Page:Pain--Eliza.djvu/110

Shakespeare On the following night Eliza said that she hoped I was not going to sit up until three in the morning, wasting the gas and ruining my health, over a book that I myself had said—

"And who pays for the gas?"

"Nobody's paid last quarter's yet. Mother can't do everything, and—"

"Well, we can talk about that some other time. To-night I am going to read aloud to you a play of Shakespeare's. I wonder if you even know who Shakespeare was?"

"Of course I do."

"Could you honestly say that you have ever read one—only one—of his tragedies?"

"No. Could you?"

"I am going to read 'Macbeth' to you, trying to indicate by changes in my voice which character is speaking." I opened the book.

Eliza said that she couldn't think who it was took her scissors.

"I can't begin till you keep quiet," I said. 84