Guards at the Taj and Mr. Wolf_Two Plays Read online

  HUMAYUN: I have never slept as soundly as I slept on that raft we made in the trees.

  BABUR: Do you remember how good it felt when we had completed it? Sitting, admiring it, bathed in sweat, drinking cold riverwater.

  HUMAYUN: Yes.

  BABUR: Now: Think how Ustad Isa must feel. 16 years in the making, surrounded by those walls, so that no one may see it until it is complete . . .

  HUMAYUN: Which is today’s first light.

  BABUR: Which is today’s first light. And for 16 years, he built this thing.

  He smiles at everyone, because he is happy. Because he made Tajmahal. Ustad Isa is amazing! Even God couldn’t make Tajmahal!

  HUMAYUN: Blasphemy! Would you stop? Don’t forget the punishment for blasphemy is three days in prison.

  BABUR: That is weird, though, isn’t it?

  HUMAYUN: What?

  BABUR: Mild sedition—for example, making a joke!—is . . . whipping, shaved head, torture . . . but blasphemy . . . just three days in jail! As if the emperor doesn’t really care about speaking ill of Allah. He’s way more concerned about himself.

  HUMAYUN: Don’t test him! And stop with this Ustad Isa talk. Tajmahal was made by His Sovereign Ruler of Hindustan, Shah Jahan who built this for his tragic queen, Her Excellent Empress Mumtaz Mahal. This is her tomb, a mausoleum to honor her for all time.

  BABUR: Nah.

  HUMAYUN: Nah what?!

  BABUR: Ustad Isa. He made Tajmahal.

  HUMAYUN: Oh yeah? Did Ustad Isa import the Pietra Dura from Greece? Or the Herringbone from Iraq? Or the Marble from China? Or 700 tons of Jasper from some damnfool slum in Uzbekistan!? No: He didn’t. Shah Jahan did.

  BABUR: Ustad Isa says that today’s first light is important for Tajmahal because after today, the air and the rain and the sand and heat of sun will start to age her perfect face. But that today, at first light, Tajmahal will be the most beautiful thing in the history of everything that has ever existed.

  (beat)

  Think about it! The most beautiful thing ever made . . .

  Tajmahal is sitting there, waiting to be lit by the day’s first light . . . waiting to be seen-

  HUMAYUN: We are not turning around.

  BABUR: AW, COME ON MAN!

  HUMAYUN: No. We are guarding. We are facing South. Not North. South.

  BABUR: Just for a quick moment! We turn around, we turn back around . . .

  HUMAYUN: Absolutely not. Imperial Guards do not move from their post.

  BABUR: They don’t speak either, but here we are / speaking for a long . . .

  HUMAYUN: We’re not turning around! We are Imperial Guards! This is very important to me!

  BABUR: To me as well. But . . .

  HUMAYUN: People are watching us.

  BABUR: Who?

  HUMAYUN: Elders. Waiting for us to deviate from the sacred oaths. You and me, Babur, there is no one below us. If there is a post that nobody wants? For example the one single guard post that faces AWAY from Tajmahal at dawn? Then we are assigned that post.

  We are grunts of the Imperial Force until that day new appointments are made. And until that day: We get the jobs nobody else wants.

  Unless, of course, we are sacked for being stupid because we turned around at first light to see a white building. They’d send us to the brink.

  We’d end up patrolling Kashmir—a place to which, if some bastard is assigned, some bastard ends up dead.

  (beat)

  Do you want to go patrol Kashmir?

  BABUR: No.

  HUMAYUN: Do you want 40 lashes and a shaved head?

  BABUR: No.

  HUMAYUN: Do you want to be blinded by a dull blade? Or sewn into the hide of a water buffalo?

  BABUR: No.

  HUMAYUN: Or maybe you want to end up like poor Ustad Isa and . . .

  Humayun cuts off. Babur notices.

  BABUR: Wait, what?

  HUMAYUN: Nothing.

  BABUR: No, what were you just saying?

  HUMAYUN: Nothing. Forget it.

  BABUR: What about Ustad Isa?

  HUMAYUN: Nothing..

  BABUR: Come on, what?

  HUMAYUN: Nothing.

  BABUR: Humayun.

  HUMAYUN: No.

  BABUR: Huma . . .

  HUMAYUN: No.

  BABUR: Tell me.

  HUMAYUN: No.

  BABUR: What have you heard.

  HUMAYUN: It’s simple: Don’t be careless.

  Beat.

  BABUR: Come on. Tell me.

