The DOCTOR tries the catches: with a little force they give, and the lid is opened.
Inside are neatly-arranged cartons with labels indicating that they contain blasting gelignite. There are also smaller cartons marked as containing detonators.
GHENT and DOCTOR are silent as they look into the suitcase. GHENT looks up, lost in thought. DOCTOR glances at him.
DOCTOR
You don’t still blame yourself for what happened, do you?
GHENT
No, I never did. I’ve always been quite certain that I didn’t short across as I was wiring up. Did I tell you Rimmer was a Peterman in his day, amongst other things?
DOCTOR shakes head.
GHENT
Well, Rimmer told me that he’d known similar things happen. There can be a freak short — some unsuspected current, totally unknown, perhaps static electricity on someone’s clothes. No one knows, and such accidents are unexplained because the only person likely to know is dead.
Another silence.
DOCTOR
The longer gelignite is kept, the less sensitive and dangerous it becomes.
GHENT
Yes, so Rimmer told me. . . .
DOCTOR
I didn’t rely on hearsay! Since I had it as a house-guest for so long, I took the precaution of looking up its endearing characteristics in a dictionary of chemical technology.
GHENT
I’m sure it didn’t tell you what to do with it when it does get old! Rimmer told me — you simply use a. . . .
DOCTOR (still friendly)
I don’t really want to know. It’s not as though I’ll be using it again.
Silence.
DOCTOR
Our initial mistake was haste, I’ve always thought.
GHENT
John Stannis wasn’t quick enough. . . .
DOCTOR glances at him with just a hint of disapproval.
DOCTOR
We’ve read the textbook way, and we chose to disregard it. Some would say that was amateurism. I wouldn’t though.
GHENT
The way we left the place was bloody professional! I’m sure you’ve never driven like that again!
DOCTOR
If you’d both set out the charge, and then run the cable back together, as the textbook. . . .
GHENT
Then we’d both have been blown up together. I’m positive it was caused by nothing the textbooks could have warned us against.
Another silence.
GHENT (suddenly)
I’m going away.
DOCTOR (after a pause)
This time our correspondence should be free of the need to say everything in one letter a month.
GHENT (warmly)
I shall write. . . .
DOCTOR (reciprocating)
I shall be here. . . .
13. INTERIOR. KITCHEN. DAY
GHENT is in the kitchen: he gingerly sniffs at some cold food: makes a pained face, moves out of kitchen door towards living area.
14. INTERIOR. LIVING AREA. DAY
Most of the furniture in the living area has dustcovers over it, and the room shows other signs of the house being about to be shut up for a long period.
CHRISTINA sits reading a newspaper in an armchair with its dustcover thrown back.
Enter GHENT from kitchen.
GHENT
Now I’ve got stomach trouble. I suppose it was inevitable. . .
CHRISTINA
Have you read this!
GHENT (deliberately)
My stomach and I have been acquainted for forty-odd years — I thought I understood it. I’ve never known it behave. . .
CHRISTINA
But it’s libellous!
GHENT
I thought the ‘Mad Bomber’ bit was quite funny. . .
CHRISTINA
They also make you out to be a writer of pornography, a lecher in general and an adulterer in particular. A liar. . . .and probably a murderer.
GHENT
I didn’t laugh so much at those bits.
CHRISTINA (distressed)
Laugh! And what about me? It doesn’t give my name, but it’ll be obvious to anyone around here that I’m the woman living with you!
GHENT
‘Flaxen-haired beauty’ is the gem of a phrase they used, isn’t it?
CHRISTINA
And that explains the phone calls! Three times this morning there were breathers!
GHENT
Breathers?
CHRISTINA
Just breathing at the other end of the line, nothing else. (pause) Surely you’ll sue them for libel over this?
GHENT
I could do. But I’m a gaolbird, and they think they’re safe to say anything about me. (pause) Besides, I’m going away, aren’t I?
CHRISTINA
You don’t seem worried by it all!
