hated to leave him. It seemed as if he heard voices....
WALTER
Sit down, mother. It's very jolly here.
MRS. EVERITT
Thank you, Walter. How many years since I've enjoyed a real fire, like
this!
WALTER
Oh, there isn't enough wood. Just a minute--(_He goes out_)
ALICE
You look tired.
MRS. EVERITT
I'm all right, dear.
ALICE
No you're not. Why won't you tell me?
MRS. EVERITT
But Alice, there's nothing to tell. I do feel a little tired, but then, I
shall be all right in the morning.
ALICE
I wish--(_Walter enters with more wood_)
WALTER
Well, Alice, are you still thinking about that dance?
ALICE
Why no, I'd forgotten all about it. Who could dance in such a rain? It
would make the music seem artificial. I'm getting tired of boys, too. They
don't really _feel_ things--like rain, and fire.
MRS. EVERITT
What's that noise,--Harold?
WALTER
No. It's the men in the bar room.
MRS. EVERITT
I'm sure it's Harold.
ALICE
I'll go see. (_She goes out_)
WALTER
Mother.
MRS. EVERITT
What, Walter?
WALTER
I must be an awful coward--
MRS. EVERITT
Why, what do you mean?
WALTER
I mean that when I really want something, and ought to say so, I go along
without saying it. I don't mean that I'm _really_ afraid to say it, but I
always feel somehow that other people ought to know what I want, and save
me the trouble of asking it. No, not _trouble_ exactly--but you know what
I mean.
MRS. EVERITT
Yes, Walter, I'm afraid I know exactly what you mean. Lots of us are
cursed with the same instinct. I am, and sometimes I believe your father
is, too. It ought to be that when one sees a thing clearly in his own
mind, and knows it is best, others--at least those near to him--should
somehow be aware of it. But they usually are not.
WALTER
No. And it's those nearest one that it's hardest to say things to. But
to-night, somehow, I don't feel that way.
MRS. EVERITT
Tell me.
WALTER
It's this architecture. You remember when I used to play with water colors
all the while, and say I was going to be an artist?
MRS. EVERITT
Yes, but--
WALTER
Father always said I would get over it. But when I didn't, then it
occurred to him that if I learned architecture I could help him in his
building.... I thought architecture would be the same. But it isn't. I
can't see any art in it at all--it's nothing but engineering.
MRS. EVERITT
But Walter, you haven't gone far enough in it. The art will come later.
WALTER
No it won't! At least not with father. He never builds anything that lets
me _imagine_. You don't know how I hate those blue prints. I've been
worrying along so far because I didn't want to disappoint father, though
every day I hoped he would see what I really felt. But to-night I know I
can't go on any longer without having it out. If he will let me follow my
own idea he will be better pleased in the end than if I stick at this
business of his. It will require one good fight, and then I shall be free
to show what I can do.
MRS. EVERITT
But Walter, what is it exactly you want to do?
WALTER.
I suppose I ought to say that I want to be an artist rather than a
builder's draughtsman, but that isn't really it. I mean that behind the
brain I think with every day there is another brain, bigger and wiser,
that keeps asking the chance to show the rest of me what and how to act.
In ordinary things the everyday mind gets along by itself all right, but I
feel the other self there all the while, wanting me to begin something
different, something to let it escape from dreaming to doing. And it keeps
threatening that some day it will he too late. Only begin, begin!... Yes,
I have worried along so far, but just to-night, for some reason or other,
I seem to be standing on the brink. I won't go another step. It's in the
rain now--I hear it. Oh, the pictures I could paint if we lived in the
country!
MRS. EVERITT
In the country!
WALTER
Yes. It comes over me here how much these hills mean. Oh! and there's
another thing, mother.... I thought I was born in New York, I thought we
always lived there, but just a while ago I ran onto your old family Bible,
and it had the records in it. I--
MRS. EVERITT
Oh, Walter!
WALTER
It seems queer that neither of you said anything about it, if I was really
born in this very town.... I might never have thought much about it, but
to-night everything seems to be stirred up. Tell me, mother--
MRS. EVERITT
We lived here only a little while. We didn't like it, so your father sold
his farm and we went away to New York.
