The Straw Market, Act II

(The Headlight Bar on the Via Tornabuoni one afternoon in early May. Everything looks much the same except that it is all much darker. The bead curtain has been pushed aside, and a heavy door is closed in its place. Umbrellas can be seen on the Via Tornabuoni and in the corner of the bar.

GLADYS DAVOS, MRS. WEDGWOOD DAVOS, AND WILSON BRUSH are all again at their table.

The COWBOY is seated below the iron kettle as before, guitar in hand. At another table, as before, MRS. WADDLE, LIVIA GADDES GLATINI, and COMMENDATORE FACCIOTUTTO. At their same table downstage, WAVERLY THORNE and HILDA DONEAPPLE.

Before the Curtain rises, the COWBOY is heard singing:

It’s raining in Florence; It’s coming down in torrents, It’s raining in Florence.

It’s raining through the valley On every street and alley And every piazzale— It’s raining in Florence.

We can’t go and spend our money As we would if it were sunny, So curl up with a book, honey— It’s raining in Florence.

The merchants they are frowning; The violets are drowning On the tomb of Elizabeth Browning— It’s raining in Florence.

With rain on the roof above you, What can I do but love you— Shall I count the ways I love you? It’s raining in Florence.

Water through the gutters is gushing, Feet on the street are slushing— The gabinetti flushing It’s raining in Florence.

The door opens and PROFESSOR DUNCAN FIN enters, umbrella in hand.)

PROFESSOR DUNCAN PIN Rain, rain on the dusty fields and the olive groves, collecting in barrels, dancing on cobblestone, bathing the cab horses with their sad noses in their feed bags, rain on the Via Tornabuoni, rain on the Piazza della Republica, rain on the Piazza Santo Spirito, rain on the Piazza Ognisanti, rain on the Piazza Beccheria, rain on the English Cemetary, on the buried heart of Elizabeth Barrett Browningrain! Per esempio! Per favore! Per consequnza!

(He sits down beside the COWBOY.)

MRS. DAVOS The rain really helps Florence, don’t you think Mr. Brush? It helps obscure all those heavy stones, and the umbrellas like, black beaten tulips all along the Arno, and then the Ponte Vecchio, floating out there in the mist as if it had been painted on a crumbling Chinese scroll.

COWBOY

We gaze out the window hazily: It’s raining on Fiesole, The drivers are driving crazily It’s raining in Florence. It’s raining in Settignano On Berenson’s Settignano And his Cinque Cento Anno It’s raining in Florence. It’s raining in Florence, It’s coming down in torrents, It’s raining in Florence.

(A pause.)

MRS. DAVOS Let’s play Images, wouldn’t that be fun? Have you ever played?

WILSON BRUSH No, I’m not much for games.

MRS. DAVOS It’s quite easy, really. Let’s play. I pretend that I’m looking at something in Italy that you know and then I describe it in terms of something else. Now, are you ready? . . . I’m looking at a camel with wonderful gold humps. He’s kneeling by the water on a floor of stone, and people are flocking around him like flies . . . What am I looking at?

WILSON BRUSH: (with great confidence) You are looking at the stage set of Aida at the Teatro Communale on the banks of the Arno.

MRS. DAVOS No, Mr. Brush, wrong water, wrong city, wrong humpsWrong! I’m looking at St. Mark’s in Venice . . . Now, shall we try again? . . . I’m looking at a delicate egg-cup, all pink and white and green, so frail it would crack if you flicked it ever so slightly with your little finger.

WILSON BRUSH (his eyes lighting up) That must be Giotto’s belltower. You can’t fool me on that one. You remember what Ruskin said about it: “In its first appeal to the strangers’s eye there is something unpleasing; a mingling, as it seems to him, of over severity with over minuteness.”

MRS. DAVOS Yes . . . And now this is rather different. I’m looking at a bloody penguin on an iceburg.

WILSON BRUSH Well, you’ve got me there.

MRS. DAVOS Oh, that’s easy. I’m looking at one of those carabinieri on one of those white boxes, directing traffic. Now let me give you something a little more difficult.

(She leans forward in meditation. A pause.)

I am looking at Ernest Hemingway!

GLADYS DAVOS Mother, don’t be silly. You’re not looking at anything. Your hat has slipped down over your eyes.

PROFESSOR DUNCAN PIN Per Favore! Per cortesia!

(A pause.)

GLADYS DAVOS Professor Pin seems to be attacking his idioms now . . .

PROFESSOR DUNCAN PIN Per Bacco!

GLADYS DAVOS Wilson, that article of yours— “Athens on the Arno”is the best thing we’ve had in years. You did a bang-up job, and we’re all grateful. You seemed to catch the spirit of the whole thing so beautifully . . . and all those shots of the Merlini girl were just terrific.

WILSON BRUSH Well, I did love doing it.

GLADYS DAVOS It was wonderful.

(She beckons to Marina.)

Now we all must celebrate. What will you have? An Americano? . . . We’ll have three americanos.

(A pause.)

MRS. DAVOS Ah, I do wish you’d been in Venice with us, Mr. Brush. Venice is all so human, isn’t it? The canals are like the vessels of the human body.

WILSON BRUSH Yes, it must be strange to find them frozen over in winter.

MRS. DAVOS Like hardening of the arteries . . . Ah, Venice is lovely, isn’t it, Mr. Brush? It really is the flower in the buttonhole of the world, so to speak.

WILSON BRUSH Yes, so to speak.

MRS. DAVOS At night the buildings along the Grand Canal are exotic flowers explored by luminous insects, and the stars are the beaks of pale birds pecking the water. It’s so wonderful to be there perched on the waves. Sometimes in the dead of night I can actually hear the mud slipping under the sea.

WILSON BRUSH That must be an odd sensation.

MRS. DAVOS And, the gondolas! There’s something about the motion of a gondola, Mr. Brush, that nobody’s been able to pin down, wouldn’t you agree? . . . I never know which I preferlying in a gondola and looking at the land or lying on the land and looking at a gondola.

(A pause.)

WAVERLY THORNE I don’t think you’ve heard this. It’s called “Poem.” It’s my only poem called just poem .

HILDA DONEAPPLE Oh, you’re so good on titles! How do you know about those things?

WAVERLY THORNE Instinct, I suppose.

(A pause. She Recites.)

Poem Turning the knob, the Nabob enters, green with Envy.

Thing- a- ma- bob the lob- ster floats in the tureen

Watch- fob Corn- cob Green- leaves

and no birds sing Whodunit?

HILDA DONEAPPLE Oh, Waverly, that’s really sprung , isn’t it? All those ob’s and een’s and in’s and un’s. Remarkable!

WAVERLY THORNE If I have anything, it’s an ear!

(A pause.)

PROFESSOR DUNCAN PIN Per Esempio!

WAVERLY THORNE If only I didn’t have to duel so with my daemon . . .

(While the others at her table sip their drinks, GLADYS DAVOS opens a large envelope.)

GLADYS DAVOS: (her expression changing slightly for a moment) Well, that’s too bad.

WILSON BRUSH What’s too bad?

GLADYS DAVOS Delphine Hawkins, our Editor, says that Florence is out.

WILSON BRUSH Out?

MRS. DAVOS I could have told her that to begin with.

WILSON BRUSH You mean my article— you mean “Athens on the Arno”is out? They’re not going to print it— after all the work?

GLADYS DAVOS Yes, Wilson, I’m afraid that’s it . . . Delphine has decided that Florence just isn’t in at the moment. She wants us to do Rome . . . You know, after all, as someone said, when you go to Italy you enter “the Ivory Gate into the Land of Dreams,” and you can’t just enter the Ivory Gates sideways. You’ve got to go straight in. Florence is Florence, but then it’s sort of warmed—over Rome, isn’t it? And in weather like this, it isn’t even warmed over. You’d think you were in London.

MRS. DAVOS That’s what I’ve always said.

GLADYS DAVOS And then there’s so much going on right now in Romethe new movies, the new fashionsit’s all so exciting. And thenlet’s not forget the Pope.

WILSON BRUSH I wasn’t about to forget the Pope. In fact, I hadn’t even thought of the Pope.

GLADYS DAVOS Wilson, you hadn’t thought of the Pope: there are millions and millions of people all over the world who are thinking about the Pope at every minute of the day and night. With Holy Year almost upon us, how can you say such a thing? Rome is Rome, you understand.

