Remembrance and Pantomime Page 4
JORDAN
“Remembrance,” and put for the dedication: To E.T. No, put: To A.H., just under the title; that is, if the measly eight dollars and fifty cents you pay not going break your budget. Christmas card? You know the best Christmas-card writer? William Blake. Take it or leave it, that’s how I feel. Maybe is not modern enough for your little pseudo-radical rag, but that’s the best I can do.
PILGRIM
I told you, I go print it with pleasure, Albert. Is Monday morning, so don’t give your old pardner a hard time. I am the one who respects your work, especially the short stories, and I told you one day I’ll send a boy around with a tape to take down your reminiscences. Because your eyes. This thing kind of close to the bone, boy. What is this “friends betray” business? Which friends?
JORDAN
Look, Ezra Pilgrim! You think you’re my one friend? Blasted conceit! All right. You are. Is just a bloody poem.
PILGRIM
“Sons die.” That ain’t just a bloody poem, Albert.
JORDAN
Look, Ezra, I know your big ambition was to be a barrister, but I too old for you to practice on, you hear? Friends betray, and that’s it! Sons die, and that’s also it. That’s eight dollars and fifty cents’ worth of truth.
PILGRIM
You talking about my so-called influence on Junior, right? Because I let him loose in my library? Because I made him read Césaire and Marx and Fanon? That was wrong?
JORDAN
I am talking about life. Life, man, life!
PILGRIM
Because I let him write those articles in The Bugle?
JORDAN
Ezra …
(PILGRIM goes for the bottle)
PILGRIM
Life? I’m a confirmed bachelor, Albert. I haven’t had your good luck, so the only family I’ve ever had is this.
JORDAN
You’re not that unlucky, Ezra, you nearly succeeded in stealing away my son. Put down the damned bottle.
PILGRIM
Junior?
JORDAN
Aye.
PILGRIM
Stealing your son? Ahh … that’s what the poem is all about, then. That “friends betray” business. I best have another one, Albert, because …
JORDAN
Face the truth, Ezra. It’s time. We avoid it, avoid it, face the truth. That poem is the truth …
PILGRIM
I tried to steal your son.
JORDAN
My friend …
PILGRIM
What is it I was supposed to have done? Help kill that boy? I was Uncle Ezra to him.
JORDAN
And I was Uncle Tom. I was his father, and I was also Uncle Tom. You printed all his revolutionary stuff in The Bugle, because you were scared shitless, Ezra; you recanted on all the culture we had known. Remember what we were, and what principles we considered sacred, friend?
PILGRIM
I thought I was an editor, but this is news to me, that I’m a murderer, too. Jesus, you’ve called me many things, Albert, but never this one. Jesus.
JORDAN
Shhh. You’ll wake the child.
PILGRIM
What child?
JORDAN
Never mind. Just don’t start shouting. I have a child in there.
PILGRIM
I hope Mabel don’t hear about it. Is there somebody in there, Albert? You have some girl in there ’cause Mabel’s gone? Well, that is your business, but I’m not going around, I’m not leaving this house carrying that guilt inside me about Junior. I will not. You hear?
JORDAN
Keep your voice down, please. They shot him, Ezra. They put a hole in that boy’s body, but they’ve ripped out a hole in my own heart that nothing, nothing can fill.
PILGRIM
A stupid, excited policeman shot him, it wasn’t “they”! The country was under martial law.
JORDAN
Bad company, bad company. What was the company we kept in our youth, Ezra? The company of great minds, great music. Right, Pilly? So we educated ourselves past ourselves, eh, Pilly boy? While our contemporaries were out chasing woman, drinking grog, and sniffing like dogs round the arse of a pension, we’d be here after work, right here on this veranda, right there by the seed ferns, way past suppertime, reading Macaulay, Carlyle, and Edward Bulwer-Lytton to each other. Yes, friend. A. P. Jordan and young Ezra Pilgrim civilized themselves.
PILGRIM
Belmont is a village, Albert, so think of it this way: that your son, Albert Perez Jordan, was the village Hampden.
