Porcelain and Pink, F. Scott Fitzgerald

“And do you write for any other magazines?” inquired the young lady.

“Oh, yes,” I assured her. “I’ve had some stories and plays in the ‘Smart Set,’ for instance——”

The young lady shivered.

“The ‘Smart Set’!” she exclaimed. “How can you? Why, they publish stuff about girls in blue bathtubs, and silly things like that.”

And I had the magnificent joy of telling her that she was referring to “Porcelain and Pink,” which had appeared there several months before.

Porcelain and Pink

A room in the down-stairs of a summer cottage. High around the wall runs an art frieze of a fisherman with a pile of nets at his feet and a ship on a crimson ocean, a fisherman with a pile of nets at his feet and a ship on a crimson ocean, a fisherman with a pile of nets at his feet and so on. In one place on the frieze there is an overlapping—here we have half a fisherman with half a pile of nets at his foot, crowded damply against half a ship on half a crimson ocean. The frieze is not in the plot, but frankly it fascinates me. I could continue indefinitely, but I am distracted by one of the two objects in the room—a blue porcelain bath-tub. It has character, this bath-tub. It is not one of the new racing bodies, but is small with a high tonneau and looks as if it were going to jump; discouraged, however, by the shortness of its legs, it has submitted to its environment and to its coat of sky-blue paint. But it grumpily refuses to allow any patron completely to stretch his legs—which brings us neatly to the second object in the room:

It is a girl—clearly an appendage to the bath-tub, only her head and throat—beautiful girls have throats instead of necks—and a suggestion of shoulder appearing above the side. For the first ten minutes of the play the audience is engrossed in wondering if she really is playing the game fairly and hasn’t any clothes on or whether it is being cheated and she is dressed.

The girl’s name is Julie Marvis. From the proud way she sits up in the bath-tub we deduce that she is not very tall and that she carries herself well. When she smiles, her upper lip rolls a little and reminds you of an Easter Bunny. She is within whispering distance of twenty years old.

One thing more—above and to the right of the bath-tub is a window. It is narrow and has a wide sill; it lets in much sunshine, but effectually prevents any one who looks in from seeing the bath-tub. You begin to suspect the plot?

We open, conventionally enough, with a song, but, as the startled gasp of the audience quite drowns out the first half, we will give only the last of it:

Julie: (In an airy sophrano—enthusiastico)
When Caesar did the Chicago
He was a graceful child,
Those sacred chickens
Just raised the dickens
The Vestal Virgins went wild.
Whenever the Nervii got nervy
He gave them an awful razz
They shook in their shoes
With the Consular blues
The Imperial Roman Jazz

(During the wild applause that follows Julie modestly moves her arms and makes waves on the surface of the water—at least we suppose she does. Then the door on the left opens and Lois Marvis enters, dressed but carrying garments and towels. Lois is a year older than Julie and is nearly her double in face and voice, but in her clothes and expression are the marks of the conservative. Yes, you’ve guessed it. Mistaken identity is the old rusty pivot upon which the plot turns.)

Lois: (Starting) Oh, ’scuse me. I didn’t know you were here.

Julie: Oh, hello. I’m giving a little concert—

Lois: (Interrupting) Why didn’t you lock the door?

Julie: Didn’t I?

Lois: Of course you didn’t. Do you think I just walked through it?

Julie: I thought you picked the lock, dearest.

Lois: You’re so careless.

Julie: No. I’m happy as a garbage-man’s dog and I’m giving a little concert.

Lois: (Severely) Grow up!

Julie: (Waving a pink arm around the room) The walls reflect the sound, you see. That’s why there’s something very beautiful about singing in a bath-tub. It gives an effect of surpassing loveliness. Can I render you a selection?

Lois: I wish you’d hurry out of the tub.

Julie: (Shaking her head thoughtfully) Can’t be hurried. This is my kingdom at present, Godliness.

Lois: Why the mellow name?

Julie: Because you’re next to Cleanliness. Don’t throw anything please!

Lois: How long will you be?

Julie: (After some consideration) Not less than fifteen nor more than twenty-five minutes.

Lois: As a favor to me will you make it ten?

Julie: (Reminiscing) Oh, Godliness, do you remember a day in the chill of last January when one Julie, famous for her Easter-rabbit smile, was going out and there was scarcely any hot water and young Julie had just filled the tub for her own little self when the wicked sister came and did bathe herself therein, forcing the young Julie to perform her ablutions with cold cream—which is expensive and a darn lot of troubles?

Lois: (Impatiently) Then you won’t hurry?

