Complete Works, Volume IV (5 page)

He sits with coffee.

Yes, I remember you quite clearly from The Wayfarers.

ANNA
The what?

DEELEY
The Wayfarers Tavern, just off the Brompton Road.

ANNA
When was that?

DEELEY
Years ago.

ANNA
I don’t think so.

DEELEY
Oh yes, it was you, no question. I never forget a face. You sat in the corner, quite often, sometimes alone, sometimes with others. And here you are, sitting in my house in the country. The same woman. Incredible. Fellow called Luke used to go in there. You knew him.

ANNA
Luke?

DEELEY
Big chap. Ginger hair. Ginger beard.

ANNA
I don’t honestly think so.

DEELEY
Yes, a whole crowd of them, poets, stunt men, jockeys, standup comedians, that kind of setup. You used to wear a scarf, that’s right, a black scarf, and a black sweater, and a skirt.

ANNA
Me?

DEELEY
And black stockings. Don’t tell me you’ve forgotten The Wayfarers Tavern? You might have forgotten the name but you must remember the pub. You were the darling of the saloon bar.

ANNA
I wasn’t rich, you know. I didn’t have money for alcohol.

DEELEY
You had escorts. You didn’t have to pay. You were looked after. I bought you a few drinks myself.

ANNA
You?

DEELEY
Sure.

ANNA
Never.

DEELEY
It’s the truth. I remember clearly.

Pause

ANNA
You?

DEELEY
I’ve bought you drinks.

Pause

Twenty years ago . . . or so.

ANNA
You’re saying we’ve met before?

DEELEY
Of course we’ve met before.

Pause

We’ve talked before. In that pub, for example. In the corner. Luke didn’t like it much but we ignored him. Later we all went to a party. Someone’s flat, somewhere in Westbourne Grove. You sat on a very low sofa, I sat opposite and looked up your skirt. Your black stockings were very black because your thighs were so white. That’s something that’s all over now, of course, isn’t it, nothing like the same palpable profit in it now, it’s all over. But it was worthwhile then. It was worthwhile that night. I simply sat sipping my light ale and gazed . . . gazed up your skirt. You didn’t object, you found my gaze perfectly acceptable.

ANNA
I was aware of your gaze, was I?

DEELEY
There was a great argument going on, about China or something, or death, or China
and
death, I can’t remember which, but nobody but I had a thigh-kissing view, nobody but you had the thighs which kissed. And here you are. Same woman. Same thighs.

Pause

Yes. Then a friend of yours came in, a girl, a girl friend. She sat on the sofa with you, you both chatted and chuckled, sitting together, and I settled lower to gaze at you both, at both your thighs, squealing and hissing, you aware, she unaware, but then a great multitude of men surrounded me, and demanded my opinion about death, or about China, or whatever it was, and they would not let me be but bent down over me, so that what with their stinking breath and their broken teeth and the hair in their noses and China and death and their arses on the arms of my chair I was forced to get up and plunge my way through them, followed by them with ferocity, as if I were the cause of their argument, looking back through smoke, rushing to the table with the linoleum cover to look for one more full bottle of light ale, looking back through smoke, glimpsing two girls on the sofa, one of them you, heads close, whispering, no longer able to see anything, no longer able to see stocking or thigh, and then you were gone. I wandered over to the sofa. There was no one on it. I gazed at the indentations of four buttocks. Two of which were yours.

Pause

ANNA
I’ve rarely heard a sadder story.

DEELEY
I agree.

ANNA
I’m terribly sorry.

DEELEY
That’s all right.

Pause

I never saw you again. You disappeared from the area. Perhaps you moved out.

ANNA
No. I didn’t.

DEELEY
I never saw you in The Wayfarers Tavern again. Where were you?

ANNA
Oh, at concerts, I should think, or the ballet.

Silence

Katey’s taking a long time over her bath.

DEELEY
Well, you know what she’s like when she gets in the bath.

ANNA
Yes.

DEELEY
Enjoys it. Takes a long time over it.

ANNA
She does, yes.

DEELEY
A hell of a long time. Luxuriates in it. Gives herself a great soaping all over.

Pause

Really soaps herself all over, and then washes the soap off, sud by sud. Meticulously. She’s both thorough and, I must say it, sensuous. Gives herself a comprehensive going over, and apart from everything else she does emerge as clean as a new pin. Don’t you think?

ANNA
Very clean.

DEELEY
Truly so. Not a speck. Not a tidemark. Shiny as a balloon.

ANNA
Yes, a kind of floating.

DEELEY
What?

ANNA
She floats from the bath. Like a dream. Unaware of anyone standing, with her towel, waiting for her, waiting to wrap it round her. Quite absorbed.

Pause

Until the towel is placed on her shoulders.

Pause

DEELEY
Of course she’s so totally incompetent at drying herself properly, did you find that? She gives herself a really good
scrub,
but can she with the same efficiency give herself an equally good
rub?
I have found, in my experience of her, that this is not in fact the case. You’ll always find a few odd unexpected unwanted cheeky globules dripping about.

