How Far - a one-act stage play

  In 1997, my friend Mary Higgins Clark invited me to submit a story for an anthology in aid of literacy. The book would be called The Plot Thickens, and each story would be required to contain three things—a thick steak, a thick fog, and a thick book. If anyone else had made the request, I’d have replied that the whole idea made me thick to my thtomach, but who in the world could possibly say no to Mary?

  Good thing. “How Far It Could Go” is a favorite story of mine, and that it grew out of such a gimmicky notion shows the unfathomable nature of the creative process. It was indeed published in The Plot Thickens, and reprinted in EQMM, before being gathered up into my own omnibus collection, Enough Rope.

  Then, a couple of years later, someone in the theater pointed out that it would make a workable one-act play. I read it and discovered that it was already a one-act play, that all it required was to be recast in stageplay form. So I sat down to that task, shortened the title, and here’s the result.

  I believe it was performed once in Australia. One simple set, two characters—what could be simpler to stage? if anyone out there wants to take a shot at this for local or amateur theater, just get in touch. I’m game.

  Contact information:

  Email: [email protected]

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  HOW FAR

  a one-act stage play

  by Lawrence Block

  SCENE: A restaurant in Hoboken, New Jersey. BILLY CUTLER is at a table for two, reading a thick hardcover novel. DOROTHY MORGAN enters, looks around the room, unsure if this is the man she’s supposed to meet. She goes offstage and returns accompanied by a WAITER, who steers her toward BILLY’s table. BILLY looks up, and closes his book and stands as she approaches.

  BILLY

  BILLY Cutler. And you’re DOROTHY Morgan, and you could probably use a drink. What would you like?

  DOROTHY

  I don’t know. What are you having?

  BILLY

  Well, night like this, minute I sat down I ordered a martini, straight up and dry as a bone. And I’m about ready for another.

  DOROTHY

  Martini’s are in, aren’t they?

  BILLY

  Far as I’m concerned, they were never out.

  DOROTHY

  I’ll have one.

  BILLY

  Joe?

  (The waiter withdraws)

  It’s treacherous out there. The main roads, the Jersey Turnpike and the Garden State, they get these chain collisions where fifty or a hundred cars slam into each other. Used to be a lawyer’s dream before no-fault came in. I hope you didn’t drive.

  DOROTHY

  No, I took the PATH train. And then a cab.

  BILLY

  Much better off.

  DOROTHY

  Well, I’ve been to Hoboken before. In fact we looked at houses here about a year and a half ago.

  BILLY

  You bought anything then, you’d be way ahead now. Prices are through the roof.

  DOROTHY

  We decided to stay in Manhattan.

  BILLY

  And you knew to take the PATH train. Well, I drove, and the fog’s terrible, no question, but I took my time and I didn’t have any trouble. Matter of fact, I couldn’t remember if we said seven or seven-thirty, so I made sure I was here by seven.

  DOROTHY

  Then I kept you waiting. I wrote down seven-thirty, but—

  BILLY

  I figured it was probably seven-thirty. I also figured I’d rather do the waiting myself than keep you waiting. Anyway, I had a book to read, and I ordered a drink, and what more does a man need? Ah, here we go.

  (The waiter appears with two drinks on a tray. She takes a sip, relaxes visibly.)

  DOROTHY

  That was just what I needed.

  BILLY

  Well, there’s nothing like a martini, and they make a good one here. Matter of fact, it’s a pretty decent restaurant altogether. They serve a good steak, a strip sirloin.

  DOROTHY

  Also coming back in style, along with the martini.

  BILLY

  So? You want to be right up with the latest trends? Should I order us a couple of steaks?

  DOROTHY

  Oh, I don’t think so. I really shouldn’t stay that long.

  BILLY

  Whatever you say.

  DOROTHY

  I just thought we’d have a drink and—

  BILLY

  And handle what we have to handle.

  DOROTHY

  That’s right.

  BILLY

  Sure. That’ll be fine.

  DOROTHY

  (She picks up her drink, sips it, looking for a way back into the conversation.)

  Even without the fog, I’d have come by train and taxi. I don’t have a car.

  BILLY

  No car? Didn’t Tommy say you had a weekend place up near him? You can’t go back and forth on the bus.

  DOROTHY

  It’s his car.

  BILLY

  His car. Oh, the fella’s.

  DOROTHY

  Howard Bellamy’s. His car, his weekend place in the country. His loft on Greene Street, as far as that goes.

  BILLY

  But you’re not still living there.

