ACT I

Plays by

Susan Glaspell

TRIFLES

THE OUTSIDE

THE VERGE

INHERITORS

TRIFLES

First performed by the Provincetown Players at the Wharf Theatre,

Provincetown, Mass., August 8, 1916.

GEORGE HENDERSON (County Attorney)

HENRY PETERS (Sheriff)

LEWIS HALE, A neighboring farmer

MRS PETERS

MRS HALE

SCENE: _The kitchen is the now abandoned farmhouse of_ JOHN WRIGHT, _a

gloomy kitchen, and left without having been put in order--unwashed pans

under the sink, a loaf of bread outside the bread-box, a dish-towel on

the table--other signs of incompleted work. At the rear the outer door

opens and the_ SHERIFF _comes in followed by the_ COUNTY ATTORNEY _and_

HALE. _The_ SHERIFF _and_ HALE _are men in middle life, the_ COUNTY

ATTORNEY _is a young man; all are much bundled up and go at once to the

stove. They are followed by the two women--the_ SHERIFF_'s wife first;

she is a slight wiry woman, a thin nervous face_. MRS HALE _is larger

and would ordinarily be called more comfortable looking, but she is

disturbed now and looks fearfully about as she enters. The women have

come in slowly, and stand close together near the door_.

COUNTY ATTORNEY: (_rubbing his hands_) This feels good. Come up to the

fire, ladies.

MRS PETERS: (_after taking a step forward_) I'm not--cold.

SHERIFF: (_unbuttoning his overcoat and stepping away from the stove as

if to mark the beginning of official business_) Now, Mr Hale, before we

move things about, you explain to Mr Henderson just what you saw when

you came here yesterday morning.

COUNTY ATTORNEY: By the way, has anything been moved? Are things just as

you left them yesterday?

SHERIFF: (_looking about_) It's just the same. When it dropped below

zero last night I thought I'd better send Frank out this morning to make

a fire for us--no use getting pneumonia with a big case on, but I told

him not to touch anything except the stove--and you know Frank.

COUNTY ATTORNEY: Somebody should have been left here yesterday.

SHERIFF: Oh--yesterday. When I had to send Frank to Morris Center for

that man who went crazy--I want you to know I had my hands full

yesterday. I knew you could get back from Omaha by today and as long as

I went over everything here myself--

COUNTY ATTORNEY: Well, Mr Hale, tell just what happened when you came

here yesterday morning.

HALE: Harry and I had started to town with a load of potatoes. We came

along the road from my place and as I got here I said, I'm going to see

if I can't get John Wright to go in with me on a party telephone.' I

spoke to Wright about it once before and he put me off, saying folks

talked too much anyway, and all he asked was peace and quiet--I guess

you know about how much he talked himself; but I thought maybe if I went

to the house and talked about it before his wife, though I said to Harry

that I didn't know as what his wife wanted made much difference to

John--

COUNTY ATTORNEY: Let's talk about that later, Mr Hale. I do want to talk

about that, but tell now just what happened when you got to the house.

HALE: I didn't hear or see anything; I knocked at the door, and still it

was all quiet inside. I knew they must be up, it was past eight o'clock.

So I knocked again, and I thought I heard somebody say, 'Come in.' I

wasn't sure, I'm not sure yet, but I opened the door--this door

(_indicating the door by which the two women are still standing_) and

there in that rocker--(_pointing to it_) sat Mrs Wright.

(_They all look at the rocker_.)

COUNTY ATTORNEY: What--was she doing?

HALE: She was rockin' back and forth. She had her apron in her hand and

was kind of--pleating it.

COUNTY ATTORNEY: And how did she--look?

HALE: Well, she looked queer.

COUNTY ATTORNEY: How do you mean--queer?

HALE: Well, as if she didn't know what she was going to do next. And

kind of done up.

COUNTY ATTORNEY: How did she seem to feel about your coming?

HALE: Why, I don't think she minded--one way or other. She didn't pay

much attention. I said, 'How do, Mrs Wright it's cold, ain't it?' And

she said, 'Is it?'--and went on kind of pleating at her apron. Well, I

was surprised; she didn't ask me to come up to the stove, or to set

down, but just sat there, not even looking at me, so I said, 'I want to

see John.' And then she--laughed. I guess you would call it a laugh. I

thought of Harry and the team outside, so I said a little sharp: 'Can't

I see John?' 'No', she says, kind o' dull like. 'Ain't he home?' says I.

'Yes', says she, 'he's home'. 'Then why can't I see him?' I asked her,

out of patience. ''Cause he's dead', says she. _'Dead_?' says I. She

just nodded her head, not getting a bit excited, but rockin' back and

forth. 'Why--where is he?' says I, not knowing what to say. She just

pointed upstairs--like that (_himself pointing to the room above_) I got

up, with the idea of going up there. I walked from there to here--then I

says, 'Why, what did he die of?' 'He died of a rope round his neck',

says she, and just went on pleatin' at her apron. Well, I went out and

called Harry. I thought I might--need help. We went upstairs and there

he was lyin'--

COUNTY ATTORNEY: I think I'd rather have you go into that upstairs,

where you can point it all out. Just go on now with the rest of the

story.

HALE: Well, my first thought was to get that rope off. It looked ...

(_stops, his face twitches_) ... but Harry, he went up to him, and he

said, 'No, he's dead all right, and we'd better not touch anything.' So

we went back down stairs. She was still sitting that same way. 'Has

anybody been notified?' I asked. 'No', says she unconcerned. 'Who did

this, Mrs Wright?' said Harry. He said it business-like--and she stopped

pleatin' of her apron. 'I don't know', she says. 'You don't _know_?'

says Harry. 'No', says she. 'Weren't you sleepin' in the bed with him?'

says Harry. 'Yes', says she, 'but I was on the inside'. 'Somebody

slipped a rope round his neck and strangled him and you didn't wake up?'

says Harry. 'I didn't wake up', she said after him. We must 'a looked as

if we didn't see how that could be, for after a minute she said, 'I

sleep sound'. Harry was going to ask her more questions but I said maybe

we ought to let her tell her story first to the coroner, or the sheriff,

so Harry went fast as he could to Rivers' place, where there's a

telephone.

COUNTY ATTORNEY: And what did Mrs Wright do when she knew that you had

gone for the coroner?

HALE: She moved from that chair to this one over here (_pointing to a

small chair in the corner_) and just sat there with her hands held

together and looking down. I got a feeling that I ought to make some

conversation, so I said I had come in to see if John wanted to put in a

telephone, and at that she started to laugh, and then she stopped and

looked at me--scared, (_the_ COUNTY ATTORNEY, _who has had his notebook

out, makes a note_) I dunno, maybe it wasn't scared. I wouldn't like to

say it was. Soon Harry got back, and then Dr Lloyd came, and you, Mr

Peters, and so I guess that's all I know that you don't.

COUNTY ATTORNEY: (_looking around_) I guess we'll go upstairs first--and

then out to the barn and around there, (_to the_ SHERIFF) You're

convinced that there was nothing important here--nothing that would

point to any motive.

SHERIFF: Nothing here but kitchen things.

(_The_ COUNTY ATTORNEY, _after again looking around the kitchen, opens

the door of a cupboard closet. He gets up on a chair and looks on a

shelf. Pulls his hand away, sticky_.)

COUNTY ATTORNEY: Here's a nice mess.

(_The women draw nearer_.)

MRS PETERS: (_to the other woman_) Oh, her fruit; it did freeze, (_to

the_ LAWYER) She worried about that when it turned so cold. She said the

fire'd go out and her jars would break.

SHERIFF: Well, can you beat the women! Held for murder and worryin'

about her preserves.

COUNTY ATTORNEY: I guess before we're through she may have something

more serious than preserves to worry about.

HALE: Well, women are used to worrying over trifles.

(_The two women move a little closer together_.)

COUNTY ATTORNEY: (_with the gallantry of a young politician_) And yet,

for all their worries, what would we do without the ladies? (_the women

do not unbend. He goes to the sink, takes a dipperful of water from the

pail and pouring it into a basin, washes his hands. Starts to wipe them

on the roller-towel, turns it for a cleaner place_) Dirty towels!

(_kicks his foot against the pans under the sink_) Not much of a

housekeeper, would you say, ladies?

MRS HALE: (_stiffly_) There's a great deal of work to be done on a farm.

COUNTY ATTORNEY: To be sure. And yet (_with a little bow to her_) I know

there are some Dickson county farmhouses which do not have such roller

towels. (_He gives it a pull to expose its length again_.)

MRS HALE: Those towels get dirty awful quick. Men's hands aren't always

as clean as they might be.

COUNTY ATTORNEY: Ah, loyal to your sex, I see. But you and Mrs Wright

were neighbors. I suppose you were friends, too.

MRS HALE: (_shaking her head_) I've not seen much of her of late years.

I've not been in this house--it's more than a year.

COUNTY ATTORNEY: And why was that? You didn't like her?

MRS HALE: I liked her all well enough. Farmers' wives have their hands

full, Mr Henderson. And then--

COUNTY ATTORNEY: Yes--?

MRS HALE: (_looking about_) It never seemed a very cheerful place.

COUNTY ATTORNEY: No--it's not cheerful. I shouldn't say she had the

homemaking instinct.

MRS HALE: Well, I don't know as Wright had, either.

COUNTY ATTORNEY: You mean that they didn't get on very well?

MRS HALE: No, I don't mean anything. But I don't think a place'd be any

cheerfuller for John Wright's being in it.

COUNTY ATTORNEY: I'd like to talk more of that a little later. I want to

get the lay of things upstairs now. (_He goes to the left, where three

steps lead to a stair door_.)

SHERIFF: I suppose anything Mrs Peters does'll be all right. She was to

take in some clothes for her, you know, and a few little things. We left

in such a hurry yesterday.

COUNTY ATTORNEY: Yes, but I would like to see what you take, Mrs Peters,

and keep an eye out for anything that might be of use to us.

MRS PETERS: Yes, Mr Henderson.

(_The women listen to the men's steps on the stairs, then look about the

kitchen_.)

MRS HALE: I'd hate to have men coming into my kitchen, snooping around

and criticising.

(_She arranges the pans under sink which the_ LAWYER _had shoved out of

place_.)

MRS PETERS: Of course it's no more than their duty.

MRS HALE: Duty's all right, but I guess that deputy sheriff that came

out to make the fire might have got a little of this on. (_gives the

roller towel a pull_) Wish I'd thought of that sooner. Seems mean to

talk about her for not having things slicked up when she had to come

away in such a hurry.

MRS PETERS: (_who has gone to a small table in the left rear corner of

the room, and lifted one end of a towel that covers a pan_) She had

bread set. (_Stands still_.)

MRS HALE: (_eyes fixed on a loaf of bread beside the bread-box, which is

on a low shelf at the other side of the room. Moves slowly toward it_)

She was going to put this in there, (_picks up loaf, then abruptly drops

it. In a manner of returning to familiar things_) It's a shame about her

fruit. I wonder if it's all gone. (_gets up on the chair and looks_) I

think there's some here that's all right, Mrs Peters. Yes--here;

(_holding it toward the window_) this is cherries, too. (_looking

again_) I declare I believe that's the only one. (_gets down, bottle in

her hand. Goes to the sink and wipes it off on the outside_) She'll feel

awful bad after all her hard work in the hot weather. I remember the

afternoon I put up my cherries last summer.

(_She puts the bottle on the big kitchen table, center of the room. With

a sigh, is about to sit down in the rocking-chair. Before she is seated

realizes what chair it is; with a slow look at it, steps back. The chair

which she has touched rocks back and forth_.)

MRS PETERS: Well, I must get those things from the front room closet,

(_she goes to the door at the right, but after looking into the other

room, steps back_) You coming with me, Mrs Hale? You could help me carry

them.

(_They go in the other room; reappear,_ MRS PETERS _carrying a dress and

skirt,_ MRS HALE _following with a pair of shoes._)

MRS PETERS: My, it's cold in there.

(_She puts the clothes on the big table, and hurries to the stove._)

MRS HALE: (_examining the skirt_) Wright was close. I think maybe that's

why she kept so much to herself. She didn't even belong to the Ladies

Aid. I suppose she felt she couldn't do her part, and then you don't

enjoy things when you feel shabby. She used to wear pretty clothes and

be lively, when she was Minnie Foster, one of the town girls singing in

the choir. But that--oh, that was thirty years ago. This all you was to

take in?

MRS PETERS: She said she wanted an apron. Funny thing to want, for there

isn't much to get you dirty in jail, goodness knows. But I suppose just

to make her feel more natural. She said they was in the top drawer in

this cupboard. Yes, here. And then her little shawl that always hung

behind the door. (_opens stair door and looks_) Yes, here it is.

(_Quickly shuts door leading upstairs._)

MRS HALE: (_abruptly moving toward her_) Mrs Peters?

MRS PETERS: Yes, Mrs Hale?

MRS HALE: Do you think she did it?

MRS PETERS: (_in a frightened voice_) Oh, I don't know.

MRS HALE: Well, I don't think she did. Asking for an apron and her

little shawl. Worrying about her fruit.

MRS PETERS: (_starts to speak, glances up, where footsteps are heard in

the room above. In a low voice_) Mr Peters says it looks bad for her. Mr

Henderson is awful sarcastic in a speech and he'll make fun of her

sayin' she didn't wake up.

MRS HALE: Well, I guess John Wright didn't wake when they was slipping

that rope under his neck.

MRS PETERS: No, it's strange. It must have been done awful crafty and

still. They say it was such a--funny way to kill a man, rigging it all

up like that.

MRS HALE: That's just what Mr Hale said. There was a gun in the house.

He says that's what he can't understand.

MRS PETERS: Mr Henderson said coming out that what was needed for the

case was a motive; something to show anger, or--sudden feeling.

MRS HALE: (_who is standing by the table_) Well, I don't see any signs

of anger around here, (_she puts her hand on the dish towel which lies

on the table, stands looking down at table, one half of which is clean,

the other half messy_) It's wiped to here, (_makes a move as if to

finish work, then turns and looks at loaf of bread outside the breadbox.

Drops towel. In that voice of coming back to familiar things._) Wonder

how they are finding things upstairs. I hope she had it a little more

red-up up there. You know, it seems kind of sneaking. Locking her up in

town and then coming out here and trying to get her own house to turn

against her!

MRS PETERS: But Mrs Hale, the law is the law.

MRS HALE: I s'pose 'tis, (_unbuttoning her coat_) Better loosen up your

things, Mrs Peters. You won't feel them when you go out.

(MRS PETERS _takes off her fur tippet, goes to hang it on hook at back

of room, stands looking at the under part of the small corner table_.)

MRS PETERS: She was piecing a quilt. (_She brings the large sewing

basket and they look at the bright pieces_.)

MRS HALE: It's log cabin pattern. Pretty, isn't it? I wonder if she was

goin' to quilt it or just knot it?

(_Footsteps have been heard coming down the stairs_. The SHERIFF enters

followed by HALE and the COUNTY ATTORNEY.)

SHERIFF: They wonder if she was going to quilt it or just knot it! (_The

men laugh, the women look abashed_.)

COUNTY ATTORNEY: (_rubbing his hands over the stove_) Frank's fire

didn't do much up there, did it? Well, let's go out to the barn and get

that cleared up. (_The men go outside_.)

MRS HALE: (_resentfully_) I don't know as there's anything so strange,

our takin' up our time with little things while we're waiting for them

to get the evidence. (_she sits down at the big table smoothing out a

block with decision_) I don't see as it's anything to laugh about.

MRS PETERS: (_apologetically_) Of course they've got awful important

things on their minds.

(_Pulls up a chair and joins MRS HALE at the table_.)

MRS HALE: (_examining another block_) Mrs Peters, look at this one.

Here, this is the one she was working on, and look at the sewing! All

the rest of it has been so nice and even. And look at this! It's all

over the place! Why, it looks as if she didn't know what she was about!

(_After she has said this they look at each other, then start to glance

back at the door. After an instant_ MRS HALE _has pulled at a knot and

ripped the sewing_.)

MRS PETERS: Oh, what are you doing, Mrs Hale?

MRS HALE: (_mildly_) Just pulling out a stitch or two that's not sewed

very good. (_threading a needle_) Bad sewing always made me fidgety.

MRS PETERS: (nervously) I don't think we ought to touch things.

MRS HALE: I'll just finish up this end. (_suddenly stopping and leaning

forward_) Mrs Peters?

MRS PETERS: Yes, Mrs Hale?

MRS HALE: What do you suppose she was so nervous about?

MRS PETERS: Oh--I don't know. I don't know as she was nervous. I

sometimes sew awful queer when I'm just tired. (MRS HALE _starts to say

something, looks at_ MRS PETERS, _then goes on sewing_) Well I must get

these things wrapped up. They may be through sooner than we think,

(_putting apron and other things together_) I wonder where I can find a

piece of paper, and string.

MRS HALE: In that cupboard, maybe.

MRS PETERS: (_looking in cupboard_) Why, here's a bird-cage, (_holds it

up_) Did she have a bird, Mrs Hale?

MRS HALE: Why, I don't know whether she did or not--I've not been here

for so long. There was a man around last year selling canaries cheap,

but I don't know as she took one; maybe she did. She used to sing real

pretty herself.

MRS PETERS: (_glancing around_) Seems funny to think of a bird here. But

she must have had one, or why would she have a cage? I wonder what

happened to it.

MRS HALE: I s'pose maybe the cat got it.

MRS PETERS: No, she didn't have a cat. She's got that feeling some

people have about cats--being afraid of them. My cat got in her room and

she was real upset and asked me to take it out.

MRS HALE: My sister Bessie was like that. Queer, ain't it?

MRS PETERS: (_examining the cage_) Why, look at this door. It's broke.

One hinge is pulled apart.

MRS HALE: (_looking too_) Looks as if someone must have been rough with

it.

MRS PETERS: Why, yes.

(_She brings the cage forward and puts it on the table_.)

MRS HALE: I wish if they're going to find any evidence they'd be about

it. I don't like this place.

MRS PETERS: But I'm awful glad you came with me, Mrs Hale. It would be

lonesome for me sitting here alone.

MRS HALE: It would, wouldn't it? (_dropping her sewing_) But I tell you

what I do wish, Mrs Peters. I wish I had come over sometimes when _she_

was here. I--(_looking around the room_)--wish I had.

MRS PETERS: But of course you were awful busy, Mrs Hale--your house and

your children.

MRS HALE: I could've come. I stayed away because it weren't

cheerful--and that's why I ought to have come. I--I've never liked this

place. Maybe because it's down in a hollow and you don't see the road. I

dunno what it is, but it's a lonesome place and always was. I wish I had

come over to see Minnie Foster sometimes. I can see now--(_shakes her

head_)

MRS PETERS: Well, you mustn't reproach yourself, Mrs Hale. Somehow we

just don't see how it is with other folks until--something comes up.

MRS HALE: Not having children makes less work--but it makes a quiet

house, and Wright out to work all day, and no company when he did come

in. Did you know John Wright, Mrs Peters?

MRS PETERS: Not to know him; I've seen him in town. They say he was a

good man.

MRS HALE: Yes--good; he didn't drink, and kept his word as well as most,

I guess, and paid his debts. But he was a hard man, Mrs Peters. Just to

pass the time of day with him--(_shivers_) Like a raw wind that gets to

the bone, (_pauses, her eye falling on the cage_) I should think she

would 'a wanted a bird. But what do you suppose went with it?

MRS PETERS: I don't know, unless it got sick and died.

(_She reaches over and swings the broken door, swings it again, both

women watch it_.)

MRS HALE: You weren't raised round here, were you? (_MRS PETERS shakes

her head_) You didn't know--her?

MRS PETERS: Not till they brought her yesterday.

MRS HALE: She--come to think of it, she was kind of like a bird

herself--real sweet and pretty, but kind of timid and--fluttery.

How--she--did--change. (_silence; then as if struck by a happy thought

and relieved to get back to everyday things_) Tell you what, Mrs Peters,

why don't you take the quilt in with you? It might take up her mind.

MRS PETERS: Why, I think that's a real nice idea, Mrs Hale. There

couldn't possibly be any objection to it, could there? Now, just what

would I take? I wonder if her patches are in here--and her things.

(_They look in the sewing basket_.)

MRS HALE: Here's some red. I expect this has got sewing things in it.

(_brings out a fancy box_) What a pretty box. Looks like something

somebody would give you. Maybe her scissors are in here. (_Opens box.

Suddenly puts her hand to her nose_) Why--(MRS PETERS _bends nearer,

then turns her face away_) There's something wrapped up in this piece of

silk.

MRS PETERS: Why, this isn't her scissors.

MRS HALE: (_lifting the silk_) Oh, Mrs Peters--it's--

(MRS PETERS _bends closer_.)

MRS PETERS: It's the bird.

MRS HALE: (_jumping up_) But, Mrs Peters--look at it! It's neck! Look at

its neck!

It's all--other side _to_.

MRS PETERS: Somebody--wrung--its--neck.

(_Their eyes meet. A look of growing comprehension, of horror. Steps are

heard outside_. MRS HALE _slips box under quilt pieces, and sinks into

her chair. Enter_ SHERIFF _and_ COUNTY ATTORNEY. MRS PETERS _rises_.)

COUNTY ATTORNEY: (_as one turning from serious things to little

pleasantries_) Well ladies, have you decided whether she was going to

quilt it or knot it?

MRS PETERS: We think she was going to--knot it.

COUNTY ATTORNEY: Well, that's interesting, I'm sure. (_seeing the

birdcage_) Has the bird flown?

MRS HALE: (_putting more quilt pieces over the box_) We think the--cat

got it.

COUNTY ATTORNEY: (_preoccupied_) Is there a cat?

(MRS HALE _glances in a quick covert way at_ MRS PETERS.)

MRS PETERS: Well, not now. They're superstitious, you know. They leave.

COUNTY ATTORNEY: (_to_ SHERIFF PETERS, _continuing an interrupted

conversation_) No sign at all of anyone having come from the outside.

Their own rope. Now let's go up again and go over it piece by piece.

(_they start upstairs_) It would have to have been someone who knew just

the--

(MRS PETERS _sits down. The two women sit there not looking at one

another, but as if peering into something and at the same time holding

back. When they talk now it is in the manner of feeling their way over

strange ground, as if afraid of what they are saying, but as if they can

not help saying it_.)

MRS HALE: She liked the bird. She was going to bury it in that pretty

box.

MRS PETERS: (_in a whisper_) When I was a girl--my kitten--there was a

boy took a hatchet, and before my eyes--and before I could get

there--(_covers her face an instant_) If they hadn't held me back I

would have--(_catches herself, looks upstairs where steps are heard,

falters weakly_)--hurt him.

MRS HALE: (_with a slow look around her_) I wonder how it would seem

never to have had any children around, (_pause_) No, Wright wouldn't

like the bird--a thing that sang. She used to sing. He killed that, too.

MRS PETERS: (_moving uneasily_) We don't know who killed the bird.

MRS HALE: I knew John Wright.

MRS PETERS: It was an awful thing was done in this house that night, Mrs

Hale. Killing a man while he slept, slipping a rope around his neck that

choked the life out of him.

MRS HALE: His neck. Choked the life out of him.

(_Her hand goes out and rests on the bird-cage_.)

MRS PETERS: (_with rising voice_) We don't know who killed him. We don't

_know_.

MRS HALE: (_her own feeling not interrupted_) If there'd been years and

years of nothing, then a bird to sing to you, it would be awful--still,

after the bird was still.

MRS PETERS: (_something within her speaking_) I know what stillness is.

When we homesteaded in Dakota, and my first baby died--after he was two

years old, and me with no other then--

MRS HALE: (_moving_) How soon do you suppose they'll be through, looking

for the evidence?

MRS PETERS: I know what stillness is. (_pulling herself back_) The law

has got to punish crime, Mrs Hale.

MRS HALE: (_not as if answering that_) I wish you'd seen Minnie Foster

when she wore a white dress with blue ribbons and stood up there in the

choir and sang. (_a look around the room_) Oh, I _wish_ I'd come over

here once in a while! That was a crime! That was a crime! Who's going to

punish that?

MRS PETERS: (_looking upstairs_) We mustn't--take on.

MRS HALE: I might have known she needed help! I know how things can

be--for women. I tell you, it's queer, Mrs Peters. We live close

together and we live far apart. We all go through the same things--it's

all just a different kind of the same thing, (_brushes her eyes,

noticing the bottle of fruit, reaches out for it_) If I was you, I

wouldn't tell her her fruit was gone. Tell her it _ain't_. Tell her it's

all right. Take this in to prove it to her. She--she may never know

whether it was broke or not.

MRS PETERS: (_takes the bottle, looks about for something to wrap it in;

takes petticoat from the clothes brought from the other room, very

nervously begins winding this around the bottle. In a false voice_) My,

it's a good thing the men couldn't hear us. Wouldn't they just laugh!

Getting all stirred up over a little thing like a--dead canary. As if

that could have anything to do with--with--wouldn't they _laugh_!

(_The men are heard coming down stairs_.)

MRS HALE: (_under her breath_) Maybe they would--maybe they wouldn't.

COUNTY ATTORNEY: No, Peters, it's all perfectly clear except a reason

for doing it. But you know juries when it comes to women. If there was

some definite thing. Something to show--something to make a story

about--a thing that would connect up with this strange way of doing it--

(_The women's eyes meet for an instant. Enter HALE from outer door_.)

