Page 229 - SpringBoard_ELA_Grade8_Flipbook

aCTIvITy 3.10
continued
Dramatic Tone Shifts
gnawing: biting or chewing
My Notes
Mr. Frank: Edith, please. Go back to sleep. (He turns over. Mrs. Frank gets up, quietly creeps to the main room, standstill. There is a tiny crunching sound. In the darkness, a figure is faintly illuminated, crouching over, gnawing on something. Mrs. Frank moves closer, turns on the light. Trembling, Mr. van Daan jumps to his feet. He is clutching a piece of bread.)
Mrs. Frank: My God, I don’t believe it! The bread! He’s stealing the bread! (Pointing at Mr. van Daan.) Otto, look!
Mr. van Daan: No, no. Quiet.
Mr. Frank: (As everyone comes into the main room in their nightclothes.) Hermann, for
God’s sake!
Mrs. van Daan: (Opening her eyes sleepily.) What is it? What’s going on? Mrs. Frank: It’s your husband. Stealing our bread!
Mrs. van Daan: It can’t be. Putti, what are you doing?
Mr. van Daan: Nothing.
Mr. Dussel: It wasn’t a rat. It was him.
Mr. van Daan: Never before! Never before!
Mrs. Frank: I don’t believe you. If he steals once, he’ll steal again. Every day I watch the children get thinner. And he comes in the middle of the night and steals food that should go to them!
Mr. van Daan: (His head in his hands.) Oh my God. My God.
Mr. Frank: Edith. Please.
Margot: Mama, it was only one piece of bread.
Mr. van Daan: (Putting the bread on the table. In a panic.) Here. (Mrs. Frank swats the bread away.)
Mr. Frank: Edith, he couldn’t help himself! It could happen to any one of us. Mrs. Frank: (Quiet.) I want him to go.
Mrs. van Daan: Go? Go where?
Mrs. Frank: Anywhere.
Mrs. van Daan: You don’t mean what you’re saying.
Mr. Dussel: I understand you, Mrs. Frank. But it really would be impossible for them—
Mrs. Frank: They have to! I can’t take it with them here.
Mr. Frank: Edith, you know how upset you’ve been these past—
Mrs. Frank: That has nothing to do with it.
Mr. Frank: We’re all living under terrible strain. (Looking at Mr. van Daan.) It won’t happen again.
Mr. van Daan: Never. I promise.
Mrs. Frank: I want them to leave.
Mrs. van Daan: You’d put us out on the street?
202 SpringBoard® English Language Arts Grade 8
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