plays [31]
SCENE V
BRODIE, MARY
BRODIE. Did you open the door?
MARY. I did.
BRODIE. You . . . . you opened the door?
MARY. I did open it
BRODIE. Were you . . . alone?
MARY. I was not. The servant was with me; and the doctor.
BRODIE. O . . . the servant . . . and the doctor. Very
true. Then it's all over the town by now. The servant and the
doctor. The doctor? What doctor? Why the doctor?
MARY. My father is dead. O Will, where have you been?
BRODIE. Your father is dead. O yes! He's dead, is he? Dead.
Quite right. Quite right . . . How did you open the door? It's
strange. I bolted it.
MARY. We could not help it, Will, now could we? The doctor
forced it. He had to, had he not?
BRODIE. The doctor forced it? The doctor? Was he here? He
forced it? He?
MARY. We did it for the best; it was I who did it . . . I, your
own sister. And O Will, my Willie, where have you been? You
have not been in any harm, any danger?
BRODIE. Danger? O my young lady, you have taken care of that.
It's not danger now, it's death. Death? Ah! Death! Death!
Death! (CLUTCHING THE TABLE. THEN, RECOVERING AS FROM A DREAM.)
Death? Did you say my father was dead? My father? O my God, my
poor old father! Is he dead, Mary? Have I lost him? is he gone?
O, Mary dear, and to think of where his son was!
MARY. Dearest, he is in heaven.
BRODIE. Did he suffer?
MARY. He died like a child. Your name . . . it was his last.
BRODIE. My name? Mine? O Mary, if he had known! He knows now.
He knows; he sees us now . . . sees me! Ay, and sees you, left
how lonely!
MARY. Not so, dear; not while you live. Wherever you are, I
shall not be alone, so you live.
BRODIE. While I live? I? The old house is ruined, and the old
master dead, and I! . . . O Mary, try and believe I did not
mean that it should come to this; try and believe that I was only
weak at first. At first? And now! The good old man dead, the
kind sister ruined, the innocent boy fallen, fallen . . . ! You
will be quite alone; all your old friends, all the old faces,
gone into darkness. The night (WITH A GESTURE) . . . it waits
for me. You will be quite alone.
MARY. The night!
BRODIE. Mary, you must hear. How am I to tell her, and the old
man just dead! Mary, I was the boy you knew; I loved pleasure, I
was weak; I have fallen . . . low . . . lower than you think.
A beginning is so small a thing! I never dreamed it would come
to this . . . . this hideous last night.
MARY. Willie, you must tell me, dear. I must have the truth .
. . the kind truth . . . at once . . . in pity.
BRODIE. Crime. I have fallen. Crime.
MARY. Crime?
BRODIE. Don't shrink from me. Miserable dog that I am, selfish
hound that has dragged you to this misery . . . you and all
that loved him . . . think only of my torments, think only of my
penitence, don't shrink from me.
MARY. I do not care to hear, I do not wish, I do not mind; you
are my brother. What do I care? How can I help you?
BRODIE. Help? help ME? You would not speak of it, not wish it,
if you knew. My kind good sister, my little playmate, my sweet
friend! was I ever unkind to you till yesterday? Not openly
unkind? you'll say that when I am gone.
MARY. If you have done wrong, what do I care? If you have
failed, does it change my twenty years of love and worship?
Never!
BRODIE. Yet I must make her understand . . . . !
MARY. I am your true sister, dear. I cannot fail, I will never
leave you, I will never blame you. Come! (GOES TO EMBRACE.)
BRODIE (RECOILING). No, don't touch me, not a finger, not that,
anything but that!
MARY. Willie, Willie!
BRODIE (TAKING THE BLOODY DAGGER FROM THE TABLE). See, do you
understand that?
MARY. Ah! What, what is it!
BRODIE. Blood. I have killed a man.
MARY. You? . . . .
BRODIE. I am a murderer; I was a thief before. Your brother . .
. the old man's only son!
MARY. Walter, Walter,