19 Nocturne Boulevard

A story of a future without genders.... sort of.

MANY COMMENTS from Julie, LOLOLOL

[warning - mature situations, foul language and violence]

An ornery old woman takes on all comers in defense of her family and her freedom - even the Devil and Death!

Cast List Maggie - Julie Hoverson Nursey - Robyn Keyes Bertha - Rhys TM Barry - Mr. Synyster Kev - Michael Coleman (Tales of the Extraordinary) Jemma - Gwendolyn-Jensen Woodard (Gypsy Audio) Morte - Russell Gold Devil -Jack Kincaid (Edict Zero) Ted - Russell Gold Spike - Paul Mannering (Brokensea Audio) Other Bikers - Brandon O'Brien; Bill Hollweg

Music: Kevin MacLeod (Incompetech.com) Editing and Sound: Julie Hoverson Cover Photo: Elizabeth Flores (courtesy of Stock Xchange.com)

"What kind of a place is it? Why it's a recovery ward, can't you tell?"

*****************************************

CRUMPING THE DEVIL

Cast:

• [Opening credits - Olivia]
• Maggie
• Kev/"the Maniac", grandson
• Bertha, the manipulative daughter
• Barry, Bertha's bastard husband
• Nursey
• Morte
• Satan
• Jemma, the pregnant wimp daughter
• Ted, Jemma's abusive bastard husband
• Spike, violent biker

OLIVIA Did you have any trouble finding it? What do you mean, what kind of a place is it? Why, it's a recovery ward, can't you tell?

MUSIC

AMBIANCE Hospital, beeps etc.

MAGGIE [talking on phone] I don't give a flying rat's flaming anus how good a job he does! Shall I roll past your garage and post photos of what he did to his wife? Perhaps I should leave a nice big bloodstain on your doorstep with the words wifebeater scrawled on the pavemment - don't think I won't!

PATIENT [groan]

MAGGIE [up] Stuff it! [back on phone] Oh, yes! [evil laugh] You come down here and say that to my face - I'll call the press. [delighted laugh] I can just see the rags with you beating up a helpless gran in a wheelchair. Tough guy!

SOUND DOOR OPENS, FEET COME IN

NURSEY Now, now - phone time's over. Time to say goodbye to all your friends.

MAGGIE Bugger off, stay-puft.

NURSEY [tsks]

SOUND PHONE GRABBED AND HUNG UP FORCEFULLY

NURSEY Dear, dear - no need to drive up your blood pressure. You need to stay calm, ducks, and get your rest.

SOUND CURTAIN PULLED AROUND BED

MAGGIE I'm ordering prunes! Lots of prunes! Just so you have to clean up the mess when they come out the other end!

NURSEY My, my - but I'm not here all the time.

MAGGIE [snarled] I have your schedule memorized.

MUSIC

BERTHA Mother, you need to be rational about this. This is your fourth hospitalization this year - you've reached a point where you need someone to look after you.

MAGGIE Visiting nurse comes by twice a week.

BERTHA [prompting] Barry!

BARRY What if you... fall?

MAGGIE I have this very special invention. It allows me to magically contact help when I need it.

BARRY Oh, what?

MAGGIE It's called a cellphone, you scrofulous prick. I'll wear it on a lanyard if it'll make you piss off. Now get your sorry arses out of my sickroom.

PATIENT Go away.

MAGGIE See? Even that bastard hates you.

BERTHA No mother, we're not leaving until we get this settled.

MAGGIE Nurse!

BARRY There is a button--

MAGGIE Fuck off - this annoys her more. Nurse!

SOUND DOOR OPENS, FEET COME IN SLOWLY

KEV H'lo Gran. [reluctant] Mum. [distasteful] Barry.

MAGGIE Who the bloody buggery hell are you supposed to be?

BERTHA Oh, heavens, her memory is going!

MAGGIE Don't get your hopes up, arse-face. Are you trying to tell me the fruit of your sweaty loins--

BERTHA [gasp]

MAGGIE --has taken to running about dressed as sir poncy de leon?

KEV I'm Hamlet.

MAGGIE [laughing wickedly] Go on! You? You can't memorize the balance of your overdraft! Come on then, soliloquize us!

KEV [chuckles] It's a sales promotion for a mattress shop. To sleep or not to sleep, all that bollocks.

BERTHA [muttered] I just don't know where he gets this language from.

MAGGIE Oh, god - if you're truly that fucking dense, I wish I was your father so at least I'd have some slight glimmer of hope that you weren't mine!

SOUND DOOR OPENS, NURSEY FEET ENTER

NURSEY Come, come - let's keep it all nice and civil, there are other people in this hospital, you know.

MAGGIE Well, there must be people somewhere, but there's a couple of wankers in here. Bugger off, knot-knickers.

BERTHA [gasp, then affronted noises as she leaves]

SOUND FEET STORM OUT

NURSEY Dear, dear. Poor old Maggie's being deserted.

MAGGIE Your turn, then isn't it, blancmange? Shuffle off and fetch something, would you? ...Like a stick?

NURSEY Tsk Tsk. You really need to--

MAGGIE You, hey you in the tights. You stay. [beat] Gotta catflap in those bonbon knickers?

KEV No, gran.

NURSEY [psst, then confidential] Young man, you haven't brought her any alcohol have you?

KEV No - no! What sort of grandson would that make me? No bottle on me anywhere, [leering] want to pat me down?

NURSEY [oblivious] No, no! Five minutes, then visiting hours are over.

SOUND HER FEET LEAVE, DOOR SHUTS

MAGGIE [hushed] You did bring me something, didn't you? You are aware I think you're the least worthless of all my pathetic offspring?

SOUND PLASTIC BAG OUT OF POCKET

KEV Love you too, gran. I remember how much you complained last time of not being able to find a place to light one up, so I baked you some brownies.

MAGGIE You? Baked?

KEV I'm a sensitive new age type of bloke. I can make a mix.

SOUND OPENING PLASTIC BAG

MAGGIE [sniffs] Nice. You didn't skimp on the "spices."

SOUND TAP ON THE DOOR

NURSEY Time's up!

KEV Stuff em somewhere. Size of that cow, she probably snaps up everyone's sweeties.

MAGGIE I think she just eats patients--

SOUND DOOR OPENS

MAGGIE [louder] --mostly the males.

KEV [wincey noise] Ooh...

MUSIC

MAGGIE [into phone, trying to be quiet] --the Maniac left me a mobile. Have you tracked down Python yet, then? [beat, then getting loud] Sod it! I thought you bastards had better legal these days!

SOUND QUIETLY DOOR OPENS, SLOW FOOTSTEPS ENTER

MAGGIE There must be someone there whose tattooes run more than knickers deep! [beat] Fine, I'll call the--

SOUND CURTAIN SWEPT ASIDE SUDDENLY

MAGGIE [gasp] Bugger me!

SOUND MUFFLED VOICE AS SHE HIDES THE PHONE, BEEPING, TRYING TO TURN IT OFF

MORTE Madame? I believe you are expecting me.

MAGGIE Riiight. Middle of the night, hospital room. Must be the stripper. Where's your music?

MORTE [startled] Um, no, I--

MAGGIE Well, you can't be a doctor - they've all gone home. We're in the hands of the sadists and the diapers.

MORTE The what?

MAGGIE Nurses and interns. Look, It's late and I'm a bit too knackered to abuse you properly, so tell me who you bleeding think you are so you can sod off!

MORTE [trying to get his spooky back on] I'm... death.

MAGGIE Pull the other one - it spits.

MORTE No, really. I'm... death.

MAGGIE Always thought you'd be Welsh. So what are you doing swotting around here? I'm not dead. The infernal pinging thing says so.

MORTE But you are old [spooky] ...and dying.

MAGGIE [getting mad] So they keep fucking telling me, but I've never been one for following orders. If you're really the angel of death, why are you wearing such a for-fucks-sake ugly suit? And where's your bleeding scythe? Can't be death without a jolly great scythe, can you, now?

MORTE Oh, please - this is the 21st century.

MAGGIE First piece of sense to come out of your festering gob, you git. Now bugger off - I'm knackered, but I'm not ready for the tip yet.

MORTE You will see me again tomorrow.

MAGGIE Tell you what - you come back during visiting hours and I'll get my bastard son-in-law to drop in. All I have to do is wave money anywhere within ten kilometers of my Jemma and that bastard appears like bleeding magic.

MORTE But I--

MAGGIE Him you can take, with all my heartfelts. If you're not going to make yourself useful, though, you can piss off and stay there.

SOUND FISHES OUT THE PHONE AND DIALS

MORTE [affronted, huffy] You're not supposed to have a mobile in the hospital.

MAGGIE Fuck off. [into phone] Spike?

MORTE You have a friend named Spike?

MAGGIE [into phone] No, that's not a cop - just some prat trying to sell me life insurance. Are you Spike?

MORTE You're really going to just ignore me?

MAGGIE Hold on. [hand over phone] Sorry, didn't mean to leave you hanging like that. You're right, I should finish with you before making my calls. So if you would kindly FUCK OFF? Good. [back to phone] God, these bleeding salesmen. They're like some damn pet pekingese - no balls but still won't stop humping once they get a grip on your leg.

MORTE Well, I- I-I- never!

MAGGIE Spike? Great - what would it take to get some help with a problem?

SOUND MORTE'S FEET STORM OUT, DOOR OPENS AND SHUTS.

MAGGIE Nice! Hold that thought, and I'll ring you back tomorrow - that twat's just gone to grass on me to the warden.

MUSIC

AMB HOSPITAL ROOM - NOT SO URGENT. NO PINGING THING.

SOUND TAP ON DOOR, THEN DOOR OPENS WITHOUT WAITING

SOUND WHEELCHAIR BEING PUSHED IN

JEMMA [weak, hopeful] Hello? [down] Mum.

MAGGIE [trying to be calm and quiet] Jemma.

NURSEY Here we all are then.

SOUND DOOR SWINGS SHUT

NURSEY Ready for a nice litle family chat.

MAGGIE Just ignore her. [deep breath] They say you're going home soon.

JEMMA I'm all right. [she's not]

MAGGIE I'll see to it, someone drops around and keeps an eye on you.

JEMMA I'll be careful. [not very convincing] Won't walk into any more... doors.

MAGGIE [getting a bit annoyed] Won't walk into any more fists, more like.

JEMMA [upset, "not in front of the nurse"] Mum!

MAGGIE She's heard worse. Haven't you, snowball?

NURSEY [affirming, acerbic] From you alone.

MAGGIE [snort of laughter, then serious] So, when can I kill him?

JEMMA What?

MAGGIE That cocksucker husband of yours.

JEMMA Mother!

MAGGIE You can't say you don't want him dead. Bertha keeps pissing on and on about my hospital record - you're leagues ahead of me. Between the times he's knocked you up and the times he's knocked you down, it's amazing they don't just name a suite for you and give you your own key.

JEMMA [crying] He doesn't mean to--

MAGGIE [losing it] Doesn't mean to! What, he was cleaning his swotting great fist and it went off!? Or the other part - dearie, you get preggers every time that arsehole even wanks in your direction. You'd be much better off without him.

JEMMA He loves me.

MAGGIE Oh, god - we are not having this discussion again.

JEMMA And we have eight children to look after - nine, soon.

MAGGIE [softer again] It's all right then?

JEMMA [barely able to talk] Yes.

MAGGIE Jems, that son of a syphilitic whore punched you - punched a pregnant woman, let alone a pregnant woman he claims to care for - in the bloody stomach.

JEMMA [breaks into tears]

NURSEY Oh, look at the time. Come along Maggie, musn't be late on your pills!

MAGGIE [yelling as they leave] Get it through your sodding thick skull - He DID MEAN IT!

MUSIC

SOUND NIGHT, PINGING, ETC.

SOUND MAGGIE MUNCHING ON SOMETHING

SOUND DOOR OPENS, SLOW FOOSTEPS (two sets)

SOUND PLASTIC BAG RATTLES AS IT'S HIDDEN

MAGGIE [sucking stuff out of her teeth] Who's there?

SOUND CURTAIN PULLED ASIDE

MAGGIE [disgusted noise] Oh, it's just you. Piss off.

MORTE I told you I would return.

MAGGIE And take my soul blah blah blah. I have you sussed, you wanker.

MORTE Sussed? I already told you - I'm death.

MAGGIE Right. And I have a daughter who would like nothing more than to have her dear old mum babbling on about meeting death in the flesh - all so she can have me declared non compos and shoved away in some shithole of a home while she sends all my odds and sods to auction "on my behalf". Piss off, and tell her she can piss off too.

SATAN [explosive laugh]

MORTE See? I told you.

MAGGIE Told me what? You're not making sense, the curtain is laughing like a drain, and I'm not that stoned.

SOUND CURTAIN OPENS FURTHER WITH A DRAMATIC SWEEP

MORTE She surely is the most frightful woman I've seen in years.

SATAN I like it.

MAGGIE And who are you supposed to be? Revival of the Rocky Horror show?

SATAN [laughs harder]

MORTE He's the devil.

MAGGIE Well I knew he wasn't a doctor - not dressed like that. [sigh]

SATAN [laughing subsides]

MAGGIE Are you done? I wouldn't want to waste a good insult on you when you can't hear it properly.

SATAN [chuckles, but stops himself] Go on.

MAGGIE Dressed like that, you look like Sir Elton John vomited all over you.

SATAN [chuckles]

MAGGIE And I suspect that'd be rare, since he's probably got a strong gag reflex.

SATAN [a moment, then a gasp as he gets it, then uproarious laughter]

MAGGIE Told you it was a good one. [joins in]

MORTE I don't get it.

MAGGIE Oh, god. You need to loosen the fuck up. [evil chuckle] Here. Have a brownie.

MORTE A brownie? Ooh. Chocolate is my weakness.

SOUND RATTLE OF PLASTIC

MAGGIE Death and chocolate - imagine that. How about you, Gary Glitter?

