A View From the Bridge: A Play in Two Acts Read online

  CATHERINE: No! It’s the first I thought of it.

  BEATRICE, with a quiet sad laugh: Well you should have thought of it before ... but I’m not. We’ll be all right. Just give him to understand; you don’t have to fight, you’re just—You’re a woman, that’s all, and you got a nice boy, and now the time came when you said good-by. All right?

  CATHERINE, strangely moved at the prospect: All right.... If I can.

  BEATRICE: Honey ... you gotta.

  Catherine, sensing now an imperious demand, turns with some fear, with a discovery, to Beatrice. She is at the edge of tears, as though a familiar world had shattered.

  CATHERINE: Okay.

  Lights out on them and up on Alfieri, seated behind his desk.

  ALFIERI: It was at this time that he first came to me. I had represented his father in an accident case some years before, and I was acquainted with the family in a casual way. I remember him now as he walked through my doorway—

  Enter Eddie down right ramp.

  His eyes were like tunnels; my first thought was that

  he had committed a crime,

  Eddie sits beside the desk, cap in hand, looking

  out.

  but soon I saw it was only a passion that had moved

  into his body, like a stranger. Alfieri pauses, looks

  down at his desk, then to Eddie as though he were

  continuing a conversation with him. I don’t quite

  understand what I can do for you. Is there a question

  of law somewhere?

  EDDIE: That’s what I want to ask you.

  ALFIERI: Because there’s nothing illegal about a girl falling in love with an immigrant.

  EDDIE: Yeah, but what about it if the only reason for it is to get his papers?

  ALFIERI: First of all you don’t know that.

  EDDIE: I see it in his eyes; he’s laughin’ at her and he’s laughin’ at me.

  ALFIERI: Eddie, I’m a lawyer. I can only deal in what’s provable. You understand that, don’t you? Can you prove that?

  EDDIE: I know what’s in his mind, Mr. Alfieri!

  ALFIERI: Eddie, even if you could prove that—

  EDDIE: Listen ... will you listen to me a minute? My father always said you was a smart man. I want you to listen to me.

  ALFIERI: I’m only a lawyer, Eddie.

  EDDIE: Will you listen a minute? I’m talkin’ about the law. Lemme just bring out what I mean. A man, which he comes into the country illegal, don’t it stand to reason he’s gonna take every penny and put it in the sock? Because they don’t know from one day to another, right?

  ALFIERI: All right.

  EDDIE: He’s spendin’. Records he buys now. Shoes. Jackets. Y’understand me? This guy ain’t worried. This guy is here. So it must be that he’s got it all laid out in his mind already—he’s stayin’. Right?

  ALFIERI: Well? What about it?

  EDDIE: All right. He glances at Alfieri, then down to the floor. I’m talking to you confidential, ain’t I?

  ALFIERI: Certainly.

  EDDIE: I mean it don’t go no place but here. Because I don’t like to say this about anybody. Even my wife I didn’t exactly say this.

  ALFIERI: What is it?

  EDDIE takes a breath and glances briefly over each shoulder: The guy ain’t right, Mr. Alfieri.

  ALFIERI: What do you mean?

  EDDIE: I mean he ain’t right.

  ALFIERI: I don’t get you.

  EDDIE shifts to another position in the chair: Dja ever get a look at him?

  ALFIERI: Not that I know of, no.

  EDDIE: He’s a blond guy. Like ... platinum. You know what I mean?

  ALFIERI: No.

  EDDIE: I mean if you close the paper fast—you could blow him over.

  ALFIERI: Well that doesn’t mean—

  EDDIE: Wait a minute, I’m tellin’ you sump’m. He sings, see. Which is—I mean it’s all right, but sometimes he hits a note, see. I turn around. I mean—high. You know what I mean?

  ALFIERI: Well, that’s a tenor.

  EDDIE: I know a tenor, Mr. Alfieri. This ain’t no tenor. I mean if you came in the house and you didn’t know who was singin’, you wouldn,t be lookin’ for him you be lookin’ for her.

  ALFIERI: Yes, but that’s not—

  EDDIE: I’m tellin’ you sump’m, wait a minute. Please, Mr. Alfieri. I’m tryin’ to bring out my thoughts here. Couple of nights ago my niece brings out a dress which it’s too small for her, because she shot up like a light this last year. He takes the dress, lays it on the table, he cuts it up; one-two-three, he makes a new dress. I mean he looked so sweet there, like an angel—you could kiss him he was so sweet.

