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The Feathered Witness
From a Collection of Crowley's Plays and Scenarios
Dramatis Personae: Ulysses Putnam, Double role. Stiletto Jack, Double role. Penelope Putnam, wife of Ulysses. Harold MacMillan, detective. Mrs. Ashley, questionable widow. English Rector. Abraham Dyer, murdered millionaire. Japanese servant to Dyer. Ill tempered sailor. Captain of whaler. Dr. Graham. Dr. Greene.
The Home of Ulysses Putnam: A fine house, standing in its own grounds. Ulysses, aged thirty, is shown in his den. This is decorated with various trophies of sport, such as cars, silver cups, heads of big game and an immense bow and quiver above which a shield inscribed with his name as the world's champion archer. In the grounds, too, is a target at which his pretty wife, Penelope, is seen shooting. Her dress shows the weather to be fine and warm but Ulysses is crouched over a blazing fire. He seems impatient and anxious.
An automobile drives up to the house and from it there alight Dr. Green, a typical country practitioner, and a tall stranger, very severely dressed, who is Dr. Graham, a New York specialist. Mrs. Putnam sees them and runs to welcome them. It becomes evident that she has been practising archery to help conquer her nervousness. She takes them to the room of Ulysses. Dr. Green introduces the specialist. They examine him and declare him to be physically sound save for overwrought nerves.
Dr. Green, aside, tells his colleagues, in a series of short pictures of the eccentric acts of Ulysses which have resulted in the consultation. (Ulysses goes to the city, loses himself, cannot remember his name; he insults inoffensive strangers; he appears at an evening party in boating flannels; he digs in the garden and when approached makes a mystery of what he is doing. In each case he shows lapses of memory.
Questioned as to his physical strength, Ulysses takes down the bow, strings it and fitting an arrow to it, offers it to the specialist, who fails to draw it. Ulysses then, with a laugh, sends an arrow through the window to the bull's eye in the target in the garden.
Inquiry now follows as to the cause of the trouble. Ulysses is shewn at his bank, with the president treating him most deferentially; at a fashionable party where everybody treats him with respect and affection; at a political meeting where he sits at the right hand of the speaker, and in his home, where he and his wife evidently love one another intensely.
The specialist decides that home life does not afford sufficient outlet for the energies of so vigorous a man, and says: “Out on the old trail: six months with Mother Nature.” Ulysses asks how he can leave his wife. The doctor replies: “The old trail or the madhouse.” Ulysses calls Penelope: they tell her. She braces herself and says: “Go.”
The Residence of an aged Millionaire Abraham Dyer in Larchmont N.Y.: Dyer dines alone and gives his Jap leave to go out.
It is midnight and he cannot sleep. Presently he puts on his dressing gown and goes to the library to get a book.
A highly respectable man, with a notable scar on his cheek, drives home from the Town Hall, where he is an important official: once arrived, he changes his clothes and becomes Stiletto Jack, a masked burglar. He then goes to the Dyer home, gains entrance and is at the library safe when he hears Dyer and springs behind the door. The safe door is already open. As Dyer enters, he throws a cloth over his head and stabs him in the back. Meanwhile Dyer's Japanese servant returns from his evening out, sees the burglar's entry, telephones the police and then enters the house with a latch key. He is just too late to prevent the murder but runs in and grapples the burglar, who wounds him but is flung by the Jap, who turns on the light. The burglar's mask has come off and he seen to have a deep scar on the right cheek. The Jap faints, the burglar runs to the window and sees police gathering; decides to bolt and gets away just as they arrive.
Jack, after various doublings, reaches his headquarters. A woman admits him. It is a vulgarly prosperous house. In the back room are two other men. They greet him with respect as their chief. He rapidly tells the story, making these points emphatic:
1. That the police have never caught him, so that they have no measurements or thumbprints. 2. That despite that, the Jap can recognize him by the scar. 3. That this scar is known to many people: prominent citizens.
The police therefore may be expected to raid the house at any moment.
