Alan Bennett: Plays, Volume 1

  DAD: She’s wonderful, this girl. Got her philosophy of life worked out down to the last detail.

  MAM: They might find they’ve got things in common. They’ve both got bags of poise.

  DAD: Her legs aren’t a patch on Linda’s.

  LINDA: I’m not staying long. It’s only a flying visit.

  DAD: Foreign parts again, is it, love? You and your boss. Another top-level conference. Feel my arm. All his travel arrangements at your fingertips. Every hitch anticipated by his unobtrusive Girl Friday. I love this girl. I live for this girl. Feel my arm.

  LINDA: (Still looking at the letter) Preserve what?

  MAM: A close-knit community. The society of the streets. They want to know why we’re so happy.

  DAD: Feel my arm. It’s irrelevant to you, Linda. You triumphed over all that. You transcended it.

  LINDA: Where’s my suitcase? I’m leaving.

  DAD: You don’t need a suitcase, Linda. An overnight bag’s all you want. A change of clothes and a few simple accessories. Europe these days, it’s only like the next street.

  LINDA: I’m leaving. How many more times?

  MAM: Leaving? Why?

  LINDA: I’m going to Saudi Arabia. (LINDA goes upstairs.)

  DAD: Saudi Arabia! That’s the way with Linda. One minute she’s here, next minute she’s flying over the Red Sea.

  LINDA: (Off) Where’s my suitcase?

  MAM: Look on top of our wardrobe. She sounds to be leaving for good.

  DAD: Business trip. Moment’s notice. Rooms booked at the local Intercontinental Hotel. Prawn cocktail and steak diane in her room, followed by early bed so as to be fresh and alert at her boss’s elbow for the first round of negotiations in the morning. It won’t take her two minutes to pack. Always travels light does Linda. Got it down to a fine art. Toothbrush and briefcase, that’s all she needs.

  (At this point LINDA comes in with a large suitcase and an equally large pink teddy bear or dog.)

  Planning to be away long, love? When is the duration of the conference?

  LINDA: What conference? I’m going to Saudi Arabia. To live.

  MAM: You live here, Linda. This is your home.

  LINDA: This? It’s a pigsty.

  MAM: We’re your parents.

  LINDA: Yes. Fat Pig One and Fat Pig Two.

  MAM: Ignore that, love. She’s probably menstruating.

  DAD: It’s not very commodious here, I agree, but it’ll be different once we’re into the maisonette.

  MAM: The bus service is tip top and you’ll have your own room with washbasin en suite.

  LINDA: I’m going to Saudi Arabia.

  DAD: You can’t. It’s sons that migrate; daughters, they’re supposed to live round the corner. You can confirm that.

  You’re the sociologist.

  (MS CRAIG is blank.)

  Nod, you blank bugger.

  LINDA: Who says I am your daughter anyway?

  DAD: Linda!

  MAM: Course you’re our daughter: I bought you those slippers.

  LINDA: They’ve brought me up, I grant you, but it would take more than that to convince me this is my mother and father.

  As such.

  DAD: Linda. You’ve never voiced these doubts before.

  LINDA: I’ve never had an independent witness before.

  MAM: But we have pictures of you as a baby. On a rug. I should have kept the rug. That would have proved it.

  DAD: You’ve staggered me a bit, Linda. I’ve to some extent idolized you. I must be your father. I’ve given you that much affection.

  LINDA: I contemplated having a blood test, but I was told it wouldn’t be conclusive, and even if it was it wouldn’t convince me. Though I could modify my position to this extent: one of you may be my parent but definitely not both.

  DAD: You’re my daughter right enough. I recognize my dogged determination. My optimism and will to win.

  MAM: She’s got my hair. Her hair’s the split image of mine. Her eyes are the same colour.

  DAD: (Contemptuously) Blue.

  MAM: She’s got my skin.

  LINDA: Your skin, lady? Is that your skin? I should know.

  DAD: No, she’s my girl, this one. Set her sights on something she wants and she goes all out to get it. I was like that once. My girl.

  MAM: And mine.

  (Silence)

  And mine, Dad.

  (DAD doesn’t answer. MAM weeps.)

  LINDA: Do you remember having me?

  MAM: I remember having somebody. I had a lot of pain. I remember the pain.

