The final draft, November 17, 2007

Furniture
Copyright, 2007 by Peter J. Roberts

Setting, time and place
Furniture is set in the northeast, New England or parts of New York, during the Age of Electricity, but after the presidential election of 1948. Telephones, electric lamps, cars, trains, radios and other timeless devices are used as references but more later day ones (computers) have not, although they can be. All action takes place in the living room of middle class home, but off stages voices will be heard from other parts of the house. The home's location is deliberately vague. It could be rural, urban, or suburban with neighbors just next door or miles away, freeing the audience to place the house and the family in what ever geography they wish.

Characters
There are five acting characters. They are; Paul O'Malley, Kevin Butler, Dr. Joan Sullivan (Mrs. O'Malley), Linda O'Malley and the Desk.

Paul O'Malley (Paul) is in his fifties, fit and healthy and is an actuary at insurance company from which he will retire in the next few weeks. Act I opens with Paul reviewing the content of his and his wife Joan's home with an estate appraiser, Kevin Butler for an upcoming auction of most of their possessions.

Kevin Butler (Kevin) is in his early thirties and has taken over his late father's business, Butler Estate Appraisal and Auction Service. He an eager young man, it is apparent early on that running the business was not what Kevin wanted to do.

Dr. Joan Sullivan (Joan) (Paul's wife, aka, Mrs. O'Malley) is around 10 years younger than Paul and is a family doctor with her own practice in partnership. A very attractive woman, she looks at Paul's early retirement as an opportunity for her to do something else, perhaps in the arts.

Linda O'Malley (Linda), Paul and Joan's only child, is in her mid twenties and like her mother, a real head turner if head strong. She arrives in Act I scene 2, from New Jersey to help with the auction and subsequent move by Paul and Joan to another location, somewhere up north. The only heir to the estate, Linda has no interest in keeping anything, save for a twelve volume edition of the Oxford English Dictionary.

The Desk is a mature male, seen and heard as a character by the audience, but not by the other characters. He cannily anticipates what the other characters will say and do and make observations on their current and future actions, or lack thereof. The Desk also provides background information on itself and the family. The Desk is an “inactive” participant in the play.

Stage and props
Contrasting the plays title, the stage should be bare, if not barren, except for four folding chairs, a wood desk with a chair, a suitcase and a large, ugly, Victorian type lamp. A table can not be substituted for the desk.

The desk should represent one built around 1940 as a secretary desk. Importantly, the desk should be simple Americana and not an antique. Characters also use coffee cups and Kevin has a clip board with a well used pad attached. These are the only props required for the play.

Additional props may be used but should not detract from the overall effect of the interaction among the characters or clutter the stage.

Blocking
Characters enter the home by the front door which is at stage right. Other parts of the home, bedrooms, basement and kitchen are off stage at stage left. Characters leave for and return from carriage house by the front door, stage right.


Act I, Scene 1.

(“Paul” O'Malley and “Kevin” Butler enter stage left from elsewhere in the house. Kevin is carrying his clipboard with numerous notes.)

Paul
Well there's a thumbnail view of our modest estate. There's still more in the carriage house out back, but there's not a lot there; stacks of newspapers, a few pictures and dried up paint cans. Oh, and there's a brass bed up in the peak, but the springs are pretty well gone and the mattress long ago became an apartment house for field mice. The rest is just firewood, stacks of kindling and parts.

(they cross the stage and sit on the folding chairs, stage right.)

Kevin
Parts?

Paul
Oh you know, an old mower or stove gives up the ghost but we keep'em for parts. They never fit anything, always just a little off, but we hang on to 'em because someday they might. One dead lawn mower leads to another. After a while the place is full of useless relics.

Kevin (reviewing his notes on the clipboard)
I'll take a look in there tomorrow but overall, you've some nice pieces and many are in excellent condition.

Paul
We've never made a conscious effort to collect things but over the years, things seem to appear and then they start to take over.

Kevin
Like parts.

Paul
Yes, just like parts. We wondered who owned what, but I'll bet you've heard that before?

Kevin
Yes, many times. People don't realize what they've accumulated until someone shows up,

Paul (interrupts)
Like a long lost relative at the reading of the will.

Kevin
That too, or someone like me comes along with a dispassionate eye to determine what's in an estate and the actual value of its contents.

Paul
Actual value or what's actually junk.

Kevin
My father told me never to use the work junk.

Paul
What did he call the stuff people should just throw out?

Kevin
Items of undetermined value. You'd be surprised what people consider valuable. He always cautioned me about jumping to conclusions about a thing's worth. He'd say, “We just don't know enough about what people hold near and dear.”

Paul
Or we just don't know how stupid some people really are.

Kevin
Admittedly, that's also true.

(Enter Joan, stage left, the front door.)

Joan
How's my old coot?

(Paul and Kevin rise to meet Joan)

Paul
Ah, here's the lady of my life. Kevin, this is my wife Joan. Dear, this is Kevin Butler, the young man who is going to releave us of all this stuff.

Joan
Very nice to meet you Mr. Butler
(they shake hands while exchanging greetings)

Kevin
Mrs. O'Malley, or Doctor Sullivan? I go by Kevin.

(Joan crosses to stage left while speaking, placing her medical bag on the desk, returning to stage right and all three sit on the folding chairs.)

Joan
For me, it's both, depending on how the check is written, but for you Kevin, it's simply Joan. I hope you've not been too hampered by the intemperance of the old man. He's always found civil decorum a needless challenge and now that he's near retirement, the usual restraints are gone.

Kevin
To the contrary, he's been very helpful, more than what I'm accustomed. Most people tend to exaggerate or inflate the value of their possessions while Paul seems to think everything you own is, in his word, just junk.

Joan (laughing)
He has a way with words, doesn't he? Then I take it you've decided to do the auction and help us sell off our family's treasures. (sarcastically)

Kevin
Yes, indeed, I have. As I said to Paul during this initial inspection, you've some interesting pieces that will interest many buyers. I've already taken the liberty of speaking to some of them and there is keen interest in the sale, given the circumstances.

Joan
Circumstances?

Kevin
The fact that you're both alive and competent.

Paul (interrupts)
Excuse me for a moment Kevin....Dear, what of Mrs. Perkins?

Joan
She passed this morning around ten.

Paul (he claps his hands in a sign of victory)
Ah ha, Right on the money. I just knew it.

Kevin (confused)
I'm sorry. Was Mrs. Perkins a friend?

Joan (explains)
One of my patients. You have to understand my husband. He's spent most of his adult life working in the insurance industry as an actuary.

Paul (interrupts)
And a darn good one, too.

Joan (continues)
Throughout his career, its been his life's work to determine, with some exactitude, when people were going to die.

Paul (interrupts)
Or the likelihood of them being in an accident. Hit by a car. Fall off a bicycle. That sort of thing.

Joan (continues)
Or have an unfortunate and fatal accident.

Paul (interrupts again)
The “fatal” part is the key. In insurance, anything non-fatal doesn't count.

Joan (continues)
But his bread and butter, what he was paid to do, is to determine what he calls his D-three.

Kevin (puzzled)
D-three. What's D-three?

Paul (interrupts)
Drop Dead Date. I came up with the term. An industry standard now.

Joan (continues)
But my work as a doctor, is to keep people alive and healthy for as long as possible.

Paul (interrupts)
Past their expected and legitimate D-three.

Kevin
You seem to be working at cross-purposes.

Paul
That thought had occurred to us.

Joan (continues)
Over the years we've developed this little game.

Paul (interrupts)
I come up with the likely date one of her patients will die and she does her best to make a lier out of me.

Joan
I admit it might appear a little morbid and we certainly don't share the results of game with others.

Kevin
I can see how it could be misinterpreted, especially by the next-of-kin.

Paul
Oh heck, we all do the same thing. We're all going to check out, we just have a little fun with it.

Joan
Maybe “fun” is the wrong word but there have been some real surprises.

Paul (interrupts)
Charlie Johnson.

Kevin
Charlie Johnson?

Joan
In our little contest, Mr. Johnson holds the record for surpassing his D-three.

Paul (interrupts)
The guy had every ailment known to man and a few that should have been named after him but he just kept on going. Year in and year out, old Charlie hung on.

Joan (in a professional tone)
Mr. Johnson was blessed with extraordinary longevity.

Kevin
How long did he live?

Paul
Charlie went on for 97 years and added a few extra months for good measure. I had him pegged for no more than 85, tops.

Kevin (speaking to Paul and getting back to Mrs. Perkins)
So you predicted that Mrs. Perkins would die today?

Paul
Not exactly. There's only so much statistical analysis can do but I determined that within a margin of a few weeks, the old lady would be off Joan's patient rolls pretty darn soon.

Joan
It's unfortunate, but as he's getting older, he's been getting better at covering the spread. But let's get back to the auction.

Kevin
Yes, indeed, as I ways saying, this one is unusual because you both are alive, healthy and competent.

Joan
So you said.

Paul
And despite ample evidence to the contrary.

Kevin (continues)
And your only child,

Paul (interrupts)
Linda.

Kevin
Yes, of course, Linda has expressed no interest in receiving anything from your estate.

Paul
She wants none of it.

Joan
That's not entirely true. Remember, she wants the OED.

Kevin
The OED?

Paul
Of course, I forgot. (speaking to Kevin)
Remember the set of dictionaries I showed you downstairs. I don't know how many volumes there are.

Kevin
Yes, yes (reading his notes on the clipboard) The Oxford English Dictionary, third revised edition. There's twelve volumes and it looks to be complete, if dated.

Joan
Some words never go out of style but that's what she wants.

Paul
And all she wants. They'll be great for pressing leaves.

Joan (addressing Paul)
You're dating yourself. People don't press leaves anymore, they spray them with plastic, but I think our daughter will use them to document just how far off you are from the accepted norms of the language.

Paul
Accepted norms! What goes for today's norms are not worth accepting. Have you listened to the radio lately? Everything is new and improved. Or they'll make up a catchy, little gobbly gook, phrase-word because using a real one might be too difficult for the great unwashed to fathom.

Joan (getting back to the subject of the auction, addressing Kevin)
This is what I was feared, Kevin. Paul has some decided opinions that he's not adverse to share.

Kevin
It's a pleasure to hear an intelligent man speak his mind.

Paul
There are so few of us left.

Joan
Weathered, as he is, the last of the specie.

Paul
A proud reminder of what was.

Joan
All be it, a far distant reminder. But getting back to the reason we're having this discussion.

Kevin
The sale of your holding at an open auction.

Joan
But we've identified a few things that we want to take with us.

Paul
I've already pointed them out and Kevin has put a red tag on them.

Kevin
So the dealers will know not to bid on them during the auction.

Joan
Oh, good...We're keeping the bed room set, much of the kitchen things-pots, pans, dishes, the silverware....oh yes, and the short wave radio....

Paul
Even in retirement, I still need to receive my coded instructions from Radio Moscow.

Joan
Oh stop it...Kevin will get the wrong idea.

Kevin (reviewing his notes on the clipboard and joining in on the kidding.)
Despite the “red tag” you've no worry on that score. You seem like a red-blooded, God fearing, America First family to me.

Paul
Oh you can never be too sure about people now-a-days and you never know when there's a knock at the door and some guy in a trench coat say, “Are you now or have you ever been,”

Joan (interrupts)
Paul!

Paul
OK I'll stop.

Kevin (still kidding but back to the auction)
I don't think your Radio Moscow friends will think much of the auction. This is strictly good, old-fashion, American “cash and carry, capitalism.” Everything without a tag is available.

Paul (interjects)
And sold to the highest bidder.

Kevin
To whoever will pay the most on the day of the auction. But what I find interesting is you don't want the things that most families hang onto forever.

Joan
We're making a clean break.

Paul
We've had it with all this stuff. We're wiping the slate.

Kevin
You certainly are. I understand Linda will be arriving to help.

Paul
She's taking the train and should be here today or tomorrow. She was unsure when she could get away.

Kevin (speaking to Paul)
You said she lives out west.

Joan
Is that what he told you? She doesn't live out west. She lives in New Jersey for God's sake.

Kevin
I got the impression she lived farther away.

Joan (speaking to Paul)
Geography does not stop at the Hudson River, my dear and despite what you might think, New Jersey does not boarder the states of Utah or Wyoming nor does it lie off the Sea of Japan.

Kevin (looking to end the conversation)
You understand that I'll be around the house just about every day until the auction, cataloging the estate and asking questions about a particular object. The more information we have, the more valuable it can be.

Paul
As you know, I'm on a last vacation until I retire next month, so I'll be here to help, or be in the way.

Joan
And I'm closing down my practice, slowly. It's been difficult as some of my patients have been with me since the very beginning but we're happy to do what we can.

Kevin (he rises and starts for the door, looking back at the desk, stage left.)
Please go over the notes I've made and oh yes, Paul was unsure about the desk. Do you want to sell it or keep it?

Joan
You're right. We've avoided a decision on the desk but push has come to shove. It was here when we moved in and each one of us has used it, almost on a daily basis, all these years.

Kevin (walks over to the desk)
It's an American classic but not an antique in the traditional sense. It's still used in many offices and like most of your other things, the condition is excellent.

Paul
They don't make them like that any more do they?

Kevin
Those days are long gone. Do you know if this is one of the special ones.

Paul
Special? What could be special about our desk?

Kevin
With a secret compartment. A hiding place.

Joan
A secret compartment!

Kevin
Some of the workmen who made these desks installed a secret compartment known only to themselves. People have used these desks for years and never known about them.

Joan
Now that's interesting. But we've had it for more than twenty years, you'd think we would have found it by now.

Paul
What would be the purpose for a secret compartment that no one knew about?

Kevin
For fun. The workers had a chance to put one over on their boss.

Joan
They knew about it and the boss didn't.

Paul
That sounds so refreshing. Revenge of the little guy.

Joan (kiddingly)
You need to tell Radio Moscow about this one.

Kevin
It was a game they played among themselves. This style of desk was very popular and each had to be made exactly alike so office space could be planned around its size. Like so much else, there was no room for creativity. For the workers, doing the same thing day in and day out was boring. So some of them added their signature to a few of the desks, the secret compartment. They had a competition among themselves for the most clever and inconspicuous compartment.

Joan
Why didn't they just add their initials to a board?

Kevin
The boss would never allow it and much too obvious for these skilled wood workers and carpenters. When you think about it, anyone can put their initials on a piece of wood. There's nothing special in that. But installing a secret compartment that no one else could find and only they knew about, that was something.

Joan
We have our drop dead date and they had their secret compartment.

Kevin
Exactly. You've your game and so did they.

Paul
Do you think this desk has one ?

Kevin
It could and it might have two.

Joan
Two compartments! Why two?

Kevin
Manufacturing took a few weeks and at the final stage there were at least two master furniture makers involved. Each was responsible for particular part of the desk like the drawers or final finishing and they'd work at different times so they wouldn't get in each others way. If they wanted to add the secret compartment, this is when they'd do it, so the other wouldn't know about it. When the desk was finally done, they gather around and see if anyone could find a compartment. They must have had a good time, fooling each other, or trying to. Some desks would have one compartment while others had two. Most didn't have any, but they still had to look for them because they couldn't be sure.

Joan
Did they put anything into the compartment like a note or message?

Kevin
Not that I've ever heard. It wasn't like putting a letter in a bottle. Just making the compartment was enough. That was their message. They could do something no one else could.

Paul
They also knew how to make desks.

Kevin
They sure did.

Paul
Well with or without a secret compartment, if we decide to sell it, do you think its worth much?

Kevin
Not a lot but you can never be sure about a piece like this. A dealer may know a buyer who is looking for one and is willing to pay top dollar. Timing is everything, with a little luck added in. But you might want it for your new home. You'll probably need some kind of a desk and you've got a fine one now.

Joan
That's a good point that we've been dickering over. Why we've decided to sell everything except the desk is beyond me.

Paul
And now we add into the fray a secret compartment or even two,

Kevin (interrupts)
Or none at all.

Paul
Right, or none at all, feeding our procrastination on the desk. Maybe we should let it sit here, as we drive away.

Kevin (moves back to stage right for exit)
In any case, I've got to be off for another appointment. Review my notes and the estimates for opening bids at the auction. I've kept them low to avoid unreasonable expectations.

Joan
Kevin, I think you'll find our expectations are reasonable. All we really want is that after the auction, we'll be free of this stuff.

Paul
To desk, or not to desk. That's our only question.

(Kevin shakes hand with both Paul and Joan and begins his exit)

Kevin
It was very nice meeting you both. If you've any questions please feel free to ask. As my dad always said, “A well run auction is a joint venture.” I'll be back tomorrow morning at around ten, if that's OK.

Paul
Ten will be fine.

Kevin
Then I'll leave you to think things over, especially the desk, and see you in the morning.

(Kevin exits)

Paul (walking Kevin to the door as he exits)
See you tomorrow then.

(Paul returned to stage center right. Joan and Paul sit down on the folding chairs, stage right)

Joan
What a delightful young man.

Paul
You remember his father? We asked him years ago to look at the things we got from Aunt Silvia after she passed.

Joan
A tall, red haired man?

Paul
Yes, was him.

Joan
Now I remember. A very proper looking man with a bow tie.

Paul
He brought his son with him, who was around ten or eleven.

Joan
That young boy was Kevin!

Paul
Yes. He took over the firm a few years ago when his father died.

Joan
I'm sorry to hear that but it looks as if he's filling in for his dad just fine. He certainly seems knowledgeable. Was there anything else of note that caught his eye? What about all the books?

Paul
Ah, the books. Suffice it to say that our library is not on the same par with the Library of Congress.

Joan
We've a few of them. Surely they're worth something to someone!

Paul
I'm sorry, but not much. He did figure we've over three thousand, scattered throughout the house.

Joan
He didn't count all the books did he?

Paul
No. He used a trick he learned from his father, called a shelf length estimate.

Joan (somewhat incredulous)
A shelf length estimate?

Paul
It's really very simple. You estimate the length of the average shelf then you determine the average number of books on each shelf. From then it's a simple process of multiplying the number of shelves by the average number of books and you come out with a ballpark total. The formula even allows for books that are piled length-wise on top of books. An elegant system which in our case yields approximately (Paul looks at the notes given to him by Kevin) three thousand, four hundred and twenty-seven books. There's a margin of error of about three hundred volumes. Oh, and he deducted the OED that Linda wants.

Joan
That's all very interesting but can he sell any of them?

Paul
He was not encouraging. He immediately wrote off you text books from medical school as worthless.

Joan
I half expected that.

Paul
Things have changed since you were taught to throw bones on the floor of the cave and chant in a circle walking backwards.

Joan
It wasn't that long ago but I get your point.

Paul
The same is true with most of my business books. He did get a chuckle from “Modern Ethics in American Foreclosure.”

Joan
I remember your machinations over that one. It almost went out the window.

Paul
It should have. He's a cleaver young man and asked me what was wrong with the old ethics in foreclosures.

Joan
What did you tell him?

Paul
I said in the bad, old days, if you didn't leave the house they'd shoot you but in the new ethical business environment, they move your stuff on the street and let you stay until you starved to death.

Joan
I'll bet that put his mind to rest. But what about the others?

Paul
He counted three, soft cover copies of A Separate Peace.

Joan
Why do we have three copies of A Separate Peace?

Paul
Who knows? Why do we have one copy?

Joan
But what about all the others?

Paul
He said that most seem too well read.

Joan
“Too well read?”

Paul
They carry the stigma of being read, sometimes more than once. The binding are bent, pages folded and a few he opened had pages underlined and notes written in the margins.

Joan
Pristine, un-read books are best.

Paul
I'm afraid so. Except for a few first editions, our library is of value to us and to few others. He said after the auction, what didn't sell he'll cart away. He'll try libraries first, then some used book stores and finally.

Joan (interrupts)
Let me guess. To the dump.

Paul
Indeed. The dump is where most of them will end up.

Joan
Did he see anything that might be of value?

Paul
Yes he did and here's a surprise. The ugly lamp.

Joan
Not Aunt Florance's monstrosity!

Paul
One in the same. Style and taste may change but the French Whore House look has made decided come back. He thought it would bring in top dollar.

Joan
It's hideous.

Paul
That's part of its “unique charm.” My love, its another example of the triumph of style over substance.

Joan
It seems we've lots of worthless substance, like our books and very little style.

Paul
Its our unique charm.

Joan
We still have to decide about the desk. Maybe we should just leave it.

Paul
With our three copies of A Separate Peace. But it's late and I'm getting hungry. Why don't we see what we can make in the kitchen.

Joan
Yes, I'm a little hungry too but we need to decide about the desk.

(Paul and Joan move stage left, toward the kitchen)

Paul (while exiting)
Yes we do but we've got a week until the auction and my stomach clock has gone off.

Joan (remains on stage)

You go ahead. I'll be right in.
(now speaking to herself while contemplating the desk)
A secret compartment that none of us knew about for all these years.

Paul reappears, stage extream left)
Paul
Or maybe two or none at all.

Joan
We'd have known. Surely one of us would have found it.

Paul
Or them. But remember what Kevin said. Some compartments so well constructed and hidden they were never found. But come love. Let's leave the mystery for a while and feed ourselves.

Joan
You're right. I'm hungry too. The desk will be here, but we've got to make a decision.

Paul
It's always been here and will for at least a while longer. Let's eat.

(Paul and Joan both exit, stage left, for the kitchen)

End of Act I, scene 1.


Furniture
Act I, scene 2
(The Desk enters, from lower stage left to upper part of stage left.)

The Desk (speaking to the audience)
They've not made a decision about me. Are you're surprised? They are. Will wonders never cease?

You want to know about me. What are my details? They're important to you and you place in them in high regard, as you do yourselves. But candidly, you've been known to gloss over your details, preferring what you call the big picture and fearing that a closer look might not support the larger canvas. I know the value of standing back from the portrait. I am, after all, a desk.

All right then. My details. I'm exactly five feet long and a trim three feet wide. Despite the years, I'm happy to report, I've still all my screws. Each one is stainless. The attentive will learn more about my screws. The in-attentive need not fear. There will be no test, unless self-inflicted.

My writing surface measures thirty inches from the ground, a perfect height for most when I was crafted. People were smaller then, as were giants. I've eight square legs, each with a gentle –- I like to say, “sexy” –- taper. Each leg has a square, brass floor shoe, measuring exactly one and one half inches high. They used to polish my shoes twice a year and how they'd shine in the morning sun. There's no time for that now. Shining in the sunlight carries less importance in today's incandescent world. Mr. Edison's doing.

I weigh a healthy 206 pounds and my pop-up, spring-action typewriter table, made to appear like a set of draws on my right side, can handle the iron clad Underwood Number 5 with ease. I've also room for a ream of bond paper and box of legal size envelopes.

My left side is all drawers, three in fact. Each is as deep as I am wide, adding to my utilitarian delight. They're stuffed with ease. Inside are bills, letters of undermined value, advertisements and announcements for things that are not certifiably useless but do not have the urgency that's reserved for the in box.

Stuffing is deliberate mental process. It rewards the user with the assurance that they were indeed “filed” while still avoiding the question of their ultimate disposition. My deep, bountiful drawers are a purgatory for papers that are not quite ready to cross the river of the underworld, for the trash basket.

My center drawer is nineteen and one-half inches wide, two and a quarter inches high and has permanently installed, molded wood tray on the right side. The tray was optimistically designed for pens, pencils, a protract -- which is never, ever used -- a ruler, the inevitable collection of well entangled paper clips and three or four hard, dried up erasers, none of which can be thrown out with a clear conscience.

I've found that the circular trays contains an average of 24 cents in coins with at least two nickels, the balance in pennies. There is also nearly a dollar's worth of postage stamps in various amounts, brought on by the periodic but highly predictable changes in postal rates.
Oh, I've two wrist watches tucked way in the back. Frozen in time, but exactly correct twice a day, they are too precious to discard and too expensive to repair. The leather bands are while well wore but classified as usable. In truth, neither had the stamina to keep on ticking.

(Enter Linda, stage right, the front door)

Linda (carrying her suitcase)
Hello. Is the museum still open?

(Paul and Joan enter quickly, stage left.)

Paul
There's our little girl from way out west.

Joan
The museum is always open for its benefactor.

(Hugs are exchanged in typical, warm, family greetings)

Paul (stepping back to stage center)
Let me look at the princes.

Linda twirls and does a curtsy.

Linda
I hope all is pleasing for my lord and lady.

Joan
Linda, we love you dearly but please don't feed him with more idolatry. As you know all too well, he's difficult enough as it is. But how was the train?

(Joan and Paul sit in the chairs while Linda moves about the stage.)

Linda
It was a beautiful ride along the shore. I kept wanting pull the cord and stop it so I could run on the beach. I didn't and the train kept going. But had I gun I would have shot a few of the passengers, at least one in particular.

Paul
The passengers? What did they do?

Linda
There were two other women in the car and both were, oh how shall I put it? Matronly.

Paul
They were old hags.

Linda
They were ancient. Leaving me the only prospect, real or imagined, for the male passengers. One was particularly repulsive. So full of himself.

Joan
Sounds all too familiar. You were the object of his polite interest.

Paul
And entirely understandable. You're a healthy looking girl.

Linda
Dad, I endured being a “healthy girl,” as you put it, since I put down the roller skates. I prefer being a woman now. There was a time when you'd be rushing out the door to ring the necks of these lechers and their less than wholesome designs on your healthy girl, without her skates.

Paul
Yes, I surely would have but the train has left the station.

Linda
It left years ago but enough of my tribulations. How goes the divorce?

Paul
Divorce. What are you talking about?

Joan
I think she's referring to the disposition of our estate. A good term, I think.

Linda
Thank you mother, but I don't see anything missing. Nothing is out-of-place. All the crap is still here.

Paul
Don't be fooled but what you don't see. Despite what your eyes tell you, we're making progress and we've retained a very nice young man to help with the process. You'll meet Kevin Butler tomorrow. He'll be managing the estate sale and the removal of what doesn't sell.

Linda
You could just put the collected artifacts on the curb and watch the scavengers work over the piles. We could sell tickets and have a keg of beer.

Paul
There's an idea. A community event. The high school band could play.

Linda
Sosa to serenade the trash pickers.

Joan
Paul, please. Linda, you're making light of a difficult time for us.

Linda
Why is it so difficult? Just shove the stuff out the door.

Joan
It's difficult but not for the reasons you may suspect. It is the accumulation of things. You father is retiring, I'm closing up my practice and we're both saying our good-byes to people, and yes, to things, that we've known for a long time. Here you come, prancing in on the latest of your occasional visits and wondering why the God took nearly a week to make the universe.

Linda
The universe was the easy part mother, it was all the added stuff that he's paying for now. The garden and that jackass Adam. He should have stuck with light and darkness.

Joan
Linda, please! You're being curt and not the least helpful.

Linda
I'm sorry but I hope you'll not take another twenty years to determine what part of our glorious family history is just so much bunk.

Joan
Linda, you think you understand but you don't.

Linda (interrupts)
Mother! I understand. I thought we all did.

Paul (addressing Linda)
Linda, listen to her.

Linda
All right. Go on.

Joan
There's so much we agreed on. We took stock of ourselves and this family and we didn't like was we saw. We were like everyone else but we knew we weren't and we both thank you for pointing this out to us.

Linda
It was decision we all took.

Paul
Yes you were and we all agreed that the “crap” as you call it, was taking over.

Linda
Father, it was running things. The Stone Age had taken over. Look at this place!

Paul (frustrated)
OK, OK. Let's not go over that again. But remember, you've not been here and we have. We've had to decide what “crap” we should hang onto. And it's true the majority of our possessions have no value to us, there are a few things that we've debated, in your absence. Kevin has been a great help in this regard. He knows his stuff and I think you'll like him. He calls our situation “Dewey Defeats Truman, twice removed.”

Joan
I've not heard this one yet.

Linda
What does Dewey Defeats Truman have to do with us?

Paul
Remember the picture of Harry Truman right after the election, holding up the newspaper with the headline about his defeat to Dewey. He had a big smile.

Linda
Yes. Truman won. Dewey lost. The newspaper got it all wrong.

Paul
Right. The newspaper printed thousands of copies of that edition, each with the same wrong headline.

Linda (getting a little impatient)
Dad, it's an old story. What's the point?

Paul
I'm getting to it. The photograph of Truman with the newspaper in hand was picked up by every wire service. It was on page one of every daily. That actual picture, while noteworthy, became less interesting because everyone had seen it. It was everywhere.
But the the original newspaper, the one that said “Dewey Defeats Truman” became famous, or infamous if you wish, not because it was wrong, which it was, but because it was photographed with Truman holding it up.

Joan
I think I'm missing something.

Linda
I'm with you mother.

Paul
Don't you see? The value of the incorrect newspaper, if you had one, far exceeds the value of all the other newspapers with Truman's photograph mocking it. The error is worth more than the truth. There were millions of newspapers with the picture of Truman holding the newspaper that was false. But only a few remain of what was thought to be true but wasn't. The greater value resides, in what isn't than what is.

Joan
I've never considered our estate sale a metaphysical statement.

Paul
Now maybe you should.

Linda
I'll have to meet with this guy Kevin, but for now, I'd like to sleep on the metaphysics but not with Mr. Dewey or Mr. Truman. It's been a long day for this healthy woman.

Joan
Kevin will be here around ten, but have you eaten?

Linda
I'm fine mother. I think it's time bed. I hope contenders doesn't mind.

Paul
Yes, you're right. I'm going to the office tomorrow for the last time.

Linda
I thought you were done with them.

Joan
So did we but they called a few days ago and asked him to come in briefly.

Paul
For the life of me I've not a clue what they need. I made a point of dotting every last 'i' but it's possible something came up that I didn't finish.

Linda
They want that last pound of flesh.

Paul
Oh don't be so hard on them. They're just trying to make a buck. I'll be home by noon.

Linda
One last item. What about the desk?

Joan
I knew as soon as we realized that we've not made a decision on it, she'd bring it up.

Paul
You both have a clairvoyance that drives me batty. It's just a damn desk.

Linda
So you've not decided to sell it, bring it or leave it.

Simultaneously
Paul Joan
Sell it Bring it

Linda
Now there's a consensus. Should we ask Truman, Dewey or a headline writer?

Paul
Now I hear some battle music. Pipes, drums and everyone dressed to the nines. But on another front, we did learn something interesting about the desk from Kevin.

Linda
Was it Truman's or Dewey's?

Joan
Neither that we know, but we may have a special desk, or maybe not.

Linda
A special desk or not? That's definitive. Have you checked out this guy Kevin?

Paul
We learned from Kevin that some of these desks had a secret compartment installed during manufacturing.

Joan
A few had two compartments, installed by carpenters knew about their compartments but didn't know about the other.

Linda
And that makes this a special desk?

Joan
That's the point, we don't know, and no one else does. You never found a hiding place in it, did you?

Linda
Of course I did. That's where I kept the maps to the buried treasure in the back yard. But let's take a stab at reality; even if the desk had a secret compartment, does that make it so special?

