Act III-1

Act III.

Now we’re back at the Frosts’ house, and it’s a week after the events narrated in Act I. It is about nine o ’clock in the morning, and through the open windows the sun is shining in great, brave squares upon the carpet. The jars, the glasses, the phials of a certain memorable night have been removed, but there is an air about the house quite inconsistent with the happy day outside an air of catastrophe, a profound gloom that seems to have settled even upon the “Library of Wit and Humor” in the dingy bookcase.

There is brooding going on upon the premises.

A quick tat-tat-tat from outdoors—the clatter of someone running up the porch steps. The door opens and Doris comes in, Doris in a yellowish skirt with a knit jersey to match, Doris chewing, faintly and delicately, what can surely be……