Play With a Tiger and Other Plays. Doris Lessing
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Название: Play With a Tiger and Other Plays

Автор: Doris Lessing

Издательство: HarperCollins

Жанр: Книги о войне

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isbn: 9780007498307

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СКАЧАТЬ Well, there’s no need to be so stuffy about it Tom –

      [A bell rings downstairs.]

      MARY: Was that the bell? Are you expecting someone, Anna?

      TOM: Of course she’s expecting someone.

      ANNA: No.

      MARY [who hasn’t heard]: Who are you expecting?

      ANNA: Nobody.

      MARY: Well, I’ll go for you, I have to go down anyway. Are you in or out, Anna?

      ANNA: I’m out.

      MARY: It’s often difficult to say, whether you are in or out, because after all, one never knows who it might be.

      ANNA [patiently]: Mary, I really don’t mind answering my bell you know.

      MARY [hastily going to the door]: Sometimes I’m running up and down the stairs half the day, answering Anna’s bell. [as she goes out and shuts the door] Pussy, pussy, where are you puss, puss, puss.

      TOM: She’s deteriorating fast, isn’t she? [ANNA patiently says nothing] That’s what you’re going to be like in ten years’ time if you’re not careful.

      ANNA: I’d rather be like Mary in ten years’ time than what you’re going to be like when you’re all settled down and respectable.

      TOM: A self-pitying old bore.

      ANNA: She is also a kind warm-hearted woman with endless time for people in trouble … Tom, you’re late, the boss waits, and you can’t afford to offend him.

      TOM: I remember Mary, and not so long ago either – she was quite a dish, wasn’t she? If I were you I’d be scared stiff.

      ANNA: Sometimes I am scared stiff. [seriously] Tom, her son’s getting married next week.

      TOM: Oh, so that’s it.

      ANNA: No, that’s not it. She’s very pleased he’s getting married.

      And she’s given them half the money she’s saved – not that there’s much of it. You surely must see it’s going to make quite a difference to her, her son getting married?

      TOM: Well he was bound to get married some time.

      ANNA: Yes he was bound to get married, time marches on, every dog must have its day, one generation makes way for another, today’s kittens are tomorrow’s cats, life’s like that.

      TOM: I don’t know why it is, most people think I’m quite a harmless sort of man. After ten minutes with you I feel I ought to crawl into the nearest worm-hole and die.

      ANNA: We’re just conforming to the well-known rule that when an affair ends, the amount of violence and unpleasantness is in direct ratio to its heat.

      [Loud laughter and voices outside – HARRY and MARY.]

      TOM: I thought you said you were out. Mary really is quite impossible.

      ANNA: It’s Harry who’s impossible. He always takes it for granted one doesn’t mean him.

      TOM [angry]: And perhaps one doesn’t.

      ANNA: Perhaps one doesn’t.

      TOM: Anna! Do let’s try and be a bit more …

      ANNA: Civilized? Is that the word you’re looking for?

      [HARRY and MARY come in.]

      HARRY [as he kisses ANNA]: Civilized, she says. There’s our Anna. I knew I’d come in and she’d be saying civilized. [coolly, to TOM] Oh, hullo.

      TOM [coolly]: Well, Harry.

      MARY [who has been flirted by HARRY into an over-responsive state]:

      Oh, Harry, you are funny sometimes. [she laughs] It’s not what you say, when you come to think of it, it’s the way you say it.

      HARRY: Surely, it’s what I say as well?

      ANNA: Harry, I’m not in. I told Mary, I don’t want to see anybody.

      HARRY: Don’t be silly, darling, of course you do. You don’t want to see anybody, but you want to see me.

      TOM [huffy]: Anna and I were talking.

      HARRY: Of course you are, you clots. And it’s high time you stopped. Look at you both. And now we should all have a drink.

      TOM: Oh damn. You and Mary go and have a drink.

      HARRY: That’s not the way at all. Anna will come to the pub with me and weep on my shoulder, and Tom will stay and weep on Mary’s.

      TOM [rallying into his smooth sarcasm]: Harry, I yield to no one in my admiration of your tact but I really must say …

      HARRY: Don’t be silly. I got a clear picture from Mary here, of you and Anna, snarling and snapping on the verge of tears – it doesn’t do at all. When a thing’s finished it’s finished. I know, for my sins I’m an expert.

      TOM: Forgive me if I make an over-obvious point, but this really isn’t one of the delightful little affairs you specialize in.

      HARRY: Of course it was. You two really aren’t in a position to judge. Now if you weren’t Tom and Anna, you’d take one look at yourselves and laugh your heads off at the idea of your getting married.

      ANNA [she goes to the window and looks down]: Harry, come and see me next week and I’ll probably laugh my head off.

      HARRY: Next week’s no good at all. You won’t need me then, you’ll have recovered.

      TOM [immensely sarcastic]: Surely, Harry, if Anna asks you to leave her flat, the least you can do is to … [ANNA suddenly giggles.]

      HARRY: There, you see? How could you possibly marry such a pompous idiot, Anna. [to TOM, affectionately] Anna can’t possibly marry such an idiot, Tom. Anna doesn’t like well-ordered citizens, like you, anyway.

      MARY: I don’t know how you can say well-ordered. He was just another lame duck until now.

      HARRY: But he’s not a lame duck any more. He’s going to work for Jeffries, and he’ll be administering to the spiritual needs of the women of the nation through the ‘Ladies Own.’

      TOM: I’m only going to be on the business side. I won’t be responsible for the rubbish they – [He stops, annoyed with himself. HARRY and MARY laugh at him.]

      HARRY: There you are, he’s a solid respectable citizen already.

      TOM [to HARRY]: It’s not any worse than the rag you work for is it?

      HARRY [reacts to TOM with a grimace that says touché! and turns to ANNA]: СКАЧАТЬ