WALTER
Yes, but why wasn't something said about it when we came here this
afternoon? It seems funny, not to.
MRS. EVERITT
Dear, there was a little family trouble, long ago, which is best
forgotten.
WALTER
Oh.
ALICE (_entering_)
It wasn't Harold, after all, but I just had to stay and listen to him. He
tried over and over to tell me something. I couldn't make out what it was
until he showed me with his hands--you know that funny little way he
has--and what do you suppose it was?
MRS. EVERITT
The dear child. What was it?
ALICE
Why, he remembered the big drum he saw once in a parade, and he was trying
to explain that he was _inside_ a drum. The rain, you know.
EVERITT (_entering_)
We had to jack up the car. The barn is flooding with water.
MRS. EVERITT
Is that where you were?
EVERITT
Yes.... How strange you look in that light, Alice! I never saw you look
like that before. (_He kisses her_)
ALICE
Oh!
MRS. EVERITT
What is it, Alice?
ALICE
Why ... I thought his cigar was going to burn me.
MRS. EVERITT
Oh.
EVERITT
Alice, you jumped because you didn't like my breath. I'm sorry, I did take
a drink, and I shouldn't have kissed you, only....
WALTER
Only what?
EVERITT
She looked just as Mary did when I first knew her. It startled me.
ALICE
Do I?
MRS. EVERITT
Was I like that?
EVERITT
Of course you were.
ALICE
Oh, I'm glad!
MRS. EVERITT
Thank you, dear, but you're not half so glad as I am.
EVERITT
It's queer, there used to be a fine old stock up in this country. It seems
to have died out. The people here don't half appreciate the place.
MRS. EVERITT
But you haven't seen many of them, have you?
EVERITT
No, I talked with some in the bar room.
ALICE
Oh, the bar room?
EVERITT
Yes, I know. One can't judge from that. A filthy place--it made me ashamed
of drinking. I only went in hoping to see some of the people I used to
know.
MRS. EVERITT
Oh!
WALTER
Where's my portfolio?
MRS. EVERITT
In the office, with those hand bags we decided not to open.
WALTER
I'm going to get it. I just had an idea.... (_He goes out_)
EVERITT
It's only ten o'clock, but it seems like midnight.
ALICE
So it does. Are we going on to-morrow? Will the car be all right?
EVERITT
George says so. To-morrow? I suppose so.
ALICE
Well, I'm going to bed.
MRS. EVERITT
I hope Harold is asleep. Good night, dear.
EVERITT
Good night, Mary.
ALICE
You said "Mary."
EVERITT
Did I? Well, you might be, for all that.
ALICE (_leaving_)
Good night.
EVERITT
If she had on that blue dress you used to wear, your own mother couldn't
tell you apart.
MRS. EVERITT
Charles.
EVERITT
What?
MRS. EVERITT
Walter knows he was born here. He wants to know why we didn't mention it
to-day.
EVERITT
So do I! So do I want to know why we didn't mention it! It's been between
us all these years! (_Walter enters with his portfolio. He stands
unnoticed at the door_)
MRS. EVERITT
You want to know? You know very well yourself! It's I who ought to ask
what the matter is!
EVERITT
You? Good heavens! Wasn't it you who suddenly made up your mind we had to
leave this town, and insisted and insisted until I sold the house? Didn't
I do that to please you, because you went into hysterics about it, and I
had to think of Walter? I didn't want to go. It isn't every man who would
change his whole life for a woman's unreasonable whim!
MRS. EVERITT
Whim! It isn't every wife who--Oh! Oh!
EVERITT
Yes whim! And haven't I stayed away all these years from my people because
you wouldn't hear to our coming back even for a visit?
MRS. EVERITT
No you didn't stay away! You sneaked up here the very next year when you
made that trip to Boston. And you can't deny it, because Janet Richardson
wrote me.
