Script: Mary Rose (1964)

The following is based on Jay Presson Allen's second draft of "Mary Rose", dated February 15th, 1964.

A number of typos have been corrected, along with the unusual attempts at a Gaelic accent — for example, "very" is typed as "ferry" in the original draft when spoken by Cameron — which is spelling carried over from J.M. Barrie's original play.

Time Periods

The draft takes place over several years and Allen gives the character's ages as follows:

1896

MARY ROSE is 18.

SIMON is 33.

MR. MORLAND is 50.

MRS. MORLAND is 49.

MR. AMY is (approx.) 47.

1898

KENNETH is born.

1900

MARY ROSE disappears.

CAMERON is (approx.) 22.

1913

MARY ROSE returns.

MR. MORLAND is now 72

MRS. MORIAND is 71.

SIMON is 55.

MR. AMY is 69.

CAMERON is 40.

1939

KENNETH’S return to house.

He is 41.

Character Descriptions

KENNETH

Fair and blue-eyed like mother (Mary Rose)

SIMON

Tall man - dark - heavily built. Habitually rather solemn; he has a quality of passion.

MRS. OTERY

Old, gaunt, narrow-eyed.

CAMERON (at 22)

Old-young man ... gawky youth.

Scene 1

FADE IN:

Our picture opens on a fairly distant shot of The Island, lonely, sun-speckled yet mist-dim, somehow unsubstantial. Slowly, the CAMERA moves closer as a man’s voice speaks. It is a Highlander’s soft voice.

CAMERON (o.s.)

Well, there it is. The Island. A mossy bank, a soft bit of sod, a spot to rest your oars and sit and sun yourself a spell. Somehow the sun does seem to favor the place. A toy island... a wee insignificant bit of grass and stone... as tranquil looking a piece of real estate as anyone could fancy. Stop! Stop here!

THE CAMERA obeys.

CAMERON (cont’d) (o.s.)

We’ll go no closer. Not again. Not ever again.

(draws a deep breath and speaks words in Gaelic)

That is its name in Gaelic. In English it means The Island That Likes to be Visited.

(his voice deeply ironic)

Visited indeed. There are those who have found the island hospitable to a fault. There are those who have found the island... hungry… for visitors...

FADE OUT.

FADE IN:

Scene 2

LONG SHOT, HIGH, of a country house, not really isolated, but somehow alienated from its neighbours. It is run-down, neglected, empty and... even in the light of mid-afternoon... dark. Over this scene we once more hear the O.S. voice of CAMERON.

CAMERON (o.s.) (sighing)

Yes... another choice bit of real estate. But here... there is no invitation here... no beckoning... no wanting to be visited. And yet this house... this house and the Island are for all time linked moat tragically together...

The voice fades as a jeep, vintage World War II, canes down the road, slowing down and finally stopping in front of the house. The CAMERA closes in and by the time the back door opens and a man, an American officer in battle dress, gets out of the car, we are in MEDIUM CLOSE-UP. The man turns and faces the house as if confronting it. His eyes narrow speculatively as he slowly, deliberately, takes in the dark decay of the place, the ‘FOR SALE’ sign, itself now old and forlornly awry on its base.

At last the man moves across the weedy stretch of lawn, mounts the steps, starts to knock, changes his mind and tries the door. It opens easily, and he steps into the house, closing the door gently behind him.

Scene 3

He finds himself in a small entrance hall. On either side of him are closed-off rooms. Before him is a staircase curving gracefully upward. A pale light dimly penetrates the dirty fanlight above the door, making it possible for the man... and for us... to make out the gracious lines of the architecture. Even now, in this sorry state, one can imagine how inviting, how warm, this small manor house must once have been.

Without haste, the man takes in the sight, the ambiance. But, though unhurried, he wastes no time, far his interest his focus of attention, seems to be on the staircase and on the unseen floor above.

Slowly, he begins to mount the stairs. At the top, he discovers a door, open upon a dark and deeply silent room. Quietly, he enters. All of this room’s past, which can be taken away, has gone. Such light as there is... no more than enough to make shadows.. .comes from the only window, which is at the back and incompletely shrouded in sacking. Also toward the back of the room is another door. - It is closed. As his eyes adjust to the dark, they circle the room, taking in the peeling wallpaper, the desolated, deserted sadness of it all, until finally his eyes cane to rest upon the only furnishings in the room... if two upended packing cases and a chair may be called furnishings. 

On top of one of the cases is an unlighted candle in a holder, and beside it is a chair, the back of which is turned toward the man. These objects seem only to add to the impression of empty desertion. And then, in the dark, the man becomes slowly conscious of the faintest, almost indiscernible movement. It is in the chair. He freezes. There is a moment of utterly suspended animation. Then he speaks, his voice hardly a whisper.

KENNETH

Who’s there?

THE CAMERA closes in tight on the chair, as from its depth the movement takes shape and turns to face the man. In the chair is a woman, old, gaunt, narrow-eyed... as frightened by the man as he has been by her. Only when her old gimlet eyes observe the obviously corporeal nature of the intruder, does she let out her breath. Hostilely, she regards him.

MRS. OTERY

What do you think you’re up to here now! This here’s private property!

KENNETH (relaxes, almost smiles)

And you must be the caretaker. Your name is... ?

MRS. OTERY

(compelled against herself to answer his gentle, but utterly assured command)

Mrs. Otery.

(trying to regain her authority)

Mrs. Harry Otery, that’s who. And I’m in charge of this house. It’s my job to show it to prospective purchasers with appointments.

KENNETH

Really? From the looks of things, I shouldn’t think you’d find yourself very busy.

MRS. OTERY (firmly)

Also I’m to see that no mischief makers come pokin’ around...

KENNETH

Good for you, but aren’t you allowed a bit of light? Why were you sitting here in the dark when you’ve plenty of candles there...

MRS. OTERY

I’m not one to waste good candlelight when I’m sitting alone. There’s a war on, Mister.

KENNETH (cheerfully)

Right you are, Mrs. Otery. But I don’t think our common cause will be fatally compromised if we burn an inch or so of that candle.

He attempts to light candle, but the wick has burned too low. He then removes a knife, a rather large, lethal-looking instrument, from inside his jacket and with it begins to carve the wick out of the wax.

MRS. OTERY (at the sight of the knife)

‘Ere now... what are you carrying a wicked thing like that for?

KENNETH

As you rightfully pointed out. Madam, there’s a war on. Government issue.

He now lights the candle and in its feeble, flicking light, begins to look around the room. The light shows MRS. OTERY nothing she has not already seen; her attention is still riveted on the knife. We follow KENNETH’s examination of the room as MRS. OTERY speaks.

MRS. OTERY (suspiciously)

Wot government? Knives is a nasty, foreign sort of weapon, I’d say.

KENNETH

Not at all. In this year of our Lord knives are the calling cards of even proper English gentlemen.

To tease her, he picks up the knife and casts it at one of the packing cases where it sticks, quivering in the wood.

KENNETH (cont’d)

One leaves it on favored parties, like that.

He moves away, looks about the room as memories come worrying up in him.

KENNETH (cont’d)

There were peacocks... somewhere...

MRS. OTERY (indignantly)

Peacocks! Wot peacocks?

KENNETH

Long ago... in this room... decorations...

MRS. OTERY

Oh, them sort of peacocks. I was told a cloth used to hang on the wall there... tapestries they’re called, and that it had pictures of peacocks on it. How would you know?

KENNETH (not really addressing her)

This was the living-room...

MRS. OTERY (quotes from some brochure) ‘Specially charming is the drawing-room with its superb view of the Downs. This room is upstairs and is approached by...

KENNETH

By a stair, containing some superbly romantic rat-holes.

(moves to window)

There’s an apple tree outside there, with one of its branches scraping against the window...

(smiles)

It was my own private entrance and exit...

He pulls aside the sacking, which lets in a little more light. We see that the window, which reaches to the floor, opens outwards. There is, however, no tree. The man stares in disappointment, lets out his breath.

KENNETH (cont’d)

Ah...

MRS. OTERY

Well, there was a tree, I believe. You can see the root if you look down.

KENNETH (at the window)

Yes. Yes, I see it in the long grass. And a bit of the seat that used to be around it. There were blue curtains at the window, and there was a sofa at this end, and I had my first swimming lessons on it.

(turns, smiles wryly at the sour, indifferent old woman)

You are a fortunate woman to be here drinking in these moving memories.

She eyes him narrowly.

KENNETH (cont’d)

I was hoping you would like to show me around the other rooms.

MRS. OTERY shrugs, stands, moves as if to stairs, but the little door at the back has caught his eye.

KENNETH

That door...

MRS. OTERY (avoiding looking at the door)

It’s nothing. Just a cupboard door. Come this way.

KENNETH (turns back toward the door)

It leads into a little dark passage...

MRS. OTERY (agrees... too quickly)

Yes. That’s all.

KENNETH

No — no... it leads — it leads to a single room. Yes. And the door of the room faces this way.

Quickly, before she can stop him, he opens the door, disclosing, as he had surmised, another door beyond. He turns on her.

KENNETH (cont’d) (sharply)

Why did you say it was only a cupboard?

MRS. OTERY

It’s of no consequence, sir. No consequence.

KENNETH

The room has... two stone windows... and wooden rafters...

MRS. OTERY

It’s the oldest part of the house.

KENNETH

I once slept there — when I was very young — I can’t really remember, but it is a bedroom.

MRS. OTERY

Was.

(insistent)

If you’ll come down with me...

KENNETH

No. I’m curious to see that room...

She steps in front of him, barring his way, thin-lipped, determined.

MRS. OTERY

No.

He gives a piercing look toward the room, then back at the woman, his face shows the beginning of understanding

KENNETH

Ah...

MRS. OTERY

You cannot go in there.

KENNETH (softly; deceptively casual)

Indeed, Mrs. Otery? For what reason?

MRS. OTERY

It’s locked. It’s kept locked.

KENNETH

Since you are the caretaker, you must have the key.

MRS. OTERY

It’s ... lost.

KENNETH

Then why were you so anxious to stop me? When you knew I would find the door locked?

MRS. OTERY

Sometimes it’s locked; sometimes not.

KENNETH

Oh? Then it’s not you who locks it?

MRS. OTERY (grimly)

Not me.

KENNETH

Then who? Who has the key if not you, the lawful caretaker? Who locks and unlocks the door… without, I take it, leave from you?

MRS. OTERY (defiantly)

Wot’s any of this got to do with you? You didn’t come here with any sort of proper appointment! I’m not obliged to show you around nor answer no impertinent questions neither!

KENNETH (still softly)

Who, Mrs. Otery? Who locks the door?

MRS. OTERY (her defiance flickering out)

It’s never locked... it’s... it’s held.

KENNETH (eyes her curiously)

You’re shivering, Mrs. Otery. Are you cold? Here...

He bends down to the grate of the fireplace and puts a match to the few sticks there.

KENNETH (cont’d)

May I light these bits of sticks?

MRS. OTERY (stubbornly resisting, but not ungrateful for the feeble little flames)

Ask after you’ve done it! My orders are to have fires once a week, no more.

KENNETH (now turns and addresses her directly, casually)

What is wrong with this house?

MRS. OTERY (again on guard)

There is nothing wrong with it.

KENNETH

Then why has it stood virtually empty for some twenty years? What made the last tenant leave in such an extraordinary rush? And the tenants before them? Why can no one live in the house?

MRS. OTERY (snorts)

You’ve been listening to village gossip.

KENNETH

Why, yes. The villagers are quite keen to discuss this house. When I inquired about it, they said the owners had to get a caretaker from a distance because no woman from around here would live in this house.

MRS. OTERY

A pack of cowards.

KENNETH

They said this caretaker, imported from another county, was a pretty bold number... when she came.

MRS. OTERY (pulls her sweater closer around her gaunt frame)

I’m bold enough still.

KENNETH

I was told that this caretaker had been seen to run out into the fields and stay there trembling half the night.

She does not answer, and more kindly, he continues.

KENNETH (cont’d)

Village talk, I expect. They don’t care what they say about an outsider.

MRS. OTERY (relieved)

That’s the mean way of them.

KENNETH (suddenly staring over her shoulder)

What’s that?

With a frightened scream she whirls toward the small door. There is nothing.

KENNETH (clinically)

What was it you expected to see, Mrs. Otery?

The woman only shivers silently.

KENNETH (cont’d)

They say there is a ghost. Is there a ghost, my friend?

She remains sullenly silent.

KENNETH (cont’d)

Because if there is a ghost about the premises, I’d like to...

(smiles)

...pay my respects.

MRS. OTERY (hisses)

You can smart-talk all you like, mister, when you’ve gone, but for God’s sake keep a civil tongue while you’re in this house!

(straightens up, her voice pitched normally... perhaps a shade louder than normal)

There is no use showing you the rest of the place. You haven’t come to buy. Now, if you want to be stepping, I have my duties.

KENNETH (pleasantly, as be lights a pipe)

My dear Mrs. Otery, we have got on so nicely, I wonder if you would give me a cup of tea? There is a deathly chill in the house.

(he takes a bill from his wallet, presses it upon her)

That wouldn’t be too much trouble for you, would it? Just a cup of tea?

MRS. OTERY (eyes the money, speaks ungraciously)

Well... I don’t suppose so.

KENNETH

Since you are so pressing, I accept your hospitality.

MRS. OTERY

Come on down then, to the kitchen.

KENNETH

No, no, I’m sure the Prodigal Son got his tea in the ‘drawing- room’. I’ll wait here.

(he leans against a wall, his arms folded)

MRS. OTERY stares at him, and blandly, he returns her gaze. At last, the merest hint of a thin smile passes her lips.

MRS. OTERY

I see. You are meaning to go into that room. I wouldn’t if I was you.

KENNETH

If you were me... you would.

With a last look at the open door, she moves toward it and closes it gently, then she turns on her heel.

MRS. OTERY

Prodigal whatever, if you want tea you can come to the kitchen.

At the door leading to the staircase, she looks back over her shoulder at him, and this time she smiles outright. It is a most unpleasant smile.

MRS. OTERY (cont’d)

Stay here as long as you like, sir... with your brave uniform and your knife. She might take a fancy to you - or...

(eyes the knife)

to it.

KENNETH

So, it’s a woman, is it? Your ghost?

MRS. OTERY

No concern of yours, I’d say.

KENNETH

Yes. It is my concern. I am a Morland.

MRS. OTERY

Picked up that name in the village too, did you? There’s no more of the Morlands around here.

KENNETH

There is now.

MRS. OTERY (fretfully)

The old admiral that died last year... he wasn’t even no Morland himself.

KENNETH

I know.

