Works of Edwin Arlington Robinson
Page 56
You seem to know the truth already. If you don’t, I
cannot tell a lie.
[Very distinctly]
In the last analysis, then, the thing is worse than — than office-hours.
VILLA
[With determination]
I’m going to say something now. I’m going to ask Otto to turn that picture to the wall until Weldon comes back.
I won’t have it abused.
[To LUCAS, with sorry laugh]
The only trouble with that picture is that it isn’t me.
LUCAS
[Drily]
Yes, that is one trouble with it.
[VILLA looks at him strangely, and laughs again as before. MRS. LOVETT looks at her with mild disapproval. OTTO grins, and begins to sing the swan-song in Lohengrin with subdued satisfaction as he turns the easel. As OTTO comes back to the center of the stagey the bell rings, and all appear to be suddenly disturbed]
MRS. LOVETT
Now who in the world is that? We don’t want people.
LUCAS
You might find out, Otto.
OTTO
Aye, aye, sir.
[Becoming more exuberant, he propels himself towards the door with a series of quasi-nautical hitches, trumpeting with his lips the opening chorus in “Pinafore” LUCAS watches him with a weary smile, VILLA VANNEVAR laughs, and MRS.
LOVETT looks bewildered. OTTO opens the door and stands back, in whimsical obeisance]
OTTO
You may come in, for I know your name. Your name is Van Zorn, and I’ve seen you before.
[VAN ZORN ENTERS. HE is rather tall, well built, bronzed, and has powerful, penetrating eyes. His manner, though court and possibly a bit too dignified, is also a little heavy.
He seems to be in constant fear of being taken too seriously; and yet he is a very serious person, inclined to a certain intangible melancholy that is easy to recognize but difficult to describe. His voice is rich, deep, and musical, his laugh is rare but pleasing, but his smile is frequent and engaging.
There is at times something childlike in his acceptance of unusual situations and events, and there is something almost unreal in his easy persistence along lines that few men would ever think of pursuing. While he is for the most part self explanatory, there remains a fringe of mystery about him to the end]
VAN ZORN
[Taking Otto’s hand and smiling]
And I should remember your name. Your name is...
OTTO
[Distinctly]
Mink.
VAN ZORN
[With another smile]
Indeed? Then you must have two names.
OTTO
[As the two move into the room]
I have. The grand total is Otto Mink.
VAN ZORN
I remember now that Farnham called you Otto. I am very glad to see you again.
OTTO
[With expansion]
And now it devolves upon me to present a few of Farnham’s friends. Here, for example, is Mrs. Lovett.
[She smiles at Otto, and receives Van Zorn with unqualified approval]
And here is Miss Villa Vannevar. She’s another friend of Farnham’s, and you’ve met her before.
[VILLA gives VAN ZORN her hand, and he looks at her, in spite of his efforts, as if he were fascinated. The two appear to be very serious, until OTTO presents LUCAS, when she laughs — but with no great amount of spirit]
And here is Mr. Lucas. Sometimes we call him Phoebus —
on account of his sunny disposition.
[VAN ZORN shakes hands with LUCAS with great cordiality and looks at him as long as he looked at VILLA VANNEVAR, but with an entirely different expression. There is a kindness and a certain satisfaction in his eyes that surprises LUCAS
and embarrasses him]
That object over there is a portrait of Miss Vannevar, but we are not to see it again until Farnham comes back. You won’t like Farnham any better after you see it.
VAN ZORN
[Amused]
That doesn’t sound altogether complimentary to Farnham.
OTTO
[Cheerfully]
It isn’t.
VAN ZORN
Perhaps I don’t quite understand you.
OTTO
You will.
VAN ZORN
[With a look of amused inquiry at Lucas]
You surprise me. I have come to think of Farnham as one of the best of living painters.
OTTO
[With his hands in his trousers? pockets]
He is. That’s partly what ails him.
MRS. LOVETT
Why, Otto, — you ridiculous child!
OTTO
If you don’t believe me, ask Phoebus — I mean Lucas.
VAN ZORN
[To Villa, smiling]
I think I’ll wait and ask Farnham himself.
VILLA
[Laughing]
He may bite you.
VAN ZORN
I know Farnham’s bite. It isn’t very dangerous.
VILLA
He thinks it is.
VAN ZORN
[Moving nearer to her, as if drawn]
How soon do you expect him back?
VILLA
[Suddenly serious]
At any moment.
[LUCAS begins a silent investigation of the studio, while MRS. LOVETT and OTTO talk together, MRS. LOVETT apparently amused and perhaps a little scandalized by his childlike narrations. She looks frequently and almost eagerly at VAN ZORN and VILLA, who stand near the table. They seem to be laboring under a mysterious constraint, which VILLA tries to put of with an assumed light humor]
VAN ZORN
[Smiling]
You talk as if you thought me a doubtful character.
