Scampi: Can’t
Peter: Immanuel?
Scampi: Jesus.
PAUSE.
Scampi: You look like you got some sun.
Peter: Perhaps.
Scampi: Sometimes I think your hands are made of wax.
Peter: They are not.
Scampi: Candle wax.
Peter: Incorrect.
Scampi: I’m just saying. That’s all.
Peter: Well.
Scampi: What do you think about that?
Peter: About you saying things that are untrue?
Scampi: Forget it.
Peter: I shall do my best.
Scampi: Do you hear a crackling?
Peter: In your voice?
Scampi: No. In the air.
Peter: No.
Scampi: It’s electric. The air.
Peter: Your voice is cracking a little.
Scampi: It isn’t.
Peter: Okay.
Scampi: It is not.
Peter: Fine.
Scampi: I like pinecones.
Peter: Oh?
Scampi: I do. Nice shape they have.
Peter: It is an ingenious design.
Scampi: [with great disdain] Design!
Peter: Roomy, yet delicate.
Scampi: Just like you!
Peter: I am not roomy.
Scampi: [CACKLES]
Peter: Well.
Scampi: Horses are good, too. All that kind of stuff.
Peter: What kind of stuff?
Scampi: You know, horses. And stuff.
Peter: Horses? And?
Scampi: Stuff.
Peter: Stuff.
Scampi: You know what I mean.
Peter: This is rarely an accurate statement.
Scampi: [GUFFAWS.]
Peter: I fail to see the humour.
Scampi: This is generally an accurate statement.
Peter: Are you quite finished?
Scampi: With what?
Peter: This tomfoolery.
Scampi: Tomfoolery! Oho, Peter!
Peter: No comment.
Scampi: Har har.
PAUSE.
Scampi: You and your waxy fingertips.
Peter: They are not waxen. This has been established.
Scampi: Waxy.
Peter: SIGHS.
Scampi: Do you know what a dagesh is?
Peter: Perhaps.
Scampi: I bet you don’t.
Peter: That’s rude.
Scampi: It’s a dot.
Peter: Ah.
Scampi: In Hebrew consonants. It strengthens them.
Peter: I see. Perhaps I did know that.
Scampi: Yeah right. Anyway, can you imagine? Strengthening a consonant.
Peter: I don’t see why not.
Scampi: Humph. Imagine yourself.
Peter: I don’t generally have to.
Scampi: Being strengthened by a dot, I mean.
Peter: I am not a consonant.
Scampi: Don’t be too sure.
Peter: I am fairly sure.
Scampi: Well, it’s nothing to be smug about, anyway.
Peter: I don’t think—
Scampi: You probably think you’re some kind of a vowel! Ha ha.
Peter: Incorrect.
Scampi: And sometimes y!
Peter: I am not a member of the alphabet.
Scampi: A member! You’re killing me.
Peter: That is not the intent.
Scampi: Ah, the comprehensive Aristotelian tragedy. Intent has nothing to do with it, I’m afraid.
Peter: That is cause to be fearful.
Scampi: It is.
THE SILENCE OF BLACKBIRDS.
Scampi: Would you like to know something else about the language of our fathers?
Peter: What are you talking about?
Scampi: The shva. You know what that is?
Peter: I do not.
Scampi: I know. You know what it does?
Peter: No.
Scampi: Ha. It represents four things, four different things. Grammatical entities. Get this.
Peter: One hopes I shall, eventually.
Scampi: Resting, moving, and floating are the first three. You know what the last one is?
Peter: Hang-gliding?
Scampi: No. Bleating. (Or bellowing.) Can you imagine?
Peter: Being so often in your company leaves little about bleating and bellowing to the imagination.
Scampi: Humph. I bet you’d be strengthened by a pinprick to the middle.
Peter: As I have recently stated, I am not a consonant.
Scampi: True. You might deflate.
Peter: SIGHS.
Scampi: It would probably sound like that, too. Or not.
PENSIVE MOMENT.
Peter: Are you suffering from a broken heart, perchance?
Scampi: I liked it better when we were talking about horses.
