Act 2

________________________________________________
_ ACT II

The same scene on an afternoon a month later. DAVID is discovered at his desk, scribbling music in a fever of enthusiasm. MENDEL, dressed in his best, is playing softly on the piano, watching DAVID. After an instant or two of indecision, he puts down the piano-lid with a bang and rises decisively.

MENDEL
David!

DAVID
[Putting up his left hand]

Please, please----

[He writes feverishly.]

MENDEL
But I want to talk to you seriously--at once.

DAVID
I'm just re-writing the Finale. Oh, such a splendid inspiration!

[He writes on.]

MENDEL
[Shrugs his shoulders and reseats himself at piano. He plays a bar or two. Looks at watch impatiently. Resolutely]

David, I've got wonderful news for you. Miss Revendal is bringing somebody to see you, and we have hopes of getting you sent to Germany to study composition.

[DAVID does not reply, but writes rapidly on.]

Why, he hasn't heard a word!

[He shouts.]

David!

DAVID
[Writing on]

I can't, uncle. I _must_ put it down while that glorious impression is fresh.

MENDEL
What impression? You only went to the People's Alliance.

DAVID
Yes, and there I saw the Jewish children--a thousand of 'em--saluting the Flag.

[He writes on.]

MENDEL
Well, what of that?

DAVID
What of that?

[He throws down his quill and jumps up.]

But just fancy it, uncle. The Stars and Stripes unfurled, and a thousand childish voices, piping and foreign, fresh from the lands of oppression, hailing its fluttering folds. I cried like a baby.

MENDEL
I'm afraid you _are_ one.

DAVID
Ah, but if you had heard them--"Flag of our Great Republic"--the words have gone singing at my heart ever since--

[He turns to the flag over the door.]

"Flag of our Great Republic, guardian of our homes, whose stars and stripes stand for Bravery, Purity, Truth, and Union, we salute thee. We, the natives of distant lands, who find

[Half-sobbing]

rest under thy folds, do pledge our hearts, our lives, our sacred honour to love and protect thee, our Country, and the liberty of the American people for ever."

[He ends almost hysterically.]

MENDEL
[Soothingly]

Quite right. But you needn't get so excited over it.

DAVID
Not when one hears the roaring of the fires of God? Not when one sees the souls melting in the Crucible? Uncle, all those little Jews will grow up Americans!

MENDEL
[Putting a pacifying hand on his shoulder and forcing him into a chair]

Sit down. I want to talk to you about your affairs.

DAVID
[Sitting]

_My_ affairs! But I've been talking about them all the time!

MENDEL
Nonsense, David.

[He sits beside him.]

Don't you think it's time you got into a wider world?

DAVID
Eh? This planet's wide enough for me.

MENDEL
Do be serious. You don't want to live all your life in this room.

DAVID
[Looks round]

What's the matter with this room? It's princely.

MENDEL
[Raising his hands in horror]

Princely!

DAVID
Imperial. Remember when I first saw it--after pigging a week in the rocking steerage, swinging in a berth as wide as my fiddle-case, hung near the cooking-engines; imagine the hot rancid smell of the food, the oil of the machinery, the odours of all that close-packed, sea-sick----

MENDEL
[Putting his hand over DAVID'S mouth]

Don't! You make me ill! How could you ever bear it?

DAVID
[Smiling]

I was quite happy--I only had to fancy I'd been shipwrecked, and that after clinging to a plank five days without food or water on the great lonely Atlantic, my frozen, sodden form had been picked up by this great safe steamer and given this delightful dry berth, regular meals, and the spectacle of all these friendly faces.... Do you know who was on board that boat? Quincy Davenport.

MENDEL
The lord of corn and oil?

DAVID [Smiling]

Yes, even we wretches in the steerage felt safe to think the lord was up above, we believed the company would never dare drown _him_. But could even Quincy Davenport command a cabin like this?

[Waving his arm round the room.]

Why, uncle, we have a cabin worth a thousand dollars--a thousand dollars a _week_--and what's more, it doesn't wobble!

[He plants his feet voluptuously upon the floor.]

MENDEL
Come, come, David, I asked you to be serious. Surely, some day you'd like your music produced?

DAVID
[Jumps up]

Wouldn't it be glorious? To hear it all actually coming out of violins and 'cellos, drums and trumpets.

MENDEL
And you'd like it to go all over the world?

DAVID
All over the world and all down the ages.

MENDEL But don't you see that unless you go and study seriously in Germany----?

[Enter KATHLEEN from kitchen, carrying a furnished tea-tray with ear-shaped cakes, bread and butter, etc., and wearing a grotesque false nose. MENDEL cries out in amaze.]

Kathleen!

DAVID
[Roaring with boyish laughter]

Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha!

KATHLEEN
[Standing still with her tray] Sure, what's the matter?

DAVID
Look in the glass!

KATHLEEN
[Going to the mantel]

Houly Moses!

