Big Toot

How Hair Makes Life Real and You Can Too

 

a satire

by

Judson Blake

 

 

                                                       

Cast: 

Big Toot                   Owner & CEO of the Blue Heaven Amusement Park

Kushie                      Toot’s valet and adopted son

Mother Toot           Toot’s mother

Kissy Bazoom        Toot’s lover    

Wince                       Imposter called Doc Fok

Gascone                   Coiffeur to the Great and Troubled

Lotta Lickhouse   Kushie’s wife and Reality Czar of Blue Heaven

 

 

 

Act I, sc. 1 

 

( Gascone’s office.    If space permits this could be a small section of the stage while most of the action occurs in the rest.    Gascone is slumped in his armchair by a crude table in half light.    He wears dark clothing in grays and browns.     The room is crowded by shady hangings on the walls, half-empty bottles.   Ancient manuscripts roll off the table.    A construction of wires, audio gear and TV’s are turned to the wall.    A rack of guns includes a gas mask.   Motifs of skulls, ancient battle flags, spray cans and fishing net.   There are foxed pictures of maps and dead soldiers on the walls, along with worn coats and useless fabric.   To one side, a beautician’s standing hairdryer is draped in a thin black veil that hangs to the floor.      Wince enters carrying a flashlight which he needs to find his way.)

Gascone:     Shut the door.    Were you followed?      

Wince:          (hesitates) No. 

Gascone:     So.   Is he coming tonight?   

Wince:          He’s never coming. 

Gascone:     So why are you here? 

 ( Wince takes his time, accustoming himself to the light. )

Wince:          To tell you.    That you shouldn’t expect him.   

Gascone:     Okay.    And so? 

Wince:          So there are some other things.   (Wince pockets the flashlight, hangs up his coat, throws a switch to turn on a dim light.    He finds a bottle and pours himself a drink.   He strolls without haste around the room.   He goes to the shelf and idly fingers over Gascone’s miniature figurines.     He pretends he has nothing to say. )   Funny these little trinkets of yours.    Always admired them.    Like little magical tokens.   I wonder where you get them.    Well, you travel so much.    You’ve been everywhere and yet, look around at this, you wind up here.   

Gascone:     Get used to the low places, little man.   When you fall it won’t be far.   

Wince:          A tiger.    A snail.    A lady with no arms.     Well, those arms only get in the way,  eh?     I always wondered about you.     

Gascone:     You don’t wonder at all.     You pretend that you know already.     Which in a way is better then knowing and being burdened with real knowledge of anything.     So what are these “other things”? 

Wince:          Hm.   Things.  

Gascone:     You think you’ve got him figured out, don’t you?     As if you, dragging your tattooed ass in the dirt, as if you were secretly in his class.     Down in the gutter all things look the same.     You slither out when you’re sober and have a low opinion of what you see.   

Wince:          Ah.    I’m not on your high level.    

Gascone:     The level of the mind.     Of how things progress because people believe.    That’s land you’ll never cross.    I think you’re not the size of other men.     The conns you pull on old drunks, I’ve seen you in the park.     Well, that sleazy style won’t work on him.    See?   He didn’t come when you called last night and you were very sure, weren’t you?    He won’t return your tweets.    He’s used to taking things from others, not giving out favors for a whimper and a smile.     Nothing like what you’ve got to sell.  

Wince:          We think alike, Gascone, now we’re dealing with matters of a, what shall I say?    A succubus kind.      Yes, there is a way.    A way you’ll like.    What do you do?    You find a flaw.      A flaw he can’t correct.      And then what do you do?   

Gascone:     Ah.     You solve the problem.      You help him out. 

Wince:          I do.    I will.   It has to do with what he values most.    

Gascone:     Ah, you know of course.     But he’s more slippery than you.     “What he values most”, you say.    He cries for meat and when it arrives, throws it on the floor.    Says this is not meat.    Not real meat.    And you’re going to straighten him out?   Butchers are all fakes.   They only pretend to kill.    Throw it all out.   Then he does the same with men.     Same with women.   

Wince:          But.     He does have one thing.   

Gascone:     And that is?   

Wince:          He wants to be flawless.     And so I will help him out.       

(Both men stare into space as the lights fade.)       

 

Act I, sc. 2

 

( Executive suite of the Blue Heaven Amusement Park.    Sumptuous, over decorated, tasteless faux-Victorian furnishings.    Gaudy tapestries.    Small bland artwork overrun by heavy ormolu frames.    To left a floor to ceiling picture window.  A canopied couch where Mother Toot lies languishing with tissue wiping away tears.   ) 

 (Kissy Bazoom enters.)

Kissy:            Eeehyeww!    Mother Toot!    Why are you all bent up?   

MT:                Oh, Kissy, Kissy darling.     I’m so glad you’ve come.              

Kissy:            It’s a lovely day.   

MT:                It is and oh, I can’t forget: our life here at Blue Heaven is so perfect.    So peaceful.    So many lovely things.     So why do I have bad thoughts?

Kissy:            Bad thoughts?      Whatever for?      Here.    Let me get you some fluffy pillows.     There.     Lovey-dovey fluff.    Fluff-fluff.    Fluff-up.    Yeah.    Are you depressed?      You look yellowish.      Off color kind of.   Hm!   Fluff.  Did you lose money?   

MT:                No loss of money could make me feel this way.     I worry for my son.      I worry if he’ll be all right.

Kissy:            Gosh, Mother Toot.      Why ever?     He was fine last night. 

MT:                Last night there was gunfire out my window.    I know it’s part of the playful games the Amusement park stages for our guests.     But it was more alarming than before.    Louder.   Could real harm come from it, Kissy?   

Kissy:            Oh, I don’t see how.      It’s all in good fun.     Bombs, machine guns, drones flying everywhere, it has to look realistic.    It’s the Blue Heaven Amusement Park after all.    That’s part of the thrill.    

MT:                I’m glad you have a calm view.    But I know it affects my boy.    Ever since we came to Blue Heaven and he became famous he’s a great man to the world now, but to me he’s still my little Toot.    A mother knows.   For all the anguish he must face as chief of this the greatest amusement park in the world, adversity on every side, petty profiteers eager to drag him down.     The attacks outside are only an echo of the crushing weight he must bear.              

Kissy:            Gosh, that’s terrible, Mother Toot.   

MT:                And worse still is the awful dream I had.    

Kissy:            You had a dream?     Tell me.  

MT:                No, it’s too terrible to recount.    You’re his main squeeze now, and how can you do your part if your head is filled with strange ideas?  

Kissy:            Oh, come on.    I won’t tell.  

MT:                It was full of violent thunder claps.    Clouds rolled up like walls that shook with sounds of dark foreboding.     There were cruel grotesques rising out of the Earth and with one sweep of the hand they worked a roaring sea of chaos.    Crazed masses of people swayed to music prophesizing doom.    Then suddenly there came a flaming crash that broke down all before it.   Windows shattered.    Out of the blue a strange frantic being raced into the room carrying an empty golf bag, yes, and his garments on one side were torn to shreds and burned black.   And strangest thing of all: he had a red balloon tied to one ear.     It was horrid.   

Kissy:            Which ear?    

MT:                This one I think.      A red balloon of all things.      Like a toy in a maelstrom.    What can it mean, Kissy? 

Kissy:            They say all dreams mean something or other.    But you don’t take drugs.   So how could you have a dream so weird?    My.   I just don’t know. 

 (A crash comes from stage right.       Kissy and MT look around in horror.     Kushie races in from stage right swinging an empty golf bag.    He has a red balloon tied to his ear.     He wears a trim business suit with one side shredded, burnt and smoldering.    In the rest of the play he wears this same costume. )    

Kushie:        They’re coming.    They’re wild men.     They’ve broken through.    

MT:                What? 

Kissy:            Who?

Kushie:        They’re rioting.     It’s a swamp of brutal maniacs.    They strike out at anyone.    They say any profanity and the meanest always wins.    Oh, they won’t listen to reason.        

MT:                Oh, Kushie, surely it’s a game.     Only nice things happen at Blue Heaven Amusement Park.          

Kushie:        This is no game.    It’s an angry mob.         Oh, it’s not for fun, it’s a riot.    They’re like animals high on meth.    I saw a body lying in the street.       Hey, at least it’s him and not me.     I had to fight my way through.    I used every club I had beating my way here.    Cut and slash.     Slash and mash.    Bash and trash.      It was all I could do to hack my way here.    One way I clubbed with the driver.    A fevered crowd backed off.    Next I slashed with nine-iron.    That left them reeling.     The putter I buried in the chest of some crazed berserk who would’ve crushed my skull.    It’s a storm.    It’s a riot.    Take cover.   

Lotta:            (entering) Kushie, Kushie, Kushie baby.    There you are.    You’ve done it again.  

Kushie:        What?  

Lotta:            Believing reality when I told you not to.    

Kushie:        But it is real.    

Lotta:            It’s not real.    Come here, Honey.     You’ve had a bad time.   

Kushie:        How do you know?     You didn’t see the horrible things I saw.    You weren’t there.

Lotta:            Of course I was.      You just wandered into a new game we created.    You got frightened by some of the new attractions, that’s all.      New monsters, did they scare you?      The new rides?       Did they seem too realistic?     But stay where I say and things like that won’t happen.       That hair, ooo, is a mess.    And the red balloon again.             

Kushie:        Oh, Lotta, dearest, I guess I forgot.    You mean it’s not real?  

Lotta:            Of course not, Honey.      That’s why I’m Reality Czar for all of Blue Heaven Amusement Park, to keep you from bad dreams.      I make it real so you don’t have to.   You had a bad dream, that’s all. 

Kushie:        Bad dream?     Really?     I’ve never had a bad dream.      All my dreams have been about sweetness and being rich.

Lotta:            Of course.     But an amusement park has to have exciting rides and scary tunnels so people get a thrill when they come here.      And we just added some new ones.     Come to Momma and let me wipe away all those evil thoughts.    There.    See, Honey, you can’t have fantasy without reality to make it real, don’t you see?      Stands to reason.      That’s why I’m Lotta, the one and only Reality Czar for all of Blue Heaven.     When something is real, you can bet I’ll know it.      I make it real after all.     And when I don’t, well, then it’s not. 

Kissy:            Really?   Reality Czar, that’s so cool.     But is it what’s real or what people think is real?

Lotta:            Oh, Honey, I’m both.      What’s real and the other thing, I cover the ground in Blue Heaven.

Kissy:            She’s just divine the way she explains things.    It makes it so clear.     

MT:                You’re so right.      She must have known the dream I had and then she made it come true.    

Kissy:            It’s so reassuring, to know what’s real and what’s not.     I wish I knew those big words.  

( Big Toot enters from right.     As he enters blue and yellow rays come from the picture window left.)

MT:                My son.     He’s awakened.    

Toot:             Look at this vista, this peaceful land.     And so many people enjoying themselves.      How they swarm.   They can’t contain themselves.   Just look at this.         This, what you see here, this is what makes Blue Heaven Amusement Park the finest entertainment in all of creation.     Makes blue Blue Heaven truly blue.  

MT:                Oh.    That’s my boy.      

(  Crash of broken glass.     A brick flies through the window, lands at Big Toot’s feet.    It has a note tied to it.)

MT:                Aaiieee!   Oh, my God.     (falls back on couch)  

Kissy:            Wow!     That’s exciting.      They must’ve seen you coming.      

Kushie:        They’re throwing things.      Back off, Sir.    

Kissy:            Is that writing?      A mysterious message in secret code? 

Toot:             What?    Can’t they tweet? 

Kushie:        Careful, Sir.   Watch out.    It could be a bomb in disguise.         

Toot:              (  Toot strolls away, tweeting.)    Yes, check it out, Son.       ( Toot pecks on empty air.   He pecks on the walls, on the furniture, on Kushie’s head.    Kushie hesitatingly picks up the brick, reads the note.)     

Kushie:        Scribbling of some kind.     I can’t read it.    

Toot:              Are they congratulating me on my stature, the milestones I have achieved so far?

MT:                Has to be that.            

Toot:              Or on my ascendency yet to come in the future far beyond?    

Kushie:        It’s something else.    Something strange.   

MT:                It looks kind of sweet.   

(Kushie turns the note around so it’s right side up.)           

Toot:             Of course.   They’re visionaries, seekers blinded by the light.        

Lotta:            Let me see that.    (Grabs the note.)    Well, this is strange.     (reads)     Blue Heaven should be blue.   

Toot:              Well, isn’t it already?   

Kissy:            Oh, this is bad news, isn’t it?     I just know…  I gotta go…   (exits)

MT:                Oh, it is blue.    I know.     

Lotta:            Estonians call for blue.    Okay.    I was worried about this.    It’s the Estonians again.   There’s something I gotta tell you, Big Toot.    The Estonians are a problem.   The Estonians own our exciting toy concession and they’re holding out.

MT:                Holding out on my son?    I knew there was something wrong.    My horrid dream.    I must get help.   (exits)  

Kushie:        It’s the Estonian cartel, Sir.    They hold all the patents on the… er, you know.

Toot:              Estonians?      Is that a conspiracy?    A secret cabal?    I gotta find out.    (withdraws tweeting)  

Lotta:            Estonians are our main supplier.    We need their product.          

Kushie:        Product?    Oh, you mean the um… things.   

Lotta:            The what?  

