The Turquoise Elephant Read online

  OLYMPIA: The musk ox.

  AUGUSTA: There’s no such thing.

  OLYMPIA: Of course there is.

  AUGUSTA: They became extinct years ago.

  OLYMPIA: I don’t think so, dear.

  AUGUSTA: Yes. There are no musk ox left.

  OLYMPIA: I saw one, dear.

  AUGUSTA: And if there was there wouldn’t be any in Greenland.

  OLYMPIA: There are now. In the savannah plains. Magnificent!

  AUGUSTA: You were hallucinating, Olympia.

  OLYMPIA: Well, it was a collective hallucination in that case. That’s what’s in the bag.

  Everyone stares at it.

  BASRA: That—carcass—is a musk ox?

  OLYMPIA: Yes.

  BASRA: How did you get it through customs?

  OLYMPIA: Oh, we don’t worry about that. It’s dinner.

  BASRA/AUGUSTA/VISI: Dinner?

  OLYMPIA: Yes. I only eat endangered species now.

  BASRA: That’s revolting.

  OLYMPIA: That’s how you save the species.

  BASRA: By eating it?

  OLYMPIA: Yes! Supply and demand.

  AUGUSTA: Ah—the free market.

  OLYMPIA: They’re being commercially farmed.

  AUGUSTA: The free market prevails! You see? Not governments. Not environmental fanatics!

  OLYMPIA: Farmers.

  AUGUSTA: I think that’s marvellous.

  BASRA: It’s macabre.

  AUGUSTA: You don’t live in the real world, Basra. Never have.

  VISI: How do you cook it?

  OLYMPIA: Curry it. Twelve hours, apparently. To break down the muscle and sinew. A few cloves and spices. You’ll know what to do with it. You are the cook, aren’t you?

  Pause.

  VISI: Yes, I’m the cook.

  OLYMPIA: Wonderful! Thank you, Cissy.

  BASRA: It’s Visi.

  VISI hauls it off.

  BASRA pours the tea. Hands a cup to OLYMPIA.

  OLYMPIA: Now. I need to tell you. I met someone. On the ship, and—

  AUGUSTA: What do you mean you ‘met’ someone?

  OLYMPIA: An odd sort. But he found me fascinating.

  BASRA: Was he a psychiatrist?

  OLYMPIA: No, a tycoon. Made all his money in microchips and nano something-or-other. Kept blathering on about ‘The Paradigm’. ‘The Paradigm’ this and ‘The Paradigm’ that.

  BASRA: What paradigm exactly?

  OLYMPIA: I don’t know. But he was exhausted by ‘The Paradigm’ and was ‘Going Inside’.

  AUGUSTA: Inside where? Not you, I hope.

  OLYMPIA: Australia. To the outback. He’s set his sights on this enormous cattle run that he wants to convert.

  BASRA: To what?

  OLYMPIA: To a paradise. The Hanging Gardens of Carpentaria. Tens of thousands of square kilometres. Half the country. Under a dome. A new world.

  BASRA: Like a utopia?

  OLYMPIA: I suppose so. I didn’t understand most of it. But he was clearly obsessed.

  AUGUSTA: He’s after your money, Olympia.

  OLYMPIA: He has money, Augusta.

  AUGUSTA: Then why was he interested in you?

  OLYMPIA: Oh, there was some other harpy trying to get her hooks into him. You know the type. Some gaping-mouthed acolyte. One of the women who wear amber. But I tell you his eyes were on me the whole trip.

  BASRA: Where is this settlement exactly?

  AUGUSTA: Yes, why haven’t I heard of it?

  OLYMPIA: All a big secret. He’s searching for pilgrims.

  AUGUSTA: There are more of them?

  OLYMPIA: Somewhere. All boarding the ark together.

  AUGUSTA: And warning bells didn’t start ringing then?

  OLYMPIA: Preserving the human race.

  BASRA: Sounds fascinating.

  OLYMPIA: The animals marched on two by two. Now there’s a retirement plan for us, Augusta.

  AUGUSTA: I don’t do retirement.

  OLYMPIA: I suspect he wants me to join him.

  AUGUSTA: Oh, God. It’s a doomsday cult. Stay away, Olympia.

  OLYMPIA: ‘New Eden’ they’re calling it.

  BASRA: No, seriously, this sounds really interesting. Has anyone else written about this?

  OLYMPIA: I told you—it’s a secret.

  BASRA: What’s his name?

  OLYMPIA: Jeff.

  AUGUSTA: Of course it is.

  BASRA: Would he be available for interview, do you think?