GHENT (resigned)
This is just the latest of a long series of caricatures of me — and in some ways it’s the funniest. Barely recognisable. (picks up paper, reads aloud) I never knew this house was a ‘mountain fastness’, did you? My father thought of it as good arable hill country. ‘Sex is a marvellous idea — only God could have thought of it.’ They quote that as though I said it yesterday!
CHRISTINA
But did you say it?
GHENT
Yes and no. It’s a line out of a play I wrote years ago, oh, twenty years ago. (pause) Poor Gwen doesn’t come off too well either, does she? I should think she could successfully sue for libel. Though they’re only telling the truth about her having the child. (pause) Oh, and this is a bit I like a lot: ‘Guilty secret of frightened. . . .’
Phone rings. CHRISTINA answers it.
CHRISTINA
353? (pause) Hallo? (pause) Hallo!
CHRISTINA is distressed, looks across at GHENT. He comes across and takes the phone from her. Listens for a moment.
GHENT
You’ll have to breathe harder — it’s a bad line!
Smiles; waits a moment for a possible reaction, then puts down phone. He consults a small notebook, picks up phone again, and dials a long (STD) number.
CHRISTINA
I don’t know how you can find it funny!
GHENT
I don’t know how I can do anything else! (pause) Laughing at other people is really only saying that they are not like oneself — which we all knew already, of course. (pause: then to phone) Hallo? Russian Embassy?
Reaction shot: CHRISTINA puzzled.
GHENT (on phone)
Hallo? I suppose I want to speak to some sort of Cultural Attaché. (pause) I’m a writer, a poet, Ghent. G-h-e-n-t. Ghent. (pause) You must have heard of me. (pause) Yes, yes. (pause) Well, I want to defect. (embarrassed but sincere) Defect. Choose freedom in Russia. (pause) Defect, don’t you understand? I want to leave this bloody country to go to one where minorities are not oppressed. (pause)
Reaction shot: CHRISTINA cannot tell whether he is serious or not.
GHENT (on phone)
Think of the propaganda value. (pause) Ghent! Ghent? I was on television a few nights ago! Released from prison after a twelve-year sentence for political offences! Ghent! This could mean a tremendous amount of. . . .
Phone goes dead; he puts it down.
GHENT (annoyed)
Put the phone down on me! Must think I’m a crank — I expect they get dozens on the phone every day. I’d better go there myself when I’m in London.
CHRISTINA (very puzzled)
I didn’t know we were thinking of going to Russia?
GHENT (looking round room)
There’s a lot of me in this house. Literally, when you think of it. I’ve spent thirty years here, and most of the skin I shed in that time must be in the dust, in the crevices, in the air.
CHRISTINA (brusquely)
What a curious idea!
GHENT
No, you know our skin is constantly being shed, rubbed off and renewed? Well,
it must go somewhere, mustn’t it? That’s how places literally become one with the people who live in them a long time.
CHRISTINA looks dismissive.
GHENT
No, it’s not a whimsical idea. I felt it as we were converting the place. This section, from about here (indicates) was a long barn, a continuation of the same structure but intended to house farm animals. I suppose what they’d left behind was joined with what we had when we knocked the old kitchen and the barn into this one space. Rubbed skin, pared nails, the odd spot of blood — there’s a lot of me in this house. (pause) Nothing I can’t do without.
CHRISTINA
What makes you think I want to go to Russia?
GHENT (severely)
Nothing makes me think you want to go to Russia!
Silence.
GHENT (to himself)
There was a time in this house when Gwen and I were so close that I could say about love: I lived up there, at night the whole of me would live up there.
CHRISTINA has realised that he is not going to take her with him, wherever he is going: she stands, comes across to where GHENT is now putting on his coat.
CHRISTINA (sadly, genuinely)
I was going to make you into a great poet, remember?
GHENT (gently)
Don’t you see I only needed the poetry while I was in prison? (pause) It kept me sane. (pause) I’ll take you back to Hind. Then you two can get on with your life’s work of seeing that a decent burial is given to ‘our’ language. And there’s something else I have to leave with Hind, too.
