Delphi Complete Works of Jerome K. Jerome (Illustrated) (Series Four) (324 page)

GEOFFREY What more can I do than I’m doing? How can I countenance this sort of thing? [He indicates the posters.] Declare myself dead against the whole movement?

LAMB You’ll do it later. May as well do it soon.

GEOFFREY Why must I do it?

LAMB Because you’re beginning to find out what it means.

[A pause. The door is open. ANNYS is standing there.]

ANNYS Dare we venture into the enemy’s camp?

[She enters, laughing, followed by ELIZABETH and PHOEBE. ANNYS is somewhat changed from the grave, dreamy ANNYS of a short week ago. She is brimming over with vitality — excitement. There is a decisiveness, an egoism, about her that seems new to her. The women’s skirts make a flutter. A breeze seems to have entered. ANNYS runs to her husband. For the moment the election fades away. They are all smiles, tenderness for one another.]

ANNYS Don’t tell, will you? Mamma would be so shocked. Do you know you haven’t been near me for three days?

GEOFFREY Umph! I like that. Where were you last night?

ANNYS Last night? In the neighbourhood of Leicester Square till three o’clock. Oh, Geoff, there’s such a lot wants altering!

[She turns to greet the others.]

GEOFFREY Your ruining your health won’t do it. You’re looking fagged to death.

ANNYS [She shakes hands with SIGSBY.] How are you? [To LAMB.]
I’m so glad you’re helping him. [She turns again to GEOFFREY.]
Pure imagination, dearest. I never felt better in my life.

GEOFFREY Umph! Look at all those lines underneath your eyes. [He shakes hands with ELIZABETH.] How do you do? [To PHOEBE.] How are you?

ANNYS [She comes back to him — makes to smooth the lines from his forehead.] Look at all those, there. We’ll run away together for a holiday, when it’s all over. What are you doing this evening?

SIGSBY You promised to speak at a Smoker to-night; the Bow and
Bromley Buffaloes.

ANNYS Oh, bother the Buffaloes. Take me out to dinner. I am free after seven.

[MRS. CHINN has entered — is arranging the table for tea. ANNYS goes to her.]

How are you, Mrs. Chinn?

MRS. CHINN [She wipes her hand on her apron before taking ANNYS’S proffered hand.]

GEOFFREY [To SIGSBY.] I can turn up there later in the evening.
[He joins the others for a moment — talks with them.]

MRS. CHINN [Now shaking hands.] Quite well, thank you, ma’am. [She has cast a keen, motherly glance at ANNYS.] I hope you’re taking care of yourself, ma’am.

ANNYS Of course I am. We Politicians owe it to our Party.
[Laughs.] How are they getting on here, without me?

MRS. CHINN Well, ma’am, from what I can see, I think Mr. Chilvers is trusting a little too much to his merits. Shall I bring some more cups and saucers, sir?

GEOFFREY Ah! yes! [To ANNYS.] You’ll have some tea?

ANNYS Strong, please, Mrs. Chinn.

[MRS. CHINN goes out.]

[Laughs.] Yes, I know it’s bad for me. [She puts a hand over his mouth.]

PHOEBE Old Mother Chinn is quite right, you know, Geoff. You’re not putting up a good fight.

GEOFFREY [A slight irritability begins to show itself.] I frankly confess that I am not used to fighting women.

ELIZABETH Yes. It was easier, no doubt, when we took it lying down.

ANNYS You promised, if I brought you, that you would be good.

GEOFFREY I wish it had been you.

PHOEBE Yes, but we don’t!

[As she and ELIZABETH move away.]

Did you have a row with the doctor when you were born?

[To which ELIZABETH replies, though the words reach only PHOEBE: “I might have, if I had known that my mother was doing all the work, while he was pocketing the fee!”]

LAMB You see, Mrs. Chilvers, our difficulty is that there is nothing to be said against you — except one thing.

ANNYS What’s that?

LAMB That you’re a woman.

ANNYS [Smiling.] Isn’t that enough?

SIGSBY Quite enough, Mrs. Chilvers, if the guv’nor would only say it.

