STUDY FOR A PASSION: a working script in II Acts for 2 Actors (2007)
it was cast, rehearsal rooms were booked, a read-through took place. The rain of ash was devised, the reference for the costumes was the cover of Tindersticks's second album and Margiela. It was to be performed at City Art Rooms, Auckland. The misunderstanding arose because "artists fund their own work," there was no budget for production.
I.i.
A man stands in the cold autumn air in front of a projection curtain. He takes his hands out of his pockets every so often to cup them and blow into the hollow of his palms, to restore some warmth to his fingers. He stamps his feet occasionally to stop his legs going numb, both from having stood for a considerable time in the same spot and from the chill that rises through the soles of his feet.
Another man approaches along the line of curtains. He is wordlessly acknowledged by the first man, who makes to leave. It could be a change of guards, but for the fact that the two men, although they dress similarly, are by no means in uniform. The first man will be, for our purposes, called Eggs, the second, K.
K.
Don’t leave.
Pause.
Eggs shrugs and stays.
E.
Dr. K.
K.
Mr. Eggs.
Pause.
E.
Cold, isn’t it?
K.
Sorry. You’ll want to be heading in.
E.
No. No. … Yes.
K.
I thought I’d take the opportunity to chat. If you don’t mind.
Eggs eyes him suspiciously.
He chooses a different angle, from which to eye him suspiciously again.
K. removes a bottle and two glasses from the satchel he wears.
He opens the bottle and fills Eggs glass first, which he hands him.
K. fills his own glass.
K.
Well…
Eggs raises his glass.
E.
Up your bum.
They lightly touch glasses.
Eggs takes a couple of sips, then drains his glass.
He hugs himself, suddenly chilled.
E.
It’s hardly the weather for it, nor the time, but it’s very nice. Very nice.
Eggs holds out his glass for more.
K. recharges him.
E.
Thank you. Yes, refreshing! And… And… my favourite! Yes! Really! How did you know?
K.
I…
E.
You guessed, didn’t you? You guessed it! You thought, you guessed that by now I’d be yearning, I’d be thirsting for a very nice bottle, if medium-priced, a bottle of French… It is, isn’t it?
K. nods.
E.
Champagne!
He holds up his glass to inspect it.
E.
Ha!
K.
You weren’t?
E.
No. No. Of course I was, albeit that it was the last thing I expected! It’s enough to make me want to, it’s almost enough to make me want to, forgive you: it’s almost sufficient.
Eggs holds his glass for more.
K. doesn’t pour.
K.
For what? What for?
E.
For making me wait. I’d been waiting an hour, at least, when you scuttled up and I’ve a horror of waiting.
K.
An hour? How do you know?
E.
I felt it. I felt each advance of the, whatever it is.
K.
Second hand.
E.
No. Not that. The other thing. I felt it advancing like years, like wisdom, like a great big trap.
K. replenishes Eggs’s glass.
K.
Nothing to do with me.
E.
No? Then why all this?
Eggs gestures, inclusively.
E.
This, this… chatting? You asked me to stay.
K.
I enjoy your company.
E.
You do? No you don’t. You’ve barely given me the time of day since I came here.
K.
I find it comforting.
E.
Did somebody send you?
K.
Somebody?
E.
Somebody, you know, I might know.
K.
Somebody special?
E.
Why? You want names? Is that why?
K.
No.
E.
George, did George send you?
K.
No.
E.
Was it Ian? Mother? Edoma? Peter? John? Dick?
K. shakes his head.
E.
No? Not even a message?
K.
What did you expect?
E.
Not you. I didn’t expect you.
Pause.
E.
I didn’t expect to be drinking Champagne first thing, after a freezing night. I expected some birdsong. I expected to wake up with an erection. I didn’t expect to be hungry. I’m never hungry in the morning. I didn’t expect a kiss on the cheek. I didn’t expect a thump in the chest. I suppose I expected that routine would reassert itself. I find it usually does, after a hiccup.
K.
What are you in for?
E.
Oh, I’m not in.
K.
No?
E.
In is far too exclusive for my liking. No. … It’s my friend, you see?
K.
Friend?
E.
I’ve been locked out.
K.
Out?
E.
Do you think I make a habit of greeting the dawn from my front doorstep? No. There must have been a scene. There usually is. Before this one. You can be sure there were words. And emotions. And things were said. And there were breakages, glass flying. Of course, I’m the one to end up worse off, the ashmatic. Put him out in the street, like a dog. It’s my fucking house!
K.
That’s right. I’d forgotten.
E.
I don’t know how I put up with it. What had you forgotten?
K.
It’s autumn.
E.
Is it?
K.
The chill.
E.
Autumn.
K.
You must have been relieved to see me.
E.
Must I?
K.
I would have been, in your shoes. I’d have greeted whomever it was with open arms, no matter whether I’d been expecting him or not. I’d simply have been grateful that he showed up, that he showed up at all. I’d have licked his hands.
Pause.
K.
You say it was an hour?
E.
It might’ve been longer.
K.
Could it have been a year?
Silence.
K.
How about fifteen to twenty?
Silence.
K.
Forty years?
Silence.
K.
At the end of my life, even with the palsy upon me, but with a wit sharp as a blade, after forty years, I’d have taken his hands in mine. And licked them. The years would have dropped away.
Pause.
K.
“I thought I’d never live to see the day,” that’s what I might have said, or, “I was ready to wait another lifetime, just to see your face!”
Pause.
K.
Lifting myself, for the final time, and leaving my post, for in my heart it would have been as if only an hour had passed, I’d have risen to thank him. Whether, it was with a long sharp knife that he greeted me, to twist it in my heart, or whether it was with the Spanish word, Compagnero! Even to thank him would not have been enough. I’d have dried his wet feet with my hair.
