Chapter II: Front Matter (2)

ASENATH: (leaning forward, speaking low) Shall I tell you a thing? Why do you think Peter Roscorla is so hungry for the child to come that’s coming, and why has he been wild for joy ever since he had the hope of him, and why does he fear every minute of the day that his wife isn’t cared for as she should be? Is it love for his wife, do you think? Is it just and only because he wants a son of his own? O, he loves his wife, and he’s hungering for a son of his own; but it’s to spite his brother as well, it’s for fear his brother should come to take his place here after he’s dead; it’s because his brother shan’t inherit Roscorla.

SISTER A.: Has his brother ever done him any harm?

ASENATH: Gregory never did any man harm; but the Roscorla blood’s in Peter. Do you know what they say in these parts? “To hate like a Roscorla.” Peter will have an evil child.

SISTER A.: And she, why is it she is so afraid of being a mother?

ASENATH: (as before, leaning forward and speaking low) Do you know how Peter Roscorla that was, died? No one knows how he died; his sons don’t know how he died; I tended him, weeks and weeks, and he cried on God and the saints when he saw hell-fire coming near him; there was the smoke of it in his eyes, and he fell a-whimpering at the last, and he cursed the father that had begotten him. The child that’s going to be born will curse his father.

SISTER A.: Do you mean that they are all—?

ASENATH: An evil race, bad sons, and bad fathers; evil in the blood. They come and they go with the wind, and it’s the birth that’s the greater evil.

SISTER A.: And she, does she know?

ASENATH: (keenly) Ay, she knows now.

SISTER A.: Didn’t she know when she married him?

ASENATH: What does a young girl know? A little and sweet thing, like a young child, that I could take in my arms. But she knows now, (meaningly).

SISTER A.: She should never have known.

ASENATH: (fiercely) It was right for her to know; what I told her I told her for her good.

SISTER A.: (rising, in agitation) You? Do you mean that _you_ told her?

(The door at the side opens and PETER ROSCORLA enters. He is in
riding gaiters, spotted with mud; he carries a whip which he lays
down gently on a table near the door. He moves with clumsy care,
glancing at the bedroom door, as if afraid of disturbing his
wife).

ROSCORLA: (going over to SISTER AGATHA and speaking rapidly and harshly) Why are you not with her? Has the doctor called?

SISTER A.: (standing stiffly) Sister Katherine is taking her turn to watch beside her; she was asleep when I left her. The doctor has not called.

ROSCORLA: (taking out his watch and putting it back without looking at it) I went for him, but he wasn’t there. When do you think he will come? (Takes out watch again and looks at it.) You say she’s asleep. Has she been quite quiet? said nothing? not wanted anything?

SISTER A.: She cried a little, but very quietly. She has said nothing.

ROSCORLA: (makes a few steps, then turns—anxiously) When do you think he will come?

SISTER A.: The doctor promised to be here soon after five.

ROSCORLA: (looking at his watch and speaking slowly) Five minutes to five. (He controls himself with an effort.) (appealingly) I suppose I mayn’t go in?

(SISTER AGATHA shakes her head firmly, she sits down in her
former seat, and turns to the fire. ROSCORLA moves away and seats
himself heavily in the oak armchair at the upper end of the long
table. ASENATH has not taken her eyes off his face. He looks at
her abruptly).

What are you staring at me for, like an old raven?

ASENATH: Mayn’t old Asenath look at you, Master Peter? It’s three generations of the Roscorlas that she’s seen born. There was Peter Roscorla, your father, there was you, Master Peter, there was Master Gregory—

ROSCORLA: (his face convulsed with rage) Gregory!

(He is about to bring down his fist on the table when he stops,
glancing aside at the closed door. ASENATH gets up and comes over
to him slowly).

ASENATH: (shaking her head) No birth here comes to good. There’s a wind at sea, Master Peter, there’s a wind coming in from the sea; the wind’s bringing trouble, it’s bringing trouble to the Roscorlas; mark my words, it’s an evil night, Master Peter, it’s an evil night to be born on.

ROSCORLA: (angrily, looking up at her with an ugly sneer) You’re the witch on the hearth, Asenath; you always bode ill-luck. But you’re wrong; it’s an ill wind, Asenath, but it’s bringing good luck to me.

ASENATH: (shaking her head) No birth here comes to good, Master Peter. Do you know what you’re going to give to the child that’s to be born?

(He stares at her with a puzzled look).

The legacy of the Roscorlas.

(As she speaks the door at the side opens and DR. TREVITHICK
enters. He comes up to the table. ROSCORLA rises eagerly).

ROSCORLA: I am so glad you have come. And you will stay?

