The Project Gutenberg e-Book of One-Act Plays by Modern Authors; Editor: Helen Louise Cohen

Peele [rousing himself]. Giles! Gi-les!

Giles [hurries to him]. What more, zur? Wilt ha' the pastry or—?

Peele. Another quart of sack.

Giles. Yus, zur! Anne, bist asleep? [The girl rises slowly.]

Anne [takes the tankard]. He hath had three a'ready.

Peele [cheerfully]. And shall have three more so I will. This player's life of mine is a weary one.

Anne [pertly]. And a thirsty one, too, methinks.

Giles [scandalized]. Come, wench! Ha' done gawking about, and haste! [Anne goes at right.] 'Er be a forrard gel, zur, though hendy. I be glad 'er's none o' mine, but my brother's in Shottery. He canna say I love 'is way o' making wenches so saucy.

Peele. A pox on you! The best-spirited maid I ha' seen in Warwickshire, I say. Forward? Man alive, wouldst have her like your blowsy wenches here, that lie i' the sun all day? I have seen no one so comely since I left London.

Giles [feebly]. But 'ere, zur, in Stratford—

Peele [hotly]. Stratford? I doubt if God made Stratford! Another day here and I should die in torment. Your grass lanes, your rubbly houses, fat burgesses, old women, your young clouter-heads who have no care for a bravely acted stage-play. [Bitingly.] "Can any good come out of Stratford?"

Giles. Noa, Maister Peele! Others ha' spoke more fairly—

Peele [impatiently]. My sack, man! Is the girl a-brewing it?

Giles. Anne! Anne! (I'll learn she to mess about.) Anne!

Anne [hurries in and serves Peele]. I heard you.

Giles. Then whoi cunst thee not bustle? Be I to lose my loongs over 'ee?

Anne [simply]. Mistress Shakespeare called me to the butt'ry door. Will hath not been home all day, and she is fair anxious. She bade me send him home once I saw him.

Peele [drinking noisily]. Who is it? [Anne is clearing the table.]

Giles [shortly]. Poor John Shakespeare's son Will.

Peele. A Stratford lad? A straw-headed beater of clods!

Giles. Nay, zur. A wild young un, as 'ull do noa honest work, but dreams the day long, or poaches the graät woods wi' young loons o' like stomach.

Anne [indignantly, dropping a dish]. It's not true! He is no poacher.

Peele [grinning]. What a touchy lass! No poacher, eh?

Anne. Nay, sir, but the brightest lad in Stratford. He hath learning beyond the rest of us—and if he likes to wander i' the woods, 'tis for no ill—he loves the open air—and you should hear the little songs he makes!

Peele. Do all the lads find in you such a defender, or only—? [She turns away.] Nay, no offense! I should like to see this Will.

Giles [grumpily]. 'E 'ave noa will to help 'is father in these sorry times, but ever gawks at stage-plays. 'E 'ull come to noa good end. [The player starts up.]

Peele. Stage-plays—no good end? Have a care, man!

Giles. Nay, zur—noa harm, zur! I—I—canna bide longer. [Backs out.]

Anne [at the window, wonderingly]. He should be here. He hath never lingered till sunset before. [Peele comes up behind her.]

Peele. Troubled, lass?

Anne. Nay, sir, but—but—[Suddenly] Listen!

Peele [blankly]. To what? [A faint singing without.]

Anne [eagerly]. Canst hear nothing—a lilt afar off?

Peele [nodding]. Like a May-day catch? I hear it.

Anne. 'Tis Will! Cousin, Will is coming. [Giles comes back.]

Giles [peevishly]. I canna help it. Byunt 'e later'n common?

A Voice. [The clear, boyish singing is coming very near.]

When springtime frights the winter cold, 5
(Hark to the children singing!)
The cowslip turns the fields to gold,
The bird from 's nest is winging—

Peele. Look you! There the boy comes.

Anne [leaning out the window]. Isn't he coming here? Will! Will! [He passes by the window singing the last words

Young hearts are gay, while yet 'tis May,
Hark to the children singing!

and leaps in over the lower part of the door, a sturdy, ruddy boy, with merry face and a mop of brown hair. Anne greets him with outstretched hands.]

Anne [reproachfully]. Will! Thy mother was so anxious!

Will. I did na' think. I ha' been in the woods all day and forgot everything till the sun set.

Anne. All the day long? Thou must be weary.

Will [frankly]. Nay, not very weary—but hungry.

Anne. Poor boy. He shall have his supper now.

Giles [protesting]. 'E be allus eating 'ere, and I canna a-bear it. Let him sup at his own whoam.

Will [shaking his head]. I dare na go home, for na doubt my father'll beat me rarely. I'll bide here till he be asleep. [He places himself easily in the armchair by the fire.]

Giles [going sulkily]. Thriftless young loon!

Anne [laying the table]. Hast had a splendid day?

Will [absently]. Aye. In the great park at Charlecote. There you can lie on your back in the grass under the high arches of the trees, where the sun rarely peeps in, and you can listen to the wind in the trees, and see it shake the blossoms about you, and watch the red deer and the rabbits and the birds—where everything is lovely and still. [His voice trails off into silence. Anne smiles knowingly.]

Anne. Thou'lt be making poetry before long, eh, Will?—Will? [To Peele] The boy hath not heard a word I spoke.

Peele [coming forward]. Would he hear me, I wonder! Boy!

Will [starting]. Sir? [Peele looks down on him sternly.]

Peele. Dost know thou'rt in my chair?

Will [coolly]. Thine? Indeed, 'tis very easy.

Peele. Hark 'ee! Dost know my name?

Will. I canna say I do.

Peele [distinctly]. Master George Peele.

Will. I thank thee, sir.

Peele. Player in my Lord Admiral's Company.

Will. [His whole manner changes and he jumps up eagerly.] A player? Oh—I did not know. Pray, take the seat.

Peele [amused]. Dost think players are as lords? Most men have other views. [Sits. Will watches him, fascinated.]

Will. Nay, but—oh, I love to see stage-plays! Didst not play in Coventry three days agone, "The History of the Wicked King Richard"?

Peele. Aye, aye. Behold in me the tyrant.

Will. Thou? Rarely done! I mind me yet how the hump-backed king frowned and stamped about—thus [imitating]. Ha! Ha! 'Twas a brave play!

Anne. Thy supper is ready, Will.

Peele [amused]. The true player-instinct, on my soul!

Will [flattered]. Dost truly think so? [Anne plucks his sleeve.]

Anne. Will, where are thy wits? Supper waits.

Will [apologetically]. Oh—I—I—did na hear thee. [He tries to eat, but his attention is ever distracted by the player's words.]

Peele. Is my reckoning ready, girl?

Anne. Reckoning now, sir? Wilt thou—?

Peele. Yes, yes, I go to-night. To-morrow Warwick, then the long road to Oxford, playing by the way—and London at last!

Anne. And then? [Will listens intently.]

Peele. Then back to the old Blackfriars, where all the city will flock to our tragedies and chronicles—a long, merry life of it.

Anne [interested]. And does the Queen ever come?

Peele. Nay, child, we go to her. Last Christmas I played before her at court, in the great room at Whitehall, before the nobles and ambassadors and ladies—oh, a gay time—and the Queen said—

Will [starting up]. What was the play?

Anne. Eat thy supper, Will.

Will [impatiently]. I want no more.

Peele. So my young cockerel is awake again. Will, a boy of thy stamp is lost here in Stratford. Thou shouldst be in London with us. By cock and pie, I have a mind to steal thee for the company! [Rises to pace the floor.]

Will [breathlessly]. To play in London?

Anne. Nay, Will, he but jests. Thou'rt happier here than traipsing about wi' the players. [Giles appears at back.]

Giles. Nags be ready, zur, at sunset as thee'st bid. Shall I put the gear on?

Peele [sharply]. Well fed and groomed? Nay, I will see them myself. [Giles vanishes. Peele turns at the door.] Hark'ee, lass. Thy lad could do far worse than become a player. Good meat and drink, gold in 's pouch, favor at court, and true friends. I like the lad's spirit. [He goes. Anne drops into his chair by the fire. Twilight is coming on rapidly. Will stands silent at the window looking after the player.]

Anne [troubled]. Will, what is it? Thou'rt very strange to-night.

Will [wistfully]. I—I—Oh, Anne, I want to go to London. I am a-weary of rusting in Stratford, where I can learn nothing new, save to grow old, following my father's trade.

Anne. But in London?

Will [kindling]. In London one can learn more marvels in a day than in a lifetime here; for there the streets are in a bustle all day long, and the whole world meets in them, soldiers and courtiers and men of war, from France and Spain and the new lands beyond the sea, all full of learning and pleasant tales of foreign wars and the wondrous things in the colonies. My schoolmaster told me of it. You can stand in St. Paul's and the whole world passes by, mad for knowledge and adventure. And then the stage-plays—!

Anne. Oh, Will, why long for them?

Will. Think how splendid they must be when the Queen herself loves to see 'em. If I were like this player-fellow, and acted with the Admiral's company! He laughed that he would take me with him—to be a player and perchance write plays, interludes, and noble tragedies! Think of it, Anne—to live in London and be one of all the rare company there, to write brave plays wi' sounding lines for all to wonder at, and have folk turn on the streets when I passed and whisper, "That be Will Shakespeare, the play-maker"—to act them even at court and gain the Queen's own thanks! Anne, London is so great and splendid! It beckons me wi' all its turmoil of affairs and its noble hearts ready to love a new comrade. [Disconsolately] And I must bide in Stratford?

Anne [gently]. Come now, Will. No need to be so feverish. Sit down by me. What canst thou know of play-making? What canst thou do in London?

Will [he sits down by the hearth at her feet, looking into the firelight]. I'll tell thee, Anne. Thy father and half the village call me a lazy oaf, that I stray i' the woods some days instead of helping my father. I canna help it. The fit comes on me, and I must be alone, out i' the great woods.

Anne [gladly]. Then thou dost not poach?

Will [hastily]. No, no—that is—sometimes I am with Hodge and Diccon and John a' Field, and 'tis hard not to chase the deer. Nay, look not so grave—I try to do no harm.

Anne [quietly]. And when thou'rt alone?

Will. Then I lie under the trees or wander through the fields, and make plays to myself, as though I writ them in my mind, and cry the lines forth to the birds—they sound nobly, too—or make little songs and sing them i' the sunshine. They are but dreams, I know, but splendid ones—and the player looked wi' favor on me, and said I might make a good player, and he would take me with him.

Anne. But he only jested.

Will. No jest to me! I'll take him at his word and go with him to London. [He starts up eagerly.]

Anne [troubled]. Will, Will! [Peele enters at the back.]

Peele. Hark 'ee, Giles, I go in half an hour!

Will. Master Peele! [Catches at his arm.]

Peele. Well, youngster?

Will [slowly]. Thou—thou saidst I had a good spirit and would do well in London—in a stage company. Thou wert in jest, but—I will go with thee, if I may.

Peele [taken all aback]. Go with me?

Will [earnestly]. With the player's company—to London.

Peele [laughing]. 'S wounds! Thou hast assurance! Dost think to become a great player at once?

Will [impatiently]. Oh, I care not for the playing. Let me but be in London, to see the people there and be near the theatre. I'll be the players' servant, I'll hold the nobles' horses in the street—I'll do anything!

Peele [seriously]. And go with us all over England on hard journeys to play to ignorant rustics?

Will. Anywhere—I'll follow on to the world's end—only take me with you to London! [As he speaks Giles and Mistress Shakespeare, a kindly faced woman of middle age, dressed in housewife's cap and gown, appear at the door.]

Giles. There 'e be, Mistress Shixpur.

Mistress S. [as she enters]. Oh, Will. [He turns sharply.]

Will [confusedly]. Mother! I—I—did not know thou wert here.

Mistress S. Why didst not come home—and what dost thou want with this stranger?

Anne. He would go to London with him.

Mistress S. [aghast]. To London. My Will?

Will [quietly]. Thou knowest, mother, what I ha' told thee, things I told to no other, and now the good time has come that I can see more of England.

Mistress S. But I canna let thee go. Oh, Anne, I knew the boy was restless, but I did not think for it so soon. He is only a boy.

Will [coloring]. In two years I shall be a man—I am a man now in spirit. I canna stay in Stratford. [Mistress Shakespeare sinks down in a chair.]

Mistress S. What o' me? And, Will, 'twill break thy father's heart! [Will looks ashamed.]

Will. I know, he would not understand. 'Tis hard. He must not know till I be gone.

Mistress S. [To Peele]. Oh, sir, how could you wish to lead the lad away? Hath not London enough a'ready?

Peele [who has been listening uncomfortably, faces her gravely]. I but played with the lad at first, till I saw how earnest he was; then I would take him, for I loved his boldness. But, boy, I'll tell thee fairly, thou'lt do better here. Thou'st seen the brave side of it, the gay dresses, the good horses, the cheering crowds and the court-favor. But 'tis dark sometimes, too. The pouches often hang empty when the people turn away—the lords are as the clouded sun, now smiling, now cold—and there come the bitter days, when a man has no friends but the pot-mates of the moment, when every man's hand is against him for a vagabond and a rascal, when the prison-gates lay ever wide before him, and the fickle folk, crying after a new favorite, leave the old to starve.

Anne. Will, canst not see? Thou'rt better here—

Will [bravely]. I know—all this may wait me—but I must go.

Mistress S. [alarmed]. Must go, Will? [He kneels by her side.]

Will. [tenderly]. Hush, mother, I'll tell thee. 'Tis not entirely my longing, for this morning the keeper of old Lucy—

Giles. Ha, poaching again, young scamp!

Will. Brought me before him—I was na poaching, I'll swear it, not so much as chasing the deer—but Sir Thomas had no patience, and bade me clear out, else he would seize me. I—I—dare na stay.

Mistress S. I feared it; thy father forbade thee in the great park. And now—Oh, Will, Will—I know well how thou'st longed to go from here—and now thou must—what shall I do, lacking thee?

Peele [frankly]. Will, if thou must go, thou must. London is greater than Stratford, and there is much evil there, but thou'rt true-hearted, and—by my player's honor—I will stand by thee, till the hangman get me. But we must go soon. 'Tis a dark road to Warwick—I'll see to the horses. Is it a compact? [Will gives him his hands.]

Will [huskily]. A compact, sir—to the end. [Peele hurries out.]

Giles. Look at 'e now, breaking 'is mother's heart, and mad wi' joy to revel in London. 'Tis little 'e recks of she.

Will [hotly]. Thou liest. [Bending over her] Mother, 'tis not true. I do love thee and father, I love Stratford. I'll never forget it. But 'tis so little here, and I must get away to gain learning and do things i' the world, that I may bring home all I get; fame, if God grant it, money, if I gain it, all to those at home.

Anne. Thou'rt over-confident.

Will. Aye, because I'm young. God knows there is enough pain in London, and I'll get my share—but I'm young! Mother, thou'rt not angry?

Mistress S. I knew 'twas coming, and 'tis not so hard. We will always wait for thee at home, when thou'rt weary.

Giles [at the door]. The horses are waiting. 'Tis dark, Will.

Will [breaking down]. Mother, mother!

Mistress S. The good God keep thee safe. Kiss me, Will. [He bends over her, then stumbles to the door, Anne following.]

Will [turning]. Anne—Anne—thou dost not despise me for deserting Stratford. I must go.

Anne. Oh, I know. Thou'lt go to London and forget us all.

Will. No, no, thou—I couldn't forget. I'll remember thee, Anne—I'll put thee in my plays; all my young maids and lovers shall be thee, as thou'rt now—and I'll bring thee rare gifts when I come home.

Anne. I do na want them. Will—I—I—did na mean to be unkind. We were good friends, and I trust in thee, for the future, that thou'lt be great. Good-by—and do na forget the little playmate.

Will. I will na forget [kissing her], and, Anne, be good to my mother. [She goes back to Mistress Shakespeare, and he stands watching them in the dusk.]

Peele [at the window]. Come, come, Will! We must go.

Will [turning slowly]. I—I'm coming, sir.

Anne. Louis, it is growing dark very fast.

Louis. I had not observed it, my sister. [He lights a second candle from the first; then, pen in mouth, scratches at his writing with a little knife.]

Anne. People are still crowding in front of the wine-shop across the street.

Louis [smiling with one side of his mouth]. Naturally. Reading the list of the proscribed that came at noon. Also waiting, amiable vultures, for the next bulletin from Paris. It will give the names of those guillotined day before yesterday. For a good bet: our own names [he nods toward the other room]—yes, hers, too—are all three in the former. As for the latter—well, they can't get us in that now.

Anne [eagerly]. Then you are certain that we are safe?

Louis. I am certain only that they cannot murder us day before yesterday. [As he bends his head to his writing a woman comes in languidly through the open door, bearing an armful of garments, among which one catches the gleam of fine silk, glimpses of lace and rich furs—a disordered burden which she dumps pell-mell into a large portmanteau lying open upon a chair near the desk. This new-comer is of a startling gold-and-ivory beauty; a beauty quite literally striking, for at the very first glance the whole force of it hits the beholder like a snowball in the eye; a beauty so obvious, so completed, so rounded, that it is painful; a beauty to rivet the unenvious stare of women, but from the full blast of which either king or man-peasant would stagger away to the confessional. The egregious luster of it is not breathed upon even by its overspreading of sullen revolt, as its possessor carelessly arranges the garments in the portmanteau. She wears a dress all gray, of a coarse texture, but exquisitely fitted to her; nothing could possibly be plainer, or of a more revealing simplicity. She might be twenty-two; at least it is certain that she is not thirty. At her coming, Louis looks up with a sigh of poignant wistfulness, evidently a habit; for as he leans back to watch her he sighs again. She does not so much as glance at him, but speaks absently to Madame de Laseyne. Her voice is superb, as it should be; deep and musical, with a faint, silvery huskiness.]

Eloise [the new-comer]. Is he still there?

Anne. I lost sight of him in the crowd. I think he has gone. If only he does not come back!

Louis [with grim conviction]. He will.

Anne. I am trying to hope not.

Eloise. I have told you from the first that you overestimate his importance. Haven't I said it often enough?

Anne [under her breath]. You have!

Eloise [coldly]. He will not harm you.

Anne [looking out of the window]. More people down there; they are running to the wine-shop.

Louis. Gentle idlers! [The sound of triumphant shouting comes up from the street below.] That means that the list of the guillotined has arrived from Paris.

Anne [shivering]. They are posting it in the wine-shop window. [The shouting increases suddenly to a roar of hilarity, in which the shrilling of women mingles.]

Louis. Ah! One remarks that the list is a long one. The good people are well satisfied with it. [To Eloise] My cousin, in this amiable populace which you champion, do you never scent something of—well, something of the graveyard scavenger? [She offers the response of an unmoved glance in his direction, and slowly goes out by the door at which she entered. Louis sighs again and returns to his scribbling.]

Anne [nervously]. Haven't you finished, Louis?

Louis [indicating the floor strewn with crumpled slips of paper]. A dozen.

Anne. Not good enough?

Louis [with a rueful smile]. I have lived to discover that among all the disadvantages of being a Peer of France the most dangerous is that one is so poor a forger. Truly, however, our parents are not to be blamed for neglecting to have me instructed in this art; evidently they perceived I had no talent for it. [Lifting a sheet from the desk.] Oh, vile! I am not even an amateur. [He leans back, tapping the paper thoughtfully with his pen.] Do you suppose the Fates took all the trouble to make the Revolution simply to teach me that I have no skill in forgery? Listen. [He reads what he has written.] "Committee of Public Safety. In the name of the Republic. To all Officers, Civil and Military: Permit the Citizen Balsage"—that's myself, remember—"and the Citizeness Virginie Balsage, his sister"—that's you, Anne—"and the Citizeness Marie Balsage, his second sister"—that is Eloise, you understand—"to embark in the vessel Jeune Pierrette from the port of Boulogne for Barcelona. Signed: Billaud Varennes. Carnot. Robespierre." Execrable! [He tears up the paper, scattering the fragments on the floor.] I am not even sure it is the proper form. Ah, that Dossonville!

Anne. But Dossonville helped us—

Louis. At a price. Dossonville! An individual of marked attainment, not only in penmanship, but in the art of plausibility. Before I paid him he swore that the passports he forged for us would take us not only out of Paris, but out of the country.

Anne. Are you sure we must have a separate permit to embark?

Louis. The captain of the Jeune Pierrette sent one of his sailors to tell me. There is a new Commissioner from the National Committee, he said, and a special order was issued this morning. They have an officer and a file of the National Guard on the quay to see that the order is obeyed.

Anne. But we bought passports in Paris. Why can't we here?

Louis. Send out a street-crier for an accomplished forger? My poor Anne! We can only hope that the lieutenant on the quay may be drunk when he examines my dreadful "permit." Pray a great thirst upon him, my sister! [He looks at a watch which he draws from beneath his frock.] Four o'clock. At five the tide in the river is poised at its highest; then it must run out, and the Jeune Pierrette with it. We have an hour. I return to my crime. [He takes a fresh sheet of paper and begins to write.]

Anne [urgently]. Hurry, Louis!

Louis. Watch for Master Spy.

Anne. I cannot see him. [There is silence for a time, broken only by the nervous scratching of Louis's pen.]

Louis [at work]. Still you don't see him?

Anne. No. The people are dispersing. They seem in a good humor.

Louis. Ah, if they knew—[He breaks off, examines his latest effort attentively, and finds it unsatisfactory, as is evinced by the noiseless whistle of disgust to which his lips form themselves. He discards the sheet and begins another, speaking rather absently as he does so.] I suppose I have the distinction to be one of the most hated men in our country, now that all the decent people have left it—so many by a road something of the shortest! Yes, these merry gentlemen below there would be still merrier if they knew they had within their reach a forfeited "Emigrant." I wonder how long it would take them to climb the breakneck flights to our door. Lord, there'd be a race for it! Prize-money, too, I fancy, for the first with his bludgeon.

Anne [lamentably]. Louis, Louis! Why didn't you lie safe in England?

Louis [smiling]. Anne, Anne! I had to come back for a good sister of mine.

Anne. But I could have escaped alone.

Louis. That is it—"alone"! [He lowers his voice as he glances toward the open door.] For she would not have moved at all if I hadn't come to bully her into it. A fanatic, a fanatic!

Anne [brusquely]. She is a fool. Therefore be patient with her.

Louis [warningly]. Hush.

Eloise [in a loud, careless tone from the other room]. Oh, I heard you! What does it matter? [She returns, carrying a handsome skirt and bodice of brocade and a woman's long mantle of light-green cloth, hooded and lined with fur. She drops them into the portmanteau and closes it.] There! I've finished your packing for you.

Louis [rising]. My cousin, I regret that we could not provide servants for this flight. [Bowing formally.] I regret that we have been compelled to ask you to do a share of what is necessary.

Eloise [turning to go out again]. That all?

Louis [lifting the portmanteau]. I fear—

Eloise [with assumed fatigue]. Yes, you usually do. What now?

Louis [flushing painfully]. The portmanteau is too heavy. [He returns to the desk, sits, and busies himself with his writing, keeping his grieved face from her view.]

Eloise. You mean you're too weak to carry it?

Louis. Suppose at the last moment it becomes necessary to hasten exceedingly—

Eloise. You mean, suppose you had to run, you'd throw away the portmanteau. [Contemptuously.] Oh, I don't doubt you'd do it!

Louis [forcing himself to look up at her cheerfully]. I dislike to leave my baggage upon the field, but in case of a rout it might be a temptation—if it were an impediment.

Anne [peremptorily]. Don't waste time. Lighten the portmanteau.

Louis. You may take out everything of mine.

Eloise. There's nothing of yours in it except your cloak. You don't suppose—

Anne. Take out that heavy brocade of mine.

Eloise. Thank you for not wishing to take out my fur-lined cloak and freezing me at sea!

Louis [gently]. Take out both the cloak and the dress.

Eloise [astounded]. What!

Louis. You shall have mine. It is as warm, but not so heavy.

Eloise [angrily]. Oh, I am sick of your eternal packing and unpacking! I am sick of it!

Anne. Watch at the window, then. [She goes swiftly to the portmanteau, opens it, tosses out the green mantle and the brocaded skirt and bodice, and tests the weight of the portmanteau.] I think it will be light enough now, Louis.

Louis. Do not leave those things in sight. If our landlord should come in—

Anne. I'll hide them in the bed in the next room. Eloise! [She points imperiously to the window. Eloise goes to it slowly and for a moment makes a scornful pretense of being on watch there; but as soon as Madame de Laseyne has left the room she turns, leaning against the wall and regarding Louis with languid amusement. He continues to struggle with his ill-omened "permit," but, by and by, becoming aware of her gaze, glances consciously over his shoulder and meets her half-veiled eyes. Coloring, he looks away, stares dreamily at nothing, sighs, and finally writes again, absently, like a man under a spell, which, indeed, he is. The pen drops from his hand with a faint click upon the floor. He makes the movement of a person suddenly awakened, and, holding his last writing near one of the candles, examines it critically. Then he breaks into low, bitter laughter.]

Eloise [unwillingly curious]. You find something amusing?

Louis. Myself. One of my mistakes, that is all.

Eloise [indifferently]. Your mirth must be indefatigable if you can still laugh at those.

Louis. I agree. I am a history of error.

Eloise. You should have made it a vocation; it is your one genius. And yet—truly because I am a fool I think, as Anne says—I let you hector me into a sillier mistake than any of yours.

Louis. When?

Eloise [flinging out her arms]. Oh, when I consented to this absurd journey, this tiresome journey—with you! An "escape"? From nothing. In "disguise." Which doesn't disguise.

Louis [his voice taut with the effort for self-command]. My sister asked me to be patient with you, Eloise—

Eloise. Because I am a fool, yes. Thanks. [Shrewishly.] And then, my worthy young man? [He rises abruptly, smarting almost beyond endurance.]

Louis [breathing deeply]. Have I not been patient with you?

Eloise [with a flash of energy]. If I have asked you to be anything whatever—with me!—pray recall the petition to my memory.

Louis [beginning to let himself go]. Patient! Have I ever been anything but patient with you? Was I not patient with you five years ago when you first harangued us on your "Rights of Man" and your monstrous republicanism? Where you got hold of it all I don't know—

Eloise [kindling]. Ideas, my friend. Naturally, incomprehensible to you. Books! Brains! Men!

Louis. "Books! Brains! Men!" Treason, poison, and mobs! Oh, I could laugh at you then: they were only beginning to kill us, and I was patient. Was I not patient with you when these Republicans of yours drove us from our homes, from our country, stole all we had, assassinated us in dozens, in hundreds, murdered our King? [He walks the floor, gesticulating nervously.] When I saw relative after relative of my own—aye, and of yours, too—dragged to the abattoir—even poor, harmless, kind André de Laseyne, whom they took simply because he was my brother-in-law—was I not patient? And when I came back to Paris for you and Anne, and had to lie hid in a stable, every hour in greater danger because you would not be persuaded to join us, was I not patient? And when you finally did consent, but protested every step of the way, pouting and—

Eloise [stung]. "Pouting!"

