Icebound: A Play

The Project Gutenberg EBook of Icebound, by Owen Davis This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org/license Title: Icebound A Play Author: Owen Davis Release Date: June 18, 2019 [EBook #59777] Language: English Character set encoding: UTF-8 *** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ICEBOUND *** Produced by Tim Lindell, David E. Brown, and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This book was produced from images made available by the HathiTrust Digital Library.) ICEBOUND By Owen Davis THE DETOUR ICEBOUND ICEBOUND _A Play_ BY OWEN DAVIS [Illustration] BOSTON LITTLE, BROWN, AND COMPANY 1923 _Copyright, 1922, 1923_, BY OWEN DAVIS. _All rights reserved_ Published July, 1923 No performance of this play, professional or amateur,--or public reading of it--may be given without the written permission of the author and the payment of royalty. Application for the rights of performing “Icebound” must be made to Sam H. Harris, Sam H. Harris Theatre, New York City. PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA FOREWORD With the production of “The Detour,” about a year ago, I managed to secure some measure of success in drawing a simple picture of life as it is lived on a Long Island farm; encouraged by this, I am now turning toward my own people, the people of northern New England, whose folklore, up to the present time, has been quite neglected in our theatre. I mean, of course, that few serious attempts have been made in the direction of a genre comedy of this locality. Here I have at least tried to draw a true picture of these people, and I am of their blood, born of generations of Northern Maine, small-town folk, and brought up among them. In my memory of them is little of the “Rube” caricature of the conventional theatre; they are neither buffoons nor sentimentalists, and at least neither their faults nor their virtues are borrowed from the melting pot but are the direct result of their own heritage and environment. OWEN DAVIS. 1923. ICEBOUND “Icebound” was originally produced in New York, February 10, 1923, with the following cast: HENRY JORDAN _John Westley_ EMMA, his wife _Lotta Linthicum_ NETTIE, her daughter by a former marriage _Boots Wooster_ SADIE FELLOWS, once Sadie Jordan, a widow _Eva Condon_ ORIN, her son _Andrew J. Lawlor, Jr._ ELLA JORDAN, the unmarried sister _Frances Neilson_ DOCTOR CURTIS _Lawrence Eddinger_ JANE CROSBY, a second cousin of the Jordans _Phyllis Povah_ JUDGE BRADFORD _Willard Robertson_ BEN JORDAN _Robert Ames_ HANNAH _Edna May Oliver_ JIM JAY _Charles Henderson_ ACT ONE. THE PARLOR OF THE JORDAN HOMESTEAD, 4 P.M., October, 1922. ACT TWO. THE SITTING ROOM OF THE JORDAN HOMESTEAD, Two months later. Afternoon. ACT THREE. SAME AS ACT I, Late in the following March. ICEBOUND ACT ONE _Scene: The parlor of the Jordan Homestead at Venzie, Maine._ _It is late October, and through the two windows at the back one may see a bleak countryside, the grass brown and lifeless, and the bare limbs of the trees silhouetted against a gray sky. Here, in the room that for a hundred years has been the rallying point of the Jordan family, a group of relatives are gathered to await the death of the old woman who is the head of their clan. The room in which they wait is as dull and as drab as the lives of those who have lived within its walls. Here we have the cleanliness that is next to godliness, but no sign of either comfort or beauty, both of which are looked upon with suspicion as being signposts on the road to perdition._ _In this group are the following characters: Henry Jordan, a heavy set man of fifty, worn by his business cares into a dull sort of hopeless resignation. Emma, his wife, a stout and rather formidable woman of forty, with a look of chronic displeasure; Nettie, her daughter by a former marriage, a vain and shallow little rustic beauty; Sadie, a thin, tight-lipped woman of forty, a widow and a gossip; Orin, her son, a pasty-faced boy of ten with large spectacles; Ella, a “Maiden lady” of thirty-six, restless and dissatisfied._ _Ella and Sadie, true Jordans by birth, are a degree above Emma in social standing, at least they were until Henry’s marriage to Emma made her a somewhat resentful member of the family. In Emma’s dialogue and in her reactions, I have attempted a rather nice distinction between the two grades of rural middle-class folk; the younger characters here, as in most other communities, have advanced one step._ _Rise: At rise there is a long silence; the occupants of the room are ill at ease. Emma is grim and frowning. Nettie sits with a simper of youthful vanity, looking stealthily at herself from time to time in a small mirror set in the top of her cheap vanity case. Ella and Sadie have been crying and dab at their eyes a bit ostentatiously. Henry makes a thoughtful note with a pencil, then returns his notebook to his pocket and warms his hands at the stove._ _There is a low whistle of a cold autumn wind as some dead leaves are blown past the window. Orin, who has a cold in his head, sniffs viciously; the others, with the exception of his mother, look at him in remonstrance. An eight-day clock in sight, through the door to the hall, strikes four._ EMMA (_sternly_) Four o’clock. HENRY (_looks at watch_) Five minutes of. That clock’s been fast for more’n thirty years. NETTIE (_looks at wrist watch_) My watch says two minutes after. HENRY Well, it’s wrong! EMMA (_acidly_) You gave it to her yourself, didn’t you? SADIE (_sighs_) Good Land! What does it matter? NETTIE (_offended_) Oh! Doesn’t it? Oh! ELLA Maybe it does to you. She ain’t your blood relation. EMMA Nettie loves her grandma, don’t you dear? NETTIE Some folks not so far off may get fooled before long about how much grandma and I was to each other. EMMA (_sternly_) You hush! [_Again there is a pause, and again it is broken by a loud sniff from Orin, as the women look at him in disgust. Sadie speaks up in his defense._ SADIE He’s got kind of a cold in his head. HENRY The question is, ain’t he got a handkerchief? SADIE Here, Orin! [_She hands him her handkerchief._ ELLA The idea! No handkerchief when you’ve come expectin’ some one to die! ORIN I had one, but I used it up. [_He blows his nose._ HENRY After four. Well, I expect they’ll have to close the store without me. ELLA I left everything just as soon as Jane sent me word! SADIE Why should Jane be with her instead of you or me, her own daughters? HENRY You girls always made her nervous, and I guess she’s pretty low. (_He looks at his watch again_) I said I’d be back before closin’ time. I don’t know as I dare to trust those boys. EMMA You can’t tell about things, when Sadie’s husband died we sat there most all night. SADIE (_angrily_) Yes, and you grudged it to him, I knew it then and it isn’t likely I’m going to forget it. ELLA Will was a good man, but even you can’t say he was ever very dependable. EMMA My first husband died sudden--(_she turns to Nettie_)--you can’t remember it, dear. ELLA _You_ didn’t remember it very long, it wa’n’t much more’n a year before you married Henry. HENRY (_sighs_) Well, he was as dead then as he’s ever got to be. (_He turns and glances nervously out window_) I don’t know but what I could just run down to the store for a minute, then hurry right back. SADIE You’re the oldest of her children, a body would think you’d be ashamed. HENRY Oh, I’ll stay. [_There is a silence. Orin sniffs. Ella glares at him._ ELLA Of course he _could_ sit somewheres else. [_Sadie puts her arm about Orin and looks spitefully at Ella. Doctor Curtis, an elderly country physician, comes down the stairs and enters the room, all turn to look at him._ DOCTOR No change at all. I’m sendin’ Jane to the drug store. ELLA (_rises eagerly_) I’ll just run up and sit with mother. [_Sadie jumps up and starts for door._ SADIE It might be better if I went. ELLA Why might it? [_They stand glaring at each other before either attempts to pass the Doctor, whose ample form almost blocks the doorway._ SADIE _I’ve_ been a wife and a mother. DOCTOR Hannah’s with her, you know. I told you I didn’t want anybody up there but Jane and Hannah. ELLA But we’re her own daughters. DOCTOR You don’t have to tell me, I brought both of you into the world. The right nursing might pull her through, even now; nothing else can, and I’ve got the two women I want. (_He crosses to Henry at stove_) Why don’t you put a little wood on the fire? HENRY Why--I thought ’twas warm enough. ELLA Because you was standin’ in front of it gettin’ all the heat. [_Henry fills the stove from wood basket._ _Jane Crosby enters on stairs and crosses into the room. Jane is twenty-four, a plainly dressed girl of quiet manner. She has been “driven into herself” as one of our characters would describe it, by her lack of sympathy and affection and as a natural result she is not especially articulate; she speaks, as a rule, in short sentences, and has cultivated an outward coldness that in the course of time has become almost aggressive._ JANE I’ll go now, Doctor; you’d better go back to her. Hannah’s frightened. DOCTOR Get it as quick as you can, Jane; I don’t know as it’s any use, but we’ve got to keep on tryin’. JANE Yes. [_She exits; Doctor warms his hands._ DOCTOR Jane’s been up with her three nights. I don’t know when I’ve seen a more dependable girl. ELLA She ought to be. HENRY If there’s any gratitude in the world. DOCTOR Oh, I guess there is; maybe there’d be more if there was more reason for it. It’s awful cold up there, but I guess I’ll be gettin’ back. [_He crosses toward door._ HENRY Doctor! [_He looks at his watch._ DOCTOR (_stops in doorway_) Well? HENRY It’s quite a bit past four, I don’t suppose--I don’t suppose you can tell---- DOCTOR No, I can’t tell. [_He turns and exits up the stairs._ ELLA There’s no fool like an old fool. SADIE Did you hear him? “Didn’t know when he’d seen a more dependable girl than her!” EMMA Makes a lot of difference who’s goin’ to depend on her. I ain’t, for one. NETTIE If I set out to tell how she’s treated me lots of times, when I’ve come over here to see grandma, nobody would believe a word of it. SADIE Mother took her in out of charity. ELLA And kept her out of spite. HENRY I don’t know as you ought to say that, Ella. ELLA It’s my place she took, in my own mother’s house. I’d been here now, but for her. I ain’t goin’ to forget that. No! Me, all these years payin’ board and slavin’ my life out, makin’ hats, like a nigger. NETTIE (_smartly_) Oh! So _that’s_ what they’re like. I’ve often wondered! ELLA (_rises_) You’ll keep that common little thing of your wife’s from insultin’ me, Henry Jordan, or I won’t stay here another minute. EMMA (_angry_) Common! NETTIE Mother! HENRY (_sternly_) Hush up! All of yer! SADIE It’s Jane we ought to be talkin’ about. EMMA Just as soon as you’re the head of the family, Henry, you’ve got to tell her she ain’t wanted here! HENRY Well--I don’t know as I’d want to do anything that wasn’t right. She’s been here quite a spell. SADIE Eight years! ELLA And just a step-cousin, once removed. HENRY I guess mother’s made her earn her keep. I don’t know as ever there was much love lost between ’em. EMMA As soon as your mother’s dead, you’ll send her packing. HENRY We’ll see. I don’t like countin’ on mother’s going; that way. SADIE (_hopefully_) Grandmother lived to eighty-four. HENRY All our folks was long lived; nothin’ lasts like it used to,--Poor mother! ELLA Of course she’ll divide equal, between us three? HENRY (_doubtfully_) Well, I don’t know! SADIE Orin is her only grandchild; she won’t forget that. HENRY Nettie, there, is just the same as my own. I adopted her legal, when I married Emma. EMMA Of course you did. Your mother’s too--just a woman to make distinctions! NETTIE Yes, and the funny part of it is grandma may leave me a whole lot, for all any of _you_ know. ELLA Nonsense! She’ll divide equally between us three; won’t she, Henry? HENRY (_sadly_) She’ll do as she pleases, I guess we all know that. ELLA She’s a religious woman, she’s _got_ to be fair! HENRY Well, I guess it would be fair enough if she was to remember the trouble I’ve had with my business. I don’t know what she’s worth, she’s as tight-mouthed as a bear trap, but I could use more’n a third of quite a little sum. ELLA Well, you won’t get it. Not if I go to law. EMMA It’s disgusting. Talking about money at a time like this. HENRY I like to see folks reasonable. I don’t know what you’d want of a third of all mother’s got, Ella. SADIE (_to Ella_) You, all alone in the world! ELLA Maybe I won’t be, when I get that money. SADIE You don’t mean you’d get married? EMMA At your age! ELLA I mean I never had anything in all my life; now I’m going to. I’m the youngest of all of you, except Ben, and he never was a real Jordan. I’ve never had a chance; I’ve been stuck here till I’m most forty, worse than if I was