The Skin of Our Teeth

by Thornton Wilder

  She dusts MRS. ANTROBUS’ rocking chair.

  Mrs. Antrobus is as fine a woman as you could hope to see. She lives only for her children; and if it would be any benefit to her children she’d see the rest of us stretched out dead at her feet without turning a hair,—that’s the truth. If you want to know anything more about Mrs. Antrobus, just go and look at a tigress, and look hard.

  As to the children—

  Well, Henry Antrobus is a real, clean-cut American boy. He’ll graduate from High School one of these days, if they make the alphabet any easier.—Henry, when he has a stone in his hand, has a perfect aim; he can hit anything from a bird to an older brother—Oh! I didn’t mean to say that!—but it certainly was an unfortunate accident, and it was very hard getting the police out of the house.

  Mr. and Mrs. Antrobus’ daughter is named Gladys. She’ll make some good man a good wife some day, if he’ll just come down off the movie screen and ask her.

  So here we are!

  We’ve managed to survive for some time now, catch as catch can, the fat and the lean, and if the dinosaurs don’t trample us to death, and if the grasshoppers don’t eat up our garden, we’ll all live to see better days, knock on wood.

  Each new child that’s born to the Antrobuses seems to them to be sufficient reason for the whole universe’s being set in motion; and each new child that dies seems to them to have been spared a whole world of sorrow, and what the end of it will be is still very much an open question.

  We’ve rattled along, hot and cold, for some time now—

  A portion of the wall above the door, right, flies up into the air and disappears.

  —and my advice to you is not to inquire into why or whither, but just enjoy your ice cream while it’s on your plate,—that’s my philosophy.

  Don’t forget that a few years ago we came through the depression by the skin of our teeth! One more tight squeeze like that and where will we be?

  This is a cue line. SABINA looks angrily at the kitchen door and repeats:

  . . . we came through the depression by the skin of our teeth; one more tight squeeze like that and where will we be?

  Flustered, she looks through the opening in the right wall; then goes to the window and reopens the Act.

  Oh, oh, oh! Six o’clock and the master not home yet. Pray God nothing has happened to him crossing the Hudson. Here it is the middle of August and the coldest day of the year. It’s simply freezing; the dogs are sticking. One more tight squeeze like that and where will we be?

  VOICE:

  Off stage.

  Make up something! Invent something!

  SABINA:

  Well . . . uh . . . this certainly is a fine American home . . . and—uh . . . everybody’s very happy . . . and—uh . . .

  Suddenly flings pretense to the winds and coming down stage says with indignation:

  I can’t invent any words for this play, and I’m glad I can’t. I hate this play and every word in it.

  As for me, I don’t understand a single word of it, anyway,—all about the troubles the human race has gone through, there’s a subject for you.

  Besides, the author hasn’t made up his silly mind as to whether we’re all living back in caves or in New Jersey today, and that’s the way it is all the way through.

  Oh—why can’t we have plays like we used to have—Peg o’ My Heart, and Smilin’ Thru, and The Bat—good entertainment with a message you can take home with you?

  I took this hateful job because I had to. For two years I’ve sat up in my room living on a sandwich and a cup of tea a day, waiting for better times in the theatre. And look at me now: I—I who’ve played Rain and The Barretts of Wimpole Street and First Lady—God in Heaven!

  The STAGE MANAGER puts his head out from the hole in the scenery.

  MR. FITZPATRICK:

  Miss Somerset!! Miss Somerset!

  SABINA:

  Oh! Anyway!—nothing matters! It’ll all be the same in a hundred years.

  Loudly.

  We came through the depression by the skin of our teeth,—that’s true!—one more tight squeeze like that and where will we be?

  Enter MRS. ANTROBUS, a mother.

  MRS. ANTROBUS:

  Sabina, you’ve let the fire go out.

  SABINA:

  In a lather.

  One-thing-and-another; don’t-know-whether-my-wits-are-upside-or-down; might-as-well-be-dead-as-alive-in-a-house-all-sixes-and-sevens. . . .

  MRS. ANTROBUS:

  You’ve let the fire go out. Here it is the coldest day of the year right in the middle of August, and you’ve let the fire go out.

