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PREVIOUSLY: Piebald interrupts Jackson’s story by giving him tips on how to increase the profits for the Eat and Leave Happy diner. With excruciating difficulty, Cornelius manages to tell Piebald to let Jackson finish. When Piebald protests sarcastically, Jenny, Cornelius’s wife, verbally destroys Piebald (to Cililla’s glee), and Jackson continues ….
CHARACTERS: Listed and described in Author Notes. They take a few moments, but if it is your first foray into “Eavesdropper”, I highly recommend that you read them first. [NOTE: during this and subsequent scenes, we will introduce unnamed EXTRAS, located at various tables or at the counter]
SETTING: Interior of the Eat and Leave Happy diner. Tables with chairs scattered about, a few not occupied. A lunch counter runs from upstage to downstage right, with cushioned stools lining its outer side, a few occupied. A rectangular opening behind the counter where orders are placed and steaming food-laden plates are delivered. Upstage center, an old-fashioned nickelodeon hunkers. Upstage right, exit to restrooms and hallway (implied, but off-stage) leading to Jackson’s and Martha’s home. Upstage to downstage Left, a huge window offering a view of the outside blizzard.
Time: New Year’s Eve, 1968
AT RISE: Harry ambles from the nickelodeon to his chair. Immediately after Jackson’s first words, the Nickelodeon begins playing Johnny Mathis’s It’s Not For Me To Say. [Note to director (or reader): The song should play very softly in the background while Jackson speaks. It can be set up in a loop to play over and over, with the volume increasing or decreasing with the inner dynamics of Jackon’s dialogue.]
JACKSON:
I’d like to say that the fire was Martha’s and my worst—
(Head jerking to the nickelodeon)
Why is that playing? Why—? Who chose—?
HARRY:
My apologies, Sir. I had a quarter in my pocket, not likely to sire more coinage.
JACKSON:
But why that particular—?
(voice fades to a somber shaking of his head.)
HARRY:
I was fond of that song from my youth, Sir. I was on the bonny Isle of Man—I couldn’t have been more than 15—but I looked older. I was waiting to board a steamer on which the captain graciously allowed me to work for my passage when I heard Johnny Mathis’s haunting voice. Wait! Or was I lingering at the railing—that might have been it—yes, as the steamer pulled away from the harbor, and I strained to listen until his voice blended with the chooga-chooga of the engine?
(Sighing, as faraway)
Time … and songs … they blend into so many engines.
JACKSON:
At fifteen …?
HARRY:
Yes. I caught the whiff of another rumor, you see. Dad’s ship—he was always on his ship … somewhere—it might be landing on England’s shores where the men would disembark for a day of R and R. So I was on a race from the Isle of Man to England’s merry shore … when I heard this song.
JACKSON:
It was Laura’s—her favorite song.
HARRY:
(Cocking his head, appearing to study JACKSON)
Allow me to pull the plug on it, Sir.
JACKSON:
No! No, no, that’s not—Let’s let it play.
HARRY:
It’s not a new song. Like the kids would play today. It surprised me to see it listed just after Hey Jude.
JACKSON:
I purchased it. I thought I could …
(bitter chuckle)
… could listen to it every now and then. And smile. I didn’t know … Anyway …
(Makes an awkward attempt at smiling)
I was about to—to get to Laura anyhow. So … after the fire Martha and me … we put all our efforts into getting Eat ’n Leave Happy back to where it was before. We worked very hard. It was tough. We didn’t have Mr. Piebald’s—
(looking at his table)
Oh … he’s still in the restroom?
[As though on cue, MR. PIEBALD appears at the upstage right exit and makes his way back to his table]
JACKSON (Continues):
… we didn’t have Mr. Piebald's progressive ideas back then.
PIEBALD:
Say what? Oh, that’s right.
(Draws his thumb and forefinger across his closed lips)
JACKSON:
Laura was seven, as I recollect, and it was tough building back our diner and seeing to her childhood as well. It wasn’t easy for Laura. She had no friends nearby. She was schooled in the nearest town of Greensley. But as I said, that was twenty-eight miles away. Martha or me had to drive Laura out to the Interstate every day to catch her bus … and be there every afternoon when the bus returned. Every morning. Every afternoon. It was worse in the winter. Not often like this. But snowy.
FEMALE EXTRA 1:
That must have been tough on poor little Laura, too, Jackson.
