HARRY PORTER
Margaret...

MARGARET PORTER
Hmm?

HARRY
Have you... Have you said anything yet to...to John?

MARGARET
John?

HARRY
Yes, about, uh... You know...

MARGARET
Oh...Michael. No... No, I...I haven't yet. I...I'm sorry. I don't have the old excuse anymore, do I? He's better now than he's ever been, and...and he's different. He's much more confident, more sure of himself. So, if you ask me why I haven't, perhaps Freda was right...you know, the longer you leave it, the worse it gets. In a way, I think I'm a little bit afraid of him.

HARRY
Of John?

MARGARET
(chuckling)
Yes, of John. You see, I've always assumed that when I did tell him, it will be him that I'd have to protect...you know, from the hurt of it. I don't think that's true anymore.

HARRY
In what way, not true?

MARGARET
I don't think he'll forgive me...and not just for Michael, but for having kept silent about it for so long.

HARRY
But when he hears why you kept silent: for his sake...

MARGARET
Ah, but will he believe it...that that's the real reason? Do I believe it? Do you believe it?

HARRY
Why do you ask me if I believe it? I do believe it. You know I believe it.

MARGARET
You know, you still have much too high an opinion of me.

HARRY
Do I?

MARGARET
Yes.

HARRY
You have said nothing for his sake...because he was ill. Why try to convince yourself otherwise?

MARGARET
He's not ill now, is he? So why am I still not saying anything?

(Harry does not respond, and something becomes clear to Margaret.)

MARGARET
You want me to tell him, don't you? You're asking me to.

HARRY
Yes, yes, I do. The fact is...well, if he doesn't learn it from you, sooner or later Celia's going to tell him.

MARGARET
Yes, but she promised you she wouldn't, didn't she?

HARRY
That's because I threatened to leave her. She doesn't believe I will anymore...and she's right, of course. Oh, I believed it at the time...that day, Christmas a year ago ...when we be here, and she opened that letter from your...

MARGARET
Lover?

(He cannot bring himself to accept the word.)

MARGARET
A letter from my lover?

HARRY
No. Please, don't say that.

MARGARET
There you are. You see, you'll turn away from me. Isn't that what John's going to do?

HARRY
Yes, but you didn't go on with it, did you? Not in the end, not when he needed you.

MARGARET
If you knew how close I came to doing just that...

HARRY
But you didn't. That's what counts, Margaret. That's what counts...the fact that you didn't.

MARGARET
Is it? Aren't you saying that because you want it to count? Because you stayed with her? Why, Harry? What was it...pity, compassion?

HARRY
Partly, but...but it's not the same with Celia and me. You and John are different.

MARGARET
You wanted to walk away from something. Me, with Michael...I wanted to walk towards something, something that I'd turned my back on. And why did I turn my back on it? Because I was nearly thirty...too old, as I saw it, for love...because I had a child, or because I felt as you do?

HARRY
Because you love John.

MARGARET
You know, when you say that, I ask myself, "What is love? You know, what is it?" Already, I've forgotten. All I can remember is the pain...with the sharp edges gone. And you've forgotten too, haven't you? We've both put something else in its place. You and I are not so very different, are we?

 

(from "The Things You Never Told Me" by John Finch)