HALE: Well, I've got the team around. Pretty cold out there.

COUNTY ATTORNEY: I'm going to stay here a while by myself, (_to the_

SHERIFF) You can send Frank out for me, can't you? I want to go over

everything. I'm not satisfied that we can't do better.

SHERIFF: Do you want to see what Mrs Peters is going to take in?

(_The_ LAWYER _goes to the table, picks up the apron, laughs_.)

COUNTY ATTORNEY: Oh, I guess they're not very dangerous things the

ladies have picked out. (_Moves a few things about, disturbing the quilt

pieces which cover the box. Steps back_) No, Mrs Peters doesn't need

supervising. For that matter, a sheriff's wife is married to the law.

Ever think of it that way, Mrs Peters?

MRS PETERS: Not--just that way.

SHERIFF: (_chuckling_) Married to the law. (_moves toward the other

room_) I just want you to come in here a minute, George. We ought to

take a look at these windows.

COUNTY ATTORNEY: (_scoffingly_) Oh, windows!

SHERIFF: We'll be right out, Mr Hale.

(HALE _goes outside. The_ SHERIFF _follows the_ COUNTY ATTORNEY _into

the other room. Then_ MRS HALE _rises, hands tight together, looking

intensely at_ MRS PETERS, _whose eyes make a slow turn, finally meeting_

MRS HALE_'s. A moment_ MRS HALE _holds her, then her own eyes point the

way to where the box is concealed. Suddenly_ MRS PETERS _throws back

quilt pieces and tries to put the box in the bag she is wearing. It is

too big. She opens box, starts to take bird out, cannot touch it, goes

to pieces, stands there helpless. Sound of a knob turning in the other

room_. MRS HALE _snatches the box and puts it in the pocket of her big

coat. Enter_ COUNTY ATTORNEY _and_ SHERIFF.)

COUNTY ATTORNEY: (_facetiously_) Well, Henry, at least we found out that

she was not going to quilt it. She was going to--what is it you call it,

ladies?

MRS HALE: (_her hand against her pocket_) We call it--knot it, Mr

Henderson.

(CURTAIN)

THE OUTSIDE

First performed by the Provincetown Players at the Playwrights' Theatre,

December 28, 1917.

CAPTAIN (of 'The Bars' Life-Saving Station)

BRADFORD (a Life-Saver)

TONY (a Portuguese Life-Saver)

MRS PATRICK (who lives in the abandoned Station)

ALLIE MAYO (who works for her)

SCENE: _A room in a house which was once a life-saving station. Since

ceasing to be that it has taken on no other character, except that of a

place which no one cares either to preserve or change. It is painted the

life-saving grey, but has not the life-saving freshness. This is one end

of what was the big boat room, and at the ceiling is seen a part of the

frame work from which the boat once swung. About two thirds of the back

wall is open, because of the big sliding door, of the type of barn door,

and through this open door are seen the sand dunes, and beyond them the

woods. At one point the line where woods and dunes meet stands out

clearly and there are indicated the rude things, vines, bushes, which

form the outer uneven rim of the woods--the only things that grow in the

sand. At another point a sand-hill is menacing the woods. This old

life-saving station is at a point where the sea curves, so through the

open door the sea also is seen. (The station is located on the outside

shore of Cape Cod, at the point, near the tip of the Cape, where it

makes that final curve which forms the Provincetown Harbor.) The dunes

are hills and strange forms of sand on which, in places, grows the stiff

beach grass--struggle; dogged growing against odds. At right of the big

sliding door is a drift of sand and the top of buried beach grass is

seen on this. There is a door left, and at right of big sliding door is

a slanting wall. Door in this is ajar at rise of curtain, and through

this door_ BRADFORD _and_ TONY, _life-savers, are seen bending over a

man's body, attempting to restore respiration. The captain of the

life-savers comes into view outside the big open door, at left; he

appears to have been hurrying, peers in, sees the men, goes quickly to

them._

CAPTAIN: I'll take this now, boys.

BRADFORD: No need for anybody to take it, Capt'n. He was dead when we

picked him up.

CAPTAIN: Dannie Sears was dead when we picked him up. But we brought him

back. I'll go on awhile.

(_The two men who have been bending over the body rise, stretch to

relax, and come into the room._)

BRADFORD: (_pushing back his arms and putting his hands on his chest_)

Work,--tryin to put life in the dead.

CAPTAIN: Where'd you find him, Joe?

BRADFORD: In front of this house. Not forty feet out.

CAPTAIN: What'd you bring him up here for?

(_He speaks in an abstracted way, as if the working part of his mind is

on something else, and in the muffled voice of one bending over._)

BRADFORD: (_with a sheepish little laugh_) Force of habit, I guess. We

brought so many of 'em back up here, (_looks around the room_) And then

it was kind of unfriendly down where he was--the wind spittin' the sea

onto you till he'd have no way of knowin' he was ashore.

TONY: Lucky I was not sooner or later as I walk by from my watch.

BRADFORD: You have accommodating ways, Tony. No sooner or later. I

wouldn't say it of many Portagees. But the sea (_calling it in to the_

CAPTAIN) is friendly as a kitten alongside the women that live _here_.

Allie Mayo--they're _both_ crazy--had that door open (_moving his head

toward the big sliding door_) sweepin' out, and when we come along she

backs off and stands lookin' at us, _lookin_'--Lord, I just wanted to

get him somewhere else. So I kicked this door open with my foot

(_jerking his hand toward the room where the_ CAPTAIN _is seen bending

over the man_) and got him _away. (under his voice_) If he did have any

notion of comin' back to life, he wouldn't a come if he'd seen her.

(_more genially_) I wouldn't.

CAPTAIN: You know who he is, Joe?

BRADFORD: I never saw him before.

CAPTAIN: Mitchell telephoned from High Head that a dory came ashore

there.

BRADFORD: Last night wasn't the _best_ night for a dory. (_to_ TONY,

_boastfully_) Not that I couldn't 'a' stayed in one. Some men can stay

in a dory and some can't. (_going to the inner door_) That boy's dead,

Capt'n.

CAPTAIN: Then I'm not doing him any harm.

BRADFORD: (_going over and shaking the frame where the boat once swung_)

This the first time you ever been in this place, ain't it, Tony?

TONY: I never was here before.

BRADFORD: Well, _I_ was here before. (_a laugh_) And the old

man--(_nodding toward the_ CAPTAIN) he lived here for twenty-seven

years. Lord, the things that happened _here_. There've been dead ones

carried through _that_ door. (_pointing to the outside door_) Lord--the

ones _I've_ carried. I carried in Bill Collins, and Lou Harvey and--huh!

'sall over now. You ain't seen no _wrecks_. Don't ever think you have. I

was here the night the Jennie Snow was out there. (_pointing to the

sea_) There was a _wreck_. We got the boat that stood here (_again

shaking the frame_) down that bank. (_goes to the door and looks out_)

Lord, how'd we ever do it? The sand has put his place on the blink all

right. And then when it gets too God-for-saken for a life-savin'

station, a lady takes it for a summer residence--and then spends the

winter. She's a cheerful one.

TONY: A woman--she makes things pretty. This not like a place where a

woman live. On the floor there is nothing--on the wall there is nothing.

Things--(_trying to express it with his hands_) do not hang on other

things.

BRADFORD: (_imitating_ TONY_'s gesture_) No--things do not hang on other

things. In my opinion the woman's crazy--sittin' over there on the

sand--(_a gesture towards the dunes_) what's she _lookin'_ at? There

ain't nothin' to _see_. And I know the woman that works for her's

crazy--Allie Mayo. She's a Provincetown girl. She was all right once,

but--

(MRS PATRICK _comes in from the hall at the right. She is a 'city

woman', a sophisticated person who has been caught into something as

unlike the old life as the dunes are unlike a meadow. At the moment she

is excited and angry_.)

MRS PATRICK: You have no right here. This isn't the life-saving station

any more. Just because it used to be--I don't see why you should

think--This is my house! And--I want my house to myself!

CAPTAIN: (_putting his head through the door. One arm of the man he is

working with is raised, and the hand reaches through the doorway_) Well

I must say, lady, I would think that any house could be a life-saving

station when the sea had sent a man to it.

MRS PATRICK: (_who has turned away so she cannot see the hand_) I don't

want him here! I--(_defiant, yet choking_) I must have my house to

myself!

CAPTAIN: You'll get your house to yourself when I've made up my mind

there's no more life in this man. A good many lives have been saved in

this house, Mrs Patrick--I believe that's your name--and if there's any

chance of bringing one more back from the dead, the fact that you own

the house ain't goin' to make a damn bit of difference to me!

MRS PATRICK: (_in a thin wild way_) I must have my house to myself.

CAPTAIN: Hell with such a woman!

(_Moves the man he is working with and slams the door shut. As the_

CAPTAIN _says, 'And if there's any chance of bringing one more back from

the dead_', ALLIE MAYO _has appeared outside the wide door which gives

on to the dunes, a bleak woman, who at first seems little more than a

part of the sand before which she stands. But as she listens to this

conflict one suspects in her that peculiar intensity of twisted things

which grow in unfavoring places_.)

MRS PATRICK: I--I don't want them here! I must--

(_But suddenly she retreats, and is gone_.)

BRADFORD: Well, I couldn't say, Allie Mayo, that you work for any too

kind-hearted a lady. What's the matter with the woman? Does she want

folks to die? Appears to break her all up to see somebody trying to save

a life. What d'you work for such a fish for? A crazy fish--that's what I

call the woman. I've seen her--day after day--settin' over there where

the dunes meet the woods, just sittin' there, lookin'. (_suddenly

thinking of it_) I believe she _likes_ to see the sand slippin' down on

the woods. Pleases her to see somethin' gettin' buried, I guess.

(ALLIE MAYO, _who has stepped inside the door and moved half across the

room, toward the corridor at the right, is arrested by this last--stands

a moment as if seeing through something, then slowly on, and out_.)

BRADFORD: Some coffee'd taste good. But coffee, in this house? Oh, no.

It might make somebody feel better. (_opening the door that was slammed

shut_) Want me now, Capt'n?

CAPTAIN: No.

BRADFORD: Oh, that boy's dead, Capt'n.

CAPTAIN: (_snarling_) Dannie Sears was dead, too. Shut that door. I

don't want to hear that woman's voice again, ever.

(_Closing the door and sitting on a bench built into that corner between

the big sliding door and the room where the_ CAPTAIN _is_.)

BRADFORD: They're a cheerful pair of women--livin' in this cheerful

place--a place that life savers had to turn over to the sand--huh! This

Patrick woman used to be all right. She and her husband was summer folks

over in town. They used to picnic over here on the outside. It was Joe

Dyer--he's always talkin' to summer folks--told 'em the government was

goin' to build the new station and sell this one by sealed bids. I heard

them talkin' about it. They was sittin' right down there on the beach,

eatin' their supper. They was goin' to put in a fire-place and they was

goin' to paint it bright colors, and have parties over here--summer folk

notions. Their bid won it--who'd want it?--a buried house you couldn't

move.

TONY: I see no bright colors.

BRADFORD: Don't you? How astonishin'! You must be color blind. And I

guess _we're_ the first party. (_laughs_) I was in Bill Joseph's grocery

store, one day last November, when in she comes--Mrs Patrick, from New

York. 'I've come to take the old life-saving station', says she. 'I'm

going to sleep over there tonight!' Huh! Bill is used to queer ways--he

deals with summer folks, but that got _him_. November--an empty house, a

buried house, you might say, off here on the outside shore--way across

the sand from man or beast. He got it out of her, not by what she said,

but by the way she looked at what he said, that her husband had died,

and she was runnin' off to hide herself, I guess. A person'd feel sorry

for her if she weren't so stand-offish, and so doggon _mean_. But mean

folks have got minds of their own. She slept here that night. Bill had

men hauling things till after dark--bed, stove, coal. And then she

wanted somebody to work for her. 'Somebody', says she, 'that doesn't say

an unnecessary word!' Well, then Bill come to the back of the store, I

said, 'Looks to me as if Allie Mayo was the party she's lookin' for.'

Allie Mayo has got a prejudice against words. Or maybe she likes 'em so

well she's savin' of 'em. She's not spoke an unnecessary word for twenty

years. She's got her reasons. Women whose men go to sea ain't always

talkative.

(_The_ CAPTAIN _comes out. He closes door behind him and stands there

beside it. He looks tired and disappointed. Both look at him. Pause_.)

CAPTAIN: Wonder who he was.

BRADFORD: Young. Guess he's not been much at sea.

CAPTAIN: I hate to leave even the dead in this house. But we can get

right back for him. (_a look around_) The old place used to be more

friendly. (_moves to outer door, hesitates, hating to leave like this_)

Well, Joe, we brought a good many of them back here.

BRADFORD: Dannie Sears is tendin' bar in Boston now.

(_The three men go; as they are going around the drift of sand_ ALLIE

MAYO _comes in carrying a pot of coffee; sees them leaving, puts down

the coffee pot, looks at the door the_ CAPTAIN _has closed, moves toward

it, as if drawn_. MRS PATRICK _follows her in_.)

MRS PATRICK: They've gone?

(MRS MAYO _nods, facing the closed door_.)

MRS PATRICK: And they're leaving--him? (_again the other woman nods_)

Then he's--? (MRS MAYO _just stands there_) They have no right--just

because it used to be their place--! I want my house to myself!

(_Snatches her coat and scarf from a hook and starts through the big

door toward the dunes_.)

ALLIE MAYO: Wait.

(_When she has said it she sinks into that corner seat--as if

overwhelmed by what she has done. The other woman is held_.)

ALLIE MAYO: (_to herself._) If I could say that, I can say more.

(_looking at woman she has arrested, but speaking more to herself_) That

boy in there--his face--uncovered something--(_her open hand on her

chest. But she waits, as if she cannot go on; when she speaks it is in

labored way--slow, monotonous, as if snowed in by silent years_) For

twenty years, I did what you are doing. And I can tell you--it's not the

way. (_her voice has fallen to a whisper; she stops, looking ahead at

something remote and veiled_) We had been married--two years. (_a start,

as of sudden pain. Says it again, as if to make herself say it_)

Married--two years. He had a chance to go north on a whaler. Times hard.

He had to go. A year and a half--it was to be. A year and a half. Two

years we'd been married.

(_She sits silent, moving a little back and forth._)

The day he went away. (_not spoken, but breathed from pain_) The days

after he was gone.

I heard at first. Last letter said farther north--not another chance to

write till on the way home. (_a wait_)

Six months. Another, I did not hear. (_long wait_) Nobody ever heard.

(_after it seems she is held there, and will not go on_) I used to talk

as much as any girl in Provincetown. Jim used to tease me about my

talking. But they'd come in to talk to me. They'd say--'You may hear

_yet._' They'd talk about what must have happened. And one day a woman

who'd been my friend all my life said--'Suppose he was to walk _in!_' I

got up and drove her from my kitchen--and from that time till this I've

not said a word I didn't have to say. (_she has become almost wild in

telling this. That passes. In a whisper_) The ice that caught

Jim--caught me. (_a moment as if held in ice. Comes from it. To_ MRS

PATRICK _simply_) It's not the way. (_a sudden change_) You're not the

only woman in the world whose husband is dead!

MRS PATRICK: (_with a cry of the hurt_) Dead? My husband's not _dead_.

ALLIE MAYO: He's _not?_ (_slowly understands_) Oh.

(_The woman in the door is crying. Suddenly picks up her coat which has

fallen to the floor and steps outside._)

ALLIE MAYO: (_almost failing to do it_) Wait.

MRS PATRICK: Wait? Don't you think you've said enough? They told me you

didn't say an unnecessary word!

ALLIE MAYO: I don't.

MRS PATRICK: And you can see, I should think, that you've bungled into

things you know nothing about!

(_As she speaks, and crying under her breath, she pushes the sand by the

door down on the half buried grass--though not as if knowing what she is

doing._)

ALLIE MAYO: (_slowly_) When you keep still for twenty years you

know--things you didn't know you knew. I know why you're doing that.

(_she looks up at her, startled_) Don't bury the only thing that will

grow. Let it grow.

(_The woman outside still crying under her breath turns abruptly and

starts toward the line where dunes and woods meet._)

ALLIE MAYO: I know where you're going! (MRS PATRICK _turns but not as if

she wants to_) What you'll try to do. Over there. (_pointing to the line

of woods_) Bury it. The life in you. Bury it--watching the sand bury the

woods. But I'll tell you something! _They_ fight too. The woods! They

fight for life the way that Captain fought for life in there!

(_Pointing to the closed door_.)

MRS PATRICK: (_with a strange exultation_) And lose the way he lost in

there!

ALLIE MAYO: (_sure, sombre_) They don't lose.

MRS PATRICK: Don't _lose_? (_triumphant_) I have walked on the tops of

buried trees!

ALLIE MAYO: (_slow, sombre, yet large_) And vines will grow over the

sand that covers the trees, and hold it. And other trees will grow over

the buried trees.

MRS PATRICK: I've watched the sand slip down on the vines that reach out

farthest.

ALLIE MAYO: Another vine will reach that spot. (_under her breath,

tenderly_) Strange little things that reach out farthest!

MRS PATRICK: And will be buried soonest!

ALLIE MAYO: And hold the sand for things behind them. They save a wood

that guards a town.

MRS PATRICK: I care nothing about a wood to guard a town. This is the

outside--these dunes where only beach grass grows, this outer shore

where men can't live. The Outside. You who were born here and who die

here have named it that.

ALLIE MAYO: Yes, we named it that, and we had reason. He died here

(_reaches her hand toward the closed door_) and many a one before him.

But many another reached the harbor! (_slowly raises her arm, bends it

to make the form of the Cape. Touches the outside of her bent arm_) The

Outside. But an arm that bends to make a harbor--where men are safe.

MRS PATRICK: I'm outside the harbor--on the dunes, land not life.

ALLIE MAYO: Dunes meet woods and woods hold dunes from a town that's

shore to a harbor.

MRS PATRICK: This is the Outside. Sand (_picking some of it up in her

hand and letting it fall on the beach grass_) Sand that _covers_--hills

of sand that move and cover.

ALLIE MAYO: Woods. Woods to hold the moving hills from Provincetown.

Provincetown--where they turn when boats can't live at sea. Did you ever

see the sails come round here when the sky is dark? A line of

them--swift to the harbor--where their children live. Go back!

(_pointing_) Back to your edge of the woods that's the _edge of the

dunes_.

MRS PATRICK: The edge of life. Where life trails off to dwarfed things

not worth a name.

(_Suddenly sits down in the doorway_.)

ALLIE MAYO: Not worth a name. And--meeting the Outside!

(_Big with the sense of the wonder of life_.)

MRS PATRICK: (_lifting sand and letting it drift through her hand_.)

They're what the sand will let them be. They take strange shapes like

shapes of blown sand.

ALLIE MAYO: Meeting the Outside. (_moving nearer; speaking more

personally_) I know why you came here. To this house that had been given

up; on this shore where only savers of life try to live. I know what

holds you on these dunes, and draws you over there. But other things are

true beside the things you want to see.

MRS PATRICK: How do you know they are? Where have you been for twenty

years?

ALLIE MAYO: Outside. Twenty years. That's why I know how brave _they_

are (_indicating the edge of the woods. Suddenly different_) You'll not

find peace there again! Go back and watch them _fight_!

MRS PATRICK: (_swiftly rising_) You're a cruel woman--a hard, insolent

woman! I knew what I was doing! What do you know about it? About me? I

didn't go to the Outside. I was left there. I'm only--trying to get

along. Everything that can hurt me I want buried--buried deep. Spring is

here. This morning I _knew_ it. Spring--coming through the storm--to

take me--take me to hurt me. That's why I couldn't bear--(_she looks at

the closed door_) things that made me know I feel. You haven't felt for

so long you don't know what it means! But I tell you, Spring is here!

And now you'd take _that_ from me--(_looking now toward the edge of the

woods_) the thing that made me know they would be buried in my

heart--those things I can't _live_ and know I feel. You're more cruel

than the sea! 'But other things are true beside the things you want to

see!' Outside. Springs will come when I will not know that it is spring.

(_as if resentful of not more deeply believing what she says_) What

would there be for me but the Outside? What was there for you? What did

you ever find after you lost the thing you wanted?

ALLIE MAYO: I found--what I find now I know. The edge of life--to hold

life behind me--

(_A slight gesture toward_ MRS PATRICK.)

MRS PATRICK: (_stepping back_) You call what you are life? (_laughs_)

Bleak as those ugly things that grow in the sand!

ALLIE MAYO: (_under her breath, as one who speaks tenderly of beauty_)

Ugly!

MRS PATRICK: (_passionately_) I have _known_ life. I have known _life_.

You're like this Cape. A line of land way out to sea--land not life.

ALLIE MAYO: A harbor far at sea. (_raises her arm, curves it in as if

around something she loves_) Land that encloses and gives shelter from

storm.

MRS PATRICK: (_facing the sea, as if affirming what will hold all else

out_) Outside sea. Outer shore. Dunes--land not life.

ALLIE MAYO: Outside sea--outer shore, dark with the wood that once was

ships--dunes, strange land not life--woods, town and harbor. The line!

Stunted straggly line that meets the Outside face to face--and fights

for what itself can never be. Lonely line. Brave growing.

MRS PATRICK: It loses.

ALLIE MAYO: It wins.

MRS PATRICK: The farthest life is buried.

ALLIE MAYO: And life grows over buried life! (_lifted into that; then,

as one who states a simple truth with feeling_) It will. And Springs

will come when you will want to know that it is Spring.

(_The_ CAPTAIN _and_ BRADFORD _appear behind the drift of sand. They

have a stretcher. To get away from them_ MRS PATRICK _steps farther into

the room_; ALLIE MAYO _shrinks into her corner. The men come in, open

the closed door and go in the room where they left the dead man. A

moment later they are seen outside the big open door, bearing the man

away_. MRS PATRICK _watches them from sight_.)

MRS PATRICK: (_bitter, exultant_) Savers of life! (_to_ ALLIE MAYO) You

savers of life! 'Meeting the Outside!' Meeting--(_but she cannot say it

mockingly again; in saying it, something of what it means has broken

through, rises. Herself lost, feeling her way into the wonder of life_)

Meeting the Outside!

(_It grows in her as_ CURTAIN _lowers slowly_.)

THE VERGE

First performed at the Provincetown Playhouse on November 14, 1921.

PERSONS OF THE PLAY

ANTHONY

HARRY ARCHER, Claire's husband

HATTIE, The maid

CLAIRE

DICK, Richard Demming

TOM EDGEWORTHY

ELIZABETH, Claire's daughter

ADELAIDE, Claire's sister

DR EMMONS

ACT I

_The Curtain lifts on a place that is dark, save for a shaft of light

from below which comes up through an open trap-door in the floor. This

slants up and strikes the long leaves and the huge brilliant blossom of

a strange plant whose twisted stem projects from right front. Nothing is

seen except this plant and its shadow. A violent wind is heard. A moment

later a buzzer. It buzzes once long and three short. Silence. Again the

buzzer. Then from below--his shadow blocking the light, comes_ ANTHONY,

_a rugged man past middle life;--he emerges from the stairway into the

darkness of the room. Is dimly seen taking up a phone._

ANTHONY: Yes, Miss Claire?--I'll see. (_he brings a thermometer to the

stairway for light, looks sharply, then returns to the phone_) It's down

to forty-nine. The plants are in danger--(_with great relief and

approval_) Oh, that's fine! (_hangs up the receiver_) Fine!

(_He goes back down the stairway, closing the trap-door upon himself,

and the curtain is drawn upon darkness and wind. It opens a moment later

on the greenhouse in the sunshine of a snowy morning. The snow piled

outside is at times blown through the air. The frost has made patterns

on the glass as if--as Plato would have it--the patterns inherent in

abstract nature and behind all life had to come out, not only in the

creative heat within, but in the creative cold on the other side of the

glass. And the wind makes patterns of sound around the glass house.

The back wall is low; the glass roof slopes sharply up. There is an

outside door, a little toward the right. From outside two steps lead

down to it. At left a glass partition and a door into the inner room.

One sees a little way into this room. At right there is no dividing wall

save large plants and vines, a narrow aisle between shelves of plants

leads off.

This is not a greenhouse where plants are being displayed, nor the usual

workshop for the growing of them, but a place for experiment with

plants, a laboratory.

At the back grows a strange vine. It is arresting rather than beautiful.

It creeps along the low wall, and one branch gets a little way up the

glass. You might see the form of a cross in it, if you happened to think

it that way. The leaves of this vine are not the form that leaves have

been. They are at once repellent and significant_.

ANTHONY _is at work preparing soil--mixing, sifting. As the wind tries

the door he goes anxiously to the thermometer, nods as if reassured and

returns to his work. The buzzer sounds. He starts to answer the

telephone, remembers something, halts and listens sharply. It does not

buzz once long and three short. Then he returns to his work. The buzzer

goes on and on in impatient jerks which mount in anger. Several times_

ANTHONY _is almost compelled by this insistence, but the thing that

holds him back is stronger. At last, after a particularly mad splutter,

to which_ ANTHONY _longs to make retort, the buzzer gives it up_.

ANTHONY _goes on preparing soil.

