Page:Plunder (Perlman).djvu/88

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82

BRUNO

This wasn't meant for you, Pretoria.

PRETORIA

(picks up the Indio mask and speaks to it)

I'm going with you, Indio. We'll go back to the village. Father will have clay again, won't he Indio? Surely you and I can find the clay. We'll look together. Then we'll watch father shape his bowls. They're beautiful bowls, aren't they Indio?

BRUNO

Forgive me, Pretoria. I had not known what depths a mask can penetrate. I've accomplished my purpose; I've torn off your mask, but that mask through the years had merged with your flesh. Forgive me, Pretoria. I had not meant to tear a mask of flesh. Is it possible that time can consume our true faces so completely, obliterating even the memory of our selves, leaving flesh death beneath a mask? Forgive me, Pretoria. I did not know there was no face below the mask. Exposed, you'll bleed to death. Forgive me, Pretoria. I'll find a new mask to cover your bleeding faceless flesh.

VAISYA

(to the "Soldiers," who now tightly encircle the group)

That's enough! What are you doing?

"SOLDIERS"

We've been tortured long enough!
We're awake now! We are not animals any more.
This time they're going to pay for it! From now on they're going to pay for it!

(Pretoria, holding the Indio mask, lunges through the circle of "Soldiers")

AMONG AUDIENCE

DARIUS STARK

(stands up)

Stop this! Lights! Lights!