A Free Man of Color (9 page)

DR. T
Let me explain—

MORALES
(
drawing his sword
)
Arrest Dr. Toubib!

JACQUES CORNET
Unhand him!

The men draw their swords. Jacques Cornet wrests a sword from Creux and challenges the men. They parry.

MORALES
Stop! Before we extract punishment, I announce a decision. Thanks to my rage, I rescind the right of deposit on the Mississippi. No ships may dock in New Orleans.

HARCOURT
But it’s our life blood!

DORILANTE
The town will starve!

SPARKS
You’ll destroy the city!

MORALES
When you starve, point the world’s finger to Jacques Cornet! The Mississippi is closed!

Jacques Cornet frees Dr. T with elaborate sword play. Exit Jacques Cornet, Murmur, and Dr. T, pursued by the men.

DR. T
(
to us
)
Before we escape into the bayou, know what happened up north, when this news reached Washington.

Enter Jefferson and Meriwether.

MERIWETHER
Send in troops to liberate the Mississippi!

JEFFERSON
No! That will force England to join the fray. We have to get New Orleans legally before there’s war. No word from Livingston? Bring me James Monroe.

JAMES MONROE
appears.

JEFFERSON
Go to Paris. Join Livingston. I authorize you to spend ten million dollars—

MONROE
Ten million dollars?!

JEFFERSON
Ten million dollars to buy New Orleans.

MONROE
Buy New Orleans?!

JEFFERSON
Buy New Orleans. Move quickly! France is vulnerable. The future destiny of this republic depends on you!

Exit Jefferson, Meriwether and Monroe. Livingston appears.

LIVINGSTON
Monroe coming to Paris! I’ll buy New Orleans before Monroe arrives. I’m going to be the only one in the history books.

Exit Livingston.

The bayou. Drums beat madly. Morales, Pincepousse, the women of New Orleans search for Jacques and go. Jacques, Murmur, and Dr. T emerge from hiding.

JACQUES CORNET
We must cleverly escape from the present misfortune. Murmur, you shall put on my clothes while I . . .

MURMUR
Sir, you’d expose me to be killed in your clothes?

JACQUES CORNET
Happy is the servant who has the glory of dying for his master.

MURMUR
I thought you freed me.

JACQUES CORNET
To demonstrate my affection, I shall free my favorite last. Who’s there? Who comes?

Pincepousse appears, holding sword and lamp.

JACQUES CORNET
Ahhh, my brother.

PINCEPOUSSE
You dare call me brother?

JACQUES CORNET
(
drawing his sword
)
My father was your father.

They duel.

PINCEPOUSSE
Your mother was his slave. Bought and sold for a very trivial price. I only tolerate you because of my compassion for a man who made three mistakes in his life. He left France for New Orleans. He had a weakness for women of color.

JACQUES CORNET
And his third mistake?

PINCEPOUSSE
He did not strangle the mistakes he made with those women
at birth
.

JACQUES CORNET
You honor him when you honor me.

PINCEPOUSSE
(
attacking him
)
Sharing my wife’s favors was not included in the honoraria. Fool! Learn how madly you rush on death!

They cross swords. Margery appears and cries out. Pincepousse turns to her. Jacques makes one home thrust mortally wounding him.

PINCEPOUSSE
I yield existence—a wife’s honor’s worth— life—its price—proves none too dear—truth, I did love her.

Pincepousse dies. Jacques Cornet wipes his sword.

JACQUES CORNET
Ridiculing the price of my mother.

MARGERY
Sire, now I am yours!

JACQUES CORNET
Leave me. I’ll give you money for your child.

DR. T
Where will you go?

JACQUES CORNET
(
taking out his maps
)
These maps lead me into
terra incognita
. The hieroglyphs of geography.

DR. T
You have no warmth. You can’t wear these slippers.

JACQUES CORNET
As nature has given me my precious instincts, so I trust nature to care for me.

MURMUR
Do you want me to come with you? Please say no.

JACQUES CORNET
I’m become Robinson Crusoe. I want no man’s company.

MURMUR
Thank god.

JACQUES CORNET
It shall be like stepping off a mountain into a white cloud.

DR. T
And Jacques Cornet goes into the white spaces.

Jacques Cornet goes. The townsmen and women enter to find Pincepousse’s body.

SPARKS
Find Cornet!

HARCOURT
Bring him back!

PYTHAGORE
Death to Cornet!

MARGERY
Will he come back? What will become of me?

They go.

A large map of North America descends. Enter Napoleon in full majesty and Talleyrand.

NAPOLEON
Le Clerc dead? Our entire fleet wiped out. Damn sugar, damn coffee, damn the muslins of my wife! That American—the deaf one—

TALLYRAND
The one who wanted to buy New Orleans? Livingston.

NAPOLEON
Bring him here.

TALLYRAND
You can’t sell New Orleans. I won’t allow it.

NAPOLEON
You won’t allow. I’ve listened to your slime long enough. Sell all of Louisiana. Get rid of all of it. I am no longer paltry, Citizen First Counsel. I will be Emperor!

TALLYRAND
Sell the entire Louisiana territory and risk making the United States a rival?

DR. T
And listen to what Napoleon says!

NAPOLEON
At first, America will be proud of their size. They’ll start singing songs about their country—(
A scratchy recording of a choir singing “America the Beautiful”
)
.
I see slavery spreading like a cancer. I see this territory tearing blacks and whites apart. The poor United States—not prepared for greatness. Sell it. Get their money. Then we attack and destroy Britain. France, ruler of the seas, sails to an emasculated North America and reclaims war-torn Louisiana for France. (
The enormous white space of the Louisiana Territory glows on the map of North America.
) Give them all this size. No country can be this big and survive. They’ll collapse within three years. The luck of Napoleon will see me through.

