’N’ finally Death come walket by, ’n’ he looket like a nightmare,’n’ da sun go blacket where he walk, but da woman light up ’n’ say: “You bin da only true friend a mine, you da one thing I can hope fer ’n’ know I han’t be disappointet inna end.”
So Death become da godfather a her kid, ’n’ he christen him . . . Thomas. ’N’ da kid growet up ta be a famous doctah wif da power a life ’n’ death, ’n’ den . . .
’N’ den he died, a course.
(She’s finished. She bites off the thread and leaves.
Schadenfreude and Doña Estrelita enter stealthily. They pull the body of Pumpkin’s rummy out from under the bed. They place it next to Browne’s corpse on the bed. Then they position themselves to lift Browne off the bed.)
DR. SCHADENFREUDE
Eins, zwei, drei . . .
(They lift and almost drop him, staggered by the weight.)
DR. SCHADENFREUDE
He weighs more than I’d expect.
DOÑA ESTRELITA
He seems to have gotten heavier . . . Sssssh! Someone’s coming!
(They begin running with the body in one direction; Estrelita stops when she realizes they won’t make it out of the room in time. Panicking, they toss Browne’s body back on the bed, where it lands topsy-turvy atop the rummy’s body. Schadenfreude and Estrelita hide. Babbo enters. Babbo sees the corpses all a-jumble.)
BABBO
Dat’s funny.
Musta slippet.
(She straightens the bodies out, in the process reversing Browne and the rummy’s bodies.)
BABBO
Nicet ’n’ neat, dat bin more liket.
(Sniffs) Hooh! Sumpin stinket harful a cheap hooch, hope it han’t bin me . . .
(Babbo starts to leave, then stops, thinks for a moment, turns back to the bed, counts the corpses silently: “One, two.” Thinks a moment more, then runs out screaming.
Schadenfreude and Estrelita emerge from their hiding places and start to lift the wrong corpse.)
DR. SCHADENFREUDE
Do you think he’ll fit?
DOÑA ESTRELITA
It’s a very large oven. Everything reeks dreadfully of rum.
DR. SCHADENFREUDE
(Indicating the corpse still on the bed) Our dead ringer must have been a drinker; fortunately Thomas was fastidiously abstemious. It would be infelicitous to introduce a body supersaturated with highly flammable spirits to a roaring oven fire. There could be . . . an explosion!
DOÑA ESTRELITA
Hurry! No time to think!
(They exit, carrying the rummy’s body. Dogwater enters.)
DR. DOGWATER
There but for the grace of God go I. We read of well-orchestrated d . . . d . . . final days. Like tuh-tightly written dramas. This . . . was not well made.
(The Abbess enters, crosses herself. She sees Dogwater and crosses herself again, more ostentatiously.)
THE ABBESS OF X
The Will?
DR. DOGWATER
The uh-ancient cuh-cook has it.
THE ABBESS OF X
Babbo? He gave it to Babbo?
DR. DOGWATER
Your brother may have lived a genius but he died a loo-lunatic.
(The Abbess leaves.)
DR. DOGWATER
Rah-runs in the family.
(Pumpkin enters.)
PUMPKIN
Pardon me, Pastah.
DR. DOGWATER
Cuh-come for him already? We hah-haven’t performed the exequies yet.
PUMPKIN
Funeral bin tomorrow. I wannet ta talk to you, Pastah.
DR. DOGWATER
Not now, Pah-Pumpkin, I’m too dah-dah-distracted.
PUMPKIN
Bin a matter of business.
DR. DOGWATER
I’m listening.
PUMPKIN
I got summat you bin verra interstet ta learn, but I han’t gonna tell ya fer free.
DR. DOGWATER
What could you possibly know that I—
PUMPKIN
It concernet da quarry. ’N’ da Will.
(Little pause.)
DR. DOGWATER
What will it cuh-cost me, this information?
PUMPKIN
Ten shares a da quarry.
DR. DOGWATER
PUMPKIN
Small comparet to what it cost you not ta know what I knowet.
DR. DOGWATER
Well, nuh-naturally you’d say that but—
THE ABBESS OF X
(Emerging from the shadows) Pay it Leviticus.
DR. DOGWATER
Uh-eavesdropping?
THE ABBESS OF X
Of course. Does this information concern Dame Dorothy?
PUMPKIN
How you know dat?
DR. DOGWATER
Whuh-what could he possibly know about Duh-Dame D . . .
