"Your part?"
"The girl. Carol."
"She's honest."
"That's what's confusing."
"That's what's real."
"I don't know anybody like her."
"I do."
"She's impossible to play. I don't even understand her."
"I understand everything about her."
"Then you play her."
"No, you play her, Hester."
"I wouldn't know where to begin. Besides, why should I? Your last play was a flop."
"So was yours."
"That was before Lincoln Center."
"It was still a flop."
"I got rave notices."
"The critics hated the play."
"That doesn't mean it was bad."
"It closed, didn't it?"
"That wasn't my fault."
"Of course not, Hester. In New York, it's never the actor's fault."
"You're talking like a writer."
"What should I talk like?"
"You're being defensive and hostile…"
"But honest."
"Besides, the critics loved me."
"The hell with the critics."
"Oh, sure, the hell with them, I agree. But they loved me. Did you see the play?"
"Yes."
"Didn't you love me?"
"I loved you."
"You're lying."
"No, I'm being honest."
"Whenever I meet anybody who claims he's honest, I run and hide the family jewels. You just want me in your play, that's all."
"Is that all?"
"What else?"
"You're right, Hester."
"What?"
"About what else I want."
I'm always right about what men want."
"I'd like to…"
"Stop working so hard," she said. She looked at him steadily. "You turned me on at least ten minutes ago."
… knew then I wanted to be an actress, and that nothing else would ever satisfy me, no wait here, I want to check. I have a woman sleeping in, you know, I think it's all right, yes, her door is closed. I put a television set in her room, one of those little GE's, do you know them? If she's awake I can hear the set going. I'll put the light on when we get upstairs, watch the flowerpot on the bottom step. Do you really like my legs, you never did say you liked them, you know. My bedroom is at the other end of the hall, there's a little wrought iron balcony that overlooks the backyard, there are dozens of daffodils in bloom in the spring, I go out every morning to say hello to them. I put them in myself last year, the bulbs. A boy dying of leukemia sent them to me, he wrote the nicest letter. His parents had taken him to see me downtown, knowing he was going to die and all, they own a seed order business upstate. He sent me the daffodil bulbs later, with his marvelous letter telling me what a dazzling actress he thought I was, and how beautiful, do you think I'm beautiful? I planted them myself last fall. I bought one of those tools, it's a hollow circle you press into the earth, it makes the hole just the right depth, and I planted them all one afternoon, there were four dozen of them. They came in a specially protected bag, you should see them now, they're gorgeous. I go out to look at them each morning in the spring, and I feel the world is coming alive, even though that poor lovely little boy is probably dead by now, leukemia, what a terrible thing. I wrote him a nice thank-you note, I hope he died happy, give me your hand, it's this way.
I don't want to put the light on, do you mind? Let's just sit here by the window. I bought this loveseat in London at the Portobello market, do you like it, it's red velvet, you can't see the color in the dark, I know, but it's the most brilliant red, and really in excellent condition. It's a genuine antique, you know, the man gave me papers for it and everything, sit here, are you comfortable? I sometimes sit here by the window and look out at the city and try to superimpose London on it, those marvelous little slate roofs, and the chimney pots, and the London sounds. I try to transport them here. I knew a very wonderful man in London, he was a correspondent for the B.B.C., they came to interview the cast one day. This was two summers ago, the weather was so marvelously sunny and bright, so rare for London, so rare. I was there with The Alchemist, which was like carrying coals to Newcastle, I suppose, but they seemed to love it. The critics said I was radiant, I adore the English, don't you adore the English? He had a mustache, this man in London, a big bristling cavalry mustache, and very blue English eyes, and that florid complexion all Englishmen seem to have, that fine aquiline nose, very much like your nose, Arthur, your're not English, are you? We had tea at the Stafford, and I told him all about myself, I am Hester Miers, I said, I've been acting since the time I was sixteen and won a high school contest sponsored by KJR in Seattle, well not quite all about myself, I've never told anyone everything about myself, do you mind the dark? I love to make the room dark. When the drapes are closed, the blackness, try to see my eyes in the dark, Arthur. Put your face very close to mine, can you see my eyes? Kiss me.
In Clovelly, you can walk miles down to the sea, a cobbled path goes down the side of the cliff, it's teeming with Englishmen on holiday.
He took me there one weekend and bought me a dish of ice cream from an old man in one of the shops, Bed and Breakfast the signs all say. He got stung by a bee while we lay in the grass on the side of the hill, the weather still so beautifully mild and bright, we lay in the high grass, and the bee flew into his open collar and stung him on the back of his neck. Oh, you should have seen him fuss, the big baby, ranting and shouting, you'd think he was about to die, I couldn't stop laughing, Arthur, it was so funny. On the way to Dorset, we drove up Porlock Hill, do you know what heather looks like? The hill was covered with heather, and sheep grazing, and we got out of the car and looked out over the sea, with the wind howling, I hugged my sweater around me. I was wearing a blue cashmere I'd bought in Birmingham in the Ring, have you ever been there, it's a science-fiction city, you must touch me, Arthur. George Bernard Shaw had one of his plays done there for the first time, at the Birmingham Rep, that was before the bombings, touch me everywhere.
Is it really a good part, Arthur? I read a play nowadays, and I can't tell anymore, it used to be so easy. When I was hungry, every part was a good part, and I wanted them all, I wanted to play every woman ever invented. And now I can't tell anymore, do you know how old I am? I'm twenty-five years old, did I tell you that? How old is Carol supposed to be, she's younger than that, isn't she? Are you really sure you want me to take the part? Arthur, I hope you don't think, Oh God, you're so warm, I hope you don't think there's a connection, I hope you haven't got it in your mind that this has anything to do with whether I play the part or not, because it doesn't. It Wouldn't matter, it doesn't matter, oooh, what are you doing, I love it, there's no connection between this and the play, don't you see, this is something else. She's so young, how could I play a girl so young, is she supposed to be a virgin? He said I had no breasts, in Ohio this was, do you like my breasts? I was playing summer stock there, I was only seventeen. The moment he said it my nipples began to show through my sweater, and he knew, oh boy did he know, he was a very wise old bastard, he knew from the first day the summer began. He made love to me on the floor of the theater, upstairs where we used to paint the flats, we could hear them rehearsing down below, they were doing Winterset, the girl playing Mariamne was having trouble with her lines, she kept repeating them over and over again while he made love to me, oh God I was so excited, I was only a girl, Arthur, I was only seventeen, I really don't know about this play of yours or the confused girl in it, it's driving me crazy, I mean it, she is really a very confused person. Oh, I admit it would be a challenge, don't misunderstand me, the smell of the paint and Mariamne's lines, And I came back because I must see you again. And we danced together and my heart hurt me, I learned the part that afternoon, what a long afternoon, but I can't remember his name, isn't that funny? I'd just hate to accept your play and then disappoint you, I couldn't bear that, Arthur, disappointing anyone. I can't bear failing anyone. If I thought my note to that poor lovely boy, do I excite you, that poor lovely boy with leukemia, do I excite you very much, had failed him, well I just couldn't bear the thought, give me your cock. You have a big beautiful cock.