Man From the USSR & Other Plays
Page 8
TAUBENDORF
No, no—it’s closing tomorrow. And this is the last day of shooting, too. I’ll find something or other.
KUZNETSOFF
Well, there’s shooting and shooting. Let’s say good-by.
(They embrace.)
TAUBENDORF
God bless you....
(When Taubendorf goes through the door Kuznetsoff whips out a Browning and aims at him.)
KUZNETSOFF
Hold it!
TAUBENDORF
Alyosha, someone might see you. (leaves)
KUZNETSOFF
Good for him.... Didn’t even flinch.... And you, my friend, don’t you let me down, (addressing the pistol, which he aims at the audience) Don’t you flinch in the clinch, (puts it back in his pocket)
(A stagehand runs in and carries off the map and the balalaika. Kuznetsoff consults his watch. Buzzing of the klieg lights offstage. Marianna hurries in. She sheds her fur hat and gives her hair a toss.)
KUZNETSOFF
Marianna Sergeyevna, I’m afraid I have to be going.
MARIANNA
Alec!
KUZNETSOFF
You’ve done your part already?
MARIANNA
No, no.... I’ll only be starting in a minute. I have a scene with the male lead. But that’s not the point. Alec, are you still planning to leave on Saturday?
KUZNETSOFF
Yes.
MARIANNA
I can’t believe this. I can’t believe you are abandoning me. Listen, Alec, listen.... I’ll give up the stage. I’ll forget about my talent. I’ll go with you. Take me away somewhere. We’ll live somewhere in the South, in Nice.... Your silly commercial dealings can wait. Something horrible is happening to me. I’ve already ordered dresses, bright, wonderful dresses for the South....I thought.... No, tell me you’re not going off and leaving me! I’ll caress you. You know how good I am at it, don’t you? We’ll have a villa full of flowers. We’ll be so happy.... You’ll see....
MEGAPHONE OFFSTAGE
Everybody back! Everybody back! It isn’t worth a damn! Listen, when I say “One!”—that’s when Group One gets up. And when I say “Two!” Group Two runs left. Quiet! Achtung!
KUZNETSOFF
I had a good time with you. But now I’m leaving.
MARIANNA
Alec, what is the meaning of this?
MEGAPHONE OFFSTAGE
One!
KUZNETSOFF
I don’t think I ever gave you reason to believe that our relationship would last. I am a very busy man. To tell you the truth, I don’t even have the time to say I am a busy man.
MARIANNA
Oh, so that’s the way it is.... Then let me tell you something too. It was all playacting. I was just doing a part. I feel nothing but revulsion for you. I’m the one who’s leaving you, not the other way around. And one other thing—I know you’re a Bolshevik, a Cheka agent, God knows what else.... You disgust me!
MEGAPHONE OFFSTAGE
Two!
MARIANNA
You’re a Bolshevik! Get out of here. Don’t you dare come back to me. Don’t you dare write me. No, it doesn’t matter—I know you’ll write anyway, but I’ll tear up your letters.
MEGAPHONE OFFSTAGE
Three!
KUZNETSOFF
No, no, Marianna Sergeyevna, I have no intention of writing. Anyway, right now you’re only making me late. It’s time for me to go.
MARIANNA
Do you realize that you’ll never see me again?
KUZNETSOFF
Yes, of course—what’s the point of repeating yourself all the time? Say good-by.
MARIANNA
(turning away)
No.
(Kuznetsoff bows and unhurriedly goes off right. Stagehands walk toward him carrying banners, and a bundle of rifles. He slows, glancing at them with a fleeting smile, then leaves. Marianna is left standing by the scenery at the left.)
MEGAPHONE OFFSTAGE
Back! Everybody back! It’s no good! People, I’m telling you for the last time—listen ... Group One—
CURTAIN
ACT FIVE
The Oshivenskis’ room. On the left, a door to the entrance hall; in the rear wall, a smaller door to the adjoining room; on the right, a window onto the courtyard. Against the rear wall, to the left of the door, the bare metal frame of a double bed, its springs exposed; next to it a night table (propped against the wall, evidently because one leg has broken off) with its door wide open; by the bed a small rug lies askew, with one corner folded back. To the right of the door, several suitcases (one of them is open), a Russian wooden trunk with hasps, a hamper, a carton with a squashed top, and a large bundle. The floor around the suitcases is mottled with scraps of white and brown paper; the bare table has been moved over to the window, while the wastebasket remains where the table used to stand in the middle of the room and, lying on its side, disgorges various trash. The chairs stand helter-skelter; one of them has been moved up against the wardrobe (which is by the rear wall, to the right of the door), from whose top things have apparently been removed since a whole newspaper page hangs down on one side. The walls of the room are covered with suspicious water stains; and a monstrous chandelier, suspended from the ceiling (Bavarian workmanship: a Gretchen with a dolphin’s tale from which extend, curving upward, deer antlers crowned with light bulbs), gazes reproachfully at the dust, at the absurd placement of the chairs, at the baggage of the departing tenants.
