27 Wagons Full of Cotton and Other Plays Read online

TOM: You never could find it in all them cinders.

  WILLIE: I don’t know. It had a lot of shine.

  TOM: It wasn’t a genuine diamond.

  WILLIE: How do you know?

  TOM: I just imagine it wasn’t. Because if it was you wouldn’t be walking along a railroad track with a banged-up doll and a piece of a rotten banana.

  WILLIE: Oh, I wouldn’t be so sure. I might be peculiar or something. You never can tell. What’s your name?

  TOM. Tom.

  WILLIE: Mine’s Willie. We’ve both got boy’s names.

  TOM: How did that happen?

  WILLIE: I was expected to be a boy but I wasn’t. They had one girl already. Alva. She was my sister. Why ain’t you at school?

  TOM: I thought it was going to be windy so I could fly my kite.

  WILLIE: What made you think that?

  TOM: Because the sky was so white.

  WILLIE: Is that a sign?

  TOM : Yeah.

  WILLIE: I know. It looks like everything had been swept off with a broom. Don’t it?

  TOM: Yeah.

  WILLIE: It’s perfectly white. It’s white as a clean piece of paper.

  TOM: Uh-huh.

  WILLIE: But there isn’t a wind.

  TOM: Naw.

  WILLIE: It’s up too high for us to feel it. It’s way, way up in the attic sweeping the dust off the furniture up there!

  TOM: Uh-huh. Why ain’t you at school?

  WILLIE: I quituated. Two years ago this winter.

  TOM: What grade was you in?

  WILLIE: Five A.

  TOM : Miss Preston.

  WILLIE: Yep. She used to think my hands was dirty until I explained that it was cinders from falling off the railroad tracks so much.

  TOM: She’s pretty strict.

  WILLIE: Oh, no, she’s just disappointed because she didn’t get married. Probably never had an opportunity, poor thing. So she has to teach Five A for the rest of her natural life. They started teaching algebra an’ I didn’t give a goddam what X stood for so I quit.

  TOM: You’ll never get an education walking the railroad tracks.

  WILLIE: You won’t get one flying a red kite neither. Besides . . .

  TOM: What?

  WILLIE: What a girl needs to get along is social training. I learned all of that from my sister Alva. She had a wonderful popularity with the railroad men.

  TOM: Train engineers?

  WILLIE: Engineers, firemen, conductors. Even the freight sup’rintendent. We run a boarding-house for railroad men. She was I guess you might say The Main Attraction. Beautiful? Jesus, she looked like a movie star!

  TOM: Your sister?

  WILLIE: Yeah. One of ‘em used to bring her regular after each run a great big heart-shaped red-silk box of assorted chocolates and nuts and hard candies. Marvelous?

  TOM: Yeah. (The cawing of crows sounds through the chilly air.)

  WILLIE: You know where Alva is now?

  TOM: Memphis?

  WILLIE: Naw.

  TOM: New Awleuns?

  WILLIE: Naw.

  TOM: St. Louis?

  WILLIE: You’ll never guess.

  TOM: Where is she then? (Willie does not answer at once.)

  WILLIE: (very solemnly) She’s in the bone-orchard.

  TOM: What?

  WILLIE: (violently) Bone-orchard, cemetery, graveyard! Don’t you understand English?

  TOM: Sure. That’s pretty tough.

  WILLIE: You don’t know the half of it, buddy. We used to have some high old times in that big yellow house.

  TOM: I bet you did.

  WILLIE: Musical instruments going all of the time.

  TOM: Instruments? What kind?

  WILLIE: Piano, victrola, Hawaiian steel guitar. Everyone played on something. But now it’s—awful quiet. You don’t hear a sound from there, do you?

  TOM: Naw. Is it empty?

  WILLIE: Except for me. They got a big sign stuck up.

  TOM: What does it say?

  WILLIE: (loudly but with a slight catch) “THIS PROPERTY IS CONDEMNED!”

  TOM: You ain’t still living there?

  WILLIE: Uh-huh.

  TOM: What happened? Where did everyone go?

  WILLIE: Mama run off with a brakeman on the C. & E. I. After that everything went to pieces. (A train whistles far off.) You hear that whistle? That’s the Cannonball Express. The fastest thing on wheels between St. Louis, New Awleuns an’ Memphis. My old man got to drinking.

  TOM: Where is he now?

