Alan Bennett: Plays, Volume 2

by Alan Bennett

  Bron goes out.

  Hilary gets up and looks across the garden, singing another snatch of the same hymn:

  ‘Ransomed, healed, restored, forgiven,

  Who like me his praise should sing?’

  (He waves.) Hello! Where’ve you been hiding yourself? You’re quite a stranger. Nothing amiss, I hope? I was just wondering whether I dare venture forth. Doesn’t look too promising, does it? Best not go too far afield. Still it’s what we need: the dahlias are dying on their feet. However. Soldier on. Don’t work too hard.

  Bron comes back with three ties.

  Hilary takes one, changes his mind and takes another instead, say a Garrick Club tie.

  Pause.

  If one was a drunkard and one’s name was Johnny Walker one could form a society called Alcoholics Eponymous. Or if there were two of you called Johnny Walker, Alcoholics Synonymous. However.

  Bron Are you going to be sitting around here all morning?

  Pause.

  What happened to your walk?

  Hilary shrugs.

  Pause.

  Can’t keep up with you. Five minutes ago you were bubbling over.

  Hilary Well now I’ve bubbled over.

  Bron Pity you couldn’t save it.

  Hilary Save what?

  Bron The bubbling over. Been bubbling over when they were here and bubbled over after they’d gone. Or be like me. Always at Gas Mark One.

  Hilary And nothing in the oven. (He stands up and stretches.) Oven/haven, given/Devon, leaven/lumpen, open/ heaven. Where do birds go when they fly across the sky?

  Bron You’ve got birds on the brain.

  Hilary Not all birds of course. Some just float around the sky not doing anything in particular. But look, that one.

  (He hands Bron some binoculars.) That’s quite definitely off on an errand. It’s got up early, done its stint in the dawn chorus, looked at its wrist watch and set off somewhere. Now where? I think it’s late for an appointment with the headmaster of a good comprehensive school that might possibly be persuaded to admit its child on the strength of its slight proficiency on the cello and the prominence of its father in the field of communications. Whereas that one, flying round and round in seemingly aimless circles, is in some agitation over the proposed demolition of several quite pleasant, though not architecturally outstanding Victorian villas in order to make room for some old people’s flats. Themselves an outmoded social concept. However. Do you know what that is … birds with wrist watches?

  Bron Yes. Tripe.

  Hilary The Pathetic Fallacy. The idea that animals behave as we do. Or feel at all. We have visitors.

  Bron Already?

  Hilary Other visitors. (He is looking through the binoculars.) Your friend.

  Hilary hands Bron the binoculars. Hilary’s movements should now be swift and precise. Both are getting ready quickly, removing any sign that they have been there very recently.

  Were a person to cut across the field to the trees that person could be seen instantly from the track.

  Bron I can’t. I can’t.

  Hilary Except if that person or persons were to wait until the last moment when the car has come through the gate and is coming round the back of the house there would be just enough time to reach the wood before they came in.

  (He opens the drawer of the table and takes out a revolver.) The car has stopped by the gate. Eric is getting out to open it.

  Hilary and Bron are now crouching down by the verandah steps. It ought to be tense and comic.

  Bron I like him.

  Hilary I like him.

  Bron She’s all right.

  Hilary He’s back in the car. She is a bleak bitch. They’re just coming up to the corner. They are out of sight… NOW.

  They both dash down the verandah steps across the garden. Pause. Sound of a car door slamming, twice.

  Eric’s Voice Hello.

  Eric comes on. He is in his late twenties, a rather weak good looking young man. His wife Olga is older, has a faint mid-European accent, plainly dressed. Ankle socks.

  Eric Knock knock. Got a visitor.

  Olga comes on very slowly and stands waiting.

  Don’t say they’re not here. No.

  Olga sees the rocking-chair is still faintly rocking. She looks at Eric. He hasn’t seen it. She stops it, without him noticing. She looks across the garden.

  The car’s here. They can’t have gone far.

  Olga What do you want to do?

  Eric I don’t know. What do you want to do?

  Pause.

  These chairs are nice. I always liked these chairs.

