|
Main
- books.jibble.org
My Books
- IRC Hacks
Misc. Articles
- Meaning of Jibble
- M4 Su Doku
- Computer Scrapbooking
- Setting up Java
- Bootable Java
- Cookies in Java
- Dynamic Graphs
- Social Shakespeare
External Links
- Paul Mutton
- Jibble Photo Gallery
- Jibble Forums
- Google Landmarks
- Jibble Shop
- Free Books
- Intershot Ltd
|
books.jibble.org
Previous Page
| Next Page
Page 12
STRANGER. I've done all I can to forget it. I've expunged it from
my memory so that it no longer has any reality for me.
LADY. If that's so, will you come home with me to-night?
STRANGER. No. Will you come with me?
LADY. Where?
STRANGER. Anywhere! I have no home, only a trunk. Money I sometimes
have--though not often. It's the one thing life has capriciously
refused me, perhaps because I never desired it intensely enough.
(The LADY shakes her head.) Well? What are you thinking?
LADY. I'm surprised I'm not angry with you. But you're not serious.
STRANGER. Whether I am or not's all one to me. Ah! There's the
organ! It won't be long now before the drink shops open.
LADY. Is it true _you_ drink?
STRANGER. Yes. A great deal! Wine makes my soul from her prison, up
into the firmament, where she what has never yet been seen, and
hears what men never yet heard. ...
LADY. And the day after?
STRANGER. I have the most delightful scruples of conscience! I
experience the purifying emotions of guilt and repentance. I enjoy
the sufferings of the body, whilst my soul hovers like smoke about
my head. It is as if one were suspended between Life and Death,
when the spirit feels that she has already opened her pinions and
could fly aloft, if she would.
LADY. Come into the church for a moment. You'll hear no sermon,
only the beautiful music of vespers.
STRANGER. No. Not into church! It depresses me because I feel I
don't belong there. ... That I'm an unhappy soul and that it's as
impossible for me to re-enter as to become a child again.
LADY. You feel all that ... already?
STRANGER. Yes. I've got that far. I feel as if I lay hacked in
pieces and were being slowly melted in Medea's cauldron. Either I
shall be sent to the soap-boilers, or arise renewed from my own
dripping! It depends on Medea's skill!
LADY. That sounds like the word of an oracle. We must see if you
can't become a child again.
STRANGER. We should have to start with the cradle; and this time
with the right child.
LADY. Exactly! Wait here for me whilst I go into the church. If the
caf� were open I'd ask you please not to drink. But luckily it's
shut.
(The LADY exits. The STRANGER sits down again and draws in the
sand. Enter six funeral attendants in brown with some mourners. One
of them carries a banner with the insignia of the Carpenters,
draped in brown cr�pe; another a large axe decorated with spruce, a
third a cushion with a chairman's mallet. They stop outside the
caf� and wait.)
STRANGER. Excuse me, whose funeral have you been attending?
FIRST MOURNER. A house-breaker's. (He imitates the ticking of a
clock.)
STRANGER. A real house-breaker? Or the insect sort, that lodges in
the woodwork and goes 'tick-tick'?
FIRST MOURNER. Both--but mainly the insect sort. What do they call
them?
STRANGER (to himself). He wants to fool me into saying the
death-watch beetle. So I won't. You mean a burglar?
SECOND MOURNER. No. (The clock is again heard ticking.)
Previous Page
| Next Page
|
|