Tea and Sympathy Read online

  LILLY (Pleased)

  Really?

  LAURA

  Really.

  LILLY

  That's the sweetest thing you've said to me in days. Good-bye. (She goes out the door, and a moment later we hear the outside door close.)

  LAURA (Sits for a moment, listening to TOM'S rather plaintive whistling. She rises and looks at the Canada vacation literature on the desk, and then, looking at her watch, goes to the door, opens it, and calls up the stairway)

  Tom . . . Oh, Tom.

  (The moment TOM hears his name, he jumps from the bed, and goes through the sitting room, and appears on the stairs.)

  TOM

  Yes?

  LAURA

  (She is very friendly with him, comradely)

  If it won't spoil your supper, come on down for a cup of tea.

  (TOM goes back into his room and brushes his hair, then he comes on down the stairs, and enters the study. He enters this room as though it were something rare and special. This is where LAURA lives.)

  LAURA (Has gone out to the other part of the house. Comes to doorway for a moment pouring cream from bottle to pitcher)

  I've iust about finished your costume for the play, and we can have a fitting.

  TOM

  Sure. That'd be great. Do you want the door open or shut?

  LAURA (Goes off again)

  It doesn't make any difference.

  (TOM shuts the door. He is deeply in love with this woman, though he knows nothing can come of it. It is a sort of delayed puppy love. It is very touching and very intense. They are easy with each other, casual, though he is always trying in thinly veiled ways to tell her he loves her. LAURA enters with tea tray and sees him closing the door. She puts tray on table)

  Perhaps you'd better leave it ajar, so that if some of the other boys get out of class early, they can come in too.

  TOM (Is disappointed)

  Oh, sure.

  LAURA (Goes off for the plate of cookies, but pauses long enough to watch TOM open the door the merest crack. She is amused. In a moment, she re-enters with a plate of cookies)

  Help yourself.

  TOM

  Thanks.

  (He takes a cookie, and then sits on the floor, near her chair.)

  LAURA

  Are the boys warm enough in the rooms? They shut down the heat so early this spring, I guess they didn't expect this little chill.

  TOM

  We're fine. But this in nice. (He indicates low fire in fireplace.)

  LAURA (Goes back to her sewing)

  I heard you singing.

  TOM

  I'm sorry if it bothered you.

  LAURA

  It was very nice.

  TOM

  If it ever bothers you, just bang on the radiator.

  LAURA

  What was the name of the song? It's lovely.

  TOM

  It's an old French song . . . "The Joys of Love" . . .

  (He speaks the lyric)

  The joys of love Are but a moment long, The pain of love Endures forever.

  LAURA

  And is that true? (TOM shrugs his shoulders) You sang as, though you knew all about the pains of love.

  TOM

  And you don't think I do?

  LAURA

  Well . . .

  TOM

  You're right.

  LAURA

  Only the joys.

  TOM

  Neither, really. (Teapot whistles off stage.)

  LAURA

  Then you're a fake. Listening to you, one would think you knew everything there was to know. (Rises and goes to next room for tea) Anyway, I don't believe it. A boy like you.

  TOM

  It's true.

  LAURA (Off stage)

  Aren't you bringing someone to the dance after the play Saturday?

  TOM

  Yes.

  LAURA

  Well, there.

  TOM

  You.

  LAURA (Reappears in doorway with teapot)

  Me?

  TOM

  Yes, you're going to be a hostess, aren't you?

  LAURA

  Yes, of course, but . . .

  TOM

  As a member of the committee, I'm taking you. All the committee drew lots . . .

  LAURA

  And you lost.

  TOM

  I won.

  LAURA (A little embarrassed by this)

  Oh. My husband could have taken me.

  (She sits down again in her chair.)

  TOM

  He's not going to be in town. Don't you remember, Mountain Climbing Club has its final outing this week-end.

  LAURA

  Oh, yes, of course. I'd forgotten.

  TOM

  He's out a lot on that kind of thing, isn't he? (LAURA ignores his probing) I hope you're not sorry that I'm to be your escort.

  LAURA

  Why, I'll be honored.

  TOM

  I'm supposed to find out tactfully and without your knowing it what color dress you'll be wearing.

  LAURA

  Why?

  TOM

  The committee will send you a corsage.

  LAURA

  Oh, how nice. Well, I don't have much to choose from, I guess my yellow.

  TOM

  The boy who's in charge of getting the flowers thinks a corsage should be something like a funeral decoration. So I'm taking personal charge of getting yours.

  LAURA

  Thank you.

  TOM

  You must have gotten lots of flowers when you were acting in the theater.

  LAURA

  Oh, now and then. Nothing spectacular.

  TOM

  I can't understand how a person would give up the theater to come and live in a school . . . I'm sorry. I mean, I'm glad you did, but, well . . .

  LAURA

  If you knew the statistics on unemployed actors, you might understand. Anyway, I was never any great shakes at it.

