Vieux Carre (11 page)

WRITER
[
as narrator
]: She was watching him with an unspoken question in her eyes, a little resentful now.

MRS. WIRE'S VOICE
[
from off stage, curiously altered
]: Why are those stairs so dark?

WRITER
[
crossing from the studio, dismayed
]: Is that you, Mrs. Wire?

MRS. WIRE
: Now, Timmy, Timmy, you mustn't cry every time Daddy gets home from the road and naturally wants to be in bed just with Mommy. It's Daddy's privilege,
Mommy's—
obligation. You'll understand when you're
older—
you see, Daddy finds Mommy attractive.

WRITER
[
backing away from the cubicle entrance
]: Mrs. Wire, you're dreaming.

MRS. WIRE
: Things between grownups in love and marriage can't be told to a child. [
She sits on the writer's cot
.] Now lie down and Mommy will sing you a little sleepy-time song. [
She is staring into space. He moves to the cubicle entrance; the candle is turned over and snuffed out
.]

MRS. WIRE
: “Rock-a-bye, baby, in a tree top, If the wind blows, the cradle will rock . . .”

WRITER
: Mrs. Wire, I'm not Timothy, I'm not Tim, I'm not Timmy. [
He touches her
.]

MRS. WIRE
: Dear child given to me of love . . .

WRITER
: Mrs. Wire, I'm not your child. I am nobody's child. Was maybe, but not now. I've grown into a man, about to take his first step out of this waiting station into the world.

MRS. WIRE
: Mommy knows you're scared sleeping alone in the dark. But the Lord gave us dark for sleep, and Daddy don't like to find you took his rightful place . . .

WRITER
: Mrs. Wire, I'm no relation to you, none but a tenant that earned his keep a while . . . Nursie! Nursie!

NURSIE
[
approaching
]: She gone up there? [
Nursie appears
.] She gets these spells, goes back in time. I think it musta been all that Azalea Festival excitement done it.

MRS. WIRE
: “If the bough breaks, the cradle will fall . . .”

NURSIE
[
at the cubicle entrance
]: Mizz Wire, it's Nursie. I'll take you back downstairs.

MRS. WIRE
[
rousing a bit
]: It all seemed so real. —I even remember lovemaking . . .

NURSIE
: Get up, Mizz Wire, come down with Nursie.

MRS. WIRE
[
accepting Nursie's support
]: Now I'
m—
old.

MRS. WIRE'S VOICE
: Ahhhhhhhh . . . Ahhhhhhhh . . . Ahhhh . . . Ahhhhh . . .

WRITER
: Grand! [
She lifts her hand in a valedictory gesture
.] I guess angels warn you to leave a place by leaving before you.

JANE
: You said you were going to get dressed and go back to your place of employment and resume the pitch for the ladies.

TYE
: What did you say, Babe?

JANE
: A hundred dollars, the price, and worth it, certainly worth it. I must be much in your debt, way over my means to payoff!

TYE
: Well, I ain't paid to make a bad appearance at work. [
He puts on a sport shirt with girls in grass skirts printed on it
.]

JANE
: I hate that shirt.

TYE
: I know you think it's tacky. Well, I'm tacky, and it's the only clean one I got.

JANE
: It isn't clean, not really. And does it express much grief over the Champagne Girl's violent departure to Spain?

TYE
: Do you have to hit me with that? What reason . . . ?

JANE
: I've really got no reason to hit a goddamn soul but myself that lacked pride to keep my secrets. You know I shouldn't have told you about
my—
intentions, I should have just slipped
away. The Brazilian was far from attractive
but—
my circumstances required some
drastic—
compromises.

TYE
[
crouching beside her
]: You're talking no sense, Jane. The Brazilian's out of the picture; those steps on the stairs were steps of hospital workers coming to take
a—
pick a dying fruit outa the place.

JANE
:
Do you think I expect you back here again?
You'll say yes, assure me now as if
forever—
but—
reconsider—
the moment of impulse . . .

TYE
: Cut some slack for me, Babe. We all gotta cut some slack for each other in this fucking world. Lissen. You don't have to sweat it.

JANE
: Give me another remission; one that lasts!

TYE
: Gotta go now, it's late, after dark and I'm dressed.

JANE
: Well, zip your fly up unless you're now in the show. [
She rises and zips up his fly, touches his face and throat with trembling fingers
.]

TYE
: Jane, we got love between us! Don't ya know that?

JANE
[
not harshly
]: Lovely old word, love, it's travelled a long way, Tye.

TYE
: And still's a long way to go. Hate to leave you alone
but—

JANE
: I'm not alone. I've got Beret. An animal is a comforting presence sometimes. I wonder if they'd admit her to St. Vincent's?

TYE
: St. Vincent's?

