owned this note
owned this note
Published
Linked with GitHub
---
type: slide
title: FEN
slideOptions:
controls: false
help: false
slideNumber: false
---
<!-- BEGIN SETTINGS -->
<style>
.present {
color: yellow;
text-align: center;
padding: 0 2rem;
font-size: 70px;
}
.present h2 {
font-size: 100%;
text-transform: uppercase;
color: yellow;
opacity: 0.7;
}
</style>
<!-- END SETTINGS -->
---
Before the show begins, please turn *off* your cell phone and all other electronic devices.
---
# FEN
By Caryl Churchill
---
---
[crows cawing]
[distant voices]
[the sound of wings]
---
[wind]
---
[tense music]
---
[music ends]
<!-- SCENE ONE -->
---
## BUSINESSMAN:
The Tokyo Company welcomes you to the fen.
---
Most expensive earth in England.
---
Two thousand pounds an acre.
---
A long time ago this land was under water - fishes and eels swam here.
---
It’s not true people had webbed feet but they did walk on stilts. Wild people. Fen tigers.
---
In 1630 rich lords planned to drain the fen, change it from swamp into grazing land.
---
These were far thinking men - brave investors.
---
The fen people wanted to keep the fishes and eels to live on --
---
-- they had no vision.
---
They refused to work on the drainage, smashed the dykes and broke the sluices.
---
Lots of problems. But in the end we have this beautiful earth.
---
It’s very efficient. Flat land.
---
You can plough right up to the edge so there’s no waste.
---
This farm, one of our twenty-five farms, is a very good investment.
---
It belongs to Baxter Nolesford Ltd, which belongs to Reindorp Smith Farm Land trust, of which 65% belongs to our company.
---
We now count ourselves among many illustrious landowners,
---
Esso, Gallagher, Imperial Tobacco, Equitable Life.
---
We all love this excellent earth.
---
The English countryside is beautiful, isn’t it?
---
Now let’s find a teashop, a warm fire, and an old countryman to tell us tales.
---
<!-- SCENE TWO -->
[low music]
[wind]
---
## SHIRLEY:
[sings] Pugh, Pugh, Barney McGrew, Cuthbert, Dibble, Grub.
---
[sings] Da da diddidi da Diddidi diddidi diddidi da Da da diddidi da Diddidi diddidi da, pom.
---
## NELL:
You all right, girl?
---
## MRS HASSETT:
What’s the matter, Val? Took short?
---
## VAL:
I've got to leave now.
---
## MRS HASSETT:
What do you mean, got to leave? It ent three o'clock.
---
## VAL:
I know, but I'm going.
---
## MRS HASSETT:
Who's going to do your work then? Mr. Coleman wants this done today.
---
How does it make me look?
---
## VAL:
Sorry, I can't help it.
---
## MRS HASSETT:
You think twice before you ask me for work again because I'll think twice an' all.
---
So where you off to so fast?
---
## VAL:
Just back home.
---
## MRS HASSETT:
What's waiting there then?
---
## VAL:
I've got to. I've gone. Never mind.
---
## MRS HASSETT:
Wait then, I'll give you a lift halfway.
---
I've another lot at Mason's I've got to look in on.
---
## VAL:
I've got to go now.
---
## MRS. HASSETT:
You'll be quicker waiting.
---
I don't owe you nothing for today.
---
## VAL:
You do.
---
## MRS HASSETT:
Not with you messing me about like this, not if you want another chance.
---
## VAL:
I'll start walking and you pick me up.
---
## MRS HASSETT:
What's your name? Wilson? The idea's to get the work done properly not win the Derby.
---
Want to come again?
---
## WILSON:
Yes, Mrs. Hassett.
---
## MRS HASSETT:
Because if you work regular with me it's done proper with stamps.
---
I don't want you signing on at the same time because that makes trouble for me, never mind you.
---
And if I catch you with them moonlighting gangs out of town you don't work for me again.
---
Work for peanuts them buggers, spoil it for the rest of you, so keep well clear.
---
## NELL:
Spoil it for you, Mrs. Hassett.
---
## MRS HASSETT:
Spoil it for all of us, Nell.
---
## ANGELA:
What's up with Val?
---
## NELL:
You've got two colour tellies to spoil.
---
## MRS HASSETT:
Think you'd get a better deal by yourself? Think you’d get a job at all?
---
## ANGELA:
Where's she gone? Ent she well?
---
## MRS HASSETT:
She don't say she's ill. She don't say what.
---
## NELL:
You paying her what she's done?
---
## MRS HASSETT:
Will you mind your own business or she won't be the only one don't get picked up tomorrow morning.
---
## NELL:
It is my business. You'd treat me the same.
---
## ANGELA:
Nell, do give over.
---
## SHIRLEY:
Come on, Nell, let's get on with it.
---
## NELL:
She treat you the same.
---
## WILSON:
If I do hers, do I get her money?
---
## MRS HASSETT:
You'll have enough to do to finish your own.
---
## WILSON:
Can I try?
---
## MRS HASSETT:
If you do it careful.
---
## NELL:
Am I crazy? Am I crazy? Am I crazy?
---
## MRS HASSETT:
I'm off now, ladies and gent. Can't stand about in this wind.
---
I should get a move on, you've plenty to do.
---
## ANGELA:
Nell, you're just embarrassing.
---
<!-- SCENE THREE -->
---
["Heat of the Moment" by Asia plays]
---
[music quiets]
---
## FRANK:
Mr. Tewson, Can I have a word with you?
---
Yes, Frank, what can I do for you lad?
---
I'm finding things a bit difficult.
---
So am I, Frank. Hard times.
---
Fellow come round from the union last week.
---
Little fellow with a squint?
---
I don't hold with strikes myself.
---
I'm not against the union, Frank. I can see the sense of it for your big newfangle farms. Not when people are friends.
---
Fact is, Mr. Tewson, living separate from the wife and kids I can't seem to manage.
---
It's lucky I'm able to let them stay on in the cottage. The council housing's not up to much eh?
---
I'm very grateful. But Mr. Tewson I can't live on the money.
---
You'd get half as much again in a factory, Frank. I wouldn't blame you.
---
But l remember when your dad worked for my dad and you and your brother played about the yard.
---
Your poor old brother, eh Frank? lt was great we got him into that home when your mum died.
---
We're like family. We'd both put up with a lot to go on living this good old life here.
---
I hate you, you old bugger.
---
["Heat of the Moment" resumes]
---
[music quiets]
## FRANK:
What happened?
---
## VAL:
Suddenly came to me.
---
## FRANK:
What's wrong?
---
## VAL:
I'm leaving him.
---
I'm going to London on the train, I'm taking the girls, I've left him a note and that's it.
---
You follow us soon as you can. It's the only thing. New life.
---
## FRANK:
Where are you going to live?
---
## VAL:
We'll find somewhere together.
---
## FRANK:
How much money you got?
---
## VAL:
Fifty-six pounds. I’ll get a job. I just want to be with you.
---
## FRANK:
I want to be with you, Val.
---
## VAL:
All right then.
---
## FRANK:
What am I supposed to do in London?
---
## VAL:
Where do you want to go? You say. I don’t mind.
---
You don’t like it here. You’re always grumbling about Mr. Tewson.
---
## FRANK:
He’s not a bad old boy.
---
## VAL:
He don’t pay what he should.
---
## FRANK:
He was good to my brother.
---
## VAL:
I’m in a panic.
---
## FRANK:
Shall I see you tonight?
---
## VAL:
In London?
---
## FRANK:
Here.
---
## VAL:
How can I get out? I’m going crazy all this dodging about.
---
## FRANK:
Come and live with me. If you’re ready to leave.
---
## VAL:
With the girls?
---
## FRANK:
With or without.
---
## VAL:
He’ll never let me. He’ll have them off me.
---
## FRANK:
Please do.
---
---
## VAL:
I suppose I go home now. Unpack.
