Happy Birthday, Wanda June Page #24

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HAROLD:

What's this?

PAUL wilts instantly, attempts to make his rifle

inconspicuous, harmless, meaningless.

HAROLD:

What's this?

PAUL:

Nothing.

HAROLD:

That's a rifle you have?

PAUL:

No.

HAROLD:

Of course it is. Is it loaded?

PAUL:

No.

HAROLD:

Open the bolt!

PAUL obeys. A cartridge pops out.

HAROLD:

That's a cartridge, if I'm not

mistaken. Gunpowder, bullet,

cartridge case, and fulminate of

mercury percussion cap--all set to go.

PAUL:

I was cleaning it.

HAROLD:

Pick up that cartridge and slip it

back into the chamber--where it

belongs.

PAUL:

Gee whiz, Dad--

HAROLD:

Welcome to manhood, you little

sparrowfart! Load that gun!

PAUL:

(bleatingly)

Dad--

HAROLD:

Too late! It's man to man now.

Protecting your mother from me, are

you? Protect her!`

PENELOPE:

He's a child!

HAROLD:

With an iron penis three feet long.

Load it, boy.

PENELOPE:

You're begging him to kill you?

HAROLD:

If he thinks he's man enough.

PENELOPE:

(amazed by sudden insight)

That's really what you want. You

become furious when people won't

make you dead.

HAROLD:

I'm teaching my son to be a man.

PENELOPE:

So he can kill you. You hate your

own life that much. You beg for a

hero to kill you.

HAROLD:

I plan to live one hundred years!

PENELOPE:

No you don't.

HAROLD:

If that's the case--what's to

prevent my killing myself?

PENELOPE:

Honor, I suppose.

HAROLD:

What a handsome word.

PENELOPE:

(wonderingly)

But it's all balled up in your head

with death. The highest honor is

death. When you talk of these

animals, one by one, you don't just

talk of killing them. You honored

them with death. Harold--it is not

honor to be killed.

HAROLD:

If you've lived a good life, fought

well--

PENELOPE:

It's still just death, the absence

of life--no honor at all. It's

worse than the blue soup by far--

that nothingness. To you, though,

it's the honor that crowns them all.

HAROLD:

May I continue with the rearing of

my son?

(to PAUL)

Load that gun!

PAUL shakes his head.

HAROLD:

Load it!

PAUL refuses.

HAROLD:

Then speak, by God! Can you fight

with words?

PAUL:

I don't want to fight you.

HAROLD:

Get mad! Tell me you don't like

the way I treat your mother! Tell

me you wish I'd never come home!

PAUL:

(weakly)

It's your house, Dad.

HAROLD:

(throwing up his hands)

Everybody simply evaporates!

(including the

audience, inviting it

to share his indignation)

There are guest issues to be fought

out here--or to be argued, at least.

The enemy, the champion of all who

oppose me, is in East St. Louis

with his mother and his aunt! I

have so far done battle with a

woman and a child and a violin.

PENELOPE:

The old heroes are going to have to

get used to this, Harold--the new

heroes who refuse to fight.

They're trying to save the planet.

There's no time for battle, no

point to battle anymore.

HAROLD:

I feel mocked, insulted, with no

sort of satisfaction in prospect.

We don't have to fight with steel.

I can fight with words. I'm not an

inarticulate ape, you know, who

grabs a rock for want of a

vocabulary. Call him up in East St.

Louis, Penelope. Tell him to come

here.

PENELOPE:

No.

HAROLD:

(emptily, turning away)

No.

Pause. He contemplates PAUL.

HAROLD:

And my son, the only son of Harold

Ryan--he's going to grow up to be a

vanisher, too?

PENELOPE:

I don't know. I hope he never

hunts. I hope he never kills

another human being.

HAROLD:

(to PAUL, quietly)

You hope this, too?

PAUL:

I don't know what I hope. But I

don't think you care what I hope,

anyway. You don't know me.

(indicating PENELOPE)

You don't know her, either. I

don't think you know anybody. You

talk to everybody just the same.

HAROLD:

I'm talking to you gently now.

PAUL:

Yeah. But it's going to get loud

again.

PENELOPE:

He's right, Harold. To you, we're

simply pieces in a game--this one

labeled "woman," that one labeled

"son." There is no piece labeled

"enemy" and you are confused.

Lion doorbell roars. PAUL goes to answer it.

HAROLD:

There won't be anybody out there.

That's the new style: nobody anywhere.

PAUL, aghast, admits NORBERT WOODLY. WOODLY is high as a

kite on his own adrenaline.

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