Death of a Salesman_ Certain Private Conversations in Two Acts and a Requiem - Miller, Arthur [21]
LINDA: There’s nothing to make up, dear. You’re doing fine, better than—
WILLY [noticing her mending]: What’s that?
LINDA: Just mending my stockings. They’re so expensive—
WILLY [angrily, taking them from her]: I won’t have you mending stockings in this house! Now throw them out!
[LINDA puts the stockings in her pocket.]
BERNARD [entering on the run]: Where is he? If he doesn’t study!
WILLY [moving to the forestage, with great agitation]: You’ll give him the answers!
BERNARD: I do, but I can’t on a Regents! That’s a state exam! They’re liable to arrest me!
WILLY: Where is he? I’ll whip him, I’ll whip him!
LINDA: And he’d better give back that football, Willy, it’s not nice.
WILLY: Biff! Where is he? Why is he taking everything?
LINDA: He’s too rough with the girls, Willy. All the mothers are afraid of him!
WILLY: I’ll whip him!
BERNARD: He’s driving the car without a license!
[THE WOMAN’S laugh is heard.]
WILLY: Shut up!
LINDA: All the mothers—
WILLY: Shut up!
BERNARD [backing quietly away and out]: Mr. Birnbaum says he’s stuck up.
WILLY: Get outa here!
BERNARD: If he doesn’t buckle down he’ll flunk math! [He goes off.]
LINDA: He’s right, Willy, you’ve gotta—
WILLY [exploding at her]: There’s nothing the matter with him! You want him to be a worm like Bernard? He’s got spirit, personality . . .
[As he speaks, LINDA, almost in tears, exits into the living-room. WILLY is alone in the kitchen, wilting and staring. The leaves are gone. It is night again, and the apartment houses look down from behind.]
WILLY: Loaded with it. Loaded! What is he stealing? He’s giving it back, isn’t he? Why is he stealing? What did I tell him? I never in my life told him anything but decent things.
[HAPPY in pajamas has come down the stairs; WILLY suddenly becomes aware of HAPPY’S presence.]
HAPPY: Let’s go now, come on.
WILLY [sitting down at the kitchen table]: Huh! Why did she have to wax the floors herself? Everytime she waxes the floors she keels over. She knows that!
HAPPY: Shh! Take it easy. What brought you back tonight?
WILLY: I got an awful scare. Nearly hit a kid in Yonkers. God! Why didn’t I go to Alaska with my brother Ben that time! Ben! That man was a genius, that man was success incarnate! What a mistake! He begged me to go.
HAPPY: Well, there’s no use in—
WILLY: You guys! There was a man started with the clothes on his back and ended up with diamond mines?
HAPPY: Boy, someday I’d like to know how he did it.
WILLY: What’s the mystery? The man knew what he wanted and went out and got it! Walked into a jungle, and comes out, the age of twenty-one, and he’s rich! The world is an oyster, but you don’t crack it open on a mattress!
HAPPY: Pop, I told you I’m gonna retire you for life.
WILLY: You’ll retire me for life on seventy goddam dollars a week? And your women and your car and your apartment, and you’ll retire me for life! Christ’s sake, I couldn’t get past Yonkers today! Where are you guys, where are you? The woods are burning! I can’t drive a car!
[CHARLEY has appeared in the doorway. He is a large man, slow of speech, laconic, immovable. In all he says, despite what he says, there is pity, and, now, trepidation. He has a robe over pajamas, slippers on his feet. He enters the kitchen.]
CHARLEY: Everything all right?
HAPPY: Yeah, Charley, everything’s . . .
WILLY: What’s the matter?
CHARLEY: I heard some noise. I thought something happened. Can’t we do something about the walls? You sneeze in here, and in my house hats blow off.
HAPPY: Let’s go to bed, Dad. Come on.
[CHARLEY signals to HAPPY to go.]
WILLY: You go ahead, I’m not tired at the moment.
HAPPY [to WILLY]: Take it easy, huh? [He exits.]
WILLY: What’re you doin’ up?
CHARLEY [sitting down at the kitchen table opposite WILLY]: Couldn’t sleep good. I had a heartburn.
WILLY: Well, you don’t know how to eat.
CHARLEY: I eat with my mouth.
WILLY: No, you’re ignorant. You gotta know about vitamins and things like that.
CHARLEY: Come on, let’s shoot. Tire you out a