Deborah Kerr: Bridie Quilty

I See a Dark Stranger

Bridie Quilty

J. Miller: You should visit England one day. You may change your mind.
Bridie Quilty: There's no need. I've an aunt there who has told me all about it. She says the upper classes are cringing and always moaning about their troubles, and the lower classes are arrogant and think they own the Earth.
J. Miller: I thought it was the other way round.
Bridie Quilty: My aunt runs a servants' registry office.
J. Miller: Ah!
Bridie Quilty: There's no "ah" about it. She hates the whole lot of them, and so do I. My father fought for Ireland against the English in 1916, and if I ever get the chance I shall do the same.
J. Miller: For a subject of a neutral country, aren't you being a little belligerent?
Bridie Quilty: There's nothing belligerent about it. It's entirely a question of which side I'm neutral on.

[Bridie's thoughts as she sizes up her compartment-mate on a train.]
Bridie Quilty: His hair is going grey, but it looks very nice the way he has it brushed. He's a faraway look in his eyes... a poet maybe. No, he's much too clean. And he puts his trousers under the mattress like Terence Delaney. Hasn't he the lovely nails? He's a gentleman, I think. I don't like being alone with a strange man at this time of night. He doesn't look that sort of man, of course, but how can you tell? Mr. McGee didn't look that sort of man, and Mr. Clogherty... was a terrible shock to me. Hmm, he's a traveller from abroad. Miller, Miller, that can't be an Irish name... he's English! Of all of the compartments of this train, I have to get into one with an Englishman. Why, I might have known it! Will you look at him, will you look at the cruel set of his jaw! You could mistake him for Cromwell!

Lt. David Baynes: Where'd you get this? D'you realize you can go to prison for forging an identity card? What made you do it?
Bridie Quilty: It's nothing to do with you; it's my business.
Lt. David Baynes: It's my name! Small point, perhaps.
Bridie Quilty: Oh, isn't it like an Englishman to niggle about a thing like that?

Bridie Quilty: Will there be anything else you require, please? It's me half-day.
Lt. David Baynes: No, I don't think so, thank you.
Bridie Quilty: Thank you.
Lt. David Baynes: Oh, I suppose you wouldn't know anyone who could show me around the town this afternoon, by any chance?
Bridie Quilty: I would not.
Lt. David Baynes: No, I... I only wondered.
Bridie Quilty: You're awful quick, aren't you?
Lt. David Baynes: Sorry. I've been working very closely with the American army.

Bridie Quilty: [showing Lt. Baynes his room for the night, walking briskly and pressing him to hurry] Will you be watching your head now.
[carrying his suitcase, Lt. Baynes +ducks his head, then trips and stumbles and curses]
Bridie Quilty: Oh yes forgot to tell you to mind the step.