The Incorruptible — Act IV

A Play

Missed an Act? Check the index.

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Act IV

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Summary: As Justina searches for her father, Rosh investigates the acolyte’s murder. Merritt is plagued by visions of Vesper and his acolytes.

Scene i

The Plaza. Midday. Enter Justina and a crowd who either ignore her or only shake their heads in answer.

JUSTINA: Do you know where my father’s gone?
Have any heard the Vesper’s howls?
The stillest nights, he used to call
to me, but when I listen now
I’m met with silence.

Enter the Beggar and Rosh, separately.

ROSH: You’re worn as moth-beleaguered thread,
Justina. I’ll escort you home.
There’s not a thing worth doing sans
a bit of rest.

JUSTINA:             Is Connor buried?

ROSH: The ground was fighting every spade,
but now he sleeps in dark repose.
The sheriff sent me with a question:
We lack a motive for his death, 
and evidence; do you recall
a glint of steel atop the snow?

The beggar, eavesdropping, draws near to Justina and Rosh.

JUSTINA: Wandering in the night, what glint
would I have seen? 

ROSH:                         A knife. The one
was thrust in Connor’s side that night.

JUSTINA: If it was there, it’s covered now. 

ROSH: The sheriff thinks if he just saw
that knife, he could identify
the killer too. But I can solve
this murder without evidence.
The prophet’s had it out for Vesper
as long as Vesper’s known his name.
The knife that killed that acolyte
was his. There’s no doubt in my mind.

BEGGAR: You slanderous degenerate!
The prophet never knew that boy
nor does he need to steal kids’ robes. 

ROSH: The motive’s not material need,
I’ll grant you that. The prophet’s gouged
your pockets well enough, could use
your lint as kindling. No, it’s sickness,
mark you, a sickness of the soul
that made him strip the lad half-naked. 

BEGGAR: You’ll burn for that, malignant cur. 
The prophet never left his house
that night, and he’s no sorcerer 
communing with infernal powers
whose agency he’d use to kill
nonentities such as that monk. 

JUSTINA: Connor pursued a noble end,
and you should be ashamed to speak
about the dead so cavalierly. 
But it’s true, Rosh. Merritt was home,
had sent me out into the storm,
when I found Connor lying cold. 

BEGGAR: I will not pad my words for Rosh. 

ROSH: You couldn’t either. Them lousy ones
you have are stuffed in through your ears
and lose their wool before you spit
them out. Before a lady, too. 

BEGGAR: That’s convoluted imagery. 

ROSH: I mean, you lack originality. 
You screech the words your handlers teach. 

JUSTINA: Don’t be so harsh with him. 

ROSH:                                               I will. 
Take flight, you puffed up Guinea hen,
before I pluck and spatchcock you. 

Rosh chases the Beggar and kicks him several times. Exeunt Beggar.

ROSH: I never could stand grovelers
or sycophants, and he’s the worst.
Employs his lips as Merritt’s bootblack.
Wish we were rid of both of them.

JUSTINA: Just lately do I understand
that sentiment. I’d rather not
dwell on the prophet’s servant though.
I’m looking for my father, Rosh.
Have you had any word of him?

ROSH: Not since the night of Connor’s death.
I hate to say I fear the worst,
but since I do, I lay the blame
at Merritt’s feet. 

JUSTINA:            He wouldn’t kill
the Vesper. Merritt’s not so cruel
he’d kill his lover’s father after
he’d sent her crawling back to him.

ROSH: I hope you’re right. If Vesper’s round,
his acolytes would know. The beast
in him stayed close to feeding hands.

Exeunt.

Scene ii

Merritt’s bedroom. Restless and groaning, Merritt lies in bed, plagued by visions of the Vesper’s Acolytes. Several Acolytes enter from various directions, chanting, and gather around Merritt’s bed.

ACOLYTES: O Holy One, thrice-praised, you raise
the buried sun, whose brilliance
long winter can nowise abate.
And from the tomb, the innocent
bring forth your light. Thus you preserve
the incorruptible in death,
in darkness make thine wonders known.
O Holy One, thrice-glorified,
the six-winged seraphim must shield
their eyes to sing your glory’s praise.
O Coming One, we wait for you
to judge the living and the dead.
You take from the destroyer rest.
The wicked find no peace in sleep.
Their seed is planted in the pit
of a forgotten land, where night-
long grief will meet the sun still mourning.

MERRITT: [crying out in sleep] 
Release him, Vesper! Fire and smoke!
You break his charcoaled bones to bits.

ACOLYTES: [still chanting] 
All you who hate instruction, cast
your hope into the depthless sea.
Because you saw the thief and ran
beside him, multiplied your sin
with evil speech, adultery,
so that your offspring was defiled,
and have denied the day will come
when he who rends your flesh is God
(from whom none can deliver you),
when you cry out for mercy then,
he will withhold what you withheld.

