Goodness

by Michael Redhill

  MICHAEL: Why don’t you go see her?

  MAN: I’m not invited.

  MICHAEL: And I am?

  MAN: She’ll like you.

  He holds out the paper with the address on it. Michael doesn’t take it.

  MICHAEL: Hi there! I’m Michael. Some guy in a bar thinks you’ll like me. Can I come in?

  MAN: First, what you do is you apologize for disturbing her. You say you just want five minutes of her time. And when she says she doesn’t have five minutes, you tell her a name. Mathias Todd.

  MICHAEL: And that’s you?

  MAN: No. But you see, you say that name, she gets a message, and she opens the door.

  MICHAEL: You really think I’m going to visit this woman, don’t you?

  MAN: Because you will.

  MICHAEL: Uh, no I won’t.

  MAN: Well, you think you won’t, but you will.

  MICHAEL: You know what? You’re an asshole.

  MAN: And you’d be a fool to turn down your only opportunity to have your question answered.

  MICHAEL: Oh, right. And what was my question?

  MAN: Why do good people rush to do evil? And what do they become? (Long beat.) Think what a story that will make.

  This freezes Michael.

  SONG: ‘Heyamo’ (a work song from the Black Sea area of Turkey)

  He He Heyamo

  (Heyamo – a greeting, as in ‘hello’)

  (The song goes on to say ‘Your aunt is having a work party. It’s time to start digging.’)

  MICHAEL: I didn’t get your name.

  MAN: I know.

  SONG: Yamo Hemo Heyamo

  The man stands up.

  MAN: Remember: ‘Mathias Todd.’ Tell her ‘Mathias Todd.’ She’ll make Poland look like Disneyland.

  SONG: Heyamoli Heyamo

  The man holds the address out to Michael.

  MICHAEL: His fingernails were perfect white crescent moons.

  MAN: Maybe you’ll see me again.

  The man drifts away.

  ‘Heyamo’ is sung under the following, harmonies are added.

  MICHAEL: When I stepped outside, I realized the address he’d written down was across the street. This man must have been watching this woman coming and going … (Beat.) I had seven hours to catch my plane. I could have gone to a movie and had a nice long dinner somewhere, but …

  Althea appears.

  ALTHEA: Hello?

  MICHAEL: I used the buzzcode the man had written down. There was music playing in the background.

  ALTHEA: Hello?

  MICHAEL: I didn’t know what I was doing.

  ALTHEA: Who is it!

  MICHAEL: Um, it’s uh, um, uh, my name’s Michael.

  ALTHEA: Who?

  MICHAEL: Listen, someone, a friend of yours, suggested I come and talk to you.

  ALTHEA: I don’t have any friends.

  MICHAEL: Well sure you do. Everyone has friends. (Long beat.) Hello? He asked me to give you a message. He told me to say ‘Mathias Todd.’

  ALTHEA: (Beat.) Are you a reporter?

  MICHAEL: No, no – well, uh, I am a writer, but I’m not –

  ALTHEA: How did you find me?

  MICHAEL: I … A man – in a bar … gave me your … (realizing how absurd this sounds) Ohh boy.

  ALTHEA: You’re an American.

  MICHAEL: No, Canadian. (Beat.) Sorry.

  ALTHEA: Where in Canada.

  MICHAEL: Toronto?

  ALTHEA: Just a moment. (Pause – she retreats into her apartment.)

  MICHAEL: Ma’am?

  ALTHEA: What state is Toronto in, and what is the capital of that state?

  MICHAEL: What?

  ALTHEA: Answer.

  MICHAEL: Toronto’s in Ontario, which is a province, and it’s also the capital. Of the province.

  ALTHEA: No it isn’t. I’m calling the police.

  MICHAEL: WAIT WAIT, hold on! … Are you looking at an atlas?

  ALTHEA: Yes. And Ottawa is the capital of Ontario.

  MICHAEL: No, no – Ottawa, it’s the capital of the country. Toronto’s the capital of the province. If you look, there’s probably a really big star beside Ottawa and a smaller one beside Toronto.

  ALTHEA: Oh … you’re right, I see that. Yes. Okay then.

  Beat.

  ALTHEA: Say that name again.

  Michael begins to speak.

  ALTHEA: No. Don’t.

  The door buzzes open. A song begins, and moves them towards one another.

