THE COAL DIAMOND AONE ACT PLAY BY SHIRLEY LAURO * DRAMATISTS PLAY SERVICE INC.THE COAL DIAMOND A comer of the Research Office in the Insurance Company. Where the “smart girls” work. Lunchtime. Two gray desks with typewriters on them. An old-fashioned ceil- ing fan, moving only in centimeters. If a all. A water cooler. One desk has been pushed up to the window to get whatever breeze there may be. There is one door, D.R., to hall. Office is deserted except for three typists who are bustling around, getting ready to eat lunch and play bridge. (Lena, Inez ‘and Betty Jean). In the dark we hear Inez ping. Lights up. LENA. (Telling punchline of joke.) And then, he said to her: "I said bells, lady, not balls?” (Peals of laughter from Inez, Betty Jean and Lena.) BETTY JEAN. Oh, Lena, that's jist awful! INEZ. (Makes mistake on typeuriter.) Law! You got me laughin’ so, 1 jist made a mistake! LENA. You can fix it this afternoon. It’s ten after twelve already! And both you girls have put in a terrible hard mornin’ asitist BETTY JEAN, Isn't that the truth! Land! This hot ole mornin’ seemed a thousand hours long! LENA. Well, come on now, Betty Jean let's us jist all relax our brains—and have us some fun! It’s “Lunch Time" girls! (Pear! enters, carrying her bunch, looking around, not immediately seeing the others, who are now setting up for bridge game and lunch. They prt deck of cards and scorepad on desk, and take out brown paper bags witk baloney and cheese sandwiches, apples, candy bars and Cokes: Inez puts a pack of Camels on the desk.) INEZ. Héy, Pearl: Honey; you jist come right along over here! We're jist about ready to start! PEARL. (Joining the group.) I'm jist terrible sorry to be late and all. I got stuck doin’ this report? And I couldn't remember how she said to do it. Finally 1 jist give up! INEZ. (Rising, encircling Pearl's waist.) Jist never you mind, Pearl, honey. It's OK. Why, we're all so tickled to git us a fourth, we're 5about to die! Now jist let me name you around, Everyone: this here’s my friend, Pearl Brewster, like I said. Jist started to work here Monday. They stuck her in Underwriting, BETTY JEAN. Oh Law! INEZ. This here's Betty Jean McGaffee. PEARL. Pleased to know you Betty Jean. BETTY JEAN. Thanks. INEZ. Her husband works out to the Firestone Plant. First Shift! BETTY JEAN. Shoot! Don’t have to give her my family tree! INEZ. (Patting Betty Jean's stomach.) Somebody already yave you your family tree, girl! (Everyone laughs.) Anyhow, this little gold- haired honey jist graduated high school a year ago June, and already got herself this good job in Research, a husband on First Shift, and a kid almost due! PEARL. (Taking in the black roots on Betty Jean's hair.) Isn't that something now? (Betty Jean takes her ‘knitting [booties] from desk drawer.) INEZ. And finally . . . this is Lena Travis, Boss of the Research Section! (Lena shakes Pearl's hand.) Lena is terrible smart at Insur- ance and Bridge. Only thing is—she can't get her a man! (The other girls smile ever so sweetly at Lena.) . LENA. (Hitching up her glasses, a habit which she does very often, and then taking a bite out of her apple.) Never you mind what I got or ain't got, Inez Potter! INEZ. Heck! I was only teasin’, Lena! Truth is, Pearl, honey, Lena is jist too dang good for any old man! Why. Betty Jean and me, we never had such a wonderful girl to work for ever in our lives as Lena Travis. And that’s fact! LENA. (Touched.) Shoot! (Lena siti, motions Peart to sit. Betty Jean goes to window, opens it wide.) INEZ. Well, it's the Lord’s truth, Lena, and you know it is. Why, we're jist crazy about workin’ for you! BETTY JEAN. She is jist terrible nice, Pearl. Heck! Everytime I get the backache, she give me this pass to the Lounge. And she sure has got a swell sense of humor, Lena has, Keeps us in stitches all the time! *I—I said ‘bells’ lady, not ‘balls!”