Part 9
And yet you had to--shy away from Bernice. Into a smaller world that could be all your world. No, Craig, you haven’t power. It’s true. And for one hour in our lives let’s try to--Those love affairs of yours--they’re like your false writing--to keep yourself from knowing you haven’t power. Did you ever see a child try to do a thing--fail--then turn to something he could do and make a great show of doing that? That’s what most of our lives are like.
CRAIG
[_Rudely._] Well, why _haven’t_ I power? If you are going to be any good to me--tell me that.
MARGARET
[_Shaking her head._] I can’t tell you that. I haven’t any light that--goes there. But isn’t it true? Isn’t your life this long attempt to appear effective--to persuade yourself that you _are_ something? What a way to spend the little time there is for living.
CRAIG
I fancy it’s the way most lives are spent.
MARGARET
That only makes it infinitely sadder.
CRAIG
[_As if he can stay in this no longer._] As to writing, Margaret, the things that interest you wouldn’t interest most people.
MARGARET
“Wouldn’t interest most people!” Oh, Craig, don’t slide away from that one honest moment. Say you haven’t got it. Don’t say they wouldn’t want it. Why, if now--in this our day--our troubled day of many shadows--came a light--a light to reach those never lighted places--wouldn’t _want_ it? I wish some one could try them! No, Craig, they all have their times of suspecting their lives are going by in a fog. They’re _pitifully_ anxious for a little light. Why--they continue to look to _writers_. You know, Craig, what living makes of us--it’s a rim--a bounded circle--and yet we know--have our times of suspecting--that if we could break through _that_. [_Seeing._] O-h. It’s like living in the mountains--those high vast places of Colorado--in a little house with shaded windows. You’d _suspect_ what was there! A little sunshine through the cracks--mountain smells--and at times the house would shake--and you’d wonder--and be fretted in your little room. And if some day you could put up the shade and--_see where you were_. Life would never be so small a thing again. Bernice could do that. Her own life did not bound her.
CRAIG
No. That was what--
MARGARET
Hurt your vanity?
CRAIG
I don’t know. I’m trying to be honest. I honestly don’t know.
MARGARET
No. We don’t know. That’s why--oh, Craig, it would be so wonderful to be a writer--something that gets a little farther than others can get--gets at least the edge of the shadow. [_After her own moment on the edge of the shadow._] If you ever felt the shock of reality, and _got_ that back in you--you wouldn’t be thinking of whom it would “interest”! But, Craig--_this_. [_A movement toward the closed room._] Doesn’t _this_ give you that shock of reality?
CRAIG
What of _you_? Doesn’t it give it to you? You’re speaking as if this hadn’t happened! You leave it out--what Bernice did because of me. You’re talking of my having no power. What of _this_? _Had_ I no power? [_After her look at him._] Oh, yes--I know I used it terribly--plenty of years for my heart to break over that. But can you say I didn’t _have_ it?
MARGARET
I do leave it out. It isn’t right there should be anything in Bernice not Bernice. And she had a great rightness--rightness without effort--that rare, rare thing.
CRAIG
You say it isn’t right--and so you leave it out? And then _you_ talk about the shock of reality.
MARGARET
I don’t say it isn’t fact. I say it isn’t--_in the rightness_.
CRAIG
“In the rightness!” Is that for you to say? Is rightness what you think? What you can see? No. You didn’t know Bernice. You didn’t know she loved me--_that way_. And I didn’t know. But she did! How _could_ I have had that--and not _known_? But I _did_ have it! I did _have_ it! You say life broke through her--the whole of life. But Bernice didn’t want--the whole of life. She wanted _me_. [_He goes to the door, bows against it, all sorrow and need._] I want to talk to _her_--not you. I want her _now_--_knowing_.
[_He opens that door and goes in to Bernice. MARGARET stands motionless, searching, and as if something is coming to her from the rightness. When she speaks it is a denial from that inner affirmation._
MARGARET
No! I say--No! [_Feeling some one behind her, swiftly turning she sees ABBIE outside, looking through the not quite drawn curtains of the door. She goes to the door and draws ABBIE in._] Yes, I _am_ here--and I say _no_. [_She has hold of her, drawing her in as she says it._] You understand--I say _no_. _I don’t believe it._ What you told me--_I don’t believe it_.