  LINDA: What intrigues me is who the other person was. I imagine it must have been somebody prominent in the world of sport or entertainment. A tycoon possibly. Someone with bags of personality at any rate. Quite frankly it wouldn’t surprise me if it was somebody extra-terrestrial.

  DAD: Don’t be so daft, Linda. What would I be doing with somebody extra-terrestrial?

  MAM: You must be our daughter: we love you.

  LINDA: Love. You’re always on about love. I don’t want love. I want consumer goods.

  (LINDA goes upstairs for a moment. DAD sits in flabbergasted silence while MS CRAIG writes slowly.

  The ensuing conversation is partly shouted up the stairs.)

  DAD: Why Saudi Arabia?

  LINDA: (Off) It could be Kuwait. Plans aren’t finalized yet.

  MAM: You’d be a fool to leave Leeds. (To MS CRAIG.) It’s a tip-top shopping centre now they’ve secluded the traffic. A pedestrians’ paradise. There’s some grand shops, people come from all over. (Pause. To LINDA.) I saw a very reasonable little costume in Lewis’s. (Pause) The new precinct’s gorgeous. It’s all climate controlled. It’s a godsend in inclement weather. Tell her, Dad. It has the biggest Boots outside Manchester.

  DAD: There won’t be a Boots in Kuwait.

  LINDA: There will. There’ll be everything there soon. Boots, Littlewoods. C. & A. They’re queuing up.

  MAM: Not climate controlled.

  LINDA: No need to control it. It’s hot.

  DAD: Turning your back on all this love.

  MAM: They have some right bonny little handbags in Schofields.

  LINDA: I’m going to bury the past. And everyone that goes with it.

  DAD: We’re getting on, Linda.

  MAM: Our idea was that you’d look after us in our old age. We thought you’d be bobbing in and out like daughters do. You can’t do that from … where is it you’re going? Sweden?

  LINDA: I have my own young life to lead.

  DAD: What will happen to us?

  LINDA: You’re going into the horrible new flats.

  MAM: What if we can’t manage?

  LINDA: Contact your social worker.

  MAM: We don’t have a social worker. Do we?

  (LINDA should play whenever possible to MS CRAIG.)

  LINDA: Then do what everybody else does: go into a home.

  MAM: We don’t want to go into a home.

  LINDA: Why? There’s some nice homes now. Big places on the outskirts, standing in their own grounds. Drives, shrubbery, everything. One even has a lake. Feed the ducks.

  DAD: Who’ll come and see us.

  LINDA: All sorts come. These voluntary groups. The Variety Club comes. Lions come. Unemployed school leavers come. Old folks in homes these days, they’re inundated with visitors. You won’t have a moment to yourselves. I can send you a postcard now and again to pin up on the door of your locker. (To MS CRAIG.) They provide them with lockers now. They’ve got much more enlightened in that respect.

  MAM: I’ll make a cup of tea. Oh Dad, Dad! (She goes into the scullery.)

  DAD: Linda.

  LINDA: What?

  DAD: With all due respect to your mother, Linda, she is the imposter.

  (LINDA is in and out packing so DAD is talking to her and to MS CRAIG.)

  She doesn’t take after her Mam for a start. Linda’s not swilling and scrubbing and keeping the place straight. She’s like me, devil may care. I’m th
e genuine parent. No question. But when it comes to who her mother was I’m a bit stumped. I think Linda’s right, it’s got to be someone who mirrors her qualities, someone with poise and bags of get up and go, somebody famous. And I have to admit my contacts with the famous have been few and far between. We had the Princess Royal down to the works once to open a new canteen. She half-paused at an adjoining table and expressed interest to some fellow workmates in the colour of the formica top, but that’s as far as it went. Then I had some contact with Mrs Somebody-Something, a famous Dutch sprinter.

  LINDA: A Dutch spinster?

  DAD: No, love. Sprinter. She won the Olympics once before you were born. Not a particularly good-looking woman but the personality very well defined. She ran past the end of the street once in pursuit of some charity thing and I remember thinking ‘Well, there’s an opportunity here if I want to take it.’ But to my mind the most likely candidate was one of the Rank starlets. You won’t remember them. They were starlets for Rank, generally girls with large busts who’d been in films then went round the provinces officiating at functions. This one was Dawn something or something Dawn. She epitomized glamour.

  LINDA: Glamour?

