The Drone | Page 4

Will you?
DANIEL. No, certainly not.
MARY. I do hope uncle brings that nice boy. Dark--tall--well set up--well to do.
(KATE comes in again through the yard door, and looks at MARY, who is gazing vacantly into space.)
KATE. Well? What notion have you got now?
MARY. Oh! just think, Kate! How would you like a boy who was dark and tall, and well set up and well to do?
KATE. I'd just leap at him.
MARY (laughing). Agh! I don't think he'll ever come, Kate!
KATE. I think you've plenty on hand to manage. (BROWN opens the yard door and resumes his old-position from which he stares at the dresser). You're back again, are you?
BROWN. Aye.
KATE. What ails you now?
BROWN. I'm looking the spanner.
MARY. The spanner?
BROWN. The spanner, Miss Mary. It's for turning the nuts like.
KATE. Have you never got it yet?
BROWN. Do you think I've got eyes in the back of my head? Underneath the seat, beside the salt-box, on the right near the wee crock in the left hand corner. (He makes a movement to open one of the drawers of the dresser.)
KATE. Will you get out of that, ignorance. It's not there.
BROWN (with an appealing look at MARY). Maybe its in the parlour?
MARY. Well, I'll take a look round. (She goes through the door to living rooms.)
BROWN (mysteriously). Did you hear the news?
KATE. No. (Very much interested.) What?
BROWN. Ach! You women never know anything.
KATE. What's the news? Somebody killed?
BROWN. No. More serious.
KATE (alarmed). God bless me! What is it?
BROWN. Andy McMinn has a sister.
KATE (disappointed). Ach!
BROWN. And she's trying to get a man.
KATE. Well. I knowed that this years.
BROWN. And Mr. John Murray is a widow man.
KATE. You mean to be telling me that Mr. John has a notion of that old thing? Go long with you!
BROWN. Did you ever hear tell of a widow man that never got married again.
KATE. Plenty. Don't come in here talking blethers.
BROWN. Whist. There's more in what I'm telling you than you think. And I'll hold you to a shilling that Sarah McMinn will be Mrs. John Murray before one month.
KATE. Who told you?
BROWN. Ach. You've no more head than a yellow yorling. Where has Mr. John been going to these wheen of nights?
KATE (thinking). Andy McMinns!
BROWN. Aye. Do you think it is to see old Andy? And sure he's been talking to me all morning about the way the house is being kept. No hand to save the waste; bread and things destroyed; hens laying away; eggs ate up by the dozen and chickens lost and one thing and another. And hinting about what money a good saving woman would bring him. And Mr. Daniel----
KATE. Sh----he's in there working.
BROWN. Working? Ah, God save us! Him working! The last man that seen Mr. Dan working is in his grave this twenty years. (He goes over next workshop door.) I'll just peep in at him through the keyhole. (He goes over and does so, and then beckons KATE over. She peeps in and grins. As they are thus occupied ALICK MCCREADY opens the door and stands gazing at them. He is a type of the young well-to-do farmer, respectably dressed and good-looking.)
ALICK. Well! Well! Some people earn their money easy!
BROWN. Aye. In soul. Just look in there to see it. (MCCREADY looks in and bursts into a loud hearty laugh. BROWN hurriedly goes out by the yard door and KATE by door to inner rooms.)
DANIEL (opening door and standing there, perplexed looking). What's the matter?
ALICK. Ah. I was just laughing at a wee joke, Mr. Murray.
DANIEL. It must have been very funny.
ALICK. Aye. It was. (Coming close to DANIEL, who walks slowly to the middle of the kitchen.) I say. Were you at McArn's publichouse last night?
DANIEL (looking round cautiously to see that no one else can hear him). Well, just a minute or two. Why?
ALICK. There was someone there told Andy McMinn this morning, I believe, that you'd been talking of a great invention altogether, and he was that much curious to see it that him and his sister Sarah are coming over this day to have a look at it.
DANIEL. Who? Sarah McMinn?
ALICK. Aye. She's very anxious to see it, I believe.
DANIEL. Um. Rather awkward this. She's not a woman that, plainly speaking, I care very much to talk about my ideas to.
ALICK. But have you got something struck out?
DANIEL. McCready, come here. (ALICK goes closer to him.) It is really a great idea. Splendid. But I've a great deal of trouble over it. In fact I've been thinking out details of a particular gear all morning.
ALICK. Aye. (He looks at DANIEL and then endeavours to restrain unsuccessfully a burst of laughter.)
DANIEL (angrily). You were always an ignorant hound anyway and be d----d to you. (He turns to go towards his workshop.)
ALICK. Ah, Mr. Murray, I beg