Последний отзыв
Очень интересная!
По всем вопросам обращайтесь на: info@litportal.ru
(©) 2003-2024.
✖
More Portmanteau Plays
Автор
Год написания книги
2018
Настройки чтения
Размер шрифта
Высота строк
Поля
Jonathan Makes a Friend
[The scene represents the lumber room in the carriage house on John Clay's suburban estate. The room is crowded with old trunks, paintings, barrels, boxes, chests, furniture showing long residence during slow epochs of changing taste. Everything is in good order and carefully labelled. At the right of the room is a door opening onto the stairs which lead to the ground floor. A small window is set high in the peak of the gabled end up centre. At the left a chimney comes through the floor and cuts into the roof as though it had been added by Victorian standards of taste for exterior beautification. An open stove intrudes its pipe into the chimney. The single indication of the life of today having touched the place is the studied arrangement of an old rosewood square grand piano. The keyboard is uncovered. On the top is a tiny theatre—a model masked and touched with mystery, according to early adolescent standards. Two benches stand in front of the piano, and the piano stool is meticulously set in place. A flamboyant placard leaning against the music rack announces:
TODAY
ZENOBIA
A tragedy in ten acts
by
Alexander Jefferson, Sr.
The light in the room is dim, although it is quite bright out of doors. There are two low windows which are heavily barred. The little theatre is so arranged that when the manipulator stands on the box to work it, his head can be seen over the masking.
The curtain rises disclosing an empty room. Presently laborious steps are heard on the stairs and a key is turned in the lock. Then Aunt Letitia enters followed by Susan Sample. Aunt Letitia is a motherly old woman who has been in the Clay home for many years. She may have preferences, but like the buildings on the estate, she stays where she is. Susan Sample is a tall, slender girl of fourteen with a very gentle manner and a way of looking at people that indicates a receptivity rarely met in one so old. Letitia goes to one of the trunks marked E R in large white letters and unlocks it.
LETITIA
Here they are, my dear. Help me with the hasps.
SUSAN
What does E. R. really stand for, Mis' Letitia?
LETITIA
E. R.... That's a secret, Susan, that little girls aren't supposed to know.
SUSAN
I won't tell.
LETITIA
But what good would that do, my sweet? Please open the windows.
SUSAN (opening the window and returning to her question)
No one would know you told me.
LETITIA
I would know. Yes, I would know that I had told somebody else's secret.
SUSAN
Whose secret is it? Please.
LETITIA
I've been living in this house for thirty-five years, Susan, and I've known the secrets of all the boys and girls from time to time.
SUSAN
You know mine, too.
LETITIA
And I've never told one of them, either.
SUSAN
Does old Mr. John ever have secrets?
LETITIA
Old Mr. John! For shame!… Of course he has secrets.
SUSAN
I wish I knew some of his, Mis' Letitia.
LETITIA
My dear, you never will know them. John is very quiet.
SUSAN
Who in the family didn't have any secrets at all?
LETITIA
Oh, they all had secrets when they were young. Nathaniel had fewer than any of them and…
[Her words are lost tenderly in a memory.
SUSAN
Why hasn't he ever come back home?
LETITIA (as she busies herself with the contents of the trunk)
That is his secret, Susan, and we mustn't ask too many questions. Nathaniel is coming today. I won't ask any questions.... He was a fine young man. Yes, he's coming back today, my dear. He was the baby of the family.
SUSAN
How old is he now?
[The scene represents the lumber room in the carriage house on John Clay's suburban estate. The room is crowded with old trunks, paintings, barrels, boxes, chests, furniture showing long residence during slow epochs of changing taste. Everything is in good order and carefully labelled. At the right of the room is a door opening onto the stairs which lead to the ground floor. A small window is set high in the peak of the gabled end up centre. At the left a chimney comes through the floor and cuts into the roof as though it had been added by Victorian standards of taste for exterior beautification. An open stove intrudes its pipe into the chimney. The single indication of the life of today having touched the place is the studied arrangement of an old rosewood square grand piano. The keyboard is uncovered. On the top is a tiny theatre—a model masked and touched with mystery, according to early adolescent standards. Two benches stand in front of the piano, and the piano stool is meticulously set in place. A flamboyant placard leaning against the music rack announces:
TODAY
ZENOBIA
A tragedy in ten acts
by
Alexander Jefferson, Sr.
The light in the room is dim, although it is quite bright out of doors. There are two low windows which are heavily barred. The little theatre is so arranged that when the manipulator stands on the box to work it, his head can be seen over the masking.
The curtain rises disclosing an empty room. Presently laborious steps are heard on the stairs and a key is turned in the lock. Then Aunt Letitia enters followed by Susan Sample. Aunt Letitia is a motherly old woman who has been in the Clay home for many years. She may have preferences, but like the buildings on the estate, she stays where she is. Susan Sample is a tall, slender girl of fourteen with a very gentle manner and a way of looking at people that indicates a receptivity rarely met in one so old. Letitia goes to one of the trunks marked E R in large white letters and unlocks it.
LETITIA
Here they are, my dear. Help me with the hasps.
SUSAN
What does E. R. really stand for, Mis' Letitia?
LETITIA
E. R.... That's a secret, Susan, that little girls aren't supposed to know.
SUSAN
I won't tell.
LETITIA
But what good would that do, my sweet? Please open the windows.
SUSAN (opening the window and returning to her question)
No one would know you told me.
LETITIA
I would know. Yes, I would know that I had told somebody else's secret.
SUSAN
Whose secret is it? Please.
LETITIA
I've been living in this house for thirty-five years, Susan, and I've known the secrets of all the boys and girls from time to time.
SUSAN
You know mine, too.
LETITIA
And I've never told one of them, either.
SUSAN
Does old Mr. John ever have secrets?
LETITIA
Old Mr. John! For shame!… Of course he has secrets.
SUSAN
I wish I knew some of his, Mis' Letitia.
LETITIA
My dear, you never will know them. John is very quiet.
SUSAN
Who in the family didn't have any secrets at all?
LETITIA
Oh, they all had secrets when they were young. Nathaniel had fewer than any of them and…
[Her words are lost tenderly in a memory.
SUSAN
Why hasn't he ever come back home?
LETITIA (as she busies herself with the contents of the trunk)
That is his secret, Susan, and we mustn't ask too many questions. Nathaniel is coming today. I won't ask any questions.... He was a fine young man. Yes, he's coming back today, my dear. He was the baby of the family.
SUSAN
How old is he now?
Другие электронные книги автора Stuart Walker
Последний отзыв
Очень интересная!