



 Produced by David Widger



PLAYS IN THE FOURTH SERIES


A BIT O' LOVE

By John Galsworthy



PERSONS OF THE PLAY

     MICHAEL STRANGWAY
     BEATRICE STRANGWAY
     MRS. BRADMERE
     JIM BERE
     JACK CREMER
     MRS. BURLACOMBE
     BURLACOMBE
     TRUSTAFORD
     JARLAND
     CLYST
     FREMAN
     GODLEIGH
     SOL POTTER
     MORSE, AND OTHERS
     IVY BURLACOMBE
     CONNIE TRUSTAFORD
     GLADYS FREMAN
     MERCY JARLAND
     TIBBY JARLAND
     BOBBIE JARLAND




   SCENE: A VILLAGE OF THE WEST

   The Action passes on Ascension Day.

   ACT I.  STRANGWAY'S rooms at BURLACOMBE'S.  Morning.

   ACT II.  Evening

        SCENE I.  The Village Inn.
        SCENE II.  The same.
        SCENE III.  Outside the church.

   ACT III.  Evening

        SCENE I.  STRANGWAY'S rooms.
        SCENE II.  BURLACOMBE'S barn.




A BIT O' LOVE




ACT I

     It is Ascension Day in a village of the West.  In the low
     panelled hall-sittingroom of the BURLACOMBE'S farmhouse on the
     village green, MICHAEL STRANGWAY, a clerical collar round his
     throat and a dark Norfolk jacket on his back, is playing the
     flute before a very large framed photograph of a woman, which is
     the only picture on the walls.  His age is about thirty-five his
     figure thin and very upright and his clean-shorn face thin,
     upright, narrow, with long and rather pointed ears; his dark
     hair is brushed in a coxcomb off his forehead.  A faint smile
     hovers about his lips that Nature has made rather full and he
     has made thin, as though keeping a hard secret; but his bright
     grey eyes, dark round the rim, look out and upwards almost as if
     he were being crucified.  There is something about the whole of
     him that makes him seen not quite present.  A gentle creature,
     burnt within.

     A low broad window above a window-seat forms the background to
     his figure; and through its lattice panes are seen the outer
     gate and yew-trees of a churchyard and the porch of a church,
     bathed in May sunlight.  The front door at right angles to the
     window-seat, leads to the village green, and a door on the left
     into the house.

     It is the third movement of Veracini's violin sonata that
     STRANGWAY plays.  His back is turned to the door into the house,
     and he does not hear when it is opened, and IVY BURLACOMBE, the
     farmer's daughter, a girl of fourteen, small and quiet as a
     mouse, comes in, a prayer-book in one hand, and in the other a
     gloss of water, with wild orchis and a bit of deep pink
     hawthorn.  She sits down on the window-seat, and having opened
     her book, sniffs at the flowers.  Coming to the end of the
     movement STRANGWAY stops, and looking up at the face on the
     wall, heaves a long sigh.

IVY.  [From the seat] I picked these for yu, Mr. Strangway.

STRANGWAY.  [Turning with a start]  Ah!  Ivy.  Thank you.  [He puts
his flute down on a chair against the far wall]  Where are the
others?

     As he speaks, GLADYS FREMAN, a dark gipsyish girl, and CONNIE
     TRUSTAFORD, a fair, stolid, blue-eyed Saxon, both about sixteen,
     come in through the front door, behind which they have evidently
     been listening.  They too have prayer-books in their hands.
     They sidle past Ivy, and also sit down under the window.

GLADYS.  Mercy's comin', Mr. Strangway.

STRANGWAY.  Good morning, Gladys; good morning, Connie.

     He turns to a book-case on a table against the far wall, and
     taking out a book, finds his place in it.  While he stands thus
     with his back to the girls, MERCY JARLAND comes in from the
     green.  She also is about sixteen, with fair hair and china-blue
     eyes.  She glides in quickly, hiding something behind her, and
     sits down on the seat next the door.  And at once there is a
     whispering.

STRANGWAY.  [Turning to them] Good morning, Mercy.

MERCY.  Good morning, Mr.  Strangway.

STRANGWAY.  Now, yesterday I was telling you what our Lord's coming
meant to the world.  I want you to understand that before He came
there wasn't really love, as we know it.  I don't mean to say that
there weren't many good people; but there wasn't love for the sake of
loving.  D'you think you understand what I mean?

