Who is Sylvia? and Duologue

by Terence Rattigan

  OSCAR. I’m flying for my life.

  MARK. Why?

  OSCAR. Husband trouble.

  MARK. Serves you right. You shouldn’t have husband trouble at all. It’s utterly against the rules.

  OSCAR. The game I play – which is entirely of my own invention – has, happily – no rules of any kind. May I make myself a cocktail?

  MARK. Why?

  OSCAR. Well, I’m not going to get one downstairs, it seems.

  MARK. Yes. All right. Everything’s there. Make one for me too.

  OSCAR (at the sideboard). Luckily he’s never seen me – this Colonel Wilberforce, but some idiot told him I was at the party, and now he’s roaring across the room about having a word or two to say to this young rotter Philipson.

  MARK. ‘Young rotter’? Oh, well, of course, you were saying he’d never seen you.

  OSCAR. And you tell me my humour is fourth form. There’s no ice.

  MARK. Of course there’s no ice.

  OSCAR. I used to keep it in a sort of vacuum thingammajig. What’s happened to it?

  MARK. You took it.

  OSCAR. So I did. Well, as I was saying, this mutual menace of ours, this Colonel Wilberforce, has an entirely misguided notion that I once took certain liberties with Mrs Wilberforce in a taxi going from the Pyramids to the Cairo Opera House. (Tries the cocktail.) This tastes rather good. Do you know, I think it’s better without ice.

  MARK. How misguided was the Colonel’s notion?

  OSCAR. Oh, entirely. It wasn’t in a taxi at all.

  MARK. On a camel?

  OSCAR. Fourth form. Fourth form. It was in a beautiful moonlit garden, and I didn’t take liberties. I was accorded them.

  MARK. God, what have you put in this thing? (Indicates his cocktail, which he has just sipped.)

  OSCAR. Ordinary gin and French. It’s that little touch of lemon that makes the difference.

  MARK. It’s got a sort of sickly taste – like a decaying turnip.

  OSCAR. Nonsense. It’s delicious.

  He drinks his down. MARK puts his aside.

  MARK. Oscar – I’ve got something very serious to tell you. Can I have your whole attention, please?

  OSCAR nods. There is a pause.

  What do you think of her?

  OSCAR. Her? Oh, charming, charming – of course, she’s Sylvia, version 1929 – bang up to date.

  MARK. Sylvia doesn’t come into it this time.

  OSCAR. Of course she does. This girl is the living image –

  MARK. I know. It makes no difference. I’m not in love with an image. I’m in love with Nora Patterson.

  OSCAR. I knew this would happen one day. You can’t say I haven’t warned you. Oh, Lord – I suppose I shall have to give evidence.

  MARK. Evidence? Where?

  OSCAR (crossing to sideboard for another drink). At the divorce.

  MARK. Divorce? Whose divorce?

  OSCAR. Your divorce of course.

  MARK. Don’t be so infernally melodramatic. Who’s talking about divorce?

  OSCAR. You said you were in love with –

  MARK. Well, so I am. All I’m trying to tell you is I’m sufficiently in love with her to give up the Diplomatic.

  Pause.

  OSCAR. Tiens, tiens.

  MARK. What did you say?

  OSCAR. I said, tiens, tiens. It’s a French expression meaning ‘hold, hold’.

  MARK. Have you any other comment?

  OSCAR. Only that sitting on this very sofa – many years ago – I warned you of this very disaster – I remember it perfectly. Your two worlds, I said, will collide, and blow each other up. Mark Wright blown up, I said, will be a good thing. But Mark Binfield blown up, I said – will be a catast – catastrophe. Do you know – I think I did put something rather funny in this. (Indicates his cocktail.)

  MARK (after sipping his own glass). You know what you’ve done, don’t you. You’ve put brandy in instead of vermouth.

  OSCAR. Ridiculous. I couldn’t have – (Goes to the drink sideboard.) There’s the gin. And there’s the – (Sniffs the second decanter. Furiously.) Well, of all the idiotic things to do – to go and put brandy in the vermouth decanter.

  MARK. That’s the brandy decanter. There’s no such thing as a vermouth decanter.

  OSCAR. Certainly there’s such a thing as a vermouth decanter. This is the vermouth decanter. I always kept vermouth in this decanter –

  MARK. Well, I keep brandy in it.

