The Naturewoman Part 14

OCEANA. I can't tell you that.

FREDDY. Oh, you are pitiless to me!

OCEANA. One does not give love out of pity. That is a cowardly thing to ask. [She pauses.] I must be frank with you, Freddy. You have got to face the facts. When I give my love, it will be to a man; and you are not a man.

FREDDY. But I am growing up!

OCEANA. No; you don't understand me. You should have grown up years ago. You have been stunted. [She takes his hand.] Look! See the stains!

FREDDY. Why...

OCEANA. Cigarettes! And you want to be a man!

FREDDY. Is that so unforgivable?

OCEANA. It is only one thing of many, my dear cousin.

FREDDY. Oceana, you don't know what men are!

OCEANA. Oh, don't I! My dear boy, there is nothing about men that I don't know. I have read Krafft-Ebing and Havelock Ellis... I know it all. I know it as a physician knows it. I can read a man's diseases in his complexion... I can read his vices in his eyes. Don't you see?

FREDDY. [Drops his eyes.] I see!

OCEANA. Don't think that I am despising you, dear boy. I know the world you have lived in.

FREDDY. But what can I do?

OCEANA. You can go away, and make a man of yourself. Go West, get out into the open. Learn to ride and hunt... harden your muscles and expand your chest. Until then you're not fit to be the father of any woman's child!

FREDDY. Drop college, you mean?

OCEANA. Be your own college! The idea of trying to build a brain in a body that's decaying! How could you stand it? Don't you ever feel that you are boiling over... that you must have something upon which you can wreak yourself? Don't you feel that you'd like to tame a horse, or to sail a boat in a storm? Don't you ever read about adventures?

FREDDY. Yes, I read about them.

OCEANA. And don't you ever feel that you must experience them? That you must face some kind of danger... do something that you can look back on with pride? Why, see... six years ago there came to our island three war-canoes full of savages... cannibals they were. If father and I hadn't been there, they'd have wiped our people out. And do you think I'd give up the memory of that struggle?

FREDDY. What happened?

OCEANA. Fortunately they came in the daytime, so we soon drove them back to their boats. See... I'll show you. [She goes to trunk.] Here's one of them.

[She lifts up a human skull.]

FREDDY. Good Lord!

OCEANA. Notice that crack. That was done with a spear... by my prince, the one who made me this robe, you know. He cleaned the skull out for me.

FREDDY. Rather a ghastly sort of souvenir.

OCEANA. Oh, I don't mind that. Father and I found it useful... a sort of memento mori.

FREDDY. [Looking into trunk.] And what are those things?

OCEANA. They are some of my arrows. And these are what we used for bowls... turtle-sh.e.l.ls, you see.

FREDDY. [Pointing.] But those?

OCEANA. Oh, my single-sticks. [Lifts them.] That's the game Henry and I were talking about. You ought to get him to teach it to you.

FREDDY. What's it like?

OCEANA. I'll show you. [She takes from the trunk two leather helmets and gloves.] Here you are! It's an old English game... didn't you ever read "Robin Hood"?

FREDDY. Oh, it's that? Why, they used to crack each other's heads!

OCEANA. The object was to draw first blood. But we used to wear these helmets. You see how we've dented them up? And these old cudgels... how they remind me of father!

FREDDY. Humph! They're heavy.

OCEANA. You take the stick this way; it's a kind of fencing. [She gives him a stick and ill.u.s.trates the play.] No, so!

MRS. MASTERSON. [Enters.] What's this? Is this the way you get ready to leave?

OCEANA. [Imploring.] Oh, Aunt Sophronia, I beg your pardon! I got so interested...

MRS. MASTERSON. Is there no limit to your indiscretion?

DR. MASTERSON. [Enters hurriedly.] Sophronia, I beg of you...

MRS. MASTERSON. I will hear no more of this! I have spoken, once for all...

DR. MASTERSON. But, my dear...

MRS. MASTERSON. No more!

DR. MASTERSON. But, Sophronia, the people don't understand why....

MRS. MASTERSON. It was outrageous!

DR. MASTERSON. I know. But since it was begun... it's so difficult to explain...

MRS. MASTERSON. No more of this! I won't hear it!

HENRY. [Enters; stares about.] Mrs. Masterson, what have you done here?

MRS. MASTERSON. There is no reason why you should concern yourself with it.

HENRY. But I wish to know.