Читать книгу The Princess Casamassima - Frank J. Morlock - Страница 5

ACT I

Scene 1. Pinnie’s Millinery shop.

It is a poor seamstress’s shop in a London slum about 1885. Pinnie is a middle-aged woman, very thin, and possessed of a wiry, puritanical energy. Pinnie is puzzled by the appearance of the fashionably dressed, blowsy Millicent Henning. Indeed old Pinnie is in a state of partial shock, not knowing whether to admit the girl or not, or what she can possibly want of her.

Milly

Well, you’ll have to guess my name before I tell you. Won’t you let me in? I don’t want to order anything, I only came to inquire after your ’ealth. Now, tell me, how’s old Hyacinth? I should like so much to see him.

Pinnie

Old Hyacinth?

Milly

Perhaps you call him Mr. Robinson today—you always wanted him to hold himself so high. But to his face I’ll call him the way I always did, you wait and see.

Pinnie

Bless my soul, you must be that awful little ’Enning girl!

Milly (indignant)

Well! I’m glad you finally recognized me. I suppose I was awful. (brightly) But, I ain’t so bad now, hey? I has a call to make in these parts, and it came into my ’ead to look you up. I don’t forget old friends.

Pinnie

You’ve improved as I couldn’t have believed.

Milly

Well—you haven’t changed. You were always calling me something ’orrid.

Pinnie

I daresay it doesn’t matter to you now, does it?

Milly

Oh, I’m all right now.

Pinnie

You were a pretty child— I never said contrary to that. But I had no idea you’d turn out like this. You’re too tall for a woman.

Milly

Well, I enjoy beautiful ’ealth. Everyone thinks I’m at least twenty-two.

Pinnie

But how did you get so splendid?

Milly

Laws! Just luck. I got work as a shop girl in a fashionable store and now they use me as a model. We have to be beautifully dressed—I love to look nice.

Pinnie

And how are your parents?

Milly

Gone to ’Ell, I’m afraid. They drifted off years ago, and I’m on my own.

Pinnie (suspiciously)

You haven’t come here to see me.

Milly

I’m glad to see you. I told you I came to ask after my sweetheart. Wot’s become of him?

Pinnie

He’s an apprentice bookbinder.

Milly

In bookbinding? Laws! Do you mean he works? Well, I always knew he would have something to do with books. But, I didn’t think he would ever follow a trade.

Pinnie

A trade? Mr. Robinson considers it one of the fine arts.

Milly

Very likely it’s good work. Better than this, no doubt.

Pinnie (crossly)

I haven’t so much work as I used to have, if that’s what you mean. My eyes aren’t so good and neither is my health these days.

Milly

You need some new ideas about fashion. You need someone to help you. I can see you’re using the same old styles as ever.

Pinnie

I’ve had helpers in the past. None of them turned out any good.

Milly

Maybe I can get you some business—you always did excellent sewing—but, you ain’t got no sense of fashion. I’ll bring the patterns.

Pinnie (some sense of Pinnie’s poverty can be gained from the fact that she would like to reject such help out of hand but swallows her pride and says quietly)

That would be very kind.

Milly

Mind you give my love to Hyacinth. I don’t care if you know that the only reason I stopped was in hope of seeing him again. There’s no shame in wanting to see my childhood sweetheart. Do give him my best love, and tell him I hope he’ll come and see me. I can see you won’t tell him anything. What are you afraid of? I won’t hurt your precious Hyacinth. I’ll leave my card for him all the same. (extracting a visiting card from her purse)

Pinnie (amazed at the little Henning girl’s social standing without being in any way delighted by it)

My word!

Milly

What do you think I want to do with him? I could swallow him in one bite.

Pinnie

You needn’t think I shall put myself out to keep him in the dark. I shall certainly tell him you’ve been here, and exactly how you strike me.

Milly

Of course, you’ll say something nasty like you used to when I was a child. You used to let me ’ave it then, you know.