  SABINA:

  Mrs. Antrobus, I’d like to give my two weeks’ notice, Mrs. Antrobus. A girl like I can get a situation in a home where they’re rich enough to have a fire in every room, Mrs. Antrobus, and a girl don’t have to carry the responsibility of the whole house on her two shoulders. And a home without children, Mrs. Antrobus, because children are a thing only a parent can stand, and a truer word was never said; and a home, Mrs. Antrobus, where the master of the house don’t pinch decent, self-respecting girls when he meets them in a dark corridor. I mention no names and make no charges. So you have my notice, Mrs. Antrobus. I hope that’s perfectly clear.

  MRS. ANTROBUS:

  You’ve let the fire go out!—Have you milked the mammoth?

  SABINA:

  I don’t understand a word of this play.—Yes, I’ve milked the mammoth.

  MRS. ANTROBUS:

  Until Mr. Antrobus comes home we have no food and we have no fire. You’d better go over to the neighbors and borrow some fire.

  SABINA:

  Mrs. Antrobus! I can’t! I’d die on the way, you know I would. It’s worse than January. The dogs are sticking to the sidewalks. I’d die.

  MRS. ANTROBUS:

  Very well, I’ll go.

  SABINA:

  Even more distraught, coming forward and sinking on her knees.

  You’d never come back alive; we’d all perish; if you weren’t here, we’d just perish. How do we know Mr. Antrobus’ll be back? We don’t know. If you go out, I’ll just kill myself.

  MRS. ANTROBUS:

  Get up, Sabina.

  SABINA:

  Every night it’s the same thing. Will he come back safe, or won’t he? Will we starve to death, or freeze to death, or boil to death or will we be killed by burglars? I don’t know why we go on living. I don’t know why we go on living at all. It’s easier being dead.

  She flings her arms on the table and buries her head in them. In each of the succeeding speeches she flings her head up—and sometimes her hands—then quickly buries her head again.

  MRS. ANTROBUS:

  The same thing! Always throwing up the sponge, Sabina. Always announcing your own death. But give you a new hat—or a plate of ice cream—or a ticket to the movies, and you want to live forever.

  SABINA:

  You don’t care whether we live or die; all you care about is those children. If it would be any benefit to them you’d be glad to see us all stretched out dead.

  MRS. ANTROBUS:

  Well, maybe I would.

  SABINA:

  And what do they care about? Themselves—that’s all they care about.

  Shrilly.

  They make fun of you behind your back. Don’t tell me: they’re ashamed of you. Half the time, they pretend they’re someone else’s children. Little thanks you get from them.

  MRS. ANTROBUS:

  I’m not asking for any thanks.

  SABINA:

  And Mr. Antrobus—you don’t understand him. All that work he does—trying to discover the alphabet and the multiplication table. Whenever he tries to learn anything you fight against it.

  MRS. ANTROBUS:

  Oh, Sabina, I know you.

  When Mr. Antrobus raped you home from your Sabine hills, he did it to insult me.

  He did it for your pretty face, and to insult me.

  You were the new w
ife, weren’t you?

  For a year or two you lay on your bed all day and polished the nails on your hands and feet.

  You made puff-balls of the combings of your hair and you blew them up to the ceiling.

  And I washed your underclothes and I made you chicken broths.

  I bore children and between my very groans I stirred the cream that you’d put on your face.

  But I knew you wouldn’t last.

  You didn’t last.

  SABINA:

  But it was I who encouraged Mr. Antrobus to make the alphabet. I’m sorry to say it, Mrs. Antrobus, but you’re not a beautiful woman, and you can never know what a man could do if he tried. It’s girls like I who inspire the multiplication table.

  I’m sorry to say it, but you’re not a beautiful woman, Mrs. Antrobus, and that’s the God’s truth.

  MRS. ANTROBUS:

  And you didn’t last—you sank to the kitchen. And what do you do there? You let the fire go out!

  No wonder to you it seems easier being dead.

  Reading and writing and counting on your fingers is all very well in their way,—but I keep the home going.

  MRS. ANTROBUS:

  —There’s that dinosaur on the front lawn again.—Shoo! Go away. Go away.