  ALFIERI: Now look, Eddie—

  EDDIE: Mr. Alfieri, they’re laughin’ at him on the piers. I’m ashamed. Paper Doll they call him. Blondie now. His brother thinks it’s because he’s got a sense of humor, see—which he’s got—but that ain’t what they’re laughin’. Which they’re not goin’ to come out with it because they know he’s my relative, which they have to see me if they make a crack, y’know? But I know what they’re laughin’ at, and when I think of that guy layin’ his hands on her I could—I mean it’s eatin’ me out, Mr. Alfieri, because I struggled for that girl. And now he comes in my house and—

  ALFIERI: Eddie, look—I have my own children. I understand you. But the law is very specific. The law does not ...

  EDDIE, with a fuller flow of indignation: You mean to tell me that there’s no law that a guy which he ain’t right can go to work and marry a girl and—?

  ALFIERI: You have no recourse in the law, Eddie.

  EDDIE: Yeah, but if he ain’t right, Mr. Alfieri, you mean to tell me—

  ALFIERI: There is nothing you can do, Eddie, believe me.

  EDDIE: Nothin’.

  ALFIERI: Nothing at all. There’s only one legal question here.

  EDDIE: What?

  ALFIERI: The manner in which they entered the country. But I don’t think you want to do anything about that, do you?

  EDDIE: You mean—?

  ALFIERI: Well, they entered illegally.

  EDDIE: Oh, Jesus, no, I wouldn’t do nothin’ about that, I mean—

  ALFIERI: All right, then, let me talk now, eh?

  EDDIE: Mr. Alfieri, I can’t believe what you tell me. I mean there must be some kinda law which—

  ALFIERI: Eddie, I want you to listen to me. Pause. You know, sometimes God mixes up the people. We all love somebody, the wife, the kids—every man’s got somebody that he loves, heh? But sometimes ... there’s too much. You know? There’s too much, and it goes where it mustn’t. A man works hard, he brings up a child, sometimes it’s a niece, sometimes even a daughter, and he never realizes it, but through the years—there is too much love for the daughter, there is too much love for the niece. Do you understand what I’m saying to you?

  EDDIE, sardonically: What do you mean, I shouldn’t look out for her good?

  ALFIERI: Yes, but these things have to end, Eddie, that’s all. The child has to grow up and go away, and the man has to learn to forget. Because after all, Eddie —what other way can it end? Pause. Let her go. That’s my advice. You did your job, now it’s her life; wish her luck, and let her go. Pause. Will you do that? Because there’s no law, Eddie; make up your mind to it; the law is not interested in this.

  EDDIE: You mean to tell me, even if he’s a punk? If he’s—

  ALFIERI: There’s nothing you can do.

  Eddie stands.

  EDDIE: Well, all right, thanks. Thanks very much.

  ALFIERI: What are you going to do?

  EDDIE, with a helpless but ironic gesture: What can I do? I’m a patsy, what can a patsy do? I worked like a dog twenty years so a. punk could have her, so that’s what I done. I mean, in the worst times, in the worst, when there wasn’t a ship comin’ in the harbor, I didn’t stand around lookin’ for relief—I hustled. When there was empty piers in Brooklyn I went to Hoboken, Staten Island, the Wes
t Side, Jersey, all over—because I made a promise. I took out of my own mouth to give to her. I took out of my wife’s mouth. I walked hungry plenty days in this city! It begins to break through. And now I gotta sit in my own house and look at a son-of-a-bitch punk like that—which he came out of nowhere! I give him my house to sleep! I take the blankets off my bed for him, and he takes and puts his dirty filthy hands on her like a goddam thief!

  ALFIERI, rising: But, Eddie, she’s a woman now.

  EDDIE: He’s stealing from me!

  ALFIERI: She wants to get married, Eddie. She can’t marry you, can she?

  EDDIE, furiously: What’re you talkin’ about, marry me! I don’t know what the hell you’re talkin’ about!

  Pause.

  ALFIERI: I gave you my advice, Eddie. That’s it.

  Eddie gathers himself. A pause.

  EDDIE: Well, thanks. Thanks very much. It just—it’s breakin’ my heart, y’know. I—

  ALFIERI: I understand. Put it out of your mind. Can you do that?

  EDDIE: I’m—He feels the threat of sobs, and with a helpless wave. I’ll see you around. He goes out up the right ramp.