---
---
[crows cawing]
[church bells]
<!-- SCENE FOUR -->
---
## VAL:
You're to be a good girl Deb, and look after Shona.
---
Mummy will come and see you all the time. You can come and see Mummy and Frank.
---
Mummy loves you very much. Daddy loves you very much.
---
I'll only be down the road.
---
## DEB:
I want to go on the train.
---
## VAL:
We will go on the train sometime. We can't go now.
---
Mummy's got to go and live with Frank because I love him.
---
You be a good girl and look after Shona.
---
Daddy's going to look after you. And Nan's going to look after you.
---
Daddy loves you very much. I'll come and see you all the time.
---
## DEB:
I want new colours.
---
## VAL:
You've still got your old ones, haven't you.
---
Lucky we didn't go away, you've still got all your things.
---
## DEB:
I want new colours.
---
## VAL:
I'll get you some new colours.
---
Mummy's sorry. Love you very much. Look after Shona.
---
<!-- SCENE FIVE -->
---
["True" by Spandau Ballet plays]
---
[music distorts]
<!-- SCENE SIX -->
---
[whistling kettle]
---
---
## ANGELA:
You shouldn't let me treat you like this.
---
## BECKY:
Can I sit down now, Angela?
---
## ANGELA:
No, because you asked.
---
Drink it standing up. And you didn't call me mum.
---
## BECKY:
You're not, that's why.
---
## ANGELA:
Wouldn't want to be the mother of a filthy little cow like you.
---
Pity you didn't die with her. Your dad wishes you'd died with her.
---
Now drink it quick.
---
Now look. Don't you dare pick it up. That's your trick is it, so I'll let you move?
---
I'll have to punish you for breaking a cup. Why do you push me.
---
## BECKY:
Too hot.
---
## ANGELA:
It's meant to be hot. What you made of, girl? Ice cream? Going to melt in a bit of hot?
---
I'll tell your dad what a bad girl you are if he phones up tonight and then he won't love you.
---
He'll go off in his lorry one day and not come back and he'll send for me and he won't send for you.
---
Say sorry and you needn't drink it.
---
---
Faster than that. Crybaby. Hurts, does it? Say sorry now. Sorry mummy.
---
I'm not bothered. No one's going to come you know.
---
No chance of anyone dropping in.
---
We've got all afternoon and all evening and all night.
---
We can do what we like so long as we get your dad's tea tomorrow.
---
## BECKY:
I'm going to tell him.
---
## ANGELA:
You tell him what you like and what won't I tell him about you.
---
## BECKY:
I'll tell someone. You'll be put in prison, you'll be burnt.
---
## ANGELA:
You can't tell because I'd kill you.
---
You know that. Do you know that?
---
## BECKY:
Yes.
---
## ANGELA:
Do you?
---
## BECKY:
Yes.
---
## ANGELA:
Now why not say sorry and we'll have a biscuit and see what's on telly.
---
You needn't say mummy, you can say, 'Sorry. Angela, I’m bad all through.'
---
I don't want you driving me into a mood.
---
## BECKY:
Sorry, Angela, bad all through.
---
---
## ANGELA:
No stamina, have you? 'Sorry Angela' What you made of, girl?
---
[tense choral music]
<!-- SCENE SEVEN -->
---
[music stops suddenly]
---
## DEB:
Is she a man?
---
## BECKY:
No, she's a morphrodite.
---
## DEB:
What's that?
---
## BECKY:
A man and a woman both at once.
---
## DEB:
Can it have babies by itself?
---
## BECKY:
It has them with another morphrodite. Like snails. But she's never met one yet.
---
## SHONA:
Is she a witch?
---
## BECKY:
She eats little children. So watch out.
---
## DEB:
She talks to herself. That's spells.
---
## BECKY:
Angela says she makes trouble.
---
## DEB:
She goes in the gang with my mum.
---
## BECKY:
She makes trouble.
---
## DEB:
Let's get her wild.
---
## BECKY:
I hate her, don't you?
---
## DEB:
She makes me feel sick.
---
## BECKY:
Let's make her shout.
---
## SHONA:
Poo bum! Poo bum!
---
## DEB:
Shut up, Shona.
---
## NELL:
What you doing there?
---
## BECKY:
Watching you, so what?
---
## NELL:
Come out and watch me close up then.
---
## DEB:
Can I ask you something?
---
## NELL:
What?
---
## DEB:
Have you got — have you got — ?
---
## NELL:
What?
---
Well I don't know what you want.
---
Want to help me with my garden? You can do some weeding.
---
## BECKY:
That's a funny hat.
---
## NELL:
That's a good old hat. It's a funny old hat.
---
## SHONA:
Poo bum.
---
## NELL:
You watch out, Shona, or you'll have a smack.
---
## DEB:
You hit my sister and I'll kill you.
---
## BECKY:
I'll kill you.
---
Kill you with the hoe.
---
You're horrible.
---
## NELL:
Watch what you're doing. Put it down.
---
## DEB:
Make her run. Give her a poke.
---
## BECKY:
Jump. Jump.
---
## SHONA:
Poo poo poo poo.
---
## NELL:
You stop that.
---
Now you mind who you poke. Give me my hoe and get on home.
---
## DEB:
You let her go.
---
## BECKY:
I'll have your foot. I'll have your eyes.
---
## NELL:
Right then, you stop in there like a little rabbit.
---
## SHONA:
Let me out.
---
## DEB:
Kill her.
---
## BECKY:
Let her out.
---
## NELL:
Give me that hoe first. Now shut up, Shona, or I'll have you for tea.
---
## DEB:
Kill her.
---
[Becky yells]
---
---
## NELL:
Now give me my hoe.
---
Give me my hat.
---
And get out of my garden.
---
## DEB:
Shona.
---
## NELL:
What if I keep Shona an hour or two? Teach you a lesson.
---
## DEB:
Please let her go.
---
## SHONA:
Deb, get me out, I can’t move, get me out.
---
## NELL:
Nasty, nasty children. What will you grow up like? Nasty.
---
You should be entirely different. Everything. Everything.
---
You're the poo bum now, all rabbit business.
---
## SHONA:
Are you a witch?
---
## NELL:
No, I'm a princess. Now get out.
---
---
## BECKY
(singing) I want to be a nurse when I grow up
---
## DEB, SHONA:
And I want to have children and get married.
---
## BECKY:
But I don't think I'll leave the village when I grow up.
---
## DEB, SHONA:
I'm never going to leave the village when I grow up even when I get married.
---
I think I'll stay in the village and be a nurse.
---
## BECKY:
I want to be a hairdresser when I grow up
## DEB, SHONA:
or perhaps a teacher.
---
## BECKY:
I don't really care if I get married or be a hairdresser.
---
I want to be a cook when I grow up.
---
## DEB, SHONA:
If I couldn't be a cook I'd be a hairdresser.
---
## BECKY:
But I don't really want to leave the village when I grow up.
---
## BECKY, DEB, SHONA:
I don't think much about what I want to be.
---
I don't mind housework.
---
I think I want to be a housewife until I think of another job.
---
When I grow up I'm going to be a nurse and if not a hairdresser.
---
I'm going to be a hairdresser when I grow up and if not a nurse.
---
[crows cawing]
[singing echoes]
<!-- SCENE EIGHT -->
---
[music stops]
## MAY:
When the light comes down from behind the clouds it comes down like a ladder into the graveyards.
---
And the dead people go up the light into heaven.
---
## SHONA:
Can you see them going up?
---
## MAY:
I never have. You look for them, my sugar.
---
---
## DEB:
Sing something, nan.
---
## MAY:
I can't sing, my sugar.
---
## SHONA:
Go on, sing something.
---
## MAY:
I can't, I can't sing.
---
## SHONA:
Mum can sing.
---
## MAY:
Yes, she's got a nice voice, Val.
---
## DEB:
Sing something.
---
---
## MAY:
I can't sing, my sugar.
---
## DEB:
You're no good then, are you.
