by Tom Stoppard
Who’s there? Who’s that?
FRASER (applauding): Very nice, very nice. The egotist school of songwriting.
ALBERT: Who are you?
FRASER: You mean my name?
ALBERT: I suppose so.
FRASER: Fraser.
ALBERT: What are you doing on my bridge?
FRASER: Yours?
ALBERT: I’m painting it. I’m authorized.
FRASER: You’ve got a big job ahead of you.
ALBERT: I’ve got the time.
FRASER: You’ve got the time perhaps, but I’d say that time is against you. The condition of the paintwork is very shoddy.
ALBERT: Well, it hasn’t been done for a fair while.
FRASER: Yes, it’s beginning to look definitely tatty.
ALBERT: I’m getting through it bit by bit.
FRASER: Too slow. The old paint isn’t lasting. People have noticed, you know. There’s been talk.
ALBERT: Look here—are you the bridge inspector or something?
FRASER: What?
ALBERT: Did Mr. Fitch send you?
FRASER: Who?
ALBERT: What’s it all about then?
FRASER: Look down there. I came up because up was the only direction left. The rest has been filled up and is still filling. The city is a hold in which blind prisoners are packed wall to wall. Motor-cars nose each other down every street, and they are beginning to breed, spread, they press the people to the walls by their knees, pinning them by their knees, and there’s no end to it, because if you stopped making them, thousands of people would be thrown out of work, and they’d have no money to spend, the shopkeepers would get caught up in it, and the farms and factories, and all the people dependent on them, with their children and all. There’s too much of everything, but the space for it is constant. So the shell of human existence is filling out, expanding, and it’s going to go bang.
ALBERT: You’re frightened of traffic?
FRASER: We are at the mercy of a vast complex of moving parts, any of which might fail. Civilization is in decline, and the white rhino is being wiped out for the racket in bogus aphrodisiacs.
ALBERT: An animal lover——
FRASER: That was merely a trifle I snatched at in my inability to express the whole. I have never been able to understand, for instance, why anyone should want to be a dentist. I cannot pin down the divinity which ensures that just so many people take up dentistry and just so many agree to milk the cows which would otherwise scream in pain just as children would scream if there were no dentists.
ALBERT: I see. A lunatic, in fact.
FRASER: Not certifiably so. By no means certified. I am simply open, wide open, to certain insights. I do not believe that there is anyone in control. There is the semblance of pattern—supply meeting demand, one-way streets, give and take, the presumption of return tickets, promises to pay the bearer on demand, etcetera—but there’s nothing really holding it together. One is forced to recognize the arbitrariness of what we claim to be order. Somewhere there is a lynch pin, which, when removed, will collapse the whole monkey-puzzle. And I’m not staying there till it happens.
ALBERT: I see. Well, we all have our problems, but I don’t see how that justifies you climbing about council property. So would you kindly descend——
FRASER: That’s what I came up for.
ALBERT: To descend?
FRASER: It never occurred to me to stay.
ALBERT: You came up to go down?
FRASER: To jump.
ALBERT: Jump?
FRASER: Off.
ALBERT: Jump off? You’d kill yourself. Ah.
FRASER: Yes.
ALBERT: I see. All right, then.
FRASER: My mind was made up——
ALBERT: I see your point.
FRASER: It seemed the easiest thing to do.
ALBERT: I agree. Well then, time is hurrying by, waiting for no man. Or is that tide?
FRASER: I see you’re trying to humour me. Well, I expected that. You’ll be sending for a priest next.
ALBERT: Come, come, don’t procrastinate.
FRASER: Me?
ALBERT: You said you were going to jump.
FRASER: Well?
ALBERT: Well, jump.
FRASER: Aren’t you going to try to talk me out of it?
ALBERT: You know your own mind. And you’re holding me up. I’ve got to paint where you’re standing.
FRASER: You wouldn’t just stand there without lifting a finger?
ALBERT: I knew it. You’re just a talker. Those ones never do it.
FRASER: I can’t believe it. You wouldn’t just stand there and watch me kill myself.
