The Living Room Page 5

  JAMES: Is it true, Helen?

  HELEN: Oh, yes, it’s true—in a way. I wanted to know where she went off to nearly every afternoon. I suspected this.

  JAMES: Why?

  [TERESA has been quietly crying.]

  HELEN: Stop snivelling, Teresa.

  JAMES: I said why?

  HELEN: She’s our responsibility. It was my duty to clear this thing up. You’re so weak, you threw them together. She told you she was going away with him. It’s a mortal sin.

  JAMES: How do you know?

  HELEN: Because he’s a married man, of course.

  JAMES: Do you think you know a mortal sin when you see it? You’re wiser than the Church then.

  HELEN: Have some common sense.

  JAMES: Yes: if you would have some charity.

  HELEN: James, you’re a fool.

  JAMES: I see what’s in front of my eyes. God doesn’t require me to do more—

  HELEN: You’ve heard her—bragging. They’d have been living together now, day in day out, if I hadn’t stopped them.

  JAMES [sharply]: Stopped them?

  ROSE: Of course we’d have been together. Of course we’d have been lovers. Oh, you talk a lot about mortal sin. Why didn’t you let me go? Is this any better? Afternoons at Regal Court.

  HELEN: It is better. It will soon come to an end—this way.

  ROSE: Love ending is a good thing, isn’t it? To you.

  HELEN: This sort of love.

  ROSE: What’s the difference between this sort of love and any other? Would making love feel any different if he hadn’t got a wife? [She answers her own question in a lower voice] Only happier.

  JAMES [who has been waiting his opportunity]: You said you stopped them?

  HELEN: Yes. I’m not ashamed of it. I’ve kept her in the Church, haven’t I? She can go to confession now any time she likes.

  ROSE: And do it again, and go to confession, and do it again? Do you call that better than having children, living together till we die …

  HELEN: In mortal sin.

  ROSE: God’s got more sense. And mercy.

  HELEN: And it’s another sin to trust too much to His mercy.

  ROSE: Oh, they have a name for that too. I know it. The nuns taught it me. It’s called presumption. Well, I’m damned well going to presume.

  JAMES [to HELEN]: What do you mean, you stopped them?

  HELEN: Teresa wasn’t ill.

  ROSE: Not ill? She was in a faint on the floor.

  HELEN: I told her she was ill. She believed it.

  ROSE [turning quietly away]: Oh.

  [A long silence.]

  HELEN [defensively]: I had to act quickly, James.

  JAMES: I’d think you were a very wicked woman if you weren’t such a fool.

  TERESA: I don’t understand what you are all talking about.

  JAMES [to HELEN, bitterly]: Perhaps you can explain it to her, I can’t. Teresa, dear, go to your room with Helen. You’ve been up long enough.

  TERESA: Are you trying to get rid of me, James?

  JAMES: Yes, dear, I am. Take my book. I want a word with Rose alone.

  [TERESA begins to cross the room. Near the door she pauses.]

  TERESA: Aren’t you coming, Helen?

  HELEN [to JAMES]: I don’t trust you. I’m staying.

  JAMES: If you want to, you will. I know that. Rose, you see Teresa to her room.

  [ROSE takes TERESA by the arm and leads her through the door.]

  TERESA [as she goes, with a note of appeal, like a child]: You’ll come and say good-night, James?

  JAMES: It’s early. I’ll come and read to you till you feel sleepy. I’ll come before dinner.

  [ROSE and TERESA go out.]

  JAMES [to HELEN]: You might have killed Teresa.

  HELEN: I only told her she didn’t look well. I’d no intention …

  JAMES: You’ve told us clearly enough what you intended.

  HELEN: I wish the girl had never come here.

  JAMES: Oh, so do I, so do I. We’ve ruined her between us.

  HELEN: Us? We aren’t to blame. That man with all his wickedness …

  JAMES: Don’t blame him. Blame our dead goodness. Holy books, holy pictures, a subscription to the Altar Society. Do you think, if she had come into a house where there was love, she wouldn’t have hesitated, thought twice, talked to us …

  HELEN: And why didn’t she?

  JAMES: Because there was fear, not love, in this house. If we had asked her for a sacrifice, what would we have offered? Pious platitudes.

  HELEN: Speak for yourself, James.

