Текст книги "Pygmalion and Three Other Plays"

Автор книги: George Bernard Shaw

Соавторы: John A. Bertolini
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Текущая страница: 38 (всего у книги 44 страниц)

MRS HUSHABYE [rather stolidly] Sorry.

MAZZINI [looking forlornly at the body] What is your objection to poor Mangan, Mrs Hushabye? He looks all right to me. But then I am so accustomed to him.

MRS HUSHABYE Have you no heart? Have you no sense? Look at the brute! Think of poor weak innocent Ellie in the clutches of this slavedriver, who spends his life making thousands of rough violent workmen bend to his will and sweat for him: a man accustomed to have great masses of iron beaten into shape for him by steam-hammers! to fight with women and girls over a halfpenny an hour ruthlessly! a captain of industry, I think you call him, don’t you? Are you going to fling your delicate, sweet, helpless child into such a beast’s claws just because he will keep her in an expensive house and make her wear diamonds to show how rich he is?

MAZZINI [staring at her in wide-eyed amazement] Bless you, dear Mrs Hushabye, what romantic ideas of business you have! Poor dear Mangan isn’t a bit like that.

MRS HUSHABYE [scornfully] Poor dear Mangan indeed!

MAZZINI But he doesn’t know anything about machinery. He never goes near the men: he couldn’t manage them: he is afraid of them. I never can get him to take the least interest in the works: he hardly knows more about them than you do. People are cruelly unjust to Mangan: they think he is all rugged strength just because his manners are bad.

MRS HUSHABYE Do you mean to tell me he isn’t strong enough to crush poor little Ellie?

MAZZINI Of course it’s very hard to say how any marriage will turn out; but speaking for myself, I should say that he won’t have a dog’s chance against Ellie. You know, Ellie has remarkable strength of character. I think it is because I taught her to like Shakespeare when she was very young.

MRS HUSHABYE [contemptuously] Shakespeare! The next thing you will tell me is that you could have made a great deal more money than Mangan. [She retires to the sofa, and sits down at the port end of it in the worst of humors.]

MAZZINI [following her and taking the other end] No: I’m no good at making money. I don’t care enough for it, somehow. I’m not ambitious! that must be it. Mangan is wonderful about money: he thinks of nothing else. He is so dreadfully afraid of being poor. I am always thinking of other things: even at the works I think of the things we are doing and not of what they cost. And the worst of it is, poor Mangan doesn’t know what to do with his money when he gets it. He is such a baby that he doesn’t know even what to eat and drink: he has ruined his liver eating and drinking the wrong things; and now he can hardly eat at all. Ellie will diet him splendidly. You will be surprised when you come to know him better: he is really the most helpless of mortals. You get quite a protective feeling towards him.

MRS HUSHABYE Then who manages his business, pray?

MAZZINI I do. And of course other people like me.

MRS HUSHABYE Footling[310]310
  Silly, or inconsequential.


[Закрыть] people, you mean.

MAZZINI I suppose you’d think us so.

MRS HUSHABYE And pray why don’t you do without him if you’re all so much cleverer?

MAZZINI Oh, we couldn’t: we should ruin the business in a year. I’ve tried; and I know. We should spend too much on everything. We should improve the quality of the goods and make them too dear. We should be sentimental about the hard cases among the workpeople. But Mangan keeps us in order. He is down on us about every extra halfpenny. We could never do without him. You see, he will sit up all night thinking of how to save sixpence. Won’t Ellie make him jump, though, when she takes his house in hand!

MRS HUSHABYE Then the creature is a fraud even as a captain of industry!

MAZZINI I am afraid all the captains of industry are what you call frauds, Mrs Hushabye. Of course there are some manufacturers who really do understand their own works; but they don’t make as high a rate of profit as Mangan does. I assure you Mangan is quite a good fellow in his way. He means well.

MRS HUSHABYE He doesn’t look well. He is not in his first youth, is he?

MAZZINI After all, no husband is in his first youth for very long, Mrs Hushabye. And men can’t afford to marry in their first youth nowadays.

MRS HUSHABYE Now if I said that, it would sound witty. Why can’t you say it wittily? What on earth is the matter with you? Why don’t you inspire everybody with confidence? with respect?