EVERITT
Sneaked up here! Deny it! Are you mad? The only reason I didn't mention it
was because I never understood your positive hatred for the place. What
harm was there in coming back for a day or two? On every other subject you
are all right, but whenever we get within a mile of mentioning this town I
feel your hysteria, so I have kept still. But if there's anything you can
say to explain yourself, for goodness sake say it! This nightmare has
been between us long enough.
MRS. EVERITT
Yes, it has! Too long! And I like your way of saying you had to think of
Walter! It was I had to think of my baby! If it hadn't been for Walter, I
wouldn't have lived with you another day! I kept on at first so that he
might be born with a father to look out for him, and then I kept on so
that he needn't grow up in the shame of a divorce. But oh, the pain of it!
To keep silent, year after year!
EVERITT
Look here, are we both crazy? Out with it!
MRS. EVERITT
_Annie Pratt!_
EVERITT
What? Who?
MRS. EVERITT
Annie Pratt!
EVERITT
Who the devil's Annie Pratt? What's she got to do with it?
MRS. EVERITT
Ha! Not faithful even to her! Or are you trying to lie out of it? You
can't, _because I've still got the letter_.
EVERITT
What letter? I'm not going to stand these hysterics any longer!
MRS. EVERITT
You needn't. But you've got to stand the truth, do you hear me? I found
the letter in your pocket. We hadn't been married a year. I was so happy!
Oh! Oh!
EVERITT
So was I happy, Oh! Oh!
MRS. EVERITT
Hypocrite! "Dearest Charlie: You said it is I who am your wife really,
because it's I who make you happy." Vile cat!
EVERITT
Annie Pratt, Annie Pratt. I remember her....
MRS. EVERITT
I should think you would! But any man who will--
EVERITT
Look here! I've got the whole thing! You found that letter in my pocket?
MRS. EVERITT
Yes I did.
EVERITT
Well, do you remember my quarrel with Charlie Fisher?
MRS. EVERITT
Yes. Why?
EVERITT
Because, you poor child, that letter was written to him.
MRS. EVERITT
To him!
EVERITT
Yes, Charlie Fisher. I found that he was going with Annie Pratt and I had
it out with him one day in the barn. I told him if he didn't quit his
foolishness I'd tell his people. We nearly came to blows--he was drinking
too much, too--and I found that letter on the floor afterwards. I meant to
burn it up, but I forgot it. And you thought I was the Charlie!
MRS. EVERITT
God forgive me!
EVERITT
But why on earth didn't you come right out with it?
MRS. EVERITT
Oh! You can't realize how crushed I felt. I wanted only to run away, like
a wounded animal.... And then I couldn't bear to quarrel, for the sake of
Walter. So it's been festering in me all this time.
EVERITT
So that's it. Well, thank heaven! (_He starts to embrace her_)
MRS. EVERITT
But that letter you picked up so quickly to-night--was that from somebody
else?
EVERITT
Lord, I'd almost forgotten it.
MRS. EVERITT
There! And I was almost happy!
EVERITT
For goodness sake, read it!
MRS. EVERITT
From your bank.... I don't understand it.
EVERITT
It's simple enough. They won't make me another loan.
MRS. EVERITT
Well?
EVERITT
Between the unions and the new inspection--well, I can't finish the
Broadway contract on time, and I'm done.
MRS. EVERITT
Done?
EVERITT
Done. Smashed. I might save ten thousand dollars, that's all. My life's
work....
MRS. EVERITT
You mean money?
EVERITT
I mean the lack of it.
MRS. EVERITT
Is that all? Thank heaven!
EVERITT
All! But do you realize it means giving up the house, and beginning all
over again on ten thousand dollars?
MRS. EVERITT
I don't care. I was never happy there anyhow. And now I could be happy
doing my own work in a tenement.
EVERITT
I think I could be happy as a carpenter again by the day. But the
children. It's going to be hard for them. Walter's architecture.
WALTER
Father!
EVERITT
Good gracious! Where did you come from?
