Merrick:
The noise you made was like that! But I knew
You'ld laugh at me, so sure you were the world
Would shiver like a bursting grindlestone:
Else I'ld have said out loud, 'twas a fool's whimsy.
Vine:
Where are you now? What am I now to think?
Your minds run round in puzzles, like chased hares.
I cannot sight them.
Merrick:
Think of going to bed.
Sollers:
And dreaming prices for your pigs.
Merrick:
O Warp,
You should have seen Vine crying! The moon, he said,
The silver moon! Just like an onion 'twas
To stir the water in his eyes.
Sollers:
He's left
A puddle of his tears where he was droopt
Over the table.
Vine:
There's to be no ruin?--
But what's the word of a molecatcher, to crow
So ringing over a dowser's word?
Warp:
I'll tell you.
These dowsers live on lies: my trade's the truth.
I can read moles, and the way they've dug their journeys,
Where you'ld not see a wrinkle.
Vine:
And he knows
The buried water.
Warp:
There's always buried water,
If you prod deep enough. A dowser finds
Because the whole earth's floating, like a raft.
What does he know? A twitching in his thews;
A dog asleep knows that much. What I know
I've learnt, and if I'd learnt it wrong, I'ld starve.
And if I'm right about the grubbing moles,
Won't I be right for news of walking men?
Merrick:
Of course you're right. Let's put the whole thing by,
And have a pleasant drink.
Shale (to Mrs HUFF):
You must be tired
With all this story. Shall we be off for home?
Huff:
You brass! You don't go now with her! She's mine:
You gave her up.
Shale:
And you made nothing of her.
(To Mrs Huff)
Come on.
Mrs Huff:
Warp, will you do a thing for me?
Warp:
A hundred things.
Mrs Huff:
Then slap me these cur-dogs.
Warp: