Theatricals

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BOUGHT WITH THE INCOME FROM THE

SAGE ENDOWMENT FUND

THE GIFT OP

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Tenants ... . i

IN THREE ACTS

Act First

The spacious, sociable, old - fashioned hall at Beechingham, panelled in clear colours and used as =i place of reunion. It opens, largely, into an ante-room, through the wide window of which the avenue of a small park and a charming horizon are shown, and which conducts on the left to the entrance of the house as well as to various apartments, and on the right to the staircase, to other apartments and to the billiard-room. On the right of the hall the door to the drawing-room ; on the left the door to the library. The place shows signs of constant and familiar habitation and of studied comfort, but not of conspicuous luxury.

Miss Dyer comes down impatiently from the window of the ante-room. MISS DYER.

What a bore to have to wait half the day for your letters ! The next position I accept, I shall make an early London post a condition.

Enter Mildred through the ante-room from the left, with several letters in her hand.

MILDRED.

Here they are : I looked out for the groom in the park.

MISS DYER.

I'm not quite sure you ought !

MILDRED.

Dear Miss Dyer, you're never quite sure I ought ! Here's a letter for you.

MISS DYER, with the letter.

Only one ?

MILDRED.

Only one.

MISS DYER.

How stupid — from mamma ! And are all the others for you ?

MILDRED.

For me ? who ever writes to me ? Some of them are for Sir Frederick ; the others are for Mr. Byng.

MISS DYER.

I suppose those are the ones you looked out for in the park !

MILDRED, holding up a letter.

This is the one. It has a big official seal, which I've taken the liberty to examine. .; '

MISS DYER.

I'm not quite sure you ought !

MILDRED. I

The deec^is done, and the horrible thing is from the people in London, to put an end to his leave.

MISS DYER.

I think it high time !

Act First S Mildred

After a month — only a little month ?

MISS DYER.

A month isn't so little, when one makes such a big use of it.

MILDRED, vague.

What use, pray — ?

MISS DYER.

To make love to you !

MILDRED.

Why shouldn't he, if he likes me ?

MISS DYER.

I'm not quite sure he ought !

MILDRED.

Neither am I. But perhaps he can't help it !

^ MISS DYER.

I think Sir Frederick will come to his aid. And since we're discussing the subject —

MILDRED.

Dear Miss Dyer, we're not discussing the subject.

MISS DYER.

Yes — I'm not quite sure we ought !

Enter Norman Byng through the ante-room from the right.

NORMAN, hearing the last words.

You certainly oughtn't — if you mean reading my letters.

MILDRED.

I was just going to carry them to you. (ThenasNoKMAN takes the letters.) There's One with a dreadful seal.

NORMAN, looking.

Governmental ? My death-knell !

MISS DYER.

Oh, you won't die, Mr. Byng — you'll get better.

MILDRED.

Certainly, my dear — if you nurse him ! I must take Sir Frederick his letters.

NORMAN.

You'll come back, won't you ?

MILDRED, at the door of the hbrary.

To hear if you must go ?

NORMAN.

Oh, I can read that without breaking the envelope !

MILDRED.

I'll come back. ;^

Exit Mildred to the library.

MISS DYER.

In that case I shall be in the way !

ACT FIRST 7 NORMAN, preoccupied, looking over his letters

Oh, Miss Dyer — don't say that !

MISS DYER.

You know that's what I am here for — to be in the

way.

NORMAN, still absent.

I see — we must do our duty.' I've got to do mine.

MISS DYER, with much expression.

Be brave, then, Mr. Byng, and face it at whatever cost !

NORMAN, surprised at her manner.

It's all in the day's work.

MISS DYER.

You won't go without bidding me good-bye ?

NORMAN.

Oh, dear no ! Good-bye now, if you Hke.

MISS DYER, gazing at him a moment ; then with unspeakable reproach.

Farewell !

Exit Miss Dyer to the drawing-room.

NORMAN, alone.

She z's a " companion " with a vengeance ! She was engaged to be Mildred's, but she seems to want to be

mine. (Re-enter Mildred from the library.) My dear child, the

bolt has fallen — the end of these golden days.

MILDRED, with a soft sigh of wonder and regret.

