Plays Part 4

BRADFORD: No need for anybody to take it, Capt'n. He was dead when we picked him up.

CAPTAIN: Dannie Sears was dead when we picked him up. But we brought him back. I'll go on awhile.

(The two men who have been bending over the body rise, stretch to relax, and come into the room.)

BRADFORD: (pus.h.i.+ng back his arms and putting his hands on his chest) Work,-tryin to put life in the dead.

CAPTAIN: Where'd you find him, Joe?

BRADFORD: In front of this house. Not forty feet out.

CAPTAIN: What'd you bring him up here for?

(He speaks in an abstracted way, as if the working part of his mind is on something else, and in the m.u.f.fled voice of one bending over.)

BRADFORD: (with a sheepish little laugh) Force of habit, I guess. We brought so many of 'em back up here, (looks around the room) And then it was kind of unfriendly down where he was-the wind spittin' the sea onto you till he'd have no way of knowin' he was ash.o.r.e.

TONY: Lucky I was not sooner or later as I walk by from my watch.

BRADFORD: You have accommodating ways, Tony. No sooner or later. I wouldn't say it of many Portagees. But the sea (calling it in to the CAPTAIN) is friendly as a kitten alongside the women that live here. Allie Mayo-they're both crazy-had that door open (moving his head toward the big sliding door) sweepin' out, and when we come along she backs off and stands lookin' at us, lookin'-Lord, I just wanted to get him somewhere else. So I kicked this door open with my foot (jerking his hand toward the room where the CAPTAIN is seen bending over the man) and got him away. (under his voice) If he did have any notion of comin' back to life, he wouldn't a come if he'd seen her. (more genially) I wouldn't.

CAPTAIN: You know who he is, Joe?

BRADFORD: I never saw him before.

CAPTAIN: Mitch.e.l.l telephoned from High Head that a dory came ash.o.r.e there.

BRADFORD: Last night wasn't the best night for a dory. (to TONY, boastfully) Not that I couldn't 'a' stayed in one. Some men can stay in a dory and some can't. (going to the inner door) That boy's dead, Capt'n.

CAPTAIN: Then I'm not doing him any harm.

BRADFORD: (going over and shaking the frame where the boat once swung) This the first time you ever been in this place, ain't it, Tony?

TONY: I never was here before.

BRADFORD: Well, I was here before. (a laugh) And the old man-(nodding toward the CAPTAIN) he lived here for twenty-seven years. Lord, the things that happened here. There've been dead ones carried through that door. (pointing to the outside door) Lord-the ones I've carried. I carried in Bill Collins, and Lou Harvey and-huh! 'sall over now. You ain't seen no wrecks. Don't ever think you have. I was here the night the Jennie Snow was out there. (pointing to the sea) There was a wreck. We got the boat that stood here (again shaking the frame) down that bank. (goes to the door and looks out) Lord, how'd we ever do it? The sand has put his place on the blink all right. And then when it gets too G.o.d-for-saken for a life-savin' station, a lady takes it for a summer residence-and then spends the winter. She's a cheerful one.

TONY: A woman-she makes things pretty. This not like a place where a woman live. On the floor there is nothing-on the wall there is nothing. Things-(trying to express it with his hands) do not hang on other things.

BRADFORD: (imitating TONY's gesture) No-things do not hang on other things. In my opinion the woman's crazy-sittin' over there on the sand-(a gesture towards the dunes) what's she lookin' at? There ain't nothin' to see. And I know the woman that works for her's crazy-Allie Mayo. She's a Provincetown girl. She was all right once, but-

(MRS PATRICK comes in from the hall at the right. She is a 'city woman', a sophisticated person who has been caught into something as unlike the old life as the dunes are unlike a meadow. At the moment she is excited and angry.)

MRS PATRICK: You have no right here. This isn't the life-saving station any more. Just because it used to be-I don't see why you should think-This is my house! And-I want my house to myself!

CAPTAIN: (putting his head through the door. One arm of the man he is working with is raised, and the hand reaches through the doorway) Well I must say, lady, I would think that any house could be a life-saving station when the sea had sent a man to it.

MRS PATRICK: (who has turned away so she cannot see the hand) I don't want him here! I-(defiant, yet choking) I must have my house to myself!

CAPTAIN: You'll get your house to yourself when I've made up my mind there's no more life in this man. A good many lives have been saved in this house, Mrs Patrick-I believe that's your name-and if there's any chance of bringing one more back from the dead, the fact that you own the house ain't goin' to make a d.a.m.n bit of difference to me!

MRS PATRICK: (in a thin wild way) I must have my house to myself.

