An Afternoon Interlude

The world is adopting you! Must pitch into him about Nina … have to have his help … damn little time to convince him … he's the kind you have to explode a bomb under to get them to move … but not too big a bomb … they blow to pieces easily …. Not that her father's death is a shock in the usual sense of grief. I wish to God it were! No, it's a shock because it's finally convinced her she can't feel anything any more. That's what she's doing upstairs now--trying to goad herself into feeling something! She'll be down any minute, and I've got a lot to talk over with you.

Then you'll want as much as I do to get her straightened out. She's a corking girl. She ought to have every chance for a happy life. She's piled on too many destructive experiences. A few more and she'll dive for the gutter just to get the security that comes from knowing she's touched bottom and there's no farther to go!

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What do you know of Nina since she left home? But she hadn't been nursing with us three days before I saw she really ought to be a patient; and ever since then I've studied her case. So I think it's up to you to listen. How much need I tell him? Nina has been giving way more and more to a morbid longing for martyrdom.

The reason for it is obvious. Gordon went away without--well, let's say marrying her. The war killed him. She was left suspended. Then she began to blame herself and to want to sacrifice herself and at the same time give happiness to various fellow war-victims by pretending to love them. It's a pretty idea but it hasn't worked out. Nina's a bad actress.

She hasn't convinced the men of her love--or herself of her good intentions. And each experience of this kind has only left her more a prey to a guilty conscience than before and more determined to punish herself! What does he mean? DARRELL-- coldly in turn On her evident craving to make an exhibition of kissing, necking, petting--whatever you call it--spooning in general--with any patient in the institution who got a case on her! And that brings me to what I want you to urge her to do. He doesn't want her back … I must have been wrong … but there might be many reasons why he'd wish to get rid of her ….

You're the last link connecting her with the girl she used to be before Gordon's death. You're closely associated in her mind with that period of happy security, of health and peace of mind. I know that from the way she talks about you. You're the only person she still respects--and really loves. I mean the sort of love she'd feel for an uncle. Looks damnably upset … wants to evade all responsibility for her, I suppose … he's that kind … all the better! You've got to help snap her out of this.

He makes a silly gesture toward the door--thinking confusedly. Wrong again … why does he want her married to … it's some trick. He's in love with her. And it's one of those unselfish loves you read about. And she is fond of him. In a maternal way, of course--but that's just what she needs now, someone she cares about to mother and boss and keep her occupied. And still more important, this would give her a chance to have children. She's got to find normal outlets for her craving for sacrifice. She needs normal love objects for the emotional life Gordon's death blocked up in her.

Now marrying Sam ought to do the trick. Naturally, no one can say for certain. But I think his unselfish love, combined with her real liking for him, will gradually give her back a sense of security and a feeling of being worth something to life again, and once she's got that, she'll be saved! He has spoken with persuasive feeling. He asks anxiously Doesn't that seem good sense to you?

I don't know anything about Evans, for one thing. He's a fine healthy boy, clean and unspoiled. You can take my word for that. And I'm convinced he's got the right stuff in him to succeed, once he grows up and buckles down to work. He's only a big kid now, but all he needs is a little self-confidence and a sense of responsibility. He's holding down a fair job, too, considering he's just started in the advertising game--enough to keep them living.

They're upstate country folks--fruit growers and farmers, well off, I believe. Simple, healthy people, I'm sure of that although I've never met them. If I were serious she wouldn't listen, she'd say I was prescribing. But I think what I've said has planted it in her mind as a possibility. Is this Doctor her lover? That you may be in love with Nina yourself! What in the devil makes you think that? Not that any man mightn't fall in love with Nina.

Most of them do. But I didn't happen to. And what's more I never could. In my mind she always belongs to Gordon. It's probably a reflection of her own silly fixed idea about him. Not to mention the living who have had her! I wouldn't care to share with a ghost-lover myself. That species of dead is so invulnerably alive! Even a doctor couldn't kill one, eh?