A moment later the glass door swings violently in, snow blowing in, and

also_ MR HARRY ARCHER, _wrapped in a rug._)

ANTHONY: Oh, please close the door, sir.

HARRY: Do you think I'm not trying to? (_he holds it open to say this_)

ANTHONY: But please _do_. This stormy air is not good for the plants.

HARRY: I suppose it's just the thing for me! Now, what do you mean,

Anthony, by not answering the phone when I buzz for you?

ANTHONY: Miss Claire--Mrs Archer told me not to.

HARRY: Told you not to answer me?

ANTHONY: Not you especially--nobody but her.

HARRY: Well, I like her nerve--and yours.

ANTHONY: You see, she thought it took my mind from my work to be

interrupted when I'm out here. And so it does. So she buzzes once long

and--Well, she buzzes her way, and all other buzzing--

HARRY: May buzz.

ANTHONY: (_nodding gravely_) She thought it would be better for the

flowers.

HARRY: I am not a flower--true, but I too need a little attention--and a

little heat. Will you please tell me why the house is frigid?

ANTHONY: Miss Claire ordered all the heat turned out here, (_patiently

explaining it to_ MISS CLAIRE's _speechless husband_) You see the roses

need a great deal of heat.

HARRY: (_reading the thermometer_) The roses have seventy-three I have

forty-five.

ANTHONY: Yes, the roses need seventy-three.

HARRY: Anthony, this is an outrage!

ANTHONY: I think it is myself; when you consider what we paid for the

heating plant--but as long as it is defective--Why, Miss Claire would

never have done what she has if she hadn't looked out for her plants in

just such ways as this. Have you forgotten that Breath of Life is about

to flower?

HARRY: And where's my breakfast about to flower?--that's what I want to

know.

ANTHONY: Why, Miss Claire got up at five o'clock to order the heat

turned off from the house.

HARRY: I see you admire her vigilance.

ANTHONY: Oh, I do. (_fervently_) I do. Harm was near, and that woke her

up.

HARRY: And what about the harm to--(_tapping his chest_) Do roses get

pneumonia?

ANTHONY: Oh, yes--yes, indeed they do. Why, Mr Archer, look at Miss

Claire herself. Hasn't she given her heat to the roses?

HARRY: (_pulling the rug around him, preparing for the blizzard_) She

has the fire within.

ANTHONY: (_delighted_) Now isn't that true! How well you said it. (_with

a glare for this appreciation_, HARRY _opens the door. It blows away

from him_) Please do close the door!

HARRY: (_furiously_) You think it is the aim of my life to hold it open?

ANTHONY: (_getting hold of it_) Growing things need an even temperature,

(_while saying this he gets the man out into the snow_)

(ANTHONY _consults the thermometer, not as pleased this time as he was

before. He then looks minutely at two of the plants--one is a rose, the

other a flower without a name because it has not long enough been a

flower. Peers into the hearts of them. Then from a drawer under a shelf,

takes two paper bags, puts one over each of these flowers, closing them

down at the bottom. Again the door blows wildly in, also_ HATTIE, _a

maid with a basket_.)

ANTHONY: What do you mean--blowing in here like this? Mrs Archer has

ordered--

HATTIE: Mr Archer has ordered breakfast served here, (_she uncovers the

basket and takes out an electric toaster_)

ANTHONY: _Breakfast_--here? _Eat_--here? Where plants grow?

HATTIE: The plants won't poison him, will they? (_at a loss to know what

to do with things, she puts the toaster under the strange vine at the

back, whose leaves lift up against the glass which has frost leaves on

the outer side_)

ANTHONY: (_snatching it away_) You--you think you can cook eggs under

the Edge Vine?

HATTIE: I guess Mr Archer's eggs are as important as a vine. I guess my

work's as important as yours.

ANTHONY: There's a million people like you--and like Mr Archer. In all

the world there is only one Edge Vine.

HATTIE: Well, maybe one's enough. It don't look like nothin', anyhow.

ANTHONY: And you've not got the wit to know that that's why it's the

Edge Vine.

HATTIE: You want to look out, Anthony. You talk nutty. Everybody says

so.

ANTHONY: Miss Claire don't say so.

HATTIE: No, because she's--

ANTHONY: You talk too much!

(_Door opens, admitting_ HARRY; _after looking around for the best place

to eat breakfast, moves a box of earth from the table_.)

HARRY: Just give me a hand, will you, Hattie?

(_They bring it to the open space and he and_ HATTIE _arrange breakfast

things_, HATTIE _with triumphant glances at the distressed_ ANTHONY)

ANTHONY: (_deciding he must act_) Mr Archer, this is not the place to

eat breakfast!

HARRY: Dead wrong, old boy. The place that has heat is the place to eat

breakfast. (_to_ HATTIE) Tell the other gentlemen--I heard Mr Demming

up, and Mr Edgeworthy, if he appears, that as long as it is such a

pleasant morning, we're having breakfast outside. To the conservatory

for coffee.

(HATTIE _giggles, is leaving_.)

And let's see, have we got everything? (_takes the one shaker, shakes a

little pepper on his hand. Looks in vain for the other shaker_) And tell

Mr Demming to bring the salt.

ANTHONY: But Miss Claire will be very angry.

HARRY: I am very angry. Did I choose to eat my breakfast at the other

end of a blizzard?

ANTHONY: (_an exclamation of horror at the thermometer_) The temperature

is falling. I must report. (_he punches the buzzer, takes up the phone_)

Miss Claire? It is Anthony. A terrible thing has happened. Mr

Archer--what? Yes, a terrible thing.--Yes, it is about Mr

Archer.--No--no, not dead. But here. He is here. Yes, he is well, he

seems well, but he is eating his breakfast. Yes, he is having breakfast

served out here--for himself, and the other gentlemen are to come

too.--Well, he seemed to be annoyed because the heat had been turned off

from the house. But the door keeps opening--this stormy wind blowing

right over the plants. The temperature has already fallen.--Yes, yes. I

thought you would want to come.

(ANTHONY _opens the trap-door and goes below_. HARRY _looks

disapprovingly down into this openness at his feet, returns to his

breakfast_. ANTHONY _comes up, bearing a box_.)

HARRY: (_turning his face away_) Phew! What a smell.

ANTHONY: Yes. Fertilizer has to smell.

HARRY: Well, it doesn't have to smell up my breakfast!

ANTHONY: (_with a patient sense of order_) The smell belongs here. (_he

and the smell go to the inner room_)

(_The outer door opens just enough to admit_ CLAIRE--_is quickly closed.

With_ CLAIRE _in a room another kind of aliveness is there_.)

CLAIRE: What are you doing here?

HARRY: Getting breakfast. (_all the while doing so_)

CLAIRE: I'll not have you in my place!

HARRY: If you take all the heat then you have to take me.

CLAIRE: I'll show you how I have to take you. (_with her hands begins

scooping upon him the soil_ ANTHONY _has prepared_)

HARRY: (_jumping up, laughing, pinning down her arms, putting his arms

around her_) Claire--be decent. What harm do I do here?

CLAIRE: You pull down the temperature.

HARRY: Not after I'm in.

CLAIRE: And you told Tom and Dick to come and make it uneven.

HARRY: Tom and Dick are our guests. We can't eat where it's warm and

leave them to eat where it's cold.

CLAIRE: I don't see why not.

HARRY: You only see what you want to see.

CLAIRE: That's not true. I wish it were. No; no, I don't either. (_she

is disturbed--that troubled thing which rises from within, from deep,

and takes_ CLAIRE. _She turns to the Edge Vine, examines. Regretfully

to_ ANTHONY, _who has come in with a plant_) It's turning back, isn't

it?

ANTHONY: Can you be sure yet, Miss Claire?

CLAIRE: Oh yes--it's had its chance. It doesn't want to be--what hasn't

been.

HARRY: (_who has turned at this note in her voice. Speaks kindly_) Don't

take it so seriously, Claire. (CLAIRE _laughs_)

CLAIRE: No, I suppose not. But it _does_ matter--and why should I

pretend it doesn't, just because I've failed with it?

HARRY: Well, I don't want to see it get you--it's not important enough

for that.

CLAIRE: (_in her brooding way_) Anything is important enough for

that--if it's important at all. (_to the vine_) I thought you were out,

but you're--going back home.

ANTHONY: But you're doing it this time, Miss Claire. When Breath of Life

opens--and we see its heart--

(CLAIRE _looks toward the inner room. Because of intervening plants they

do not see what is seen from the front--a plant like caught motion, and

of a greater transparency than plants have had. Its leaves, like waves

that curl, close around a heart that is not seen. This plant stands by

itself in what, because of the arrangement of things about it, is a

hidden place. But nothing is between it and the light_.)

CLAIRE: Yes, if the heart has (_a little laugh_) held its own, then

Breath of Life is alive in its otherness. But Edge Vine is running back

to what it broke out of.

HARRY: Come, have some coffee, Claire.

(ANTHONY _returns to the inner room, the outer door opens_. DICK _is

hurled in_.)

CLAIRE: (_going to the door, as he gasps for breath before closing it_)

How dare you make my temperature uneven! (_she shuts the door and leans

against it_)

DICK: Is that what I do?

(_A laugh, a look between them, which is held into significance_.)

HARRY: (_who is not facing them_) Where's the salt?

DICK: Oh, I fell down in the snow. I must have left the salt where I

fell. I'll go back and look for it.

CLAIRE: And change the temperature? We don't need salt.

HARRY: You don't need salt, Claire. But we eat eggs.

CLAIRE: I must tell you I don't like the idea of any food being eaten

here, where things have their own way to go. Please eat as little as

possible, and as quickly.

HARRY: A hostess calculated to put one at one's ease.

CLAIRE: (_with no ill-nature_) I care nothing about your ease. Or about

Dick's ease.

DICK: And no doubt that's what makes you so fascinating a hostess.

CLAIRE: Was I a fascinating hostess last night, Dick? (_softly sings_)

'Oh, night of love--' (_from the Barcorole of 'Tales of Hoffman'_)

HARRY: We've got to have salt.

(_He starts for the door._ CLAIRE _slips in ahead of him, locks it,

takes the key. He marches off, right_.)

CLAIRE: (_calling after him_) That end's always locked.

DICK: Claire darling, I wish you wouldn't say those startling things.

You do get away with it, but I confess it gives me a shock--and really,

it's unwise.

CLAIRE: Haven't you learned that the best place to hide is in the truth?

(_as_ HARRY _returns_) Why won't you believe me, Harry, when I tell you

the truth--about doors being locked?

HARRY: Claire, it's selfish of you to keep us from eating salt just

because you don't eat salt.

CLAIRE: (_with one of her swift changes_) Oh, Harry! Try your egg

without salt. Please--please try it without salt! (_an intensity which

seems all out of proportion to the subject_)

HARRY: An egg demands salt.

CLAIRE: 'An egg demands salt.' Do you know, Harry, why you are such an

unseasoned person? 'An egg demands salt.'

HARRY: Well, it doesn't always get it.

CLAIRE: But your spirit gets no lift from the salt withheld.

HARRY: Not an inch of lift. (_going back to his breakfast_)

CLAIRE: And pleased--so pleased with itself, for getting no lift. Sure,

it is just the right kind of spirit--because it gets no lift. (_more

brightly_) But, Dick, you must have tried your egg without salt.

DICK: I'll try it now. (_he goes to the breakfast table_)

CLAIRE: You must have tried and tried things. Isn't that the way one

leaves the normal and gets into the byways of perversion?

HARRY: Claire.

DICK: (_pushing back his egg_) If so, I prefer to wait for the salt.

HARRY: Claire, there is a _limit_.

CLAIRE: Precisely what I had in mind. To perversion too there is a

limit. So--the fortifications are unassailable. If one ever does get

out, I suppose it is--quite unexpectedly, and perhaps--a bit terribly.

HARRY: Get out where?

CLAIRE: (_with a bright smile_) Where you, darling, will never go.

HARRY: And from which you, darling, had better beat it.

CLAIRE: I wish I could. (_to herself_) No--no I don't either

(_Again this troubled thing turns her to the plant. She puts by

themselves the two which_ ANTHONY _covered with paper bags. Is about to

remove these papers_. HARRY _strikes a match_.)

CLAIRE: (_turning sharply_) You can't smoke here. The plants are not

used to it.

HARRY: Then I should think smoking would be just the thing for them.

CLAIRE: There is design.

HARRY: (_to_ DICK) Am I supposed to be answered? I never can be quite

sure at what moment I am answered.

(_They both watch_ CLAIRE, _who has uncovered the plants and is looking

intently into the flowers. From a drawer she takes some tools. Very

carefully gives the rose pollen to an unfamiliar flower--rather

wistfully unfamiliar, which stands above on a small shelf near the door

of the inner room_.)

DICK: What is this you're doing, Claire?

CLAIRE: Pollenizing. Crossing for fragrance.

DICK: It's all rather mysterious, isn't it?

HARRY: And Claire doesn't make it any less so.

CLAIRE: Can I make life any less mysterious?

HARRY: If you know what you are doing, why can't you tell Dick?

DICK: Never mind. After all, why should I be told? (_he turns away_)

(_At that she wants to tell him. Helpless, as one who cannot get across

a stream, starts uncertainly_.)

CLAIRE: I want to give fragrance to Breath of Life (_faces the room

beyond the wall of glass_)--the flower I have created that is outside

what flowers have been. What has gone out should bring fragrance from

what it has left. But no definite fragrance, no limiting enclosing

thing. I call the fragrance I am trying to create Reminiscence. (_her

hand on the pot of the wistful little flower she has just given pollen_)

Reminiscent of the rose, the violet, arbutus--but a new thing--itself.

Breath of Life may be lonely out in what hasn't been. Perhaps some day I

can give it reminiscence.

DICK: I see, Claire.

CLAIRE: I wonder if you do.

HARRY: Now, Claire, you're going to be gay to-day, aren't you? These are

Tom's last couple of days with us.

CLAIRE: That doesn't make me especially gay.

HARRY: Well, you want him to remember you as yourself, don't you?

CLAIRE: I would like him to. Oh--I would like him to!

HARRY: Then be amusing. That's really you, isn't it, Dick?

DICK: Not quite all of her--I should say.

CLAIRE: (_gaily_) Careful, Dick. Aren't you indiscreet? Harry will be

suspecting that I am your latest strumpet.

HARRY: Claire! What language you use! A person knowing you only by

certain moments could never be made to believe you are a refined woman.

CLAIRE: True, isn't it, Dick?

HARRY: It would be a good deal of a lark to let them listen in at

times--then tell them that here is the flower of New England!

CLAIRE: Well, if this is the flower of New England, then the half has

never been told.

DICK: About New England?

CLAIRE: I thought I meant that. Perhaps I meant--about me.

HARRY: (_going on with his own entertainment_) Explain that this is what

came of the men who made the laws that made New England, that here is

the flower of those gentlemen of culture who--

DICK: Moulded the American mind!

CLAIRE: Oh! (_it is pain_)

HARRY: Now what's the matter?

CLAIRE: I want to get away from them!

HARRY: Rest easy, little one--you do.

CLAIRE: I'm not so sure--that I do. But it can be done! We need not be

held in forms moulded for us. There is outness--and otherness.

HARRY: Now, Claire--I didn't mean to start anything serious.

CLAIRE: No; you never mean to do that. I want to break it up! I tell

you, I want to break it up! If it were all in pieces, we'd be (_a little

laugh_) shocked to aliveness (_to_ DICK)--wouldn't we? There would be

strange new comings together--mad new comings together, and we would

know what it is to be born, and then we might know--that we are. Smash

it. (_her hand is near an egg_) As you'd smash an egg. (_she pushes the

egg over the edge of the table and leans over and looks, as over a

precipice_)

HARRY: (_with a sigh_) Well, all you've smashed is the egg, and all that

amounts to is that now Tom gets no egg. So that's that.

CLAIRE: (_with difficulty, drawing herself back from the fascination of

the precipice_) You think I can't smash anything? You think life can't

break up, and go outside what it was? Because you've gone dead in the

form in which you found yourself, you think that's all there is to the

whole adventure? And that is called sanity. And made a virtue--to lock

one in. You never worked with things that grow! Things that take a

sporting chance--go mad--that sanity mayn't lock them in--from life

untouched--from life--that waits, (_she turns toward the inner room_)

Breath of Life. (_she goes in there_)

HARRY: Oh, I wish Claire wouldn't be strange like that, (_helplessly_)

What is it? What's the matter?

DICK: It's merely the excess of a particularly rich temperament.

HARRY: But it's growing on her. I sometimes wonder if all this

(_indicating the place around him_) is a good thing. It would be all

right if she'd just do what she did in the beginning--make the flowers

as good as possible of their kind. That's an awfully nice thing for a

woman to do--raise flowers. But there's something about this--changing

things into other things--putting things together and making queer new

things--this--

DICK: Creating?

HARRY: Give it any name you want it to have--it's unsettling for a

woman. They say Claire's a shark at it, but what's the good of it, if it

gets her? What is the good of it, anyway? Suppose we can produce new

things. Lord--look at the one ones we've got. (_looks outside; turns

back_) Heavens, what a noise the wind does make around this place, (_but

now it is not all the wind, but_ TOM EDGEWORTHY, _who is trying to let

himself in at the locked door, their backs are to him_) I want my _egg_.

You can't eat an egg without salt. I must say I don't get Claire lately.

I'd like to have Charlie Emmons see her--he's fixed up a lot of people

shot to pieces in the war. Claire needs something to tone her nerves

_up_. You think it would irritate her?

DICK: She'd probably get no little entertainment out of it.

HARRY: Yes, dog-gone her, she would. (TOM _now takes more heroic

measures to make himself heard at the door_) Funny--how the wind can

fool you. Now by not looking around I could imagine--why, I could

imagine anything. Funny, isn't it, about imagination? And Claire says I

haven't got any!

DICK: It would make an amusing drawing--what the wind makes you think is

there. (_first makes forms with his hands, then levelling the soil

prepared by_ ANTHONY, _traces lines with his finger_) Yes, really--quite

jolly.

(TOM, _after a moment of peering in at them, smiles, goes away._)

HARRY: You're another one of the queer ducks, aren't you? Come now--give

me the dirt. Have you queer ones really got anything--or do you just put

it over on us that you have?

DICK: (_smiles, draws on_) Not saying anything, eh? Well, I guess you're

wise there. If you keep mum--how are we going to prove there's nothing

there?

DICK: I don't keep mum. I draw.

HARRY: Lines that don't make anything--how can they tell you anything?

Well, all I ask is, don't make Claire queer. Claire's a first water good

sport--really, so don't encourage her to be queer.

DICK: Trouble is, if you're queer enough to be amusing, it might--open

the door to queerness.

HARRY: Now don't say things like that to Claire.

DICK: I don't have to.

HARRY: Then _you_ think she's queer, do you? Queer as you are, you think

she's queer. I would like to have Dr Emmons come out. (_after a moment

of silently watching_ DICK, _who is having a good time with his

drawing_) You know, frankly, I doubt if you're a good influence for

Claire. (DICK _lifts his head ever so slightly_) Oh, I don't worry a bit

about--things a husband might worry about. I suppose an intellectual

woman--and for all Claire's hate of her ancestors, she's got the bug

herself. Why, she has times of boring into things until she doesn't know

you're there. What do you think I caught her doing the other day?

Reading Latin. Well--a woman that reads Latin needn't worry a husband

much.

DICK: They said a good deal in Latin.

HARRY: But I was saying, I suppose a woman who lives a good deal in her

mind never does have much--well, what you might call passion, (_uses the

word as if it shouldn't be used. Brows knitted, is looking ahead, does

not see_ DICK_'s face. Turning to him with a laugh_) I suppose you know

pretty much all there is to know about women?

DICK: Perhaps one or two details have escaped me.

HARRY: Well, for that matter, you might know all there is to know about

women and not know much about Claire. But now about (_does not want to

say passion again_)--oh, feeling--Claire has a certain--well, a

certain--

DICK: Irony?

HARRY: Which is really more--more--

DICK: More fetching, perhaps.

HARRY: Yes! Than the thing itself. But of course--you wouldn't have much

of a thing that you have irony about.

DICK: Oh--wouldn't you! I mean--a man might.

HARRY: I'd like to talk to Edgeworth about Claire. But it's not easy to

talk to Tom about Claire--or to Claire about Tom.

DICK: (_alert_) They're very old friends, aren't they?

HARRY: Why--yes, they are. Though they've not been together much of late

years, Edgeworthy always going to the ends of the earth to--meditate

about something. I must say I don't get it. If you have a place--that's

the place for you to be. And he did have a place--best kind of family

connections, and it was a very good business his father left him.

Publishing business--in good shape, too, when old Edgeworthy died. I

wouldn't call Tom a great success in life--but Claire does listen to

what he says.

DICK: Yes, I've noticed that.

HARRY: So, I'd like to get him to tell her to quit this queer business

of making things grow that never grew before.

DICK: But are you sure that's what he would tell her? Isn't he in the

same business himself?

HARRY: Why, he doesn't raise anything.

(TOM _is again at the door_.)

DICK: Anyway, I think he might have some idea that we can't very well

reach each other.

HARRY: Damn nonsense. What have we got intelligence for?

DICK: To let each other alone, I suppose. Only we haven't enough to do

it.

(TOM _is now knocking on the door with a revolver_. HARRY _half turns,

decides to be too intelligent to turn_.)

HARRY: Don't tell me I'm getting nerves. But the way some of you people

talk is enough to make even an aviator jumpy. Can't reach each other!

Then we're fools. If I'm here and you're there, why can't we reach each

other?

DICK: Because I am I and you are you.

HARRY: No wonder your drawing's queer. A man who can't reach another

man--(TOM _here reaches them by pointing the revolver in the air and

firing it_. DICK _digs his hand into the dirt_. HARRY _jumps to one

side, fearfully looks around_. TOM, _with a pleased smile to see he at

last has their attention, moves the handle to indicate he would be glad

to come in_.)

HARRY: Why--it's Tom! What the--? (_going to the door_) He's locked out.

And Claire's got the key. (_goes to the inner door, tries it_) And she's

locked in! (_trying to see her in there_) Claire! Claire! (_returning to

the outer door_) Claire's got the key--and I can't get to Claire.

(_makes a futile attempt at getting the door open without a key, goes

back to inner door--peers, pounds_) Claire! Are you there? Didn't you

hear the revolver? Has she gone down the cellar? (_tries the trap-door_)

Bolted! Well, I love the way she keeps people locked out!

DICK: And in.

HARRY: (_getting angry, shouting at the trap-door_) Didn't you hear the

revolver? (_going to_ TOM) Awfully sorry, old man, but--(_in

astonishment to_ DICK) He can't hear me. (TOM, _knocking with the

revolver to get their attention, makes a gesture of inquiry with it_)

No--no--no! Is he asking if he shall shoot himself? (_shaking his head

violently_) Oh, no--no! Um--_um_!

DICK: Hardly seems a man would shoot himself because he can't get to his

breakfast.

HARRY: I'm coming to believe people would do anything! (TOM _is making

another inquiry with the revolver_) No! not here. Don't shoot yourself.

(_trying hard to get the word through_) _Shoot_ yourself. I mean--don't,

(_petulantly to_ DICK) It's ridiculous that you can't make a man

understand you when he looks right at you like that. (_turning back to_

TOM) Read my lips. Lips. I'm saying--Oh damn. Where is Claire? All

right--I'll explain it with motions. We wanted the salt ... (_going over

it to himself_) and Claire wouldn't let us go out for it on account of

the temperature. Salt. Temperature. (_takes his egg-cup to the door,

violent motion of shaking in salt_) But--no (_shakes his head_) No salt.

(_he then takes the thermometer, a flower pot, holds them up to_ TOM) On

account of the temperature. Tem-per-a--(TOM _is not getting it_)

Oh--well, what can you do when a man don't _get_ a thing? (TOM _seems to

be preparing the revolver for action_. HARRY _pounds on the inner door_)

Claire! Do you want Tom to shoot himself?

(_As he looks in there, the trap-door lifts, and CLAIRE comes half-way

up._)

CLAIRE: Why, what is Tom doing out there, with a revolver?

HARRY: He is about to shoot himself because you've locked him out from

his breakfast.

CLAIRE: He must know more interesting ways of destroying himself.

(_bowing to_ TOM) Good morning. (_from his side of the glass_ TOM _bows

and smiles back_) Isn't it strange--our being in here--and he being out

there?

HARRY: Claire, have you no ideas of hospitality? Let him in!

CLAIRE: In? Perhaps that isn't hospitality.

HARRY: Well, whatever hospitality is, what is out there is snow--and

wind--and our guest--who was asked to come here for his breakfast. To

think a man has to _such_ things.

CLAIRE: I'm going to let him in. Though I like his looks out there.

(_she takes the key from her pocket_)

HARRY: Thank heaven the door's coming open. Somebody can go for salt,

and we can have our eggs.

CLAIRE: And open the door again--to let the salt in? No. If you insist

on salt, tell Tom now to go back and get it. It's a stormy morning and

there'll be just one opening of the door.

HARRY: How can we tell him what we can't make him hear? And why does he

think we're holding this conversation instead of letting him in?

CLAIRE: It would be interesting to know. I wonder if he'll tell us?

HARRY: Claire! Is this any time to wonder anything?

CLAIRE: Give up the idea of salt for your egg and I'll let him in.

(_holds up the key to _TOM_ to indicate that for her part she is quite

ready to let him in_)

HARRY: I want my egg!

