Stealing Souls was first performed at the Red Room, London, on 5 April 1996. The cast was as follows.
| Vince | Tom Marshall |
| Maria | Raquel Cassidy |
Directed by Shabnam Shabazi
Designed by Roswitha Gerlitz
Lighting by John Sharian
Music by Kate Heath
A room in the Flamengo Palace Hotel, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. Early hours of the morning.
The room is dimly lit by lamps and scented candles. Music plays softly.
Vincc Stanier, a photographer, sits cross-legged and still on the bed. Dr Maria Segundo stands by the door, holding her medical bag.
Maria An emergency, they said.
Vince Four hours, thirty-six bloody minutes.
Maria I was expecting something serious.
Vince I’m in agony.
Maria (unimpressed) Ay.
Vince Been awake all night with the pain.
Maria In your tooth?
Vince (snaps) No, in my arse. Look, you really are the dentist, not room service or dial-a-whore?
Maria I’m a doctor.
Vince turns off the music.
Vince Shit. Dentist, dentista! I told them.
Maria I know about teeth …
Vince I know about cunts, darling, but that doesn’t make me a gynaecologist.
Maria I must be crazy. I must be going completely mad … I thought someone was dying up here. A matter of life and death they said.
Vince No dentist on a Sunday was all they kept telling me, so after ringing the desk every hour on the hour and getting that same old shit, I carefully cradled the receiver against the good side of my jaw … (He demonstrates.) Took a deep breath and … HELP! GOD! JESUS! HELP ME! OH GOD! … . shit, that fucking hurt.
Maria I thought … I thought there would be other people here, someone else at least. Perhaps your wife …
Vince (amused) … Wife.
Maria turns to go.
Maria I’m sorry. I cannot help. See the dentist on Monday.
Vince gets up.
Vince Hey! Wait a minute. You said you knew about teeth.
Maria Yes … and you said …
Vince That I know about cunts, well, I do, and my interest is as strictly professional as yours.
Maria I’m sorry –
Vince (sharply) About what?
Maria I shouldn’t have come up here.
Vince blocks the doorway.
Vince What’re you afraid of?
Maria I wish to leave.
Vince Afraid of me?
Maria I don’t know you. You could be …
Vince A rapist?
Maria Let me go now.
Vince Is that what you think? You think I’ll jump you and rape you? Sure, I do it all the time – pretend I’ve got toothache to lure a lady doctor up here, then rape her, strangle her, and shut her body in the wardrobe. Go on, open it up, have a look in there. See how many skeletons I’ve got in my cupboard.
He moves away from the door.
Get out! Get out of my fucking room! Fora! Fora! I’ve never been so fucking insulted!
Maria You’re insulted, ay!
Vince Do you naturally assume that every man who calls you out in the middle of the night wants to have his wicked way with you?
Maria No, but –
Vince Take a look at yourself, no offence, Doctor, but you’re hardly a vision of love’s young dream. Oh shit – I’m always ratty at this time in the morning, even when I haven’t had a rough night. Let’s start again, shall we? Oh, come on … still scared, Doctor?
Maria I think it is you who is scared.
Vince laughs, then holds his jaw.
Maria Ah, you’re not pretending.
Vince Huh?
Maria You said you pretend to have toothache, just to … get a woman to come up here.
Vince Shit, man, don’t people in this bloody country ever listen!
Maria opens her bag. Vince buttons up his shirt, checks his fly, flattens his hair, squeezes a little toothpaste from a tube.
Maria What’re you doing, Mr …
Vince Vince Stanier. Eating toothpaste.
Maria Eating it?
Vince To stop my breath killing you at ten paces.
Maria You don’t like Brazilian cuisine, Mr Stanier?
Vince Love it, when I’m able to eat it. Are you hungry? There’s a gorgeous dish of cold rice and orange going to waste here.
He brings the dish to Maria.
Vince Smells good, eh?
Maria Mmmm.
Vince Go on, tuck in.
Maria When I’ve seen to that tooth maybe.
Vince Eat it now. The sight of my suppurating molar will spoil your appetite.
Maria picks at the food.
Maria Is this your first visit to Brazil, Mr Stanier?
Vince Rio is my home from home. I come here when I need to be surprised, excited, stimulated, when I need to remind myself that I’m alive … when I can afford it. This is where I find my inspiration. Where I felt inspiration for the first time, in fact.
Maria You write then? Or paint?
Vince No, I … I’m sorry, I can’t watch a woman eat.
