SCENE II: _Two weeks later. The stage is as in Scene I, except that

the breakfast table has been removed. During the first few minutes the dusk of a winter afternoon deepens. Out of the darkness spring rows of double street-lights almost meeting in the distance. HENRIETTA is at the psychoanalytical end of STEVE’S work-table, surrounded by open books and periodicals, writing. STEVE enters briskly._

STEVE

What are you doing, my dear?

HENRIETTA

My paper for the Liberal Club.

STEVE

Your paper on--?

HENRIETTA

On a subject which does not have your sympathy.

STEVE

Oh, I’m not sure I’m wholly out of sympathy with psychoanalysis, Henrietta. You worked it so hard. I couldn’t even take a bath without it’s meaning something.

HENRIETTA

[_Loftily._] I talked it because I knew you needed it.

STEVE

You haven’t said much about it these last two weeks. Uh--your faith in it hasn’t weakened any?

HENRIETTA

Weakened? It’s grown stronger with each new thing I’ve come to know. And Mabel. She is with Dr. Russell now. Dr. Russell is wonderful! From what Mabel tells me I believe his analysis is going to prove that I was right. Today I discovered a remarkable confirmation of my theory in the hen-dream.

STEVE

What is your theory?

HENRIETTA

Well, you know about Lyman Eggleston. I’ve wondered about him. I’ve never seen him, but I know he’s less bourgeois than Mabel’s other friends--more intellectual--and [_Significantly_] she doesn’t see much of him because Bob doesn’t like him.

STEVE

But what’s the confirmation?

HENRIETTA

Today I noticed the first syllable of his name.

STEVE

Ly?

HENRIETTA

No--egg.

STEVE

Egg?

HENRIETTA

[_Patiently._] Mabel dreamed she was a _hen_. [_STEVE laughs._] You wouldn’t laugh if you knew how important names are in interpreting dreams. Freud is full of just such cases in which a whole hidden complex is revealed by a single significant syllable--like this egg.

STEVE

Doesn’t the traditional relation of hen and egg suggest rather a maternal feeling?

HENRIETTA

There is something maternal in Mabel’s love, of course, but that’s only one element.

STEVE

Well, suppose Mabel hasn’t a suppressed desire to be this gentleman’s mother, but his beloved. What’s to be done about it? What about Bob? Don’t you think it’s going to be a little rough on him?

HENRIETTA

That can’t be helped. Bob, like everyone else, must face the facts of life. If Dr. Russell should arrive independently at this same interpretation I shall not hesitate to advise Mabel to leave her present husband.

STEVE

Um--hum! [_The lights go up on Fifth Avenue. STEVE goes to the window and looks out._] How long is it we’ve lived here, Henrietta?

HENRIETTA

Why, this is the third year, Steve.

STEVE

I--we--one would miss this view if one went away, wouldn’t one?

HENRIETTA

How strangely you speak! Oh, Stephen, I _wish_ you’d go to Dr. Russell. Don’t think my fears have abated because I’ve been able to restrain myself. I had to on account of Mabel. But now, dear--won’t you go?

STEVE

I--[_He breaks off, turns on the light, then comes and sits beside HENRIETTA._] How long have we been married, Henrietta?

HENRIETTA

Stephen, I don’t understand you! You _must_ go to Dr. Russell.

STEVE

I have gone.

HENRIETTA

You--what?

STEVE

[_Jauntily._] Yes, Henrietta, I’ve been psyched.

HENRIETTA

You went to Dr. Russell?

STEVE

The same.

HENRIETTA

And what did he say?

STEVE

He said--I--I was a little surprised by what he said, Henrietta.

HENRIETTA

[_Breathlessly._] Of course--one can so seldom anticipate. But tell me--your dream, Stephen? It means--?

STEVE

It means--I was considerably surprised by what it means.

HENRIETTA

_Don’t_ be so exasperating!

STEVE

It means--you really want to know, Henrietta?

HENRIETTA

Stephen, you’ll drive me mad!

STEVE

He said--of course he may be wrong in what he said.

HENRIETTA

He _isn’t_ wrong. _Tell_ me!

STEVE

He said my dream of the walls receding and leaving me alone in a forest indicates a suppressed desire--

HENRIETTA

Yes--yes!

STEVE

To be freed from--

HENRIETTA

Yes--freed from--?

STEVE

Marriage.

HENRIETTA

[_Crumples. Stares._] Marriage!

STEVE

He--he may be mistaken, you know.

HENRIETTA

_May_ be mistaken?

STEVE

I--well, of course, I hadn’t taken any stock in it myself. It was only your great confidence--

HENRIETTA

Stephen, are you telling me that Dr. Russell--Dr. A. E. Russell--told you this? [_STEVE nods._] Told you you have a suppressed desire to separate from _me_?

STEVE

That’s what he said.

HENRIETTA

Did he know who you were?

STEVE

Yes.

HENRIETTA

That you were married to me?

STEVE

Yes, he knew that.

HENRIETTA

And he told you to leave me?

STEVE

It seems he must be wrong, Henrietta.

HENRIETTA

[_Rising._] And I’ve sent him more patients--! [_Catches herself and resumes coldly._] What reason did he give for this analysis?

STEVE

He says the confining walls are a symbol of my feeling about marriage and that their fading away is a wish-fulfillment.

HENRIETTA

[_Gulping._] Well, is it? Do you want our marriage to end?

STEVE

It was a great surprise to me that I did. You see I hadn’t known what was in my unconscious mind.

HENRIETTA

[_Flaming._] What did you tell Dr. Russell about me to make him think you weren’t happy?

STEVE

I never told him a thing, Henrietta. He got it all from his confounded clever inferences. I--I tried to refute them, but he said that was only part of my self-protective lying.

HENRIETTA

And that’s why you were so--happy--when you came in just now!

STEVE

Why, Henrietta, how can you say such a thing? I was _sad_. Didn’t I speak sadly of--of the view? Didn’t I ask how long we had been married?

HENRIETTA

[_Rising._] Stephen Brewster, have you no sense of the seriousness of this? Dr. Russell doesn’t know what our marriage has been. You do. You should have laughed him down! Confined--in life with me? Did you tell him that I _believe_ in freedom?

STEVE

I very emphatically told him that his results were a great surprise to me.

HENRIETTA

But you accepted them.

STEVE

Oh, not at all. I merely couldn’t refute his arguments. I’m not a psychologist. I came home to talk it over with you. You being a disciple of psychoanalysis--

HENRIETTA

If you are going, I wish you would go tonight!

STEVE

Oh, my dear! I--surely I couldn’t do that! Think of my feelings. And my laundry hasn’t come home.

