MR WILCOX: Nurse, will you tell me your name?
NURSE: Broadbanks.
MR WILCOX: You know I meant your Christian name. Don’t torment me, Nurse, I can’t stand it.
NURSE: I was baptized Millicent Emily.
MR WILCOX: “Millicent Emily” — it’s like the “Song of Solomon”. Can I say it again?
NURSE: If you will say it only to yourself.
MR WILCOX: My name is James — Jim for short.
NURSE: I thought it was Hezekiah — or Ezekiel.
MR WILCOX: Hezekiah’s my second name — James Hezekiah.
NURSE: I like Hezekiah better.
MR WILCOX: Do you — I thought you didn’t. Oh, I’m glad you like it. But yours is lovely.
NURSE: I prefer Nurse.
MR WILCOX: So do I — nice and short. (A pause.) Shall I sing to you, Nurse?
NURSE: Do you sing?
MR WILCOX: Oh, yes — I used to be a great one at “Ora pro Nobis”. Should I sing you “Gentle Annie”? I used to sing that forty years since.
NURSE: When you were courting, Mr Wilcox?
MR WILCOX: Afore that.
He hesitates — goes to the piano and, after fumbling, begins to vamp to “What Are the Wild Waves Saying”. He begins to sing, “lamentoso”.
NURSE: There’s someone at the door!
Not hearing, or observing, he continues to play. She opens to DR FOULES: they stand smiling. MR WILCOX stops playing and wheels round.
DR FOULES: “Music, when soft voices die, vibrates in the memory.”
NURSE: Mr Wilcox was enlivening my leisure. Do you know Mr Wilcox, Dr Foules?
DR FOULES: I have not had the pleasure till now.
He bows.
MR WILCOX: Good even’ — I wasn’t aware as anybody was here.
DR FOULES: “By rapture’s blaze impelled he swelled the artless lay.”
NURSE: I think Mr Wilcox sings very well indeed. Will you finish, Mr Wilcox?
MR WILCOX: No, thanks, I must be going.
DR FOULES: Pray do not let me hasten you away.
MR WILCOX: Oh, I was just going. Well — happen you’ll call at our house, Nurse?
NURSE: I will, Mr Wilcox.
He leaves.
DR FOULES: Did I interrupt you?
NURSE: You did not interrupt me.
DR FOULES: Then I incur no disfavour?
NURSE: Not for stopping poor Mr Wilcox at “Brother, I hear no singing” — Poor man!
DR FOULES: You pity him?
NURSE: I do.
DR FOULES: Ah! Is it of the mind-melting sort?
NURSE: I do not understand.
DR FOULES: “For pity melts the mind to love” —
NURSE: No — poor man. I can just imagine my mother, if I took him down to Kent. Well, you’ve done a nice thing for yourself —
DR FOULES: You daren’t face family criticism?
NURSE: I daren’t.
DR FOULES: Ah! Then he does aspire?
NURSE: Poor old fellow!
DR FOULES: I do not like your pity, Nurse — however near akin it may be to something better.
NURSE: You have often incurred it, Doctor.
DR FOULES: Which of the two, Nurse?
NURSE: The pity, of course. I have said “poor boy”.
DR FOULES: Why?
NURSE: Why? (She laughs.) Because, I suppose, you were pitiable.
DR FOULES (blushing): You mean I was to be pitied. Why?
NURSE: Because you were not like the Pears’ Soapy baby — ”He won’t be happy till he gets it,” but you went on washing your self without soap, good as gold.
DR FOULES: I cannot apply your simile.
NURSE: Perhaps not. I never was literary.
DR FOULES: You have grown brilliant — and caustic, if I may say so.
NURSE: It is the first time I have been accused of brilliance.
DR FOULES: Then perhaps I am the steel which sheds the sparks from your flint.
NURSE: Oh, the sparks may come, but they’re not noticed. Perhaps you are only the literary man who catches them on his tinder and blows them into notice. You love a phrase beyond everything.
DR FOULES: Really — I hardly recognize you, Nurse.
NURSE: And what did your mother say of me?
DR FOULES: I thank you for calling so soon. Did she seem changed, to you?
NURSE: She looks very ill.
DR FOULES: Yes, I am worried.
NURSE: You are afraid it is something serious?
DR FOULES: Yes.
NURSE: I hope not. But it put me about to see her looking so frail. She was very kind to me.
DR FOULES: You are very good, Nurse.
NURSE: It is my duty to be sympathetic, Doctor.
DR FOULES: And use is second nature. I will take courage, Nurse.
NURSE: Will it not be a complete disguise?
DR FOULES: Your duty does not extend to me, Nurse.
NURSE: No, Doctor.
DR FOULES: You wish me to see you in your new guise, Nurse. You stick daw’s feathers among your dove’s plumage.