  DAD: I met her when she was presiding over the gala opening of a discount warehouse in converted premises formerly a church. We went along for sentimental reasons … we’d got married there … and also because we were crying out for a bit of underfelt for the stairs. I know I engaged this Rank lady in conversation. I have her autograph on the back of a bill for felt underlay. It’s upstairs somewhere if your so-called mother hasn’t thrown it away. Whether anything actually transpired I can’t say with any certainty. I have a very clear picture in my mind of something happening between us. The point is, Linda, I think you’re right. That isn’t your mother. That woman. You’ve no ties in that direction. Me, it’s different. We’re one and the same, you and me.

  And the way I’ve been thinking is that with my experience in the Western Desert I’m actually cut out for Kuwait. I revel in the heat whereas your mother (her in there), she hates it. I’ve been begging her for years to go to Torquay only she says she was smothered at Scarborough. So where are you? Kuwait would suit my arm. The feeling would be back in no time. What do you say, Linda?

  LINDA: I wasn’t listening.

  DAD: There’s that many things I could do for you. Little jobs. I could keep your cosmetics ship-shape for instance. Not allow those nasty deposits to form round the top of your nail-varnish bottle … keep your mascara brushes soft and yielding … always have a point ready on your eyebrow pencils. Let me come, Linda.

  MAM: (Returning) How will you make a living? You’ll have to go out to work.

  LINDA: Work? I shall never have to work again. I’m getting married.

  MAM: Married! Oh, Linda. Why didn’t you say? I’m so happy. She’s getting married, Dad. Our Linda’s getting married. I thought she was just going out there on spec but it’s wedding bells!

  DAD: I don’t want her to get married. She’s not ready for marriage. I’ve yet to meet the man that’s good enough for our Linda.

  MAM: Who will it be?

  DAD: Kuwait? It will be one of these international oil men.

  MAM: An oil man? You need a degree for that. Some form of higher education anyway. Our Linda’s marrying somebody with qualifications.

  (LINDA returns.)

  When’s the wedding?

  LINDA: This afternoon. At least the civil ceremony. When we get to Saudi Arabia they have the religious ceremony where they slit the throat of a goat.

  MAM: A goat. Oh. We’ve always been Church of England. Still it’s nice when they believe anything at all these days. And I suppose the animals are more used to it out there. He’s not an oil man then?

  LINDA: Oil man? He’s a prince.

  MAM: A prince. Linda!

  DAD: He’s not coloured?

  LINDA: Probably. I haven’t seen him yet.

  MAM: You haven’t seen him? It’s not love then?

  LINDA: It might be. He’s seen pictures of me.

  MAM: Oh, well. It may ripen into love. These arranged things often do. Royalty it often ripens into love. You read about it. King Hussein married like that and his ripened into love. Even some of ours marry like that and it always ripens into love.

  DAD: Where did he see these pictures of you?

  LINDA: They were shown him by a business associate. He’s sending a car.

  MAM: A car, Dad! A prince is sending a car for our Linda!

  LINDA: Only the bugger’s late.

  DAD: There won’t be a car. They don’t send cars for lasses who answer adverts.

  LINDA: Who said I answered an advert? They’re sending a car. They’re sending a sodding car.

  DAD: None of your secretary talk here. Who is he, then, this so-called prince? Why does he want to marry you?

  LINDA: Why does anybody want to marry anybody? Why did you want to marry her?

  DAD: I can’t remember.

  MAM: Love, wasn’t it?

  DAD: Candid photographs, were they? Full length?

  LINDA: I was holding a bicycle and looking apprehensive. They were very tasteful.

  MAM: Not taken at your desk, then? Sitting at your typewriter?

  LINDA: No. I have been photographed at a desk. Sitting on a typewriter.

  MAM: On it? How unusual.

  DAD: Can I see them?

  (LINDA ignores this.)

  Getting all this down, are you?

  MAM: I’d forgotten you. I was being utterly natural. Though this isn’t normal. It’s not every day Linda gets married and goes off to … where is it you’re going, love?

  LINDA: Saudi Arabia.

  DAD: She’s not going to Saudi Arabia.

  LINDA: I bloody am.

  DAD: Over my dead body.

  MAM: You see. As soon as I draw their attention to you they start showing off.

