[Coldly]
You may be right.
LARRY
Doctor Ben is rather a good sort, Rollo, in some ways.
ROLLO
For a creature of instinct, yes.
LARRY
Hum! So the mercury is falling again. Why do you let it fall, Rollo?
ROLLO
It seems to me that you require a great deal of explanation.
LARRY
[Tapping his boots]
Which means, I suppose, that you don’t like my coming here to be fed. Well, Rollo, if that’s what’s troubling you, let me tell you that I have come back for reasons that are different from any that you seem to have invented. For I came back in the hope of being of some definite service to you, and incidentally to find out what friends I might have left in Tadmor. Now you know pretty well who my friends are, and you know that you are not one of them.
[ROLLO stands up, and puts his hands to his head]
Not yet, I mean.
[Very distinctly]
And you may know also, or you may not know, that you are the talk of the town.
ROLLO
[Glares at LARRY and goes to the door]
Will you kindly leave this house?
[Throws the door open]
Do you hear me?
[More loudly]
I ask you to get out of this house and out of my sight.
If you are in want, I will give you money to buy food and clothing, but never again in this house.
[RACHEL appears suddenly from the child’s room and stands looking in a frightened way at the two mm. LARRY stands near the rocking chair]
RACHEL
[Trembling]
Was that your voice, Rollo?
ROLLO
[Angrily]
It was.
RACHEL
[Trembling]
You — you told Larry to go!
ROLLO
This is none of your affair, Rachel, and you will please go back to that room.
RACHEL
[Still trembling You told Larry to go!
ROLLO
I did, and I must ask you again to do the same.
[He moves towards her, and she moves towards LARRY]
RACHEL
You told Larry to go!... Larry! what is it?
[She lays her hand on LARRY’S arm]
ROLLO
Rachel, you are my wife, and this is my house.
RACHEL
[To LARRY]
But what is it!
LARRY
[Clearly]
Wait a minute, Rollo. This house is yours, if you insist upon having it.
[Smiling]
We won’t go into that now. For the rest of this business, the fault is partly mine, I confess; and I owe you, in spite of your late courtesy, a few words of explanation. Therefore I must ask you, Rachel, to leave the two of us together for a little while. Rollo makes mistakes now and then, like all the rest of us, but this time he is right in asking you to go away. You trust me, I hope?
RACHEL
[Bewildered]
Yes, Larry, I trust you. But I don’t know what you mean.
LARRY
[Patting her shoulder and smiling Neither does Rollo — quite. My purpose is to make him know — before he drives me away forever. You needn’t be at all scared. Now go away.
[RACHEL moves slowly towards the child’s room]
ROLLO
[Closing the vestibule door]
Your request appears to be reasonable, and I will listen to what you have to say.
[There is distinct hostility in his manner]
LARRY
[To RACHEL, who hesitates at the door]
Rachel?
RACHEL
[Looking from one to the other]
Yes, Larry.
[She goes out slowly, closing the door silently]
ROLLO
[Half way to the table]
Well, I am waiting.
LARRY
[Sitting in rocking chair and facing him]
The whole town is waiting.
ROLLO
[Standing with his hands behind him]
No more of that.
LARRY
And the whole town is saying things, Rollo.
ROLLO
[With false irony]
Well — what things?
LARRY
The town is saying, among other things, that you are killing your wife.
ROLLO
[Sitting down heavily]
Do you mean to say that you have heard talk about....
LARRY
[Distinctly]
Yes, I’ve heard a lot of it. I heard the first of it in Chicago.
ROLLO
For the love of heaven, Larry, don’t make a joke of this.
LARRY
[Tapping his boots]
Joke? I should say not. You see Rollo, I was sitting one afternoon in my Chicago office, looking out over the town and thinking over my not altogether creditable career, when my partner Fillson came in and began to talk. He’s a good talker — Fillson. He had just returned from a trip to these parts, and it transpired that he had the devil and all to talk about — including yourself.
ROLLO
Fillson? I seem to remember that name.
LARRY
Very likely, for you met him less than a year ago. He came here at my suggestion to have a look at Appleton’s Ledges, with a view of possible quarrying. Nothing came of that, however.
ROLLO
[Puzzled]
But what have you to do with granite?
LARRY
[Laughing]
Nothing. But when it comes to showing other fellows what to do with it, Fillson insists that I have not lived in vain. In fact, I suppose I may say that some of the stunningest huts in Chicago are due to Fillson — and to me.
