19 Nocturne Boulevard - THE WATER GHOST OF HARROWBY HALL - Reissue
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.\xa0 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
****************************************************
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
\xa0
MUSIC - CHRISTMAS
\xa0
SCENE 1.\xa0\xa0\xa0 BALLROOM
SOUND\xa0\xa0\xa0 FAIRLY SEDATE PARTY
CHRISTINA\xa0\xa0\xa0 [american] I'm terribly charmed to meet you!\xa0 I've never danced with a Lord before.\xa0 Makes me feel like a lady.
EDWARD\xa0\xa0\xa0 [chuckles]\xa0 You're lucky I'm also a gentleman - not every lord can claim that.
CHRISTINA\xa0\xa0\xa0 Oh, you!
EDWARD\xa0\xa0\xa0 You're in London with friends?
CHRISTINA\xa0\xa0\xa0 I'm a guest of the Harrisons.\xa0 Daddy thought a trip to England would be nice polish.\xa0 He's very impressed by nobilities.
EDWARD\xa0\xa0\xa0 I'm sure.
SOUND\xa0\xa0\xa0 CLOCK STARTS TO STRIKE TWELVE
CHRISTINA\xa0\xa0\xa0 Goodness, your parties go late over here.\xa0 I'm afraid you must think I'm terribly provincial.
EDWARD\xa0\xa0\xa0 Oh no.\xa0 Never.
SOUND\xa0\xa0\xa0 CLOCK FINISHES, SUDDEN DELUGE OF WATER, COVERS EVERYTHING.
CHRISTINA\xa0\xa0\xa0 [screaming!]\xa0 My dress!\xa0 Oh no!
SOUND\xa0\xa0\xa0 OTHER PEOPLE PROTESTING, RUNNING AWAY
EDWARD\xa0\xa0\xa0 [calm but shouting] Just clear out, everyone, please!
SOUND\xa0\xa0\xa0 DOORS SLAM, NO MORE RUNNING
GHOST\xa0\xa0\xa0 Oglethorpe.
EDWARD\xa0\xa0\xa0 [sigh]\xa0 Yes.
MUSIC
\xa0
SCENE 2.\xa0\xa0\xa0 BALLROOM, DRIPPING WET
SOUND\xa0\xa0\xa0 KNOCK ON THE DOOR
LESLIE\xa0\xa0\xa0 Hello?
SOUND\xa0\xa0\xa0 WATER STILL DRIPPING ALL OVER
EDWARD\xa0\xa0\xa0 [glum] It's all over but the blotting.\xa0 Safe to come in.
SOUND\xa0\xa0\xa0 DOOR OPENS, WOMAN WALKS IN
LESLIE\xa0\xa0\xa0 Oh, my.
EDWARD\xa0\xa0\xa0 [resigned] I'll take care of any repairs.\xa0
LESLIE\xa0\xa0\xa0 Towel?\xa0 I also brought you a robe, but we haven't even been properly introduced yet.
EDWARD\xa0\xa0\xa0 Henry Oglethorpe.\xa0 [sigh] \xa0Baron Harrowby, I suspect.
LESLIE\xa0\xa0\xa0 Leslie Widdrington.\xa0 Poor relation.
EDWARD\xa0\xa0\xa0 [chuckles, but not really amused] Huh. \xa0I've just come into a great deal of money.
LESLIE\xa0\xa0\xa0 How's that?
EDWARD\xa0\xa0\xa0 My father must have died, or this would have happened to him.\xa0
LESLIE\xa0\xa0\xa0 Ah.\xa0 [sympathetical understanding] Ancestral curse?
EDWARD\xa0\xa0\xa0 You're curiously sanguine about it.
LESLIE\xa0\xa0\xa0 [flippant] It's not my ballroom.\xa0 Come along, let's get you out of this damp.\xa0 Perhaps a hot bath would be in order?
MUSIC
\xa0
SCENE 3.\xa0\xa0\xa0 CASTLE
LESLIE\xa0\xa0\xa0 [reading] "The trouble with Harrowby Hall is that it was haunted.\xa0 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\xa0\xa0\xa0 My father had a flowery turn of phrase.
LESLIE\xa0\xa0\xa0 A style the suits the classic ghost story.\xa0 You're quite sure you don't mind?
EDWARD\xa0\xa0\xa0 I need to confide in someone, and he's already written it all down.\xa0 But you can skip past the part about it appearing only for an hour every Christmas at midnight.\xa0 I think we've established that.
