HIS SOUL
Soon! Soon!
DR. BROWNE
Very soon.
HIS SOUL
You stink like a sewer! I can’t bear this much longer.
DR. BROWNE
(Straining) I can’t release . . . it won’t come out . . . (He gives up)
(Dame Dorothy Browne hurries in. His Soul disappears.)
DAME DOROTHY
Are you . . . ? Thank God.
DR. BROWNE
Not yet. But soon . . .
(Dame Dorothy goes to windows, pulls open the big drapes. Morning light streams in.)
DAME DOROTHY
Happy Birthday, Thomas. Did you pass a stool? (Silence. She checks the bedpan. Empty) Guess not.
DR. BROWNE
I’ve swollen again.
DAME DOROTHY
You can’t have swollen, you haven’t eaten in a week.
(Babbo rushes in.)
BABBO
Bin dead?
(She sees him)
Ahhh, thank God. Many happy returns, Dr. Browne. You look spectacala.
DR. BROWNE
I bloat.
BABBO
Mrs. Browne, dose wimmin you let in last night, dey be making a harful warrick in da kitchen, be scarfin down da rah heggs ’n’ sucking seeds outa da squash, ’n’ one bin slavverin every dropta wine inna pantry. Fer breakfast.
DAME DOROTHY
I have to go now, Thomas. Thomas?
DR. BROWNE
I want to see the gravedigger.
DAME DOROTHY
You don’t need a gravedigger.
DR. BROWNE
I have instructions—
BABBO
’N’ dey keept it up in halfta nour don’t be nuffin potable ner comastible in da place, ’n’ no food fer Dr. Browne’s funeral.
DAME DOROTHY
Babbo!
BABBO
’N’ you better come now ’cause I can’t congle with ’em, ’n’ twas your idea to let ’em in.
DR. BROWNE
GRAVEDIGGER!
DAME DOROTHY
Babbo, stay here and watch till Dr. Schadenfreude comes. (She goes)
DR. BROWNE
I shouldn’t scream. It brings on the bloating.
BABBO
Fer aftah da funeral, I thought maybe ta serve plum tart with lemmin grind. It’s yer favorite. How’d dat be, Dr. Browne?
DR. BROWNE
I don’t care . . . what you serve. I won’t be there.
BABBO
Dat’s true. But all same, ’tis yer funeral. ’N’ you was always such a fussy ’n’ patricula man.
DR. BROWNE
Last night
I dreamt I breathed
my final breath, and as I did
my soul
escaped,
rose out of me
like a fat, pale moon.
It floated to the ceiling.
It caught there
in the blackened roof beams,
and stuck. My dead eyes,
my dead eyes saw it wriggle like a fly,
trapped, not
able
to rise any higher.
(His Soul rattles its chains.)
BABBO
(Softly) I think I’ll make da tart. Dere bin early plums, so it be tarter dan usual, make everyone pucker ’n’ deir eyes water like dey was crying fer you.
(She laughs a little.)
DR. BROWNE
A good plan. There should be tears.
BABBO
I’ll weep fer you, Sir Thomas.
DR. BROWNE
Listen, old lady.
BABBO
Listet to what?
DR. BROWNE
That pounding. In the distance. Rolling over the meadows. Boooomm. Boooommm. It’s the sound of the engines in the quarry, digging deep.
My engines.
I don’t want to die.
(Maccabbee and the gravedigger, Leonard Pumpkin, enter.)
MACCABBEE
Da gravedigger.
(Dr. Schadenfreude enters.)
MACCABBEE
’N’ da doctah.
DR. BROWNE
It’s my birthday.
DR. SCHADENFREUDE
Congratulations. You look . . . appallingly bad. Your color—it’s positively inorganic.
DR. BROWNE
The leeches.
DR. SCHADENFREUDE
In a minute. First—
DR. BROWNE
What?
DR. SCHADENFREUDE
A mercury enema!
DR. BROWNE
NO!
(Dr. Schadenfreude pulls from his bag a frightful gadget, a large glass bottle filled with quicksilver, on one end a syringe plunger, on the other end large phallic-shaped leather nozzle.)
DR. SCHADENFREUDE
Yes.
DR. BROWNE
I refuse.
DR. SCHADENFREUDE
I’m your doctor.
