226 (Audio Drama)

(teasing, lighthearted) "Wait'll you come home some night... some Christmas maybe... when every customer on yer route's had three times the mail. And maybe some dog took after ya. And some old lady kept ya waitin' on her stoop, tellin' ya all about her grandchildren. And you wouldn't have the heart to tell her ya can't talk- I know you. So ya come home, all cranky and late besides. Hungry-wantin' your dinner. And there I am, with my easel set up in the kitchen, and a drop cloth on the floor, my paints all over the table. And your dinner nowhere in sight. What would ya say then? "

(Emotional) "Ma... All my life, I've done what other people told me to do. I quit school. Because you said I should. I put that brush in my mouth 'cause Mrs. McNeil said I should. I never said, please can't I finish school? I never said, I don't like the taste of this paint. I never argued. Even though I knew-Ma. I knew somethin' wasn't right. At night, I'd lie in bed, and I'd see my dress. Hanging on the back of the closet door. All aglow. My shoes on the floor. My hairbrush. And comb. On the dresser. So much light, Ma. So much light! And I never once questioned. I never once asked! Don't you see? They knew I wouldn't. That's what they were counting on. "

(empty laugh) "A humanitarian gesture...? " (Erupting, tears flowing) "HUMANITARIAN??? MONTH AFTER MONTH, DELAY AFTER DELAY, YOU PUT US OFF! KNOWING HOW SICK- HOW TIRED AND DESPERATE WE WERE!!! (tired, sickly) Humanitarian...? You're just waiting for us to die..."

(Admiring) "You shoulda seen it, Grace! The church was filled with flowers. Lilies and carnations and orchids. You know how Amelia loved orchids. "

(Awestruck) "And can you imagine? Can you imagine? If he loved her and he never told her, never could bring himself to say! Because ... because she was so beautiful.. .and ... and he was so shy. And now it's too late. It's too late, their love is forever thwarted..." (Realizing, more somber) "He didn't tell her, and he'll never get a chance ever again."

(Panicked) "Yeah? That's how it started for Irene. Just a toothache. You wait, Grace. You wait, you'll wake up one morning, your gums hurting so bad you won't be able to open your mouth. So weak and sick ya won't be able to stand up! The pain so bad you won't be able to sleep. And your face so swollen you won't be able to stand the sight of yourself-" (getting interrupted)

(lighthearted) "Ain't like Amelia don't deserve it. She paints more dials than any girl on the floor. And can't be bothered to talk to nobody either. You say "Amelia! What's new?" and she just looks at ya funny. "

(mocking) " I hAvE mY iNsTruCtiOns, GirLS, I hAve My InsTruCtiOnS!" (teasing, behind back) "Here's an instruction for you, MacNeil: Let some of the starch outta yer corset!" *giggle*

(Excited) "Standard Chemical publishes its own journal. Sends it out monthly-to twelve thousand doctors. We could do something similar!"

(Tipsy) "Italians. The conditions they live in! Ten, twelve people in three rooms. It's a wonder they don't all die of one infection or another. "

(pure rage) "Every. penny. Every penny I've put by in the last SEVEN. YEARS. I have sunk into this company. Why? Because of you! Because you said it was a sure thing. No miss-"why work for Von Sochocky when we can work for ourselves?" Remember that one? "Take a chance, Charlie. TAKE A CHANCE!!!!""

(reflective) "Some of you I have known since you were little girls. Coming here during the war. Working so hard! Day after day at the bench, two hundred, three hundred, some of you, five hundred dials a day! So excited to be part of our work here. When this company I start, in my own kitchen, mixing up the paint, I knew I found something miraculous, to make life better... easier .. And now what do I read? More and more uses are there for the radium... More than I dreamed possible."

(calm) "Perhaps you should. But you will not. You will sit down. You will have some tea. And you will calm your self."

(Cryptic) "But I've known for a while. Miss Wiley, from the Consumer's League, persuaded me to assist Dr. Martland in testing the dialpainters for radium exposure. There aren't that many people around, you know, who can measure that kind of thing. So she came to me. Knowing I had the equipment, and, of course, the skill. I didn't believe her either, Arthur. I didn't want to believe the girls could get sick from working with my paint. I wanted to show her it was a mistake. So I agreed to help. Dr. Martland and I conducted expired air tests on the girls. It was then that I found out. When my own breath registered radioactive. Then my fingers, they began to turn black. (Beat.) Now. You wish to have words with me.?"

(rushed) "Girls, girls! The whistle's already gone. Now, then. I've received new instructions this day. We're going back to the old way of pointin' the brushes. We was losin' too much paint in the cloth. "

(excited) "That's the spirit, Charlie!!! Advertising. That's the wave of the future! It's not just the product, it's the way you promote it.!"