  SONG: ‘Shto Mi E Milo’ (Macedonian)

  Shto mi e milo, milo i drago

  (How I’d love to live, have a shop)

  Vo Struga grada, mamo, duk’an da imam

  (In the village of Struga)

  Lele varaj mome, mome Kalino

  (Hurry, young Kalino)

  Vo Struga grada mamo duk’an da imam

  (In the village of Struga)

  Silence. They stand together quite awkwardly in her front room. She’s looking at him intensely. He has his notebook open in hand.

  ALTHEA: You don’t look Jewish.

  MICHAEL: Really? Okay. Well, um, people say I look Armenian sometimes.

  ALTHEA: Uh-huh.

  MICHAEL: You know, the dark hair and the blue eyes.

  ALTHEA: I don’t know any Armenians. Is that what they look like?

  MICHAEL: Some of them.

  ALTHEA: Maybe the Jewish ones.

  MICHAEL: (to us) She was in her sixties. Greying hair. Pale blue eyes, sad eyes, like a bloodhound’s, like a … the sad, sick eyes of a … (to her) That was nice music you were listening to. Where was it from?

  ALTHEA: What kind of writer?

  MICHAEL: Sorry?

  ALTHEA: You said you were a writer. What kind?

  MICHAEL: Oh, ah …well, not really a – fiction, I guess. I won’t write about you if that’s –

  ALTHEA: What do I have to do with your business in Poland?

  MICHAEL: Oh, uh, nothing. But this, this man thought it might be good for me to talk to you.

  ALTHEA: It would be good for you.

  MICHAEL: And, he seemed to think, you know, you’d enjoy talking to someone.

  ALTHEA: Enjoy?

  MICHAEL: Well, yeah. He didn’t actually use that word.

  ALTHEA: What else did he say?

  MICHAEL: Just that you’d worked together once. And that, um, your project didn’t work out or something like that.

  ALTHEA: Our project.

  MICHAEL: Yeah. So! Mathias Todd. What kind of name is that? Is it German?

  ALTHEA: Do you think it is?

  MICHAEL: Don’t you know?

  Althea is silent.

  MICHAEL: Okay.

  ALTHEA: Nobody knows me here. Not in this country. And it’s going to stay that way.

  MICHAEL: … All right.

  ALTHEA: This is all you need to know: I come from a country that used to be two.

  MICHAEL: I’m sorry – I’m not sure I – ?

  ALTHEA: Two neighbouring countries. But after World War II, the League of Nations redrew our borders, and we were annexed to our neighbours. They were on the losing side of the war and we were their punishment.

  MICHAEL: (trying to follow) So, these were reparations?

  ALTHEA: Did I say that?

  MICHAEL: No, but – okay. Which country is this?

  ALTHEA: I haven’t told you that either, have I? Think of it this way: we were a mouse that the West put into a cat’s cage. For the sake of the mouse, they said. There were a great many people murdered after that. And Mathias Todd was the cause of it. The one who made it happen. When it was all over, there was a commission struck to bring people to justice and I took a job with it as a prison guard. They chose me to watch over Todd. It was an honour. (Beat.)

  MICHAEL: A prison guard. Huh … He was a politician, this Todd?

  ALTHEA: You would probably call him an ‘intellectual.’ He was a professor at one of the main universities. He had ‘ideas.’

 
MICHAEL: Ideas.

  ALTHEA: ‘Protect our traditions. Safeguard our children’s future.’ You know, harmless ideas. (She sees he’s writing.) They killed two hundred thousand of us.

  MICHAEL: What?

  ALTHEA: Put that away.

  MICHAEL: Oh … I’m just trying to keep track –

  ALTHEA: For who? (He doesn’t answer.) You will not write about me.

  MICHAEL: No, no, of course not.

  ALTHEA: (Beat.) Can I trust you?

  Michael laughs.

  ALTHEA: What?

  MICHAEL: Nothing. I never used to get asked that question.

  ALTHEA: Why do you get asked it now.

  MICHAEL: Well, I recently had, I was put through a, a divorce, and –

  ALTHEA: Never mind.

  MICHAEL: (Beat.) I found out she was cheating on me.

  ALTHEA: (Beat.) How.

  MICHAEL: I … read her … I read her diary.

  She stares at him.

  ALTHEA: What did you say to this man, that he sent you to me?

  MICHAEL: … I’m not sure.

  ALTHEA: And where was this bar?