LESLIE\xa0\xa0\xa0 You're lucky you didn't catch pneumonia.
EDWARD\xa0\xa0\xa0 I'm still undecided.\xa0 [coughs, but not seriously]\xa0 At least one good thing came from the deluge.
LESLIE\xa0\xa0\xa0 Oh?
EDWARD\xa0\xa0\xa0 I needed a secretary.
LESLIE\xa0\xa0\xa0 I suppose it pays to be intrepid, then.\xa0
SOUND\xa0\xa0\xa0 PAGES FLIP
LESLIE\xa0\xa0\xa0 Ah.\xa0 [start here?] "The owners of Harrowby Hall had done their utmost--?"\xa0\xa0
EDWARD\xa0\xa0\xa0 Sounds good.
LESLIE\xa0\xa0\xa0 "--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. \xa0They 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\xa0\xa0\xa0 We've done absolutely everything.\xa0 Or tried to.\xa0 My own grandfather caulked up every crack in the floor, covered it with tarpaper - every conceivable kind of waterproofing was put into effect.\xa0 And yet--
LESLIE\xa0\xa0\xa0 But you weren't even in the tower room.
EDWARD\xa0\xa0\xa0 [sigh] It's all in the manuscript.
LESLIE\xa0\xa0\xa0 At least it will be another year until she makes an appearance.
EDWARD\xa0\xa0\xa0 There is a great deal to be said for predictability.
LESLIE\xa0\xa0\xa0 [reading dramatically] "The following Christmas eve she appeared as promptly as before, and frightened the occupant of the room--"
EDWARD\xa0\xa0\xa0 That wasn't even one of my forefathers.\xa0 Just an unfortunate guest.\xa0
LESLIE\xa0\xa0\xa0 "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\xa0\xa0\xa0 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\xa0\xa0\xa0 Then comes a year they chose not to open the room at all.
EDWARD\xa0\xa0\xa0 "Let her haunt the room - she'll not haunt me!"\xa0 Father railed, or so I have been told.
LESLIE\xa0\xa0\xa0 Didn't work, though, did it?
EDWARD\xa0\xa0\xa0 [sigh]\xa0 No.\xa0 Apparently the room is only the primary target.\xa0 If there is no one present to receive her, the current lord will always have a visitor.\xa0
LESLIE\xa0\xa0\xa0 Thus the monsoon in the ballroom?
EDWARD\xa0\xa0\xa0 [rueful]\xa0 Father didn't even tell me he was doing poorly.\xa0 [snappy again] A little warning would have been ... convenient.\xa0 I could have spent the night in the desert.
LESLIE\xa0\xa0\xa0 What do you plan to do?
EDWARD\xa0\xa0\xa0 Foil her.
LESLIE\xa0\xa0\xa0 How?
EDWARD\xa0\xa0\xa0 That I do not quite know... yet.\xa0 I need to go over father's manuscript with a fine tooth comb for any possible clues.\xa0 Anything can be overcome with the application of a modicum of logic.
LESLIE\xa0\xa0\xa0 Well, then.\xa0 Shall we get back to it?
EDWARD\xa0\xa0\xa0 Go back to the year father tried to simply ignore the ghost.\xa0 It seems she first appeared in the tower room, for the parlor below had a great damp spot on the ceiling.\xa0 But she didn't stay there.
LESLIE\xa0\xa0\xa0 [reading]\xa0 "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\xa0\xa0\xa0 Father always did have a turn of phrase.\xa0 And a fondness for water-butts.\xa0 [dramatic] And there she stood. \xa0The lady of the cavernous eyes and seaweed fingers.
LESLIE\xa0\xa0\xa0 "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\xa0\xa0\xa0 I like a good shower bath as much as the next person, but I do prefer it on the tropical side of tepid.\xa0
LESLIE\xa0\xa0\xa0 [teasing] Hush.\xa0
EDWARD\xa0\xa0\xa0 My father was a brave man, and not to be daunted.\xa0 Forced to face the ghost, he determined to discover some particulars.
LESLIE\xa0\xa0\xa0 "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\xa0\xa0\xa0 So he faced her with all the bravado he could muster.
LESLIE\xa0\xa0\xa0 Sounds like he was chock a block with bravado.\xa0 At least the way he wrote it.
EDWARD\xa0\xa0\xa0 Let us hope it runs in the family.