THE ABBESS OF X
He’s her lover.
PUMPKIN
That han’t so!
DR. DOGWATER
(Overlapping Pumpkin) Luh-luh-luh . . . Uh-what?
THE ABBESS OF X
I’m trained to track the scent of carnal sin. You’re her lover. Now you have something we want—
DR. DOGWATER
Wuh-we?
THE ABBESS OF X
I spoke with Thomas before he died. I’m certain to be named in the Will. Partners. Gloria in Excelsis Deo.
As I was saying. (To Pumpkin) You know something we want, and we know something you want kept a secret. So we compromise. Three shares.
PUMPKIN
I han’t care ef it bin a secret. ’Tis her worry. Ten shares.
THE ABBESS OF X
Dogwater, what’s the local penalty for adultery?
DR. DOGWATER
Fuh-fuh-flogging. And thirty days in the stocks for fuh-fuh-fornicating.
PUMPKIN
Seven shares.
THE ABBESS OF X
Five.
PUMPKIN
Done
(Produces a document) Sign dis.
(Dogwater takes the document, reads it, looks at Pumpkin.)
DR. DOGWATER
Uh-it’s already made out for fuh-five shares.
PUMPKIN
(Producing a pencil) I bin preparet ta compromise. Sign ’n’ I talk.
(Dogwater signs. Pumpkin takes the document.)
PUMPKIN
As a fellow shareholder in da Walsingham Quarry I feel it bin my duty ta inform ya dat Dame Dorothy, da soon-ta-be majority shareholder, plans ta—
(Dorothy enters.)
DAME DOROTHY
Plans to what, Mr. Pumpkin?
Plans to do what?
(Dorothy and Pumpkin look at one another.)
PUMPKIN
I bin sorry, Dorfy, but you han’t listet ta me.
(He shows her the document.)
PUMPKIN
It han’t da hentire works, but it bin five shares, ’n’ dat’s better’n’ nuffin.
DAME DOROTHY
“Nuffin” is precisely what it is.
This man knows nothing of my affairs. He’s swindled you.
How could he know my plans?
DR. DOGWATER
He . . . he—
THE ABBESS OF X
. . . is your lover.
DAME DOROTHY
Him! He’s a commoner!
Hello Alice, I’d heard you’d returned from the dead.
I lovet you, Dorfy, but love han’t lastet onna small holding farm.
DAME DOROTHY
A commoner and deluded.
THE ABBESS OF X
At the risk of being . . . indelicate. This afternoon around six I took a little stroll in the woods, Dorothy. There’s a lovely clearing with beds of wildflowers.
DAME DOROTHY
Ah.
THE ABBESS OF X
Need I say which two people in th
is room were making use of those beds? He may not be your lover, Dorothy, but he must be a very close friend.
DAME DOROTHY
(To Pumpkin) Tell them. I interrupted you.
PUMPKIN
You tell.
DAME DOROTHY
With pleasure.
I plan to close the quarry and give the fields away, back to the people who—
DR. DOGWATER
DUH-DO WHAT? YOU PLAN TO DO WHAT?
DAME DOROTHY
Walsingham Fields will be common lands again.
THE ABBESS OF X
Dorothy, that’s insane.
DAME DOROTHY
Babbo told me about your visions, Alice. I’d be careful calling other people insane.
DR. DOGWATER
This is the fuh-final straw. You’re mad, wuh-woman. The cuh-corporation will stop you, you’ll be prevented—
THE ABBESS OF X
Sit, down, Leviticus, you’re apoplectic.
(Schadenfreude enters.)
DR. SCHADENFREUDE
Ah, my dear Dogwater.
DR. DOGWATER
Whuh-where’s that Wuh-Will! Where’s that Guh-Goddamn cuh-cook?
DOÑA ESTRELITA
(Entering) Stay out of the kitchen! I just put a very large roast in the oven!
DR. SCHADENFREUDE
And look what I found in the oven fire!
(He displays a charred, smoking, thick manuscript) My eulogy! Yours, I regret to say, I was unable to save . . .
DR. DOGWATER
My eu-eu-eu-eu . . . (He runs out)
DR. SCHADENFREUDE
(As Dogwater flees) I tried my best to pluck it from the inferno, but your prose, alas, is infinitely drier than mine.
PUMPKIN
Dorfy, could we go—
DAME DOROTHY
Mrs. Browne, please. Your services won’t be required till tomorrow morning. Not at all, in fact. I’ll find someone more fit to bury my husband. He was right about you, you are too . . . tense.