ALBERT: I thought that’s what you wanted.
FRASER: Well, I did. I couldn’t bear the noise, and the chaos. I couldn’t get free of it, the enormity of that disorder, so dependent on a chance sequence of action and reaction. So I started to climb, to get some height, you know, enough height to drop from, to be sure, and the higher I climbed, the more I saw and the less I heard. And look now. I’ve been up here for hours, looking down and all it is, is dots and bricks, giving out a gentle hum. Quite safe. Quite small after all. Quite ordered, seen from above. Laid out in squares, each square a function, each dot a functionary. I really think it might work. Yes, from a vantage point like this, the idea of society is just about tenable.
ALBERT: Funked it. Well, mind how you go. Don’t fall.
(Cut bridge.)
CHAIRMAN: Gentlemen. This special emergency meeting of the Clufton Bay Bridge Sub-Committee has been called as a result of public representations, both direct and via the press, concerning the unsightly condition of what is the symbol of Clufton’s prosperity. My grandfather, who was loved by the public, and owed everything to them, must be turning in his grave. It is a salutary reminder that we are all servants of the public, Mr. Fitch.
DAVE: Hear, hear, Mr. Chairman.
CHAIRMAN: Shut up, Dave. As chairman, I, of course, take full responsibility. That is the duty of the chairman, regardless of where that responsibility actually lies, Mr. Fitch.
GEORGE: Hear, hear, Mr. Chairman.
CHAIRMAN: It is no smiling matter, George. The city publicity officer has been on to me, the Parks and Amenities have been on to me, British Railways have been on to me and the Clufton Chronicle has been doing its damndest to get on to me. This committee is the shame and the laughing stock of the Clufton Council, and as the future—as a possible future Mayor—I am gravely embarrassed by having to carry the can for a lack of foresight and watchfulness on the part of committee members whose names I will not mention, George. I have issued a statement to the effect that the squalid state of disrepair of Clufton’s highly-respected bridge is the result of a miscalculation by a senior public official, for which I, as chairman, take full responsibility, Mr. Fitch.
FITCH (a broken man): I can only say in mitigation that I have been under pressure—a sick man—domestic and financial worries——
CHAIRMAN: Quite, quite. Let’s stick to essentials. Two years ago, at your insistence and against my better judgement, which I left unspoken in deference to your professional capacity, we arranged to switch to improved paint lasting eight years, and through a reasoning which I never pretended to follow, to sack three of the four painters. Today, two years later, we are left with a bridge that is only one quarter painted while the other three-quarters is in a condition ranging from the sub-standard to the decrepit. Now then—what happened?
FITCH: Mr. Chairman, gentlemen, I have served Clufton man and boy for five years…. Clufton is the repository of my dreams and boyhood memories, the temple of my hopes to transform the running of a living community to a thing of precision and efficiency, a cybernetic poem—a programmed machine as perfect as a rose——
CHAIRMAN: For God’s sake, Fitch, pull yourself together.
FITCH: Gentlemen, let us take as our starting point the proposition that X painters painting at the rate of Y would take Z years to paint surfa
ce ABC. We found that when X equalled four, Z equalled two, Y and ABC remaining constant. Then along came factor P, a paint lasting eight years——
CHAIRMAN: I can’t stand it.
GEORGE: I think what Mr. Fitch is getting at, Mr. Chairman, is that the brown paint on the bridge was only supposed to last two years, the time that it took four painters to finish the job and start again. Well, of course, when we cut down to one painter using eight-year paint, it was obvious that in two years’ time he’d only be a quarter of the way along, so the old paint would be ready for another coat.
CHAIRMAN: If it was obvious why didn’t you say so?
GEORGE: I couldn’t catch the eye of the chairman. Of course, if we could hang on for another six years, Mr. Fitch would emerge triumphantly vindicated as the poet of precision and efficiency.
CHAIRMAN: I might be dead in six years.
DAVE: Hear, hear, Mr. Chairman.