Maria I beg your …
Vince I can’t look at a woman while she’s eating, it touches me.
Maria Ay.
Vince When a woman raises an item of food to her mouth, I feel kinda awkward about being there and seeing her at that moment. It’s like watching her undressing, or in the bath. Eating, she gives something of her true self away. It’s a moment of intense revelation.
Maria Really?
Vince No – I can’t stand it!
Maria Shall I stop?
Vince Continue, please. Don’t let me spoil your meal. Take no notice of me.
He turns away, but keeps taking sly glances at her when he thinks she’s not looking.
Why is it Brazilian women eat so little?
Maria Do we?
Vince I had this girlfriend …
Maria puts her fork down.
Vince A Brazilian girlfriend – ate like a bird … no, like a butterfly. I never understood why she didn’t waste away. She was very beautiful, though she had rather large teeth.
Maria, pushes the dish away.
Vince Perhaps I’m unkind to her memory. Maybe I only remember her teeth as large as all I have left are the scars they made.
Maria Oh my … this girl … may I ask … where did she bite you?
Vince Usually in bed, sometimes in the car.
Maria And why –
Vince Do you think she was sick, Doctor?
Maria Do you?
Vince Biting me used to quieten her, seemed to give her some kind of comfort – Like a child suckling at its mother’s breast, I don’t know.
Maria Perhaps there was little else to comfort her in her life. Where did –
Vince Right in the crook of my arm. Look, see there and there? Blood fascinated her. Sounds morbid, but she wasn’t. If I’d cut myself shaving she’d want to touch and sniff and taste. She’d press her cheek to mine and smear the few droplets across her own face. I see her now laughing, blood below her high cheekbones, blood on her big teeth.
Maria Did you love her very much?
Vince I didn’t know it ’til she was gone. Rather, I had gone, home to England.
Maria Shall I look at that tooth now? Mr Stanier? What, what is it?
Vince Nothing. Ghosts of the past, that’s all.
Maria They visit me too sometimes.
Vince But yours are probably friendly ghosts, Doctor.
Maria No, not friendly … lonely ghosts maybe. Now don’t be nervous, I’ll just look to begin with, nothing else.
Vince You won’t be able to see anything.
Maria … Unless you let me try. Sit under the light, please.
Maria takes a mirror and a probe from her bag.
Vince Not that meat hook! Is it sterilised? Unless you sterilise it first, you’re not getting that anywhere near my gob.
Maria You’re impossible! I’m wasting my time!
Vince I better show you which tooth …
Vince opens his mouth.
Maria It is this tooth, yes? This one?
Vince Ow! Yeah … don’t touch it.
Maria The gum’s very swollen. Does it hurt …
Maria And here?
Vince Ahhh!
Maria Here?
Vince leaps up.
Maria Hurt a lot, huh?
Vince No shit.
Maria You’ve an abscess, a large one. You’ll have to see the dentist on Monday.
Vince Monday! Can’t you give me some painkillers or something?
Maria Some aspirins, certainly.
Vince I’m already taking those by the dozen. Something stronger.
Maria Very well. I’ll write you a prescription. The chemist won’t be open until Monday though.
Vince Fucking Monday! I’ll have to go down into the town as soon as it gets light, see if I can find anyone down a back street who can pull a tooth.
Maria And you’ll get yourself hit over the head and wake up with your money gone and all your teeth pulled.
Vince Well, what else can you suggest?
Maria I suppose I could try to take the tooth out for you and lance that abscess.
Vince ‘Try’? Would it be very difficult?
Maria Not really.
Vince What do you usually do – as a doctor?
Maria Everything. From birth to … death.
Vince Have you taken a tooth out before?
Maria It doesn’t take long. Usually it’s quite easy.
Vince Right then.
Maria But with an abscess . .
Vince What?
Maria lays out her instruments.
Maria Have you a couple of clean cups and a large bowl?
Vince Cups, yeah, and a bowl.
Maria For the blood.
Vince Wait … How much is this going to cost?
Maria It depends.
Vince On?
Maria How long it takes.
Vince The longer it takes the more I owe you, eh?
Maria That’s right.
Vince You’ll take as long as you can then, won’t you? Wait … How about if I pay you in reverse?
He fetches the cups and bowls.
Maria I don’t understand.
Vince I’ll pay you more if you do it quickly, less if you take a long time. Traveller’s cheques or rayale?
Maria Cash would be best.
Vince Like the whores and the models. Hope I’ve enough left.