  ALFIERI sits on desk: There are times when you want to spread an alarm, but nothing has happened. I knew, I knew then and there—I could have finished the whole story that afternoon. It wasn’t as though there was a mystery to unravel. I could see every step coming, step after step, like a dark figure walking down a hall toward a certain door. I knew where he was heading for, I knew where he was going to end. And I sat here many afternoons asking myself why, being an intelligent man, I was so powerless to stop it. I even went to a certain old lady in the neighborhood, a very wise old woman, and I told her, and she only nodded, and said, “Pray for him ...” And so I—waited here.

  As lights go out on Alfieri, they rise in the apartment where all are finishing dinner. Beatrice and Catherine are clearing the table.

  CATHERINE: You know where they went?

  BEATRICE: Where?

  CATHERINE: They went to Africa once. On a fishing boat. Eddie glances at her. It’s true, Eddie.

  Beatrice exits into the kitchen with dishes.

  EDDIE: I didn’t say nothin’. He goes to his rocker, picks up a newspaper.

  CATHERINE: And I was never even in Staten Island.

  EDDIE, sitting with the paper: You didn’t miss nothin’. Pause. Catherine takes dishes out. How long that take you, Marco—to get to Africa?

  MARCO, rising: Oh ... two days. We go all over.

  RODOLPHO, rising: Once we went to Yugoslavia.

  EDDIE, to Marco: They pay all right on them boats?

  Beatrice enters. She and Rodolpho stack the remaining dishes.

  MARCO: If they catch fish they pay all right. Sits on a stool.

  RODOLPHO: They’re family boats, though. And nobody in our family owned one. So we only worked when one of the families was sick.

  BEATRICE: Y‘know, Marco, what I don’t understand—there’s an ocean full of fish and yiz are all starvin’.

  EDDIE: They gotta have boats, nets, you need money.

  Catherine enters.

  BEATRICE: Yeah, but couldn’t they like fish from the beach? You see them down Coney Island—

  MARCO: Sardines.

  EDDIE: Sure. Laughing: How you gonna catch sardines on a hook?

  BEATRICE: Oh, I didn’t know they’re sardines. To Catherine: They’re sardines!

  CATHERINE: Yeah, they follow them all over the ocean, Africa, Yugoslavia ... She sits and begins to look through a movie magazine. Rodolpho joins her.

  BEATRICE, to Eddie: It’s funny, y’know. You never think of it, that sardines are swimming in the ocean! She exits to kitchen with dishes.

  CATHERINE: I know. It’s like oranges and lemons on a tree. To Eddie: I mean you ever think of oranges and lemons on a tree?

  EDDIE: Yeah, I know. It’s funny. To Marco: I heard that they paint the oranges to make them look orange.

  Beatrice enters.

  MARCO—he has been reading a letter: Paint?

  EDDIE : Yeah, I heard that they grow like green.

  MARCO: No, in Italy the oranges are orange.

  RODOLPHO: Lemons are green.

  EDDIE, resenting his instruction: I know lemons are green, for Christ’s sake, you see them in the store they’re green sometimes. I said oranges they paint, I didn’t say nothin’ about lemons.

  BEATRICE, sitting; diverting their attention: Your wife is gettin’ the money all right, Marco?

  MARCO: Oh, yes. She bought medicine for my boy.

  BEATRICE: That’s wonderful. You feel better, heh?

  MARCO: Oh, yes! But I’m lonesome.

  BEATRICE: I just hope you ain’t gonna do like some of them around here. They’re here twenty-five years, some men, and they didn’t get enough together to go back twice.

  MARCO: Oh, I know. We have many families in our town, the children never saw the father. But I will go home. Three, four years, I think.

  BEATRICE: Maybe you should keep more here. Because maybe she thinks it comes so easy you’ll never get ahead of yourself.

  MARCO: Oh, no, she saves. I send everytning. My wife is very lonesome. He smiles shyly.

  BEATRICE: She must be nice. She pretty? I bet, heh?

  MARCO, blushing: No, but she understand everything.

  RODOLPHO : Oh, he’s got a clever wife!

  EDDIE: I betcha there’s plenty surprises sometimes when those guys get back there, heh?

  MARCO: Surprises?

  EDDIE, laughing: I mean, you know—they count the kids and there’s a couple extra than when they left?

  MARCO: No—no ... The women wait, Eddie. Most. Most. Very few surprises.

  RODOLPHO: It’s more strict in our town. Eddie looks at him now. It’s not so free.

