Flare Path by Terence Rattigan

Author:Terence Rattigan
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Nick Hern Books

ACT TWO

Scene One

The same, about three hours later.

PETER is sitting on the fender and PATRICIA is sitting above the fire. MAUDIE is in a chair, right, apart from them. Coffee things are on the table, right. The wireless is going.

ANNOUNCER.… at the controlled price of two and ten a pound, and will shortly be obtainable throughout the United Kingdom. (Pause.) That is the end of the nine o’clock news. Tonight’s talk is by a sergeant wireless operator from one of the Stirlings which took part in this afternoon’s strikingly successful raid on the harbour and docks of Kiel.

PATRICIA. Turn it off.

PETER does so.

You don’t mind, do you, Mrs Miller?

MAUDIE. No, thank you. I wasn’t listening, anyway.

The bar door opens and DORIS appears, accompanied by a rattle and hum of voices. She has a drink in her hand and a set of darts.

DORIS. Anyone hear the nine o’clock? I clean forgot the time.

PATRICIA. We’ve just turned it off.

DORIS. There wasn’t anything fresh, I suppose. No pincers on anything anywhere?

RAF CORPORAL JONES appears at the door.

JONES. Come on, Countess. We still want a double-two.

PATRICIA shakes her head.

DORIS (to JONES). Take my turn, Wiggy. I’ll be back in a minute.

JONES goes out.

Why don’t you all come in here? We’re having a slap-up do.

PATRICIA. I don’t think so, if you don’t mind.

DORIS. Perhaps you’re right. The boys are a bit noisy.

PATRICIA (hastily). It’s not that.

DORIS. I know, ducks. You don’t have to tell me. Do you remember the old joke about wives waiting up for their husbands at five in the morning with a rolling pin? Makes me laugh sometimes when I think of it, it does, really. There’s a full moon tonight. I think I’ll just go and have a look.

She goes out of the front door.

PETER. I’ve rather taken to the Countess. What’s going to happen to her after the war, I wonder?

PATRICIA. Oh, she’ll go to Poland with her Johnny, and find herself mistress of an enormous estate, with thousands of serfs, or muzhiks, or whatever they are. She’ll probably make a big success of it.

PETER. Supposing there is an ‘after the war’.

PATRICIA. Or supposing there’s a Johnny.

DORIS re-enters and stands by the inside door.

PETER (slowly). Or supposing he wants to take her.

PATRICIA. Yes, that’s rather a point, I admit.

PETER. I’m afraid it’s the point. Our Countess has a personal interest in the war continuing.

DORIS. The sirens have just gone in Skillingworth.

JONES (off). What’s yours, Countess?

DORIS (over her shoulder). Gin and ginger. (To PATRICIA.) It’s on Hull, I believe, but they may drop a couple on the aerodrome. They do sometimes. Tinkerty-tonk, Mrs Miller!

MAUDIE. Tinkerty-tonk.

DORIS disappears into the bar.

PETER. Purely as a matter of idle interest – is there a shelter here?

PATRICIA. I don’t know. If there is I don’t suppose anyone would bother to use it.

PETER. I suppose if I’d been in England longer than a mere three months, I might become as blasé about raids as you are. (Sharply.) Listen! Those ours?

MAUDIE (breaking a long pause). Theirs.

PETER. Oh, are they? How do you know?

MAUDIE.

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