Those parts of the text in italics are spoken by both characters.

After a long pause:
 

WOMAN              One evening she spoke her voice soft 

O she said to hear the violin

For that was the sound she so wished to hear

Once long ago she had heard it and she had never forgotten

Yet she had never before spoken of it

Until once as evening fell the chill deepening the house empty but for her she spoke at last

O to hear the violin

Her lips hardly moving her head bowed

Somewhere in her empty house was the room where she had heard the violin so long ago

By whose hands the violin was played she no longer recalled only that they were very pale and moved with such grace that she felt in her heart some feeling she had never felt before or since

Hands before or since those she saw upon the violin never moved with such grace 

O she said to see again those pale hands moving

Her own hands were pale and still and rested upon the arms of her chair

So pale and still were her hands that they might be mistaken for the hands of a corpse for they resembled the hands of someone who has passed from this life yet remains frozen in the attitude of their last moment

In her chair by the window her ancient visage turned from what little light fell through the heavy curtains her head bowed as though in prayer or supplication

It had been a loved one who had played the violin of that she felt sure

When all else about her seemed so uncertain she held on to that dim understanding

Not really knowing if it were true

Some loved one she had forgotten 

So many times through the long years she had closed her eyes her head bowed as though in prayer or supplication hoping to hear the violin 

As if somewhere in her mind the sound remained unchanged and unchanging 

But she heard nothing

Yet the violin remained so fixed in her mind if not the actual sound it made then its effect which had been so profound as to last so long

For so long had passed 

The room had been almost in darkness then as her room was almost in darkness now and yet somehow she had seen those pale hands

Perhaps it had been evening and they were caught in the dying light

As her hands were now caught

Whom had she loved?

To this question none of her memories would answer for she had never wished to love or be loved nor had she sought any solace from what she considered the tasks of her life

Yet she knew even now that never wishing to be loved did not mean that she had not been loved

She felt certain that if she had been loved she had not returned that love

For she had no recollection of loving 

The tasks of her life had been such as to engage her completely

She understood that she had attended to these tasks in solitude

She had always been alone

Regarding this fact she had no feeling or opinion

For such had been her life and could not be changed

Hers had been a solitary life and had remained one 

Other matters and their importance other people and their tasks were dim shades that played about her in a dance the music of which she never heard

As to her tasks themselves she had now only a dim recollection but she felt certain they concerned themselves with the nursing of her mother who had the ill fortune of being unsound of mind and of body and upon whom great amounts of time and effort were spent in maintaining her comfort such as it was

She did not consider her mother a loved one

Of her passing away she recalled only that it was considered a blessed relief for her as well as for those who had tended her for she had lingered in her painful state to an age well beyond what she might have been expected to reach

Those who had tended her mother had themselves grown old and she seemed to recall them stooped over the dead woman's grave not in grief but out of weariness

She thought that those who had tended her mother were few in number though she could not now remember how many there were exactly only that they were now all passed away and that she felt they were no great loss 

None of them were loved ones 

And yet the thought persisted that there had been one

One who had loved her

One she had not loved in return

For even now after so long had passed since the evening those pale hands had been caught in the failing light she felt again in her heart some feeling she had never felt before or since 

To know who that loved one might have been

If loved one could mean one loving and not loved

To remember who it was

That was her wish

For now in the dim light of her failing mind this one she did not love but who had loved her was one she wished to recognise

For perhaps to recognise was to love

She did not know

Perhaps it had been a child though she could recall no children

The child did not need to be her own for children can enter the lives of the childless 

There were times now and then when she thought she remembered the soft orb of an infant's skull cupped in her hands or resting in the crook of her arm

She remembered nothing else of the child if ever there had been one

Her own child or another's 

A child who loved her and played the violin for her

A child whose love she had not returned

Nothing she said softly

If only she had been able to rise from her chair she would have found her way along the darkened hallways and visited everyroom of the house for she thought that perhaps even now she might be able to recognise it

Perhaps in some room the evening light was falling through the window as it had fallen that evening the violin was played

She thought that if only she could see that light falling in the empty room she might be able to recall this loved one and hear again theviolin

But to rise from her chair was something that she dimly understood was not possible though why it was not possible she did not know 

Nor did she understand how she managed to live from day to day without moving from her chair and with no one tending to what needs she knew she must have though even these were beyond her memory or understanding

Unless there was someone she could not recall nor whom she expected who in fact did tend to her needs whatever they were

She imagined that her needs were meagre

Perhaps the child she did not love and could not remember who had played the violin for her so long ago was the one who now tended to her meagre needs

A child now old and stooped with weariness expecting no love in return for the love they expressed

There was so much she did not know and of that much she was certain which was at least a source of comfort to her no matter howsmall

On occasion the thought had occurred to her that her life such as it was and how it continued was not something she could any longer hope to understand

For she was of sufficient mind to think such thoughts

Yet there lingered certain doubts as to her state of mind which she understood to be frail

For she felt frail of mind

But for the certainty of the violin which she had heard so long ago and wished to hear again

It was a wish that in the midst of so much uncertainty she knew would not be fulfilled

And yet still she wished it

Until her strength such as it was failed her and she felt she could wish no longer

For even to wish was something that tested the limits of her strength which was less than enough 

And so she lifted her hands from the arms of her chair as if to call a halt to call a halt at last

At last she said softly

Putting an end to the love she knew or did not know

The love offered and not returned 

If ever it had been so

At last she said

Her pale hands trembling in the last of the light
 

The table lamp slowly fades to black.
 
 

Copyright Daniel Keene.  All rights reserved.  Inquiries concerning performance rights should be directed to the author at danielkeene.com