Man and Superman · Act II (2/2) (1/3)
The Legs Aha! I got him.
Tanner All right now?
The Legs All right now.
Tanner* stoops and takes the legs by the ankles, drawing their owner forth like a wheelbarrow, walking on his hands, with a hammer in his mouth. He is a young man in a neat suit of blue serge, clean shaven, dark eyed, square fingered, with short well brushed black hair and rather irregular sceptically turned eyebrows. When he is manipulating the car his movements are swift and sudden, yet attentive and deliberate. With Tanner* and Tanner’s friends his manner is not in the least deferential, but cool and reticent, keeping them quite effectually at a distance whilst giving them no excuse for complaining of him. Nevertheless he has a vigilant eye on them always, and that, too, rather cynically, like a man who knows the world well from its seamy side. He speaks slowly and with a touch of sarcasm; and as he does not at all affect the gentleman in his speech, it may be inferred that his smart appearance is a mark of respect to himself and his own class, not to that which employs him.
He now gets into the car to test his machinery and put his cap and overcoat on again. Tanner takes off his leather overcoat and pitches it into the car. The chauffeur (or automobilist or motoreer or whatever England may presently decide to call him) looks round inquiringly in the act of stowing away his hammer.
The Chauffeur Had enough of it, eh?
Tanner I may as well walk to the house and stretch my legs and calm my nerves a little. Looking at his watch. I suppose you know that we have come from Hyde Park Corner to Richmond in twenty-one minutes.
The Chauffeur I’d have done it under fifteen if I’d had a clear road all the way.
Tanner Why do you do it? Is it for love of sport or for the fun of terrifying your unfortunate employer?
The Chauffeur What are you afraid of?
Tanner The police, and breaking my neck.
The Chauffeur Well, if you like easy going, you can take a bus, you know. It’s cheaper. You pay me to save your time and give you the value of your thousand pound car. He sits down calmly.
Tanner I am the slave of that car and of you too. I dream of the accursed thing at night.
The Chauffeur You’ll get over that. If you’re going up to the house, may I ask how long you’re goin to stay there? Because if you mean to put in the whole morning talkin to the ladies, I’ll put the car in the stables and make myself comfortable. If not, I’ll keep the car on the go about here till you come.
Tanner Better wait here. We shan’t be long. There’s a young American gentleman, a Mr. Malone, who is driving Mr. Robinson down in his new American steam car.
The Chauffeur Springing up and coming hastily out of the car to Tanner. American steam car! Wot! racin us down from London!
Tanner Perhaps they’re here already.
The Chauffeur If I’d known it! With deep reproach. Why didn’t you tell me, Mr. Tanner?
Tanner Because I’ve been told that this car is capable of 84 miles an hour; and I already know what you are capable of when there is a rival car on the road. No, Henry: there are things it is not good for you to know; and this was one of them. However, cheer up: we are going to have a day after your own heart. The American is to take Mr. Robinson and his sister and Miss Whitefield. We are to take Miss Rhoda.
The Chauffeur Consoled, and musing on another matter. That’s Miss Whitefield’s sister, isn’t it?
Tanner Yes.
The Chauffeur And Miss Whitefield herself is goin in the other car? Not with you?
Tanner Why the devil should she come with me? Mr. Robinson will be in the other car. The Chauffeur* looks at Tanner with cool incredulity, and turns to the car, whistling a popular air softly to himself. Tanner, a little annoyed, is about to pursue the subject when he hears the footsteps of Octavius on the gravel. Octavius* is coming from the house, dressed for motoring, but without his overcoat. We’ve lost the race, thank Heaven: here’s Mr. Robinson. Well, Tavy, is the steam car a success?
Octavius I think so. We came from Hyde Park Corner here in seventeen minutes. The Chauffeur, furious, kicks the car with a groan of vexation. How long were you?
Tanner Oh, about three quarters of an hour or so.
The Chauffeur Remonstrating. Now, now, Mr. Tanner, come now! We could ha done it easy under fifteen.
Tanner By the way, let me introduce you. Mr. Octavius Robinson: Mr. Enry Straker.
Straker Pleased to meet you, sir. Mr. Tanner is gittin at you with his Enry Straker, you know. You call it Henery. But I don’t mind, bless you.
Tanner You think it’s simply bad taste in me to chaff him, Tavy. But you’re wrong. This man takes more trouble to drop his aiches than ever his father did to pick them up. It’s a mark of caste to him. I have never met anybody more swollen with the pride of class than Enry is.
Straker Easy, easy! A little moderation, Mr. Tanner.
Tanner A little moderation, Tavy, you observe. You would tell me to draw it mild. But this chap has been educated. What’s more, he knows that we haven’t. What was that board school of yours, Straker?
