VIOLET: THE OPERA

Speranza

An analysis.

R. C. Scruton

Violet

Dramatis Personae

 

auctioneer bass

auctioneer’s assistant tenor

Jessica Gwynne

-- great niece of Violet, and heir to her house soprano

Violet Gordon-Woodhouse

-- ... soprano

Gordon Woodhouse

-- husband to Violet ... tenor

Miss Woodhouse 1, sister to Gordon soprano

Miss Woodhouse II, sister to Gordon mezzo-soprano

Bill (Viscount) Barrington

-- friend of Gordon ... baritone

The Hon. Denis Tollemache, at first a schoolboy soprano

Max Labouchère

-- man about town ...... counter-tenor

Houghton

-- butler to the Misses Woodhouse tenor .

Butler to Violet

-- tenor

Dame Ethel Smyth

-- composer  .... bass

Chorus
 Prologue

Seventies.

A large country house, Nether Lypiatt, with the accumulated objets d’art et de vertu from a life that has for many years been over, but which has had no sequel.

It is evening, and an auctioneer and his staff are busy valuing the contents prior to the auction that is to take place next day.

auctioneer: Three jackets, one embroidered, hunting diary, rocking horse, tooled leather gun-case. Ten pounds.

Assistant: Lot 246, ten pounds.

Auctioneer

Parasol, white appliqué lacework on black silk, ebony shaft, handle tipped with mother-of-pearl. Ten similar. Twelve pounds.

Assistant

Lot 247, twelve pounds.

Auctioneer

Fifteen dresses by Poiret, silk, satin, etc., style ballet russe; ten pairs of snake-skin shoes, pair brocaded evening slippers with gold inlay and pearl-set tassles. Wow! What would you say Charles?

Assistant

I’d say two hundred pounds.

Auctioneer

And now the instruments: two harpsichords, three lutes, theorbo, serpent, clavichord and dulcimer: where are they?

Assistant

In there Mr Harrison, in the haunted room.

Auctioneer

The haunted room?

Assistant

Sometimes they say, you can hear her playing: slow music on the harpsichord, pinching the ear like frost. Someone in the garden glimpsed her at the window. And last night, on the lawn outside, a large white horse…

Auctioneer

What nonsense: where’s the key?

Assistant

It isn’t locked. But we must wait to enter. They belonged to his aunt, Mrs Gordon Woodhouse.

She appended to her will,

A little codicil,

To say her nephew Gwynne,

Was not to sell a thing,

But keep them for his daughter.

Auctioneer

For Miss Gwynne. I see. And is she here?

(Enter Jessica left. She is in travelling clothes, with a duffle bag.)

Assistant

She’s due right now. In fact this must be her.

Auctioneer

Miss Gwynne, John Harrison. How pleased I am to meet you. We’ve covered all the rooms, or almost all, and bless me! What a house! What furniture! What exquisite taste your father had…

Jessica

Not his taste, but my Great-Aunt Violet’s. Taste was her life.

Auctioneer

Ah, Violet Gordon Woodhouse: the great musician. I never knew her, though she was the talk of hereabouts, she and Mr Gordon and Lord Bill.

Jessica

She is still here, filling the place. It was why my father wanted to move. To live with Violet, he said, you must belong to her. Even when she is dead; especially when she is dead.

Auctioneer

(embarrassed) Well yes, that might be so.

But to those who pass it in their rounds,

As I do, this house has been

A tranquil haven, elegant, serene -

A little piece of England, such as I

Would love to…

Jessica (impatiently)
Yes, yes. It’s not the house I object to – it is all this waste, this débris – objects which once had a soul, and have a soul no longer.
 

Auctioneer
 

Oh, don’t say that, Miss Gwynne.

In fact I’ve seldom seen

A house and contents so in tune:

I think of Sitwells and Sassoon,

Witty evenings, wistful days,

Urban style and country ways…

Jessica

Oh dear, I need to be alone.

Auctioneer

Of course.

Jessica

This is her room, the crystal cell

Floating above the sea of trouble,

Filled with the things I’m not to sell,

Unless I choose to burst her bubble.

