Allelujah!

by Alan Bennett

  Colin I keep being told it does work.

  Gilchrist Just.

  You don’t see the queues, the full wards, the beds blocked.

  Nothing moves.

  Colin It’s a hospital. You can’t just look at it in terms of through-put and turnover.

  Gilchrist That’s an admission coming from you. Are you having second thoughts? Two minds?

  Colin Two minds went out with Mrs Thatcher.

  Seeing my dad. I know how I ended up where I am. When I was a kid I had to be on their side. But how could I be when every fucking day it was drummed into me about Mrs T closing down the pits? And it didn’t help that he was right she was lying. But God it was so dreary. So of course you’re young and you go the other way. That’s what he can’t forgive.

  Ambrose (speaking for the first time) I wish you’d have been in my class. I could have put you straight, changed your mind.

  Gilchrist Bit late now.

  Salter comes on.

  Salter Mr Colman.

  Colin I’m needed at the coalface.

  Salter Off already? I’m glad I caught you.

  Colin When it comes to the decision, you should remember that most politicians are cowards. Is that reassuring?

  Salter It is.

  However, if you’re talking to the Minister, make sure you tell him that we’ve followed his advice renaming the wards and how grateful we are …

  Colin Yes?

  Salter Plus I’d count it a courtesy were you to emphasise how keenly one sympathises with his predicament and should he decide that closure is unavoidable one hopes that my experience and goodwill might be found useful in some other capacity. If you understand me.

  Colin I think I do.

  Salter Travel safely.

  Settling in, Mrs Maudsley?

  Mrs Maudsley It was my house!

  Salter Quite so.

  Salter goes. Colin goes back to Joe.

  Colin I’m off back to London, Dad.

  Joe You’ve only just got here. There was something else. What was it?

  Colin I’ll miss my train.

  He tries to kiss his father.

  Joe Gerroff.

  Colin Dad, everybody kisses now.

  Joe Not up here.

  Colin It doesn’t mean anything.

  Joe So why do it?

  Off you go. Mind on your bike.

  Alex and Cliff are filming. Gerald is attending to Mavis.

  Alex Do you like singing?

  Mavis I do, but then I’m more artistic. You do, don’t you, Mrs Maudsley?

  Mrs Maudsley I’ve got something to tell you.

  Mavis We know it was your house, love, but besides that, you liked singing.

  Mrs Maudsley Did I?

  Mavis You were the Pudsey Nightingale.

  Mrs Maudsley It wasn’t just Pudsey. I went all over, singing at different dos. I sang in … somewhere beginning with S …

  Joe Stockholm?

  Mrs Maudsley Stockport.

  Lucille To be honest I don’t much – like singing. Only it keeps her happy.

  Neville Who?

  Lucille Bouncing Betty. She thinks it takes your mind off things. Busy busy busy.

  Neville Singing takes it out of me a bit.

  Joe Tell you what would take it out of you. Hacking away with a pick and shovel half the day.

  Singing, it’s nowt.

  Molly starts banging her tray.

  Mavis Get lost, Molly.

  Gerald It’s alright, Mavis.

  Mavis He likes me, does Gerald.

  Lucille I’m the one he likes. I’m his favourite.

  Alex (to Cliff) This is no good. It’s all so fucking nice. What we need is dirt.

  Do you remember when we did that pig farm thing for Anglia, where we thought the pigs were being fed hospital waste – and we kitted the two lads out with camcorders.

  Cliff I’ve still got one. The thieving little sods nicked the other.

  Alex It won’t be Steadicam with this lot … (He mimes trembling with the camera.) Still, worth a try.

  Look, boys and girls.

  Joe We’re not boys and girls.

  Alex Quite right. Ladies and gentleman.

  Mavis Oooh.

  Alex Has anyone ever handled a camera?

  Mavis Snaps? Of course.

  Lucille I have. Our Joseph filmed me for a school project.

  Alex But you’ve never done it?

  Lucille I’m eighty-four.

  Mary I have.

  Lucille You? How?

  Mary At the library. I often did it. Manuscripts and one thing and another. Camera just like that. I’m not just a pretty face.

