The Playboy of the Western World and Other Plays Read Online Free Page A

it’s not for nothing you’re letting on to be dead?
    DAN. It is not, stranger, but she won’t be coming near me at all, and it’s not long now I’ll be letting on, for I’ve a cramp in my back, and my hip’s asleep on me, and there’s been the devil’s own fly itching my nose. It’s near dead I was wanting to sneeze, and you blathering about the rain, and Darcy (bitterly)— the devil choke him—and the towering church. (Crying out impatiently.) Give me that whisky. Would you have herself come back before I taste a drop at all?
    (TRAMP gives him the glass.)
    DAN (after drinking). Go over now to that cupboard, and bring me a black stick you’ll see in the west corner by the wall.
    TRAMP (taking a stick from the cupboard). Is it that?
    DAN. It is, stranger; it’s a long time I’m keeping that stick for I’ve a bad wife in the house.
    TRAMP (with a queer look). Is it herself, master of the house, and she a grand woman to talk?
    DAN. It’s herself, surely, it’s a bad wife she is—a bad wife for an old man, and I’m getting old, God help me, though I’ve an arm to me still. (He takes the stick in his hand.) Let you wait now a short while, and it’s a great sight you’ll see in this room in two hours or three. (He stops to listen.) Is that somebody above?
    TRAMP (listening). There’s a voice speaking on the path.
    DAN. Put that stick here in the bed and smooth the sheet the way it was lying. (He covers himself up hastily.) Be falling to sleep now and don’t let on you know anything, or I’ll be having your life. I wouldn’t have told you at all but it’s destroyed with the drouth I was.
    TRAMP (covering his head.) Have no fear, master of the house. What is it I know of the like of you that I‘ld be saying a word or putting out my hand to stay you at all?
    (He goes back to the fire, sits down on a stool with his back to the bed and goes on stitching his coat.)
    DAN (under the sheet, querulously.) Stranger.
    TRAMP (quickly). Whisht, whisht. Be quiet I’m telling you, they’re coming now at the door.
    (NORA comes in with MICHEAL DARA, a tall, innocent young man behind her.)
    NORA. I wasn’t long at all, stranger, for I met himself on the path.
    TRAMP. You were middling long, lady of the house.
    NORA. There was no sign from himself?
    TRAMP. No sign at all, lady of the house.
    NORA (to MICHEAL). Go over now and pull down the sheet, and look on himself, Micheal Dara, and you’ll see it’s the truth I’m telling you.
    MICHEAL. I will not, Nora, I do be afeard of the dead.
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    (He sits down on a stool next the table facing the TRAMP. NORA puts the kettle on a lower hook of the pot-hooks, and piles turf under it.)
    NORA (turning to TRAMP). Will you drink a sup of tea with myself and the young man, stranger, or (speaking more persuasively) will you go into the little room and stretch yourself a short while on the bed, I’m thinking it’s destroyed you are walking the length of that way in the great rain.
    TRAMP. Is it to go away and leave you, and you having a wake, lady of the house? I will not surely. (He takes a drink from his glass which he has beside him.) And it’s none of your tea I’m asking either.
    (He goes on stitching. NORA makes the tea.)
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    MICHEAL (after looking at the TRAMP rather scornfully for a moment). That’s a poor coat you have, God help you, and I’m thinking it’s a poor tailor you are with it.
    TRAMP. If it’s a poor tailor I am, I’m thinking it’s a poor herd does be running back and forward after a little handful of ewes the way I seen yourself running this day, young fellow, and you coming from the fair.
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    (NORA comes back to the table.)
    NORA (to MICHEAL in a low voice). Let you not mind him at all, Micheal Dara, he has a drop taken and it’s soon he’ll be falling asleep.
    MICHEAL. It’s no lie he’s