The Miracle Worker by William Gibson

the wheelbarrow over, leavesit handy, rolls the bed off; VINEY puts the bed linens on top of a waiting boxful of HELEN’S toys, and loads the box on the wheelbarrow; MARTHA and PERCY take out the chairs, with the trayful, then the table; and JAMES, coming down and into the room, lifts ANNIE’S suitcase from its corner. VINEY and the other servant load the remaining odds and ends on the wheelbarrow, and the servant wheels it off. VINEY and the children departing leave only JAMES in the room with ANNIE and HELEN. JAMES studies the two of them, without mockery, and then, quietly going to the door and opening it, bears the suitcase out, and housewards. He leaves the door open.
    KATE steps into the doorway, and stands. ANNIE lifting her gaze from HELEN sees her; she takes HELEN’S hand from her cheek, and returns it to the child’s own, stroking it there twice, in her mother-sign, before spelling slowly into it:)
    M, o, t, h, e, r. Mother.
    ( HELEN with her hand free strokes her cheek, suddenly forlorn. ANNIE takes her hand again.)
    M, o, t, h—
    (But KATE is trembling with such impatience that her voice breaks from her, harsh.)
    KATE: Let her come !
    ( ANNIE lifts HELEN to her feet, with a turn, and gives her a little push. Now HELEN begins groping, sensing something, trembling herself; and KATE falling one step in onto her knees clasps her, kissing her. HELEN clutches her, tight as she can. KATE is inarticulate, choked, repeating HELEN’S name again and again. She wheels with her in her arms, to stumble away out the doorway; ANNIE stands unmoving, while KATE in a blind walk carries HELEN like a baby behind the main house, out of view.
    ANNIE is now alone on the stage. She turns, gazing around at the stripped room, bidding it silently farewell, impassively, like a defeated general on the deserted battlefield. All that remains is a stand with a basin of water; and here ANNIE takes up an eyecup, bathes each of her eyes, empties the eyecup, drops it in her purse, and tiredly locates her smoked glasses on the floor. The lights alter subtly; in the act of putting on her glasses ANNIE hears something that stops her, with head lifted. We hear it too, the voices out of the past, including her own now, in a whisper:)
    BOY’S VOICE: You said we’d be together, forever—You promised, forever and— Annie!
    ANAGNOS’ VOICE: But that battle is dead and done with, why not let it stay buried?
    ANNIE’S VOICE [ WHISPERING ]: I think God must owe me a resurrection.
    ANAGNOS’ VOICE: What?
    (A pause, and ANNIE answers it herself, heavily.)
    ANNIE: And I owe God one.
    BOY’S VOICE: Forever and ever—
    ( ANNIE shakes her head.)
    â€”forever, and ever, and—
    ( ANNIE covers her ears.)
    â€”forever, and ever, and ever—
    (It pursues ANNIE; she flees to snatch up her purse, wheels to the doorway, and KELLER is standing in it. The lights have lost their special color.)
    KELLER: Miss—Annie.
    (He has an envelope in his fingers.)
    I’ve been waiting to give you this.
    ANNIE [ AFTER A BREATH ]: What?
    KELLER: Your first month’s salary.
    (He puts it in her hand.)
    With many more to come, I trust. It doesn’t express what we feel, it doesn’t pay our debt. For what you’ve done.
    ANNIE: What have I done?
    KELLER: Taken a wild thing, and given us back a child.
    ANNIE [ PRESENTLY ]: I taught her one thing, no. Don’t do this, don’t do that—
    KELLER: It’s more than all of us could, in all the years we—
    ANNIE: I wanted to teach her what language is. I wanted to teach her yes.
    KELLER: You will have time.
    ANNIE: I don’t know how. I know without it to do nothing but obey is—no gift, obedience without understanding is a—blindness, too. Is that all I’ve wished on her?
    KELLER [ GENTLY ]: No, no—
    ANNIE: Maybe. I don’t know what else to do. Simply go on, keep doing what I’ve done, and have—faith that inside