HENRIETTA

I ask you to go tonight. Some women would falter at this, Steve, but I am not such a woman. I leave you free. I do not repudiate psychoanalysis; I say again that it has done great things. It has also made mistakes, of course. But since you accept this analysis--[_She sits down and pretends to begin work._] I have to finish this paper. I wish you would leave me.

STEVE

[_Scratches his head, goes to the inner door._] I’m sorry, Henrietta, about my unconscious mind.

[_Alone, HENRIETTA’S face betrays her outraged state of mind--disconcerted, resentful, trying to pull herself together. She attains an air of bravely bearing an outrageous thing.--The outer door opens and MABEL enters in great excitement._

MABEL

[_Breathless._] Henrietta, I’m so glad you’re here. And alone? [_Looks toward the inner door._] Are you alone, Henrietta?

HENRIETTA

[_With reproving dignity._] Very much so.

MABEL

[_Rushing to her._] Henrietta, he’s found it!

HENRIETTA

[_Aloof._] Who has found what?

MABEL

Who has found what? Dr. Russell has found my suppressed desire!

HENRIETTA

That is interesting.

MABEL

He finished with me today--he got hold of my complex--in the most amazing way! But, oh, Henrietta--it is so terrible!

HENRIETTA

Do calm yourself, Mabel. Surely there’s no occasion for all this agitation.

MABEL

But there is! And when you think of the lives that are affected--the readjustments that must be made in order to bring the suppressed hell out of me and save me from the insane asylum--!

HENRIETTA

The insane asylum!

MABEL

You said that’s where these complexes brought people!

HENRIETTA

What did the doctor tell you, Mabel?

MABEL

Oh, I don’t know how I can tell you--it is so awful--so unbelievable.

HENRIETTA

I rather have my hand in at hearing the unbelievable.

MABEL

Henrietta, who would ever have thought it? How can it be true? But the doctor is perfectly certain that I have a suppressed desire for--

[_Looks at HENRIETTA, is unable to continue._

HENRIETTA

Oh, go on, Mabel. I’m not unprepared for what you have to say.

MABEL

Not unprepared? You mean you have suspected it?

HENRIETTA

From the first. It’s been my theory all along.

MABEL

But, Henrietta, I didn’t know myself that I had this secret desire for Stephen.

HENRIETTA

[_Jumps up._] Stephen!

MABEL

My brother-in-law! My own sister’s husband!

HENRIETTA

_You_ have a suppressed desire for _Stephen_!

MABEL

Oh, Henrietta, aren’t these unconscious selves terrible? They seem so unlike _us_!

HENRIETTA

What insane thing are you driving at?

MABEL

[_Blubbering._] Henrietta, don’t you use that word to me. I don’t _want_ to go to the insane asylum.

HENRIETTA

What did Dr. Russell say?

MABEL

Well, you see--oh, it’s the strangest thing! But you know the voice in my dream that called “Step, Hen!” Dr. Russell found out today that when I was a little girl I had a story-book in words of one syllable and I read the name Stephen wrong. I used to read it S-t-e-p, step, h-e-n, hen. [_Dramatically._] Step Hen is Stephen. [_Enter STEPHEN, his head bent over a time-table._] Stephen is Step Hen!

STEVE

I? Step Hen?

MABEL

[_Triumphantly._] S-t-e-p, step, H-e-n, hen, Stephen!

HENRIETTA

[_Exploding._] Well, what if Stephen is Step Hen? [_Scornfully._] Step Hen! Step Hen! For that ridiculous coincidence--

MABEL

Coincidence! But it’s childish to look at the mere elements of a dream. You have to look _into_ it--you have to see what it _means_!

HENRIETTA

On account of that trivial, meaningless play on syllables--on that flimsy basis--you are ready--[_Wails._] O-h!

STEVE

What on earth’s the matter? What has happened? Suppose I _am_ Step Hen? What about it? What does it mean?

MABEL

[_Crying._] It means--that I--have a suppressed desire for _you_!

STEVE

For me! The deuce you have! [_Feebly._] What--er--makes you think so?

MABEL

Dr. Russell has worked it out scientifically.

HENRIETTA

Yes. Through the amazing discovery that Step Hen equals Stephen!

MABEL

[_Tearfully._] Oh, that isn’t all--that isn’t near all. Henrietta won’t give me a chance to tell it. She’d rather I’d go to the insane asylum than be unconventional.

HENRIETTA

We’ll all go there if you can’t control yourself. We are still waiting for some rational report.

MABEL

[_Drying her eyes._] Oh, there’s such a lot about names. [_With some pride._] I don’t see how I ever did it. It all works in together. I dreamed I was a hen because that’s the first syllable of _Hen_-rietta’s name, and when I dreamed I was a hen, I was putting myself in Henrietta’s place.

HENRIETTA

With Stephen?

MABEL

With Stephen.

HENRIETTA

[_Outraged._] Oh! [_Turns in rage upon STEPHEN, who is fanning himself with the time-table._] What are you doing with that time-table?

STEVE

Why--I thought--you were so keen to have me go tonight--I thought I’d just take a run up to Canada, and join Billy--a little shooting--but--

MABEL

But there’s more about the names.

HENRIETTA

Mabel, have you thought of Bob--dear old Bob--your good, kind husband?

MABEL

Oh, Henrietta, “my good, kind husband!”

HENRIETTA

Think of him, Mabel, out there alone in Chicago, working his head off, fixing people’s _teeth_--for you!

MABEL

Yes, but think of the living Libido--in conflict with petrified moral codes! And think of the perfectly wonderful way the names all prove it. Dr. Russell said he’s never seen anything more convincing. Just look at Stephen’s last name--Brewster. I dream I’m a hen, and the name Brewster--you have to say its first letter by itself--and then the hen, that’s me, she says to him: “Stephen, Be Rooster!”

[_HENRIETTA and STEPHEN collapse into the nearest chairs._

MABEL

I think it’s perfectly wonderful! Why, if it wasn’t for psychoanalysis you’d never find out how wonderful your own mind is!

STEVE

[_Begins to chuckle._] Be Rooster! Stephen, Be Rooster!

HENRIETTA

You think it’s funny, do you?

STEVE

Well, what’s to be done about it? Does Mabel have to go away with me?

HENRIETTA

Do you want Mabel to go away with you?

STEVE

Well, but Mabel herself--her complex--her suppressed desire--!

HENRIETTA

[_Going to her._] Mabel, are you going to insist on going away with Stephen?

MABEL

I’d rather go with Stephen than go to the insane asylum!

HENRIETTA

For heaven’s sake, Mabel, drop that insane asylum! If you _did_ have a suppressed desire for Stephen hidden away in you--God knows it isn’t hidden now. Dr. Russell has brought it into your consciousness--with a vengeance. That’s all that’s necessary to break up a complex. Psychoanalysis doesn’t say you have to _gratify_ every suppressed desire.

