"Sweet-and-Twenty" was first produced by the Provincetown Players, New
York City, in 1918, with the following cast:
The Young Woman ........ Edna St. Vincent
Millay The Young Man ... Ordway Tead
The Agent .............. Otto Liveright
The Guard .............. Louis Ell
The cherry-orchard scene was effectively produced on a small stage by a
blue-green back-drop with a single conventionalized cherry-branch
painted across it, and two three-leaved screens masking the wings,
painted in blue-green with a spray of cherry blossoms.
_A corner of the cherry orchard on the country place of the late Mr.
Boggley, now on sale and open for inspection to prospective buyers. The
cherry orchard, now in full bloom, is a very pleasant place. There is a
green-painted rustic bench beside the path. . . .
A young woman, dressed in a light summer frock and carrying a parasol,
drifts in from the back. She sees the bench, comes over to it and sits
down with an air of petulant weariness.
A handsome young man enters from the right. He stops short in surprise
on seeing the charming stranger who lolls upon the bench. He takes off
his hat_.
HE. Oh, I beg your pardon!
SHE. Oh, you needn't! I've no right to be here, either.
HE. (_coming over to her_) Now what do you mean by that?
SHE. I thought perhaps you were playing truant, as I am.
HE. Playing truant?
SHE. I was looking at the house, you know. And I got tired and ran
away.
HE. Well, to tell the truth, so did I. It's dull work, isn't it?
SHE. I've been upstairs and down for two hours. That family portrait
gallery finished me. It was so old and gloomy and dead that I felt as
if I were dead myself. I just had to do something. I wanted to jab my
parasol through the window-pane. I understood just how the suffragettes
felt. But I was afraid of shocking the agent. He is such a meek little
man, and he seemed to think so well of me. If I had broken the window I
would have shattered his ideals of womanhood, too, I'm afraid. So I
just slipped away quietly and came here.
HE. I've only been there half an hour and we--I've only been in the
basement. That's why our tours of inspection didn't bring us together
sooner. I've been cross-examining the furnace. Do you understand
furnaces? (_He sits down beside her_) I don't.
SHE. Do you like family portraits? I hate 'em!
HE. What! Do the family portraits go with the house?
SHE. No, thank heaven. They've been bequeathed to some museum, I am
told. They're valuable historically--early colonial governors and all
that sort of stuff. But there is some one with me who--who takes a deep
interest in such things.
HE. (_frowning at a sudden memory_) Hm. Didn't I see you at that real
estate office in New York yesterday?
SHE. Yes. _He_ was with me then.
HE. (_compassionately_) I--I thought I remembered seeing you
with--with him.
SHE. (_cheerfully_) Isn't he _just_ the sort of man who would be
interested in family portraits?