He forces a laugh--then in a friendly confidential tone Gordon is too egregious for a ghost. That was the way Nina's father felt about him, too. A charming old fellow!

She looks from one to the other with a queer, quick, inquisitive stare, but her face is a pale expressionless mask drained of all emotional response to human contacts. It is as if her eyes were acting on their own account as restless, prying, recording instruments. The two men have risen and stare at her anxiously. Darrell moves back and to one side until he is standing in relatively the same place as Marsden had occupied in the previous scene while Marsden is in her father's place and she stops where she had been.

There is a pause. Then just as each of the men is about to speak, she answers as if they had asked a question. NINA-- in a queer flat voice Yes, he's dead--my father--whose passion created me--who began me--he is ended. There is only his end living--his death. It lives now to draw nearer me, to draw me nearer, to become my end!

How terrible she is! Darrell makes an impatient gesture for him to let her go on. What she is saying interests him and he feels talking it out will do her good. She looks at Marsden for a moment startledly as if she couldn't recognize him. Do I seem queer? It's because I've suddenly seen the lies in the sounds called words. You know--grief, sorrow, love, father--those sounds our lips make and our hands write. You ought to know what I mean. You work with them. Have you written another novel lately?

But, stop to think, you're just the one who couldn't know what I mean. With you the lies have become the only truthful things. And I suppose that's the logical conclusion to the whole evasive mess, isn't it? Do you understand me, Charlie? Say lie-- She says it, drawing it out. Life is just a long drawn out lie with a sniffling sigh at the end! She sits at center.

He comes and sits on the bench. Marsden sits by the table. Are you prescribing for me again, Ned? This is my pet doctor, Charlie. He couldn't be happy in heaven unless God called him in because He'd caught something! Did you ever know a young scientist, Charlie? He believes if you pick a lie to pieces, the pieces are the truth! I like him because he's so inhuman. But once he kissed me--in a moment of carnal weakness! I was as startled as if a mummy had done it! And then he looked so disgusted with himself! I had to laugh!

She smiles at him with a pitying scorn. I'd forgotten about that kiss … I was sore at myself afterwards … she was so damned indifferent! I was trying to pray. I tried hard to pray to the modern science God. I thought of a million light years to a spiral nebula--one other universe among innumerable others. But how could that God care about our trifling misery of death-born-of-birth? I couldn't believe in Him, and I wouldn't if I could! I'd rather imitate His indifference and prove I had that one trait at least in common!

They're only words, remember! So many many words have jammed up into thoughts in my poor head! You'd better let them overflow or they'll burst the dam! I wanted to believe in any God at any price--a heap of stones, a mud image, a drawing on a wall, a bird, a fish, a snake, a baboon--or even a good man preaching the simple platitudes of truth, those Gospel words we love the sound of but whose meaning we pass on to spooks to live by!

You ought to stop talking. You'll work yourself into-- He glances angrily at Darrell as if demanding that, as a doctor, he do something. I don't want to be alone with her! NINA-- dully Let him go. I've said everything I can ever say--to him. I want to talk to you, Charlie. Darrell goes out noiselessly with a meaning look at Marsden--a pause.

Here … now … what I hoped … she and I alone … she will cry … I will comfort her … why am I so afraid? Why are you always afraid? What are you afraid of? NINA-- nodding slowly I know. Of course, women would see Him that way, but men should have been gentlemen enough, remembering their mothers, to make God a woman!

But the God of Gods--the Boss--has always been a man. That makes life so perverted, and death so unnatural. We should have imagined life as created in the birth-pain of God the Mother. Then we would understand why we, Her children, have inherited pain, for we would know that our life's rhythm beats from Her great heart, torn with the agony of love and birth. And we would feel that death meant reunion with Her, a passing back into Her substance, blood of Her blood again, peace of Her peace!