---
## MAY:
There's other things besides singing.
---
## DEB:
Like what?
---
---
## VAL:
Hello, mum.
---
Hello, Deb. Oh Deb, hello.
---
Shona, Shona. What are you drawing? Can't I look?
---
## MAY:
They're telling me off because I can't sing.
---
You can sing them something since you're here.
---
## VAL:
You want me to sing you something, Deb?
---
## DEB:
No.
---
## VAL:
Shona?
---
[Val starts to sing "The Itsy Bitsy Spider"]
---
---
## MAY:
How long is this nonsense going to last?
---
## VAL:
Don't.
---
## MAY:
I'm ashamed of you.
---
## VAL:
Not in front.
---
## MAY:
What you after? Happiness? Got it have you?
---
Bluebird of happiness? Got it have you? Bluebird?
---
What you after?
---
## DEB:
Shut up.
---
## VAL:
Don't speak to your nan like that.
---
## DEB:
You shut up,
---
## DEB:
... none of your business.
## MAY:
Don't speak to your mum like that. She's getting dreadful, Val.
---
## MAY:
You've only yourself to blame.
## DEB:
I'm not. You are. You're getting dreadful.
---
## MAY:
You see what I mean.
---
## VAL:
You're winding her up.
---
## MAY:
I'm winding her up? She was good as gold till you come in.
---
## MAY:
You better think what you're doing.
## VAL:
Don't start on me. Just because you had nothing.
---
## MAY:
Don't speak to me like that,
---
## MAY:
... my girl, or it's out you go.
## DEB:
Don't speak to my mum.
---
## VAL:
I've not been here --
---
## VAL:
-- five minutes.
## DEB:
Don't speak to my nan.
---
## VAL:
Shut up, Deb.
---
## MAY:
Don't speak to the child like that.
---
[Shona screams]
---
## MAY:
Don’t go after her.
---
## VAL:
Don't you go after her.
---
## MAY:
Deb, you go and look after your sister.
---
## DEB:
No.
---
---
## VAL:
I'd better go after her.
---
## DEB:
Leave her alone.
---
## MAY:
Leave her alone a bit, best thing.
---
## VAL:
Never mind, Deb.
---
## MAY:
Get one thing straight. It's no trouble having them. They've always a place here.
---
## VAL:
I know that.
---
## MAY:
I'll stand by you. I stand by my children.
---
I'd never have left you, Val.
---
## VAL:
Just don't.
---
## MAY:
I'd go through fire. What's stronger than that?
---
## VAL:
Just don't.
---
## MAY:
What's stronger?
---
## DEB:
I'll get Shona.
---
[church bells]
[wings fluttering]
<!-- SCENE NINE -->
---
## TEWSON:
Suppose I was to die.
---
I can claim fifty percent working farmer relief on my land value.
---
## CADE:
And thirty percent on the value of your working capital.
---
## TEWSON:
My son would still have a bill of...
---
## CADE:
Three hundred thousand pounds.
---
## TEWSON:
Which I don't have.
---
## CADE:
That's the position exactly.
---
## TEWSON:
It would mean selling a hundred and fifty acres.
---
## CADE:
That's what it would mean.
---
## TEWSON:
He could do that.
---
## CADE:
It's certainly an option.
---
## TEWSON:
Take a good few generations before the whole farm disappears. Eh?
---
## CADE:
Alternatively you can give land direct to the Inland Revenue.
---
Alternatively.
---
## TEWSON:
I need to be bloody immortal. Then I'd never pay tax.
---
You're bloody immortal, eh? City institutions are immortal.
---
## CADE:
The farmers who have sold to us are happy, Mr. Tewson.
---
## TEWSON:
Bloody driven to it. Don't have to like you as well.
---
I've read about you, Miss Cade. Moguls.
---
## CADE:
The popular farming press unfortunately—
## TEWSON:
And tycoons. And barons.
---
## CADE:
The specialist journals take a longer view.
---
## TEWSON:
Who pushed the price of land up?
---
## CADE:
Not in fact the City.
---
## TEWSON:
I don't want these fields to be worth hundreds of thousands.
---
More tax l have to pay.
---
## CADE:
We follow the market. The rise in prices is caused by government policies.
---
Ever since the Heath administration introduced rollover relief —
---
## TEWSON:
Same old fields. My great great grandfather, Miss Cade.
---
I am a member of the Country Landowners Association.
---
We have ears in the corridors of power. My family are landowners.
---
If I sell to you I become a tenant on my grandfather's land.
---
Our president appealed to us to keep our nerve.
---
## CADE:
With us, your grandson will farm his grandfather's acres.
---
The same number of acres. More.
---
You'll have the capital to reinvest. Land and machinery.
---
## TEWSON:
My family hold this land in trust for the nation.
---
## CADE:
We too have a sense of heritage.
---
## TEWSON:
Grandson, eh?
---
## CADE:
No reason why not.
---
## TEWSON:
When I say nation. You don't want to go too far in the public responsibility direction.
---
You raise the spectre of nationalisation.
---
## CADE:
No danger of that. Think of us as yourself.
---
## TEWSON:
No problem getting a new tractor then.
---
## CADE:
I can leave the papers with you.
---
---
## TEWSON:
Cup of tea? Daresay Mrs. Tewson's made a cake.
---
You want to watch the Transport and General Workers.
---
The old agricultural union was no trouble.
---
We'll have these buggers stopping the trains.
---
---
## TEWSON:
Good afternoon. Who's that? You're not one of Mrs. Hassett's girls.
---
## GHOST:
We are starving, we will not stand this no longer.
---
Rather than starve we are torment to set you on fire.
---
You bloody farmers could not live if it was not for the poor, tis them that keep you bloody rascals alive,
---
but there will be a slaughter made amongst you very soon.
---
I should very well like to hang you the same as I hanged your beasts.
---
You bloody rogue, I will light up a little fire for you the first opportunity I can make.
---
## TEWSON:
My father saw you. I didn't believe him.
---
## GHOST:
I been working in this field a hundred and fifty years.
---
There ain't twenty in this parish but what hates you, bullhead.
---
## TEWSON:
Are you angry because I'm selling the farm?
---
## GHOST:
What difference will it make?
---
## TEWSON:
None, none, everything will go on the same.
---
## GHOST:
That's why I'm angry.
---
## TEWSON:
I'm going.
---
## GHOST:
Get home then. I live in your house. I watch television with you.
---
I stand beside your chair and watch the killings. I watch the food and I watch what makes people laugh.
---
My baby died starving.
---
[the sound of voices in pain grows louder and louder]
<!-- SCENE TEN -->
---
[the voices stop abruptly]
---
## SHIRLEY:
No Val today?
---
## ANGELA:
No time for onions.
---
## NELL:
Need the money though, won't she?
---
## ALICE:
Not surprised she don't come. You shouldn't be surprised.
---
## SHIRLEY:
What's that mean?
---
## ALICE:
Way you treat her.
---
## SHIRLEY:
What's that mean?
---
## ALICE:
Everyone's acting funny with her.
---
## ANGELA:
She's the one acting funny. Leave her own kiddies.
---
If I had my own kiddies I wouldn't leave them.
---
## ALICE:
I know she's wicked but she's still my friend.
---
## SHIRLEY:
What you talking about wicked?
---
## ALICE:
It was sinners Jesus Christ come for so don't you judge.
---
## SHIRLEY:
Who said anything?
---
## ALICE:
Outside school yesterday, collecting time, no one said hello except me.
---
## SHIRLEY:
I wasn't there, was I.
---
Expect me to shout from the other end of the street.
---
Hello Val! Say hello now, shall I? Hello, Val!
---
That'll cheer her up wherever she is. Altogether now, Hello —
---
## ALICE:
Never mind. You're all so —
---
-- never mind.
---
## NELL:
Did I ever tell you about my grandfather?
---
## SHIRLEY:
When he was a boy and run away, that one?
---
## NELL:
I know you know, you'll have to hear it again.
