Ends and Odds by Samuel Beckett

Author:Samuel Beckett
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Grove/Atlantic, Inc.
Published: 1976-05-27T16:00:00+00:00

Theatre II

Upstage centre high double window open on bright night-sky. Moon invisible.

Downstage audience left, equidistant from wall and axis of window, small table and chair. On table an extinguished reading-lamp and a briefcase crammed with documents.

Downstage right, forming symmetry, identical table and chair. Extinguished lamp only.

Downstage left door.

Standing motionless before left half of window with his back to stage, C.

Long pause.

Enter A. He closes door, goes to table on right and sits with his back to right wall. Pause. He switches on lamp, takes out his watch, consults it and lays it on the table. Pause. He switches off.

Long pause.

Enter B. He closes door, goes to table on left and sits with his back to left wall. Pause. He switches on lamp, opens briefcase and empties contents on table. He looks round, sees A.

B: Well!

A: Hsst Switch off. (B switches off. Long pause. Low.) What a night! (Long pause. Musing.) I still don’t understand. (Pause.) Why he needs our services. (Pause.) A man like him. (Pause.) And why we give them free. (Pause.) Men like us. (Pause.) Mystery. (Pause.) Ah well … (Pause. He switches on.) Shall we go? (B switches on, rummages in his papers.) The crux. (B rummages.) We sum up and clear out. (B rummages.) Set to go?

B: Rearing.

A: We attend.

B: Let him jump.

A: When?

B: Now.

A: From where?

B: From here will do. Three to three and a half metres per floor, say twenty-five in all.

Pause.

A: I could have sworn we were only on the sixth. (Pause.) He runs no risk?

B: He has only to land on his arse, the way he lived. The spine snaps and the tripes explode.

Pause. A gets up, goes to the window, leans out, looks down. He straightens up, looks at the sky. Pause. He goes back to his seat.

A: Full moon.

B: Not quite. Tomorrow.

A takes a little diary from his pocket.

A: What’s the date?

B: Twenty-fourth. Twenty-fifth tomorrow.

A (turning pages): Nineteen … twenty-two …twenty-four. (Reads.) “Our Lady of Succour. Full moon.” (He puts back the diary in his pocket.) We were saying then … what was it … let him jump. Our conclusion. Right?

B: Work, family, third fatherland, cunt, finances, art and nature, heart and conscience, health, housing conditions, God and man, so many disasters.

Pause.

A (meditative): Does it follow? (Pause.) Does it follow? (Pause.) And his sense of humour? Of proportion?

B: Swamped.

Pause.

A: May we not be mistaken?

B (indignant): We have been to the best sources. All weighed and weighed again, checked and verified. Not a word here (brandishing sheaf of papers) that is not cast iron. Tied together like a cathedral. (He flings down the papers on the table. They scatter on the floor.) Shit!

He picks them up. A raises his lamp and shines it about him.

A: Seen worse dumps. (Turning towards window.) Worse outlooks. (Pause.) Is that Jupiter we see?

Pause.

B: Where?

A: Switch off. (They switch off.) It must be.

B (irritated): Where?

A (irritated): There. (B cranes.) There, on the right, in the corner.

Pause.

B: No. It twinkles.

A: What is it then?

B (indifferent): No idea. Sirius.

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