I trust that Farnham hasn’t given me one.
VILLA
[Nervously]
Weldon has praised you so much that we are all a little afraid of you.
VAN ZORN
I shall have to stop that.
[Pause]
Do you remember the day when you and Mr. —
[Glancing at OTTO]
Mr. Mink — went over my boat with Farnham and me?
VILLA
Of course I do. That was the day before you sailed away to the other side of the world.
VAN ZORN
[Earnestly]
Thank you for remembering that day.
VILLA
[Still nervous]
I remember the day — and I remember that you frightened me somehow.
[Laughing]
You made me think of Captain Kidd and the Flying Dutchman — both together.
VAN ZORN
[Smiling]
I don’t know about Captain Kidd, but I suppose I am a sort of Dutchman.
VILLA
[With a little shiver]
Not the Flying Dutchman — I hope?
VAN ZORN
[With a quaint seriousness]
No — not exactly. As a matter of fact, I have undertaken to be a doctor.
VILLA
[Bewildered]
Medicine, Philosophy or Divinity?
VAN ZORN
[With a melancholy laugh.]
All three, in a measure — and I shall be my own patient.
[Quite seriously]
I must have a place in the scheme of existence, and I have had a presentiment that I am soon to find it.
VILLA
[Drawing back a little and laughing]
You?... A place in the scheme of existence?...
I’m beginning to be positively creepy. I thought you had everything.
VAN ZORN
[Shaking his head]
Then you are greatly mistaken. I have nothing — yet.
VILLA
[Impulsively]
What a very unfortunate person! I beg your pardon a thousand times, but you make me laugh.
VAN ZORN
You needn’t be apo
logetic, and you needn’t laugh.
VILLA
[Bewildered]
What — are you going to do — first?
VAN ZORN
[Smiling faintly]
I have thought of several plans to make my existence worth while, but I am not yet sure of any of them.
VILLA
[With a sigh and a laugh]
Well, I don’t know what you expect me to say. You don’t speak a language that a poor girl can understand.
[She looks over her shoulder and meets the eyes of LUCAS, who by this time has made a circuit of the studio and taken a casual inventory of its contents. She looks at him, smiling, and then at VAN ZORN, who is looking at LUCAS with a slight frown that is both friendly and inquiring]
VILLA
I wonder if George — Mr. Lucas — could be of any service to you. He isn’t a doctor, but he knows almost everything.
VAN ZORN
[Pleasantly, after a slow nod at Lucas]
Does he know himself?
LUCAS
[With a shrug]
I regret to say that he does.
VAN ZORN
[To Lucas, distinctly]
Then Miss Vannevar is right. The man who knows himself does know almost everything.
[There has been a brief pause in OTTO’S animated conversation with MRS. LOVETT, and now OTTO looks keenly at VILLA,
VAN ZORN, and LUCAS]
VILLA
[Laughing at Otto]
The man who knows himself must be inspired.
[To VAN ZORN]
Otto couldn’t keep from being inspired if he tried. Otto is a poet.
OTTO
[Grinning]
Do I look like one?
VILLA
You look like a rose of Sharon, Otto.
[Glancing towards the door]
I thought I heard something.
OTTO
[Holding up his finger]
Hist! There it is again!
[Going to the door mysteriously]
It’s the Thing itself.
[FARNHAM is heard in the vestibule, singing carelessly to himself the air of the Conspirators from “La Fille de Madame Angot.”
OTTO opens the door with a flourish, and FARNHAM soon enters]
OTTO
You are late, and the show is half over.
[Putting his hands into his trousers’ pockets]
The next thing on the programme will be the eminent comedians, Van Zorn and Lucas, in “The Old Oaken Bucket.” Song and dance.
MRS. LOVETT
[With languid primness]
Otto, you might take your hat and go home.
FARNHAM
[Taking Mrs. Lovett’s hand]
No, don’t send him home. He can’t help it. The trouble is in his brain.
[He shakes hands with Villa and smiles]
But you
[Shaking hands with Van Zorn and looking at him with eager satisfaction]
— you might have let a fellow know that you were coming.
[looking around]
I suppose there is no need of introductions.
OTTO
[Beaming]
None whatever. We are all happily acquainted.
FARNHAM
[After giving Otto a patronizing scrutiny]
There are the photographs, Mrs. Lovett, and if you don’t find them sufficiently bad, it won’t be Petherick’s fault. Poor Poe!
[Nodding to Van Zorn]
He could tell you something about Destiny, if he were alive.
