HELENA: That is the one and only respect in which your friend, Miss Bodenhafer, and I have something in common.
DOROTHEA: Poor Miss Bodenhafer is terribly naïve for a girl approaching forty.
HELENA: Miss Bodenhafer is not approaching forty. She has encountered forty and continued past it, undaunted.
DOROTHEA: I don’t believe she’s the sort of girl who would conceal her age.
HELENA [laughing like a cawing crow]: Dorothea, no girl could tell me she’s under forty and still be singing a song of that vintage. Why, she knows every word of it, including—what do they call it? The introductory verse? Why is she cracking hard-boiled eggs in there?
DOROTHEA: She’s making deviled eggs for a picnic lunch.
HELENA: Oh. In Forest Park.
DOROTHEA: No, at Creve Coeur.
HELENA: Oh, at Creve Coeur, that amusement park on a lake, of which Miss Bodenheifer gave such a lyrical account. Would you like a Lucky?
DOROTHEA: No. Thank you. My father smoked Chesterfields. Do you know Creve Coeur?
HELENA: Heard of it. Only. You go out, just the two of you?
DOROTHEA: No, her brother, Buddy, usually goes with us on these excursions. They say they’ve been going out there since they were children, Bodey and Buddy. They still ride the Ferris wheel, you know, and there’s a sort of loop-the-loop that takes you down to the lake shore. Seats much too narrow sometimes. You see, it’s become embarrassing to me lately, the brother you know . . .
HELENA: Who doesn’t interest you?
DOROTHEA: Heavens, no, it’s—pathetic. I don’t want to hurt Bodey’s feelings, but the infatuation is hardly a mutual thing and it never could be, of course, since I am—well, involved with—
HELENA: The dashing, the irresistible new principal at Blewett.
[Bodey sings.]
DOROTHEA: —I’d rather not talk about that—prematurely, you know. Ralph feels it’s not quite proper for a principal to be involved with a teacher. He’s—a very, very scrupulous young man.
HELENA: Oh? Is that the impression he gives you? I’m rather surprised he’s given you that impression.
DOROTHEA: I don’t see why. Is it just because he’s young and attractive with breeding, background? Frequently mentioned in the social columns? Therefore beyond involvement with a person of my ignominious position.
HELENA: Personally, I’d avoid him like a—snakebite!
[Bodey, in the kitchenette, sings “I’m Just Breezing along with the Breeze” again.]
Another one of her oldies! The prospect of this picnic at Creve Coeur seems to make her absolutely euphoric.
DOROTHEA: I’m afraid that they’re the high points in her life. Sad . . . Helena, I’m very puzzled by your attitude toward Ralph Ellis. Why on earth would a girl want to avoid a charming young man like Ralph?
HELENA: Perhaps you’ll understand a little later.
[Dorothea glances at her watch and the silent phone.]
DOROTHEA [raising her voice]: Bodey, please not quite so loud in there! Miss Brookmire and I are holding a conversation in here, you know. [She turns back to Helena and continues the conversation with an abrupt vehemence.] —Helena, that woman wants to absorb my life like a blotter, and I’m not an ink splash! I’m sorry you had to meet her. I’m awfully—embarrassed, believe me.
HELENA: I don’t regret it at all. I found her most amusing. Even the Gluck!
DOROTHEA [resuming with the same intensity]: Bodey wants me to follow the same, same old routine that she follows day in and day out and I—feel sympathy for the loneliness of the girl, but we have nothing, nothing, but nothing at all, in common. [She interrupts herself.] Shall we have some coffee?
HELENA: Yes, please. I do love iced coffee, but perhaps the ice is depleted.
BODEY [from the kitchenette]: She knows darn well she used the last piece.
HELENA: Is it still warm?
[Dorothea has risen and gone into the kitchenette where she pours two cups of coffee.]
DOROTHEA: It never cools off in this electric percolator, runs out, but never cools off. Do you take cream?
HELENA: No, thank you.
DOROTHEA [bringing the coffee into the living room]: Bodey does make very good coffee. I think she was born and raised in a kitchen and will probably die in a kitchen if ever she does break her routine that way.
[Bodey crosses to the kitchen table with Dorothea’s purse and hat which she has collected from the living room while Helena and Dorothea sip their coffee.]