  Cliff Right, darling. You’re on the team.

  Ambrose Very Free Cinema.

  Cliff Just keep your eyes open for anything that’s funny.

  Mary Funny ha-ha?

  Alex More funny peculiar.

  Mary Sex, you mean?

  Alex No. Well, yes, if there is any.

  Mary I don’t want to get anyone into bother.

  Cliff You won’t, love. It’s just for the film.

  Alex All in aid of the hospital. (To Valentine.) Now, OK with you, Doctor, if we get them talking about their memories?

  Valentine What sort of memories?

  Alex Work, for a start.

  Valentine Sure.

  Alex Did you all go out to work?

  Hazel I did.

  Cora I didn’t.

  Mary You had to do.

  Hazel I worked in Stylo shoe shop for a bit. Then Gallons and the Maypole. And I did a bit at Timothy White’s before it changed hands.

  Alex Then what?

  Hazel I got married.

  Lucille I live the high life. Many’s the knicker I’ve had to retrieve from the chandelier in that house.

  Mavis Where?

  Lucille Leeds.

  Mavis We’re talking about work.

  Lucille It was work. Men. Men. Men.

  Valentine (embarrassed) Who’s got grandchildren?

  Cora One of mine’s a fully qualified market gardener.

  Mavis Our Kirsty’s a dental hygienist. She’d do my teeth only I don’t have any.

  Lucille I’ve got grandchildren only they never come near. One’s called Emily, which used to be a right ordinary name only now it’s more of an upmarket name. Joseph’s the same. Our Eileen’s got a Joseph. He’s a right demon. That’s the school’s fault, I think. When I went to elementary school, they sat us down and made us learn.

  Alex Learn what?

  Lucille Poetry for a start. I used to know reams of poetry.

  Joe I remember ‘Eskimo Nell’.

  Lucille That wasn’t taught at school.

  Joe We used to sing it in the bar at the Institute.

  Alex What’s the Institute?

  Joe It was the club where we played snooker and whatnot.

  Carpet warehouse now.

  Neville

  I wandered lonely as a cloud,

  That floats on high o’er vales and hills,

  When all at once I saw a crowd,

  A host of golden daffodils.

  Valentine Very good, Neville.

  Neville Ullswater that was. We once went up there on a mystery tour. It wasn’t much. Give me Roundhay Park any day.

  Mary

  And thou most kind and gentle Death,

  Waiting to hush our latest breath,

  O praise Him! Alleluia!

  Thou leadest home the child of God,

  And Christ our Lord the way hath trod.

  O praise Him! O praise Him!

  They all join in.

  Alleluia! Alleluia! Alleluia!

  Mavis That doesn’t count. That’s a hymn.

  Valentine Anything counts. It isn’t a competition.

  Joe Everything’s a competition these days. Just ask my lad. Competition brings out the best in people. That’s what Mrs Thatcher taught us apparently.

  Valentine I’ve got a poem I li
ke if I can find it.

  He looks through his notebook, which should have been seen earlier.

  It’s called ‘Ten Types of Hospital Visitor’.

  Lucille Ten? We’re lucky if we get one.

  Valentine It’s by a poet called …

  Ambrose Charles Causley. He once gave a talk at our school. Is he still with us?

  Valentine I don’t think so.

  He talks about all the visitors you don’t want to see, but this is the ideal visitor.

  The sixth visitor says little,

  Breathes reassurance,

  Smiles securely.

  Carries no black passport of grapes

  And visa of chocolate. Has a clutch

  Of clean washing.

  Unobtrusively stows it

  In the locker; searches out more.

  Talks quietly to the Sister

  Out of sight, out of earshot, of the patient.

  Arrives punctually as a tide.

  Does not stay the whole hour.

  Even when she has gone

  The patient seems to sense her there:

  An upholding

  Presence.

  Ambrose What about the last verse?

  Valentine I’m not sure we want it. Why? Do you know it?

  Ambrose Yes, it’s very short.

  The tenth visitor

  Is not usually named.

  Pinkney Well I think that’s morbid. We’re better off singing.

