Silence.
JULIE
It makes you think, doesn’t it?
PRUE
It does make you think.
LAMBERT
You see that girl at that table? I know her. I fucked her when she was eighteen.
JULIE
What, by the banks of the river?
LAMBERT waves at SUKI. SUKI waves back. She whispers to RUSSELL, gets up and goes to Lambert’s table followed by RUSSELL.
SUKI
Lambert! It’s you!
LAMBERT
Suki! You remember me!
SUKI
Do you remember me?
LAMBERT
Do I remember you? Do I remember you!
SUKI
This is my husband Russell.
LAMBERT
Hello Russell.
RUSSELL
Hello Lambert.
LAMBERT
This is my wife Julie.
JULIE
Hello Suki.
SUKI
Hello Julie.
RUSSELL
Hello Julie.
JULIE
Hello Russell.
LAMBERT
And this is my brother Matt.
MATT
Hello Suki, hello Russell.
SUKI
Hello Matt.
RUSSELL
Hello Matt.
LAMBERT
And this is his wife Prue. She’s Julie’s sister.
SUKI
She’s not!
PRUE
Yes, we’re sisters and they’re brothers.
SUKI
They’re not!
RUSSELL
Hello Prue.
PRUE
Hello Russell.
SUKI
Hello Prue.
PRUE
Hello Suki.
LAMBERT
Sit down. Squeeze in. Have a drink.
They sit.
What’ll you have?
RUSSELL
A drop of that red wine would work wonders.
LAMBERT
Suki?
RUSSELL
She’ll have the same.
SUKI
(To LAMBERT) Are you still obsessed with gardening?
LAMBERT
Me?
SUKI
(To JULIE) When I knew him he was absolutely obsessed with gardening.
LAMBERT
Yes, well, I would say I’m still moderately obsessed with gardening.
JULIE
He likes grass.
LAMBERT
It’s true. I love grass.
JULIE
Green grass.
SUKI
You used to love flowers, didn’t you? Do you still love flowers?
JULIE
He adores flowers. The other day I saw him emptying a piss pot into a bowl of lilies.
RUSSELL
My dad was a gardener.
MATT
Not your grandad?
RUSSELL
No, my dad.
SUKI
That’s right, he was. He was always walking about with a lawn mower.
LAMBERT
What, even in the Old Kent Road?
RUSSELL
He was a man of the soil.
MATT
How about your grandad?
RUSSELL
I never had one.
JULIE
Funny that when you knew my husband you thought he was obsessed with gardening. I always thought he was obsessed with girls’ bums.
SUKI
Really?
PRUE
Oh yes, he was always a keen wobbler.
MATT
What do you mean? How do you know?
PRUE
Oh don’t get excited. It’s all in the past.
MATT
What is?
SUKI
I sometimes feel that the past is never past.
RUSSELL
What do you mean?
JULIE
You mean that yesterday is today?
SUKI
That’s right. You feel the same, do you?
JULIE
I do.
MATT
Bollocks.
JULIE
I wouldn’t like to live again though, would you? Once is more than enough.
LAMBERT
I’d like to live again. In fact I’m going to make it my job to live again. I’m going to come back as a better person, a more civilised person, a gentler person, a nicer person.
JULIE
Impossible.
Pause.
PRUE
I wonder where these two met? I mean Lambert and Suki.
RUSSELL
Behind a filing cabinet.
Silence.
JULIE
What is a filing cabinet?
RUSSELL
It’s a thing you get behind.
Pause.
LAMBERT
No, not me mate. You’ve got the wrong bloke. I agree with my wife. I don’t even know what a filing cabinet looks like. I wouldn’t know a filing cabinet if I met one coming round the corner.
Pause.
JULIE
So what’s your job now then, Suki?
SUKI
Oh, I’m a schoolteacher now. I teach infants.
PRUE
What, little boys and little girls?
SUKI
What about you?
PRUE
Oh, Julie and me – we run charities. We do charities.
RUSSELL
Must be pretty demanding work.
JULIE
Yes, we’re at it day and night, aren’t we?
PRUE
Well, there are so many worthy causes.
MATT
(To RUSSELL) You’re a banker? Right?
RUSSELL
That’s right.
MATT
(To LAMBERT) He’s a banker.
LAMBERT
With a big future before him.
MATT
Well that’s what he reckons.
LAMBERT
I want to ask you a question. How did you know he was a banker?
MATT
Well it’s the way he holds himself, isn’t it?
LAMBERT
Oh, yes.
SUKI
What about you two?
LAMBERT
Us two?
SUKI
Yes.
LAMBERT
Well, we’re consultants. Matt and me. Strategy consultants.