(agitated) "You women think you can go around and fix the world's problems.... while your husbands go out and make a living! You're going to quit that club. And stop talking to that idiot Mrs. Middleton. She doesn't know anything. None of those women know anything!!" (erupting) "YOU DON'T KNOW ANYTHING!"

(Older, somber) "I think back on those days-and I try to think-how could it have happened? I remember so clearly climbing the stairs to the studio at Alden Street. At the top of the stairs, those wide, high windows, and the slant of light, the way it hit the floor, the way the floor creaked under my feet-the smell of the place, chalky, like an old schoolroom, and all those girls. Schoolgirls, really-all bent to the task, in their plain green smocks, their delicate little hands moving so quickly. No man could work the way those girls did. So careful. So fast. Those brushes flying from the dials to the paint to the dials-to their lips. (Beat.) Try as I might, Harriet, try as I might... I cannot remember their faces. ...I never saw their faces. "

(panicked) "At the club today, someone actually had the nerve to say to me: Is it true? Is it true, she said? Did your husband poison those women? I said: "Mrs. Cowles. If you think it is true, then why would you speak to me at all? I certainly would not associate with a woman whose husband did such things." "

(Emotional) "Grace. I can't think about that. I just want for us to be together now. I want to come home to you at night. To my wife-my home. I'm too old to be living like this-this, in-between life. I promise, Grace. I'll do whatever it takes to make it easy for you. "

(Comforting) "Grace. I know it feels like you're lettin' Kathryn down. But if she decided to take the company's offer, would you hold it against her? No. Ya wouldn't. Now. We'll take that check and pay the bills and what- ever is left-you and Tom can have. A little something to get ya started. "

(Emotional) "Grace. I know it feels like you're lettin' Kathryn down. But if she decided to take the company's offer, would you hold it against her? No. Ya wouldn't. Now. We'll take that check and pay the bills and what- ever is left-you and Tom can have. A little something to get ya started...."

(Holding back tears, erupting) "YOU CALL THAT MAN BACK! What are you trying to prove here-? What? You'll never get inside that courtroom, and even if you did- you can't proof nothin!!"

"To Mr. Arthur Roeder. U.S. Radium Corporation. From Cecil Drinker, Harvard University. Enclosed is our report. We believe the trouble in your plant is due to the radium. The blood changes in your employees can be explained on no other grounds. Photographic films carried by employees show heavy fogging and we suspect high levels of gamma radiation throughout the plant. "

(Matter of fact) "This was an expensive case to treat and I never did get no compensation. The girl died. Her family never paid. "

(threatning) Expert witnesses? Paid lackeys is more like it. And none of em's got the dirt I got. If you're smart, you'll play ball with me. Believe me. There's plenty of other folks interested in the information..."

(defeated, quick recovery) "All right, all right! You don't want to play ball? Fine. But believe me. When all this shakes out, it won't be me holding the short end of the stick!"

"Uh .. .I will continue my experiments to find better methods for ze treatment of ze cancer. "

"Ah. It has not been easy. But my daughters share my gratitude to ze American women for ze interest in science and my work. I am most grateful. "

(professional) "Dr. Knef is a dentist. Not a physician. What you have is a vitamin deficiency. You must eat more fresh fruit. And raw meat as well. That will help the anemia. Raw calves liver, particularly. Cook it if you must. But eat it twice a week. At a minimum."

(cheery, condescending) "Sure. Think it over. I understand-you're worried about what people will say. But hey-you gotta think about your own interests here. There's no reason you shouldn't get something out of all of this. Look out for number one, that's the way. Everyone else is out to get what they can. For sure. Why should ya sit back and keep your nose clean when everyone else is up to their elbows in it? "

(News voice) " What would you do? To ease your last suffering days on earth? What would you do with two hundred and fifty thousand dollars? "

(cheery) "Yes, indeed. I myself was the picture of lethargy before I discovered the amazing, vitalizing qualities of radium water. Now look at me-I'm nearly fifty years old-but I have the energy of a man in his thirties. "

(child) "Papa! I can see clear to the church!"

(nonchalant, now much older) "Oh, Papa. That was years ago. Why don't you just forget about it? It's not like it was your fault. Nobody knew about things like that, then. Science just wasn't as advanced, the way it is now."

"Welcome all, welcome all! I must ask you, ladies and gentlemen of the press, please limit your questions! Madame Curie is about to embark on an exhaustive tour of the country. And she is under strict doctor's orders to rest-although, in the typical fashion of a scientist who can think only of her research, her life's work-she has refused to rest! "