HAMM:

This is slow work.

(Pause.)

Is it not time for my pain-killer?

CLOV:

No.

(Pause.)

I'll leave you, I have things to do.

HAMM:

In your kitchen?

CLOV:

Yes.

HAMM:

What, I'd like to know.

CLOV:

I look at the wall.

HAMM:

The wall! And what do you see on your wall? Mene, mene? Naked bodies?

CLOV:

I see my light dying.

HAMM:

Your light dying! Listen to that! Well, it can die just as well here, your light. Take a look at me and then come back and tell me what you think of your light.

(Pause.)

CLOV:

You shouldn't speak to me like that.

(Pause.)

HAMM (coldly):

Forgive me.

(Pause. Louder.)

I said, Forgive me.

CLOV:

I heard you.

(The lid of Nagg's bin lifts. His hands appear, gripping the rim. Then his head emerges. In his mouth the biscuit. He listens.)

 

NAGG:

Let me tell it again.

(Raconteur's voice.)

An Englishman, needing a pair of striped trousers in a hurry for the New Year festivities, goes to his tailor who takes his measurements.

(Tailor's voice.)

"That's the lot, come back in four days, I'll have it ready." Good. Four days later.

(Tailor's voice.)

"So sorry, come back in a week, I've made a mess of the seat." Good, that's all right, a neat seat can be very ticklish. A week later.

(Tailor's voice.)

"Frightfully sorry, come back in ten days, I've made a hash of the crotch." Good, can't be helped, a snug crotch is always a teaser. Ten days later.

(Tailor's voice.)

"Dreadfully sorry, come back in a fortnight, I've made a balls of the fly." Good, at a pinch, a smart fly is a stiff proposition.

(Pause. Normal voice.)

I never told it worse.

(Pause. Gloomy.)

I tell this story worse and worse.

(Pause. Raconteur's voice.)

Well, to make it short, the bluebells are blowing and he ballockses the buttonholes.

(Customer's voice.)

"God damn you to hell, Sir, no, it's indecent, there are limits! In six days, do you hear me, six days, God made the world. Yes Sir, no less Sir, the WORLD! And you are not bloody well capable of making me a pair of trousers in three months!"

(Tailor's voice, scandalized.)

"But my dear Sir, my dear Sir, look---

(disdainful gesture, disgustedly)

---at the world---

(Pause.)

and look---

(loving gesture, proudly)

---at my TROUSERS!"

(Pause. He looks at Nell who has remained impassive, her eyes unseeing. He breaks into a high forced laugh, cuts it short, pokes his head towards Nell, launches his laugh again.)

HAMM:

Silence!

(Nagg starts, cuts short his laugh.)

 

HAMM:

In my house.

(Pause. With prophetic relish.)

One day you'll be blind like me. You'll be sitting here, a speck in the void, in the dark, forever, like me.

(Pause.)

One day you'll say to yourself, I'm tired, I'll sit down, and you'll go and sit down. Then you'll say, I'm hungry, I'll get up and get something to eat. But you won't get up. You'll say, I shouldn't have sat down, but since I have I'll sit on a little longer, then I'll get up and get something to eat. But you won't get up and you won't get anything to eat.

(Pause.)

You'll look at the wall a while, then you'll say, I'll close my eyes, perhaps have a little sleep, after that I'll feel better, and you'll close them. And when you open them again there'll be no wall any more.

(Pause.)

Infinite emptiness will be all around you, all the resurrected dead of all the ages wouldn't fill it, and there you'll be like a little bit of grit in the middle of the steppe.

(Pause.)

Yes, one day you'll know what it is, you'll be like me, except that you won't have anyone with you, because you won't have had pity on anyone and because there won't be anyone left to have pity on you.

(Pause.)

CLOV:

It's not certain.

(Pause.)

And there's one thing you forgot.

HAMM:

Ah?

CLOV:

I can't sit down.

 

HAMM: But what in God's name do you imagine? That the earth will awake in the spring? That the rivers and seas will run with fish again? That there's manna in heaven still for imbeciles like you?

(Pause.)