Paul
Of course it does! Oh, you're just too cynical. We may be the proud owners of a repository for messages, long forgotten.

Linda
Have you looked for any of the “secret” compartments?

Joan
Remember Linda, Kevin said there may be two.

Paul
No, we've only found out about the possibility today but you'd think that one of us would have found it, if there was one.

Linda
Or two. But let's get some shut eye. I would like a hot cup of tea.

(All three walk to stage left, toward the kitchen)

Paul
We've a special on tea tonight. You just missed the crowd.

Linda
I knew I'd picked the right place to stop.

Paul
We're not picky. We'll take in anyone.

Joan
At least for the next few weeks. Then you'll have get your tea on your own.

Linda
There are worse fates. But I'll have my dictionary and you'll do without.
All three exit
(The Desk enters, stage left to stage center)

The Desk
The chair has a an understandable prominence but without a desk, where would you be? What was your first chair? Was it a tree limb or a flat rock? Anyone can sit on a rock and do nothing and for thousands of years, nothing is what you did. You sat and if you thought at all, your intellectual curiosity was confined to the next banana.

Granted, the chair has prestige. Monarchs sit on one and legal arguments are made before the bench, a variation on the chair's theme. Academics hold a chair while the less august, or less lucky, are given one
But to do something, a chair needs a desk and not a table. The distinction is obvious. The table is lap, writ large. It's for still life paintings; apples and pears on its surface, doing nothing. A reason its called “still life”. A grand and absurd parity of what isn't. Dewey Defeats Truman.

A desk is for work. A blind man could see the necessity for a desk. “Serve your breakfast cereal on the kitchen table” he might have said, “but if you wish an epic or two, please clear the fruit from my desk.”

I'm getting all worked up and I shouldn't. It's most un-desk-like.
They claim I'm all oak but that's not true. Inside, where one really has no business in peeking, there is birch. The birch supports my drawers, keeping them straight and true; a concession to function over altruism. What is 100 per cent of anything, anyway?

Oak is not suited for intricate, utilitarian purposes, like a moving parts, a drawer. Hard woods don't like to admit it, but sometimes soft wood is better. The truth can be disconcerting but purist can rest assured, I've no veneer. Oak, solid and true, the birch excepting, is what I am.

I came from one “old growth” tree and what a tree it was, measuring nearly three hundred feet. Its roots burrowed deep into the earth, making a subterranean maze of roots and rocks to anyone wishing to till the land. This rich earth was a wonderful incubator for oak but not for corn.

More than two centuries ago, the tree was a fortunate sapling. Oak is notoriously unkind to potential progeny. Saplings scattered by the score, most are snuffed out by older branches, denying the sun's light.

Some struggle in the shadows to a height of a few feet, but inevitable is, the inevitable. They wither and feed, without pomp or fan far, they cycle you call mulching. They give back to the land with an innocent reluctance. They could know no other fate.

The great oak was hurriedly felled on a late November day. A darkening sky and fast moving clouds bode to all the coming December. The limbs were cut-- it took four teams of trimmers two days – and the oak was again cut into seven, round lengths, each about forty feet long.

The lengths were hustled to the river by a teams of work horses. The team consisting of six members, each content with their job and position, there was also a driver, a helper and often a dog with a red neck scarf, meant to inform hasty hunters of its un-deer like nature.

Unceremoniously but with a great splash, into the river the pieces were tossed. Ice was forming modestly and not yet an encumbrance but ice, none-the-less. The down river journey took nine uneventful days. Log jams are a peak season problem when hundreds of trees vie for river space. Only an occasional shove was needed to keep the wood train moving.
The great tree's lengths arrived in Pittsfield in the second week of December, was surprisingly warm and dry for the men working the river. Each length was retrieved by workers from the Edmund J. Walker and Sons furniture factory, of the same city. It was there that the oak's parts were cut to size and I was crafted.

Yes, I know. Can something be legitimately “crafted” at a factory? The answer turns on one's perspective. In defense of “crafting” I'll turn the question around. Aren't we all alike or manufactured? Or is each of us, however so slightly, crafted differently? I'm decidedly with the later view. My parts were allowed to dry. There was a fire which, was a comfort and a seed of foreboding. It was a wood fire. Naturally, the great oaks parts would have preferred a fuel less close to home. Coal would have done just as well.
-26-

Eight men “crafted” my parts by hand, and like the work horses, each knew their task; cutting to standard, rough finishing, sanding, final finishing, applying three layers of stain, then two of varnish, drying and adding another coat of varnish. Making me took less that a few hours for gluing and hand screwing.

One chap, an older man with bright, brown eyes, walked the factory floor with a square and level checking and correcting variations between what was suppose to be a ninety degree angle or bubble that was a shade off to the right or left. Some workers thought he was deaf, but he could hear just fine, except for excuses.

I was crafted in nine days at Walker & Sons then I was sold, sight unsee, to Mr. Benjamin Gage, attorney at law and the original owner of this residence. My journey here was nearly two hundred miles was by river barge, railroad and wagon. All went well, save for the last twenty feet. Attorney Gage miscalculated, either by misunderstanding the circumstances or from shear neglect. An occupational consistency, I'm told.

I arrived on a cold but dry January morning. Four workers, hired by Attorney Gage, unpacked me and spent the better part of that morning trying to get me into the house.
I was turned up-side-down and sideways and my drawers were removed; all to no avail. They said I was too big. I think it's more accurate to say, the doorway was too small. In either case, Attorney Gage's new desk, me, was outside looking in.

Attorney Gage had exhausted all appeals. He could find himself stupid and lose the case or he could change the rules. He chose the later. He had the workers remove, encumbrances: the front door, molding and the support beams. I was moved inside. I've been here ever since.

Attorney Gage was not well liked as his practice was largely devoted to finding loopholes for the wealthy and pitfalls for the less prosperous. When he died, there was talk of having him repose on my top since I played so great a part in his efforts to impoverish all but the most comfortable.

His few heirs thought otherwise. A bachelor, his memorial service was brief and appropriately affordable. The house was put up for sale and as an added inducement, I was added to the property. The front door's size was non mentioned during the sale process.

It appears I'm in the mist of another controversy. Is there a secret compartment or even two? And if so, did anyone know? What could it or they contain?
How silly. I've heard all their secrets. Secrets are their life-blood, flowing through the bodies until they're cut. Then they bleed. It flows, red and rich, staining the patchwork they call the family. They think selling everything a remedy. Yes, I may have a secret compartment or two or none at all. I might be just a desk; mere furniture. I know what I am. I'm an oak desk. Can they, or you, speak with the same assurance? Did Dewey beat Truman?
(The Desk exits, stage left)
End of Act I, scene 2

Furniture, Act II, scene 1.
(Next morning. Linda enters from stage left, the kitchen, wearing casual clothing, not a night gown or bathrobe.)

Linda (walking to the desk, speaking to herself, between sips of coffee)
So, Mr. Desk your secrets may or may not be out. Oh dear, have I made an assumption of gender? I don't think so. You do have a masculine charm that I've always admired. It will be hard parting with you but somethings just must be done.

(Linda sits at the desk, rubbing her hands on its surface, sipping her coffee. The Desk enters, stage left to center left)

The Desk
Gender was never a question during my crafting. According to the bias of the time, my typewriter stand would indicate use by a woman, a typist. But the intension of my makers was always slanted to the masculine. Oak is dark, solid and strong, much as the men around me envisioned themselves, evidence to the contrary not withstanding. Real men didn't need to type, they thought. Thus, my masculine bent.

(The Desk retreats to lower, stage left)

Linda (again addressing The Desk)
You present an interesting dilemma for my wonderfully confused parents. They just don't know what to do. Each wishes the secrets they hold, would just go away, like they are doing or be open, for all to see. But you and I, Mr. Desk know the truth, don't we. (she laughs) Which one of us will spill the beans?

(Enter Paul and Joan, extream left, hurriedly moving to stage right, front door.)

Paul
Good morning dear, you're up early.

Linda
As are you both.

Joan
We're late.

Paul
I'm off for the office, for God only knows what.

Joan
And I've got some patients who are right now wondering where the heck I am.

Paul (addressing Linda)
You remember that Mr. Butler, Kevin, will be here this morning.

Linda (moves to stage right, guiding them to the front door.)
Yes, our salvation and the last Dewey fan on the planet.

Joan
Let's try and avoid the melodramatics. He really is a very nice young man.

Linda
So you've said. After hearing his presidential theory, I'm holding off judgment.

Paul
You could do worse, and have, but we're off. Try and be nice to Kevin, dear.

Linda (pushing them gently out the door)
Yes, father now both of you leave. Mr. Desk and I've much to discuss.

(while they are leaving, stage right)

Joan (off stage right, the front door)
If you find a secret compartment...

Linda (cuts Joan off)
I'll be sure to keep it a secret.

Joan and Paul exit.

Linda (returns to the desk chair, stage left, coffee cup in hand, while addressing the desk)
There is so much we both know, Mr. Desk but unlike you, I'm not telling until I have to. Until then, let's just keep this between you and me. I'd offer you some coffee, but I recall you don't much care for coffee. You've felt too many spills. But it's time for me to refill my cup.

(Linda exits to the kitchen, stage left, white The Desk re-enters, lower stage left to center stage.)

The Desk
Secret desk compartments were not unusual and were quite common in the more ornate, French models and less so the hearty, nothing-to-hide, American variety. What is shared by the ornate and utilitarian is the lock for drawers and the lost keys. Something I've never understood. Why is the key to a desk lock nearly always misplaced?

Legions of desk users do not intentionally throw the keys to the wind. To the contrary, most keys are held with reverence and respect. Desk keys are smaller than others so the size differences can explain some of the loss, but usually the keepers of the keys go to extreams to identify and safeguard their desk keys. Seldom do they prevail.

Like most keys, desk keys have a ring at the top,so it can be hung and safeguarded on a hook, chain or nail. To further guard against confusion and loss, most have a tag reading,”desk” making the confusion of purpose even more remote.

The problem arises, as in so much, with the passage of time. A few fortunate desks are secured at the end of the day. Habit being the best teacher, these keys are seldom lost. But most of us left unlocked and this is where the link between key and lock dissolves.

My center drawer lock has never been used, not once. The key and the lock were always assumed to be compatible. My key was removed and placed on a hook in the kitchen closet. Hard as it is to fathom, this was done so I'd not be locked with the key inside.

If my key were the sole purpose for the hook, I'm sure the key would still be available. The hook appeared naked with but one, small key. Others were added.

First came suitcase keys. Are there more useless keys? Why try to steal the content of a suitcase when a thief could make off with the case and open it at his leisure? Next came a key found on the sidewalk. Its owner might yet show up. The rule is hard and fas. A key is never, ever discarded.

The builder of the basement storage closets added locks, each with a key and a number. None of the corresponding five closets were likewise identified. The number of keys on the hook was seven.

There's a strong box in the attic. Fearing that if locked, it could never be opened, it has always been unsecured, just like a desk.

It contains a silver plated ring with the initials JSM. Who JSM is lost to history but like the key on the sidewalk, JSM may yet show up. There are three theater stubs for a show that no one in this family remembers seeing and a dozen Roman coins. Like millions of others in thousands of attics on all continents, the pail rendering of some “Caesar” suggests the empire's decline. He appears neither strong or wise. Being Caesar, however briefly, was enough. The strong box key was added to the hook.

What doomed my key was man named Frank. Frank was painter who was hired to paint the closet. Frank was left to his own devices, including the removal of the closet's content before painting. He placed the keys on the hook in a cup. Into the cup were added coins found on the floor, a religious pin of some importance to someone and two keys for the front door.

After he finished, Frank put the all the keys back on the newly painted hook. It was a difficult manurer as the gobs of new paint on the hook took up more space than previously. There was less room for the keys. The hook reached a saturation point.
Jarred with each opening, keys fell off the hook, landing on the floor near the trash can. Rather than adding a second hook, each key discovered on the floor was returned to the hook. This worked well enough until the trash can was moved inadvertently, under the hook. My key landed on the newspaper and remained there until removed with the can's other content. I've been key less ever since. And so has this family.

(Desk exits, stage lower left)
Door bell rings.
(Enter Linda, stage left, cross stage to extream stage right, the front door.)
(Enter Kevin, stage right, front door)

Kevin
Good morning. You must be Linda. I'm Kevin Butler, the appraiser.
(they greet, shake hands)

Linda
Yes, good morning, my parents said you would be by. Would you like some coffee?

Kevin (Kevin puts his notes and clip board and sets them on the desk)
Not just yet, but thank you. How was your journey?

Linda
From way out west?

Kevin
Yes, New Jersey, isn't it?

Linda
Surprisingly, I had very little difficulty clearing customs.

Kevin (laughs)
Nothing to declare?

Linda
Just my innocence. So your going to rid us of all this stuff.

(Linda sits down at a chair and motions to Kevin to join her, which he does while continuing.)

Kevin
I'm going to try. There's a good deal to catalog and identify but there is much interest in the auction among the collectors and dealers I've contacted.

Linda
That's good to hear. It's terrible to throw a party and have no one come.

Kevin
Oh I've no doubt that your party, as you call it, will have a good turn out. It's not a large estate but the auction's appeal is its unusual nature.

Linda
Unusual. How so? You do this all the time don't you?

Kevin
Yes, I do but as I've said to your parents, the liquidation of an estate while the owners and heir are all very much alive and healthy is out of the ordinary. For me, it's also a lot of fun. I don't get a chance to speak to the owners of things too much. If they're not dead, well, there's a lot of drooling.

Linda (laughing)
We should all be six feet under or crazy as a loon wearing a bib.

Kevin
That's generally the case. The owners, if still breathing, are, shall we say, not competent or otherwise unable and the heirs just want to get things over with and collect the cash. But of course, that's not the case here. There's not even one attorney.

Linda
I hadn't considered that but you're right. Not one “whereas the party of the first part...” or “being of sound mind and body” to muddy the waters. How refreshing. No paying by the billable word.

Kevin
Yes it is and that's one reason this is so much fun for me. Then are your parents. They're remarkable and fun to be around. The two are so very different.

Linda
But they get along, or try to. They mix but it's like oil and water.

Kevin
Quick separation.

Linda
Yes, they've been known to need a good shake.

Kevin
We all need a good shake every now and then.

Linda
Or things settle to the bottom.

Kevin
And never make it to the top. Turmoil has its place.

Linda (laughing)
I've never consider the positive aspects of turmoil. Why this is special. No lawyers and an honored spot for turmoil. How perfectly wonderful. I don't think I've ever met an appraiser before. You might be my first.

Kevin
Yes you have.

Linda
Have I! Don't you have a guild and wear a secret ring?

Kevin
Yes, but I left my ring at home. Our meetings are held a midnight in museums, during a full moon, but when its cloudy so we can't be seen. Appraisers are very secretive, but don't tell anyone. It's a secret.

Linda
You said I've met an appraiser. In an earlier reincarnation or the one I'm in now?.

Keven
This one and any that came before. We're all appraisers. I just happen to get paid for it.

Linda
Oh, it's early. But please go on, Mr. Appraiser.

Kevin
We appraise everything and everyone. We know what and who we like and assign a value to it or them.

Linda
This is getting deep. Are you sure you don't want any coffee?

Kevin
No, not yet but deep, not really. You see a dress in a store window and its price tag. You make a judgment about the dress relative to its price.

Linda (beginning to catch on)
Or the opening bid. An appraisal.

Kevin
Precisely. You may not like the dress so you judge its value to be less than someone who does, making two values for the same dress. Two appraisals, one dress.

