II, Theaterstücke 9, (Der grüne Kakadu. Drei Einakter, 3), Der grüne Kakadu. Groteske in einem Akt, Seite 235

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Cutling Fron—
The Daily Telegraph.
Date of Issue:
VAUDEVILLE TIIEATRE.
* BETWEEN SUNSETAND DAWN.“
We hnd some odd varieties of life, After a
long stay in the mean streets of our London
ne were whirled through a phantasmagoria of
iche Pares of the Revolution. At the end of it
all, one might be exoused for a certain bewildor¬
ment. But the first half wus at least isterest¬
ing. and the last hugely exeting. Mr. Hermon
Oud’s play,“ Between Sunset and Dawn,?’ 1
a wholly sombre piece of work. Not much light
breukes through the shadows of his realism. Bur
on the whole we believed-in che gloom. There
was here and chere dilliculty in mickung out
just what some of the hapless claracters would
be at, and even in die und we were not quite
Gillident as to what the author of his being
meant diie chief of them to be. You feel um
uneasiness, am uncertainty of touch which mul¬
tiplies words withomt producig à clear inuswes¬
sion. Still, it was quite plain that Mr. Hermon
Oeld lis something to say und the ability to
say it in an interesting fashion.
The play takes the unusual form of four
short scenes. It began in the kitchen of a doss¬
heuse, which Jim Harris managed for his
mother. Thither came Liz Higgins, forlorn
and penniless, to be subsequently pursued by
her drunken and foul-mouthed husband Bill.
Bill was a boon companion of Jim Harris, but
Jim proposed to hide the wife and pack the
husband off. We were never quité ab home with
Jim. From the first he scemed a ki##
ro
whom you would not find managi
dosshouse. He was attracted by
pretty helplessness and annoyec
#hen ahe was discovered he hustled
of
the house and kept the fuming Bill behind
long enough for her to escape.
BETWEEN TWO STOOLS.
In the next scene, midnight having fallen
upon the dosshouse, Liz Higgins crept back
Sae was quite resourceless, Jim liked her more
and more, gave her sixpence for a night’s
lodging, and proposed to meet her in the morn¬
ing and set up house with her. She was not
Techilarated bythe prospect or his kisses. After
fall, she was her Bill's lawful wife; she was
gborn respectable, and in soine fashion or other
she still loved the brutish rascal. So the third
scene took her buck to him.
There was no doubt about Mrs. Higgins.
FShe was a real human ereature in all her vacil¬
lations and ber helplessness. Perhape we did
not feel much kinddess for ber. She was by
Inature so futile, such a blind waif in the
world. But there is notable work in the
Scharacter, observation, and knowiedge austerely
Free Trom the temptations of sentiment. When
her Bill found her home again ho was ready
to be moderately peuitent. Unfortunately he
would talk abont Jim Harris and breathe
Tenspicions threats. In vain Liz protested that
Fim was not, had net been, and never would
be anything to her. Bill growled still of
revenge, and when she protested raged at her,
so again she ran away.
Between two stools, the poor creature fell
tothe gronnd. Jim might perhaps havo for¬
given her stealing back to Bill, might have for¬
given her pathetie plending that she was
respertable, and did not know how to be any¬
üthing else. He could not forgive a lie, and
Isho had tol! Bill that Jim and she had nothing
between them. Jim was disgnsted at that,
and did not want her anv more. A nice point
in male human nature this. but quite credible.
What was to become of her? Jim had his
solution. He began to laugh in a queer way,
Dhe asked her to kiss him and he stabbed her.
Was he mnad? We had heard something, but
nothing conclusive, of his queerness. Was he
resolved, like some other people in literature,
to preserve the lady spetloss for another worle?

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