TITHONUS:
No. I’m relieved for my sake. I’m not bound by her love. It will be easier to go away.
MRS. MALLOW:
And where had you thought of going, may I ask?
(Pointedly.)
And with whom?
TITHONUS:
Anywhere. Italy, Africa, Sweden, Constantinople. If Father were dead, it would be easier yet!
MRS. MALLOW (shocked):
Hush now! As if easiness were all we looked for!
TITHONUS:
And if you were dead, too, I could walk out that door, through the orchard, whistling a song. Don’t mistake me, I mean it tenderly!
MRS. MALLOW:
Enough, Tithonus! Life and death are sacred things. We do not make jokes about them.
TITHONUS:
I don’t want anybody dead. But I don’t want to die myself—I’m too young! So much is expected of me. I’ve done nothing yet to make my name endure, to give me immortality ….
MRS. MALLOW:
There are other ways to make your name endure. For instance, when you have children of your own—
TITHONUS:
I never want to have children. It’s too cruel, that a child should suffer as it does!
(Pause.)
MRS. MALLOW:
Tithonus, dear, believe me, this spell of terrible loneliness is at an end. I’ve been lonely, too, sitting by that bed in silence.
(Taking a shawl which TITHONUS has picked up, and placing it in the trunk.)
I may not be a woman of much learning, but I’ve learned about life. I’ve sat by many a deathbed.
(Warmly.)
Oh, I have such hopes for you, Tithonus! You’re turning into such a fine, clever young man!
TITHONUS:
But I don’t want to turn into anything! Change is what I’ve always hated—to see people, like leaves on fire, twisted and crumpled by life ….
MRS. MALLOW:
No. There is no such violence. At times the eyes remain open, and must be shut.
(More softly.)
Dying is part of life, Tithonus. It happens to us from day to day.
TITHONUS:
That’s the terrible compromise you make! You let it happen!
MRS. MALLOW:
Yes. We let it happen.
(Holding out her arms in a motherly gesture.)
Dear child, dear indignant child, we have no choice!
(Pause. TITHONUS appears to falter, then slowly draws away from her and goes out. After a moment, MRS. MALLOW resumes her packing, A burst of sunlight on the stage, which has been gradually brightening, Grieg “Morning” music. MRS. MALLOW looks up fatalistically.)
I might have known, it never rains but it pours.
AURORA (offstage):
Tithonus! Lazy one!
(The French doors part. AURORA stands on the threshold, a young girl of the period, wearing a pale, flowered dress, her hair in a Grecian knot.)
Oh! He’s not here? It’s true, he wasn’t expecting me this week, but—
(Laughing, advancing.)
You weren’t expecting me either, judging from your expression. It’s been ages since I’ve seen you. You’re always somewhere else when I come. But I daresay you keep up with me through Tithonus.
MRS. MALLOW:
Hardly. He never speaks of you, Aurora.
AURORA:
Perhaps not to you. Oh, look at all the clothes! Whose are they?
(Holds up a dress, which MRS. MALLOW takes and places in the trunk.)
Where is Tithonus?
MRS. MALLOW:
I couldn’t say. Look for him, why don’t you?
AURORA (starting out):
Thank you, I shall.
MRS. MALLOW:
Aurora, I have this to say, and then I shall leave you. Take care of what you’re doing to the boy. Your influence upon him is a pernicious one. I’m sure you don’t mean it so, but the truth is, you stand in his way, in the way of his maturity. You encourage Tithonus to stay a child. I don’t know what else you could do, being so much a child yourself. A lovely child, yes, that’s what you are.
(AURORA begins to giggle.)
I hadn’t hoped to provide entertainment for you.
AURORA:
Have you ever been told that your mouth works in a most killing way when you talk, as though you were eating something? I’m sorry, I’m not really laughing at that. Isn’t it a beautiful day? You feel that you want to laugh on a day like this!
(Inspecting a cloak.)
What a pretty cloak! I love other people’s clothes, don’t you?
MRS. MALLOW:
Is it necessary to stand on it in order to admire it?
(AURORA wanders about.)
You’re beyond your depth with Tithonus. What’s right for you isn’t right for him.
(AURORA tries on a bonnet.)
Kindly put that down!
AURORA:
You’re wrong about Tithonus, you know. He has a very special sensibility—more like one of us. You don’t do justice to him. I do.
MRS. MALLOW:
Call it justice if you like. I don’t.
AURORA:
Tell me something—oh, it’s no concern of mine—but why do you wear black? Granted it does express the real you, still it’s not becoming. Besides, Tithonus is very handsome, don’t you agree?
