The Magic Tower and Other One-Act Plays

  Morally unfit—for her position!

  [Now the locomotive thunder drowns out the voice. Blanche backs in panic away from the lowered window shade through which the sound bellows. The outside door opens in the upstage room and Jack Kiefaber enters with a bloodstained package from the butcher. He smiles and speaks to Grace. Passes her the package. She kisses him and crosses to the ice-box. Their voices are drowned by the passing locomotive. The noise is now receding. Blanche steadies herself and returns to the dresser and picks up the brush. Grace’s voice becomes audible through the fading roar.]

  GRACE: I thought you were going bowling this afternoon.

  JACK: I am. Came home to change. Blanche in the bathtub?

  GRACE: I think she’s out. Are you, Blanche?

  BLANCHE: What?

  GRACE: Yes, she’s out of the bathtub. Jack wants to bathe.

  JACK: I’m not going to bathe, I just want to make pee-pee.

  [Blanche slams the brush down.]

  GRACE: Jack!

  JACK: Apologies, ladies. I mean I wish to relieve my kidneys.

  BLANCHE [loudly]: I can’t stand anymore of it! We weren’t brought up like this and I can’t stand anymore of it!

  [Through the portieres Jack makes a wide gesture of good-humored despair.]

  It isn’t funny, nothing that goes on here is funny at all! [She crosses to bathroom and closes door. The light is normal.]

  JACK: What is she talking about?

  GRACE: Oh, Jack, I don’t know, I don’t know! She’s worried me so, I hate to be in the house with her, on account of the baby. She seemed strange when she got here, not like herself, but then she improved so much while she was going out with George—I was so relieved, I thought she was going to be all right! But he hasn’t called or come around in two weeks and she’s gotten steadily worse. You’ve been on the road so much you haven’t noticed but it’s been like living in a—I hate to say it!—in a cell with—

  [The bathroom door is flung open. The lurid stains reappear on the walls.]

  BLANCHE [Screaming]: Oh, you hate to say it! Yes, you hate to say it! What a soft heart you have, my sweet little sister! [She turns on Jack.] And you! And you!

  JACK: All present and accounted for! What have I done, baby?

  BLANCHE: You think that I don’t know?

  JACK: Don’t know what?

  BLANCHE: Well, I do! I’m not so insane I can’t figure out who told him!

  JACK: Who is him, and told what?!

  GRACE [despairingly]: I think she imagines that someone has—

  [Blanche runs with a sobbing laugh back into the bathroom.]

  You see? That’s how it’s been here while you were out on the road!

  JACK: Jesus.

  GRACE: I always adored her so.

  JACK: Well, she’s your sister, baby, but personally— Where’s my bowling shirt?

  GRACE: She ironed it for you and hung it up in there.

  JACK: She did?

  GRACE: She still does nice little things like that now and then when you don’t expect it. That’s what makes it so hard to understand.

  JACK: You know what I think but I’m not going to say it. [Crosses into downstage room and removes vivid green silk bowling shirt from hanger. On its back is emblem of firm he works for. He starts removing blue work shirt he has on.]

  GRACE: No, don’t say it! And with my baby coming I don’t feel safe.

  JACK: Well—

  GRACE: Oh, honey. [She comes up and embraces him.] You’ve been sweet and patient and— Gosh! You need to shave.

  JACK: I don’t want you to worry about anything. Blanche, can I get in the bathroom? It’s urgent!

  [Blanche comes out, holding a towel.]

  BLANCHE: I—I am sorry I—didn’t sleep well last night and—

  JACK: Oh, that’s all right, Blanche. [He goes into bathroom and shuts door.]

  BLANCHE [to Grace]: I know how awful I look, you don’t have to tell me.

  GRACE: Why, I was just thinking how pretty you look today, Blanche.

  BLANCHE: A likely story! Are you two going out?

  GRACE: Jack’s going to bowl.

  BLANCHE: And you’re going to stay here pouring that sickening blood red goo into jars all night, are you? The odor of it is suffocating, Grace! That’s why my nerves are—God! Is the window open?

  GRACE: I didn’t know you minded it. Why didn’t you say so?

  BLANCHE: It isn’t my place, it’s yours and Mr. Kiefaber’s! I’m just a—visiting relation! Whose welcome has been out-worn!

  GRACE: You know that’s not true.

