Lord Dunsany
[Footnote 1: Reprinted from the Atlantic Monthly for June, 1919, by special permission of Lord Dunsany and the editors of the Atlantic Monthly.]
TIME: February 30th.
HARRY DE REVES.—A Poet.
(This name, though of course of French origin, has become anglicized and is pronounced DE REEVES.)
DICK PRATTLE.—A Lieutenant-Major of the Royal Horse Marines.
(The POET is sitting at a table, writing. Enter DICK PRATTLE.)
PRATTLE. Hullo, Harry.
DE REVES. Hullo, Dick. Good Lord, where are you from?
PRATTLE (casually). The ends of the Earth.
DE REVES. Well, I'm damned!
PRATTLE. Thought I'd drop in and see how you were getting on.
DE REVES. Well, that's splendid. What are you doing in London?
PRATTLE. Well, I wanted to see if I could get one or two decent ties to wear,—you can get nothing out there,—then I thought I'd have a look and see how London was getting on.
DE REVES. Splendid! How's everybody?
PRATTLE. All going strong.
DE REVES. That's good.
PRATTLE. (seeing paper and ink). But what are you doing?
DE REVES. Writing.
PRATTLE. Writing? I didn't know you wrote.
DE REVES. Yes, I've taken to it rather.
PRATTLE. I say—writing's no good. What do you write?
DE REVES. Oh, poetry.
PRATTLE. Poetry? Good Lord!
DE REVES. Yes, that sort of thing, you know.
PRATTLE. Good Lord! Do you make any money by it?
DE REVES. No. Hardly any.
PRATTLE. I say—why don't you chuck it?
DE REVES. Oh, I don't know. Some people seem to like my stuff, rather. That's why I go on.
PRATTLE. I'd chuck it if there's no money in it.
DE REVES. Ah, but then it's hardly in your line, is it? You'd hardly approve of poetry if there was money in it.
PRATTLE. Oh, I don't say that. If I could make as much by poetry as I can by betting I don't say I wouldn't try the poetry touch, only—
DE REVES. Only what?
PRATTLE. Oh, I don't know. Only there seems more sense in betting, somehow.
DE REVES. Well, yes. I suppose it's easier to tell what an earthly horse is going to do, than to tell what Pegasus—
PRATTLE. What's Pegasus?
DE REVES. Oh, the winged horse of poets.
PRATTLE. I say! You don't believe in a winged horse, do you?
DE REVES. In our trade we believe in all fabulous things. They all represent some large truth to turn us. An emblem like Pegasus is as real a thing to a poet as a Derby winner would be to you.
PRATTLE. I say. (Give me a cigarette. Thanks.) What? Then you'd believe in nymphs and fauns, and Pan, and all those kind of birds?
DE REVES. Yes. Yes. In all of them.
PRATTLE. Good Lord!
DE REVES. You believe in the Lord Mayor of London, don't you?
PRATTLE. Yes, of course; but what has—
DE REVES. Four million people or so made him Lord Mayor, didn't they? And he represents to them the wealth and dignity and tradition of—
PRATTLE. Yes; but, I say, what has all this—
DE REVES. Well, he stands for an idea to them, and they made him
Lord Mayor, and so he is one….
PRATTLE. Well, of course he is.
DE REVES. In the same way Pan has been made what he is by millions; by millions to whom he represents world-old traditions.
PRATTLE. (rising from his chair and stepping backwards, laughing and looking at the POET in a kind of assumed wonder). I say…. I say…. You old heathen … but Good Lord….
(He bumps into the high screen behind, pushing it back a little.)
DE REVES. Look out! Look out!
PRATTLE. What? What's the matter?
DE REVES. The screen!
PRATTLE. Oh, sorry, yes. I'll put it right.
(He is about to go round behind it.)
DE REVES. No, don't go round there.
PRATTLE. What? Why not?
DE REVES. Oh, you wouldn't understand.
PRATTLE. Wouldn't understand? Why, what have you got?
DE REVES. Oh, one of those things…. You wouldn't understand.
PRATTLE. Of course I'd understand. Let's have a look. (The POET walks toward PRATTLE and the screen. He protests no further. PRATTLE looks round the corner of the screen.) An altar.
DE REVES. (removing the screen altogether). That is all. What do you make of it?
(An altar of Greek design, shaped like a pedestal, is revealed. Papers litter the floor all about it.)
PRATTLE. I say—you always were an untidy devil.
DE REVES. Well, what do you make of it?
PRATTLE. It reminds me of your room at Eton.
DE REVES. My room at Eton?
PRATTLE. Yes, you always had papers all over your floor.
DE REVES. Oh, yes—
PRATTLE. And what are these?
DE REVES. All these are poems; and this is my altar to Fame.
PRATTLE. To Fame?
DE REVES. The same that Homer knew.
PRATTLE. Good Lord!
DE REVES. Keats never saw her. Shelley died too young. She came late at the best of times, now scarcely ever.
PRATTLE. But, my dear fellow, you don't mean that you think there really is such a person?
DE REVES. I offer all my songs to her.