MATT
Strategy consultants.
LAMBERT
It means we don’t carry guns.
MATT and LAMBERT laugh.
We don’t have to!
MATT
We’re peaceful strategy consultants.
LAMBERT
Worldwide. Keeping the peace.
RUSSELL
Wonderful.
LAMBERT
Eh?
RUSSELL
Really impressive. We need a few more of you about.
Pause.
We need more people like you. Taking responsibility. Taking charge. Keeping the peace. Enforcing the peace. Enforcing peace. We need more like you. I think I’ll have a word with my bank. I’m moving any minute to a more substantial bank. I’ll have a word with them. I’ll suggest lunch. In the City. I know the ideal restaurant. All the waitresses have big tits.
SUKI
Aren’t you pushing the tits bit a bit far?
RUSSELL
Me? I thought you did that.
Pause.
LAMBERT
Be careful. You’re talking to your wife.
MATT
Have some respect, mate.
LAMBERT
Have respect. That’s all we ask.
MATT
It’s not much to ask.
LAMBERT
But it’s crucial.
Pause.
So how is the strategic consultancy business these days?
LAMBERT
Very good, old boy. Very good.
MATT
Very good. We’re at the receiving end of some of the best tea in China.
RICHARD and SONIA come to the table with a magnum of champagne, the WAITER with a tray of glasses. Everyone gasps.
RICHARD
To celebrate a treasured wedding anniversary.
MATT looks at the label on the bottle.
MATT
That’s the best of the best.
The bottle opens. RICHARD pours.
LAMBERT
And may the best man win!
JULIE
The woman always wins.
PRUE
Always.
SUKI
That’s really good news.
PRUE
The woman always wins.
RICHARD and SONIA raise their glasses.
RICHARD
To the happy couple. God bless. God bless you all.
EVERYONE
Cheers. Cheers …
MATT
What a wonderful restaurant this is.
SONIA
Well, we do care. I will say that. We care. That’s the point. Don’t we?
RICHARD
Yes. We do care. We care about the welfare of our clientele. I will say that.
LAMBERT stands and goes to them.
LAMBERT
What you say means so much to me. Let me give you a cuddle.
He cuddles RICHARD.
And let me give you a cuddle.
He cuddles SONIA.
This is so totally rare, you see. None of this normally happens. People normally – you know – people normally are so distant from each other. That’s what I’ve found. Take a given bloke – this given bloke doesn’t know that another given bloke exists. It goes down through history, doesn’t it?
MATT
It does.
LAMBERT
One bloke doesn’t know that another bloke exists. Generally speaking. I’ve often noticed.
SONIA
(To JULIE and PRUE) I’m so touched that you’re sisters. I had a sister. But she married a foreigner and I haven’t seen her since.
PRUE
Some foreigners are all right.
SONIA
Oh I think foreigners are charming. Most people in this restaurant tonight are foreigners. My sister’s husband had a lot of charm but he also had an enormous moustache. I had to kiss him at the wedding. I can’t describe how awful it was. I’ve got such soft skin, you see.
WAITER
Do you mind if I interject?
RICHARD
I’m sorry?
WAITER
Do you mind if I make an interjection?
RICHARD
What on earth do you mean?
WAITER
Well, it’s just that I heard all these people talking about the Austro-Hungarian Empire a little while ago and I wondered if they’d ever heard about my grandfather. He was an incredibly close friend of the Archduke himself and he once had a cup of tea with Benito Mussolini. They all played poker together, Winston Churchill included. The funny thing about my grandfather was that the palms of his hands always seemed to be burning. But his eyes were elsewhere. He had a really strange life. He was in love, he told me, once, with the woman who turned out to be my grandmother, but he lost her somewhere. She disappeared, I think, in a sandstorm. In the desert. My grandfather was everything men aspired to be in those days. He was tall, dark and handsome. He was full of good will. He’d even give a cripple with no legs crawling on his belly through the slush and mud of a country lane a helping hand. He’d lift him up, he’d show him his way, he’d point him in the right direction. He was like Jesus Christ in that respect. And he was gregarious. He loved the society of his fellows, W. B. Yeats, T. S. Eliot, Igor Stravinsky, Picasso, Ezra Pound, Bertholt Brecht, Don Bradman, the Beverley Sisters, the Inkspots, Franz Kafka and the Three Stooges. He knew these people where they were isolated, where they were alone, where they fought against savage and pitiless odds, where they suffered vast wounds to their bodies, their bellies, their legs, their trunks, their eyes, their throats, their breasts, their balls –
LAMBERT
(Standing) Well, Richard – what a great dinner!
RICHARD
I’m so glad.
