by Unknown
Robert. Yes, it’s my father. He’s dozing. Shouldn’t be here at all. He forgets things. It’s just age.
Philip (grimly). Forgets things. That must be fine.
Robert (conventionally). I should like, Sir Philip, to offer you my sincere condolences. In the midst of life we are — How true that is. I attended the funeral.
Philip. I saw you.
Robert. A much esteemed lady. I had a great respect for her.
Philip (almost with relish). Do you mind, when we used to come here about the will, somehow she — we — always took for granted I should be the first to go.
Robert (devoutly). These things are hid from mortal eyes.
Philip (with conviction). There’s a lot hid. We needn’t have worried so much about the will if — well, let us get at it. (Fiercely) I haven’t given in, you know.
Robert. We must bow our heads ——
Philip. Must we? Am I bowing mine?
Robert (uncomfortably). Such courage in the great hour — yes — and I am sure Lady Ross ——
Philip (with the ugly humour that has come to him). She wasn’t that.
Robert. The honour came so soon afterwards — I feel she would like to be thought of as Lady Ross. I shall always remember her as a fine lady richly dressed who used ——
Philip (harshly). Stop it. That’s not how I think of her. There was a time before that — she wasn’t richly dressed — (he stamps upon his memories). Things went wrong, I don’t know how. It’s a beast of a world. I didn’t come here to talk about that. Let us get to work.
Robert (turning with relief from the cemetery). Yes, yes, and after all life has its compensations. You have your son who ——
Philip (snapping). No, I haven’t. (This startles the lawyer.) I’m done with him.
Robert. If he has been foolish ——
Philip. Foolish! (Some dignity comes into the man.) Sir, I have come to a pass when foolish as applied to my own son would seem to me a very pretty word.
Robert. Is it as bad as that?
Philip. He’s a rotter.
Robert. It is very painful to me to hear you say that.
Philip. More painful, think you, than for me to say it? (Clenching his fists.) But I’ve shipped him off. The law had to wink at it, or I couldn’t have done it. Why don’t you say I pampered him and it serves me right? It’s what they are all saying behind my back. Why don’t you ask me about my girl? That’s another way to rub it in.
Robert. Don’t, Sir Philip. I knew about her. My sympathy ——
Philip. A chauffeur! that is what he was. The man who drove her own car.
Robert. I was deeply concerned ——
Philip. I want nobody’s pity. I’ve done with both of them, and if you think I’m a broken man you’re much mistaken. I’ll show them. Have you your papers there? Then take down my last will. I have everything in my head. I’ll show them.
Robert. Would it not be better to wait till a calmer ——
Philip. Will you do it now, or am I to go across the street?
Robert. If I must.
Philip. Then down with it. (He wets his lips.) I, Philip Ross, of 77 Bath Street, W., do hereby revoke all former wills and testaments, and I leave everything of which I die possessed ——
Robert. Yes?
Philip. Everything of which I die possessed ——
Robert. Yes?
Philip. I leave it — I leave it — (The game is up.) My God, Devizes, I don’t know what to do with it.
Robert. I — I — really — come ——
Philip (cynically). Can’t you make any suggestions?
Robert. Those cousins are dead, I think?
Philip. Years ago.
Robert (troubled). In the case of such a large sum ——
Philip (letting all his hoarded gold run through his fingers). The money I’ve won with my blood. God in heaven. (Showing his teeth.) Would that old man like it to play with? If I bring it to you in sacks, will you fling it out of the window for me?
Robert. Sir Philip!
Philip (taking a paper from his pocket). Here, take this. It has the names and addresses of the half-dozen men I’ve fought with most for gold; and I’ve beaten them. Draw up a will leaving all my money to be divided between them, with my respectful curses, and bring it to my house and I’ll sign it.
Robert (properly shocked). But really I can’t possibly ——
Philip. Either you or another; is it to be you?
Robert. Very well.
Philip. Then that’s settled. (He rises with an ugly laugh. He regards Mr. Devizes quizzically.) So you weren’t in at the last will after all, old Sleep by the Fire.
(To their surprise the old man stirs.)
Mr. Devizes. What’s that about a will?
Robert. You are awake, father?
Mr. Devizes (whose eyes have opened on Philip’s face). I don’t know you, sir.
Robert. Yes, yes, father, you remember Mr. Ross. He is Sir Philip now.
Mr. Devizes (courteously). Sir Philip? I wish you joy, sir, but I don’t know you.
Robert (encouragingly). Ross, father.
Mr. Devizes. I knew a Mr. Ross long ago.
