This translation of Kathie and the Hippopotamus was first performed as a rehearsed reading on 15 April 1989 at the Gate Theatre, Notting Hill. The cast was as follows:
KATHIE KENNETY Marian Diamond
SANTIAGO ZAVALA Thomas Wheatley
ANA DE ZAVALA Geraldine Fitzgerald
JUAN Alan Barker
Director David Graham-Young
Life, such as it has been made for men, can only be born with lies.
Simone Weil, ‘Miscellaneous Thoughts about Loving God’
Go, go, go, said the bird: human kind
Cannot bear very much reality.
T. S. Eliot, Four Quartets
ACT ONE
When the curtain goes up, Parisian music from the 1940s or 1950s can be heard in the background. SANTIAGO is dictating into a tape-recorder. KATHIE walks round him, going through some notes, recalling her experiences. When their voices become audible, the background music fades into an Arab melody with flutes, hornpipes and drums.
KATHIE: I stood beside the Sphinx until it got dark – then suddenly the lights came on.
SANTIAGO: Oblivious of the advancing night I stand transfixed, gazing up at the Sphinx. All at once, an unearthly glow illuminates her face, and she smiles serenely down at me. There we confront each other – I, the woman of flesh and blood; she with her heart of stone, head aloft, and lion’s claws.
KATHIE: There were masses of stars. It was late and I felt – I don’t know – sort of alone out there amongst all those Egyptian tombs.
SANTIAGO: I meander midst vast pyramidical sepulchres and megalithic colossi of the ancient pharaohs: beneath the canopy of night, an infinity of stars, which floats over Cairo in an indigo sea of opalescent hues.
KATHIE: It was rash of me to have stayed behind. Who would there be to defend me in case of danger? But then I remembered my revolver and didn’t feel afraid any more.
SANTIAGO: Not a living soul in sight – neither man, nor beast, nor plant: hardly aware of my isolation, I muse on that far-off civilization that raised such memorials, a race so perfectly attuned to the supernatural, as fish are to the ocean. I hold silent communion with the Sphinx. Suddenly my illusion is shattered and harsh reality reasserts itself: what am I doing there, alone, exposing myself to a thousand perils – does a hunger-crazed jackal or some ruthless desperado lie in wait? But I am reassured as I remember my small revolver with its mother-of-pearl handle which accompanies me round the world like a faithful dog.
KATHIE: At that point, the man appeared in front of me. Heaven knows how he’d got there. I couldn’t even shout, I was so frightened. What was he going to do to me?
(Enter JUAN.)
SANTIAGO: The figure of a man, in a red cape and white turban, suddenly emerges in front of me, as if conjured from the hot desert air or out of the past. He is tall, slim, with pitch-black eyes and gleaming white teeth. Is he going to attack me? Is he going to violate me? Should I run for help, burst into tears?
KATHIE: (Addressing herself for the first time to SANTIAGO) I don’t like that last bit.
SANTIAGO: We’ll rub it out then. Where shall we go back to?
KATHIE: To where the man appears in front of me.
(SANTIAGO leans over his tape-recorder to rub out the last part of his dictation. JUAN moves closer to KATHIE. They both undergo a transformation: they are now like two youngsters chatting on the corner of the street.)
JUAN: ‘Man’? You mean, of course, ‘boyfriend’.
KATHIE: You, my boyfriend? Ha ha, excuse me while I laugh.
JUAN: I’ll excuse you anything you like, Kathie. Except one thing – don’t try and pretend you’re not in love with me.
KATHIE: But I’m not.
JUAN: You will be though.
KATHIE: Don’t you ever get tired of me saying no to you, Johnny?
JUAN: Once I get an idea into my head, there’s no stopping me, Pussikins. I’ll keep on proposing to you till you say yes to me. You’ll be my girlfriend, my fiancée, and we’ll end up getting married, want to bet?
KATHIE: (dying of laughter) So I’m going to get married to you now, am I?
JUAN: And who else are you going to marry, if you don’t marry me?
KATHIE: I’ve plenty of admirers, Johnny.
JUAN: You’ll pick the best though.
KATHIE: How conceited you are.
JUAN: I know very well who’s been proposing to you. And why, may I ask, did you send them all packing? Because you’re really nuts about me.
KATHIE: You’re so conceited, Johnny.
JUAN: I’ve every reason to be conceited. Do you want me to tell you why?
