27 Wagons Full of Cotton and Other Plays (15 page)

O
LD
W
OMAN:
Go on, skip that, get on to where she
meets
him!

S
PINSTER: “
Fearing to interrupt his poetic trance, I slackened my pace and pretended to watch the view. I kept my look thus carefully averted until the narrowness of the steps compelled me to move close by him.”

O
LD
W
OMAN:
Of course he pretended not to see she was coming!

S
PINSTER: “
Then finally I faced him.”

O
LD
W
OMAN:
Yes!

S
PINSTER: “
Our eyes came together!”

O
LD
W
OMAN:
Yes! Yes! That's the part!

S
PINSTER: “
A thing which I don't understand had occurred between us, a flush as of recognition swept through my whole being! Suffused my—”

O
LD
W
OMAN:
Yes . . . Yes, that's the part!

S
PINSTER: “
‘Pardon me,' he exclaimed, ‘you have dropped your glove!' And indeed to my surprise I found that I had, and as he returned it to me, his fingers ever so slightly pressed the cups of my palm.”

O
LD
W
OMAN:
(
hoarsely
)
Yes!
(
Her bony fingers clutch higher up on the curtain, the other hand also appears, slightly widening the aperture.
)

S
PINSTER: “
Believe me, dear Diary, I became quite faint and breathless, I almost wondered if I could continue my lonely walk through the ruins. Perhaps I stumbled, perhaps I swayed a little. I leaned for a moment against the side of a column.

The sun seemed terribly brilliant, it hurt my eyes. Close behind me I heard that voice again, almost it seemed I could feel his breath on my—”

O
LD
W
OMAN:
Stop
there!
That will be quite enough! (
The Spinster closes the journal.
)

M
ATRON:
Oh, is that all?

O
LD
W
OMAN:
There's a great deal more that's not to be read to people.

M
ATRON:
Oh.

S
PINSTER:
I'm sorry. I'll show you the letter.

M
ATRON:
How nice! I'm dying to see it! Winston?
Do
sit
up!
(
He has nearly fallen asleep. The Spinster produces from the cabinet another small packet which she unfolds. It contains the letter. She hands it to the Matron, who starts to open it.
)

O
LD
W
OMAN:
Watch out, watch
out,
that woman can't
open
the letter!

S
PINSTER:
No, no, please, you mustn't. The contents of the letter are strictly private. I'll hold it over here at a little distance so you can see the writing.

O
LD
W
OMAN:
Not too close, she's holding up her glasses! (
The Matron quickly lowers her lorgnette.
)

S
PINSTER:
Only a short while later Byron was killed.

M
ATRON:
How did he die?

O
LD
W
OMAN:
He was killed in action, defending the cause of freedom! (
This is uttered so strongly the husband starts.
)

S
PINSTER:
When my Grandmother received the news of Lord Byron's death in battle, she retired from the world and remained in complete seclusion for the rest of her life.

M
ATRON:
Tch-tch-tch! How dreadful! I think that was foolish of her. (
The cane taps furiously behind the curtains.
)

S
PINSTER:
You don't understand. When a life is completed, it ought to be put away. It's like a sonnet. When you've written the final couplet, why go on any further? You only destroy the part that's already written!

O
LD
W
OMAN:
Read them the poem, the sonnet your Grandmother wrote to the memory of Lord Byron.

S
PINSTER:
Would you be interested?

M
ATRON:
We'd adore it—truly!

S
PINSTER:
It's called
Enchantment.

M
ATRON:
(
She assumes a rapt expression.
)
Aahhh!

S
PINSTER:
(
reciting
)

“
Un saison enchanté!
I mused. Beguiled

Seemed Time herself, her erstwhile errant ways

Briefly forgotten, she stayed here and smiled,

Caught in a net of blue and golden days.”

O
LD
W
OMAN:
Not blue and golden—gold and
azure
days!

S
PINSTER:

“Caught in a net—of gold and azure days!

But I lacked wit to see how lightly shoon

Were Time and you, to vagrancy so used—”

(
The Old Woman begins to accompany in a hoarse undertone. Faint band music can be heard.
)

“That by the touch of one October moon

From summer's tranquil spell you might be loosed!”

O
LD
W
OMAN:
(
rising stridently with intense feeling above the Spinster's voice
)

“Think you love is writ on my soul with chalk,

To be washed off by a few parting tears?

Then you know not with what slow step I walk

The barren way of those hibernal years—

My life a vanished interlude, a shell

Whose walls are your first kiss—and last farewell!”

(
The band, leading the parade, has started down the street, growing rapidly louder. It passes by like the heedless, turbulent years. The Husband, roused from his stupor, lunges to the door.
)

M
ATRON:
What's that, what's that? The
parade?
(
The Husband slaps the paper cap on his head and rushes for the door.
)

H
USBAND:
(
at the door
)
Come on, Mama, you'll miss it!