Kushie:        Well, there was a box of … um-bum, but… and the unh… but it’s gone. 

Lotta:            What?     What’s left?       

Kushie:        We’re out of unh, totally.    And the … you know, bditz-it thing, well, I sold the last one…   

Lotta:            Can’t you talk English?     Are you speaking Estonian?   

Kushie:        I’m trying to learn.    

Lotta:            Learn what unh is?    What’s unh?  

Kushie:        It’s… it’s that thing, what you said.    That, that word.  

Lotta:            (pulls him to her)   Honeyy.   Look at you.   (holds up burnt arm)   You’ve had a hard day.    It’s not a word.    Electronic artificially intelligent pantyhose is our hottest item.    And the hydraulic chicken wringer specially engineered to serve so many other exciting functions?    Huh-uh?     And the elevated strapless bra with Internet of Things alligator clips?    So many thrills waiting to happen I can’t name them all.   And then there’s the super unhs and the giant um-bums, and the enhanced bditzies things.      If we had all that we’d be shoveling the platinum in carloads.     Without exciting toys , they’re unsettled.     Out of sorts.   People need entertainment.    This is Blue Heaven for God’s sake.   You expect us to sell liquor and drugs?  

Kushie:        Gee, Lotta, you think…. We never thought of selling liquor and drugs.   

Lotta:            People are ready for product.    They hunger for it.      You want us to freeze over?     You want us to live on borrowed money and sink into an infested swamp?    You know how big this is?    You know.   Get on the phone to those Estonians. 

Kushie:        I called last night.     They wouldn’t talk to me.    

Lotta:            Oh?    Did you happen to mention the unh?         Maybe the bditz didn’t translate right.    That might’ve under impressed them. 

Toot:             I won’t stand for this.     Hey, Kushie, get over here.   Get me an Estonian.

( Kushie taps on Toot’s cell.  Light goes up on Gascone alone in his office.) 

Toot:              (to cell on speaker)   Estonian.    Estonian there? 

Gascone:     (Fakes Estonian accent)   Estonian here.      Yes.    Estonian.  

Toot:              Okay, listen.     Listen, Estonian.     What’s this you’re telling my Reality Czar you’re doing some holdout game on those special toys?    Is that it?     ‘Cause that don’t work for us– not for the good times over here in Blue Heaven.    You know?    We got customers and obligations and interest payments and lotsa golden parachutes might go hungry, you hear that?    

Gascone:     Oh.    Not sunny day?     Oooh.     I didn’t know it was problem, Sir.

Toot:              It’s not a problem, Estonian.     It’s a problem and it’s not a problem.     You solve it, the problem goes away.     Flap-flap.    Like a little birdie, like that.     Are you gonna flap-flap for me?     Are you that kind of guy?    A guy who can make me flap happy? 

Gascone:     Sure thing, Sir.    Absolute.      Blue Heaven Amusement Park, oh, is the greatest.    Tops on our list.    Yessir.    Right there.     Upsy-tupsy.      You got it.     Is only one little thing.

Toot:              One thing? 

Gascone:     One little thing. 

Toot:              One thing?    One thing?   Things?    More things I don’t need.    How many thing-things are there?    The whilitzer kazoo?    The thought guided virtual reality torpedo, what can it be?  

Gascone:     Blue Heaven is always the best, Sir.     It’s just that….

Toot: The 5G artificial nipple, you’re not gonna hold out on that, are you?    It’s a hot item, I can tell you.    I gave you a yacht, a whole yacht, for that order.   

Gascone:     No, no.    We got yacht.      What we didn’t get….

Toot:              And it was a great yacht.    A real class yacht for an Estonian.

Gascone:     Is wonderful.      True blue.     What we didn’t get was the hole.    Of the True Blue golf course.    The 18^th Hole.    We Estonians try to play and then we come up to the last hole and we get nothing.      No hole.       

Toot:              …and that magic thingy with the corkscrew and the bear claw at the end?    You send that?  

Gascone:     We don’t got what we don’t got.    I say it for you special: the 18^th Hole is no more.

Toot:              18^th Hole?    What 18^th Hole?   Of my golf course?  What’s he talking about?    

Gascone:     18^th Hole of Dilly-Dally golf course, of course.     You remember?     You promise that so sweet so nice you promise–and then you give away.     Who you give it to?    Chinese.     Chinese got 18^th hole now.     Not nice.    Not Estonian.    18^th Hole, now is not Blue.    Is Chinese.    Is that fair to Estonia?     We here in Estonia think not eevie stevie.      We got the yacht, but they stole the hole.     Heh-heh.    Is little joke.    Okay?   So sad they got it and we don’t.    But Blue Heaven, that is greatest.      Great-great.   Blue-blue.    Greatoh, eh?     Just little thing.  

Lotta:            We got it.    We don’t own the 18^th Hole.  

Gascone:     Blue Heaven is blue-blue, Sir.    

Toot:              Is he… ?    Is he… talking to me?    18^th Hole?    Of the golf course?    Of my golf course?    (turns away in a stupor)

Lotta:            All right, Estonian.     Enjoy the rest of your day.     

Gascone:     Is night here in Estonia, Sir.     Ah, he hang-up.     Mus be in hurry up lotsa totsa in Blue-blue.      (light on Gascone fades.    Toot sinks down in despair.)

Toot:              This can’t be true.     The 18^th hole is sacred.      It’s the most important part of the greatest golf course in the world.

Lotta:            This is for real, Big Toot.     You can’t fake this.    This is a bigger deal than we thought.    I mean big big.  

Toot:              I like big.  

Lotta:            You won’t like this big.     The Chinese have bought the 18^th Hole.     Without firing a shot. 

Kushie:        No.    They can’t do that.   Oh, I remember those sweet days when you first acquired Dilly-Dally.     Dilly-Dally in the valley, your mother said.    Made it sound like an off-color innuendo, but I saw through that:   It was golf course to the stars.     And you let me tee off the very first time.         

Toot:             Oh, this is awful.    It’s incomplete.      No 18^th hole?         

Kushie:        And I didn’t go in the rough, did I, Dad?          

Toot:             This is staring into a black abyss.     A homeless bum has his shopping cart but I’m left without the simplest thing, the last hole.     The one they all yearn for.    They own… the Chinese really own….   But… how could they buy something that isn’t theirs?    

Kushie:        Oh, they’re so conniving.  

Toot:              (Hiding his head)   Back it out.    Say it’s not so.        

Lotta:            Well, we could make it real if it was fake.     But it’s real already.     That’s a toughy.   First the Estonians hold out on us so we got no product.     And now the Chinese buy our real estate.     The Estonians hold out, the Chinese hold on.             

Toot:              (prostrate, groaning on the couch)      Oh.    They got…    They got the whole hole.        (falls back in a faint. There is a long pause while everyone gathers to one side to observe this strange behavior.   Slowly MT and Kissy enter behind Lotta and Kushie.    All crouch in awe. ) 

Kushie:        Gosh, he’s never done that before.   

MT:                My boy.     He needs a rest.  

Lotta:            Too much reality.    It takes a toll.  

Kissy:            He was fine last night.  

            (lights out.)   

 

 

Act II, sc. 1

( MT & Kissy are waiting to one side.    Toot lies prostrate on the couch.   Cymbal crash.  Wince enters stage right)

MT:                Here he is.   (runs to Wince)  Oh, Doctor you’ve come.   He’s here for my boy.  

Kissy:            Who?    Who are you?

MT:                He’s the doctor.    

Kissy:            Hieee.     You’re cute.   

Wince:          Doctor Foc.    I’m here to help.   But I don’t insist on formality.   Just call me Doc Fok.      It’s a normal name.    Rhymes with clock, dock and knock.  

Kissy:            Oh, that makes sense.           

MT:                Well, Doc, there’s Big Toot.     Flat on his back.    He’s suffered a terrible shock.   Can you pick him up?   

Wince:          ( Examines Toot.    Touches his ear.  Pokes at his shirt.   )   Ah-ha.    Ah-ha.    Appears to be a case.    Acute somatic de-depression.   Inflammation of the upper left frontal lobe.    I’ve seen a case.        Ooookay.   Now, let me explain.   Get right to the point.   You were right, Mother Toot.   Right to bring me in.    As you yourself must have felt, felt deeply, with your mother’s intuition.  

MT:                Oh, I have.   I have.    Oh, he feels what I’m going through.    He knows.     Even if he’s in a coma, which he seems to be right now, oh, he knows.     

Wince:          We got the report.    We know there’s reason for concern.   

MT:                Report?     Ooooh.   Oh, but Doctor, this has to go far beyond a silly report.    It has to be, if you excuse the expression, like in touch,… in touch with… the Beyond.  

Wince:          Hm!   (makes note)  Wants connection with higher powers.     Yep.  

MT:                He worries what the papers will say.

Wince:         Ah-ha.    Paranoid fears of eternal damnation.   Oookay.    Wistful desire of course for the opposite, one night of divine bliss.     

Kissy:            Sure, that would be nice.   

Wince:          Affects his mind.

Kissy:            And that too.    That’s so sweet.          

Wince:          Hm-hm.   I see.     That’s frequently a symptom.   All right.     Has he been eating his veggies?  

MT:                Oh, no, no.   I wouldn’t think…. He only likes, well, cooked in a special….

Wince:          Fried basil leaves?  

MT:                What?   Well, I…

Wince:          Beef tacos still twitching? 

MT:                Well, sometimes he….

Wince:          I thought so.    I can help.     First thing is we need to test for Q disease.

MT:                Oh my,…. Disease?     What disease?

Kissy:            Well, he lost some real estate.     That could be the problem.      

Wince:          Oh, no.    It won’t be anything simple like that.     The reports are clear.   I’ve seen the EKG, the CBC, the IOT and the SPQR.    His cholascerbic bile scrotum-totum is oatum.    Herrum scarum tested way out of range.    No, Ladies, I’m sad to tell you: this is not pretty.     Big Toot is more susceptible to the Q disease than most.                     

MT:                I didn’t realize it was so…

Wince:          It’s going around.    We bribe the media, so few are aware.     Not to alarm the populace.      It could be communicated by exhalation, even by word of mouth.    The more they know, the more the disease might spread.   We don’t want an epidemic on our hands.               

MT:                Well, if you think for my boy….

Wince:         Only a blood test can be sure.   (Wince produces a huge hypodermic syringe. )        

Kissy:            He was fine last night.  

Wince:          This won’t take a minute.     I’ll get it while he’s asleep.   

(Wince advances on Toot and applies the syringe.    There is a loud slurping sound.)   

MT:                Don’t hurt my son.

Kissy:            Eeehyeww!    

Wince:         Ah!    Success.    All right.    Good sample.      That’ll do.     We should know by tonight.   I have dozens more to do.    There’s suspicion everywhere.     Well, toodle-doo.  

MT:                 Oh, but wait, Doctor.    Wait.   My son, if he has the Q disease, he mustn’t ever find out.    You must protect him from the knowledge.    

(Kissy primps her hair and models in the mirror.)

Wince:         True.    Even knowledge that he has the Q Disease will exacerbate the condition, make it much much worse.    It’s a science.  

MT:                But you didn’t tell us, really, I mean actually really,…  

Wince:         What?  

MT:                What the Q disease, I mean, does.   I mean I can imagine, a thing like that, it’s strictly need to know.     But we’re family here.   We stick together.     And we need to understand the risks.       

Wince:         Well, there are many.      I can’t enumerate them all.            

MT:                But what are the symptoms?     I mean besides sadness and despair like I feel for him.    

Wince:         Symptoms appear late and by then there’s little hope.   

MT:                But there must be something, something we can see. 

Wince:         The mouth and larynx are the central locus of infection.    In advanced stages these and adjacent organs even become plasto-leprotic or as some say in the literature, dying off.       Those vital organs, as if having a mind of their own, well, they join forces, collude against the rest of the body and decide to separate, yes, depart from the whole of the otherwise healthy organism.     Then, in that outcome, it’s called Dropsy-Q.    People say Q-flu or Q-do and Q-di-do and when someone else gets it: “Q-too?”   It makes a brotherhood of sorts.   Blood and other fluids everywhere.    In the end the body turns into a hideous gelatinous mass.    In medical terms it’s called the gulch.   And older term for it was the gullet-musset.     Sometimes in old scholarly papers it was called the gullet-gulch, but that usage is deprecated.     Today the proper term is just gwulch.      Correct pronunciation involves swallowing mucus when you say it.     Those parts of the body that have fallen off actually become an entity in their own right.    The resultant pseudo-organism becomes like a disgusting animal that grovels along the floor eating anything and leaving behind nothing but drivel.

Kissy:                        Oooh.   Like a puppy.   I had one of those.     He did funny trick like this….           

MT:                Drivel?   Oh, my.   My son?    But Doctor, are you sure you mean drivel?   You don’t mean snivel?  

Wince:         You question the importance of drivel?

MT:                No, of course not.     Drivel has its own special domain.   I only want to know if snivel might be involved. 

Wince:         In some cases I’ve seen snivel was indeed implicated.    You’re very perceptive to bring up snivel.   

MT:                But drivel, if it were only drivel alone, mightn’t that provide some hope? 

Wince:         It would, if you hadn’t brought up snivel. 

MT:                Well, if it’s not important, I mean on a higher level, well, why do we have snivel at all? 

