by Unknown
MRS MORLAND (giving it to him). We didn’t open it.
SIMON. Two to one it is recalling me.
MRS MORLAND. It came two days ago. I don’t like them, Simon, never did; they have broken so many hearts.
SIMON. They have made many a heart glad too. It may be from my Harry — at last. Mother, do you think I was sometimes a bit harsh to him?
MRS MORLAND. I think you sometimes were, my son.
MR MORLAND. Open it, Simon.
(SIMON opens the telegram and many unseen devils steal into the room.)
MRS MORLAND (shrinking from his face). It can’t be so bad as that. We are all here, Simon.
(For a moment he has not been here himself, he has been on an island. He is a good son to MRS. MORLAND now, thinking of her only, placing her on the sofa, going on his knees beside her and stroking her kind face. Her arms go out to her husband, who has been reading the telegram.)
MR. morland (dazed). Can’t be, can’t be!
SIMON (like some better father than he perhaps has been). It is all right, Mother. Don’t you be afraid. It is good news. You are a brave one, you have come through much, you will be brave for another minute, won’t you?
(She nods, with a frightened smile.)
Mother dear, it is Mary Rose.
MR MORLAND. It can’t be true. It is too — too glorious to be true.
MRS MORLAND. Glorious? Is my Mary Rose alive?
SIMON. It is all right, all right. I wouldn’t say it, surely, if it wasn’t true. Mary Rose has come back. The telegram is from Cameron. You remember who he was. He is minister there now. Hold my hand, and I’ll read it. ‘Your wife has come back. She was found to-day on the island. I am bringing her to you. She is quite well, but you will all have to be very careful.’ mrs morland. Simon, can it be?
SIMON. I believe it absolutely. Cameron would not deceive me.
MR MORLAND. He might be deceived himself; he was a mere acquaintance.
SIMON. I am sure it is true. He knew her by sight as well as any of us.
MR MORLAND. But after twentyfive years!
SIMON. Do you think I wouldn’t know her after twentyfive years?
MRS MORLAND. My — my — she will be — very changed.
SIMON. However changed, Mother, wouldn’t I know my Mary Rose at once! Her hair may be as grey as mine — her face — her little figure — her pretty ways — though they were all gone, don’t you think I would know Mary Rose at once?
(He is suddenly stricken with a painful thought.) Oh, my God, I saw her, and I didn’t know her!
MRS MORLAND. Simon!
SIMON. It had been Cameron with her. They must have come in my train. Mother, it was she I saw going across the fields — her little walk when she was excited, half a run, I recognised it, but I didn’t remember it was hers.
(Those unseen devils chuckle.)
MR. MORLAND. It WAS GETTING DARK. Simon (slowly). Mary Rose is coming across the fields.
(He goes out morland peers weakly through the window curtains, mrs morland goes on her knees to pray.)
MR MORLAND. It is rather dark. I — I shouldn’t wonder though there was a touch of frost tonight. I wish I was more use.
(cameron enters, a bearded clergyman now.)
MRS MORLAND. Mr. Cameron? Tell us quickly, Mr. Cameron, is it true?
CAMERON. It iss true, ma’am. Mr. Blake met us at the gate and he iss with her now. I hurried on to tell you the things necessary. It iss good for her you should know them at once.
MRS MORLAND. Please, quick.
CAMERON. You must be prepared to find her — different.
MRS MORLAND. We are all different. Her age —
CAMERON. I mean, Mrs. Morland, different from what you expect. She iss not different as we are different. They will be saying she iss just as she was on the day she went away.
(mrs morland shrinks.)
These five-and-twenty years, she will be thinking they were just an hour in which Mr. Blake and I had left her in some incomprehensible jest.
MRS MORLAND. James, just as it was before!
MR MORLAND. But when you told her the truth?
CAMERON. She will not have it.
MRS MORLAND. She must have seen how much older you are.
CAMERON. She does not know me, ma’am, as the boy who was with her that day. When she did not recognise me I thought it best — she was so troubled already — not to tell her.
MR MORLAND (appealing). But now that she has seen Simon. His appearance, his grey hair — when she saw him she would know.
CAMERON (unhappy). I am not sure; it iss dark out there.
MR MORLAND. She must have known that he would never have left her and come home.
CAMERON. That secretly troubles her, but she will not speak of it. There iss some terrible dread lying on her heart.
MR MORLAND. A dread?
MRS MORLAND. Harry. James, if she should think that Harry is still a child!
CAMERON. I never heard what became of the boy.
MRS MORLAND. He ran away to sea when he was twelve years old. We had a few letters from Australia, very few; we don’t know where he is now.
MR MORLAND. How was she found, Mr. Cameron?