KATHIE: Yes, go on, tell me why.
JUAN: Am I or am I not better than Bepo Torres?
KATHIE: How are you better than Bepo Torres?
JUAN: I surf better than him for a start. He can’t even stand on the board. Besides, I’m better looking than he is.
KATHIE: You think you’re the best-looking man around, don’t you?
JUAN: Well, I’m better-looking than Bepo Torres anyway. And Kike Ricketts. Do you really think Kike’s a match for me? Does he surf better than me? Is he better-looking than me?
KATHIE: He’s a better dancer than you.
JUAN: Kike? Ha ha, excuse me while I laugh. Can he do the mambo better than me? (Does a few steps.) The cha-cha-cha? (Another few steps.) The huaracha? (Another few steps.) When I dance at parties, everyone gathers round, as you very well know. Who showed poor old Kike how to dance in the first place? I even showed him how to smooch.
KATHIE: He’s better at the marinera and the creole waltz than you are.
JUAN: The marinera! The creole waltz! I say, how frightfully refined. No one does those fuddy-duddy dances these days, Pussikins.
KATHIE: You’re just dying of jealousy, aren’t you? You’re jealous of Bepo, of Kike, of Gordo …
JUAN: Gordo? Me, jealous of Gordo Rivarola? What’s Gordo got that I haven’t? A chevrolet convertible nineteen fifty. Well, I’ve got a Studebaker convertible nineteen fifty-one. Do me a favour, Pussikins, please. Why should I be jealous of Bepo, or Kike, or Gordo, or Sapo Saldívar, or Harry Santana, or Abel, my brother, or any of the rest of them who have proposed to you for that matter? They aren’t even in the same league as me, any of them, and you know it …
KATHIE: (Reflectively – forgetting about JUAN, and emerging for a moment from her fantasy world) Kike, Bepo, Harry, Gordo Rivarola … It seems ages ago now …
JUAN: (Who hasn’t been listening to her) And then there’s another reason, of course. Shall I be quite frank with you? Shall I?
KATHIE: (Returning to her fantasy world) Yes, Johnny. Be quite frank with me.
JUAN: I’ve got money, Pussikins.
KATHIE: Do you really think that matters to me? My daddy’s got more money than your daddy, silly.
JUAN: Exactly, Pussikins. With me you can be sure it’s you I want – if I marry you it’ll be for no other reason but yourself. You can’t be so sure about that with the others, can you? I heard my old man saying to yours only yesterday: ‘Be careful of those young men who gad about with your daughter. They’re out to land the best deal of their lives.’
KATHIE: (Confused) Don’t be so vulgar, Johnny.
JUAN: (Confused also) I’m not being vulgar. Marrying for money’s not being vulgar. OK, if I was, I apologize. You see, you’ve gone all quiet. It’s true what I’m telling you, ask your old man. You couldn’t deny it. You see, I’m already starting to convince you. Next time I propose to you, I don’t think you’ll send me packing quite so quickly, eh, Pussikins …
(As his voice fades, KATHIE distances herself from him, physically and mentally. JUAN remains on stage. He is like a little boy; he saunters about, whistling, looking idly around with his hands in his pockets. SANTIAGO has finished erasing the last part of the dictation on the tape-recorder.)
SANTIAGO: Ready, it’s all rubbed out. Shall we carry on from your visit to the Sphinx or shall we go on to another ch
apter, señora?
KATHIE: Why don’t you call me Kathie? ‘Senora’ makes me feel so old.
SANTIAGO: Can I ask you a question? Where did ‘Kathie Kennety’ come from?
KATHIE: Don’t you like the name?
SANTIAGO: It’s pretty. But how did it originate? Why did you choose it?
KATHIE: If I used my real name, no one would take my book seriously. Peruvian names don’t somehow seem right for authors. ‘Kathie Kennety’, on the other hand, has a certain exotic, musical, cosmopolitan ring to it. (Looks at him reflectively.) Santiago Zavala doesn’t sound too good either, not for an artist. Why don’t you change it? Yes, yes, let me rechristen you. Let’s see now … I know. Mark. Mark Griffin. May I call you that? We’ll only use it here, in this little attic. You don’t mind?
SANTIAGO: No, señora, I don’t mind.
KATHIE: Do you really find me so old, you can’t call me Kathie?