Louis. And when that stranger came posting after us so obvious a spy—

Eloise [scornfully]. Pooh! He is nothing.

Louis. Is there a league between here and Paris over which he has not dogged us? By diligence, on horseback, on foot, turning up at every posting-house, every roadside inn, the while you laughed at me because I read death in his face! These two days we have been here, is there an hour when you could look from that window except to see him grinning up from the wine-shop door down there?

Eloise [impatiently, but with a somewhat conscious expression]. I tell you not to fear him. There is nothing in it.

Louis [looking at her keenly]. Be sure I understand why you do not think him a spy! You believe he has followed us because you—

Eloise. I expected that! Oh, I knew it would come! [Furiously.] I never saw the man before in my life!

Louis [pacing the floor]. He is unmistakable; his trade is stamped on him; a hired trailer of your precious "Nation's."

Eloise [haughtily]. The Nation is the People. You malign because you fear. The People is sacred!

Louis [with increasing bitterness]. Aren't you tired yet of the Palais Royal platitudes? I have been patient with your Mericourtisms for so long. Yes, always I was patient. Always there was time; there was danger, but there was a little time. [He faces her, his voice becoming louder, his gestures more vehement.] But now the Jeune Pierrette sails this hour, and if we are not out of here and on her deck when she leaves the quay, my head rolls in Samson's basket within the week, with Anne's and your own to follow! Now, I tell you, there is no more time, and now—

Eloise [suavely]. Yes? Well? "Now?" [He checks himself; his lifted hand falls to his side.]

Louis [in a gentle voice]. I am still patient. [He looks into her eyes, makes her a low and formal obeisance, and drops dejectedly into the chair at the desk.]

Eloise [dangerously]. Is the oration concluded?

Louis. Quite.

Eloise [suddenly volcanic]. Then "now" you'll perhaps be "patient" enough to explain why I shouldn't leave you instantly. Understand fully that I have come thus far with you and Anne solely to protect you in case you were suspected. "Now," my little man, you are safe: you have only to go on board your vessel. Why should I go with you? Why do you insist on dragging me out of the country?

Louis [wearily]. Only to save your life; that is all.

Eloise. My life! Tut! My life is safe with the People—my People! [She draws herself up magnificently.] The Nation would protect me! I gave the people my whole fortune when they were starving. After that, who in France dare lay a finger upon the Citizeness Eloise d'Anville!

Louis. I have the idea sometimes, my cousin, that perhaps if you had not given them your property they would have taken it, anyway. [Dryly.] They did mine.

Eloise [agitated]. I do not expect you to comprehend what I felt—what I feel! [She lifts her arms longingly.] Oh, for a Man!—a Man who could understand me!

Louis [sadly]. That excludes me!

Eloise. Shall I spell it?

Louis. You are right. So far from understanding you, I understand nothing. The age is too modern for me. I do not understand why this rabble is permitted to rule France; I do not even understand why it is permitted to live.

Eloise [with superiority]. Because you belong to the class that thought itself made of porcelain and the rest of the world clay. It is simple: the mud-ball breaks the vase.

Louis. You belong to the same class, even to the same family.

Eloise. You are wrong. One circumstance proves me no aristocrat.

Louis. What circumstance?

Eloise. That I happened to be born with brains. I can account for it only by supposing some hushed-up ancestral scandal. [Brusquely.] Do you understand that?

Louis. I overlook it. [He writes again.]

Eloise. Quibbling was always a habit of yours. [Snapping at him irritably.] Oh, stop that writing! You can't do it, and you don't need it. You blame the people because they turn on you now, after you've whipped and beaten and ground them underfoot for centuries and centuries and—

Louis. Quite a career for a man of twenty-nine!

Eloise. I have said that quibbling was—

Louis [despondently]. Perhaps it is. To return to my other deficiencies, I do not understand why this spy who followed us from Paris has not arrested me long before now. I do not understand why you hate me. I do not understand the world in general. And in particular I do not understand the art of forgery. [He throws down his pen.]

Eloise. You talk of "patience"! How often have I explained that you would not need passports of any kind if you would let me throw off my incognito. If anyone questions you, it will be sufficient if I give my name. All France knows the Citizeness Eloise d'Anville. Do you suppose the officer on the quay would dare oppose—

Louis [with a gesture of resignation]. I know you think it.

Eloise [angrily]. You tempt me not to prove it. But for Anne's sake—

Louis. Not for mine. That, at least, I understand. [He rises.] My dear cousin, I am going to be very serious—

Eloise. O heaven! [She flings away from him.]

Louis [plaintively]. I shall not make another oration—

Eloise. Make anything you choose. [Drumming the floor with her foot.] What does it matter?

Louis. I have a presentiment—I ask you to listen—

Eloise [in her irritation almost screaming]. How can I help but listen? And Anne, too! [With a short laugh.] You know as well as I do that when that door is open everything you say in this room is heard in there. [She points to the open doorway, where Madame de Laseyne instantly makes her appearance, and after exchanging one fiery glance with Eloise as swiftly withdraws, closing the door behind her with outraged emphasis.]

Eloise [breaking into a laugh]. Forward, soldiers!

Louis [reprovingly]. Eloise!

Eloise. Well, open the door, then, if you want her to hear you make love to me! [Coolly.] That's what you're going to do, isn't it?

Louis [with imperfect self-control]. I wish to ask you for the last time—

Eloise [flouting]. There are so many last times!

Louis. To ask you if you are sure that you know your own heart. You cared for me once, and—

Eloise [as if this were news indeed]. I did? Who under heaven ever told you that?

Louis [flushing]. You allowed yourself to be betrothed to me, I believe.

Eloise. "Allowed" is the word, precisely. I seem to recall changing all that the very day I became an orphan—and my own master! [Satirically polite.] Pray correct me if my memory errs. How long ago was it? Six years? Seven?

Louis [with emotion]. Eloise, Eloise, you did love me then! We were happy, both of us, so very happy—

Eloise [sourly]. "Both!" My faith! But I must have been a brave little actress.

Louis. I do not believe it. You loved me. I—[He hesitates.]

Eloise. Do get on with what you have to say.

Louis [in a low voice]. I have many forebodings, Eloise, but the strongest—and for me the saddest—is that this is the last chance you will ever have to tell—to tell me—[He falters again.]

Eloise [irritated beyond measure, shouting]. To tell you what?

Louis [swallowing]. That your love for me still lingers.

Eloise [promptly]. Well, it doesn't. So that's over!

Louis. Not quite yet. I—

Eloise [dropping into a chair]. O Death!

Louis [still gently]. Listen. I have hope that you and Anne may be permitted to escape; but as for me, since the first moment I felt the eyes of that spy from Paris upon me I have had the premonition that I would be taken back—to the guillotine, Eloise. I am sure that he will arrest me when I attempt to leave this place to-night. [With sorrowful earnestness.] And it is with the certainty in my soul that this is our last hour together that I ask you if you cannot tell me that the old love has come back. Is there nothing in your heart for me?

Eloise. Was there anything in your heart for the beggar who stood at your door in the old days?

Louis. Is there nothing for him who stands at yours now, begging for a word?

Eloise [frowning]. I remember you had the name of a disciplinarian in your regiment. [She rises to face him.] Did you ever find anything in your heart for the soldiers you ordered tied up and flogged? Was there anything in your heart for the peasants who starved in your fields?

Louis [quietly]. No; it was too full of you.

Eloise. Words! Pretty little words!

Louis. Thoughts. Pretty, because they are of you. All, always of you—always, my dear. I never really think of anything but you. The picture of you is always before the eyes of my soul; the very name of you is forever in my heart. [With a rueful smile.] And it is on the tips of my fingers, sometimes when it shouldn't be. See. [He steps to the desk and shows her a scribbled sheet.] This is what I laughed at a while ago. I tried to write, with you near me, and unconsciously I let your name creep into my very forgery! I wrote it as I wrote it in the sand when we were children; as I have traced it a thousand times on coated mirrors—on frosted windows. [He reads the writing aloud.] "Permit the Citizen Balsage and his sister, the Citizeness Virginie Balsage, and his second sister, the Citizeness Marie Balsage, and Eloise d'Anville"—so I wrote!—"to embark upon the vessel Jeune Pierrette—" You see? [He lets the paper fall upon the desk.] Even in this danger, that I feel closer and closer with every passing second, your name came in of itself. I am like that English Mary: if they will open my heart when I am dead, they shall find, not "Calais," but "Eloise"!

Eloise [going to the dressing-table]. Louis, that doesn't interest me. [She adds a delicate touch or two to her hair, studying it thoughtfully in the dressing-table mirror.]

Louis [somberly]. I told you long ago—

Eloise [smiling at her reflection]. So you did—often!

Louis [breathing quickly]. I have nothing new to offer. I understand. I bore you.

Eloise. Louis, to be frank: I don't care what they find in your heart when they open it.

Louis [with a hint of sternness]. Have you never reflected that there might be something for me to forgive you?

Eloise [glancing at him over her shoulder in frowning surprise]. What!

Louis. I wonder sometimes if you have ever found a flaw in your own character.

Eloise [astounded]. So! [Turning sharply upon him.] You are assuming the right to criticize me, are you? Oho!

Louis [agitated]. I state merely—I have said—I think I forgive you a great deal—

Eloise [beginning to char]. You do! You bestow your gracious pardon upon me, do you? [Bursting into flame.] Keep your forgiveness to yourself! When I want it I'll kneel at your feet and beg it of you! You can kiss me then, for then you will know that "the old love has come back"!

Louis [miserably]. When you kneel—

Eloise. Can you picture it—Marquis? [She hurls his title at him, and draws herself up in icy splendor.] I am a woman of the Republic!

Louis. And the Republic has no need of love.

Eloise. Its daughter has no need of yours!

Louis. Until you kneel to me. You have spoken. It is ended. [Turning from her with a pathetic gesture of farewell and resignation, his attention is suddenly arrested by something invisible. He stands for a moment transfixed. When he speaks, it is in an altered tone, light and at the same time ominous.] My cousin, suffer the final petition of a bore. Forgive my seriousness; forgive my stupidity, for I believe that what one hears now means that a number of things are indeed ended. Myself among them.

Eloise [not comprehending]. "What one hears?"

Louis [slowly]. In the distance. [Both stand motionless to listen, and the room is silent. Gradually a muffled, multitudinous sound, at first very faint, becomes audible.]

Eloise. What is it?

Louis [with pale composure]. Only a song! [The distant sound becomes distinguishable as a singing from many unmusical throats and pitched in every key, a drum-beat booming underneath; a tumultuous rumble which grows slowly louder. The door of the inner room opens, and Madame de Laseyne enters.]

Anne [briskly, as she comes in]. I have hidden the cloak and the dress beneath the mattress. Have you—

Louis [lifting his hand]. Listen! [She halts, startled. The singing, the drums, and the tumult swell suddenly much louder, as if the noise-makers had turned a corner.]

Anne [crying out]. The "Marseillaise"!

Louis. The "Vultures' Chorus"!

Eloise [in a ringing voice]. The Hymn of Liberty!

Anne [trembling violently]. It grows louder.

Louis. Nearer!

Eloise [running to the window]. They are coming this way!

Anne [rushing ahead of her]. They have turned the corner of the street. Keep back, Louis!

Eloise [leaning out of the window, enthusiastically]. Vive la—[She finishes with an indignant gurgle as Anne de Laseyne, without comment, claps a prompt hand over her mouth and pushes her vigorously from the window.]

Anne. A mob—carrying torches and dancing. [Her voice shaking wildly.] They are following a troop of soldiers.

Louis. The National Guard.

Anne. Keep back from the window! A man in a tricolor scarf marching in front.

Louis. A political, then—an official of their government.

Anne. O Virgin, have mercy! [She turns a stricken face upon her brother.] It is that—

Louis [biting his nails]. Of course. Our spy. [He takes a hesitating step toward the desk; but swings about, goes to the door at the rear, shoots the bolt back and forth, apparently unable to decide upon a course of action; finally leaves the door bolted and examines the hinges. Anne, meanwhile, has hurried to the desk, and, seizing a candle there, begins to light others in a candelabrum on the dressing-table. The noise outside grows to an uproar; the "Marseillaise" changes to "Ça ira"; and a shaft of the glare from the torches below shoots through the window and becomes a staggering red patch on the ceiling.]

Anne [feverishly]. Lights! Light those candles in the sconce, Eloise! Light all the candles we have. [Eloise, resentful, does not move.]

Louis. No, no! Put them out!

Anne. Oh, fatal! [She stops him as he rushes to obey his own command.] If our window is lighted he will believe we have no thought of leaving, and pass by. [She hastily lights the candles in a sconce upon the wall as she speaks; the shabby place is now brightly illuminated.]

Louis. He will not pass by. [The external tumult culminates in riotous yelling, as, with a final roll, the drums cease to beat. Madame de Laseyne runs again to the window.]

Eloise [sullenly]. You are disturbing yourselves without reason. They will not stop here.

Anne [in a sickly whisper]. They have stopped.

Louis. At the door of this house? [Madame de Laseyne, leaning against the wall, is unable to reply, save by a gesture. The noise from the street dwindles to a confused, expectant murmur. Louis takes a pistol from beneath his blouse, strides to the door, and listens.]

Anne [faintly]. He is in the house. The soldiers followed him.

Louis. They are on the lower stairs. [He turns to the two women humbly.] My sister and my cousin, my poor plans have only made everything worse for you. I cannot ask you to forgive me. We are caught.

Anne [vitalized with the energy of desperation]. Not till the very last shred of hope is gone. [She springs to the desk and begins to tear the discarded sheets into minute fragments.] Is that door fastened?

Louis. They'll break it down, of course.

Anne. Where is our passport from Paris?

Louis. Here. [He gives it to her.]

Anne. Quick! Which of these "permits" is the best?

Louis. They're all hopeless—[He fumbles among the sheets on the desk.]

Anne. Any of them. We can't stop to select. [She thrusts the passport and a haphazard sheet from the desk into the bosom of her dress. An orderly tramping of heavy shoes and a clinking of metal become audible as the soldiers ascend the upper flight of stairs.]

Eloise. All this is childish. [Haughtily.] I shall merely announce—

Anne [uttering a half-choked scream of rage]. You'll announce nothing! Out of here, both of you!

Louis. No, no!

Anne [with breathless rapidity, as the noise on the stairs grows louder]. Let them break the door in if they will; only let them find me alone. [She seizes her brother's arm imploringly as he pauses, uncertain.] Give me the chance to make them think I am here alone.

Louis. I can't—

Anne [urging him to the inner door]. Is there any other possible hope for us? Is there any other possible way to gain even a little time? Louis, I want your word of honor not to leave that room unless I summon you. I must have it! [Overborne by her intensity, Louis nods despairingly, allowing her to force him toward the other room. The tramping of the soldiers, much louder and very close, comes to a sudden stop. There is a sharp word of command, and a dozen muskets ring on the floor just beyond the outer door.]

Eloise [folding her arms]. You needn't think I shall consent to hide myself. I shall tell them—

Anne [in a surcharged whisper]. You will not ruin us! [With furious determination, as a loud knock falls upon the door.] In there, I tell you! [Almost physically she sweeps both Eloise and Louis out of the room, closes the door upon them, and leans against it, panting. The knocking is repeated. She braces herself to speak.]

Anne [with a catch in her throat]. Who is—there?

A Sonorous Voice. French Republic!

Anne [faltering]. It is—it is difficult to hear. What do you—

The Voice. Open the door.

Anne [more firmly]. That is impossible.

The Voice. Open the door.

Anne. What is your name?

The Voice. Valsin, National Agent.

Anne. I do not know you.

The Voice. Open!

Anne. I am here alone. I am dressing. I can admit no one.

The Voice. For the last time: open!

Anne. No!

The Voice. Break it down. [A thunder of blows from the butts of muskets falls upon the door.]

Anne [rushing toward it in a passion of protest]. No, no, no! You shall not come in! I tell you I have not finished dressing. If you are men of honor—Ah! [She recoils, gasping, as a panel breaks in, the stock of a musket following it; and then, weakened at rusty bolt and crazy hinge, the whole door gives way and falls crashing into the room. The narrow passage thus revealed is crowded with shabbily uniformed soldiers of the National Guard, under an officer armed with a saber. As the door falls a man wearing a tricolor scarf strides by them, and, standing beneath the dismantled lintel, his hands behind him, sweeps the room with a smiling eye.

This personage is handsomely, almost dandiacally dressed in black; his ruffle is of lace, his stockings are of silk; the lapels of his waistcoat, overlapping those of his long coat, exhibit a rich embroidery of white and crimson. These and other details of elegance, such as his wearing powder upon his dark hair, indicate either insane daring or an importance quite overwhelming. A certain easy power in his unusually brilliant eyes favors the probability that, like Robespierre, he can wear what he pleases. Undeniably he has distinction. Equally undeniable is something in his air that is dapper and impish and lurking. His first glance over the room apparently affording him acute satisfaction, he steps lightly across the prostrate door, Madame de Laseyne retreating before him but keeping herself between him and the inner door. He comes to an unexpected halt in a dancing-master's posture, removing his huge hat—which displays a tricolor plume of ostrich feathers—with a wide flourish, an intentional burlesque of the old-court manner.]

Valsin. Permit me. [He bows elaborately.] Be gracious to a recent fellow-traveler. I introduce myself. At your service: Valsin, Agent of the National Committee of Public Safety. [He faces about sharply.] Soldiers! [They stand at attention.] To the street door. I will conduct the examination alone. My assistant will wait on this floor, at the top of the stair. Send the people away down below there, officer. Look to the courtyard. Clear the streets. [The officer salutes, gives a word of command, and the soldiers shoulder their muskets, march off, and are heard clanking down the stairs. Valsin tosses his hat upon the desk, and turns smilingly to the trembling but determined Madame de Laseyne.]

Anne [summoning her indignation]. How dare you break down my door! How dare you force your—

Valsin [suavely]. My compliments on the celerity with which the citizeness has completed her toilet. Marvelous. An example to her sex.

Anne. You intend robbery, I suppose.

Valsin [with a curt laugh]. Not precisely.

Anne. What, then?

Valsin. I have come principally for the returned Emigrant, Louis Valny-Cherault, formerly called Marquis de Valny-Cherault, formerly of the former regiment of Valny; also formerly—

Anne [cutting him off sharply]. I do not know what you mean by all these names—and "formerlies"!

Valsin. No? [Persuasively.] Citizeness, pray assert that I did not encounter you last week on your journey from Paris—

Anne [hastily]. It is true I have been to Paris on business; you may have seen me—I do not know. Is it a crime to return from Paris?

Valsin [in a tone of mock encouragement]. It will amuse me to hear you declare that I did not see you traveling in company with Louis Valny-Cherault. Come! Say it.

Anne [stepping back defensively, closer to the inner door]. I am alone, I tell you! I do not know what you mean. If you saw me speaking with people in the diligence, or at some posting-house, they were only traveling acquaintances. I did not know them. I am a widow—

Valsin. My condolences. Poor, of course?

Anne. Yes.

Valsin. And lonely, of course? [Apologetically.] Loneliness is in the formula: I suggest it for fear you might forget.

Anne [doggedly]. I am alone.

Valsin. Quite right.

Anne [confusedly]. I am a widow, I tell you—a widow, living here quietly with—

Valsin [taking her up quickly]. Ah—"with"! Living here alone, and also "with"—whom? Not your late husband?

Anne [desperately]. With my niece.

Valsin [affecting great surprise]. Ah! A niece! And the niece, I take it, is in your other room yonder?

Anne [huskily]. Yes.

Valsin [taking a step forward]. Is she pretty? [Anne places her back against the closed door, facing him grimly. He assumes a tone of indulgence.] Ah, one must not look: the niece, likewise, has not completed her toilet.

Anne. She is—asleep.

Valsin [glancing toward the dismantled doorway]. A sound napper! Why did you not say instead that she was—shaving? [He advances, smiling.]

Anne [between her teeth]. You shall not go in! You cannot see her! She is—

Valsin [laughing]. Allow me to prompt you. She is not only asleep; she is ill. She is starving. Also, I cannot go in because she is an orphan. Surely, she is an orphan? A lonely widow and her lonely orphan niece. Ah, touching—and sweet!

Anne [hotly]. What authority have you to force your way into my apartment and insult—

Valsin [touching his scarf]. I had the honor to mention the French Republic.

Anne. So! Does the French Republic persecute widows and orphans?

Valsin [gravely]. No. It is the making of them!

Anne [crying out]. Ah, horrible!

Valsin. I regret that its just severity was the cause of your own bereavement, Citizeness. When your unfortunate husband, André, formerly known as the Prince de Laseyne—

Anne [defiantly, though tears have sprung to her eyes]. I tell you I do not know what you mean by these titles. My name is Balsage.

Valsin. Bravo! The Widow Balsage, living here in calm obscurity with her niece. Widow Balsage, answer quickly, without stopping to think. [Sharply.] How long have you lived here?

Anne. Two months. [Faltering.]—A year!

Valsin [laughing]. Good. Two months and a year! No visitors? No strangers?

Anne. No.

Valsin [wheeling quickly and picking up Louis's cap from the dressing-table]. This cap, then, belongs to your niece.

Anne [flustered, advancing toward him as if to take it]. It was—it was left here this afternoon by our landlord.

Valsin [musingly]. That is very, very puzzling. [He leans against the dressing-table in a careless attitude, his back to her.]

Anne [cavalierly]. Why "puzzling"?

Valsin. Because I sent him on an errand to Paris this morning. [She flinches, but he does not turn to look at her, continuing in a tone of idle curiosity.] I suppose your own excursion to Paris was quite an event for you, Widow Balsage. You do not take many journeys?

Anne. I am too poor.

Valsin. And you have not been contemplating another departure from Boulogne?

Anne. No.

Valsin [still in the same careless attitude, his back toward her and the closed door]. Good. It is as I thought: the portmanteau is for ornament.

Anne [choking]. It belongs to my niece. She came only an hour ago. She has not unpacked.

Valsin. Naturally. Too ill.

Anne. She had traveled all night; she was exhausted. She went to sleep at once.

Valsin. Is she a somnambulist?

Anne [taken aback]. Why?

Valsin [indifferently]. She has just opened the door of her room in order to overhear our conversation. [Waving his hand to the dressing-table mirror, in which he had been gazing.] Observe it, Citizeness Laseyne.

Anne [demoralized]. I do not—I—[Stamping her foot.] How often shall I tell you my name is Balsage!

Valsin [turning to her apologetically]. My wretched memory. Perhaps I might remember better if I saw it written: I beg a glance at your papers. Doubtless you have your certificate of citizenship—

Anne [trembling]. I have papers, certainly.

Valsin. The sight of them—

Anne. I have my passport; you shall see. [With wildly shaking hands she takes from her blouse the passport and the "permit," crumpled together.] It is in proper form—[She is nervously replacing the two papers in her bosom when with a sudden movement he takes them from her. She cries out incoherently, and attempts to recapture them.]

Valsin [extending his left arm to fend her off]. Yes, here you have your passport. And there you have others. [He points to the littered floor under the desk.] Many of them!

Anne. Old letters! [She clutches at the papers in his grasp.]

Valsin [easily fending her off]. Doubtless! [He shakes the "permit" open.] Oho! A permission to embark—and signed by three names of the highest celebrity. Alas, these unfortunate statesmen, Billaud Varennes, Carnot, and Robespierre! Each has lately suffered an injury to his right hand. What a misfortune for France! And what a coincidence! One has not heard the like since we closed the theatres.

Anne [furiously struggling to reach his hand]. Give me my papers! Give me—

Valsin [holding them away from her]. You see, these unlucky great men had their names signed for them by somebody else. And I should judge that this somebody else must have been writing quite recently—less than half an hour ago, from the freshness of the ink—and in considerable haste; perhaps suffering considerable anguish of mind, Widow Balsage! [Madame de Laseyne, overwhelmed, sinks into a chair. He comes close to her, his manner changing startlingly.]

Valsin [bending over with sudden menace, his voice loud and harsh]. Widow Balsage, if you intend no journey, why have you this forged permission to embark on the Jeune Pierrette? Widow Balsage, who is the Citizen Balsage?

Anne [faintly]. My brother.

Valsin [straightening up]. Your first truth. [Resuming his gaiety.] Of course he is not in that room yonder with your niece.

Anne [brokenly]. No, no, no; he is not! He is not here.

Valsin [commiseratingly]. Poor woman! You have not even the pleasure to perceive how droll you are.

Anne. I perceive that I am a fool! [She dashes the tears from her eyes and springs to her feet.] I also perceive that you have denounced us before the authorities here—

Valsin. Pardon. In Boulogne it happens that I am the authority. I introduce myself for the third time: Valsin, Commissioner of the National Committee of Public Safety. Tallien was sent to Bordeaux; Collot to Lyons; I to Boulogne. Citizeness, were all of the august names on your permit genuine, you could no more leave this port without my counter-signature than you could take wing and fly over the Channel!

Anne [with a shrill laugh of triumph]. You have overreached yourself! You're an ordinary spy: you followed us from Paris—

Valsin [gaily]. Oh, I intended you to notice that!

Anne [unheeding]. You have claimed to be Commissioner of the highest power in France. We can prove that you are a common spy. You may go to the guillotine for that. Take care, Citizen! So! You have denounced us; we denounce you. I'll have you arrested by your own soldiers. I'll call them— [She makes a feint of running to the window. He watches her coolly, in silence; and she halts, chagrined.]

Valsin [pleasantly]. I was sure you would not force me to be premature. Remark it, Citizeness Laseyne: I am enjoying all this. I have waited a long time for it.

Anne [becoming hysterical]. I am the Widow Balsage, I tell you! You do not know us—you followed us from Paris. [Half sobbing.] You're a spy—a hanger-on of the police. We will prove—

Valsin [stepping to the dismantled doorway]. I left my assistant within hearing—a species of animal of mine. I may claim that he belongs to me. A worthy patriot, but skillful, who has had the honor of a slight acquaintance with you, I believe. [Calling.] Dossonville! [Dossonville, a large man, flabby of flesh, loose-mouthed, grizzled, carelessly dressed, makes his appearance in the doorway. He has a harsh and reckless eye; and, obviously a flamboyant bully by temperament, his abject, doggish deference to Valsin is instantly impressive, more than confirming the latter's remark that Dossonville "belongs" to him. Dossonville, apparently, is a chattel indeed, body and soul. At sight of him Madame de Laseyne catches at the desk for support and stands speechless.]

Valsin [easily]. Dossonville, you may inform the Citizeness Laseyne what office I have the fortune to hold.

Dossonville [coming in]. Bright heaven! All the world knows that you are the representative of the Committee of Public Safety. Commissioner to Boulogne.

Valsin. With what authority?