* (Betty Jean, Lena and Inez laugh. Everyone settles down at table.) LENA, Aw go on! (Begins to welcome Pearl, dealing cards as she does.) Now, I mean to tell ya, Pearl, honey, we're proud to have ya come in like this of a Friday to be a fourth. Friday noons is terrible hard to get a fourth, Everybody goes on uptown, see, to make theit 6deposits on account of we git paid about a quarter of. Why it's a positive chore gittin’ someone up here of a Friday. Specially since we're the only Department hasn't got us our air-conditioner yet. Hotas this weather is. . . PEARL. (Kicking off sandals and spreading her toes over the cool linoleum. Opens lunch bag now, eating her jelly doughnuu first, It drips on hher dress.) Ob, pshaw! Don't bother me none about the air- conditioner. I'm jist glad to git out of Underwriting! All they do is play Pinochole! Got this mean ole Boss LENA. Jessie? PEARL. . . . Jessie!! . . . always makes me do my reports over again! INEZ. Well, don't worry. You'll catch on, Pearl just moved to town. From River Falls. You was cashierin’ there weren't ya? Never tried office work before? PEARL. Mmm. I's double the money! It’s gonna be our break! INEZ. That's where we two met. When I was livin’ in River Fal PEARL. (Confused.) It is? I thought we met at that company picnic when our’husbands was workin’ over at Adas Movin’ Outfit in Cherokee. INEZ. (Chuckles, wads up gum wrapper and shoots it at the wastebasket.) Pshaw! Pearl! You got a memory like a frog! It was over to River Falls we met. Before we was ever married, (Others laugh.) She can’t even remember bird one! PEARL. You're right! I remember it all now. It was at one a them Baptist Fellowship Picnics we met. And they had it right on the river bank . . . and there was these big ole horseflies around. And they bit Inez! And she started yellin’ out—so I come over and INEZ, (Anxious to get off the topic.) We all set? (Cards have been dealt. Lena and Betty Jean are partners, siting opposite, and Pearl and Inez.) LENA. Mmm. Let's play cards. Here we go: One heart! INEZ, Crime’n Itly! I haven't got anything! Pass! BETTY JEAN. Two hearts! PEARL. Two spades. LENA. Three hearts. INEZ. I still haven't got pidaly: pass. PEARL. That's okay. BETTY JEAN. Pass, My land! What a hot ole August day! PEARL. You got it, Lena. It's yours. LENA, Ain't that nice now. Three hearts. (Inez leads out, Betty Jean 7lays down hand, gets up and goes around to look over Lena's shoulder at her hand.) PEARL. (Taking the first rick.) Hey .-, . who's the fourth here the rest of the week? INEZ, Wanda Sue Turner. Goes to the bank to deposit on Fridays regular. Puts away every cent she gits I guess! LENA. (Slapping her card down to take trick) I guess! (Leads out.) PEARL. Tight, hub? LENA. (Taking next tric, winking at Betty Jean.) Tight? Girl, I mean to tell you she puts Jack Benny to shame! Why she lives in a rented. room over Ramsey's Auto Parts Store. Hasn't even got a hotplate to her name! She makes a complete diet outa soda crackers and skim milk, and she won't even chip in on the baby showers or birthday cards for the rest of the force! PEARL. (Stunned.) She don't chip in2 LENA. Isn't that the limit though? Why, when she first came in here to work and I knew she was a stranger in town, yah know? tried to find her a place to live. I told her about my apart ment . . . the Glenview Arms? Them real swell apartments over by the river? PEARL. Oh, Iseenthem . . . they're justawful nice. LENA. So, anyhow, she says, how much do they cost, and I says pay $60.a month, and PEARL. Oh, Law! You pay $60 a month? Jist for yourself? LENA, Mmm, $65 now. That was three years ago. Anyhow. You shoulda seen ole Wanda's face when I told her. Flabbergasted is the only word to name the state of that girl's face. I figured her ‘out then and there. (Betty Jean goes back to the window.) INEZ. Aw, that ain't nice, Lena! She's not so tight! (Inez takes a swig of her Coke.) Truth of it is, Wanda Sue’s hopin’ to git married. She's savin’ for her hope chest. Lena jist don't like her. She's got a chip on her shoulder about poor Wanda Sue. PEARL. Oh? LENA. She is too tight! Among other things... (Betty Jean bursts out laughing at this, and Inez, in spite of better instincts, does too. Betty Jean goes back to look over Lena's shoulder.) PEARL. Well jst listen to you all! What is it? What are you savin’ it up for, the Fourth of July? Tell me before you bust your seams! LENA. Shoot! Now will you look at her? Miss Curiosity! Honey, you're too young. I don't want to.dirty up those lily white ears! (Betty Jean finds this incredibly funny; she shrieks with laughter.) 