Wince:         Snivel occurs at an advanced stage.    But by then the body parts have deserted, completely fallen off and are snuffling along the ground in their own offal.      The snuffle of snivel is the usual technical term.    It isn’t a pretty sight.   

MT:                But what if he changes his mind?    What if he decides not to snivel and turn only to drivel?  

Wince:         You mean, if I get your meaning, if the disease changes his mind for him.     Then he would, metaphysically speaking, turn around in his tracks.     I’ve seen a strange case in Estonia.     The result is what we call swivel.     A common late stage hyperplasia.    Many turn to swivel when they’ve gone to the limits of drivel.     And when sniveling no longer has the usual self-palliative effects.     In the act of swiveling, the patient in effect does a verbal pirouette, aka swivel, for the sake of advancing incomprehension, if you get my meaning.      

MT:                You mean….

Wince:         Yes, I’m afraid so.   Swivel is the last refuge when all drivel has gone its course.    Worst case, the distraught sufferer can’t tell swivel from drivel, even when snivel has been temporarily relieved, if that makes it simpler for you.      It’s painful for the patient, but it doesn’t effect a cure.

MT:                Yes, the cure.     There has to be a cure for my son.

Wince:         Sadly, there is only a race for the cure.    

MT:                But he’s been weak and out of sorts for days.    I know.   I’ve felt it.     Felt it here.

Kissy:            He was fine last night.  

Wince:         So that’s the Q Disease.    It’s very serious.     In fact, unless it’s carefully concealed,  you can tell when someone has it by the tell-tale phrase they all utter in their sleep: Q-too?        Well, I have the sample.    I can let you know the prognosis.     It could be further tests will be needed.     We’ll get a PDQ, a lipid panel, a qualude panel, a wood panel, and a dishpan panel.     And finish off with a flannel panel.      

MT:                You’re so kind.      I have to lie down.     It’s too much for now.   (exits)

 ( Wince starts to exit. )

Kissy:            You’re a doctor?    We didn’t get introduced.    I’m Kissy.    Kissy Bazoom.    I’m a little bit famous, but not really famous.   I’m the big guy’s sweetie.     The Emperor.     I call him Emperor because people all do what he says.     

Wince:         Ah, well, he’s a great man and a lucky one.

Kissy:            But he’s very busy.     And I have a lot of time on my hands.     

Wince:         Well, you take care of yourself.   (starts to exit.    Kissy stands in his way.)

Kissy:            I think doctors are the cutest.      They know so many things.     They know how to get to the bottom of things.     Are you like that? 

Wince:         Well, I ….

Kissy:            When I say bottom of things, I mean way down.   

Wince:         Way… down?

Kissy:            Yeah, wayyy down.     Like that.    Down.   ( grabs his tie)    Down inside.     ‘Cause when you get down inside you get to the real thing, don’t you think?      I mean the total experience.    You like real things, don’t you?        

Wince:         Well, what’s real, sometimes, I mean there are times when it’s, I suppose,  better than what’s not.     Not real, I mean.   

Kissy:            Oh, we agree.      We’re on the same wavelength.     That’s so rare.    It’s so unusual.   

Wince:         I’m so glad you believe me.    It touches me right here.   Just between you and me, well, if you want to know, I’m a total fake.   

Kissy:            Oh but then, I’m real.     I’m all real.     

(MT returns, comes forward, takes Kissy by the hand and draws her to one side)

MT:                Give us a little privacy, Doctor.   I mean if you would. 

Wince:         Oh.    Well, sure.      Sure, sure.     I mean sure.     Very sure.     Sure…

( Wince  exits)    

MT:                My dear, you’re so young.    No one can blame you for a little coquetry, but where does it lead?    How can you see the larger picture when you have so little history to draw from?     Why, look around you.    (Kissy does.   MT goes to the window to look out.)    I remember when my boy first acquired this, all you see, the great palace and executive conclave here of the Blue Heaven Amusement Park and environs.    That was his great dream.    But was that enough?     No.    Soon he had to have it all.    The Dilly-Dally Golf Course had to be his too.    And now see out there, well, beyond those burnt cars and you can see the flags of our own private Silver Sand Beach Club and the Castle in the Cream Lagoon.    Oh, he had to have them.    Yes.    Why, ever since he was a pup his little successes cheered me up.     Like you, the latest notch on his bedpost.      He’s had hundreds, of course.   But now, even after all these years, each new romp, it still warms a mother’s heart.    I’m so proud.    But you’re special, Kissy.    You’re something extra.      No one can replace you.     And what about now?    What about you and this great world before you?    I can guess a girl like you has been around the pool table quite a few times.    You know the right moves of course.     But in the long run, how can I say… have you ever…

Kissy:            Huh?

MT:                Have you ever thought of… well, tying the knot?    

Kissy:            Why Mother Toot, I didn’t know you were into…

MT:                No, no.   Of course…

Kissy:            Oh, I’m not criticizing.      I keep an open mind.      I mean really open.     You can tell me what’s on your mind.  

 MT:               No, no, child.    I mean what about the idea of marriage? 

Kissy:            Marriage?   Wow.    Really?    Between two people you mean?    Huh! (folds two fingers together)  I never thought of that. 

MT:                Well, it takes a mother’s higher wisdom to see through the fog to what’s important in life.  

Kissy:            You mean after sex and money.   

MT:                I mean in the larger scheme of things.     I mean,… let me ask you: why Kissy, why didn’t you ever marry?

Kissy:            Um, well to be honest, Mother Toot, hm!    I guess I forgot. 

MT:                And so that’s why I’m here to remind you.     To round out your ideas, unformed as they are.    

Kissy:            Gosh.   That sounds super.     You’d do that for me?  

MT:                Yes and who better to choose than my Little Toot?   Hm?    I mean he’s Big Toot now, but to me, to a mother, he’ll always be as he was in those first few golden years.     When he was two toots and then three toots and then ha-ha, high toots to the wind.     With his cattle prod electric tank and his little hammer bashing up this and that.    And now when he’s full grown I want him to feel the exaltation of union, of togetherness for life, of a bosom companion he can call his own.     Oh, and Kissy, you couldn’t have known, but the glory of the wedding ceremony, the pageantry, the flowers, the gifts from the hearts of so many, so, so many, the coming together of friends for life.     The music, the orchestral triumphs, the sparkling society that closeness engenders and marriage makes complete.     It’s an experience of a lifetime, simply put.  

Kissy:            Well, I don’t want to miss out on that, Mother Toot.  

MT:                So I’ll arrange it.    Leave it to me.      I know how to reach his inmost soul. 

Kissy:            Me too.      Oh.    Well, you mean what’s got exalted and sparkled and with flowers and like that.    

MT:                Yes.   You’ll see.     I know what my growing boy needs.   Your breasts of course.    But so much more that I know you have.    Oh, a mother understands even before the child knows.    Yes.    One day you’ll see: a mother has her ways.    

            (lights out.) 

Act II, sc. 2

(Wince in doctor’s smock with stethoscope.  Toot enters.) 

Toot:             Hey, Doc, you say I don’t have it, but she says I do.     And the 18^th hole she said that’s a goner.  What am I to do?      She’s the Reality Czar.    If I get rid of her, people won’t believe the fantasy is real.    They’ll confuse it with what’s real and they won’t take the rides any more.     I need her to make stuff real but not really real.    

Wince:          Well hey, she sees the other side.     The dark side.      But you don’t have to see that. 

Toot:              Dark?     Dark?     Hey, kid.     Get this.     This chick, my Reality Czar.     Whatta hunk, heh?     Lots of science stuff she’s got.   In addition to… Heh-heh.   For the whole of Blue Heaven.     Are you thinking straight?    

Wince:          (faked laugh)  Women.     What you gonna do?      They all think alike.  

Toot:              She says what she thinks is true.   (taps on cell) T. H. N.  No.  I.   She keeps saying that.      No.   I keep saying that.         

Toot:              (to cell)  What is she tweeting?    Cure?    No cure?    She says if I didn’t have the disease I wouldn’t have lost the 18^th hole.    I give her a cool job and she gives me what?  Science?   When I got other problems.    Big problems.    The 18^th Hole.  It’s gone.    That bitch talks too much.    I gotta get someone to push that cunt under a garbage truck.      Well…   Ah, but she has a nice ass.   (air gropes)   Damn.    No, maybe not.   

Wince: (draws Toot aside)     Oh, Sir.    I see your problem.      Even for a doctor it touches me.    I sympathize.    For a man of your stature, there’s a better way, a sweeter way to deal with um… the lady.      

Toot:              Yeah? 

Wince: Hey, she’s your Reality Czar, well, you know what they think?   

Toot:              This one thinks too much.      Doesn’t understand me.          

Wince: Yes, and that’s just the start.     Then there’s more.    There’s statistics.     You get me? 

Toot:              Of course I get you.     You been here a while.     I’ll mop the floor with you.     Just kidding, kid.    

Wince: Women.     They look at the dark side.     They’re paid for it.    

Toot:              I don’t pay.     I don’t pay.     Except the super tens, with hooters out to here, you know.    Then I pay a little.    Why not?     Give them a good time.  

Wince: What’s a Reality Czar anyway?     Just another voice on the phone you gotta talk to.     Or they talk and talk.     You got time for that?

Toot:              Hey, depends…  

Wince:          But if you get rid of her you have to replace her.    With something better.        

Toot:              Replace that twat?     Eh, she’s got a good ass.     I dunno.  

Wince: Easy as that.     ‘Cuz I’ll tell you, I see it all the time.      They paint the picture they have in their heads and how can you change that?   

Toot:              Yeah, yeah.    It’s in their heads.    So you change heads.     Haaa.     Is that funny or what?    

Wince: Yeah, you change heads.      And this is a new one that doesn’t talk back.     It’s a new head.   Here.    (pulls out the rubber duck with feathers, squeezes it; it squeaks. )  See this?     This is no ordinary executive appointment.    Oh, no.    This, watch closely, this is your next Reality Czar for all of Blue Heaven.     You replace that ziphead with lipstick — and you get this.    Heh?   And lookee here.    See this feather?    It looks small, doesn’t it?      But.     Look closely, that’s artificial intelligence that’s beyond intelligent.    That right there, that’s a nuclear scientist embedded with deep learning way down.     Stuffed with super brains.    Packed with all the minds you’ll ever need and then some.      You get the idea.      Here.       From me to you.    Henh?      Just wait a couple days, that’ll be the right time.  

 (Toot examines it, clutches the rubber duck.  ) 

Toot:              Right time?    I’ll fire her right now.

Wince: Ah, no.    That’s too quick.    You have to wait for this little fellow’s deep learning to acquire all the things she knows.     Just a day or two.    You don’t want to upset the media.      So do it when something else is in the wind.    You give it the higher tweet, the sweeter tweet.    

Toot:              Yes, but still I grieve: that won’t get me back the thing I’ve lost.    The last hole.     The lost hole.  

Wince: Oh, but it will.    With the woman gone, this genius creature in your hand, what vistas will open up.   You’ll be free.     Free to strive.   To strive higher.     To attain your fondest wish and reach for the infinite.    The higher perspective, the deeper mind.   And striving higher you’ll move on to greatness.      

Toot:              I hear you.    Yeah.    The highest.    The great minds.   (cuddles the duck )  I feel the will to strive rising in me even now.    Higher.   To the highest.    Yeah.    That’s why I gotta move, move it, move on.     (holds the duck up and gives a last crazy glance at Wince.     Lights out.)      

 

Act II, sc. 3 

(  Gascone is slouched as before, alone in the darkness.     Wince enters with flashlight, throws his coat on the floor.)

Wince:          They found out.     

Gascone:     Were you followed?        

Wince:          I said, they found out.           

Gascone:     And you thought they never would. 

Wince:          I thought it would take time.    But no.   A subversive leak.   Had to be that.     That’s the only way it could have happened.           

Gascone:     An informer.      

Wince:          Yes.       

Gascone:     Someone like yourself.      

Wince:          Well…         

Gascone:     Only more honest.     

Wince:          Somewhat honest.    Don’t blow it out of proportion.       

Gascone:     But they think they’re safe.   

Wince:          Yes.    Thanks to me.    I convinced them that the Q disease can’t touch him.       

Gascone:     When of course it already has.    

Wince:          Don’t get simple.    I don’t get paid if there are no problems.          

Gascone:     No, you get sacked.

Wince:          Which I don’t intend to happen.          

Gascone:     Well, you’d better get cracking then with this new problem.       

Wince:          It is a problem.    It’s nagging at them.    It’s a brick wall they hadn’t expected.    What would you do?           

Gascone:     Do?     I wouldn’t do anything.    I’d just talk, which is what you’re going to do.        

Wince:          And say what?            

Gascone:     Do I have to do your thinking for you?    You have the problem, that’s the gold.    This thing with the 18^th Hole.     Dear to his heart.    That’s where you go.    Go right to that.    It’s a flaw and so you turn it into a success.    It’s a low point, so you make it into a splendid cliff overlooking the sea.     It’s a downer, so you make it into an ascent.           

Wince:          Yes.    You’re right.     That’s where I have him.   I have him hooked.    I just have to draw him in.           

Gascone:     One thing he loves: the subservience of others.      He likes to be master and take all the world in servitude.     He likes to be praised.    So, isn’t it obvious?     The way to his heart?     Why, of course you praise.    You adulate.     You pretend to adore.    

Wince:         Then he thinks he has me in the palm of his hand, whereas I have him in mine.       

