Ask Me No Questions and You'll Heat No Stories Fox, an idle young bachelor, lives in a charming apartment in NYC. Blah Blah Blah. Towards one evening, he comes home with a friend, Brodie. They are sitting in the Living Room, talking.... Brodie: Well Fox, I envy you. Fox: Come on, Brodie. Brodie: Perfectly astonishing. I always said it was tricks. But he went to sleep under my very eyes ... and then he danced when you told him he was a ballet dancer and cried when you told him his sweetheart was dead. And he sentenced that criminal very justly when you made him a judge. Fox: Didn't he? Brodie: It's magic. Fox: We can all be magicians to some extent. Brodie: Perfectly uncanny. Fox: Not more so than much else in life..not uncanny than we've been finding out the last hundred years. If you'd suddenly proved to one of our ancestors that the world went round, he'd turn giddy. Brodie: But this seems Super Natural. Fox: So must anything strange. What would a man think if he'd never seen a sunset before, or watched the spring arrive...the trees and the flowers...and felt himself falling in love. Brodie: Mesmerism. Fox: Hypnotism. Brodie: Yes, I'll make sure no one does it to me. Fox: Where's the harm? I tell you to go to sleep. You settle down comfortably...off you go... Brodie: Then you tell me I'm a Sanitation Worker and in the garbage I go and get all dirty. Fox: But, you know, it has great scientific possibilities. We're hardly on the threshold of them yet.... Bad luck. Brodie: Why bad luck? Fox: I could have made that man into a King or a Chicken. I only wish I could do the same for me. Brodie: Can't you? Fox: I've tried. I've stared and stared at this ring of mine, saying Sleep... and then wake up with the little wretch that's driving you mad, gone clean from your mind. Brodie: Still the same little wretch? Fox: Of course. I'm worthless. Brodie: And still suspecting her? Fox: I don't want to hear it. I know perfectly well that she's untrue to me. She puts her arms around my neck and kisses me, we're happy. But all the time.... As sure as she's standing there.. I know that she's.... Brodie: Oh shut up. Fox: What? Brodie: Then how do you know? Fox: When I feel a thing as I feel this... it must be true. Brodie: That's undebatable, anyhow. Fox: Besides, girls like this always are unfaithful. It comes naturally to them... it's a sort of instinct. Just as I have two or three books that I have read at a time, they must keep two or three men hanging around. Brodie: But doesn't she love you? Fox: What difference does it make? Brodie: Who's the other man? Fox: How do I know? Someone has seen her at the club. Someone has made eyes at her in the train going home. Brodie: Bull. Fox: Why? All she wants is to have a good time without thinking about it. I ask her if she loves me. She says Yes.... And it's perfectly true. Then... am I the only man she loves? She says Yes again.. and that's true too, for the time being. For the time being she's forgotten the other fellow. Besides.... What else can a woman say? She can't tell you... No my darling, the very moment your back is turned...1 Still... I wish I knew for certain. Brodie: Fox, if she really loves you... Fox: Oh, you're so Naïve. What does love have to o with it? Brodie: A great deal, I should hope. Fox: Then why am I not true to her? I really love her, don't I? Brodie: You're a man. Fox: Thank you ..... it only needed that! Of course... we are men and women are different. Some! If their mommas lock them up or if they're little fishes. Otherwise, my dear Brodie, women and men are very much alike....especially women. And if I swear to one of them that she's the only women I love, is that lying to her...just because the night before I've been saying the same thing to another? Brodie: Well.....speak for yourself. Fox: Cold-blooded. I'm afraid dear Maria's rather less like you than she is like me. Perhaps she isn't...but perhaps she is. I'd give a lot to know. I might go on my knees and swear I'd forgiven her already.... But she'd lie to me just the same. Haven't I been begged with tears a dozen times... for God's sake to tell them I'm true. They won't say an angry word if I'm not...only tell them. Then I've lied...calmly and cheerfully. And quite right too. Why should I make poor women wretched? They've believed in me and been happy. Brodie: Very well, then... Fox: But I don't believe in her and I'm not happy. Oh...if some one could invent a way to make these vixens speak the truth1 Brodie: What about your hypnotism? Fox: My.....? Brodie: Put her to sleep and draw it like a tooth. Fox: I could. Brodie: What an opportunity. Fox: Isn't it? Brodie: Does she love you.... Or who else is it? Where has she been...where's she's going? What's his name....? Fox: Oh if I knew that? Brodie: But you've only to ask her.... Fox: And she must answer. Brodie: You lucky fellow! Fox: Yes...I am. It'll be my own fault if I worry any more, won't it? She's under my thumb now isn't she? Brodie: I'm curious you know. Fox: Why... do you think she's not truthful? Brodie; No one should think that but you. Fox: No, nobody may. When you've just found your girl in another man's arms and an old friend meets you and says Poor fellow, I'm afraid your girl isn't all that she should be... do you clasp his hand gratefully and tell him he's quite right? No...you knock him down. Brodie: Yes...the principal task of friendship is to foster one's friend's imagination. Fox: Shhh Brodie: What/ Fox: How well I know the sound of her! Brodie; I don't... Fox: In the hall. Here she is. Well... Maria? Maria: Sweetie! Oh... someone with you. Fox: Only Brodie. Maria; How are you? Why are you in the dark? Fox: I like the dark! Maria; Romantic darling. Let's turn on the lights. You don't mind, do you? Fox: Isn't she....? Brodie: She is! Maria: Had a nice long talk? Fox: Half an hour. Maria: What about? Fox: All sorts of things. Brodie: Hypnotism. Maria: You're all going mad about that. Fox: Yes Maria: Fox, why don't you hypnotize me some time? Fox: really? Maria: Sure! It'll be fun if you do it darling. Fox: Alright. Maria: At least a stranger isn't messing about. Fox: Alright...I'll hypnotize you. Maria: When? Fox: Now Maria: Will you? What do I do? Fox: Sit in that chair and go to sleep. Maria: That's is? Fox: You must look at me... straight at me. And I stoke your forehead....and then over your eyes...like this. Maria: What else? Fox: Sit back and relax. Maria: When... Fox: Don't talk....go to sleep. You are very sleepy. Maria: No I'm not. Fox: Just a little. Maria: Yeah, just a little. Fox: Oh...it's so hard to stay awake. Don't try...you can't lift up your hands. Maria: No I can't. Fox: You are so sleepy...so sleepy...so very sleepy. Well, then....sleep, sleep...sleep. You can't open your eyes now. You can't because you are asleep. Keep sleeping. Brodie: Is she....? Fox: Sssh. Sleeping...sleeping...fast asleep. All right now. Brodie; Is she really asleep? Fox: Look at her. Let her be for a minute. Maria, answer me when I as you. What's your name? Maria: Maria. Fox: Maria...we're walking along a road...out in the country. Maria: Yes...isn't it pretty/ That's a tall tree. There's a bird singing. Fox: Maria... you're going to tell me the truth. Do you understand/ Maria: I am going to tell you the truth. Fox: Answer me all that I ask you quite truthfully...but when you wake up you will have forgotten. Do you understand? Maria: Yes Fox: The sleep...How shall we begin? Brodie: How old is she? Fox: She's nineteen. Maria...how old are you? Maria: twenty-five. Brodie: Damn Fox: Shh...that's odd...But, there you are. Brodie: She never thought she's be such a success. Fox: Well..one more martyr to science. Let's try again. Maria, do you love me? Maria, dear...do you love me? Maria: Yes Fox: There...that's the truth. Brodie: And now for the moment we've been waiting for...is she true to you? Fox: Yes...Maria, are you.... No, that won't do.