  OSCAR. You realise what you’ve done, don’t you? Quite apart from rendering me insensible hours before my normal time, you’ve very probably given me another of my livers. (Bad temperedly.) What were we talking about?

  MARK. Me – giving up the Diplomatic.

  OSCAR. Oh yes. Catastrophe. (Surprised.) I said it all right that time.

  MARK. Nonsense.

  OSCAR (crossly). I did say it all right –

  MARK. I mean, it’s nonsense to sit there just burbling ‘catastrophe’.

  OSCAR (darkly). You’ll see, my boy. You’ll see. Oh, and I have one further comment to make. A brief comment but one of extraordinary penetrative – penetrativeness –

  MARK. Try penetration.

  OSCAR. I’ve said penetrativeness now.

  MARK. Make the comment.

  OSCAR. Denis.

  MARK. That’s idiotic. Denis is eighteen. He can’t possibly know his own mind, while I know exactly what I’m doing –

  OSCAR. The difference, in fact, between suicide while of unsound mind and felo de se. Do you know that’s rather good? I wish someone could have heard that.

  MARK. I heard it, and thought it damn silly. Besides, Denis thinks he’s going to be an actor –

  OSCAR. What do you think you’re going to be?

  MARK. Myself. No more than that. I’ll sculpt a bit more, perhaps – write a little – read all the books I ought to have read –

  OSCAR. You can do all that in La Paz.

  MARK. Yes, but why La Paz, for heaven’s sake? Why should I, in the prime of life –

  OSCAR. Slim, handsome, and witty –

  MARK. Shut up. Why should I incarcerate myself in a place like La Paz – probably for years and years – exiled, forgotten, humiliated, ignored – in some moth-eaten little South American dust heap?

  OSCAR. It’s a delightful city, La Paz.

  MARK. Have you been there?

  OSCAR. I’ve had a postcard.

  MARK. Minister in La Paz! I tell you, Oscar, if I give in now, I give in to old age, and dullness and respectability and drab security and all the things I’ve been trying to run away from in the last thirteen years – ever since I invented Mark Wright. Very well – the two worlds have collided – who cares? Better Binfield go under than Wright. Binfield is nothing – there are millions like him – respectable, domesticated, frustrated bores, half-dead without knowing it. But Wright is alive – he has a great capacity for living – and life should be lived in the full tide – not snoozed away in stagnant backwaters. I tell you, Oscar, I have reached my turning point – the moment that comes to a man once and only once in his life time – when he has to make a Napoleonic decision – a decision that is going to make or mar him for the rest of his time on earth. Well, I’ve made mine. I’m resigning from the Service tomorrow.

  OSCAR is staring at him fixedly.

  Well?

  OSCAR. Extraordinary the way your eyebrows move about when you get excited.

  MARK. Any further comment?

  OSCAR. Yes.

  MARK. What?

  OSCAR. Disaster. Utter cata – disaster –

  WILLIAMS comes in with a tray on which is a coffee pot, a bottle, and a cup.

  MARK. Has that damn Colonel gone yet?

  WILLIAMS. No, my lord. I spilled a tomato juice on him, like you said, but he hardly seemed to notice it. (Goes into the bedroom.)

  MARK. What on earth can we do to get rid of him?

  After a second’s pause the same idea occurs to them simultaneously
. The both turn and look at the shaker. They get up and go to the sideboard.

  Can you remember the exact formula?

  OSCAR. Of course. A perfectly ordinary dry Martini, my dear chap. (Mixes a cocktail, using the same decanters as before.) Two parts gin – one part vermouth – a touch more vermouth, I think, don’t you – don’t let’s be stingy – and then just a dash of lemon, which brings the whole thing to glorious life. There we are. (Sips it.) Yes. That is the veritable brew. The Philipson patent husband-remover or Binfield-shouter slayer.

  WILLIAMS emerges from the bedroom. MARK takes the shaker from OSCAR and hands it to WILLIAMS.

  MARK. Ah, Williams, this is for Colonel Wilberforce only. Only, understand.

  WILLIAMS. Yes, my lord.

  MARK. But be careful. Don’t spill it, or we’ll have a hole in the floor.

  OSCAR. What was it you just took into the bedroom, Williams?

  WILLIAMS. Black coffee – and vodka – sir, for one of the guests.

  OSCAR. Oh. What sex is the guest?

  WILLIAMS. Female, sir.

  OSCAR. Below the age of thirty?

  WILLIAMS. Yes, sir.

  OSCAR. What is her name?

