Sorry that there has been such a long time between the last update and this. Quite a few things stopped me uploading, but these should be more regular again; for a while, at least, though I can't promise anything. Anyway, enjoy, and, as ever, please review.


Then the whining school-boy with his satchel
And shining morning face


Act 3 – Scene 1

(A classroom with posters lining the walls, which attempt to give lessons in grammar in an engaging way. This is meant to be achieved by the use of block colours and badly drawn cartoons. The vocabulary used is likely of great use for those who wish to explain while on holiday precisely what they have in the pencil-cases, and who need to know how to get to the library. Or possibly the bookshop.

Few of the students are paying much attention to the teacher.)

MADAME WHITE: Attention, s'il vous plait! Alors, je voudrais discuter vos vacances. Martin?

MARTIN: (Who has not been listening. He looks up, worried.) Uh, uh – er – oui?

MME WHITE : (Sighs) Non. Où es-tu allé l'été dernière?

MARTIN: …

MME WHITE : Pour exemple, l'été dernière, je suis allé à New York pour mes vacances. Et tu?

JAMES : (Whispered to Susan) What's she saying?

SUSAN : Something about a vacancy in New York, I think. But apparently that's a poor example to use.

JAMES : Why?

SUSAN : I dunno. (Nods towards Benny, who is sitting on his own in the row across from them.) He would, though. He's good at this kind of thing.

JAMES : Yeah, I heard they were good at things like that.

SUSAN : (Startled) What? What do you mean 'they'? And good at what, exactly?

JAMES : (Shrugs, blushing.) Well, you know…

SUSAN : Yeah…?

JAMES : Nerds. They know stuff.

SUSAN : Oh. Yeah, right, they do. That's right.

JAMES : (Frowns) What did you think I meant?

SUSAN : Uh, nothing, I guess…

JAMES : Did you think –

(They argue in hushed voices, all the while pretending to be engaged in the lesson.)

(Benny rests his chin on his hands and stares, wary – giving way to bored – around the room. He rubs his eyes, frustrated.)

BENNY : (aside) If this is a play, why would you even bother having a scene like this? Just for the sake of some comic misunderstandings of French? Nothing important is happening here at all. No advancing of the plot. Not even –

MME WHITE : Benny? Did you hear me?

BENNY : (fluent) Pardonnez-moi, madame. Je suis allé à Toronto pour mes vacances dans le dernier été. Là, je visitais la musée d'art d'Ontario, la tour 'CN', et la musée Gardiner. Aussi, je –

MME WHITE : Merci, Benny, mais je tu voudrais ouvrir la fenêtre.

BENNY : (embarrassed) Bien sûr…

(He looks to his right, into one of the wings of the stage. He cannot see a window to open. He looks back, perplexed, at the teacher. The rest of the class is waiting, partly impatient, partly gleeful, and partly relieved at his apparent incomprehension. Very slowly, and fully aware of the insanity of his action, Benny mimes opening a window.

Madame White beams.)

MME WHITE : Merci beaucoup, Benny! Maintenant… (She continues to talk to members of the class about their holidays.)

BENNY : (aside) Well, that was odd. Was it just an excuse to set up the old joke of someone answering the question only to find out that they were being asked something quite different? That's the kind of writing we're working with here? Cheap jokes – at my expense…

SUSAN: (Still whispering to James.) So, what I'm trying to say is – is – uh –

(James waits expectantly. As the moments pass, he becomes more agitated.)

SUSAN: …

JAMES: (Out of the corner of his mouth.) What?

SUSAN: (Blushing.) I – I've forgotten my lines. Um.

(James waits, his eyes darting off-stage nervously.)

SUSAN: (Hushed.) Got it! (Louder.) – er – you should be more careful about what you say.

JAMES: Yeah. Um. (He blinks.) Oh, no, now I've forgotten…

(Sighing, bored, Benny glances around the classroom. There is a glittering figure sitting in the seat two seats to his left, an empty chair between them. Benny looks back down at his work. He narrows his eyes and rapidly turns his head. There is now nothing there.)

MME WHITE: Benny? Are you alright?