CLAIRE: Then ask him to bring the salt. It's quite simple.

(HARRY _goes through another pantomime with the egg-cup and the missing

shaker._ CLAIRE, _still standing half-way down cellar, sneezes._ HARRY,

_growing all the while less amiable, explains with thermometer and

flower-pot that there can only be one opening of the door._ TOM _looks

interested, but unenlightened. But suddenly he smiles, nods, vanishes._)

HARRY: Well, thank heaven (_exhausted_) that's over.

CLAIRE: (_sitting on the top step_) It was all so queer. He locked out

on his side of the door. You locked in on yours. Looking right at each

other and--

HARRY: (_in mockery_) And me trying to tell him to kindly fetch the

salt!

CLAIRE: Yes.

HARRY: (_to_ DICK) Well, I didn't do so bad a job, did I? Quite an idea,

explaining our situation with the thermometer and the flower-pot. That

was really an apology for keeping him out there. Heaven knows--some

explanation was in order, (_he is watching, and sees_ TOM _coming_) Now

there he is, Claire. And probably pretty well fed up with the weather.

(CLAIRE _goes to the door, stops before it. She and_ TOM _look at each

other through the glass. Then she lets him in._)

TOM: And now I am in. For a time it seemed I was not to be in. But after

I got the idea that you were keeping me out there to see if I could get

the idea--it would be too humiliating for a wall of glass to keep one

from understanding. (_taking it from his pocket_) So there's the other

thermometer. Where do you want it? (CLAIRE _takes it_)

CLAIRE: And where's the pepper?

TOM: (_putting it on the table_) And here's the pepper.

HARRY: Pepper?

TOM: When Claire sneezed I knew--

CLAIRE: Yes, I knew if I sneezed you would bring the pepper.

TOM: Funny how one always remembers the salt, but the pepper gets

overlooked in preparations. And what is an egg without pepper?

HARRY: (_nastily_) There's your egg, Edgeworth. (_pointing to it on the

floor_) Claire decided it would be a good idea to smash everything, so

she began with your egg.

TOM: (_looking at his egg_) The idea of smashing everything is really

more intriguing than an egg.

HARRY: Nice that you feel that way about it.

CLAIRE: (_giving_ TOM _his coffee_) You want to hear something amusing?

I married Harry because I thought he would smash something.

HARRY: Well, that was an error in judgment.

CLAIRE: I'm such a naive trusting person (HARRY _laughs_--CLAIRE _gives

him a surprised look, continues simply_). Such a guileless soul that I

thought flying would do something to a man. But it didn't take us out.

We just took it in.

TOM: It's only our own spirit can take us out.

HARRY: Whatever you mean by out.

CLAIRE: (_after looking intently at_ TOM, _and considering it_) But our

own spirit is not something on the loose. Mine isn't. It has something

to do with what I do. To fly. To be free in air. To look from above on

the world of all my days. Be where man has never been! Yes--wouldn't you

think the spirit could get the idea? The earth grows smaller. I am

leaving. What are they--running around down there? Why do they run

around down there? Houses? Houses are funny lines and down-going

slants--houses are vanishing slants. I am alone. Can I breathe this

rarer air? Shall I go higher? Shall I go too high? I am loose. I am out.

But no; man flew, and returned to earth the man who left it.

HARRY: And jolly well likely not to have returned at all if he'd had

those flighty notions while operating a machine.

CLAIRE: Oh, Harry! (_not lightly asked_) Can't you see it would be

better not to have returned than to return the man who left it?

HARRY: I have some regard for human life.

CLAIRE: Why, no--I am the one who has the regard for human life, (_more

lightly_) That was why I swiftly divorced my stick-in-the-mud artist and

married--the man of flight. But I merely passed from a stick-in-the-mud

artist to a--

DICK: Stick-in-the-air aviator?

HARRY: Speaking of your stick-in-the-mud artist, as you romantically

call your first blunder, isn't his daughter--and yours--due here to-day?

CLAIRE: I knew something was disturbing me. Elizabeth. A daughter is

being delivered unto me this morning. I have a feeling it will be more

painful than the original delivery. She has been, as they quaintly say,

educated; prepared for her place in life.

HARRY: And fortunately Claire has a sister who is willing to give her

young niece that place.

CLAIRE: The idea of giving anyone a place in life.

HARRY: Yes! The very idea!

CLAIRE: Yes! (_as often, the mocking thing gives true expression to what

lies sombrely in her_) The war. There was another gorgeous chance.

HARRY: Chance for what? I call you, Claire. I ask you to say what you

mean.

CLAIRE: I don't know--precisely. If I did--there'd be no use saying it.

(_at_ HARRY's _impatient exclamation she turns to_ TOM)

TOM: (_nodding_) The only thing left worth saying is the thing we can't

say.

HARRY: Help!

CLAIRE: Yes. But the war didn't help. Oh, it was a stunning chance! But

fast as we could--scuttled right back to the trim little thing we'd been

shocked out of.

HARRY: You bet we did--showing our good sense.

CLAIRE: Showing our incapacity--for madness.

HARRY: Oh, come now, Claire--snap out of it. You're not really trying to

say that capacity for madness is a good thing to have?

CLAIRE: (_in simple surprise_) Why yes, of course.

DICK: But I should say the war did leave enough madness to give you a

gleam of hope.

CLAIRE: Not the madness that--breaks through. And it was--a stunning

chance! Mankind massed to kill. We have failed. We are through. We will

destroy. Break this up--it can't go farther. In the air above--in the

sea below--it is to kill! All we had thought we were--we aren't. We were

shut in with what wasn't so. Is there one ounce of energy has not gone

to this killing? Is there one love not torn in two? Throw it in! Now?

Ready? Break up. Push. Harder. Break up. And then--and then--But we

didn't say--'And then--' The spirit didn't take the tip.

HARRY: Claire! Come now (_looking to the others for help_)--let's talk

of something else.

CLAIRE: Plants do it. The big leap--it's called. Explode their

species--because something in them knows they've gone as far as they can

go. Something in them knows they're shut in to just that. So--go

mad--that life may not be prisoned. Break themselves up into crazy

things--into lesser things, and from the pieces--may come one sliver of

life with vitality to find the future. How beautiful. How brave.

TOM: (_as if he would call her from too far--or would let her know he

has gone with her_) Claire!

CLAIRE: (_her eyes turning to him_) Why should we mind lying under the

earth? We who have no such initiative--no proud madness? Why think it

death to lie under life so flexible--so ruthless and ever-renewing?

ANTHONY: (_from the door of the inner room_) Miss Claire?

CLAIRE: (_after an instant_) Yes? (_she goes with him, as they disappear

his voice heard_,'show me now ... want those violets bedded')

HARRY: Oh, this has got to _stop_. I've got to--put a stop to it some

way. Why, Claire used to be the best sport a man ever played around

with. I can't stand it to see her getting hysterical.

TOM: That was not hysterical.

HARRY: What was it then--I want to know?

TOM: It was--a look.

HARRY: Oh, I might have known I'd get no help from either of you. Even

you, Edgeworthy--much as she thinks of you--and fine sort as I've no

doubt you are, you're doing Claire no good--encouraging her in these

queer ways.

TOM: I couldn't change Claire if I would.

HARRY: And wouldn't if you could.

TOM: No. But you don't have to worry about me. I'm going away in a day

or two. And I shall not be back.

HARRY: Trouble with you is, it makes little difference whether you're

here or away. Just the fact of your existence does encourage Claire in

this--this way she's going.

TOM: (_with a smile_) But you wouldn't ask me to go so far as to stop my

existence? Though I would do that for Claire--if it were the way to help

her.

HARRY: By Jove, you say that as if you meant it.

TOM: Do you think I would say anything about Claire I didn't mean?

HARRY: You think a lot of her, don't you? (TOM _nods_) You don't mean

(_a laugh letting him say it_)--that you're--in love with Claire!

TOM: In love? Oh, that's much too easy. Certainly I do love Claire.

HARRY: Well, you're a cool one!

TOM: Let her be herself. Can't you see she's troubled?

HARRY: Well, what is there to trouble Claire? Now I ask you. It seems to

me she has everything.

TOM: She's left so--open. Too exposed, (_as_ HARRY _moves impatiently_)

Please don't be annoyed with me. I'm doing my best at saying it. You see

Claire isn't hardened into one of those forms she talks about. She's

too--aware. Always pulled toward what could be--tormented by the lost

adventure.

HARRY: Well, there's danger in all that. Of course there's danger.

TOM: But you can't help that.

HARRY: Claire was the best fun a woman could be. Is yet--at times.

TOM: Let her be--at times. As much as she can and will. She does need

that. Don't keep her from it by making her feel you're holding her in

it. Above all, don't try to stop what she's doing here. If she can do it

with plants, perhaps she won't have to do it with herself.

HARRY: Do what?

TOM: (_low, after a pause_) Break up what exists. Open the door to

destruction in the hope of--a door on the far side of destruction.

HARRY: Well, you give me the willies, (_moves around in irritation,

troubled. To_ ANTHONY, _who is passing through with a sprayer_) Anthony,

have any arrangements been made about Miss Claire's daughter?

ANTHONY: I haven't heard of any arrangements.

HARRY: Well, she'll have to have some heat in her room. We can't all

live out here.

ANTHONY: Indeed you cannot. It is not good for the plants.

HARRY: I'm going where I can _smoke_, (_goes out_)

DICK: (_lightly, but fascinated by the idea_) You think there is a door

on the--hinter side of destruction?

TOM: How can one tell--where a door may be? One thing I want to say to

you--for it is about you. (_regards_ DICK _and not with his usual

impersonal contemplation_) I don't think Claire should have--any door

closed to her. (_pause_) You know, I think, what I mean. And perhaps you

can guess how it hurts to say it. Whether it's--mere escape

within,--rather shameful escape within, or the wild hope of that door

through, it's--(_suddenly all human_) Be good to her! (_after a

difficult moment, smiles_) Going away for ever is like dying, so one can

say things.

DICK: Why do you do it--go away for ever?

TOM: I haven't succeeded here.

DICK: But you've tried the going away before.

TOM: Never knowing I would not come back. So that wasn't going away. My

hope is that this will be like looking at life from outside life.

DICK: But then you'll not be in it.

TOM: I haven't been able to look at it while in it.

DICK: Isn't it more important to be in it than to look at it?

TOM: Not what I mean by look.

DICK: It's hard for me to conceive of--loving Claire and going away from

her for ever.

TOM: Perhaps it's harder to do than to conceive of.

DICK: Then why do it?

TOM: It's my only way of keeping her.

DICK: I'm afraid I'm like Harry now. I don't get you.

TOM: I suppose not. Your way is different, (_with calm, with

sadness--not with malice_) But I shall have her longer. And from deeper.

DICK: I know that.

TOM: Though I miss much. Much, (_the buzzer_. TOM _looks around to see

if anyone is coming to answer it, then goes to the phone_) Yes?... I'll

see if I can get her. (_to_ DICK) Claire's daughter has arrived,

(_looking in the inner room--returns to phone_) I don't see her.

(_catching a glimpse of ANTHONY off right_) Oh, Anthony, where's Miss

Claire? Her daughter has arrived.

ANTHONY: She's working at something very important in her experiments.

DICK: But isn't her daughter one of her experiments?

ANTHONY: (_after a baffled moment_) Her daughter is finished.

TOM: (_at the phone_) Sorry--but I can't get to Claire. She appears to

have gone below. (ANTHONY _closes the trap-door_) I did speak to

Anthony, but he says that Claire is working at one of her experiments

and that her daughter is finished. I don't know how to make her hear--I

took the revolver back to the house. Anyway you will remember Claire

doesn't answer the revolver. I hate to reach Claire when she doesn't

want to be reached. Why, of course--a daughter is very important, but

oh, that's too bad. (_putting down the receiver_) He says the girl's

feelings are hurt. Isn't that annoying? (_gingerly pounds on the

trap-door. Then with the other hand. Waits_. ANTHONY _has a gentle smile

for the gentle tapping--nods approval as,_ TOM _returns to the phone_)

She doesn't come up. Indeed I did--with both fists--Sorry.

ANTHONY: Please, you won't try again to disturb Miss Claire, will you?

DICK: Her daughter is here, Anthony. She hasn't seen her daughter for a

year.

ANTHONY: Well, if she got along without a mother for a year--(_goes back

to his work_)

DICK: (_smiling after_ ANTHONY) Plants are queer. Perhaps it's _safer_

to do it with pencil (_regards_ TOM)--or with pure thought. Things that

grow in the earth--

TOM: (_nodding_) I suppose because we grew in the earth.

DICK: I'm always shocked to find myself in agreement with Harry, but I

too am worried about Claire--and this, (_looking at the plants_)

TOM: It's her best chance.

DICK: Don't you hate to go away to India--for ever--leaving Claire's

future uncertain?

TOM: You're cruel now. And you knew that you were being cruel.

DICK: Yes, I like the lines of your face when you suffer.

TOM: The lines of yours when you're causing suffering--I don't like

them.

DICK: Perhaps that's your limitation.

TOM: I grant you it may be. (_They are silent_) I had an odd feeling

that you and I sat here once before, long ago, and that we were plants.

And you were a beautiful plant, and I--I was a very ugly plant. I

confess it surprised me--finding myself so ugly a plant.

(_A young girl is seen outside_. HARRY _gets the door open for her and

brings_ ELIZABETH _in_.)

HARRY: There's heat here. And two of your mother's friends. Mr

Demming--Richard Demming--the artist--and I think you and Mr Edgeworthy

are old friends.

(ELIZABETH _comes forward. She is the creditable young American--well

built, poised, 'cultivated', so sound an expression of the usual as to

be able to meet the world with assurance--assurance which training has

made rather graceful. She is about seventeen--and mature. You feel solid

things behind her_.)

TOM: I knew you when you were a baby. You used to kick a great deal

then.

ELIZABETH: (_laughing, with ease_) And scream, I haven't a doubt. But

I've stopped that. One does, doesn't one? And it was you who gave me the

idol.

TOM: Proselytizing, I'm afraid.

ELIZABETH: I beg--? Oh--_yes (laughing cordially_) I _see. (she

doesn't_) I dressed the idol up in my doll's clothes. They fitted

perfectly--the idol was just the size of my doll Ailine. But mother

didn't like the idol that way, and tore the clothes getting them off.

(_to_ HARRY, _after looking around_) Is mother here?

HARRY: (_crossly_) Yes, she's here. Of course she's here. And she must

know you're here, (_after looking in the inner room he goes to the

trap-door and makes a great noise_)

ELIZABETH: Oh--_please_. Really--it doesn't make the least difference.

HARRY: Well, all I can say is, your manners are better than your

mother's.

ELIZABETH: But you see I don't do anything interesting, so I have to

have good manners. (_lightly, but leaving the impression there is a

certain superiority in not doing anything interesting. Turning cordially

to_ DICK) My father was an artist.

DICK: Yes, I know.

ELIZABETH: He was a portrait painter. Do you do portraits?

DICK: Well, not the kind people buy.

ELIZABETH: They bought father's.

DICK: Yes, I know he did that kind.

HARRY: (_still irritated_) Why, you don't do portraits.

DICK: I did one of you the other day. You thought it was a milk-can.

ELIZABETH: (_laughing delightedly_) No? Not really? Did you think--How

could you think--(_as_ HARRY _does not join the laugh_) Oh, I beg your

pardon. I--Does mother grow beautiful roses now?

HARRY: No, she does not.

(_The trap-door begins to move_. CLAIRE's _head appears_.)

ELIZABETH: Mother! It's been so long--(_she tries to overcome the

difficulties and embrace her mother_)

CLAIRE: (_protecting a box she has_) Careful, Elizabeth. We mustn't

upset the lice.

ELIZABETH: (_retreating_) Lice? (_but quickly equal even to lice_)

Oh--yes. You take it--them--off plants, don't you?

CLAIRE: I'm putting them on certain plants.

ELIZABETH: (_weakly_) Oh, I thought you took them off.

CLAIRE: (_calling_) Anthony! (_he comes_) The lice. (_he takes them from

her_) (CLAIRE, _who has not fully ascended, looks at_ ELIZABETH,

_hesitates, then suddenly starts back down the stairs_.)

HARRY: (_outraged_) Claire! (_slowly she re-ascends--sits on the top

step. After a long pause in which he has waited for_ CLAIRE _to open a

conversation with her daughter_.) Well, and what have you been doing at

school all this time?

ELIZABETH: Oh--studying.

CLAIRE: Studying what?

ELIZABETH: Why--the things one studies, mother.

CLAIRE: Oh! The things one studies. (_looks down cellar again_)

DICK: (_after another wait_) And what have you been doing besides

studying?

ELIZABETH: Oh--the things one does. Tennis and skating and dancing and--

CLAIRE: The things one does.

ELIZABETH: Yes. All the things. The--the things one does. Though I

haven't been in school these last few months, you know. Miss Lane took

us to Europe.

TOM: And how did you like Europe?

ELIZABETH: (_capably_) Oh, I thought it was awfully amusing. All the

girls were quite mad about Europe. Of course, I'm glad I'm an American.

CLAIRE: Why?

ELIZABETH: (_laughing_) Why--mother! Of course one is glad one is an

American. All the girls--

CLAIRE: (_turning away_) O--h! (_a moan under the breath_)

ELIZABETH: Why, mother--aren't you well?

HARRY: Your mother has been working pretty hard at all this.

ELIZABETH: Oh, I do so want to know all about it? Perhaps I can help

you! I think it's just awfully amusing that you're doing something. One

does nowadays, doesn't one?--if you know what I mean. It was the war,

wasn't it, made it the thing to do something?

DICK: (_slyly_) And you thought, Claire, that the war was lost.

ELIZABETH: The _war? Lost!_ (_her capable laugh_) Fancy our losing a

war! Miss Lane says we should give _thanks_. She says we should each do

some expressive thing--you know what I mean? And that this is the

_keynote_ of the age. Of course, one's own kind of thing. Like

mother--growing flowers.

CLAIRE: You think that is one's own kind of thing?

ELIZABETH: Why, of course I do, mother. And so does Miss Lane. All the

girls--

CLAIRE: (_shaking her head as if to get something out_) S-hoo.

ELIZABETH: What is it, mother?

CLAIRE: A fly shut up in my ear--'All the girls!'

ELIZABETH: (_laughing_) Mother was always so amusing. So _different_--if

you know what I mean. Vacations I've lived mostly with Aunt Adelaide,

you know.

CLAIRE: My sister who is fitted to rear children.

HARRY: Well, somebody has to do it.

ELIZABETH: And I do love Aunt Adelaide, but I think its going to be

awfully amusing to be around with mother now--and help her with her

work. Help do some useful beautiful thing.

CLAIRE: I am not doing any useful beautiful thing.

ELIZABETH: Oh, but you are, mother. Of course you are. Miss Lane says

so. She says it is your splendid heritage gives you this impulse to do a

beautiful thing for the race. She says you are doing in your way what

the great teachers and preachers behind you did in theirs.

CLAIRE: (_who is good for little more_) Well, all I can say is, Miss

Lane is stung.

ELIZABETH: Mother! What a thing to say of Miss Lane. (_from this

slipping into more of a little girl manner_) Oh, she gave me a spiel one

day about living up to the men I come from.

(CLAIRE _turns and regards her daughter_.)

CLAIRE: You'll do it, Elizabeth.

ELIZABETH: Well, I don't know. Quite a job, I'll say. Of course, I'd

have to do it in my way. I'm not going to teach or preach or be a stuffy

person. But now that--(_she here becomes the product of a superior

school_) values have shifted and such sensitive new things have been

liberated in the world--

CLAIRE: (_low_) Don't use those words.

ELIZABETH: Why--why not?

CLAIRE: Because you don't know what they mean.

ELIZABETH: Why, of course I know what they mean!

CLAIRE: (_turning away_) You're--stepping on the plants.

HARRY: (_hastily_) Your mother has been working awfully hard at all

this.

ELIZABETH: Well, now that I'm here you'll let me help you, won't you,

mother?

CLAIRE: (_trying for control_) You needn't--bother.

ELIZABETH: But I _want_ to. Help add to the wealth of the world.

CLAIRE: Will you please get it out of your head that I am adding to the

wealth of the world!

ELIZABETH: But, mother--of course you are. To produce a new and better

kind of plant--

CLAIRE: They may be new. I don't give a damn whether they're better.

ELIZABETH: But--but what are they then?

CLAIRE: (_as if choked out of her_) They're different.

ELIZABETH: (_thinks a minute, then laughs triumphantly_) But what's the

use of making them different if they aren't better?

HARRY: A good square question, Claire. Why don't you answer it?

CLAIRE: I don't have to answer it.

HARRY: Why not give the girl a fair show? You never have, you know.

Since she's interested, why not tell her what it is you're doing?

CLAIRE: She is not interested.

ELIZABETH: But I am, mother. Indeed I am. I do want awfully to

understand what you are doing, and help you.

CLAIRE: You can't help me, Elizabeth.

HARRY: Why not let her try?

CLAIRE: Why do you ask me to do that? This is my own thing. Why do you

make me feel I should--(_goes to_ ELIZABETH) I will be good to you,

Elizabeth. We'll go around together. I haven't done it, but--you'll see.

We'll do gay things. I'll have a lot of beaus around for you. Anything

else. Not--this is--Not this.

ELIZABETH: As you like, mother, of course. I just would have been so

glad to--to share the thing that interests you. (_hurt borne with good

breeding and a smile_)

HARRY: Claire! (_which says, 'How can you?'_)

CLAIRE: (_who is looking at_ ELIZABETH) Yes, I will try.

TOM: I don't think so. As Claire says--anything else.

ELIZABETH: Why, of course--I don't at all want to intrude.

HARRY: It'll do Claire good to take someone in. To get down to brass

tacks and actually say what she's driving at.

CLAIRE: Oh--_Harry_. But yes--I will try. (_does try, but no words come.

Laughs_) When you come to say it it's not--One would rather not nail it

to a cross of words--(_laughs again_) with brass tacks.

HARRY: (_affectionately_) But I want to see you put things into words,

Claire, and realize just where you are.

CLAIRE: (_oddly_) You think that's a--good idea?

ELIZABETH: (_in her manner of holding the world capably in her hands_)

Now let's talk of something else. I hadn't the least idea of making

mother feel badly.

CLAIRE: (_desperately_) No, we'll go on. Though I don't know--where

we'll end. I can't answer for that. These plants--(_beginning

flounderingly_) Perhaps they are less beautiful--less sound--than the

plants from which they diverged. But they have found--otherness,

(_laughs a little shrilly_) If you know--what I mean.

TOM: Claire--stop this! (_To_ HARRY) This is wrong.

CLAIRE: (_excitedly_) No; I'm going on. They have been shocked out of

what they were--into something they were not; they've broken from the

forms in which they found themselves. They are alien. Outside. That's

it, outside; if you--know what I mean.

ELIZABETH: (_not shocked from what she is_) But of course, the object of

it all is to make them better plants. Otherwise, what would be the sense

of doing it?

CLAIRE: (_not reached by_ ELIZABETH) Out there--(_giving it with her

hands_) lies all that's not been touched--lies life that waits. Back

here--the old pattern, done again, again and again. So long done it

doesn't even know itself for a pattern--in immensity. But this--has

invaded. Crept a little way into--what wasn't. Strange lines in life

unused. And when you make a pattern new you know a pattern's made with

life. And then you know that anything may be--if only you know how to

reach it. (_this has taken form, not easily, but with great struggle

between feeling and words_)

HARRY: (_cordially_) Now I begin to get you, Claire. I never knew before

why you called it the Edge Vine.

CLAIRE: I should destroy the Edge Vine. It isn't--over the edge. It's

running, back to--'all the girls'. It's a little afraid of Miss Lane,

(_looking sombrely at it_) You are out, but you are not alive.

ELIZABETH: Why, it looks all right, mother.

CLAIRE: Didn't carry life with it from the life it left. Dick--you know

what I mean. At least you ought to. (_her ruthless way of not letting

anyone's feelings stand in the way of truth_) Then destroy it for me!

It's hard to do it--with the hands that made it.

DICK: But what's the point in destroying it, Claire?

CLAIRE: (_impatiently_) I've told you. It cannot create.

DICK: But you say you can go on producing it, and it's interesting in

form.

CLAIRE: And you think I'll stop with that? Be shut in--with different

life--that can't creep on? (_after trying to put destroying hands upon

it_) It's hard to--get past what we've done. Our own dead things--block

the way.

TOM: But you're doing it this next time, Claire, (_nodding to the inner

room_.) In there!

CLAIRE: (_turning to that room_) I'm not sure.

TOM: But you told me Breath of Life has already produced itself. Doesn't

that show it has brought life from the life it left?

CLAIRE: But timidly, rather--wistfully. A little homesick. If it is less

sure this time, then it is going back to--Miss Lane. But if the

pattern's clearer now, then it has made friends of life that waits. I'll

know to-morrow.

ELIZABETH: You know, something tells me this is _wrong_.

CLAIRE: The hymn-singing ancestors are tuning up.

ELIZABETH: I don't know what you mean by that, mother but--

CLAIRE: But we will now sing, 'Nearer, my God, to Thee: Nearer to--'

ELIZABETH: (_laughingly breaking in_) Well, I don't care. Of course you

can make fun at me, but something does tell me this is wrong. To do

what--what--

DICK: What God did?