  DOROTHY

  No, of course not. And I don’t have any of my stuff at the house in the country. And I gave back my set of car keys. All my keys, the car and both houses. I kept my old apartment on West Tenth Street all this time. I didn’t even sublet it because I figured I might need it in a hurry. And I was right, wasn’t I?

  BILLY

  What’s your beef with him exactly, if you don’t mind me asking?

  DOROTHY

  My beef. I never had one, as far as I was concerned. We lived together three years, and the first two weren’t too bad. Trust me, it was never Romeo and Juliet, but it was all right. And then the third year was bad, and it was time to bail out.

  (She reaches for her drink, surprised to note it’s empty.)

  He says I owe him ten thousand dollars.

  BILLY

  Ten large.

  DOROTHY

  He says.

  BILLY

  Do you?

  DOROTHY

  (shakes her head no)

  But he’s got a piece of paper. A note I signed.

  BILLY

  For ten thousand dollars.

  DOROTHY

  Right.

  BILLY

  Like he loaned you the money.

  DOROTHY

  Right. But he didn’t. Oh, he’s got the paper I signed, and he’s got a canceled check made out to me and deposited to my account. But it wasn’t a loan. He gave me the money and I used it to pay for a cruise the two of us took.

  BILLY

  Where? The Caribbean?

  DOROTHY

  The Far East. We flew to Singapore and cruised down to Bali.

  BILLY

  That sounds pretty exotic.

  DOROTHY

  I guess it was. This was while things were still good between us, or as good as they ever were.

  BILLY

  This paper you signed.

  DOROTHY

  Something with taxes. So he could write it off, don’t ask me how. Look, all the time we lived together I paid my own way. We split expenses right down the middle. The cruise was something else, it was on him. If he wanted me to sign a piece of paper so the government would pick up part of the tab—

  BILLY

  Why not?

  DOROTHY
>
  Exactly. And now he says it’s a debt, and I should pay it, and I got a letter from his lawyer. Can you believe it? A letter from a lawyer?

  BILLY

  He’s not going to sue you.

  DOROTHY

  Who knows? That’s what the lawyer letter says he’s going to do.

  BILLY

  The minute he goes into court and you start testifying about a tax dodge—

  DOROTHY

  But how can I, if I was a party to it?

  BILLY

  Still, the idea of him suing you after you were living with him. Usually it’s the other way around, isn’t it? They got a word for it.

  DOROTHY

  Palimony.

  BILLY

  That’s it, palimony. You’re not trying for any, are you?

  DOROTHY

  Are you kidding? I said I paid my own way.

  BILLY

  That’s right, you did say that.

  DOROTHY

  I paid my own way before I met him, the son of a bitch, and I paid my own way while I was with him, and I’ll go on paying my own way now that I’m rid of him. The last time I took money from a man was when my Uncle Ralph lent me busfare to New York when I was eighteen years old. He didn’t call it a loan, and he sure as hell didn’t give me a piece of paper to sign, but I paid him back all the same. I saved up the money and sent him a money order. I didn’t even have a bank account. I got a money order at the post office and sent it to him.

  BILLY

  That’s when you came here? When you were eighteen?

  DOROTHY

  Fresh out of high school. And I’ve been on my own ever since, and paying my own way. I would have paid my own way to Singapore, as far as that goes, but that wasn’t the deal. It was supposed to be a present. And he wants me to pay my way and his way, he wants the whole ten thousand plus interest, and—

  BILLY

  He’s looking to charge you interest?

  DOROTHY

  Well, the note I signed. Ten thousand dollars plus interest at the rate of eight percent per annum.

  BILLY

  Interest.

  DOROTHY

  He’s pissed off that I wanted to end the relationship. That’s what this is all about.

  BILLY

  I figured.

  DOROTHY

  And what I figured is if a couple of the right sort of people had a talk with him, maybe he would change his mind.

  BILLY

  And that’s what brings you here.

  (She nods. She’s toying with her empty glass. He points to it, raises his eyebrows. She nods, he raises a hand, catches the offstage waiter’s eye, signals for another round.)

  DOROTHY

  (pause)

  I didn’t know who to call, and then I thought of Tommy, and he said maybe he knew somebody.

  BILLY

  And here you are.

  DOROTHY

  And here I am, and—

  (He holds up a hand, cutting her off, and the WAITER appears, and they’re silent until he has served their drinks and withdrawn.)

  BILLY

  A couple of the boys could talk to him.