CAMERON. Two men fishing from a boat saw her. She was asleep by the shore at the very spot where Mr. Blake made a fire so long ago. There was a rowan-tree beside it. At first they were afraid to land, but they did. They said there was such a joy on her face as she slept that it was a shame to waken her.
MR. MORLAND. Joy?
CAMERON. That iss so, sir. I have sometimes thought —
(There is a gleeful clattering on the stairs of some one to whom they must be familiar; and if her father and mother have doubted they know now before they see her that MARY ROSE has come back. She enters. She is just as we saw her last except that we cannot see her quite so clearly. She is leaping towards her mother in the old impulsive way, and the mother responds in her way, but something steps between them.)
MARY ROSE (puzzled). What is it?
(It is the years.)
MRS MORLAND. My love.
MR MORLAND. Mary Rose.
MARY ROSE. Father.
(But the obstacle is still there. She turns timidly to simon, who has come in with her.)
What is it, Simon?
(She goes confidently to him till she sees what the years have done with him. She shakes now.)
SIMON. My beloved wife.
(He takes her in his arms and so does her mother, and she is glad to be there, but it is not of them she is thinking, and soon she softly disengages herself.)
MR. MORLAND. We are so glad you — had you a comfortable journey, Mary Rose? You would like a cup of tea, wouldn’t you? Is there anything I can do?
(MARY ROSE’S eyes go from him to the little door at the back.)
MARY ROSE (coaxingly to her father). Tell me.
MR. MORLAND. Tell you what, dear?
MARY ROSE (appealing to CAMERON). YOU?
(He presses her hand and turns away. She goes to SIMON and makes much of him, cajoling him.)
Simon, my Simon. Be nice to me, Simon. Be nice to me, dear Simon, and tell me.
SIMON. Dearest love, since I lost you — it was a long time ago —
MARY ROSE (petulant). It wasn’t — please, it wasn’t. (She goes to her mother.) Tell me, my mother dear.
MR MORLAND. I don’t know what she wants to be told.
MRS. MORLAND. I know.
MARY ROSE (an unhappy child). Where is my baby?
(They cannot face her, and she goes to seek an answer from the room that lies beyond the little door. Her mother and husband follow her.
MR. MORLAND and CAMERON left alone are very conscious of what may be going on in that inner room.)
MR. morland. Have you been in this part of the country before, Mr. Cameron?
CAMERON. I haf not, sir. It iss my first visit to England. You cannot hear the sea in this house at all, which iss very strange to me.
MR MORLAND. If I might show you our Downs —
CAMERON. I thank you, Mr. Morland, but — in such circumstances do not trouble about me at all.
(They listen.)
MR MORLAND. I do not know if you are interested in prints. I have a pencil sketch by Cousins — undoubtedly genuine —
CAMERON. I regret my ignorance on the subject. This matter, so strange — so inexplicable —
MR. morland. Please don’t talk of it to me, sir. I am — an old man. I have been so occupied all my life with little things — very pleasant — I cannot cope — cannot cope —
(A hand is placed on his shoulder so sympathetically that he dares to ask a question.)
Do you think she should have come back, Mr. Cameron?
(The stage darkens and they are blotted out. Into this darkness MRS. OTERY enters with a candle, and we see that the scene has changed to the dismantled room of the first act.
HARRY is sunk in the chair as we last saw him.)
MRS. otery (who in her other hand has a large cup and saucer). Here is your tea, mister. Are you sitting in the dark? I haven’t been more than the ten minutes I promised you. I was —
(She stops short, struck by his appearance. She holds the candle nearer him. He is staring wide-eyed into the fire, motionless.)
What is the matter, mister? Here is the tea, mister.
(He looks at her blankly.) I have brought you a cup of tea, I have just been the ten minutes.
HARRY (rising). Wait a mo.
(He looks about him, like one taking his bearings.)
Gimme the tea. That’s better. Thank you, missis.
MRS OTERY. Have you seen anything?
HARRY. See here, as I sat in that chair — I wasn’t sleeping, mind you — it’s no dream — but things of the far past connected with this old house — things I knew naught of — they came crowding out of their holes and gathered round me till I saw — I saw them all so clear that I don’t know what to think, woman.
(He is a grave man now.) Never mind about that. Tell me about this — ghost.
MRS OTERY. It’s no concern of yours.
HARRY. Yes, it is some concern of mine. The folk that used to live here — the Morlands —
MRS OTERY. That was the name. I suppose you heard it in the village?
HARRY. I have heard it all my days. It is one of the names I bear. I am one of the family.
MRS OTERY. I suspicioned that.
HARRY. I suppose that is what made them come to me as I sat here. Tell me about them.
