November Read online

  ARCHER: That’s right.

  CHARLES: … in the factories, and so on.

  ARCHER: That’s right.

  CHARLES: Which once dotted our land.

  ARCHER: … read your history …

  CHARLES: So, so, Bernstein …

  ARCHER: Bernstein, there are Bigger Issues involved here …

  BERNSTEIN: Oh, Sir, you have lowered yourself in my estimate.

  CHARLES: Whoa whoa whoa whoa whoa: I’m gonna tell you what. Bernstein? You and your pal. Go home. One of you throw on a sportcoat, come back, allow the American Public to infer that one of you’s a man, and on we go.

  BERNSTEIN: Sir, my partner is a woman.

  CHARLES: Who is to say what a woman is?

  BERNSTEIN: Sir.

  CHARLES: Many fine doctors …

  BERNSTEIN: Sir.

  CHARLES: Are unable, totally, at birth, to determine …

  ARCHER: Absolutely.

  BERNSTEIN: Mist …

  CHARLES: … the sex … uh … of the uh child.

  ARCHER: Chucky …

  CHARLES: Resulting in …

  ARCHER: Chucky. I need you to clear your mind.

  CHARLES: … great, great sorrow, as the infant grapples …

  ARCHER: ’Cause in two minutes you are going on international TV.

  CHARLES: … in later life.

  ARCHER: Chuck.

  CHARLES: As the kid, in high school, trying out for track, field hockey for example, and, she finds out, she’s a guy.

  ARCHER: Sir …

  CHARLES: Opening herself, to uh, uh, “hazing …”

  ARCHER: Sir …?

  CHARLES: (Pause) Because of a simple error. On the uh, birth certificate, the fucken nurse checked off the wrong, uh …

  ARCHER: Chuck.

  CHARLES: Sex …

  ARCHER: Chuck …

  CHARLES: … of the child.

  BERNSTEIN: Sir, my partner is a woman.

  CHARLES: Who are you to judge?

  BERNSTEIN: I’m sure she’d say she is a woman.

  CHARLES: At the cost of your happiness? (Pause) I’m going to tell you, Bernstein, I don’t care what sex she is. Couldn’t care less. If she merely…

  BERNSTEIN: She’s wearing a wedding dress.

  CHARLES: Allows it to be inferred, that she …

  BERNSTEIN: Sir.

  CHARLES: … is any one thing but a woman, I will hitch you up so tight, your eyes will pop.

  BERNSTEIN: Sir …

  CHARLES: Well, then, do you know what? Fuck you. Because, this is the trouble with your liberal agenda.

  BERNSTEIN: What is that?

  (TURKEY GUY enters.)

  TURKEY GUY: Sir, the cameras are about to roll. The turkeys are restive, and I assume you’ve resolved that other matter.

  BERNSTEIN: What is the problem with my liberal agenda, Sir?

  CHARLES: You are willing to sacrifice the happiness of actual flesh-and-blood “people” to protect some cockamamie, dumb idea of “justice.”

  BERNSTEIN: I take the strongest exception to your speech.

  CHARLES: And so you want to “Save the World.”

  TURKEY GUY: Uh, uh …

  CHARLES: And all that happy horseshit.

  BERNSTEIN: Sir …

  CHARLES: But, not unless you and your pal can have a little piece of paper…

  BERNSTEIN: That quote little piece of paper, as you denigrate it, is the symbol of our …

  CHARLES: Oh, stuff a sock in it.

  BERNSTEIN: HUMAN DIGNITY. (Sneezes)

  CHARLES: Oh, please.

  TURKEY GUY: Sir.

  BERNSTEIN: We named our baby after you.

  ARCHER: Bernstein: It’s just, JUST not going to happen.

  (Pause.)

  BERNSTEIN: I wrote you such a beautiful speech …

  CHARLES: I’m sorry, Bernstein …

  BERNSTEIN: About how, as a nation, those things which unite US… (BERNSTEIN gives the speech to CHARLES. To CHARLES)… here … (Pause) Read it, Sir. The words are mine, but the ideas are yours.