LESLIE\xa0\xa0\xa0 [leading into flashback] He faced the ghost...
MUSIC SEGUE INTO FLASHBACK
SOUND\xa0\xa0\xa0 WATER DRIPPING and TRICKLING
HENRY\xa0\xa0\xa0 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. \xa0Go 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. \xa0It is damned disagreeable.
GHOST\xa0\xa0\xa0 Henry Hartwick Oglethorpe.\xa0 That is a bit of specious nonsense.\xa0 You must know that I am compelled to haunt this place year after year by inexorable fate. \xa0I never aspired to be a shower-bath, but it is my doom. \xa0Do you know who I am?
HENRY\xa0\xa0\xa0 No, I do not. I should say you were the Lady of the Lake, or Little Sallie Waters.
GHOST\xa0\xa0\xa0 You are a witty man for your years.
HENRY\xa0\xa0\xa0 Well, my humor is drier than yours ever will be.
GHOST\xa0\xa0\xa0 No doubt - I am never dry. \xa0I am the Water Ghost of Harrowby Hall, and dryness is a quality entirely beyond my wildest hope. \xa0I have been the incumbent of this highly unpleasant office for two hundred years tonight.
HENRY\xa0\xa0\xa0 How the deuce did you ever come to get elected?
GHOST\xa0\xa0\xa0 [matter of fact]\xa0 Suicide.\xa0 I am the ghost of that fair maiden whose picture hangs over the mantelpiece in the drawing room.
LESLIE\xa0\xa0\xa0 [v.o.] That lovely early Georgian piece?\xa0 Or do I mean Jacobean?
EDWARD\xa0\xa0\xa0 [v.o.] Take down a memorandum - draw a mustache on her at the earliest opportunity.
GHOST\xa0\xa0\xa0 Had I lived, I should have been your great-great-great-great-great-aunt.
HENRY\xa0\xa0\xa0 But what induced you to get this house into such a predicament?
GHOST\xa0\xa0\xa0 It was my father's fault. \xa0It was he who built Harrowby Hall, and the haunted chamber was to have been mine. \xa0My father had it furnished in pink and yellow, knowing well that blue and gray formed the only combination of colours I could tolerate.
HENRY\xa0\xa0\xa0 And...?
GHOST \xa0\xa0\xa0\xa0He did it merely to spite me, and I declined to live in the room.\xa0 Whereupon father said I could live there or on the lawn, he didn't care which. \xa0That night I ran from the house and jumped over the cliff into the sea.
EDWARD\xa0\xa0\xa0 [v.o.] That was rash.
LESLIE\xa0\xa0\xa0 [v.o.] Dying over pink and yellow?\xa0 I should say so. \xa0Green and orange, perhaps.
EDWARD\xa0\xa0\xa0 [v.o.] But only if one is Irish.
GHOST\xa0\xa0\xa0 Had I but known the consequences, I should not have jumped.
HENRY\xa0\xa0\xa0 A bit late for hindsight.\xa0
GHOST\xa0\xa0\xa0 I had been drowned a week when I was informed it would be my doom to haunt Harrowby Hall. \xa0
LESLIE\xa0\xa0\xa0 [v.o.] Informed?\xa0 Informed by whom?\xa0
EDWARD\xa0\xa0\xa0 [v.o.] Hmm.\xa0 Never considered it.\xa0 The local union of apparations, phantoms and sundry visitations?
HENRY\xa0\xa0\xa0 I'll sell the place.
EDWARD\xa0\xa0\xa0 [v.o.] Sound thinking.
GHOST\xa0\xa0\xa0 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\xa0\xa0\xa0 [v.o.] Snap!\xa0
HENRY\xa0\xa0\xa0 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?\xa0 And soaking me through to the skin?
GHOST\xa0\xa0\xa0 You have stated the case clearly, Oglethorpe. \xa0And what is more - it doesn't make the slightest difference where you are.\xa0 If I find that room empty, wherever you may be I shall douse you with my spectral pres--
SOUND\xa0\xa0\xa0 CLOCK STRIKES ONE
LESLIE\xa0\xa0\xa0 [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\xa0\xa0\xa0 By St. George and his Dragon! \xa0It 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\xa0\xa0\xa0 [v.o. fading to normal]\xa0 He would have lost that bet.\xa0 That was last year, and this year, he passed away just in time to avoid the deluge.
LESLIE\xa0\xa0\xa0 And you didn't know, and we are now caught up to the present.
