Bertolt Brecht: Mutter Courage und ihre Kinder 6

  Dogsborough’s BUTLER

  Bodyguards

  Gunmen

  Vegetable dealers of Chicago and Cicero

  Reporters

  Prologue

  The Announcer steps before the curtain. Large notices are attached to the curtain: ‘New developments in dock subsidy scandal’ … ‘The true facts about Dogsborough’s will and confession’… ‘Sensation at warehouse fire trial’… ‘Friends murder gangster Ernesto Roma’… ‘Ignatius Dullfeet blackmailed and murdered’ … ‘Cicero taken over by gangsters’. Behind the curtain popular dance music.

  THE ANNOUNCER:

  Friends, tonight we’re going to show –

  Pipe down, you boys in the back row!

  And, lady, your hat is in the way! –

  Our great historical gangster play

  Containing, for the first time, as you’ll see

  The truth about the scandalous dock subsidy.

  Further we give you, for your betterment

  Dogsborough’s confession and testament.

  Arturo Ui’s rise while the stock market fell.

  The notorious warehouse fire trial. What a sell!

  The Dullfeet murder! Justice in a coma!

  Gang warfare: the killing of Ernesto Roma!

  All culminating in our stunning last tableau:

  Gangsters take over the town of Cicero!

  Brilliant performers will portray

  The most eminent gangsters of our day.

  You’ll see some dead and some alive

  Some by-gone and others that survive

  Some born, some made – for instance, here we show

  The good old honest Dogsborough!

  Old Dogsborough steps before the curtain.

  His hair is white, his heart is black.

  Corrupt old man, you may step back.

  Dogsborough bows and steps back.

  The next exhibit on our list

  Is Givola –

  Givola has stepped before the curtain.

  – the horticulturist.

  His tongue’s so slippery he’d know how

  To sell you a billy-goat for a cow!

  Short, says the proverb, are the legs of lies.

  Look at his legs, just use your eyes.

  Givola steps back limping.

  Now to Emanuele Giri, the super-clown.

  Come out, let’s look you up and down!

  Giri steps before the curtain and waves his hand at the audience.

  One of the greatest killers ever known!

  Okay, beat it!

  Giri steps back with an angry look.

  And lastly Public Enemy Number One

  Arturo Ui. Now you’ll see

  The biggest gangster of all times

  Whom heaven sent us for our crimes

  Our weakness and stupidity!

  Arturo Ui steps before the curtain and walks out along the footlights.

  Doesn’t he make you think of Richard the Third?

  Has anybody ever heard

  Of blood so ghoulishly and lavishly shed

  Since wars were fought for roses white and red?

  In view of this the management

  Has spared no cost in its intent

  To picture his spectacularly vile

  Manoeuvres in the grandest style.

  But everything you’ll see tonight is true.

  Nothing’s invented, nothing’s new

  Or made to order just for you.

  The gangster play that we present

  Is known to our whole continent.

  While the music swells and the sound of a machine-gun mingles with it, the Announcer retires with an air of bustling self-importance.

  1

  a

  Financial district. Enter five businessmen, the directors of the Cauliflower Trust.

  FLAKE: The times are bad.

  CLARK: It looks as if Chicago

  The dear old girl, while on her way to market

  Had found her pocket torn and now she’s starting

  To scrabble in the gutter for her pennies.

  CARUTHER: Last Thursday Jones invited me and eighty

  More to a partridge dinner to be held

  This Monday. If we really went, we’d find

  No one to greet us but the auctioneer.

  This awful change from glut to destitution

  Has come more quickly than a maiden’s blush.

  Vegetable fleets with produce for this city

  Still ply the lakes, but nowhere will you find

  A buyer.

  BUTCHER: It’s like darkness at high noon.

  MULBERRY: Robber and Clive are being auctioned off.

  CLARK: Wheeler – importing fruit since Noah’s ark –

  Is bankrupt.