  They sing.

  MUSIC: ‘Blow the Wind Southerly’ (reprise).

  Fletcher Do you know what I dream of?

  Ramesh I never sleep.

  Fletcher A bed.

  Ramesh Who with?

  Fletcher With nobody. An empty fucking bed. A vacancy. I haven’t had a bonus in weeks. What’s the secret?

  Ramesh Charm?

  Fletcher Bollocks. Who do you have to fuck? Because I know it’s not Gilchrist.

  Ramesh A smile knows no frontiers.

  Fletcher I’m getting desperate. Currently, I have one patient in an ambulance in the long-stay car park, two in the corridor by the bins, and when we were really desperate last week I stashed somebody in the mortuary.

  Ramesh Dead?

  Fletcher No. It’s called thinking outside the box.

  Ramesh It’s no good. We can’t go on like this. We’re going to have to widen our horizons.

  Fletcher How?

  Ramesh (and he’s said this many times before) The private sector.

  Fletcher Where? Where?

  Stage dark, apart from the lights on the nurses’ station. Gilchrist at the desk. Valentine, having done the ward round, is signing it off.

  Gilchrist This is the time I like. When you’ve done the handover, been round with the trolley and they’re all tucked up, clean and dry. Sometimes on a night, if you open the window, you can smell the moors.

  Valentine None of that at Tadcaster. I’m told the windows don’t even open.

  Will you miss it?

  Gilchrist Nursing? No. That’s what people pretend is a vocation and it’s just the place where they’ve ended up. No choice to it.

  Dr Valentine. Can I show you something?

  She fishes out a piece of paper.

  Valentine Sure.

  Gilchrist It’s only rough and the spelling’s all over the place only it’s what I thought I could say when they give me the medal.

  Valentine Spelling doesn’t matter … what’s this?

  He shows it to her.

  Gilchrist It’s meant to be ‘apprenticeship’. It doesn’t seem stupid?

  Valentine No, course it doesn’t.

  Gilchrist And I don’t sound like a freak?

  Valentine Sister Gilchrist …

  Gilchrist You never call me Alma.

  Valentine Nobody does. Can I?

  Gilchrist You can if you want. Though not in front of the others.

  Valentine Alma, you say you were no good at exams. You should have got help.

  Gilchrist I’d have had to ask. I didn’t want to be beholden. And I didn’t want to let on. I don’t want to be in anybody’s pocket.

  Valentine I can understand that.

  Gilchrist You must have been good at exams.

  Valentine The medical ones were alright.

  Gilchrist Why, what other ones are there?

  Pause.

  Valentine I thought they’d forgotten me, only now some question has arisen over my status.

  Gilchrist Are you not a proper doctor?

  Valentine Oh no. Not that status.

  It’s what they’re supposed to do, employers … check up on … whether one has a right to be here.

  Gilchrist Even if you’re a doctor?

  Valentine Even if you’re Archbishop of York. My hearing’s over at Pontefract. I haven’t told anyone, though Ambrose has been helping me a bit without understanding why. We shall see.

  He pats her hand.

  Gilchrist I hope when they give me this medal they won’t ask me what lessons I’ve learned.

  Valentine And if they do?

  Gilchrist I would say that, if there was one lesson I’ve learned, it’s don’t leave it too late to die.

  These did.

  Valentine A doctor can’t say that.

  Gilchrist (she takes his hand) Nurses can. Nurses do.

  Valentine Have a quiet night.

  He goes. Gilchrist remains seated at the desk and there is silence, broken by …

  Mrs Maudsley (calling out) It was my house. It was my house.

  Gilchrist stands up to see whose bed it is. She sits for a moment, before getting on the mobile.

  Gilchrist Ramesh. It’s me.

  Just to put you on standby. We may lose somebody on Shirley Bassey. Try me later on.

  Mrs Maudsley (calling out) It was my house.

  Gilchrist takes something from her drawer. She hesitates with some sort of weighing-up going on.

  Then, priming it as she goes, she holds it up to the light so that we see it is a syringe.

  But what we also see is Mary holding her camcorder sneaking a shot of what is happening.

