Town of Dissident
Act I
Scene III
Characters mentioned/ involved:
Kanen
Soldier
Adam
(Scene opens on Kanen, a tall, dark muscular man, walking quickly through a moist torch lit brick passage. He stops in front of the largest door at the very end of the tunnel, and ferociously unlocks it. He pushes the door open so hard and it slams inward and smashes into the brick wall, sending an echoing smash throughout the interior room. The people inside all jump to their feet. There are six young men, among them Adam, dirt caked over their skin and with heavy shackles around their ankles. All of them watch Kanen tentatively as he slowly steps into the dark room while taking a coiled black whip from his belt. He slowly looks over each individual boy.)
Kanen: [Under his breath] Filthy. [His eyes fall on Adam.]
Kanen: Ah! [He takes a step toward him while letting the whip unravel behind him.]
Adam: Sir, will thou beat an innocent man?
Kanen: [Laughs.] Three notices. More lashes, remember the pact? You endure, or become acquainted with the guillotine. Perhaps you’ll agree to hang after your lashes?
Adam: It is a mistake, sir, I addressed the letters to the house of Brindel, to Kas.
Kanen: [Scowls.] Mistake? I know of Brindel. I too know of his daughter Kas. [Begins to slowly pace back and forth in front of the lined up convicts.] Tell me, what business be this?
Adam: What, sir?
Kanen: [Slightly annoyed.] What business would Brindel have with a woodcutter who has yet to behold his seventeenth year, and only ten of these to have known such a service?
Adam: [Hesitates.] Sir, will thou gloat on my own personnel affairs? Please, I beg you, I…
Kanen: [Turns and flicks the whip across Adam’s chest, ripping his torso and cutting him. He falls to his knees, and Kanen slams the whip against his back. There are already several scabbed lines on his back.] Thou art in no position to beg of anyone but thy fellows! [Beckons at other prisoners.] Tell me thy purpose for writing scripts to Brindel’s household. Tell me how thou came to know Kas.
Adam: [Breathing hard, and shaking.] A friend she is, sir.
Kanen: [Laughing.] A friend? An aristocrat.
Adam: Sir, wealth has nothing to do with….
Kanen: [Whips Adam again, the other boys cringe and back away from him as far as they can. Adam stays hunched over his knees shaking. He begins slowly walking towards the hunching Adam.] Innocence…..Justice…..Liberty….. [Crouches next to Adam.] In all honesty, none ever exist. They are but myths, legends that were simply invented on the matter of civil peace, and power.
Adam: I…
Kanen: I tell you, boy, that ‘tis unimportant whether you are innocent or guilty. I, myself, would let you walk the streets this hour, I would‘ve had you free the moment you entered this pound, but the well-to-do of the town hear not of such…. Repugnant, as they would have you known, beings. What is a woodcutter to them?
Adam: You would have me here for your own social standing then?
Kanen: [Laughs.] Perhaps.
Adam: I have naught to know the reasons for me being here.
Kanen: [Laughs again.] I have told you the charges. There is no reason , boy, there is but the opinion of the ‘civilized’, the prideful actions of the wealthy, the heroic laws of the upper class.
Adam: Then another will have me rot?
Kenan: [Laughing.] Thou should have been a scholar.
(Kanen gets to his feet, walks a few paces from the still kneeling Adam, then turns and whips him repeatedly. Adam falls forward, and lays face down on the moldy floor while still taking the blows. Kanen watches him a moment, then exits, gently slinging the whip behind his back. He shuts the door loudly behind him, mumbling something as he exits