  FLAKE: And Dick Havelock’s garages

  Are liquidiating.

  CARUTHER: Where is Sheet?

  FLAKE: Too busy

  To come. He’s dashing round from bank to bank.

  CLARK: What? Sheet?

  Pause.

  In other words, the cauliflower

  Trade in this town is through.

  BUTCHER: Come, gentlemen

  Chin up! We’re not dead yet.

  MULBERRY: Call this a life?

  BUTCHER: Why all the gloom? The produce business in

  This town is basically sound. Good times

  And bad, a city of four million needs

  Fresh vegetables. Don’t worry. We’ll pull through.

  CARUTHER: How are the stores and markets doing?

  MULBERRY: Badly.

  The customers buy half a head of cabbage

  And that on credit.

  CLARK: Our cauliflower’s rotting.

  FLAKE: Say, there’s a fellow waiting in the lobby –

  I only mention it because it’s odd –

  The name is Ui …

  CLARK: The gangster?

  FLAKE: Yes, in person.

  He’s smelled the stink and thinks he sees an opening.

  Ernesto Roma, his lieutenant, says

  They can convince shopkeepers it’s not healthy

  To handle other people’s cauliflower.

  He promises our turnover will double

  Because, he says, the shopkeepers would rather

  Buy cauliflower than coffins.

  They laugh dejectedly.

  CARUTHER: It’s an outrage.

  MULBERRY, laughing uproariously:

  Bombs and machine guns! New conceptions of

  Salesmanship! That’s the ticket. Fresh young

  Blood in the Cauliflower Trust. They heard

  We had insomnia, so Mr Ui

  Hastens to offer us his services.

  Well, fellows, we’ll just have to choose. It’s him

  Or the Salvation Army. Which one’s soup

  Do you prefer?

  CLARK: I tend to think that Ui’s

  Is hotter.

  CARUTHER: Throw him out!

  MULBERRY: Politely though.

  How do we know what straits we’ll come to yet?

  They laugh.

  FLAKE, to Butcher:

  What about Dogsborough and a city loan?

  To the others.

  Butcher and I cooked up a little scheme

  To help us through our pesent money troubles.

  I’ll give it to you in a nutshell. Why

  Shouldn’t the city that takes in our taxes

  Give us a loan, let’s say, for docks that we

  Would undertake to build, so vegetables

  Can be brought in more cheaply? Dogsborough

  Is influential. He could put it through.

  Have you seen Dogsborough?

  BUTCHER: Yes. He refuses

  To touch it.

  FLAKE: He refuses? Damn it, he’s

  The ward boss on the waterfront, and he

  Won’t help us!

  CARUTHER: I’ve contributed for years

  To his campaign fund.

/>   MULBERRY: Hell, he used to run

  Sheet’s lunchroom. Before he took up politics

  He got his bread and butter from the Trust.

  That’s rank ingratitude. It’s just like I’ve been

  Telling you, Flake. All loyalty is gone!

  Money is short, but loyalty is shorter.

  Cursing, they scurry from the sinking ship

  Friend turns to foe, employee snubs his boss

  And our old lunchroom operator

  Who used to be all smiles is one cold shoulder.

  Morals go overboard in times of crisis.

  CARUTHER: I’d never have expected that of Dogsborough.

  FLAKE: What’s his excuse?

  BUTCHER: He says our proposition

  Is fishy.

  FLAKE: What’s fishy about building docks?

  Think of the men we’d put to work.

  BUTCHER: He says

  He has his doubts about our building docks.

  FLAKE: Outrageous!

  BUTCHER: What? Not building?

  FLAKE: No. His doubts.

  CLARK: Then find somebody else to push the loan.

  MULBERRY: Sure, there are other people.

  BUTCHER: True enough.

  But none like Dogsborough. No, take it easy.

  The man is good.

  CLARK: For what?

  BUTCHER: He’s honest. And

  What’s more, reputed to be honest.

  FLAKE: Rot!

