VIADUCT

a play by

Paul Copley

Agent: Margaret Ramsay Ltd.

01 — 240 — 0691

(now Tom Erhardt at Casarotto Ramsay Assocs. Ltd

020 7287 4450)

Characters:

EMMERSON MATHERS             64, North Yorkshireman, wiry, strong, circumspect

JACKY SUMMERS                     24, Yorkshire girl, bright, tomboyish, wistful

HEDLEY TURNER                      28, Yorkshireman, open, slightly restless

PETER SUMMERS                     24, Yorkshireman, bright, good-looking

DICK DULLY                             a Puck like boy, proficient in the acrobatic art of balance

The play was first produced at The Bush Theatre in March 1980

Director Simon Stokes

Designer Geoff Rose

Original cast

Emmerson                    Brian Hayes

Jacky                           Annie Hulley

Hedley                         Anthony Milner

Peter                            Ashley Barker

Dick Dully                    Gary Shail

The play takes place on a piece of scrubland belonging to British Rail, beneath a viaduct on the outskirts of a village in West Yorkshire.

The ground rises away steeply upstage, forming a banking covered in long grass, weeds and scrub.

Stage right the banking serves as a foundation for the base of one leg of a great stone arch, part of the railway viaduct. What we can see of this is stone, towering and massive.

Stone steps, overgrown and mossy, curve down from behind the arch and stop about half way down the banking, so that a muddy path connects the bottom step with path along the front of the set.

The path along the front is blocked stage left by a narrow broken gate set in a dry stone wall, which runs from the front of the set back into the banking. The wall has bellied out and fallen down. It is in the process of being rebuilt from the banking forwards.

Near the gate is a peeling notice which reads:-

‘Victoria Mill

Fine Worsteds

TRESPASSERS WILL BE

PROSECUTED

By Order

Z. Dyson and Sons’

Stage left of the wall is full of woollen mill and dye-plant rubble - empty dye drums both metal and cardboard, boxes, old electrical ducting and some dirty, multi-coloured woollen waste.

Near to the place where the wall meets the banking but on a higher level, towards centre stage, is a small broken down entrance into the hillside, an old air-raid shelter doorway. The door has long since gone and the frame is broken. A piece of dirty, heavy, industrial polythene has been nailed to the architrave to half cover the doorway.

An underground stream follows the line of the’ steps but the only evidence of this is a ‘well’ stage left of the foot of the steps, a water hole half covered by a stone flag.

It is a damp place and all the stone has a tinge of green from the moss that has taken advantage of the conditions, except for the stone that has been handled and dressed where the wall is being mended.

SCENE ONE

We hear the ringing sound of hammer on stone.

The lights fade up.

It is a warm, bright Friday lunchtime, late summer, present day.

EMMERSON MATHERS is working at the broken down dry-stone wall. He is using a short handled mason’s hammer called a slat hammer to knock caked clay from the flat stone in his hand.

He is dressed in layers of second hand clothes, all hard wearing, greys and. browns, his coat is a ‘Burberry’ type heavy gaberdeen with large pockets inside. His shoes are very old but strong and soled with leather. He should give the air of being dressed practically if eccentrically rather than ragged or dishevelled.

He moves slowly and carefully most of the time, but when he occasionally moves faster he is deft and precise.

Having studied the stone in his hand and the wall itsself, he carefully places the stone on the wall and beds it in with rubble from the centre until he is satisfied. He gives it a tap of satisfaction with his hammer.

He picks up another stone. It is bigger with an irregular shape. It seems to present a problem.

He stares at it and then at the wall. He becomes more uncertain about how to use it and tries it on the wall, without letting it go.

He lifts it again and carefully chips at it with the slat hammer. He tries it again. It does not fit. He chips at it, it still does not fit.

He swivels the hammer in his hand, and quickly breaks up the stone into the centre of the wall to use it as filling. He looks at the wall uncertainly.

He moves to pick up another stone but stops himself, and instead he turns and moves to the entrance of the shelter.

He draws back the sheet of polythene. It is dark inside the shelter, but just inside the

entrance we can see an old wooden tea box with a sliding lid, a battered biscuit tin and a large enamel lading can.

He puts down his hammer and picks up the lading can.

He moves to the well and half fills the can. He scoops water from the can and vigorously washes his hands. He returns the can to the shelter and dries his hands on some woollen waste which he takes from and returns to his pocket.

He sits on the steps and suddenly buries his face in his hands and sits quite motionless.

Pause.

The lunchtime buzzer blows at the woollen mill. It is a high pitched whistle which tails off at the end rather mournfully.

EMMERSON looks up, gets up and exits up the steps and round the back of the arch.

In a distant car park we can hear cars being started and driven away.

JACKY enters excitedly stage right. She has on jeans and a sweater. She is small and puckish. She is looking back all the time. She runs to the top of the steps and looks back the way she has come.