Merritt bolts up in bed, coughing, wiping at his face.

MERRITT: Thomas! Your blood has filled my mouth,
pours down my chin, has soaked my sheets!

Merritt looks frantically at the Acolytes surrounding him. Their low chant continues, though the words are indiscernible. The acolytes lean over Merritt’s bed. The stage goes dark.

MERRITT: They’ve come to murder me! The light!
Cursed be the darkness! I’d defend
myself against these murderers
if I could see the falling knife.

The lights come up, but dimly. The acolytes are gone, but beside Merritt’s bed stands the Vesper holding Thomas’s head.

MERRITT: Is there no honor in the grave
that you must desecrate my son?
Lazarus refused the rich
man water, and his relatives
he left without a warning word,
yet you return with Thomas’s
decapitated head. The dead
should let the living live in peace. 
Let judgment wait for judgment day. 

THOMAS’S HEAD: Eternity is in your heart
and that is where torment begins. 
You need not wait till you depart
to feel the burden of your sins. 

Six robed arms emerge from the mattress and grab Merritt. He struggles, screaming. The lights go dark. Merritt continues yelling. The lights come up. Merritt, alone in his room, jumps out of bed. Exeunt.

Scene iii

Merritt’s Parlor. Enter Merritt and Beggar.

BEGGAR: Why aren’t you glad he’s disappeared?
If it’s because you’d rather see
him broken, I can sympathize.
Most likely, the exposure numbed him,
thickened his blood to sap, and laid
the Vesper down in peaceful sleep,
but we don’t know, and I prefer
to think a sated puma batted
Vesper around the woods for hours
before its appetite returned
and only then did that big lion
sink sabered fangs into his neck.
In any case, the Vesper’s gone,
and you can preach now undisturbed.

MERRITT: I’m haunted, Beggar, and alone.
Each blow we struck that holy man
increased his suzerain, enclosed
his iron fingers round our throats.
And now you say he’s gone, except
his aspect is in everything.
I cannot leave this house without
a man in dark capote behind
me, taller than a winter’s shade,
and turning to defend my peace,
I find within the hood a blaze
the heat of which my cheek can feel
though I am thirty paces off,
and yet his face is not consumed.
And do you know whose face it is?

BEGGAR: How could I?

MERRITT:                      No? The Vesper’s own!

BEGGAR: You mean the Vesper is alive?

MERRITT: I mean in death he has possessed
his followers, so now a score
of Vespers float among the trees,
corporeal ghosts who must avenge
on us the beating Vesper took.

BEGGAR: His acolytes swore vows of peace.
They wander not to seek our harm
but mourn their choice of the wrong path.

MERRITT: Does the demoniac’s intent
prevent the spirit that controls
his hands and legs from drowning him?
The oaths men take, the grave rescinds.
In life, he was a pacifist.
With Vesper’s death, his war begins.

BEGGAR: Then barricade yourself at home
and rest till this delirium’s passed.

MERRITT: I cannot shelter behind bricks
and glass or hide beneath duvets.
The silence in this empty house
conveys the Vesper’s spectral voice.
An unrelenting accusation,
proved by my loneliness, that I’m
to blame for Thomas’s departure.

BEGGAR: Then let me go and bring him back.
You’ve met your son’s condition, closed
your door ’gainst Vesper’s daughter’s pleas.

MERRITT: Where would you go to find my son?
I condescended to his wish
except too late. By now he’s gone
so far, I’m sure he can’t return.

A bell resounds. Enter Rosh.

BEGGAR: You barge in boldly for a skiff.

ROSH: A skiff’s enough to take the legs
from under drunks like you. If I could,
I would steer clear your rotten breath,
but I go where the sheriff says. 

BEGGAR: You heard it from Justina’s lips,
the prophet has an alibi
that she and I can both confirm.

ROSH: It’s not your master but his son
the sheriff takes an interest in.
I came to see where he might be.

BEGGAR: Which shows how little you’re informed.
The prophet’s son’s been gone for weeks,
and though we set a place for him
at dinner time, he doesn’t sup.
You know he has a rented room.

ROSH: Aye, and his landlady has said
his room’s been vacant least as long
as that young, murdered lad’s been dead.
We figured he’d have shown up here.

MERRITT: The beggar’s right. He’s not come home
or given word of where he’s been,
what he has done, or if he will
return. 

ROSH:       Sounds like he’s on the lam. 

MERRITT: He’s not your man. Tom has no blood
upon his hands. I’m sure that he’s
gone visiting his dear friend Joan.
If I recall, he wrote to her
and said an envelope could not
contain two seasons’ worth of news
and that he’d tell her all come spring.

ROSH: His dear friend Joan.

MERRITT:         That’s right.