Robert. This is the same.
Mr. Devizes (annoyed). No, no. A bright young fellow he was, with such a dear, pretty wife. They came to make a will. (He chuckles.) And bless me, they had only twopence halfpenny. I took a fancy to them; such a happy pair.
Robert (apologetically). The past is clearer to him than the present nowadays. That will do, father.
Philip (brusquely). Let him go on.
Mr. Devizes. Poor souls, it all ended unhappily, you know.
Philip (who is not brusque to him). Yes, I know. Why did things go wrong, sir? I sit and wonder, and I can’t find the beginning.
Mr. Devizes. That’s the sad part of it. There was never a beginning. It was always there. He told me all about it.
Robert. He is thinking of something else; I don’t know what.
Philip. Quiet. What was it that was always there?
Mr. Devizes. It was always in them — a spot no bigger than a pin’s head, but waiting to spread and destroy them in the fulness of time.
Robert. I don’t know what he has got hold of.
Philip. He knows. Could they have done anything to prevent it, sir?
Mr. Devizes. If they had been on the watch. But they didn’t know, so they weren’t on the watch. Poor souls.
Philip. Poor souls.
Mr. Devizes. It’s called the accursed thing. It gets nearly everybody in the end, if they don’t look out.
(He sinks back into his chair and forgets them.)
Robert. He is just wandering.
Philip. The old man knows.
(He slowly tears up the paper he had given Robert.)
Robert (relieved). I am glad to see you do that.
Philip. A spot no bigger than a pin’s head. (A wish wells up in him, too late perhaps.) I wish I could help some young things before that spot has time to spread and destroy them as it has destroyed me and mine.
Robert (brightly). With such a large fortune ——
Philip (summing up his life). It can’t be done with money, sir.
(He goes away; God knows where.)
HALF AN HOUR
CHARACTERS
Garson
Lady Lilian
Hugh Paton
Susie
Dr. Brodie
Withers
Redding
Mrs. Redding
HALF AN HOUR
Mr. Garson, who is a financier, and his young wife, the lovely Lady Lilian, are in their mansion near Park Lane, but they are not at home this evening to the public eye; they are in the midst of a brawl which, it may be hoped, does not show them at their best. There is such a stirring time before them, and only half an hour for it, that we must not keep them waiting. Indeed they have so much to do that we challenge them to do it.
Lady Lilian (a frozen flower). Why don�
��t you strike me, Richard? I am a woman, and there is no one within call.
Garson. A woman! You useless thing, that is just what you are not.
(It is evidently his honest if mistaken opinion, and he pushes her from him so roughly that she lies on the couch as she fell, in a touching but perhaps rather impertinent little heap.)
Lilian (who, though a dear woman to some, has a genius for putting her finger on the raw of those she does not favour). How strong you are, husband mine! No wonder I love you! Now as I have told you why I love you, won’t you tell me why you love me?
(He fumes inarticulately while she takes off her hat and coat, perhaps in search of that homey feeling.)
How you have ruffled me! (She considers her frock.) You know, I can’t make up my mind whether green is really my colour. What do you think? Which colour do you like best to knock me about in, Richard?
Garson (with his fists clenched though they are not upraised). You take care!
Lilian (as he stamps the floor). Do you mind telling me what all this scene has been about?
Garson. You have me there. But how does it matter what it is that sets a pair like you and me saying what we think of each other?
Lilian. True. But we knew what we thought of each other before.
Garson. We did. And I’ve said to that father of yours ——
Lilian. By the way, I never heard how much you paid Pops for me?
Garson. One way or another, a good twenty thousand.
Lilian. I can’t help feeling proud.
Garson. If I could have got you for half I wouldn’t have had you.
Lilian. How like you to say that, Richard! Still, there are other pretties for whom you could have had the satisfaction of paying more. There must have been some — dear reason — why you flung the handkerchief to me?
Garson. Your rotten old families, all so poor and so well turned out. The come-on look in the melting eyes of you, and the disdain of you. I suppose they went to my head. You were the worst, so I chose you.
Lilian (clapping her hands). I won!
Garson. Oh, you didn’t need to come to me unless you liked.
Lilian (shivering). I admit that. It was your money that brought me.
Garson. Quite so.
Lilian (with a sincerity that makes us hopeful of her). I’m sorry, Richard, for both of us.
Garson. Pooh!
Lilian. You must at least allow that I never pretended it was anything but your wealth that drew me.
Garson. I never wanted it to be anything else.
Lilian. How like you again! Perhaps that is even some little excuse — though not very much — for me.
