Out of the Wings

Falsa alarma (c.1957), Virgilio Piñera

False Alarm : ACT ONE

False Alarm, translated by Kate Eaton

ACT ONE

Context:

This is the opening of the play.

Sample text

The scene shows an office. A desk, swivel chair, opposite the desk a chair, a bench against the wall stage right; statue of Justice centre stage. As the curtain rises the Judge appears dressed in his robes with his biretta in his hand. The Murderer, who has his back to the door, is leaning against the statue.

JUDGE: (Stopping in the doorway.): Good morning!
MURDERER: (Turning abruptly.): Who are you…?
JUDGE: (Stepping one pace forward; severely.): I am the judge. (He steps forward another two paces and touches the statue with his fingertips.) And as for this, this is Justice…
MURDERER:: Justice…?
JUDGE: (Sitting in the swivel chair and moving his body from right to left.): Yes, Justice… I always have her brought here when I am about to conduct a criminal hearing.
MURDERER: (Standing before the desk.): I killed in self-defence.
JUDGE: (Rapping his knuckles together.): That’s what they all say. (Pause) So you shot him at point-blank range…
MURDERER:: …at point-blank range.
JUDGE: (Pointing to the bench): . Sit down. You’ll be calmer.
MURDERER: (Continuing to stand.): I want to know what’s going to happen to me.
JUDGE: (Pointing to the bench again.): Sit down. You’re rushing.
MURDERER: (Sitting.): Can I smoke?
JUDGE:: Yes. (Pause) Did he fall forwards or backwards?
MURDERER: (Lighting a cigarette.): Forwards: over a chair. (Pause) I’m tired.
JUDGE:: What did you do first? Steal or kill?
MURDERER:: I stole first; then the guy arrived. He jumped on me. I shot him.
JUDGE:: Do you know what they’re saying?
MURDERER:: What?
JUDGE:: That it was all an act of revenge; that the dead man was an old enemy of yours; that you had sworn to kill him the first chance you got.
MURDERER: (Violently, getting up.): That’s a lie! I’d never seen him before.
JUDGE: (Pointing to the chair.): Sit down in that chair.
MURDERER: (Sits.): Who’s saying that?
JUDGE:: It’s none of your business. (He turns on the lamp that is on the desk and shines it into the Murderer’s face.) Yes, you had seen him before.
MURDERER:: Why have you turned that light on?
JUDGE:: Just answer. You mustn’t ask me anything. (Warning pause) Admit that it was all an act of revenge.
MURDERER: (Blinking strongly.): No, I swear it. This is the first time I’ve visited this town.
JUDGE:: You were hunting him from town to town. Here you found him.
MURDERER: (Visibly nervous.): Why are they saying that? Why do they say it? (Pause) Yes, I killed him, but he wasn’t my enemy. I didn’t know him.
JUDGE: (Thunderously.): It is essential that you speak the truth and nothing but the truth so that justice knows how to apply itself.
MURDERER: (Turning his face away from the light.): I went into the bedroom…
JUDGE: (Interrupting abruptly.): Face… Turn your face to the light!
MURDERER: (Looking at the light again.): I went into the bedroom; I stole five hundred pesos that were in a briefcase. I was just leaving when the guy came in. When he saw me he jumped on me. Then I fired.
JUDGE:: At point-blank range?
MURDERER:: At point-blank range.
JUDGE:: At last you had your revenge
MURDERER:: It wasn’t revenge.
JUDGE: (Implacable.): That’s what they’re saying.
MURDERER:: Tell them to come and say it to me.
JUDGE:: Anyway, that’s what they’re saying.
MURDERER:: But can’t you see that it’s slander? (Pause) Listen: I want to go and live in New York. I came to this city from my village and I took up lodgings at the Hotel America. The people in the room next door to mine were a married couple. On my second day in the hotel I could hear the wife telling the husband that he shouldn’t leave the door unlocked; that thieves were everywhere; even amongst the hotel staff; that in short, anyone might pass by and seeing the door unlocked, slip into the room and steal the money.
JUDGE:: Or carry out an act of revenge that had been nurtured over a long period of time… Isn’t that so?
MURDERER:: I didn’t take any chances: I waited until the guy had gone out. Do you know that he forgot to lock the door? Then I slipped into the room.
JUDGE:: A nice version, but, my dear sir, I fear that the facts are very different… It would be better if you confessed.
MURDERER:: I have told the truth. (He makes the sign of the cross with his fingers and kisses them.) On this!
JUDGE:: A perjurer as well?
MURDERER: (Covering his face): For God’s sake! What are you trying to make me out to be?
