Plays
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