---
## ALICE:
People are all miserable sinners. Miserable.
---
## SHIRLEY:
You want to tell Val not us. Give her a fright.
---
## ANGELA:
This one of your dirty stories, Nell? Or one of your frightening ones?
---
## SHIRLEY:
It's funny.
---
## NELL:
He used to swear this really happened.
---
When he was ten his mother died in childbirth, and his father soon got a woman in he said was a housekeeper,
---
but she slept with him from the first night. My grandfather hated her and she hated him,
---
and she'd send him to bed without any tea, and his father always took her side.
---
So after a few months of this, early one morning when his father had gone to work but she wasn't up yet,
---
he took some bread and some cold tea and he run off.
---
He walked all day and it got real dark and he was frit as hell.
---
There was no houses on the road, just an old green drove sometimes going off towards the coast,
---
so he thought he'd have to sleep by the road.
---
Then he sees a little light shining so he set off down the drove that led to it and he comes to an old stone house.
---
So he knocks on the door and the woman comes,
---
and she'd a candlestick in one hand and a big old copper stick in the other.
---
But when she sees it's only a boy she says come in and she makes him sit by the fire
---
and gives him a bowl of hot milk with some fat bacon in it and a hunk of brown bread.
---
Then she says, 'Me and my husband are going out but you can sleep by the fire.'
---
'But you must stay here in the kitchen,' she says, 'whatever you do, you mustn’t go through that door,'
---
and she points to the door at the back of the kitchen.
---
Then her husband came and said the pony trap was ready
---
and he didn't look too pleased to see the boy but he didn't say nothing and off they went for their night out.
---
So he sat by the fire and sat by the fire, and he thought I'll just take a look through that door.
---
So he turned the handle but it was locked.
---
And he saw a key lay on the dresser and he tried it and slowly opened the door, and then he wished he hadn't.
---
There was a candle in the window which was the light he'd seen, and a long table,
---
and on the table was a coffin with the lid off, and inside the coffin there was a body.
---
And he was just going to shut the door and hurry back by the fire
---
when the body in the coffin sat up and opened its eyes, and said, 'Who are you boy?'
---
Oh he were petrified.
---
But the body said, 'Don't be afraid, I'm not dead,' he said, 'Where have they gone?'
---
meaning the woman and the husband.
---
When he heard they were out he got out of the coffin and come in the kitchen and made some cocoa.
---
Then he told my grandfather his missus had been having an affair with the chap from the next smallholding,
---
and she was trying to get rid of him by putting rat poison in his food, and he'd fed it to some pigeons and they'd died.
---
So what he'd done, he'd pretended to die,
---
and she'd told the doctor he'd had a heart attack, and he'd been put in the coffin.
---
And before that he'd sold the farm without telling the wife and had the money safe in the bank under another name.
---
So he give my grandfather a screwdriver
---
and said when the couple came home and screwed down the coffin,
---
after they was in bed he was to unscrew it again.
---
So he went back by the fire and pretended to be asleep, and he heard them screw up the coffin
---
and laughing about how they'd got the old man's farm and kissing,
---
and later he got the old fellow out and he were real glad because he said he wanted a pee so bad he could almost taste it.
---
Then he got a large two tined pitchfork and a pickaxe handle and he said 'Come on it's time to go.'
---
My grandfather thought they were going to leave, but the old fellow crept upstairs,
---
and gave the boy the candle and the pickaxe handle to carry,
---
and he crept up and opened the door of the bedroom.
---
There was the couple lying close together, completely naked and fast asleep.
---
Then suddenly he raised the pitchfork and brung it down as hard as he could
---
directly over their bare stomachs, so they were sort of stitched together.
---
They screamed and screamed and he grabbed the pickaxe handle off of my grandfather
---
and clubbed them on their heads till they lay still.
---
Then he gets the man and takes him downstairs and puts him in the coffin and screws it up.
---
He says, 'They'll bury him tomorrow and think it's me,'
---
'and when they find her dead they'll know she was out drinking with her fellow'
---
and they'll think he killed her and done a bunk, so the police won't be looking for me,’ he said, 'they'll be looking for him.'
---
'And I'm going to start a new life in London or Australia, and if you talk about it I'll find you and slit your throat from ear to ear.'
---
And he never did till he was so old he knew the old man must be dead,
---
and even then he waited a good few years more, and I was the first person he ever told.
---
The old fellow gave my grandfather a gold sovereign and told him to walk west and look for a job on a farm over that way,
---
so he walked five days and slept five nights in barns, and got a job on a farm near Doncaster.
---
## ANGELA:
He never heard no more about it?
---
## NELL:
If it was in the paper he wouldn't know because he couldn't read.
---
He never heard nothing about it, and his father never found him neither.
---
## ALICE:
You said it was funny, Shirley.
---
## ANGELA:
I don't reckon it's true.
---
## SHIRLEY:
Funny if it is true, eh Nell?
---
## NELL:
I believe it all right. Why not?
---
There's harder things to believe than that. Makes me laugh.
---
[tense music]
<!-- SCENE ELEVEN -->
---
[music stops]
---
## VAL:
I made a cake Deb always likes and I had to throw half of it away.
---
Frank and I don't like cake.
---
## SHIRLEY:
You're bound to miss them.
---
## VAL:
I do see them. It's right he should keep them. I see that.
---
It's not his fault. He's a good father. It's better for them to stay in their own home.
---
Frank's only got the one room. It makes sense. It's all for the best.
---
## SHIRLEY:
At harvest dad'd say, 'Come on, Shirley, you're marker.'
---
Then if the shock fell over, 'Who's the marker?'
---
I'd say, 'I'll go outside, let someone else be marker,' but he wouldn't let me.
---
And leading the horse. 'What if he treads on my feet?’ I never could work in front of a horse.
---
Many's the time they'd bolt up the field. My mother wouldn't let me off.
---
'Just get on with it, Shirley.'
---
## VAL:
Can I help with something?
---
## SHIRLEY:
Thank you but I know how I like it.
---
## VAL:
Is that Mary's baby?
---
## SHIRLEY:
No, it's Susan's.
---
## VAL:
You've so many grandchildren I lose track.
---
## SHIRLEY:
I'll be a great-grandmother next.
---
## VAL:
What, Sukey's never?
---
## SHIRLEY:
No, but she's sixteen now and I was a grandmother at thirty-two.
---
Same thing when I went into service. I was fifteen and I hated it.
---
They had me for a week's trial and I could have gone home at the end of it
---
but I didn't want my mother to think she'd bred a gibber. Stayed my full year.
---
I don't think she will somehow, Sukey.
---
She's got green hair. Shocks her mother.
---
[baby begins to fuss]
Woken up, have we?
---
## VAL:
I can't remember what they look like.
---
## SHIRLEY:
You see them every other day.
---
## VAL:
I don't think I can have looked at them when I had them.
---
I was busy with them all the time so I didn't look.
---
Now when I meet them I really stare. But they're not the same.
---
## SHIRLEY:
You've too much time on your hands. You start thinking.
---
Can't think when you're working in the field can you?
---
It's work work work, then you think, 'I wonder what the time is,' and it's dinnertime.
---
Then you work again and you think, 'I wonder if it's time to go home,' and it is.
---
Mind you, if I didn't need the money I wouldn't do any bugger out of a job.
---
## VAL:
Sukey's a freak round here but if she went to a city she wouldn't be, not so much.
---
And I wouldn't.
---
## SHIRLEY:
You can take the baby off me if you want to do something.
---
---
## SHIRLEY:
We have to have something to talk about, Val, you mustn't mind if it's you. We'll soon stop.
---
Same things people do in cities get done here, we're terrible here, you're the latest that's all.
---
If it's what you want, get on with it.
---
Frank left his wife two years ago and everyone's got used to that.
---
What I can't be doing with is all this fuss you're making.
---
## VAL:
I can't hold the baby, it makes me cry. I'll do the ironing.