  MICHAEL: Um … it’s just across from you. Just down there.

  SONG: ‘Halala Kina’ (a Zimbabwean call-and-response song – sung quietly)

  Halala Kina

  (There is confusion)

  Kina kimuhelele

  (There a solution)

  She crosses to her window and looks down.

  ALTHEA: But he told you to come.

  MICHAEL: He said you have something of his.

  Mona

  (Search)

  Mona ko halleluya

  (Search above for the answer)

  ALTHEA: I see.

  Kina / Kina kimuhelele

  Mona / Mona ko halleluya

  Althea smiles at some inner thought, turns from the window back to Michael. She has made a decision to tell Michael her story.

  ALTHEA: Where was I? (She looks at Michael, who doesn’t seem to understand what she’s saying.) Where were we?

  MICHAEL: (He returns to his notebook, ready to write.) Two hundred thousand?

  ALTHEA: Mathias Todd fled the country after the killings. Went to Switzerland.

  MICHAEL: So, this is Europe then.

  ALTHEA: (She looks at him.) Put your little notebook away. (Beat.) It took us over ten years to get him back.

  Lights come up behind them on the understairs of a municipal courthouse. Michael registers the presence of this world – an unexpected transformation has occurred. There is a cell with a prisoner in it, Mathias Todd. The younger Althea is present, watching. Todd looks haggard and older than his sixty years.

  TODD: (to Michael, quietly, with clarity) Hello.

  ALTHEA: When they brought him to the courthouse, he was sick. They claimed he was sick. Alzheimer’s, his lawyers said. So he was put in the cells while they figured out what to do with him.

  A buzzer goes in the background, and Young Althea delivers a tray of food to Todd. She puts it on a ledge on the side of the cage and pushes it through. Todd looks at it, and at her.

  ALTHEA: Every day, I put food in front of him, but he wouldn’t eat.

  YOUNG ALTHEA: Starve, then.

  ALTHEA: I’d leave the food on the ledge and we would both stare at it.

  YOUNG ALTHEA: You forget how to eat?

  Silence. After a moment, she goes to unlock the cage, bringing her chair along.

  ALTHEA: But if he got sicker, if he starved, if he died, he would not stand trial, would he?

  Young Althea enters the cage. By now, both the older Althea and Michael have turned to look at the scene from the past.

  MICHAEL: So you fed him.

  ALTHEA: It was my duty.

  MICHAEL: I think that was the right thing to do.

  ALTHEA: So we’re in agreement.

  We watch the younger Althea spoon-feeding Todd. When the food enters his mouth, he eats helplessly, with profound hunger.

  TODD: Oh. Thank you, Margaret.

  YOUNG ALTHEA: I’m not Margaret.

  TODD: This is very good, Margaret.

  He holds his mouth open; she holds the spoon too far away.

  ALTHEA: (watching herself) I had to feed him with a spoon, so he couldn’t harm himself.

  The young Althea jams the spoon into Todd’s mouth, gagging him, but he does not register this as aggression, just copes with the discomfort.

  YOUNG ALTHEA: What’s wrong?

  TODD: My mouth hurts.

  YOUNG ALTHEA: You feel pain?

  TODD: A little. What happened?

  YOUNG ALTHEA: Your people shot my nephew in the mouth.

  TODD: Afterwards, we should take a turn around the lake. I will catch you a frog!

  Young Althea drops the tray at his feet with a clatter, stands and leaves the cell.

  TODD: Where’s my supper, Margaret?

  YOUNG ALTHEA: That’ll keep you alive until morning.

  ALTHEA: His lawyers said, even if he was guilty, how could he stand trial if he was that sick?

  MICHAEL: Erich Honecker had liver cancer.

  ALTHEA: I beg your pardon?

  MICHAEL: When they came to put Erich Honecker on trial, he was already dying. They had a hard time deciding if they had the moral right to try him.

  ALTHEA: This has nothing to do with that.

  MICHAEL: But you had a moral dilemma, too.

  ALTHEA: No. We didn’t.

  MICHAEL: You say Mathias Todd was sick.

  ALTHEA: I said they claimed he was sick.

  MICHAEL: So he wasn’t.

  ALTHEA: Would you like me to write this all down on the back of an envelope and then you can call me later if you have any questions?

  MICHAEL: I’d just like to be completely clear about what it is you’re telling me.

  ALTHEA: Let’s just say the situation was ambiguous. You do know what ‘ambiguous’ means?