STEVE

[_Softly._] Unless it’s for Lyman Eggleston.

HENRIETTA

[_Turning on him._] Well, if it comes to that, Stephen Brewster, I’d like to know why that interpretation of mine isn’t as good as this one? Step, Hen!

STEVE

But Be Rooster! [_He pauses, chuckling to himself._] Step-Hen B-rooster. And _Hen_rietta. Pshaw, my dear, Doc Russell’s got you beat a mile! [_He turns away and chuckles._] Be rooster!

MABEL

What has Lyman Eggleston got to do with it?

STEVE

According to Henrietta, you, the hen, have a suppressed desire for _Egg_leston, the egg.

MABEL

Henrietta, I think that’s indecent of you! He is bald as an egg and little and fat--the idea of you thinking such a thing of me!

HENRIETTA

Well, Bob isn’t little and bald and fat! Why don’t you stick to your own husband? [_To STEPHEN._] What if Dr. Russell’s interpretation has got mine “beat a mile”? [_Resentful look at him._] It would only mean that Mabel doesn’t want Eggleston and does want you. Does that mean she has to have you?

MABEL

But you said Mabel Snow--

HENRIETTA

_Mary_ Snow! You’re not as much like her as you think--substituting your name for hers! The cases are entirely different. Oh, I wouldn’t have _believed_ this of you, Mabel. [_Beginning to cry._] I brought you here for a pleasant visit--thought you needed brightening _up_--wanted to be _nice_ to you--and now you--my husband--you insist--

[_In fumbling her way to her chair she brushes to the floor some sheets from the psychoanalytical table._

STEVE

[_With solicitude._] Careful, dear. Your paper on psychoanalysis!

[_Gathers up sheets and offers them to her._

HENRIETTA

I don’t want my paper on psychoanalysis! I’m sick of psychoanalysis!

STEVE

[_Eagerly._] Do you mean that, Henrietta?

HENRIETTA

Why shouldn’t I mean it? Look at all I’ve done for psychoanalysis--and--[_Raising a tear-stained face_] what has psychoanalysis done for me?

STEVE

Do you mean, Henrietta, that you’re going to stop _talking_ psychoanalysis?

HENRIETTA

Why shouldn’t I stop talking it? Haven’t I seen what it does to people? Mabel has gone crazy about psychoanalysis!

[_At the word_ “crazy” _with a moan MABEL sinks to chair and buries her face in her hands._

STEVE

[_Solemnly._] Do you swear never to wake me up in the night to find out what I’m dreaming?

HENRIETTA

Dream what you please--I don’t care what you’re dreaming.

STEVE

Will you clear off my work-table so the Journal of Morbid Psychology doesn’t stare me in the face when I’m trying to plan a house?

HENRIETTA

[_Pushing a stack of periodicals off the table._] I’ll _burn_ the Journal of Morbid Psychology!

STEVE

My dear Henrietta, if you’re going to separate from psychoanalysis, there’s no reason why I should separate from _you_.

[_They embrace ardently. MABEL lifts her head and looks at them woefully._

MABEL

[_Jumping up and going toward them._] But what about me? What am I to do with my suppressed desire?

STEVE

[_With one arm still around HENRIETTA, gives MABEL a brotherly hug._] Mabel, you just keep right on suppressing it!

(CURTAIN)

* * * * *

TICKLESS TIME

A COMEDY IN ONE ACT

(In Collaboration with George Cram Cook)

First performed by the Provincetown Players, New York, December 20, 1918

* * * * *

ORIGINAL CAST

IAN JOYCE, _Who Has Made a Sun-dial_ JAMES LIGHT ELOISE JOYCE, _Wedded to the Sun-dial_ NORMA MILLAY MRS. STUBBS, _a Native_ JEAN ROBB EDDY KNIGHT, _a Standardized Mind_ HUTCHINSON COLLINS ALICE KNIGHT, _a Standardized Wife_ ALICE MACDOUGAL ANNIE, _Who Cooks by the Joyces’ Clock_ EDNA ST. VINCENT MILLAY

TICKLESS TIME

SCENE: _A garden in Provincetown. On the spectator’s right a two-story house runs back from the proscenium--a door towards the front, a second-story window towards the back. Across the back runs a thick-set row of sunflowers nearly concealing a fence or wall. Back of this are trees and sky. There is a gate at the left rear corner of the garden. People entering it come straight toward the front, down the left side and, to reach the house door, pass across the front of the stage. A fence with sunflowers like that at the back closes off the left wing of the stage--a tree behind this left fence._

_The sun-dial stands on a broad step or pedestal which partly masks the digging which takes place behind it. The position of the sun-dial is to the left of the center of the stage midway between front and back._

_From behind the tree on the left the late afternoon sun throws a well-defined beam of light upon the horizontal plate of the sun-dial and upon the shaft which supports it. On this shaft is the accompanying diagram: two feet high and clearly visible._

_On the plate of the sun-dial stands the alarm-clock. A huge shovel leans against the wall of the house-corner at the back._

_IAN is at the sun-dial. He sights over the style to some distant stake left rear, marking the north. He then sights over the east and west line toward the six o’clock sun. Looks at shadow. Looks at alarm clock. Is intensely pleased._

IAN

[_Turning toward house and calling excitedly._] Eloise! Oh, Eloise!

ELOISE

[_Inside house._] Hello!

IAN

Come quick! You’ll miss it.

ELOISE

[_Poking her head out of the second-story window; she cranes her neck to look straight up in the air._] What is it?

IAN

Come down here quick or you’ll miss it.

ELOISE

[_Disappears from window. A moment later comes running out, one braid of hair up and one braid down. Again looks wildly up in the air._] Where is it?

IAN

[_Absorbed in the sun-dial._] Where’s what?

ELOISE

The airplane.

IAN

Airplane? It’s the sun-dial. It’s right. Just look at this six o’clock shadow. [_She goes around to the other side of it._] It’s absolutely, mathematically--you’re in the way of the sun, Eloise. [_She steps aside._] Look! the style is set square on the true north--this is the fifteenth of June--the clock is checked to the second by telegraph with the observatory at Washington and see! the clock is exactly nineteen minutes and twenty seconds behind the shadow--the precise difference between Provincetown local time and standard Eastern time.

ELOISE

Then the sun-dial’s really finished--and working right! After all these, weeks! Oh, Ian!

[_Embraces him._

IAN

It’s good to get it right after all those mistakes. [_With vision._] Why, Eloise, getting this right has been a symbol of man’s whole search for truth--the discovery and correction of error--the mind compelled to conform step by step to astronomical fact--to truth.