[She drops the tray, which MENDEL catches, and snatches off the nose.]

Och, I forgot to take it off--'twas the misthress gave it me--I put it on to cheer her up.

DAVID
Is she so miserable, then?

KATHLEEN
Terrible low, Mr. David, to-day being _Purim_.

MENDEL
_Purim!_ Is to-day _Purim_?

[Gives her the tea-tray back. KATHLEEN, to take it, drops her nose and forgets to pick it up.]

DAVID
But _Purim_ is a merry time, Kathleen, like your Carnival. Haven't you read the book of Esther--how the Jews of Persia escaped massacre?

KATHLEEN
That's what the misthress is so miserable about. Ye don't _keep_ the Carnival. There's noses for both of ye in the kitchen--didn't I go with her to Hester Street to buy 'em?--but ye don't be axin' for 'em. And to see your noses layin' around so solemn and neglected, faith, it nearly makes me chry meself.

MENDEL
[Bitterly to himself]

Who can remember about _Purim_ in America?

DAVID
[Half-smiling]

Poor granny, tell her to come in and I'll play her _Purim_ jig.

MENDEL
[Hastily]

No, no, David, not here--the visitors!

DAVID
Visitors? What visitors?

MENDEL
[Impatiently]

That's just what I've been trying to explain.

DAVID
Well, I can play in the kitchen.

[He takes his violin. Exit to kitchen. MENDEL sighs and shrugs his shoulders hopelessly at the boy's perversity, then fingers the cups and saucers.]

MENDEL
[Anxiously]

Is that the _best_ tea-set?

KATHLEEN
Can't you see it's the Passover set!

[Ruefully]

And shpiled intirely it'll be now for our Passover.... And the misthress thought the visitors might like to thry some of her _Purim_ cakes.

[Indicates ear-shaped cakes on tray.]

MENDEL
[Bitterly]

_Purim_ cakes!

[He turns his back on her and stares moodily out of the window.]

KATHLEEN
[Mutters contemptuously]

Call yerself a Jew and you forgettin' to keep _Purim_!

[She is going back to the kitchen when a merry Slavic dance breaks out, softened by the door; her feet unconsciously get more and more into dance step, and at last she jigs out. As she opens and passes through the door, the music sounds louder.]

FRAU QUIXANO
[Heard from kitchen]

Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha! Kathleen!!

[MENDEL'S feet, too, begin to take the swing of the music, and his feet dance as he stares out of the window. Suddenly the hoot of an automobile is heard, followed by the rattling up of the car.]

MENDEL
Ah, she has brought somebody swell!

[He throws open the doors and goes out eagerly to meet the visitors. The dance music goes on softly throughout the scene.]

QUINCY DAVENPORT
[Outside]

Oh, thank you--I leave the coats in the car.

[Enter an instant later QUINCY DAVENPORT and VERA REVENDAL, MENDEL in the rear. VERA is dressed much as before, but with a motor veil, which she takes off during the scene. DAVENPORT is a dude, aping the air of a European sporting clubman. Aged about thirty-five and well set-up, he wears an orchid and an intermittent eyeglass, and gives the impression of a coarse-fibred and patronisingly facetious but not bad-hearted man, spoiled by prosperity.]

MENDEL
Won't you be seated?

VERA
First let me introduce my friend, who is good enough to interest himself in your nephew--Mr. Quincy Davenport.

MENDEL
[Struck of a heap]

Mr. Quincy Davenport! How strange!

VERA
What is strange?

MENDEL
David just mentioned Mr. Davenport's name--said they travelled to New York on the same boat.

QUINCY
Impossible! Always travel on my own yacht. Slow but select. Must have been another man of the same name--my dad. Ha! Ha! Ha!

MENDEL
Ah, of course. I thought you were too young.

QUINCY
My dad, Miss Revendal, is one of those antiquated Americans who are always in a hurry!

VERA
He burns coal and you burn time.

QUINCY
Precisely! Ha! Ha! Ha!

MENDEL
Won't you sit down--I'll go and prepare David.

VERA
[Sitting]

You've not prepared him yet?

MENDEL I've tried to more than once--but I never really got to----

[He smiles]

to Germany.

[QUINCY sits.]

VERA
Then prepare him for _three_ visitors.

MENDEL
Three?

VERA
You see Mr. Davenport himself is no judge of music.

QUINCY
[Jumps up]

I beg your pardon.

VERA In manuscript.

QUINCY
Ah, of course not. Music should be heard, not seen--like that jolly jig. Is that your David?

MENDEL
Oh, you mustn't judge him by that. He's just fooling.

QUINCY
Oh, he'd better not fool with Poppy. Poppy's awful severe.

MENDEL
Poppy?

QUINCY
Pappelmeister--my private orchestra conductor.

MENDEL
Is it _your_ orchestra Pappelmeister conducts?

QUINCY
Well, I pay the piper--and the drummer too!

[He chuckles.]