8PEARL. Goon! Isshe . . . ornery? LENA. Ornery? Well I don't know as I'd call it that . . . exactly. Besides it ain't really her . . . it's that bum she thinks is gonna marry her! (Lena trumps the trick) PEARL. What's wrong with him? LENA. Everything! (Lena stops game now to devote full attention to telling this.) He has got himself a reputation all over this office 1 mean to tell you! He used to work here. INEZ. Til he got himself fired! Lena had to let him go. (Betty Jean crosses to her own desk to powder face.) PEARL. Oh . . . he was the one was . . . ornery then? LENA. Shoot, he was way past ornery. Dirty! That's the word to describe that man, Filthy dirty man! PEARL. No! Right here in this office? LENA. Mmm. Why he was always takin’ anybody he could git a hold of out behind the candy machine in the hall, and you better believe he wasn't shovin' nickels in a machine for no Hershey bars out there! PEARL. No! LENA. Shoot! Once I seen him back that Dago girl, Marie . . you remember Marie, don’t ya, Inez? Worked for Dooley? INEZ. Married some Hunkie in Chicago? LENA. Yeah, that’s her. Anyhow I seen Wanda’s intended back this Dago girl, Marie, up against a wall and about rip her blouse off her, out there by the candy machine. Right from my desk 1 had a complete view. Poor thing was so scared she didn’t know which end was up! PEARL. All right here in this office? Law! LENA. Well don’t drop your pants about it, Pearl honey. I'm tellin’ you the man was trash! PEARL. (Pouting:) Pshaw! We haven't got nobody like that up in Underwriting. All we got is Mr. Johnson? Lives with his mother in Clive! INEZ. Well thank your stars, Pearl, honey, on that account, It was a terrible influence on us havin’ him here. Why he never even ‘went to church Easter Morning! PEARL. No! LENA. And the stories he used to pass around! Why . . . he told Betty Jean here . . . and before she was even married, you un- derstand . . . told her how he'd gone to this sideshow out by Hampton and scen some girl performer do something with a stud 9pony! Well! I don't mean to spell it out for ya, but Law, when Betty Jean here told her Earl Henry about it, didn’t he about knock her cuckoo for knowing about such disgustin’ chings! BETTY JEAN. (Coming back from her desk.) He was terrible mad! PEARL. No! In Hampton they do that? LENA, Crime 'n Iu! That's jist nothin’ to how low he was! He came right over to Inez at her desk, right before Inez had her baby, James Orville, and he yells jist as loud as a fire truck: “Hey, Inez.” He yells, “Why don’t you send that husband of yours up to Merrimack and git that doctor up there to fix him for yal" PEARL. The nerve! They do that in Merrimack? INEZ. Docsn't that beat all? Why the very, idea! Could have spoiled the rest of my married life? LENA. Oh, I don’t know as that’s true. Lola What's-Her-Name, used to work on the IBM Machine on two? She sent her husband upto that doctor in Merrimack. PEARL. (Trying to place Lola.) Really? INEZ. I didn't know that. BETTY JEAN. (Pressing in’her back.) Well, she already had five kids. PEARL. Mmm. This Lola happen to say what happened after her husband got himself fixed? LENA. Nothin’ . . . so she says! Didn't do nothin’ but make him worse than he already was! Wasn't anything could hold him down after the operation Lola said. Wasn't ten months later she had her a sct a twins! Both boys! A