Maria Models?
Vince Photographic.
Maria Ah.
Vince What do you mean ‘ah’? It’s all quite respectable … these days.
Maria I think … you’d better instead go to the dentist on Monday.
Vince Don’t you think you can do it, after all?
Maria I can do it, but you’ll make too much fuss, such a great commotion. A dentist would be able to give you a proper anaesthetic.
Vince Whisky! I’ve a bottle somewhere.
Maria I could rub it around the tooth. It might numb it a little.
Vince Fuck that. I’m gonna finish the bottle.
Maria Ay, ay, ay, I don’t think you should …
Vince You sound like my mother.
He fetches the bottle and glasses.
Have one yourself, Doctor.
Maria No thank you.
Vince You’ve quite a tremble there.
Maria Perhaps it is a little cold in here.
Vince Bollocks. Alright, I’ll close the window, shall I? You’re more nervous than I am. Well, don’t be, I can virtually guarantee it will hurt me more than it does you. Just half a glass, I’m superstitious about drinking alone.
He lifts his glass.
See, no shake? The stoicism of the Englishman abroad. Cheers.
Maria lifts her glass.
Maria (solemnly) Here’s looking at you, kid.
Vince splutters whisky everywhere, holds his jaw.
Vince It used to a little joke between Ines and me.
Maria Oh.
Maria gulps her whisky and chokes.
Vince Ines who preferred to drink blood.
Maria Was Casablanca her favourite too?
Vince We watched it on telly when she was still at school and knew hardly any English.
Maria A long time ago?
Vince My first trip to Brazil. Nineteen, maybe twenty years ago. I’ve some pictures of her somewhere.
He rummages among his things, takes out some photos.
This is some of my work – various shoots for magazines and brochures. Assorted views mainly. Looking down from the Corcovado Christ at sunset, the view from Sugar Loaf in spring. The carnival, the festival of Jesus of Seafarers. Ah …
Maria Is this her?
Vince Ines? No that’s another girl … er … Clara. There’s some more of Clara …
He looks at each photo, then passes them to Maria, who is becoming restless.
Some more girls.
Maria Mainly you photograph girls?
Vince Nice work if you can get it.
Maria For girlie magazines? British girlie magazines?
Vince American and German ones more often. The Germans like their Brazilian women to be real Amazonians …
Maria Was Ines …
Vince God, no. She was small, quiet. Here she is, in a favourite pose.
Maria Hers or yours? She looks very young.
Vince She was fourteen. I put her on a pedestal. Here she is again.
Maria The way she’s sitting … looking over her shoulder, twisting a strand of hair around her finger …
She mimics the pose. Vince snatches up his camera, photographs her.
Hey! Is there film in there?
Vince That’s good, you’re a natural. Try this one. Turn the chair around.
Maria takes up the pose.
Maria Like this?
Vince Yeah, but you’re too tense. You’re all angles where, look, she’s smoothly flowing. No harsh lines. See how her legs and toes point. That’s better, much better. But you’re still hunching your shoulders. Deep breaths, relax. You’ve a natural poise and grace but you’re way too tense. You should go to dance classes or aerobics to loosen yourself up a bit.
He picks up his camera again.
Smile. Open mouth – how’re your teeth? Just a little. OK. But don’t clench your jaw, I’m the one with the toothache. Nice and relaxed.
He moves around her with the camera.
Try looking down, right down here. Now glance up at the camera. Terrific.
Maria Is there film in the camera?!
Vince I’ve some more of Ines. Special ones. I don’t usually show people these.
He hands the photos to Maria. He watches over her shoulder as she studies them.
Beautiful, aren’t they?
Maria She looks sad … sad and scared.
Vince She’s smiling in every one.
Maria Her eyes are not smiling. When you sold these pictures …
Vince I didn’t. They were just for me.
Maria Did she know that?
Vince I expect I made her a few promises, I mean, she could’ve been a top model if these had landed on the right desk.
Maria And escaped from her life of poverty.
Vince Yes, her family was poor. But they were close to each other and happy. She didn’t have any great ambitions to go jetting off somewhere, so I don’t feel bad about keeping these just for myself.
Maria So you think she was content, huh?
Vince She was happy-go-lucky, if rather intense.
He puts the photos away.
I taught her to read English and she read every book and magazine in the place. She was that clever.
Maria Her parents knew she came to you?
Vince Her father introduced us at a party. He didn’t know I’d arranged to see her the following day, and he never found us out. She told him she’d found a lonely old spinster to teach her English.