Marsden has been listening to her fascinatedly. She gives a strange little laugh. Now wouldn't that be more logical and satisfying than having God a male whose chest thunders with egotism and is too hard for tired heads and thoroughly comfortless? NINA-- suddenly jumping to her feet and going to him--with a horrible moaning desolation Oh, God, Charlie, I want to believe in something! I want to believe so I can feel! I want to feel that he is dead--my father! And I can't feel anything, Charlie! I can't feel anything at all! She throws herself on her knees beside him and hides her face in her hands on his knees and begins to sob--stifled torn sounds.

MARSDEN-- bends down, pats her head with trembling hands, soothes her with uncertain trembling words There--there--don't--Nina, please--don't cry--you'll make yourself sick--come now--get up--do! His hands grasping her arms he half raises her to her feet, but, her face still hidden in her hands, sobbing, she slips on to his lap like a little girl and hides her face on his shoulder.

His expression becomes transported with a great happiness. In an ecstatic whisper. There … this is all my desire … I am this kind of lover … this is my love … she is my girl … not woman … my little girl … and I am brave because of her little girl's pure love … and I am proud … no more afraid … no more ashamed of being pure! He kisses her hair again tenderly and smiles at himself. Then s oothingly with a teasing incongruous gaiety This will never do,. NINA-- in a muffled voice, her sobbing beginning to ebb away into sighs--in a young girl's voice Oh, Charlie, you're so kind and comforting!

I've wanted you so! I've been so homesick. I've wanted to run home and 'fess up, tell how bad I've been, and be punished! Oh, I've got to be punished, Charlie, out of mercy for me, so I can forgive myself! And now Father dead, there's only you. You will, won't you--or tell me how to punish myself? You've simply got to, if you love me! NINA-- with a comforted smile, closing her eyes and cuddling up against him I knew you would.

She looks up into his face. NINA-- in a strange, far-away tone, looking up not at him but at the ceiling For playing the silly slut, Charlie. For giving my cool clean body to men with hot hands and greedy eyes which they called love! A shiver runs over her body. NINA-- with simple surprise Ned? No, how could I? The war hadn't maimed him.

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There would have been no point in that. But I did with others--oh, four or five or six or seven men, Charlie. I forget--and it doesn't matter. They were all the same. Count them all as one, and that one a ghost of nothing. That is, to me. They were important to themselves, if I remember rightly. Perhaps I knew at the time but I've forgotten.

It's all mixed up. There was a desire to be kind. But it's horribly hard to give anything, and frightful to receive! And to give love--oneself--not in this world! And men are difficult to please, Charlie. I seemed to feel Gordon standing against a wall with eyes bandaged and these men were a firing squad whose eyes were also bandaged--and only I could see! No, I was the blindest! I would not see! I knew it was a stupid, morbid business, that I was more maimed than they were, really, that the war had blown my heart and insides out! And I knew too that I was torturing these tortured men, morbidly super-sensitive already, that they loathed the cruel mockery of my gift!

Yet I kept on, from one to one, like a stupid, driven animal until one night not long ago I had a dream of Gordon diving down out of the sky in flames and he looked at me with such sad burning eyes, and all my poor maimed men, too, seemed staring out of his eyes with a burning pain, and I woke up crying, my own eyes burning. Then I saw what a fool I'd been--a guilty fool!

So be kind and punish me! I wish she hadn't told me this … it has upset me terribly! Dear old Father Charlie now! He is a splendid chap, clean and boyish, with real stuff in him, too, to make a career for himself if he finds a helpmeet who will inspire him to his best efforts and bring his latent ability to the surface.

NINA-- drowsily Sam is a nice boy. Yes, it would be a career for me to bring a career to his surface.

A great late afternoon interlude - Patisserie Mark Bennett

I would be busy--surface life--no more depths, please God! But I don't love him, Father. And he loves you devotedly. And it's time you were having children--and when children come, love comes, you know. NINA-- drowsily I want children. I must become a mother so I can give myself. I am sick of sickness. You've been so kind. You've let me off too easily. I don't feel as if you'd punished me hardly at all. But I'll never, never do it again, I promise--never, never! I'll carry her up to her room. He rises to his feet with Nina sleeping peacefully in his arms.