CAPTAIN: h.e.l.l with such a woman!

(Moves the man he is working with and slams the door shut. As the CAPTAIN says, 'And if there's any chance of bringing one more back from the dead', ALLIE MAYO has appeared outside the wide door which gives on to the dunes, a bleak woman, who at first seems little more than a part of the sand before which she stands. But as she listens to this conflict one suspects in her that peculiar intensity of twisted things which grow in unfavoring places.)

MRS PATRICK: I-I don't want them here! I must-

(But suddenly she retreats, and is gone.)

BRADFORD: Well, I couldn't say, Allie Mayo, that you work for any too kind-hearted a lady. What's the matter with the woman? Does she want folks to die? Appears to break her all up to see somebody trying to save a life. What d'you work for such a fish for? A crazy fish-that's what I call the woman. I've seen her-day after day-settin' over there where the dunes meet the woods, just sittin' there, lookin'. (suddenly thinking of it) I believe she likes to see the sand slippin' down on the woods. Pleases her to see somethin' gettin' buried, I guess.

(ALLIE MAYO, who has stepped inside the door and moved half across the room, toward the corridor at the right, is arrested by this last-stands a moment as if seeing through something, then slowly on, and out.)

BRADFORD: Some coffee'd taste good. But coffee, in this house? Oh, no. It might make somebody feel better. (opening the door that was slammed shut) Want me now, Capt'n?

CAPTAIN: No.

BRADFORD: Oh, that boy's dead, Capt'n.

CAPTAIN: (snarling) Dannie Sears was dead, too. Shut that door. I don't want to hear that woman's voice again, ever.

(Closing the door and sitting on a bench built into that corner between the big sliding door and the room where the CAPTAIN is.)

BRADFORD: They're a cheerful pair of women-livin' in this cheerful place-a place that life savers had to turn over to the sand-huh! This Patrick woman used to be all right. She and her husband was summer folks over in town. They used to picnic over here on the outside. It was Joe Dyer-he's always talkin' to summer folks-told 'em the government was goin' to build the new station and sell this one by sealed bids. I heard them talkin' about it. They was sittin' right down there on the beach, eatin' their supper. They was goin' to put in a fire-place and they was goin' to paint it bright colors, and have parties over here-summer folk notions. Their bid won it-who'd want it?-a buried house you couldn't move.

TONY: I see no bright colors.

BRADFORD: Don't you? How astonis.h.i.+n'! You must be color blind. And I guess we're the first party. (laughs) I was in Bill Joseph's grocery store, one day last November, when in she comes-Mrs Patrick, from New York. 'I've come to take the old life-saving station', says she. 'I'm going to sleep over there tonight!' Huh! Bill is used to queer ways-he deals with summer folks, but that got him. November-an empty house, a buried house, you might say, off here on the outside sh.o.r.e-way across the sand from man or beast. He got it out of her, not by what she said, but by the way she looked at what he said, that her husband had died, and she was runnin' off to hide herself, I guess. A person'd feel sorry for her if she weren't so stand-offish, and so doggon mean. But mean folks have got minds of their own. She slept here that night. Bill had men hauling things till after dark-bed, stove, coal. And then she wanted somebody to work for her. 'Somebody', says she, 'that doesn't say an unnecessary word!' Well, then Bill come to the back of the store, I said, 'Looks to me as if Allie Mayo was the party she's lookin' for.' Allie Mayo has got a prejudice against words. Or maybe she likes 'em so well she's savin' of 'em. She's not spoke an unnecessary word for twenty years. She's got her reasons. Women whose men go to sea ain't always talkative.

(The CAPTAIN comes out. He closes door behind him and stands there beside it. He looks tired and disappointed. Both look at him. Pause.)

CAPTAIN: Wonder who he was.

BRADFORD: Young. Guess he's not been much at sea.

CAPTAIN: I hate to leave even the dead in this house. But we can get right back for him. (a look around) The old place used to be more friendly. (moves to outer door, hesitates, hating to leave like this) Well, Joe, we brought a good many of them back here.

BRADFORD: Dannie Sears is tendin' bar in Boston now.

(The three men go; as they are going around the drift of sand ALLIE MAYO comes in carrying a pot of coffee; sees them leaving, puts down the coffee pot, looks at the door the CAPTAIN has closed, moves toward it, as if drawn. MRS PATRICK follows her in.)

MRS PATRICK: They've gone?

(MRS MAYO nods, facing the closed door.)

MRS PATRICK: And they're leaving-him? (again the other woman nods) Then he's-? (MRS MAYO just stands there) They have no right-just because it used to be their place-! I want my house to myself!