ELOISE

[_Going to it again._] And to think that it’s the sun-dial which is true and the clock--all the clocks--are wrong! I’m glad it is true. Alice Knight has been here talking to me for an hour. I want to think that something’s true.

IAN

That’s just it, Eloise. The sun-dial is more than sun-dial. It’s a first-hand relation with truth. A personal relation. When you take your time from a clock you are mechanically getting information from a machine. You’re nothing but a clock yourself.

ELOISE

Like Alice Knight.

IAN

But the sun-dial--this shadow is an original document--a scholar’s source.

ELOISE

To tell time by the shadow of the sun--so large and simple.

IAN

I wouldn’t call it simple. Here on this diagram I have worked out--

ELOISE

Dearest, you know I can’t understand diagrams. But I get the feeling of it, Ian--the sun, the North star. I love to think that this [_Placing her hands on the style_] is set by the North star. [_Her right hand remains on the style, her left prolongs its line heavenward._] Why, if I could go on long enough I’d get _to_ the North star!

IAN

[_Impressively._] The line that passes along the edge of this style joins the two poles of the heavens. [_ELOISE pulls away her hand as one who fears an electric shock._] Look at this slow shadow and what you see is the spin of the earth on its axis. It is not so much the measure of time as time itself made visible.

ELOISE

[_Knitting her brows to get this: escaping to an impetuous generality._] Ian, which do you think is the more wonderful--space _or_ time?

IAN

[_Again sighting over his east and west lines. Good-humoredly._] Both are a little large for our approbation.

ELOISE

[_Sitting on the steps and putting up the other braid._] Do you know, Ian, that’s the one thing about them I don’t quite like. You can’t get very intimate with them, can you? They make you so humble. That’s one nice thing about a clock. A clock is sometimes wrong.

IAN

Don’t you want to live in a first-hand relation to truth?

ELOISE

Yes; yes, I do--generally.

IAN

I have a feeling as of having touched vast forces. To work directly with worlds--it lifts me out of that little routine of our lives which is itself a clock.

ELOISE

[_Catching his exultation._] Let us _be_ like this! Let us have done with clocks!

IAN

Eloise, how wonderful! Can the clocks and live by the sun-dial? Live by the non-automatic sun-dial--as a pledge that we ourselves refuse to be automatons!

ELOISE

Like Alice Knight. [_She takes clock from dial and puts it face downward on the ground._] I shall never again have anything to do with a clock!

IAN

Eloise! How corking of you! I didn’t think you had it in you. [_Raising his right hand._] Do you solemnly swear to live by the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth?

ELOISE

[_Her hand upon the sun-dial._] I swear.

IAN

Bring them!

ELOISE

Bring--?

IAN

The clocks! Bring them! [_Seizes the spade over by the house; begins to dig a grave behind the sun-dial._] Bring every one! We will bury the clocks before the sun-dial--an offering, a living sacrifice. I tell you this is _great_, Eloise. What is a clock? Something agreed upon and arbitrarily imposed upon us. Standard time. Not true time. Symbolizing the whole standardization of our lives. Clocks! Why, it is clockiness that makes America mechanical and mean! Clock-minded! A clock is a little machine that shuts us out from the wonder of time. [_A large gesture with the shovel._] Who thinks of spinning worlds when looking at a clock? How _dare_ clocks do this to us? But the sun-dial--because there was creation, because there are worlds outside our world, because space is rhythm and time is flow that shadow falls precisely there and not elsewhere! Bring them, Eloise! I am digging the graves of the clocks!

[_ELOISE swept up by this ecstasy, yet frightened at what it is bringing her to, hesitates, then runs to house. IAN digs with rhythmic vigor. A moment later ELOISE is seen peering down at him from window, in her arms a cuckoo clock. It begins to cuckoo, startling ELOISE._

IAN

That damned cuckoo!

[_A moment later ELOISE comes out, bearing cuckoo clock and an old-fashioned clock. IAN’S back is to her; she has to pass the alarm clock, lying where she left it, prone on the ground. She hesitates, then carefully holding the other two clocks in one arm, she stealthily goes rear and puts the alarm clock behind the sunflowers. Then advances with the other two._

IAN

[_While digging._] Into these graves go all that is clock-like in our own minds. All that a clock world has made of us lies buried here!

[_ELOISE stands rather appalled at the idea of so much of herself going into a grave. Puts the old-fashioned clock carefully on the ground. Gingerly fits the cuckoo clock into the completed grave. With an exclamation of horror lifts it out of the grave. Listens to its tick. Puts her ear to the sun-dial; listens vainly._

ELOISE

The sun-dial doesn’t tick, does it, Ian?

IAN

Why should it tick?

ELOISE

Do you know, Ian, I [_Timidly_] I like to hear the ticking of a clock. [_No reply. ELOISE holds up the cuckoo clock._] This was a wedding present.

IAN

No wonder marriage fails.

[_He moves to take it from her._

ELOISE

I wonder if we hadn’t better leave the cuckoo until tomorrow.

IAN

Flaming worlds! A cuckoo!

ELOISE

Eddy and Alice gave us the cuckoo. You know they’re coming back. I asked them for dinner. They might not understand our burying their clock.

IAN

Their failure to understand need not limit our lives.

[_Puts the cuckoo clock in its grave and begins to cover it._

ELOISE

[_As the earth goes on._] I liked the cuckoo! I liked to see him popping out!

IAN

[_Kindly._] You will grow, Eloise. You will go out to large things now that you have done with small ones.

ELOISE

I hope so. It will be hard on me if I don’t.

[_IAN reaches for the other clock._

ELOISE

[_Snatching it._] Oh, Ian, I don’t think I ought to bury this one. It’s the clock my grandmother started housekeeping with!

IAN

[_Firmly taking clock._] And see what it did to her. Meticulous old woman!

[_Puts it in its grave._

ELOISE

You were glad enough to get her pies and buckwheat cakes.

IAN

She had all the small virtues. But a standardized mind. [_Trampling down the grave._] She lacked scope. And now--a little grave for little clocks. [_Takes out his watch, puts it in the grave._] Your watch, Eloise.

ELOISE

[_Holding to her wrist watch._] I thought I’d keep my watch, Ian. [_Hastily._] For an ornament, you know.

IAN

We are going to let truth be your ornament, Eloise.

ELOISE

Nobody sees truth. [_With a fresh outburst._] This watch was my graduation present!

IAN

Symbolizing all the standardized arbitrary things you were taught! Commemorating the clock-like way your mind was made to run. Free yourself of that watch, Eloise. [_ELOISE reluctantly frees herself. IAN briskly covers the watches. Moves to the unfilled grave._] Is there nothing for this grave? [_ELOISE shakes her head._] Sure--the alarm clock!

