show you how deep it goes. Each picture is a detail of the
previous one, blown up. And so on. For ever. Pretty nice, eh? hannah: Is it important? valentine: Interesting. Publishable. hannah: Well done! valentine: Not me. It's Thomasina's. I just pushed her
equations through the computer a few million times further
than she managed to do with her pencil.
(From the old portfolio he takes Thomasina's lesson book and gives
it to HANNAH. The piano starts to be heard.)
You can have it back now. hannah: What does it mean? valentine: Not what you'd like it to. HANNAH: Why not?
valentine: Well, for one thing, she'd be famous. hannah: No, she wouldn't. She was dead before she had time to
be famous . .. valentine: She died? hannah: . . .burned to death.
valentine: (Realizing) Oh. .. the girl who died in the fire! hannah: The night before her seventeenth birthday. You can see
where the dormer doesn't match. That was her bedroom
under the roof. There's a memorial in the Park. valentine: (Irritated) I know-it's my house.
(valentine turns his attention back to his computer, hannah
goes back to her chair. She looks through the lesson book.) hannah: Val, Septimus was her tutor -he and Thomasina would
have-
?6
valentine: You do yours. (Pause. Two researchers.
LORD AUGUSTUS, fifteenyears old, wearing clothes ofi8i2,
bursts in through the non-music room door. He is laughing. He
dives under the table. He is chased into the room by
thomasina, aged sixteen and furious. She spots AUGUSTUS
immediately.) thomasina: You swore! You crossed your
heart!
(AUGUSTUS scampers out from under the table and THOMASINA
chases him around it.) Augustus: I'll tell mama! I'll tell mama! thomasina: You beast!
{She catches Augustus as Septimus enters from the other
door, carrying a book, a decanter and a glass, and his portfolio.) Septimus: Hush! What is this? My lord! Order, order!
(thomasina and Augustus separate.)
I am obliged.
(SEPTIMUS goes to his place at the table. He pours himself a
glass of wine.) Augustus: Well, good day to you, Mr Hodge!
(He is smirking about something.
thomasina dutifully picks up a drawing book and settles down
to draw the geometrical solids.
SEPTIMUS opens his portfolio.) Septimus: Will you join us this morning, Lord Augustus? We
have our drawing lesson. Augustus: I am a master of it at Eton, Mr Hodge, but we only
draw naked women. Septimus: You may work from memory. thomasina: Disgusting! Septimus: We will have silence now, if you please.
(From the portfolio SEPTIMUS takes Thomasina's lesson book
and tosses it to her; returning homework. She snatches it and
opens it.) thomasina: No marks?! Did you not like my rabbit equation? Septimus: I saw no resemblance to a rabbit. thomasina: It eats its own progeny.
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Septimus: (Pause) I did not see that.
(He extends his hand for the lesson book. She returns it to him.) thomasina: I have not room to extend it.
(SEPTIMUS and HANNAH turn the pages doubled by time.
AUGUSTUS indolently starts to draw the models.) hannah: Do you mean the world is saved after all? valentine: No, it's still doomed. But if this is how it started,
perhaps it's how the next one will come. hannah: From good English algebra? Septimus: It will go to infinity or zero, or nonsense. thomasina: No, if you set apart the minus roots they square
back to sense.
(SEPTIMUS turns the pages.
THOMASINA starts drawing the models.
HANNAH closes the lesson book and turns her attention to her
stack of'garden books'.) valentine: Listen - you know your tea's getting cold. hannah: I like it cold. valentine: (Ignoring that) I'm telling you something. Your tea
gets cold by itself, it doesn't get hot by itself. Do you think
that's
odd?
HANNAH: No.
valentine: Well, it is odd. Heat goes to cold. It's a one-way street. Your tea will end up at room temperature. What's happening to your tea is happening to everything everywhere. The sun and the stars. It'll take a while but we're all going to end up at room temperature. When your hermit set up shop nobody understood this. But let's say you're right, in 18-whatever nobody knew more about heat than this scribbling nutter living in a hovel in.Derbyshire.
hannah: He was at Cambridge - a scientist.
valentine: Say he was. I'm not arguing. And the girl was his pupil, she had a genius for her tutor.
hannah: Or the other way round.
valentine: Anything you like. But not thisl Whatever he thought he was doing to save the world with good English
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algebra it wasn't this! hannah: Why? Because they didn't have calculators? valentine: No. Yes. Because there's an order things can't
happen in. You can't open a door till there's a house. hannah: I thought that's what genius was. valentine: Only for lunatics and poets.
(Pause.) hannah: 'I had a dream which was not all a dream.
The bright sun was extinguished, and the stars Did wander darkling in the eternal space, Rayless, and pathless, and the icy earth Swung blind and blackening in the moonless air . ..' valentine: Your own? hannah: Byron.
(Pause. Two researchers again.) thomasina: Septimus, do you think that I will marry Lord
Byron? Augustus: Who is he? thomasina: He is the author of 'Childe Harold's Pilgrimage',
the most poetical and pathetic and bravest hero of any book I
ever read before, and the most modern and the handsomest,
for Harold is Lord Byron himself to those who know him,
like myself and Septimus. Well, Septimus? SEPTIMUS: (Absorbed) No.
(Then he puts her lesson book away into the portfolio and picks
up his own book to read.) thomasina: Why not?