ELIZABETH: Well--yes. Unless you do it to make them better--to _do_ it

just to do it--that doesn't seem right to me.

CLAIRE: (_roughly_) 'Right to you!' And that's all you know of

adventure--and of anguish. Do you know it is you--world of which you're

so true a flower--makes me have to leave? You're there to hold the door

shut! Because you're young and of a gayer world, you think I can't _see_

them--those old men? Do you know why you're so sure of yourself? Because

you can't _feel_. Can't feel--the limitless--out there--a sea just over

the hill. I will not stay with you! (_buries her hands in the earth

around the Edge Vine. But suddenly steps back from it as she had from_

ELIZABETH) And I will not stay with _you! (grasps it as we grasp what we

would kill, is trying to pull it up. They all step forward in horror.

ANTHONY is drawn in by this harm to the plant_)

ANTHONY: Miss Claire! Miss Claire! The work of years!

CLAIRE: May only make a prison! (_struggling with_ HARRY, _who is trying

to stop her_) You think I too will die on the edge? (_she has thrown him

away, is now struggling with the vine_) Why did I make you? To get past

you! (_as she twists it_) Oh yes, I know you have thorns! The Edge Vine

should have thorns, (_with a long tremendous pull for deep roots, she

has it up. As she holds the torn roots_) Oh, I have loved you so! You

took me where I hadn't been.

ELIZABETH: (_who has been looking on with a certain practical horror_)

Well, I'd say it would be better not to go there!

CLAIRE: Now I know what you are for! (_flings her arm back to strike_

ELIZABETH _with the Edge Vine_)

HARRY: (_wresting it from her_) Claire! Are you mad?

CLAIRE: No, I'm not mad. I'm--too sane! (_pointing to_ ELIZABETH--_and

the words come from mighty roots_) To think that object ever moved my

belly and sucked my breast! (ELIZABETH _hides her face as if struck_)

HARRY: (_going to_ ELIZABETH, _turning to_ CLAIRE) This is atrocious!

You're cruel.

(_He leads_ ELIZABETH _to the door and out. After an irresolute moment

in which he looks from_ CLAIRE _to_ TOM, DICK _follows._ ANTHONY _cannot

bear to go. He stoops to take the Edge Vine from the floor._ CLAIRE's

_gesture stops him. He goes into the inner room._)

CLAIRE: (_kicking the Edge Vine out of her way, drawing deep breaths,

smiling_) O-h. How good I feel! Light! (_a movement as if she could

fly_) Read me something, Tom dear. Or say something pleasant--about God.

But be very careful what you say about him! I have a feeling--he's not

far off.

CURTAIN

ACT II

_Late afternoon of the following day._ CLAIRE _is alone in the tower--a

tower which is thought to be round but does not complete the circle. The

back is curved, then jagged lines break from that, and the front is a

queer bulging window--in a curve that leans. The whole structure is as

if given a twist by some terrific force--like something wrong. It is

lighted by an old-fashioned watchman's lantern hanging from the ceiling;

the innumerable pricks and slits in the metal throw a marvellous pattern

on the curved wall--like some masonry that hasn't been.

There are no windows at back, and there is no door save an opening in

the floor. The delicately distorted rail of a spiral staircase winds up

from below._ CLAIRE _is seen through the huge ominous window as if shut

into the tower. She is lying on a seat at the back looking at a book of

drawings. To do this she has left the door of her lantern a little

open--and her own face is clearly seen.

A door is heard opening below; laughing voices,_ CLAIRE _listens, not

pleased._

ADELAIDE: (_voice coming up_) Dear--dear, why do they make such

twisting steps.

HARRY: Take your time, most up now. (HARRY_'s head appears, he looks

back._) Making it all right?

ADELAIDE: I can't tell yet. (_laughingly_) No, I don't think so.

HARRY: (_reaching back a hand for her_) The last lap--is the bad lap.

(ADELAIDE _is up, and occupied with getting her breath._)

HARRY: Since you wouldn't come down, Claire, we thought we'd come up.

ADELAIDE: (_as_ CLAIRE _does not greet her_) I'm sorry to intrude, but I

have to see you, Claire. There are things to be arranged. (CLAIRE

_volunteering nothing about arrangements,_ ADELAIDE _surveys the tower.

An unsympathetic eye goes from the curves to the lines which diverge.

Then she looks from the window_) Well, at least you have a view.

HARRY: This is the first time you've been up here?

ADELAIDE: Yes, in the five years you've had the house I was never asked

up here before.

CLAIRE: (_amiably enough_) You weren't asked up here now.

ADELAIDE: Harry asked me.

CLAIRE: It isn't Harry's tower. But never mind--since you don't like

it--it's all right.

ADELAIDE: (_her eyes again rebuking the irregularities of the tower_)

No, I confess I do not care for it. A round tower should go on being

round.

HARRY: Claire calls this the thwarted tower. She bought the house

because of it. (_going over and sitting by her, his hand on her ankle_)

Didn't you, old girl? She says she'd like to have known the architect.

ADELAIDE: Probably a tiresome person too incompetent to make a perfect

tower.

CLAIRE: Well, now he's disposed of, what next?

ADELAIDE: (_sitting down in a manner of capably opening a conference_)

Next, Elizabeth, and you, Claire. Just what is the matter with

Elizabeth?

CLAIRE: (_whose voice is cool, even, as if herself is not really engaged

by this_) Nothing is the matter with her. She is a tower that is a

tower.

ADELAIDE: Well, is that anything against her?

CLAIRE: She's just like one of her father's portraits. They never

interested me. Nor does she. (_looks at the drawings which do interest

her_)

ADELAIDE: A mother cannot cast off her own child simply because she does

not interest her!

CLAIRE: (_an instant raising cool eyes to_ ADELAIDE) Why can't she?

ADELAIDE: Because it would be monstrous!

CLAIRE: And why can't she be monstrous--if she has to be?

ADELAIDE: You don't have to be. That's where I'm out of patience with

you Claire. You are really a particularly intelligent, competent person,

and it's time for you to call a halt to this nonsense and be the woman

you were meant to be!

CLAIRE: (_holding the book up to see another way_) What inside dope have

you on what I was meant to be?

ADELAIDE: I know what you came from.

CLAIRE: Well, isn't it about time somebody got loose from that? What I

came from made you, so--

ADELAIDE: (_stiffly_) I see.

CLAIRE: So--you being such a tower of strength, why need I too be

imprisoned in what I came from?

ADELAIDE: It isn't being imprisoned. Right there is where you make your

mistake, Claire. Who's in a tower--in an unsuccessful tower? Not I. I go

about in the world--free, busy, happy. Among people, I have no time to

think of myself.

CLAIRE: No.

ADELAIDE: No. My family. The things that interest them; from morning

till night it's--

CLAIRE: Yes, I know you have a large family, Adelaide; five and

Elizabeth makes six.

ADELAIDE: We'll speak of Elizabeth later. But if you would just get out

of yourself and enter into other people's lives--

CLAIRE: Then I would become just like you. And we should all be just

alike in order to assure one another that we're all just right. But

since you and Harry and Elizabeth and ten million other people bolster

each other up, why do you especially need me?

ADELAIDE: (_not unkindly_) We don't need you as much as you need us.

CLAIRE: (_a wry face_) I never liked what I needed.

HARRY: I am convinced I am the worst thing in the world for you, Claire.

CLAIRE: (_with a smile for his tactics, but shaking her head_) I'm

afraid you're not. I don't know--perhaps you are.

ADELAIDE: Well, what is it you want, Claire?

CLAIRE: (_simply_) You wouldn't know if I told you.

ADELAIDE: That's rather arrogant.

HARRY: Yes, take a chance, Claire. I have been known to get an idea--and

Adelaide quite frequently gets one.

CLAIRE: (_the first resentment she has shown_) You two feel very

superior, don't you?

ADELAIDE: I don't think we are the ones who are feeling superior.

CLAIRE: Oh, yes, you are. Very superior to what you think is my feeling

of superiority, comparing my--isolation with your 'heart of humanity'.

Soon we will speak of the beauty of common experiences, of the--Oh, I

could say it all before we come to it.

HARRY: Adelaide came up here to help you, Claire.

CLAIRE: Adelaide came up here to lock me in. Well, she can't do it.

ADELAIDE: (_gently_) But can't you see that one may do that to one's

self?

CLAIRE: (_thinks of this, looks suddenly tired--then smiles_) Well, at

least I've changed the keys.

HARRY: 'Locked in.' Bunkum. Get that our of your head, Claire. Who's

locked in? Nobody that I know of, we're all free Americans. Free as air.

ADELAIDE: I wish you'd come and hear one of Mr Morley's sermons, Claire.

You're very old-fashioned if you think sermons are what they used to be.

CLAIRE: (_with interest_) And do they still sing 'Nearer, my God, to

Thee'?

ADELAIDE: They do, and a noble old hymn it is. It would do you no harm

at all to sing it.

CLAIRE: (_eagerly_) Sing it to me, Adelaide. I'd like to hear you sing

it.

ADELAIDE: It would be sacrilege to sing it to you in this mood.

CLAIRE: (_falling back_) Oh, I don't know. I'm not so sure God would

agree with you. That would be one on you, wouldn't it?

ADELAIDE: It's easy to feel one's self set apart!

CLAIRE: No, it isn't.

ADELAIDE: (_beginning anew_) It's a new age, Claire. Spiritual values--

CLAIRE: Spiritual values! (_in her brooding way_) So you have pulled

that up. (_with cunning_) Don't think I don't know what it is you do.

ADELAIDE: Well, what do I do? I'm sure I have no idea what you're

talking about.

HARRY: (_affectionately, as_ CLAIRE _is looking with intentness at what

he does not see_) What does she do, Claire?

CLAIRE: It's rather clever, what she does. Snatching the phrase--(_a

movement as if pulling something up_) standing it up between her

and--the life that's there. And by saying it enough--'We have life! We

have life! We have life!' Very good come-back at one who would really

be--'Just so! _We_ are that. Right this way, please--'That, I suppose is

what we mean by needing each other. All join in the chorus, 'This is it!

This is it! This is it!' And anyone who won't join is to be--visited by

relatives, (_regarding_ ADELAIDE _with curiosity_) Do you really think

that anything is going on in you?

ADELAIDE: (_stiffly_) I am not one to hold myself up as a perfect

example of what the human race may be.

CLAIRE: (_brightly_) Well, that's good.

HARRY: Claire!

CLAIRE: Humility's a _real_ thing--not just a fine name for laziness.

HARRY: Well, Lord A'mighty, you can't call Adelaide lazy.

CLAIRE: She stays in one place because she hasn't the energy to go

anywhere else.

ADELAIDE: (_as if the last word in absurdity has been said) I_ haven't

energy?

CLAIRE: (_mildly_) You haven't any energy at all, Adelaide. That's why

you keep so busy.

ADELAIDE: _Well_--Claire's nerves are in a worse state than I had

realized.

CLAIRE: So perhaps we'd better look at Blake's drawings, (_takes up the

book_)

ADELAIDE: It would be all right for me to look at Blake's drawings.

You'd better look at the Sistine Madonna, (_affectionately, after she

has watched_ CLAIRE_'s face a moment_) What is it, Claire? Why do you

shut yourself out from us?

CLAIRE: I told you. Because I do not want to be shut in with you.

ADELAIDE: All of this is not very pleasant for Harry.

HARRY: I want Claire to be gay.

CLAIRE: Funny--you should want that, (_speaks unwillingly, a curious,

wistful unwillingness_) Did you ever say a preposterous thing, then go

trailing after the thing you've said and find it wasn't so preposterous?

Here is the circle we are in._describes a big circle_) Being gay. It

shoots little darts through the circle, and a minute later--gaiety all

gone, and you looking through that little hole the gaiety left.

ADELAIDE: (_going to her, as she is still looking through that little

hole_) Claire, dear, I wish I could make you feel how much I care for

you. (_simply, with real feeling_) You can call me all the names you

like--dull, commonplace, lazy--that is a new idea, I confess, but the

rest of our family's gone now, and the love that used to be there

between us all--the only place for it now is between you and me. You

were so much loved, Claire. You oughtn't to try and get away from a

world in which you are so much loved, (_to_ HARRY) Mother--father--all

of us, always loved Claire best. We always loved Claire's queer gaiety.

Now you've got to hand it to us for that, as the children say.

CLAIRE: (_moved, but eyes shining with a queer bright loneliness_) But

never one of you--once--looked with me through the little pricks the

gaiety made--never one of you--once, looked with me at the queer light

that came in through the pricks.

ADELAIDE: And can't you see, dear, that it's better for us we didn't?

And that it would be better for you now if you would just resolutely

look somewhere else? You must see yourself that you haven't the poise of

people who are held--well, within the circle, if you choose to put it

that way. There's something about being in that main body, having one's

roots in the big common experiences, gives a calm which you have missed.

That's _why_ I want you to take Elizabeth, forget yourself, and--

CLAIRE: I do want calm. But mine would have to be a calm I--worked my

way to. A calm all prepared for me--would stink.

ADELAIDE: (_less sympathetically_) I know you have to be yourself,

Claire. But I don't admit you have a right to hurt other people.

HARRY: I think Claire and I had better take a nice long trip.

ADELAIDE: Now why don't you?

CLAIRE: I am taking a trip.

ADELAIDE: Well, Harry isn't, and he'd like to go and wants you to go

with him. Go to Paris and get yourself some awfully good-looking

clothes--and have one grand fling at the gay world. You really love

that, Claire, and you've been awfully dull lately. I think that's the

whole trouble.

HARRY: I think so too.

ADELAIDE: This sober business of growing plants--

CLAIRE: Not sober--it's mad.

ADELAIDE: All the more reason for quitting it.

CLAIRE: But madness that is the only chance for sanity.

ADELAIDE: Come, come, now--let's not juggle words.

CLAIRE: (_springing up_) How dare you say that to me, Adelaide. You who

are such a liar and thief and whore with words!

ADELAIDE: (_facing her, furious_) How _dare_ you--

HARRY: Of course not, Claire. You have the most preposterous way of

using words.

CLAIRE: I respect words.

ADELAIDE: Well, you'll please respect me enough not to dare use certain

words to me!

CLAIRE: Yes, I do dare. I'm tired of what you do--you and all of you.

Life--experience--values--calm--sensitive words which raise their heads

as indications. And you _pull them up_--to decorate your stagnant little

minds--and think that makes you--And because you have pulled that word

from the life that grew it you won't let one who's honest, and aware,

and troubled, try to reach through to--to what she doesn't know is

there, (_she is moved, excited, as if a cruel thing has been done_) Why

did you come here?

ADELAIDE: To try and help you. But I begin to fear I can't do it. It's

pretty egotistical to claim that what so many people are, is wrong.

(_CLAIRE, after looking intently at ADELAIDE, slowly, smiling a little,

describes a circle. With deftly used hands makes a quick vicious break

in the circle which is there in the air._)

HARRY: (_going to her, taking her hands_) It's getting close to

dinner-time. You were thinking of something else, Claire, when I told

you Charlie Emmons was coming to dinner to-night, (_answering her look_)

Sure--he is a neurologist, and I want him to see you. I'm perfectly

honest with you--cards all on the table, you know that. I'm hoping if

you like him--and he's the best scout in the world, that he can help

you. (_talking hurriedly against the stillness which follows her look

from him to ADELAIDE, where she sees between them an 'understanding'

about her_) Sure you need help, Claire. Your nerves are a little on the

blink--from all you've been doing. No use making a mystery of it--or a

tragedy. Emmons is a cracker-jack, and naturally I want you to get a

move on yourself and be happy again.

CLAIRE: (_who has gone over to the window_) And this neurologist can

make me happy?

HARRY: Can make you well--and then you'll be happy.

ADELAIDE: (_in the voice of now fixing it all up_) And I had just an

idea about Elizabeth. Instead of working with mere plants, why not think

of Elizabeth as a plant and--

(CLAIRE, _who has been looking out of the window, now throws open one of

the panes that swings out--or seems to, and calls down in great

excitement._)

CLAIRE: Tom! _Tom!_ Quick! Up here! I'm in trouble!

HARRY: (_going to the window_) That's a rotten thing to do, Claire!

You've frightened him.

CLAIRE: Yes, how fast he can run. He was deep in thought and I stabbed

right through.

HARRY: Well, he'll be none too pleased when he gets up here and finds

there was no reason for the stabbing!

(_They wait for his footsteps,_ HARRY _annoyed,_ ADELAIDE _offended, but

stealing worried looks at_ CLAIRE, _who is looking fixedly at the place

in the floor where_ TOM _will appear.--Running footsteps._)

TOM: (_his voice getting there before he does_) Yes,

Claire--yes--yes--(_as his head appears_) What is it?

CLAIRE: (_at once presenting him and answering his question_) My sister.

TOM: (_gasping_) Oh,--why--is that all? I mean--how do you do? Pardon, I

(_panting_) came up--rather hurriedly.

HARRY: If you want to slap Claire, Tom, I for one have no objection.

CLAIRE: Adelaide has the most interesting idea, Tom. She proposes that I

take Elizabeth and roll her in the gutter. Just let her lie there until

she breaks up into--

ADELAIDE: _Claire!_ I don't see how--even in fun--pretty vulgar fun--you

can speak in those terms of a pure young girl. I'm beginning to think I

had better take Elizabeth.

CLAIRE: Oh, I've thought that all along.

ADELAIDE: And I'm also beginning to suspect that--oddity may be just a

way of shifting responsibility.

CLAIRE: (_cordially interested in this possibility_) Now you know--that

might be.

ADELAIDE: A mother who does not love her own child! You are an unnatural

woman, Claire.

CLAIRE: Well, at least it saves me from being a natural one.

ADELAIDE: Oh--I know, you think you have a great deal! But let me tell

you, you've missed a great deal! You've never known the faintest

stirring of a mother's love.

CLAIRE: That's not true.

HARRY: No. Claire loved our boy.

CLAIRE: I'm glad he didn't live.

HARRY: (_low_) Claire!

CLAIRE: I loved him. Why should I want him to live?

HARRY: Come, dear, I'm sorry I spoke of him--when you're not feeling

well.

CLAIRE: I'm feeling all right. _Just_ because I'm seeing something, it

doesn't mean I'm sick.

HARRY: Well, let's go down now. About dinner-time. I shouldn't wonder if

Emmons were here. (_as ADELAIDE is starting down stairs_) Coming,

Claire?

CLAIRE: No.

HARRY: But it's time to go down for dinner.

CLAIRE: I'm not hungry.

HARRY: But we have a guest. Two guests--Adelaide's staying too.

CLAIRE: Then you're not alone.

HARRY: But I invited Dr Emmons to meet you.

CLAIRE: (_her smile flashing_) Tell him I am violent to-night.

HARRY: Dearest--how can you joke about such things!

CLAIRE: So you do think they're serious?

HARRY: (_irritated_) No, I do not! But I want you to come down for

dinner!

ADELAIDE: Come, come, Claire; you know quite well this is not the sort

of thing one does.

CLAIRE: Why go on saying one doesn't, when you are seeing one does (_to_

TOM) Will you stay with me a while? I want to purify the tower.

(ADELAIDE _begins to disappear_)

HARRY: Fine time to choose for a _tête-à-tête. (as he is leaving_) I'd

think more of you, Edgeworthy, if you refused to humour Claire in her

ill-breeding.

ADELAIDE: (_her severe voice coming from below_) It is not what she was

taught.

CLAIRE: No, it's not what I was taught, (_laughing rather timidly_) And

perhaps you'd rather have your dinner?

TOM: No.

CLAIRE: We'll get something later. I want to talk to you. (_but she does

not--laughs_) Absurd that I should feel bashful with you. Why am I so

awkward with words when I go to talk to you?

TOM: The words know they're not needed.

CLAIRE: No, they're not needed. There's something underneath--an open

way--down below the way that words can go. (_rather desperately_) It is

there, isn't it?

TOM: Oh, yes, it is there.

CLAIRE: Then why do we never--go it?

TOM: If we went it, it would not be there.

CLAIRE: Is that true? How terrible, if that is true.

TOM: Not terrible, wonderful--that it should--of itself--be there.

CLAIRE: (_with the simplicity that can say anything_) I want to go it,

Tom, I'm lonely up on top here. Is it that I have more faith than you,

or is it only that I'm greedier? You see, you don't know (_her reckless

laugh_) what you're missing. You don't know how I could love you.

TOM: Don't, Claire; that isn't--how it is--between you and me.

CLAIRE: But why can't it be--every way--between you and me?

TOM: Because we'd lose--the open way. (_the quality of his denial shows

how strong is his feeling for her_) With anyone else--not with you.

CLAIRE: But you are the only one I want. The only one--all of me wants.

TOM: I know; but that's the way it is.

CLAIRE: You're cruel.

TOM: Oh, Claire, I'm trying so hard to--save it for us. Isn't it our

beauty and our safeguard that underneath our separate lives, no matter

where we may be, with what other, there is this open way between us?

That's so much more than anything we could bring to being.

CLAIRE: Perhaps. But--it's different with me. I'm not--all spirit.

TOM: (_his hand on her_) Dear!

CLAIRE: No, don't touch me--since (_moving_) you're going away

to-morrow? (_he nods_) For--always? (_his head just moves assent_) India

is just another country. But there are undiscovered countries.

TOM: Yes, but we are so feeble we have to reach our country through the

actual country lying nearest. Don't you do that yourself, Claire? Reach

your country through the plants' country?

CLAIRE: My country? You mean--outside?

TOM: No, I don't think it that way.

CLAIRE: Oh, yes, you do.

TOM: Your country is the inside, Claire. The innermost. You are

disturbed because you lie too close upon the heart of life.

CLAIRE: (_restlessly_) I don't know; you can think it one way--or

another. No way says it, and that's good--at least it's not shut up in

saying. (_she is looking at her enclosing hand, as if something is shut

up there_)

TOM: But also, you know, things may be freed by expression. Come from

the unrealized into the fabric of life.

CLAIRE: Yes, but why does the fabric of life have to--freeze into its

pattern? It should (_doing it with her hands_) flow, (_then turning like

an unsatisfied child to him_) But I wanted to talk to you.

TOM: You are talking to me. Tell me about your flower that never was

before--your Breath of Life.

CLAIRE: I'll know to-morrow. You'll not go until I know?

TOM: I'll try to stay.

CLAIRE: It seems to me, if it has--then I have, integrity in--(_smiles,

it is as if the smile lets her say it_) otherness. I don't want to die

on the edge!

TOM: Not you!

CLAIRE: Many do. It's what makes them too smug in allness--those dead

things on the edge, died, distorted--trying to get through. Oh--don't

think I don't see--The Edge Vine! (_a pause, then swiftly_) Do you know

what I mean? Or do you think I'm just a fool, or crazy?

TOM: I think I know what you mean, and you know I don't think you are a

fool, or crazy.

CLAIRE: Stabbed to awareness--no matter where it takes you, isn't that

more than a safe place to stay? (_telling him very simply despite the

pattern of pain in her voice_) Anguish may be a thread--making patterns

that haven't been. A thread--blue and burning.

TOM: (_to take her from what even he fears for her_) But you were

telling me about the flower you breathed to life. What is your Breath of

Life?

CLAIRE: (_an instant playing_) It's a secret. A secret?--it's a trick.

Distilled from the most fragile flowers there are. It's only

air--pausing--playing; except, far in, one stab of red, its quivering

heart--that asks a question. But here's the trick--I bred the air-form

to strength. The strength shut up behind us I've sent--far out.

(_troubled_) I'll know tomorrow. And I have another gift for Breath of

Life; some day--though days of work lie in between--some day I'll give

it reminiscence. Fragrance that is--no one thing in here

but--reminiscent. (_silence, she raises wet eyes_) We need the haunting

beauty from the life we've left. I need that, (_he takes her hands and

breathes her name_) Let me reach my country with you. I'm not a plant.

After all, they don't--accept me. Who does--accept me? Will you?

TOM: My dear--dear, dear, Claire--you move me so! You stand alone in a

clearness that breaks my heart, (_her hands move up his arms. He takes

them to hold them from where they would go--though he can hardly do it_)

But you've asked what you yourself could answer best. We'd only stop in

the country where everyone stops.

CLAIRE: We might come through--to radiance.

TOM: Radiance is an enclosing place.

CLAIRE: Perhaps radiance lighting forms undreamed, (_her reckless

laugh_) I'd be willing to--take a chance, I'd rather lose than never

know.

TOM: No, Claire. Knowing you from underneath, I know you couldn't bear

to lose.

CLAIRE: Wouldn't men say you were a fool!

TOM: They would.

CLAIRE: And perhaps you are. (_he smiles a little_) I feel so desperate,

because if only I could--show you what I am, you might see I could have

without losing. But I'm a stammering thing with you.

TOM: You do show me what you are.

CLAIRE: I've known a few moments that were life. Why don't they help me

now? One was in the air. I was up with Harry--flying--high. It was about

four months before David was born--the doctor was furious--pregnant

women are supposed to keep to earth. We were going fast--I _was_

flying--I had left the earth. And then--within me, movement, for the

first time--stirred to life far in air--movement within. The man unborn,

he too, would fly. And so--I always loved him. He was movement--and

wonder. In his short life were many flights. I never told anyone about

the last one. His little bed was by the window--he wasn't four years

old. It was night, but him not asleep. He saw the morning star--you

know--the morning star. Brighter--stranger--reminiscent--and a promise.