Straker Sherbrooke Road.
Tanner Sherbrooke Road! Would any of us say Rugby! Harrow! Eton! in that tone of intellectual snobbery? Sherbrooke Road is a place where boys learn something; Eton is a boy farm where we are sent because we are nuisances at home, and because in after life, whenever a Duke is mentioned, we can claim him as an old schoolfellow.
Straker You don’t know nothing about it, Mr. Tanner. It’s not the Board School that does it: it’s the Polytechnic.
Tanner His university, Octavius. Not Oxford, Cambridge, Durham, Dublin or Glasgow. Not even those Nonconformist holes in Wales. No, Tavy. Regent Street, Chelsea, the Borough⁠—I don’t know half their confounded names: these are his universities, not mere shops for selling class limitations like ours. You despise Oxford, Enry, don’t you?
Straker No, I don’t. Very nice sort of place, Oxford, I should think, for people that like that sort of place. They teach you to be a gentleman there. In the Polytechnic they teach you to be an engineer or suchlike. See?
Tanner Sarcasm, Tavy, sarcasm! Oh, if you could only see into Enry’s soul, the depth of his contempt for a gentleman, the arrogance of his pride in being an engineer, would appal you. He positively likes the car to break down because it brings out my gentlemanly helplessness and his workmanlike skill and resource.
Straker Never you mind him, Mr. Robinson. He likes to talk. We know him, don’t we?
Octavius Earnestly. But there’s a great truth at the bottom of what he says. I believe most intensely in the dignity of labor.
Straker Unimpressed. That’s because you never done any, Mr. Robinson. My business is to do away with labor. You’ll get more out of me and a machine than you will out of twenty laborers, and not so much to drink either.
Tanner For Heaven’s sake, Tavy, don’t start him on political economy. He knows all about it; and we don’t. You’re only a poetic Socialist, Tavy: he’s a scientific one.
Straker Unperturbed. Yes. Well, this conversation is very improvin; but I’ve got to look after the car; and you two want to talk about your ladies. I know. He retires to busy himself about the car; and presently saunters off towards the house.
Tanner That’s a very momentous social phenomenon.
Octavius What is?
Tanner Straker is. Here have we literary and cultured persons been for years setting up a cry of the New Woman whenever some unusually old fashioned female came along; and never noticing the advent of the New Man. Straker’s the New Man.
Octavius I see nothing new about him, except your way of chaffing him. But I don’t want to talk about him just now. I want to speak to you about Ann.
Tanner Straker knew even that. He learnt it at the Polytechnic, probably. Well, what about Ann? Have you proposed to her?
Octavius Self-reproachfully. I was brute enough to do so last night.
Tanner Brute enough! What do you mean?
Octavius Dithyrambically. Jack: we men are all coarse. We never understand how exquisite a woman’s sensibilities are. How could I have done such a thing!
Tanner Done what, you maudlin idiot?
Octavius Yes, I am an idiot. Jack: if you had heard her voice! If you had seen her tears! I have lain awake all night thinking of them. If she had reproached me, I could have borne it better.
Tanner Tears! that’s dangerous. What did she say?
Octavius She asked me how she could think of anything now but her dear father. She stifled a sob⁠—He breaks down.
Tanner Patting him on the back. Bear it like a man, Tavy, even if you feel it like an ass. It’s the old game: she’s not tired of playing with you yet.
Octavius Impatiently. Oh, don’t be a fool, Jack. Do you suppose this eternal shallow cynicism of yours has any real bearing on a nature like hers?
Tanner Hm! Did she say anything else?
Octavius Yes; and that is why I expose myself and her to your ridicule by telling you what passed.
Tanner Remorsefully. No, dear Tavy, not ridicule, on my honor! However, no matter. Go on.
Octavius Her sense of duty is so devout, so perfect, so⁠—
Tanner Yes: I know. Go on.
Octavius You see, under this new arrangement, you and Ramsden are her guardians; and she considers that all her duty to her father is now transferred to you. She said she thought I ought to have spoken to you both in the first instance. Of course she is right; but somehow it seems rather absurd that I am to come to you and formally ask to be received as a suitor for your ward’s hand.
Tanner I am glad that love has not totally extinguished your sense of humor, Tavy.
Octavius That answer won’t satisfy her.
Tanner My official answer is, obviously, Bless you, my children: may you be happy!
Octavius I wish you would stop playing the fool about this. If it is not serious to you, it is to me, and to her.
Tanner You know very well that she is as free to choose as you.
Octavius She does not think so.
Tanner Oh, doesn’t she! Just! However, say what you want me to do.