course, all you girls'd know more about that sorta thing than me! (Hand of cards is over. Lena crosses fo water cooler to get drink.) INEZ. Pshaw! Lena. . . you gonna go through life like that? Fudge? I'd die of the curiosity! It’s just a cryin’ shame you can't hook somebody or the other! Law! (Betty Jean sits. Inez deals the newt hand.) LENA. Maybe I don't want to. Ever think of that? Maybe there ain't no dang man this side of the Mississippi I'd give the time of day to, let’alone ‘have livin’ off ty good salary the rest of my natural life! And cashin’ in on all my insurance if I pass first! BETTY JEAN. (Soothingly.) Well, Sure! Can’t say as I blame you in the least, Lena, honey. What with the kinda money you make and all the insurance you musta piled up from here for your retire- ment. (Lenia comes back and sits. Peart is watching Lena.) PEARL. You ever been in River Falls? Visitin’ or anything? Or Mountain Point? 10LENA. Nope. Why? PEARL. You you look like I know you from someplace. Only I can't locate where, INEZ. Isn't she the limit? Shoot! Somebody's always lookin’ like somebody else to old Pearl. Every Tom, Dick or Harry on Mul- berry Street puts her in mind of someone else! PEARL. No, but Lena really does! (Inez finishes the deal. They sort their hands.) INEZ. Pass. BETTY JEAN. One club, PEARL. Pass. LENA. Pass. INEZ. You got it Betty Jean for one club. BETTY JEAN. Hardly worth it. Mangy little ole bid. Well, Pearl, lead out. Law! I'm so hot I'm stickin’ to this seat! (Pearl leads.) PEARL. So, they met here INEZ. Who met here? LENA. He was in the stockroom. Doesn't that take the cake? A forty year old man stackin’ envelopes at 60¢ per? PEARL. Tommy Paul gets one-fifty out to John Deere now. BETTY JEAN. Earl Henry just got raised to twol LENA. it was the only job I figured he could handle, don't ya know? I was the one hired him to start with and first few years he was okay. PEARL. But you fired him? LENA. Had to, finally, After Wanda Sue started workin’ here he wasn't the same man, Couldn't even handle his stupid lite job. And I had to tell him so in front a everyone and yell at him and everything cause he was makin’ such a mess of that room! BETTY JEAN, It was an awful scene the day she let him go. Upset me to me stomach the whole afternoon. And Wanda Sue! Law, she threw up! PEARL. What she look like? She pretty? INEZ. Not bad. Big blue eyes. A natural blond. (Inez glances at Betty Jean.) LENA. Ain't her looks that’s gittin’ us down about her. It's that she's turnin’ out to be so blame stupid and ignorant. BETTY JEAN. Yeah. [t's all jist comin’ out ‘now. Why, Pearl takes her a solid morning to type a row of figures down a page! LENA. She come in here after her junior year of high school. Doesn't have no diploma a course. So she don't make the same as the rest of my Rescarch girls! MWINEZ. Not by half! (Pear! has spilled jelly from doughnut on dress. Goes to water cooler to clean it off.) BETTY JEAN. She is so dumb! Can you believe she’s makin’ her own wedding dress? And after I told her ninety-cleven times about them gorgeous little numbers over at “Three Sisters" where L bought mine. Jist gobs and gobs of lace and tulle for $29.98, She didn’t listen. She jist keeps bringin’ in her silly old veil to work and sewin’ on it her at lunch. Isn’t that dumb? She got the mayonnaise on it jist last week! (The other girls all laugh.) PEARL. Hey, she got her an engagement ring? (Pause. The others look at each other, begin to smirk and wink.) INEZ. Uh . . . what'd you say, honey? Has.she got her an en- gagement ring? That's the question you have asked? PEARL. (Bewildered. Turns at cooler to look at them.) Yes. INEZ. (Winking.) That's what the girl/asked, Betty Jean, What do you say to that? Has Wanda Sue got her an engagement ring? BETTY JEAN. An engagement ring, huh? Well, I don’t know . . Lena, what'd you say? Does Wanda Sue got her an engage- ment ring? LENA. Has she got a ring? Well . . I would say . . . she has got her the most unusual ring this side of the Pennsylvania mines! ‘Thav’s what | would say! (Betty Jean and Inez and Lena all burst out laughing very loudly, splattering their cards on the table and floor, totaly disrupting the game.) PEARL. Hey, you all! What's goin’ on? What is this? LENA. Honey, she’s engaged all right! And she’s got a ring! A coal diamond! All of her very own! (Girls laugh more at this.) PEARL. A what? LENA. (Magnanimously.) Oh, let's let Inez tell it. first! INEZ. (For the occasion she lights up @ Camel, takes @ drag, sticks her gum under the desk, tilts back in her chair and clears her throat.) Well! Wanda Sue Turner used to sit next to me. Right side, against the back wall. LENA (Can't keep out of it.) Left side. Against the front wall INEZ. (Giving Lena a look.) As 1 was sayin’! This Wanda Sue's a close mouth. Never tell ya anythin’ you want to know. But, any- how. In she pops this one morning and announces right outa the blue she’s gittin’ engaged the very next day and is gittin’ a half carat ring! PEARL. (Stunned.) Half-carat? You kiddin’ me? 12 he saw the thingLENA. That's what we all said, We couldn't hardly wait til the next day in fact to git a look INEZ, Next day, 8:30 on the nose, in she pops. And sure enough there she is wavin' her hand around with this great big ring. And LENA. (Can't keep out of i.) And, it was a half-carat all right. But, honey . . . it had a black spot in the center big as a dime, A chunk a coal nobody could polish into diamond and so they left it stickin’ in there, black as the ace of spades! PEARL. What? LENA. And she went around like she didn't even see that big black blob in the center, She was jst flashin’ the thing around! INEZ. And we didn’t want to say nothin’ on accounta its bein’ the first day she'd got herself engaged. We never did say nothin’. LENA. Only it is the sorriest lookin’ ring you'll ever sce in this world. (A pause.) PEARL. Seems like I seen her in that ring. In the washroom I bet. LENA. Mmm, Probably. She's still wearin’ it. Won't take it off for love nor money. She thinks he's comin’ back to her. PEARL, He left? What's he doin’? LENA. Sittin’ on his dinghy somewhere! (Girls laugh at this.) INEZ, Crime 'n Itly, Lena, don’t tease Pearl so much! He joined the Navy this week . . . took Wanda out to dance to Pee Wee Hunt's band at the Bel-Air PEARL, Law! I can’tabide Pee Wee Hunt! INEZ. Well, be sprung it on her out there about how he couldn't git another job in town because Lena kept disrecommendin’ him every place called her up. So Red joined the Navy and is gonna save up and sail home to her in two years with a genuine kimono from Tokyo, Japan! He says! BETTY JEAN. And she believes it! The rest a these are mine... (Betty Jean shows her cards, others concede the game, laying dowm their cards.) Sits here all week typin’ him mushy letters on company time! Sewin’ away on that sorry lookin’ veil, draggin’ around with that coal diamond on her hand! And doin’ her re~ ports wrong so Lena has to make her do ‘em again. LENA. Law, I jist don’t know how long I can put up with it all before I have to let ole Wanda Sue go too! ‘Cause I think she's gonna be actin’ like that til Judgement Day! INEZ. Same day you git you a man, huh? LENA. Inez, you ever let up on that? Here . . . I got to go to the 13john. Deal out, Betty Jean, and I'll be right back . . . we haven't ‘got much time left. (She gets up, starts out.) Don’t none of ya cheat ‘on me, hear? (She exits.) PEARL. (The minute Lena's gone, rising, very conspiratorily.) Hey! What was that guy's name? BETTY JEAN. Huh? Who? What guy? PEARL. That guy . . . that guy you was all jisttalkin’ about. INEZ. Who? PEARL. The guy with Wanda Sue! INEZ, Oh, Red. BETTY JEAN. Red. INEZ. Red Haner. PEARL. Red? INEZ. Mm, Had this big bushy mess red hair and freckles. Why? What's eatin’ yo PEARL. (Tritemphant.) That's jist what I thought! INEZ. What do you mean that's jist what you