[Gutenberg 55291] • Graft / A Comedy in Four Acts

A small room on the first floor, awkwardly overcrowded with the entire furniture of a cottage, a pile of which is stacked in the left corner and covered with a sheet; the plain iron bed is right, the window coming between its foot and the pile of furniture; table centre; three plain upright chairs and one wicker armchair before the fire; fireplace left; opposite it right a kitchen dresser well stocked with crockery; pans and kettle about the fireplace. For all the uncomfortable crowding the room is bright and well kept. Door right. It is 7 p.m. on a September evening, and the approach of dusk is noticed gradually. Jim Pilling, a gardener, has finished tea and sits in his shirt-sleeves before the debris of the meal facing spectator lighting a briar pipe. Jim is thirty, clean looking, dressed in his rough working clothes without coat or his combined collar and "dicky" and red tie, which hangs with the coat behind the door. Sally Pilling is transferring the last of the table utensils to a tray which she puts on the bed; then removing the white cloth and shaking crumbs into the fire; a red cloth is underneath. Sally is of the pale complexion usual to a country girl living in a town; she dresses neatly and has an apron on; Dick, a thin boy of eight, in a blue sailor suit, gets off his chair at the table. Dick. Can I go out and play now, mother? (Jim rises and crosses l. with chair.) Sally. Yes. (She crosses to door and takes down from a hook his sailor hat.) Here's your hat. (Dick comes to her; she secures it on his head with an elastic band.) Don't go far from the door, Dick. I'll shout you when it's bedtime. Jim. And don't get playing in the road-keep on the footpath. Dick. Yes, dad. (He runs out as Sally opens: the door.) Sally. Don't get run over now. Jim. The young 'un misses the country. (Sits in armchair above fire.) Sally (closing door). We all do that, Jim. Jim. Aye. Streets are no sort of playground for a growing child. Did you get out while he was at school this afternoon? Sally (gathering up tea-things). Oh, yes. There's not the cleaning to do in a single room to keep me in it all day. Jim. No; better for you to get out a bit. Sally (dully). It's no pleasure walking in the streets. Jim. Not when there's shops to look at? Sally. You can get tired of shops. (Tea-things on tray.) Jim. You're no true woman. Sally. I'm no town's woman. (Crosses to Jim.) I miss the flowers and the green. I'm pining for the country, Jim.