ANNA
Why don’t you dry her yourself?

DEELEY
Would you recommend that?

ANNA
You’d do it properly.

DEELEY
In her bath towel?

ANNA
How out?

DEELEY
How out?

ANNA
How could you dry her out? Out of her bath towel?

DEELEY
I don’t know.

ANNA
Well, dry her yourself, in her bath toweL

Pause

DEELEY
Why don’t
you
dry her in her bath towel?

ANNA
Me?

DEELEY
You’d do it properly.

ANNA
No, no.

DEELEY
Surely? I mean, you’re a woman, you know how and where and in what density moisture collects on women’s bodies.

ANNA
No two women are the same.

DEELEY
Well, that’s true enough.

Pause

I’ve got a brilliant idea. Why don’t we do it with powder?

ANNA
Is that a brilliant idea?

DEELEY
Isn’t it?

ANNA
It’s quite common to powder yourself after a bath.

DEELEY
It’s quite common to powder yourself after a bath but it’s quite uncommon to be powdered. Or is it? It’s not common where I come from, I can tell you. My mother would have a fit.

Pause

Listen. I’ll tell you what. I’ll do it. I’ll do the whole lot. The towel and the powder. After all, I am her husband. But you can supervise the whole thing. And give me some hot tips while you’re at it. That’ll kill two birds with one stone.

Pause

(
To himself.
) Christ.

He looks at her slowly.

You must be about forty, I should think, by now.

Pause

If I walked into The Wayfarers Tavern now, and saw you sitting in the corner, I wouldn’t recognize you.

The bathroom door opens. Kate comes into the bedroom. She wears a bathrobe.

She smiles at Deeley and Anna.

KATE
(
With pleasure.
) Aaahh.

She walks to the window and looks out into the night. Deeley and Anna watch her.

Deeley begins to sing softly.

DEELEY
(
Singing.
) The way you wear your hat . . .

ANNA
(
Singing, softly.
) The way you sip your tea . . .

DEELEY
(
Singing.
) The memory of all that . . .

ANNA
(
Singing.
) No, no, they can’t take that away from me . . .

Kate turns from the window to look at them.

ANNA
(
Singing.
) The way your smile just beams . . .

DEELEY
(
Singing.
) The way you sing off key . . .

ANNA
(
Singing.
) The way you haunt my dreams . . .

DEELEY
(
Singing.
) No, no, they can’t take that away from me . . .

Kate walks down towards them and stands, smiling. Anna and Deeley sing again, faster on cue, and more perfunctorily.

ANNA
(
Singing.
) The way you hold your knife—

DEELEY
(
Singing.
) The way we danced till three—

ANNA
(
Singing.
) The way you’ve changed my life—

DEELEY
No, no, they can’t take that away from me.

Kate sits on a divan.

ANNA
(
To Deeley.
) Doesn’t she look beautiful?

DEELEY
Doesn’t she?

KATE
Thank you. I feel fresh. The water’s very soft here. Much softer than London. I always find the water very hard in London. That’s one reason I like living in the country. Everything’s softer. The water, the light, the shapes, the sounds. There aren’t such edges here. And living close to the sea too. You can’t say where it begins or ends. That appeals to me. I don’t care for harsh lines. I deplore that kind of urgency. I’d like to go to the East, or somewhere like that, somewhere very hot, where you can lie under a mosquito net and breathe quite slowly. You know . . . somewhere where you can look through the flap of a tent and see sand, that kind of thing. The only nice thing about a big city is that when it rains it blurs everything, and it blurs the lights from the cars, doesn’t it, and blurs your eyes, and you have rain on your lashes. That’s the only nice thing about a big city.

ANNA
That’s not the only nice thing. You can have a nice room and a nice gas fire and a warm dressing gown and a nice hot drink, all waiting for you for when you come in.

Pause

KATE
Is it raining?

ANNA
No.

KATE
Well, I’ve decided I will stay in tonight anyway.

ANNA
Oh good. I am glad. Now you can have a good strong cup of coffee after your bath.

Anna stands, goes to coffee, pours.

I could do the hem on your black dress. I could finish it and you could try it on.

KATE
Mmmnn.

Anna hands her her coffee.

ANNA
Or I could read to you.

DEELEY
Have you dried yourself properly, Kate?

KATE
I think so.

DEELEY
Are you sure? All over?

KATE
I think so. I feel quite dry.

DEELEY
Are you quite sure? I don’t want you sitting here damply all over the place.

Kate smiles.

See that smile? That’s the same smile she smiled when I was walking down the street with her, after Odd Man Out, well, quite some time after.

What did you think of it?

ANNA
It is a very beautiful smile.

DEELEY
Do it again.

KATE
I’m still smiling.

DEELEY
You’re not. Not like you were a moment ago, not like you did then.

(
To Anna
) You know the smile I’m talking about?

KATE
This coffee’s cold.

Pause

ANNA
Oh, I’m sorry. I’ll make some fresh.

KATE
No, I don’t want any, thank you.

Pause

Is Charley coming?