WALTER
I came back from the office.... I heard what you were saying. So that's
all right. But you needn't worry about my architecture. I was telling
mother to-night. I don't like it--it isn't my work. I only wanted you to
feel as I do about it. Just feel that I really want to paint--to be an
artist. Even if I have to work at something else for a long time, I'll
feel easier, knowing you realize what I want. I love color so. And I want
to let my imagination _go_. I'll help in any way I can, naturally. I'm
glad too. I mean, I had rather live in the country like this than in New
York.
EVERITT
Good Lord! (_Alice appears in the doorway holding Harold_)
WALTER
It seems to me that none of us has been really satisfied, so it isn't so
bad after all. We can begin on something real to us all. Mother said she
would be happy in a tenement. Well, maybe she would, but why not come up
here?
MRS. EVERITT
Oh, _Charles_!
EVERITT
Well ... but Alice.
ALICE
Mother.
MRS. EVERITT
You, too! What is it? What's the matter with Harold?
ALICE
Nothing. He wouldn't go to sleep, and wouldn't. He said he wanted to sit
in your lap. I never saw him so. I had to bring him.
MRS. EVERITT
Give him to me, dear.
ALICE
And I knew something was going on down here... I could _feel_ it. I don't
know what it was, but there's one thing I do know.
MRS. EVERITT
What?
ALICE
Why, ever since father said I looked as you used to I've been thinking
about what you must have been like as a girl, and it came over me how
_useless_ I am. I've never done anything. And you must have done a lot.
EVERITT
I should say she did!
WALTER
There! Say, Alice, how'd you like to live in that white house we passed,
the one with the orchard?
ALICE
Really? And _do_ things?
MRS. EVERITT
Charles!
EVERITT
This is the most extraordinary night I ever heard of. Here I was, feeling
like a condemned criminal because I'd lost my business, afraid to tell
Mary and you children, and now you all seem positively glad of it. I
expected all kinds of trouble, and all at once.... _What the deuce is it?_
HAROLD
Rain--rain.... Mother, why can't the brook come back to the _same_ little
girl?
PICTURES
_A studio on the Rue Notre-Dame-des-Champs. There is a small entrance
hall, kitchenette, and a balcony before which curtains are drawn. It is a
winter afternoon, and a young man is busy at an easel placed close beside
the north light. A young woman arranges tea things on the table._
SILVIA
Joe.
JOE
Um.
SILVIA
Joe!
JOE
Um--um! _(She walks over, draws his watch from his pocket and shows him
the time)_
SILVIA
It's nearly four o'clock.
JOE
Just a minute--the light's fine, and I want to finish.
SILVIA
Yes, I know, but he may be here any minute.
JOE
Tea on?
SILVIA
Yes.
JOE
Well, that'll keep him while I get ready. That's mostly what they came
for, anyhow.
SILVIA
But he's different. He isn't a Cook's tourist--
JOE
No, he's a relative!
SILVIA
You wouldn't say that if one of _your_ family dropped in. Besides, I've
never even seen him. And he's something of a collector, Joe. He _buys_
pictures.
JOE
So I hear. The last thing he bought was a Bougereau!
SILVIA
Well, he's a _relative_ ... and when he sees your last things!
JOE
Um.... There, it's all done.
SILVIA
I'm crazy to see it, Joe, but run up and get ready. _Sh!_ (_A knock at the
door. Joe runs upstairs to the balcony. Silvia opens the door and admits
Mr. Wentworth, rather stout and with gold spectacles_)
MR. WENTWORTH
Mrs. Carson?
SILVIA
Yes. This is Mr. Wentworth? Joe and I have been expecting you. Let me take
your coat. The studio's rather upset just now--
MR. WENTWORTH
Delightful! How I love the atmosphere of work in a studio! I used to paint
a bit myself, you know.
SILVIA
Did you? Father never mentioned that.
MR. WENTWORTH
Oh, I guess everybody has forgotten it by now. An early adventure with
life! Goodness only knows what might have happened, though, if the
business hadn't fallen on me to look out for. I might have been a great
artist. Ha!
SILVIA
I'm sure you would, Mr. Wentworth. You've always been interested in art,
haven't you?
MR. WENTWORTH
Yes indeed. Of course I have been very busy, until lately. But I always
followed the best English magazines.