dead, fifty times worse! Now I’m going to buy things--everything I want--I don’t care what--I’ll buy it, even if it’s a man! Anything I want! NETTIE A man! [_Nettie looks at Ella in cruel amazement and all but Orin burst into a laugh--Ella turns up and hides her face against the window as Orin pulls at his mother’s skirt._ ORIN Mum! Mum! I thought you told me not to laugh, not once, while we was here! HENRY You’re right, nephew, and we’re wrong, all of us. I’m sorry, Ella, we’re all sorry. ELLA (_wipes her eyes_) Laugh if you want to--maybe it won’t be so long before I do some of it myself. HENRY (_thoughtfully_) Equally between us three? Well, poor mother knows best of course. [_He sighs._ SADIE She wouldn’t leave _him_ any, would she,--Ben? ELLA (_shocked_) Ben! HENRY (_in cold anger_) She’s a woman of her word; no! SADIE If he was here he’d get around her; he always did! HENRY Not again! SADIE If she ever spoiled anybody it was him, and she’s had to pay for it. Sometimes it looks like it was a sort of a judgment. HENRY There hasn’t been a Jordan, before Ben, who’s disgraced the name in more’n a hundred years; he stands indicted before the Grand Jury for some of his drunken devilment. If he hadn’t run away, like the criminal he is, he’d be in the State’s Prison now, down to Thomaston. Don’t talk _Ben_ to me, after the way he broke mother’s heart, and hurt my credit! NETTIE I don’t remember him very well. Mother thought it better I shouldn’t come around last time he was here; but he looked real nice in his uniform. SADIE It was his bein’ born so long after us that made him seem like an outsider; father and mother hadn’t had any children for years and years! Of course I never want to sit in judgment on my own parents, but I never approved of it; it never seemed quite--what I call proper. NETTIE (_to Emma_) Mother, don’t you think I’d better leave the room? SADIE (_angrily_) Not if half the stories I’ve heard about you are true, I don’t. HENRY Come, come, no rows! Is this a time or place for spite? We’ve always been a united family, we’ve always got to be,--leavin’ Ben out, of course. You can’t make a silk purse out of a sow’s ear. ORIN Mum! Say Mum! (_He pulls at Sadie’s dress_) Why should anybody want to make a silk purse out of a sow’s ear? ELLA Can’t you stop that boy askin’ such fool questions? SADIE Well, as far as that goes, why should they? It never sounded reasonable to me. HENRY (_sternly_) Decent folks don’t reason about religion; they just accept it. ORIN You could make a skin purse out of a sow’s ear, but I’ll be darned if you could make a silk purse out of one. I’ll bet God couldn’t. HENRY Are you going to let him talk about God like that, like he was a real person? ELLA I don’t know as a body could expect any better; his father was a Baptist! SADIE (_angrily_) His father was a good man, and if he talked about God different from what you do, it was because he knew more about him. And as for my being here at all--(_she rises with her arms about Orin_)--I wouldn’t do it, not for anything less than my own mother’s deathbed. HENRY This family don’t ever agree on nothin’ but just to differ. EMMA As far as I see, the only time you ever get together is when one of you is dead. ELLA Maybe that’s the reason I got such a feelin’ against funerals. [_The outside door opens and Jane enters, a druggist’s bottle in her hand; she is followed by John Bradford, a man of about thirty-five. He is better dressed than any of the others and is a man of a more cosmopolitan type,--a New Englander, but a university man, the local judge and the leading lawyer of the town._ JANE I met Judge Bradford on the way. JUDGE (_John Bradford_) Court set late. I couldn’t get here before. Jane tells me that she’s very low. HENRY Yes. JUDGE I can’t realize it; she has always been so strong, so dominant. ELLA In the midst of life we are in death. ORIN Say, Mum, that’s in the Bible too! SADIE Hush! ORIN Well, ain’t it? SADIE Will you hush? HENRY It’s our duty to hope so long as we can. JUDGE Yes, of course. JANE I’ll take this right up. [_She exits up the stairs._ JUDGE (_removes his coat_) I’ll wait. SADIE She can’t see you; she ain’t really what a body could call in her right mind. JUDGE So Jane said. [_He crosses to stove and warms his hands._ ELLA (_sighs_) It’s a sad time for us, Judge! JUDGE She was always such a wonderful woman. HENRY An awful time for us. Did you come up Main Street, Judge? JUDGE Yes. HENRY Did you happen to notice if my store was open? JUDGE No. HENRY Not that it matters---- SADIE Nothing matters now. HENRY No--Mother wasn’t ever the kind to neglect things; if the worst does come she’ll find herself prepared. Won’t she? Won’t she, Judge? JUDGE Her affairs are, as usual, in perfect order. HENRY In every way? JUDGE (_looks at him coldly_) Her will is drawn and is on deposit in my office, if that is what you mean. HENRY Well--that _is_ what I mean--I’m no hypocrite. EMMA He’s the oldest of the family. He’s got a right to ask, hasn’t he? JUDGE Yes. HENRY (_honestly_) If I could make her well by givin’ up everything I’ve got in the world, or ever expect to git, I’d do it! SADIE All of us would. HENRY If it’s in my mind at all, as I stand here, that she’s a rich woman, it’s because my mind’s so worried, the way business has been, that I’m drove most frantic; it’s because, well--because I’m human; because I can’t help it. ELLA (_bitterly_) You’re a man! What do you think it’s been for me! SADIE (_with arm about Orin_) His father didn’t leave much, you all know that, and it’s been scrimp and save till I’m all worn to skin and bone. ELLA Just to the three of us, that would be fair. HENRY Judge! My brother’s name ain’t in her will, is it? Tell me that? Ben’s name ain’t there! JUDGE I’d rather not talk about it, Henry. ELLA She’d cut him off, she said, the last time he disgraced us, and she’s a woman of her word. SADIE (_eagerly, to Judge_) And the very next day she sent for you because I was here when she telephoned; and you came to her that very afternoon because I saw you from my front window cross right up to this door. JUDGE Possibly. I frequently drop in to discuss business matters with your mother for a moment on my way home. SADIE It was five minutes to four when you went in that day, and six minutes to five when you came out, by the clock on my mantel. JUDGE Your brother has been gone for almost two years; Your memory is very clear. ELLA So’s her window. NETTIE I know folks in this town that are scared to go past it. SADIE (_to her_) I know others that ought to be. HENRY (_discouraged_) Every time you folks meet there’s trouble. [_Jane enters down the stairs and into the room._ JUDGE (_looks at her_) Well, Jane? JANE No change. It’s--it’s pitiful, to see her like that. [_Sadie sobs and covers her face._ HENRY It’s best we should try to bear this without any fuss, she’d ’a’ wanted it that way. SADIE She didn’t even want me to cry when poor Will died, but I did; and somehow I don’t know but it made things easier. HENRY When father died she didn’t shed a tear; she’s been a strong woman, always. [_The early fall twilight has come on and the stage is rather dim, the hall at R. is in deep shadow, at the end of Henry’s speech the outside door supposedly out at R. is open, then shut rather violently._ ELLA (_startled_) Someone’s come in. SADIE Nobody’s got any right---- [_She rises as some one is heard coming along the hall._ HENRY (_sternly_) Who’s that out there? Who is it? ORIN Mum! Who is it! [_He clings to his mother afraid, as all turn to the door, and Ben Jordan steps into the room and faces them with a smile of reckless contempt. Ben is the black sheep of the Jordan family, years younger than any of the others, a wild, selfish, arrogant fellow, handsome but sulky and defiant. His clothes are cheap and dirty and he is rather pale and looks dissipated. He doesn’t speak but stands openly sneering at their look of astonishment._ JANE (_quietly_) I’m glad you’ve come, Ben. BEN (_contemptuously_) _You_ are? JANE Yes, your mother’s awful sick. BEN She’s alive? JANE Yes. BEN Well--(_He looks contemptuously about_) Nobody missin’. The Jordans are gathered again, handkerchiefs and all. HENRY You’ll be arrested soon as folks know you’ve come. BEN (_scornfully_) And I suppose you wouldn’t bail me out, would you, Henry? HENRY (_simply_) No, I wouldn’t. BEN God! You’re still the same, all of you. You stink of the Ark, the whole tribe. It takes more than a few Edisons to change the Jordans! ELLA How’d you get here? How’d you know about mother? BEN (_nods at Jane_) She sent me word, to Bangor. SADIE (_to Jane_) How’d you get to know where he was? JANE (_quietly_) I knew. HENRY How’d you come; you don’t look like you had much money? BEN She sent it. (_He nods toward Jane_) God knows, it wasn’t much. ELLA (_to Jane_) Did mother tell you to----? BEN Of course she did! JANE (_quietly_) No, she didn’t. HENRY You sent your own money? JANE Yes, as he said it wasn’t much, but I didn’t have much. BEN (_astonished_) Why did you do it? JANE I knew she was going to die; twice I asked her if she wanted to see you, and she said no---- HENRY And yet you sent for him? JANE Yes. HENRY Why? JANE He was the one she really wanted. I thought she’d die happier seeing him. ELLA You took a lot on yourself, didn’t you? JANE Yes, she’s been a lonely old woman. I hated to think of her there, in the churchyard, hungry for him. BEN I’ll go to her. JANE It’s too late; she wouldn’t know you. BEN I’ll go. JANE The doctor will call us when he thinks we ought to come. BEN (_fiercely_) I’m going now. HENRY (_steps forward_) No, you ain’t. BEN Do you think I came here, standin’ a chance of bein’ sent to jail, to let _you_ tell me what to do? HENRY If she’s dyin’ up there, it’s more’n half from what you’ve made her suffer; you’ll wait here till we go to her together. EMMA Henry’s right. SADIE Of course he is. ELLA Nobody but Ben would have the impudence to show his face here, after what he’s done. BEN I’m going just the same! HENRY No, you ain’t. [_Their voices become loud._ EMMA Henry! Don’t let him go! SADIE Stop him. ELLA (_grows shrill_) He’s a disgrace to us. He always was. HENRY You’ll stay right where you are. [_He puts his hand heavily on Ben’s shoulder--Ben throws him off fiercely._ BEN Damn you! Keep your hands off me! [_Henry staggers back and strikes against a table that falls to the floor with a crash. Nettie screams._ JANE Stop it--stop! You must! JUDGE Are you crazy? Have you no sense of decency? [_Doctor Curtis comes quickly downstairs._ DOCTOR What’s this noise? I forbid it. Your mother has heard you. HENRY (_ashamed_) I’m sorry. BEN (_sulkily_) I didn’t mean to make a row. HENRY It’s him. (_He looks bitterly at Ben_) He brings out all the worst in us. He brought trouble into the world with him when he came, and ever since. [_Hannah, a middle-aged servant, comes hastily half-way downstairs and calls out sharply._ HANNAH Doctor! Come, Doctor! [_She exits up the stairs, as the Doctor crosses through the hall and follows her._ ORIN (_afraid_) Is she dead, Mum? Does Hannah mean she’s dead! [_Sadie hides her head on his shoulder and weeps._ JANE I’ll go to her. [_She exits._ ELLA (_violently_) She’ll go. There ain’t scarcely a drop of Jordan blood in her veins, and _she’s_ the one that goes to mother. EMMA (_coldly_) Light the lamp, Nettie; it’s gettin’ dark. NETTIE Yes, mother. [_She starts to light lamp._ HENRY I’m ashamed of my part of it, makin’ a row, with her on her deathbed. BEN You had it right, I guess. I’ve made trouble ever since I came into the world. NETTIE There! [_She lights lamp; footlights go up._ JUDGE (_sternly_) You shouldn’t have come here; you know that, Ben. BEN I’ve always known that, any place I’ve been, exceptin’ only those two years in the Army. That’s the only time I ever was in right. JUDGE (_sternly_) I would find it easier to pity you if you had any one to blame besides yourself. BEN Pity? Do you think I want your pity? [_There is a pause._ _Jane is seen on stairs, they all turn to her nervously as she comes down and crosses into room. She stops at the door looking at them._ HENRY (_slowly_) Mother--mother’s--gone! JANE Yes. [_There is a moment’s silence broken by the low sobs of the women who for a moment forget their selfishness in the presence of death._ HENRY The Jordans won’t ever be the same; she was the last of the old stock, mother was--No, the Jordans won’t ever be the same. [_Doctor Curtis comes downstairs and into the room._ DOCTOR It’s no use tryin’ to tell you what I feel. I’ve known her since I was a boy. I did the best I could. HENRY The best anybody could, Doctor, we know that. DOCTOR I’ve got a call I’d better make--(_He looks at watch_)--should have been there hours ago, but I hadn’t the heart to leave her. Who’s in charge here? HENRY I am, of course. DOCTOR I’ve made arrangements with