Race by David Mamet Read Free Book Online Page B

the press.
    HENRY : Why would you want to do that?
    CHARLES : To explain . . .
    JACK : It’s our job Mr. Strickland to get you acquitted , not to explain. Not to apologize . To win the case. Look, everyone wants to be cleansed, it is attractive to confess . . . I understand , but . . .
    CHARLES : . . . I wronged that man. I called him my friend. And I did him a great wrong. And I never knew it.
    (Susan enters with a sheet of paper.)
    JACK : Whatever other “slurs,” or acts you may feel yourself accused of. (Pause) You’ve been charged with rape. The charge is unsustainable, and we’re going to see that you’re exonerated. (Pause) You cannot confess. You cannot talk to the press. Whatever you feel, listen to me. You must control your desire to confess. (Pause; referring to the postcard) This, this man can be bought off.
    HENRY : That may not be so, Jack . . .

    JACK (Waving it off) : Be that as it may . . . it has nothing whatever to do with the case at hand.
    CHARLES : My friend hated me. I humiliated him. So badly. That he remembered. All these years.
    HENRY : Do you know. Mister Strickland.
    (Pause.)
    CHARLES : What?
    HENRY : We all have to put up with a lot. From each other.
    (Pause.)
    CHARLES (He starts off) : That’s very generous.
    HENRY : I’ll walk you out.
    (He does so.)
    JACK (To Susan) : He’s been accused of rape. Of which he’s innocent. (Pause) He hasn’t been accused of being racist. (Pause) Look, you work in this racket, you are going to meet a lot of people. At Their Most Human which is to say “at their worst.” There are things all of us, would rather . . . (Susan hands him a sheet of paper) What is this?
    SUSAN : A statement. From the hotel cleaning lady. She now remembers. Finding sequins underneath the bed.
    (Pause; she turns to go.)
    JACK : Hold the fuck on . Tell me again.
    SUSAN : They have a statement from the maid who now remembers finding red sequins underneath the bed.
    JACK : What prompted her to think again?
    (Pause.)
    SUSAN : I beg your pardon?
    JACK : Why did the cleaning lady think again? She all of a sudden “got the idea ” . . . ?

    SUSAN : I . . .
    JACK : . . . to remember something she “forgot”? Why would she do that?
    SUSAN : How would I know?
    JACK : How did we get the statement?
    (Henry reenters.)
    HENRY : . . . what?
    JACK (To Susan) : Get Kelley on the phone.
    (She goes to the phone and dials.)
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    They’ve got a statement from the hotel cleaning lady . . . (He gives it to Henry; to phone) Hello, Kelley . (Pause) When? (Pause) At whose instigation? (Pause) She just “came in”? (Pause) The maid . (Pause) Just “came in ” . . . You’re telling me, some half-literate illegal hotel maid, suddenly, takes it upon herself: to go back to the police . . .
    SUSAN : “Half-literate . . .”
    JACK (Referring to sheet of paper) : Rosa fucking Gonzales. (To phone) I have to call you back.
    SUSAN : “Half-literate.” Hotel Maid.
    JACK : Can we call things: by their name? Her social security number is false, her employment application is written in a misspelled scrawl, she is illegal . God bless her, that’s what she is. (Pause) When, in a million years , is this woman going of her own free will back to the police. In a case, she probably can’t even understand . To call their attention to a fact that she cannot possibly feel is important. (Pause) You tell me that. Our client, did our client talk to someone ’cause if not Somebody told the other side, and there’s our fucking case, and an innocent man’s going to jail. (Pause) I do not understand. (Pause) Alright . . .
    (Pause.)
    SUSAN : We . . .

    HENRY (To Susan) : Susan, I left my briefcase in the car, would . . .
    JACK : No. (To Susan) She should be here . . . We . . .
    HENRY : I need the fucking briefcase.
    SUSAN : I’ll get it.
    HENRY : Thank you.
    (She exits.)
    JACK : I. Do. Not. Understand. How in