(Mrs. Bramble knits. A tap at the door. Percy pokes his head in.
Percy: Evening, Jane. Harold anywhere about?
Mrs. Bramble: He’s out for a nice walk. What brings you here so late,
Percy?
(Percy disappears, then re-enters fully, holding the door. Bill enters
awkwardly.)
Mrs. Bramble: Bill!
Bill: (scratching head) Evening, Jane.
Percy: The scales have fallen from his eyes!
Mrs. Bramble: What scales?
Bill Bramble, what are you doing here when you ought to be at the White
Hart training?
Percy: I’ve wrestled with him and been vouchsafed the victory!
Mrs. Bramble: You?
ill: Jerry Fisher’s a hard nut. He don’t like visitors unless he brings ’em.
Percy: So I wrote him letters. Sent tracts.
Bill, which tract snatched you from the primrose path?
Bill: It wasn’t so much the tracts, Perce. It was what you wrote about
Harold.
Mrs. Bramble: Bill, what are you doing home instead of training?
Bill: I’ve come home, Jane.
Major: Glory!
Mrs. Bramble: Percy! Keep quiet!
Bill, is there NOT going to be the fight next week?
Major: The fight’s over! Bill’s won—with me seconding him!
Mrs. Bramble: PERCY!
Bill: (small voice) I’m not going to fight, Jane.
Mrs. Bramble: You’re NOT—!? And what about the money?
Major: What’s money?
Mrs. Bramble: You ought to know—you’ve borrowed enough from me!
Bill, that purse would’ve given Harold a start in life!
(She sits and sobs.)
Bill: Jane… it was Harold I was thinking of.
The papers would print it. His Mail might show my picture. Then the fat’d
be in the fire.
That’s what Percy said—so I hopped it.
(A knock. Jerry Fisher bursts in, sees Percy, and lunges.)
Jerry: I thought so!
Bill: Jerry!
Mrs. Bramble: Mr. Fisher!
Major: Be reasonable! (dives under table)
Jerry: Let me at him, Bill! Just let me at him!
Mrs. Bramble: Remember there’s a lady present!
(Jerry freezes, trembling with rage.)
Jerry: Bill Bramble—come back with me to the White Hart!
I never knew you do such a thing. Bad companions, that’s what it is.
Bill: You tell him, Percy.
Major: You tell him, Jane.
Mrs. Bramble: I won’t!
Jerry: Tell me WHAT?
Bill: I’m not going to fight on Monday.
Jerry: WHAT?!
Percy: Bill has seen a sudden bright light—at the eleventh hour!
Jerry: (strangled noise)
Bill: Sorry, Jerry. But Harold would die of shame if he knew his pa was
Young Porky.
Jerry: Bill, think of the purse!
Mrs. Bramble: Yes, Bill!
Jerry: Think of the swells! The papers! Think of ME!
Bill: But Harold—
Jerry: You CAN’T not fight Monday!
Bill: He’s a little gentleman, Jerry. I got to think of Harold.
Harold: (entering) What about me, pa?
(All freeze. Jerry’s eyes glitter with revenge.)
Jerry: So YOU’RE Harold. Listen here—
Bill: Jerry, you keep your mouth shut or I’ll dot you one!
Jerry: (raising chair) Try it!
Mrs. Bramble: Mr. Fisher, be a gentleman!
Percy: My dear sir—do nothing hasty!
Jerry: Tommy, your pa ain’t a commercial. He’s a fighting-man.
Eight-stone-four ringside. Known as Young Porky.
(Bill collapses into chair.)
Bill: Jerry… how could you?
Jerry: And YOU broke training! Fair’s fair.
Percy: Harold, don’t think the worse of your pa. He’s given it up forever.
Bill: That’s right, lad. I was to fight Murphy Monday, but I ain’t going to
now—not if the King asked me on his bended knees.
Harold: (horrified) Oh! Then what about my two bobs?
I’ve bet Dicky Saunders Murphy won’t last ten rounds!
It’s jolly thick, that’s what it is!
(All stare.)
Harold: And keeping it from me that you were Young Porky!
Fellows would LOOK UP to me!
Instead, they call me Goggles!
Pa, if you beat Jimmy Murphy, you’ll get a chance at Sid Sampson for the
Lonsdale Belt!
Jerry: If I’ve told him that once, I’ve told him twenty times!
Harold: Pa, can’t you give me a picture of yourself boxing?
I could swank like anything!
(Jerry steps to the door.)
Jerry: Bill, you and me better be getting back to the White Hart.
(Bill nods silently and exits with him.)
Harold: (to his mother and Percy) Honestly—grown-ups ARE the limit.
Would you hear me on my poem?
(Lights fade.)