Queen of Swords – the Tarot play by Alysse Aallyn

SCENE 4

(Lights up on Strip club., “Guilty Pleasures”. Pole, stage, café table with chairs on top. MR BUTTERBATCH wearing apron is sweeping floor. Enter WHITNEY with wheeled suitcase)

WHITNEY
Didn’t this club used to be The Gentleman’s Secret?

BUTTERBATCH
Long, long ago. Are you the new dancer?

WHITNEY
Not hardly.

BUTTERBATCH
Well, that’s lucky.

(Shakes his head.)

WHITNEY
I’m looking for the owner.

BUTTERBATCH
Oh, the owners never come in. Day manager arrives after eleven.

WHITNEY
Maybe you can help me. Were you here sixteen years ago?

BUTTERBATCH
Lady, I’ve been here since the beginning of time. Butterbatch is the name. Butter by name and bachelor by nature.

WHITNEY
You’re just who I’m looking for…if your memory is any good.

(Takes down a chair and sits exhaustedly)

BUTTERBATCH
My memory is fantastic. It’s pretty much all I’ve got these days. What is it that you want to know exactly? Are you implying I’m too old to know anything because I said you were too fat to be a dancer?

WHITNEY
Did you say that?

BUTTERBATCH
No. I’m polite. So maybe you shouldn’t go casting aspersions.

WHITNEY
Honestly I wasn’t casting aspersions. I’m too tired to cast aspersions. I’ve been up all night, flying standby.

BUTTERBATCH
(Vigorously sweeping)

Traveling steerage, were you? Well, that was dumb. That one’s on you.

WHITNEY
Let’s start over. I’m investigating a murder.

BUTTERBATCH
We’ve got two. Bar fight 96 or stage manager 99?

WHITNEY
(Eyes popping)

Stage manager 1999! Wow! You get right to it.

BUTTERBATCH
See? You’ve come to the right place. I know everything. We oldsters are the guardians of the past. Not that anyone cares these days. Crime shows don’t like unsolved crimes. Can’t get the media interested. What’s the “spin” is all they want to know. I can answer any question you’ve got but first, I’ve got a little question of my own.

(Getting comfortable leaning on his broom)

What’s it to you?

WHITNEY
I don’t understand.

BUTTERBATCH
Of course you don’t understand, that’s what I’m here for. I’m gonna explicate. But first you’ve got to riddle me this; Why ya wanna know?

WHITNEY
Oh. Well, I think I know who might have killed that guy.

BUTTERBATCH
Really? Cold case like that? Why ain’t you talkin’ to the police?

WHITNEY
Because I need to talk to you first.

(Shows her phone)

Recognize this woman?

BUTTERBATCH
I’m not sure. She wasn’t a waitress, I can tell you that, and she wasn’t a patron any night I was here. But those dancers – they change. Wigs, makeup. Costumes. They transform themselves. Professional chameleons.

WHITNEY
Her name was Pearleen Purdy.

BUTTERBATCH
Oh, Pearleen! Of course I remember her. Destiny! She barely used the pole! She worked the edge of the stage. Everyone remembers her. I’ve got guys that still ask about her. Poor Lester Westerhaven ain’t never got over her.

WHITNEY
Destiny?

BUTTERBATCH
That was her stage name. On account of the palm reading. Yup, she had quite a following. Now I always thought she was kind of scary.

WHITNEY
You did? Why?

BUTTERBATCH
She had these terrible eyes. She looked at people like she was trying to figure out how much space they took up and whether she could relieve them of it. Gave me the heebie-jeebies. You think Pearleen killed Burt?

WHITNEY
Tell me more about these “heebie-jeebies”.

BUTTERBATCH
You know how when women, like, go for things they want, they go all roundabout? Making nice? Playing coy? She wasn’t like that at all! She told you what she wanted right up front! The audience never saw that part. But when she was looking at everybody, it was like she was looking at nobody. I always felt like this was her world and the rest of us were just passing through.

WHITNEY
So what did she want?

BUTTERBATCH
Well, not me, I can tell you that much. And not Burt either, though he was pretty handsy. Casper the Grasper the girls called him. She was dating a couple of customers, I seem to remember. Rich guys. Married guys. She blew through Lester’s little stash like he was standing still.

WHITNEY
(Reads her phone)

Says here Burt was found dead at nine AM June 16.

BUTTERBATCH
By yours truly! You never saw such blood! Handcuffed to his chair; throat slit with a frog-gigger. Nasty little knife. Right here in the office. Blood everywhere!

(Shivers)

WHITNEY
A frog-gigger?

BUTTERBATCH
I’m still not over it. But you know I just don’t see how a little thing like Pearleen could manhandle a fellow that size! Burt was 250 pounds of hard blubber! Even handcuffed to a chair…

WHITNEY
How about surprise? I mean, what if she just came up behind him? Say he was blindfolded.

BUTTERBATCH
That would work. Now you’re talking. And he could have been high. He liked to be high when he thought he was gonna get some.

WHITNEY
So what happened to Pearleen? Where was she at the time of the murder? Or after it?

BUTTERBATCH
Who knows! You kidding me? Them dancers scattered like cockroaches in the sunlight! Half of ‘em were undocumented and the rest were violating parole. Everybody’s wanted for something or other.

WHITNEY
But who had a motive?

BUTTERBATCH
Everyone had a motive with Burt! Yours truly excepted, natch. Burt was the drug connection. The police pounced right on the drug angle because his stash was missing. Nobody wanted to be connected to that. Nobody even went to the poor guy’s funeral. It was just me and the owners. This place closed down entirely for a couple of weeks. We had to reopen under a new name, new dancers, everything.

WHITNEY
Anything else you can tell me about Pearleen?

BUTTERBATCH
Oh, she was a fortuneteller. She’d look deep in your eyes – right through to the back of your head – pretending to read your palm. Oh, my God! Gives me the shiverbumps now.

WHITNEY
She never told your fortune?

BUTTERBATCH
(Shudders)
Heck no. I stay away from that stuff. Feels like they’re trying to put a mark on you. Somebody gives you a fortune, it might come true. I like to keep the future unexpected. Keeps life interesting. I wasn’t expecting you, see? Keeps me alert. And I’m still here, aren’t I?

WHITNEY
This is just what I needed. Thanks for all your help.

BUTTERBATCH
(Calling after her)

Off to the police? Planning to star on one of them crime shows?

WHITNEY
Why not?

BUTTERBATCH
Don’t waste your breath. They “lost” all the evidence. It’s just another grassy knoll!

(Punctuates with finger commas.)

Lost the evidence! That’s what I’m telling you. Thing they said was, “We don’t have the room to store all that stuff.”

WHITNEY
Who said that?

BUTTERBATCH
Cold case guy. I called him up because Burt’s dealer turned up dead in a mobile home out on Rt. 80. You’re not the only one wants to star in a crime show. I said should they take DNA for Burt’s case and they told me –

WHITNEY
Evidence destroyed. Just my luck.

(Wheels suitcase away, staggering.)

BUTTERBATCH
Don’t take it so hard. What comes around goes around. I always say.

WHITNEY
And that helps how?

BUTTERBATCH
Nobody gets away with nothing, not in my experience. Say, you’re sure you don’t want to audition? Talking to you now, I see a glimmer of light beneath that bushel of yours. Could be hidden talent. Let ‘er out and let ‘er rip. Tips here are very good.

WHITNEY
Thanks but no thanks.

(Dragging away depressed. Lights out. )