JUDGE:: Confess, confess!
MURDERER:: I can’t confess to what I haven’t done.
JUDGE:: Do you deny that you have killed?
MURDERER:: I have killed a man, but I didn’t do it out of revenge.
JUDGE:: Alright, let’s leave the revenge. (Pause) So, you killed him because you were in love with his wife then, did you?
MURDERER:: You’re trying to confuse me. (He bows his head.)
JUDGE: (Shouting.): Head! Lift your head up I said! Stare at the light! (Pause) They say that the motive for the crime might have been jealousy.
MURDERER:: Jealousy… Whose jealousy?
JUDGE:: Yours, your jealousy, the jealousy you felt because he was the happy husband.
MURDERER:: But I’d never even seen his wife!
JUDGE:: Do you expect me to take what you say seriously?
MURDERER:: I swear to you that I’d never met her! What’s more: I don’t even know what she looks like.
WIDOW: (She enters impetuously, sobbing, prisoner to her immense grief: She is the classic widow who has just lost her husband, her hysteria heightened by the violent death of her consort ,and intensified by the loss of the five hundred pesos. Her entire being of outraged widow demands swift satisfaction. In her right hand she tightly squeezes a small handkerchief. She is dressed in full widow’s weeds; from the black suit down to the veil covering her toque; between sobs.): Justice, Your Honour, Justice! (Facing the statue of Justice) Justice, Madam Justice, Justice! (More sobs.)
MURDERER: (To the Judge.): Who’s that?
JUDGE: (Getting to his feet.): Calm yourself madam, calm yourself… (To the Murderer) Quick! It’s the widow. Go to the bench. (To the widow, taking her by the hands) My dear lady: sit yourself down in this chair.
WIDOW:: Who is that man?
JUDGE:: Your husband’s killer.
WIDOW: (Letting out a scream.): Him! (She sinks into the chair; more sobs, pause, she throws herself at the Murderer like a wild animal.) Murderer, thief, murderer! (She pummels him on the chest with her fists.) Why did you kill him? Tell me, why?
JUDGE:: You must be brave, madam, very brave!
WIDOW: (Still sobbing.): Brave you say… What do you suppose…? I was brave enough to see him dead, stretched out in a pool of blood; I told him about the door, but he was too good, he didn’t believe that the world could be full of thieves and murderers. (Looking at the Murderer) Yes, murderers like you, you evil man. What had we done to you, tell me, what? Did we owe you something? Had we ever even seen you before?
MURDERER: (To the Judge.): Hear that? I didn’t know her.
WIDOW:: Of course I didn’t know him. How could I know a murderer? Suddenly they’re everywhere your Honour. People like that, people who don’t know where they’ve been or where they’re going, ought to be watched very closely. (Pause) My God! Why didn’t you rent another room? How, exactly, did you come to occupy the room next to ours?
MURDERER:: I asked for a room and they gave me number thirty-five.
WIDOW: (Ingenuously.): … And ours was number thirty-six. (Pause) Hear that? People like you don’t stay in hotels, they sleep in parks, do you hear? In parks. (Pause) Oh Alfonso! Where are you, Alfonso? Are you listening to me? Twenty years together, and now dead, dead, dead!
JUDGE:: Come now, madam, resignation. The law will punish the culprit.
WIDOW: (Pointing to the Murderer.): That... That is the murderer of my unhappy husband! (Pause) Did you hear, you monster? You will be executed very soon. I will come to your execution. I won’t lose a single detail; my eyes will pierce you like two daggers until all life has flowed from that miserable body bequeathed to you by an unnatural mother.
JUDGE:: Madam, please…!
WIDOW:: Please, please…! It’s relevant! The unhappy widow is supposed to be sensible now, but as for you lot… Why weren’t you lot sensible enough to put a police officer on the door of every room?
JUDGE:: I think that you should calm down and tell me whether you happened to see this man prowling around outside your room?
WIDOW:: No, no I didn’t see him. If I had seen him, as sure as my name is Rita, I wouldn’t have left Alfonso alone for one minute. Oh, no, I wouldn’t have left you alone, Alfonso! (She turns pleadingly to the Judge.) Listen to me, your Honour: Swear to me that you will condemn him to death. Swear it! (She points to the statue.)
JUDGE:: I can’t swear anything, but the evidence for the crime is so overwhelming that the court will inflict the highest penalty.
WIDOW: (Emphasizing the phrase.): …The-high-est pe-nal-ty.
JUDGE:: The vote will be unanimous.
WIDOW:: …Be u-na-ni-mous.
