by Alan Bennett
DAD: Shut up about Linda.
(MS CRAIG writes something down.)
She’s a personal secretary.
MAM: She’s a personal secretary. She’s our only daughter.
DAD: Our only child. Goes all over. Last week it was West Germany. You’ve never been to West Germany, I bet. She spent Christmas in the Lebanon. A grand girl. Everything a father could wish for.
(MAM returns.)
MAM: She’s quite at home in hotels; can choose from a menu without turning a hair. He’s deeply proud of her. Where is it she’s gone?
DAD: I said to her last time she was home: Did you ever dream you’d be in Beirut? But she’s very modest: she just laughed.
MAM: Just laughed. Where was it she liked? Antwerp, was it?
DAD: Antwerp! Hamburg.
MAM: I forget, you see. My mother was like that. It’s boys that generally travel. Daughters are more the stay-at-home type. Linda’s different.
DAD: She was a wanderer, right from being a kiddy. It was always: Get out the atlas, Dad. Let me sit on your knee. Show me Las Vegas, Dad. Rio de Janeiro.
MAM: Sat on his knee. Las Vegas. Rio de Janeiro.
DAD: They advertised for a Girl Friday. Someone with the ability to arrange small private lunches and take creative decisions in a crisis. She’s strong on both those points.
MAM: She takes air travel in her stride. It’s a shame she’s not here. You’d have had something in common.
DAD: What?
MAM: Both career women.
DAD: There’s no comparison.
MAM: He idolizes Linda. Only she’s not normal for girls round here.
DAD: Normal? She’s exceptional. You won’t find girls like Linda stood on every street corner. Girls with no advantages who are in a position to fly off to Scandinavia at five minutes’ notice.
MAM: They’ve both done well.
(At ‘both’ MS CRAIG looks up.)
DAD: I can hear a kettle.
MAM: Right from the start we were determined neither of them should have to go through what we went through.
DAD: I can hear a kettle. Make the bloody tea, go on.
(DAD makes some threatening move towards MAM with his stick as she goes.)
Go with her. Go on.
(MS CRAIG doesn’t stir.)
So it’s me you’re watching? Not her. What for? There’s only me, sitting. (Pause) And that’s not real, not accurate. Because you’re here too. You spoil it. Go away and I might be natural. Me alone in a room. What’s that like? You’ll never know. Private, madam. My secret. (Pause) And don’t think you’re going to pick up any information about me and her either. Our so-called sexual relations. If that’s the sort of gen you’re after you go out of here on your arse. I make no apology for using that word. On your arse. I know you want to know. You’re just the sort of casual caller that does. Well, no. No. No. (He bangs his stick closer to her but she does not flinch.) Write that down. (She doesn’t. Pause) Still, I’m not an unreasonable man. You’ve got your job to do. And I don’t want to give you the idea I’m trying to hide something, or that anything unorthodox goes on between my wife and me. It doesn’t. Nothing goes on. Nothing at all. I don’t know whether that’s unorthodox. Judging from all these magazines it probably is. No foreplay. No afterplay. And fuck all in between. But don’t expect me to expand on that. What made you do this job?
(MS CRAIG makes a note.)
So far as the formal sex act is concerned, in the actual performance of sexual intercourse, or coitus or whatever you were brought up to say, I start off at some disadvantage. I’ve no feeling in this arm and I can hardly see. Which knocks out at least three erogenous zones for a kick-off. I was run over down at Four Lane Ends.
(In the scullery MAM is singing ‘We’ll Gather Lilacs’ (Novello, Perchance to Dream).)
I was on a crossing. I was within my rights. He came straight at me. It wasn’t a genuine accident. I don’t think it was an accident at all. It was a deliberate attempt at murder. The police kept the file open for months but they never found him. Do you drive? I expect so. They all have cars on the Council. I don’t bear a grudge. I did bear a grudge for a long time, only now they’ve put me on tablets, since when the grudge has gone. But there’s no feeling in that arm. I couldn’t tell if this hand was wet or dry, if you understand me. It’s numb. Grip it. Go on. Grip it hard. Listen, I’m old enough to be your father. You can’t afford to turn your nose up at me. Bite it. Go on. Bite the bugger.
(She doesn’t.)