Dossonville. Absolute—unlimited! Naturally. What else would be useful?

Valsin. You recall this woman, Dossonville?

Dossonville. She was present when I delivered the passport to the Emigrant Valny-Cherault, in Paris.

Valsin. Did you forge that passport?

Dossonville. No. I told the Emigrant I had. Under orders. [Grinning.] It was genuine.

Valsin. Where did you get it?

Dossonville. From you.

Valsin [suavely]. Sit down, Dossonville. [The latter, who is standing by a chair, obeys with a promptness more than military. Valsin turns smilingly to Madame de Laseyne.] Dossonville's instructions, however, did not include a "permit" to sail on the Jeune Pierrette. All of which, I confess, Citizeness, has very much the appearance of a trap! [He tosses the two papers upon the desk. Utterly dismayed, she makes no effort to secure them. He regards her with quizzical enjoyment.]

Anne. Ah—you—[She fails to speak coherently.]

Valsin. Dossonville has done very well. He procured your passport, brought your "disguises," planned your journey, even gave you directions how to find these lodgings in Boulogne. Indeed, I instructed him to omit nothing for your comfort. [He pauses for a moment.] If I am a spy, Citizeness Laseyne, at least I trust your gracious intelligence may not cling to the epithet "ordinary." My soul! but I appear to myself a most uncommon type of spy—a very intricate, complete, and unusual spy, in fact.

Anne [to herself, weeping]. Ah, poor Louis!

Valsin [cheerfully]. You are beginning to comprehend? That is well. Your niece's door is still ajar by the discreet width of a finger, so I assume that the Emigrant also begins to comprehend. Therefore I take my ease! [He seats himself in the most comfortable chair in the room, crossing his legs in a leisurely attitude, and lightly drumming the tips of his fingers together, the while his peaceful gaze is fixed upon the ceiling. His tone, as he continues, is casual.] You understand, my Dossonville, having long ago occupied this very apartment myself, I am serenely aware that the Emigrant can leave the other room only by the window; and as this is the fourth floor, and a proper number of bayonets in the courtyard below are arranged to receive any person active enough to descend by a rope of bed-clothes, one is confident that the said Emigrant will remain where he is. Let us make ourselves comfortable, for it is a delightful hour—an hour I have long promised myself. I am in a good humor. Let us all be happy. Citizeness Laseyne, enjoy yourself. Call me some bad names!

Anne [between her teeth]. If I could find one evil enough!

Valsin [slapping his knee delightedly]. There it is: the complete incompetence of your class. You poor aristocrats, you do not even know how to swear. Your ancestors knew how! They were fighters; they knew how to swear because they knew how to attack; you poor moderns have no profanity left in you, because, poisoned by idleness, you have forgotten even how to resist. And yet you thought yourselves on top, and so you were—but as foam is on top of the wave. You forgot that power, like genius, always comes from underneath, because it is produced only by turmoil. We have had to wring the neck of your feather-head court, because while the court was the nation the nation had its pockets picked. You were at the mercy of anybody with a pinch of brains: adventurers like Mazarin, like Fouquet, like Law, or that little commoner, the woman Fish, who called herself Pompadour and took France—France, merely!—from your King, and used it to her own pleasure. Then, at last, after the swindlers had well plucked you—at last, unfortunate creatures, the People got you! Citizeness, the People had starved: be assured they will eat you to the bone—and then eat the bone! You are helpless because you have learned nothing and forgotten everything. You have forgotten everything in this world except how to be fat!

Dossonville [applauding with unction]. Beautiful! It is beautiful, all that! A beautiful speech!

Valsin. Ass!

Dossonville [meekly]. Perfectly, perfectly.

Valsin [crossly]. That wasn't a speech; it was the truth. Citizeness Laseyne, so far as you are concerned, I am the People. [He extends his hand negligently, with open palm.] And I have got you. [He clenches his fingers, like a cook's on the neck of a fowl.] Like that! And I'm going to take you back to Paris, you and the Emigrant. [She stands in an attitude eloquent of despair. His glance roves from her to the door of the other room, which is still slightly ajar; and, smiling at some fugitive thought, he continues, deliberately.] I take you: you and your brother—and that rather pretty little person who traveled with you. [There is a breathless exclamation from the other side of the door, which is flung open violently, as Eloise—flushed, radiant with anger, and altogether magnificent—sweeps into the room to confront Valsin.]

Eloise [slamming the door behind her]. Leave this Jack-in-Office to me, Anne!

Dossonville [dazed by the vision]. Lord! What glory! [He rises, bowing profoundly, muttering hoarsely.] Oh, eyes! Oh, hair! Look at her shape! Her chin! The divine—

Valsin [getting up and patting him reassuringly on the back]. The lady perceives her effect, my Dossonville. It is no novelty. Sit down, my Dossonville. [The still murmurous Dossonville obeys Valsin turns to Eloise, a brilliant light in his eyes.] Let me greet one of the nieces of Widow Balsage—evidently not the sleepy one, and certainly not ill. Health so transcendent—

Eloise [placing her hand upon Madame de Laseyne's shoulder]. This is a clown, Anne. You need have no fear of him whatever. His petty authority does not extend to us.

Valsin [deferentially]. Will the niece of Widow Balsage explain why it does not?

Eloise [turning upon him fiercely]. Because the patriot Citizeness Eloise d'Anville is here!

Valsin [assuming an air of thoughtfulness]. Yes, she is here. That "permit" yonder even mentions her by name. It is curious. I shall have to go into that. Continue, niece.

Eloise [with supreme haughtiness]. This lady is under her protection.

Valsin [growing red]. Pardon. Under whose protection?

Eloise [sulphurously]. Under the protection of Eloise d'Anville! [This has a frightful effect upon Valsin; his face becomes contorted; he clutches at his throat, apparently half strangled, staggers, and falls choking into the easy-chair he has formerly occupied.]

Valsin [gasping, coughing, incoherent]. Under the pro—the protection—[He explodes into peal after peal of uproarious laughter.] The protection of—Aha, ha, ha, ho, ho, ho! [He rocks himself back and forth unappeasably.]

Eloise [with a slight lift of the eyebrows]. This man is an idiot.

Valsin [during an abatement of his attack]. Oh, pardon! It is—too—much—too much for me! You say—these people are—

Eloise [stamping her foot]. Under the protection of Eloise d'Anville, imbecile! You cannot touch them. She wills it! [At this, Valsin shouts as if pleading for mercy, and beats the air with his hands. He struggles to his feet and, pounding himself upon the chest, walks to and fro in the effort to control his convulsion.]

Eloise [to Anne, under cover of the noise he makes]. I was wrong: he is not an idiot.

Anne [despairingly]. He laughs at you.

Eloise [in a quick whisper]. Out of bluster; because he is afraid. He is badly frightened. I know just what to do. Go into the other room with Louis.

Anne [protesting weakly]. I can't hope—

Eloise [flashing from a cloud]. You failed, didn't you? [Madame de Laseyne, after a tearful perusal of the stern resourcefulness now written in the younger woman's eyes, succumbs with a piteous gesture of assent and goes out forlornly. Eloise closes the door and stands with her back to it.]

Valsin [paying no attention to them]. Eloise d'Anville! [Still pacing the room in the struggle to subdue his hilarity.] This young citizeness speaks of the protection of Eloise d'Anville! [Leaning feebly upon Dossonville's shoulder.] Do you hear, my Dossonville? It is an ecstasy. Ecstasize, then. Scream, Dossonville!

Dossonville [puzzled, but evidently accustomed to being so, cackles instantly]. Perfectly. Ha, ha! The citizeness is not only stirringly beautiful, she is also—

Valsin. She is also a wit. Susceptible henchman, concentrate your thoughts upon domesticity. In this presence remember your wife!

Eloise [peremptorily]. Dismiss that person. I have something to say to you.

Valsin [wiping his eyes]. Dossonville, you are not required. We are going to be sentimental, and heaven knows you are not the moon. In fact, you are a fat old man. Exit, obesity! Go somewhere and think about your children. Flit, whale!

Dossonville [rising]. Perfectly, my chieftain. [He goes to the broken door.]

Eloise [tapping the floor with her shoe]. Out of hearing!

Valsin. The floor below.

Dossonville. Well understood. Perfectly, perfectly! [He goes out through the hallway; disappears, chuckling grossly. There are some moments of silence within the room, while he is heard clumping down a flight of stairs; then Valsin turns to Eloise with burlesque ardor.]

Valsin. "Alone at last!"

Eloise [maintaining her composure]. Rabbit!

Valsin [dropping into the chair at the desk, with mock dejection]. Repulsed at the outset! Ah, Citizeness, there were moments on the journey from Paris when I thought I detected a certain kindness in your glances at the lonely stranger.

Eloise [folding her arms]. You are to withdraw your soldiers, countersign the "permit," and allow my friends to embark at once.

Valsin [with solemnity]. Do you give it as an order, Citizeness?

Eloise. I do. You will receive suitable political advancement.

Valsin [in a choked voice]. You mean as a—a reward?

Eloise [haughtily]. I guarantee that you shall receive it! [He looks at her strangely; then, with a low moan, presses his hand to his side, seeming upon the point of a dangerous seizure.]

Valsin [managing to speak]. I can only beg you to spare me. You have me at your mercy.

Eloise [swelling]. It is well for you that you understand that!

Valsin [shaking his hand ruefully]. Yes; you see I have a bad liver: it may become permanently enlarged. Laughter is my great danger.

Eloise [crying out with rage]. Oh!

Valsin [dolorously]. I have continually to remind myself that I am no longer in the first flush of youth.

Eloise. Idiot! Do you not know who I am!

Valsin. You? Oh yes—[He checks himself abruptly; looks at her with brief intensity; turns his eyes away, half closing them in quick meditation; smiles, as upon some secret pleasantry, and proceeds briskly.] Oh yes, yes, I know who you are.

Eloise [beginning haughtily]. Then you—

Valsin [at once cutting her off]. As to your name, I do not say. Names at best are details; and your own is a detail that could hardly be thought to matter. What you are is obvious: you joined Louis and his sister in Paris at the barriers, and traveled with them as "Marie Balsage," a sister. You might save us a little trouble by giving us your real name; you will probably refuse, and the police will have to look it up when I take you back to Paris. Frankly, you are of no importance to us, though of course we'll send you to the Tribunal. No doubt you are a poor relative of the Valny-Cheraults, or, perhaps, you may have been a governess in the Laseyne family, or—

Eloise [under her breath]. Idiot! Idiot!

Valsin [with subterranean enjoyment, watching her sidelong]. Or the good-looking wife of some faithful retainer of the Emigrant's, perhaps.

Eloise [with a shrill laugh]. Does the Committee of Public Safety betray the same intelligence in the appointment of all its agents? [Violently.] Imbecile, I—

Valsin [quickly raising his voice to check her]. You are of no importance, I tell you! [Changing his tone.] Of course I mean politically. [With broad gallantry.] Otherwise, I am the first to admit extreme susceptibility. I saw that you observed it on the way—at the taverns, in the diligence, at the posting-houses, at—

Eloise [with serenity]. Yes. I am accustomed to oglers.

Valsin. Alas, I believe you! My unfortunate sex is but too responsive.

Eloise [gasping]. "Responsive"—Oh!

Valsin [indulgently]. Let us return to the safer subject. Presently I shall arrest those people in the other room and, regretfully, you too. But first I pamper myself; I chat; I have an attractive woman to listen. In the matter of the arrest, I delay my fire; I do not flash in the pan, but I lengthen my fuse. Why? For the same reason that when I was a little boy and had something good to eat, I always first paid it the compliments of an epicure. I looked at it a long while. I played with it. Then—I devoured it! I am still like that. And Louis yonder is good to eat, because I happen not to love him. However, I should mention that I doubt if he could recall either myself or the circumstance which annoyed me; some episodes are sometimes so little to certain people and so significant to certain other people. [He smiles, stretching himself luxuriously in his chair.] Behold me, Citizeness! I am explained. I am indulging my humor: I play with my cake. Let us see into what curious little figures I can twist it.

Eloise. Idiot!

Valsin [pleasantly]. I have lost count, but I think that is the sixth idiot you have called me. Aha, it is only history, which one admires for repeating itself. Good! Let us march. I shall play—[He picks up the "permit" from the desk, studies it absently, and looks whimsically at her over his shoulder, continuing:] I shall play with—with all four of you.

Eloise [impulsively]. Four?

Valsin. I am not easy to deceive; there are four of you here.

Eloise [staring]. So?

Valsin. Louis brought you and his sister from Paris: a party of three. This "permit" which he forged is for four; the original three and the woman you mentioned a while ago, Eloise d'Anville. Hence she must have joined you here. The deduction is plain: there are three people in that room: the Emigrant, his sister, and this Eloise d'Anville. To the trained mind such reasoning is simple.

Eloise [elated]. Perfectly!

Valsin [with an air of cunning]. Nothing escapes me. You see that.

Eloise. At first glance! I make you my most profound compliments. Sir, you are an eagle!

Valsin [smugly]. Thanks. Now, then, pretty governess, you thought this d'Anville might be able to help you. What put that in your head?

Eloise [with severity]. Do you pretend not to know what she is?

Valsin. A heroine I have had the misfortune never to encounter. But I am informed of her character and history.

Eloise [sternly]. Then you understand that even the Agent of the National Committee risks his head if he dares touch people she chooses to protect.

Valsin [extending his hand in plaintive appeal]. Be generous to my opacity. How could she protect anybody?

Eloise [with condescension]. She has earned the gratitude—

Valsin. Of whom?

Eloise [superbly]. Of the Nation!

Valsin [breaking out again]. Ha, ha, ha! [Clutching at his side.] Pardon, oh, pardon, liver of mine. I must not die; my life is still useful.

Eloise [persisting stormily]. Of the People, stupidity! Of the whole People, dolt! Of France, blockhead!

Valsin [with a violent effort, conquering his hilarity]. There! I am saved. Let us be solemn, my child; it is better for my malady. You are still so young that one can instruct you that individuals are rarely grateful; "the People," never. What you call "the People" means folk who are not always sure of their next meal; therefore their great political and patriotic question is the cost of food. Their heroes are the champions who are going to make it cheaper; and when these champions fail them or cease to be useful to them, then they either forget these poor champions—or eat them. Let us hear what your Eloise d'Anville has done to earn the reward of being forgotten instead of eaten.

Eloise [her lips quivering]. She surrendered her property voluntarily. She gave up all she owned to the Nation.

Valsin [genially]. And immediately went to live with her relatives in great luxury.

Eloise [choking]. The Republic will protect her. She gave her whole estate—

Valsin. And the order for its confiscation was already written when she did it.

Eloise [passionately]. Ah—liar!

Valsin [smiling]. I have seen the order. [She leans against the wall, breathing heavily. He goes on, smoothly.] Yes, this martyr "gave" us her property; but one hears that she went to the opera just the same and wore more jewels than ever, and lived richly upon the Laseynes and Valny-Cheraults, until they were confiscated. Why, all the world knows about this woman; and let me tell you, to your credit, my governess, I think you have a charitable heart: you are the only person I ever heard speak kindly of her.

Eloise [setting her teeth]. Venom!

Valsin [observing her slyly]. It is with difficulty I am restraining my curiosity to see her—also to hear her!—when she learns of her proscription by a grateful Republic.

Eloise [with shrill mockery]. Proscribed? Eloise d'Anville proscribed? Your inventions should be more plausible, Goodman Spy! I knew you were lying—

Valsin [smiling]. You do not believe—

Eloise [proudly]. Eloise d'Anville is a known Girondist. The Gironde is the real power in France.

Valsin [mildly]. That party has fallen.

Eloise [with fire]. Not far! It will revive.

Valsin. Pardon, Citizeness, but you are behind the times, and they are very fast nowadays—the times. The Gironde is dead.

Eloise [ominously]. It may survive you, my friend. Take care!

Valsin [unimpressed]. The Gironde had a grand façade, and that was all. It was a party composed of amateurs and orators; and of course there were some noisy camp-followers and a few comic-opera vivandières, such as this d'Anville. In short, the Gironde looked enormous because it was hollow. It was like a pie that is all crust. We have tapped the crust—with a knife, Citizeness. There is nothing left.

Eloise [contemptuously]. You say so. Nevertheless, the Rolands—

Valsin [gravely]. Roland was found in a field yesterday; he had killed himself. His wife was guillotined the day after you left Paris. Every one of their political friends is proscribed.

Eloise [shaking as with bitter cold]. It is a lie! Not Eloise d'Anville!

Valsin [rising]. Would you like to see the warrant for her arrest? [He takes a packet of documents from his breast pocket, selects one, and spreads it open before her.] Let me read you her description: "Eloise d'Anville, aristocrat. Figure, comely. Complexion, blond. Eyes, dark blue. Nose, straight. Mouth, wide—"

Eloise [in a burst of passion, striking the warrant a violent blow with her clenched fist]. Let them dare! [Beside herself, she strikes again, tearing the paper from his grasp. She stamps upon it.] Let them dare, I say!

Valsin [picking up the warrant]. Dare to say her mouth is wide?

Eloise [cyclonic]. Dare to arrest her!

Valsin. It does seem a pity. [He folds the warrant slowly and replaces it in his pocket.] Yes, a great pity. She was the one amusing thing in all this somberness. She will be missed. The Revolution will lack its joke.

Eloise [recoiling, her passion exhausted]. Ah, infamy! [She turns from him, covering her face with her hands.]

Valsin [with a soothing gesture]. Being only her friend, you speak mildly. The d'Anville herself would call it blasphemy.

Eloise [with difficulty]. She is—so vain—then?

Valsin [lightly]. Oh, a type—an actress.

Eloise [her back to him]. How do you know? You said—

Valsin. That I had not encountered her. [Glibly.] One knows best the people one has never seen. Intimacy confuses judgment. I confess to that amount of hatred for the former Marquis de Valny-Cherault that I take as great an interest in all that concerns him as if I loved him. And the little d'Anville concerns him—yes, almost one would say, consumes him. The unfortunate man is said to be so blindly faithful that he can speak her name without laughing.

Eloise [stunned]. Oh!

Valsin [going on, cheerily]. No one else can do that, Citizeness. Jacobins, Cordeliers, Hébertists, even the shattered relics of the Gironde itself, all alike join in the colossal laughter at this Tricoteuse in Sèvres—this Jeanne d'Arc in rice-powder!

Eloise [tragically]. They laugh—and proclaim her an outlaw!

Valsin [waving his hand carelessly]. Oh, it is only that we are sweeping up the last remnants of aristocracy, and she goes with the rest—into the dust-heap. She should have remained a royalist; the final spectacle might have had dignity. As it is, she is not of her own class, not of ours: neither fish nor flesh nor—but yes, perhaps, after all, she is a fowl.

Eloise [brokenly]. Alas! Homing—with wounded wing! [She sinks into a chair with pathetic grace, her face in her hands.]

Valsin [surreptitiously grinning]. Not at all what I meant. [Brutally.] Peacocks don't fly.

Eloise [regaining her feet at a bound]. You imitation dandy! You—

Valsin [with benevolence]. My dear, your indignation for your friend is chivalrous. It is admirable; but she is not worth it. You do not understand her: you have probably seen her so much that you have never seen her as she is.

Eloise [witheringly]. But you, august Zeus, having never seen her, will reveal her to me!

Valsin [smoothly urbane]. If you have ears. You see, she is not altogether unique, but of a variety known to men who are wise enough to make a study of women.

Eloise [snapping out a short, loud laugh in his face]. Pouff!

Valsin [unruffled]. I profess myself an apprentice. The science itself is but in its infancy. Women themselves understand very well that they are to be classified, and they fear that we shall perceive it: they do not really wish to be known. Yet it is coming; some day our cyclopedists will have you sorted, classed, and defined with precision; but the d'Alembert of the future will not be a woman, because no woman so disloyal will ever be found. Men have to acquire loyalty to their sex: yours is an instinct. Citizen governess, I will give you a reading of the little d'Anville from this unwritten work. To begin—

Eloise [feverishly interested, but affecting languor]. Must you?

Valsin. To Eloise d'Anville the most interesting thing about a rose-bush has always been that Eloise d'Anville could smell it. Moonlight becomes important when it falls upon her face; sunset is worthy when she grows rosy in it. To her mind, the universe was set in motion to be the background for a decoration, and she is the decoration. She believes that the cathedral was built for the fresco. And when a dog interests her, it is because he would look well beside her in a painting. Such dogs have no minds. I refer you to all the dogs in the portraits of Beauties.

Eloise [not at all displeased; pretending carelessness]. Ah, you have heard that she is beautiful?

Valsin. Far worse: that she is a Beauty. Let nothing ever tempt you, my dear, into setting up in that line. For you are very well-appearing, I assure you; and if you had been surrounded with all the disadvantages of the d'Anville, who knows but that you might have become as famous a Beauty as she? What makes a Beauty is not the sumptuous sculpture alone, but a very peculiar arrogance—not in the least arrogance of mind, my little governess. In this, your d'Anville emerged from childhood full-panoplied indeed; and the feather-head court fell headlong at her feet. It was the fated creature's ruin.

Eloise [placidly]. And it is because of her beauty that you drag her to the guillotine?

Valsin. Bless you, I merely convey her!

Eloise. Tell me, logician, was it not her beauty that inspired her to give her property to the Nation?

Valsin. It was.

Eloise. What perception! I am faint with admiration. And no doubt it was her beauty that made her a Republican?

Valsin. What else?

Eloise. Hail, oracle! [She releases an arpeggio of satiric laughter.]

Valsin. That laugh is diaphanous. I see you through it, already convinced. [She stops laughing immediately.] Ha! we may proceed. Remark this, governess: a Beauty is the living evidence of man's immortality; the one plain proof that he has a soul.

Eloise. It is not so bad then, after all?

Valsin. It is utterly bad. But of all people a Beauty is most conscious of her duality. Her whole life is based upon her absolute knowledge that her Self and her body are two. She sacrifices all things to her beauty because her beauty feeds her Self with a dreadful food which it has made her unable to live without.

Eloise. My little gentleman, you talk like a sentimental waiter. Your metaphors are all hot from the kitchen.

Valsin [nettled]. It is natural; unlike your Eloise, I am really of "the People"—and starved much in my youth.

Eloise. But, like her, you are still hungry.

Valsin. A Beauty is a species of cannibal priestess, my dear. She will make burnt-offerings of her father and her mother, her sisters—her lovers—to her beauty, that it may in turn bring her the food she must have or perish.

Eloise. Boum! [She snaps her fingers.] And of course she bathes in the blood of little children?

Valsin [grimly]. Often.

Eloise [averting her gaze from his]. This mysterious food—

Valsin. Not at all mysterious. Sensation. There you have it. And that is why Eloise d'Anville is a renegade. You understand perfectly.

Eloise. You are too polite. No.

Valsin [gaily]. Behold, then! Many women who are not Beauties are beautiful, but in such women you do not always discover beauty at your first glance: it is disclosed with a subtle tardiness. It does not dazzle; it is reluctant; but it grows as you look again and again. You get a little here, a little there, like glimpses of children hiding in a garden. It is shy, and sometimes closed in from you altogether, and then, unexpectedly, this belated loveliness springs into bloom before your very eyes. It retains the capacity of surprise, the vital element of charm. But the Beauty lays all waste before her at a stroke: it is soon over. Thus your Eloise, brought to court, startled Versailles; the sensation was overwhelming. Then Versailles got used to her, just as it had to its other prodigies: the fountains were there, the King was there, the d'Anville was there; and naturally, one had seen them; saw them every day—one talked of matters less accepted. That was horrible to Eloise. She had tasted; the appetite, once stirred, was insatiable. At any cost she must henceforth have always the sensation of being a sensation. She must be the pivot of a reeling world. So she went into politics. Ah, Citizeness, there was one man who understood Beauties—not Homer, who wrote of Helen! Romance is gallant by profession, and Homer lied like a poet. For the truth about the Trojan War is that the wise Ulysses made it, not because Paris stole Helen, but because the Trojans were threatening to bring her back.

Eloise [unwarily]. Who was the man that understood Beauties?

Valsin. Bluebeard. [He crosses the room to the dressing-table, leans his back against it in an easy attitude, his elbows resting upon the top.]

Eloise [slowly, a little tremulously]. And so Eloise d'Anville should have her head cut off?

Valsin. Well, she thought she was in politics, didn't she? [Suavely.] You may be sure she thoroughly enjoyed her hallucination that she was a great figure in the Revolution—which was cutting off the heads of so many of her relatives and old friends! Don't waste your pity, my dear.

Eloise [looking at him fixedly]. Citizen, you must have thought a great deal about my unhappy friend. She might be flattered by so searching an interest.

Valsin [negligently]. Not interest in her, governess, but in the Emigrant who cools his heels on the other side of that door, greatly to my enjoyment, waiting my pleasure to arrest him. The poor wretch is the one remaining lover of this girl; faithful because he let his passion for her become a habit; and he will never get over it until he has had possession. She has made him suffer frightfully, but I shall never forgive her for not having dealt him the final stroke. It would have saved me all the bother I have been put to in avenging the injury he did me.

Eloise [frowning]. What "final stroke" could she have "dealt" him?

Valsin [with sudden vehement intensity]. She could have loved him! [He strikes the table with his fist.] I see it! I see it! Beauty's husband! [Pounding the table with each exclamation, his voice rising in excitement.] What a vision! This damned, proud, loving Louis, a pomade bearer! A buttoner! An errand-boy to the perfumer's, to the chemist's, to the milliner's! A groom of the powder-closet—

Eloise [snatching at the opportunity]. How noisy you are!

Valsin [discomfited, apologetically]. You see, it is only so lately that we of "the People" have dared even to whisper. Of course, now that we are free to shout, we overdo it. We let our voices out, we let our joys out, we let our hates out. We let everything out—except our prisoners! [He smiles winningly.]

Eloise [slowly]. Do you guess what all this bluster—this tirade upon the wickedness of beauty—makes me think?

Valsin. Certainly. Being a woman, you cannot imagine a bitterness which is not "personal."

Eloise [laughing]. "Being a woman," I think that the person who has caused you the greatest suffering in your life must be very good-looking!

