A View from the Bridge (8 page)

MARCO: I beg your pardon, Eddie.

EDDIE: I mean, that's what I understood in the first place, see.

MARCO: Yes. That's why we came.

EDDIE
sits on his rocker:
Well, that's all I'm askin'.

Eddie reads his paper. There is a pause, an awk wardness. Now Catherine gets up and puts a record on the phonograph
—
“Paper Doll.”

CATHERINE,
flushed with revolt:
You wanna dance, Rodolpho?

RODOLPHO,
in deference to Eddie:,
No, I—I'm tired.

BEATRICE: Go ahead, dance, Rodolpho.

CATHERINE: Ah, come on. They got a beautiful quartet, these guys. Come.

EDDIE,
to Catherine :
What's that, a new record?

CATHERINE: It's the same one. We bought it the other day.

BEATRICE, to Eddie: They only bought three records.
She watches them dance; Eddie turns his head away. Marco just sits there, waiting. Now Beatrice turns to Eddie.
Must be nice to go all over in one of them fishin' boats. I would like that myself. See all them other countries?

EDDIE : Yeah.

BEATRICE,
to Marco:
But the women don't go along, I bet.

MARCO: No, not on the boats. Hard work.

BEATRICE: What're you got, a regular kitchen and everything?

MARCO: Yes, we eat very good on the boats—especially when Rodolpho comes along; everybody gets fat.

BEATRICE: Oh, he cooks?

MARCO: Sure, very good cook. Rice, pasta, fish, everything.

EDDIE: He's a cook, too!
Looking at Rodolpho:
He sings, he cooks ...

BEATRICE: Well it's good, he could always make a living.

EDDIE: It's wonderful. He sings, he cooks, he could make dresses ...

CATHERINE: They get some high pay, them guys. The head chefs in all the big hotels are men. You read about them.

EDDIE: That's what I'm sayin'.

CATHERINE: Yeah, well, I mean.

EDDIE,
to Beatrice: He's lucky, believe me. Slight pause. He looks away, then back to Beatrice.
That's why the water front is no place for him.
They stop dancing. Rodolpho turns off phonograph.
I mean like me—I can't cook, I can't sing, I can't make dresses, so I'm on the water front. But if I could cook, if I could sing, if I could make dresses, I wouldn't be on
the water front. He has been unconsciously twisting the newspaper into a tight roll. They are all regarding him now; he senses he is exposing the issue and he is driven on.
I would be someplace else. I would be like in a dress store.
He has bent the rolled paper and it suddenly tears in two. He suddenly gets up and pulls his pants up over his belly and goes to Marco.
What do you say, Marco, we go to the bouts next Saturday night. You never seen a fight, did you?

MARCO,
uneasily:
Only in the moving pictures.

EDDIE,
going to Rodolpho:
I'll treat yiz. What do you say, Danish? You wanna come along? I'll buy the tickets.

RODOLPHO: Sure. I like to go.

CATHERINE
goes to Eddie; nervously happy now:
I'll make some coffee, all right?

EDDIE: Go ahead, make some! Make it nice and strong.
Mystified, she smiles and exits to kitchen. He is weirdly elated, rubbing his fists into his palms. He strides to Marco.
You wait, Marco, you see some real fights here. You ever do any boxing?

MARCO: No, I never.

EDDIE,
to Rodolpho:
Betcha you have done some, heh?

RODOLPHO: No.

EDDIE: Well, come on, I'll teach you.

BEATRICE: What's he got to learn that for?

EDDIE: Ya can't tell, one a these days somebody's liable to step on his foot or sump'm. Come on, Rodolpho, I show you a couple a passes.
He stands below table.

BEATRICE: Go ahead, Rodolpho. He's a good boxer, he could teach you.

RODOLPHO,
embarrassed:
Well, I don't know how to—
He moves down to Eddie.