Linda (jokingly)
Life is just a parade of dresses. You men got left out again.

Kevin
A slight simplification but either you like the dress at its price or you don't. It has value to you that you are willing to pay or it doesn't. We do the same with people, places we visit the music we hear. And we try to accumulate the things and people we appraise as valuable to us. We spend our entire lives appraising and accumulating. That's why what you and your parents are doing is so interesting although others might find it scary.

Linda
Scary. How is our auction scary? We're getting rid of all the dresses we don't want.

Kevin
You've appraised the collected items of your past at no value. Your not only walking by the dress shop but all the other stores. You're not buying anything because, unlike everyone else, nothing in any of the store windows has any value to you. Which suggests a question for you.

Linda
Let me guess. You want to know why I don't want anything except the dictionary.

Kevin
Yes. This is a modest estate but there are some notable items that many would want to keep and hand down. But you've expressed no interest in anything except for a slightly dated edition of the Oxford English Dictionary.

Linda
Mr. Butler

Kevin (interrupts)
Please, call me Kevin.

Linda
Yes, of course, Kevin. Nice name. Short and unpretentious.

Kevin
I've known no other but I was “junior” for what seemed like an eon.

Linda
I was always “Doctor Joan's daughter.”

Kevin
I was an only child too.

Linda
Always the youngest in the room during holidays with old aunt so and so wondering, as if it mattered “How's school going, dear?”

Kevin
And no one else to help do the dishes.

Linda
Always on “best behavior”

Kevin
Is there any other kind?

Linda
And the tag team.

Kevin
Tag team?

Linda
You know. You're getting the better of one.

Kevin
Oh yes. Just when one is ready to give in, the other shows up, fresh and rested, to go another round.

Linda
And they wonder why we're so tough.

Kevin
I had never looked at it that way, but you're right. We were always were out numbered.

Linda (getting back to his question)
And you wonder why I don't want this stuff?

Kevin
Yes I do. There must be some trophies from victories that you'd like to keep.

Linda
Trophies. No, not a one. I'll ask you a question. Do you still have your high school ring?

Kevin
Somewhere, I think. Like most, I stopped wearing it soon after graduation.

Linda
It doesn't mean much to you now, does it?

Kevin
Point well made. Its value to me has diminished.

Linda
The dress in window.

Kevin (conceding)
Just like the dress in the window.

Linda
I've given this some thought. Nothing around here means much to me. If that's the case for me, it would be more so for anyone else, like any children I might have.

Kevin
But don't you think they'd enjoy learning about you by your history?

Linda
I'll write my own history, after making it, thank you.

Kevin
I believe you shall.

Linda
I've explained myself, slightly. And what of you? What history are you writing?

Kevin
Or making.

Linda
Thank you for reminding me. There is what happened and then there is what is said happened.

Kevin
And the two seldom coninside. Wasn't it Ford who said,

Linda (interrupts)
History is bunk.

Kevin (laughing)
Yes, that's it. You know what Bonaparte said.

Linda
I should remember.

Kevin
History is a myth agreed upon.

Linda
Well, it is! Dewey Beats Truman.

Kevin
You're Dad told you about them.

Linda
Yes, when I got in last night. Granted, I was tired but I my image of you was not enhanced by the analogy. Today I'm pleasantly surprised.

Kevin
I'm glade to hear that but in the interests of accuracy, the headline was, “Dewey Defeats Truman” not Dewey “Beats” Truman.

Linda
I sit corrected.

Paul
Remember, you're speaking to one who makes a living on the value of artifacts. Someone, somewhere might want my high school ring.

Linda
Or more likely, no one. The newspapers that reported the election correctly are worthless. The one that didn't,

Kevin (interrupts)
Is the one with value. I prefer to use value rather than worth. Everything has a value, however remote but not everything has worth.

Linda
Oh, you are fun. Why weren't you on the train?

Kevin
On the train?

Linda
Window shoppers. OK Mr. Value, explain your existence.

Kevin
Should I skip birth and toilet training?

Linda
Only if they're significant.

Kevin
Not dramatically so.

Linda
The go on.

(Kevin walks over to the desk and pulls out his files and paperwork)
Kevin
I grew up with old things. The house was filled with them and each was connected to a piece of paper.

Linda
A house full of antiques and paperwork. How ghastly!

Kevin
Or what was thought to be an antique or something of value, however remote.

Linda
There's that word again.

Kevin
Yes, something of value. I learned a lot from my father about things. Where they came from, who made them, what they were used for and their possible “value” (emphasis) to others.

Linda
An interesting education.

Kevin
I suppose it was. Since papers and things was all I knew, I never gave it much thought. If this is what you know, then this is what you know.

Linda
Or possibly, all you know.

Kevin
One hopes not.

Linda
If you've always have a toothache.

Kevin
You don't know what it's like not to have a toothache. You could have picked a better metaphor.

Linda
It's still early. Go on. The toothache.

Kevin
My father never really had a job, at least that I was aware of. He dabbled with people and things and that's how he started the business. He used to say it was a fortuitous accident.

Linda
An accident?

Kevin
Yes, an accident. When his father died.

Linda
Did you know your grandfather?

Kevin
No, he died with I was very young as did my grandmother.

Linda
You didn't know either.

Kevin
No, but I did know their stuff. One day, I was around six or seven, it all arrived. After my grandfather's burial it all showed up at the house. I watched men unloaded everything on the yard. Tables, chairs, lamps, books, clothing, everything they had. My grandparents rented their house and the owner needed to clear things out.

Linda
So that's how your father got into the antique business.

Kevin
Not directly. He didn't want the stuff.

Linda
See! Doesn't that sound familiar?

Kevin
It was all piled on the lawn and a neighbor saw a chest of draws and asked my dad what he wanted for it. Soon the chest was gone and my dad had a few dollars in his pocket.

Linda
Isn't sentimental capitalism grand?

Kevin
So it occurs to my dad that if without any effort he could sell something he didn't want, maybe with a little effort he could sell more.

Linda (looking at his business card)
Thus Butler Estate Appraisal and Auction Service.

Kevin
My dad never had to really work a day in his life again.

Linda
And you're carrying on in the bold, family tradition.

Kevin
But not by design.

Linda
Another accident?

Kevin
An accumulation of accidents.

Linda
I'm intrigued.

Kevin
It's really quite simple. I was broke and when dad died my mother asked me to close things up.

Linda
That sounds simple. Just cart it away like we're doing.

Kevin
Then she died and I was stuck.

Linda
With all the stuff.

Kevin
And the papers. My dad had contracts pending and I knew about the value of things, or so some thought.

Linda
The knowledge of what it all means.

Kevin
Knowledge. Yes, I suppose that's true.

Linda
And here you are.

Kevin
Yes, here I am, prying into your past.

Linda
To sell to the highest bidder.

Kevin
That's you dad's phrase.

Linda
I think its been said before.

Kevin
Once or twice.

(they both laugh)

Linda
So what do you need me to do?

Kevin (sitting at the desk, going over his notes)
Right now there's not much. But I would like that cup of coffee.

Linda
Of course. Come into the kitchen and I'll pour you a cup. It still should be fresh.

(Linda and Kevin exit, stage left for the kitchen. The Desk enters again, lower stage left to stage center)

The Desk
While it might appear that I'm entirely composed like others of my style and model number, this is a popular misconception. I was one of the first to have my innards joined by the newly devised stainless steel screws. A remarkable innovation it was.

My immediate predecessors had steel screws, all flat tip and they worked fine. I've no reason to speak disparagingly of my kin, but the air, even in ratified climates, contains moisture. In chemistry and in life, moisture and steel inevitably leads to rust.

The introduction of my stainless steel screws was entirely accidental. They arrived at the factory but on opening the crate, it was immediately noticed that they were shinier than the screws used previously. Everything else was in order, the length, width, tapering and each had a flush top. The invoice was checked it was determined that the screws were the new stainless steel ones.

Marketing was still in its infancy but the new screws did suggest an opportunity to further enhance my stature.

“Made entirely with stainless steel screws” and “the new standard in durable excellence” were attached to my promotional literature. Predictably, sales increased.

(Linda and Kevin enter, coffee cups in hand, stage left to stage right and sit down. The Desk moves to lower, stage left.)

Kevin
The coffee is good. Thank you.

Linda
I don't think they've decided about the desk.

Kevin
As of yesterday, that was true. I have to tell you I've found it strange that they've agreed to sell everything else but the desk.

Linda (interrupts)
Or otherwise dispose of.

Kevin
Yes, or simple throw out. Everything but the desk.

Linda
I think the chair will suffer the same fate as the desk.

Kevin
Yes, we've not mentioned it but I would assume that would be the case.

The Desk
Going back to the very first of my style, the possibility of crafting a matching chair was never pursued. The assumption was two fold; my makers were in the business of making oak desks, not chairs, oak or otherwise. They drew a line over which they refused to cross.

They also believed, and not without some justification, that a chair, its very nature being one of near constant contact with the user, should be decided by personal contours, rather than the established standards of manufacturing. They wisely decided to forgo making chairs, leaving that robust decision, to others.

(The Desk exits, stage left)

Linda
The desk was here before us and it's the one thing we've all shared. Mom studied at it during medical school. Dad used it as an office when he didn't have one.

Kevin
When he didn't have an office at work?

Linda
He's retiring a few years early, he's done close to twenty with the company, but there were many times that he was between jobs. The desk was his office. I used it for homework and the like. We all had our own drawer. The one on top, predictably, was for Dad. The middle one was for mother and I used the one on the bottom.

Kevin
What about the middle drawer? Was that for guests?

Linda (she laughs)
Entirely neutral ground.

Kevin
A no man's land.

Linda
Or no women's land. We had two drawers to his one.

Kevin
Can I ask you a question?

Linda
I brush at least twice a day, sometimes more. That's what they tell us to do on the radio.

-42
Kevin
Your not married.

Linda
Yes, and in my mid-twenties. I'm just an old hag in training.

Kevin
Hardly. I'm single too.

Linda
I'm not married and to be honest, my prospects for being married any time soon are not good.

Kevin
You've not a boy friend?

Linda
Oh, please, not you too.

Kevin
I don't mean to offend.

Linda
You're not being offensive, to the contrary, you shyness is cute. But no, I've not a close male companion, or as is said, a boy friend.

Kevin
How come?

Linda
You may have answered your own question. I've no interest in boys, at least not lately, so I've no interest in having a boy friend.

Kevin
Oh, I see. You want a real man.

Linda
No. I don't want a “real” man either. There's so over rated. I don't want Aunt Tilley's lamp or the tea service from China.
(aside) There's a cup missing, by the way.

Kevin
Yes, I noted it yesterday.

Linda
I threw it at the door.

Kevin
Thus, the missing cup.

Linda
Or the extra saucer.

Kevin
The glass is half full.

Linda
And so it is. My glass if brimming.

Kevin
Just don't throw it at the door.

Linda
I will if I want to. I've no need for boys needing someone to cover their butts when they screw up or wipe their nose on a winter's morning. I don't need a he-man, a preacher, a teacher, a lecher or a best buddy to trade baseball cards. And if I want to sweat, I can put on a sweater and go for a long walk.

Kevin
Will you go out to diner with me this evening?

Linda
An impulsive question deserves an impulsive answer. Yes I will. My word, a first date. Is it my worth or my value?

Kevin
I've not completed my appraisal, but no sweating, I promise.

Linda
No. No sweating, (emphasis) I promise.

Kevin
I really must get to work if I'm going to rid you of all this stuff. Oh, and about tonight, after we eat, would you like to go dancing?

Linda
Oh, I love to dance. Just like my dad. He taught me.

Kevin
Your dad's a dancer?

Linda
That's what he always wanted to do. You should ask him about his first love but can you dance?

Kevin
A little but to be on the safe side, I'll not wear my boots.

Linda
My toes thank you. Dad and I used to dance the waltz to the Blue Danube.

Kevin
Ah, Mr. Johann Strauss

Linda (interrupts)
The Younger.

Kevin
Yes, there were a few of them. Hard to keep them all straight.

Linda
Not on The Blue Danube.
(Linda begins to dance around the floor and hum The Blue Danube. Keven, enchanted, joins in and the two dance a modest waltz, both humming The Blue Danube.)
Oh...this fun.

Kevin
Yes, it is. You dance very well.
(They stop in mid stage. Kevin makes a formal bow while Linda does a deep curtsy.)

Kevin
If I'm going to releave you of all this stuff, I really get must to work. We'll dance more this evening.

Linda
I would like that very much but you are right, please do what you have to releave us of all this.

Kevin
I've not been to the carriage house. Could you give me a tour?

Linda
I've not been there in years. When I was young I used to hide there. There was a big, brass bed in the peak that would catch the afternoon sun through the window. I'd sit up there with a book or nothing at all and watch the spiders build webs in the rafters.

Kevin
You're not afraid of spiders.

Linda
I'm deathly afraid of spiders. Those hairy legs, justs like a man. But the webs are a marvel. Let's go and see what other treasures we can find out there to throw out.

Kevin (as they are leaving)
Or sell.

Linda
To the highest bidder.

Kevin
Yes, indeed, to the highest bidder.

(Linda and Kevin exit, stage right, the front door. The Desk enters, stage, lower left to stage left.)

The Desk
The concept of issue avoidance is storied one, needing no explanation. In their conversation, sex is implied as a good way to sweat, but entirely avoided. Likewise, the secret compartment or a pair of secret compartments or the complete lack thereof. A lovable consistency, don't you agree? Of course you do.

When you scratch you own hidden parts, what is it that you find? Is it oak or birch?

(The Desk exits, stage left)

End of Act II, scene 1.

Act II, scene 2. (later in the afternoon of that same day)

Enter Joan and Paul (front door, stage right. Kevin is sitting at the desk, going over his notes.)

Paul (to Joan as they enter)
I hope your day was better than mine.

Joan
Oh dear, that doesn't sound good.
(Addressing Kevin at the desk)
Kevin, please forgive my husband. I sense one of his moods is coming on and I was hoping that this last visit to the office would be a pleasant one.

(Joan puts her doctors bag on the desk and the two meet, stage center, exchange kisses and sit down)

Paul
It wasn't.

Kevin (to Joan)
You go right ahead. As you can see, I've some notes to go over. I'll not be interfering will I?

Joan
Certainly not although I suspect we might be interfering with you. Did you and Linda meet?

Kevin
Yes we had a very nice conversation and we're going out to diner tonight.

Joan
Oh, that's lovely.

Kevin
So is she. She took me out to the carriage house and we looked things over. I've a question on one item there.

Paul
I'd be happy answer what I can, but first let me recount my absolute last day at the office.

Joan (patronizingly to Paul)
Alright dear, tell the doctor all about it.

Paul
Just when I thought they could never get any lower on the food chain, wham, they lay on a new bacteria.

Joan (kiddingly)
Are the plans for the surprise retirement party askew?

Paul (serious)
There isn't going to be a retirement party.

Kevin (trying to make an exit)
I think I'll be off to check out the carriage house again.

Paul (still upset but lightening up)
No, no, you stay right where you are. You're not interfering in the least.
(speaking to Joan)
If I thought I could get away with it, there'd be a neck tie party.

Joan (again, trying to smooth things out)
Let me guess. One of the new bosses would be guests of honor.

Paul
Drawn and quartered would be too kind.

Joan
Before we review all the options of medieval execution, please fill me in on the inquisition.

Paul
The day started out just fine. I got to the office and chatted with a few folks and there was not just a little envy in the air. I'm cutting out and most of them are still tied to the wheel.
(speaking more privately to Joan) And some of the young bucks think you're still the cat's meow.

