Below the buffet a
door opens into the butler's pantry. A dinner table stands well
down the stage with a chair at each end and on either side. Two
chairs are set against the back wall to the right of the door. The
walls and windows are decorated with holly and mistletoe and
Christmas wreaths tied with bows of scarlet ribbon. When the
window is opened there is a view of falling snow. At first the
room is in complete darkness.
The time is the day after Christmas, near midnight.
After the curtain rises, one hears the noise of a file scraping
on iron. It comes apparently from outside the house at a point
distant from the dining room. The filing is repeated cautiously,
with a wait between each stroke, as though the person using the
file had paused to listen.
Alice Gardner enters at centre, carrying a lighted candle in a
silver candlestick. She wears a dressing gown, with swan's down
around her throat and at the edges of her sleeves. Her feet are
in bedroom slippers topped with fur. Her hair hangs down in a
braid. After listening intently to the sound of the file, she
places candle on sideboard and goes to telephone.
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