EDDIE: Just put your hands up. Like this, see? That's right. That's very good, keep your left up, because you lead with the left, see, like this.
He gently moves his left into Rodolpho's face.
See? Now what you gotta do is you gotta block me, so when I come in like that you—
Rodolpho parries his left.
Hey, that's very good!
Rodolpho laughs.
All right, now come into me. Come on.

RODOLPHO: I don't want to hit you, Eddie.

EDDIE: Don't pity me, come on. Throw it, I'll show you how to block it.
Rodolpho jabs at him, laughing. The others join.
'At's it. Come on again. For the jaw right here.
Rodolpho jabs with more assurance.
Very good!

BEATRICE,
to Marco:
He's very good!

EDDIE: Sure, he's great! Come on, kid, put sump'm behind it, you can't hurt me.
Rodolpho, more seriously, jabs at Eddie's jaw and grazes it.
Attaboy.

Now I'm gonna hit you, so block me, see?

CATHERINE,
with beginning alarm:
What are they doin'?

BEATRICE
—she senses only the comradeship in it now:
He's teachin' him; he's very good!

EDDIE: Sure, he's terrific! Look at him go!
Rodolpho lands a blow.
'At's it! Now, watch out, here I come, Danish!
He feints with his left hand and lands with his right. It mildly staggers Rodolpho. Marco rises.

CATHERINE,
rushing to Rodolpho:
Eddie!

EDDIE: Why? I didn't hurt him. Did I hurt you, kid?
He rubs the back of his hand across his mouth.

RODOLPHO: No, no, he didn't hurt me.
To Eddie with
a
certain gleam and a smile:
I was only surprised.

BEATRICE,
pulling Eddie down into the rocker:
That's enough, Eddie; he did pretty good, though.

EDDIE: Yeah.
Rubbing his fists together:
He could be very good, Marco. I'll teach him again.

RODOLPHO: Dance, Catherine. Come.
He takes her hand; they go to phonograph and start it. It plays “Paper Doll.”

MARCO: Can you lift this chair?

EDDIE: What do you mean?

MARCO: From here.
He gets on one knee with one hand behind his back, and grasps the bottom of one of the chair legs but does not raise it.

EDDIE: Sure, why not?
He comes to the chair, kneels, grasps the leg, raises the chair one inch, but it leans over to the floor.
Gee, that's hard, I never knew that.
He tries again, and again fails.
It's on an angle, that's why, heh?

MARCO: Here.
He kneels, grasps, and with strain slowly raises the chair higher and higher, getting to his feet now. Rodolpho and Catherine have stopped dancing as Marco raises the chair over his head.

Marco is face to face with Eddie, a strained tension gripping his eyes and jaw, his neck stiff, the chair raised like a weapon over Eddie's head
—
and he transforms what might appear like a glare of warning into a smile of triumph, and Eddie's grin vanishes as he absorbs his look.

 

ALFIERI: On the twenty-third of that December a case of Scotch whisky slipped from a net while being unloaded—as a case of Scotch whisky is inclined to do on the twenty-third of December on Pier Forty-one. There was no snow, but it was cold, his wife was out shopping. Marco was still at work. The boy had not been hired that day; Catherine told me later that this was the first time they had been alone together in the house.

CATHERINE: You hungry?

RODOLPHO: Not for anything to eat. Pause. I have nearly three hundred dollars. Catherine?

CATHERINE: I heard you.

RODOLPHO: You don't like to talk about it any more?

CATHERINE: Sure, I don't mind talkin' about it.

RODOLPHO: What worries you, Catherine?

CATHERINE: I been wantin' to ask you about something. Could I?

RODOLPHO: All the answers are in my eyes, Catherine. But you don't look in my eyes lately. You're full of secrets. She looks at
him. She seems withdrawn.
What is the question?

CATHERINE: Suppose I wanted to live in Italy.

RODOLPHO,
smiling at the incongruity:
You going to marry somebody rich?

CATHERINE: No, I mean live there—you and me.

RODOLPHO,
his smile vanishing:
When?

CATHERINE: Well ... when we get married.

RODOLPHO,
astonished:
You want to be an Italian?