JORDAN
The boy was wild, Ezra. He called me a Fascist, but the boy was wild. He ran with wild companions, wild ideas. He said I ran this house like a classroom, but discipline was always my weakness since the army. Sometimes I feel I could beat this whole damn country with a strap, ministers and all! Big boys!
(Mime)
“What wrong with the phone, eh?” WHAP! “Who lock off the water?” WHADDAP! But the boy was wild. Pilly, I’m sorry.
(Pours PILGRIM a drink)
But I want to show you something.
(He is at the record player)
PILGRIM
Goddamnit, man, Albert, I can’t stop and listen to no music now.
JORDAN
The house quiet, Mabel ain’t here and Frederick’s gone. Every anniversary of Junior’s death, he goes on one of his periodic retreats to the hills, you know that.
PILGRIM
Albert, look! I know you’re retired and you want a little company, but Monday is a bitch of a time in the printery, so I’ll pass in after work, so if you ain’t mind, le’ me just take this poem.
JORDAN
Not “lemme” just take. Let me just take.
PILGRIM
Let me just take. I can’t take the classics before lunch.
JORDAN
You printing it just so? Without asking who A.H. is?
PILGRIM
Yes, I printing it, Albert. I’m concerned with the part that concerns me, but I’ll print it. So, I gone.
JORDAN
Ask me.
PILGRIM
Ask you what, man? ’Tain’t my business.
JORDAN
Don’t shrug your blasted shoulders at me, Ezra Pilgrim!
PILGRIM
Yes, teacher! I unshrug my shoulders. So, who is A.H.? Hitler?
(Sings)
“Run your run, Adolf Hitler, run your run.”
(Pause)
Albert, I fainting with curiosity.
JORDAN
Prepare to faint with shock, old friend. A girl came into this house last night. A girl from off the street—so drugged with tiredness that she’s slept in there for hours, except when she’s had to change or feed her child—standing there on the veranda near the ferns. An American, a drifter. I’ve feasted my eyes on them asleep in Junior’s room, and her name is Anna Herschel.
PILGRIM
So I can go now.
JORDAN
I’ve gone around the house on velvet feet. I warned the sunlight entering her room not to make a noise. I wanted her to sleep after thirty-five years of wandering among the ruins of bombed-out London. She said to me, last night, before she went to sleep, jokingly, “Maybe I’ll dance for you sometime,” like Esther, Esther Trout? Believe me, Ezra, she is Esther Trout.
(ANNA appears from the bedroom)
PILGRIM
I see. Hello. Remarkable.
ANNA
Hi … I didn’t know …
PILGRIM
Hello. Good morning.
JORDAN
Anna, my dear friend and editor, Ezra Pilgrim.
ANNA
Heaven, I’m in heaven. Joke.
JORDAN
You slept forever. Ezra here’s a rabid balletomane and an armchair conductor, like me. He sits here Sunday mornings with the bottle open and his eyes closed, conducting. I’ll turn it up … Would you dance for Mr. Pilgrim?
PI
LGRIM
Albert …
ANNA
Hooo, wait, wait, hold on! Would I what? I thought there’d be a catch. What kind of dance? That’s Chopin.
JORDAN
We so rarely get a chance down here, you see. I thought …
ANNA
You’re crazy. Sorry. I mean … Oh, shit, I’m a mess. Excuse me. That was a little joke on myself last night, about dancing.
JORDAN
Oh, I know. It wasn’t your promise. I thought you might have brought a little delight, joy, purely spiritual joy to the hearts of two old men …
ANNA
Dance. I had a baby. I haven’t danced … not ballet anyway; it’s eight-thirty or something … in the morning.
JORDAN
I’m sorry. The way I put it sounds a little obscene …
ANNA
Is Mrs. Jordan back? I’d love to thank her.
JORDAN
She’s gone.
ANNA
Gone. Aha … I see. I’m awfully sorry, you understand, Mr. Pilgrim, but I wasn’t such a hot dancer anyway, you know. Just an Off Off Off Broadway gypsy … And nothing you ever do or say could ever be obscene, Mr. Jordan … Ever.
