by David Hare
There is a silence, and an admission in the silence.
Paul ‘Yes.
Elsa ‘And?
Paul looks tempted for a moment.
So?
Paul ‘You’re married, Elsa. You’ll never leave him.
Elsa ‘What makes you so stubborn? What makes you so sure?
Paul ‘I am sure.
Elsa ‘Oh it’s easy to be you. It’s so easy.
Paul ‘Is it?
Elsa ‘Oh yes. The heartbreaker. When anyone needs you, you run. When anyone loves you, you go.
Paul ‘I love you. It’s true. Explain. How does it help if I stay?
They stand, looking at each other. Victor comes in, whisky bottle in hand. His mood has darkened.
Victor ‘Not even dusk and there’s no one to be seen. My modernist corridors deserted. Glass reflecting only glass. It’s a business for obsessives they say. But where are they? On their August beaches, or in their back gardens. Fled. All fled.
Victor turns with a note of drama.
And not a soul remains. Whisky?
Elsa ‘No thank you.
Paul shifts, uncomfortable.
Paul has something to tell you.
Victor ‘Tell me?
Paul ‘It isn’t good news. I admit I’m feeling an idiot.
Elsa ‘He wants to leave.
Victor ‘I see.
Elsa ‘Paul’s insisting he leaves.
Paul ‘Victor, can we be honest? The fact is, I’m actually hopeless at the job.
Victor ‘Really?
Paul ‘‘The unsinkable Flotilla.’
Victor ‘Huh.
Paul ‘‘Float into the future with Flotilla.’ ‘Hey there, killer, try Flotilla.’ I can’t do it. I can’t write to order.
Victor ‘Too much the poet? Too much your own man?
There is a silence. Then Victor smiles, accepting.
It’s not easy, is it? It’s never easy, is it, when you try to help?
Elsa shifts, knowing where he’s heading.
Victor ‘I tell you, I was sleeping last night in Regents Park …
Paul ‘I’m sorry?
Victor ‘Didn’t I say? I slept the night in Regents Park.
Paul ‘You didn’t say, no.
Victor ‘Beneath the stars.
Paul ‘Is that legal?
Victor ‘It’s not illegal.
Elsa ‘I didn’t know.
Elsa is standing some way away, shocked.
I didn’t know where you were.
Victor ‘After all, I had to sleep somewhere. Isn’t that what men do? When they quarrel with their wives?
Elsa ‘I had no idea.
Victor ‘Didn’t you?
Paul ‘What about? What was the subject of the quarrel?
There is a brief silence. Victor looks across to Elsa.
Victor ‘I lay last night beneath the stars, the stars bright above me, felt the earth moving below me, the planet hurtling through space. I lay in the night, listening to the random noises of the night, thinking of Elsa in her bed two hundred yards away. I thought of the many nights we had passed, she shaking from the agony of addiction, the passage from high to low, from frenzy and finally to calm …
Victor thinks a moment.
What was the subject of the quarrel? We quarrelled about love. I’d had an idea. For years I’d had an idea. An idea of what love might accomplish. Foolish. No good.
Victor turns a moment and looks at Elsa.
Victor ‘Don’t we most of all resent the person who helps?
Elsa ‘That’s not what I said. That’s not what I was saying.
Paul looks between them, unable to fathom the depth of their feeling.
Victor ‘Yes, last night we quarrelled.
Elsa ‘Yes.
Victor ‘Yes, we quarrelled as we have never done in our lives.
Elsa ‘It’s true.
Victor ‘As if a whole life’s anger rose up and seized us by the throat.
Elsa ‘He told me I was weak.
Victor ‘That’s it.
Elsa ‘He accused me of being weak. I defended myself.
Victor ‘She did. She defended herself well.
Elsa ‘That’s why we fought. That was the beginning of the fight.
Victor ‘Absolutely. The fight spread, as it were, from there.
Paul ‘Fight?
Victor ‘Argument, Paul. Dispute.
Paul ‘And was it resolved?
There is a silence. The stage is darkening. Victor turns to look out onto the weather. Then Elsa speaks, clear, compassionate.
Elsa ‘Are we ever cured?
Victor ‘That’s the question.
Elsa ‘How do we know? Yes, I can sometimes go without drinking. Months go by. And, yes, at another time, I taste just one drink. ‘Just the one,’ I say. Paul is right. It’s for life.
Victor is sitting quite still, listening.
I asked Victor to accept that. I want him to accept that.
It is almost dark now, the dark before rain. The three of them are still.
I was lucky to meet a man. I met a good man. But I met him nonetheless, loved him nonetheless, or rather, have tried to love him. I still do. I still will.
Elsa stands behind him, and now leans down to kiss him. Victor is moved. It comes on to rain outside the windows.