One of the other men, a highly intellectual type, proposes to cover the scar and bandages this, putting his arm in a sling as an additional blind. They change his clothes, shave his moustache, thrust rolls of money in his pockets and also give him a forged passport so that he can get abroad and lie low. They arrange to send proper credentials top the Town Hall urging unexpected and important business elsewhere. He gets clear away and the people of the house are quietly playing cards when the police arrive.
Harold MacMillan, a detective with the raiding party has from the Jap a description of Stiletto Jack. Search is made without avail. MacMillan happens in a couple of days to see a picture of the Town Official, and is curiously attracted by the scar: hears of the unexpected departure, becomes suspicious, shows picture to Japanese — “Yes, that's the Man.” Description is telegraphed and broadcast and it is learned Jack has been seen in the far West, and then lost track of again. MacMillan takes up the scent.
Meanwhile Ulysses has arrived in San Francisco, outfits himself in trapper's costume and bargains with a whaler to take him to Alaska. His baggage is shipped and attention is called to a small writing case, which contains passport, letters of introduction, traveller's checks, his wife's letters, photographs of himself, his wife, their home, and other strictly personal papers. Penelope leaves him to go home and he sails.
Stiletto Jack has meanwhile reached a small port at which the coaster calls. He has disguised his scar by painting the whole cheek and part of the neck to look like a port wine stain. He prevails on the Captain to take him to Alaska (he is dressed as a regular miner), embarks and shares the cabin with Ulysses.
MacMillan trails Jack to port of embarkation and, learning of his departure on the whaler, arranges to follow.
On Board the Ship: Ulysses becomes friendly with Jack. One of the sailors is a surly drunken brute, who takes drugs and is half insane. This man quarrels with Ulysses, who knocks him down. The sailor threatens revenge and that night when Jack, unable to sleep goes on deck, the sailor follows him with a marlin spike. Jack turns and the sailor turns back astonished.
Next morning Jack and Ulysses compare notes and so discover that their general build and carriage is very similar, though Jack's scar is, of course, such as to destroy any original facial resemblance.
The captain wants to put the sailor in irons but he is short-sighted. The sailor seems sincerely penitent and they agree to release him but to watch him.
Outwardly and in public Jack is shown as acting his part splendidly but when alone he is a prey to agonies of fear.
The following night Ulysses is on deck and the crazy sailor, who is lookout, begins to sing and dance. He is reprimanded from the bridge but for an answer throws himself overboard. Ulysses flings off his sou'wester and dives after him. The weather is rough and the night dark. The ship is hove to, boats lowered and search made, but neither of the men can be picked up.
Jack is now shown thinking hard. An idea strikes him: he would be safe if he could take some assured personality. He curses the tell-tale scar. Thinks harder, smiles, takes Ulysses' writing-case and puts it in his grip. The ship calls at another port; Jack steals ashore under cover of night and, reaching a small country inn, takes room, having disguised himself as a clergyman wishing to recuperate from a nervous breakdown.
MacMillan reaches the boat eventually, only to be told of the disappearance of one man and the drowning of the other and that the effects of Ulysses had been sent to his wife at the first port after his disappearance.
Ulysses swims in the dark. He has almost given up when a strange shape looms before him. It is a waterlogged derelict. He clambers on to it. Day dawns. He finds the hold full of loose planks and makes a small raft out of these with some cordage, uses a pole for a mast and a tarpaulin for a sail. He launches this and strikes a small island, just before thirst and hunger and exhaustion finish him.
The island is wooded and he finds an abandoned cottage, once the summer residence of a rich crank. It is furnished with many necessaries, unopened tins of provisions etc. He lives here for some time and during one of his explorations strikes a rich reef of gold. He collects a number of large nuggets and at the same time sets himself to repair an old boat which has been left to rot on the beach.
Meanwhile the Captain travels to break the news to Penelope of the drowning of her husband. She is in agony but something in her refuses to believe it. Public opinion, however, compels her to wear widow's weeds.
We also see Jack in his inn, studying the contents of the writing desk. He practices forging the name of Ulysses and studies the photographs and other clues to his identity. He extends the scar on his face to include the whole side of it and makes a new scar over the left eye. His idea is to impersonate Ulysses, explains his changed appearance by the accident, causing these scars at the same time to invalidate the Jap's identification of him as the murderer of Dyer.
