Can You Hear Me Mother. (3) Lucy: He respects me. Enid: So he should. Lucy: We kissed. Just kissed. Enid: From little acorns… Lucy: It was a natural thing. It just happened. Enid: So does flu. (Lucy stares at the sky and Enid stares ahead. Silence.) End of Act One and Scene Seven. Act Two. Scene One. Late afternoon. George, Nellie, Lucy sit on the garden bench. Enid sits on the deckchair with her book in her hands. George: Great tit! Nellie: George, language. George: It’s a bird, rare one round here. Not seen one for ages. Nellie: Him and his birds. You’d think he’d have something better to do than look at birds at his age. Enid: My father the ornithologist. Nellie: What’s that when it’s at home? George: It might have been a blue tit of course; I only got a quick look at it. Enid: Someone who studies birds, Mother. Nellie: He does that all right. Spends hours at it he does. Head in a book, glasses on the end of his beak like some bloody owl. George: I saw a coal tit last year. Now that is a rarity. Lucy: I wouldn’t know one tit from another. What do they look like? George: I’ll show you my book later. Lovely birds. Like bull finches. They’re very rare round here. Seen them in the country. Plenty of birds there. Nellie: That Mrs Coles was in the butchers. Her legs aren’t half-bad. Had a job to get across the road she did. Enid: It’s either a subject you love or hate, ornithology. Birds are birds to me. They fly. They have feathers. That’s as far as I go. George: I haven’t quite picked out their singing yet. Blackbirds I know well. Lucy: Clarence Serf used to feed the birds out the back of the boarding house, but his wife kept telling him not to, but he still did it. Nellie: Eaten up with it she is. Enid: Who’s eaten up with what? Nellie: Mrs Coles, eaten up with arthritis. Poor old girl. She’s had a life she has. First, her husband goes off with that girl from the grocers just after the War, and then her son, Don, gets himself wounded in Suez and comes back a cripple. Enid: I don’t think arthritis eats you up, Mum. It’s an inflammation of the joints. Terrible thing that. Bert Lomax had it bad if you remember. Lucy: Clarence Serf was kind. Always thinking of others he was. Gave me a big cuddle when I fell over and hurt my leg. Nellie: Well, whatever it is, she’s crippled with it. And her son’s no help seeing as he’s not able to get about much what with that gammy leg of his. George: Don Coles knows his horses, though, gammy leg or not. He can pick a winner with his eyes shut. Nellie: That’s as may be, but his mother has a job getting about. Half an hour it took her to get from the butchers to the kerb. She couldn’t have any more kids after her Don as she had to have an operation to sort her out afterwards. Poor cow. (Sighs. Pause. Looks about her. Studies Lucy sitting beside her.)Don’t get old, Lucy. It’s not worth the effort. George: What’s she supposed to do then? Commit suicide when she’s out of her sixties? Lucy: I don’t want to get old. I want to stay as I am. Enid: Wouldn’t we all have liked to have done. I’d love to be fifteen again. Nellie: You were a little tearaway when you were fifteen. Wouldn’t want to go through that again thank you very much. Off on the back of motorbikes at all hours. Your father and I had nightmares we did. Wondering if you’d be back in one piece. George: When I was fifteen I’d been at work a year or so, working for next to nothing. Tough days they were. You had to get your back into it or get out. No mucking about in those days. Lucy: I was very upset when I had my first... Enid: I was only having fun. Got to have fun when you’re young. Nellie: You had some odd-looking blokes calling for you, you did. Bloody convict looking some of them. Your father had them wait in the garden at the front and wouldn’t let them in. (Looks across at Enid in the deckchair.)Turned my hair grey overnight it did all that worry. Lucy: Thought I was dying. George: I wanted to be an engine driver, but my father said I had to work with him so he could keep an eye on me. (Pause.) Enid: Anyway, here I am still unmarried for all those blokes knocking at the door with their flowers and boxes of chocolates. Nellie: Some of them were quite nice. George: A job for life my father said. You’ll be here until you retire he said. The Great War made a mockery of that. Many a bloke never came back. (Becomes silent for a few moments.)My best mate, Roland Smith, never came back with me. We enlisted the same day and joined the same regiment. We went through thick and thin together and had many a laugh about our escapes and close scrapes. (Sighs. Pause. Breathes