The Road to Damascus, a Trilogy Part 3

BEGGAR. I got it from a near relation.

STRANGER. Now you frighten me! Are you real? May I touch you? (He touches his arm.) There's no doubt of it.... Would you deign to accept a small coin in return for a promise to seek Polycrates' ring in another part of the town? (He hands him a coin.) Post nummos virtus.... Another echo. You must go at once.

BEGGAR. I will. But you've given me far too much. I'll return three-quarters of it. Now we owe one another nothing but friends.h.i.+p.

STRANGER. Friends.h.i.+p! Am I a friend of yours?

BEGGAR. Well, I am of yours. When one's alone in the world one can't be particular.

STRANGER. Then let me tell you you forget yourself...

BEGGAR. Only too pleased! But when we meet again I'll have a word of welcome for you. (Exit.)

STRANGER (sitting down again and drawing in the dust with his stick).

Sunday afternoon! A long, dank, sad time, after the usual Sunday dinner of roast beef, cabbage and watery potatoes. Now the older people are testing, the younger playing chess and smoking. The servants have gone to church and the shops are shut. This frightful afternoon, this day of rest, when there's nothing to engage the soul, when it's as hard to meet a friend as to get into a wine shop. (The LADY comes back again, she is noun wearing a flower at her breast.) Strange! I can't speak without being contradicted at once!

LADY. So you're still here?

STRANGER. Whether I sit here, or elsewhere, and write in the sand doesn't seem to me to matter--as long so I write in the sand.

LADY. What are you writing? May I see?

STRANGER. I think you'll find: Eve 1864.... No, don't step on it.

LADY. What happens then?

STRANGER. A disaster for you... and for me.

LADY. You know that?

STRANGER. Yes, and more. That the Christmas rose you're wearing is a mandragora. Its symbolical meaning is malice and calumny; but it was once used in medicine for the healing of madness. Will you give it me?

LADY (hesitating). As medicine?

STRANGER. Of course. (Pause.) Have you read my books?

LADY. You know I have. And that it's you I have to thank for giving me freedom and a belief in human rights and human dignity.

STRANGER. Then you haven't read the recent ones?

LADY. No. And if they're not like the earlier ones I don't want to.

STRANGER. Then promise never to open another book of mine.

LADY. Let me think that over. Very well, I promise.

STRANGER. Good! But see you keep your promise. Remember what happened to Bluebeard's wife when curiosity tempted her into the forbidden chamber....

LADY. You see, already you make demands like those of a Bluebeard. What you don't see, or have long since forgotten, is that I'm married, and that my husband's a doctor, and that he admires your work. So that his house is open to you, if you wish to be made welcome there.

STRANGER. I've done all I can to forget it. I've expunged it from my memory so that it no longer has any reality for me.

LADY. If that's so, will you come home with me to-night?

STRANGER. No. Will you come with me?

LADY. Where?

STRANGER. Anywhere! I have no home, only a trunk. Money I sometimes have--though not often. It's the one thing life has capriciously refused me, perhaps because I never desired it intensely enough. (The LADY shakes her head.) Well? What are you thinking?

LADY. I'm surprised I'm not angry with you. But you're not serious.

STRANGER. Whether I am or not's all one to me. Ah! There's the organ! It won't be long now before the drink shops open.

LADY. Is it true _you_ drink?

STRANGER. Yes. A great deal! Wine makes my soul from her prison, up into the firmament, where she what has never yet been seen, and hears what men never yet heard....

LADY. And the day after?

STRANGER. I have the most delightful scruples of conscience! I experience the purifying emotions of guilt and repentance. I enjoy the sufferings of the body, whilst my soul hovers like smoke about my head.

It is as if one were suspended between Life and Death, when the spirit feels that she has already opened her pinions and could fly aloft, if she would.

LADY. Come into the church for a moment. You'll hear no sermon, only the beautiful music of vespers.

STRANGER. No. Not into church! It depresses me because I feel I don't belong there.... That I'm an unhappy soul and that it's as impossible for me to re-enter as to become a child again.

LADY. You feel all that... already?

STRANGER. Yes. I've got that far. I feel as if I lay hacked in pieces and were being slowly melted in Medea's cauldron. Either I shall be sent to the soap-boilers, or arise renewed from my own dripping! It depends on Medea's skill!

LADY. That sounds like the word of an oracle. We must see if you can't become a child again.

STRANGER. We should have to start with the cradle; and this time with the right child.

LADY. Exactly! Wait here for me whilst I go into the church. If the cafe were open I'd ask you please not to drink. But luckily it's shut.

(The LADY exits. The STRANGER sits down again and draws in the sand.

Enter six funeral attendants in brown with some mourners. One of them carries a banner with the insignia of the Carpenters, draped in brown crepe; another a large axe decorated with spruce, a third a cus.h.i.+on with a chairman's mallet. They stop outside the cafe and wait.)

STRANGER. Excuse me, whose funeral have you been attending?

FIRST MOURNER. A house-breaker's. (He imitates the ticking of a clock.)

STRANGER. A real house-breaker? Or the insect sort, that lodges in the woodwork and goes 'tick-tick'?

FIRST MOURNER. Both--but mainly the insect sort. What do they call them?