DEALING IN FUTURES
A Play In Three Acts
By Harold Brighouse
New York: Samuel French Publisher
1913
CONTENTS
DEALING IN FUTURES
A PLAY IN THREE ACTS
CHARACTERS
JABEZ Thompson....................A Chemical Manufacturer.
ROSIE Thompson....................His Daughter.
JOHN Bunting......................A Master Dyer.
CHARLIE Bunting...................His Son.
WALTER Clavering..................A Young Doctor.
The Scene is laid in an outlying Lancashire village and the action of the play takes place within a space of twenty-six hours.
ACT I
The dining-room of Jabez Thompson's; the room is luxuriously furnished and combines comfort with ostentation; the door is left, and at the back a large doorway curtained off leads to the billiard-room. (A plan of this and the other scenes in the play will be found at the end of the book.) The table is littered with the debris of dinner, and at it sit Jabez Thompson (l.), and Rosie his daughter (l.), facing each other. Jabez is elderly, corpulent, bearded, of florid face and general prosperous appearance; he wears a frock coat, light grey trousers, and has a heavy gold watch chain. He speaks with all the assertiveness of life-long success.
ROSIE is dark and highly coloured, her face strong rather than beautiful. She dresses with taste, avoiding her fathers scarcely veiled vulgarity, and wears a high dress of some amber material. She inherits her father's strength of will, and though outwardly cultured, has not been able to subdue entirely a naturally violent temper. Her voice is a little shrill and shrewish, and Jabez is obviously rather afraid of her.
Mallinson, the butler, enters with coffee, which he places on the table by Rosie. Rosie pours coffee. Butler puts cup by Jabez.
BUTLER. Mr. Lomax, from the works, has arrived, sir.
JABEZ. Very well, put him in the library. I'll be there in a moment to sign the letters.
BUTLER. Yes, sir.
JABEZ. Oh, give him this and tell him to look through it. (Gives folded paper from his pocket.)
BUTLER. Yes, sir. (Takes paper and exit.)
JABEZ (Sips coffee, lights cigar, and turns chair to face audience). By the way, Rosie, I asked Charlie to come round after dinner and to bring his father.
ROSIE (Interested). Oh! Why?
JABEZ. I'm not