MENDEL
[Sadly]

_I_ wanted to play in it, but he turned me down.

QUINCY
I told you he was awful severe.

[To VERA]

He only allows me comic opera once a week. My wife calls him the Bismarck of the baton.

MENDEL
[Reverently]

A great conductor!

QUINCY
Would he have a twenty-thousand-dollar job with me if he wasn't? Not that he'd get half that in the open market--only I have to stick it on to keep him for my guests exclusively.

[Looks at watch.]

But he ought to be here, confound him. A conductor should keep time, eh, Miss Revendal?

[He sniggers.]

MENDEL
I'll bring David. Won't you help yourselves to tea?

[To VERA]

You see there's lemon for you--as in Russia.
[Exit to kitchen--a moment afterwards the merry music stops in the middle of a bar.]

VERA
Thank you.

[Taking a cup.]

Do _you_ like lemon, Mr. Davenport?

QUINCY
[Flirtatiously]

That depends. The last I had was in Russia itself--from the fair hands of your mother, the Baroness.

VERA
[Pained]

Please don't say my mother, my mother is dead.

QUINCY
[Fatuously misunderstanding]

Oh, you have no call to be ashamed of your step-mother--she's a stunning creature; all the points of a tip-top Russian aristocrat, or Quincy Davenport's no judge of breed! Doesn't speak English like your father--but then the Baron is a wonder.

VERA
[Takes up teapot]

Father once hoped to be British Ambassador--that's why _I_ had an English governess. But you never told me you met him in _Russia_.

QUINCY Surely! When I gave you all those love messages----

VERA
[Pouring tea quickly]

You said you met him at Wiesbaden.

QUINCY Yes, but we grew such pals I motored him and the Baroness back to St. Petersburg. Jolly country, Russia--they know how to live.

VERA
[Coldly]

I saw more of those who know how to die.... Milk and sugar?

QUINCY
[Sentimentally]

Oh, Miss Revendal! Have you forgotten?

VERA
[Politely snubbing]

How should I remember?

QUINCY
You don't remember our first meeting? At the Settlement Bazaar? When I paid you a hundred dollars for every piece of sugar you put in?

VERA
Did you? Then I hope you drank syrup.

QUINCY
Ugh! I hate sugar--I sacrificed myself.

VERA
To the Settlement? How heroic of you!

QUINCY
No, not to the Settlement. To you!

VERA
Then I'll only put milk in.

QUINCY
I hate milk. But from you----

VERA
Then we _must_ fall back on the lemon.

QUINCY
I loathe lemon. But from----

VERA
Then you shall have your tea neat.

QUINCY
I detest tea, and here it would be particularly cheap and nasty. But----

VERA
Then you shall have a cake!

[She offers plate.]

QUINCY
[Taking one]

Would they be eatable?

[Tasting it.]

Humph! Not bad.

[Sentimentally]

A little cake was all you would eat the only time you came to one of my private concerts. Don't you remember? We went down to supper together.

VERA
[Taking his tea for herself and putting in lemon]

I shall always remember the delicious music Herr Pappelmeister gave us.

QUINCY
How unkind of you!

VERA
Unkind?

[She sips the tea and puts down the cup.]

To be grateful for the music?

QUINCY
You know what I mean--to forget _me_!

[He tries to take her hand.]

VERA
[Rising]

Aren't you forgetting yourself?

QUINCY
You mean because I'm married to that patched-and-painted creature? She's hankering for the stage again, the old witch.

VERA
Hush! Marriages with comic opera stars are not usually domestic idylls.

QUINCY
I fell a victim to my love of music.

VERA
[Murmurs, smiling]

Music!

QUINCY
And I hadn't yet met the right breed--the true blue blood of Europe. I'll get a divorce.

[Approaching her]

Vera!

VERA
[Retreating]

You will make me sorry I came to you.

QUINCY
No, don't say that--promised the Baron I'd always do all I could for----

VERA
You promised? You dared discuss my affairs?

QUINCY
It was your father began it. When he found I knew you, he almost wept with emotion. He asked a hundred questions about your life in America.

VERA
His life and mine are for ever separate. He is a Reactionary, I a Radical.

QUINCY
But he loves you dreadfully--he can't understand why you should go slaving away summer and winter in a Settlement--you a member of the Russian nobility!

VERA
[With faint smile]

I might say, _noblesse oblige_. But the truth is, I earn my living that way. It would do _you_ good to slave there too!

QUINCY
[Eagerly]

Would they chain us together? I'd come to-morrow.

[He moves nearer her. There is a double knock at the door.]

VERA
[Relieved]

Here's Pappelmeister!

QUINCY
Bother Poppy--why is he so darned punctual?

[Enter KATHLEEN from the kitchen.]

VERA
[Smiling]

Ah, you're still here.

KATHLEEN
And why would I not be here?

[She goes to open the door.]

PAPPELMEISTER
Mr. Quixano?

KATHLEEN
Yes, come in.

