A More Perfect Heaven (15 page)

GIESE. (
entering
) What’s the matter with you? Why are you still in bed?

BISHOP. Did the boy let you in?

GIESE. Are you ill?

BISHOP. Yes. No! But I feel addled. Like a horse kicked me in the head. GIESE. We should send for Nicholas to come and examine you.

FRANZ
enters with a pitcher and basin, sets them on a washstand, exits.

BISHOP. Nicholas was here all night. An awful night I had. Some cursed Lutheran tried to poison me.

GIESE. Poison?!

BISHOP. Tried to kill me. And very nearly succeeded.

GIESE. Heaven forbid.

BISHOP. Agh! I ask you, Tiedemann: If I’m not safe in my own dining room, where am I safe? Lutherans everywhere. In the kitchen. In the soup.

GIESE. Have you apprehended a suspect?

BISHOP. I can’t tell who is trustworthy anymore. I may have to torture someone to get at the truth.

The
BISHOP
rises, goes to the washstand, and, through the following dialogue, removes his nightshirt, grooms himself.

GIESE. Are you sure it was poison? What did Nicholas say?

BISHOP. Nicholas! His skills may combat a single instance of poisoning. And thank God for that. But his medicaments cannot stanch the spread of the Lutheran plague. It oozes and festers all around us. As God is my witness, it has reached epidemic proportions!

GIESE. You talk like a soldier, Johann.

BISHOP. And you, Tiedemann! You sit idly by, and watch. You do nothing to stem the tide.

GIESE. What would you have me do? Lay siege to Wittenberg?

BISHOP. You have still not adopted my edict in your diocese. Have you?

GIESE. Now, Johann.

BISHOP. You won’t do even that much.

GIESE. You know how I feel about …

BISHOP. We’re the only ones left, Tiedemann. You and I. We’re the last holdouts in the whole region. Every other bishop, to a man, has bowed to that dev il Luther. God help us, even the duke has converted. We are surrounded. We must crush the menace.

GIESE. We are men of God, Johann.

BISHOP. The Church calls us to her defense. I need your support. As long as you allow Lutherans to live and work in Kulm …

GIESE. Our Lutherans in Kulm don’t cause any trouble. They just …

BISHOP. Listen to me, Tiedemann. If we have trouble here in Varmia, you have trouble in Kulm. We have the same troubles, you and I. How do you know my assassin wasn’t one of your Lutherans?

GIESE. These are peasant farmers. Merchants. Tradesmen. The same people who have lived among us for generations, since long before …

BISHOP. They have betrayed us, by betraying the Church. You cannot let them go about with impunity.

GIESE. In your heart, you know there’s a better path to reconciliation with our Protestant brethren.

BISHOP. Oh, please, Tiedemann! When will you face the facts?!

GIESE. We’re all Christians in the eyes of God.

BISHOP. Haven’t the past twenty years taught you anything? That sniveling little monk! He has whined and complained and … and gained himself a huge following! How did it happen? Hm? Who ever thought anyone would listen to him? Now look at him. He sings a few hymns, and half the continent thinks he’s the Second Coming.

The
BISHOP
finishes his grooming, throws down his towel like a gauntlet.

BISHOP. It’s an abomination.

GIESE. The Church has weathered worse storms before this. If we are steadfast in our faith, and treat our fellow citizens with compassion …

BISHOP. You mean you refuse to back me?

GIESE. I’m saying that the changing times challenge us to summon new reserves of patience, so we can negotiate peaceably with …

BISHOP. You have more tolerance for Lutherans than you have for me.

GIESE. Let us pray together, for guidance. “Our Father, Who art in Heaven …”

BISHOP. I bet you’d just love for one of them to do away with me. So you could take my place, and be bishop here yourself.

GIESE. Don’t give in to such dark thoughts, Johann. Pray with me now. “Our Father, Who art in Heaven, hallowed be Thy name …”

GIESE
keeps praying, whispering under the
BISHOP’s
lines, speaking louder between them.

BISHOP. That’s why you keep your canonry here, isn’t it? You want to have your foot in the door, so when I die …

GIESE. “Give us this day our daily bread. Lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil. Forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those who trespass against us …”

BISHOP. Why didn’t I see it before? Why else would you remain a canon here in Varmia?

GIESE. “Amen.”

BISHOP. You should give up your canonry!

GIESE. What?!

BISHOP. You have no right to be a canon here any longer.

GIESE. Don’t be silly, Johann. I have every right …

BISHOP. I want you to resign. Right now. You should step down of your own volition. Don’t make me force you out.

GIESE. You cannot force me to … It’s a lifetime appointment. Everyone knows that.

BISHOP. Nevertheless, you are free to leave it.

GIESE. Why would I? I rely on my income from the canonry.

BISHOP. You’re Bishop of Kulm now.

GIESE. Kulm is such a poor diocese. You know that better than anyone, Johann. When you were Bishop of Kulm …

BISHOP. You cannot be Bishop of Kulm and canon of Varmia, too.

GIESE. Of course I can. You did. When you were Bishop of Kulm, you didn’t give up your Varmia canonry.

BISHOP. What I did has nothing to do with what you should do.

GIESE. But it’s exactly the same situation. You remained a canon here the whole time you were Bishop of Kulm. If you hadn’t done that, you could never have been elected Bishop of Varmia.

BISHOP. Aha! You admit it, then! You do want to take my place!

GIESE. I’m older than you, Johann. I’m not likely to outlive you.

