The Mousetrap and Other Plays (32 page)

The following Monday morning

The lights are lowered during Act III to denote the passing of one hour

Time: the present

ACT ONE

SCENE
:
The garden room of
SIR
HENRY
ANGKATELL
's house, The Hollow, about eighteen miles from London. A Friday afternoon in early September.

It is an informal room, but furnished with taste. Back Centre, up three steps, there are French windows opening on to a terrace with a low wall at the far side. Beyond the wall there is a view of the wooded hillside on which the house is built. There are smaller French windows, up one step Centre, of the wall Right, leading to the garden and giving a view of dense shrubbery. A door down Left leads to the other parts of the house. There is a large alcove in the back wall Left of the French windows. The entrance to this is arched, and a heavy curtain in the archway closes it off from the rest of the room. The back wall of the alcove is fitted with well-filled, built-in bookshelves and furnished with a small table on which stands a silver bowl of roses. A piece of statuary can be supposed to stand in the alcove, though not visible to the audience. The fireplace is Centre of the wall Left and there are well-filled, built-in bookshelves in the walls Right of the French windows up Centre and below the French windows Right. There is a small writing table down Right, on which stands a small table lamp and a telephone. A small chair is set at the table and a wastepaper basket stands below it. Above the writing table there is a pedestal on which stands a piece of abstract statuary. There is a table with a table lamp on it below the bookshelves up Right. A small table with a radio receiver stands above the fireplace. There is an armchair up Left Centre, and a comfortable sofa Right Centre. Below the sofa stands a small circular coffee table. A pouffe near the hearth completes the furniture. The room is carpeted and gay curtains hang at the windows. In addition to the table lamps, the room is lit at night by an electric candle lamp wall bracket Left of the French windows up Centre, and small electric candle lamps on the mantelpiece. One or two miniatures decorate the walls, and over the mantelpiece there is a fine picture depicting the idyllic scene of a Georgian house with columns, set in woodlands. The light switch and bell push are in the wall below the fireplace. There is also a switch controlling the light in the alcove, Right of the arch. Two wall vases, filled with flowers, decorate the side walls of the French windows up Centre.

When Curtain rises, it is a fine afternoon and all the French windows stand open.
SIR
HENRY
ANGKATELL
,
KCB
.,
a distinguished-looking, elderly man, is seated at the Right end of the sofa, reading “The Times.”
HENRIETTA
ANGKATELL
is on the terrace outside the French windows up Centre, standing at a tall sculptor's stand, modelling in clay. She is a handsome young woman of about thirty-three, dressed in good country tweeds and over them a painter's overall. She advances and retreats towards her creation once or twice, then enters up Centre and moves to the coffee table below the sofa. There is a smear of clay on her nose, and she is frowning.

HENRIETTA
. (
As she enters
) Damn and damn and damn!

SIR
HENRY
. (
Looking up
) Not going well?

HENRIETTA
. (
Taking a cigarette from the box on the coffee table
) What misery it is to be a sculptor.

SIR
HENRY
. It must be. I always thought you had to have models for this sort of thing.

HENRIETTA
. It's an abstract piece I'm modelling, darling.

SIR
HENRY
. What—(
He points with distaste to the piece of modern sculpture on the pedestal Right
) like that?

HENRIETTA
. (
Crossing to the mantelpiece
) Anything interesting in
The Times?
(
She lights her cigarette with the table lighter on the mantelpiece.
)

SIR
HENRY
. Lots of people dead. (
He looks at
HENRIETTA
.) You've got clay on your nose.

HENRIETTA
. What?

SIR
HENRY
. Clay—on your
nose.

HENRIETTA
. (
Looking in the mirror on the mantelpiece; vaguely
) Oh, so I have. (
She rubs her nose, then her forehead, turns and moves Left Centre.
)

SIR
HENRY
. Now it's all over your face.

HENRIETTA
. (
Moving up Centre; exasperated
) Does it matter, darling?

SIR
HENRY
. Evidently not.

(
HENRIETTA
goes on to terrace up Centre and resumes work.
LADY
ANGKATELL
enters Right. She is a very charming and aristocratic-looking woman aged about sixty, completely vague, but with a lot of personality. She is apparently in the middle of a conversation.
)

LADY
ANGKATELL
. (
Crossing above the sofa to the fireplace
) Oh dear, oh dear! If it isn't one thing it's another. Did I leave a mole trap in here? (
She picks up the mole trap from the mantelpiece and eases Centre
) Ah yes—there it is. The worst of moles is—you never know where they are going to pop up next. People are quite right when they say that nature in the wild is seldom raw. (
She crosses below the sofa to Right.
) Don't you think I'm right, Henry?

SIR
HENRY
. I couldn't say, my dear, unless I know what you're talking about.

LADY
ANGKATELL
. I'm going to pursue them quite ruthlessly—I really am.

(
Her voice dies away as she exits Right.
)

HENRIETTA
. (
Looking in through the French window up Centre.
) What did Lucy say?

SIR
HENRY
. Nothing much. Just being Lucyish. I say, it's half past six.

HENRIETTA
. I'll have to stop and clean myself up. They're all coming by car, I suppose? (
She drapes a damp cloth over her work.
)

SIR
HENRY
. All except Midge. She's coming by Green Line bus. Ought to be here by now.

HENRIETTA
. Darling Midge. She is nice. Heaps nicer than any of us, don't you think? (
She pushes the stand out of sight Right of the terrace.
)

SIR
HENRY
. I must have notice of that question.