Victor ‘My love.
Victor moves and takes her in his arms. The two of them are reconciled. Paul stands at the side, useless, irrelevant. Then Victor unfurls himself and turns to Paul.
I’m sorry. I apologise. Private. Private stuff.
Paul ‘Of course.
Victor ‘Forgive us.
Victor looks him straight in the eye. Then he reaches out and touches Paul’s arm. Then he recovers and cheers up.
So. You’re determined to go?
Paul ‘I am.
Victor ‘You submit your resignation?
Paul ‘I do.
Victor ‘It’s done. It’s accepted. Why not? Collect your cards. Elsa, I think we’re moving on.
Elsa has been wiping her eyes behind them.
Fair enough. After all, it’s a freelance culture, that’s what they tell me.
Paul ‘That’s what I’ve heard.
Victor ‘The idea of long-term employment is a thing of the past. A job is no longer for life.
Paul ‘Well, I’ve only been here three months.
Victor ‘Excellent. You’ve grasped the principle exactly.
Paul ‘Thank you.
Victor ‘Paul, you are the modern man. Experience becomes a ceaseless search for experience. Slap! It goes on your CV. ‘I worked for Victor Quinn.’
Victor turns.
It’s been a summer, eh? What a summer.
Paul ‘Yes.
Victor ‘It’s what a summer should be.
Paul ‘You think?
Victor ‘In the cold months we have to work, we have to live, we have to get on with living. So let us use the warm months for stopping to think. What do you say, Paul?
Paul ‘I agree.
It has stopped raining. The evening is lightening outside. Victor is standing opposite Paul. He reaches out and embraces him.
Victor ‘Is perfect friendship always brief?
Victor releases Paul and now steps back.
Hmm. ‘Moderation in all things,’ said my mum. And died at the age of forty. I miss her. I still miss her. Don’t fear for me.
Paul ‘I shan’t.
Victor ‘History threw me up. It may now cast me down.
Paul ‘I hope not.
Victor ‘It worries me not at all. I have written my epitaph. ‘He may have buckled but he did not break.’
The two men smile, uncertain how to part.
And it’s time to say goodbye. Not the last time we shall see you, I hope.
Paul ‘No.
Victor ‘And you must say goodbye to Elsa as well. I insist. I insist.
He turns to Elsa.
Elsa. If we hurry … At least the seco
nd half of the concert.
Victor walks quickly away. He becomes a small figure as his back disappears down the long corridor. Elsa has got up.
Elsa ‘You won’t forget me?
Paul ‘No.
Elsa ‘Promise you won’t forget me.
Elsa moves towards him and kisses him on the cheek.
It’s rare, isn’t it? It’s rare to find love.
Paul looks at her a moment. Elsa turns and goes quickly out. Paul puts his things down, and stands. Then Paul turns also.
TEN
The stage clears, and becomes a void again. Paul moves forward and begins to speak directly to us.
Paul ‘Joseph Conrad says that inside every heart there burns a desire to set down once and for all a true record of what happened.
As everyone knows, Victor Quinn died soon after in a car crash, driving himself not on the M4, but in Leytonstone, an East London suburb. His blood was three times over the permitted alcohol level. Elsa went to identify the body. At last, she said, Victor lay on his zinc bed.
The Flotilla software was bought out by Microsoft. After a while Microsoft said the software was unreliable and replaced it with products of their own. One day – like the Roman Empire – Microsoft will itself be replaced. This too shall pass.
ELEVEN
Now from the distance, Victor approaches, in characteristic good spirits, full of life, talking as he comes.
Victor ‘‘Many are the stories with interesting beginnings, but harder to find are the stories which end well.’
Paul is waiting as if they were meeting for the very first time. Victor smiles and shakes hands with Paul, as he once did, introducing himself.
Victor ‘Quinn.
Paul ‘Paul Peplow.
Victor ‘Of course.
Victor stands, impressed at meeting Paul.
That’s why personally I prefer to read thrillers. For years I read only thrillers. In a thriller the writer is obligated at least to make an effort at an ending.
Paul ‘That’s right.
Victor ‘The novel, to the contrary, remains unresolved.
Seemingly in response to his words, a City church bell at once tolls, deep. The stage changes shape to find Elsa sitting, as she once sat, on Paul’s desk.
Paul ‘Elsa crossed and uncrossed her legs, and the bell of a City church rang as she looked at me, not speaking. Just looked at me, looked deep into me.
Elsa looks tenderly at Paul.
Elsa ‘Paul, you are not addicted to alcohol. You are addicted to blame.
There is a silence. Then the lighting changes once more.
