The Kentucky Cycle
Page 3
No response.
Well, starve then, if you’ve a mind to.
He starts to take her bowl away. She grabs it back. They stare at each other. He smiles. She turns away and attacks the contents of the bowl ravenously. She wipes the bowl clean and then throws it on the floor. She sucks and licks her fingers clean. Michael pushes his bowl across the table to her. She looks at it for a moment.
Go on. Only I’d eat it a little more slowly if I was you. That is, if ya want to keep any of it down.
She grabs the bowl and begins wolfing it down like the first one.
I said slowly!
Startled by the violence in his voice, she stops and stares at him. He gestures.
Eat slowly.
She obeys, cautiously. Michael smiles.
My name is Michael. You?
She stares at him. He repeats:
Michael. You?
She stares at him. Then:
WOMAN: Michael you?
Michael stares at her, then laughs. She laughs. He roars. She laughs harder. Then, abruptly, he slams both his hands down on the table. He points to himself.
MICHAEL: Michael.
He points to her. She looks at him warily.
WOMAN: Knox Sanale.
MICHAEL: Knox Sanale?
She nods.
That means . . . Morning Star.
He points to her.
Morning Star.
She shakes her head.
STAR: Knox Sanale.
He laughs.
MICHAEL: “And I saw Satan fall like lightning from Heaven.” (He laughs.) Was that you, Morning Star? Tempter of our Lord? Lucifer’s handmaiden here in the wilderness! Sure, but you’ve got some devil in ya—like all women. (Beat.) Come here.
She doesn’t move.
I said, come here!
He gestures. She rises, uncertain, bowl in hand. She crosses to stand beside him. He takes the bowl from her hand and puts it on the table. He pulls her into his lap and kisses her. She remains passive.
Gradually, she begins to embrace him. She kisses him harder and harder. He moans, kisses her throat, her breasts.
With one hand, she reaches behind her and picks up the wooden bowl. He senses something and turns, but before he can move, she smashes the bowl into his face. Simultaneously, she slips off his lap and grabs him by his hair and pulls him to his knees on the floor. He struggles to rise, but she picks up the chair and brings it down on his head. She runs off. He shakes his head, now covered with blood and gruel, and bellows with rage:
God damn it! God damn you!! Damn you!
He staggers out after her.
Blackout.
SCENE FOUR
Lights up. Michael sits in a chair at the table. Perhaps he whittles. Star stands by the fireplace and periodically stirs a large iron pot.
Beat.
MICHAEL: I been killin’ as long as I can remember. Ireland. Georgia. Here. Never for the pleasure innit, ya understand—though I’m good at it, and a man should take pride in what he does well. But if you go simple with blood you can lose your way. And I meant never to do that. I was always headed somewheres better.
I killed my first man when I was seven. A bloody lobsterback. One o’ them that was runnin’ our piece of Ireland like his own bloody vegetable patch. They’d have “hunts” on the land, see. Our land. Racin’ through our fields on their fine horses in their blacks and scarlets. A beautiful sight! If you could just forget it was your crops out there bein’ trampled underfoot for their sport.
Beat.
Did you ever notice how like the distant bayin’ of a fine pack of hounds is the sound of a hungry child cryin’ hisself to sleep?
Beat.
One of the silly bastards had too much to drink and lagged behind the rest. He failed to clear a wall and took a bad fall. His horse rolled over him. Must’ve broke him all up inside, ’cause he couldn’t move none. I got to him first. I stood there, over him, and I remember him lookin’ up at me with the queerest look on his face. What a sight I must’ve been: little snot-nosed, barefoot boy, more dirt than clothes. I wondered what he thought now, him and his kind always bein’ so high and mighty. And then I stepped on his neck and broke it. Like Saint Patrick crushin’ a snake.
Beat.
But there was no sport innit. See, I learned early, blood’s just the coin of the realm, and it’s important to keep strict accounts and pay your debts. That’s all.
