This Side of Paradise
evening. If I drop my voice, my eyes, my handkerchief at a dance,
my partner calls me up on the ’phone every day for a week.
CECELIA: It must be an awful strain.
ROSALIND: The unfortunate part is that the only men who interest
me at all are the totally ineligible ones. Now—if I were poor I’d
go on the stage.
CECELIA: Yes, you might as well get paid for the amount of acting
you do.
ROSALIND: Sometimes when I’ve felt particularly radiant I’ve
thought, why should this be wasted on one man?
CECELIA: Often when you’re particularly sulky, I’ve wondered why
it should all be wasted on just one family. (Getting up.) I think
I’ll go down and meet Mr. Amory Blaine. I like temperamental men.
ROSALIND: There aren’t any. Men don’t know how to be really angry
or really happy—and the ones that do, go to pieces.
CECELIA: Well, I’m glad I don’t have all your worries. I’m
engaged.
ROSALIND: (With a scornful smile) Engaged? Why, you little
lunatic! If mother heard you talking like that she’d send you off
to boarding-school, where you belong.
CECELIA: You won’t tell her, though, because I know things I
could tell—and you’re too selfish!
ROSALIND: (A little annoyed) Run along, little girl! Who are you
engaged to, the iceman? the man that keeps the candy-store?
CECELIA: Cheap wit—good-by, darling, I’ll see you later.
ROSALIND: Oh, be _sure_ and do that—you’re such a help.
(Exit CECELIA. ROSALIND finished her hair and rises, humming. She
goes up to the mirror and starts to dance in front of it on the
soft carpet. She watches not her feet, but her eyes—never
casually but always intently, even when she smiles. The door
suddenly opens and then slams behind AMORY, very cool and
handsome as usual. He melts into instant confusion.)
HE: Oh, I’m sorry. I thought—
SHE: (Smiling radiantly) Oh, you’re Amory Blaine, aren’t you?
HE: (Regarding her closely) And you’re Rosalind?
SHE: I’m going to call you Amory—oh, come in—it’s all
right—mother’ll be right in—(under her breath) unfortunately.
HE: (Gazing around) This is sort of a new wrinkle for me.
SHE: This is No Man’s Land.
HE: This is where you—you—(pause)
SHE: Yes—all those things. (She crosses to the bureau.) See,
here’s my rouge—eye pencils.
HE: I didn’t know you were that way.
SHE: What did you expect?
HE: I thought you’d be sort of—sort of—sexless, you know, swim
and play golf.
SHE: Oh, I do—but not in business hours.
HE: Business?
SHE: Six to two—strictly.
HE: I’d like to have some stock in the corporation.
SHE: Oh, it’s not a corporation—it’s just “Rosalind, Unlimited.”
Fifty-one shares, name, good-will, and everything goes at $25,000
a year.
HE: (Disapprovingly) Sort of a chilly proposition.
SHE: Well, Amory, you don’t mind—do you? When I meet a man that
doesn’t bore me to death after two weeks, perhaps it’ll be
different.
HE: Odd, you have the same point of view on men that I have on
women.
SHE: I’m not really feminine, you know—in my mind.
HE: (Interested) Go on.
SHE: No, you—you go on—you’ve made me talk about myself. That’s
against the rules.
HE: Rules?
SHE: My own rules—but you—Oh, Amory, I hear you’re brilliant. The
family expects _so_ much of you.
HE: How encouraging!
SHE: Alec said you’d taught him to think. Did you? I didn’t
believe any one could.
HE: No. I’m really quite dull.
(He evidently doesn’t intend this to be taken seriously.)
SHE: Liar.
HE: I’m—I’m religious—I’m literary. I’ve—I’ve even written poems.
SHE: Vers libre—splendid! (She declaims.)
“The trees are green, The birds are singing in the trees, The girl
sips her poison The bird flies away the girl dies.”
HE: (Laughing) No, not that kind.
SHE: (Suddenly) I like you.
HE: Don’t.
SHE: Modest too—
HE: I’m afraid of you. I’m always afraid of a girl—until I’ve
kissed her.
SHE: (Emphatically) My dear boy, the war is over.
HE: So I’ll always be afraid of you.
SHE: (Rather sadly) I suppose you will.
(A slight hesitation on both their parts.)
HE: (After due consideration) Listen. This is a frightful thing
to ask.
SHE: (Knowing what’s coming) After five minutes.
HE: But will you—kiss me? Or are you afraid?
SHE: I’m never afraid—but your reasons are so poor.
HE: Rosalind, I really _want_ to kiss you.
SHE: So do I.
(They kiss—definitely and thoroughly.)
HE: (After a breathless second) Well, is your curiosity
satisfied?
SHE: Is yours?
HE: No, it’s only aroused.
(He looks it.)
SHE: (Dreamily) I’ve kissed dozens of men. I suppose I’ll kiss
dozens more.
HE: (Abstractedly) Yes, I suppose you could—like that.
SHE: Most people like the way I kiss.
HE: (Remembering himself) Good Lord, yes. Kiss me once more,
Rosalind.
SHE: No—my curiosity is generally satisfied at one.
HE: (Discouraged) Is that a rule?
SHE: I make rules to fit the cases.
HE: You and I are somewhat alike—except that I’m years older in
experience.
SHE: How old are you?
HE: Almost twenty-three. You?
SHE: Nineteen—just.
HE: I suppose you’re the product of a fashionable school.
SHE: No—I’m fairly raw material. I was expelled from Spence—I’ve
forgotten why.