He pointed--'Mother', he asked me, 'what is there--beyond the stars?' A

baby, a sick baby--the morning star. Next night--the finger that pointed

was--(_suddenly bites her own finger_) But, yes, I am glad. He would

always have tried to move and too much would hold him. Wonder would

die--and he'd laugh at soaring, (_looking down, sidewise_) Though I

liked his voice. So I wish you'd stay near me--for I like your voice,

too.

TOM: Claire! That's (_choked_) almost too much.

CLAIRE: (_one of her swift glances--canny, almost practical_) Well, I'm

glad if it is. How can I make it more? (_but what she sees brings its

own change_) I know what it is you're afraid of. It's because I have so

much--yes, why shouldn't I say it?--passion. You feel that in me, don't

you? You think it would swamp everything. But that isn't all there is to

me.

TOM: Oh, I know it! My dearest--why, it's because I know it! You think I

_am_--a fool?

CLAIRE: It's a thing that's--sometimes more than I am. And yet I--I am

more than it is.

TOM: I know. I know about you.

CLAIRE: I don't know that you do. Perhaps if you really knew about

me--you wouldn't go away.

TOM: You're making me suffer, Claire.

CLAIRE: I know I am. I want to. Why shouldn't you suffer? (_now seeing

it more clearly than she has ever seen it_) You know what I think about

you? You're afraid of suffering, and so you stop this side--in what you

persuade yourself is suffering, (_waits, then sends it straight_) You

know--how it is--with me and Dick? (_as she sees him suffer_) Oh, no, I

don't want to hurt you! Let it be you! I'll teach you--you needn't scorn

it. It's rather wonderful.

TOM: Stop that, Claire! That isn't you.

CLAIRE: Why are you so afraid--of letting me be low--if that is low? You

see--(_cannily_) I believe in beauty. I have the faith that can be bad

as well as good. And you know why I have the faith? Because

sometimes--from my lowest moments--beauty has opened as the sea. From a

cave I saw immensity.

My love, you're going away--

Let me tell you how it is with me;

I want to touch you--somehow touch you once before I die--

Let me tell you how it is with me.

I do not want to work,

I want to be;

Do not want to make a rose or make a poem--

Want to lie upon the earth and know. (_closes her eyes_)

Stop doing that!--words going into patterns;

They do it sometimes when I let come what's there.

Thoughts take pattern--then the pattern is the thing.

But let me tell you how it is with me. (_it flows again_)

All that I do or say--it is to what it comes from,

A drop lifted from the sea.

I want to lie upon the earth and know.

But--scratch a little dirt and make a flower;

Scratch a bit of brain--something like a poem. (_covering her face_)

Stop _doing_ that. Help me stop doing that!

TOM: (_and from the place where she had carried him_)

Don't talk at all. Lie still and know--

And know that I am knowing.

CLAIRE:

Yes; but we are so weak we have to talk;

To talk--to touch.

Why can't I rest in knowing I would give my life to reach you?

That has--all there is.

But I must--put my timid hands upon you,

Do something about infinity.

Oh, let what will flow into us,

And fill us full--and leave us still.

Wring me dry,

And let me fill again with life more pure.

To know--to feel,

And do nothing with what I feel and know--

That's being good. That's nearer God.

(_drenched in the feeling that has flowed through her--but

surprised--helpless_) Why, I said your thing, didn't I? Opened my life

to bring you to me, and what came--is what sends you away.

TOM: No! What came is what holds us together. What came is what saves us

from ever going apart. (_brokenly_) My beautiful one. You--you brave

flower of all our knowing.

CLAIRE: I am not a flower. I am too torn. If you have anything--help me.

Breathe, Breathe the healing oneness, and let me know in calm. (_with a

sob his head rests upon her_)

CLAIRE: (_her hands on his head, but looking far_) Beauty--you pure one

thing. Breathe--Let me know in calm. Then--trouble me, trouble me, for

other moments--in farther calm. (_slow, motionless, barely articulate_)

TOM: (_as she does not move he lifts his head. And even as he looks at

her, she does not move, nor look at him_) Claire--(_his hand out to her,

a little afraid_) You went away from me then. You are away from me now.

CLAIRE: Yes, and I could go on. But I will come back, (_it is hard to

do. She brings much with her_) That, too, I will give you--my

by-myself-ness. That's the uttermost I can give. I never thought--to try

to give it. But let us do it--the great sacrilege! Yes! (_excited, she

rises; she has his hands, and bring him up beside her_) Let us take the

mad chance! Perhaps it's the only way to save--what's there. How do we

know? How can we know? Risk. Risk everything. From all that flows into

us, let it rise! All that we never thought to use to make a moment--let

it flow into what could be! Bring all into life between us--or send all

down to death! Oh, do you know what I am doing? Risk, risk everything,

why are you so afraid to lose? What holds you from me? Test all. Let it

live or let it die. It is our chance--our chance to bear--what's there.

My dear one--I will love you so. With all of me. I am not afraid

now--of--all of me. Be generous. Be unafraid. Life is for _life_--though

it cuts us from the farthest life. How can I make you know that's true?

All that we're open to--(_hesitates, shudders_) But yes--I will, I will

risk the life that waits. Perhaps only he who gives his

loneliness--shall find. You never keep by holding, (_gesture of giving_)

To the uttermost. And it is gone--or it is there. You do not know

and--that makes the moment--(_music has begun--a phonograph downstairs;

they do not heed it_) Just as I would cut my wrists--(_holding them

out_) Yes, perhaps this lesser thing will tell it--would cut my wrists

and let the blood flow out till all is gone if my last drop would

make--would make--(_looking at them fascinated_) I want to see it doing

that! Let me give my last chance for life to--

(_He snatches her--they are on the brink of their moment; now that there

are no words the phonograph from downstairs is louder. It is playing

languorously the Barcarole; they become conscious of this--they do not

want to be touched by the love song._)

CLAIRE: Don't listen. That's nothing. This isn't that, (_fearing_) I

tell you--it isn't that. Yes, I know--that's amorous--enclosing. I

know--a little place. This isn't that, (_her arms going around him--all

the lure of 'that' while she pleads against it as it comes up to them_)

We will come out--to radiance--in far places (_admitting, using_) Oh,

then let it be that! Go with it. Give up--the otherness. I will! And in

the giving up--perhaps a door--we'd never find by searching. And if it's

no more--than all have known, I only say it's worth the allness! (_her

arms wrapped round him_) My love--my love--let go your pride in

loneliness and let me give you joy!

TOM: (_drenched in her passion, but fighting_) It's _you_. (_in

anguish_) You rare thing untouched--not--not into this--not back into

this--by me--lover of your apartness.

(_She steps back. She sees he cannot. She stands there, before what she

wanted more than life, and almost had, and lost. A long moment. Then she

runs down the stairs._)

CLAIRE: (_her voice coming up_) Harry! Choke that phonograph! If you

want to be lewd--do it yourselves! You tawdry things--you cheap little

lewd cowards, (_a door heard opening below_) Harry! If you don't stop

that music, I'll kill myself.

(_far down, steps on stairs_)

HARRY: Claire, what _is_ this?

CLAIRE: Stop that phonograph or I'll--

HARRY: Why, of course I'll stop it. What--what is there to get so

excited about? Now--now just a minute, dear. It'll take a minute.

(CLAIRE _comes back upstairs, dragging steps, face ghastly. The amorous

song still comes up, and louder now that doors are open. She and_ TOM

_do not look at one another. Then, on a languorous swell the music comes

to a grating stop. They do not speak or move. Quick footsteps_--HARRY

_comes up_.)

HARRY: What in the world were you saying, Claire? Certainly you could

have asked me more quietly to turn off the Victrola. Though what harm

was it doing you--way up here? (_a sharp little sound from_ CLAIRE; _she

checks it, her hand over her mouth_. HARRY _looks from her to_ TOM)

Well, I think you two would better have had your dinner. Won't you come

down now and have some?

CLAIRE: (_only now taking her hand from her mouth_) Harry, tell him to

come up here--that insanity man. I--want to ask him something.

HARRY: 'Insanity man!' How absurd. He's a nerve specialist. There's a

vast difference.

CLAIRE: Is there? Anyway, ask him to come up here. Want to--ask him

something.

TOM: (_speaking with difficulty_) Wouldn't it be better for us to go

down there?

CLAIRE: No. So nice up here! Everybody--up here!

HARRY: (_worried_) You'll--be yourself, will you, Claire? (_She checks a

laugh, nods_.) I think he can help you.

CLAIRE: Want to ask him to--help me.

HARRY: (_as he is starting down_) He's here as a guest to-night, you

know, Claire.

CLAIRE: I suppose a guest can--help one.

TOM: (_when the silence rejects it_) Claire, you must know, it's because

it is so much, so--

CLAIRE: Be still. There isn't anything to say.

TOM: (_torn--tortured_) If it only weren't _you_!

CLAIRE: Yes,--so you said. If it weren't. I suppose I wouldn't be

so--interested! (_hears them starting up below--keeps looking at the

place where they will appear_)

(HARRY _is heard to call_, 'Coming, Dick?' _and_ DICK's _voice replies_,

'In a moment or two.' ADELAIDE _comes first_.)

ADELAIDE: (_as her head appears_) Well, these stairs should keep down

weight. You missed an awfully good dinner, Claire. And kept Mr Edgeworth

from a good dinner.

CLAIRE: Yes. We missed our dinner. (_her eyes do not leave the place

where_ DR EMMONS _will come up_)

HARRY: (_as he and_ EMMONS _appear_) Claire, this is--

CLAIRE: Yes, I know who he is. I want to ask you--

ADELAIDE: Let the poor man get his breath before you ask him anything.

(_he nods, smiles, looks at_ CLAIRE _with interest. Careful not to look

too long at her, surveys the tower_)

EMMONS: Curious place.

ADELAIDE: Yes; it lacks form, doesn't it?

CLAIRE: What do you mean? How _dare_ you?

(_It is impossible to ignore her agitation; she is backed against the

curved wall, as far as possible from them._ HARRY _looks at her in

alarm, then in resentment at_ TOM, _who takes a step nearer_ CLAIRE.)

HARRY: (_trying to be light_) Don't take it so hard, Claire.

CLAIRE: (_to_ EMMONS) It must be very interesting--helping people go

insane.

ADELAIDE: Claire! How preposterous.

EMMONS: (_easily_) I hope that's not precisely what we do.

ADELAIDE: (_with the smile of one who is going to 'cover it'._) Trust

Claire to put it in the unique and--amusing way.

CLAIRE: Amusing? You are amused? But it doesn't matter, (_to the

doctor_) I think it is very kind of you--helping people go insane. I

suppose they have all sorts of reasons for having to do it--reasons why

they can't stay sane any longer. But tell me, how do they do it? It's

not so easy to--get out. How do so many manage it?

EMMONS: I'd like immensely to have a talk with you about all this some

day.

ADELAIDE: Certainly this is not the time, Claire.

CLAIRE: The time? When you--can't go any farther--isn't that that--

ADELAIDE: (_capably taking the whole thing into matter-of-factness_)

What I think is, Claire has worked too long with plants. There's

something--not quite sound about making one thing into another thing.

What we need is unity. (_from_ CLAIRE _something like a moan_) Yes,

dear, we do need it. (_to the doctor_) I can't say that I believe in

making life over like this. I don't think the new species are worth it.

At least I don't believe in it for Claire. If one is an intense,

sensitive person--

CLAIRE: Isn't there any way to _stop_ her? Always--always smothering it

with the word for it?

EMMONS: (_soothingly_) But she can't smother it. Anything that's really

there--she can't hurt with words.

CLAIRE: (_looking at him with eyes too bright_) Then you don't see it

either, (_angry_) Yes, she can hurt it! Piling it up--always piling it

up--between us and--What there. Clogging the way--always, (_to_ EMMONS)

I want to cease to know! That's all I ask. Darken it. Darken it. If you

came to help me, strike me blind!

EMMONS: You're really all tired out, aren't you? Oh, we've got to get

you rested.

CLAIRE: They--deny it saying they have it; and he (_half looks at_

TOM_--quickly looks away_)--others, deny it--afraid of losing it. We're

in the way. Can't you see the dead stuff piled in the path?

(_Pointing._)

DICK: (_voice coming up_) Me too?

CLAIRE: (_staring at the path, hearing his voice a moment after it has

come_) Yes, Dick--you too. Why not--you too. (_after he has come up_)

What is there any more than you are?

DICK: (_embarrassed by the intensity, but laughing_) A question not at

all displeasing to me. Who can answer it?

CLAIRE: (_more and more excited_) Yes! Who can answer it? (_going to

him, in terror_) Let me go with you--and be with you--and know nothing

else!

ADELAIDE: (_gasping_) Why--!

HARRY: Claire! This is going a little too--

CLAIRE: Far? But you have to go far to--(_clinging to_ DICK) Only a

place to hide your head--what else is there to hope for? I can't stay

with them--piling it up! Always--piling it up! I can't get through

to--he won't let me through to--what I don't know is there! (DICK _would

help her regain herself_) Don't push me away! Don't--don't stand me up,

I will go back--to the worst we ever were! Go back--and remember--what

we've tried to forget!

ADELAIDE: It's time to stop this by force--if there's no other way.

(_the doctor shakes his head_)

CLAIRE: All I ask is to die in the gutter with everyone spitting on me.

(_changes to a curious weary smiling quiet_) Still, why should they

bother to do that?

HARRY: (_brokenly_) You're sick, Claire. There's no denying it. (_looks

at_ EMMONS, _who nods_)

ADELAIDE: Something to quiet her--to stop it.

CLAIRE: (_throwing her arms around_ DICK) You, Dick. Not them. Not--any

of them.

DICK: Claire, you are overwrought. You must--

HARRY: (_to_ DICK, _as if only now realizing that phase of it_) I'll

tell you one thing, you'll answer to me for this! (_he starts for_

DICK--_is restrained by_ EMMONS, _chiefly by his grave shake of the

head. With_ HARRY_'s move to them,_ DICK _has shielded_ CLAIRE)

CLAIRE: Yes--hold me. Keep me. You have mercy! You will have mercy.

Anything--everything--that will let me be nothing!

CURTAIN

ACT III

_In the greenhouse, the same as Act I._ ANTHONY _is bedding small plants

where the Edge Vine grew. In the inner room the plant like caught motion

glows as from a light within._ HATTIE, _the Maid, rushes in from

outside._

ANTHONY: (_turning angrily_) You are not what this place--

HATTIE: Anthony, come in the house. I'm afraid. Mr Archer, I never saw

him like this. He's talking to Mr Demming--something about Mrs Archer.

ANTHONY: (_who in spite of himself is disturbed by her agitation_) And

if it is, it's no business of yours.

HATTIE: You don't know how he _is_. I went in the room and--

ANTHONY: Well, he won't hurt you, will he?

HATTIE: How do I know who he'll hurt--a person's whose--(_seeing how to

get him_) Maybe he'll hurt Mrs Archer.

ANTHONY: (_startled, then smiles_) No; he won't hurt Miss Claire.

HATTIE: What do you know about it?--out here in the plant house?

ANTHONY: And I don't want to know about it. This is a very important day

for me. It's Breath of Life I'm thinking of today--not you and Mr

Archer.

HATTIE: Well, suppose he does something to Mr Demming?

ANTHONY: Mr Demming will have to look out for himself, I am at work.

(_resuming work_)

HATTIE: Don't you think I ought to tell Mrs Archer that--

ANTHONY: You let her alone! This is no day for her to be bothered by

you. At eleven o'clock (_looks at watch_) she comes out here--to Breath

of Life.

HATTIE: (_with greed for gossip_) Did you see any of them when they came

downstairs last night?

ANTHONY: I was attending to my own affairs.

HATTIE: They was all excited. Mr Edgeworth--he went away. He was gone

all night, I guess. I saw him coming back just as the milkman woke me

up. Now he's packing his things. _He_ wanted to get to Mrs Archer

too--just a little while ago. But she won't open her door for none of

them. I can't even get in to do her room.

ANTHONY: Then do some other room--and leave me alone in this room.

HATTIE: (_a little afraid of what she is asking_) Is she sick,

Anthony--or what? (_vindicating herself, as he gives her a look_) The

doctor, he stayed here late. But she'd locked herself in. I heard Mr

Archer--

ANTHONY: You heard too much! (_he starts for the door, to make her

leave, but_ DICK _rushes in. Looks around wildly, goes to the trap-door,

finds it locked_)

ANTHONY: What are you doing here?

DICK: Trying not to be shot--if you must know. This is the only place I

can think of--till he comes to his senses and I can get away. Open that,

will you? Rather--ignominious--but better be absurd than be dead.

HATTIE: Has he got the revolver?

DICK: Gone for it. Thought I wouldn't sit there till he got back, (_to_

ANTHONY) Look here--don't you get the idea? Get me some place where he

can't come.

ANTHONY: It is not what this place is for.

DICK: Any place is for saving a man's life.

HATTIE: Sure, Anthony. Mrs Archer wouldn't want Mr Demming shot.

DICK: That's right, Anthony. Miss Claire will be angry at you if you get

me shot. (_he makes for the door of the inner room_)

ANTHONY: You can't go in there. It's locked. (HARRY _rushes in from

outside_.)

HARRY: I thought so! (_he has the revolver_. HATTIE _screams_)

ANTHONY: Now, Mr Archer, if you'll just stop and think, you'll know Miss

Claire wouldn't want Mr Demming shot.

HARRY: You think that can stop me? You think you can stop me? (_raising

the revolver_) A dog that--

ANTHONY: (_keeping squarely between_ HARRY _and_ DICK) Well, you can't

shoot him in here. It is not good for the plants. (HARRY _is arrested by

this reason_) And especially not today. Why, Mr Archer, Breath of Life

may flower today. It's years Miss Claire's been working for this day.

HARRY: I never thought to see this day!

ANTHONY: No, did you? Oh, it will be a wonderful day. And how she has

worked for it. She has an eye that sees what isn't right in what looks

right. Many's the time I've thought--Here the form is set--and then

she'd say, 'We'll try this one', and it had--what I hadn't known was

there. She's like that.

HARRY: I've always been pleased, Anthony, at the way you've worked with

Miss Claire. This is hardly the time to stand there eulogizing her. And

she's (_can hardly say it_) things you don't know she is.

ANTHONY: (_proudly_) Oh, I know that! You think I could work with her

and not know she's more than I know she is?

HARRY: Well, if you love her you've got to let me shoot the dirty dog

that drags her down!

ANTHONY: Not in here. Not today. More than like you'd break the glass.

And Breath of Life's in there.

HARRY: Anthony, this is pretty clever of you--but--

ANTHONY: I'm not clever. But I know how easy it is to turn life back.

No, I'm not clever at all (CLAIRE _has appeared and is looking in from

outside_), but I do know--there are things you mustn't hurt, (_he sees

her_) Yes, here's Miss Claire.

(_She comes in. She is looking immaculate._)

CLAIRE: From the gutter I rise again, refreshed. One does, you know.

Nothing is fixed--not even the gutter, (_smilingly to_ HARRY _and

refusing to notice revolver or agitation_) How did you like the way I

entertained the nerve specialist?

HARRY: Claire! You can _joke_ about it?

CLAIRE: (_taking the revolver from the hand she has shocked to

limpness_) Whom are you trying to make hear?

HARRY: I'm trying to make the world hear that (_pointing_) there stands

a dirty dog who--

CLAIRE: Listen, Harry, (_turning to_ HATTIE, _who is over by the tall

plants at right, not wanting to be shot but not wanting to miss the

conversation_) You can do my room now, Hattie. (_HATTIE goes_) If you're

thinking of shooting Dick, you can't shoot him while he's backed up

against that door.

ANTHONY: Just what I told them, Miss Claire. Just what I told them.

CLAIRE: And for that matter, it's quite dull of you to have any idea of

shooting him.

HARRY: I may be dull--I know you think I am--but I'll show you that I've

enough of the man in me to--

CLAIRE: To make yourself ridiculous? If I ran out and hid my head in the

mud, would you think you had to shoot the mud?

DICK: (_stung out of fear_) That's pretty cruel!

CLAIRE: Well, would you rather be shot?

HARRY: So you just said it to protect him!

CLAIRE: I change it to grass, (_nodding to_ DICK) Grass. If I hid my

face in the grass, would you have to burn the grass?

HARRY: Oh, Claire, how _can_ you? When you know how I love you--and how

I'm suffering?

CLAIRE: (_with interest_) Are you suffering?

HARRY: Haven't you _eyes_?

CLAIRE: I should think it would--do something to you.

HARRY: God! Have you no heart? (_the door opens._ TOM _comes in_)

CLAIRE: (_scarcely saying it_) Yes, I have a heart.

TOM: (_after a pause_) I came to say good-bye.

CLAIRE: God! Have you no heart? Can't you at least wait till Dick is

shot?

TOM: Claire! (_now sees the revolver in her hand that is turned from

him. Going to her_) Claire!

CLAIRE: And even you think this is so important? (_carelessly raises the

revolver, and with her left hand out flat, tells_ TOM _not to touch

her_) Harry thinks it important he shoot Dick, and Dick thinks it

important not to be shot, and you think I mustn't shoot anybody--even

myself--and can't any of you see that none of that is as important

as--where revolvers can't reach? (_putting revolver where there is no

Edge Vine_) I shall never shoot myself. I'm too interested in

destruction to cut it short by shooting. (_after looking from one to the

other, laughs. Pointing_) One--two--three. You-love-me. But why do you

bring it out here?

ANTHONY: (_who has resumed work_) It is not what this place is for.

CLAIRE: No this place is for the destruction that can get through.

ANTHONY: Miss Claire, it is eleven. At eleven we are to go in and see--

CLAIRE: Whether it has gone through. But how can we go--with Dick

against the door?

ANTHONY: He'll have to move.

CLAIRE: And be shot?

HARRY: (_irritably_) Oh, he'll not be shot. Claire can spoil anything.

(DICK _steps away from the door_; CLAIRE _takes a step nearer it_.)

CLAIRE: (_halting_) Have I spoiled everything? I don't want to go in

there.

ANTHONY: We're going in together, Miss Claire. Don't you remember? Oh

(_looking resentfully at the others_) don't let any little thing spoil

it for you--the work of all those days--the hope of so many days.

CLAIRE: Yes--that's it.

ANTHONY: You're afraid you haven't done it?

CLAIRE: Yes, but--afraid I have.

HARRY: (_cross, but kindly_) That's just nervousness, Claire. I've had

the same feeling myself about making a record in flying.

CLAIRE: (_curiously grateful_) You have, Harry?

HARRY: (_glad enough to be back in a more usual world_) Sure. I've been

afraid to know, and almost as afraid of having done it as of not having

done it.

(CLAIRE _nods, steps nearer, then again pulls back_.)

CLAIRE: I can't go in there. (_she almost looks at_ TOM) Not today.

ANTHONY: But, Miss Claire, there'll be things to see today we can't see

tomorrow.

CLAIRE: You bring it in here!

ANTHONY: In--out from its own place? (_she nods_) And--where they are?

(_again she nods. Reluctantly he goes to the door_) I will not look into

the heart. No one must know before you know.

(_In the inner room, his head a little turned away, he is seen very

carefully to lift the plant which glows from within. As he brings it in,

no one looks at it_. HARRY _takes a box of seedlings from a stand and

puts them on the floor, that the newcomer may have a place_.)

ANTHONY: Breath of Life is here, Miss Claire.

(CLAIRE _half turns, then stops._)

CLAIRE: Look--and see--what you see.

ANTHONY: No one should see what you've not seen.

CLAIRE: I can't see--until I know.

(ANTHONY _looks into the flower._)

ANTHONY: (_agitated_) Miss Claire!

CLAIRE: It has come through?

ANTHONY: It has gone on.

CLAIRE: Stronger?

ANTHONY: Stronger, surer.

CLAIRE: And more fragile?

ANTHONY: And more fragile.

CLAIRE: Look deep. No--turning back?

ANTHONY: (_after a searching look_) The form is set. (_he steps back

from it_)

CLAIRE: Then it is--out. (_from where she stands she turns slowly to the

plant_) You weren't. You are.

ANTHONY: But come and see, Miss Claire.

CLAIRE: It's so much more than--I'd see.

HARRY: Well, I'm going to see. (_looking into it_) I never saw anything

like that before! There seems something alive--inside this outer shell.

DICK: (_he too looking in and he has an artist's manner of a hand up to

make the light right_) It's quite new in form. It--says something about

form.

HARRY: (_cordially to_ CLAIRE, _who stands apart_) So you've really put

it over. Well, well,--congratulations. It's a good deal of novelty, I

should say, and I've no doubt you'll have a considerable success with

it--people always like something new. I'm mighty glad--after all your

work, and I hope it will--set you up.

CLAIRE: (_low--and like a machine_) Will you all--go away?

(ANTHONY _goes--into the other room._)

HARRY: Why--why, yes. But--oh, Claire! Can't you take some pleasure in

your work? (_as she stands there very still_) Emmons says you need a

good long rest--and I think he's right.

TOM: Can't this help you, Claire? Let this be release. This--breath of

the uncaptured.

CLAIRE: (_and though speaking, she remains just as still_)

Breath of the uncaptured?

You are a novelty.