The detective returning to the home of Ulysses, learns of the disappearance of the writing desk. He divines Jack's plans for assuming the identity of his fellow traveller and decides to watch Mrs. Putnam.
Ulysses stows the gold about his person, provisions the repaired boat and sets sail for the continent. He is, however, run down during the night by a liner bound for Japan. He is asleep at the time. The liner rescues him but when he is restored to health after many days of severe illness, he has completely forgotten who he is, and on landing in Japan has to be sent to an asylum. In time he recovers his intellectual characteristics but not his memory. They think he is English and send him to London.
Penelope, meantime, becoming more and more depressed finally sells the home and goes to visit friends in England.
Jack, having now made himself as like Ulysses as possible, telegraphs to Mrs. Putnam that he has been picked up and, after a long illness partially damaging his memory and disfiguring his face, is coming home to her. He is seen arriving at the house and learning that Penelope has gone to England, he identifies himself at the bank and re-opens the closed account; telling the president that he will bring his wife back. He is everywhere accepted as Ulysses, and he then goes to England, cabling Penelope of his coming.
Mrs. Putnam has taken a house on the Thames. She has reconstructed her husband's den as nearly as possible and still clings to the belief that he may be alive. When she receives the cable she is overjoyed, believes the lie and prepares a wifely welcome. Meantime informing MacMillan of her husband's return. On Jack's arrival MacMillan intrudes upon the meeting, accusing Jack point blank of being himself. Jack denies this coolly and offers to prove his identity. His story baffles Harold, who does not dare to arrest him. Meanwhile the wife has an instinct of repulsion. Jack pleads passionately with her for full recognition and taunts her that it is his scar which disqualifies him. She tries to yield, but though her mind is convinced, her soul rejects the imposture. It is agreed that for the time being he shall live at the neighbouring hotel, with full opportunity to persuade her that he is her husband.
Ulysses has arrived in London, a socially and financially eligible though nameless Englishman. His romantic situation and pleasant manners make him a favorite at dinner parties, despite his lapse of memory. He is asked to a boating party ay which Jack, who has made himself popular in the neighbourhood, is present. Ulysses has grown a beard on his island and it is quite white. He has this trimmed and looks very distinguished, but his privations have thinned and tanned him so that he looks very different from the rather fleshy invalid in the first scene. Jack recognizes him immediately. Ulysses, on the other hand, has no memory of Jack or of his own name when Jack is introduced by it.
Jack is, however, alarmed lest the other should regain his memory. He resolves to make a friend of him, firstly, in order to study certain points in his personally which he may imitate and so gain Mrs. Putnam and her wealth as well as his own safety, and, secondly, this first aim accomplished, to kill Ulysses with no doubt about it and so end the danger from that quarter. He is also anxious to keep husband and wife from meeting.
Mrs. Putnam is received everywhere as a widow and many charming men with to marry her. She naturally refuses to discuss the question. Her chosen friends, besides the ladies of the county, are elderly men and in particular the rector of the parish, who is a celebrated Greek scholar. As time goes on she is more and more convinced that Jack is not her husband but it also grows harder for her to refuse his demands. Her lawyers tell her that she is helpless and that MacMillan has utterly failed her.
Ulysses, though welcome at dinner parties, is not eligible to marry till he can produce a family tree. There is, however, a woman on the edge of society, Mrs. Ashley. twice divorced, who wants to marry him. He is not eager, but his loneliness, especially in his state of mind, oppresses him and he ultimately becomes engaged to her. They are seen about together everywhere. Jack cultivates them and obtains a hold on the woman by threatening to tell Ulysses, who has taken the name of Quien Sabe, of her past. He forces her to keep Ulysses from meeting his wife, though both are now moving in a small circle of Riverside pleasure seekers.
Ulysses and Mrs. Ashley are automobiling and the machine breaks down just as night falls. He leaves her in the car and walks on to get help. His wife's house is the first he comes to. He knocks and asks to leave to telephone. There is no recognition, but he seems bewildered as of among familiar things, and when his wife appears some inner impulse so upsets his mind that he forgets entirely why he has called at the house. He murmurs apologies, gets out somehow, and having forgotten the car wanders about and is ultimately picked up by a grocer's cart and taken to the local hotel.
