60 Plays: The George Bernard Shaw Edition (Illustrated). GEORGE BERNARD SHAW

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СКАЧАТЬ A room in the Warren Lodge

      Lydia at her writing table

      LYDIA. O Past and Present, how ye do conflict

       As here I sit writing my father’s life!

       The autumn woodland woos me from without

       With whispering of leaves and dainty airs

       To leave this fruitless haunting of the past.

       My father was a very learnéd man.

       I sometimes think I shall oldmaided be

       Ere I unlearn the things he taught to me.

      Enter Policeman

      POLICEMAN. Asking your ladyship to pardon me

       For this intrusion, might I be so bold

       As ask a question of your people here

       Concerning the Queen’s peace?

      LYDIA. My people here

       Are but a footman and a simple maid;

       And both have craved a holiday to join

       Some local festival. But, sir, your helmet

       Proclaims the Metropolitan Police.

      POLICEMAN. Madam, it does; and I may now inform you

       That what you term a local festival

       Is a most hideous outrage ‘gainst the law,

       Which we to quell from London have come down:

       In short, a prizefight. My sole purpose here

       Is to inquire whether your ladyship

       Any bad characters this afternoon

       Has noted in the neighborhood.

      LYDIA. No, none, sir.

       I had not let my maid go forth to-day

       Thought I the roads unsafe.

      POLICEMAN. Fear nothing, madam:

       The force protects the fair. My mission here

       Is to wreak ultion for the broken law.

       I wish your ladyship good afternoon.

      LYDIA. Good afternoon. [Exit Policeman.

       A prizefight! O my heart!

       Cashel: hast thou deceived me? Can it be

       Thou hast backslidden to the hateful calling

       I asked thee to eschew?

       O wretched maid,

       Why didst thou flee from London to this place

       To write thy father’s life, whenas in town

       Thou might’st have kept a guardian eye on him —

       What’s that? A flying footstep —

      Enter Cashel

      CASHEL. Sanctuary!

       The law is on my track. What! Lydia here!

      LYDIA. Ay: Lydia here. Hast thou done murder, then,

       That in so horrible a guise thou comest?

      CASHEL. Murder! I would I had. Yon cannibal

       Hath forty thousand lives; and I have ta’en

       But thousands thirty-nine. I tell thee, Lydia,

       On the impenetrable sarcolobe

       That holds his seedling brain these fists have pounded

       By Shrewsb’ry clock an hour. This bruiséd grass

       And cakéd mud adhering to my form

       I have acquired in rolling on the sod

       Clinched in his grip. This scanty reefer coat

       For decency snatched up as fast I fled

       When the police arrived, belongs to Mellish.

       ’Tis all too short; hence my display of rib

       And forearm mother-naked. Be not wroth

       Because I seem to wink at you: by Heaven,

       ’Twas Paradise that plugged me in the eye

       Which I perforce keep closing. Pity me,

       My training wasted and my blows unpaid,

       Sans stakes, sans victory, sans everything

       I had hoped to win. Oh, I could sit me down

       And weep for bitterness.

      LYDIA. Thou wretch, begone.

      CASHEL. Begone!

      LYDIA. I say begone. Oh, tiger’s heart

       Wrapped in a young man’s hide, canst thou not live

       In love with Nature and at peace with Man?

       Must thou, although thy hands were never made

       To blacken others’ eyes, still batter at

       The image of Divinity? I loathe thee.

       Hence from my house and never see me more.

      CASHEL. I go. The meanest lad on thy estate

       Would not betray me thus. But ’tis no matter. [He opens the door.

       Ha! the police. I’m lost. [He shuts the door again.

       Now shalt thou see

       My last fight fought. Exhausted as I am,

       To capture me will cost the coppers dear.

       Come one, come all!

      LYDIA. Oh, hide thee, I implore:

       I cannot see thee hunted down like this.

       There is my room. Conceal thyself therein.

       Quick, I command. [He goes into the room.

       With horror I foresee,

       Lydia, that never lied, must lie for thee.

      Enter Policeman, with Paradise and Mellish in

       custody, Bashville, constables, and others

      POLICEMAN. СКАЧАТЬ