JANE
: That charity hospital where they took the painter called Nightingale.

TYE
: You ain't going there, honey.

JANE
: It strikes me as being a likely destination.

TYE
: Why?

JANE
: I watched you dress. I didn't exist for you. Nothing existed for you but your image in the mirror. Understandably so. [
With her last strength she draws herself up
.]

TYE
: What's understandable, Jane? —You got a fever? [
He rises, too, and stretches out a hand to touch her forehead. She knocks it away
.]

JANE
: What's understandable is that your present convenience is about to become an encumbrance. An invalid, of no use, financial or sexual. Sickness is repellent, Tye, demands more care and gives less and less in return. The person you
loved—
assuming that you
did
love when she was still
useful—
is now, is now as absorbed in preparing herself for oblivion as you were absorbed, in
your—
your image in
the—
mirror!

TYE
: [
frightened by her vehemence
]: Hey, Jane!

JANE
: Readies herself for it as you do for the street! [
She continues as to herself
.] —Withdraws into another dimension. Is indifferent to you except
as—
caretaker! Is less aware of you than
of—
[Panting,
she looks up slowly through the skylight
.]—sky that's visible to her from her bed under the
skylight—
at
night,
these—
filmy white clouds, they move, they drift over the roofs of the Vieux Carré so close that if you have fever you feel as if you could touch them, and bits would come off on your fingers, soft
as—
cotton
candy—

TYE
: Rest, Babe. I'll be back early. I'll get Smokey to take over for me at midnight, and I'll come back with tamales and a bottle of vino! [
He crosses out of the light. She rushes to the door
.]

JANE
:
No, no, not before daybreak and with a new needle mark on your arm
. Beret? Beret!

WRITER
: I lifted her from the floor where she'd fallen . . .

Jane? Jane?

JANE
: —My cat, I scared it away . . .

NURSIE
[
offstage
]: What is goin' on up there?

WRITER
: She was frightened by something.

JANE
: I lost my cat, that's all. —They don't understand . . . [
The writer places her on the bed
.] Alone. I'm alone.

WRITER
: She'll be back. [
He continues as narrator
.] Jane didn't seem to hear me. She was looking up at the skylight.

JANE
: It isn't blue any more, it's suddenly turned quite dark.

WRITER
: It was dark as the question in her eyes. [
The blues piano fades in
.]

JANE
: It's black as the piano man playing around the corner.

WRITER
[
to Jane
]: It must be after six. What's the time now?

JANE
: Time? What? Oh. Time. My sight is blurred. [
She shows him her wristwatch
.] Can't make out the luminous dial, can you?

WRITER
: It says five of twelve.

JANE
: An improbable hour. Must have run down.

WRITER
: I'll take it off. To wind it. [
He puts the watch to his ear
.] I'm afraid it's broken.

JANE
[
vaguely
]: I hadn't noticed. —
Lately—
I tell time by the sky.

WRITER
: His name was Sky.

JANE
: Tye . . .

WRITER
: No, not Tye. Sky was the name of someone who offered me a ride West.

JANE
: —I've had fever all day. Did you ask me a question?

WRITER
: I said I'd planned a trip to the West Coast with this young vagrant, a musician.

JANE
: Young vagrants are irresponsible. I'm not at all
surprised—
he let you down? Well. I have travel plans, too.

WRITER
: With Tye?

JANE
: No, I was going alone, not with Tye. What are you doing there?

WRITER
: Setting up the chess board. Want to play?

JANE
: Oh, yes, you said you play. I'd have a partner for once. But my concentration'
s—
I warn
you—
it's likely to
be—
impaired.

WRITER
: Want to play white or black?

JANE
: You choose.

WRITER
: Black. In honor of the musician around the corner.

JANE
: —He's playing something appropriate to the occasion as if I'd phoned in a request. How's it go, so familiar?

JANE
: Each of us abandoned to the other. You know this is almost our first private conversation. [
She nearly falls to the floor. He catches her and supports her to the chair at the upstage side of the table
.] Shall we play, let's do. With no distractions at all. [
She seems unable to move; she has a frozen attitude
.]

Vagrants, I can tell you about them. From experience. Incorirgibly delinquent. Purposeless. Addictive. Grab at you for support when support's what
you
need—
gone? Whistling down the last flight, such a lively popular tune. Well, I have travel plans, but in the company of no charming young vagrant. Love Mediterranean countries but somehow missed Spain. I plan to go. Now! Madrid, to visit the Prado, most celebrated museum of all. Admire the Goyas, El Grecos. Hire a car to cross
the—
gold plains of Toledo.

WRITER
: Jane, you don't have to make up stories, I heard your talk with
Tye—
all of it.

JANE
: Then you must have heard his leaving. How his steps picked up speed on the second flight
down—
started whistling . . .