Valsin [calmly]. Quite right. It was precisely this d'Anville. I will tell you. [He sits on the arm of a chair near her, and continues briskly.] I was not always a politician. Six years ago I was a soldier in the Valny regiment of cavalry. That was the old army, that droll army, that royal army; so ridiculous that it was truly majestic. In the Valny regiment we had some rouge-pots for officers—and for a colonel, who but our Emigrant yonder! Aha! we suffered in the ranks, let me tell you, when Eloise had been coy; and one morning it was my turn. You may have heard that she was betrothed first to Louis and later to several others? My martyrdom occurred the day after she had announced to the court her betrothal to the young Duc de Creil, whose father afterward interfered. Louis put us on drill in a hard rain: he had the habit of relieving his chagrin like that. My horse fell, and happened to shower our commander with mud. Louis let out all his rage upon me: it was an excuse, and, naturally, he disliked mud. But I was rolling in it, with my horse: I also disliked it—and I was indiscreet enough to attempt some small reply. That finished my soldiering, Citizeness. He had me tied to a post before the barracks for the rest of the day. I remember with remarkable distinctness that the valets of heaven had neglected to warm the rain for that bath; that it was February; and that Louis's orders had left me nothing to wear upon my back except an unfulsome descriptive placard and my modesty. Altogether it was a disadvantageous position, particularly for the exchange of repartee with such of my comrades as my youthful amiability had not endeared; I have seldom seen more cheerful indifference to bad weather. Inclement skies failed to injure the spectacle: it was truly the great performance of my career; some people would not even go home to eat, and peddlers did a good trade in cakes and wine. In the evening they whipped me conscientiously—my tailor has never since made me an entirely comfortable coat. Then they gave me the place of honor at the head of a procession by torchlight and drummed me out of camp with my placard upon my back. So I adopted another profession: I had a friend who was a doctor in the stables of d'Artois; and I knew horses. He made me his assistant.

Eloise [shuddering]. You are a veterinarian!

Valsin [smiling]. No; a horse-doctor. It was thus I "retired" from the army and became a politician. My friend was only a horse-doctor himself, but his name happened to be Marat.

Eloise. Ah, frightful! [For the first time she begins to feel genuine alarm.]

Valsin. The sequence is simple. If Eloise d'Anville hadn't coquetted with young Creil I shouldn't be Commissioner here to-day, settling my account with Louis. I am in his debt for more than the beating: I should tell you there was a woman in my case, a slender lace-maker with dark eyes—very pretty eyes. She had furnished me with a rival, a corporal; and he brought her for a stroll in the rain past our barracks that day when I was attracting so much unsought attention. They waited for the afterpiece, enjoyed a pasty and a bottle of Beaune, and went away laughing cozily together. I did not see my pretty lace-maker again, not for years—not until a month ago. Her corporal was still with her, and it was their turn to be undesirably conspicuous. They were part of a procession passing along the Rue St. Honoré on its way to the Place of the Revolution. They were standing up in the cart; the lace-maker had grown fat, and she was scolding her poor corporal bitterly. What a habit that must have been!—they were not five minutes from the guillotine. I own that a thrill of gratitude to Louis temporarily softened me toward him, though at the very moment I was following him through the crowd. At least he saved me from the lace-maker!

Eloise [shrinking from him]. You are horrible!

Valsin. To my regret you must find me more and more so.

Eloise [panting]. You are going to take us back to Paris, then? To the Tribunal—and to the—[She covers her eyes with her hands.]

Valsin [gravely]. I can give you no comfort, governess. You are involved with the Emigrant, and, to be frank, I am going to do as horrible things to Louis as I can invent—and I am an ingenious man. [His manner becomes sinister.] I am near the top. The cinders of Marat are in the Pantheon, but Robespierre still flames; and he claims me as his friend. I can do what I will. And I have much in store for Louis before he shall be so fortunate as to die!

Eloise [faintly]. And—and Eloise—d'Anville? [Her hands fall from her face: he sees large, beautiful tears upon her cheeks.]

Valsin [coldly]. Yes. [She is crushed for the moment; then, recovering herself with a violent effort, lifts her head defiantly and stands erect, facing him.]

Eloise. You take her head because your officer punished you, six years ago, for a breach of military discipline!

Valsin [in a lighter tone]. Oh no. I take it, just as she injured me—incidentally. In truth, Citizeness, it isn't I who take it: I only arrest her because the government has proscribed her.

Eloise. And you've just finished telling me you were preparing tortures for her! I thought you an intelligent man. Pah! You're only a gymnast. [She turns away from him haughtily and moves toward the door.]

Valsin [touching his scarf of office]. True. I climb. [She halts suddenly, as if startled by this; she stands as she is, her back to him, for several moments, and does not change her attitude when she speaks.]

Eloise [slowly]. You climb alone.

Valsin [with a suspicious glance at her]. Yes—alone.

Eloise [in a low voice]. Why didn't you take the lace-maker with you? You might have been happier. [Very slowly she turns and comes toward him, her eyes full upon his: she moves deliberately and with incomparable grace. He seems to be making an effort to look away, and failing: he cannot release his eyes from the glorious and starry glamour that holds them. She comes very close to him, so close that she almost touches him.]

Eloise [in a half-whisper]. You might have been happier with—a friend—to climb with you.

Valsin [demoralized]. Citizeness—I am—I—

Eloise [in a voice of velvet]. Yes, Say it. You are—

Valsin [desperately]. I have told you that I am the most susceptible of men.

Eloise [impulsively putting her hand on his shoulder]. Is it a crime? Come, my friend, you are a man who does climb: you will go over all. You believe in the Revolution because you have used it to lift you. But other things can help you, too. Don't you need them?

Valsin [understanding perfectly, gasping]. Need what? [She draws her hand from his shoulder, moves back from him slightly, and crosses her arms upon her bosom with a royal meekness.]

Eloise [grandly]. Do I seem so useless?

Valsin [in a distracted voice]. Heaven help me! What do you want?

Eloise. Let these people go. [Hurriedly, leaning near him.] I have promised to save them: give them their permit to embark, and I—[She pauses, flushing beautifully, but does not take her eyes from him.] I—I do not wish to leave France. My place is in Paris. You will go into the National Committee. You can be its ruler. You will rule it! I believe in you! [Glowing like a rose of fire.] I will go with you. I will help you! I will marry you!

Valsin [in a fascinated whisper]. Good Lord! [He stumbles back from her, a strange light in his eyes.]

Eloise. You are afraid—

Valsin [with sudden loudness]. I am! Upon my soul, I am afraid!

Eloise [smiling gloriously upon him]. Of what, my friend? Tell me of what?

Valsin [explosively]. Of myself! I am afraid of myself because I am a prophet. This is precisely what I foretold to myself you would do! I knew it, yet I am aghast when it happens—aghast at my own cleverness!

Eloise [bewildered to blankness]. What?

Valsin [half hysterical with outrageous vanity]. I swear I knew it, and it fits so exactly that I am afraid of myself! Aha, Valsin, you rogue! I should hate to have you on my track! Citizen governess, you are a wonderful person, but not so wonderful as this devil of a Valsin!

Eloise [vaguely, in a dead voice]. I cannot understand what you are talking about. Do you mean—

Valsin. And what a spell was upon me! I was near calling Dossonville to preserve me.

Eloise [speaking with a strange naturalness, like a child's]. You mean—you don't want me?

Valsin. Ah, Heaven help me, I am going to laugh again! Oh, ho, ho! I am spent! [He drops into a chair and gives way to another attack of uproarious hilarity.] Ah, ha, ha, ha! Oh, my liver, ha, ha! No, Citizeness, I do not want you! Oh, ha, ha, ha!

Eloise. Oh! [She utters a choked scream and rushes at him.] Swine!

Valsin [warding her off with outstretched hands]. Spare me! Ha, ha, ha! I am helpless! Ho, ho, ho! Citizeness, it would not be worth your while to strangle a man who is already dying!

Eloise [beside herself]. Do you dream that I meant it?

Valsin [feebly]. Meant to strangle me?

Eloise [frantic]. To give myself to you!

Valsin. In short, to—to marry me! [He splutters.]

Eloise [furiously]. It was a ruse—

Valsin [soothingly]. Yes, yes, a trick. I saw that all along.

Eloise [even more infuriated]. For their sake, beast! [She points to the other room.] To save them!

Valsin [wiping his eyes]. Of course, of course. [He rises, stepping quickly to the side of the chair away from her and watching her warily.] I knew it was to save them. We'll put it like that.

Eloise [in an anger of exasperation]. It was that!

Valsin. Yes, yes. [Keeping his distance.] I saw it from the first. [Suppressing symptoms of returning mirth.] It was perfectly plain. You mustn't excite yourself—nothing could have been clearer! [A giggle escapes him, and he steps hastily backward as she advances upon him.]

Eloise. Poodle! Valet! Scum of the alleys! Sheep of the prisons! Jailer! Hangman! Assassin! Brigand! Horse-doctor! [She hurls the final epithet at him in a climax of ferocity which wholly exhausts her; and she sinks into the chair by the desk, with her arms upon the desk and her burning face hidden in her arms. Valsin, morbidly chuckling, in spite of himself, at each of her insults, has retreated farther and farther, until he stands with his back against the door of the inner room, his right hand behind him, resting on the latch. As her furious eyes leave him he silently opens the door, letting it remain a few inches ajar and keeping his back to it. Then, satisfied that what he intends to say will be overheard by those within, he erases all expression from his face, and strides to the dismantled doorway in the passage.]

Valsin [calling loudly]. Dossonville! [He returns, coming down briskly to Eloise. His tone is crisp and soldier-like.] Citizeness, I have had my great hour. I proceed with the arrests. I have given you four plenty of time to prepare yourselves. Time? Why, the Emigrant could have changed clothes with one of the women in there a dozen times if he had hoped to escape in that fashion—as historical prisoners have won clear, it is related. Fortunately, that is impossible just now; and he will not dare to attempt it.

Dossonville [appearing in the hallway]. Present, my chieftain!

Valsin [sharply]. Attend, Dossonville. The returned Emigrant, Valny-Cherault, is forfeited; but because I cherish a special grievance against him, I have decided upon a special punishment for him. It does not please me that he should have the comfort and ministrations of loving women on his journey to the Tribunal. No, no; the presence of his old sweetheart would make even the scaffold sweet to him. Therefore I shall take him alone. I shall let these women go.

Dossonville. What refinement! Admirable! [Eloise slowly rises, staring incredulously at Valsin.]

Valsin [picking up the "permit" from the desk]. "Permit the Citizen Balsage and his sister, the Citizeness Virginie Balsage, and his second sister, Marie Balsage, and Eloise d'Anville—" Ha! You see, Dossonville, since one of these three women is here, there are two in the other room with the Emigrant. They are to come out, leaving him there. First, however, we shall disarm him. You and I have had sufficient experience in arresting aristocrats to know that they are not always so sensible as to give themselves up peaceably, and I happened to see the outline of a pistol under the Emigrant's frock the other day in the diligence. We may as well save one of us from a detestable hole through the body. [He steps toward the door, speaking sharply.] Emigrant, you have heard. For your greater chagrin, these three devoted women are to desert you. Being an aristocrat, you will pretend to prefer this arrangement. They are to leave at once. Throw your pistol into this room, and I will agree not to make the arrest until they are in safety. They can reach your vessel in five minutes. When they have gone, I give you my word not to open this door for ten. [A pistol is immediately thrown out of the door, and falls at Valsin's feet. He picks it up, his eyes alight with increasing excitement.]

Valsin [tossing the pistol to Dossonville]. Call the lieutenant. [Dossonville goes to the window, leans out, and beckons. Valsin writes hastily at the desk, not sitting down.] "Permit the three women Balsage to embark without delay upon the Jeune Pierrette. Signed: Valsin." There, Citizeness, is a "permit" which permits. [He thrusts the paper into the hand of Eloise, swings toward the door of the inner room, and raps loudly upon it.] Come, my feminines! Your sailors await you—brave, but no judges of millinery. There's a fair wind for you; and a grand toilet is wasted at sea. Come, charmers; come! [The door is half opened, and Madame de Laseyne, white and trembling violently, enters quickly, shielding as much as she can the inexpressibly awkward figure of her brother, behind whom she extends her hand, closing the door sharply. He wears the brocaded skirt which Madame de Laseyne has taken from the portmanteau, and Eloise's long mantle, the lifted hood and Madame de Laseyne's veil shrouding his head and face.]

Valsin [in a stifled voice]. At last! At last one beholds the regal d'Anville! No Amazon—

Dossonville [aghast]. It looks like—

Valsin [shouting]. It doesn't! [He bows gallantly to Louis.] A cruel veil, but, oh, what queenly grace! [Louis stumbles in the skirt. Valsin falls back, clutching at his side. But Eloise rushes to Louis and throws herself upon her knees at his feet. She pulls his head down to hers and kisses him through the veil.]

Valsin [madly]. Oh, touching devotion! Oh, sisters! Oh, love! Oh, honey! Oh, petticoats—

Dossonville [interrupting humbly]. The lieutenant, Citizen Commissioner. [He points to the hallway, where the officer appears, standing at attention.]

Valsin [wheeling]. Officer, conduct these three persons to the quay. Place them on board the Jeune Pierrette. The captain will weigh anchor instantly. [The officer salutes.]

Anne [hoarsely to Louis, who is lifting the weeping Eloise to her feet]. Quick! In the name of—

Valsin. Off with you! [Madame de Laseyne seizes the portmanteau and rushes to the broken doorway, half dragging the others with her. They go out in a tumultuous hurry, followed by the officer. Eloise sends one last glance over her shoulder at Valsin as she disappears, and one word of concentrated venom: "Buffoon!" In wild spirits he blows a kiss to her. The fugitives are heard clattering madly down the stairs.]

Dossonville [excitedly]. We can take the Emigrant now. [Going to the inner door.] Why wait—

Valsin. That room is empty.

Dossonville. What!

Valsin [shouting with laughter]. He's gone! Not bare-backed, but in petticoats: that's worse! He's gone, I tell you! The other was the d'Anville.

Dossonville. Then you recog—

Valsin. Imbecile, she's as well known as the Louvre! They're off on their honeymoon! She'll take him now! She will! She will, on the soul of a prophet! [He rushes to the window and leans far out, shouting at the top of his voice:] Quits with you, Louis! Quits! Quits! [He falls back from the window and relapses into a chair, cackling ecstatically.]

Dossonville [hoarse with astonishment]. You've let him go! You've let 'em all go!

Valsin [weak with laughter]. Well, you're not going to inform. [With a sudden reversion to extreme seriousness, he levels a sinister forefinger at his companion.] And, also, take care of your health, friend; remember constantly that you have a weak throat, and don't you ever mention this to my wife! These are bad times, my Dossonville, and neither you nor I will see the end of them. Good Lord! Can't we have a little fun as we go along? [A fresh convulsion seizes him, and he rocks himself pitiably in his chair.]

Link [snapping his eyes wide open, sits up].
Hello! Cat-nappin' was I, Polly?

Polly. Just
a kitten-nap, I guess.
[Laying the hoe down, she approaches.]
The yoke done?

Link [giving a final whittle to the yoke-collar thong].
Thar!
When he's ben steamed a spell, and bended snug,
I guess this feller'll sarve t' say "Gee" to—

[Lifting the other yoke-collar from beside his chair, he holds the whittled thong next to it, comparing the two with expert eye.]

and "Haw" to him. Beech every time, Sir; beech or walnut. Hang me if I'd shake a whip at birch, for ox-yokes.—Polly, are ye thar?

Polly.
Yes, Uncle Link.

Link. What's that I used to sing ye?
"Polly, put the kittle on,
Polly, put the kittle on,
Polly, put the kittle on—" [Chuckling.]
We'll give this feller a dose of ox-yoke tea!

Polly.
The kettle's boilin'.

Link. Wall, then, steep him good.

[Polly takes from Link the collar-thong, carries it to the work-bench, shoves it into the narrow end of the box, which she then closes tight and connects—by a piece of hose—to the spout of the kettle. At the further end of the box, steam then emerges through a small hole.]

Polly.
You're feelin' smart to-day.

Link. Smart!—Wall, if I could git a hull man to swap legs with me, mebbe I'd arn my keep. But this here settin' dead an' alive, without no legs, day in, day out, don't make an old hoss wuth his oats.

Polly [cheerfully].
I guess you'll soon be walkin' round.

Link. Not if that doctor feller has his say: He says I can't never go agin this side o' Jordan; and looks like he's 'bout right.—Nine months to-morrer, Polly, gal, sence I had that stroke.

Polly [pointing to the ox-yoke].
You're fitter sittin' than most folks standin'.

Link [briskly]. Oh, they can't keep my two hands from makin' ox-yokes. That's my second natur' sence I was a boy.
[Again in the distance a bugle sounds. Link starts.]
What's that?

Polly. Why, that's the army veterans down to the graveyard. This is Decoration mornin': you ain't forgot?

Link. So 'tis, so 'tis. Roger, your young man—ha! [Chuckling.] He come and axed me was I agoin' to the cemetery.
"Me? Don't I look it?" says I. Ha! "Don't I look it?"

Polly He meant—to decorate the graves.

Link. O' course; but I must take my little laugh. I told him I guessed I wa'n't persent'ble anyhow, my mustache and my boots wa'n't blacked this mornin'. I don't jest like t' talk about my legs.— Be you a-goin' to take your young school folks, Polly?

Polly.
Dear no! I told my boys and girls to march up this way with the band. I said I'd be a-stayin' home and learnin' how to keep school in the woodpile here with you.

Link [looking up at her proudly].
Schoolma'am at seventeen! Some smart, I tell ye!

Polly [caressing him].
School-master, you, past seventy; that's smarter! I tell 'em I learn from you, so's I can teach my young folks what the study-books leave out.

Link.
Sure ye don't want to jine the celebratin'?

Polly.
No Sir! We're goin' to celebrate right here, and you're to teach me to keep school some more.
[She holds ready for him the blue coat and hat.]

Link [looking up].
What's thar?

Polly. Your teachin' rig.
[She helps him on with it.]

Link. The old blue coat!—
My, but I'd like to see the boys: [Gazing at the hat.] the Grand Old Army Boys! [Dreamily.] Yes, we was boys: jest boys!
Polly, you tell your young folks, when they study the books, that we was nothin' else but boys jest fallin' in love, with best gals left t' home— the same as you; and when the shot was singin', we pulled their pictur's out, and prayed to them 'most more 'n the Allmighty.

[Link looks up suddenly—a strange light in his face. Again, to a far strain of music, the bugle sounds.]

Thar she blows
Agin!

Polly.
They're marchin' to the graves with flowers.

Link.
My Godfrey! 't ain't so much thinkin' o' flowers and the young folks, their faces, and the blue line of old fellers marchin'—it's the music! that old brass voice a-callin'! Seems as though, legs or no legs, I'd have to up and foller to God-knows-whar, and holler—holler back to guns roarin' in the dark. No; durn it, no! I jest can't stan' the music.

Polly [goes to the work-bench, where the box is steaming].
Uncle Link,
you want that I should steam this longer?

Link [absently].
Oh,
A kittleful, a kittleful.

Polly [coming over to him].
Now, then,
I'm ready for school.—I hope I've drawed the map all right.

Link.
Map? Oh, the map!
[Surveying the woodpile reminiscently, he nods.]
Yes, thar she be:
old Gettysburg!

Polly.
I know the places—most.

Link.
So, do ye? Good, now: whar's your marker?

Polly [taking up the hoe].
Here.

Link.
Willoughby Run: whar's that?

Polly [points with the hoe toward the left of the woodpile].
That's farthest over next the barn door.

Link. My, how we fit the Johnnies
thar, the fust mornin'! Jest behind them willers,
acrost the Run, that's whar we captur'd Archer.
My, my!

Polly. Over there—that's Seminary Ridge.
[She points to different heights and depressions, as Link nods his approval.]
Peach Orchard, Devil's Den, Round Top, the Wheatfield—

Link.
Lord, Lord, the Wheatfield!

Polly [continuing].
Cemetery Hill,
Little Round Top, Death Valley, and this here
is Cemetery Ridge.

Link [pointing to the little flag].
And colors flyin'!
We kep 'em flyin' thar, too, all three days,
from start to finish.

Polly. Have I learned 'em right?

Link.
A number One, chick! Wait a mite: Culp's Hill:
I don't jest spy Culp's Hill.

Polly. There wa'n't enough
kindlin's to spare for that. It ought to lay
east there, towards the kitchen.

Link. Let it go!
That's whar us Yanks left our back door ajar
and Johnson stuck his foot in: kep it thar,
too, till he got it squoze off by old Slocum.
Let Culp's Hill lay for now.—Lend me your marker.
[Polly hands him the hoe. From his chair, he reaches with it and digs in the chips.]
Death Valley needs some scoopin' deeper. So:
smooth off them chips.
[Polly does so with her foot.]
You better guess 't was deep
as hell, that second day, come sundown.—Here,
[He hands back the hoe to her.]
flat down the Wheatfield yonder.
[Polly does so.]
Goda'mighty!
that Wheatfield: wall, we flatted it down flatter
than any pancake what you ever cooked,
Polly; and 't wan't no maple syrup neither
was runnin', slipp'ry hot and slimy black
all over it, that nightfall.

Polly. Here's the road
to Emmetsburg.

Link. No, 'tain't: this here's the pike
to Taneytown, where Sykes's boys come sweatin',
after an all-night march, jest in the nick
to save our second day. The Emmetsburg
road's thar.—Whar was I, 'fore I fell cat-nappin'?

Polly.
At sunset, July second, Sixty-three.

Link [nodding, reminiscent].
The Bloody Sundown! God, that crazy sun:
she set a dozen times that afternoon,
red-yeller as a punkin jacko'lantern,
rairin' and pitchin' through the roarin' smoke
till she clean busted, like the other bombs,
behind the hills.

Polly. My! Wa'n't you never scart
and wished you'd stayed t' home?

Link. Scart? Wall, I wonder!
Chick, look a-thar: them little stripes and stars.
I heerd a feller onct, down to the store,—
a dressy mister, span-new from the city—
layin' the law down: "All this stars and stripes,"
says he, "and red and white and blue is rubbish,
mere sentimental rot, spread-eagleism!"
"I wan't t' know!" says I. "In Sixty-three,
I knowed a lad, named Link. Onct, after sundown
I met him stumblin'—with two dead men's muskets
for crutches—towards a bucket, full of ink—
water, they called it. When he'd drunk a spell,
he tuk the rest to wash his bullet holes.—
Wall, sir, he had a piece o' splintered stick,
with red and white and blue, tore 'most t' tatters,
a-danglin' from it." "Be you color sergeant?"
says I. "Not me," says Link; "the sergeant's dead,
but when he fell, he handed me this bit
o' rubbish—red and white and blue." And Link
he laughed. "What be you laughin' for?" says I.
"Oh, nothin'. Ain't it lovely, though!" says Link.

Polly.
What did the span-new mister say to that?

Link.
I didn't stop to listen. Them as never
heerd dead men callin' for the colors don't
guess what they be. [Sitting up and blinking hard.]
But this ain't keepin' school!

Polly [quietly].
I guess I'm learnin' somethin', Uncle Link.

Link.
The second day, 'fore sunset.
[He takes the hoe and points with it.]
Yon's the Wheatfield.
Behind it thar lies Longstreet with his rebels.
Here be the Yanks, and Cemetery Ridge
behind 'em. Hancock—he's our general—
he's got to hold the Ridge, till reinforcements
from Taneytown. But lose the Wheatfield, lose
the Ridge, and lose the Ridge—lose God-and-all!—
Lee, the old fox, he'd nab up Washington,
Abe Lincoln and the White House in one bite!—
So the Union, Polly,—me and you and Roger,
your Uncle Link, and Uncle Sam—is all
thar—growin' in that Wheatfield.

Polly [smiling proudly].
And they're growin'
still!

Link.
Not the wheat, though. Over them stone walls,
thar comes the Johnnies, thick as grasshoppers:
gray legs a-jumpin' through the tall wheat tops.
And now thar ain't no tops, thar ain't no wheat,
thar ain't no lookin': jest blind feelin' round
in the black mud, and trampin' on boys' faces,
and grapplin' with hell-devils, and stink o' smoke,
and stingin' smother, and—up thar through the dark—
that crazy punkin sun, like an old moon
lopsided, crackin' her red shell with thunder!

[In the distance, a bugle sounds, and the low martial music of a brass band begins. Again Link's face twitches, and he pauses, listening. From this moment on, the sound and emotion of the brass music, slowly growing louder, permeates the scene.]

Polly.
Oh! What was God a-thinkin' of, t' allow
the created world to act that awful?

Link. Now,
I wonder!—Cast your eye along this hoe:
[He stirs the chips and wood-dirt round with the hoe-iron.]
Thar in that poked up mess o' dirt, you see
yon weeny chip of ox-yoke?—That's the boy
I spoke on: Link, Link Tadbourne: "Chipmunk Link,"
they call him, 'cause his legs is spry 's a squirrel's.—
Wall, mebbe some good angel, with bright eyes
like yourn, stood lookin' down on him that day,
keepin' the Devil's hoe from crackin' him.
[Patting her hand, which rests on his hoe.]
If so, I reckon, Polly, it was you.
But mebbe jest Old Nick, as he sat hoein'
them hills, and haulin' in the little heaps
o' squirmin' critters, kind o' reco'nized
Link as his livin' image, and so kep him
to put in an airthly hell, whar thar ain't no legs,
and worn-out devils sit froze in high-backed chairs,
list'nin' to bugles—bugles—bugles, callin'.
[Link clutches the sides of his chair, staring. The music draws nearer. Polly touches him soothingly.]

Polly.
Don't, dear; they'll soon quit playin'. Never mind 'em.

Link [relaxing under her touch].
No, never mind; that's right. It's jest that onct—
onct we was boys, onct we was boys—with legs.
But never mind. An old boy ain't a bugle.
Onct, though, he was: and all God's life a-snortin'
outn his nostrils, and Hell's mischief laughin'
outn his eyes, and all the mornin' winds
ablowin' Glory Hallelujahs, like
brass music, from his mouth.—But never mind!
'T ain't nothin': boys in blue ain't bugles now.
Old brass gits rusty, and old underpinnin'
gits rotten, and trapped chipmunks lose their legs.
[With smoldering fire.]
But jest the same—

[His face convulses and he cries out, terribly—straining in his chair to rise.]

—for holy God, that band!
Why don't they stop that band!

Polly [going].
I'll run and tell them.
Sit quiet, dear. I'll be right back.

[Glancing back anxiously, Polly disappears outside. The approaching band begins to play "John Brown's Body." Link sits motionless, gripping his chair.]

Link. Set quiet!
Dead folks don't set, and livin' folks kin stand,
and Link—he kin set quiet.—Goda'mighty,
how kin he set, and them a-marchin' thar
with old John Brown? Lord God, you ain't forgot
the boys, have ye? the boys, how they come marchin'
home to ye, live and dead, behind old Brown,
a-singin' Glory to ye! Jest look down:
thar's Gettysburg, thar's Cemetery Ridge:
don't say ye disremember them! And thar's
the colors: Look, he's picked 'em up—the sergeant's
blood splotched 'em some—but thar they be, still flyin'!
Link done that: Link—the spry boy, what they call
Chipmunk: you ain't forgot his double-step,
have ye? [Again he cries out, beseechingly.]—
My God, why do You keep on marchin'
and leave him settin' here?

[To the music outside, the voices of children begin to sing the words of "John Brown's Body." At the sound, Link's face becomes transformed with emotion, his body shakes and his shoulders heave and straighten.]