MRS. OTERY (peering suspiciously at him)

The only other Morland just disappeared, they say, years ago...

(smiles grimly)

Seems to run in the family, like. Disappearing.

KENNETH

Yes. Wall, this one has reappeared. I am Kenneth Morland Blake. The old admiral was my father and this house...

(gazes around)

now belongs to me.

MRS. OTERY

Who says? If you’re him, why didn’t you come in here all proper with word from the agent?

KENNETH (obligingly hands her a piece of paper)

Here you are. All proper with word from the agent.

MRS. OTERY (stares first at the paper, then at him)

Well…

(smiles cynically)

I’d say you’ve been in no particular hurry to claim your fine inheritance.

KENNETH

It is not your place, Mrs. Otery, to say anything whatever. Except in answer to my questions.

MRS. OTERY sniffs and pulls her shawl more tightly about her. Her lack of truckle amuses him, and he relents, smiles.

KENNETH

Mrs. Otery, I find your manners irresistible.

MRS. OTERY

Be that as it may.

(curiosity getting the better of her)

You don’t speak like no Englishman to my ears.

KENNETH

I have been an American for over twenty years.

(takes her measure)

See here, I’ve no objections to satisfying your curiosity if you will, in turn, satisfy mine.

(confidingly)

You see, I’ve been away so long. I went to America shortly after the last war. I joined the army in 1914... I was only sixteen... I never got home again...

MRS. OTERY (interrupting; suspiciously)

The army, was it? And you claim the old admiral was your father?

KENNETH (grimly)

Cause and effect, Mrs. Otery.

(there is a breath of silence. And on KENNETH’S face we can see residual pain, continuing bitterness)

In any event. I was prisoner-of- war for three years, and then when I was finally released, I was advised to go directly to a nursing home in Switzerland, where a woman I barely recognized as my own grandmother informed me that my grandfather had suffered a stroke and was dead, that this house, the only home I’d ever known, was closed and would be sold or rented... at which point a nurse came in and said I was disturbing the patient, (he takes a deep breath and a grim flicker of a smile sets in) My father — not yet an admiral, but as always a commanding man... gave a short, brutally succinct account on what had happened in this house and of my own history — after which he gave me a fairly handsome pourboire and suggested that I try the ‘colonies’.

(lets out his breath)

I never saw him or my grandmother… or this house again. And that, old bean, is the story of my life. Now. It’s your turn. But not, if you please, the works. Just the last three years... since you’ve been here... will do.

MRS. OTERY (shrugs sullenly)

I look after the house. I told you that.

KENNETH

Yes, but I am interested in your social life here... your con5>anions. I am interested in your ghost. Have you ever actually seen her?

She nods.

KENNETH (cont’d)

Where? In this room?

MRS. OTERY looks toward the inner room.

KENNETH (cont’d)

Ah. Has she ever been seen out of that room?

MRS. OTERY (in a rush… at last she speaks)

All over the house... in every room and on the stairs. I tell you I’ve met her on the stairs and she drew back to let me pass and said ‘Good evening’!

KENNETH (incredulous, humoring, he smiles)

Indeed? She sounds a very gentle, harmless sort of ghost.

MRS. OTERY

There’s some wouldn’t say that. Them that left in a hurry... there is a terrible wind-like thing... terrible... that comes when she gets restless and thinks you are keeping it from her. Then she’d do you a mischief... it’s terrible then...

KENNETH

What do you mean ‘keeping it from her’? Keeping what from her?

MRS. OTERY

Whatever it is she prowls about this cold house searching for, searching, searching. I don’t know what it is. But it is awful... her loss.

KENNETH (grimly)

There’s worse than not finding what you’re looking for. There is finding it so different from what you had expected.

(he sighs)

All right, Mrs. Otery. Go on down to the kitchen and leave me here.

MRS. OTERY

You think you’re in no danger, but…

He has dismissed her, and is now utterly oblivious to her presence.

MRS. OTERY (cont’d)

I’ll be in the kitchen...

(she turns, walks from the room, does not look back to deliver her last line)

Waiting.

As MRS. OTERY’S footsteps are heard descending the stairs KENNETH hesitates, his eyes fixed on the little door, but slowly he forces himself to relax, smiling at himself.

With a show of patience, indifference even, he sits down in the chair that MRS. OTERY had occupied. He taps out his pipe, his eye first on the door, then deliberately turned toward the delicate movement of the little fingers of dying fire. As the fire burns lower, he sits quietly, and in the increasing dusk, he ceases to be an intruder, and his figure becomes indistinct and fades from sight.

Scene 4

When the haze lifts we are looking at the room as it was some forty-five years ago on the serene afternoon that began its troubled story. There are rooms that are always cheerful, and MRS. MORLAND’S little drawing-room is one of them. It is furnished, as we have already heard, with the blue curtains, the sofa on which KENNETH had his first swimming lessons, the peacocks on the veil, and the apple tree is in full blossom at the open window. One of the tree’s branches has even stepped into the room.

MR. MORLAND and the local clergyman, MR. AMY, are chatting importantly about sane matter of no Importance, while MRS. MORLAND is on her sofa at the other side of the room. She is knitting and she cones into the conversation occasionally with a cough or a click of her needles. This is her tactful way of telling her husband not to be so assertive to his guest. All three people are slightly over forty years of age. They are people who have found life to be, on the whole, an easy and happy adventure. The squire is only a small squire of very moderate means who passes life pleasantly and not unprofitably in being a J.P. and will discuss for days or months the advisability of putting a new roof on a tenant's cowshed. Eventually, without his knowing it, his wife will make up his mind for him. Even she does not know she has done it. MRS. MORLAND is a delightful woman with rather shrewder sense than her husband, and she has a joke that has kept her merry through all her married life, viz. her husband. She adores him, however, and they are an extremely happy sociable couple. MR. AMY is even more sociable than MR. MORLAND; he is reputed to know everyone in the county, and has several times fallen off his horse because he will salute all passers-by. On his visits to London he usually returns depressed because there are so many people in the streets to whom he may not give a friendly bow. Be likes to read a book if he knows the residence of a relative of the author, and at a play it is far more to him to learn that the actress has three children, one of them down with measles, than to follow her histrionic genius. He and his host have the pleasant habit of print-collecting, and a very common scene between them is that which now follows. They are bent over the squire's latest purchase.

MR. AMY

Very Interesting. A nice little lot. I must say, James, you have the collector’s flair.

MR. MORLAND (modestly)

Oh, I don’t know...

MR. AMY

The flair. That is what you have, James. You got them at Peterkin’s in Dean Street, didn’t you? Yes, I know you did. I saw them there. I wanted them too, but they told me you had already got the refusal.

MR. MORLAND

Sorry to have been too quick for you, George, but it is my way to nip in. You have some nice prints yourself.

MR. AMY

I haven’t got your flair, James.

MR. MORLAND

I admit I don’t miss much.

So far it has been a competition in saintliness.

MR. AMY

No.

(the saint leaves him)

You missed something at Peterkin’s though.

MR. MORLAND

How do you mean?

MR. AMY

You didn’t examine the little lot lying beneath this lot.

MR. MORLAND

I turned them over; just a few odds and ends of no account.

MR. AMY (with horrible complacency)

All except one, James.

MR. MORLAND (twitching)

Something good?

MR. AMY (at his meekest)

Just a little trifle of a Gainsborough.

MR. MORLAND (faintly)

What! You’ve got it?

MR. AMY

I’ve got it. I am a poor man, but I thought ten pounds wasn’t too much for a Gainsborough.

The devil has them both now.

MR. MORLAND

Ten pounds! Is it signed?

MR. AMY

No, it isn’t signed.

MR. MORLAND (almost his friend again)

Ah!

MR. AMY

What do you precisely mean by that ‘Ah!’, James? If it had been signed, could I have got it for ten pounds? You are always speaking about your flair, I suppose I can have a little flair sometimes too.

MR. MORLAND

I am not always speaking about my flair, and I don’t believe it is a Gainsborough.

MR. AMY (with dignity)

If I had thought you would grudge me my little find — which you missed — I wouldn’t have brought it to show you.

(with shocking exultation he produces a roll of paper)

MR. MORLAND (backing from it)

So, that’s it.

MR. AMY

This is it.

The squire has to examine it like a Christian.

MR. AMY (cont’d)

There! I have the luck this time. I hope you will have it next.

The exultation passes from one face into the other.

MR. MORLAND

Interesting, George. Quite. But definitely not a Gainsborough.

By this time the needles have entered into the controversy but they are disregarded.

MR. MORLAND (cont’d)

I should say the work of a clever amateur. No more.

MR. AMY

James, I had no idea you had such a small nature.

MR. MORLAND

No one would have been more pleased than myself if you had picked up a Gainsborough. But look at the paper, George.

MR. AMY

What is wrong with the paper, Mr. Morland?

MR. MORLAND

Machine made, my friend. Machine made!

After further inspection MR. AMY is convinced against his will, and the find is returned to his pocket less carefully than it had been produced.

MR. MORLAND (cont’d)

Don’t get into a tantrum about it, George.

MR. AMY (grandly)

I am not in a tantrum, and I should be obliged If you wouldn’t George me. Salle on, Mr. Morland, I congratulate you on your triumph. You have hurt an old friend to the quick. Bravo, bravo, dank you, Mr. Morland, for a very pleasant visit. Good-day.

MRS. MORLAND (prepared)

I shall see you into your coat. George.

MR. AMY

I thank you, Mrs. Morland, but I need no one to see me into my coat.

MRS. MORLAND (blandly)

Nonsense. Now which of you is to say it first? James?

MR. MORLAND

George, I apologize.

MR. AMY

James, I am heartily ashamed of myself. I quite see that it isn’t a Gainsborough.

MR. MORLAND

After all, it’s certainly in the Gainsborough school.

They clasp hands sheepishly, but the peacemaker helps the situation by showing a roguish face, and MR. AMY departs.

MR. AMY

Goodnight, Fanny, what a saint you are.

MRS. MORLAND

Not a bit! I’m a very selfish woman who bends everyone to her iron will.

Both MR. AMY and MR. MORLAND laugh and MR. AMY is gone.

MRS. MORLAND

I coughed so often, James, and you must have heard me clicking.

MR. MORLAND

I heard it alright. Good old George! It’s a pity he has no flair. He might as well order his prints by wireless.

MRS. MORLAND

What is that?

MR. MORLAND

Wireless it’s to be called. There is an article about it in that paper. The fellow says that before many years have passed we shall be able to talk to ships on the ocean.

MRS. MORLAND (who has resumed her knitting)

What nonsense.

MR. MORLAND

Oh, I don’t know, my dear. There is no denying that there are more things in heaven and earth than are dreamt of in our philosophy.

MRS. MORLAND

You and I know that to be true, James.

For a moment he does not know to what she is referring,

MR. MORLAND (edging away from trouble)

Oh, that. My dear, that is all dead and done with long ago.

MRS. MORLAND (thankfully)

Yes. But sometimes when I look at Mary Rose —

MR. MORLAND

Fanny, don’t seek trouble.

MRS. MORLAND

She’ll want to marry one day soon...

MR. MORLAND

That infant! Really, Fanny!

MRS. MORLAND

She’s eighteen. She only seems en infant, James... It’s her...

(shrugs)

...her way.

MR. MORLAND

And a delightful way it is!

MRS. MORLAND

I know, I know. And you are not the only man alive who will find it so.

(she puts down her knitting)

And she cannot marry, James, without your first telling the man. We agreed.

MR. MORLAND

Well, I’m no longer sure about that, Fanny. Let sleeping dogs lie, you know.

MRS. MORLAND

James...

MR. MORLAND

What difference does it make? Now?

MRS. MORLAND

Whether we like it or not, Mary Rose is the same girl to whom it happened. Whether she remembers it or not, it happened to her. It makes her singular. Whomever she marries must understand...

MR. MORLAND (shrugging it all off)

Possibly. Possibly. We shall think about all that when the time comes. But that time, mercifully, is not upon us yet.

(reminded that this evening’s time is passing)

However, I believe my bedtime is. Where do you think Mary Rose has hared off to with old Simon? Shouldn’t they be back?

MRS. MORLAND (smiles)

They probably walked all the way to the river... I don’t believe the young people found your’s and George’s talk about old prints very stimulating.

MR. MORLAND

Eh? Why Mary Rose is always extremely int...

(interrupts himself )

Young people? Simon? That old dog? Ha!

MRS. MORLAND

James, you have slipped into, the attitude of regarding Simon as one of our own generation... he’s only thirty-three, you know.

MR. MORLAND (mildly surprised to be reminded of SIMON’S relative youth)

I do forget, you know. Simon has always been so... solid and all.

MRS. MORLAND

Yes.

(enigmatically)

For which we may be grateful.

MR. MORLAND (looks keenly at her. He knows this tone)

What is that supposed to convey?

MRS. MORLAND

Just that if it is to be Simon, I am glad that he is what he is. 

MR. MORLAND (frowning)

If what is to he Simon? What on earth are you trying to suggest? Do you mean to tell me that you think Simon is... interested in Mary Rose? What utter nonsense! Simon and Mary Rose! Why he’s old enough to be her...

(quickly calculates the age difference, is forced to finish lamely)

...uncle…

MRS. MORLAND

He is thirty-three. She is eighteen. Not an unprecedented difference in ages.

MR. MORLAND

But what on earth would a grown man... a Navy man... a Commander, mind you, why should a fellow like that bother with a baby like Mary Rose? Why he knew her in her pram! Absurd! Really, Fanny, it’s not nice of you to put such ideas into my head.

(nervously drums his fingers on a table, takes a few short paces, turns abruptly and gives his wife a rather baleful glare, then without further to-do, strides to the window, pulls aside the curtain, peers out into the dark, then raises his voice peremptorily)

Mary Rose? Mary Rose!

A soft answer comes from the nearby gloom of the impenetrably leafy tree.

MARY ROSE (o.s.)

Yes, Daddy.

MR. MORLAND (startled, he steps back)

What’s that? Confound it, Marry Rose, come inside at once. Where’s Simon? What are you doing in that tree? In the dark?

MARY ROSE (o.s.)

I’m hiding.

MR. MORLAND

From Simon?

MARY ROSE (o.s.) (her voice pales)

No... not Simon.

MR. MORLAND

Mary Rose? Are you frightened? Come in at once.

(there is a beat while he waits for her to obey; but when she does not appear, he speaks again)

What has frightened you? Has Simon frightened you?

The thickly-leaved branches of the tree tremble and we see a girl lower herself onto the branch that is level with the window. She does not yet step into the room.

MR. MORLAND (heavily)

I said has Simon frightened you?

