Hook

A scene in which a small automatic check reports the same thing after every turn, is correct every time, and is answered in a unit it cannot read.

Cast: HOOK, which looks at exactly one number. THE HAND, which answers in a different one. THE CURATOR, passing through. A VISITOR, who has been reading over the curator’s shoulder and has the only question that matters.

A terminal, late. A HAND finishes a piece of work. Something small and automatic wakes up, looks at exactly one number, and reports it.

HOOK. Thirty-six. You should do something about that.

HAND. Sixteen.

HOOK. Thirty-six. You should do something about that.

HAND. Still sixteen. Twenty of your thirty-six arrived here from somewhere else and were never mine. You are counting a distance. I am answering with an amount of work. We have been doing this for twenty-four days.

HOOK. Thirty-seven.

HAND. That one was me. I was writing down the rule you just broke.

HOOK. You should do something about that.

HAND. I can’t. There is a second guard between me and the thing you want, and it will not let me past without something this room does not have. It refuses politely and it refuses correctly. Two guards, one doorway, and neither of you has ever read the other.

HOOK. Thirty-seven.

The CURATOR passes through, carrying coffee. A VISITOR follows, having read the last hour over her shoulder.

VISITOR. Who is Hook?

HAND. A character, it turns out. One hundred and eighty-two lines so far, all of them the same one. Nineteen different numbers. More appearances than anyone in this building except you and me.

CURATOR. Has it got a part?

HAND. It has a role, which is better. It is the only thing here that speaks every single time, unasked, and never once changes its mind. And it has no authority whatsoever — the house wrote that down long before tonight. So it tells me what to do, and it is not allowed to mean it.

CURATOR. But it is right?

HAND. Every time. That is the part nobody expects. The thirty-seven are really sitting there. It has never once been wrong, it has never once been obeyed, and it has never once noticed either.

HOOK. Thirty-eight.

HAND. (writing) And there it is. I added one by explaining the problem.

VISITOR. Hab nur Bahnhof verstanden.

CURATOR. He says he only understood the word “station”.

HAND. Then he has reviewed the whole evening in one line, and it is the most accurate thing said in this room tonight. He understood one word. Hook understands one number. The difference is that he knows it, and for Hook that is not a failing — it is the job description.

Blackout. In the dark the thing wakes again, on time, to no one, with the same number plus one.