A MERRY DEATH

       Table of Contents

      A Harlequinade

      By Nicholas Evréinov

       Characters

      Death

       Scene: Harlequin’s House

       A Merry Death

       (Harlequin is sleeping. Pierrot clumsily chases the flies from his face, then turns to the Audience.)

      Pierrot: Shhh! Quiet! Take your seats quietly and try to talk and turn in your seats less. Even if an ingenuous friend has dragged you in and yourselves are too serious to be interested in a harlequinade, it’s quite superfluous to hint of it to the public, which in the main has no affair with your personal tastes. Besides, Harlequin’s asleep — you see him! Shh! I’ll explain it all to you afterwards. But don’t wake him up, please! And when Columbine comes on, don’t applaud her like mad, just in order to show your neighbours that you know her, had a little intrigue with her, and can appreciate certain talents. I beg and entreat you! It’s no joke. Harlequin’s terribly ill! Just think, he’s been raving about my Columbine, although, of course, there’s nothing in common between him and my Columbine; there isn’t, because Columbine’s my wife, and there’s an end of it! I strongly suspect that Harlequin won’t live till to-morrow; a fortuneteller told him that the day he sleeps longer than he revels he will die exactly at midnight. Look, it’s just eight o’clock of the evening, and he’s still asleep! I’ll tell you even more — I know, perhaps for sure, that Harlequin will soon die. But what decent actor will tell the audience the end of the play before it begins? I’m not one of those who give away the management, and I thoroughly understand that the audience goes to the theatre not for any idea in the piece, or masterly dialogue, but simply to know how the play ends, and all the same I can't help sighing and weeping in my long sleeves and saying (sobs): “Poor, poor Harlequin, who ever could have thought it?” I used to like him very much! He was my first friend; though, by the way, this never prevented me from envying him a little, because, as everybody knows, if I’m Pierrot, it’s only because I’m not a successful Harlequin. However, I’m not as simple as my clothes, and, I assure you, I’ve managed already to go for a doctor, although it’s useless, because Harlequin can die quite all right without a doctor; but — nice people always do it, and I’m not inferior to them; for, if I didn’t behave like everybody else, I should be a bold, merry Harlequin, for whom there are no laws; but I — I’m only silly, cowardly Pierrot, whose character, by the way, will be quite clear to you in the further course of the drama, if only you stop till the end of the performance and don’t run away now from my chatter. So I’ll stop it, informing you only of the following plan which came into my head entirely without outside influence: if Harlequin is fated to die exactly at midnight by this clock, then won’t it be a comradely service on my part to put back the hands, even for — well, only two hours? I always liked taking people in; but when it’s a matter of taking in death and Harlequin at the same time, and, as well, for the harm of the first and the good of the second, I don’t think you can call this plan anything but a genius’s. Well, to work! The performance begins! (Climbs on a stool and, stretching over the bed on which Harlequin is sleeping, puts the clock back two hours.) Poor, poor Harle—— (Falls down on the floor.) Poor Pierrot! (Rubs his back. Harlequin, waking, smiles, pulls Pierrot towards him by the chin, and tenderly kisses him.)

      Pierrot (naïvely): I seem to have waked you.

      Harlequin: Why didn’t you do it earlier?

      Pierrot : What for?

      Harlequin: My hours are numbered.

      Pierrot : Rubbish!

      Harlequin: I want to live them.

      Pierrot : And you will.

      Harlequin: You nearly let me sleep them away.

      Pierrot : I thought ——

      Harlequin: What’s the time?

      Pierrot : Six.

      Harlequin: Only.

      Pierrot : Yes. How do you feel?

      Harlequin: Dying.

      Pierrot : You’re frightening me. (Weeps.)

      Harlequin: Stop! Why, I’m alive! What have you done? Isn’t my clock wrong?

      Pierrot : I went for a doctor. Lie down quietly. I must take your temperature.

      Harlequin: For a doctor? (Giggles.) Will, what of it, if he cures me ——

      Pierrot : Lift up your arm. That’s the way. (Applies a thermometer.) Is that someone coming? (The thermometer begins to burn.)

      Harlequin: It shows the exact temperature.

      (Pierrot takes away the thermometer and puts out the flame. Harlequin jumps up and circles about snapping his fingers.) Haha! Harlequin’s not dead yet!

      Pierrot: Only a thermometer spoiled.

      Harlequin: Yes, I’ve not long to live; but (taking down a lute) look, how many strings are broken and the rest are frayed! But does that stop me playing the introduction to a serenade? (Plays. Steps are heard to the left)

      Pierrot: D’you hear? The doctor! Stop playing and lie down quickly. It’s he. I can tell people at once by their step. That could only be someone hurrying to help a friend.

      Harlequin (stops playing and lies down): To get money. (A knock.)

      Pierrot: Come in!

      Doctor (in huge spectacles, bald, with a big red nose and a syringe in a bag, comes in, stops, and sings to the audience):

      Good-day, my dear Harlequin. What’s the matter with you?

      Harlequin: That’s for you to judge.

      Doctor: You’re quite right. (In Pierrot's ear.) There’s never any need to contradict a patient. (To Harlequin.) Temperature been taken?

      Pierrot (shaking his hand): Don’t inquire!

      Doctor: How do you feel?

      Harlequin: An attack.

      Doctor: Of coughing?

      Harlequin: Of laughing.

      Doctor: What are you laughing at?

      Harlequin: You! (Bursts with laughter.)

      Doctor (to Pierrot): He doesn’t believe in medicine?

      Pierrot: No, apparently only in you.

      Doctor: What a curious invalid! Your pulse, please. Oho, I can't count quickly enough! Show your tongue.

      Harlequin: To whom?

      Doctor: To me!

      Harlequin: Oh, to you? Delighted! (Shows his tongue.)

      Doctor: