by Tom Stoppard
It is mid-morning. The room is empty. The doorbell rings. Hapgood comes flying out from the other door. We haven’t seen her like this. She is as different from her other self as the flat is different from her office: the office being rather cleaner, tidier, and better organized. Hapgood opens the front door, and it’s Ridley. Ridley has been shopping: glossy Bond Street carrier bags. He stares at her.
RIDLEY Mrs Newton?
HAPGOOD (Casually) Oh, shit.
RIDLEY I’m Ernest.
HAPGOOD Well, you’re not what I want, so keep your clothes on. Stupid bugger! Not you, darling, come in anyway. (She is already heading for the telephone.)
What did they do? Pick you from the catalogue? I’ll try and sort it out—charge them for half a day if it looks like their fault—it won’t be the first time—(Now into the phone) It’s Celia, I want Fred.
Would you mind not wandering around.
Her last remark needs explaining. Ridley has dropped his parcels and is now, frankly, casing the joint. He is not taking a lot of notice of her. He moves around coolly as if he owns the place, and in due course he leaves the room, disappearing through the ‘kitchen door’.
(Into phone) Hello, darling, you’re losing your grip—I said a Roman soldier, not an Italian waiter, and also he looks queer to me … Don’t tell me what I mean, you’re gay, he’s queer, he’s got a queer look about him, he won’t sell bamboo shoots to a fucking panda, never mind boxer shorts … Well, I’ll look at his body and let you know—Fred?—Have you gone?—No, the phone clicked—
She looks around and finds that the room is empty.
Hey—? What’s his name? (She calls out) Victor!
Ridley wanders back into the room.
RIDLEY (Casual) Hang up.
HAPGOOD What do you think you’re doing? (Into phone) Is he a regular? Well, I don’t fancy him—
That’s as far as the phone call gets because Ridley, still maintaining a sort of thoughtful cruise, disconnects the call.
Now listen—
He looks at her. She goes from fear to relief.
You’re Betty’s friend. God, I am sorry, darling, I’m Celia, don’t be offended, being rude about the models is the house style, it saves a lot of nonsense about being paid for the reshoot. And anyway you do look like an Italian waiter. What does Betty want?—I don’t owe her any favours, she never does me any, I mean there must be lots of photographic work going in the spy racket. She says I won’t keep my mouth shut—can you believe it? Can you smell burning? Oh, sod!
She leaves the room in a hurry. Ridley has been looking at her like somebody looking at a picture in a gallery. He reaches into his jacket and produces his radio.
RIDLEY (On radio) Mother.
HAPGOOD (On radio) Ridley.
RIDLEY You’re out of your fucking mind.
HAPGOOD (On radio) What’s the matter?
RIDLEY She may be your twin but there the resemblance ends. She’s a pot-head, it reeks, she’s growing the stuff in the window-box, she won’t stop talking, she picks her nose, she looks like shit, I mean it doesn’t begin …
HAPGOOD (On radio) Where is she?
RIDLEY In the kitchen burning things …
HAPGOOD (On radio) I’m signing off.
RIDLEY No, listen—
But evidently she has cut him off. He puts his radio away and goes to pick up his shopping. He puts it on the sofa, perhaps, and anyway starts unloading the carrier bags. They are full of clothes in tissue paper. There’s also a shoe box and other stuff. It all adds up to one outfit, suitable for the office.
While he is doing this Hapgood bangs her way back into the room (she probably wouldn’t have bothered to close the door so a door on a spring might be useful).
She is nibbling the unburned portion of a croissant, which rapidly gets as far as the wastepaper basket.
HAPGOOD And you made me warm my croissant to a frazzle. What have you got there?
RIDLEY Clothes, shoes, make-up … Is there a bathroom?
HAPGOOD No, we pee in the sink. Can you try to show a little charm?
RIDLEY Your sister said do what he tells you.
HAPGOOD So what?
RIDLEY Run a bath.
HAPGOOD Why?
RIDLEY You look as if you need one.
HAPGOOD Now just a minute—
RIDLEY And wash your hair.