  HUMAYUN: Okay. But you can’t tell anyone.

  BABUR: I promise! Who keeps a promise better than me?

  HUMAYUN: Okay.

  It has been said, that after the last jewels were inlaid, and the last piece of marble polished . . . it has been said that this wastrel, this cur, Ustad Isa, the proud architect who thinks himself equal to a King, approached Shah Jahan himself and asked His Excellent Mughal Lineage for a personal favor.

  BABUR: A personal favor?

  HUMAYUN: Yes.

  BABUR: He asked the Emperor for a Personal Favor?

  HUMAYUN:

  (almost delighted by this)

  I don’t even know which level of sedition that is because it’s never been classified because nobody’s ever done it! This is the kind of useless vagabond your brilliant artist is. He asks Shah Jahan, great great grandson of Babur, First Mughal Emperor—

  BABUR: —My namesake

  HUMAYUN: —Your namesake—Ustad Isa asks Shah Jahan for things such as these, personal things.

  BABUR: My God.

  HUMAYUN: Yes.

  Beat.

  BABUR: What was it?

  HUMAYUN: (as if telling a secret)

  Ustad Isa asked Shah Jahan if the 20,000 men who built it, could wander the unsheathed Tajmahal at first light, so that they could see and admire their handiwork, this thing to which they owe the last 16 years of their lives.

  BABUR: Oh.

  Huh.

  What did Shah Jahan reply?

  HUMAYUN: His Supreme Excellent Imperious Royalty said No.

  BABUR: Oh.

  HUMAYUN: But there is a rumor.

  BABUR: Of?

  HUMAYUN: Having never in his life been asked a personal favor before—His Most Sovereign Enlightened One needed time to fully absorb the gross insult hurled upon him.

  BABUR: The Emperor is angry.

  HUMAYUN: Yeah. The Emperor is angry. So now the emperor has issued a decree: Nothing so beautiful as Tajmahal shall ever be built again.

  BABUR: What kind of decree is that?

  HUMAYUN: He has ordered that the hands of every mason, laborer and artisan who crafted Tajmahal . . . be chopped off.

  BABUR: WHAT?

  Wait wait wait. He’s going to chop 20,000 hands off?

  HUMAYUN: 40,000.

  BABUR: Because they wanted to look at Tajmahal?

  HUMAYUN: We need not ask why. A Royal Decree is exactly that.

  BABUR: Every worker? Every man who built this?

  HUMAYUN: Every one.

  BABUR: So someone is going to have to chop off 40 Thousand Hands?

  HUMAYUN: Yep.

  BABUR: That’s a terrible job. Who’s gonna have to do that?

  A long beat as they both realize what this means.

  HUMAYUN: Shit.

  BABUR: Oh no . . .

  HUMAYUN: Shit.

  BABUR: It’s us, right?

  HUMAYUN: Shit.

  BABUR: I don’t want to do that!

  HUMAYUN: I don’t either.

  BABUR: Shit.

  Beat.

  BABUR: Well, I think the Emperor is overreacting.

  Beat.

  BABUR: 40,000 severed hands. What’s the purpose of such punishment?

  HUMAYUN: Nothing so beautiful as Tajmahal shall ever be built again.

  This news depresses Babur. Also Humayun, although he wouldn’t admit it. Long Beat. Babur looks at the stars.

  BABUR: It’s almost first light.

>   (beat)

  Huma . . .

  HUMAYUN: What.

  BABUR: If a flying palanquin did exist, like the one I said . . . and a person could fly to those little fires in the sky . . . would you go?

  HUMAYUN: If it pleased His All-Powerful Reign.

  BABUR: I would go, even if it didn’t please him. What an invention that would be!

  I would call it . . . an Allah-aero-platforma-al-Agra-Babura . . .

  Or for short . . . Aeroplat.

  HUMAYUN: Aeroplat.

  BABUR: Can you imagine? To be as far away as that? Agra would seem no bigger than the flickering up there.

  We are as small as that, Huma.

  And further away from that, we are smaller.

  And further away from that . . . we don’t exist. There is no proof of us, or this place, of Tajmahal, or Shah Jahan or Hindustan, or the razai of candlelight above our heads.

  Far enough away . . . is another world, with different Kings, and different Imperial Guards.

  Different Gods, even.

  A beat. Then Babur turns around to look at the Taj.

  HUMAYUN: (panicking, but not moving)

  Babur, what are you doing?

  Turn back around! You . . . you can’t . . . Babur!