Pinnie

Ah, well, you’re very different now, when I think what you’ve come from.

Milly

What I’ve come from? Just because you’re stuck in this slum, don’t expect me to stay ’ere! You’ve had to stay in it yourself, so you might speak civilly of it! And pray, what have you come from yourself, and what has he come from? The mysterious Mr. Hyacinth Robinson, whose father was Lord Fredrick and whose mother was—

Pinnie (jumping up)

I’ve nothing to tell you. Leave my shop!

(Hyacinth Robinson, a finely built, young man of about twenty enters unseen by Pinnie, but visible to Millicent.)

Milly

Gracious, Hyacinth Robinson—is that you?

(Pinnie turns around, then immediately, crestfallen, goes to her sewing desk.)

Hyacinth

Were you talking about me just now?

Milly

When I asked where you ‘ad come from? (innocently) That was because we heard you in the ‘all. I suppose you’ve come from your work.

Hyacinth

You used to live in the Place—you were the girl that always wanted to kiss me. Didn’t she live in Lomax Place, Pinnie?

Milly

Do you know what you look like—you look for all the world like a plastered up Frenchman! Don’t he look like a funny little Frenchie, Mrs. Pysnet?

Hyacinth

Have you come back to live in the Place?

Milly

Heaven forbid, that I should ever do that! I must live near the establishment in which I am employed.

Hyacinth

And what establishment is that now? Is it the Cock and Bull, or the Elephant and Castle?

Milly

A pub? Well, you haven’t got the manners of a Frenchie.

Pinnie (under her breath)

Whorehouse more likely!

Milly

I don’t care what a man looks like so long as he knows a lot. That’s the look I like.

Pinnie

Miss ’Enning wouldn’t live in Lomax Place for the world. She thinks it too low.

Hyacinth

So it is, it’s a beastly hole.

Milly

Right you are!

Hyacinth

Don’t you think I know something?

Milly

You? Oh, I don’t care a straw what you know!

Pinnie

I think you had better shut the door.

Hyacinth

Did you come here on purpose to see us?

Milly

I thought I’d just give it a look. I had an engagement not far off. But I wouldn’t have believed anyone who said I’d find you just where I left you.

Pinnie (sourly)

We needed you to look after us!

Hyacinth

Oh, you’re such a success.

Milly

None of your rattling impudence. I’m as good a girl as there is in London. If you were to offer to see me home, I’d tell you I don’t knock about that way with gentlemen.

Hyacinth

I’ll go with you as far as you like.

Milly

Well—all right—but it’s only because I knew you as a baby.

Hyacinth

Pinnie, let’s have some tea.

(Pinnie, mortified, obeys and goes out to get the tea.)

Milly

What a way to treat your mother. Oh—I forgot she ain’t your mother. How stupid I am! I keep forgetting.

Hyacinth

My mother died many years ago; she was an invalid. But Pinnie has been very good to me.

Milly

My mother’s dead, too. She died very suddenly. I daresay you remember her in the Place. But I’ve had no Pinnie.

Hyacinth

You look as if you can take care of yourself.

Milly

Well, I’m very healthy. What became of Mr. Vetch? We used to say that if Miss Pysnet was your mama, Mr. Vetch was your papa. We used to call him Miss Pysnet’s young man.

Hyacinth

He’s her young man still. He’s our best friend. He lives by his fiddle—as he used to. In fact, he got me the place I’m now in.

Milly

I should have thought he would get you a place at his theatre.

Hyacinth

At his theatre? But, I’d be no use in the theatre. I don’t play any instrument.

Milly

I don’t mean in the orchestra, you baby. You’d look very nice in a fancy costume. Is Miss Pysnet some relation? What gave her any rights over you?

Hyacinth (uneasily)

Miss Pysnet’s an old friend of the family. My mother was very fond of her and she was fond of my mother. Mr. Vetch has changed his lodgings: he moved out of Seventeen three years ago. He couldn’t stand the other people in the house. There was a man who played the accordion.