---
## SHIRLEY:
Give her here then. You don't want to be so soft.
---
If you can't stop away from them, go back to them.
---
## VAL:
I can't leave Frank.
---
## SHIRLEY:
Nothing's perfect is it, my poppet? There's a good girl.
---
---
## GEOFFREY:
Dinner ready?
---
## SHIRLEY:
Just about.
---
## VAL:
Hello, Geoffrey.
---
## GEOFFREY:
Could do with some dinner.
---
## SHIRLEY:
Ent you got a civil tongue?
---
## GEOFFREY:
I don't hold you personally responsible, Val.
---
You're a symptom of the times. Everything's changing, everything's going down.
---
Strikes, militants, I see the Russians behind it.
---
## GEOFFREY:
All the boys want to do today
## SHIRLEY:
You expect too much Val.
---
## GEOFFREY:
is drive their bikes and waste petrol.
## SHIRLEY:
Till Susan was fifteen I never went out.
---
## GEOFFREY:
When we went to school we got beaten and when we got home --
## SHIRLEY:
Geoffrey wouldn't either, he wouldn't go to the pub without me.
---
## GEOFFREY:
-- we got beaten again. They don't want to work today.
## SHIRLEY:
'She's mine as much as yours', he says, 'I've as much right to stop in as what you have.'
---
---
## SHIRLEY:
Lived right out on the fen till ten years ago.
---
## SHIRLEY:
You could stand at the door with your baby in your arms and not see a soul from one week's end to the next.
---
## GEOFFREY:
Don't talk to me about unemployment.
---
## SHIRLEY:
Delivery van come once a week.
## GEOFFREY:
They've got four jobs.
---
## SHIRLEY:
My sister come at Christmas.
## GEOFFREY:
Doing other people out of jobs.
---
## GEOFFREY:
Being a horseman was proper work, but all your Frank does is sit on a tractor.
---
## GEOFFREY:
Sitting down's not work. Common market takes all the work.
---
Only twenty in church on Sunday. Declining morals all round. Not like in the war.
---
Those French sending rockets to the Argies, forgotten what we did for them I should think.
---
## GEOFFREY:
Common market's a good thing for stopping wars.
## SHIRLEY:
I remember dad said to mum one Bank Holiday,
---
## SHIRLEY:
'Do you want to go out?' 'Yes please,' she said.
---
## SHIRLEY:
'Right,' he said, 'We'll go and pick groundsel.'
---
## GEOFFREY:
We had terrible times. If I had cracked tomatoes for my tea I thought I was lucky.
---
## SHIRLEY:
It's easy living here like I do now.
## GEOFFREY:
So why shouldn't you have terrible times?
---
## GEOFFREY:
Who are all these people
---
## GEOFFREY:
who come and live here to have fun? I don't know anybody.
## SHIRLEY:
Your bike'd be mud right up to the middle of the wheel.
---
## GEOFFREY:
Nobody does. Makes me wild.
## SHIRLEY:
I'd think, 'If anything's after me it'll have to pedal.'
---
## GEOFFREY:
My mother was glad she could keep us alive, that's all.
---
## GEOFFREY:
I'm growing Chinese radishes. I've never eaten Chinese food and I never will.
---
Friend of mine grows Japanese radishes and takes them to Bradford,
---
tries to sell them to the Pakis. Pakis don't want them.
---
You want to pull yourself together, girl, that's what you want to.
---
<!-- SCENE TWELVE -->
---
[wind and rain]
[music]
---
## SHIRLEY:
(sings) Who would true valour see Let him come hither.
[music fades]
---
One here will constant be
Come wind come weather.
---
There's no discouragement
Shall make him once relent
---
His first avowed intent
To be a pilgrim.
---
---
[the sound of a plane overhead]
---
## NELL:
Sod this.
---
## ANGELA:
Keep up, Beck.
---
---
## TEWSON:
You're good workers, I'll say that for you.
---
## NELL:
Thank you very much.
---
## TEWSON:
Better workers than men.
---
I've seen women working in my fields with icicles on their faces. I admire that.
---
## SHIRLEY:
Better than men all right.
---
## NELL:
Bloody fools, that's all.
---
## ANGELA:
What you crying for, Beck?
---
## BECKY:
I'm not.
---
## SHIRLEY:
Cold are you?
---
## BECKY:
No.
---
## NELL:
I am and so are you.
---
What's going to make us feel better? Sun going to come out?
---
You going to top yourself, Tewson. like that farmer over Chatteris?
---
## TEWSON:
She's funny in the head, isn't she.
---
## ANGELA:
She likes a joke.
---
## TEWSON:
Better watch her tongue.
---
## SHIRLEY:
She's a good worker, Mr. Tewson, she don't do no harm.
---
## NELL:
Don't I though. Don't I do harm.
---
I'll do you some harm one of these days, you old bugger.
---
## ANGELA:
What you made of, Becky?
---
## SHIRLEY:
You'll get used to it.
---
## BECKY:
I want to be a hairdresser.
---
## TEWSON:
That was a friend of mine you were speaking of.
---
He found out he had six months to live. So he sold his orchards without telling anyone.
---
Then before he started to suffer he took his life. Never said a word to his family.
---
Carried it out alone, very bravely. I think that's a tragedy.
---
## SHIRLEY:
Well it is, yes.
---
## TEWSON:
Might clear up tonight.
---
---
## NELL:
Best hope if they all top themselves.
---
Start with the queen and work down and I'll tell them when to stop.
---
## SHIRLEY:
All right, Val?
---
## NELL:
What's wrong with you?
---
## VAL:
Nothing.
---
## NELL:
Slows you up a lot for nothing.
---
## VAL:
It's like thick nothing.
---
I can't get on. Makes my arms and legs heavy.
---
## SHIRLEY:
Still you're back with the kids, best thing. Just get on with it.
---
## NELL:
You think I'm the loony. Is she eating? Sleeping?
---
## ANGELA:
She wants to go to the doctor, get some valium.
---
A man's not worth it, mate. Kids neither.
---
## NELL:
I'm not working in this.
---
## SHIRLEY:
Don't be soft.
---
## NELL:
It's more than rain, it's splinters.
---
Come on, Becky, you’ve had enough.
---
## BECKY:
Can I stop, Angela? Please, mum, can I?
---
## ANGELA:
I've had enough myself. Can’t work in this.
---
## SHIRLEY:
I can.
---
[somber choral music]
<!-- SCENE THIRTEEN -->
---
[music stops]
---
## FRANK:
What?
---
## VAL:
I wanted to see you.
---
## FRANK:
Why?
---
Coming back to me?
---
## VAL:
No.
---
## FRANK:
Then what? What?
---
I don't want to see you, Val
---
## VAL:
No.
---
## FRANK:
Stay with me tonight
---
## VAL:
No.
---
## FRANK:
Please go away.
---
<!-- SCENE FOURTEEN -->
---
["He Is Lord" plays]
---
[music stops abruptly]
## MRS FINCH:
God is doing wonderful things among us.
---
## MAVIS:
I hope you'll stay with us because we all love each other.
---
## ALICE:
She's a friend of mine. I brought her.
---
## MAVIS:
Alice is a beautiful friend to have.
---
[Mrs. Finch plays a note on a tuning instrument]
---
[Alice, Mavis, Mrs. Finch and Margaret harmonize]
---
[Alice, Mavis, Mrs. Finch and Margaret sing the hymn "Thank You Jesus"]
---
## MRS FINCH:
[speaking] How lovely to be here again with all my sisters.
---
And specially lovely to welcome new faces.
---
We hope you will commit yourself to the Lord because with him you will have everything.
---
And without him, nothing.
---
This is not a perfect world and we can't be perfect in it.
---
You know how we work cleaning our houses or weeding our gardens,
---
but they're never perfect, there's always another job to start again.
---
But our Lord Jesus is perfect, and in him we are made perfect.
---
That doesn't mean I'm perfect. You know I'm not. I know you're not.