No, you’re like her. You’re two of a kind. She won’t either.
MAM: (From scullery) How do you like your tea, Dad?
DAD: We’ve been married twenty-five years. Strong. I like it strong. ‘Dad.’ You never asked me my name. It’s Wilfred. Wilf. Only it never gets used. Always Dad. It’s practically new, my name; it’s hardly been used since we were first married. It’s kept for best. She’ll use it when I’m dying, you’ll see. She’ll fetch it out then.
(Pause)
Linda touches it. Linda strokes it. Linda wants the feeling back. She’s a saint is Linda. Only what good’s that when she’s in bloody Sweden?
(MAM comes in with a nice tea-tray.)
MAM: Who are you talking to?
DAD: I’m talking to madam.
MAM: There’s nobody here, Dad. Nobody here at all. (She winks at MS CRAIG.) We’re just having a normal day.
DAD: Where’s my beaker? Which cups are these? We don’t use these cups.
MAM: (Sotto voce) Dad.
(DAD belches.)
Pardon.
DAD: What?
MAM: Beg pardon. I don’t know what sort of impression this young lady’s getting. I’m trying to behave normally and you seem bent on showing us up.
(DAD gets up.)
Where are you going?
DAD: For a piss.
(MRS CRAVEN is mortified.)
MAM: He wouldn’t say that normally. He’d say anything but that. Pay a visit. Spend a penny. There’s half a dozen ways you can get round it if you make the effort. He’s just trying to impress.
DAD: Well what about you?
MAM: What?
DAD: Normally every time I get up to go to the lav, you say ‘Don’t wet on the floor.’
MAM: I never do.
DAD: Without fail. She does ‘Don’t wet on the floor, Dad.’ (He goes.)
MAM: I don’t say that. I promise. Though he is very slapdash. He puts it down to his arm but frankly I think he doesn’t concentrate.
(Pause)
We were the first couple in this street to install an inside toilet. You could say we were pioneers in that department. Then everybody else followed suit. (Pause) When we first came there was all that having to go down the street. I never liked that. (Pause) Mr Craven’s not been well. He’s on tablets. The aftermath of being run over. One of these hit-and-run drivers. Are you motorized? Practically everybody is nowadays. Without a car you’re static. It was after his accident he started imagining things. Someone was trying to kill him. Dr Sillitoe’s got him on tablets for depression. It’s not mental, in fact it’s quite widespread. A lot of better-class people get it apparently. I’m surprised I haven’t had it because you’re more at risk if you’re sensitive, which I am. More than Dad anyway. Only it’s not mental. Health is a great gift. He reckons he’ll be better once we get into these horrible new flats but I have my doubts. They’re not the high flats. Not the multis. They’ve discontinued those. It’s a maisonette. They’re built more on the human scale. That’s the latest thing now, the human scale. Still I’ve no need to tell you that, if you’re from the Housing.
(DAD returns.)
DAD: She’s not from the Housing. She’s doing a survey. She’s seeing how we live. I put her in the picture vis-à-vis our sex-lives.
MAM: I think I’ll just have a run round with the Ewbank.
DAD: I was telling her in graphic detail how nothing happens.
MAM: I wage a constant battle against dust.
DAD: I was hoping she’d be able to furnish me with some comparative statistics.
MAM: It’s having an audience. Saying stuff. Ordinarily speaking we never have a wrong word.
DAD: We do.
MAM: We don’t.
DAD: We fucking well do.
MAM: And he doesn’t swear.
DAD: I do. I fucking do.
MAM: He doesn’t use that word.
DAD: What word?
MAM: The word he just used.
DAD: Well say it. Say it.
MAM: NO. That isn’t my husband. I forget your name. What is it you’re from?
DAD: Read it. Read it. Read it. (He hands MAM the paper.) I’m telling her the same thing sixteen times over.
MAM: You’d better go.
DAD: Sit still.
MAM: You’ve changed your tune. You didn’t want her in here. She was going to kill you. He’s all over you now.
DAD: It’s something fresh for me, having a witness. It’s a change from suffering in silence.
MAM: It’s all a performance. For your benefit. We don’t live like this. Granted we have the occasional difference but when it’s just the two of us we get on like a house on fire.