SANTIAGO: Of course not. But I’ve got to get used to the idea. I’m working for you, remember. I think of you as my boss.
KATHIE: Why not think of me as a colleague? Come on, we mustn’t waste our two hours. Let’s start another chapter. (Looking at her notes) The Visit to the Cairo Museum. The Fabulous Treasures of Tutankhamun.
(Enter ANA. Arab music. She shrinks shyly into a corner, and starts to cry. JUAN pesters her by grimacing and making obscene gestures.)
SANTIAGO: I devote the following morning to the enamel helmets, the necklaces of turquoise and lapis lazuli, the coral brooches, and the golden statuettes of King Tutankhamun.
KATHIE: Hidden among masks and hundreds of other beautiful objects, there was a poor helpless blonde girl weeping like a statue of Mary Magdalene.
SANTIAGO: All at once, ‘midst the splendour of crystal urns, palanquins, sedan chairs, sumptuously adorned sarcophagi and shimmering caskets, I spy a ravishing young beauty with honeyed complexion and exquisite features, sobbing uncontrollably … What can have happened to her?
KATHIE: She was a German tourist. The stupid girl had gone out alone to sight-see in the streets of Cairo in a miniskirt. She’d caused such a commotion that she’d had to go inside the museum to escape the rabble.
SANTIAGO: Fleeing from the licentious looks, the importunate hands, the lascivious gestures, the illicit thoughts, and the extravagant displays of appreciation which her long pale legs provoked in the streets of Cairo, she had come to seek asylum amongst the wonders of Ancient Egypt. She reminded me of the girl Victor Hugo once described as obscene, because she was so innocent. Taking pity on her, I offered her my help.
ANA: (Sarcastically) It’s you who should be pitied … Mark Griffin.
SANTIAGO: (Without looking at her) Go to hell.
(KATHIE carries on dictating without seeing ANA.)
ANA: I went some time ago, Mark Griffin. You sent me there, with a millstone round my neck. Have you forgotten already? Cast your mind back, Mark Griffin, try and remember.
(As SANTIAGO and ANA talk, KATHIE carries on revising her notes and dictating as if SANTIAGO were still at his desk by the tape-recorder.)
SANTIAGO: (Getting to his feet) I can’t go on living in this house a moment longer. As far as I’m concerned, marriage is a totally meaningless institution. It’s how you feel about other people that’s important. I don’t love you any more. I can’t carry on living with a woman I don’t love, my principles won’t allow it. I suppose you’re going to cry, make a scene, threaten me with suicide, do what most middle-class women do when their husbands leave them. Behave like a sensible, grown-up woman with a mind of her own, for a change.
ANA: All right. I won’t make a scene. I won’t force you to stay. But what should I tell the children?
SANTIAGO: So it’s blackmail, is it? You’re going to accuse me of abandoning the children, is that it? Do you want me to lose my respect for you into the bargain? Stop acting like a woman who’s seen too many soap operas on television. Just because a marriage breaks up it doesn’t mean it’s the end of the world for the children.
ANA: Oh, I dare say they’ll survive. I’m asking you what I should tell them, how I explain to them that their father is not going to live with them any more. I’m not arguing with you or blackmailing you. I’m asking your advice. They’re very young. They’ll be very upset. Just tell me what to say to them so they won’t be so hurt.
SANTIAGO: Tell them the truth. Or do you think it’s preferable to lie to them – to indulge that hypocritical middle-class habit just to spare their feelings a little longer?
ANA: So I tell them the truth, do I? I tell them their father has run off because he’s fallen in love with one of his pupils?
SANTIAGO: Exactly. It could’ve happened to you. It may even happen to them, later. And if they’re at all in touch with their emotions, and don’t grow up into repressed middle-class women, they’ll follow my example – like mature rational beings.
(He returns to his desk and sits, ready to carry on with the recording.)
ANA: Do you really think you’re mature and rational, Mark Griffin? Now that you’re writing that travel book about the journeys of Mrs Kathie Kennety through the Far East and Black Africa – the book she supplies the ideas for while paying you to put them into words – can you honestly keep criticizing middle-class women with a clear conscience, Mark Griffin?
(She leaves him and moves towards JUAN. A few bars of Arab music are heard.)
KATHIE: Then I went to the old part of Cairo, and saw a little church where the Virgin Mary had taken refuge with the infant Jesus during the flight into Egypt. It was very beautiful.