[He nods at the envelope]
MRS. LOVETT
[Looking at one of the photographs]
Poe was a wonderful creature.
FARNHAM
There are no records to prove that he ever denied it.
[To Villa, with his most confident smile]
Have you seen the picture, and the frame?
[He gazes at the easel, frowns for a moment, and then laughs drily]
Who turned it to the wall? Did you do that, Lucas?
VILLA
[Quickly]
Otto did it. I told him to.
FARNHAM
[Rather drily]
That was very considerate of you.
[He moves the easel back to its former position]
Well, there it is.
[Confidently]
And now you may all do your worst. Otto and Lucas needn’t say anything, for I know what they think already.
OTTO
[Cheerfully]
You may not. We’ve never told you.
FARNHAM
[With a short laugh]
Well, if you haven’t, you needn’t.
[Van Zorn stands before the picture and studies it ominously]
FARNHAM
Well, which is it — life, or death?
VAN ZORN
[With annihilating deliberation]
I should say that it was neither. I am not satisfied with it.
FARNHAM
[With a dry laugh]
Were you ever entirely satisfied with anything?
VAN ZORN
[Gently]
We are not here on earth to be entirely satisfied, are we?
FARNHAM
Oh, I don’t know about that.
VAN ZORN
I hope most sincerely that you are not satisfied with this picture.
FARNHAM
I thought it had a kind of merit.
VAN ZORN
[Frowning]
It has. It’s a work of genius, if you like.
OTTO
[Promptly]
That’s what I said.
FARNHAM
[Patiently]
I know it Otto — And now I should like to hear what Mrs Lovett has to say.
MRS. LOVETT
But, dear Weldon, you can’t possibly care what I
think — a poor old thing like me.
[Looking through her glasses]
Of course you have flattered the poor child almost to death.
FARNHAM
[Genially]
I don’t see how you can say so.
VILLA
[To Van Zorn and Lucas]
Help! help!
MRS. LOVETT
But you are a wonderful creature, all the same, and I
shall have to forgive you. Two very intelligent men
[Beaming on Otto]
have called you a genius, and surely that should be enough for one morning.
OTTO
Three, Mrs. Lovett, Phœbus — I mean George — called him one before you came in.
MRS. LOVETT
[After a look at Lucas]
I am very glad to hear it.
OTTO
[Briskly]
I knew you would be.
[Going to Lucas]
And now, Phoebus — I mean George — it’s time for you and me to go out and have something to eat. I have a premonition that you and I are in a way to become superfluous.
MRS. LOVETT
[With motherly tolerance]
Otto, are you going to talk nonsense all the rest of your life?
OTTO
[Spinning his hat on the end of his stick]
If youth but knew.
VILLA
[With animation]
Why can’t we all go out and lunch somewhere together?
I’ve got some money.
MRS. LOVETT
You forget, my child, that we are to have luncheon with Mrs Dyce.
OTTO
Give my love to Mrs. Dyce, and to the Pomeranian twins. And now Phoebus and I are going over to the Brevoort House and have something with a squeezed lime in it. After that we shall have a morsel of bread, and Phoebus will tell me what he thinks of my new book — Au Cinquième, I call it.
[To Villa]
You haven’t seen it. Are you going to be at home this afternoon?
VILLA
[Laughing]
Yes, Otto, — to you
.
OTTO
All right. I’ll bring around a copy of Au Cinquième.
[cheerfully] I wrote it with my heart’s blood.
[To Lucas, briskly]
Come along, Phoebus.
VILLA
[Going to Lucas and holding out her hand]
Good-bye, George.
LUCAS
[Taking her hand and speaking strangely]
Good-bye.
VAN ZORN
[Giving Lucas his hand]
I am very glad to have met you, Mr. Lucas — very glad indeed.
[He speaks with a peculiar earnestness that causes Mrs. Lovett and Farnham to look at each other. But Lucas appears to be abstracted and indifferent]
OTTO
[At the door, declaiming solemnly]
“So now for a season we leave you, taking with us our various musical instruments. Presently we shall return, bringing with us nothing but our accordéons.” Auf wiedersehen.
[Otto and Lucas go out. Mrs. Lovett and Farnham look after Otto and laugh. Van Zorn looks at Villa Vannevar, who stands gazing at the floor. Her face is troubled and she bites her under lip as if to keep it under control]
MRS. LOVETT
[To Farnham]
Otto should be ashamed of himself.
FARNHAM
He will be — sometime.
MRS. LOVETT
He is going to take that poor unfortunate Mr. Lucas over to the Brevoort House and give him liquor.
FARNHAM
[With an unfeeling grin]
I don’t see any way out of it now. As for poor Mr.