  AUGUSTA: Don’t tell her any more, Olympia.

  BASRA: How would I contact him?

  OLYMPIA: You won’t have to.

  AUGUSTA: Thank you.

  OLYMPIA: He’s coming here.

  AUGUSTA: He’s what?

  OLYMPIA: On his way to New Eden. I’ve invited him here to stay.

  Beat.

  Well, don’t look at me like that. There’s plenty of room in the Serengeti.

  TRANSITION SEQUENCE:

  The MASKED FIGURE’s tone has now shifted from one of cultured, lofty detachment to something more urgent. There are elements of zeal sneaking in.

  MASKED FIGURE: Three days of aching tedium at this indulgent global yack-fest, and still no action. The first cases of cholera have broken out in Melbourne. People are abandoning the city in their hundreds of thousands and forming makeshift camps all over the country. The Australian continent is now witnessing its largest mass migration since the last Ice Age. What is it going to take to convince you people that drastic action is needed and it’s needed now?!

  A little bird has told us that our wealthy summiteers are working on a treaty. They are about to propose a return to fossil fuels as a solution to the environmental apocalypse that is unfolding around us.

  Well, here’s a counterproposal for you: if this purported treaty makes the light of day, the next image you see filling your screens will be one of carnage. Art and life will merge in a single terrifying moment of creativity.

  You won’t be able to look away.

  A sudden, staticky jump cut to silence. Suddenly we are back inside the domestic scene.

  SCENE THREE

  VIKA—though of course we think it is still VISI—is doing AUGUSTA’s hair. Some kind of bouffant ridiculousness. OLYMPIA is ‘eating’ the musk ox curry. She chews and chews the meat to absorb its flavour and then spits the food matter into an ostentatious spittoon. AUGUSTA and VISI brace in unison with each spit.

  OLYMPIA: Where’s Basra?

  AUGUSTA: Blogging.

  OLYMPIA: In her bedroom? Sounds revolting. The word itself—reeks of disgorgement. I might get my cochlear to edit it out. What’s it called again?

  AUGUSTA: What?

  OLYMPIA: The girl’s blog.

  AUGUSTA: The Turquoise Elephant.

  OLYMPIA: Sounds pretty. Like something you might encounter through the looking glass. Turquoise. Hm.

  Spit.

  I might invent a colour. Before I die. And that will be my politic. Heliotrope!

  AUGUSTA: Already invented.

  OLYMPIA: That’s my favourite word for a colour. ‘She enters in heliotrope and diamonds.’ That’s Wilde, isn’t it? Oscar Wilde?

  AUGUSTA: I don’t know, Olympia.

  OLYMPIA: ‘Heliotrope’. Just saying it. Feels somehow … erotic.

  VIKA pulls too tightly on AUGUSTA’s hair.

  AUGUSTA: Ow!

  VIKA: Sorry.

  OLYMPIA: You there. Vicky.

  VIKA: [simultaneously] Vika.

  AUGUSTA: [simultaneously] Visi.

  VIKA: [quickly correcting herself] Visi. My family call me Vika. But it’s Visi.

  OLYMPIA: You’ve been silent all morning. Wise choice. I never speak unless I have something fascinating to say. For instance: I read this week that that we’re attracted to the scent of people with the same political beliefs as us.

  Beat.

  Isn’t that fascinating? If the reverse is true, then those whose views we oppose must reek.

  BASR
A enters with a laptop.

  BASRA: We’re taking in two refugee families.

  AUGUSTA: We’re what?

  BASRA: From Melbourne.

  AUGUSTA: Don’t be preposterous.

  BASRA: You mocked me for being passive. This is me taking action.

  OLYMPIA: I thought she was busy blogging.

  AUGUSTA: It’s not action, Basra. It’s reaction.

  BASRA: The current Governor-General doesn’t seem to think so.

  AUGUSTA: The current Governor-General is a weak-minded fool. I have it on the best authority he’s about to stand down.

  BASRA: To protest his own government’s inaction!

  AUGUSTA: He’s a fool.

  BASRA: He’s brilliant.

  AUGUSTA: He’s history.

  BASRA: He’s asking every family in the country to take someone in.

  AUGUSTA: So it’s not even your own idea.

  BASRA: It’s appalling that we should just sit here doing nothing while the world tilts into chaos. Stuck in this fishbowl. Watching it all unfold from the windows—on the video screens. I’ve made up my mind. We’re helping these people.

  Another spit from OLYMPIA.

  AUGUSTA: Where will they stay?

  BASRA: I’m giving them the winter lodge—in Jindabyne.