HE: What’s your general trend?
SHE: Oh, I’m bright, quite selfish, emotional when aroused, fond
of admiration—
HE: (Suddenly) I don’t want to fall in love with you—
SHE: (Raising her eyebrows) Nobody asked you to.
HE: (Continuing coldly) But I probably will. I love your mouth.
SHE: Hush! Please don’t fall in love with my mouth—hair, eyes,
shoulders, slippers—but _not_ my mouth. Everybody falls in love
with my mouth.
HE: It’s quite beautiful.
SHE: It’s too small.
HE: No it isn’t—let’s see.
(He kisses her again with the same thoroughness.)
SHE: (Rather moved) Say something sweet.
HE: (Frightened) Lord help me.
SHE: (Drawing away) Well, don’t—if it’s so hard.
HE: Shall we pretend? So soon?
SHE: We haven’t the same standards of time as other people.
HE: Already it’s—other people.
SHE: Let’s pretend.
HE: No—I can’t—it’s sentiment.
SHE: You’re not sentimental?
HE: No, I’m romantic—a sentimental person thinks things will
last—a romantic person hopes against hope that they won’t.
Sentiment is emotional.
SHE: And you’re not? (With her eyes half-closed.) You probably
flatter yourself that that’s a superior attitude.
HE: Well—Rosalind, Rosalind, don’t argue—kiss me again.
SHE: (Quite chilly now) No—I have no desire to kiss you.
HE: (Openly taken aback) You wanted to kiss me a minute ago.
SHE: This is now.
HE: I’d better go.
SHE: I suppose so.
(He goes toward the door.)
SHE: Oh!
(He turns.)
SHE: (Laughing) Score—Home Team: One hundred—Opponents: Zero.
(He starts back.)
SHE: (Quickly) Rain—no game.
(He goes out.)
(She goes quietly to the chiffonier, takes out a cigarette-case
and hides it in the side drawer of a desk. Her mother enters,
note-book in hand.)
MRS. CONNAGE: Good—I’ve been wanting to speak to you alone before
we go down-stairs.
ROSALIND: Heavens! you frighten me!
MRS. CONNAGE: Rosalind, you’ve been a very expensive proposition.
ROSALIND: (Resignedly) Yes.
MRS. CONNAGE: And you know your father hasn’t what he once had.
ROSALIND: (Making a wry face) Oh, please don’t talk about money.
MRS. CONNAGE: You can’t do anything without it. This is our last
year in this house—and unless things change Cecelia won’t have
the advantages you’ve had.
ROSALIND: (Impatiently) Well—what is it?
MRS. CONNAGE: So I ask you to please mind me in several things
I’ve put down in my note-book. The first one is: don’t disappear
with young men. There may be a time when it’s valuable, but at
present I want you on the dance-floor where I can find you. There
are certain men I want to have you meet and I don’t like finding
you in some corner of the conservatory exchanging silliness with
any one—or listening to it.
ROSALIND: (Sarcastically) Yes, listening to it _is_ better.
MRS. CONNAGE: And don’t waste a lot of time with the college
set—little boys nineteen and twenty years old. I don’t mind a
prom or a football game, but staying away from advantageous
parties to eat in little cafes down-town with Tom, Dick, and
Harry—
ROSALIND: (Offering her code, which is, in its way, quite as high
as her mother’s) Mother, it’s done—you can’t run everything now
the way you did in the early nineties.
MRS. CONNAGE: (Paying no attention) There are several bachelor
friends of your father’s that I want you to meet
to-night—youngish men.
ROSALIND: (Nodding wisely) About forty-five?
MRS. CONNAGE: (Sharply) Why not?
ROSALIND: Oh, _quite_ all right—they know life and are so
adorably tired looking (shakes her head)—but they _will_ dance.
MRS. CONNAGE: I haven’t met Mr. Blaine—but I don’t think you’ll
care for him. He doesn’t sound like a money-maker.
ROSALIND: Mother, I never _think_ about money.
MRS. CONNAGE: You never keep it long enough to think about it.
ROSALIND: (Sighs) Yes, I suppose some day I’ll marry a ton of
it—out of sheer boredom.
MRS. CONNAGE: (Referring to note-book) I had a wire from
Hartford. Dawson Ryder is coming up. Now there’s a young man I
like, and he’s floating in money. It seems to me that since you
seem tired of Howard Gillespie you might give Mr. Ryder some
encouragement. This is the third time he’s been up in a month.
ROSALIND: How did you know I was tired of Howard Gillespie?
MRS. CONNAGE: The poor boy looks so miserable every time he
comes.
ROSALIND: That was one of those romantic, pre-battle affairs.
They’re all wrong.
MRS. CONNAGE: (Her say said) At any rate, make us proud of you
to-night.
ROSALIND: Don’t you think I’m beautiful?
MRS. CONNAGE: You know you are.
(From down-stairs is heard the moan of a violin being tuned, the
roll of a drum. MRS. CONNAGE turns quickly to her daughter.)
MRS. CONNAGE: Come!
ROSALIND: One minute!
(Her mother leaves. ROSALIND goes to the glass where she gazes at
herself with great satisfaction. She kisses her hand and touches
her mirrored mouth with it. Then she turns out the lights and
leaves the room. Silence for a moment. A few chords from the
piano, the discreet patter of faint drums, the rustle of new
silk, all blend on the staircase outside and drift in through the
partly opened door. Bundled figures pass in the lighted hall. The
laughter heard below becomes doubled and multiplied. Then some