Gradually I cooled down, sufficiently at least to ask him how long he had taken on the way. Three whole days. Good. In what condition he had left the child. Deep in sleep.

(Forcibly.)

But deep in what sleep, deep in what sleep already?

(Pause.)

Well to make it short I finally offered to take him into my service. He had touched a chord. And then I imagined already that I wasn't much longer for this world.

(He laughs. Pause.)

Well?

(Pause.)

Well? Here if you were careful you might die a nice natural death, in peace and comfort.

(Pause.)

Well?

(Pause.)

In the end he asked me would I consent to take in the child as well---if he were still alive.

(Pause.)

It was the moment I was waiting for.

(Pause.)

Would I consent to take in the child...

(Pause.)

I can see him still, down on his knees, his hands flat on the ground, glaring at me with his mad eyes, in defiance of my wishes.

(Pause. Normal tone.)

I'll soon have finished with this story.

(Pause.)

Unless I bring in other characters.

(Pause.)

But where would I find them?

(Pause.)

Where would I look for them?

(Pause. He whistles. Enter Clov.)

Let us pray to God.

 

HAMM:

You'll finish him later. Let us pray to God.

CLOV:

Again!

NAGG:

Me sugar-plum!

HAMM:

God first!

(Pause.)

Are you right?

CLOV (resigned):

Off we go.

HAMM (to Nagg):

And you?

NAGG (clasping his hands, closing his eyes, in a gabble):

Our Father which art---

HAMM:

Silence! In silence! Where are your manners?

(Pause.)

Off we go.

(Attitudes of prayer. Silence. Abandoning his attitude, discouraged.)

Well?

CLOV (abandoning his attitude):

What a hope! And you?

HAMM:

Sweet damn all!

(To Nagg.)

And you?

NAGG:

Wait!

(Pause. Abandoning his attitude.)

Nothing doing!

HAMM:

The bastard!! He doesn't exist.

CLOV:

Not yet.

NAGG:

Me sugar-plum!

HAMM:

There are no more sugar plums!

(Pause.)

NAGG:

It's natural. After all I'm your father. It's true if it hadn't been me it would have been someone else. But that's no excuse.

(Pause.)

Turkish Delight, for example, which no longer exists, we all know that, there is nothing in the world I love more. And one day I'll ask you for some, in return for a kindness, and you'll promise it to me. One must live with the times.

(Pause.)

Whom did you call when you were a tiny boy, and were frightened, in the dark? Your mother? No. Me. We let you cry. Then we moved you out of earshot, so that we might sleep in peace.

(Pause.)

I was asleep, as happy as a king, and you woke me up to have me listen to you. It wasn't indispensable, you didn't really need to have me listen to you.

(Pause.)

I hope the day will come when you'll really need to have me listen to you, and need to hear my voice, any voice.

(Pause.)

Yes, I hope I'll live till then, to hear you calling me like when you were a tiny boy, and were frightened, in the dark, and I was your only hope.

(Pause. Nagg knocks on lid of Nell's bin. Pause.)

Nell!

(Pause. He knocks louder. Pause. Louder.)

Nell!

(Pause. Nagg sinks back into his bin, closes the lid behind him. Pause.)

HAMM:

Our revels now are ended.

(He gropes for the dog.)

The dog's gone.

CLOV:

He's not a real dog, he can't go.

HAMM (groping):

He's not there.

CLOV:

He's lain down.

HAMM:

Give him up to me.

(Clov picks up the dog and gives it to Hamm. Hamm holds it in his arms. Pause. Hamm throws away the dog.)

Dirty brute!

(Clov begins to pick up the objects lying on the ground.)

What are you doing?

CLOV:

Putting things in order.

(He straightens up. Fervently.)

I'm going to clear everything away!

(He starts picking up again.)

HAMM:

Order!

CLOV (straightening up):

I love order. It's my dream. A world where all would be silent and still and each thing in its last place, under the last dust.

(He starts picking up again.)

HAMM (exasperated):

What in God's name do you think you're doing?

CLOV (straightening up):

I'm doing my best to create a little order.

HAMM:

Drop it!

(Clov drops the objects he has picked up)