  (The phone rings. ARCHER answers and listens.)

  ARCHER: Yes. (Hangs up the phone)

  CHARLES: (Reads) “The Little League, the sewing circle, the scout troop.”

  ARCHER: The turkeys died.

  CHARLES: “our blessed American spirit of cooperation.”

  ARCHER: The turkeys are dead.

  BERNSTEIN: I beg your pardon.

  ARCHER: The turkeys are dead.

  TURKEY GUY: No. No. The turkeys can’t be dead. (He takes the phone.) What do you mean the turkeys are …

  ARCHER: … what did they die of?

  TURKEY GUY: (To phone) What did they … BIRD FLU?

  CHARLES: Bird flu?

  TURKEY GUY: (To phone) They died of Bird Flu …? HOW COULD THEY GET BIRD FLU, WE’VE HAD THEM IN AN ISOLATION TANK SINCE BIRTH.

  CHARLES: (To self)… the Fucken turkeys died of Bird Flu.

  TURKEY GUY: (To phone) How … who, who, has anybody in the office been to China…

  ARCHER: (Takes phone) Okay, okay.… Who said it was Bird Flu?

  CHARLES: Who said it?

  ARCHER: The guy from Walter Reed.

  CHARLES: A “doctor”…?

  ARCHER: Yes, a doctor.

  CHARLES: Who did he say it to?

  ARCHER: He said it on national TV.

  CHARLES: … Well, that sucks …

  ARCHER: The birds died on national TV, the doctor walked over, and said it was Bird Flu.

  TURKEY GUY: NO NO NO NO NO …

  CHARLES: What was the doctor doing there …?

  TURKEY GUY: (To self) The turkeys died.

  ARCHER: You sent for him because Bernstein was sneezing.

  TURKEY GUY: She was sneezing, and the other girl was sneezing and … WHAT IS THAT ABOUT YOUR NECK?

  CHARLES: An ancient Chinese amulet.

  TURKEY GUY: Where did you get it?

  BERNSTEIN: China.

  CHARLES: Yeah, she just came back from China.

  TURKEY GUY: YOU’VE GIVEN MY TURKEYS BIRD FLU. You’ve killed my turkeys. (Begins to weep)

  CHARLES: Get him a fucken sedative.

  (ARCHER walks TURKEY GUY to the door.)

  ARCHER: Bernstein, you swine …

  CHARLES: (To self) The turkeys are dead.

  ARCHER: You traitor lesbian swine …

  CHARLES: Can I pardon the turkeys, though dead?

  ARCHER: What have you done?

  CHARLES: … what has she done …

  ARCHER: She’s plunged this country into chaos.

  CHARLES: Will anybody still give me some money?

  (The TURKEY GUY reenters, obviously upset, and starts for the President.)

  TURKEY GUY: You’ve Killed my Fucken Turkeys!!!

  (ARCHER drags the TURKEY GUY from the room.)

  CHARLES: (To phone) Could somebody please find the Secret Service? For the love of God. (Hangs up phone; to BERNSTEIN) You’ve plunged this country into chaos, Bernstein. (ARCHER reenters.) Was this your intent …?

  ARCHER: … and she’s cost us the election …

  CHARLES: Was this your intent? You’ve ground this country to a halt. JUST BECAUSE YOU HAD TO HAVE A LITTLE CHINESE BABY. YOU COULDN’T GET KNOCKED UP, IN THE BACKSEAT OF A CHEVY, NO. LIKE EVERY OTHER AMERICAN GIRL IN HISTORY. But, no, you’ve got to tritz off to “China” and bring back avian-borne Bird Flu, that scourge which will destroy civilization as we know it.