Hannah; she’ll tell you. I’ll say good night now. HENRY Good night, Doctor. JANE And thank you. DOCTOR We did our best, Jane. [_He exits._ SADIE He’s gettin’ old. When Orin had the stomach trouble a month ago, I sent for Doctor Morris. I felt sort of guilty doin’ it, but I thought it was my duty. JUDGE You will let me help you, Jane? JANE Hannah and I can attend to everything. Henry! (_She turns to him_) You might come over for a minute this evening and we can talk things over. I’ll make the bed up in your old room, Ben, if you want to stay. EMMA (_rises and looks at Jane coldly_) Now, Henry Jordan, if she’s all through givin’ orders, maybe you’ll begin. ELLA Well, I should say so. Let’s have an understandin’. SADIE You tell her the truth, Henry, or else one of us will do it for you. HENRY (_hesitates_) Maybe it might be best if I should wait until after the funeral. ELLA You tell her now, or I will. JANE Tell me what? HENRY We was thinkin’ now that mother’s dead, that there wasn’t much use in your stayin’ on here. JANE Yes? [_She looks at him intently._ HENRY We don’t aim to be hard, and we don’t want it said we was mean about it; you can stay on here, if you want to, until after the funeral, maybe a little longer, and I don’t know but what between us, we’d be willing to help you till you found a place somewheres. JANE You can’t help me, any of you. Of course now she’s dead, I’ll go. I’ll be glad to go. ELLA Glad! JANE (_turns on them_) I hate you, the whole raft of you. I’ll be glad to get away from you. She was the only one of you worth loving, and she didn’t want it. EMMA If that’s how you feel, I say the sooner you went the better. HENRY Not till after the funeral. I don’t want it said we was hard to her. JUDGE (_quietly_) Jane isn’t going at all, Henry. HENRY What’s that? ELLA Of course she’s going. JUDGE No, she belongs here in this house. HENRY Not after I say she don’t. JUDGE Even then, because it’s hers. SADIE Hers? JUDGE From the moment of your mother’s death, everything here belonged to Jane. HENRY Not everything. JUDGE Yes, everything--your mother’s whole estate. BEN Ha! Ha! Ha! [_He sits at right laughing bitterly._ JANE That can’t be, Judge, you must be wrong. It’s a mistake. JUDGE No. HENRY My mother did this? JUDGE Yes. HENRY Why? You’ve got to tell me why! JUDGE That isn’t a part of my duties. HENRY She couldn’t have done a thing like that without sayin’ why. She said something, didn’t she? JUDGE I don’t know that I care to repeat it. HENRY (_fiercely_) You must repeat it! JUDGE Very well. The day that will was drawn she said to me, “The Jordans are all waiting for me to die, like carrion crows around a sick cow in a pasture, watchin’ till the last twitch of life is out of me before they pounce. I’m going to fool them,” she said, “I’m going to surprise them; they are all fools but Jane--Jane’s no fool.” BEN (_bitterly_) No--Ha! Ha! Ha! Jane’s no fool! JUDGE And she went on--(_He turns to Jane_) You’ll forgive me Jane; she said, “Jane is stubborn, and set, and wilful, but she’s no fool. She’ll do better by the Jordan money than any of them.” ELLA We’ll go to law, that’s what we’ll do! SADIE That’s it, we’ll go to law. HENRY (_to Judge_) We can break that will; you know we can! JUDGE It’s possible. HENRY Possible! You _know_, don’t yer! You’re supposed to be a good lawyer. JUDGE Of course if I _am_ a good lawyer you can’t break that will, because you see I drew it. ELLA And we get nothing, not a dollar, after waitin’ all these years? JUDGE There are small bequests left to each of you. SADIE How much? JUDGE One hundred dollars each. ELLA (_shrilly_) One hundred dollars. JUDGE I said that they were small. BEN You said a mouthful! ELLA Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha! [_She laughs wildly._ HENRY (_sternly_) Stop your noise, Ella. ELLA I----Ha! Ha! Ha!----I told you I was going to have my laugh, didn’t I? Ha! Ha! Ha! ORIN (_pulls Sadie’s dress_) Mum! What’s she laughin’ for? SADIE You hush! EMMA (_faces them all in evil triumph_) If anybody asked me, I’d say it was a judgment on all of yer. You Jordans was always stuck up, always thought you was better’n anybody else. I guess I ought to know, I married into yer!--You a rich family?--You the salt of the Earth--You Jordans! You paupers--Ha! Ha! Ha! ORIN (_pulls Sadie’s skirt_) Ain’t she still dead, Mum! Ain’t grandma still dead? SADIE (_angrily_) Of course she is. ORIN But I thought we was all goin’ to cry! SADIE Cry then, you awful little brat. [_She slaps his face and he roars loudly; she takes him by the arm and yanks him out of the room, followed by Henry, Emma, Nettie and Ella--through his roars, they all speak together as they go._ EMMA (_to Henry_) One hundred dollars! After all your blowin’. HENRY It’s you, and that child of your’n; you turned her against me. NETTIE Well, I just won’t spend my hundred dollars for mournin’. I’ll wear my old black dress! ELLA And me makin’ hats all the rest of my life--just makin’ hats! [_The front door is heard to shut behind them. Jane, Ben and Judge are alone. Judge stands by stove. Jane is up by window, looking out at the deepening twilight. Ben sits at right._ BEN Ha! Ha! Ha! “Crow buzzards” mother called us--the last of the Jordans--crow buzzards--and that’s what we are. JUDGE You can’t stay here, Ben; you know that as well as I do. I signed the warrant for your arrest myself. It’s been over a year since the Grand Jury indicted you for arson. BEN You mean you’ll give me up? JANE You won’t do that, Judge; you’re here as her friend. JUDGE No, but if it’s known he’s here, I couldn’t save him, and it’s bound to be known. JANE (_to Ben_) Were you careful coming? BEN Yes. JUDGE It’s bound to be known. BEN He means they’ll tell on me. (_He nods his head toward door_) My brother, or my sisters. JUDGE No, I don’t think they’d do that. BEN Let ’em! What do I care. I’m sick of hiding out, half starved! Let ’em do what they please. All I know is one thing,--when they put her into her grave her sons and daughters are goin’ to be standin’ there, like the Jordans always do. JANE (_quietly_) Hannah will have your room ready by now. There are some clean shirts and things that was your father’s; I’ll bring them to you. BEN (_uneasily_) Can I go up there, just a minute? JANE To your mother? BEN Yes. JANE If you want to. BEN I do. JANE Yes, you can go. [_Ben turns and exits up the stairs. Jane crosses and sits by stove, sinking wearily into the chair._ JUDGE And she left him nothing, just that hundred dollars, and only that because I told her it was the safest way to do it. I thought he was her one weakness, but it seems she didn’t have any. JANE No. JUDGE She was a grim old woman, Jane. JANE I think I could have loved her, but she didn’t want it. JUDGE And yet she left you everything. JANE I don’t understand. JUDGE She left a sealed letter for you. It’s in my strong box; you may learn from it that she cared more about you than you think. JANE No. JUDGE There was more kindness in her heart than most people gave her credit for. JANE For her own, for Uncle Ned, who never did for her, for Ned, for the Jordan name. I don’t understand, and I don’t think I care so very much; it’s been a hard week, Judge. [_She rests her head against the back of the chair._ JUDGE I know, and you’re all worn out. JANE Yes. JUDGE It’s a lot of money, Jane. JANE I suppose so. JUDGE And so you’re a rich woman. I am curious to know how you feel? JANE Just tired. [_She shuts her eyes. For a moment he looks at her with a smile, then turns and quietly fills the stove with wood as Ben comes slowly downstairs and into the room._ BEN If there was only something I could do for her. JUDGE Jane’s asleep, Ben. BEN Did she look like that, unhappy, all the time? JUDGE Yes. BEN Crow buzzards! God damn the Jordans! [_Front door bell rings sharply, Ben is startled._ JUDGE Steady there! It’s just one of the neighbors, I guess. (_Bell rings again as Hannah crosses downstairs and to hall_) Hannah knows enough not to let any one in. BEN (_slowly_) When I got back, time before this, from France, I tried to go straight, but it wasn’t any good, I just don’t belong---- [_Hannah enters frightened._ HANNAH It’s Jim Jay! BEN (_to Judge_) And you didn’t think my own blood would sell me? [_Jim Jay, a large, kindly man of middle age, enters._ JIM I’m sorry, Ben, I’ve come for you! [_Jane wakes, startled, and springs up._ JANE What is it? JIM I got to take him, Jane. BEN (_turns fiercely_) Have you! JIM (_quietly_) I’m armed, Ben--better not be foolish! JANE He’ll go with you, Mr. Jay. He won’t resist. JIM (_quietly_) He mustn’t. You got a bad name, Ben, and I ain’t a-goin’ to take any chances. BEN I thought I’d get to go to her funeral, anyway, before they got me. JIM Well, you could, maybe, if you was to fix a bail bond. You’d take bail for him, wouldn’t you, Judge? JUDGE It’s a felony; I’d have to have good security. JANE I’m a rich woman, you said just now. Could I give bail for him? JUDGE Yes. BEN (_to her_) So the money ain’t enough. You want all us Jordans fawnin’ on you for favors. Well, all of ’em but me will; by mornin’ the buzzards will be flocking round you thick! You’re going to hear a lot about how much folks love you, but you ain’t goin’ to hear it from me. JANE (_turns to him quietly_) Why did you come here, Ben, when I wrote you she was dying? BEN Why did I come? JANE Was it because you loved her, because you wanted to ask her to forgive you, before she died--or was it because you wanted to get something for yourself? BEN (_hesitates_) How does a feller know why he does what he does? JANE I’m just curious. You’ve got so much contempt for the rest, I was just wondering? You were wild, Ben, and hard, but you were honest--what brought you here? BEN (_sulkily_) The money. JANE I thought so. Then when you saw her you were sorry, but even then the money was in your mind--well--it’s mine now. And you’ve got to take your choice,--you can do what I tell you, or you’ll go with Mr. Jay. BEN Is that so? Well I guess there ain’t much doubt about what I’ll do. Come on, Jim? JIM All right. (_He takes a pair of handcuffs from his pocket_) You’ll have to slip these on, Ben. BEN (_steps back_) No--wait--(_He turns desperately to Jane_) What is it you want? JANE I want you to do as I say. BEN (_after a look at Jim and the handcuffs_) I’ll do it. JANE I thought so. (_She turns to Judge_) Can you fix the bond up here? JUDGE Yes. (_He sits at table and takes pen, ink and paper from a drawer_) I can hold court right here long enough for that. JIM This is my prisoner, Judge, and here’s the warrant. [_He puts warrant on table._ JANE First he’s got to swear, before you, to my conditions. BEN What conditions? JANE When will his trial be, Judge? JUDGE Not before the spring term, I should think--say early April. JANE You’ll stay here till then, Ben; you won’t leave town! You’ll work the farm,--there’s plenty to be done. BEN (_sulkily_) I don’t know how to work a farm. JANE I do. You’ll just do what I tell you. BEN Be your slave? That’s what you mean, ain’t it? JANE I’ve been about that here for eight years. BEN And now it’s your turn to get square on a Jordan! JANE You’ll work for once, and work every day. The first day you don’t I’ll surrender you to the judge, and he’ll jail you. The rest of the Jordans will live as I tell them to live, or for the first time in any of their lives, they’ll live on what they earn. Don’t forget, Ben, that right now I’m the head of the family. JUDGE (_to Ben_) You heard the conditions? Shall I make out the bond? BEN (_reluctantly_) Yes. [_He sits moodily at right, looking down at the floor. Jane looks at him for a moment, then turns up to window._ JANE It’s snowing! JIM Thought I smelled it. (_He buttons his coat_) Well, nothin’ to keep me, is there, Judge? JUDGE No. (_He starts to write out the bond with a rusty pen_) This pen is rusty! JIM I was sorry to hear about the old lady. It’s too bad, but that’s the way of things. JUDGE (_writes_) Yes. JIM Well--It’s early for snow, not but what it’s a good thing for the winter wheat. [_He exits._ CURTAIN ACT TWO _Scene: Sitting room of the Jordan homestead some two months later._ _This room also shows some traces of a family’s daily life, and to that extent is less desolate than the “parlor” of the first act, although the stern faith of the Puritan makes no concession to the thing we have learned to call “good taste.” The old-fashioned simplicity seen in such a room as this has resulted from poverty, both of mind and of purse, and has nothing akin to the simplicity of the artist; as a matter of fact, your true descendant of the settlers of 1605 would be the first to resent such an implication; to them the arts are directly connected with heathen practices, and any incense burned before the altars of the Graces still smells to them of brimstone._ _At back center folding doors, now partly