Misalliance(错姻缘)

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Misalliance

by George Bernard Shaw

Misalliance

Johnny Tarleton, an ordinary young business man of thirty or less, is

taking his weekly Friday to Tuesday in the house of his father, John

Tarleton, who has made a great deal of money out of Tarleton's Underwear.

The house is in Surrey, on the slope of Hindhead; and Johnny, reclining,

novel in hand, in a swinging chair with a little awning above it, is

enshrined in a spacious half hemisphere of glass which forms a pavilion

commanding the garden, and, beyond it, a barren but lovely landscape of

hill profile with fir trees, commons of bracken and gorse, and wonderful

cloud pictures._

_The glass pavilion springs from a bridgelike arch in the wall of the

house, through which one comes into a big hall with tiled flooring, which

suggests that the proprietor's notion of domestic luxury is founded on the

lounges of week-end hotels. The arch is not quite in the centre of the

wall. There is more wall to its right than to its left, and this space is

occupied by a hat rack and umbrella stand in which tennis rackets, white

parasols, caps, Panama hats, and other summery articles are bestowed.

Just through the arch at this corner stands a new portable Turkish bath,

recently unpacked, with its crate beside it, and on the crate the drawn nails

and the hammer used in unpacking. Near the crate are open boxes of

garden games: bowls and croquet. Nearly in the middle of the glass

wall of the pavilion is a door giving on the garden, with a couple of steps

to surmount the hot-water pipes which skirt the glass. At intervals round

the pavilion are marble pillars with specimens of Viennese pottery on them,

very flamboyant in colour and florid in design. Between them are folded

garden chairs flung anyhow against the pipes. In the side walls are two

doors: one near the hat stand, leading to the interior of the house, the

other on the opposite side and at the other end, leading to the vestibule._

_There is no solid furniture except a sideboard which stands against

the wall between the vestibule door and the pavilion, a small writing table

with a blotter, a rack for telegram forms and stationery, and a wastepaper

basket, standing out in the hall near the sideboard, and a lady's worktable,

with two chairs at it, towards the other side of the lounge. The writing

table has also two chairs at it. On the sideboard there is a tantalus,

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liqueur bottles, a syphon, a glass jug of lemonade, tumblers, and every

convenience for casual drinking. Also a plate of sponge cakes, and a

highly ornate punchbowl in the same style as the keramic display in the

pavilion. Wicker chairs and little bamboo tables with ash trays and boxes

of matches on them are scattered in all directions. In the pavilion, which

is flooded with sunshine, is the elaborate patent swing seat and awning in

which Johnny reclines with his novel. There are two wicker chairs right

and left of him._

_Bentley Summerhays, one of those smallish, thinskinned youths, who

from 17 to 70 retain unaltered the mental airs of the later and the physical

appearance of the earlier age, appears in the garden and comes through the

glass door into the pavilion. He is unmistakably a grade above Johnny

socially; and though he looks sensitive enough, his assurance and his high

voice are a little exasperating._

JOHNNY. Hallo! Wheres your luggage?

BENTLEY. I left it at the station. Ive walked up from Haslemere.

_[He goes to the hat stand and hangs up his hat]._

JOHNNY _[shortly]_ Oh! And who's to fetch it?

BENTLEY. Dont know. Dont care. Providence, probably. If not,

your mother will have it fetched.

JOHNNY. Not her business, exactly, is it?

BENTLEY. _[returning to the pavilion]_ Of course not. Thats

why one loves her for doing it. Look here: chuck away your silly

week-end novel, and talk to a chap. After a week in that filthy office my

brain is simply blue-mouldy. Lets argue about something intellectual.

_[He throws himself into the wicker chair on Johnny's right]._

JOHNNY. _[straightening up in the swing with a yell of protest]_

No. Now seriously, Bunny, Ive come down here to have a pleasant week-

end; and I'm not going to stand your confounded arguments. If you want

to argue, get out of this and go over to the Congregationalist minister's.

He's a nailer at arguing. He likes it.

BENTLEY. You cant argue with a person when his livelihood

depends on his not letting you convert him. And would you mind not

calling me Bunny. My name is Bentley Summerhays, which you please.

Misalliance

JOHNNY. Whats the matter with Bunny?

BENTLEY. It puts me in a false position. Have you ever

considered the fact that I was an afterthought?

JOHNNY. An afterthought? What do you mean by that?

BENTLEY. I--

JOHNNY. No, stop: I dont want to know. It's only a dodge to

start an argument.

