Sweet Bird of Youth Read online

  CHANCE: Sure you've had enough of it?

  PRINCESS [laughing breathlessly]: Yes, for God's sake, take it away. I must look hideous in it.

  CHANCE [taking the mask]: No, no, you just look exotic, like a Princess from Mars or a big

  magnified insect.

  PRINCESS: Thank you, check the cylinder please.

  CHANCE: For what?

  PRINCESS: Check the air left in it; there's a gauge on the cylinder that gives the pressure. . . .

  CHANCE: You're still breathing like a quarter horse that's been run a full mile. Are you sure you don't want a doctor?

  PRINCESS: No, for God's sake . . . no!

  CHANCE: Why are you so scared of doctors?

  PRINCESS [hoarsely, quickly]: I don't need them. What happened is nothing at all. It happens

  frequently to me. Something disturbs me . . . adrenaline's pumped in my blood and I get short-winded, that's all, that's all there is to it. . . . I woke up, I didn't know where I was or who I was with, I got panicky . . . adrenaline was released and I got short-winded. . . .

  CHANCE: Are you okay now, Princess? Huh? [He kneels on the, bed, and helps straighten up

  the pillows.]

  PRINCESS: Not quite yet, but I will be. I will be.

  CHANCE: You're full of complexes, plump lady.

  PRINCESS: What did you call me?

  CHANCE: Plump lady.

  PRINCESS: Why do you call me that? Have I let go of my figure?

  CHANCE: You put on a good deal of weight after that disappointment you had last month.

  PRINCESS [hitting him with a small pillow]: What disappointment? I don't remember any.

  CHANCE: Can you control your memory like that?

  PRINCESS: Yes. I've had to learn to. What is this place, a hospital? And you, what are you, a male nurse?

  CHANCE: I take care of you but I'm not your nurse.

  PRINCESS: But you're employed by me, aren't you? For some purpose or other?

  CHANCE: I'm not on salary with you.

  PRINCESS: What are you on? Just expenses?

  CHANCE: Yep. You're footing the bills.

  PRINCESS: I see. Yes, I see.

  CHANCE: Why're you rubbing your eyes?

  PRINCESS: My vision's so cloudy! Don't I wear glasses, don't I have any glasses?

  CHANCE: You had a little accident with your glasses,

  PRINCESS: What was that?

  CHANCE: You fell on your face with them on.

  PRINCESS: Were they completely demolished?

  CHANCE: One lens cracked.

  PRINCESS: Well, please give me the remnants. I don't mind waking up in an intimate situation

  with someone, but I like to see who it's with, so I can make whatever adjustment seems called for. . . .

  CHANCE [rising and going to the trunk, where he lights cigarette]: You know what I look like.

  PRINCESS: No, I don't.

  CHANCE: You did.

  PRINCESS: I tell you I don't remember, it's all gone away!

  CHANCE: I don't believe in amnesia.

  PRINCESS: Neither do I. But you have to believe a thing that happens to you.

  CHANCE: Where did I put your glasses?

  PRINCESS: Don't ask me. You say I fell on them. If I was in that condition I wouldn't be likely to know where anything is I had with me. What happened last night?

  [He has picked them up but not given them to her.]

  CHANCE: You knocked yourself out.

  PRINCESS: Did we sleep here together?

  CHANCE: Yes, but I didn't molest you.

  PRINCESS: Should I thank you for that, or accuse you of cheating? [She laughs sadly.]

  CHANCE: I like you, you're a nice monster.

  PRINCESS: Your voice sounds young. Are you young?

  CHANCE: My age is twenty-nine years.

  PRINCESS: That's young for anyone but an Arab. Are you very good-looking?

  CHANCE: I used to be the best-looking boy in this town.

  PRINCESS: How large is the town?

  CHANCE: Fair-sized.

  PRINCESS: Well, I like a good mystery novel, I read them to put me to sleep and if they don't put me to sleep, they're good; but this one's a little too good for comfort. I wish you would find me my glasses. . . .

  [He reaches over headboard to hand the glasses to her. She puts them on and looks him

  over. Then she motions him to come nearer and touches his bare chest with her finger tips.]

  Well, I may have done better, but God knows I've done worse,

  CHANCE: What are you doing now, Princess?

  PRINCESS: The tactile approach.

  CHANCE: You do that like you were feeling a piece of goods to see if it was genuine silk or

  phony. . . .

  PRINCESS: It feels like silk. Genuine! This much I do remember, that I like bodies to be

  hairless, silky-smooth gold!

  CHANCE: Do I meet these requirements?

  PRINCESS: You seem to meet those requirements. But I still have a feeling that something is

  not satisfied in the relation between us.

  CHANCE [moving away from her]: You've had your experiences, I've had mine. You can't

  expect everything to be settled at once. . . . Two different experiences of two different people.

  Naturally there's some things that have to be settled between them before there's any absolute agreement.

