Dance of the Vampires and Six Other Plays

Part VII - Shoes

331 Part VII Shoes 332 333 Characters FIRST SOLDIER: Commanding Officer SECOND: Captain and second in command THIRD: Chief Warrant Officer FOURTH: Sergeant VOICES: Young Woman Man Old Woman/Old Women Crowd This play is set anywhere in a military dictatorship 334 335 The Beginning Was ... Four soldiers, their weapons at the ready storm playing area from different directions and then converge CS. Silence followed by wild laughter. FIRST Terrorists! SECOND Vandals! THIRD Traitors! FOURTH Subversives! They burst into wild laughter again and then do a jig. SOLO: ebeesee, ebeesee! CHORUS: Wonderful! SOLO: ebeesee, ebeesee! CHORUS: Wonderful! SOLO: Small gondele, big, big bobbi! CHORUS: Wonderful! SOLO: Big gondele, small, small bobbi! CHORUS: Wonderful! SOLO: We soja dem di jam noting! CHORUS: Wonderful! SOLO: Woman na so dem buku fo ya! CHORUS: Wonderful! SOLO: Small gondele, big, big bobbi! CHORUS: Wonderful! SOLO: Big gondele, small, small bobbi! CHORUS: Wonderful! 336 Another burst of laughter. FIRST Intoxicators and propagandists! SECOND Power mongers and vandals! THIRD Ignorant manipulated traitors! FOURTH Jealousy na im go kill dem all. FIRST/SECOND Terrorist vandals! THIRD/FOURTH Subversive traitors! FIRST Troops attention! At ease! How many did we capture during the operation? FOURTH Who cares? All the baggas should have been shot on battle field. Especially with that stampede. Even two hundred could die. SECOND You are right, Sergeant. Our boys of the sacred choir would have demonstrated their expertise in forcing it down the throat of whoever would want to listen. THIRD What you fo do with the bodies? 337 FIRST Bobbies? You don’t know what to do with bobbies? SECOND You squeezam small, small. Then you suckam like picken who has not seen his mammy for one whole day. After that you take your belt and lasham well, well. That is what you do with bobbies. THIRD Yes, that is all you know. Woman palaver and torture. Who call bobbi? I said what you fo do with the bodies? Die body or corpse, that’s what I mean. FOURTH That is easy, man. Load them on trucks and dump them in shallow graves in the forest. SECOND Which forest? FIRST What do you mean, which forest? There is a lot of forest all over the place: east, south, centre; centre, south, east. Everywhere is forest. THIRD And when the parents and relatives come? FIRST Show them the empty cells and mortuary. Nobody dead. Nobody arrested. Soldier no kill nobody. Soldier no carry loaded gun. Soldier is there to protect vandals and subversives. SECOND And if they insist. 338 FOURTH Insist? Who born dog? Then we teargas and horsewhip them. Nonsense! Insist indeed. FIRST And my question. SECOND/THIRD What question? FIRST How many did we capture during the operation? THIRD Who cares to count? Four or five truck loads. Something like that. FIRST Any girls? SECOND Plenty. You know they are more easily affected by the gas. And since we surrounded them completely it was by far better to catch a girl. FOURTH Na who no like bobbi we-i sabi book? I will show them. FIRST Who? The girls or the bobbies? FOURTH Those half-cooked subversives who think they know all the book in the world. Now they allow themselves to be manipulated by those jealous, greedy and ambitious vandals who call themselves Manjong 339 and Mfu leaders. People who cannot control their own wives and children now think they can manage affairs of the land. THIRD Why do you talk as if to say you are angry? You know say we in the military we don’t have any hand inside politics matters. SECOND Yes, we are just there to execute orders, not to play politics. FOURTH When the other man and his people chopped and chopped for over twenty donkey years nobody said anything. Now my own man, the General comes, he has not even done half-time and people are already shouting. Dat one na jealousy pure and simple. FIRST You shut your big mouth, Sergeant! Too much size-mut na-im di kill dis country. We have a job to do, that’s all. Troops attention! At ease! Now let’s get the shoes in one nice heap. Fall out! Fourth is examining shoes to see if any of them can match. FIRST Hei, you! Sergeant! What the hell do you think you are doing? FOURTH Nothing, my Commandant. I just wanted to see if any...