HAPGOOD Just a minute. I’m not going to a party, I’ve got a busy morning.
RIDLEY Victor isn’t coming. It’s ten twenty and we’re leaving here at one fifteen, just under three hours. I’ll explain as you go.
HAPGOOD Will you indeed.
She picks up the phone again and starts dialling.
RIDLEY Who are you calling?
HAPGOOD I want to talk to Betty.
Without hurrying much, because she is still dialling, Ridley yanks the phone cord which comes away from the wall bringing fragments of plastic and bits of skirting-board with it.
RIDLEY You don’t talk to Betty, you don’t talk to anybody, in fact you don’t talk so much in general, and you don’t swear at all, get used to it, please.
HAPGOOD You bloody gangster, that telephone is my livelihood!
RIDLEY Is that right? You’ll have to fall back on photography.
She swings at him. He catches her wrist. With his other hand he takes a wad of banknotes out of one pocket.
That’s two thousand pounds.
He lets go of her wrist and takes a similar wad out of another pocket.
So’s this. That’s now, this is later.
HAPGOOD What is it for?
RIDLEY It’s for looking nice and not talking dirty, and answering a telephone. After that, we’ll see.
HAPGOOD Why?
RIDLEY I’ll tell you when it’s time.
HAPGOOD Then why would I do it?
RIDLEY For the money, your sister said. I want to know about you and your sister, sibling bribery is a new one on me.
HAPGOOD Well, you can go and—
RIDLEY Every time you swear I’m taking £50 out of this bundle. You’ll get what’s left.
HAPGOOD —fuck yourself.
Ridley separates a £50 note from the bundle of money (which is perhaps secured by a rubber band), and puts the remainder back into his pocket.
That’s theft.
RIDLEY No, it’s arson.
Because his hand has come out of his pocket with his cigarette lighter with which he sets fire to the note.
HAPGOOD You’re all nutters. I knew it then. Is Betty in trouble?
RIDLEY When?
HAPGOOD If she’s in trouble, I don’t mind helping.
RIDLEY You knew it when?
HAPGOOD Whenever—all those years ago when we did the interviews.
RIDLEY Tell me about that.
HAPGOOD I failed the attitude test. Betty was exactly their cup of tea so they kept her anyway.
RIDLEY Anyway?
HAPGOOD They were seeing twins—it was a phase. Nutters is not the word. (Ridley laughs.) Ask Betty, they had a reason, she’ll know what it was. Well, that cheered you up.
RIDLEY Yes. Will you have a bath and talk nice and do what I tell you?
HAPGOOD Is it her money?
RIDLEY Not exactly.
HAPGOOD I wouldn’t take it if it was hers.
RIDLEY Fine. It’s ten twenty-five.
HAPGOOD What did you say your name was?
RIDLEY Ernest. Do you want me to scrub your back?
HAPGOOD No, thank you.
RIDLEY Take the clothes. They’re for you to put on.
She gathers them up to take them out.
HAPGOOD They’re not really me.
RIDLEY That’s right.
Hapgood leaves the room. Ridley stays where he is. The next time he moves, he’s somebody else.)
INTER-SCENE
So we lose the last set without losing Ridley. When the set has gone, Ridley is in some other place … which may be a railway station, or alternatively a pla
ce where boats come in, or an airport; whatever the design will take, really. The main thing is that he is a man arriving somewhere. He carries a suitcase. He is a different Ridley.
It’s like a quantum jump.
And now we lose him. Perhaps he walks out. Perhaps the scene change has been continuous and he is now erased by its completion.
SCENE 3
Blair and Kerner are at the Zoo. Blair has the ‘pink diagram’.
BLAIR I must confess I always thought that one Ridley was enough and occasionally surplus to an ideal arrangement of the universe. Now we’ve got one in Kensington and one who could be anywhere. I imagine he doesn’t hang around, he’d come in and out as required. Could be on a British passport, more likely not. This is, of course, assuming that he exists. Does this (the diagram) prove twins?
KERNER No. An invisible man is also a correct solution.
BLAIR You chaps.
