A View from the Bridge

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Book: Read A View from the Bridge for Free Online
Authors: Arthur Miller
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    RODOLPHO: Maybe you can come too. I want to see all those lights. He sees no response in Eddie’s face. He glances at Catherine. I’ll walk by the river before I go to sleep. He walks off down the street.
    CATHERINE: Why don’t you talk to him, Eddie? He blesses you, and you don’t talk to him hardly.
    EDDIE, enveloping her with his eyes: I bless you and you don’t talk to me. He tries to smile.
    CATHERINE: I don’t talk to you? She hits his arm. What do you mean?
    EDDIE: I don’t see you no more. I come home you’re runnin’ around someplace—
    CATHERINE: Well, he wants to see everything, that’s all, so we go.... You mad at me?
    EDDIE: No. He moves from her, smiling sadly. It’s just I used to come home, you was always there. Now, I turn around, you’re a big girl. I don’t know how to talk to you.
    CATHERINE: Why?
    EDDIE: I don’t know, you’re runnin‘, you’re runnin’, Katie. I don’t think you listening any more to me.
    CATHERINE, going to him: Ah, Eddie, sure I am. What’s the matter? You don’t like him?
    Slight pause.
    EDDIE turns to her: You like him, Katie?
    CATHERINE, with a blush but holding her ground: Yeah. I like him.
    EDDIE—his smile goes: You like him.
    CATHERINE, looking down: Yeah. Now she looks at him for the consequences, smiling but tense. He looks at her like a lost boy. What’re you got against him? I don’t understand. He only blesses you.
    EDDIE turns away: He don’t bless me, Katie.
    CATHERINE: He does! You’re like a father to him!
    EDDIE turns to her: Katie.
    CATHERINE: What, Eddie?
    EDDIE: You gonna marry him?
    CATHERINE: I don’t know. We just been ... goin’ around, that’s all. Turns to him: What’re you got against him, Eddie? Please, tell me. What?
    EDDIE: He don’t respect you.
    CATHERINE: Why?
    EDDIE: Katie ... if you wasn’t an orphan, wouldn’t he ask your father’s permission before he run around with you like this?
    CATHERINE: Oh, well, he didn’t think you’d mind.
    EDDIE: He knows I mind, but it don’t bother him if I mind, don’t you see that?
    CATHERINE: No, Eddie, he’s got all kinds of respect for me. And you too! We walk across the street he takes my arm—he almost bows to me! You got him all wrong, Eddie; I mean it, you—
    EDDIE: Katie, he’s only bowin’ to his passport.
    CATHERINE: His passport!
    EDDIE: That’s right. He marries you he’s got the right to be an American citizen. That’s what’s goin’ on here. She is puzzled and surprised. You understand what I’m tellin’ you? The guy is lookin’ for his break, that’s all he’s lookin’ for.
    CATHERINE, pained: Oh, no, Eddie, I don’t think so.
    EDDIE: You don’t think so! Katie, you’re gonna make me cry here. Is that a workin’ man? What does he do with his first money? A snappy new jacket he buys, records, a pointy pair new shoes and his brother’s kids are starvin’ over there with tuberculosis? That’s a hit-and-run guy, baby; he’s got bright lights in his head, Broadway. Them guys don’t think of nobody but their-self! You marry him and the next time you see him it’ll be for divorce!
    CATHERINE steps toward him: Eddie, he never said a word about his papers or—
    EDDIE: You mean he’s supposed to tell you that?
    CATHERINE: I don’t think he’s even thinking about it.
    EDDIE: What’s better for him to think about! He could be picked up any day here and he’s back pushin’ taxis up the hill!
    CATHERINE: No, I don’t believe it.
    EDDIE: Katie, don’t break my heart, listen to me.
    CATHERINE: I don’t want to hear it.
    EDDIE: Katie, listen ...
    CATHERINE: He loves me!
    EDDIE, with deep alarm: Don’t say that, for God’s sake! This is the oldest racket in the country—
    CATHERINE, desperately, as

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