MAZZINI [humbly] I think that what is the matter with me is that I am poor. You don’t know what that means at home. Mind: I don’t say they have ever complained. They’ve all been wonderful: they’ve been proud of my poverty. They’ve even joked about it quite often. But my wife has had a very poor time of it. She has been quite resigned —

MRS HUSHABYE [shuddering involuntarily]!!

MAZZINI There! You see, Mrs Hushabye. I don’t want Ellie to live on resignation.

MRS HUSHABYE Do you want her to have to resign herself to living with a man she doesn’t love?

MAZZINI [wistfully] Are you sure that would be worse than living with a man she did love, if he was a footling person?

MRS HUSHABYE [relaxing her contemptuous attitude, quite interested in MAZZINI now] You know, I really think you must love Ellie very much; for you become quite clever when you talk about her.

MAZZINI I didn’t know I was so very stupid on other subjects.

MRS HUSHABYE You are, sometimes.

MAZZINI [turning his head away; for his eyes are wet] I have learnt a good deal about myself from you, Mrs Hushabye; and I’m afraid I shall not be the happier for your plain speaking. But if you thought I needed it to make me think of Ellie’s happiness you were very much mistaken.

MRS HUSHABYE [leaning towards him kindly] Have I been a beast?

MAZZINI [pulling himself together] It doesn’t matter about me, Mrs Hushabye. I think you like Ellie; and that is enough for me.

MRS HUSHABYE I’m beginning to like you a little. I perfectly loathed you at first. I thought you the most odious, self-satisfied, boresome elderly prig I ever met.

MAZZINI [resigned, and now quite cheerful] I daresay I am all that. I never have been a favorite with gorgeous women like you. They always frighten me.

MRS HUSHABYE [pleased] Am I a gorgeous woman, Mazzini? I shall fall in love with you presently.

MAZZINI [with placid gallantry] No, you won‘t, Hesione. But you would be quite safe. Would you believe it that quite a lot of women have flirted with me because I am quite safe? But they get tired of me for the same reason.

MRS HUSHABYE [mischievously] Take care. You may not be so safe as you think.

MAZZINI Oh yes, quite safe. You see, I have been in love really: the sort of love that only happens once. [Softly.] That’s why Ellie is such a lovely girl.

MRS HUSHABYE Well, really, you are coming out. Are you quite sure you won’t let me tempt you into a second grand passion?

MAZZINI Quite. It wouldn’t be natural. The fact is, you don’t strike on my box, Mrs Hushabye; and I certainly don’t strike on yours.

MRS HUSHABYE I see.Your marriage was a safety match.

MAZZINI What a very witty application of the expression I used! I should never have thought of it.

ELLIE comes in from the garden, looking anything but happy.

MRS HUSHABYE [rising] Oh! here is Ellie at last. [She goes behind the sofa.]

ELLIE [on the threshold of the starboard door] Guinness said you wanted me: you and papa.

MRS HUSHABYE You have kept us waiting so long that it almost came to – well, never mind. Your father is a very wonderful man [she ruffles his hair affectionately]: the only one I ever met who could resist me when I made myself really agreeable. [She comes to the big chair, on MANGAN’s left.] Come here. I have something to show you. [ELLIE strolls listlessly to the other side of the chair.] Look.

ELLIE [contemplating MANGAN without interest] I know. He is only asleep. We had a talk after dinner; and he fell asleep in the middle of it.

MRS HUSHABYE You did it, Ellie. You put him asleep.

MAZZINI [rising quickly and coming to the back of the chair] Oh, I hope not. Did you, Ellie?

ELLIE [wearily] He asked me to.

MAZZINI But it’s dangerous. You know what happened to me.

ELLIE [utterly indifferent] Oh, I daresay I can wake him. If not, somebody else can.

MRS HUSHABYE It doesn’t matter, anyhow, because I have at last persuaded your father that you don’t want to marry him.

ELLIE [suddenly coming out of her listlessness, much vexed] But why did you do that, Hesione? I do want to marry him. I fully intend to marry him.

MAZZINI Are you quite sure, Ellie? Mrs Hushabye has made me feel that I may have been thoughtless and selfish about it.

