Structure:
The three sisters begin with a short scene together, where
one says she has seen a fox. This short scene ends with the three sisters each
leaving with a handful of audience members.
The following scene is the same for each sister. As she tells the story, she ritually washes the audience. She
wipes their sweat and washes their hands/arms.
After that scene, the three sisters come back together.
1 Three together
2 Three apart
3 Three together
1.
Sister 1: What hast thou seen, sister?
Sister 2: I
saw a fox.
Sister 1: Where
didst thou see it, sister?
Sister 2: Along
the corridor.
Sister 3: You
didn’t see a thing.
Sister 2: I
saw a fox. A fox, a fox.
Sister 3: There
was no fox.
Sister 2 becomes sad at the thought. Sister
1 comforts 2.
Sister 2: My
speech is weak. It’s falling down.
Sister 3 removes 1 from 2.
Sister 3: Prop
yourself up.
Sister 2 pulls herself together.
There’s
more to come.
There’s
a ritual now that needs to be done.
Sisters separate and take one third of the
audience each with them.
2.
Please…Sit…
Take your time.
Sister sighs and visibly relaxes. She becomes more
‘natural’.
Are you tired?
Sister encourages the audience members to (briefly) speak to her on the subject of sleep. Her
response to their speech is friendly yet cold.
The sister can admit that she is tired.
“Your eyes look heavy.”
“It’s the worst thing to be told you look tired, isn’t it?”
The sister fills a bowl with water from a bottle and dampens a towel.
This will be used to ritualistically clean the audience members, ie, dampen
their brow, clear their hands, wash their arms.
If an audience member asks the sister where she has been, then she
continues with the following speech. Otherwise, she should manoeuvre the
conversation to lead into the following speech.
I wandered through a forest, the trees dark…the soil wet…A
fox, a fox. It ran between the trees…
Sister moves to select a bottle of white
wine and brings it to the centre.
I wandered without my sisters. I pushed the branches away. My
wrists were black and blue. I wandered home and where the trees all grouped
together I waited and called but there was no sight, there was no sound.
Was I asleep? When the trees grew sparse…When I wandered
towards the city lights? Was I sleeping when I walked by the road?
____
Do you know the place? Where the forest meets the city?
The trees stop when you lean against the barriers.
____
Only one car stopped as I stood beneath the streetlight. The window was spotless.
I tapped at the glass.
Sister drinks. She dampens the towel.
I sat in the leather seat. The air conditioning was cold.
The Sister uses the wet towel to wash the
brow of an audience member.
“Breathe. Calm down,” he said. “You’re breathing so quickly.
Calm down.”
I could see the trees in the headlights. Lit up. The
branches yellow. The bark brown.
“I can take you to the police,” he said. His voice was so
calm. “I can take you there now.”
But I didn’t want to go to the police. He took me to a
hospital. I didn’t go inside…I stood by the door and after he drove off I
wandered out.
There was no-one else there.
____
Are you comfortable?
The Sister uses the wet towel to wash the hands of an audience member.
____
Was I sleeping in the forest still? The ground was wet beneath
my head…A fox, a fox…That wandered against me lying there…I walked along the
streets.
I called for my sisters
but no-one answered…I wandered past the shops. The lights were all turned off.
I looked into the windows and I could see the clothing…The skirts and the
dresses …Arms spread…black bird…There was a bird flying between the branches.
The Sister uses the wet towel to wash the
arms of an audience member.
“Give me your arm,”
he said. “Rest it here on the leaves.”
I walked past the buildings. I looked at how high they were…I
walked on my own, beside the river. I headed east. Something drew me back, I
didn’t know where else to go...
The tower was the only place I knew.
____
Did you feel the same way? Did you feel like this was the
only place you could’ve gone?
Sister drinks from the bottle of wine.
You must be so tired. You’ve been awake for so long.
____
I leant my back against the wall and rested for a moment. I
caught my breath…A fox, a fox. I saw a fox beside the gates.
Was I sleeping still?
Was my head on the ground? Were my sister’s beside me?
I thought…I thought it was raining…the rain fell on my
head…wet head…the little drops…he’d kept me dry…at least there was that…dry and
clean… I thought it was raining…the rain was coming and there was only the gate
to the tower…only the gate to go through.
I pushed the button to his floor and the lift took me
up. I went to his floor. I opened the
door to this flat and he was waiting.
“Give me your arm,” he said. “Rest it on me.”
____
The Sister uses the wet towel to soak the hand of an audience member.
“There’s Witchcraft
in the way you kiss me,” he said.
____
I looked at the window, at the lights spread out...the
buildings all lit…TVs on…the walls all blue…the people sat together…and there I
watched as he called his friends…I watched their faces reflected as they walked
through the door.
“My little fox, you’re breathing so fast. Rest your head on
the leaves.”
They came and stood around me….their boots…their heels...the
trunks of the trees.
“My little fox, you’ve come to wash us clean.”
So I washed their hands and I washed their feet. I washed
the dirt from their fingers and I cleaned the sweat from their necks. I peeled
the dirt from the bark but…but the trees came down …I called for my sisters but
there was no sight, there was no sound. The branches fell…they scratched at my
skin.
“Rest your head on the leaves. Let them cover you.”
And they covered me. They covered me.
The sister drinks from the bottle again. The
sister slams the bottle down (smashes it?)
This point should mark a change
in the sister. She becomes intimidating in the way she speaks.
But I pushed them away…I pushed at the fingers, the thorns…“Breathe
and be still.” I would not be still. “Breathe. Calm down. You’re breathing so
quickly. Calm down.” I would not calm. I stood up straight. I tore at the bark.
“Your nails are sharp. There’s fire in your eyes.” And I tugged at the
branches…I kicked at the brambles…I pulled at the roots ‘til they popped from
their sockets.
____
All the toil that was piled on me. All the trouble I’d cause
in return.
They called me a witch… They don’t like the look of me now… They
choose that way to see me when I made this tower my home.
The eye of newt… tongue of dog… poison’d entrails… Swelter'd
venom sleeping got…
(Mournful) I just wanted to be with my sisters…I only want to be
with them.
____
Sister pours gas into the bowl of water and lights it. She drips the
audience’s sweat (from the towel) on the flames.
In my arms I collected the twigs and in a bonfire I burnt
them. I emptied a can of petrol …I lit a match…The smoke went high into the
air.
Was I sleeping still?
Was I sleeping when I saw a fox beside the flames…a fox who
leapt and danced…who kicked its back and raised its jaw…
Was I sleeping?
Knocking.
3.
The knocking keeps on ticking.
There is a change in mood. The ritual is over. The sister puts out the
fire by draping the wet towel over the flames.
The sister walks back to the concourse where she is joined by the other
sisters, each returning from their same scene.
Sister 2: A fox, a fox. I saw a fox.
Sister 3: There
was no fox.
Sister 2: I
saw it in my room.
Sister 1: The
foxes are all gone. They’ve long gone from here.
Sister 2: I
saw it as I slept.
Sister 3: Macbeth
hath murdered sleep.
Sister 2: Macbeth, Macbeth. Those knock
keeps on coming.
Sister 3: The
knocking won’t stop.
Sister 2: I
called for you my sister…
Sister 1: I
called for you my sister…
Sister 3: I
called for you my sister…
Sister 2: But
you wouldn’t come.
Lead into the next scene.
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