Chapter 3

JIMMY. Spare the common decencies at least. Go in the other room.

THE ANGEL. Certainly, if that is the custom here. With the clothes over his arm, he goes into the bedroom.

JIMMY. (_sternly, to Annabelle_) And now tell me, what do you mean by this?

ANNABELLE. (_simply_)--We are in love.

JIMMY. Do you mean to say you would throw me over for that fellow?

ANNABELLE. Why not?

JIMMY. What good is he? All he can do is sing hymns. In three months he'll be a tramp.

ANNABELLE. I don't care. And he won't be a tramp. I'll look after him.

JIMMY. (_sneeringly_) The maternal instinct! Well, take care of him if you like. But of course you know that in six weeks he'll fall in love with somebody else?

ANNABELLE. No he won't. I'm sure that I am the only girl in the world to him.

JIMMY. Of course you're the only girl in the world to him--now. You're the only one he's ever seen. But wait till he sees the others! Six weeks? On second thought I make it three days. Immortal love! (_He laughs_.)

ANNABELLE. What difference does it make? You don't understand. Whether it lasts a day or a year, while it lasts it will be immortal. _The Angel enters, dressed in Jimmy's old clothes, and carrying his wings in his hands. He seems exhilarated_.

THE ANGEL. How do I look?

JIMMY. It is customary to wear one's tie tucked inside the vest.

THE ANGEL. (_flinging the ends of the gorgeous necktie over his shoulder_) No! Though I have become a man, I do not without some regret put on the dull garb of mortality. I would not have my form lose all its original brightness. Even so it is the excess of glory obscured.

ANNABELLE. (_coming over to him_) You are quite right, darling.

_She tucks the tie inside his vest_.

THE ANGEL. Thank you, beloved.--And now these wings! Take them, and burn them with your own sweet hands, so that I can never leave you, even if I would.

ANNABELLE. No! I would rather put them away for you in a closet, so that you can go and look at them any time you want to, and see that you have the means to freedom ready to your hand. I shall never hold you against your will. I do not want to burn your wings. I really don't! But if you insist--!

_She takes the wings, and approaches the grate_.

JIMMY. (_to the Angel_) Don't let her do it! Fool! You don't know what you are doing. Listen to me! You think that she is wonderful-- superior--divine. It is only natural. There are moments when I have thought so myself. But I know why I thought so, and you have yet to learn. Keep your wings, my friend, against the day of your awakening-- the day when the glamour of sex has vanished, and you see in her, as you will see, an inferior being, with a weak body, a stunted mind, devoid of creative power, almost devoid of imagination, utterly lacking in critical capacity--a being who does not know how to work, nor how to talk, nor even how to play!

_Annabelle, dropping the wings on the hearth, stares at him, in speechless anger_.

THE ANGEL. Sir! Do you refer in these vulgar and insulting terms to the companion of my soul, the desire of my heart, the perfect lover whose lips have kindled my dull senses to ecstasy?

JIMMY. I do. Remember that I know her better than you do, young man. Take my advice and leave her alone. Even now it is not too late! Save yourself from this folly while there is still time!

THE ANGEL. Never!

JIMMY. Then take these tickets--and I hope that I never see either of you again! _He holds out the tickets. Annabelle, after a pause, steps forward and takes them_.

ANNABELLE. That is really sweet of you, Jimmy! The blast of an auto-horn is heard outside.

JIMMY. (_bitterly_) And there's my taxi. Take that, too.

THE ANGEL. Farewell!

_He opens the door. Annabelle, at his side, turns and blows Jimmy a kiss. Stonily, Jimmy watches them go out. Then he picks up his suitcase and goes, with an air of complete finality, into the other room_.

_There is a moment's silence, and then the door opens softly, and the Angel looks in, enters surreptitiously, seizes up the wings, and with them safely clasped to his bosom, vanishes again through the door_.

LEGEND

A ROMANCE

TO KIRAH MARKHAM

"Legend" was first produced, under the title, "My Lady's Mirror," at the Liberal Club, in 1915, with the following cast:

He ............... Clement Wood She............... Kirah Markham

_A small room with a little table in the centre, and a chair on either side of it. At the back is the embrasure of a French window opening on a balcony. In another wall is the outer door. The room is lighted by tall candles. There is an image of the Virgin in a niche in the corner_.