BISHOP. Not likely, no. Except in the event of my untimely death.

GIESE. You cannot accuse me of such treachery!

BISHOP. Can’t I?

GIESE. It’s the principle of the thing. And the income, of course. And I … I still belong to this community. These are my lifelong friends. Nicholas and I go back …

BISHOP. Don’t expect your friend Nicholas to come to your rescue now. He’s on very shaky ground himself.

GIESE. Nicholas?! He keeps all of us alive!

BISHOP. I could have him excommunicated.

GIESE. Have you gone mad, Johann?

BISHOP. I refuse to look the other way any longer while that harlot comes and goes as she pleases.

GIESE. You mean the housekeeper?

BISHOP. Housekeeper, harlot. What’s the difference? What do you take me for? A simpleton? You think I don’t know a harlot when I see one?

GIESE. But he has trained her, Johann. About herbs and … Medicinal herbs, I mean. She makes … medicines. She …

BISHOP. I had no idea you were so fond of her, Tiedemann. Why don’t you take her home with you? That would solve everything. The harlot goes. Nicholas is absolved. And you are content to stay home in Kulm with your Lutherans and your new concubine.

Blackout. The choir chants Lauds.

SCENE v. TOWER ROOM
WORLD MACHINE

Dim lights reveal the tower room as small and spare, dusty from disuse, almost scary, with minuscule windows and a low door. The furnishings include a table and chair, a cot, and the World Machine, a globe-like nest of intersecting rings, about the size of a manned spacecraft capsule, perched on a pedestal.

RHETICUS. (
offstage
) Where are you taking me, sir?

COPERNICUS. (
offstage
) Only a little farther now.

RHETICUS. (
offstage
) But where … ?

COPERNICUS. (
offstage
) We’re nearly there … Ah!

COPERNICUS
enters, breathless, with a lantern.

COPERNICUS. Here we are.

RHETICUS
follows him in, stays close.

COPERNICUS. You can stay here.

RHETICUS. Here?

COPERNICUS. This is it.

RHETICUS. What is this place?

COPERNICUS. You’ll be safe here.

RHETICUS. Is it your observatory?

COPERNICUS. This? No.

RHETICUS. Not a prison cell, is it?

COPERNICUS. Oh, no. It’s a retreat. A safe house. We all have rooms like this.

When there’s danger, from outside, we come up here, and … and we stay here until … until it’s safe to leave.

RHETICUS. You really expect me to stay here?

COPERNICUS. No one will think to look here now. In peacetime.

RHETICUS. For how long?

COPERNICUS. Just till tonight.

RHETICUS. The whole day?!

COPERNICUS. After sunset, you can go. As soon as it’s dark, I’ll come fetch you.

RHETICUS. You’re not staying with me?

COPERNICUS. No.

RHETICUS. But now we have all day.

COPERNICUS. I can’t stay with you. I have to …

RHETICUS. Oh, please. Stay and seize this day with me. Look how God has provided a space of time for us, after all. This is our chance to talk. One mathematician to another. I …

RHETICUS
sees the Machine.

RHETICUS. What’s that?

COPERNICUS. That?

RHETICUS. What is it?

COPERNICUS. Just … something I made.

RHETICUS. You built it?

COPERNICUS. A long time ago.

RHETICUS. But what is it? Some kind of observing instrument?

COPERNICUS. No. No, it’s … more of a model, really.

RHETICUS. Like an armillary sphere?

COPERNICUS. You might say.

RHETICUS. Only larger.

COPERNICUS. Yes.

RHETICUS. Much larger.

COPERNICUS. I don’t use it anymore.

RHETICUS. Why so big?

COPERNICUS. Well, the person inside needs room to …

RHETICUS. There’s someone inside it?!

COPERNICUS. Not now.

RHETICUS. No. But a person could … ?

COPERNICUS. Yes. The person has to sit inside it, to get the effect.

RHETICUS. And what effect would that be? Inside?

COPERNICUS. The sense of … the consequences, really, of my theory.

RHETICUS. So, you sat in there, while you were figuring out how to … ?

COPERNICUS. No. I stood out here, to operate it.

RHETICUS. Someone else was inside?

COPERNICUS. Yes.

RHETICUS. So you did have a student? Before me?

COPERNICUS. No.

RHETICUS. Then why … ?

COPERNICUS. No, I made this for my … for a friend. Someone who couldn’t grasp the mathematical concepts. Who needed a way to … visualize the spheres.

RHETICUS. You certainly went to a lot of trouble.

COPERNICUS. I suppose I did.

RHETICUS. For your friend.

COPERNICUS. Yes. Well, then. You wait here, and …

RHETICUS. Could I try it?

COPERNICUS. No, I don’t think so.

RHETICUS. I’d really like to see what it does.

COPERNICUS. No one’s used it in years. I doubt it still works.

RHETICUS. Let’s try it and see.

COPERNICUS. There’s no need. You, of all people, can follow the math.

RHETICUS
fumbles about the Machine, looking for a way in.

RHETICUS. I was hoping to read your work, sir. I didn’t know I could ride in it.

COPERNICUS. Don’t touch that.

RHETICUS. How do you get in?

COPERNICUS. Not there. No, not like that.

RHETICUS. Show me, then. Please.

COPERNICUS. Let go of that. It’s over here. You climb in through here.

RHETICUS
dives in, but finds entry a struggle.

RHETICUS. This is a lot smaller than it looks. There’s hardly room to … Your friend must have been half my size.