  BUTCHER: He’s got to think about his reputation.

  That’s obvious.

  FLAKE: Who gives a damn? We need

  A loan from City Hall. His reputation

  Is his affair.

  BUTCHER: You think so? I should say

  It’s ours. It takes an honest man to swing

  A loan like this, a man they’d be ashamed

  To ask for proofs and guarantees. And such

  A man is Dogsborough. Old Dogsborough’s

  Our loan. All right, I’ll tell you why. Because they

  Believe in him. They may have stopped believing

  In God, but not in Dogsborough. A hard-boiled

  Broker, who takes a lawyer with him to

  His lawyer’s, wouldn’t hesitate to put his

  Last cent in Dogsborough’s apron for safe keeping

  If he should see it lying on the bar.

  Two hundred pounds of honesty. In eighty

  Winters he’s shown no weakness. Such a man

  Is worth his weight in gold – especially

  To people with a scheme for building docks

  And building kind of slowly.

  FLAKE: Okay, Butcher

  He’s worth his weight in gold. The deal he vouches

  For is tied up. The only trouble is:

  He doesn’t vouch for ours.

  CLARK: Oh no, not he!

  ‘The city treasury is not a grab bag!’

  MULBERRY: And ‘All for the city, the city for itself!’

  CARUTHER: Disgusting. Not an ounce of humour.

  MULBERRY: Once

  His mind’s made up, an earthquake wouldn’t change it.

  To him the city’s not a place of wood

  And stone, where people live with people

  Struggling to feed themselves and pay the rent

  But words on paper, something from the Bible.

  The man has always gotten on my nerves.

  CLARK: His heart was never with us. What does he care

  For cauliflower and the trucking business?

  Let every vegetable in the city rot

  You think he’d lift a finger? No, for nineteen years

  Or is it twenty, we’ve contributed

  To his campaign fund. Well, in all that time

  The only cauliflower he’s ever seen

  Was on his plate. What’s more, he’s never once

  Set foot in a garage.

  BUTCHER: That’s right.

  CLARK: The devil

  Take him!

  BUTCHER: Oh no! We’ll take him.

  FLAKE: But Clark says

  It can’t be done. The man has turned us down.

  BUTCHER: That’s so. But Clark has also told us why.

  CLARK: The bastard doesn’t know which way is up.

  BUTCHER: Exactly. What’s his trouble? Ignorance.

  He hasn’t got the faintest notion what

  It’s like to be in such a fix. The question

  Is therefore how to put him in our skin.

  In short, we’ve got to educate the man.

  I’ve thought it over. Listen, here’s my plan.

  A sign appears, recalling certain incidents in the recent past.*

  b

  Outside the produce exchange. Flake and Sheet in conversation.

  SHEET: I’ve run from pillar to post. Pillar was out

  Of town, and Post was sitting in the bathtub.

  Old friends show nothing but their backs. A brother

  Buys wilted shoes before he meets his brother

  For fear his brother will touch him for a loan.

  Old partners dread each other so they use

  False names when meeting in a public place.

  Our citizens are sewing up their pockets.

  FLAKE: So what about my proposition?

  SHEET: No. I

  Won’t sell. You want a five-course dinner for the

  Price of the tip. And to be thanked for the tip

  At that. You wouldn’t like it if

  I told you what I think of you.

  FLAKE: Nobody

  Will pay you any more.

  SHEET: And friends won’t be

  More generous than anybody else.

  FLAKE: Money is tight these days.

  SHEET: Especially

  For those in need. And who can diagnose

  A friend’s need better than a friend?

  FLAKE: You’ll lose

  Your shipyard either way.

  SHEET: And that’s not all

  I’ll lose. I’ve got a wife who’s likely to

  Walk out on me.

  FLAKE: But if you sell …

  SHEET: … she’ll last another year. But what I’m curious

  About is why you want my shipyard.

  FLAKE: Hasn’t

  It crossed your mind that we – I mean the Trust –

  Might want to help you?