Maria A respectable girl wouldn’t have let herself be photographed like this. She’d have been in school or studying for her exams.
Vince She was a respectable girl.
Maria Before or after meeting you?
Vince She still is, or at least was. A few years ago, I saw a picture of her in the paper. Here, I have the cutting in my wallet. It’s her wedding photo.
Maria Have you read the article?
Vince I can’t read Portuguese I’m ashamed to say.
Maria (reading) ‘The body washed up on the beach at Leblon is still to be formally identified, but is thought to be that of missing newlywed Ines Verde –’
Vince snatches the page.
Vince (softly) Ines.
Maria ‘Foul play is not suspected …’
Vince She loved life. She devoured it. She was devout, she never missed mass. A good girl, a good family. She was, she was …
Vince sobs. Maria stands up, moves away from him.
Maria Mr Stanier …
She goes back to him.
Vincent, querida amigo, Vincent …
Vince looks up, startled.
Maria Querida amigo, Vincent, nao foi por querer que o magoei … I didn’t hurt you on purpose.
Maria picks up and examines the camera.
Vince A stealer of souls, according to a superstition in these parts.
Maria I don’t think you can steal someone’s soul.
Vince Suppose that they gave it to you?
Maria Gave you their soul? What would you do with it?
Vince Cherish it.
Maria Betray it.
Vince No.
He pulls a suitcase from under the bed.
This is where I keep her.
Maria Her?
Vince Her memory.
He pulls a beautiful emerald-green dress from the case.
Vince She wanted to have this. I said I needed it for other girls. Actually, I won’t let anyone else try it on, but I do use it to tempt them: ‘If you’re as good as Ines you can have this,’ I say. They try but of course they don’t come close. When I’m in a lonely hotel room, in a lonely city at a lonely hour of the morning, I take it out, unfold it and shake out the creases. If you’d like one of the other dresses I’ll give it to you.
Maria If I pull your tooth? You said you could pay.
Vince (snaps) Of course I’ll bloody pay you! I was just going to make you a present, that’s all.
Maria Why? You haven’t let me take the tooth out yet. I wonder if you are going to. I wonder if you’re only wasting my time.
She checks her watch.
Look how long you’ve kept me here.
Vince Do you have other calls to make? Go then. Am I delaying you while someone lies dying?
Maria I’ve no more calls tonight. If there’s an emergency, the clinic will bleep me.
Vince Haven’t you been working a long day, don’t you yearn to go home to your bed?
Maria I’m a night owl, but I’ll go now if you don’t need me.
Vince I didn’t say that.
Maria looks at the green dress, then sees Vince is looking at her.
Maria It is beautiful.
Vince Try it. For you I’ll make an exception. Go on, try it.
Maria For whose benefit?
Vince You can change in the bathroom if you’re shy, Doctor … You never did tell me your name?
Maria Dr Segundo.
Vince First name?
Maria Maria.
Vince There’s a comb in the bathroom, perhaps you could put your hair up.
Maria Like Ines in the photos? … OK.
Vince OK? Great.
Maria But I shall take your tooth out first.
Vince The green goes with your eyes.
Maria puts a towel over Vince, hands him the bowl.
Maria Open.
She inserts the probe and pliers in his mouth. Suddenly he yells, closes his mouth on her hand, and knocks her away from him. She stands looking intently at her hand.
Vince Fuck it! Oh shit.
He looks in the mirror.
The bastard’s still there and it’s killing me now. You’ve mangled the gum and barely wobbled the tooth. Are you sure you know what you’re doing? You really have done this before, haven’t you? I can’t endure any more of this, I’ll be climbing the fucking wall in a minute.
Maria (brightly) Ready for another tug?
Vince No way.
Maria One more and then no problem … unless …
Vince … It still won’t budge, then worse than agony.
Maria You make too much fuss, you’re impossible. I’ll get it this time. I’ll brace myself against the chair.
Vince Wish I shared your confidence.
Maria I might have to cut the gum, just a little …
Vince More whisky! Lots more. And aspirin.
Vince takes some aspirins with a gulp of whisky. He swigs some more straight from the bottle.
Maria (tutting) Living dangerously, Mr Stanier.
Vince I need something stronger. Haven’t you anything in that little black bag of yours, doctor?
Maria Nothing suitable.
Vince Maybe I can go out and get something.
Maria The chemist doesn’t open until Monday.
Vince I know some people, from the favelas, hang about on the beach at night.
