LUTHER: Ah, but though . . .
JOE: What?
LUTHER: I — I — I’ve done it.
JOE: Well, it might ha’ happened t’r anybody.
LUTHER: But when ‘er knows — an’ it’s me as has done it . . .
JOE: It wouldn’t ha’ mattered o’ anyhow, if it had bin sumb’dy else. But tha knows what ter’s got ter say. Arena’ ter goin’ ter wesh thee? Go an’ get th’ panchion.
LUTHER (rising): ‘Er’ll be comin’ in any minnit.
JOE: Get thee weshed, man.
LUTHER (fetching a bucket and lading-can from the scullery, and emptying water from the boiler): Go an’ ta’e ‘er somewhere, while Mrs Purdy goes, sholl ter?
JOE: D’rectly. Tha heered what I telled thee?
There is a noise of splashing in the scullery. Then a knock.
JOE goes to the door. He is heard saying “Come in.”
Enter MRS PURDY.
MRS PURDY: I hope I’ve not come a-mealtimes.
JOE: No, they’ve finished. Minnie’s gone up t’r our Harriet’s.
MRS PURDY: Thank the Lord for small mercies — for I didn’t fancy sittin’ an’ tellin’ her about our Bertha.
JOE: We dunna want ‘er ter know. Sit thee down.
MRS PURDY: I’m of that mind, mester, I am. As I said, what’s th’ good o’ jackin’ up a young married couple? For it won’t unmarry ‘em nor ma’e things right. An’ yet, my long lass oughtner ter bear a’ th’ brunt.
JOE: Well, an’ ‘er isna goin’ to.
MRS PURDY: Is that Mester weshin’?
JOE: Ah.
MRS PURDY: ‘As ter towd him?
JOE: Ah.
MRS PURDY: Well, it’s none o’ my wishin’s, I’m sure o’ that. Eh, dear, you’ve bin breakin’ th’ crockery a’ready!
JOE: Yes, that’s me, bein’ wallit.
MRS PURDY: T-t-t! So this is ‘ow she fancied it?
JOE: Ah, an’ it non luiks bad, does it?
MRS PURDY: Very natty. Very nice an’ natty.
JOE (taking up the lamp): Come an’ look at th’ parlour.
JOE and MRS PURDY exit R.
MRS PURDY’S VOICE: Yis — yis — it’s nice an’ plain. But a bit o’ red plush is ‘andsomer, to my mind. It’s th’old-fashioned style, like! My word, but them three ornyments is gaudy-lookin’.
JOE: An’ they reckon they’re worth five pound. ‘Er mester gen ‘em ‘er.
MRS PURDY: I’d rather had th’ money.
JOE: Ah, me an’ a’.
During this time, LUTHER has come hurrying out of the scullery into the kitchen, rubbing his face with a big roller-towel. He is naked to the waist. He kneels with his knees on the fender, sitting on his heels, rubbing himself. His back is not washed. He rubs his hair dry.
Enter JOE, with the lamp, followed by MRS PURDY.
MRS PURDY: It’s uncommon, very uncommon, Mester Gaskin — and looks well, too, for them as likes it. But it hardly goes wi’ my fancy, somehow, startin’ wi’ second-hand, owd-fashioned stuff. You dunno who’s sotten themselves on these ‘ere chairs, now, do you?
LUTHER: It ma’es no diff’rence to me who’s sot on ‘em an’ who ‘asna.
MRS PURDY: No — you get used to’m.
LUTHER (to JOE): Shall thee go up t’r our Harriet’s?
JOE: If ter’s a mind. (Takes up his cap. To MRS PURDY): An’ you two can settle as best you can.
MRS PURDY: Yes — yes. I’m not one for baulkin’ mysen an’ cuttin’ off my nose ter spite my face.
LUTHER has finished wiping himself. He takes a shifting shirt from the bureau, and struggles into it; then goes into the scullery.
JOE: An’ you sure you’ll keep it quiet, missis?
MRS PURDY: Am I goin’ bletherin’ up street an’ down street, think yer?
JOE: An’ dunna tell your Bob.