No!—I—won't—set!
[Wresting himself mightily, he rises from his chair, and stands.]
Them are the boys that marched to Kingdom-Come
ahead of us, but we keep fallin' in line.
Them voices—Lord, I guess you've brought along
your Sunday choir of young angel folks
to help the boys out.
[Following the music with swaying arms.]
Glory!—Never mind
me singin': you kin drown me out. But I'm
goin' t' jine in, or bust!

[Joining with the children's voices, he moves unconsciously along the edge of the woodpile. With stiff steps—his one hand leaning on the hoe, his other reached as to unseen hands, that draw him—he totters toward the sunlight and the green lawn, at back. As he does so, his thin, cracked voice takes up the battle-hymn where the children's are singing it:]

"—a-mold'rin' in the grave,
John Brown's body lies a-mold'rin' in the grave,
John Brown's body lies a-mold'rin' in the grave,
But his soul goes—"

[Suddenly he stops, aware that he is walking, and cries aloud, astounded:]
Lord, Lord, my legs!
Whar did Ye git my legs?

[Shaking with delight, he drops his hoe, seizes up the little flag from the woodpile, and waves it joyously.]

I'm comin', boys!
Link's loose agin: Chipmunk has sprung his trap.
[With tottering gait, he climbs the little mound in the woodpile.]
Now, boys, three cheers for Cemetery Ridge!
Jine in, jine in!
[Swinging the flag.]
Hooray!—Hooray!—Hooray!

[Outside, the music grows louder, and the voices of old men and children sing martially to the brass music.
With his final cheer, Link stumbles down from the mound, brandishes in one hand his hat, in the other the little flag, and stumps off toward the approaching procession into the sunlight, joining his old cracked voice, jubilant, with the singers:]

"—ry hallelujah,
Glory, glory hallelujah,
His truth is marchin' on!"

Richard. Three guesses who it is.

Viola [putting her hands over his]. The Archbishop of Canterbury.

Richard. No.

Viola. The Archbishop of York.

Richard. Fortunately that exhausts the archbishops. Now, then, your last guess.

Viola. Richard Meriton, M.P.

Richard. Wonderful! [He kisses the top of her head lightly and goes round to the club fender, where he sits with his back to the fireplace.] How did you know? [He begins to fill a pipe.]

Viola [smiling]. Well, it couldn't have been father.

Richard. N-no, I suppose not. Not just after breakfast anyway. Anything in the paper?

Viola. There's a letter from father pointing out that ——

Richard. I never knew such a man as Robert for pointing out.

Viola. Anyhow, it's in big print.

Richard. It would be.

Viola. You are very cynical this morning, Dick.

Richard. The sausages were cold, dear.

Viola. Poor Dick! Oh, Dick, I wish you were on the same side as father.

Richard. But he's on the wrong side. Surely I've told you that before.... Viola, do you really think it would make a difference?

Viola. Well, you know what he said about you at Basingstoke the other day.

Richard. No, I don't, really.

Viola. He said that your intellectual arrogance was only equaled by your spiritual instability. I don't quite know what it means, but it doesn't sound the sort of thing you want in a son-in-law.

Richard. Still, it was friendly of him to go right away to Basingstoke to say it. Anyhow, you don't believe it.

Viola. Of course not.

Richard. And Robert doesn't really.

Viola. Then why does he say it?

Richard. Ah, now you're opening up very grave questions. The whole structure of the British Constitution rests upon Robert's right to say things like that at Basingstoke.... But really, darling, we're very good friends. He's always asking my advice about things—he doesn't take it, of course, but still he asks it; and it was awfully good of him to insist on my staying here while my flat was being done up. [Seriously.] I bless him for that. If it hadn't been for the last week I should never have known you. You were just "Viola"—the girl I'd seen at odd times since she was a child; and now—oh, why won't you let me tell your father? I hate it like this.

Viola. Because I love you, Dick, and because I know father. He would, as they say in novels, show you the door. [Smiling.] And I want you this side of the door for a little bit longer.

Richard [firmly]. I shall tell him before I go.

Viola [pleadingly]. But not till then; that gives us two more days. You see, darling, it's going to take me all I know to get round him. You see, apart from politics you're so poor—and father hates poor people.

Richard [viciously]. Damn money!

Viola [thoughtfully]. I think that's what father means by spiritual instability.

Richard. Viola! [He stands up and holds out his arms to her. She goes to him and—] Oh, Lord, look out!

Viola [reaching across to the mantelpiece]. Matches?

Richard. Thanks very much. [He lights his pipe as Robert Crawshaw comes in. Crawshaw is forty-five, but his closely-trimmed mustache and whiskers, his inclination to stoutness, and the loud old-gentlemanly style in trousers which he affects with his morning-coat, make him look older, and, what is more important, the Pillar of the State which he undoubtedly is.]

Crawshaw. Good-morning, Richard. Down at last?

Richard. Good-morning. I did warn you, didn't I, that I was bad at breakfasts?

Crawshaw. Viola, where's your mother?

Viola [making for the door]. I don't know, father; do you want her?

Crawshaw. I wish to speak to her.

Viola. All right, I'll tell her. [She goes out. Richard picks up "The Times" and sits down again.]

Crawshaw [sitting down in a business-like way at his desk]. Richard, why don't you get something to do?

Richard. My dear fellow, I've only just finished breakfast.

Crawshaw. I mean generally. And apart, of course, from your—ah—work in the House.

Richard [a trifle cool]. I have something to do.

Crawshaw. Oh, reviewing. I mean something serious. You should get a directorship or something in the City.

Richard. I hate the City.

Crawshaw. Ah! there, my dear Richard, is that intellectual arrogance to which I had to call attention the other day at Basingstoke.

Richard [dryly]. Yes, so Viola was telling me.

Crawshaw. You understood, my dear fellow, that I meant nothing personal. [Clearing his throat.] It is justly one of the proudest boasts of the Englishman that his political enmities are not allowed to interfere with his private friendships.

Richard [carelessly]. Oh, I shall go to Basingstoke myself one day.

Enter Margaret. Margaret has been in love with Robert Crawshaw for twenty-five years, the last twenty-four years from habit. She is small, comfortable, and rather foolish; you would certainly call her a dear, but you might sometimes call her a poor dear.

Margaret. Good-morning, Mr. Meriton. I do hope your breakfast was all right.

Richard. Excellent, thank you.

Margaret. That's right. Did you want me, Robert?

Crawshaw [obviously uncomfortable]. Yes—er—h'r'm—Richard—er—what are your—er—plans?

Richard. Is he trying to get rid of me, Mrs. Crawshaw?

Margaret. Of course not. [To Robert.] Are you, dear?

Crawshaw. Perhaps we had better come into my room, Margaret. We can leave Richard here with the paper.

Richard. No, no; I'm going.

Crawshaw [going to the door with him]. I have some particular business to discuss. If you aren't going out, I should like to consult you in the matter afterwards.

Richard. Right. [He goes out.]

Crawshaw. Sit down, Margaret. I have some extraordinary news for you.

Margaret [sitting down]. Yes, Robert?

Crawshaw. This letter has just come by hand. [He reads it.] "199, Lincoln's Inn Fields. Dear Sir, I have the pleasure to inform you that under the will of the late Mr. Antony Clifton you are a beneficiary to the extent of £50,000."

Margaret. Robert!

Crawshaw. Wait! "A trifling condition is attached—namely, that you should take the name of—Wurzel-Flummery."

Margaret. Robert!

Crawshaw. "I have the honor to be, your obedient servant, Denis Clifton." [He folds the letter up and puts it away.]

Margaret. Robert, whoever is he? I mean the one who's left you the money?

Crawshaw [calmly]. I have not the slightest idea, Margaret. Doubtless we shall find out before long. I have asked Mr. Denis Clifton to come and see me.

Margaret. Leaving you fifty thousand pounds! Just fancy!

Crawshaw. Wurzel-Flummery!

Margaret. We can have the second car now, dear, can't we? And what about moving? You know you always said you ought to be in a more central part. Mr. Robert Crawshaw, M.P., of Curzon Street sounds so much more—more Cabinety.

Crawshaw. Mr. Robert Wurzel-Flummery, M.P., of Curzon Street—I don't know what that sounds like.

Margaret. I expect that's only a legal way of putting it, dear. They can't really expect us to change our name to—Wurzley-Fothergill.

Crawshaw. Wurzel-Flummery.

Margaret. Yes, dear, didn't I say that? I am sure you could talk the solicitor round—this Mr. Denis Clifton. After all, it doesn't matter to him what we call ourselves. Write him one of your letters, dear.

Crawshaw. You don't seem to apprehend the situation, Margaret.

Margaret. Yes, I do, dear. This Mr.—Mr.—

Crawshaw. Antony Clifton.

Margaret. Yes, he's left you fifty thousand pounds, together with the name of Wurzley-Fothergill—

Crawshaw. Wurzel—oh, well, never mind.

Margaret. Yes, well, you tell the solicitor that you will take the fifty thousand pounds, but you don't want the name. It's too absurd, when everybody knows of Robert Crawshaw, M.P., to expect you to call yourself Wurzley-Fothergill.

Crawshaw [impatiently]. Yes, yes. The point is that this Mr. Clifton has left me the money on condition that I change my name. If I don't take the name, I don't take the money.

Margaret. But is that legal?

Crawshaw. Perfectly. It is often done. People change their names on succeeding to some property.

Margaret. I thought it was only when your name was Moses and you changed it to Talbot.

Crawshaw [to himself]. Wurzel-Flummery!

Margaret. I wonder why he left you the money at all. Of course it was very nice of him, but if you didn't know him—Why do you think he did, dear?

Crawshaw. I know no more than this letter. I suppose he had—ah—followed my career, and was—ah—interested in it, and being a man with no relations, felt that he could—ah—safely leave this money to me. No doubt Wurzel-Flummery was his mother's maiden name, or the name of some other friend even dearer to him; he wished the name—ah—perpetuated, perhaps even recorded not unworthily in the history of our country, and—ah—made this will accordingly. In a way it is a kind of—ah—sacred trust.

Margaret. Then, of course, you'll accept it, dear?

Crawshaw. It requires some consideration. I have my career to think about, my duty to my country.

Margaret. Of course, dear. Money is a great help in politics, isn't it?

Crawshaw. Money wisely spent is a help in any profession. The view of riches which socialists and suchlike people profess to take is entirely ill-considered. A rich man, who spends his money thoughtfully, is serving his country as nobly as anybody.

Margaret. Yes, dear. Then you think we could have that second car and the house in Curzon Street?

Crawshaw. We must not be led away. Fifty thousand pounds, properly invested, is only two thousand a year. When you have deducted the income-tax—and the tax on unearned income is extremely high just now—

Margaret. Oh, but surely if we have to call ourselves Wurzel-Flummery it would count as earned income.

Crawshaw. I fear not. Strictly speaking, all money is earned. Even if it is left to you by another, it is presumably left to you in recognition of certain outstanding qualities which you possess. But Parliament takes a different view. I do not for a moment say that fifty thousand pounds would not be welcome. Fifty thousand pounds is certainly not to be sneezed at—

Margaret. I should think not, indeed!

Crawshaw [unconsciously rising from his chair]. And without this preposterous condition attached I should be pleased to accept this trust, and I would endeavor, Mr. Speaker—[He sits down again suddenly.] I would endeavor, Margaret, to carry it out to the best of my poor ability. But—Wurzel-Flummery!

Margaret. You would soon get used to it, dear. I had to get used to the name of Crawshaw after I had been Debenham for twenty-five years. It is surprising how quickly it comes to you. I think I only signed my name Margaret Debenham once after I was married.

Crawshaw [kindly]. The cases are rather different, Margaret. Naturally a woman, who from her cradle looks forward to the day when she will change her name, cannot have this feeling for the—ah—honor of his name, which every man—ah—feels. Such a feeling is naturally more present in my own case since I have been privileged to make the name of Crawshaw in some degree—ah—well-known, I might almost say famous.

Margaret [wistfully]. I used to be called "the beautiful Miss Debenham of Leamington." Everybody in Leamington knew of me. Of course, I am very proud to be Mrs. Robert Crawshaw.

Crawshaw [getting up and walking over to the fireplace]. In a way it would mean beginning all over again. It is half the battle in politics to get your name before the public. "Whoever is this man Wurzel-Flummery?" people will say.

Margaret. Anyhow, dear, let us look on the bright side. Fifty thousand pounds is fifty thousand pounds.

Crawshaw. It is, Margaret. And no doubt it is my duty to accept it. But—well, all I say is that a gentleman would have left it without any conditions. Or at least he would merely have expressed his wish that I should take the name, without going so far as to enforce it. Then I could have looked at the matter all round in an impartial spirit.

Margaret [pursuing her thoughts]. The linen is marked R. M. C. now. Of course, we should have to have that altered. Do you think R. M. F. would do, or would it have to be R. M. W. hyphen F.?

Crawshaw. What? Oh—yes, there will be a good deal of that to attend to. [Going up to her.] I think, Margaret, I had better talk to Richard about this. Of course, it would be absurd to refuse the money, but—well, I should like to have his opinion.

Margaret [getting up]. Do you think he would be very sympathetic, dear? He makes jokes about serious things—like bishops and hunting—just as if they weren't at all serious.

Crawshaw. I wish to talk to him just to obtain a new—ah—point of view. I do not hold myself in the least bound to act on anything he says. I regard him as a constituent, Margaret.

Margaret. Then I will send him to you.

Crawshaw [putting his hands on her shoulders]. Margaret, what do you really feel about it?

Margaret. Just whatever you feel, Robert.

Crawshaw [kissing her]. Thank you, Margaret; you are a good wife to me. [She goes out. Crawshaw goes to his desk and selects a "Who's Who" from a little pile of reference-books on it. He walks round to his chair, sits down in it and begins to turn the pages, murmuring names beginning with "C" to himself as he gets near the place. When he finds it, he murmurs "Clifton—that's funny" and closes the book. Evidently the publishers have failed him.]

Enter Richard.

Richard. Well, what's the news? [He goes to his old seat on the fender.] Been left a fortune?

Crawshaw [simply]. Yes.... By a Mr. Antony Clifton. I never met him and I know nothing about him.

Richard [surprised]. Not really? Well, I congratulate you. [He sighs.] To them that hath—But what on earth do you want my advice about?

Crawshaw. There is a slight condition attached.

Richard. Oho!

Crawshaw. The condition is that with this money—fifty thousand pounds—I take the name of—ah—Wurzel-Flummery.

Richard [jumping up]. What!

Crawshaw [sulkily]. I said it quite distinctly—Wurzel-Flummery. [Richard in an awed silence walks over to the desk and stands looking down at the unhappy Crawshaw. He throws out his left hand as if introducing him.]

Richard [reverently]. Mr. Robert Wurzel-Flummery, M.P., one of the most prominent of our younger Parliamentarians. Oh, you ... oh!... oh, how too heavenly! [He goes back to his seat, looks up and catches Crawshaw's eye, and breaks down altogether.]

Crawshaw [rising with dignity]. Shall we discuss it seriously, or shall we leave it?

Richard. How can we discuss a name like Wurzel-Flummery seriously? "Mr. Wurzel-Flummery in a few well-chosen words seconded the motion." ... "'Sir,' went on Mr. Wurzel-Flummery"—Oh, poor Robert!

Crawshaw [sitting down sulkily]. You seem quite certain that I shall take the money.

Richard. I am quite certain.

Crawshaw. Would you take it?

Richard [hesitating]. Well—I wonder.

Crawshaw. After all, as William Shakespeare says, "What's in a name?"

Richard. I can tell you something else that Shakespeare—William Shakespeare—said. [Dramatically rising.] Who steals my purse with fifty thousand in it—steals trash. [In his natural voice.] Trash, Robert. [Dramatically again.] But he who filches from me my good name of Crawshaw [lightly] and substitutes the rotten one of Wurzel—

Crawshaw [annoyed]. As a matter of fact, Wurzel-Flummery is a very good old name. I seem to remember some—ah—Hampshire Wurzel-Flummeries. It is a very laudable spirit on the part of a dying man to wish to—ah—perpetuate these old English names. It all seems to me quite natural and straightforward. If I take this money I shall have nothing to be ashamed of.

Richard. I see.... Look here, may I ask you a few questions? I should like to know just how you feel about the whole business?

Crawshaw [complacently folding his hands]. Go ahead.

Richard. Suppose a stranger came up in the street to you and said, "My poor man, here's five pounds for you," what would you do? Tell him to go to the devil, I suppose, wouldn't you?

Crawshaw [humorously]. In more parliamentary language, perhaps, Richard. I should tell him I never took money from strangers.

Richard. Quite so; but that if it were ten thousand pounds, you would take it?

Crawshaw. I most certainly shouldn't.

Richard. But if he died and left it to you, then you would?

Crawshaw [blandly]. Ah, I thought you were leading up to that. That, of course, is entirely different.

Richard. Why?

Crawshaw. Well—ah—wouldn't you take ten thousand pounds if it were left to you by a stranger?

Richard. I daresay I should. But I should like to know why it would seem different.

Crawshaw [professionally]. Ha—hum! Well—in the first place, when a man is dead he wants his money no longer. You can therefore be certain that you are not taking anything from him which he cannot spare. And in the next place, it is the man's dying wish that you should have the money. To refuse would be to refuse the dead. To accept becomes almost a sacred duty.

Richard. It really comes to this, doesn't it? You won't take it from him when he's alive, because if you did, you couldn't decently refuse him a little gratitude; but you know that it doesn't matter a damn to him what happens to his money after he's dead, and therefore you can take it without feeling any gratitude at all.

Crawshaw. No, I shouldn't put it like that.

Richard [smiling]. I'm sure you wouldn't, Robert.

Crawshaw. No doubt you can twist it about so that—

Richard. All right, we'll leave that and go on to the next point. Suppose a perfect stranger offered you five pounds to part your hair down the middle, shave off your mustache, and wear only one whisker—if he met you suddenly in the street, seemed to dislike your appearance, took out a fiver and begged you to hurry off and alter yourself—of course you'd pocket the money and go straight to your barber's?

Crawshaw. Now you are merely being offensive.

Richard. I beg your pardon. I should have said that if he had left you five pounds in his will?—well, then twenty pounds?—a hundred pounds?—a thousand pounds?—fifty thousand pounds?—[Jumping up excitedly.] It's only a question of price—fifty thousand pounds, Robert—a pink tie with purple spots, hair parted across the back, trousers with a patch in the seat, call myself Wurzel-Flummery—any old thing you like, you can't insult me—anything you like, gentlemen, for fifty thousand pounds. [Lowering his voice.] Only you must leave it in your will, and then I can feel that it is a sacred duty—a sacred duty, my lords and gentlemen. [He sinks back into the sofa and relights his pipe.]

Crawshaw [rising with dignity]. It is evidently useless to prolong this conversation.

Richard [waving him down again]. No, no, Robert; I've finished. I just took the other side—and I got carried away. I ought to have been at the Bar.

Crawshaw. You take such extraordinary views of things. You must look facts in the face, Richard. This is a modern world, and we are modern people living in it. Take the matter-of-fact view. You may like or dislike the name of—ah—Wurzel-Flummery, but you can't get away from the fact that fifty thousand pounds is not to be sneezed at.

Richard [wistfully]. I don't know why people shouldn't sneeze at money sometimes. I should like to start a society for sneezing at fifty thousand pounds. We'd have to begin in a small way, of course; we'd begin by sneezing at five pounds—and work up.... The trouble is that we're all inoculated in our cradles against that kind of cold.

Crawshaw [pleasantly]. You will have your little joke. But you know as well as I do that it is only a joke. There can be no serious reason why I should not take this money. And I—ah—gather that you don't think it will affect my career?

Richard [carelessly]. Not a bit. It'll help it. It'll get you into all the comic papers.

Margaret comes in at this moment, to the relief of Crawshaw, who is not quite certain if he is being flattered or insulted again.

Margaret. Well, have you told him?

Richard [making way for her on the sofa]. I have heard the news, Mrs. Crawshaw. And I have told Robert my opinion that he should have no difficulty in making the name of Wurzel-Flummery as famous as he has already made that of Crawshaw. At any rate I hope he will.

Margaret. How nice of you!

Crawshaw. Well, it's settled then. [Looking at his watch.] This solicitor fellow should be here soon. Perhaps, after all, we can manage something about—Ah, Viola, did you want your mother?

Enter Viola.

Viola. Sorry, do I interrupt a family meeting? There's Richard, so it can't be very serious.

Richard. What a reputation!

Crawshaw. Well, it's over now.

Margaret. Viola had better know, hadn't she?

Crawshaw. She'll have to know some time, of course.

Viola [sitting down firmly on the sofa]. Of course she will. So you'd better tell her now. I knew there was something exciting going on this morning.

Crawshaw [embarrassed]. Hum—ha—[To Margaret.] Perhaps you'd better tell her, dear.

Margaret [simply and naturally]. Father has come into some property, Viola. It means changing our name unfortunately. But your father doesn't think it will matter.

Viola. How thrilling! What is the name, mother?

Margaret. Your father says it is—dear me, I shall never remember it.

Crawshaw [mumbling]. Wurzel-Flummery.

Viola [after a pause]. Dick, you tell me, if nobody else will.

Richard. Robert said it just now.

Viola. That wasn't a name, was it? I thought it was just a—do say it again, father.

Crawshaw [sulkily but plainly]. Wurzel-Flummery.

Viola [surprised]. Do you spell it like that? I mean like a wurzel and like flummery?

Richard. Exactly, I believe.

Viola [to herself]. Miss Viola Wurzel-Flummery—I mean they'd have to look at you, wouldn't they? [Bubbling over.] Oh, Dick, what a heavenly name! Who had it first?

Richard. They are an old Hampshire family—that is so, isn't it, Robert?

Crawshaw [annoyed]. I said I thought that I remembered—Margaret, can you find Burke there? [She finds it, and he buries himself in the families of the great.]

Margaret. Well, Viola, you haven't told us how you like being Miss Wurzel-Flummery.

Viola. I haven't realized myself yet, mummy. I shall have to stand in front of my glass and tell myself who I am.

Richard. It's all right for you. You know you'll change your name one day, and then it won't matter what you've been called before.

Viola [secretly]. H'sh! [She smiles lovingly at him, and then says aloud.] Oh, won't it? It's got to appear in the papers, "A marriage has been arranged between Miss Viola Wurzel-Flummery ..." and everybody will say, "And about time too, poor girl."

Margaret [to Crawshaw]. Have you found it, dear?

Crawshaw [resentfully]. This is the 1912 edition.

Margaret. Still, dear, if it's a very old family, it ought to be in by then.

Viola. I don't mind how old it is; I think it's lovely. Oh, Dick, what fun it will be being announced! Just think of the footman throwing open the door and saying—

Maid [announcing]. Mr. Denis Clifton. [There is a little natural confusion as Clifton enters jauntily in his summer suiting with a bundle of papers under his arm. Crawshaw goes towards him and shakes hands.]

Crawshaw. How do you do, Mr. Clifton? Very good of you to come. [Looking doubtfully at his clothes.] Er—it is Mr. Denis Clifton, the solicitor?

Clifton [cheerfully]. It is. I must apologize for not looking the part more, but my clothes did not arrive from Clarkson's in time. Very careless of them when they had promised. And my clerk dissuaded me from the side-whiskers which I keep by me for these occasions.

Crawshaw [bewildered]. Ah yes, quite so. But you have—ah—full legal authority to act in this matter?

Clifton. Oh, decidedly. Oh, there's no question of that.

Crawshaw [introducing]. My wife—and daughter. [Clifton bows gracefully.] My friend, Mr. Richard Meriton.

Clifton [happily]. Dear me! Mr. Meriton too! This is quite a situation, as we say in the profession.

Richard [amused by him]. In the legal profession?

Clifton. In the theatrical profession. [Turning to Margaret.] I am a writer of plays, Mrs. Crawshaw. I am not giving away a professional secret when I tell you that most of the managers in London have thanked me for submitting my work to them.

Crawshaw [firmly]. I understood, Mr. Clifton, that you were the solicitor employed to wind up the affairs of the late Mr. Antony Clifton.

Clifton. Oh, certainly. Oh, there's no doubt about my being a solicitor. My clerk, a man of the utmost integrity, not to say probity, would give me a reference. I am in the books; I belong to the Law Society. But my heart turns elsewhere. Officially I have embraced the profession of a solicitor—[Frankly, to Mrs. Crawshaw.] But you know what these official embraces are.

Margaret. I'm afraid—[She turns to her husband for assistance.]

Clifton [to Richard]. Unofficially, Mr. Meriton, I am wedded to the Muses.

Viola. Dick, isn't he lovely?

Crawshaw. Quite so. But just for the moment, Mr. Clifton, I take it that we are concerned with legal business. Should I ever wish to produce a play, the case would be different.

Clifton. Admirably put. Pray regard me entirely as the solicitor for as long as you wish. [He puts his hat down on a chair with the papers in it, and taking off his gloves, goes on dreamily.] Mr. Denis Clifton was superb as a solicitor. In spite of an indifferent make-up, his manner of taking off his gloves and dropping them into his hat—[He does so.]

Margaret [to Crawshaw]. I think, perhaps, Viola and I—

Richard [making a move too]. We'll leave you to your business, Robert.

Clifton [holding up his hand]. Just one moment if I may. I have a letter for you, Mr. Meriton.

Richard [surprised]. For me?

Clifton. Yes. My clerk, a man of the utmost integrity—oh, but I said that before—he took it round to your rooms this morning, but found only painters and decorators there. [He is feeling in his pockets and now brings the letter out.] I brought it along, hoping that Mr. Crawshaw—but of course I never expected anything so delightful as this. [He hands over the letter with a bow.]

Richard. Thanks. [He puts it in his pocket.]

Clifton. Oh, but do read it now, won't you? [To Mrs. Crawshaw.] One so rarely has an opportunity of being present when one's own letters are read. I think the habit they have on the stage of reading letters aloud to each other is such a very delightful one. [Richard, with a smile and a shrug, has opened his letter while Clifton is talking.]

Richard. Good Lord!

Viola. Dick, what is it?

Richard [reading]. "199, Lincoln's Inn Fields. Dear Sir, I have the pleasure to inform you that under the will of the late Mr. Antony Clifton you are a beneficiary to the extent of £50,000."

Viola. Dick!

Richard. "A trifling condition is attached—namely, that you should take the name of—Wurzel-Flummery." [Clifton, with his hand on his heart, bows gracefully from one to the other of them.]

Crawshaw [annoyed]. Impossible! Why should he leave any money to you?

Viola. Dick! How wonderful!

Margaret [mildly]. I don't remember ever having had a morning quite like this.

Richard [angrily]. Is this a joke, Mr. Clifton?

Clifton. Oh, the money is there all right. My clerk, a man of the utmost—

Richard. Then I refuse it. I'll have nothing to do with it. I won't even argue about it. [Tearing the letter into bits.] That's what I think of your money. [He stalks indignantly from the room.]