  BLANCHE: Go on with your jelly making—if that’s what it is!

  GRACE: Oh, Blanche, you make me feel dizzy. [She crosses tiredly back upstage: leans thoughtfully on the ironing board. Starts putting the filled jars away. Through the closed door of the bathroom comes a voice.]

  THE VOICE: Let’s have—intimate—relations! Let’s have—intimate—relations!

  [Blanche faces it and advances a few steps with clenched hands.]

  THE VOICE: Let’s have—intimate—relations!

  [The door opens and Jack comes out drying face with towel. Blanche stares at him with a fixity, which he ignores. He turns his back on her.]

  GRACE [from kitchen]: Is this game part of the tournament?

  JACK: Semi-finals.

  GRACE: Who are you bowling with?

  JACK: Crescent City Grain Packers.

  GRACE: Are they good?

  JACK: Champions last season. [He bends over to change shoes.]

  THE VOICE: Let’s have—intimate—relations. Let’s have—

  GRACE: Think you’ll beat them?

  JACK: Well, there’s two possibilities, honey. They’ll beat us or we’ll beat them! Damn!

  GRACE: What’s the trouble?

  JACK: Broke a shoelace.

  GRACE: —Oh.

  JACK: What’s that sweet smell in here?

  BLANCHE [suddenly]: Death!

  JACK [looking up, startled]: Huh?

  BLANCHE: I said, Death! Didn’t you know death smelled like sugar-candy?

  JACK: Huh! That’s a pleasant little thought!

  GRACE: Blanche doesn’t like the odor of my jelly.

  JACK: Jelly, huh? Crab apple?

  BLANCHE: —There was a body found on our plantation that had been lying out dead for a few days in summer. Yes, at Belle Reve, when Grace and I were children, before—Belle Reve was lost. And we noticed a smell that was sweet like that in back of the house toward the Bayou and somebody said—I think it was our old nurse—Ozzie—said— “That’s something dead back there that isn’t buried!” [She laughs.] Something dead back there that isn’t buried. And sure enough. They looked around and they found an old colored man’s body. . .

  [Jack is repairing his shoe-lace: he looks up with a shrug.]

  GRACE: I had forgotten that, Blanche.

  BLANCHE: You forget everything about Belle Reve so that you can fully appreciate the refinements of your present ménage!

  JACK: At least we don’t have dead bodies lying around anywhere. Do we, Grace?

  BLANCHE: Have you looked closely?

  GRACE: Blanche, I’ve had about enough morbid talk for one hot afternoon’s entertainment! Please stop! Read a book! Get busy at something! Or go out and see a good movie!

  JACK: You want me to drop you off at a picture-show, Blanche?

  BLANCHE: Thank you, no! [She returns to the dresser.] Come here, Jack.

  [Jack has started for the door.]

  JACK: Huh?

  BLANCHE: Come here for a minute.

  JACK: What for?

  BLANCHE: I want to kiss you.

  [He looks at Grace.]

  GRACE: Well, well.

  BLANCHE: You, too, Grace, I want to kiss you both. Please, please! [She is suddenly very sweet and charming. They stand off looking at her. Her expression changes.] What is the matter? Am I disgusting to you? Have I grown so old and hideous that neither of you can bea
r any contact with me? [Then she turns mockingly to Jack.] That’s not what you were saying a moment ago when you were pretending to be so busy with your shoes!

  [He glances again, helplessly, at Grace. Then he walks quickly to the outside door.]

  JACK: Bye, Grace! [He goes out.]

  [Blanche laughs sadly and mockingly and picks up her hair brush again. Grace stares at her a moment longer: then goes back to the upstage room. She sinks into a chair, in view through the portieres. She rubs her temples with the palms of her hands, a slow rotation as if to ease a headache. Blanche stops brushing her hair and lights a cigarette with trembling fingers. The phone rings. Blanche springs up. Grace rises to answer it. Blanche leans forward tensely.]

  GRACE: Oh! —Just a moment.

  BLANCHE [in a whisper that doesn’t reach Grace]: George? George?

  [Grace returns to the phone.]

  GRACE: Yes, he took it, Harry. At least it isn’t parked in front of the house. All right. Good luck! [Hangs up. A look of desolation settles again on Blanche’s face. Grace, in the other room, turns on the radio. Then she comes through portieres. Doorbell rings.] My goodness, the phone and the doorbell, the doorbell and the phone! Will you answer it, Blanche?