MRS PURDY: I’ve more sense. There’s not a word ‘e ‘ears a-whoam as is of any count, for out it ‘ud leak when he wor canned. Yes, my guyney — we know what our mester is.
Re-enter LUTHER, in shirt and black trousers. He drops his pit-trousers and singlet beside the hearth.
MRS PURDY bends down and opens his pit-trousers.
MRS PURDY: Nay, if ter drops ‘em of a heap, they niver goin’ ter get dry an’ cosy. Tha sweats o’ th’ hips, as my lads did.
LUTHER: Well, go thy ways, Joe.
JOE: Ay — well — good luck. An’ good night, Mrs Purdy.
MRS PURDY: Good night.
Exit JOE.
There are several moments of silence.
LUTHER puts the broken pots on the table.
MRS PURDY: It’s sad work, Mester Gaskin, f’r a’ on us.
LUTHER: Ay.
MRS PURDY: I left that long lass o’ mine fair gaunt, fair chalked of a line, I did, poor thing. Not bu’ what ‘er should ‘a ‘ad more sense.
LUTHER: Ah!
MRS PURDY: But it’s no use throwin’ good words after bad deeds. Not but what it’s a nasty thing for yer t’r ‘a done, it is — an’ yer can scarce look your missis i’ th’ face again, I should think. (Pause.) But I says t’r our Bertha, “It’s his’n, an’ he mun pay!” Eh, but how ‘er did but scraight an’ cry. It fair turned me ower. “Dunna go to ‘m, Mother,” ‘er says, “dunna go to ‘m for to tell him!” “Yi,” I says, “right’s right — tha doesna get off wi’ nowt, nor shall ‘e neither. ‘E wor but a scamp to do such a thing,” I says, yes, I did. For you was older nor ‘er. Not but what she was old enough ter ha’e more sense. But ‘er wor allers one o’ th’ come-day go-day sort, as ‘ud gi’e th’ clothes off ‘er back an’ niver know ‘er wor nek’d — a gra’t soft looney as she is, an’ serves ‘er right for bein’ such a gaby. Yi, an’ I believe ‘er wor fond on thee — if a wench can be fond of a married man. For one blessing, ‘er doesna know what ‘er wor an’ what ‘er worn’t. For they mau talk o’ bein’ i’ love — but you non in love wi’ onybody, wi’out they’s a chance o’ their marryin’ you — howiver much you may like ‘em. An’ I’m thinkin’, th’ childt’ll set ‘er up again when it comes, for ‘er’s gone that wezzel-brained an’ doited, I’m sure! An’ it’s a mort o’ trouble for me, mester, a sight o’ trouble it is. Not as I s’ll be hard on ‘er. She knowed I wor comin’ ‘ere to-night, an’s not spoke a word for hours. I left ‘er sittin’ on th’ sofey hangin’ ‘er ‘ead. But it’s a weary business, mester, an’ nowt ter be proud on. I s’d think tha wishes tha’d niver clapt eyes on our Bertha.
LUTHER (thinking hard): I dunna — I dunna. An’ I dunna wish as I’d niver seen ‘er, no, I dunna. ‘Er liked me, an’ I liked ‘er.
MRS PURDY: An’ ‘appen, but for this ‘ere marriage o’ thine, tha’d ‘a married ‘er.
LUTHER: Ah, I should. F’r ‘er liked me, an’ ‘er worna neither nice nor near, nor owt else, an’ ‘er’d bin fond o’ me.
MRS PURDY: ‘Er would, an’ it’s a thousand pities. But what’s done’s done.
LUTHER: Ah, I know that.
MRS PURDY: An’ as for yer missis —
LUTHER: ‘Er mun do as ‘er likes.
MRS PURDY: But tha’rt not for tellin’ ‘er?
LUTHER: ‘Er — ’er’ll know some time or other.
MRS PURDY: Nay, nay, ‘er nedna. You married now, lad, an’ you canna please yoursen.
LUTHER: It’s a fact.
MRS PURDY: An’ Lizzy Stapleton, she had forty pound wi’ ‘er lad, an’ it’s not as if you hadn’t got money. An’ to be sure, we’ve none.