PRATTLE. But you don't mean you think you could actually see Fame?
DE REVES. We poets personify abstract things, and not poets only but sculptors and painters too. All the great things of the world are those abstract things.
PRATTLE. But what I mean is they're not really there, like you or me.
DE REVES. To us these things are more real than men, they outlive generations, they watch the passing of Kingdoms: we go by them like dust; they are still here, unmoved, unsmiling.
PRATTLE. But, but, you can't think that you could see
Fame, you don't expect to see it.
DE REVES. Not to me. Never to me. She of the golden trumpet and
Greek dress will never appear to me…. We all have our dreams.
PRATTLE. I say—what have you been doing all day?
DE REVES. I? Oh, only writing a sonnet.
PRATTLE. Is it a long one?
DE REVES. Not very.
PRATTLE. About how long is it?
DE REVES. About fourteen lines.
PRATTLE (impressively). I tell you what it is.
DE REVES. Yes?
PRATTLE. I tell you what. You've been overworking yourself. I once got like that on board the Sandhurst, working for the passing-out exam. I got so bad that I could have seen anything.
DE REVES. Seen anything?
PRATTLE. Lord, yes: horned pigs, snakes with wings, anything, one of your winged horses even. They gave me some stuff called bromide for it. You take a rest.
DE REVES. But my dear fellow, you don't understand at all. I merely said that abstract things are to a poet as near and real and visible as one of your bookmakers or barmaids.
PRATTLE. I know. You take a rest.
DE REVES. Well, perhaps I will. I'd come with you to that musical comedy you're going to see, only I'm a bit tired after writing this; it's a tedious job. I'll come another night.
PRATTLE. How do you know I'm going to see a musical comedy?
DE REVES. Well, where would you go? Hamlet's on at the
Lord Chamberlain's. You're not going there.
PBATTLE. Do I look like it?
DE REVES. No.
PRATTLE. Well, you're quite right. I'm going to see "The Girl from Bedlam." So long. I must push off now. It's getting late. You take a rest. Don't add another line to that sonnet; fourteen's quite enough. You take a rest. Don't have any dinner to-night, just rest. I was like that once myself. So long.
DE REVES. So long.
(Exit PRATTLE. DE REVES returns to his table and sits down.)
Good old Dick. He's the same as ever. Lord, how time passes.
(He takes his pen and his sonnet and makes a few alterations.)
Well, that's finished. I can't do any more to it.
(He rises and goes to the screen; he draws back part of it and goes up to the altar. He is about to place his sonnet reverently at the foot of the altar amongst his other verses.)
No, I will not put it there. This one is worthy of the altar.
(He places the sonnet upon the altar itself.)
If that sonnet does not give me Fame, nothing that I have done before will give it to me, nothing that I ever will do.
(He replaces the screen and returns to his chair at the table. Twilight is coming on. He sits with his elbow on the table, his head on his hand, or however the actor pleases.)
Well, well. Fancy seeing Dick again. Well, Dick enjoys his life, so he's no fool. What was that he said? "There's no money in poetry. You'd better chuck it." Ten years' work and what have I to show for it? The admiration of men who care for poetry, and how many of them are there? There's a bigger demand for smoked glasses to look at eclipses of the sun. Why should Fame come to me? Haven't I given up my days for her? That is enough to keep her away. I am a poet; that is enough reason for her to slight me. Proud and aloof and cold as marble, what does Fame care for us? Yes, Dick is right. It's a poor game chasing illusions, hunting the intangible, pursuing dreams. Dreams? Why, we are ourselves dreams. (He leans back in his chair.)
We are such stuff
As dreams are made on, and our little life
Is rounded with a sleep.
(He is silent for a while. Suddenly he lifts his head)
My room at Eton, Dick said. An untidy mess.
(As he lifts his head and says these words, twilight gives place to broad daylight, merely as a hint that the author of the play may have been mistaken, and the whole thing may have been no more than a poet's dream.)
So it was, and it's an untidy mess there (looking at screen) too. Dick's right. I'll tidy it up. I'll burn the whole damned heap. (He advances impetuously toward the screen) Every damned poem that I was ever fool enough to waste my time on.
(He pushes back the screen. FAME in a Greek dress with a long golden trumpet in her hand is seen standing motionless on the altar like a marble goddess.)
So … you have come!
(For a while he stands thunderstruck. Then he approaches the altar.)
Divine fair lady, you have come.
(He holds up his hands to her and leads her down from the altar and into the centre of the stage. At whatever moment the actor finds it most convenient, he repossesses himself of the sonnet that he had placed on the altar. He now offers it to FAME.)
This is my sonnet. Is it well done?
(FAME takes it, reads it in silence, while the POET watches her rapturously.)
FAME. You're a bit of all right.
DE REVES. What?
FAME. Some poet.
DE REVES. I—I—scarcely … understand.
FAME. You're IT.
DE REVES. But … it is not possible … are you she that knew Homer?
FAME. Homer? Lord, yes. Blind old bat, 'e couldn't see a yard.
