Carmen Read Online Free PDF Page B

greedy)
    Twenty thousand dollars. Small bills. I’ll forget this incident but not this fool! No way I forget him.
    DANCAIRO and RAIMONDO escort ZUNIGA out.
    JOSÉ
    (standing)
    What have I done? My career is finished.
    CARMEN
    You shoot a man because he disses you? How stupid is that? I look at you and I don’t know who you are! When I saw your picture in the paper, I thought I recognized someone from when I was a girl. But now I don’t recognize you at all!
    JOSÉ
    Oh, God! Look, Carmen, I love you, but right now I have to think. I just know my career is wrecked.
    CARMEN
    What did the boy do? Did he look at you wrong, too?
    JOSÉ
    What boy? Look, I don’t have time to talk now. I have to go and pack some things.
    (He looks around.)
    I guess I’m one of you now. Carmen, wait here for me!
    JOSÉ leaves, stopping for a moment to look at RAIMONDO as he returns.
    RAIMONDO
    We’re screwed if Zuniga changes his mind. He can arrest everybody here and make it stick if he wants to. Now we have to pull this job off. We better make it pay big-time or we’re all in trouble. How about you, Carmen? You down with us now?
    CARMEN
    Yeah, I’m down, Raimondo. I got nothing to lose.
    RAIMONDO
    Good. I need to hit the streets and get our lookouts on the corners in case Zuniga changes his mind and wants to hit us. You okay, Carmencita?
    CARMEN
    I’m okay, Raimondo.
    RAIMONDO
    Everybody out. I need you all on the corners looking out for the heat. Everybody out!
    They all leave except for CARMEN, who stands alone, forlorn.
    CARMEN sits and, for a long beat, thinks about what has happened. We hear the sound of a harp introducing her song.
    CARMEN
    (sings “Love Has Flown Away”)
    Love came easy, but it just wasn’t for me.
    It flew away like swallows on a summer evening.
    Love sang softly, but it just wasn’t to me.
    Was I a fool to give my love, to give my soul, and more away?
    My heart aches with longing, cries each night,
    As I just fall apart.
    (clearly distressed)
    What have I done? What have I done?
    Am I so hungry for love that I can’t see
    It’s not going to ever happen for me?
    I saw the darkness in his eyes
    And knew there was even more darkness behind those lovely eyes
    And yet…
    And yet I kept stumbling blindly
    Like some silly schoolgirl from another place, another time.
    I’ve got to be the old Carmen again.
    Too hard to hurt, too hard to fall in love.
    The music continues softly as CARMEN puts her head down on the table.

Act Two

Scene 1
    We are in the back room of Lillas Pastia’s club, which is the home base of DANCAIRO’s crew. There is a bar at the back of the stage, and the back wall is covered with colored curtains depicting scenes from a tropical location.
    At one table we see CARMEN, FRASQUITA, and MERCEDES. At the end of the bar, JOSÉ is drinking by himself, head down. The atmosphere is fairly busy, and the music from the sound system is upbeat.
    MERCEDES
    This boy wants me sooo much, you wouldn’t believe it. If I walk into a room where he is, his heart starts beating faster. You can tell from across the room—you can almost hear it! That’s how much he loves me.
    FRASQUITA
    Is he cute?
    MERCEDES
    He drives a BMW.
    FRASQUITA
    That’s pretty cute. What was he arrested for?
    MERCEDES
    How do you know he was arrested? You don’t know that.
    FRASQUITA
    He’s young, he lives around here, he’s been arrested. What for?
    MERCEDES
    On a technicality. They caught him with some television sets, which he was going to sell but they got to him before he could get the sets out. Then—and you’re not going to believe this—they charged him with possession of stolen goods, and the only reason he had them in his possession was because they arrested him before he could sell them!
    FRASQUITA
    That’s got to be some kind of violation. That’s what they do to us and then they say we don’t have family values. How are we going to have family values when you can’t afford a place to put your family?
    CARMEN
    I