The Miracle Worker (5 page)

ANNIE:
I'd like it.

KELLER
[
GALLANTLY
]: I couldn't think of it, Miss Sullivan. You'll find in the south we—

ANNIE:
Let me.

KELLER:
—view women as the flowers of civiliza—

ANNIE
[
IMPATIENTLY
]: I've got something in it for Helen!

(She tugs it free;
KELLER
stares.)

Thank you. When do I see her?

KATE:
There. There is Helen.

(
ANNIE
turns, and sees
HELEN
on the porch. A moment of silence. Then
ANNIE
begins across the yard to her, lugging her suitcase.)

KELLER
[
SOTTO VOCE
]: Katie—

(
KATE
silences him with a hand on his arm. When
ANNIE
finally reaches the porch steps she stops, contemplating
HELEN
for a last moment before entering her world. Then she drops the suitcase on the porch with intentional heaviness,
HELEN
starts with the jar, and comes to grope over it.
ANNIE
puts forth her hand, and touches
HELEN'S.
HELEN
at once grasps it, and commences to explore it, like reading a face. She moves her hand on to
ANNIE'S
forearm, and dress; and
ANNIE
brings her face within reach of
HELEN'S
fingers, which travel over it, quite without timidity, until they encounter and push aside the smoked glasses.
ANNIE'S
gaze is grave, unpitying, very attentive. She puts her hands on
HELEN'S
arms, but
HELEN
at once pulls away, and they confront each other with a distance between. Then
HELEN
returns to the suitcase, tries to open it, cannot.
ANNIE
points
HELEN'S
hand overhead.
HELEN
pulls away, tries to open the suitcase again;
ANNIE
points her hand overhead again.
HELEN
points overhead. A question, and
ANNIE
,
drawing
HELEN'S
hand to her own face, nods.
HELEN
now begins tugging the suitcase toward the door, when
ANNIE
tries to take it from her, she fights her off and backs through the doorway with it.
ANNIE
stands a moment, then follows her in, and together they get the suitcase up the steps into
ANNIE'S
room.)

KATE:
Well?

KELLER:
She's very rough, Katie.

KATE:
I like her, Captain.

KELLER:
Certainly rear a peculiar kind of young woman in the north. How old is she?

KATE
[
VAGUELY
]: Ohh— Well, she's not in her teens, you know.

KELLER:
She's only a child. What's her family like, shipping her off alone this far?

KATE:
I couldn't learn. She's very closemouthed about some things.

KELLER:
Why does she wear those glasses? I like to see a person's eyes when I talk to—

KATE:
For the sun. She was blind.

KELLER:
Blind.

KATE:
She's had nine operations on her eyes. One just before she left.

KELLER:
Blind, good heavens, do they expect one blind child to teach another? Has she experience at least, how long did she teach there?

KATE:
She was a pupil.

KELLER
[
HEAVILY
]: Katie, Katie. This is her first position?

KATE
[
BRIGHT VOICE
]: She was valedictorian—

KELLER:
Here's a houseful of grownups can't cope with the child, how can an inexperienced half-blind Yankee schoolgirl manage her?

(
JAMES
moves in with the trunk on his shoulder.)

JAMES
[
EASILY
]: Great improvement. Now we have two of them to look after.

KELLER:
You look after those strawberry plants!

(
JAMES
stops with the trunk.
KELLER
turns from him without another word, and marches off.)

JAMES:
Nothing I say is right.

KATE:
Why say anything?

(She calls.)

Don't be long, Captain, we'll have supper right away—

(She goes into the house, and through the rear door of the family room.
JAMES
trudges in with the trunk, takes it up the steps to
ANNIE'S
room, and sets it down outside the door. The lights elsewhere dim somewhat.

Meanwhile, inside,
ANNIE
has given
HELEN
a key; while
ANNIE
removes her bonnet,
HELEN
unlocks and opens the suitcase. The first
thing she pulls out is a voluminous shawl. She fingers it until she perceives what it is; then she wraps it around her, and acquiring
ANNIE'S
bonnet and smoked glasses as well, dons the lot: the shawl swamps her, and the bonnet settles down upon the glasses, but she stands before a mirror cocking her head to one side, then to the other, in a mockery of adult action.
ANNIE
is amused, and talks to her as one might to a kitten, with no trace of company manners.)

ANNIE:
All the trouble I went to and that's how I look?

(
HELEN
then comes back to the suitcase, gropes for more, lifts out a pair of female drawers.)

Oh, no. Not the drawers!

(But
HELEN
discarding them comes to the elegant doll. Her fingers explore its features, and when she raises it and finds its eyes open and close, she is at first startled, then delighted. She picks it up, taps its head vigorously, taps her own chest, and nods questioningly.
ANNIE
takes her finger, points it to the doll, points it to
HELEN
,
and touching it to her own face, also nods.
HELEN
sits back on her heels, clasps the doll to herself, and rocks it.
ANNIE
studies her, still in bonnet and smoked glasses like a caricature of herself, and addresses her humorously.)