  JAMES: I do. Goodness that sits and talks piously and decays all the time.

  HELEN: He seduced her.

  JAMES: It’s a silly word, but what if he did? God sometimes diverts the act, but the pious talk He seems to leave like the tares, useless.

  [ROSE enters.]

  ROSE [defiantly]: Well?

  JAMES [to HELEN]: You’d better apologize to her.

  HELEN: Apologize?

  JAMES [to ROSE]: She had no right to have you followed.

  HELEN: She’s in our care. She lied to us.

  ROSE: You lied to me.

  HELEN: There are lies and lies.

  JAMES: There needn’t be any more. God forgive me, but you bore me, Helen. Please go away.

  HELEN: I’m going to stay here.

  JAMES: I know I’m your brother, but I’m still a priest. I’ve asked you to go.

  [HELEN makes for the door, but she flings back one more insult.]

  HELEN: Oh, the Church is well rid of a useless priest like you, James. [She goes and the door closes.]

  [Silence.]

  ROSE [defiantly]: You know what this means?

  [No answer.]

  If Aunt Teresa’s well, I’m free. I can go with him. We are just where we were.

  JAMES: Are you?

  ROSE: We haven’t tired of each other, if that’s what you mean. [Defiantly] We love each other more. We know each other properly now.

  JAMES: I’m glad the hours in Regal Court were so rewarding.

  ROSE [her voice breaking]: Don’t laugh at me. Please don’t laugh at me.

  JAMES: I don’t feel like laughing.

  ROSE: Uncle, it isn’t wonderful at all. It’s sad, sad. [Sitting on the floor by his chair] I’m tired. I don’t know what to do.

  JAMES: How is he standing it?

  ROSE: We both stand it when we are together. We are happy at half-past two, we are still happy at three o’clock. Then we sometimes sleep a bit. It’s not so bad at four o’clock, but then we hear the quarter strike and all the sadness starts. Every day at a quarter-past four. We behave awfully sensibly when five o’clock comes. There’s a beastly little French gilt clock on the mantelpiece. One day I’m going to smash its pretty face. I oughtn’t to tell you all this.

  JAMES: I want to hear. People don’t talk to priests much—except in formulas, in that coffin-shaped box of ours.

  ROSE: ‘Since my last confession three weeks ago I’ve committed adultery twenty-seven times.’ That’s what Aunt Helen would like me to say, and, Father, it doesn’t mean a thing. We are supposed to be talking to God, aren’t we, through you, and God knows all about the clock on the mantelpiece. I don’t want to confess. I want to say, ‘Dear God. Give us more love. Give us a life together. Don’t let it be just Regal Court over and over again.’ Do you understand?

  JAMES: A little. All I can.

  ROSE: What are we to do?

  JAMES: My dear …

  ROSE [interrupting him]: I’m not asking you as a priest, I know that answer. But I can’t believe it’s true what Aunt Helen says, that God would rather have Regal Court and saying good-bye three times a week than—the other thing.

  JAMES: What?

  ROSE: Oh, peace and children and getting older. Outside the Church.

  JAMES: You wouldn’t be happy …

  ROSE: Oh yes, I would. Don’t make any mistake about that, Father. I could live a
lifetime without the sacraments. That wouldn’t hurt—but a lifetime, without him …

  JAMES: One gets over a separation. Time passes.

  ROSE: You have to live through it first though. You have to dream at night you are together and wake up in the morning alone, and count the hours till bed again.

  JAMES [sadly and with amazement]: What a lot of growing up you’ve done in three weeks.

  ROSE: Do you think if I left Michael I could really love a God who demanded all that pain before He’d give Himself …

  JAMES: You simplify too much.

  ROSE: But it’s a simple situation, Father. There’s nothing complicated about this—love affair. I’m not a case history.

  JAMES: The trouble is you don’t trust God enough. He would make things so much easier for you if you would shut your eyes and leave it to Him.

  [ROSE’S face hardens during this speech. She will not be persuaded.]

  ROSE: Would He? It’s not the way He always works. Look round the world nowadays. He seems to want heroes and I’m not a hero. I’m a coward. I can’t bear too much pain. There are a lot of us like that, Father. When I betray Him, I’m not doing any worse than Peter, am I? God died for the cowards too.

  [A bell rings below.]