  As Babur starts to really see the Taj, the Taj also transforms, each passing moment slowly bringing a new shade of morning light.

  BABUR: Humayun.

  HUMAYUN: Turn around!

  BABUR: Humayun.

  HUMAYUN: Babur, if anyone sees you . . .

  BABUR: Humayun!

  HUMAYUN: Why are you doing this, man!?

  BABUR: I think you should look.

  HUMAYUN: We can look at any other time! Any other time except now! Why is it so important to risk everything to look at this now! Turn around!

  With each second, Babur is more transformed. A new light shines on the Taj. He lowers his sword, as if it had simply become too heavy.

  HUMAYUN: Babur! Raise your sword!

  Babur drops his sword to the ground. Involuntarily. He doesn’t even know he has done it.

  HUMAYUN: You dropped your . . . Oh COME ON man! You are an Imperial Guard. They will . . .

  BABUR: There’s no one watching. Not us, Huma. Trust me. There are no eyes in this land that would waste themselves on us. They are not watching us. They are watching this. This. Huma-bhai . . . Look. Look and see . . .

  Humayun finally breaks, a little, and very slowly, awkwardly turns around. He stares at the Taj. Both men do.

  After a moment, and another shift of morning light, Humayun lowers his sword. Eventually he drops his sword, too.

  Both men, without sound, and without even knowing, begin to weep.

  They are experiencing Awe in the most biblical sense. It is Fear, it is one of the fires in the sky, landed in their city.

  Humayun hits Babur’s arm and holds on to it, as if to make sure they both aren’t dreaming.

  Humayun’s clutch of Babur’s arm slowly loosens, drops.

  The two men, as if to keep themselves slightly in reality, take each others hands. They hold hands and watch the first light of day illuminate the Taj Mahal.

  SCENE 2.

  Lights up on a far away underground chamber.

  The floor is pooled with blood. Smoke is in the air. There are several giant baskets that are heavy with blood and severed hands.

  There is a waist-high wooden chopping block, like a podium, particularly soaked with blood.

  Humayun lies on a bench, his eyes shut. He holds a smoking cauterizing iron.

  Babur sits in the corner, slumped over, almost as if in a trance. He grips a large sword tightly with both hands. The sword, his hands, his arms, his entire body—soaked with blood.

  Neither man moves for a long time.

  Finally, Humayun, as if waking from a dream, sits up, drops the iron, and rubs his eyes. Looks. Rubs his eyes some more . . . He can’t see . . .

  HUMAYUN: Babur. Babur. Babur . . . BABUR!

  BABUR: What.

  HUMAYUN: I can’t see.

  BABUR: What?

  HUMAYUN: I can’t see.

  BABUR: What do you mean you can’t see.

  HUMAYUN: I mean, I am opening my eyes and I can’t see! I’m blind!

  BABUR: What are you talking about?

  HUMAYUN: I’m fucking blind!

  BABUR: You’re not blind.

  HUMAYUN: I’M BLIND, I’M TELLING YOU.

  BABUR: You probably just got smoke in them.

  HUMAYUN: Smoke doesn’t make you go blind!

  BABUR: You just cauterized 40 thousand stumps! You were seeing just fine then!

  HUMAYUN: I know, but NOW I CAN’T SEE!

  Humayun walks around blindly, looking for something.

  HUMAYUN: I need water . . . I need to wash out my eyes. Babur, get the water.. find it and bring it to me. BABUR!

  BABUR: Okay, I’ll get the water . . .

  Babur stands up, still clutching his sword. He suddenly realizes he can’t let go of the sword.

  BABUR: Huma . . . HUMA!!

  HUMAYUN: What?

  BABUR: My HANDS!

  HUMAYUN: What about them?!

  BABUR: I can’t let go . . . I can’t let go . . . They’re stuck . . . I CAN’T LET GO OF MY SWORD!

  HUMAYUN: You’re just cramped. Relax—

  BABUR: I CAN’T LET GO OF MY HANDS!

  HUMAYUN: JUST RELAX!

  BABUR: Don’t tell me to relax!

  HUMAYUN: Your hands are just cramped! From all the chopping! Relax and you can—

  BABUR: Don’t tell me to relax!

  HUMAYUN: I’m blind okay?

  BABUR: You’re not blind.

  HUMAYUN: I can’t see!

  BABUR: I can’t get you water until my hands uncramp.

  HUMAYUN: Well un-cramp them!

  BABUR: I don’t know how to uncramp them!