Joan
As well they should. Oh how I love to make them purr.

Paul
I think most of them will miss me because you will not be stopping by the office to say hello.

Joan
There was one young man, tall and very muscular,

Paul
David Scott

Joan (she begins to fantasize)
Yes, that was his name. David, if you were not around and,

Paul (interrupts)
And you thought you could keep up with a twenty-five year old.

Joan
Is that all he is?

Paul
He's only voted once and you my dear,

Joan
Yes, I know. I've seen a few elections.

Kevin (interjects)
Dewey Defeats Truman.

Joan (sarcastic)
Thank you Kevin for reminding me but I missed that one.

Paul
Any way, after all the young bucks saw that I was still around and you were spoken for, McKenzie comes up to me and give me the, Gee you look great and we're sure going to miss you routine.

Then he asks me to come into his office. I knew some thing was up when he offered to get coffee and instead of sitting behind his desk he says the two of us should sit on the couch, like we were old school buddies.

Joan (speaking to Kevin)
If you hadn't figured, Mr. McKenzie is

Paul (interrupts)
Was...

Joan
Was (emphasis) Paul's boss.

Kevin
I gathered that.

Paul (continues)
So he ask for your and Linda and says he might come by for the auction. I'll shoot him if he show up. Then he starts to lay it on pretty thick. How I've been a team player and how they always could depend on me no matter what. He goes on for a while and I'm thinking why is he waisting so much of my time and his.

Joan (interrupts, more sarcastic)
After all, you're such a busy man.

Paul
You know what I mean. I don't have to listen to him anymore.

Joan
Go on.

Paul
Then he gets to why the heck he asked me to come in. You remember Jerry Thomas.

Joan
Yes, of course. Than very nice young man you hired a few years ago.

Paul
He's another one that thinks you're just swell.

Joan
Ah, isn't it a shame all the good young ones are married.

Kevin
No all of them.

Joan
I'll remember that Kevin. Go on Paul.

Paul
So McKenzie goes on about how the company needs to cut back on costs, to shore up the bottom line.

Joan
You've been in on that bottom line.

Paul
You could say that.

Joan
I just did.

Paul
Then he gets to Jerry. He wants me to let him go. He says since I'm still with the company and his department head, it should come from me. The bastard.

Joan
Just like that. Come on in and while you're getting ready to leave, here's a guy to fire. The bastard.

Paul
He had a termination letter, with my name at the bottom, a final paycheck and even a company letter on retirement.

Joan
He's young with a new wife and baby. He needs a paycheck not a retirement plan.

Kevin (interjects from the desk)
The bastard.

Paul
So I thought for a moment and said yes, I would do it. I would let him go.

Joan
You did what?

Paul
I wanted to speak to him, one-on-one, because I wanted him to know what I thought about him, and not what the letter said.

Joan
OK, that makes sense. Did you offer him a cigarette and a blind fold?

Paul
Please. After the ass left, Jerry comes into the office and we spend a little time going over things, none of which I could care about and all of which he was polite enough to bring up, when I get to the reason we're meeting in McKeniez's office and why I'm there today.

Joan
Did he get the hint?

Paul
Of course he did. He's no fool. He knew what was up. I didn't have to say a word before he's telling me what a pleasure it has been to work with me and how much he's learned.

Joan
He let you off the hook.

Paul
No. I gave him the news and he looked like I just gave him a pay raise. Here's a guy with a new wife and baby on the way and I've just told him that the packet they made for him had his last paycheck and he's telling me what a great guy I am.

Kevin
He must have been in shock.

Paul
No, Kevin. Maybe we're the crazy ones.

Joan
What do you mean?

Kevin
Yea, this is another interesting family story.

Joan
And he's not even in the family.

Paul
The man is shaking my hand, hoping retirement will treat me well and that everything is all right and by all means, don't worry about him.

Joan
Who fired who?

Paul
That's what I was thinking. I told him that he could use me for a reference and I'd be happy to help in any way I could.

Joan
Did you ask him what he might do?

Paul
Yes I did. And this is the funny part. I thought he'd be unsure, just being fired and all, but no, he said he had an idea about a restaurant.

Joan
He wants to open a restaurant.

Paul
Well, sort of. The way he explained it to me, and remember we had a brief talk, was his restaurant wouldn't have many tables or chairs.

Joan
What would people do? Stand around with plates and silverware.

Paul
No, they'd take the food back to their cars and eat it there.

Joan
Eat the food in their cars.

Paul
Yes. All the food would be served in plastic containers, even the forks and spoons would be plastic or wood, and they'd come to the restaurant and bring the food to their cars.

Kevin (listening in)
Who would want to eat like that and how would he make any money?

Paul
That's what I was wondering. He said that it might sound strange but if you thought about it, the one thing people don't have anymore is time. Everyone is so busy we don't have time to even eat.

His idea is to get some kind of food, any kind of food, to people quickly and he might have a point. He figured since he's not paying for waiters, waitresses or dish washers and keeping the menu limited, he could cut his costs down to nothing.

Joan
The customers are doing most of the work.

Paul
You could look at that way. They're doing everything but the cooking. They even take away their own trash. And he's got a name for the restaurant.

Joan
Oh dear. What would that be?

Paul
Jerry's Go and Gobble.

Kevin
I'll pass.

Joan
I'd pass out.

Paul
I didn't comment on the idea except to wished him well. Then he's out the door. His desk is cleared in no time and this smiling, happy, just-fired young man is waving to all in the office as he's leaving for the last time.

Joan
Speaking of the leaving the office for the last time.

Paul
Yes, this was it for me. After I was done with Jerry I said my fond farewells to everyone for the very last time and I was out the door too.

Kevin (interjects again)
Right after Go and Gobble

Paul
Just the “go” part.

Joan
Speaking of gobble, I'm off to the kitchen. Kevin, will you join us for something to eat?

Kevin
Yes, that would be nice, if is not too much trouble. But there are a few questions I like to ask about some things I found today.

Paul (speaking to Joan)
Dear, why don't you go and do what you can in the kitchen and I'll see if I can help Kevin.

Joan (while exiting)
That's a deal. I've seen your work in the kitchen. You might try for a job with Jerry.

Paul
Hey, they said Columbus would fall off the edge.

Joan exits

Joan (off stage voice)
If only he had.

Paul
Kevin, enough about me. How are things going with our auction?

(Kevin leaves the desk and sits next to Paul)

Kevin (reading from his clipboard)
You've 11 lamps, most in good to excellence condition ranging in age from a few years to a turn-of-the-century converted electric with the original shade...estimated price $200

Paul
Did you find any real gems?

Kevin
Only one 26 year old. And what a gem she is.

Paul
Be careful my boy. Many before you have heard the calling, but few were chosen.
Did you get much accomplished, aside from our 26 year old beauty.

Kevin
Yes I did. I completed the inventory and evaluations of everything in the house and Linda and I toured the carriage house.

Paul
Oh, that's good. I was going to ask you about that but I see you've beat me to the punch.

Kevin
You were right, there wasn't much there but who is the Army Officer in the photograph.

Paul
The Army officer?

Kevin
Yes, there's a large, framed photograph of a man with a chest full of medals. If I knew more about him it might be worth something, especially if you had the medals.

Joan (calling out from off stage, in the kitchen)
The family's one military hero dear....

Paul
Of course. Major Silas Witherspoon, late of the Grand Army of the Republic.

Joan (enters, briefly from stage left, speaking to Kevin)
Please don't get your hopes too high on selling his photograph. His story is not quite up there with Pershing.
(now speaking to Paul)
I'm going to see about lunch. Dear, would you enlighten Kevin about the true military exploits of the good major.

Paul
I'll be only too happy.
(Linda exits again, stage left, back to the kitchen)

(Paul now speaking to Kevin)
Major Witherspoon is on Joan's side of the family.

Kevin
It sounds like you don't want to clam him?

Paul
Let's say I'm pleased to note his blood line isn't in my system.

Kevin
You've got to tell me about him. He was a major?

Paul
Oh yes indeed. He started the Civil War off as a major, but instant promotions were not unusual. He went from civilian to major in an afternoon.
(Paul thinks for a moment)
OK, here's the story of our family hero.
After the attack at Charleston in South Carolina.

Kevin (interrupts)
Sumter. Fort Sumter.

Paul
Yes, Fort Sumter. Silas was caught up in the patriotic fervor sweeping the country and like many able bodied men, looked for ways to serve the Union.

Kevin
He became a major?

Paul
Be patient my boy. At the time Silas made a living by investing in other businesses and concerns. He was a speculator of sorts but strictly small time. He had an interest in some farm land and a few shops. He seems to have made a small but consistent profit.

Kevin
He was in the middle class.

Paul
Yes, you could say that. He kept his ear to the ground and when he saw an opportunity, he'd grab it. As most capitalists know, there's no better time to make a buck than during a war but as we all know, wars can be messy. So Silas was caught between two conflicting urges; to serve his country and take care of business.

Kevin
A rock and a hard place

Paul
More like a rock and a green back. Silas received his commission in early 1862 and was just about to be sent south when the reports came back from the fighting at Bull Run.

Kevin
The Union didn't do well.

Paul
No they didn't. The north got its butt kicked. This was an aspect of the conflict that was not lost on Silas, who was now awaiting orders as Major Witherspoon. It dawned on him, and many others, that in the war, a man could get killed. This tempered his initial enthusiasm, but as a new major he needed to do something to justify his uniform. As you can see from the photograph, he cut a fine image with his gold buttons and sword. Giving them up would be difficult.

Kevin
He wanted the uniform but didn't want to fight.

Paul
That's a fare statement.

Kevin
So what did he do?

Paul
He came up with a brilliant military strategy designed to serve the Union's cause and keep him out of harm's ways and Lee's bullets.

Kevin
Which was?

Paul
The dangers on the northern front.

Kevin
The northern front?

Paul
Yes. While most of the fighting was in the south, where the southern armies were, the northern states, New York, Vermont, New Hampshire and Maine were exposed to a possible invasion by Lee's armies from Canada.

Kevin (beginning to catch on)
Where the rebel armies weren't.

Paul
Exactly. In war, so Major Witherspoon's reasoning went, one can never be too sure, especially where Robert E. Lee was concerned.

Kevin
How was Lee supposed to get to Canada?

Paul
That's a detail of Lee's Southern Invasion from the north that was never fully explored. But in a series of letters to the war department, which further delayed his deployment to the south, he managed to convince them of the dangers of a southern storm, via Montreal or even Toronto. He painted a grim picture of helpless towns and cities lying in waste to the marauding horde of Lee's Army of Northern Virgina.

Kevin
Lee was actually a thousand miles to the south.

Paul
True, but in his correspondence the image of the flag of the Confederacy flying over the state capital in Albany was a real possibility. Lee's army was called the Army of “Northern” (emphasis) Virginia further suggesting his real designs.

Kevin
And they bought off on this danger?

Paul
Not completely. To sweeten the deal, the major offered to organize a brigade to protect the northern front and monitor the trade going over the border with a special eye to things that might be useful in the south's war effort.

Kevin
Like gun powder, shot...

Paul
And Scotch whiskey.

Kevin
Whiskey?

Paul
Yes, whiskey. It all comes together soon.

Kevin
Go on.

Paul
Silas was not without connections in the war department and perhaps in an effort to get him off their backs, they accepted his proposal and the Witherspoon Northern Brigade was born, commanded by Major Silas Witherspoon. It was headquartered, with some political logic, not far from the endangered State Capital in Albany.

Kevin
To the relief of everyone.

Paul (laughing)
It was a small brigade, no more than 300 of like mined men, but they did have some grand parades and fired off their cannon for the Fourth of July. Taking his role of protecting the north with all seriousness, the major, his aids and escorts made periodic visits to the “front lines” near the Canadian border and it was during one of these visits that he intercepted a four wagon, convoy of Scotch whiskey.

Kevin
Bound no doubt, to aid the rebells.

Paul
A real possibility. The major immediately sprang into action and impounded the wagons. As a further safeguard, least they fall into the wrong hands, he had them moved to his farm for storage.

Kevin
What a patriot.

Paul
Indeed. For the remainder of the war the whiskey sat at the farm, safe from rebel hands. But at war's end the major “discovered” the forgotten whiskey and was faced with another problem.

Kevin
What to do with the whiskey?

Paul
Yes. The war was over so there was reason for sending it to Washington and there was the question about how much the major should charge the war department for storing the whiskey on his farm.

It was around this time that Silas considered running for political office. He had served so ably during the war, peace time service made sense. The problem for Silas was that his service was something short of valiant. Having never ventured any farther south than Poughkeepsie, the major might find his service lacking if compared with an opposing candidate who actually fought at Gettysburg or rode with Sherman to Atlanta.

Kevin
What did he do?

Paul
That's where the whiskey and the photograph came in.

Kevin
And the medals?

Paul
Them too. Silas found that voters, all of whom were men, were more inclined to support his candidacy, with a liberal distribution of the aforementioned whiskey. Some might call it the spoils of war. Silas preferred the “fruits of victory”. In either case, he won four elections to congress in handy fashion. It worked out to one wagon of whiskey per election victory. He commissioned the photographic studio, what was their name?

Kevin (reading from his notes)
On the back of the photograph it says, James L. Lamore, Photographer.

Paul
Yes, the Lamore Studio, to immortalize his war profile and exploits.

Kevin
But he had no war exploits, except for the whiskey.

Paul
That's where the photographer comes in. It's more style over substance. What's real and what isn't. If you wait long enough, memory seems to blur.

Kevin
Aided by some whiskey, perhaps.

Paul
Yes indeed, the whiskey would help and some medals provided by the photographer.

Kevin
So the medal weren't his.

Paul
Of course not. To get a medal you've got to do at least something. Maybe just show up. Silas didn't even do that. His detractors, at least those who didn't get the whiskey, called him the “Rock of Niagara Falls” but armed with the whiskey and a photograph with a chest full of medals, he was a shoo in. He had four terms in Washington and a fifth seemed likely.

Kevin
What happened? Did the whiskey run out?

Paul
His wife shot him, right between the eyes. They said it was such a clean shot, looking down at him at the funeral, it could have been a third eye.

Kevin
You're going to tell me how this happened!

Paul
It's not hard to figure out. She found the congressman in a comprising position with another woman and perhaps a second.

Kevin
At the same time.

Paul
So it was said. Silas has a reputation for getting things done, fast afoot, so it was not surprising that he might try to kill two birds with one stone.

Kevin
What happened to his wife.

Paul
She got off.

Kevin
For shooting him?
-60-
Paul
The sheriff said it was an accident.

Kevin
An accident, right between the eyes!

Paul
Accidents happen and had there been a trial, things would have come out that might not reflect well on the late congressman or his many supporters. He had a robust payroll, and not all of these paid positions were, on the up and up. And he did have a storied career during the war.

Kevin
On the Northern Front, headquartered in Albany. Is this the same Witherspoon on Witherspoon Hall at the university?

Paul
One in the same.

Kevin
With the statue out front.

Paul
Major Witherspoon, sword draw on his steed, urging his gallant men on,

Kevin
To the Canadian border.

Paul
And four wagons of whiskey.

Kevin
How did we get Witherspoon Hall?

Paul
The same way everything gets a name. We find the least offensive and settle. They could have called it Washington Hall but we've got too many of them. The same with Lincoln. So why not Witherspoon? A major in the War. A congressman. A business man. And if you forget he was plugged by his wife, a devoted husband and family man. Besides, he was dead and it didn't matter. They had to call it something.

Kevin
I think will pull the photograph from the auction. The frame is good however.