15. INTERIOR. NEWSPAPER OFFICE. DAY
Close on the fibre suitcase (last seen containing gelignite at the Doctor’s house) being carried fairly swiftly up some stairs and through a door: follow it as it is swung up and on to a desk.
GHENT (vo)
It’s the Mad Bomber!
Widen to reveal NEWS EDITOR, startled, seated at desk behind suitcase. Reveal it is GHENT who has placed it there and stands menacingly in front of him.
GHENT
Where will he strike next!?
NEWS EDITOR says nothing: looks petrified.
GHENT
Death is a marvellous idea — only God could have thought of it. (pause) Ha!
NEWS EDITOR starts at this — as he was meant to.
GHENT
You know, for someone who’s shown such a deep interest in me for the last few weeks, you have very little to say. (pause) Or don’t I look like any of the caricatures by which you think you know me? (pause) You don’t mean I’ve come all this way, stropped by the London traffic, and you’re not even going to say hello? ‘Stropped by the traffic, stropped’. Do you like that? Do you think that’s poetical? Don’t find language like that in your paper, do we? Of course, you couldn’t mention I was a poet. The Mad Bomber Poet. The Mad Poet Bomber. Doesn’t sound right, does it?
NEWS EDITOR seems transfixed by the suitcase. Only very occasionally can he bring himself to glance at GHENT’S face.
GHENT goes across to a chair, sits in it.
GHENT
Perhaps you think I’m here to indulge myself in a confession to a total stranger?
NEWS EDITOR finally manages a glance at his office door, which is still half-open.
GHENT
Yes, someone might come in. But it wouldn’t make any difference. To you, that is. It might to them. (pause) Tell us a joke, then. You journalists know all the filthy jokes. It’s a long while since I had a good laugh. (pause) We know who your stringer is in the village. He won’t be letting you know many more. . . .filthy jokes. Save you a bit, that piece of information.
Silence. The two of them stare at the suitcase for a few seconds. Then an unexpected noise outside the door makes GHENT leap quickly to his feet and go over to the suitcase.
GHENT
This is how we set it. Watch!
Carefully, pretending precision, he clicks open both catches but does not open lid.
GHENT
There!
This is said with dramatic over-emphasis: its intention being to transfix the NEWS EDITOR even more.
Then GHENT suddenly makes a very quick exit from the room.
The NEWS EDITOR sits staring at the suitcase for about ten seconds in increasing fear. Then his eyes go to the door: then back to the suitcase: then to the window. It is clear that he thinks he stands more chance if he throws the suitcase out of the window than if he makes a run for the door.
Another long stare at the case: then NEWS EDITOR suddenly picks it up and throws it through an already open window.
16. EXTERIOR. NEWSPAPER OFFICE BLOCK. DAY
Tight on upper floor window as suitcase comes through. The catches being undone, its contents begin to spill out as it falls: papers. Widen to follow fall.
The suitcase hits the ground, spills the rest of its contents: all papers of various sizes and descriptions.
Close on papers: it is clear that they are poems, and that they are by GHENT. There is no sign of gelignite.
Come up off papers to see GHENT on his own in middle distance walking away from camera.
Credits over last shot.
Not Counting the Savages
EDITORS’ NOTE
Not Counting the Savages was commissioned by the BBC in 1971 for the series Thirty Minute Theatre. It was broadcast on BBC 2 on 3 January 1972. The cast consisted of Hugh Burden (the Husband), Brenda Bruce (the Wife), Fiona Walker (Rosa) and William Hoyland (Jerry). The director was Mike Newell. The screenplay was later published in Transatlantic Review 45. A black and white home recording of the broadcast was recovered in 2012 and screened at the bfi South Bank on 2 December that year.
CHARACTERS
HUSBAND
WIFE
ROSA, their daughter
JERRY, their son
WOMAN PATIENT, aged 60
ANAESTHETIST
NURSE
The drawing room and kitchen of a professional-class house in (say) Maida Vale/St. John’s Wood, London.