SATAN Well, if you're offering.

[They munch for a minute]

MORTE Interesting [licks his lips, speculatively] ...aftertaste.

MAGGIE Old family recipe. The maniac bakes them for me. Don't tell the nurse - she's already thirteen stone.

MORTE [snorts] Oh goodness!

SATAN [giggles uncontrollably]

SOUND CELL PHONE RINGS

MAGGIE Scuse me for a minute, will you?

[they murmur assent]

SOUND PHONE ACTIVATED

MAGGIE Yeah? Is this Spike? Then who the bloody hell-- [pleased] Really?

MORTE [confiding, but loopy] Shouldn't have mobile in hospital.

SATAN Might call for help?

[they both laugh]

MAGGIE You up for it, then? More the merrier, I always say. [beat] Oh, dead may be overkill, but I wouldn't shed any tears. Mostly I'd prefer him unable to fuck, or walk for at least a year - no, never again on the first - can you manage that?

SATAN [awed] What? Did I hear you--?

MAGGIE Shut it. [on phone] Candy striper. You know, one of those new homosexual ones. [back on topic] So, you can handle it?

SATAN I'll have you know--

MAGGIE [covers phone] Everyone knows you swing both ways - the devil can fuck with anyone.

SATAN Well [trying not to laugh], if you put it that way [bursts into hilarity again]

MAGGIE Great - when? [upset] Weekend? Not sooner? They'll be sending her home tomorrow!

MORTE I thought you were talking about a man? Who you don't want to be able to--

MAGGIE Fine. [annoyed] I'll try and get out of here too, then shall I? No I bloody well can't talk them into letting her stay--

MORTE --to [uncomfortable] "do it"--

SATAN Just say "fuck."

MORTE [affronted] No.

SATAN Come on, I dare you.

MAGGIE Shut up or piss off. I'm almost finished. [into phone] Saturday night, then? Call me Thursday, same time, and I'll say where. Brilliant.

SOUND PHONE OFF

MORTE So is it?

MAGGIE Is it what, arse-face?

MORTE Is it a man or a woman?

SATAN He means who are you talking on the phone about?

MAGGIE I've got some friends of a--

MORTE --questionable moral character?

MAGGIE Well, they do call themselves the Bastards of Carnage, so that might be a clue - Anyway, I've arranged will ... have a chat with ... my daughter's oozing sore of a so-called husband.

MORTE And you don't want him to be able to--

MAGGIE And they won't be as kind as a vetrinarian.

SATAN Well! [lip smacking noises] Have you any more of those brownies?

MUSIC

AMB MAGGIE'S ROOM

KEV I hear they're letting you go?

MAGGIE They have to get sick of me eventually.

KEV Are you doing all right? Really?

MAGGIE Healthy as a horse. [sighs] One of those swayback cartoon nags with glue factory stamped on them. You know what your evil bitch of a mother is trying to do to me?

KEV Would it be so bad?

MAGGIE Et tu, wanker?

KEV No! I'm really just curious.

MAGGIE Well, quite apart from the horrors of loss of control over your life, the fact that they will likely frown on my extensive collection of filthy artwork, and having to obey people whose nappies I might have changed, it's the piss.

KEV Piss?

MAGGIE At your age, piss is still romantic. Getting yourself well and truly pissed, pissing in the snow, nasty piss-scented alleys where you buy happy little packages - piss hasn't lost its shine.

KEV Oh?

MAGGIE By the time you get old, piss is the thing you fear the most. Your own, someone else's - fuck death, fuck the devil, if there was a sodding god of piss we'd all be sacrificing virgin sheep to him just to make him stay the fuck away. That's what those places are, Kev. [solemn] They are where piss goes to die. The smell, the damp, the feel in the air. As long as I can still hold my water and get myself in and out of the bogatory, it's my bleeding right to look after myself.

KEV [serious] All right.

MAGGIE [fierce again] Next time you feel yourself getting curious, darling beast, just swot on down to the crystal lights retirement complex - you don't even have to go inside, just stand downwind and have a good long whiff.

MUSIC

AMB NIGHTTIME AGAIN

MAGGIE [anxious sigh, then fretting] What is the bloody holdup? I said--

SOUND PHONE BUZZES, TURNED ON

MAGGIE Finally! Took your goddamn time, didn't you? [beat] So Jemma phoned you - God, how I spewed forth such a spineless cow, I've no idea. [beat, then disgusted] Oh, right, the bloody money - that's the only thing you give a shit about, isn't it?

MAGGIE Don't bother, you mealy mouthed two faced prick! I know just how much you care for your wife - I've seen the sodding medical charts. [beat] Blah Blah Blah. Blah Blah Blah. Course you have a problem - you're still fucking breathing. I am planning on fixing that, you know. [beat] [chuckles nastily] Wouldn't you like to know? I'll tell you when, though - give you something to stew about, you arsehole - Saturday night. You'd best watch your step, cause you may not realize it, but I have friends in low, low places, and they just love an excuse to beat some bastard to holy fuck and back! [beat] What do you mean, how are they going to find you? They're probably already watching you. Run if you want, but unless you find some way to get me first, they will get you.

SOUND PHONE SHUT OFF

SATAN Was that really a good idea?

SOUND QUIET FOOTSTEPS APPROACH

MAGGIE What, impressed?

SATAN Yes and no. I like your intensity, but you shouldn't have warned him.

MAGGIE Betcha I know what I'm doing.

SATAN [seriously] Let me think about it.

MAGGIE So, what's the pitch tonight? And where's the undertaker?

SATAN He's a very busy entity. He's already wasted rather a lot of time trying to impress you.

MAGGIE Why impress me - isn't he fucking all-powerful death? Doesn't he just whisk people off and bobs your uncle, you're hip deep in the bleeding river styx?

SATAN Styx? Well, I'm impressed--

MAGGIE [dismissively] Beer mat trivia. So it's just you and me tonight, is it? Pity - I haven't had a really good threesome since 1968.

SATAN [chortle]

MAGGIE Right, laughing boy. Either you dropped in for more of the maniac's brownies, or you want something from me, and I don't fancy myself so fucking entertaining that I'd drag you away from the torture telly.

SATAN Torture?

MAGGIE Bleeding heart chat shows and those so-called game shows where people swallow foul things that haven't even taken them to dinner and a picture first.

SATAN [sigh] Bloody hell - it's getting so hard to frighten people these days. You say you'll stick a red-hot poker up the bum and half say "been there, done that".

MAGGIE Well, I've been and done around in my time. Are you planning to try and scare the crap out of me?

SATAN Really, I just follow Morty around, since once he lets on he's coming for someone, it's usually a piece of piss to get them to agree to sell their soul...

MAGGIE [bark of laughter] A bit like when a bloody great hurricane hits and all the bastard insurance salesmen clean up selling storm coverage?

SATAN A bit. So. You selling?

MAGGIE Blunt, aren't you?

SATAN I feel we've gone a bit beyond a sales pitch here.

MAGGIE So? I sell my soul and you - what? Give me my greatest wish? I assume immortality is only on the high shelf - the one you can't ever knock down enough sodding bottles to win.

SATAN What do you want?

MAGGIE [thinks, then] No. Two reasons. First, I still believe you're some starving artist Bertha paid to come round and chat me up. Second, I might have a mouth like a public urinal, but I still read my classics. Monkey's Paw? Nothing good ever comes from a bad deal.

SATAN It's not my fault if people don't take time to read the small print.

MAGGIE You ponder enough, there's always a way to bugger the customer. If nothing else - just send the damn thing round unassembled, with instructions in fucking Parsi.

SATAN [laughing again] I do like you.

MAGGIE Can't say you're the worst bastard I've had to deal with in my whole sodding life.

SATAN Tell you what - just to prove that I am what I claim to be, how about a freebie?

MAGGIE I draw the line at giving up my favors for anything less than a fiver.

SATAN [chuckling] No, I mean I'll do something for you. No strings. Cross my heart.

MAGGIE You're not planning to bugger me on this?

SATAN What would it get me, until I get a signature on the dotted line? It can't be anything huge - I'll not cure cancer or feed the world's hungry--

MAGGIE Sod the hungry. Too many bloody people clogging up the sewer we call the world anyway.

SATAN --or make you healthy.

MAGGIE [grim] Yeah, right.

SATAN Something short term and simple.

MAGGIE I got it. And if you do it, I promise to take under consideration that you might actually be the bleeding king of the underworld. Right?

SATAN Ask and it shall be done.

MAGGIE Right. Now you have to wait until I say "done" before you go swotting off and do this - I want every bloody condition met.

SATAN [very serious] Very well.

MAGGIE With no harm to either of them, in the immediate or long term, I want something to happen that will keep Jemma in hospital until Sunday. Can you do me that? Suspicious skin condition, something - and this is the part that if you fuck me I will find a way to rip your bollocks off - it has to be something that won't hurt the baby. Right, uh... [thinking, then] Fuck. Done.

SATAN [dead serious] I see. Agreed. [beat, then a bit hesitant] You wouldn't happen to have any of those brownies, would you?

MUSIC

SOUND WHEELING DOWN A HOSPITAL HALL

NURSEY Doctor says you're just about well enough to leave.

MAGGIE [snarl] Lovely.

NURSEY Probably tomorrow - just in time for the weekend.

MAGGIE [snarl] Can't think of anything that would brighten my day more.

SOUND DOOR OPENS

BERTHA Oh! Here she is.

MAGGIE Oh, bollocks, who decided to shit all over my parade?

BERTHA Mother!

MAGGIE Technically. Can you at least keep your festering gob shut until this pelican gets me settled? It's humiliating enough to be jumbled around like someone's sodding laundry, but to have an audience is just the bloody capper.

BERTHA Mother, this is too important to wait.

MAGGIE Fine. Talk.

BERTHA I brought you the brochures--

MAGGIE [somewhat muffled] Talk over. Fuck off.

BERTHA Mother! You must admit you need care. You can't--

MAGGIE I can! You'll never get an agreement from me to being stuck in your fucking P-O-W camp, and if you even think about trying to prove me incompetent, I will change my will and put Jemma in charge.

BERTHA [indignant] Jemma! She doesn't --- She has too many... children... to look after!

MAGGIE [smug] And a bastard husband who will go through the bulk of my money in a week or two, slick as snot.

BERTHA Besides, Jemma's going to be a bit longer here herself. Some weird rash has cropped up that they want to keep for observation.

MAGGIE [at a loss] Really? [swallows, then her beligerance returns] Devil only knows how that happened. Right. Now, I'm tired and you need to PISS OFF.

BERTHA This is not over!

SOUND FEET STORM OUT, DOOR SLAMS

NURSEY And what's wrong with a little care?

MAGGIE You.

MUSIC

SOUND NIGHTTIME

MAGGIE All right, you pouffy bastard - come out.

SATAN [tsks] Names?

MAGGIE Endearments, darling beast. So what did you do to my idiot daughter?

SATAN You asked for a skin disease - I gave you one. Shouldn't even be much scarring.

MAGGIE Scars she's used to. I'll send her a bloody great tub of aloe vera. Or will it to her. I meant to ask, when can I expect another visit from lord stick up his bum?

SATAN Death? About a week. Maybe less.

MAGGIE And then--?

SATAN [final, agreeing] And then. You ready to sign on?

MAGGIE I'll read the bloody fine print first.

SATAN [chuckling, evilly] You may not have time - there's a helluva lot of fine print.

MAGGIE [chukles evilly back] Hand it over.

SOUND HUGE SHEAF OF PAPER HITS THE TABLE WITH A THUD

MAGGIE Bugger me!

SATAN There may be an easier way.

MAGGIE Than buggering me? What's that, then?

SATAN A bet.

MAGGIE A bet?

SATAN You suggested it yourself last night. I asked if you know what you're doing, and you--

MAGGIE [considering, then quietly] I spoke very loosely.

SATAN The devil is in the details. [laughs]

MAGGIE How do I prove I won, and what do I get?

SATAN What you get - hmm - I'll get Morty off your back, for, say, ten years?

MAGGIE Is that all?

SATAN Who do you think I am, bloody Oprah?

MAGGIE That has to come with two things--

SATAN I said--

MAGGIE I have to be in at least as good health as I am now the entire time - no fucking coma for ten years - and abso-fucking-lutely no bloody nursing home. I'll live on the kerb before I'll--

SATAN Done.

MAGGIE And if I lose?

SATAN I get your soul - immediately.

MAGGIE So the bet is I know what I'm doing - how do I prove I won?

SATAN What are you trying to accomplish?

MAGGIE Oh, no - I'm not giving you any chance to play silly beggars with my plans. Suffice to say that after Saturday night I will still be the one smiling?

SATAN Hmm - give me a few more of those brownies and you have a deal.

MUSIC

SOUND DOOR OPENS, WHEELCHAIR ENTERS

MAGGIE Jems?

JEMMA [weak, but better than before] Yes?

MAGGIE They say you're to stay here a few more days.

JEMMA It's this bloody rash. [itching noise]

NURSEY Now now, you know you're not supposed to--

MAGGIE [weary] Bugger off Moby Dick. Jems, I'm going home now, they say, and - uh - this weekend should be bloody interesting.

JEMMA [dull] Of course, mum. You have someone to look in on you? Bertha?

MAGGIE Only if I want to sign my away my soul. [laughs uncomfortably] Nah, I've talked Kev into roughing it with me for the weekend.

JEMMA [a bit disbelieving] Oh. Yeah. Good.

MUSIC

KEV [muffled, nervous, on the phone] Of course this is her bloody mobile! She's asleep. [beat] Fuck no, I won't! You can haul your own bleeding carcass in here and do your own dirty work. [beat, sarcastic] Ri-i-ight. No, you don't understand - I'm rather fond of the old bag-- [beat] Well, yeah, there is a toady element to it, but we get on, gran and me. I'd just as soon have her around a while longer. [beat] Ain't impossible, innit? She is meeting her solicitor next-- [beat] Oh, you didn't know that yet, did you? [beat, then cowed] Y‑yeah, I know-- No! No, don't go to the cops. I'll-- [beaten] I'll leave latch up, then, shall I?

MUSIC [very ominous]

SOUND DOOR OPENS VERY CAREFULLY. SOUND OF GENTLE WHEEZY BREATHING. SLOW CREAKING FOOTFALLS.

TED [muttering] Stupid bloody old cow. Have my guts for garters will she? Hah!

SOUND CREEPING GETS CLOSER TO THE BREATHING.

TED Once we've got your fucking money, you old bitch, Jemma'n me'll be just bloody fine.

SOUND LIGHT SWITCH TURNED ON

MAGGIE [casual, off in a corner] Oh, right. Tickety-bloody-boo.

TED [whirling] You insane bitch! [unsure] Wait! If you're over there in the shadows, then who's in the sodding bed?

SOUND BEDCLOTHES FLUNG BACK

KEV [flamey] 'elo, luv!

TED What kind of bloody game are you playing?

MAGGIE Hmm. Red Rover. Red Rover, red rover, send the donkey's scrotum over.

TED Two to one? The mummy and the weasel. I can take the both of you! [yells and runs at her]

SOUND RUNNING FEET, BROUGHT TO A SUDDEN HALT

TED [urk]

SOUND BODY DROP

SPIKE [chuckles nastily] No, me old son, I think you've got that ass-backwards. Hasn't he, lads?

SOUND DOORS OPEN, SEVERAL SETS OF HEAVY FEET ENTER

BIKERS [agreeing noises, laughs.]

SOUND SLAP OF FIST INTO HAND, CHAIN RATTLES

KEV You mind, gran? Not my thing.

MAGGIE [kindly] Nah, go ahead, you ponce. I'll be right here. Better than a jolly great football riot.

KEV [off] Yeah, but guess who gets to hose out your kip?

SOUND FEET SCUTTLE OUT OF ROOM

TED [panicking] Someone'll hear!

MAGGIE Not bloody likely. I made dead cert of that. Amazing what free dinner coupons will do to get people to vacate for the night. Course, police'll chalk them up to the same burglars who broke in here - luckily Kev and I stopped in for dinner with Bertha.

KEV [yelling from off] We had a sodding flat on the way.

MAGGIE [threatening] Doesn't that just take the biscuit? Now Ted. If you take this like a good little mountain of elephant dung, quietly and repentant-like, they might leave you alive.

SOUND PUNCHING COMMENCES, associated noises from the bikers

TED [grunts] Hey! Why--?

MAGGIE [incensed] Why? Hold up. [starting low, and mounting] Three broken wrists - that's why. A cracked fucking pelvis - that's why. A broken collarbone - that's why! Thirty-bloody-seven sodding black eyes, and that's only the ones I counted myself - that's why! Punching your fucking pregnant wife in her stomach [ragged breath, then almost a whisper] That. Is why.

SOUND PUNCHING COMMENCES AGAIN, associated noises from the bikers

MUSIC

SOUND HOSPITAL HALLWAY, ANNOUNCEMENTS, WHEELCHAIR APPROACHES

NURSEY [distasteful, but trying to hide it] Oh, goodness, are you back?

MAGGIE No fear, yeti. We're just visiting, aren't we?

KEV Right. We're family.

NURSEY That's lovely. Well, just a minute then. He's not really up to much. Poor fellow.

SOUND DOOR OPENS, PINGING MACHINES INSIDE

MAGGIE I know. [pouring on the melodrama] Apparently he was coming by to bring some flowers - since I'd just got out of hospital - and surprised some burglars or something. [sounding almost teary] But for the grace of the almighty, that could have been us - couldn't it, Kev?

KEV Worth every bite of mum's pork au poivre.

MAGGIE [sharp] Shh. [teary] Tragic.

NURSEY [softening] See, I knew you had it in you.

SOUND DOOR SHUTS

MAGGIE If only she had it in her more often, she wouldn't be such a tight-ass knicker-twisting sodding git.

TED [muffled by tubes and such] uh?

MAGGIE Good night. What a mess.

TED [alarmed] uh!

MAGGIE Don't call reinforcemants just yet - we're merely here to deliver a message.

TED [shuddering] um?

MAGGIE It boils down to this, my evil bastard sonofabitch in law. Quite apart from being ready to kill you should anything untoward happen to either of us here, my friends plan to visit anything you do to Jemma upon you. And I do mean anything. If you get anywhere near her, even with a freindly weapon, you better be ready to take every single bleeding stroke you give.

SOUND WHEELCHAIR ROLLS AWAY

MAGGIE I'll send round some vaseline.

SOUND DOOR OPENS

MUSIC

SOUND TELLY ON LOW, MAGGIE TAPPING FURIOUSLY AWAY ON COMPUTER

MAGGIE Bastards! Fucking evil empire bastards! They just wait until I'm in hospital, and change the rates on me again!

SATAN [clears throat]

MAGGIE One minute - I have to update my sodding bid structure. Again.

SATAN What?

MAGGIE Business. And... there. Good for now.

SATAN Well, um. [a bit cowed] The bet.

MAGGIE You have to admit, I got my bloody way.

SATAN Yes. Very well too.

MAGGIE So I win, do I?

SATAN Oh... yes. You're very impressive. I'd almost offer you a job myself.

MAGGIE Come back in ten years, [fondly] you ponce. So what, do we shake on it or somesuch?

SATAN Frankly, I'm rather fond of my fingers.

MAGGIE [laughs] You have my oath I won't bite... This time.

SATAN Right, then.

SOUND HESITATE, THEN A HANDSHAKE

MAGGIE Go on then. I'm far too bloody busy to be swotting around all day with the likes of you.

SOUND TAPS A FEW KEYS

MAGGIE [to computer] What does that wanker bloody mean he forgot to pay me? [aside] There's some brownies there. Drop round any time. [back to computer, then fading out] Dammit! Dammit it all to bloody buggery arse-face fucking donkey scrotum hell!!!

CLOSER

OLIVIA Now that you know how to find us, you'll have to come back. Maybe next week? Don't be a stranger - we have enough of those already...

Newsflash! Women turn green in small community! Strange growths everywhere! What could be behind it?

Adapted by Julie Hoverson from a story by Saki (H.H. Munro)

When the Christmas rush takes shoppers off to the big city, how do you get them to stick to the local shops?

A lovely tale of viral marketing!

[Saki was often way ahead of his time!]

Announcer - Jennifer Dixon Mr. Scarrick - John Lingard Jimmy - Will Watt Lucy - Tanja Milojevic [Lightning Bolt Theater] Boy - Reynaud LeBoeuf Man - Anthony D.P. Mann [Horror Etc.] Miss Fritten - Robyn Keyes Mrs. Greyes - Jennifer Dixon Mrs. Gordon - Judith Moore Gloria - Beverly Poole Other women - Julie Hoverson

Sound and mastering by Julie Hoverson

Music by Kevin McLeod (Incompetech.com) Picture by lucias_clay, found with help from Bill Jones.

************************************************

Quail Seed

Cast:

• Announcer
• Scarrick, shopkeeper (M50s)
• Jimmy, Assistant (M20s)
• Lucy, Jimmy's girl (F20s)
• Boy (M20s)
• Man/Beard (M30s)
• Miss Fritten (F30s)
• Greyes (F30s)
• Gordon (F30s)
• Miss Jones (F30s)
• Miss Smith (F30s)
• Gloria (F20s)
• Lipping (F30s)

SAKI OPENING

MUSIC

SCENE 1. SCARRICK'S SUNDRIES (SHOP)

SOUND SHOP DOOR, BELL, FOOTSTEPS

LUCY Hello? Helloooo?

JIMMY [close] Morning, Lucy!

LUCY [startled gasp] Jimmy! There you are. Bit... empty in here, isn't it?

JIMMY [heavy sigh] A bit.

LUCY But where are all the Christmas shoppers?

JIMMY Shh! Whatever you do, don't ask that in front of Mr. Scarrick. You'll quite set him off.

LUCY Oh!

JIMMY It's all right, he's out at the moment.

LUCY [impressed] He left you in charge?

JIMMY [heavy sigh, morose] Only in the certainty that there won't be a stampede on our services.

LUCY That bad, eh?

JIMMY Yeah. Quite.

SOUND DOOR, BELL, FOOTSTEPS

MISS SMITH Hello?

SOUND QUICK STEPS

JIMMY Yes? How may I assist you?

MISS SMITH [nervous] Oh, I was -um- just looking for a railway timetable? I'm going up to the city-- [breaks off]

JIMMY Sorry. Clean out. Perhaps next week.

MISS SMITH Ah. Thank you.

SOUND FOOTSTEPS, BELL DOOR

LUCY You might have made a sale!

JIMMY She just wanted to look.

LUCY You don't know that.

JIMMY [bitter admission] She's the fourth today. Everyone would rather take the train to town and shop in a big department store than [quoting] bother to take advantage of the convenience--

SOUND DOOR BELL

MISS JONES Hello?

JIMMY ...and that's five.

MUSIC

SCENE 2. PUB

SCARRICK The outlook is not encouraging for us smaller businesses.

SOUND POURING DRINK

SCARRICK These big concerns are offering all sorts of attractions to the shopping public which we couldn't afford to imitate, even on a small scale-- reading-rooms and play-rooms and gramophones and Heaven knows what.

BOY [normal, commiserating] People like shiny objects.

SCARRICK And they don't care to buy half a pound of sugar nowadays unless they can listen to Harry Lauder and have the latest Australian cricket scores ticked off before their eyes.

MAN Seems like quite a trip for sugar.

SCARRICK With the big Christmas stock we've got in, we ought to keep half a dozen assistants hard at work. But as it is my nephew Jimmy and myself can pretty well attend to it ourselves. In fact, I've left him in charge. I've never done that before.

BOY I'm sure he'll be fine.

SCARRICK [drinks] It's a nice stock of goods, too. I could run it all off in a few weeks time, but there's no chance of that--not unless the London line was to get snowed up for a fortnight before Christmas.

MAN [musing] How you gonna keep them home on the farm?

MUSIC

SCENE 3. SCARRICK'S

SOUND SHOP DOOR, BELL

MRS. GREYES --so tedious, but there it is, and what else is one to do?

MISS FRITTEN We shall simply wait for the next--

SCARRICK May I help you ladies?

MRS. GREYES Oh! [evasive] Really, we just stopped in to see about --- um, about--

MISS FRITTEN Bootlaces.

MRS. GREYES Bootlaces! Yes! I've been in dire need of some--

SCARRICK [hearty] Of course. Over on the left wall, near the back.

MRS. GREYES Oh, yes, of course. [whispering] You knew he'd try and sell us something if we came in here! Bootlaces indeed. I already have more laces than boots!

MISS FRITTEN At least if we do make a purchase, they're small enough to carry when we go to--

MRS. GREYES Shh!

SCARRICK Finding everything?

MRS. GREYES Oh, yes. This is the best ... um... anchovy paste. Just what I was looking for.

MISS FRITTEN Just lovely!

SCARRICK Perhaps you ladies could help me. I was thinking of adding a little entertainment to the shop.

MRS. GREYES Oh?

SCARRICK I did have a sort of idea of engaging Miss Luffcombe to give recitations during afternoons; she made a great hit at the Post Office entertainment with her rendering of 'Little Beatrice's Resolve'.

MISS FRITTEN [very uncertain] Oh, that would be ...just ... lovely.

SOUND DOOR OPENS, BELL RINGS ODDLY

SCARRICK What?

SOUND ODD FOOTSTEPS ENTER

SCARRICK [excusing himself] Your pardon.

SOUND SCARRICK GOES TO THE COUNTER

MRS. GREYES [whispered] Perhaps we should just do our shopping here.

MISS FRITTEN But I'm in my best hat!

MRS. GREYES Shh! Shh! Look at that!

MISS FRITTEN What an odd looking boy. Brown as a nut, but we've not had sun in weeks!

MRS. GREYES And those clothes. Like something out of the Arabian nights!

SOUND CLANG

BOY [accented now] Six pomegranates, please, and a packet of quail seed.

MISS FRITTEN What's the bowl for?

MRS. GREYES To carry the pomegranates?

MISS FRITTEN Why not a string bag?

MRS. GREYES Allergies? Shh!

SCARRICK [business as usual] Here you are. We have some lovely pomegranates.

MISS FRITTEN He doesn't even look surprised!

MRS. GREYES The boy must have been here before.

SOUND COIN SKITTERING, CAUGHT

BOY The wine and figs were not paid for yesterday. Keep what is over of the money for our future purchases.

SCARRICK [formal and serious] As you wish.

SOUND BOY LEAVES, DOOR SHUTS

SOUND SKITTERING OF LADIES FEET

MISS FRITTEN [to Scarrick, hinting] A very strange-looking boy?

SCARRICK [final] A foreigner, I believe.

MRS. GREYES Does he shop here often? Surely there can't be much call for ...quail seed... at this time of year.

SCARRICK It takes all sorts.

SOUND DOOR OPENS

SOUND HEAVY OMINOUS FOOTSTEPS

MISS FRITTEN [gasp]

MRS. GREYES Oh! [covering her consternation] Oh, I forgot those bootlaces! [hissed] Come on!

SOUND THEY SKITTER AWAY

MAN [accented] I wish for a pound and a half of the best coffee you have.

SCARRICK [wary] Certainly sir.

MRS. GREYES Look at that beard!

MISS FRITTEN Like a comedy Russian.

MRS. GREYES No, more like an ancient Assyrian.

MAN [suspicious] Has a dark-faced boy been here buying pomegranates?

SCARRICK Can't say that I've seen anyone like that.

MRS. GREYES Oh! [muffles self]

MISS FRITTEN [whispered] How could he!

SCARRICK [offhanded] We have a few pomegranates in stock, but there has been no real demand for them.

MAN My servant will fetch the coffee, as usual.