Paul
If you can sell it, by all means do so. You're going to diner with Linda?


-61-

Kevin
And then some dancing. Linda said you're a dancer.

Paul
Oh, I'll tell you about my dancing days. Let's go see what Joan is doing in the kitchen.

(Both head to stage left, the kitchen)

Kevin
Yes, I wanted to ask her about her old doctor's bag and instruments. It seems a pity she wants to sell them off. And you've still got to decide about the desk...

Paul
Perhaps you can convince her otherwise about the kit and yes, I know, the desk. What to do with the desk?

(Kevin and Paul exit stage left)

End of Act II, scene 2.


Act III, scene 1, (later that evening)
Paul and Joan are sitting in the folding chair, both reading sections of the newspaper. Desk enters, briefly from stage left)

The Desk
I've been moved twice since my entrance into this house.
(with blocking)
From here to here and back again to here.
(The Desk moves from stage left to stage right then back to stage left)

Joan
Any more thoughts about the desk?

Paul
No. What do you think?

Joan
Moving it will not be easy.

Paul
It was here when we arrived.

Joan
You're suggesting we should leave it.

Paul
No, I'm merely saying it was here before us.

Joan
And thus suggesting it should stay after we leave.

Paul
Or come with us to a place with a wide door.

Joan
And less narrow halls.

Paul
That too.

The Desk (from stage lower left)
As a writing surface, indeed, as with all writing surfaces, I'm closely associated with bad news or the things in life people would rather not think about. I am used to forestall, and sometimes defeat the more unpleasant occurrences in life. More often I'm used as an instrument of unconditional surrender.

Joan
Why are we having such a hard time with the desk?

Paul
We've never moved it. Maybe that's why

The Desk (from stage lower left)
They've forgotten about the boy who used to help them here. His name was James Black but they called him Jimmie. He helped move me more than ten years ago. A nice boy, he gently lifted me up, kept his end well off the floor and then set me down. It was when they were painting the house on their own, or trying to.

Paul thought I wouldn't have to be moved but Jimmie thought better and prevailed on Paul. The two of them moved me away from where they were working and covered me with drop cloth. It was a smart move. Paul knocked over a half-filed paint can sitting on my top. Today, I could be pea green.

There's a reason they forgot about moving me and Jimmie. They've blocked it out, just like they're trying to do with history. Jimmie went away and never came back. He's still living somewhere but no one is sure just where. Neither is Jimmie. You had one of your conflicts and he joined up. “Staff Sergeant James Eliot Black, 24th Infantry Division, Mechanized, United States Army” sound pretty impressive, doesn't it? Unless you're what's left of Jimmie. He was welcomed home and everyone was there, except of course the young man who went away.

Paul
Let's not forget what's in the attic.

Joan
Oh, Lord, the attic.

Paul
We got up there but its not a pretty picture. Boxes on top of boxes.

Joan
That's my point. Here is the desk, sitting right in front of us and we've still not decided what to do with it.

The Desk (moving to and seated at the desk)
I served as a connector to the world, and not all the connections were pleasant.
(Desk reads from a folder of papers he is carrying)

Dear Mr. O'Malley. Thank you for sending us your resume. Unfortunately, we've no openings for your particular skills at this time....Very truly yours.......

Mr. Paul O'Malley and Dr. Joan Sullivan. After a through review of your taxes returns, this department has determined that you owe, as of May 1, the sum of two thousand, four hundred and ninety-seven dollars for the prior tax year. This office must receive payment in full by June 1 or additional legal remedies will be pursued. Very truly yours, R. Thomas, collections bureau.

As with everything, the slight and mundane are always the most bothersome.

The Desk continues to read
Dear Dr. Sullivan. While you may believe that our medical lenses are defective, we've determined that they meet accepted standards. Your request to return these items is rejected.

Dear Mr. O'Mallley The Speedy Radio Corporation stands behind every radio we sell with an unconditional, one hundred percent guarantee. Your Speedy Radio, “The World Unifier” model number 1412-B, the ninety day warranty had expired by a full month. You may ship it to us, postage paid, for a repair, at our standard rates of twelve dollars an hour, or parts thereof. Sincerely. Your friends at Speedy Radio.

Not all the arrows are pointed personally, but they try to hit their mark, with varying degrees of success.

Dear Concerned Citizens....(Desk looks up from the letter.)

One wonders how they'd address Unconcerned Citizens or the “concerned” who aren't citizens?

You can make a difference. Yes you can (The Desk pauses) Your donation to (The Desk pauses) will enable us to (The Desk pauses) so together we can stop (The Desk pauses) Send your check today to (The Desk pauses) and on behalf of your friends at (The Desk pauses) we thank you.

Then there are life's small blunders. The slight ticks that, piled on top of one another, push many over the edge.

Miss Linda O'Malley. Your scholarship application is rejected. As is clearly stated on page twelve, section eleven under the heading, Parents or Guardian History, you failed to note if Dr. Joan Sullivan, is a parent or a guardian and if the latter, was guardianship formally granted and if so, by what court and in which state or county. We wish you well in your academic purists. Sincerely, the Scholarship Committee.

A letter from a committee. You can't even run over a committee.

(The Desk begins to slowing exit, stage lower right)

They tend to forget these cuts and think them healed over time. Some do while others make a scab that never goes away. My surface is clean and pure. In moments of weakness many have thought of carving into me. Initials or some other sort of rot but not once has anyone given into the temptation. Why you might ask? Because I'm all they've got to measure themselves. If I'm marred, however slightly, then so must they.
We've an unacknowledged bond. What, after all, are secret compartment for if not for secrets.

Enter Kevin and Linda, front door, stage ext ream right

Kevin
Hello folks. The kids are home.

Linda
We've let ourselves in.

Paul
I noted that. Next time I'll get my gun and fire away.

Joan
Kevin, don't listen to him. He doesn't own a gun and if he did, he wouldn't know which way to point it.

Kevin
Linda and I did the town.

Paul
So it looks. She didn't take much time to dazzle you.

Linda
Dad, you know I come from a line of dazzlers.

Paul
It's in the blood...

Kevin
From which side?

Linda
Yet to be determined.

Joan
OK you two. I'm happy you had a good time but while you were lighting the lights, we've been thinking about the auction.

Kevin (kiddingly)
Auction? What auction?

Paul
With particular attention to the Desk.

Linda
You're going to sell it!

Kevin
Or take it with you.

Joan
Neither.

Paul
Or may both.

Linda
You've not decided.

Joan
That's definitive. We've not decided.

Linda
I'm going to make some tea. Would anyone like some?

Kevin
Yes, please.

Joan
Me as well. I'll join you. Let the men talk.

(Linda and Joan exit to the kitchen)

Kevin (sitting down next to Paul)
Linda is a good dancer but she says you're better.

Paul
She's too kind but we both have great legs.

Kevin
Did you study dancing?

Paul
I gave it a try, but actually, not a day.

Kevin
It's a little different than being an actuary. Why didn't dance in school?

Paul
Dancing was something I always wanted to do but I just didn't have the ability or maybe it was the luck.

Kevin
But you were an athlete in high school.

Paul
Oh, you mean the varsity baseball letters framed in the hall.

Kevin
I played short stop. They said I was pretty good. What position did you play?

Paul
I didn't play. Not one game.

Kevin
I did some bench sitting myself but I did play in a few games.

Paul
They gave me a uniform but I never put it on. Never had to.

Kevin
Then how did you get the varsity letters.

Paul
Tea leaves.

Kevin
Tea leaves?

Paul
Yes, I could read the leaves and tell the coach and the players, at least those who would listen, what the opposing pitcher or base runners were going to do.

Kevin
I hope you're going to explain tea leaves and baseball.

Paul
When I was in high school you had to participate in some sort of after school athletic program in order to graduate. All part of the “well rounded student” malarkey.

Kevin
We had that too.

Paul
(An aside) Sweating build character, or so the thinking went. In my junior year I tried out for baseball. I wanted to play left field and I foolishly thought that I could hit the ball with some regularity. I has a vision of someday hitting that game winning, long ball, with a full count, in the bottom of the ninth.

Kevin
Without a uniform?

Paul
That was not part of the vision but that's how it ended up. I didn't have a mitt and never held a bat, but I did have a clip board.

Kevin
A clipboard?

Paul
And a slide rule.

Kevin
Slide rule?

Paul (explains)
A ancient contraption that could add, subtract, multiply and divide without being plugged in.

Kevin
You kept the game records.

Paul
No, I put the haphazard collection of what our team did on the field and at the plate and that of opposing teams and made a symphony. It was in nine movements. Because I knew what a player had done in any number of given situations, I was able to predict the likely outcome of of most situations, right down to what the next pitch would be.

Kevin
But you didn't actually play.

Paul
Not once. I sat on the bench or in the stands and waited for the numbers to work. Then I'd tell them what to do.

Kevin
You told them what to do?

Paul
An arrogant description but accurate. That's what I did.

Kevin
But you made the team, didn't you?

Paul
Not in a formal sense. I was not in the team photograph but the coach, knowing what I had done with my clip board and slide rule, he got me the letters. We were sixteen and two that season and we lost those two because I was sick and couldn't be there with my clip board and slid rule.

Kevin
Tell me about dancing. It doesn't seem to fit with working with a slid rule and numbers.

Paul
Oh yes it is. Just as numbers can flow from one point to another, a dancer makes light of gravity. We feel it, deep down, that they are flying past us and for a moment, however brief, we're flying too. We're free to fly, by watching and feeling the air they push aside.

Kevin
The waxing poetics of an actuary. How did you discover dancing?

Paul
An angle fell into waiting arms on a spring day at the beach.

Kevin
An angle at the beach. Or a line drive landing at the very top of the wall, into the webbing of the left fielders mitt.

Paul
Now you've got it.

Kevin
Tell me what I've got?

Paul
I was in high school and we were at the beach. It was a beautiful, early spring day, still a little cool but you knew the winter was over. The sky was so blue, like you'd see in a postcard, and the sun's warmth, if you were out of the wind, soaked into your bones.

We stretched our blankets on the sand near the edge of the boardwalk, in the sun but protected from the wind, when some older kids came by. College students, maybe twelve of them, laughing and having a great time. They marched onto the beach near us, then down to the water. Some rolled up their pants and went in, but just up to their knees, it was so cold. We thought they were crazy but, Lord it was fun to watch.

But there were two who caught my eye. She was younger and slight -- a thin build -- a wisp of a girl, with very long, straight blond hair, untied and it blew every which way in the wind. But there was something about her. The way she carried herself. Still a child, but older and more skilled, but still a child.

Kevin
Like an angle?

Paul
What gave you that idea?

Kevin
Just a guess.

Paul
She was with a boy of dark complexion, Italian or Greek maybe and the two of them were with these other kids, but off to themselves, walking, skipping, running along the shore having a great time.

Then I heard her say, I want to fly...Are you ready?

He didn't say a word. He just gave her a big smile and a nod and she was off running past him and the others down the beach. I thought maybe they were play tag when she stopped and turned, said, “I'm ready. Are you?” Again he just smiled and stretched out his arm.

At full speed she ran back towards him, her long hair trailing like a comet. Closer and closer she got with no effort to slow down until she was nearly on top of him when she jumped into the air into his waiting arms. He caught her in mid flight and sent her back soring into the sky, falling again into his grasp.

He spun her effortlessly around and the placed her gently on the sand. He picked her up and the two ran father down the shore. She truly did fly. It was wonderful.
Later I asked one of their companions who they were. Oh she said, “just dancers”.

Kevin
You must have studied dance.

Paul
Not once.

Kevin
Why not.

Paul
There were two reason. I knew, deep down, I did not have the majesty. They had it. It was there for all to see. I knew others would catch angels. angels who would never fear not being caught. The other reason had to do with lines.

Kevin
Lines?

Paul
Yes, I got in the wrong one. That's why I've been an actuary for nearly twenty years and not a second string, understudy at the ballet.

Linda (off stage voice)
The tea will be ready soon gentleman.

Kevin
The wrong line?

Paul
You know how crazy things are when you first get to college, signing up for classes.

Kevin
Go on.

Paul
I arrived a day late for my freshmen year at the university but knew I wanted to sign up for Contemporary American Dance. The gymnasium was crowded with all the incoming student in line for freshmen courses but I found the line for the dance course. We all had to stand in line for hours but when I got to the desk I found out that the dance class line was at the next table over. I was in the line for Contemporary American Business. There weren't a lot of classes left so I started my dance career studying why the hourly wage was a curse from the devil.

Kevin
But you must have taken other dance classes later.

Paul
Yes, the next year I did manage to find the right line and was enrolled in the dance class.

Kevin
You must have enjoyed that.

Paul
I probably would have had it not been for the broken toe. It went two days before the first class. They moved me from dance to something about ethics in capitalism.

Enter stage left, Linda and Joan from the kitchen

Kevin
I've a question for both of you. Who's idea was the move?

(they both point to each other)

Paul
Hers

Joan
His

Linda
See what I've putting up with all these years.

Kevin
I'm starting to understand.

Paul
It was my idea but I think it had been rumbling around both our heads for sometime now.

Joan
When they sold the company again. The third time wasn't it Paul?

Paul
Yes, three new owners in a little over ten years, with all the “wheel reinvention” that each one entails.

Joan
We both thought it was time for us to change as well. Permanence is not what it used to be.

Kevin
You've been here a long time.

Joan
Each year better than the last.

Paul
We've had some wonderful times here.

Linda
And some rotten ones.

Paul
Them as well.

Kevin
Such as?

Paul
I would have liked a better roof.

Kevin
It leaked?

Paul
Saying it leaked imply something minor and infrequent. The roof, until we removed and replaced it, was something that only marginally infringed on the rains journey to the basement.

Joan
Oh, it wasn't that bad.

Paul
Neither was the black death, if you were one of the lucky ones

Joan
I don't think anyone was lucky back then.

Kevin (getting away from Black Death talk)
My dad always liked this place. He said he almost bought it.

Paul
We beat him to it, roof and all.

Enter The Desk, stage left, sitting at the desk

The Desk
I've still lots of relatives working for a living in Chicago and way up in Bismark where a company with a string of grain elevators has seventeen, each working away, in good weather and bad.

Kevin
I've found out a few things about it. There's a guy in Armonk that converts this style into a liquor cabinet or bar.

Joan
A bar. Interesting idea.

The Desk
Not if you're a desk and meant to be a desk.

Kevin
They turn the pop up typewriter stand for bottles and glasses. With one pull, up comes the booze. They also removed the shelves on the left side.

The Desk
And put in a small ice box.

Kevin
And put in an ice box.

The Desk
They forget I was their first piece of real furniture.

Joan
It was our first piece of real furniture. Moving it will not be easy.

The Desk
How cleaver she is.

Paul
We've got to make up our minds about the desk.

The Desk
Of course, not making a decision is also a decision. They should speak to the folks in Bismark.

Kevin
A decision of any kind will do just fine. I've still red tags.

The Desk
He still thinks he'll get a decision. He doesn't understand them and what may be in me.

Linda (speaking to Kevin and avoiding the subject of the desk)
Kevin, you've never said what you wanted to do before you took over from your father.

Kevin
Like most, I wasn't sure but I thought about using my hands to make things.

The Desk
Like a desk? Or would that be too involved? He could have started with chairs.

Paul
Like a carpenter or woodworker?

The Desk
Uninspired chairs for the truly uninspired.

Kevin
Maybe. I always enjoyed tinkering but felt there was something missing from the things I was playing with. I always wanted to make a statement of some kinds, but never knew what I wanted to say.

Joan
Artists of all kinds face the same quandary.