  BERNSTEIN: Sir …

  CHARLES: I’m very disappointed in you … (The phone rings.) Hello. Cathy. Yes. It’s Bird Flu. But: they’ll send a bus, to take us to the Hole in the Mountains … right Arch?

  ARCHER: If you win …

  CHARLES: What?

  ARCHER: You can stay in the Hole in the Mountains as long as you’re President.

  CHARLES: They take you to the Hole in the Mountains, as long as you’re President … They kick you out of the Hole in the Mountains, when you’re not Pr
esident?

  ARCHER: That is correct.

  CHARLES: That’s cold.

  (DWIGHT GRACKLE bursts in.)

  DWIGHT GRACKLE: Where is he …?

  CHARLES: Now who the fuck are you?

  DWIGHT GRACKLE: Who the fuck am I? Who the fuck am I? Look HERE: (Shows pass) That’s who I am. Who the fuck are you? Eurotrash.

  CHARLES: I’m the President of the United States.

  (ARCHER looks at pass and translates for the President.)

  ARCHER: “Dwight Grackle.”

  CHARLES: You know what?… where is my security?

  ARCHER: (Looks at watch) Coffee break.

  CHARLES: … fucken civil service.

  DWIGHT GRACKLE: Chief Dwight Grackle, the incarnation of “Raven,” the trickster, messenger of DOOM.

  CHARLES: (To phone)… would you see if there’s anybody out there, who’s got a gun …?

  DWIGHT GRACKLE: Avenger of the Micmac Nation.

  CHARLES: Or a “fire hatchet” or something …? (Hangs up phone)

  DWIGHT GRACKLE: Fucken USURPER.

  ARCHER: Calm down.

  DWIGHT GRACKLE: Don’t tell me to calm down, for I have come for blood …

  (Phone rings. CHARLES answers it.)

  CHARLES: Cathy, I’ll have to call you back. (Hangs up phone)

  DWIGHT GRACKLE: I have come to avenge a debt of honor. Honor, you colonialist prick, but you…

  CHARLES: How’d you get in?

  DWIGHT GRACKLE: I have a pass. Sir? I have a pass, as if I needed a pass.

  CHARLES: … everybody needs a pass. How’d he get a pass?

  ARCHER: You told the gate to give him a pass.

  DWIGHT GRACKLE: As if I needed a pass. To walk on this land.

  CHARLES: … well.

  DWIGHT GRACKLE: As if I needed a pass.

  CHARLES: Well, you’ve got a pass, so what are you bitching about?

  DWIGHT GRACKLE: You maligned me and my people.

  CHARLES: Uh-huh.

  DWIGHT GRACKLE: And I’m gonna cut your fucken heart out and eat it in front of your dying eyes.

  CHARLES: Perhaps I spoke intemperately.

  DWIGHT GRACKLE: Your curse can only be expunged by blood.

  CHARLES: Hey, those are big words.

  ARCHER: He called you one, you called him one …

  DWIGHT GRACKLE: And he maligned the Treaty of Porcupine Cove.

  CHARLES: Archie … I believe we have a COPY OF THAT “treaty,” out in the outer office, would you.

  ARCHER: Abso … (Starts to leave)

  DWIGHT GRACKLE: NOT SO FRICKEN FAST. And he suggested my second wife be eaten by a walrus.

  CHARLES: Well, I’m sure that was traumatic. (To phone) … is there anybody out there with a big “ruler” or a cricket bat …

  DWIGHT GRACKLE: Too late.

  (DWIGHT takes a long ceremonial-looking pipe from his jacket.)

  CHARLES: I don’t think so, Dwight—as I see, after everything is said and done, man that you are, you’ve brought the peace pipe.

  DWIGHT GRACKLE: It’s not a peace pipe, dickwad. It’s a blowpipe fashioned from the never-cut first bough of the Rowan tree, wrapped with the hair of fifteen virgins.

  CHARLES: That’s swell …

  DWIGHT GRACKLE: And here’s the kicker, what is this? (Takes out a poison dart.) A poison dart, its point the tooth of a female otter, dipped in wolverine blood and fox semen.