So suddenly — so soon?

NORMAN.

Doesn't it seem only yesterday that I came ?

MILDRED, musing.

I don't know what it seems, Norman. It has made such a difference.

NORMAN.

Ah, they come quickly, such differences as that !

MILDRED.

Isn't it wonderful ? — when everything is changed !

NORMAN.

Yes, a great new life is born, somehow, in a little instant of time. We've got to take care of it, Mildred— we've got to bring it up !

MILDRED, smiling sadly.

I hope you don't think it's delicate.

NORMAN.

I daresay it will thrive ! (Grave, tender.) It's " promising '' — it will be the support of our old age.

MILDRfiD.

Our old age ? Shall we have to wait for that ?

NORMAN.

I mean it will be the security, the foundation of our future. That's what you've done for me, darling — you've made me a future.

Act First 9 Mildred

You've made me a past — that began a month ago; blessed memories after you're gone !

NORMAN.

Ah, think of me — think of me then, dear girl !

MILDRED.

I shan't have to "think" of you — I shall see you, I shall hear you, I shall touch you.

NORMAN.

We shall be doing just the same thing, in that case, at just the same moment.

MILDRED.

We shall be together then, shan't we, after all ?

NORMAN.

People are together when they hate sufficiently the things that keep them apart.

MILDRED.

You can trust me to hate them sufficiently !

NORMAN, who has looked off through the wide window.

This picture of peace and summer, of fragrant, fruitful confidence, of a kind of sacred safety, is the image of what has passed between us. I shall carry it with me, and it will be the world I shall really live in.

lo TENANTS

MILDRED.

But don't take it down yet ! Surely they give you time.

J NORMAN.

Five days. They'll do to break our hearts in !

MILDRED.

They'll do to break your father's. He asked me if you were here; so I judge he's coming to you. I must go.

NORMAN.

Don't be nervous — wait for him. If our minutes are numbered, let us at least not be cheated.

MILDRED.

When you talk of sacredness and safety, what do you do with the wolf in the fold ?

NORMAN.

My father ? He's the sheep-dog biting the lambs ! Yes, he's sacred, dear man, but he's not particularly safe.

MILDRED.

I'm sure he's going to be dreadful — he has his ideas.

NORMAN.

He'd be so wise without them !

MILDRED, as the door of Ihe librai"y opens.

Here he comes.

NORMAN.

We are cheated !

ACT FIRST II MILDRED, from the ante-room

We shall make it up !

Exit Mildred to the right.

Enter Sir Frederick Byng from the lihrary.

SIR FREDERICK, who has seen Mildred.

You're not behaving well, Norman — neither is that girl.

NORMAN.

You don't know our excuse. (Handing one of his letters.) See what I've just received. ,

SIR FREDERICK, with the open letter ; glancing over it and handing it back.

It's a great relief to me. If this summons hadn't arrived I should have been under the painful necessity of asking you to bring your visit to Beechingham to a close.

NORMAN.

You'd have turned me out of the house ?

SIR FREDERICK.

AVouldn't that have been better than turning Mildred ?

NORMAN.

I may be utterly wanting in acuteness, but I can't for the life of me understand why you should turn either of us.

SIR FREDERICK.

You're not in the least wanting in acuteness, but you're remarkably wanting in delicacy.

NORMAN.

Do you mean because I'm such a coarse brute as to be in love ?

SIR FREDERICK.

Be in love as much as you please; but hold your tongue about it !

NORMAN.

What good will that do me ?

SIR FREDERICK.

The good of keeping you a gentleman — so long as Mildred's my charge. She came into this house, as you know, by no incUnation or invitation of mine, two years ago ; when, the day after my return from India, my oldest friend, the friend of my earliest years, took it into his head to impose on me unexpectedly, on his death-bed as it were, the guardianship of his only daughter — of her unprotected youth, her unspotted honour, and her very considerable fortune.

NORMAN.

It was a favour to ask of a quiet widower — with so little experience of women !

SIR FREDERICK, dry.

Stanmore judged of my experience, and I appreciated his. His marriage had been deeply unhappy ; it had led him to make some gloomy generalisations, and to wish, perversely if you like, but intensely, to consign Mildred to hands other than those he had fallen into. In a word, he held that the best influence for her would be an

Act First 13

honest gentleman as nearly as possible like himself. I accepted his confidence — I hold it sacred. But it has been a great complication.