Pause.
K.
“You’ve come to replace me,” I’d have said, “At last!” I’d have had no way of knowing this at the time, but his dark brown eyes would have clouded with confusion. He’d have gone into a doorway. Disappeared, without a word or sign of recognition.
Silence.
K.
As if he didn’t know who I was!
Pause.
K.
Imagine, then, his return, minutes later, with a bottle. What a travesty! As if to mark the occasion! Imagine he’d said, I think it’s time for a chat, Mr. Eggs. You’re sure it was an hour?
E.
It was long enough for me to begin to feel a little afraid. Nothing tangible, mind you. It wasn’t long enough that I could put my finger on it.
K.
You were very keen to leave when I arrived.
E.
I was, Dr. K.
K.
When I “scuttled up.”
E.
You have – everybody does, don’t they? – a peculiar way of walking. Peculiar to you, I mean, a signature walk.
K.
Like a rat?
E.
I see you staying in the shadows. You stick to the edges when you cross the square. But this morning you were late.
K.
Was it then the absence of the rat that made you afraid? You weren’t by any chance frightened that nobody was going to turn up to relieve you of your doorstep?
E.
And that somebody would let me in at last? Yes, I was scared of that.
A beat.
E.
You understand the World of Love, Dr. K.
K.
I understand the Law.
E.
The Law is a great burden.
K.
Love is a great burden. Why do you think I scuttle around the outside of the square?
E.
Trouble at home?
Slight pause.
K.
Do I look like a rat to you?
E.
No… But there’s something…
Eggs inspects him.
E.
Some new thing, some… change…
K. self-consciously brings his hand up to his hair.
E.
No. That’s not it.
Eggs rests on one hip, then the other, changing position to register in his own body what’s new about K.
E.
You’re trying something different with your… your… your…
Eggs looks K. full in the face.
E.
YOU’RE BLIND!
Eggs staggers back in surprise and horror.
K.
Shh!
E.
YOU ARE!
K.
No. I’m not.
E.
You’re eyes, they’re pits!
K.
Look again!
E.
No, I can’t.
Slight pause.
E.
It would’ve had to have been gradual. You can’t just have woken up one morning blind. You must have had weeks to get used to it.
K.
Calm down, Mr. Eggs. Look!
E.
Otherwise I’d have noticed, some hesitation, some faltering. But…
K. takes a step towards Eggs, grabs his arm.
E.
You must have been counting. You haven’t been bumping into things.
K. shakes his head.
E.
I haven’t seen you uncertain or confused or lost.
K.
Look at me!
K. forces Eggs to look.
E.
Holes.
Eggs passes his hand in front of K.’s face.
E.
They’re dead.
Pause.
K.
But I can see you, my friend.
E.
This was the reason for our chat, wasn’t it? You’d prepared a surprise for me.
K.
Thank you.
E.
You didn’t want anyone else to know. The other officers…
K.
The other officers are ungrateful drunks! Slobbering all over each other.
E.
Do they?
A beat.
E.
Why are you thanking me?
K.
I had my suspicions. But I wasn’t sure.
E.
Then you are blind?
K.
No.
E.
What, then?
K.
It’s not blindness…
E.
Would you tell me if it happened to me? Would you look at me and tell me?
Silence.
E.
We’re standing on the lip of hell.
K.
The Square?
Pause.
K.
This is where I grew up.
Silence.
I.ii.
Eggs stares out onto the Square.
E.
I’ve never seen the Square like this. I’ve never stayed so long.
K.
I believe we can talk directly. I think we’re both afraid of the same thing.
E.
At my post, that is. It’s bigger than I thought.
K.
As winter nears and the mist increases, soon you won’t be able to see the other side.
E.
And the leaves? Where do the leaves come from?
K.
I think you know.
Eggs bends to rub a leaf between his fingers.
K.
No trees. But always leaves, whatever the season, blowing around the faces of the soldiers doing their drill. Parade Day, you take them home in your hair. They get under your clothes, in your underwear. You’re sneezing them out in the morning for weeks.
E.
You have an allergy.
K.
To service. All my other complaints stem from that one thing. Sometimes I feel I’m choking, only it’s not from an obstacle or irritation in my airways and it’s not in my lungs. As you know.
Pause.
E.
Do I?
K. hold his hands up in front of his face, palms inward.
E.
Your eyes?
K.
Its latest victims, their blindness would bring relief from the things I’m given to see. The deaf are given deafness to be their reward.
A beat.
K.
But I drown, under the walls of vision. In the deep noise there’s no sunlight, no swimming to reach the surface. The sunlight, the swimming and all this skin in the air…
He takes in the Square.
K.
It all looks like ash to me.
Slight pause.
E.
You’ve an allergy.
Silence.
E.
Grey.
K.
Not at all. It’s a symphony. All the notes. And every emotional colouring and hue and tone. But no relations between them. I see things as one who’s tone-deaf hears notes in a symphony. But no space between them, either. A wash, an outpouring, a human wash. All the bodies are meat and meat is a delicacy, red and blue. I’m buried under a pile of colour.
E.
You’d lose your office if they knew.
K.
Yes.
E.
You’d lose your privileges.
K.
Privileges!
E.
You’d go to the bottom of the pile.
K.
I’d prefer to disappear.
E.
Course you would. You’ve a disorder.
K.
No.
E.
Functionally, you’re blind.
K.
I’m not blind.
E.
If there’s not the slightest gap between things and people…
K.
Not a crack.
E.