Linda
Yes Kevin, you'd make a fine artist, once you decided on your work's value and worth.

Kevin
I tried painting briefly but it was too quiet, just a blank piece of white canvas, waiting for color.

The Desk
Or inspiration. Can anything compare with the sound of extra fine sandpaper smoothing the top of a soon to be varnished desk top?

Kevin
I thought for a while I'd like to fix people, like what you do. A doctor.

Joan
We try and put people's parts back together. Some say we tinker. You might be a good doctor, why don't you give it a try?

The Desk
And much easier than making a desk. Take two pills and call me next week.

Kevin
I think that time has passed, at least for now. But speaking of now, I've got to be off as I'm worn out from the estate's heir. She just doesn't pause, not for a moment.

Paul
Linda did you in did she?

Kevin
We did each other in. But I was a willing accomplish.

Paul
The condemned prisoner tying his own noose.

Linda
I do them all in father. You should know that by now. Kevin was just the latest in a long list of stretched necks.

Joan
He's seemed to survive the ordeal.

Kevin
I think her killer's instinct is less fatal than she might have us believe.

Joan
More bark than bite?

Joan
Sometimes showing the teeth and a good growl is enough.

Kevin
But she wow em' on the dance floor. If she'd a mind, she could make a bundle as a dime a dance girl. The old geezers would be standing in line with their silver dimes.

Linda
I've not had a dime day since school and even then it was more an act of charity towards the desperately belligered. And as for the geezers, there's only so much drooling one can take without just compensation.

Kevin (laughingly)
We should reassess your worth and value.

Joan
Be careful Kevin. Remember the noose.

Linda
And all those stretched necks. How about after the auction?

Kevin
I'll stick my neck out again. A deal. But it's in two days and if I'm going to erase history, I'll need my sleep and finish the lose ends.

Joan
Interesting way to put it, erase history.

Linda
I like it.

The Desk
Of course she'd like it. But she'd like to erase only so much, and leave the rest. So do they all.

Kevin
I'm not surprised. The word suits you. But that's what you're doing. Erasing the past, selling it to the highest bidder, as if it didn't happen.

Linda
I thought I had you fooled.

Joan
I thought we all did. You are a cleaver young man.

The Desk
He's not as smart as they think and either are they. They are fooling him and themselves but it is true, a fool can sometimes be right by chance.

Linda
And he dances well too mother.

Kevin
I wasn't fooled but but I'm attaining a deeper understanding of the wisdom of your ways.

Paul
I wonder if wisdom is the right word?

Kevin
It will have to do for now. But on to the more mundane. (speaking to Paul and Joan) I hope you will not be home during the auction.

Paul
But why. I'd like to watch the carnage over that ugly lamp.

Kevin
You might put off some buyers from bidding properly.

Linda
We wouldn't want improper bidding. Think what the neighbors would say but can I be here?

Kevin
Yes, in fact I could use your help, but it would be best if Paul and Joan weren't here.

Joan
If you think it's best we can spend the night in a hotel although I am curious about watching who gets what. And I can't imagine anyone walking off with that lamp.

Paul
Why should we not be here. It's our stuff being auctioned.

Kevin
Try to understand how the buyers might feel.

Joan
How they'd feel! They're just buying what we're selling.

Paul
And hoping to get as much as they can for as little has they have to pay.

Kevin
That's all true. The people who've I've invited to the auction are in business and they'd be out of business if they'd let their feelings make their decisions.

The Desk
Oh, now we're getting a little too close for comfort. He's talking about decisions, an uncomfortable subject for any of them, given the circumstance.

Kevin (continues)
They buy things that they can resell later. But the thing they buy were normally owned by others who are not around anymore.

Paul
Like you've said, they're dead and buried.

Kevin
And they may fell uncomfortable bidding on things with you there in front of them.

Joan
Oh, I get it. We'd be live ghosts, right there watching them take our history for a song and that might not sit too well with the more squeamish.

Kevin
That's a way to put it. I'll be trying to get the best price I can for each item and if you're not there, it will be a little easier.

Linda
I just knew there was honor among the squeamish thieves.

Kevin
Linda, that's the way the business is done. Buy low, sell high.

Linda
I'll make sure the live ghosts are gone. Just you and me. A pair.

Paul
And a house full of squeamish thieves.

Kevin
History will make three.

Linda
Three of a kind then

Kevin
But it doesn't beat a full house.

Linda
OK, I'll fold. At least for this hand.

The Desk
Isn't it remarkable how they're able to translate important ideas into jargon than is universally repeated and universally misunderstood. Ah, their consistency is to be admired.

Joan
Kevin, you get along now. Why don't we all just go to bed and get a good night's sleep before everything is gone.

Kevin (while exiting, front door, stage right)
I will see you after the auction

Linda
Kevin is also taking me to the station and my one claim to our vast hold, the OED, to the station for shipment out west.

Kevin (On the way out the door, stage right)
All the way to New Jersey. I just hope the natives don't attack.

Paul
We've be scarce so you can do your dirty work, unhampered by living ghosts.

(Kevin exits stage right, front door. Linda, Jone and Paul walk slowly from stage right to center, each looking at the desk)

Joan
We've still not made a decision about the desk and no one knows if it has any secret compartments.

The Desk
Oh, that's not true at all. More than a half century ago workers in Pittsfield knew. They built the secret compartment or two or none. But they knew. They knew all too well.

Paul
Oh to heck with the secret compartment. Let's get some sleep.

(all exit, stage left, The Desk enters, lower stage left)

The Desk
It is said that nothing concentrates a condemned man more than the passage of time.
Each tick of the clock is noted with clarity. Kevin, the auctioneer and appraiser is right. They are trying to erase history. Most just try to rewrite what has transpired, but not them. They want to erase it. As if it never happened. But it did. I know. I was here all the time.

The auction is here and their hoped for liberation is about to commence. Free of everything, save for dishes and few pots, a bed and oh yes, an old dictionary, they plan on walking away from this place and their past. Erasing. The pretend not to know that some inks are indelible. They remain forever.

Are my days numbered? Perhaps. Or they are just starting. There's alway Bismark wheat. You all have to eat.

The Desk exits, stage lower left.

End of Act III, scene 1.


Act III, scene 2
(stage is absent the lamp and two of the folding chairs. Only the desk remains and two chairs)
(Enter Joan, stage left)

Joan (speaking to Paul, off stage)
Dear, did you get the suitcase in the extra bedroom?

Enter Paul, stage left
Paul
It's packed with last of the others. With that one, there's just enough room for us in the car.
(calling to Linda, off stage)
What time is Kevin taking you to the train?

Enter Linda, stage left
Linda
He should be along soon. The train leaves just after eleven but he's taking me out to breakfast before. But I'm all packed, the OED is on its way back west to New Jersey and my part of this affair is over. I left my key on the hook in the kitchen.

Paul
Then that's it. We're done at last.
(looking around)
I still can't believe someone bought that lamp.

Joan
Kevin said he thought it might sell. But who is their right mind,

Paul (interrupts)
Speaking of Kevin.

Enter Kevin, stage right, front door

Kevin
Hello all.

Paul
The miracle man. Welcome to our wonderfully, suddenly, humble abode.

Kevin
No miracle maker here, just an auctioneer and of late, part time cab driver and delivery man.

Paul
Is the meter running?

Kevin
My meter's always running but its been a little slow of late.

Linda
Oh you're our he-man, auction man. But speaking of deliveries, my OED is on its way to New Jersey.

Kevin
Oh please, I'm hardly a he-man but after carrying the twelve volumes of that damn dictionary to the shipping office, I though I might need attention from the good doctor of the house.

Joan
Oh Kevin, I've given up my practice, but maybe we could make some kind of deal for in-kind services.

Kevin
I'm always open to lucrative offers.

Paul
Watch it young man or you'll really need a doctor.

Linda
Oh father, he can't have us both.

Kevin
I trust everyone is happy the way things worked out. I was pleased with the reaction from many of the dealers. There was some hot bidding.

Linda
Yes, it was exciting to watch. Clawing over our trash.

Joan
The house is nearly empty. It's just glorious but noisy. There's nothing to absorb the sound. We're a loud bunch.

Paul
Kevin, I got your check at the post office and its in the bank. I was surprised how much you got. You did very well, as did we.

Kevin
I've said all along, you had some nice pieces. It didn't take much coaching on my part to move the sales. Linda was also helpful, especially with some of the men. She kept smiling and they kept raising their hands.

Linda
There was one older gentleman,
(addressing Kevin)
the man in the dark, green sweater.

Kevin
That would be Mr. Peters, Lawrence Peters of Peter's and Sons

Linda
He has sons!

Kevin
Two, neither as interesting as the dad, but I thought you weren't looking for men on this trip back east.

Linda
Kevin you know I'm always looking to expand my portfolio but for an older man, Mr. Peters is very attractive with a romantic, almost rustic aura. He was most attentive.

Kevin
Larry Peters would have fit right in with your train companion. Peters has a certain reputation among dealers. He specializes in assisting widowed women, of all ages, in disposing of their assets and his personal assistance, evidently, has no bounds. While he may have been attentive, he was decidedly unresponsive during the bidding process. Perhaps you should have appeared more helpless and virgin like.

Paul
Please, I don't want to know anymore about that Mr. Peters or my daughter's standards of chastity.

Linda
Dad, I auctioned off my chastity belt years ago. You should have seen the crowd.

Joan
Linda, what a thing to say.

Kevin
I'd have liked to have been at that auction. The bidding must have been highly competitive.

Linda
The winner was pleased with the merchandise.

Kevin
Did you provide a guarantee?

Linda
All of me is guaranteed but there' s a no return policy.

Kevin
I think it would be difficult to return. Let the buyer beware!

Joan
Would you two please stop.

Paul
Even in silly speculation, there are some things a parent doesn't need to hear.

Kevin
But back to the auction, just about everything sold. I had the remaining books and other clutter taken away and the cleaning crew were done by early evening.

Joan
They did a fine job.

Kevin
It's easy to clean a empty house.

Paul
I knew we should have done this years ago. The dust we would have been spared.

Kevin
Everything went according to plan with one obvious exception.

Joan
The desk.

Kevin
Yes, the desk. You may recall we've discussed it on more than one occasion.

Paul
I know Kevin and we're sorry. We just never got around to making a decision.

Kevin
And without a decision I did not open it for bidding. There were a few inquiries and I think it would have sold had it been available. But as you can see, it's still very much here, secret compartment and all.

Joan
I think by default, it's staying in the house. We'll make it a gift to the new owners.

Paul
It was a gift to us and the movers have come and gone. It's just too late to take it with us.

Kevin
I'd like to see if it has a secret compartment. Has anyone looked?

(All four gather, slowly around the desk)

Linda
I think we've just been too busy, but remember, there might be two.

Paul
Oh, I'm not convinced that there is one and surely there couldn't be two. We'd found it.

Linda
Kevin, don't waste your time. You've got to get me to breakfast and the station.

Kevin
We've got time. The station is just down the road and I'd like to see if this is one of the special desks.

Paul
Kevin, Linda shouldn't miss her train. The next one is not until much later today.

Joan
Kevin doesn't need to look for a secret compartment.

Paul
Yes, you're right, he doesn't.

Joan
You don't understand. The reason Kevin doesn't need to look for is because I found it years ago. It's on the left side, beneath the drawers. I thought I would keep it “my secret” until a day like this. There's a note in it.

Paul (confused)
You found the compartment on the left (emphasis) side.

Joan (going to the left side of the desk)
Yes. It was very well done. I found it just by accident. See, it's right over here. (she reaches behind bottom drawer)
If you're careful you can pop it open with the right touch. Like this.
(Joan seeks out the secret compartment)
What's going on? It's empty!

Linda
Yes it is mother. As is yours dad, on the right side, under the typing stand, with your letter to mother

Paul (Paul moves to the right side of the desk, by the typing stand)
The desk had two compartments. I had one and you (speaking to Joan) had one. (Paul seeks his compartment) And my is empty. Where's my note?

Joan
I thought mine was the only one.

Paul
So did I. (speaking to Linda) Be we had two and you found them and took what was inside.

Linda
Both on the same lucky day. First mother's then yours dad. I was home sick from school and you both were at work. They weren't all that hard to find. I found them just as each of you did.

Kevin
I'll be damned. It is a special desk with two compartment. (speaking to Linda) And you knew all the time.

Paul
We may all be damned. Each of us kept a secret from the other, all these years.
(speaking to Linda)
We wrote to each other in secret and you found them.

Linda
I found your letter to mother and her letter to you.

Joan
And you took them. You took both letters.

Linda
Yes I did mother. His letter was addressed to Doctor Joan Sullivan. Your letter was simply for “Paul”

Joan
Where is my letter?

Linda
They've been gone for years. You should have taken better care of your secret correspondence.

Joan
You had no right to take my note. It was meant for your father to read, not you.

Kevin
Let me see if I understand this. All three of you claimed not to know about the desk being special or any secret compartments and now it appears the only one who didn't know about them was me, the expert on special desks and secret compartment.
I was the one in the dark and no one thought to tell me what they knew.

Linda
Kevin, that's why they built the hiding place. To keep things a secret.

Kevin
And all three of you tried to communicate in secret, two with letters and one with a theft.

Linda
There was no theft. The letters are safe. And you're not the only one in the dark. All of us are.

Joan
Linda, where is my letter. I'm not sure I'd want Paul to read the letter now. Please give them back. My letter was not meant to be read unless I wanted it read.

Paul
I've already said to whom my letter was for. It was written during a hard time in my life when I need to get things out of my head. It was a short, silly stupid letter about dreams and angels and dancing on the beach. Linda, where are the letters?

Linda
What difference does it make? You both wrote something that you wanted to hide. But like the furniture in this house, it's done with.

Joan
You say the letters are safe. Where are they?

Linda
On their way to New Jersey.

Paul
New Jersey?

Linda
And well protected too.

Kevin
The OED!

Joan
The one thing she wanted from the house.

Paul
Our letters are in the Oxford English Dictionary?

Linda
Somewhere between “A “ in volume one and Zyzma in twelve. When I found them I thought the best place to hide them would be in a book neither of you would use too much. I thought of the Bible but then remembered the dictionary. So I put them there.

Joan
But you still had no right to read our letters, regardless of where they are.

Linda
I know that mother. I didn't either one. They are still sealed and unopened.

Joan
You've not read the letters.

Linda
No. Your secrets are safe, for the time being.

Kevin
That's why you couldn't make up you minds about selling the desk. You each wanted to retrieve your letters but with me and Linda around all the time you each kept on putting off the decision.

Paul
I was going to get mine just before we left.

Joan
I planned to do the same. And now they're on a train bound for New Jersey.

Linda
Way out west, as Dad would say.

Joan
Are you going to return them?

Linda
Do you really want them?

Paul
It should be our decision.

Joan
We wanted them today and might again, someday.

Linda
Or maybe never. Neither of you really wanted them today, did you? You were looking to protect yourselves from who and where you were years ago. You still wanted them hidden, kept away in your hiding place. But the secret compartment is no longer a secret. Look around you. The furniture is gone.

Joan
We've no choice. The letters are gone.

Kevin
So are the people who wrote them.

Paul
Who ever they were.

Joan (speaking to Linda)
You promise you'll not read them.

Linda
Mother, we've had our secret compartments. I'll not open another. The desk is staying, as will it secrets and hiding places.

Joan
Then let's forget the letters for now.

Paul
We have to. We're heading north, away from this secret foolishness.

Joan (speaking to Linda)
You can have the Oxford English Dictionary and what it contains. Your letters should be much improved, flawless.