  TOM

  I can't believe that.

  LAURA

  Then take my word for it.

  TOM (After a moment, looking into the fire, pretending to be casual, but actually touching on his love for LAURA)

  Did you ever do any of Shaw's plays?

  LAURA

  Yes.

  TOM

  We got an assignment to read any Shaw play we wanted. I picked Candida .

  LAURA

  Because it was the shortest?

  TOM (Laughs)

  No . . . because it sounded like the one I'd like the best, one I could understand. Did you ever play Candida?

  LAURA

  In stock -- a very small stock company, way up in Northern Vermont.

  TOM

  Do you think she did right to send Marchbanks away?

  LAURA

  Well, Shaw made it seem right. Don't you think?

  TOM (Really talking about himself)

  That Marchbanks sure sounded off a lot. I could never sound off like that, even if I loved a woman the way he did. She could have made him seem awfully small if she'd wanted to.

  LAURA

  Well, I guess she wasn't that kind of woman. Now stand up. Let's see if this fits.

  (She rises with dress in her hands.)

  TOM (Gets up)

  My Dad's going to hit the roof when he hears I'm playing another girl.

  LAURA

  I think you're a good sport not to mind. Besides, it's a good part. Lady Teazle in The School For Scandal .

  TOM (Puts on top of dress)

  It all started when I did Lady Macbeth last year. You weren't here yet for that. Lucky you.

  LAURA

  I hear it was very good.

  TOM

  You should have read a letter I got from my father. They printed a picture o{ me in the Alumni Bulletin , in costume. He was plenty peeved about it.

  LAURA

  He shouldn't have been.


  TOM

  He wrote me saying he might be up here today on Alumni Fund business. If he comes over here, and you see him, don't tell him about this.

  LAURA

  I won't . . . What about your mother? Did she come up for the play?

  (She helps him button the dress.)

  TOM

  I don't see my mother. Didn't you know?

  (He starts to roll up pants legs.)

  LAURA

  Why no. I didn't.

  TOM

  She and my father are divorced.

  LAURA

  I'm sorry.

  TOM

  You needn't be. They aren't. I was supposed to hold them together. That was how I happened to come into the world. I didn't work. That's a terrible thing, you know, to make a flop of the first job you've got in life.

  LAURA

  Don't you ever see her?

  TOM

  Not since I was five. I was with her till five, and then my father took me away. All I remember about my mother is that she was always telling me to go outside and bounce a ball.

  LAURA (Handing him skirt of the d?ess)

  You must have done something before Lady Macbeth. When did you play that character named Grace?

  TOM (Stiffens)

  I never played anyone called Grace.

  LAURA

  But I hear the boys sometimes calling you Grace. I thought . . . (She notices that he's uncomfortable) I'm sorry. Have I said something terrible?

  TOM

  No.

  LAURA

  But I have. I'm sorry.

  TOM

  It's all right. But it's a long story. Last year over at the movies, they did a revival of Grace Moore in One Night of Love . I'd seen the revival before the picture came. And I guess I oversold it, or something. But she was wonderful! . . . Anyway, some of the guys started calling me Grace. It was my own fault, I guess.

  LAURA

  Nicknames can be terrible. I remember at one time I was called "Beany." I can't remember why, now, but I remember it made me mad.

  (She adjusts the dress a little)

  Hold still a moment. We'll have to let this out around here.

  (She indicates the bosom)

  What size do you want to be?

  TOM

  (He is embarrassed, but rather nicely, not obviously and farcically. In his embarrassment he looks at LAURA's bosom, then quickly away)

  I don't know. Whatever you think.

  LAURA (She indicates he is to stand on a small wooden footstool)

  I should think you would have invited some girl up to see you act, and then take her to the dance.

  TOM (Gets on stool)

  There's nobody I could ask.

  LAURA (Working on hem of dress)

  What do you mean?

  TOM

  I don't know any girls, really.

  LAURA

  Oh, certainly back home . . .

  TOM

  Last ten years I haven't been home, I mean really home. Summers my father packs me off to camps, and the rest of the time I've been at boarding schools.

  LAURA

  What about Christmas vacation, and Easter?

  TOM

  My father gets a raft of tickets to plays and concerts, and sends me and my aunt.

  LAURA

  I see.

  TOM

  So I mean it when I say I don't know any girls.

  LAURA

  Your roommate, Al, knows a lot of girls. Why not ask him to fix you up with a blind date?

  TOM

  I don't know . . . I can't even dance. I'm telling you this so you won't expect anything of me Saturday night.

  LAURA

  We'll sit out and talk.

  TOM

  Okay.

  LAURA

  Or I could teach you how to dance. It's quite simple.

  TOM (Flustered)

  You?

  LAURA

  Why not?

  TOM

  I mean, isn't a person supposed to go to some sort of dancing class or something?