ABBIE
[_At first it is horror--then strange relief, as if nothing could be so bad as this has been._] Well, I’m glad you know.
MARGARET
[_Very slowly, knowing now it is fact she has come to._] Glad I know _what_?
ABBIE
That it isn’t true. That she didn’t do it.
MARGARET
Didn’t do it? Did _not_ take her own life?
ABBIE
No. Of course she didn’t.
MARGARET
[_Still very slowly, as if much more is coming than she can take in._] Then _why_--did you say she did?
ABBIE
Because she said I must. Oh--look at me! Look at me! But you knew her. You know the strength of her. If she’d told you the way she told me--_you’d have done it too_. You would!
MARGARET
[_Saying each word by itself._] I can not understand one word you’re saying. Something is wrong with you. [_Changing, and roughly taking hold of ABBIE._] Tell me. Quick, the truth.
ABBIE
Wednesday night, about eight o’clock, about an hour after she told me to telegraph you, she said, “Why, Abbie, I believe I’m going to die.” I said no, but she said, “I think so.” I said we’d send for Mr. Norris. She said no, and not to frighten her father. I--_I_ didn’t think she was going to die. All the time I was trying to get the doctor. There were two hours when she was--quiet. Quiet--not like any quiet I ever knew. Thinking. You could see thinking in her eyes--stronger than sickness. Then, after ten, she called me to her. She took my hands. She said, “Abbie, you’ve lived with me all my life.” “Yes,” I said. “You love me.” “Oh, yes,” I said. “Will you do something for me?” “You know I will,” I told her. “Abbie,” she said, looking right at me, _all_ of her looking right at me, “if I die, I want you to tell my husband I killed myself.” [_MARGARET falls back._] Yes, I did that too. Then I thought it was her mind. But I looked at her, and oh, her mind was there! It was terrible--how it was all _there_. She said--and then she [_The sobs she has been holding back almost keep ABBIE from saying this_]--held out her hands to me--“Oh, Abbie, do this last thing for me! After all there has been, I have a _right_ to do it. If my life is going--let me have _this_ much from it!” And as still I couldn’t--_couldn’t_--the tears ran down her face and she said, “I want to rest before pain comes again. Promise me so I can rest.” And I promised. And you would have too!
MARGARET
You don’t know what you’re _telling_ me! You don’t know _what_ you’re doing. You do this _now_--after she can do nothing? [_Holding out her hands._] Abbie! Tell me it isn’t true!
ABBIE
It’s true.
MARGARET
You are telling me her life was _hate_? [_Stops, half turns to the room where CRAIG is with Bernice._] You are telling me she covered hate with--with the beauty that was like nothing else? Abbie! _You_ are telling me that as Bernice left life she _held out her hands_ and asked you to take _this_ back for her?
ABBIE
There are things we can’t understand. There’s no use trying.
[_She turns to go._
MARGARET
You can’t leave me like this!
ABBIE
[_More gently._] You shouldn’t have tried to know. But--if you have _got_ to know things--you have got to take them.
[_CRAIG comes out; ABBIE goes._
CRAIG
Go in there, Margaret. There’s something wonderful there.
MARGARET
[_Turned from him, her face buried in her hands._] Oh no--no--no. I can _never_ go in there. I--I never _was_--in there.
[_Her other words are lost in wild sobbing. He stands regarding her in wonder, but not losing what he himself has found._
(CURTAIN)
ACT THREE
SCENE: _The same as in Acts One and Two; it is early afternoon of the next day; the door leading outdoors is a little open; when the curtain is drawn CRAIG is seen outside, just passing the window, as one who is walking back and forth in thinking. In the room are LAURA and the FATHER--the FATHER sitting at the table by the stairs--LAURA, standing, watches CRAIG pass the door; she has in her hand a paper on which are some memoranda. After watching CRAIG she sighs, looks at her notes, sits down._
LAURA
I’m sorry to be troubling you, Mr. Allen. Certainly you should not be asked to discuss these matters about--arrangements. But really, you and I seem the only people who are capable of going on with things. I must say, I don’t know what to make of everyone else. They all seem to be trying to--keep away from one. I think that’s a little unnecessary. Of course I know what grief does, and I’m sure I have every consideration for that, but really--I’m sorry Craig keeps his own sister out. When I’m here to help him. And Abbie--why she seems to have lost her head. Just when it’s so important that she look after things. And as to Margaret Pierce--she certainly is worse than useless. I don’t see what she came for if she didn’t want to be helpful.