EDWARD\xa0\xa0\xa0 [sigh] But for the bill for the ballroom.\xa0\xa0
MUSIC
\xa0
SCENE 4.\xa0\xa0\xa0 TEA
LYDIA\xa0\xa0\xa0 So glad you could accommodate me for tea, Edward.\xa0 I've not returned to society yet, and I'm getting sick to the teeth of a house covered in black crepe.
EDWARD\xa0\xa0\xa0 Ah.
LYDIA\xa0\xa0\xa0 Your father positively loathed black.
EDWARD\xa0\xa0\xa0 Ah.
LYDIA\xa0\xa0\xa0 And I loathe crepe.\xa0 I've developed quite a mental aversion to it.\xa0 I don't supposed a doctor could furnish me with some sort of prescription?
EDWARD\xa0\xa0\xa0 I doubt it.\xa0 Mourning is mourning, mother.\xa0 And you are hardly the only one inconvenienced by father's untimely demise.
LYDIA\xa0\xa0\xa0 [slightly amused] Ah, yes I heard.
EDWARD\xa0\xa0\xa0 You might have sent a wire or something.\xa0
LYDIA\xa0\xa0\xa0 I was rather preoccupied.\xa0 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\xa0\xa0\xa0 I could get you some corgis.
LYDIA\xa0\xa0\xa0 Hush.\xa0 You know very well what I mean!\xa0 It is your responsibility to produce an heir and a spare, particularly now that you are effectively the last of the line.
EDWARD\xa0\xa0\xa0 Hmm...\xa0 [chuckle] It would be funny to find out who gets haunted, should I die early.
LYDIA\xa0\xa0\xa0 I should say not!
EDWARD\xa0\xa0\xa0 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\xa0\xa0\xa0 There's always some rich American.\xa0 they'll even pay extra for such a heritage!
EDWARD\xa0\xa0\xa0 [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\xa0\xa0\xa0 OH.\xa0 Yes, I see.
EDWARD\xa0\xa0\xa0 So I'm down to shop assistants and ladies who speak no English.
SOUND\xa0\xa0\xa0 DOOR OPENS, LESLIE ENTERS BRISKLY
LESLIE\xa0\xa0\xa0 Here's your correspondence for the day-- oh.\xa0 I'm so dreadfully sorry.\xa0 I wasn't aware -- I don't have any engagements on your calendar for this afternoon.
EDWARD\xa0\xa0\xa0 Miss Widdrington, may I present my mother, the Dowager Baroness of Harrowby.\xa0 Mother, my new secretary.\xa0
LYDIA\xa0\xa0\xa0 [a bit snotty] Charmed.
LESLIE\xa0\xa0\xa0 [overly subservient, almost goofy] I'll be in the study, then, sir, should you need me.\xa0 If I may excuse myself?
EDWARD\xa0\xa0\xa0 [equally over the top] Dismissed.
SOUND\xa0\xa0\xa0 LESLIE LEAVES
LYDIA\xa0\xa0\xa0 Who is she?
EDWARD\xa0\xa0\xa0 My secretary.
LYDIA\xa0\xa0\xa0 Widdrington.\xa0 Widdrington.\xa0 Any relation to the Haversham Widdringtons?
EDWARD\xa0\xa0\xa0 [offhanded] Poor relation.\xa0 Quite destitute.
LYDIA\xa0\xa0\xa0 [musing] Still.\xa0 She's got a good back.\xa0 Does she ride?
MUSIC
\xa0
SCENE 5.\xa0\xa0\xa0 STUDY
SOUND\xa0\xa0\xa0 DOOR OPENS
LESLIE\xa0\xa0\xa0 So sorry about that--
EDWARD\xa0\xa0\xa0 You couldn't have known.
LESLIE\xa0\xa0\xa0 It's dreadfully easy to fall into old habits.
EDWARD\xa0\xa0\xa0 Old?
LESLIE\xa0\xa0\xa0 I wasn't always "how you see me now."\xa0 Impoverished.\xa0 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.\xa0 And that, as they say, was that.
EDWARD\xa0\xa0\xa0 At least you're not bitter.
LESLIE\xa0\xa0\xa0 Oh you should have heard me a year ago.\xa0 I would have blistered a sailor's ears.
EDWARD\xa0\xa0\xa0 And now?
LESLIE\xa0\xa0\xa0 [pleased] Now, I am employed.\xa0
EDWARD\xa0\xa0\xa0 And you don't mind?