ELOISE

[_Running to the sunflowers and spreading out her skirts before them._] Oh, Ian, _not_ the alarm clock! How would we ever go to Boston? The train doesn’t run by the sun.

IAN

Then the train is wrong.

ELOISE

But, Ian, if the train is wrong we have to be wrong to catch the train.

IAN

_That’s_ civilization. [_Stands resolutely by the grave._] The alarm clock, Eloise. The grave awaits it.

ELOISE

[_Taking it up, her arms folded around it._] I wanted to go to Boston and buy a hat!

IAN

The sun will fall upon your dear head and give you life.

ELOISE

[_About to cry._] But no style! It ticks so loud and sure!

IAN

All false things are loud and sure.

ELOISE

I need a tick! I am afraid of tickless time!

[_Holding the clock in both hands she places it against her left ear._

IAN

[_Spade still in his right hand, he places his left arm around her reassuringly._] You will grow, Eloise. You are growing.

[_He takes the clock as he is saying this. She turns her head backward following the departing clock with surprised and helpless eyes. Disconsolately watches him bury it._

ELOISE

[_An inspiration._] Ian! Couldn’t you fix the sun-dial to be set and go off?

IAN

[_Pained._] “Set and go off?” [_Pause; regards the sun._] _Sine sole sileo._

ELOISE

What did you say, Ian?

IAN

I said: _Sine sole sileo_.

ELOISE

Well, I don’t know what you say when you say that.

IAN

It’s a Latin motto I’ve just thought of for the sun-dial. It means, “Without sun, I am silent.” Silence is a great virtue. [_Having finished the grave, he looks around, making sure there are no more clocks. Joyously._] Now we are freed! Eloise, think what life is going to be! Done with approximations. Done with machine thinking. In a world content with false time, we are true.

ELOISE

[_Sitting on the steps._] Yes, it’s beautiful. I want to be true. It’s just that it’s a little hard to be true in a false world. For instance, tomorrow I have an appointment with the dentist. If I come on sun-time I suppose I’ll be twenty minutes--

IAN

[_Eagerly. Going to the sun-dial and pointing._] If you will just let me explain this table--[_ELOISE shrinks back. IAN gives it up._] Oh, well, tell him you are living by the truth.

ELOISE

I’m afraid he’ll charge me for it. And when we ask people for dinner at seven, they’ll get here at twenty minutes of seven. Or will it be twenty minutes _after_ seven?

IAN

[_Smoothing down graves._] It will be a part of eternal time.

ELOISE

Yes,--_that’s_ true. Only the roast isn’t so eternal. Why do they have clocks wrong?

IAN

Oh, Eloise, I’ve explained it so many times. You--living in Provincetown, three hundred miles to the eastward, are living by the mean solar time of Philadelphia. [_Venomously._] Do you _want_ to live by the mean solar time of Philadelphia?

ELOISE

Certainly _not_. [_An idea._] Then has Philadelphia got the right time?

IAN

It’s right six miles this side of Philadelphia.

ELOISE

We might move to Philadelphia.

[_Enter through gate, MRS. STUBBS, a Provincetown “native.”_

MRS. STUBBS

Now, Mr. Joyce, this sun clock,--is it running?

IAN

It doesn’t “run,” Mrs. Stubbs. It is acted upon.

MRS. STUBBS

Oh. Well, is it being acted upon?

IAN

As surely as the sun shines.

MRS. STUBBS

[_Looking at the sun._] And it is shining today, isn’t it? Well, will you tell me the time? My clock has stopped and I want to set it.

IAN

[_Happily._] You hear, Eloise? Her clock has stopped.

MRS. STUBBS

Yes, I forgot to wind it.

ELOISE

[_Grieved to think of any one living in such a world._] _Wind_ it!

IAN

Do you not see, Mrs. Stubbs, where the shadow falls? [_She comes up the steps._] From its millions of spinn--You’re in the way of the sun, Mrs. Stubbs. [_She steps aside._] Its millions of spinning miles the sun casts that shadow and here we know that it is eight minutes past six.

MRS. STUBBS

Now, ain’t that wonderful? Dear, dear, I wish Mr. Stubbs could make a sun clock. But he’s not handy around the house. Past six. Well, I must hurry back. They work tonight at the cold storage but Mr. Stubbs gets home for his supper at half past six.

[_Starts away, reaching the gate._

ELOISE

[_Running to her._] Oh, Mrs. Stubbs! Don’t get his supper by sun time. It wouldn’t be ready. It--[_With a hesitant look at IAN_] might get cold. [_MRS. STUBBS stares._] You see, Mr. Stubbs is coming home by the mean solar time of Philadelphia.

MRS. STUBBS

[_Loyal to MR. STUBBS._] Who said he was?

ELOISE

[_In distress._] Oh, it’s all so false! And arbitrary!

[_To IAN._] But I think Mrs. Stubbs had better be false and arbitrary too. Mr. Stubbs might rather have his supper than the truth.

MRS. STUBBS

[_Advancing a little._] What is this about my being false? And--arbitrary?

ELOISE

You see, you have to be, Mrs. Stubbs. We don’t blame you. How can you live by the truth if Mr. Stubbs doesn’t work by it?

MRS. STUBBS

This is the first word I ever heard said against Johnnie Stubbs’ way of freezin’ fish.

ELOISE

Oh, Mrs. Stubbs, if it were _merely_ his way of freezing fish!

IAN

Since you are not trying to establish a direct relation with truth, set your clock at five minutes of six. The clocks, as would be clear to you if you would establish a first-hand relation with this diagram, Eloise, are slow.

MRS. STUBBS

You mean your sun clock’s wrong.

IAN

All other clocks are wrong.

ELOISE

You live by the mean solar time of Philadelphia.

MRS. STUBBS

I do no such thing!

ELOISE

Yes, you do, Mrs. Stubbs. You see the sun can’t be both here and in Philadelphia at the same time. Now could it? So we have to pretend to be where it is in Philadelphia.

MRS. STUBBS

Who said we did?

ELOISE

Well, [_After a look at IAN_] the Government.

MRS. STUBBS

_Them_ congressmen!

ELOISE

But Mr. Joyce and I--You’re standing on a grave, Mrs. Stubbs. [_MRS. STUBBS jumps._] The grave of my grandmother’s clock. [_In reply to MRS. STUBBS look of amazement._] Oh, yes! That clock has done harm enough. Mrs. Stubbs, think what time is--and then consider my grandmother’s clock! Tick, tick! Tick, tick! Messing up eternity like that!

MRS. STUBBS

[_After failing to think of anything adequate._] I must get Mr. Stubbs his supper!