Maria You’ll get yourself murdered.
Vince Probably be lot less painful …
Maria So much fuss! You’re completely crazy. Go then, go and get yourself killed!
She opens her case.
Or maybe … maybe I could give you something. A little morphine maybe.
Vince Now you’re talking.
Maria This is not good. I could get into trouble and maybe …
She fills the syringe.
Maybe you’re also afraid of needles.
Vince Fortunately not.
He rolls up his sleeve, but does not look as she injects him. She remains looking at the tiny smear of blood on his arm as if mesmerised.
Is it all right? You put it in the right place, didn’t you? You hit the vein?
Maria No problem.
Vince I feel kinda like suddenly something’s coming back to me.
Maria Tell me when it starts to hit the pain, Vince.
Vince Vince? Oh yeah, I did tell you … This is good shit.
Vince laughs.
Maria What is it?
Vince The Jardim Botánico. Walking hand in hand along the palm-lined avenue. Every time I turned to look at your face you were smiling. Smiling and showing off your big white teeth. Your hand in mine was so warm. Those water lilies, what were they called?
Maria (softly) Victoria regia.
Vince Their leaves as big as a room. I asked you to stand on one, to step from the paved edge of the pond on to the huge flat leaf, so you’d look like a water nymph …
Maria Ay.
Vince The stems were quite thick, the leaf was strong. You didn’t believe it was safe though. You thought you’d be tipped in the water. I wanted that picture, you in your deep-emerald dress in the middle of the leaf, a few drops of trapped water sparkling around your feet like diamonds. My nymph of the fountain.
Maria Yes.
Vince I put the camera strap over your head, let you look through the viewfinder, altered the focus for you so you could see what a perfect, enchanted place I’d chosen to be graced by your beauty. Still you were wary, but I told you that you were a dragonfly able to alight on the leaf without even causing it to dip a little or ripple the water.
So as delicately as a ballerina you stepped from the firm rock on to the floating leaf – and it tipped you straight in the water. To my eternal regret I forgot to press the shutter. If I’d photographed that moment, I’d have trapped your spirit, stolen your soul.
You could’ve drowned, darling, while I stood there laughing. But you crawled from the water, dragonfly no longer, instead a slimy, green amphibian. Quite a crowd was gathering, having heard the splash. A loud fat woman ran up to you shouting some words I didn’t understand, scolding in a motherly kind of way. You pushed her away, you met my eyes and you grinned. You threw back your head and laughed, laughed as if you were laughing at me. Your teeth looked huge, predatory, devouring. I ran to embrace you to stop the hysteria, or whatever it was that was making you laugh like you’d lost all possession of your senses. I tried to hug you – I hugged air. Your footsteps pounded up the avenue of palms. I sprinted after you, expecting the sodden dress dragging around your legs to trip you, but you reached the Rua and I lost you amidst the traffic. Ines!
Maria leaves the room with the green dress.
Vince Wait! Ines! Nao foi por querer que o magoei! Ines, I didn’t mean to hurt you.
He throws all the dresses out of the case, rummages in the bottom, takes out an English/Portuguese dictionary. He unfolds the newspaper cutting, then flicks through the dictionary.
Cas … Casamento – wedding. Feliz – happy. Fotogrqfia, yeah. Photograph of the … happy … occasion? … couple? Casamento – wedding of Ines Verde and …
Maria comes in wearing the green dress.
Vince Dr Felipe Segundo. Dr Segundo. Death.
He flicks through the dictionary.
Vince Mort.
He checks the article for the word.
No. Try drowned, drowning. No mention of death or drowning. Body? Washed up? Accident? Suicide?
He continues to flick through the dictionary. He looks up, sees Maria.
There’s nothing here about her drowning and being washed up on Leblon beach. You lied, she isn’t dead.
Maria You stole her soul, how could she live?
Vince I’m going crazy or else it’s the morphine …
You’re not her come back, you can’t be … And you’re not having my darling’s dress, it’s all I have left of her.
Maria You have the photos.
Vince I can’t take them to bed at night.
Maria You have your scars.
Vince Everyone has those.
Maria That dress is mine. I gave you my soul for it.
Vince grabs hold of her.
Maria Have I changed so much?
Maria laughs, throwing her head back.
Vince Your teeth, Ines …
Maria I had them fixed.
Maria sits Vince down on the bed, rolls his sleeve up to the elbow. She turns the lamp low and the soft music back on, before lifting the crook of his arm to her teeth.
Blackout.