Plays Part 3

COUNTY ATTORNEY: (preoccupied) Is there a cat?

(MRS HALE glances in a quick covert way at MRS PETERS.)

MRS PETERS: Well, not now. They're superst.i.tious, you know. They leave.

COUNTY ATTORNEY: (to SHERIFF PETERS, continuing an interrupted conversation) No sign at all of anyone having come from the outside. Their own rope. Now let's go up again and go over it piece by piece. (they start upstairs) It would have to have been someone who knew just the-

(MRS PETERS sits down. The two women sit there not looking at one another, but as if peering into something and at the same time holding back. When they talk now it is in the manner of feeling their way over strange ground, as if afraid of what they are saying, but as if they can not help saying it.)

MRS HALE: She liked the bird. She was going to bury it in that pretty box.

MRS PETERS: (in a whisper) When I was a girl-my kitten-there was a boy took a hatchet, and before my eyes-and before I could get there-(covers her face an instant) If they hadn't held me back I would have-(catches herself, looks upstairs where steps are heard, falters weakly)-hurt him.

MRS HALE: (with a slow look around her) I wonder how it would seem never to have had any children around, (pause) No, Wright wouldn't like the bird-a thing that sang. She used to sing. He killed that, too.

MRS PETERS: (moving uneasily) We don't know who killed the bird.

MRS HALE: I knew John Wright.

MRS PETERS: It was an awful thing was done in this house that night, Mrs Hale. Killing a man while he slept, slipping a rope around his neck that choked the life out of him.

MRS HALE: His neck. Choked the life out of him.

(Her hand goes out and rests on the bird-cage.)

MRS PETERS: (with rising voice) We don't know who killed him. We don't know.

MRS HALE: (her own feeling not interrupted) If there'd been years and years of nothing, then a bird to sing to you, it would be awful-still, after the bird was still.

MRS PETERS: (something within her speaking) I know what stillness is. When we homesteaded in Dakota, and my first baby died-after he was two years old, and me with no other then-

MRS HALE: (moving) How soon do you suppose they'll be through, looking for the evidence?

MRS PETERS: I know what stillness is. (pulling herself back) The law has got to punish crime, Mrs Hale.

MRS HALE: (not as if answering that) I wish you'd seen Minnie Foster when she wore a white dress with blue ribbons and stood up there in the choir and sang. (a look around the room) Oh, I wish I'd come over here once in a while! That was a crime! That was a crime! Who's going to punish that?

MRS PETERS: (looking upstairs) We mustn't-take on.

MRS HALE: I might have known she needed help! I know how things can be-for women. I tell you, it's queer, Mrs Peters. We live close together and we live far apart. We all go through the same things-it's all just a different kind of the same thing, (brushes her eyes, noticing the bottle of fruit, reaches out for it) If I was you, I wouldn't tell her her fruit was gone. Tell her it ain't. Tell her it's all right. Take this in to prove it to her. She-she may never know whether it was broke or not.

MRS PETERS: (takes the bottle, looks about for something to wrap it in; takes petticoat from the clothes brought from the other room, very nervously begins winding this around the bottle. In a false voice) My, it's a good thing the men couldn't hear us. Wouldn't they just laugh! Getting all stirred up over a little thing like a-dead canary. As if that could have anything to do with-with-wouldn't they laugh!

(The men are heard coming down stairs.)

MRS HALE: (under her breath) Maybe they would-maybe they wouldn't.

COUNTY ATTORNEY: No, Peters, it's all perfectly clear except a reason for doing it. But you know juries when it comes to women. If there was some definite thing. Something to show-something to make a story about-a thing that would connect up with this strange way of doing it-

(The women's eyes meet for an instant. Enter HALE from outer door.)

HALE: Well, I've got the team around. Pretty cold out there.

COUNTY ATTORNEY: I'm going to stay here a while by myself, (to the SHERIFF) You can send Frank out for me, can't you? I want to go over everything. I'm not satisfied that we can't do better.

SHERIFF: Do you want to see what Mrs Peters is going to take in?

(The LAWYER goes to the table, picks up the ap.r.o.n, laughs.)

COUNTY ATTORNEY: Oh, I guess they're not very dangerous things the ladies have picked out. (Moves a few things about, disturbing the quilt pieces which cover the box. Steps back) No, Mrs Peters doesn't need supervising. For that matter, a sheriff's wife is married to the law. Ever think of it that way, Mrs Peters?

MRS PETERS: Not-just that way.

SHERIFF: (chuckling) Married to the law. (moves toward the other room) I just want you to come in here a minute, George. We ought to take a look at these windows.

COUNTY ATTORNEY: (scoffingly) Oh, windows!

SHERIFF: We'll be right out, Mr Hale.

(HALE goes outside. The SHERIFF follows the COUNTY ATTORNEY into the other room. Then MRS HALE rises, hands tight together, looking intensely at MRS PETERS, whose eyes make a slow turn, finally meeting MRS HALE's. A moment MRS HALE holds her, then her own eyes point the way to where the box is concealed. Suddenly MRS PETERS throws back quilt pieces and tries to put the box in the bag she is wearing. It is too big. She opens box, starts to take bird out, cannot touch it, goes to pieces, stands there helpless. Sound of a k.n.o.b turning in the other room. MRS HALE s.n.a.t.c.hes the box and puts it in the pocket of her big coat. Enter COUNTY ATTORNEY and SHERIFF.)

COUNTY ATTORNEY: (facetiously) Well, Henry, at least we found out that she was not going to quilt it. She was going to-what is it you call it, ladies?

MRS HALE: (her hand against her pocket) We call it-knot it, Mr Henderson.

(CURTAIN)

THE OUTSIDE

First performed by the Provincetown Players at the Playwrights' Theatre, December 28, 1917.

CAPTAIN (of 'The Bars' Life-Saving Station)

BRADFORD (a Life-Saver)

TONY (a Portuguese Life-Saver)

MRS PATRICK (who lives in the abandoned Station)

ALLIE MAYO (who works for her)

SCENE: A room in a house which was once a life-saving station. Since ceasing to be that it has taken on no other character, except that of a place which no one cares either to preserve or change. It is painted the life-saving grey, but has not the life-saving freshness. This is one end of what was the big boat room, and at the ceiling is seen a part of the frame work from which the boat once swung. About two thirds of the back wall is open, because of the big sliding door, of the type of barn door, and through this open door are seen the sand dunes, and beyond them the woods. At one point the line where woods and dunes meet stands out clearly and there are indicated the rude things, vines, bushes, which form the outer uneven rim of the woods-the only things that grow in the sand. At another point a sand-hill is menacing the woods. This old life-saving station is at a point where the sea curves, so through the open door the sea also is seen. (The station is located on the outside sh.o.r.e of Cape Cod, at the point, near the tip of the Cape, where it makes that final curve which forms the Provincetown Harbor.) The dunes are hills and strange forms of sand on which, in places, grows the stiff beach gra.s.s-struggle; dogged growing against odds. At right of the big sliding door is a drift of sand and the top of buried beach gra.s.s is seen on this. There is a door left, and at right of big sliding door is a slanting wall. Door in this is ajar at rise of curtain, and through this door BRADFORD and TONY, life-savers, are seen bending over a man's body, attempting to restore respiration. The captain of the life-savers comes into view outside the big open door, at left; he appears to have been hurrying, peers in, sees the men, goes quickly to them.

CAPTAIN: I'll take this now, boys.