ANNYS [To GEOFFREY.] Why don’t you? I’ll promise not to deny it.

[The others drift apart. They group themselves near to the window.
They talk together — grow evidently interested and excited.]

GEOFFREY I have just had a letter from your — Election Agent, expressing indignation with one of my supporters for merely having hinted at the fact.

ANNYS I don’t understand.

GEOFFREY [He takes from the table the letter and hands it to her in silence. He seats himself on the settee and watches her.]

ANNYS [She seats herself on a chair just opposite to him; reads the letter through in silence.] In my case it does not apply.

GEOFFREY How do you know?

ANNYS [The atmosphere has grown suddenly oppressive.] Oh, I — I think we might find some other reason than that. [She hands him back the letter.]

GEOFFREY It’s the only one of any importance. It embraces all the others. Shall woman be mother — or politician? [He puts the letter in his pocket.]

ANNYS Why cannot she be both?

GEOFFREY [He is looking at her searchingly.] Because if she is the one, she doesn’t want to be the other.

[A silence.]

ANNYS You are wrong. It is the mother instinct that makes us politicians. We want to take care of the world.

GEOFFREY Exactly. You think man’s job more interesting than your own.

ANNYS [After a moment.] Who told you that it was a man’s job?

GEOFFREY Well. [He shrugs his shoulders.] We can’t do yours.

ANNYS Can’t we help each other?

GEOFFREY As, for instance, in this election! [He gives a short laugh.]

ANNYS Of course, this is an exceptional case.

GEOFFREY It’s an epitome of the whole question. You are trying to take my job away from me. To the neglect of your own.

ANNYS [After another moment’s silence.] Haven’t I always tried to do my duty?

GEOFFREY I have thought so.

ANNYS Oh, my dear, we mustn’t quarrel. You will win this election. I want you to win it. Next time we must fight side by side again.

GEOFFREY Don’t you see? Fighting you means fighting the whole movement. [He indicates the posters pinned to the walls.] That sort of thing.

ANNYS [After a brief inspection.] Not that way. [Shaking her head.] It would break my heart for you to turn against us. Win because you are the better man. [Smiling.] I want you to be the better man.

GEOFFREY I would rather be your husband.

ANNYS [Smiling.] Isn’t that the same thing?

GEOFFREY No. I want a wife.

ANNYS What precisely do you mean by “wife”?

GEOFFREY It’s an old-established word.

[MRS. CHINN has entered to complete the tea arrangements. She is arranging the table.]

MRS. CHINN There’s a deputation downstairs, sir, just come for you.

GEOFFREY What are they?

MRS. CHINN It’s one of those societies for the reform of something. They said you were expecting them.

SIGSBY [Breaking away from the group by the window.] Quite right.
[Looks at his watch.] Five o’clock, I’ll bring them up.

GEOFFREY Happen to know what it is they want to reform?

SIGSBY [By door.] Laws relating to the physical relationship between the sexes, I think.

GEOFFREY Oh, only that!

SIGSBY Something of the sort.

[He goes out. MRS. CHINN also by the other door.]

GEOFFREY [Rising.] Will you pour out?

ANNYS [She has been thinking. She comes back to the present.] We shan’t be in your way?

GEOFFREY Oh, no. It will make it easier to get rid of them.

[ANNYS changes her chair. The others gather round. The service and drinking of tea proceeds in the usual course.]

[To ELIZABETH.] You’ll take some tea?

ELIZABETH Thank you.

GEOFFREY You must be enjoying yourself just now.

ELIZABETH [Makes a moue.] They insist on my being agreeable.

ANNYS It’s so good for her. Teaches her self-control.

LAMB I gather from Mrs. Spender, that in the perfect world there will be no men at all.

ELIZABETH Oh, yes, they will be there. But in their proper place.

ST. HERBERT That’s why you didn’t notice them.

[The DEPUTATION reaches the door. The sound of voices is heard.]

PHOEBE She’s getting on very well. If she isn’t careful, she’ll end up by being a flirt.