Victor ‘When the party is over, I pride myself I will know when to leave. Why hang on? I don’t want the host yawning all over and longing to go to bed. I read the other day: most people die in the small hours, when their resistance is lowest.
There is a silence. Then Paul speaks directly to us.
Paul ‘When I think of Victor now it is as a helpless giant, lolling, struggling, tied down with little strings, flailing, now he is dead, in something like innocence …
Paul stays facing us at the front of the stage while Victor speaks behind him with his usual crispness.
Victor ‘I prefer jazz to the classics and always will. What about you?
Paul ‘Oh …
Victor ‘A jazz musician is someone who never plays the same thing twice. The classics mystify me. Why listen again when they’re always the same?
Elsa appears at the back of the stage, miles, miles away from us in a little pool of light.
Elsa ‘They deepen.
Victor ‘Do they?
Victor turns and begins to walk away from us towards her.
Elsa ‘They deepen each time.
Victor reaches Elsa and in a gesture of instinctive love she reaches out and takes him in her arms, embracing him. They are tiny figures in the distance.
Paul ‘For myself, well, it’s embarrassing to admit, but I drank again for a while. The result was a book of poetry which to my amazement did even better than the first. For a brief while, I became somewhat well known.
I did see Elsa. Of course I did. I saw her a number of times. But there comes a moment – doesn’t there? You tell me, doesn’t there come a moment? – when you have to decide between what you can handle and what you can’t.
Let’s say, another way of putting it: I’m sorry. I have to go to a meeting.
About the Author
David Hare was born in Sussex in 1947. He is the author of twenty-eight plays for the stage, sixteen of which have been seen at the National Theatre. These plays include Plenty, The Secret Rapture, Skylight, Amy’s View, Via Dolorosa, Stuff Happens, Gethsemane and The Power of Yes. In 1993 three plays about the Church, the Law and the Labour Party – Racing Demon, Murmuring Judges and The Absence of War – were presented in repertory in the Olivier Theatre. His many screenplays for cinema and television include Licking Hitler, Damage, The Hours and The Reader.
By the Same Author
PLAYS ONE
(Slag, Teeth ’n’ Smiles, Knuckle, Licking Hitler, Plenty)
PLAYS TWO
(Fanshen, A Map of the World, Saigon, The Bay at Nice, The Secret Rapture)
PLAYS THREE
(Skylight, Amy’s View, The Judas Kiss, My Zinc Bed)
THE GREAT EXHIBITION
RACING DEMON
MURMURING JUDGES
THE ABSENCE OF WAR
VIA DOLOROSA
THE BREATH OF LIFE
THE PERMANENT WAY
STUFF HAPPENS
THE VERTICAL HOUR
GETHSEMANE
BERLIN/WALL
THE POWER OF YES
SOUTH DOWNS
adaptations
THE RULES OF THE GAME by Pirandello
THE LIFE OF GALILEO by Brecht
MOTHER COURAGE AND HER CHILDREN by Brecht
IVANOV by Chekhov
THE BLUE ROOM from Reigen by Schnitzler
PLATONOV by Chekhov
THE HOUSE OF BERNARDA ALBA by Lorca
ENEMIES by Gorky
screenplays for television
LICKING HITLER
DREAMS OF LEAVING
SAIGON: YEAR OF THE CAT
HEADING HOME
screenplays
DAVID HARE COLLECTED SCREENPLAYS
(Wetherby, Paris by Night, Strapless, Heading Home, Dreams of Leaving)
PLENTY, THE SECRET RAPTURE, THE HOURS,
THE READER, PAGE EIGHT
opera libretto
THE KNIFE
prose
ACTING UP
ASKING AROUND: BACKGROUND TO THE DAVID HARE TRILOGY
WRITING LEFT-HANDED
OBEDIENCE, STRUGGLE AND REVOLT
Copyright
This collection first published in 2008
by Faber and Faber Ltd
Bloomsbury House
74–77 Great Russell Street
London WC1B 3DA
This ebook edition first published in 2013
All rights reserved
Skylight first published in 1995
© David Hare, 1995, 1997
Amy’s View first published in 1997
© David Hare, 1997, 2008
The Judas Kiss first published in 1998
© David Hare, 1998, 2008
My Zinc Bed first published in 2000
© David Hare, 2000, 2008
The right of David Hare to be identified as author of this work has been asserted in accordance with Section 77 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988
All rights whatsoever in this work are strictly reserved. Applications for permission for any use whatsoever including performance rights must be made in advance, prior to any such proposed use, to Casarotto Ramsay and Associates Ltd, 4th Floor, Waverley House, 7–12 Noel Street, London W1F 8GQ. No performance may be given unless a licence has first been obtained.
This ebook is copyright material and must not be copied, reproduced, transferred, distribut
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ISBN 978–0–571–30134–8