Page:Tales of the Jazz Age.djvu/328

 these McCormick harvesters&mdash;they mean nothing to my children. I understand.

CHARLES: (More gently) Then you'll think of me kindly, feyther. To understand is to forgive.

MR. ICKY: No...no....We never forgive those we can understand....We can only forgive those who wound us for no reason at all....

CHARLES: (Impatiently) I'm so beastly sick of your human nature line. And, anyway, I hate the hours around here.

(Several dozen more of MR. ICKY'S children trip out of the house, trip over the grass, and trip over the pots and dods. They are muttering "We are going away," and "We are leaving you.")

MR. ICKY: (His heart breaking) They're all deserting me. I've been too kind. Spare the rod and spoil the fun. Oh, for the glands of a Bismarck.

(There is a honking outside&mdash;probably DIVINE'S chauffeur growing impatient for his master.)

MR. ICKY: (In misery) They do not love the soil! They have been faithless to the Great Potato Tradition! (He picks up a handful of soil passionately and rubs it on his bald head. Hair sprouts.) Oh, Wordsworth, Wordsworth, how true you spoke! "No motion has she now, no force;    She does not hear or feel;   Roll'd round on earth's diurnal course     In some one's Oldsmobile." (They all groan and shouting "Life" and "Jazz" move slowly toward the wings.)

CHARLES: Back to the soil, yes! I've been trying to turn my back to the soil for ten years!

ANOTHER CHILD: The farmers may be the backbone of the country, but who wants to be a backbone?