by Dan Isaac
ethel: Now that he’s gone, have you made any plans for your future?
star: No.
[Ether’s voice begins to shake with religious excitement.]
ethel: There’s time in everybody’s life when an opportunity comes to go up— [She points.] Or down.
star: You mean Heaven? You can count me outa that. I’ve already put in my reservations at the other end. [She laughs and lights a cigarette.]
ethel: Now, you’re just talking sinful. I guess it’s the bad company that you been keeping. I seen that red-headed Jezebel frum acrost the tracks prancin’ outa here as I come up the walk. What was she doin’ here?
star: The same thing you’re doin’. Preachin’ salvation. Only hers was a house in Birmingham. I told her she could count me outa that, too.
ethel: I see. I’ve always felt there was good in you Star, or I wouldn’t—I wouldn’t . . . .
star: You wouldn’t’ve disgraced yourself by comin’ in here.
ethel: Hmm. I just wanted to know what you was planning to do with yourself now that Jake’s dead. [Her voice rises.] There’s plenteous redemption in the blood of the lamb! Remember that.
star: Yeah.
ethel: Just remember. It’s a glorious thing to be saved. [She rises, her fervor reaching an almost hysterical pitch.] I’ll never fergit the time that I first saw the light, and before that time Star, I’d been like you—a sinful woman.
star [more amused than resentful]: You? Sinful?
ethel [in a confidential whisper]: Yes. In here. [She points to her breast.] I was full of sinful thoughts. At night I couldn’t sleep. I lay on my bed an sweated an twisted in shameful temptation. But not since then. And you, Star . . . there never was a woman more sorely tempted and tried then I was. What’s possible for me is possible for you too. Just remember that. It’s a glorious thing to be saved.
star: Yeah. I reckon it must be swell.
ethel: Who is that comin’ up the walk? Oh, it’s Luke. [She coos.] I declare he’s gettin’ that big I half took him for a full-grown man. Good evenin’, Luke.
luke: Is Star inside?
ethel: I just left her. [Luke enters. He is now a boy of about seventeen, dressed in overalls, carrying some worn-looking books under one arm.]
star: Hello, Luke. Come on in. How’s the young student? Eating these days?
luke: Hello, Star.
star: Is Hester any better?
luke: She’s about the same. Mom’s getting worried about her.
star [after a pause]: I guess Hester’s tired out.
luke: Yes, the doctor says she needs to take a long rest.
star: What doctor? That company doctor?
luke: Sure he’s the only one we got around here.
star: He’s no good. He doesn’t know a damned thing. He told me that my man Jake just had a bad cold and that he’d be back shoveling coal inside of a week. Well, just three days after that Jake Walland was dead, laid away in his grave, so if he did go back to shoveling coal there’s only one place it could be. I guess that’s where you’d expect to find him anyhow. He was the orneriest white man in the world, I reckon. Some ways, though, he was all right. He would done anything in the world I wanted him to. Yeah, he’d’ve married me if I’d wanted him to. I didn’t wanta git married to Jake. I didn’t want to git tied down to no man on this earth, and that’s the God’s truth. You know that it wasn’t because Jake wouldn’t have me for his wife like some people say. No, it was just because I wouldn’t have him nor nobody else. I wanted my freedom too much for that. There isn’t any man on this earth that I’d be willing to hitch myself up with for keeps. I don’t know why I’m telling you all this. It’s no concern of yours. But I know how people talk. I can hear ’em talk just sittin’ here in the evening, I can hear ’em talk as they go by the window. They say some rotten things about me, some of them, but I don’t care. I don’t regret nothing that I ever done. I never had a chance to do diffrent and that’s the God’s truth and you know it. Turn the lamp up will ya, Luke. I dunno what I turned it down for. I must be gittin’ sort of queer in the head. Benn sittin’ here by myself so much since old Jake turned in his checks.
luke [turning up lamp]: I like to sit in the dark sometimes myself.
star: You do, what for?
luke: Sometimes you can see things plainer in the dark than you can in the light.