DE REVES. O Heavens!
(FAME walks beautifully to the window. She opens it and puts her head out.)
FAME (in a voice with which a woman in an upper story would cry for help if the house was well alight). Hi! Hi! Boys! Hi! Say, folks! Hi!
(The murmur of a gathering crowd is heard. FAME blows her trumpet.)
FAME. Hi, he's a poet. (Quickly, over her shoulder.) What's your name?
DE REVES. De Reves.
FAME. His name's de Reves.
DE REVES. Harry de Reves.
FAME. His pals call him Harry.
THE CROWD. Hooray! Hooray! Hooray!
FAME. Say, what's your favourite color?
DE REVES. I … I … I don't quite understand.
FAME. Well, which do you like best, green or blue?
DE REVES. Oh—er—blue. (She blows her trumpet out of the window.) No—er—I think green.
FAME. Green is his favourite colour.
THE CROWD. Hooray! Hooray! Hooray!
FAME. 'Ere, tell us something. They want to know all about yer.
DE REVES; Wouldn't you perhaps … would they care to hear my sonnet, if you would—er….
FAME (picking up quill). Here, what's this?
DE REVES. Oh, that's my pen.
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 worshipped 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.)
Beulah Marie Dix
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 bloody rag. DICK 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 (shifting 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 hell? What else should I see, and a pest choke your throat with your fool's questions, Dick Fenton!
(Resumes his watch.)
FENTON (as who should say: "I thank you!"). God 'a' mercy—Captain Talbot!
(Resumes his singing.)
DRISCOLL. God'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—
(Tries to rise, but in the effort sways weakly forward and rests with his head upon the stool which BUTLER has quitted.)
BUTLER. A'Heaven's name, ha' done with that hanging tune! Ha' done, Dick Fenton! We're not yet at the gallows' foot.
(Joins JOHN TALBOT at the shot-windows.)
FENTON. Nay, Myles, for us 'tis like to be nothing half so merry as the gallows.
BUTLER. Hold your fool's tongue!
NEWCOMBE (crying out in his sleep). Oh! Oh!
JOHN TALBOT. What was that?
FENTON. 'Twas naught but young Newcombe that cried out in the clutch of a nightmare.
BUTLER. 'Tis time Kit Newcombe rose and stood his watch.
JOHN TALBOT (leaving the window). Nay, 'tis only a boy. Let him sleep while he can! Let him sleep!
BUTLER. Turn and turn at the watch, 'tis but fair. Stir yonder sluggard awake, Dick!
FENTON. Aye. (Starts to rise.)
JOHN TALBOT. Who gives commands here? Sit you down, Fenton! To your place, Myles Butler!
BUTLER. Captain of the Gate! D'ye mark the high tone of him,
Dick?
JOHN TALBOT (tying a fresh bandage about his hand). You're out there, Myles. There is but one Captain of the Gate of Connaught—he who set me here—my cousin, Hugh Talbot.
BUTLER (muttering). Aye, and it's a deal you'll need to be growing, ere you fill Hugh Talbot's shoes.
JOHN TALBOT. And that's a true word! But 'twas Hugh Talbot's will that I should command, here at the Bridge of Cashala. And as long as breath is in me I—
DRISCOLL (raising his head heavily). Water! Water! Myles! Dick! Will ye give me to drink, lads? Jack Talbot! I'm choked wi' thirst.
JOHN TALBOT. There's never a drop of water left us, Phelimy, lad.
FENTON. Owen Bourke drained the last of it, God rest him!
BUTLER. 'Tis likely our clever new Captain of the Gate will hit on some shift to fill our empty casks.
(DRISCOLL rises heavily.)
JOHN TALBOT. Not the new Captain of the Gate. The old Captain of the Gate—Hugh Talbot. He'll be here this day—this hour, maybe.
FENTON. That tale grows something old, Jack Talbot.
JOHN TALBOT. He swore he'd bring us succor. He—
(DRISCOLL tries to unbar the exit door.)
Driscoll! Are you gone mad? Stand you back from that door!
(Thrusts DRISCOLL from the door.)
DRISCOLL (half delirious). Let me forth! The spring—'tis just below—there on the river-bank! Let me slip down to it—but a moment—and drink!
JOHN TALBOT. Cromwell's soldiers hold the spring.
DRISCOLL. I care not! Let me forth and drink! Let me forth!
JOHN TALBOT. 'T would be to your death.
BUTLER. And what will he get but his death if he stay here,
Captain Talbot?
DRISCOLL (struggling with JOHN TALBOT). I'm choked! I'm choked, I tell ye! Let me go, Jack Talbot! Let me go!
NEWCOMBE (still half-asleep, rises to his knees, with a terrible cry, and his groping hands upthrust to guard his head). God's pity! No! no! no!
DRISCOLL (shocked into sanity, staggers back, crossing himself).
God shield us!
BUTLER. Silence that whelp!
FENTON. Clear to the rebel camp they'll hear him!
JOHN TALBOT (catching NEWCOMBE by the shoulder). Newcombe! Kit
Newcombe!