Out?

You have been brought in.

A thousand years from now, when you are but a form too long repeated,

Perhaps the madness that gave you birth will burst again,

And from the prison that is you will leap pent queernesses

To make a form that hasn't been--

To make a person new.

And this we call creation, (_very low, her head not coming up_)

Go away!

(TOM _goes_; HARRY _hesitates, looking in anxiety at_ CLAIRE. _He starts

to go, stops, looks at_ DICK, _from him to_ CLAIRE. _But goes. A moment

later_ DICK _moves near_ CLAIRE; _stands uncertainly, then puts a hand

upon her. She starts, only then knowing he is there._)

CLAIRE: (_a slight shrinking away, but not really reached_) Um, um.

(_He goes_. CLAIRE _steps nearer her creation. She looks into what

hasn't been. With her breath, and by a gentle moving of her hands, she

fans it to fuller openness. As she does this_ TOM _returns and from

outside is looking in at her. Softly he opens the door and comes in. She

does not know that he is there. In the way she looks at the flower he

looks at her._)

TOM: Claire, (_she lifts her head_) As you stood there, looking into the

womb you breathed to life, you were beautiful to me beyond any other

beauty. You were life and its reach and its anguish. I can't go away

from you. I will never go away from you. It shall all be--as you wish. I

can go with you where I could not go alone. If this is delusion, I want

that delusion. It's more than any reality I could attain, (_as she does

not move_) Speak to me, Claire. You--are glad?

CLAIRE: (_from far_) Speak to you? (_pause_) Do I know who you are?

TOM: I think you do.

CLAIRE: Oh, yes. I love you. That's who you are. (_waits again_) But why

are you something--very far away?

TOM: Come nearer.

CLAIRE: Nearer? (_feeling it with her voice_) Nearer. But I think I am

going--the other way.

TOM: No, Claire--come to me. Did you understand, dear? I am not going

away.

CLAIRE: You're not going away?

TOM: Not without you, Claire. And you and I will be together. Is

that--what you wanted?

CLAIRE: Wanted? (_as if wanting is something that harks far back. But

the word calls to her passion_) Wanted! (_a sob, hands out, she goes to

him. But before his arms can take her, she steps back_) Are you trying

to pull me down into what I wanted? Are you here to make me stop?

TOM: How can you ask that? I love you because it is not in you to stop.

CLAIRE: And loving me for that--would stop me? Oh, help me see it! It is

so important that I see it.

TOM: It is important. It is our lives.

CLAIRE: And more than that. I cannot see it because it is so much more

than that.

TOM: Don't try to see all that it is. From peace you'll see a little

more.

CLAIRE: Peace? (_troubled as we are when looking at what we cannot see

clearly_) What is peace? Peace is what the struggle knows in moments

very far apart. Peace--that is not a place to rest. Are you resting?

What are you? You who'd take me from what I am to something else?

TOM: I thought you knew, Claire.

CLAIRE: I know--what you pass for. But are you beauty? Beauty is that

only living pattern--the trying to take pattern. Are you trying?

TOM: Within myself, Claire. I never thought you doubted that.

CLAIRE: Beauty is it. (_she turns to Breath of Life, as if to learn it

there, but turns away with a sob_) If I cannot go to you now--I will

always be alone.

(TOM _takes her in his arms. She is shaken, then comes to rest._)

TOM: Yes--rest. And then--come into joy. You have so much life for joy.

CLAIRE: (_raising her head, called by promised gladness_) We'll run

around together. (_lovingly he nods_) Up hills. All night on hills.

TOM: (_tenderly_) All night on hills.

CLAIRE: We'll go on the sea in a little boat.

TOM: On the sea in a little boat.

CLAIRE: But--there are other boats on other seas, (_drawing back from

him, troubled_) There are other boats on other seas.

TOM: (_drawing her back to him_) My dearest--not now, not now.

CLAIRE: (_her arms going round him_) Oh, I would love those hours with

you. I want them. I want you! (_they kiss--but deep in her is sobbing_)

Reminiscence, (_her hand feeling his arm as we touch what we would

remember_) Reminiscence. (_with one of her swift changes steps back from

him_) How dare you pass for what you're not? We are tired, and so we

think it's you. Stop with you. Don't get through--to what you're in the

way of. Beauty is not something you say about beauty.

TOM: I say little about beauty, Claire.

CLAIRE: Your life says it. By standing far off you pass for it. Smother

it with a life that passes for it. But beauty--(_getting it from the

flower_) Beauty is the humility breathed from the shame of succeeding.

TOM: But it may all be within one's self, dear.

CLAIRE: (_drawn by this, but held, and desperate because she is held_)

When I have wanted you with all my wanting--why must I distrust you now?

When I love you--with all of me, why do I know that only you are worth

my hate?

TOM: It's the fear of easy satisfactions. I love you for it.

CLAIRE: (_over the flower_) Breath of Life--you here? Are you

lonely--Breath of Life?

TOM: Claire--hear me! Don't go where we can't go. As there you made a

shell for life within, make for yourself a life in which to live. It

must be so.

CLAIRE: As you made for yourself a shell called beauty?

TOM: What is there for you, if you'll have no touch with what we have?

CLAIRE: What is there? There are the dreams we haven't dreamed. There is

the long and flowing pattern, (_she follows that, but suddenly and as if

blindly goes to him_) I am tired. I am lonely. I'm afraid, (_he holds

her, soothing. But she steps back from him_) And because we are

tired--lonely--and afraid, we stop with you. Don't get through--to what

you're in the way of.

TOM: Then you don't love me?

CLAIRE: I'm fighting for my chance. I don't know--which chance.

(_Is drawn to the other chance, to Breath of Life. Looks into it as if

to look through to the uncaptured. And through this life just caught

comes the truth she chants._)

I've wallowed at a coarse man's feet,

I'm sprayed with dreams we've not yet come to.

I've gone so low that words can't get there,

I've never pulled the mantle of my fears around me

And called it loneliness--And called it God.

Only with life that waits have I kept faith.

(_with effort raising her eyes to the man_)

And only you have ever threatened me.

TOM: (_coming to her, and with strength now_) And I will threaten you.

I'm here to hold you from where I know you cannot go. You're trying what

we can't do.

CLAIRE: What else is there worth trying?

TOM: I love you, and I will keep you--from fartherness--from harm. You

are mine, and you will stay with me! (_roughly_) You hear me? You will

stay with me!

CLAIRE: (_her head on his breast, in ecstasy of rest. Drowsily_) You can

keep me?

TOM: Darling! I can keep you. I will keep you--safe.

CLAIRE: (_troubled by the word, but barely able to raise her head_)

Safe?

TOM: (_bringing her to rest again_) Trust me, Claire.

CLAIRE: (_not lifting her head, but turning it so she sees Breath of

Life_) Now can I trust--what is? (_suddenly pushing him roughly away_)

No! I will beat my life to pieces in the struggle to--

TOM: To _what_, Claire?

CLAIRE: Not to stop it by seeming to have it. (_with fury_) I will keep

my life low--low--that I may never stop myself--or anyone--with the

thought it's what _I_ have. I'd rather be the steam rising from the

manure than be a thing called beautiful! (_with sight too clear_) Now I

know who you are. It is you puts out the breath of life. Image of

beauty--_You fill the place--should be a gate._ (_in agony_) Oh, that it

is _you_--fill the place--should be a gate! My darling! That it should

be you who--(_her hands moving on him_) Let me tell you something. Never

was loving strong as my loving of you! Do you know that? Oh, know that!

Know it now! (_her arms go around his neck_) Hours with you--I'd give my

life to have! That it should be you--(_he would loosen her hands, for he

cannot breathe. But when she knows she is choking him, that knowledge is

fire burning its way into the last passion_) It _is_ you. It is you.

TOM: (_words coming from a throat not free_) Claire! What are you doing?

(_then she knows what she is doing_)

CLAIRE: (_to his resistance_) No! You are _too much_! You are _not

enough_. (_still wanting not to hurt her, he is slow in getting free. He

keeps stepping backward trying, in growing earnest, to loosen her hands.

But he does not loosen them before she has found the place in his throat

that cuts off breath. As he gasps_)

Breath of Life--my gift--to you!

(_She has pushed him against one of the plants at right as he sways,

strength she never had before pushes him over backward, just as they

have struggled from sight. Violent crash of glass is heard._)

TOM: (_faint smothered voice_) _No_. I'm--hurt.

CLAIRE: (_in the frenzy and agony of killing_) Oh, gift! Oh, gift!

(_there is no sound._

CLAIRE _rises--steps back--is seen now; is looking down_) Gift.

(_Like one who does not know where she is, she moves into the

room--looks around. Takes a step toward Breath of Life; turns and goes

quickly to the door. Stops, as if stopped. Sees the revolver where the

Edge Vine was. Slowly goes to it. Holds it as if she cannot think what

it is for. Then raises it high and fires above through the place in the

glass left open for ventilation_. ANTHONY _comes from the inner room.

His eyes go from her to the body beyond_. HARRY _rushes in from

outside_.)

HARRY: Who fired that?

CLAIRE: I did. Lonely.

(_Seeing_ ANTHONY'S _look_, HARRY _'s eyes follow it_.)

HARRY: Oh! What? What? (DICK _comes running in_) Who? Claire!

(DICK _sees--goes to_ TOM)

CLAIRE: Yes. I did it. MY--Gift.

HARRY: Is he--? He isn't--? He isn't--?

(_Tries to go in there. Cannot--there is the sound of broken glass, of a

position being changed--then_ DICK _reappears_.)

DICK: (_his voice in jerks_) It's--it's no use, but I'll go for a

doctor.

HARRY: No--no. Oh, I suppose--(_falling down beside_ CLAIRE--_his face

against her_) My darling! How can I save you now?

CLAIRE: (_speaking each word very carefully_) Saved--myself.

ANTHONY: I did it. Don't you see? I didn't want so many around.

Not--what this place is for.

HARRY: (_snatching at this but lets it go_) She wouldn't let--(_looking

up at_ CLAIRE--_then quickly hiding his face_) And--don't you see?

CLAIRE: Out. (_a little like a child's pleased surprise_) Out.

(DICK _stands there, as if unable to get to the door--his face

distorted, biting his hand_.)

ANTHONY: Miss Claire! You can do anything--won't you try?

CLAIRE: Reminiscence? (_speaking the word as if she has left even that,

but smiles a little_)

(ANTHONY _takes Reminiscence, the flower she was breeding for fragrance

for Breath of Life--holds it out to her. But she has taken a step

forward, past them all_.)

CLAIRE: Out. (_as if feeling her way_)

Nearer,

(_Her voice now feeling the way to it_.)

Nearer--

(_Voice almost upon it_.)

--my God,

(_Falling upon it with surprise_.)

to Thee,

(_Breathing it_.)

Nearer--to Thee,

E'en though it be--

(_A slight turn of the head toward the dead man she loves--a

mechanical turn just as far the other way_.)

a cross

That

(_Her head going down_.)

raises me;

(_Her head slowly coming up--singing it_.)

Still all my song shall be,

Nearer, my--

(_Slowly the curtain begins to shut her out. The last word heard is the

final_ Nearer--_a faint breath from far_.)

CURTAIN

INHERITORS

_Inheritors_ was first performed at the Provincetown Playhouse on April 27, 1921.

SMITH (a young business man)

GRANDMOTHER (SILAS MORTON'S mother)

SILAS MORTON (a pioneer farmer)

FELIX FEJEVARY, the First (an exiled Hungarian nobleman)

FELIX FEJEVARY, the Second (his son, a Harvard student)

FELIX FEJEVARY, the Second (a banker)

SENATOR LEWIS (a State Senator)

HORACE FEJEVARY (son of FELIX FEJEVARY, the Second)

DORIS (a student at Morton College)

FUSSIE (another college girl)

MADELINE FEJEVARY MORTON (daughter of IRA MORTON, and granddaughter of

SILAS MORTON)

ISABEL FEJEVARY (wife of FELIX FEJEVARY, the Second, and MADELINE'S

aunt)

HARRY (a student clerk)

HOLDEN (Professor at Morton College)

IRA MORTON (son of SILAS MORTON, and MADELINE'S father)

EMIL JOHNSON (an Americanized Swede)

ACT I

SCENE: _Sitting-room of the Mortons' farmhouse in the Middle West--on

the rolling prairie just back from the Mississippi. A room that has been

long and comfortably lived in, and showing that first-hand contact with

materials which was pioneer life. The hospitable table was made on the

place--well and strongly made; there are braided rugs, and the wooden

chairs have patchwork cushions. There is a corner closet--left rear. A

picture of Abraham Lincoln. On the floor a home-made toy boat. At rise

of curtain there are on the stage an old woman and a young man._

GRANDMOTHER MORTON _is in her rocking-chair near the open door, facing

left. On both sides of door are windows, looking out on a generous land.

She has a sewing basket and is patching a boy's pants. She is very old.

Her hands tremble. Her spirit remembers the days of her strength._

SMITH _has just come in and, hat in hand, is standing by the table. This

was lived in the year 1879, afternoon of Fourth of July._

SMITH: But the celebration was over two hours ago.

GRANDMOTHER: Oh, celebration, that's just the beginning of it. Might as

well set down. When them boys that fought together all get in one

square--they have to swap stories all over again. That's the worst of a

war--you have to go on hearing about it so long. Here it is--1879--and

we haven't taken Gettysburg yet. Well, it was the same way with the war

of 1832.

SMITH: (_who is now seated at the table_) The war of 1832?

GRANDMOTHER: News to you that we had a war with the Indians?

SMITH: That's right--the Blackhawk war. I've heard of it.

GRANDMOTHER: Heard of it!

SMITH: Were your men in that war?

GRANDMOTHER: I was in that war. I threw an Indian in the cellar and

stood on the door. I was heavier then.

SMITH: Those were stirring times.

GRANDMOTHER: More stirring than you'll ever see. This war--Lincoln's

war--it's all a cut and dried business now. We used to fight with

anything we could lay hands on--dish water--whatever was handy.

SMITH: I guess you believe the saying that the only good Indian is a

dead Indian.

GRANDMOTHER: I dunno. We roiled them up considerable. They was mostly

friendly when let be. Didn't want to give up their land--but I've

noticed something of the same nature in white folks.

SMITH: Your son has--something of that nature, hasn't he?

GRANDMOTHER: He's not keen to sell. Why should he? It'll never be worth

less.

SMITH: But since he has more land than any man can use, and if he gets

his price--

GRANDMOTHER: That what you've come to talk to him about?

SMITH: I--yes.

GRANDMOTHER: Well, you're not the first. Many a man older than you has

come to argue it.

SMITH: (_smiling_) They thought they'd try a young one.

GRANDMOTHER: Some one that knew him thought that up. Silas'd help a

young one if he could. What is it you're set on buying?

SMITH: Oh, I don't know that we're set on buying anything. If we could

have the hill (_looking off to the right_) at a fair price--

GRANDMOTHER: The hill above the town? Silas'd rather sell me and the

cat.

SMITH: But what's he going to do with it?

GRANDMOTHER: Maybe he's going to climb it once a week.

SMITH: But if the development of the town demands its use--

GRANDMOTHER: (_smiling_) You the development of the town?

SMITH: I represent it. This town has been growing so fast--

GRANDMOTHER: This town began to grow the day I got here.

SMITH: You--you began it?

GRANDMOTHER: My husband and I began it--and our baby Silas.

SMITH: When was that?

GRANDMOTHER: 1820, that was.

SMITH: And--you mean you were here all alone?

GRANDMOTHER: No, we weren't alone. We had the Owens ten miles down the

river.

SMITH: But how did you get here?

GRANDMOTHER: Got here in a wagon, how do you s'pose? (_gaily_) Think we

flew?

SMITH: But wasn't it unsafe?

GRANDMOTHER: Them set on safety stayed back in Ohio.

SMITH: But one family! I should think the Indians would have wiped you

out.

GRANDMOTHER: The way they wiped us out was to bring fish and corn. We'd

have starved to death that first winter hadn't been for the Indians.

SMITH: But they were such good neighbours--why did you throw dish water

at them?

GRANDMOTHER: That was after other white folks had roiled them up--white

folks that didn't know how to treat 'em. This very land--land you want

to buy--was the land they loved--Blackhawk and his Indians. They came

here for their games. This was where their fathers--as they called

'em--were buried. I've seen my husband and Blackhawk climb that hill

together. (_a backward point right_) He used to love that

hill--Blackhawk. He talked how the red man and the white man could live

together. But poor old Blackhawk--what he didn't know was how many white

man there was. After the war--when he was beaten but not conquered in

his heart--they took him east--Washington, Philadelphia, New York--and

when he saw the white man's cities--it was a different Indian came back.

He just let his heart break without ever turning a hand.

SMITH: But we paid them for their lands. (_she looks at him_) Paid them

something.

GRANDMOTHER: Something. For fifteen million acres of this Mississippi

Valley land--best on this globe, we paid two thousand two hundred and

thirty-four dollars and fifty cents, and promised to deliver annually

goods to the value of one thousand dollars. Not a fancy price--even for

them days, (_children's voices are heard outside. She leans forward and

looks through the door, left_) Ira! Let that cat be!

SMITH: (_looking from the window_) These, I suppose, are your

grandchildren?

GRANDMOTHER: The boy's my grandson. The little girl is Madeline

Fejevary--Mr Fejevary's youngest child.

SMITH: The Fejevary place adjoins on this side? (_pointing right, down_)

GRANDMOTHER: Yes. We've been neighbours ever since the Fejevarys came

here from Hungary after 1848. He was a count at home--and he's a man of

learning. But he was a refugee because he fought for freedom in his

country. Nothing Silas could do for him was too good. Silas sets great

store by learning--and freedom.

SMITH: (_thinking of his own project, looking off toward the hill--the

hill is not seen from the front_) I suppose then Mr Fejevary has great

influence with your son?

GRANDMOTHER: More 'an anybody. Silas thinks 'twas a great thing for our

family to have a family like theirs next place to. Well--so 'twas, for

we've had no time for the things their family was brought up on. Old Mrs

Fejevary (_with her shrewd smile_)--she weren't stuck up--but she did

have an awful ladylike way of feeding the chickens. Silas thinks--oh, my

son has all kinds of notions--though a harder worker never found his bed

at night.

SMITH: And Mr Fejevary--is he a veteran too?

GRANDMOTHER: (_dryly_) You don't seem to know these parts well--for one

that's all stirred up about the development of the town. Yes--Felix

Fejevary and Silas Morton went off together, down that road (_motioning

with her hand, right_)--when them of their age was wanted. Fejevary came

back with one arm less than he went with. Silas brought home everything

he took--and something he didn't. Rheumatiz. So now they set more store

by each other 'an ever. Seems nothing draws men together like killing

other men. (_a boy's voice teasingly imitating a cat_) Madeline, make

Ira let that cat be. (_a whoop from the girl--a boy's whoop_)

(_looking_) There they go, off for the creek. If they set in it--(_seems

about to call after them, gives this up_) Well, they're not the first.

(_rather dreams over this_)

SMITH: You must feel as if you pretty near owned this country.

GRANDMOTHER: We worked. A country don't make itself. When the sun was up

we were up, and when the sun went down we didn't. (_as if this renews

the self of those days_) Here--let me set out something for you to eat.

(_gets up with difficulty_)

SMITH: Oh, no, please--never mind. I had something in town before I came

out.

GRANDMOTHER: Dunno as that's any reason you shouldn't have something

here.

(_She goes off, right; he stands at the door, looking toward the hill

until she returns with a glass of milk, a plate of cookies._)

SMITH: Well, this looks good.

GRANDMOTHER: I've fed a lot of folks--take it by and large. I didn't

care how many I had to feed in the daytime--what's ten or fifteen more

when you're up and around. But to get up--after sixteen hours on your

feet--_I_ was willin', but my bones complained some.

SMITH: But did you--keep a tavern?

GRANDMOTHER: Keep a tavern? I guess we did. Every house is a tavern when

houses are sparse. You think the way to settle a country is to go on

ahead and build hotels? That's all you folks know. Why, I never went to

bed without leaving something on the stove for the new ones that might

be coming. And we never went away from home without seein' there was

a-plenty for them that might stop.

SMITH: They'd come right in and take your food?

GRANDMOTHER: What else could they do? There was a woman I always wanted

to know. She made a kind of bread I never had before--and left a-plenty

for our supper when we got back with the ducks and berries. And she left

the kitchen handier than it had ever been. I often wondered about

her--where she came from, and where she went, (_as she dreams over this

there is laughing and talking at the side of the house_) There come the

boys.

(MR FEJEVARY _comes in, followed by_ SILAS MORTON. _They are men not far

from sixty, wearing their army uniforms, carrying the muskets they used

in the parade_. FEJEVARY _has a lean, distinguished face, his dark eyes

are penetrating and rather wistful. The left sleeve of his old uniform

is empty_. SILAS MORTON _is a strong man who has borne the burden of the

land, and not for himself alone--the pioneer. Seeing the stranger, he

sets his musket against the wall and holds out his hand to him, as_ MR

FEJEVARY _goes up to_ GRANDMOTHER MORTON.)

SILAS: How do, stranger?

FEJEVARY: And how are you today, Mrs Morton?

GRANDMOTHER: I'm not abed--and don't expect to be.

SILAS: (_letting go of the balloons he has bought_) Where's Ira? and

Madeline?

GRANDMOTHER: Mr Fejevary's Delia brought them home with her. They've

gone down to dam the creek, I guess. This young man's been waiting to

see you, Silas.

SMITH: Yes, I wanted to have a little talk with you.

SILAS: Well, why not? (_he is tying the gay balloons to his gun, then as

he talks, hangs his hat in the corner closet_) We've been having a

little talk ourselves. Mother, Nat Rice was there. I've not seen Nat

Rice since the day we had to leave him on the road with his torn

leg--him cursing like a pirate. I wanted to bring him home, but he had

to go back to Chicago. His wife's dead, mother.

GRANDMOTHER: Well, I guess she's not sorry.

SILAS: Why, mother.

GRANDMOTHER: 'Why, mother.' Nat Rice is a mean, stingy, complaining

man--his leg notwithstanding. Where'd you leave the folks?

SILAS: Oh--scattered around. Everybody visitin' with anybody that'll

visit with them. Wish you could have gone.

GRANDMOTHER: I've heard it all. (_to_ FEJEVARY) Your folks well?

FEJEVARY: All well, Mrs Morton. And my boy Felix is home. He'll stop in

here to see you by and by.

SILAS: Oh, he's a fine-looking boy, mother. And think of what he knows!

(_cordially including the young man_) Mr Fejevary's son has been to

Harvard College.

SMITH: Well, well--quite a trip. Well, Mr Morton, I hope this is not a

bad time for me to--present a little matter to you?

SILAS: (_genially_) That depends, of course, on what you're going to

present. (_attracted by a sound outside_) Mind if I present a little

matter to your horse? Like to uncheck him so's he can geta a bit

o'grass.

SMITH: Why--yes. I suppose he would like that.

SILAS: (_going out_) You bet he'd like it. Wouldn't you, old boy?

SMITH: Your son is fond of animals.

GRANDMOTHER: Lots of people's fond of 'em--and good to 'em. Silas--I

dunno, it's as if he was that animal.

FEJEVARY: He has imagination.

GRANDMOTHER: (_with surprise_) Think so?

SILAS: (_returning and sitting down at the table by the young man_) Now,

what's in your mind, my boy?

SMITH: This town is growing very fast, Mr Morton.

SILAS: Yes. (_slyly--with humour_) I know that.

SMITH: I presume you, as one of the early settlers--as in fact a son of

the earliest settler, feel a certain responsibility about the welfare

of--

SILAS: I haven't got in mind to do the town a bit of harm. So--what's

your point?

SMITH: More people--more homes. And homes must be in the healthiest

places--the--the most beautiful places. Isn't it true, Mr Fejevary, that

it means a great deal to people to have a beautiful outlook from their

homes? A--well, an expanse.

SILAS: What is it they want to buy--these fellows that are figuring on

making something out of--expanse? (_a gesture for expanse, then a

reassuring gesture_) It's all right, but--just what is it?

SMITH: I am prepared to make you an offer--a gilt-edged offer for that

(_pointing toward it_) hill above the town.

SILAS: (_shaking his head--with the smile of the strong man who is a

dreamer_) The hill is not for sale.

SMITH: But wouldn't you consider a--particularly good offer, Mr Morton?

(SILAS, _who has turned so he can look out at the hill, slowly shakes

his head_.)

SMITH: Do you feel you have the right--the moral right to hold it?

SILAS: It's not for myself I'm holding it.

SMITH: Oh,--for the children?

SILAS: Yes, the children.

SMITH: But--if you'll excuse me--there are other investments might do

the children even more good.

SILAS: This seems to me--the best investment.

SMITH: But after all there are other people's children to consider.

SILAS: Yes, I know. That's it.

SMITH: I wonder if I understand you, Mr Morton?

SILAS: (_kindly_) I don't believe you do. I don't see how you could. And

I can't explain myself just now. So--the hill is not for sale. I'm not

making anybody homeless. There's land enough for all--all sides round.

But the hill--

SMITH: (_rising_) Is yours.

SILAS: You'll see.

SMITH: I am prepared to offer you--

SILAS: You're not prepared to offer me anything I'd consider alongside

what I am considering. So--I wish you good luck in your business

undertakings.