LESLIE\xa0\xa0\xa0 Well I'm also intrigued by your dilemma - most particularly because it's not my own.
EDWARD\xa0\xa0\xa0 [laughs] \xa0
LESLIE\xa0\xa0\xa0 But today's problem is your social calander.
EDWARD\xa0\xa0\xa0 oh?\xa0 More cancellations?
LESLIE\xa0\xa0\xa0 Every dinner party, every engagement for the opera, every ball.
EDWARD\xa0\xa0\xa0 Everything that might possibly involve late nights, in other words.
LESLIE\xa0\xa0\xa0 Precisely.\xa0 But there are still afternoon teas, ascot, and a tentative engagement for croquet.
EDWARD\xa0\xa0\xa0 [sulky] Suddenly I'm an elderly uncle.
MUSIC - CHRISTMAS
\xa0
SCENE 6.\xa0\xa0\xa0 NEXT YEAR
SOUND\xa0\xa0\xa0 DRIPPING
SOUND\xa0\xa0\xa0 STEAM HISS
SOUND\xa0\xa0\xa0 DOOR OPENS
LESLIE\xa0\xa0\xa0 Time?
EDWARD\xa0\xa0\xa0 [sigh]\xa0 Yes.
SOUND\xa0\xa0\xa0 HUGE SWOOSH OF WATER
EDWARD\xa0\xa0\xa0 [disgusted sigh]
LESLIE\xa0\xa0\xa0 I brought some heated towels.
EDWARD\xa0\xa0\xa0 I am par-broiled.\xa0 I'll need more than towels!
MUSIC
\xa0
SCENE 7.\xa0\xa0\xa0 STUDY
SOUND\xa0\xa0\xa0 DOOR OPENS, FABRIC RUBS
LESLIE\xa0\xa0\xa0 Check off steam pipes.
EDWARD\xa0\xa0\xa0 Yes.\xa0 Just turned her from cold water to hot.\xa0 The Turkish baths for the past month seem to have helped a bit, but on the whole, it was\u2011\u2011 [searching for the right word]
LESLIE\xa0\xa0\xa0 [teasing] A washout?
EDWARD\xa0\xa0\xa0 Oh, please don\u2019t.
LESLIE\xa0\xa0\xa0 [apologetic] Sorry.\xa0 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\u2011\u2011
EDWARD\xa0\xa0\xa0 [cutting her off] It was a good sight better than any of my ideas.\xa0\xa0 Trying to evaporate the ghost into steam.
LESLIE\xa0\xa0\xa0 Now you have a year to plan.\xa0 Again.
EDWARD\xa0\xa0\xa0 I don't know.\xa0 I doubt my health can take another such night.\xa0 And the room is destroyed.\xa0 Again.\xa0 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\xa0\xa0\xa0 Heat can do terrible things.\xa0 Tea.
SOUND\xa0\xa0\xa0 POURS
EDWARD\xa0\xa0\xa0 [sips]\xa0 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\xa0\xa0\xa0 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\xa0\xa0\xa0 She will always be wet.\xa0 So I must somehow be dry...
MUSIC
\xa0
SCENE 8.\xa0\xa0\xa0 CASTLE
SOUND\xa0\xa0\xa0 TEA
SOUND\xa0\xa0\xa0 CONSTRUCTION [OFF]
MOTHER\xa0\xa0\xa0 Must they be so loud?
EDWARD\xa0\xa0\xa0 At least I can tell they're working.\xa0
MOTHER\xa0\xa0\xa0 So it happened again?
EDWARD\xa0\xa0\xa0 You can't be surprised.\xa0 You had to go through it, didn't you?\xa0 With father?
MOTHER\xa0\xa0\xa0 Oh, no.\xa0 No, I didn't even know about it for quite years.
EDWARD\xa0\xa0\xa0 How the devil?
MOTHER\xa0\xa0\xa0 Language.
EDWARD\xa0\xa0\xa0 I'll devil as I please, until I get what I want.
MOTHER\xa0\xa0\xa0 When your father inherited the title - after his father died of pneumonia, as I recall.
EDWARD\xa0\xa0\xa0 [sarcasm] Imagine.
MOTHER\xa0\xa0\xa0 Hush.\xa0 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\xa0\xa0\xa0 Truly?\xa0 That was clever.
MOTHER\xa0\xa0\xa0 And I believe there was a year where he had to take a business trip.