  HUMAYUN: Massage them!

  BABUR: With what? My feet!?

  HUMAYUN: Figure something out I need the god damn water for my eyes, I CAN’T SEE!

  BABUR: Okay, okay, okay . . . just . . .

  HUMAYUN: Come on, Babur . . .

  BABUR: If you massage my hands, and get this sword out of my hands, I’ll get you water, okay? Okay, Huma?

  HUMAYUN: Where are you?

  BABUR: Here.

  HUMAYUN: Where “here”?

  BABUR: Here!

  HUMAYUN: Am I walking towards you?

  BABUR: No, turn around.

  HUMAYUN: Now?

  BABUR: No, turn halfway around!

  The other halfway! Follow my voice!

  HUMAYUN: It echoes in here! You sound like you’re everywhere.

  (panics)

  I’m fucking blind!

  BABUR: There now step towards me and I’ll step towards you, but don’t step into my sword, okay, because it’s sticking straight out . . .

  Humayun, cautiously walks towards Babur . . . but then slips in a pool of blood. This causes Babur also to slip in a pool of blood.

  . . . they both splash to the floor, and then both scramble to get up, and both slip again, effectively covering themselves in more blood.

  The slipping and sliding causes both of them to panic even more.

  BABUR: STOP IT! Don’t move! Don’t move! I’ll move towards you . . .

  Babur slides on his butt over to Humayun (both of them drenched, head to toe, in blood).

  BABUR: Careful of my sword.

  HUMAYUN: Okay.

  BABUR: Here are my hands. Okay.

  HUMAYUN: They’re like stone.

  BABUR: I know, I told you.

  HUMAYUN: Relax them.

  BABUR: I’m trying.

  Humayun massages Babur’s hands.

  HUMAYUN: God.

  BABUR: I know.

  HUMAYUN: What just happened?

  BABUR: I don’t know.

  Twenty thousand men. Forty thousand hands.

  HUMAYUN: I can’t believe we chopped off for
ty thousand hands.

  BABUR: NO.

  HUMAYUN: No what?

  BABUR: I cut off forty thousand. You cauterized. I chopped, you cauterized.

  HUMAYUN: So?

  BABUR: Different!

  HUMAYUN: Both unsavory.

  BABUR: Different!

  HUMAYUN: How’s it different?

  BABUR: I took apart, you put together.

  HUMAYUN: We could have switched! You think I was having a party over there, cauterizing stumps? I went blind!

  BABUR: You’re not blind!

  HUMAYUN: You get cramps in your hands, I go blind, who had the worse job? Answer me that, fucko.

  BABUR: IT WAS DIFFERENT. I chopped off hands. And then, instead of bleeding to death, you stopped the bleeding. I caused damage that you then healed. How do you not see the difference in these things?! How do you not see that?

  HUMAYUN: Because I’m blind!

  BABUR: Just massage my hands so I can get you water so I can stop hearing about how blind you are.

  HUMAYUN: I’m trying.

  BABUR: Try harder.

  More massaging.

  BABUR: Chopping was worse.

  HUMAYUN: We could have switched.

  BABUR: But we couldn’t! We fell into a rhythm!

  HUMAYUN: We fell into a trance. I don’t even remember. It’s like I don’t even remember doing it.

  BABUR: I do.

  They continue this, almost silently, as Humayun massages Babur’s hands.

  HUMAYUN: You know that uh . . .

  That invention you had? The . . . uh . . .

  (thinks, trying to remember)

  Allaporta-palanquin-pa? Or . . . was that it?

  BABUR: Aeroplat.

  HUMAYUN: The thing that could fly to the stars?

  THAT WAS A GOOD IDEA.

  (beat)

  But I was wondering . . . what if you fell off? If this mechanism was soaring to the stars, like some giant bird with cushions . . . wouldn’t one be in danger of being swept away by the wind, or maybe in an effort to see the everything below, the palaces and streets and jungles, wouldn’t, curiosity, couldn’t it, somehow, make a curious person peer too far over the edge of his flying box and then plummet down and then Splatooey?

  BABUR: There would be a strap.

  HUMAYUN: A strap?

  BABUR: Attached to the sitting cushion. Wrapping around the stomach like a belt.

  HUMYAUN: Some kind of seat-belt.

  BABUR: Yes.

  HUMAYUN: That’s a good idea.

  BABUR: Yeah. Ahhhhhhh . . ..

  Babur’s hands finally loosen. Humayun pries the sword away, tosses it to the side.