  BLANCHE: I’m not dressed.

  GRACE: You have enough on.

  BLANCHE: Some women go to the door in a negligee but those women are more likely to be Kiefabers than Shannons—if you will excuse me for drawing so fine a distinction!

  GRACE: Ha-ha! —That’s almost funny! [Crosses over.] Dame Blanche! [She opens the door for a tradesman or bill collector. The following dialogue is part real and part imagined by Blanche. Only the allusions to the bill and the money are actual, the rest is auditory hallucination.]

  BILL COLLECTOR: Morning, Mrs. Kiefaber. How’s things going?

  GRACE: So-so.

  BILL COLLECTOR: Only so-so, huh?

  GRACE: How much is it?

  BILL COLLECTOR: Well, a dollar an’ twenty-two cents will just about do it. [Then, whispering.] Where is Blanche?

  GRACE [whispering]: In the next room.

  BILL COLLECTOR: Tell her that George is through with her.

  GRACE: What? [Grace is looking through her purse. Blanche sits up stiffly and sets down the hairbrush.]

  BILL COLLECTOR [slowly and distinctly]: Tell her that George is through with her.

  GRACE: I was afraid that he was. He hasn’t called her up in nearly two weeks. What happened between them?

  BILL COLLECTOR: He got tired of waiting for the ice to melt.

  GRACE: She’s frigid?

  BILL COLLECTOR: No, but she wants to get married and George doesn’t want to get married. He wanted to have intimate relations and she wouldn’t have intimate relations without a ring on her finger.

  GRACE: But she’s not cold, is she?

  BILL COLLECTOR: Quite the contrary.

  GRACE: That’s what I suspected.

  BILL COLLECTOR: Watch her with your husband.

  GRACE: I’ve noticed how she looks at him. She listens to us at night and we have no privacy from her.

  BILL COLLECTOR: She is eating her heart out with jealousy.

  BLANCHE [in a stifled whisper]: No!

  GRACE: And she’s lost George?

  BILL COLLECTOR: He never wants to see her again.

  GRACE: And that’s why he hasn’t called.

  BILL COLLECTOR: He’ll never call.

  GRACE: Every time the phone rings she thinks it’s him. [Laughs and raises her voice.] You never can find pennies when you want them.

  BILL COLLECTOR: It never will be George again. And after George there won’t be any others because her unhappy nature has begun to show in her face.

  [Blanche turns horrified to the mirror.]

  BILL COLLECTOR: She’s getting lines of bitterness.

  GRACE: I’ve seen them, too. Her throat is getting so drawn!

  [Blanche touches her throat.]

  BILL COLLECTOR: Sometimes the process of decay works very swiftly.

  GRACE: Twenty-two, did you say?

  BILL COLLECTOR [raising his voice]: Yes, Ma’am, a dollar twenty-two.

  GRACE: It’s impossible to hide those little snakes in the brain.

  [Blanche catches her breath and clenches her hands to her temples.]

  BILL COLLECTOR: Ha-ha! Yes, you can hear them hiss.

  GRACE: Is that what it is, that hissing sound at night from where she sleeps?

  BILL COLLECTOR: Ha-ha! I’ve got it. [He picks up a piece of change dropped on floor.] —Yes, that’s what it is! George could hear them, too, when she brought up marriage. Thinking that she could hold out on him long enough to make him give in and produce the diamond.

  GRACE: She wanted a solitaire, huh?

  BILL COLLECTOR: That’s what the she-devil hoped for.

  GRACE: She’ll get a solitaire all of her live-long days!

  BILL COLLECTOR: He won’t call again.

  GRACE: And she’ll lose her job at the school when her nerves break up, and I can hear them breaking. Can’t you hear them breaking?

  [There is a cracking noise—splintering: Blanche makes frantic gestures and rises slowly and stiffly from her chair at the dresser.]

  BILL COLLECTOR: All things come apart in time, but some things can’t wait for the time. She was a fool to want anything because she can’t get anything with those weak fingers of hers and wanting something and not getting it and wanting and not getting and wanting and not getting with those weak fingers of hers, and not ever getting but still wanting with those weak fingers of hers. Not getting, not getting, not getting—!