  JAMES: He made them into heroes, even Peter.

  ROSE: Oh, we read about God’s successes. We don’t read about His failures. His happy failures. Who just don’t care much about Him, and go on living quietly all the same.

  JAMES: One has to deserve to be a failure.

  ROSE: But, Uncle, I don’t want to try, I’m a coward. I just want a bit of ordinary human comfort. Not formulas. ‘Love God. Trust God. Everything will be all right one day.’ Uncle, please say something that’s not Catholic.

  [HELEN enters hurriedly.]

  HELEN: There’s someone downstairs to see you, Rose.

  JAMES: Who?

  HELEN: Mrs Dennis.

  JAMES: What does she want? [With suspicion] Who brought her here?

  HELEN [with a suspicion of secret triumph]: I’ve told you—she wants to see Rose.

  [ROSE turns away with a movement of panic.A pause.]

  JAMES: Is this your work again, Helen? Tell her Rose is sick, not here. Tell her anything, but get rid of her.

  HELEN: She has a right…

  JAMES: This child has had enough to stand.

  HELEN [scornfully]: Child?

  JAMES: Yes. Child.

  [ROSE suddenly turns back to them.]

  ROSE: I’m here, aren’t I? What are you waiting for? Tell her to come up. [She crosses to the door and pulls it open.]

  [HELEN passes quickly through and is heard calling to MARY to show MRS DENNIS up.]

  JAMES [unwilling to go]: Can you stand it?

  ROSE: I’ve been standing the thought of her, haven’t I, all these weeks.

  [JAMES stops his chair by the door and appeals again.]

  JAMES: Call me if you need me. I’ll be in my room.

  [ROSE obstinately makes no reply and JAMES leaves.

  ROSE stands alone, facing the door as MARY shows MRS DENNIS in and hurriedly closes the door on her. MRS DENNIS is a woman of about forty-five, with prematurely grey hair and a strained neurotic but determined face. She comes in and looks uneasily about her as though the strangeness of this living room communicated itself even to her.]

  MRS DENNIS: Is Michael here?

  ROSE: No. Did you expect him to be?

  MRS DENNIS: He said he was at a lecture, but I never know now. You’re Rose, aren’t you?

  ROSE: You’re his wife, aren’t you?

  MRS DENNIS: I read one of your letters. It fell out of his dressing-gown pocket.

  ROSE: Yes?

  MRS DENNIS: He’s always been silly that way—keeping letters.

  ROSE: Is that what you’ve come to tell me? Was it worth climbing all those stairs?

  MRS DENNIS [maliciously]: I thought your letter so touching. You trust him so much.

  ROSE: Yes. I do.

  MRS DENNIS: You shouldn’t, you know, but of course you can’t know, he wouldn’t tell you. But there’s always been trouble with his students. Reading Freud together, I suppose. The third year we were married—just after our baby died—I could have divorced him.

  ROSE: Why didn’t you?

  MRS DENNIS [fiercely]: Because he’s happier with me. He’ll always be happier with me. I’d forgive him anything. Would you?

  ROSE: No. Because I love him. I wouldn’t want to hold him prisoner with forgiveness. I wouldn’t want to hold him a minute if he wanted to be somewhere else.

  MRS DENNIS: He only thinks that.

  ROSE: He has a right to think. He has a right to think wrong.

  MRS DENNIS: If he really loved you, he’d have left me.

  ROSE: He meant to. Three weeks ago.

  MRS DENNIS: But he’s still here.

  ROSE: Because I wouldn’t go.

  MRS DENNIS: Why?

  ROSE: I was caught like him. By pity [savagely]—He pities you.

  MRS DENNIS [maliciously]: It didn’t feel like pity—last night.

  ROSE [crying out in pain]: I don’t believe you.

  MRS DENNIS: If I’m ready to share him, what right …

  ROSE: You’re lying. You know you are lying. What have you come here for? You’re just lying to break me. You’re wicked.

  MRS DENNIS: Wicked’s an odd word from you. I am his wife.

  ROSE: You can stay his wife. I only want to be his mistress.

  [MRS DENNIS suddenly crumbles. She drops into a chair and begins to weep.ROSE watches her for a moment, but she cannot remain indifferent.]

