The Master of Mrs. Chilvers Part 10

[She has become quite oratorical.]

JAWBONES Glad to 'ear it. Take my tip: you'll use 'em.

Meanwhile I'll 'ave another cup o' tea.

GINGER [She takes the cup--is making for the window.]

JAWBONES [Fierce again.] I said tea.

GINGER All right, I was only going to throw the slops out of window. There ain't no basin.

JAWBONES I'll tell yer when I want yer to open the window and call for the p'lice. You can throw them into the waste-paper basket.

GINGER [She obeys.]

JAWBONES Thank you. Very much obliged. One of these d'ys, maybe, you'll marry.

GINGER When I do, it will be a man, not a monkey.

JAWBONES I'm not proposing. I'm talking to you for your good.

GINGER [Snorts.]

JAWBONES You've been listening to a lot of toffs. Easy enough for them to talk about wimmen not being domestic drudges. They keep a cook to do it. They don't pity 'e for being a down-trodden slive, spending sixteen hours a d'y in THEIR kitchen with an evening out once a week. When you marry it will be to a bloke like me, a working man . . .

GINGER Working! [She follows it with a shrill laugh.]

JAWBONES Yus. There's always a cla.s.s as laughs when you mention the word "work." Them as knows wot it is, don't. I've been at it since six o'clock this morning, carrying a ladder, a can of paste weighing twenty pounds, and two 'undred double royal posters. You try it! When 'e comes 'ome, 'e'll want 'is victuals. If you've got 'em ready for 'im and are looking nice--no reason why you shouldn't--and feeling amiable, you'll get on very well together.

If you are going to argue with 'im about woman's sphere, you'll get the worst of it.

GINGER You always was a bully.

JAWBONES Not always. Remember last Bank 'oliday? [He winks.]

GINGER [She tries not to give in.]

JAWBONES 'Ave a cup of tea. [He pours it out for her.]

GINGER [The natural woman steals in--she sits.]

JAWBONES 'Ow are they doing you, fairly well?

GINGER Oh! Well, nothing to grumble at.

JAWBONES You can do a bit o' dressing on it.

GINGER [She meets his admiring eye. The suffragette departs.]

Dressing don't cost much--when you've got tyste.

JAWBONES Wot! Not that 'at?

GINGER Made it myself.

JAWBONES No!

GINGER Honour bright! Tell yer -

[GEOFFREY and ST. HERBERT enter. JAWBONES and GINGER make to rise.

GINGER succeeds.]

GEOFFREY All right, all right. Don't let me disturb the party.

Where's Mr. Sigsby?

JAWBONES Gone to look up the police, I think, sir. [Having finished, he rises.] Some of those factory girls been up to their larks again.

GEOFFREY Umph! What's it about this time?

JAWBONES They've took objection to one of our posters.

GEOFFREY What, another! [To ST. HERBERT.] Woman has disappointed me as a fighter. She's willing enough to strike. If you hit back, she's surprised and grieved.

ST. HERBERT She's come to the game rather late.

GEOFFREY She might have learned the rules. [To JAWBONES.] Which particular one is it that has failed to meet with their approval?

JAWBONES It's rather a good one, sir, from our point of view: "Why she left her 'appy 'ome."

GEOFFREY I don't seem to remember it. Have I seen it?

JAWBONES I don't think you 'ave, sir. It was Mr. Sigsby's idea.

On the left, the ruined 'ome, baby crying it's little 'eart out-- eldest child lying on the floor, scalded--upset the tea-kettle over itself--youngest boy in flames--been playing with the matches, n.o.body there to stop 'im. At the open door the father, returning from work. Nothing ready for 'im. On the other side--'ER, on a tub, spouting politics.

GEOFFREY [To ST. HERBERT.] Sounds rather good.

JAWBONES Wait a minute. There was a copy somewhere about--a proof. [He is searching for it on the desk--finds it.] Yus, 'ere 'tis. [To GINGER.] Catch 'old.

[JAWBONES and GINGER hold it displayed.] That's the one, sir.

ST. HERBERT Why is the working man, for pictorial purposes, always a carpenter?

GINGER It's the skirt we object to.

GEOFFREY The skirt! What's wrong with the skirt?

GINGER Well, it's only been out of fas.h.i.+on for the last three years, that's all.

GEOFFREY Oh! I see. [To ST. HERBERT.] We've been hitting them below the belt. What do you think I ought to do about it?

ST. HERBERT What would you have thought yourself, three weeks ago?