The Essential G. K. Chesterton

by G. K. Chesterton

  [MR. HASTINGS _goes out into the garden. He returns with_ MORRIS CARLEON, _a very young man: hardly more than a boy, but with very grown-up American dress and manners. He is dark, smallish, and active; and the racial type under his Americanism is Irish._

  MORRIS. [_Humorously, as he puts in his head at the window._] See here, does a Duke live here?

  DOCTOR. [_Who is nearest to him, with great gravity._] Yes, only one.

  MORRIS. I reckon he's the one I want, anyhow. I'm his nephew.

  [_The_ DUKE, _who is ruminating in the foreground, with one eye rather off, turns at the voice and shakes_ MORRIS _warmly by the hand._

  DUKE. Delighted to see you, my dear boy. I hear you've been doing very well for yourself.

  MORRIS. [_Laughing._] Well, pretty well, Duke; and better still for Paul T. Vandam, I guess. I manage the old man's mines out in Arizona, you know.

  DUKE. [_Shaking his head sagaciously._] Ah, very go-ahead man! Very go-ahead methods, I'm told. Well, I dare say he does a great deal of good with his money. And we can't go back to the Spanish Inquisition.

  [_Silence, during which the three men look at each other._

  MORRIS. [_Abruptly._] And how's Patricia?

  DUKE. [_A little hazily._] Oh, she's very well, I think. She....

  [_He hesitates slightly._

  MORRIS. [_Smiling._] Well, then, where's Patricia?

  [_There is a slightly embarrassed pause, and the_ DOCTOR _speaks._

  DOCTOR. Miss Carleon is walking about the grounds, I think.

  [MORRIS _goes to the garden doors and looks out._

  MORRIS. It's a mighty chilly night to choose. Does my sister commonly select such evenings to take the air--and the damp?

  DOCTOR. [_After a pause._] If I may say so, I quite agree with you. I have often taken the liberty of warning your sister against going out in all weathers like this.

  DUKE. [_Expansively waving his hands about._] The artist temperament! What I always call the artistic temperament! Wordsworth, you know, and all that.

  [_Silence._

  MORRIS. [_Staring._] All what?

  DUKE. [_Continuing to lecture with enthusiasm._] Why, everything's temperament, you know! It's her temperament to see the fairies. It's my temperament not to see the fairies. Why, I've walked all round the grounds twenty times and never saw a fairy. Well, it's like that about this wizard or whatever she calls it. For her there is somebody there. For us there would not be somebody there. Don't you see?

  MORRIS. [_Advancing excitedly._] Somebody there! What do you mean?

  DUKE. [_Airily._] Well, you can't quite call it a man.

  MORRIS. [_Violently._] A man!

  DUKE. Well, as old Buffle used to say, what is a man?

  MORRIS. [_With a strong rise of the American accent._] With your permission, Duke, I eliminate old Buffle. Do you mean that anybody has had the tarnation coolness to suggest that some man....

  DUKE. Oh, not a _man_, you know. A magician, something mythical, you know.

  SMITH. Not a _man_, but a medicine man.

  DOCTOR. [_Grimly._] I am a medicine man.

  MORRIS. And you don't look mythical, Doc.

  [_He bites his finger and begins to pace restlessly up and down the room._

  DUKE. Well, you know, the artistic temperament....

  MORRIS. [_Turning suddenly._] See here, Duke! In most commercial ways we're a pretty forward country. In these moral ways we're content to be a pretty backward country. And if you ask me whether I like my sister walking about the woods on a night like this! Well, I don't.

  DUKE. I am afraid you Americans aren't so advanced as I'd hoped. Why! as old Buffle used to say....

  [_As he speaks a distant voice is heard singing in the garden; it comes nearer and nearer, and_ SMITH _turns suddenly to the_ DOCTOR.

  SMITH. Whose voice is that?

  DOCTOR. It is no business of mine to decide!

  MORRIS. [_Walking to the window._] You need not trouble. I know who it is.

  _Enter_ PATRICIA CARLEON

  [_Still agitated._] Patricia, where have you been?

  PATRICIA. [_Rather wearily._] Oh! in Fairyland.

  DOCTOR. [_Genially._] And whereabouts is that?

  PATRICIA. It's rather different from other places. It's either nowhere or it's wherever you are.

  MORRIS. [_Sharply._] Has it any inhabitants?

  PATRICIA. Generally only two. Oneself and one's shadow. But whether he is my shadow or I am his shadow is never found out.

  MORRIS. He? Who?

  PATRICIA. [_Seeming to understand his annoyance for the first time, and smiling._] Oh, you needn't get conventional about it, Morris. He is not a mortal.