FATHER
Margaret and Bernice were very dear friends, Laura.
LAURA
Is that any reason for not being helpful in Bernice’s household at a time like this? Really I do like control. [_After looking at her notes._] Then the minister will come here at three, Mr. Allen. Why that will be little more than an hour! Think of things having been neglected like this! [_As CRAIG, having turned in his walk, is again passing the door._] Craig! [_He steps to the door._] The minister, Mr. Howe, will come here, Craig, at three.
CRAIG
What for?
LAURA
Craig! What _for_?
CRAIG
I don’t see why he comes here. Why Bernice scarcely knew him. [_To her father._] Did Bernice know him?
FATHER
Well, I don’t know whether she knew him, but--
LAURA
It is not a personal matter, Craig.
CRAIG
I think it is. Very personal.
LAURA
You mean to say you are not going to have any _service_?
CRAIG
I haven’t thought anything about it. Oh, Laura! How can I think of such things now?
LAURA
Well, I will think of them for you, dear.
CRAIG
Don’t bring him here. He can go--[_Stops_] there, if he wants to. Where--we have to go. Not here. In her own house. The very last thing.
FATHER
I’m afraid it will seem strange, Craig.
CRAIG
Strange? Do I care if it seems strange? Bernice seemed strange too. But she wasn’t strange. She was wonderful. [_Putting out his hand impatiently._] Oh, _no_, Laura. There’s so much else to think of--now.
[_He steps out of the door and stands there, his back to the room._
FATHER
[_In a low voice._] I wonder--could we go somewhere else? Into my room, perhaps. I’m afraid we are keeping Craig out of here. And I think he wants to be here--near Bernice. We will be undisturbed in my room.
[_He gets up and goes to the door of his room, LAURA turns to follow. Outside CRAIG passes from sight._
LAURA
I think it’s too bad things have to be made so--complicated.
FATHER
[_After opening the door._] Oh, Margaret is in here.
MARGARET
[_From the other room._] I was just going out. I just came in here to--[_Enters._] I just went in there--I didn’t think about it being your room.
FATHER
Why that was quite all right, Margaret. I’m only sorry to disturb you.
MARGARET
No. That doesn’t matter. I--wasn’t doing anything.
LAURA
There is a great deal to do.
[_She follows the FATHER into his room. MARGARET walks across the room, walks back, stands still, head bent, hands pressing her temples. ABBIE comes part way down the stairs, sees MARGARET, stands still as if not to be heard, turns to go back upstairs._
MARGARET
[_Hearing her, looking up._] Abbie! [_ABBIE comes slowly down._] Where is he, Mr. Norris? Where is he?
ABBIE
I don’t know. He was here a little while ago. Perhaps he went out.
[_Indicating the open door._
MARGARET
I have to tell him!
ABBIE
[_After an incredulous moment._] Tell _him_ what you made me tell you?
MARGARET
Of course I have to tell him! You think I can leave that on him? And the things I said to him--they were not just.
ABBIE
And you’d rather be “just” than leave it as she wanted it?
MARGARET
Oh, but Abbie--what she _wanted_--[_Holds up her hand as if to shut something from her eyes._] No. You can’t put that on anyone. I couldn’t _live_--feeling I had left on him what shouldn’t be there.
ABBIE
But you wouldn’t tell him _now_?
MARGARET
I must tell him now. Or I won’t tell him. And I must go away. I can’t stay. I can’t stay here.
ABBIE
But what will they think--your leaving? You mean--before we’ve taken _her_ away?
MARGARET
Oh, I don’t know. How can I--plan it out? I’m going as soon as I can tell him. All night--all day--I’ve been trying to tell him--and when I get near him--I run away. _Why did you tell me?_
ABBIE
[_Harshly._] Why did you _know_--what you weren’t to know? But if you have some way of knowing what you aren’t told--you think you have the right to do _your_ thing with that? Undo what she did? What _I_ did? Do you know what it took _out_ of me to do this? There’s nothing left of me.
