ADA
What are you thinking of? [Pause.] I was never taught, until it was too late. All my life I regretted it.
HENRY
What was your strong point, I forget.
ADA
Oh . . . geometry I suppose, plane and solid. [Pause.] First plane, then solid. [Shingle as he gets up.] Why do you get up?
HENRY
I thought I might try and get as far as the water’s edge.
[Pause. With a sigh.] And back. [Pause.] Stretch my old bones. [Pause.]
ADA
Well, why don’t you? [Pause.] Don’t stand there thinking about it. [Pause.] Don’t stand there staring. [Pause. He goes towards sea. Boots on shingle, say ten steps. He halts at water’s edge. Pause. Sea a little louder. Distant.] Don’t wet your good boots. [Pause.]
HENRY
Don’t! don’t. . . .
[Sea suddenly rough.]
ADA
[twenty years earlier, imploring] Don’t! Don’t!
HENRY
[ditto, urgent] Darling!
ADA
[ditto, more feebly] Don’t!
HENRY
[ditto, exultantly] Darling!
[Rough sea. Ada cries out. Cry and sea amplified, cut off. End of evocation. Pause. Sea calm. He goes back up deeply shelving beach. Boots laborious on shingle. He halts. Pause. He moves on. He halts. Pause. Sea calm and faint.]
ADA
Don’t stand there gaping. Sit down. [Pause. Shingle as he sits.] On the shawl. [Pause.] Are you afraid we might touch? [Pause.] Henry.
HENRY
Yes.
ADA
You should see a doctor about your talking, it’s worse, what must it be like for Addie? [Pause.] Do you know what she said to me once, when she was still quite small, she said, Mummy, why does Daddy keep on talking all the time? She heard you in the lavatory. I didn’t know what to answer.
HENRY
Daddy! Addie! [Pause.] I told you to tell her I was praying.
[Pause.] Roaring prayers at God and his saints.
ADA
It’s very bad for the child. [Pause.] It’s silly to say it keeps you from hearing it, it doesn’t keep you from hearing it and even if it does you shouldn’t be hearing it, there must be something wrong with your brain. [Pause.]
HENRY
That! I shouldn’t be hearing that!
ADA
I don’t think you are hearing it. And if you are what’s wrong with it, it’s a lovely peaceful gentle soothing sound, why do you hate it? [Pause.] And if you hate it why don’t you keep away from it? Why are you always coming down here? [Pause.] There’s something wrong with your brain, you ought to see Holloway, he’s alive still, isn’t he? [Pause.]
HENRY
[wildly] Thuds, I want thuds! Like this! [He fumbles in the shingle, catches up two big stones and starts dashing them together.] Stone! [Clash.] Stone! [Clash. “Stone!” and clash amplified, cut off. Pause. He throws one stone away. Sound of its fall.] That’s life! [He throws the other stone away. Sound of its fall.] Not this . . . [pause] . . . sucking!
ADA
And why life? [Pause.] Why life, Henry? [Pause.] Is there anyone about?
HENRY
Not a living soul.
ADA
I thought as much. [Pause.] When we longed to have it to ourselves there was always someone. Now that it does not matter the place is deserted.
HENRY
Yes, you were always very sensitive to being seen in gallant conversation. The least feather of smoke on the horizon and you adjusted your dress and became immersed in the Manchester Guardian.[Pause.] The hole is still there, after all these years. [Pause. Louder.] The hole is still there.
ADA
What hole? The earth is full of holes.
HENRY
Where we did it at last for the first time.
ADA
Ah yes, I think I remember. [Pause.] The place has not changed.
HENRY
Oh yes it has, I can see it. [Confidentially.] There is a levelling going on! [Pause.] What age is she now?
ADA
I have lost count of time.
HENRY
Twelve? Thirteen? [Pause.] Fourteen?
ADA
I really could not tell you, Henry.
HENRY
It took us a long time to have her. [Pause.] Years we kept hammering away at it. [Pause.] But we did it in the end. [Pause. Sigh.] We had her in the end. [Pause.] Listen to it! [Pause.] It’s not so bad when you get out on it. [Pause.] Perhaps I should have gone into the merchant navy.
ADA
It’s only on the surface, you know. Underneath all is as quiet as the grave. Not a sound. All day, all night, not a sound. [Pause.]
HENRY
Now I walk about with the gramophone. But I forgot it today.
ADA
There is no sense in that. [Pause.] There is no sense in trying to drown it. [Pause.] See Holloway.
[Pause.]
HENRY
Let us go for a row.
ADA
A row? And Addie? She would be very distressed if she came and found you had gone for a row without her. [Pause.] Who were you with just now? [Pause.] Before you spoke to me.
HENRY
I was trying to be with my father.