WILSON BRUSH (blurting out) But I will get paid , won’t I?

GLADYS DAVOS (slowly and somewhat indignantly) Paid? For what?

WILSON BRUSH For my article . . .

GLADYS DAVOS You do understand, Wilson, that The Medium ’s policy on this sort of thing is that you do it on speculation. We have to think of our readers . . . we can’t accept every article that comes along . . . And besides, the fun of something like this is in the doing isn’t it?

PROFESSOR DUN PIN Per piacere! Per cortesia! Per consequenza!

GLADYS DAVOS Mother, we must be off. Rome awaits. Rome—and the Ivory Gate into the Land of Dreams.

MRS. DAVOS R . S. V. P.

GLADYS DAVOS Well, Wilson, I wish you lots of luck. I know you will do some wonderful thing while you’re here. And do always keep The Medium in mind.

WILSON BRUSH I certainly will.

GLADYS DAVOS Good-bye.

MRS. DAVOS Arrivederci , Mr. Brush.

(GLADYS DAVOS and MRS. DAVOS make their way to the door. MARINA sees them out. WILSON BRUSH concentrates despondently on his drink.)

MRS. WADDLE Mirabelle Taft, the head of One World, is trying to get the Mayor of Siena to have Siena secede from Italy and join the world. She wants it to be the first city in Italy to recognize the boundaries of the heart . . . Isn’t that exciting? . . . What cantata are you betting on in the Palio, Commendatore Facciotutto?

COMMENDATORE FACCIOTUTTO The word is, I think, contrada .

MRS. WADDLE Well, that’s Italian for you, isn’t it?

COMMENDATORE FACCIOTUTTO Yes, that is Italian, Mrs. Waddle.

MRS. WADDLE Mirabelle is hoping to have ten thousand people from all over Europe come to Florence next month to burn their passports in the Piazza Signoria—right there where Savonarola burned all those awful things—right in front of all those naked statues. Of course, once they’ve burned their passports, they won’t be able to go anywhere. But they won’t have to go anywhere. They’ll be in Florence, and they can just be .

COMMENDATORE FACCIOTUTTO How interesting, Mrs. Waddle.

LIVIA GADDES GELATINI Fascinating, Mrs. Waddle.

(A pause.)

MRS. WADDLE And how are your memoirs coming along, Signora Gelatini?

LIVIA GADDES GELATINI They’re not, darling. The publishers want to pay me to go on, and other people want to pay me to stop. I’m caught between two fires.

COMMENDATORE FACCIOTUTTO Peccato, cara.

LIVIA GADDES GELATINI The editor adores the part about my childhood on the Island of Weed off Java. You know I wore no clothes at all until the age of fifteen. It’s hardly surprising that I became the plaything of three continents and that at the mere mention of my name men in high public office would swallow visibly and stare at their agendas . . . Yes, it’s been a long but fascinating road—all the way from that brilliant young Marquess of Wickerhaven to old Luigi Gaddes Gelatini.

COMMENDATORE FACCIOTUTTO Yes, there’s certainly not very much on his agenda.

LIVIA GADDES GELATINI Ah, but then, Franco, yours is always so full . . . . Of course, the editor isn’t at all happy about the end. He’s insisting that I go to Sicily and live in a cave and become a follower of Father Pio—just to give the book some sort of classical unity.

MRS. WADDLE: (glancing toward the window, from which MARINA is drawing back the curtain) The rain seems to be stopping.

LIVIA GADDES GELATINI What a relief. It’s such a bore.

(On this note MRS. CARBOY enters. She removes her red raincape, shuts her umbrella, and sits down purposefully with WILSON BRUSH. She opens a copy of The Medium, and brandishes it before him.)

MRS. CARBOY Such vulgarity, Mr. Brush: Think of comparing Spanish moss to “pale gray mop-ends worked by the wind’s fingers.” I can’t go along with him there!

WILSON BRUSH But I understand he’s only eighteen.

MRS. CARBOY I don’t care if he’s ten. Zinnias like “frayed tennis balls scattered at random over the lawn.”. . . And black eyes “clicking like castanets against white marble.”