S
PINSTER:
(
quickly
)
We usually accept—you understand?—a small sum of money, just anything that you happen to think you can spare.

O
LD
W
OMAN:
Stop him! He's gone outside! (
The Husband has escaped to the street. The band blares through the door.
)

S
PINSTER:
(
extending her hand
)
Please—a
dollar . . .

O
LD
W
OMAN:
Fifty cents!

S
PINSTER:
Or a
quarter!

M
ATRON:
(
paying no attention to them
)
Oh, my goodness—
Winston!
He's
disappeared
in the
crowd!
Winston—
Winston! Excuse
me! (
She rushes out onto the door sill.
)
Winston!
Oh, my goodness gracious, he's off again!

S
PINSTER:
(
quickly
)
We usually accept a little money for the display of the letter. Whatever you feel that you are able to give. As a matter of fact it's all that we have to
live
on!

O
LD
W
OMAN:
(
loudly
)
One dollar!

S
PINSTER:
Fifty cents—or a quarter!

M
ATRON:
(
oblivious, at the door
)
Winston!
Winston!
Heavenly days.
Goodbye!
(
She rushes out on the street. The Spinster follows to the door, and shields her eyes from the light as she looks after the Matron. A stream of confetti is tossed through the doorway into her face. Trumpets blare. She slams the door shut and bolts it.
)

S
PINSTER:
Canaille! . . . Canaille!

O
LD
W
OMAN:
Gone? Without paying?
Cheated
us? (
She parts the curtains.
)

S
PINSTER:
Yes
—the
canaille!
(
She fastidiously plucks the thread of confetti from her shoulder. The Old Woman steps from behind the curtains, rigid with anger.
)

O
LD
W
OMAN:
Ariadne, my letter! You've dropped my letter! Your Grandfather's letter is lying on the floor!

CURTAIN

The Strangest Kind of Romance

A Lyric Play in Four Scenes

The game enforces smirks; but we have seen the moon in lonely alleys make a grail of laughter of an empty ash can, and through all sound of gaiety and quest have heard a kitten in the wilderness.

HART CRANE
(
Chaplinesque
)

CHARACTERS

T
HE
L
ITTLE
M
AN.

T
HE
L
ANDLADY.

T
HE
O
LD
M
AN,
her father-in-law.

T
HE
B
OXER.

N
ITCHEVO,
the cat.

The Strangest Kind of Romance

S
CENE
:
A furnished room in a small industrial city of the middle-western states. It resembles any such room except that the walls are covered with inscriptions, the signatures of former occupants of it, men who have stayed and passed along to other such places, the itinerant, unmarried working-men of a nation. There are two windows. One shows the delicate branches of a tree that is surrendering its leaves to late autumn. The other window admits a view of the bristling stacks of the great manufacturing plant which is the heart of the city.

S
CENE
I

The Landlady, a heavy woman of forty who moves and speaks with a powerful sort of indolence, is showing the room to a prospective roomer, the Little Man, dark and more delicate and nervous in appearance than laborers usually are. As soon as he enters the door behind the Landlady, his remarkably dilapidated suitcase comes apart, spilling its contents over the floor
—
unlaundered shirts, old shoes, shoe-polish, a rosary.

LANDLADY:
(
laughing
)
Well! The suitcase has decided!

L
ITTLE
M
AN:
(
stooping to replace the scattered articles
)
It’s been working loose all day.

L
ANDLADY:
How long have you had that suitcase?

L
ITTLE
M
AN:
Since I started traveling.

L
ANDLADY:
You must be Gulliver, then! You’ve stood up under the strain a lot better than it has.

L
ITTLE
M
AN:
(
straightening
)
I don’t know.

L
ANDLADY:
You ain’t held together by such old worn-out ropes.

L
ITTLE
M
AN:
(
smiling shyly and sadly
)
I don’t know.

L
ANDLADY:
(
crossing to raise the window-blind
)
About this room—I hope you ain’t superstitious.

L
ITTLE
M
AN:
Why?

L
ANDLADY
: This room is one that a man lived in who had a bad run of luck.

L
ITTLE
M
AN:
Oh. What happened to him? (
The Landlady suddenly observes the cat on the bed.
)

L
ANDLADY:
Now how did that cat get in here? A little mystery, huh? She must’ve got up the pear tree, dropped on the roof of the porch, an’ climbed in th’ window. (
The Little Man sets down his valise and crosses gently smiling to the cat. He picks her up with great tenderness.
)
She used to occupy this room with the Russian.

L
ITTLE
M
AN:
The who?

