Act I Scene v.
The street. Enter Jasper and Mustard, the former a heavy-set, tall man in a suit; the latter, this time, in addition to his previous attire, is wearing a kilt and an eccentrically colored denim jacket. They are coming from an incredibly successful heist of heroin. Three other huddled figures are sleeping in the street.
JASPER: Who woulda thought the whole thing could be so…(Stuck for a word)
MUSTARD: … magic!
JASPER: What?
MUSTARD: Magic, y’know, dynamite.
JASPER: Right. It couldn’t’ve been smoother, timed better, more secret. The Gardai haven’t even sniffed our presence in Paris, let alone fucking Kilfenora. I’m a genius is what I am, and d’you know what I deserve… I deserve a handsome re… re…
MUSTARD: …reward?
JASPER: What?
MUSTARD: Reward.
JASPER: No, recompense is what I was thinking, handsome recompense…
MUSTARD: Same thing.
JASPER: I deserve a handsome reward for my labours?
MUSTARD: You are indeed on the crest of a wave my dear Jasper.
JASPER: (Clipping Mustard in the ear.) Don’t you ‘my dear Jasper’ me! Don’t you give me that shit.
MUSTARD: Ok. (A beat. He changes tack.) Fuck you Jasper, peabrain, this is just the calm before the storm.
JASPER: What storm?
MUSTARD: Oh, arrest, incarceration, buggery.
JASPER: I’ve just moved £2million worth of heroin without anyone noticin’.
MUSTARD: Most of the proceeds for the poor, but, I haven’t been paid yet.
JASPER: Here. (He hands him a sachet of heroin as payment.)
MUSTARD: Never touch the stuff.
JASPER: Bollox. How much are you expectin’?
MUSTARD: (Cagily) Are you invitin’ me to negotiate?
JASPER: Negotiate! Fuck, that’s what you do when the Judge is sending you down for 20 years. Fucking negotiate. You’ll get what you always get. You’ll get your week’s wages and no more.
MUSTARD: £1000!! Ah, for fucksake Jasper, this is a special week. I deserve a bonus. I deserve £10,000 for the risks and crap I went through this week. You can’t be serious.
Jasper is occupying himself handing out free sachets to the addicts lying in the street.
JASPER: Ah, suffer the little children to come onto me. Here, my dear man, take this, on me, no need to get up. Best quality, just in from gay Paree, knock yourself out.
MUSTARD: You can’t be serious Jasper?! It’s important to keep your employees happy. I deserve a handsome reward as you said yourself.
JASPER: Fuck off. Don’t annoy me. You’re not my employee. You’re my slave, camelshit, look at the state o’ you. You do the dirty work, clean the toilets, you’re my sudden-impact man. You’d be sucking dick in Mountjoy if it wasn’t for me. How often have I saved your life?
MUSTARD: Oh, not this again.
JASPER: You owe me, I own you.
MUSTARD: (After a couple of beats.) You saw the Indo yesterday, didn’t you?
JASPER: No, I didn’t. I’m a celebrity, how am I supposed to read everything they write about me?
MUSTARD: This woman, Myra Deane, is getting kinda close to the bone.
JASPER: Yeh, yeh, the writing’s already on the wall for her. I sent the lads over earlier to pay her a visit. She’s a good writer. We’ll use her again.
MUSTARD: She mentioned your mother in today’s article.
JASPER: What did she say about me mother?
MUSTARD: That she died in pain and poverty.
JASPER: (A bit shocked and upset) Really?
MUSTARD: She also had a few things to say about Ian Grimes.
JASPER: (Very upset. Hissing.) What!?
Long pause. Jasper is shocked and unnerved. This is very serious. His anger builds to the point where he grabs Mustard by the throat and chokes him in earnest.
JASPER: Some fucker, some bollox, some cunt has betrayed me! It wouldn’t be you would it? No, you just want your wages, you just want… what the fuck do you want? (A beat) Nah, it’s not you. (He throws Mustard aside, who slides gasping into a corner.) You wouldn’t have the nerve for betrayal! (Jasper kicks a couple of the deadbeats in the street.) How about all you meatballs?! Was it one of yous? Someone doing some whispering behind good king Jasper’s back? Someone trying to take me down when I’m on a roll. There’s no one knows about me and Ian Grimes. (Pause. He looks around. Kicks the third figure.) What about you fuckface? (The figure groans.) Aw, did I upset your sleep, did I interrupt a sweet dream? (He kicks him hard) You wouldn’t be squeeling on me by any chance, would ya? Ha? Ha? Fucking drug addicts, you make me puke. No will power. Why can’t yis get yisr acts together? (He throws him a sachet of heroin.) Hey, how about doing a little bit o’ detective work for me, eh? Maybe you could find out who told Mizz Deane that I killed Ian Grimes.
MUSTARD: It didn’t say you killed him.
