Название: The Complete Plays of J. M. Barrie - 30 Titles in One Edition
Автор: Джеймс Барри
Издательство: Bookwire
Жанр: Языкознание
isbn: 9788027224012
isbn:
NANNY. Well, when the Minister was out, Jean used to take favoured parties into the study to see the rose, and they gossiped about wha the lady could be, till Tibbie Birse and Bell Dundas got so curious that they stole the rose — it being of an uncommon kind — and now they ‘re going the round o’ all the gentry’s gardens trying to match it — so as to find out wha she is!
(GAVIN rises; BABBIE looking at him demurely.)
You’ve no finished, sir? You’ve eaten nothing.
GAVIN. Yes, I have made a very good tea, Mrs. Webster. Thank you. (Plays with spinning-wheel.)
NANNY (whispering). Rise up, lassie, he’s finished.
(Abruptly takes the cup out of babbie’s hand.) You winna tell me her name, Mr. Dishart?
GAVIN (looking at her, then at his feet, then at her again, sharply). No! (Sends spinning-wheel going quickly.)
(Exit NANNY sighing, with tray, BABBIE looks approvingly at him. He turns quickly, they catch each other’s eye. He sighs and folds his arms.)
BABBIE (faintly). I think I had better go!
(No answer, GAVIN turns wheel.)
Goodbye.
GAVIN (hoarsely). You should never have come.
BABBIE (indignantly). Oh! Goodbye for ever. (Goes to door.) Unless you apologise I will never speak to you again.
(She waits expectant; rattles door latch. He says nothing.)
Did you apologise?
GAVIN. I did not. (Fiercely turns wheel round.)
BABBIE (nonplussed). Yes, you did — I heard you. (Comes down to him quaintly.) I forgive you, Mr. Gavin Dishart!
GAVIN (meaning first to be angry and then endearingly). Babbie.
BABBIE. What?
(His arms go out lovingly. In alarm he checks himself and breathes heavily like one who has had a narrow escape.)
GAVIN. YOU ARE EVERYTHING A WOMAN OUGHT NOT TO BE.
(BABBIE hangs more and more limp with each charge he brings against her.)
As a minister I despise you for your want of seriousness; you are no respecter of the proprieties. That humility in the presence of your superiors, which so well becomes a maiden, is totally and lamentably lacking in you. Everything about you is wrong —
(She looks up.)
Your very hair infuriates me —
(She holds her hair.)
As a wife — a wife! Can any sane man conceive you as a wife!
(Goes down a step.)
BABBIE (looking up suddenly). You are not proposing to me, are you?
GAVIN. Heaven forbid! Then why is it —
BABBIE. Why is what?
GAVIN. I don’t know. But you — you — your hair — your eyes — (His arm rises admonishingly.)
(Enter nanny.)
NANNY (gleefully). Eh, but she’s catching it now.
GAVIN. Go away! Go away!
NANNY. Lassie, you ‘re to catch it now!
(NANNY goes off rubbing her hands gleefully.)
GAVIN (intensely). Babbie, I never kissed a woman before.
BABBIE. Before what?
(He is startled. He goes for his hat on loom, then turns to her.)
GAVIN. Are you never serious?
BABBIE. Yes.
GAVIN. When?
BABBIE (lugubriously, and in a sort of solemn burlesque). When I — when I think of how I am going to end. I have read my future, Mr. Dishart, and it is not to be a glorious one. (Sits in armchair.) This flibberty-gibbet of a Babbie is to get her licks in the end. (Reading her hand) I see him — I see my husband!
GAVIN (going to her, eagerly). You won’t care for him?
BABBIE (examining her hand). Will I — or won’t I? This line — but that line — no, I don’t believe I will.
GAVIN. Then why?
BABBIE (half serious for the first time). I suppose just for the fun of the thing. Haven’t you seen that I do everything for fun? It tosses me in the air; I am just a bubble. Some day, foof! — (making the action of blowing) — and I shall be blown out.
GAVIN (ardently). A soldier is not the right man for you.
BABBIE. The right man for me! I see him!
GAVIN. Tell me, woman!
BABBIE. He is everything I am not, and nothing that I am.
GAVIN (seeing himself in this). Yes, yes.
BABBIE. He must be a man — not a bubble —
GAVIN. No!
BABBIE. One who takes the world by the throat —
GAVIN. All ministers do.
(They are not looking at each other.)
BABBIE. A man who has a mind of his own, and having once made it up, stands to it in defiance of everyone.
GAVIN. Thomas Whamond.
BABBIE. If I love him it must be because he has shown me what love is. If I have a soul, he has got to find it for me. He must compel me somehow to think — he must be my master —
GAVIN (carried away). Your master! (Going close to her)
Babbie, I am that man!
(The awfulness of what he has said strikes them both; they stare at each other aghast, GAVIN seizes his hat and rushes in horror from the room.)
SCENE II
The Manse Garden: It is early evening, some days later.
(As curtain rises JEAN is taking down towels from line. She exits with basket in one arm, apron in other, and pin in mouth. Nothing is now left of the washing except rope. While this is going on, GAVIN is seen passing and repassing window (whose blind is not drawn). He is walking up and down room composing, muttering to himself, etc. Once he stands looking out at СКАЧАТЬ