Septimus: For one thing, he is not aware of your existence. thomasina: We exchanged many significant glances when he
was at Sidley Park. I do wonder that he has been home
almost a year from his adventures and has not written to me
once. Septimus: It is indeed improbable, my lady. Augustus: Lord Byron?! - he claimed my hare, although my
shot was the earlier! He said I missed by a hare's breadth.
His conversation was very facetious. But I think Lord Byron
will not marry you, Thorn, for he was only lame and not
blind.
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Septimus: Peace! Peace until a quarter to twelve. It is intolerable
for a tutor to have his thoughts interrupted by his pupils. Augustus: You are not my tutor, sir. I am visiting your lesson by
my free will. Septimus: If you are so determined, my lord.
(thomasina laughs at that, the joke is for her, Augustus, not
included, becomes angry.) Augustus: Your peace is nothing to me, sir. You do not rule
over me. thomasina: (Admonishing) Augustus! Septimus: I do not rule here, my lord. I inspire by reverence for
learning and the exaltation of knowledge whereby man may
approach God. There will be a shilling for the best cone and
pyramid drawn in silence by a quarter to twelve at the earliest. Augustus: You will not buy my silence for a shilling, sir. What I
know to tell is worth much more than that.
(And throwing down his drawing book and pencil, he leaves the
room on his dignity, closing the door sharply. Pause. SEPTIMUS
looks enquiringly at THOMASINA.) thomasina: I told him you kissed me. But he will not tell. Septimus: When did I kiss you? thomasina: What! Yesterday! Septimus: Where? thomasina: On the lips! Septimus: In which county? thomasina: In the hermitage, Septimus! Septimus: On the lips in the hermitage! That? That was not a
shilling kiss! I would not give sixpence to have it back. I had
almost forgot it already. thomasina: Oh, cruel! Have you forgotten our compact? Septimus: God save me! Our compact? thomasina: To teach me to waltz! Sealed with a kiss, and a
second kiss due when I can dance like mama! SEPTIMUS: Ah yes. Indeed. We were all waltzing like mice in
London. thomasina: I must waltz, Septimus! I will be despised if I do not
waltz! It is the most fashionable and gayest and boldest
invention conceivable - started in Germany!
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Septimus: Let them have the waltz, they cannot have the calculus.
thomasina: Mama has brought from town a whole book of waltzes for the Broad wood, to play with Count Zelinsky.
Septimus: I need not be told what I cannot but suffer. Count Zelinsky banging on the Broadwood without relief has me reading in waltz time.
thomasina: Oh, stuff! What is your book?
Septimus: A prize essay of the Scientific Academy in Paris. The author deserves your indulgence, my lady, for you are his prophet.
thomasina: I? What does he write about? The waltz?
Septimus: Yes. He demonstrates the equation of the propagation of heat in a solid body. But in doing so he has discovered heresy - a natural contradiction of Sir Isaac Newton.
thomasina: Oh! - he contradicts determinism?
Septimus: No!... Well, perhaps. He shows that the atoms do not go according to Newton.
(Her interest has switched in the mercurial way characteristic of her-she has crossed to take the book.)
thomasina: Let me see - oh! In French?
Septimus: Y
es. Paris is the capital of France.
thomasina: Show me where to read.
(He takes the book back from her and finds the page for her. Meanwhile, the piano music from the next room has doubled its notes and its emotion.)
thomasina: Four-handed now! Mama is in love with the Count.
Septimus: He is a Count in Poland. In Derbyshire he is a piano tuner.
(She has taken the book and is already immersed in it. The piano music becomes rapidly more passionate, and then breaks off suddenly in mid-phrase. There is an expressive silence next door which makes SEPTIMUS raise his eyes. It does not register with thomasina. The silence allows us to hear the distant regular thump of the steam engine which is to be a topic. A few moments later LADY CROOM enters from the music room, seeming surprised and slightly flustered to find the schoolroom occupied. She collects herself, closing the door behind her. And remains watching,
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aimless and discreet, as though not wanting to interrupt the lesson. SEPTIMUS has stood, and she nods him back into his chair.
CHLOfi, in Regency dress, enters from the door opposite the music
room. She takes in valentine and HANNAH but crosses without
pausing to the music room door.) CHLOfi: Oh!-where's Gus? valentine: Dunno.
(CHLOfi goes into the music room.) lady croom: (Annoyed) Oh! - Mr Noakes's engine!
(She goes to the garden door and steps outside.
CHLOfi re-enters.) CHLOfi: Damn.
lady croom: (Calls out) Mr Noakes! valentine: He was there not long ago... lady croom: Halloo!
CHLOfi: Well, he has to be in the photograph - is he dressed? hannah: Is Bernard back? CHLOfi: No-he's late!
(The piano is heard again, under the noise of the steam engine.
lady croom steps back into the room.
CHLOfi steps outside the garden door. Shouts.) Gus! lady croom: I wonder you can teach against such a disturbance
and I am sorry for it, Mr Hodge.
(CHLOfi comes back inside.) valentine: (Getting up) Stop ordering everybody about. lady croom: It is an unendurable noise. valentine: The photographer will wait.
(But, grumbling, he follows CHLOfi out of the door she came in by,
and closes the door behind them, hannah remains absorbed.
In the silence, the rhythmic thump can be heard again.) lady croom: The ceaseless dull overbearing monotony of it! It