ADA
Oh. [Pause.] No difficulty about that.
HENRY
I mean I was trying to get him to be with me. [Pause.] You seem a little cruder than usual today, Ada. [Pause.] I was asking him if he had ever met you, I couldn’t remember.
ADA
Well?
HENRY
He doesn’t answer any more.
ADA
I suppose you have worn him out. [Pause.] You wore him out living and now you are wearing him out dead. [Pause.] The time comes when one cannot speak to you any more. [Pause.] The time will come when no one will speak to you at all, not even complete strangers. [Pause.] You will be quite alone with your voice, there will be no other voice in the world but yours. [Pause.] Do you hear me?
[Pause.]
HENRY
I can’t remember if he met you.
ADA
You know he met me.
HENRY
No, Ada, I don’t know, I’m sorry, I have forgotten almost everything connected with you.
ADA
You weren’t there. Just your mother and sister. I had called to fetch you, as arranged. We were to go bathing together.
[Pause.]
HENRY
[irritably] Drive on, drive on! Why do people always stop in the middle of what they are saying?
ADA
None of them knew where you were. Your bed had not been slept in. They were all shouting at one another. Your sister said she would throw herself off the cliff. Your father got up and went out, slamming the door. I left soon afterwards and passed him on the road. He did not see me. He was sitting on a rock looking out to sea. I never forgot his posture. And yet it was a common one. You used to have it sometimes. Perhaps just the stillness, as if he had been turned to stone. I could never make it out.
[Pause.]
HENRY
Keep on, keep on! [Imploringly.] Keep it going, Ada, every syllable is a second gained.
ADA
That’s all, I’m afraid. [Pause.] Go on now with your father or your stories or whatever you were doing, don’t mind me any more.
HENRY
I can’t! [Pause.] I can’t do it any more!
ADA
You were doing it a moment ago, before you spoke to me.
HENRY
[angrily] I can’t do it any more now! [Pause.] Christ!
[Pause.]
ADA
Yes, you know what I mean, there are attitudes remain in one’s mind for reasons that are clear, the carriage of a head for example, bowed when one would have thought it should be lifted, and vice versa, or a hand suspended in mid-air, as if unowned. That kind of thing. But with your f
ather sitting on the rock that day nothing of the kind, no detail you could put your finger on and say, How very peculiar! No, I could never make it out. Perhaps, as I said, just the great stillness of the whole body, as if all the breath had left it. [Pause.] Is this rubbish a help to you, Henry? [Pause.] I can try and go on a little if you wish. [Pause.] No? [Pause.] Then I think I’ll be getting back.
HENRY
Not yet! You needn’t speak. Just listen. Not even. Be with me. [Pause.] Ada! [Pause. Louder.] Ada! [Pause.] Christ! [Pause.] Hooves! [Pause. Louder.] Hooves! [Pause.] Christ! [Long pause.] Left soon afterwards, passed you on the road, didn’t see her, looking out to. . . . [Pause.] Can’t have been looking out to sea.[Pause.] Unless you had gone round the other side. [Pause.] Had you gone round the cliff side? [Pause.] Father! [Pause.] Must have I suppose. [Pause.] Stands watching you a moment, then on down path to tram, up on open top and sits down in front. [Pause.] Sits down in front. [Pause.] Suddenly feels uneasy and gets down again, conductor: “Changed your mind, Miss?,” goes back up path, no sign of you. [Pause.] Very unhappy and uneasy, hangs round a bit, not a soul about, cold wind coming in off sea, goes back down path and takes tram home. [Pause.] Takes tram home. [Pause.] Christ! [Pause.] “My dear Bolton. . . .” [Pause.] “If it’s an injection you want, Bolton, let down your trousers and I’ll give you one, I have a panhysterectomy at nine,” meaning of course the anaesthetic. [Pause.] Fire out, bitter cold, white world, great trouble, not a sound. [Pause.] Bolton starts playing with the curtain, no, hanging, difficult to describe, draws it back no, kind of gathers it towards him and the moon comes flooding in, then lets it fall back, heavy velvet affair, and pitch black in the room, then towards him again, white, black, white, black, Holloway: “Stop that for the love of God, Bolton, do you want to finish me?” [Pause.] Black, white, black, white, maddening thing. [Pause.] Then he suddenly strikes a match, Bolton does, lights a candle, catches it up above his head, walks over and looks Holloway full in the eye. [Pause.] Not