[The DEPUTATION enters, guided by SIGSBY. Its number is five, two men and three women. Eventually they group themselves — some standing, some sitting — each side of GEOFFREY. The others gather round ANNYS, who keeps her seat at the opposite side of the table.]

SIGSBY [Talking as he enters.] Exactly what I’ve always maintained.

HOPPER It would make the husband quite an interesting person.

SIGSBY [Cheerfully.] That’s the idea. Here we are, guv’nor.
This is Mr. Chilvers.

[GEOFFREY bows, the DEPUTATION also. SIGSBY introduces a remarkably boyish-looking man, dressed in knickerbockers.]

SIGSBY This is Mr. Peekin, who has kindly consented to act as spokesman. [To the DEPUTATION, generally.] Will you have some tea?

MISS BORLASSE [A thick-set, masculine-featured lady, with short hair and heavy eyebrows. Her deep, decisive tone settles the question.] Thank you. We have so little time.

MR. PEEKIN We propose, Mr. Chilvers, to come to the point at once.
[He is all smiles, caressing gestures.]

GEOFFREY Excellent.

PEEKIN If I left a baby at your door, what would you do with it?

GEOFFREY [For a moment he is taken aback, recovers himself.] Are you thinking of doing so?

PEEKIN It’s not impossible.

GEOFFREY Well, it sounds perhaps inhospitable, but do you know I really think I should ask you to take it away again.

PEEKIN Yes, but by the time you find it there, I shall have disappeared — skedaddled.

HOPPER Good. [He rubs his hands. Smiles at the others.]

GEOFFREY In that case I warn you that I shall hand it over to the police.

PEEKIN [He turns to the others.] I don’t myself see what else Mr.
Chilvers could be expected to do.

MISS BORLASSE He’d be a fool not to.

GEOFFREY Thank you. So far we seem to be in agreement. And now may I ask to what all this is leading?

PEEKIN [He changes from the debonnair to the dramatic.] How many men, Mr. Chilvers, leave their babies every year at the door of poverty-stricken women? What are they expected to do with them?

[A moment. The DEPUTATION murmur approval.]

GEOFFREY I see. But is there no difference between the two doors?
I am not an accomplice.

PEEKIN An accomplice! Is the ignorant servant-girl — first lured into the public-house, cajoled, tricked, deceived by false promises — the half-starved shop-girl in the hands of the practised libertine — is she an accomplice?

MRS. PEEKIN [A dowdily-dressed, untidy woman, but the face is sweet and tender.] Ah, Mr. Chilvers, if you could only hear the stories that I have heard from dying lips.

GEOFFREY Very pitiful, my dear lady. And, alas, only too old. But there are others. It would not be fair to blame always the man.

ANNYS [Unnoticed, drawn by the subject, she has risen and come down.] Perhaps not. But the punishment always falls on the woman. Is THAT quite fair?

GEOFFREY [He is irritated at ANNYS’S incursion into the discussion.] My dear Annys, that is Nature’s law, not man’s. All man can do is to mitigate it.

PEEKIN That is all we ask. The suffering, the shame, must always be the woman’s. Surely that is sufficient.

GEOFFREY What do you propose?

MISS BORLASSE [In her deep, fierce tones.] That all children born out of wedlock should be a charge upon the rates.

MISS RICKETTS [A slight, fair, middle-aged woman, with a nervous hesitating manner.] Of course, only if the mother wishes it.

GEOFFREY [The proposal staggers him. But the next moment it inspires him with mingled anger and amusement.] My dear, good people, have you stopped for one moment to consider what the result of your proposal would be?

PEEKIN For one thing, Mr. Chilvers, the adding to the populace of healthy children in place of the stunted and diseased abortions that is all that these poor women, out of their scanty earnings, can afford to present to the State.

GEOFFREY Humph! That incidentally it would undermine the whole institution of marriage, let loose the flood-gates that at present hold immorality in check, doesn’t appear to trouble you. That the law must be altered to press less heavily upon the woman — that the man must be made an equal sharer in the penalty — all that goes without saying. The remedy you propose would be a thousand times worse than the disease.