COCKNEY COQUETRY: A STUDY IN REGENT'S PARK.
SCENE—Near the Band-Stand. TIME—7 P.M. on a Sunday in August.
CHARACTERS.
Polly (about 22; a tall brunette, of the respectable lower middle-class, with a flow of light badinage, and a taste for tormenting.)
Flo (18; her friend; shorter, somewhat less pronounced in manner; rather pretty, simply and tastefully dressed; milliner or bonnet-maker's apprentice.)
Mr. Ernest Hawkins (otherwise known as "ERNIE 'ORKINS"; 19 or 20; short, sallow, spectacled; draper's assistant; a respectable and industrious young fellow, who chooses to pass in his hours of ease as a blasé misogynist).
Alfred (his friend; shorter and sallower; a person with a talent for silence, which he cultivates assiduously).
POLLY and FLO are seated upon chairs by the path, watching the crowd promenading around the enclosure where the Band is playing.
Polly (to FLO). There's ERNIE 'ORKINS;—he doesn't see us yet. 'Ullo, ERNIE, come 'ere and talk to us, won't you?
Flo. Don't, POLLY. I'm sure I don't want to talk to him!
Polly. Now you know you do, FLO,—more than I do, if the truth was known. It's all on your account I called out to him.
Mr. Hawkins (coming up). 'Ullo! so you're 'ere, are you?
[Stands in front of their chairs in an easy attitude. His friend looks on with an admiring grin in the background, unintroduced, but quite happy and contented.
Polly. Ah, we're 'ere all right enough. 'Ow did you get out?
Mr. H. (his dignity slightly ruffled). 'Ow did I get out? I'm not in the 'abit of working Sundays if I know it.
Polly. Oh, I thought p'raps she wouldn't let you come out without 'er. (Mr. H. disdains to notice this insinuation.) Why, how you are blushing up, FLO! She looks quite nice when she blushes, don't she?
Mr. H. (who is of the same opinion, but considers it beneath him to betray his sentiments). Can't say, I'm sure; I ain't a judge of blushing myself. I've forgotten how it's done.
Polly. Ah! I dessay you found it convenient to forget. (A pause. Mr. H. smiles in well-pleased acknowledgment of this tribute to his brazen demeanour.) Did ARTHUR send you a telegraph?—he sent FLO one. [This is added with a significance intended to excite Mr. H.'s jealousy.
Mr. H. (unperturbed). No; he telegraphed to father, though. He's gettin' on well over at Melbun, ain't he? They think a lot of him out there. And now gettin' his name in the paper, too, like that, why—
Flo. That'll do him a lot of good, 'aving his name in the paper, won't it?
Mr. H. Oh, ARTHUR's gettin' on fine. Have you read the letters he's sent over? No? Well, you come in to-morrow evening and have a look at 'em. Look sharp, or they'll be lent out again; they've been the reg'lar round, I can tell you. I shall write and blow 'im up, though, for not sending me a telegraft, too.
Polly. You! 'Oo are you? You're on'y his brother, you are. It's different, his sending one to FLO.
Mr. H. (not altogether relishing this last suggestion). Ah, well, I dessay I shall go out there myself, some day.
[Looks at Miss FLO, to see how she likes that.
Flo. Yes, you'd better. It would make you quite a man, wouldn't it? [Both girls titter.
Mr. H. (nettled). 'Ere, I say, I'm off. Good-bye! Come on, ALF!
[Fausse sortie.
Polly. No, don't go away yet. Shall you take 'er out with you, ERNIE, eh?
Mr. H. What 'er? I don't know any 'er.
Polly (archly). Oh, you think we 'aven't 'eard. 'Er where you live now. We know all about it!
Mr. H. Then you know more than what I do. There's nothing between me and anybody where I live. But I'm going out to Ostralia, though. I've saved up 'alf of what I want already.
Polly (banteringly). You are a good boy. Save up enough for me too!
Mr. H. (surveying her with frank disparagement). You? Oh, lor! Not if I know it!
Flo (with an exaggerated sigh). Oh dear, I wish I was over there. They say they're advertising for maidservants—fifteen shillings a week, and the washing put out. I'd marry a prince or a lord duke, perhaps, when I got there. ARTHUR sent me a fashion-book.
Mr. H. So he sent me one, too. It was the Autumn fashions. They get their Autumn in the Spring out there, you know, and their Christmas Day comes in the middle of July. Seems rum, doesn't it?