ROSH:                                      You’d say
we should expect him back here, then?

MERRITT: No telling what the young will do.

ROSH: So says the prophet. 

BEGGAR:                            Watch it, Rosh.

MERRITT: That all?

ROSH:                        It is.

BEGGAR:                  I’ll see you out.

ROSH: I can work the door myself.

Exeunt Rosh.

MERRITT: You said Justina took my side?

BEGGAR: She told the sheriff’s man the truth.

MERRITT: She could have held her tongue or lied.
The contest ’tween your words and hers
unaided by more evidence
would be quite short. Men don’t esteem
a beggar who opposes beauty.
So, if Justina spoke my part,
perhaps she doesn’t wish me ill.
Since Thomas is not coming back,
I can recant my former lie
and cease abstaining from the girl.
Beggar, go fetch Justina. Tell
her that the vision I relayed
about her death that night was true,
and fearing she’d refuse to go,
I broke her heart and saved her life
with necessary perjury. [Exeunt Beggar.]
Spirit of will be force and fire,
enclose and bring the girl to me.
As one who sleeps to inner eye
entrusts himself despite the leer,
night-grim, of manufactured ghoul,
I’ll throw full-weighted self on bed
and let the phantom thoughts be hid
if in those sheets I feel the girl,
touch-tender when my mind’s aflame.
Her scent must incantation be,
as circled salt or clove or tree
whose branches bear the wind-blown chime.
For we know that a little faith
with love can cover over truth,
a shade of doubt erase the moon,
and judgment be improved by wine.
Ah yes, with good vintage I’ll greet
Justine. We’ll drink, merry, and eat.

Merritt sets his crozier beside the fireplace and exits the room. Enter Beggar and Justina in her cloak.

JUSTINA: But don’t you think it’s odd he’d lie?

BEGGAR: To save your life.

JUSTINA:                        A man of God
does not employ an evil as
a matter of efficiency.

BEGGAR: I’ll find the prophet. He’ll explain.

JUSTINA: If Merritt called me here, what need
is there to fetch him? If he’d have
me wait, I will not wait alone.

BEGGAR: I’ll do my best to please you, miss.

JUSTINA: A strange disquiet in the parlor,
the house in whole. An unlit fire
waits on a match and keeps the room
in chill, damp, and stale-smelling dark.

BEGGAR: We’ve let the andirons grow cold,
a symbol of the prophet’s grief
since your departure. But we’ll stoke
the coals of joy now you’ve returned.

The Beggar starts a fire. Justina lightly touches Merritt’s staff.

JUSTINA: This basilisk has lost its eyes.
What omen can I read in this?
The prophet’s judgments have been blind
concerning me and my exile.
With confidence he cast me out; 
to emptiness he brings me back.
I come as skeptic, hesitant,
resisting every urge to feel
at home again in Merritt’s house.
Except I’m desperate to see 
my father, I would not have come. 

BEGGAR: You’ve come to see the Vesper here?

JUSTINA: To beg that Merritt use his gift
of eloquence to ask his men
to fuss over the holt until
they find the Vesper and restore
a father to his daughter’s arms.

MERRITT: [shouting from offstage] That crackling upon my hearth
must mean Justina has agreed
to rendezvous with me. I’ve wine
enough to last us many months!
We’ll burn the corks to signify
intentions to drink every drop.

JUSTINA: [to Beggar] I thought he’d be more penitent,
considering the murderous night
on which he banished me. With words,
I’ll add, that greater saints than I
would struggle to forgive on sight. 

BEGGAR: If he came simpering, with hair
pulled out in fistfuls, you’d recoil
and say it was undignified.
The little that I know of love
has shown that women never want
a man who grovels and bemoans
mistakes. He lets the past alone 
and points us to what’s yet undone.

JUSTINA: His error lies in that neglect.
The Cause of all-that-will-be-done
is without change, and history
to that unchanging testifies.
The past tells what the future is.

Enter Merritt. Justina does not turn to greet him.

MERRITT: Who keeps the beggar company?
Unrobed or not, the incline that
her shoulders take to greet her neck
is intimately known by me
and spurs an image in my mind
that gestures her totality.
Yet the impressionistic strokes
of fantasy cannot compare
to nature’s work. If she would turn
her face that I might see the truth,
I’d say with the iconoclast
these idols that my mind engraved
defame what is ineffable,
diminishing what they’d preserve.
For none would trade in canvas, stone,
or thoughts having received the flesh
and felt the quickening of blood.
So, turn, if you would still be mine,
and let me look upon Justine.

JUSTINA: How long will Merritt’s new words last?
They’re pretty while upon the tongue,
but spilling out are soon forgotten.

MERRITT: They will endure as every word
of love I’ve spoken to you has.

JUSTINA: When they so recently have failed,
you offer little to persuade
me that your words are steadfast now.