star: Yeah? What things for instance?
luke: Mostly things I read about.
star: You read a lot of things, don’t you?
luke: Much as I can get hold of around here. Books are pretty scarce. There’s a fellow named Birmingham Red has a few he loaned me.
star: The guy that’s been holding them meetings!
luke: Yeah.
star: You better stay away from him. He’s a troublemaker.
luke: He’s just tryin’ to show us how things are. We been pore-hawgin’ along for years now—but we’ve reached the dead-end. When we was workin’ regular no matter how little we got paid there was always enough to eat on. But now with the mines shut down half the time and nobody sure where the next meal’s comin’ from—things have got to be diff’rent. Red was talkin’ to me a few nights ago about something called cooperative commonwealth.
star: What’s that mean?
luke: I ain’t sure myself about what the words mean, but I was thinkin’ it over in bed after I turned the light out and all of a sudden I got an idea of what it was all about and I jumped out of bed and run over to Red’s place and we sat up the rest of the night talking some more. It’s funny about that guy. He ain’t in it for what he can get out of it like everybody else seems to be. He talks about—society. You know—you and me and everybody else that makes up the whole world. It’s too big to understand all at once. It’s one of those things that you have to lay in the dark and think about a long time before they begin to sink in.
star: It’s just a lot of hot air. Tell him you don’t fall for that kind of stuff.
luke: I do, though, Star. I don’t think it’s always going to go on like this.
star: Maybe when you and me have been dead a couple thousand years things will be different.
luke: Red don’t think it can come all at once neither. But it’s worth working for just the same. It’s justice . . . that’s what he calls it—the principle of social justice.
star: Justice . . . that’s just one of them words you find in the dictionary. That Birmingham Red he’s a funny sort of guy ain’t he? He’s got a lot of screwy ideas like that. Justice. Equality. Freedom. I go to hear him talk sometimes. I sit in the front row. But he don’t even look at me, he looks right over my head, and it makes me so damn mad I want to throw a brick at him and yell at the top of my voice, or something. I guess even then he wouldn’t know I was there. What’s the matter with him? Don’t he go for women?
luke: I guess he’s got other things on his mind.
star: Someday he’ll wake up and find out he’s human. Maybe he’ll take a look at me then. I’m not so bad to look at. I got my good points and I don’t keep ’em all under cover with a man like Birmingham Red.
luke: What do you want him for, Star. He ain’t your sort is he?
star: What do you mean he ain’t my sort? He’s big, ain’t he. I always liked big men.
luke: He’s got brains.
star: Yeah, and I can appreciate brains in a guy as well as anyone else. And I can also appreciate good looks. Birmingham Red’s the only guy in this lousy mining camp that I’d walk across the street to spit on.
luke: Hester wouldn’t like to hear you talk like that, Star.
star: Hester don’t bother about me no more.
luke: Yes, she does. She talks about you all the time.
star [huskily]: Does she?
luke: Yes, ’specially since she’s sick. She worries about you.
star: Worries about me. What for? I can take care of myself.
luke: She don’t like to you see you living like this.
star: Like
what? [After a pause.] Yeah, I know what you mean . . .
luke: What’re you goin’ to do now?
star: Now?
luke: Yes, now that Jake’s dead.
star: Oh, I dunno.
luke: You can’t stay on here, can you?
star: Rent’s paid up til the first.
luke: The company’ll put you out after that if you can’t keep payin’ the rent.
star: Sure they will.
luke: Well, now that Jake’s gone—you ought to come back home.
star: Home? Bram’s house? He run me out of there once. When I was just a kid, sixteen, because I stayed out all night with Jake Walland and come home with a new silk kimona. He run me out of the house for that, when I was sixteen. I was green as grass then. I didn’t know a damned thing. Now I’m twenty-six and pretty wise. I can take care of myself—one way or another I don’t need to go whining back to Bram’s house. I’d starve first. But I won’t starve. You can tell that Bolshevik friend of yourn that if he won’t give me a tumble there’s others that will. I can pick and choose!