BODEY: Dotty, remember, Buddy is waiting for us at the Creve Coeur station, we mustn’t let him think we’ve stood him up.
DOROTHEA [sighing]: Excuse me, Helena, there really has been a terrible problem with communication today. [She crosses to Bodey and adjusts her hearing aid for her.] Can you hear me clearly, now at last?
BODEY: You got something to tell me?
DOROTHEA: Something I’ve told you already, frequently, loudly, and clearly, but which you simply will not admit because of your hostility toward Ralph Ellis. I’m waiting here to receive an important call from him, and I am not going anywhere till it’s come through.
BODEY: Dotty. It’s past noon and he still hasn’t called.
DOROTHEA: On Saturday evenings he’s out late at social affairs and consequently sleeps late on Sundays.
BODEY: This late?
HELENA: Miss Bodenhafer doesn’t know how the privileged classes live.
BODEY: No, I guess not, we’re ignorant of the history of art, but Buddy and me, we’ve got a life going on, you understand, we got a life . . .
DOROTHEA: Bodey, you know I’m sorry to disappoint your plans for the Creve Coeur picnic, but you must realize by now—after our conversation before Miss Brookmire dropped in—that I can’t allow this well-meant design of yours to get me involved with your brother to go any further. So that even if I were not expecting this important phone call, I would not go to Creve Coeur with you and your brother this afternoon—or ever! It wouldn’t be fair to your brother to, to—lead him on that way . . .
BODEY: Well, I did fry up three chickens and I boiled a dozen eggs, but, well, that’s—
HELENA: Life for you, Miss Bodenhafer. We’ve got to face it.
BODEY: But I really was hoping—expecting—
[Tears appear in Bodey’s large, childlike eyes.]
HELENA: Dorothea, I believe she’s beginning to weep over this. Say something comforting to her.
DOROTHEA: Bodey? Bodey? This afternoon you must break the news to your brother that—much as I appreciate his attentions—I am seriously involved with someone else, and I think you can do this without hurting his feelings. Let him have some beer first and a—cigar. . . . And about this super-abundance of chicken and deviled eggs, Bodey, why don’t you call some girl who works in your office and get her to go to Creve Coeur and enjoy the picnic with you this afternoon?
BODEY: Buddy and I, we—don’t have fun with—strangers . . .
DOROTHEA: Now, how can you call them strangers when you’ve been working in the same office with these girls at International Shoe for—how many years? Almost twenty? Strangers? Still?
BODEY: —Not all of ’em have been there long as me . . . [She blows her nose.]
DOROTHEA: Oh, some of them must have, surely, unless the death rate in the office is higher than—a cat’s back.
[Dorothea smiles half-apologetically at Helena. Helena stifles a malicious chuckle.]
BODEY: —You see, Dotty, Buddy and me feel so at home with you now.
DOROTHEA: Bodey, we knew that I was here just for a while because it’s so close to Blewett. Please don’t make me feel guilty. I have no reason to, do I?
BODEY: —No, no, Dotty—but don’t worry about it. Buddy and me, we are both—big eaters, and if there’s somethin’ left over, there’s always cute little children around Creve Coeur that we could share with, Dotty, so—
DOROTHEA: Yes, there must be. Do that. Let’s not prolong this discussion. I see it’s
painful to you.
BODEY: —Do you? No. It’s—you I’m thinking of, Dotty. —Now if for some reason you should change your mind, here is the schedule of the open-air streetcars to Creve Coeur.
HELENA: Yellowing with antiquity. Is it legible still?
BODEY: We’ll still be hoping that you might decide to join us, you know that, Dotty.
DOROTHEA: Yes, of course—I know that. Now why don’t you finish packing and start out to the station?
BODEY: —Yes. —But remember how welcome you would be if—shoes. [She starts into the bedroom to put on her shoes.] I still have my slippers on.
DOROTHEA [to Helena after Bodey has gone into the bedroom]: So! You’ve got the postdated check. I will move to Westmoreland Place with you July first, although I’ll have to stretch quite a bit to make ends meet in such an expensive apartment.
HELENA: Think of the advantages. A fashionable address, two bedrooms, a baby grand in the front room and—
DOROTHEA: Yes, I know. It would be a very good place to entertain Ralph.
