Man and Superman and Three Other Plays (25 page)

MARCHBANKS
[scrambling up almost fiercely]
Wicked people means people who have no love: therefore they have no shame. They have the power to ask for love because they don't need it: they have the power to offer it because they have none to give.
[He collapses into his seat, and adds, mournfully]
But we, who have love, and long to mingle it with the love of others: we cannot utter a word.
[Timidly.]
You find that, don't you?

PROSERPINE Look here : if you don't stop talking like this, I'll leave the room, Mr. Marchbanks: I really will. It's not proper.
[She resumes her seat at the typewriter, opening the blue book and preparing to copy a passage from it.
]

MARCHBANKS
[hopelessly]
Nothing that's worth saying is proper.
[He rises, and wanders about the room in his lost way, saying]
I can't understand you, Miss Garnett. What am I to talk about?

PROSERPINE
[snubbing him]
Talk about indifferent things. Talk about the weather.

MARCHBANKS Would you stand and talk about indifferent things if a child were by, crying bitterly with hunger.

PROSERPINE I suppose not.

MARCHBANKS Well:
I
can't talk about indifferent things with my heart crying out bitterly in i t s hunger.

PROSERPINE Then hold your tongue.

MARCHBANKS Yes: that is what it always comes to. We hold our tongues. Does that stop the cry of your heart?—for it does cry: doesn't it? It must, if you have a heart.

PROSERPINE [
suddenly rising with her hand pressed on her heart]
Oh, it's no use trying to work while you talk like that.
[She leaves her little table and sits on the sofa. Her feelings are evidently strongly worked on.]
It's no business of yours, whether my heart cries or not; but I have a mind to tell you, for all that.

MARCHBANKS You needn't. I know already that it must.

PROSERPINE But mind: if you ever say I said so, I'll deny it.

MARCHBANKS
[compassionately]
Yes, I know. And so you haven't the courage to tell him?

PROSERPINE
[bouncing
up] Him! Who?

MARCHBANKS Whoever he is. The man you love. It might be anybody. The curate, Mr. Mill, perhaps.

PROSERPINE
[with disdain]
Mr. Mill!!! A fine man to break my heart about, indeed! I'd rather have y o u than Mr. Mill.

MARCHBANKS
[recoiling]
No, really—I'm very sorry; but you mustn't think of that. I—

PROSERPINE
[testily, crossing to the fire and standing at it with her back to him]
Oh, don't be frightened: it's not you. It's not any one particular person.

MARCHBANKS I know. You feel that you could love anybody that offered—

PROSERPINE
[exasperated]
Anybody that offered! No, I do not. What do you take me for?

MARCHBANKS
[discouraged]
No use. You won't make me real answers—only those things that everybody says.
[He strays to the sofa and sits down disconsolately.
]

PROSERPINE
[nettled at what she takes to be a disparagement of her manners by an aristocrat
] Oh, well, if you want original conversation, you'd better go and talk to yourself.

MARCHBANKS That is what all poets do: they talk to themselves out loud; and the world overhears them. But it's horribly lonely not to hear someone else talk sometimes.

PROSERPINE Wait until Mr. Morell comes. He'll talk to you.
[MARCHBANKS shudders.
] Oh, you needn't make wry faces over him: he can talk better than you.
[With temper.]
He'd talk your little head off.
[She is going back angrily to her place, when, suddenly enlightened, he springs up and stops her.]

MARCHBANKS Ah, I understand now!

PROSERPINE
[reddening]
What do you understand?

MARCHBANKS Your secret. Tell me: is it really and truly possible for a woman to love him?

PROSERPINE
[as if this were beyond all bounds]
Well!!

MARCHBANKS
[passionately]
No, answer me. I want to know: I must know.
I
can't understand it. I can see nothing in him but words, pious resolutions, what people call goodness. You can't love that.

PROSERPINE
[attempting to snub him by an air of cool propriety]
I simply don't know what you're talking about. I don't understand you.

MARCHBANKS
[vehemently]
You do. You lie—

PROSERPINE Oh!

MARCHBANKS You d o understand; and you k n o w.
[Determined to have an answer.]
Is it possible for a woman to love him?