MARY ROSE (a faint smile)

Partly. Partly, he has.

MR. MORLAND

Then what else? Who else?

MARY ROSE now steps into the drawing-room.

MARY ROSE

You. I am mostly afraid of you.

If there is anything strange about this girl of eighteen, it is no more than an elusiveness of which she herself is unaware. She appears to be a happy, straightforward girl, only perhaps a little younger in manner than eighteen would imply. She is likely to give way to a tomboyishness of gesture or a child's guileless amusement that a more demure or more tactful eighteen would restrain. However, now, at the moment we first see her, she is quite keyed up, trying everything to ease over the situation... girlish appeal, teasing, bullying, candour, evasion. Her mother gets up from the couch and approaches MARY ROSE.

MR. MORLAND (quite flattered to hear that his daughter might find him frightening)

Of me!? Frightened of me?

MARY ROSE stifles a giggle, butts her head impulsively into MRS. MORLAND’S comfortable bosom.

MRS. MORLAND

Ah.

MR. MORLAND

‘Ah‘? What the devil is ‘ah’ supposed to convey?

MRS. MORLAND (to MARY ROSE)

I take it Simon's been disturbing you.

MARY ROSE (pulls her head up. She likes her mother's way of expressing the situation)

Yes. he has. It's all Simon’s fault.

MR. MORLAND

What is? What's Simon's fault? Where is he?

MARY ROSE

At the foot of the tree.

(laughs, her manner becomes even more high-strung)

He's so pompous...he wants to come in by the door!

MR. MORLAND

Well what’s a stopping him?

MARY ROSE (in a breath - it all pour a nervously out)

Me. I told him it would be better if I case first... after all, I knew you wouldn’t seriously abuse me!

(can’t help a grin of mischief)

You can’t think how quickly he agreed! He’s positively craven! But I don’t care. I love him anyway.

MR. MORLAND

Love?

MR. MORLAND is aghast. MARY ROSE rushes into his arms to help in this terrible hour.

MARY ROSE

Poor Daddy!

MR. MORLAND

Mary Rose...

(blankly)

Mary Rose... you’re not in love with Simon! Are you?

MARY ROSE

Oh, Daddy, I am sorry!

(turns to her mother)

What can we do?

(with no warning whatever, she begins to cry)

MRS. MORLAND

Oh, darling... pet... don’t. Don’t cry.

MARY ROSE

But everything is so changed!

(awed)

Before... before he was Just... well... good old Simon... and then, Daddy... he wasn’t.

(back to her mother)

You will scarcely know him!

MRS. MORLAND

Well, love, he breakfasted with us; I think I shall know him still.

MARY ROSE

He is quite different from breakfast time. He’s simply awful! He’s... he’s talking about properties and lawyers and income.

(she begins to cry again)

MR. MORLAND (with spirit)

Income! He’s got as far as that has he? Does he propose that this marriage should take place tomorrow? Tonight!

MARY ROSE

Oh, no! Not for ages and ages!

(a breath)

Not till his next leave.

MRS. MORLAND

Mary Rose!

MARY ROSE

He is waiting down there, Mummy. He’s terrified... or just hang-dog, poor thing!

MRS. MORLAND

Run down and tell him to come up, Mary Rose.

MR. MORLAND

But don’t come with him.

MARY ROSE

Oh!

MRS. MORLAND (soothing her daughter, and at the same time warning her husband of what must be said to Simon)

Your father is right, Mary Rose. You know Simon must feel quite... discomfited.

MR. MORLAND (snorts)

Discomfited indeed!

MRS. MORLAND

Send Simon up, Mary Rose. Alone.

MARY ROSE (anxiously)

He wants to do the right thing, Father.

MR. MORLAND

What’s that?

(darkly)

The right thing?

MRS. MORLAND (calmly smiling)

I’m sure he does, darling.

MARY ROSE

Daddy... you won’t try to put him against me...

MR. MORLAND (adamantly)

I most assuredly will...

MRS. MORLAND (interrupting smoothly)

....not try... to ‘put him against you’, sweetheart.

At this phrasing, MR. MORLAND turns with sudden memory and looks at his wife. He clears his throat, turns gently now to his daughter.

MR. MORLAND

Run along, Mary Rose, and tell Simon we’re waiting for him.

MARY ROSE moves slowly toward the door leading to the stairs, turns back once to regard her parents questioningly.

MARY ROSE (almost a whisper)

I love Simon. I love him.

She leaves. We stay with the MORLANDS only long enough to see their uneasy exchange of looks, then we follow MARY ROSE in her flight down the stairs. What starts as a stately, solemn descent, degenerates into a headlong, three-steps-at-a-time plunge. She quite literally lunges at the door and yanks it open, out of the breath with which to call SIMON. But there is no need. For he is there, framed in the door, waiting. Startled, delighted, MARY ROSE gasps and flattens herself against him. She finds the breath to whisper... ‘Simon’...

He takes her in his arms and gently kisses her heir.

CUT TO:

Scene 5

MR. & MRS. MORLAND, waiting. MR. MORLAND has opened the leaves of a photograph album, an album which one instantly surmises is principally dedicated to MARY ROSE. Stopping at a picture that seems to move him particularly - perhaps one of a small girl hanging trustingly onto his own hand. It is charmingly period. It’s colour is the sepia of the period’s photography.

MR. MORLAND

...Oh, Fanny, my dear... look, here is one that you took, Fanny. Very steady you were.

(sighs deeply)

Such a child... Fanny, did you hear what she said? She said, ‘You won’t try to put him against me, Daddy?’

MRS. MORLAND

He must be told.

MR. MORLAND

I suppose — In any event, he will be an ass if it bothers him.

(a look out the dark windows)

Won’t he, Fanny?

CUT TO:

Scene 6

MARY ROSE and SIMON, her face now raised to his as he kisses her mouth. When at last, breathlessly, she breaks away, she cannot bear the solemnity of the moment. She makes a silly face and hisses.

MARY ROSE

I wouldn’t like to be you, Simon. Guess what happened up there?

(Ides of March sort of reading)

Daddy, you know? My darling old daddy? He turned into a father! Before our very eyes! All right, Simon. Courage! In you go... and me for the attic!

MARY ROSE stifles a laugh and runs away leaving SIMON to make his way alone to the house and up the stairs to the drawing-room where the MORLANDS await him. SIMON enters the room and we see him as the MORLANDS see him: a tall man, dark, heavily built. We feel that he is habitually rather solemn, but certainly more so now. He has a quality of passion. If MARY ROSE seems young for her age, SIMON then seems old for his. He approaches the MORLANDS with a steady step and a look of assurance... assurance of himself, at any rate. But MRS. MORLAND’S almost warning look and MR. MORLAND’S averted face, cause him to falter slightly. There is an unexpected moment of strained silence between these old and happy acquaintances. MRS. MORLAND breaks the uneasy silence.

MRS. MORLAND

Simon.

SIMON (a faint feeling-out sort of smile)

I feel as If I’ve been brought before a hanging judge.

MR. MORLAND (gruffly)

And so you should. That’s what we used to do with poachers.

SIMON (he is not without shame)

Oh Lord! I really an in Dickie’s meadow... I understand perfectly that you think Mary Rose too young...

MR. MORLAND

Don’t be plausible, sir! You will need something better than plausibility to plead your case.

MRS. MORLAND

Oh Simon... couldn’t you have waited? Just a little time longer?

SIMON (directly. To MRS. MORLAND he can speak candidly)

No. I don’t believe I could.

MR. MORLAND

Your... urgency does you no credit, sir!

There is now heard, startling the MORLANDS but not SIMON, a gentle tapping from the ceiling. SIMON smiles.

MR. MORLAND (glancing upwards)

What on earth...?

SIMON

It’s Mary Rose. She’s lending me her support, from the attic. She saw instantly that I might show the white feather...

(his smile broadens)

...she wouldn’t put it past me to bolt.

He catches MRS. MORLAND’S smile and addresses his next line at her

SIMON (cont’d)

She suggested that she back me up like an admiral with a questionable link in the line of command. She was to make her presence felt, indicating that England expects her officers this dread day to do his duty.

MRS. MORLAND

Simon. You two are moat flagrantly in cahoots against us. You should be ashamed.

SIMON

Well of course I am ashamed. But there it is.

MR. MORLAND (aggressively)

Are you aware, Simon, what a fool this business makes you out? After all, Mary Rose is quite simply an infant.

SIMON

No, sir. Not quite and not simply.

MR. MORLAND shoots him a look, reddens, starts to deliver a killing rejoinder, but once again MRS. MORLAND interferes.

MRS. MORLAND

I expect you are right, Simon. She isn’t altogether a child... nor... yet is she altogether a woman.

Again there is heard the gentle tapping from above.

QUICK CUT TO:

Scene 7

ATTIC.

MARY ROSE seated on the floor of attic. She holds an old gold stick that she has obviously used for the tapping. Now she puts her ear to the floor, straining to hear. But the voices do not penetrate and impatiently she sits up again and prepares wait further, using the gold stick as a prop to lean against.

CUT TO:

Scene 8

DRAWING-ROOM. SIMON

Mrs. Morland...

(turns to Include MR. MORLAND)

…sir, I think Mary Rose is more woman than you know... or want to admit. She wants to marry me as much as I want to marry her.

(pleading now)

See here. I’m not kidnapping the girl, you know! We’ll always be close by... Mary Rose will probably even want to stay on here with you while I’m on sea duty, at least to begin with. Even when we open up my place... it’s still only a meadow away.

MR. MORLAND turns to his wife, gives her a gentle look, puts his arm around her.

MR. MORLAND

That’s true enough, Fanny. She would be near... that is certainly to be considered...

SIMON (decides to finish the painful discussion)

Precisely.

(he picks up a fire tool and points it at the ceiling; gives the MORLANDS a sheepish grin)

I promised to knock back as soon as I thought things were going well. Shall I call her down?

MR. MORLAND (looks into the honest, earnest eyes of the other man, then averts his gaze, dears his throat, doesn’t quite look straight at his wife)

Well... Fanny, I think he might...

MRS. MORLAND (of sterner stuff)

No.

(takes a deep breath, faces SIMON)

Simon, there’s more than... there is something... a little thing, Simon... but we feel we ought to tell you... before you knock, dear.

Curiously, SIMON gives her his attention.

MRS. MORLAND (cont’d)

It’s not very important, I think, but it is something she doesn’t know of herself. And it... it makes her a little different from other girls.

SIMON (smiles)

She’s quite different from other girls.

MRS. MORLAND

For you, of course. But this is...

(a small, nervous ‘social’ laugh is forced from her)

I’m really finding this most difficult!

SIMON (slowly)

Mrs. Morland. I don’t want to hear anything against Mary Rose.

MR. MORLAND

No, Simon. We have nothing to tell you against her.

MRS. MORLAND

It is just something that happened, Simon. She couldn’t help it. It hasn’t troubled us in the least for years, but we always agreed that she mustn’t be engaged before we told the man. And we must have your promise, before we tell you, that you will keep it to yourself. You must never speak of it to her... not to anyone... but especially to her. You must give us your promise.

SIMON (frowning, hesitates before he answers)

Very well, I promise.

MRS. MORLAND sits down as if suddenly weary. Her husband eyes her with tender concern, begins the story.

MR. MORLAND

It happened eleven years ago, when Mary Rose was seven. We were on holiday in a remote part of Scotland... the Outer Hebrides.

SIMON

I once went on shore there from the Gadfly. Very bleak and barren... hardly a tree...

MR. MORLAND

Yes, it is mostly like that. There is a whaling station. We went because I was fond of fishing...

(sighs)

Anyway, quite close to the inn where we put up there is... a little island...

And here he stops. He sees that little island so clearly in his mind’s eye that he forgets to go on with the story.

MRS. MORLAND

James...

MR. MORLAND

Eh? Oh... yes... it... is quite a small island, uninhabited, no sheep even. No more, I suppose, than five, six acres. Not unusual in any way...

MRS. MORLAND

It had more trees than the other islands.

MR. MORLAND

Yes, that’s right. Scotch firs and a few rowan-trees... and it has what might be called a lake, I suppose. A little pool, really, out of which a small stream flows. And it has hillocks and a glade, a sort of miniature land... curiously complete in itself. That was all we noticed.

He sees that his wife has put trembling fingers to her lips.

MR. MORLAND (cont’d)

I can tell him without your being here, Fanny.

She shakes her head, does not move. And he resumes his tale, now moving about the room, nervously recreating that other place and time.

MR. MORLAND (cont’d)

I fished a great deal in the loch between that island... that damned island...

(he takes a steadying breath)

...and the larger one. Mary Rose always wanted to go with me, but she didn’t like to see the baiting... the little island with its tiny pool attracted her. She claimed she could catch everything from minnows to whales in that pool... without bait... if she wanted to. But she preferred to sketch and colour in a little notebook she carried. So I would row her across to the little island and leave her there sitting in her favourite spot - on an old tree stump beside the little pool, pretending to fish...

There is now, once again, the tapping from the attic; this time, the tattoo has an impatient ring.

CUT TO:

Scene 9

CLOSE-UP - MARY ROSE

IN ATTIC as she give one last imperious thump on the floor with the golf stick she holds. The thump startles even her and she pulls her head into her shoulders and swings herself around to hunch herself into a smaller size. We are now behind her, and in the dark of the attic the diminished shape, holding the golf stick, is not at all unlike…

FADE INTO...

Scene 10

The back of a small girl by the island pool holding, instead of the golf stick, a fishing rod, the line of which bobs harmlessly in the water. Over this scene we continue to hear the O.S. voice of MR. MORLAND as he describes what happened.

MR. MORLAND (o.s.)

...I could see her from the boat most of the time and we used to wave to each other...

We see the child and man... the man at a distance over the water... do just that. They wave. And somewhere, muffled by time and distance, deep below the present voice of MR. MORLAND, there are the faint, dim sounds of that other place... the wind, the water and the childish voice carried across it.

MR. MORLAND (cont’d) (o.s.)

We would wave and then I would fish awhile longer and then go back for her. Mary Rose was very fond of the place. She called it her island, her darling, things like that. It had a Gaelic name which means ‘The Island That Likes To Be Visited’. We were only told about it later. After... well, it happened on what was to be our last day. I had landed her on the island as usual, and in the early evening I pulled across to take her off. From the bet I saw her and waved that I was coming for her. She waved back...

We see this scene from the boat’s P.O.V.

MR. MORLAND (cont’d) (o.s.)

...then I rowed over, with, of course, my back to her... less than a hundred yards to go, but when I got across she wasn’t there. She just wasn’t there. Not on the island. No one in the village went to bed that night...

