by Alan Bennett
(She laughs and is stroking MS CRAIG’s face when HERITAGE returns. She leaves her hand on MS CRAIG’s face for a moment before turning to him.
She and HERITAGE embrace passionately.
This continues for a few moments. MS CRAIG watches impassively.)
LINDA: She’s watching you, Brian. She’s watching you kissing me. I can see her watching us. Can you?
HERITAGE No. I want to see her. I want to see her watching me.
LINDA: Get round in front of the mirror then. Get me in front of the mirror. Can you see her?
HERITAGE: Edge round.
LINDA: Oh, Brian. Can you see her?
HERITAGE: I can see her. The dirty bitch. She’s just watching. The dirty cow.
LINDA: Brian.
HERITAGE: What?
LINDA: I … I can’t see her now.
HERITAGE: I want you to see her.
LINDA: I can’t.
HERITAGE: I want to see you, seeing her, seeing me.
LINDA: We need another mirror. (She looks round for one.) That’s typical of this place: no amenities.
HERITAGE: I like her legs. Though she hasn’t got much in the way of tits.
LINDA: Course not. If you’ve got tits you don’t work for the Council; you get yourself into the private sector. Like me. Brian.
HERITAGE: Linda.
(They fall on the floor in front of MS CRAIG who moves very slightly to accommodate them.)
I can see right up her legs.
LINDA: You can see right up mine, if you want.
HERITAGE: Yes, only she doesn’t want me to see up hers. Taking it all in, aren’t you? Watching my every move. Watching my hands. Oh, yes.
(HERITAGE starts to get LINDA’s knickers down.)
What’s matter?
LINDA: I’ve gone off it.
HERITAGE: Well I bloody haven’t.
LINDA: Well I bloody have. On the living-room floor? We’re not animals. Don’t imagine this is the norm, coitus on the carpet. I’m more on the shy side. You can’t get me out of my shell normally but it’s with being on the eve of marriage: there’s a lot of unreleased tension. Mind you I knew he was only after one thing when I saw him eyeing me in the rear-view mirror. Kindly rejoin your vehicle.
HERITAGE: Sod you, madam.
LINDA: Don’t you madam me. You’re an employee.
HERITAGE: So are you.
LINDA: I am a personal secretary. I shall see my husband to be is informed of your conduct. It falls far short of the professional standards he is entitled to expect as a visitor to these shores and I hope he saws your scrotum off. He can, you know, in Saudi Arabia. They’re a law unto themselves. And send them two inside, else there won’t be a maraschino cherry left. And Heritage …
HERITAGE: Yes, madam.
LINDA: The luggage.
HERITAGE: Cow.
LINDA: Whatever happened to our tradition of service? (HERITAGE goes.)
Nice of you to take an interest in the parents, so-called. I’m under intolerable pressure sometimes. I can’t see what they have to live for, quite frankly. People do cling on, don’t they? My problem is: I hate my loved ones. Folks do these days, I read it in Readers’ Digest. They either love them, which means they hate them. Else they hate them, which means they love them. Of course most people keep up a façade. Only I can’t, I’m just too honest. Smoke? Very wise. I’m going to give up when I get to Saudi Arabia. Do you believe in reincarnation? I do. I think that’s why I can’t get on with those two, they’re so many turns behind me. They were probably insects last time round, whereas me, I get the feeling I’m quite advanced. I’ve been something Egyptian, I know that for a fact, some quite high-up handmaiden … I’m going back a few thousand years now. I know I was once waiting on in the temple in a ritual that culminated in human sacrifice. Another time I came over with the Vikings. As a man, of course. Sex is irrelevant in the great chain of being. Last time I think I was twins and died on the guillotine. It’s fascinating when you go into it. I’ve read a great deal about it in paperback.
(MAM and DAD are returning.)
MAM: Nice car, Linda. The only comparable vehicle I’ve been in was at your Grandma’s funeral. Only that didn’t have a cocktail cabinet. I liked the absence of piped music. That was very tasteful. I shall save my cocktail stick as a memento.
LINDA: Right, I’m off.
MAM: Where are you going?
DAD: Linda. Aren’t you going to kiss your father?
MAM: Aren’t you going to kiss your mother? (Where is it she’s going?)
