TYE: He does dress now—quickly, guiltily, without a glance at me, as if I’d caught him at some shameful thing.

TYE [wrestling himself rapidly into his clothes]: I’m—trying to think. She’s thrown an awful lot at this country mighty quick . . .

JANE: I should have told you nothing, just slipped away. These Brazilians are sentimental, you know. I could have told him at once that I was dying and he would have put me in a suite at the best hospital to do it. —Among fresh flowers daily. You’d have visiting privileges. I’d introduce you to him as my kid brother from Friars Point, Miss!—he’s a gullible bastard. [A little hysterical laugh.] —He’d comfort you with a 22-karat, eighteen jewel, Swiss movement wristwatch.

TYE: Babe—cut some slack, will you, huh? We all got to cut some slack. Listen. You know you don’t have to sweat it.

JANE: —So?

TYE: Not with me.

JANE: Oh. —Can you give me another remission, one that lasts? And if it doesn’t last long, can you put me in the—astronomical hospital suite reserved for VIP’s?

TYE: —‘Sthat what you want? the Astronomical Hospital suite or me here and the skylight?

JANE: Or you there with the strippers . . .

TYE: Babe, cut some slack. And don’t sweat it. It’s late, after dark, I’m dressed.

JANE: Zip your fly up unless you’re now in the show.

[Pause. He suddenly moves to her and kisses her intensely, draws back and looks into her eyes. She smiles and zips up his fly and touches his face and throat with trembling fingers.]

TYE: —Love . . .

JANE: Lovely old word, love, it’s travelled a long way, Tye.

TYE: Still has a long way to go. —Well, I—hate to leave you alone.

JANE: I’m not alone. The cat’s here. She’s a—very comforting presence in a room with a skylight. —This city is under sea level. At night those fleecy gray white clouds come so close over the roofs of the Quarter that if you’re slightly smashed and have a gallery you feel like you could touch them and little bits of them would come off your fingers like tufts of—cotton candy . . .

TYE: Yeah, yeh. I’ll tell you. I’ll get Kewpie to take over for me at midnight and I’ll come back with pizzas and a bottle of vino. We’ll have a—quiet celebration with—candles? Huh? —Now rest.

JANE: But TYE!

TYE: What, Babe?

JANE: How presumptuous of me, how—conceited of me to think that I, Jane, out of everybody living isn’t scared of—can’t even speak the word!

PLAYWRIGHT: Downstage.

[She moves quickly forward.]

JANE: —Death.

[Tye starts out the door. The playwright is lighted in his aisle seat.]