open, lead to dining room. In this room may be seen the dining table, back of the table a window looking out on to the farm yard, now deep in midwinter snow. At right is an open fireplace with a log fire. Below fireplace a door to hall. Up left door to small vestibule in which is the outside door. Down left a window overlooking a snowbound countryside. The clock above the fireplace is set for quarter past four. Several straight-backed chairs and a woodbox by fireplaces. A sewing table and lamp at center. A sewing machine near window at left. A wall cupboard on the wall right of the doors to the dining room. An old sofa down left, two chairs at right. When the door at left, in vestibule, is opened, one may see a path up to the door, between two walls of snow._ _Discovered: Ella sits right at sewing machine, hemming some rough towels. Orin and Nettie are by fireplace. Sadie sits right of center. Sadie and Orin are dressed for outdoors. Nettie’s coat, hat and overshoes are on a hat-rack by door at left. Orin, as the curtain goes up, is putting a log on the fire._ SADIE (_acidly to Ella_) Why shouldn’t he put wood on the fire if he wants to? ELLA (_at sewing machine_) Because it ain’t your wood. SADIE No, it’s _hers_! Everything is hers! ELLA And maybe she just don’t know it. NETTIE (_at fireplace_) Ah! (_She bends closer to the fire as the log blazes up_) I do love a good fire! Oh it’s nice to be warm! SADIE There’s somethin’ sensual about it. NETTIE Mother told me that the next time you started talkin’ indecent I was to leave the room. SADIE Tell your mother I don’t wonder she’s sort of worried about you. I’d be if you was _my_ daughter. ELLA I don’t see why you can’t let Nettie alone! NETTIE She’s always picking on me, Aunt Ella! To hear her talk anybody would think I was terrible. SADIE I know more about what’s going on than some folks think I do. NETTIE Then you know a lot. I heard Horace Bevins say a week ago that he didn’t know as it was any use tryin’ to have a Masonic Lodge in the same town as you. SADIE They never was a Bevins yet didn’t have his tongue hung from the middle; the day his mother was married she answered both the responses. ORIN Mum! Mum! Shall I take my coat off; are we going to stay, Mum? SADIE No, we ain’t going to stay. I just want to see Cousin Jane for a minute. ELLA She’s in the kitchen with Hannah. SADIE Watchin’ her, I bet! I wonder Hannah puts up with it. ELLA If you was to live with Jane for a spell, I guess you’d find you had a plenty to put up with. SADIE It’s enough to make the Jordans turn in their graves, all of ’em at once. ELLA I guess all she’d say would be, “Let ’em if it seemed to make ’em any more comfortable.” [_Jane enters. She has apron on and some towels over her arm._ JANE Are those towels finished? ELLA Some is! Maybe I’d done all of ’em if I’d been a centipede. JANE Oh! I didn’t see you, Sadie. SADIE Oh! Ha, ha! Well, I ain’t surprised. JANE (_with Ella, selecting finished towels_) Well, Orin, does the tooth still hurt you? ORIN Naw, it don’t hurt me none now. I got it in a bottle. [_He takes small bottle from pocket._ NETTIE Oh you nasty thing. You get away! SADIE (_angrily_) What did I tell you about showin’ that tooth to folks! JANE Never mind, Orin, just run out to the barn and tell your Uncle Ben we’ve got to have a path cleared under the clothes-lines. ORIN All right. [_He crosses toward door._ JANE Hannah’s going to wash to-morrow, tell him. I’ll expect a good wide path. ORIN I’ll tell him. [_He exits._ SADIE I must say you keep Ben right at it, don’t you? JANE Yes. (_She takes the last finished towel and speaks to Ella_) I’ll come back for more. SADIE (_as Jane crosses_) First I thought he’d go to jail before he’d work, but he didn’t, did he? JANE No. [_She exits right._ SADIE Yes. No! Yes. No! Folks that ain’t got no more gift of gab ain’t got much gift of intellect. I s’pose Hannah’s out there. ELLA Yes, she keeps all of us just everlastingly at it. SADIE When Jane comes back, I wish you and Nettie would leave me alone with her, just for a minute. ELLA (_as she works over sewing machine_) It won’t do you much good; she won’t lend any more money. SADIE Mother always helped me. I’ve got a right to expect it. ELLA (_as she bites off a thread_) Expectin’ ain’t gettin’. SADIE I don’t know what I’ll do. ELLA You had money out of her; so has Henry. SADIE (_shocked, to Nettie_) You don’t mean to say your father’s been borrowin’ from her. [_This to Nettie._ NETTIE He’s always borrowin’. Didn’t he borrow the hundred dollars grandma left me? I’m not going to stand it much longer. ELLA Henry’s havin’ trouble with his business. SADIE We’re fools to put up with it. Everybody says so. We ought to contest the will. ELLA Everybody says so but the lawyers; they won’t none of ’em touch the case without they get money in advance. SADIE How much money? Didn’t your father find out, Nettie? NETTIE The least was five hundred dollars. ELLA Can you see us raisin’ that? SADIE If we was short, we might borrow it from Jane. ELLA We’d have to be smarter’n I see any signs of; she’s through lendin’. SADIE How do you know? ELLA I tried it myself. SADIE What do you want money for. Ain’t she takin’ you in to live with her? ELLA I don’t call myself beholden for that. She had to have some one, with Ben here, and her unmarried, and next to no relation to him. NETTIE Everybody’s callin’ you the chaperon! (_She laughs_) Not but what they ought to be one with _him_ around; he’s awful good lookin’. SADIE You keep away from him. He’s no blood kin of yours, and he’s a bad man, if he is a Jordan. Always makes up to everything he sees in petticoats, and always did. NETTIE Thanks for the compliment, but I’m not looking for any jailbirds. ELLA It will be awful, Ben in State’s Prison,--and I guess he’ll have to go, soon as he stands his trial. SADIE He got drunk and had a fight with the two Kimbal boys, and they licked him, and that night he burned down their barn; everybody knows it. ELLA He’s bad, all through, Ben is. NETTIE He’ll get about five years, father says. I guess that will take some of the spunk out of him. [_A sound in the hall at right._ ELLA Hush! I think he’s coming. [_Ben enters at right with a big armful of firewood and crosses and drops it heavily into woodbox, then turns and looks at them in silence._ SADIE Seems kind of funny, your luggin’ in the wood. BEN (_bitterly_) Does it? SADIE Did you see Orin out there? BEN Yes, he went along home. SADIE How do you like workin’? BEN How do you think I like it? Workin’ a big farm in winter, tendin’ the stock and milking ten cows. How do I like it? [_As he stands by fire Nettie looks up at him._ NETTIE I think it’s just a shame! SADIE (_turns to Ella_) Are you going to make towels all the afternoon? ELLA I am ’til they’re done, then I expect she’ll find somethin’ else for me to do. NETTIE (_to Ben_) Do you know I’m sorry for you, awful sorry. [_She speaks low. Ella and Sadie are at the other side of room._ BEN Then you’re the only one. NETTIE Maybe I am, but I’m like that. BEN Another month of it, then State’s Prison, I guess. I don’t know as I’ll be sorry when the time comes. NETTIE Oh, Uncle Ben! No, I’m not goin’ to call you _that_. After all, you’re not really any relation, are you? I mean to me? BEN No. NETTIE (_softly_) I’m just going to call you Ben! BEN You’re a good kid, Nettie. NETTIE Oh, it isn’t that, Ben, but it does just seem too awful. [_As she looks up at him, the outside door opens and Henry and Emma enter. They see Nettie and Ben together by the fire._ EMMA (_sternly_) Nettie! NETTIE (_sweetly_) Yes, mother? EMMA You come away from him. BEN (_angrily_) What do you mean by that? EMMA You tell him, Henry. HENRY I don’t know as it’s any use to---- EMMA (_sternly_) Tell him what I mean. HENRY (_to Ben_) Emma thinks, considerin’ everything, that it’s best Nettie shouldn’t talk to you. BEN Why don’t you keep her at home then? You don’t suppose I want to talk to her. EMMA Oh, we ain’t wanted here, I guess. We know that, not by you, or by _her_;--and Henry’s the oldest of the Jordans. All this would be his, if there was any justice in the world. NETTIE Father wouldn’t have taken that hundred dollars grandma left me if there had been any justice in the world. That’s what I came here for, not to talk to him. To tell Cousin Jane what father did, and to tell her about Nellie Namlin’s Christmas party, and that I’ve got to have a new dress. I’ve just got to! SADIE A new dress, and my rent ain’t paid. She’s got to pay it. My Orin’s got to have a roof over his head. HENRY I don’t know as you’ve got any call to be pestering Jane all the time. ELLA She’s always wantin’ something. SADIE What about you? Didn’t you tell me yourself you tried to borrow from her? ELLA I got a chance to set up in business, so as I can be independent. I can go in with Mary Stanton, dressmakin’. I can do it for two hundred dollars, and she’s got to give it to me. HENRY You ought to be ashamed, all three of you, worryin’ Jane all day long. It’s more’n flesh and blood can stand! NETTIE (_to him_) Didn’t you say at breakfast you was coming here to-day to make Cousin Jane endorse a note for you? Didn’t you? EMMA (_fiercely_) You hush! BEN (_at back by window_) Ha! Ha! Ha! Crow buzzards. HENRY Endorsing a note ain’t lending money, is it? It’s a matter of business. I guess my note’s good. BEN Take it to the bank without her name on it and see how good it is. EMMA You don’t think we want to ask her favors, but Henry’s in bad trouble and she’ll just have to help us this time. BEN There’s one way out of your troubles. One thing you could all do, for a change, instead of making Jane pay all your bills. I wonder you haven’t any of you thought of it. HENRY What could we do? BEN Go to work and earn something for yourselves. SADIE Like you do, I suppose. EMMA The laughing-stock of all Veazie! ELLA Everybody’s talkin’ about it, anywhere you go. NETTIE Jane Crosby’s White Slave, that’s what they call you. Jane Crosby’s White Slave. BEN (_fiercely_) They call me that, do they? ELLA (_to Nettie_) Why can’t you ever hold your tongue? BEN (_in cold anger_) I’ve been a damned fool. I’m through. [_Hannah enters._ HANNAH She wants you. BEN Jane? HANNAH Yes. BEN I won’t come. HANNAH There’ll be another row. BEN Tell her I said I wouldn’t come. [_He sits._ HANNAH She’s awful set, you know, when she wants anything. BEN You tell her I won’t come. HANNAH Well, I don’t say I hanker none to tell her, but I’d rather be in my shoes than your’n. [_She exits._ SADIE Well, I must say I don’t blame you a mite. EMMA If the Jordans is a lot of slaves, I guess it’s pretty near time we knew it. HENRY (_worried_) She’ll turn you over to Judge Bradford, Ben; he’ll lock you up. It ain’t goin’ to help me none with the bank, a brother of mine bein’ in jail. BEN So they’re laughing at me, are they, damn them. NETTIE (_at door right_) She’s coming! [_There is a moment’s pause and Jane enters door right. Hannah follows to door and looks on eagerly._ JANE I sent for you, Ben. BEN I won’t budge. JANE (_wearily_) Must we go through all this again? BEN I ain’t going to move out of this chair to-day. You do what you damned please. JANE I am sorry, but you must. BEN Send for Jim Jay, have me locked up, do as you please. Oh, I’ve said it before, but this time I mean it. JANE And you won’t come? BEN No. JANE Then I’ll do the best I can alone. [_She crosses up to wall closet and opens it and selects a large bottle, and turns. Ben rises quickly._ BEN What do you want of that? JANE It’s one of the horses. I don’t know what’s the matter with her. She’s down in her stall, just breathing. She won’t pay any attention to me. BEN Old Nellie? JANE Yes. BEN What you got? (_He steps to her and takes the bottle from her and looks at it_) That stuff’s no good. Here! (_He steps to cabinet and selects another bottle_) If you hadn’t spent five minutes stalling around, I might have had a better chance. [_He exits quickly at left._ HANNAH I allers said ’twas easier to catch flies with honey than ’twas with vinegar. HENRY What’s Ben know about horses? JANE A lot. HENRY I didn’t know that. JANE Neither did Ben, six weeks ago. [_She exits._ HENRY Mother was like that, about animals. I guess Ben sort of takes after her. EMMA (_shocked_) Ben! Like your mother! HANNAH Of course he is. He’s the “spit and image of her.” [_She exits._ NETTIE She made him go! It wouldn’t surprise me a mite if she’d pushed that old horse over herself. [_Jane enters._ JANE He wouldn’t let me in the barn. (_For the first time in the play, she laughs lightly_) Well--(_She looks about at them_) we have quite a family gathering here this afternoon. I am wondering if there is any--special reason for it? HENRY I wanted to talk with yer for just a minute, Jane. SADIE So do I. JANE Anybody else? [_She looks about._ ELLA I do. NETTIE So do I. JANE I’ve a