NEWCOMBE. Ah, God! Keep them from me! Keep them from me!
JOHN TALBOT. Ha' done! Ha' done!
NEWCOMBE. Not that! Not the butt of the muskets! Not that! Not that!
JOHN TALBOT (stifling NEWCOMBE'S outcry with a hand upon his mouth). Wake! You're dreaming!
DRISCOLL. 'Tis ill luck! 'Tis ill luck comes of such dreaming!
NEWCOMBE. Drogheda! I dreamed I was at Drogheda, where my brother—my brother—they beat out his brains—Cromwell's men—with their clubbed muskets—they—
(Clings shuddering to JOHN TALBOT.)
FENTON. English officers that serve amongst the Irish—'t is thus that Cromwell uses them!
BUTLER. English officers—aye, like ourselves!
JOHN TALBOT. Be quiet, Kit! You're far from Drogheda—here at the Bridge of Cashala.
BUTLER. Aye, safe in Cashala Gatehouse, with five hundred of
Cromwell's men sitting down before it.
JOHN TALBOT. Keep your watch, Butler!
NEWCOMBE. You give orders? You still command, Jack? Where's
Captain Talbot, then?
(Snatches up his sword and rises.)
BUTLER (quitting the window). Aye, where is Captain
Talbot?
JOHN TALBOT. You say—
FENTON (rising). We all say it.
JOHN TALBOT. Even thou, Dick?
DRISCOLL. He does not come! Hugh Talbot does not come!
FENTON. He bade us hold the bridge one day. We've held it three days now.
BUTLER. And where is Hugh Talbot with the aid he promised?
JOHN TALBOT. He promised. He has never broken faith. He will bring us aid.
FENTON. Aye, if he be living!
DRISCOLL. Living? You mean that he—Och, he's dead! Hugh Talbot's dead! And we're destroyed! We're destroyed!
NEWCOMBE (cowering). The butt of the muskets!
FENTON. God!
(Deliberately BUTLER lays down his musket.)
JOHN TALBOT. Take up your piece!
BUTLER. Renounce me if I do!
FENTON. I stand with you, Myles Butler. Make terms for us, John
Talbot, or, on my soul, we'll make them for ourselves.
JOHN TALBOT. Surrender?
NEWCOMBE. Will Cromwell spare us, an we yield ourselves now? Will he spare us? Will he—
FENTON. 'Tis our one chance.
NEWCOMBE. Give me that white rag!
(Crosses and snatches a bandage from chimneypiece.)
FENTON (drawing his ramrod). Here's a staff!
(Together FENTON and NEWCOMBE make ready a flag of truce.)
JOHN TALBOT (struggling with BUTLER and DRISCOLL). A black curse on you!
BUTLER. We'll not be butchered like oxen in the shambles!
JOHN TALBOT. Your oaths!
BUTLER. We'll not fight longer to be knocked on the head at the last.
NEWCOMBE. No! No! Not that! Out with the flag, Dick!
FENTON. A light here at the grating!
(NEWCOMBE turns to take a candle, obedient to FENTON'S order. At that moment, close at hand, a bugle sounds.)
JOHN TALBOT. Hark!
DRISCOLL. The bugle! They're upon us!
BUTLER (releasing his hold on JOHN TALBOT). What was that?
JOHN TALBOT. You swore to hold the bridge.
BUTLER. Swore to hold it one day. We've held it three days now.
FENTON. And the half of us are slain.
NEWCOMBE. And we've no water—and no food!
JOHN TALBOT (pointing to the powder-keg). We have powder in plenty.
DRISCOLL. We can't drink powder. Ah, for God's love, be swift,
Dick Fenton! Be swift!
JOHN TALBOT. You shall not show that white flag!
(Starts toward FENTON, hand on sword.)
BUTLER (pinioning JOHN TALBOT). God's death! We shall! Help me here, Phelimy!
JOHN TALBOT. A summons to parley. What see you, Fenton?
FENTON (at the shot-window). Torches coming from the boreen, and a white flag beneath them. I can see the faces. (With a cry) Look, Jack! A'God's name! Look!
(JOHN TALBOT springs to the window.)
DRISCOLL. What is it you're seeing?
FENTON. It is—
JOHN TALBOT (turning from the window). 'Tis Hugh Talbot comes!
'Tis the Captain of the Gate!
BUTLER. With them? A prisoner?
JOHN TALBOT. No, no! No prisoner! He wears his sword.
(BUTLER snatches up his piece and resumes watch.)
FENTON. Then he'll have made terms with them! Terms!
NEWCOMBE (embracing DRISCOLL). Terms for us! Terms for us!
JOHN TALBOT. I told ye truth. He has come. Hugh Talbot has come.
(Goes to door.)
HUGH TALBOT (speaks outside). Open! I come alone, and in peace.
Open unto me!
JOHN TALBOT. Who goes there?
HUGH TALBOT (outside). The Captain of the Gate!