HELENA: I trust that entertaining Ralph is not your only motive in making this move to Westmoreland Place.
DOROTHEA: Not the only, but the principal one.
HELENA [leaning forward slowly, eyes widening]: Oh, my dear Dorothea! I have the very odd feeling that I saw the name Ralph Ellis in the newspaper. In the society section.
DOROTHEA: In the society section?
HELENA: I think so, yes. I’m sure so.
[Rising tensely, Dorothea locates the Sunday paper which Bodey had left on the sofa, in some disarray, after removing the “certain item”—the society page. She hurriedly looks through the various sections trying to find the society news.]
DOROTHEA: Bodey?—BOOO-DEYY!
BODEY: What, Dotty?
DOROTHEA: Where is the society page of the Post-Dispatch?
BODEY: —Oh . . .
DOROTHEA: What does “oh” mean? It’s disappeared from the paper and I’d like to know where.
BODEY: Dotty, I—
DOROTHEA: What’s wrong with you? Why are you upset? I just want to know if you’ve seen the society page of the Sunday paper?
BODEY: —Why, I—used it to wrap fried chicken up with, honey.
DOROTHEA [to Helena]: The only part of the paper in which I have any interest. She takes it and wraps fried chicken in it before I get up in the morning! You see what I mean? Do you understand now? [She turns back to Bodey.] Please remove the fried chicken from the society page and let me have it!
BODEY: —Honey, the chicken makes the paper so greasy that—
DOROTHEA: I will unwrap it myself! [She charges into the kitchenette, unwraps the chicken, and folds out the section of pages.] —A section has been torn out of it? Why? What for?
BODEY: Is it? I—
DOROTHEA: Nobody possibly could have done it but you. What did you do with the torn out piece of the paper?
BODEY: —I— [She shakes her head helplessly.]
DOROTHEA: Here it is! —Crumpled and tossed in the wastebasket!—What for, I wonder? [She snatches up the crumpled paper from the wastebasket and straightens it, using both palms to press it hard against the kitchen table so as to flatten it. She holds up the torn-out section of the paper so the audience can see a large photograph of a young woman, good looking in a plain fashion, wearing a hard smile of triumph, then she reads aloud in a hoarse, stricken voice.] Mr. and Mrs. James Finley announce the engagement of their daughter, Miss Constance Finley, to Mr.—T. Ralph Ellis, principal of—
[Pause. There is much stage business. Dorothea is stunned for some moments but then comes to violent life and action. She picks up the picnic shoebox, thrusts it fiercely into Bodey’s hands, opens the door for her but rushes back to pick up Bodey’s small black straw hat trimmed with paper daises, then opens the door for Bodey again with a violent gesture meaning, “Go quick!” Bodey goes. In the hall we hear various articles falling from Bodey’s hold and a small, panting gasp. Then there is silence. Helena gets up with a mechanical air of sympathy.]
HELENA: That woman is sly all right but not as sly as she’s stupid. She might have guessed you’d want the society page and notice Mr. Ellis’s engagement had been torn out. Anyhow, the news would have reached you at the school tomorrow. Of course I can’t understand how you could be taken in by whatever little attentions you may have received from Ralph Ellis.
DOROTHEA: —“Little—attentions?” I assure you they were not—“little attentions,” they were—
HELENA: Little attentions which you magnified in your imagination. Well, now, let us dismiss the matter, which has dismissed itself! Dorothea, about the postdated check, I’m not sure the real estate agents would be satisfied with that. Now surely, Dorothea, surely you have relatives who could help you with a down payment in cash?
DOROTHEA: —Helena, I’m not interested in Westmoreland Place. —Now.
HELENA: What!
DOROTHEA: I’ve—abandoned that idea. I’ve decided not to move.
HELENA [aghast]: —Do you realize what a shockingly irresponsible thing you are doing? Don’t you realize that you are placing me in a very unfair position? You led me to believe I could count on your sharing the expense of the place, and now, at the last moment, when I have no time to get hold of someone else, you suddenly—pull out. It’s really irresponsible of you. It’s a really very irresponsible thing to do.
DOROTHEA: —I’m afraid we wouldn’t have really gotten along together. I’m not uncomfortable here. It’s only two blocks from the school and—I won’t be needing a place I can’t afford to entertain—anyone now. —I think I would like to be alone.