  MORRIS. What's his name?

  PATRICIA. We have no names there. You never really know anybody if you know his name.

  MORRIS. What does he look like?

  PATRICIA. I have only met him in the twilight. He seems robed in a long cloak, with a peaked cap or hood like the elves in my nursery stories. Sometimes when I look out of the window here, I see him passing round this house like a shadow; and see his pointed hood, dark against the sunset or the rising of the moon.

  SMITH. What does he talk about?

  PATRICIA. He tells me the truth. Very many true things. He is a wizard.

  MORRIS. How do you know he's a wizard? I suppose he plays some tricks on you.

  PATRICIA. I should know he was a wizard if he played no tricks. But once he stooped and picked up a stone and cast it into the air, and it flew up into God's heaven like a bird.

  MORRIS. Was that what first made you think he was a wizard?

  PATRICIA. Oh, no. When I first saw him he was tracing circles and pentacles in the grass and talking the language of the elves.

  MORRIS. [_Sceptically._] Do you know the language of the elves?

  PATRICIA. Not until I heard it.

  MORRIS. [_Lowering his voice as if for his sister, but losing patience so completely that he talks much louder than he imagines._] See here, Patricia, I reckon this kind of thing is going to be the limit. I'm just not going to have you let in by some blamed tramp or fortune-teller because you choose to read minor poetry about the fairies. If this gipsy or whatever he is troubles you again....

  DOCTOR. [_Putting his hand on_ MORRIS'S _shoulder._] Come, you must allow a little more for poetry. We can't all feed on nothing but petrol.

  DUKE. Quite right, quite right. And being Irish, don't you know, Celtic, as old Buffle used to say, charming songs, you know, about the Irish girl who has a plaid shawl--and a Banshee. [_Sighs profoundly._] Poor old Gladstone!

  [_Silence as usual._

  SMITH. [_Speaking to_ DOCTOR.] I thought you yourself considered the family superstition bad for the health?

  DOCTOR. I consider a family superstition is better for the health than a family quarrel. [_He walks casually across to_ PATRICIA.] Well, it must be nice to be young and still see all those stars and sunsets. We old buffers won't be too strict with you if your view of things sometimes gets a bit--mixed up, shall we say? If the stars get loose about the grass by mistake; or if, once or twice, the sunset gets into the east. We should only say, "Dream as much as you like. Dream for all mankind. Dream for us who can dream no longer. But do not quite forget the difference."

  PATRICIA. What difference?

  DOCTOR. The difference between the things that are beautiful and the things that are there. That red lamp over my door isn't beautiful; but it's there. You might even come to be glad it is there, when the stars of gold and silver have faded. I am an old man now, but some men are still glad to find my red star. I do not say they are the wise men.

  PATRICIA. [_Somewhat affected._] Yes, I know you are good to everybody. But don't you think there may be floating and spiritual stars which will last longer than the red lamps?

  SMITH. [_With decision._] Yes. But they are fixed stars.

  DOCTOR. The red lamp will last my time.

  DUKE. Capital! Capital! Why, it's like Tennyson. [_Sile
nce._] I remember when I was an undergrad....

  [_The red light disappears; no one sees it at first except_ PATRICIA, _who points excitedly._

  MORRIS. What's the matter?

  PATRICIA. The red star is gone.

  MORRIS. Nonsense! [_Rushes to the garden doors._] It's only somebody standing in front of it. Say, Duke, there's somebody standing in the garden.

  PATRICIA. [_Calmly._] I told you he walked about the garden.

  MORRIS. If it's that fortune-teller of yours....

  [_Disappears into the garden, followed by the_ DOCTOR.

  DUKE. [_Staring._] Somebody in the garden! Really, this Land Campaign....

  [_Silence._

  [MORRIS _reappears rather breathless._

  MORRIS. A spry fellow, your friend. He slipped through my hands like a shadow.

  PATRICIA. I told you he was a shadow.

  MORRIS. Well, I guess there's going to be a shadow hunt. Got a lantern, Duke?

  PATRICIA. Oh, you need not trouble. He will come if I call him.

  [_She goes out into the garden and calls out some half-chanted and unintelligible words, somewhat like the song preceding her entrance. The red light reappears; and there is a slight sound as of fallen leaves shuffled by approaching feet. The cloaked_ STRANGER _with the pointed hood is seen standing outside the garden doors._

  PATRICIA. You may enter all doors.

  [_The figure comes into the room_

  MORRIS. [_Shutting the garden doors behind him._] Now, see here, wizard, we've got you. And we know you're a fraud.