DAD: It’s a hell-hole. I had six men under me.
MAM: He sits there. Never does a hand’s turn. Always under my feet. I’m following him round picking up this, wiping up that. Retirement. Women don’t retire, do they? When’s our whip-round? I keep that toilet like a palace.
DAD: This is her number-one topic. Have you noticed? Have you got that written down? My wife is the world authority on toilets. She has an encyclopaedic knowledge. She could go on TV. One of these general-knowledge programmes, except where normal folks say they know about Wordsworth or Icelandic sagas, she’d opt for toilets.
MAM: Shut up. Don’t listen.
DAD: Day in day out, you talk about nothing else.
MAM: I don’t. I talk about all sorts. What were we talking about before she knocked at the door? Something. He has me this way, you see, because I can’t remember, My memory’s poor. My mother was the same. But we have proper conversations. It isn’t just toilets. We really run the gamut sometimes. What were we talking about before?
DAD: We were talking about the new flats.
MAM: That’s right. Well that’s not toilets.
DAD: The chrome handles on the baths.
MAM: You see.
DAD: The vinyl flooring.
MAM: Vinyl flooring. That’s right. We were talking about vinyl flooring. We were having a really good conversation about vinyl flooring.
DAD: The flats have vinyl flooring. Vinyl flooring throughout.
MAM: That’s right.
DAD: Even in the lifts.
MAM: Yes. (Absently) They pee in those lifts.
(MAM cries out in dismay and covers her face in her hands,
DAD says nothing but stretches out his arms as if to say ‘My wife.’)
I forget.
DAD: It’s not simply you forget. You forget that you do forget half the time. That’s what I can’t stand. If you could only remember that you forget it’d make it easier. For me.
MAM: Well I do forget. I know that.
DAD: And everything you’ve said, you’ve said before. Sixteen times. Every question you ask, you’ve asked before. Every remark you make, I’ve heard. I’ve heard it nineteen times over. Day after day after day.
MAM: We’re married.
(Long pause.)
There’s a couple down the street would do better than us. He’s black but she always passes the time of day. They’re more typical than we are.
DAD: Stay there.
MAM: If you wanted to go two doors down there’s one of these single-parent families. And he’s a problem child. That’s quite typical of round here too. We’re not typical.
DAD: We’re not typical because of you. I’m the typical one.
MAM: You’re depressed. You’re on tablets. That’s not typical.
There’s none of that on our side of the family.
DAD: I may be depressed, only I’ve still got hopes. This house depresses me. You say I don’t help, I’ve given up trying. Because when I do it’s ‘Don’t use that bucket, that’s the outside bucket.’ ‘Don’t use that cloth, I use that to do under the sink.’ It’s a minefield this house. She’s got it all mapped out. The dirty bits and the clean bits. Bits you have to wash your hands after, bits you wash your hands before. And aught that comes into contact with me is dirty. I dirty it.
MAM: Well you do. You don’t take care.
DAD: I pollute my own house. Me, I’m the shit on the doorstep.
MAM: That’s a word he’s heard other people say. He only says it to impress you. It’s no crime, cleanliness.
DAD: I am clean.
MAM: You’re not. They aren’t clean, men. Except our Linda’s the same.
DAD: Yes. She’s like me is Linda. She’s got her priorities right.
MAM: Linda. It’s all Linda. Well I had somebody like me, once.
He was clean.
DAD: Be quiet.
MAM: Sixteen. Clean. Quiet. Shy.
DAD: Shut up.
MAM: Your own son.
DAD: I haven’t got a son.
MAM: You haven’t got a son? Who is it I’ve got in my mind’s eye then? A son. A clever son. A son who came top all through school. A lovely, lovely son.
DAD: Gone. Dead. No son.
MAM: No son, no son: no time for son, no room for son. All Linda.
DAD: Shut up about Linda. I love Linda. I love her.
MAM: Yes. I know you do.
(DAD hits her. As he does so, MS CRAIG involuntarily gets up. It is a startling departure, more startling than the blow, and it has the effect of stopping them dead in their tracks. They both focus on her. MS CRAIG instantly recovers her composure, sits down again and makes a very small note.
Pause)
MAM: She’s written it down, that blow. It’ll go on record down at the Town Hall. Next thing is we’ll be pestered with social workers.