Viola. Dick! Oh, but, mother, he mustn't. Oh, I must tell him—[She hurries after him.]

Margaret [with dignity]. Really, Mr. Clifton, I'm surprised at you. [She goes out too.]

Clifton [looking round the room]. And now, Mr. Crawshaw, we are alone.

Crawshaw. Yes. Well, I think, Mr. Clifton, you have a good deal to explain—

Clifton. My dear sir, I'm longing to begin. I have been looking forward to this day for weeks. I spent over an hour this morning dressing for it. [He takes papers from his hat and moves to the sofa.] Perhaps I had better begin from the beginning.

Crawshaw [interested, indicating the papers]. The documents in the case?

Clifton. Oh dear, no—just something to carry in the hand. It makes one look more like a solicitor. [Reading the title.] "Watherston v. Towser—in re Great Missenden Canal Company." My clerk invents the titles; it keeps him busy. He is very fond of Towser; Towser is always coming in. [Frankly.] You see, Mr. Crawshaw, this is my first real case, and I only got it because Antony Clifton is my uncle. My efforts to introduce a little picturesqueness into the dull formalities of the law do not meet with that response that one would have expected.

Crawshaw [looking at his watch]. Yes. Well, I'm a busy man, and if you could tell me as shortly as possible why your uncle left this money to me, and apparently to Mr. Meriton too, under these extraordinary conditions, I shall be obliged to you.

Clifton. Say no more, Mr. Crawshaw; I look forward to being entirely frank with you. It will be a pleasure.

Crawshaw. You understand, of course, my position. I think I may say that I am not without reputation in the country; and proud as I am to accept this sacred trust, this money which the late Mr. Antony Clifton has seen fit—[modestly] one cannot say why—to bequeath to me, yet the use of the name Wurzel-Flummery would be excessively awkward.

Clifton [cheerfully]. Excessively.

Crawshaw. My object in seeing you was to inquire if it was absolutely essential that the name should go with the money.

Clifton. Well [thoughtfully], you may have the name without the money if you like. But you must have the name.

Crawshaw [disappointed]. Ah! [Bravely.] Of course, I have nothing against the name, a good old Hampshire name—

Clifton [shocked]. My dear Mr. Crawshaw, you didn't think—you didn't really think that anybody had been called Wurzel-Flummery before? Oh no, no. You and Mr. Meriton were to be the first, the founders of the clan, the designers of the Wurzel-Flummery sporran—

Crawshaw. What do you mean, sir? Are you telling me that it is not a real name at all?

Clifton. Oh, it's a name all right. I know it is because—er—I made it up.

Crawshaw [outraged]. And you have the impudence to propose, sir, that I should take a made-up name?

Clifton [soothingly]. Well, all names are made up some time or other. Somebody had to think of—Adam.

Crawshaw. I warn you, Mr. Clifton, that I do not allow this trifling with serious subjects.

Clifton. It's all so simple, really.... You see, my Uncle Antony was a rather unusual man. He despised money. He was not afraid to put it in its proper place. The place he put it in was—er—a little below golf and a little above classical concerts. If a man said to him, "Would you like to make fifty thousand this afternoon?" he would say—well, it would depend what he was doing. If he were going to have a round at Walton Heath—

Crawshaw. It's perfectly scandalous to talk of money in this way.

Clifton. Well, that's how he talked about it. But he didn't find many to agree with him. In fact, he used to say that there was nothing, however contemptible, that a man would not do for money. One day I suggested that if he left a legacy with a sufficiently foolish name attached to it, somebody might be found to refuse it. He laughed at the idea. That put me on my mettle. "Two people," I said; "leave the same silly name to two people, two well-known people, rival politicians, say, men whose own names are already public property. Surely they wouldn't both take it." That touched him. "Denis, my boy, you've got it," he said. "Upon what vile bodies shall we experiment?" We decided on you and Mr. Meriton. The next thing was to choose the name. I started on the wrong lines. I began by suggesting names like Porker, Tosh, Bugge, Spiffkins—the obvious sort. My uncle—

Crawshaw [boiling with indignation]. How dare you discuss me with your uncle, sir! How dare you decide in this cold-blooded way whether I am to be called—ah—Tosh—or-ah—Porker!

Clifton. My uncle wouldn't hear of Tosh or Porker. He wanted a humorous name—a name he could roll lovingly round his tongue—a name expressing a sort of humorous contempt—Wurzel-Flummery! I can see now the happy ruminating smile which came so often on my Uncle Antony's face in those latter months. He was thinking of his two Wurzel-Flummeries. I remember him saying once—it was at the Zoo—what a pity it was he hadn't enough to divide among the whole Cabinet. A whole bunch of Wurzel-Flummeries; it would have been rather jolly.

Crawshaw. You force me to say, sir, that if that was the way you and your uncle used to talk together at the Zoo, his death can only be described as a merciful intervention of Providence.

Clifton. Oh, but I think he must be enjoying all this somewhere, you know. I hope he is. He would have loved this morning. It was his one regret that from the necessities of the case he could not live to enjoy his own joke; but he had hopes that echoes of it would reach him wherever he might be. It was with some such idea, I fancy, that toward the end he became interested in spiritualism.

Crawshaw [rising solemnly]. Mr. Clifton, I have no interest in the present whereabouts of your uncle, nor in what means he has of overhearing a private conversation between you and myself. But if, as you irreverently suggest, he is listening to us, I should like him to hear this. That, in my opinion, you are not a qualified solicitor at all, that you never had an uncle, and that the whole story of the will and the ridiculous condition attached to it is just the tomfool joke of a man who, by his own admission, wastes most of his time writing unsuccessful farces. And I propose—

Clifton. Pardon my interrupting. But you said farces. Not farces, comedies—of a whimsical nature.

Crawshaw. Whatever they were, sir, I propose to report the whole matter to the Law Society. And you know your way out, sir.

Clifton. Then I am to understand that you refuse the legacy, Mr. Crawshaw?

Crawshaw [startled]. What's that?

Clifton. I am to understand that you refuse the fifty thousand pounds?

Crawshaw. If the money is really there, I most certainly do not refuse it.

Clifton. Oh, the money is most certainly there—and the name. Both waiting for you.

Crawshaw [thumping the table]. Then, sir, I accept them. I feel it my duty to accept them, as a public expression of confidence in the late Mr. Clifton's motives. I repudiate entirely the motives that you have suggested to him, and I consider it a sacred duty to show what I think of your story by accepting the trust which he has bequeathed to me. You will arrange further matters with my solicitor. Good-morning, sir.

Clifton [to himself as he rises]. Mr. Crawshaw here drank a glass of water. [To Crawshaw.] Mr. Wurzel-Flummery, farewell. May I express the parting wish that your future career will add fresh luster to—my name. [To himself as he goes out.] Exit Mr. Denis Clifton with dignity. [But he has left his papers behind him. Crawshaw, walking indignantly back to the sofa, sees the papers and picks them up.]

Crawshaw [contemptuously]. "Watherston v. Towser—in re Great Missenden Canal Company." Bah! [He tears them up and throws them into the fire. He goes back to his writing-table and is seated there as Viola, followed by Meriton, comes in.]

Viola. Father, Dick doesn't want to take the money, but I have told him that of course he must. He must, mustn't he?

Richard. We needn't drag Robert into it, Viola.

Crawshaw. If Richard has the very natural feeling that it would be awkward for me if there were two Wurzel-Flummeries in the House of Commons, I should be the last to interfere with his decision. In any case, I don't see what concern it is of yours, Viola.

Viola [surprised]. But how can we get married if he doesn't take the money?

Crawshaw [hardly understanding]. Married? What does this mean, Richard?

Richard. I'm sorry it has come out like this. We ought to have told you before, but anyhow we were going to have told you in a day or two. Viola and I want to get married.

Crawshaw. And what did you want to get married on?

Richard [with a smile]. Not very much, I'm afraid.

Viola. We're all right now, father, because we shall have fifty thousand pounds.

Richard [sadly]. Oh, Viola, Viola!

Crawshaw. But naturally this puts a very different complexion on matters.

Viola. So of course he must take it, mustn't he, father?

Crawshaw. I can hardly suppose, Richard, that you expect me to entrust my daughter to a man who is so little provident for himself that he throws away fifty thousand pounds because of some fanciful objection to the name which goes with it.

Richard [in despair]. You don't understand, Robert.

Crawshaw. I understand this, Richard. That if the name is good enough for me, it should be good enough for you. You don't mind asking Viola to take your name, but you consider it an insult if you are asked to take my name.

Richard [miserably to Viola]. Do you want to be Mrs. Wurzel-Flummery?

Viola. Well, I'm going to be Miss Wurzel-Flummery anyhow, darling.

Richard [beaten]. Heaven help me! you'll make me take it. But you'll never understand.

Crawshaw [stopping to administer comfort to him on his way out]. Come, come, Richard. [Patting him on the shoulder.] I understand perfectly. All that you were saying about money a little while ago—it's all perfectly true, it's all just what I feel myself. But in practice we have to make allowances sometimes. We have to sacrifice our ideals for—ah—others. I shall be very proud to have you for a son-in-law, and to feel that there will be the two of us in Parliament together upholding the honor of the—ah—name. And perhaps now that we are to be so closely related, you may come to feel some day that your views could be—ah—more adequately put forward from my side of the House.

Richard. Go on, Robert; I deserve it.

Crawshaw. Well, well! Margaret will be interested in our news. And you must send that solicitor a line—or perhaps a telephone message would be better. [He goes to the door and turns round just as he is going out.] Yes, I think the telephone, Richard; it would be safer. [Exit.]

Richard [holding out his hands to Viola]. Come here, Mrs. Wurzel-Flummery.

Viola. Not Mrs. Wurzel-Flummery; Mrs. Dick. And soon, please, darling. [She comes to him.]

Richard [shaking his head sadly at her]. I don't know what I've done, Viola. [Suddenly.] But you're worth it. [He kisses her, and then says in a low voice.] And God help me if I ever stop thinking so!

Enter Mr. Denis Clifton. He sees them, and walks about very tactfully with his back towards them, humming to himself.

Richard. Hullo!

Clifton [to himself]. Now where did I put those papers? [He hums to himself again.] Now where—oh, I beg your pardon! I left some papers behind.

Viola. Dick, you'll tell him. [As she goes out, she says to Clifton.] Good-by, Mr. Clifton, and thank you for writing such nice letters.

Clifton. Good-by, Miss Crawshaw.

Viola. Just say it to see how it sounds.

Clifton. Good-by, Miss Wurzel-Flummery.

Viola [smiling happily]. No, not Miss, Mrs. [She goes out.]

Clifton [looking in surprise from her to him]. You don't mean—

Richard. Yes; and I'm taking the money after all, Mr. Clifton.

Clifton. Dear me, what a situation! [Thoughtfully to himself.] I wonder how a rough scenario would strike the managers.

Richard. Poor Mr. Clifton!

Clifton. Why poor?

Richard. You missed all the best part. You didn't hear what I said to Crawshaw about money before you came.

Clifton [thoughtfully]. Oh! was it very—[Brightening up.] But I expect Uncle Antony heard. [After a pause.] Well, I must be getting on. I wonder if you've noticed any important papers lying about, in connection with the Great Missenden Canal Company—a most intricate case, in which my clerk and I—[He has murmured himself across to the fireplace, and the fragments of his important case suddenly catch his eye. He picks up one of the fragments.] Ah, yes. Well, I shall tell my clerk that we lost the case. He will be sorry. He had got quite fond of that canal. [He turns to go, but first says to Meriton.] So you're taking the money, Mr. Meriton?

Richard. Yes.

Clifton. And Mr. Crawshaw too?

Richard. Yes.

Clifton [to himself as he goes out]. They are both taking it. [He stops and looks up to Uncle Antony with a smile.] Good old Uncle Antony—he knew—he knew! [Meriton stands watching him as he goes.]

Blanche. Will you buy a flower, monsieur?

Paul. Flower, mademoiselle? You can sell flowers at this hour when it is nearly midnight?

Blanche. There is moonlight, and I have a smile, monsieur. It is my smile which sells the flowers. Does not monsieur agree that it is irresistible?

Paul [uneasily]. Mademoiselle has charm.

Blanche. And I have charms for you. My flowers. Will you not buy a flower, monsieur, and I will pin it to your uniform where it will draw all the ladies' eyes to you when you promenade on the boulevard?

Paul. I do not promenade. I stay here.

Blanche. Here in the Square where it is dull and lonely? But on the boulevards are lights, monsieur, and gaiety, and people promenade because to-night is Christmas Eve.

Paul. Mademoiselle, you're kind. Will you be kind to me and tell me something?

Blanche. What can I tell?

Paul. I am only a peasant and I do not know many things. But you live in the town and you must know. They say, mademoiselle, they have told me, that there are miracles on Christmas Eve.

Blanche. Did you believe them?

Paul. I did not know. I only hoped.

Blanche. What did you hope?

Paul [very earnestly]. I have been told that stone can speak on Christmas Eve. And I want, oh, mademoiselle, I want to hear the blessed voice of our glorious Maid.

Blanche. Monsieur has sentiment.

Paul [pleadingly]. You think that she will speak to me?

Blanche [dropping all banter]. Monsieur, she speaks in stone to all of us. She stands erect, serene, like the unconquerable spirit of France and cries defiance at the Boche. They sent their shells like hail and ground our homes to powder and made a desolation of our streets, but they could not touch the statue of the Maid nor the church she guards.

Paul. And she speaks! She speaks!

Blanche. She is the soul of France, monsieur, defying tyranny, invincible and unafraid. She is a message to each one of us. As the shells fell all around and could not harm her, so must we stand unshaken for the France we love. She speaks of freedom and deliverance.

Paul. And she will speak to me?

Blanche [pityingly as she sees how literally he has taken her]. Perhaps.

Paul. What must I do, mademoiselle, to hear her voice?

Blanche [seeing in this too good an opportunity for selling a flower]. Will you not buy a flower for the Maid? They come from far away, from the South where there is always sun, and so they are not cheap. But, for a franc, you may have one lily of Lorraine to put upon the statue of the Maid.

Paul. A lily of Lorraine!

Blanche [showing a flower, then taking it back tantalizingly]. See, monsieur! How could she refuse to speak to you if you gave her that?

Paul. It is the way to make her speak! [Puts out hand for the flower and then draws back. ] But a franc! And I have nothing but one sou.

Blanche. One sou! When flowers are so dear, and have to come so far! Mon dieu, monsieur, but you have had a thirsty day if a sou is all that you have left from the wineshops.

Paul. I did not spend it there, mademoiselle. I gave it to the church, this church where is the statue of our Maid.

Blanche [only half scoffing]. Monsieur is devout.

Paul. Not always, mademoiselle. But I was born at Domremy where she was born and I have always adored our sainted Maid who died for France. Perhaps because of that, perhaps without the flower, Jeanne will speak to me at midnight when they say the statues come to life.

Blanche [touched]. Monsieur, I do not know. Perhaps she will. But see, here is a lily of Lorraine which I give you for the Maid. Put it upon her statue and perhaps it will awaken her to speech.

Paul. Mademoiselle! [Taking the flower.] How can I thank you?

Blanche. I also am a maid of France, monsieur. You are a soldier and you fight for France. But I must sell my flowers now. Perhaps, when I have sold them, I will come again to see if Jeanne has spoken.

Paul. You think she will?

Blanche. Monsieur, have faith. All things are possible on Christmas Eve. [She moves L. Paul goes to the statue and puts the lily on its breast.]

Blanche. Holy Virgin, the lies I've told! What simplicity! But Jeanne might. She might. [Exit Blanche L. Paul stands, watching. An English lieutenant, Gerald Soames, enters R., carrying a small wreath of evergreens. He is awkward and self-conscious and stops short when he sees Paul, annoyed in the English way at being found out in an act of sentiment. By consequence, the little ceremony he had proposed falls short of the impressiveness he designed for it.]

Gerald. O Lord, there's a fellow there. Er—[Paul salutes.] Oh—er—c'est ici la statue de Jeanne d'Arc, n'est-ce pas?

Paul. Mais oui, monsieur.

Gerald. And that's about as far as my French will go. I say, you're not on duty, are you? Vous n'êtes pas de garde?

Paul. Non, monsieur.

Gerald. No, of course you're not. Damned silly question to ask. All the same, I wish he'd take a hint. I say. Lord, I've forgotten the French for "have a drink." Besides, he couldn't. It's too late. I'll just do what I came for and go. [Puts back into pocket the coin he had taken out.] After all, the fellow's as good a right to be here as I have. I'll have one more shot. N'avez-vous pas des affaires?

Paul. Mais non, monsieur. Pas ce soir. Je suis en congé.

Gerald. Heaven knows what that means, except that he's a fixture. Oh well, I don't care if he does see me. He'll not know what to make of it, anyhow. [Up to statue.] Jeanne d'Arc, I'm putting this wreath on your statue. It's an English wreath and it came from England. It's English holly and English ivy and it's supposed to mean that England's sorry for the awful things she did to you and I hope you've forgiven us all. [He has cap off. Now puts cap on.] I think that's all. [Places wreath at statue's feet. Stands erect, salutes, turns.] Hang that French fellow. I suppose he'll think I'm mad. [Gerald goes down steps and off R. Paul salutes, then goes up steps to look at the wreath. Fred Colledge, an English private, enters L. Without noticing Paul, he sits on the steps and lights a cigarette. In the light of his match he sees Paul, gives a little amused laugh and lies back making himself comfortable, turning up coat-collar, etc. Paul sees him, and is shocked. Comes down steps.]

Paul. Monsieur!

Fred. Hullo, cockey. How are you getting on?

Paul. Monsieur! This place. These steps. One does not rest upon these steps.

Fred. Ho yes, one does. I'm doing it, so I ought to know.

Paul. But here, monsieur. Outside the church.

Fred. That's all right. The better the place the better the seat. It ain't a feather-bed in the old house at home, but I've sort of lost the feather-bed 'abit lately.

Paul. One should not sit on these steps, monsieur.

Fred. You must like that tune, old son, the way you stick to it. And, if you ask me, one should not do a pile of things that one's been doing over here. Take me, now. By rights, I ought to be eating roast beef and plum-pudding to-morrow in Every Street. Third turn on the left below the Mile End Pavilion, but I suppose I'm the same way as you. Going back on the train at 2 A.M. to eat my Christmas dinner in the blooming trenches. That's you, ain't it? And it's me, too. So let's sit down together and do an entente for an hour. Don't talk and I'll race you to where the dreams come from. [He pulls Paul down genially beside him.]

Paul [sitting]. I ought not to sit here.

Fred. Ain't these steps soft enough for you?

Paul. Monsieur, you do not understand. I come from Domremy.

Fred. Do you? I'm Mile End myself. What about it?

Paul. But Domremy.

Fred. Can't say I'm much the wiser.

Paul. But here, monsieur. This statue. It is our glorious maid. C'est Jeanne d'Arc.

Fred. Ark, eh? Is that old Noah? [Gets up to look at statue.]

Paul [rising]. Jeanne d'Arc, monsieur. She—

Fred. Oh, it's a lady, is it? Dressed like that for riding, I reckon. So that's old Noah's wife, is it? Well, the old cock had a bit of taste.

Paul. It is Jeanne d'Arc. You call her—what do you call her?—Joan of—

Fred. Not guilty. I ain't so forward with the ladies. I don't call them in their Christian names till I've been introduced.

Paul. You English call her Joan of Arc. The great Jeanne d'Arc. She—

Fred. Wait a bit. Now don't excite me for a moment. I'm thinking. I've heard that name before.

Paul. But yes, monsieur. In history.

Fred. That's done it. I take you, cockey. I knew it was a way back. Well, she's nothing in my life. [Returns to steps and sits.]

Paul. She is of my life. I come from Domremy.

Fred. So you said.

Paul. It was her birthplace.

Fred [clapping him on the shoulder]. Cockey, I'm with you now. I know the feeling. Why, we'd a man born in our street that played center-forward for the Arsenal. Makes you proud of the place where you were born. Na pooed now, poor devil. Got his head blown off last month. He was a sergeant in our lot. 'Ave a woodbine?

Paul. Not here, monsieur.

Fred. Please yourself. Smoke your own. Them black things are no use to me. It's a rum country yours, old son. Light beer and black tobacco. But you fight on it all right. Oh yes, you fight all right. 'Ere, 'ave a piece of chocolate to keep the cold out. My missus sent me that.

Paul [accepting]. Merci. I hope madame is well.

Fred. Eh? Who's madame? Oh, you mean old Sally. She's all right. In bed. That's where she is. And I'm here. But I could do with a bit of a snooze myself. Come on, let's do a doss together.

Paul. A doss?

Fred. Yus. Wait a bit. I speak French when I'm 'appy. Je vais dormir. Vous likewise dormir.

Paul. I did not come to sleep, monsieur. I came to watch.

Fred. Watch? What do you want to watch for here? No Germans here.

Paul. C'est la nuit de Noël, monsieur. They say the statues come to life on Christmas Eve, and I am watching here to see if Jeanne will breathe and move and speak to a piou-piou from Domremy.

Fred. You know, old son, you could have scared me once with a tale like that. But not to-day. I've been seeing life lately. If old Nelson got down off his perch, and I met him walking in Trafalgar Square, I'd just salute and think no more about it. You can't raise my hair now.

Paul. Then you believe that she will speak?

Fred. You go to sleep, cockey, and there's no knowing what you'll hear. Come on, old sport. Je dormir and vous dormir, and we'll be a blooming dormitory. [Paul hesitates, looks at statue, then lies by Fred.] That's right. Lie close. Two can keep warmer than one. Oh well, good-night all. Merry Christmas, and to hell with the Kaiser. [They sleep. The statue is darkened, and the lay figure of the statue is replaced by the living Jeanne. Bells chime midnight. As they begin, Jeanne awakes. With the first chime, light shines dimly on the statue. By the last chime, the statue is in brilliant light and Jeanne stirs on the pedestal and bends to the wreath. She lifts it, wondering.

Jeanne. The wreath is here. I did not dream it, then. I saw him come and lay the wreath at my feet. I saw his uniform, and the uniform was not of France. I saw his face, and it was not a Frenchman's face. I heard his voice, and the voice was an English voice. I do not understand. Why should the English bring a wreath to me? I do not want their wreath. I want no favors from an Englishman. I am Jeanne d'Arc. I am your enemy, you English, whom I made to bite the dust at Orléans and vanquished at Patay. It was I who bore the standard into the cathedral at Rheims when we crowned my Dauphin the anointed King of France, and English Bedford trembled at my name. Burgundians took me at Compiègne. Your English money bought me from them, and your English hatred gave me up to mocking priests to try for sorcery. You called me "Heretic," "Relapsed," "Apostate," and "Idolater," and burnt me for a witch in Rouen market-place. And now do you lay a wreath at Jeanne's feet? And do you think she thanks you? I scorn your wreath. This wreath an English soldier set at Jeanne's feet. I tear it, and I trample on it. [Fred and Paul have awakened during this speech. Both are bewildered at first, like men who dream. But as Jeanne is about to tear the wreath Fred interposes.]

Fred. I dunno if I'm awake or asleep, but that there wreath, lady—I say, don't tear it. I don't know nothing about it bar what you've just said, but if any of our blokes put it there, you can take it from me it was kindly meant.

Jeanne. You? Who are you? You're—You're English.

Fred [apologetically]. Yus. I'm English. I don't see that I can help it, though. I just happen to be English same as a dawg. I'm sorry if it upsets you, but I'm English all right. And—No. Blimey, I won't apologize for it. I'm English. I'm English, and proud of it. So there!

Jeanne. Why are the English here in France? Why do I see so many of them?

Paul. Maid—Jeanne—

Jeanne. You! You are not English. You are a soldier of France.

Paul. I am of France.

Jeanne. Then shame to you, soldier of France! Shame on a Frenchman who can forget his pride of race and make a comrade of an Englishman!

Paul. Maid, you do not understand.

Jeanne. No. I do not understand. I do not understand treachery. I do not understand baseness, dishonor, and the perfidy of one who has forgotten he is French. The English are the foes of France, and you consort with them. You—

Fred. 'Ere, 'ere, 'alf a mo'. Steady on, lady. You've got to learn something. All that stuff you've just been talking about the Battle of Waterloo. It's a wash-out now. We've cut it out. This 'ere bloke you're grousing at 'e's a friend of mine, and I'll pipe up for a friend when 'e's being reprimanded undeserving.

Jeanne. It is for that I blame a son of France, that he makes friends with you.

Fred. Well, it's your mistake. That's the worst of coming out of history. You're out of date. If I took my great-grandmother on a motor-bus to a picture-show, she'd have the same sort of fit that you've got, only it's worse with you. You're further back. And I'll tell you something. That old French froggy business is dead and gorn. We've given it up. Time's passed when an Englishman thought he could lick two Frenchmen with one hand tied behind his back. It's a back number, lady. Carpentier put the lid on that. You ask Billy Wells. Us blokes and the French, we're feeding out of one another's hands to-day.

Jeanne. I have seen the English and the French together in the streets. They do not fight.

Fred. Lord bless you, no. Provost-marshal wouldn't let 'em, if they wanted a friendly scrap.

Jeanne. They fraternize. I have seen them walking arm-in-arm.

Fred. That's natural enough.

Jeanne. Natural, for French and English!

Fred. Yes, lady, natural. If you'd seen the Frenchies fighting, same as I have, you'd want to walk arm-in-arm with them yourself, and be proud to do it, too.

Paul. The English, are our brothers, Maid.

Fred. Gorlummy, we're more than that. I've known brothers do the dirty on each other. Us and the French, we're—why, we're pals. So that's all right, lady. Just let me put that wreath back where you got it from. I'm sure you'll 'urt someone's feelings if you trample on it. [He tries to take wreath, she prevents him.]

Jeanne. When you have shown me why I should accept an English wreath, perhaps I will. So far I've yet to learn why a soldier of France is friendly with an Englishman.

Fred. I can't show you more than this, can I? [Links arms with Paul.]

Jeanne. That is not reason.

Paul [unlinking his arm]. Perhaps I can show you reason. I who was born at Domremy.

Jeanne. You come from there! My home?

Paul. Yes.

Jeanne. You know St. Remy's church and the Meuse and the beech-tree where they said the fairies used to dance. The tree. Is it still there?

Paul. I do not know.

Jeanne. And the fields! The fields where I kept my father's sheep, and the wolves would not come near when I had charge of them, and the birds came to me and ate bread from my lap. You know those fields of Domremy?

Paul. I knew them once.

Jeanne. You knew my church. It still is there?

Paul. Who can say?

Jeanne. Cannot you, who were baptized in it?

Paul. Jeanne, the Germans came to Domremy. I do not know if anything is left.

Jeanne. The Germans? But the Germans did not count when I lived there.

Fred. No, and they'll count a sight less before so long.