PUMPKIN
As a shareholder I gotta right ta hear da Will readet.
DAME DOROTHY
Then sit in a corner somewhere and please refrain from speaking to me.
(The ranters enter.)
SARAH
We come ta see da houtcome.
RUTH
(Looking at the corpse) It look verra satisfactory.
(The rumble in the fields is heard, ominous.)
MARY
Da best bin yet ta comet.
DR. DOGWATER
(Reentering) Ranters, nuns and foreigners. This place is a fuh-frigging zuh-zoo.
MACCABBEE
(Entering) Da cook bin comet.
(He sees His Soul) Why hantchoo ascendet?
(His Soul takes a drag on the cigarette, looks at Maccabbee, looks up to Heaven.)
HIS SOUL
That is a very interesting question.
(Calling out to the audience) Is there a theologian in the house?
(It lifts the cup of poison, makes a toasting gesture, and drinks more poison) To your health, you snoutless procrastinator.
MACCABBEE
Han’t rubbet in.
HIS SOUL
I’m famished. I gotta get a bite to eat. (Exits)
(Babbo enters; she’s been drinking to fortify her nerves.)
DR. DOGWATER
Well hah-hallelujah! It’s the kuh-kuh-queen of Heaven!
BABBO
Thank Gawd, dere bin da correck numba a cadavahs. Musta been delucinatet.
DAME DOROTHY
I think we ought to sing a hymn. In the memory of.
DR. SCHADENFREUDE
Hear hear! May I suggest “Oh Mein Gott, Du Rhüst So Denken Geschmecktet Dört die Himmelplatz Abfärht”?
DR. DOGWATER
Ah, pluh-please! We’ll suh-sing an English hymn. (To Schadenfreude) Barbarian. “There Is a Land of Pure Delight.”
BABBO
Oh, dat bin one a my favorites.
DR. DOGWATER
Well, anything to puh-please you, Your Guh-Grace. In Memory: Sir Thomas Browne.
THE ABBESS OF X
Requiescat in Pace.
EVERYONE
(Sings:)
There is a land of pure delight
Where saints immortal reign.
Infinite day excludes the night
And pleasure banish pain.
There everlasting spring abides,
And never-withering flowers.
Death like a narrow sea divides
This heavenly land from ours.
Amen.
DR. DOGWATER
Nuh-now the Will.
THE ABBESS OF X
Read it, Babbo. You have the Will? . . .
BABBO
Well, I misplacet it, but . . .
(Dogwater lunges for the Bible.)
DR. DOGWATER
But here it is!
(He opens the Bible, and pulls out long shreds of paper.)
DR. DOGWATER
Wuh-what the fuh-fuh-fuh-
(The Abbess meanwhile has lunged at the mattress and retrieved the Will hidden there.)
THE ABBESS OF X
Forget it, Leviticus, the Will of Browne is here!
(She tears open the seal, as Dogwater lunges for the document. There is a brief snarling tug-of-war; the Abbess wins, doubling Dogwater over with a well-placed kick.)
THE ABBESS OF X
I begin to suspect you enjoy this trouncing, Leviticus.
DR. DOGWATER
(Clutching his privates) I cuh-could get used to it.
THE ABBESS OF X
(Speed reading through the Will) AHA! Here! “And all my shares in the Walsingham Quarry I bequeath to my dearly beloved wife Dorothy B—”
(She instantly starts to rip the Will into shreds. Dorothy rushes to stop her.)
DAME DOROTHY
What are you . . . IT TOOK ME TWO-AND-A-HALF HOURS TO WRITE THAT—Oops.
THE ABBESS OF X
(Rushing to the bed) IT’S A FAKE! WE’LL SEARCH FOR THE—
DAME DOROTHY
If you’re looking for your version, Alice, here it is.
(Dorothy hurls a cloud of black ash in the Abbess’s face.)
THE ABBESS OF X
You . . . You burned it!?!
(The Abbess lunges at Dorothy, Pumpkin intercedes, the Abbess flips him head over heels.)
DAME DOROTHY
Thank you, Alice, you must teach me how that’s done.
DR. SCHADENFREUDE
Through the Will the dead speak to the living, and Browne remains for once uncharacteristically mum. Through the eulogy the living speak to the dead, and since I am the only one prepared to eulogize the deceased when the king arrives—