Fifty Contemporary One-Act Plays Part 198

COUNTY ATTORNEY. By the way, has anything been moved? Are things just as you left them yesterday?

SHERIFF [_looking about_]. It's just the same. When it dropped below zero last night I thought I'd better send Frank out this morning to make a fire for us--no use getting pneumonia with a big case on, but I told him not to touch anything except the stove--and you know Frank.

COUNTY ATTORNEY. Somebody should have been left here yesterday.

SHERIFF. Oh--yesterday. When I had to send Frank to Morris Center for that man who went crazy--I want you to know I had my hands full yesterday. I knew you could get back from Omaha by to-day and as long as I went over everything here myself--

COUNTY ATTORNEY. Well, Mr. Hale, tell just what happened when you came here yesterday morning.

HALE. Harry and I had started to town with a load of potatoes. We came along the road from my place and as I got here I said, "I'm going to see if I can't get John Wright to go in with me on a party telephone." I spoke to Wright about it once before and he put me off, saying folks talked too much anyway, and all he asked was peace and quiet--I guess you know about how much he talked himself; but I thought maybe if I went to the house and talked about it before his wife, though I said to Harry that I didn't know as what his wife wanted made much difference to John--

COUNTY ATTORNEY. Let's talk about that later, Mr. Hale. I do want to talk about that, but tell now just what happened when you got to the house.

HALE. I didn't hear or see anything; I knocked at the door, and still it was all quiet inside. I knew they must be up, it was past eight o'clock.

So I knocked again, and I thought I heard somebody say "Come in." I wasn't sure, I'm not sure yet, but I opened the door--this door [_indicating the door by which the two women are still standing_] and there in that rocker--[_pointing to it_] sat Mrs. Wright.

[_They all look at the rocker._]

COUNTY ATTORNEY. What--was she doing?

HALE. She was rockin' back and forth. She had her ap.r.o.n in her hand and was kind of--pleating it.

COUNTY ATTORNEY. And how did she--look?

HALE. Well, she looked queer.

COUNTY ATTORNEY. How do you mean--queer?

HALE. Well, as if she didn't know what she was going to do next. And kind of done up.

COUNTY ATTORNEY. How did she seem to feel about your coming?

HALE. Why, I don't think she minded--one way or other. She didn't pay much attention. I said, "How do, Mrs. Wright, it's cold, ain't it?" And she said "Is it?"--and went on kind of pleating at her ap.r.o.n. Well, I was surprised; she didn't ask me to come up to the stove, or to set down, but just sat there, not even looking at me, so I said, "I want to see John." And then she--laughed. I guess you would call it a laugh. I thought of Harry and the team outside, so I said a little sharp: "Can't I see John?" "No," she says, kind o' dull like. "Ain't he home?" says I.

"Yes," says she, "he's home." "Then why can't I see him?" I asked her, out of patience. "'Cause he's dead," says she. "_Dead_?" says I. She just nodded her head, not getting a bit excited, but rockin' back and forth. "Why--where is he?" says I, not knowing what to say. She just pointed upstairs--like that [_himself pointing to the room above_]. I got up, with the idea of going up there. I walked from there to here--then I says, "Why, what did he die of?" "He died of a rope round his neck," says she, and just went on pleatin' at her ap.r.o.n. Well, I went out and called Harry. I thought I might--need help. We went upstairs and there he was lyin'----

COUNTY ATTORNEY. I think I'd rather have you go into that upstairs, where you can point it all out. Just go on now with the rest of the story.

HALE. Well, my first thought was to get that rope off. It looked....

[_Stops, his face twitches._] ... but Harry, he went up to him, and he said, "No, he's dead all right, and we'd better not touch anything." So we went back down stairs. She was still sitting that same way. "Has anybody been notified?" I asked. "No," says he, unconcerned. "Who did this, Mrs. Wright?" said Harry. He said it business-like--and she stopped pleatin' of her ap.r.o.n. "I don't know," she says. "You don't _know_?" says Harry. "No," says she. "Weren't you sleepin' in the bed with him?" says Harry. "Yes," says she, "but I was on the inside."