PROSERPINE
[looking him straight in the face]
Yes.
[He covers his face with his hands.]
Whatever is the matter with you!
[He takes down his hands and looks at her. Frightened at the tragic mask presented to her, she hurries past him at the utmost possible distance, keeping her eyes on his face until he turns from her and goes to the child's chair beside the hearth, where he sits in the deepest dejection. As she approaches the door, it opens and BURGESS enters. On seeing him, she ejaculates]
Praise heaven, here's somebody!
[and sits down, reassured, at her table. She puts a fresh sheet of paper into the typewriter as BURGESS crosses to EUGENE.
]

BURGESS
[bent on taking care of the distinguished visitor]
Well: so this is the way they leave you to yourself, Mr. Morchbanks. I've come to keep you company.
[MARCHBANKS looks up at him in consternation, which is quite lost on him.]
James is receivin' a deppita tion in the dinin' room; and Candy is hupstairs educatin' of a young stitcher gurl she's hinterusted in. She's settin' there learnin' her to read out of the “‘ Ev'nly Twins.”
¹¹
[Condolingly.
] You must find it lonesome here with no one but the typist to talk to. [
He pulls round the easy chair above fire, and sits down.
]

PROSERPINE
[highly incensed]
He'll be all right now that he has the advantage of you r polished conversation: that's one comfort, anyhow.
[She begins to typewrite with clattering asperity.]

BURGESS
[amazed at her audacity]
Hi was not addressin' myself to you, young woman, that I'm awerr of.

PROSERPINE
[tartly, to MARCHBANKS]
Did you ever see worse manners, Mr. Marchbanks?

BURGESS
[with pompous severity]
Mr. Morchbanks is a gentleman and knows his place, which is more than some people do.

PROSERPINE
[ fretfully]
It's well you and I are not ladies and gentlemen : I'd talk to you pretty straight if Mr. Marchbanks wasn't here.
[She pulls the letter out of the machine so crossly that it tears.
] There, now I've spoiled this letter—have to be done all over again. Oh, I can't contain myself—silly old fathead!

BURGESS
[rising, breathless with indignation]
Ho! I'm a silly ole fat‘ead, am I? Ho, indeed
[gasping].
Hall right, my gurl! Hall right. You just wait till I tell that to your employer. You'll see. I'll teach you: see if I don't.

PROSERPINE I—

BURGESS
[cutting her short]
No, you've done it now. No huse a-talkin' to me. I'll let you know who I am. [
PROSERPINE shifts her paper carriage with a defiant bang, and disdainfully goes on with her work.]
Don't you take no notice of her, Mr. Morchbanks. She's beneath it.
[He sits down again loftily.
]

MARCHBANKS
[miserably nervous and disconcerted]
Hadn't we better change the subject. I—I don't think Miss Garnett meant anything.

PROSERPINE
[with intense conviction]
Oh, didn't I though, just!

BURGESS I wouldn't demean myself to take notice on her.
[An electric bell rings twice
.]

PROSERPINE
[gathering up her note-book and papers]
That's for me.
[She hurries out.]

BURGESS
[calling after her]
Oh, we can spare you. [
Somewhat relieved by the triumph of having the last word, and yet half inclined to try to improve on it, he looks after her for a moment; then subsides into his seat by EUGENE, and addresses him very confidentialty.]
Now we're alone, Mr. Morchbanks, let me give you a friendly ‘int that I wouldn't give to everybody. 'Ow long ‘ave you known my son-in-law James here?

MARCHBANKS I don't know. I never can remember dates. A few months, perhaps.

BURGESS Ever notice anything queer about him?

MARCHBANKS I don't think so.

BURGESS
(impressively]
No more you wouldn't. That's the danger in it. Well, he's mad.

MARCHBANKS Mad!

BURGESS Mad as a Morch ‘are. You take notice on him and you'll see.

MARCHBANKS
[beginning]
But surely that is only because his opinions—

BURGESS
[touching him with his forefinger on his knee, and pressing it as if to hold his attention with it]
That's wot I used ter think, Mr. Morchbanks. H i thought long enough that it was honly ‘is opinions; though, mind you, hopinions becomes vurry serious things when people takes to hactin on 'em as ‘e does. But that's not wot I go on.
[He looks round to make sure that they are alone, and bends over to EUGENE's ear.]
Wot do you think he says to me this mornin' in this very room?

