Read Online 27 Wagons Full of Cotton and Other Plays by Tennessee Williams - Free Book Online Page B
Authors: Tennessee Williams
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be an in-law of my sister’s! I heard last night that argument over money.
M RS. H ARDWICKE -M OORE: What argument? What money?
M RS. W IRE: He shouted so loud I had to shut the front window to keep the noise from carrying out on the streets! I heard no mention of any Brazilian plantation! But plenty of other things were plainly referred to in that little midnight conversation you had! Larkspur Lotion—to take the polish off nails! Am I in my infancy, am I? That’s on a par with thewonderful rubber plantation! ( The door is thrown open. The Writer, wearing an ancient purple bathrobe, enters. )
W RITER: Stop!
M RS. W IRE: Oh! It’s you!
W RITER: Stop persecuting this woman!
M RS. W IRE: The second Mr. Shakespeare enters the scene!
W RITER : I heard your demon howling in my sleep!
M RS. W IRE: Sleep? Ho -ho! I think that what you mean is your drunken stupor!
W RITER: I rest because of my illness! Have I no right—
M RS. W IRE: ( interrupting )Illness— alcoholic! Don’t try to pull that beautiful wool over my eyes. I’m glad you come in now. Now I repeat for your benefit what I just said to this woman. I’m done with dead beats! Now is that plain to yuh? Completely fed-up with all you Quarter rats, half-breeds, drunkards, degenerates, who try to get by on promises, lies, delusions!
M RS. H ARDWICKE -M OORE: ( covering her ears ) Oh, please, please, please stop shrieking! It’s not necessary!
M RS. W IRE: ( turning on Mrs. Hardwicke-Moore )You with your Brazilian rubber plantation. That coat-of-arms on the wall that you got from the junk-shop—the woman who sold it told me! One of the Hapsburgs! Yes! A titled lady! The Lady of Larkspur Lotion! There’s your title! ( Mrs. Hardwicke-Moore cries out wildly and flings herself face down on the sagging bed. )
W RITER: ( with a pitying gesture )Stop badgering this unfortunate little woman! Is there no mercy left in the world anymore? What has become of compassion and understanding? Where have they all gone to? Where’s God? Where’s Christ? ( He leans trembling against the armoire. )What if there is no Brazilian rubber plantation?
M RS. H ARDWICKE -M OORE: ( sitting passionately erect )I tellyou there is, there is! ( Her throat is taut with conviction, her head thrown back. )
W RITER: What if there is no rubber king in her life! There ought to be rubber kings in her life! Is she to be blamed because it is necessary for her to compensate for the cruel deficiencies of reality by the exercise of a little—what shall I say?—God-given—imagination?
M RS. H ARDWICKE -M OORE: ( throwing herself face down on the bed once more )No, no, no, no, it isn’t —imagination!
M RS. W IRE: I’ll ask you to please stop spitting me in the face those high-flown speeches! You with your 780-page masterpiece—right on a par with the Lady of Larkspur Lotion as far as the use of imagination’s concerned!
W RITER: ( in a tired voice )Ah, well, now, what if I am? Suppose there is no 780-page masterpiece in existence. ( He closes his eyes and touches his forehead. )Supposing there is in existence no masterpiece whatsoever! What of that, Mrs. Wire? But only a few, a very few—vain scribblings—in my old trunk-bottom. . . . Suppose I wanted to be a great artist but lacked the force and the power! Suppose my books fell short of the final chapter, even my verses languished uncompleted! Suppose the curtains of my exalted fancy rose on magnificent dramas—but the house-lights darkened before the curtain fell! Suppose all of these unfortunate things are true! And suppose that I—stumbling from bar to bar, from drink to drink, till I sprawl at last on the lice-infested mattress of this brothel—suppose that I, to make this nightmare bearable for as long as I must continue to be the helpless protagonist of it—suppose that I ornament, illuminate—glorify it! With dreams and fictions and fancies! Such as the existence of a 780-page masterpiece—impending Broadway
M RS. H ARDWICKE -M OORE: What argument? What money?