ROLLO
[Getting up and going towards the stove]
Are you an architect?
LARRY
I might say so, by straining a point.
ROLLO
I knew nothing of this.
LARRY
Well, no matter about it now. Whether I am rich, or poor, or so-so, is of little consequence — compared with Rachel and Alma.
ROLLO
[Amazed]
Rich?
LARRY
[Laughing]
Not at all, as the word goes nowadays. But aren’t we forgetting Rachel?
ROLLO
[Protesting]
By no means. But — you see....
LARRY
[Tapping his boots]
Of course I see. I can’t very well help seeing. But the most important question now is, if you will pardon me, not so much what I see as what you see. With Rachel wearing out, and with Alma in a tuberose way, don’t you begin to see that this little affair of yours with — the Blue Lady —
ROLLO
Stop!
LARRY
[Calmly]
You mean, must stop. You left out a word. And you may as well know that Stuart Hoover, whatever you may think of him, would have had you over the coals long ago if it hadn’t been for Rachel’s feelings. I don’t know just how much longer he’ll wait.
ROLLO
[Wiping his forehead]
Does Ben understand this?
LARRY
Didn’t you hear what he said before he went out — about Rachel and Alma?
ROLLO
[With evasion]
Ben would like to marry Alma himself.
LARRY
Well/he won’t. And so you won’t have to worry any more about that.
ROLLO
[Hesitating]
What does Ben say about — about me?
LARRY
For the moment, Rollo, I’m afraid that Ben doesn’t see a very conspicuous niche for you in the halls of heroic fame.
ROLLO
[Wetting his lips]
Then you give me to und
erstand that I am a coward in men’s eyes, do you?
LARRY
Did I say that? Aren’t you a soldier in the army of the — what’s his name? — the Great Uplift?
ROLLO
[Brokenly]
There was a time when I could say so, but God knows what I am today.
LARRY
You still carry the banner.
ROLLO
[Bitterly]
Yes — I still carry it.
LARRY
Why don’t you pass it on to some one else?
ROLLO
[With difficulty]
Because I can carry it still. Yes, and I can fight, even though I be a wounded man.
LARRY
That might sound rather well, Rollo, if only you could say it without stopping to swallow.
ROLLO
[After an uncomfortable pause]
Well then, if you must know, there is another reason.
LARRY
I thought so.
ROLLO
[Earnestly]
You see me in a bad light now, Larry — I know that. But — well, listen. I married Rachel, and I did everything in my power to make her happy until I realized that all my efforts, all my love, all my devotion, were thrown away. I did all that a man could possibly do. And that marriage, I tell you, was the result of her coming to me of her own accord, and telling me that she was so unhappy where she lived that she begged me to take her away. You know that I had given up all hope of ever having her for my wife, and therefore you can partly imagine what my surprise and happiness must have been when I realized, or thought I realized, the truth.
[Clutching LARRY’S arm]
But you cannot ever imagine what an inferno it was for me when I found that I had married a porcupine instead of a woman.
[He moves backward a few steps and wipes his forehead]
LARRY
[Worried and puzzled]
Do you call Rachel a porcupine?
[He ends with a forced laugh]
ROLLO
I don’t know what else to call her. Whatever she is, she is something that isn’t human. Whenever I go near her now, she seems to wear an armor of invisible knives.
And I tell you, Larry, they cut. They cut deep.
[Pause]
Have I thrown any new light on myself?
LARRY
[Slowly]
Yes — you have.
ROLLO
[Bitterly]
Good, or bad?
LARRY
[Slowly]
New.
ROLLO
[Throwing up his hands]
It may be new to you, Larry, but heaven knows it’s old enough to me.
[Losing himself]
Is it altogether strange that I gave out at last? What if I have made a fool of myself with another woman? What if the whole town is waiting? Haven’t I waited? Haven’t I prayed, and suffered, and starved? Do you understand what I am saying?
LARRY
[Heaves a long sigh and sits down again in the rocking chair]
Every word of it.
[Looking up]
I’m sorry for you, Rollo, but before I can be of any spiritual or material service, I’m still very much afraid that you’ll have to change your ways.
[Calmly but incisively]
If we are going to have a small-town Don Juan in the family, he must throw away his banner of light, or I go back to Chicago.