Auctioneer

(to assistant) Have we finished?

Assistant

Yes, finished, Mr Harrison.

Auctioneer

So then I’ll leave you here, Miss Gwynne.

The sale begins tomorrow; nine o’clock.

Jessica

Tomorrow, then, at nine.

(Exeunt Auctioneer and staff.)

This passion that has ruined life for me:

Teach me your remedy!

Violet your name, inviolate your heart,

Give me, oh give your healing art!
 

(Jessica enters the room. Inner curtain rises to reveal a desk, chair, couch, various instruments, all in a shaft of afternoon sunlight. The rear of the stage is dark, with the outlines of a harpsichord just visible. There are books, diaries, some frameless pictures stacked against the wall, and an old mahogany cabinet full of papers. The whole has the air of an abandoned shrine, with votive offerings to a forgotten god. Jessica looks around, then sits at the desk, idly opening drawers. She takes out a diary, from which a letter falls. She opens it and begins to read.)

My darling sister,

I’ve tried to please Papa. I’ve gone round and round his scheme in my head and in my heart. And it will not do, Dot, it will not do. Lord Gage is kind, considerate and wealthy. He loves me, in the way that people love, who live alone in splendid mansions. He is even musical, and the other day said some not entirely stupid things about Mozart. He will make some woman happy. But not me, Dot, not me. To marry, just think of it: to lie beside a man, this man, Papa’s friend, and then to do the thing that doctors write about and children giggle over – honestly, Dot, I cannot bear to think of it …

(The harpsichord has begun to sound from the back of the room. Jessica turns on a light to read, and Violet becomes visible, studying her own hands as they play. After a while she rises and comes forward fully into the light.)

Violet

Of course I did not marry him. I married none of them.

I married all of them: they married me.

To everyone who loved me I belonged, and yet

Their arms around me closed on air.

Jessica

Aunt Violet…

Violet

But let it not have been in vain,

The joy that bound us, and the pain,

The distillation into sound

Of the many loves I found:

Christabel and Adelina,

Gordon, Denis, Ethel, Max

And darling Bill: who was the tax

I paid for all my thrills,

And this you’ll see. The keys and quills

Lie here around: pluck the strings

And still they’ll sound. Read my things

And you’ll remember. Show it mattered:

Show our friendship wasn’t scattered

But stays like music in the air

The air of England, where we were.

(The lights dim, as Violet retreats to her instruments, and Jessica is still visible at the desk, turning over the pages. The curtain falls, and an intermezzo plays from the orchestra, with a prominent piano part, becoming more and more florid and virtuoso, until the piano takes over.)

 ACT ONE. Scene 1

The intermezzo comes to a stop with two piano chords fortissimo, as the curtain rises again to show a drawing room full of well-dressed Edwardian people. Violet is leaning back from the piano, her hands raised after the final chords, an ecstatic but winsome expression on her face. The audience bursts into applause. Denis, a schoolboy of sixteen with soprano voice, stands slightly apart from them, appalled at their presence.)

Chorus:
 

Quite exceptional
rare talent
And such looks
You’d almost say she wasn’t English, a je ne sais quoi in her features,
those lustrous eyes, that sultry oriental mouth, so exquisite, so tiny
– and such rhythm
She must have Spanish blood.

Denis: If I could touch her! If I could only speak to her alone!

The Misses Woodhouse

So good of you, dear Violet, to invite us up to town, to hear your lovely playing, and to meet such dazzling people, such a treat…

Violet

But my dears, you had to come – dear Gordon’s sisters must be here when the new piano’s launched!

The Misses Woodhouse

And such delicious cakes, we’ll ask your mother’s cook to give the recipe – our dear Mrs Gawthrop…

Chorus

(drowning out the Misses Woodhouse as Violet circulates) I thought the Schumann quite superb, and then the nocturne by Liszt – it must have been Liszt! How did you get your fingers – oh, those tiny fingers, those child-like ivory fingers! – around the Liszt?