     MERCY fidgets.  GLADYS'S eyes are following a fly.

IVY.  Yes, Mr.  Strangway.

STRANGWAY.  It isn't enough to love people because they're good to
you, or because in some way or other you're going to get something by
it.  We have to love because we love loving.  That's the great thing
--without that we're nothing but Pagans.

GLADYS.  Please, what is Pagans?

STRANGWAY.  That's what the first Christians called the people who
lived in the villages and were not yet Christians, Gladys.

MERCY.  We live in a village, but we're Christians.

STRANGWAY.  [With a smile] Yes, Mercy; and what is a Christian?

     MERCY kicks afoot, sideways against her neighbour, frowns over
     her china-blare eyes, is silent; then, as his question passes
     on, makes a quick little face, wriggles, and looks behind her.

STRANGWAY.  Ivy?

IVY.  'Tis a man--whu--whu----

STRANGWAY.  Yes?--Connie?

CONNIE.  [Who speaks rather thickly, as if she had a permanent slight
cold] Please, Mr.  Strangway, 'tis a man what goes to church.

GLADYS.  He 'as to be baptised--and confirmed; and--and--buried.

IVY.  'Tis a man whu--whu's gude and----

GLADYS.  He don't drink, an' he don't beat his horses, an' he don't
hit back.

MERCY.  [Whispering]  'Tisn't your turn.  [To STRANGWAY]  'Tis a man
like us.

IVY.  I know what Mrs. Strangway said it was, 'cause I asked her
once, before she went away.

STRANGWAY.  [Startled]  Yes?

IVY.  She said it was a man whu forgave everything.

STRANGWAY.  Ah!

     The note of a cuckoo comes travelling.  The girls are gazing at
     STRANGWAY, who seems to have gone of into a dream.  They begin
     to fidget and whisper.

CONNIE.  Please, Mr. Strangway, father says if yu hit a man and he
don't hit yu back, he's no gude at all.

MERCY.  When Tommy Morse wouldn't fight, us pinched him--he did
squeal!  [She giggles]  Made me laugh!

STRANGWAY.  Did I ever tell you about St. Francis of Assisi?

IVY.  [Clasping her hands]  No.

STRANGWAY.  Well, he was the best Christian, I think, that ever
lived--simply full of love and joy.

IVY.  I expect he's dead.

STRANGWAY.  About seven hundred years, Ivy.

IVY.  [Softly]  Oh!

STRANGWAY.  Everything to him was brother or sister--the sun and the
moon, and all that was poor and weak and sad, and animals and birds,
so that they even used to follow him about.

MERCY.  I know!  He had crumbs in his pocket.

STRANGWAY.  No; he had love in his eyes.

IVY.  'Tis like about Orpheus, that yu told us.

STRANGWAY.  Ah!  But St.  Francis was a Christian, and Orpheus was a
Pagan.

IVY.  Oh!

STRANGWAY.  Orpheus drew everything after him with music; St.
Francis by love.

IVY.  Perhaps it was the same, really.

STRANGWAY.  [looking at his flute]  Perhaps it was, Ivy.

GLADYS.  Did 'e 'ave a flute like yu?

IVY.  The flowers smell sweeter when they 'ear music; they du.

     [She holds up the glass of flowers.]

STRANGWAY.  [Touching one of the orchis]  What's the name of this
one?

     [The girls cluster; save MERCY, who is taking a stealthy
     interest in what she has behind her.]

CONNIE.  We call it a cuckoo, Mr. Strangway.

GLADYS.  'Tis awful common down by the streams.  We've got one medder
where 'tis so thick almost as the goldie cups.

STRANGWAY.  Odd!  I've never noticed it.

IVY.  Please, Mr. Strangway, yu don't notice when yu're walkin'; yu
go along like this.

     [She holds up her face as one looking at the sky.]

STRANGWAY.  Bad as that, Ivy?

IVY.  Mrs. Strangway often used to pick it last spring.

STRANGWAY.  Did she?  Did she?

     [He has gone off again into a kind of dream.]

MERCY.  I like being confirmed.

STRANGWAY.  Ah!  Yes.  Now----What's that behind you, Mercy?

MERCY.  [Engagingly producing a cage a little bigger than a
mouse-trap, containing a skylark]  My skylark.

STRANGWAY.  What!

MERCY.  It can fly; but we're goin' to clip its wings.  Bobbie caught
it.

STRANGWAY.