luke: There’s no use talking to you, Star. [He crosses down-stage near the inner door.]
star: There’s no use preaching to me, if that’s what you mean. [Music cue.] Put your shoes on, Luke, and go down there to the dance. The moon’s as big and yellow as a pumpkin tonight.—You’re young. Have a good time while you can. Pretty soon old Bram’ll be draggin’ you down in the coal mines with him.
luke [rising and picking up his books]: No, he won’t. Mom’s dead set against me working in the coal mines.
star: And Hester was dead set against it for John, too, but he got killed in one of them, didn’t he?
luke: I won’t. I’ll tell you something. Mom’s been putting by some money out of the washing she takes in to send me to college in Tuscaloosa.
star: Poor old Hester, nothing worked out right for her. None of us done like she wanted us to. Now she’s dying I guess. Sometimes you wonder what it’s all about, this living and dying, don’t you?
luke: If Hester don’t get better—I mean if she should take a turn for the worse— [Goes to her.]
star: Let me know if she does!
luke: Would you come and see her?
star: A-course. You come and call for me. I’d go with you. I—I wouldn’t want Hester to die without forgiving me.
luke: She don’t hold nothing against you, Star.
star: I know. She’s got so she speaks to me sometimes on the street. But there’s such a—a look in her eyes—when she sees me— It’s just as though she was looking at my dead body! [She rises and turns her back to Luke.] So long, Luke.
luke: So long— [He pauses a second and then goes out.]
[Star moves to the window. A small crowd of townspeople appear at the rear of the stage, observing Star at her window.]
woman: Look at ’er.
another woman: Brave as brass, ain’t she?
a third woman: Ought be ashamed to show her face!
man: Hi, there, Star. Better come down to the dance.
another man: Yeah, come along, Star. You ain’t gonna be a widow all yer life.
star: I ain’t a widow.
man: Yer a common-law widder, ain’tcha? [Loud guffaws.]
star: You’re too damned smart.
woman: Didja ever see the likes of that? Come on, Sarah! YOU Sam! What’re you lookin’ in that window for?
another woman: Fixin’ to catch herself a new man already!
star [smiling with suppressed excitement]: Who’s that?
red [opening door]: Me.
star [after a slight pause, probably to control herself]: I knew you was coming.
red: Did you?
star: Yeah, that’s why I stayed home from the dance tonight.
red: Well, that’s flattering. What made you expect me tonight?
star: It’s Saturday night. You might call it playing a hunch. [There is a long pause.] Set down. Make yourself comfortable. [Red seats himself in a straight chair by the table. He appears rather constrained.] That chair’s kin’ of hard on your back. Why don’t you set on the bed? That’s where I set mostly.
red: Do you?
star: Yeah. Mostly.
red: I feel all right here, thank you.
star: Was you brought up in a barn?
red: What do you mean?
star: Ain’t you never heard of shutting doors when you come in?
[Red rises and shuts the door. She rises.]
red: The air’s so nice tonight I thought maybe you’d want it open. What made you think I was coming here?
star: I told you. It’s Saturday night. [She crosses to the table.]
red: What’s that got to do with me coming here?
star: Saturday night’s pay night. A lot of the boys come to see me on Saturday night. At least they used to. That was the night Jake Walland went out and got drunk and didn’t come home til next morning. . . I guess you know who Jake was?
red: Yeah, he was the lung case that passed out last week. Did you get any flowers from Gomstock Incorporated? [He sits on the bed.]
star: The company furnished a coffin.
red: That’s good. At the rate they’re turning out corpses it’d pay them to go into the coffin business.
star: Jake drank his guts to pieces. I guess that was really what done him in.
red: Hell! Don’t you know what he died of even? It was silicosis!
star: What’s that? [She moves toward Red a little.]