Vague impressions, if I take you rightly…
K.
The visible rears up above me in a great wave of distinct impressions. I’m distracted, hunting for the crawl-space, looking for an exit from the blue-red room. Any second the wave could crest and break. Its weight would certainly crush me. Fear has me scampering all over its surface, sticking my fingers in crannies where they don’t belong, searching for a way out. In my distraction, I miss entire scenes. And then, my night vision’s very good.
E.
Night vision?!
K.
I see very well at night. Underground.
E.
Under the ground?
K.
When I’m digging.
E.
What?
K.
In my chambers.
E.
You mean digging through papers, files…
K.
No.
E.
To find that number, that reference, or clause…
K.
No.
E.
Which has eluded you in the past.
K.
I mean in the dirt.
E.
Digging the dirt on…
K.
No.
A beat.
K.
I mean digging in the dirt.
A beat.
K.
In the dark.
Pause.
K.
Other people, I know, don’t feel the need. But then, I can’t help it. Claws, yellow teeth, red eyes. What else can I do?
E.
Alone?
K.
Yes. No. I was but… I am… I HATE TO TALK. I hate having to talk! I hate HAVING!
K. turns away from Eggs.
E.
One would think you’d be better suited to pit-work.
K.
Pit-work! Pit-work! I’d willingly do pit-work for the whipping.
A beat.
K.
In other words, it makes no difference whether I’m…
K. searches for the expression.
E.
Exposed.
K.
Yes.
K. considers.
He gestures.
K.
Out here. Or…
Slight pause.
K.
I could run onto the Parade Ground, out onto the Square.
A beat.
K.
I’d start at a run. But very soon I’d be reduced, I’m sure, to a crawl. And in no time at all, I’d collapse. They’d trample me. They’d cut me to pieces. Would anyone notice? No.
E.
Perhaps if you cried out.
K.
If I cried out it would be with joy. With joy in my final moments, the joy of being able, finally, to take part. Out on the Square. At the Parade. In the Show of Might.
E.
I would go with you.
K.
That’s very comforting.
E.
I mean it.
Slight pause.
E.
Of course, you can say these things. I simply have no experience of them. But it’s certain.
Slight pause.
E.
There’s a breath on my cheek.
A beat.
E.
The sun rises and the breeze comes up, I imagine.
A beat.
E.
Such things have inhabited my fantasy.
A beat.
E.
A breath on my cheek. It’s from the animal that’s about to rip a great chunk of my face with its yellow teeth.
Slight pause.
E.
Or is it you, Dr. K? Checking the pulse in my throat with your blunt forefinger.
Eggs takes K.’s hand.
K.
No, my friend. I’m a doctor of other conditions than yours.
E.
You’re alarmed.
K.
Am I?
E.
At the prospect of intimacy.
K.
In death? What could be more intimate? For my money, there is no other kind. Than trampled to death. No.
A beat.
K.
I’m alarmed at how easily you’re led.
E.
I said I’d go with you out onto the Parade Ground. That’s all.
K.
You drained the bottle.
E.
I did. And I stayed. We’ve chatted. It’s been nice, very nice.
Short pause.
E.
Shall we have another?
K.
It’s cold.
E.
I’m warming up.
K.
There is no more.
E.
There is. You know the officers keep a cellar. I don’t think you even ventured in very far. I’m sure there are vintages, cuvees, that were put down in the time of our fathers, of our fathers’ fathers, that haven’t been touched since.
K.
Rumours.
E.
What?
K.
Rumours! Do you think I went myself?
E.
You might’ve. On one of your digs.
K.
I sent a boy.
E.
A human child?
K.
You’re right!
E.
No…
K.
But the kids turn rotten.
E.
I’m sorry…
K.
It’s true! It’s how they survive.
E.
I didn’t mean to say that.
K.
You know how kids are: resourceful, adaptive and rotten.
E.
No, I meant that human‘s rare. Humanity. For a boy, a child. A friend. To be human at all is rare.
K.
It’s their secret society that almost runs the joint. Almost, not quite. One or two are always hanging around the barracks looking for favours. I don’t trust them. So when I spot them I put them to work. To neutralise their strategic advantage.
A beat.
K.
If our survival were left to children, they’d get the job done.
E.
Thankfully it’s not. We still have our pleasures, the things they haven’t yet learnt to love. But I suppose the kids are our only link back to the women?
K.
No! Plenty of women, plenty of them. You didn’t see any hopping from apartment to apartment through the night?
E.
No.
K.
Swarming up the fire-escapes, swinging from the balconies and vaulting from rail to rail?
A beat.
K.
No? The street-sweepers have had on occasion to contend with a square full of discarded women’s underwear.
Short pause.
K.
As if after a thousand sex-crimes.
Pause.
K.
No. There’s no link to the women through the kids. And sex will be one of those things they haven’t learnt to love, then, won’t it?
E.
Haven’t they? From the picture you draw, I’m surprised they’re not going at it on the ground in front of us.
K.
They’re too busy forming committees.
E.
What for?
K.
Improved efficiency in the supply chains, of course. Little orgies of concern over how much butter Mrs. Spat is getting and what she’s paying.
E.
Spat?
K.
One of the mothers.
E.
So there are mothers?
K.
The mothers talk to the officers. And, now you mention it, one of them gave me this.
K. pulls a photo from between leaves of a field notebook which he keeps in his satchel.
Eggs takes it, handling it nervously.
K.
This is your friend, Mr. Eggs? The friend who kicked you out of your own house?
E.
His name’s John.
K.
Now, I’ve no interest in the matter, but since a mother has brought it to our attention: your friend is a boy.
E.
Yes.