Julie: Why should I?

Lois: I’ve got a date.

Julie: Here at the house?

Lois: None of your business.

(Julie shrugs the visible tips of her shoulders and stirs the water into ripples.)

Julie: So be it.

Lois: Oh, for Heaven’s sake, yes! I have a date here, at the house—in a way.

Julie: In a way?

Lois: He isn’t coming in. He’s calling for me and we’re walking.

Julie: (Raising her eyebrows) Oh, the plot clears. It’s that literary Mr. Calkins. I thought you promised mother you wouldn’t invite him in.

Lois: (Desperately) She’s so idiotic. She detests him because he’s just got a divorce. Of course she’s had more experience than I have, but—

Julie: (Wisely) Don’t let her kid you! Experience is the biggest gold brick in the world. All older people have it for sale.

Lois: I like him. We talk literature.

Julie: Oh, so that’s why I’ve noticed all these weighty books around the house lately.

Lois: He lends them to me.

Julie: Well, you’ve got to play his game. When in Rome do as the Romans would like to do. But I’m through with books. I’m all educated.

Lois: You’re very inconsistent—last summer you read every day.

Julie: If I were consistent I’d still be living on warm milk out of a bottle.

Lois: Yes, and probably my bottle. But I like Mr. Calkins.

Julie: I never met him.

Lois: Well, will you hurry up?

Julie: Yes. (After a pause) I wait till the water gets tepid and then I let in more hot.

Lois: (Sarcastically) How interesting!

Julie: ’Member when we used to play “soapo”?

Lois: Yes—and ten years old. I’m really quite surprised that you don’t play it still.

Julie: I do. I’m going to in a minute.

Lois: Silly game.

Julie: (Warmly) No, it isn’t. It’s good for the nerves. I’ll bet you’ve forgotten how to play it.

Lois: (Defiantly) No, I haven’t. You—you get the tub all full of soapsuds and then you get up on the edge and slide down.

Julie: (Shaking her head scornfully) Huh! That’s only part of it. You’ve got to slide down without touching your hand or feet—

Lois:(Impatiently) Oh, Lord! What do I care? I wish we’d either stop coming here in the summer or else get a house with two bath-tubs.

Julie: You can buy yourself a little tin one, or use the hose——

Lois: Oh, shut up!

Julie: (Irrelevantly) Leave the towel.

Lois: What?

Julie: Leave the towel when you go.

Lois: This towel?

Julie: (Sweetly) Yes, I forgot my towel.

Lois: (Looking around for the first time) Why, you idiot! You haven’t even a kimono.

Julie: (Also looking around) Why, so I haven’t.

Lois: (Suspicion growing on her) How did you get here?

Julie: (Laughing) I guess I—I guess I whisked here. You know—a white form whisking down the stairs and—

Lois: (Scandalized) Why, you little wretch. Haven’t you any pride or self-respect?

Julie: Lots of both. I think that proves it. I looked very well. I really am rather cute in my natural state.

Lois: Well, you—

Julie: (Thinking aloud) I wish people didn’t wear any clothes. I guess I ought to have been a pagan or a native or something.

Lois: You’re a—

Julie: I dreamt last night that one Sunday in church a small boy brought in a magnet that attracted cloth. He attracted the clothes right off of everybody; put them in an awful state; people were crying and shrieking and carrying on as if they’d just discovered their skins for the first time. Only I didn’t care. So I just laughed. I had to pass the collection plate because nobody else would.

Lois: (Who has turned a deaf ear to this speech) Do you mean to tell me that if I hadn’t come you’d have run back to your room—un—unclothed?

Julie: Au naturel is so much nicer.

Lois: Suppose there had been some one in the living-room.

Julie: There never has been yet.

Lois: Yet! Good grief! How long—

Julie: Besides, I usually have a towel.

Lois: (Completely overcome) Golly! You ought to be spanked. I hope you get caught. I hope there’s a dozen ministers in the living-room when you come out—and their wives, and their daughters.

Julie: There wouldn’t be room for them in the living-room, answered Clean Kate of the Laundry District.

Lois: All right. You’ve made your own—bath-tub; you can lie in it.

(Lois starts determinedly for the door.)

Julie: (In alarm) Hey! Hey! I don’t care about the k’mono, but I want the towel. I can’t dry myself on a piece of soap and a wet wash-rag.

Lois: (Obstinately) I won’t humor such a creature. You’ll have to dry yourself the best way you can. You can roll on the floor like the animals do that don’t wear any clothes.

Julie: (Complacent again) All right. Get out!

Lois: (Haughtily)