  PRINCESS [throwing the glasses on the bed]: Take that splintered lens out before it gets in my eye.

  CHANCE [obeying this instruction by knocking the glasses sharply on the bed table]: You like

  to give orders, don't you?

  PRINCESS: It's something I seem to be used to.

  CHANCE: How would you like to take them? To be a slave?

  PRINCESS: What time is it?

  CHANCE: My watch is in hock somewhere. Why don't you look at yours?

  PRINCESS: Where's mine?

  [He reaches lazily over to the table, and hands it to her.]

  CHANCE: It's stopped, at five past seven.

  PRINCESS: Surely it's later than that, or earlier, that's no hour when I'm . . .

  CHANCE: Platinum, is it?

  PRINCESS: No, it's only white gold. I never travel with anything very expensive.

  CHANCE: Why? Do you get robbed much? Huh? Do you get 'rolled' often?

  PRINCESS: Get what?

  CHANCE: 'Rolled'. Isn't that expression in your vocabulary?

  PRINCESS: Give me the phone.

  CHANCE: For what?

  PRINCESS: I said give me the phone.

  CHANCE: I know. And I said for what?

  PRINCESS: I want to inquire where I am and who is with me?

  CHANCE: Take it easy.

  PRINCESS: Will you give me the phone?

  CHANCE: Relax. You're getting short-winded again. . . .

  [He takes hold of her shoulders.]

  PRINCESS: Please let go of me.

  CHANCE: Don't you feel secure with me? Lean back. Lean back against me.

  PRINCESS: Lean back?

  CHANCE: This way, this way. There . . .

  [He pulls her into his arms. She rests in them, panting a little like a trapped rabbit.]

  PRINCESS: It gives you an awful trapped feeling this, this memory block. . . . I feel as if

  someone I loved had died lately, and I don't want to remember who it could be.

  CHANCE: Do you remember your name?

  PRINCESS: Yes, I do.

  CHANCE: What's your name?

  PRINCESS: I think there's some reason why I prefer not to tell you.

  CHANCE: Well, I happen to know it. You registered under a phony name in Palm Beach but I

  discovered your real one. And you admitted it to me.

  PRINCESS: I'm the Princess Kosmonopolis.

  CHANCE: Yes, and you used to be known as . . .

  PRINCESS [sitting up sharply]: No, stop . . . will you let me do it? Quietly, in my own way?

  The last p
lace I remem--brr . . .

  CHANCE: What's the last place you remember?

  PRINCESS: A town with the crazy name of Tallahassee.

  CHANCE: Yeah. We drove through there. That's where I reminded you that today would be

  Sunday and we ought to lay in a supply of liquor to get us through it without us being

  dehydrated too severely, and so we stopped there but it was a college town and we had some

  trouble locating a package store, open. . . .

  PRINCESS: But we did, did we?

  CHANCE [getting up for the bottle and pouring her a drink]: Oh, sure, we bought three bottles of vodka. You curled up in the back seat with one of those bottles and when I looked back you were blotto. I intended to stay on the old Spanish Trail straight through to Texas, where you had some oil wells to look at. I didn't stop here . . . I was stopped.

  PRINCESS: What by, a cop? Or . . .

  CHANCE: No. No cop, but I was arrested by something.

  PRINCESS: My car. Where is my car?

  CHANCE [handing her the drink]: In the hotel parking lot, Princess.

  PRINCESS: Oh, then, this is a hotel?

  CHANCE: It's the elegant old Royal Palms Hotel in the town of St Cloud.

  [Gulls Fly past window, shadows sweeping the blind: they cry out with soft urgency.]

  PRINCESS: Those pigeons out there sound hoarse. They sound like gulls to me. Of course,

  they could be pigeons with laryngitis.

  [Chance glances at her with his flickering smile and laughs softly.]

  Will you help me please? I'm about to get up.

  CHANCE: What do you want? I'll get it.

  PRINCESS: I want to go to the window.

  CHANCE: What for?

  PRINCESS: To look out of it.

  CHANCE: I can describe the view to you.

  PRINCESS: I'm not sure I'd trust your description. WELL?

  CHANCE: Okay, oopsa-daisy.

  PRINCESS: My God! I said help me up, not . . . toss me on to the carpet! [Sways dizzily a

  moment, clutching bed. Then draws a breath and crosses to the window.]

  [The Princess pauses as she gazes out, squinting into noon's brilliance.]

  CHANCE: Well, what do you see? Give me your description of the view, Princess?

  PRINCESS [facing the audience]: I see a palm garden.

  CHANCE: And a four-lane highway just past it.

  PRINCESS [squinting and shielding her eyes]: Yes, I see that and a strip of beach with some

  bathers and then, an infinite stretch of nothing but water and . . . [She cries softly and turns away from the window.]

  CHANCE: What? . . .

  PRINCESS: Oh God, I remember the thing I wanted not to. The goddam end of my life! [She

  draws a deep shuddering breath.]