DR. T.: I have to see an old man in the village. But I can attend to that later. There is no change, Sister Agatha?

SISTER A.: (rising and coming forward) There is no change, doctor. She was asleep a little while ago. Shall I see if she is awake?

DR. T.: If you please.

(SISTER AGATHA opens the bedroom door quietly, and goes in. Part
of the bed is seen as she opens the door).

(The Doctor turns to ROSCORLA, looking at him keenly).

Have you done exactly as I told you?

ROSCORLA: (meekly) Yes, doctor.

DR. T.: You have left her quite alone; not disturbed her in way? not let her know that you have any anxiety?

ROSCORLA: I have left her quite alone.

(SISTER AGATHA opens the bedroom door, and beckons to the doctor,
who goes in. The stage has gradually darkened: ASENATH gets up
and lights several candles, which give a dim light.

ROSCORLA walks up and down uneasily; suddenly he stops in front
of ASENATH, who is in the act of lighting a candle).

What do you mean by what you said just now?

ASENATH: (hypocritically) What was it I was saying just now, Master Peter?

(She goes back to the fireside. He follows her).

ROSCORLA: The legacy of the Roscorlas. What did you mean?

ASENATH: It was only a word that I said, Master, and there was no great meaning in it. Birth and death I’ve seen the coming and going of them for three generations. (Looking up at him and putting her hand on his sleeve.) Are you not fearing this birth that’s going to be?

ROSCORLA: (excitedly) Asenath, when I come in here holding my son in my arms——

ASENATH: Your son, Master Peter?

ROSCORLA: It must be a son. Hasn’t the first-born here always been a son, Asenath?

ASENATH: Very true, Master; the first-born of the Roscorlas has always been a son; yes, it’ll be a son, Master Peter, and the blood of the Roscorlas will be in him....

ROSCORLA: (triumphantly) Didn’t I tell you? The legacy of the Roscorlas! Is that what you meant? It’s old blood, good Cornish blood, the blood of gentlemen.

ASENATH: Ay, ay, old and gentle; do you know what goes to the seasoning of old blood among gentle-folk?

(The bedroom door opens, and the doctor comes out with a very
anxious look on his face. He looks scrutinisingly at ROSCORLA
before speaking to him. ASENATH looks suspiciously at the doctor,
and mutters, shaking her head).

ASENATH: It’s not the doctor that’s wanted, but the power of God!

(ASENATH goes out by the door on the right).

ROSCORLA: Well, doctor?

(A pause).

DR. T.: (sitting down at the side of the table and leaning his arms upon it) I must not hide from you that the case is grave.

ROSCORLA: She is worse! She is not dying?

DR. T.: She is not dying. But she is not out of danger.

ROSCORLA: Only—you are going to save her!

DR. T.: I hope so, I think so. But, something may have to be done, as I feared. There are times when it is doubtful if we or Nature are the best physicians. Nature generally knows better than we do, but she is not always to be trusted to do what we want.

ROSCORLA: Something will have to be done!

DR. T.: _May_ have to be done. Do you mind if I ask you a few questions?

ROSCORLA: I will answer anything you ask me.

DR. T.: Do you know I sometimes wish we physicians had the power that our rival, the priest, has; the power of getting at the truth, the real, inner truth of our patients. The body is so often little more than the slave of the mind. And yet all we can say is: “Do you feel a pain here, a pain there?” the mere ache of the body. We dare not pry into the soul.

ROSCORLA: What do you mean?

DR T.: If I were a priest, I would ask your wife to come to me for confession.

ROSCORLA: (proudly) My wife has nothing to confess.

DR. T.: Do not misunderstand me. Something has been preying on her mind; the mind has helped to take its own revenge upon the body; some shock, some brooding trouble; do you know of any?

ROSCORLA: (shaking his head blankly) No.

DR. T.: Something to account for what is certainly the fact: that she has a morbid horror of giving birth to a child.

ROSCORLA: Nothing possible in the world.

DR. T.: How long is it since she became melancholy, silent, brooding? Since she has expected the child?

ROSCORLA: She was filled with joy! Oh, it is not that. Something has changed her, but not that, about five months ago. I don’t know what it was. There was no reason. There could have been no reason.

DR. T.: And since then?

ROSCORLA: (bitterly) She has been different, she has seemed as if she were afraid of something; afraid of me! But it’s nerves, surely it’s nothing but nerves? It’s wild here in the Winter, the house is gloomy, it’s too near the sea. She is rather afraid of the sea and the wind, but I’ll take her to London, I’ll do anything she likes. I’m very fond of Barbara! All I want is one thing: my son. It _will_ be a son. It must be. It’s all I want in the world.

DR. T.: You want a son more than anything in the world?

(A pause).

Do you know I don’t always agree with people when they express that wish. There are some children who should never be born. (He looks at ROSCORLA keenly.)

ROSCORLA: (excitedly) My son must be born. If I don’t have a son, Gregory gets the land when I die.

DR. T.: Is that why you want a son so much, Roscorla?

ROSCORLA: (rising to his feet, in intense excitement, and leaning towards the doctor) Isn’t that reason enough? Gregory shall never be master here, not if I’m alive, not if I’m dead. _I_ keep him out now, and my son keeps him out when I’m gone.

DR. T.: What wrong has your brother done you?

ROSCORLA: (sitting down fiercely) Wrong? None! He exists.

DR. T.: Is that enough reason, in your family, for hating one another?

ROSCORLA: (jumping up in rage) Yes. (Sitting down again.) Don’t you know the saying: to hate like a Roscorla? It’s a true saying.

DR. T.: I know it’s a true saying. I was by your father’s bedside when he died.

ROSCORLA: They sent me away when he was dying. I was young then. I never heard much about it.

DR. T.: When I said to you just now that there were some children who should never be born——

ROSCORLA: Yes?

DR. T.: Do you know much about your family history, Roscorla?

ROSCORLA: I’ve got the pedigree; it’s in the drawer, yonder. I never went beyond it.

DR. T.: I don’t quite mean that. Your father, your grandfather, _his_ father: do you know much about them, about how they lived and died?

ROSCORLA: (with a laugh, which he tries to render careless) Now you’re talking to me like Asenath. What are these riddles, Doctor?

DR. T.: Asenath! What was she saying to you? She has been here since your grandfather’s time, hasn’t she?

ROSCORLA: Asenath is always saying she has seen three generations born, and the birth of a Roscorla brings trouble and talk of that kind. But you, Doctor, you are not going to tell me old wives’ tales? (Excitedly.) I want to know exactly what you mean.

DR. T.: What I mean is this, that, as you must be aware, there is a certain strain in your family, call it a strain of eccentricity, which is not exactly healthy; perhaps from an abstract point of view, not exactly desirable to perpetuate. Have you ever thought of the responsibility of bringing a child into the world? (Meaningly.) Has your wife ever thought of it?

ROSCORLA: (looking round at him in a dazed, awakening way) I begin to see what you mean. You mean (slowly) that we are all——(breaking off with a gasp of terror).

DR. T.: You see my point. You see the reason why I speak to you about it at this moment.

ROSCORLA: (haggard and dazed, shaking his head helplessly) No.... (His face slowly changes, and with a dull terror in his eyes he whispers.) Is it in me?

DR. T.: No, no, I don’t mean that at all. One generation may escape, often does. It is the next that suffers.

ROSCORLA: The next!

DR. T.: Now, I tell you frankly: I am not sure that I can save both your wife and your child. If the child lives the mother _may_ die. Will you risk her life on a possibility, on such a possibility? Will you, after what I have told you?

ROSCORLA: (sullenly) I don’t believe what you have told me. The family’s a good family. You and Asenath are only trying to frighten me. I must have my son. _And_ Barbara——(excitedly) Both!

DR. T.: I am not sure I can save them both.

ROSCORLA: Barbara has been a good wife to me. There was no woman for me till I married Barbara. I shouldn’t care much for life if she wasn’t there. But my son—he’s to live after me! If my son isn’t born Gregory’ll have the place. (Starting to his feet as if struck by a sudden thought.) Do you think _she_ knows anything about it? Is _that_ why she’s frightened of me?

DR. T.: I think it is possible she has guessed something.

ROSCORLA: (in wild excitement) She wants to rob me of my child! She wants my child not to be born! They all want my child not to be born! They are all in league against me! But, I’ll have my way. It’s the way of Nature! I have that on my side they can’t fight with. They’re fighting against God. (Dropping into his chair as if exhausted.) I must have my child.

(While he is speaking the door on the right opens, and ASENATH
steals in quietly and makes her way unobserved to her seat by the
fire. She listens to every word).

DR. T.: At whatever cost?

ROSCORLA: At whatever cost!

DR. T.: (rising and taking out his watch) I will return in half-an-hour. Mind, till then, quiet; above all, quiet.

(He goes out. ROSCORLA buries his face in his hands, and then
sits staring before him with his elbows on his knees. After a
pause).

ROSCORLA: What have you been saying to my wife, Asenath?

ASENATH: (as if she did not hear) Eh, master?

ROSCORLA: It is you that set her thinking on things there was no need to think on.

