60 Plays: The George Bernard Shaw Edition (Illustrated). GEORGE BERNARD SHAW
they think I am a talking machine to be turned on for their pleasure every evening of my life. May I not have ONE night at home, with my wife, and my friends?
(They are all amazed at this outburst, except Eugene. His expression remains unchanged.)
CANDIDA. Oh, James, you know you’ll have an attack of bad conscience tomorrow; and I shall have to suffer for that.
LEXY (intimidated, but urgent). I know, of course, that they make the most unreasonable demands on you. But they have been telegraphing all over the place for another speaker: and they can get nobody but the President of the Agnostic League.
MORELL (promptly). Well, an excellent man. What better do they want?
LEXY. But he always insists so powerfully on the divorce of Socialism from Christianity. He will undo all the good we have been doing. Of course you know best; but — (He hesitates.)
CANDIDA (coaxingly). Oh, DO go, James. We’ll all go.
BURGESS (grumbling). Look ‘ere, Candy! I say! Let’s stay at home by the fire, comfortable. He won’t need to be more’n a couple-o’-hour away.
CANDIDA. You’ll be just as comfortable at the meeting. We’ll all sit on the platform and be great people.
EUGENE (terrified). Oh, please don’t let us go on the platform. No — everyone will stare at us — I couldn’t. I’ll sit at the back of the room.
CANDIDA. Don’t be afraid. They’ll be too busy looking at James to notice you.
MORELL (turning his head and looking meaningly at her over his shoulder). Prossy’s complaint, Candida! Eh?
CANDIDA (gaily). Yes.
BURGESS (mystified). Prossy’s complaint. Wot are you talking about, James?
MORELL (not heeding him, rises; goes to the door; and holds it open, shouting in a commanding voice). Miss Garnett.
PROSERPINE (in the distance). Yes, Mr. Morell. Coming. (They all wait, except Burgess, who goes stealthily to Lexy and draws him aside.)
BURGESS. Listen here, Mr. Mill. Wot’s Prossy’s complaint? Wot’s wrong with ‘er?
LEXY (confidentially). Well, I don’t exactly know; but she spoke very strangely to me this morning. I’m afraid she’s a little out of her mind sometimes.
BURGESS (overwhelmed). Why, it must be catchin’! Four in the same ‘ouse! (He goes back to the hearth, quite lost before the instability of the human intellect in a clergyman’s house.)
PROSERPINE (appearing on the threshold). What is it, Mr. Morell?
MORELL. Telegraph to the Guild of St. Matthew that I am coming.
PROSERPINE (surprised). Don’t they expect you?
MORELL (peremptorily). Do as I tell you.
(Proserpine frightened, sits down at her typewriter, and obeys. Morell goes across to Burgess, Candida watching his movements all the time with growing wonder and misgiving.)
MORELL. Burgess: you don’t want to come?
BURGESS (in deprecation). Oh, don’t put it like that, James. It’s only that it ain’t Sunday, you know.
MORELL. I’m sorry. I thought you might like to be introduced to the chairman. He’s on the Works Committee of the County Council and has some influence in the matter of contracts. (Burgess wakes up at once. Morell, expecting as much, waits a moment, and says) Will you come?
BURGESS (with enthusiasm). Course I’ll come, James. Ain’ it always a pleasure to ‘ear you.
MORELL (turning from him). I shall want you to take some notes at the meeting, Miss Garnett, if you have no other engagement. (She nods, afraid to speak.) You are coming, Lexy, I suppose.
LEXY. Certainly.
CANDIDA. We are all coming, James.
MORELL. No: you are not coming; and Eugene is not coming. You will stay here and entertain him — to celebrate your return home. (Eugene rises, breathless.)
CANDIDA. But James —
MORELL (authoritatively). I insist. You do not want to come; and he does not want to come. (Candida is about to protest.) Oh, don’t concern yourselves: I shall have plenty of people without you: your chairs will be wanted by unconverted people who have never heard me before.
CANDIDA (troubled). Eugene: wouldn’t you like to come?
MORELL. I should be afraid to let myself go before Eugene: he is so critical of sermons. (Looking at him.) He knows I am afraid of him: he told me as much this morning. Well, I shall show him how much afraid I am by leaving him here in your custody, Candida.
MARCHBANKS (to himself, with vivid feeling). That’s brave. That’s beautiful. (He sits down again listening with parted lips.)
CANDIDA (with anxious misgiving). But — but — Is anything the matter, James? (Greatly troubled.) I can’t understand —
MORELL. Ah, I thought it was I who couldn’t understand, dear. (He takes her tenderly in his arms and kisses her on the forehead; then looks round quietly at Marchbanks.)
ACT III
Late in the evening. Past ten. The curtains are drawn, and the lamps lighted. The typewriter is in its case; the large table has been cleared and tidied; everything indicates that the day’s work is done.
Candida and Marchbanks are seated at the fire. The reading lamp is on the mantelshelf above Marchbanks, who is sitting on the small chair reading aloud from a manuscript. A little pile of manuscripts and a couple of volumes of poetry are on the carpet beside him. Candida is in the easy chair with the poker, a light brass one, upright in her hand. She is leaning back and looking at the point of it curiously, with her feet stretched towards the blaze and her heels resting on the fender, profoundly unconscious of her appearance and surroundings.
MARCHBANKS (breaking off in his recitation): Every poet that ever lived has put that thought into a sonnet. He must: he can’t help it. (He looks to her for assent, and notices her absorption in the poker.) Haven’t you been listening? (No response.) Mrs. Morell!
CANDIDA (starting). Eh?
MARCHBANKS. Haven’t you been listening?
CANDIDA (with a guilty excess of politeness). Oh, yes. It’s very nice. Go on, Eugene. I’m longing to hear what happens to the angel.
MARCHBANKS (crushed — the manuscript dropping from his hand to the floor). I beg your pardon for boring you.
CANDIDA. But you are not boring me, I assure you. Please go on. Do, Eugene.
MARCHBANKS. I finished the poem about the angel quarter of an hour ago. I’ve read you several things since.
CANDIDA (remorsefully). I’m so sorry, Eugene. I think the poker must have fascinated me. (She puts it down.)
MARCHBANKS. It made me horribly uneasy.
CANDIDA. Why didn’t you tell me? I’d have put it down at once.
MARCHBANKS. I was afraid of making you uneasy, too. It looked as if it were a weapon. If I were a hero of old, I should have laid my drawn sword between us. If Morell had come in he would have thought you had taken up the poker because there was no sword between us.
CANDIDA (wondering). What? (With a puzzled glance at him.) I can’t quite follow that. Those sonnets of yours have perfectly addled me. Why should there be a sword between us?
MARCHBANKS (evasively). Oh, never mind. (He stoops to pick up the manuscript.)
CANDIDA. Put that down again, Eugene. There are limits to my appetite for poetry — even your poetry. You’ve been reading to me for