  CHANCE [running to her aid]: What's the matter?!

  PRINCESS: Help me back to bed. Oh God, no wonder I didn't want to remember, I was no

  fool!

  [He assists her to the bed. There is an unmistakable sympathy in his manner, however

  shallow.]

  CHANCE: Oxygen?

  PRINCESS [drawing another deep shuddering breath]: No! Where's the stuff? Did you leave it in the car?

  CHANCE: Oh, the stuff? Under the mattress. [Moving to the other side of the bed, he pulls out a small pouch.]

  PRINCESS: A stupid place to put it.

  CHANCE [sitting at the foot of the bed]: What's wrong with under the mattress?

  PRINCESS [sitting up on the edge of the bed]: There's such a thing as chambermaids in the

  world, they make up beds, they come across lumps in a mattress.

  CHANCE: This isn't pot. What is it?

  PRINCESS: Wouldn't that be pretty? A year in jail in one of those model prisons for

  distinguished addicts. What is it? Don't you know what it is, you beautiful, stupid young man?

  It's hashish, Moroccan, the finest.

  CHANCE: Oh, hash! How'd you get it through customs when you came back for your come-

  back?

  PRINCESS: I didn't get it through customs. The ship's doctor gave me injections while this

  stuff was winging over the ocean to a shifty young gentleman who thought he could blackmail

  me for it. [She puts on her slippers with a vigorous gesture.]

  CHANCE: Couldn't he?

  PRINCESS: Of course not. I called his bluff.

  CHANCE: You took injections coming over?

  PRINCESS: With my neuritis? I had to. Come on, give it to me.

  CHANCE: Don't you want it packed right?

  PRINCESS: You talk too much. You ask too many questions. I need something quick. [She

  rises.]

  CHANCE: I'm a new hand at this.

  PRINCESS: I'm sure, or you wouldn't discuss it in a hotel room. . . .

  [She turns to the audience, and intermittently changes the focus of her attention.]

  For years they all told me that it was ridiculous of me to feel that I couldn't go back to

  the screen or the stage as a middle-aged woman. They told me I was an artist, not just a star whose career depended on youth. But I knew in my heart that the legend of Alexandra Del Lago

  couldn't be separated from an appearance of youth. . . . There's no more valuable knowledge

  than knowing the right time to go. I knew it. I went at the right time to go.

  RETIRED! Where to? To what? To that dead planet the moon. . . .

  There's nowhere else to retire to when you retire from an art because, believe it or not, I

  really was once an artist. So I retired to the moon, but the atmosphere of the moon doesn't have any oxygen in it. I began to feel breathless, in that withered, withering country, of time coming after time not meant to come after, and so I discovered . . . Haven't you fixed it yet?

  [Chance rises and goes to her with a cigarette he has been preparing.]

  Discovered

  this!

  And other practices like it, to put to sleep the tiger that raged in my nerves. . . . Why the unsatisfied tiger? In the nerves' jungle? Why is anything, anywhere, unsatisfied, and raging? . . .

  Ask somebody's good doctor. But don't believe his answer because it isn't . . . the

  answer . . . if I had just been old but you see, I wasn't old. . . .

  I just wasn't young, not young, young. I just wasn't young any more. . . .

  CHANCE: Nobody's young any more. . . .

  PRINCESS: But you see, I couldn't get old with that tiger, still in me raging.

  CHANCE: Nobody can get old. . . .

  PRINCESS: Stars in retirement sometimes give acting lessons. Or take up painting, paint

  flowers on pots, or landscapes. I could have painted the landscapes of the endless, withering country in which I wandered like a lost nomad. If I could paint deserts and nomads, if I could paint . . . hahaha. . . .

  CHANCE: Sh-Sh-sh-

  PRINCESS: Sorry!

  CHANCE: Smoke.

  PRINCESS: Yes, smoke! And then the young lovers . . .

  CHANCE: Me?

  PRINCESS: You? Yes, finally you. But you come after the come-back. Ha . . . Ha . . . The

  glorious come-back, when I turned fool and came back. . . . The screen's a very clear mirror.

  There's a thing called a close-up. The camera advances and you stand still and your head, your

  face, is caught in the frame of the picture with a light blazing on it and all your terrible history screams while you smile. . . .

  CHANCE: How do you know? Maybe it wasn't a failure, maybe you were just scared, just

  chicken, Princess. . . ha-ha-ha . . .

  PRINCESS: Not a failure . . . after that close-up they gasped. . . . People gasped. . . . I heard them whisper, their shocked whispers. Is that her? Is that her? Her? . . . I made the mistake of wearing a very elaborate gown to the premire, a gown with a train that had to be gathered up as I rose from my seat and began the interminable retreat from th
e city of flames, up, up, up the unbearably long theatre aisle, gasping for breath and still clutching up the regal white train of my gown, all the way up the forever . . . length of the aisle, and behind me some small