Denis

A nocturne by Liszt! Such philistines! The joy, the sweetness, the sheer love in Chopin – wasted on them! If only she would notice what I feel!

(Gordon steps forward from the crowd, leading Bill by the arm. He turns first to the Misses Woodhouse.)

Gordon

May I introduce to you a new neighbour of ours in the country, Ella? My friend Mr Barrington.

(Bill and the Misses Woodhouse bow to each other, as Gordon turns to Violet.)

And Bill, this is Violet Gwynne. Miss Gwynne – Bill Barrington.

(Violet and Bill shake hands. She holds his hand for a moment and looks into his eyes. Something passes between them. Then she turns away to talk with other guests.)

Violet

Ah, Sir James, how very kind, and Mrs Knighton…

Bill

(Soliloquizes) In woods and fields, the weather blowing,

A dog beside me and a gun in hand –

How often I have dreamed of such a woman,

So self-contained, so decorous, so poised.

Gordon

(To Bill, confiding)Such magnetic beauty, such enchantment,

And such depths of personality. She would grace any salon, Bill.

She would justify everything, Bill, everything! I want her, Bill.

Chorus

How marvellous your playing, Miss Gwynne, such warmth,

such eloquence, such technique!

Violet

(commanding silence)Thank you friends, although the credit is

theirs – the masters of harmony and the human heart. But let me

share my thoughts with you.

I love those great romantic works,

There’s no denying it.

But I love the classics more:

For depth and thought and soulfulness

Great Bach has no compare. And as for Schubert,

Schubert makes nothing happen; he lives

In a place of his own, where griefs

And joys lie down together and agree

To die to this world, to awaken

Into memory.

The Misses Woodhouse

How beautiful!

Denis

To die to this world, to awaken

Into memory: remembering only her!

Gordon

(To Bill) She’s got it all, Bill, got it all!

Chorus

She’s got it all!

Bill

Yes, a woman to admire!

Denis

If I could show my love,

My love so pure!

Violet

(To herself): Music is the food of love,

To them the food of lust:

False vows and greedy kisses -

Dust to dust!

(Collecting herself, aloud):

Music makes unsensual sense:

Voices lead and follow,

Not touching, but intense -

This the masters show us

In songs that by-pass lips,

Cadenzas full of frenzy

Contained in fingertips.

Chorus

(fading) Music makes unsensual sense …

Violet

(To Gordon, whom she has enticed away) What instrument

Can gather threads

Of sentiment

And not stretch them

Into kitsch?

My fingers itch

To show you …

She moves to the harpsichord, as Gordon comes forward and the crowd recedes.

Bill lingers behind, though Violet smiles at him as she plays.

The inner curtain falls on the scene, leaving Violet and Gordon alone at the front of the stage. Violet continues to play as Gordon addresses her.)

Gordon

I so agree, Miss Gwynne, I so agree.

Love should be like music:

Not worldly but – but true and free,

Free, I mean, from all this, all this …

I mean, take you and me;

That is, take me – my love, my high esteem,

My need, yes need for you, my dream,

My …

Violet

Once there was a violet,

Crushed beneath his heel,

Because she could not feel,

Could not …

Gordon

My darling, don’t explain …

Violet

Das arme Veilchen …

Gordon

Es war ein herzigs Veilchen!

You know, I’m just the same.

I want only to adore you from afar,

To care for you, to fetch and carry,

To be your slave, in short – to marry

On any terms you choose.

(As Gordon pours out his feelings, Violet sits at the harpsichord, improvising a fugue in response to his words.)

All these years since I flunked my tripos and came down from Cambridge what have I done? Dabbled in the family business, lounged in fashionable salons, motored from one shooting party to the next, become every inch the eligible bachelor, by which they mean someone who is eligible to be a bachelor for ever. Meanwhile I have yearned in my heart for only one thing: the sparkling, cultured, lovely woman who would make it all worthwhile. To whom I could give all that I own. And now I have met her. Don’t refuse.

(Violet looks at him, long and hard.)

Violet

Dear Gordon, I accept,

So take my hand

And kiss it – this I’ll stand,

But…

Gordon

Yes, I know,

The rest we must forego.