LINDA: Saudi bloody Arabia.
MAM: Saudi Arabia. (Weeping) I never thought I’d have to kiss somebody goodbye who was going to Saudi Arabia.
DAD: You love us, don’t you, Linda?
MAM: Course she loves us. Will it be Concorde?
LINDA: I expect so.
MAM: Fancy, Dad, our only daughter flying at twice the speed of sound plus as much champagne as she can drink.
DAD: You’ll not like it. Women out there, they’re rubbish.
MAM: That’s their own women. They’ll treat you like a goddess and if they don’t you want to come straight back. With the customs being different I don’t suppose they’ll send out bits of wedding cake.
LINDA: No, but I’ll send you some of the goat. (She laughs.)
MAM: Bless her. She’s just trying to put a face on it, she’ll be in floods of tears once she’s round the corner. Maybe when you’ve settled in we could come out by the overland route and have a fortnight together somewhere at the seaside. Say goodbye to the young lady. Come on, Dad. Let’s wave her off. (MAM and DAD get up and go outside.
MS CRAIG remains sitting for a moment, then gets up and walks slowly round the room. She stops in front of the fireplace and looks at the mantelpiece.)
MS CRAIG: One clock in light oak, presented to Mam’s father after forty years with Greenwood and Batley. Stopped; the key lost.
A wooden candlestick that’s never seen a candle. A tube of ointment for a skin complaint that cleared up after one application. An airmail letter, two years old, announcing the death of a cousin in Perth, Western Australia, the stamp torn off. Two half-crowns not cashed at decimalization because Mam read in the Evening Post that one day they would be priceless. Four old halfpennies kept on the same principle. A dry Biro. Various reminders on the backs of envelopes. Tension, Thursday’, ‘Dad’s pills’, ‘Gone down the road. Dinner on’. And, starkly, ‘Gas’. A rubber band. Three plastic clips from the package of a new shirt, kept by Dad with the idea it will save wasting money on paper clips. Not that he ever does waste money on paper clips.
Three tuppeny-halfpenny stamps.
A packet of nasturtium seeds on offer with some custard powder. A newspaper-cutting recording the conviction for shoplifting of the wife of the local vicar, saved to send to relatives in Canada. Dad’s last appointment card at the Infirmary and two grey aspirins.
Altar, noticeboard, medicine chest, cemetery. A shrine laden with the relics of the recent past and a testimonial to the faith that one day the world will turn and the past come back into its own and there will be a restoration. The coinage will make sense once more, letters again cost twopence halfpenny and life return to its old ways. On that day the nasturtiums will be planted, the half-crowns spent, the skin complaint will recur and the ointment be applied once more to the affected part. The Biro will flow again, the second cousin in Toronto will be informed at last of the conviction of the vicar’s wife and on that day the key will be found and the clock strike.
(MS CRAIG hears MAM and DAD returning and sits down.)
MAM: She’s gone. (Pause) Only us now.
DAD: Be off, you. We don’t want you here now Linda’s gone.
MAM: No, Dad. She’s not to go. She’s all right where she is. We shall be wanting a bit of company.
(To the strains of ‘Fly Home Little Heart’ (Novello, King’s Rhapsody) MS CRAIG slowly takes out a cigarette and lights it. MAM puts an ash-tray within ra
nge of her chair. Pause.)
MAM: Where is it our Linda’s gone? (Pause) Dad!
DAD: Feel my arm.
(MAM’s recorded voice is heard singing ‘Fly Home Little Heart’ as the curtain falls.)
ACT TWO
MAM’s voice is heard singing ‘Love is My Reason for Living’ (Novello, Perchance to Dream) as the curtain rises on DAD and MS CRAIG alone.
Long pause.
DAD: The phrase ‘no love lost’ has always puzzled me. As in the sentence ‘There was no love lost between me and her.’ What does that mean? Does it mean that the love between the persons concerned was so precious they could not bear to spill a single drop? And thus no love went to waste. Taking love as some kind of liquid. I’m thinking of me and Linda. Or does ‘no love lost’ mean there was no love? None whatsoever. He didn’t waste any love on her or she on him, so none was lost and they both hung onto their quota.