Gascone:     And draw him on.     The completion.     The taking of territory from those who don’t deserve to have it.    Touch him there and then you own him.   On to the greatest height, the pinnacle of blue, Blue Heaven.    Then he will see a higher light.    Let him.   A light he’s never seen before.    I’ll show him that, since you can’t.     Then, my friend, one of us will be the captain, the capo of all he surveys.   

 

Act III, sc. 1

 

(Toot is seated alone downstage.    He is intent tweeting on his cell.     Often, when someone speaks to him he won’t answer quickly, but continues his tweet and pauses before speaking.     He gives the impression of being oblivious or perplcxed by others.      Now from time to time he makes the motion of bowling an imaginary bowling ball, down, toward the audience.    Each time he does this he pays close attention to how the imaginary pins fall, sometimes standing up to watch, then he reacts to this and goes back pecking on his cell.     Kushie enters hurriedly, stops with hesitation. )

Kushie:        Uh,… Dad?     Dad?    (pause while Toot tweets) I can call you Dad, can’t I?      I mean, if it’s all right.   

Toot:              Hh?

Kushie:        I can, can’t I?     Call you… Dad. 

Toot:              Of course.     Of course, son.     You’re adopted of course.    But we’re family now.

Kushie:        Oh, good.     But hey, well, can I ask you… something?   

Toot:              (tweeting)   Hm? 

Kushie:        Dad?    It’s kind of important.  

Toot:              Yeah?    Yeah?    What?  

Kushie:        (hesitates.    Nervous laugh )   Oh, nothing.    I’m so silly.   (pause)    I wonder… um,… mind telling me, um, how you got to be the CEO of all of Blue Heaven.   It’s… it’s such a big job. 

Toot:              Son, let me make it clear for you.    You interview for the job and if you interview better than anyone else, hey, you get the job.     That’s the end of it.     Simple?     Of course.      What you do on the job doesn’t matter, doesn’t make any difference at all, because you interviewed.      Isn’t that obvious?     You got the interview and the game is over.      You scored.     You won out.   That’s how I got to be CEO of Blue Heaven.       Is this too hard for you?      Once you’ve won out, won the title, the command of the tiller, why then all life is easy.      You just have to concentrate on having fun after that.    Culture your whims.    Live them out.    Stick by them, stay with the ones you love.    The faves.   You get to the high point like me, then you can make it all real.     You have that right.     Because the purpose of life is to make fantasies real.     And what are those fantasies?     They’re like little ducks and unicorns and fuzzy bears that are lost in the wabe.      That’s so big, so huge….

Kushie:        What’s the wabe?

Toot:              It’s … well, it’s…. where you wander with your babe.    Like that.     The dreams you had when you were a kid are so cunning and sweet.      And they have lost their way and have to find their manifest destiny after that.     Get my meaning?      Dreams and whims, hey, they get lost when we grow up, lost on a sea of useless facts and so we have to find them and rescue them back to the beautiful world of enhanced illusion, authentic whimsy.     For, better believe it: enhanced illusion is doing a favor for reality.      It’s a beautiful dream, better than the best CGI because it’s up here and I have it.   (points to his head)   I’ve got the dream right here.      In fact that’s a beautiful thought right now.     I better send that out (tweets).     Y’see, son.     That’s the hard lesson you’ve got to learn:  how to turn facts against themselves so they aren’t facts any more.     They become poof and piffle and then you’re free of them.      Freedom, boy.     Freedom to dream!   

Kushie:        That’s so impressive, Dad.    How you could know all that.   Dad?    Please.    What I really wanted was to talk to you about something else.    

Toot:              Sure.   (tweets)    Sure.    

Kushie:        I can call you Dad, can’t I?      I mean, if it’s all right.   

Toot:              You just asked me that.   

Kushie:        Oh.   Right.   You’re so perceptive.     You think of … all the right things. 

Toot:              That’s why I’m CEO, son.     So I can lead the way.        

Kushie:        Listen, Dad, there’s something… something I’ve gotta tell you.      Something you ought to hear.      

Toot:             See, I’ve noticed that about you.   You don’t think clearly, Kushie.   You’re confused.    Your ideas are muddled.     But you’re typical in that way.    I’ve seen it many times.    And when the whole populace in Blue Heaven is muddled, that’s when they need a strong CEO.   That’s why I give them what they need.   The best rides.    The best thrills.    Colorful.   High up.    They cry, they plead for someone powerful and assertive, not an economist.    That’s why we have it over the Chinese, they’re only economists.  

Kushie:        Well, economics used to be important.    Money.    At least for people who, not like us, don’t have any.   

Toot:              Exactly.    If people don’t have any, or don’t have much, they can’t see the big picture.   They need good rides, good thrills.    That’s where I come in.    I give them that.   And how?   Because I’ve got what it takes.    Think about it: What’s more important than money?   Eh?   Can you guess?   What’s more important than brains, hard work, education, good will, money or any of that?    Do you know?      Well, I’ll tell you.    It’s cuteness.    Heh?   Cuteness trumps all those things.     Being cute will open doors that brains and money and education and using big words—none of them can.     And I’m cute.    I’ve proven it.     They all say it.    

Kushie:        It thought you were powerful and assertive and had strong opinions.   

Toot:              Exactly.    That has cuteness built in.  

Kushie:        But it’s not the highest.    It’s not what the doctor said would lead you to greatness. 

Toot:              Not yet.    Not yet.    But soon. 

Kushie:        But that isn’t really it, Dad.     That’s not what I have to talk to you about.   I mean, it really has to do with something well, that you told me.      A few days ago.     Like father-son?    You remember?      Well, no.      How could you?      It’s only a detail to you, you have your mind on important things and I, well, I’m just a footnote in all of that.      I mean, I wish I weren’t.      I’d like to be, well,…  important like you.       It’s probably hard for you to understand what it’s like.      Being me.    (Toot bowls.)     Like?     Being,…well, not that im-portant.      Might as well say it.      But I’m getting there.     I’m following your lead.    Yes.     What?     Why are you doing that?  

(Toot stands and sees the imaginary strike.    He smiles and crosses his arm, strutting before Kushie.) 

Toot:              Whattaya see?    Huh? 

Kushie:        (Stares.   Hesitates.   )    Uh,… well… Strike!    Beautiful strike!

Toot:              Eh?    Eh?   See that?     I took the whole thing.      That’s what you gotta do in life, son.    Take the whole thing.    (Toot flexes his hand the way he holds a bowling ball, demonstrating for Kushie.)

Kushie:        Well, actually, that’s what I want to talk to you about, Dad.      I mean, as I understand it.      What you said.   What you told me, well, it was just the other day.   

Toot:              And I told you right.   

Kushie:        You remember?      How you said… I can’t quite get to it….

Toot:              It’s easy, son.    Here.   Put your thumb here.      Like this.    No, not like that.    Like this.      You cock it.     And then the middle finger.       See how easy it is?      You gotta grab.     And hold.       And then you gotta sail.    (Toot makes his bowling motion.)   Sail!     And then you let her loose and she sails on down.     Pow!     Strike!      What’d I tell you? 

Kushie:        I know.    I know.    I know that’s exactly what you said.      

Toot:              Yeah.  

Kushie:        I know you’ve got the experience.      The know how.      The commanding presence in a tight situation.

Toot:              Yeah.    Tight.      I like’em tight.     

Kushie:        And you always come out on top in the rough and tumble of real life.    

Toot:              Real?    Oh, yeah.    Real real.      

Kushie:        I mean the hard facts, that’s what you deal with every day.  

Toot:              Hard.       (bowls again)      Stee-rike!      The hard way.      But it’s the strike that matters.      The all the way.    The touchdown.     The home run.       Hard enough so you can break plates on it.     (Toot bends down and examines Kushie’s crotch as if he could see through fabric.      He gives the crotch an approving tap.)     Can you break plates on it?      Can you?  

Kushie:        Whut?    Well,…  Can I?    Well, that’s what I wanted to talk to you about, sort of.      I mean….        

Toot:              Don’t hold back, Son.     Speak your mind.     I always have.       And look where I am now.           

Kushie:        Well, you know how you said, I mean when you said, I mean, when I’m with her, with the woman, with…. My wife.  You know.    You said.  

Toot:              What’d I say, son?   Spit it out.   Make sure you get my words right.  

Kushie:        You said… you said I gotta grab her like with a bowling ball.   Yeah.   With the middle finger here, up her… you know.   And the other finger here, like where,… you catch on.  Don’t you?   

Toot:              Catch on.    I like that.   

Kushie:        And then you squeeze, squeeze hard, you said.  

Toot:              Yeah.  Squeeze hard.   Squeeze till she screams.    And then you swing.    (Toot goes through the bowling motion again.   He’s ecstatic at the result.)  Cast.    Bowl.   Ooooh.    Stee-rike!     Yes.     Now there.    There.    There you see how it’s done.  

Kushie:        Well, Dad.    I,… I tried it and it, well to be honest, it didn’t work out so well.  

Toot:              Ah, well, you missed.     Just have to try again.     And practice is where the fun is.    In’it?     That’s how you find the sweet spot.      See, with your fingers, see?     Like this.   You feel it.    Swee-uht!    Eh?    Can you make your grip like this?  

Kushie:        No, no.    You don’t see.      I did what you told me.      Pretty much.     But I didn’t get the reaction I… well, was expecting.  

Toot:              No?   

Kushie:        No.    She said,… well, I can pretty much say it word for word.     She said….

Toot:              Yeah, spit it out, son.

Kushie:        She said if I did that again, she would cut off my dick, fry it in canola oil and feed it to the cat.  

(Pause while Toot strains in thought.)

Toot:              I didn’t know you had a cat. 

Kushie:        I don’t think that’s the….

Toot:              Canola oil.    Hm.     Might work.    

Kushie:        And when she’s angry like that….

Toot:              To the cat.     Now that’s imaginative.     Feed it to the cat.

Kushie:        I felt she was…  I felt humiliated.   After all you said.    I don’t think that…

Toot:              No, no.    I see it now.    You’re facing a problem.   You’re facing a hidden obstacle.     Something off the beaten path.      But I see the way out.    

Kushie:        You do? 

Toot:              Yeah.    It’s a complex situation.     But like all complicated problems, it has a simple solution.

Kushie:        It does?     What’s that?

Toot:              It’s obvious.   Can’t you guess? 

Kushie:        No.     

Toot:              You have to kill the cat.    Heh?    You kill it, it’s over with, out, then everything will be fixed up.

Kushie:        I… don’t see how that will….

Toot:              You don’t see because you don’t know.     How things work.    How things really get done.     Kill the cat.      I know how things work. 

Kushie:        But… well, I dunno.    It’s her favorite cat.    Her only cat.       

Toot:              Ehh, son.   Stand back.   You gotta see the bigger picture.    Like me. 

Kushie:        The cat likes her.    I don’t see what that…. She loves the cat.     Who could ever do such a thing?    It’s like lopping off… something precious, something dear.    Oh, I don’t know.      

Toot:              Of course.    You’d be blamed.    It has to be someone else, someone willing to kill. 

Kushie:        Who could be so heartless? 

Toot:              Leave it to me.    I might know someone.         

 

 

Act III, sc. 2   

(Wedding music from Lohengrin) 

MT:                This’ll be something to see.     There he is, my boy.    He’s no longer little Toot; he’s Big Toot now.   See how he shines.     His hair combed just right.   Like that my boy can stay young forever—so, ha-ha, why grow up at all?     

Kushie:        He doesn’t need to.     Everyone follows in his wake wherever he leads.  

MT:                A little child shall lead them, isn’t that sweet?  

Kushie:        How everybody’s keyed up.    And of course the paparazzi, hanging from the chandeliers.      Oh, I could like being a paparazzo.      Exciting life.     Getting in people’s faces.     Especially if they’re rich and repugnant.    Feeling those vicious rays of hatred from people who are helpless to do anything really hateful to you.    Ah.    Might be fulfilling at the end of the day.     But sadly it’s only a pipedream for me; I’m too busy being rich myself.     See them crowd around the groom, pumped with excitement and trying not to show it.       

Toot:              (on his cell, off to one side)  Oh, Harvey.    Harvey, you kill me.    Uh-huh.    Uh-huh.     And you made her do what? 

MT:                Oh, here comes the bride all decked out.

(Kissy enters)

Toot:              Oh, that’ll show her.     And then?    Five more times after that?   Yeah.   Yeah.    Oh, you know how to do it, Harv.  

MT:                Son.   Son.    Pay attention.   Isn’t she lovely?    I designed that dress myself.    Son.       

Toot:              Just a minute, Harv.     What is it?    

MT:                You look magnificent, yes.   If I do say so myself.   

Kushie:        The feeling of celebration is vibrating in the air.     That wonderful once in a lifetime feeling of something really important being done and the greatness radiates down for all to feel, feel how deeply we care.       

Toot:              And then you didn’t give her the part anyway?    After she worked so hard?    Harv, you are such a kidder. 

Kushie:        And Big Toot, his biggest moment, is enjoying it all the more. 

Toot:              Complain?    Why would she complain?      She needs the practice.     Build her craft.    How is she gonna learn if she gets no experience?     Plus hey, she had a good time, I can tell that.  

MT:                Son.    Dearest, come over here.     Look.    Look at the lovely bride.     

