Scene Ten
Two years later. The parlor of the Wedgewood home, suggested
by a small sofa, a bureau saturated with Wedgewood ceramics and a piano forte.
Charles, 29, enters, furtively, looking for someone to be home. Emma, 30,
enters, wearing worn and stained dress, carrying a chamber pot and towels, a
water pitcher, doesn’t see him.
CHARLES
Emma!
EMMA
(turns,
startled)
Goodness!
CHARLES
Ah.
Perhaps I should have waited at the door.
Emma is slightly embarrassed to be found in this state.
EMMA
Yes,
you should have done.
(beat)
Are
you here to see my father?
CHARLES
(shakes
his head, then moves toward her)
May
I help you with that?
EMMA
(recoiling
away)
No!
I was in my Mother’s room. You know she’s--
CHARLES
Ill.
Yes. I’m so sorry. Why don’t you let
the
servants take it?
EMMA
Oh,
the great defender of the slave!
CHARLES
Servants
aren’t slaves.
EMMA
Excuse
me.
Emma leaves to dispose of things. Charles pulls out a small
journal from his pocket, looks at something.
CHARLES
(calls
offstage)
I
hope your sister Elizabeth has been
a
help.
EMMA
(from
offstage)
No.
CHARLES
(beat)
I
understand.
Emma re-enters, trying to smooth out her dress, becoming
aware it is stained.
EMMA
(pointedly)
Do
you?
CHARLES
Scientifically
and medically, I mean.
EMMA
Of
course. Father tells me you are the toast of
London.
CHARLES
Goodness,
no.
(beat)
Only
among the men of science in England.
And
Europe.
EMMA
Mm.
CHARLES
Owen--
God bless him-- has confirmed that
the
toxodon I found is from the sloth
family--
not a relative of the African giants
but
of the modern day South American calabara!
Isn’t
that wonderful!
EMMA
(beat)
Wonderful.
Pardon me, but I was
about
to practice on the piano forte.
She sits at the piano and begins playing Chopin’s “Raindrop”
Prelude.
CHARLES
Is
that new?
(no
answer, so he looks over her shoulder)
Ah,
yes! By your old teacher, Mr. Chopin.
(no
response)
Are
you angry with me?
EMMA
No.
CHARLES
But
you are.
EMMA
No,
I’m not.
CHARLES
You
see, it’s this sort of thing that
makes
it so difficult.
Charles writes something in his little journal.
EMMA
What
sort of thing?
CHARLES
The
need to assign blame, even when unfounded.
EMMA
What?
CHARLES
Irrational
and sudden aggression.
EMMA
You
have come unannounced. I am
hardly
presentable to guests.
CHARLES
Why?
EMMA
This
is an old dress I have worn
for
two days. It is stained and
unflattering.
CHARLES
I
hadn’t noticed.
EMMA
Ugh!
CHARLES
I
should think that was a good thing.
EMMA
It
is offensive to a woman. It suggests
that
you simply “don’t notice” whether
she
is in rags or an elegant gown suited
for
the Queen’s coronation.
Charles writes in journal.
CHARLES
“Obsessive
concern with physical appearance”.
EMMA
(stops
playing)
What
are you writing!?
CHARLES
I
am weighing the advantages and
disadvantages
of marriage.
EMMA
(a
dumbstruck pause)
Marriage?...
Marriage, specifically or generally?
CHARLES
Generally,
of course. You must start there
if
you mean to reach an informed conclusion.
EMMA
You
came here to interview me?
CHARLES
And
to observe you. Your input has already
been
tremendously valuable.
A beat, then Emma returns to her piano. After a few moments.
CHARLES
Chopin
has so many brisk, springy
pieces...
Why don’t you play one of those?
EMMA
You
are vexing beyond any man
that
I have ever met!
CHARLES
(writes)
“Easily
vexed”.
EMMA
Stop
it!
He puts the journal away, sits. She returns to playing, but
keeps looking toward the pocket where the journal was placed.
EMMA
And
so, you’ve created a list?
CHARLES
Yes.
EMMA
The
good and the bad?
CHARLES
The
reasons “for” and “against”.
EMMA
Perhaps
I should create my own list.
Reasons
“for” and “against” men.
CHARLES
Oh,
I think it would be infinitely valuable.
Emma stops playing, turns on the piano stool toward Charles.
EMMA
I
don’t honestly care, but
am
curious. What is on
your
“for” list?
Charles pulls out the journal, reads.
CHARLES
“Children,
if it please God. Constant
companion
and friend in old age
who
will feel interested in one... object
to
be beloved and played with--
better
than a dog anyhow.”
EMMA
“Better
than a dog”?
CHARLES
“Anyhow.”
Don’t you agree?
EMMA
What
else?
CHARLES
Uhm--
“Home, and someone to take care
of
house.”
EMMA
Hm.
CHARLES
“Charms
of music and female chit-chat.
Good
for one’s health but terrible loss of time.”
EMMA
Terrible.
CHARLES
But!
“It is intolerable to think of spending
ones
whole life, like a neuter bee, working,
working
and nothing after all. No, no won’t do.”
EMMA
That’s
all?
CHARLES
Yes.
EMMA
And
what is under the heading of “against”?
Charles looks, skimming through several pages.
CHARLES
Do
you really have time?
(beat)
Clearly,
you’re interested. Fine.
(reads)
“Freedom
to go where one likes... Choice
of
society and little of it... Conversation
of
clever men at clubs... Not forced to
visit
relatives, nor to bend to every trifle...
to
have the expense and anxiety of children.”
EMMA
“Expense
and anxiety”-- that’s how you
see
children?
CHARLES
(looks
up, then reads on)
“Perhaps
quarreling... Loss of time”--
which
I already mentioned in the “for”--
“Cannot
read in the evenings-- fatness
and
idleness-- Less money for books... Perhaps
wife
won’t like London--”
EMMA
But
you don’t like London! You said it’s
cramped,
smokey, dirty, dingy--!”
CHARLES
Yes,
but if my wife doesn’t like London,
then
my sentence is banishment and
degradation
into an indolent, idle fool!
EMMA
Well,
I am so pleased that I know where you stand.
CHARLES
(beat)
May
I speak to you frankly, as my cousin and
old
friend?
EMMA
As
those appear to be the only terms under
which
we shall speak hereafter, why not?
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