  CHARLES: (To phone)… can anybody find a cop …?

  DWIGHT GRACKLE: And an irreversible mulberry-root toxin known only to the elders of my tribe. Prepare to die.

  BERNSTEIN: Don’t do it Dwight.

  DWIGHT GRACKLE: He has watered the land with the blood of my tribe.

  BERNSTEIN: No doubt. But Dwight … I’m going to ask you, Dwight, to listen to the voice of reason.

  CHARLES: You listen to the voice of reason, Dwight.

  DWIGHT GRACKLE: You stole my land with honeyed words.

  BERNSTEIN: He didn’t steal your land.

  DWIGHT GRACKLE: His ancestors.

  CHARLES: My ancestors came from Lithuania.

  BERNSTEIN: His ancestors came from Lithuania, Dwight.

  DWIGHT GRACKLE: The weapon, having been unsheathed, cries out for blood.

  BERNSTEIN: No, you can resheathe the weapon, Dwight; no harm’s been done—give it to me.

  DWIGHT GRACKLE: Stand back …

  BERNSTEIN: Give me the blowpipe, Dwight.

  DWIGHT GRACKLE: Each of us owes the gods a death. Pay up, you chucklehead.

  BERNSTEIN: Stop! He’s the leader of the Free World!

  (DWIGHT puts the dart in the blowpipe and fires it. BERNSTEIN interposes herself between the assassin and the President. The dart hits her and she falls. A pause.)

  BERNSTEIN: Oh, gosh …

  CHARLES: Bernstein …

  (Pause.)

  BERNSTEIN: Mister President …

  CHARLES: Bernstein, don’t die …

  BERNSTEIN: Mister President … My partner …

  CHARLES: Yes, Bernstein, yes.

  BERNSTEIN: My partner and I.

  CHARLES: Yes.

  BERNSTEIN: We …

  CHARLES: Bernstein …

  BERNSTEIN: We were going to vote for you.

  (She dies. A pause.)

  CHARLES: (To DWIGHT GRACKLE) You sonofabitch. YOU JUST COST ME TWO VOTES!!!

  DWIGHT GRACKLE: Oh, jeez.

  CHARLES: What have you done? With your warlike impulses.

  DWIGHT GRACKLE: I’m just that sorry …

  CHARLES: Everyone’s about to die from Bird Flu, awaiting some word of consolation, from their President, and my speechwriter’s dead.

  ARCHER: (Pause) Hey, life goes on …

  CHARLES: She took a poison dart for me.

  ARCHER: … she’s a true patriot.

  (The phone rings. ARCHER answers the phone.)

  CHARLES: (To self) She gave up her life for her country …

  ARCHER: (To phone) What?

  CHARLES: Just like the Hist’ry books. Wow.

  ARCHER: (Pause) What? Say that again, please. Thank you. (Pause) The turkeys aren’t dead.

  CHARLES: What …?

  ARCHER: I beg your pardon, they are dead, but they didn’t die of Bird Flu.

  CHARLES: They’re “dead,” but they didn’t die of Bird Flu?

  ARCHER: No.

  CHARLES: What did they die of?

  ARCHER: They exploded.

  CHARLES: They “exploded”?

  ARCHER: The TV lights were too hot.

  CHARLES: Yes …

  ARCHER: And they’re all over the walls. They blew up.

  CHARLES: But it’s not Bird Flu?

  ARCHER: Wait wait wait wait wait: if it were Bird Flu, the voters would have to stay home. And you win.

  CHARLES: … but it’s not Bird Flu.

  ARCHER: No. The lights or something were too hot, and they expanded. (To phone) Yep. Let’s go with “Bird Flu …”

  BERNSTEIN: … but then people will be frightened.

  ARCHER: They’re gonna do just fine. Excuse me, why are you alive …?

  CHARLES: Bernstein …?

  BERNSTEIN: Sir?

  CHARLES: Why are you alive.

  DWIGHT GRACKLE: (Reflectively)… the poison has never failed.

  CHARLES: … why …?

  DWIGHT GRACKLE: (Similarly) How has the white woman survived?

  ARCHER: Bernstein? How have you survived?

  BERNSTEIN: Uh, the dart struck my amulet.

  (CHARLES examines BERNSTEIN.)

  CHARLES: The dart has struck her amulet. The Chinese amulet has saved her life.

  (The phone rings.)

  ARCHER: Yes.

  CHARLES: (To self) Huh…

  ARCHER: It’s the Secret Service, they’re back from their coffee break …

  CHARLES: The Chinese amulet signifying “love” has saved her life …

  (Pause.)

  ARCHER: … and “are you okay”???r />
  CHARLES: Bernstein, you saved my life.

  BERNSTEIN: I can’t tell you how happy I am, Sir, to serve.

  CHARLES: I betrayed you, and yet, you risked your life for me.

  ARCHER: You had your life saved by a lesbian. Great. “In the midst of Bird Flu …”

  CHARLES: You risked your life for me, why?

  BERNSTEIN: Sir, you’re the President.

  CHARLES: I…

  BERNSTEIN: The people voted for you.

  CHARLES: They were mistaken.

  BERNSTEIN: That’s their right.

  CHARLES: Bernstein, you know who I am—I’m just some guy in a suit.

  BERNSTEIN: Sir, with respect? So were all the other guys who sat here.

  CHARLES: What? George Washington?

  BERNSTEIN: Guy in a suit.

  CHARLES: Abraham Lincoln?

  BERNSTEIN: Guy in a suit.

  CHARLES: Bernstein, Lincoln freed the slaves. I can’t free the slaves.

  BERNSTEIN: You could marry me and my partner. (Pause) It would be your legacy.

  CHARLES: … my legacy …

  ARCHER: Chucky …

  CHARLES: (Holds up a hand for quiet. Pause) I always felt that I’d do something memorable—I just assumed it’d be getting impeached. Huh. (Pause) “My legacy—” (Pause) Bernstein—wash your face—you’re getting married.

  ARCHER: It’s not legal.

  CHARLES: Let the next guy figure it out.

  ARCHER: It’ll cost you the election.

  CHARLES: Damn job’s a pain in the ass. Too much stress. Too little opportunity for theft. I’m broke, I’m tired, and I’m going home.

  BERNSTEIN: … what will you do …?

  CHARLES: I’ll have Thanksgiving at the kitchen table, Bernstein. I’ll sit out on my front porch, and I’ll watch the sun go down … on a life of Public Service.

  BERNSTEIN: Sir, may I kiss you …?

  CHARLES: In the Oval Office …? Get the fuck out of here.

  (BERNSTEIN kisses CHARLES.)

  CHARLES: Bernstein. Come on. I’m giving you away.

  ARCHER: (re: DWIGHT GRACKLE) What about the Indian?

  (Pause.)

  CHARLES: Oh, yes: Dwight? United for an instant in this accident called “time,” our paths converged. Now we must part, each to his own fate. I, a failed politician, am dismissed to poverty, you, an assassin, go to torture and death. Farewell.

  DWIGHT GRACKLE: Sir? Wyntcha just pardon me, give me Nantucket Island, you ’n’ me’ll build a casino. (Pause)

  CHARLES: Jesus I love this country.

  ALSO BY DAVID MAMET

  BOSTON MARRIAGE

  In this droll comedy of errors set in a Victorian drawing room, Anna and Claire are two bantering, scheming “women of fashion” who live together on the fringes of society. Anna has just become the mistress of a wealthy man. Claire, meanwhile, is infatuated with a young girl and wants to enlist the jealous Anna’s help for an assignation. As the two women exchange barbs, Claire’s inamorata arrives and sets off a crisis that puts both women’s futures at risk.