  Olga What do you want to do?

  Eric I said they’re nice chairs. Do you like them? The chairs. Yes or no?

  Olga Why?

  Olga sits down. Eric gets up and looks in one of the rooms offstage.

  Eric (off) Our place isn’t like this?

  Olga You don’t have any books.

  Eric Besides books. The things. Bits of wood. Things they find on walks. Pebbles. Bits of glass. Bones. (He walks round touching objects, looking at books, meddling.)

  Olga The contents of a schoolboy’s pocket.

  Eric Treasures.

  Olga We pick flowers.

  Eric Bluebells! Kids pick flowers. That’s nothing. She picks weeds. That’s art. I could have done art. It was an option. Art or mechanical drawing. Trigonometry. You never hear of that now. Not that it was ever big news.

  Olga We could call coming back.

  Eric Who else do I see? I like them. Why don’t you go on?

  Olga What happens to your picnic?

  Eric My picnic is it now? It was you that suggested it.

  Olga You wanted to go. You behave like a child. We could wait all day. They are not here. Come on.

  Eric No

  Olga Why?

  Eric What’s wrong with just sitting. I like just sitting. I had two years on and off just sitting. Looking out. Allotments. Trucks shunted past. My personal piece of sky. Heaven.

  Pause.

  What could you see?

  Olga Where?

  Eric In prison, dear. Stir. The nick.

  Olga If I looked, I could see a wall.

  Eric That all? A wall?

  Olga That, or the eye in the door. I forget. You should forget. Your little memories. Gosport. Wakefield. Your would-be souvenirs. They all have to be carried. So leave them. They are not important.

  Eric That was always the refrain. ‘It is not important.’ ‘Do not worry about it.’ The box in the wardrobe, the pit in the floor. The ritual with the bathroom curtains. ‘What are you doing?’ ‘It is not important.’ ‘Where are you going?’ ‘Never mind.’

  The telephone rings. Eric waits a moment then goes to answer it.

  Olga No.

  Eric You then.

  Olga No.

  Eric Why not?

  Olga What is it to do with us? Leave it.

  Eric sits down and it stops ringing. There is a moment of relief, then it starts to ring again. Hilary comes in rapidly, revolver in hand. He ignores them and goes through into the inner room where the telephone is ringing. As he answers it, it stops. He comes back.

  Hilary Sorry.

  Eric We weren’t sure what to do.

  Hilary Well. You have a telephone. Sometimes it rings. It seems to me then that you have a very limited number of choices. I mean, I have been known not to answer the door were someone to call unexpectedly for instance, but I always answer the telephone. You didn’t telephone?

  Eric We just called on the off-chance. Only you were out.

  Hilary Exercise, Eric. Stretching the old legs. Fleeing the spectre of coronary thrombosis.

  Olga In your carpet slippers?

  Hilary My brogues are at the menders.

  Eric Why the gun?

  Hilary I have been defending Elgar.

  Enter Bron, breathless, with some grasses.

  Bron Visitors! Eric! Goodness!
Isn’t this a surprise? (She kisses Eric on both cheeks.) And Olga. Well! Well! (She shakes hands with Olga.) Was it anybody?

  Hilary It was a reverse charges call. A Mr Joseph Stalin is telephoning you from a Haslemere call box and wishes you to pay for the call. Will you accept the charge?

  Hilary is restless, sensing there is something wrong with the room, something out of place. He roams round until he has located the (say) two objects Eric has (very slightly) displaced.

  This place is upside down.

  Bron Eric, some lemonade?

  Eric I’ll come.

  Bron Stay and entertain Hilary. Olga, you don’t, do you?

  Bron goes out.

  Hilary A lesson to us all. You don’t drink. I’m not sure I’ve ever known you eat. Does she eat, Eric?

  Eric Yes. We’re just going on a picnic.

  Olga Sandwiches in the woods, only.

  Eric Well, a picnic.

  Hilary The most I’ve ever seen you have is a few sips of water. And that was after a three-hour meeting when us lesser mortals adjourned for lunch. But not your good lady, Eric. She pours herself half a glass of very old water and keeps at it right through the afternoon.