All right, Miss O'Sullivan. Let's begin with doll.

(She takes
HELEN'S
hand; in her palm
ANNIE'S
forefinger points, thumb holding her other fingers clenched.)

D.

(Her thumb next holds all her fingers clenched, touching
HELEN'S
palm.)

O.

(Her thumb and forefinger extend.)

L.

(Same contact repeated.)

L.

(She puts
HELEN'S
hand to the doll.)

Doll.

JAMES:
You spell pretty well.

(
ANNIE
in one hurried move gets the drawers swiftly back into the suitcase, the lid banged shut, and her head turned, to see
JAMES
leaning in the doorway.)

Finding out if she's ticklish? She is.

(
ANNIE
regards him stonily, but
HELEN
after a scowling moment tugs at her hand again, imperious.
ANNIE
repeats the letters, and
HELEN
interrupts her fingers in the middle, feeling each of them, puzzled.
ANNIE
touches
HELEN'S
hand to the doll, and begins spelling into it again.)

JAMES:
What is it, a game?

ANNIE
[
CURTLY
]: An alphabet.

JAMES:
Alphabet?

ANNIE:
For the deaf.

(
HELEN
now repeats the finger movements in air, exactly, her head cocked to her own hand, and
ANNIE'S
eyes suddenly gleam.)

Ho. How
bright
she is!

JAMES:
You think she knows what she's doing?

(He takes
HELEN'S
hand, to throw a meaningless gesture into it; she repeats this one too.)

She imitates everything, she's a monkey.

ANNIE
[
VERY PLEASED
]: Yes, she's a bright little monkey, all right.

(She takes the doll from
HELEN,
and reaches for her hand;
HELEN
instantly grabs the doll back.
ANNIE
takes it again, and
HELEN'S
hand next, but
HELEN
is incensed now; when
ANNIE
draws her hand to her face to shake her head no, then tries to spell to her,
HELEN
slaps at
ANNIE'S
face.
ANNIE
grasps
HELEN
by both arms, and swings her into a chair, holding her pinned there, kicking, while glasses, doll, bonnet fly in various directions.
JAMES
laughs.)

JAMES:
She wants her doll back.

ANNIE:
When she spells it.

JAMES:
Spell, she doesn't know the thing has a name, even.

ANNIE:
Of course not, who expects her to, now? All I want is her fingers to learn the letters.

JAMES:
Won't mean anything to her.

(
ANNIE
gives him a look. She then tries to form
HELEN'S
fingers into the letters, but
HELEN
swings a haymaker instead, which
ANNIE
barely ducks, at once pinning her down again.)

Doesn't like that alphabet, Miss Sullivan. You invent it yourself?

(
HELEN
is now in a rage, fighting tooth and nail to get out of the chair, and
ANNIE
answers while struggling and dodging her kicks.)

ANNIE:
Spanish monks under a—vow of silence. Which I wish
you'd
take!

(And suddenly releasing
HELEN'S
hands, she comes and shuts the door in
JAMES'S
face.
HELEN
drops to the floor, groping around for the doll.
ANNIE
looks around desperately, sees her purse on the bed, rummages in it, and comes up with a battered piece of cake wrapped in newspaper; with her foot she moves the doll deftly out of the way of
HELEN'S
groping, and going on her knee she lets
HELEN
smell the cake. When
HELEN
grabs for it,
ANNIE
removes the cake and spells quickly into the reaching hand.)

Cake. From Washington up north, it's the best I can do.

(
HELEN'S
hand waits, baffled.
ANNIE
repeats it.)

C, a, k, e. Do what my fingers do, never mind what it means.

(She touches the cake briefly to
HELEN'S
nose, pats her hand, presents her own hand.
HELEN
spells the letters rapidly back.
ANNIE
pats her hand enthusiastically, and gives her the cake;
HELEN
crams it into her mouth with both hands.
ANNIE
watches her, with humor.)

Get it down fast, maybe I'll steal that back too. Now.

(She takes the doll, touches it to
HELEN'S
nose, and spells again into her hand.)

D, o, l, l. Think it over.

(
HELEN
thinks it over, while
ANNIE
presents her own hand. Then
HELEN
spells three letters.
ANNIE
waits a second, then completes the word for
HELEN
in her palm.)

L.

(She hands over the doll, and
HELEN
gets a good grip on its leg.)

Imitate now, understand later. End of the first les—

(She never finishes, because
HELEN
swings the doll with a furious energy, it hits
ANNIE
squarely in the face, and she falls back with a cry of pain, her knuckles up to her mouth.
HELEN
waits, tensed for further combat. When
ANNIE
lowers her knuckles she looks at blood on them;
she works her lips, gets to her feet, finds the mirror, and bares her teeth at herself. Now she is furious herself.)

You little wretch, no one's taught you
any
manners? I'll—