  SMITH. [_Quietly._] Pardon me, I do not fancy that we know that. For myself I must confess to something of the Doctor's agnosticism.

  MORRIS. [_Excited, and turning almost with a snarl._] I didn't know you parsons stuck up for any fables but your own.

  SMITH. I stick up for the thing every man has a right to. Perhaps the only thing that every man has a right to.

  MORRIS. And what is that?

  SMITH. The benefit of the doubt. Even your master, the petroleum millionaire, has a right to that. And I think he needs it more.

  MORRIS. I don't think there's much doubt about the question, Minister. I've met this sort of fellow often enough--the sort of fellow who wheedles money out of girls by telling them he can make stones disappear.

  DOCTOR. [_To the_ STRANGER.] Do you say you can make stones disappear?

  STRANGER. Yes. I can make stones disappear.

  MORRIS. [_Roughly._] I reckon you're the kind of tough who knows how to make a watch and chain disappear.

  STRANGER. Yes; I know how to make a watch and chain disappear.

  MORRIS. And I should think you were pretty good at disappearing yourself.

  STRANGER. I have done such a thing.

  MORRIS. [_With a sneer._] Will you disappear now?

  STRANGER. [_After reflection._] No, I think I'll appear instead. [_He throws back his hood, showing the head of an intellectual-looking man, young but rather worn. Then he unfastens his cloak and throws it off, emerging in complete modern evening dress. He advances down the room towards the_ DUKE, _taking out his watch as he does so._] Good-evening, your Grace. I'm afraid I'm rather too early for the performance. But this gentleman [_with a gesture towards_ MORRIS] seemed rather impatient for it to begin.

  DUKE. [_Rather at a loss._] Oh, good-evening. Why, really--are you the...?

  STRANGER. [_Bowing._] Yes. I am the Conjurer.

  [_There is general laughter, except from_ PATRICIA. _As the others mingle in talk, the_ STRANGER _goes up to her._

  STRANGER. [_Very sadly._] I am very sorry I am not a wizard.

  PATRICIA. I wish you were a thief instead.

  STRANGER. Have I committed a worse crime than thieving?

  PATRICIA. You have committed the cruellest crime, I think, that there is.

  STRANGER. And what is the cruellest crime?

  PATRICIA. Stealing a child's toy.

  STRANGER. And what have I stolen?

  PATRICIA. A fairy tale.

  CURTAIN

  ACT II

  _The same room lighted more brilliantly an hour later in the evening. On one side a table covered with packs of cards, pyramids, etc., at which the_ CONJURER _in evening dress is standing quietly setting out his tricks. A little more in the foreground the_ DUKE; _and_ HASTINGS _with a number of papers._

  HASTINGS. There are only a few small matters. Here are the programmes of the entertainment your Grace wanted. Mr. Carleon wishes to see them very much.

  DUKE. Thanks, thanks. [_Takes the programmes._]

  HASTINGS. Shall I carry them for your Grace?

  DUKE. No, no; I shan't forget, I shan't forget. Why, you've no idea how businesslike I am. We have to be, you know. [_Vaguely._] I know you're a bit of a Socialist; but I assure you there's a good deal to do--stake in the country, and all that. Look at remembering faces now! The King never forgets faces. [_Waves the programmes about._] I never forget faces. [_Catches sight of the_ CONJURER _and genially draws him into the discussion._] Why, the Professor here who performs before the King [_puts down the programmes_]--you see it on the caravans, you know--performs before the King almost every night, I suppose....

  CONJURER. [_Smiling._] I sometimes let his Majesty have an evening off. And turn my attention, of course, to the very highest nobility. But naturally I have performed before every sovereign potentate, white and black. There never was a conjurer who hadn't.

  DUKE. That's right, that's right! And you'll say with me that the great business for a King is remembering people?

  CONJURER. I should say it was remembering which people to remember.

  DUKE. Well, well, now.... [_Looks round rather wildly for something._] Being really businesslike....

  HASTINGS. Shall I take the programmes for your Grace?

  DUKE. [_Picking them up._] No, no, I shan't forget. Is there anything else?

  HASTINGS. I have to go down the village about the wire to Stratford. The only other thing at all urgent is the Militant Vegetarians.

  DUKE. Ah! The Militant Vegetarians! You've heard of them, I'm sure. Won't obey the law [_to the_ CONJURER] so long as the Government serves out meat.

  CONJURER. Let them be comforted. There are a good many people who don't get much meat.

  DUKE. Well, well, I'm bound to say they're very enthusiastic. Advanced, too--oh, certainly advanced. Like Joan of Arc.

  [_Short silence, in which the_ CONJURER _stares at him._]