Play With a Tiger and Other Plays

[ANNA, watching him, slowly comes from window as he talks, first crouches on the carpet, then collapses face down – she puts her hands over her ears, then takes them away.]

DAVE [into mirror]: Dave Miller? David Abraham Miller? No reply. No one at home. Anna, do you know what I’m scared of? One of these fine days I’ll look in the glass, expecting to see a fine earnest ethical young … and there’ll be nothing there. Then, slowly, a small dark stain will appear on the glass, it will slowly take form and … Anna, I want to be a good man. I want to be a good man.

ANNA [for herself]: I know.

[But he has already recovered. He comes to her, pulls her up to sit by him.]

DAVE: If that God of theirs ever dishes out any medals to us, what’ll it be for?

ANNA: No medals for us.

DAVE: Yes, for trying. For going on. For keeping the doors open.

ANNA: Open for what?

DAVE: You know. Because if there’s anything new in the world anywhere, any new thought, or new way of living, we’ll be ready to hear the first whisper of it. When Dr Melville Cooper-Anstey, imagines God, how does he imagine him?

ANNA: As Dr Melville Cooper-Anstey, two sizes larger.

DAVE: But we’ve got to do better. Anna look – the walls are down, and anyone or anything can come in. Now imagine off the street comes an entirely new and beautiful phenomenon, a new human being.

ANNA: Jewish boy – you’re a good Jewish boy after all waiting for the Messiah.

DAVE: That’s what everyone’s waiting for, even if they don’t know it – something new to be born. Anna, supposing superman walked in now off the street, how would you imagine him?

ANNA: Superwoman.

DAVE: Oh OK.

ANNA [in despair]: Me.

DAVE: I know. I know it. Me too. I sit and think and think – because if we don’t know what we want to grow into, how can we shape ourselves better? So I concentrate until my brain is sizzling, and who comes in through the door – me!

ANNA: Just once it wasn’t me.

DAVE [excited]: Who?

ANNA: I was sitting here, like this. I was thinking – if we can’t breed something better than we are, we’ve had it, the human race has had it. And then, suddenly …

DAVE: What?

ANNA: He walked in, twitching his tail. An enormous, glossy padding tiger. The thing was, I wasn’t at all surprised. Well tiger, I said, and who do you belong to?

DAVE [furious]: Anna, a tiger walks in here, and all you can say is, wild beast, whose label is around your neck?

ANNA: I thought you wanted to know.

DAVE: Go on.

ANNA: The tiger came straight towards me. Hullo tiger, I said, have you escaped from the zoo?

DAVE [mocking]: Of course he’s escaped from the zoo. He couldn’t be a wild tiger, could he?

ANNA [she kneels, talking to the tiger]: Tiger, tiger, come here. [she fondles the tiger] Tiger, tiger – The tiger purred so loud that the sound drowned the noise of the traffic. And then suddenly – [ANNA starts back, clutching at her arms.] He lashed out, I was covered with blood. Tiger, I said, what’s that for … he backed away, snarling.

[ANNA is now on her feet, after the tiger.]

DAVE [very excited]: Yeah. That’s it. That’s it. That’s it.

ANNA: He jumped on to my bed and crouched there, lashing his tail. But tiger, I said, I haven’t done anything to you, have I?

DAVE [furious]: Why didn’t you offer him a saucer of milk? Kitty, kitty, have a nice saucer of milk?

ANNA [beside the bed, trying to hold the tiger]: Tiger, don’t go away. But he stared and he glared, and then he was off – down he leaped and out into the street, and off he padded with his yellow eyes gleaming into the shadows of Earls Court. Then I heard the keepers shouting after him and wheeling along a great cage … [She comes back opposite DAVE.] That was the best I could do. I tried hard, but that was the best – a tiger. And I’m covered with scars.

DAVE [gently]: Anna.

[They kneel, foreheads touching, hands together.]

[The telephone starts ringing.]

DAVE: Answer it.

ANNA: No.

DAVE: Is it Tom?

ANNA: Of course it isn’t Tom.

DAVE: Then who?

ANNA: Don’t you really know?

[She goes to answer telephone, it stops ringing. She stands a moment. Then turns to him, fast.]

ANNA: Love me Dave, Love me Dave. Now.

[DAVE rolls her on to the carpet. They roll over and over together. Suddenly she breaks free and begins to laugh.]

DAVE: What’s so funny?

ANNA [kneeling up, mocking]: I’ll tell you what’s funny, Dave Miller. We sit here, tearing ourselves to bits trying to imagine something beautiful and new – but suppose the future is a nice little American college girl all hygienic and virginal and respectable with a baby in her arms. Suppose the baby is what we’re waiting for – a nice, well-fed, well-educated, psycho-analysed superman …

DAVE: Anna, please stop it.

ANNA: But imagine. Anything can come in – tigers, unicorns, monsters, the human being so beautiful he will send all of us into the dust-can. But what does come in is a nice, anxious little girl from Philadelphia.

DAVE: Well Anna?