Early Evening; May
KITCHEN
HUSBAND and WIFE are eating at home, informally; or, rather, he is eating: she is in attendance, agitated over something she has not yet told him; indecisively moving between cooker and draining-board.
HUSBAND is coarsely feeding, finishing what remains of a huge main course. He is fat; expensively dressed, though in shirt sleeves now, tie loosened. He is ignoring the WIFE: she moves about behind him. He may have been late for dinner: he is gross, getting down to his food piggishly. He is about fifty: so is the WIFE. She is very well dressed, even for the kitchen: this more than anything else gives the professional class of the couple.
HUSBAND is an ugly, lumpish man. He finishes his course, pushes plate away from him, cutlery splayed anyhow.
WIFE tidies away plate immediately, automatically putting cutlery in the conventional closed position; then she brings a large bowl of half-a-dozen different fruits, and a cheese board just as varied.
HUSBAND cuts a whole camembert cleanly and precisely in half, eats with his fingers, messily; but is careful to wipe them afterwards on linen napkin.
WIFE pours coffee for him from an electric percolator, spilling some at first into the saucer: it is doubtful whether this was an accident or an attempt to gain his attention. She clears away both cup and saucer, fetches clean ones, this time pours successfully.
HUSBAND still gives no indication of having noticed her agitation; even her presence; reaches for the other half-camembert and eats it even more grossly. When he has finished this, he sits back and wipes his mouth roughly with the napkin. His hands are noticeable: beautifully clean, manicured, supple: totally at odds with the rest of his person, with the way he has been behaving over his food: the hand movements deft, precise, as he takes up coffee cup.
HUSBAND
Well?
WIFE looks at him with animosity.
HUSBAND
You want to say something. (pause) I can tell.
/> WIFE overcomes her hostility, obviously does want to talk, is relieved.
WIFE
I went out to see Georgie today. (pause) To see how the grave was looking (pause) after the winter. There wasn’t much on it, it was a terrible winter for Georg. . .for the grave, for the garden. (pause) As you know. That moss you planted has done well, though, green as green, and those seed things on the end of their tiny hairs, stalks. . . . it’s nearly all over the grave now, I’ll have to cut it back to. . . .
HUSBAND
So?
WIFE
You know where it is. (pause) Two or three graves from the edge, from the fence. And there’s a sort of public footpath through the woods on the other side. Well, I was kneeling down, tidying up as best I could, with my back to the fence, when suddenly I heard voices, two men carrying on a conversation. One of them called the other John, I think. (pause) I didn’t look round, of course, but when I went round to tidy the other side of the grave I became aware of a man standing close up against the wire fence. (pause) At first I thought he’d caught his handkerchief or something white on it. (pause) Then I realised what it was. . . .
HUSBAND
What?
WIFE
He was exposing himself! (pause) Exposing himself! To me!
Pause. HUSBAND takes large gulp of coffee. Then hawks.
HUSBAND
You’ve seen one before.
HUSBAND takes coffee cup (but not saucer), gets up from the table clumsily, noisily, and begins to move away.
WIFE
But it upset me terribly! (pause) You can’t know how distressed I was! (pause) I still am!
WIFE never quite breaks into tears: as though she never does: this is the limit of her emotion.
HUSBAND stops on his way out, cup in hand, turns.
HUSBAND
Why? You’re an old woman. Why should you be upset? (pause) It was playacting. You’re an old woman.
Exit HUSBAND
WIFE’s face, from being distressed, sets into a bitter stare.
DRAWING ROOM
HUSBAND goes across to a calendar on the mantelpiece. The date can be changed on this kind of calendar by turning a knob at the side. HUSBAND twiddles idly with the knob, not quite changing the date (which is the 16th): then suddenly gives it a quick twirl which sends the date several days wrong, preferably ending up part-way between two numbers.
Well Done God! Page 23