CHAIRMAN: Thank you, Dave. So what are we going to do about it? Fitch?
FITCH: Er…. If we hired extra painters, one to start at the far end, one in the middle going one way, another going the opposite way, no … er, the progressive element intercedes—if we have two painters back to back at a point nine-sixteenths from the far end—no——
CHAIRMAN: We’d better go back to the old system and hire three more painters. Carry on from there.
FITCH: You can’t do that! They wouldn’t be quick enough on the one hand and they’d finish too soon on the other—you see, the bridge won’t need re-painting for another six years, and the resultant co-efficient—waste and unsightliness—the entire system would disintegrate and cost thousands——
CHAIRMAN: Money? (Appalled.) My grandfather——
GEORGE: I think I see a way out, Mr. Chairman. From the points of view of efficiency and expediency, I think we can get the whole thing resolved with just a bit of organization.
FITCH: Every day counts.
GEORGE: One day is all we’ll need.
(Cut.)
ALBERT: Met a feller up on the bridge the other day.
KATE (strained): Oh yes?
ALBERT: Yes. Climbed up to chuck himself off.
KATE: Did he?
ALBERT: No. Once he got up there, the mood passed.
KATE: Albert….
ALBERT (going): Just off.
KATE: You used to say good-bye.
(Cut to bridge.)
FRASER: Hello.
ALBERT: Who’s that?
FRASER: Me again.
ALBERT: Did you forget something?
FRASER: No, it all came back to me. After I went down, it all started again. So I came back up.
ALBERT: To jump?
FRASER: Yes.
ALBERT: Go on then.
FRASER: I’m all right again now. I don’t want to.
ALBERT: Now look here, this isn’t a public right of way. I’ll report you.
FRASER: I can’t help it. I’m forced up and coaxed down. I’m a victim of perspective.
ALBERT (shouts): Get down!
FRASER: All right, I’m going.
(Cut bridge.)
ALBERT: I’m not a complaining man. I let people get on with their own lives, I’m sympathetic to problems, but a line must be drawn. I’ve found him up there four times now, Mr. Fitch, and each time it’s the same story—he doesn’t want to jump after all. I’ve given him every chance.
FITCH: Yes yes, but that isn’t what I’ve asked to see you about at all. You haven’t been listening to me.
ALBERT: It’s unnerving me, finding company up there. Well, it’s changing the character of the job, and playing hell with my schedule—simply on the level of efficiency I protest.
FITCH: Well, as I say, for the reasons given, the matter is to be resolved. We have to get the bridge finished by the end of the week.
ALBERT: What?
FITCH: We can’t allow further deterioration. The public is roused.
ALBERT: Wait a minute—I can’t possibly finish by the end of the week.
FITCH: I realize, of course, you’ll need help. I have made arrangements.
ALBERT: What arrangements?
FITCH: Eighteen-hundred painters will report for work at seven o’clock tomorrow morning. By nightfall the job will be done. I have personally worked it out, and my department has taken care of the logistics.
ALBERT: Eighteen-hundred?
FITCH: Seventeen-hundred-and-ninety-nine. I kept a place for you. I thought you’d like that.
(Cut to door slam.)
ALBERT (breathless): They’re moving in on me, the dots are ganging up. I’ll need food and spare clothes, a couple of blankets. What are you doing?
KATE (off): Packing, Albert. I’m going.
ALBERT: Kate, they’ve got it in for me. They’re trying to move me off—and I’ve earned my position. I’ve worked for it.
KATE (approach): I’ve got a position—a housemaid, living in. With Katherine. I’ll let you know my days off, for visiting.
(Pause.)
ALBERT: Kate … I’m sorry…. Will you come and see me sometimes…? Will you come along and wave?
(Cut in bridge and painting.)
(More rapid than before.)
Dip brush, dip brush—slap it on, slide silver
over the iron, glide like mercury—slick, wipe,
tickle it wet, swish, slop, sweep and wipe the
silver slime, it’s all I can do—
in eight years I’ll be pushing thirty-two
a manic painter coming through for the second time.
