Just needs to get home.
Mikey is pedalling. Distressed. Tears.
Suddenly his bike goes wrong.
He falls.
Still for a second.
Then he’s up and kicking at his bike.
Mikey I hate you.
I hate you.
I hate you.
He picks up the bike and throws it in a bush.
He picks up a piece that has fallen off and throws it away.
Then he runs after it.
Into the darkness.
Into the woods.
That was Mikey upset.
And if we can’t get a real bike then you should know that what happened was the wheel fell off. Literally.
And something snapped inside him too.
A little bit of something that had held him all these years.
And through the tears he’d seen the woods outside Little Bevan and he’d wanted it. The darkness. The oblivion. And he wanted to run through it.
And be torn and dirty and filthy till something else snapped.
So he’d run off like that.
All to say, he wasn’t having a very good day.
We hear Mikey offstage. His fury has driven him wild.
TWELVE
Nine forty-five.
Ooooooh
Isn’t it fun.
All this stuff going on.
A teenage boy on the run.
Gill’s party. We’ll get to that soon.
And the moon.
Oh la lune!
Gorgeous fecund glowing orb.
Look at her go!
Shining tonight like never before. Bringing madness to all below.
The same moon that would’ve shone when the Vikings swarmed this land.
The Heathen Army. Mothers fear. Children’s tears. Nuns’ swarm. And underground. Not a sound.
A saint sleeps on. The peace profound. Waiting for what?
Dot dot dot.
Up above.
Tony is dressed in his explorer gear. It looks slightly mad.
Tony is hunting in the dark.
Trying to pretend he’s in Raiders of the Lost Ark.
Compass, coat, torch, hat. He’d done a copy of the map.
Blown it up so he could see the faint ‘X’, marking what?
Could it really be the spot where Agathus was buried.
So much changed in a thousand years, but one thing was still clear.
The area known as Nun’s Down. Creepy. About a mile out of town deep in the ancient woods.
He knew he should wait till morning.
But something had drawn him here. Now.
He’ll just have a go.
Be in bed by eleven.
How little he did know.
We see Tony enter the woods.
THIRTEEN
Eleven o’clock.
Gill looks about at what she’s created.
The night she’s waited for.
The special ingredient she grated into the punch. The stew. The cheese fondue.
Was having an effect.
Everyone was well and truly wrecked.
The music explodes.
We see various people from the village dancing.
Josie Gill, this punch it’s …?
Gill Thanks, Josie.
Won’t you have some more?
Josie I’m not sure.
Are my teeth showing?
I think I can taste the moon tonight.
Gosh, I wouldn’t normally say that. Would I, Gill?
Gill No.
Josie Still, a little more won’t hurt.
It’s just so …
Gill It’s good to let loose.
Josie LOOSE! That’s it.
Josie flies away.
Pat arrives.
Pat Gill. Gill.
You’ll never guess what –
Oh, I’ve forgotten.
And it seemed so …
She laughs a bit wildly.
Oh Gill. Am I okay?
Gill You’re fine, Pat.
Pat Do you have any more of that …
Gill Harvest wine?
Of course. Here you go.
They dance. Getting wilder.
Andy Gill!
Gill Andy.
Andy I love your …
Well, what are they?
Gill These? These are ears of corn.
Traditionally they were worn –
Oh, but I wouldn’t want to bore you.
Josie Gill! You could never bore us.
Josie trying her sincere face.
And so, not without a certain grace, Gill takes to her makeshift stage.
And explains what she’s wearing. Revenge she’d been preparing for six weeks.
Gill You see, I am the Horkey Lord. It’s a tradition going way back. On Harvest Moon one person in the village would be decorated with the fruits of that year’s harvest. Until night fell and well, the village had to swallow it down. Eat what they’d grown. Reap what they’d sown.
Only there mustn’t be any rot in the harvest. One rotten apple can spoil the lot.
And it was the Horkey Lord’s job to root out anything rotten in the community too.
To sing the life of the village that year.
Its lives. Its secrets. Its lies.
So there was nothing left to fester.
The village spellbound now.
Gill filled with some kind of power.
But also … this unease. Was it the trees, creaking in the sudden still? It felt like they were being watched.
Spirits old unlocked.
A cloud across the moon. And so began the strangest tune.