Violet and Gordon

The love that we were seeking, we have found.

A love of spirits – heaven bound.

(They retreat behind the curtain.)

 

Scene 2.

(The curtain rises to reveal the interior of a country house, Armscote. It is morning, and light streams in from French windows Right. Gordon and Violet separate. Gordon walks across to the couch and settles down with a newspaper. Violet goes to the piano, where she makes notes on an open score, fingering an awkward passage. Enter Bill in a fluster.)

Bill

Gordon, I must speak with you –

(Observing Violet he falls silent. She looks at him, plays a few intimate chords, and quickly leaves.)

I must leave at once.

Gordon

My dear chap, you have only just arrived.

Bill

I’m in love with your wife.

Gordon

Yes, yes, so am I. But what does she feel?

Bill

What does she feel? How should I know?

Gordon

Oh, little signs, smiles, nods, that kind of thing.

Bill

I say, you don’t seriously mean…

Gordon

I don’t mean anything – only

Violet is no ordinary person.

That is why we love her.

(Enter Violet, with troubled gestures.)

Violet

Gordon, dear, you must prevent this thing.

Gordon

What thing?

Violet

Why – Bill…

Bill

Don’t worry, I’ll prevent it. I’m leaving now.

Violet

But that’s exactly what you must prevent, dear Gordon.

Bill loves me – that is plain. And so he should:

Love freely given, chaste and pure, is good

And we can all enjoy it. And in my way

I love him too: what harm in that?

Gordon

No harm at all, my darling.

Bill

Violet!

Violet

(serenely)

Muddles come from self-indulgence;

Happiness means self-control.

Strict counterpoint resolves in cadence,

As note meets note, so soul meets soul.

So off you go my dears, and sort it out.

I’ll stay here and practice.

And when you’ve finished, Gordon dear, please send to Madame

Lucile for the dresses I ordered. I can wear them this weekend, to

celebrate our new arrangement.

(Bill and Gordon go out, arm in arm, through the French windows, while Violet sits again at the piano and works at the score.)

 

Scene 3.

(Violet remains dreaming at the piano, while the two Misses Woodhouse appear at the back of the stage.)

The Misses Woodhouse

My dear, what’s going on?

Two men now living with her?

Of course, they’re friends: but still…

Two men! Ah well,

We mustn’t judge, no, mustn’t judge…

(The two Misses Woodhouse disappear, and the spotlight is again on Violet, dreaming at the piano, smiling to herself.)

 

Scene 4.

(Enter Butler.)

Butler

Miss Ethel Smyth.

(Ethel (not yet a dame) sweeps past him dressed in masculine tweeds and riding boots, her face half covered by a trilby.)

Ethel

Two days ago we had a date:

The Savoy at four – I waited there till eight.

And here I find you, settled with your mate,

Subdued at last to woman’s grim estate.

How could you? Oh you tease! You cad!

You wayward sylph, delicious slut, you bad,

Bad girl….

Violet

Dear Ethel, simmer down;

I was unavoidably called away from town.

In marriage some things change.

Ethel

Some things cannot change. This love

I feel, this cauterizing passion. Like Sappho,

I love delicacy, and for me

Love has the beauty and splendour

Of the Sun…

Violet

Ethel please, we mustn’t let…

Ethel

No, we mustn’t let our feelings out.

They writhe and slurp inside the belly,

They squeal and squelch like pigs in jelly,

They cry aloud for sticky kisses,

And tumble out in dreadful messes…

(Violet moves over to the harpsichord and plays frostily.)

Violet

I’m growing tired of Richard Strauss;

Cool Scarlatti fills this house:

Ancient music, clear as amber…

Ethel

And once you let me – you remember –

On that sunlit afternoon, when those tender

Lips were raised to mine and…

(Enter Max, in motoring costume, beaming.)

Violet

Max, darling! Just in time!

Max

I’ve found you out at last!

Ethel

Bother! Who is this?

Violet

Why, this is Max, my mentor:

You’ll love him, Ethel, he’s a charmer.