KERNER Mathematics does not take pictures of the world, it’s only a way of making sense. Twins, waves, black holes—we make bets on what makes best sense. In Athens, in Paris, and at the pool, two Ridleys satisfy the conditions. He was his own alibi. So we’re betting on twins. But we need to be lucky also, and today is Friday; is it the thirteenth?
BLAIR You chaps don’t believe in that.
KERNER Oh, we chaps! Niels Bohr lived in a house with a horseshoe on the wall. When people cried, for God’s sake Niels, surely you don’t believe a horseshoe brings you luck!, he said, no, of course not, but I’m told it works even if you don’t believe it.
Blair continues to look grave.
What is the matter, Paul?
BLAIR Those photographs. Think of Ridley sitting there. He’s been sending film to Moscow and now here are these prints, spread out on the table, courtesy of the Washington pouch. Awkward moment for him. And yet, suddenly he’s in the clear. Kerner owns up. Well, we can’t have Ridley sitting there wondering why you’re owning up to his pictures. Ridley knew this wasn’t his batch, because he photographed his pages flat, separately; they weren’t pinned together by the corners and turned over. And those figures peeping out underneath, the whatsit production in the cyclone-whatever, they were nothing to do with him.
KERNER I assumed naturally they were not Ridley’s pictures.
BLAIR Did you? I wish you’d said so. I wish you’d said, ‘Paul where did you get that photo?’ … because you see, those cycleclip numbers were pulled together from different sets, the way somebody might do it at the Moscow end, and it really upsets me, Joseph, that you weren’t … I don’t know … surprised.
KERNER Cyclotron, Paul. It’s a sensible word. Cycleclip is bizarre by comparison.
Pause.
Poor Paul. Everybody is a suspect. (Reminded) Explain something to me. I forgot to ask Elizabeth. Prime suspect: it’s in nearly all the books. I don’t understand. A prime is a number which won’t divide nicely, and all the suspects are prime. It’s the last thing to expect with a suspect. You must look for squares. The product of twin roots. Four, nine, sixteen … what is the square root of sixteen?
BLAIR Is this a trick question?
KERNER For you, probably.
BLAIR Four, then.
KERNER Correct. But also minus four. Two correct answers. Positive and negative. (Pause.) I’m not going to help you, you know. Yes–no, either–or … You have been too long in the spy business, you think everybody has no secret or one big secret, they are what they seem or they are the opposite. You look at me and think: Which is he? Plus or minus? If only you could figure it out like looking into me to find my root. And then you still wouldn’t know. We’re all doubles. Even you. Your cover is Bachelor of Arts first class, with an amusing incomprehension of the sciences, but you insist on laboratory standards for reality, while I insist on its artfulness. So it is with us all, we’re not so one-or-the-other. The one who puts on the clothes in the morning is the working majority, but at night—perhaps in the moment before unconsciousness—we meet our sleeper—the priest is visited by the doubter, the Marxist sees the civilizing force of the bourgeoise, the captain of industry admits the justice of common ownership.
BLAIR And you—what do you admit?
KERNER My estrangement.
BLAIR I’m sorry.
KERNER I’m thinking of going home, perhaps you know.
BLAIR No, I didn’t.
KERNER Ah, well.
BLAIR It may be tricky for you.
KERNER Do you mean leaving or arriving?
BLAIR That’s roughly what I’m asking you?
KERNER Of course. Dog or dog-catcher. I forget. It’s true that when the KGB came to me in Kaliningrad I had already thought of coming West, but to be honest the system I hated was the vacuum tube logic system. We were using computers which you had in museums. I wasn’t seeking asylum, I was seeking an IBM 195.
BLAIR No. They put you up to it and Elizabeth turned you. You were her joe.
KERNER Yes, I was. There is something terrible about love. It uses up all one’s moral judgement. Afterwards it is like returning to a system of values, or at least to the attempt.
BLAIR (Angrily) Yes, values. It’s not all bloody computers, is it?
KERNER No. The West is morally superior, in my opinion. It is unjust and corrupt like the East, of course, but here it means the system has failed; at home it means the system is working. But the system can change.