K.
A child.
A beat.
K.
Or, as you so poetically put it, a human child.
E.
He’s twenty-six!
K.
It was his mother who brought it to my personal attention.
Short pause.
K.
He is her baby.
E.
I don’t have sex with him.
K.
Describe what is happening in this picture.
E.
He is beating me.
K.
I need not repeat myself: the colour of bare flesh. I’m indifferent to its meaning. As I am to that of blood breaking through the skin. But you are naked.
E.
Yes.
K.
I accept my blindness, as you so poetically put it, as a liability of office.
A beat.
K.
Explain why you are naked.
E.
I’m about to have a shower.
K.
Are you?
E.
Yes. I… I… You enjoy my company. You just wanted to chat.
Slight pause.
E.
I’ve done nothing wrong.
K.
Apart from waiting for over an hour in front of a door you were afraid would be opened. Were you afraid, Mr. Eggs?
E.
A little. More excited than afraid. Afraid we’d make up. Excited that, after the jockeying for position, I’d win. That I’d be held to blame.
K.
You seem to have no trouble accepting punishment as your reward.
E.
I defer to your greater knowledge on the subject, Dr. K.
K.
You have, my friend, been sentenced to death.
Eggs grabs at the notebook.
E.
Show me!
K.
It’s not here!
E.
Where is it?
K.
It was such a simple sentence, I didn’t write it down.
E.
Death.
K.
Yes.
E.
Who’d do a thing like that?
K.
Pick.
E.
Pick!
K.
Yes.
E.
Hasn’t he issued a summons? Or… isn’t there to be an arraignment or something?
K.
We thought this would be enough.
E.
We?
K.
Yes. We though you’d understand.
A beat.
K.
I was there, at the tribunal. We’ve already sat.
E.
I don’t get a trial?
K.
You do. It’s gone.
Slight pause.
K.
It’s already been held.
E.
But I don’t get to defend myself? I don’t get to answer the charges?
K.
You had representation.
E.
I did?
K.
Yes.
E.
Who represented me?
K. smiles and clasps his hands.
I.iii
E.
You?
K.
I may have no respect for my office. I may in fact despise it. But I am an officer, of the lowest rank, one whose inadequacy denies him a place in the Parade. What am I, what would I be, but an embarrassment?
A beat.
K.
Marching? I can’t imagine it.
E.
In front of Pick!
K.
It was all over in a matter of minutes. The tribunal, anyway, wouldn’t see you. Being the lowest, I’ve the unwelcome responsibility of standing for those even worse off than I. At least I believe my modest contribution to have lightened things up.
Silence.
K.
At one point, before he delivered his judgement, Pick almost smiled.
E.
Then, I presume, he said, Death.
K.
But it was the way he said it.
E.
Mine.
K.
No. He gave it a much more inclusive sense. It was for all of us. It was a treat to hear death spoken of so… richly, so well. It was a perfect delivery. He gave it back its sense. It almost but not quite gave me hope for when my number’s up.
E.
Did he say how?
Silence.
E.
How, facing the sea, am I to dive in?
Silence.
E.
Am I first to undress?
A beat.
E.
Should I first describe, give an account of it, to take the measure of my own insignificance?
Silence.
E.
The tramping feet will come.
A beat.
E.
I expect this is how I’d like to die: under their contact. It’s tempting.
A beat.
E.
To leave nothing, of the body, but a spine. Like a blade of grass.
A beat.
E.
It’s tempting.
A beat.
E.
Something sharp, tucked into a fold. In the air. Under sand. Or on your tongue. That, like a tongue, flashes for a second.
Slight pause.
E.
I’d like to cut, in that second, so that its recipient can’t say why he’s bleeding. I’d like everyday to be the cut, which comes out of nowhere and reminds you that you’re alive and I’m dead.
Short pause.
E.
Clearly, your representation of me can’t have brought that sense to the court.
K.
Oh, they knew.
E.
I’m sorry it’s …
K.
It’s all right.
E.
What will happen to John?
K.
We had to pull him out.
E.
What?
K.
He wouldn’t leave. We had to pull him out. So he could resume his duties. Be a good son.
Pause.
I.iv.
E.
You know, Doc, for all that he lived in my house and took my money, he never kissed me. It was me who stole from him.
A beat.
E.
He never gave a sod.
K.
No.
E.
And the number of times I had to drag him away from his mates! With their beer and their scraps. Circling like idiot animals some little bitch on heat. Pawing at each other, as much as at her. And not yet equipped to know what to do if they caught her. But if they got her as a pack, as a pack they’d have her.
A beat.
E.
Cowards.
K.
Children.
E.
Yes. And I suppose he hated me for it. Because it was his life I dragged him away from every time.
A beat.
E.
How frustrating for him. Poor John. To want to take it out on me and when we got home for that to be the very thing I wanted from him.
Short pause.
E.
Did I really take away his chance of growing up?
Silence.
E.
I expect so.
Slight pause.
E.
I expect I hurt him a great deal. With my demands. And the others who preceded him. I expect I was a corrupting influence.
A beat.
E.
But why? Isn’t this what we all do? Without superior knowledge of what we do?
A beat.
E.
Don’t we use?
A beat.
E.
When a light’s shone on it, yes, that use is ugly. But am I to be condemned for ugliness? Or for bringing that ugliness to light?
Silence.
E.
Think about this when you get around to killing me. I’m not a child. You won’t be sliding in the knife and twisting it in the heart of a boy. Somebody’s son. You’ll be killing a man. You’ll have that on your conscience. Or if you’re smart, like a savage, when you take my life you’ll add my strength to yours. It’ll pass from me to you. In a glance. And you’ll taste it in my blood when you drink it, in my body when you eat.
