27 Wagons Full of Cotton and Other Plays by Tennessee Williams Page A

fall shut. )The sidewalks seem so dreadfully long in summer. . . .
    E LEVATOR B OY: This ain’t summer, Miss Collins.

    M ISS COLLINS: ( dreamily )I used to think I’d never get to the end of that last block. And that’s the block where all the trees went down in the big tornado. The walk is simply glit -teringwith sunlight. ( pressing her eyelids )Impossible to shade your face and I do perspire so freely! ( She touches her forehead daintily with the rag. )Not a branch, not a leaf to give you a little protection! You simply have to en- dure it. Turn your hideous red face away from all the front-porches and walk as fast as you decently can till you get by them! Oh, dear, dear Savior, sometimes you’re not so lucky and you meet people and have to smile! You can’t avoid them unless you cut across and that’s so ob -vious, you know. . . . People would say you’re pe cul iar. . . . His house is right in the middle of that awful leafless block, their house, his and hers, and they have an automobile and always get home early and sit on the porch and watch me walking by—Oh, Father in Heaven—with a ma li cious de light! ( She averts her face in remembered torture. )She has such penetrating eyes, they look straight through me. She sees that terrible choking thing in my throat and the pain I have in here —( touching her chest )—and she points it out and laughs and whispers to him, “There she goes with her shiny big red nose, the poor old maid—that loves you!” ( She chokes and hides her face in the rag. )
    P ORTER: Maybe you better forget all that, Miss Collins.
    M ISS COLLINS: Never, never forget it! Never, never! I left my parasol once—the one with long white fringe that belonged to Mother—I left it behind in the cloak-room at the church so I didn’t have anything to cover my face with when I walked by, and I couldn’t turn back either, with all those people behind me—giggling back of me, poking fun at my clothes! Oh, dear, dear! I had to walk straight forward—past the last elm tree and into that merciless sunlight. Oh! It beat down on me, scorching me! Whips! . . . Oh, Jesus! . . . Over myface and my body! . . . I tried to walk on fast but was dizzy and they kept closer behind me—! I stumbled, I nearly fell, and all of them burst out laughing! My face turned so horribly red, it got so red and wet, I knew how ugly it was in all that merciless glare—not a single shadow to hide in! And then—( Her face contorts with fear. )—their automobile drove up in front of their house, right where I had to pass by it, and she stepped out, in white, so fresh and easy, her stomach round with a baby, the first of the six. Oh, God! . . . And he stood smiling behind her, white and easy and cool, and they stood there waiting for me. Waiting! I had to keep on. What else could I do? I couldn’t turn back, could I? No! I said dear God ,strike me dead! He didn’t, though. I put my head way down like I couldn’t see them! You know what she did? She stretched out her hand to stop me! And he —he stepped up straight in front of me, smiling, blocking the walk with his terrible big white body! “ Lucretia,” he said, “Lucretia Collins!” I—I tried to speak but I couldn’t, the breath went out of my body! I covered my face and—ran! . . . Ran! . . . Ran! ( beating the arm of the sofa )Till I reached the end of the block—and the elm trees— started again. . . . Oh, Merciful Christ in Heaven, how kind they were! ( She leans back exhaustedly, her hand relaxed on sofa. She pauses and the music ends. )I said to Mother, “Mother, we’ve got to leave town!” We did after that. And now after all these years he’s finally remembered and come back! Moved away from that house and the woman and come here —I saw him in the back of the church one day. I wasn’t sure—but it was. The night after that was the night that he first broke in—and indulged his senses with me. . . . He doesn’t realize that I’ve changed,