Milly (reproachfully)

He might have put you into something better than a bookbinder’s.

Hyacinth

He wasn’t obliged to put me into anything. After all, he’s not even a relation of Pinnie’s. And he has trouble enough supporting himself. I think he never married Pinnie—assuming he could persuade her—because he has no money.

(Pinnie returns with the teapot and servings. After placing everything on the table, she stalks out.)

Milly

Friendly, ain’t she?

Hyacinth

She’s very protective of me. She’s always afraid I’ll marry beneath me.

Milly

All the same, I didn’t expect to find you in a bookbinder’s.

Hyacinth

Where would you have looked to find me? Pity you couldn’t have told me in advance, I’d have endeavored to meet your expectations.

Milly

Do you know what they used to say in the Place? They say your father was a Lord. A real English Lord.

Hyacinth

Very likely. That’s the kind of gossip they spread in that precious hole.

Milly

Well, perhaps he was.

Hyacinth

He might have been Prime Minister for all the good it has done me.

Milly

Fancy, your talking as if you didn’t know!

Hyacinth (politely, but savagely)

Finish your tea. Don’t mind how I talk.

Milly

Well, you ’ave got a temper. I should’ve thought you’d be a clerk to a lawyer, or at a bank.

Hyacinth

Do they select them for their tempers?

Milly

You know what I mean. You used to be so clever. I never thought you’d follow a trade.

Hyacinth

I’m not clever enough to live on air.

Milly

You might be, really, for all the tea you drink! Why didn’t you go in for some profession?

Hyacinth (bitterly)

How was I to go in? Who the devil was to help me?

Milly

Haven’t you got a connection?

Hyacinth

Are you trying to trick me into boasting of my aristocratic connections? Sorry, I don’t have any.

Milly

Well, I’m sorry you’re only a journeyman.

Hyacinth

So am I! But the art of bookbinding is an exquisite art, I’ll say that. Even if it doesn’t pay well.

Milly

So Pinnie told me! Have you got some samples? I’d like to look at some.

Hyacinth (condescendingly)

You wouldn’t know how good they are.

Milly (irritated)

That’s just the way you used to talk to me years ago in the Place.

Hyacinth

I don’t care about that. I hate all that time.

Milly

If you come to that, so do I! You always used to have your nose in a book. I never thought you’d work with your hands.

Hyacinth

Depend upon it, I won’t do it an hour longer than I have to.

Milly

What will you do then?

Hyacinth

You’ll see someday. I had to do something. I couldn’t go on living off Pinnie. I took what I could get. Thank God I help her a little now.

Milly

You talk like a reg’lar gentleman.

Hyacinth

I’m not. I’m just an obscure little beggar born of a French woman to a supposed English Lord—living in a squalid little corner of London. And so, I’m a bookbinder.

Milly

I didn’t think I could ever fancy anyone in that line.

Hyacinth

Allow me to see you out.

Milly

I should be delighted. (aside) A reg’lar gentleman.

(Exit Milly and Hyacinth out the street door. After a moment, enter Mr. Vetch with Poupin, Madame Poupin, and Paul Muniment.)

Vetch

Pinnie was good enough to let us meet here.

(They close the shutters. Poupin coughs terribly, and is helped by his wife.)

Vetch

Are you all right, my dear Poupin?

Poupin

I’m suffering extremely, but we must all suffer so long as the social question is so abominably, iniquitously neglected.

Madame

Ah yes, the politicians never think of the poor. There are times when I ask myself how long it will go on.

Poupin (passionately)

It will go on till the measure of their infamy is full. Till the day of justice! Till the day the disinherited shake the globe!

Madame

Oh, we always see things continue; we never see them change.

Poupin

We may not see it, but They will see it.

Paul

What do you mean, shake the globe?

Poupin

I mean that force will make the bourgeoisie go down to their cellars and hide—behind their barrels of wine and their heaps of gold.