JACKSON:
Yes, it was. And though she got used to the routine and did most of her studying on the car ride to the interstate and the bus ride, after that, to school … we noticed a day-to-night change in Laura once she switched from the small elementary school to Greensley’s one high school.
FEMALE EXTRA 1:
That’s a big change for any kid.
JACKSON:
More so for her. Our Laura didn’t make friends easily. She had only one friend in elementary school and she moved out of the state before high school. According to Laura’s teachers—and Martha and me met with several of them during PTAs—she was kind of a loner. They all agreed that she was a bright—a very bright, according to the tests—child. And Martha kept her well-dressed according to all the teen magazines she bought for Laura … but which Laura never … even … opened.
(Eyes closed, he releases a sigh that seems to go on forever, but then ends in the most mournful of moans)
Ohhhhhh, I’m sorry, folks—
(Clearly embarrassed, his face goes through a myriad of tics: smile-flickers transitioning to that look of severe concentration men’s faces tend to take on when they fight back tears)
I—I—Our Laura was a beautiful child—everyone could see—here, let me show you …
(Reaches under the counter and retrieves a stack of copy paper which he places on the counter)
I’d have given each of you one of these before you left anyhow. Everyone gets one. The newspaper had a copy—when it was still—
(swallows)
newsworthy. We use them to refresh the ones on telephone poles on the way to Greensley … and in the town.
HARRY:
Allow me, Sir.
[Taking the stack, he goes from table to table, finishing with those sitting at the counter, then keeping a sheet for himself, he hands the remainder to JACKSON, and returns to his table. A murmur of voices ensues.]
JACKSON:
(Reading)
“Have you seen our daughter, Laura Forte? Missing since Sept. 13th, 1964. Age 17, Height 5 ft. 2 in. Wt. 119. Hair blonde. Eyes blue. A one-one-inch scar on her left ankle.
“If you’ve seen Laura, please c-call: Jackson Forte, at (845) 239–0274. If you see her, but don’t have access to our number …”
(He lowers his eyes from the sheet, swallows, and continues)
“please … just a-a-ask Laura to call her parents. Please. We miss her.”
FEMALE EXTRA 2:
(Daubing her eyes)
That just tears me up inside, Mr. Forte.
JACKSON:
Sorry to bring everyone down on New Year’s Eve.
MALE EXTRA 1:
Did anyone ever—you know—call you?
PIEBALD:
You shoulda turned it over to the police, Jackson.
JACKSON:
Oh, we did, Bob. Of course, we did.
PIEBALD:
Lotta crazy people out there.
MALE EXTRA 1:
Oh, come on!
JACKSON:
No, it’s okay, Sir. The police did all they could. Till it went cold. She’s still alive, though. She is. We know that.
PIEBALD:
How?
MALE EXTRA 1:
Just shut up, will ya!?
PIEBALD:
No, but really … how? I’m just asking what the police must’ve asked. She just ups and disappears four years ago. How do you know she wasn’t kidnapped? Strangers coming in here every day.
JACKSON:
(Impatiently)
Bob, she wasn’t kidnapped. She left a note for us.
PIEBALD:
Well, there you go.
JACKSON:
It was on her bed that Sunday morning—we always let her sleep in on Sundays—and so Martha didn’t check on her till about noon. And she found the note. On the made bed.
FEMALE EXTRA 1:
So, you say the bed was made? So she could have left …
JACKSON:
We figured. The night before.
PIEBALD:
Who’s to say she didn’t make the bed when she got up in the morning? See, you guys aren’t thinking this through.
MALE EXTRA 1:
Jesus!
JACKSON:
She couldn’t have, Bob. See, on Sundays, I get up at six and open up the Eat ’n Leave Happy and let in the cook and the waitress, June Ann.
PIEBALD:
So?
JACKSON:
Well, I wasn’t going to mention this part. I didn’t want you to get the wrong idea. But—well, I always leave my ring of keys on the hook next to the door—that’s the house door that opens to the hallway
(Pointing to the exit)
leading to the diner. It’s ’cause I was always forgetting where I left them.
(Beat)
So … she took the car key off the ring when she left.
PIEBALD:
So, she stole your car?
MALE EXTRA 1:
(Half-rising)
That’s it! One more asinine word, Pieballs, an’ I swear—
JACKSON:
(Holding up his hand palm extended)
Now, wait—wait—wait! I can see as how you’d think that, Bob. Most people would’ve kept that thought to themselves, but—but that’s okay. It’s one of the reasons I didn’t want to bring it up.