ELLIE [very clearly and steadily] Papa. When Mrs. Hushabye takes it on herself to explain to you what I think or don’t think, shut your ears tight; and shut your eyes too. Hesione knows nothing about me: she hasn’t the least notion of the sort of person I am, and never will. I promise you I won’t do anything I don’t want to do and mean to do for my own sake.

MAZZINI You are quite, quite sure?

ELLIE Quite, quite sure. Now you must go away and leave me to talk to Mrs Hushabye.

MAZZINI But I should like to hear. Shall I be in the way?

ELLIE [inexorable] I had rather talk to her alone.

MAZZINI [affectionately] Oh, well, I know what a nuisance parents are, dear. I will be good and go. [He goes to the garden door.] By the way, do you remember the address of that professional who woke me up? Don’t you think I had better telegraph to him?

MRS HUSHABYE [moving towards the sofa] It’s too late to telegraph tonight.

MAZZINI I suppose so. I do hope he’ll wake up in the course of the night. [He goes out into the garden.]

ELLIE [turning rigorously on HESIONE the moment her father is out of the room]. Hesione, what the devil do you mean by making mischief with my father about Mangan?

MRS HUSHABYE [promptly losing her temper] Don’t you dare speak to me like that, you little minx. Remember that you are in my house.

ELLIE Stuff! Why don’t you mind your own business? What is it to you whether I choose to marry Mangan or not? MRS HUSHABYE Do you suppose you can bully me, you miserable little matrimonial adventurer?

ELLIE Every woman who hasn’t any money is a matrimonial adventurer. It’s easy for you to talk: you have never known what it is to want money; and you can pick up men as if they were daisies. I am poor and respectable —

MRS HUSHABYE [interrupting] Ho! respectable! How did you pick up Mangan? How did you pick up my husband? You have the audacity to tell me that I am a – a – a —

ELLIE A siren. So you are. You were born to lead men by the nose: if you weren‘t, Marcus would have waited for me, perhaps.

MRS HUSHABYE [suddenly melting and half laughing] Oh, my poor Ellie, my pettikins, my unhappy darling! I am so sorry about Hector. But what can I do? It’s not my fault: I’d give him to you if I could.

ELLIE I don’t blame you for that.

MRS HUSHABYE What a brute I was to quarrel with you and call you names! Do kiss me and say you’re not angry with me.

ELLIE [fiercely] Oh, don’t slop and gush and be sentimental. Don’t you see that unless I can be hard – as hard as nails – I shall go mad? I don’t care a damn about your calling me names: do you think a woman in my situation can feel a few hard words?

MRS HUSHABYE Poor little woman! Poor little situation!

ELLIE I suppose you think you’re being sympathetic. You are just foolish and stupid and selfish. You see me getting a smasher right in the face that kills a whole part of my life: the best part that can never come again; and you think you can help me over it by a little coaxing and kissing. When I want all the strength I can get to lean on: something iron, something stony, I don’t care how cruel it is, you go all mushy and want to slobber over me. I’m not angry; I’m not unfriendly; but for God’s sake do pull yourself together; and don’t think that because you’re on velvet and always have been, women who are in hell can take it as easily as you.

MRS HUSHABYE [shrugging her shoulders] Very well. [She sits down on the sofa in her old place.] But I warn you that when I am neither coaxing and kissing nor laughing, I am just wondering how much longer I can stand living in this cruel, damnable world. You object to the siren: well, I drop the siren. You want to rest your wounded bosom against a grindstone. Well [folding her arms], here is the grindstone.

ELLIE [sitting down beside her, appeased] That’s better: you really have the trick of falling in with everyone’s mood; but you don’t understand, because you are not the sort of woman for whom there is only one man and only one chance.

MRS HUSHABYE I certainly don’t understand how your marrying that object [indicating MANGAN] will console you for not being able to marry Hector.

ELLIE Perhaps you don’t understand why I was quite a nice girl this morning, and am now neither a girl nor particularly nice.

MRS HUSHABYE Oh, yes, I do. It’s because you have made up your mind to do something despicable and wicked.

ELLIE I don’t think so, Hesione. I must make the best of my ruined house.

