_Will._ Yes, on a hot night!
_Peggy._ What do you think of my love-interest?
_Will._ I think it"s rotten.
_Peggy._ Will!
_Will._ Absolutely rotten! The idea of having her turn Jack down--at the very beginning of the play!
_Peggy._ But that"s exactly what happened! Didn"t Gladys turn _you_ down? And besides, she can take him up again, if you like.
_Will._ How"s she going to see him when he goes out on the street?
_Peggy._ Can"t she run into him somewhere by accident?
_Will._ By accident--in a city of six million people!
_Peggy._ Well then, why not have her go where he goes? Let Bob follow Jack, or let them hire a detective.
_Will._ Melodrama! Ten-twenty-thirty! I don"t like Gladys as a character any more than I did as a person. She"s shallow and cheap--a regular worldling! I won"t have any such creature in my play!
_Peggy._ There"s no use talking that way, Will, you simply can"t write a money-making play without love-interest. And also you"ve got to have comedy characters--real characters--
_Will (eagerly)._ I"ll have one character, at least! In the next scene, when the father comes in! It"ll be a jolly lark, Peggy--I"m going to use Dad!
_Peggy._ Your own father!
_Will._ Yes, why not?
_Peggy._ He might hear of it, Will!
_Will._ He despises the theatre. Half his anger at me was because I married an actress. And it seems to me, if we can"t get any money out of him, we might at least get a character-study.
_Peggy._ All right, Dad let it be!
_Will._ I"ll show you how it is. Here! (_Pushes the ma.n.u.scripts towards her; the Play-play begins to appear._) Jack has gone upstairs to change his clothes, and here comes Dad. He"s an old man--rich, irascible, given to scolding. I remember how he used to snort when anything didn"t please him.
_Dad._ Huh! huh-huh!
_Will._ He"s heard the story about Jack. Here"s the Mss. Read. (_She takes the ma.n.u.script and begins to read. Full light on Play-play.
Will exit secretly._)
_Dad (to Bob)._ What do you think of this?
_Bob._ What?
_Dad._ My precious son in trouble again! Never any end to it!
Recklessness--dissipation--insolence! I"ve reached the end of my patience. Absolutely the end!
_Bob._ What"s happened?
_Dad (waves letter in his hand)._ Here"s a letter from the dean.
He"s got himself suspended from college.
_Jessie (horrified)._ Oh, Dad!
_Bob._ What"s he done?
_Dad._ Turning loose a live goat in a college lecture hall!
_Bob._ You can"t mean it!
_Dad._ Here"s the letter! They were having a fraternity initiation, it seems, and Jack was bringing the goat, his horns painted with phosphorus, a bunch of fire-crackers tied to his tail. Fire-crackers to the tail of a goat!
_Jessie._ But Dad! How do you know that Jack--
_Dad._ He admitted everything in his letter to the dean! He was pa.s.sing a hall where they were giving an evening lecture. He had a grudge against the professor. He turned out the lights, and turned loose the goat! What do you think of that? _(A silence.)_ What do you _think_ of it?
_Jessie._ Why Dad, I think it"s funny.
_Dad._ Funny! You propose to take his side, do you? And now he"s out of college and has nothing to do but loaf around the house! I tell you I"ve reached the limit of my patience. It"s just as Bob says--he"s a parasite. Nothing to do but squander my money--fit for nothing else, having no other idea! I tell you I won"t support the loafer!
_Jessie._ Dad!
_Bob._ You"ve brought the boy up wrong.
_Dad._ So you propose to blame _me!_
_Jack (appears in doorway Left clad in ragged anil dirty overcoat)._ Of course, Dad. It really isn"t fair to scold other people for your own blunder.
_Dad._ Oh, there you are! _(Notices Jack"s clothes.)_ What the devil is this?
_Jack._ What, Dad?
_Dad._ Drunk again, sir? Rolling in the gutter? And on your birthday too!
_Jack._ Dad--
_Dad._ Look at him! A hundred and eighty dollars I pay to a Broadway tailor to make this young hopeful an overcoat, and look at what he does with it! I prepare a birthday party, and invite all his friends, and see the condition in which he comes to welcome them! Do you wonder my patience is exhausted? Do you wonder--
_Jessie._ Dad, you don"t understand!
_Dad._ No, I don"t understand! How could I be expected to understand? How can an old man hope to keep up with a youth so brilliant--a youth who goes to college and ties firecrackers to the tails of goats! A youth who comes on his birthday looking like a tramp--
_Jessie._ Listen, Dad--this is a joke--
_Dad._ Everything"s a joke to my son! But I tell you I"m tired of his jokes. I mean to make him understand that his days of tomfoolery are over! Do you realize it--here he is, twenty-one years of age, when he should be coming into possession of the fortune his mother left him--and he"s tying fire-crackers to the tails of goats! And I--I am trustee of the money, and have to decide whether he"s fit to have it or not! I know that if I give it to him I ruin him for life--I start him on a career of drunkenness and idleness! Look at him as he stands there--and imagine him the owner of a quarter of a million dollars! And under his mother"s will the only choice I have is to give it to him, or turn it over to a Home for Cats!
_Jessie._ Please, Dad!