Resurrection Blues Read Online Free Page A

outside my window. Terrible scene; four or five of his . . . I suppose you could call them disciples stood there, weeping.
    One of the cops clubbed him down and kicked him squarely in the mouth. I was paralyzed. But then, as they were pushing him into the van—quite accidentally, his gaze rose up to my window and for an instant our eyes met.—His composure, Felix—his poise—there was a kind of tranquility in his eyes that was . . . chilling; he almost seemed to transcend everything, as though he knew all this had to happen . . .
    Â 
    FELIX: I thank you for this conversation, it’s cleared me up . . .
    Â 
    HENRI: Let me talk to him. I take it you have him here?
    Â 
    FELIX: He won’t open his mouth.
    Â 
    HENRI: Let me try to convince him to leave the country.
    Â 
    FELIX: Wonderful, but try to feel out if we can expect some dignity if he’s nailed up? I don’t want it to look like some kind of torture or something . . .
    Â 
    HENRI: And what about our dignity!
    Â 
    FELIX: Our dignity is modernization! Tell him he’s going to die for all of us!
    Â 
    HENRI:. . . Because we need that money!
    Â 
    FELIX: All right, yes, but that’s a hell of a lot better than dying for nothing!
    Â 
    Felix opens the door; a blinding white light pours
through the doorway through which they are peering.
    HENRI: What is that light on him?
    Â 
    FELIX: Nothing. He just suddenly lights up sometimes. It happens, that’s all.
    Â 
    HENRI: It “happens”!
    Â 
    FELIX, defensive outburst: All right, I don’t understand it! Do you understand a computer chip? Can you tell me what electricity is? And how about a gene? I mean what is a fucking gene? So he lights up; it’s one more thing, that’s all. But look at him, you ever seen such total vacancy in a man’s face? Pointing. That idiot is mental and he’s making us all crazy! Go and godspeed!
    Â 
    HENRI, takes a step toward doorway and halts: You know, when I saw him outside my window a very odd thought . . . exploded in my head—that I hadn’t actually been seeing anything . . . for most of my life. That I have lived half blind . . . to Jeanine, even to my former wife . . . I can’t begin to explain it, Felix, but it’s all left me with one idea that I can’t shake off—it haunts me.
    Â 
    FELIX: What idea?
    Â 
    HENRI: That I could have loved. Slight pause. In my life.
    Â 
    Henri, conflicted, exits through the doorway. Felix
shuts the door behind him.
    Â 
    FELIX: Odd—one minute I’d really love to blow that moron away. But the next minute . . .
    He stares in puzzlement. He goes to his phone. Picks
up the letter.
    Â 
    Isabelle. Get me New York. 212-779-8865. Want to speak to a Mr. . . . Reads letter. Skip L. Cheeseboro, he’s a vice president of the firm.—Well, yes—if they ask you, say it’s in reference to a crucifixion. He’ll know what it means.
    Â 
    Blackout.

SCENE 2
    Mountain top. Emily Shapiro enters with Skip L.
Cheeseboro. She is in jeans and zipper jacket and
baseball cap, he in bush jacket, carrying a portfolio and
a shooting stick.They bend over to catch their breaths.
Now she straightens up and looks out front, awed.
    Â 
    EMILY: My god! Look at this!
    Â 
    SKIP: Yeah!
    Â 
    EMILY: That snow. That sun. That light!
    Â 
    SKIP: Yeah!
    Â 
    EMILY: What a blue! What an orange! What mountains!
    Â 
    SKIP: What’s the date today?
    Â 
    EMILY: Seventeenth.
    Â 
    SKIP: Huh! . . . I think she’s getting the divorce today and I completely forgot to call her.
    EMILY: Well maybe she’ll forgive you. Looking into distance .—This is absolutely awesome. How pure.
    Â 
    SKIP: A lot like Nepal—the Ivory Soap shoot.
    Â 
    EMILY: Like Kenya too, maybe . . . Chevy Malibu.
    Â 
    SKIP: The Caucasus, too.
    Â 
    EMILY: Caucasus?
    Â 
    SKIP: Head and Shoulders.
    Â 
    EMILY: Wasn’t that Venezuela?
    Â 
    SKIP: