A View from the Bridge (6 page)

CATHERINE: Hey, Eddie—what a picture we saw! Did we laugh!

EDDIE—
he can't help smiling at sight of her:
Where'd you go?

CATHERINE: Paramount. It was with those two guys, y'know? That—

EDDIE: Brooklyn Paramount?

CATHERINE,
with an edge of anger, embarrassed before Rodolpho:
Sure, the Brooklyn Paramount. I told you we wasn't goin' to New York.

EDDIE,
retreating before the threat of her anger:
All right, I only asked you.
To Rodolpho:
I just don't want her hangin' around Times Square, see? It's full of tramps over there.

RODOLPHO: I would like to go to Broadway once, Eddie. I would like to walk with her once where the theaters are and the opera. Since I was a boy I see pictures of those lights.

EDDIE,
his little patience waning:
I want to talk to her a minute, Rodolpho. Go inside, will you? RODOLPHO: Eddie, we only walk together in the streets. She teaches me.

CATHERINE: You know what he can't get over? That there's no fountains in Brooklyn!

EDDIE,
smiling unwillingly: Fountains? Rodolpho smiles at his own naïveté.

CATHERINE: In Italy he says, every town's got fountains, and they meet there. And you know what? They got oranges on the trees where he comes from, and lemons. Imagine—on the trees? I mean it's interesting. But he's crazy for New York.

RODOLPHO,
attempting familiarity:
Eddie, why can't we go once to Broadway—?

EDDIE: Look, I gotta tell her something—

RODOLPHO: Maybe you can come too. I want to see all those lights.
He sees no response in Eddie's face. He glances at Catherine.
I'll walk by the river before I go to sleep.
He walks off down the street.

CATHERINE: Why don't you talk to him, Eddie? He blesses you, and you don't talk to him hardly.

EDDIE,
enveloping her with his eyes:
I bless you and you don't talk to me.
He tries to smile.

CATHERINE:
I
don't talk to you? She hits his arm. What do you mean?

EDDIE: I don't see you no more. I come home you're runnin' around someplace—

CATHERINE: Well, he wants to see everything, that's all, so we go.... You mad at me?

EDDIE: No.
He moves from her, smiling sadly.
It's just I used to come home, you was always there. Now, I turn around, you're a big girl. I don't know how to talk to you.

CATHERINE: Why?

EDDIE: I don't know, you're runnin‘, you're runnin', Katie. I don't think you listening any more to me.

CATHERINE,
going to him:
Ah, Eddie, sure I am. What's the matter? You don't like him?

EDDIE
turns to her: You
like him, Katie?

CATHERINE,
with a blush but holding her ground:
Yeah. I like him.

EDDIE—his
smile goes:
You like him.

CATHERINE,
looking down:
Yeah.
Now she looks at him for the consequences, smiling but tense. He looks at her like a lost boy.
What're you got against him? I don't understand. He only blesses you.

EDDIE
turns away:
He don't bless me, Katie.

CATHERINE: He does! You're like a father to him!

EDDIE
turns to her:
Katie.

CATHERINE: What, Eddie?

EDDIE: You gonna marry him?

CATHERINE: I don't know. We just been ... goin' around, that's all.
Turns to him:
What're you got against him, Eddie? Please, tell me. What?

EDDIE: He don't respect you.

CATHERINE: Why?

EDDIE: Katie ... if you wasn't an orphan, wouldn't he ask your father's permission before he run around with you like this?

CATHERINE: Oh, well, he didn't think you'd mind.

EDDIE: He knows I mind, but it don't bother him if I mind, don't you see that?

CATHERINE: No, Eddie, he's got all kinds of respect for me. And you too! We walk across the street he takes my arm—he almost bows to me! You got him all wrong, Eddie; I mean it, you—

EDDIE: Katie, he's only bowin' to his passport.

CATHERINE: His passport!