[_Frightened exit._

IAN

[_Standing near house door._] Eloise, how I love you when feeling lifts you out of routine! Do you know, dearest, you are very sensitive in the way you feel feeling? Sometimes I think that to feel feeling is greater than to feel. You’re like the dial. Your sensitiveness is the style--the gnomon--to cast the shadow of the feeling all around you and mark what has been felt.

[_They embrace. EDDY and ALICE open the gate._

EDDY

Ahem! [_He comes down._] Ahem! We seem to have come ahead of time.

ELOISE

Oh, Eddy! Alice! [_Moving toward EDDY but not passing the dial._] We are living by sun time now. You haven’t arrived for twenty minutes.

EDDY

We haven’t arrived for twenty minutes? [_Feeling of himself._] Why do I seem to be here?

ALICE

[_Approaching dial._] So this is the famous sun-dial? How very interesting it is!

ELOISE

It’s more than that.

ALICE

Yes, it’s really beautiful, isn’t it?

ELOISE

It’s more than that.

EDDY

Is it?

ELOISE

It’s a symbol. It means that Ian and I are done with approximations arbitrarily and falsely imposed upon us.

EDDY

Well, I should think you would be. Who’s been doing that to you?

ELOISE

Don’t step on the graves, please, Alice.

ALICE

[_Starting back in horror._] Graves?

ELOISE

[_Pointing down._] The lies we inherited lie buried there.

EDDY

Well, I should think that might make quite a graveyard. So the sun-dial is built on lies.

ELOISE

Indeed it is not!

ALICE

Does it keep time?

IAN

It doesn’t “keep” time. It gives it.

EDDY

[_Comparing with his watch._] Well, it gives it wrong. It’s twenty minutes fast.

[_IAN and ELOISE smile at one another in a superior way._

ALICE

You couldn’t expect a home-made clock to be perfectly accurate. I think it’s doing very well to come within twenty minutes of the true time.

IAN

It _is_ true time.

ELOISE

You think it’s twenty minutes fast because your puny, meticulous little watch is twenty minutes slow.

ALICE

Why is it, Eddy? [_Comparing watches across the sun-dial._] No, Eddy’s watch is right by mine.

IAN

And neither of you is right by the truth.

ELOISE

[_Pityingly._] Don’t you know that you are running by the mean solar time of Philadelphia?

EDDY

Well, isn’t everybody else running that way?

ELOISE

Does that make it right?

EDDY

I get you. You are going to cast off standard time and live by solar time.

ELOISE

Lies for truth.

EDDY

But how are you going to connect up with other people?

IAN

We can allow for their mistakes.

ELOISE

We will connect with other people in so far as other people are capable of connecting with the truth!

EDDY

I’m afraid you’ll be awful lonesome sometimes.

ALICE

But, Eloise, do you mean to say that you are going to insist on being right when other people are wrong?

ELOISE

I insist upon it.

ALICE

What a life!

EDDY

Come now, what difference does it make if we’re wrong if we’re all wrong together?

IAN

That idea has made a clock of the human mind.

[_Enter ANNIE._

ANNIE

Mrs. Joyce, can’t I have my clock back now? I don’t know when to start dinner.

IAN

[_Consulting dial._] By true time, Annie, it is twenty minutes past six.

ELOISE

[_Confidentially._] By false time, it is six.

ANNIE

I have to have my kitchen clock back.

[_She looks around for it._

IAN

We are done with clocks, Annie.

ANNIE

You mean I’m _not_ to have it back?

ELOISE

It lies buried there.

ANNIE

_Buried?_ My clock buried? It’s not _dead_!

IAN

It’s dead to us, Annie.

ANNIE

[_After looking at the grave._] Do I get a new clock?

ELOISE

We are going to establish a first-hand relation with truth.

ANNIE

You can’t cook without a clock.

IAN

A superstition. And anyway--have you not the sun?

ANNIE

[_After regarding the sun._] I’d rather have a clock than the sun.

[_Returns to her clockless kitchen._

IAN

That’s what clocks have made of the human mind.

EDDY

[_Coming to IAN._] Of course, this is all a joke.

IAN

The attempt to reach truth has always been thought a joke.

EDDY

But this isn’t any new truth! Why re-reach it?

IAN

I’m reaching it myself. I’m getting the impact--as of a fresh truth.

ALICE

But hasn’t it all been worked out for us?

IAN

And we take it never knowing--never _feeling_--what it is we take.

ELOISE

And that has made us the mechanical things we are!

ANNIE

[_Frantically rushes in, peeling an onion._] Starting the sauce for the spaghetti. Fry onions in butter three minutes.

[_Wildly regards sun-dial--traces curved line of diagram with knife. Looks despairingly at the sun. Tears back into house._

IAN

You get no sense of wonder in looking at a clock.

ALICE

Yes, do you know, I do. I’ve always thought that clocks were perfectly wonderful. I never could understand how they could run like that.

ELOISE

I suppose you know they run wrong?

EDDY

What do you mean “run wrong?”

ELOISE

Why, you are running by the mean solar time of Philadelphia! And yet here you are in Provincetown where the sun is a very different matter. You have no direct relation with the sun.

EDDY

That doesn’t seem to worry me much.

IAN

No, it wouldn’t worry you, Eddy. You’re too perfect a product of a standardized world.

[_EDDY bows acknowledgment._

ANNIE

[_Rushing out to look at dial._] Add meat, brown seven minutes.

[_Measures seven minutes between thumb and finger, holds up this fragment of time made visible and carries it carefully into the house._

EDDY

That girl’ll get heart disease.

IAN

Let her establish a first-hand relation to heat. If she’d take a look at the food instead of the clock--!

EDDY

Trouble is we have to establish a first-hand relation with the spaghetti. [_EDDY now comes down and regards the sun-dial. Moralizes._] If other people have got the wrong dope, you’ve got to have the wrong dope or be an off ox.

IAN

Perfect product of a standardized nation!

EDDY

[_Pointing with his stick._] What’s this standardized snake?

IAN

That’s my diagram correcting the sun.

EDDY

Does one correct the sun?

ELOISE

[_From behind the dial._] Ian! Correcting the _sun_!

IAN

You see there are only four days in the year when the apparent time is the same as the average time.

ELOISE

[_In growing alarm._] Do you mean to tell me the sun is not right with _itself_?

IAN

I’ve tried to explain it to you, Eloise, but you said you could get the feeling of it without understanding it. This curve [_Pointing_] marks the variation. Here today, you see, the shadow is “right” as you call it--that is, average. It will be right again here in September and again on December twenty-first.

ALICE

My birthday!

ELOISE

Ian, you mean to say the sun only tells the right _sun_-time four days in the year?

