Doris Lessing - Play With a Tiger and Other Plays

HARRY: You’ve made your point, come on.

ANNA: See you in the morning, Mary.

MARY: Well I’ve been meaning to say it and I have.

[HARRY and MARY go out , HARRY with a nod and a smile at the other two. ]

DAVE: Anna, she’ll have forgotten all about it in the morning.

[ He goes to her. She clings to him. ]

DAVE: And if she hasn’t, you’ll have to.

ANNA: Oh hell, hell, hell.

DAVE: Yes, I know baby, I know.

ANNA: She’s going to wish she were dead tomorrow morning.

DAVE: Well, it’s not so terrible. You’ll be here and you can pick up the pieces. [ He leads her to the bed, and sits by her, his arm around her. ] That’s better. I like looking after you. Let’s have six months’ peace and quiet. Let’s have a truce – what do you say?

[ The telephone rings. They are both tense, listening. HARRY comes in. ]

HARRY: Don’t you answer your telephone, Anna? What’s the matter with you two? [ He goes to the telephone to answer it. Sees their faces, stops. ] I’m a clod. Of course, it’s Tom.

ANNA: It isn’t Tom.

HARRY: Of course it is. Poor bastard, he’s breaking his heart and here you are dallying with Dave.

ANNA: I know it isn’t.

DAVE: Never argue with Anna when she’s got one of her fits of intuition.

ANNA: Intuition!

HARRY: Mary’s passed clean out. Mary’s in a bad way tonight. Just my luck. I need someone to be nice to me, and all Mary wants is someone to be nice to her.

ANNA: I hope you were.

HARRY: Of course I was.

ANNA: Why don’t you go home to Helen?

HARRY [ bluff ]: It’s four in the morning. Did you two fools know it’s four in the morning? I’ll tell Helen my troubles tomorrow. Anna, don’t tell me you’re miserable too. [ going to her ] Is that silly bastard Dave playing you up? It’s a hell of a life. Now I’ll tell you what. I’ll pick you up for lunch tomorrow, I mean today, and I’ll tell you my troubles and you can tell me yours. [ to DAVE] You’ve made Anna unhappy, you clod, you idiot.

ANNA: Oh damn it, if you want to play big Daddy why don’t you go home and mop up some of Helen’s tears?

HARRY [ bluff ]: I don’t have to worry about Helen, I keep telling you.

ANNA: Harry!

HARRY [ to DAVE, shouting it ]: Clod. Fool … all right, I suppose I’ve got to go home. But it’s not right, Anna. God in his wisdom has ordained that there should be a certain number of understanding women in the world whose task it is to bind up the wounds of warriors like Dave and me. Yes, I’ll admit it, it’s hard on you but – you’re a man’s woman Anna, and that means that when we’re in trouble you can’t be.

ANNA: Thank you, I did understand my role.

[ The telephone rings. ]

HARRY: He’s a persistent bugger, isn’t he? [ He picks up telephone, shouts into it. ] Well you’re not to marry him, Anna. Or anyone. Dave and I won’t let you. [ He slams receiver back. ]

ANNA: Go home. Please go home.

HARRY [ for the first time serious ]: Anna, you know something? I’m kind Uncle Harry, the world’s soft shoulder for about a thousand people. I make marriages, I patch them up. I give good advice. I dish out aid and comfort. But there’s just one person in the world I can’t be kind to.

ANNA: Helen’s ill.

HARRY: I know she is. I know it. But every time it’s the same thing. I go in, full of good intentions – and then something happens. I don’t know what gets into me … I was looking into the shaving glass this morning, a pretty sight I looked, I was up all last night drinking myself silly because my poppet’s getting married. I looked at myself. You silly sod, I said. You’re fifty this year, and you’re ready to die because of a little girl who … you know, Anna, if she wanted me to cut myself into pieces for her I’d do it? And she looked at me yesterday with those pretty little eyes of hers and she said – primly, she said it, though not without kindness – Harry, do you know what’s wrong with you? You’re at the dangerous age, she said. All men go through it. Oh Christ, Anna, let me take you out and give you a drink tonight. I’ve got to weep on someone’s shoulder. I’d have wept on Mary’s, only all she could say was: ‘Harry, what’s the meaning of life?’ She asks me.

ANNA: Anything you like but for God’s sake go home now.

HARRY: I’m going. Helen will pretend to be asleep. She never says anything. Well I suppose she’s learned there’s not much point in her saying anything, poor bitch.

[ He goes. DAVE and ANNA look at each other. ]

DAVE: OK Anna. Now let’s have it.

ANNA [ in cruel parody ]: I’m just a little ordinary girl, what’s wrong with that? I want to be married, what’s wrong with that? I never loved anyone as I loved Dave …

DAVE: No, Anna, not like that.

ANNA [ in JANET’S voice, wild with anxiety ]: When I knew I was pregnant I was so happy. Yes I know how it looks, trapping a man, but he said he loved me, he said he loved me. I’m five months’ pregnant.

[ She stands waiting. DAVE looks at her. ]

ANNA: Well haven’t you got anything to say?

DAVE: Did you expect me to fall down at your feet and start grovelling? God Anna, look at you, the mothers of the universe have triumphed, the check’s on the table and Dave Miller’s got to pay the bill, that’s it, isn’t it?

[ She says nothing. DAVE laughs. ]

ANNA: Funny?

DAVE [ with affection ]: You’re funny, Anna.

ANNA: It’s not my baby. I’m sorry it isn’t. I wasn’t so intelligent.

DAVE: That’s right. You’ve never got the manacles on me, but Janet has. Now I marry Janet and settle down in the insurance business and live happily ever after, is it that? Is that how you see it? If not, this cat and mouse business all evening doesn’t make sense.

ANNA: And the baby? Just another little casualty in the sex war? She’s a nice respectable middle-class girl, you can’t say to her, have an illegitimate baby, it will be an interesting experience for you – you could have said it to me.

DAVE: Very nice, and very respectable.

ANNA: You said you loved her.

DAVE: Extraordinary. You’re not at all shocked that she lied to me all along the line?

ANNA: You told her you loved her.

DAVE: I’ll admit it’s time I learned to define my terms … you’re worried about Janet’s respectability? If the marriage certificate is what is important to her I’ll give her one. No problems.

ANNA: No problems!

DAVE: I’ll fix it. Anna, you know what? You’ve been using Janet to break off with me because you haven’t the guts to do it for yourself? I don’t come through for you so you punish me by marrying me off to Janet Stevens?

ANNA: OK, then why don’t you come through for me? Here you are, Dave Miller, lecturing women all the time about how they should live – women should be free, they should be independent, etc., etc. None of these dishonest female ruses. But if that’s what you really want what are you doing with Janet Stevens – and all the other Janets? Well? The truth is you can’t take us, you can’t take me. I go through every kind of bloody misery trying to be what you say you want, but …

DAVE: OK, some of the time I can’t take you.

ANNA: And what am I supposed to do when you’re off with the Janets?

DAVE [ with confidence ]: Well you can always finally kick me out.

ANNA: And in a few months’ time when you’ve got tired of yourself in the role of a father, there’ll be a knock on the door … ‘Hi, Anna, do you love me? Let’s have six months’ peace and quiet, let’s have a truce … ’ and so on, and so on, and so on, and so on …