  Eric We thought we’d try out one of these specially designated picnic areas. In the forest by the lake. It’s all laid out, apparently. There are big tree stumps for tables and little tree stumps for chairs.

  Hilary I may be sticking my neck out on this one, but that sounds as if somebody in authority’s been using their imagination.

  Eric Boats, toilets, music. And it all blends in. What we wondered … I suggested … if it would be a good idea if …

  Hilary We made up a foursome, you mean? That’s a thought. So far as I know we’ve nothing on the agenda for today and in principle it sounds a fine idea. Still I’d better put it to the management. Don’t want to take a unilateral decision on this one. (He adjusts something else.) This room looks as if it’s been hit by an earthquake. What’s been going on?

  Enter Bron.

  Bron. Mate o’ mine. It appears our young friends are picnic-bound and we oldsters are more than welcome to tag along. What say? We’ve nothing scheduled have we?

  Bron Stop being silly. You know we’ve got people.

  Hilary smacks his forehead in a gesture of absentmindedness.

  Hilary Dolt! Cretin! Deceiver! My sister Veronica is coming to lunch. Big occasion. The fatted calf. All the trimmings. And not only my sister but her newly knighted husband.

  Eric Never mind.

  Hilary Always the way. Days, weeks go by and nothing doing then treat jostles with treat.

  Eric There’ll be other times.

  Bron Perhaps you and I could go on one of our little expeditions during the week.

  Hilary Hear that, Olga? Little plots being hatched behind the backs of the workers.

  Olga You will be pleased to see your relatives?

  Bron Oh yes. Particularly Veronica. Her husband’s a bit of a stick, but we’re quite fond of him.

  Hilary What’s that, dear?

  Bron Duff.

  Hilary I don’t think you’d like him, Olga. Duff, basically, is just a nasty green bogey drizzling from the nose of art. However.

  Olga Is she older or younger than you?

  Bron Younger.

  Hilary Older. No Eric I don’t think I’d want to be on the roads today. Today is one of those days when the people, God bless them, will be out in force.

  Bron Why not?

  Hilary Well to be quite candid because one sees quite enough of them during the week. Come the weekend … and I know this isn’t everybody’s cup of tea … come the weekend I like to get right away from my fellow man, plonk the old backside down in a field somewhere, get my back up against a haystack, close my eyes and sit there while the skylarks and the thrushes and the bees etc. do their worst and Dame Nature weaves her healing magic. That’s how I recharge my batteries. You can keep your leisure centres, your Costa Brava …

  Bron Chuck it.

  Hilary You can help us here, Olga. Before your somewhat adventitious arrival we were talking, my wife and I, about the alternative locations for this landscape.

  Pause.

  Say you had no means of knowing whereabouts you were, where would you say this was? Eric? A synonymous place. You are to imagine you have been put on a train, Olga, your destination something of a mystery. The train travels day and night for the best part of a week, finally is shunted into a siding. You try and see out. It is the middle of the night. Lights nearby. Loudspeakers. At dawn the doors are slid back and you fall out on to the platform, look round and see … (He lifts his arms.) this.

  Pause.

  Where would you say you were? Because I would have said Aldershot. Or if not Aldershot exactly, Pirbright. You have the pines.

  Bron Spruce in fact.

  Hilary Sandy soil. Scrub. Bracken. The odd silver birch. It’s the common at Pirbright as seen from the Salisbury train. Or half a dozen places in Hampshire.

  Bron Pirbright’s in Surrey.

  Hilary Aldershot then. Were you ever in Aldershot?

  Olga No.

  Eric Yes we were. We had a Chinese meal there one Sunday afternoon.

  Hilary That sounds as if it could be Aldershot. However, I’m afraid I must love you and leave you. We working girls. Olga, nice to see you in mufti, as it were. Eric be good. And Bronnie, don’t keep them too long or they may not get a tree stump. (He is going.)

  Bron Hilary.

  Hilary What?

  Bron Take that thing with you. (She points at the revolver.)