And now here, at last, I’m a man of property meself, on the kind of land ya only dream about. Dirt so rich I could eat it with a spoon. I’ve but to piss on the ground and somethin’ grows. I’ve corn for whiskey and white oaks for barrels to put it in and a river to float it down and sell it. I’ve everythin’ I’ve ever wanted: the land, and to be left alone on it. I’m richer than that snot-nosed boy ever dreamed he’d be.
But somethin’ isn’t right.
Beat.
I’m gettin’ in and layin’ by more food than one man could eat in a year and instead of feelin’ full, I feel empty. I feel hungry. What’s the point, after so much blood and so much sweat, if ten years after I’m gone, the damn forest covers my fields again? Or worse, some stranger does? Will I have built all of this for nothin’? For no one?
Michael, me boy, what you want is a family. And for that, you need a wife.
Star limps over slowly to the table and ladles out stew into a bowl for Michael. For the first time, we notice a clumsy, bloodstained bandage wrapped tightly around her right ankle and calf. Finishing serving, Star begins to cross back. Michael stops her with a touch. She freezes instantly. He looks at her leg.
MICHAEL: Still swollen some, but gettin’ better. It’ll heal.
He releases her. Star crosses back and stands by the fireplace. She stares at him as he talks.
I cut the tendon cleanly. You’ll always limp, but you’ll walk soon enough just fine. No pain. But you’ll never be able to run. Not fast enough. Not far enough. (Beat. He raises his glass.) Here’s to our firstborn. A son! (Beat.) Gimme a daughter, and I’ll leave it on the mountain for the crows.
Blackout.
SCENE FIVE: STAR’S VISION
Three pools of light.
Michael stands upstage left.
Upstage right is a BODY DOUBLE for Star. She squats, her back to the audience, and grips the posts of the bed. She is in labor, and her groans and cries counterpoint, accent, and build with Star’s speech. The rest of the ENSEMBLE breathes with her.
Downstage center, facing the audience, is Star.
STAR: This child will kill me! Like the leaves in the time of changing colors, I am torn and scattered.
The Double screams.
Where are you, Grandmother?! You have turned your back on your people and we are no more. Cloudy Boy and even your Dog have abandoned us. The Four Witnesses hide their eyes and are mute. The Four Winds are still. All is death.
The Double screams.
It is the time of the Fall Bread Dance, and we gather to give thanks, Grandmother, for your bounty. The Great Game is close this year, but we women win and the men must gather the wood for the twelve days of feasting and dancing! Aaiiiieee! Laughing Eagle smiles at me, and my sisters whisper that his mother will soon be talking to mine and bringing the gift of skins. Father frowns, but secretly I think he is pleased. Brother is chosen as one of the twelve who will provide for the feast, and my heart swells so with pride it will burst! At dawn on the third morning, we gather to greet them at the Council House. See how he steps forward with the Grandfather of Deer—horns like the branches of an oak tree!
Tbe Double screams.
That night, my brother grows ill. Hot, like a fire, his skin burns to the touch. No amount of water can touch his thirst. He drinks streams and lakes. The Shaman dances, but he, too, is ill. We burn now, all of u
s. Two days later, the blisters appear, stinging like red ants, like bees. I claw at my skin, my nails black with my own blood.
Tbe Double screams.
The first to die are dressed and painted by their friends, as the great Grandmother taught us. Each is given proper burial in the earth, but as more and more are dying, there is no one with the strength to carry his brother to the burial ground. My father dresses in his finest skins and feathers. He paints his face and sings his death song. He takes his shield and his lance and dares the Red Death to fight him in the Council House. The Red Death smiles at him and he dies.
The Double screams.
Everywhere is death. And I am the Noon-Day Sun who dreamed once that she was a woman named Morning Star.
The Double screams.
Where are my sisters?! Who will build my birthing hut? Where is my mother? Who will guide me through my time? Where are you, Grandmother?! Why have you turned your face from your people?! THIS CHILD WILL KILL ME!
The Double screams.
How I hated you, little one. When my blood stopped and my belly grew, how I hated you! You were a part of him, my enemy, only now he was inside me. No longer could I shut him out, for there you were, always! How I hated you!