(The actor must make it clear that this mental state is by no means a relapse, but a step towards complete cure — not the drowsiness of a tired man but the half awake state of the early riser.)
He recovers next day and has a violent scene with Mrs. Ashley, who, however. forgives him, but he finds himself utterly unable to marry her and tells her so. Another scene follows. She throws him out of the house. He goes to ask Jack's advice. Jack questions him closely. Ulysses is now sure that he has been married at some time but all that he can remember about his wife is that she has a mole just under her left arm. He indicates the exact spot. Jack says: “That's only a fancy; you're bound in honour to Mrs. Ashley.”
Jack is both delighted and alarmed. He can now convince Penelope, but also Ulysses looks more like recovering his memory. Jack has been drinking heavily during this conversation. When Ulysses goes, he passes the room as if in doubt, seems to make up his mind to act quickly and decisively with a strong gesture, then suddenly grows dizzy, clutches at the mantle-piece, but falls. The hotel servants carry him to bed and call a doctor. He lies helpless for some time.
Meanwhile Penelope has made up her mind that she hates Jack, is sure he is false. She consults the rector who agrees with her, but thinks she should marry one of her other suitors to put an end to the persecution. She pleads for delay.
Ulysses, on leaving Jack's hotel, has again lost himself and he strays, as if guided unconsciously, back to Mrs. Putnam's house. She feels a curious interest in him. They get into conversation — he is more and more drawn to her. He goes to Mrs. Ashley and pleads to be released, offers her half his fortune. She refuses, fearing Jack, who has threatened not only to spoil her game with Ulysses but to kill her if she disobeyed. His silence frightens her more. She divines another woman in the case and follows Ulysses secretly. She spies his next conversation with his wife and takes the bold step of entering the garden and making Ulysses present her as his betrothed, His honor compels him and he tears himself away.
This is all done under cover of politeness and Mrs. Putnam asks them to dinner for the following week.
After they go, the rector calls. She is again at archery: the rector consoles her, then notes championship shield and the bow. Gets an idea, says: “Strange that your husband was Ulysses, you Penelope; he a champion archer. This has all happened before.”
Rector then tells Penelope, in picture, the story of The Return of Ulysses (see any Classical Dictionary for the story of Ulysses). He then says: “Invite your suitors to the big dinner party next week; promise to marry the man who can bend your husband's bow.” She agrees.
The Part: Jack has now recovered and calls. The rector is there, MacMillan is on the watch. The suitors and Ulysses with Mrs. Ashley arrive. Tea is served. The rector announces Penelope's decision. Jack gets up, says: “This is my wife.” “Prove it.”
“I have given many proofs; I held one back. If she refuses to admit it, she is not fit to marry.”
Great confusion. Penelope almost faints. Jack approaches her, touches here where the mole is, and says: “There is a mole under my finger.” Penelope faints, and after recovery says: “I can't deny it.”
Jack says: “Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to my house.” and takes Penelope in his arms. The rector says: “Stop. If you are the man, you can surely bend his bow.”
They send for arrows and bow. Jack says that his illness and accident have weakened him but he thinks himself stronger than Ulysses ever was, and that his best policy is to try. It takes three men to string the bow. Jack fits an arrow: he cannot draw it to his shoulder — “I'm not the man I was.”
The strength of the bow makes the youths emulous. They all try and fail.
During this scene Ulysses has appeared half dazed. He takes the bow and handles it curiously — its touch seems to transform him. He snatches an arrow and without effort sends it to the target. The consternation is general. Ulysses strikes his brow, points to his wife, says slowly: “Then you're my wife.” Jack laughs and sneers, touching the mole. Ulysses, still with his half dazed look, says: “It was I told you that,” and, constantly pointing, adds: “You're, you're — you're the man on the boat.”
Harold MacMillan leaps into the group and catches Jack, crying: “Stiletto Jack, I arrest you for the murder of Abraham Dyer.”
Jack breaks away and draws a gun. They all finch and he bolts for the gate. But Ulysses, with the second arrow, transfixes him.
Husband and wife unite.
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