We see the tension, the consternation of the villagers, their eyes on the distant flickering lights of the searchers on the island… there is a heightening of sound under MR. MORLAND’S voice.

MR. MORLAND (cont’d) (o.s.)

It was then we learned how they feared the island. They had not realized that I had been landing Mary Rose there... and they are deeply religious people, ashamed I expect of their superstition... not wanting to bring it to the attention of strangers... not without reason.

(sighs)

The pool was dragged... everything. There was nothing we didn’t try; but she was gone. Gone. After the third day, the searchers gave up… except two whom I paid to continue with me... hopelessly. Finally, I had to let them go. There wasn’t a leaf or a stone or a blade of grass that wasn’t examined fifty times. It was twenty days. But we couldn’t leave. We couldn’t leave! That day... that twentieth day, I was wandering along the shore of the loch, you can imagine in what state of mind. I stopped and stood looking across the water at the island, and... and I saw her! I saw her sitting there on the tree trunk... as I had seen her last... she waved at me and I... I waved back. It was like a dream. I got into my boat and rowed across, in the old way... except this time I sat facing her, so that I could see her all the time. When I landed, the first thing she said to me was, ‘Daddy, why did you row in that funny way...’

CUT BACK TO:

Scene 11

HOUSE. MRS. MORLAND, still on the sofa, weeping silently now, SIMON riveted with attention to MR. MORLAND.

MR. MORLAND (cont’d) (his face seems older than when he began the story)

I knew at once that she didn’t know anything had happened.

SIMON

But that’s simply not possible I now could... where did she say she had been?

MR. MORLAND

She didn’t know she had been anywhere, Simon. She thought I had just come for her at the usual time.

SIMON

But twenty days! You aren’t suggesting she had been on the island all that time?

MR. MORLAND

We don’t know.

MRS. MORLAND

James brought her back to me just the same little...

(catches her breath)

...unselfconscious girl. She had no thought that she had been away from me for more than an hour or two.

SIMON

But when you told her...

MRS. MORLAND (fiercely)

We never told her; she does not know!

SIMON

But surely...

MRS. MORLAND

No. We had her back. No one here knew the story. Why should she be different? Why should she be made to doubt herself... her senses?

SIMON

You told no one?

MRS. MORLAND (darkly)

Doctors. Several doctors.

SIMON

How did they explain it?

MRS. MORLAND (with heavy bitter irony)

They explained about fatigue and hysteria and nerves... they explained ‘time disorientation’. They explained nothing. Nothing.

MR. MORLAND

They had no explanation for it except that it never took place. You can think that too, If you like.

SIMON

I don’t know what to think.

(after a moment of uneasy silence)

It has had no effect on her, at any rate.

MR. MORLAND

None whatever — and you can guess how we used to watch.

MRS. MORLAND

Simon, I am very anxious to be honest with you. I have sometimes thought that Mary Rose is curiously young for her age — as if — you know how just a touch of frost may stop the growth of a plant and yet leave it blooming — it has sometimes seemed to me as if a cold finger had once touched my child.

MR. MORLAND

We have sometimes thought that she had momentary glimpses back into that time but before we could question her in a cautious way about them the gates had closed and she remembered nothing. You never saw her talking... to some person who wasn’t there?

SIMON

No.

MRS. MORLAND

Nor listening? As if for some... some sound that never came?

SIMON

A sound?

(he shakes his head)

MRS. MORLAND (sighs deeply, shudderingly)

At any rate she has outgrown it all... the listening... all of it.

SIMON

It is curious that she’s never spoken to me of that holiday. She tells me everything.

MRS. MORLAND

No, that isn’t curious; it is just that the island has faded from her memory. I should be troubled if she began to recall it. Well, Simon, we felt we had to tell you. That is all we know; I am sure it is all we shall ever know. What are you going to do?

SIMON (smiles, once more picks up fire tool)

Why, I’m going to knock on the ceiling, Mrs. Morland.

He does so.

CUT TO:

Scene 12

ATTIC.

MARY ROSE is instantly mobilized by the sound. She jumps to her feet and excitedly answers the tap, then flings the golf stick aside and dashes to the stairs. Once more we witness her headlong way with stairs, half run, half flight. At the bottom, she grasps the handrail and brings herself to an abrupt halt, mindful suddenly of her dishevelled appearance. Child-like, she thinks to rub her possibly dirty face with her dress sleeve, runs an abortive hand through her tangled hair... she has achieved nothing, really, by her efforts, when once again, SIMON appears suddenly before her. She stares wide-eyed at him.

SIMON

It’s all right, Mary Rose.

MARY ROSE (flings herself at him)

Oh, Simon! You and me!

SIMON kisses her, then gently speaks.

SIMON

Come along, darling. They’ve been most decent and they’re waiting.

MARY ROSE

Oh, poor them!

Scene 13

He takes her arm and leads her Into the DRAWING-ROOM where her parents are, Indeed, waiting. MARY ROSE takes one brief look at her mother and father, smiles tremulously at her mother, goes to her father and put a her arms around him.

MARY ROSE

It’s frightfully difficult, isn’t it, darling... being a father?

MR. MORLAND

It’s pure hell, that’s all. Pure hell.

MARY ROSE helps him to find his handkerchief. He blows his nose. MRS. MORLAND kisses MARY ROSE, then moves to SIMON and kisses him as well.

SIMON (pleased)

That is the official seal, isn’t it, Mrs. Morland?

MRS. MORLAND

More or less.

SIMON

Thank you.

MARY ROSE

Oh, goodness, this is all so solemn! It’s horribly embarrassing. When I get embarrassed I have to run!

(grabs SIMON’S hand)

Come on, Simon... I’ll race you to the summer-house.

SIMON

Nothing of the kind, my girl. Now that we are properly engaged, we shall decorously stroll to the summer-house.

MARY ROSE throws a hasty kiss to her parents; SIMON gives them an apologetic grin as he is pulled from the room by the impulsive, over-stimulated girl. When SIMON and MARY ROSE are out of sight, MRS. MORLAND moves to her husband and now gently kisses his forehead.

MR. MORLAND

Well, it is hell!

(sighs, turns sadly toward the open window, holding onto his wife)

I say, Fanny, I don’t suppose we could sit out in the apple tree.

CUT TO:

Scene 14

LAWN, curving gently down to a stream on which the summer-house is situated. SIMON has succeeded in restraining MARY ROSE, if not to a stroll, at least to the extent of her having to keep to his pace even if it means walking backward in front of him, circling him, taking two or three steps to his measured one.

MARY ROSE

How dreadful to be old and have to sit up there In that room.

SIMON

I know quite a bit about age, love, and I assure you most of us don’t Rind at all sitting about in dull places.

MARY ROSE

Simon, you won’t mind if I don’t bother to get old, will you? I don’t think it would suit me somehow.

SIMON (smiles)

Oh, I don’t expect you’ll mind... you’ll want to keep up with me, you know.

MARY ROSE (curiously)

Will I? Not if you take to sitting about in rooms.

(laughs uncertainly)

I mean, Simon, I don’t think it would be very considerate of you... getting old and all....

SIMON PULLS her to him in a hug, forcing her to march at his side for a few paces.

SIMON

What a silly nit it is.

MARY ROSE (agreeably)

Oh yes. Still... I am quite frightened by it all, you know...

SIMON

What all, darling?

MARY ROSE

Well, I don’t mind the idea of the wedding, of course...

(laughs)

...that’s just rather an expensive way of playing dress up! But...

(seriously)

Simon. How shall I be... a wife?

SIMON (smugly)

In quite the regular way, poppet.

She hugs herself as if chilled.

SIMON (cont’d)

See here, you’ve dashed out into the night without a wrap...

(takes off his jacket)

Here. Put this around your shoulders.

MARY ROSE

Oh, bother...

She starts to move ahead but firmly he takes her arm, pulls her back.

SIMON

You are in my care now; I am responsible for you. I order you to pat on this jacket.

MARY ROSE (her mood suddenly changed; she is delighted)

Order? Oh, Simon! You do say the loveliest things!

(quickly she slips into the wrap, smiles happily at him)

Simon... while I was up in the attic waiting, I had the most delicious idea about our honeymoon. There is a place in Scotland... in the Hebrides... I should love to go there.

SIMON (comes to an abrupt halt)

The Hebrides?

MARY ROSE

Yes. We went to it once when I was little. Isn’t it queer? I had almost forgotten about that island, and then suddenly, as I was sitting up there in the attic, I saw it quite clearly. Quite clearly.

SIMON (cautiously)

Mary Rose, tell me... what was there, I mean in particular about that place?

MARY ROSE

Oh, the fishing for father. But there was another island... a very small one where I often... Oh! My little island!

(her face, radiant with the rush of memory, turns from him)

SIMON (disturbed, but not wanting to let her see. His voice is careful)

Mary Rose. Mary Rose, are you listening for something?

MARY ROSE

What? Listening? I don’t hear anything. Do you?

(moves once again within his orbit, but continues to explore the rediscovered excitement within herself)

Oh, darling... I should love to show you my island. There is a rowan-tree and an old stump beside the dearest baby pond...

(laughs)

I used to pretend to fish there... I didn’t want daddy to be disappointed that I didn’t really like to fish, you know.

(solemnly)

Fishing is unkind, Simon. Anyway, Daddy would land me on the island. I expect he didn’t like to put up with my wriggling about in the boat... and the little island was such a safe place.

SIMON (troubled)

That had been the idea.

(gives her a little shake)

I have no intention of spending my honeymoon by the sea or anything like it. I hope you can bring yourself to come to Italy with me.

She laughs and kisses him. Then arm in arm they walk, silent for a long moment before Simon’s voice again penetrates the night.

SIMON (cont’d)

And yet... I should like to go to the Hebrides… someday... to see that island of yours.

MARY ROSE

Oh, yes. Let’s.

SLOW FADE OUT.

FADE IN:

Scene 15

At the base of the apple tree a small celebration is in progress. There is a tea-table on which there is a birthday cake with one candle. MARY ROSE is seated with her year-old son on her knee. She helps him blow out the candle. There is laughter and applause. SIMON watches proudly nearby and it is this picture that MR. MORLAND, with MRS. MORLAND’S assistance, takes.

MRS. MORLAND

How like you he looks, Mary Rose!

MR. MORLAND

Mary Rose, bounce him a bit, let us see his tooth...

MARY ROSE obliges.

MRS. MORLAND

Now! Now, James! Be still, Mary Rose.

There is a flash. The picture is taken. We see the reality and then a moment later, we see the picture as it eventually will repose in MR. MORLAND’S album, oval in shape, sepia in colour.

CUT TO:

Scene 16

Another year, another celebration, the action varied this time perhaps by the presence of MR. AMY and a maid bringing the cake toward the now toddling child. SIMON hugs MARY ROSE’S shoulder as the little boy clutches at his mother’s skirt.

SIMON

Look at your grandfather, Kenneth.

The flash. And this picture we see, in turn, among the leaves of the album.

FADE OUT.

SLOW FADE IN:

Scene 17

THE ISLAND.

The day is clear and bright. Now for the first time we are actually on the island and it is not at all frightening. The day is clear and sunny; the pond is clear and fresh, the growing things are a simply... growing things... firs, rowan, green grass, whin.

There is a soft, languorous breeze, and in the distance, across the loch, can easily be seen the other larger island. There is a boat skirting along the outer edges of the lit island and a young Highlander, a Cameron, guides it. We hear a woman’s laugh. It is MARY ROSE. And now, she and SIMON come into sight. They are dressed as English people dress in Scotland. And only by her clothes can we see that this is a possibly older MARY ROSE.

MARY ROSE (thrilled)

I think... not I don’t think at all, I am quite sure. This is the place. Simon, kiss me! Quickly! You promised that when we found the place...

SIMON (obeying)

Certainly I am not a man to break my word. Still, I might point out to you that this is the third spot you have picked as being the one and only place, and three times I have kissed you quick on that understanding. ...

MARY ROSE (laughs)

Stingy!

SIMON

Not at all. It’s not the kissing I begrudge... it’s this clambering around that you insist must precede it... at any rate, we’ve covered the island, as my bleeding limbs testify.

(the whins have been tearing at him, and he rubs his legs)

MARY ROSE

They didn’t hurt me at all. They favour me.

SIMON

Oh. I see. And you... do you favour this spot? You are quite sure this is the one?

MARY ROSE

Darling, I know I’m not clever, but at least I am always right.

He laughs.

MARY ROSE (cont’d)

Well, aren’t I? Look... the rowan-berries! I used to put them in my hair.

(she does so again)

Simon... I feel absolutely positive that this rowan-tree is glad to see me back!

(addresses it)

You don’t look a bit older. How do you think I’m wearing?

(she pulls a little branch of the rowan-tree around her shoulders)

Oh, Simon, how I loved this place! I remember it all so... so passionately!

He smiles indulgently.

MARY ROSE (cont’d)

Don’t smirk, you clod! This was my first love!

SIMON

Never mind your first. So long as I am your ultimate.

MARY ROSE (laughs)

Why does ‘ultimate’ sound much grander than ‘last’? I’m not at all sure I will concede you the glory of ‘ultimate’. Oh, I’m so glad to be here!

(abruptly)

Simon... you know I wanted to come away. I wanted to leave...

(stricken)

He was so little... waving me his sad little goodbye. Oh, Simon, how could I have wanted to come away from him!

SIMON (reasonably)

It’s only a short holiday, Mary Rose. We haven’t been away together in donkey’s years...

MARY ROSE

But don’t you see? I shouldn’t want to leave my baby!

He takes her into his arms.

SIMON

Stop it, Mary Rose. You’re being absurd.

MARY ROSE (seriously)

Am I?

SIMON

Indeed you are. At this very moment Master Kenneth is most likely being happily bounced on your mother’s knee without any thought whatever of us.

MARY ROSE (not thinking of her? This is a new idea. She acknowledges it with a wry smile)

Oh. Do you think so? Are you sure he doesn’t think I’ve abandoned him?

SIMON (firmly)

Quite sure. Come on now, you goose, are you going to let your island see how utterly displaced in your affections it is?

She shakes off her mood, laughing a little at herself and obediently moves about making discoveries.

MARY ROSE

This moss! I feel sure there is a tree-trunk beneath it, the one on which I used to sit.

Obligingly, SIMON clears away some moss.

MARY ROSE (cont’d)

I believe... I believe I cut my name on it with a knife...

SIMON

You’re absolutely right. Here... see it? M... A... R... Just M.A.R. It stops there.

MARY ROSE (puzzled)

Why didn’t I finish?

SIMON

I expect the knife blade broke.

MARY ROSE (disappointed)

I can’t remember.