Paul. They came like a thunderstorm, Jeanne. They swept our men away. They tore up treaties, and they came through Belgium and ravished it, and took us unawares. They blotted out our frontiers and came on like the tide till even Paris heard the sound of German guns. And then the English came, slowly at first, and just a little late, but not too late, then more and more and all the time more English came. They swept the Germans from the seas and drove their ships to hide. Shoulder to shoulder they have fought for France. They hurled the Germans back from Paris, and when their soldiers fell more came and more. Their plowmen and their clerks, their great lords and their scullions, all came to France to fight with us for la patrie. Their women make munitions and—

Fred. Yus. I daresay. Very fine. Only that'll do. We ain't done nothing to make a song about.

Paul. Our children and our children's children will make songs of what the English did.

Fred. You let 'em. Leave it to 'em. Way I look at it is this, lady. There's a big swelled-headed bully, and he gets a little fellow down and starts kicking 'im. Well, it ain't manners, and we blokes comes along to teach 'im wot's wot. That's all there is to it.

Paul. There's more than I could tell in a hundred years, Jeanne.

Fred. Then what's the good of trying?

Jeanne. He tried because he had to make me understand your friendship and all the noble thought and noble deed that lie behind this little wreath. [She raises the wreath.]

Fred [interposing]. Oh, I say now, lady, go easy with that wreath, won't you? I—I wouldn't trample it if I were you. Battle of Waterloo's a long time ago.

Jeanne. Don't be afraid.

Fred. Gave me a turn to see you pick it up like that.

Jeanne [putting it on her head]. The English wreath is in its right place now. Here, on the head of Jeanne d'Arc. I'll wear that wreath forever. Give me your hand, you English soldier.

Fred. I've not washed since morning, lady.

Jeanne. Your hand, that fights for France. [She takes it.] And yours, soldier of France.

Paul. Jeanne! But you—[Holding back timidly.]

Jeanne. I am where I would always be—[she has a hand of both]—amongst my fighting men. They have set me on a pedestal and made a saint of me, but I am better here, between you two, both soldiers of France. They will not let me fight for France to-day. Save for this mystic hour on Christmas Eve I am a thing of stone. But Jeanne lives on. Her spirit fights for France to-day as Jeanne fought five hundred years ago. And, in this hour when I am granted speech, I say, "Fight on, fight on for France till France and Belgium are free and the invader pays the price of treachery. And you, you English who have come to France, and you in England who are making arms for France, I, who have hated you, I, whom you burnt, I, Jeanne d'Arc of Rheims and Orléans, I give you thanks. My people are your people, and my cause your cause. Vivent! Vivent les Anglais!" [During this speech she drops the soldiers' hands. They resume gradually their sleeping attitudes. Jeanne mounts her pedestal, and gives the last words from it, then becomes stone again. The light fades to darkness, then becomes the moonlight of the opening. Blanche enters L. She goes to the steps, looks at the sleeping soldiers, and stands above them. Her basket is empty but for one flower.]

Paul [stirring and seeing her]. Jeanne!

Blanche. My name is Blanche, monsieur.

Paul. But I—you—[he rises]. Mademoiselle, you are very like—

Blanche. I am the flower-girl whom you saw before you went to sleep, and I am very like myself, monsieur.

Paul. Was I asleep? [Looks at statue.] Yes. There is Jeanne.

Blanche. Where else should Jeanne be but on her pedestal?

Fred [stirring]. Revelley again before you've hardly closed your blooming eyes. [Sits up sharply on seeing Blanche.] Hullo! You're—you're—[Turns to Paul.] Why, cockey, it wasn't a yarn. The statues do walk about in France. There's one of them doing it.

Paul. You saw her too?

Fred. Saw her? Of course I seen her. She's there. Ain't you and me been talking familiar with her for the last ten minutes?

Paul. Yes, with Jeanne.

Fred. Took my 'and she did, and chanced the dirt.

Blanche. You have been dreaming, monsieur. C'était une rêverie.

Fred. Who's raving? Well, it may be raving, but we all raved together. You and me and 'im, and I'll eat my bayonet raw if you didn't stand there and take us by the hands and tell us you were that there Joan of Arc what used to tell old Bonaparte what to do when he was in an 'ole.

Blanche. It was not I. There is the statue, monsieur. [Points to it.]

Fred. Where? [Looks.] Well, that's queer. You're the dead spit and image of 'er, too. And 'ere, 'ere, cockey! [Takes Paul's arm excitedly.]

Paul. Monsieur?

Fred. Look at the statue. Look at its head. Who put that wreath on it? Did you climb up there?

Paul. No.

Fred. No. You know you didn't. We saw her put it on herself.

Paul. But, monsieur, then you have dreamed the same dream as I.

Fred. I saw you all right, and you saw me?

Paul. I saw you.

Fred. And we both saw 'er. It's a rum go, cockey, but I told you I'd given up being surprised. Our lot and yours we're going whacks in licking the Germans, ain't we? Yus, and now we're going whacks in the same dream, so that's that and chance it. Ententing again, only extra cordial. [Scratches head.] I don't quite see where she comes in, though, if she ain't the statue.

Blanche. I am a flower-girl, monsieur.

Fred. Not so many flowers about you, then.

Blanche. I have sold out, all but one flower, monsieur, and I came back to see if you [to Paul] had got your wish.

Paul. Yes, mademoiselle, I had my wish. The saints sent Jeanne to me in a dream.

Blanche. You happy man, to get your wish!

Paul. I am happy, mademoiselle. I have spoken with Jeanne d'Arc.

Fred. And you and me will be speaking with our sergeants if we don't buck up and catch that blinking train. Come on, old son, back to the Big Stink for us.

Blanche. Messieurs return to fight?

Fred. Lord love you, no. It's only a rumor about the war. We're a Cook's excursion on a joy-ride seeing the sights of France. [Fred and Paul move R. together.]

Blanche. Monsieur!

Fred [stopping]. Well?

Blanche. I kept one flower back. It is for you—for the brave English soldier who goes out to fight for France.

Fred. Don't make me homesick. Reminds me of the flower-pots on my kitchen window-sill. [Takes flower and produces chocolate.] 'Ere, miss, 'ave a bit of chocolate. Made in England, that was.

Blanche. Monsieur will need it for himself.

Fred. Go on. Take it. I'm all right. It's Christmas Day and extra rations. [Kisses her.]

Blanche. Merci, monsieur. Et bonne chance, mes braves, bonne chance.

Fred. Oh, we'll chance it all right. Merry Christmas, old dear. [Fred and Paul go off together R. Blanche watches them go. Lights in the church go out. Girls enter L. as if coming from Mass, singing a carol.]

Girls

[Blanche joins them, singing as they cross.]

Magistrate. So that is the Fair Green. Cattle and sheep and mud. No system. What a repulsive sight!

Policeman. That is so, indeed.

Magistrate. I suppose there is a good deal of disorder in this place?

Policeman. There is.

Magistrate. Common assault?

Policeman. It's common enough.

Magistrate. Agrarian crime, no doubt?

Policeman. That is so.

Magistrate. Boycotting? Maiming of cattle? Firing into houses?

Policeman. There was one time, and there might be again.

Magistrate. That is bad. Does it go any farther than that?

Policeman. Far enough, indeed.

Magistrate. Homicide, then! This district has been shamefully neglected! I will change all that. When I was in the Andaman Islands, my system never failed. Yes, yes, I will change all that. What has that woman on her stall?

Policeman. Apples mostly—and sweets.

Magistrate. Just see if there are any unlicensed goods underneath—spirits or the like. We had evasions of the salt tax in the Andaman Islands.

Policeman [sniffing cautiously and upsetting a heap of apples]. I see no spirits here—or salt.

Magistrate [to Mrs. Tarpey]. Do you know this town well, my good woman?

Mrs. Tarpey [holding out some apples]. A penny the half-dozen, your honor.

Policeman [shouting]. The gentleman is asking do you know the town! He's the new magistrate!

Mrs. Tarpey [rising and ducking]. Do I know the town? I do, to be sure.

Magistrate [shouting]. What is its chief business?

Mrs. Tarpey. Business, is it? What business would the people here have but to be minding one another's business?

Magistrate. I mean what trade have they?

Mrs. Tarpey. Not a trade. No trade at all but to be talking.

Magistrate. I shall learn nothing here. [James Ryan comes in, pipe in mouth. Seeing Magistrate he retreats quickly, taking pipe from mouth.]

Magistrate. The smoke from that man's pipe had a greenish look; he may be growing unlicensed tobacco at home. I wish I had brought my telescope to this district. Come to the post-office, I will telegraph for it. I found it very useful in the Andaman Islands. [Magistrate and Policeman go out left.]

Mrs. Tarpey. Bad luck to Jo Muldoon, knocking my apples this way and that way. [Begins arranging them.] Showing off he was to the new magistrate. [Enter Bartley Fallon and Mrs. Fallon.]

Bartley. Indeed it's a poor country and a scarce country to be living in. But I'm thinking if I went to America it's long ago the day I'd be dead!

Mrs. Fallon. So you might, indeed. [She puts her basket on a barrel and begins putting parcels in it, taking them from under her cloak.]

Bartley. And it's a great expense for a poor man to be buried in America.

Mrs. Fallon. Never fear, Bartley Fallon, but I'll give you a good burying the day you'll die.

Bartley. Maybe it's yourself will be buried in the graveyard of Cloonmara before me, Mary Fallon, and I myself that will be dying unbeknownst some night, and no one a-near me. And the cat itself may be gone straying through the country, and the mice squealing over the quilt.

Mrs. Fallon. Leave off talking of dying. It might be twenty years you'll be living yet.

Bartley [with a deep sigh]. I'm thinking if I'll be living at the end of twenty years, it's a very old man I'll be then!

Mrs. Tarpey [turns and sees them]. Good morrow, Bartley Fallon; good morrow, Mrs. Fallon. Well, Bartley, you'll find no cause for complaining to-day; they are all saying it was a good fair.

Bartley [raising his voice]. It was not a good fair, Mrs. Tarpey. It was a scattered sort of a fair. If we didn't expect more, we got less. That's the way with me always; whatever I have to sell goes down and whatever I have to buy goes up. If there's ever any misfortune coming to this world, it's on myself it pitches, like a flock of crows on seed potatoes.

Mrs. Fallon. Leave off talking of misfortunes, and listen to Jack Smith that is coming the way, and he singing. [Voice of Jack Smith heard singing:]

I thought, my first love,
There'd be but one house between you and me,
And I thought I would find
Yourself coaxing my child on your knee.
Over the tide
I would leap with the leap of a swan,
Till I came to the side
Of the wife of the red-haired man!

[Jack Smith comes in; he is a red-haired man, and is carrying a hayfork.]

Mrs. Tarpey. That should be a good song if I had my hearing.

Mrs. Fallon [shouting]. It's "The Red-haired Man's Wife."

Mrs. Tarpey. I know it well. That's the song that has a skin on it! [She turns her back to them and goes on arranging her apples.]

Mrs. Fallon. Where's herself, Jack Smith?

Jack Smith. She was delayed with her washing; bleaching the clothes on the hedge she is, and she daren't leave them, with all the tinkers that do be passing to the fair. It isn't to the fair I came myself, but up to the Five Acre Meadow I'm going, where I have a contract for the hay. We'll get a share of it into tramps to-day. [He lays down hayfork and lights his pipe.]

Bartley. You will not get it into tramps to-day. The rain will be down on it by evening, and on myself too. It's seldom I ever started on a journey but the rain would come down on me before I'd find any place of shelter.

Jack Smith. If it didn't itself, Bartley, it is my belief you would carry a leaky pail on your head in place of a hat, the way you'd not be without some cause of complaining. [A voice heard, "Go on, now, go on out o' that. Go on I say."]

Jack Smith. Look at that young mare of Pat Ryan's that is backing into Shaughnessy's bullocks with the dint of the crowd! Don't be daunted, Pat, I'll give you a hand with her. [He goes out, leaving his hayfork.]

Mrs. Fallon. It's time for ourselves to be going home. I have all I bought put in the basket. Look at there, Jack Smith's hayfork he left after him! He'll be wanting it. [Calls.] Jack Smith! Jack Smith!—He's gone through the crowd—hurry after him, Bartley, he'll be wanting it.

Bartley. I'll do that. This is no safe place to be leaving it. [He takes up fork awkwardly and upsets the basket.] Look at that now! If there is any basket in the fair upset, it must be our own basket! [He goes out to right.]

Mrs. Fallon. Get out of that! It is your own fault, it is. Talk of misfortunes and misfortunes will come. Glory be! Look at my new egg-cups rolling in every part—and my two pound of sugar with the paper broke—

Mrs. Tarpey [turning from stall]. God help us, Mrs. Fallon, what happened your basket?

Mrs. Fallon. It's himself that knocked it down, bad manners to him. [Putting things up.] My grand sugar that's destroyed, and he'll not drink his tea without it. I had best go back to the shop for more, much good may it do him! [Enter Tim Casey.]

Tim Casey. Where is Bartley Fallon, Mrs. Fallon? I want a word with him before he'll leave the fair. I was afraid he might have gone home by this, for he's a temperate man.

Mrs. Fallon. I wish he did go home! It'd be best for me if he went home straight from the fair green, or if he never came with me at all! Where is he, is it? He's gone up the road [jerks elbow] following Jack Smith with a hayfork. [She goes out to left.]

Tim Casey. Following Jack Smith with a hayfork! Did ever anyone hear the like of that. [Shouts.] Did you hear that news, Mrs. Tarpey?

Mrs. Tarpey. I heard no news at all.

Tim Casey. Some dispute I suppose it was that rose between Jack Smith and Bartley Fallon, and it seems Jack made off, and Bartley is following him with a hayfork!

Mrs. Tarpey. Is he now? Well, that was quick work! It's not ten minutes since the two of them were here, Bartley going home and Jack going to the Five Acre Meadow; and I had my apples to settle up, that Jo Muldoon of the police had scattered, and when I looked round again Jack Smith was gone, and Bartley Fallon was gone, and Mrs. Fallon's basket upset, and all in it strewed upon the ground—the tea here—the two pound of sugar there—the egg-cups there—Look, now, what a great hardship the deafness puts upon me, that I didn't hear the commincement of the fight! Wait till I tell James Ryan that I see below; he is a neighbor of Bartley's, it would be a pity if he wouldn't hear the news! [She goes out. Enter Shawn Early and Mrs. Tully.]

Tim Casey. Listen, Shawn Early! Listen, Mrs. Tully, to the news! Jack Smith and Bartley Fallon had a falling out, and Jack knocked Mrs. Fallon's basket into the road, and Bartley made an attack on him with a hayfork, and away with Jack, and Bartley after him. Look at the sugar here yet on the road!

Shawn Early. Do you tell me so? Well, that's a queer thing, and Bartley Fallon so quiet a man!

Mrs. Tully. I wouldn't wonder at all. I would never think well of a man that would have that sort of a moldering look. It's likely he has overtaken Jack by this. [Enter James Ryan and Mrs. Tarpey.]

James Ryan. That is great news Mrs. Tarpey was telling me! I suppose that's what brought the police and the magistrate up this way. I was wondering to see them in it a while ago.

Shawn Early. The police after them? Bartley Fallon must have injured Jack so. They wouldn't meddle in a fight that was only for show!

Mrs. Tully. Why wouldn't he injure him? There was many a man killed with no more of a weapon than a hayfork.

James Ryan. Wait till I run north as far as Kelly's bar to spread the news! [He goes out.]

Tim Casey. I'll go tell Jack Smith's first cousin that is standing there south of the church after selling his lambs. [Goes out.]

Mrs. Tully. I'll go telling a few of the neighbors I see beyond to the west. [Goes out.]

Shawn Early. I'll give word of it beyond at the east of the green. [Is going out when Mrs. Tarpey seizes hold of him.]

Mrs. Tarpey. Stop a minute, Shawn Early, and tell me did you see red Jack Smith's wife, Kitty Keary, in any place?

Shawn Early. I did. At her own house she was, drying clothes on the hedge as I passed.

Mrs. Tarpey. What did you say she was doing?

Shawn Early [breaking away.] Laying out a sheet on the hedge. [He goes.]

Mrs. Tarpey. Laying out a sheet for the dead! The Lord have mercy on us! Jack Smith dead, and his wife laying out a sheet for his burying! [Calls out.] Why didn't you tell me that before, Shawn Early? Isn't the deafness the great hardship? Half the world might be dead without me knowing of it or getting word of it at all! [She sits down and rocks herself.] Oh, my poor Jack Smith! To be going to his work so nice and so hearty, and to be left stretched on the ground in the full light of the day! [Enter Tim Casey.]

Tim Casey. What is it, Mrs. Tarpey? What happened since?

Mrs. Tarpey. Oh, my poor Jack Smith!

Tim Casey. Did Bartley overtake him?

Mrs. Tarpey. Oh, the poor man!

Tim Casey. Is it killed he is?

Mrs. Tarpey. Stretched in the Five Acre Meadow!

Tim Casey. The Lord have mercy on us! Is that a fact?

Mrs. Tarpey. Without the rites of the Church or a ha'porth!

Tim Casey. Who was telling you?

Mrs. Tarpey. And the wife laying out a sheet for his corpse. [Sits up and wipes her eyes.] I suppose they'll wake him the same as another? [Enter Mrs. Tully, Shawn Early, and James Ryan.]

Mrs. Tully. There is great talk about this work in every quarter of the fair.

Mrs. Tarpey. Ochone! cold and dead. And myself maybe the last he was speaking to!

James Ryan. The Lord save us! Is it dead he is?

Tim Casey. Dead surely, and the wife getting provision for the wake.

Shawn Early. Well, now, hadn't Bartley Fallon great venom in him?

Mrs. Tully. You may be sure he had some cause. Why would he have made an end of him if he had not? [To Mrs. Tarpey, raising her voice.] What was it rose the dispute at all, Mrs. Tarpey?

Mrs. Tarpey. Not a one of me knows. The last I saw of them, Jack Smith was standing there, and Bartley Fallon was standing there, quiet and easy, and he listening to "The Red-haired Man's Wife."

Mrs. Tully. Do you hear that, Tim Casey? Do you hear that, Shawn Early and James Ryan? Bartley Fallon was here this morning listening to red Jack Smith's wife, Kitty Keary that was! Listening to her and whispering with her! It was she started the fight so!

Shawn Early. She must have followed him from her own house. It is likely some person roused him.

Tim Casey. I never knew, before, Bartley Fallon was great with Jack Smith's wife.

Mrs. Tully. How would you know it? Sure it's not in the streets they would be calling it. If Mrs. Fallon didn't know of it, and if I that have the next house to them didn't know of it, and if Jack Smith himself didn't know of it, it is not likely you would know of it, Tim Casey.

Shawn Early. Let Bartley Fallon take charge of her from this out so, and let him provide for her. It is little pity she will get from any person in this parish.

Tim Casey. How can he take charge of her? Sure he has a wife of his own. Sure you don't think he'd turn souper and marry her in a Protestant church?

James Ryan. It would be easy for him to marry her if he brought her to America.

Shawn Early. With or without Kitty Keary, believe me it is for America he's making at this minute. I saw the new magistrate and Jo Muldoon of the police going into the post-office as I came up—there was hurry on them—you may be sure it was to telegraph they went, the way he'll be stopped in the docks at Queenstown!

Mrs. Tully. It's likely Kitty Keary is gone with him, and not minding a sheet or a wake at all. The poor man, to be deserted by his own wife, and the breath hardly gone out yet from his body that is lying bloody in the field! [Enter Mrs. Fallon.]

Mrs. Fallon. What is it the whole of the town is talking about? And what is it you yourselves are talking about? Is it about my man Bartley Fallon you are talking? Is it lies about him you are telling, saying that he went killing Jack Smith? My grief that ever he came into this place at all!

James Ryan. Be easy now, Mrs. Fallon. Sure there is no one at all in the whole fair but is sorry for you!

Mrs. Fallon. Sorry for me, is it? Why would anyone be sorry for me? Let you be sorry for yourselves, and that there may be shame on you forever and at the day of judgment, for the words you are saying and the lies you are telling to take away the character of my poor man, and to take the good name off of him, and to drive him to destruction! That is what you are doing!

Shawn Early. Take comfort now, Mrs. Fallon. The police are not so smart as they think. Sure he might give them the slip yet, the same as Lynchehaun.

Mrs. Tully. If they do get him, and if they do put a rope around his neck, there is no one can say he does not deserve it!

Mrs. Fallon. Is that what you are saying, Bridget Tully, and is that what you think? I tell you it's too much talk you have, making yourself out to be such a great one, and to be running down every respectable person! A rope, is it? It isn't much of a rope was needed to tie up your own furniture the day you came into Martin Tully's house, and you never bringing as much as a blanket, or a penny, or a suit of clothes with you and I myself bringing seventy pounds and two feather beds. And now you are stiffer than a woman would have a hundred pounds! It is too much talk the whole of you have. A rope is it? I tell you the whole of this town is full of liars and schemers that would hang you up for half a glass of whisky. [Turning to go.] People they are you wouldn't believe as much as daylight from without you'd get up to have a look at it yourself. Killing Jack Smith indeed! Where are you at all, Bartley, till I bring you out of this? My nice quiet little man! My decent comrade! He that is as kind and as harmless as an innocent beast of the field! He'll be doing no harm at all if he'll shed the blood of some of you after this day's work! That much would be no harm at all. [Calls out.] Bartley! Bartley Fallon! Where are you? [Going out.] Did anyone see Bartley Fallon? [All turn to look after her.]

James Ryan. It is hard for her to believe any such a thing, God help her! [Enter Bartley Fallon from right, carrying hayfork.]

Bartley. It is what I often said to myself, if there is ever any misfortune coming to this world it is on myself it is sure to come! [All turn round and face him.]

Bartley. To be going about with this fork and to find no one to take it, and no place to leave it down, and I wanting to be gone out of this—Is that you, Shawn Early? [Holds out fork.] It's well I met you. You have no call to be leaving the fair for a while the way I have, and how can I go till I'm rid of this fork? Will you take it and keep it until such time as Jack Smith—

Shawn Early [backing]. I will not take it, Bartley Fallon, I'm very thankful to you!

Bartley [turning to apple stall]. Look at it now, Mrs. Tarpey, it was here I got it; let me thrust it in under the stall. It will lie there safe enough, and no one will take notice of it until such time as Jack Smith—

Mrs. Tarpey. Take your fork out of that! Is it to put trouble on me and to destroy me you want? putting it there for the police to be rooting it out maybe. [Thrusts him back.]

Bartley. That is a very unneighborly thing for you to do, Mrs. Tarpey. Hadn't I enough care on me with that fork before this, running up and down with it like the swinging of a clock, and afeard to lay it down in any place! I wish I never touched it or meddled with it at all!

James Ryan. It is a pity, indeed, you ever did.

Bartley. Will you yourself take it, James Ryan? You were always a neighborly man.

James Ryan [backing]. There is many a thing I would do for you, Bartley Fallon, but I won't do that!

Shawn Early. I tell you there is no man will give you any help or any encouragement for this day's work. If it was something agrarian now—

Bartley. If no one at all will take it, maybe it's best to give it up to the police.

Tim Casey. There'd be a welcome for it with them surely! [Laughter.]

Mrs. Tully. And it is to the police Kitty Keary herself will be brought.

Mrs. Tarpey [rocking to and fro]. I wonder now who will take the expense of the wake for poor Jack Smith?

Bartley. The wake for Jack Smith!

Tim Casey. Why wouldn't he get a wake as well as another? Would you begrudge him that much?

Bartley. Red Jack Smith dead! Who was telling you?

Shawn Early. The whole town knows of it by this.

Bartley. Do they say what way did he die?

James Ryan. You don't know that yourself, I suppose, Bartley Fallon? You don't know he was followed and that he was laid dead with the stab of a hayfork?

Bartley. The stab of a hayfork!

Shawn Early. You don't know, I suppose, that the body was found in the Five Acre Meadow?

Bartley. The Five Acre Meadow!

Tim Casey. It is likely you don't know that the police are after the man that did it?

Bartley. The man that did it!

Mrs. Tully. You don't know, maybe, that he was made away with for the sake of Kitty Keary, his wife?

Bartley. Kitty Keary, his wife! [Sits down bewildered.]

Mrs. Tully. And what have you to say now, Bartley Fallon?

Bartley [crossing himself]. I to bring that fork here, and to find that news before me! It is much if I can ever stir from this place at all, or reach as far as the road!

Tim Casey. Look, boys, at the new magistrate, and Jo Muldoon along with him! It's best for us to quit this.

Shawn Early. That is so. It is best not to be mixed in this business at all.

James Ryan. Bad as he is, I wouldn't like to be an informer against any man. [All hurry away except Mrs. Tarpey, who remains behind her stall. Enter Magistrate and Policeman.]

Magistrate. I knew the district was in a bad state, but I did not expect to be confronted with a murder at the first fair I came to.

Policeman. I am sure you did not, indeed.

Magistrate. It was well I had not gone home. I caught a few words here and there that roused my suspicions.

Policeman. So they would, too.

Magistrate. You heard the same story from everyone you asked?

Policeman. The same story—or if it was not altogether the same, anyway it was no less than the first story.

Magistrate. What is that man doing? He is sitting alone with a hayfork. He has a guilty look. The murder was done with a hayfork!

Policeman [in a whisper]. That's the very man they say did the act; Bartley Fallon himself!

Magistrate. He must have found escape difficult—he is trying to brazen it out. A convict in the Andaman Islands tried the same game, but he could not escape my system! Stand aside—Don't go far—have the handcuffs ready. [He walks up to Bartley, folds his arms, and stands before him.] Here, my man, do you know anything of John Smith?

Bartley. Of John Smith! Who is he, now?

Policeman. Jack Smith, sir—Red Jack Smith!

Magistrate [coming a step nearer and tapping him on the shoulder]. Where is Jack Smith?

Bartley [with a deep sigh, and shaking his head slowly]. Where is he, indeed?

Magistrate. What have you to tell?

Bartley. It is where he was this morning, standing in this spot, singing his share of songs—no, but lighting his pipe—scraping a match on the sole of his shoe—

Magistrate. I ask you, for the third time, where is he?

Bartley. I wouldn't like to say that. It is a great mystery, and it is hard to say of any man, did he earn hatred or love.

Magistrate. Tell me all you know.

Bartley. All that I know—Well, there are the three estates; there is Limbo, and there is Purgatory, and there is—

Magistrate. Nonsense! This is trifling! Get to the point.

Bartley. Maybe you don't hold with the clergy so? That is the teaching of the clergy. Maybe you hold with the old people. It is what they do be saying, that the shadow goes wandering, and the soul is tired, and the body is taking a rest—The shadow! [Starts up.] I was nearly sure I saw Jack Smith not ten minutes ago at the corner of the forge, and I lost him again—Was it his ghost I saw, do you think?

Magistrate [to Policeman]. Conscience-struck! He will confess all now!

