_)
MR. ICKY: (_Sadly_) You went to seed long ago.
CHARLES: I've been reading "Conrad."
PETER: (_Dreamily_) "Conrad," ah! "Two Years Before the Mast," by
Henry James.
CHARLES: What?
PETER: Walter Pater's version of "Robinson Crusoe."
CHARLES: (_To his feyther_) I can't stay here and rot with you. I
want to live my life. I want to hunt eels.
MR. ICKY: I will be here... when you come back....
CHARLES: (_Contemptuously_) Why, the worms are licking their
chops already when they hear your name.
(_It will be noticed that some of the characters have not spoken for
some time. It will improve the technique if they can be rendering a
spirited saxophone number._)
MR. ICKY: (_Mournfully_) These vales, these hills, these
McCormick harvesters--they mean nothing to my children. I understand.
CHARLES: (_More gently_) Then you'll think of me kindly, feyther.
To understand is to forgive.
MR. ICKY: No...no....We never forgive those we can understand....We
can only forgive those who wound us for no reason at all....
CHARLES: (_Impatiently_) I'm so beastly sick of your human nature
line. And, anyway, I hate the hours around here.
(_Several dozen more of _MR. ICKY'S_ children trip out of the
house, trip over the grass, and trip over the pots and dods. They are
muttering "We are going away," and "We are leaving you."_)
MR. ICKY: (_His heart breaking_) They're all deserting me.
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