lot to do; suppose I answer you all at once. I’m sorry, but I won’t lend you any money. HENRY Of course, I didn’t think they’d call that note of mine; it’s only five hundred, and you could just endorse it. JANE No! SADIE I was going to ask you---- JANE No! ELLA I got a chance to be independent, Jane, and----No. I haven’t any money. I won’t have before the first of the month. EMMA No money! HENRY I bet you’re worth as much to-day as you was the day mother died. JANE To a penny. I’ve lived, and run this house, and half supported all of you on what I’ve made the place earn. Yesterday I spent the first dollar that I didn’t have to spend. I mean, on myself. But that’s no business of yours. I _am_ worth just as much as the day I took the property, and I’m not going to run behind, so you see, after all, I’m a real Jordan. EMMA Seems so. I never knew one of ’em yet who didn’t seem to think he could take it with him. HENRY Well, Jane, I don’t know as it’s any use tryin’ to get you to change your mind? JANE I’m sorry. EMMA You can leave that for us to be. I guess it’s about the only thing we’ve got a right to. Get your things on, Nettie! NETTIE I’m going to stay a while with Aunt Ella; I won’t be late. HENRY I don’t know what I’m goin’ to do about that note. I s’pose I’ll find some way out of it. JANE I hope so. EMMA Thank yer. Of course we know there’s always the poorhouse. Come, Henry. [_She exits at left, leaving the outside door open._ HENRY Emma is a little upset. I hope you won’t mind her talk. I guess her part of it ain’t any too easy. [_He exits, shutting the door._ ELLA (_to Jane_) Poor Henry! Of course I s’pose you’re right not to lend it to him. But I don’t know as _I_ could do it, but I’m sensitive. JANE Perhaps it’s harder to say no than you think. [_Hannah enters._ HANNAH I got everything ready for to-morrow’s wash, but the sheets off your bed, Miss Ella. ELLA Good Land! I forgot ’em. Nettie will bring ’em right down. NETTIE (_to Jane_) After that, I’m going to stay and help Aunt Ella. I was wondering if you’d be here all the afternoon. JANE Yes. NETTIE (_charmingly_) Nothing special, you know. I’d just like to have a little visit with you. [_She exits at left with Ella._ HANNAH (_looks after her_) Every time I listen to that girl I get fur on my tongue. JANE Fur? HANNAH Like when my dyspepsia’s coming. There’s two things I can’t abide, her and cucumbers. [_She crosses to door left._ JANE Hannah! HANNAH (_stops_) Well? JANE (_rather shyly_) We are going to have rather a special supper to-night. HANNAH (_doubtfully_) We are? JANE Yes. That’s why I had you roast that turkey yesterday. HANNAH (_firmly_) That’s for Sunday! JANE No, it’s for to-night. HANNAH (_angrily_) Why is it? JANE It’s my birthday. HANNAH I didn’t know that. JANE No, it isn’t exactly a national holiday, but we’ll have the turkey, and I’ll get some preserves up, and I want you to bake a cake, a round one. We’ll have candles on it. I got some at the store this morning. HANNAH (_shocked_) Candles? JANE Yes. HANNAH Who’s going to be to this party? JANE (_a little self-conscious_) Why--just--just ourselves. HANNAH Just you and Mr. Ben and Miss Ella? JANE Yes. HANNAH You don’t want candles on that cake, you want crape on it. [_She exits door left._ [_Jane crosses up and starts to clear the dining-room table of its red table cover, as Ben enters door left._ BEN (_cheerfully_) Well, I fixed Old Nellie up. (_He puts his bottle back in its place in the wall cabinet_) Just got her in time. Thought she was gone for a minute, but she’s going to be all right. JANE That’s good. [_She folds the tablecloth up and puts it away._ BEN (_in front of fire_) She knew what I was doin’ for her too; you could tell by the way she looked at me! She’ll be all right, poor old critter. I remember her when she was a colt, year before I went to high school. [_Jane crosses into room, shutting the dining-room door after her._ JANE You like animals, don’t you, Ben? BEN (_surprised_) I don’t know. I don’t like to see ’em suffer. JANE Why? BEN I guess it’s mostly because they ain’t to blame for it. I mean what comes to ’em ain’t their fault. If a woman thinks she’s sick, ’til she gets sick, that’s her business. If a man gets drunk, or eats like a hog, he’s got to pay for it, and he ought to. Animals live cleaner than we do anyhow--and when you do anything for ’em they’ve got gratitude. Folks haven’t. JANE Hand me that sewing basket, Ben. [_She has seated herself at left center by table. Ben at left of table, hands her the basket as she picks up some sewing._ BEN It’s funny, but except for a dog or two, I don’t remember carin’ nothin’ for any of the live things, when I lived here I mean. JANE I guess that’s because you didn’t do much for them. BEN I guess so--Sometimes I kind of think I’d like to be here when spring comes--and see all the young critters coming into the world--I should think there’d be a lot a feller could do, to make it easier for ’em. JANE Yes. BEN Everybody’s always makin’ a fuss over women and their babies. I guess animals have got some feelings, too. JANE (_sewing_) Yes. BEN I _know_ it--Yes, sometimes I sort of wish I could be here, in the spring. JANE You’ll be a big help. BEN I’ll be in prison. (_He looks at her. She drops her head and goes on sewing_) You forgot that, didn’t yer? JANE Yes. BEN What’s the difference? A prison ain’t just a place; it’s bein’ somewheres you don’t want to be, and that’s where I’ve always been. JANE You liked the army? BEN I s’pose so. JANE Why? BEN I don’t know, there was things to do, and you did ’em. JANE And some one to tell you what to do? BEN Maybe that’s it, somebody that knew better’n I did. It galled me at first, but pretty soon we got over in France, an’ I saw we was really doin’ something, then I didn’t mind. I just got to doin’ what I was told, and it worked out all right. JANE You liked France, too? BEN Yes. JANE I’d like to hear you tell about it. BEN Maybe I’ll go back there some time. I don’t know as I’d mind farming a place over there. Most of their farms are awful little, but I don’t know but what I’d like it. JANE Farming is farming. Why not try it here? BEN Look out there! (_He points out of the window at the drifted snow_) It’s like that half the year, froze up, everything, most of all the people. Just a family by itself, maybe. Just a few folks, good an’ bad, month after month, with nothin’ to think about but just the mean little things, that really don’t amount to nothin’, but get to be bigger than all the world outside. JANE (_sewing_) Somebody must do the farming, Ben. BEN Somebody like the Jordans, that’s been doin’ it generation after generation. Well, look at us. I heard a feller, in a Y.M.C.A. hut, tellin’ how nature brought animals into the world, able to face what they had to face---- JANE Yes, Ben? BEN That’s what nature’s done for us Jordans,--brought us into the world half froze before we was born. Brought us into the world mean, and hard, so’s we could live the hard, mean life we have to live. JANE I don’t know, Ben, but what you could live it different. BEN They _laugh_ over there, and sing, and God knows when I was there they didn’t have much to sing about. I was at a rest camp, near Nancy, after I got wounded. I told you about the French lady with all those children that I got billeted with. JANE Yes. BEN They used to _sing_, right at the table, and laugh! God! It brought a lump into my throat mor’n once, lookin’ at them, and rememberin’ the Jordans! JANE I guess there wasn’t much laughing at your family table. BEN Summers nobody had much time for it, and winters,--well, I guess you know. JANE Yes. BEN Just a few folks together, day after day, and every little thing you don’t like about the other raspin’ on your nerves ’til it almost drives you crazy! Most folks quiet, because they’ve said all the things they’ve got to say a hundred times; other folks talkin’, talkin’, talkin’ about nothing. Sometimes somebody sort of laughs, and it scares you; seems like laughter needs the sun, same as flowers do. Icebound, that’s what we are all of us, inside and out. [_He stands looking grimly out window._ JANE Not all. I laughed a lot before I came here to live. BEN (_turns and looks at her_) I remember, you were just a little girl. JANE I was fourteen. See if there’s a spool of black sewing cotton in that drawer. BEN (_looking in drawer_) You mean thread? JANE Yes. BEN This it? [_He holds up a spool of white thread._ JANE Would you call that black? BEN (_looks it over_) No--it ain’t black. (_He searches and finds black thread_) Maybe this is it! JANE Maybe it is! (_She takes it_) You were with that French family quite a while, weren’t you? BEN Most a month; they was well off, you know; I mean, they was, before the war. It was a nice house. JANE (_sewing_) How nice? BEN (_hesitates_) I don’t know, things--well--useful, you know, but nice, not like this. [_He looks about._ JANE (_looks around with a sigh_) It’s not very pretty, but it could be. I could make it. BEN If you did, folks would be sayin’ you wasn’t respectable. JANE Tell me about the dinner they gave you the night before you went back to your company. BEN I told you. JANE Tell me again. BEN (_smiles to himself at the remembrance_) They was all dressed up, the whole family, and there I was with just my dirty old uniform. JANE Yes. BEN (_lost in his recollections_) It was a fine dinner, but it wasn’t that. It was their doin’ so much for me, folks like that--I’ve sort of pictured ’em lots of times since then. JANE Go on. BEN All of the young ones laughing and happy, and the mother too, laughing and tryin’ to talk to me, and neither one of us knowing much about what the other one was sayin’. [_He and Jane both laugh._ JANE And the oldest daughter? The one that was most grown up? BEN She was scared of me somehow, but I don’t know as ever I’ve seen a girl like her, before or since. JANE Maybe ’twas that dress you told me about; seems to me you don’t remember much else about her; not so much as what color her hair was, only just that that dress was blue. BEN (_thoughtfully_) Yes. JANE (_sewing_) Sometimes you say dark blue! [_She is watching him closely through half-shut eyes._ BEN (_absently_) I guess so. JANE And then I say, dark as something I point out to you, that isn’t dark at all, and you say, “No, lighter than that!” BEN (_absently_) Just--sort of blue. JANE Yes, sort of blue. It had lace on it, too, didn’t it? BEN Lace? Maybe--yes, lace. JANE There’s more than one blue dress in the world. BEN Like enough. Maybe there’s mor’n one family like that lady’s, but I’ll be damned if they live in Veazie. (_He crosses and opens cupboard and selects a bottle_) I might as well run out and see how the old mare is getting on. [_He selects bottle from shelf._ JANE And you’ve got to shovel those paths for the clothes lines yet. BEN I know. JANE Well, don’t forget. BEN It ain’t likely you’ll let me. [_He exits at door right. Jane laughs softly to herself, and runs to closet and takes out a large cardboard box and putting it on the table, she cuts the string and removes the wrapping paper, then lifts the cover of the box and draws out a dainty light-blue gown with soft lace on the neck and sleeves. She holds it up joyfully, then covering her own dress with it, she looks at herself in a mirror on wall. As she stands smiling at her reflection, there is a sharp knock on the outside door. Jane hastily returns dress to box and as the knock is repeated, she puts the box under the sofa at left and crosses and opens the outside door._ _Judge Bradford enters._ JANE Oh, it’s you, Judge! Come in. JUDGE I thought I’d stop on my way home and see how you were getting on, Jane. JANE I’ll take your coat. JUDGE I’ll just put it here. (_He puts coat on chair_) Have you time to sit down a minute? JANE Of course. [_They sit._ JUDGE (_looks at her_) That isn’t a smile on your lips, is it, Jane? JANE Maybe---- JUDGE (_laughingly_) I’m glad I came! JANE It’s my birthday. JUDGE Why, Jane! (_He crosses to her and holds out his hand. She takes it_) Many happy returns! JANE (_thoughtfully_) Many--happy returns--that’s a lot to ask for. JUDGE You’re about twenty-two, or twenty-three, aren’t you? JANE Twenty-three. JUDGE Time enough ahead of you. (_His eye falls on the box, imperfectly hidden under the sofa; out of it a bit of the blue dress is sticking_) Hello! What’s all that? JANE My birthday present. JUDGE Who gave it to you? JANE I did. JUDGE Good! It’s about time you started to blossom out. JANE I ordered a lot of things from Boston; they’ll be here to-morrow. JUDGE I suppose that one’s a dress? JANE Yes. JUDGE (_bends over to look_) Light blue, isn’t it? JANE (_smiles_) Just sort of blue--with lace on it. JUDGE Oh, you’re going to wear it, I suppose, in honor of your birthday? JANE (_startled_) To-night--oh, no--soon maybe, but not to-night. JUDGE (_smiles_) How