JORDAN
It was just one of my selfish, crazy impulses, that’s all. Sorry. You better go to work, Pilly. God, I feel lecherous and soiled.
PILGRIM
It was nice to meet you, Miss …
ANNA
Call me Anna. I love Trinidad. I think you’re lucky to be in such a beautiful country and have such a beautiful friend as Mr. Jordan.
JORDAN
Go to work, Pilgrim.
(ANNA goes to the record player and bends to start the record)
No. If you do that, Miss Gypsy, it will seem an obscene request.
PILGRIM
Shut up, Albert, we all understand …
JORDAN
… and I was not in quest of an obscene experience, but I simply wanted, because of the beauty and strength of this morning, to show my friend here that there is still innocence and grace left in this sordid world of ours and …
ANNA
Sit down please, Mr. Pilgrim … Now, there’s a legato passage here that I can manage better. What the hell.
(She turns the record over to a slower movement)
Just make yourselves invisible and I’ll try … it’s like the legend of Susanna and the Elders, except they were just old Peeping Toms. And it’s not like an audition here, because I’m happy and, oh, cut it out and do it, lady …
(She begins to dance, PILGRIM looks on, then begins to applaud)
No, no, don’t applaud, it’s terrible! Terrible!
(Stops)
Turn it off. Please. Please turn it off.
JORDAN
It’s beautiful …
PILGRIM
It was a wonderful experience. One that an old man will always cherish. I saw Pavlova once in London
(ANNA ransacks the record rack, selecting, then holds up record)
ANNA
Whose is this?
JORDAN
My son’s. Junior’s or Frederick’s.
ANNA
Well, this is more my speed. If I’m going to earn my keep.
(She puts on a heavy rock number. Moves wildly, as a disco dancer)
Sit back, gentlemen, and enjoy the ride!
JORDAN
Stop it! No! Better her dead than this. Better her dead than this! What have they done to you, Esther? You didn’t have to punish yourself.
ANNA
I didn’t want you to get the wrong impression. I’m no saint, Mr. Jordan.
PILGRIM
Nobody is, kid.
JORDAN
“Nobody is, kid!” Stop trying to talk Yankee, Pilgrim. And isn’t it time you went down to work?
PILGRIM
I saw Pavlova once, in London. She moved like a young birch tree in moonlight. For a second there …
ANNA
Thank you, but I’m not Pavlova, Mr. Pilgrim.
(They shake hands)
PILGRIM
Bless you, Anna. Watch out for him. He’s dangerous. He sits there like an old spider in a chair, spinning remembrance. So long, Al.
(He exits)
ANNA
He’s a nice man. You have nice friends. Boy, am I rusty. Uh!
JORDAN
Do you feel used?
ANNA
Used. Oh, no, not at all. There was a shaky second there when it felt a little … you know. You start …
(Pause)
Forget it. Let me just be thankful for some peace. You’ve never asked me who I was.
JORDAN
I knew who you were.
ANNA
Yeah? You know more than me, then. You don’t care? Pretty insulting. I didn’t know it showed. I’m not tough, I just talk tough. Jesus, I never slept so long … You know, you start bright and confident, star of some small-town company, then you get the first shock, you’re one of five thousand, and then you start to take revenge on your ambition, and soon there’s a baby with the father gone. And there’s an ad saying “Dancer Wanted,” and there you are, Pavlova from Rhode Island doing the Funky Chicken at ten in the morning with two stars on your tits under the red lights of an empty bar in Jersey, but what the hell, you’re dancing.
JORDAN
All artists make compromises, love. Don’t cry like that. Make a sound.
ANNA
I came out of that bar in Jersey in freezing sunshine feeling so soiled, so ashamed of degrading myself, that I borrowed all the money I could and went to a ticket office and said: South! The farther the better, and this is the farthest the ticket went! I should shower. I’m ready to move again. I’m going to leave very soon, Mr. Jordan, soon as I get that money wired to me. But in the meantime, I am very grateful. Very. You’re like a saint or something, you know that?