OSHIVENSKI
(as he finishes packing a suitcase)
Junk....
MRS. OSHIVENSKI
Another piece of string would be handy....
OSHIVENSKI
There is no more string. Junk.
MRS. OSHIVENSKI
And where are we supposed to go now? Oh my dear God....
OSHIVENSKI
We’ll move straight into the Kingdom of Heaven. At least there you don’t have to pay the rent in advance.
MRS. OSHIVENSKI
Shame on you, Vitya, for talking like that. A crying shame. Here, help me lock this trunk.
OSHIVENSKI
What a miserable life....No—I’ve had enough!
MRS. OSHIVENSKI
Just be careful, Vitya ... when you start talking with him.... We can put the trunk over against the wall for now.
OSHIVENSKI
Against the wall.... Against the wall.... Enough is enough. We’ve done our share of suffering. Anything would be better. Even the wall and the firing squad.
MRS. OSHIVENSKI
You stick mostly to questions—you know, what and where....
OSHIVENSKI
Even one’s honor goes to the dogs. That’s enough. What are you bawling about?
MRS. OSHIVENSKI
You won’t find Vasya’s grave anyway. There is no grave. Even if you search all of Russia....
OSHIVENSKI
You’d better get the parcel ready. Damn these newspapers—they keep rustling under one’s feet.... I’ll start bawling myself in a minute. Stop it, Zhenya....
MRS. OSHIVENSKI
I don’t trust him. A man like that might filch it.
OSHIVENSKI
(sitting down at the table)
Stop the nonsense—that’s got nothing to do with it. And why on earth are you sending that halva?
MRS. OSHIVENSKI
Oh, the halva is unimportant. The main thing is that he get the fabric to them....
OSHIVENSKI
And where do we get the money to settle with the landlady—answer that one! (At the word “money” he hits the table violently with the palm of his hand.) I can just hear her screeching like a parrot....
MRS. OSHIVENSKI
If I had another piece of string....
(A knock at the door; Marianna enters. She is wearing a sober dark suit, as if she were in mourning.)
OSHIVENSKI
(without enthusiasm)
Welcome....
&nbs
p; MARIANNA
Excuse me.... You’re packing.... I’m disturbing you....
MRS. OSHIVENSKI
Come on in, honey. It’s all right, we’re finished.
MARIANNA
Yes....If I may....
OSHIVENSKI
My little tavern—remember? Eh? Nice little tavern, wasn’t it, eh? The passing legs, eh? Look at us now. Nothing but a fourth-class ticket to join our ancestors.
MRS. OSHIVENSKI
You’re so pale! Honey, what’s the matter? You look like a ghost.
MARIANNA
Oh, please don’t look at me like that. Please don’t.
OSHIVENSKI
(getting up)
Well, Zhenya, wish me luck. I’m off to confabulate with the landlady. Perhaps she’ll take pity on us.
MRS. OSHIVENSKI
Go ahead, go ahead. Marianna and I will stay here and have a cup of tea. Oh, I forgot—all the china is packed. Forgive me.
(Oshivenski has left.)
MARIANNA
Yevghenia Vasilyevna, I’ve had a catastrophe.
MRS. OSHIVENSKI
I can see, I can see, dear—you’re so listless, so quiet, that I hardly recognize you.
MARIANNA
A terrible catastrophe. I just saw the first screening.
MRS. OSHIVENSKI
What screening was that, dear?
MARIANNA
Oh, you know—I had a part in a film. And yesterday the picture was screened for the first time.
MRS. OSHIVENSKI
Then what was the catastrophe? A fire, or what?
MARIANNA
Yes, a fire. Everything I had has been destroyed—my dreams, my faith in myself, my life. I’m totally ruined.
MRS. OSHIVENSKI
Oh, yes, by the way—there was a favor I wanted to ask you, darling. But we can talk about it later. Tell me what happened.
MARIANNA
I saw myself on the screen. It was monstrous. I had waited with such anticipation for the moment when I would see myself, and finally that moment came. An absolute horror. In one place, for instance, I’m lying flat on the couch and then I get up. When we were shooting, I thought I was so graceful, so vivacious. But when I saw myself on the screen, Yevghenia Vasilyevna, I got up—excuse the expression-bottom first....I stuck out my behind and made such a clumsy turn! And it was like that all the way through. Artificial, horrendous gestures. And here that lousy Pia Mora glides around like a swan. It’s mortifying....