LUTHER: No, an’ I’ve none.
MRS PURDY: Yes, you’ve some atween you — an’ — well . . .
LUTHER: I can get some.
MRS PURDY: Then what do you say?
LUTHER: I say as Bertha’s welcome t’r any forty pounds, if I’d got it. For — for — missis, she wor better to me than iver my wife’s bin.
MRS PURDY (frightened by his rage): Niver, lad!
LUTHER: She wor — ah but though she wor. She thought a lot on
me.
MRS PURDY: An’ so I’m sure your missis does. She naggles thy heart out, maybe. But that’s just the wrigglin’ a place out for hersen. She’ll settle down comfortable, lad.
LUTHER (bitterly): Will she!
MRS PURDY: Yi — yi. An’ tha’s done ‘er a crewel wrong, my lad. An’ tha’s done my gel one as well. For, though she was old enough to know better, yet she’s good-hearted and trusting, an’ ‘ud gi’e ‘er shoes off ‘er feet. An’ tha’s landed ‘er, tha knows. For it’s not th’ bad women as ‘as bastards nowadays — they’ve a sight too much gumption. It’s fools like our’n — poor thing.
LUTHER: I’ve done everything that was bad, I know that.
MRS PURDY: Nay — nay — young fellers, they are like that. But it’s wrong, for look at my long lass sittin’ theer on that sofey, as if ‘er back wor broke.
LUTHER (loudly): But I dunna wish I’d niver seen ‘er, I dunna. It wor — it wor — she wor good to me, she wor, an’ I dunna wish I’d niver done it.
MRS PURDY: Then tha ought, that’s a’. For I do — an’ ‘er does.
LUTHER: Does ‘er say ‘er wishes ‘er’d niver seen me?
MRS PURDY: ‘Er says nowt o’ nohow.
LUTHER: Then ‘er doesna wish it. An’ I wish I’d ha’ married ‘er.
MRS PURDY: Come, my lad, come. Married tha art —
LUTHER (bitterly): Married I am, an’ I wish I worna. Your Bertha ‘er’d ‘a thought a thousand times more on me than she does. But I’m wrong, wrong, wrong, i’ ivry breath I take. An’ I will be wrong, yi, an’ I will be wrong.
MRS PURDY: Hush thee — there’s somebody comin’.
They wait.
Enter JOE and MINNIE, JOE talking loudly.
MINNIE: No, you’ve not, you’ve no right at all. (To LUTHER): Haven’t you even cleared away? (To MRS PURDY): Good evening.
MRS PURDY: Good evenin’, missis. I was just goin’ — I’ve bin sayin’ it looks very nice, th’ ‘ouse.
MINNIE: Do you think so?
MRS PURDY: I do, indeed.
MINNIE: Don’t notice of the mess we’re in, shall you? He (pointing to JOE) broke the plates — and then I had to rush off up to Mrs Preston’s afore I could clear away. And he hasn’t even mended the fire.
LUTHER: I can do — I niver noticed.
MINNIE (to MRS PURDY): Have a piece of cake? (Goes to cupboard.)
MRS PURDY: No, thanks, no, thanks. I mun get off afore th’ Co-op shuts up. Thank yer very much. Well — good night, all.
JOE opens the door; MRS PURDY goes out.
MINNIE (bustling, clearing away as LUTHER comes in with coals): Did you settle it?
LUTHER: What?
MINNIE: What she’d come about.
LUTHER: Ah.
MINNIE: An’ I bet you’ll go and forget.
LUTHER: Oh ah!
MINNIE: And poor old Bob Purdy will go on just the same.
LUTHER: Very likely.
MINNIE: Don’t let the dust all go on the hearth. Why didn’t you clear away? The house was like a pigsty for her to come into.
LUTHER: Then I wor the pig.
MINNIE (halting): Why — who’s trod on your tail now?
LUTHER: There’d be nobody to tread on it if tha wor out.
MINNIE: Oh — oh, dearo’ me. (To JOE): I think we’d better go to the Cinematograph, and leave him to nurse his sore tail.
JOE: We better had.
LUTHER: An’ joy go with yer.