EDWARD\xa0\xa0\xa0 to the tropics, by any chance?
MOTHER\xa0\xa0\xa0 May very well have been.\xa0 I believe I spent the holidays with my sister, in town.
EDWARD\xa0\xa0\xa0 And he kept this up for years and years?
MOTHER\xa0\xa0\xa0 Well you were away at school for much of this.\xa0
EDWARD\xa0\xa0\xa0 No wonder he never had me home for the winter holidays.\xa0 I was rather bereft at the time.
MOTHER\xa0\xa0\xa0 We sent presents.
EDWARD\xa0\xa0\xa0 Much appreciated, but--
MOTHER\xa0\xa0\xa0 So - what are you doing about this?
EDWARD\xa0\xa0\xa0 I tried steam pipes.\xa0
SOUND\xa0\xa0\xa0 CRASH
EDWARD\xa0\xa0\xa0 That's what they are engaged in repairing upstairs at the moment, and--
MOTHER\xa0\xa0\xa0 Not that!\xa0 What are you doing about providing me with a brace of grandchildren to brighten my declining years?
EDWARD\xa0\xa0\xa0 Oh, that.\xa0 [sigh]
MUSIC
\xa0
\xa0
SCENE 9.\xa0\xa0\xa0 STUDY
SOUND\xa0\xa0\xa0 TEARING PAPER - letter opening.
LESLIE\xa0\xa0\xa0 Hmm.\xa0 Catalog of some sort?\xa0 [gasp, the laughing a bit]\xa0 oh-ho.
SOUND\xa0\xa0\xa0 DOOR OPENS
EDWARD\xa0\xa0\xa0 What's the joke?
LESLIE\xa0\xa0\xa0 [arch] A catalog of gentlemen's garments?
EDWARD\xa0\xa0\xa0 Hmm?
LESLIE\xa0\xa0\xa0 In the finest quality india rubber?
EDWARD\xa0\xa0\xa0 Oh that!\xa0 Uhhhhh... It's not what you--
LESLIE\xa0\xa0\xa0 I would assume they're for waterproofing, except that many of them seem to be ... excised in certain locations.
EDWARD\xa0\xa0\xa0 Skip to the back.\xa0 They assured me there would be more... complete... units.
SOUND\xa0\xa0\xa0 PAGES FLIP
LESLIE\xa0\xa0\xa0 Ah.\xa0 So you're thinking--?
EDWARD\xa0\xa0\xa0 If I can't keep the room dry, at least I might be able to keep my person insulated.
LESLIE\xa0\xa0\xa0 If you were to wear one of these over something in wool, perhaps?
EDWARD\xa0\xa0\xa0 Mm.\xa0 I would start to look like a child in swaddling.
LESLIE\xa0\xa0\xa0 Better swaddled than soaked.
EDWARD\xa0\xa0\xa0 True.
LESLIE\xa0\xa0\xa0 And it would be warm, even if wet.\xa0
EDWARD\xa0\xa0\xa0 Wouldn't want to get cold.\xa0 I might -- [idea]\xa0 oh!
LESLIE\xa0\xa0\xa0 Oh?
EDWARD\xa0\xa0\xa0 I've got it!
LESLIE\xa0\xa0\xa0 Do tell?
EDWARD\xa0\xa0\xa0 Order me one of those - a size bigger than my suits, and in their thickest rubber.\xa0 Then another two sizes larger.
LESLIE\xa0\xa0\xa0 Why?
EDWARD\xa0\xa0\xa0 I'll let you guess.\xa0 I must go and consult a furrier.
MUSIC
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SCENE 10.\xa0\xa0\xa0 MONTAGE - PHONE CALLS
LESLIE\xa0\xa0\xa0 That sounds like it will precisely fill the bill.\xa0 And everything is reinforced with asbestos?\xa0 Very good.
EDWARD\xa0\xa0\xa0 You have the address to ship to?\xa0 Excellent.\xa0 I realize it will take a prodigious amount of power to maintain.\xa0 If necessary, I shall buy the power company!\xa0\xa0
LESLIE\xa0\xa0\xa0 Woolens.\xa0 Two sizes larger than I had originally inquired.\xa0 Yes - the warmest you have.\xa0 Oh, no, he likes it thick.
EDWARD\xa0\xa0\xa0 No, no, the first set was quite satisfactory.\xa0 [annoyed] Please place my order and refrain from further comment on my proclivities!