JASPER: It’s all the fuckin’ same! The fact that our names were mentioned in the same mouthful means the damage is already … fuck!… when I get my hands on that stoolie I’ll… fuck… I’ll tear his tongue out through his throat. I saw that in a film once. Columbian necktie. It was fuckin’ perfect. It was fuckin’ sublime.
MUSTARD: What would you know about perfection, about sublime. You’re too pigfuckin’ ignorant to know anything about perfe…
JASPER: Shut up, shut up, I’m tellin’ you, it was sublime. There’s not enough fuckin’ violence in films. You hear all this shit about there bein’ too much violence, too much bang-bang an’ thunk-thunk, it’s all crap. There’s no violence at all on TV. What?! What?! You think lettin’ off a jasus subfuckinmachinegun is violence, do you? You think prancin’ around sweatin’ an’ showin’ off biceps is violence. That’s not hurt, that’s not pain, that’s not violence, that’s choreography. Rambo or Van Damme with their muscles and their tai kwan dooby shit! That’s not violence. You wanna see some violence, do you? You wanna taste of the tree of blood an’ evil, eh? Well, go see Ian Grimes’ family and see how they still suffer. Endless loss. Foreverache. What fuckin’ TV show shows that? Eh? Eh? That‘s violence. (Raising his voice.) An’ let whoever squeeled on me be warned. I will rain such hurt on you and yours that you’ll beg me to slaughter everyone you know. Do I make myself clear?! (He turns quickly and conspiratorially to Mustard.) She has to be silenced, what can we do?
MUSTARD: We can pull her tongue through her throat an’ just forget about the stoolie.
JASPER: Oh, that’s very clever, very intellectual indeed. We kill her and the stoolie just goes on crappin’ stools!! Anyway, you don’t have the nerve for that kind of movie star shit. Can’t you be more helpful? Didn’t I just say I was givin’ you a bonus, didn’t I? Make a reasonable suggestion an’ there’ll be a few gs under your pillow on the morn. C’mon Mustard me oul flower, don’t go sour on me now, I need you, I need your quick wits. I need your style Mustard, where would I be without you? (A Pause. Mustard clearly can’t think of anything. Jasper throws him aside again.) Thick as two short fuckin’ planks, that’s what you are. Do I have to do everythin’ alone? Do I? Can I not depend on you to come up with the odd bright idea now an’ again. Huh? Huh? Jesus, it’s like gettin’… it’s like … it’s like gettin’…
MUSTARD: …blood from a stone?
JASPER: Well, aren’t we a regular little cliché machine or wha’?
MUSTARD: You’re such a prick. If you’d just shut up for a minute I might be able to think straight. (Long silence) What did you get the lads to do this mornin’?
JASPER: Just scare her a bit.
MUSTARD: What did they do?
JASPER: They broke in, and wrote shit on her wall, stuff like…eh… Write no more… or… y’know, stuff to tell her not to write any more.
MUSTARD: That’s all you want, isn’t it? To stop her writin’? Ok. I could pay her a visit, drive the nail home. Let her know we’re serious.
JASPER: Yes, very serious.
MUSTARD: An’ if we have to get heavy we can always do something really sick, like cut her writin’ finger off or somethin’.
JASPER: Oh, fuck!! I didn’t want it to go this way. She’s drivin’ me to it. I didn’t want … What are we goin’ to do? An’ everythin’ was goin’ so well. (He cries) I just want a healthy wealthy life with a bit of decision-makin’ power. It’s not fair. Some people get that handed on a plate to them. But people’ve been fuckin’ with me since I was a kid. You know when I was a kid the big boys used to rub jam sandwiches in my face an’ make me cry. It was terrible.
MUSTARD: We could get Leary’s gang to do a drive-by an’ pay them with a couple o’ pound o’ smack.
JASPER: More violence. Orphaned child an’ a lonely Dad. It’s awful sad. Isn’t there another way? (A beat) If we have to get shut of her we’ll need a good alibi. Get workin’ on that immediately. Have the two of us out of the country if possible. We’ll decide on a date soon.
MUSTARD: Yeh, I love alibis. Plausible elsewheres. How about skiin’ with Fritz in the Swiss Alps?
JASPER: I don’t ski.
MUSTARD: So?
JASPER: How about ridin’ the arse off some Spanish birds in Ibiza?
MUSTARD: But you don’t ride either.
JASPER: Like fuck.
MUSTARD: Ibiza’s good, yeh. But, you know what we should try first? We should just go to her editor, whatshisname…
JASPER: O’ course, yeh, Harris, that softy fuck’ll do anythin’ we say.
MUSTARD: We should just go to him an’ tell him not to publish her stuff anymore.
JASPER: Brilliant. You’re a genius, (He starts kissing Mustard, who objects) y’know that. I’d be lost without you. Ah, c’mon, don’t be shy. It’s them lips o’ yours, they’re an awful turn-on. You can’t blame a man for feelin’ amorous with a looker like you steamin’ up the atmosphere.
MUSTARD: Give over.
JASPER: The original tongue an’ groove is right.
MUSTARD: Piss off.
Blackout.
Cool Root 