Come here, my pet, and I’ll embrace you.

Max

Tookees, I was passing, had to kiss you!

(They embrace facetiously as Ethel storms out, and then disengage, laughing.)

Who was that preposterous old hag?

Violet

Now Max, don’t be unkind. She is a genius,

A bit too late romantic,

But all the same, the best composer of our sex.

Max

Not your sex, surely?

Violet

Max, you know you mustn’t talk like that.

How can I love you if you are not pure?

Max

Sorry, Tookees, sorry. Oh this room!

So haunting, so enchanting!

Such innocent excess!

And in this choc-à-bloc

Chocolate box

A sweet lacuna,

A scented corner,

Where a ballerina,

Twirls and trips

On fingertips.

Violet, you’re like a line

From Mallarmé

Whose syllables

Infallible

Disarm me!

Violet

Oh Max: you know so much,

And what you know is just a little out of date.

(She sits at the piano.)

Listen to this: I worked it out today.

A theme with all twelve notes, none repeated.

The music of the future:

Let’s see what we can do with it.

(Max takes off his motoring jacket, rolls up his sleeves and sits beside her at the piano. They improvise together to Violet’s theme, each with delighted exclamations as some new corner is turned from Debussy, to Strauss, to Wagner, etc. Gordon and Bill come in, still arm in arm, from the garden, and sit down to listen, nodding appreciatively but clearly not understanding a thing. As the improvisation ends, and Violet and Max embrace impetuously like children, the butler enters.)

Butler

Dinner is served, madam.

Violet

Darling Max, do stay for dinner. Oh and longer. Stay forever.

Gordon

(rising and coming forward) Yes, do old man.

Bill

Do stay: it would be so delightful.

Violet, Gordon, Max and Bill

The fruit of knowledge was forbidden

But not the fruit of love.

All jealousy must now be hidden

Beyond the stars above.

(As they sing their quartet Denis enters, in school uniform. He discreetly adds his voice to make a quintet. As the music ends Violet turns to him crossly:)

Violet

Denis, you wicked boy, why are you here?

Denis

I ran away, to be with you.

Violet

(seats the others at table and rings for the butler:) You have such a sweet, bold way with you, dear boy.

Denis

Mrs Woodhouse! I couldn’t stay away,

Although I promised.

In my wilderness

You are the flower.

In my darkness

You are the light.

Violet

You foolish boy.

Denis

I’ll not trouble you.

Just let me stay,

And dream, and hear you play.

Violet

Well join us, and we’ll discuss it.

(To the butler, as he enters) Leporello, un’ altra cena!

(Enter Ethel, pushing impatiently past the Butler.)

Ethel

Ferma un po’!

All

(satirically) Non si pasce di cibo mortale

Chi si pasce di cibo celeste!

The Misses Woodhouse (appearing at the back): It’s a scandal, quite a

scandal!

Violet

Denis, you angel! You angel, yes you angel!

(They all laugh, as the music bustles quickly to an end.)

 

ACT TWO

 

Scene 1.

(Armscote, the country house. Violet is practising the harpsichord in another room. Gordon in the drawing room, reading a newspaper, dressed for the city. From the window a view over English countryside. Bill enters from the garden, dressed in country clothes.)

Gordon

You’re working hard this morning.

Going well, I hope.

Bill

Yes, and this garden will be hers,

Will be ours, Gordon.

(Bill makes himself comfortable.)

So much I’ve learned from her, but most of all

That art and music, poetry and thought

Are nothing if detached from love and loyalty.

And love and loyalty for me mean land. It is this land

That shaped us, Gordon, that we too must shape,

This soil in which our ancestors

Lie buried. And now that we – or I at least – am gardening

It comes alive for me, as never in my days

Before the rootedness of all we mean and do.

Gordon

You’re right of course, dear Bill.

But don’t forget:

what made our country great

Was not the land. It was the sea – that vast expanse

We conquered, taking law and trade,

Faith, morals, truth and simple engineering

To places which had never known these gifts,

Braving all for Empire’s sake. And now, I fear,

The storm clouds gather.