SMITH: Sorry--you won't let us try to help the town.

SILAS: Don't sit up nights worrying about my chokin' the town.

SMITH: We could make you a rich man, Mr Morton. Do you think what you

have in mind will make you so much richer?

SILAS: Much richer.

SMITH: Well, good-bye. Good day, sir. Good day, ma'am.

SILAS: (_following him to the door_) Nice horse you've got.

SMITH: Yes, seems all right.

(SILAS _stands in the doorway and looks off at the hill_.)

GRANDMOTHER: What are you going to do with the hill, Silas?

SILAS: After I get a little glass of wine--to celebrate Felix and me

being here instead of farther south--I'd like to tell you what I want

for the hill. (_to_ FEJEVARY _rather bashfully_) I've been wanting to

tell you.

FEJEVARY: I want to know.

SILAS: (_getting the wine from the closet_) Just a little something to

show our gratitude with.

(_Goes off right for glasses_.)

GRANDMOTHER: I dunno. Maybe it'd be better to sell the hill--while

they're anxious.

FEJEVARY: He seems to have another plan for it.

GRANDMOTHER: Yes. Well, I hope the other plan does bring him something.

Silas has worked--all the days of his life.

FEJEVARY: I know.

GRANDMOTHER: You don't know the hull of it. But I know. (_rather to

herself_) Know too well to think about it.

GRANDMOTHER: (_as_ SILAS _returns_) I'll get more cookies.

SILAS: I'll get them, mother.

GRANDMOTHER: Get 'em myself. Pity if a woman can't get out her own

cookies.

SILAS: (_seeing how hard it is for her_) I wish mother would let us do

things for her.

FEJEVARY: That strength is a flame frailness can't put out. It's a great

thing for us to have her,--this touch with the life behind us.

SILAS: Yes. And it's a great thing for us to have you--who can see those

things and say them. What a lot I'd 'a' missed if I hadn't had what

you've seen.

FEJEVARY: Oh, you only think that because you've got to be generous.

SILAS: I'm not generous. _I'm_ seeing something now. Something about

you. I've been thinking of it a good deal lately--it's got something to

do with--with the hill. I've been thinkin' what it's meant all these

years to have a family like yours next place to. They did something

pretty nice for the corn belt when they drove you out of Hungary.

Funny--how things don't end the way they begin. I mean, what begins

don't end. It's another thing ends. Set out to do something for your own

country--and maybe you don't quite do the thing you set out to do--

FEJEVARY: No.

SILAS: But do something for a country a long way off.

FEJEVARY: I'm afraid I've not done much for any country.

SILAS: (_brusquely_) Where's your left arm--may I be so bold as to

inquire? Though your left arm's nothing alongside--what can't be

measured.

FEJEVARY: When I think of what I dreamed as a young man--it seems to me

my life has failed.

SILAS: (_raising his glass_) Well, if your life's failed--I like

failure.

(GRANDMOTHER MORTON _returns with her cookies_.)

GRANDMOTHER: There's two kinds--Mr Fejevary. These have seeds in 'em.

FEJEVARY: Thank you. I'll try a seed cookie first.

SILAS: Mother, you'll have a glass of wine?

GRANDMOTHER: I don't need wine.

SILAS: Well, I don't know as we need it.

GRANDMOTHER: No, I don't know as you do. But I didn't go to war.

FEJEVARY: Then have a little wine to celebrate that.

GRANDMOTHER: Well, just a mite to warm me up. Not that it's cold.

(FEJEVARY _brings it to her, and the cookies_) The Indians used to like

cookies. I was talking to that young whippersnapper about the Indians.

One time I saw an Indian watching me from a bush, (_points_) Right out

there. I was never afraid of Indians when you could see the whole of

'em--but when you could see nothin' but their bright eyes--movin'

through leaves--I declare they made me nervous. After he'd been there an

hour I couldn't seem to put my mind on my work. So I thought, Red or

White, a man's a man--I'll take him some cookies.

FEJEVARY: It succeeded?

GRANDMOTHER: So well that those leaves had eyes next day. But he brought

me a fish to trade. He was a nice boy.

SILAS: Probably we killed him.

GRANDMOTHER: I dunno. Maybe he killed us. Will Owens' family was

massacred just after this. Like as not my cookie Indian helped out

there. Something kind of uncertain about the Indians.

SILAS: I guess they found something kind of uncertain about us.

GRANDMOTHER: Six o' one and half a dozen of another. Usually is.

SILAS: (_to_ FEJEVARY) I wonder if I'm wrong. You see, I never went to

school--

GRANDMOTHER: I don't know why you say that, Silas. There was two winters

you went to school.

SILAS: Yes, mother, and I'm glad I did, for I learned to read there, and

liked the geography globe. It made the earth so nice to think about. And

one day the teacher told us all about the stars, and I had that to think

of when I was driving at night. The other boys didn't believe it was so.

But I knew it was so! But I mean school--the way Mr Fejevary went to

school. He went to universities. In his own countries--in other

countries. All the things men have found out, the wisest and finest

things men have thought since first they began to think--all that was

put before them.

FEJEVARY: (_with a gentle smile_) I fear I left a good deal of it

untouched.

SILAS: You took a plenty. Tell in your eyes you've thought lots about

what's been thought. And that's what I was setting out to say. It makes

something of men--learning. A house that's full of books makes a

different kind of people. Oh, of course, if the books aren't there just

to show off.

GRANDMOTHER: Like in Mary Baldwin's new house.

SILAS: (_trying hard to see it_) It's not the learning itself--it's the

life that grows up from learning. Learning's like soil. Like--like

fertilizer. Get richer. See more. Feel more. You believe that?

FEJEVARY: Culture should do it.

SILAS: Does in your house. You somehow know how it is for the other

fellow more'n we do.

GRANDMOTHER: Well, Silas Morton, when you've your wood to chop an' your

water to carry, when you kill your own cattle and hogs, tend your own

horses and hens, make your butter, soap, and cook for whoever the Lord

sends--there's none too many hours of the day left to be polite in.

SILAS: You're right, mother. It had to be that way. But now that we buy

our soap--we don't want to say what soap-making made us.

GRANDMOTHER: We're honest.

SILAS: Yes. In a way. But there's another kind o' honesty, seems to me,

goes with that more seein' kind of kindness. Our honesty with the

Indians was little to brag on.

GRANDMOTHER: You fret more about the Indians than anybody else does.

SILAS: To look out at that hill sometimes makes me ashamed.

GRANDMOTHER: Land sakes, you didn't do it. It was the government. And

what a government does is nothing for a person to be ashamed of.

SILAS: I don't know about that. Why is _he_ here? Why is Felix Fejevary

not rich and grand in Hungary to-day? 'Cause he was ashamed of what his

government was.

GRANDMOTHER: Well, that was a foreign government.

SILAS: A seeing how 'tis for the other person--_a bein'_ that other

person, kind of honesty. Joke of it, 'twould do something for _you_.

'Twould 'a' done something for us to have _been_ Indians a little more.

My father used to talk about Blackhawk--they was friends. I saw

Blackhawk once--when I was a boy. (_to_ FEJEVARY) Guess I told you. You

know what he looked like? He looked like the great of the earth. Noble.

Noble like the forests--and the Mississippi--and the stars. His face was

long and thin and you could see the bones, and the bones were beautiful.

Looked like something that's never been caught. He was something many

nights in his canoe had made him. Sometimes I feel that the land itself

has got a mind that the land would rather have had the Indians.

GRANDMOTHER: Well, don't let folks hear you say it. They'd think you was

plum crazy.

SILAS: I s'pose they would, (_turning to_ FEJEVARY) But after you've

walked a long time over the earth--and you all alone, didn't you ever

feel something coming up from it that's like thought?

FEJEVARY: I'm afraid I never did. But--I wish I had.

SILAS: I love land--this land. I suppose that's why I never have the

feeling that I own it.

GRANDMOTHER: If you don't own it--I want to know! What do you think we

come here for--your father and me? What do you think we left our folks

for--left the world of white folks--schools and stores and doctors, and

set out in a covered wagon for we didn't know what? We lost a horse.

Lost our way--weeks longer than we thought 'twould be. You were born in

that covered wagon. You know that. But what you don't know is what

_that's_ like--without your own roof--or fire--without--

(_She turns her face away._)

SILAS: No. No, mother, of course not. Now--now isn't this too bad? I

don't say things right. It's because I never went to school.

GRANDMOTHER: (_her face shielded_) You went to school two winters.

SILAS: Yes. Yes, mother. So I did. And I'm glad I did.

GRANDMOTHER: (_with the determination of one who will not have her own

pain looked at_) Mrs Fejevary's pansy bed doing well this summer?

FEJEVARY: It's beautiful this summer. She was so pleased with the new

purple kind you gave her. I do wish you could get over to see them.

GRANDMOTHER: Yes. Well, I've seen lots of pansies. Suppose it was pretty

fine-sounding speeches they had in town?

FEJEVARY: Too fine-sounding to seem much like the war.

SILAS: I'd like to go to a war celebration where they never mentioned

war. There'd be a way to celebrate victory, (_hearing a step, looking

out_) Mother, here's Felix.

(FELIX, _a well-dressed young man, comes in_.)

GRANDMOTHER: How do, Felix?

FELIX: And how do you do, Grandmother Morton?

GRANDMOTHER: Well, I'm still here.

FELIX: Of course you are. It wouldn't be coming home if you weren't.

GRANDMOTHER: I've got some cookies for you, Felix. I set 'em out, so you

wouldn't have to steal them. John and Felix was hard on the cookie jar.

FELIX: Where is John?

SILAS: (_who is pouring a glass of wine for_ FELIX) You've not seen John

yet? He was in town for the exercises. I bet those young devils ran off

to the race-track. I heard whisperin' goin' round. But everybody'll be

home some time. Mary and the girls--don't ask me where they are. They'll

drive old Bess all over the country before they drive her to the bam.

Your father and I come on home 'cause I wanted to have a talk with him.

FELIX: Getting into the old uniforms makes you want to talk it all over

again?

SILAS: The war? Well, we did do that. But all that makes me want to talk

about what's to come, about--what 'twas all for. Great things are to

come, Felix. And before you are through.

FELIX: I've been thinking about them myself--walking around the town

to-day. It's grown so much this year, and in a way that means more

growing--that big glucose plant going up down the river, the new lumber

mill--all that means many more people.

FEJEVARY: And they've even bought ground for a steel works.

SILAS: Yes, a city will rise from these cornfields--a big rich

place--that's bound to be. It's written in the lay o' the land and the

way the river flows. But first tell us about Harvard College, Felix.

Ain't it a fine thing for us all to have Felix coming home from that

wonderful place!

FELIX: You make it seem wonderful.

SILAS: Ah, you know it's wonderful--know it so well you don't have to

say it. It's something you've got. But to me it's wonderful the way the

stars are wonderful--this place where all that the world has learned is

to be drawn from me--like a spring.

FELIX: You almost say what Matthew Arnold says--a distinguished new

English writer who speaks of: 'The best that has been thought and said

in the world'.

SILAS: 'The best that has been thought and said in the world!' (_slowly

rising, and as if the dream of years is bringing him to his feet_)

That's what that hill is for! (_pointing_) Don't you see it? End of our

trail, we climb a hill and plant a college. Plant a college, so's after

we are gone that college says for us, says in people learning has made

more: 'That is why we took this land.'

GRANDMOTHER: (_incredulous_) You mean, Silas, you're going to _give the

hill away_?

SILAS: The hill at the end of our trail--how could we keep that?

GRANDMOTHER: Well, I want to know why not! Hill or level--land's land

and not a thing you give away.

SILAS: Well, don't scold _me_. I'm not giving it away. It's giving

itself away, get down to it.

GRANDMOTHER: Don't talk to me as if I was feeble-minded.

SILAS: I'm talking with all the mind I've got. If there's not mind in

what I say, it's because I've got no mind. But I have got a mind, (_to_

FEJEVARY, _humorously_) Haven't I? You ought to know. Seeing as you gave

it to me.

FEJEVARY: Ah, no--I didn't give it to you.

SILAS: Well, you made me know 'twas there. You said things that woke

things in me and I thought about them as I ploughed. And that made me

know there had to be a college there--wake things in minds--so

ploughing's more than ploughing. What do you say, Felix?

FELIX: It--it's a big idea, Uncle Silas. I love the way you put it. It's

only that I'm wondering--

SILAS: Wondering how it can ever be a Harvard College? Well, it can't.

And it needn't be (_stubbornly_) It's a college in the cornfields--where

the Indian maize once grew. And it's for the boys of the cornfields--and

the girls. There's few can go to Harvard College--but more can climb

that hill, (_turn of the head from the hill to_ FELIX) Harvard on a

hill? (_As_ FELIX _smiles no_, SILAS _turns back to the hill_) A college

should be on a hill. They can see it then from far around. See it as

they go out to the barn in the morning; see it when they're shutting up

at night. 'Twill make a difference--even to them that never go.

GRANDMOTHER: Now, Silas--don't be hasty.

SILAS: Hasty? It's been company to me for years. Came to me one

night--must 'a' been ten years ago--middle of a starry night as I was

comin' home from your place (_to_ FEJEVARY) I'd gone over to lend a hand

with a sick horse an'--

FEJEVARY: (_with a grateful smile_) That was nothing new.

SILAS: Well, say, I'd sit up with a sick horse that belonged to the

meanest man unhung. But--there were stars that night had never been

there before. Leastways I'd not seen 'em. And the hill--Felix, in all

your travels east, did you ever see anything more beautiful than that

hill?

FELIX: It's like sculpture.

SILAS: Hm. (_the wistfulness with which he speaks of that outside his

knowledge_) I s'pose 'tis. It's the way it rises--somehow--as if it knew

it rose from wide and fertile lands. I climbed the hill that night,

(_to_ FEJEVARY) You'd been talkin'. As we waited between medicines you

told me about your life as a young man. All you'd lived through seemed

to--open up to you that night--way things do at times. Guess it was

'cause you thought you was goin' to lose your horse. See, that was

Colonel, the sorrel, wasn't it?

FEJEVARY: Yes. Good old Colonel.

SILAS: You'd had a long run o' off luck. Hadn't got things back in shape

since the war. But say, you didn't lose him, did you?

FEJEVARY: Thanks to you.

SILAS: Thanks to the medicine I keep in the back kitchen.

FEJEVARY: You encouraged him.

GRANDMOTHER: Silas has a way with all the beasts.

SILAS: We've got the same kind of minds--the beasts and me.

GRANDMOTHER: Silas, I wish you wouldn't talk like that--and with Felix

just home from Harvard College.

SILAS: Same kind of minds--except that mine goes on a little farther.

GRANDMOTHER: Well I'm glad to hear you say that.

SILAS: Well, there we sat--you an' me--middle of a starry night, out

beside your barn. And I guess it came over you kind of funny you should

be there with me--way off the Mississippi, tryin' to save a sick horse.

Seemed to--bring your life to life again. You told me what you studied

in that fine old university you loved--the Vienna,--and why you became a

revolutionist. The old dreams took hold o' you and you talked--way you

used to, I suppose. The years, o' course, had rubbed some of it off.

Your face as you went on about the vision--you called it, vision of what

life could be. I knew that night there was things I never got wind of.

When I went away--knew I ought to go home to bed--hayin' at daybreak.

'Go to bed?' I said to myself. 'Strike this dead when you've never had

it before, may never have it again?' I climbed the hill. Blackhawk was

there.

GRANDMOTHER: Why, he was _dead_.

SILAS: He was there--on his own old hill, with me and the stars. And I

said to him--

GRANDMOTHER: Silas!

SILAS: Says I to him, 'Yes--that's true; it's more yours than mine, you

had it first and loved it best. But it's neither yours nor mine,--though

both yours and mine. Not my hill, not your hill, but--hill of vision',

said I to him. 'Here shall come visions of a better world than was ever

seen by you or me, old Indian chief.' Oh, I was drunk, plum drunk.

GRANDMOTHER: I should think you was. And what about the next day's hay?

SILAS: A day in the hayfield is a day's hayin'--but a night on the

hill--

FELIX: We don't have them often, do we, Uncle Silas?

SILAS: I wouldn't 'a' had that one but for your father, Felix. Thank God

they drove you out o' Hungary! And it's all so dog-gone _queer_. Ain't

it queer how things blow from mind to mind--like seeds. Lord

A'mighty--you don't know where they'll take hold.

(_Children's voices off_.)

GRANDMOTHER: There come those children up from the creek--soppin' wet, I

warrant. Well, I don't know how children ever get raised. But we raise

more of 'em than we used to. I buried three--first ten years I was here.

Needn't 'a' happened--if we'd known what we know now, and if we hadn't

been alone. (_With all her strength_.) I don't know what you mean--the

hill's not yours!

SILAS: It's the future's, mother--so's we can know more than we know

now.

GRANDMOTHER: We know it now. 'Twas then we didn't know it. I worked for

that hill! And I tell you to leave it to your own children.

SILAS: There's other land for my own children. This is for all the

children.

GRANDMOTHER: What's all the children to you?

SILAS: (_derisively_) Oh, mother--what a thing for you to say! You who

were never too tired to give up your own bed so the stranger could have

a better bed.

GRANDMOTHER: That was different. They was folks on their way.

FEJEVARY: So are we.

(SILAS _turns to him with quick appreciation_.)

GRANDMOTHER: That's just talk. We're settled now. Children of other old

settlers are getting rich. I should think you'd want yours to.

SILAS: I want other things more. I want to pay my debts 'fore I'm too

old to know they're debts.

GRANDMOTHER: (_momentarily startled_) Debts? Huh! More talk. You don't

owe any man.

SILAS: I owe him (_nodding to_ FEJEVARY). And the red boys here before

me.

GRANDMOTHER: Fiddlesticks.

FELIX: You haven't read Darwin, have you, Uncle Silas?

SILAS: Who?

FELIX: Darwin, the great new man--and his theory of the survival of the

fittest?

SILAS: No. No, I don't know things like that, Felix.

FELIX: I think he might make you feel better about the Indians. In the

struggle for existence many must go down. The fittest survive. This--had

to be.

SILAS: Us and the Indians? Guess I don't know what you mean--fittest.

FELIX: He calls it that. Best fitted to the place in which one finds

one's self, having the qualities that can best cope with conditions--do

things. From the beginning of life it's been like that. He shows the

growth of life from forms that were hardly alive, the lowest animal

forms--jellyfish--up to man.

SILAS: Oh, yes, that's the thing the churches are so upset about--that

we come from monkeys.

FELIX: Yes. One family of ape is the direct ancestor of man.

GRANDMOTHER: You'd better read your Bible, Felix.

SILAS: Do people believe this?

FELIX: The whole intellectual world is at war about it. The best

scientists accept it. Teachers are losing their positions for believing

it. Of course, ministers can't believe it.

GRANDMOTHER: I should think not. Anyway, what's the use believing a

thing that's so discouraging?

FEJEVARY: (_gently_) But is it that? It almost seems to me we have to

accept it because it is so encouraging. (_holding out his hand_) Why

have we hands?

GRANDMOTHER: Cause God gave them to us, I s'pose.

FEJEVARY: But that's rather general, and there isn't much in it to give

us self-confidence. But when you think we have hands because ages

back--before life had taken form as man, there was an impulse to do what

had never been done--when you think that we have hands today because

from the first of life there have been adventurers--those of best brain

and courage who wanted to be more than life had been, and that from

aspiration has come doing, and doing has shaped the thing with which to

do--it gives our hand a history which should make us want to use it

well.

SILAS: (_breathed from deep_) Well, by God! And you've known this all

this while! Dog-gone you--why didn't you tell me?

FEJEVARY: I've been thinking about it. I haven't known what to believe.

This hurts--beliefs of earlier years.

FELIX: The things it hurts will have to go.

FEJEVARY: I don't know about that, Felix. Perhaps in time we'll find

truth in them.

FELIX: Oh, if you feel that way, father.

FEJEVARY: Don't be kind to me, my boy, I'm not that old.

SILAS: But think what it is you've said! If it's true that we made

ourselves--made ourselves out of the wanting to be more--created

ourselves you might say, by our own courage--our--what is

it?--aspiration. Why, I can't take it in. I haven't got the mind to take

it in. And what mind I have got says no. It's too--

FEJEVARY: It fights with what's there.

SILAS: (_nodding_) But it's like I got this (_very slowly_) other way

around. From underneath. As if I'd known it all along--but have just

found out I know it! Yes. The earth told me. The beasts told me.

GRANDMOTHER: Fine place to learn things from.

SILAS: Anyhow, haven't I seen it? (_to_ FEJEVARY) In your face haven't I

seen thinking make a finer face? How long has this taken, Felix,

to--well, you might say, bring us where we are now?

FELIX: Oh, we don't know how many millions of years since earth first

stirred.

SILAS: Then we are what we are because through all that time there've

been them that wanted to be more than life had been.

FELIX: That's it, Uncle Silas.

SILAS: But--why, then we aren't _finished_ yet!

FEJEVARY: No. We take it on from here.

SILAS: (_slowly_) Then if we don't be--the most we can be, if we don't

be more than life has been, we go back on all that life behind us; go

back on--the--

(_Unable to formulate it, he looks to_ FEJEVARY.)

FEJEVARY: Go back on the dreaming and the daring of a million years.

(_After a moment's pause_ SILAS _gets up, opens the closet door_.)

GRANDMOTHER: Silas, what you doing?

SILAS: (_who has taken out a box_) I'm lookin' for the deed to the hill.

GRANDMOTHER: What you going to do with it?

SILAS: I'm going to get it out of my hands.

GRANDMOTHER: Get it out of your hands? (_he has it now_) Deed your

father got from the government the very year the government got it from

the Indians?

(_rising_) Give me that! (_she turns to_ FEJEVARY) Tell him he's crazy.

We got the best land 'cause we was first here. We got a right to keep

it.

FEJEVARY: (_going soothingly to her_) It's true, Silas, it is a serious

thing to give away one's land.

SILAS: You ought to know. You did it. Are you sorry you did it?

FEJEVARY: No. But wasn't that different?

SILAS: How was it different? Yours was a fight to make life more, wasn't

it? Well, let this be our way.

GRANDMOTHER: What's all that got to do with giving up the land that

should provide for our own children?

SILAS: Isn't it providing for them to give them a better world to live

in? Felix--you're young, I ask you, ain't it providing for them to give

them a chance to be more than we are?

FELIX: I think you're entirely right, Uncle Silas. But it's the

practical question that--

SILAS: If you're right, the practical question is just a thing to fix

up.

FEJEVARY: I fear you don't realize the immense amount of money required

to finance a college. The land would be a start. You would have to

interest rich men; you'd have to have a community in sympathy with the

thing you wanted to do.

GRANDMOTHER: Can't you see, Silas, that we're all against you?

SILAS: All against me? (_to_ FEJEVARY) But how can you be? Look at the

land we walked in and took! Was there ever such a chance to make life

more? Why, the buffalo here before us was more than we if we do nothing

but prosper! God damn us if we sit here rich and fat and forget man's in

the makin'. (_affirming against this_) There will one day be a college

in these cornfields by the Mississippi because long ago a great dream

was fought for in Hungary. And I say to that old dream, Wake up, old

dream! Wake up and fight! You say rich men. (_holding it out, but it is

not taken_) I give you this deed to take to rich men to show them one

man believes enough in this to give the best land he's got. That ought

to make rich men stop and think.

GRANDMOTHER: Stop and think he's a fool.

SILAS: (_to_ FEJEVARY) It's you can make them know he's not a fool. When

you tell this way you can tell it, they'll feel in you what's more than

them. They'll listen.

GRANDMOTHER: I tell you, Silas, folks are too busy.

SILAS: Too busy!' Too busy bein' nothin'? If it's true that we created

ourselves out of the thoughts that came, then thought is not something

_outside_ the business of life. Thought--(_with his gift for wonder_)

why, thought's our chance. I know now. Why I can't forget the Indians.

We killed their joy before we killed them. We made them less, (_to_

FEJEVARY, _and as if sure he is now making it clear_) I got to give it

back--their hill. I give it back to joy--a better joy--joy o'aspiration.

FEJEVARY: (_moved but unconvinced_) But, my friend, there are men who

have no aspiration. That's why, to me, this is as a light shining from

too far.

GRANDMOTHER: (_old things waked in her_) Light shining from far. We used

to do that. We never pulled the curtain. I used to want to--you like to

be to yourself when night conies--but we always left a lighted window

for the traveller who'd lost his way.

FELIX: I should think that would have exposed you to the Indians.

GRANDMOTHER: Yes. (_impatiently_) Well, you can't put out a light just

because it may light the wrong person.

FEJEVARY: No. (_and this is as a light to him. He turns to the hill_)

No.

SILAS: (_with gentleness, and profoundly_) That's it. Look again. Maybe

your eyes are stronger now. Don't you see it? I see that college rising

as from the soil itself, as if it was what come at the last of that

thinking that breathes from the earth. I see it--but I want to know it's

real before I stop knowing. Then maybe I can lie under the same sod with

the red boys and not be ashamed. We're not old! Let's fight! Wake in

other men what you woke in me!

FEJEVARY: And so could I pay my debt to America. (_His hand goes out_.)

SILAS: (_giving him the deed_) And to the dreams of a million years!

(_Standing near the open door, their hands are gripped in compact_.)

CURTAIN