The Project Gutenberg EBook of One Day More, by Joseph Conrad

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Title: One Day More
A Play In One Act

Author: Joseph Conrad

Release Date: January 29, 2006 [EBook #17621]

Language: English

Character set encoding: ASCII

*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ONE DAY MORE ***

Produced by David Widger

This is the sixth book issued by the Beaumont Press 24 copies (four of
which are not for sale) have been printed on Japanese vellum signed
by the author and numbered 1 to 24 and 250 copies on hand-made paper
numbered 25 to 274 This is No. 46

ONE DAY MORE

A PLAY IN ONE ACT

BY JOSEPH CONRAD

CHARACTERS

Captain Hagberd (a retired coasting skipper).

Josiah Carvil (formerly a shipbuilder--a widower--blind).

Harry Hagberd (son of Captain Hagberd, who as a boy ran away from home).

A Lamplighter.

Bessie Carvil (daughter of Josiah Carvil).

SCENE

A small sea port.

To rights two yellow brick cottages belonging to Captain Hagberd, one
inhabited by himself the other by the Carvils. A lamp-post in front. The
red roofs of the town in the background. A sea-wall to left.

Time: The present-early autumn, towards dusk.

ONE DAY MORE

SCENE I.

CURTAIN RISES DISCLOSING CARVIL _and Bessie moving away from sea-wall.
Bessie about twenty-five. Black dress; black straw hat. A lot of
mahogany-coloured hair loosely done up. Pale face. Full figure. Very
quiet. Carvil, blind, unwieldy. Reddish whiskers; slow, deep voice
produced without effort. Immovable, big face._

Carvil (_Hanging heavily on Bessie's arm_). Careful! Go slow! (_Stops;
Bessie waits patiently_.) Want your poor blind father to break his neck?
(_Shuffles on_.) In a hurry to get home and start that everlasting yarn
with your chum the lunatic?

Bessie. I am not in a hurry to get home, father.

Carvil. Well, then, go steady with a poor blind man. Blind! Helpless!
(_Strikes the ground with his stick_.) Never mind! I've had time to make
enough money to have ham and eggs for breakfast every morning--thank
God! And thank God, too, for it, girl. You haven't known a single
hardship in all the days of your idle life. Unless you think that a
blind, helple