(Enter Max, in arty clothes, as though preparing for a trip to town.)

Max

Bill and Gordon, have you heard?

Lady Anderton – it’s too absurd -

Is leaving her rich husband, by degrees,

For a young fellow in blue dungarees

A fashionable artist whom she met

(You won’t believe this) through our Violet.

Apparently his greatest claim to fame

Is painting bloated carcases of game

In which Sir James’s face is clearly seen

Crawling with hidden life à la Soutine…

Gordon

How odd, dear Max, the stories that you find

Another side to Violet, I suppose, and one

That Bill and I don’t know…

(Enter Denis, in boating hat and blue blazer, holding a volume of verse.)

Denis

Gordon, Bill, Max – I’ve made a wonderful discovery: The Testament of Beauty by Robert Bridges; not a discovery really. I mean Violet introduced the book to me, explained the symbols, apparently she knows the man. Man I say, but god would be more true. These lines like arteries, ideas pumped along them by the beating heart, I want to shout the words aloud…

Max

Denis, if it were not for Violet’s high opinion, I would think you quite absurd.

Denis

I am absurd; that’s why I love her. She makes absurdity into a free choice, a way of life, a style, an offering to her.

Max

There, you’ve hit on it. She blesses us, and in return we give ourselves to her.

Denis, Bill, Gordon, Max

With Violet I am myself, wholly free, wholly me,

Her love is constant, undemanding, pure.

How firm and true is this our

four-branched tree,

In which our little song-bird sings,

And flits from me to you and you to me.

(Enter Ethel, in another masculine costume and another feminine tantrum.)

Ethel

Poppycock! Violet, I’ll have you know,

Is not a little songbird, but every bit as human as

– as human – well, as me.

Where is she anyway?

(Enter Violet.)

Your men, my dear, are quite ridiculous.

They belong to a vanished age; I think it’s time

I took you for a trip into the present tense.

Violet

The present tense – what does it mean, except

This fairy-tale called passion?

All that’s rotten in the world of fashion,

All in art that’s overblown and gross –

For instance, Ethel, Skryabin and Strauss –

Is due to passion. We live serene,

Bill, Gordon, Denis, Max and I.

And into these old instruments

I summon voices that sang once

And sing again. Together then we visit

A time of beauty: softened, deep, exquisite.

Ours is the perfect tense!

Bill, Gordon, Denis, Max

Ours is the perfect tense!

Ethel

Scrumptious tart, delicious vagabond!

Violet

These dear friends I entertain

With the chaste authentic sound

Of Farnaby, John Dowland,

Thomas Morley and John Bull;

Of Gibbons, Byrd and Robert Johnson:

England’s ancient school.

Measured by the standards of that time

Our sublimated loves become sublime.

Their tense was perfect, like their instruments.

Bill, Gordon, Denis, Max

Their tense was perfect, like their instruments.

Ethel

Their women too were instruments, mere slaves!

Violet

(ignoring her) My friends, the beauty that the masters knew

Was made by faith, and faith runs dry.

A war will come in which our youth will die,

This country that we love will yield her best

When once the flag of passion is unfurled;

And afterwards the unheroic rest

Will wander wretched through our ruined world.

Bill, Gordon, Denis, Max and Ethel

(subdued) And afterwards the unheroic rest

Will wander wretched through our ruined world.

(Violet comes forward to sit at the harpsichord, Bill slowly following her. The curtain falls on the others, leaving Bill and Violet alone at the front of the stage. Violet plays a sarabande, but the orchestra constantly interrupts with jagged, disordered and passion-soaked chords. Bill approaches her, and she shudders at his touch.)

Bill

Your hands caress the past,

Which is your refuge.

My hands possess the present

Which is you.

Violet

Ah Bill, your love waters in me

The tree of life. I am your garden, Bill,

Whose flower and fruit are music.

Bill

And kisses too.

(She rises and turns to him. The music becomes more and more disordered as their lips approach, until the noises of battle are heard, and the stage is plunged in darkness. The curtain rises to reveal:)

 

Scene 2.