soon? JANE Soon as I dare to; not just yet. JUDGE You have plenty of money; you ought to have every comfort in the world, and some of the luxuries. JANE (_gravely_) Judge! I want you to do something for me. JUDGE And of course I’ll do it. JANE I want you to get Ben off. I want you to fix it so he won’t go to State’s Prison. JUDGE But if he’s guilty, Jane? JANE I want you to go to old Mr. Kimbal for me and offer to pay him for that barn of his that Ben burned down. Then I want you to fix it so he won’t push the case, so’s Ben gets off. JUDGE Do you know what you are asking of me? JANE To get Ben off. JUDGE To compound a felony. JANE Those are just words, Judge, and words don’t matter much to me. I might say I wasn’t asking you to compound a felony. I was askin’ you to save a sinner, but those would be just words too. There’s nobody else; you’ve _got_ to help me. JUDGE (_thoughtfully_) I’ve always thought a lot could be done for Ben, by a good lawyer. JANE It doesn’t matter how, so long as it’s done. JUDGE He was drinking, with a crowd of young men; the two Kimbal boys jumped on him and beat him up rather badly. That’s about all we know, aside from the fact that Ben was drunk, and that that night the Kimbals’ barn was set on fire. JANE Just so long as you can get him off, Judge. JUDGE I think a case of assault could be made against the Kimbal boys, and I think it would stand. JANE What of it? JUDGE It is quite possible that the old man, if he knew that action was to be taken against his sons, and if he could be tactfully assured of payment for his barn, say by Ben, in a year’s time, might be persuaded to petition to have the indictment against Ben withdrawn. In that event, I think the chances would be very much in Ben’s favor. JANE I don’t care what names you call it, so long as it’s done. Will you fix it? JUDGE Well, it’s not exactly a proper proceeding for a Judge of the Circuit Court. JANE I knew you’d do it. JUDGE Yes, and I think you knew why, didn’t you? JANE Ever since she’s died, you’ve helped me about everything. Before she died you were just as good to me, and nobody else was. JUDGE I am glad you said that, because it clears me from the charge of being what poor Ben calls “one of the crow buzzards,” and I don’t want you to think me that. JANE No, you’re not that. JUDGE I love you, Jane. JANE No! JUDGE Yes--I’ve done that for a long while. Don’t you think you could get used to the thought of being my wife? JANE (_gently_) No. JUDGE I think I could make you happy. JANE No. JUDGE I am afraid being happy is something you don’t know very much about. JANE No. JUDGE It isn’t a thing that I am going to hurry you over, my dear, but neither is it a thing that I am going to give up hoping for. JANE When you told me, that day, that Mrs. Jordan had left me all her money, I couldn’t understand; then, afterwards, you gave me the letter she left for me. I want you to read it. JUDGE What has her letter to do with us? JANE Maybe, reading it, you’ll get to know something you’ve got a right to know, better than I could tell it to you. JUDGE Very well. JANE It’s here. (_She opens drawer, and selects a letter in a woman’s old-fashioned handwriting, from a large envelope of papers_) She was a cold woman, Judge. She never let me get close to her, although I tried. She didn’t love me. I was as sure of it then as I am now. (_She holds out the letter_) Read it. JUDGE If it’s about the thing I’ve been speaking of, I’d rather hear it in your voice. JANE (_reads_) “My dear Jane, the doctor tells me I haven’t long to live, and so I’m doing this, the meanest thing I think I’ve ever done to you. I’m leaving you the Jordan money. Since my husband died, there has been just one person I could get to care about; that’s Ben, who was my baby so long after all the others had forgotten how to love me. And Ben’s a bad son, and a bad man. I can’t leave him the money; he’d squander it, and the Jordans’ money came hard.” JUDGE Poor woman! It was a bitter thing for her to have to write like that. JANE (_reads on_) “If squandering the money would bring him happiness, I’d face all the Jordans in the other world and laugh at them, but I know there’s only just one chance to save my boy,--through a woman who will hold out her heart to him and let him trample on it, as he has on mine.” JUDGE (_in sudden fear_) Jane! JANE (_reads on_) “Who’d work, and pray, and live for him, until as age comes on, and maybe he gets a little tired, he’ll turn to her. And you’re that woman, Jane; you’ve loved him ever since you came to us. Although he doesn’t even know it. The Jordan name is his, the money’s yours, and maybe there’ll be another life for you to guard. God knows it isn’t much I’m leaving you, but you can’t refuse it, because you love him, and when he knows the money is yours, he will want to marry you. I’m a wicked old woman. Maybe you’ll learn to forgive me as time goes on--It takes a long time to make a Jordan.” (_Jane drops her hand to her side_) Then she just signed her name. JUDGE Is the damnable thing she says there true? JANE Yes, Judge. JUDGE And you’re going to do this thing for her? JANE No, for him. JUDGE (_bitterly_) He isn’t worth it. JANE I guess you don’t understand. JUDGE No. [_He crosses and picks up his coat._ JANE You can’t go like that, angry. You have to pay a price for being a good man, Judge--I need your help. JUDGE You mean _he_ needs my help? JANE Yes, and you’ll have to give it to him, if what you said a little while ago was true. JUDGE (_after a pause_) It _was_ true, Jane. I’ll help him. [_He picks up his hat._ JANE I’ve an errand at the store. I’ll go with you. [_She takes hat and coat from rack and puts them on._ JUDGE Is it anything I could have sent up for you? JANE (_putting on coat_) I guess not. You see, I’ve got to match a color. JUDGE Another new dress? JANE (_they start toward door_) Just a ribbon, for my hair. JUDGE I didn’t know women still wore ribbons in their hair. JANE It seems they do--in France. [_They exit together at left to the outside door and off._ _Nettie and Ella enter quickly, after a slight pause, Nettie running in from right, followed more sedately by Ella._ NETTIE You see! I was right! She went with him. [_She has run to window left and is looking out._ ELLA That’s what money does. If mother hadn’t left her everything, he wouldn’t have touched her with a ten-foot pole. NETTIE Well, if she’s fool enough to stay in this place, I guess he’s about the best there is. ELLA Then trust her for gettin’ him; by the time she gets through in Veazie, this town will be barer than Mother Hubbard’s cupboard by the time the dog got there. (_Her eye falls on Jane’s box, partly under sofa._) What’s that? [_She bends over, looking at it._ NETTIE What? ELLA I never saw it before. (_She draws it out_) Looks like a dress. See! Blue silk! NETTIE Open it. ELLA (_hesitates_) Must be hers! Maybe she wouldn’t like it. NETTIE Maybe she wouldn’t know it. ELLA A cat can look at a king! [_She opens the box and holds up the blue dress._ NETTIE Oh! Oh! ELLA (_really moved_) Some folks would say a dress like that wasn’t decent, but I wouldn’t care, not if it was mine, and it might have been mine--but for her. NETTIE Yours! Grandma wouldn’t have left her money to you. She hated old people. Everybody does. She’d have left it to me, but for Jane Crosby! ELLA (_looks at dress_) I always wanted a dress like this; when I was young, I used to dream about one, but mother only laughed. For years I counted on gettin’ me what I wanted, when she died; now I never will. NETTIE (_fiercely_) I will--somehow! ELLA Maybe but not me. Oh, if I could have the feelin’ of a dress like that on me, if I could wear it once, where folks could see me--Just once! Oh, I know how they’d laugh--I wouldn’t care---- NETTIE (_almost in tears_) I can’t stand it if she’s going to wear things like that. ELLA I’ll put it back. [_She starts to do so._ NETTIE (_catches her hand_) Not yet. ELLA I guess the less we look at it, the better off we’ll be. [_There is a ring at the front door._ NETTIE Who’s that? ELLA Here! (_She hands the box to Nettie_) Shove it back under the sofa. I’ll go and see. (_She turns and crosses to door left and out to the vestibule. Nettie, with the box in her arms, hesitates for a moment then turns and exits at right, taking the box with her. Ella opens the outside door at left, showing Orin on the doorstep. Ella looks at him angrily_) For time’s sake, what are _you_ ringing the bell for? ORIN Mum says for me not to act like I belonged here. ELLA Well, I’m goin’ to shut the door. Git in or git out! ORIN I got a note. (_He enters room as Ella shuts door_) It’s for her. ELLA (_holds out hand_) Let me see it. ORIN Mum said not to let on I had nothin’ if you came nosin’ around. [_Jane enters from left._ JANE I just ran across to the store. I haven’t been five minutes. [_She takes coat off._ ELLA He’s got a note for you, from Sadie. JANE Oh, let me see it, Orin. ORIN (_gives her note_) She said, if you said is they an answer, I was to say yes, they is. JANE Just a minute. [_She opens note and reads it._ ELLA I must say she didn’t lose much time. JANE (_after reading note_) Poor Sadie! Wait, Orin! (_She sits at table and takes checkbook from the drawer and writes_) Just take this to your mother. ELLA You don’t mean you’re goin’ to---- JANE Be quiet, Ella. Here, Orin. (_She hands him check_) Don’t lose it, and run along. ORIN All right. Mum said we was goin’ to have dinner early, and go to a movie! Good night. JANE (_again writing in checkbook_) Good night. [_Orin exits._ ELLA So you sent her her rent money, after all? JANE Here! [_She rises and hands a check to Ella._ ELLA What’s that? JANE Two hundred dollars. You can try that dressmaking business if you want to, Ella. ELLA [_Looks at check._ Two hundred dollars! JANE You needn’t thank me. ELLA That ain’t it. I was just wonderin’ what’s come over you all of a sudden. [_Ben enters._ JANE It’s my birthday, that’s all. Did you know it was my birthday, Ben? BEN (_carelessly_) Is it? I shoveled them damned paths! [_He crosses and sits by fire._ JANE Ella’s going into the dressmaking business, Ben. BEN (_moodily_) What of it? ELLA That’s what I say. It ain’t much of a business. [_She exits at right; outside it grows to dusk._ JANE Are you tired? BEN Maybe. [_He stretches his feet out toward fire._ JANE You’ve done a lot of work to-day. BEN And every day. JANE I don’t suppose you know how much good it’s done you, how well you look! BEN Beauty’s only skin deep. JANE Folks change, even in a few weeks, outside and in. Hard work don’t hurt anybody. BEN I got chilblains on my feet. The damned shoes are stiffer than they ever was. JANE Icebound, you said. Maybe it don’t have to be like that. Sometimes, just lately, it’s seemed to me that if folks would try, things needn’t be so bad. All of ’em try, I mean, for themselves, and for everybody else. BEN If I was you, I’d go out somewheres and hire a hall. JANE If you’d put some pork fat on those shoes to-night, your feet wouldn’t hurt so bad. BEN Maybe. [_He sits looking moodily into the fire. After a moment’s hesitation, Jane crosses and sits in the chair beside his, the evening shadows deepen around them but the glow from the fire lights their faces._ JANE I’m lonesome to-night. We always made a lot of birthdays when I was a girl. BEN Some do. JANE Your mother didn’t. She found me once trying, the day I was fifteen. I remember how she laughed at me. BEN All the Jordans have got a sense of humor. JANE She wasn’t a Jordan, not until she married your father. BEN When a woman marries into a family, she mostly shuts her eyes and jumps in all over. JANE Your mother was the best of the whole lot of you. Anyway, I think so. BEN I _know_ it. I always thought a lot of her, in spite of our being relations. JANE She loved you, Ben. BEN She left me without a dollar, knowin’ I was going to State’s Prison, and what I’d be by the time I get out. JANE Maybe some day you’ll understand why she did it. BEN Because she thought you’d take better care of the money than any of the rest of us. JANE And you hate me because of that, the way all the rest of the Jordans do? BEN Sometimes. JANE (_sadly_) I suppose it’s natural. BEN But I ain’t such a fool as Henry, and the women folks. They think you took advantage and fooled her into what she did. I thought so at first, now I don’t. JANE What do you think now, Ben? BEN She’d watched you; she knew you were worth mor’n all of us in a lump. I know it, too, but some way it riles me worse than if you wasn’t. JANE That’s silly! BEN (_with growing resentment_) Don’t you suppose I know what you’ve been doin’ to me. Tryin’ to make a man of me. Tryin’ to help me. Standing up to me and fightin’ me every day, tryin’ to teach me to be decent. Workin’ over me like I was a baby, or somethin’, and you was tryin’ to teach me how to walk. Gettin’ me so upset that every time I don’t do what I ought to do, I get all het up inside; I never was so damned uncomfortable in all my life. JANE And I never was so happy. BEN I s’pose God knew what he was about when he made women. JANE Of course he did. BEN Anyhow, he gave ’em the best of it, all right. JANE You don’t mean that! You _can’t_! BEN I do. Let a man get miserable, and he is miserable. A woman ain’t really happy no other way. JANE Maybe you think I’m having an easier time right now than you are. BEN I know it. JANE They all hate me, and they all want something, all the time. I can’t say yes, and it’s hard to always say no. Then there’s the farm, big, and poor, and all worked out. The Jordans have been taking their living out of this soil for more than a hundred years, and never putting anything back. BEN Just themselves, that’s all. JANE Worked right, like they do out West, this place could be what it ought to be. How can I do that; it needs a man. BEN I been thinkin’ lately things could be done a whole lot different. JANE By a man, if he loved the old place-- You Jordans robbed this soil always. Suppose one of you tried to pay it back--it would mean work and money, for a couple of years maybe, then I guess you’d see what gratitude meant. BEN It could be done; it ought to be. JANE By you, Ben! BEN No--I guess I ain’t got the judgment. JANE You’ve got it, if you’d learn to use it. BEN Anyhow, I’ve got just a month, that’s all. JANE Maybe you’ll have more. BEN I’m as good as convicted as I sit here. I’ve only got a month. JANE Then help me for that month. We could plan how to start out in the spring. I’ve got books that will help us, and I can get more. We could do a lot! BEN I don’t know but what we could! JANE (_bends toward him_) Will you shake hands on it? [_She offers her hand._ BEN (_surprised_) What for? JANE Oh, just because we never have. BEN We ain’t goin’ to change _everything_, are we? JANE One thing. We’re going to be friends. BEN (_takes her hand awkwardly_) You’re a good sport, game as a man, gamer maybe. JANE And now for the surprise. BEN The what! JANE (_draws her hand away and rises_) You’ll see. I want you to sit right here, until I open those doors. [_She points to doors to dining room._ BEN I wasn’t thinkin’ of movin’. JANE Just sit right there. BEN And do what? JANE Think. BEN What of? JANE Oh, anything--so long as it’s pleasant--of the spring that’s coming---- BEN In the prison down at Thomaston. JANE Of France then, of the family that was so good to you--of the beautiful lady--of the daughter, if you want to, the one that was most grown up--and of the wonderful blue dress. Just shut your eyes and think, ’til I come back! [_She exits through doors to dining room and closes the doors after her. Ben sits in glow from the fire, his eyes closed. In a moment the door at right is thrown open and Nettie stands in the doorway, the light from the hall falling on her. She has on Jane’s blue dress and is radiant with youth and excitement._ NETTIE Ben! Look at me! Look, Ben! BEN What? NETTIE Look Ben! [_He looks at her and for a moment sits in stupid wonder, then rises slowly to his feet._ BEN It’s--It’s Nettie! NETTIE Did you ever see anything so lovely, did you? BEN You’re--you’re a woman, Nettie! NETTIE Of course I am, you stupid! BEN (_crosses down to her_) God! How I’ve starved for somethin’ pretty to look at! God! How I’ve starved for it! NETTIE That’s why I came down, I wanted you to see! I waited there in the hall till she went out. BEN And you’ve been here all the time, and I haven’t so much as looked at you! NETTIE (_softly_) You’ve been in trouble, Ben! BEN I’ll get out of that somehow! I’m going to make a fight. I ain’t goin’ to let ’em take me now. NETTIE Honest, Ben? BEN Not now. Oh, you pretty kid! You pretty little thing! [_He catches her fiercely in his arms._ NETTIE You mustn’t, Ben! BEN (_triumphant_) Mustn’t! You don’t know me! NETTIE Just one then! (_She holds up her lips, and as he kisses her ardently, the dining-room doors back of them open and Jane stands in the doorway, looking at them. She has removed her apron and has made some poor attempt at dressing up. Back of her we see the table bravely spread for the festive birthday party. There is a large turkey and other special dishes, and a round cake on which blaze twenty-two tiny candles. They turn their heads, startled, as Jane looks at them, and Ben tightens his arms defiantly about Nettie_) Let me go! BEN (_holding her and looking past her to Jane_) No! (_Then to Jane_) Why are you looking at me like that? NETTIE Let me go. BEN (_to Jane_) To hell with your dream of grubbing in the dirt. Now I know what I want, and I’m going to get it. NETTIE Let go, dear. (_She draws away_) I’m ashamed about wearin’ your dress, Cousin Jane. I’ll take it right off. JANE You needn’t. I guess I don’t want it any more. (_For the first time her eyes leave Ben’s face. She turns and steps past them to the door at right and calls_) Supper’s ready, Ella! [_Hannah enters at back in dining room with a plate of hot biscuits._ CURTAIN ACT III _Scene: Same as Act One. Parlor at the Jordans’, two months later._ _At rise the characters are grouped exactly as they were at the opening of the play. The white slip covers, however, have been removed from the chairs, and the backing through the window shows partly melted snow drifts. Henry sighs; the clock strikes two. Henry looks at his watch._ _There is a pause. The outside door slams and Ben enters and looks about._ BEN Well--here we all are again. SADIE (_sadly_) Yes. HENRY I ain’t been in this room before since the funeral. SADIE And I ain’t, and the last time before that was when father died. EMMA I sat right here, in the same chair I’m settin’ in now, but to your grandfather’s funeral, right after I married Henry, I was treated like one of the poor relations! I had to stand up. HENRY I remember; it made considerable trouble. ELLA I don’t know as it was ever what I called a cheerful room. HENRY (_severely_) A parlor’s where a person’s supposed to sit and think of God, and you couldn’t expect it to be cheerful! ELLA (_looks about_) Seems like we’d had trouble and disgrace enough in this family without her takin’ all the slip covers off of the chairs and sofa! EMMA It ain’t _right_! SADIE That Boston woman that’s building the house over on Elm Street ain’t so much as goin’ to have a parlor. I stopped her right on the street and asked her what she was plannin’ to do soon as the first of ’em died. EMMA What did she say? SADIE Said she tried not to think about such things. HENRY (_sternly_) We got Atheists enough in this town right now. BEN Well, if Jane’s coming I wish she’d come; this ain’t exactly my idea of pleasant company. ELLA She says we’re all to wait in here for Judge Bradford. SADIE What did she send for us for? ELLA I don’t know. EMMA Why didn’t you ask her? ELLA I did, and she most bit my head off. BEN She most bites mine off every time I see her. I must say she’s changed, Jane has; she ain’t the same girl at all she was a few weeks ago. NETTIE She’s actin’ just awful, especially to me! SADIE Of course, I’d be the last one to say anything against her, but---- BEN But nothin’! There ain’t one of you here fit to tie her shoes! SADIE _We_ ain’t? BEN And I ain’t! The only difference between us is I ain’t worth much and I know it, and you ain’t worth nothin’ and you don’t. EMMA I guess you’d better be careful how you talk! NETTIE If anybody says anything about Jane lately, that’s the way he always talks! The worse she treats him the better he seems to like it. SADIE Well, I don’t know as I’m surprised more about his insultin’ the rest of us, but it’s sort of comical his talkin’ that way about you, Nettie. EMMA Nettie! What’s Nettie got to do with him? SADIE Oh! Excuse me! I didn’t know ’twas supposed to be a secret. EMMA What is? SADIE About the way those two have been carryin’ on together! HENRY What! ELLA Ben and Nettie! NETTIE (_afraid_) Stop her, Ben, can’t you? BEN If I knew a way to stop women like her I’d patent it and get rich! EMMA (_sternly_) Him and Nettie? SADIE They passed my house together _once_ a week ago Wednesday, _once_ the Tuesday before that, and _twice_ the Sunday after New Year’s. HENRY Together! SADIE And Eben Tilden’s boy told Abbie Palsey that Tilly Hickson heard Aaron Hamlin say he’d seen ’em together at the picture show! HENRY (_to Ben_) Is it true? EMMA You’ve been with him after all I told you! BEN It ain’t going to hurt her none just to talk to me, is it? EMMA Them that touches pitch gets defiled! HENRY (_to Nettie_) I want you to tell me everything that’s took place between you two. SADIE Wait! HENRY What? SADIE Orin! Leave the room! NETTIE He don’t have to leave the room. I don’t care who knows what happened! HENRY Go on then. NETTIE Well--Ben and I--We--Just for a few days--anyway, it was all his fault. BEN She threw me down because I was going to prison. NETTIE He said he’d get out of it somehow, but he can’t, and I just won’t have folks laughing at me! BEN It’s all right, it never meant nothin’ to her, and I guess it didn’t mean much to me. It’s just as well it’s over. NETTIE It’s a whole lot better. HENRY Well--what’s passed is passed. Folks that plant the wind reap the whirlwind! There’s no use cryin’ over spilled milk. ORIN Say, Mum! What do you s’pose Uncle Henry thinks he means when he says things? HENRY Somehow I can’t help wishin’ you was my son for just about five minutes. [_Hannah and Judge Bradford enter._ HANNAH They’re all in here, Judge. JUDGE Good afternoon. HENRY How are you, Judge? SADIE It’s a mild day; winter’s most over. Stop scratching yourself. [_This last to Orin who seems to be uneasy and frequently scratches himself._ HANNAH (_at door_) I’ll tell her you’re here, Judge. She’ll be right down. [_Hannah exits._ ELLA Won’t you sit? JUDGE Thanks. [_He sits by table._ HENRY What’s it about? Why did she say we was to all be here at two o’clock? JUDGE She will probably be able to answer that question herself, Ben. SADIE (_to Orin_) Don’t. ORIN What? SADIE Scratch! ORIN Oh. [_Jane enters. The Judge rises._ JUDGE Well, Jane? JANE Don’t get up, Judge. JUDGE Will you sit here? [_Judge turns to get a chair for Jane. Orin scratches himself. Ella rises._ ELLA What is the matter with this brat? ORIN I itch! SADIE It’s warm, and he’s got on his heavy flannels! He’s as clean as you are! [_Jane and Judge sit._ BEN You said to heat this room up and wait here for you and the Judge. Why? I got my stock to tend. HENRY It’s a bad time for me to get away from the store; What was it you wanted of us? JANE I’m afraid it isn’t going to be easy to tell you. JUDGE Won’t you let me do it, Jane? JANE No. I’ve come to know that your mother didn’t really want that I should have the Jordan money. SADIE What’s that? JANE I put it as simply as I could. BEN You mean a later will’s been found? JUDGE No. JANE In a way, Judge, it’s like there had. Your mother left me a letter dated later than the will. ELLA Leavin’ the money different? JANE Tellin’ what she really wanted. BEN Well, what did she want? JANE It was like she left me all her money in trust, so I could keep it safe until the time she was hopin’ for come, and in a way it did come, not quite like she wanted it, but near enough so I can give up a burden I haven’t strength enough to carry any more. [_She stops._ JUDGE Let me finish, Jane. Jane has asked me to draw a deed of gift, making the Jordan property over to Ben. BEN Why? JANE She wanted you to have it. BEN Why didn’t she will it to me, then? JANE She was afraid to trust you. BEN Well? JANE You’ve learned to work; you’ll keep on working. HENRY You mean to say my mother wanted him to have it all? JANE Yes. HENRY I am a religious man, but there was a time when even Job gave up! So--all our money goes to Ben--and he can’t even buy himself out of prison! JANE (_after a pause_) Ben isn’t going to prison. BEN Why? Who’s to stop it? JUDGE (_after a look from Jane_) Kimbal agreed not to press the charge against you. It seems that there were certain extenuating circumstances. A motion has been made for the dismissal of the indictment, and it won’t be opposed. BEN Why did he? Who fixed this thing. JANE Judge Bradford did. [_She looks at Judge._ BEN (_slowly_) It means a lot to me. There’s things I’d like to do. I haven’t dared to think about ’em lately--now I’ll do ’em. [_There is a pause._ HENRY Well, Ben, so you’ve got the money! I guess maybe it’s better than her havin’ it; after all blood’s thicker than water! We’ll help you any way we can and--er--of course you’ll help us. BEN Why will I? HENRY We’re brothers, Ben! We’re old Jordans! BEN What was we when I got back from France? There was a band met us boys at the station. I was your brother all right that day, only somehow, in just a little while you forgot about it. I was a Jordan when I was hidin’ out from the police, and all that kept me from starvin’ was the money Jane sent me! I was your brother the night mother died, and you said you wouldn’t go my bail. ELLA You ain’t going to be hard, Ben! BEN I’m the head of the family now, ain’t I, and you can bet all you’ve got I’m going to be a real Jordan. HENRY I think, Ben---- BEN From now on, there ain’t nobody got any right to think in this house but just me! So run along home, the whole pack of you, and after this, when you feel like you must come here--come separate. ELLA Turn us out, Ben? BEN Sure, why not? NETTIE (_crosses to him. Sweetly_) There ain’t any reason why _we_ can’t be friends, is there? BEN Well, I don’t know. There’s only one way I could ever get to trust you. NETTIE What way, Ben? BEN I’d have to go to jail for five years and see if you’d wait for me! EMMA It’s an awful thing for a mother to have a fool for a child. ELLA (_goes upstage with Nettie_) Well, I must say you made a nice mess of things! NETTIE (_exits with Ella_) Well, I don’t care! I don’t see how anybody would expect me to be a mind reader! SADIE Come, Orin--say good-by to your Uncle Ben. ORIN What will I do that for? SADIE Because I tell you to! ORIN Yesterday you told me he wasn’t worth speakin’ to! SADIE Are you going to move, you stupid little idiot. [_She drags him out._ ORIN (_as they go_) What did I say? You let me alone! HENRY I was wonderin’, Ben, how you’d feel about endorsing that note of mine. BEN You was? HENRY Yes, I don’t know what I’m going to do about it. BEN As far as I care, you can go nail it on a door. (_Henry and Emma start to exit_) No, hold on, I’ll pay it. HENRY You will! BEN Yes, I don’t know as it would do me much good at the bank, havin’ a brother of mine in the poorhouse. [_Ben laughs as Henry and Emma exit._ JUDGE Well, Ben? “Uneasy lies the head that wears a crown.” BEN (_down to stove_) Depends on the head. Mine’s thick, I guess. Anyhow, none of them is going to bother it. I’m boss here now. JUDGE You’ll find a copy here of the inventory of the estate, and other legal papers. Everything is in order. JANE And my accounts, Ben; you’ll find the exact amount your mother left. I spent some money about six weeks ago, on myself, but I’ve been careful ever since and I’ve made up for it. BEN You said, Judge, she didn’t have to go by that letter of my mother’s, if she didn’t want to? She didn’t have to give anything back at all? JUDGE No, she didn’t. BEN Then if I was you--(_to Jane_) I wouldn’t talk so much about the little you spent on yourself. I guess to look at you it wasn’t much. JANE Yes, it was. BEN Well, we’ll fix things so you can keep on spendin’. Only let’s see somethin’ come of it. I never was so damned sick of anything in my life as I am of that old black dress of yours! [_Crosses stage up and over right._ JANE I’ve got plenty of clothes upstairs. I’m sorry now I ever bought them, but I’ll take them with me when I go. BEN Go? Go where? JANE To Old Town. I’ve got a place there, clerking in the Pulp Mill. BEN You! JANE Yes. BEN But what about me? JUDGE Don’t you think Jane has done about enough for you? BEN She’s done a lot, she’s given up the money. I don’t know as I like that; ’course I like gettin’ it, but not if she’s going away. JANE I couldn’t stay now, and I wouldn’t want to. BEN I don’t suppose you remember about plannin’ what you and me was to do with this old farm? JANE I remember. BEN Well--then what are you going away for? JANE Because I couldn’t be happy here, Ben--It’s been harder than anything I ever thought could come to anybody, the last few weeks here--and so I’m going. (_She turns to Judge_) I’ll go upstairs and get my things. I’ll stop at your office, Judge, on the way to the station. JUDGE Thank you, Jane. BEN You’re goin’ to-day? Before I order my new farm machinery or anything? You’re goin’ to leave me with all this work on my hands? JANE Yes, Ben. [_She exits._ BEN Well--that’s a lesson to me! Oh, she’s a good woman! I ain’t denyin’ that--but she’s fickle! JUDGE You’re a fool, Ben! BEN I been doin’ kitchen police around this town for quite a spell now, Judge, but from this day on I ain’t goin’ to take that sort of talk from anybody. JUDGE I assure you that you won’t have to take any sort of talk at all from me. [_He starts for the door._ BEN I didn’t mean that. I don’t want you to think I ain’t grateful for all you’ve done for me. JUDGE (_coldly_) I have done nothing for you. BEN If it wasn’t for you, I’d want to die; that’s what I did want. I was afraid of that prison, just a coward about it. Now I’m a free man, with a big life openin’ out ahead of me--I got everything in the world right here in my two hands, everything--and I owe it to you! JUDGE I am very glad to say that you don’t owe me anything. I don’t like you, I haven’t forgiven you for what you did to your mother’s life. Nor for a worse thing, one you haven’t brains enough to even know you’ve done. Don’t be grateful to me, Ben, please. I think nothing could distress me more than that. BEN You’ve been a good friend to me. JUDGE I haven’t meant to be, as I said I don’t like you. I haven’t any faith in you. I don’t believe in this new life of yours. You made a mess of the old one, and I think you will of the new. BEN No matter what you say, you can’t get away from me. I’ll be grateful till I die. But for you I’d have gone to that damned prison! JUDGE But for Jane. BEN How Jane? JUDGE How Jane? Jane went your bond the day your mother died. Jane took you in and taught you how to work, made you work, taught you through the one decent spot in you something of a thing you’d never know, self-respect. Worked over you, petted you, coaxed you--held you up--Then you hurt her--but she kept on--She went herself to Kimbal, after he had refused me, and got his help to keep you out of prison--then, against my will, against the best that I could do to stop her, she turns over all this to you--and goes out with nothing--and you ask “How Jane?” BEN Why? Why has she done this, all this, for me? [_The Judge looks at Ben with contempt and turns and exits. Ben is left in deep thought. Jane comes downstairs dressed for a journey with a hand bag, etc. She enters._ JANE Good-by, Ben. (_She crosses to him, her hand out_) Good-by. Won’t you say good-by? BEN First, there’s some things I got to know about. JANE (_smiles_) I guess there’s not much left for us to say, Ben. BEN (_she crosses to door, but he gets ahead of her_) There’s things I got to know. (_She looks at him but does not speak_) The Judge tells me ’twas you got Kimbal to let me go free. (_He looks at her--she half turns away_) Answer me. (_Pause_) The Judge tells me you gave up what was yours--to me--without no other reason than because you wanted me to have it. That’s true, ain’t it? (_Pause_) You sent me every cent you had, when you knew mother was dying, then you went bail for me, like he said--and did all them other things. I don’t know as any woman ever did any more--. I want to know why! JANE Why do you think? BEN I don’t know--I sort of thought--sort of hoped---- JANE (_bravely_) It was because I loved her, Ben---- BEN Oh. [_He turns away disappointed._ JANE You’re forgetting, I guess, how long we was alone here--when you was in France--then the months we didn’t know where you was, when the police was looking for you--She used to make me promise if ever I could I’d help you. BEN Well--all I’ve got to say is you’re no liar. JANE Good-by. [_She turns to go._ BEN Wait. (_Closes door_) Let’s see that letter you said she left for you. JANE No. I won’t do that. I’ve done enough; you’re free, you’ve got the money and the farm. BEN (_crosses in front of table and sits left of table_) They ain’t worth a damn with you gone--I didn’t know that till just now, but they ain’t. JANE It’s sort of sudden, the way you found that out. BEN Oh, it don’t take long for a man to get hungry--it only takes just a minute for a man to die; you can burn down a barn quick enough, or do a murder; it’s just living and getting old that takes a lot of time--Can’t you stay here, Jane? JANE There’s Nettie. BEN Nettie--that couldn’t stand the gaff--that run out on me when I was in trouble. JANE It doesn’t matter what folks do, if you love ’em enough. BEN What do you know about it? I suppose you’ve been in love a lot of times? JANE No. BEN Then you be quiet and let an expert talk. I was lonesome and I wanted a woman; she was pretty and I wanted to kiss her--that ain’t what I call love. JANE You. You don’t even know the meaning of the word. BEN That don’t worry me none--I guess the feller that wrote the dictionary was a whole lot older’n I am before he got down to the L’s. JANE You’ve got good in you, Ben, deep down, if you’d only try. (_Ben turns_) I know, it’s always been that way! You’ve never tried for long; you’ve never had a real ambition. BEN When I was a kid I wanted to spit farther than anybody. JANE Good-by. [_She starts up to door._ BEN And so you’re going to break your word? JANE (_hurt--turns_) BEN I don’t know what ’twas you promised mother, but you’ve broke your word. No man ever needed a woman more’n I need you, and you’re leaving me. JANE That isn’t fair. BEN It’s true, ain’t it; truth ain’t always fair--You ain’t helped me none, you’ve hurt me--worse than being broke, worse than bein’ in jail. JANE It don’t seem like I could stand to have you talk like that. BEN What you done you done for her. I didn’t count, I never have, not with you. JANE When you’ve been trying to do a thing as long as I have, it gets to be a part of you. BEN You done it all for her--well--she’s dead--you’d better go. JANE Maybe I had, but if I do it will be with the truth between us. Here’s the letter she left for me, Ben--I got a feeling somehow like she was here with us now, like she wanted you to read it. (_She holds it out_) It’s like she was guiding us from the grave--Read it. [_Crosses up to window._ BEN (_reads_) “My dear Jane: The doctor tells me I haven’t long to live and so I am doing this, the meanest thing I think I’ve ever done to you. I’m leaving you the Jordan money. Since my husband died there has been just one person I could get to care about, that’s Ben, who was my baby so long after all the others had forgotten how to love me.” (_He mumbles the letter to himself, then brings out the words_) “Hold out her heart and let him trample on it, as he has on mine.” [_Slowly he breaks down, sobbing bitterly._ JANE Don’t, Ben---- BEN Look what I done to her. Look what I done. JANE (_hand on his shoulder_) Oh, my dear--my dear! BEN I did love her, mor’n she thought, mor’n I ever knew how to tell her! JANE (_kneels beside him_) It wasn’t all your fault--you were a lonely boy--she never said much--she was like you, Ben, ashamed to show the best that’s in you. BEN (_bitterly_) The best in me. I ain’t fit that you should touch me Jane--you’d better go. JANE Not if you need me, Ben, and I think you do. BEN I love you--mor’n I ever thought I could--tenderer--truer--but I’m no good--You couldn’t trust me--I couldn’t trust myself. JANE Spring’s coming, Ben, everywhere, to you and me, if you would only try. BEN Can a feller change--Just ’cause he wants to? JANE I don’t want you changed. I want you what you are, the best of you--just a man that loves me--if you do love me, Ben. BEN Can’t you help me to be fit? JANE I’m going to do the thing I always meant to do--Good times and bad, Ben, I’m going to share with you. BEN God knows I---- JANE Hush, Ben--I don’t want another promise. BEN What do you want? JANE You said I was a good sport once--You shook hands on what we’d do to bring this old place back--there’s plenty to be done. I’ll stay and help you if you want me. BEN A good sport? (_He takes her hand_) I’ll say you’re all of that. [_Hannah enters._ HANNAH If you ain’t careful you’ll miss that train. JANE That’s just what I want to do. HANNAH You ain’t going? JANE I’m never going, Hannah. HANNAH You going to marry him? BEN You bet your life she is! HANNAH I guess you’ll be mighty happy--marriage changes folks--and any change in him will be a big improvement. [_She picks up Jane’s bag and exits--Jane and Ben laugh._ TRANSCRIBER’S NOTES: Italicized text is surrounded by underscores: _italics_. Obvious typographical errors have been corrected. End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Icebound, by Owen Davis *** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ICEBOUND *** ***** This file should be named 59777-0.txt or 59777-0.zip ***** This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: http://www.gutenberg.org/5/9/7/7/59777/ Produced by Tim Lindell, David E. Brown, and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This book was produced from images made available by the HathiTrust Digital Library.) Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions will be renamed. 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