---
But we've plunged ourselves body and soul in the water of God.
---
Next Sunday Margaret will be baptised and she'll testify before the whole congregation.
---
Tonight she's going to share with her loving sisters how she accepted the Lord into her life.
---
## MARGARET:
I thought I would be nervous but I'm not.
---
Because Jesus is giving me strength to speak.
---
I don't know where to begin because I've been unhappy as long as I can remember.
---
My mother and father were unhappy too.
---
I think my grandparents were unhappy.
---
My father was a violent man.
---
You'd hear my mother, you'd say, 'Are you all right, mum?' But that's a long time ago.
---
I wasn't very lucky in my marriage.
---
So after that I was on my own except I had my little girl.
---
Some of you knew her. But for those of you who didn't, she couldn't see.
---
I thought at first that was why she couldn't learn things but it turned out to be in her head as well.
---
But I taught her to walk, they said she wouldn't but she did.
---
She slept in my bed, she wouldn't let me turn away from her, she'd put her hand on my face.
---
It was after she died I started drinking,
---
which has been my great sin and brought misery to myself and those who love me.
---
I betrayed them again and again by saying I would give it up,
---
but the drink would have me hiding a little away.
---
But my loving sisters in Christ stood by me.
---
I thought if God wants me he'll give me a sign,
---
because I couldn't believe he really would want someone as terrible as me.
---
I thought if I hear two words today,
---
one beginning with M for Margaret, my name, and one with J for Jesus, close together,
---
then I'll know how close I am to him.
---
And that very afternoon I was at Mavis's house and her little boy was having his tea,
---
and he said, 'More jam, mum.' So that was how close Jesus was to me, right inside my heart.
---
That was when I decided to be baptised.
---
But I slid back and had a drink again and next day I was in despair.
---
I thought God can't want me, nobody can want me.
---
And a thrush got into my kitchen. l thought if that bird can fly out, I can fly out of my pain.
---
I stood there and watched, I didn't open another window, there was just the one window open.
---
The poor bird beat and beat round the room, the tears were running down my face.
---
And at last as it found the window and went straight through into the air.
---
I cried tears of joy because I knew Jesus would save me.
---
## VAL:
I want to go
## MARGARET:
So I went to Malcolm and said
---
## ALICE:
What? Val?
## MARGARET:
'Baptise me now because I'm ready'.
---
## VAL:
I'm going. You needn't.
## MARGARET:
I want to give myself over
---
## ALICE:
Aren't you well?
## MARGARET:
completely to God
---
## VAL:
I feel sick.
## MARGARET:
so there's nothing else of me left,
---
## ALICE:
I'm coming, I'm coming.
## MARGARET:
and then the pain will be gone
---
## MARGARET:
and I'll be saved.
---
Without the love of my sisters I would never have got through.
---
## ALICE:
It's a powerful effect.
---
## VAL:
Yes.
---
## ALICE:
I'm glad I brought you, Val.
---
## VAL:
I hated it.
---
## ALICE:
What do you mean?
---
## VAL:
That poor woman.
---
## ALICE:
She's all right now, thank the Lord.
---
## VAL:
She just liked a drink. No wonder.
---
Can't you understand her wanting a drink?
---
## ALICE:
Of course I can. So can Jesus. That's why he forgives her.
---
## VAL:
She thinks she's rubbish.
---
## ALICE:
We're all rubbish but Jesus still loves us so it's all right.
---
## VAL:
It was kind of you to bring me. I loved the singing. And everyone was so loving.
---
## ALICE:
Well then? That's it, isn't it? Better than we get every day, isn't it?
---
How cold everyone is to each other? All the women there look after each other.
---
I was dreadful after the miscarriage and they saved my life.
---
Let Jesus help you, Val, because I know you're desperate.
---
You need to plunge in. What else are you going to do?
---
Poor Val.
---
## VAL:
Can't you give me a hug without Jesus?
---
## ALICE:
Of course not, we love better in Jesus.
---
## VAL:
I’d rather take valium.
---
[crows cawing]
[tense music rises and fades]
<!-- SCENE FIFTEEN -->
---
[wind]
---
## VAL:
I was frightened.
---
## FRANK:
When?
---
## VAL:
When I left you.
---
## FRANK:
I was frightened when you came back.
---
## VAL:
Are you now?
---
---
## FRANK:
Thought of killing myself after you’d gone.
---
Lucky I didn't.
---
## VAL:
What are you frightened of?
---
## FRANK:
Going mad.
---
Heights.
---
Beauty.
---
## VAL:
Lucky we live in a flat country.
---
<!-- SCENE SIXTEEN -->
---
[May, Deb and Shona sing "Happy Birthday"]
---
## IVY:
Sometimes I think I was never there.
---
You can remember a thing because someone told you.
---
When they were dredging the mud out of the leat.
---
I can picture the gantry clear as a bell.
---
But whether I was there or someone told me, I don't know.
---
Am I ninety?
---
Ninety is it? 'Are you the bloody union man?’ he'd say to Jack.
---
'Are you the bloody union man?'
---
And Jack'd say, 'Are you going to pay him, because if not I'll splash it all over.'
---
## MAY:
Kiss your greatnan, Shona.
---
## IVY:
Ever kill a mouse, Shona? Tuppence a score.
---
How old are you?
---
## SHONA:
Six.
---
## IVY:
I come home late from school on purpose so I wouldn't have to help mum with the beet.
---
So I had to go without my tea and straight out to the field.
---
'You can have tea in the dark,' mum said, 'but you can’t pick beet in the dark.'
---
I were I six then.
---
Jack didn’t wear shoes till he were fourteen. You could stick a pin in.
---
Walked through the night to the union meeting.
---
Fellow come round on his bike and made his speech in the empty street
---
and everybody'd be in the house listening
---
because they daren't go out because what old Tewson might say.
---
'Vote for the blues, boys,' he'd say and he'd give them money to drink.
---
They'd pull off the blue ribbons behind the hedge.
---
Still have the drink though.
---
You'd close your eyes at night, it was time to open them in the morning.
---
Jack'd be out in the yard at midnight.
---
'It's my tilley lamp and my wick,' I said, 'you owe me for that, Mr. Tewson.'
---
Chased him with a besom.
---
'You join that union, Jack,' I said.
---
Nothing I couldn't do then.
---
Now my balance takes me and I go over backwards.
---
There was five of us if you count my brother John
---
that had his face bit off by the horse.
---
'Are you the bloody union man?' That quack who said he could cure cancer.
---
Took the insides of sheep and said it was the cancer he got out.
---
I didn't believe it but most of them did.
---
Stoned the doctor's house when he drove him out.
---
Welcomed him back with a brass band.
---
Laudanum pills were a great thing for pain.
---
Walk from Littleport to Wisbech in no time.
---
Ninety is it? Old fellow lived next to us, he was a hundred.
---
He'd come out on the bank and shout out to the undertaker lived on the other side,
---
'Jarvis, Jarvis, come and make my coffin.'
---
'Are you the bloody union man?' he'd say.
---
'Yes I am,' he'd say, 'and what about it?'
---
They don't marry today with the same love.
---
'Jarvis, come and make my coffin.'
---
[tense music rises and fades]
<!-- SCENE SEVENTEEN -->
---
## FRANK:
What you doing?
---
## VAL:
Can't sleep.
---
## FRANK:
Come back to bed.
---
I can't sleep with you up.
---
## VAL:
I'm not too bad in the day, am I?
---
---
## FRANK:
Go back to them then.
---
## VAL:
Tried that.
---
## FRANK:
He'd have you back still.
---
## VAL:
Tried it already.
---
## FRANK:
If I went away it might be easier.
---
We'd know it was for definite.
---
## VAL:
You could always come back. I'd come after you.
---
## FRANK:
I'd better kill myself hadn't I.
---
## FRANK:
Be out of your way then.
## VAL:
Don't be stupid.
---
## FRANK:
The girls are all right, you know.
---
## VAL:
I just want them. I can't help it. I just want them.
