Digital Manuscript ProjectFootfalls / Pas

V
[0107]
M continues pacing.
[0108]
[0112|001]
[0115]
Fade up to Five seconds. Say 3 lengths
[0109]
Fade out on strip.
[0110]
Stage in darkness.
[0111]
Silence. [0112] Long pause.
S
Two.
[0113] Sound
xxx xxx xxx dimmer on strip. [0116]
, shorter, 4 steps starting at xxx Rest in darkness.
[0117]
M standing facing front at R end
[0118]
Five seconds Pause
Now I am one who may not predecease her.
[0118|002] Chilling prospect, for her physical health [0129]
is fair. See how firm she stands, how clear
[0130]
the complexion skin and, when she moves, with
what poise. (Pause.)
[0133] Yet she never goes [0133|001]
abroad, she has not been abroad now for
-
let me calculate - over 30 years. So no
hope from that quarter.
[0134] (Pause.)
[0139] Where is she, [0141]
it may be wondered. She is in the old home, [0141|001]
the same where she was fooled into this world
by the old family physician, a general
practitioner named Haddon, long gone to
his account. So much for that unity.
[0141|002] (Pause.)
[0141|003] Though on the plain side, [⁁]as you may see she has had admirers,
male & female, but none outstanding, as far as that
one knows.
[0141|004] [⁁]Indeed that That she is still a maid [0141|005]
is almost certain. So no light from that quarter.
[0148]
(Pause.)
[0149] Let us pass on now and ask, When did this [0149|001]
begin? Shall we say, In girlhood? xxx
Well before puberty?
[0177]
Does she ever utter now? still [0178]
sleep?
In fits & starts, bows her head [0180]
till it rests against the wall and gets a
little light sleep. xxx xxx xxx xxx? Still speak.
[0181] Some nights it is said she does, in the
dead hour when all are sleeping and she thinks
xxx xx xxx none can xxx hear.
[0155] The floor here,
now bare as some of you may see, was once -.
[0155|001] (Pause.
[0156]
M starts pacing.)
[0158] But let us watch
[0163]
her pace in silence. (M paces in silence till
[0164]
finally, at one or other end of strip, V
joins in, synchronous with steps.) One two
[0164|001]
three four five six seven wheel, one two three
four five six seven wheel. (Pacing continues)
[0164|002]
Dix till M halts at same point as at curtainside.
[0161] See with what grace she wheels, now deasil,
[0165]
now withershins, and, when she halts, how
always facing xxx the wall, to gaze before her with
unseeing eyes. (Pacing continues till M
halts at xxx R end of strip.)
sleep?
till it rests against the wall and gets a
little light sleep.
[0181]
dead hour when all are sleeping and she thinks
xxx xx xxx none can xxx hear.
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Footfalls / Pas © 2022 Samuel Beckett Digital Manuscript Project.
Editors: James Little and Vincent Neyt