MARGARET
[_With a laugh. Right on the verge of being not herself._] No. You’re a wreck. Another wreck. It’s your Darwinian theory. Your free speech.
ABBIE
Oh, I was afraid of you. I didn’t want you to come. I knew you’d--get _to_ things.
[_ABBIE goes to the door and looks out._
MARGARET
He is out there?
ABBIE
Yes.
[_MARGARET tries to go; moves just a little._] And you’d go to him and--what _for_?
MARGARET
Because I can’t _live_--leaving that on him--having him think--when I know he didn’t. I can’t leave that on him one more hour.
ABBIE
[_Standing in the door to block her going._] And when you take that from him--_what do you give to him?_
[_They stare at one another; MARGARET falls back._
MARGARET
Don’t ask me to see so many things, Abbie. I can only see this thing. I’ve grown afraid of seeing.
ABBIE
[_After looking at her, seeing something of her suffering._] Miss Margaret, why did you do what you did last night? How did you know?
MARGARET
I don’t know.
ABBIE
But you knew.
MARGARET
No. I didn’t _know_. I didn’t know. It didn’t come from me. It came--from the rightness.
[_A laugh._
ABBIE
If you could get that without being told--why don’t you get more without being told? [_MARGARET gives her a startled look._] For you will never be told.
MARGARET
You know _more_?
ABBIE
No. My knowing stops with what you got from me last night. But I knew her. I thought maybe, as you have some way of knowing what you aren’t told, you could--see into this. _See._
MARGARET
I’ve lost my seeing. It was through her I saw. It was through Bernice I could see. And now it’s dark. [_Slowly turning toward the closed room._] Oh, how still death is.
[_The two women are as if caught into this stillness._
ABBIE
[_Looking from the door._] He turned this way. [_Swiftly turning back to MARGARET._] But you _couldn’t_ tell him.
MARGARET
No, I can’t. Yes, I must! I tell you there’s something in me can’t _stand_ it to see any one go down under a thing he shouldn’t have to bear. Why that feeling has made my life! Do you think I’ve _wanted_ to do the kind of work I do? Don’t you think I’d like to be doing--happier things? But there’s something in my blood _drives_ me to--what’s right.
ABBIE
And something in _my_ blood drives me to what’s right! And I went against it--went against my whole life--so she could rest. I did it because I loved her. But you didn’t love her.
MARGARET
Oh--Abbie!
ABBIE
Not as you love--what’s right. If you loved her, don’t you want to protect her--now that she lies dead in there? [_Her voice breaking._] Oh, Miss Margaret, it was right at the very _end_ of her life. Maybe when we’re going to die things we’ve borne all our lives are things we can’t bear any longer. Just--don’t count that last hour.
MARGARET
[_After a moment of being swayed by this._] Yet you counted it, Abbie. You did what she said--because of the strength of her. You told me last night--her mind was there. Terrible the way it was right _there_. She hadn’t left her life.
ABBIE
Well, and if she hadn’t left her life! If all those years with him there was something she hid, and if she seemed to feel--what she didn’t feel. She did it well, didn’t she?--and almost to the last. Shan’t we hide it now? For her? You and me, who loved her--isn’t she _safe_--with us? [_Going nearer MARGARET._] Perhaps if you would go in there now--
MARGARET
Oh no--no.
ABBIE
[_In a last deeply emotional appeal._] Miss Margaret, didn’t she do a good deal for you?
MARGARET
_Do_ a good deal for me? Yes. Yes!
ABBIE
Yes. She did for me. I--I’m something _more_ on account of her. Aren’t you?
MARGARET
Yes.
ABBIE
Yes, I think you are too. I can see myself as I’d have been if my life hadn’t been lived round her. [_Thinks, shakes her head._] It would be left you--what feels and knows it feels. And you said it was through Bernice you could see. Well, lets forget what we don’t want to know! On account of what we are that we wouldn’t have been--lets put it out of our minds! One ugly thing in a whole beautiful life! Let it go! And let all the rest live! [_They can see CRAIG outside._] Oh--do this for _her_. _Make_ yourself do it. Let _that_ be what’s dead--and let all the rest live! You were _her_ friend not his.