HELENA: All I can say is, the only thing I can say is—
DOROTHEA: Don’t say it, just, just—leave me alone, now, Helena.
HELENA: Well, that I shall do. You may be right, we wouldn’t have gotten along. Perhaps Miss Bodenheifer and her twin brother are much more on your social and cultural level than I’d hoped. And of course there’s always the charm of Miss Gluck from upstairs.
DOROTHEA: The prospect of that is not as dismaying to me, Helena, as the little card parties and teas you’d had in mind for us on Westmoreland Place . . .
HELENA: Chacun à son goût.
DOROTHEA: Yes, yes.
HELENA [at the door]: There is rarely a graceful way to say good-bye. [She exits.]
[Pause. Dorothea shuts her eyes very tight and raises a clenched hand in the air, nodding her head several times as if affirming an unhappy suspicion regarding the way of the world. This gesture suffices to discharge her sense of defeat. Now she springs up determinedly and goes to the phone.
[While waiting for a connection, she notices Miss Gluck seated disconsolately in a corner of the kitchenette.]
DOROTHEA: Now Miss Gluck, now Sophie, we must pull ourselves together and go on. Go on, we must just go on, that’s all that life seems to offer and—demand. [She turns her attention to the phone.] Hello, operator, can you get me information, please? —Hello? Information? Can you get me the number of the little station at the end of the Delmar car-line where you catch the, the—open streetcar that goes out to Creve Coeur Lake?— Thank you.
MISS GLUCK [speaking English with difficulty and a heavy German accent]: Please don’t leave me alone. I can’t go up!
DOROTHEA [her attention still occupied with the phone]: Creve Coeur car-line station? Look. On the platform in a few minutes will be a plumpish little woman with a big artificial flower over one ear and a stoutish man with her, probably with a cigar. I have to get an important message to them. Tell them that Dotty called and has decided to go to Creve Coeur with them after all so will they please wait. You’ll have to shout to the woman because she’s—deaf . . .
[For some reason the word “deaf“ chokes her and she begins to sob as she hangs up the phone. Miss Gluck rises, sobbing louder.]
No, no, Sophie, come here. [Impulsively she draws Miss Gluck into her arms.] I know, Sophie, I know, crying is a releas
e, but it—inflames the eyes.
[She takes Miss Gluck to the armchair and seats her there. Then she goes to the kitchenette, gets a cup of coffee and a cruller, and brings them to Sophie.]
Make yourself comfortable, Sophie.
[She goes to the bedroom, gets a pair of gloves, then returns and crosses to the kitchen table to collect her hat and pocketbook. She goes to the door, opens it, and says . . .]
We’ll be back before dark.
THE LIGHTS DIM OUT
New Directions Paperbooks—a partial listing
Cèsar Aira, Ghosts
Paul Auster, The Red Notebook
Djuna Barnes, Nightwood
Charles Baudelaire, The Flowers of Evil
Bei Dao, The August Sleepwalker
Roberto Bolaño, By Night in Chile, Last Evenings on Earth
Jorge Luis Borges, Labyrinths
Kamau Brathwaite, Middle Passages
Basil Bunting, Complete Poems
Anne Carson, Glass, Irony & God
Horatio Castellanos Moya, Senselessness
Camilo José Cela, Mazurka for Two Dead Men
Louis-Ferdinand Céline, Journey to the End of the Night
Inger Christensen, alphabet
Julio Cortázar, Cronopios & Famas
Robert Creeley, If I Were Writing This
Osamu Dazai, The Setting Sun
H.D., Trilogy
Robert Duncan, Selected Poems
Eça de Queirós, The Maias
Shusaku Endo, Deep River
Jenny Erpenbeck, The Book of Words
Lawrence Ferlinghetti, A Coney Island of the Mind, Poetry as Insurgent Art
F. Scott Fitzgerald, The Crack-Up
Forrest Gander, As a Friend
Hermann Hesse, Siddhartha
Takashi Hiraide, For the Fighting Spirit of the Walnut (bilingual)
Susan Howe, My Emily Dickinson
Bohumil Hrabal, I Served the King of England
Christopher Isherwood, Berlin Stories
B.S. Johnson, The Unfortunates