K.
Yes, Mr. Eggs. However, I’m not your executioner. I’m not obliged to take that on my conscience. And, to be honest, I don’t see myself gaining from turning you into cutlets or otherwise making a meal of my task. Call this short-sighted if you will. Which task I put my hand up for because I like your company and in order to divert the attention of the gods away from myself. Which task, upon the findings of the tribunal under Pick, I accepted because I recognise you, my friend. Which task is solely that of remaining with you to see that the sentence of the court is carried out to the letter.
E.
You’re a vegetarian.
K.
I might be.
E.
That’s why you can’t imagine eating me.
Silence.
E.
Forward of me to suggest it, but given the circumstances…
K.
Yes, it is.
E.
No.
Short pause.
Eggs suppresses a laugh.
E.
No!
Short pause.
E.
Ha!
K. pulls Eggs around to face him.
Eggs answers by taking hold of K.’s lapels.
E.
Why don’t you take me underground!?
K.
What?
E.
In the dark!
A beat.
E.
Where you can see… clearly!
K.
But I…
E.
Come on!
K.
No.
E.
Come on, Doc!
K.
I…
E.
Think of it! We would both be… out!
K.
No, I…
E.
Where’s the entrance?!
K.
What?
E.
It’s a tunnel, isn’t it? Where’s its entrance? Where does it come out?
Silence.
Eggs still holds K.
E.
Is it under the Square? Is it…
Eggs stamps.
E.
Hollow!?
A beat.
E.
No?!
Eggs shakes K.
He punctuates the following with shakes of K.
E.
Will we hear screams, will we? When we first cut through, pierce its shell, its surface? Will we hear the screams of lost souls, poor human lost souls… masses… millions… and feel the heat rising from its depths? Will we hear them shouting and screaming in that infernal chorus, will we? God, it’s got to be hot down there!
A beat.
Eggs resumes his shaking of K.
E.
So damn hot down there, all that’s left up here is ASH! You might call them dead leaves but I know they’re ash. On the surface. From those millions of poor human souls underground. ASH on the wind! Hell, I can’t wait to get down there! TAKE ME UNDERGROUND!
K.
But I’ve never taken anybody down there.
E.
YES, YOU HAVE! … YOU HAVE! … YOU HAVE! … … YOU HAVE! … HAVEN’T YOU! … YOU HAVE!
Silence.
E.
WHAT?
A beat.
E.
WHAT?
Eggs shakes K. so hard that both fall.
Eggs smashes K.’s skull into the ground.
E.
WHAT? … WHAT? … WHAT’S THAT? … I … DIDN’T … CATCH … THAT!
Eggs takes a breather then starts in again.
E.
PERHAPS … YOU’D … LIKE … TO … REPEAT … IT!
K.
Yes. … No. … I don’t know.
Eggs stands and moves away.
After a while, K. turns to look at him.
Eggs makes a lunge onto K., who doesn’t scream until the last moment, when he gives a small shriek.
Eggs doesn’t immediately start in again with his torture.
He threatens to.
K.
I did! … I did! … I did! … But I hate …
Eggs crawls off and away from K.
K.
Having. …
Eggs casts K. a threatening glance.
K.
To see that look on her face again!
I.v.
K.
It smells.
E.
What?
K.
My underground lair. My bunker. It smells of her. It smells of me. It’s disgusting.
E.
It can’t be any more disgusting than up here.
K.
She was gutting fish.
E.
Who?
K.
Clara.
E.
If you can take a woman down there, you can take me.
K.
I can’t. But if I could see her as she was then! I’d lick the blood from her soft hands. I’d lick the blood from her tender hands. I’d lap it all up, blood, scales, guts, everything. There’s not all that many that would. And I’d smack my lips!
Slight pause.
K.
Just to have the chance to know her again as she was when I first met her. Would you do that? No. But then I’m the lowest sort of life and this is an altogether different kind of stench.
E.
Consider the facts: I’ve nothing to lose. If you refuse, I’ll kill you.
K.
You’re probably right. There is that option. It’s nothing less than I deserve.
Eggs stands over K.
E.
Get up!
K.
No.
E.
You’re not a man at all, are you!?
K.
No.
A beat.
K.
I’m a mole.
E.
Don’t say that.
K.
Why not?
E.
You can’t say that.
K.
But it’s true.
K. repeats a gesture he made earlier.
K.
Have I told you about my eyes?
E.
You said you could see very well.
K.
Underground.
E.
You’re not blind.
K.
Quite the opposite. I feel constantly I’m about to be crushed under the enormous weight of it all.
A beat.
K.
Perhaps my sense of smell somehow and without my knowledge is underwriting the loss of the other sense. Filling in the blank in such a way that my mind struggles with its primitive and heavy-handed style, which lacks the normal finesse and tact of sight.
Slight pause.
K.
As if I was being helped by an idiot. Without having accepted the offer of help. Just because the idiot thinks I need it. She hands me the world but it’s already bruised to a pulp by her good intentions when I get it.
A beat.
K.
This, again, would be the action of an angel.
Short pause.
K.
Much worse has happened to me. Enough has happened to me, it makes whatever you can do seem preferable to going back to the dark below the Square.
E.
Give me the directions and I’ll go myself.
K.
No.
E.
You know I can beat them out of you.
K.
Don’t leave.
E.
Have you waited this long to tell me that you are, in fact, my executioner?
K.
No.
A beat.
K.
But the door is open.
E.
What door?
K.
Your friend…
Eggs races up and down in front of the curtain.
E.
John! … John! … JOHN!