JUDGE:: The deliberation will be very brief.
WIDOW:: …Ve-ry bri-ef.
JUDGE:: A question of pure formality.
WIDOW:: …Of pu-re for-mal-ity.
JUDGE: (To the Murderer.): Each member of the jury will have the profound sensation that you are a public enemy.
WIDOW:: …A pub-lic en-em-y.
JUDGE:: The whole courtroom will feel relieved when the jury pronounces its verdict.
WIDOW:: …Its ver-dict.
JUDGE:: Mothers will hug their children, children their mothers, brothers their sisters, husbands their wives, in short, the great human family will say in gratitude: “The long arm of justice has fallen on the head of the culprit.” (He touches the arm of the statue.)
WIDOW:: …On the he-ad of the cul-prit. (She touches the arm of the statue.)
JUDGE:: So be it. (Taking the Widow by the waist) Come, poor, unhappy, inconsolable widow; let us leave this sinner alone with his remorse. (They head for the door.)
MURDERER: (Catching up with the Judge): Your Honour, please…! What will you do with me?
JUDGE: (Opening the door, letting the Widow through first.): What the penal code demands in such cases: Execute you! (He goes out and closes the door.); The Murderer remains leaning against the statue; sustained pause. The door opens again and one of the stage-hands enters. He goes over to the Murderer and gently prises him away from the statue which he removes. As he exits another stage-hand enters carrying a portable gramophone, which he places on the pillar where the statue was. He puts on some music and goes out closing the door. Long pause. The door opens again and the Judge appears dressed in a lounge suit; he goes over to the gramophone and takes the record off.
JUDGE:: Intolerable. How many more times will I have to listen to the Blue Danube? (To the Murderer) Don’t you agree with me?
WIDOW: (Elegantly attired, in a brightly coloured cocktail dress. She goes over to the gramophone as she says to the Judge.): Why did you take the record off? I adore the Blue Danube. (She puts the record on again; to the Murderer) Isn’t this waltz adorable? (She takes the Murderer by the arms and starts to dance with him; he moves like an automaton, she stops.) Well, dear me… What’s the matter with you, have you forgotten how to waltz or didn’t you ever learn? (To the Judge) Shall we dance then?
JUDGE:: Delighted! I don’t like to listen to the Blue Danube, but I love to dance to it. (He takes the Widow in his arms and they give a few turns.)
WIDOW: (Stopping dancing; to the Murderer.): There, see how it’s done? It’s not very important however. You don’t know how to waltz, but perhaps you know how to dance the tango?
JUDGE: (Taking the record off again.): I hate the tango; too languorous. I much prefer a waltz.
WIDOW:: Then you wouldn’t mind a little boogie woogie…
JUDGE:: Of course I wouldn’t mind it! It’s just that these days, my muscles…
WIDOW: (To the Judge, imploringly.): Please, a little more Danube…
JUDGE:: Oh no…! If we’re not going to waltz, what’s the point…? (Pause) So what about tap then?
WIDOW:: Tap, tap! What a happy coincidence that you’ve brought up the subject of tap. It’s my favourite style of dancing, my absolute favourite.
JUDGE:: Have you taken part in any tap dancing competitions?
WIDOW:: No; I only dance it chez moi or, that is, in front of close friends, extremely close friends…
JUDGE:: My little niece already knows how to dance it. She’s only five, but you should see her, clacking away in her shoes with the reinforced metal soles, backwards and forwards, prancing around, etcetera, etcetera. She’s a prodigy.
WIDOW:: Sometimes there are nasty tumbles…
JUDGE:: Yes, but nobody complains. Anyway, the person who takes the tumble doesn’t get upset, because nobody thinks about sympathizing with him or telling him off.
WIDOW:: That’s just what I say! If you hurt your knee, you hurt your knee, end of story…!
JUDGE:: End of story!
WIDOW: (She sits in the chair.): You don’t know anyone who’d like to buy my little beach house off me do you? I can offer a good commission.
JUDGE:: What! You’re selling your lovely beach house?
WIDOW:: I’m selling it and very cheaply too; seven thousand pesos. (To the Murderer) Sit down will you; you look like a gatepost… (The Murderer sits in the Judge’s chair.) I hadn’t sold it because Alfonso used to spend the weekends at the beach, but now that he’s dead, I haven’t any excuse not to put it on the market.
JUDGE:: You had it rented out, did you not?
WIDOW:: Yes, that’s why we were living at the America. It wasn’t a matter of having two houses at the same time.