NORMAN.

He overlooked your other incumbrance.

SIR FREDERICK.

You were in training for your career — taking your first far-away steps in it. He had scarcely seen you — he didn't focus you.

NORMAN.

Why should you assume that if he had done me that honour —

SIR FREDERICK.

He would have checked your aspirations ? I assume nothing, and that's precisely why I don't assume that he would have wished his daughter — simply because you're my son — to bind herself to you before she has had a glimpse of another fate.

NORMAN.

The Rhadamanthus your early friend has made of you, sir, is a thing to make one beware of early friendships !

SIR FREDERICK, after a moment.

Do that indeed — in every sense of the term : make the largest application of the moral ! Remember that when you reach my age, if you've had time to have a past you also still have time to suffer from it. Your past is on your back, and at fifty-seven you may have a good way farther to carry it.

NORMAN.

I should have thought your age delightful — it certainly makes you so ! But your description of it sounds indeed alarming.

SIR FREDERICK.

The more reason for keeping arj eye on it in advance. Reflect on that, and beware of entanglements. I didn't — but that's none of your business.

NORMAN.

None whatever, father.

SIR FREDERICK.

Don't be impertinent. You are, horribly, when you affect to criticise me for not thinking it consistent with the dignity of my office to throw my helpless ward, who has seven thousand a year, into the arms of my ambitious son, who has nothing.

NORMAN.

I'm not a beggar, you know.

SIR FREDERICK.

You're the next thing to it ! You have no prospects to speak of from me. I left India with my pension, but with very little else — save the ruins of my constitution. I'm so little at my ease, at this moment, that I've made up my mind to a tiresome sacrifice.

NORMAN.

The sacrifice of what ?

Act First 15 Sir Frederick

The old lodge at Clere — the dowerhouse of the estate. I've determined to let it.

NORMAN.

That will rather be^a gain, if you let it to pleasant people.

SIR FREDERICK.

Pleasant people are what I hope for. They may make a little company for Mildred.

NORMAN.

Especially, I ■ suppose, if there's a sweet young man among them who hasn't the misfortune to be your son.

SIR FREDERICK.

He may be as sweet as he likes — he'll have to wait till she's of age.

NORMAN.

Which, by the terms of her father's cold-blooded will, is not to be till she's twenty-two.

SIR FREDERICK.

That gives you the measure of his circumspection, which I rigidly emulate.

NORMAN.

So that as she's only eighteen now —

SIR FREDERICK.

The sweet young men will have exactly four years to wait. For yourself, the first on the charming hst, you'll i6 TENANTS

be so good as to wait in silence, and to go about your business meanwhile. In a word, you'll postpone all further overtures to Miss Stanmore till she is in a position to reflect, to compare, to choose — to dispose intelligently of her hand and her money.

NORMAN.

Your conditions are hard, sir.

SIR FREDERICK.

If you rebel against them you give me a pretext for making them harder.

NORMAN.

How can they be ?

SIR FREDERICK.

My dear boy, don't force me to request you to go about your business on the instant.

NORMAN, after a moment.

Will you give me the very few days they allow me at headquarters ?

SIR FREDERICK.

It's lucky for you they're numbered ! (Crosses to the door of the drawing-room.) But I count on your absolute discretion.

NORMAN.

You may count.

SIR FREDERICK.

Meanwhile kindly tell me if you've seen Miss Dyer.

Act First 17 Norman

She was here a moment ago — she went to the drawing-room.

SIR FREDERICK, ceremoniously.

Thank you.

Exit Sir Frederick to the drawing-room.

NORMAN, alone.

He wants to tell her to keep an eye on Mildred. Ah, Miss Dyer's eye !

L Re-enter Mildred through the ante-room from the right. MILDRED.

May I come back ?

NORMAN.

Yes, but I mayn't speak to you.

MILDRED, coming down.

And mayn't I speak to you ?

NORMAN.

What good will it do if I can't answer ?

MILDRED.

We understand each other without words. Was your father very dreadful ?

NORMAN.