(Beat)
But it was right there in the note she left us. She would leave the car, with the keys under the floor mat, in the Greyhound parking lot.
[General murmur, lasting close to half a minute]
BETT:
(In a voice accustomed to being listened to)
Mr. Forte … I feel the heaviness of your heart. And I know the void left in Mrs. Forte’s heart. I know that because I am a woman. And while I never felt the joy of motherhood—and its inevitable losses—I possess—all women possess … and all women share as part of their sexual legacy—the same nurturing spirit.
(Beat)
I suspect, Mr. Forte, that your Laura—
(Pausing to interject a short, but joy-filled laugh)
And Laura is—I assure you, Mr. Forte—Laura is alive and thriving … but I was going to say before I rudely interrupted myself … your Laura—Oh, I feel it so strongly—has in her something of the kindred spirit of—
(Turning her attention briefly to JAY III)
of this young man’s Grandfather. That mysterious force that Jay had—had for he is dead now—and Laura has … is a kind of foolhardy faith, a faith in that which your common sense and mine would declare as foolishness.
JACKSON:
Excuse me, Your Honor, but I don’t see how—any of that—
BETT:
How it’s relevant?
(Smiling)
Of course, you don’t. But you must try. Otherwise, you will never understand the gift of … of faith that was given, somehow, to Laura.
(Beat)
You said she was a loner, growing up. She had her chores here ... I understand. And she went to school. But when she wasn’t working, wasn’t at school …
JACKSON:
She read. Oh, God, how she read! Every other Saturday, Martha took her to the library in Greensley and she got the maximum they allowed. Twenty, thirty books.
BETT:
Food. Nourishment. To feed the plumping chrysalis while it waited for its moment.
PIEBALD:
Plumping what? Plum-Plum Chrys? What?
JACKSON:
We checked over the books when she was at school—Martha and me. Poetry—mostly poetry. A few novels. Oh, and biographies. Tons of biographies.
BETT:
All nourishment. Do you remember the novels, Mr. Forte?
JACKSON:
Old-time novels mostly. The ones they had us read in school.
BETT:
Twain?
JACKSON:
(Quickly, but with a look of puzzlement at BETT)
Yes! But how—? Laura always had one of Mark Twain’s novels tucked under her arm.
BETT:
(Casting a glance at HARRY)
Huckleberry—
JACKSON:
(Snaps finger)
Finn! Oh, my God, your honor! Huckleberry Finn.
(Eyes filling)
A moment …
(Beat)
Yes. Huckleberry Finn. See, we had to pay for it at the library. It was missing from the last stack we returned after she—left. That and another book we paid for; a biography of … oh, I wish I could think of his name … a French poet—a child poet. First name of Arthur … Arthur … Arthur—no it’s gone.
BETT:
You and Martha would do well to research it, Mr. Forte. Buy that biography. Study it. It might serve up some clues. If she took it with her, it will give you some clues.
JACKSON:
(Suddenly)
Rimbow!
(With closed eyes)
R-i-m-b-a-u-d. Rimbow! I know because she laughed at my pronunciation of it. I thought it was Rim-bawd, but she told me the French pronounce the ending as bow.
PIEBALD:
That’s really …
(Ends by shaking his head, grinning)
BETT:
That’s right! It really is interesting. Why else would she correct your pronunciation unless she wanted to share an important part of herself with her father?
JACKSON:
(Sighing)
Me and Martha didn’t know.
BETT:
Of course, you didn’t.
JACKSON:
That’s how I knew Arthur Ribaud was a child. Laura told me. It’s all so clear now! She wanted me to know about him. How he was a child prodigy. God help me, I didn’t let it go further than that. I just wasn’t interested. I had the diner ….
FEMALE EXTRA 2:
I don’t understand. Laura was—Laura is a poet, then?
JACKSON:
Not that I knew of. But then … I knew so little.
BETT:
If there weren’t obvious clues to that, then she probably wasn’t a writing poet. But that wasn’t important. Her mind and heart were in Huckleberry Finn. And in the life of Arthur Rimbaud. To get to her heart and mind, you need to read them.
HARRY:
I have a passing knowledge of Arthur Rimbaud, Your Honor.
END OF SCENE 5
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