BENTLEY. Dont be afraid: it wont overtax your brain. My father

was 44 when I was born. My mother was 41. There was twelve years

between me and the next eldest. I was unexpected. I was probably

unintentional. My brothers and sisters are not the least like me. Theyre

the regular thing that you always get in the first batch from young parents:

quite pleasant, ordinary, do-the-regular-thing sort: all body and no brains,

like you.

JOHNNY. Thank you.

BENTLEY. Dont mention it, old chap. Now I'm different. By the

time I was born, the old couple knew something. So I came out all brains

and no more body than is absolutely necessary. I am really a good deal

older than you, though you were born ten years sooner. Everybody feels

that when they hear us talk; consequently, though it's quite natural to hear

me calling you Johnny, it sounds ridiculous and unbecoming for you to

call me Bunny. _[He rises]._

JOHNNY. Does it, by George? You stop me doing it if you can:

thats all.

BENTLEY. If you go on doing it after Ive asked you not, youll feel

an awful swine. _[He strolls away carelessly to the sideboard with his

eye on the sponge cakes]._ At least I should; but I suppose youre not so

particular.

JOHNNY _[rising vengefully and following Bentley, who is forced to

turn and listen]_ I'll tell you what it is, my boy: you want a good

talking to; and I'm going to give it to you. If you think that because your

father's a K.C.B., and you want to marry my sister, you can make yourself

as nasty as you please and say what you like, youre mistaken. Let me tell

you that except Hypatia, not one person in this house is in favor of her

Misalliance

marrying you; and I dont believe shes happy about it herself. The match

isnt settled yet: dont forget that. Youre on trial in the office because the

Governor isnt giving his daughter money for an idle man to live on her.

Youre on trial here because my mother thinks a girl should know what a

man is like in the house before she marries him. Thats been going on for

two months now; and whats the result? Youve got yourself thoroughly

disliked in the office; and youre getting yourself thoroughly disliked here,

all through your bad manners and your conceit, and the damned

impudence you think clever.

BENTLEY. _[deeply wounded and trying hard to control himself]_

Thats enough, thank you. You dont suppose, I hope, that I should have

come down if I had known that that was how you felt about me. _[He

makes for the vestibule door]._

JOHNNY. _[collaring him]._ No: you dont run away. I'm going

to have this out with you. Sit down: d'y' hear? _[Bentley attempts to

go with dignity. Johnny slings him into a chair at the writing table,

where he sits, bitterly humiliated, but afraid to speak lest he should burst

into tears]._ Thats the advantage of having more body than brains, you

see: it enables me to teach you manners; and I'm going to do it too.

Youre a spoilt young pup; and you need a jolly good licking. And if

youre not careful youll get it: I'll see to that next time you call me a

swine.

BENTLEY. I didnt call you a swine. But _[bursting into a fury of

tears]_ you are a swine: youre a beast: youre a brute: youre a cad:

youre a liar: youre a bully: I should like to wring your damned neck

for you.

JOHNNY. _[with a derisive laugh]_ Try it, my son. _[Bentley

gives an inarticulate sob of rage]._ Fighting isnt in your line. Youre too

small and youre too childish. I always suspected that your cleverness

wouldnt come to very much when it was brought up against something

solid: some decent chap's fist, for instance.

BENTLEY. I hope your beastly fist may come up against a mad bull

or a prizefighter's nose, or something solider than me. I dont care about

your fist; but if everybody here dislikes me-- _[he is checked by a sob]._

Misalliance

Well, I dont care. _[Trying to recover himself]_ I'm sorry I intruded:

I didnt know. _[Breaking down again]_ Oh you beast! you pig!

Swine, swine, swine, swine, swine! Now!

JOHNNY. All right, my lad, all right. Sling your mud as hard as

you please: it wont stick to me. What I want to know is this. How is

it that your father, who I suppose is the strongest man England has

produced in our time--

BENTLEY. You got that out of your halfpenny paper. A lot you

know about him!

JOHNNY. I dont set up to be able to do anything but admire him and

appreciate him and be proud of him as an Englishman. If it wasnt for my

respect for him, I wouldnt have stood your cheek for two days, let alone

two months. But what I cant understand is why he didnt lick it out of

you when you were a kid. For twenty-five years he kept a place twice as

big as England in order: a place full of seditious coffee-colored heathens

and pestilential white agitators in the middle of a lot of savage tribes.

And yet he couldnt keep you in order. I dont set up to be half the man

your father undoubtedly is; but, by George, it's lucky for you you were not

my son. I dont hold with my own father's views about corporal

punishment being wrong. It's necessary for some people; and I'd have

tried it on you until you first learnt to howl and then to behave yourself.