HE. (_a cloaked figure, standing with hat and stick in one hand and holding in the other a large square parcel_) First of all, I have a present for you.

SHE. (_where she has just risen when he entered_) A present! Oh, thank you, Luciano!

HE. It is not me you have to thank for this present! (_He puts it on the table_.) It is some one else. I am only the bearer.

SHE. Who can it be? Who would send me a present?

HE. What a question, Donna Violante! Not a man in Seville, not a man in Spain, but would send you gifts if he dared. It is not "Who would?" but "Who could?"

SHE. No man, as you know, Luciano, has that right.

HE. Have you so soon forgotten your husband, Violante? He, surely, has that right! And it is thoughtful of him, too, to pause in the midst of his antiquarian researches in Rome, to think of his young wife and send her a gift. He appreciates you more than I imagined. Under his grizzled and scientific exterior, he is a human being. I respect him for it.

_He puts down his hat and stick_.

SHE. My husband! But why, then, do _you_ bring it?

HE. I was commissioned by him to do so. I received the package, this morning, with a letter. Shall I read it to you?

_He takes out the letter_.

SHE. Yes.... But why should he not send it direct to _me_?

HE. Your husband is a man of curious and perverse mind, Violante, and, in spite of his interest in dead things, not without some insight into the living soul. I think it gave him an obscure pleasure to think of _me_ the bearer of _his_ gift. But shall we let him speak for himself?

_He opens the envelope_.

SHE. Yes. Read the letter.

_She sits down to listen_.

HE. (_reading_) "My dear young friend: I am sending you a package, which I beg you, as a favour, to deliver to Donna Violante, my wife. It contains a gift of an unusual sort, which you as well as she will appreciate. As you know, it is the unusual which interests me--the unusual and the old. And yet, antiquarian though I am, I flatter myself that I understand the mind of a beautiful young woman, especially when that young woman is my wife. I have found her a mirror. Yes, a mirror! Under this name it seems commonplace enough, but when you have seen it I do not think you will say so. It is not the kind of mirror that is ordinarily found in a lady's boudoir. Yet it will give to her a faithful reflection of her loveliness as it is in truth. I found it-- this will interest you--in the Catacombs. You would not think the early Christians had so much vanity! Yet it was a mirror into which the virgin-martyrs-to-be of the time of Nero looked each day. As they looked, let Donna Violante look. Say to her from me--'Look long and well into this mirror, and profit by what you see.'--Humbly your friend, Don Vincenzio." . . . Is not that a pleasant letter?

_He restores the letter to his pocket_.

SHE. There is something in it that makes me shiver.... Let us look.

_She takes the paper from the box and is about to open it when he stops her_.

HE. No. Not now. I want to talk to you.

SHE (_lapsing into a hostile coldness_) Yes.

HE. You know what I have to say. I have said it so often. I shall say it once more.

SHE. (_appealingly_) Luciano!

HE. No, let me speak. You are not happy. You do not love your husband. And you are too young and beautiful to live without love.

SHE. Please!

HE. I love you. And you love me. Why do you not surrender yourself to love?

SHE. Why do you say such things? They hurt me.

HE. They are reality. Does reality hurt you? Are you living in a shadow-world, that you should flinch from the hard touch of truth? I say it again. I love you.

SHE. Before you started to talk like that, we were so happy together.

HE. Before I spoke out the truth of my own heart and yours. You didn't want it spoken out. You didn't want to be told you were in love. It was a thing too harsh and sweet. It frightened you to think of. You wanted us to sit for ever, like two lovers painted on a fan, fixed in an everlasting and innocuous bliss.

SHE. Well, you have succeeded in spoiling that. You have made me unhappy, if that gives you any pleasure.

HE. It was not I who have spoiled your shadow-world. It is love, coming like the dawn on wings of flame, and shattering the shadows with spears of gold. It is love that has made you unhappy. You tremble at its coming, and try to flee. But the day of love has come for you.

SHE. Ah, if it had only come before--before....

HE. Before you married that perverse old man. If it had come while you were still a maiden, free, with a right to give yourself up to it! Ah, you would have given yourself gloriously! It is beautiful--but it is a dream, and the time calls for a deed. We love each other. We can take our happiness now. Will you do it? Will you come away with me?

SHE. No.