  [Blanche, staring down at her hands, suddenly utters a shrill cry. Grace rushes in. The bill collector stands curiously by the portieres.]

  GRACE: Blanche! What’s the matter?

  BLANCHE [laughing weakly]: I burned myself.

  GRACE: What with?

  BLANCHE: A—cigarette. . .

  GRACE [relieved]: Oh. Not badly?

  BLANCHE: No. No—not badly. . . Who is—who is that—man?

  GRACE: Why, a collector for the Picayune, honey.

  BLANCHE [half reassured]: —Oh. Will you close the portieres, please? Can’t you see I’m not dressed?

  GRACE: Sure, Blanche. I’m just trying to dig up some change.

  BLANCHE [sharply]: So that is what you were doing? That was the subject of the long conversation? Change? What kind of change, Grace? Good or bad? And whose change, yours or mine?

  GRACE [stares at her aghast]: What are you talking about?

  BLANCHE [dropping her eyes finally]: Nothing. How long will he stand there looking in at my body?

  [Grace makes a despairing gesture and goes back out, closing the portieres. Blanche sinks exhaustedly back into her chair.]

  BLANCHE [softly and sorrowfully]: Malice—malice—malice. . . I never could understand it. I’m too soft!

  BILL COLLECTOR [leaving]: Thank you, Mrs. Kiefaber. Goodbye. [Door slams.]

  [Grace comes slowly and anxiously back through the portieres. There are soft and light cries of children playing on the street. Blanche slowly picks up the brush and resumes brushing her hair, but her face is set in a look of hostility and suspicion.]

  GRACE: Blanche, I wish you’d be more open about things with me. We’ve always confided everything to each other but now you’re holding something back. All I know is that you are terribly unhappy over something. I want to help you but can’t unless you tell me.

  BLANCHE [in a high, strained voice]: I haven’t the faintest, remotest notion of what you are talking about, Grace Shannon. Pardon me—I mean—Kiefaber! [She utters the name with contempt.]

  GRACE: We were getting along so nicely together until just lately. You liked Jack and Jack was so pleased having you here with us and it was so nice for me.

  BLANCHE: Don’t worry. I’m moving out the moment I find a vacant room and I don’t care if it’s over a stable!

  GRACE: Blanche!

  BLANCHE: There’s a limit
to what I can put up with!

  GRACE: In—me?

  BLANCHE: In him, that man that you live with! Mr. Jack Kiefaber! Don’t you think I realize what happened? He went to George and told him that I could be had without marriage! Do you know why he did that? Because he didn’t want me to marry George! And do you know why he didn’t want me to marry George? Because he wanted to have intimate relations with me himself. Yes, while you’re in the hospital having a baby, that is the horrible plan in the back of his mind! We’ll be alone here together, only those loose portieres separating our beds. And he’ll come stalking through them in his pajamas! [Throws back her head with a peal of wild laughter.] He’ll come marching through them in his red silk pajamas!—while you are being delivered of a new life. . . And I always wanted so badly—to keep myself—straight. . . [There is a long pause.]

  GRACE: Blanche, you’re going to have to see a doctor.

  BLANCHE: Yes. I knew you’d say that.

  GRACE: I’ve been wondering for some time. Now I know.

  BLANCHE: That lunacy has descended upon our house?

  GRACE: That you’re in a very dangerous condition.

  BLANCHE: Lunacy, Grace? Is it lunacy I’m charged with?

  GRACE: I want to put my arms around you and cry but when you look at me like that I can’t come near you.

  BLANCHE: It’s better you don’t. Lunatics do awful things. And there are several objects on this dresser with fairly sharp points. I’m driven beyond the point of desperation. To it and beyond it, my dear, sweet sister! I’ve lived in a nest of snakes for the past few weeks! I hear the whisperings going on at night between you and my sweet brother-in-law! The plots, the conspiracies, the plans! Machiavelli and Lucrezia Borgia in the outward and visible form of Mr. and Mrs. Kiefaber of 232 Esplanade!

  GRACE: If you go on like this I am going to call an ambulance to come for you right this minute, so you sit down in that chair and hold your tongue, Blanche Shannon!

  BLANCHE: Oh, yes, you’re not in the dark. You’re fully aware of all that’s been going on. You provided him with the information.

  GRACE: What information?