  The baby DINOSAUR puts his head in the window.

  DINOSAUR:

  It’s cold.

  MRS. ANTROBUS:

  You go around to the back of the house where you belong.

  DINOSAUR:

  It’s cold.

  The DINOSAUR disappears. MRS. ANTROBUS goes calmly out.

  SABINA slowly raises her head and speaks to the audience. The central portion of the center wall rises, pauses, and disappears into the loft.

  SABINA:

  Now that you audience are listening to this, too, I understand it a little better.

  I wish eleven o’clock were here; I don’t want to be dragged through this whole play again.

  The TELEGRAPH BOY is seen entering along the back wall of the stage from the right. She catches sight of him and calls:

  Mrs. Antrobus! Mrs. Antrobus! Help! There’s a strange man coming to the house. He’s coming up the walk, help!

  Enter MRS. ANTROBUS in alarm, but efficient.

  MRS. ANTROBUS:

  Help me quick!

  They barricade the door by piling the furniture against it.

  Who is it? What do you want?

  TELEGRAPH BOY:

  A telegram for Mrs. Antrobus from Mr. Antrobus in the city.

  SABINA:

  Are you sure, are you sure? Maybe it’s just a trap!

  MRS. ANTROBUS:

  I know his voice, Sabina. We can open the door.

  Enter the TELEGRAPH BOY, 12 years old, in uniform. The DINOSAUR and MAMMOTH slip by him into the room and settle down front right.

  I’m sorry we kept you waiting. We have to be careful, you know.

  To the ANIMALS.

  Hm! . . . Will you be quiet?

  They nod.

  Have you had your supper?

  They nod.

  Are you ready to come in?

  They nod.

  Young man, have you any fire with you? Then light the grate, will you?

  He nods, produces something like a briquet; and kneels by the imagined fireplace, footlights center. Pause.

  What are people saying about this cold weather?

  He makes a doubtful shrug with his shoulders.

  Sabina, take this stick and go and light the stove.

  SABINA:

  Like I told you, Mrs. Antrobus; two weeks. That’s the law. I hope that’s perfectly clear.

  Exit.

  MRS. ANTROBUS:

  What about this cold weather?

  TELEGRAPH BOY:

  Lowered eyes.

  Of course, I don’t know anything . . . but they say there’s a wall of ice moving down from the North, that’s what they say. We can’t get Boston by telegraph, and they’re burning pianos in Hartford.

  . . . It moves everything in front of it, churches and post offices and city halls.

  I live in Brooklyn myself.

  MRS. ANTROBUS:

  What are people doing about it?

  TELEGRAPH BOY:

  Well . . . uh . . . Talking, mostly.

  Or just what you’d do a day in February.

  There are some that are trying to go South and the roads are crowded; but you can’t take old people and children very far in a cold like this.

  MRS. ANTROBUS:

  —What’s this telegram you have for me?

  TELEGRAPH BOY:

  Fingertips to his forehead.

  If you wait just a minute; I’ve got to remember it.

  The ANIMALS have left their corner and are nosing him. Presently they take places on either side of him, leaning against his hips, like heraldic beasts.

  This telegram was flashed from Murray Hill to University Heights! And then by puffs of smoke from University Heights to Staten Island.

  And then by lantern from Staten Island to Plainfield, New Jersey. What hath God wrought!

  He clears his throat.

  “To Mrs. Antrobus, Excelsior, New Jersey:

  My dear wife, will be an hour late. Busy day at the office. Don’t worry the children about the cold just keep them warm burn everything except Shakespeare.”

  Pause.

  MRS. ANTROBUS:

  Men!—He knows I’d burn ten Shakespeares to prevent a child of mine from having one cold in the head. What does it say next?

  Enter SABINA.

  TELEGRAPH BOY:

  “Have made great discoveries today have separated em from en.”

  SABINA:

  I know what that is, that’s the alphabet, yes it is. Mr. Antrobus is just the cleverest man. Why, when the alphabet’s finished, we’ll be able to tell the future and everything.

  TELEGRAPH BOY:

  Then listen to this: “Ten tens make a hundred semi-colon consequences far-reaching.”

  Watches for effect.