"Somebody slipped a rope round his neck and strangled him and you didn't wake up?" says Harry. "I didn't wake up," she said after him. We must 'a looked as if we didn't see how that could be, for after a minute she said, "I sleep sound." Harry was going to ask her more questions, but I said maybe we ought to let her tell her story first to the coroner, or the sheriff, so Harry went fast as he could to Rivers' place, where there's a telephone.

COUNTY ATTORNEY. And what did Mrs. Wright do when she knew that you had gone for the coroner?

HALE. She moved from that chair to this over here.... [_Pointing to a small chair in the corner._] ... and just sat there with her hands held together and looking down. I got a feeling that I ought to make some conversation, so I said I had come in to see if John wanted to put in a telephone, and at that she started to laugh, and then she stopped and looked at me--scared. [_The County Attorney, who has had his notebook out, makes a note._] I dunno, maybe it wasn't scared. I wouldn't like to say it was. Soon Harry got back, and then Dr. Lloyd came, and you, Mr.

Peters, and so I guess that's all I know that you don't.

COUNTY ATTORNEY [_looking around_]. I guess we'll go upstairs first--and then out to the barn and around there. [_To the Sheriff._] You're convinced that there was nothing important here--nothing that would point to any motive?

SHERIFF. Nothing here but kitchen things.

[_The County Attorney, after again looking around the kitchen, opens the door of a cupboard closet. He gets up on a chair and looks on a shelf. Pulls his hand away, sticky._]

COUNTY ATTORNEY. Here's a nice mess.

[_The women draw nearer._]

MRS. PETERS [_to the other woman_]. Oh, her fruit; it did freeze. [_To the Lawyer._] She worried about that when it turned so cold. She said the fire'd go out and her jars would break.

SHERIFF. Well, can you beat the women! Held for murder and worryin'

about her preserves.

COUNTY ATTORNEY. I guess before we're through she may have something more serious than preserves to worry about.

HALE. Well, women are used to worrying over trifles.

[_The two women move a little closer together._]

COUNTY ATTORNEY [_with the gallantry of a young politician_]. And yet, for all their worries, what would we do without the ladies? [_The women do not unbend. He goes to the sink, takes a dipperful of water from the pail and pouring it into a basin, washes his hands. Starts to wipe them on the roller-towel, turns it for a cleaner place._] Dirty towels!

[_Kicks his foot against the pans under the sink._] Not much of a housekeeper, would you say, ladies?

MRS. HALE [_stiffly_]. There's a great deal of work to be done on a farm.

COUNTY ATTORNEY. To be sure. And yet.... [_With a little bow to her._] ... I know there are some d.i.c.kson county farmhouses which do not have such roller towels.

[_He gives it a pull to expose its full length again._]

MRS. HALE. Those towels get dirty awful quick. Men's hands aren't always as clean as they might be.

COUNTY ATTORNEY. Ah, loyal to your s.e.x, I see. But you and Mrs. Wright were neighbors. I suppose you were friends, too.

MRS. HALE [_shaking her head_]. I've not seen much of her of late years.

I've not been in this house--it's more than a year.

COUNTY ATTORNEY. And why was that? You didn't like her?

MRS. HALE. I liked her all well enough. Farmers' wives have their hands full, Mr. Henderson. And then--

COUNTY ATTORNEY. Yes--?

MRS. HALE [_looking about_]. It never seemed a very cheerful place.

COUNTY ATTORNEY. No--it's not cheerful. I shouldn't say she had the homemaking instinct.

MRS. HALE. Well, I don't know as Wright had, either.

COUNTY ATTORNEY. You mean that they didn't get on very well?

MRS. HALE. No, I don't mean anything. But I don't think a place'd be any cheerful for John Wright's being in it.