MRS. OSHIVENSKI
It’s not as bad as all that, darling. You should see how I came out on my passport photo. A mug you wouldn’t believe.
MARIANNA
And that’s only the beginning: this was just a private screening for us. But now the film is going to be shown all over Berlin, and then all over the world, and with it my ridiculous gestures and grimaces, my unbelievable gait....
MRS. OSHIVENSKI
Here’s what I wanted to ask you, my dear. We have to move and we don’t have a penny. Do you think you might be able to make us a loan of fifty marks or so?
MARIANNA
A loan? Oh, so that’s what you were talking about....I guess I’m walking around in a kind of fog today. No, Yevghenia Vasilyevna, I’m broke too. I spent all my earnings on dresses.
MRS. OSHIVENSKI
Shame on you, you clotheshorse. Well, I guess that’s that....
MARIANNA
On dresses! I bought myself a beautiful, white, Paris original. And you know for what? So I could.... Oh, there’s no use talking about it!...
MRS. OSHIVENSKI
Tell me, tell me—you know, I wouldn’t breathe a word, I never gossip.
MARIANNA
I couldn’t care less about the film. That’s not it at all. The point is that I fell in love, fell in love like an idiot. Got hooked, in other words. And he left me. That’s all there is to it.
MRS. OSHIVENSKI
Who was it? Some German?
MARIANNA
He could have been a German or a Chinaman—what difference does it make?...Or an American.
MRS. OSHIVENSKI
Time heals all wounds, dear. Things aren’t easy for any of us. Little Mara, your namesake and my granddaughter, was also abandoned by her husband. All because they got married in a civil ceremony. Yes, life isn’t easy. What will become of my old Vitya and me now? Where do we go? I have absolutely no idea.
MARIANNA
Yevghenia Vasilyevna, may I make a phone call?
MRS. OSHIVENSKI
Go into that room over there. The tenant left but the telephone is still connected. Don’t worry, there’s no one there.
(Marianna leaves by the door in the rear wall. Grunting and holding up the hem of her skirt, Mrs. Oshivenski shoves a suitcase into a corner with her foot. She bends over and checks the lock. There is a knock at the door.)
MRS. OSHIVENSKI.
Come in. Herein.
(Kuznetsoff hurries in.)
KUZNETSOFF
Quite a mess you have here.
MRS. OSHIVENSKI
Oh, thanks for dropping by....Very kind of you....
KUZNETSOFF
My wife gave me your message. I came for the parcel.
MRS. OSHIVENSKI
Yes, yes, of course.... Thank you so much.
KUZNETSOFF
I’m in a hurry.
MRS. OSHIVENSKI
Oh, but my husband wanted to have a chat with you. It was about something very important.
KUZNETSOFF
My train leaves at seven. I have to make one more stop before my departure.
MRS. OSHIVENSKI
My husband is downstairs—he’ll be here in a minute. Couldn’t you just wait for him, my dear sir?
KUZNETSOFF
I can’t right now. By the way, your parcel is pretty hefty. If you wish I can look in again on my way to the station.
MRS. OSHIVENSKI
Oh, that would be so nice! Here’s the address—is it clear?
KUZNETSOFF
Yes, certainly. Only now it’s not Morskaya Street but Herzen Street.
MRS. OSHIVENSKI
What do we know: Herzen, Trotsky—who can tell them apart.... Don’t lose the parcel. Regards to dear Olga Pavlovna.
KUZNETSOFF
No—I’ve already said good-by to her. So long. I’ll drop by in half an hour. (leaves)
(Marianna returns, listlessly crosses the room, listlessly sinks into a chair.)
MARIANNA
He’s gone.
MRS. OSHIVENSKI
You mean Kolya, dear?
MARIANNA
(angrily)
And good riddance! It’s best that way.
MRS. OSHIVENSKI
The world is full of ways. In my time there was only one—straight and simple, while nowadays there is any number of them—twisted ones, crooked ones. We’re being buffeted right and left. And you want me to tell you where it all comes from, what the root of the evil is—
(Oshivenski enters.)
OSHIVENSKI
No luck. She started talking about the police, (sits down and drums on the table)
MRS. OSHIVENSKI
What will become of us now? Oh my Lord....
OSHIVENSKI
Just don’t you start whimpering.
MARIANNA
I’ll be running along.
MRS. OSHIVENSKI
You do look dejected today, dear. Well, go on and God bless you. Things aren’t very joyful here either.