BLAIR No, it can’t. Come on, Joseph, you know them—Budapest in ’56—Prague in ’68—Poland in ’81—we’ve been there!—and it’s not going to be different in East Berlin in ’89. They can’t afford to lose.
KERNER (Shrugs) It’s not my job to change it. My friend Georgi has offered to arrange things if I want to go.
BLAIR Why are you telling me?
KERNER I declined his offer.
BLAIR I’m glad, Joseph.
KERNER I prefer British Airways.
Pause.
BLAIR You should have accepted.
KERNER (Angrily) Oh, yes!—You don’t want to look, and then you’ll get spy pattern.
BLAIR I like to know what’s what.
KERNER Of course! Yes–no, either–or.
BLAIR That’s right. You’re this or you’re that, and you know which. Prophecy is a pastime I can’t afford, I’ve got one of my people working the inside lane on false papers and if she’s been set up I’ll feed you to the crocodiles.
KERNER One of your people? Oh, Paul. You would betray her before I would. My mamushka.
BLAIR Good. Good, Joseph.
He seems pleased by the way that went.
Now. Is the sister thing going to work?
KERNER Oh, yes. I was afraid of it, but with Mr Ridley it will be all right.
He starts to leave, pause.
I never saw Elizabeth sleeping. Interrogation hours, you know. She said, ‘I want to sleep with you.’ But she never did. And when I learned to read English books I realized that she never said it, either.
Kerner walks away.
SCENE 4
Hapgood’s office. It’s empty.
The door is opened with a key from the outside. Ridley enters the office.
RIDLEY (Addressing Hapgood outside) Move.
Hapgood enters behind him. She is wearing the clothes which he brought to the flat.
Ridley closes the door. Hapgood looks around. Ridley has a bag, perhaps a sports holdall.
Sit there.
Ridley does everything smoothly and quickly. He riffles through a stack of printed documents (technical magazines perhaps) on the desk and extracts a sealed envelope, which he tears open. It contains a small key and a scribble.
HAPGOOD What if somebody comes in?
RIDLEY It’s your office, for God’s sake.
He gives her the key.
Middle drawer.
Hapgood uses the key to open the middle drawer of the desk.
Remote key.
HAPGOOD This?
She shows him the electronic key for the safe. Ridl
ey takes it. He consults the scribble, programmes the key, opens the safe. From the safe he takes a disc-box—a new one, i.e. a sealed once-only box of the same type. He closes the safe. He puts the disc-box into his bag, together with the torn envelope and the scribble. During this:
Are you going to tell me what I’m doing here?
RIDLEY Sure. Any phone that rings, don’t pick it up. I’ll pick it up.
He picks up the red telephone, looks at its underneath, puts it down again; from the bag he takes a simple ‘eavesdrop’ connection, a single earpiece ready to be wired up into a telephone receiver; and a screwdriver.
At that moment, the door opens and Maggs walks in, with a file, much as yesterday.
MAGGS Good afternoon Mrs Hapgood, you came in after all. Do you want to see the decrypts?
Hapgood looks at Ridley.
RIDLEY Hello, Maggs … aren’t you supposed to be having lunch?
MAGGS Yes, sir.
RIDLEY Well, piss off then. Go to the pub.
MAGGS I was in the pub. (To Hapgood) I got the desk to bleep me if you came in—just the top one, really, it’s green-routed and Sydney’s been on twice this morning.
HAPGOOD Has he?
MAGGS Sydney—they only want a yes or no.
RIDLEY Let them wait.
HAPGOOD No, I can do that.
RIDLEY Are you sure, Mother?
HAPGOOD What’s the matter with you today, Ridley?
Hapgood takes the ‘top one’ from Maggs and peruses it with interest.
Mm …
RIDLEY Perhaps you’d like me to …
HAPGOOD Fascinating.
MAGGS Just a yes or no.
HAPGOOD Yes! Definitely yes!
She passes the paper smartly back to Maggs.
Thank you, Maggs. I’ll do the rest later.