MRS OTERY. It is little I know. They were dead and gone before my time, the old man and his wife.
HARRY. It’s not them I am asking you about.
MRS OTERY. They had a son-in-law, a sailor. The war made a great man of him before it drowned him.
HARRY. I know that 5 he was my father. Hard I used to think him, but I know better now. Go on, there’s the other one.
MRS OTERY (reluctantly). That was all.
HARRY. There is one more.
MRS OTERY. If you must speak of her, she is dead too. I never saw her in life.
HARRY. Where is she buried?
MRS OTERY. Down by the church.
HARRY. Is there a stone?
MRS. OTERY. Yes.
HARRY. Does it say her age?
MRS. OTERY. No.
HARRY. Is that holy spot well taken care of?
MRS OTERY. You can see for yourself.
HARRY. I will see for myself. And so it is her ghost that haunts this house?
(She makes no answer. He struggles with himself.)
There is no such thing as ghosts. And yet — Is it true about folk having lived in this house and left in a hurry?
MRS OTERY. It’s true.
HARRY. Because of a ghost — a thing that can’t be.
MRS OTERY. When I came in your eyes were staring; I thought you had seen her.
HARRY. Have you ever seen her yourself?
(She shivers.)
Where? In this room?
(She looks at the little door.)
In there? Has she ever been seen out of that room?
MRS OTERY. All over the house, in every room and on the stairs. I tell you I’ve met her on the stairs, and she drew back to let me pass and said ‘Good evening’ too, timidlike, and at another time she has gone by me like a rush of wind.
HARRY. What is she like? Is she dressed in white? They are alius dressed in white, aren’t they?
MRS OTERY. She looks just like you or me. But for all that she’s as light as air. I’ve seen — things.
HARRY. You look like it, too. But she is harmless, it seems?
MRS OTERY. There’s some wouldn’t say that; them that left in a hurry. If she thought you were keeping it from her she would do you a mischief.
HARRY. Keeping what from her?
MRS OTERY. Whatever it is she prowls about this cold house searching for, searching, searching. I don’t know what it is.
HARRY (grimly). Maybe I could tell you. I dare say I could even put her in the way of finding him.
MRS OTERY. Then I wish to God you would, and let her rest.
HARRY. My old dear, there are worse things than not finding what you are looking for; there is finding them so different from what you had hoped. (He moves about.) A ghost. Oh no — and yet, and yet — See here, I am going into that room.
MRS OTERY. As you like; I care not.
HARRY. I’ll burst open the door.
MRS OTERY. No need; it’s not locked; I cheated you about that.
HARRY. But I tried it and it wouldn’t open.
(MRS. OTERY is very unhappy.)
1 — ou think she is in there?
MRS OTERY. She may be.
HARRY (taking a deep breath). Give me air.
(He throws open the window and we see that it is a night of stars.)
Leave me here now. I have a call to make.
MRS OTERY (hesitating). I dunno. You think you ‘re in no danger, but —
HARRY. That is how it is to be, missis. Just ten minutes you were out of the room, did you say?
MRS OTERY. That was all.
HARRY. God!
(She leaves him. After a moment’s irresolution he sets off upon his quest carrying the candle, which takes with it all the light of the room. He is visible on the other side of the darkness, in the little passage and opening the door beyond. He returns, and now we see the pale ghost of MARY ROSE standing in the middle of the room, as if made out of the light he has brought back with him.)
MARY ROSE (bowing to him timidly). Have you come to buy the house?
HARRY (more startled by his own voice than by hers). Not me.
MARY ROSE. It is a very nice house. (Doubtfully) Isn’t it?
HARRY. It was a nice house once.
MARY ROSE (pleased). Wasn’t it! (Suspiciously) Did you know this house?
HARRY. When I was a young shaver.
MARY ROSE. Young? Was it you who laughed?
HARRY. When was that?
MARY ROSE (puzzled). There was once some one who laughed in this house. Don’t you think laughter is a very pretty sound?
HARRY (out of his depths). Is it? I dare say. I never thought about it.
MARY ROSE. You are quite old.
HARRY. I’m getting on.
MARY ROSE (confidentially). Would you mind telling me why every one is so old? I don’t know you, do I?
HARRY. I wonder. Take a look. You might have seen me in the old days — playing about — outside in the garden — or even inside.
MARY ROSE. You — you are not Simon, are you?
HARRY. No. (Venturing) My name is Harry.
MARY ROSE (stiffening). I don’t think so. I strongly object to your saying that.
HARRY. I’MA queer sort of cove, and I would like to hear you call me Harry.
MARY ROSE (firmly). I decline. I regret, but I absolutely decline.