MUSIC
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SCENE 11.\xa0\xa0\xa0 DRESSING ROOM
SOUND\xa0\xa0\xa0 CHRISTMAS CAROLS PLAY LIGHTLY IN THE BACKGROUND
SOUNDS\xa0\xa0\xa0 RUBBERY SQUEAKS AND RUSTLES AS SHE DRESSES HIM.
EDWARD\xa0\xa0\xa0 I've come to hate that music.
LESLIE\xa0\xa0\xa0 This may be the last time it calls to mind such misfortunes.\xa0 I've stitched the wool together at the waist.\xa0 Too bad your valet can be no help.
EDWARD\xa0\xa0\xa0 He demanded this week off.\xa0 No wish to be anywhere in the entire country when the ghost arrives.
LESLIE\xa0\xa0\xa0 Some people simply do not pay attention.\xa0 The ghost only makes a bother in a given vicinity for a given time.
EDWARD\xa0\xa0\xa0 Logic has nothing to do with superstitious fear.\xa0 Let's see if the second rubber suit will go on.
LESLIE\xa0\xa0\xa0 I've brought talc.
EDWARD\xa0\xa0\xa0 You plan for everything, don't you?
LESLIE\xa0\xa0\xa0 That's why you keep me around, though I must say you are the master planner here.\xa0 Fur, then rubber, then wool, and rubber again - she shan't be able to get a drop of her icy dampness near you!
EDWARD\xa0\xa0\xa0 No, indeed.\xa0 Have you noticed, is it still snowing?
LESLIE\xa0\xa0\xa0 There are great drifts on the windward side of the house, though the wind has died away.
EDWARD\xa0\xa0\xa0 Excellent.
LESLIE\xa0\xa0\xa0 When this is all over, you can focus on finding yourself a bride and satisfying your poor mother.
EDWARD\xa0\xa0\xa0 [musing] Yes.
LESLIE\xa0\xa0\xa0 Now the diving helmet.\xa0
SOUND\xa0\xa0\xa0 LARGE METAL PICKED UP
MUSIC
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SCENE 12.\xa0\xa0\xa0 MUD ROOM / PORCH
SOUND\xa0\xa0\xa0 DOOR OPENS, HEAVY SQUEAKY RUBBER NOISES ENTER
SOUND\xa0\xa0\xa0 CLOCK CHIMES TWELVE, DOOR SHUT IN THE MIDDLE OF IT
SOUND\xa0\xa0\xa0 CAREFULLY SITTING DOWN
EDWARD\xa0\xa0\xa0 [slightly canned throughout - in his diving helmet] Oh... that's a bit tight.
SOUND\xa0\xa0\xa0 SQUEAK AS HE ADJUSTS
EDWARD\xa0\xa0\xa0 [hums a bit]
SOUND\xa0\xa0\xa0 BANGING OF DOORS, WIND, SPLASH
EDWARD\xa0\xa0\xa0 Right on time.
GHOST\xa0\xa0\xa0 Greetings.\xa0 You must know you cannot avoid me by hiding here in - in - what is this room, anyway?
EDWARD\xa0\xa0\xa0 It is called a mud room, and I'm not hiding.\xa0 In fact, I'm glad to see you.
GHOST\xa0\xa0\xa0 You are the most original man I've met, if that is true.\xa0 And what an odd hat!
EDWARD\xa0\xa0\xa0 It is a little portable observatory I had made for just such engagements as this.
SOUND\xa0\xa0\xa0 CLUNK ON HELMET
EDWARD\xa0\xa0\xa0 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\xa0\xa0\xa0 That is my detestable fate.
EDWARD\xa0\xa0\xa0 Let's go for a walk, then.
GHOST\xa0\xa0\xa0 You cannot get rid of me that way!\xa0 My water does not wear out with movement of any sort.\xa0 I will merely damage more of your home.
EDWARD\xa0\xa0\xa0 Then we will not walk through the house.\xa0 Come along.
SOUND\xa0\xa0\xa0 SQUEAKING, FOOTSTEPS
SOUND\xa0\xa0\xa0 DRIPPING SQUISHES FOLLOW
SOUND\xa0\xa0\xa0 DOOR OPENS, SNOWSTORM, FEET INTO SNOW
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SCENE 13.\xa0\xa0\xa0 OUTSIDE
SOUND\xa0\xa0\xa0 XMAS MUSIC NEARBY FROM INSIDE
GHOST\xa0\xa0\xa0 But, my dear sir!\xa0 It is fearfully cold out there!\xa0 You shall be frozen hard before you've been out ten minutes.
