Contemporary One-Act Plays Part 24

MISS JOYCE. I know of a good lodging, but it is only a very good man would be taken into it.

MRS. DELANE. Sure there could be no objection there to Mr. Halvey. There is no appearance on him but what is good, and the sergeant after taking him up the way he is doing.

MISS JOYCE. You will be near to the sergeant in the lodging I speak of.

The house is convenient to the barracks.

HYACINTH. [_Doubtfully._] To the barracks?

MISS JOYCE. Alongside of it, and the barrack-yard behind. And that's not all. It is opposite to the priest's house.

HYACINTH. Opposite, is it?

MISS JOYCE. A very respectable place, indeed, and a very clean room you will get. I know it well. The curate can see into it from his window.

HYACINTH. Can he now?

FARDY. There was a good many, I am thinking, went into that lodging and left it after.

MISS JOYCE. [_Sharply._] It is a lodging you will never be let into or let stop in, Fardy. If they did go they were a good riddance.

FARDY. John Hart, the plumber, left it----

MISS JOYCE. If he did it was because he dared not pa.s.s the police coming in, as he used, with a rabbit he was after snaring in his hand.

FARDY. The schoolmaster himself left it.

MISS JOYCE. He needn't have left it if he hadn't taken to card-playing.

What way could you say your prayers, and shadows shuffling and dealing before you on the blind?

HYACINTH. I think maybe I'd best look around a bit before I'll settle in a lodging----

MISS JOYCE. Not at all. You won't be wanting to pull down the blind.

MRS. DELANE. It is not likely _you_ will be snaring rabbits.

MISS JOYCE. Or bringing in a bottle and taking an odd gla.s.s the way James Kelly did.

MRS. DELANE. Or writing threatening notices, and the police taking a view of you from the rear.

MISS JOYCE. Or going to roadside dances, or running after good-for-nothing young girls----

HYACINTH. I give you my word I'm not so harmless as you think.

MRS. DELANE. Would you be putting a lie on these, Mr. Halvey? [_Touching testimonials._] I know well the way you will be spending the evenings, writing letters to your relations----

MISS JOYCE. Learning O'Growney's exercises----

MRS. DELANE. Sticking post-cards in an alb.u.m for the convent bazaar.

MISS JOYCE. Reading the "Catholic Young Man"----

MRS. DELANE. Playing the melodies on a melodeon----

MISS JOYCE. Looking at the pictures in the "Lives of the Saints." I'll hurry on and engage the room for you.

HYACINTH. Wait. Wait a minute----

MISS JOYCE. No trouble at all. I told you it was just opposite. [_Goes._

MR. QUIRKE. I suppose I must go up-stairs and ready myself for the meeting. If it wasn't for the contract I have for the soldiers' barracks and the sergeant's good word, I wouldn't go anear it. [_Goes into shop._

MRS. DELANE. I should be making myself ready, too. I must be in good time to see you being made an example of, Mr. Halvey. It is I, myself, was the first to say it; you will be a credit to the town. [_Goes._

HYACINTH. [_In a tone of agony._] I wish I had never seen Cloon.

FARDY. What is on you?

HYACINTH. I wish I had never left Carrow. I wish I had been drowned the first day I thought of it, and I'd be better off.

FARDY. What is it ails you?

HYACINTH. I wouldn't for the best pound ever I had be in this place to-day.

FARDY. I don't know what you are talking about.

HYACINTH. To have left Carrow, if it was a poor place, where I had my comrades, and an odd spree, and a game of cards--and a coursing-match coming on, and I promised a new greyhound from the city of Cork. I'll die in this place, the way I am, I'll be too much closed in.

FARDY. Sure it mightn't be as bad as what you think.

HYACINTH. Will you tell me, I ask you, what way can I undo it?

FARDY. What is it you are wanting to undo?

HYACINTH. Will you tell me what way can I get rid of my character?

FARDY. To get rid of it, is it?

HYACINTH. That is what I said. Aren't you after hearing the great character they are after putting on me?

FARDY. That is a good thing to have.

HYACINTH. It is not. It's the worst in the world. If I hadn't it, I wouldn't be like a prize marigold at a show, with every person praising me.

FARDY. If I had it, I wouldn't be like a head in a barrel, with every person making hits at me.

HYACINTH. If I hadn't it, I wouldn't be shoved into a room with all the clergy watching me and the police in the back yard.

FARDY. If I had it, I wouldn't be but a message-carrier now, and a clapper scaring birds in the summer-time.