  DOROTHY

  That would be great. What would it cost me?

  BILLY

  Five hundred dollars would do it.

  DOROTHY

  Well, that sounds good to me.

  BILLY

  The thing is, when you say talk, it’ll have to be more than talk. You want to make an impression, situation like this, the implication is either he goes along with it or something physical is going to happen. Now, if you want to give that impression, you have to get physical at the beginning.

  DOROTHY

  So he knows you mean it?

  BILLY

  So he’s scared. Because otherwise what he gets is angry. Not right away, but later. Two tough-looking guys push him against a wall and tell him what he’s gotta do, that scares him, but then they don’t get physical and he goes home, and he starts to think about it, and he gets angry.

  DOROTHY

  I can see how that might happen.

  BILLY

  But if he gets knocked around a little the first time, enough so he’s gonna feel it for the next four, five days, he’s too scared to get angry. That’s what you want.

  DOROTHY

  Okay.

  BILLY

  (Sips his drink, looks at her over the brim)

  There’s things I need to know about the guy.

  DOROTHY

  Like?

  BILLY

  Like what kind of shape is he in.

  DOROTHY

  He could stand to lose twenty pounds, but other than that he’s okay.

  BILLY

  No heart condition, nothing like that?

  DOROTHY

  No.

  BILLY

  He work out?

  DOROTHY

  He belongs to a gym, and he went four times a week for the first month after he joined, and now if he gets there twice a month it’s a lot.

  BILLY

  Like everybody. That’s how the gyms stay in business. If all their paid-up members showed up, you couldn’t get in the door.

  DOROTHY

  You work out.

  BILLY

  Well, yeah. Weights, mostly, a few times a week. I got in the habit. I won’t tell you where I got in the habit.

  DOROTHY

  And I won’t ask, but I could probably guess.

  BILLY

  (grinning)

  You probably could.

  (back to business)

  Martial arts. He ever get into any of that?

  DOROTHY

  No.

  BILLY

  You’re sure? Not lately, but maybe before the two of you started keeping company?

  DOROTHY

  He never said. And he would, it’s the kind of thing he’d brag about.

  BILLY

  Does he carry?

  DOROTHY

  Carry?

  BILLY

  A gun.

  DOROTHY

  God, no.

  BILLY

  You know this for a fact?

  DOROTHY

  He doesn’t even own a gun.

  BILLY

  Same question. Do you know this for a fact?

  DOROTHY

  Well, how would you know something like that for a fact? I mean, you could know for a fact that a person did own a gun, but how would you know that he didn’t? I can say this much—I lived with him for three years and there was never anything I saw or heard that gave me the slightest reason to think he might own a gun. Until you asked the question just now it never entered my mind, and my guess is it never entered his mind, either.

  BILLY

  You’d be surprised how many people own guns.

  DOROTHY

  I probably would.

  BILLY

  Sometimes it feels like half the country walks around strapped. There’s more carrying than there are carry permits. A guy doesn’t have a permit, he’s likely to keep it to himself that he’s carrying, or that he even owns a gun in the first place.

  DOROTHY

  I’m pretty sure he doesn’t own a gun, let alone carry one.

  BILLY

  And you’re probably right, but the thing is you never know. What you got to prepare for is he might have a gun, and he might be carrying it.

  (he waits while she takes this in and nods)

  So here’s what I’ve got to ask you. What you got to ask yourself, and come up with the answer. How far are you prepared for this to go?

  DOROTHY

  I’m not sure what you mean.

  BILLY

  We already said it’s gonna be physical. Manhandling him, and a couple of shots he’ll feel for the better part of a week. Work the rib cage, say.

  DOROTHY

  All right.

  BILLY

  Well, that’s great, if that’s how it goes. But you got to recognize it could
go farther.

  DOROTHY

  What do you mean?

  BILLY

  I mean you can’t necessarily decide where it stops. I don’t know if you ever heard the expression, but it’s like, uh, having relations with a gorilla. You don’t stop when you decide. You stop when the gorilla decides.

  DOROTHY

  I never heard that before. It’s cute, and I sort of get the point, or maybe I don’t. Is Howard Bellamy the gorilla?

  BILLY

  He’s not the gorilla. The violence is the gorilla.

  DOROTHY

  Oh.

  BILLY

  You start something, you don’t know where it goes. Does he fight back? If he does, then it goes a little farther than you planned. Does he keep coming back for more? As long as he keeps coming back for it, you got to keep dishing it out. You got no choice.

  DOROTHY

  I see.