FARQUHAR: There’s the fuel in the can.
STYLER: I used it all.
FARQUHAR: Is it my imagination or have we just taken a downward spiral into farce?
STYLER: I’m sorry. (Pause.) I still want to do it.
FARQUHAR: I think the moment has passed, really.
STYLER: Please.
FARQUHAR: Well, we’ll have to consider another method.
STYLER: Yes.
FARQUHAR: You could strangle her.
STYLER: What?
FARQUHAR: I strangled two, maybe three of my victims. I forget the exact number.
STYLER: No.
FARQUHAR: Wait a minute…
FARQUHAR goes over to the desk and picks up the plastic Marks & Spencer bag. He takes the box of tissues out of the bag and hands the bag to STYLER.
Use this.
STYLER looks puzzled.
FARQUHAR: Use it to smother her.
STYLER: Smother her? With that?
FARQUHAR: Yes.
STYLER: It’s Marks & Spencer.
FARQUHAR: That guarantees the quality. Put it over her head. She won’t be able to breathe.
STYLER: I could do that.
FARQUHAR: Then do it.
PLIMPTON: No…
FARQUHAR gives STYLER the bag.
FARQUHAR: This is getting tedious. Just do it and then let’s go.
STYLER takes the bag and advances on PLIMPTON.
PLIMPTON: Mr Styler…you can’t do this. I’ll tell you why you can’t do this. Because whatever he says, you’re not like him. You know what you’re doing so it’s impossible for you to…
As quick as a flash, STYLER whips the bag over PLIMPTON’s head and holds it there. The bag cuts out any sound. Tied to the chair, PLIMPTON can barely struggle. But her legs kick more. Meanwhile, FARQUHAR gives advice.
FARQUHAR: That’s right. Trap the ends and keep the air out but don’t squeeze her throat. This is death by smothering, a Jacobean device frequently seen on stage. Much loved. It’s also the method, incidentally, by which Lee Marvin was killed in Stanley Donen’s 1963 classic, Charade.
Suddenly PLIMPTON slumps and her legs stop moving. Even then, STYLER doesn’t relax his grip. Not until FARQUHAR comes over to him and lays a hand on his arm. And suddenly we become aware that FARQUHAR has changed character again. He is gentler now, rational, sympathetic.
You’ve done it.
STYLER: Yes.
FARQUHAR: How did it feel?
STYLER: It felt…
FARQUHAR: Tell me!
STYLER: (Sobbing.) It felt horrible!
FARQUHAR: Do you feel remorse?
STYLER shakes his head, unable to speak.
Do you feel guilt? (Pause.) You feel disgust?
STYLER nods.
You wanted to be Easterman. (Pause.) You wanted to be Easterman.
STYLER: Yes.
FARQUHAR: And now you have become Easterman.
STYLER nods. Then realises.
STYLER: No.
FARQUHAR: Sssh…!
STYLER: I’m not Easterman.
FARQUHAR: You are Easterman. But you don’t want to be.
STYLER: No!
FARQUHAR: It’s alright now. We’ve moved back to the periphery. We’re in status nascendi. It’s alright.
STYLER: What?
FARQUHAR: You are Easterman. You were always Easterman. But what we’ve explored a little more today is why you were Easterman.
A pause.
STYLER: What are you talking about?
FARQUHAR: (Gently.) Easterman…
STYLER: I’m Styler!
FARQUHAR: You were Styler. That’s the name you chose. ( A smile.) All Styler, no substance. He’s gone now.
STYLER: I’m a writer.
FARQUHAR: We have no more time now.
STYLER: What are you doing?
FARQUHAR: That’s enough.
STYLER: This is a trick. You’re trying to trick me.
‘DR FARQUHAR’ whips the bag off ‘NURSE PLIMPTON’s’ head. She is alive. And she too has changed character. From now on she is a business-like woman, brittle and serious. Unhappy with what has taken place.
It would seem that DR FARQUHAR is actually Karel Ennis.
NURSE PLIMPTON is actually Dr Farquhar.
And STYLER is actually Easterman.
FARQUHAR: Tell him, Dr Farquhar.
PLIMPTON: Go back to your room, Easterman. That’s enough for today.
A pause.
