Read-Aloud Plays Part 26

Father!

EVERITT

Good gracious! Where did you come from?

WALTER

I came back from the office.... I heard what you were saying. So that's all right. But you needn't worry about my architecture. I was telling mother to-night. I don't like it--it isn't my work. I only wanted you to feel as I do about it. Just feel that I really want to paint--to be an artist. Even if I have to work at something else for a long time, I'll feel easier, knowing you realize what I want. I love color so. And I want to let my imagination _go_. I'll help in any way I can, naturally. I'm glad too. I mean, I had rather live in the country like this than in New York.

EVERITT

Good Lord! (_Alice appears in the doorway holding Harold_)

WALTER

It seems to me that none of us has been really satisfied, so it isn't so bad after all. We can begin on something real to us all. Mother said she would be happy in a tenement. Well, maybe she would, but why not come up here?

MRS. EVERITT

Oh, _Charles_!

EVERITT

Well ... but Alice.

ALICE

Mother.

MRS. EVERITT

You, too! What is it? What's the matter with Harold?

ALICE

Nothing. He wouldn't go to sleep, and wouldn't. He said he wanted to sit in your lap. I never saw him so. I had to bring him.

MRS. EVERITT

Give him to me, dear.

ALICE

And I knew something was going on down here... I could _feel_ it. I don't know what it was, but there's one thing I do know.

MRS. EVERITT

What?

ALICE

Why, ever since father said I looked as you used to I've been thinking about what you must have been like as a girl, and it came over me how _useless_ I am. I've never done anything. And you must have done a lot.

EVERITT

I should say she did!

WALTER

There! Say, Alice, how'd you like to live in that white house we pa.s.sed, the one with the orchard?

ALICE

Really? And _do_ things?

MRS. EVERITT

Charles!

EVERITT

This is the most extraordinary night I ever heard of. Here I was, feeling like a condemned criminal because I'd lost my business, afraid to tell Mary and you children, and now you all seem positively glad of it. I expected all kinds of trouble, and all at once.... _What the deuce is it?_

HAROLD

Rain--rain.... Mother, why can't the brook come back to the _same_ little girl?

PICTURES

_A studio on the Rue Notre-Dame-des-Champs. There is a small entrance hall, kitchenette, and a balcony before which curtains are drawn. It is a winter afternoon, and a young man is busy at an easel placed close beside the north light. A young woman arranges tea things on the table._

SILVIA

Joe.

JOE

Um.

SILVIA

Joe!