Play With a Tiger and Other Plays. Doris Lessing
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new book is or is not an advance on his last. Well, Anna, is it really worth it?
ANNA: Yes it is. I’m free to live as I like. You won’t be, ever again.
TOM: And worrying all the time how you’re going to find the money for what your kid wants. Do you think he’s going to thank you for living like this?
ANNA: That’s right. Always stick the knife in, as hard as you can, into a person’s weakest spot.
TOM: An art you are not exactly a stranger to? You live here, hand to mouth, never knowing what’s going to happen next, surrounding yourself with bums and neurotics and failures. As far as you’re concerned anyone who has succeeded at anything at all is corrupt. [She says nothing.] Nothing to say, Anna? That’s not like you.
ANNA: I was thinking, not for the first time, unfortunately, how sad it is that the exquisite understanding and intimacy of the bed doesn’t last into the cold light of day.
TOM: So that’s all we had in common. Thank you Anna, you’ve now defined me.
ANNA: All right, all right, all right. I’m sorry. What else can I say – I’m sorry.
[There is a knock on the door.]
ANNA: Come in.
TOM: Oh my God, Mary.
MARY [outside the door]: Pussy, pussy, pussy.
[A knock on the door.]
ANNA: Come in.
TOM: She’s getting very deaf, isn’t she?
ANNA: She doesn’t know it. [as the door opens] For the Lord’s sake don’t say … [she imitates him] … I was under the impression we had said come in, if I’m wrong please correct me.
TOM: Just because you’ve decided to give me the boot, there’s no need to knock me down and start jumping on me.
[MARY comes in, backwards, shutting the door to keep the cat out.]
MARY: No pussy, you stay there. Anna doesn’t really like you, although she pretends she does. [to ANNA] That cat is more like a dog, really, he comes when I call. And he waits for me outside a door. [peeping around the edge of the door] No, puss, wait. I won’t be a minute. [to ANNA] I don’t know why I bothered to christen that cat Methuselah, it never gets called anything but puss. [sprightly with an exaggerated sigh] Really, I’m getting quite an old maid, fussing over a cat … If you can call a widow with a grown up son an old maid, but who’d have believed I’d have come to fussing over a cat. [seeing TOM] Oh, I didn’t know you were here.
TOM: Didn’t you see me? I said hullo.
MARY: Sometimes I think I’m getting a bit deaf. Well, what a surprise. You’re quite a stranger, aren’t you?
TOM: Hardly a stranger, I should have said.
MARY: Dropped in for old times’ sake [TOM is annoyed. MARY says to ANNA] I thought we might go out to the pub. I’m sick of sitting and brooding. [as ANNA does not respond – quick and defensive] Oh I see, you and Tom are going out, two’s company and three’s none.
ANNA: Tom’s going to the Jeffries.
MARY [derisive]: Not the Jeffries – you must be hard up for somewhere to go.
ANNA: And I think I’ll stay and work.
TOM: Anna is too good for the Jeffries.
MARY: Who isn’t?
[ANNA has gone back to the window, is looking down into the street.]
TOM [angrily]: Perhaps you’d like to come with me, since Anna won’t.
MARY [half aggressive, half coy]: You and me going out together – that’d be a change. Oh, I see, you’re joking. [genuinely] Besides, they really are so awful.
TOM: Better than going to the pub with Methuselah, perhaps?
MARY: [with spirit]: No, I prefer Methuselah. You don’t want to bore yourself at the Jeffries. Stay and have some coffee with us.
ANNA [her back still turned]: It’s the Royal Command.
MARY: Oh. You mean you’ve taken that job after all? I told Anna you would, months ago. There, Anna, I told you he would. Anna said when it actually came to the point, you’d never bring yourself to do it.
TOM: I like the idea of you and Anna laying bets as to whether the forces of good or evil would claim my soul.
MARY: Well, I mean, that’s what it amounts to, doesn’t it? But I always said Anna was wrong about you. Didn’t I, Anna? Anna always does this. [awkwardly] I mean, it’s not the first time, I mean to say. And I’ve always been right. Ah, well, as Anna says, don’t you, Anna, if a man marries, he marries a woman, but if a woman marries, she marries a way of life.
TOM: Strange, but as it happens I too have been the lucky recipient of that little aphorism.
MARY: Well, you were bound to be, weren’t you? [she sees TOM is furious and stops] Harry telephoned you, Anna.
ANNA: What for?
MARY: Well, I suppose now you’re free he thinks he’ll have another try.
TOM: May I ask – how did he know Anna was free? After all, I didn’t.
MARY: Oh, don’t be silly. I mean, you and Anna might not have known, but it was quite obvious to everyone else … well, I met Harry in the street some days ago, and he said …
TOM: I see.
MARY: Well, there’s no need to be so stuffy about it Tom –
[A bell rings downstairs.]
MARY: Was that the bell? Are you expecting someone, Anna?
TOM: Of course she’s expecting someone.
ANNA: No.
MARY [who hasn’t heard]: Who are you expecting?
ANNA: Nobody.
MARY: Well, I’ll go for you, I have to go down anyway. Are you in or out, Anna?
ANNA: I’m out.
MARY: It’s often difficult to say, whether you are in or out, because after all, one never knows who it might be.
ANNA [patiently]: Mary, I really don’t mind answering my bell you know.
MARY [hastily going to the door]: Sometimes I’m running up and down the stairs half the day, answering Anna’s bell. [as she goes out and shuts the door] Pussy, pussy, where are you puss, puss, puss.
TOM: She’s deteriorating fast, isn’t she? [ANNA patiently says nothing] That’s what you’re going to be like in ten years’ time if you’re not careful.
ANNA: I’d rather be like Mary in ten years’ time than what you’re going to be like when you’re all settled down and respectable.
TOM: A self-pitying old bore.
ANNA: She is also a kind warm-hearted woman with endless time for people in trouble … Tom, you’re late, the boss waits, and you can’t afford to offend him.
TOM: I remember Mary, and not so long ago either – she was quite a dish, wasn’t she? If I were you I’d be scared stiff.
ANNA: Sometimes I am scared stiff. [seriously] Tom, her son’s getting married next week.
TOM: Oh, so that’s it.
ANNA: No, that’s not it. She’s very pleased he’s getting married.
And she’s given them half the money she’s saved – not that there’s much of it. You surely must see it’s going to make quite a difference to her, her son getting