The Complete Dramatic Works (31 page)

     You love me so!

(
Pause.
Happy
expression
off.
She
closes
her
eyes.
Bell
rings
loudly.
She
opens
her
eyes.
She
smiles,
gazing
front.
She
turns
her
eyes,
smiling,
to
 
WILLIE
,
still
on
his
hands
and
knees
looking
up
at
her.
Smile
off.
They
look
at
each
other.
Long
pause.
]

CURTAIN

Written in English in July-September 1956. First published by Grove Press, New York,
in 1957. First published in Britain by Faber and Faber, London, also in 1957. First
broadcast by the BBC Third Programme on 13 January 1957.

MRS ROONEY:
Poor woman. All alone in that ruinous old house. [
Music
louder.
Silence
but
for
music
playing.
The
steps
resume.
Music
dies,
 
MRS ROONEY
murmurs,
melody.
Her
murmur
dies.

Sound of approaching cartwheels. The cart stops. The steps slow down, stop.
]

Is that you, Christy?

CHRISTY:
It is, Ma’am.

MRS ROONEY:
I thought the hinny was familiar. How is your poor wife?

CHRISTY:
No better, Ma’am.

MRS ROONEY:
Your daughter then?

CHRISTY:
No worse, Ma’am.

[
Silence.
]

MRS ROONEY:
Why do you halt? [
Pause.
]
But why do I halt?

[
Silence.
]

CHRISTY:
Nice day for the races, Ma’am.

MRS ROONEY:
No doubt it is. [
Pause.
]
But will it hold up? [
Pause.
With
emotion
.]
Will it hold up?

[
Silence.
]

CHRISTY:
I suppose you wouldn’t–

MRS ROONEY:
Hist! [
Pause.
]
Surely to goodness that cannot be the up mail I hear already.

[
Silence.
The
hinny
neighs.
Silence.
]

CHRISTY:
Damn the mail.

MRS ROONEY:
Oh thank God for that! I could have sworn I
heard it, thundering up the track in the far distance. [
Pause.
]
So hinnies whinny. Well, it is not surprising.

CHRISTY:
I suppose you wouldn’t be in need of a small load of dung?

MRS ROONEY:
Dung? What class of dung?

CHRISTY:
Stydung.

MRS ROONEY:
Stydung … I like your frankness, Christy. [
Pause.
]
I’ll ask the master. [
Pause.
]
Christy.

CHRISTY:
Yes, Ma’am.

MRS ROONEY:
Do you find anything … bizarre about my way of speaking? [
Pause.
]
I do not mean the voice. [
Pause.
] No, I mean the words. [
Pause.
More
to
herself.
]
I use none but the simplest words, I hope, and yet I sometimes find my way of speaking
very… bizarre. [
Pause.
]
Mercy! What was that?

CHRISTY:
Never mind her, Ma’am, she’s very fresh in herself today.

[
Silence.
]

MRS ROONEY:
Dung? What would we want with dung, at our time of life? [
Pause.
]
Why are you on your feet down on the road? Why do you not climb up on the crest of
your manure and let yourself be carried along? Is it that you have no head for heights?

[
Silence.
]

CHRISTY:
[
To
the
hinny.
]
Yep! [
Pause.
Louder.
]
Yep wiyya to hell owwa that!

[
Silence.
]