(Pause)
And ‘Butter wouldn’t melt in her mouth.’ What the fuck does that mean? Somebody could be sat there looking as if butter wouldn’t melt in her mouth and I wouldn’t recognize it. I should miss it.
(Pause)
A woman came round with leaflets once. Special offer. Dry cleaning. Eiderdowns re-covered. Very reasonable. I had her on that table. Youngish woman. White boots. Butter melted in her mouth, one way and another.
(Pause)
She’ll forget what she’s gone for. She writes it down but she forgets she’s written it down. She goes out for a bit of something tasty for the tea and comes back with toilet-rolls. We’ll be found starved to death and the house stuffed with toilet-rolls. (Pause)
I’m conversing but don’t be misled. I’m still inconsolable over Linda. The bitch. My own daughter. I’ve invested so much love in that girl over the years. Saudi Arabia. Well, I’m writing it off. As from today. It was a bad investment and I’m disappointed. But I’m not going to let it get in the way of my new life. I’m going to start mixing again. I haven’t mixed properly since my accident. Now there’s going to be an alteration. Once we get into the flats I shall make a point of getting to know the other occupants. Get on dropping-in terms. Drop in on them, have them drop in on me. For coffee, for instance. I shall have a real shot at being the life and soul of the party and live more like you see in the adverts. I’ve never been a good mixer but I’ve discovered the secret now. It’s to take an interest in other people. That’s what makes people like you. If you take an interest in them. I’ve read several articles in different magazines and they all say the same: ‘Take an interest in other people.’ I tell you I’m going to be a changed man.
(Pause)
Have you any hobbies?
Do you do anything in your spare time?
You’re probably a person of wide interests.
Those are questions normally guaranteed to break the ice.
(The ice remains unbroken.)
Remember I asked anyway. Make a note. (She doesn’t.) I can’t tell you how much I welcome this opportunity of talking to you alone. She confuses matters. I hope you noticed that as soon as she went we really started to hit it off. It was like that with the boy. My son so-called. He was in perpetual partnership with his mam. I never got near. I would have liked to have put my stamp on him but I never even got to take him to a football match. We would very likely have got on like a house on fire on our own only she was always putting her spoke in, making out she and him were the big duo. He’d have loved me, given the chance, I know. I don’t see how he could have stopped himself.
(Pause) Are you tall?
(A moment, then MS CRAIG stands up.)
I can’t see.
(She approaches.)
You are tall.
(She stands in front of him.)
Show me your hand.
(She slowly holds out her hand.)
It’s a smooth hand. It’s a big hand. It’s smooth only it’s big.
He’d never hold my hand when he was little. Always her hand. I had to force him. What would you say if I asked to hold your hand? (He takes her hand.) It’s a father’s right.
It’s normal.
(MS CRAIG looks down at him and he up at her at which point there is a loud bang on the door.
She unhurriedly sits down again.
A voice comes through the letter-box. It is young, wheedling and intimidating.)
ANTHONY: Hello, Grandad. It’s me, Grandad.
DAD: I’m not your Grandad. Go away.
ANTHONY: I want to come in, Grandad.
DAD: You can’t come in. I’ve got somebody with me.
ANTHONY: Grandad’s lying. She’s gone shopping. Grandad. Grandad.
DAD: I’m not his Grandad. How could I be his Grandad? What?
ANTHONY: I’ve a new book to show you.
DAD: I’m not in the mood.
ANTHONY: It’s a good one.
DAD: He gets these books out. War books mainly. Rommel, Monty. The war in the desert seen in terms of overall strategy.
ANTHONY: Pictures of twat. Grandad.
DAD: I’m not his Grandad.
ANTHONY: You’ll like this one. (He kicks the door.)
DAD: He’ll get bored in a bit. They do get bored his generation.
We never got bored.
(MR CRAVEN takes a zinc bath from behind the door and puts it across the threshold.) He’s a hooligan. He’s been sent away once or twice but he persistently absconds. He’s out of control. He sometimes has green hair.
(The letter-box opens and ANTHONY proceeds to piss through it into the zinc bath.)
That’s one of his favourite tricks, pissing through the letter-box. It’s another thing that makes me look forward to the new flats. They’re a different class of people there. And the letter-boxes are much higher up.