BENNY: Ça va bien…

(Madame White opens her mouth to ask another question, but is interrupted by the school bell. She frowns briefly: Whitechapel High doesn't normally have a bell that sounds like that – like it had come straight out of an old TV show about a school. The class is already packing up.)

MME WHITE: That bell is a signal for me, not you –

(The first pupils have left the classroom.)

MME WHITE: (Despairing) Please remember to read pages 72 to 76 and be prepared to talk about them –

(Everyone has gone, except for Benny.)

- next week…

BENNY: (Notices that everyone else has left. Starts to pack up.) 72 to 76? Merci, Madame.

MME WHITE : Merci beaucoup, Benny… Are you sure that everything's all OK?

BENNY: (Puts on a smile.) Yes, I'm sure.

(He picks up his bag, and pats the side of it, checking for his phone.)

Au revoir, madame!

(He leaves the stage, intending to contact his grandma.)

MME WHITE: (Going over to the whiteboard at the front of the classroom, and talking mostly to herself.) Au revoir.

(Wiping the board clean, she hurries off stage, going to the staff room, and coffee.)


Act 3 – Scene 2

(Ethan's office. It is surprisingly light, with rather modern-looking furniture – shiny, and highly polished. A laptop sits close on his desk, and is almost totally white except for the dark red fingerprint (slightly smudged) just off-centre to the left.

A door at the back off the stage opens, and Ethan enters, licking his lips. From a box on the desk, he picks out a paper tissue and fastidiously wipes his hands and mouth. The tissue comes away red. He notices the mark on the laptop, and, with a grimace that reveals a bloodied canine, he rubs it off, before dropping the tissue into the bin.

He leans against the desk and stares out towards the audience.)

ETHAN: Did you think I hadn't noticed you all? (He waves.)

The lights do strange things, and I can't see your faces, but, still, it's pretty obvious that you're there. (He grins.) Besides, I can smell you. (His eyes narrow and he lowers his voice.) I can hear you think…

(He keeps staring into the audience, his eyes darting from one to the next, to the next, to the next – he stops abruptly and rubs his forehead.)

So loud! Clunk, clunk, clunk, the lot of you! (He sighs.) So Benny's trying to find a way to fix it, or we all stay like this? Like this? (Gestures at the black cloak.) Benny has to get it right or it's like this forever? (He groans – theatrically) We're doomed…

(He leans away from the desk and starts to pace, his head bowed in thought.)

I reckon that that was some kind of – of – of – hmm. It was glittering? (Bites his lip.) I can't say that I'm familiar with that exact type. Maybe it's unique. It's certainly specialised. Some kind of sprite, I'd guess, with the ability to change reality. These things can't normally end without some kind of condition being fulfilled. Given the nature of the change, I'm going to guess at something within a dramatic structure. A conclusion. A resolution – a finale – a –

(He laughs.) I know. I know exactly what'll do it. (Raises an eyebrow.) And it shouldn't even take much setting up. Huh. (His mouth twitches, amused.) Of course, it all depends on whether we're in a comedy or a tragedy…

(He claps his hands together and turns back to speak directly at the audience.)

But 'I' get a little ahead of 'me':

I should go back into character.

I am the villain: the problem is not

Mine to solve. I'll wait – I'll see – if a mind

Heroic can pattern out an answer.

There's time enough to wait as all those small

Sad hours slip past fearful ticking ears;

There's time to watch the panic setting in,

Beading on the brow, running down the nose:

A sea of fear to taste. I'll offer him no help

(He would refuse it off me, anyway –

At least until that final moment, when

Crashing all about him comes the cardboard

World, and then, oh, then, he might accept a

Word or two of terse direction.) Then he'll

Sigh, and sob, and wring his hands – and then just

Bend and let me have my way. It's for the

Common good (though, if there were a way to

Help just me, then that I would have taken.)

So the villain (here I repeat myself)

Am I. That is my part: it suits me well.

But I think, just for a little sport, I'll

Play the lover too. I'll go in disguise –

Here, for once, an uncloaking serves to cloak! – (Gestures to his cape.)

And then I'll steal upon them: there to lie,

Seduce, and wait for the hours to die. (Exit.)