BENTLEY. _[contemptuously]_ Yes: behavior wouldnt come

naturally to your son, would it?

JOHNNY. _[stung into sudden violence]_ Now you keep a civil

tongue in your head. I'll stand none of your snobbery. I'm just as proud

of Tarleton's Underwear as you are of your father's title and his K.C.B.,

and all the rest of it. My father began in a little hole of a shop in Leeds

no bigger than our pantry down the passage there. He--

BENTLEY. Oh yes: I know. Ive read it. "The Romance of

Business, or The Story of Tarleton's Underwear. Please Take One!" I

took one the day after I first met Hypatia. I went and bought half a dozen

unshrinkable vests for her sake.

JOHNNY. Well: did they shrink?

BENTLEY. Oh, dont be a fool.

Misalliance

JOHNNY. Never mind whether I'm a fool or not. Did they shrink?

Thats the point. Were they worth the money?

BENTLEY. I couldnt wear them: do you think my skin's as thick as

your customers' hides? I'd as soon have dressed myself in a nutmeg

grater.

JOHNNY. Pity your father didnt give your thin skin a jolly good

lacing with a cane--!

BENTLEY. Pity you havnt got more than one idea! If you want to

know, they did try that on me once, when I was a small kid. A silly

governess did it. I yelled fit to bring down the house and went into

convulsions and brain fever and that sort of thing for three weeks. So the

old girl got the sack; and serve her right! After that, I was let do what I

like. My father didnt want me to grow up a broken-spirited spaniel,

which is your idea of a man, I suppose.

JOHNNY. Jolly good thing for you that my father made you come

into the office and shew what you were made of. And it didnt come to

much: let me tell you that. When the Governor asked me where I

thought we ought to put you, I said, "Make him the Office Boy." The

Governor said you were too green. And so you were.

BENTLEY. I daresay. So would you be pretty green if you were

shoved into my father's set. I picked up your silly business in a fortnight.

Youve been at it ten years; and you havnt picked it up yet.

JOHNNY. Dont talk rot, child. You know you simply make me pity

you.

BENTLEY. "Romance of Business" indeed! The real romance of

Tarleton's business is the story that you understand anything about it.

You never could explain any mortal thing about it to me when I asked you.

"See what was done the last time": that was the beginning and the end of

your wisdom. Youre nothing but a turnspit.

JOHNNY. A what!

BENTLEY. A turnspit. If your father hadnt made a roasting jack

for you to turn, youd be earning twenty-four shillings a week behind a

counter.

JOHNNY. If you dont take that back and apologize for your bad

Misalliance

manners, I'll give you as good a hiding as ever--

BENTLEY. Help! Johnny's beating me! Oh! Murder! _[He

throws himself on the ground, uttering piercing yells]._

JOHNNY. Dont be a fool. Stop that noise, will you. I'm not going

to touch you. Sh--sh--

_Hypatia rushes in through the inner door, followed by Mrs Tarleton,

and throws herself on her knees by Bentley. Mrs Tarleton, whose knees

are stiffer, bends over him and tries to lift him. Mrs Tarleton is a shrewd

and motherly old lady who has been pretty in her time, and is still very

pleasant and likeable and unaffected. Hypatia is a typical English girl of

a sort never called typical: that is, she has an opaque white skin, black

hair, large dark eyes with black brows and lashes, curved lips, swift

glances and movements that flash out of a waiting stillness, boundless

energy and audacity held in leash._

HYPATIA. _[pouncing on Bentley with no very gentle hand]_

Bentley: whats the matter? Dont cry like that: whats the use? Whats

happened?

MRS TARLETON. Are you ill, child? _[They get him up. There,

there, pet! It's all right: dont cry _[they put him into a chair]_: there!

there! there! Johnny will go for the doctor; and he'll give you something

nice to make it well.

HYPATIA. What has happened, Johnny?

MRS TARLETON. Was it a wasp?

BENTLEY. _[impatiently]_ Wasp be dashed!

MRS TARLETON. Oh Bunny! that was a naughty word.

BENTLEY. Yes, I know: I beg your pardon. _[He rises, and

extricates himself from them]_ Thats all right. Johnny frightened me.

You know how easy it is to hurt me; and I'm too small to defend myself

against Johnny.

MRS TARLETON. Johnny: how often have I told you that you

must not bully the little ones. I thought youd outgrown all that.

HYPATIA. _[angrily]_ I do declare, mamma, that Johnny's

brutality makes it impossible to live in the house with him.