Linda
I'll use the phone. You will have one.

Joan
I imagine we shall. But I'll miss the fine art of letter writing.

Kevin
Even when they're not delivered, it might be best if the stuff of life were not documented.

Paul
Come love, let's be off. The day is still young. We'll buy another dictionary.

Joan
Just a one volume and another desk, without a history.

(All three walk to stage right, the front door)

Paul (looking back at the desk)
It was a great desk.

Kevin
You're leaving it, just as you found it.

Paul
As if we'd never been here.

Linda
Come father. It's just furniture.

Paul
Yes, your right. Just furniture.

(All exit, stage right)
End of Act III, scene 2

Act III, scene 3
(Desk enters stage left and sits at the desk.)

The Desk
A young couple, Mark and Sue, will move in tomorrow. They've left the furnace running, although it is far too warm to worry about the pipes. It was a polite gesture and Paul's idea. “No need to move into a cold house. The world is cold enough,” he said.

Mark and Sue are pleased with their new home and surprised to find me. They hadn't a desk worthy of the name. I'm a welcomed addition to their family.

Mark is an assistant manager at a department store and Sue is in college studying nursing. No children yet, but as is said, they've got time. Less than they think but that's always the case. We've always less time and then wonder where it went.

In retirement and their self-imposed exile from the past, the other family, Paul, Joan and Linda, are carrying on much as it always had, belying the adage; the sum of the parts being greater than the whole.

Enter Paul and Joan, stage left to stage center.

Paul
We settled in a small community near the mountains. It was nice enough and everyone seemed to want to keep to themselves, or so they'd like have you think.

Joan
We've always known that Yankees were like that. They pretend not to care about your business but they really do.

Paul
Their trick is to be in everyone's business without crossing the line between being just neighborly and a busy body.

Joan
But they really wanted to know everything.

Joan
They gossiped and talked like everyone, but barely moved their lips. No one would admit to wanting to know.

Paul
All in code. A nod and a knowing smile was all it took.

Joan
What they didn't know, they'd make up. Except right after church on Sundays.
That's when it was nobody's business, except God's, and he wasn't saying.

Paul
I gave ball room dancing a spin.

Joan
He talked me into being his partner. I protested, but who else was he going to get?

Paul
We got to the VFW and it was packed with old folks in funny cloths, like you'd see at a carnival. They started with the pledge of allegiance. Things when down hill from there.

Joan
The women had colored dresses with rhinestones and sequins, all designed to disguise body parts that were spent long ago and well beyond redemption.

Paul
Everyone was so darn polite and warm. They just oozed with the charm you'd expect from a used car dealer. “Hey there Paul, is this the little lady? You'd better keep an eye on her or one of us will steal her away.” I thought I'd die.

Joan
Ball room dancing was something he thought we could do together. I didn't ask him why we needed this injection of “togetherness” but I should have. He still doesn't know, or wants to admit that we're two people, not an amalgamation. Oil and water don't mix. A good dressing needs to be shook. He came to his senses and realized we're not Fred and Ginger.

(the two move toward the folding chairs, stage right, sitting down but speaking to one another.)

Paul
You're right, we're not Fred and Ginger. We're Paul and Joan. It wasn't what I had hoped for.

Joan
What did you hope for?

Paul
Heck, I don't know. What does any of us hope for? Something different. Something that would stick in our memories and make it all worthwhile, even for a few seconds.

Joan
Like that day at the beach. Were you hoping to find another angel?

Paul
Maybe. But I'm getting on and angels should fall into younger, stronger arms. We're near the mountains now and too far from the beach.

Joan (speaking to Paul)
I've always liked hearing about that day at the ocean. Will you tell me again?

Paul (speaking to Joan)
Yes, but later, my love.

The Desk
For reasons related to the absence of any military service, Paul next tried skeet shooting. He liked it and he's become a crack shot with a double-barreled, heavy gage shot gun. There are nine victory trophies in the den. Each is dusted and polished with a regularity that my brass shoes never received.

Paul (Paul gets up from the chair)
I'll tell you why I'm a good shot. I've wanted to blow something up to smithereens since I was a kid. It's lock and load and another clay pigeon, or whoever I might want it to be, becomes just dust falling to the ground. The pigeons can't shoot back. They have to take it, just like we all do.

The Desk
Showing no mercy to harmless, clay pigeons, Paul learned that skeet shooting did have its hazards. He's injured his shoulder from the recoil and punctured his right ear drum during a completion.

Paul (Paul sits back down in the chair)
I put a hot pack on the shoulder and when I need to, I can read lips. My left ear works just fine.

Joan (moves back to stage center)
His selective hearing has also improved.

The Desk
Doctor Joan Sullivan sold her medical kit at the auction and save for looking after Paul, stopped being a physician. As she wanted, she's pursued interests in the arts; water colors, oils, wood sculpting and something called “mixed media”. Always a striking woman, she has even posed, for a slight fee, often with next to nothing on.

Joan
It's called the healing arts. You fix a broken body, or try to, until the next comes along.
They tell you everything, these broken bodies. You're suppose to want to know, but you don't, not really and you can't. The next broken one is waiting to see you with more stories and more impatience. I could do the healing but I never found the art.

I was flattered, when a young man asked if I modeled. Paul was off at one of his shooting, a weekend trip, and I was at an art show. It was a hot summer day and I wore shorts. He said he liked my cheek bones, my eyes and the way my hair fell on my shoulders. He said I should never put it up but let it hang lose.

For a few years I was running with the arts crowd. Some came up from Boston to make leather belts or paint but they'd head back after the leaves fell. They were fun.
Paul shoots clay pigeon. I took off my cloths. I confess, it was cold in the winter but if you've got long hair and great legs, I'd recommend it.

The Desk
Aside from using her legs to inspire the creations of others, she made no effort to make a living with her own art. She said it was too much like being a doctor.

Joan
Everyone's a damn critic.

The Desk
Her work was called “interesting” and showed “talent.” This adulation was enough for her. She's most proud of saving a child who had fallen into the ice at the lake.

Joan
They knew I worked in art and that I “posed” but no one thought I was a doctor. I had to go into the water to get him and nearly frozen myself. The boy's parents were grateful but the rest didn't know what to think. The woman still kept their children away from the art lady and the men, they were just men. At the “Four Corners Sportsmen Club,” I'm sure they noted my lifesaving skills. Are great legs and a healthy appearance a help or a hindrance?

Joan returns to the chairs and sits down,
Enter Kevin from stage left to stage center.

Kevin
I tried to sell the business but it never worked out. Everyone just wanted it for the money, which wasn't much. No one understood that things are nothing without a history.
(looking at Paul and Joan) Just ask them.

The Desk
Kevin married a young woman who stopped at his shop for directions. She was a tall, statuesque blond who had never been out of New York City.

Kevin
Emily said she was looking for local color. I was happy to obliged. We've two children, Isaak and Sara, three dogs and “his and hers” pickup trucks. She's not been back to New York since her mother's funeral and doesn't miss it. She keeps busy with the kids and running her vegetable stand. She stopped asking me about medical school a few years ago. I've learned to pilot an airplane and I'm teaching her. She's good at take-offs but her landings can be a bumpy.

(Kevin to stage right, standing behind Joan)
(Enter Linda, stage left to stage center)

The Desk
Linda met Mr. Right while they were sequestered on jury duty in The Garden State.

Linda
The mayor was accused of shaking down contractors. We both voted to convict but I was the only one who wanted to give him the death penalty. We were married shortly after the second mistrial was declared.

(Linda to stage right, standing behind Paul)

The Desk
Major Silas Witherspoon, Grand Army of the Republic and hero of the Northern front, now graces the Town Hall of Windsor, Vermont. A gift to the town by Slone family, part time residents of the town, the major keeps a watchful eye on the tax assessors office. The town's historian, Miss Gladys Pipps, was not consulted prior to accepting the gift but her subsequent investigations did indicate that the major had passed through Windsor during one of his inspections of the Vermont front. Fortunately, General Lee and his rebells were no where to be found. His war service being somewhat suspect, Miss Pipps opposed a Major Silas Witherspoon Festival, suggested by the Greater Windsor Chamber of Commerce. Heeding her evaluation, the chamber stuck to extolling the town's connection to maple syrup candy.

And what became of the dictionary and the letters placed somewhere between the pages? That's what you really want to know, isn't it?
(Linda to stage center)

Linda
The crate containing the Oxford English Dictionary was at my door when I arrived. It weighed 87 pounds. I didn't it unpack for it nearly a month until I found a spot in the front hall. I didn't think about the letters, I just wanted it out of the living room.

The Desk
She kept her word about not reading her parent's correspondence although not entirely for the reasons you might suspect.

Linda
I was tempted many times. What could they have written that was so important that they'd want to hide it? There was their privacy to consider (looking over at Paul and Joan) and another reason. I forgot where I'd put them in the twelve thick books. There were tens of thousands of thin pages and I didn't want to take the time to look for them. They could wait, I thought.

The Desk
The letters remained safely unread in Linda's front hall, still hidden, in the Garden State.
And as they had been for years, they were out of sight, and nearly out of mind.

Linda
Two years later, during my divorce, I lugged the set and other books to a used book store in Newark. I was moving to Florida and certainly wouldn't need it there. I remembered the letters a few days later and called the bookstore but the owner said he sold it. He didn't know who the purchaser was. An older gentleman was all he remembered, who paid in cash.

(Linda returns to stage right, standing behind Paul who is sitting in a chair)

The Desk
Retrieved from the trunk of their car, the Oxford English Dictionary arrived at the brick home of Professor and Mrs. Thomas P. Green, professor emeritus of Comparative Literature, at what was once called the College of New Jersey, but is now Princeton University. This was the professor's second copy of the OED, his “emergency copy” as he called it, although what emergency would necessitate its use was unclear. He seldom used it but some volumes were consulted by his wife although never to solve a cross word puzzles. Neither noted any letters found in their bindings. If they had, they failed to speak of them to their children or colleagues.

After his death, the professor's copies of the Oxford English Dictionary were donated to the William and Mary Johnson Center for Advanced Linguistic Studies at the University of Manitoba. Professor Green was a Canadian citizen. Curators at the center reviewed the condition of each volume, some for the first time in more than two decades and declared it suitable for limited use by students. No mention was made of any letters.

What became of the letter? We know they were written, addressed, sealed and then hidden in my two secret compartments.

Paul
I put mine in the compartment on the right side.

Joan
Mine was hidden on the left.

The Desk
We know the letters were found and hidden again.

Linda
After I found them I put them somewhere in the thousands of pages of that dictionary. I should have put them in “L” for letters but I just picked two pages and stuck them in. I was sick that day and not thinking clearly.

The Desk
Linda never read the letters. She can't tell us what they said.

Linda (speaking to Kevin)
Did you sell the brass bed in the peak of the Carriage House?

The Desk
Ah, the brass bed. Did you note how quickly she's gone from the unread and misplaced letters to the old brass bed?

Kevin
It didn't sell. It's still up there, just as we left it the last time.

The Desk
Why didn't Kevin have the brass bed removed with everything else that didn't sell? He might have forgotten about it or he maybe he remembered it all too well. Historic encounters, even in the distant past, are still historic. Helen's face launched a thousand ships, but she must have had other parts, equally historic.

Linda
Let's explore it again, for the last time.

Kevin
The very last time. I'm game if you are.

(Kevin and Linda move to stage right, the front door)

Linda
I'm always game but you'll watch the spiders.

Kevin
I'll protect you from the hairy legs. We'll concentrate on the webs.

(Kevin and Linda exit, stage right, the front door)

The Desk
With each move and new owner of the Oxford English Dictionary, the letters could have fallen from the pages and been swept up on a midnight rounds of street cleaning? Or they may be on a shelf in Manitoba, somewhere between A and Zyzma?
Professor Green may have found them, or his wife or the bookstore owner or some newly minted graduate student. Had they been read, what might the letters have said?

Joan rises from the chair and moves to stage center

Joan
Paul, I found this hiding place in the desk by accident, just as I found you. I've put down my books to write to you and then I'm going to bury it back inside the desk. I may want you to read it someday, but you may not. It may not matter.

Right now, you and I are friends. That's a good thing. Real friends are rare and when we find one, we should hang on. That's what I'm doing. I'm going to hang onto you. I might even love you but I'm no sure. I'm not sure what love is. I hope you will understand, but it is but a word. I hope someday, I'll be sure, but today I'm not. Today I'm studying about blood cells. Last week it was about bones. Our bones and blood are much the same and there's nothing we can do about it. We're stuck.

I don't want to be stuck with you but I'm worried that might happen. I don't want to feel sorry for you. I've no desire to have an obligation to you that keeps me from being me.
There is more to us, I hope, than the blood and bones that make us. Maybe it is love, whatever that is. There should be something else.

You've said you want to have children. I want a child. You want a family. I think we're all in a family, just the last names are different. The blood and the bones are all the same.

I still might love you. You make me laugh and you add a grace to us. You catch me. So few people have before. I'd like to tell you more about me but there is too much and I understand too little. If you read this, you should know by then. Please tell me, if you can. Your good with details. I hope you'll forgive my foolishness. I'm learning, a little from you, that wisdom learns from foolishness. Let's be foolish together.

If you find this letter, or if I give it to you, understand that it was written from one foolish friend to another.

Fondly,
Joan

(Joan remains at stage center)

The Desk
Whoever found the letters might have discovered other foolish tragedies or possibilities.

(Paul rises from his chair and moves next to Joan, stage center)

Paul (speaking to Joan)
My dearest Joan
I found this place in our desk that I think was installed to hide things. Why its here I don't know but I'm using it to write to you. It may be more of a note to myself. Had I not found the hiding place, I never would have written to you. I guess that says something. Maybe I should just tell you.

As you can see, I've addressed it to Doctor Joan Sullivan. I'm very proud of you and that you are my wife. Sometimes I have to pinch myself to make sure I'm not dreaming. You are so beautiful, what are you doing with me? You could have done so much better and still could. I wonder why you've hung on with me when you could have written your own ticket.

I don't really know what we're doing. I think that's true of everyone. No one knows why or how two people pair up. Some make it but most just fake it. Others don't really try. I don't want to fake it with you and I'm going to try to stay out of your way. It will be hard for me, but I'm going to try. When and if you ever read this, let me know how I did, if I'm still around.
I'm going to hide this letter to you now. You're my angel. I'll try hard not to clip your wings.
I love you.
Paul

The Desk
And she might have healed him by simply writing.

Joan
I am complete now, because of you. I know now the healing begins after the pain.

Paul
Come my angel. Let's go to the beach, while we've still time and the sun is warm.

Joan
Will you catch me?

Paul
I will try, my love. I will try.

(Exit, Paul and Joan stage right, the front door)

The Desk
That's what they might have written, long ago and hidden in my two secret compartments. One on the left and one on the right. She never read that letter. He did not read hers. Their silence has remained unbroken.

They could have hastily scrolled something entirely different. The letters could have been a laundry list of life's missed potentialities. We all have regrets, don't we? But do you all write them down? Maybe you should.

Have the letters been read? Yes, years ago. By me? Perhaps. They were written on me and hidden in me. I knew what they were doing, even if they did not. Their secrets stay with me and for now, with them.

What do I know? I'm just an oak desk with a little birch inside. I can't erase history. Only you can do that. Just sell everything and be done with it. Let them think that Dewey beat Truman.
But you know the truth, don't you?
You're listening to a desk.
You forget, I'm just furniture.

(Exit The Desk, stage left, back into the house, humming The Blue Danube)
End of Act III, scene 3 and Furniture