MRS ROONEY:
She does not move a muscle. [
Pause.
]
I too should be getting along, if I do not wish to arrive late at the station. [
Pause.
]
But a moment ago she neighed and pawed the ground. And now she refuses to advance.
Give her a good welt on the rump. [
Sound
of
welt.
Pause.
] Harder! [
Sound
of
welt.
Pause.
]
Well! If someone were to do that for me I should not dally. [
Pause.
]
How she gazes at me to be sure, with her great moist cleg-tormented eyes! Perhaps
if I were to move on, down the road, out of her field of vision …. [
Sound
of
welt
.]
No, no, enough! Take her by the snaffle and pull her eyes away from me. Oh this is
awful! [
She
moves
on.
Sound
of
her
dragging
feet
.]
What have I done to deserve all this, what, what? [
Dragging feet.
]
So long ago …. No! No! [
Dragging
feet.
Quotes.
] “Sigh out a something something tale of things, Done long ago and ill done.” [
She
halts.
]
How can I go on, I cannot. Oh let me just flop down flat on the road like a big fat
jelly out of a bowl and never move again! A great big slop thick with grit and dust
and flies, they would have to scoop me up with a shovel. [
Pause.
]
Heavens, there is that up mail again, what will become of me! [
The
dragging
steps
resume.
]
Oh I am just a hysterical old hag I know, destroyed with sorrow and pining and gentility
and
church-going
and fat and rheumatism and childlessness. [
Pause.
Brokenly.
]
Minnie! Little Minnie! [
Pause.
]
Love, that is all I asked, a little love, daily, twice daily, fifty years of twice
daily love like a Paris horse-butcher’s regular, what normal woman wants affection?
A peck on the jaw at morning, near the ear, and another at evening, peck, peck, till
you grow whiskers on you. There is that lovely laburnum again.

[
Dragging
feet.
Sound
of
bicycle-bell.
It
is
old
 
MR TYLER
coming
up
behind
her
on
his
bicycle,
on
his
way
to
the
station.
Squeak
of
brakes.
He
slows
down
and
rides
abreast
of
her.
]

MR TYLER:
Mrs Rooney! Pardon me if I do not doff my cap, I’d fall off. Divine day for the meeting.

MRS ROONEY:
Oh, Mr Tyler, you startled the life out of me stealing up behind me like that like
a deer-stalker! Oh!

MR TYLER:
[
Playfully.
]
I rang my bell, Mrs Rooney, the moment I sighted you I started tinkling my bell,
now don’t you deny it.

MRS ROONEY:
Your bell is one thing, Mr Tyler, and you are another. What news of your poor daughter?

MR TYLER:
Fair, fair. They removed everything, you know, the whole … er … bag of tricks. Now
I am grandchildless.

[
Dragging
feet
]

MRS ROONEY:
Gracious how you wobble! Dismount, for mercy’s sake, or ride on.

MR TYLER:
Perhaps if I were to lay my hand lightly on your
shoulder, Mrs Rooney, how would that be?

[
Pause.
]
Would you permit that?

MRS ROONEY:
No, Mr Rooney, Mr Tyler I mean, I am tired of light old hands on my shoulders and
other senseless places, sick and tired of them. Heavens, here comes Connolly’s van!
[
She
halts.
Sound
of
motor-van.
It
approaches,
passes
with
thunderous
rattles,
recedes.
]
Are you all right, Mr Tyler? [
Pause.
]
Where is he? [
Pause.
]
Ah there you are! [
The
dragging
steps
resume.
] That was a narrow squeak.

MR TYLER:
I alit in the nick of time.

MRS ROONEY:
It is suicide to be abroad. But what is it to be at home, Mr Tyler, what is it to
be at home? A lingering dissolution. Now we are white with dust from head to foot.
I beg your pardon?

MR TYLER:
Nothing, Mrs Rooney, nothing, I was merely cursing, under my breath, God and man,
under my breath, and the wet Saturday afternoon of my conception. My back tyre has
gone down again. I pumped it hard as iron before I set out. And now I am on the rim.

MRS ROONEY:
Oh what a shame!

MR TYLER:
Now if it were the front I should not so much mind. But the back. The back! The chain!
The oil! The grease! The hub! The brakes! The gear! No! It is too much!

[
Dragging
steps.
]

MRS ROONEY:
Are we very late, Mr Tyler? I have not the courage to look at my watch.

MR TYLER:
[
Bitterly.
]
Late! I on my bicycle as I bowled along was already late. Now therefore we are doubly
late, trebly, quadrupedly late. Would I had shot by you, without a word.