(At the front, a violent clash, Denis in officer’s uniform rallies his shattered band. They fall around him: as the Germans surround him his pistol jams and he is taken prisoner.)

Voice of Violet

(distraught) Denis, ah Denis: the battalion wiped out;

no survivors!

And Bill, my refuge, posted to India, among those eligible

daughters and wanting an heir, the next Lord Barrington.

The horror! Our world in ruins!

Ah, Denis, who loved only me!

(The smoke clears to reveal Max in an army tent, writing a letter. The stage props throughout the next two scenes should be both jagged battle- débris and, when righted, beautiful old furniture.)

Max

Darling Tookees – Thank God, the news came today that Denis was not killed, but taken prisoner: brave as always, courting Death, though Death avoids him. You can sleep now my dearest.

Oh, and Tookees: we go up tonight.

It is an almost perfect day, with bright, hot sun.

What a day for a Sunday walk at Armscote.

What happiness you have brought into our lives.

And God, how I love you. Max.

P.S. We have lost three quarters of our men.

I’ve nothing left save the clothes I stand up in.

Please ask Gordon to send me an auto razor,

And a pair of corderoys from Cordings.

(The curtain falls. Sounds of battle. The curtain rises to reveal Houghton, running from the battle, his hands over his ears, with an expression of horror on his face. Max comes forward, snatches Houghton’s gun from him, and rushes forward into the fray. He is shot and lies fatally wounded, as a German ambulance patrol lifts him on to a stretcher. He is set down on a camp table. In the background Bill, Gordon and Violet appear.)

Tookees! Darling! So beautiful, so serious, so gay!

(He dies.)

Violet

Max, my darling!

Bill and Gordon

Goodbye old man, goodbye …

Violet

My Max, forever mine!

(Curtain falls to more smoke and gunfire, as the sinister war music resumes. Curtain then rises to:)

 

Scene 3

(The smoke clears to reveal the table on which Max died, now a breakfast table, where the two Misses Woodhouse sit at Burghill Court. They are served by Houghton, the butler, who stumbles drunkenly. Elements of the battlefield are still visible, Max’s body dragged to one side.)

The Misses Woodhouse

And now it comes to light: four

husbands, and two with foreign names! And that horrible female,

not just a composer but a suffragette! They say she has foreign

blood herself: oriental, Asian, a half-caste, half hindoo! No

wonder sister left the house to us, and not to Gordon!

(Houghton knocks a plate to the floor.)

Miss Woodhouse 1

(starting up) Houghton, this is too much!

Miss Woodhouse 2

You’ve been drinking Houghton, don’t deny it.

The Misses Woodhouse

We warned you, Houghton.

Houghton

Yes ma’am. It’s my nerves ma’am, can’t forget it ma’am: the noise, the screams, the…

The Misses Woodhouse

You will leave this house at once,

Houghton. James will drive you to the station.

Houghton

That’s not fair ma’am.

Miss Woodhouse 1

Don’t argue, Houghton.

(Houghton goes out, swaying, and staring fixedly in front of him.)

Miss Woodhouse 2

Good riddance!

The Misses Woodhouse

And to think we were taken in by her. So full of charm, so enchanting, making us believe that nobody was more dear to her than us. And oh so beautifully dressed: how did she afford those clothes, those jewels, those houses – and those men? Spend, spend, spend – and borrowing against our legacy! Well, we have cut her off. Serves her right. Just our signatures needed and she’s done for. Where is that will?

(They extract the will from a piece of furniture/battle débris. They are about to sign it when Houghton enters with a cooking pot on his head and a blunderbuss. He shoots them dead and goes out laughing. More smoke and battle noise as the curtain falls.)

 

Scene 4.

(The curtain rises to reveal smoke clearing away, the bodies being removed, the débris being turned over and set up as furniture, to form the hallway of a grand country house. Bill, Gordon and Violet stumble in to their inheritance. Denis follows: he has a moustache, is somewhat bent and clearly not in good health. His is a mute part now, so that the audience will not be surprised by the soprano voice.)

