by Dan Laurence
JANGA [rising similarly] No more of this endless talk! talk! talk!
VASHTI. Yes, action! daring! Let us rob.
MAYA. Let us shoot.
KANCHIN. Let us die for something.
JANGA. For our flag and for our Empress.
VASHTI. For our country, right or wrong.
MAYA. Let there be sex appeal. Let the women make the men brave.
KANCHIN. We must defend our homes.
JANGA. Our women.
VASHTI. Our native soil.
MAYA. It is sweet to die for one’s country.
VASHTI. It is glorious to outface death.
ALL FOUR. Yes. Death! death! Glory! glory!
PROLA. Hold your tongues, you young whelps. Is this what we have brought you up for?
PRA. Stop screaming about nothing, will you. Use your minds.
MAYA. We have no minds.
VASHTI. We have imaginations.
KANCHIN. We have made this house a temple.
JANGA. We have made Prola a goddess.
MAYA. We have made it a palace.
VASHTI. A palace for Queen Prola.
KANCHIN. She shall reign.
JANGA. For ever and ever.
VASHTI AND MAYA [in unison] Hail, Prola, our goddess!
KANCHIN AND JANGA [in unison] Hail, Prola, our empress!
ALL FOUR [rushing down to the lawn and throwing themselves on their knees before her] Hail!
PROLA. Will you provoke me to box your ears, you abominable idolaters. Get up this instant. Go and scrub the floors. Do anything that is dirty and grubby and smelly enough to shew that you live in a real world and not in a fool’s paradise. If I catch you grovelling to me, a creature of the same clay as yourselves, but fortunately for you with a little more common sense, I will beat the slavishness out of your bones.
MAYA. Oh, what ecstasy to be beaten by Prola!
VASHTI. To feel her rule in the last extremity of pain!
KANCHIN. To suffer for her!
JANGA. To die for her!
PROLA. Get out, all four. My empire is not of such as you. Begone.
MAYA. How lovely is obedience! [She makes an obeisance and runs away through the garden].
VASHTI. Obedience is freedom from the intolerable fatigue of thought. [She makes her obeisance and sails away, disappearing between the garden and the house].
KANCHIN. You speak as an empress should speak. [He salaams and bounds off after Maya].
JANGA. The voice of authority gives us strength and unity. Command us always thus: it is what we need and love. [He strides away in Vashti’s footsteps].
PROLA. An excuse for leaving everything to me. Lazy, lazy, lazy! Someday Heaven will get tired of lazy people; and the Pitcairn Islanders will see their Day of Judgment at last.
A distant fusillade of shotguns answers her.
SIR CHARLES. Shooting! What can the matter be?
They all rise and listen anxiously.
A trumpet call rings out from the sky.
HYERING. Where on earth did that come from? There is not such a thing as a trumpet in the island.
The four come rushing back into the garden, wildly excited.
KANCHIN. Look, look, quick! The albatross.
PRA [rising] The albatross!!
MAYA. Yes: Iddy’s albatross. Look!
JANGA. Flying over the town.
VASHTI [pointing] There it goes. See.
A second fusillade of shotguns, much nearer.
MAYA. Oh, theyre all trying to shoot it. Brutes!
KANCHIN. They havnt hit it. Here it comes.
MAYA. It’s flying this way.
VASHTI. It’s swooping down.
Iddy comes from the house and trots down the steps with a field glass in his hand.
IDDY. Ive been looking at it through the window for the last five minutes. It isnt an albatross. Look at it through this. [He hands the glass to Pra].
KANCHIN. Then what is it?
IDDY. I think it’s an angel.
JANGA. Oh get out, you silly idiot.
PRA [looking through the glass] That is no bird.
An angel flies down into the middle of the garden. General stupefaction. He shakes himself. Quantities of bullets and small shot fall from his wings and clothes.
THE ANGEL. Really, your people ought to know better than to shoot at an angel.
MAYA. Are you an angel?
THE ANGEL. Well, what do you suppose I am?
VASHTI. Of course he is an angel. Look at his wings.
THE ANGEL. Attention, please! Have you not heard the trumpet? This is the Judgment Day.
ALL THE REST. The what???!!!
THE ANGEL. The Judgment Day. The Day of Judgment.
SIR CHARLES. Well I’ll be damned!
THE ANGEL. Very possibly.
HYERING. Do you mean that the Pitcairn Islanders were right after all?!
THE ANGEL. Yes. You are all now under judgment, in common with the rest of the English speaking peoples. Dont gape at me as if you had never seen an angel before.
PROLA. But we never have.
THE ANGEL [relaxing] True. Ha ha ha! Well, you thoroughly understand, dont you, that your records are now being looked into with a view to deciding whether you are worth your salt or not.
PRA. And suppose it is decided that we are not worth our salt?
THE ANGEL [reassuring them in a pleasantly off-handed manner] Then you will simply disappear: that is all. You will no longer exist. Dont let me keep you all standing. Sit down if you like. Never mind me: sitting and standing are all alike to an angel. However – [he sits down on the parapet of the well].
They sit as before, the four superchildren enshrining themselves as usual.