MRS HUSHABYE Pooh!You’ll get over it.Your house isn’t ruined.

ELLIE Of course I shall get over it. You don’t suppose I’m to sit down and die of a broken heart, I hope, or be an old maid living on a pittance from the Sick and Indigent Roomkeepers’ Association. But my heart is broken, all the same. What I mean by that is that I know that what has happened to me with Marcus will not happen to me ever again. In the world for me there is Marcus and a lot of other men of whom one is just the same as another. Well, if I can’t have love, that’s no reason why I should have poverty. If Mangan has nothing else, he has money.

MRS HUSHABYE And are there no young men with money.

ELLIE Not within my reach. Besides, a young man would have the right to expect love from me, and would perhaps leave me when he found I could not give it to him. Rich young men can get rid of their wives, you know, pretty cheaply. But this object, as you call him, can expect nothing more from me than I am prepared to give him.

MRS HUSHABYE He will be your owner, remember. If he buys you, he will make the bargain pay him and not you. Ask your father.

ELLIE [rising and strolling to the chair to contemplate their subject] You need not trouble on that score, Hesione. I have more to give Boss Mangan than he has to give me: it is I who am buying him, and at a pretty good price too, I think. Women are better at that sort of bargain than men. I have taken the Boss’s measure; and ten Boss Mangans shall not prevent me doing far more as I please as his wife than I have ever been able to do as a poor girl. [Stooping to the recumbent figure.] Shall they, Boss? I think not. [She passes on to the drawing-table, and leans against the end of it, facing the windows.] I shall not have to spend most of my time wondering how long my gloves will last, anyhow.

MRS HUSHABYE [rising superbly] Ellie, you are a wicked, sordid little beast. And to think that I actually condescended to fascinate that creature there to save you from him! Well, let me tell you this: if you make this disgusting match, you will never see Hector again if I can help it.

ELLIE [unmoved] I nailed Mangan by telling him that if he did not marry me he should never see you again [she lifts herself on her wrists and seats herself on the end of the table].

MRS HUSHABYE [recoiling] Oh!

ELLIE So you see I am not unprepared for your playing that trump against me. Well, you just try it: that’s all. I should have made a man of Marcus, not a household pet.

MRS HUSHABYE [flaming] You dare!

ELLIE [looking almost dangerous] Set him thinking about me if you dare.

MRS HUSHABYE Well, of all the impudent little fiends I ever met! Hector says there is a certain point at which the only answer you can give to a man who breaks all the rules is to knock him down. What would you say if I were to box your ears?

ELLIE [calmly] I should pull your hair.

MRS HUSHABYE [mischievously] That wouldn’t hurt me. Perhaps it comes off at night.

ELLIE [so taken aback that she drops off the table and runs to her] Oh, you don’t mean to say, Hesione, that your beautiful black hair is false?

MRS HUSHABYE [patting it] Don’t tell Hector. He believes in it.

ELLIE [groaning] Oh! Even the hair that ensnared him false! Everything false!

MRS HUSHABYE Pull it and try. Other women can snare men in their hair; but I can swing a baby on mine. Aha! you can’t do that, Goldylocks.

ELLIE [heartbroken] No. You have stolen my babies.

MRS HUSHABYE Pettikins, don’t make me cry. You know what you said about my making a household pet of him is a little true. Perhaps he ought to have waited for you. Would any other woman on earth forgive you?

ELLIE Oh, what right had you to take him all for yourself! [Pulling herself together.] There! You couldn’t help it: neither of us could help it. He couldn’t help it. No, don’t say anything more: I can’t bear it. Let us wake the object. [She begins stroking MANGAN’s head, reversing the movement with which she put him to sleep.] Wake up, do you hear? You are to wake up at once. Wake up, wake up, wake —