SILVIA
My husband's upstairs getting the paint off his hands. He will be down in
a minute. Then we'll have some tea.
MR. WENTWORTH
You don't paint, do you, Silvia? I may call you Silvia, may I not?
SILVIA
Of course. No, I don't paint. I just fly around amongst the artists and
see what's going on. Are you staying in Paris very long?
MR. WENTWORTH
A couple of weeks more, at least. I am revelling in the galleries and
museums here.
SILVIA
Here comes Joe. Joe, I want you to meet my cousin, Mr. Wentworth. Mr.
Wentworth--Mr. Carson.
JOE
Very glad to meet you, Mr. Wentworth.
MR. WENTWORTH
It's a great pleasure for me to meet a real artist, Mr. Carson.
SILVIA
Excuse me a moment. I'll bring on the tea.
JOE
Oh, as for that--I'm working along. Sometimes I hit it--
MR. WENTWORTH
_Ars longa, vita brevis_ you know! I want to see your pictures very much.
I was just telling Silvia how I delight in the Louvre. I go there with a
class for lectures every morning. I suppose you often copy the old
masters?
JOE
Copy the old masters? I should say not. I'm not out to be a camera. It's
all I can do to work out my own impressions.
MR. WENTWORTH
Oh, I see. But--
SILVIA
The tea's ready. Joe, bring up that chair for Mr. Wentworth. Mr.
Wentworth, do you take cream and sugar?
MR. WENTWORTH If you please. Yes, two lumps. There's nothing like the
atmosphere of a studio, is there? I love it. I feel I have missed so
much. Still, the instinct for beauty, fragile as it is, does persist.... I
was surprised to feel so many of my old emotions awake on coming to Paris.
So much that hasn't been real to me for years! I have gained much
inspiration for planning my new house.
SILVIA
You are building a new house? I have heard father talk about your
collection of Japanese prints.
MR. WENTWORTH
A really delightful thing, Japanese prints. Yes, I intend building on Long
Island. And my new interest in pictures ... I shall have a gallery
especially for them.
JOE
Americans haven't done any too much for art so far.
MR. WENTWORTH
Oh, I assure you! I know many men who are continually buying the best on
the market.
JOE
Oh, _that_....
SILVIA
Another cup, Mr. Wentworth? Joe, pass the cake.
MR. WENTWORTH
No, thank you, Silvia. Yes, the cake if you please. Why, it's real English
plumcake!
SILVIA
English things are getting very popular over here. Joe, won't you show us
the new picture? He finished it just before you came, Mr. Wentworth.
MR. WENTWORTH
Indeed! I should like to see it very much.
JOE
There isn't very much light.
SILVIA
No, the light is poor. But even so--and your colors will stand out, Joe.
MR. WENTWORTH
Really, Mr. Carson, I counted on seeing some of your work. I have heard,
nice things about you.
JOE
There. If you stand just here....
SILVIA
Oh, _Joe_!
JOE
What?
SILVIA
It's our little cottage! I'm so glad! That's where we lived last summer,
Mr. Wentworth. I always wanted Joe to paint it. Joe, it's splendid! Don't
you think so, Mr. Wentworth?
MR. WENTWORTH
Yes.... Yes. _Very_ interesting....
SILVIA
Don't you love the bright colors and the firm, flowing lines?
MR. WENTWORTH
Of course, it isn't exactly what I have been accustomed to.... I have
heard that some of the younger Frenchmen and Russians are painting in a
new way, but--
SILVIA
Joe, it's so _alive_! I _feel_ it, every inch of it! You've no idea, Mr.
Wentworth, how Joe's painting has changed me. I used to be such a little
New Englander, _afraid_ of life, but now--
JOE
It isn't only what you call the "younger Frenchmen and Russians" who are
learning how to paint--the modern movement has spread all over.
MR. WENTWORTH
Of course, I don't pretend to be an artist myself, but I have always
studied and loved pictures, and when you say "learning _how_ to paint"--
JOE
That's exactly what it is. Learning _how_ to paint. Learning what art is.
Getting _life_ into it instead of abstract ideas.