GILL’S HARVEST SONG
Here in Little Bevan
We’ve made our little heaven (so sweet)
And all neglect to mention
The things that aren’t quite so neat
But a rot that starts small
It’ll spread through us all
Unless we lance it like a boil
Secrets hidden much too long
I’ll end them with this song …
In winter time we stay at home
In private with our vices
Hang around for long enough
You’re sure to glimpse a few surprises
There’s Pete in his window sobbing, heaving
Ten cans of Stella help the grieving
‘I love you.’ Too late. She’s six months dead.
He pukes into their empty bed
Look at you
You’d swear that butter wouldn’t melt
What? Don’t tell me you’ve never felt like saying it all?
Telling all our secrets in the village hall.
Like Mrs Hargreaves’ cat. You remember, don’t you, Pat?
The way she used to kill the little birds you loved so much (tweet, tweet, tweet)
But tuna laced with poison? Then wrapped in a Tesco bag
Mrs Moggins in a shallow grave beneath the rabbit hutch
Springtime when the sap doth rise
Best beware of prying eyes
As Polly steals her wardrobe from Josie’s washing line
And Steve’s screwdriver goes in Andy’s brand new tyres
In our gentle little village, where do we find the time
For dabbling in a delicious little bit of petty crime?
In summer things get hotter still
The truth can be a bitter pill
For those who gamble parish funds
On a losing horse and a few greyhounds
But always hide their tracks somehow
Jan, why not take a bow?
Richard fiddles on his taxes
Mary’s son is selling hashish
Pat the klepto steals groceries for kicks
The Motley-Dickson twins are the ones who threw the bricks into the hall …
So it wasn’t ‘Gyppo-Davie’ after all, though you all couldn’t wait to call the cops on him
Isn’t it
a sin
This village we all live in?
And Mrs Hargreaves though you’re a thousand years old
It’s time that everyone was told
Who spread about that nasty cold
That laid the whole village low
Oh Josie, it’s you I’ve saved for last
The thing I saw while walking past
Those plantation shutters you should close
You leave yourself so very exposed
When making the beast with two backs like that
I recognised your meaty thighs
With Steve away I was surprised.
Then! Of course! I couldn’t help but laugh
At the rise and fall of Andy’s pale white arse
It was like a cosmic thing
A hairy moon round a Saturn ring
O Little Bevan
We’ve made our little heaven
A bed to lie in, the fruit we’ve grown
Now let’s reap what we have sown
FOURTEEN
Mikey’s lit a fire.
And as a ritual sacrifice he’s put on it his bike tyre.
It was all there, like it was waiting for him.
Someone else been before and left charred bits of wood and a lighter too.
Watches the flames.
Long time.
Sounds of the wood.
He’s sat so long he’s forgotten who he is.
Which is just perfect.
FIFTEEN
Tony’s not sure what he saw.
It was just a feeling.
Like there was someone behind him.
Tony jumps.
Ah!
Then from a tree something flies out and blinds him.
And before he knows, he’s stubbed both toes.
And is sort of making a strange sound.
SIXTEEN
The ghost of Nun’s Down.
Mikey Who’s there?
Synapses flare.
What was he doing all alone out here?
Mikey and Tony run around, both terrified.
Then they come face to face and scream.
SEVENTEEN
Tony Michael?
Mikey Tony.
Tony What are you doing out here?
Had the boy been crying? Streaks of tears.
Tony What’s wrong?
Mikey …
Nothing.
Tony Well, you shouldn’t be here.
And you certainly shouldn’t be lighting fires at this time of year.
And Michael feels this thing.
Like anger inside, growing.
At this man who he’d heard people say.
Was ‘a bit funny’, ‘a bit that way’.
Glasses taped together. Sad and old.
Mikey feels something take hold.
Mikey You know what they say about you, don’t you, Mr Grieves?
Tony What?
Mikey The village. They say you’re weird.
‘Poor Tony, all alone with his mum.’
They say it isn’t natural for a man of sixty-one.
They say you stare at the kids. Is that true?
Tony What?
Mikey I just wondered what you were doing out in the woods at night?
What is it? Some kind of paedo’s delight?
Tony Michael!
And right on cue the tape on Tony’s glasses goes.
They ping off his nose into the undergrowth below.
Tony scrabbles to find them. Mikey watches.
This man scrabbling round, was this all there was? Mikey feels sick to even be close.
Turns to go home.
Back to it all.
And with that, what can only be described as a crack opened up in the earth below.
And little Mikey was swallowed whole.
What?
I know. Dramatic, right? A sort of fight, then this. An almost biblical rending of the earth. Turf thrown high, some going right in Tony’s eye.
Tony Ah!
And from far below.
Mikey (fading) Ooooooooooh!
Tony Michael!
MICHAEL!