[He holds his stick crosswise against his knee and watches ROLLO]
ROLLO
[In despair]
Don’t use your advantage over me now, Larry. Don’t remember what I may have said to you when you came back — for you came back at a time when I was in no condition to be tested. Besides, I could have helped you — if you had needed help — and I — I would have helped you.... But no man can help me, now.
LARRY
That remains to be proved. In the meantime, Rollo,
I wish you would say nothing about — Chicago. You know what I mean — my clothes, and all that... I tell you,
Rollo, there’s a way out of this.
ROLLO
[Putting his hand to his forehead]
There is only one way out, and that will be long and hard and bitter.
LARRY
[Getting up and touching ROLLO’S shoulder with his stick]
My dear fellow, there is altogether too much finality in your make-up. Now I believe in ways out of places. The more I consider this world, and its damnable nests of misery that might be cleaned out by the exercise of a little ordinary intelligence, the more do I believe in ways out of places. Take my word for it. The ways are here, and we are here to find them. And don’t, for God’s sake! think the stars in their courses are against you. If you begin to do that, you may come to enjoy it; and that’s a good deal worse than being dead.
[With an encouraging laugh]
Rollo, you speak as if this little provincial tangle of yours were going to be the end of the world.
ROLLO
It might as well be, so far as I am concerned.
LARRY
So this is how the wounded warrior fights.
ROLLO
[Throwing up his hands]
Forgive me, Larry, but I cannot listen to you any longer. If you understood my situation a little better perhaps I might listen. I don’t know.
[He begins to move towards the study door]
LARRY
Haven’t you told me your story?
ROLLO
It means nothing to you.
LARRY
[Smiling]
Come, come! That isn’t fair.
ROLLO
But it’s true, all the same....
[Looking down]
Besides, there is something else.
LARRY
[Frowning]
Something else? Is there never to be an end to this story of yours?
[He takes ROLLO by the sleeve]
ROLLO
There will be an end sometime. Now let me go.
LARRY
[Still holding him]
But you mustn’t leave your story half told, if you expect me to do anything.
[Laughs suddenly, after a pause]
It isn’t possible, Rollo, that you suspect me of taking too much interest in your Blue Lady on the Hill?
ROLLO
[Putting up his hands but not freeing himself from LARRY]
O Larry, let me go! Let me go!
LARRY
[Laughing with unconscious roughness]
Rollo, will you be here tomorrow afternoon? I may be able to tell you something.
ROLLO
Yes, yes, — but let me go.
[He goes backwards towards the study]
LARRY
[Still holding him]
But, Rollo —
ROLLO
[Tearing himself free and plunging into the study]
Let me go!
LARRY
[Laughing]
But, Rollo!...
[The curtain, falling rapidly, closes the scene with LARRY’S last word]
CURTAIN
ACT II
The same room on the following day. DOCTOR BEN is standing near the table, looking at ALMA, who is also near the table, to the left. DOCTOR BEN has his hands in the pockets of his fur overcoat and he is chewing an unlighted cigar. After a pause he takes the cigar from his mouth and addresses ALMA with a good natured but sincerely disappointed growl.
DR. BEN
By George, Alma! I wish you would tell me why it is that women don’t like me.
ALMA
[Smiling]
But they do, Ben.
DR. BEN
Bah! You don’t.
ALMA
But I do, Ben. Really I do. I always did, and I always shall.
DR. BEN
[Growling]
You don’t like me well enough to marry me.
ALMA
[Biting her
lip]
That is something entirely beyond our control.
DR. BEN
[With a heavy sigh and a gesture of despair]
It seems to be beyond mine, fast enough. I wonder why it is.
ALMA
[Almost laughing I know some women who would jump at the chance —
if they could have it.
DR. BEN
Bah! So would I jump — the other way.
[Growling]
You know what I mean. I mean women like you.
ALMA
[Seriously]
Ben, you have no right to speak to me like this again.
DR. BEN
I suppose you are right.
[Shortly]
What’s the good of it?
ALMA
None whatever.
DR. BEN
That’s evident enough. But somehow, Alma, I can’t let you go — entirely. You see, I’ve got so used to being turned down by you, that —
ALMA
O Ben, Ben, — don’t!
DR. BEN
In your eyes, Alma, I suppose I’m something between a chimpanzee and a nigger minstrel. You don’t think I’m good for much, but still you rather like me — sometimes. I’ve no doubt you say to yourself that I’m as funny as a Newfoundland dog — with a biscuit on his nose.
ALMA
Works of Edwin Arlington Robinson Page 67
