Pygmalion, George Bernard Shaw [e book reader free TXT] 📗

He rushes across to his working table and picks out a cylinder to use on the phonograph. Mrs. Pearce Only half resigned to it. Very well, sir. It’s for you to say. She goes downstairs. Higgins This is rather a bit of luck. I’ll show you how I make records. We’ll set her talking; and I’ll take it down first in Bell’s visible Speech; then in broad Romic; and then we’ll get her on the phonograph so that you can turn her on as often as you like with the written transcript before you. Mrs. Pearce Returning. This is the young woman, sir. The Flower Girl enters in state. She has a hat with three ostrich feathers, orange, sky-blue, and red. She has a nearly clean apron, and the shoddy coat has been tidied a little. The pathos of this deplorable figure, with its innocent vanity and consequential air, touches Pickering, who has already straightened himself in the presence of Mrs. Pearce. But as to Higgins, the only distinction he makes between men and women is that when he is neither bullying nor exclaiming to the heavens against some featherweight cross, he coaxes women as a child coaxes its nurse when it wants to get anything out of her. Higgins Brusquely, recognizing her with unconcealed disappointment, and at once, baby-like, making an intolerable grievance of it. Why, this is the girl I jotted down last night. She’s no use: I’ve got all the records I want of the Lisson Grove lingo; and I’m not going to waste another cylinder on it. To the girl. Be off with you: I don’t want you. The Flower Girl Don’t you be so saucy. You ain’t heard what I come for yet. To Mrs. Pearce, who is waiting at the door for further instruction. Did you tell him I come in a taxi? Mrs. Pearce Nonsense, girl! what do you think a gentleman like Mr. Higgins cares what you came in? The Flower Girl Oh, we are proud! He ain’t above giving lessons, not him: I heard him say so. Well, I ain’t come here to ask for any compliment; and if my money’s not good enough I can go elsewhere. Higgins Good enough for what? The Flower Girl Good enough for ye⁠—oo. Now you know, don’t you? I’m come to have lessons, I am. And to pay for em too: make no mistake. Higgins Stupent.Well!!!Recovering his breath with a gasp. What do you expect me to say to you? The Flower Girl Well, if you was a gentleman, you might ask me to sit down, I think. Don’t I tell you I’m bringing you business? Higgins Pickering: shall we ask this baggage to sit down or shall we throw her out of the window? The Flower Girl Running away in terror to the piano, where she turns at bay. Ah⁠—ah⁠—ah⁠—ow⁠—ow⁠—ow⁠—oo! Wounded and whimpering. I won’t be called a baggage when I’ve offered to pay like any lady. Motionless, the two men stare at her from the other side of the room, amazed. Pickering Gently. What is it you want, my girl? The Flower Girl I want to be a lady in a flower shop stead of selling at the corner of Tottenham Court Road. But they won’t take me unless I can talk more genteel. He said he could teach me. Well, here I am ready to pay him⁠—not asking any favor⁠—and he treats me as if I was dirt. Mrs. Pearce How can you be such a foolish ignorant girl as to think you could afford to pay Mr. Higgins? The Flower Girl Why shouldn’t I? I know what lessons cost as well as you do; and I’m ready to pay. Higgins How much? The Flower Girl Coming back to him, triumphant. Now you’re talking! I thought you’d come off it when you saw a chance of getting back a bit of what you chucked at me last night. Confidentially. You’d had a drop in, hadn’t you? Higgins Peremptorily. Sit down. The Flower Girl Oh, if you’re going to make a compliment of it⁠— Higgins Thundering at her. Sit down. Mrs. Pearce Severely. Sit down, girl. Do as you’re told. She places the stray chair near the hearthrug between Higgins and Pickering, and stands behind it waiting for the girl to sit down. The Flower Girl Ah⁠—ah⁠—ah⁠—ow⁠—ow⁠—oo! She stands, half rebellious, half bewildered. Pickering Very courteous. Won’t you sit down? Liza Coyly. Don’t mind if I do. She sits down. Pickering returns to the hearthrug. Higgins What’s your name? Liza Liza Doolittle. Higgins Declaiming gravely. Eliza, Elizabeth, Betsy and Bess, They went to the woods to get a bird’s nes’: Pickering They found a nest with four eggs in it: Higgins They took one apiece, and left three in it. They laugh heartily at their own wit. Liza Oh, don’t be silly. Mrs. Pearce You mustn’t speak to the gentleman like that. Liza Well, why won’t he speak sensible to me? Higgins Come back to business. How much do you propose to pay me for the lessons? Liza Oh, I know what’s right. A lady friend of mine gets French lessons for eighteenpence an hour from a real French gentleman. Well, you wouldn’t have the face to ask me the same for teaching me my own language as you would for French; so I won’t give more than a shilling. Take it or leave it. Higgins Walking up and down the room, rattling his keys and his cash in his pockets. You know, Pickering, if you consider a shilling, not as a simple shilling, but as a percentage of this girl’s income, it works out as fully equivalent to sixty or seventy guineas from a millionaire. Pickering How so? Higgins Figure it out. A millionaire has about 150 pounds a day. She earns about half-a-crown. Liza Haughtily. Who told you I only⁠— Higgins Continuing. She offers me two-fifths of her day’s income for a lesson. Two-fifths of a millionaire’s income for a day would be somewhere about 60 pounds. It’s handsome. By George, it’s enormous! it’s the biggest offer I ever