And Tony, not really thinking.
Slides to where Mikey had started sinking.
Tony Hang on, Michael!
The last thing he sees above, the moon’s glow.
As he slips, feet first, into the world below.
Interval.
EIGHTEEN
Gill is running wildly through the woods. Nettles sting her legs, brambles whip her. Her clothes are becoming ripped and torn.
Gill Come on! COME ON!
Gill can’t remember the last time she’s been like this.
Heart beating, feet stumbling, brambles ripping her legs.
Completely out of control.
She can hear the rest of the village in the distance.
After her.
For what she’s done.
Every secret of the village she’d sung.
The silence right after. When even the night sounds seemed to stop.
An owl in a tree. Shocked.
It was Pat what did it.
Though later she said it felt more of a group thing.
A sort of spontaneous rising of shamanic powers.
Blood lust flooding the brain.
And making even the most sensible, practical person, someone who, for example, might have read the entire North Norfolk Environmental Impact Planning Guidance Booklet temporarily INSANE!
Do it.
Do it.
Do it.
Do it.
Some ancient power taking over.
Rising in them all.
Their eyes not quite human.
Gill swore she saw a glint of red pass over Josie’s bulging orb.
As Andy picked up a rock.
What?
Surely not.
Well, maybe not, but it all got a little heated.
As Gill retreated.
And then, throwing the last of her fruit at the throng, she’d jumped the fence and run headlong into the woods.
‘GET HER!’
And it felt … good.
Something. Some kind of something felt good.
Because when was she last in the woods?
Like this. Ripped to bits.
God. When? When did she lose this?
Gill Come on! Come on!
A kid. She’d been a kid.
Something of a memory then flickers through her.
This. This forest all round.
The sound of wind and air and tearing through it all.
She was free once.
Gill I was free!
You hear me. I was free!
Shit.
Her knee goes.
Then she’s down.
Gill AH!
Gill cries out in pain.
The dark above. Canopy.
Her knee. Her bloody knee. She’s not a kid.
She’s just this thing. This woman. Lying in the dark.
The spark which had lit her.
Suddenly gone.
Gill Help. Help me please.
Someone.
NINETEEN
The tunnels below the woods.
The distant sound of holy music.
It’s pitch black.
Tony comes to.
He crawls.
He bumps into Mikey, who wakes with a fright.
Tony Michael?
Mikey Yes.
Tony Are you okay?
Mikey I don’t know.
Tony Hang on. I just –
He finds his torch. Turns it on.
There.
Mikey Where are we?
Tony …
The Burrels. They’re real.
Mikey What?
Tony Tunnels. Below the woods. They’re much deeper than I thought.
Mikey Right.
Tony No wonder no one’s ever found them. No one’s been here for over nine hundred years.
Mikey So �
�� we’re …
Hello?
Hello!
Tony Michael. Are you okay?
Mikey Yeah. I just.
I’m not good in small spaces.
I don’t –
Oh God.
Please.
Get me out.
Get me out!
He looks at his phone.
Mikey There’s no signal.
There’s nothing.
He starts hyperventilating.
Towards the end when Tony’s mum wasn’t much there.
But sometimes would rise up like she was coming up for air.
Seeing where she was and how she was and this was the same sound she made.
Losing control.
And so Tony knows.
He knows what to do.
Tony holds Mikey, firm.
Tony It’s okay. Breathe, Mum. Just breathe.
Mikey calms a little.
Mikey We need to get out.
Tony Okay. We will. But first. We just need to calm down.
Pause as Mikey calms a little more. Still on edge.
‘Under the earth was Agathus laid. Into the tunnels below did her followers go.’
Mikey What?
Tony It’s the only recorded mention of the tunnels.
The Liber Eliensis.
…
Book One.
…
Page 12.
…
Paragraph 3.
Mikey What were they for?
Tony To escape. The madness. You see, the Danes had arrived.
Mikey The Vikings?
Tony … Sort of.
‘This year eight hundred and sixty-five. The heathens made great slaughter with the North Folk. And did burn the corn and sleep with their horses.’
Mikey Don’t stop.
Tony What?
Mikey Just keep talking.
I don’t care if it’s boring.
Tony Thanks.
Mikey Please. It helps.
Tony I can’t.
I mean –
Mikey looks. Waiting.
I’m not very good at …
Mikey You’re fine.
Tony Okay. Well, once …
Once upon a time, I suppose.
Mikey That works.
Tony A terrible curse fell upon the land of the East Angles.
The Tale of Little Bevan Page 3