Violet

Darling Gordon, Darling Denis – Bill,

This will be our home – the perfect setting:

No matter, Gordon, that your sisters

Wished to cheat you of your property:

We need it, and that’s that.

A piece of country rescued

From the present tense.

We’ll have concerts, theatres, soirées,

And Bill will run the farm, and plant

The garden. And I’ll build

A Palladian Temple

In memory of Max;

Poor Max! Dear Max!

Bill

Yes. Poor Max. But the garden

Will be a monument;

And we’ll make the place

So beautiful, dear Violet.

Violet

An avenue of chestnuts there,

And here herbaceous borders,

With lavender on dry-stone walls,

Rock plants, thyme, snapdragons, –

And whatever else you will

My dear, whatever else you will.

Bill

We’ll make the place

So beautiful…

Gordon

We’ll revive our old society,

Invite our special friends,

The Sitwells, Arthur Waley, Pound and Eliot

For our own variety

Of strenuous weekends.

And you will practise every day,

Hold court to famous men,

And in the evening

Sometimes read to Denis here,

The poets that he loves.

(Denis smiles and nods. As they sing out their several dreams, Denis and Gordon wander into the interior of the house, and the curtain falls, concealing them. Violet is left alone with Bill.)

Violet

How this world disgusts me, Bill,

This new world made by scandal

And by Freud.

This world of lust

And eager passions,

Handfuls of dust

In childish fashions…

I practised to avoid it,

And I failed…

Bill

Your failure, dearest Violet,

Is success for me: at last

I have a present, better than the past.

(As they kiss passionately, the light changes to reveal Jessica, still reading at the desk. Violet and Bill are cloaked by darkness, as romantic music swamps the stage, obliterating the baroque continuo. After a moment, Violet is revealed again, sitting at the harpsichord, which she is closing sadly.)

Violet

Yes, I practised, hour upon hour,

And yes, the great men came: Stravinsky,

Bartok, Picasso and Diaghilev.

Dear Delius even wrote a piece for me.

But the wounds began to grow:

Max, and then poor Denis, dying,

Loving only me

For half a century.

And then the other wound,

The wound I thought would never open

The raw wound of desire.

I wanted him, I wanted Bill,

And so my magic left me,

I was dragged into the present tense,

This life of sweet illusions

Lost its innocence.

Jessica

(turning) Not so, dear Aunt,

That perfect tense you longed for

You achieved. You made

A moment of beauty

Which leaves no children

To betray it. You took

Your world into yourself,

And absconded with it

Into silence. So rest now,

Be at peace.

Violet

(goes across to a couch, stage right):

I join you Max and Denis;

Farewell dear Bill and Gordon,

Do not grieve.

(Bill and Gordon enter and silently place violets on her corpse. Jessica takes a pressed violet from the book she holds and adds it to the bouquet. The scene dwindles to darkness.)

 

EPILOGUE.

(Lights suddenly flood the stage. It is morning, with Jessica asleep on the couch where Violet’s corpse had been. She starts awake as the Auctioneer enters.)

Auctioneer

Miss Gwynne, hard at work I see. So this is the haunted room. Look! A Dolmetsch harpsichord! A Goff! A Chickering spinet!

Jessica

So, sell them. I’ll keep

Only these papers, and perhaps the lute.

Auctioneer

And what of your great-aunt’s wishes?

Jessica

She wished for many things, but most of all

To live her life as though remembering it.

She robbed what she loved of its future tense,

And here her loves remain,

Old instruments that she alone could play

And now stand silent.

Auctioneer

And when will you be moving in, Miss Gwynne?

Jessica

Never. I shall leave today. The house can be sold.

Chorus of Ghosts

Take us with you, Jessica.

Auctioneer

Sad for us, Miss Gwynne, when a little piece of England loses its rightful owner.

Jessica

Was my aunt the rightful owner, She who lived in the past?

This house deserves a present tense To be itself at last.

Chorus of Ghosts

Take us with you, Jessica.

Voice of Violet

Remember me!

(Curtain.)