red: It’s a special bonus the company gives their employees for long and faithful service. Like some places hand out a gold watch after so many years—our company deals ’em a pair of rotten lungs. That’s what killed your man. You see, when they’re blasting down there in the shaft they oughta get the men out first, but that would take more time and trouble than Gomstock Inc. figures that they can afford. They’d rather just—settle for a coffin! Maybe some day they’ll learn something about practical economy. Now they figure they can’t even afford to pay us money. They’re paying us scrip. And with prices so high at the company store, there’s damned few getting even enough to eat. Pellagra’s about as bad among the women as silicosis is with the men. Bram Pilcher’s wife’s dying of it now—
star: Hester—dying of— ?
red: You know her?
star [after a pause, her voice low]: Yeah, my mother.
red: I’m sorry. I didn’t know.
star: I known she was dying. I didn’t know what of. I guess she’s been scrimping herself so’s the others would have enough. That’s like her. I didn’t know she had—pellagra. I thought maybe she was jes tired of living—
red: Maybe she was. I wouldn’t blame her for that. Would you?
star: No. I wouldn’t blame her. [Sits beside him on bed.] I wouldn’t blame her for being tired of living. Evuh’thing turned out wrong for her—including me.
red: What’s the matter with you?
star [moving closer and placing a hand on his knee]: I dunno. S’pose you tell me?
red [rising and going back to the straight chair]: Nothing except your technique.
star [huffily]: Yeah? What’s wrong with my technique!
red: You’re a little bit quick on the uptake.
star [smiling]: I guess you like them kind of hard to get huh? Well, I am hard to get with mos’ men. I jes happens that I have a sort a weakness for boys of your type. Why don’t you come down off the platform and give us girls a break! Some of us ain’t so bad when you get to know us better. They tell me you go to bed at night with the dictionary. Huh? [She laughs softly and stretches herself provocatively on the bed.]
red: I don’t like women who can’t talk clean.
star [rising furiously]: Oh, you big stiff, you give me a pain. What did I say that was dirty I’d liketa know? I didn’t know you was a Sunday school teacher.
red [still quietly]: I’m not. But I like my women to talk decent.
star: What the hell did you co
me here for? To talk about the weather? It’s a swell night, ain’t it? Just like spring!
red [after a pause]: It is spring. You can smell the honeysuckle.
star [somewhat pacified]: Yeah. It does smell kind of good at night. [She goes over and sits down by the window on upper edge of bed.]
red: That’s a sprig of it you’ve got pinned on your dress. Isn’t it?
star: Yeah. I pulled it off one of them vines down there by the spring.
red [going over to her]: Let me smell it. [He seats himself on the window still beside her and presses his face against her breast.]
star [pushing away]: Now you’re going a little too fast.
red: Am I? I thought you liked plenty of speed.
star: Well, I always slow down on the curves. Go back over and sit in the chair. [He doesn’t move.] If you caint act like a gentleman you’d better not stay. [Archly.] I like to CONVERSE with my gentleman visitors. Let’s see now, what was we talking about? Oh, yes. You was telling me about your past life . . .
red: My past life?
star: Yeah, there’s a lot of things about you I’d like to know. For instance what do they call you Red for? Your hair ain’t no red.
red: No, but they say my neck is.
star: Red neck? I know what that means. That means a Bolshevik!
red: That’s what they call any guy who’s interested in saving somebody’s skin beside his own. I try to get the workers decent living conditions, try to keep ’em from being exploited by the operators for all they’re worth—and they call me a Bolshevik!
star: You know what’s the matter with you? You take things too serious. You oughta come down off the soap-box oncet a while!
red: I thought you was interested. You been coming to the meetings.
star: Yeah, I like to hear you talk, Red. It ain’t what you say. It’s just the sound of your voice. It kind of gets under my skin. [Red is completely bemused. Star gets up and turns down the lamp very low, then sits down again.] I don’t like them fast hoe-downs. I like a sweet soundin’ waltz, don’t you?—Why don’t you SAY somthin’ you?!
red [drawling]: I caint . . . .
star: Has the cat got your tongue?
red [slow drawl]: When I look at you the way you are now I don’t feel much like talkin’.
star [rising]: Maybe you’d rather dance, huh?