Dip brush, dip brush—
FRASER: What’s the rush?
(Painting stops.)
ALBERT: Fraser.
FRASER: You’re going at it.
ALBERT (shouting): Get down! Get down!
FRASER: This isn’t like you at all.
ALBERT: I’m not having you up here.
FRASER: There’s room for both of us.
ALBERT: You’re just the first, and I’m not going to have it. If you’re going to jump—jump.
FRASER: That’s why I came, again.
ALBERT (closer and quieter): You’re going to jump?
FRASER: No. Not today.
ALBERT (furious): Up and down like a yo-yo!
FRASER: I agree that it is ludicrous. Down there I am assailed by the flying splinters of a world breaking up at the speed of procreation without end. The centre cannot hold and the outside edge is filling out like a balloon, without the assurance of infinity. More men are hungry than honest, and more eat than produce. The apocalypse cannot be long delayed.
ALBERT: You’d be better out of it. I’ll tell them why you did it, if that’s what’s worrying you.
FRASER: … So I climb up again and prepare to cast myself off, without faith in angels to catch me—or desire that they should—and lo! I look down at it all and find that the proportions have been re-established. My confidence is restored, by perspective.
ALBERT: But it’s my bridge——
FRASER: You think only of yourself—you see yourself as the centre, whereas I know that I am not placed at all——
ALBERT: There are other bridges—bigger——
FRASER (listening): What’s that?
ALBERT: San Francisco—Sydney——
FRASER: Listen.
ALBERT: Brooklyn—there’s a place for you——
FRASER: Listen!
ALBERT: —but I was here first—this is mine——
(He tails off as there is the faintest sound of 1,8oo men marching, whistling ‘Colonel Bogey’.)
FRASER: There’s an army on the march….
ALBERT: So they’re coming….
FRASER: A solid phalanx moving squarely up the road, an officer at the head….
ALBERT: Fitch.
FRASER: But they’re not soldiers.
ALBERT: He’s mad.
FRASER (appalled): They’re just—people.
ALBERT (shouts—to the people): Go away!
FRAS
ER: Coming here.
ALBERT: Halt! About turn!
FRASER: They’ve lined up hundreds and hundreds of ordinary people—the overflow—all the fit men in the prime of life—they’re always the ones on the list—preference is given to the old and the sick, the women and children—when it comes to the point, it’s the young and able-bodied who go first——
ALBERT: Can’t you see—they’re taking over!
FRASER: Ten abreast—sixty deep—and another phalanx behind—and another—successive waves——
(The whistling is getting louder.)
—so it has come to this.
ALBERT: They’re going to come up!
FRASER: It was the only direction left.
ALBERT: They’re going to wheel right——
FITCH (distant): Right—wheel!
ALBERT: Off the road and through the gate——
FITCH: Straighten up there!
ALBERT: Up to the end of the bridge, on to the tracks——
FRASER: That’s it, then—they have finally run out of space, the edges have all filled out and now there is only up.
ALBERT: Eighteen-hundred men—flung against me by a madman! Was I so important? Here they come.
(This is difficult; as the front rank reaches the bridge, the tramp-tramp of the march should start to ring hollow, progressively, as more and more leave terra firma and reach the bridge.)
(From now, approaching tears.) I could have done it, given time——
FRASER: There will be more behind them—the concrete mixers churn and churn until only a single row of corn grows between two cities, and is finally ground between their walls….
ALBERT: They didn’t give me a fair chance—I would have worked nights——
FRASER: They’ll all come following—women and children too—and those that are at the top will be pushed off like disgraced legionaires——
ALBERT: I had it under control—ahead of schedule——
FRASER: Ah well. But they should be breaking step.
(Tramp tramp).
Like soldiers do when they come to a bridge——
ALBERT: I was all right—I was doing well——
FRASER: For the very good reason—
(Tramp tramp.)
that if they don’t—
ALBERT: I was still young—fit—
FRASER: —the pressures cannot bounce—but build and have to break out—