Napoleon stands in shadows. Livingston appears.

DR. T
On April 11, 1803, the day before Monroe arrives—

TALLYRAND
I offer you all of Louisiana.

LIVINGSTON
(
to us
)
Don’t blink an eye. He’s like Mephistopheles offering Faust the world. All this ours? Jefferson sent me here to buy only this little bit. Jefferson never imagined—if only I could talk to Jefferson.

TALLYRAND
Give me a price.

LIVINGSTON
Since no one knows what’s there, four million dollars.

TALLYRAND
Twenty million francs? No, no, no, no. Fifty million francs.

LIVINGSTON
Ten million dollars for this? Out of the question.

Napoleon steps into the light.

NAPOLEON
Stop! Irresolution and deliberation are no longer in season. I renounce Louisiana. Take it or leave it.

Napoleon and Talleyrand go. Enter Monroe.

MONROE
Monroe arrives.

LIVINGSTON
Damn, I’ll have to share the history books. I tell him the offer.

MONROE
How big is all this?

LIVINGSTON
Roughly nine hundred thousand square miles.

MONROE
Nine hundred thousand—

LIVINGSTON
What would we do, transformed into this Goliath?

MONROE
Megatherian.

LIVINGSTON
Herculean.

MONROE
We’re a sensible Puritan country.

LIVINGSTON
We only require New Orleans.

MONROE
On the other hand. Look at the size of France.

LIVINGSTON
Look at the size of England.

MONROE
We’d be so big, the world would fear us—

LIVINGSTON
—cower before us.

LIVINGSTON AND MONROE
Let’s do it.

Enter Napoleon and Talleyrand.

NAPOLEON
Get one hundred million francs.

TALLYRAND
I now need one hundred million francs.

MONROE
Bargain bargain bargain . . .

LIVINGSTON
Haggle haggle bargain . . .

MONROE
We agree to sixty million francs plus twenty million francs for merchant claims—

LIVINGSTON
Roughly fifteen million dollars.

NAPOLEON
Done!

DR. T
(
to us
)
And this is how empires stumble into being.

Enter the Infanta, Doña Polissena, Toussaint.

INFANTA
A hungry one-eyed Princess in Italy.

DOÑA POLISSENA
A tiny mosquito in the Indies.

TOUSSAINT
A former slave who challenged an empire and won. I died in France in a dungeon at the same time as these negotiations.

They go. Enter Jefferson and Meriwether.

JEFFERSON
The news of the purchase reaches me on the Fourth of July 1803!—What! Fifteen million dollars???

DR. T
Which in 2010 is worth roughly one hundred and ninety five million dollars.

JEFFERSON
Fifteen million dollars???

DR. T
As Linnaeus sent out young men to catalog the world’s flora, so Mr. Jefferson liberates Meriwether Lewis from his desk, sending him out with William Clark to see what the hell it is they have bought.

Meriwether enters in full exploration gear.

JEFFERSON
Meriwether, prepare to voyage into whiteness.

Jefferson goes. Music. Eerie. Majestic. Full of wonder. Meriwether moves onto an empty stage now blinding white.

A Figure appears in the distance, covered in bear skins huddled against the cold.

MERIWETHER
Hello? What tribe you from? I speak bit of Mandan. I’m separated from my party. You like pocket mirror? See self. Beads? Silk ribbons. Ivory comb. Tobacco. Tomahawk that can be pipe. Vermilion face paint.

(
taking out list
)

How long do Indians live?

How do you treat small pox?

Diseases of venery.

What kind of animals do you keep?

What kind of games do you play?

Does the Missouri flow northwest? Southwest?

Or just west?

I have food? Tasty beef and eggs and vegetables boiled into a paste? M-m-m-m! You want?

The Figure tosses back the bear skin. It is Jacques Cornet, ragged, unshaven, his hair grown out.

JACQUES CORNET
No
foie gras?

MERIWETHER
Foie gras
?

JACQUES CORNET
I have a yen for
foie gras
. Like a song that refuses to vacate one’s head, so was I sitting here thinking of Bourdeaux geese having grain stuffed down their throats to engorge their livers. Let me see that pocket mirror. I look a fright. Let me have some of that vermilion war paint. (
Jacques Cornet smears it on.
) Yes, it appears I speak English.

MERIWETHER
What kind of Indian are you?

JACQUES CORNET
Descended from a tribe of fops that landed here a thousand years ago. We keep the good things of life alive. Music. Fashion. Let me try that paste—I’ll eat it cold.

MERIWETHER
(
passing him food
)
Who are you?

JACQUES CORNET
An inept traveler. (
eats
) Your food is this dreadful at the beginning of a journey? This is food for the end of a journey.

MERIWETHER
Are you a citizen of the United States?

JACQUES CORNET
N.O. Letters which are also the initials of New Orleans. I am
Orleanais
. I believe there’s a price on my head? Have you come to capture me and claim the reward?

Jacques Cornet seizes the tomahawk on Meriwether’s belt.

MERIWETHER
Are you mad?

JACQUES CORNET
I’d have to be. To find myself in a blizzard dressed like this. Do you have whiskey with you? How big is your party?

Meriwether gives him a flask of whiskey. Jacques Cornet drinks.

MERIWETHER
So far we have twenty-two men plus three sergeants. My partner, William Clark, has brought the slave he’s had from childhood. His name is York. Do you know him?

JACQUES CORNET
York? No. Why would I?

MERIWETHER
It always surprises me all Negroes don’t know each other.

JACQUES CORNET
Being mulatto, I only know half the Negroes. Where are we?

MERIWETHER
(
unfolding a map
)
In the Indiana territory. At the junction of the Mississippi and the Ohio rivers.

JACQUES CORNET
A collector of maps. As am I. Are we in white space yet?