(Another bang.)
ANTHONY: A book, Grandad.
DAD: At school they’re not interested in books. The teachers can’t get them to look at books. I can’t let him in on your account. He has these boots somebody bought him. Steel-tipped. They don’t function as boots. They don’t buy them for boots, because they’re hard-wearing, they buy them to kick people to death with. The manufacturers want reporting.
ANTHONY: Books.
(MS CRAIG gets up.)
DAD: Where are you going? Sit down. Where’ve you got to? Come away from that door. You’ll have him inside. Leave that.
(MS CRAIG unlatches the door and sits down again, unhurriedly. The door opens and ANTHONY comes in slowly, calm and smiling.)
ANTHONY: Hello, Grandad.
(He is about sixteen.)
DAD: His hair’s generally dyed.
(ANTHONY has left the door open and a youngish man
(GREGORY) comes in, notebook in hand, and leans against the wall watching.)
Who’s this? Who’re you?
ANTHONY: It’s Gregory, Grandad. It’s my friend Gregory. He’s attached to me. I’m being studied.
DAD: Studied? You’ve just pissed through our letter-box!
ANTHONY: I had to do that. I have to act normally. I’m not supposed to behave. It’s not like probation. I do what I want. Unless I do just what I want, it’s useless. Isn’t it, Gregory? (GREGORY is impassive as is MS CRAIG.)
DAD: Does yours talk?
ANTHONY: He says ‘fuck’ now and again, but in a very natural way.
DAD: That’s an earring he’s got. In my day it was tattooes. Now it’s earrings and coloured hair. Some of them dress up in smart little suits: they’re the worst of all.
ANTHONY: I want to show you a book.
DAD: I don’t want to see no book. A lad of your age. You ought to be outside playing football instead of stuck inside reading books. He’s not a bad boy. He’s run me no end of errands in the past. When they’ve done dyeing their hair and putting earrings in they’re just lads same as we were. See, get yourself one or two crisps. (He tries to snatch the book.)
ANTHONY: I hope you’re taking note of this carry-on. Under ordinary circumstances he
would have no hesitation. This isn’t the real him. You’re making him shy.
DAD: You bugger.
ANTHONY: Dad and I share a common interest in the female figure, nude for preference.
DAD: It’s a lie. (ANTHONY puts DAD’s stick out of reach.)
ANTHONY: There’s genuine affection here though that may be hard to credit. It is not a lie.
DAD: Young man, help me.
ANTHONY: Gregory can’t help you. It’s not a part of his brief. Gregory’s brief is to watch me. Stay with it, Greg. What say we adhere to our usual practice, Dad. I browse through until we hit upon something of mutual interest, fair enough? She’s boring for a start. You’re not looking, Grandad. You’ve got to look.
DAD: Go away. Showing me up.
ANTHONY: You should see us, Greg. These publications are our constant study. Not looking, Grandad.
DAD: It’s true I do see them now and again. But they come from a very respectable newsagent’s. There are sometimes articles about people’s philosophies. How they got started in life. That’s what interests the discerning reader.
ANTHONY: I don’t think we like her, do we? Nor the usual Portuguese waiter with his obligatory slack dick. No thanks.
DAD: Footballers give their thoughts. Prominent businessmen discuss free enterprise. Famous novelists tell you about drinks. There’s a whole world here if you know how to acquire it.
ANTHONY: Nothing so far, but I am about to turn the vital page. Watch, you old sod. Look. (He covers the face of the model.)
Now. Those tits ring a bell? You’re not looking. Look. Watch.
DAD: No. No.
ANTHONY: (Reading) ‘When it comes to changing a wheel our Norma can beat a man hands down.’
‘Norma, who hails from Southport has no trouble putting her hand on the jack but is a bit puzzled what to do with it.’
‘Ah, well, next time we have a blow-out we hope Norma’s in the vicinity.’
Who’s that, then, Grandad?
DAD: I don’t know.
ANTHONY: They’ve got her name wrong. Her name’s not Norma. Her name’s Linda.
DAD: It never is. Our Linda’s got brown hair. That one’s a blonde. And Linda doesn’t come from Southport.
ANTHONY: A wig, Dad. She’s wearing a wig.