---
## FRANK:
I left my family.
---
## VAL:
Not for me.
---
## FRANK:
I didn't say it was for you. I said I manage.
---
## VAL:
I'm the one who should kill themself.
---
I'm the one can't get used to how things are.
---
I can't bear it either way, without them or without you.
---
## FRANK:
Try and get them off him again.
## VAL:
We've been over that.
---
## VAL:
They're his just as much.
---
Why should he lose everything? He's got the place.
---
We've been over that.
---
---
## FRANK:
Let's go to bed.
---
I'm cold.
---
## VAL:
One of us better die I think.
---
["Heaven and Hell" by Black Sabbath plays]
<!-- SCENE EIGHTEEN -->
---
## NELL:
How's Mr. Tewson then?
You're his right-hand man.
[music fades]
---
## FRANK:
I do my job.
---
## NELL:
I'm nobody's right hand. And proud of it.
---
I'm their left foot more like. Two left feet.
---
## FRANK:
Bloody trouble-maker.
---
[Alice and Angela exclaim]
---
## NELL:
I just can't think like they do. I don't know why.
---
I was brought up here like everyone else.
---
My family thinks like everyone else. Why can't l?
---
I've tried to. I've given up now. I see it all as rotten.
---
What finished me off was my case. Acton's that closed down.
---
## FRANK:
Made trouble there.
---
## NELL:
I wanted what they owed me — ten years I'd topped their effing carrots.
---
You all thought I was off the road.
---
[whistles]
You’ll never think I'm normal now. Thank God, eh?
---
---
## ANGELA:
All alone?
---
## FRANK:
Just having a pint.
---
## ANGELA:
How's Val?
---
## FRANK:
Fine.
---
## ANGELA:
Never thought you were the type.
---
## FRANK:
What type?
---
## ANGELA:
After the married women.
---
## FRANK:
I'm not.
---
## ANGELA:
I got married too soon you know.
---
I think forty-five’s a good age to get married.
---
Before that you want a bit of fun. You having fun?
---
## FRANK:
No.
---
## ANGELA:
Maybe it's gone on too long.
---
## FRANK:
Should never have started.
---
## ANGELA:
You can always try again.
---
## FRANK:
Too late for that.
---
## ANGELA:
You've got no spirit, Frank. Nobody has round here.
---
Flat and dull like the landscape.
---
I am too. I want to live in the country.
---
## FRANK:
What's this then?
---
## ANGELA:
I like more scenery. The Lake District's got scenery.
---
We went there on our honeymoon.
---
He said we were going to live in the country.
---
I wouldn't have come. Real country is romantic.
---
Away from it all. Makes you feel better.
---
## FRANK:
This is real country. People work in it. You want a holiday.
---
## ANGELA:
I want more than two weeks.
---
You wouldn't consider running away with me?
---
## FRANK:
I'm thinking of killing myself.
---
## ANGELA:
God, so am I, all the time. We'll never do it.
---
We'll be two old dears of ninety in this pub and never even kissed each other.
---
---
## NELL:
Tell you something about Tewson.
---
He's got a sticker in the back of his car, Buy British Beef.
---
And what sort of car is it?
---
## FRANK:
Volvo.
---
## NELL:
There, see?
---
## FRANK:
He's sold the farm, hasn't he? He's just a tenant himself
---
He had to, to get money for new equipment.
---
## NELL:
So who's boss? Who do you have a go at?
---
Acton's was Ross, Ross is Imperial Foods, Imperial Foods is Imperial Tobacco, so where does that stop?
---
He's your friend, I know that.
---
Good to your brother, all that. Nice old fellow.
---
## FRANK:
That's right.
---
## NELL:
You don't think I'm crackers, do you?
---
## FRANK:
No.
---
## NELL:
I don't think you are neither.
---
---
You cheer up anyway. Don't give them the satisfaction.
---
## FRANK:
I'm fine, thank you.
---
## NELL:
You never see a farmer on a bike.
---
---
[discordant voices]
[tense music]
<!-- SCENE NINETEEN -->
---
[voices and music stop]
## BECKY:
It's private.
---
## ANGELA:
Nothing's private from me.
---
## BECKY:
Give it back.
---
## ANGELA:
Ashamed of it? I should think so.
---
It's rubbish. And it's dirty. And it doesn't rhyme properly.
---
Listen to this.
---
## BECKY:
No.
## ANGELA:
You're going to listen to this, Becky.
---
You wrote it, you hear it.
---
[reads] "When I'm dead and buried in the earth
Everyone will cry and be sorry then."
---
"Nightingales will sing and wolves will howl.
I'll come back and frighten you to death."
---
Who? Me, I suppose. Me?
---
## BECKY:
No.
## ANGELA:
Who?
---
## BECKY:
Anyone.
---
## ANGELA:
Me, but you won't. You’ve got a horrible mind.
---
[reads] "The saint was burnt alive
The crackling fat ran down.""
---
"Everyone ran to hear her scream
They thought it was a bad dream."
---
Eugh. Oh this is very touching.
---
[reads] "Mother where are you sweet and dear?
Your lonely child is waiting here."
---
## BECKY:
No, no, shut up.
## ANGELA:
"If you could see what's done to me"
---
## ANGELA:
"You'd come and get me out of here."
## BECKY:
Mother where are you sweet and dear?
---
## BECKY:
Your lonely child is waiting here.
## ANGELA:
"My love for you is always true..."
---
## BECKY:
If you could see what's done to me
## ANGELA:
You shut up, Becky.
---
## BECKY:
You'd come and get me out of here.
## ANGELA:
I never said you could.
---
## BECKY:
My love for you is always true --
## ANGELA:
Becky I'm warning you.
---
## ANGELA:
Just for that you've got to hear another one. Not a word.
---
Now this is dirty. Wrote this in bed I expect.
---
[reads] "He pressed her with a passionate embrace
Tears ran down all over her face."
---
"He put his hand upon her breast
Which gave her a sweet rest."
---
"He put his hand upon her cunt
And put his cock up her."
---
That doesn't even rhyme, you filthy child.
---
"He made love to her all night long.
They listened to the birdsong."
---
What puts filth like that into your head?
---
What if I showed your dad?
---
## BECKY:
No.
---
## ANGELA:
Lucky I'm your friend.
---
## BECKY:
I'll never do another one.
---
## ANGELA:
I don't care. Hope you don't.
---
You should do one for Frank.
---
## BECKY:
I don't love Frank.
---
## ANGELA:
You love Frank, do you?
---
## ANGELA:
l hadn't guessed that.
## BECKY:
I don't.
---
## BECKY:
I said I don't. You do.
---
## ANGELA:
What? Watch out, Becky, don't get me started.
---
Make a poem about him dying.
---
## BECKY:
He's not dead?
---
## ANGELA:
He tried to. He took some pills, but Val got the ambulance.
---
## BECKY:
When? When?
---
## ANGELA:
I'll make one.
---
Frank was miserable and wished he was dead.
He had horrible thoughts in his head.
---
He took some pills to end his life.
Too bad he got saved by his silly wife.
---
Not his wife.
---
Now he's got to go on being alive
Like all the rest of us here who survive.
---
I stay alive so Frank may as well.
He won't go to heaven and he's already in hell.
---
Poor Frank was never very cheerful...
---
## BECKY:
Except when he goes to the pub and then he's beerful.
---
## ANGELA:
Those pills must have made him feel sick
And wish he'd never followed his prick.
---
[Becky and Angela laugh]
---
## BECKY:
That's quite good.
---
---
## ANGELA:
Becky, why do you like me? I don't want you to like me.
---
## BECKY:
Poor Frank.
---
Imagine.
---
[tense music]
<!-- SCENE TWENTY -->
---
[music stops]
## VAL:
Shona. I hoped I'd see you.
---
## SHONA:
I've been to the shop for nan.
---
## VAL:
What did you get?