Flo. He sent me his photo, too. He has improved.
Polly. You go out there, ERNIE, and p'raps you'll improve. [FLO giggles.
Mr. H. (hurt). There, that's enough—good-bye.
[Fausse sortie No. 2.
Polly (persuasively). 'Ere, stop! I want to speak to you. Is your girl here?
Mr. H. (glad of this opportunity). My girl? I ain't got no girl. I don't believe in 'em—a lot of—
Polly (interrupting). A lot of what? Go on—don't mind us.
Mr. H. It don't matter. I know what they are.
Polly. But you like Miss PINKNEY, though,—at the shop in Queen's Road,—you know.
Mr. H. (by way of proclaiming his indifference). Miss PINKNEY? She ought to be Mrs. SOMEBODY by this time,—she's getting on for thirty.
Polly. Ah, but she don't look it, does she: not with that lovely coloured 'air and complexion? You knew she painted, I dessay? She don't look—well, not more than thirty-two, at the outside. She spends a lot on her 'air, I know. She sent our GEORGY one day to the 'air-dresser's for a bottle of the stuff she puts on, and the barber sez: "What, do you dye your 'air?" To little GEORGY! fancy!
Mr. H. Well, she may dye herself magenter for all I care. (Changing the subject.) ARTHUR's found a lot of old friends at Melbun,—first person he come upon was a policeman as used to be at King Street; and you remember that Miss LAVENDER he used to go out with? (Speaking at FLO.) Well, her brother was on board the steamer he went in.
Polly. It's all right, FLO, ain't it? so long as it wasn't Miss LAVENDER herself! (To Mr. H.) I say, ain't you got a moustarsh comin'!
Mr. H. (wounded for the third time). That'll do. I'm off this time! [The devoted ALF once more prepares for departure.
Polly. All right! Tell us where you'll be, and we may come and meet you. I daresay we shall find you by the Outer Circle,—where the children go when they get lost. I say, ERNIE, look what a short frock that girl's got on.
Mr. H. (lingering undecidedly). I don't want to look at no girls, I tell you.
Polly. What, can't you see one you like,—not out of all this lot?
Mr. H. Not one. Plenty of 'ARRIETS! [Scornfully.
Flo. Ah! and 'ARRIES too. There's a girl looking at you, ERNIE; do turn round.
Mr. H. (loftily). I'm sure I shan't look at her, then. I expected a cousin of mine would ha' turned up here by now.
Polly. I wish he'd come. P'raps I might fall in love with him,—who knows?—or else FLO might.
Mr. H. Ah! he's a reg'lar devil, I can tell you, my cousin is. Why, I'm a saint to 'im!
Polly. Oh, I daresay! "Self-praise," you know!
Mr. H. (with a feeling that he is doing himself an injustice). Not but what I taught him one or two things he didn't know, when he was with me at Wandsworth. (Thinks he won't go until he has dropped one more hint about Australia.) As to Ostralia, you know, I've quite made up my mind to go out there as soon as I can. I ain't said nothing, but I've been meaning it all along. They won't mind my going at home, like they did ARTHUR's, eh?
Flo (in a tone of cordial assent). Oh no, of course not. It isn't as if you were 'im, is it?
Mr. H. (disappointed, but still bent on asserting his own value). You see, I'm independent. I can always find a berth, I can. I don't believe in keeping on anywhere longer than I'm comfortable. Not but what I shall stick to where I am a bit longer, because I've a chance of a rise soon. The Guv'nor don't like the man in the Manchester department, so I expect I shall get his berth. I get on well with the Guv'nor, you know, and he treats us very fair;—we've a setting-room to ourselves, and we can come and set in the droring-room of a Sunday afternoon, like the family; and I often have to go into the City, and, when I get up there, I can tell yer, I—
Flo (suddenly). Oh! there's Mother! I must go and speak to her a minute. Come, POLLY!
[Both girls rise, and rush after a stout lady who is disappearing in the crowd.
Alfred (speaking for the first time). I say, we'll 'ook it now, eh?
Mr. H. (gloomily accepting the situation). Yes, we'd better 'ook it.
[They "'ook it" accordingly, and Miss FLO and Miss POLLY, returning later, find, rather to their surprise, that their victim has departed, and their chairs are filled by blandly unconscious strangers. However, both young ladies declare that it is "a good riddance," and they thought "that ERNIE 'ORKINS never meant to go,"— which seems amply to console them for having slightly overrated their powers of fascination.