CATHERINE: No, but I could live there without being Italian. Americans live there.

RODOLPHO: Forever?

CATHERINE: Yeah.

ROOOLPHO
crosses to rocker:
You're fooling.

CATHERINE: No, I mean it.

RODOLPHO: Where do you get such an idea?

CATHERINE: Well, you're always saying it's so beautiful there, with the mountains and the ocean and all the—

RODOLPHO: You're fooling me.

CATHERINE: I mean it.

RODOLPHO
goes to her slowly:
Catherine, if I ever brought you home with no money, no business, nothing, they would call the priest and the doctor and they would say Rodolpho is crazy.

CATHERINE: I know, but I think we would be happier there.

RODOLPHO: Happier! What would you eat? You can't cook the view!

CATHERINE: Maybe you could be a singer, like in Rome or—

RODOLPHO: Rome! Rome is full of singers.

CATHERINE: Well, I could work then.

RODOLPHO: Where?

CATHERINE: God, there must be jobs somewhere!

RODOLPHO: There's nothing! Nothing, nothing, nothing. Now tell me what you're talking about. How can I bring you from a rich country to suffer in a poor country? What are you talking about?
She searches for words.
I would be a criminal stealing your face. In two years you would have an old, hungry face. When my brother's babies cry they give them water, water that boiled a bone. Don't you believe that?

CATHERINE,
quietly:
I'm afraid of Eddie here.

RODOLPHO
steps closer to her:
We wouldn't live here. Once I am a citizen I could work anywhere and I would find better jobs and we would have a house, Catherine. If I were not afraid to be arrested I would start to be something wonderful here!

CATHERINE,
steeling herself:
Tell me something. I mean just tell me, Rodolpho—would you still want to do it if it turned out we had to go live in Italy? I mean just if it turned out that way.

RODOLPHO: This is your question or his question?

CATHERINE: I would like to know, Rodolpho. I mean it.

RODOLPHO: To go there with nothing.

CATHERINE : Yeah.

RODOLPHO: No.
She looks at him wide-eyed.
No.

CATHERINE: You wouldn't?

RODOLPHO: No; I will not marry you to live in Italy. I want you to be my wife, and I want to be a citizen. Tell him that, or I will. Yes.
He moves about angrily.
And tell him also, and tell yourself, please, that I am not a beggar, and you are not a horse, a gift, a favor for a poor immigrant.

CATHERINE: Well, don't get mad!

RODOLPHO: I am furious!
Goes to her.
Do you think I am so desperate? My brother is desperate, not me. You think I would carry on my back the rest of my life a woman I didn't love just to be an American? It's so wonderful? You think we have no tall buildings in Italy? Electric lights? No wide streets? No flags? No automobiles? Only work we don't have. I want to be an American so I can work, that is the only wonder here—work! How can you insult me, Catherine?

CATHERINE: I didn't mean that—

RODOLPHO: My heart dies to look at you. Why are you so afraid of him?

CATHERINE,
near tears:
I don't know!

RODOLPHO: Do you trust me, Catherine? You?

CATHERINE: It's only that I—He was good to me, Rodolpho. You don't know him; he was always the sweetest guy to me. Good. He razzes me all the time but he don't mean it. I know. I would—just feel ashamed if I made him sad. ‘Cause I always dreamt that when I got married he would be happy at the wedding, and laughin'—and now he's—mad all the time and nasty—
She is weeping.
Tell him you'd live in Italy—just tell him, and maybe he would start to trust you a little, see? Because I want him to be happy; I mean—I like him, Rodolpho—and I can't stand it!

RODOLPHO: Oh, Catherine—oh, little girl.

CATHERINE: I love you, Rodolpho, I love you.

RODOLPHO: Then why are you afraid? That he'll spank you?

CATHERINE: Don't, don't laugh at me! I've been here all my life.... Every day I saw him when he left in the morning and when he came home at night. You think it's so easy to turn around and say to a man he's nothin' to you no more?