You Never Can Tell | Page 8

were a tender one). I am not quite sure. I think so.
MRS. CLANDON (grimly). You are not sure?
GLORIA. No.
MRS. CLANDON (with quiet force). Gloria: if I had ever struck you-- (Gloria recoils: Philip and Dolly are disagreeably shocked; all three start at her, revolted as she continues)--struck you purposely, deliberately, with the intention of hurting you, with a whip bought for the purpose! Would you remember that, do you think? (Gloria utters an exclamation of indignant repulsion.) That would have been your last recollection of your father, Gloria, if I had not taken you away from him. I have kept him out of your life: keep him now out of mine by never mentioning him to me again. (Gloria, with a shudder, covers her face with her hands, until, hearing someone at the door, she turns away and pretends to occupy herself looking at the names of the books in the bookcase. Mrs. Clandon sits down on the sofa. Valentine returns.).
VALENTINE. I hope I've not kept you waiting. That landlord of mine is really an extraordinary old character.
DOLLY (eagerly). Oh, tell us. How long has he given you to pay?
MRS. CLANDON (distracted by her child's bad manners). Dolly, Dolly, Dolly dear! You must not ask questions.
DOLLY (demurely). So sorry. You'll tell us, won't you, Mr. Valentine?
VALENTINE. He doesn't want his rent at all. He's broken his tooth on a Brazil nut; and he wants me to look at it and to lunch with him afterwards.
DOLLY. Then have him up and pull his tooth out at once; and we'll bring him to lunch, too. Tell the maid to fetch him along. (She runs to the bell and rings it vigorously. Then, with a sudden doubt she turns to Valentine and adds) I suppose he's respectable---really respectable.
VALENTINE. Perfectly. Not like me.
DOLLY. Honest Injun? (Mrs. Clandon gasps faintly; but her powers of remonstrance are exhausted.)
VALENTINE. Honest Injun!
DOLLY. Then off with you and bring him up.
VALENTINE (looking dubiously at Mrs. Clandon). I daresay he'd be delighted if--er---?
MRS. CLANDON (rising and looking at her watch). I shall be happy to see your friend at lunch, if you can persuade him to come; but I can't wait to see him now: I have an appointment at the hotel at a quarter to one with an old friend whom I have not seen since I left England eighteen years ago. Will you excuse me?
VALENTINE. Certainly, Mrs. Clandon.
GLORIA. Shall I come?
MRS. CLANDON. No, dear. I want to be alone. (She goes out, evidently still a good deal troubled. Valentine opens the door for her and follows her out.)
PHILIP (significantly--to Dolly). Hmhm!
DOLLY (significantly to Philip). Ahah! (The parlor maid answers the bell.)
DOLLY. Show the old gentleman up.
THE PARLOR MAID (puzzled). Madam?
DOLLY. The old gentleman with the toothache.
PHILIP. The landlord.
THE PARLOR MAID. Mr. Crampton, Sir?
PHILIP. Is his name Crampton?
DOLLY (to Philip). Sounds rheumaticky, doesn't it?
PHILIP. Chalkstones, probably.
DOLLY (over her shoulder, to the parlor maid). Show Mr. Crampstones up. (Goes R. to writing-table chair).
THE PARLOR MAID (correcting her). Mr. Crampton, miss. (She goes.)
DOLLY (repeating it to herself like a lesson). Crampton, Crampton, Crampton, Crampton, Crampton. (She sits down studiously at the writing- table.) I must get that name right, or Heaven knows what I shall call him.
GLORIA. Phil: can you believe such a horrible thing as that about our father---what mother said just now?
PHILIP. Oh, there are lots of people of that kind. Old Chalice used to thrash his wife and daughters with a cartwhip.
DOLLY (contemptuously). Yes, a Portuguese!
PHILIP. When you come to men who are brutes, there is much in common between the Portuguese and the English variety, Doll. Trust my knowledge of human nature. (He resumes his position on the hearthrug with an elderly and responsible air.)
GLORIA (with angered remorse). I don't think we shall ever play again at our old game of guessing what our father was to be like. Dolly: are you sorry for your father---the father with lots of money?
DOLLY. Oh, come! What about your father---the lonely old man with the tender aching heart? He's pretty well burst up, I think.
PHILIP. There can be no doubt that the governor is an exploded superstition. (Valentine is heard talking to somebody outside the door.) But hark: he comes.
GLORIA (nervously). Who?
DOLLY. Chalkstones.
PHILIP. Sh! Attention. (They put on their best manners. Philip adds in a lower voice to Gloria) If he's good enough for the lunch, I'll nod to Dolly; and if she nods to you, invite him straight away.
(Valentine comes back with his landlord. Mr. Fergus Crampton is a man of about sixty, tall, hard and stringy, with an atrociously obstinate, ill tempered, grasping mouth, and a querulously dogmatic voice. Withal he is highly nervous and sensitive, judging by his thin transparent skin marked with multitudinous lines, and his slender fingers. His consequent capacity for suffering acutely from all