DAD: I didn’t mean it, Connie.
MAM: They won’t know that. They’ll think that’s the normal pattern of events. We should have sent her away.
DAD: We should never have let her in in the first place. We’re too old for this guinea-pig lark.
MAM: He never hits me. He’s not struck me in ten years!
DAD: It eggs you on, somebody sat there. It’s all right her saying nothing but that eggs you on more. She wormed all sorts out of me while you were in the scullery, just sitting there.
MAM: Me and all.
DAD: We’re in the computer now. Push a button and up will come the particulars. We can forgive and forget but not the computer.
MAM: What have we to be ashamed of? This is a happy marriage.
DAD: I’m turning her out.
MAM: We’ve done nothing but fratch ever since you arrived. We go for days and never have a wrong word. You aggravate matters, you distort things, watching, sitting there.
DAD: Having to pretend you’re not here. You are here, taking it all in. So out, madam. Now. Come on. This is my house.
It’s my right.
(MS CRAIG doesn’t move.)
MAM: Go on, love. If Dad thinks it’s best you go. (No response.) For our sakes! You know what he’s like. Dad knows best. It’s not just him. We’d both like you to go. We’ve talked it over.
DAD: Not like. No like about it. I’ve told you. Get out. And take your notebook with you. (He picks us MS CRAIG’s handbag and hands it to her.) We’re fed up of being scrutinized. Condescended to. Criticized implicitly. We don’t want somebody educated in this house. So off. Out.
MAM: Don’t hit her, Dad. Not her head, Dad.
DAD: Looked at, made notes on. Sized up, pinned down. Assessed, cheapened, dismissed, ridiculed. Well it’s over. Finished.
Now. Right?
(MS CRAIG slowly and deliberately rises, when the door opens suddenly and LINDA hops in, hol
ding her ankle.)
LINDA: Shit!
MAM: (Brightly) Hello, Linda!
LINDA: Skit!
MAM: We thought you’d gone somewhere abroad. Where was it we thought she’d gone, Dad? Somewhere.
LINDA: Shit shit shit.
MAM: Linda’s a personal secretary. (LINDA isn’t a personal secretary. LINDA is quite plainly a tart.)
LINDA: Forty-five quid. Forty-five flaming quid. And the heel’s snapped clean off.
MAM: You don’t get the workmanship now. Everything’s the same. Particularly electrical goods.
LINDA: Listen. These shoes cost nearly fifty quid. They were hand-stitched. Made in Rumania. You can’t get better workmanship than that. They’re Rumanian pigskin. Only they were designed for use on fitted carpets. Not obstacle courses. Not mountaineering. Have you been outside that door? It’s a wilderness!
DAD: Come see your old Dad, Linda. Come give your Dad a kiss and tell us about Scandinavia.
LINDA: Shit.
DAD: Feel my arm.
LINDA: And who are we then? One silk-stockinged leg flung carelessly over the other?
MAM: She’s a fellow businesswoman, Linda. It’s a survey of some description. Happiness, friendship. It’s all official.
DAD: Official trouble.
(LINDA reads the form.)
LINDA: Nice costume.
MAM: Linda always had taste. A dress sense came very early.
LINDA: What does ‘traditional communities’ mean?
MAM: The streets. These houses. Gilpins, Grasmeres, our overall environment.
DAD: The slums.
MAM: We were thinking you’d gone abroad somewhere.
DAD: Sweden.
LINDA: And neighbourliness means that cow next door?
MAM: Mrs Clegg has her good side, Linda. When Dad had shingles she was worth her weight in gold.
LINDA: Sweden? Swindon.
DAD: I had visions of Scandinavia. Swindon’s Wiltshire.
LINDA: You just sit here? Is that all she does?
DAD: Yes, and we don’t want it. On your way, you. Our Linda comes home to unwind. She’s enough on her plate without you sat there annotating. What was the weather like in Swindon, love? Have it nice, did you?
LINDA: Stay if you want, sweeheart. I never object to onlookers, once in a while. It takes all sorts, that’s my motto.
MAM: I agree.
LINDA: Brings out the actress in me, if you see what I mean. Course it’s all acting really, isn’t it?