  WILLIE: Disappeared. I guess I ought to refer his case to the Bureau of Missing Persons. The same as he done with Mama when she disappeared. Then there was me and Alva. Till Alva’s lungs got affected. Did you see Greta Garbo in Camille? It played at the Delta Brilliant one time las’ spring. She had the same what Alva died of. Lung affection.

  TOM: Yeah?

  WILLIE: Only it was—very beautiful the way she had it. You know. Violins playing. And loads and loads of white flowers. All of her lovers come back in a beautiful scene!

  TOM: Yeah?

  WILLIE: But Alva’s all disappeared.

  TOM: Yeah?

  WILLIE: Like rats from a sinking ship! That’s how she used to describe it. Oh, it—wasn’t like death in the movies.

  TOM: Naw?

  WILLIE: She says, “Where is Albert? Where’s Clemence?” None of them was around. I used to lie to her, I says, “They send their regards. They’re coming to see you tomorrow.” “Where’s Mr. Johnson?” she asked me. He was the freight sup’rintendent, the most important character we ever had in our rooming-house. “He’s been transferred to Grenada,” I told her. “But wishes to be remembered.” She known I was lying.

  TOM: Yeah?

  WILLIE: “This here is the pay-off!” she says. “They all run out on me like rats from a sinking ship!” Except Sidney.

  TOM: Who was Sidney?

  WILLIE: The one that used to give her the great big enormous red-silk box of American Beauty choc’lates.

  TOM: Oh.

  WILLIE: He remained faithful to her.

  TOM: That’s good.

  WILLIE: But she never did care for Sidney. She said his teeth was decayed so he didn’t smell good.

  TOM: Aw!

  WILLIE: It wasn’t like death in the movies. When somebody dies in the movies they play violins.

  TOM: But they didn’t for Alva.

  WILLIE: Naw. Not even a goddam victrola. They said it didn’t agree with the hospital regulations. Always singing around the house.

  TOM: Who? Alva?

  WILLIE: Throwing enormous parties. This was her favorite number. (She closes her eyes and stretches out her arms in the simulated rapture of the professional blues singer. Her voice is extraordinarily high and pure with a precocious emotional timbre.)

  You’re the only star

  In my blue hea-ven

  And you’re shining just

  For me!

  This is her clothes I got on. Inherited from her. Everything Alva’s is mine. Except her solid gold beads.

  TOM: What happened to them?

  WILLIE: Them? She never took ‘em off.

  TOM: Oh!

  WILLIE: I’ve also inherited all of my sister’s beaux. Albert and Clemence and even the freight sup’rintendent.

  TOM: Yeah?

  WILLIE: They all disappeared. Afraid that they might get stuck for expenses I guess. But now they turn up again, all of ‘em, like a bunch of bad pennies. They take me out places at night. I’ve got to be popular now. To parties an’ dances an’ all of the railroad affairs. Lookit here!

  TOM: What?

  WILLIE: I can do bumps! (She stands in front of him and shoves her stomach toward him in a series of spasmodic jerks.)

  TOM: Frank Waters said that . . .

  WILLIE: What?

  TOM: You know.

  WILLIE: Know what?

  TOM: You took him inside and danced for him with your clothes off.

  WILLIE: Oh. Crazy Doll’s hair ne
eds washing. I’m scared to wash it though ‘cause her head might come unglued where she had that compound fracture of the skull. I think that most of her brains spilled out. She’s been acting silly ever since. Saying an’ doing the most outrageous things.

  TOM: Why don’t you do that for me?

  WILLIE: What? Put glue on your compound fracture?

  TOM: Naw. What you did for Frank Waters.

  WILLIE: Because I was lonesome then an’ I’m not lonesome now. You can tell Frank Waters that. Tell him that I’ve inherited all of my sister’s beaux. I go out steady with men in responsible jobs. The sky sure is white. Ain’t it? White as a clean piece of paper. In Five A we used to draw pictures. Miss Preston would give us a piece of white foolscap an’ tell us to draw what we pleased.

  TOM: What did you draw?

  WILLIE: I remember I drawn her a picture one time of my old man getting conked with a bottle. She thought it was good, Miss Preston, she said, “Look here. Here’s a picture of Charlie Chaplin with his hat on the side of his head!” I said, “Aw, naw, that’s not Charlie Chaplin, that’s my father, an’ that’s not his hat, it’s a bottle!”

  TOM: What did she say?

  WILLIE: Oh, well. You can’t make a school-teacher laugh.

  You’re the only star

  In my blue hea-VEN . . .

  The principal used to say there must’ve been something wrong with my home atmosphere because of the fact that we took in railroad men an’ some of ‘em slept with my sister.