(JOHN TALBOT unbars the door, and bars it again upon the entrance of HUGH TALBOT. The latter comes slowly into the room. He is a man in his late thirties, a tall, martial figure, clad in much-worn velvet and leather, with sword at side. The five salute him as he enters.)
HUGH TALBOT (halts and for a moment surveys his followers). Well, lads?
(The five stand trembling on the edge of a nervous break, unable for the moment to speak.)
NEWCOMBE. We thought—we thought—that you—that you—
(Breaks into childish sobbing.)
FENTON. What terms will they grant us, sir?
JOHN TALBOT. Sir, we have held the bridge.
HUGH TALBOT. You five—
JOHN TALBOT. Bourke is dead, sir, and Tregarris, and Langdale, and—and James Talbot, my brother.
DRISCOLL. And we've had no water, sir, these many hours.
HUGH TALBOT. So! You're wounded, Phelimy.
DRISCOLL. 'Tis not worth heeding, sir.
HUGH TALBOT. Kit! Kit! (At the voice NEWCOMBE pulls himself together.) A light here! Dick, you've your pouch under your hand?
FENTON. 'Tis here, sir.
(Offers his tobacco pouch.)
HUGH TALBOT (filling his pipe). Leave the window, Myles! They've promised us a half hour's truce—and Cromwell's a man of his word.
NEWCOMBE (bringing a lighted candle). He'll let us pass free now, sir, will he not?
HUGH TALBOT (lighting his pipe at the candle). You're not afraid,
Kit?
NEWCOMBE. I? Faith, no, sir. No! Not now!
HUGH TALBOT. Sit ye down, Phelimy, lad! You look dead on your feet. Give me to see that arm! (As HUGH TALBOT starts toward DRISCOLL, his eye falls on the open keg of powder. He draws back hastily, covering his lighted pipe.) Jack Talbot! Who taught ye to leave your powder uncovered, where lighted match was laid?
BUTLER. My blame, sir.
(Covers the keg.)
JOHN TALBOT. We opened the keg, and then—
FENTON. Truth, we did not cover it again, being somewhat pressed for time.
(The five laugh, half hysterically.)
HUGH TALBOT (sitting by fire). And you never thought, maybe, that in that keg there was powder enough to blow the bridge of Cashala to hell?
JOHN TALBOT. It seemed a matter of small moment, sir.
HUGH TALBOT. Small moment! Powder enough, put case ye set it there, at the stairhead—d'ye follow me?—powder enough to make an end of Cashala Bridge for all time—aye, and of all within the Gatehouse. You never thought on that, eh?
JOHN TALBOT. We had so much to think on, sir.
HUGH TALBOT. I did suspect as much. So I came hither to recall the powder to your minds.
DRISCOLL. We thought—(BUTLER motions him to be silent.) We thought maybe you would not be coming at all, sir. Maybe you would be dead.
HUGH TALBOT. Well? What an if I had been dead? You had your orders. You did not dream of giving up the Bridge of Cashala—eh, Myles Butler?
BUTLER (after a moment). No, sir.
HUGH TALBOT. Nor you, Dick Fenton?
FENTON. Sir, I—No!
HUGH TALBOT (smoking throughout). Good lads! The wise heads were saying I was a stark fool to set you here at Cashala. But I said: I can be trusting the young riders that are learning their lessons in war from me. I'll be safe putting my honor into their hands. And I was right, wasn't I, Phelimy Driscoll?
DRISCOLL. Give us the chance, sir, and we'll be holding Cashala, even against the devil himself!
FENTON. Aye, well said!
HUGH TALBOT. Sure,'tis a passing good substitute for the devil sits yonder in Cromwell's tent.
NEWCOMBE (with a shudder). Cromwell!
HUGH TALBOT. Aye, he was slaying your brother at Drogheda, Kit, and a fine, gallant lad your brother was. And I'm thinking you're like him, Kit. Else I shouldn't be trusting you here at Cashala.
NEWCOMBE. I—I—Will they let us keep our swords?
HUGH TALBOT. Well, it's with yourselves it lies, whether you'll keep them or not.
FENTON. He means—we mean—on what terms, sir, do we surrender?
HUGH TALBOT. Surrender? Terms?
JOHN TALBOT. We thought, sir, from your coming under their white flag—perhaps you had made terms for us.
HUGH TALBOT. How could I make terms?
NEWCOMBE. Captain!
(At a look from HUGH TALBOT he becomes silent, fighting for self-control.)
HUGH TALBOT. How could I make terms that you would hear to?
Cashala Bridge is the gate of Connaught.
JOHN TALBOT. Yes.
HUGH TALBOT. Give Cromwell Cashala Bridge, and he'll be on the heels of our women and our little ones. At what price would ye be selling their safety?
DRISCOLL. Cromwell—when he takes us—when he takes us—
NEWCOMBE. He'll knock us on the head!
HUGH TALBOT. Yes. At the last. Your five lives against our people's safety. You'd not give up the bridge?
JOHN TALBOT. Five? Our five? But you—you are the sixth.
FENTON. You stay with us, Captain. And then we'll fight—you'll see how we shall fight.