Toot:              Call you back, Harv.     Little fire to put out.   (pockets his cell.)    Huh?    What?        

MT:                You march out and walk down the aisle.     Before the bride.     

Toot:             Bride?      Oh.    Right.     

MT:                Kissy.    Look at her.    She just dazzling.     She’s so happy to be here.     Such a little temptress.     Cute as a plum pudding.     All juicy, eager and sweet.      All for you, my son.  

Toot:             Hm?    Where?    Oh yeah.   (goes to take Kissy’s hand)      

(  From the wings Gascone, disguised as a priest shrouded in black, races to center stage.    He carries a black book and a large tablet of ledger paper.  He starts speaking while still off stage.) 

Gascone:     Dearly beloved, sisters and brothers we are gathered here together… Oh, box!    Can’t we stop with this repetitious song of artificial convention everyone knows till they’re sick?    Does anyone here what have you in that case and if…all the same whichever in the next…. run for the wine and cheese… but in all events forever hold their peace?       I’m for genuine feelings whenever those can be found anywhere by anyone who so ever anyway.

Kissy:            Me too.         

Gascone:     And with getting to the point before we stretch it out interminably to the boredom of everyone, even the paparazzi who are never bored.    Won’t you agree?   

Kissy:            Oh, I agree.  

Gascone:     Do you, Kissy… oh bollox. … and so on so on so on… have you thought this over?  Well?      

Kissy:            Oh sure.     Fine by me.      

Gascone:     You’re cool.   Do you, Emperor and CEO of the Blue Heaven Amusement Park, the Dilly-Dally golf course and environs plus numerous territories off shore and not, through nested shell corporations known and unknown including but not limited to all those sequestered by the pre-nuptual agreement attested and affirmed herein and hereby….I’ve forgotten the rest but anyway how do you plead?    Sir?    Sir? Answer the question.        

Toot:             Yeah right.    Cut to the drinks.        

( Gascone tears off a huge sheet from his ledger and presents it to Kissy.   Gascone runs for the exit, delivering part of the next line off stage.   ) 

Gascone:     Here’s your receipt, and my ditto from the receipt.    I now pronounce you hu-hubitz and why-whiffle.     And you may kiss the bride.                

MT:                Oh, it brings tears.    Kiss.   Kiss your little sweetie, darling.        

Toot:             Huh?    Oh, yeah. 

(   Toot grabs his mother’s hand and kisses Kissy.    She fishes a diamond ring out of his pocket and proudly displays it.   Kissy dreamily separates and flaunts the receipt.   Toot tweets.  ) 

Kissy:            Well, I want to tell you all: this is such an exciting moment.     I’ll always, oh, I’ll always remember.     And this wonderful receipt.    Wow!   Official and everything.    I’ll frame it in gold and display it in the bedroom of that memorable yacht where we first… you know.    It symbolizes the deep feeling of being married to such an important man.     And he has atomic weapons, did you know that?   Which most amusement parks never get.    Because he’s the Emperor and CEO.   Yes.     I’m so lucky.    Most girls don’t ever get one of these.    See?     See?     And did you get a picture of this?    See?     

(  Kissy takes modeling poses, holds up her ring and the receipt trophy-like, the music rises and flashes pop till black out.) 

 

Act III, sc. 3  

(Gascone enters from left.    As he proceeds, he throws off parts of his priest costume.    Wince follows.)

Wince:          Will you stop.      Now you’re here, now you’re there.     Don’t you ever plant yourself somewhere?   

Gascone:     I’m stopped.    I’m here.   Get me a drink.         

Wince:          You’ve really blown it now.     You’ve really done it.  

(finds a bottle, brings it with a glass )       

Gascone:     You can’t blow this. 

Wince:          So you think.    He’s not striving.    You’ve let him lapse.  

Gascone:     Striving was your job. 

Wince:          He’s gonna forget.  

Gascone:     ( pours)  He won’t forget.

Wince:          He might.     He’s changeable.      Any thought, any syllable, doesn’t have to follow from the one before.    If he’s too happy, you watch, he’ll forget. 

Gascone:     Happy?    Happy did you say?    Happy from getting married?     Don’t make me puke. 

Wince:          Well, content.     Happy in some other form.  

Gascone:     You can call it happiness.     Even if it’s just an illusion.     A perisheable thing made out of clouds, out of idle whims preserved in the freezer of his dreams.     Happiness, well I admit, could get in the way.  

Wince:          So.     Then you see my point.     We have a problem.    

Gascone:     We don’t have a problem.    

Wince:          You think.     But if he forgets, then what?    It will go on.    Go on forever.     You want that?   

Gascone:     All right.    If it costs nothing, I’ll intervene.  

Wince:          Ah.   All right.   You make it sound simple.    How will you do that? 

Gascone:     Oh, well,…  you create a disturbance.     A quirky chance occurrence if you will.    Or give that impression.   He’ll like that.     It obviates thought which he doesn’t like anyway.     Hm.     But the tenor of that…

Wince:          Yes.   The tenor must be?  

Gascone:     It must have a special flavor borne in the texture of the moment.    It must have things he’s seen before intertwined with things he hasn’t.    Better yet: give it a twist and a chance to blame someone. 

Wince:          That’s important.     Adds weight.    Someone else you mean. 

Gascone:     That too.      Has to be something strange, though.    Something irrational like himself but it must not seem so.    Something he can’t ridicule right away.     It should be loveable and have to his heart some secret appeal.    Touch his quaint indifference to, well, to love.     Something fitting to the moment yet strange, obscure but acceptable by convention.    Hm.   I have to think.   

Wince:          (grabs the bottle)  Give me some of that.      You always take the last.      Thing about you I’ve noticed.   

Act III, sc. 4  

( Kissy & Toot are in bed.   She snuggles up on his shoulder.   He is busy tweeting.  )

Kissy:            Oh, we’re so different now.     It’s like a new world.     We’re not just two people, we’re we.     I had no idea how it would make me feel.     Do you feel it too?       

Toot:             Sure.        

Kissy:            Married people must be different.     It’s a new kind of existence almost.    A couple is different from just friends, don’t you think?

Toot:              Yeah, yeah.      How do you spell shit hole?     If you put the words together it’s like she-thole.    Nah.    That can’t be right.    I need a hyphen.    Where’s the hyphen on this thing?     

Kissy:            It’s like a new form of togetherness all over.    Of intimacy unknown before.   Something serene and other worldly and makes me feel sorry for all the unmarried people out there.     How they must feel so, well, lonely.    Do you feel it too?          

Toot:             Eh.     Poor slobs.     Pathetic excuse.     Low class.     Seen it… all.     No hyphen.   

Kissy:            But we, we’re one.   We’re not even two anymore.    One.     We’ve found something else.      Something precious and dear that comes only to…. To…. To the best people.     People like we know and who know and care about us…           

( From offstage a door slams and Lotta cries loudly )

Lotta:            You’re toast!    

( Lotta strides in.   She is angry and over dressed. )     

Lotta:            What did you do to the Estonians?     And what’s this 18^th hole charade?    You call this an amusement park?    I’m not amused.   Did you hear them outside?    You want to be burned at the stake?      You the great piñata?      They’re coming for your gut this time.       Reality.     Reality is catching up.

(   Lotta sits on the bed, yanks off her shoes and angrily throws them on the floor.    All through the scene she undresses, throwing her clothes anywhere till she is down to her slip.   )             

Toot:             Who?            

(As Lotta goes on, Toot sinks beneath the sheets. )

Lotta:            Who, he asks.     Who?    What are you thinking?    You’re going to exclude me?    You’re not going to exclude me.    You’re gonna replace me with a stuffed toy?     Where is it?    Are you out of your mind?     With all my experience, my expertise, the people I know and who love me?     My cheekbones, this ass, my push up bra and all that?    Reality Czar after all.  What does this thing know about how people believe, how fantasy becomes real and what’s real doesn’t matter?       

 (Toot looks hopefully at the rubber duck and squeezes it. )

Kissy:            Golly, you know about all that?

Toot:             (points to feather)   Nuclear scientist.   

Lotta:            The what?   

Kissy:            He told me about it.   It’s artificial intelligence.    Which is a better kind.   Better than the …you know.    See?     Right here.    In concentrated form.      Right here.    The doctor said.    Doc Fok said.    

Lotta:            And have you forgotten the most important part?   The Chinese aren’t selling the 18the Hole.   No.   Their leaders are economists, a sign of their perversity and their hatred of the Dilly-Dally life style that makes Blue Heaven blue.       As the price goes lower, they sell debt and buy equity.     Disaster.    Bankruptcy now will be real news, not fabricated.  

(Kissy yawns, blissfully stretches out, turns to looking for split ends. )  

Toot:              This feather here.    Doc Fok said….

Lotta:            Yeah, what did he say?    Hm?    Tell me.

Toot:              He got it to say stuff.     He reported that they said stuff.    It’s in the news.      

Lotta:            Uh-huh.    You get that from your nuclear genius?    Your doctor with the cute feather?     You think that’s real?   You think you can get my kind of insight from a plastic stand in, an ersatz kewpy made in Estonia?    

Toot:              (mumbles)  Says made in Mexico.

Lotta:            You remember when I tried out for this job?     A bunch of nerds and tenured flops, PhD’s in bird watching and bathtub canoeing was the competition.     I blew them away.    They couldn’t compete with me.    And the new rides I created?   Huh?   The one with the tunnel off the cliff?    And the molasses swim?    That’s a seller.     And I invented sex toys like they don’t sell in Iowa.    And now you’re gonna second guess all that I’ve got because of your petty tiff with the Chinese?     

Toot:              It isn’t petty.     It’s slippery slope.   (starts to cry)

Lotta:            So squabble.     I don’t care.      Just you get back the 18^th Hole and we’ll be cool.     What?   Aren’t you listening?         

Toot:              They … won’t sell.    

Lotta:            Oh Darling, don’t cry.   

Toot:              I can’t take it.     I can’t take anymore.     It’s like I lost a limb.    (turns and hides his face)   

Lotta:            Toot, honey.    Honeyy.     What are you feeling today?      Is it umpsa-wumpsa?     Or is it kuziluzatay?    Have you been burped?     Come here.     Let me caress that troubled mind.  (she cuddles him tenderly, then pushes him away)       Did you see your hairdresser today? 

Toot:              Coiffeur.      He’s my coiffeur.      I gotta see him.      See him tomorrow.  

Lotta:            Of course you will.      Coiffeur to the stars.      Coiffeur to the rich and bothered.        What did he say about your feathered toy?      

Toot:              He knows the doctor.      The doctor said it was the very best thing.    The latest technology in hair.   It will relieve all the pressure.    I have to answer to the press.     The media hounds me day and night.   Doc Fok said this was the thing.    They only make them in Mexico, in Teotehuacan.     Has to be special order.     And there are only a few of them around.     You have to wait years and someone has to lose a limb and catch a disease to sanctify the process of making one of these.    Underneath it all, the secret is that the toy is really an atomic scientist in disguise.      That’s how special it is.   

Lotta:            And you believe that?    I’ve heard better stories on morning television.     C’mere.       You need to relax.    You’ve had a tough day.      The ceremony.    The reception.     Non-stop idiots congratulating the bride.     Did they ignore you?     That’s exhausting.     Let me caress that troubled paunch.    That itchy fuzzy wuzzy.     You always liked that.     

Toot:              Yeah, I did.  

Kissy:            He does?

Lotta:            And you still do.     I see that little smile, that little bubba-wubba smile you get when you’re all tickled inside like now. 

Toot:              Well, that’s how you got this job.    You were more real than the others.       

Lotta:            Yes, and that began our sweet times together, didn’t it?      So, we have to let the water drift the way it wants, don’t we?      Gimme that.  (pockets the rubber duck)      Enough with these disturbing ideas.      That’s for tourists.     Not for nothing I’m the Czar.  You can’t fire me; I’m reality.  

Toot:              So what do I tell the doctor?     He’s gonna sulk.   

Lotta:            Oh, Toot, honey.    Honeey.     You the master of make believe to the stars.     You the mandrake of metaphors, just tell him I’ll see him, darling, I’ll meet with him and we’ll work out a modus vivendi.     Or there’ll be a report.     And a committee will offer it for review.       Doctor!      Are you saying some doctor can come between us?     Between you and me?  

Toot: Er,… No, no.   I guess, now you put it that way.      You have such a way about you.  

Lotta:            And what about your bride?     You gonna forget her? 

Toot:              No, no, of course not.      She deserves the best. 

(Lotta crawls in bed and lies between Toot and Kissy)       

Lotta:            (to Kissy) And you do too, sweetie.     Don’t sell yourself short.      Being the wife of the CEO of Blue Heaven Amusement Park isn’t nothing.      You can go a ways with a game like that.      Just because there are other chicks waiting in the wings, that’s no reason for you to give up your pride of place.  

Kissy:            Really?    Honestly?    You think so?  

Lotta:            (snaps out the light)    I know it.       

 

Act IV, sc. 1

(   Toot is seated downstage center in a barber’s chair.    He holds a mirror, admiring himself.     )  

Gascone:     ( Wafting a lock of Toot’s hair )    What we show to the people is our golden gift we shower upon them, Sir.    And then it becomes, why, it becomes all that they have and know.    If we spin it right, well, we make their world for them.    And should we let them doubt that little that they are so sure of?    Nah.   What’s dear to their hearts?     Assurance.    Credulity.     The knowledge that they know they know.    See?    And here, as if proof were needed, hey, you see: appearance is what is real.    I mean, if you comb it right.      And here we are and here we will. 