---
## SHONA:
Sliced loaf, pound of sausages, butterscotch Instant Whip,
---
and a Marathon for me and Deb, I'm going to cut it in half.
---
The warts have gone off my hands because nan said get some meat
---
and she got some meat yesterday and it was liver and it wasn't cooked yet
---
but she cooked it for tea but l didn't like it but I liked the bacon.
---
She cut off a bit and rubbed it on my warts, Deb said Eugh.
---
Then me and Deb buried it in the garden near where nan’s dog's buried.
---
There was one here and one here and another one and some more.
---
I watched 'Top of the Pops' last night and I saw Madness.
---
Deb likes them best but I don't.
---
## VAL:
What do you like?
---
## SHONA:
I don't like Bucks Fizz because Mandy does.
---
She's not my friend because I took the blue felt tip for doing eskimos
---
and Miss said use the wax ones but I have to have felt tips so I got it
---
and Mandy says she won't choose me when it's sides.
---
## VAL:
She'll probably have forgotten by tomorrow.
---
## SHONA:
Nan says you mustn't cut your toenails on Sunday or the devil gets you.
---
## VAL:
It's just a joke.
---
## SHONA:
My toenails don't need cutting because nan cut them already.
---
What's yellow and got red spots?
---
## VAL:
The sun with measles.
---
## SHONA:
Knock knock.
---
## VAL:
Who's there?
---
## SHONA:
A man without a hat on.
---
## VAL:
What?
---
## SHONA:
Why did the mouse run up the clock?
---
## VAL:
Why?
---
## SHONA:
To see what time it is.
---
## VAL:
Shona, when you grow up I hope you're happy.
---
## SHONA:
I'm going to be an eskimo.
---
Mandy can't because she can't make an igloo. She can come on my sledge.
---
Nan said to be quick.
---
## VAL:
Why does an elephant paint its toenails red?
---
## SHONA:
Footprints in the butter.
---
## VAL:
No, that's how you know it's been in the fridge.
---
## SHONA:
Why then?
---
## VAL:
So it can hide in a cherry tree.
---
## SHONA:
Deb knows that one.
---
Nan doesn't.
---
[church bells]
---
[ominous music]
<!-- SCENE TWENTY-ONE -->
---
[music stops]
## VAL:
I've got it all worked out.
---
Look. I marked the place with a biro.
---
That's where the knife has to go in. I can't do it to myself.
---
## FRANK:
I can't even kill a dog.
---
## VAL:
I've been feeling happy all day because I decided.
---
## FRANK:
You marked the place with a biro.
---
## VAL:
I know it's funny but I want it to work.
---
## FRANK:
It's ridiculous.
---
## VAL:
Just say you love me and put the knife in and hold me till it's over.
---
## FRANK:
We don't have to do this.
---
## VAL:
Say you love me.
---
## FRANK:
You know that.
---
## VAL:
But say it.
---
---
## FRANK:
I nearly did it.
---
## FRANK:
I nearly killed you.
## VAL:
Do it.
---
## VAL:
Do it.
## FRANK:
How can I?
---
## VAL:
Just do it.
---
## FRANK:
Aren't you cold? I'm shivering.
---
Let's have a fire and some tea. Eh, Val?
---
Remember —
---
## VAL:
What?
---
## FRANK:
Early on.
---
It wasn't going to be like this.
---
Why do you — ?
---
## VAL:
What?
---
## FRANK:
All right then.
---
All right.
---
[Frank grunts]
---
[choral music]
[Frank cries]
---
[music continues]
---
## VAL:
[from afar] It's dark.
---
I can see through you.
---
No, you're better now.
---
## FRANK:
Does it go on?
---
## VAL:
There's so much happening.
---
There's all those people and I know about them.
[the sound of distant voices]
---
There's a girl who died.
---
I saw you put me in the wardrobe, I was up by the ceiling, I watched.
---
I could have gone but I wanted to stay with you and I found myself coming back in.
[more distant voices]
---
There's so many of them all at once.
---
He drowned in the river carrying his torch and they saw the light shining up through the water.
---
There's the girl again, a long time ago when they believed in boggarts.
---
The boy died of measles in the first war.
---
The girl, I'll try and tell you about her and keep the others out.
---
A lot of children died that winter and she's still white and weak
---
though it's nearly time to wake the spring —
---
-- stand at the door at dawn and when you see a green mist rise from the fields you throw out bread and salt,
---
and that gets the boggarts to make everything grow again.
---
She's getting whiter and sillier and she wants the spring.
---
She says maybe the green mist will make her strong.
---
So every day they're waiting for the green mist.
---
I can't keep them out.
---
Her baby died starving. She died starving.
---
[more voices]
---
Who?
---
She says if the green mist don't come tomorrow she can't wait.
---
'If I could see spring again I wouldn't ask to live longer than one of the cowslips at the gate.'
---
The mother says, 'Hush, the boggarts'll hear you.'
---
Next day, the green mist.
---
It's sweet, can you smell it? Her mother carries her to the door.
---
She throws out bread and salt. The earth is awake.
---
Every day she's stronger, the cowslips are budding, she's running everywhere.
---
She's so strange and beautiful they can hardly look.
---
Is that all?
[more voices]
---
A boy talks to her at the gate. He picks a cowslip without much noticing.
---
'Did you pick that?'
---
She's a wrinkled white dead thing like the cowslip.
---
[voices rise]
[choral music]
There's so many, I can't keep them out.
---
They're not all dead.
---
There's someone crying in her sleep.
---
[the sound of Becky crying]
---
It's Becky.
---
## FRANK:
I can hear her.
---
## VAL:
She's having a nightmare.
---
She's running downstairs away from Angela.
---
She's out on the road but she must run fast enough.
---
She's running on her hands and feet to go faster,
---
she's swimming up the road, she's trying to fly
---
but she can't get up because Angela's after her,
---
and she gets to school and sits down at her desk.
---
But the teacher's Angela.
---
She comes nearer.
---
But she knows how to wake herself up, she's done it before,
---
she doesn't run away, she must hurl herself at Angela — jump! jump!
---
and she's falling — but it's wrong,
---
instead of waking up in bed she's falling into another dream and she's here.
---
## BECKY:
I want to wake up.
---
## VAL:
It's my fault.
---
## BECKY:
I want to wake up. Angela beats me.
---
She shuts me in the dark. She put a cigarette on my arm. She's here.
---
## ANGELA:
Becky, do you feel it? I don't, not yet.
---
There's a pain somewhere. I can see so far and nothing's coming.
---
I stand in a field and I'm not there.
---
I have to make something happen.
---
I can hurt you, can't I? You feel it, don't you? Let me burn you.
---
I have to hurt you worse. I think I can feel something.
---
It's my own pain. I must be here if it hurts.
---
## BECKY:
You can't, I won't, I'm not playing.
---
You're not here.
[Becky's voice echoes]
[the sound of wings]
---
## NELL:
I was walking out on the fen. The sun spoke to me.
---
It said, 'Turn back, turn back.'
---
I said, 'I won't turn back for you or anyone.'
---
---
## SHIRLEY:
My grandmother told me her grandmother said
---
when times were bad they'd mutilate the cattle.
---
Go out in the night and cut a sheep's throat or hamstring a horse or stab a cow with a fork.
---
They didn't take the sheep, they didn't want the meat.
---
She stabbed a lamb. She slashed a foal. 'What for?' I said.
---
They felt quieter after that. I cried for the hurt animals.
---
I'd forgotten that.
---
I'd forgotten what it was like to be unhappy.
---
I don't want to.
---
## FRANK:
I've killed the only person l love.
---
## VAL:
It's what I wanted.
---
## FRANK:
You should have wanted something different.
---
## VAL:
My mother wanted to be a singer.
---
That's why she'd never sing.
---
[May exclaims]
---
[choral music begins]
---
[May starts to sing, then stops]
---
[May starts to sing again]
---
[singing builds]
---
---
Google Drive
Gist
Clipboard
Sign in with Wallet