Quite ghastly ! But I've accepted his conditions.

MILDRED.

And what are they ?

VOL. I c i8 TENANTS

NORMAN.

To wait the four years.

MILDRED, dolorous.

Ah ! (After a moment.) Well, I accept them.

NORMAN.

I can't tell you what I feel when I hear you say that — because I've promised not to. But I may feel it all the same, mayn't I ?

Re-enter Miss Dyer from the drawing-room.

MILDRED, pointed.

I'm not quite sure you ought !

MISS DYER.

My dear Mildred, I've opened the new piano for you. I think you'd better go and try it.

NORMAN, privately to Mildred.

Miss Dyer's eye !

MILDRED, in the same way.

It's better than Miss Dyer's ear ! (Then aloud.) What shall I play?

NORMAN.

"When we two parted — in silence and tears!"

MILDRED.

I know the air.

Exit Mildred to the drawing-room

Act First 19

MISS DYER, looking at Norman sentimentally, and warbling the rest of the Byronic quotation.

" Half broken-hearted — to sever for years ! "

NORMAN, at the door of the library.

Only for four !

Exit Norman to the library.

MISS DYER, alone, plaintive.

He hates me when I call her away from him. It's hard to be obliged to make him hate me ! (Then seeing

Mrs. ViBERT, who has appeared in the ante-room from the left, and stands there

looking at her.) A lady — a Stranger ?

Enter Mrs. Vibert, who slowly comes down.

MRS. VIBERT.

If I venture to come in unannounced, I'll tell you presently why.

MISS DYER.

In these soft September days, in the depths of Devonshire, we leave everything open.

MRS. VIBERT.

I like open houses — and open hearts ! And I'm not dangerous, though you look at me as if I were a gipsy.

MISS DYER, mystified, fluttered, but responsive ; having surveyed her charming appearance and French dress, and taken in her cosmopolitan air.

Not the kind that tell one's fortune !

MRS. VIBERT.

I've walked across your park — your park is lovely.

MISS DYER.

It's not mine — I wish it were !

MRS. VIBERT, gay.

Oh, I know where I am — I know your facts ! (Then as Miss Dyer slightly starts.) Don't be frightened : I'm sure you've no secrets.

MISS DYER, with superiority.

A woman who has no secrets must be rather a frump !

MRS. VIBERT.

Not so great a frump as the woman who doesn't find them out ! What I meant is that I know about Beechingham Manor — I've come to see it.

MISS DYER.

Are you under the impression that it's shown ?

MRS. VIBERT.

Not in general ; but (with a flattering, insinuating smile)yOU COUld

be my cicerone.

MISS DYER.

I'm not quite sure I ought ! I haven't the honour of knowing —

MRS. VIBERT.

In the least who I am ? /e vous tovibe des niies, precisely.

MISS DYER, pleased.

I do know French !

Act First 21

MRS. VIBERT.

Let me tell you in plain English that I'm a possible tenant for Clere.

MISS DYER.

The dowerhouse ?

MRS. VIBERT.

At the other end of the park. I heard it was to let, I'm in search of a quiet refuge in the country, I came over this morning from a little watering-place on the Cornish border, I looked at the whole thing and fell in love with it.

MISS DYER.

It's a sweet little nest.

MRS. VIBERT, who has looked about her.

And in the shadow of such pleasant things !

MISS DYER.

I do what I can here, but I fear I can't boast of my material.

MRS. VIBERT.

Whatever your material, it appeals to me, since I'm to be a neighbour : it may make a great difference to me. So I sent the agent away and just wandered across — to explore and to propose.

MISS DYER, with a slight movement.

To propose ?

MRS. VIBERT, laughing.

Oh not in the sense you naturally attach — ! But I'm a very frank, direct person — I like to stand up to m; landlord.

MISS DYER.

It's a pity Sir Frederick's so shy !

MRS. VIBERT.

That's perhaps only with you ! May I inquire if he's a home?

MISS DYER.

He was in the drawing-room a moment ago — he wen into the garden.

MRS. VIBERT.

Could you kindly cause him to be informed that hii tenant would like to see him ?

MISS DYER.

What name shall I have the honour to give?

MRS. VIBERT.