WILSON BRUSH Perhaps we ought to give him a chance to develop.

MRS. CARBOY Such comparisons make a needless assault on one’s unconscious.

WILSON BRUSH Oh . . .

MRS. CARBOY It’s beyond my comprehension how a writer like Harding Calhoun can refer to “a churchtower poised like a surgical instrument in the blue tongue of the valley” or “the whiplike river lashing the violet flesh of the mountain” or “an old wall peeking over a hill.” He may very well be writing for those thousands of women in their aluminum beehive bonnets in those beauty parlors stretching across the deserts of western America, but this is not my cup of tea. Oh, every time I read one of these new stories in The Medium I feel I want to die . . . You’ve finished your piece for them, I gather.

WILSON BRUSH Yes, it’s finished . . . in more ways than one.

MRS. CARBOY Were they pleased?

WILSON BRUSH Yes, they were very pleased. They’ve thrown it out.

MRS. CARBOY What a shame! . . . But you will have time now to concentrate on what you’re over here for , won’t you? . . . I hope this doesn’t mean that you won’t be able to take my cousin’s apartment on the Lung’Arno?

WILSON BRUSH I think it does. I’ve already spent the money I was supposed to have made.

MRS. CARBOY Oh, you poor boy . . . But you must get out of the Americano . . . You must have a proper place to live. You can’t go on living—existing—at the Americano. That’s just too dismal for words . . . If you want to take the lease, I’m sure we can arrange it somehow . . . I’m sure Cucu would like that, wouldn’t she?

WILSON BRUSH Yes, of course.

MRS. CARBOY You do have the 100,000 Lire you were going to put down for the lease.

WILSON BRUSH Yes.

MRS. CARBOY Well, why don’t I put up the other 100,000? I’d love to do that. You wouldn’t have to think of repaying me. You could do that somehow some time in the future. It would be a favor to me to have you look after the things there.

WILSON BRUSH That’s wonderful!

(MRS. CARBOY extracts a large envelope from her bag and puts it on the table.)

MRS. CARBOY You know the apartment is in a building that belonged to an ancient order known as The Sweepers. The Sisters were allowed the use of only one implement—the broom. Hence, in the vulgar tongue their retreat became known as “The Broom Closet.”

(She rushes ahead, savoring the sibilants.)

One sister is supposed to have swept so severely that she dislodged a heavy stone and fell into a cistern in the cellar. You’re supposed to hear her when it rains.

WILSON BRUSH How interesting!

MRS. CARBOY (indicating the envelope and extending her cupped hand in much the same way as THE MARCHESA at the end of ACT I) You put your share in the envelope, and then I’ll put mine, and my cousin, Luisa Lampone, will be by in a minute to pick it up and she will give you the keys. I know you are going to enjoy it. It’s a lovely place, and you’ll get so much valuable work done while you’re there.

(She hands him the envelope; he deposits the money in it, hands it back to her; she opens her purse, rummages around in it, stuffs the envelope and then returns it to WILSON BRUSH. He looks at it, and puts it down on the table in front of him.)

MRS. CARBOY I won’t be seeing you for a while, Mr. Brush. I’m leaving for Madrid. But I know you’ll love the apartment . . . Good-bye and good luck. Luisa will be here in a moment . . . Remember, Florence has two gates . . . one to the past and one to the present, and that both are always open.

(Exit MRS. CARBOY. A long pause. WILSON BRUSH stares straight ahead, the envelope prominently before him.)

WAVERLY THORNE Don’t talk to me about the problem of the writer in America . . . Who knows better than I what it’s like? I’ve worked in a laundry, a factory, a brewery, a bindery, a bakery, a brothel . . . I’ve kneaded, I’ve nursed, I’ve riveted, I’ve modeled, I’ve mangled . . . And have I ever stopped writing? . . . I would come home late at night too tired to hold my head up and I’d pound my typewriter until my fingers were blue. And when I couldn’t afford a typewriter, I’d pound the floor —up and down, up and down, wringing out the secrets of my tortured soul . . . And is there any reward? Is there any reward ? There is only one possible reward. Immortality !

(A long pause. WILSON BRUSH stares at the envelope, which he picks up and looks at from time to time. Everyone sits meditating intensely in the fashion of the silent films.