  MRS. ANTROBUS:

  The earth’s turning to ice, and all he can do is to make up new numbers.

  TELEGRAPH BOY:

  Well, Mrs. Antrobus, like the head man at our office said: a few more discoveries like that and we’ll be worth freezing.

  MRS. ANTROBUS:

  What does he say next?

  TELEGRAPH BOY:

  I . . . I can’t do this last part very well.

  He clears his throat and sings.

  “Happy w’dding ann’vers’ry to you, Happy ann’vers’ry to you—”

  The ANIMALS begin to howl soulfully; SABINA screams with pleasure.

  MRS. ANTROBUS:

  Dolly! Frederick! Be quiet.

  TELEGRAPH BOY:

  Above the din.

  “Happy w’dding ann’vers’ry, dear Eva; happy w’dding ann’vers’ry to you.”

  MRS. ANTROBUS:

  Is that in the telegram? Are they singing telegrams now?

  He nods.

  The earth’s getting so silly no wonder the sun turns cold.

  SABINA:

  Mrs. Antrobus, I want to take back the notice I gave you. Mrs. Antrobus, I don’t want to leave a house that gets such interesting telegrams and I’m sorry for anything I said. I really am.

  MRS. ANTROBUS:

  Young man, I’d like to give you something for all this trouble; Mr. Antrobus isn’t home yet and I have no money and no food in the house—

  TELEGRAPH BOY:

  Mrs. Antrobus . . . I don’t like to . . . appear to . . . ask for anything, but . . .

  MRS. ANTROBUS:

  What is it you’d like?

  TELEGRAPH BOY:

  Do you happen to have an old needle you could spare? My wife just sits home all day thinking about needles.

  SABINA:

  Shrilly.

  We only got two in the house. Mrs. Antrobus, you know we only got two in the house.

  MRS. ANTROBUS:

 
After a look at SABINA taking a needle from her collar.

  Why yes, I can spare this.

  TELEGRAPH BOY:

  Lowered eyes.

  Thank you, Mrs. Antrobus. Mrs. Antrobus, can I ask you something else? I have two sons of my own; if the cold gets worse, what should I do?

  SABINA:

  I think we’ll all perish, that’s what I think. Cold like this in August is just the end of the whole world.

  Silence.

  MRS. ANTROBUS:

  I don’t know. After all, what does one do about anything? Just keep as warm as you can. And don’t let your wife and children see that you’re worried.

  TELEGRAPH BOY:

  Yes. . . . Thank you, Mrs. Antrobus. Well, I’d better be going.—Oh, I forgot! There’s one more sentence in the telegram. “Three cheers have invented the wheel.”

  MRS. ANTROBUS:

  A wheel? What’s a wheel?

  TELEGRAPH BOY:

  I don’t know. That’s what it said. The sign for it is like this. Well, goodbye.

  The WOMEN see him to the door, with goodbyes and injunctions to keep warm.

  SABINA:

  Apron to her eyes, wailing.

  Mrs. Antrobus, it looks to me like all the nice men in the world are already married; I don’t know why that is.

  Exit.

  MRS. ANTROBUS:

  Thoughtful; to the ANIMALS.

  Do you ever remember hearing tell of any cold like this in August?

  The ANIMALS shake their heads.

  From your grandmothers or anyone?

  They shake their heads.

  Have you any suggestions?

  They shake their heads.

  She pulls her shawl around, goes to the front door and opening it an inch calls:

  HENRY. GLADYS. CHILDREN. Come right in and get warm. No, no, when mama says a thing she means it.

  Henry! HENRY. Put down that stone. You know what happened last time.

  Shriek.

  HENRY! Put down that stone!

  Gladys! Put down your dress!! Try and be a lady.

  The CHILDREN bound in and dash to the fire. They take off their winter things and leave them in heaps on the floor.

  GLADYS:

  Mama, I’m hungry. Mama, why is it so cold?

  HENRY:

  At the same time.

  Mama, why doesn’t it snow? Mama, when’s supper ready?

  Maybe, it’ll snow and we can make snowballs.

  GLADYS:

  Mama, it’s so cold that in one more minute I just couldn’t of stood it.