IAN

It always tells the “right” sun-time, but here the said right sun-time is fifteen minutes behind its own average, and here it is sixteen minutes ahead. This scale here across the bottom shows you the number of minutes to add or subtract.

ELOISE

[_With bitterness._] Add! Subtract! Then you and your sun are false!

IAN

No, Eloise, not false. Merely intricate. Merely not regular. Machines are regular.

ELOISE

You got me to bury the clocks and live by the sun--and now you tell me you have to _fix up_ the sun.

IAN

It was you who said bury the clocks.

ELOISE

I suppose you have to do something to the North star too!

IAN

Yes, the North star is not true north.

[_He starts to point out its error, sighting over the style of the dial._

ELOISE

What _is_ true? What _is_ true?

IAN

[_With vision._] The mind of man.

ELOISE

I think I’d better have a clock. [_A new gust._] You told me I was to live by the sun and now--after the clocks are in their graves--what I am to live by is _that snake_.

[_She points at diagram._

IAN

You are a victim of misplaced confidence, Eloise. Sometimes when one feels things without understanding them, one feels the wrong thing. But there’s nothing to worry about. The sun and I can take care of the sun’s irregularities.

EDDY

Take heart, Eloise. It’s a standardized sun.

IAN

It’s not a blindly accepted sun!

ANNIE

[_Who comes as one not to be put aside._] What’ll I do when it rains?

IAN

You’ll use your mind.

ANNIE

To tell time by? [_Looking to ELOISE._] I think I’d better find another place.

ALICE

[_Coming forward, regarding this as a really serious matter._] No, don’t do that, Annie.

ELOISE

[_Tearfully._] You don’t _know_ the _wonders_ of your own mind!

ANNIE

No, ma’m. [_After a look at the sun, becomes terrified._] It’s going down!

EDDY

Yes, it goes down.

ANNIE

How’ll we tell time when it’s dark?

IAN

_Sine sole sileo._

ANNIE

Is that saying how we’ll know when it’s time to go to bed?

IAN

The doves know when to go to bed.

ANNIE

The doves don’t go to the pictures.

ELOISE

[_Hysterically._] You’ll grow, Annie!

ANNIE

I’d rather have a clock!

[_Exit._

IAN

She’d rather have a clock than grow.

ALICE

Now why can’t one do both?

IAN

One doesn’t--that’s the answer. One merely has the clock. I’d rather be a fool than a machine.

EDDY

I never definitely elected to be either.

IAN

One can be both without electing either.

ELOISE

I want to hear the ticking of a clock!

EDDY

It’s a nice thing to hear. The ticking of a clock means the minds of many men. As long as the mind of man has to--fix up the facts of nature in order to create ideal time I feel it’s a little more substantial to have the minds of many men.

ALICE

As I’ve told you before, Eloise, you can’t do better than accept the things that have been all worked out for you.

IAN

You hear them, Eloise? You see where this defense of clocks is leading?

ELOISE

Ian, I’m terribly worried--and a little hurt--about the sun. [_As one beginning a dirge._] The sun has failed me. The North star is false.

IAN

[_Going to her._] I am here, dearest.

ELOISE

Sometimes you seem so much like space. I am running by the sun--that wobbly sun [_Looking at it_] and everyone else is running by Philadelphia. I want a little clock to tick to me!

IAN

You will grow, dearest.

ELOISE

There’s no use growing. The things you grow to are wrong. [_Pressing her hands to her head._] I need a tick in time!

IAN

[_Striding savagely from her._] Very well, then; dig up the clocks.

EDDY

Now you’re? talking!

[_ELOISE springs up._

IAN

Dig up the clocks! And we spend our lives nineteen minutes and twenty seconds apart!

[_ELOISE is arrested, appalled. Dreadful pause._

ELOISE

You mean we’d never get together?

IAN

Time would lie between us. I refuse to be re-caught into a clock world. It was you, Eloise, who proposed we give up the clocks and live in this first-hand relation to truth.

ELOISE

I didn’t know I was proposing a first-hand relation with that snake!

IAN

It’s not a snake! It’s a little piece of the long winding road to truth. It’s the discarding of error, the adjustment of fact. And I did it myself. And it puts me _on_ that road. Oh, I know [_To EDDY and ALICE_] how you can laugh if you yourself feel no need to _feel_ truth. And you, Eloise, if you don’t want to feel time--return to your mean little clock. What is a clock? A clock is the soulless--

[_The alarm clock enters a protest. Smothered sound of the alarm going off underground. ELOISE screams._

ELOISE

The alarm clock! It’s going off!

ALICE

Buried alive!

ELOISE

Oh, no--oh, no! How terrible! Ian, how terrible!

[_She runs to him. Alarm clock, being intermittent, goes off again._

IAN

Eloise, if you listen to the voice of that clock--!

EDDY

How bravely it tries to function in its grave!

ALICE

The death struggle--the last gasp!

[_With another scream ELOISE snatches spade, begins to dig; alarm clock gives another little gasp; spade is too slow for her: in her desperation goes to it with her hands. Gets it and, as she holds it aloft, the alarm clock rings its triumph._

ELOISE

[_Holding it to her ear._] It’s ticking! It ticks! It ticks! Oh, it’s good to hear the ticking of a clock!

[_As he hears this, IAN, after a moment of terrible silence, goes and unscrews the plate of the sun-dial. All watch him, afraid to speak. He takes it off, holds it above the grave from which the alarm clock has been rescued._

ELOISE

Ian! What are you doing? [_He does not answer, but puts the sun-dial in the alarm clock’s grave._] Ian! No! No! Not that! Not your beautiful sun-dial! Oh, no! Not that!

[_IAN, having finished the burial of the sun-dial, sees the alarm clock and puts it on the pedestal from which the sun-dial has been taken._

IAN

We bow down, as of old, to the mechanical. We will have no other god but it.

[_He then sits on the step, sunk in gloom. ANNIE appears, in her hand a panful of water._

ANNIE

This liver has to soak five minutes. I’ll soak it here. [_Sees the alarm clock; with a cry of joy._] My clock! My clock! [_Overcome with emotion._] Oh! My clock! My clock! Can I take it in the house to finish dinner?

ELOISE

[_In a hopeless voice._] Yes, take it away.

[_Beaming, ANNIE bears it to her kitchen. ELOISE now kneels behind the grave of the sun-dial._

EDDY

Let us leave them alone with their dead.

[_Leads ALICE to the corner of the house; they look off down the road. ELOISE and IAN sit there on either side of the grave, swaying a little back and forth, as those who mourn._

ELOISE

[_Looking at grave._] I had thought life was going to be so beautiful.

IAN

It might have been.