[Enter HERR PAPPELMEISTER, a burly German figure with a leonine head, spectacles, and a mane of white hair--a figure that makes his employer look even coarser. He carries an umbrella, which he never lets go. He is at first grave and silent, which makes any burst of emotion the more striking. He and QUINCY DAVENPORT suggest a picture of "Dignity and Impudence." His English, as roughly indicated in the text, is extremely Teutonic.]

QUINCY
You're late, Poppy!

[PAPPELMEISTER silently bows to VERA.]

VERA
[Smilingly goes and offers her hand.]

Proud to meet you, Herr Pappelmeister!

QUINCY
Excuse me----

[Introducing]

Miss Revendal!--I forgot you and Poppy hadn't been introduced--curiously enough it was at Wiesbaden I picked him up too--he was conducting the opera--your folks were in my box. I don't think I ever met anyone so mad on music as the Baron. And the Baroness told me he had retired from active service in the Army because of the torture of listening to the average military band. Ha! Ha! Ha!

VERA
Yes, my father once hoped _my_ music would comfort him.

[She smiles sadly.]

Poor father! But a soldier must bear defeat. Herr Pappelmeister, may I not give you some tea?

[She sits again at the table.]

QUINCY
Tea! Lager's more in Poppy's line.

[He chuckles.]

PAPPELMEISTER
[Gravely]

Bitte.
Tea.

[She pours out, he sits.]

Lemon. Four lumps.... _Nun_, five!... Or six!

[She hands him the cup.]

Danke.

[As he receives the cup, he utters an exclamation, for KATHLEEN after opening the door has lingered on, hunting around everywhere, and having finally crawled under the table has now brushed against his leg.]

VERA
What are you looking for?

KATHLEEN
[Her head emerging] My nose!

[They are all startled and amused.]

VERA
Your nose?

KATHLEEN
I forgot me nose!

QUINCY
Well, follow your nose--and you'll find it. Ha! Ha! Ha!

KATHLEEN
[Pouncing on it]

Here it is!

[Picks it up near the armchair.]

OMNES Oh!

KATHLEEN
Sure, it's gotten all dirthy.

[She takes out a handkerchief and wipes the nose carefully.]

QUINCY
But why do you want a nose like that?

KATHLEEN
[Proudly]

Bekaz we're Hebrews!

QUINCY
What!

VERA
What _do_ you mean?

KATHLEEN
It's our Carnival to-day! _Purim._

[She carries her nose carefully and piously toward the kitchen.]

VERA
Oh! I see.

[Exit KATHLEEN.]

QUINCY
[In horror]

Miss Revendal, you don't mean to say you've brought me to a Jew!

VERA
I'm afraid I have. I was thinking only of his genius, not his race. And you see, so many musicians are Jews.

QUINCY
Not _my_ musicians. No Jew's harp in my orchestra, eh?

[He sniggers.]

I wouldn't have a Jew if he paid _me_.

VERA
I daresay you have some, all the same.

QUINCY
Impossible. Poppy! Are there any Jews in my orchestra?

PAPPELMEISTER
[Removing the cup from his mouth and speaking with sepulchral solemnity]

Do you mean are dere any Christians?

QUINCY
[In horror]

Gee-rusalem! Perhaps _you're_ a Jew!

PAPPELMEISTER
[Gravely]

I haf not de honour. But, if you brefer, I will gut out from my brogrammes all de Chewish composers. _Was?_

QUINCY
Why, of course. Fire 'em out, every mother's son of 'em.

PAPPELMEISTER
[Unsmiling]

_Also_--no more comic operas!

QUINCY
What!!!

PAPPELMEISTER
Dey write all de comic operas!

QUINCY Brute!

[PAPPELMEISTER'S chuckle is heard gurgling in his cup. Re-enter MENDEL from kitchen.]

MENDEL
[To VERA]

I'm so sorry--I can't get him to come in--he's terrible shy.

QUINCY
Won't face the music, eh?

[He sniggers.]

VERA
Did you tell him _I_ was here?

MENDEL
Of course.

VERA
[Disappointed]

Oh!

MENDEL
But I've persuaded him to let me show his MS.

VERA
[With forced satisfaction]

Oh, well, that's all we want.

[MENDEL goes to the desk, opens it, and gets the MS. and offers it to QUINCY DAVENPORT.]

QUINCY
Not for me--Poppy!

[MENDEL offers it to PAPPELMEISTER, who takes it solemnly.]

MENDEL
[Anxiously to PAPPELMEISTER]

Of course you must remember his youth and his lack of musical education----

PAPPELMEISTER
_Bitte, das Pult!_

[MENDEL moves DAVID'S music-stand from the corner to the centre of the room. PAPPELMEISTER puts MS. on it.]

_So!_

[All eyes centre on him eagerly, MENDEL standing uneasily, the others sitting. PAPPELMEISTER polishes his glasses with irritating elaborateness and weary "achs," then reads in absolute silence. A pause.]