Please simply say a lady- — to treat ! (Exit Miss Dyer througi

the ante-room, to the right. Mrs. ViBERT, alone, looks round her.) It I.

charming, and if I wanted to reconnoitre I've succeedec beyond my hope.

Re-enter Mildred, without perceiving her, from the drawing-room. MILDRED, weary, impatient, while Mrs. Vibert goes up to look further.

The new piano's deadly flat — everything, to-day, ii

deadly flat. (Seeing Mrs. Vibert; to herself.) Ah nO, s/ie's nOt MRS. VIBERT, seeing Mildred and coming down again.

Excuse me, mademoiselle — while I wait for you: father.

ACT FIRST 23 MILDRED, blank

My father ? I have no father.

MRS, VIBERT, looking at hei- with compassion and admiration.

Forgive my mistake! It's a pity: he would have adored you !

MILDRED, simply, wonderingly, yet with a certain suggestion of mistrust.

And I have no mother.

MRS. VIBERT.

Then you must let me be kind to you.

MILDRED.

I don't know who you are, madam !

MRS. VIBERT.

I'm nobody yet, but to-morrow (curtseying to her with indulgent jocularity) I shall be yOUr neighbour ! (Mildred formally returns her curtsey and passes back to the door of the drawing-room, where she stands looking at her.) So We shall meet again. (To herself.) That

will be up-hill !

Re-enter Miss Dyer through the ante-room from the right. MISS DYER, to Mrs. Vibert.

Sir Frederick tells me he'll come to you. (To Mildred,

passing her arm round her.) And yOU, my child, yOu'll COme tO

me. We'll go out !

Exeunt Mildred and Miss Dyer to the drawing-room.

MRS. VIBERT, alone.

Now then, my dear, toe the mark !

Re-enter Sir Frederick through the ante-room, from the right, approaching Mrs. ViBERT with businesslike civility.

SIR FREDERICK, inquiring.

Madam ?

MRS. VIBERT, after a moment.

That's not what you called me of old !

SIR FREDERICK startled by her voice, staring an instant, then utterly surprised.

Good God — Eleanor !

MRS. VIBERT.

Frederick !

SIR FREDERICK.

You rise before me — after all these years — like the ghost of my youth !

MRS. VIBERT.

And you stand before me, my friend, like the hope of my future !

SIR FREDERICK.

You're not, perhaps, so young ; and yet you're somehow - — so new !

MRS. VIBERT.

I've been revised and improved : I'm the latest edition ! Let me reassure you — I'm better reading than I was.

SIR FREDERICK.

Ah, don't speak of what you were !

Act First 25

MRS. VIBERT.

Why shouldn't I? When I see you again, I'm not ashamed of it !

SIR FREDERICK, after a moment.

What has led you to take steps to see me again ?

MRS. VIBERT.

Everything else that I have seen !

SIR FREDERICK.

Eleanor, have you come to put your hand on me ?

MRS. VIBERT.

To lean on you, do you mean? As your ivy there leans on your wall ! The wall can bear it.

SIR FREDERICK.

Oh, I'm not stone ; and everything is different now.

MRS. VIBERT.

Different indeed — that's exactly why I've come. (Afteian instant.) My husband's dead.

SIR FREDERICK.

Not lately, I see, for you're not in weeds.

MRS. VIBERT.

It doesn't matter when. We had wholly ceased to meet.

SIR FREDERICK.

That was the case even before I knew you.

MRS. VI BERT.

Have I forgotten my circumstances then ? They wer( ahuost my exoneration. He was Hving abroad, bu after you and I parted, after you went to India, he cami home. Then / went abroad — to escape him. But '. never really escaped him — till the day he died.

SIR FREDERICK.

What a history ! What has become of your son ?

MRS. VIBERT.

My son's alive. Him we can'f escape.

SIR FREDERICK takes her hand and, bending over it, raises it to his lips We don't desire to ! (He walks away a few steps and comes back.

Did your husband ever learn ?

MRS. VIBERT.

He learnt everything.

SIR FREDERICK.

And what did he do ?

MRS. VIBERT.

He made me pay.

SIR FREDERICK, vague, helpless, compassionate.

Dearest friend — !

MRS. VIBERT.

I'm paying still.