JUDGE:: Ah! Did you let the beach house furnished?
WIDOW:: Furnished.
JUDGE:: But, my dear lady, how could your husband spend the weekends there if other people were occupying it?
WIDOW: (Lighting a cigarette.): C’est la vie… The couple who lived there would take up residence in our hotel room on Saturdays and Sundays, whilst we would go off to the beach house. (To the Murderer) Oh sorry! I forgot to offer you a cigarette. (She gives him one, the Murderer takes it automatically; she stretches her arm across the table and gives him a light; she offers another to the Judge.)
JUDGE:: No thank you, I don’t smoke. (Pause) Who taught you to smoke? Your husband…?
WIDOW:: Well, no, not him exactly…, I already smoked when we got married but Alfonso really got me hooked. (Pause) For instance: if before marrying I smoked three cigarettes a day, now I smoke twenty.
JUDGE:: Don’t you get dizzy? Doesn’t it make you lose your appetite?
WIDOW:: If you only knew… (Pensive) Yes it makes me lose my appetite, yes I get dizzy… but it’s so, so… (She lets out a huge puff of smoke) So… so… (She finishes by singing ‘so’ softly to herself.)
JUDGE:: That’s it! So… If you were to say any other word, you couldn’t express everything that ‘so’ says about cigarettes.
WIDOW:: But also, one is oneself so… so… (Pause) Of course! Everything is so and nothing more than so…
JUDGE:: So, so, so…
WIDOW:: But of course, so, so, so.
JUDGE:: Changing the subject: do you think you’ll marry again?
WIDOW: (With a sidelong glance at the Murderer.): Perhaps, who knows…? If I find a man to suit me…
JUDGE:: Well, a man who…, a man… If you understand me: a man who has lived as much as you, or more.
WIDOW: (Laughing.): Ah, now I get you! I tell you what; that also falls into the sphere of ‘so’. But look here: Politeness isn’t a sign of weakness… And one thing has nothing to do with another…
JUDGE:: That’s what I say: one can live, or one cannot live; my sister has nothing to do with blenders; whilst my brother-in-law does not sit in a wheelchair.
WIDOW:: That is a profound thought. You are a wise man. I like your musicality.
JUDGE:: I met a man who was missing the index finger of his right hand; when anyone in his presence used the phrase “all ten fingers”, he would hasten to say: “all nine fingers”. Do you see?
WIDOW: (Roaring with laughter.): What precision, what exquisite precision! He had forgotten about his amputated finger so completely that he was totally unaware of the existence of the tenth finger. He lived with only nine fingers!
JUDGE:: And he always added that if one day for some reason his hands and feet were amputated then he would forget that those parts of the body existed too.
WIDOW:: Very amusing: “Mr X, I’ve dislocated my arm…” and Mr X replies: “What is an arm?”
JUDGE:: Let’s not get into too much detail…Leave it there… (He gets up and paces around the office.) How much commission would you give me for the sale of the beach house?
WIDOW: (Pensive.): Chère Madame Widow: Are you tormented by the memory of your dear dead Alfonso? And Chère Madame Widow replies: What is an Alfonso? Where do you buy one? What do you eat it with? (Laughs) Well dear me, I don’t know what you would eat it with…
JUDGE:: Are you thinking of travelling with the proceeds from the sale of the beach house?
WIDOW:: If I get the full seven thousand pesos, I will spend a year in Paris and a year in New York. (Pause) Wouldn’t you like to come with me?
JUDGE:: Why do you make me that proposal?
WIDOW:: I know that you spend the day sitting on your hands…
JUDGE:: Ah! You know…?
WIDOW:: I know it; one knows everything. But I suppose you have done the same as your friend with the nine fingers…
JUDGE:: To a certain extent yes: when the judges disappeared from the face of the Earth, then I continued to exist without the judge that I had been for twenty years.
WIDOW:: And why do you say to a certain extent…?
JUDGE:: Because there are always people who will insist on taking me for what I was, that is, for a judge, and so I devote myself to demonstrating to them that judges don’t exist anymore.
MURDERER: (Stupefied.): But… You… Aren’t you the judge that sentenced me just half an hour ago?
WIDOW:: What’s he saying?
JUDGE: (Laughing sonorously.): He’s talking about a judge. (To the Murderer) Which judge are you referring to?
MURDERER:: To you. (Turning to the Widow) And aren’t you the widow of the man that I shot?
WIDOW: (To the Judge.): I have to renew my passport. It’s an eternity since I last travelled.