LAMBERT opens his wallet and unpeels fifty-pound notes. He gives two to RICHARD.
LAMBERT
This is for you.
RICHARD
No, no really –
LAMBERT
No no, this is for you. (To SONIA) And this is for you.
SONIA
Oh, no please –
LAMBERT dangles the notes in front of her cleavage.
LAMBERT
Shall I put them down here?
SONIA giggles.
No I’ll tell you what – you wearing suspenders?
SONIA giggles.
Stick them in your suspenders. (To WAITER) Here you are son. Mind how you go.
Puts a note into his pocket.
Great dinner. Great restaurant. Best in the country.
MATT
Best in the world I’d say.
LAMBERT
Exactly. (To RICHARD) I’m taking their bill.
RUSSELL
No, no you can’t –
LAMBERT
It’s my wedding anniversary! Right? (To RICHARD) Send me their bill.
JULIE
And his.
LAMBERT
Send me both bills. Anyway …
He embraces SUKI.
It’s for old time’s sake as well, right?
SUKI
Right.
RICHARD
See you again soon?
MATT
Absolutely.
SONIA
See you again soon.
PRUE
Absolutely.
SONIA
Next celebration?
JULIE
Absolutely.
LAMBERT
Plenty of celebrations to come. Rest assured.
MATT
Plenty to celebrate.
LAMBERT
Dead right.
MATT slaps his thighs.
MATT
Like – who’s in front? Who’s in front?
LAMBERT joins in the song, slapping his thighs in time with MATT.
LAMBERT and MATT
Who’s in front?
Who’s in front?
LAMBERT
Get out the bloody way
You silly old cunt!
LAMBERT and MATT laugh.
SUKI and RUSSELL go to their table to collect handbag and jacket, etc.
SUKI
How sweet of him to take the bill, wasn’t it?
RUSSELL
He must have been very fond of you.
SUKI
Oh he wasn’t all that fond of me really. He just liked my … oh … you know …
RUSSELL
Your what?
SUKI
Oh … my … you know …
LAMBERT
Fabulous evening.
JULIE
Fabulous.
RICHARD
See you soon then.
SONIA
See you soon.
MATT
I’ll be here for breakfast tomorrow morning.
SONIA
Excellent!
PRUE
See you soon.
SONIA
See you soon.
JULIE
Lovely to see you.
SONIA
See you soon I hope.
RUSSELL
See you soon.
SUKI
See you soon.
They drift off.
JULIE (off)
So lovely to meet you.
SUKI (off)
Lovely to meet you.
Silence.
The WAITER stands alone.
WAITER
When I was a boy my grandfather used to take me to the edge of the cliffs and we’d look out to sea. He bought me a telescope. I don’t think they have telescopes any more. I used to look through this telescope and sometimes I’d see a boat. The boat would grow bigger through the telescopic lens. Sometimes I’d see people on the boat. A man, sometimes, and a woman, or sometimes two men. The sea glistened.
My grandfather introduced me to the mystery of life and I’m still in the middle of it. I can’t find the door to get out. My grandfather got out of it. He got right out of it. He left it behind him and he didn’t look back.
He got that absolutely right.
And I’d like to make one further interjection.
He stands still.
Slow fade.
THREE SKETCHES
The short sketches which follow, from different periods of Harold Pinter’s life, appeared in print for the first time in the 2011 edition of this volume
UMBRELLAS
CHARACTERS
A
B
Umbrellas was first presented as part of the revue You, Me and the Gatepost, performed for one night only at the Nottingham Playhouse on 27 June 1960.
Two gentlemen in deckchairs on the terrace of a large hotel. Wearing shorts and sunglasses. Sunbathing. They do not move throughout the exchange.
A
The weather’s too much for me today.
Pause.
B
Well, you’re damn lucky you’ve got your umbrella.
A
I’m never without it, old boy.
Pause.
B
I think I’d do well to follow your example.
A
Yes, you would. Means the world to me. I never find myself at a loss. You understand what I mean?
B
You’re a shrewd fellow, I’ll say that for you.
Pause.
A
My house is full of umbrellas.
B
You can’t have too many.
A
You’ve never said a truer word, old boy.
Pause.
B
I haven’t got one to bless myself with.
Pause.
A
Well, I can foresee a time you’ll regret it.
B
I think the time’s come, old boy.
A
You can’t be too careful, old boy.
Pause.
B
Well, you’ve got your feet firmly planted on the earth, there’s no doubt about that.
Pause.
A
I certainly feel secure, old boy.
B
Yes, you know where you stand, all right. You can’t take that away from you.
Pause.
Harold Pinter Page 21