  MICHAEL: Fine. Go on, then. You had your war criminal.

  ALTHEA: Right. Although a charge of war crimes was too great a risk.

  MICHAEL: You didn’t have enough proof?

  ALTHEA: We had proof. But we didn’t want to lose him to a bunch of bureaucrats in the Hague. So he was charged with a single murder – not war crimes. We wanted this trial at home.

  MICHAEL: He committed a murder that wasn’t a war crime? He was busy.

  ALTHEA: He killed a woman. Someone from my background.

  MICHAEL: How was it not a war crime then? I thought he ‘murdered’ two hundred thousand of you.

  ALTHEA: It was someone he had an affair with. This was before the purges.

  MICHAEL: An affair? So he hated your – kind – but he fell in love with one?

  ALTHEA: My kind?

  MICHAEL: I mean –

  ALTHEA: Stop. It’s sweet that you think it was love. Who knows – maybe you’re right. (A quiet drone is added.) But if it was, he corrected that flaw in himself.

  SONG: ‘A Salaam’ (from the Taaisha, a nomadic Islamic people from Central West Africa)

  LOW VOICES (MALE): Yu Ma Hoy

  MIDDLE VOICES (FEMALE): Bint al Haj / Shuffil Kho / Darinzan

  HIGH VOICE (FEMALE): A Salaam

  (This song, sung under the following, calls to the Mother – Ma – meaning all that comforts and provides. It then asks the daughter of the Haj to look for those in need, and to help them. ‘Salaam’ means ‘Peace.’)

  TODD: (to Michael ) What is this place we live in now? Is it ‘ours’ – is it ‘theirs’? Once we had neighbours, and how nice it was! But when they suddenly found themselves annexed to this country, they must have thought, Where is our home? (The women’s voices join in.) And we thought: why should they have been forced to live our way of life? Why should we live theirs? Ah, but when the Leaders of the Free World speak, we must listen! They have come to FIX us. They disturb the peace, (One of the women’s voices jumps up an octave.) they broker a new peace, they send in their peacekeepers to keep the peace. And now
that they have been and gone: chaos. That is their legacy. But where do those who nourish this chaos think it will lead us? (The music finishes.)

  MICHAEL: (to us) It was a tape of a speech, with music in the background. It sounded familiar, but my memory for music – you can ask my … ex. I think the only song I could ever remember the name of was ‘Rundown Sally’ –

  JULIA: ‘Runaround Sue.’

  MICHAEL: Yeah, whatever. But the music sounded Arabic.

  JULIA: Or maybe Hebrew?

  MICHAEL: Uh – no. They were singing ‘salaam,’ not ‘shalom.’

  TODD: You sure it wasn’t German? (a laugh) Maybe Armenian?

  STEPHEN: Or Polish?

  ALTHEA: It’s not about music. It was a speech. A code. He gave them a message. And they understood.

  MICHAEL: What? Who did?

  ALTHEA: They did.

  TODD: Kill the others.

  ALTHEA: He was their leader.

  TODD: (to Michael) I’m sick.

  Michael gets up and walks into the past to get closer to the story.

  MICHAEL: Are you? (to Althea) Was he?

  ALTHEA: He could remember things that had happened a long time ago. And a few moments ago. But nothing in between. Nothing that we wanted.

  TODD: (to Michael) Look at my wedding ring.

  He holds his ringless hand up to Michael.

  ALTHEA: He had one story that drove me crazy.

  TODD: Bedouin market. Twenty-four karat gold. Real rubies. Do you know where I bought this ring?

  YOUNG ALTHEA: Be quiet!

  TODD: I bought it in a Bedouin market, one for Margaret, one for me –

  Young Althea comes and rips Todd’s hand away from his face.

  YOUNG ALTHEA: You’re not wearing a ring!

  TODD: Margaret? What’s wrong?

  YOUNG ALTHEA: (pulling his hand up to show him) Look.

  TODD: Ahh. (studying his hand) Do you remember where I bought this ring?

  YOUNG ALTHEA: Christ!

  ALTHEA: When the disease progresses, it is as if a sheet of paper with your life written on it has begun burning right in the middle. You are a baby at the top of the page and it is today at the bottom, and the flame is slowly eating everything in between –

  TODD: Real rubies.

  Stephen, the state prosecutor, a man in his late thirties, comes in, applauding.