Bartley. His ghost to come before me! It is likely it was on account of the fork! I to have it and he to have no way to defend himself the time he met with his death!

Magistrate [to Policeman]. I must note down his words. [Takes out notebook.] [To Bartley.] I warn you that your words are being noted.

Bartley. If I had ha' run faster in the beginning, this terror would not be on me at the latter end! Maybe he will cast it up against me at the day of judgment—I wouldn't wonder at all at that.

Magistrate [writing]. At the day of judgment—

Bartley. It was soon for his ghost to appear to me—is it coming after me always by day it will be, and stripping the clothes off in the night time?—I wouldn't wonder at all at that, being as I am an unfortunate man!

Magistrate [sternly]. Tell me this truly. What was the motive of this crime?

Bartley. The motive, is it?

Magistrate. Yes; the motive; the cause.

Bartley. I'd sooner not say that.

Magistrate. You had better tell me truly. Was it money?

Bartley. Not at all! What did poor Jack Smith ever have in his pockets unless it might be his hands that would be in them?

Magistrate. Any dispute about land?

Bartley [indignantly]. Not at all! He never was a grabber or grabbed from anyone!

Magistrate. You will find it better for you if you tell me at once.

Bartley. I tell you I wouldn't for the whole world wish to say what it was—it is a thing I would not like to be talking about.

Magistrate. There is no use in hiding it. It will be discovered in the end.

Bartley. Well, I suppose it will, seeing that mostly everybody knows it before. Whisper here now. I will tell no lie; where would be the use? [Puts his hand to his mouth, and Magistrate stoops.] Don't be putting the blame on the parish, for such a thing was never done in the parish before—it was done for the sake of Kitty Keary, Jack Smith's wife.

Magistrate [to Policeman]. Put on the handcuffs. We have been saved some trouble. I knew he would confess if taken in the right way. [Policeman puts on handcuffs.]

Bartley. Handcuffs now! Glory be! I always said, if there was ever any misfortune coming to this place it was on myself it would fall. I to be in handcuffs! There's no wonder at all in that. [Enter Mrs. Fallon, followed by the rest. She is looking back at them as she speaks.]

Mrs. Fallon. Telling lies the whole of the people of this town are; telling lies, telling lies as fast as a dog will trot! Speaking against my poor respectable man! Saying he made an end of Jack Smith! My decent comrade! There is no better man and no kinder man in the whole of the five parishes! It's little annoyance he ever gave to anyone! [Turns and sees him.] What in the earthly world do I see before me? Bartley Fallon in charge of the police! Handcuffs on him! Oh, Bartley, what did you do at all at all?

Bartley. Oh, Mary, there has a great misfortune come upon me! It is what I always said, that if there is ever any misfortune—

Mrs. Fallon. What did he do at all, or is it bewitched I am?

Magistrate. This man has been arrested on a charge of murder.

Mrs. Fallon. Whose charge is that? Don't believe them! They are all liars in this place! Give me back my man!

Magistrate. It is natural you should take his part, but you have no cause of complaint against your neighbors. He has been arrested for the murder of John Smith, on his own confession.

Mrs. Fallon. The saints of heaven protect us! And what did he want killing Jack Smith?

Magistrate. It is best you should know all. He did it on account of a love affair with the murdered man's wife.

Mrs. Fallon [sitting down]. With Jack Smith's wife! With Kitty Keary!—Ochone, the traitor!

The Crowd. A great shame, indeed. He is a traitor, indeed.

Mrs. Tully. To America he was bringing her, Mrs. Fallon.

Bartley. What are you saying, Mary? I tell you—

Mrs. Fallon. Don't say a word! I won't listen to any word you'll say! [Stops her ears.] Oh, isn't he the treacherous villain? Ohone go deo!

Bartley. Be quiet till I speak! Listen to what I say!

Mrs. Fallon. Sitting beside me on the ass car coming to the town, so quiet and so respectable, and treachery like that in his heart!

Bartley. Is it your wits you have lost or is it I myself that have lost my wits?

Mrs. Fallon. And it's hard I earned you, slaving, slaving—and you grumbling, and sighing, and coughing, and discontented, and the priest wore out anointing you, with all the times you threatened to die!

Bartley. Let you be quiet till I tell you!

Mrs. Fallon. You to bring such a disgrace into the parish. A thing that was never heard of before!

Bartley. Will you shut your mouth and hear me speaking?

Mrs. Fallon. And if it was for any sort of a fine handsome woman, but for a little fistful of a woman like Kitty Keary, that's not four feet high hardly, and not three teeth in her head unless she got new ones! May God reward you, Bartley Fallon, for the black treachery in your heart and the wickedness in your mind, and the red blood of poor Jack Smith that is wet upon your hand! [Voice of Jack Smith heard singing.]

The sea shall be dry,
The earth under mourning and ban!
Then loud shall he cry
For the wife of the red-haired man!

Bartley. It's Jack Smith's voice—I never knew a ghost to sing before—It is after myself and the fork he is coming! [Goes back. Enter Jack Smith.] Let one of you give him the fork and I will be clear of him now and for eternity!

Mrs. Tarpey. The Lord have mercy on us! Red Jack Smith! The man that was going to be waked!

James Ryan. Is it back from the grave you are come?

Shawn Early. Is it alive you are, or is it dead you are?

Tim Casey. Is it yourself at all that's in it?

Mrs. Tully. Is it letting on you were to be dead?

Mrs. Fallon. Dead or alive, let you stop Kitty Keary, your wife, from bringing my man away with her to America!

Jack Smith. It is what I think, the wits are gone astray on the whole of you. What would my wife want bringing Bartley Fallon to America?

Mrs. Fallon. To leave yourself, and to get quit of you she wants, Jack Smith, and to bring him away from myself. That's what the two of them had settled together.

Jack Smith. I'll break the head of any man that says that! Who is it says it? [To Tim Casey.] Was it you said it? [To Shawn Early.] Was it you?

All together [backing and shaking their heads]. It wasn't I said it!

Jack Smith. Tell me the name of any man that said it!

All together [pointing to Bartley]. It was him that said it!

Jack Smith. Let me at him till I break his head! [Bartley backs in terror. Neighbors hold Jack Smith back.]

Jack Smith [trying to free himself]. Let me at him! Isn't he the pleasant sort of a scarecrow for any woman to be crossing the ocean with! It's back from the docks of New York he'd be turned [trying to rush at him again], with a lie in his mouth and treachery in his heart, and another man's wife by his side, and he passing her off as his own! Let me at him, can't you. [Makes another rush, but is held back.]

Magistrate [pointing to Jack Smith]. Policeman, put the handcuffs on this man. I see it all now. A case of false impersonation, a conspiracy to defeat the ends of justice. There was a case in the Andaman Islands, a murderer of the Mopsa tribe, a religious enthusiast—

Policeman. So he might be, too.

Magistrate. We must take both these men to the scene of the murder. We must confront them with the body of the real Jack Smith.

Jack Smith. I'll break the head of any man that will find my dead body!

Magistrate. I'll call more help from the barracks. [Blows Policeman's whistle.]

Bartley. It is what I am thinking, if myself and Jack Smith are put together in the one cell for the night, the handcuffs will be taken off him, and his hands will be free, and murder will be done that time surely!

Magistrate. Come on! [They turn to the right.]

Vavasour[40] [calling]. Kats, Kats, mind ye come home soon from Pally Hughes's!

Catherine [from a distance]. Aye, I'm no wantin' to go, but I must. Good-by!

Vavasour. Good-by! Kats, ye mind about comin' home? [There is no reply, and Vavasour looks still further into the rain-wet street. He calls loudly and desperately.] Kats, Kats darlin', I cannot let you go without tellin' ye that—Kats, do ye hear? [There is still no reply and after one more searching of the street, Vavasour closes the door and sits down on the end of the nearest settle.]

Vavasour. Dear, dear, she's gone, an' I may never see her again, an' I'm to blame, an' she didn't know whatever that in the night—[Loud knocking on the closed door; Vavasour jumps and stands irresolute.] The devil, it can't be comin' for her already? [The knocking grows louder.]

Voice [calling]. Catherine, Vavasour, are ye in?

Vavasour [opening the door]. Aye, come in, whoever ye are. [Mrs. Morgan, the Baker, dressed in a scarlet whittle and freshly starched white cap beneath her tall Welsh beaver hat, enters, shaking the rain from her cloak.]

Mrs. Morgan. Where's Catherine?

Vavasour. She's gone, Mrs. Morgan.

Mrs. Morgan. Gone? Are ye no goin'? Not goin' to Pally Hughes's on Allhallows' Eve?

Vavasour [shaking his head and looking very white]. Nay, I'm no feelin' well.

Mrs. Morgan. Aye, I see ye're ill?

Vavasour. Well, I'm not ill, but I'm not well. Not well at all, Mrs. Morgan.

Mrs. Morgan. We'll miss ye, but I must hurryin' on whatever; I'm late now. Good-night!

Vavasour [speaking drearily]. Good-night! [He closes the door and returns to the settle, where he sits down by the pile of peat and drops his head in his hand. Then he starts up nervously for no apparent cause and opens one of the lattice windows. With an exclamation of fear, he slams it to and throws his weight against the door. Calling and holding hard to the door.] Ye've no cause to come here! Ye old death's head, get away! [Outside there is loud pounding on the door and a voice shouting for admittance. Vavasour is obliged to fall back as the door is gradually forced open, and a head is thrust in, a white handkerchief tied over it.]

Howell Howell [seeing the terror-stricken face of Vavasour]. Well, man, what ails ye; did ye think I was a ghost? [Howell Howell, the Milliner, in highlows and a plum-colored coat, a handkerchief on his hat, enters, stamping off the rain and closing the door. He carefully wipes off his plum-colored sleeves and speaks indignantly.] Well, man, are ye crazy, keepin' me out in the rain that way? Where's Catherine?

Vavasour [stammering]. She's at P-p-p-ally Hughes's.

Howell Howell. Are ye no goin'?

Vavasour. Nay, Howell Howell, I'm no goin'.

Howell Howell. An' dressed in your best? What's the matter? Have ye been drinkin' whatever?

Vavasour [wrathfully]. Drinkin'! I'd better be drinkin' when neighbors go walkin' round the village on Allhallows' Eve with their heads done up in white.

Howell Howell. Aye, well, I can't be spoilin' the new hat I have, that I cannot. A finer beaver there has never been in my shop. [He takes off the handkerchief, hangs it where the heat of the fire will dry it a bit, and then, removing the beaver, shows it to Vavasour, turning it this way and that.]

Vavasour [absent-mindedly]. Aye, grand, grand, man!

Howell Howell. What are ye gazin' at the clock for?

Vavasour [guiltily]. I'm no lookin' at anything.

Howell Howell. Well, indeed, I must be goin', or I shall be late at Pally Hughes's. Good-night.

Vavasour. Good-night. [He closes the door and stands before the clock, studying it. While he is studying its face the door opens slowly, and the tumbled, curly head of a lad about eighteen years of age peers in. The door continues slowly to open. Vavasour unconscious all the while.] 'Tis ten now. Ten, eleven, twelve; that's three hours left, 'tis; nay, nay, 'tis only two hours left, after all, an' then—

Eilir Morris [bounding in and shutting the door behind him with a bang]. Boo! Whoo—o—o!

Vavasour [his face blanched, dropping limply on to the settle]. The devil!

Eilir Morris [troubled]. Uch, the pity, Uncle! I didn't think, an' ye're ill!

Vavasour. Tut, tut, 'tis no matter, an' I'm not ill—not ill at all, but Eilir, lad, ye're kin, an'—could ye promise never to tell?

Eilir Morris [who thinks his uncle has been drinking, speaks to him as if he would humor his whim]. Aye, Uncle, I'm kin, an' I promise. Tell on. What is it? Are ye sick?

Vavasour [drearily]. Uch, lad, I'm not sick!

Eilir Morris. Well, what ails ye?

Vavasour. 'Tis Allhallows' Eve an'—

Eilir Morris. Aren't ye goin' to Pally Hughes's?

Vavasour [moaning and rising]. Ow, the devil, goin' to Pally Hughes's while 'tis drawin' nearer an' nearer an'—Ow! 'Tis the night when Catherine must go.

Eilir Morris. When Aunt Kats must go! What do you mean?

Vavasour. She'll be dead to-night at twelve.

Eilir Morris [bewildered]. Dead at twelve? But she's at Pally Hughes's. Does she know it?

Vavasour. No, but I do, an' to think I've been unkind to her! I've tried this year to make up for it, but 'tis no use, lad; one year'll never make up for ten of harsh words, whatever. Ow! [Groaning, Vavasour collapses on to the settle and rocks to and fro, moaning aloud.]

Eilir Morris [mystified]. Well, ye've not been good to her, Uncle, that's certain; but ye've been different the past year.

Vavasour [sobbing]. Aye, but a year'll not do any good, an' she'll be dyin' at twelve to-night. Ow! I've turned to the scriptures to see what it says about a man an' his wife, but it'll no do, no do, no do!

Eilir Morris. Have ye been drinkin', Uncle?

Vavasour [hotly]. Drinkin'!

Eilir Morris. Well, indeed, no harm, but, Uncle, I cannot understand why Aunt Kats's goin' an' where.

Vavasour [rising suddenly from the settle and seizing Eilir by the coat lapel]. She's goin' to leave me, lad; 'tis Allhallows' Eve whatever! An' she'll be dyin' at twelve. Aye, a year ago things were so bad between us, on Allhallows' Eve I went down to the church porch shortly before midnight to see whether the spirit of your Aunt Kats would be called an'—

Eilir Morris. Uncle, 'twas fair killin' her!

Vavasour. I wanted to see whether she would live the twelve months out. An' as I was leanin' against the church wall, hopin', aye, lad, prayin' to see her spirit there, an' know she'd die, I saw somethin' comin' 'round the corner with white over its head.

Eilir Morris [wailing]. Ow—w!

Vavasour. It drew nearer an' nearer, an' when it came in full view of the church porch, it paused, it whirled around like that, an' sped away with the shroud flappin' about its feet, an' the rain beatin' down on its white hood.

Eilir Morris [wailing again]. Ow—w!

Vavasour. But there was time to see that it was the spirit of Catherine, an' I was glad because my wicked prayer had been answered, an' because with Catherine dyin' the next Allhallows', we'd have to live together only the year out.

Eilir Morris [raising his hand]. Hush, what's that?

Vavasour. 'Tis voices whatever. [Both listen, Eilir goes to the window, Vavasour to the door. The voices become louder.]

Eilir Morris. They're singin' a song at Pally Hughes's. [Voices are audibly singing:]

Vavasour. Aye, they're happy, an' Kats does not know. I went home that night, lad, thinkin' 'twas the last year we'd have to live together, an', considerin' as 'twas the last year, I might just as well try to be decent an' kind. An' when I reached home, Catherine was up waitin' for me an' spoke so pleasantly, an' we sat down an' had a long talk—just like the days when we were courtin'.

Eilir Morris. Did she know, Uncle?

Vavasour [puzzled]. Nay, how could she know. But she seems queer,—as if she felt the evil comin'. Well, indeed, each day was sweeter than the one before, an' we were man an' wife in love an' kindness at last, but all the while I was thinkin' of that figure by the churchyard. Lad, lad, ye'll be marryin' before long,—be good to her, lad, be good to her! [Vavasour lets go the lapels of Eilir's coat and sinks back on to the settle, half sobbing. Outside the roar of wind and rain growing louder can be heard.]

Vavasour [looking at the clock]. An' here 'tis Allhallows' Eve again, an' the best year of my life is past, an' she must die in an hour an' a half. Ow, ow! It has all come from my own evil heart an' evil wish. Think, lad, prayin' for her callin'; aye, goin' there, hopin' ye'd see her spirit, an' countin' on her death!

Eilir Morris [mournfully]. Aye, Uncle, 'tis bad, an' I've no word to say to ye for comfort. I recollect well the story Granny used to tell about Christmas Pryce; 'twas somethin' the same whatever. An' there was Betty Williams was called a year ago, an' is dead now; an' there was Silvan Griffith, an' Geffery, his friend, an' Silvan had just time to dig Geffery's grave an' then his own, too, by its side, an' they was buried the same day an' hour.

Vavasour [wailing]. Ow—w—w! [At that moment the door is blown violently open by the wind; both men jump and stare out into the dark where only the dimmed lights of the rain-swept street are to be seen, and the very bright windows of Pally Hughes's cottage.]

Eilir Morris. Uch, she'll be taken there!

Vavasour. Aye, an', Eilir, she was loath to go to Pally's, but I could not tell her the truth.

Eilir Morris. Are ye not goin', Uncle?

Vavasour. Nay, lad, I cannot go. I'm fair crazy. I'll just be stayin' home, waitin' for them to bring her back. Ow—w—w!

Eilir Morris. Tut, tut, Uncle, I'm sorry. I'll just see for ye what they're doin'. [Eilir steps out and is gone for an instant. He comes back excitedly.]

Vavasour [shouting after him]. Can ye see her, lad?

Eilir Morris [returning]. Dear, they've a grand display, raisins an' buns, an' spices an' biscuits—

Vavasour. But your Aunt Kats?

Eilir Morris. Aye, an' a grand fire, an' a tub with apples in it an'—

Vavasour. But Catherine?

Eilir Morris. Aye, she was there near the fire, an' just as I turned, they blew the lights out.

Vavasour. Blew the lights out! Uch, she'll be taken there whatever!

Eilir Morris. They're tellin' stories in the dark.

Vavasour. Go back again an' tell what ye can see of your Aunt Kats, lad.

Eilir Morris. Aye.

Vavasour [shouting after him]. Find where she's sittin', lad—make certain of that.

Eilir Morris [running in breathless]. They're throwin' nuts on the fire—

Vavasour. Is she there?

Eilir Morris. I'm thinkin' she is, but old Pally Hughes was just throwin' a nut on the fire an'—

Vavasour [impatiently]. 'Tis no matter about Pally Hughes whatever, but your Aunt Kats, did—

Eilir Morris. There was only the light of the fire; I did not see her, but I'll go again.

Vavasour. Watch for her nut an' see does it burn brightly.

Eilir Morris [going out]. Aye.

Vavasour [calling after]. Mind, I'm wantin' to know what she's doin'. [He has scarcely spoken the last word when a great commotion is heard: a door across the street being slammed to violently, and the sound of running feet. Vavasour straightens up, his eyes in terror on the door, which Catherine Jones throws open and bursts through.]

Vavasour [holding out his arms]. Catherine, is it really ye! [Catherine, after a searching glance at him, draws herself up. Vavasour draws himself up, too, and then stoops to pick up some peat which he puts on the fire, and crosses over to left and sits down on the settle near the chimney, without having embraced her. Catherine's face is flushed, her eyes wild under the pretty white cap she wears, a black Welsh beaver above it. She is dressed in a scarlet cloak, under this a tight bodice and short, full skirt, bright stockings, and clogs with brass tips. Her apron is of heavy linen, striped; over her breast a kerchief is crossed, and from the elbows down to the wrist are full white sleeves stiffly starched.]

Catherine. Yiss, yiss, 'twas dull at Pally's—very dull. My nut didn't burn very brightly, an'—an'—well, indeed, my feet was wet, an' I feared takin' a cold.

Vavasour. Yiss, yiss, 'tis better for ye here, dearie. [Then there is silence between them. Catherine still breathes heavily from the running, and Vavasour shuffles his feet. While they are both sitting there, unable to say a word, the door opens without a sound, and Eilir's curly head is thrust in. A guttural exclamation from him makes them start and look towards the door, but he closes it before they can see him. Catherine then takes off her beaver and looks at Vavasour. Vavasour opens his mouth, shuts it, and opens it again.]

Vavasour [desperately]. Did ye have a fine time at Pally's?

Catherine. Aye, 'twas gay an' fine an'—an'—yiss, yiss, so 'twas an' so 'twasn't.

Vavasour [his eyes seeking the clock]. A quarter past eleven, uch! Katy, do ye recall Pastor Evan's sermon, the one he preached last New Year?

Catherine [also glancing at the clock]. Sixteen minutes after eleven—yiss—yiss—

Vavasour [catching Catherine's glance at the clock]. Well, Catherine, do—

Catherine. Yiss, yiss, I said I did whatever. 'Twas about inheritin' the grace of life together.

Vavasour. Kats, dear, wasn't he sayin' that love is eternal, an' that—a man—an'—an'—his wife was lovin' for—for—

Catherine [glancing at the clock and meeting Vavasour's eyes just glancing away from the clock]. Aye, lad, for ever-lastin' life! Uch, what have I done?

Vavasour [unheeding and doubling up as if from pain]. Half after eleven! Yiss, yiss, dear, didn't he say that the Lord was mindful of us—of our difficulties, an' our temptations an' our mistakes?

Catherine [tragically]. Aye, an' our mistakes. Ow, ow, ow, but a half hour's left!

Vavasour. Do ye think, dearie, that if a man were to—to—uch!—be unkind to his wife—an' was sorry an' his wife—his wife dies, that he'd be—be—

Catherine [tenderly]. Aye, I'm thinkin' so. An', lad dear, do ye think if anythin' was to happen to ye to-night,—yiss, this night,—that ye'd take any grudge against me away with ye?

Vavasour [stiffening]. Happen to me, Catherine? [Vavasour collapses, groaning. Catherine goes to his side on the settle.]

Catherine [in an agonized voice]. Uch, dearie, what is it, what is it, what ails ye?

Vavasour [slanting an eye at the clock]. Nothin', nothin' at all. Ow, the devil, 'tis twenty minutes before twelve whatever!

Catherine. Lad, lad, what is it?

Vavasour. 'Tis nothin', nothin' at all—'tis—ow!—'tis just a little pain across me.

Catherine [her face whitening as she steals a look at the clock and puts her arm around Vavasour]. Vavasour, lad dear, is that the wind in the chimney? Put your arm about me an' hold fast.

Vavasour [both hands across his stomach, his eyes on the clock]. Ow—ten minutes!

Catherine [shaking all over]. Is that a step at the door?

Vavasour [unheeding].'Tis goin' to strike now in a minute.

Catherine [her eyes in horror on the clock]. Five minutes before twelve!

Vavasour [almost crying, his eyes fixed on the clock's face]. Uch, the toad, the serpent!

Catherine [her face in her hands]. Dear God, he's goin' now!

Vavasour [covering his eyes]. Uch, the devil! Uch, the gates of hell! [Catherine cries out. Vavasour groans loudly. The clock is striking: One, Two, Three, Four, Five, Six, Seven, Eight, Nine, Ten, Eleven, Twelve! The last loud clang vibrates and subsides. Through a chink in her fingers Catherine is peering at Vavasour. Through a similar chink his agonized eyes are peering at her.]

Catherine [gulping]. Uch!

Vavasour. The devil!

Catherine [putting out her hand to touch him]. Lad, dear! [They embrace, they kiss, they dance madly about. Then they do it all over again. While they are doing this, Eilir opens the door again and thrusts in his head. He stares open-eyed, open-mouthed at them, and leans around the side of the door to see what time it is, saying audibly "five minutes past twelve," grunts his satisfaction, and closes the door.]

Vavasour [mad with joy]. Kats, are ye here, really here?

Catherine [surprised]. Am I here? Tut, lad, are ye here?

Vavasour [shrewdly]. Yiss, that is are we both here?

Catherine [perplexed]. Did ye think I wasn't goin' to be?

Vavasour [suppressed intelligent joy in his eyes]. No—o, not that, only I thought, I thought ye was goin' to—to—faint, Kats. I thought ye looked like it, Kats.

Catherine [the happiness on her face vanishing, sinks on to the nearest settle]. Uch, I'm a bad, bad woman, aye, Vavasour Jones, a bad woman!

Vavasour [puzzled, yet lightly]. Nay, Kats, nay!

Catherine [desperately and almost in tears]. Ye cannot believe what I must tell ye. Lad, a year ago this night I went to the church porch, hopin', aye, prayin', ye'd be called, that I'd see your spirit walkin'.

Vavasour [starting and recovering himself]. Catherine, ye did that!

Catherine [plunging on with her confession]. Aye, lad, I did, I'd been so unhappy with the quarrelin' an' hard words. I could think of nothin' but gettin' rid of them.

Vavasour [in a tone of condemnation and standing over her]. That was bad, very bad indeed!

Catherine. An' then, lad, when I reached the church corner an' saw your spirit was really there, really called, an' I knew ye'd not live the year out, I was frightened, but uch! lad, I was glad, I was indeed.

Vavasour [looking grave]. Catherine, 'twas a terrible thing to do!

Catherine [meekly]. Yiss, I know it now, but I didn't then. I was hard-hearted, an' I was weak with longin' to escape from it all. An' when I ran home I was frightened, but uch! lad, I was glad, too, an' now it hurts me so to think of it. Can you no comfort me?

Vavasour [grudgingly, but not touching Catherine's outstretched hand]. Aye, well, I could, but, Kats, 'twas such a terrible thing to do!

Catherine. Yiss, yiss, ye'll never be able to forgive me, I'm thinkin'. An' then when ye came in from the lodge, ye spoke so pleasantly to me that I was troubled. An' now the year through it has grown better an' better, an' I could think of nothin' but lovin' ye, an' wishing' ye to live, an' knowin' I was the cause of your bein' called. Uch, lad, can ye forgive me?

Vavasour [slowly]. Aye, I can, none of us is without sin; but, Catherine, it was wrong, aye, aye, 'twas a wicked thing for a woman to do.

Catherine [still more meekly]. An' then to-night, lad, I was expectin' ye to go, knowin' ye couldn't live after twelve, an' ye sittin' there so innocent an' mournful. An' when the time came, I wanted to die myself. Uch!

Vavasour [sitting down beside her and putting an arm about her as he speaks in a superior tone of voice]. No matter, dearie, now. It was wrong in ye, but we're still here, an' it's been a sweet year, yiss, better nor a honeymoon, an' all the years after we'll make better nor this. There, there, Kats, let's have a bit of a wassail to celebrate our Allhallows' honeymoon, shall we?

Catherine [starting to fetch a bowl]. Yiss, lad, 'twould be fine, but, Vavasour, can ye forgive me, think, lad, for hopin', aye, an' prayin' to see your spirit called, just wishin' that ye'd not live the year out?

Vavasour [with condescension]. Kats, I can, an' I'm not layin' it up against ye, though 'twas a wicked thing for ye to do—for anyone to do. Now, darlin', fetch the bowl.

Catherine [starting for the bowl again but turning on him]. Vavasour, how does it happen that the callin' is set aside, an' that ye're really here? Such a thing has not been in Beddgelert in the memory of man.

Vavasour [with dignity]. I'm not sayin' how it's happened, Kats, but I'm thinkin' 'tis modern times whatever, an' things have changed—aye, indeed, 'tis modern times.

Catherine [sighing contentedly]. Good! 'Tis lucky 'tis modern times whatever!