MARCHBANKS What?

BURGESS He sez to me—this is as sure as we're settin' here now—he sez: “I'm a fool,” he sez; “and yore a scounderi”—as cool as possible. Me a scounderl, mind you! And then shook ‘ ands with me on it, as if it was to my credit! Do you mean to tell me that that man's sane?

MORELL
[outside, calling
to
PROSERPINE,
holding the door open] Get all their names and addresses, Miss Garnett.

PROSERPINE
[in
the
distance]
Yes, Mr. Morell.
[MORELL
comes in, with the
deputation's
documents in his
hands.]

BURGESS
[aside
to MARCHBANKS] Yorr he is. Just you keep your heye on him and see. [Rising
momentously.
] I'm sorry, James, to ‘ ave to make a complaint to you. I don't want to do it; but I feel I oughter, as a matter o' right and dooty.

MORELL What's the matter.

BURGESS Mr. Morchbanks will bear me out: he was a witness.
[Very solemnly.
] Your young woman so far forgot herself as to call me a silly ole fat‘ead.

MORELL
[delighted
—
with
tremendous heartiness] Oh, now, isn't that exactly like Prossy? She's so frank: she can't contain herself! Poor Prossy! Ha! Ha!

BURGESS
[trembling
with rage] And do you hexpec me to put up with it from the like of er?

MORELL Pooh, nonsense! you can't take any notice of it. Never mind.
[He goes to the cellaret and puts the papers into one of the drawers.
]

BURGESS Oh,
I
don't mind. I'm above it. But is it r i g h t?—that's what I want to know. Is it right?

MORELL That's a question for the Church, not for the laity. Has it done you any harm, that's the question for you, eh? Of course, it hasn't. Think no more of it.
[He dismisses the subject by going to his place at the table and setting to work at his correspondence.]

BURGESS
[aside
to MARCHBANKS] What did I tell you? Mad as a ‘atter.
[He goes to the table and asks, with the sickly civility of a hungry man]
When's dinner, James?

MORELL Not for half an hour yet.

BURGESS
[with plaintive
resignation]
Gimme a nice book to read over the fire, will you, James: thur's a good chap.

MORELL What sort of book? A good one?

BURGESS
[with almost a yell of remonstrance]
Nah-oo! Summat pleasant, just to pass the time.
[MORELL
takes
an
illustrated paper
from the table and offers it. He accepts it humbly.
Thank yer, James. [He goes back to his easy chair
at
the fire,
and
sits there
at his ease, read
ing.
]

MORELL [
as he writes]
Candida will come to entertain you presently. She has got rid of her pupil. She is filling the lamps.

MARCHBANKS
[starting up in the wildest consternation]
But that will soil her hands. I can't bear that, Morell: it's a shame. I'll go and fill them.
[He makes for the door.

MORELL You'd better not.
[MARCHBANKS
stops
irresolutely.]
She'd only set you to clean my boots, to save me the trouble of doing it myself in the morning.

BURGESS
[with grave disapproval]
Don't you keep a servant now, James?

MORELL Yes; but she isn't a slave; and the house looks as if I kept three. That means that everyone has to lend a hand. It's not a bad plan: Prossy and I can talk business after breakfast whilst we're washing up. Washing up's no trouble when there are two people to do it.

MARCHBANKS [
tormentedly
] Do you think every woman is as coarse-grained as Miss Garnett?

BURGESS
[emphatically]
That's quite right, Mr. Morchbanks. That‘squiteright. She is corse-grained.

MORELL
(quietly and significantly]
Marchbanks!

MARCHBANKS Yes.

MORELL How many servants does your father keep?

MARCHBANKS Oh, I don't know.
[He comes back uneasily to the sofa, as if to get as far as possible from MORELL's questioning, and sits down in
great
agony of mind, thinking of the paraffin.
]

MORELL
[very gravely]
So many that you don't know.
[More aggressively.]
Anyhow, when there's anything coarse-grained to be done, you ring the bell and throw it on to somebody else, eh? That's one of the great facts in y o u r existence, isn't it?