MANGAN [bouncing out of the chair in a fury and turning on them] Wake up! So you think I’ve been asleep, do you? [He kicks the chair violently back out of his way, and gets between them.] You throw me into a trance so that I can’t move hand or foot – I might have been buried alive! it’s a mercy I wasn‘t – and then you think I was only asleep. If you’d let me drop the two times you rolled me about, my nose would have been flattened for life against the floor. But I’ve found you all out, anyhow. I know the sort of people I’m among now. I’ve heard every word you’ve said, you and your precious father, and [to MRS HUSHABYE] you too. So I’m an object, am I? I’m a thing, am I? I’m a fool that hasn’t sense enough to feed myself properly, am I? I’m afraid of the men that would starve if it weren’t for the wages I give them, am I? I’m nothing but a disgusting old skinflint to be made a convenience of by designing women and fool managers of my works, am I? I’m —

MRS HUSHABYE [with the most elegant aplomb] Sh-sh-sh-sh-sh! Mr Mangan, you are bound in honor to obliterate from your mind all you heard while you were pretending to be asleep. It was not meant for you to hear.

MANGAN Pretending to be asleep! Do you think if I was only pretending that I’d have sprawled there helpless, and listened to such unfairness, such lies, such injustice and plotting and backbiting and slandering of me, if I could have up and told you what I thought of you! I wonder I didn’t burst.

MRS HUSHABYE [sweetly] You dreamt it all, Mr. Mangan. We were only saying how beautifully peaceful you looked in your sleep. That was all, wasn’t it, Ellie? Believe me, Mr Mangan, all those unpleasant things came into your mind in the last half second before you woke. Ellie rubbed your hair the wrong way; and the disagreeable sensation suggested a disagreeable dream.

MANGAN [doggedly] I believe in dreams.

MRS HUSHABYE So do I. But they go by contraries,[311]311
  That is, the reality is the opposite of the dream.


[Закрыть] don’t they?

MANGAN [depths of emotion suddenly welling up in him] I shan’t forget, to my dying day, that when you gave me the glad eye that time in the garden, you were making a fool of me. That was a dirty low mean thing to do. You had no right to let me come near you if I disgusted you. It isn’t my fault if I’m old and haven’t a moustache like a bronze candlestick as your husband band has. There are things no decent woman would do to a man – like a man hitting a woman in the breast. HESIONE, utterly shamed, sits down on the sofa and covers her face with her hands. MANGAN sits down also on his chair and begins to cry like a child. ELLIE stares at them. MRS HUSHABYE, at the distressing sound he makes, takes down her hands and looks at him. She rises and runs to him.

MRS HUSHABYE Don’t cry: I can’t bear it. Have I broken your heart? I didn’t know you had one. How could I?

MANGAN I’m a man, ain’t I?

MRS HUSHABYE [half coaxing, half rallying, altogether tenderly] Oh no: not what I call a man. Only a Boss: just that and nothing else. What business has a Boss with a heart?

MANGAN Then you’re not a bit sorry for what you did, nor ashamed?

MRS HUSHABYE I was ashamed for the first time in my life when you said that about hitting a woman in the breast, and I found out what I’d done. My very bones blushed red. You’ve had your revenge, Boss. Aren’t you satisfied?

MANGAN Serve you right! Do you hear? Serve you right! You’re just cruel. Cruel.

MRS HUSHABYE Yes: cruelty would be delicious if one could only find some sort of cruelty that didn’t really hurt. By the way [sitting down beside him on the arm of the chair], what’s your name? It’s not really Boss, is it?

MANGAN [shortly] If you want to know, my name’s Alfred.

MRS HUSHABYE [springs up] Alfred!! Ellie, he was christened after Tennyson!!!

MANGAN [rising] I was christened after my uncle, and never had a penny from him, damn him! What of it?

MRS HUSHABYE It comes to me suddenly that you are a real person: that you had a mother, like anyone else. [Putting her hands on his shoulders and surveying him.] Little Alf!

MANGAN Well, you have a nerve.

MRS HUSHABYE And you have a heart, Alfy, a whimpering little heart, but a real one. [Releasing him suddenly.] Now run and make it up with Ellie. She has had time to think what to say to you, which is more than I had [she goes out quickly into the garden by the port door].

MANGAN That woman has a pair of hands that go right through you.

ELLIE Still in love with her, in spite of all we said about you?

MANGAN Are all women like you two? Do they never think of anything about a man except what they can get out of him? You weren’t even thinking that about me. You were only thinking whether your gloves would last.

ELLIE I shall not have to think about that when we are married.