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At this moment Sam Evans enters from the right with the package of medicine in his hand. She cried and then she fell asleep--like a little girl. My mother is waiting up for me. I'll just carry Nina upstairs and put her on her bed and throw something over her. I cannot help myself. As Evans looks puzzled and startled he adds with an ironical, self-mocking geniality You'd better call me just Charlie after this. He smiles bitterly to himself as he goes out.

EVANS-- looks after him for a moment--then cannot restrain a joyful, coltish caper--gleefully Good egg! As if he had heard or guessed, Marsden's bitter laugh comes back from the end of the hallway. SCENE-- Seven months or so later--the dining room of the Evans' homestead in northern New York state--about nine o'clock in the morning of a day in late spring of the following year. The room is one of those big, misproportioned dining rooms that are found in the large, jigsaw country houses scattered around the country as a result of the rural taste for grandeur in the eighties.

There is a cumbersome hanging lamp suspended from chains over the exact center of the ugly table with its set of straight-backed chairs set back at spaced intervals against the walls. The wall paper, a repulsive brown, is stained at the ceiling line with damp blotches of mildew, and here and there has started to peel back where the strips join.

The floor is carpeted in a smeary brown with a dark red design blurred into it. In the left wall is one window with starched white curtains looking out on a covered side porch, so that no sunlight ever gets to this room and the light from the window, although it is a beautiful warm day in the flower garden beyond the porch, is cheerless and sickly. There is a door in the rear, to left of center, that leads to a hall opening on the same porch.

To the right of door a heavy sideboard, a part of the set, displaying some "company" china and glassware. In the right wall, a door leading to the kitchen. Nina is seated at the foot of the table, her back to the window, writing a letter. Her whole personality seems changed, her face has a contented expression, there is an inner calm about her. And her personal appearance has changed in kind, her face and figure have filled out, she is prettier in a conventional way and less striking and unusual; nothing remains of the strange fascination of her face except her unchangeably mysterious eyes.

It's a queer house, Ned. There is something wrong with its psyche, I'm sure. Therefore you'd simply adore it. It's a hideous old place, a faded gingerbread with orange fixin's and numerous lightning rods. Around it are acres and acres of apple trees in full bloom, all white and pinkish and beautiful, like brides just tripping out of church with the bridegroom, Spring, by the arm. Which reminds me, Ned, that it's over six months since Sam and I were married and we haven't seen hide nor hair of you since the ceremony. Do you think that is any nice way to act? You might at least drop me a line.

But I'm only joking. I know how busy you must be now that you've got the chance you've always wanted to do research work. Did you get our joint letter of congratulation written after we read of your appointment? But to get back to this house. I feel it has lost its soul and grown resigned to doing without it. It isn't haunted by anything at all--and ghosts of some sort are the only normal life a house has--like our minds, you know. So although last evening when we got here at first I said "obviously haunted" to myself, now that I've spent one night in it I know that whatever spooks there may once have been have packed up their manifestations a long time ago and drifted away over the grass, wisps of mist between the apple trees, without one backward glance of regret or recollection.

It's incredible to think Sam was born and spent his childhood here. I'm glad he doesn't show it! We slept last night in the room he was born in. Or rather he slept, I couldn't. I lay awake and found it difficult to breathe, as if all the life in the air had long since been exhausted in keeping the dying living a little longer. It was hard to believe anyone had ever been born alive there.

I know you're saying crossly "She's still morbid" but I'm not. I've never been more normal. I feel contented and placid. Should I have told him? But speaking of Sam's birth, you really must meet his mother sometime. It's amazing how little she is like him, a strange woman from the bit I saw of her last night. She has been writing Sam regularly once a week ever since she's known we were married, the most urgent invitations to visit her. They were really more like commands, or prayers. I suspect she is terribly lonely all by herself in this big house.