NURSE (laughing): What, am I a dove then? It is a silly bird.
DR FOULES: You have had a hard time, Nurse?
NURSE: I have got over the hardness, thank you. It is all moderate, now.
DR FOULES: Might it not be more than moderate?
NURSE: I hope it will be some day.
DR FOULES: Could I help it, do you think?
NURSE: Everybody helps it, by being amiable —
DR FOULES: But might I not help it — more particularly? You used to —
NURSE: Say you are in love with me, Doctor —
DR FOULES: I have always been —
NURSE: Then the light has been under a bushel.
DR FOULES: “Blown to a core of ardour by the awful breath of — ” (He smiles very confusedly.) I may hope then, Nurse.
NURSE (smiling): Along with Mr Wilcox.
DR FOULES: Thank you for the company.
NURSE: Look here, Arthur, you have lived like a smug little candle in a corner, with your mother to shelter you from every draught. Now you can get blown a bit. I do not feel inclined to shelter you for the rest of your life.
DR FOULES: Thank you.
NURSE: I am sorry if I am nasty. But I am angry with you.
DR FOULES: It is evident.
NURSE: And I will still come and see your mother, if I may. She is a woman to respect.
DR FOULES: I do not order my mother’s comings and goings. The case is the reverse, you remember.
NURSE: Very well. On your high horse, you are more like the nursery than ever.
DR FOULES: Thank you.
NURSE (mimicking): Thank you.
DR FOULES: I am surprised —
NURSE: I am surprised — but — was that someone at the door?
DR FOULES: I could not tell you.
NURSE: Excuse me, I will see.
DR FOULES: Let me go, first. (Catching his hat to depart.)
NURSE (opening the door): You, Mr Hemstock. Will you come in?
Enter HARRY.
DR FOULES: Good evening, Mr Hemstock. I will make way for you.
NURSE: “Applications considered Tuesday, between seven and nine p.m.” That is your meaning, Doctor?
DR FOULES: With your usual astuteness, you have it.
NURSE: With my usual astuteness, I have avoided so far the “Matrimonial Post”. This is the irony of fate, Doctor. It never rains but it pours.
DR FOULES (bowing to NURSE and HARRY): The third time pays for all, they say.
NURSE (laughing): I will tell you to-morrow.
DR FOULES: It will not be too late to drop me a post card.
NURSE: I will see. Good night, Dr Foules.
DR FOULES: Good night, Nurse Broadbanks. I wish you luck.
NURSE: And lifelong happiness.
DR FOULES: Good night!
Exit DR FOULES.
NURSE: He is very pleasant, isn’t h
e?
HARRY: They say so.
NURSE: How is Mrs Hemstock?
HARRY: She’s worse. She’s not speakin’.
NURSE: Oh, I’m sorry to hear that. Did you want me to do anything? Poor thing, it will be a relief when she’s gone.
HARRY: The ‘owd doctor’s bin. He told us to ax you to see her settled down —
NURSE: Shall I come now?
HARRY: Or in about half an hour’s time — when you’re ready.
NURSE: I may as well come now — when I’ve just tidied the room. Are you going to sit up with her?
HARRY: No — my father is, an’ our Susy. I’m going to work.
NURSE: Going to work? I thought you hadn’t a place.
HARRY: They sent me word as I wor to go to-morrow — buttyin’ wi’ Joe Birkin.
NURSE: And will it be a good place?
HARRY: Ha! It’s a sight better than ever I expected.
NURSE: Oh, that is nice, isn’t it?
HARRY: It’s better nor mormin’ about at home.
NURSE: It is. I’m so glad, Mr Hemstock. Then you’ll stop at Greenway?
HARRY: I’m reckonin’ so. There’s nowt else, is there?
NURSE: No — why should there be? You’ll have to begin afresh after Mrs Hemstock has gone —
HARRY: I s’ll make a start o’ some sort.
NURSE: You will? Do you know, I’ve had old Mr Wilcox here tonight.
HARRY: Oh — ah?
NURSE: He’s so comical. He was singing to me. (She laughs into her hand.)
HARRY: He must ha’ wanted summat to do —
NURSE: I think so. You never heard anything like it in your life.
HARRY: ‘E never wor but dosy-baked.
NURSE (purring): What does that mean?
HARRY: Soft, batchy, sawney.
NURSE: Poor old chap. It’s no use being angry with him, is it?
HARRY: What for?
NURSE: For thinking I would accept him.
HARRY: No, it’s not good bein’ mad wi’ him.
NURSE: He looked so crestfallen.
HARRY: He’ll be just as game by to-morrow.
NURSE: Of course he will. Men only pretend to be so heartbroken. By supper-time they’ve forgotten.
HARRY: An’ what’s a woman do?