SOUND COIN SKITTERS, HEAVY FEET START TO WALK AWAY, THEN STOP

MAN [very importantly] Have you, perhaps, any quail seed?

SCARRICK [unhesitating] No. we don't stock it.

GREYES AND FRITTEN [gasp]

SOUND FEET WALK AWAY

MRS. GREYES [whispered] What will he deny next?

MISS FRITTEN And I always believed Mr. Scarrick to be such a truthful man. Heavens! He just presided at a lecture on Savonarola.

SOUND DOOR OPENS AND CLOSES

MRS. GREYES Don't let's bother about the 3.12. Let's dash, and talk this out at Laura Lipping's

MISS FRITTEN Perhaps we should buy a few things first. Since we're here.

MUSIC

SCENE 4. TEA

MISS FRITTEN [recounting lusciously] Turning up the deep astrakhan collar of his long coat, the stranger swept out of the shop, with the air of a Satrap proroguing a Sanhedrim.

MRS. LIPPING Do Satraps prorogue?

MISS FRITTEN [coldly superior] Have you ever seen one that didn't?

GLORIA I don't even know what a Sanhedrim is. Is it a dance?

MISS FRITTEN It is a simile and hardly matters. Or do I mean an allegory?

MRS. GORDON And the boy?

MRS. GREYES I should have though him Greek, but after seeing that beard--

MRS. LIPPING They could have been unrelated.

MISS FRITTEN Unrelated? And both asking for "quail seed"? Mark my words. There's something afoot.

MRS. GREYES What bothers me most is this unprecedented streak of falsity in our local grocer!

GLORIA I've never known Mr. Scarrick to prevaricate like that before!

MRS. GREYES It's the influence of that artist that took the flat above the shop. Mark my words. [importantly] Bohemian.

MRS. GORDON [tragically] I shall never again be able to believe what he tells me about the absence of colouring matter in the jam.

MUSIC

SCENE 5. SCARRICK'S

SOUND DOOR, BELL

SOUND BROOM

LUCY Jimmy?

JIMMY Yeah. Here.

LUCY Goodness, it looks like a tornado touched down.

JIMMY Fabulous, isn't it?

LUCY But, what happened?

JIMMY This afternoon, from tea onwards, we had a constant stream of shoppers.

LUCY Is this something to do with the odd individuals who may or may not have been in this afternoon?

JIMMY [overly innocent] Whomever do you refer to?

LUCY Come on! It's all over town. People talked about it at tea, and more people talked about it at supper. I expect they're all talking about it over Bridge even as we speak. The dark young man and the Beard.

JIMMY Sounds a bit like a music hall act.

LUCY [speculatively] Yes... yes, it does....

MUSIC

SCENE 6. SCARRICK'S

[MANY CUSTOMERS]

MISS SMITH Is this the freshest jar of pickles?

JIMMY Miss? I suppose so.

MISS SMITH It looks a bit dusty.

JIMMY That would be my fault--

SCARRICK [commanding] Jimmy!

JIMMY So sorry, must jump.

MISS FRITTEN [whispered] Do you think they will return?

MRS. GREYES I have it on good authority someone's rented that house at the far end of Plummergen.

MISS FRITTEN But why should they come all this way to shop?

MRS. GREYES [knowing] Plummergen drapers don't stock quail seed.

MISS FRITTEN [getting it] Ah!

SOUND REGISTER NOISE

SCARRICK That will be three shillings and four pence.

SOUND COINS

MRS. LIPPING I'm looking for something interesting for a savory. Have you any, any‑‑

SOUND GENERAL HUSH

MRS. LIPPING [nervous] --any, um--

SCARRICK [as if nothing is amiss] I have some pickled olives. Imported from turkey.

MRS. LIPPING Yes, anything.

SOUND JAR SET DOWN, CASH REGISTER

SOUND JABBER BEGINS AGAIN

SOUND DOOR OPENS, BELL, JABBER SLOWLY DIES AWAY.

SILENCE

SOUND BOY WALKS IN.

SOUND BOWL SET DOWN.

SCARRICK [normal] What can I get for you today?

BOY I require a pound of honey.

SOUND BREATH BEING LET OUT ALL OVER

BOY and - [quieter] and a packet of quail seed.

SOUND GENERAL INTAKE OF BREATH, GIGGLE QUICKLY MUFFLED

SCARRICK Very good, sir.

SOUND CONVERSATIONS, FORCED LAUGHTER, BUT MUTED, LISTENING

MISS FRITTEN [excited whisper] We might be living in the Arabian Nights.

MRS. GREYES Hush! Listen!

SOUND THINGS PLACED INTO BOWL, BOWL REMOVED, BOY STARTS TO LEAVE.

SOUND QUICK FOOTSTEPS

JIMMY [hurried, fraught with meaning] We have some very fine Jaffa oranges. Around behind here.

BOY [gasps]

SOUND QUICK SHUFFLE OF FEET

SOUND DOOR OPENS, MAN STRIDES IN.

SOUND GASPS

SCARRICK [unperturbed] What may I get for you today, Sir?

MAN A pound of dates and a tin of the best Smyrna halva.

MISS FRITTEN Halva? What is that?

MRS. GREYES It comes from Smyrna - that's figs, isn't it, Smyrna is?

GLORIA Who would want dates AND figs?

MRS. LIPPING Hush.

SCARRICK There you are.

MAN Hmm [evaluating noise] Yes.

SOUND COINS DROPPED

MAN Has the dark-faced boy, of whom I spoke yesterday, been here to-day?

GLORIA [stifled squeak of excitement]

SOUND [shushing all round]

SCARRICK We've had rather more people than usual in the shop to-day... but I can't recall a boy such as you describe.

SOUND [gasps]

MRS. GREYES [satisfied] Didn't we say?

MISS FRITTEN It's too too terrible.

MUSIC

SCENE 7. TEA

MRS. GREYES It is deplorable that anyone - particularly someone in a position such as Mr. Scarrick -should treat the truth as an article temporarily and excusably out of stock.

MISS FRITTEN More quail seed! Those quails must be voracious! [realizing] or else... perhaps it isn't quail seed at all.

MRS. GREYES I believe it's opium, and the bearded man is a detective.

MRS. LIPPING I don't. I'm sure it's something to do with the Portuguese Throne.

MISS FRITTEN More likely to be a Persian intrigue on behalf of the ex-Shah. The bearded man belongs to the Government Party. The quail-seed is a countersign, of course; Persia is almost next door to Palestine, and quails come into the Old Testament, you know.

GLORIA [exasperated] Only as a miracle. [knowing] I've thought all along it was part of a love intrigue.

MRS. LIPPING I distinctly saw a snarl of baffled rage as the man departed, sandwiched between that heavy moustache and upturned astrakhan collar.

GLORIA I can't imagine that that boy is the guilty party here. Much more likely he's simply perishing of love for someone - perhaps the daughter of the beard, but the match is quite unsuitable--

MISS FRITTEN Honey and pomegranates - of course!!!

MUSIC

SCENE 8. SCARRICK'S

SHOP, NIGHT, QUIET

SOUND DOOR, BELL

JIMMY [calling from off] Closed!

LUCY I know, mutton head.

JIMMY Oh, Lucy!

SOUND BROOM DOWN, STEPS

LUCY Another busy day?

JIMMY The busiest. Another day or two of brisk trade and we'll be--[cut off with a gasp]

SOUND KISS

LUCY [laughing] I was here today, you know.

JIMMY [uneasy] Oh?

LUCY [indulgent] You were quite the hero. Hustling that poor young man off behind the biscuit tins in the very nick of time.

JIMMY [flustered] Well, I've got a good view of the street from my post at the cheese and bacon counter.

LUCY [pouty] Jimmy. Have you EVER known me to gossip?

JIMMY You, Lucy? I don't think so.

LUCY Quite a vote of confidence.

JIMMY I didn't mean that-- [sigh] No. No I've never known you to gossip.

LUCY Let me in, then! Perhaps there's something I can do to help?

MUSIC

SCENE 9. PUB

SCARRICK It was quite marvelous! And we sold out of that blasted Halva.

MAN It looked crowded, but they were actually buying?

SCARRICK They bought and bought - some came back three or four times, just to have an excuse to linger.

BOY "Oh, I forgot" and "silly me, one more thing."

SCARRICK Exactly. Even those women whose purchases were of "modest proportions" dawdled over them as though they had, uh--

MAN Brutal, drunken husbands to go home to?

SCARRICK [chuckles] I've even had to take on a couple of extra assistants for tomorrow.

MUSIC

SCENE 10. SCARRICK'S STORE - BUSY

MISS FRITTEN What do you think? Is this bowl anything like the one the young gentleman carries?

MRS. GREYES Nonsense. His is brass. Or bronze, perhaps. That one is copper.

MISS FRITTEN Still, it's got a lovely patina.

MRS GORDON Ducks?

SCARRICK [distracted] Pardon?

MRS GORDON Ducks? I found a lovely recipe for Bombay duck, and I was wondering if a domestic duck would suffice.

SCARRICK I suspect that ducks are much the same the world over-- [small gasp]

SOUND DOOR OPENS, BELL

GENERAL EXPECTANT HUSH

SCARRICK You'll excuse me.

SOUND BOY'S FOOTSTEPS, SCARRICK MEETS HIM

MRS GORDON oh!

SCARRICK Sir?

BOY Yes?

SCARRICK [overtly confidential] I must warn you--

SOUND [gasps]

SCARRICK [as if saying something else] We have run out of quail seed.

BOY [shocked and disappointed] Oh. I should-- I must--

MRS GORDON Oh no!

SOUND SCUTTLING FEET

JIMMY [excited] We do have some much finer oranges today, if you want to step over here.

BOY [dramatic gasp]

SOUND BOY RUNS

SOUND DOOR SLAMS OPEN, BELL

SOUND OMINOUS FOOTSTEPS

MRS. GORDON [voice over] I found my self sub-consciously repeating "The Assyrian came down like a wolf on the fold" under my breath.

MISS FRITTEN [whispered] Watch the door!

SCARRICK [very tense] Ah. Coffee again today sir? Perhaps figs?

MAN I am looking for--

LUCY [in disguise, foreign sounding] Jaffa oranges, I think.

MAN What?

MRS GREYES [voiceover] She slithered out of the aisle like the lady in the lake.

LUCY Your Excellency does his shopping himself?

MAN [suspicious] I order the things myself. I find it difficult to make my servants understand.

MISS FRITTEN [voiceover] How ever did we miss a mysterious veiled lady, right in the midst of us all?

LUCY I was saying... They have some excellent Jaffa oranges here. [tinkling laugh]

SOUND HER FEET TAP AWAY TO THE DOOR, BELL

MAN [considering] Hmph.

MRS. GORDON [gasp]

MAN You!

SCARRICK [tense] Yes?

MAN You have, perhaps, some good Jaffa oranges?

GLORIA [voiceover] Everyone expected an instant denial on the part of Mr. Scarrick of any such possession, but before he could answer‑‑

BOY No!

SOUND RUNNING FEET, DOOR, BELL

MISS FRITTEN [voiceover] Holding his empty brass bowl before him as he dashed into the street. His face was masked with studied indifference

SOUND THE VOICEOVERS START TO FADE INTO TEA

SCENE 11. TEA

MRS GREYES Overspread with ghastly pallor!

MRS. LIPPING I would call it blazing with defiance.

GLORIA How defiant could he be! He was so terrified that his teeth chattered!

MRS. GORDON I distinctly heard him whistling the Persian National anthem.

MISS FRITTEN But the bearded man - his face was a mask of abject terror!

MRS GREYES I thought he would dash out after the boy, but he just paced to and fro like a caged animal seeking an outlet for escape.

GLORIA He couldn't take his eyes off the door.

MRS GORDON Did he ever come back for his purchases? Or send his servant?

MISS FRITTEN I've not had the nerve to ask Mr. Scarrick. The whole thing was so ... overwhelming.

MUSIC

SCENE 12. SCARRICK'S STORE

LUCY It was so overwhelming. Trying not to laugh while watching all their faces.

JIMMY [chuckles] You did a fabulous job.

LUCY You like me in a veil?

JIMMY I can think of a certain veil I'd like to see you in.

LUCY [interested, pleased] Really?

JIMMY Mm-hmm [yes]

SOUND KISS

MUSIC

SCENE 13. PUB

SCARRICK I can never thank you fellows enough.

MAN We enjoyed the fun of it. [laughs, then talks like beard] And the figs.

BOY It was a welcome vacation from posing for hours for 'The Lost Hylas'

MAN You just have to sit still. I'm the one who has to make you look good.

SCARRICK What do I owe you?

MAN No, no. It was far too entertaining.

BOY We did get all those lovely pomegranates.

SCARRICK At any rate... I insist on paying for the hire of the black beard.

THE END

From Black Cat Magazine in 1889

What could be better than clockwork staff who don't eat, complain, or revolt? So, the programming's a little... off....

From our Edwardian Entertainments collection, just in time for the winter holidays.

The Water Ghost of Harrowby Hall

A hereditary curse appears in a torrent of water every Christmas to the current heir. How to stop this perennial wet blanket?

By John Kendrick Bangs, adapted by Julie Hoverson Sound produced by Scott Pigg

Cast: The GHOST - Gwendolyn Jensen-Woodard Edward - Gareth Bowley Leslie - Tansy Undercrypt Father - John Lingard Mother - Jennifer Dixon The American - Julie Hoverson

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THE WATER GHOST OF HARROWBY HALL

Adapted by Julie Hoverson from the story by John Kendrick Bangs

[published in 1894]

Cast:

• The GHOST
• EDWARD Oglethorpe, the Young Master
• LESLIE Widdrington, The Secretary
• HENRY Oglethorpe, the father
• LYDIA Oglethorpe, the mother
• Christina, vapid American debutante

MUSIC - CHRISTMAS

SCENE 1. BALLROOM

SOUND FAIRLY SEDATE PARTY

CHRISTINA [american] I'm terribly charmed to meet you! I've never danced with a Lord before. Makes me feel like a lady.

EDWARD [chuckles] You're lucky I'm also a gentleman - not every lord can claim that.

CHRISTINA Oh, you!

EDWARD You're in London with friends?

CHRISTINA I'm a guest of the Harrisons. Daddy thought a trip to England would be nice polish. He's very impressed by nobilities.

EDWARD I'm sure.

SOUND CLOCK STARTS TO STRIKE TWELVE

CHRISTINA Goodness, your parties go late over here. I'm afraid you must think I'm terribly provincial.

EDWARD Oh no. Never.

SOUND CLOCK FINISHES, SUDDEN DELUGE OF WATER, COVERS EVERYTHING.

CHRISTINA [screaming!] My dress! Oh no!

SOUND OTHER PEOPLE PROTESTING, RUNNING AWAY

EDWARD [calm but shouting] Just clear out, everyone, please!

SOUND DOORS SLAM, NO MORE RUNNING

GHOST Oglethorpe.

EDWARD [sigh] Yes.

MUSIC

SCENE 2. BALLROOM, DRIPPING WET

SOUND KNOCK ON THE DOOR

LESLIE Hello?

SOUND WATER STILL DRIPPING ALL OVER

EDWARD [glum] It's all over but the blotting. Safe to come in.

SOUND DOOR OPENS, WOMAN WALKS IN

LESLIE Oh, my.

EDWARD [resigned] I'll take care of any repairs.

LESLIE Towel? I also brought you a robe, but we haven't even been properly introduced yet.

EDWARD Henry Oglethorpe. [sigh] Baron Harrowby, I suspect.

LESLIE Leslie Widdrington. Poor relation.

EDWARD [chuckles, but not really amused] Huh. I've just come into a great deal of money.

LESLIE How's that?

EDWARD My father must have died, or this would have happened to him.

LESLIE Ah. [sympathetical understanding] Ancestral curse?

EDWARD You're curiously sanguine about it.

LESLIE [flippant] It's not my ballroom. Come along, let's get you out of this damp. Perhaps a hot bath would be in order?

MUSIC

SCENE 3. CASTLE

LESLIE [reading] "The trouble with Harrowby Hall is that it was haunted. What was worse, the ghost did not content itself with merely appearing at the bedside of the afflicted person who saw it, but persisted in remaining there for one mortal hour before it would disappear."

EDWARD My father had a flowery turn of phrase.

LESLIE A style the suits the classic ghost story. You're quite sure you don't mind?

EDWARD I need to confide in someone, and he's already written it all down. But you can skip past the part about it appearing only for an hour every Christmas at midnight. I think we've established that.

LESLIE You're lucky you didn't catch pneumonia.

EDWARD I'm still undecided. [coughs, but not seriously] At least one good thing came from the deluge.

LESLIE Oh?

EDWARD I needed a secretary.

LESLIE I suppose it pays to be intrepid, then.

SOUND PAGES FLIP

LESLIE Ah. [start here?] "The owners of Harrowby Hall had done their utmost--?"

EDWARD Sounds good.

LESLIE "--their utmost to rid themselves of the damp and dewy lady who rose up out of the best bedroom floor at midnight, but without avail. They had tried stopping the clock, so that the ghost would not know when it was midnight; but she made her appearance just the same, with that fearful miasmatic personality of hers, and there she would stand until everything about her was thoroughly saturated."

EDWARD We've done absolutely everything. Or tried to. My own grandfather caulked up every crack in the floor, covered it with tarpaper - every conceivable kind of waterproofing was put into effect. And yet--

LESLIE But you weren't even in the tower room.

EDWARD [sigh] It's all in the manuscript.

LESLIE At least it will be another year until she makes an appearance.

EDWARD There is a great deal to be said for predictability.

LESLIE [reading dramatically] "The following Christmas eve she appeared as promptly as before, and frightened the occupant of the room--"

EDWARD That wasn't even one of my forefathers. Just an unfortunate guest.

LESLIE "Frightened him quite out of his senses by sitting down alongside of him and gazing with her cavernous blue eyes into his; and her long, aqueously bony fingers were entwined with bits of dripping seaweed - these ends she drew across his forehead until he became like one insane.

EDWARD I believe he never recovered from the shock, or the damp, or perhaps the cold, and died several years later of pneumonia and nervous prostration.

LESLIE Then comes a year they chose not to open the room at all.

EDWARD "Let her haunt the room - she'll not haunt me!" Father railed, or so I have been told.

LESLIE Didn't work, though, did it?

EDWARD [sigh] No. Apparently the room is only the primary target. If there is no one present to receive her, the current lord will always have a visitor.

LESLIE Thus the monsoon in the ballroom?

EDWARD [rueful] Father didn't even tell me he was doing poorly. [snappy again] A little warning would have been ... convenient. I could have spent the night in the desert.

LESLIE What do you plan to do?

EDWARD Foil her.

LESLIE How?

EDWARD That I do not quite know... yet. I need to go over father's manuscript with a fine tooth comb for any possible clues. Anything can be overcome with the application of a modicum of logic.

LESLIE Well, then. Shall we get back to it?

EDWARD Go back to the year father tried to simply ignore the ghost. It seems she first appeared in the tower room, for the parlor below had a great damp spot on the ceiling. But she didn't stay there.

LESLIE [reading] "She found me in my own cozy room drinking whiskey," undiluted, he notes, "and felicitating myself upon having foiled her ghostship, when all of a sudden the curl went out of my hair, the whiskey bottle filled and overflowed, and I found myself in a condition similar to that of a man who has fallen into a water-butt." [chuckles]

EDWARD Father always did have a turn of phrase. And a fondness for water-butts. [dramatic] And there she stood. The lady of the cavernous eyes and seaweed fingers.

LESLIE "The sight was so unexpected and so terrifying that I fainted, but immediately came to, as the vast amount of chill water trickling down over my face restored my consciousness."

EDWARD I like a good shower bath as much as the next person, but I do prefer it on the tropical side of tepid.

LESLIE [teasing] Hush.

EDWARD My father was a brave man, and not to be daunted. Forced to face the ghost, he determined to discover some particulars.

LESLIE "In an effort to warm myself, I approached the hearth, an unfortunate move as it turned out, because it brought the ghost directly over the fire, which immediately was extinguished."

EDWARD So he faced her with all the bravado he could muster.

LESLIE Sounds like he was chock a block with bravado. At least the way he wrote it.

EDWARD Let us hope it runs in the family.

LESLIE [leading into flashback] He faced the ghost...

MUSIC SEGUE INTO FLASHBACK

SOUND WATER DRIPPING and TRICKLING

HENRY Far be it from me to be impolite to a woman, madam, but I'm hanged if it wouldn't please me better if you'd stop these infernal visits of yours to this house. Go sit out on the lake, if you like that sort of thing; soak the water-butt, if you wish; but do not, I implore you, come into a gentleman's house and saturate him and his possessions in this way. It is damned disagreeable.

GHOST Henry Hartwick Oglethorpe. That is a bit of specious nonsense. You must know that I am compelled to haunt this place year after year by inexorable fate. I never aspired to be a shower-bath, but it is my doom. Do you know who I am?

HENRY No, I do not. I should say you were the Lady of the Lake, or Little Sallie Waters.

GHOST You are a witty man for your years.

HENRY Well, my humor is drier than yours ever will be.

GHOST No doubt - I am never dry. I am the Water Ghost of Harrowby Hall, and dryness is a quality entirely beyond my wildest hope. I have been the incumbent of this highly unpleasant office for two hundred years tonight.

HENRY How the deuce did you ever come to get elected?

GHOST [matter of fact] Suicide. I am the ghost of that fair maiden whose picture hangs over the mantelpiece in the drawing room.

LESLIE [v.o.] That lovely early Georgian piece? Or do I mean Jacobean?

EDWARD [v.o.] Take down a memorandum - draw a mustache on her at the earliest opportunity.

GHOST Had I lived, I should have been your great-great-great-great-great-aunt.

HENRY But what induced you to get this house into such a predicament?

GHOST It was my father's fault. It was he who built Harrowby Hall, and the haunted chamber was to have been mine. My father had it furnished in pink and yellow, knowing well that blue and gray formed the only combination of colours I could tolerate.

HENRY And...?

GHOST He did it merely to spite me, and I declined to live in the room. Whereupon father said I could live there or on the lawn, he didn't care which. That night I ran from the house and jumped over the cliff into the sea.

EDWARD [v.o.] That was rash.

LESLIE [v.o.] Dying over pink and yellow? I should say so. Green and orange, perhaps.

EDWARD [v.o.] But only if one is Irish.

GHOST Had I but known the consequences, I should not have jumped.

HENRY A bit late for hindsight.

GHOST I had been drowned a week when I was informed it would be my doom to haunt Harrowby Hall.

LESLIE [v.o.] Informed? Informed by whom?

EDWARD [v.o.] Hmm. Never considered it. The local union of apparations, phantoms and sundry visitations?

HENRY I'll sell the place.

EDWARD [v.o.] Sound thinking.

GHOST That you cannot do, for it is also required of me that I shall appear to any purchaser, and divulge to him the awful secret of the house.

LESLIE [v.o.] Snap!

HENRY Do you mean to tell me that on every Christmas eve you are going to haunt me wherever I may be, ruining my whiskey and extinguishing my fire? And soaking me through to the skin?

GHOST You have stated the case clearly, Oglethorpe. And what is more - it doesn't make the slightest difference where you are. If I find that room empty, wherever you may be I shall douse you with my spectral pres--

SOUND CLOCK STRIKES ONE

LESLIE [v.o.] "Here the clock struck one, and immediately the apparition faded away. It was perhaps more of a trickle than a fade, but as a disappearance it was complete"

HENRY By St. George and his Dragon! It is guineas to hot-cross buns that next Christmas there'll be an occupant of that room, or I shall spend the night in a bathtub!

EDWARD [v.o. fading to normal] He would have lost that bet. That was last year, and this year, he passed away just in time to avoid the deluge.

LESLIE And you didn't know, and we are now caught up to the present.

EDWARD [sigh] But for the bill for the ballroom.

MUSIC

SCENE 4. TEA

LYDIA So glad you could accommodate me for tea, Edward. I've not returned to society yet, and I'm getting sick to the teeth of a house covered in black crepe.

EDWARD Ah.

LYDIA Your father positively loathed black.

EDWARD Ah.

LYDIA And I loathe crepe. I've developed quite a mental aversion to it. I don't supposed a doctor could furnish me with some sort of prescription?

EDWARD I doubt it. Mourning is mourning, mother. And you are hardly the only one inconvenienced by father's untimely demise.

LYDIA [slightly amused] Ah, yes I heard.

EDWARD You might have sent a wire or something.

LYDIA I was rather preoccupied. So, now that you are the Baron, am I to expect the pitter-patter of little feet in the great hall any time soon?

EDWARD I could get you some corgis.

LYDIA Hush. You know very well what I mean! It is your responsibility to produce an heir and a spare, particularly now that you are effectively the last of the line.

EDWARD Hmm... [chuckle] It would be funny to find out who gets haunted, should I die early.

LYDIA I should say not!

EDWARD Anyway, after my very public unmasking as the bearer of an ancestral curse, there's hardly a family worth knowing that would want me as a graft to the family tree.

LYDIA There's always some rich American. they'll even pay extra for such a heritage!

EDWARD [laughing ruefully] While an American won't bat an eye at a spectre or two, true - threaten them with a waterlogged poiret [pwah-RAY] or patou [pah-TOO], and they flee in panic, clutching their pocketbooks.

LYDIA OH. Yes, I see.

EDWARD So I'm down to shop assistants and ladies who speak no English.

SOUND DOOR OPENS, LESLIE ENTERS BRISKLY

LESLIE Here's your correspondence for the day-- oh. I'm so dreadfully sorry. I wasn't aware -- I don't have any engagements on your calendar for this afternoon.

EDWARD Miss Widdrington, may I present my mother, the Dowager Baroness of Harrowby. Mother, my new secretary.

LYDIA [a bit snotty] Charmed.

LESLIE [overly subservient, almost goofy] I'll be in the study, then, sir, should you need me. If I may excuse myself?

EDWARD [equally over the top] Dismissed.

SOUND LESLIE LEAVES

LYDIA Who is she?

EDWARD My secretary.

LYDIA Widdrington. Widdrington. Any relation to the Haversham Widdringtons?

EDWARD [offhanded] Poor relation. Quite destitute.

LYDIA [musing] Still. She's got a good back. Does she ride?

MUSIC

SCENE 5. STUDY

SOUND DOOR OPENS

LESLIE So sorry about that--

EDWARD You couldn't have known.

LESLIE It's dreadfully easy to fall into old habits.

EDWARD Old?

LESLIE I wasn't always "how you see me now." Impoverished. I was polished at the finest schools, only to find that the family coffer had been tapped out to pay death duties and father's debts. And that, as they say, was that.

EDWARD At least you're not bitter.

LESLIE Oh you should have heard me a year ago. I would have blistered a sailor's ears.

EDWARD And now?

LESLIE [pleased] Now, I am employed.

EDWARD And you don't mind?

LESLIE Well I'm also intrigued by your dilemma - most particularly because it's not my own.

EDWARD [laughs]

LESLIE But today's problem is your social calander.

EDWARD oh? More cancellations?

LESLIE Every dinner party, every engagement for the opera, every ball.

EDWARD Everything that might possibly involve late nights, in other words.

LESLIE Precisely. But there are still afternoon teas, ascot, and a tentative engagement for croquet.

EDWARD [sulky] Suddenly I'm an elderly uncle.

MUSIC - CHRISTMAS

SCENE 6. NEXT YEAR

SOUND DRIPPING

SOUND STEAM HISS

SOUND DOOR OPENS

LESLIE Time?

EDWARD [sigh] Yes.

SOUND HUGE SWOOSH OF WATER

EDWARD [disgusted sigh]

LESLIE I brought some heated towels.