  AUGUSTA: You can’t.

  BASRA: I can.

  OLYMPIA: It hasn’t snowed there in years. Let them have it.

  BASRA: You won’t give me my money, but you can’t stop me handing over property I own.

  AUGUSTA: We know nothing about them. They could be terrorists.

  BASRA: Don’t be ridiculous.

  AUGUSTA: That’s how they work. They infiltrate the system and take advantage.

  BASRA: That is blatant prejudice and you know it.

  AUGUSTA: I know how these things work, Basra.

  BASRA: Too late.

  AUGUSTA: I forbid it!

  BASRA raises her finger over the laptop keyboard.

  Don’t you dare.

  A click of a button.

  BASRA: … and done.

  AUGUSTA: You’ll regret this, Basra. It will come back to bite you.

  OLYMPIA regurgitates another mouthful into the spittoon.

  BASRA: I’m sorry, but that is just disgusting. Can you please go somewhere else and do that?

  OLYMPIA: Where?

  BASRA: A toilet?

  OLYMPIA: I haven’t defecated in eighteen years.

  AUGUSTA: Oh, really, Olympia. This is too much!

  OLYMPIA: Not since that dreadful wog I picked up in Zanzibar.

  BASRA: I can’t be in the same room as this. Somebody call me when the visitor arrives.

  OLYMPIA: Do you remember, Augusta?

  AUGUSTA: No.

  BASRA: Somebody?

  OLYMPIA: You were there.

  BASRA: Anybody?

  OLYMPIA: In the Stone Town. The old slave markets.

  VIKA catches BASRA’s eye and nods. BASRA exits.

  My God, the things that came out of my bowels! Fingernails. Bits of cork. An old typewriter key. A small coin no longer in circulation. Now how did that get there? I must have swallowed it when I was a child. It was like I was evacuating a lifetime’s bric-a-brac.

  AUGUSTA: Olympia!

  OLYMPIA: And then it was empty! The end. The last time I ate—or passed—solids. Funny, isn’t it … waste. Yes …

  VIKA: [to AUGUSTA] You’re done.

  AUGUSTA: Splendid. What do you think, Olympia?

  OLYMPIA: Divine. You look like Boadicea.

  AUGUSTA: Now all I need is the suit of armour to match. Into battle!

  OLYMPIA: Into the fray!

  AUGUSTA: This is perfect for tomorrow, Visi, thank you. Can you set it again in the morning?

  VIKA: Should I come with you?

  AUGUSTA: Where, dear?

  VIKA: To your speech? To finish you off?

  AUGUSTA: I don’t think that will be necessary, dear.

  The intercom buzzer sounds. Everyone jumps.

  OLYMPIA: That’s him! He’s here!

  AUGUSTA: Calm down, Olympia. Screeching like a macaw. Visi, quick. Go and make sure all of Olympia’s belongings have been shifted to my room.

  AUGUSTA exits.

  JEFF: [over the intercom] Hello.

  OLYMPIA: Yoo hoo!

  AUGUSTA: There’ll be no fornicating in the Rift Valley while I’m still sentient.

  BASRA enters.

  You might need to go and help him, Basra. He may have trouble with the stairs.

  OLYMPIA: Come through, the drawbridge is lowered!

  AUGUSTA: I must get those handrails installed in the bathroom.

  And JEFF springs into the room. A Richard Branson type. Or a Paul Theroux in his prime. An overnight bag and briefcase. Altogether younger and more corporate than what we were expecting.

  JEFF: Hello, ladies!

  AUGUSTA: Oh.

  OLYMPIA: Jeff.

  JEFF: Miss Olympia Macquarie.

  A long, uncomfortable kiss.

  OLYMPIA: [flustered] Well, now. The old engine still seems to be running.

  JEFF: [to AUGUSTA] You must be Her Excellency.

  A handshake. AUGUSTA covers her nose and mouth as he approaches, like he reeks to the heavens.

  AUGUSTA: You’re about fifty years younger than we were expecting.

  JEFF: Happy to surprise. [To BASRA] And you … My Lord. Your aunt’s description didn’t do you justice at all.

  BASRA: Likewise.

  A kiss of the hand. VIKA enters.

  JEFF: And, hello. What have we here?

  OLYMPIA: The help.

  JEFF: Well, well, well—aren’t you a marvel? Jeff Cleveland.

  VIKA: Visi.

  JEFF: Visi. Beautiful. Visi and Basra. Olympia and Augusta. Have I just stumbled into the final set of a beauty pageant? Where’ve you got Miss Venezuela hidden?