in hard.)Then a sniper picks off the silly blighter. A single bullet right through his head. One moment he’s there smiling his head off, the next he’s on the floor of the trench with a hole in his head. (Pause.)There, that was a thrush. (Puts his hand over his ear and leans his head to one side.)I know that sound when I hear it. Lucy: I hate being a young woman sometimes. Men seem to be looking at you and whispering behind your back or whistling at you. You can almost hear their brains ticking over. Enid: That’s men for you, Lucy. Eyes out on stoppers soon as a pretty girl goes by. Nellie: I’ve yet to meet a bloke who didn’t have his eyes out on stoppers when a girl goes by. Glad I didn’t have sons. Lucy: Makes you feel dirty imagining what they might be thinking. George: I’d love to be in the country again and see all those birds you can’t see in London. Breathe in the fresh air. Feel the country air in your face. Enid: I’ve had a few blokes like that. Hands like an octopus. Tongues down your throat like bloody vipers. You have to let them know where you stand, Lucy. Don’t stand for any nonsense. Don’t let them get away with anything you don’t want. If you let them do it, they won’t respect you afterwards. Lucy: Jude does things I’m not happy about. Enid: Tell him, Lucy, tell him. Put the bugger straight. Let him see the line where he’s not to go beyond and he’ll respect you. Nellie: Smack the blighter’s face. Kick his backside for him. George: You always were a romantic weren’t you, Mother. Nellie: A girl has to stand her ground. No use worrying afterwards about it. Once the horse’s bolted that’s it. Enid: Mrs Clerk’s daughter (Whispers.)Wendy, she was caught out. Her belly stuck out a like an elephant’s backside and still her mother didn’t notice until it was almost due. “How’d that get there,” her mother said to her. “How’d do you think it got there,” Wendy says to her,” eating too much rhubarb?”(Pause.) Couldn’t remember who the father was. However, once the baby was born and was as black as coal that narrowed the field down a bit. (Pause.)You have to make your stand, Lucy. Got to let them see you mean business. When you say no, mean no. No is no. George: Except when it means yes. Nellie: Shut up, George, you’ll confuse the girl. Lucy: Kisses is all right isn’t it? Nellie: Kissing’s fine. George: I knew a girl who had a stammer. When she said no it took so long for her to get it out that the bloke had gone home and was in bed by the time she’d finished. Enid: You and your tales, Dad. It’s serious. We don’t want young Lucy here getting herself in the family way before she’s had time to live and see the world. George: She had the same trouble when she said yes. She’s still a virgin at sixty-two. Nellie: George, stop this nonsense. Lucy’s being serious. She needs advice. Lucy: Jude thinks we ought to get more serious. Says we’re too timid. Enid: I’ll give him too timid. If he meets me in a dark alley, he won’t think me too timid. Nellie: Timid my backside. What will blokes come out with next? George: That, if I’m not mistaken, was a blackbird. Nellie: They have some bright ideas they do. All he wants, Lucy is to see how far he can go. Enid: I’ll show him how far he can go all right. To the far end of a short pier and jump off. George: Makes your eyes water all this birdsong. Makes you think you’re in the country. Nellie: Best to keep your legs crossed rather than your fingers. Don’t give him an inch or he’ll take a yard. Lucy: Clarence Serf was a gentleman. He knew how to respect a girl. George: Ramsgate is where you get your seabirds. That’s something to look forward to when we go there. Nellie: I had enough of them blokes when I was dancer. Eyes and hands they were. Not a bit cultured they weren’t. Wouldn’t know a can-can from a waltz. I could have done ballet if I wanted. This bloke from up West says he thought I had the making of a good ballet dancer if I set my mind to it. Enid: I can see you now, Mother, with your tutu and your ballet shoes. George: I think that Mrs Serf’s a bit of sadist. The way she treats her husband. Talk about tongue-lashing. Lucy: He kissed me that time when I scrapped my knees on those rocks. Nellie: Could have been famous. Have danced before royalty. Have been somebody worth noticing. (Pause. Looks at the sky.) George: Wouldn’t want her in my bed that’s for sure. Enid: Dreams are dreams, Mother. Lucy: He will think I’ve grown. George: Not that I’d fancy him either. Soft in the head. Enid: What might have been is just that a big might have been. Lucy: I hope he’ll still like me. George: A fine pair