MANGAN And you think I am going to marry you after what I heard there!

ELLIE You heard nothing from me that I did not tell you before.

MANGAN Perhaps you think I can’t do without you.

ELLIE I think you would feel lonely without us all, now, after coming to know us so well.

MANGAN [with something like a yell of despair] Am I never to have the last word?

CAPTAIN SHOTOVER [appearing at the starboard garden door] There is a soul in torment here. What is the matter?

MANGAN This girl doesn’t want to spend her life wondering how long her gloves will last.

CAPTAIN SHOTOVER [passing through] Don’t wear any. I never do [he goes into the pantry].

LADY UTTERWORD [appearing at the port garden door, in a handsome dinner dress] Is anything the matter?

ELLIE This gentleman wants to know is he never to have the last word?

LADY UTTERWORD [coming forward to the sofa] I should let him have it, my dear. The important thing is not to have the last word, but to have your own way.

MANGAN She wants both.

LADY UTTERWORD She won’t get them, Mr Mangan. Providence always has the last word.

MANGAN [desperately] Now you are going to come religion over me. In this house a man’s mind might as well be a football. I’m going. [He makes for the hall, but is stopped by a hail from the captain, who has just emerged from his pantry].

CAPTAIN SHOTOVER Whither away, Boss Mangan?

MANGAN To hell out of this house: let that be enough for you and all here.

CAPTAIN SHOTOVER You were welcome to come: you are free to go. The wide earth, the high seas, the spacious skies are waiting for you outside.

LADY UTTERWORD But your things, Mr Mangan. Your bag, your comb and brushes, your pyjamas —

HECTOR [who has just appeared in the port doorway in a handsome Arab costume] Why should the escaping slave take his chains with him?

MANGAN That’s right, Hushabye. Keep the pyjamas, my lady, and much good may they do you.

HECTOR [advancing to LADY UTTERWORD’s left hand] Let us all go out into the night and leave everything behind us.

MANGAN You stay where you are, the lot of you. I want no company, especially female company.

ELLIE Let him go. He is unhappy here. He is angry with us.

CAPTAIN SHOTOVER Go, Boss Mangan; and when you have found the land where there is happiness and where there are no women, send me its latitude and longitude; and I will join you there.

LADY UTTERWORD You will certainly not be comfortable without your luggage, Mr Mangan.

ELLIE [impatient] Go, go: why don’t you go? It is a heavenly night: you can sleep on the heath. Take my waterproof to lie on: it is hanging up in the hall.

HECTOR Breakfast at nine, unless you prefer to breakfast with the captain at six.

ELLIE Good night, Alfred.

HECTOR Alfred! [He runs back to the door and calls into the garden. ] Randall, Mangan’s Christian name is Alfred.

RANDALL [appearing in the starboard doorway in evening dress] Then Hesione wins her bet.

MRS HUSHABYE appears in the port doorway. She throws her left arm round HECTOR’s neck: draws him with her to the back of the sofa: and throws her right arm round LADY UTTERWORD’s neck.

MRS HUSHABYE They wouldn’t believe me, Alf. They contemplate him.

MANGAN Is there any more of you coming in to look at me, as if I was the latest thing in a menagerie?

MRS HUSHABYE You are the latest thing in this menagerie. Before MANGAN can retort, a fall of furniture is heard from upstairs: then a pistol shot, and a yell of pain. The staring group breaks up in consternation.

MAZZINI’S VOICE [from above] Help! A burglar! Help![312]312
  Shaw had rehearsed this sudden intrusion by a criminal into a country house in his earlier play Misalliance (1910).


[Закрыть]

HECTOR [his eyes blazing] A burglar!!!

MRS HUSHABYE No, Hector: you’ll be shot [but it is too late; he has dashed out past MANGAN, who hastily moves towards the bookshelves out of his way].

CAPTAIN SHOTOVER [blowing his whistle] All hands aloft! [He strides out after HECTOR.]

LADY UTTERWORD My diamonds! [She follows the captain. ]

RANDALL [rushing after her] No, Ariadne. Let me.

ELLIE Oh, is papa shot? [She runs out.]

MRS HUSHABYE Are you frightened, Alf?

MANGAN No. It ain’t my house, thank God.