K. puts his hands palm up.
K.
Look! It’s snowing…
Eggs comes to a halt beside K.
K.
Ash is falling.
K. pulls himself up, using Eggs as a support.
K.
How touching.
A beat.
K.
They must have got the furnaces working.
A beat.
K.
In my absence. Soon.
A beat.
K.
Soon…
K. drapes his arm over Eggs’s shoulders.
K.
There’ll be the Show of Might. On the Parade Ground. Out there…
K. points.
K.
All the way.
Silence.
E.
You’re not an officer.
K.
No.
E.
You’d be with the other officers.
K.
I’m a mouse.
E.
Standing around.
Pause.
E.
Then I’m as good as on my own.
K.
They’ll be burning all day now.
Pause.
E.
Why aren’t you with the other officers?
Eggs takes K.’s arm and begins to twist it.
E.
Why aren’t you helping?
Eggs twists.
E.
It can’t be your duty to stay here on the edge of the action, like one of your audience…
Eggs twists.
E.
One of your spectators.
Eggs twists.
K.
There are no spectators.
E.
Is John coming to do me in? Is that it? Have you been put up to this by that lazy sod?
Eggs twists.
E.
So he can stay in bed. In my bed. In my house.
Eggs twists.
K.
No!
E.
Cunt!
K.
No!
E.
But we’ll wake him up with a bang, won’t we? He’ll soon wake up when the Show of Might begins.
Eggs twists.
K.
Yes!
E.
One thing I don’t understand is, if you’re not about to do it yourself, if you’re not about to stick me under the ribs with a stilleto or plant a bullet in my brain, or however you people perform your executions these days…
Eggs twists.
E.
Why are you not, as an officer, I mean…
Eggs twists.
E.
Taking part in the preparations and doing your bit?
Eggs twists.
K.
We mice are…
E.
And if you are using me to deflect attention away from yourself, which I can understand, what is it that you’ve done? What have you done to attract this unwanted attention? And why, then, won’t you run with me into the tunnels?
Eggs twists.
K.
LET ME GO!
Eggs lets go.
K.
Look at me! What could I do with this body?
Silence.
K.
Nothing!
A beat.
K.
How could I claim any authority, let alone that proper to an officer, with this? Like this?
Silence.
K.
I can’t!
E.
But, Dr. K., there’s nothing the matter with you. You’re arm might be a bit sore, but you’re fine as far as I can see!
K.
YOU ALMOST BROKE IT!
Short pause.
II.i.
K.
You’re a bully.
A beat.
K.
Shameless. You belong with the bullies.
Projected onto the curtains, a tiny figure approaches imperceptibly slowly.
K.
You belong to the bullies.
E.
I survive, is that what you’re trying to say?
A beat.
E.
And you’re right, now I look. You’re a pathetic individual. Badly dressed. Useless. And a complainer.
K.
My mother…
E.
My mother, as soon as I was old enough, I fought my way out of her.
K.
Away from her clutches?
E.
No! Out of her cold womb. Her male womb. Out of a body that had died around me!
Slight pause.
E.
And if I killed her again in the process, if she bled again and gave birth again, it was from her mouth. Because that’s what you have to do. Every child knows that’s what you have to do. You have to get out!
A beat.
E.
Isn’t that what you do, Doc? Isn’t that why you’re digging in the dirt, underground?
K.
No. Not every opening is the same. You can’t say, I come out of your ear, A child’s pulled out of your anus, I’m born out of your skin. Every opening is different.
A beat.
K.
There are no escape routes underground.
Slight pause.
K.
My mother…
E.
Shut up about your mother! Old cow! Why? Why? Why are there no escape routes underground?
K.
My mother…
E.
Cunt.
K.
My mother still lives in the city. And I’m still allowed to visit her.
E.
Cunt.
K.
I haven’t yet acquired my mole-like proclivities. Her apartment is small, comfortable, self-contained. Her…
E.
Cunt!
K.
Routine is the same. I suspect this is where the resemblance comes in. She hasn’t yet met my girlfriend…
E.
Cunt.
K.
When it happens. I call her that, but… never mind.
E.
What happens?
K.
The world changes. One ends. Another begins.
A beat.
II.ii.
K.
I take her underground.
E.
You do what?
K.
Clara. I give in.
E.
Then give in to me.
K.
To you?
E.
Why not?
K.
Because any torture you inflict on me doesn’t come close to what I allowed her to do to me.
E.
To you?
K.
I left her down there.
A beat.
K.
Insist! Pull me to pieces! What would be better is if you cut me back into pieces!
A beat.
K.
She sutured me together. She bathed each piece in pain. Then she sewed me up so that the smallest amount of suffering could be transmitted, like a shock, to every muscle in my body.
A beat.
K.
Stitched with wire, now I’m one. One shameful thing. A circuit of shame. With one thought. One grief.
E.
Is that what happens?
K.
Not entirely. It’s why I’m in. Although I would’ve turned myself in anyway.
E.
But they don’t know.
K.
No. But it’s the inner spring of all my outward action.
E.
Guilt?
K.
No. Fear!
E.
But the other officers don’t know.
K.
No.
Slight pause.
K.
To be brought in. Dragged, almost. To witness the pain of our people in their new houses, with all their modern appliances. And then to suffer the unbelievable ignominy of being made an officer! To wear a red armband! Like a character in a play who’s dressed up as a Nazi! Not to share the torment of my brothers and sisters! To be in some way the cause of it!
E.
Pick doesn’t know. Otherwise he’d have tried you too.
K.
Just you tell me, my friend, which path is worse? Yours or mine?
A beat.
K.