MRS. MALLOW:
Goodbye, Aurora. One day you will recognize my usefulness, my good influence, and understand—
AURORA:
I understand enough to know sour grapes when I smell them. We even have that up there!
MRS. MALLOW:
You have not only the comprehension but the cruelty of a child. One day he will understand that.
(She goes out.)
AURORA (to herself):
Small wonder the English climate is what it is. What do they ever do to make the sun shine?
(Sees the GARDENER in the garden.)
You there! Joseph? James?
GARDENER (starts, then, blushing with pleasure, crosses the threshold):
Oh, it’s you, Miss! Lovely morning, Miss.
AURORA:
Why, thank you!
GARDENER:
I had a feeling you’d be coming, soon as the sky cleared.
AURORA:
Well, here I am. Have you seen Tithonus?
GARDENER:
Yes, Miss. He just now walked out the front door and settled himself by the apple tree. Wrapped in thought.
AURORA:
Tell him I’ve come, will you please?
GARDENER:
Yes, Miss.
AURORA (seeing that he does not go):
What is it?
GARDENER:
Oh, Miss, I—I can’t explain. No offense meant.
AURORA:
I shall never be offended by those who find me beautiful, Joseph.
GARDENER:
John, Miss.
AURORA:
John. Now will you call Tithonus?
GARDENER:
Right away, Miss.
(Exit. AURORA, alone, tries on the cloak and bonnet before a mirror, humming to herself. TITHONUS enters from the garden and stops, unable to choose between laughter and tears.)
TITHONUS:
Is it you?
AURORA (turning):
I couldn’t wait. I know you didn’t—
TITHONUS:
What are you doing?
AURORA:
Doing? Oh,
(Laughing.)
I was seeing if I could look mortal—do I?
TITHONUS:
Yes.
AURORA:
You didn’t want to see me today, you’re sorry I came—but, my darling, it’s been five days!
TITHONUS:
Aurora! You’ve never looked more beautiful! Your beautiful eyes, your throat …. I’ve missed you, Aurora, I’ve needed you ….
AURORA:
But you told me not to come!
You never say what you mean.
TITHONUS:
But you’re here! You always do the right thing, whatever I say.
AURORA:
I hope I always shall. Even so, darling, you must tell me what you feel and what you need. Don’t let’s have any confusion. This is love, this is love for the first time, and often I’m on pins and needles. I’m so frightfully unsound—ethically? Is that the word?
(Starts to take off the bonnet.)
TITHONUS:
No, stay as you are for a moment! Aurora, I’ve never loved you so much!
AURORA:
For myself, I know what I need—the sense of its having put forth leaves, our love, like the apple tree out there, where I saw you first, through the blossoms, reading, with a blossom in your mouth. “I want that,” I said to myself. Now look at our tree—greener and golder and growing stronger. I feel all this has happened because of me, and I am proud of the loveliness around me, for being equal to the love within me. Whose clothes are these?
TITHONUS:
My mother’s.
AURORA:
I like her so much, you know. Is she going away?
(Remembers.)
Oh, of course, she’s—That was why you told me not to come.
(Instinctively removes bonnet and cloak, placing them in the trunk.)
I imagine you loved her very dearly. A pity you haven’t a really good photograph of her.
(Embarrassed.)
Photography—it’s rather a new thing I’ve been learning about. I’d thought of taking it up as a hobby …. Oh, will I ever know what to say at such moments?
TITHONUS:
Now father’s sending away her clothes.
AURORA:
Very sensible of him!
TITHONUS:
That was not the thing to say.
AURORA:
You’ve had a row with him? Another one?
LAOMEDON (offstage):
Tithonus!
AURORA:
Here he is!
(TITHONUS groans.)
Well, don’t let him get the better of you!
LAOMEDON (enters, fully dressed):
Tithonus, I was thinking—oh, excuse me, Aurora. Have you succeeded in cheering up your young friend?
AURORA:
Oh, how much you disapprove of me!
LAOMEDON:
You have never heard me say so.
AURORA:
Precisely! If you had, I’d have felt some grudging fondness, some weak little seed of liking, for me to warm into flower. It’s unnatural of you! I am likable!
LAOMEDON:
I’m pleased to have it from your own mouth.
AURORA:
What’s more, Laomedon, I don’t like to be disliked.
LAOMEDON:
Who does? That must be your human side.
(To TITHONUS.)
I came to ask if you cared to go with me to the village in about an hour.
TITHONUS:
I think not, Father, thank you.