thought? PEARL. Boy, have I gota story for you all! Thank the Lord Lena left! BETTY JEAN. Why? PEARL. You know how I said Lena looked familiar to me? INEZ. Oh, everybody looks familiar'to you. What's that got to do. with the price of eggs? PEARL. I kept thinkin’ all hour I kriew Lena from before only I couldn’t locate where. Then jist a few minutes ago right outa the blue, I commenced to think on my Aunt Fanriie! Used to run this boardinghouse in Clearview. And [ used to go visit summers when Iwas a lite kid. Nineteen, ewenty years ago. INEZ. Well who cares what you did twenty years ago? PEARL. (Getting very excited.) But that's when I seen Lena. The summer I graduated grade school and went to visit Aunt Fannie Lena was rentin’ a room off her and had a job in some dinky litde hicktown office in Clearview. And Lena was young then, ole Lena was—real young— BETTY JEAN. Yeah? PEARL. Mmm. But jist as sorry lookin’ then as she is now. An Old Maid in her Youth! BETTY JEAN. Wellfeature that! PEARL. Never did have any boyfriends like the rest of the girls in the roomin’ house, you know? Jist her job. That's all Lena ever did talk about was that dumb ole hicktown office job a hers! 4INEZ. Oh, Law! PEARL. Other girls kept on goin’ out on their Saturday night dates while Lena jist sat there with me‘and Aunt Fannie on the front porch. All the nights of August she jist sat. Until this one night we seen her comin’ down Willow Street, runnin’, shoutin’ at us and wavin’ her left hand! And then she come up on the porch and sticks it in our faces and shows us this big ole half carat ‘engagement ring! BETTY JEAN, What? PEARL. And tells us she has met someone on the job and has got engaged and is gonna git married! BETTY JEAN. Oh, Land! PEARL. Only thing of it was that ring had a chunk of coal in the middle of it big as a dime! INEZ. What do you mean? PEARL. (Exultant.) That Lena was engaged to Red too! And wore that coal diamond jist like Wanda Sue! I knew I seen that ring before! (A long pause. The revelation has stunned Inez and Betty Jean.) BETTY JEAN. Crime’n Itly girl, you mean it? PEARL. Mmm. And to beat all she pretended there wasn't no coal in the middle of it either! That it was the most perfect ring ever existed in the world of God! (Betty Jean and Inez are very excited now, laughing and giggling.) INEZ. I can hardly believe it at all. PEARL. Well, it’s the Lord's truth. Didn't last more ‘n two, three months. After I left, Aunt Fannie said Lena used to sneak him up to her room, and then he started eatin’ in the roomin’ house and she footed his bill! But by the time I went back to Clearview for Christmas vacation, it was over. Lena said he had to “support his mother” so had to “postpone the wedding” and take back the ring because he loved Lena “so dearly” and didn’t want to spoil Lena's chances with all the other men! ‘Course we knew Red jist give Lena that ring to git himself that job! BETTY JEAN. And then Lena got her this job here in Valley Center and moved here and hired him again? Thinkin’ she'd git him in the end I bet! PEARL. Mmm. And then along comes Wanda Sue! Well! How's that for a story, girls? Guess that takes the cake about that swell boss you all keep braggin’ on! (In triumph Pearl chuckles, takes a big bite out of her apple, tilts back in her chair.) 15BETTY JEAN. My Land! How many years was it he was— (Lena enters.) LENA. Well, now, nobody cheated on me did they? (Girls laugh, thinly.) INEZ. Cheated? Shoot, Lena, not on you! BETTY JEAN. We were jist killin’ time INEZ. (Busying herself with cards.) Tryin’ to keep cool. « BETTY JEAN. Shootin’ the breeze . . . INEZ. Jist waitin’ on ya, Lena tocome back... LENA, (Putting’her purse away.) Well, I bumped into old Mavis Jones in the washroom, From Claims on 4? And you know how that girl goes on! BETTY JEAN. (Busying herself too.) Oh, Law! ° LENA. Mmm. She told me they're hirin’ wo more Claims In- vestigators over there at Boone Ridge. BETTY JEAN. Two