Sam's feeling toward her puzzles me. I don't believe he ever mentioned her until her letters began coming or that he'd ever have come to see the poor woman if I hadn't insisted. His attitude rather shocked me. It was just as though he'd forgotten he had a mother. And yet as soon as he saw her he was sweet enough. She seemed dreadfully upset to see Charlie with us, until we'd explained it was thanks to his kindness and in his car we were taking this deferred honeymoon. Charlie's like a fussy old woman about his car, he's afraid to let Sam or me drive it He is spruce, dressed immaculately, his face a bit tired and resigned, but smiling kindly.

He has a letter in his hand. She gives a start and instinctively covers the letter with her hand. Why did she cover it up like that? You know how she worries. Apron strings … still his devotion to her is touching … I hope if mine is a boy he will love me as much … oh, I hope it is a boy … healthy and strong and beautiful … like Gordon!

I've owed him one for ages. She folds it up and puts it aside. I thought she'd forgotten him … still I suppose it's just friendly … and it's none of my business now she's married. NINA-- with a sad smile No, I got the feeling the ghosts had all deserted the house and left it without a soul--as the dead so often leave the living-- she forces a little laugh if you get what I mean.

Slipping back into that morbid tone … first time in a long while …. Do I hear graveyards yawning from their sleep--and yet I observe it's a gorgeous morning without, the flowers are flowering, the trees are treeing with one another, and you, if I mistake not, are on your honeymoon! NINA-- immediately gaily mocking Oh, very well, old thing! She dances up to him. NINA-- kisses him quickly You deserve one for that! All I meant was that ghosts remind me of men's smart crack about women, you can't live with them and can't live without them.

You're ghostless and womanless--and as sleek and satisfied as a pet seal! She sticks out her tongue at him and makes a face of superior scorn. That for you, 'Fraid-cat Charlie, you slacker bachelor! She runs to the kitchen door. I'm going to bum some more coffee! She disappears into the kitchen. Thinking with bitter pain. Round and round … thoughts … damn pests! Marsden departs a bit from his familiar field" … well, there they were stuck in the Professor's house … couldn't afford a vacation … never had a honeymoon … I've pretended to be done up every night so they could … I've gone to bed right after dinner so they could be alone and … I wonder if she can really like him … that way?

The sound of Evans' voice and his mother's is heard from the garden. Marsden goes over and carefully peers out. Sam with his mother … peculiar woman … strong … good character for a novel … no, she's too somber … her eyes are the saddest … and, at the same time, the grimmest … they're coming in … I'll drive around the country a bit … give them a chance for a family conference … discuss Nina's pregnancy, I suppose … does Sam know?

He goes out, rear. The outside door in the hall is heard being opened and Evans and his mother evidently meet Marsden as he is about to go out. Their voices, his voice explaining, are heard, then the outer door being opened and shut again as Marsden departs. A moment later Evans and his mother enter the dining room. Sam looks timorously happy, as if he could not quite believe in his good fortune and had constantly to reassure himself about it, yet he is riding the crest of the wave, he radiates love and devotion and boyish adoration.

He is a charming-looking fresh boy now. He wears a sweater and linen knickers, collegiate to the last degree. His mother is a tiny woman with a frail figure, her head and face, framed in iron-gray hair, seeming much too large for her body, so that at first glance she gives one the impression of a wonderfully made, lifelike doll.

Baby shower/afternoon tea - Interlude Tea Room & Emporium

She is only about forty-five but she looks at least sixty. Her face with its delicate features must have once been of a romantic, tender, clinging-vine beauty, but what has happened to her has compressed its defenseless curves into planes, its mouth into the thin line around a locked door, its gentle chin has been forced out aggressively by a long reliance on clenched teeth. She is very pale. Her big dark eyes are grim with the prisoner-pain of a walled-in soul. Yet a sweet loving-kindness, the ghost of an old faith and trust in life's goodness, hovers girlishly, fleetingly, about the corners of her mouth and softens into deep sorrow the shadowy grimness of her eyes.