LAOMEDON:
My thought was to find some occupation for you, until you return to the University. Mr. Hobbs, for instance, might let you work in his office, if only to oblige me. That would be a most valuable experience.
TITHONUS:
I’ve told you, Father, that I don’t intend to return to the University.
LAOMEDON:
And I replied that we would see about that.
TITHONUS:
And I don’t intend to be embalmed in a lawyer’s office.
LAOMEDON:
Perhaps you have some alternative of your own.
TITHONUS:
My alternative is to do exactly as I do.
LAOMEDON:
In that case I have something to say to you.
AURORA:
I’ll be on my way ….
TITHONUS:
Oh stay, please!
AURORA:
Really, I can’t bear scenes!
LAOMEDON:
In my opinion, young lady, it might be a good thing for you to hear what I have to say.
AURORA:
Aren’t you forgetting as usual who I am?
LAOMEDON:
I know who you are. And I know my place. But since you have condescended to meddle with human affairs, and with my son’s life in particular, it wouldn’t hurt you to learn how sensible people think down here—whatever the thinking processes may be where you come from.
AURORA (gaily):
Oh, we never think!
LAOMEDON:
I thought as much.
AURORA:
And even with people, Laomedon, I never feel the really brilliant ones think at all!
TITHONUS:
Neither do I!
AURORA:
Besides, Tithonus is teaching me about people.
LAOMEDON:
You see me as an old bore, don’t you?
TITHONUS:
Of course not, Father.
AURORA:
Or at least, a very distinguished one.
LAOMEDON:
No matter. That is how I saw my father at your age, and how your son will see you. Nature is very economical.
AURORA:
An example to us all!
LAOMEDON:
I am a soldier, a simple man who has worked hard. And what you can’t believe is that I’ve enjoyed it. There’s nothing finer than to live through every difficulty that comes your way.
TITHONUS:
It may have been so in your own life. But if, as you say, you’re a simple person who enjoys the difficulty of living, why can’t I be a difficult person who doesn’t enjoy it? Because I don’t!
AURORA:
Neither do I!
TITHONUS:
I’m wasting my youth, is that what you think? And wilful waste makes woeful want?
LAOMEDON:
You may scoff at your father’s maxims, as I once did. That will not make them less true. They are convenient expressions of profound human laws. I have proven them by bitter experience.
AURORA:
Experience isn’t always bitter, you know.
LAOMEDON:
I don’t speak of your experience, Aurora.
(She giggles, LAOMEDON turns to go.)
We’ll have our talk later. I see I’ve chosen a bad time.
AURORA (whispering to TITHONUS):
Go on! Stand up to him!
TITHONUS:
All right, Father. Tell me plainly what you expect me to do.
LAOMEDON:
Tell me first what you do do.
(A silence.)
AURORA:
He reads!
TITHONUS:
Yes! I spent much of yesterday reading. Didn’t you see me?
LAOMEDON:
I saw you on the sofa with some books.
TITHONUS:
Well, I was reading.
LAOMEDON:
May I know which authors you were reading?
TITHONUS:
Different ones. Ovid. Ossian. Mrs. Browning.
LAOMEDON:
Go on.
TITHONUS:
I’m—ah—about to begin a large painting. The canvas isn’t quite prepared, but I have a whole notebook of sketches.
LAOMEDON:
What is to be the subject of your painting?
TITHONUS:
I haven’t altogether decided. Possibly a Massacre of the Innocents—or else a pastoral scene of some sort, Pan Among Nymphs, you know ….
AURORA:
Oh, do let me pose for you! The way I look on the ceiling at the Rospigliosi’s—well, it’s just not me!
LAOMEDON (to TITHONUS):
What else?
TITHONUS:
At the moment, there’s nothing else.
LAOMEDON:
Thank you. You have answered my question.
TITHONUS:
If anything, I’m ashamed there should be so much, at such a time.
LAOMEDON:
I shall now answer yours. I notice that your mother’s death does not keep you from agreeable society.
AURORA:
But he’s so young! You must make allowances!
LAOMEDON (cheerfully):
I do. Since he is unfit to take charge of his own life, I shall have to do it for him. That’s the allowance I make for his youth.
(To TITHONUS.)
Believe me, I have your interest at heart. I merely expect you to do something serious and responsible, Tithonus. Don’t look as if it were the end of the world!
(Pause.)
Tell me, have you a genuine distaste for work? Or do you reject as a matter of course whatever I recommend?
TITHONUS:
There is one thing I can do, Father, that might satisfy you.
Collected Novels and Plays Page 50