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By Root 138 0

A census conducted house by house. William and Louisa accepted the situation as best they could. William’s instrument was taken. The symphony was no more. It was turned into a courtroom. There was suddenly a need for many more courtrooms than had previously existed. A portion of the citizenry previously given short shrift now rode high and composed the various juries of various courts that tried every imaginable offense. In fact, there were so many offenses that one couldn’t avoid committing crime. One had to simply limit one’s time in the public eye, accept small penalties. All manner of symbols denoting various crimes were worn on one’s person. This was the period of transition. Things grew worse. The food shortages began. They had conversations, saying things to each other. He will say one thing and she will reply, or she will speak and he will answer. They reach out often without reason, and speak often without import. This is the nature of their concern.

And then one day

LOUISA was

TAKEN AWAY

FOR GOOD.

William is crying and pacing up and down in the rooms of his house. He does this for days, but the scene lasts one hour, with his quiet sobbing. In the next room a small mouse puppet is crying also, in an entirely different register. Meanwhile, in the street outside, people come and go. A group of men looking straight ahead. A boy with a brown paper bag. A dog with a blanket hung over its back. A car here or there, a bicycle. William is sitting on the clean bedspread, holding one of Louisa’s dresses. He is not pressing it to his chest, he is simply holding it. Mrs. Gibbons begins to cry softly, and the puppets begin to cry, one by one. The whole room is sobbing, except Molly, who sits bolt upright. Her hands are clenched. The next scene is about to begin.

CURTAIN

A BOARD WITH WORDS ON IT:

END OF ACTS ONE and TWO

and

INTERMISSION

A minute passes. Molly turns around in her chair. Mrs. Gibbons is missing.

—Pssst. Molly.

Molly sneaks a look over her shoulder. Mr. Gibbons, beside the theater, is motioning to her. She tiptoes over. The puppets look in a different direction.

—What do you think?

Molly pulls a scrap of paper out of her pocket.

*So far so good.

She pauses.

*Do you … You know, my father …

Looking over her shoulder as she is writing, he:

—I don’t know. We’ll just have to see.

*But …

—I wish I knew. I …

Into the room, then, Mrs. Gibbons with a mug of chocolate for each of them.

—TO YOUR SEATS, shouts the bailiff, he upon the highest turret of the theater.

Molly catches the edge of Mr. Gibbons’s mouth moving, just by chance, as her eyes haven’t left him. Ventriloquism, she thinks. And if he uses his ventriloquism to say my words through the mouth of another—what is that called?

She scratches her leg and hunches her shoulders.

—TO YOUR SEATS!

ACT THREE: to be conducted by LOTTERY of MEMORY.

The curtain sweeps open. The veiled jester is again upon his floor of clouds.

—I shall explain, he says. It will all soon be clear.

Each time he speaks with a different voice. Now he speaks with the voice of a scholarly nun calling a pupil to task.

—Molly. Molly! Come here.

Molly comes out from the side of the stage. Her tail is very long and gray. She walks on her hind legs and wears very delicately embroidered clothing. Her feet are clad in dancing slippers.

—Will you say a few words for the audience?

*There are certain days that shape a person’s life because they change a person’s understanding about what is possible in a day. This is why it is very important, for instance, as a child, to visit the house of a talented painter. I am speaking of a man or a woman who lives alone, knows no one, and paints while rivers and streams pass effortlessly in the vicinity unimpeded in a country of small bridges, lamps, and messages delivered by hand. My father brought me in secret to such a woman. She lived in the country and, being a hermit, was undetected by the revolution’s machinery. Her house was a series of cottages linked by little paths through the woods. She would sit and watch the light as