Second Plays Part 10

DOCTOR. Then concentrate on the other two, dear lady.

AUNT JANE. Thank you, doctor. [They go out.

GOVERNESS. We will now go on with our lessons. Oliver, you will have opportunities in your bedroom this afternoon of learning your poetry.

By the way, I had better have that book which you were reading when I came in just now.

OLIVER (trying to be surprised). Which book?

JILL (n.o.bly doing her best to save the situation). Miss Pinniger, if you're multiplying rods, poles, or perches by nine, does it matter if---

GOVERNESS. I am talking to Oliver, Geraldine. Where is that book, Oliver?

OLIVER. Oh, _I_ know the one you mean. I must have put it down somewhere. (He looks vaguely about the room.)

GOVERNESS. Perhaps you put it in your desk.

OLIVER. My desk?

JILL (going up to MISS PINNIGER with her work). You see, it's all gone wrong here, and I think I must have multiplied---- (Moving in front of her as she moves) I think I must have multiplied----

(Under cover of this, OLIVER makes a great effort to get the book into JILL'S desk, but it is no good.)

GOVERNESS (brushing aside JILL and advancing on OLIVER). Thank you, _I_ will take it.

OLIVER (looking at the t.i.tle). Oh yes, this is the one.

GOVERNESS. And I will speak to your aunt at _once_ about the behaviour of both of you. [She goes out.

OLIVER (gallantly). _I_ don't care.

JILL. I did try to help you, Oliver.

OLIVER. You wait. Won't I jolly well bag something of hers one day, just when she wants it.

JILL. I'm afraid you'll find the afternoon rather tiring without your book. What will you do?

OLIVER. I suppose I shall have to think.

JILL. What shall you think about?

OLIVER. I shall think I'm on my desert island.

JILL. Which desert island?

OLIVER. The one I always pretend I'm on when I'm thinking.

JILL. Isn't there any one else on it ever?

OLIVER. Oo, lots of pirates and Dyaks and cannibals and--other people.

JILL. What sort of other people?

OLIVER. I shan't tell you. This is a special think I thought last night. As soon as I thought of it, I decided to keep it for (impressively) a moment of great emergency.

JILL (silenced). Oh! . . . Oliver?

OLIVER Yes?

JILL. Let me be on your desert island this time. Because I did try to help you.

OLIVER. Well--well---- (Generously) Well, you can if you like.

JILL. Oh, thank you, Oliver. Won't you tell me what it's about, and then we can both think it together this afternoon.

OLIVER. I expect you'll think all sorts of silly things that _never_ happen on a desert island.

JILL. I'll try not to, Oliver, if you tell me.

OLIVER. All right.

JILL (coming close to him). Go on.

OLIVER. Well, you see, I've been wrecked, you see, and the ship has foundered with all hands, you see, and I've been cast ash.o.r.e on a desert island, you see.

JILL. Haven't I been cast ash.o.r.e too?

OLIVER. Well, you will be this afternoon, of course. Well, you see, we land on the island, you see, and it's a perfectly ripping island, you see, and--and we land on it, you see, and. . . .

(But we are getting on too fast. When the good ship crashed upon the rock and split in twain, it seemed like that all aboard must perish.

Fortunately OLIVER was made of stern mettle. Hastily constructing a raft and placing the now unconscious JILL upon it, he launched it into the seething maelstrom of waters and pushed off. Tossed like a c.o.c.kle-sh.e.l.l upon the mountainous waves, the tiny craft with its precious freight was in imminent danger of foundering. But OLIVER was made of stern mettle. With dauntless courage he rigged a jury-mast, and placed a telescope to his eye. "Pull for the lagoon, JILL," cried the dauntless OLIVER, and in another moment. . . .)

(As the raft glides into the still waters beyond the reef, we can see it more clearly. Can it be JILL'S bed, with OLIVER in his pyjamas perched on the rail, and holding up his bath-towel? Does he shorten sail for a moment to thump his chest and say, "But OLIVER was made of stern mettle"? Or is it----)

(But the sun is sinking behind the swamp where the rattlesnakes bask.

For a moment longer the sail gleams like copper in its rays, and then--fizz-z--we have lost it. See! Is that speck on the inky black waters the dauntless Oliver? It is. Let us follow to the island and see what adventures befall him.)

SCENE II.--It is the island which we have dreamed about all our lives.

But at present we cannot see it properly, for it is dark. In one of those tropical darknesses which can be felt rather than seen OLIVER hands JILL out of the boat.

OLIVER. Tread carefully, Jill, there are lots of deadly rattlesnakes about.

JILL (stepping hastily back into the boat). Oli-ver!

OLIVER. You hear the noise of their rattles sometimes when the sun is sinking behind the swamp. (The deadly rattle of the rattlesnake is heard) There!