  WILLIAMS. Oh! I heard Miss Patterson call her Bubbles.

  OSCAR. Bubbles. Bring another cup, would you?

  He goes into the bedroom.

  MARK. The second this Colonel Wilberforce falls in a stupor, bundle him into a taxi – and let me know –

  WILLIAMS. Yes, my lord.

  NORA comes in.

  NORA. Darling, really – you are too naughty. They’re all screaming for you downstairs.

  MARK. I can’t come down just yet, darling. I really can’t. But, with Williams’s help, I have the highest hopes of being down in a very few minutes now – all right, Williams. Thank you.

  He nods to WILLIAMS, who goes out.

  NORA. Well, don’t leave it too long, darling, or they’ll all begin to believe Mark Wright doesn’t exist.

  MARK. Mark Wright does exist. In fact, Mark Wright has just made a very momentous decision.

  NORA. No La Paz?

  MARK. No La Paz.

  NORA. Thank you. I can’t say more. Just thank you. I must go back. Darling, there’s someone actually aching to meet you. I was showing him some of your work and he said he recognised it.

  MARK (pleased). Oh. Who was that?

  NORA. I can’t remember his name. Viscount someone or other.

  He came with Ursula Culpepper. I’ll send him up.

  MARK (gently). Darling – two things. First, I told you I didn’t want Ursula Culpepper at this party – I detest and deplore the woman –

  NORA. You can’t keep her out, darling. Besides, she is my leading lady – after all. I’m so sorry. What’s the second thing?

  MARK. Well, it’s a very tiny little snob point, but you did ask me once to put you right on these things, didn’t you?

  NORA. Yes, darling –

  MARK. Well, one doesn’t talk about ‘Viscount So-and-so’ – one says ‘Lord’ – (An appalling thought strikes him. Stops as if shot.) Viscount who, did you say?

  NORA. St Something.

  MARK (in agony). With Ursula Culpepper?

  NORA. Yes.

  MARK. How old?

  NORA. Oh. Eighteen – nineteen.

  MARK. Yes. I see. (Looks wildly round the room as if meditating diving through the window.) Darling – would you think it awfully odd of me if I went out for a little stroll?

  NORA. But darling, my party.

  MARK. Yes, I know, darling. But sometimes I get the most terrible, terrible claustrophobia at parties.

  The words freeze on his lips as DENIS appears.

  NORA. This is the boy I was telling you about, dear. (To DENIS.) Darling, what was that name again?

  DENIS. St Neots.

  NORA. That’s right. Viscount – sorry – Lord St Neots – Mr Wright. I’ll leave you two together. (To MARK.) Goodbye, my precious. (Kisses him on the cheek.) Now don’t be too long. I mean, it’s really too blush-making to give a party just to show off one’s gorgeous, glamorous lover, and then he just doesn’t put in an appearance at all.

  She goes out. There is an endless pause after she has gone.

  MARK (at length). These young girls nowadays have a rather exaggerated way of expressing themselves sometimes.

  DENIS. Yes. I know.

  MARK. It’s what they call being modern, I suppose.

  DENIS. I suppose so. (Pause.) Very old-fashioned, really, isn’t it?

  MARK. Yes, I suppose it is. (Pause.) You’re looking very brown.

  DENIS. I’ve been sunbathing a lot.

  MARK. Yes. Of course. (Pause.) Appearances, you know,

  Denis, can often be very deceptive.

  DENIS. Yes. I know.

  MARK. I only say that because I don’t want you to jump to any hasty or rash conclusions.

  DENIS. No, Father, I won’t.

  MARK. I don’t know whether you know – as a matter of fact I don’t think you do – that for some time past now I have been engaged on a little – undercover work for the Government. I won’t tell you any more than that – but you can probably guess what I’m hinting at.

  DENIS. Yes, I think I can.

  MARK. Good. Good. Oh, by the way, I’d rather you didn’t give my real name away here if you can avoid it.

  DENIS. Of course I won’t.

  MARK. Miss Patterson and I, of course, are old friends – very old friends.

  DENIS. Yes. I rather gather so –

  MARK. But even she doesn’t know my real identity –

  OSCAR appears at the bedroom door, on the arm of BUBBLES.

  OSCAR. A nymph! I have found myself a nymph. And vodka, let me tell you, is the tipple of the world.

  He comes face to face with the grave-faced DENIS.

  Tiens, tiens.