L
ANDLADY:
The fellow I mentioned who had the bad run of luck. I used to say I thought she brought it on him.

L
ITTLE
M
AN:
They loved each other?

L
ANDLADY:
I never seen such devotion.

L
ITTLE
M
AN:
Then she couldn’t have brought the bad luck on him. Nothing’s unlucky that loves you. What’s her name?

L
ANDLADY:
Nitchevo.

L
ITTLE
M
AN:
What?

L
ANDLADY:
Nitchevo. That’s what he called her. He told me once what it means but I’ve forgotten. It used to give me a pain.

L
ITTLE
M
AN:
What?

L
ANDLADY:
I’d come in here to talk. The circumstances I’ve got to live under are trying. I have a good deal of steam I need to blow off. He was a good listener.

L
ITTLE
M
AN:
The Russian?

L
ANDLADY:
Sympathetic, but silent. While I talked he was only watching the cat.

L
ITTLE
M
AN:
(
smiling a little
)
And so you don’t like her?

L
ANDLADY:
NO. (
She sits comfortably on the bed.
)
I’ll tell you the story. He was a Russian or something. Polacks I usually call ‘em. Occupied this room before he took sick. He’d found the cat in the alley an’ brought her home an’ fed her an’ took care of ‘er an’ let ‘er sleep in his bed. A dirty practice, animals in the bed. Don’t you think so? (
The Little Man shrugs.
)
Well—the work at the plant is unhealthy for even a strong-bodied man. The Polack broke down. Tuberculosis developed. He gets an indemnity of some kind and goes West. The cat—he wanted to take her with him. I set my foot down on that. I told him she’d disappeared. He left without her. Now I can’t get rid of the dirty thing.

L
ITTLE
M
AN:
The cat?

L
ANDLADY:
Twice today I thrown cold water on her when she come slinking around here looking for him. See how she stares at me? Hatred. Withering hatred. Just like one jealous woman looks at another. I guess she’s waiting around for him to come home.

L
ITTLE
M
AN:
Will he?

L
ANDLADY:
Never in this world.

L
ITTLE
M
AN:
Dead?

L
ANDLADY:
The sixteenth of January I got the notice. Wasn’t nobody else to be informed. (
The Little Man nods with a sad smile and strokes the cat.
)
Some people say an animal understands. I told her this morning, He ain’t coming back, he’s dead. But she don’t understand it.

L
ITTLE
M
AN:
I think she does. She’s grieving, (
holding her against his ear
)
Yes, I can hear her—grieving.

L
ANDLADY:
You’re a funny one, too. How does this bedroom suit you?

L
ITTLE
M
AN:
It’s a beautiful room.

L
ANDLADY:
Who’re you kidding?

L
ITTLE
M
AN:
You
. H
ow much?

L
ANDLADY:
Three-fifty—in advance.

L
ITTLE
M
AN:
I will take it, provided—

L
ANDLADY:
What? Provided?

L
ITTLE
M
AN:
I can do like the Russian and keep the cat here with me.

L
ANDLADY:
(
grinning
)
Oh, so you want to do like the Russian.

L
ITTLE
M
AN:
Yes.

L
ANDLADY:
(
fixing her hair at the cracked mirror
)
My husban’s a chronic invalid. An injury at the plant.

L
ITTLE
M
AN:
Yeah? I’m sorry.

L
ANDLADY:
Codein every day. Fifty cents a pill is what it costs me. I wouldn’t mind if only he wasn’t such a pill sometimes himself. But who can look at suffering in a person?

L
ITTLE
M
AN:
Nobody.

L
ANDLADY:
Yes. That’s how I feel. Well . . . the Russian used to help me out with man’s work in the house.

L
ITTLE
M
AN:
I see.

L
ANDLADY:
How old are you? I bet I can guess! Thirty-five?

L
ITTLE
M
AN:
Uh-huh. About.

L
ANDLADY:
Eyetalian?

L
ITTLE
M
AN:
Uh-huh.

L
ANDLADY:
Wouldn’t you think that I was a fortune-teller? My father was a Gypsy. He taught me a lot of the Zigeuner songs. He used to say to me, Bella, you’re nine parts music—the rest is female mischief! (
She smiles at him.
)
That instrument on the wall’s a balalaika. Some night I’ll drop in here to entertain you.

L
ITTLE
M
AN:
Good. I heard you singing as I came up to the house. That’s why I stopped. (
She smiles again and stands as if waiting.
)

L
ANDLADY:
I’ll call you Musso. Musso for Mussolini. You got a job?

L
ITTLE
M
AN:
Not yet.

L
ANDLADY:
Go down to the plant an’ ask for Oliver Woodson.

