DELIA. You've been away a long time.

TREMAYNE. I'll do my best to make up for it.

BELINDA. Delia, darling, I think you might kiss your poor old father.

(As the does to, DEVENISH suddenly and hastily kisses BELINDA on the cheek.)

DEVENISH. Just in case you're going to be my mother-in-law.

TREMAYNE. We seem to be rather a family party.

BELINDA (suddenly). There! We've forgotten Mr. Baxter again.

BAXTER (who has come in quietly with a book in his hand). Oh, don't mind about me, Mrs. Tremayne. I've enjoyed myself immensely. (Referring to his book.) I have been collecting some most valuable information on (looking round at them) lunacy in the--er--county of _Devonshire_.

THE RED FEATHERS

AN OPERETTA IN ONE ACT

[In the living-room of a country-house, half farm, half manor, a MOTHER and her DAUGHTER are sitting. It is any year you please--between, let us say, the day when the fiddle first came to England and the day when Romance left it. As for the time of the year, let us call it May. Oh yes, it is certainly May, and about twelve o'clock, and the DAUGHTER is singing at the spinet, while her MOTHER is at her needlework. Through the lattice windows the murmur of a stream can be heard, on whose banks--but we shall come to that directly. Let us listen now to what the DAUGHTER is singing:]

Life pa.s.ses by.

I do not know its pleasure or its pain-- The Spring was here, the Spring is here again, The Spring will die.

Life pa.s.ses by.

The doors of Pain and Pleasure open wide, The crowd streams in--and I am left outside....

They know; not I.

[You don't like it? Neither did her Mother.]

MOTHER (looking up from her work). Yes, I should call that a melancholy song, dear.

DAUGHTER. It is sung by a melancholy person, Mother.

MOTHER. Why are you that, child?

DAUGHTER (getting up). I want so much that I shall never have.

MOTHER. Well, so do we all.

DAUGHTER (impatiently). Oh, why does nothing ever happen? We sit here all day, and we sing or do our embroidery, and we go to bed, and the next day we get up and do the same things over again, and so it goes on.

Mother, is that all there is in the world?

MOTHER. It's all there is in our world.

DAUGHTER. Are we so very poor?

MOTHER. We have the house--and very little else.

DAUGHTER. Oh, I wish that we were _really_ poor--

MOTHER. You needn't wish, child.

DAUGHTER. Oh, but I mean so that it wouldn't matter what clothes we wore; so that we could wander over the hills and down into the valleys, and sleep perhaps in a barn and bathe ourselves in the brook next morning, and--

MOTHER. I don't think I should like that very much. Perhaps I'm peculiar.

DAUGHTER. Oh, if only I were a boy to go out and make my own way in the world. Would you let me go, Mother, if I were a boy?

MOTHER. I don't suppose you'd ask me, dear.

DAUGHTER (sighing). Oh, well! We must make the best of it, I suppose.

Perhaps one day something will happen. (She goes back to the spinet and sings again.)

_Lads and la.s.ses, what will you sell, What will you sell?_

Four stout walls and a roof atop, Warm fires gleaming brightly, Well-stored cellar and garnered crop, Money-bags packed tightly; An ordered task in an ordered day, And a sure bed nightly; Years which peacefully pa.s.s away, Until Death comes lightly.

_Lads and la.s.ses, what will you buy?

What will you buy?_

Here is a cap to cover your head, A cap with one red feather; Here is a cloak to make your bed Warm or winter weather; Here is a satchel to store your ware, Strongly lined with leather; And here is a staff to take you there When you go forth together.

_Lads and la.s.ses, what will you gain, What will you gain?_

Chatter of rooks on tall elm-trees New Spring houses taking; Daffodils in an April breeze Golden curtsies making; Shadows of clouds across the weald From hill to valley breaking, The first faint stir which the woodlands yield When the world is waking.

_Lads and la.s.ses, this is your gain, This is your gain._

(Towards the end of the song the face and shoulders of the TALKER appear at the open lattice window on the left. He listens with a bland and happy smile until the song is finished.)

TALKER. Brava! Brava! (They turn round towards the window in astonishment.) A vastly pleasing song, vastly well sung. Mademoiselle Nightingale, permit me to felicitate you. (Turning to the Mother) The Mother of the Nightingale also. Mon Dieu, what is voice, of a richness, of a purity! To live with it always! Madame, I felicitate you again.

MOTHER. I must ask you, sir, to explain the meaning of this intrusion.

TALKER. Intrusion? Oh, fie! Madame, not intrusion. My feet stand upon the highway. The road, Madame, is common to all. I can quote you Rex--What does Rex, cap. 27, para. 198, say? _Via_, says Rex, meaning the road; _communis_ is common; _omnibus_ to all, meaning thereby--but perchance I weary you?

DAUGHTER. Mother, who is he?

TALKER. Ah, Mademoiselle Nightingale, you may indeed ask. Who is he? Is he the Pope of Rome? Nay, he is not the Pope of Rome. Is he the Cham of Tartary? Nay, he is not the Cham of Tartary, for an he were the Cham of Tartary--

MOTHER. I beg you, sir, to tell us as shortly as you can who you are and what you want.

TALKER. Madam, by nature I am a taciturn man; Silent John I am named by my friends. I am a glum body, a reserved creature. These things you will have already noticed. But now I will commit to you it secret, known only to my dearest friends. Uncommunicative as I am by nature (he disappears and reappears at the middle window), I am still more so when compelled to hold converse with two such ornaments of their s.e.x (he disappears and reappears at the right-hand window) through a lattice window. Am I getting any nearer the door?