HE. Then I if you cannot take your happiness, give me mine. If you cannot be a woman, be an angel, and lean down from your dream heaven to slake my earthly thirst.

SHE. No.

HE. No angel? Then a goddess! You want to be worshipped. You want to be adored. I will worship you, but not from afar, I will adore you in my own fashion. I will praise you without words, and you shall be the answer to my prayer. Will you?

SHE. No.

HE. "No." "No." "No." How did your lips learn to say that word so easily? They are not made to say such a word. They are too young, too red, to say "No" to Life. When you say that word, the world grows black. The stars go out, the leaves wither, the heart stops beating. It is a word that kills. It is the word of Death. Dare you say it again? Answer me, do we love each other? . . . Silence.

SHE. I think . . . I am going . . . to cry.

HE. And tears. Tears are a slave's answer. Speak. Defend yourself. Why do you stay here? Why do you deny yourself happiness? Why won't you come with me?

SHE. I cannot.

HE. Always the same phrase that means nothing. Ah, Violante, lady of few words, you know how to baffle argument. If I could only make you speak! If I could only see what the thoughts are that darken your will!

SHE. Don't.

HE. By God! I wonder that I don't hate you instead of love you. There is something ignobly feminine about you. You are incapable of action-- almost incapable of speech. Your lips are shut tight against kisses, and when they open to speak, all that they say is "Don't."

SHE. What do you expect to gain by scolding me?

HE. I gain the satisfaction of telling you the truth--that you have the most cowardly soul that was ever belied by a glorious body. Who would think to look at you that you were afraid?

SHE. It's no use bullying me.

HE. I know that, Violante. It's the poorest way to woo a woman. But I have tried every other way. I have pleaded, and been answered with silence. I have wooed you with caresses, and been answered with tears.

SHE. I am sorry, Luciano.

HE. I want you to be glad.

SHE. I am glad--glad of you--in spite of everything.

HE. Gladness is something fiercer than that. You are too tame. Oh, if I could reach and rouse your soul!

SHE. My soul is yours already....

HE. And your body...?

SHE. It is impossible.

HE. No. It isn't impossible. But I'll tell you what is impossible. This--for me to go on loving you and despising you.... I came here today to make one last appeal to you. I don't mean it as a threat. But I am going away tonight for ever--with you, or without you. You must decide.

SHE. (_rising_) But--I don't want you to go, Luciano!

HE. You will miss me, I know. But don't think too much of that. You will find a new friend--if you decide against me.

SHE. And I must decide now?

HE. Yes--now.

SHE. But how can I? Oh, Luciano!

HE. I know it is hard. But I will not make it harder. Violante: I have sought to appeal to your emotion when my appeal to your will was in vain. But tonight I will leave you to make your own decision. You must come to me freely or not at all. There must be no regrets.

SHE. I cannot do it.

HE. If you say that when I return I will accept it as a final answer. I am going out on the balcony--for a long minute. And while I am gone you must decide what to do. Will you?

SHE. Yes.

HE. (_turning at the window_) And if while I am gone you wish to recall my arguments to your mind--(_he points to the box on the table_)--look in your mirror there. Your beauty will plead for me. As Don Vincenzio said: Look long and well into that mirror, lady, and profit by what you see.

_He goes out. . . . She looks after him, and when he is gone holds out her arms towards the door. She makes a step towards it, and then stops, her hands falling to her sides. Her head droops for a moment or two, and then is slowly lifted. Her eyes sweep the room imploringly, and rest on the image of the Virgin. She goes over to it and kneels_.

SHE. Mary, Mother of God, give me a sign. I do not know what to do. Help me. I must decide. Love has entered my heart, and it may be that I cannot be a good woman any longer. You will be kind to me, and pity me, and send me a sign. Perhaps you will let me have my lover, for you are kind.

_She crosses herself, rises, and looks around. She sees the box on the table, and puts her hand to her face with a gesture of sudden thought. She smiles_.

Perhaps that is the sign!

_She goes to the box and touches it_.

He said it would plead for him. . . .

_She opens it--and starts back with a gesture and a cry_.

It _is_ the sign!

_With one hand over her heart she approaches it again. She takes out of the box and puts on the table a skull. . . . She stares at it a long while, and then turns with a shiver_.

How cold it is here! Where are the lights?

_She is compelled to look again_.