Your certainty that the sentence will be carried out, from the outside? Or my certainty that the sentence is already being carried out, from the inside?
E.
But we can both escape!
K.
Listen, my friend, there’s no hope, since the law is necessity, which cancels out hope. Since the law is the ground on which all things grow, there are no escape routes that lead into the earth.
E.
So what else?
Silence.
E.
What else happens?
Silence.
E.
You said, not entirely. So what else happens?
II.iii.
K.
Clara.
Slight pause.
K.
I’d been lucky. At this time women were attracted by my looks, if you can imagine it. I still looked a lot younger than I was. But I’d managed to put each of my potential mates off with a simple tour of my entrance-way. Before they’d gone very far, they’d invariably turn around and run to the crescent of light from the tunnel lid, which I’d left ajar in order to encourage their retreat.
A beat.
K.
Clara didn’t retreat. She neither turned, nor ran She penetrated the soft light. Into the harsher darkness of the lower depths, where the dreadful necessities of my subterranean life did not deter her from setting up house. I’m referring here, of course, to smells and seepages, to the lack of plumbing or adequate ventilation.
A beat.
K.
Nothing seemed to dissuade her from the position that I was her special little one, neither collapse nor the calamities that followed closely on one another’s heels, like a blind chorus.
Slight pause.
K.
But it wore her down. It did. Or rather, I wore her down.
A beat.
K.
I’d dig deeper in my night-time agony of fear and doubt, self-recrimination. And in the morning, she’d up sticks to follow. And join me. Deeper. Until it got warmer down there.
Slight pause.
K.
Here we enter what you might call hell. Or else the walls in that deep darkness are paper-thin between us and hell’s eternity. She hears the voices. I don’t. She takes to wandering. That’s how I lose her.
Pause.
K.
In the distant upper reaches of the burrow, one day, I find her. An angel crouches over her. Who knows how long it’s been there.
Slight pause.
E.
What do you do?
K.
Nothing.
A beat.
K.
My first impulse is to grab her by the ankles and pull her out from under it. But I don’t.
E.
Why not?
K.
Because I can’t.
E.
You have to do something!
K.
That’s what she says.
A beat.
K.
It’s the way she looks at me.
Slight pause.
K.
Her mouth is open to speak. No it’s not. She’s receiving something from the angel.
E.
What?
K.
A blessing. A bone. An order. A mouse. … Whatever it is that angels can’t digest.
A beat.
K.
It’s not a violent act.
E.
Do something!
K.
And divert its attention back onto me?!
A beat.
K.
When it’s finished… In fact, I wait a long time. And, afterwards, I take up thread. I sew up the gash in her cheek, that, with all that time on her hands, she’s sliced into her cheek. And I prise her fingers away from the shard of glass she’s used.
A beat.
K.
I do these things with my eyes closed, so as not to read the word she carved, while the angel crouched over her, stuffing her mouth with something so she could neither speak, nor cry out. I don’t know why I do. It won’t heal.
A beat.
K.
I have to break her jaw to shut her mouth. And, finally, I wipe her lips.
II.iv.
E.
The word…?
K.
What am I, after all, but the piece of glass she cut herself with? Look how thin I’ve got!
E.
What was it? What did it say?
K.
I don’t know!
A beat.
K.
Sometimes, in my dreams, I touch the scar of that word on her face. In my dreams I can’t see a thing. I read it with my fingertips. It’s a name. An ordinary name. Like yours and mine. What a relief!
A beat.
K.
But there’s always more. A list of names. Written in the raised flesh of her wound. Occasionally there’ll be a suture which hasn’t been removed, sticking out like a stiff hair. The list goes on and on.
Slight pause.
K.
As if her cheek were now a wall, where you’d write down the war dead. I read from right to left, as you do in dreams, all night.
Pause.
E.
Take me to her.
K.
Why? Leave her be. Let my memories alone now.
E.
No, I can’t bear standing out here waiting to see who it’s going to be who’s going to carry out Pick’s orders.
K.
It was the tribunal.
E.
I don’t care who it was. I don’t care who. I loathe waiting. And I couldn’t give a shit how. Whichever way it comes… No. Take me down to her.
K.
No.
E.
If a piece of glass is there, I’ll find it. I’ll lie down next to her. And if I fumble the first attempt, at least in the dark no one will see. My blood can ooze into the dirt and no one needs to know. Except you, Doc.
A beat.
E.
When you dream, you can dream of both of us. We’ll be setting up house down there. Decorating. You won’t know the place by the time we’re finished.
Slight pause.
E.
It’s hardly appropriate, in fact, from me it’s entirely inappropriate, but I always liked the idea of having children. Now wouldn’t that be hysterical! Uncle Doctor K.!
A beat.
E.
Listen! He’s upstairs.
A beat.
E.
ALIVE.
Slight pause.
E.
I always thought I’d like to hear the sound described as ‘tiny feet.’ But for us underneath, our happy little family, the tramp of your boots and the pitter-patter of the marching on the Square will perhaps have to do. Then how much ought the dead really to hear?
A beat.
E.
I’m sure certain things should be kept from them. Haven’t they suffered enough? It’s you who presume to live who must bear them. Because all our sins are yours.
A beat.
E.
Do you hear me? I’m prematurely amongst them! I’m counting myself among the dead! How pompous!
A beat.
E.
No. If I understand anything at all of that estate that I’m prepared to pass to, you’ll be picking up the bill, carrying your own baggage, bearing your own crosses. And I’ll be travelling light. With your ex. You did nothing when the Angel of Death gave birth to Clara. Because that’s what really happened, isn’t it?!
Silence.
E.
Isn’t it?!
