[Mitch crosses to the switch. He turns the light on and stares at her. She cries out and covers her face. He turns the light off again.]
MITCH [slowly and bitterly]:
I don't mind you being older than what I thought. But all the rest of it--Christ! That pitch about your ideals being so old-fashioned and all the malarkey that you've dished out all summer. Oh, I knew you weren't sixteen any more. But I was a fool enough to believe you was straight.
BLANCHE:
Who told you I wasn't--'straight'? My loving brother-in-law. And you believed him.
MITCH:
I called him a liar at first And then I checked on the story. First I asked our supply-man who travels through Laure. And then I talked directly over long-distance to this merchant
BLANCHE:
Who is this merchant?
MITCH:
Kiefaber.
BLANCHE:
The merchant Kiefaber of Laurel! I know the man. He whistled at me. I put him in his place. So now for revenge he makes up stories about me.
MITCH:
Three people, Kiefaber, Stanley and Shaw, swore to them!
BLANCHE:
Rub-a-dub-dub, three men in a tub! And such a filthy tub!
MITCH:
Didn't you stay at a hotel called the Flamingo?
BLANCHE:
Flamingo? No! Tarantula was the name of it! I stayed at a hotel called the Tarantula Arms!
MITCH [stupidly]:
Tarantula?
BLANCHE:
Yes, a big spider! That's where I brought my victims.
[She pours herself another drink]
Yes, I had many intimacies with strangers. After the death of Allan--intimacies with strangers was all I seemed able to fill my empty heart with.... I think it was panic, just panic, that drove me from one to another, hunting for some protection--here and there, in the most--unlikely places--even, at last, in a seventeen-year-old boy but--somebody wrote the superintendent about it--"This woman is morally unfit for her position!"
[She throws back her head with convulsive, sobbing laughter. Then she repeats the statement, gasps, and drinks.]
True? Yes, I suppose--unfit somehow--anyway... So I came here. There was nowhere else I could go. I was played out. You know what played out is? My youth was suddenly gone up the water-spout, and--I met you. You said you needed somebody. Well, I needed somebody, too. I thanked God for you, because you seemed to be gentle--a cleft in the rock of the world that I could hide in! But I guess I was asking, hoping--too much! Kiefaber, Stanley and Shaw have tied an old tin can to the tail of the kite.
[There is a pause. Mitch stares at her dumbly.]
MITCH:
You lied to me, Blanche.
BLANCHE:
Don't say I lied to you.
MITCH:
Lies, lies, inside and out, all lies.
BLANCHE:
Never inside, I didn't lie in my heart....
[A Vendor comes around the corner. She is a blind Mexican woman in a dark shawl, carrying bunches of those gaudy tin flowers that lower class Mexicans display at funerals and other festive occasions. She is calling barely audibly. Her figure is only faintly visible outside the building.]
MEXICAN WOMAN:
Flores. Flores. Flores para los muertos. Flores. Flores.
BLANCHE:
What? Oh! Somebody outside...
[She goes to the door. opens it and stares at the Mexican Woman.]
MEXICAN WOMAN [she is at the door and offers Blanche some of her flowers]:
Flores? Flores para los muertos?
BLANCHE [frightened]: No, no! Not now! Not now!
[She darts back into the apartment, slamming the door.]
MEXICAN WOMAN [she turns away and starts to move down the street]:
Flores para los muertos.
[The polka tune fades in.]
BLANCHE [as if to herself]:
Crumble and fade and--regrets--recriminations... "If you'd done this, it wouldn't've cost me that!"
MEXICAN WOMAN:
Corones para los muertos. Corones...
BLANCHE:
Legacies! Huh... And other things such as bloodstained pillow-slips--"Her linen needs changing"--"Yes Mother." But couldn't we get a colored girl to do it?" No, we couldn't of course. Everything gone but the--
MEXICAN WOMAN:
Flores,
BLANCHE:
Death--I used to sit here and she used to sit over there and death was as close as you are.... We didn't dare even admit we had ever heard of it!
MEXICAN WOMAN:
Flores para los muertos, flores--flores...
BLANCHE:
The opposite is desire. So do you wonder? How could you possibly wonder! Not far from Belle Reve, before we had lost Belle Reve, was a camp where they trained young soldiers. On Saturday nights they would go in town to get drunk--
MEXICAN WOMAN [softly]:
Corones...
BLANCHE:
--and on the way back they would stagger onto my lawn and call--"Blanche! Blanche!"--The deaf old lady remaining suspected nothing. But sometimes I slipped outside to answer their calls.... Later the paddy-wagon would gather them up like daisies... the long way home....
[The Mexican Woman turns slowly and drifts back off with her soft mournful cries. Blanche goes to the dresser and leans forward on it. After a moment, Mitch rises and follows her purposefully. The polka music fades away. He places his hands on her waist and tries to turn her about.]
BLANCHE:
What do you want?
MITCH [fumbling to embrace her]:
What I been missing all summer.
BLANCHE:
Then marry me, Mitch!
MITCH:
I don't think I want to marry you any more.
BLANCHE:
No?
MITCH [dropping his hands from her waist]:
You're not clean enough to bring in the house with my mother.
BLANCHE:
Go away, then.
[He stares at her]
Get out of here quick before I start screaming fire!
[Her throat is tightening with hysteria]
Get out of here quick before I start screaming fire.
[He still remains staring. She suddenly rushes to the big window with its pale blue square of the soft summer light and cries wildly.]
Fire! Fire! Fire!
[With a startled, gasp, Mitch turns and goes out the outer door, clatters awkwardly down the steps and around the corner of the building, Blanche staggers back from the window and falls to her knees. The distant piano is slow and blue.]
SCENE TEN
It is a few hows later that night. Blanche has been drinking fairly steadily since Mitch left. She has dragged her wardrobe trunk into the center of the bedroom. It hangs open with flowery dresses thrown across it. As the drinking and packing went on, a mood of hysterical exhilaration came into her and she has decked herself out in a somewhat soiled and crumpled white satin evening gown and a pair of scuffed silver slippers with brilliants set in their heels. Now she is placing the rhinestone tiara on her head before the mirror of the dressing-table and murmuring excitedly as if to a group of spectral admirers.
BLANCHE:
How about taking a swim, a moonlight swim at the old rock quarry? If anyone's sober enough to drive a car! Ha-ha! Best way in the world to stop your head buzzing! Only you've got to be careful to dive where the deep pool is--if you hit a rock you don't come up till tomorrow....
[Tremblingly she lifts the hand mirror for a closer inspection. She catches her breath and slams the mirror face down with such violence that the glass cracks. She moans a little and attempts to rise.
[Stanley appears around the corner of the building. He still has on the vivid green silk bowling shirt. As he rounds the corner the honky-tonk music is heard. It continues softly throughout the scene.
[He enters the kitchen, slamming the door. As he peers in at Blanche, he gives a low whistle. He has had a few drinks on the way and has brought some quart beer bottles home with him.]
BLANCHE:
How is my sister?
STANLEY:
She is doing okay.
BLANCHE: