Act 1 Flashcards
Prince
So?
Harry
I dropped it! And when I turned into Flower and Dean Street I raised it again. He must have guessed what I was going to do. Christ! I never saw so many policemen appear so quickly. They seemed to pour out of all the windows when they heard that penny-farthing whistle. I only just had time to hop into my mother’s place.
Monty
And you stayed there?
Harry
I had a cup of tea and at about four o’clock I came out. I got to Gardiner’s Corner and police were charging the barricades. I didn’t see no Fascists. Any get there?
Prince
They stayed in the back streets. The police did all the attacking. So?
Harry
So I saw the police were picking our boys off like flies and then I saw my policeman – his hat was missing by this time. Oooh! There was a vicious look came into his eye when he saw me. I didn’t stop to ask him where he’d lost it. I just ran back to my mother’s and read a book.
Hymie
(ominously) So you were at your mother’s. (To the others.) I think we’d better go before Sarah comes back. Harry, we’re going.
Harry
You’re not staying for something to eat?
Hymie
Lottie’s waiting for me, Harry. Come on, you two.
Harry
Hey, Hymie. You won’t tell her I was at my mother’s all the time, will you? No?
Sarah
You think I’m a fool, don’t you?
Harry shifts uncomfortably, doesn’t answer. Sarah watches him.
Sarah
Think I can’t see, that I don’t know what’s going on. (Pause.) Look at him! The man of the house! Nothing matters to him! (Pause.) Well, Harry, why don’t you look at me? Why don’t you talk to me? I’m your wife, aren’t I? A man is supposed to discuss things with his wife.
Harry
(at last) What do you want me to say?
Sarah
Must I tell you what to say? Don’t you know? Don’t you just know! (Pause.) Artful! Oh, you’re so artful!
Harry
Yes, yes, I’m artful.
Harry
Yes, yes, I’m artful.
Sarah
Aren’t you artful, then? You think because you sit there pretending to read that I won’t say anything? That’s what you’d like – that I should just come in and carry on and not say anything. You’d like that, wouldn’t you? That you should carry on your life just the same as always and no one should say anything.
Harry
Oh, leave me alone, Sarah.
Sarah
Oh, leave me alone, Sarah! I’ll leave you alone all right. There’ll be blue murder, Harry, you hear me? There’ll be blue murder if it carries on like this. All our life is it going to be like this? I can’t leave a handbag in the room. You remember what happened last time? You left me! Remember?
Sarah
Remember? And you wanted to come back? And you came back – full of promises. What’s happened to them now?
Harry
Nothing’s happened! Now stop nagging! Good God, you don’t let a man live in peace.
Sarah
You can still pretend? After you took ten shillings from my bag and you know that I know you took it and you can still be righteous? Say you don’t know anything about it, go on. Say you don’t know what I’m talking about.
Harry
No. I don’t know what you’re talking about.
Sarah
(finally unable to control herself, cursing him) Fire on your head! May you live so sure if you don’t know what I’m talking about. The money fell out of my purse, I suppose. I dropped it in the street. (Screaming at him.) Fire on your head!
Harry
(rising and facing her in a rage) I’ll throw this book at you – so help me I’ll throw this book at you.
Ada
Harry, stop it. (She cries.) Oh, stop it!
Harry
(shouting) Tell your mother to stop it, she’s the cause, it’s her row. Don’t you know your mother by now? (He has moved away to the door.)
Sarah
I’m the cause? Me? You hear him, Ada, you hear him? I’m the cause! (Throws a saucer at him.) Swine, you!
Harry
(in speechless rage, throws his book to the ground) She’s mad, your mother, she’s stark raving mad!