HENRIETTA
. (
Moving Centre; laughing
) Well, less eccentric, anyway. There's something very sane about Midge. (
She rubs her hands on her overall.
)

SIR
HENRY
. (
Indignantly
) I'm perfectly sane, thank you.

HENRIETTA
. (
Removing her overall and looking at
SIR
HENRY
) Ye-es—perhaps you are. (
She puts her overall over the back of the armchair Left Centre.
)

SIR
HENRY
. (
Smiling
) As sane as anyone can be that has to live with Lucy, bless her heart. (
He laughs.
)

(
HENRIETTA
laughs, crosses to the mantelpiece and puts her cigarette ash in the ashtray.
)

(
He puts his newspaper on the coffee table. Worried.
) You know, Henrietta, I'm getting worried about Lucy.

HENRIETTA
. Worried? Why?

SIR
HENRY
. Lucy doesn't realize there are certain things she can't do.

HENRIETTA
. (
Looking in the mirror
) I don't think I quite know what you mean. (
She pats her hair
).

SIR
HENRY
. She's always got away with things. I don't suppose any other woman in the world could have flouted the traditions of Government House as she did. (
He takes his pipe from his pocket.
) Most Governors' wives have to toe the line of convention. But not Lucy! Oh dear me, no! She played merry hell with precedence at dinner parties—and that, my dear Henrietta, is the blackest of crimes.

(
HENRIETTA
turns.
)

(
He pats his pockets, feeling for his tobacco pouch.
) She put deadly enemies next to each other. She ran riot over the colour question. And instead of setting everyone at loggerheads, I'm damned if she didn't get away with it.

(
HENRIETTA
picks up the tobacco jar from the mantelpiece, crosses and hands it to
SIR
HENRY
.)

Oh, thank you. It's that trick of hers—always smiling at people and looking so sweet and helpless. Servants are the same—she gives them any amount of trouble and they simply adore her.

HENRIETTA
. I know what you mean. (
She sits on the sofa at the Left end.
) Things you wouldn't stand from anyone else, you feel they are quite all right if Lucy does them. What is it? Charm? Hypnotism?

SIR
HENRY
. (
Filling his pipe
) I don't know. She's always been the same from a girl. But you know, Henrietta, it's growing on her. She doesn't seem to realize there
are
limits. I really believe Lucy would feel she could get away with
murder.

HENRIETTA
. (
Rising and picking up the piece of clay from the carpet
) Darling Henry, you and Lucy are angels letting me make my messes here—treading clay into your carpet. (
She crosses and puts the piece of clay in the wastepaper basket down Right.
) When I had that fire at my studio, I thought it was the end of everything—it was sweet of you to let me move in on you.

SIR
HENRY
. My dear, we're proud of you. Why, I've just been reading a whole article about you and your show in
The Times.

HENRIETTA
. (
Crossing to the coffee table and picking up “The Times”)
Where?

SIR
HENRY
. Top of the page. There, I believe. Of course, I don't profess to know much about it myself.

HENRIETTA
. (
Reading
) “The most significant piece of the year.” Oh, what gup! I must go and wash.

(
She drops the paper on the sofa, crosses, picks up her overall and exits hurriedly Left.
SIR
HENRY
rises, puts the papers and tobacco on the coffee table, takes the clay from the table to the wastepaper basket, moves to the drinks table, and picks up the matches.
MIDGE
HARVEY
enters up Centre from Left. She is small, neatly dressed but obviously badly off. She is a warmhearted, practical and very nice young woman, a little younger than
HENRIETTA
.
She carries a suitcase.
)

MIDGE
. (
As she enters
) Hullo, Cousin Henry.

SIR
HENRY
. (
Turning
) Midge! (
He moves to Right of her, takes the suitcase from her, and kisses her.
) Nice to see you.

MIDGE
. Nice to see
you.

SIR
HENRY
. How are you?

MIDGE
. Terribly well.

SIR
HENRY
. Not been overworking you in that damned dress shop of yours?

MIDGE
. (
Moving down Centre
) Business is pretty slack at the moment, or I shouldn't have got the weekend off. The bus was absolutely crowded; I've never known it go so slowly. (
She sits on the sofa, puts her bag and gloves beside her and looks towards the window Right.
) It's heaven to be here. Who's coming this weekend?

SIR
HENRY
. (
Putting the suitcase on the floor Right of the armchair Left Centre
) Nobody much. The Cristows. You know them, of course.

MIDGE
. The Harley Street doctor with a rather dim wife?

SIR
HENRY
. That's right. Nobody else. Oh yes—(
He strikes a match
) Edward, of course.

MIDGE
. (
Turning to face
SIR
HENRY
;
suddenly stricken by the sound of the name
) Edward!

SIR
HENRY
. (
Lighting his pipe
) Quite a job to get Edward away from Ainswick these days.

MIDGE
. (
Rising
) Ainswick! Lovely, lovely Ainswick! (
She crosses to the fireplace and gazes up at the picture above it.
)

SIR
HENRY
. (
Moving down Centre
) Yes, it's a beautiful place.

MIDGE
. (
Feelingly
) It's the most beautiful place in the world.

SIR
HENRY
. (
Putting the matchbox on the coffee table
) Had some happy times there, eh? (
He eases to Right of the armchair Left Centre.
)

MIDGE
. (
Turning
) All the happy times I've ever had were there.