QUINCY
[Bored by the silence]

But won't you play it to us?

PAPPELMEISTER
Blay it? Am I an orchestra? I blay it in my brain.

[He goes on reading, his brow gets wrinkled. He ruffles his hair unconsciously. All watch him anxiously--he turns the page.]

_So!_

VERA
[Anxiously]

You don't seem to like it!

PAPPELMEISTER
I do not comprehend it.

MENDEL
I knew it was crazy--it is supposed to be about America or a Crucible or something. And of course there are heaps of mistakes.

VERA
That is why I am suggesting to Mr. Davenport to send him to Germany.

QUINCY
I'll send as many Jews as you like to Germany. Ha! Ha! Ha!

PAPPELMEISTER
[Absorbed, turning pages]

_Ach!--ach!--So!_

QUINCY
I'd even lend my own yacht to take 'em back. Ha! Ha! Ha!

VERA
Sh! We're disturbing Herr Pappelmeister.

QUINCY
Oh, Poppy's all right.

PAPPELMEISTER
[Sublimely unconscious]

_Ach so--so--SO! Das ist etwas neues!_

[His umbrella begins to beat time, moving more and more vigorously, till at last he is conducting elaborately, stretching out his left palm for pianissimo passages, and raising it vigorously for forte, with every now and then an exclamation.]

_Wunderschoen!... pianissimo!_--now the flutes! Clarinets! _Ach, ergoetzlich_ ... bassoons and drums!... _Fortissimo!... Kolossal! Kolossal!_

[Conducting in a fury of enthusiasm.]

VERA
[Clapping her hands]

Bravo! Bravo! I'm so excited!

QUINCY
[Yawning]

Then it isn't bad, Poppy?

PAPPELMEISTER
[Not listening, never ceasing to conduct]

_Und_ de harp solo ... _ach, reizend!_ ... Second violins----!

QUINCY
But Poppy! We can't be here all day.

PAPPELMEISTER
[Not listening, continuing pantomime action]

Sh! Sh! _Piano._

QUINCY
[Outraged]

Sh to _me_!

[Rises.]

VERA
He doesn't know it's you.

QUINCY
But look here, Poppy----

[He seizes the wildly-moving umbrella. Blank stare of PAPPELMEISTER gradually returning to consciousness.]

PAPPELMEISTER
_Was giebt's...?_

QUINCY
We've had enough.

PAPPELMEISTER
[Indignant]

Enough? Enough? Of such a beaudiful symphony?

QUINCY
It may be beautiful to you, but to us it's damn dull. See here, Poppy, if you're satisfied that the young fellow has sufficient talent to be sent to study in Germany----

PAPPELMEISTER
In Germany! Germany has nodings to teach him, he has to teach Germany.

VERA Bravo!

[She springs up.]

MENDEL
I always said he was a genius!

QUINCY
Well, at that rate you could put this stuff of his in one of my programmes. _Sinfonia Americana_, eh?

VERA
Oh, that _is_ good of you.

PAPPELMEISTER
I should be broud to indroduce it to de vorld.

VERA
And will it be played in that wonderful marble music-room overlooking the Hudson?

QUINCY
Sure. Before five hundred of the smartest folk in America.

MENDEL
Oh, thank you, thank you. That will mean fame!

QUINCY
And dollars. Don't forget the dollars.

MENDEL
I'll run and tell him.

[He hastens into the kitchen, PAPPELMEISTER is re-absorbed in the MS., but no longer conducting.]

QUINCY
You see, I'll help even a Jew for your sake.

VERA
Hush!

[Indicating PAPPELMEISTER.]

QUINCY
Oh, Poppy's in the moon.

VERA
You must help him for his own sake, for art's sake.

QUINCY
And why not for heart's sake--for my sake?

[He comes nearer.]

VERA
[Crossing to PAPPELMEISTER]

Herr Pappelmeister! When do you think you can produce it?

PAPPELMEISTER
_Wunderbar!..._

[Becoming half-conscious of VERA]

Four lumps....

[Waking up]

_Bitte?_

VERA
How soon can you produce it?

PAPPELMEISTER
How soon can he finish it?

VERA
Isn't it finished?

PAPPELMEISTER
I see von Finale scratched out and anoder not quite completed. But anyhow, ve couldn't broduce it before Saturday fortnight.

QUINCY
Saturday fortnight! Not time to get my crowd.

PAPPELMEISTER
Den ve say Saturday dree veeks. Yes?

QUINCY
Yes. Stop a minute! Did you say Saturday? That's my comic opera night! You thief!

PAPPELMEISTER
Somedings must be sagrificed.

MENDEL
[Outside]

But you _must_ come, David.

[The kitchen door opens, and MENDEL drags in the boyishly shrinking DAVID. PAPPELMEISTER thumps with his umbrella, VERA claps her hands, QUINCY DAVENPORT produces his eyeglass and surveys DAVID curiously.]