EDWARD I am par-broiled. I'll need more than towels!

MUSIC

SCENE 7. STUDY

SOUND DOOR OPENS, FABRIC RUBS

LESLIE Check off steam pipes.

EDWARD Yes. Just turned her from cold water to hot. The Turkish baths for the past month seem to have helped a bit, but on the whole, it was‑‑ [searching for the right word]

LESLIE [teasing] A washout?

EDWARD Oh, please don't.

LESLIE [apologetic] Sorry. I thought that since steam-pipes could lie hundreds of feet deep in water, and still retain sufficient heat to drive the water away in vapor, they might‑‑

EDWARD [cutting her off] It was a good sight better than any of my ideas. Trying to evaporate the ghost into steam.

LESLIE Now you have a year to plan. Again.

EDWARD I don't know. I doubt my health can take another such night. And the room is destroyed. Again. Anything not simply soaked through has been cracked and warped to an extent that I've no doubt it will break me to repair.

LESLIE Heat can do terrible things. Tea.

SOUND POURS

EDWARD [sips] Worst of all, as the last drop of the water ghost was slowly sizzling itself out on the floor, she whispered that this scheme would avail me nothing, because--

GHOST There is always water in great plenty where I come from, and next year will find me rehabilitated and as exasperatingly saturating as ever.

EDWARD She will always be wet. So I must somehow be dry...

MUSIC

SCENE 8. CASTLE

SOUND TEA

SOUND CONSTRUCTION [OFF]

MOTHER Must they be so loud?

EDWARD At least I can tell they're working.

MOTHER So it happened again?

EDWARD You can't be surprised. You had to go through it, didn't you? With father?

MOTHER Oh, no. No, I didn't even know about it for quite years.

EDWARD How the devil?

MOTHER Language.

EDWARD I'll devil as I please, until I get what I want.

MOTHER When your father inherited the title - after his father died of pneumonia, as I recall.

EDWARD [sarcasm] Imagine.

MOTHER Hush. It was in the spring, and Henry somehow managed to pick a dreadful quarrel with me - something that sent me flying home to mother for the holidays.

EDWARD Truly? That was clever.

MOTHER And I believe there was a year where he had to take a business trip.

EDWARD to the tropics, by any chance?

MOTHER May very well have been. I believe I spent the holidays with my sister, in town.

EDWARD And he kept this up for years and years?

MOTHER Well you were away at school for much of this.

EDWARD No wonder he never had me home for the winter holidays. I was rather bereft at the time.

MOTHER We sent presents.

EDWARD Much appreciated, but--

MOTHER So - what are you doing about this?

EDWARD I tried steam pipes.

SOUND CRASH

EDWARD That's what they are engaged in repairing upstairs at the moment, and--

MOTHER Not that! What are you doing about providing me with a brace of grandchildren to brighten my declining years?

EDWARD Oh, that. [sigh]

MUSIC

SCENE 9. STUDY

SOUND TEARING PAPER - letter opening.

LESLIE Hmm. Catalog of some sort? [gasp, the laughing a bit] oh-ho.

SOUND DOOR OPENS

EDWARD What's the joke?

LESLIE [arch] A catalog of gentlemen's garments?

EDWARD Hmm?

LESLIE In the finest quality india rubber?

EDWARD Oh that! Uhhhhh... It's not what you--

LESLIE I would assume they're for waterproofing, except that many of them seem to be ... excised in certain locations.

EDWARD Skip to the back. They assured me there would be more... complete... units.

SOUND PAGES FLIP

LESLIE Ah. So you're thinking--?

EDWARD If I can't keep the room dry, at least I might be able to keep my person insulated.

LESLIE If you were to wear one of these over something in wool, perhaps?

EDWARD Mm. I would start to look like a child in swaddling.

LESLIE Better swaddled than soaked.

EDWARD True.

LESLIE And it would be warm, even if wet.

EDWARD Wouldn't want to get cold. I might -- [idea] oh!

LESLIE Oh?

EDWARD I've got it!

LESLIE Do tell?

EDWARD Order me one of those - a size bigger than my suits, and in their thickest rubber. Then another two sizes larger.

LESLIE Why?

EDWARD I'll let you guess. I must go and consult a furrier.

MUSIC

SCENE 10. MONTAGE - PHONE CALLS

LESLIE That sounds like it will precisely fill the bill. And everything is reinforced with asbestos? Very good.

EDWARD You have the address to ship to? Excellent. I realize it will take a prodigious amount of power to maintain. If necessary, I shall buy the power company!

LESLIE Woolens. Two sizes larger than I had originally inquired. Yes - the warmest you have. Oh, no, he likes it thick.

EDWARD No, no, the first set was quite satisfactory. [annoyed] Please place my order and refrain from further comment on my proclivities!

MUSIC

SCENE 11. DRESSING ROOM

SOUND CHRISTMAS CAROLS PLAY LIGHTLY IN THE BACKGROUND

SOUNDS RUBBERY SQUEAKS AND RUSTLES AS SHE DRESSES HIM.

EDWARD I've come to hate that music.

LESLIE This may be the last time it calls to mind such misfortunes. I've stitched the wool together at the waist. Too bad your valet can be no help.

EDWARD He demanded this week off. No wish to be anywhere in the entire country when the ghost arrives.

LESLIE Some people simply do not pay attention. The ghost only makes a bother in a given vicinity for a given time.

EDWARD Logic has nothing to do with superstitious fear. Let's see if the second rubber suit will go on.

LESLIE I've brought talc.

EDWARD You plan for everything, don't you?

LESLIE That's why you keep me around, though I must say you are the master planner here. Fur, then rubber, then wool, and rubber again - she shan't be able to get a drop of her icy dampness near you!

EDWARD No, indeed. Have you noticed, is it still snowing?

LESLIE There are great drifts on the windward side of the house, though the wind has died away.

EDWARD Excellent.

LESLIE When this is all over, you can focus on finding yourself a bride and satisfying your poor mother.

EDWARD [musing] Yes.

LESLIE Now the diving helmet.

SOUND LARGE METAL PICKED UP

MUSIC

SCENE 12. MUD ROOM / PORCH

SOUND DOOR OPENS, HEAVY SQUEAKY RUBBER NOISES ENTER

SOUND CLOCK CHIMES TWELVE, DOOR SHUT IN THE MIDDLE OF IT

SOUND CAREFULLY SITTING DOWN

EDWARD [slightly canned throughout - in his diving helmet] Oh... that's a bit tight.

SOUND SQUEAK AS HE ADJUSTS

EDWARD [hums a bit]

SOUND BANGING OF DOORS, WIND, SPLASH

EDWARD Right on time.

GHOST Greetings. You must know you cannot avoid me by hiding here in - in - what is this room, anyway?

EDWARD It is called a mud room, and I'm not hiding. In fact, I'm glad to see you.

GHOST You are the most original man I've met, if that is true. And what an odd hat!

EDWARD It is a little portable observatory I had made for just such engagements as this.

SOUND CLUNK ON HELMET

EDWARD Is it true that you are doomed to follow me for one mortal hour -- to stand where I stand, to sit where I sit?

GHOST That is my detestable fate.

EDWARD Let's go for a walk, then.

GHOST You cannot get rid of me that way! My water does not wear out with movement of any sort. I will merely damage more of your home.

EDWARD Then we will not walk through the house. Come along.

SOUND SQUEAKING, FOOTSTEPS

SOUND DRIPPING SQUISHES FOLLOW

SOUND DOOR OPENS, SNOWSTORM, FEET INTO SNOW

SCENE 13. OUTSIDE

SOUND XMAS MUSIC NEARBY FROM INSIDE

GHOST But, my dear sir! It is fearfully cold out there! You shall be frozen hard before you've been out ten minutes.

EDWARD Not I! I am very warmly dressed. Come along!

SOUND SNOWSTORM GETS LOUDER TO SHOW TIME

SOUND MUSIC IS FARTHER AWAY

GHOST Oh sir! You walk too slowly! I am nearly frozen.

EDWARD Is that so. Hmm.

GHOST My knees are so stiff now I can hardly move. I beseech you to accelerate your step.

EDWARD I should like to oblige a lady, but my clothes are rather heavy, and a hundred yards an hour is about my top speed. Indeed, I think we would better sit down here on this snowdrift and talk matters over.

GHOST Do not! Do not do so, I beg! Let us move along. I feel myself growing rigid as it is. If we stop here, I shall be frozen stiff.

EDWARD [chuckles] That, madam, is precisely why I have brought you here. We have been on this spot just ten minutes; we have fifty more before your hour ends. Take your time about it, madam, but freeze, that is all I ask of you.

GHOST I cannot move my right leg now! And my overskirt is a solid sheet of ice. Oh, good, kind Mr. Oglethorpe, light a fire, and let me go free from these icy fetters.

EDWARD Never, madam. I have you at last, and I plan to keep you!

GHOST Alas! Help me, I beg. I congeal!

EDWARD Congeal, madam, congeal! You have drenched me and mine for over two hundred years, madam. Tonight you have had your last drench.

GHOST Ah, but I shall thaw out again, and then you'll see. Instead of the comfortably tepid, genial ghost I have been in my past, sir, I shall be iced water!

EDWARD No, you won't, either! For when you are frozen quite stiff, I shall send you to a cold-storage warehouse, and there you shall remain an icy work of art forever more.

GHOST But warehouses burn.

EDWARD So they do, but this warehouse cannot burn. It is made of asbestos and surrounding it are fireproof walls.

GHOST For the last time let me beseech you. I would go on my knees to you, Oglethorpe, were they not already frozen. [freezing up] I beg of you do not doom me--

SOUND DISTANT CLOCK STRIKES ONE

SOUND CRACKLE OF ICE

SOUND WIND RISES

EDWARD I do feel for you, miss. But I feel for myself more.

MUSIC

SCENE 14. STUDY

SOUND PHONE HUNG UP

LESLIE Delivery was made, and all is well. The room has been sealed, and that, as they say, is that.

EDWARD I'm almost at a loss.

LESLIE What? Why?

EDWARD If you have an obstacle for such a long time, then it is gone, what can be left?

LESLIE Your mother still wishes for grandchildren.

EDWARD Now that "all good families" will have me over again?

LESLIE You are now not only rich and titled and eligible, you are also known to have single-handedly defeated an ancestral ghost. You are quite the talk of the town. Parents will be lining up to introduce their marriageable daughters to you.

EDWARD I think I can save them the trouble.

LESLIE What do you mean?

EDWARD There is something very alluring about a person who will stand by you through thick and thin.

LESLIE [oblivious] You're still upset that they wouldn't have anything to do with you while you were haunted?

EDWARD I shan't pay any mind to what they did. Just what you did.

LESLIE Pardon?

EDWARD [teasing] Are you not interested in being the mistress of Harrowby Hall? There is an opening in that position.

LESLIE [startled] Me? Marry you?

EDWARD If not you, my next best option is to thaw out the ghost and make an honest woman of her. I'm reasonably certain we're far enough removed that it would be legal.

LESLIE You're quite serious? About me, not her.

EDWARD Of course. About you, not her.

LESLIE Of course!

CLOSER

END

Rigging a card game is tricky, but rigging someone's thoughts?

Sometimes an advance takes a long long time...

Tim might expect to see corpses, working graveyard in the morgue, but never expected one that could talk...

Cast List Timothy Grant - Jasper Loovis Bedelia Crane - Emmatrice Devan Gordy - George Dunn Darcy - Megan Lane Halston - Gene Thorkildsen Sophia - Julie Hoverson Mr. Summerfield - Bryan Hendrickson Male Body - Reynaud LeBoeuf Security Guard - Sky Iolta

Music: Kevin MacLeod (Incompetech.com) Recorded with the assistance of Ryan Hirst of Neohoodoo Studio Editing and Sound: Julie Hoverson Cover Design: Brett Coulstock

"What kind of a place is it? Why it's a morgue - can't you tell?"

*********************************************************

DRAWER 23

Cast:

• Olivia, host
• Timothy Grant (M20s), temp. night shift at morgue
• Sophia (F30s), who Tim is replacing
• Gordy (M20s), the go-to guy
• Darcy (F20s), med student
• Halston (M40s), swing shift attendant
• Bedelia Crane (F40-ish), ghost, southern belle from the 1920s
• MALE BODY - Bedelia, but with a man's voice
• Summerfield (M50s), tough boss
• Security guard (any)

OLIVIA Did you have any trouble finding it? What do you mean, what kind of a place is it? Why, it's a morgue, can't you tell?

MUSIC

SCENE 1. MORGUE, NIGHT

SOUND WHOOSH OF HYDRAULIC DOORS OPENING

SOPHIA And THIS--

TIM --Got it. I watch CSI.

SOPHIA On this shift, you won't usually have to deal with the - well, everyday ins and outs, but there are times when somebody has to get in here right away, so you need to know the check-in procedures.

TIM Oh, sure.

SOPHIA Is this your first time dealing with cadavers?

TIM Mm, yeah, but I--

SOPHIA Try not to faint when you smell them. The cold helps, but I have some mentholatum if you need it--

TIM Oh, yeah, I saw Silence of the Lambs.

SOPHIA [sigh, then muttered] And you plan to be a doctor...?

TIM Hmm?

SOPHIA If you, or anyone else, does faint, and sustains any appreciable injury, you must fill out a form 5-C-H dash 2-1-7 dash 62.

TIM There's a form for it?

SOPHIA There's insurance for it. Did you ever see Quincy?

TIM Quincy Jones?

SOPHIA [Sigh] A television show. In the opening credits - never mind.

SOUND DOOR OPENS

SOPHIA There are 30 drawers. You always fill the top row first, followed by the next down, and the floor level ones last of all.

TIM 30? I never thought that Cumberland Pass would--

SOPHIA We really don't. I've only seen all the drawers filled once - after that really bad fire. Well, all the drawers but one.

TIM [waits, then] One?

