The Collected Shorter Plays by Samuel Beckett Page B

That sound you hear is the sea. [
Pause. Louder
.] I say that sound you hear is the sea, we are sitting on the strand. [
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.] I mention it because the sound is so strange, so unlike the sound of the sea, that if you didn’t see what it was you wouldn’t know what it was. [
Pause
.] Hooves! [
Pause. Louder
.] Hooves! [
Sound of hooves walking on hard road
.
They die rapidly away. Pause
.] Again! [
Hooves as before
.
Pause. Excitedly
.] Train it to mark time! Shoe it with steel and tie it up in the yard, have it stamp all day! [
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.] A ten-ton mammoth back from the dead, shoe it with steel and have it tramp the world down! Listen to it! [
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.] Listen to the light now, you always loved light, not long past noon and all the shore in shadow and the sea out as far as the island. [
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.] You would never live this side of the bay, you wanted the sun on the water for that evening bathe you took once too often. But when I got your money I moved across, as perhaps you may know. [
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.] We never found your body, you know, that held up probate an unconscionable time, they said there was nothing to prove you hadn’t run away from us all and alive and well under a false name in the Argentine for example, that grieved mother greatly. [
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.] I’m like you in that, can’t stay away from it, but I never go in, no, I think the last time I went in was with you. [
Pause
.] Just be near it. [
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.] Today it’s calm, but I often hear it above in the house and walking the roads and start talking, oh just loud enough to drown it, nobody notices. [
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.] But I’d be talking now no matter where I was, I once went to Switzerland to get away from the cursed thing and never stopped all the time I was there. [
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.] I usen’t to need anyone, just to myself, stories, there was a great one about an old fellow called Bolton, I never finished it, I never finished any of them, I never finished anything, everything always went on for ever. [
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.] Bolton. [
Pause. Louder
.] Bolton! [
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.] There before the fire. [
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.] Before the fire with all the shutters . . . no, hangings, hangings, all the hangings drawn and the light, no light, only the light of the fire, sitting there in the . . . no, standing, standing there on the hearthrug inthe dark before the fire with his arms on the chimney-piece and his head on his arms, standing there waiting in the dark before the fire in his old red dressing-gown and no sound in the house of any kind, only the sound of the fire. [
Pause
.] Standing there in his old red dressing-gown might go on fire any minute like when he was a child, no, that was his pyjamas, standing there waiting in the dark, no light, only the light of the fire, and no sound of any kind, only the fire, an old man in great trouble. [
Pause
.] Ring then at the door and over he goes to the window and looks out between the hangings, fine old chap, very big and strong, bright winter’s night, snow everywhere, bitter cold, white world, cedar boughs bending under load and then as the arm goes up to ring again recognizes . . . Holloway . . . [
long pause
] . . . yes, Holloway, recognizes Holloway, goes down and opens. [
Pause
.] Outside all still, not a sound, dog’s chain maybe or a bough groaning if you stood there listening long enough, white world, Holloway with his little black bag, not a sound, bitter cold, full moon small and white, crooked trail of Holloway’s galoshes, Vega in the Lyre very green. [
Pause
.] Vega in the Lyre very green. [
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.] Following conversation then on the step, no, in the room, back in the room, following conversation then back in the room, Holloway: “My dear Bolton, it is now past midnight, if you would be good enough—,” gets no further, Bolton: “Please! PLEASE!” Dead silence then, not a sound, only the fire, all coal, burning down now, Holloway on the hearthrug trying to toast his arse, Bolton, where’s Bolton, no light, only the fire, Bolton at the window his back to