  Hilary No. Put it back where it belongs. It lives in the drawer.

  He goes.

  Olga Your husband does not like me.

  Eric Olga.

  Bron He likes his routine.

  Olga He likes his routine. He does not like me.

  Eric Olga.

  Olga I embarrass you. It is in bad taste to say that. It is without irony. I make you uncomfortable.

  Eric You don’t even try. She doesn’t try. Just be nice.

  Olga Nice. Is that nice? The railway train? Was that nice?

  Bron Never mind …

  Eric Let’s talk about something else.

  Olga I say your husband does not like me and you are embarrassed. Why?

  Eric groans.

  Eric She was only trying to be nice. You should try to be nice.

  Olga These little feelings do not matter. Nice. They belong to the past.

  Bron They do matter, don’t they? Otherwise everybody ends up feeling terrible. I do.

  Eric It’s different for Olga. She’s had a different upbringing.

  Olga It is not my upbringing. I had no upbringing. Feelings like that, feelings about feelings. Putting yourself in another person’s place. These are luxuries for which there is no time any more. Making people feel better. What is the point in that? It does not last.

  Eric Then why bother to tell us? Why not leave us to get on with it?

  Olga They are the most embarrassed nation in the world, the English. You cannot look each other in the face. Eric can scarcely look me in the face, my husband. Husbands embarrassed by wives, wives embarrassed by husbands. Children by parents. Is there anyone not embarrassed in England? The Queen perhaps. She is not embarrassed. With the rest it’s ‘I won’t make you feel bad so long as you don’t make me feel bad’. Then everybody is happy. That is the way it works. That is the social contract. Society is making each other feel better.

  Eric We’d better go.

  Olga No. Stay. You enjoy it here. Eric likes you. He says you are his only friend.

  Eric Olga. Why say it?

  Olga I say your husband does not like me and you are embarrassed. I say my husband likes you and he is embarrassed. I do not understand it. I will go and sit in the car.

  Eric Yes.

  Bron No.

  Eric Oh God.

  Olga Do not hurry. We are not in the least pushed for time. I am not hurt. (She g
oes.)

  Eric Clumsy cow. I don’t talk about you. Not all the time. I …

  Bron It doesn’t matter. It’s not important.

  Pause. Eric wanders round touching things again. Picking up items.

  Eric I wish I read. I want to.

  Bron What’s stopping you? Take something. He won’t mind.

  Eric No point.

  Bron Then you don’t want to read, do you? You just want to want to.

  Eric No.

  Bron It’s like me. I used to think I wanted to leave Hilary. Then I realised I didn’t want to. I just wanted to want to.

  Pause.

  Eric I tell you about Joyce? My sister.

  Bron Joyce. No. Why?

  Eric I had a letter. She’s going in for one of these child care officers. I reckon she’s quite brave to be branching out. Thirty-eight.

  Bron Is that the one in Leicester?

  Eric Nottingham.

  Bron The one who’s married to the personnel officer.

  Eric Labour relations.

  Bron That should be interesting.

  Eric Apparently local government now you can’t go wrong. They’re on a sliding scale. Haven’t you any news?

  Bron is still staring after Olga.

  Leave her.

  Bron Hilary’s father’s in the bin again.

  Eric Is that bad?

  Bron Belsize Park.

  Eric They’re generally on the outskirts somewhere.

  Bron What?

  Eric Homes.

  Bron Belsize Park is London.

  Eric Belsize Park? It sounds like a country house.

  Bron I suppose it was once. Robin’s come out of the army.

  Eric He the good-looking one?

  Bron He doesn’t know what he wants to do. He wondered about starting a safari park. He’s got someone to put up the money but I think they may be going out now, safari parks. What do you think?

  Eric I’ve only been to one and the animals were all asleep. It’s the same as a cage only bigger: they’ll soon know it inside out.

  Bron Zoos seem to be full of people staring at animals that hail from the same countries as they do. Africans, Japanese. It’s as if they’ve gone to the zoo because it’s where they’re sure to find a familiar face. Friends who just happen to be living abroad.