those two. Enid: I could have been the daughter of a famous ballerina. Have gone to a school for rich kids and got spoilt. (Looks back at Nellie. She smiles.)However, what would I be doing going to a school for rich brats? I’d rather be who I am and what I am for all that. Lucy: I hope he does. He was a kind man. Always ready with a cuddle and a smile. George: Her with a bust like a battleship and him with moustache like dead hedgehog. Strange couple. Nice place, though. Nice place. (Pause. George closes his eyes. Enid reads a page of her book. Nellie gets up from the bench and wanders off indoors without saying a word. Lucy looks at Enid and thinks of Ramsgate.) End of Scene One. Act Two. Scene Two. Half an hour later. George and Lucy sit on the bench. Enid is in the deckchair with her eyes closed. Lucy: What was it like being the father of four daughters, Grandad? George: Like being in the trenches all over again. I was out numbered five to one. That's frightening odds. No army would go into a battle against such odds. (Smiles.)I received a medal for fighting in the trenches, but I've received nothing for being a father for forty-three years. Only hair loss and a nervous disposition. Lucy: Didn't any of my aunt's want to go on the stage and be a dancer like Nan? George: Freda was always the comedian and thought she'd make it on the stage or in films, but she failed all the auditions she went for and got married instead. (Pause)Your mother wanted to be an actress, but it wasn't easy in those days. Just after the War, things were pretty desperate. She had to get a job so put the idea aside. However, she went to the theatre quite a lot. That's where she met your father. They married. Tommy came along and then you and that was that. Your father being an actor seemed to sustain her in her gloomy moments. Lucy: I think she's more ambitious than Dad is. George: Always has been, always will. Lucy: Dad could have made it to the top Mum says. But Dad being Dad he just plods along from one small part to the other. Enid: I wanted to go on the stage, but Mum was against it. George: She knows what it's like being on stage in that type of world. Lucy: Dad wants to play King Lear one day. Enid: I could have managed to cope. Mum did. George: Perhaps she thought you might be better than she was. Lucy: He knows the part by heart. Enid: Better? Better or worse, just a chance to prove myself would have been something. Instead, all I got was a firm no. George: You should have seen your Mother on the stage. She had presence. She had an air of glamour about her. Dance? She could dance the backside off any of the others on the stage at that time. When I saw her for the first time, I was gob-smacked. I couldn't take my eyes off her. And those legs of hers. They were beautiful. They started from her toes and went right up to her backside. Enid: Dad! Language. Remember we have company. Lucy: He wanted to play Hamlet when he was younger, but the part never came up. George: I thought she was the bee's-knees. Now she's got housemaid’s knees and a figure like an orang-utan. Enid: Dad, that's not true. Mum's still attractive for her age. George: So is an antique. Lucy: Mum says he doesn't try harder enough. Too easy going. Enid: Your mum always was pushy. She would have made it under different circumstances. Women didn't have the same chances as men in those days. It was hard to make it if you were a woman. George: Your mother has always known what she wanted. These days she would have found it easier. Without her, your father would be sweeping the stage rather than acting on it. Lucy: What bird is that? (Points to the sky.) George: Swallow. Lucy: Nice. Enid: You and your birds. George: They are lovely birds. Lucy: Lovely way of flying. Enid: A bird's a bird. What's all the fuss about? George: Birds are as different as you and me. Lucy: Beautiful wings. Enid: Don't you start, Lucy. You're as bad as he is. George :( Looking around the garden.)This is the best time of year. Smell those flowers. Look at those colours. Hear the birds. This is life. This is the life. (Pause. Looks at Lucy beside him.) Don't waste your youth, Lucy. Don't let it pass you by without noticing the beauty of it. I spent four years of my youth in the bloody trenches. You haven’t such thing to prevent you enjoying your life. You have beauty. You have intelligence. You have the freedom. Don't waste it. Enid: Here endeth the first lesson. Lucy: I won't, Grandad. I want to make the best of my youth. George: Good girl. Enid: Don't let that Jude get into your knickers. Lucy: Auntie Enid! Enid: Just be