The Double screams.
But when I felt you move, child, when you whispered to me that you were mine—aaahhh, how then I laughed at my fears! Mine! You are my blood, and my flesh! We are one breath, and one heartbeat, and one thought, and that is DEATH TO HIM!
The Double screams.
Hurry, child—how I long to hold you!
The Double screams.
Hurry, child—my breasts ache for your touch!
The Double screams.
Hurry, child, and grow strong!
The Double screams one last time and collapses.
Silence.
A baby cries.
Michael turns.
Star raises an imaginary infant up to the audience.
Michael Rowen, you have a son.
She looks at the baby and smiles.
He is born with teeth.
Blackout.
SCENE SIX
Night. The cabin. Star sits at the table. Michael stands by the fire, watching her. Star rocks the baby and sings to him.
STAR: Jaslinigohi adage tahlihi, jaslanigohi hatvhi iniyigati. Agado alteluhe hatohisgvi, uganowi kosti ale uhisodi ojigotisgo jalosohnvhi. [Grow strong, young warrior, grow strong, grow tall. The land shakes with your war cry, warm ashes and grief mark your passing.]
MICHAEL: What are ya singin’ to him?
STAR: Just words I make up to quiet the child.
MICHAEL: You ought to sing him a proper lullaby.
STAR: Then teach me one.
Beat.
MICHAEL: I don’t know any.
STAR: There you are, then.
MICHAEL: Don’t be smart with me, girl. I don’t want you talkin’ Cherokee to him, you understand? He’s not to grow up like some savage. He’s a Rowen!
Star coos to the baby.
STAR: Sssshhhh. What a baby. What a baby.
MICHAEL: Is he hungry?
STAR: He just ate.
MICHAEL: Did he piss himself?
STAR: No.
MICHAEL: Then why does he cry?
Star shrugs, laughs derisively.
STAR: Who knows? He’s a baby. Babies cry. (She coos to the child.) What a baby. What a baby.
MICHAEL: Do your breasts still bleed?
STAR: A little.
MICHAEL (matter-of-factly): It’s not natural.
STAR: What do you know of babies ’cept how to get them?
MICHAEL (with distaste): Milk and blood.
STAR: He’s a Rowen. (Beat.) Sure you won’t like to hold him? (Beat.) Here.
She rises up and offers Michael the child. He backs up and waves her away.
MICHAEL: No.
STAR: Go on.
MICHAEL: I said no!
Beat.
STAR: You afraid of him? Your own son?
MICHAEL: I’ve no gift for babies, that’s all!
Michael walks outside. Star watches him go, then returns to her chair. Michael watches them from outside, disturbed by forces he has set in motion but doesn’t understand, can’t articulate. Star croons to her baby; maybe she dangles the gold watch over him.
STAR: Afraid of his own son. Hmmmmm? (Beat.) What a baby. What a baby.
She laughs softly. Michael watches.
Slow fade to black.
THE HOMECOMING
This thing shall be done with speed.
The hand gropes now, and
the other
hand follows in turn.
—AESCHYLUS
CHARACTERS
PATRICK ROWEN age sixteen, Michael’s son
REBECCA TALBERT age sixteen, a neighbor
STAR ROWEN age thirty-two
MICHAEL ROWEN age fifty-one
JOE TALBERT age forty-seven, Rebecca’s father
SALLIE age twenty-two, a slave
NARRATOR: The Homecoming.
Sixteen years later. 1792. A ridge in eastern Kentucky. Later, the Rowen homestead.
The Homecoming.
1792. Late morning. A ridge overlooking a vast expanse of mountains and valleys in eastern Kentucky.
SCENE ONE
As the lights come up, we see a young man, PATRICK ROWEN, staring out past the audience. He rests easily on his haunches and seems as much at home, as much a part of the wilderness that surrounds him, as any tree or bush. He thoughtfully chews on a grass stalk and he cradles a long rifle lightly in his large hands. He shifts slightly and smiles. He picks up a handful of dirt and sifts it through his fingers.