VERA
Oh, Mr. Quixano, I am so glad! Mr. Davenport is going to produce your symphony in his wonderful music-room.

QUINCY
Yes, young man, I'm going to give you the smartest audience in America. And if Poppy is right, you're just going to rake in the dollars. America wants a composer.

PAPPELMEISTER
[Raises hands emphatically.]

_Ach Gott, ja!_

VERA
[To DAVID]

Why don't you speak? You're not angry with me for interfering----?

DAVID
I can never be grateful enough to you----

VERA
Oh, not to me. It is to Mr. Davenport you----

DAVID
And I can never be grateful enough to Herr Pappelmeister. It is an honour even to meet him.

[Bows.]

PAPPELMEISTER
[Choking with emotion, goes and pats him on the back.]

_Mein braver Junge!_

VERA
[Anxiously]

But it is Mr. Davenport----

DAVID
Before I accept Mr. Davenport's kindness, I must know to whom I am indebted--and if Mr. Davenport is the man who----

QUINCY
Who travelled with you to New York? Ha! Ha! Ha! No, _I'm_ only the junior.

DAVID
Oh, I know, sir, you don't make the money you spend.

QUINCY
Eh?

VERA
[Anxiously]

He means he knows you're not in business.

DAVID
Yes, sir; but is it true you are in pleasure?

QUINCY
[Puzzled]

I beg your pardon?

DAVID
Are all the stories the papers print about you true?

QUINCY
_All_ the stories. That's a tall order. Ha! Ha! Ha!

DAVID
Well, anyhow, is it true that----?

VERA
Mr. Quixano! What _are_ you driving at?

QUINCY
Oh, it's rather fun to hear what the masses read about me. Fire ahead. Is what true?

DAVID
That you were married in a balloon?

QUINCY
Ho! Ha! Ha! That's true enough. Marriage in high life, they said, didn't they? Ha! Ha! Ha!

DAVID
And is it true you live in America only two months in the year, and then only to entertain Europeans who wander to these wild parts?

QUINCY
Lucky for you, young man. You'll have an Italian prince and a British duke to hear your scribblings.

DAVID
And the palace where they will hear my scribblings--is it true that----?

VERA
[Who has been on pins and needles] Mr. Quixano, what possible----?

DAVID
[Entreatingly holds up a hand.]

Miss Revendal!

[To QUINCY DAVENPORT]

Is this palace the same whose grounds were turned into Venetian canals where the guests ate in gondolas--gondolas that were draped with the most wonderful trailing silks in imitation of the Venetian nobility in the great water fetes?

QUINCY
[Turns to VERA]

Ah, Miss Revendal--what a pity you refused that invitation! It was a fairy scene of twinkling lights and delicious darkness--each couple had their own gondola to sup in, and their own side-canal to slip down. Eh? Ha! Ha! Ha!

DAVID
And the same night, women and children died of hunger in New York!

QUINCY
[Startled, drops eyeglass.]

Eh?

DAVID
[Furiously]

And this is the sort of people you would invite to hear my symphony--these gondola-guzzlers!

VERA
Mr. Quixano!

MENDEL
David!

DAVID
These magnificent animals who went into the gondolas two by two, to feed and flirt!

QUINCY
[Dazed]

Sir!

DAVID
I should be a new freak for you for a new freak evening--I and my dreams and my music!

QUINCY
You low-down, ungrateful----

DAVID
Not for you and such as you have I sat here writing and dreaming; not for you who are killing my America!

QUINCY
_Your_ America, forsooth, you Jew-immigrant!

VERA
Mr. Davenport!

DAVID Yes--Jew-immigrant! But a Jew who knows that your Pilgrim Fathers came straight out of his Old Testament, and that our Jew-immigrants are a greater factor in the glory of this great commonwealth than some of you sons of the soil. It is you, freak-fashionables, who are undoing the work of Washington and Lincoln, vulgarising your high heritage, and turning the last and noblest hope of humanity into a caricature.

QUINCY
[Rocking with laughter]

Ha! Ha! Ha! Ho! Ho! Ho!

[To VERA.]

You never told me your Jew-scribbler was a socialist!

DAVID I am nothing but a simple artist, but I come from Europe, one of her victims, and I know that she is a failure; that her palaces and peerages are outworn toys of the human spirit, and that the only hope of mankind lies in a new world. And here--in the land of to-morrow--you are trying to bring back Europe----

QUINCY
[Interjecting]

I wish we could!----

DAVID Europe with her comic-opera coronets and her worm-eaten stage decorations, and her pomp and chivalry built on a morass of crime and misery----

QUINCY
[With sneering laugh]

Morass!

DAVID
[With prophetic passion]

But you shall not kill my dream! There shall come a fire round the Crucible that will melt you and your breed like wax in a blowpipe----

QUINCY
[Furiously, with clenched fist]

You----

DAVID
America _shall_ make good...!