MINNIE: We certainly shan’t leave it at home. (To JOE): What time does it begin?
JOE: Seven o’clock.
MINNIE: And I want to call in Sisson’s shop. Shall you go with me, or wouldn’t you condescend to go shopping with me? (She has cleared the table, brought a tray and a bowl, and is washing up the pots.)
JOE: Dost think I’m daunted by Polly Sisson?
MINNIE: You’re braver than most men if you dare go in a shop. Here, take a towel and wipe these pots.
JOE: How can I?
MINNIE: If you were a gentleman, you’d hold the plates in your teeth to wipe them.
JOE: Tha wouldna look very ladylike at th’ end on’t.
MINNIE: Why?
JOE: Why, hast forgot a’ready what a shine tha kicked up when I broke them two other plates? (He has got a towel, and wedging a plate against his thighs, is laboriously wiping it.)
MINNIE: I never kicked up a shine. It is nice of you!
JOE: What?
MINNIE: To do this for me.
LUTHER has begun sweeping the hearth.
JOE: Tha’s got two servants.
MINNIE: But I’m sure you want to smoke while you’re doing it — don’t you now?
JOE: Sin’ tha says so. (Fumbles in his pocket.)
MINNIE (hastily wiping her hands, puts a cigarette between his lips — gets matches from the mantelpiece, ignoring her husband, who is kneeling sweeping the hearth — lights his cigarette): It’s so nice to have a lamed man. You feel you’ve got an excuse for making a fuss of him. You’ve got awfully nice eyes and eyebrows. I like dark eyes.
JOE: Oh ah!
LUTHER rises hastily, goes in the passage, crosses the room quietly. He wears his coat, a red scarf and a cap.
MINNIE: There’s more go in them than in blue. (Watches her husband go out. There is silence between the two.)
JOE: He’ll come round again.
MINNIE: He’ll have to. He’ll go on sulking now. (Her face breaks.) You — you don’t know how hard it is.
JOE: What?
MINNIE (crying a few fierce tears): This . . .
JOE (aghast): What?
MINNIE: Why — you don’t know. You don’t know how hard it is, with a man as — as leaves you alone all the time.
JOE: But — he niver hardly goes out.
MINNIE: No, but — you don’t know — he leaves me alone, he always has done — and there’s nobody . . .
JOE: But he . . .
MINNIE: He never trusts me — he leaves me so alone — and — (a little burst of tears) it is hard! (She changes suddenly.) You’ve wiped your plates; my word, you are a champion.
JOE: I think so an’ a’.
MINNIE: I hope the pictures will be jolly — but the sad ones make me laugh more, don’t they you?
JOE: I canna do wi’ ‘em.
CURTAIN
ACT II
The same evening — eleven o’clock, LUTHER’S house.
MINNIE, alone, weeping. She gets up, fills the kettle, puts it on the hob, sits down, weeps again; then hears somebody coming, dries her eyes swiftly, turns the lamp low.
Enter LUTHER. He stands in the doorway — is rather tipsy; flings his cap down, sits in his chair, lurching it slightly. Neither speaks for some moments.
LUTHER: Well, did yer like yer pictures?
MINNIE: Where have you been?
LUTHER: What does it matter where I’ve been?
MINNIE: Have you been drinking?
LUTHER: What’s it matter if I have?
MINNIE: It matters a lot to me
LUTHER: Oh ah!
MINNIE: Do you think I’m going to sleep with a man who is half-drunk?
LUTHER: Nay, I non know who tha’rt goin’ ter sleep wi’.
MINNIE (rising): I shall make the bed in the other room.
LUTHER: Tha’s no ‘casions. I s’ll do very nicely on t’ sofa; it’s warmer.
MINNIE: Oh, you can have your own bed.
LUTHER: If tha doesna sleep in it, I dunna.
MINNIE: And if you do, I don’t.
LUTHER: Tha pleases thysen. Tha can sleep by thysen for iver, if ter’s a mind to’t.
MINNIE (who has stood hesitating): Oh, very well!
She goes upstairs, returns immediately with a pillow and two blankets, which she throws on the sofa.
Complete Works of D.H. Lawrence Page 721