Toot:              A little off the left.     That fuzz.  (Gascone lifts a lock)   Yeah, there.  

Gascone:     The truth lies in the mind.    And what is closest to the mind?    Hair.     Hair and great ideas both come from the head.      If the hair is right oh, let me tell you, then fantasy and reality merge and become one.     And we can stop and start anything, science, history, public events, stop and make it start running again, like a toy train.   Like the toy train that is is.    Because it’s all in the mind and the mind is the world.     (Combs the hair one way)    If you merely make a small adjustment in your thinking.    (Combs the other way)    Then the facts all gather round like friendly admirers, customers come to buy the rides, sit in the seats, enjoy the fun.     And what is hair, hm, Mon General, may I call you El Caudillo, or would I better say Commander of the Host of all Blue Heaven?    

Toot:              Yeah.  

Gascone:     Yes.    Here we see the luster of each glowing lock, tender in its effulgence, oooh such brilliance grows out of the fertile soil of the mind itself.    Hair?    See?     Imagine for a moment, for now, Dear Toot, and in the glance of a moment I will show you what?   What is real.    Ah, look at that, Sir.     A simple strand of hair, it rises like an opalescent geyser from the clear lake below, the thinking mind, the deep abode of understanding.     Yes, out of the soul of comprehension the beatific strand arises, the map becomes the territory, all you see, and what you dreamed when you were small becomes at last what happens in your time.   

 ( Toot burps.   )  

Gascone:     So let me take you on a journey, heh?   

(   Gascone swivels Toot’s chair to face right.     A soft orange glow enshrouds them from above and brightens in yellow and purple rays.     As Gascone speaks the light varies and shines slowly from lower and lower before them, meaning Toot and Gascone are rising to a higher and higher vantage on the Ferris wheel.  )  

Gascone:     This will be a journey only a coiffeur of the real and what is hoped for can arrange.    This, even on your own Blue Heaven Ferris wheel, this will be the greatest ride of all, where we see a new world, where yesterday’s whimsical phantoms become what’s lived in now.    And you see how we rise, rise as hair and idle thoughts arise, toward the highest point in all blue Blue Heaven, on the Ferris Wheel of Higher Dreams. 

Toot:              Yeh.     High up.  

Gascone:     Now look, Sir.    See?   We sail upward on shining steel circles, higher, higher now, rising toward the pinnacle of all that is truly Blue.      Yes, here we lift, we arise on the Ferris Wheel of Greatness.     Look, Sir, see the green plain below, your land, spreading out beneath you like a child’s first vision of its magical home.    Oh, and there.   See the little people, harmless really, never interfering with our greater vision, they stray, they wander about their aimless ways.    Look on.   See.    Now we arise and rise higher.     The large perspective unfolds beneath you and all, all this, all that you see is yours.      

(Pause while the light glows over their faces.    A soft music cue.)

Gascone:     Ah, but is that enough?    It’s a child’s ecstatic dream, but how can we make it more so?     Like this.   (Combs up a lock of Toot’s hair. )   For the highest attainment in life, as you well know, is to live out your fantasies, the video game that was always there just waiting to become real.    Here the dream arises, the dream for you to strive and strive still higher.   For as you rise, you pass above all smaller things, you waft through many levels of small details.    Old complicated words ensnare the ignorant, morbid accountants, look at them below, simple people dazed in the swamp of muddy facts.     Not for you.     Those musty books are for librarians and petty thinkers, how they huddle in their cubicles, lost, receding far below, as we ascend higher to your realm, the realm of inspiration, of rising of your magnificence.      This at last is where you shine.      Here rising on a high circle is no dawdling with picky gotchas.     August flights of mind lift us far above all that.      As we rise higher in the firmament, we see it all stretched out beneath us, a pretty land where ordinary drudges do our chores and ply their simple ways.       Now you sail, sail above them, you magisterially disdain their world, their tinny facts and petty brawling.  

Toot:              Yah.    Not petty.     No, no.  

Gascone:     All of this you own, Sir.    All of this is your domain.   

Toot:              I own it.    It is mine.    

Gascone:     All these little things dwell within your house.    See, they creep so far beneath you.  

Toot:              They envy the higher strength, the higher truth.  

Gascone:     They envy the greatness that is yours.   

(Raises his arm for applause cue.  Huzzahs of applause rise in crescendo as Gascone twirls his arm with directorial gusto.)   

Toot:              There, my loyal followers, ah, how they applaud.    I love to hear their frantic cries. 

( When Gascone strikes down, the applause suddenly stop.  )  

Gascone:     They lift their yearning eyes.     Your slightest gesture is all the gratitude they need.  

Toot:              Hey!    What is that over there?     Is that a place, that sort of … dark mound?     That blot on the ragged outskirts looks like a hovel I never bought or dreamed.     I never saw that before.    

Gascone:     Oh, that.     That’s some old house, I’ve been there once or twice myself.     It’s been off in that outpost for ages, I don’t know why.          

Toot:              Is that a house?     Who could live there?     It looks so … cheap.     Old tires and dilapidated trailers?    Laundry hung on a dumpster bin?     What?     Can’t they clean up their yard?     That doesn’t belong in Blue Heaven.

Gascone:     I know.    A patient old couple lives there.     Pathetic, really.     They probably came from another amusement park and settled here somehow happy in their humble circumstance.     I agree it’s out of place.     I remember ages past when you bought Blue Heaven and environs.    All the other tenants happily took your gifts and left.     But those two down there for some strange reason would not leave.     They held out.     Look at them, silly in their imagined bliss, sitting there, smiling by dilapidated walls, as if they were happy in that squalor.     As if they had no cares, no striving for greater greatness.     Sentimental ignorance, I guess.    Shall I abolish them, Sir?

Toot:              Yeah.      Get it over with.    I want to be complete.      And pure.     That’s not right for Blue Heaven.  That’s not blue.        

(   Gascone raises his arm.  Crash of an explosion and distant screams off stage.   A new glow of fire light shines on Toot.   Then silence.)     

Gascone:     Done, Sir.    Yeh, in the twinkling of an eye.    See?   And now, ( bucolic music queue ) a rainbow descends where that bad spot was, strung out long past its allotted time.      Now you see it too is really yours.      All yours, Sir, to have and make your own.    

(Lotta enters from stage left. )

Lotta:            He owns it?    Him?    You don’t own it, Sweetie.   You did.    Not anymore.    Not now.     Ha-ha.    The 18^th Hole isn’t yours.    18.    18 no more.     It’s theirs.   Theirs.     Theirs.     (exit.)       

Toot:              What did she say?    I heard a voice.     An old thought, or a bad dream.   Oh!    The 18^th Hole.     Where?    Where is that?   

(Gascone puts on a Chinese garment and cap.    He fakes a Chinese accent.)

Gascone:     Oh, so please.     Is lovely lovely 18 Hole.    Is all smooth grass.    Sooo smooth.   So green.    And little hole take golf ball go way inside go.    Plink-plonk.    Thank you.    Thank you.     Is pretty what you got, lots of blue?     Oh, so please.     Thank you make ours now.     So kind.   18 is 2 times 9, you know?    Is 3 times 6.    Oooooh.    Very lucky number in Chinese.     Very lucky is Chinese now.     Plink-plonk.    Make Chinese take out on 18.     Oh, and not to worry, we put up wonton nukey missiles just for show.      Better sand trap.    Hit golf balls long way off high up laser guide.    Yeah.   Blue Heaven is very best.    You come visit.    Stay over night, bring girl friend, nice bed, eat lots ramen.    We always friendly.    Make pretty for you.    We always welcome nice people Blue Heaven.      Is the best best.      Thank you.     Thank you.    Very great, our hole now.          

(Gascone changes back to his own clothes. )

Toot:              Oh, God.    They do own it.   I thought it was a bad dream.    They really really own it.      This is Hell.       

Gascone:     Oh, Hell is far from here, Sir.     A long ways.     A place far below.  

Toot:              They own it?     That can’t be true.     There must be a way.    What can I do to get it back?     

Gascone:     I’ll show you soon.      Now say farewell to this pinnacle of the possible.     Now let the Wheel of Fantasy circle softly down and we will drift far away.   

(  Light that before descended now ascends showing Toot and Gascone passing lower down.  )  

Gascone:     Now we descend but the dream goes on.    Sinking.   Sinking.    Ethereal heights like we’ve seen ennoble you, but for the rest of us, they can make us giddy.     So for myself, I feel more solid in the lowest place.    Are you quite at home on this Earth?    Enjoy, swell up, take in its solid frankness.     After the heights and all their glow, we must journey to a darker realm.     

 (  Gascone twirls Toot’s chair in the opposite direction.     Now the lighting moves behind them and what Toot faces is a rippling purple dark. )  

Toot:              18?    Did she say 18?     What?   Did you say something?   Where are we now?  ( Pecks cell.  )   It says there is nothing here. 

Gascone:     Nothing that you can see yet.      But as your vision clears many forms will rise up from the dark that is their home.    

Toot:              Dark?     I like the light, but dark is mysterious.      There must be some strange meaning here.  

Gascone:     Yes.   We journey now to a region that others never see.     They only dwell on the surface but we go deep.    We descend into the heavy black earth beneath the sun of Greater Blue Heaven.      Here below are rippling murmurs; we feel liquid vibrations of messages from below.      Here the flow of the Q disease runs fast and heavy and people arise that think getting sick is bad. 

Toot:              Yes.    Bad. 

Gascone:     But they’ve been taught to think that way.

Toot:              How? 

Gascone:     By a ruse that only lies here in these hidden places.    Oh, you’ll soon see.   It’s all a sophisticated media ploy.  

Toot:              A ploy?     Oh, good.     

Gascone:     Yes.    The ploy’s a dance they do to make people believe what they say.  

Toot:              … make people believe…. Hey, that’s my idea.    We should get that ploy.  

Gascone:     Only if we find the one who has it.       

Toot:              It’s so dark.    Is there anyone here?  

Gascone:     There are many people here.    

Toot:              Turn on the light.   

Gascone:     Ah, here the light you see, that is all there is.      Down this way we follow to the last great tunnel, to the abyss they call the Cavern of Credulity.      Isn’t that lovely, Sir?     It’s dark, but there’s plenty to believe in.      And here in the dark they do believe.     Believe every word you say.    

( Sound of an adulant choir.)    

Toot:              Ah, at last.     

Kissy:            ( suddenly entering.  )   Eeehyeww!     Why are you down here?     It’s wet and damp. 

Toot:              That’s enough.    They can do no more.    

( Kissy recedes into shadow, tiptoeing to avoid puddles. )

Gascone:     See, they hide in the shadows now, cowering from the light you bring.   

Lotta:            ( suddenly entering.  )   He doesn’t bring light.     But this is the right place for him.    (Looks above.)  It could do with some touch ups.     Mauve drapes would help a lot.  

Toot:              What I said.    The higher light.    The greater light.    Then they’ll have means to admire me more.       

MT:                (off)    And they will too, son.      ( She enters from the dark)    Oh, my dear.    Welcome.   You have come to visit your ol’ mum at last.        

Lotta:            Floor’s kind of sticky.     But I could fix that.

Gascone:     It’s damp and dark but it has to be endured.     Now here, Sir, here is the key.     For where we stand now is the dark foundation beneath it, beneath the gold we seek, the 18^th Hole.

Toot:              Yes!    The 18^th Hole.     But where?    I don’t see it.   

Kissy:            Oh!    He needs help.     Here.     Here I am.     (runs to embrace Toot )

 (    MT advances.     Behind her Wince pushes a light decorative table on which is placed a tall wine glass containing a golf ball.)  

MT:                But it is here, darling.    You’ve come at last to the very depths, the dark beneath the green, beneath the silver stalactite beside the 18^th Hole.     Yes.     Up there where those foreigners are planted, unsuspecting.   But its strong foundation, what it cannot do without, lies where we stand, right here.   

Kissy:            That’s so cute.   

Toot:              That?    That little light?      

MT:                It looks small from here.     But this is where the finest, the greatest golf balls go.      (   Takes out the golf ball and holds it aloft.  )     Only the prettiest, the finest for my dearest.  

(   MT tosses the ball so it bounces across the stage toward Lotta.   ) 

Gascone:     (to Wince)    What’re you just standing there?     Get it.     Get that.     (Wince scrambles to retrieve the ball.   Lotta kicks it out of the way. )    What are you supposed to be doing?

Wince:          Sorry.   I… I’m adulating.     Am I doing it right?  

MT:                But there were many great golf balls before this.      I couldn’t be here for you without collecting the finest of the fine.    

(   MT opens her purse and pulls out another golf ball.     She tosses it and Wince runs after it.     During what follows she does this more times.    Wince runs after each ball and sometimes proudly displays his find.     He and the others do a chaotic dance around Toot, losing and finding golf balls.     Sometimes they produce golf balls from their pockets and toss them at each other.)  

Toot:              The great ones!    The best!     Whoever says it’s not is…stupid.     I can’t emphasize this enough.     They are liars who say it’s not so.   So.   So-so.    They tell a falsehood, don’t they?   Do-do they do.    Woopie iddil visca whozex mipple?   Anda kinflix whakka nigga antwo!     And I furthermore deckwa… 

( Violently MT stuffs golf balls (at least one) in Toot’s mouth.    He falls back in the barber’s chair flails around.    Kissy runs to help.     Lotta yanks her away and tries to put in another golf ball.  MT yanks Lotta away and pats Toot’s chest.)  