EDWARD\xa0\xa0\xa0 Not I!\xa0 I am very warmly dressed. Come along!
SOUND\xa0\xa0\xa0 SNOWSTORM GETS LOUDER TO SHOW TIME
SOUND\xa0\xa0\xa0 MUSIC IS FARTHER AWAY
GHOST\xa0\xa0\xa0 Oh sir!\xa0 You walk too slowly!\xa0 I am nearly frozen.
EDWARD\xa0\xa0\xa0 Is that so.\xa0 Hmm.
GHOST\xa0\xa0\xa0 My knees are so stiff now I can hardly move. I beseech you to accelerate your step.
EDWARD\xa0\xa0\xa0 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\xa0\xa0\xa0 Do not! Do not do so, I beg!\xa0 Let us move along. \xa0I feel myself growing rigid as it is. If we stop here, I shall be frozen stiff.
EDWARD\xa0\xa0\xa0 [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\xa0\xa0\xa0 I cannot move my right leg now!\xa0 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\xa0\xa0\xa0 Never, madam. I have you at last, and I plan to keep you!
GHOST\xa0\xa0\xa0 Alas!\xa0 Help me, I beg. I congeal!
EDWARD\xa0\xa0\xa0 Congeal, madam, congeal!\xa0 You have drenched me and mine for over two hundred years, madam. Tonight you have had your last drench.
GHOST\xa0\xa0\xa0 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\xa0\xa0\xa0 No, you won't, either!\xa0 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\xa0\xa0\xa0 But warehouses burn.
EDWARD\xa0\xa0\xa0 So they do, but this warehouse cannot burn. \xa0It is made of asbestos and surrounding it are fireproof walls.
GHOST\xa0\xa0\xa0 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\xa0\xa0\xa0 DISTANT CLOCK STRIKES ONE
SOUND\xa0\xa0\xa0 CRACKLE OF ICE
SOUND\xa0\xa0\xa0 WIND RISES
EDWARD\xa0\xa0\xa0 I do feel for you, miss.\xa0 But I feel for myself more.
MUSIC
\xa0
SCENE 14.\xa0\xa0\xa0 STUDY
SOUND\xa0\xa0\xa0 PHONE HUNG UP
LESLIE\xa0\xa0\xa0 Delivery was made, and all is well.\xa0 The room has been sealed, and that, as they say, is that.
EDWARD\xa0\xa0\xa0 I'm almost at a loss.
LESLIE\xa0\xa0\xa0 What?\xa0 Why?
EDWARD\xa0\xa0\xa0 If you have an obstacle for such a long time, then it is gone, what can be left?
LESLIE\xa0\xa0\xa0 Your mother still wishes for grandchildren.
EDWARD\xa0\xa0\xa0 Now that "all good families" will have me over again?
LESLIE\xa0\xa0\xa0 You are now not only rich and titled and eligible, you are also known to have single-handedly defeated an ancestral ghost.\xa0 You are quite the talk of the town.\xa0 Parents will be lining up to introduce their marriageable daughters to you.
EDWARD\xa0\xa0\xa0 I think I can save them the trouble.
LESLIE\xa0\xa0\xa0 What do you mean?
EDWARD\xa0\xa0\xa0 There is something very alluring about a person who will stand by you through thick and thin.
LESLIE\xa0\xa0\xa0 [oblivious] You're still upset that they wouldn't have anything to do with you while you were haunted?
EDWARD\xa0\xa0\xa0 I shan't pay any mind to what they did.\xa0 Just what you did.
LESLIE\xa0\xa0\xa0 Pardon?
EDWARD\xa0\xa0\xa0 [teasing] Are you not interested in being the mistress of Harrowby Hall?\xa0 There is an opening in that position.
LESLIE\xa0\xa0\xa0 [startled] Me?\xa0 Marry you?
EDWARD\xa0\xa0\xa0 If not you, my next best option is to thaw out the ghost and make an honest woman of her.\xa0 I'm reasonably certain we're far enough removed that it would be legal.
LESLIE\xa0\xa0\xa0 You're quite serious?\xa0 About me, not her.
EDWARD\xa0\xa0\xa0 Of course.\xa0 About you, not her.
LESLIE\xa0\xa0\xa0 Of course!
CLOSER
END
\xa0