Complete Poems and Plays (87 page)

To whom, it seems, you had first been entrusted.

K
AGHAN.
I really don’t know what emotion to register …

L
UCASTA
.
You don’t need to talk that language any longer:

Just say you’re embarrassed.

K
AGHAN
.
                                    Well, I am embarrassed.

If Lady Elizabeth is my mother …

L
ADY
E
LIZABETH
.
There is no doubt whatever about it, Barnabas.

I am your mother.

K
AGHAN
.
                    But who was my father?

L
ADY
E
LIZABETH
.
He died very suddenly. Of a fatal accident

When you were very young. That is why you were adopted.

K
AGHAN
.
But what did he do? Was he a financier?

L
ADY
E
LIZABETH
.
He was not good at figures. Your business ability

Comes, I suppose, from my side of the family.

But he was in a very good regiment —

For a time, at least.

K
AGHAN
.
                     Well, I must get used to that.

But I should like to know how I ought to address you,

Lady Elizabeth. I’ve always been accustomed

To regard Mrs. Kaghan as my mother.

L
ADY
E
LIZABETH
.
Then in order to avoid any danger of confusion

You may address me as Aunt Elizabeth.

K
AGHAN
.
That’s easier, certainly.

L
ADY
E
LIZABETH
.
                            And I shall wish to meet them.

Claude, we must invite the Kaghans to dinner.

S
IR
C
LAUDE
.
By all means, Elizabeth.

K
AGHAN
.
                                               But, Lady Elizabeth —

I mean, Aunt Elizabeth: if I call you Aunt Elizabeth

Would you mind very much calling me … just ‘B’?

L
ADY
E
LIZABETH
.
Certainly, if you prefer that, Barnabas.

L
UCASTA
.
Why is it that you don’t like the name of Barnabas?

K
AGHAN
.
I don’t want people calling me ‘Barney’ —

Barney Kaghan! Kaghan’s all right.

But Barney Kaghan — it sounds rather flashy:

It wouldn’t make the right impression in the City.

L
UCASTA
.
When you’re an alderman, you’ll be Sir Barney Kaghan!

L
ADY
E
LIZABETH
.
And I’m very glad you’re announcing your engagement.

Lucasta, I shall take charge of your wedding.

L
UCASTA
.
We’d meant to be married very quietly

In a register office.

L
ADY
E
LIZABETH.
        You must have a church wedding.

M
RS
. G
UZZARD
.
I am glad to hear you say so, Lady Elizabeth.

But are
you
satisfied?

L
ADY
E
LIZABETH
.
           Satisfied? What about?

M
RS.
G
UZZARD
.
That your suspicions of me were wholly unfounded.

L
ADY
E
LIZABETH
.
Oh, Mrs. Guzzard, I had no suspicions!

I thought there had been a confusion — that’s all.

M
RS.
G
UZZARD.
I feared there might be a confusion in your mind

Between the meaning of
confusion
and
imposture.

S
IR
C
LAUDE.
I don’t think there is any confusion now:

I’m sure that my wife is perfectly convinced;

And Mr. Kaghan’s … mother, I am sure, will confirm it.

M
RS.
G
UZZARD.
That is as much to my interest as anyone’s.

But will your wife be satisfied,

When she has the evidence the Kaghans will supply,

To recognise Barnabas Kaghan as her son?

[
To
L
ADY
E
LIZABETH
]
Are you contented to have him as your son?

S
IR
C
LAUDE.
That seems a strange question, Mrs. Guzzard.

M
RS.
G
UZZARD.
I have been asked here to answer strange questions —

And now it is my turn to ask them.

I should like to gratify everyone’s wishes.

L
ADY
E
LIZABETH.
Oh, of course … Yes, I’m sure … I shall be very happy.

M
RS.
G
UZZARD.
You wished for your son, and now you have your son.

We all of us have to adapt ourselves

To the wish that is granted. That can be a painful process,

As I know. And you, Barnabas Kaghan,

Are you satisfied to find yourself the son

Of Lady Elizabeth Mulhammer?

K
AGHAN.
It’s very much better than being a foundling —

If I can live up to it. And … yes, of course,

If I can make it right with my parents.

I’m fond of them, you know.

L
ADY
E
LIZABETH
.
                     I shall see to that, Barnabas.

K
AGHAN.
B.
— if you don’t mind, Aunt Elizabeth.

L
ADY
E
LIZABETH.
B. — and I’m sure we shall become great friends.

E
GGERSON.
I’m sure we all wish for nothing better.

M
RS.
G
UZZARD.
Wishes, when realised, sometimes turn

Against those who have made them.

[
To
L
ADY
E
LIZABETH
and
K
AGHAN
]
Not, I think, with you.

[
To
L
UCASTA
]
Nor, so far as I can judge, with you.

Perhaps you are the wisest wisher here:

I shall not ask you whether you are satisfied

To be the wife of Barnabas Kaghan,

The daughter-in-law of Lady Elizabeth,

And the daughter of Sir Claude Mulhammer.

S
IR
C
LAUDE
.
That is
my
concern — that she shall be satisfied

To be my daughter.

M
RS.
G
UZZARD.
            Now, Colby,

I must ask
you
now, have you had your wish?

S
IR
C
LAUDE.
Colby only wanted to be sure of the truth.

C
OLBY.
That is a very strange question, Aunt Sarah:

To which I can only give a strange answer.

Sir Claude is right: I wished to know the truth.

What it is, doesn’t matter. All I wanted was relief

From the nagging annoyance of knowing there’s a fact

That one doesn’t know. But the fact itself

Is unimportant, once one knows it.

M
RS.
G
UZZARD.
You had no preference? Between a father and a mother?

C
OLBY
.
I’ve never had a father or a mother —

It’s different for B. He’s had his foster-parents,

So he can afford another relationship.

Let my mother rest in peace. As for a father —

I have the idea of a father.

It’s only just come to me. I should like a father

Whom I have never known and couldn’t know now,

Because he would have died before I was born

Or before I could remember; whom I could get to know

Only by report, by documents —

The story of his life, of his success or failure …

Perhaps his failure more than his success —

By objects that belonged to him, and faded photographs

In which I should try to decipher a likeness;

Whose image I could create in my own mind,

To live with that image. An ordinary man

Whose life I could in some way perpetuate

By being the person he would have liked to be,

And by doing the things he had wanted to do.

M
RS.
G
UZZARD.
Whose son would you wish to be, Colby:

Sir Claude’s — or the son of some other man

Obscure and silent? A dead man, Colby.

Be careful what you say.

C
OLBY
.
                                 A dead obscure man.

M
RS.
G
UZZARD.
You shall have your wish. And when you have your wish

You will have to come to terms with it. You shall have a father

Dead, and unknown to you.

S
IR
C
LAUDE.
                              What do you mean?

M
RS.
G
UZZARD
.
Colby is not your son, Sir Claude.

C
OLBY.
Who was my father, then?

M
RS.
G
UZZARD.
                                 Herbert Guzzard.

You are the son of a disappointed musician.

C
OLBY.
And who was my mother?

M
RS.
G
UZZARD.
                                 Let your mother rest in peace.

I
was
your mother; but I chose to be your aunt.

So you may have your wish, and have no mother.

S
IR
C
LAUDE.
Mrs. Guzzard, this is perfectly incredible!