  TOM: Did they?

  WILLIE: She was The Main Attraction. The house is sure empty now.

  TOM: You ain’t still living there, are you?

  WILLIE: Sure.

  TOM: By yourself?

  WILLIE: Uh-huh. I’m not supposed to be but I am. The property is condemned but there’s nothing wrong with it. Some county investigator come snooping around yesterday. I recognized her by the shape of her hat. It wasn’t exactly what I would call stylish-looking.

  TOM: Naw?

  WILLIE: It looked like something she took off the lid of the stove. Alva knew lots about style. She had ambitions to be a designer for big wholesale firms in Chicago. She used to submit her pictures. It never worked out.

  You’re the only star

  In my blue hea-ven . . .

  TOM: What did you do? About the investigators?

  WILLIE: Laid low upstairs. Pretended like no one was home.

  TOM: Well, how do you manage to keep on eating?

  WILLIE: Oh, I don’t know. You keep a sharp look-out you see things lying around. This banana, perfectly good, for instance. Thrown in a garbage pail in back of the Blue Bird Café. (She finishes the banana and tosses away the feel.)

  TOM: (grinning) Yeh. Miss Preston for instance.

  WILLIE: Naw, not her. She gives you a white piece of paper, says “Draw what you please!” One time I drawn her a picture of— Oh, but I told you that, huh? Will you give Frank Waters a message?

  TOM: What?

  WILLIE: Tell him the freight sup’rintendent has bought me a pair of kid slippers. Patent. The same as the old ones of Alva’s. I’m going to dances with them at Moon Lake Casino. All night I’ll be dancing an’ come home drunk in the morning! We’ll have serenades with all kinds of musical instruments. Trumpets an’ trombones. An’ Hawaiian steel guitars. Yeh! Yeh! (She rises excitedly.) The sky will be white like this.

  TOM: (impressed) Will it?

  WILLIE: Uh-huh. (She smiles vaguely and turns slowly toward him.) White—as a clean—piece of paper . . . (then excitedly) I’ll draw—pictures on it!

  TOM: Will you?

  WILLIE: Sure!

  TOM: Pictures of what?

  WILLIE: Me dancing! With the freight sup’rintendent! In a pair of patent kid shoes! Yeh! Yeh! With French heels on them as high as telegraph poles! An’ they’ll play my favorite music!

  TOM: Your favorite?

  WILLIE: Yeh. The same as Alva’s. (breathlessly, passionately)

  You’re the only STAR—

  In my blue HEA-VEN . . .

  I’ll—

  TOM: What?

  WILLIE: I’ll—wear a corsage!

  TOM: What’s that?

  WILLIE: Flowers to pin on your dress at a formal affair! Rosebuds! Violets! And lilies-of-the-valley! When you come home it’s withered but you stick ‘em in a bowl of water to freshen ‘em up.

  TOM: Uh-huh.

  WILLIE: That’s what Alva done. (She pauses, and in the silence the train whistles.) The Cannonball Express . . .

  TOM: You think a lot about Alva. Don’t you?

  WILLIE: Oh, not so much. Now an’ then. It wasn’t like death in the movies. Her beaux disappeared. An’ they didn’t have violins playing. I’m going back now.

  TOM: Where to, Willie?

  WILLIE: The water-tank.

  TOM: Yeah?

  WILLIE: An’ start all over again. Maybe I’ll break some kind of continuous record. Alva did once. At a dance marathon in Mobile. Across the state line. Alabama. You can tell Frank Waters everything that I told you. I don’t have time for inexperienced people. I’m going out now with popular railroad men, men with good salaries, too. Don’t you believe me?

  TOM: No. I think you’re drawing an awful lot on your imagination.

  WILLIE: Well, if I wanted to I could prove it. But you wouldn’t be worth convincing. (She smooths out Crazy Doll’s hair.) I’m going to live for a long, long time like my sister. An’ when my lungs get affected I’m going to die like she did—maybe not like in the movies, with violins playing—but with my pearl earrings on an’ my solid gold beads from Memphis. . . .

  TOM: Yes?

  WILLIE: (examining Crazy Doll very critically) An’ then I guess—

  TOM: What?

  WILLIE: (gaily but with a slight catch) Somebody else will inherit all of my beaux! The sky sure is white.

  TOM: It sure is.

  WILLIE: White as a clean piece of paper. I’m going back now.

  TOM: So long.