PAPPELMEISTER
[Who has sat down and remained imperturbably seated throughout all this scene, springs up and waves his umbrella hysterically]

_Hoch Quixano! Hoch! Hoch! Es lebe Quixano! Hoch!_

QUINCY
Poppy! You're dismissed!

PAPPELMEISTER
[Goes to DAVID with outstretched hand]

_Danke._

[They grip hands. PAPPELMEISTER turns to QUINCY DAVENPORT.]

Comic Opera! Ouf!

QUINCY
[Goes to street-door, at white heat.]

Are you coming, Miss Revendal?

[He opens the door.]

VERA
[To QUINCY, but not moving]

Pray, pray, accept my apologies--believe me, if I had known----

QUINCY
[Furiously]

Then stop with your Jew!

[Exit.]

MENDEL
[Frantically]

But, Mr. Davenport--don't go! He is only a boy.

[Exit after QUINCY DAVENPORT.]

You must consider----

DAVID
Oh, Herr Pappelmeister, you have lost your place!

PAPPELMEISTER
And saved my soul. Dollars are de devil. Now I must to an appointment. _Auf baldiges Wiedersehen._

[He shakes DAVID'S hand.]

Fraeulein Revendal!

[He takes her hand and kisses it. Exit. DAVID and VERA stand gazing at each other.]

VERA
What have you done? What have you done?

DAVID
What else could I do?

VERA
I hate the smart set as much as you--but as your ladder and your trumpet----

DAVID
I would not stand indebted to them. I know you meant it for my good, but what would these Europe-apers have understood of _my_ America--the America of my music? They look back on Europe as a pleasure ground, a palace of art--but I know

[Getting hysterical]

it is sodden with blood, red with bestial massacres----

VERA
[Alarmed, anxious]

Let us talk no more about it.

[She holds out her hand.]

Good-bye.

DAVID
[Frozen, taking it, holding it]

Ah, you are offended by my ingratitude--I shall never see you again.

VERA
No, I am not offended. But I have failed to help you. We have nothing else to meet for.

[She disengages her hand.]

DAVID
Why will you punish me so? I have only hurt myself.

VERA
It is not a _punishment_.

DAVID
What else? When you are with me, all the air seems to tremble with fairy music played by some unseen fairy orchestra.

VERA
[Tremulous]

And yet you wouldn't come in just now when I----

DAVID
I was too frightened of the others....

VERA
[Smiling]

Frightened indeed!

DAVID
Yes, I know I became overbold--but to take all that magic sweetness out of my life for ever--you don't call that a punishment?

VERA
[Blushing]

How could I wish to punish you? I was proud of you!

[Drops her eyes, murmurs]

Besides it would be punishing _myself_.

DAVID
[In passionate amaze]

Miss Revendal!... But no, it cannot be. It is too impossible.

VERA
[Frightened]

Yes, too impossible. Good-bye.

[She turns.]

DAVID
But not for always?

[VERA hangs her head. He comes nearer. Passionately] Promise me that you--that I----

[He takes her hand again.]

VERA
[Melting at his touch, breathes]

Yes, yes, David.

DAVID
Miss Revendal!

[She falls into his arms.]

VERA My dear! my dear!

DAVID
It is a dream. You cannot care for me--you so far above me.

VERA
Above you, you simple boy? Your genius lifts you to the stars.

DAVID
No, no; it is you who lift me there----

VERA
[Smoothing his hair]

Oh, David. And to think that I was brought up to despise your race.

DAVID
[Sadly]

Yes, all Russians are.

VERA
But we of the nobility in particular.

DAVID
[Amazed, half-releasing her]

You are noble?

VERA
My father is Baron Revendal, but I have long since carved out a life of my own.

DAVID
Then he will not separate us?

VERA
No. [Re-embracing him.]

Nothing can separate us.

[A knock at the street-door. They separate. The automobile is heard clattering off.]

DAVID
It is my uncle coming back.

VERA
[In low, tense tones]

Then I shall slip out. I could not bear a third. I will write.

[She goes to the door.]

DAVID
Yes, yes ... Vera.

[He follows her to the door. He opens it and she slips out.]

MENDEL
[Half-seen at the door, expostulating]

You, too, Miss Revendal----?

[Re-enters.]

Oh, David, you have driven away all your friends.

DAVID
[Going to window and looking after VERA]

Not all, uncle. Not all.

[He throws his arms boyishly round his uncle.]

I am so happy.

MENDEL
Happy?

DAVID
She loves me--Vera loves me.

MENDEL
Vera?

DAVID
Miss Revendal.

MENDEL
Have you lost your wits?

[He throws DAVID off.]

DAVID
I don't wonder you're amazed. Maybe you think _I_ wasn't. It is as if an angel should stoop down----

MENDEL
[Hoarsely]

This is true?
This is not some stupid _Purim_ joke?

DAVID
True and sacred as the sunrise.

MENDEL
But you are a Jew!

