31 Plays in 31 Days, #26 - "How Did You Come to Do This?"

[breakinglight11]

Blargh. This scene, which immediately follows Day #25 - "Act Tonight", is not working. The idea behind it is that Mrs. Hawking has come to sympathize, even identify, with this client Mrs. Khan (soon to be Mrs. Chaudhary) in the course of helping her, plus is in a self-reflective and melancholy mood due to thinking about the past. These are supposed to combine to make her more open and forthcoming than she usually is. However, the overwhelming consensus at the reading was that she was WAY TOO open and forthcoming to be in character, and after hearing that I agree. I need to find a way to get the information across here while pulling massively back to keep Mrs. Hawking believable, but I haven't undertaken that editing operation yet.

Blargh. I have five more of these to do and I think I'm out of Gilded Cages scenes I can post without excessive spoilers.

Day #26 - "How Did You Come to Do This?"
From Gilded Cages
By Phoebe Roberts

London, England, 1884

VICTORIA HAWKING, lady's champion of London
AMINA KHAN, her client
~~~

MRS. HAWKING:

You mustn’t lose hope, Mrs. Khan. If I have to tear the place to the ground piece by piece, I will.

MRS. KHAN:

How did you come to do this? Take on the demons of other people’s misery?

MRS. HAWKING:

To stave off my own.

MRS. KHAN:

Indeed?

MRS. HAWKING:

My marriage was not precisely like yours… but I too found myself trapped in it.

MRS. KHAN:

You seem to have remarkable freedom to me.

MRS. HAWKING:

Stone walls do not a prison make, nor iron bars a cage. It can be the gilded trap of a man in love. I’m sure I need not explain to you. To have my life taken from me so completely, whether I would or no… I was so angry, I thought I would go mad. I had to… do something with myself. And I knew that, if I was in such a state, there had to be others just the same. So I struck out on their behalf, against the burdens of their lot, and I felt a strength I never had before. I could change things. If I could… help them, free them from the struggles which so encumbered their lives… perhaps I could redeem my own life.

MRS. KHAN:

I see. And this… this gives you peace?

MRS. HAWKING:

No... I have no use for peace. Peace tears down no walls, nor shatters any bars.

MRS. KHAN:

Purely for the service, then?

MRS. HAWKING:

Or at least a vent to the rage.

MRS. KHAN:

Well. I suppose we are fortunate that you’ll fight for us.

MRS. HAWKING:

Go gather your daughter now, madam. My nephew will meet you at the rendezvous point with your papers.

MRS. KHAN:

Thank you, Mrs. Hawking. I will leave you to your work.