SOPHIA [sighs, somewhat embarrassed] This one. Twenty-three. It's... tsk... It's supposed to be haunted.

TIM I guess it's the right place for a--

SOPHIA I don't really believe it, but everybody else does. No one will put a body in that drawer. And me, I figure - why take a chance?

TIM I-- I'm not getting it. So there's a ghost and you don't want to put a body in the drawer why...? Because it'll get scared?

SOPHIA For 12 years, I have not seen anything to be scared of. I haven't heard anything but stories.

TIM [eager] Tell me!

SOPHIA Timothy, most people find working third shift hard enough without having ghost stories to freak out over. Just do the three months and when I get back, I promise you I will tell you everything I know.

TIM What if you decide not to come back?

SOPHIA Oh, please! Once this munchkin arrives, I'll be desperate to get back to my wonderful peaceful nights here. Dale swears up and down she's ready to lose sleep for the both of us.

TIM Kids take a lot of time.

SOPHIA [teasing] Don't get your hopes up - they take a lot of cash too, and I'm not about to give up my health benefits.

MUSIC

SCENE 2. CAFETERIA

GORDY [coming on] Hey pal! I heard you got graveyard shift in the land of the dead!

TIM Yeah, Sophia's been showing me the ropes. Seems easy. Clean this, lock that, don't take pictures of dead celebrities, make sure no one gets in without proper authorization.

GORDY Did she tell you about the ghosts?

TIM More than one? I mean, she mentioned [snickers] a haunted drawer in the cool room, but--

GORDY Hmm. Never heard THAT one, but there are supposed to be a bunch of--

DARCY [coming on] This seat taken? [sits without waiting] Hey, Tim! [less enthused] Gordy.

GORDY The lovely Lady Darcy.

TIM Hey Darce.

GORDY Deigning to sit among the common folk? What will the world come to?

TIM Gordy was just telling me--

GORDY Warning you. About the ghosts. In the morgue.

DARCY That's ridiculous.

GORDY Huh? And I suppose you know everything about--

DARCY I don't know anything about the morgue, but I do have a smattering of supernatural lore‑‑

GORDY I suppose someone's got to watch Ghosthunters.

DARCY AND it is absolutely accepted common belief that a ghost haunts the place it DIED, not the place its body went later.

TIM Maybe someone ... died in the morgue. [shudder]

GORDY "Accepted common belief"? That's about as nebulous as "according to statistics."

DARCY The O.R., now. Or the Burn Ward. That's where you'd find ghosts.

MUSIC

SCENE 3. MORGUE, NIGHT

SOUND HYDRAULIC DOOR OPENS

TIM Hello? Hello? Hello?

HALSTON [off] Just a moment!

SOUND HYDRAULIC DOOR CLOSES

SOUND PAPERS RUSTLE

TIM [muttering to self] Checklist, check. Clipboard - no scheduled arrivals, check.

HALSTON [coming on] Yeah?

TIM I'm Timothy Grant--

HALSTON Oh, yeah. Soph's gone off to spawn?

TIM She went into labor this morning, so I get to start early--

HALSTON Don't worry. Piece of cake job. Could be done by a monkey, only monkeys won't work for this pay.

TIM [chuckles] Seems fine to me.

HALSTON Yeah, well, you don't have the monkeys' union. You need anything before I take off? Any last questions?

TIM I don't think so - Sophia left me a pretty comprehensive set of notes.

HALSTON Not surprising - she's so damn organized, that kid won't stand a chance. Well, don't you go slacking off and make her clean up your messes when she gets back. It'll be bad enough when all the construction starts, [shrugs] but she's always happiest telling people what to do.

SOUND FOOTSTEPS START TO LEAVE, DOOR OPENS

TIM Oh, I did--

HALSTON [pause] What?

TIM Oh, [embarrassed] someone was telling me about a... well, a ghost. In one of the body drawers.

HALSTON And?

TIM What do you think? I'm dying of curiosity.

HALSTON You ain't the ghoulish type, are you Tim?

TIM I - I don't think so.

HALSTON [thinks, then sighs] The guy who used to do nights, before Sophia took over, swore that there was ghost in drawer 23. He said the guy before him told him about it, but that no one really knew any details, like who or what it was, just that--

TIM Yes?

HALSTON Shit. This is just one of those "you can't win" things. No matter what I say now, chances are you're gonna do something stupid.

TIM Maybe not. I mean, I'll try--

HALSTON Just don't blame me. So Fred - the guy who told me this - Fred said that one night he DID put a body into 23. And nothing happened.

TIM [deflated] Oh.

HALSTON Until midnight. Then the corpse woke up and screamed. It screamed and scratched at the drawer for just about an hour--

TIM The witching hour--

HALSTON Whatever - around one, it just shut off like a light.

TIM Maybe the poor stiff was still alive! Why didn't he open the drawer and check?

HALSTON [beat, ominous] Because the body was already autopsied.

MUSIC

SCENE 4. DAY, SCHOOL

SOUND QUICK FOOTSTEPS IN A TILED HALLWAY

TIM [off mike, slightly out of breath] Hey! Darcy?

DARCY Huh? Tim? What...?

SOUND FOOTSTEPS APPROACH AND STOP

TIM Hey. I- um, I wanted to ask--

DARCY [excited] Yes?

TIM --about ghosts.

DARCY [deflated] Oh. Why?

TIM It's the stories - you know about the ghosts in the morgue. And you seemed to know a lot. I mean, about ghosts. So-- I figured what the heck?

DARCY This is really not the place--

TIM Step outside? Just for a moment. I just got off shift and need some fresh air, anyway.

SCENE 5. OUTDOORS, CONTINUOUS

SOUND DOOR OPENS. MORNING NOISES - BIRDS, CARS

DARCY [takes a deep breath] So. Ghosts.

TIM Anything you can tell me.

DARCY That's like asking a gearhead about cars. It covers way too much territory. You need to be more specific.

TIM How do you ...talk to them?

DARCY Depends. Some ghosts can't talk. A lot of them don't even realize they're dead - they say it's the trauma. They wipe their death right out of their memories, and then get mad because people are ignoring them.

TIM Do you ...need a medium or something?

DARCY Do you need a doctor to know when you have a cold?

TIM What?

DARCY I'm saying that without some detail about your symptoms, you won't know whether to consult an expert.

TIM Oh, Ok.

DARCY I approach ghosts from a theoretical and psychological angle.

TIM Very scientific.

DARCY So? Bring me some parameters.

MUSIC

SCENE 6. MORGUE, NIGHT

SOUND BIG DRAWER ROLLS OUT

TIM I wonder if it has to be pushed in?

GORDY [filter, crackly] Dude, you're breaking up - the morgue sucks for reception.

TIM [snicker] A dead zone.

GORDY [filter, crackly] Ha-ha.

TIM So I got this guy... [muttered, to corpse] Sorry, man. [to Gordy] I wonder if it needs to be rolled in?

GORDY [filter, crackly] Did you remember to tie it up?

TIM [resigned] Yes.

GORDY [filter, crackly, fading] You'll thank me if this is a flesh eating zombie situation.

TIM In, I think.

SOUND DRAWER ROLLS IN

TIM 10, 9, 8--

GORDY [filter, crackly, fading badly] 7--[static] 5--

TIM 4, 3, 2...

SOUND PHONE BEEPS OFF

TIM Crap!

SOUND MUFFLED SCREAMING ["MALE BODY"] AND BANGING - CONTINUES UNTIL NOTED

MALE BODY [light accent - very southern belle] LET ME OUT!

TIM [almost paralyzed] Oh, shit! Oh, shit oh shit oh shit!!!

MALE BODY PLEASE!!! LET ME OUT!!!

SOUND DIALING PHONE

TIM Gordy, man!

SOUND PHONE BAD CONNECTION SOUND

TIM Shit!

MALE BODY [Screaming incoherently]

TIM [yelling] If I open the drawer, will you shut up?

MALE BODY [suddenly silent, then] Is there someone out there?

TIM Yes. Just, be calm, OK?

MALE BODY I'll try.

SOUND DRAWER ROLLED OUT

TIM [reacts in fear]

MALE BODY Thank you ever so much! I was afraid-- I-- Why on earth am I bound? [clears throat, tries to speak higher pitch] And what in heaven's name has happened to my voice?

MALE BODY I think somehow there is a great deal you are choosing not to tell me.

TIM You're right, but--- this isn't going to be easy. First, who are you? Do you remember?

MALE BODY Remember? Of course. Bedelia Crane. Miss Bedelia to my students. And yourself?

TIM Um, Tim. Timothy Grant.

MALE BODY Grant. Well, there's a name for you.

TIM And -- what year do you think it is?

MALE BODY 1932. Now it's your turn. Why don't you begin by telling me what it is you are keeping back.

MUSIC

SCENE 7. EMPTY CAFETERIA

SOUND STRAW POPS MILK CARTON

GORDY One advantage of working nights - we have our choice of tables.

TIM Yup.

GORDY So, do I have to beat it out of you?

TIM What?

GORDY What happened?

TIM Oh. [lightly] Body came to life, killed me, went off on a rampage.

GORDY Right, and even now, it is heading for the nation's capital, in search of brains.

TIM Wrong direction.

GORDY Well, that's because I was employing sarcasm. It's a tool of the trade for oncologists.

TIM [beat, shrug] Nothing.

GORDY Nothing?

TIM Nope.

GORDY Well. Guess I better cancel that Ghostbuster stripper I hired.

MUSIC

SCENE 8. OUTSIDE, DAY

SOUND FOOTSTEPS ON CONCRETE, SECOND SET HURRY UP

TIM Darcy! Got a minute?

DARCY Hi! [damping her enthusiasm] Tim.

TIM I have some more info on the ghost.

DARCY You're serious?

TIM Oh, yeah. I talked to her last night. Asked a bunch of questions - it was weird cause I didn't know she was a SHE, and I'd stuck in a man's body, but--

DARCY Tim?

TIM Yes?

DARCY You're telling me you spoke to a ghost?

TIM Yes.

DARCY A real live ghost?

TIM Apart from the poor choice of words, yes.

DARCY Are you sure you didn't just fall asleep?

TIM [not too sure] Pretty sure.

DARCY [sigh] I mean, I want to believe you, but - actually speaking to a ghost? Most people "feel a presence," or notice items have been moved a teensy bit from their previous position, or run into a cold spot.

TIM Nope. We just chatted - once I explained how things were, she seemed mostly OK with it. I guess no one ever just talked with her before.

DARCY [thinks for a moment, then] You need to video this or something.

TIM Don't you even want to know who she is? I was kind of hoping you could help me look up her records... [running out of steam] Being in records, and all.

DARCY Oh sure. Once I see your recording.

MUSIC

SCENE 9. MORGUE, NIGHT

SOUND DRAWER ROLLS OUT

TIM Is this one better?

BEDELIA [delighted] Oh, much. I almost feel like myself again. Though of course, I am not.

TIM You're taking it very well.

BEDELIA I have always prided myself on being a practical woman. There is no use in shedding tears over what cannot be changed. [losing confidence] I do, however, worry some little about what's to become of me.

TIM I have some questions for you. Are you up to answering?

BEDELIA Certainly. And, Timothy? Thank you so very much. For everything. Particularly for providing me with ... garments. I know it's ludicrous to be modest with another's--

TIM No, no. Perfectly reasonable. I'm curious‑‑

BEDELIA Could you help me out first? I would prefer to hold any such interview in a less horizontal position.

SOUND DRAWER OUT A BIT MORE

TIM & BEDELIA [grunts as he helps her up]

SOUND SEVERAL BARE FOOTSTEPS

BEDELIA [sighs as she sits] Timothy, was this poor girl deformed?

TIM Huh?

BEDELIA I can barely keep my balance and walk with such a monstrous bosom. Poor, poor child.

TIM It's-- Um - guys like girls who--

BEDELIA How times change. Now in my day - well, my heyday, shall we say - the style was a more delicate, and slender figure. Athletic. A girl like this would have cried her eyes out every night and bound herself to kingdom come, trying to achieve a decent flapper slouch.

TIM [shudder] Uhh.

BEDELIA Of, course, I was hardly a flapper - I was a bit old to run with that crowd, [nostalgic] but I spent my share of time in the speaks. Weekends only, o'course. It would never do to show up hung at the schoolhouse of a morning.

TIM Can I ask - I mean without offending you - when you were born?

BEDELIA Oh, Timothy. You are a delight. I'm dead, child, how can you offend me?

MUSIC

SCENE 10. MEETING DARCY

SOUND [On RECORDING] OUTSIDE NOISES

BEDELIA [on recording] I was born in the year 1891, in Rock Creek, Georgia. I came here in--

SOUND CLICK - TAPE MACHINE OFF

DARCY [sucks in breath, exasperated noise] But-- but that could be anyone.

TIM Yeah, I figured you might think that, so here--

SOUND CLICKING OF COMPUTER KEYS

DARCY [gasp]

TIM Sorry, it's the only way to prove - see the time code - this was 11:50, and then this--

SOUND CLICKING

TIM Was 1:08. There. Before and after shots of the same woman - dead. Autopsy scars and all.

DARCY Still...

TIM You could come and see for yourself. You can even choose the body--

DARCY I -- no. I mean, I'm in records for a reason. I don't like ...the smelly parts of medicine.

TIM All right, so--

GORDY [coming on] Hey, hey! Darcy, are you warm in here, or is it just me?

DARCY Is it funny in here, or is it just the way you smell?

TIM Um--

DARCY I've got to go, Tim. If I think of anything, I'll let you know.

TIM Um, Ok.

SOUND CHAIR, FOOTSTEPS LEAVE

GORDY Since the ghost in the drawer was a bust--

TIM [snort - almost a laugh]

GORDY --I did a little digging in old newspapers and I found you another one.

TIM Really? In the morgue too?

GORDY Yup. There was this freshman at the medical school, who for a hazing had to spend the night in the morgue - to make sure he didn't cheat, the frat boys handcuffed him to one of the drawers

TIM Number 23?