  EDDIE rises, paces up and down: It ain’t so free here either, Rodolpho, like you think. I seen greenhorns sometimes get in trouble that way—they think just because a girl don’t go around with a shawl over her head that she ain’t strict, y’know? Girl don’t have to wear black dress to be strict. Know what I mean?

  RODOLPHO: Well, I always have respect—

  EDDIE: I know, but in your town you wouldn’t just drag off some girl without permission, I mean. He turns. You know what I mean, Marco? It ain’t that much different here.

  MARCO, cautiously: Yes.

  BEATRICE: Well, he didn’t exactly drag her off though, Eddie.

  EDDIE: I know, but I seen some of them get the wrong idea sometimes. To Rodolpho : I mean it might be a little more free here but it’s just as strict.

  RODOLPHO: I have respect for her, Eddie. I do anything wrong?

  EDDIE: Look, kid, I ain’t her father, I’m only her uncle—

  BEATRICE: Well then, be an uncle then. Eddie looks at her, aware of her criticizing force. I mean.

  MARCO: No, Beatrice, if he does wrong you must tell him. To Eddie : What does he do wrong?

  EDDIE: Well, Marco, till he came here she was never out on the street twelve o’clock at night.

  MARCO, to Rodolpho : You come home early now.

  BEATRICE, to Catherine: Well, you said the movie ended late, didn’t you?

  CATHERINE: Yeah.

  BEATRICE: Well, tell him, honey. To Eddie: The movie ended late.

  EDDIE: Look, B., I’m just sayin’—he thinks she always stayed out like that.

  MARCO: You come home early now, Rodolpho.

  RODOLPHO, embarrassed: All right, sure. But I can’t stay in the house all the time, Eddie.

  EDDIE: Look, kid, I’m not only talkin’ about her. The more you run around like that the more chance you’re takin’. To Beatrice: I mean suppose he gets hit by a car or something. To Marco: Where’s his papers, who is he? Know what I mean?

  BEATRICE: Yeah, but who is he in the daytime, though? It’s the same chance in the daytime.

  EDDIE, holding back a voice full of anger: Yeah, but he don’t have to go lookin’ for it, Beatrice. If he’s here to w
ork, then he should work; if he’s here for a good time then he could fool around! To Marco: But I understood, Marco, that you was both comin’ to make a livin’ for your family. You understand me, don’t you, Marco? He goes to his rocker.

  MARCO: I beg your pardon, Eddie.

  EDDIE: I mean, that’s what I understood in the first place, see.

  MARCO: Yes. That’s why we came.

  EDDIE sits on his rocker: Well, that’s all I’m askin’.

  Eddie reads his paper. There is a pause, an awk wardness. Now Catherine gets up and puts a record on the phonograph—“Paper Doll.”

  CATHERINE, flushed with revolt: You wanna dance, Rodolpho?

  Eddie freezes.

  RODOLPHO, in deference to Eddie:, No, I—I’m tired.

  BEATRICE: Go ahead, dance, Rodolpho.

  CATHERINE: Ah, come on. They got a beautiful quartet, these guys. Come.

  She has taken his hand and he stiffly rises, feeling Eddie’s eyes on his back, and they dance.

  EDDIE, to Catherine : What’s that, a new record?

  CATHERINE: It’s the same one. We bought it the other day.

  BEATRICE, to Eddie: They only bought three records. She watches them dance; Eddie turns his head away. Marco just sits there, waiting. Now Beatrice turns to Eddie. Must be nice to go all over in one of them fishin’ boats. I would like that myself. See all them other countries?

  EDDIE : Yeah.

  BEATRICE, to Marco: But the women don’t go along, I bet.

  MARCO: No, not on the boats. Hard work.

  BEATRICE: What’re you got, a regular kitchen and everything?

  MARCO: Yes, we eat very good on the boats—especially when Rodolpho comes along; everybody gets fat.

  BEATRICE: Oh, he cooks?

  MARCO: Sure, very good cook. Rice, pasta, fish, everything.

  Eddie lowers his paper.

  EDDIE: He’s a cook, too! Looking at Rodolpho: He sings, he cooks ...

  Rodolpho smiles thankfully.

  BEATRICE: Well it’s good, he could always make a living.

  EDDIE: It’s wonderful. He sings, he cooks, he could make dresses ...

  CATHERINE: They get some high pay, them guys. The head chefs in all the big hotels are men. You read about them.

  EDDIE: That’s what I’m sayin’.