EDDIE: That's right. He marries you he's got the right to be an American citizen. That's what's goin' on here.
She is puzzled and surprised.
You understand what I'm tellin' you? The guy is lookin' for his break, that's all he's lookin' for.

CATHERINE,
pained:
Oh, no, Eddie, I don't think so.

EDDIE: You don't think so! Katie, you're gonna make me cry here. Is that a workin' man? What does he do with his first money? A snappy new jacket he buys, records, a pointy pair new shoes and his brother's kids are starvin' over there with tuberculosis? That's a hit-and-run guy, baby; he's got bright lights in his head, Broadway. Them guys don't think of nobody but their-self! You marry him and the next time you see him it'll be for divorce!

CATHERINE
steps toward him:
Eddie, he never said a word about his papers or—

EDDIE: You mean he's supposed to tell you that?

CATHERINE: I don't think he's even thinking about it.

EDDIE: What's better for him to think about! He could be picked up any day here and he's back pushin' taxis up the hill!

CATHERINE: No, I don't believe it.

EDDIE: Katie, don't break my heart, listen to me.

CATHERINE: I don't want to hear it.

EDDIE: Katie, listen ...

CATHERINE: He loves me!

EDDIE,
with deep alarm:
Don't say that, for God's sake! This is the oldest racket in the country—

CATHERINE,
desperately, as though he had made his imprint:
I don't believe it!
She rushes to the house.

EDDIE,
following her:
They been pullin' this since the Immigration Law was put in! They grab a green kid that don't know nothin' and they—

CATHERINE,
sobbing:
I don't believe, it and I wish to hell you'd stop it!

EDDIE: Katie!

EDDIE: Why don't you straighten her out?

BEATRICE,
inwardly angered at his flowing emotion, which in itself alarms her:
When are you going to leave her alone?

EDDIE: B., the guy is no good!

BEATRICE,
suddenly, with open fright and fury:
You going to leave her alone? Or you gonna drive me crazy?
He turns, striving to retain his dignity, but nevertheless in guilt walks out of the house, into the street and away. Catherine starts into a bedroom.
Listen, Catherine.
Catherine halts, turns to her sheepishly.
What are you going to do with yourself?

CATHERINE: I don't know.

BEATRICE: Don't tell me you don't know; you're not a baby any more, what are you going to do with yourself?

CATHERINE: He won't listen to me.

BEATRICE: I don't understand this. He's not your father, Catherine. I don't understand what's going on here.

CATHERINE,
as one who herself is trying to rationalize a buried impulse:
What am I going to do, just kick him in the face with it?

BEATRICE: Look, honey, you wanna get married, or don't you wanna get married? What are you worried about, Katie?

CATHERINE,
quietly, trembling:
I don't know B. It just seems wrong if he's against it so much.

BEATRICE,
never losing her aroused alarm:
Sit down, honey, I want to tell you something. Here, sit down. Was there ever any fella he liked for you? There wasn‘t, was there?

CATHERINE: But he says Rodolpho's just after his papers.

BEATRICE: Look, he'll say anything. What does he care what he says? If it was a prince came here for you it would be no different. You know that, don't you?

CATHERINE : Yeah, I guess.

BEATRICE: So what does that mean?

CATHERINE
slowly turns her head to Beatrice:
What?

BEATRICE: It means you gotta be your own self more. You still think you're a little girl, honey. But nobody else can make up your mind for you any more, you understand? You gotta give him to understand that he can't give you orders no more.

CATHERINE: Yeah, but how am I going to do that? He thinks I'm a baby.

BEATRICE: Because
you
think you're a baby. I told you fifty times already, you can't act the way you act. You still walk around in front of him in your slip—

CATHERINE: Well I forgot.

BEATRICE : Well you can't do it. Or like you sit on the edge of the bathtub talkin' to him when he's shavin' in his underwear.

CATHERINE: When'd I do that?

BEATRICE: I seen you in there this morning.