ELOISE

[_Looking at empty pedestal._] I suppose it will never be beautiful again.

IAN

It cannot be beautiful again.

[_Suddenly, with a cry, ELOISE gets up and darts to the house: comes racing back with the alarm clock, snatches spade, desperately begins to dig a grave._

ELOISE

Ian! Ian! Don’t you see what I’m doing? I’m willing to have a first-hand relation with the sun even though it’s _not_ regular.

[_But IAN is as one who has lost hope. EDDY and ALICE turn to watch the re-burial of the alarm clock. ANNIE strides in._

ANNIE

[_In no mood for feeling._] Where’s my alarm clock?

ELOISE

I am burying it.

ANNIE

Again? [_Looks at sun-dial._] And even the sun-clock’s gone?

EDDY

All is buried. Truth. Error. We have returned to the nothing from which we came.

ANNIE

This settles it. Now I go. I leave.

[_Firm with purpose re-enters the house._

ALICE

[_Excitedly._] Eloise! She means it!

ELOISE

[_Dully._] I suppose she does.

[_Continues her grave digging._

ALICE

But you can’t get anybody else! You can’t _get_ anybody now. Oh, this is madness. What does any of the rest of it matter if you have lost your cook? [_To IAN._] Eloise can’t do the work! Peel potatoes--scrub. What’s the difference what’s _true_ if you have to clean out your own sink? [_Despairing of him she turns to ELOISE._] Eloise, stop fussing about the moon and stars! You’re losing your _cook_!

[_ANNIE comes from the house with suit-case, shawl-strap and hand-bag on long strings. Marches straight to left of stage, makes a face at the sun, marches to gate left rear and off._

ALICE

Eddy, go _after_ her! Heavens! Has _no_ one a mind? Go _after_ her!

EDDY

What’s the good of going after her without a clock?

ALICE

Well, get a clock! For heaven’s sake, get a clock! Eloise, get off the grave of the alarm clock! [_ELOISE stands like a monument. To EDDY._] Well, there are graves all around you. Dig something else up. No! You call her back. I’ll--

[_Snatches spade, which is resting against sun-dial pedestal, begins to dig. EDDY stands at back, calling._

EDDY

Annie! Oh, Annie! _Wait_, Annie!

ALICE

[_While frantically digging._] Say something to _interest_ her, imbecile!

EDDY

[_Stick in one hand, straw hat in the other, making wild signals with both._] Come home, Annie! Clock! Clock! [_Giving up that job and throwing off his coat._] You interest her and I’ll dig.

[_They change places._

ALICE

She’s most to the bend! Eddy, don’t you know how to _dig_?

[_EDDY, who has been digging with speed and skill, produces the clock with which ELOISE’S grandmother started housekeeping. Starts to dash off with it._

ELOISE

[_Dully._] That clock doesn’t keep time. Annie hates it.

IAN

[_As if irritated by all this inefficiency._] What she wants is the alarm clock. Get off the grave, Eloise.

[_He disinters alarm clock and with it runs after ANNIE. ALICE draws a long breath and rubs her back. EDDY brings the clock he dug up and sets it on the pedestal. Then he looks down at the disturbed graves._

EDDY

Here’s a watch! [_Lifts it from the grave; holds it out to ELOISE; she does not take it. He puts it on the pedestal beside the clock._] Here’s another watch. [_Holds up IAN’S watch._] Quite a valuable piece of ground.

[_Now is heard the smothered voice of a cuckoo._

ALICE

[_Jumping._] What’s that?

ELOISE

The cuckoo. I suppose it’s lonesome.

ALICE

[_Outraged._] Cuckoo! [_Pointing._] In that grave? The cuckoo we gave you? [_ELOISE nods._] You buried our wedding present? [_ELOISE again nods. EDDY and ALICE draw together in indignation._] Well, I must say, the people who try to lead the right kind of lives _always_ do the wrong thing. [_Stiffly._] I am not accustomed to having my wedding presents put in graves. Will you please dig it up, Eddy? It will do very well on the mantel in our library. And my back nearly broken digging for your cook!

[_She holds her back. While EDDY is digging up the cuckoo, ANNIE and IAN appear and march across from gate to house, ANNIE triumphantly bearing her alarm clock, IAN--a captive at her chariot wheels--following with suit-case, shawl strap and long strings of bag around his wrist. A moment later IAN comes out of the house, looks at each dug-up thing, stands by the grave of the sun-dial. Enter MRS. STUBBS._

MRS. STUBBS

Oh, Mr. Joyce, I’ve come to see your sun-clock again. Mr. Stubbs says _he’ll_ not be run from Philadelphia. He says if you have got the time straight from the sun--[_Sees that the sun-dial is gone._] Oh, do you take it in at night?

IAN

The sun-dial lies buried there.

MRS. STUBBS

You’ve _buried_ the sun-clock? And dug up all the _wrong_ clocks? [_With a withering glance at ELOISE._] That’s how a smart man’s appreciated! What did you bury it for, Mr. Joyce?

[_EDDY gives the cuckoo clock to ALICE._

IAN

It cannot live in this world where no one wants truth or feeling about truth. This is a world for clocks.

MRS. STUBBS

Well, _I_ want truth! And so does Johnnie Stubbs! If you’ll excuse my saying so, Mr. Joyce, after you’ve made a thing that’s right you oughtn’t to bury it, even if there is nobody to want it. And now that _I_ want it--[_MRS. STUBBS takes the spade and begins to dig up the sun-dial. IAN cannot resist this and helps her. He lifts the sun-dial, she brushes it off and he fits it to its place on the pedestal._] Now there it is, Mr. Joyce, and as good as if it had never seen the grave. [_She looks at the setting sun._] And there’s time for it to make its shadow before this sun has gone.

IAN

The simple mind has beauty.

ELOISE

[_Coming to him._] I want to be simpler.

MRS. STUBBS

Now what time would you say it was, Mr. Joyce?

IAN

I would say it was twenty minutes of seven, Mrs. Stubbs.

MRS. STUBBS

[_Looking at EDDY and ALICE and the cuckoo clock._] And _they_ would say it was twenty minutes past six! Well, _I_ say: let them that want sun time have sun time and them that want tick time have tick time.

[_ANNIE appears at the door._

ANNIE

[_In a flat voice._] It’s dinner time!

(CURTAIN)

* * * * *

Transcriber’s Notes:

The one illustration has been moved to a paragraph break near where it is mentioned.

Punctuation has been made consistent.

Variations in spelling and hyphenation were retained as they appear in the original publication, except that obvious typographical errors have been corrected.

The following change was made:

p. 255: STEVE changed to HENRIETTA (Henrietta? HENRIETTA Why,)