JACKY: (to herself)            Aw, just look

She looks up at the viaduct and along the length of it. Then down again to where she has run from.

She laughs gleefully.

JACKY: (calls) PETER, come on. Just come and look. It’s… it’s really something.

Enter PETER. He is wearing a warehouse coat over quite a smart shirt, tie and cords. He is generally quite self important. He is picking at his thumb and occasionally examines it closely.

PETER:  Just the same from here as down there.

JACKY: Course it’s not. Look. It’s sorta framed look. (she counts) Seven, eight, ninth arch along. Like a big roof over our roof. All stone and..... stone

PETER:  Silly haddock

She laughs.

PETER: You like our little house then?

JACKY: It’s the best ever. I’ve always loved that house. I love this viaduct. I used to marvel at it from the school bus. It’s so…   (she lifts her head up) …majestic.

PETER: Pardon?

JACKY: It is. Striding across the valley. Twenty one giant steps. I’ve counted.

PETER: I used to think it was massive when I was a kid. Roof of the whole village.

JACKY: How the hummer did they manage to build it?

PETER: Don’t you know? Till the last arch was keyed, the navvies were all kept on a strict diet of spinach and cow pie. An’ something stirred in their tea to keep ‘em off the local lasses.

She smiles.  He bites at his thumb.

JACKY: What’s matter?

PETER: Got a splinter off that box of kitchen stuff.

JACKY: S’ave a look. (She examines his thumb.)   Oh yes. A little spelk.

She licks it carefully, then tries to nip it out between her finger and thumb nails. PETER watches, wincing.

PETER: Don’t call ‘em spelks.

JACKY: Do where I come from lad. (He grins.)  Thongsbridge spelkies.  Keep still.

(She nips at it.  He watches.)  I’m glad we lived at Thongsbridge ‘cos I used to really enjoy the school bus.

PETER:   You what?

JACKY: I did. The journey. I really loved it. Get your nose against the window, forget everybody else. It was quite a long way as well.

PETER:  Five miles?

JACKY:  (not to be put off)            An’ I made up stories in me head.  I did.

PETER:   Mm, I bet you did.

She nips at the splinter.

JACKY: There y’are. See it?

He looks at it.  She flicks it away.

PETER:  Ta.

JACKY: Never thought I’d ever live here though. Specially In that little house. Aw, it’s sonic.   (He laughs.)   How do those arches stay up?

PETER: Magic.   (She pulls a face at him.)   No, it’s their own weight. The stones in the arch are all wedge shaped. The last one in is called the key stone. So the weight of the arch pressing down actually makes the whole thing stronger.  (He demonstrates with his arms, pushing his knuckles together.)  And the pillars can’t spread ‘cos they’re wedged between two hills.  (He waggles his elbows.) So it ‘s just stuck with its own strength.   (She smiles at him. He drops his arms.) Some o’ those stones weigh over two tons.

JACKY: Fancy.

PETER: To collapse it’d have to actually topple over. Overbalance. (She looks at him.)   But it won’t.

She smiles.

JACKY: Can’t wait for the trains to go over.

PETER: There aren’t any now.

JACKY: There are.  Two a day.

PETER: One.

JACKY: Two.

PETER: One. Return trip to Sheffield.

JACKY: Well. Goes over us twice. Right over our little house.

PETER: Yeh, let’s hope those bloody stonemasons knew what they were doing.

They laugh.  He sucks at his thumb.

JACKY: Best house ever. Thankyou.

PETER: (less enthusiastic) It’ll do for now. Poky little place.

She looks at him, cheeky glint.

JACKY: Mm! Hope it is!  (He smiles, examines his thumb.)   Kiss better?

He looks round, slightly embarrassed.  She takes his hand and kisses his thumb. Then

she licks it, watching him all the time.

He giggles.

PETER: Give up.

She holds his thumb with both hands and sucks at it. Then suddenly she grabs his buttocks in both hands and pulls him towards her, pressing into him.

He puts his hands on her hips. She grins, meaningfully.

JACKY:  Hey You been eating spinach?

PETER: Stop it.  (He struggles to pull free.)   What if that bloody tramp’s about.

JACKY:  He’s not a tramp.

PETER:   What is he then?

Slight pause.

JACKY: Don’t know. But ‘e never goes out of the village so you can’t call ‘im a tramp. Anyway don’t change the subject.  Give ‘im a thrill, poor old sod. C’mere!

He pulls free, backs off.

PETER:  Gerroff!   I’ve got to take the van back anyway.

JACKY:  (grinning, mock derision)   Ooooh!

PETER:  I have. They’ll need it this afternoon. They’re on  push, weekend an’ that.

JACKY: (advancing)     Peter… !

He backs off.

PETER: And I’ve got to do the loading sheets before four o’clock. I’m off.

He kisses his finger and plants it on her cheek at arms length.  

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