Octavius I want you to tell her sincerely and earnestly what you think about me. I want you to tell her that you can trust her to me⁠—that is, if you feel you can.
Tanner I have no doubt that I can trust her to you. What worries me is the idea of trusting you to her. Have you read Maeterlinck’s book about the bee?
Octavius Keeping his temper with difficulty. I am not discussing literature at present.
Tanner Be just a little patient with me. I am not discussing literature: the book about the bee is natural history. It’s an awful lesson to mankind. You think that you are Ann’s suitor; that you are the pursuer and she the pursued; that it is your part to woo, to persuade, to prevail, to overcome. Fool: it is you who are the pursued, the marked down quarry, the destined prey. You need not sit looking longingly at the bait through the wires of the trap: the door is open, and will remain so until it shuts behind you forever.
Octavius I wish I could believe that, vilely as you put it.
Tanner Why, man, what other work has she in life but to get a husband? It is a woman’s business to get married as soon as possible, and a man’s to keep unmarried as long as he can. You have your poems and your tragedies to work at: Ann has nothing.
Octavius I cannot write without inspiration. And nobody can give me that except Ann.
Tanner Well, hadn’t you better get it from her at a safe distance? Petrarch didn’t see half as much of Laura, nor Dante of Beatrice, as you see of Ann now; and yet they wrote first-rate poetry⁠—at least so I’m told. They never exposed their idolatry to the test of domestic familiarity; and it lasted them to their graves. Marry Ann and at the end of a week you’ll find no more inspiration than in a plate of muffins.
Octavius You think I shall tire of her.
Tanner Not at all: you don’t get tired of muffins. But you don’t find inspiration in them; and you won’t in her when she ceases to be a poet’s dream and becomes a solid eleven stone wife. You’ll be forced to dream about somebody else; and then there will be a row.
Octavius This sort of talk is no use, Jack. You don’t understand. You have never been in love.
Tanner I! I have never been out of it. Why, I am in love even with Ann. But I am neither the slave of love nor its dupe. Go to the bee, thou poet: consider her ways and be wise. By Heaven, Tavy, if women could do without our work, and we ate their children’s bread instead of making it, they would kill us as the spider kills her mate or as the bees kill the drone. And they would be right if we were good for nothing but love.
Octavius Ah, if we were only good enough for Love! There is nothing like Love: there is nothing else but Love: without it the world would be a dream of sordid horror.
Tanner And this⁠—this is the man who asks me to give him the hand of my ward! Tavy: I believe we were changed in our cradles, and that you are the real descendant of Don Juan.
Octavius I beg you not to say anything like that to Ann.
Tanner Don’t be afraid. She has marked you for her own; and nothing will stop her now. You are doomed. Straker comes back with a newspaper. Here comes the New Man, demoralizing himself with a halfpenny paper as usual.
Straker Now, would you believe it: Mr. Robinson, when we’re out motoring we take in two papers, the Times for him, the Leader or the Echo for me. And do you think I ever see my paper? Not much. He grabs the Leader and leaves me to stodge myself with his Times.
Octavius Are there no winners in the Times?
Tanner Enry don’t old with bettin, Tavy. Motor records are his weakness. What’s the latest?
Straker Paris to Biskra at forty mile an hour average, not countin the Mediterranean.
Tanner How many killed?
Straker Two silly sheep. What does it matter? Sheep don’t cost such a lot: they were glad to ave the price without the trouble o’ sellin’ ’em to the butcher. All the same, d’y’see, there’ll be a clamor agin it presently; and then the French Government’ll stop it; an our chance will be gone see? That what makes me fairly mad: Mr. Tanner won’t do a good run while he can.
Tanner Tavy: do you remember my uncle James?
Octavius Yes. Why?
Tanner Uncle James had a first rate cook: he couldn’t digest anything except what she cooked. Well, the poor man was shy and hated society. But his cook was proud of her skill, and wanted to serve up dinners to princes and ambassadors. To prevent her from leaving him, that poor old man had to give a big dinner twice a month, and suffer agonies of awkwardness. Now here am I; and here is this chap Enry Straker, the New Man. I loathe travelling; but I rather like Enry. He cares for nothing but tearing along in a leather coat and goggles, with two inches of dust all over him, at sixty miles an hour and the risk of his life and mine. Except, of course, when he is lying on his back in the mud under the machine trying to find out where it has given way. Well, if I don’t give him a thousand mile run at least once a fortnight I shall lose him. He will give me the sack and go to some American millionaire; and I shall have to put up with a nice respectful groom-gardener-amateur, who will touch his hat and know his place. I am Enry’s slave, just as Uncle James was his cook’s slave.