JOHNNY. _[deeply hurt]_ It's twenty-seven years, mother, since

Misalliance

you had that row with me for licking Robert and giving Hypatia a black

eye because she bit me. I promised you then that I'd never raise my hand

to one of them again; and Ive never broken my word. And now because

this young whelp begins to cry out before he's hurt, you treat me as if I

were a brute and a savage.

MRS TARLETON. No dear, not a savage; but you know you must

not call our visitor naughty names.

BENTLEY. Oh, let him alone--

JOHNNY. _[fiercely]_ Dont you interfere between my mother and

me: d'y' hear?

HYPATIA. Johnny's lost his temper, mother. We'd better go.

Come, Bentley.

MRS TARLETON. Yes: that will be best. _[To Bentley]_

Johnny doesnt mean any harm, dear: he'll be himself presently. Come.

_The two ladies go out through the inner door with Bentley, who turns

at the door to grin at Johnny as he goes out._

_Johnny, left alone, clenches his fists and grinds his teeth, but can find

no relief in that way for his rage. After choking and stamping for a

moment, he makes for the vestibule door. It opens before he reaches it;

and Lord Summerhays comes in. Johnny glares at him, speechless.

Lord Summerhays takes in the situation, and quickly takes the punchbowl

from the sideboard and offers it to Johnny._

LORD SUMMERHAYS. Smash it. Dont hesitate: it's an ugly

thing. Smash it: hard. _[Johnny, with a stifled yell, dashes it in pieces,

and then sits down and mops his brow]._ Feel better now? _[Johnny

nods]._ I know only one person alive who could drive me to the point of

having either to break china or commit murder; and that person is my son

Bentley. Was it he? _[Johnny nods again, not yet able to speak]._ As

the car stopped I heard a yell which is only too familiar to me. It

generally means that some infuriated person is trying to thrash Bentley.

Nobody has ever succeeded, though almost everybody has tried. _[He

seats himself comfortably close to the writing table, and sets to work to

collect the fragments of the punchbowl in the wastepaper basket whilst

Johnny, with diminishing difficulty, collects himself]._ Bentley is a

Misalliance

problem which I confess I have never been able to solve. He was born to

be a great success at the age of fifty. Most Englishmen of his class seem to

be born to be great successes at the age of twenty-four at most. The

domestic problem for me is how to endure Bentley until he is fifty. The

problem for the nation is how to get itself governed by men whose growth

is arrested when they are little more than college lads. Bentley doesnt

really mean to be offensive. You can always make him cry by telling him

you dont like him. Only, he cries so loud that the experiment should be

made in the open air: in the middle of Salisbury Plain if possible. He

has a hard and penetrating intellect and a remarkable power of looking

facts in the face; but unfortunately, being very young, he has no idea of

how very little of that sort of thing most of us can stand. On the other

hand, he is frightfully sensitive and even affectionate; so that he probably

gets as much as he gives in the way of hurt feelings. Youll excuse me

rambling on like this about my son.

JOHNNY. _[who has pulled himself together]_ You did it on

purpose. I wasnt quite myself: I needed a moment to pull round: thank

you.

LORD SUMMERHAYS. Not at all. Is your father at home?

JOHNNY. No: he's opening one of his free libraries. Thats

another nice little penny gone. He's mad on reading. He promised

another free library last week. It's ruinous. Itll hit you as well as me

when Bunny marries Hypatia. When all Hypatia's money is thrown away

on libraries, where will Bunny come in? Cant you stop him?

LORD SUMMERHAYS. I'm afraid not. Hes a perfect whirlwind.

Indefatigable at public work. Wonderful man, I think.

JOHNNY. Oh, public work! He does too much of it. It's really a

sort of laziness, getting away from your own serious business to amuse

yourself with other people's. Mind: I dont say there isnt another side to

it. It has its value as an advertisement. It makes useful acquaintances

and leads to valuable business connections. But it takes his mind off the

main chance; and he overdoes it.

LORD SUMMERHAYS. The danger of public business is that it

never ends. A man may kill himself at it.

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Misalliance1MisalliancebyGeorgeBernardShawMisalliance2JohnnyTarleton,anordinaryyoungbusinessmanofthirtyorless,istakinghisweeklyFridaytoTuesdayinthehouseofhisfather,JohnTarleton,whohasmadeagreatdealofmoneyoutofTarleton'sUnderwear.ThehouseisinSurrey,ontheslopeofHindhead;andJohnny,reclining,novelinhand...

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