MERRITT: Your metric, pitting word on word,
is flawed. If I betrayed my words
in speech, my actions ratified
their covenantal bond. In death,
you’d not complain, yet I exchanged
derision for integrity
and bore aspersion for your sake.

JUSTINA: How noble Merritt makes it seem
to offer words of prophecy,
which I, having accepted, lacked
a second to assent that I
would leave before he changed his tack,
saying he needed novelty,
that our delights were drudgery
since he despised the form God gave me.

MERRITT: You said yourself those words seemed lies,
and I will not deny they were.
Consider this: Was Melchior,
breaking his oath to Herod, false
when he had led three kingdoms east,
but by another route, to save
the Christ child? Or was Rahab’s lie
denounced by Israel’s two spies
whom she had secreted on rooftop,
misinforming sentinels
in Jericho who sought their deaths?
My falsehood was akin to those,
and you its beneficiary.

JUSTINA: That latter point requires I take
you at your word. The only death
I glimpsed that night, I found outside
your house, within that blizzard’s gales.
On either side of me dropped spears
of ice-tipped branches; rose snow-mist
the winter’s giant might exhale
as fatal breath when spring had pierced
his powdery chest; and flew white sparks
cast off the nimbus forgesmith’s anvil,
beating an iron sheet above.
That storm laid claim to youthful life,
effaced my beauty’s vital source,
and made of softness something coarse.

MERRITT: Just look at me and I’ll confirm
you still possess your youthfulness
and house a fountain from which flows
an unremitting pulchritude.
I’d live upon a windswept dune
to feel the soft press of your hands.
With these words I renew the vows
you say I’ve broken, state again
those promises and my devotion.

JUSTINA: An oath that hangs upon my form
is bound to sag without support
from more enduring bonds. What’s sworn
today, I think you do believe,
and it may be that I’ll consent
to be your prophet-bride, but there’s
one further promise you must keep.

MERRITT: Anything that’s in my power.

JUSTINA: When first you held me in your arms
you swore, until my father knew 
his daughter’s care, you'd forego sleep.
Summon your congregants and search
these woods until his body’s found
so I can lay his bones to rest.
Do this and you’ll regain my trust.

MERRITT: I’ll do exactly as you say
if you will stop this turning. Let
me gaze upon the face I’ve missed.

Justina finally faces Merritt. A light emanates from the hood of Justina’s cloak, illuminates Merritt. He drops the bottles of wine he has been holding and shields his face.

MERRITT: I cannot stand to look at you!

JUSTINA: Were all of your assurances
just pretenses for cruelty?
Why would you tease me coldly now?
Fulfill your oath, and we’ll be warm
through Eastertide and wash away
the past with resurrected love.
But I must know where Vesper is.

MERRITT: There’s nowhere Vesper cannot be!
The Vesper has consumed your face
so I can’t differentiate
between Justina’s mask and death.
Whatever beauty you contained
has been eclipsed by what I hate.

JUSTINA: If I am changed, you are to blame!
I’ve wandered as the highways thawed,
as lover spurned and daughter shamed,
wondering where my comfort went.
There’s nowhere I can go now, Merritt.
Don’t cast me out. The Vesper’s gone.
I’m empty as my father’s house.

MERRITT: I wish that it were true he’s gone,
but he left everything in you.
Within your face, I do not see 
Justina but the wicked pride
that drove your father to assail
my ministry. Get out! You bear
his likeness, are become a curse
upon this house.

JUSTINA:           How can you talk 
like this? Has but a look reversed
your feelings for me?

MERRITT:                 Torture breaks
one man more swiftly than the next,
but how depends upon the type
employed and the man’s temperament.

JUSTINA: You call my presence torturous?

MERRITT: It is, and it will always be.
Now leave! I cannot stand you here.

Exeunt Justina.

MERRITT:[aside] A man cannot go on like this.
The Vesper’s godlike qualities
make every face his avatar
and every voice condemns me here.
I have no choice but to set sail.
[to the Beggar] I’ve had a vision.

BEGGAR:                            Vesper’s face?

MERRITT: A vision that the spirit gave.
The dispensation of the scythe
falls first among the stalks of wheat
before the sickle reaps the grapes.
As seasons indicate the fields
for harvest, God gives hired hands
the sites of his apocalypse,
which vary with his time’s demands.
And I have seen his judgment fall
upon this very land.

BEGGAR:                 Thank God!
we go to our reward.

MERRITT:                  Not yet.
The Lord still has a plan for us,
for our entire congregation.
And on the day which He’s revealed,
we’ll sail away from here, be spared
as Japheth, Ham, and Shem were spared.
As many of our faithful men
as you can find, go gather them
within the temple’s doors. The ghosts
that haunt me here, we will escape.

Exeunt.

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