The Mousetrap and Other Plays (118 page)

(
JUSTIN
exits.
CARLA
looks after him, taking in what he has said. The telephone rings.
CARLA
lifts the receiver. The light starts to dim as twilight falls
)

CARLA
. (
into the telephone
) Hullo? . . . Yes . . . Oh, it's you, Jeff . . . (
She takes the whole instrument and sits in the armchair with it, tucking one leg under her
) It may be a silly waste of time, but it's my time and if I . . . (
She straightens the seam of her stocking
) What? . . . (
Crossly
) You're quite wrong about Justin. He's a good friend—which is more than you are . . . All right, so I'm quarrelling . . . No, I don't want to dine with you . . . I don't want to dine with you anywhere.

(
ELSA
MELKSHAM
enters the hall from
L
, quietly closes the door and stands in the hall, looking at Carla.
ELSA
is tall, beautiful, very made-up and extremely smart. She wears hat and gloves, and a red velvet coat over a black dress, and carries her handbag
)

At the moment your stock is pretty low with me. (
She bangs the receiver down, rises and puts the instrument on the table
R
)

ELSA
. Miss Le Marchant—or do I say “Miss Crale”?

(
CARLA
, startled, turns quickly
)

CARLA
. So you've come after all?

ELSA
. I always meant to come. I just waited until your legal adviser had faded.

CARLA
. You don't like lawyers?

ELSA
. I prefer, occasionally, to talk woman to woman. Let's have some light. (
She switches on the wall-brackets by the switch
L
of the arch then moves down
C
and looks hard at Carla
) Well, you don't look very much like the child I remember.

CARLA
. (
simply
) I'm like my mother.

ELSA
. (
coldly
) Yes. That doesn't particularly prejudice me in your favour. Your mother was one of the most loathsome women I've ever known.

CARLA
. (
hotly
) I've no doubt she felt the same about you.

ELSA
. (
smiling
) Oh, yes, the feeling was mutual. (
She sits on the settee at the upstage end
) The trouble with Caroline was that she wasn't a very good loser.

CARLA
. Did you expect her to be?

ELSA
. (
removing her gloves; amused
) Really, you know, I believe I did. I must have been incredibly young, and naïve. Because I myself couldn't understand clinging on to a man who didn't want me, I was quite shocked that she didn't feel the same. But I never dreamt that she'd
kill
Amyas rather than let me have him.

CARLA
. She didn't kill him.

ELSA
. (
without interest
) She killed him all right. She poisoned him more or less in front of my eyes—in a glass of iced beer. And I never dreamed—never guessed . . . (
With a complete change of manner
) You think at the time that you will never forget—that the pain will always be there. And then—it's all gone—gone—like that. (
She snaps her fingers
)

CARLA
. (
sitting in the armchair
) How old were you?

ELSA
. Nineteen. But I was no injured innocent. Amyas Crale didn't seduce a trusting young girl. It wasn't like that at all. I met him at a party and I fell for him right away. I knew he was the only man in the world for me. (
She smiles
) I think he felt the same.

CARLA
. Yes.

ELSA
. I asked him to paint me. He said he didn't do portraits. I said what about the portrait he'd done of Marna Vadaz, the dancer. He said special circumstances had led to that. I knew they'd had an affair together. I said, “I
want
you to paint me.” He said, “You know what'll happen? I shall make love to you.” I said, “Why not?” And he said, “I'm a married man, and I'm very fond of my wife.” I said that now we'd got that settled, when should we start the sittings? He took me by the shoulders and turned me towards the light and looked me over in a considering sort of way. Then he said, “I've often thought of painting a flight of outrageously coloured Australian macaws alighting on St. Paul's Cathedral. If I painted you in your flamboyant youth against a background of nice traditional English scenery, I believe I'd get the same effect.” (
She pauses. Quickly
) So it was settled.

CARLA
. And you went down to Alderbury.

(
ELSA
rises, removes her coat, puts it on the downstage end of the settee and moves
C
)

ELSA
. Yes. Caroline was charming. She could be, you know. Amyas was very circumspect. (
She smiles
) Never said a word to me his wife couldn't have overheard. I was polite and formal. Underneath, though, we both knew . . . (
She breaks off
)

CARLA
. Go on.

ELSA
. (
putting her hands on her hips
) After ten days he told me I was to go back to London.

CARLA
. Yes?

ELSA
. I said, “The picture isn't finished.” He said, “It's barely begun. The truth is I can't paint you, Elsa.” I asked him why, and he said that I knew very well “why” and that's why I'd got to clear out.

CARLA
. So—you went back to London?

ELSA
. Yes, I went. (
She moves up
C
and turns
) I didn't write to him. I didn't answer his letters. He held out for a week. And then—he came. I told him that it was fate and it was no use struggling against it, and he said, “You haven't struggled much, have you, Elsa?” I said I hadn't struggled at all. It was wonderful and more frightening than mere happiness. (
She frowns
) If only we'd kept away—if only we hadn't gone back.

CARLA
. Why did you?