  SHEET: No, it never crossed

  My mind. How stupid of me to suspect you

  Of trying to grab my property, when you

  Were only trying to help.

  FLAKE: Such bitterness

  Dear Sheet, won’t save you from the hammer.

  SHEET: At least, dear Flake, it doesn’t help the hammer.

  Three men saunter past: Arturo Ui, the gangster, his lieutenant Ernesto Roma, and a bodyguard. In passing, Ui stares at Flake as though expecting to be spoken to, while, in leaving, Roma turns his head and gives Flake an angry look.

  SHEET: Who’s that?

  FLAKE: Arturo Ui, the gangster … How

  About it? Are you selling?

  SHEET: He seemed eager

  To speak to you.

  FLAKE, laughing angrily: And so he is. He’s been

  Pursuing us with offers, wants to sell

  Our cauliflower with his tommy guns.

  The town is full of types like that right now

  Corroding it like leprosy, devouring

  A finger, then an arm and shoulder. No one

  Knows where it comes from, but we all suspect

  From deepest hell. Kidnapping, murder, threats

  Extortion, blackmail, massacre:

  ‘Hands up!’ ‘Your money or your life!’ Outrageous!

  It’s got to be wiped out.

  SHEET, looking at him sharply: And quickly. It’s contagious.

  FLAKE: Well, how about it? Are you selling?

  SHEET, stepping back and looking at him:

  No doubt about it: a resemblance to
>
  Those three who just passed by. Not too pronounced

  But somehow there, one senses more than sees it.

  Under the water of a pond sometimes

  You see a branch, all green and slimy. It

  Could be a snake. But no, it’s definitely

  A branch. Or is it? That’s how you resemble

  Roma. Don’t take offence. But when I looked

  At him just now and then at you, it seemed

  To me I’d noticed it before, in you

  And others, without understanding. Say it

  Again, Flake: ‘How about it? Are you selling?’

  Even your voice, I think … No, better say

  ‘Hands up!’ because that’s what you really mean.

  He puts up his hands.

  All right, Flake, Take the shipyard!

  Give me a kick or two in payment. Hold it!

  I’ll take the higher offer. Make it two.

  FLAKE: You’re crazy!

  SHEET: I only wish that that were true.

  2

  Back room in Dogsborough’s restaurant. Dogsborough and his son are washing glasses. Enter Butcher and Flake.

  DOGSBOROUGH: You didn’t need to come. The answer is

  No. Your proposition stinks of rotten fish.

  YOUNG DOGSBOROUGH: My father turns it down.

  BUTCHER: Forget it, then.

  We ask you. You say no. So no it is.

  DOGSBOROUGH: It’s fishy. I know your kind of docks.

  I wouldn’t touch it.

  YOUNG DOGSBOROUGH: My father wouldn’t touch it.

  BUTCHER: Good.

  Forget it.

  DOGSBOROUGH: You’re on the wrong road, fellows.

  The city treasury is not a grab bag

  For everyone to dip his fingers into.

  Anyway, damn it all, your business is

  Perfectly sound.

  BUTCHER: What did I tell you, Flake?

  You fellows are too pessimistic.

  DOGSBOROUGH: Pessimism

  Is treason. You’re only making trouble for

  Yourselves. I see it this way: What do you

  Fellows sell? Cauliflower. That’s as good

  As meat and bread. Man doesn’t live by bread

  And meat alone, he needs his green goods.

  Suppose I served up sirloin without onions

  Or mutton without beans. I’d never see

  My customers again. Some people are

  A little short right now. They hesitate

  To buy a suit. But people have to eat.

  They’ll always have a dime for vegetables.

  Chin up! If I were you, I wouldn’t worry.

  FLAKE: It does me good to hear you, Dogsborough.

  It gives a fellow courage to go on.

  BUTCHER: Dogsborough, it almost makes me laugh to find

  You so staunchly confident about the future