SCENE 1

At the Heron residence and North Shore High School.

Enter several STUDENTS, singing a funeral dirge.

STUDENTS [singing:] Done to death by sland’rous tongues

Was Regina who here lies.

Wrench the heart and burst the lungs

Telling of the harsh surprise.

Lack-a-day, Regina’s gone,

Dark the night and bleak the dawn.

Enter CADY HERON.

CADY The sad report is mine to make, and I’m

Asham’d to say the truth, which cometh with

Regret and grief: ’tis how death came to her.

STUDENTS [singing:] For the which, with songs of woe,

We sing out our mournful song.

Round about her tomb we go,

Sadder than the day is long.

Lack-a-day, Regina’s gone,

Dark the night and bleak the dawn.

[Exeunt students.

CADY Nay, ’tis a jest, Regina did not die!

She hath been hurt, indeed, but not to death.

The rumors swirl’d an ’twere Charybdis’ pool,

With strength to pull in any who drew near.

’Twas said her head did turn completely ’round,

As if it were the earth, her neck its axis.

’Twas said I push’d her in the path of harm,

Which were foul words far worse than any other.

Enter LADY HERON and SIR HERON, in their residence. CADY sits at a table with them.

LADY H. Hast thou no stomach for this supper, Cady?

Mayhap thy conscience overwhelms thy belly.

CADY Nay, Mother, prithee: I am not to blame.

LADY H. Forsooth, I know not what I should believe.

CADY If thou dost seek a cause for thy belief,

Believe in me, thy humble daughter true.

I should be testament and proof enow

To satisfy thine anxious unbelief.

[Lady Heron begins putting dishes away.

LADY H. Canst thou, my daughter faithful, say wherefore

My tribal vases hide beneath the sink,

As if they shirk’d in shame at some foul deed?

CADY Beg pardon, Mother?

LADY H.   —Wilt thou play one scene

Of excellent dissembling, let it look

Like perfect honor? These, my precious vases:

Why were they here conceal’d beneath the sink?

CADY [aside:] I know, but shall not say. [To Lady Heron:]

    I do not know.

LADY H. These are the vases of fertility

Of the magnificent Ndebele tribe.

They priceless are, and irreplaceable.

Doth this mean anything to thee? Pray tell!

CADY Nay, little. Less than none.

LADY H.  —What hath befallen?

Who art thou? Verily, I know thee not.

[Exit Lady Heron.

CADY This is the perfect end to fortune’s fall:

My friends despise me. Now my mother, too.

SIR H. Thy mother doth not, could not thee despise.

She is afeard of how thou dost mature.

We, peradventure, err’d with actions swift,

Too quickly enter’d thee in mainstream schooling.

Belike returning home for school once more

Would give thee space thou needest to be whole.

CADY Nay, though for mercy I do thank thee, Father.

’Twould be e’en worse to hide myself from school

Than to return and face what I have done.

SIR H. How bad a situation shall it be

When thou again arrivest on the morrow?

CADY Dost thou remember when, in Africa,

We saw some lions fighting angrily

O’er one small carcass of a warthog slain?

I’ll warrant ’twill be I who is the warthog.

SIR H. My daughter is no warthog. Thou art lion—

O thou art woman, I can hear thee roar.

CADY O Father kind, thy discourse serves to make me

Determin’d to achieve my final goal.

SIR H. Give focus to thy studies for a while.

Thou still, in classes, art superior,

Is this not true?

CADY     —Alas, there’s one thing more.

My mathematics test, for calculus,

Thou must inscribe thy signature withal.

SIR H. Yet wherefore?

CADY   —I am failing in the class.

SIR H. Ah, ’tis a problem I cannot o’erlook.

Thou art—what is the word? Thou grounded art.

CADY I like it not, but do accept the sentence.

[Exit Sir Heron. Cady walks to school.

Next, school I must endure, with frightful nerves.

Enter JANIS IAN, DAMIAN, and other STUDENTS. CADY finds that her desk has been removed.

DAMIAN Alas, a lass can find no seat—alas.

CADY [aside:] My desk is ta’en, for they are mad at me.

Behind the student flatulent I’ll sit,

Though it may cost my nostrils and my pride.

[The gassy student releases a swift squeak of flatulence.

GASSY STD. [aside:] This Cady hath become the school’s pariah.

My derrière shall put her in her place.

This is a sweet revenge, though not so sweet.

[The bell rings. Exeunt all students except Cady, who walks to her next class.

CADY [aside:] How shameful and disgraceful is this day—

At luncheon, ev’ry eye was fix’d on me.

E’en as the volume of the din decreas’d,

I heard a voice exclaim, “There is the one—

She who did shove Regina ’fore the bus!”

Another whisper’d, “Didst thou see the deed?”

The many there were hungrier for gossip

Than for the lunches that before them sat.

No table held a place of refuge for me.

Instead, as on the day I first arriv’d,

I found a lonely dining place within

The stalls inside the women’s restroom. O,

This sad, long loneliness doth sour this day.

Enter SIR DUVALL and two POLICEMEN. Enter AARON SAMUELS and other STUDENTS in mathematics class.

DUVALL Take heed, ye class of Madam Norbury,

We have some inquiries to ask of ye:

Has e’er your teacher tried to sell or give

You marijuana for a pastime smoke,

Or tablets made of ecstasy’s mystique?

STUD. 23 Nay, never.

STUD. 24      —What are marijuana tablets?

[Cady arrives at her seat.

CADY [to Aaron:] What doth unfold? Where’s Madam

          Norbury?

AARON [to Sir Duvall:] Good Sir Duvall, this is ridiculous—

An errant search to find a phantom crime.

Kind Madam Norbury ne’er selleth drugs.

DUVALL Inside my heart I know ’tis true, indeed.

Yet after ev’ry allegation ’gainst

Coach Carr did prove to be extremely true,

The school board hath insisted ev’ry claim

Within the pages of the wretched book

Shall forthwith be investigated, Aaron.

AARON ’Twas written by a scorn of silly lasses—

Which, like a pride of lions, leap of salmon,

A romp of otters, prickle form’d by hedgehogs,

A plump of seals, a squabble made of seagulls—

Most aptly doth describe their greatest feature.

These lasses spend their time devising rumors

Whilst facing all the boredom of their lives.

DUVALL A noble speech and proper, Aaron, yet

Unless an individual comes forth

And doth declare, “ ’Tis I who am to blame!

The fiction of the book was my creation!”

We must continue in this rigid way.

CADY [aside:] This wrong I must make right, and bid

               farewell

To Aaron, who shall hate me when ’tis done.

[To Sir Duvall:] I do beseech ye, Sir Duvall: ’twas I.

The book was writ by my deceitful hand.

DUVALL My disappointment knows no bound or limit.

Come, Cady, we must take thee hence away,

Brave punishments I shall devise for thee.

[Exeunt Cady, Sir Duvall, and policemen.

AARON [aside:] So sweet was ne’er so fatal. I must weep,

But they’re cruel tears: this sorrow’s heavenly;

It strikes where it doth love. O, Cady dear,

Thou ever wert so generous and kind,

Yet can it be that thou didst instigate

The atmosphere of hatefulness that hath,

These many days, been plaguing North Shore High?

Thine actions are a tribute to thy spite—

Confession, though, hath help’d thee walk aright.

[Exeunt Aaron and other students.