(Hyacinth quietly reenters; he is expected and the discussion continues without interruption. Someone says “You’re late.”)

Madame

And, in this country, I hope in their coal bins. La, la, we shall find them even there.

Poupin

Eighty-nine was an irresistible force.

Paul

Yes, I know, I know you fought them. But everything is yet to be tried.

Poupin

Oh, the trial will be on a grand scale. Soyez tranquille.

Madame (indicating Hyacinth and Paul)

You ought to present these gentlemen.

Poupin

Monsieur Hyacinth is a gifted child—a child in whom I take a tender interest—a child who has an account to settle. Oh, a thumping big one! Isn’t that so, mon petit?

Hyacinth

Oh, I only want them to leave me alone.

Poupin

He’s very young.

Madame

He’s the person we have seen in this country that we like the best.

Paul

Perhaps he’s French.

Hyacinth

Oh, I’m nothing.

Madame

Do you mean to say you’re not as good as anyone else in this world? I should like to see—!

Paul

We all have an account to settle, don’t you know?

Madame

It is a shame not to take Monsieur Hyacinth in.

Poupin

All in good time, all in good time. Monsieur Hyacinth knows that I count on him, whether I make him an intern today or tomorrow.

Hyacinth

What do you mean “intern”?

Poupin

Do not trifle with state secrets. You are too young.

Madame

One is never too young to do one’s bit.

Paul

Can you keep a secret?

Hyacinth

Is it a plot? A conspiracy?

Poupin

He asks as if he were asking for plum pudding. It’s terribly serious, my child.

Paul

It’s a group of workers to which he (indicating Poupin) and I, and a good many others belong. (Poupin scowls) There’s no harm in telling him that.

Madame

I advise you not to tell it to Miz Pinnie; she’s quite in the old ideas.

Vetch

I quite agree. Pinnie thinks we are merely having a social gathering.

Hyacinth

If you’ve got some plan, something to which one can give one’s self— I think you might tell me.

Poupin

It’s an accident you haven’t met Paul here before.

Madame

How could they have met, when Mr. Paul never comes? He doesn’t spoil us!

Paul (seriously)

Well, you see, I have my little sister at home to take care of. This afternoon, luckily, a lady came to sit with her.

Madame

A lady—a real lady?

Paul

Oh yes, every inch a lady.

Madame

Why do you permit them to thrust themselves in on you, simply because you have the misfortune to be poor? It seems to be the custom in this country—but it wouldn’t suit me, or any other person from France at all. I should like to see one of ces dames, one of the real ones, coming to sit with me.

Paul

Oh, you’re not a cripple. You’ve got the use of your legs, whereas Rosy—

Madame

Yes, and my tongue!

Paul

This lady looks after several others in our tenement—and reads to my sister.

Madame

It would enrage me! You are too patient, you English.

Paul

We need patience. We shall never do anything without that.

Poupin

You’re perfectly right about that. You cannot say it too often. It will be a tremendous job. Only the strong will prevail.

Paul (to Hyacinth)

Madame says we ought to know each other—

Hyacinth

Will you tell me all about your plot?

Paul (warily)

It’s not a plot. I don’t care much for plots. It’s just taking a stand on two or three points.

Poupin

A stand, that’s what we must make—a stand! (he begins coughing terribly)

Madame

Between us, we’ve thrown him into a fever. We’d better go.

Paul (to Hyacinth as the Poupins prepare to leave with Vetch)

My mane is Paul—

Hyacinth

And what’s your trade?

Paul

I work for a firm of wholesale chemists at Lambeth.

Hyacinth

And where do you live?

Paul

On the far side of London. The south actually.

Hyacinth

Are you going home now?

Paul

Yes, I’m going to toddle.

Hyacinth

And may I toddle with you?

Paul

If you like, but you won’t learn about any plots. Still coming?

Hyacinth

Yes.

Paul

Come along. You can meet my sister,—her name’s Rosy. You’ve never met anyone like her.

BLACKOUT