HUGH TALBOT. I shall be seeing you fight, perhaps, but I cannot stay now at Cashala.
(Rises.)
DRISCOLL. Ye won't be staying with us?
BUTLER (laughing harshly). Now, on my soul! Is this your faith, Hugh Talbot? One liar I've followed, Charles Stuart, the son of a liar, and now a second liar—
JOHN TALBOT (catching BUTLER'S throat). A plague choke you!
HUGH TALBOT (stepping between JOHN TALBOT and BUTLER). Ha' done,
Jack! Ha' done! What more, Myles Butler?
BUTLER. Tell us whither you go, when you turn your back on us that shall die at Cashala—you that come walking under the rebel flag—that swore to bring us aid—and have not brought it! Tell us whither you go now!
HUGH TALBOT. Well, I'm a shade doubtful, Myles, my lad, though hopeful of the best.
BUTLER. 'Tis to Cromwell you go—you that have made your peace with him—that have sold us—
DRISCOLL. Captain! A' God's name, what is it that you're meaning?
HUGH TALBOT. I mean that you shall hold the Bridge of
Cashala—whatever happen to you—whatever happen to me—
FENTON. To you? Captain Talbot!
HUGH TALBOT. I am going unto Cromwell—as you said, Myles. I gave my promise.
DRISCOLL. Your promise?
JOHN TALBOT. We—have been very blind. So—they made you prisoner?
HUGH TALBOT. Aye, Jack. When I tried to cut my way through to bring you aid. And they granted me this half hour on my parole to come unto you.
JOHN TALBOT. To come—
HUGH TALBOT. To counsel you to surrender. And I have given you counsel. Hold the bridge! Hold it! Whatever they do!
DRISCOLL. Captain! Captain Talbot! God of Heaven! If you go back—'tis killed you'll be among them!
HUGH TALBOT. A little sooner than you lads? Aye, true!
FENTON. They cannot! Even Cromwell—
HUGH TALBOT. Tut, tut, Dick! It's little ye know of Cromwell.
JOHN TALBOT. Then—you mean—
HUGH TALBOT. An you surrender Cashala, we may all six pass free.
An you hold Cashala, they will hang me, here before your eyes.
(DRISCOLL gives a rattling cry.)
BUTLER. God forgive me!
HUGH TALBOT. You have your orders. Hold the bridge!
(Turns to door.)
JOHN TALBOT (barring his way). No, no! You shan't go forth!
FENTON. God's mercy, no!
HUGH TALBOT. Are you stark crazed?
FENTON. You shall stay with us.
JOHN TALBOT. What's your pledged word to men that know not honor?
HUGH TALBOT. My word. Unbar the door, Jack. Why, lad, we're traveling the same road.
FENTON. God! But we'll give them a good fight at the last. (Goes to the shot-window.) Take up your musket, Kit.
NEWCOMBB. But I—Captain! When you are gone, I—I—
HUGH TALBOT. I'll not be far. You'll hold the bridge?
JOHN TALBOT. Aye, sir.
BUTLER. We've powder enough—you said it, sir,—laid there at the stairhead, to blow the bridge to hell.
HUGH TALBOT. Aye, Myles, you've hit it!
(Holds out his hand.)
BUTLER. Not yet, sir!
HUGH TALBOT. Hereafter, then. God speed you, lads!
JOHN TALBOT. Speed you, sir! (All five stand at salute as HUGH
TALBOT goes out. In the moment's silence upon his exit, JOHN
TALBOT bars the door and turns to his comrades.) You have—Hugh
Talbot's orders. Take your pieces! Driscoll! Newcombe!
(Obediently the two join FENTON at windows.) Butler!
BUTLER. Aye! We have Hugh Talbot's orders.
(Points to powder-keg.)
JOHN TALBOT. Are you meaning—
BUTLER. It's not I will be failing him now!
FENTON (at window). God! They waste no time.
JOHN TALBOT. Already—they have dared—
FENTON. Here—this moment—under our very eyes!
DRISCOLL. Christ Jesus!
(Goes back from the window, with his arm across his eyes, and falls on his knees in headlong prayer.)
JOHN TALBOT. Kit! Kit Newcombe!
(Motions him to window.)
NEWCOMBE. I cannot! I—
JOHN TALBOT. Look forth! Look! And remember—when you meet them—remember! (NEWCOMBE stands swaying, clutching at the grating of the window, as he looks forth.) Lads! (Motions to BUTLER and FENTON to carry the powder to the stairhead.) The time is short. His orders!
(DRISCOLL raises his head and gazes fixedly toward the centre of the room.)
FENTON. Yonder, at the stairhead.
BUTLER. Aye.
(FENTON and BUTLER carry the keg to the door.)
NEWCOMBE. Not that! Not that death! No! No!
JOHN TALBOT. Be silent! And look yonder! Driscoll! Fetch the light! Newcombe! Come! You have your places, all.
DRISCOLL. But, Captain! The sixth man—where will the sixth man be standing?
(There is a blank silence, in which the men look questioningly at DRISCOLL'S rapt face and at one another.)