GORDY Dude, no one was sober enough to count. Anyway, so this poor newbie was handcuffed, in his underwear, in the morgue all night, and when they came to let him out--

TIM [waits, then] --Yes?

GORDY He was gone.

TIM Oh.

GORDY Wait, wait - He was gone, but his hand was still in the handcuff - he had chewed it off to escape!

TIM That's insane -you can't chew through bone.

GORDY Animals do it.

TIM Animals have teeth made for it. Humans simply don't have the jaw strength--

GORDY Dude, it's just a story. I guess you don't want to hear the best part.

TIM [long sigh, then] OK, what is it?

GORDY [offhand, not caring] His body was never found.

TIM Mm. Of course.

MUSIC

SCENE 11. MORGUE, NIGHT

SOUND DRAWER PULLS OUT

TIM Morning.

BEDELIA [chuckle] Help me out of here, if you please.

TIM Up you come. [grunt]

BEDELIA [sigh] Oh, this is very nice.

TIM You like?

BEDELIA Yes. A good deal closer my own age, and not bad looking.

TIM I was telling a friend about you--

BEDELIA [curious] But why? I mean, you start telling people that you're speaking with the dead, they're liable to look at you strangely.

TIM Oh, no - Darcy's cool. I asked if she wanted to drop in, but she's - a bit creeped out.

BEDELIA You have the most colorful colloquialisms.

TIM It's not the ghosts that wig her, it's more the corpses.

BEDELIA "wig"?

TIM Bother her.

BEDELIA Ahh. I don't wonder - not everyone can take a spirit at face value.

TIM Come, sit. I'm eating lunch - I don't suppose you would like some...?

BEDELIA I highly doubt it. But it certainly smells delicious.

TIM [gracious] Smell away.

BEDELIA Tell me about this lady friend of yours. Is it serious?

TIM [almost choking] You mean like dating? Me and Darcy?

BEDELIA Of course we called it courting in my day, but yes - is she your intended?

TIM I-- we-- I guess I never really thought about it. I mean, she's smart and pretty and all, but she-- [snort] She'd never be interested in me.

BEDELIA Why not? After all, you're obviously smart, kindhearted, and a fine-looking young man.

TIM [huh?] Me?

BEDELIA Of course. Is there anyone else in this room? Why, if I weren't a couple decades too old for you--

TIM --and dead--

BEDELIA --and, yes-- [sigh] You see there? Perhaps that's why you haven't any lady friend. You don't seem to think before you open your mouth.

TIM But - I just - it's the truth.

BEDELIA You are much too literal, Timothy. Sometimes - most of the time - tact isn't in what you say, so much as when you choose to say nothing at all. You would be amazed at how far a little tact and charm can take you.

SOUND DOOR OPENS, ANGRY FOOTSTEPS ENTER

SUMMERFIELD What in hell's going on?

TIM I--I--

BEDELIA [sharp] Sir? And who the devil are you?

TIM [whispered] It's my boss.

SUMMERFIELD Yeah, I'm his boss, he's my soon to fired employee, and who the devil are you?

BEDELIA [sweetness] I am Timothy's aunt, Bedelia Crane. I am so pleased to meet one of Timothy's co-workers. I didn't think I'd have such a chance--

SUMMERFIELD This is a restricted area, lady.

BEDELIA [as if he was being polite] Oh, you can call me Bedelia. And you are--?

SUMMERFIELD [rapidly losing steam] Alvin Summerfield, but--

BEDELIA I'm afraid this is all my fault, Mr. Summerfield. Or may I call you Alvin?

SUMMERFIELD [softening noticeably] Alvin--Alvin's fine. Or Al.

BEDELIA [troweling it on] Alvin is much more dignified. As I was saying, this is entirely my fault. I'm afraid I dropped in without the least warning - I'm only in town for a couple of hours, before my bus leaves again - and I came by with lunch to surprise him. I'm afraid Timothy just didn't have the heart to send his poor old aunt back out into the night, when we never get to see each other, ever, ever.

TIM Yeah.

SUMMERFIELD Well, I really can't let you stay, ma'am, but I... I understand. I won't write Tim up. This time. May I walk you to your car?

BEDELIA I'm parked quite some ways away, and couldn't possibly take you away from your business here for that long - but I would certainly appreciate an escort out of the building--

SOUND TAKES HIS ARM, THEY WALK OFF

BEDELIA [fading out] --I got myself terribly lost, trying to find my way in. But then, it is a fascinating place!

SOUND DOOR STARTS TO SWING SHUT, RUNNING FOOTSTEPS, DOOR SWINGS OPEN AGAIN

TIM Don't forget the time, aunt Bedelia!

BEDELIA Oh?

TIM You've only got [checks] uh, 43 minutes. Until you gotta be where you have to be.

BEDELIA I understand! [fading again] Such a good boy - wants to make sure I don't get left behind somewhere--

SOUND DOOR SHUTS

MUSIC

SCENE 12. MORGUE, NIGHT, LATER

SOUND PACING

TIM 12:49. Where the heck is she? I need to get that body back--

SOUND CELL PHONE RINGS

TIM [startled] Aah!

SOUND FUMBLES WITH PHONE, THEN TURNS IT ON

TIM H-hello?

GORDY [on phone] [spooooky voice] Whooo-ooooo. This is your wake-up ghost.

TIM Gordy?

GORDY [on phone] No, it's Mabel fable, put the money back on the table.

TIM Gordy!

GORDY [on phone] Ok, ok! Jeez, don't get your shroud in a bunch.

TIM Is there a point--?

GORDY [on phone] Yeah. I was googling the morgue and stuff, and realized that one reason I didn't find much was that the hospital changed its name in the 1970s. Once I found that, I uncovered a bunch of stuff.

TIM In the middle of the night?

GORDY [on phone] "Best time" "In an empty house"? - "best place."

TIM Huh?

GORDY [on phone] [sigh] You're such a nerd. All right. Most of the stuff is crap. Not very interesting. [beat] Except....

TIM [disinterested] The freshman's handless body?

GORDY [on phone] No. [serious] There really was a guy - and you can believe this, cause there's a wiki entry on it - who was working in the morgue and went nuts in the middle of July 17th.

TIM [beat] That's it?

GORDY [on phone] He claimed that a huge black shadow had risen from the floor or something, and touched him, and he like had visions or something and went nuts.

TIM When did this happen?

GORDY [on phone] uh [checking] 1945.

TIM He was probably listening to War of the Worlds or something.

GORDY [on phone] Well, there's more, [tailing off] but if you're not interested--

TIM All right. Go on.

GORDY [on phone] It happened three other times - People claimed to have seen something horrible on July 17th, or else [pause, for suspense] they killed themselves. Two suicides - a janitor and a nurse who wasn't even supposed to be in the area, both in the mid 50s.

TIM You're really serious?

GORDY [on phone] As a snack attack.

TIM But Sophia's worked here for twelve years, and she's never had a problem.

GORDY [on phone] Hmm. Ask her.

TIM Yeah - besides, she'll be back by then anyway.

GORDY [on phone] Good. You can start leading a normal life again. Oh, wait, you never had a normal life. Oh well. Chow!

TIM Bye.

SOUND TURNS OFF PHONE

SOUND MOMENT OF SILENCE, THEN A TAP AT THE WINDOW

TIM [startled] Ahh! Oh shit - Bedelia!

MUSIC

SCENE 13. OUTDOORS, EARLY MORNING

TIM [fading in] --and then it was 1 a-m and I had to drag the body back in really quick and clean it up!

DARCY [chuckling] You are such a freak!

TIM You think I'm a freak - It's Mr. Summerfield who was making all googly eyes at her. Ugh. Jeez, I hope he doesn't spot that body on the slab.

DARCY [shudder] The way you talk about her, it's easy to forget she's really... well... dead.

TIM Yeah, and she's been giving me all sorts of great advice-- [stops]

DARCY Mm?

TIM Nothing. [changing gears with difficulty] Um, Gordy told me there's concrete evidence of another ghostly presence, and I was hoping you might be interested.

DARCY Who is it this time?

TIM He said the only description was a "dark presence" and that came from a guy who went mad. I can forward you the e-mail.

DARCY [interested] Yeah. Do.

MUSIC

SCENE 14. MORGUE, NIGHT

BEDELIA It was so lovely. Being outside, in the night.

TIM You shouldn't have been out alone! You could have been--

BEDELIA Killed? [chuckles] Oh, I haven't any real worries on that score.

TIM Guess not.

BEDELIA But I do appreciate your concern, Timothy. That's very considerate of you.

TIM Well, I--

BEDELIA Now yesterday, before we were so rudely interrupted, you were telling me about your young lady friend.

TIM Uh, yeah. Look - there's something more important--

BEDELIA More important than romance? Goodness. That is just like a man.

TIM It's another ghost.

BEDELIA Oh?

TIM Here in the morgue. Someone - something - who only appears once a year - July 17 - and drives people crazy.

BEDELIA I had an uncle like that, but he only--

TIM Please! Have you ever seen this - thing?

BEDELIA [takes a moment to contemplate him] tsk. Timothy, you know very well that I have spent very little time of the last 75 years or so taking any notice of the world around me. When there's no body in the drawer at midnight, I just carry on asleep.

TIM I figured it couldn't hurt to ask.

BEDELIA Of course not. It never hurts to ask. You should ask your young lady to dinner sometime.

TIM Why? We eat together - breakfast - all the time. [flushes, realizing how this must sound, blurts] I mean when I get off shift, and she's coming in.

BEDELIA Silly boy. That's just food. "Dinner" is an event.

MUSIC

SCENE 15. OUTSIDE, MORNING

DARCY I think I found out something for you... about your friend Bedelia.

TIM Go on?

SOUND FLIPS PAGES

DARCY Hold on. All right. I found her hospital records, and they're pretty useless - it's amazing how unspecific stuff was back in the day! But they do say she was admitted on a Saturday morning, very early, unconscious, slipped into a coma and stopped breathing.

TIM But did it say why?

DARCY [she knows something] Noooo. [beat] But--

TIM But?

DARCY I checked the papers around the same time, and there were a number of near deaths from a bad batch of bathtub gin--

TIM In 1932 - but prohibition ended-- [cuts self off]

DARCY [waits a second, then] And, they all looked dead, presumably a deep coma, but then revived.

TIM You mean she--?

DARCY She probably revived in the drawer and then really died.

TIM Oh. [swallows] Well, thanks! Sounds like you did a lot of work on that.

DARCY Oh, I like going through old newspapers. The ads are hilarious! [beat] I also discovered one of the ineffable truths of life.

TIM Huh?

DARCY Gordy is an idiot.

TIM Oh, well - we knew that.

DARCY Your dark shape? It exists.

TIM Really?

DARCY In Ontario. Gordy mistook Moss Creek General, which was the old name here, for Moose Creek General, which is in some teensy town in Canada. Tsch. The wonders of the internet.

TIM Darcy...

DARCY Hmm?

TIM [very awkward] Would you like to go to dinner sometime?

MUSIC, MUCH TIME PASSES

SCENE 16. ENTERING MORGUE, NIGHT

TIM Thanks for staying up - Sophia warned me it would be awkward to readjust to days - and even more awkward to just work weekends like this.

DARCY What else am I going to do with my weekend nights? [teasing] My boyfriend has to work.

SOUND KISS, they break apart, both laughing a little

SOUND A COUPLE MORE STEPS, THEN DOOR PUSHES OPEN.

TIM [shock and horror] What the hell?

HALSTON Hiya Tim. I shoulda warned you - they finished over on the quad building ahead of schedule, so they started tearing stuff out over here. Think of it - six months, and we'll have the newest facilities in the state!

TIM But--

DARCY Oh, no! [sympathetic] Tim!

HALSTON What? Didya leave something in the morgue?

TIM Yeah. In one of the drawers. Where- where ... are ... they?

HALSTON Out back with the rest of the rubble, I suppose. Why?

TIM [strained] Nothing. Have a good night! [aside, to Darcy] Help me?

DARCY Um, sure. What do you--

TIM Come back at 11:30 and--

HALSTON [slightly off] At least it means work will be a piece of cake - everyone's being re-rerouted to Central until we get an interim suite set back up.

TIM [whispered] 11:30. We'll take a look. I just need to - at least say goodbye.

DARCY [a little unsure] Sure. Um. What's the worst that can happen?

MUSIC

SCENE 17. OUTSIDE, OUT BACK

AMBIANCE DISTANT TRAFFIC, NIGHTTIME

SOUND CLANKING NOISES

DARCY [whispered call] Found em!

SOUND HURRIED FOOTSTEPS

TIM Where?

DARCY But they're all out of order. Ooh. Some really didn't take it well.

TIM Check the numbers?

DARCY Oh, Tim - most of them don't seem to have them--

TIM Look for a dent on the front that looks like a pair of lips - I rammed a gurney into the drawer one night.

SOUND METAL RATTLES, ETC.

DARCY [beat] This one?

TIM Oh, yes! Help me turn it back over.

DARCY But without a body, how can you--

SECURITY GUARD Hey, you over there!

TIM Run, Darcy!

SOUND DARCY RUNS

SOUND TIM CLIMBS UNDER THE DRAWER AND HIDES.

SECURITY GUARD Hey! You kids!

SOUND RUNNING FEET GO PAST

TIME PASSES

SOUND DARCY'S FEET RETURN

DARCY [whispered call] Tim? Tim?

TIM Over here.

DARCY Oh! When I realized you weren't behind me, I thought he got you!

TIM [Sounding like Bedelia] Nonsense. I waited in ambush. [then, completely himself] Gotta get back to work. See you for breakfast?

DARCY Did you--? The drawer--?

TIM No. [rueful, but sounding just a touch like Bedelia] Not a soul. Any longer.

CLOSER

OLIVIA Now that you know how to find us, don't be a stranger - we have enough of those already...

END

A life of nothing but pleasant contemplation - no work, no worry - would be a lovely hell, wouldn't it?