Her voice jumps startlingly in tone from a caressing gentleness to a blunted flat assertiveness, as if what she said then was merely a voice on its own without human emotion to inspire it. EVANS-- as they come in--rattling on in the cocksure boastful way of a boy showing off his prowess before his mother, confident of thrilled adulation In a few years you won't have to worry one way or another about the darned old apple crop. I'll be able to take care of you then. Of course, I'm not making so much now. I couldn't expect to. I've only just started. But I'm making good, all right, all right--since I got married--and it's only a question of time when--Why, to show you, Cole--he's the manager and the best egg ever--called me into his office and told me he'd had his eye on me, that my stuff was exactly what they wanted, and he thought I had the makings of a real find.

That's certainly fair enough, isn't it? I do hope I'm wrong! Are you still worrying about how the darn old apples are going to turn out? That's just what I was thinking about--how proud I am you're doing so wonderful well! EVANS-- with an indefinable guilty air--as if he were reluctant to admit it I--why--you mean, is she now? I don't think so, Mother. He strolls over to the window whistling with an exaggeratedly casual air, and looks out. He don't know … there's that much to be thankful for, anyway. If that'd only happen! And I know she wants a baby so much … one reason why she married me … and I know she's felt right along that then she'd love me … really love me ….

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I wonder why … ought to have happened before this … hope it's nothing wrong … with me! He starts, flinging off this thought--then suddenly clutching at a straw, turns hopefully to his mother. Why did you ask me that, Mother? She hasn't seen you since you were eight. She wouldn't know you. And you're on your honeymoon, and old age is always sad to young folks. Be happy while you can! You catch that friend, he's just getting his car out. You drive to town with him, give me a chance to get to know my daughter-in-law, and call her to account for how she's taking care of you!

She's an angel, Mother! I know you'll love her! I'm going out this way and kiss her good-bye. He runs out through the kitchen door. If only she isn't going to have a baby … if only she doesn't care so much about having one … I got to have it out with her … got to! NINA-- comes in from the kitchen, a cup of coffee in her hand, smiling happily Good morning-- she hesitates--then shyly Mother. She comes over and kisses her--slips down and sits on the floor beside her. It's a real fine day, isn't it? I ought to have been here and got your breakfast, but I was out gallivanting round the place with Sammy.

I hope you found everything you wanted. And I ate so much I'm ashamed of myself! She nods at the cup of coffee and laughs. I'm still at it. NINA--I ought to apologize for coming down so late. Sam should have called me. But I wasn't able to get to sleep until after daylight somehow. Did you feel anything funny--about this house? That sick dead feeling … when something is going to happen … I felt it before I got the cable about Gordon …. No, it isn't a lie … I do love him … the father of my baby ….

EVANS-- in her blunt flat tones--with a mechanical rapidity to her words Don't you think it's too soon? Don't you think you better wait until Sammy's making more money? Don't you think it'll be a drag on him and you? Why don't you just go on being happy together, just you two?

What is behind what she's saying? I want a baby--beyond everything! You've got to make up your mind you can't! How can you say a thing like that? NINA-- violently I don't believe you know what you're saying! It's too terrible for you--Sam's own mother--how would you have felt if someone--when you were going to have Sam--came to you and said--? Sam's own father did--my husband! And I said it to myself! And I did all I could, all my husband could think of, so's I wouldn't--but we didn't know enough. And right to the time the pains come on, I prayed Sammy'd be born dead, and Sammy's father prayed, but Sammy was born healthy and smiling, and we just had to love him, and live in fear.

He doubled the torment of fear we lived in. And that's what you'd be in for. And Sammy, he'd go the way his father went. And your baby, you'd be bringing it into torment. Don't listen to her! Why don't you speak plainly? Praying your baby would be born dead! I know what she's doing now … just what I did … trying not to believe …. But I'll make her! Only remember it's a family secret, and now you're one of the family.

It's the curse on the Evanses. My husband's mother--she was an only child--died in an asylum and her father before her. I know that for a fact. And my husband's sister, Sammy's aunt, she's out of her mind. She lives on the top floor of this house, hasn't been out of her room in years, I've taken care of her. She just sits, doesn't say a word, but she's happy, she laughs to herself a lot, she hasn't a care in the world. But I remember when she was all right, she was always unhappy, she never got married, most people around here were afraid of the Evanses in spite of their being rich for hereabouts.