The telephone rings. Hyering rises and takes it.
HYERING [to the angel] Excuse me. [To the telephone] Yes? Hyering speaking … Somebody what? … Oh! somebody fooling on the wireless. Well, theyre not fooling: an angel has just landed here to tell us the same thing…. An angel. A for arrowroot, N for nitrogen, G for – thats it: an angel…. Well, after all, the Judgment Day had to come some day, hadnt it? Why not this day as well as another? … I’ll ask the angel about it and ring you later. Goodbye. [He rings off]. Look here, angel. The wireless has been on all over Europe. London reports the Judgment Day in full swing; but Paris knows nothing about it; Hilversum knows nothing about it; Berlin, Rome. Madrid, and Geneva know nothing about it; and Moscow says the British bourgeoisie has been driven mad by its superstitions. How do you account for that? If it is the Judgment Day in England it must be the Judgment Day everywhere.
THE ANGEL. Why?
HYERING [sitting down] Well, it stands to reason.
THE ANGEL. Does it? Would it be reasonable to try cases in hundreds of different lands and languages and creeds and colors on the same day in the same place? Of course not. The whole business will last longer than what you call a year. We gave the English speaking folk the first turn in compliment to one of your big guns – a dean – name of Inge, I think. I announced it to him last night in a dream, and asked him whether the English would appreciate the compliment. He said he thought they would prefer to put it off as long as possible, but that they needed it badly and he was ready. The other languages will follow. The United States of America will be tried tomorrow, Australasia next day, Scotland next, then Ireland –
LADY FARWATERS. But excuse me: they do not speak different languages.
THE ANGEL. They sound different to us.
SIR CHARLES. I wonder how they are taking it in England.
THE ANGEL. I am afraid most of them are incapable of understanding the ways of heaven. They go motoring or golfing on Sundays instead of going to church; and they never open a Bible. When you mention Adam and Eve, or Cain and Abel, to say nothing of the Day of Judgment, they dont know what you are talking about. The others – the pious ones – think we have come to dig up all the skeletons and put them through one of their shocking criminal trials. They actually expect us to make angels of them f
or ever and ever.
MRS HYERING. See here, angel. This isnt a proper sort of Judgment Day. It’s a fine day. It’s like Bank Holiday.
THE ANGEL. And pray why should the Day of Judgment not be a fine day?
MRS HYERING. Well, it’s hardly what we were led to expect, you know.
JANGA. ‘The heavens shall pass away with a great noise.’
KANCHIN. ‘The elements shall melt with fervent heat.’
JANGA. ‘The earth also and the works that are therein shall be burnt up.’
VASHTI. The stars are fixed in their courses. They have not fallen to the earth.
MAYA. The heavens are silent. Where are the seven thunders?
VASHTI. The seven vials full of the wrath of God?
JANGA. The four horses?
KANCHIN. The two witnesses?
THE ANGEL. My good people, if you want these things you must provide them for yourselves. If you want a great noise, you have your cannons. If you want a fervent heat to burn up the earth you have your high explosives. If you want vials of wrath to rain down on you, they are ready in your arsenals, full of poison gases. Some years ago you had them all in full play, burning up the earth and spreading death, famine, and pestilence. But the spring came and created life faster than you could destroy it. The birds sang over your trenches; and their promise of summer was fulfilled. The sun that shone undisturbed on your pitiful Day of Wrath shines today over Heaven’s Day of Judgment. It will continue to light us and warm us; and there will be no noise nor wrath nor fire nor thunder nor destruction nor plagues nor terrors of any sort. I am afraid you will find it very dull.
LADY FARWATERS [politely] Not at all. Pray dont think that.
MRS HYERING. Well, a little good manners never does any harm; but I tell you straight, Mister Angel, I cant feel as if there was anything particular happening, in spite of you and your wings. Ive only just had my tea; and I cant feel a bit serious without any preparation or even an organ playing.
THE ANGEL. You will feel serious enough presently when things begin to happen.
MRS HYERING. Yes; but what things?
THE ANGEL. What was foretold to you. ‘His angels shall gather together his elect. Then shall two be in the field: the one shall be taken and the other left. Two women shall be grinding at the mill. The one shall be taken and the other left.’
MRS HYERING. But which? Thats what I want to know.
PROLA. There is nothing new in this taking of the one and leaving the other: natural death has always been doing it.
THE ANGEL. Natural death does it senselessly, like a blind child throwing stones. We angels are executing a judgment. The lives which have no use, no meaning, no purpose, will fade out. You will have to justify your existence or perish. Only the elect shall survive.
MRS HYERING. But where does the end of the world come in?
THE ANGEL. The Day of Judgment is not the end of the world, but the end of its childhood and the beginning of its responsible maturity. So now you know; and my business with you is ended. [He rises]. Is there any way of getting out on the roof of this house?
SIR CHARLES [rising] Certainly: it is a flat roof where we often sit. [He leads the way to the house].
KANCHIN. In theory.
JANGA. In fact we never sit there.
THE ANGEL. That does not matter. All I want is a parapet to take off from. Like the albatross, I cannot rise from the ground without great difficulty. An angel is far from being the perfect organism you imagine. There is always something better.