A BEGGAR WOMAN in rags with a baby strapped to her breast comes into the bar. She makes the round of the tables, pauses in front of WILSON BRUSH, and extends her cupped hand.)

BEGGAR WOMAN Per il bambino, Signore. For the baby.

WILSON BRUSH (his mind suddenly lifted from his preoccupations of the moment.) What a pretty baby!

(He deposits a bill in the BEGGAR WOMAN’S cupped hand, which shuts like a clam.)

COWBOY

The lady has a baby, Che Bambino: What a baby! Each day a different baby— Florence in the spring!

(Mario shows the BEGGAR WOMAN to the door.)

MRS. WADDLE Sturbridge is going to speak next Sunday, Commendatore, on “The Ivory Tower.” His sermon is all about certain so-called poets (glancing in the direction of WAVERLY THORNE.) who come over to Europe on good American taxpayers’ money and sit around in public places reciting their poems that are filled with the most awful words, and never once set foot in church.

WAVERLY THORNE I’m dedicating this new poem to the Rector Sturbridge Waddle of the American Church. I’ve put him into the third circle of my Inferno along with the foreign philanderers. He’s made to urinate perpetually at the foot of a blasted orange tree while through the smoking azaleas his wife Thelma (She darts out her hand in the direction of MRS. WADDLE.) calls out to him, “Sturbridge!”

HILDA DONEAPPLE Oh, Waverly, you are savage!

WAVERLY THORNE Here is “Italian Evening:”

Through the pock-marked evening air Roman statues run for cover; In a piebald village square Operatic shadows hover; While above a trattoria there A huge, irate piano mover Shakes a grand piano leg At his bulging daughter’s lover; Someone just across the way Sings, “ La donna e mobile! ” Fat rain clouds come racing over. Tourists choke on vermicelli , Voices bounce across the valley— Roman statues take cover.

HILDA DONEAPPLE That has a real rumble to it. I don’t think anybody’s even tried anything like that since Edna St. Vincent Millay.

WAVERLY THORNE And she didn’t bring it off . . . This is another one I’ve done in the new “controversial” style. It doesn’t have a title,—

Those prunes that you left in the moonlight on the oilcloth— so delicious— you thought, my big-fingered friend, that I’d put them back in the icebox, didn’t you?

well, I didn’t— I put my foot in it . . .

(She breaks off.)

Hilda, you’re not listening.

HILDA DONEAPPLE (whose eyes have strayed to the front page of the Rome Daily American, stands up with a shriek) Waverly, have you seen this ?

(She reads in a loud, anxious voice.)

MARCHESA HEADS STREPTOMYCIN RING

The Marchesa Vincenza Doria Della Robbia Merlini was apprehended last night in Florence. Italian police authorities have disclosed that she was involved in a highly complex confidence operation. She was also the head of a successful band of black marketeers dealing in American hospital supplies in conjunction with Lucky Luciano. Her daughter, Matilda (“Cucu”) Doria Della Robbia Merlini, Florentine beauty, is reported to have fled to the Virgin Islands in the company of Ben Benzina, wealthy playboy painter from Toothless Gap, Montana.

WAVERLY THORNE Hilda Doneapple, you have the mind of a mammoth artichoke. At the mere mention of Lucky Luciano, you see yourself already being tied up and gagged and carted off to the White Slave Market.

HILDA DONEAPPLE But Waverly, this isn’t just words, words, words,the way it is in poetry. This is the newspaper. This really happened. These were real people. They were right here in Florence . . . Oh, my God!

MRS. WADDLE (folding her Rome Daily American ) Oh, my God!

WILSON BRUSH (folding his Rome Daily American ) OhmyGod! OhmyGod! Ohmy God!

PROFESSOR DUNCAN PIN (folding his Rome Daily American ) Per Bacco!

COMMENDATORE FACCIOTUTTO (folding his Rome Daily American ) Mamma mia!

WILSON BRUSH Cucu . . . Cucu . . . Cucu . . . Cucu . . .

PROFESSOR DUNCAN PIN Per carita! Per consequenza!

(A long pause. The rain has now stopped completely. MARINA opens the door and draws the bead curtain. WILSON BRUSH stares straight ahead in the fashion of the silent films, opens the envelope, and extracts the contents.)