MT:                I remember when the Sultan of Brunei scrambled in the rough and you made a birdie right past him.     Right past him.    How he suffered with his tragic loss.    

All:                 How he suffered from his tragic loss.  

(  They adlib repeating this to each other as they toss golf balls.   Soon they break into song.  )

If you’re comatose from bad TV

Addicted to dishonesty

Come on down, we’ll ease your soul

At the 18^th Hole.  

 

If you sense your orifice

Hungers for a night of bliss

You can bring your jelly roll

To the 18^th Hole

 

In the cavern of delight

Come with us, spend the night.

Make fantasy your everlivin’ goal

At the 18^th Hole.  

(  Desperate to speak Toot flails more, spits out the golf ball.   When he sees MT coming he puts it back in.  )

MT:                My son!     My Dearest!    Let me help ‘ouou. 

( MT runs and extracts the golf ball.   She chortles, tosses it in the air, rejoins the others and they go on singing and dancing in a circle.)

In the Tunnel of Credulity

Lives a Wizard, come and see.   

He has greatness you’ll extol

Underneath the 18^th Hole.  

Toot:              Wait!    Stop!  (they all do.)    Did you say Wizard?    There’s a Wizard?      A wizard down here?  

 (  Gascone dons a Wizard’s cape and hat.    He strides opposite the singers.)

Kushie:        It’s him?    It’s really him?  

Lotta:            Yes.    I’ve seen him before.    It’s really the wizard.  

Kissy:            The Wizard?    There’s really a Wizard?

MT:                I knew it.  It’s he. 

Lotta:            He’s really the Wizard, The Wizard of High Drivel.  

Kushie:        High.      Higher.      High drivel.    

Kissy:            The Wizard of High Drivel.    My.  

MT:                I knew he was down here.    Where else would he be? 

Kissy:            High drivel means high.     High up.    Hieee.    

All:                 Yes, he’s the magical wizard, the Wizard of Snivel and Highest High Drivel.

Toot:              But does he know, can he figure how to get back the 18^th Hole? 

Gascone:     Yes!    (raises his hand for silence)    Welcome, you who have come down here for me.    The highest calls and the lowest answers back.    All those who are incomplete, they come at last to me.      And I will make them whole.    You come to find the secret of credulity and I will answer you.     I see the longing in your faces, longing for what you’ve lost.    It will be returned.      The one who took it crouches like a thief, a parasite on Blue Heaven, and should the parasite rule the host?      No more.    Now comes the time.     To take it back.    What secret force can drive the alien from our turf?      Poison it, I say.     Then the parasite will flee.    Poison it and they will sell.     Poison it and it will be yours.      Yours again.     Yours always and for evermore.   

Lotta:            Poison?     Did you say poison?    

Kissy:            Eeehyeww!

Lotta:            (points upward)    Up there?    Up there?

All:                 Up there?   Where?    

MT:                Why not up there?     That’s where the hole is.  

Kushie:        Where we can’t even see?

Kissy:            Poison it?    We can’t do that.    

Kushie:        It’ll make a mess.

Lotta:            So?   They’ll clean it up.           

Gascone:     I summon now another who is mighty as I am.   With the mighty potion he alone has, he at last will work your will.   He will make you whole.   I summon from the dark abode.     I waken him from sleep. 

(pause) 

MT:                Awaken who?

All:                 Who?    Who?  

Gascone:     The great doctor.   Doc Fok.    Come!        

 (from behind Gascone Wince appears as if pulled from Gascone’s Wizard garment. )

Gascone:       He rises up with power.

Wince:          I come and I obey.      The wish of greatness is my wish too.   

Toot:              Then you have one simple thing to do.    I’ll give it to you now: Get me back that 18^th Hole. 

Wince:          Yes.  Sir.   Oh, I will.     Now.     (Wince magisterially produces the hypodermic syringe.)      See?      It’s a great invention, Sir, the anti-toxin toxin.     It will steal into the veins, into the hearts of the ones we want out.      Oh, the horror they will feel when they see their 18^th Hole now.     I’ll make it stink.     I’ll make it putrid.     Then, you’ll see, they’ll run like scared rabbits.  

Toot:             There you go.    They’ll be forced to sell at depressed prices.   We’ll buy it back and make a killing.   

Kushie:        You mean the Chinese, Sir?     Wuh,… aren’t they gonna know?      Aren’t they gonna find out what he’s doing? 

Toot:              Don’t be stupid.     We’ll do it when they’re not looking. 

Wince:          Of course.     Catch them off guard.  

Gascone:     Yes, from below.      From where they never look.      

Wince:          Oh, it’s going to be magnificent.      Now watch.   Just watch.

(Wince aims the syringe upward.   Lotta, Kissy, Kushie, MT run to see.     A colorful sparkling liquid sprays up.     All stand back, amazed.  ) 

Gascone:     And now credulity falls like rain.      They will all believe in you now, Sir.    All.

All:                 Yay.    Yay.  We poisoned the 18^th Hole.    We poisoned the 18^th Hole.     To hell with the 18^th Hole.     Hell sprinkles up.    Blue sprinkles down.  No more strange balls in the 18^th Hole.  

( Lotta, Kissy, Kushie, MT trail out chanting.  Gascone stands to one side, shielded in his Wizard’s cloak.)  

Toot:              It’ done.     I did it.      They’ll flee now.         

Wince:          It’s to your credit, Sir.     You took care of it.   All the glory is yours.    I was only the messenger, the instrument of your wish.   Oh, yes.     That 18^th Hole will be a tarpit now.    A swamp.   Snakes and alligators will be the voting populace.     Those cheesie Chinese won’t want that Hole after this.  

Toot:              Just goes to show the old rule: if you’re really obnoxious, people move away and you get their territory.     Nothing better than that.     

Wince:          I went that extra mile but it’s only what you deserve.  

Toot:              You did well, Doc.     You’re a little great too.     Now you wanta do something for me?

Wince:          Of course.    Oh, Sir, I live to satisfy you.  

Toot:              Okay.    Good.    Kill the cat.     

Wince:          What?    The cat?    Oh.   Well.    Well, you know, I’ve seen it.   It’s not an ordinary cat.    It does hey-heh, delightful tricks.    Hilarious really.    There’s one with a candelabra and a witch’s broom that’s a real crowd pleaser.

Toot:              Yeah.    Yeah.   I got it.    Kill it.

Wince:          The cat oh, well, the cat will… resist, won’t it?.    But I see you’re definite. (pause)   Decisive.   So consider it done.    Count on me.    With death the cat will be brought low at last.   Yes.   And so of course we will rise above.    I see it now.    I see you rising, rising to greatness, the greatness you deserve.    

(Wince exits.    Stage darkens except for a light on Gascone.)     

Gascone:     Now at last the cat, the cat will soon, soon be thinking eternal thoughts.      How sad.    

Act IV, sc. 2

(  The left quarter of the stage is Gascone’s office as in the first scene.    The rest is hidden by a curtain.     Gascone in his normal attire sits as in the first scene but with a VR headset on.   He has a drink.    He smiles and takes a sip.    Wince enters with flashlight.)

Wince:         You like it dark.      

Gascone:     It’s not dark.    It’s all light.     

Wince:         Take that thing off.   (  Gascone does.   Wince switches on a dim light)  I got it wired now.  

Gascone:     Do you now?    

Wince:         I know your attitude.     Give it some time.     You’re always negative, even when it does something good for people you hate.     You hate him?    Doesn’t matter.    He’s depressed.

Gascone:     You picked him up.      You solved his problem.     You made his precious domain complete and now, what, he’s depressed?   

Wince:          Could be.     Not bad for me of course.    He surveys everywhere but it’s never enough.      

Gascone:     And that, you think is good? 

Wince:          Yeah.     Wait’ll you see.      He’s not as happy as he yearns to be.     Not as complete even as his domain grows and grows.     And yeah, that’s good.   Because then I have a solution.     I’ll make him omnipotent again.    Wait till you see.    In fact right now.    Let me transport you a little as you transported him.     To the land of dreams.     You know the old old song…..

 ( Wince draws aside the curtain on the rest of the stage.    This discloses a platform three or four feet elevated from the stage.       On the platform is a business desk with TV and computer, and a Morris chair.  There is a stair off the left edge of the platform, leading up to it.      Around the edge of the platform is festive red, white and blue bunting.   Rising above that are numerous colorful balloons.   Supporting the platform is a wire cage three or four feet high, wide enough to extend to the edge of the platform in some places.   The cage has a door that locks.    In the cage are a pillow, a blanket and a chamber pot.    Above this a roll of toilet paper hangs on a wire.     Nearby a plastic cup with a spoon and toothbrush hangs from another wire.     On a hook hangs a musty shirt.     Below the desk is a small slot which the person below can reach through. ) 

Wince:          Huh?     See that?    He’s gonna love this.     It’s right over the 18^th Hole.    Right there.   As he would want, of course.       It’s perfect.   

( Gascone’s phone rings.   He picks it up. )

Gascone:     Yeah.  (pause)  He’s coming now.     You oughta be ready.     You ought to impress him. 

Wince:          Oh, he’ll be impressed.  

(Toot enters but Wince pretends not to see him.)

Wince:          Who wouldn’t be impressed with this?   An architectural marvel worthy of the man, his high principles, his deep moral integrity.    Yes, this you see will even endure as a grand symbol of the man himself, of his high character, his profound understanding, his generosity and compassion for all peoples, all, not just the ones who come to Blue Heaven Amusement Park, but all races, all economic levels, whether they are up to his kind or not.      His unbiased vision whereby he sees the great and the small with an equal eye, marks him out as above the crowd.     This platform betokens his largess and equanimity, never distracted by petty bickering or ad hominem attacks heard from the competition.      Thus he stands above those petty Estonian detractors, far above the niggardly backbiters that seek to undermine Blue Heaven and all its blueness.    

( Wince sees Toot and welcomes him.   )

Wince:          Oh, Sir.    This is a great day.   (sings and dances around Toot)   A rootie toot toot we root for the Toot for he’s the beaut who gets the loot.   Heh?    Heh?  

Toot:              That’s a terrible song.   

(Gascone returns to his office and his VR headset.)     

Wince:          Oh, Sir.    The Q Disease took over.     It worked.   We’ve made that little ole hole into the Cesspool of the 18^th Hole.    Of course the Chinese sold.    It’s a swamp.    They took a horrible loss.    And we cleaned up.     And this here is the symbol, the monument of it all.   This, Sir, this is your march of triumph.     See, we’ve constructed it just for you.    And see.  It’s right over where those Chinese were.      It’s your time of ascent.      Plus.     See this.    I’ve got something else to cap it off, oh, the best, just what you desired.  

( Wince reaches into the cage under the platform and pulls out a dead cat.    He triumphantly displays it held high.  ) 

Wince:          Just as you ordered, Sir.         

Toot:              Is that the cat?   

Wince:          It is, Sir.     As you see, very dead.  

Toot:              You killed the cat?  

Wince:          I didn’t have to, Sir.     I injected it with the Q Disease and it was reduced to a quivering puddle on the floor.     It whimpered and squealed and uttered profanities right to the last.    Oh, it was tasty.     Its little heart beat right to the end and all its dreams were history after that. 

Toot:              The cat’s dead?      Why is it dead?

Wince:          Well, uh,… But you wanted it dead.     You said quite clearly….

Toot:              Are you throwing up to me something I said?    I said kill the cat, I didn’t say kill the cat.    Are you a reporter?    You one of those scum that critiques what I say?    Things you thought I said.    Are you like that?    What does it matter to you what I said?

Wince:          Wuh,… am I hearing right?    That makes no sense. 

Toot:              Did I ask you to make sense?      

Wince:          Well, I, Sir, I wanted to make your wishes real.    Haven’t I always shown that?    Always praised you as you deserve?   I do what I can to make you happy.    

Toot:              Happy?    Happy?    Do you know what makes me happy?     Can you guess? 

Wince:          No, well, I can try.  

Toot:              Try??    Try?    Well, try now.

Wince:          Um,… Money? 

Toot:              Nah, I have enough.

Wince:          Sex?

Toot:              Same answer. 

Wince:          Sex with tens?    With broads with hooters out to here? 

Toot:              Don’t bore me.   I got ’em already.      

Wince:          Well, uh,…after money and sex… what’s left? … television?,…uh,…. drugs?

Toot:              I see, Doc, you, you’re grasping at straws.     What might it be?     What indeed?      You know what’s the greatest pleasure I can ever have?    

Wince:          I… No… I,… I guess…. I can’t guess your inner thoughts.     Although if I knew them, I’d try to fit in, comply as best I could.   But there, there I guess I don’t have a clue.

Toot:              It’s seeing you. 

Wince:          What?

Toot:              It’s seeing you.   You.

Wince:          You see me now.  

Toot:              No, not now.    It’s seeing you as you will be.    It’s seeing you humiliated.   It’s seeing you beg.    It’s seeing you grovel.    It’s seeing your abject soul hoping against hope to be let off the hook.     It’s seeing you get down, down at new sordid lows of groveling.      It’s seeing you willing to give up every principle you ever thought you had so your candy ass can be cushioned by my tolerance and money so it doesn’t have to sit in shit.   

