The Complete Plays of J. M. Barrie - 30 Titles in One Edition. Джеймс Барри

Signs to waggle cane. Shows approval and claps hands. While he is doing so, miss goodwillie enters, and observes his antics.)

      MISS GOODWILLIE. Whatever are you doing, Doctor?

      COSENS. Observe the hat — and the cane.

      MISS GOODWILLIE. Where has he gone?

      COSENS. Prepare to receive cavalry, my friend; Tom is off to the cottage where Miss White is living to propose to her.

      MISS GOODWILLIE. Ah! I think I can stop that. The Gildings have just told me something that will show Tom what she is, when I tell it to him.

      COSENS. Whatever it is, I don’t believe it.

      MISS GOODWILLIE. I do.

      COSENS. You are so cynical, Miss Goodwillie, you believe in no one.

      MISS GOODWILLIE. I believe in everything — except women — and men.

      COSENS. Where are you going now?

      MISS GOODWILLIE. TO tax her with it before Tom.

      (COSENS flings up his arms and disappears from window.

      MISS GOODWILLIE is going, but evidently sees someone else coming and turns and sits on seat. Enter LUCY.) I have been looking for you for some hours, Miss White.

      LUCY. I was out when you called. So I have come to see you.

      MISS GOODWILLIE. TO triumph over me i lucy. No, to let you triumph over me.

      MISS GOODWILLIE. What? Don’t you know that your scheme has succeeded. He wants to marry you.

      LUCY. It is your scheme that has succeeded — your scheme to make me unworthy of him. Yes, I am an adventuress now. But don’t forget that it is you who have made me one.

      MISS GOODWILLIE. How?

      LUCY. I have known for quite a long time that a word from me would open his eyes to what you were so anxious he should never see, but I would not speak it. It is true that he knows he loves me now, but only as the result of a shameless trick I played on him.

      MISS GOODWILLIE. I have heard all about that, but I admit I don’t quite see why you should tell me. (Suspicious) I suppose it is because you guessed I knew already.

      LUCY. Go on thinking the worst of me. It doesn’t matter now. I have degraded myself, and I am going away.

      MISS GOODWILLIE (on her guard). Is this true?

      LUCY. My box is packed and I leave for London tonight.

      MISS GOODWILLIE. Without seeing my brother?

      LUCY. I should prefer that.

      MISS GOODWILLIE. With no explanations? He would follow you by the next train.

      LUCY. You can tell him what I did. That will cure him.

      MISS GOODWILLIE (who secretly does not believe that it would cure him). How do I know that he will not follow you still?

      LUCY (eagerly). You think he might forgive me?

      MISS GOODWILLIE (dissembling). Never!

      LUCY. No, no! He has such a scorn of guile. He has said to me that guile is the one thing in a woman that he would never overlook.

      MISS GOODWILLIE. And it is true. He is coming.

      LUCY. Let me go.

      MISS GOODWILLIE (cunningly). Stop! There is a better way. He need not despise you.

      LUCY (eagerly). Oh!

      MISS GOODWILLIE. I need tell him nothing. It will be sufficient if you simply say to him that you don’t love him.

      LUCY. Don’t love him! How could he look at me and believe the words?

      MISS GOODWILLIE. It would be best for him, Miss White.

      LUCY. Very well.

      (Enter professor.)

      PROFESSOR. Agnes, you have not seen Miss Lucy?

      MISS GOODWILLIE. Yes. (Indicating her.)

      PROFESSOR. Miss Lucy? I see Agnes has been speaking to you about me. There is no hope for me, Agnes?

      MISS GOODWILLIE. It is for her to say, Tom. Is there any hope for him, Miss White?

      LUCY. No!

      PROFESSOR. You could not — perhaps — in time —

      MISS GOODWILLIE. Could you, Miss White?

      LUCY. No!

      (agnes goes to tom to console him.)

      PROFESSOR. Not now, dear. (To lucy) I — I — how could I have been so presumptuous? Forgive me, Miss Lucy.

      (professor goes into house.)

      MISS GOODWILLIE. You have done well. (Rather hard still)

      And now there is nothing further to keep you here.

      LUCY (looking round sadly). No, it’s all over — (Pathetically) I did not tell him I was going away.

      MISS GOODWILLIE. It is not necessary now. I will tell him and he will understand. Goodbye.

      (lucy hesitates.)

      LUCY. I have hurt him so. Why shouldn’t I tell him what I did and let him decide. Perhaps he — (She makes a movement after him and hesitates.)

      MISS GOODWILLIE (coldly, though knowing this may ruin her plans). Very well, go in and tell him — but I should have thought it was best to leave him thinking well of you.

      LUCY. I will go. You are very hard.

      MISS GOODWILLIE. Yes, I am hard. Goodbye, Miss White. I wish you well.

      (miss goodwillie goes into house, lucy meets henders, who enters with a letter, a lantern, and a wheelbarrow.)

      LUCY. Henders, I am going to London by tonight’s mail. Will you take my box to the station?

      HENDERS. I will — I’ll take it on my barrow. Are you leaving for good, Miss?

      LUCY. Yes — for good.

      HENDERS. Miss Lucy, bide a wee — here’s a queer sort of a letter. I wonder if you could make head or tail of it?

      LUCY. You want me to read it?

      HENDERS. Ay.

      (lucy sits down at gate and reads letter, puzzled.)

      LUCY. I don’t understand. Whose letter is this?

      HENDERS. That’s the query. I found it.

      LUCY. In this envelope?

      HENDERS. No! That’s a clean envelope I put it in; the real envelope was all tattered.

      LUCY. But there was an address on it?

      HENDERS. No, the writing was faded off it.

      LUCY. I can’t guess who it is for. Have you read it?

      HENDERS. Just the little words.

      LUCY. It begins: ‘My beloved one,’ and ends ‘Yours till death, Bob.’ HENDERS. Ay, ay — that sounds like swearing.

      LUCY. Listen! (Reads) ‘My Beloved One! At last, at last I am able to ask you the question I had no right to ask while I was a penniless man. But you always knew that you were all the world to me, and that I came out here to try to make a home that you could share. It has been a long struggle, but I have conquered, and so I can ask you: will you be my wife?’ HENDERS. Can it be somebody after Effie?

      LUCY. There is a good deal more, and then it ends: ‘It may be that I am too late. If so, dear Agnes, do not answer this and I will understand. But God grant that I am in time. Yours till death, Bob.’ HENDERS. Agnes — Bob! (Heavily) It sounds to me as if it was some man, name of Bob, writing to a woman, name of Agnes.

      LUCY. ‘P.S. — Address me