ASENATH: A young wife thinks her own thoughts; what should an old woman give her to think on? Maybe, it’s the wind she’s thinking on now, and the life that’s coming as the wind comes.

ROSCORLA: How did my father die, Asenath?

ASENATH: He died hard; he cursed his own father.

ROSCORLA: And my grandfather, Asenath?

ASENATH: They took him away; he didn’t die at Roscorla. The Roscorla blood was in him.

ROSCORLA: Does Barbara know all this, Asenath?

ASENATH: How should I know, master? It’s whispered, it’s not spoken.

ROSCORLA: (getting up and walking to and fro, and speaking half to himself and half to ASENATH) If it’s true—but it’s not true—it makes no difference. Do you understand, Asenath, it’s not true! Have you been telling these lies to my wife?

(ASENATH makes no reply, but gazes at him fixedly).

The Roscorla family is the best family in Cornwall. What have you been telling her?

(She remains silent).

She always believed everything you said to her. And she has been believing it; she hates to bear me a child because he’ll be a Roscorla. He shall, he shall be a Roscorla! I am going to speak to her, she must see, it must be proved to her! She doesn’t want my child to be born, Asenath. But he _must_ be born.

(In suppressed excitement he goes up to the bedroom door, opens
it and goes in).

ASENATH: What were they talking about? “Must have my child,” he said; “at any cost,” he said. Whose cost? Mistress Barbara’s. It’s the mother for the child, they mean. Is it? (she laughs) She shall know, she shall. She’s a brave woman; she will do justice on the Roscorlas.

(SISTER AGATHA opens the bedroom door and comes out, accompanied
by SISTER KATHERINE, who goes out by the door on the right. She
goes over to ASENATH).

SISTER A.: He sent us away. Will he be quite quiet? He was quiet, but he looked strange. He said he had to speak to her alone.

ASENATH: It’s lies that he has to tell her. But I am going to tell her the truth.

SISTER A.: Asenath, what is the truth? Is it something terrible? Why do you look at me like that?

ASENATH: Has she said nothing?

SISTER A.: She was listening, and she asked me if that was the wind, and I said yes, and she said “The wind from the sea. The wind of birth!” and then she said, “I don’t want to die, but it would be better if I were dead. I am bringing life.” And she turned her head over on the pillow, and lay quite still.

ASENATH: And that was all?

SISTER A.: No; I heard her say: “If I had only the courage!” I don’t know what she meant. And she said, as if she were speaking to herself, “It would be the right thing, wouldn’t it?”

ASENATH: She knows the right thing, and when she knows all she will do the right thing.

SISTER A.: Listen! He is speaking loud. O, he should not cry out to her like that! I must go back. She was so frightened, and she is lying there between life and death, as if she had to choose between them.

ASENATH: (rising) Child, let me go in to her. I can soothe her better than you can soothe her.

SISTER A.: If she could only sleep!

ASENATH: I will try to put her to sleep. But only if she chooses sleep.

(The bedroom door opens and ROSCORLA rushes out violently.
ASENATH slips into the room and closes the door behind her).

ROSCORLA: (beside himself—to SISTER AGATHA) I told her it was alright; I told her the child must be born; I was perfectly quiet; I said “Look at me!” I was as quiet as possible, but she wouldn’t hear; she shrank away from me; she said: “You, you I see it all; now I see it!” and that put me in a fury, and I don’t quite know what I said to her.

(A low wail is heard from the bedroom; they listen).

What was that?

SISTER A.: Asenath is trying to put her to sleep.

ROSCORLA: Why isn’t the doctor here?

SISTER A.: I think I hear him coming. Listen.

ROSCORLA: He is coming!

(He goes towards the door; the doctor comes in, greets him, and,
with a questioning lift of the eyebrows to SISTER AGATHA, goes
into the bedroom, followed by her. After a slight pause, the
doctor comes out, holding a phial in his hand. He says quietly):

DR T.: I have come too late. She is dead.

ROSCORLA: (with a cry, falling on his knees by the table) My God!

ASENATH: (appearing at the bedroom door) hush! I have put her to sleep. She chose sleep. There will be no more trouble to the Roscorlas for a time now.

THE CURTAIN FALLS.

THE READER CRITIC

Letters from Ezra Pound

Chère Editeuse:

May I be permitted to leave the main part of the magazine, and reply in the correspondence columns to several other writers of letters?

A. R. S. Cher Monsieur: There is one section of our magazine devoted (DEEvoted) to “interpretation”; it is, if you have not divined it, The Reader Critic. It is, so far as I know, the only publication that ever has “interpreted” our native country. Never before has the intelligent foreigner been able to learn “what the American artist is up against.”