Thirteen Women (1932)

Florence Eldridge: Grace Coombs

Quotes 

• Jo Turner : Darling, I'm sorry to make a liar out of your infallible swami, but I haven't killed myself over a man yet.

  Laura Stanhope : Jo.

  Jo Turner : He should have known that it's the men that kill themselves over me.

  Laura Stanhope : Sit down, Grace, dear, sit down.

  Grace Coombs : Oh, Jo, please don't be so flippant. What is written in the stars must come to pass.

  Jo Turner : Okay with me. I've had a lot of fun.

  Laura Stanhope : You're both fatalists.

  Jo Turner : Mm, sure! When the gods are fed up with me, pfft, voila!

• Grace Coombs : Do you still doubt, Laura? Are you still laughing, Jo? Yogadachi's been right again. Oh, you must accept his truth as I have.

  Laura Stanhope : That's the trouble with you, Grace, glorifying such rot.

  Grace Coombs : Rot? I tell you that nothing could save Helen, nor May, nor Hazel, from fate. Don't you understand? It was written for them... as it is for all of us.

  Jo Turner : Well if it's all settled for us, why worry?

  Laura Stanhope : Stop talking about it, stop thinking about it! Anyone can think themselves into anything.

  Jo Turner : You two are stumbling in a dark, material world. I am above it, as Yogadachi was. Death means peace, freedom. I shall meet him, gladly.

  Jo Turner : Well, I shan't. Depression or not, personally I'm mad about this world. Oh, go on home, Grace. You give me the creeps.

  Jo Turner : No, no, not I, but what's written for you, only you're afraid to face it.

  Laura Stanhope : Grace, I think you'd better go.

  Jo Turner : Just as you say.

• Laura Stanhope : Oh, another one of those messages?

  Grace Coombs : Yes.

  Laura Stanhope : Grace, if you don't stop selling your soul to the devil by believing in those foolish horoscopes...

  Grace Coombs : What about May? And Hazel is in jail.

  Laura Stanhope : It's pitiful, yes... but the result of natural causes. And belief in anything else is believing in magic.

  Grace Coombs : But Laura...

  Laura Stanhope : And you could help the rest of us, Grace, if you'd hush, and stop writing your letters telling us all to prepare for our...

  Grace Coombs : [Interrupting]  But the moon does control the tides, and nothing can live without the sun. Why shouldn't we be controlled?

  Laura Stanhope : Because we're reasoning human beings, silly, and not irresponsible machines.

  Grace Coombs : Listen, Laura. This letter came from the swami just an hour ago. I have to tell you. Listen: "I would do anything to prevent the disasters that have come down upon you and your friends, as I would do anything to save my own life, but I can do neither, for I am helpless too. I knew too much about the heavens. They're killing me. My own horoscope shows that I am to leave this earth before July first."

  Laura Stanhope : [laughing]  Well, if I needed anything more than common sense to disprove your argument, that would be enough. No one is going to take his own life just to prove to twelve women that he's a good stargazer. You're deranged, Grace.

  Grace Coombs : If this happens, if the swami himself does die, how can we disbelieve?