  WILLIE: Yeh. So long. (She starts back along the railroad track, weaving grotesquely to keep her balance. She disappears. Tom wets his finger and holds it up to test the wind. Willie is heard singing from a distance.)

  You’re the only star

  In my blue heaven—

  (There is a brief pause. The stage begins to darken.)

  An’ you’re shining just—

  For me!

  CURTAIN

  Talk to Me Like the Rain And Let Me Listen. . .

  CHARACTERS

  MAN

  WOMAN

  CHILD’S VOICE (off stage)

  Talk to Me Like the Rain And Let Me Listen...

  SCENE: A furnished room west of Eighth Avenue in midtown Manhattan. On a folding bed lies a Man in crumpled underwear, struggling out of sleep with the sighs of a man who went to bed very drunk. A Woman sits in a straight chair at the room’s single window, outlined dimly against a sky heavy with a rain that has not yet begun to fall. The Woman is holding a tumbler of water from which she takes small, jerky sips like a bird drinking. Both of them have ravaged young faces like the faces of children in a famished country. In their speech there is a sort of politeness, a sort of tender formality like that of two lonely children who want to be friends, and yet there is an impression that they have lived in this intimate situation for a long time and that the present scene between them is the repetition of one that has been repeated so often that its plausible emotional contents, such as reproach and contrition, have been completely worn out and there is nothing left but acceptance of something hopelessly inalterable between them.

  MAN: (hoarsely) What time is it? (The Woman murmurs something inaudible.) What, honey?

  WOMAN: Sunday.

  MAN: I know it’s Sunday. You never wind the clock.

  (The Woman stretches a thin bare arm out of the ravelled, pink rayon sleeve of her kimona and picks up the tumbler of water and the weight of it seems to pull her forward a little. The Man watches solemnl
y, tenderly from the bed as she sips the water. A thin music begins, hesitantly, repeating a phrase several times as if someone in a next room were trying to remember a song on a mandolin. Sometimes a phrase is sung in Spanish. The song could be Estrellita.)

  (Rain begins; it comes and goes during the play; there is a drumming flight of pigeons past the window and a child’s voice chants outside—)

  CHILD’S VOICE: Rain, rain, go away!

  Come again some other day!

  (The chant is echoed, mockingly by another child farther away.)

  MAN: (finally) I wonder if I cashed my unemployment. (The Woman leans forward with the weight of the glass seeming to pull her; sets it down on the window-sill with a small crash that seems to startle her. She laughs breathlessly for a moment. The Man continues, without much hope.) I hope I didn’t cash my unemployment. Where’s my clothes? Look in my pockets and see if I got the cheque on me.

  WOMAN: You came back while I was out looking for you and picked the cheque up and left a note on the bed that I couldn’t make out.

  MAN: You couldn’t make out the note?

  WOMAN: Only a telephone number. I called the number but there was so much noise I couldn’t hear.

  MAN: Noise? Here?

  WOMAN: No, noise there.

  MAN: Where was “there"?

  WOMAN: I don’t know. Somebody said come over and hung up and all I got afterwards was a busy signal . . .

  MAN: When I woke up I was in a bathtub full of melting ice-cubes and Miller’s High Life beer. My skin was blue. I was gasping for breath in a bathtub full of ice-cubes. It was near a river but I don’t know if it was the East or the Hudson. People do terrible things to a person when he’s unconscious in this city. I’m sore all over like I’d been kicked downstairs, not like I fell but was kicked. One time I remember all my hair was shaved off. Another time they stuffed me into a trash-can in the alley and I’ve come to with cuts and burns on my body. Vicious people abuse you when you’re unconscious. When I woke up I was naked in a bathtub full of melting ice-cubes. I crawled out and went into the parlor and someone was going out of the other door as I came in and I opened the door and heard the door of an elevator shut and saw the doors of a corridor in a hotel. The TV was on and there was a record playing at the same time; the parlor was full of rolling tables loaded with stuff from Room Service, and whole hams, whole turkeys, three-decker sandwiches cold and turning stiff, and bottles and bottles and bottles of all kinds of liquors that hadn’t even been opened and buckets of ice-cubes melting . . . Somebody closed a door as I came in . . . (The Woman sips water.) As I came in someone was going out. I heard a door shut and I went to the door and heard the door of an elevator shut . . . (The Woman sets her glass down.)— All over the floor of this pad near the river—articles—clothing—scattered . . . (The Woman gasps as a flight of pigeons sweeps past the open window.)— Bras! — Panties!—Shirts, ties, socks—and so forth . . .