They knew about the craziness going back, I guess, for heaven knows how long. I didn't know about the Evanses until after I'd married my husband. He came to the town I lived in, no one there knew about the Evanses. He didn't tell me until after we were married. He asked me to forgive him, he said he loved me so much he'd have gone mad without me, said I was his only hope of salvation. So I forgave him. I loved him an awful lot. I said to myself, I'll be his salvation--and maybe I could have been if we hadn't had Sammy born.

My husband kept real well up to then. We'd swore we'd never have children, we never forgot to be careful for two whole years. Then one night we'd both gone to a dance, we'd both had a little punch to drink, just enough--to forget--driving home in the moonlight--that moonlight! EVANS-- drones on My husband, Sammy's father, in spite of all he and I fought against it, he finally gave in to it when Sammy was only eight, he couldn't keep up any more living in fear for Sammy, thinking any minute the curse might get him, every time he was sick, or had a headache, or bumped his head, or started crying, or had a nightmare and screamed, or said something queer like children do naturally.

I went through it by his side! It nearly drove me crazy, too--but I didn't have it in my blood! And that's why I'm telling you! You got to see you can't, Nina! NINA-- suddenly breaking out--frenziedly I don't believe you! I don't believe Sam would ever have married me if he knew He don't know a single thing about it! That's been the work of my life, keeping him from knowing. When his father gave up and went off into it I sent Sammy right off to boarding school.

I told him his father was sick, and a little while after I sent word his father was dead, and from then on until his father did really die during Sammy's second year to college, I kept him away at school in winter and camp in summers and I went to see him, I never let him come home. I was glad taking care of them two kept me so busy I didn't get much chance to think then.

But here's what I've come to think since, Nina: I'm certain sure my husband might have kept his mind with the help of my love if I hadn't had Sammy. I thought he'd give me such healthy, happy children and I'd forget myself in them and learn to love him! Maybe I almost have--lately--but only when I thought of his baby! Now I hate him! She begins to weep hysterically. Evans goes to her and puts her arms around her.

Nina sobs out Don't touch me! I hate you, too! Why didn't you tell him he must never marry! And I never heard about you till after you were married. Then I wanted to write to you but I was scared he might read it. And I couldn't leave her upstairs to come away to see you.

I kept writing Sammy to bring you here right off, although having him come frightened me to death for fear he might get to suspect something. You got to get him right away from here, Nina! I just kept hoping you wouldn't want children right away--young folks don't nowadays--until I'd seen you and told you everything. And I thought you'd love him like I did his father, and be satisfied with him alone.

He'd go crazy sure then! You'd be a devil! Don't you see how he loves you? I only married him because he needed me--and I needed children! And now you tell me I've got to kill my--oh, yes, I see I've got to, you needn't argue any more! I love it too much to make it run that chance! And I hate it too, now, because it's sick, it's not my baby, it's his! Don't he need you now--more'n ever? But I can't tell you not to leave him, not if you don't love him. But you oughtn't to have married him when you didn't love him. And it'll be your fault, what'll happen. NINA-- torturedly What will happen?

The Piano is for Playing : www.newyorkethnicfood.com

Poor Sam … she's right … it's not his fault … it's mine … I wanted to use him to save myself … I acted the coward again … as I did with Gordon …. You got to give one Evans, the last one, a chance to live in this world! And you'll learn to love him, if you give up enough for him! You give your life to Sammy, then you'll love him same as you love yourself. That's sure as death! She laughs a queer gentle laugh full of amused bitterness.

You got to die to find out! Lived fair … pride … trust … play the game! I'll stay with Sam. There's nothing else I can do, is there, when it isn't his fault, poor boy! I'll have lost my baby! She sinks down on her knees at Mrs. Evans' feet--piteously Oh, Mother, how can I keep on living? Now she knows my suffering … now I got to help her … she's got a right to have a baby … another baby … sometime … somehow … she's giving her life to save my Sammy … I got to save her!