(  Mother Toot, Kissy, Lotta and Kushie enter and surround Wince.)

All Chant:                He killed the cat.     He killed the cat.     Did you do that?  

(Toot smiles and exits)

Wince:          Yes, and see, see I’ve solved the problem of the 18^th Hole.    

Kissy:            Well, finally.    It was good that you covered over that nasty spot.     I must say, a really inspired design choice.    Really.   

Lotta:            It isn’t solved.    It stinks. 

Wince:          Well, that was the idea.     To drive away the…

Lotta:            Whose idea?    Your idea?   

MT:                He doesn’t have ideas.    He can’t think hard like my son. 

Kushie:        Yeah, and now the cat is yeech, dead.

Wince:          All right, it’s dead.      

MT:                I think the cat’s really alive.    Secretly.    I mean in an ideal world.    

Lotta:            But if what you see you can’t agree

All:                 Just say it isn’t, ‘cause it isn’t, say it isn’t so. 

Lotta:            In the world we live in. 

All:                 Just say it isn’t so. 

MT:                Where you’re at right now.

All:                 Just say it isn’t so.

Kushie:        It’s according to how you feel.

Kissy:            And if you don’t feel like you want to feel

All:                 Just say it isn’t, ‘cause it isn’t, say it isn’t so. 

Wince:          What’re you doing?    You’re talking crazy.    

MT:                We’re talking like you always did.    We’re using your words.

Kushie:        Hey, look.   Lookie here.    Here’s the man who poisoned the 18^th Hole.  

Kissy:            You did?     You did?      You did that disgusting act? 

Wince:          Well, I,… no, I was under orders.    I didn’t really.

MT:                He didn’t really.     Hear him?     He didn’t really do it. 

Lotta:            Here’s the man who denies he poisoned 18^th Hole.  

Wince:          No, I… deny that I’m guilty,.. no, innocent,  that I’m…

Kissy:            I thought you adulated my husband.

Wince:          I did.   I do adulate.    Truth is false, well, I mean, just said differently, I think… I do adulate, don’t you think? 

(Gradually Wince becomes more debased and incoherent, ending by gasping and groveling on the floor.)

Lotta:            But you didn’t mean it.    You didn’t do sincere adulation.   

All Chant:    He refuses, he excuses.    He won’t adulate. 

Wince:          Aaargh!   You’re de-riving me cruzy.    

Lotta:            Are we?     We don’t mean to.

Kissy:            You must have done that yourself.  

Lotta:            Without our help.   

All Chant:    The rain of false facts where will it strike?    Here!     Here!  

                        Cold is hot, is it not?   Up is down.    Far is near. 

                        Round and round a tinkling sound, pleasant to the simple ear.       

Wince:          Please stop.    I don’t know where, wuh, did you or… I say?…  this is going.  

MT:                Look.   Look.    He’s groveling.     The more he grovels, the more we see what he is.

Kushie:        The real man.    The real man for a change.    

Wince:          You’re judging me.    You have no right to juh-udge me.       

Kissy:            Don’t we?     We have to judge you to know who you really are.

Wince:          Please.     Please, you’re all turning against me.  

Lotta:            How did you guess? 

Kushie:        He’s sniveling.     

MT:                But not driveling.     He hasn’t driveled yet.  

Wince:          All right.     I admire Big Toot.      I even adulate Big Toot. 

Lotta:             Really?    Do you really?    

Kissy:            You pretend to.    It’s not real.      

MT:                He doesn’t go far enough. 

Wince:          Wibble-will.   Wibble-won’t.     But adju–adju-late.    

Lotta:            Now, it’s drivel.  

Kissy:            But he hasn’t swiveled yet.    Isn’t swiveling like part of it?     

MT:                You can’t believe this.   It’s only pseudo-drivel.

Wince:          All right.   All right.   I won’t adulate.     I’ll stop.    Whatever I said before I won’t say any more.  

Kushie:        There.    That.   I saw it.    He swiveled.     

Lotta:            That does it.     That makes it complete. 

Kushie:        Erases all doubt.      

MT:                He has the Q disease like I’ve never seen.  

Wince:          You’ve made me like this.     You’re all trying to ma-ake me cr-azy.  

Kissy:            You can’t be crazy if you weren’t crazy to start with. 

All chant at random:      Crazy.    Crazy.    He had to be.    Had to be crazy to start with. 

( They brutally cram Wince into the dark cage under the platform.   Lotta throws the cat in after him.   They slam the door, shut and fix the lock. )

Wince:          No.    No, you can’t.     You can’t.   

(  His captors stand back and look.  )

Wince:          This is some kind of joke.   It’s gone far enough.  (pause)  Well, you‘re going to let me out… aren’t you?  

MT:                Will we?   

Kissy:            You look cuter there.     I bet you’re a good lay.    I mean, when you’re in a bed somewhere, not where you are now.    

Wince:          I did everything you said.    Did it just right.   This is awful.    What made you do something this mean? 

Kissy:            Just say it isn’t,

Lotta:            ‘Cause it isn’t,

All:                 Say it isn’t so.  

Kushie:        It is mean.    Should we let him out?    It’s cruel.    

MT:                Cruel enough to get revenge for my son.

Wince:          Revenge for what?    I’m innocent.    

Kissy:            He’s so logical.   It is kind of sweet.    I mean unexpected.

Wince:          When are you going to let me out?

MT:                Are we going to let you out?  

Lotta:            You could be there for a long time. 

MT:                Maybe years.   

Wince:          Years?     Please….

Kissy:            Yeah.    Years.  

Kushie:        Oh, you must feel awful.      

Wince:          It’s swampy and gooey in here. 

Lotta:            There’re crocodiles of course.   

Kissy:            They’ll come at night.  

Lotta:            But they’ll ignore you—they’d rather eat the piranhas.    

Wince:          But you will get me out, won’t you?      Please.      I’m begging you. 

MT:                Not enough.     Not enough to satisfy my son.   

Wince:          I’ll beg.    I’ll do anything.     How long do I have to stay here?  

MT:                As long as it takes.    A lifetime, why not?     Good use for your time.     Because you didn’t really admire my son.      Not really.      You only pretended.      Now you must wait there, sunken and despairing, till your adulation is total.     Till your praise wafts over my boy like peacock feathers forever stroking his soft angelic skin and my son, my dearest, is at last complete. 

Wince:          I’ll praise.     I’ll praise. 

Lotta:            He doesn’t mean it.     

All:                 He doesn’t mean it.     He doesn’t mean it.      It’s all fake, fake, fake.   

Kushie:        Or maybe it’s real.    

All chant:    Or maybe it’s real.  
If what they say displeases you
There’s a simple thing to do:
Just say it isn’t
‘Cause it isn’t
Say it isn’t so.  
If you believe what isn’t true
Here’s a simple plan for you
Just say it isn’t
‘Cause it isn’t
Say it isn’t so.  
There’s no need to get in contention
Or think all night with your head
Don’t argue about their intention
Just do one simple thing here instead:
Just say it isn’t, say it isn’t

Kushie:        ‘Cause it isn’t

All:     Say it isn’t so.   Just say it isn’t, ‘cause it isn’t, say it isn’t so.  

(Kushie, MT, Kissy, Lotta exit chanting. )  

Wince:         Help me.      Oh, the stench down here.     Sticky.    Disgusting.    I was only pretending to adulate him.

(Gascone doffs the VR headset and  slowly saunters around.)  

Gascone:     Ah.    You only pretended?    Well, then you did it twice as well.    Once for the doing and once for the pretending.     And you were so good.    Unfortunately he knew that.    You surrounded him with imaginary flowers.   

Wince:          You’ll pay eventually.    I have truth on my side. 

Gascone:     After all that pretending?    I doubt it.    You haven’t said an honest word in decades.

Wince:         I’ve done nothing to deserve this.  

Gascone:     Ah.    You did a lot.    You wanted to kill him.   I wanted him to live.     I thought your methods were superb.          

Wince:          And the vaccine?    The cure for the Q disease?     Did you find that?  

Gascone:     Of course.     The vaccine for the Q disease is the Q disease itself.   

Wince:          The disease can’t cure itself.     That’s absurd. 

Gascone:     Not now.      With this vaccine you don’t, as people say, conquer the disease.    You do something better: you make people glad they have it.      And here he comes.      He comes at last.

(  A cymbal crash.   From upstage center Toot appears wearing a long purple cape.   He strides forward.   )

Gascone:     Yes, it’s time for your ascent, Sir.     The new 18^th Hole is the ultimate accomplishment.    Finally it is worthy of you now.      Now you move from Big Toot which you’ve always been, to being at last what you always were destined for: Great Toot.  

(  Music cue:   Elgar’s Military March #1.   Toot straightens, slowly walks forward and ascends the stairs.     He stands happily before the desk amid the balloons.    He spreads his hands and smiles.  Gascone, from his own desk, produces a golfing flagstick with the number 18.   He proudly places this at the far corner of the platform.    Sound cue: uproarious applause.   Toot takes his seat at the desk.     Applause stop.   He watches the TV and intermittently taps on his cell.     Below in the cage Wince crouches, looking around at what he’ll have to become accustomed to.  He tentatively feels the wire cage.)

Gascone:     That about covers it.     Call if you need my assistance.    Or anything like it.   (returns to the seat he had at the start of act I and silently regards what follows. )

 (pause)

Wince:         I thought I was doing what you wanted.       

Toot:              Hm.  

(pause)

Wince:         I tried hard.                         

Toot:             Hm.     Yes.     

(pause)

Wince:         I’m going to speak out, though.    I will.   And I’ll set the record straight. 

Toot:             You’ll tell all you know. 

Wince:         Probably I’ll get a book deal.

Toot:              Yes. 

Wince:         I might even write a play.

Toot:             That’s a brilliant idea.

Wince:         All along I did what you said.   I know I did.    The cold facts would exonerate me.      A careful analysis of what I’ve done, an honest look at all the relevant details, yes, then, that would arrive at the truth.    If people would just take the time. 

Toot:             But they won’t.    It’s a pleasant thought though.          That’s why this is so perfect: you down there with your ideas, me up here enlarging the whole of Greater Blue Heaven.          

 (Pause.   Through a hole in the platform Wince reaches up and feels around.    He pulls on Toot’s ankle.      Toot uses his other foot, trying to dislodge Wince’s hand.      Toot stamps on the floor.        When Toot frees himself, sometimes Wince’s hand is still above the slot and Toot stamps on the floor to chase it away.        Toot sits back, watching to see if it will reappear.)

Wince:         They all think I’m insane.

Toot:             Oh, I wouldn’t go that far.     I have an opinion.    Would you like to know it?

Wince:          Yes. 

Toot:             I think you’re troubled.    I think you imagine you know the truth and that’s a weight on your conscience.   

Wince:         So you’ll help me?  

Toot:             Of course.      I’ll do everything.      I’ll hire the best doctors.        The best attorneys.

Wince:         Gascone will help.      Gascone knows I’m here?  

Toot:             Of course.      He’s filed papers to have you committed, did you know?   

Wince:         No.     (pause)   So, … so you’re going to turn me over.  

Toot:             If you want me to.      What would you prefer?    This or the psych ward?      Of course in the asylum, they’ll beat you every day and shoot you up with drugs that alter the cells of your brain and make you impotent.     In some cases the drugs are especially designed, did you know, to make the cells eat each other.     It’s a topic of research.      Yes.    Blindness is often the result.    Well, I suppose each case is different.      But you might like it.     

Wince:         I’ll stay. 

Toot:             Well, don’t say I didn’t warn you.      Your being in hiding down there is the best way to protect you.   

Wince:         But then I’m a fugitive.  

Toot:             You were already that.      We rescued you to safety.  

Wince:         But if I’m a fugitive, that convinces everyone of my guilt. 

Toot:             They’d be even more convinced of that if you exposed yourself.    They’d think you were trying to pretend innocence.   

Wince:         But I am innocent.    

Toot:             Then you don’t want any pretense to ruin it.   (Reaches a golf ball to the hole in the platform.)  Hold this. 

Wince:          What?  

Toot:              The ball.    Hold it.    I’m gonna tee off.     

Wince:          You can’t tee off.     This is the putting green, putting green of the last hole.      When you get here, the game’s over. 

Toot:              The game’s not over.      Steady now.   Hold still.

(Toot aims and swings.   As he does, Wince withdraws his hand and the ball with it.  ) 

Toot:              Wow!      What a drive!                                                                          

Wince:          You didn’t drive.  

Toot:              Oh, way to go.    Lookit that.     Look at that ball sail.

Wince:          I don’t see it going anywhere.     It’s right here.    I’m telling the truth from now on.  

Toot:              Isn’t that just like you?     Second guessing me?     Contradicting what I say?  You’re locked in the cage of your own thinking.    Not me.  

Wince:          You didn’t drive at all.    I have the ball right here in my hand.  

Toot:              So look down the fairway.     What do you see?     You see my ball flying, sailing, up and up.     On and on.       And on.     (proudly)   On into the heights, the high highest ever.   

Wince:          Heh?    It’s not going anywhere.     And where are you?    This is the last hole.     There isn’t any more.     

Toot:              You’re so silly, Doc.     Down there, what can you see?    Up here you see the infinite.   Take it from me, kid.    There’s always another hole. 

( lights out. )