I had never thought of death. My heart is cold, too. The chill of the grave is on me. Was I ever in love? It seems strange to remember. What is his name? I almost have forgotten. And he is waiting for me. I will show him this. We should have looked at it together. . . .

_A silence, as her mood changes_.

So _he_ had planned it! He wanted to cast the chill of the grave upon our love. He saw it all as though he had been here. He sent us-- this! How well he knew me--better than I knew myself. An old man's cunning! To stop my pulses throbbing with love, and put out the fever in my eyes. A trick! Yes, but it suffices. One look into the eyeless face of Death turns me to ashes. I am no longer fit for love. . . .

_She turns to the door_.

Why does he not come for his answer?

_She looks for a lingering moment toward the door, and then turns back again to the table. Her mood changes again_.

A present from a husband to a wife!

_She takes it up in her hands_.

A lady's mirror! What was it that he said? "Look long and well into this mirror, and profit by what you see," My mirror from the Catacombs!

_She sinks into a chair, holding it between her hands as it rests on the table. Her tone is trance-like_.

I look. I see the end of all things. I see that nothing matters. Is that your message? Why do you grin at me? You laugh to think that my face is like your face--or will be soon--in a few years-tomorrow. You mock at me for thinking I am alive. I am dead, you say. Dead, like you. Am I?

_She rises_.

No. Not yet. For a moment--a little lifetime--I have life, I Have lips and eyelids made for kisses. I have hands that burn to give caresses, and breasts that ache to take them. I have a body made to suffer the deep stings of love. This flesh of mine shall be a golden web woven of pain and joy.

_She takes up the skull again_.

You were alive once, and a virgin-martyr? You denied yourself love? You sent away your lover? No wonder you speak so plainly to me now. Back, girl, to your coffin!

_She puts the skull in the box, and closes the lid softly. She turns to the door and waits. At last he enters_.

HE. (_dejected_) You have--decided?

SHE. Yes. I have decided.

HE. I knew. It is no use. I will go.

_He turns to the door_.

SHE. Wait! (_He turns back incredulously_.) I have decided to go with you. (_He stands stock-still_.) Don't you understand? Take me. I am yours. Don't you believe it?

HE. Violante!

SHE. It is hard to believe, isn't it. I have been a child. Now I am a woman. And shall I tell you how I became a woman? (_She points to the box on the table_.) I looked in my mirror there. I saw that I was beautiful--and alive. Tell me, am I not beautiful--and alive?

HE. There is something terrible about you at this moment. I am almost afraid of you.

SHE. Kiss me, Luciano!

SWEET-AND-TWENTY

A COMEDY

To EDNA ST. VINCENT MILLAY

"Sweet-and-Twenty" was first produced by the Provincetown Players, New York City, in 1918, with the following cast:

The Young Woman ........ Edna St. Vincent Millay The Young Man ... Ordway Tead The Agent .............. Otto Liveright The Guard .............. Louis Ell

The cherry-orchard scene was effectively produced on a small stage by a blue-green back-drop with a single conventionalized cherry-branch painted across it, and two three-leaved screens masking the wings, painted in blue-green with a spray of cherry blossoms.

_A corner of the cherry orchard on the country place of the late Mr. Boggley, now on sale and open for inspection to prospective buyers. The cherry orchard, now in full bloom, is a very pleasant place. There is a green-painted rustic bench beside the path. . . .

A young woman, dressed in a light summer frock and carrying a parasol, drifts in from the back. She sees the bench, comes over to it and sits down with an air of petulant weariness.

A handsome young man enters from the right. He stops short in surprise on seeing the charming stranger who lolls upon the bench. He takes off his hat_.

HE. Oh, I beg your pardon!

SHE. Oh, you needn't! I've no right to be here, either.

HE. (_coming over to her_) Now what do you mean by that?

SHE. I thought perhaps you were playing truant, as I am.

HE. Playing truant?

SHE. I was looking at the house, you know. And I got tired and ran away.

HE. Well, to tell the truth, so did I. It's dull work, isn't it?

SHE. I've been upstairs and down for two hours. That family portrait gallery finished me. It was so old and gloomy and dead that I felt as if I were dead myself. I just had to do something. I wanted to jab my parasol through the window-pane. I understood just how the suffragettes felt. But I was afraid of shocking the agent. He is such a meek little man, and he seemed to think so well of me. If I had broken the window I would have shattered his ideals of womanhood, too, I'm afraid. So I just slipped away quietly and came here.