Silence.
E.
You were pulling your cock when the Angel of Death crouched over her. And shat her out!
K. leaves the front apron and disappears behind the curtains, to make his approach from extreme upstage, with a bucket and mop.
E.
And she screamed. You were death’s midwife, Officer Doctor K., wearing your red armband. A character in a play who’s dressed up as a Nazi! Her mouth open in a scream. The Angel of Death crouched above her. You heard nothing. You saw nothing. You did nothing. You were death’s midwife. And YOU WERE LATE!
II.v.
Eggs clocks K.’s approach.
E.
What have you brought me, friend Doctor K.?
Silence.
E.
What have you brought me to?
Slight pause.
E.
A sham! A camp! Not a Show of Might at all!
A beat.
E.
I want the ash to be thicker. I want it to fall thickly and cover everything in general and make it all grey and mute. I want the furnaces hotter. I want to see the flames. And the band, I want the band exactly as they are: shaved, thin and inspired, in their little hats and striped pyjamas. But I want to hear every note, as it was written.
A beat.
E.
I want the Show of Might I was promised. Not just the solitary, sad figure of my friend, stalking me, following, and picking up the pieces. My brother. I want to see his eyes, his eyes in which he says I’m no more than part of the furniture! I want to fall into his eyes and see his smile and pretend he’s smiling at me. Not giving me an order. I want him to be my lover, come to deliver me, to pretend he’s not forsaken me. I want to see him kill a man. And I want very much for him to let me back in to my house.
K. is separated from Eggs by a curtain.
He places the bucket and mop down.
He raises his knife.
E.
Then throw my body in the gutter.
Eggs turns to meet his death.
E.
Oh. It’s you. Take me back to Clara.
K. steps out from behind the curtain, leaving his projected image to slice Eggs from sternum to pubis.
K.
No.
E.
It doesn’t matter. I’ll find her. I’ll lie down next to her. I’ll look after her. Like a mother should.
Eggs remains upright.
His legs don’t buckle.
He feels everything but it ends nothing.
His guts slop into the bucket.
K. attends, as if waiting for a friend at a urinal.
The slopping and slapping of guts into the bucket continues.
K.
Finished?
Eggs groans, leaning over the bucket, which is full to the point of overflowing.
A pause.
More guts slop out, slapping onto those already collected.
There’s blood everywhere.
The projected image of K. starts mopping up.
A pregnant pause in the flow of guts.
K. looks over his shoulder.
With a final splat in the bucket Eggs is emptied.
II.vi.
E.
I understand now why the dead are mute. And why they cut their skin to speak. The skin.
A beat.
E.
When I’m lying down next to her, we’ll talk until the morning. Like school-girls. What about this and what about that. She told me, and, He did what to you? Except with scissors and glass. Until every square white inch of skin is broken. And we’re two piles of coloured ribbon. Blue, yellow, red, orange. Red, green, violet, violet, and so on. And we can’t stop giggling.
Eggs groans.
E.
I’d like that.
Eggs spits.
E.
It’s the sort of conversation that you can’t really offer, Doc. The kind of chat, the company you’re incapable of providing.
Eggs stagger.
E.
Honestly, I can’t say I’ve enjoyed a single moment of… this…
Eggs gestures, inclusively.
E.
This… this… WAITING!
The shout exhausts Eggs.
E.
Waiting.
A beat.
E
Of course, I might not have any skin left. I might be all ribs!
A beat.
E.
Ha!
A beat.
E.
Yes, Doc? Yes?
K.
Yes.
K. and Eggs leave their mute projected images.
They voice the remainder of the dialogue from slightly off, watching.
Eggs has blood from his mouth to his knees.
Spit trails from his lips.
A hole gapes in his midriff.
E.
Well, get your thread out, Clara!
Short pause.
E.
Oh.
K. takes the ladies handkerchief he’s been wearing around his neck.
He goes to wipe Eggs’s mouth.
Eggs holds his wrist.
E.
What’s this?
Eggs inspects.
E.
A lady’s dainty!
Eggs takes the handkerchief by a corner with his left hand, still holding K.’s with his right.
Eggs brings the corner of the handkerchief to the corner of his mouth.
E.
He wipes your lips!
Pause.
Eggs wavers dangerously on his legs.
He lets go of the handkerchief.
He shuts his eyes.
E.
He kisses you!
A beat.
E.
He kisses you!
A beat.
E.
He kisses you.
Eggs suddenly collapses.
II.vii.
K. kneels beside Eggs.
Ash falls.
Music plays.
E.
What are they burning?
K.
Rubbish.
E.
It’s sweet.
Pause.
Eggs listens.
E.
Music.
K.
Is that what it is.
E.
There’s a band playing across the square.
K.
What are they playing?
E.
Can you hear?
K.
I’m not a stone. What are they playing?
E.
I don’t know what it is.
K.
Then don’t listen.
Pause.
E.
It must be part of the general festivities.
K.
We mice have no use for music.
E.
The Show of Might.
K.
We moles don’t understand it.
Pause.
E.
No singing. No voices.
K.
There are no words for it.
Eggs sits up.
E.
I’m missing it!
K.
No.
Pause.
E.
The Show of Might!
K.
It’s murder.
Pause.
K.
Now lie down.
Eggs turns to K.
E.
Whose?
Slight pause.
Eggs lies back down.
E.
Mine.
A beat.
E.
And all these preparations, were they for me?
Silence.
E.
All of them?
Silence.
E.
Always?
Silence.
E.
For me?
Silence.
E.
The Show of Might?
Silence.
E.
You shouldn’t have bothered.
A beat.
E.
Really.