STYLER: (To FARQUHAR.) Dr Farquhar?
FARQUHAR: (Indicating PLIMPTON.) This is Dr Farquhar.
STYLER: No.
FARQUHAR: (To PLIMPTON.) Help him.
PLIMPTON: I’m Dr Farquhar.
STYLER: (To FARQUHAR.) So who are you? Who are you telling me…? Who are you?
FARQUHAR: I’m Karel Ennis. You know that. I’m your therapist.
STYLER: (Close to tears again.) No. You’re doing this to me. You’re both doing this to me.
PLIMPTON: (To FARQUHAR.) Could you please let me out of this chair. I’d like to go and wash.
FARQUHAR: I’m sorry…
FARQUHAR picks up the scalpel and uses it to cut PLIMPTON free. STYLER can only watch as she crosses to the desk and picks up the box of tissues, using one to wipe her face. Then she crosses the room to the door and opens it. Once again it is unlocked. But this time it leads into a small bathroom with white tiles and a sink. During what follows, she washes and changes. We see her some of the time…
STYLER: What have you done to me?
FARQUHAR: You know where we’ve been travelling. You know what we talked about. The shifting anguish of responsibility.
STYLER: No. No. No. No. No. (Pressing his fingers to his head.) You’re trying to take away who I am. I am Mark Styler. I’m a writer.
FARQUHAR: You tried to kill Nurse Plimpton.
STYLER: (With difficulty.) I did it…because I was afraid of you.
FARQUHAR: You did it because you wanted to.
STYLER: No. I have written about murder. I have written…
A pause. FARQUHAR sees there is only one way forward.
FARQUHAR: It’s over. You haven’t written. There are no books.
STYLER: You had it. You lent it to Borson.
FARQUHAR: You came here in a red BMW. Where is the BMW?
STYLER: It’s outside. It’s by the main door.
FARQUHAR: Show me.
STYLER crosses to the window. The entire view has gone by now. A high brick wall surrounds the place.
STYLER: It’s gone!
FARQUHAR: No. It was never there. You never drove to Suffolk. We’re not in Suffolk. This is Vauxhall. This is the middle of London.
STYLER: But Fairfields…
FARQUHAR: That’s what you like to call it. But there are no fields. You haven’t seen a field for thirty years.
STYLER: This is a trick!
FARQUHAR picks a sheet of paper off the desk. It is the ‘letter’ that STYLER showed FARQUHAR when he first arrived.
FARQUHAR: This is a copy of the letter you sent me. You showed it to me. You said it was the letter that you wrote to Dr Farquhar.
STYLER: Yes.
FARQUHAR turns it round and now we see that it’s a blank sheet of paper.
FARQUHAR: It’s a blank sheet of paper.
STYLER: But you read it!
FARQUHAR: No. How could I? You read it to me.
STYLER: No…
FARQUHAR: Your tape recorder. The tape recorder you used when you were asking me questions…
FARQUHAR turns it round to show that it is broken, hollow, with no inner workings.
It has no tape. It has no batteries. It has no components. It’s a shell. Just like Styler.
STYLER: You’re saying that I’m mad and you’re sane but that’s not true. That’s not true. It’s the other way round. You’ve taken over the asylum and you’re doing this to me, both of you. You’re doing this to me because you think you can get away with it. But I
know who I am. I know what I am. I know…what I see…
STYLER sinks into a chair.
FARQUHAR: (Gently.) ‘He does not think there is anything the matter with him because one of the things that is the matter with him is that he does not think there is anything the matter with him.’
PLIMPTON walks back into the room. She has wiped off all the blood make-up and is now smartly dressed as the head of Fairfields. And by now it is her portrait that dominates the room, behind the desk.
PLIMPTON: He’s still here?
FARQUHAR: We’re having a little trouble winding down.
PLIMPTON: I’m not surprised. These sessions of yours, Karel, the psychodrama. It’s getting out of hand.
FARQUHAR: So you’ve said.
PLIMPTON: I sometimes wonder what it is exactly that you’re trying to achieve. Look at him, for heaven’s sake! Sometimes I think your patients end up sicker than they were before you started…
FARQUHAR: …which is something you know perfectly well Moreno was accused of throughout his life…
PLIMPTON: Yes!