VASHTI. Excelsior.
ALL FOUR [rising and singing vociferously] Eck-cel-see-orr! Eck-cel-see-or!
THE ANGEL [putting his fingers in his ears] Please, no. In heaven we are tired of singing. It is not done now. [He follows Sir Charles out].
KANCHIN. Lets see him take off.
The four rush up the garden and look up at the roof. The others rise and watch.
JANGA [calling up] Start into the wind, old man. Spring off hard, from the ball of the foot. Dont fall on us.
KANCHIN. Oopsh! Off he goes.
The beating of the angel’s wings is heard.
VASHTI. He makes a noise like a vacuum cleaner.
MAYA [wafting kisses] Goodbye, silly old Excelsior.
The noise stops.
JANGA. His wings have stopped beating. He is soaring up the wind.
KANCHIN. He is getting smaller and smaller. His speed must be terrific.
MAYA. He is too small for an albatross.
VASHTI. He is smaller than a canary.
KANCHIN. He is out of sight.
MAYA. There! One last glint of the sun on his wings. He is gone.
The four troop back and resume their seats. The others sit as before, except that Iddy deserts Prola and sits on the well parapet. Sir Charles returns from the house with a batch of wireless messages in his hand.
SIR CHARLES [sitting in his former place] Well, my dears: the Judgment Day is over, it seems.
IDDY. I cant believe it was really the Judgment Day.
PRA. Why?
IDDY. Well, I thought some special notice would have been taken of the clergy. Reserved seats or something like that. But he treated me as if I were only the organ blower.
SIR CHARLES. There are such a lot of priests in the world, Iddy. It would be impossible to reserve seats for them all.
IDDY. Oh, I meant only the clergy of the Church of England, of course.
MRS HYERING. What I cant get over is their sending along just one angel to judge us, as if we didnt matter.
LADY FARWATERS. He actually went away and forgot to judge us.
PRA. I am not so sure of that.
IDDY. Well, are we sheep or goats? tell me that.
MAYA. You are a sheep, Iddy, my sweet: there can be no doubt about that.
IDDY [bursting into tears] I love you, Maya; and you always say unkind things to me. [He rushes away through the garden, sobbing].
MAYA. Oh, poor Iddy! I’ll go and soothe him with a thousand kisses. [She runs after him].
HYERING [to Sir Charles] What have you got there? Any news from London?
SIR CHARLES. Yes: Exchange Telegraph and Reuters. Copyright reserved.
HYERING. Lets have it.
SIR CHARLES [reading] ‘Judgment Day. Widespread incredulity as to anything having really happened. Reported appearance of angels in several quarters generally disbelieved. Several witnesses are qualifying or withdrawing their statements in deference to the prevailing scepticism.’
HYERING. We shall have to be careful too, Charles. Who will believe us if we tell this yarn of an angel flying down into the garden?
SIR CHARLES. I suppose so. I never thought of it in that way. Still, listen to this. [Reading] ‘Policeman who attempted to arrest angel in Leicester Square removed to mental hospital. Church Assembly at Lambeth Palace decides by a large majority that there has been a Visitation. Dissenting minority, led by the Bishop of Edgbaston, denounces the reports as nonsense that would not impose even on the Society for Psychical Research. His Holiness the Pope warns Christendom that supernatural communications reaching the earth otherwise than through the Church are contrary to the Catholic faith, and, if authentic, must be regarded as demoniacal. Cabinet hastily summoned to discuss the situation. Prime Minister, speaking in emergency meeting at the Mansion House, declares that reports of utterances by angels are hopelessly contradictory, and that alleged verbatim reports by shorthand writers contain vulgar expressions. The Government could not in any case allow the British Empire to be placed in the position of being judged by a commission of a few angels instead of by direct divine authority. Such a slight to the flag would never be tolerated by Englishmen; and the Cabinet was unanimous in refusing to believe that such an outrage had occurred. The Prime Minister’s speech was received with thunderous applause, the audience rising spontaneously to sing the National Anthem.’
PRA. They would.
SIR CHARLES [looking at another paper] Hallo! Whats this? [Readin
g] ‘Later. During the singing of the second verse of the National Anthem at the Mansion House the proceedings were interrupted by the appearance of an angel with a flaming sword who demanded truculently what they meant by ordering God about to do their dirty political work. He was accompanied by unruly cherubim who floated about tweaking the Lord Mayor’s nose, pouring ink into the Prime Minister’s hat, and singing derisively ConFound their Poll-It-Ticks. Part of the audience fell to their knees, repeating the Confession. Others rushed frantically to the doors. Two Salvation lasses stemmed the rush, at great personal danger to themselves, by standing in the doorway and singing Let Angels Prostrate Fall. Order was restored by the Prime Minister, who offered the angel an unreserved apology and an undertaking that the offending verse should not be sung again. A new one is to be provided by the Poet Laureate. The Premier’s last words were lost through the misconduct of a cherub who butted him violently in the solar plexus. A wave of the angel’s sword and a terrible thunderclap then threw the entire audience prone to the floor. When they rose to their feet the angel and the cherubs had disappeared.’