NURSE: I don’t know. You see it means more to a woman. It’s her life. To a man it’s only a pleasant change.
HARRY: To all appearances, you’d think it worn’t such a life-an’-death affair to her.
NURSE: Why?
HARRY: Woman is reckoned to be pinin’ for you, goes an’ makes a liar an’ a fool of you in front of other folks.
NURSE: You mean Rachel Wilcox.
HARRY: Ah — ’appen I do.
NURSE: But, poor old Baron, it would have killed him.
HARRY: Then let him die. What good is he, here or anywhere else?
NURSE: Oh, Mr Hemstock!
HARRY: Besides, she did it to spite me, because ‘er wor mad wi’ me.
NURSE: But she is engaged to Mr Bowers.
HARRY: ‘Appen so. ‘Er bites ‘er nose off to spite her face.
NURSE: But poor old Baron — it would have been so cruel.
HARRY: Would he have stopped tellin’ everybody else the truth?
NURSE: But you can’t judge in that way —
HARRY: Why canna I? You make a liar an’ a swine of me, an’ a dam’ fool of him —
NURSE: Oh, come, Mr Hemstock.
HARRY: He is a little fool — an’ wants to boss everybody else wi’ it, an’ a’ —
NURSE: You ought not to speak of the Baron like that.
HARRY: No, it’s all palaver, an’ smooth talk. I’ll see anybody in hell before I’m fed wi’ mealy-mouthed words like a young pigeon.
NURSE: I think you don’t know what you’re talking about.
HARRY: Dunna I though, but I do. I’m not going to be made a convenience of, an’ then buttered up, like a trussed fowl.
NURSE: There is no one wants to butter you up, to my knowledge.
HARRY: Alright, then — then there isn’t.
NURSE: And all this, I think, has been very uncalled for — and unnecessary.
HARRY: Alright, then — an’ it has. But I’m not a kid, nor to be treated like one —
NURSE: It’s there you make your mistake.
HARRY: Nay, it’s somebody else as had made a mistake.
NURSE: Yes — we do think the quiet vessels are the full ones. But it seems they only want shaking to rattle worse than any.
HARRY: Alright. Say what you like.
NURSE: Thank you, I don’t wish to say any more, except that I pity whoever has you, for you seem to be in a state of chronic bad temper.
HARRY: Alright — I’ll be going.
NURSE (who has been tidying the room): I will be at your house in ten minutes.
HARRY: There’s no occasion to hurry — am I to wait for you?
NURSE: No, thank you — I would rather come alone.
CURTAIN
ACT IV
The evening after the last scene. It is the third day of the play. The kitchen at the HEMSTOCKS’.
NURSE: And what about the fire in the room?
SUSY: I’ll let it go out and take the ashes up by daylight. It’s falling dusk, an’ I don’t like being in by myself.
NURSE: Poor Mrs Hemstock — she went away quickly at the last.
SUSY (red-eyed — sniffing): She did that. Eh, but wan’t she wasted? A fair skeleton! I’m glad you laid her out, Nurse.
NURSE: I shall miss her. I’ve been coming here over a year now.
SUSY: I hope I don’t lie like that. She used to be as strong as a horse. But she was hard, you know.
NURSE: Perhaps she had enough to make her.
SUSY: She had — wi’ my father an’ the lads. She was easiest wi’ our Harry. He was always mother’s lad.
NURSE: Yet they have been so indifferent —
SUSY: At the bottom they haven’t. She never forgave him for going with Rachel Wilcox — an’ he was always funny-tempered, would rool up like a pea-bug, at a word.
NURSE: I thought she favoured Rachel Wilcox.
SUSY: No, hated her; but she used her to make game of him.
NURSE: She is engaged to the Baker now.
SUSY: Yes. He’s only having her for her money — an’ she’ll hate him when she’s rubbed the fur off a bit. But she’s one would fuss round a pair of breeches on a clothesline, rather than have no man.
NURSE: I don’t like her.
SUSY: Not many does. She fair pines for our Harry, yet she’d have Job Arthur for fear of getting nobody.
NURSE: How dreadful! (She goes for her cloak.)
SUSY: Nay, dunna go. Stop an’ ha’e a cup o’ tea. I durstn’t stop in by mysen. The kettle’ll boil in a minute. (She lays the table.)
NURSE: I really ought to go.
SUSY: Don’t, I should be scared to death. You’ll stop five minutes, Nurse.
NURSE: A quarter of an hour.
SUSY (staring): What’s that?
NURSE (going to the door): It’s only Patty.
SUSY: She’s been that lost a’ day without our Harry.
NURSE: Poor old Patty!
Enter HARRY.
SUSY: Tha’rt a bit sooner than I thought fer.
HARRY (surly): Am I?
Complete Works of D.H. Lawrence Page 745