The Title

A COMEDY IN THREE ACTS

BY

ARNOLD BENNETT

CHARACTERS

ACT I

An evening between Christmas and New Year, before dinner.

ACT II

The next evening, after dinner.

ACT III

The next day, before lunch.

The scene throughout is a sitting-room in the well-furnished West End abode of the Culvers. There is a door, back. There is also another door (L) leading to Mrs. Culver's boudoir and elsewhere.

ACT I

ACT I

Hildegarde is sitting at a desk, writing . John, in a lounging attitude, is reading a newspaper .

Enter Tranto, back .

TRANTO. Good evening.

HILDEGARDE ( turning slightly in her seat and giving him her left hand, the right still holding a pen ). Good evening. Excuse me one moment.

TRANTO. All right about my dining here to-night? (Hildegarde nods .) Larder equal to the strain?

HILDEGARDE. Macaroni.

TRANTO. Splendid.

HILDEGARDE. Beefsteak.

TRANTO. Great heavens! ( imitates sketchily the motions of cutting up a piece of steak. Shaking hands with John, who has risen ). Well, John. How are things? Don't let me disturb you. Have a cigarette.

JOHN ( flattered ). Thanks. ( As they light cigarettes .) You're the first person here that's treated me like a human being.

TRANTO. Oh!

JOHN. Yes. They all treat me as if I was a schoolboy home for the hols.

TRANTO. But you are, aren't you?

JOHN. In a way, of course. But—well, don't you see what I mean?

TRANTO ( sympathetically ). You mean that a schoolboy home for the hols isn't necessarily something escaped out of the Zoo.

JOHN ( warming ). That's it.

TRANTO. In fact, what you mean is you're really an individual very like the rest of us, subject, if I may say so, to the common desires, weaknesses and prejudices of humanity—and not a damned freak.

JOHN ( brightly ). That's rather good, that is. If it's a question of the Zoo, what I say is—what price home? Now, homes are extraordinary if you like—I don't know whether you've ever noticed it. School—you can understand school. But home—! Strange things happen here while I'm away.

TRANTO. Yes?

JOHN. It was while I was away they appointed Dad a controller. When I heard—I laughed. Dad a controller! Why, he can't even control mother.

HILDEGARDE ( without looking round ). Oh yes he can.

JOHN ( pretending to start back ). Stay me with flagons! ( Resuming to Tranto.) And you're something new here since the summer holidays.

TRANTO. I never looked at myself in that light. But I suppose I am rather new here.

JOHN. Not quite new. But you've made a lot of progress during the last term.

TRANTO. That's comforting.

JOHN. You understand what I mean. You were rather stiff and prim in August—now you aren't a bit.

TRANTO. Just so. Well, I won't ask you what you think of me , John—you might tell me—but what do you think of my newspaper?

JOHN. The Echo ? I don't know what to think. You see, we don't read newspapers much at school. Some of the masters do. And a few

chaps in the Fifth—swank, of course. But speaking generally we don't. Prefects don't. No time.

TRANTO. How strange! Aren't you interested in the war?

JOHN. Interested in the war! Would you mind if I spoke plainly?

TRANTO. I should love it.

JOHN. Each time I come home I wonder more and more whether you people in London have got the slightest notion what war really is. Fact! At school, it's just because we are interested in the war that we've no time for newspapers.

TRANTO. How's that?

JOHN. How's that? Well, munition workshops—with government inspectors tumbling all over us about once a week. O.T.C. work. Field days. Cramming fellows for Sandhurst. Not to mention female masters. 'Mistresses,' I ought to say, perhaps. All these things take time.

TRANTO. I never thought of that.

JOHN. No. People don't. However, I've decided to read newspapers in future—it'll be part of my scheme. That's why I was reading

The Echo . Now, I should like to ask you something about this paper of yours.

TRANTO. Yes.

JOHN. Why do you let Hilda write those articles for you about food economy stunts in the household?

TRANTO. Well—( hesitating )

JOHN. Now, I look at things practically. When Hilda'd spent all her dress allowance and got into debt besides, about a year and a half ago, she suddenly remembered she wasn't doing much to help the war, and so she went into the Food Ministry as a typist at thirty-five shillings a week. Next she learnt typing. Then she became an authority on everything. And now she's concocting these food articles for you. Believe me, the girl knows nothing whatever about cookery. She couldn't fry a sausage for nuts. Once the mater insisted on her doing the housekeeping—in the holidays, too! Stay me with flagons!

HILDEGARDE ( without looking round ). Stay you with chocolates, you mean, Johnnie, dear.

JOHN. There you are! Her thoughts fly instantly to chocolates—and in the fourth year of the greatest war that the world—

HILDEGARDE. Etcetera, etcetera.

TRANTO. Then do I gather that you don't entirely approve of your sister's articles?

JOHN. Tripe, I think. My fag could write better. I'll tell you what I do approve of. I approve of that article to-day by that chap Sampson Straight about titles and the shameful traffic in honours, and the rot of the hereditary principle, and all that sort of thing.

TRANTO. I'm glad. Delivers the goods, doesn't he, Mr. Sampson Straight?

JOHN. Well, I think so. Who is he?

TRANTO. One of my discoveries, John. He sent me in an article about—let me see, when was it?—about eight months ago.