You want him to be happy, don't you? It's just as important for him as it is for me that I should have a baby! If you know anything at all about him, you ought to see that! I see that in him, Nina. I remember when I was carrying Sam, sometimes I'd forget I was a wife, I'd only remember the child in me. And then I used to wish I'd gone out deliberate in our first year, without my husband knowing, and picked a man, a healthy male to breed by, same's we do with stock, to give the man I loved a healthy child. And if I didn't love that other man nor him me where would be the harm?

Then God would whisper: And maybe my husband would feel without ever knowing how he felt it, that I wasn't afraid and that child wasn't cursed and so he needn't fear and I could save him. And Sammy's the same. But I'm not the same as you. I used to be a great one for worrying about what's God and what's devil, but I got richly over it living here with poor folks that was being punished for no sins of their own, and me being punished with them for no sin but loving much.

Being happy, that's good! The rest is just talk! She pauses--then with a strange austere sternness I love my boy, Sammy. I could see how much he wants you to have a baby. Sammy's got to feel sure you love him--to be happy. Whatever you can do to make him happy is good--is good, Nina! I don't care what! You've got to have a healthy baby--sometime--so's you can both be happy! It's your rightful duty! I want to be happy! Oh, my baby … my poor baby … I'm forgetting you … desiring another after you are dead! And I wouldn't say what I just said now only I know us two mustn't see each other ever again.

You and Sammy have got to forget me. They got to, poor people! And I'm saying what I said about a healthy baby so's you will remember it when you need to, after you've forgotten--this one. You're like the daughter of my sorrow! You're closer to me now than ever Sammy could be! I want you to be happy! She begins to sob, too, kissing Nina's bowed head. The Professor's study again. The books in the cases have never been touched, their austere array shows no gaps, but the glass separating them from the world is gray with dust, giving them a blurred ghostly quality.

The table, although it is the same, is no longer the Professor's table, just as the other furniture in the room, by its disarrangement, betrays that the Professor's well-ordered mind no longer trims it to his personality. The table has become neurotic. Volumes of the Encyclopedia Britannica mixed up with popular treatises on Mind Training for Success, etc. The titles of these books face in all directions, no one volume is placed with any relation to the one beneath it--the effect is that they have no connected meaning. The rest of the table is littered with an ink bottle, pens, pencils, erasers, a box of typewriting paper, and a typewriter at the center before the chair, which is pushed back, setting the rug askew.

On the floor beside the table are an overflowing wastepaper basket, a few sheets of paper and the rubber cover for the typewriter like a collapsed tent. The rocking chair is no longer at center but has been pulled nearer the table, directly faces it with its back to the bench. This bench in turn has been drawn much closer, but is now placed more to the rear and half-faces front, its back squarely to the door in the corner.

Evans is seated in the Professor's old chair. He has evidently been typing, or is about to type, for a sheet of paper can be seen in the machine. He smokes a pipe, which he is always relighting whether it needs it or not, and which he bites and shifts about and pulls in and out and puffs at nervously. This is one salad that you want to make friends with. The falafel is an optional extra and one that you should try. Of course it will, that flavour combo is a winner!

Up next was the chicken burger. The chicken burger is big and simple. Crispy southern fried chicken thigh, tomato, cheese, cabbage slaw and ranch sauce is sandwiched between a fresh roll. Trent sat with me and chatted while I ate and he enjoyed the Falafel Burger, it looks like another delicious burger option. Another thing that I really liked about Interlude Espresso Bar is that their salads and some breakfast dishes can be made in a half serve. Interlude Espresso has solved that problem! I finished with some Middle Eastern sweets that have an Armenian twist. It was sweet, nutty and very decadent.

The freshly made eshta, that I mentioned earlier, was still warm and it almost looked too pretty to eat. The flavour is subtle and the pistachios and the orange blossom syrup complete it. Interlude Espresso offers a selection of lunch and breakfast options as well as sweet treats, hot and cold drinks that can all be ordered to takeaway.