  DENIS. Hullo, Uncle Oscar.

  Pause.

  OSCAR (heartily). Hullo, Denis. You’re looking very brown.

  MARK. He’s been sunbathing.

  OSCAR. Oh yes, of course. That would account for it. Well, well, well, well, well. (After a pause.) Well, well, well.

  BUBBLES (to OSCAR). My God, darling – stop saying ‘well’, it’s too shamingly repetitious, and go on with that lovely tickling thing you were doing to the back of my neck –

  OSCAR. Er – Miss Fairweather – I wonder if you’d mind awfully going back to bed for a moment. (Pushes her towards the door.)

  BUBBLES. Well, give me my vodka – (Takes it, and kisses him on the cheek.) Baby’s not going to be left entirely on her own. (At the door.) I’ll be waiting, you gorgeous beast. I’ll be waiting – (Goes.)

  OSCAR. Extraordinary the high spirits of these youngsters, isn’t it?

  MARK. Yes, it is, isn’t it?

  OSCAR. Extraordinary. (Heartily again.) Well, Denis – quite a surprise bumping into you like this.

  DENIS. Yes, I know.

  OSCAR (carefully). Your father’s probably told you about how I happened to see him at the Club, and how I said I wanted him to come along to a party that a chap called Wright was giving, because I thought it might amuse him, you know, and of course this girl Nora Patterson is quite an old friend of mine – and your father hadn’t even met her, so I thought –

  He stops, noticing the expression on MARK’s face.

  Isn’t that what he told you?

  DENIS. No. Not exactly.

  OSCAR (aggrieved). Well, I can’t for the life of me think why not.

  MARK. Your Uncle Oscar isn’t quite accountable for his actions at the moment, you know, Denis. He had a silly accident with a cocktail he was mixing, and put brandy in instead of vermouth. Imagine.

  DENIS. Horrible, I should think. And then, of course, with vodka on top – look, Father – I’m awfully sorry about this. I hope you don’t think I’ve done it on purpose or anything – but I was downstairs and Miss Patterson was showing me some sculpture and, of course, I recognised some of it,
so I thought I’d better meet this chap Wright, because I thought perhaps some blighter was pinching your work or something.

  MARK. That’s all right, my dear boy. That’s perfectly all right. I quite understand.

  DENIS. Of course it was idiotic of me, because I should have realised the situation at once.

  MARK. Oh? Why should you?

  DENIS. Well, as soon as I saw Miss Patterson –

  MARK. I don’t quite follow.

  DENIS. Well, of course, she’s the living image of Sylvia, isn’t she?

  MARK. Sylvia?

  DENIS. That face you’re always sculpting. The one you were in love with when you were seventeen –

  MARK. Oh. How did you know that?

  DENIS. You told me about her.

  MARK. I never told you I was in love with her –

  DENIS. Oh well, Father, that was easy to guess, wasn’t it?

  MARK. Was it? I didn’t know.

  DENIS. It’s funny, you know. I imagine an awful lot of people go through life in love with the same face.

  MARK. Yes. I imagine they do.

  DENIS. It’s arrested development, really, isn’t it?

  MARK. Is it?

  DENIS. A sort of narcissism, I think.

  MARK. Narcissism?

  DENIS. Well, you know – what you’re really in love with is your vanished youth.

  OSCAR makes a slight sound.

  MARK (savagely to OSCAR). Did you say anything?

  OSCAR. No, no. Just a sneeze – that’s all.

  DENIS. You see, it’s really yourself at seventeen that you love.

  MARK. Do I?

  DENIS. Yes. (Smiling cheerfully.) Oh, it’s nothing at all to worry about, Father.

  MARK. I’m delighted to hear it.

  DENIS. I mean – you don’t need to go to a psychoanalyst or anything.

  MARK. That’s good. Psychoanalysts are so expensive, aren’t they?

  DENIS. Well, as a matter of fact, Father, I do happen to know a very good one in Wigmore Street who’d do you at a reduced rate – if you really wanted to go, that’s to say – but I honestly don’t think it’s necessary. I mean, arrested development’s awfully common, really. Practically everyone has it, in one form or another –

  MARK. Uncle Oscar, for instance?

  DENIS. Oh yes. Of course. That’s terribly obvious, isn’t it?

  OSCAR. Is it?

  DENIS. Tickling girls on the back of – the neck, and all that. It’s really children’s games, isn’t it – I mean, from a strictly Freudian point.