ELSA
. The unfinished picture. It haunted Amyas. (
She sits on the settee at the upstage end
) But things were different this time—Caroline had caught on. I wanted to have the whole thing on an honest basis. All Amyas would say was, “To hell with honesty. I'm painting a picture.”

(
CARLA
laughs
)

Why do you laugh?

CARLA
. (
rising and turning to the window
) Because I know just how he felt.

ELSA
. (
angrily
) How should
you
know?

CARLA
. (
simply
) Because I'm his daughter, I suppose.

ELSA
. (
distantly
) Amyas's daughter. (
She looks at Carla with a new appraisement
)

CARLA
. (
turning and crossing above the armchair to
C
) I've just begun to know that. I hadn't thought about it before. I came over because I wanted to find out just what happened sixteen years ago. I am finding out. I'm beginning to know the people—what they felt, what they are like. The whole thing's coming alive, bit by bit.

ELSA
. Coming alive? (
Bitterly
) I wish it would.

CARLA
. My father—you—Philip Blake—Meredith Blake. (
She crosses down
L
) And there are two more. Angela Warren . . .

ELSA
. Angela? Oh, yes. She's quite a celebrity in her way—one of those tough women who travel to inaccessible places and write books about it. She was only a tiresome teenager then.

CARLA
. (
turning
) How did
she
feel about it all?

ELSA
. (
uninterested
) I don't know. They hustled her away, I think. Some idea of Caroline's that contact with murder would damage her adolescent mind—though I don't know why Caroline should have bothered about damage to her mind when she had already damaged her face for her. When I heard that story I ought to have realized what Caroline was capable of, and when I actually
saw
her take the poison . . .

CARLA
. (
quickly
) You
saw
her?

ELSA
. Yes. Meredith was waiting to lock up his laboratory. Caroline was the last to come out. I was just before her. I looked over my shoulder and saw her standing in front of a shelf with a small bottle in her hand. Of course, she might only have been looking at it. How was I to know?

CARLA
. (
crossing to
C
) But you suspected?

ELSA
. I thought she meant it for herself.

CARLA
. Suicide? And you didn't
care?

ELSA
. (
calmly
) I thought it might be the best way out.

CARLA
. (
crossing above the armchair to the window
) Oh, no . . .

ELSA
. Her marriage to Amyas had been a failure from the start—if she'd really cared for him as much as she pretended, she'd have given him a divorce. There was plenty of money—and she'd probably have married someone else who would have suited her better.

CARLA
. How easily you arrange other people's lives. (
She moves down
R
) Meredith Blake says I may come down to Alderbury. I want to get everyone there. Will you come?

ELSA
. (
arrested, but attracted by the idea
) Come down to Alderbury?

CARLA
. (
eagerly
) I want to go over the whole thing on the spot. I want to see it as though it were happening all over again.

ELSA
. Happening all over again . . .

CARLA
. (
politely
) If it's too painful for you . . .

ELSA
. There are worse things than pain. (
Harshly
) It's forgetting that's so horrible—it's as though you were dead yourself. (
Angrily
) You—stand there so damned young and innocent—what do you know about loving a man? I loved Amyas. (
With fire
) He was so alive, so full of life and vigour, such a man. And she put an end to all that—your mother. (
She rises
) She put an end to Amyas so that
I
shouldn't have him. And they didn't even hang her. (
She pauses. In an ordinary tone
) I'll come to Alderbury. I'll join your circus. (
She picks up her coat and holds it out to Carla
)

(
CARLA
crosses to Elsa and helps her on with her coat
)

Philip, Meredith—Angela Warren—all four of us.

CARLA
. Five.

ELSA
. Five?

CARLA
. There was a governess.

ELSA
. (
collecting her bag and gloves from the settee
) Oh, yes, the governess.
Very
disapproving of me and Amyas. Devoted to Caroline.

CARLA
. Devoted to my mother—
she'll
tell me. I'm going to see her next. (
She goes into the hall and opens the door
)

ELSA
. (
moving to the hall
) Perhaps you'll get your legal
friend
to telephone me, will you?

(
ELSA
exits.
CARLA
closes the door and moves
C
)

CARLA
. The governess!

The
LIGHTS
dim to
BLACK
-
OUT

Scene IV

SCENE
—
Miss Williams' bed-sitting-room.

It is an attic room with a small window in the sloping roof
L
.
The door is presumed to be in the “fourth wall.” There is a fireplace, fitted with a gas fire, back
C
.
There is a divan with cover and cushions
R
.
A gate-legged table stands under the window. A small table with a table-lamp on it is
R
of the fireplace. Upright chairs stand
L
of the fireplace and down
L
and there is an old-fashioned armchair with a footstool under it,
C
.
An electric kettle is plugged into the skirting,
R
of the fireplace.

When the
LIGHTS
come up, the lamp is on, but the window curtains are not yet closed. A tray of tea for two is on the table
L
.
The kettle is steaming and the teapot is beside it. The gas fire is lit.
MISS
WILLIAMS
is seated in the armchair
C
.
She is sixty odd, intelligent, with clear enunciation and a pedagogic manner. She wears a tweed skirt and blouse, with a cardigan and a scarf round her shoulders.
CARLA
is seated on the divan, looking through a photograph album. She wears a brown dress.