DAVID
Yes, and just think! She was bred up to despise Jews--her father was a Russian baron----

MENDEL
If she was the daughter of fifty barons, you cannot marry her.

DAVID
[In pained amaze]

Uncle!

[Slowly]

Then your hankering after the synagogue was serious after all.

MENDEL
It is not so much the synagogue--it is the call of our blood through immemorial generations.

DAVID
_You_ say that! You who have come to the heart of the Crucible, where the roaring fires of God are fusing our race with all the others.

MENDEL
[Passionately]

Not _our_ race, not your race and mine.

DAVID
What immunity has our race?

[Meditatively]

The pride and the prejudice, the dreams and the sacrifices, the traditions and the superstitions, the fasts and the feasts, things noble and things sordid--they must all into the Crucible.

MENDEL
[With prophetic fury]

The Jew has been tried in a thousand fires and only tempered and annealed.

DAVID
Fires of hate, not fires of love. That is what melts.

MENDEL
[Sneeringly]

So I see.

DAVID
Your sneer is false. The love that melted me was not Vera's--it was the love _America_ showed me--the day she gathered me to her breast.

MENDEL
[Speaking passionately and rapidly]

Many countries have gathered us. Holland took us when we were driven from Spain--but we did not become Dutchmen. Turkey took us when Germany oppressed us, but we have not become Turks.

DAVID
These countries were not in the making. They were old civilisations stamped with the seal of creed. In such countries the Jew may be right to stand out. But here in this new secular Republic we must look forward----

MENDEL
[Passionately interrupting]

We must look backwards, too.

DAVID
[Hysterically]

To what? To Kishineff?

[As if seeing his vision]

To that butcher's face directing the slaughter? To those----?

MENDEL
[Alarmed]

Hush! Calm yourself!

DAVID
[Struggling with himself]

Yes, I will calm myself--but how else shall I calm myself save by forgetting all that nightmare of religions and races, save by holding out my hands with prayer and music toward the Republic of Man and the Kingdom of God! The Past I cannot mend--its evil outlines are stamped in immortal rigidity. Take away the hope that I can mend the Future, and you make me mad.

MENDEL
You are mad already--your dreams are mad--the Jew is hated here as everywhere--you are false to your race.

DAVID
I keep faith with America. I have faith America will keep faith with us.

[He raises his hands in religious rapture toward the flag over the door.]

Flag of our great Republic, guardian of our homes, whose stars and----

MENDEL
Spare me that rigmarole. Go out and marry your Gentile and be happy.

DAVID
You turn me out?

MENDEL
Would you stay and break my mother's heart? You know she would mourn for you with the rending of garments and the seven days' sitting on the floor. Go! You have cast off the God of our fathers!

DAVID
[Thundrously]

And the God of our children--does _He_ demand no service?

[Quieter, coming toward his uncle and touching him affectionately on the shoulder.]

You are right--I do need a wider world.

[Expands his lungs.]

I must go away.

MENDEL
Go, then--I'll hide the truth--she must never suspect--lest she mourn you as dead.

FRAU QUIXANO
[Outside, in the kitchen]

Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha!

[Both men turn toward the kitchen and listen.]

KATHLEEN
Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha!

FRAU QUIXANO AND KATHLEEN
Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha!

MENDEL
[Bitterly] A merry _Purim_!

[The kitchen door opens and remains ajar. FRAU QUIXANO rushes in, carrying DAVID'S violin and bow. KATHLEEN looks in, grinning.]

FRAU QUIXANO
[Hilariously]

_Nu spiel noch! spiel!_

[She holds the violin and bow appealingly toward DAVID.]

MENDEL
[Putting out a protesting hand]

No, no, David--I couldn't bear it.

DAVID
But I must! You said she mustn't suspect.

[He looks lovingly at her as he loudly utters these words, which are unintelligible to her.]

And it may be the last time I shall ever play for her.

[Changing to a mock merry smile as he takes the violin and bow from her]

_Gewiss_, Granny!

[He starts the same old Slavic dance.]

FRAU QUIXANO
[Childishly pleased]

He! He! He!

[She claps on a false grotesque nose from her pocket.]

DAVID
[Torn between laughter and tears]

Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha!

MENDEL
[Shocked]

_Mutter!_

FRAU QUIXANO
_Un' du auch_!

[She claps another false nose on MENDEL, laughing in childish glee at the effect. Then she starts dancing to the music, and KATHLEEN slips in and joyously dances beside her.]

DAVID
[Joining tearfully in the laughter]

Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha!

[The curtain falls quickly. It rises again upon the picture of FRAU QUIXANO fallen back into a chair, exhausted with laughter, fanning herself with her apron, while KATHLEEN has dropped breathless across the arm of the armchair; DAVID is still playing on, and MENDEL, his false nose torn off, stands by, glowering. The curtain falls again and rises upon a final tableau of DAVID in his cloak and hat, stealing out of the door with his violin, casting a sad farewell glance at the old woman and at the home which has sheltered him.] _

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