more? LENA. Pshaw! They could use eight more over there! And that’s a fact! (Pause. Lena sits down again to continue game. Girls are trying to supress giggles. There is much lension—then Inez Blurts out smischievously:) INEZ. Mmm. We got ole Pearl here talkin’. . . about her past BETTY JEAN. (Laughing tightly) Which she kin hardly remember INEZ. ‘Cause she got a memory likea frog . | . although she did remember as how she'd visited in Clearview . . . when she was a kid? Came to visit her Aunt Fannie. Ran a roomin’ house in town... for girls. . . isn't that what you said, Pearl, honey? (A long pause. Peart looks at Inez, terrified. Lena looks at Pearl, Finally:) LENA. Thata fact, Pearl? PEARL. Oh, but it was so.long ago I disremember everything about it. I can’t remember a thing! Not a thing! (She smiles weakly.) INEZ. That's ole Pearl for you! Always did have a memory like a sieve! (Pause, Lena is shaken. Arranges her hand, regaining her com- posure, Finally:) LENA. Well, now, let’s see can we finish the rubber off. Betty Jean? Your bid! BETTY JEAN. (Looking at Inez, then Lena.) I pass . . « LENA. Pearl? PEARL. Pass. LENA. One spade. Inez? 16INEZ. Pass BETTY JEAN. Two spades. PEARL. Pass, LENA. Pass, INEZ. Pass. PEARL. You got it, Lena, For two spades, LENA. Well. Then it’s ours Betty Jean. Inez, lead out! (Ines leads. Lena becomes very dictatorial now, ordering everyone.) Betty Jean, lay down your hand! (Betty Jean does.) Uh-huh. Put the eight on the three! Pearl, what you gonna do? PEARL. The King I got no choice . LENA. That's a shame! Here comes the Ace! Put down that King! (Lena takes the trick.) BETTY JEAN. Oh my! Lena that’s good! (She crosses and stands looking over Lena's shoulder.) LENA. Okay, here we go! There's mine! Inez put down yours! (She leads, Inez plays.) So, Pearl, you're in Underwriting, huh? PEARL. Yes yes,ma'am,lam 2. . 1 LENA. Me and Jessie a course are such good old girlfriends we go back must be 15 years PEARL. Oh, Jessie's just a wonderful boss to work for, I can tell you that. LENA. Thought you said she was mean? PEARL. Jessie? Oh no I didn’t LENA. Ohwell . . . itdon'tmatter . . . PEARL. Leastways I... I disremember LENA. Memory matters though. Memory's just a terrible im- portant asset for the insurance business. A person would have trouble doin’ a good job on their work without a good memory, Don't you think so girls? (A short pause.) INEZ. Why I think memory’s the most important thing to have of alll LENA. Betty Jean? BETTY JEAN. Oh, definitely the most important thing of all Why everytime I have to type a report I have to remember all them things in my head . . . LENA. Mmm, In my experience you can’t hardly handle the work without it, Most of the girls who stay on and advance theirselves have superior memories. Without that a girl could be a downright detriment to the firm. I think all the Bosses of the Sections feel exactly the same way point a fact I'm sure they do 17at least the ones I know . . . (Lena has been taking trick after inc.) Course, I'm a little more lenient that some. I say, sometimes people do forget some things that aren't important to them at all... (Lena looks at Betty Jean and Inez.) INEZ. Shoot, I'm like that! BETTY JEAN. Me too. LENA. Other people have a more general problem . . . (Bell rings.) That's it! End a lunch! BETTY JEAN. And we didn't even finish the rubber off! Fudge! PEARL. (Jumping up.) 1... . 1 got to go. I got to finish my re~ port... 1... ['lseeyouall... 1... (She is terrified. She starts huerrying out.) LENA. Pearl?! (Pear! stops.) You comie on back next Friday, hear? We'll make it permanent on Fridays, At least fora while .. . see how everything goes . . . ‘Cause you're jist like us Pearl honey, you hear? You play one mean hand of bridge! (A pause, Pearl exits ‘quickly as Inez and Betty Jean begin to set up office desks for the afternoon work. As they move around her, Lena sts staring after Pearl.) LIGHTS DIM TO BLACK. END OF PLAY. 18