[_CRAIG turns to the house, but when about to come in, turns away, covering his face._
MARGARET
[_Taking hold of ABBIE._] You see? He thinks she loved him and he killed her. He might do what he thinks she did!
ABBIE
[_Falling back._] O-h.
[_CRAIG comes in, stands by the door; MARGARET has drawn ABBIE over near the stairway. He sees them, but gives no heed to them, immersed in what he is living through. While he stands there MARGARET does not move. He turns toward the room where Bernice is; when he moves MARGARET goes a little toward him--his back is to her; ABBIE moves to step between CRAIG and MARGARET; MARGARET puts her aside. But when CRAIG comes to the closed door, and stands there an instant before it, not opening it, MARGARET too stops, as if she cannot come nearer him. It is only after he has opened the door and closed it behind him that she goes to it. She puts out her hands, but she does not even touch the door and when she cannot do this she covers her face and, head bent, stands there before the closed door. LAURA and the FATHER come out from the room where they have been. As they enter ABBIE slowly goes out, toward the kitchen._
LAURA
[_After looking at MARGARET, who has not moved._] We are going in an hour, Margaret.
MARGARET
Going?
LAURA
Taking Bernice to the cemetery.
MARGARET
Oh. Are we?
[_After a look which shows her disapproval LAURA goes out, following ABBIE._
FATHER
[_Sitting._] I can’t believe that, Margaret.
MARGARET
No. [_MARGARET sits in the window seat, by which she has been standing. As if she is just realizing what they have said._] You say--we are taking Bernice away from here--in an hour?
FATHER
Yes. Think of it, Margaret. I just can’t--take it in.
MARGARET
No.
FATHER
There is something I want to tell you, Margaret. [_MARGARET gives him a quick look, then turns away, as if afraid._] I’ve been wanting to tell you--but it’s hard to talk of such things. But before we--take Bernice away, before you--see her the last time--I want you to know. That night--the night Bernice died--at the very last, Abbie was afraid then--and had called to me. Abbie and I were in there and--Abbie went out, about the telephone call we had in for the doctor. I was all alone in there a few minutes--right at the last. Bernice said one last word, Margaret. Your name.
MARGARET
She called to me?
FATHER
No, I wouldn’t say she called to you. Just said your name. The way we say things to ourselves--say them without knowing we were going to say them. She didn’t really say it. She breathed it. It seemed to come from her whole life.
MARGARET
O-h. Then it wasn’t as if she had left me? It wasn’t as if anything was in between--
FATHER
Why no, Margaret. What an idea. Why I don’t think you ever were as close to Bernice as when she said your name and died.
[_MARGARET’S head goes down; she is crying. CRAIG comes out, carefully closing the door behind him. Partly crosses the room, looks uncertainly at the outer door as if to go outside again._
FATHER
Sit down, Craig. [_CRAIG does this._] Let’s not try to keep away from each other now. We’re all going through the same thing--in our--our different ways. [_A pause. MARGARET raises her head; she is turned a little away from the other two._] I was so glad when you came, Margaret. I don’t want Bernice to slip away from us. In an hour we--take her away from here--out of this house she loved. I don’t want her to slip away from us. She loved you so, Margaret. Didn’t she, Craig?
CRAIG
Yes. She did love Margaret.
FATHER
Oh, yes. “Margaret sees things,” she’d say. [_Wistfully._] She had great beauty--didn’t she, Margaret?
MARGARET
I always thought so.
FATHER
Oh, yes. I was thinking last night--malice was not in Bernice. I never knew her to do a--really unfriendly thing to any one. [_Again in that wistful way._] You know, Margaret, I had thought you would say things like this--and better than I can say them, to--to keep my little girl for us all. I suppose I’m a foolish old man but I seem to want them said. [_Pause. MARGARET seems to try to speak, but does not._] I think it was gentle of Bernice to be amused by things she--perhaps couldn’t admire in us she loved. Me. I suppose she might have liked a father who amounted to more--but she always seemed to take pleasure in me. Affectionate amusement. Didn’t you feel that in Bernice, Craig?
CRAIG