  DAD: You’ve been had. It’s another con. You’re always being conned. There won’t be a car. Resign yourself. This is where you belong. At home with us. Feel my arm.

  LINDA: No car? What’s this then?

  (LINDA looks through one window, MRS CRAVEN with her.)

  MAM: (Awestruck) Is that it?

  LINDA: That’s just the bonnet.

  MAM: Come look, Dad. It’s that long, I can’t even see the front of it.

  (DAD looks out of a different window.)

  DAD: I can’t see the back.

  LINDA: So now do you believe me?

  MAM: I never doubted it. It’s your Dad. He’s been a sceptic ever since we were first married. What is he like, your fiancé? Quiet? Some of them can be very nicely spoken.

  LINDA: I haven’t met him.

  MAM: He must have a good job, car like that.

  DAD: Nobody has jobs in Saudi Arabia. They just sit over a hole in the ground and put it in cans. That’s not a job.

  MAM: What?

  DAD: Oil, you flaming naff head.

  MAM: I’m more easy in my mind, now that I know that he’s a prince and seen the car. You’ve done very well, Linda. The girl King Hussein married was only a shop assistant, though very vivacious apparently. Makes me wish we had a car.

  LINDA: You wouldn’t want a car like that. It’s armour plated.

  MAM: Vandals?

  LINDA: Assassination.

  DAD: I couldn’t drive a car. Not with my arm. It’d have to be specially adapted.

  LINDA: It is specially adapted: it’s got a flame thrower.

  MAM: Oh, that’s unusual.

  LINDA: One touch on the button and you’re both dead. Burnt to a cinder.

  MAM: Well there’s all sorts of gadgets now, but if it gets you from point A to point Β that’s all you want.

  LINDA: He’s probably got it trained on you at this very moment.

  MAM: Really? What will they think of next? (MAM waves.) That’s not your fiancé driving it?

  LINDA: That’s the chauffeur.

  MAM: He’s English
anyway.

  LINDA: English? He’s got a degree in mechanical engineering.

  MAM: If he’s got a degree why don’t you fetch him in. He could perhaps do with a cup of tea.

  LINDA: If I even looked at him they would have to chop his hands off at the elbow. Honour.

  MAM: Your Uncle Graham was a bit like that. Someone looked at Thelma once and he threw them through a plate-glass window. But that wasn’t religion. It was drink.

  LINDA: I’ll just go and have a word with him. (LINDA goes out.)

  MAM: She’ll probably have a swimming-pool.

  DAD: In the car, possibly.

  MAM: A cocktail bar.

  DAD: Sauna.

  MAM: I’d like a car with toilet facilities. W.C. Wash-hand basin. With facilities like that there’d be no need to get out of the car at all. The chauffeur looks nice. I’ve a sneaking wish our Linda was marrying him. Come and look at the car, love. (MS CRAIG doesn’t move.)

  It’s all part of the picture. Happiness!

  (MS CRAIG gets up slowly and goes to one window and looks. Goes to the other. Sits down. Makes a slight note.)

  DAD: You don’t ride in cars like that, madam.

  MAM: I knew a cinema-manager a bit like him. Refined-looking. I can always pick out people who know what the word suffering means. He’s coming in.

  (LINDA comes in with the handsome brute of a chauffeur, HERITAGE.)

  LINDA: Heritage wondered if you would like to look round the car and have a cocktail from the cabinet.

  MAM: A cocktail. Why, what time is it? Thanks very much.

  DAD: I’m stopping here with Linda. She’ll be leaving us soon. Every minute is precious. (He doesn’t move.)

  MAM: You stunt me, Dad. Here’s an unlooked-for opportunity for cocktails in the back of a Rolls Royce and you turn your nose up.

  DAD: Linda.

  LINDA: Go and have a flaming cocktail.

  MAM: Are you coming, love, or are you staying to observe Linda?

  (MS CRAIG doesn’t move.)

  This isn’t normal, of course. It’s only once in a blue moon we have cocktails in the back of a Rolls Royce.

  (MAM and DAD go out, with HERITAGE, MAM singing ‘Waltz of My Heart’ (Novello, The Dancing Years).)

  LINDA: I shall be glad to see the back of this place. I can’t wait to open the curtains in a morning and see minarets. (She stands in front of MS CRAIG.) Hello. Don’t you have a little word for me then?