Of the Museum, of course. LIVINGSTON Indeed? HOOD (_Lying in spite of himself_) Yes. BESS (_With a reassuring smile_) He thinks it’s a bit cramped here. LIVINGSTON I quite approve. Space is what is needed. But you’ll find it difficult to get money from the Legislature for such purposes. I’ve tried myself. HOOD Oh, are you interested in museums? LIVINGSTON Didn’t you tell him, Bess, about the museum I had planned? BESS (_Beginning to detect his intention_) No; it slipped my mind. LIVINGSTON (_Playfully reproving her_) And I had such a personal interest in it, too. HOOD Was it a museum for fossils? LIVINGSTON It was to prevent people from becoming fossils before their time. It was a museum of safety appliances. HOOD Industrial? LIVINGSTON No: domestic. From a very long life, I’d observed that in the world and in the home, most everybody, through lack of a little precaution, makes a fool of himself or herself once or twice in a life. BESS (_Suavely_) I thought the average was higher; didn’t you, Mr. Hood? LIVINGSTON Perhaps the nasty messy mangling is. I’m not sure of the mortalities. You see, Mr. Hood--if you are interested? HOOD (_With a start_) Very. LIVINGSTON What I mean is that people cut off a useful hand or limb--metaphorically, of course--because they go a little too near the machinery: the machinery of what we call the hard facts of life. HOOD And what was your exhibit intended for? LIVINGSTON (_Pointedly_) To have them read the danger signs _first_. It was my plan to indicate how signs should be put up over terrain places, like stores and homes and.... BESS (_Calmly_) How interesting. What sort of signs were they to be, dear? HOOD “Don’t Handle,” “Watch Your Step.” You know the sort. You see, I have a theory that if these signs were placed about in enough places people would soon grow accustomed to carrying them in their mind’s eye, as it were. (_Pointedly_) Do you get my meaning? BESS But, dear; there are so many signs now. Look at these about here for instance. I’m sure people would never get anything out of these by carrying them about in their heads. LIVINGSTON It’s merely a matter of how much intelligence and imagination you bring to signs--otherwise they are only words. (_As_ LIVINGSTON _crosses to read sign under the_ BRONTOSAURUS, HOOD _makes a movement as though to speak, but_ BESS, _who has sat on the bench, stops him with an imploring gesture_.) Um--highly suggestive, this. (_Reading_) “Great Amphibious Dinosaur Brontosaurus ... Jurassic Period ... Donated by James Morrow.... The Brontosaurus lived several million years ago....” You see (_To them_) James Morrow and the animal have clasped hands over the centuries. Um. From this sign, can’t you picture the love and devotion to science that prompted such a gift? HOOD (_Now smiling for the first time_)