JORDAN
I’m not.
ANNA
You’ve never asked who I am.
JORDAN
I thought I’d let you tell me in your own good time. If you wanted to. And you don’t have to tell me now.
ANNA
Next to you, I’m a coarse person.
JORDAN
You’ll be a great woman. You’ll be a great dancer. One day you’ll be famous, and at least I can say, “Anna Herschel danced in this house.”
ANNA
I don’t believe in that any more. Fame and all that. I mean, I think it’s okay if you’re famous inside yourself. You know? You don’t have to get reviewed.
JORDAN
I know.
(ANNA rises, paces)
ANNA
Don’t say I know. ’Cause you don’t. Sorry. But you don’t know shit. I’m sorry. But it’s so easy to let it all slide and not give a fucking shrug when you hit bottom. When you asked me to dance I thought, Yeah, yeah, sure, like seeing yourself in a dirty mirror. It was Eighth Avenue all over, the Raincoat Brigade. I been in every cause, I was a permanent extra in all those crowd scenes—free-thinking, free-screwing Anna. Know what I thought? Jesus, I got to clean my mind.
JORDAN
Anna, you’re too hard on yourself.
ANNA
Not hard enough. That’s who I hate most: me. I waited for that door in there to open. Paid a landlord that way once. That’s the way it’s always been, nothing for nothing. I sound like a whore. I’m not a whore. I’m just down to the only legal tender I can deal in.
JORDAN
My dear … my dear …
ANNA
I’d like to be able to trust people again. I once laid it all out to a guy, I mean, my self, not my body. Offered it to him on a platter …
JORDAN
You bared your soul to him, and he was terrified and walked away. It’s an old story, isn’t it?
(Pause)
Can you do an English accent?
ANNA
Me? Nah. No way.
JORDAN
ANNA
Couple times, I guess. In fun. ’Tisn’t very good. Why?
JORDAN
Would you say: “I’ve grown to love it here. You mustn’t make fun of that…”
ANNA
In an English accent? I’d be awful.
JORDAN
Oh, try it. Once. For me?
ANNA
(Giggling)
I’m a dancer, I’m not an actress.
JORDAN
Give it a try. “I’ve grown to love it here. You mustn’t make fun of that … Albert.”
ANNA
Okay …
(Giggles)
“Oi’ve grown to luv it ere, you mustn’t …
(Cracks up, laughing)
Too cockney, huh?
JORDAN
What’s your religion?
ANNA
None. Why?
JORDAN
Will you come closer, please?
ANNA
What’s all this about? I just danced.
JORDAN
(Crooked arm extended)
Will you, please?
ANNA
This is tougher than paying the rent.
(Takes his arm)
I must be crazier than you are to do this. What do I do next?
JORDAN
Face the light. Where there’s Trout, there’s Hope. And be still. Hang your head in blushful shame, my dearest; no, tilt that chin upward in defiant pride.
ANNA
Defiant pride.
JORDAN
I sorry we get here twenty years late, Reverend Rabbi, but I had a little bladder trouble and a serious attack of cowardice, not to mention colonial inferiority, but we here now, anyway.
ANNA
Defiant pride is killing me.
JORDAN
So if you could get through your semi-demi as fast as possible, I’d be grateful to you for restoring my honor, for keeping my promise, and you best make one thing of it—like christening the child, pronouncing this business null and void one time—because bigamy is still a serious charge, ask Mabel, and with modest lechery, you may kiss the bride.
(Turns to ANNA)
I have kept my word, haven’t I?
ANNA
Someone you loved, huh?
JORDAN
During the war.
ANNA
Are you in touch with her?
JORDAN
I’m talking to her. Oh, that’s nonsense. She died, you see. She died in a swimming pool from a heart attack in Coral Gables, Florida, trying to extricate herself from a rubber tire. Life is ridiculous.
ANNA
I’m sorry.