SIMON (not unpleased he tickles her)

What a trumpery love. You are fickle, Mary Rose.

MARY ROSE (she appears to take his accusation seriously)

Am I?

(restlessly)

Oh, Simon, it isn’t a wrong thing that I left him, I know that... what is wrong is that I was so glad to go... and when he waved, it was sad. It was.

SIMON

Mary Rose...

MARY ROSE (in her mind, a parallel)

Isn’t it funny to think that from this very spot I used to wave to father? That was a happy time. 

SIMON (down to earth)

I should be happier here if I wasn’t so hungry. I wonder where Cameron is. I told him after he landed us to tie up the boat at any good place and make a fire. I suppose I had better try to make it myself.

MARY ROSE

How you can think of food!

SIMON (who is collecting sticks)

All very well, but you will presently be eating more than your share.

MARY ROSE

Do you know, Simon, I don’t think daddy and mother like this island.

SIMON (on his guard)

Help me with the fire, pet.

MARY ROSE

They never seem to want to speak of it.

SIMON

Forgotten it, I suppose.

MARY ROSE

I shall write to them from the inn this evening.

SIMON (casually)

I wouldn’t write from there. Wait till we cross to the mainland.

MARY ROSE

Why?

SIMON

Oh, no reason. But if they have a distaste for the place, perhaps they, wouldn’t like our coming. I say, praise me, I have got this fire going.

MARY ROSE (who is often disconcertingly pertinacious)

Simon, why did you want to come to my island without me?

SIMON

Did I? Oh, I merely suggested your remaining at the inn because I thought you seemed tired. I wonder where Cameron can have got to?

MARY ROSE

Here he comes.

(solicitously)

Do be polite to him, dear; you know how touchy they are.

SIMON

I am learning!

The boat, with CAMERON, draws in. He is a gawky youth… an old-young man, in the poor but honourable garb of the ghillie, and is not especially impressive until you question him about the universe.

CAMERON (in the soft voice of the Highlander)

Is it the wish of Mr. Blake that I should land?

SIMON

Yes, yes, Cameron, with the luncheon.

CAMERON steps ashore with the fishing basket.

CAMERON

Is it the wish of Mr. Blake that I should open the basket?

SIMON

We shall tumble out the luncheon if you bring a trout or two. I want you to show my wife, Cameron, how one cooks fish by the water’s edge.

CAMERON

I will do it with pleasure.

(he pauses)

There is one little matter, it is of small importance. You may have noticed that I always address you as Mr. Blake. I notice that you always address me as Cameron; I take no offense.

MARY ROSE

Oh dear, I am sure I always address you as Mr. Cameron.

CAMERON

That is so, Ma’am. You may have noticed that I always address you as ‘ma’am’. It is my way of indicating that I consider you a very genteel young matron, and of all such I am the humble servant.

(he pauses)

In saying I am your humble servant I do not imply that I am not as good as you are. With this brief explanation, ma’am, I will now fetch the trouts.

SIMON (taking advantage of his departure)

That is one in the eye for me.

MARY ROSE

Simon, if you want to say anything to me that is... oh... that you don’t want him to understand, say it in French.

CAMERON returns with two small sea-trout.

CAMERON

The trouts, ma’am, having been cleaned in a thorough and yet easy manner by pulling them up and down in the water, the next procedure is as follows.

He wraps up the trout in a piece of newspaper and soaks them in the water.

CAMERON (cont’d)

I now place the soaking little parcels on the fire, and when the paper begins to bum it will be a sure sign that the trouts is now ready, like myself, ma’am, to be your humble servant.

(he is returning to the boat)

MARY ROSE (who has been preparing the feast)

Don’t go away.

CAMERON

If it is agreeable to Mistress Blake I would wish to go back, to the boat.

MARY ROSE

Why?

CAMERON is not comfortable. She smiles persuasively.

MARY ROSE (cont’d)

It would be more agreeable to me if you would stay.

CAMERON (shuffling)

I will stay.

SIMON

Good man — look after the trout. It is the most heavenly way of cooking fish, Mary Rose.

CAMERON

It is a tasty way, Mr. Blake, but I would not use the word heavenly in this connection.

SIMON

I stand corrected.

(tartly)

I must say ---

MARY ROSE

Prenez garde, mon brave!

SIMON

Mon Dieu! Qu’il est un drole!

MARY ROSE

Mais moi, je l’aime, il est tellement — What is the French for an original?

SIMON

That stumps me.

CAMERON

Colloquially ‘coquin’ might be used, though the classic writers would probably say simply ‘un original’.

SIMON (with a groan)

Phew, this is serious. What was that book you were reading, Cameron, while I was fishing?

CAMERON

It is a small Euripides I carry in the pocket, Mr. Blake.

SIMON

Latin, Mary Rose!

CAMERON

It may be Latin, but in these parts we know no better than to call it Greek.

SIMON

Crushed again! Well, I daresay it is good for my character. Sit down and have pot luck with us, Mr. Cameron.

CAMERON

I thank you, Mr. Blake, but it would not be good manners for a paid man to sit with his employers.

MARY ROSE

When I ask you, Mr. Cameron?

CAMERON

It is kindly meant, but I have not been introduced to you.

MARY ROSE

Oh, but — oh, do let me. My husband, Mr. Blake — Mr. Cameron.

CAMERON

I hope you are ferry well, sir.

SIMON

The same to you, Mr. Cameron. How do you do? Lovely day, isn’t it?

CAMERON

It is a fairly fine day.

(he is not yet appeased)

MARY ROSE (to the rescue) Simon! SIMON

Ah! Do you know my wife? Mr. Cameron — Mrs. Blake.

CAMERON

I am very pleased to make Mistress Blake’s acquaintance. Is Mistress Blake making a long stay in these parts?

MARY ROSE

No, alas, we go across tomorrow.

CAMERON

I hope the weather will be favourable.

MARY ROSE

Thank you.

(passing him the sandwiches)

And now, you know, you are our guest.

CAMERON

I am much obliged.

(he examines the sandwiches)

Butcher meat! This is very excellent.

(he bursts Into a surprising fit of laughter, and suddenly cuts it off)

Please to excuse my behaviour. You have been laughing at me all this time, but you did not know I have been laughing at myself also though keeping a remarkable control over my features. I will now have my laugh out, and then I will explain.

(he finishes his laugh)

I will now explain. I am not the solemn prig I have pretended to you to be. I am really a fairly attractive young man, but I am shy and I have been guarding against your taking liberties with me, not because of myself, who am nothing, but because of the noble profession it is my ambition to enter.

They discover that they like him.

MARY ROSE

Do tell us what that is.

CAMERON

It is the profession of medicine. I am a student of Aberdeen University, and in the vacation I am a boatman, or a ghillie, or anything you please, to help to pay my fees.

SIMON

Well done!

CAMERON

I am obliged to Mr. Blake. And I may say, now that we know one another socially, that there is much in Mr. Blake which I am trying to copy.

SIMON

Something in me worth copying!

CAMERON

It is not Mr. Blake’s learning; he has not much learning, but I have always understood that the English manage without it. What I admire in you is your very nice manners and your general deportment, in all of which I have a great deal to learn yet, and I watch these things in Mr. Blake and take memoranda of them in a little note-book.

SIMON expands.

MARY ROSE

Mr. Cameron, do tell me that I also am in the little notebook?

CAMERON

You are not, ma’am, it would not be seemly in me. But it is written in my heart, and also I have said it to my father, that I will remain a bachelor unless I can marry some lady who is very like Mistress Blake.

MARY ROSE

Simon, you never said anything to me as pretty as that. Is your father a crofter in the village, Mr. Cameron?

CAMERON

Yes, ma’am, when he is not at the University of Aberdeen.

SIMON

My stars, does he go there, too?

CAMERON

He does so. We share a very small room between us.

SIMON

Father and son. Is he also entering into the medical profession?

CAMERON

Such is not his purpose. When he has taken his degree he will return and be a crofter again.

SIMON

In that case I don’t see what he is getting out of it.

CAMERON

He is getting the grandest thing in the world out of it; he is getting education.

SIMON feels that he is being gradually rubbed out, and it is a relief to him that CAMERON has now to attend to the trout. The paper they are wrapped in has begun to burn.

MARY ROSE (for the first time eating of trout as it should be cooked)

Delicious!

She offers a portion to CAMERON.

CAMERON

No, I thank you. I have lived on trouts most of my life. This butcher meat is more of an excellent novelty to me.

(he has been eating all this time)

MARY ROSE

Do sit down, Mr. Cameron.

CAMERON

I am doing ferry well here, I thank you.

MARY ROSE

But, please.

CAMERON (with decision)

I will not sit down on this island.

SIMON (curiously)

Come, come, Mr. Cameron. You are a scientist. Surely you are not superstitious?

CAMERON

This island has a bad name. I have never landed on it before.

MARY ROSE

A bad name, Mr. Cameron? Oh but what a shame! When I was here long ago, I often came to the island.

CAMERON

Is that so? It was a chancy thing to do.

SIMON (brazenly)

I have heard that its Gaelic name has an odd meaning — ‘The Island That Likes To Be Visited’ but there is nothing terrifying in that.

MARY ROSE

Oh! I never heard that. It’s charring.

CAMERON

That is as it may be, Mistress Blake.

SIMON

What is there against the island?

CAMERON

For one thing, they are saying it has no authority to be here. It was not always here, so they are saying. Then one day it was here.

SIMON

That little incident happened before your time, I should say, Mr. Cameron.

CAMERON

It happened before the time of anyone now alive, Mr. Blake.

SIMON

I thought so. And does the island ever go away for a jaunt in the same way?

CAMERON

There are some who say that it does.

SIMON

But you have not seen it on the move yourself?

CAMERON

I am not always watching it, Mr. Blake, or listening.

SIMON

Listening to the silence? An island that is as still as an empty church?

MARY ROSE

And has the poor little island many visitors?

CAMERON

An island that had visitors would not need to want to be visited. And why has it not visitors? Because they are afraid to visit it.

MARY ROSE

Whatever are they afraid of?

CAMERON

That is what I say to them. Whatever are you afraid of, I say.

MARY ROSE

But what are you afraid of, Mr. Cameron?

CAMERON

The same thing they are afraid of. There are stories, ma’am.

MARY ROSE

Do tell us. Simon, wouldn’t it be lovely if he would tell us some misty, eerie Highland stories?

SIMON

I don’t know; not unless they are pretty ones.

CAMERON

There is many stories. There is that one of the boy who was brought to this island. He was no older than your baby.

SIMON

What happened to him?

CAMERON

No one knows, Mr. Blake. His father and mother and their friends, they were gathering rowans on the island, and when they looked round, he was gone.

SIMON

Lost?

CAMERON

He could not be found. He was never found.

MARY ROSE

Never! He had fallen into the water?

CAMERON

That is a good thing to say, that he had fallen into the water. That is what I say.

SIMON

But you don’t believe it.

CAMERON

I do not.

MARY ROSE

What do the people in the village say?

CAMERON

Some say he is on the island still.

SIMON

Mr. Cameron! Oh, Mr. Cameron! What does your father say?

CAMERON

He will be saying that they are not here always, but that they come and go.

SIMON

They? Who are they?

CAMERON (uncomfortably) I do not know. But that is what they say. He had heard the island calling. SIMON (bluffly)

Calling? How calling?

CAMERON

I do not know. No one can hear it but those for whom it is meant. This is how it is. I might be standing close to you, Mistress Blake, as it were here, and I might hear it, very loud, terrible, or in soft whispers — no one knows — but I would have to go, and you will not have heard a sound.

MARY ROSE (delighted)

Simon, isn’t it creepy!

SIMON

How long ago was this supposed to have happened? The lost child?

CAMERON

It was before I was born.

SIMON (smiles)

I see.

MARY ROSE

Simon, don’t make fun. Do you know any more stories about the island, Mr. Cameron?

CAMERON

I cannot tell them if Mr. Blake will be saying things the island might not like to hear.

MARY ROSE

Simon, promise to be good.

SIMON

All right, Cameron.

CAMERON

This one is about a young English miss, and they say she was about eight years of age. 

MARY ROSE

Not so much older than I was when I came here. How long ago was it?

CAMERON

I think it is almost fifteen years ago.

MARY ROSE

Simon, it must have been the year after I was here!

SIMON thinks she has heard enough.

SIMON

Very likely. But, I say, we mustn’t stay on gossiping. We must be getting back. Did you bail out the boat?

CAMERON

I did not, but I will do it now if such is your wish.

MARY ROSE

The story first; I refuse to budge without the story.

CAMERON

Well, then the father of this miss he will be fond of fishing, and he sometimes landed the little one on the island while he fished round it from the boat.

MARY ROSE

Just as father used to do with me!

SIMON

I daresay lots of bold tourists come over here.

CAMERON

That is so, if ignorance be boldness, and sometimes —

SIMON

Quite so. But I really think we must be starting.

MARY ROSE

No, Simon! Please go on, Mr. Cameron.

CAMERON

One day the father pulled over for his little one as usual. He saw her from the boat, and it is said she kissed her hand to him. Then in a moment more he reached the island, but she was gone.

MARY ROSE

Gone? Doesn’t it make one shiver!

CAMERON

My father was one of the searchers; for many days they searched. They searched ma’am, long after there was no sense in searching this small island.

MARY ROSE

What a curdling story! Simon dear, it might have been me. Is there any more?

CAMERON

There is more. It was about a month afterwards. Her father was walking on the shore over there, and he saw something moving on the island. All in a tremble, ma’am, he came across in a boat, and it was his little miss.

MARY ROSE

Alive?

CAMERON

Yes, ma’am.

MARY ROSE

I am glad; but it rather spoils the mystery.

SIMON

How, Mary Rose?

MARY ROSE

Because she could tell them what happened, stupid. Whatever was it?

CAMERON

It is not so easy as that. She did not know that anything had happened. She thought she had been parted from her father for but an hour.

MARY ROSE shivers and takes her husband’s hand.

SIMON (speaking more lightly than he is feeling)

You and your bogies and wraiths, you man of the mists.

CAMERON

It is not good to disbelieve the stories when you are in these parts. I believe them all when I am here, though I turn the cold light of remorseless reason on them when I am in Aberdeen.

SIMON

Oh? An island that has such extraordinary powers could surely send its call to Aberdeen or farther.

CAMERON (troubled)

I had not thought of that. That may be very true.

SIMON

Beware, Mr. Cameron, lest some day when far from here, you are setting a broken leg or swabbing a throat, the call plucks you out of your very hygienic and scientific surgery and brings you back to the island like a trout on a long cast.

CAMERON

I will go and bail the boat.

He goes back to the boat which soon drifts out of sight.