MR. WENTWORTH
Art? But art is beauty! Eternal beauty. You can't change art over night,
like a fashion!
SILVIA
But that picture's beautiful!
JOE
Art changes as life changes. Art has always changed. If it didn't, why
isn't your Japanese art just like Greek art? And Greek art like the
Italian?
MR. WENTWORTH
Oh, in that way, of course. But all the great masters obey the eternal
laws of beauty!
JOE
There aren't any eternal _laws_ of beauty! There's only the eternal
impulse to create. Every artist has to express himself in his own way.
What you call the "eternal laws" are merely the particular expressions
your own favorite painters happened to work out in their time. If they had
lived in another time--
MR. WENTWORTH
A master would always be a master. There's no change possible in the
vision of the soul.
SILVIA
You see, Mr. Wentworth, what I have learned these last two years from
living among artists is that the painter with an original vision is always
opposed by the schools. That is, at first. But when he wins out, then the
schools merely take over his technic and use it as a club to put down the
next creator. And so it goes.
MR. WENTWORTH
Naturally, the great artist suffers hardship. But if we once admit there
are no _laws_, where are we? Anarchy!
JOE
The laws are contained in the impulses themselves. They come _with_ the
vision, not before it! If any one thinks this modern art is just an easy
way of painting--
SILVIA
Indeed it isn't! Joe works much harder than the students who go to the
schools. Of course, he doesn't paint by the clock.
MR. WENTWORTH
But the Louvre! All those beautiful pictures, those priceless treasures!
What about the Louvre?
JOE
The Louvre? It's a _museum_.
MR. WENTWORTH
What do you mean by "it's a _museum_"?
JOE
I mean that it's the place to put pictures in when they are dead.
MR. WENTWORTH
_Dead?_ A great masterpiece _dead_?
JOE
Of course. No man lives forever. Nobody that was ever born was useful
enough to live forever. The bigger a man is the longer his influence is
creative, in art and everything else, but the time always comes when his
value is spent. When the world needs a new influence.
SILVIA
It's really wonderful, Mr. Wentworth, how knowing the truth about art
shows one the truth about other things. When I remember what I used to
believe!
MR. WENTWORTH
But see here, young man, you wouldn't do away with the _Louvre_, would
you? Why, what would happen if these ideas were carried out....
JOE
No, I wouldn't do away with it. Why should I? If to burn it down would
wake people up to _life_, I'd do it in a minute. But it wouldn't. They
would only sanctify the superstition and make it immortal. No, leave the
Louvre as it is. It's really quite useful.
MR. WENTWORTH
But good gracious! _Useful?_
JOE
Yes. Like history. To do away with the Louvre would be to destroy a part
of history. There's no good doing that. We need history--it cranks up
life--but we've got to recognize that after all it is only history, not
life itself--not art.
MR. WENTWORTH
But what _is_ art, if the Louvre _isn't_?
SILVIA
Don't you see, Mr. Wentworth? If you could only get for a moment into the
stream of experience where Joe and the others brought me! A picture is art
as long as it's alive--as long as it can give back the fresh, first-hand
impulses that were put into it. After that--when life has flowed on and
set up new impulses requiring a different expression--then a picture drops
back upon a lower level. What Joe calls _history_.
JOE
Like everything else.
MR. WENTWORTH
But you put art on the same plane as invention. An improved motor car
scraps the old model. But you can't _improve_ art!
JOE
No, certainly not. We don't try to. We just do our best. We _recover_ art.
MR. WENTWORTH
_Recover_ it?
SILVIA
Yes--discover it all over again. It gets lost, lost in hard and fast rules
or sentimentality, then a genius comes along and digs down to the buried
city--creation. Art isn't like invention. It's more like religion.
MR. WENTWORTH
There you are!
JOE
There we are! Isn't there a struggle going on all the time to free
religion, the _spirit_ of religion, from hard and fast rules and from
false emotions? It's exactly the same thing.
MR. WENTWORTH
Ah, but rules are necessary to maintain order. That's what I insist about
art. We _must_ have rules!
SILVIA