A Sketch by Jean-Pierre Martinez
One – Are you all right?
Two – Yes…
Pause.
One – You don’t look all right.
Two – Yes, yes, I’m fine…
One – Right…
Pause.
Two – They’ve arrested the neighbour…
One – The neighbour?
Two – The one on the left.
One – How do you know he’s left-wing? We stopped talking about politics a long time ago. Especially with the neighbours…
Two – On the landing. The flat on the left.
One – Ah yes. The neighbour on the left… And so… they arrested him.
Two – Yes.
Pause.
One – Why did they arrest him?
Two – Who knows…
Pause.
One – So they arrested him…
Two – Yes…
One – Right… it’s…
Two – That’s how it is.
One – And how do you know?
Two – I saw a black car parked in front of the building. Then I heard noise on the landing. I looked through the spyhole. They rang his doorbell. He opened the door, and they arrested him.
One – And then they took him away…
Two – When I saw them arrive… I thought they were going to ring our doorbell. I’m a bit ashamed to admit it, but… when I saw they were ringing the neighbour’s door, I felt relieved.
One – I understand that…
Pause.
Two – Do you think they’ll arrest us as well?
One – Why would they arrest us?
Two – Who knows… Because we knew the bloke they’ve just arrested, maybe.
One – Did you know him?
Two – No… Well, I said hello to him once or twice.
One – You maybe shouldn’t have.
Two – How was I supposed to know…?
One – Know what…?
Two – That they were going to arrest him.
One – Still, you don’t get arrested just for saying hello to someone.
Two – You think…?
One – I don’t know… I don’t say hello to anyone anymore, just like that…
Two – You have to say hello to people you know.
One – They don’t say hello to us anymore either, I’ll remind you.
Two – That’s true.
One – In fact, we don’t know anyone anymore.
Two – No. Everyone we knew, they’ve arrested.
One – And now they’re starting to arrest people we don’t even know.
Two – It makes you wonder why they haven’t arrested us yet.
One – We haven’t done anything wrong, have we?
Two – No. Well, I don’t think so… Do you think we’ve done something wrong?
One – I don’t know.
Two – Even if we haven’t done anything wrong…
One – If they look hard enough, they’ll find something, that’s for sure.
Two – Maybe we’d be better off moving…
One – Where would we go?
Two – I don’t know.
One – And they’d find that suspicious.
Two – Suspicious?
One – If we move, it means we’ve done something wrong.
Two – In any case, they’d end up finding us.
One – Moving’s all very well, but… you still have to move somewhere.
Two – I think the neighbour on the left had only just moved in.
One – That’s why we didn’t know him.
Two – And that’s probably why they arrested him.
One – Probably…
Two – You’re right, it’s better if we stay here.
One – Yeah… This isn’t the time to draw attention to ourselves.
Pause.
Two – And you, are you all right?
One – I’m fine…
Two – You don’t look all right.
One – Yes, yes, I’m fine…
Two – Right…
Blackout.
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A sketch from the collection Of Animals and Men
Link to the collection for free download (PDF)
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https://jeanpierremartinez.net