This isn’t 200,000 Lire. It’s not money at all. It hasn’t got numbers on it. It’s got words on it—words, words, words—headlines! It’s strips of the Rome Daily American .

(He stares straight ahead as if paralyzed, then picks up the strips of paper and throws them wildly into the air.)

PROFESSOR DUNCAN PIN Dove sono io? Io sono in questa scuola.

WILSON BRUSH What was it Mrs. Carboy said? We all belong there . . . in the Straw Market . . . all bits of straw woven together for the briefest moment in infinity, and then flung away before the wind . . . (He throws a few more pieces into the air.) or left to rot in the rain.

(He stares straight ahead, then goes berserk and throws more strips of the Rome Daily American like confetti around the room.)

I’ve been Murpheyed . . . flimflammed . . . the Old Cloth Trick . . .

(He sits back down and holds his head in his hands.)

Oh, my God! . . . My life . . . my love . . . my money!

(Finally grasping the reality of the situation, he rushes madly from the bar.)

MARINA (watching him depart) Sono pazzi, gli Americani, tutti pazz i . . . Crazy!

LIVIA GADDES GELATINI (loud enough for all to hear) I hear that Hortensia Carboy and Luisa Lampone are off to Madrid . . . Some young American has, I understand, paved the way.

COMMENDATORE FACCIOTUTTO They always do, don’t they, Livia? Thank God for God’s country.

(Enter AN AMERICAN TOURIST, who slowly makes his way to the table vacated by WILSON BRUSH. HE is followed by a BLACK MARKETEER, who makes the round of the café.)

BLACK MARKETEER (softly in all directions) Sigarette americane! Sigarette americane!

COWBOY

American, go home! You may wish to roam, But Yankee . . . go home! American, go home!

You’ll lose all your foldin’ money On the Via Tornabuoni, You’ll fall for every phony— American, go home!

BLACK MARKETEER (to AMERICAN TOURIST) Sigarette, Signore?

(He sits down.)

You like Firenze, Signore? Florence, great city—City of Flowers; that’s what mean Florence. Florence—she have two gates—one to the past and one to the present. Both gates always open.

AMERICAN TOURIST Yes, it’s a great city, all right.

BLACK MARKETEER You see the Duomo, nice Duomo, eh? You see the Ghiberti doors, eh? Gold doors—beautiful doors—how you like to try to open those doors?

(A pause.)

I show you something you never seen. Something that open other doors—that open the ivory gate to the land of dreams.

(He gestures to the door.)

It was right there that Dante beheld Beatrice and it was the beginning for him of a new life . . . a new life . . .

(The bead curtain parts, and TUTU MARTINI, like Venus on her shell, stands against the light. All lustre she seems, her luminous hair held by invisible pins of mother-of-pearl, her lovely body, wrapped in a translucent sheath, arched slightly forward in readiness to move, to leap, to dance. She leans toward the AMERICAN TOURIST.)

TUTU MARTINI You are American, aren’t you?

AMERICAN TOURIST (taken aback) Yes, how could you have known?

TUTU MARTINI A little bird must have told me . . . Shall we sit down?

(They sit. The BLACK MARKETEER retires to the background, beaming down upon them.)

AMERICAN TOURIST And you are Florentine?

TUTU MARTINI Yes.

COWBOY

The con men have been In operation longer; They’re wiser, they’re stronger, American, go home!

AMERICAN TOURIST But you speak such wonderful English.

TUTU MARTINI I had an English grandmother. Everyone in Florence speaks English . . .

COWBOY

Someone or other Has an English grandmother, An American brother, Brother, go home!

TUTU MARTINI I am Caterina Martini . . . Tutu Martini . . .

PROFESSOR DUNCAN PIN Dove siamo noi? Noi siamo in questa scuola.

TUTU MARTINI I think I could learn to like you in no time at all.

AMERICAN TOURIST How wonderful . . . Tutu Martini . . . Tutu . . . Tutu . . . Tutu . . . Tutu . . .

(As the lights dim, the COWBOY makes his way to the door, singing:

Florence in the spring Is such a lovely thing It makes you want to sing— Florence in the spring!)

CURTAIN