DR. BROWNE
I’ll be dead soon. The leeches.
DR. SCHADENFREUDE
Patience. First the enema. We have to try to remove that blockage. Ladies leave.
(Babbo goes. Dr. Schadenfreude notices the gravedigger.)
DR. SCHADENFREUDE
Who are you?
PUMPKIN
Gravedigger.
DR. SCHADENFREUDE
How convenient. Now then.
(Schadenfreude leaps onto the bed with the equipment. He pulls the sheets over his head, which mercifully obscures from our sight the procedure. There is much struggling.)
MACCABBEE
(To Pumpkin) He’s gotta tumor. Inna bowels. Like a onion, dey say. Plug him up.
PUMPKIN
A onion?
MACCABBEE
Inna bowels.
PUMPKIN
Gawd.
(Dr. Schadenfreude is finished.)
DR. SCHADENFREUDE
No good. Gunpowder couldn’t budge it. Let’s bleed him a little.
DR. BROWNE
(Weakly) Leeches . . .
DR. SCHADENFREUDE
Yes, but first we skim off the bad blood, so the leeches don’t get sick when they suck. You’re a regular sack of toxins, Thomas.
(Schadenfreude takes out a horrible-looking device, like a sap-spigot for syrup gathering; he rams it in Dr. Browne’s side, and holds a bucket underneath it to catch the blood, which is running out at an alarming rate.)
DR. BROWNE
I’m . . . so . . . cold . . . no . . . more . . .
(The lights change. Music. His Soul sits up, looking eager. Schadenfreude, Maccabbee and Pumpkin can’t see this. Dr. Schadenfreude pulls out the spigot, applies a wad of cotton to the puncture.)
DR. SCHADENFREUDE
Enough for now.
(The lights go back to normal.)
HIS SOUL
(Disappearing) DAMN!
DR. SCHADENFREUDE
And already your color’s improving! The wonders of the modern age. Fifty years ago these techniques were unknown.
And now the leeches!
Thomas?
Sir Thomas?
(Dr. Browne is unconscious. Dr. Schadenfreude slaps him gently.)
DR. SCHADENFREUDE
Smack smack smack. Little crescent kisses.
(To Pumpkin, who has moved away) Squeamish?
PUMPKIN
Nope.
DR. SCHADENFREUDE
Hard to be squeamish and work in your field. Why don’t I know you?
PUMPKIN
New to these parts.
DR. SCHADENFREUDE
Name?
PUMPKIN
Pumpkin.
DR. SCHADENFREUDE
Christian name?
PUMPKIN
Leonard.
DR. SCHADENFREUDE
What happened to the old g
ravedigger?
PUMPKIN
Died.
DR. SCHADENFREUDE
Your predecessor and I had an agreement. I pay crown sterling for reasonably intact cadavers. Dr. Schadenfreude.
(He proffers his hand. Pumpkin shakes it. Schadenfreude wipes it with a hankie.)
DR. SCHADENFREUDE
Medical research. Highly scientific work. Right, Maccabbee?
MACCABBEE
Oh, yoop.
DR. SCHADENFREUDE
How are Browne’s experiments coming along?
MACCABBEE
Well, Doctah Browne mostly loss interest inna lass few weeks, oncet da swelling incepted. We was doing a experiment ta see if da dogs would eat rotted birds.
DR. SCHADENFREUDE
Did they?
MACCABBEE
O sure dey bin chompet on stuff so rotted da flies wouldn’t go near it.
DR. SCHADENFREUDE
From which you conclude . . .
MACCABBEE
Da conclusions was fer Sir Thomas ta extrapolate ’n’ send to da Royal Academy in London. I mostly took care a da nasty stuff. But I guess . . . I conclude . . . dat dogs . . . like rotted meat.
DR. SCHADENFREUDE
And thrive from eating it.
MACCABBEE
Yah, dey do at dat. ’Tis nauseating.
DR. SCHADENFREUDE
From which we may conclude, perhaps, that there is a vitality in putrefaction, a life in death: rats born in sacks of mouldy grain, maggots blossoming in rancid meat, bustle bugs in the water-tap scumbeard—
MACCABBEE
Science bin amazement!
DR. SCHADENFREUDE
Browne’s last Will and Testament. Is it available for viewing?
MACCABBEE
Han’t heard nuffin about it.
