noticed it before. BEN Well, come on. GUS What do you do? BEN See that? That's a whistle. GUS What, this? BEN Yes, take it out. Pull it out.
[GUS does so. ]
That's it.
GUS What do we do now?
BEN Blow into it.
GUS Blow?
BEN It whistles up there if you blow. Then they know you want to speak.
Blow.
[GUS blows. Silence.]
GUS [Tube at mouth.] I can't hear a thing.
BEN Now you speak! Speak into it!
.
THE DUMB WAITER / 262 1
[GUS looks at BEN, then s-peaks into the tube.] GUS The larder's bare! BEN Give me that!
[He grabs the tube and puts it to his mouth. ] [Speaking with great deference.] Good evening. I'm sorry to?bother you, but we just thought we'd better let you know that we haven't got anything left. We sent up all we had. There's no more food down here.
[He brings the tube slowly to his ear.]
What? [To mouth.] What? [To ear. He listens. To mouth.] No, all we had we sent up. [To ear. He listens. To mouth.] Oh, I'm very sorry to hear that. [To ear. He listens. To GUS.] The Eccles cake was stale. [He listens. To GUS.] The chocolate was melted. [He listens. To GUS.]
The milk was sour. GUS What about the crisps? BEN [Listening.] The biscuits were mouldy.
[He glares at GUS. Tube to mouth.] Well, we're sorry about that.
[Tube to ear.]
What? [To mouth.] What? [To ear.] Yes. Yes. [To mouth.] Yes certainly. Right away.
[To ear. The voice has ceased. He hangs up the tube.]
[Excitedly.] Did you hear that? GUS What? BEN YOU know what he said? Light the kettle! Not put on the kettle! Not
light the gas! But light the kettle! GUS How can we light the kettle? BEN What do you mean? GUS There's no gas. BEN [Clapping hand to head.] Now what do we do? GUS What did he want us to light the kettle for? BEN For tea. He wanted a cup of tea. GUS He wanted a cup of tea! What about me? I've been wanting a cup of tea
all night! BEN [Despairingly.] What do we do now? GUS What are we supposed to drink?
[BEN sits on his bed, staring.] What about us? [BEN sits.]
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261 8 / HAROLD PINTER
I'm thirsty too. I'm starving. And he wants a cup of tea. That beats the band, that does.
[BEN lets his head sink on his chest.] I could do with a bit of sustenance myself. What about you? You look as if you could do with something too.
[GUS sits on his hed.] We send him up all we've got and he's not satisfied. No, honest, it's enough to make the cat laugh. Why did you send him up all that stuff? [Thoughtfully.] Why did I send it up?
[Pause. ]
Who knows what he's got upstairs? He's probably got a salad bowl. They must have something up there. They won't get much from down here. You notice they didn't ask for any salads? They've probably got a salad bowl up there. Cold meat, radishes, cucumbers. Watercress. Roll mops.
[Pause. ] Hardboiled eggs.
[Pause.]
The lot. They've probably got a crate of beer too. Probably eating my crisps with a pint of beer now. Didn't have anything to say about those crisps, did he? They do all right, don't worry about that. You don't think they're just going to sit there and wait for stuff to come up from down here, do you? That'll get them nowhere.
[Pause.]
They do all right.
[Pause.]
And he wants a cup of tea.
[Pause. ]
That's past a joke, in my opinion.
[He looks over at BEN, rises, and goes to him.] What's the matter with you? You don't look too bright. I feel