SANTIAGO: To my joy and delight, history and religion intermingle in that kaleidoscopic maze of eternal alleyways which constitutes the old quarter of Cairo. And this secluded chapel mellowed by time, which looms before me so gracefully and discreetly through clouds of dust – what could it be? Is it the sanctuary where Mary and the baby Jesus sheltered on their flight into Egypt?
KATHIE: And then I visited another little church, Jewish, I think, where Abraham was once supposed to have been.
SANTIAGO: (Dictating) Why do the walls of this timeless synagogue exude that other-worldliness which thrills me to the marrow? Because upon its stones the feet of the Patriarch Abraham once left their sacred imprint.
KATHIE: And finally I stopped at a shop which sold perfume.
SANTIAGO: And as in Egypt the material and the spiritual worlds are inseparable, I find myself almost immediately out in the dazzling morning sunlight on the threshhold of a perfumery.
KATHIE: It was late afternoon actually.
SANTIAGO: (Correcting) I find myself almost immediately in the crimson evening twilight on the threshhold of a perfumery.
KATHIE: There were some tourists there too. The perfume-seller explained in his disreputable English that the shop was very old, and he gave us some samples to try. He would keep on staring at me and in the end I became quite nervous.
SANTIAGO: The perfume-seller is tall and slim, with jet-black eyes and gleaming teeth. His gaze never leaves me, as he explains in French, the language of seduction, that the perfumery is as ancient as the earliest Egyptian mosques and that its craftsmen manufacture essences, the secret of which has been handed down from father to son throughout the centuries. He makes us sample exotic elixirs whose fragrance lasts for years on the skin. And as he talks, those lewd, hungry, lascivious eyes of his remain steadily fixed upon me.
(As he has been talking, SANTIAGO has got up and has now taken on the guise of a passionate young man. He is very close to KATHIE.)
KATHIE: Victor! What are you doing here? What do you want?
SANTIAGO: To run away with you, to elope with you. Yes, Pussikins. It’s all arranged. I’ve got hold of a van, I’ve persuaded that little priest in Chincheros, and they’ve lent me a house in the country.
KATHIE: Are you serious, Victor?
SANTIAGO: Don’t you think it’s a romantic idea? Wouldn’t it be romantic to run away and get married in secret to the ma
n you love despite your parents’ wishes? Wouldn’t it be romantic to ditch that imbecile they’re always trying to foist on you? Aren’t you always telling me what a romantic girl you are?
KATHIE: You’ve got it all wrong. My parents have nothing to do with my decision to marry Johnny. They’re not forcing me to marry him, nobody is. I’m marrying him because I want to. Because … I love him.
SANTIAGO: That’s not true. You’re marrying Johnny because your family have been ramming him down your throat for the last I don’t know how long so you’ll forget about me. You’re not in love with that moron, don’t try and pretend you are.
KATHIE: You mustn’t say things like that about Johnny. He’s my fiancé and he’s going to be my husband.
SANTIAGO: (Trying to kiss her) But you’re in love with me, Pussikins. Haven’t you told me so countless times? Do you want me to remind you about all those things you used to say to me in your letters? You’re making a big mistake, my love. Marry Johnny and you’ll regret it for the rest of your life.
KATHIE: I’ll never regret it, I’m going to be very happy with Johnny. So stop following me around, stop ringing me up, and leave me alone. Just accept the fact once and for all: I’m going to marry Johnny.
SANTIAGO: I’ll never accept it. I won’t give up till the very last moment: not till you’re walking down the aisle together.
KATHIE: Then you’re going to be wasting your time miserably.
SANTIAGO: (Returning to his place of work and his tape-recorder, becoming himself again) It’s just that if I ever manage to convince myself there’s no more hope, that there’s no …
KATHIE: (To an invisible Victor) What will you do? Will you kill me? Will you kill Johnny?
SANTIAGO: You know it doesn’t sound very Egyptian, señora. Instead of Johnny, you need an Arab name. What about Ahmed? Or Gamul? Don’t you like Gamul, the prurient perfume-seller, or Ahmed, the amorous parfumier.
KATHIE: Oh, Johnny’s got nothing to do with my book. My mind was wandering. I was thinking of when I was young.
SANTIAGO: Stay young please, señora.
Three Plays: The Young Lady from Tacna, Kathie and the Hippopotamus, La Chunga Page 9