  AUGUSTA: You need a shower. You smell awful.

  OLYMPIA: Pheromones.

  JEFF: I choose not to bathe in artificial or treated water.

  AUGUSTA: What a surprise. Visi—take his things to the Serengeti. [Privately] Disinfect them.

  VIKA doesn’t seem to know what to do with JEFF’s things.

  VIKA: What do you mean ‘Take them to the Serengeti’?

  JEFF: The Serengeti’s where I just came from.

  AUGUSTA: His room.

  VIKA: I don’t get it.

  JEFF: Either do I.

  AUGUSTA: Take them to his room.

  BASRA: She means the Serengeti Suite.

  VIKA exits, a tad warily.

  AUGUSTA: I don’t think geography is her strong suit. Just as well she can set hair.

  BASRA: Have a seat, Jeff. You must be exhausted.

  JEFF: Oh, I slept on the plane, Miss Macquarie.

  BASRA: Basra.

  JEFF: Basra. Like the city on the Silk Trail?

  BASRA: It’s where I was conceived, I believe.

  JEFF: Then I guess you should call me ‘El Paso’! Ha! I just came from Kilimanjaro. The last snow on the African continent. Gone yesterday afternoon.

  BASRA: I heard about it.

  JEFF: Gone forever.

  OLYMPIA: That would have been good to see. I should have gone too.

  JEFF: You can’t be in all places at once, Miss Olympia. You have to be strategic about the causes you invest in.

  AUGUSTA: Olympia doesn’t invest. She’s just a tourist.

  OLYMPIA: I’m an adventuress.

  AUGUSTA: And what are you, exactly, Mr Cleveland?

  JEFF: I was a nanotechnologist. An inventor.

  AUGUSTA: Oh, yes. What did you invent?

  JEFF: A microchip.

  AUGUSTA: Which one?

  BASRA: Grandma!

  OLYMPIA: Did it have name?

  JEFF: Now I’m a futurist.

  AUGUSTA: And what future do you see yourself sharing with Olympia, precisely?

  BASRA: Jesus, Grandma. Back off!

  J
EFF: It’s okay, Basra. She’s protecting her sister. I wouldn’t have it any other way.

  VIKA re-enters with JEFF’s bag still in her hand.

  VIKA: I’m sorry—I didn’t know where to put them.

  BASRA: Down the hall. First door on the left.

  VIKA exits again.

  AUGUSTA: Really, what is wrong with everyone today?

  JEFF: I know, right? It’s crazy outside. The cars on the freeway. Where’s everyone going?

  BASRA: To the mountains.

  AUGUSTA: Sheep.

  OLYMPIA: Mountain goats.

  JEFF: Cleaner air?

  BASRA: Cooler weather. And fear that what’s happening in Melbourne will happen here.

  AUGUSTA: Ridiculous. They’re built in a basin. There’s no comparison.

  JEFF: Pilgrims.

  BASRA: Migrants.

  AUGUSTA: Bolters.

  JEFF: Where are they going to stay?

  BASRA: Well, that’s exactly what I was hoping to ask you, actually.

  JEFF: What are they going to feed on?

  BASRA: No-one’s thinking that far in advance.

  JEFF: Nobody has a plan. That’s half the world’s problem. Nobody. Has. A Plan.

  He leaps onto the couch. VIKA re-enters.

  Nobody has a fucking plan!

  AUGUSTA: Can you take your feet off the—

  JEFF: We need a plan, ladies!

  Who wants to hear about the plan?

  Who wants to hear about the plan from the man?

  AUGUSTA: Visi—fetch me a Panadol.

  JEFF: Now, here’s what we’re gonna do.

  TRANSITION SEQUENCE:

  MASKED FIGURE: Tick, tick, tick, tick.

  Twelve hours to go, people.

  Your governor-general’s just resigned!

  The wheels of government are falling off!

  And now guess what—everyone’s seeing elephants. Blue elephants—teal-coloured elephants—turquoise elephants. Massive hallucinations, a collective psychic response to tragedy.

  Everyone’s going cray-cray.

  The system is falling apart and those in power stand by doing nothing.

  We warned you what would happen if you didn’t listen.

  This is your last chance, before a work of art so indelible, you’ll never forget it.

  Stop the talks. Abandon the treaty.

  Or boom!

  SCENE FOUR

  The living room. BASRA and JEFF, with VISI cleaning in the background, listening.

  JEFF: You write so beautifully, Basra.

  BASRA: Thank you.

  JEFF: I’ve been following your blog.