M RS. W IRE: He shouted so loud I had to shut the front window to keep the noise from carrying out on the streets! I heard no mention of any Brazilian plantation! But plenty of other things were plainly referred to in that little midnight conversation you had! Larkspur Lotion—to take the polish off nails! Am I in my infancy, am I? That’s on a par with thewonderful rubber plantation! ( The door is thrown open. The Writer, wearing an ancient purple bathrobe, enters. )
W RITER: Stop!
M RS. W IRE: Oh! It’s you!
W RITER: Stop persecuting this woman!
M RS. W IRE: The second Mr. Shakespeare enters the scene!
W RITER : I heard your demon howling in my sleep!
M RS. W IRE: Sleep? Ho -ho! I think that what you mean is your drunken stupor!
W RITER: I rest because of my illness! Have I no right—
M RS. W IRE: ( interrupting )Illness— alcoholic! Don’t try to pull that beautiful wool over my eyes. I’m glad you come in now. Now I repeat for your benefit what I just said to this woman. I’m done with dead beats! Now is that plain to yuh? Completely fed-up with all you Quarter rats, half-breeds, drunkards, degenerates, who try to get by on promises, lies, delusions!
M RS. H ARDWICKE -M OORE: ( covering her ears ) Oh, please, please, please stop shrieking! It’s not necessary!
M RS. W IRE: ( turning on Mrs. Hardwicke-Moore )You with your Brazilian rubber plantation. That coat-of-arms on the wall that you got from the junk-shop—the woman who sold it told me! One of the Hapsburgs! Yes! A titled lady! The Lady of Larkspur Lotion! There’s your title! ( Mrs. Hardwicke-Moore cries out wildly and flings herself face down on the sagging bed. )
W RITER: ( with a pitying gesture )Stop badgering this unfortunate little woman! Is there no mercy left in the world anymore? What has become of compassion and understanding? Where have they all gone to? Where’s God? Where’s Christ? ( He leans trembling against the armoire. )What if there is no Brazilian rubber plantation?
M RS. H ARDWICKE -M OORE: ( sitting passionately erect )I tellyou there is, there is! ( Her throat is taut with conviction, her head thrown back. )
W RITER: What if there is no rubber king in her life! There ought to be rubber kings in her life! Is she to be blamed because it is necessary for her to compensate for the cruel deficiencies of reality by the exercise of a little—what shall I say?—God-given—imagination?
M RS. H ARDWICKE -M OORE: ( throwing herself face down on the bed once more )No, no, no, no, it isn’t —imagination!
M RS. W IRE: I’ll ask you to please stop spitting me in the face those high-flown speeches! You with your 780-page masterpiece—right on a par with the Lady of Larkspur Lotion as far as the use of imagination’s concerned!
W RITER: ( in a tired voice )Ah, well, now, what if I am? Suppose there is no 780-page masterpiece in existence. ( He closes his eyes and touches his forehead. )Supposing there is in existence no masterpiece whatsoever! What of that, Mrs. Wire? But only a few, a very few—vain scribblings—in my old trunk-bottom. . . . Suppose I wanted to be a great artist but lacked the force and the power! Suppose my books fell short of the final chapter, even my verses languished uncompleted! Suppose the curtains of my exalted fancy rose on magnificent dramas—but the house-lights darkened before the curtain fell! Suppose all of these unfortunate things are true! And suppose that I—stumbling from bar to bar, from drink to drink, till I sprawl at last on the lice-infested mattress of this brothel—suppose that I, to make this nightmare bearable for as long as I must continue to be the helpless protagonist of it—suppose that I ornament, illuminate—glorify it! With dreams and fictions and fancies! Such as the existence of a 780-page masterpiece—impending Broadway
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