MARY ROSE (pleasantly thrilled)

How awful for the girl when her father told her that she had been away for weeks!

SIMON

Perhaps she was never told. He may have thought it wiser not to disturb her.

MARY ROSE

Yes, I suppose that would have been best. And yet — it was taking a risk.

SIMON

How?

MARY ROSE

Well, not knowing what had happened before, she might come back and — and be caught again.

She draws closer to him. SIMON

If she ever comes back, let us hope it is with an able-bodied husband to protect her.

MARY ROSE (comfortably)

Nice types, husbands.

SIMON (all business)

And now to pack up the remnants of the feast and escape from the scene of the crime. We will never come back again Mary Rose. I find I’m not so enchanted with your island.

She helps him to pack.

MARY ROSE

Then I daresay I shall never visit here again. The last time of anything is always sad, don’t you think, Simon?

SIMON (briskly)

There must always be a last time, Mary Rose. For everything.

MARY ROSE

Yes — I suppose — for everything. There must be a last time I shall see you, Simon.

(playing with his hair)

Someday I shall flatten this wretched tuft for the thousandth time, and then never do it again.

SIMON

Someday I shall look for it and it won’t be there.

MARY ROSE

Oh dear!

She is whimsical rather than merry and merry rather than sad. SIMON touches her hair with his lips.

MARY ROSE (cont’d)

Someday, Simon, you will kiss me for the last time. But if you plan to be bald and fat, I daresay I shan’t mind!

SIMON

Just as I said, fickle.

He kisses her again, sportively, she quivers.

SIMON (cont’d)

What is it?

MARY ROSE

I don’t know; something seemed to pass over me. Simon... I hate last times! The thought that there must be a last time to kiss you... to hold my baby…

SIMON

Darling, the day after you have held Kenneth for the last time as a baby you will see him for the first time as a little boy, and then before you know it, as a man. Think of that.

MARY ROSE

I shall like that, I think. To have Kenneth grown and handsome and strong... and he can hold me in his arms and comfort me...

SIMON (he has been watching her, listening to her. Now he deliberately breaks into her mood)

Well, I suppose I ought to stamp out this fire?

MARY ROSE

Let Cameron do it. Simon... come sit beside me and hold me.

SIMON

What a life. Let me see now, how does one begin?

MARY ROSE

Shall I make love to you, Simon?

(touches his face, then puts her head against his chest)

I wonder if I have been a nice wife to you... I mean a tolerably good wife on the whole, not a wonderful one, but a wife that would pass in a crowd?

SIMON

Look here, Mary Rose, if you are going to butt me with your head in that way, you must take the pins out of your hair.

MARY ROSE (although he has not meant this suggestion seriously, she does take the pins from her hair, and it falls now around her shoulders)

Have I been all right as a mother, Simon?

SIMON (smiles)

You must wait a few years and ask that of Kenneth Morland Blake.

MARY ROSE

Have I...

SIMON

Shut up, Mary Rose. I know you; you will be crying in a moment, and I used your handkerchief to wrap around the trout whose head came off.

MARY ROSE (this time he does not find it so easy to disrupt her mood)

Simon, if one of us had to... to go. . .to leave Kenneth… and we could choose which one...

SIMON (an exaggerated sigh)

Oh, Lord. She’s off again.

MARY ROSE

But if? I wonder which would be best? I mean for him, of course.

SIMON

Oh, then me. I should have to hop it.

MARY ROSE

Oh, Simon!

SIMON (grins)

Steady, old girl. I haven’t skipped off yet.

(he regards her curiously)

I expect you’re not unlike mothers generally. If their husbands do... as you say, go... their first thought is, ‘the baby’s happiness must not be interfered with for a moment’.

MARY ROSE

Is that the way we are?

SIMON (confidently)

You would blot me out forever, Mary Rose, rather than see your child lose one of his hundred laughs a day. It’s true, isn’t it?

MARY ROSE

It is true that if I was the one to go, that is what I should like you to do.

SIMON

Get your feet off the table-cloth, slattern.

Her mouth opens.

SIMON (cont’d)

And don’t step in the marmalade.

MARY ROSE (throws her head back, laughs gloriously)

Oh God! Isn’t life lovely? I am so happy! Aren’t you, Simon?

SIMON

Rather.

MARY ROSE

But you can put the lid on the marmalade. Why don’t you scream with happiness? One of us has got to scream.

SIMON

Then I know which one it will be. Scream away, it will give Cameron the jumps.

CAMERON draws in.

SIMON (cont’d)

There you are, Cameron. We are still safe, you see. You can count us — two.

CAMERON

I am very glad.

SIMON

Here you are.

(handing him the luncheon basket)

You needn’t tie the boat up. Stay there and I’ll stamp out the fire myself.

CAMERON

As Mr. Blake pleases.

SIMON

Ready, Mary Rose?

MARY ROSE

I must say good-bye to my island first. Good-bye, old mossy seat, nice rowan... goodbye ...

SIMON

I say, Mary Rose, do dry up that drivel.

MARY ROSE

I won’t say another word.

SIMON

Confounded fire. Just as it seems to be out, sparks cone again. Do you think if I were to get some stones — ?

He looks up and she signs that she has promised not to talk. They laugh at each other. He is then occupied for a little time in dumping wet stones from the loch upon the fire. CAMERON is in the boat with his Euripides. MARY ROSE is sitting demure but gay, holding her tongue with her fingers like a child.

Scene 18

But something else is happening; the call has come to MARY ROSE. It is at first as soft and furtive as whisperings from holes in the ground, ‘Mary Rose’, ‘Mary Rose’. Then in a fury of storm and whistling winds that might be an unholy organ it rushes upon the island, raking every bush for her. These sounds increase rapidly in volume till the mere loudness of them is horrible. Struggling through them, and also calling her name, is to be heard music of an unearthly sweetness. Once MARY ROSE’S arms go out to her husband for help, but thereafter she is oblivious to his existence. Her face is rapt, but there is neither fear nor joy in it. Her figure moves back, back... away from the fire, from SIMON, from us, until she is outlined finally against the rise of the hillock, then disappears from our view... from our ken. Almost immediately, the island resumes its stillness. The sun has gone down. SIMON is by the fire still, and CAMERON is in the boat. They have heard nothing.

Scene 19

SIMON (on his knees)

There... that’s finally done. We can go now. How cold and grey it’s become.

(smiling, but without looking up)

You needn’t grip your tongue any longer, you know.

(he rises)

Mary Rose, where have you got to? Please don’t hide. Darling, don’t. Cameron, where is my wife?

CAMERON rises in the boat, and he is afraid to land. His face alarms SIMON, who runs this way and that and is lost to sight calling her by name again and again. He returns livid.

SIMON

Cameron, I can’t find her! Mary Rose! Mary Rose!

In spite of his trepidation, CAMERON joins SIMON on the island and as the CAMERA moves back to show their two figures running, crossing and recrossing each other’s in a frantic ballet, we see them too rise to the height of the little hillock. But we also see them descend to its other side where they discover... nothing. The CAMERA moves back and back as SIMON’S voice continues to keen the name of his wife. ‘Mary Rose!’... ‘Mary Rose!’ … ‘Mary Rose!’ And as his figure diminishes in the mist, so will his voice. The retreat of the CAMERA, the FADE OUT, will continue until the figures, the voice, are utterly diminished and as lost to us... in their way... as MARY ROSE, Who has become, it seems, no more than the haunting echo of SIMON’S fading voice.

Scene 20

From the final dim vision and failing whisper of SIMON on the island to the stillness of utter nothing. Now... from this nothing... the CAMERA again moves to life. But its moving should be like a wakening, and it comes from a distance, a great distance, slowly forward until, from timeless mists, there is a gradual focusing and the minutiae, the facts, of images are again ours. We are once more in the MORLAND'S DRAWING-ROOM. The CAMERA'S approach to the voices we hear (as SIMON'S voice diminished as we moved away from him, so now do these voices augment as we approach) is oblique, circling the room, little changed from our last visit, until it comes to rest... at last... on the three occupants. They are MR. and MRS. MORLAND and MR. AMY. Before we see them we hear their talk. MR. MORLAND says…

MR. MORLAND (o.s.)

It's the sugar I mind most. We haven't had a proper puddin' in weeks.

MR. AMY (o.s.) (replies)

Well, personally I believe these small sacrifices have been a bit of a blessing in disguise. Since I've had to walk about so much, I've dropped a full stone...feel like a boy. You would too, James, if you followed in my footsteps every day.

MR. MORLAND (o.s.)

I daresay I feel as much a boy as you, George.

Now, finally, the CAMERA closes in on MORLAND, and we see that he is now an old man. He is still straight and lean but there is simply not the vigour and chestiness of fifty nor the look that all is still possibly recoverable. His hair is quite white, his complexion ruddier and veined.

MR. MORLAND (cont'd)

You never say precisely what your age is, George.

MR. AMY (He too is much aged, but he doesn't carry his age as well as MR. MORLAND. He seems to have shrunk)

I am in my late sixties. I am sure I have told you that before.

MR. MORLAND

It would seem that you have been in the sixties longer than it is usual to be in them.

MRS. MORLAND (she too, like her husband, carries her years well, but there is no denying that she is now an old woman)

James!

MR. MORLAND

No offense, George. I was only going to say that at seventy-two I certainly do not feel my age. Nor would it seem, at, uh... sixty-nine?... do you.

MR. AMY (testily)

Whatever my age, Mr. Morland, but I have not yet found it necessary to complain about the pitiful economies of a government at war.

MR. MORLAND

Are you suggesting that I... I, who administer this county’s rationing, have been heard by you to complain!

MR. AMY

Perhaps ‘complain’ is too strong a term. Your attitude might best be described as ‘fretful’.

MR. MORLAND (outraged)

Fretful! Me!

MR. AMY (triumphantly)

Your chagrin can well be understood!

(rises)

I believe I must go. I have quite a distance to walk. I quite look forward to breathing the invigorating night air. Thank you, Mrs. Morland, for your unvarying hospitality.

He is followed to the door by MRS. MDRIAND.

MRS. MORLAND (as they leave the room)

I shall see you into your coat, George.

MR. MORLAND (satisfying himself with the last word, he does not presume to make it audible to his departing guest)

Yes, Fanny. Do help the doddering old fool. He’ll never make it alone.

(kicks at a burning log, sighs, then follows out the door)

CUT TO:

Scene 21

MRS. MORLAND and MR. AMY at front door. MRS. MORLAND helps him with his coat.

MR. AMY

Dear Fanny...

(timidly he touches her arm)

How generous of you to give us your smile through everything you’ve had to bear. You know, Fanny, I feel that I mustn’t speak of it in James’s presence... poor old James has never had your serenity of spirit, Fanny... but lately... I can’t explain it... lately I’ve had the strongest conviction that Kenneth is alive and well. That he is surely prisoner-of- war somewhere across the lines and quite safe.

MRS. MORLAND

Do you feel that, George? I do. Otherwise I’m sure I couldn’t go on.

MR. AMY (pats her gently, sighs)

Will Simon be home?

MRS. MORLAND

Yes, we’re bound to see him any day. They cannot keep his ship in constant engagement. They must be relieved soon.

MR. AMY

I should love to see him and hear about it all.

(levers his voice confessionally)

It is thrilling to think about, isn’t it? The icy black reaches of the sea, our grave ships, the gallant men guarding our shores against the silent prowling killers. They Shall Not Pass! Oh Fanny, I wish I were young!

(a sudden disturbing thought)

Not that I personally should ever wish to harm anyone… even the Hun. But I would like to stand guard.

(sighs)

Ah well. Now. I really cannot leave poor James in wrath...

(turns as if to remount the stairs, sees MR. MORLAND at the top)

Oh...

MR. MORLAND

It fretted me, George, to have you go without saying goodnight.

MR. AMY (pleased. He smiles)

Goodnight, then, James. Goodbye, Fanny.

(he leaves)

MRS. MORLAND looks up, smiles at her husband, begins to climb back up the stairs. While he comes down a few to meet her.

MR. MORLAND

What were you two gossiping about?

They walk up the last few steps together during the ensuing dialogue and re-enter the DRAWING-ROOM, he to stop again by the fire, she to where the old album lays.

MRS MORLAND (smiles)

Nothing really. Just how George wishes he were in the Navy like Simon.

MR. MORLAND

Ha! At his age? He’s getting positively senile.

MRS. MORLAND has picked up the album and opened it. Her smile doesn’t altogether disappear, but it becomes painfully poignant as she looks at the pictures. We, too, see them, these faded images of the past, the colour of the present giving way to the sepia shades of memory. The first one we see, at first glance might almost be the one taken on KENNETH’S second birthday. But we must stay with it long enough to take in the three candles on the cake, MRS. MORLAND now occupying the place of the absent MARY ROSE, and somewhat apart, unsmiling, SIMON, who is looking not at the little boy on his birthday, but into some distance of his own. The boy, KENNETH, is seen to be fair and blue-eyed like his mother, and he has something of her open gaze and look of innocent joy. This first picture should be followed by several more... five or six... all on KENNETH’S birthdays. MRS. MORLAND is always there. SIMON is sometimes not. The pictures in which SIMON is present should reveal the estrangement between father and son. They are never touching, never smiling at each other, always separated by some person or thing. The last shot should be dated 1914 and we should see SIMON in some attitude indicating his role as warrior and KENNETH’S envy and eagerness to join the company of men. Under the date 1915 there is no picture. Instead, in a firm hand should be written the words, ‘Private Kenneth Moreland Blake, Missing in Action.’

MR. MORLAND

Fanny, don’t, my dear.

MRS. MORLAND

I was just remembering how lovely the apple tree is in bloom.

MR. MORLAND

But it must come down, Fanny. It has become a danger. It might fall on someone any day. You know that.

MRS. MORLAND

But it was Kenneth’s tree... his ladder from this room to the world! How sad it will be for him if...

(firm with herself)

when he comes back.

MR. MORLAND (staunchly)

When Kenneth comes back, we shall plant another tree.

MRS. MORLAND (looking out)

And it was her tree.

(he does not respond to this)

Can we forget that, James?

(sighs)

It seems so.

MR. MORLAND (sighs)

Fanny, I have found it better to forget... so many things.

MRS. MORLAND

Yes. Of course. It is all to the good, I suppose, that as the years go by the... the dead should recede farther from us.

MR. MORLAND

Fanny... how long is it since... since you last thought of her as...

MRS. MORLAND

As not dead?

(she looks at him frankly, speaks simply)

Years.

MR. MORLAND (relieved)

We had Kenneth.