a word, just the look, the old blue eye, very glassy, lids worn thin, lashes gone, whole thing swimming, and the candle shaking over his head. [Pause.] Tears? [Pause. Long laugh.] Good God no! [Pause.] Not a word, just the look, the old blue eye, Holloway: “If you want a shot say so and let me get to hell out of here.” [Pause.] “We’ve had this before, Bolton, don’t ask me to go through it again.” [Pause.] Bolton: “Please!” [Pause.] “Please!” [Pause.] “Please, Holloway!” [Pause.] Candle shaking and guttering all over the place, lower now, old arm tired takes it in the other hand and holds it high again, that’s it, that was always it, night, and the embers cold, and the glim shaking in your old fist, saying, Please! Please! [Pause.] Begging. [Pause.] Of the poor. [Pause.] Ada! [Pause.] Father! [Pause.] Christ! [Pause.] Holds it high again, naughty world, fixes Holloway, eyes drowned, won’t ask again, just the look, Holloway covers his face, not a sound, white world, bitter cold, ghastly scene, old men, great trouble, no good. [Pause.] No good. [Pause.] Christ! [Pause. Shingle as he gets up. He goes towards sea. Boots on shingle. He halts. Pause. Sea a little louder.] On. [Pause. He moves on. Boots on shingle. He halts at water’s edge. Pause. Sea a little louder.] Little book. [Pause.] This evening. . . . [Pause.] Nothing this evening. [Pause.] Tomorrow . . . tomorrow . . . plumber at nine, then nothing. [Pause. Puzzled.] Plumber at nine? [Pause.] Ah yes, the waste. [Pause.] Words. [Pause.] Saturday . . . nothing. Sunday . . . Sunday . . . nothing all day. [Pause.] Nothing, all day nothing. [Pause.] All day all night nothing. [Pause.] Not a sound.
ROUGH FOR RADIO I
HE
[gloomily] Madam.
SHE
Are you all right? [Pause.] You asked me to come.
HE
I ask no one to come here.
SHE
You suffered me to come.
HE
I meet my debts.
[Pause.]
SHE
I have come to listen.
HE
When you please.
[Pause.]
SHE
May I squat on this hassock? [Pause.] Thank you. [Pause.] May we have a little heat?
HE
No, madam.
[Pause.]
SHE
Is it true the music goes on all the time?
HE
Yes.
SHE
Without cease?
HE
Without cease.
SHE
It’s unthinkable! [Pause.] And the words too? All the time too?
HE
All the time.
SHE
Without cease?
HE
Yes.
SHE
It’s unimaginable. [Pause.] So you are here all the time?
HE
Without cease.
[Pause.]
SHE
How troubled you look! [Pause.] May one see them?
HE
No, madam.
SHE
I may not go and see them?
HE
No, madam.
[Pause.]
SHE
May we have a little light?
HE
No, madam.
[Pause.]
SHE
How cold you are! [Pause.] Are these the two knobs?
HE
Yes.
SHE
Just push? [Pause.] Is it live? [Pause.] I ask you is it live.
HE
No, you must twist. [Pause.] To the right.
[Click.]
MUSIC
[faint] ...........................................
[Silence.]
SHE
[astonished] But there are more than one!
HE
Yes.
SHE
How many?
[Pause.]
HE
To the right, madam, to the right.
[Click.]
VOICE
[faint] ...........................................
SHE
[with voice] Louder!
VOICE
[no louder] ........................................
[Silence.]
SHE
[astonished] But he is alone!
HE
Yes.
SHE
All alone?
HE
When one is alone one is all alone.
[Pause.]
SHE
What is it like together?
[Pause.]
HE
To the right, madam.
[Click.]
MUSIC
[faint, brief] .....................................
[Silence.]
SHE
They are not together?
HE
No.
SHE
They cannot see each other?
HE
No.
SHE
Hear each other?
HE
No.
SHE
It’s inconceivable!
[Pause.]
HE
To the right, madam.
[Click.]
VOICE
[faint] ...........................................
SHE
[with voice] Louder!
VOICE
[no louder] .......................................
[Silence.]
SHE
And—[faint stress]—you like that?
HE
It is a need.
SHE
A need? That a need?
HE
It has become a need. [Pause.] To the right, madam.
[Click.]
MUSIC
[faint] .........................................
SHE
[with music] Louder!
MUSIC
[no louder] ......................................
[Silence.]
SHE
That too? [Pause.] That a need too?
HE
It has become a need, madam.
SHE
Are they in the same . . . situation?
[Pause.]
HE
I don’t understand.
SHE
Are they . . . subject to the same . . . conditions?
HE
Yes, madam.
SHE
For instance? [Pause.] For instance?
HE
One cannot describe them, madam.
[Pause.]
SHE
Well, I’m obliged to you.
HE
Allow me, this way.
[Pause.]
SHE
[a little off] Is that a Turkoman?
HE
[ditto] Allow me.
SHE
[a little further off] How troubled you look! [Pause.] Well, I’ll leave you. [Pause.] To your needs.
The Collected Shorter Plays Page 9