From behind him, a sixteen-year-old girl, REBECCA TALBERT, steps quietly out of the woods. She is slender and attractive in a blunt and unaffected manner. The emerging woman in her is plainly visible. She carries a wicker basket. She stands and considers Patrick.
REBECCA: If I was an Injun, you’d be dead six ways from Sunday by now.
PATRICK (unperturbed): Ain’t been no Injuns ’round here for five years.
REBECCA: Well, if there was, I’da had your scalp for sure.
PATRICK (laughs): I heard you comin’ days ago.
REBECCA: Oh, yeah? How’d you know it was me?
PATRICK: ’Cause as much noise as you were makin’, it had to be you or some pack of razorback hogs. I’m sittin’ downwind of you and decided early on it couldn’t be them hogs.
REBECCA: Well. That’s a nice thing to say.
PATRICK: Coulda been a lot worse. I coulda said I was still guessing till I saw you!
She swings at him. He ducks and laughs.
I take it back!
REBECCA: You better. (Beat.) Pretty up here. Maybe we oughta have us a house up here when we get married. Whatya think?
PATRICK: Don’t stand there.
She ignores him. He pulls her down beside him.
I said, don’t stand.
REBECCA: Why not?
PATRICK: ’Cause we’re on a ridge, facin’ the sun, and you stand there you stick out like a sore thumb. Might just as well fire off a cannon for folks.
REBECCA: What’s to worry? “Ain’t been no Injuns ’round here for five years.” Not countin’ you or your ma.
PATRICK: There’s worse things than Injuns.
REBECCA: I been missin’ you somethin’ fierce. You miss me?
PATRICK: Yeah. I reckon.
REBECCA: “You reckon”? Well, whyn’t you gimme some sugar and we’ll find out for sure. Come on.
He kisses her.
Well, what you think?
PATRICK: Yeah. I missed you.
Beat.
R
EBECCA: I knew you’d be up here. Know how I knew? When you weren’t in the fields I asked Star. . . .
PATRICK (concerned): I told you, you shouldn’t oughta bother my ma like that. . . .
REBECCA: All right by me! Didn’t so much as give me back a how-do-you-do. Just grunted and pointed off towards the woods. She don’t like me much.
PATRICK: She likes you fine.
REBECCA: Shoot! She’d just as soon put that gimpy leg of hers up against my backside as look at me.
PATRICK: Don’t make fun of her!
REBECCA: I wasn’t . . . makin’ fun of her.
PATRICK: Just don’t talk about my ma like that.
REBECCA: Well, how come she don’t like me? I ain’t never done nothin’, ain’t never looked crossways at her, but whenever she come visitin’, you’d think I was a chair or somethin’ for all the notice she give me.
Beat.
PATRICK (surprised): My ma’s been visitin’ over to your place?
REBECCA: Sure. Coupla times.
PATRICK: She don’t visit nobody. Ain’t never been acrost to the other side of the Shilling as far as I ever knew.
REBECCA: Well, it warn’t no social call you understand. My daddy, he had a cut on him that went bad and everythin’ and I thought maybe he was gonna lose that arm or die, maybe. Well, it ain’t no secret ’round here that your ma got healin’ hands. I guess Jeremiah gone and fetched her, ’cause she just shows up—bled my daddy and cooked him up a poultice o’ herbs and his arm healed up just fine, nice as you please. (Beat.) Since then, she been back, oh, I don’t know, a buncha times—to look in on him, I guess. Sure wasn’t to say howdy to this girl.
PATRICK: She ain’t never said nothin’ ’bout that to me.
REBECCA: So?
PATRICK: So nothin’. It’s just . . . nothin’.
Beat.
REBECCA: Anyways. So, you know how I found you? I knew you was out here somewheres, but I didn’t know exactly where. And like I said, your ma wasn’t goin’ to be any help. So, I did that thing you talked about. I tried to think like you—like you was some kind of animal or something? I thought, “Now, where would I go if I was you?” And then, I just had the strangest feelin’, like a goose stepped on my grave or somethin’, and—
PATRICK: Don’t have nothin’ to do with thinkin’.