  I’m sorry. [With a gesture of despair.] Oh, it’s all such a mess. MRS DENNIS: Please don’t take him away. ROSE: What can I do? I love him. I love him terribly.

  MRS DENNIS: But I love him too. I only want him near me still. It doesn’t hurt you.

  ROSE [bitterly]: Doesn’t it?

  MRS DENNIS: I was lying. We haven’t—been together like that for years.

  ROSE: Oh, love isn’t all making love. I’d sometimes give that up, to be together. At meals. Come into a house where he is. Sit silent with a book in the same room.

  MRS DENNIS [hysterically]: When are you going? I know you are planning to go. Don’t torture me. Tell me.

  ROSE: I don’t know.

  MRS DENNIS: You’re young. You can find any number of men. Please let him alone. [Spacing her words.] I can’t live without him.

  [ROSE watches her hysteria grow. She is trapped and horrified.] I’ll die if he leaves me. I’ll kill myself.

  ROSE: No. No. You never will.

  MRS DENNIS: I will. I know what you’re thinking—after that, I could marry him.

  ROSE: Please …

  MRS DENNIS: Go away from him. Please. Go somewhere he won’t find you. You’re young. You’ll get over it. The young always do.

  ROSE: But I don’t want to get over it.

  MRS DENNIS: I’m ill. Can’t you wait? Just wait six months and see. Six months isn’t long. [With almost a cry] You haven’t any right to hurt me like this. [She gets up and comes across the floor to ROSE.] No right. [Suddenly she strikes ROSE in the face, but immediately she has struck she goes down on her knees and starts beating the table with her fists.] You made me do that. You made me. I want to die. I want to die. I want to die.

  [ROSE stands helplessly above her as MRS DENNIS beats the table. She doesn’t know what to do.]

  He wants me to die too. You all want me to die.

  ROSE: No. No. [In a moan of despair] We only want to be happy.

  MRS DENNIS: If he runs away, I shall go mad. [She gets clumsily to her feet. The paroxysm is over. She sits down in a chair again.] Please will you get me some water?

  [ROSE goes to the closet door. As she enters the closet, MRS DENNIS hurriedly gets up and finds her bag which she had laid on the table. A tap runs. She takes a bottle out of her bag and unscrews the top. As ROSE comes in again she conceals the bottle in her
palm. She takes the glass of water.]

  MRS DENNIS: Could you turn out that light, dear? It’s so strong.

  [ROSE turns away to find the switch, MRS DENNIS begins to pour some tablets into her hand. She does it slowly with the obvious purpose that she shall be seen whenROSE turns. When ROSE sees what she is at, she runs to her and snatches the bottle which she throws into a corner of the room.]

  [Hysterically] Why did you do that? I can buy more.

  ROSE: Buy them then. You’re just blackmailing me.

  [She hears the sound of feet coming rapidly up the stairs and runs to the door.]

  Michael, for God’s sake.

  [MICHAEL enters.]

  Michael.

  MICHAEL [looking at his wife]: I heard she was here.

  ROSE [breaking down]: She tried to kill herself.

  MICHAEL: Oh no, she didn’t. I know that trick of hers. [To his wife] You promised you wouldn’t do that again. It does no good, dear.

  MRS DENNIS: Don’t call me dear.

  MICHAEL: You are dear. I call you what you are.

  [ROSE watches. She is distressed, puzzled. She hasn’t yet grown up enough to realize that there are many ways of love.]

  MRS DENNIS: But you are going to leave me?

  MICHAEL: Yes.

  MRS DENNIS: Oh, you’ve said it now. You’ve said it. You’ve never said it before.

  MICHAEL: I’ve been weak. I know. I’ve made matters worse. I’m supposed to know about people’s minds, but when it comes to the point I behave like everyone else.

  MRS DENNIS: She’s too young for you, Michael.

  MICHAEL [with bitterness]: I’m making her older already.

  MRS DENNIS: What happens to me, Michael? There isn’t even a child.

  MICHAEL: You’ll settle down. You have friends. After a little while [he is almost pleading his own cause with her] surely we can see each other.

  [ROSE turns sharply away. She can’t bear any longer the sight of them together. They are unmistakably man and wife.]

  MRS DENNIS: If you go away, you’ll never see me again. You won’t know what’s happening to me. You won’t know if I’m ill or well. I’m not going to have you come and watch my tears.