  End of Part One.

  Part Two

  MUSIC: ‘Good Golly, Miss Molly’ (Little Richard).

  The old people – in a memory of their younger selves – perform a full-out song and dance. Then:

  Mr and Mrs Earnshaw with Salter and Valentine.

  Earnshaw Stay alive … That’s all she had to do. Three months.

  Mrs Earnshaw We should have kept her at home. I said.

  Earnshaw It’s a hospital. Keeping you alive is what they do. She’s done it on purpose. She never liked me.

  The camera crew is trying to sneak in but is blocked by Salter.

  Salter Sorry, sorry. Private grief. Private grief.

  Earnshaw Come on in. Come on in. I don’t mind.

  Salter No, no. These are heartbroken people. We have a duty of care. Dr Valentine.

  Earnshaw Why? Weeping? There’s nothing you lot like better.

  But Valentine ushers the crew out, before coming back himself.

  I want to know why.

  Salter Death is a mystery.

  It’s the question loved ones so often ask: why?

  Earnshaw Not – (Eyes up to heaven.) Why?

  Why? (Jabbing his finger.)

  Why, as soon as you got your hands on her, did this old lass in relatively good nick suddenly peg out?

  Salter Well, she had gallstones and of course she was incontinent …

  Earnshaw Listen, Doctor. I don’t know much about medicine, but even I know you don’t die of wet knickers.

  Valentine She was eighty-eight.

  Earnshaw That’s no age nowadays. I read in the Mail that eighty is the new sixty. I want a post-mortem.

  Salter Dr Valentine signed the death certificate.

  Valentine She slept away. Try to think of it as a blessing.

  Earnshaw A blessing to her maybe. Not to us. We’ve lost money. Where’
s the blessing in that?

  Mrs Earnshaw (weeping) This was the Pudsey Nightingale.

  Earnshaw Don’t talk to me about the Pudsey Nightingale. I’ve never heard a nightingale, but if they are anything like your mother, I don’t wonder they’ve become extinct.

  Salter Who was on that night?

  Valentine Alma. (Correcting himself.) Sister Gilchrist. She’s a very experienced nurse.

  Salter No one more so. She’s up for the Bywater Medal

  Earnshaw I don’t care if she’s up for the V fucking C. I want an inquiry.

  Mrs Earnshaw We loved her

  Earnshaw Love nothing. We want compensation.

  Enter Pinkney with a bag.

  Pinkney We thought you might like the contents of Mother’s locker. A bottle of Lucozade, half full. An opened packet of Quality Street …

  Mrs Earnshaw And what’s that?

  Pinkney A tissue with some rhubarb crumble she’d saved from supper.

  Mrs Earnshaw She used to do that a lot, squat food. Said you never knew where your next meal was coming from.

  Earnshaw We can use the Quality Street. Though knowing her, there’ll be no soft centres. She’d always wolf them down first go off.

  Mrs Earnshaw I think we’d like to donate the Lucozade, wouldn’t we?

  Earnshaw It’s cost us a fortune, this. It’s cost us my retirement. Where were we going? Not Spain. Not Marbella. Colwyn Bay.

  This is what you get for being modest in your aspirations. Robbed, that’s what we’ve been. By an eighty-eight-year-old woman. It must be a record.

  Salter I will show you out. Very often, I have to say, at this age there is no obvious cause of death

  Earnshaw And if they do have a post-mortem, they won’t find anything because I’ll tell you what she died of … Spite.

  Pinkney comes after them.

  Pinkney You forgot your Quality Street.

  Earnshaw shoves them viciously in his pocket as they go. The expelled camera has crept back.

  Cliff Anything?

  Valentine (to camera) Ordinarily, it has to be said, rage at the death of a loved one of advanced age is happily rare, with relief more often the norm … The whole business these days coming under the name of closure … Closure to the guilt of not having visited or only staying half an hour when one does; closure to the boredom of talking to someone who is often incapable of talking back; closure to the boredom of having to talk to someone who is often disinclined to talk back. ‘A blessing’ is what relatives say. ‘A happy release’ … for everybody.