DR. SCHADENFREUDE
(Flipping Maccabbee a coin) If you happen to hear that he’s specified the name of his eulogist, fill me in. I’m certain I’ll be asked to eulogize him. I knew him inside and out! Everyone says he was a genius. They say the king himself might attend . . .
(To Pumpkin) Mendicants, vagrants, charity corpses—as long as they’re reasonably fresh.
(Dr. Schadenfreude starts out as Dame Dorothy enters.)
DR. SCHADENFREUDE
(Bowing) Dame Dorothy.
DAME DOROTHY
It’s his birthday. He says he’ll die today.
DR. SCHADENFREUDE
Cradle to crypt, a mark of character. The Romans did it.
DAME DOROTHY
By killing themselves.
DR. SCHADENFREUDE
Better a warm bath and a sharp knife than a slow, wasting death. Your husband I’m sure would agree with me. If he was conscious.
Madame. (Bows and goes)
DAME DOROTHY
Maccabbee, show him out.
MACCABBEE
(Gesturing for Pumpkin to leave) Dis way, Pumpkin.
DAME DOROTHY
No, not him. He can stay for a moment. Show the doctor out.
MACCABBEE
Da doctah’s been here every day fer a month. He knows how ta get out.
DAME DOROTHY
Well, just in case.
MACCABBEE
DAME DOROTHY
Maccabbee, go!
MACCABBEE
(Pointing to Pumpkin) How come he getsa stay?
DAME DOROTHY
I want to discuss the sarcophagus.
MACCABBEE
Da what?
(Dame Dorothy points to the door and glowers. Maccabbee grudgingly exits.)
DAME DOROTHY
Leonard.
PUMPKIN
Dorfy.
DAME DOROTHY
Wait.
(Dame Dorothy tiptoes to Dr. Browne, assures herself that he is unconscious, checks the door and windows, then goes to Pumpkin and kisses him passionately.)
PUMPKIN
(Pulling away) DORFY!
DAME DOROTHY
He’s sleeping.
PUMPKIN
’Tis perverse.
DAME DOROTHY
I know. I haven’t seen you since Monday evening.
PUMPKIN
Busy week. Dropping like—
DAME DOROTHY
(Throatily) Come here. Leonard . . .
PUMPKIN
I mean, look at him. Poor ole balloon.
DAME DOROTHY
I don’t want to look at him.
PUMPKIN
Let’s go to da woods.
DAME DOROTHY
(Pulling him down to the rug) I can’t leave. My place is here, with my husband.
PUMPKIN
Ent you sad he bin dying?
DAME DOROTHY
Grief . . . is a highly personal thing. It’s spring, Leonard. I’ve been cold a long time. Your hands are so strong and so filthy.
PUMPKIN
Grave dirt.
DAME DOROTHY
Poor Pumpkin, you work so hard.
PUMPKIN
My poor back be stabbat harful bya enna da day.
DAME DOROTHY
Because to bury the dead you must dig deep.
PUMPKIN
Head-high from da bottom a da hole.
DAME DOROTHY
Poor Thomas, in the ground.
After he’s gone, we’ll dig nothing deeper than the two-foot pit a seed-potato needs. Little rows of vegetables, on our small and fertile farm.
PUMPKIN
Fuck be dat. Bin a gentleman farmer den, own da biggest farm fer miles, hire some poor lob ta plant da vegetals fer me. ’N’ da machines ta dig limestone from da quarry.
(Silence. Dorothy looks away.)
DAME DOROTHY
I hate the quarry.
PUMPKIN
You make a swollot a money outa dat quarry.
DAME DOROTHY
Nothing good will come from it.
PUMPKIN
Limestone come from it.
DAME DOROTHY
Those women in the kitchen. Did you see them?
PUMPKIN
Ah, nope.
DAME DOROTHY
Three ranter women.
PUMPKIN
Ranters bin heretics.
DAME DOROTHY
They used to live in cottages on a farm—on the land Thomas’s father bought, where Thomas dug the quarry. They had a little farm there.
PUMPKIN
Stupid a dem to do dat, set a farm on dat rocky soil. You shouldn’ta oughta take dem in, dey han’t gonna wanna leave.’N’ steal yer eyes out yer sockets. ’N’ got contagious lice.