Garson (sneering). Soft sawder!
Lilian. I dare say. (Surveying the man with curiosity). Why don’t we end it?
Garson (bellowing). Do you know whom you are talking to? With my name in the City ——
Lilian. Of course. But if you won’t, Richard, has it never struck you that some day I ——
Garson (grinning). Never!
Lilian. You have a mighty faith in me.
Garson. Mighty.
Lilian. May I ask why?
(He comes up to her and taps her bodice.)
Garson. In this expensive little breast you know why. (In case there should be any misunderstanding he slaps his pocket.)
Lilian. I see.
Garson. Tragic lot yours, isn’t it?
Lilian. More tragic than you understand.
Garson. Bought when you were too young to know what you were doing!
Lilian. Not so young but that I should have known.
Garson. Such a rare exquisite creature, too, as you know yourself to be.
Lilian (with abnegation). As I know I am not. But as I long to be. As I think I could be.
Garson. As you think you could be, had you married a better man.
Lilian. Mock me, you have some right, but it may be truer than you think.
Garson. It is what they tell you, I don’t doubt.
Lilian. Who tell me?
Garson. The live-on-papa cubs.
Lilian (shrugging her shoulders). If I were to let them tell me what they would like to say ——
Garson (possibly with some penetration). You do, my pet, and when they have finished you tell them they mustn’t say it; and your lip trembles and one sad tear sits on your sweet eyes, the same little tear that comes when you have overdrawn your bank account.
Lilian. How you read me!
Garson. I think so. I think I know the stuff you are made of. I wouldn’t try heroics, Lilian; you can’t live up to them.
Lilian. I haven’t the courage, I suppose?
Garson. You have the pluck that let the French Jack-a-dandies go tripping to the guillotine; and perhaps my breed hasn’t. But when it comes to living you’ve got to live on us, my girl.
Lilian (rising and facing him). Oh, if — if ——
Garson. If — if you were to show me! I am not nervous. In the end you will always be true to Number One. I have thought you out.
Lilian (on fire). If I did?
Garson. If you did — if you tried to play any game on me ——
(He takes grip of her by the wrist.)
Lilian (in her earlier manner). Would it be the knife, Richard, or Desdemona’s pillow?
Garson. If you brought any shame on me, before I put you to the door I would — I would break you!
Lilian. If I did it I wouldn’t be here to break.
Garson. By the powers, it would be as well for you.
Lilian. Unless you wish to do the breaking now, please let go my wrist.
(He throws it from him, and their colloquy ends with these terrible words:)
Garson. Dinner at half-past, I suppose?
Lilian. I suppose so.
(When she is alone we see some great resolution struggling into life in her and adorning her. It means among other things, we may conclude, that she does not purpose joining him at dinner. She writes a brief letter, puts her wedding-ring in the envelope and deposits the explosive in the nearest drawer of his desk. On top of it she throws all the jewellery she is wearing and closes the drawer. She puts on her hat and coat, and after a last look in a glass at the face she is leaving behind her — the only face of her that Garson knows — she leaves his house.
Two hundred yards away is a mews, where odd brainy people — afterwards sorry for themselves — have here and there made romantic homes, all tiny but not all over the garages that have supplanted stables. This one where Hugh Paton lodges is a complete house, and we find him in a snug room, though it is only reached by a brief ladder which he frequently jumps. At present the room is in disorder, the fire extinguished by the masses of paper he has dumped on it, and he himself is tousled and in disarray. He has not quite finished an extensive packing, and has reached the point of wondering whether he should reopen that bulging bag to put those old football boots in it, or leave them for the good of the house. He is whistling gaily, with broken intervals in which his pipe is in his mouth, and he has a very honest face.
To him enters with a rush the little daughter of the house, whose heart he has won by lifting his hat to her in the mews. She has walked with more dignity ever since, and she is twelve.)
Susie. You will be stamping at me, sir, but there is a lady, and though I told her you were just putting on your muffler to start for Egypt, up she would come.
(Up she does come, and she is Lilian. When Susie sees how these two look at each other she knows all, and indeed more, and out of respect for Love she goes down the ladder on her tiptoes.)
Hugh (surprised, but with outstretched arms). You! Oh, my dear!
(She will not let him embrace her yet.)
Lilian (the soft-eyed, the tremulous). No, Hugh. Please listen to me first. You see I have changed my mind, and come after all. Yes, I am here to go with you, if you will have me still. But oh, my Hugh, let there be no mistake. Don’t have me, dear, if you would rather — rather not.