The Pot Boiler: A Comedy in Four Acts Part 5

_Will._ Yes, on a hot night!

_Peggy._ What do you think of my love-interest?

_Will._ I think it's rotten.

_Peggy._ Will!

_Will._ Absolutely rotten! The idea of having her turn Jack down--at the very beginning of the play!

_Peggy._ But that's exactly what happened! Didn't Gladys turn _you_ down? And besides, she can take him up again, if you like.

_Will._ How's she going to see him when he goes out on the street?

_Peggy._ Can't she run into him somewhere by accident?

_Will._ By accident--in a city of six million people!

_Peggy._ Well then, why not have her go where he goes? Let Bob follow Jack, or let them hire a detective.

_Will._ Melodrama! Ten-twenty-thirty! I don't like Gladys as a character any more than I did as a person. She's shallow and cheap--a regular worldling! I won't have any such creature in my play!

_Peggy._ There's no use talking that way, Will, you simply can't write a money-making play without love-interest. And also you've got to have comedy characters--real characters--

_Will (eagerly)._ I'll have one character, at least! In the next scene, when the father comes in! It'll be a jolly lark, Peggy--I'm going to use Dad!

_Peggy._ Your own father!

_Will._ Yes, why not?

_Peggy._ He might hear of it, Will!

_Will._ He despises the theatre. Half his anger at me was because I married an actress. And it seems to me, if we can't get any money out of him, we might at least get a character-study.

_Peggy._ All right, Dad let it be!

_Will._ I'll show you how it is. Here! (_Pushes the ma.n.u.scripts towards her; the Play-play begins to appear._) Jack has gone upstairs to change his clothes, and here comes Dad. He's an old man--rich, irascible, given to scolding. I remember how he used to snort when anything didn't please him.

_Dad._ Huh! huh-huh!

_Will._ He's heard the story about Jack. Here's the Mss. Read. (_She takes the ma.n.u.script and begins to read. Full light on Play-play.

Will exit secretly._)

_Dad (to Bob)._ What do you think of this?

_Bob._ What?

_Dad._ My precious son in trouble again! Never any end to it!

Recklessness--dissipation--insolence! I've reached the end of my patience. Absolutely the end!

_Bob._ What's happened?

_Dad (waves letter in his hand)._ Here's a letter from the dean.

He's got himself suspended from college.

_Jessie (horrified)._ Oh, Dad!

_Bob._ What's he done?

_Dad._ Turning loose a live goat in a college lecture hall!

_Bob._ You can't mean it!

_Dad._ Here's the letter! They were having a fraternity initiation, it seems, and Jack was bringing the goat, his horns painted with phosphorus, a bunch of fire-crackers tied to his tail. Fire-crackers to the tail of a goat!

_Jessie._ But Dad! How do you know that Jack--

_Dad._ He admitted everything in his letter to the dean! He was pa.s.sing a hall where they were giving an evening lecture. He had a grudge against the professor. He turned out the lights, and turned loose the goat! What do you think of that? _(A silence.)_ What do you _think_ of it?

_Jessie._ Why Dad, I think it's funny.

_Dad._ Funny! You propose to take his side, do you? And now he's out of college and has nothing to do but loaf around the house! I tell you I've reached the limit of my patience. It's just as Bob says--he's a parasite. Nothing to do but squander my money--fit for nothing else, having no other idea! I tell you I won't support the loafer!

_Jessie._ Dad!

_Bob._ You've brought the boy up wrong.

_Dad._ So you propose to blame _me!_

_Jack (appears in doorway Left clad in ragged anil dirty overcoat)._ Of course, Dad. It really isn't fair to scold other people for your own blunder.

_Dad._ Oh, there you are! _(Notices Jack's clothes.)_ What the devil is this?

_Jack._ What, Dad?

_Dad._ Drunk again, sir? Rolling in the gutter? And on your birthday too!

_Jack._ Dad--

_Dad._ Look at him! A hundred and eighty dollars I pay to a Broadway tailor to make this young hopeful an overcoat, and look at what he does with it! I prepare a birthday party, and invite all his friends, and see the condition in which he comes to welcome them! Do you wonder my patience is exhausted? Do you wonder--

_Jessie._ Dad, you don't understand!

_Dad._ No, I don't understand! How could I be expected to understand? How can an old man hope to keep up with a youth so brilliant--a youth who goes to college and ties firecrackers to the tails of goats! A youth who comes on his birthday looking like a tramp--

_Jessie._ Listen, Dad--this is a joke--

_Dad._ Everything's a joke to my son! But I tell you I'm tired of his jokes. I mean to make him understand that his days of tomfoolery are over! Do you realize it--here he is, twenty-one years of age, when he should be coming into possession of the fortune his mother left him--and he's tying fire-crackers to the tails of goats! And I--I am trustee of the money, and have to decide whether he's fit to have it or not! I know that if I give it to him I ruin him for life--I start him on a career of drunkenness and idleness! Look at him as he stands there--and imagine him the owner of a quarter of a million dollars! And under his mother's will the only choice I have is to give it to him, or turn it over to a Home for Cats!

_Jessie._ Please, Dad!