The Atlantic Book of Modern Plays Part 39

FAME (_after another blast on her trumpet_). He writes with a quill. (_Cheers from_ THE CROWD.)

FAME (_going to a cupboard_). Here, what have you got in here?

DE REVES. Oh ... er ... those are my breakfast things.

FAME (_finding a dirty plate_). What have yer had on this one?

DE REVES (_mournfully_). Oh, eggs and bacon.

FAME (_at the window_). He has eggs and bacon for breakfast.

THE CROWD. Hip hip hip _hooray!_ Hip hip hip _hooray!_ Hip hip hip _hooray!_

FAME. Hi, and what's this?

DE REVES (_miserably_). Oh, a golf stick.

FAME. He's a man's man! He's a virile man! He's a manly man!

(_Wild cheers from_ THE CROWD, _this time only from women's voices._)

DE REVES. Oh, this is terrible. This is terrible. This is terrible.

(FAME _gives another peal on her horn. She is about to speak._)

DE REVES (_solemnly and mournfully_). One moment, one moment....

FAME. Well, out with it.

DE REVES. For ten years, divine lady, I have wors.h.i.+pped you, offering all my songs ... I find ... I find I am not worthy....

FAME. Oh, you're all right.

DE REVES. No, no, I am not worthy. It cannot be. It cannot possibly be. Others deserve you more. I must say it! _I cannot possibly love you._ Others are worthy. You will find others.

But I, no, no, no. It cannot be. It cannot be. Oh, pardon me, but it _must_ not.

(_Meanwhile_ FAME _has been lighting one of his cigarettes. She sits in a comfortable chair, leans right back, and puts her feet right up on the table amongst the poet's papers._)

Oh, I fear I offend you. But--it cannot be.

FAME. Oh, that's all right, old bird; no offence. I ain't going to leave you.

DE REVES. But--but--but--I do not understand.

FAME. I've come to stay, I have.

(_She blows a puff of smoke through her trumpet._)

[CURTAIN]

THE CAPTAIN OF THE GATE[1]

Beulah Marie Dix

SCENE: In the cheerless hour before the dawn of a wet spring morning five gentlemen-troopers of the broken Royalist army, f.a.gged and outworn with three long days of siege, are holding, with what strength and courage are left them, the Gatehouse of the Bridge of Cashala, which is the key to the road that leads into Connaught. The upper chamber of the Gatehouse, in which they make their stand, is a narrow, dim-lit apartment, built of stone.

At one side is a small fireplace, and beside it a narrow, barred door, which leads to the stairhead. At the end of the room, gained by a single raised step, are three slit-like windows, breast-high, designed, as now used, for defense in time of war.

The room is meagrely furnished, with a table on which are powder-flask, touch-box, etc., for charging guns, a stool or two, and an open keg of powder. The whole look of the place, bare and martial, but depressed, bespeaks a losing fight. On the hearth the ashes of a fire are white, and on the chimneypiece a brace of candles are guttering out.

The five men who hold the Gatehouse wear much soiled and torn military dress. They are pale, powder-begrimed, sunken-eyed, with every mark of weariness of body and soul. Their leader, JOHN TALBOT, is standing at one of the shot-windows, with piece presented, looking forth. He is in his mid-twenties, of Norman-Irish blood, and distinctly of a finer, more nervous type than his companions. He has been wounded, and bears his left hand wrapped in a b.l.o.o.d.y rag. d.i.c.k FENTON, a typical, careless young English swashbuckler, sits by the table, charging a musket, and singing beneath his breath as he does so. He, too, has been wounded, and bears a bandage about his knee. Upon the floor (_at right_) KIT NEWCOMBE lies in the sleep of utter exhaustion. He is an English lad, in his teens, a mere tired, haggard child, with his head rudely bandaged. On a stool by the hearth sits MYLES BUTLER, a man of JOHN TALBOT'S own years, but a slower, heavier, almost sullen type. Beside him kneels PHELIMY DRISCOLL, a nervous, dark Irish lad, of one and twenty. He is resting his injured arm across BUTLER'S knee, and BUTLER is roughly bandaging the hurt.

For a moment there is a weary, heavy silence, in which the words of the song which FENTON sings are audible. It is the doleful old strain of "the hanging-tune."

[Footnote 1: Included by permission of the author and of Messrs.

Henry Holt and Company, the publishers, from the volume _Allison's Lad and Other Martial Interludes._ (1910).]

FENTON (_singing_).

Fortune, my foe, why dost thou frown on me, And will thy favors never greater be?

Wilt thou, I say, forever breed me pain, And wilt thou not restore my joys again?

BUTLER (_s.h.i.+fting_ DRISCOLL'S _arm, none too tenderly_). More to the light!

DRISCOLL (_catching breath with pain_). Ah! Softly, Myles!

JOHN TALBOT (_leaning forward tensely_). Ah!

FENTON. Jack! Jack Talbot! What is it that you see?

JOHN TALBOT (_with the anger of a man whose nerves are strained almost beyond endurance_). What should I see but Cromwell's watch-fires along the boreen? What else should I see, and the night as black as the mouth of h.e.l.l? What else should I see, and a pest choke your throat with your fool's questions, d.i.c.k Fenton!

(_Resumes his watch._)

FENTON (_as who should say: "I thank you!"_). G.o.d 'a'

mercy--_Captain_ Talbot!

(_Resumes his singing._)

DRISCOLL. G.o.d's love! I bade ye have a care, Myles Butler.

BUTLEK (_tying the last bandage_). It's a stout heart you have in you, Phelimy Driscoll--you to be crying out for a scratch. It's better you would have been, you and the like of you, to be stopping at home with your mother.

(_Rises and takes up his musket from the corner by the fireplace._)

DRISCOLL. You--you dare--you call me--coward? Ye black liar! I'll lesson ye! I'll--