JOHN TALBOT. Sixth?
FENTON. What sixth?
DRISCOLL. The blind eyes of ye! Yonder!
(Comes to the salute, even as, a few moments before, he has saluted HUGH TALBOT, living.
NEWCOMBE gives a smothered cry, as one who half sees, and takes courage. FENTON dazedly starts to salute. Outside a bugle sounds, and a voice, almost at the door, is heard to speak.)
VOICE OUTSIDE. For the last time: will you surrender you?
JOHN TALBOT (in a loud and confident voice). No! Not while our commander stands with us!
VOICE OUTSIDE. And who might your commander be?
JOHN TALBOT. Hugh Talbot, the Captain of the Gate! The light here, Phelimy.
(JOHN TALBOT bends to set the candle to the powder that shall destroy Cashala Gatehouse, and all within it. His mates are gathered round him, with steady, bright faces, for in the little space left vacant in their midst they know in that minute that HUGH TALBOT stands.)
Percy MacKaye
The shed is open on both sides, front and back, the apertures being slightly arched at the top. (In bad weather, these presumably may be closed by big double doors, which stand open now—swung back outward beyond sight.) Thus the nearer opening is the proscenium arch of the scene, under which the spectator looks through the shed to the background—a grassy yard, a road with great trunks of soaring elms, and the glimpse of a green hillside. The ceiling runs up into a gable with large beams.
On the right, at back, a door opens into the shed from the house kitchen. Opposite it, a door leads from the shed into the barn. In the foreground, against the right wall, is a work-bench. On this are tools, a long, narrow, wooden box, and a small oil-stove, with steaming kettle upon it.
Against the left wall, what remains of the year's wood supply is stacked, the uneven ridges sloping to a jumble of stovewood and kindlings mixed with small chips of the floor, which is piled deep with mounds of crumbling bark, chips and wood-dust.
Not far from this mounded pile, at right centre of the scene, stands a wooden armchair, in which LINK TADBOURNE, in his shirt-sleeves, sits drowsing. Silhouetted by the sunlight beyond, his sharp-drawn profile is that of an old man, with white hair cropped close, and gray moustache of a faded black hue at the outer edges. Between his knees is a stout thong of wood, whittled round by the drawshave which his sleeping hand still holds in his lap. Against the side of his chair rests a thick wooden yoke and collar. Near him is a chopping-block.
In the woodshed there is no sound or motion except the hum and floating steam from the tea-kettle. Presently the old man murmurs in his sleep, clenching his hand. Slowly the hand relaxes again.
From the door, right, comes POLLY—a sweet-faced girl of seventeen, quietly mature for her age. She is dressed simply. In one hand she carries a man's wide-brimmed felt hat, over the other arm a blue coat. These she brings toward LINK. Seeing him asleep, she begins to tiptoe, lays the coat and hat on the chopping-block, goes to the bench, and trims the wick of the oil-stove, under the kettle. Then she returns and stands near LINK, surveying the shed.
On closer scrutiny, the jumbled woodpile has evidently a certain order in its chaos; some of the splittings have been piled in irregular ridges; in places, the deep layer of wood-dust and chips has been scooped, and the little mounds slope and rise like miniature valleys and hills. [2]
Taking up a hoe, POLLY—with careful steps—moves among the hollows, placing and arranging sticks of kindling, scraping and smoothing the little mounds with the hoe. As she does so, from far away, a bugle sounds.
[Footnote 1: Copyright, 1912, by Percy Mackaye. All rights reserved.]
[Footnote 2: A suggestion for the appropriate arrangement of these mounds may be found in the map of the battle-field annexed to the volume by Captain R.K. Beecham, entitled Gettysburg (A.C. McClurg, 1911).]
LINK (snapping his eyes wide open, sits up)
Hello! Cat-nappin' was I, Polly?
POLLY
Just
A kitten-nap, I guess.
(Laying the hoe down, she approaches)
The yoke done?
LINK
(giving a final whittle to the yoke-collar thong)
Thar!
When he's ben steamed a spell, and bended snug,
I guess this feller'll sarve t' say "Gee" to—
(Lifting the other yoke-collar from beside his chair, he
holds the whittled thong next to it, comparing the two
with expert eye)
and "Haw" to him. Beech every time, Sir; beech
or walnut. Hang me if I'd shake a whip
at birch, for ox-yokes.—Polly, are ye thar?
POLLY
Yes, Uncle Link.
LINK
What's that I used to sing ye?
"Polly, put the kittle on,
Polly, put the kittle on,
Polly, put the kittle on—"
(Chuckling')
We'll give this feller a dose of ox-yoke tea!
POLLY
The kettle's boilin'.
LINK
Wall, then, steep him good.
(POLLY takes from LINK the collar-thong, carries it to the work-bench, shoves it into the narrow end of the box, which she then closes tight and connects—by a piece of hose—to the spout of the kettle. At the farther end of the box, steam then emerges through a small hole.)
POLLY
You're feelin' smart to-day.