L
ITTLE
M
AN:
Oliver Woodson?

L
ANDLADY:
Tell him Mizz Gallaway sent you. He’ll put you right on the pay-roll.

L
ITTLE
M
AN:
Good. Thanks.

L
ANDLADY:
Linen’s changed on Mondays. (
She starts to turn away.
)
I got to apologize for the condition the walls are in.

L
ITTLE
M
AN:
I noticed. Who did it?

L
ANDLADY:
Every man who lived here signed his name.

L
ITTLE
M
AN:
There must have been a lot.

L
ANDLADY:
Birds of passage. You ever try to count them? Restlessness—changes.

L
ITTLE
M
AN:
(
smiling
)
Yeah.

L
ANDLADY:
You’d think a man with pay-money in his pocket would have something better to do than sign his name on the walls of a rented bedroom.

L
ITTLE
M
AN:
Is the Russian’s name here, too?

L
ANDLADY:
Not his name, he couldn’t write—but his picture. There! (
She points to a childish cartoon of a big man.
)
Right beside it,
look
—tail—whiskers—the
cat!
(
They both laugh.
)
Partners in misery, huh?

L
ITTLE
M
AN:
A large man?

L
ANDLADY:
Tremendous! But when the disease germ struck him, it chopped him down like a piece of rotten timber . . . Statistics show that married men live longest. I’ll tell you why it is. (
She straightens her blouse and adjusts the belt.
)
Men that—live by themselves—get peculiar ways. All that part of their lives that was meant to be taken up with family matters is all left over—empty. You get what I mean?

L
ITTLE
M
AN:
Yeah?

L
ANDLADY:
Well . . . They fill it with make-shift things. I once
had a roomer who went to the movies every night of the week. He carried a brief-case with him all of the time. Guess what he carried in it!

L
ITTLE
M
AN:
What?

L
ANDLADY:
Sanitary paper toilet-seats. (
The Little Man looks away in embarrassment.
)
A crank about sanitation. Another I had, had a pair of pet bedroom slippers.

L
ITTLE
M
AN:
Pet—bedroom—?

L
ANDLADY:
Slippers. Plain gray felt, nothing the least bit picturesque about them. Only one thing—the odor! Highly objectionable, after fifteen years—the length of time I reckon he must ‘ve worn ‘em! Well—the slippers disappeared—accidentally on purpose, as they say! Heavens on earth! How did I know he would die of a broken heart? He practickly did! (
She laughs.
)
Life was incomplete without those bedroom slippers. (
She turns back to the walls.
)
Some day I’m going to take me a wire scrubbing-brush an’ a bar of Fels-Naphtha an’ leave them walls as clean as they was before the first roomer moved in. (
The door is pushed open. The Old Man enters. He looks like Walt Whitman.
)

O
LD
M
LAN:
You mustn’t do that, daughter.

L
ANDLADY:
Aw
. Y
ou
.
Why mustn’t I?

O
LD
M
LAN:
These signatures are their little claims of remembrance. Their modest bids for immortality, daughter. Don’t brush them away. Even a sparrow—leaves an empty nest for a souvenir. Isn’t that so, young man?

L
ITTLE
M
AN:
Yes.

O
LD
M
LAN:
Cataracts have begun to— (
He waves his hand in front of his nearly sightless eyes.
)
I’m not sure where you are.

L
ITTLE
M
AN:
(
stretching out his hand
)
Here.

O
LD
M
LAN:
Be comforted here. For the little while you stay. And write your name on the wall! You won’t be forgotten.

L
ANDLADY:
That’s enough, now, Father.

O
LD
M
LAN
: I’m only looking for some empty bottles. Have you any empty bottles?

L
ANDLADY:
How would he have empty bottles? He just moved in.

O
LD
M
LAN:
I trade them in at the Bright Spot Delicatessen. I’ll drop in later to finish our conversation. (
He goes out.
)

L
ANDLADY:
My father-in-law. Don’t encourage him, he’ll be a nuisance to you. (
She taps her forehead.
)
Alcoholic—gone!

L
ITTLE
M
AN:
(
sinking down on the bed and lifting the cat again.
)
I’m—tired.

L
ANDLADY:
I hope you’ll be comfortable here. I guess that’s all.

L
ITTLE
M
AN:
Oliver Woodson?

L
ANDLADY:
(
at the door
)
Oh, yes—Oliver Woodson. (
She goes out. The Little Man rises and removes a stub of pencil from his pocket. Smiling a little, he goes to the wall and beneath the large and elliptical self-portrait of the Russian, he draws his own lean figure, in a few quick pencil scratches. Beneath the cat’s picture, he puts an emphatic check-mark. Then he smiles at the cat and stands aside to survey.
)