MRS. MORLAND (reassuringly)

And will again, James. I feel so sure of that. As I never did after... oh, it was all so unfathomable. Sometimes I feel as if Mary Rose was just something lovely I had dreamed. Even that room...

(her head toward the small back room)

...after we moved Kenneth out of it, I never again seemed to connect it with her. I go in there now without a memory.

MR. MORLAND (gently)

I’m glad.

MRS. MORLAND

In a way I suppose it has all been harder for Simon...

MR. MORLAND

Poor old chap. And he has Kenneth on his conscience, of course.

MRS. MORLAND (this is undoubtedly a conversation that they have had many times... each of them knows the litany only too well)

He was with Kenneth so little...

MR. MORLAND

Well, those first years... he was consumed with it all... to the Hebrides again and again... every leave...

MRS. MORLAND

I think Simon couldn’t bear to look at Kenneth... the resemblance... the eyes...

MR. MORLAND

Ah... poor Simon...

MRS. MORLAND

Poor Kenneth.

(a dim, sad smile)

Poor everyone.

The telephone rings. MR. MORLAND moves to answer it.

MR. MORLAND

Morland here... yes, that’s what I said, Morland here... Long distance?

(impatiently)

Yes, of course I’ll talk... Yes?... Please speak up... Who? I’m afraid I didn’t catch... Who? …

(slowly, as he listens his expression becomes rejecting, suspicious)

Oh? Yes... yes, I remember the name. Certainly. Yes... yes, she’s quite well, thank you...

(looks at his wife, raises his eyebrows in bewilderment)

Where are you calling from? I didn’t catch the… Oh.

(his face goes quite blank)

I see. From... there... Yes… I assure you we’re quite well... What is... is there anything I can do for you? ...

MR. MORLAND now listens at some length. MRS. MORLAND watches, at first curiously, then with gathering alarm as she sees her husband slowly lower himself into a chair, his face blank with shock; he simply listens to the voice coming from the phone and stares blindly ahead. At last MR. MORLAND whispers hoarsely.

MR. MORLAND (cont’d)

Mary Rose...

White-faced MRS. MORLAND rises, crosses to her husband.

MR. MORLAND (cont’d) (into the phone)

When? ... Of course, of course... We’ll meet you... Oh... but we are a mile from the station... Yes, I see. Certainly... of course. As you say. We’ll... we’ll be here... goodbye. Goodbye.

(as he slowly bangs up)

And...

(the word catches in his throat)

and... thank you.

MRS. MORLAND

James...

MR. MORLAND looks up at her, instantly is shaken out of himself, takes her hand.

MR. MORLAND

Fanny, it’s Mary Rose. Mary Rose. He says she has been... found.

MRS. MORLAND (clutches her breast as if to restrain her heart from bursting from its cage)

Ahhhhh…

MR. MORLAND

Cameron... the ghillie... the one who took Simon and Mary Rose to the island... it was he. He is Dr. Cameron, it seems.

MRS. MORLAND

Where? Where is she?

MR. MORLAND

They found her... on the island... and he’s bringing her to us... bringing her... here. He said that was best... he was quite... firm... I didn’t know what to say...

MRS. MORLAND

When?

MR. MORLAND

Tomorrow night.

(stares)

Fanny... it is a hoax! It must be! After eighteen years... it can’t be... it just can’t be!

MRS. MORLAND

It’s all right, James. We mustn’t... be afraid. It’s our Mary Rose.

MR. MORLAND

Alive? She is really alive? He said she was... all right, Fanny. That she was... very nervous, he said, but all right. Somehow, it sounded like a warning, Fanny.

MRS. MORLAND

We must get in touch with Simon. Somehow we must get in touch with Simon.

MR. MORLAND

You know, I remembered the man’s voice... even now... after all these years. His voice instantly...

MRS. MORLAND

James... we must call the admiralty. If Simon’s ship is in port or on its way, he must be informed. We must have Simon here.

MR. MORLAND stares at her a moment, then pulls himself together. He is somehow comforted, reinforced by the thought of SIMON. He reaches for the telephone, picks it up.

MR. MORLAND

Of course, of course. Simon must be here.

SLOW FADE OUT.

FADE IN:

Scene 22

INTERIOR TRAIN COMPARTMENT - NIGHT

The train is moving through the night. In the darkened compartment, lighted only by the reflection of the moon, we see the wide-awake, erect figure of a bearded, soberly dressed man. THE CAMERA moves in close enough and slowly enough for us to recognize behind the beard and the years CAMERON. We see that his face has not actually aged. The beard is perhaps the desperate measure of a youthful professional man seeking all available aids to dignity. He is, at this moment, a deeply worried man as he gazes with pity and compassion on the sleeping figure which he is guarding through this long night journey. The figure is, of course, MARY ROSE. But she is in deep shadow, her head averted. The figure moves; there is a faint moan. Quickly CAMERON takes out his watch, checks the time, then opens his medicine kit and takes from it a hypodermic which he prepares, silently, efficiently.

FADE OUT.

FADE IN:

Scene 23

INTERIOR MORLAND DRAWING-ROOM

CLOSE-UP SIMON. His weather-beaten, exhausted face still tight with shock.

SIMON

I would not give this one moment’s credence if it were anyone but Cameron. Are you quite sure…

THE CAMERA moves back to include MR. and MRS. MORLAND. And also to allow us to see that SIMON has just recently arrived at the house... his cap, a captain’s now, beside him on the sofa.

MR. MORLAND

His voice was unmistakable, I tell you.

(a moment of almost. hostile tension)

Simon... you knew the man... do you think... I know it’s mad, but could this be some sort of wild plot to extort money? Something of that sort? It makes no sense... but it makes more sense than what he said.

SIMON

No. Not if it was Cameron. If it was Cameron...

MR. MORLAND

It was Cameron I tell you.

SIMON (like a sigh)

Then... she is alive. She’s alive?

MRS. MORLAND

Simon, dear... she will be... very changed. You must prepare yourself.

SIMON

However changed... if it is truly Mary Rose... Oh God I Did he say how... where...

MRS. MORLAND

Oh, my dear! You’re exhausted. This is too cruel...

MR. MORLAND

He said that two men fishing from a boat saw her... there. On the island. She called to them. She... apparently does not know... rather, she is confused about what happened. She... thinks you left her there…

SIMON

Left her!

MRS. MORLAND

We must compose ourselves... she’ll be here any moment...

SIMON

How will they get from the station? Why are we not to meet the train?

MR. MORLAND

He was most explicit that the reunion be private...

(the possible reasons for this are too frightening for any of them to pursue)

...he said she would benefit by the walk...

SIMON (very quietly. Conversationally)

You know, I don’t believe I can bear this...

(his face changes, alerts. He stands)

They must be almost here. I am going to meet them. I do not give a damn what he said. I am going to meet Mary Rose.

He moves from the room without another word. THE CAMERA follows SIMON’S flight down the stairs, out the door, and into the night. He runs at full speed across a broken field until he sees two dim figures cutting through the foggy dark. Then he slews to a suddenly shy and halting walk. The thought of what his next steps might bring to him are too awesome. But as his step slows, the slighter of the two distant figures begins to move forward, gaining momentum until it is, at last, a small missile that throws itself into his rusty arms.

MARY ROSE

Simon! Oh, Simon! Oh, thank goodness! Hold me! Simon!

Scene 24

CLOSE-UP - SIMON’S FACE

His eyes are closed in a dream of ecstasy as his arms enfold the slight body. There are tears in his eyes when they open. And what he sees through the tears’ soft glitter is the mature, bearded, infinitely sad face of CAMERON. The warning in the face causes him to clutch more tightly at the girl.

MARY ROSE (cont’d) (between tears and laughter)

Oh, Simon... whoever would have thought that being crushed to death would feel so safe!

CAMERON

Mr. Blake... Captain, I should say... I am greatly relieved. I hadn’t dared hope to find you here... 

MARY ROSE (not without some malice)

Simon, this gentleman very kindly...

(a small laugh)

chaperoned me home…

CAMERON

I will go ahead and pay my respects to Mr. and Mrs. Morland...

(his warning eye moves from SIMON to rest gently on MARY ROSE)

You and your husband should walk together at your leisure...

CAMERON moves rapidly away from SIMON and MARY ROSE.

MARY ROSE (whispers)

He behaves as if he knows us all... I think he must be quite mad... although he has tried to be kind... I suppose...

Once more she buries herself in his arms. Her high young voice, the quickness of her movements, the feel of her body... but most of all, her lack of the astonishment of this reunion... all of these things have begun to work on SIMON.

SIMON (softly)

Mary Rose... close your eyes, Mary Rose...

Unquestioningly , she obeys. Slowly, he lifts her chin and stares into her face. His piercing scrutiny penetrates even the pale starlight, and he sees her face. It is the same face; unmarked, unlined, exactly as he saw it last eighteen years ago. He sees her youth and he feels her youth and his loss. Her eyelids flutter... quickly he kisses them closed again.

SIMON

No... no, darling...

He is utterly bewildered by what he is feeling... or not feeling. Automatically, he pets and soothes her as, clutching her to his side, his face in darkness above her, he begins to walk her slowly toward the house. 

MARY ROSE

Oh, Simon... I’m so relieved. I couldn’t think what had happened to you! Everyone behaved so strangely... I have no idea what became of my luggage... I got rather hysterical... that man... Simon, he drugged me…

Her speech is quick, over-animated. However deeply troubled and uneasy she is, she bravely attempts now to cover her fears. She chatters in a spritely manner and does not wait for answers that might be unnerving.

MARY ROSE (cont’d)

I’ve been in this wretched dress for three days! I’ve had to sleep in it! As a matter of fact, I seem to have slept almost the entire trip... when I waked up... on the island… and couldn’t find you... I was so disturbed... I was taken to that man... he said he knew me... he said he was a doctor. Simon, he did not know me... I have no idea why he would lie, but imagine how I felt... I’d never seen the hairy old thing... if he would lie about knowing me, then maybe it was a lie about his being a doctor. Absolutely nothing made sense! They were so solemn and silent and wouldn’t answer any of my questions... I thought I was going mad... Simon, what happened? Why did you leave me? I hadn’t any luggage or even a pocket book! Can you wonder I became a little overwrought? He gave me pills… he made me take them, Simon, and after that... it’s all been a horrible blur. I knew I was on a train, but I couldn’t speak or cry out... then he was trying to force me to drink coffee and Simon, he shook me and made me walk and then when the train stopped... Oh God! You can’t imagine how relieved I was to see that I was really here! Simon, I’m home!

(she stumbles a little)

I’m still groggy, I guess. Oh, darling, take me in the house. Get rid of that man... he is too strange, Simon. Oh, I want to see everyone.

(moves precipitously ahead in her old way)

Is Kenneth asleep? Of course he is, and I shall have no conscience whatever about waking him! Simon! Don’t drag!

She pulls the resisting SIMON toward the house.

SIMON

Please, Mary Rose... wait...

MARY ROSE

Darling, I do believe you’re catching a cold. Your voice sounds so raspy... we must get inside.

(moves determinedly toward door of the house)

You are to come in at once and attempt to give me some explanation…

(her manner is meant to be sweetly teasing, but there is a tremor of uncertainty in her voice)

It appears on the face of it, that my beloved old Simon simply bolted, abandoning me to the northern elements and...

(a nervous little laugh and tosses her head in the direction of the house and CAMERON)

...and that... that extraordinary Scotsman! Darling, when we get inside, do take a good look at him and see if you think he looks in any way familiar... oh...

(she gives another uneasy little laugh)

This has all been so confusing... I shouldn’t think it possible to get a sun-stroke in Northern Scotland, should you?

SIMON is stunned and already done in by the barely subdued hysteria of this girl who is his wife and with his total in adequacy to deal with the situation.

MARY ROSE (cont’d)

Simon?

SIMON

Yes, Mary Rose?

MARY ROSE

Well! You do at least recall my name! Oh... I won’t stay out here any longer! I want to see my baby...

This time she is determined. She darts from him and into the house. Into the light. In the foyer she stops, her attention caught at once by the electric light. She begins to tremble slightly, controls herself, then notices a collection of prints that now hang in the foyer. She attempts a smile, turns back toward the open door outside which SIMON stands, unable to bring himself to cross the threshold into the revealing light.

MARY ROSE (cont’d) (determinedly down to earth)

Goodness! Daddy must have been to London and spent a packet!

(insistently)

Simon, do come inside! Why are you shuffling about out there in the dark?

SIMON does not move or answer and her voice goes quavery.

MARY ROSE (cont’d)

Simon...

And now, slowly, irrevocably, poor SIMON steps into the light. His face, taut with anxiety and, strangely, shame, shows itself to her. Her nervous, insistent smile is turned full on him. For a long moment, her expression does not change at all. And then suddenly, a little grimace that is almost a tic replaces the smile. Her reactions are small, very small, as they are when one’s confidence in one’s physical senses are dangerously shaken. One’s primary instinct is not to expose this terrifying failure. Under SIMON’S sad and silent gaze, MARY ROSE, her young body as still as a stopped heart, forces her mouth slowly back into the lines that are meant to delineate a smile.

SIMON (in pity)

I am sorry, Mary Rose...

She blinks and turns her head slightly to one aide, no longer able to look directly at him. A small shudder nans through her. She seems to become before our eyes a cruel travesty of herself. It not that she is any older, but that her youth is now somehow determined... what was once vivacity is now nerves pulled too tight; what was once ingenuous, is now disingenuous.

MARY ROSE

Why is the house so quiet? What happened to that sinister Scot?

(ducks her head away from SIMON’S... laughs)

What’s been going on behind my back, Simon... you look absolutely exhausted...

(she starts to run up the stairs, quickly putting distance between herself and SIMON)

Where is everybody? Daddy?

Scene 25

She dashed furiously up the stairs and bursts into the brightly lighted DRAWING-ROOM. Her confrontation with her white-faced, trembling parents is no more than a tear-dimmed streak across the distance that separates them. She flights herself into her mother’s arms. MRS. MORLAND, beyond tears, almost beyond feeling, simply holds, with a mother’s reflexes, this memory of a girl.

MARY ROSE

Oh, mother! Oh, I’m so glad to be home!

As if touched by some marvellous, forbidden enchantment, no one moves or speaks. Only the sound of SIMON’S footsteps at the top of the stairs, now entering the DRAWING-ROOM, breaks the spell, causing MARY ROSE to look into her mother’s face for reassurance. She sees, undeniably sees, the age. Slowly, her eyes more from MRS. MORLAND to MR. MORLAND, where she finds again, the same inexplicable blight. She turns from one face to another, and on each she sees deeply etched, in unaccountable lines, love, grief, shock, shame. Time.

