The Faith Healer Part 14

BEELER.

No, it ain't. I won't have any more of that talk around me, do you hear? I put my foot down a year ago.

MARTHA.

_Points to his foot derisively._

It's big enough and ugly enough, Heaven knows, but you can put it down as hard as you like, it won't keep a man's sperrit in his grave--not when he's a mind to come out!

BEELER.

_Astonished._

Martha Beeler!

MARTHA.

That's my name.

_She flounces out into the kitchen, covering her retreat with her last speech._

BEELER.

_Looking after her._

My kingdom! Martha! I thought she had some horse sense left.

RHODA.

_Slowly, as the finishes with the lamp._

Uncle, it's hard to live side by side with Aunt Mary and not--

BEELER.

_In angry challenge._

And not what?

RHODA.

And not believe there's something more in these matters than "horse sense" will account for.

BEELER.

_Hotly, as if a sort point has been touched upon._

There's nothing more than science will account for.

_He points to a shelf of books._

You can read it up any day you like. Read that book yonder, chapter called Hallucinations. Pathological, that's what it is, pathological.

RHODA.

What does that mean?

_Beeler taps his forehead significantly._

Uncle, you know that's not true!

BEELER.

_Growls to himself._

Pathological, up and down.

_Rhoda replaces the lamp on the mantel._

_Martha opens the kitchen door and calls in._

MARTHA.

Here's Uncle Abe!

BEELER.

Uncle Abe? Thought he was a goner.

_Uncle Abe enters. He is an old negro, with gray hair and thin, gray beard. He is somewhat bowed, and carries a stick, but he is not decrepit. His clothes are spattered with mud. Martha enters with him; she is stirring something in a bowl, and during the following continues to do so, though more and more interruptedly and absent-mindedly._

BEELER.

h.e.l.lo, Uncle Abe.

UNCLE ABE.

Good-mawnin', Mista Beeler.

BEELER.

Where've you been all winter? Thought you'd gone up Salt River.

UNCLE ABE.

_Shakes his head rea.s.suringly._

Ain' nevah goin' up no Salt River, yo' Uncle Abe ain't.