FARQUHAR: …and which he cheerfully acknowledged! (Quoting.) ‘I give them a small dose of insanity under conditions of control…’
STYLER: You’re trying to make me mad.
FARQUHAR: ‘You cannot control your emotions until you have fully experienced them.’
PLIMPTON: Yes, yes, yes. But it’s the nature of the experience that I’m questioning. And from my own perspective, as head of this establishment and your boss – which perhaps I should remind you – I’m beginning to find these sessions…well, frankly humiliating.
FARQUHAR: (Soothing.) Alex…
PLIMPTON: No! I haven’t spent twenty-nine years in clinical psychiatry to end up being treated as a bit-part player in the theatrical equivalent of a video nasty. And I’m growing increasingly concerned about the level of the violence.
FARQUHAR: There was no real violence.
PLIMPTON: It was implicit.
STYLER is being ignored, edged out. And it’s as if he can feel himself slipping away…his sanity slipping from him.
STYLER: No, no, no, no no!
PLIMPTON: Are you going to take him back to his room?
FARQUHAR: Alex, I think we need to have this out.
PLIMPTON sighs and picks up her telephone.
PLIMPTON: (Into the phone.) Nurse Borson. Could you come up to my office please.
PLIMPTON puts down the telephone.
FARQUHAR: Of course these sessions are exhausting. But you know as well as I do that we can achieve more in two hours of psychodrama than we can in two months or even two years of conventional therapy.
STYLER: (Brightly, to PLIMPTON.) Hi. I am Mark Styler.
PLIMPTON: So it’s a question of means justifying the carpet.
FARQUHAR: I don’t deny that.
STYLER: (Looking up.) What did you say?
PLIMPTON: Come on, Karel. I’m as great an admirer of Moreno as you are, you know that. But I think you can envelope his methods to extremes.
STYLER: Carpet. Envelope.
FARQUHAR: But for ten years he said nothing. He was nothing but wallpaper. And yet in the ten months since I started with him…
STYLER: It’s a game.
PLIMPTON: Cigarette?
FARQUHAR: No, thank you.
PLIMPTON takes out a cigarette and lights it with a working lighter that is unattached to a chain.
PLIMPTON: Jelly.
FARQUHAR: I wouldn’t disagree.
PLIMPTON: With the carpet or the envelope?
FARQUHAR: Nor with the wallpaper.
STYLER: I am…!
PLIMPTON: Carpet. Envelope. And, of course, wallpaper.
FARQUHAR: Cigarette. Jelly.
PLIMPTON: Carpet. Envelope.
FARQUHAR: Wallpaper. Cigarette. Jelly.
PLIMPTON: Carpet.
STYLER has shrunk into a foetal position. He begins to rock back and forward, his hands pressed against his ears, his eyes closed, humming tunelessly to himself, trying to keep out the sight and the sound of the two people in the room.
FARQUHAR: Wallpaper. Wallpaper. Cigarette. Jelly.
PLIMPTON: Carpet. Cigarette. Cigarette. Carpet.
FARQUHAR: Jelly. Carpet. Wallpaper. Cigarette. Envelope.
The words continue, spoken as if part of a completely rational conversation. STYLER rocks back and forth.
The lights fade until he is left in a single spotlight.
Blackout.
The End.
Endnote
The Mercury Theatre production used calming music throughout the play – the same music used in the film, ‘One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest’. The music could be heard occasionally (and arbitrarily) through a speaker in FARQUHAR’s study. It was also used as an ironic counterpoint to the murder at the end of Act One.
The play ended with FARQUHAR and PLIMPTON both leaving the room, talking (‘Envelope, carpet…’) as they left. At the door, FARQUHAR paused and turned to STYLER.
FARQUHAR: Envelope.
As FARQUHAR closed the door, there was an echoing crash – a metal cell door – and STYLER fell to his knees. There was an instant light change. STYLER was now imprisoned in a square block of light with bars running across. FARQUHAR and PLIMPTON could be heard walking away, their footsteps echoing on a metal floor.
The ‘Cuckoo’s Nest’ music welled up. STYLER curled into a foetal position, humming vaguely to the tune.
Blackout.
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Anthony Horowitz, Mindgame
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