CATHERINE: Oh, ... well, I wanted to tell him something and I—

BEATRICE: I know, honey. But if you act like a baby and he be treatin' you like a baby. Like when he comes home sometimes you throw yourself at him like when you was twelve years old.

CATHERINE: Well I like to see him and I'm happy so I—

BEATRICE: Look, I'm not tellin' you what to do honey, but—

CATHERINE: No, you could tell me, B.! Gee, I'm all mixed up. See, I—He looks so sad now and it hurts me.

BEATRICE: Well look Katie, if it's goin' to hurt you so much you're gonna end up an old maid here.

CATHERINE: No!

BEATRICE: I'm tellin' you, I'm not makin' a joke. I tried to tell you a couple of times in the last year or so. That's why I was so happy you were going to go out and get work, you wouldn't be here so much, you'd be a little more independent. I mean it. It's wonderful for a whole family to love each other, but you're a grown woman and you're in the same house with a grown man. So you'll act different now, heh?

CATHERINE: Yeah, I will. I'll remember.

BEATRICE: Because it ain't only up to him, Katie, you understand? I told him the same thing already.

CATHERINE,
quickly:
What?

BEATRICE: That he should let you go. But, you see, if only I tell him, he thinks I'm just bawlin' him out, or maybe I'm jealous or somethin', you know?

CATHERINE,
astonished:
He said you was jealous?

BEATRICE: No, I'm just sayin' maybe that's what he thinks. She
reaches over to Catherine's hand; with a strained smile:
You think I'm jealous of you, honey?

CATHERINE: No! It's the first I thought of it.

BEATRICE,
with a quiet sad laugh:
Well you should have thought of it before ... but I'm not. We'll be all right. Just give him to understand; you don't have to fight, you're just—You're a woman, that's all, and you got a nice boy, and now the time came when you said good-by. All right?

CATHERINE,
strangely moved at the prospect:
All right.... If I can.

BEATRICE: Honey ... you gotta.

CATHERINE: Okay.

ALFIERI: It was at this time that he first came to me. I had represented his father in an accident case some years before, and I was acquainted with the family in a casual way. I remember him now as he walked through my doorway—

His eyes were like tunnels; my first thought was that
he had committed a crime,
Eddie sits beside the desk, cap in hand, looking
out.
but soon I saw it was only a passion that had moved
into his body, like a stranger.
Alfieri pauses, looks
down at his desk, then to Eddie as though he were
continuing a conversation with him.
I don't quite
understand what I can do for you. Is there a question
of law somewhere?

EDDIE: That's what I want to ask you.

ALFIERI: Because there's nothing illegal about a girl falling in love with an immigrant.

EDDIE: Yeah, but what about it if the only reason for it is to get his papers?

ALFIERI: First of all you don't know that.

EDDIE: I see it in his eyes; he's laughin' at her and he's laughin' at me.

ALFIERI: Eddie, I'm a lawyer. I can only deal in what's provable. You understand that, don't you? Can you prove that?

EDDIE:
I know what's in his mind, Mr. Alfieri!

ALFIERI: Eddie, even if you could prove that—

EDDIE: Listen ... will you listen to me a minute? My father always said you was a smart man. I want you to listen to me.

ALFIERI: I'm only a lawyer, Eddie.

EDDIE: Will you listen a minute? I'm talkin' about the law. Lemme just bring out what I mean. A man, which he comes into the country illegal, don't it stand to reason he's gonna take every penny and put it in the sock? Because they don't know from one day to another, right?

ALFIERI: All right.

EDDIE: He's spendin'. Records he buys now. Shoes. Jackets. Y'understand me? This guy ain't worried. This guy is
here.
So it must be that he's got it all laid out in his mind already—he's stayin'. Right?

ALFIERI: Well? What about it?

EDDIE: All right.
He glances at Alfieri, then down to the floor.
I'm talking to you confidential, ain't I?