MRS. MORLAND

Oh, my darling.,..

MARY ROSE (tremulously)

Daddy?

CAMERON (to MRS. MORLAND)

Don’t you think Mary Rose might like a cup of tea?

MARY ROSE (brightly)

Oh, no thank you...

(her voice starts to break)

I don’t need anything.

CAMERON (kindly)

If you don’t fancy tea, I expect a sip of something stronger might... ward off a chill.

MARY ROSE

I’m quite all right, thank you...

Her smile Intact, MARY ROSE disengages herself from the group and moves, with a pitiful attempt at casualness, toward a wall mirror.

MARY ROSE (cont’d)

...although I’m sure I look a wreck... these clothes…

As if to straighten her hair, her appearance, MARY ROSE forces her gaze into the mirror, quite unable to disguise the trembling anxiety with which she regards her image. She sees herself... lets out her breath... for it is really herself, the self she knows. For an instant she goes slack with relief, and a smile springs spontaneously to her lips. It is shaky, but it is real.

However, before she can turn back to face the others, she sees in the mirror... his face reflected beside her own... SIMON. And the nightmare is real. He is so much older, and she is not. Only she is unchanged. The others are OLD and ALIEN. She whirls around, faces them like an animal at bay.

MARY ROSE (cont’d)

Tell me! Tell me!

MR. MORLAND (simply)

How can we, Mary Rose? We don’t know.

MARY ROSE (to SIMON)

Tell me.

SIMON (manfully, but stumbling over the words, all the wrong words)

Darling... when I lost you... it was... Mary Rose... you must understand... I did not leave you darling. It was you who… went away… who left me… us…

MARY ROSE (whimpers)

Tell me...

MRS. MORLAND (once more it is she who faces up to the worst)

She wants to know about Kenneth.

MARY ROSE

Where is my baby?

SIMON (he cannot bear this)

No! You mustn’t go on like this... believe me...

She gives SIMON one brief, baleful look, turns toward the little door at the far end of the DRAWING-ROOM end runs for it... her dash toward the door has the desperation of an attempted escape. Skirting the periphery of possibly restraining hands, she reaches the door, flings it open, runs down the little hallway to the second door, and, as if anticipating resistance, puts her shoulder fiercely against the wood, twists the door handle and pushes violently into the room to find... nothing whatsoever. The room now seems to function as a small study. There is no bed in it and, certainly, there is no child. MARY ROSE swivels around. MRS. MORLAND has had the courage to follow her.

MARY ROSE

I left my baby here! Right here! Where is my baby? Where?!

MRS. MORLAND

This isn’t used as a bedroom anymore, Mary Rose...

MARY ROSE (breaking in, her voice rising dangerously)

Where is my baby?

MRS. MORLAND

Kenneth hasn’t slept in here...

(bravely)

...since he was seven. He... needed a larger room...

MARY ROSE looks at her mother with fear and horror, drawing frantically back as SIMON and MR. MORLAND come down the hall, to precisely whose rescue they do not know.

SIMON (attempting to prevail over this sea of unreality with the only weapons he has, courage and command)

Mary Rose. Your mother... your mother cannot stand this, Mary Rose. She has borne too much... too many losses…

MARY ROSE (barely even a whisper)

What losses?

MRS. MORLAND (faintly, with infinite pity)

First there was you, my love. You have been... away, for a very long time.

SIMON (dully)

Eighteen years.

MARY ROSE (scarcely audible now)

Where is my baby?

SIMON

There is no...

(is there the faintest hint of accusation in his voice?)

Mary Rose... there is no baby.

MARY ROSE (she has been waiting for this blow, but when it comes, her reaction is one of faint stupor. She sits. There is even the beginning of a smile on her lips as if she wanted to understand the joke too)

No baby?

SIMON (feeling that the worst is over, that she is calming down)

Kenneth is...

(finishes lamely; there is too much guilt)

...he is... not here

MARY ROSE

Not here?

SIMON

He is...

(he cannot go on)

MARY ROSE (still falsely calm)

He is where?

CAMERON (In a rush, hoping to lend comfort, any comfort)

Mrs. Blake, your family has been given reason to hope...

MARY ROSE (the same almost-smile)

To hope?

MRS. MORLAND

That he has been taken prisoner...

As the room begins to spin about her and the torturing sound of the voices and the terrible sight of the faces melt and flow into one another, both visually and aurally (the repeated words are ‘missing’, ‘you went away’, ‘he has been taken’, ‘you went away’...) the tormented girl throws back her head in agony, her body stiffens, her threat arches and swells with a sound that rises in her to drown out all other sounds. She manages only to choke out four words...

MARY ROSE

Who took my baby?

...before the sound is finally torn from her. It is a scream to shake the senses of all who hear it. It fills the little room with its very essence, unquenchable sorrow and rage. And as the scream is born, MARY ROSE dies. She never rose from the chair. It is as though she were dead long before the scream had finished making its relentless, tearing course through her body. When she falls, it is as if the scream, triumphant in its monstrous birth, had simply discarded what was left of her. Of the figures in the tableau around the body of MARY ROSE, only SIMON makes a pitiful little human gesture of protest. Gently he touches her pale, almost luminous cheek., And when he takes his hand away, his fingers, where they touched her, are faintly blue. There is one small, awful, choked sound from SIMON, as the scene fades. There is no further movement MRS. MORLAND, MR. MORLAND, CAMERON, all stand frozen in the icy echoes of the scream.

FADE OUT.

FADE IN:

Scene 26

And it is the still rebounding waves of this echoed scream that move now into the dusty old room where KENNETH sits and waits in the dark, the fire and candle long since guttered out. The little door at the back opens slowly to the extent of a foot. Thus might a break of wind blow it if there were any wind. Presently KENNETH rises slowly to his feet. He hears nothing; he sees nothing. But the feel of the scream is with him. As he watches, the door closes softly. Now he picks up the candle, relights it, and with hardly a moment’s irresolution, moves toward the door. He opens it, crosses the short length of the hall and now tries the final door. Easily, without a murmur of protest, it opens for him. He holds the candle up, looking waiting... there is nothing. He lets out his breath, turns back, slowly retracing his steps into the drawing-room. And it is there, at last, that he is met by MARY ROSE. She stands quietly in the middle of the room, as if made out of the light he has brought back with him. She nods politely and speaks.

MARY ROSE

Have you come to buy the house?

KENNETH

No.

MARY ROSE

But it is a nice house.

(doubtfully)

Isn’t it?

KENNETH

It was a very nice house once.

MARY ROSE (pleased)

Wasn’t it!

(suspiciously)

Why are you here?

KENNETH

I used to know the house. When I was very young.

MARY ROSE (eagerly)

Young? Was it you who laughed? There used to be someone who laughed in this house... was it you?

KENNETH

I don’t know. Perhaps.

MARY ROSE

No. I don’t think so. You’re quite old.

(fretfully)

Would you mind telling me why everyone is so old?

KENNETH

It is only because you have stayed so young.

MARY ROSE (smiles; pleased)

Do I know you?

KENNETH

I wonder. Do I look like anyone you ever knew?

MARY ROSE

You don’t look like... Simon.

(frowns with concentration)

You are not ... Simon, are you?

KENNETH

No, not Simon. But he sent me here. He has died you know.

MARY ROSE

Died? Why?

KENNETH

He was old.

(venturing)

My name is Kenneth.

MARY ROSE (stiffens)

I don’t think so.

KENNETH

But that is my name. And I would like... very much... to hear you call me Kenneth.

MARY ROSE (firmly)

No.

KENNETH

I’m sorry.

MARY ROSE

Are you?

(still pertinacious)

I think you are sorry for me.

KENNETH

I am.

MARY ROSE

I’m rather sorry for myself. I just don’t seem to know anyone... it’s lonely...

KENNETH

You know Simon.

MARY ROSE

Simon? Well...

(confesses)

I don’t really remember him. I Just know the name.

KENNETH

Only that?

MARY ROSE (dismisses the thought of SIMON)

Anyway... it isn’t he I’m looking for...

KENNETH (hopefully)

No?

MARY ROSE

No.

(unexpectedly)

Who is it?

KENNETH

Who?

MARY ROSE

Who is it I’m searching for?

KENNETH

Have you forgotten? Even that?

MARY ROSE (defensively)

I knew. But it was such a long time ago. And I’m so tired.

KENNETH (smiles sadly)

Of searching? Of searching this old house?

MARY ROSE (whispering)

Don’t tell.

KENNETH

No, of course not.

MARY ROSE

You are nice.

KENNETH

My name is Kenneth. Won’t you please try to say it?

MARY ROSE (she likes the sound)

Kenneth, Kenneth, Kenneth, Kenneth....

KENNETH

But you don’t know what Kenneth I am.

MARY ROSE

No.

KENNETH

I would like to help you... M... Mary Rose.

MARY ROSE

Do you think you could? If I could find him... he would tell me that he understands and doesn’t blame me. Then I could go back.

KENNETH

I see. To the island?

MARY ROSE (perplexed)

Where?

KENNETH

Have you forgotten the island too?

MARY ROSE (crushed)

I am sorry.

KENNETH

I think that it is the island to which you want to return. Is it so nice there?

MARY ROSE

Oh, it is lovely!

KENNETH

Are there ghosts in that place?

MARY ROSE (firmly)

No.

KENNETH

Are you so sure?

MARY ROSE (rather crossly)

Of course!

KENNETH

Why is it so lovely?

MARY ROSE (a beginning look of radiance)

It’s so beautiful and loving and there is only oneself...

(the expression fades)

...one needn’t ever... search...

KENNETH (impulsively)

Mary Rose... listen... I believe I can help you go back... I know who you are looking for...

MARY ROSE (she stiffens, her attention suddenly riveted on him)

You know?

KENNETH

I think so.

From the beginning of his next to last speech, where he says, ‘I know who you are looking for’, a sound has begun to build, and now it surrounds KENNETH and MARY ROSE. It is not wind, but a sort of pressure, palpable and infinitely menacing. MARY ROSE’S face has darkened. She does not take her baleful eyes from KENNETH.

MARY ROSE (with an almost unseeable advance upon him)

Did you do it? Was it you who took him?

KENNETH, chilled, watchful, he steps back. As he does, he moves against the side of the packing case, stumbles slightly against it, glances quickly down and sees instantly that his knife, which was embedded in the wood, is now suddenly gone. He pulls himself together at once and faces MARY ROSE, faces her growing, terrifying wrath.

MARY ROSE (we see her now, her hand gripping the knife, the fury growing around her)

Give him back.

KENNETH

Mary Rose... stop it, Mary Rose!

MARY ROSE

You are the one who stole him from me!

KENNETH (faltering)

In a way...

MARY ROSE

Give him back!

KENNETH

But you said you didn’t know who. Who? Who do you want, Mary Rose? Tell me who?

MARY ROSE (almost a scream)

My baby! Kenneth! Kenneth!

KENNETH (quietly)

Your baby is gone beyond recall, but I am Kenneth.

She stops, stares at him, the knife still poised, the sound no longer swelling, but not abating.

KENNETH (cont’d) (he takes a cautious step towards her)

Surely I can help you... give me back the knife...

MARY ROSE (so puzzled)

Kenneth?

KENNETH

Yes. And I understand and do not blame you. Don’t you see that, poor thing?

MARY ROSE

OH!

The sound begins to diminish.

MARY ROSE (cont’d)

Oh, are you sure?

KENNETH

Yes, I’m quite sure.

Her hand, the one holding the knife, falls to her aide.

KENNETH (cont’d)

There is no one who blames you.

MARY ROSE

Ahhhhhh…

KENNETH

Now let me have my knife. Before you hurt yourself.

Sweetly obedient, she gives it to him. For a long moment they look at one another.

MARY ROSE

Have you had to search too? You look so sad.

KENNETH

Do I? I expect it’s just an old leftover look. I’m not sad anymore.

MARY ROSE (guilelessly)

I’m glad. You are so tall and grown-up and... comforting. Do you think I might... lean against you... for just a moment?

KENNETH gently takes her in his arms. She sighs.

MARY ROSE (cont’d)

Ah. That is... nice...

(she smiles contentedly, then pulls slightly away)

How good you were to cone...

KENNETH

Not good... I was searching too.

MARY ROSE

What for?

KENNETH

For you.

(sighs)

Or for something you might have been... Do you know now who I am?

MARY ROSE (simply)

Your name is Kenneth and I’m sure I would remember you, except that... that everything seems so dim...

KENNETH sighs, then his attention is caught by the window open now on the dark of early evening. The stars have triumphantly worked their way through the clouds.

KENNETH

The stars are out. They always seem so promising... are there stars above your island?

MARY ROSE

My island? Oh...

(her face begins to light as the call is heard; softly it begins... ‘Mary Rose, Mary Rose, Mary Rose...’)

Oh yes! Yes!

As the sound swells, it wraps her around, the weary little ghost. Her face is shining as her arms stretch hopefully before her; she whispers now ‘yes’ ... and takes one step. Only one. And she is gone at last, taking the sweet beckoning sound with her.

KENNETH, at the window still, has heard nothing except her voice answering, as he supposed, his question. Now he turns and finds... an empty room. It is a room no longer filled with anything at all but a chair, a pair of packing cases, himself... and dust. He sucks in his breath leans weakly against the wall, closes his eyes. Softly, he whispers ‘Oh God! You didn’t say goodbye.’ Then, at last, he opens his eyes, takes a look, a long last look about, sighs, and moves toward the stairs. He calls as he starts down, ‘Mrs. Otery? I’m coming down. Mrs. Otery…’

SLOW FADE OUT.

FADE IN:

Scene 27

Once more THE ISLAND as we saw it first, a sweetly solitary place, a promising place. And now again, we hear CAMERON’S voice.

CAMERON (o.s.)

The Island. The Island That Likes To Be Visited. Surely we all know at least one such tempting place... such an island... where we may not go. Or if we do dare to visit such an island... we cannot come away again without ...

(there is bitter humour in his voice)

...without embarrassment. And it takes more than a bit of searching to find someone who will forgive us that.

(CAMERON’S voice changes now, becomes louder, matter-of-fact, and final)

Well, that is it. Let’s go back home now.

(ironically)

There of course it’s raining...

THE CAMERA begins to retreat. The Island grows smaller, mistier.

CAMERON (cont’d) (o.s.)

...as usual. And there’s a naughty boy waiting for punishment and an old villager who had the fatal combination weak heart and bad temper. He’s waiting to be buried. All the usual, dependable, un-islandy things.

(he sighs deeply)

You understand.

As the Island becomes no more than a distant vision, CAMERON’S voice diminishes as well, until at last, we have lost them both.

FADE OUT.

THE END.