[
Dragging
feet.
]

MRS ROONEY:
Whom are you meeting, Mr Tyler?

MR TYLER:
Hardy. [
Pause.
]
We used to climb together. [
Pause.
] I saved his life once. [
Pause.
]
I have not forgotten it.

[
Dragging
feet.
They
stop.
]

MRS ROONEY:
Let us halt a moment and let this vile dust fall back upon the viler worms.

[
Silence.
Rural
sounds.
]

MR TYLER:
What sky! What light! Ah in spite of all it is a
blessed thing to be alive in such weather, and out of hospital.

MRS ROONEY:
Alive?

MR TYLER:
Well half alive shall we say?

MRS ROONEY:
Speak for yourself, Mr Tyler. I am not half alive nor anything approaching it. [
Pause.
] What are we standing here for? This dust will not settle in our time. And when it
does some great roaring machine will come and whirl it all skyhigh again.

MR TYLER:
Well, shall we be getting along in that case?

MRS ROONEY:
No.

MR TYLER:
Come, Mrs Rooney–

MRS ROONEY:
Go, Mr Tyler, go on and leave me, listening to the cooing of the ringdoves. [
Cooing.
] If you see my poor blind Dan tell him I was on my way to meet him when it all came
over me again, like a flood. Say to him, Your poor wife, She told me to tell you it
all came flooding over her again and … [
The
voice
breaks.
] … she simply went back home … straight back home….

MR TYLER:
Come, Mrs Rooney, come, the mail has not yet gone up, just take my free arm and we’ll
be there with time and to spare.

MRS ROONEY:
[
Sobbing.
] What? What’s all this now? [
Calmer.
] Can’t you see I’m in trouble? [
With
anger.
]
Have you no respect for misery? [
Sobbing
]
Minnie! Little Minnie!

MR TYLER:
Come, Mrs Rooney, come, the mail has not yet gone up, just take my free arm and we’ll
be there with time and to spare.

MRS ROONEY:
[
Brokenly.
]
In her forties now she’d be, I don’t know, fifty, girding up her lovely little loins,
getting ready for the change….

MR TYLER:
Come, Mrs Rooney, come, the mail–

MRS ROONEY:
[
Exploding.
]
Will you get along with you, Mr Rooney, Mr Tyler I mean, will you get along with
you now and cease molesting me? What kind of a country is this where a woman can’t
weep her heart out on the highways and byways without being tormented by retired
bill-brokers
! [
Mr
Tyler
prepares
to
mount
his
bicycle.
] Heavens you’re not going to ride her flat! [
Mr
Tyler
mounts
.]
You’ll tear your tube to ribbons! [
Mr
Tyler
rides
off.
Receding
sound
of
bumping
bicycle.
Silence.
Cooing.
] Venus birds! Billing in the woods all the long summer long. [
Pause.
]
Oh cursed corset! If I could let it out, without indecent exposure. Mr Tyler! Mr
Tyler! Come back and unlace me behind the hedge! [
She
laughs
wildly,
ceases.
] What’s wrong with me, what’s wrong with me, never tranquil, seething out of my dirty
old pelt, out of my skull, oh to be in atoms, in atoms! [
Frenziedly.
]
ATOMS! [
Silence.
Cooing.
Faintly.
]
Jesus! [
Pause.
]
Jesus! [
Sound
of
car
coming
up
behind
her.
It
slows
down
and
draws
up
beside
her,
engine
running.
It
is
 
MR SLOCUM
,
the
Clerk
of
the
Racecourse.
]

MR SLOCUM:
Is anything wrong, Mrs Rooney? You are bent all double. Have you a pain in the stomach?

[
Silence,
MRS ROONEY
laughs
wildly.
Finally.
]

MRS ROONEY:
Well if it isn’t my old admirer the Clerk of the Course, in his limousine.