HE. I've only been there half an hour and we--I've only been in the basement. That's why our tours of inspection didn't bring us together sooner. I've been cross-examining the furnace. Do you understand furnaces? (_He sits down beside her_) I don't.

SHE. Do you like family portraits? I hate 'em!

HE. What! Do the family portraits go with the house?

SHE. No, thank heaven. They've been bequeathed to some museum, I am told. They're valuable historically--early colonial governors and all that sort of stuff. But there is some one with me who--who takes a deep interest in such things.

HE. (_frowning at a sudden memory_) Hm. Didn't I see you at that real estate office in New York yesterday?

SHE. Yes. _He_ was with me then.

HE. (_compassionately_) I--I thought I remembered seeing you with--with him.

SHE. (_cheerfully_) Isn't he _just_ the sort of man who would be interested in family portraits?

HE. (_confused_) Well--since you ask me--

SHE. Oh, that's all right. Tubby's a dear, in spite of his funny old ideas. I like him very much.

HE. (_gulping the pill_) Yes....

SHE. He's so anxious to please me in buying this house. I suppose it's all right to have a house, but I'd like to become acquainted with it gradually. I'd like to feel that there was always some corner left to explore--some mystery saved up for a rainy day. Tubby can't understand that. He drags me everywhere, explaining how we'll keep this and change that--dormer windows here and perhaps a new wing there.... I suppose you've been rebuilding the house, too?

HE. No. Merely decided to turn that sunny south room into a study. It would make a very pleasant place to work. But if you really want the place, I'd hate to take it away from you.

SHE. I was just going to say that if _you_ really wanted it, _I'd_ withdraw. It was Tubby's idea to buy it, you know--not mine. You _do_ want it, don't you?

HE. I can't say that I do. It's so infernally big. But Maria thinks I ought to have it. (_Explanatorily_)--Maria is--

SHE. (_gently_) She's--the one who is interested in furnaces. I understand. I saw her with you at the real-estate office yesterday. Well--furnaces are necessary, I suppose. (_There is a pause, which she breaks suddenly_.) Do you see that bee?

HE. A bee?

_He follows her gaze up to a cluster of blossoms_.

SHE. Yes--there! (_Affectionately_)--The rascal! There he goes.

_Their eyes follow the flight of the bee across the orchard. There is a silence. Alone together beneath the blossoms, a spell seems to have fallen upon them. She tries to think of something to say--and at last succeeds_.

SHE. Have you heard the story of the people who used to live here?

HE. No; why?

SHE. The agent was telling us. It's quite romantic--and rather sad. You see, the man that built this house was in love with a girl. He was building it for her--as a surprise. But he had neglected to mention to her that he was in love with her. And so, in pique, she married another man, though she was really in love with him. The news came just when he had finished the house. He shut it up for a year or two, but eventually married some one else, and they lived I here for ten years--most unhappily. Then they went abroad, and the house was sold. It was bought, curiously enough, by the husband of the girl he had been in love with. They lived here till they died-hating each other to the end, the agent says.

HE. It gives me the shivers. To think of that house, haunted by the memories of wasted love! Which of us, I wonder, will have to live in it? I don't want to.

SHE. (_prosaically_) Oh, don't take it so seriously as all that. If one can't live in a house where there's been an unhappy marriage, why, good heavens, where is one going to live? Most marriages, I fancy, are unhappy.

HE. A bitter philosophy for one so young and--

SHE. Nonsense! But listen to the rest of the story. The most interesting part is about this very orchard.

HE. Really!

SHE. Yes. This orchard, it seems, was here before the house was. It was part of an old farm where he and she--the unhappy lovers, you know-- stopped one day, while they were out driving, and asked for something to eat. The farmer's wife was busy, but she gave them each a glass of milk, and told them they could eat all the cherries they wanted. So they picked a hatful of cherries, and ate them, sitting on a bench like this one. And then he fell in love with her. . . .

HE. And . . . didn't tell her so. . . .

_She glances at him in alarm. His self-possession has vanished. He is pale and frightened, but there is a desperate look in his eyes, as if some unknown power were forcing him to do something very rash. In short, he seems like a young man who has just fallen in love_.

SHE. (_hastily_) So you see this orchard is haunted, too!