LINK Smart!—Wall, if I could git a hull man to swap legs with me, mebbe I'd arn my keep. But this here settin' dead an' alive, without no legs, day in, day out, don't make an old hoss wuth his oats.
POLLY (cheerfully)
I guess you'll soon be walkin' round.
LINK Not if that doctor feller has his say: He says I can't never go agin this side o' Jordan; and looks like he's 'bout right.—Nine months to-morrer, Polly, gal, sence I had that stroke.
POLLY
(pointing to the ox-yoke)
You're fitter
sittin' than most folks standin'.
LINK
(briskly)
Oh, they can't keep my two hands from makin' ox-yokes. That's my second natur' sence I was a boy.
(Again in the distance a bugle sounds. LINK starts.)
What's that?
POLLY
Why, that's the army veterans
down to the graveyard. This is Decoration
mornin': you ain't forgot?
LINK
So't is, so't is.
Roger, your young man—ha! (chuckling) he come and axed me
was I a-goin' to the cemetery.
"Me? Don't I look it?" says I. Ha! "Don't I look it?"
POLLY
He meant—to decorate the graves.
LINK
O' course;
but I must take my little laugh. I told him
I guessed I wa'n't persent'ble anyhow,
my mustache and my boots wa'n't blacked this mornin'.
I don't jest like t' talk about my legs.—
Be you a-goin' to take your young school folks,
Polly?
POLLY
Dear no! I told my boys and girls
to march up this way with the band. I said
I'd be a-stayin' home and learnin' how
to keep school in the woodpile here with you.
LINK
(looking up at her proudly)
Schoolma'am at seventeen! Some smart, I tell ye!
POLLY (caressing him)
Schoolmaster, you, past seventy; that's smarter!
I tell 'em I learn from you, so's I can teach
my young folks what the study-books leave out.
LINK
Sure ye don't want to jine the celebratin'?
POLLY
No, sir! We're goin' to celebrate right here,
and you're to teach me to keep school some more.
(She holds ready for him the blue coat and hat.)
LINK (looking up)
What's thar?
POLLY
Your teachin' rig.
(She helps him on with it.)
LINK The old blue coat!— My, but I'd like to see the boys—(gazing at the hat) the Grand Old Army Boys! (dreamily) Yes, we was boys: jest boys! Polly, you tell your young folks, when they study the books, that we was nothin' else but boys jest fallin' in love, with best gals left t' home— the same as you; and when the shot was singin', we pulled their picters out, and prayed to them 'most morn'n the Almighty.
(LINK looks up suddenly—a strange light in his face.
Again, to a far strain of music, the bugle sounds.)
Thar she blows
Agin!
POLLY
They're marchin' to the graves with flowers.
LINK My Godfrey!'t ain't so much thinkin' o' flowers and the young folks, their faces, and the blue line of old fellers marchin'—it's the music! that old brass voice a-callin'! Seems as though, legs or no legs, I'd have to up and foller to God-knows-whar, and holler—holler back to guns roarin' in the dark. No; durn it, no! I jest can't stan' the music.
POLLY
(goes to the work-bench, where the box is steaming)
Uncle Link,
you want that I should steam this longer?
LINK
(absently)
Oh,
A kittleful, a kittleful.
POLLY
(coming over to him)
Now, then,
I'm ready for school.—I hope I've drawed the map
all right.
LINK
Map? Oh, the map!
(Surveying the woodpile reminiscently, he nods.)
Yes, thar she be:
old Gettysburg!
POLLY
I know the places—most.
LINK
So, do ye? Good, now: whar's your marker?
POLLY
(taking up the hoe)
Here.
LINK
Willoughby Run: whar's that?
POLLY
(pointing with the hoe toward the left of the woodpile)
That's farthest over
next the barn door.
LINK
My, how we fit the Johnnies
thar, the fust mornin'! Jest behind them willers,
acrost the Run, that's whar we captur'd Archer.
My, my!
POLLY
Over there—that's Seminary Ridge.
(She points to different heights and depressions, as LINK
nods his approval.)
Peach Orchard, Devil's Den, Round Top, the Wheatfield—
LINK
Lord, Lord, the Wheatfield!
POLLY
(continuing)
Cemetery Hill,
Little Round Top, Death Valley, and this here
is Cemetery Ridge.
LINK
(pointing to the little flag)
And colors flyin'!
We kep 'em flyin' thar, too, all three days,
From start to finish.
POLLY
Have I learned 'em right?
LINK
A number One, chick! Wait a mite: Culp's Hill:
I don't jest spy Culp's Hill.
POLLY
There wa'n't enough
kindlin's to spare for that. It ought to lay
east there, towards the kitchen.
LINK
Let it go!
That's whar us Yanks left our back door ajar
and Johnson stuck his foot in: kep' it thar,
too, till he got it squoze off by old Slocum.
Let Culp's Hill lay for now.—Lend me your marker.
(POLLY hands him the hoe. From his chair, he reaches
with it and digs in the chips.)
Death Valley needs some scoopin' deeper. So:
smooth off them chips.
(POLLY does so with her foot.)