MRS HUSHABYE If they catch a burglar, shall we have to go into court as witnesses, and be asked all sorts of questions about our private lives?

MANGAN You won’t be believed if you tell the truth.

MAZZINI, terribly upset, with a duelling pistol in his hand, comes from the hall, and makes his way to the drawing-table.

MAZZINI Oh, my dear Mrs Hushabye, I might have killed him. [He throws the pistol on the table and staggers round to the chair.] I hope you won’t believe I really intended to. HECTOR comes in, marching an old and villainous looking man before him by the collar. He plants him in the middle of the room and releases him.

ELLIE follows, and immediately runs across to the back of her father’s chair and pats his shoulders.

RANDALL [entering with a poker] Keep your eye on this door, Mangan. I’ll look after the other [he goes to the starboard door and stands on guard there].

LADY UTTERWORD comes in after RANDALL, and goes between MRS HUSHABYE and MANGAN.

NURSE GUINNESS brings up the rear, and waits near the door, on MANGAN’s left.

MRS HUSHABYE What has happened?

MAZZINI Your housekeeper told me there was somebody upstairs, and gave me a pistol that Mr Hushabye had been practising with. I thought it would frighten him; but it went off at a touch.

THE BURGLAR Yes, and took the skin off my ear. Precious near took the top off my head. Why don’t you have a proper revolver instead of a thing like that, that goes off if you as much as blow on it?

HECTOR One of my duelling pistols. Sorry.

MAZZINI He put his hands up and said it was a fair cop.[313]313
  Meaning he was caught fair and square.


[Закрыть]

THE BURGLAR So it was. Send for the police.

HECTOR No, by thunder! It was not a fair cop. We were four to one.

MRS HUSHABYE What will they do to him?

THE BURGLAR Ten years. Beginning with solitary. Ten years off my life. I shan’t serve it all: I’m too old. It will see me out.

LADY UTTERWORD You should have thought of that before you stole my diamonds.

THE BURGLAR Well, you’ve got them back, lady, haven’t you? Can you give me back the years of my life you are going to take from me?

MRS HUSHABYE Oh, we can’t bury a man alive for ten years for a few diamonds.

THE BURGLAR Ten little shining diamonds! Ten long black years!

LADY UTTERWORD Think of what it is for us to be dragged through the horrors of a criminal court, and have all our family affairs in the papers! If you were a native, and Hastings could order you a good beating and send you away, I shouldn’t mind; but here in England there is no real protection for any respectable person.

THE BURGLAR I’m too old to be giv a hiding, lady. Send for the police and have done with it. It’s only just and right you should.

RANDALL [who has relaxed his vigilance on seeing the burglar so pacifically disposed, and comes forward swinging the poker between his fingers like a well-folded umbrella] It is neither just nor right that we should be put to a lot of inconvenience to gratify your moral enthusiasm, my friend. You had better get out, while you have the chance.

THE BURGLAR [inexorably] No. I must work my sin off my conscience. This has come as a sort of call to me. Let me spend the rest of my life repenting in a cell. I shall have my reward above.

MANGAN [exasperated] The very burglars can’t behave naturally in this house.

HECTOR My good sir, you must work out your salvation at somebody else’s expense. Nobody here is going to charge you.

THE BURGLAR Oh, you won’t charge me, won’t you?

HECTOR No. I’m sorry to be inhospitable; but will you kindly leave the house?

THE BURGLAR Right. I’ll go to the police station and give myself up. [He turns resolutely to the door: but HECTOR stops him.]

LADY UTTERWORD You will have to do as you are told.

THE BURGLAR It’s compounding a felony, you know.

MRS HUSHABYE This is utterly ridiculous. Are we to be forced to prosecute this man when we don’t want to?

THE BURGLAR Am I to be robbed of my salvation to save you the trouble of spending a day at the sessions?[314]314
  Active court, when cases are being heard.


[Закрыть] Is that justice? Is it right? Is it fair to me?

MAZZINI [rising and leaning across the table persuasively as if it were a pulpit desk or a shop counter] Come, come! let me show you how you can turn your very crimes to account. Why not set up as a locksmith? You must know more about locks than most honest men?