Overview
- Female: 1
- Male: 1
Context
John Glassman is a landowner and a neighbor of the Cavendish family. He is a bachelor at 35 and has decided to propose to Natalie Cavendish, who is in her mid-twenties and also still unmarried. John is a hypochondriac and gets overwhelmed in moments of stress. Nervously, he begins to outline his reasons behind the proposal but, before he can finish, he and Natalie get into a heated debate about the ownership of a strip of land between their properties.
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NATALIE Oh, it's you!
GLASSMAN How do you do, Natalie?
NATALIE You must excuse my apron -- I was shelling peas. Why haven't you been here for such a long time? Sit down. Won't you have some lunch?
GLASSMAN No, thank you, I've eaten already.
NATALIE A smoke then?
(she offers Glassman a box of cigars)
The weather is splendid now, but yesterday it was so wet that the fieldhands couldn't do anything all day.
(She lights his cigar.)
How much hay have you stacked? We had the entire north field cut, and now I'm not at all pleased about it because I'm afraid my hay may rot. I ought to have waited a bit.
(Glassman coughs from the cigar.)
NATALIE (cont'd) Are you all right?
GLASSMAN Yes, it's just my chest.
NATALIE You should smoke more often - it's a natural expectorant. Strengthens the lungs.
GLASSMAN Yes, Nattie. My... my dear.
NATALIE John, you are dressed to the nines! What is the occasion?
GLASSMAN Oh, Nattie ... the fact is, I've made up my mind to ask you something. ... Of course you'll be surprised and perhaps even angry, but a ... my head is swimming. He puts the cigar down.
NATALIE What's the matter?
GLASSMAN I shall be brief. You must know that I have long, since my childhood, in fact, had the privilege of knowing your family. My late aunt and her husband, from whom, as you know, I inherited my land, always had the greatest respect for your father and your late mother. The Glassmans and the Cavendishs have always had the most friendly, and I might almost say the most affectionate, regard for each other. We're neighbors! My Oxen Meadows touch your birchwoods--
NATALIE I'm sorry -- what?
GLASSMAN What?
NATALIE You said, "my Oxen Meadows." But are they yours?
GLASSMAN Yes, mine.
NATALIE What are you talking about? Oxen Meadows are ours!
GLASSMAN No, I believe they're mine.
NATALIE How do you make that out?
GLASSMAN How? The Oxen Meadows - that wedge between your birchwoods and the Burnt Marsh.
NATALIE Yes. ... They're ours.
GLASSMAN I think you're wrong there.
NATALIE How long have they been yours?
GLASSMAN As long as I can remember.
NATALIE You won't get me to believe that!
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