careful. I know what men are like. George: She should do she's been out with enough of them. Enid: Have to be choosy. Can't jump at the first one that comes a along. Men are like buses, there will always be another coming along just behind. And some of them will be rubbish. Keep a wide berth of the wise-boys. All hands. Lucy: Jude's not like that. George: I remember that Italian you had in tow years back. Poor chap. Didn't know what hit him. Thought he'd been hit by a tornado. He was a bag of nerves after going out with you for a month. Enid: Wanted to turn me into a catholic. George: More chance of turning you into a man. Lucy: Jude's not very bad. I do like him. Enid: His parents barely spoke a word of English. It was like being inside the Vatican on a feast day. And his hands were everywhere. Thought I'd be taken in by all that romantic jargon of his. Soon put him right. Catholic my backside. All that Latin and incense. Lucy: Jude wants to marry me one day. George: He seemed quite a nice chap to me. Despite the fact his parents chose the wrong side in the War. Nice hair. Lovely eyes. Enid: You should have gone out with him, then. Lucy: He only kissed me. Only a kiss. George: Where's your mother? Enid: Getting dinner ready. (Gets up from the deckchair.)Best give her a hand. Many hands make light work. (She walks off into the door of the house.) George: Peace and quiet. Can't beat it. Lucy: Nice. George :( Softly.)Like being in the arms of a lovely woman. Lucy :( Softly.) Or boy. (Pause. Silence.) End of Scene Two. Act Two. Scene Three. Early evening, after dinner. Enid and Lucy are sitting on an old sofa down stage. George is sitting in an armchair to the left of Lucy holding a book of birds. Nellie is sitting to the right of Enid. Enid is looking through a book of art. Upper stage left is a door. Upper stage right a table and four chairs. George: That's a great tit, there. (Points to a page in the book. Lucy looks down at it.)And that's a blue tit. See the difference? Lucy: I can in the book, but not sure I'd notice out in the wilds. George: And that’s a coal tit. Nellie: You and your tits, George. Enid: And him a grown man. (Looks down at her book.)What do you think of this for art, Mum? (Shows page to Nellie.) Nellie: Call that art. I could do better than that with my eyes shut and a paintbrush between my toes. Enid: It's a Paul Klee. Nellie: Paul Klee to you too. What's it supposed to be? Enid: It's called Twittering Machine. I think it's a bird machine. Nellie: Whatever next. You and your bird machine and Dad with his birds, this place is becoming a blooming aviary. George: And those are finches. Lucy: Pretty colours. Nellie: I'm not one for modern art. I like what I see to be something I can recognise, not something from out of space or from some mad man's brain. George: Bull finch that one. Lucy: Nice. Nellie: I saw a picture once, in some gallery up the West End with your father which right turned me off art altogether. I said to Dad, if that's art then I'm a Dutch queen. (Looks closer at the page.)Don’t know what you want to look at all this arty stuff for. It’s not for the likes of us. Those with education might see something in it, but it’s just a load of rubbish to us. Enid: Talk for yourself, Mum. I like art. Always have. Nellie: Do my feet have bells on? You and art. It’s because of some bloke in that office of yours. That Mr.What's-his-name. Enid: Ronald Hickman’s his name and he’s shown me the beauty of things. Nellie: I bet he has. They’re all the same. Show you something then expect you to show them something in return. Enid: Ronald’s not like that. He’s genuine. He wants me to appreciate the finer things in life. George: That’s a spotted wagtail. Lovely bird. Brings tears to my eyes. Lucy: And what’s that one. (Lucy points at the page.) George: Wren. Small bird. Wouldn’t think they’d get so small would you? I’ve seen them in the country. Enid: Art is a refection of life, Ronald says. Nellie: Reflection of life my bleary eye. He’s having you on. Coming out with all the soft soap. Enid: He’s not at bit as you imagine him to be. Nellie: I bet he’s all toffee-nosed with a posh voice. Enid: He’s nicely spoken and well educated. Nellie: Then what’s he want with the likes of you? Enid: Thanks, Mum. I really appreciate that. He doesn’t have to be interested in me, but he is. He sees things in me, which others can’t. Says I have potential. Lucy: Clarence said birds were God’s messengers. He was funny like that. He had me in stitches with some of the things he came out with. George: Who’s Clarence?
Copyright © 2005 Terry Collett |