JOHN CLARE: Ah, yes. My pretty little daughter. Have you heard much news about her? How’s she getting on with life?
BECKETT: Dear God, not all this nonsense just when I thought we were done with it. I can’t be bothered with it anymore. And to be frank I’m not expecting much more out of this pair either. I’ve a feeling that they’ve pretty much exhausted what they had by way of conversation.
THOMAS BECKET: There I must agree. They sit half-dazed amid a sorry wreckage of their own accomplishment and neither seek atonement nor can have an expectation of redemption. It is a drear tale too often told and like you I am wearied with it. And besides, if what you’ve told to me is true I have my own drear tale to make a way through. I think I may carry on in that direction [THOMAS BECKET points towards the audience, as if at an off-stage street] to the castle where my former playmate waits for me.
BECKETT: Aye, I might join you. I was planning to walk down that way myself and take a look at old Saint Peter’s Church, the way I first did when I came here for the cricket.
THOMAS BECKET: It is a fine building of the old kind and I know it well. I must say that I am surprised to hear it is still standing, getting on a thousand years since. Has it fallen to neglect? Are all the horrible grotesques that I recall still grimacing from out the stonework?
JOHN CLARE: There’s a few have fallen off or been knocked down across the years, but the majority are still in place. So, both of you are off, then? I cannot persuade you to remain and keep me company so that I shall have someone who can hear me that I can converse with?
BECKETT: I apologise, but no, I cannot be persuaded. It has been a pleasure of a kind to meet with you, for all of your wild fancies and your tale of having impudently bedded Lucia. I should not mind if I met you again, although I must admit I say that in the expectation that it will be not be the case.
JOHN CLARE: For my part I’ll be sorry to be left here on my own, but as a consequence of my insanity I will no doubt have soon forgotten you were ever here, or will have otherwise become convinced of your delusory nature as with my first w— as with some other comical misapprehensions that I may have had. I’ve found you likeable enough, the pair of you, but must remark that you are very similar, both in the spelling of your names, and in the fact that I have thought the two of you to be quite grim.
BECKETT: You are not grim yourself, at all?
JOHN CLARE: No. I partake in a great deal of unproductive melancholy, but I don’t think I’ve the courage to be grim. Bleak sometimes, possibly, but not what you’d call grim. I’ve not the stomach for it.
THOMAS BECKET: [Kindly and sympathetically.] Will you not accompany us to the church? I should not like to think that we had left you by yourself.
BECKETT: [Aside, quietly exasperated.] Oh, that’s just great!
JOHN CLARE: [To THOMAS BECKET.] No, thank you for your offer, but I think I shall stay here awhile. I am not sure these two are finished their debate, and am yet hopeful there shall be some poetry to its conclusion. Though not very hopeful. I am after all by nature a realistic man, at least in my descriptions, for all that they say I am romantic or am otherwise a fool. The pair of you enjoy your evening, now, and leave me to enjoy my own. Good luck to you, especially to you, Saint Thomas, and congratulations on avoiding the decomposition.
THOMAS BECKET: Hm. Yes, well, thank you … though I cannot think in all humility that it was through some effort on my own part.
BECKETT: Aye, good luck to you as well. Remember that John Clare was a much better poet than Lord Byron. That should keep you straight. Farewell, now. [SAMUEL BECKETT and THOMAS BECKET stroll away towards STAGE RIGHT, talking as they go.] So, the being canonised and all of that. Had you no inkling of miraculous abilities prior to the business of not rotting?
THOMAS BECKET: Not that I recall. I had a certain fluency of penmanship, but I myself did not think it miraculous. And for your own part, you are still acquainted with the Holy Church?
BECKETT: Well, I’ll not lie. We’ve had our ups and downs … [They EXIT RIGHT. JOHN CLARE stands in place and follows them with his eyes, first tracking away to STAGE RIGHT, then turning his head slowly until he is peering out over the audience. There is a long pause as he waits to be sure they are too far off to hear.]
JOHN CLARE: I still say that I had your lady friend. The lexicon came out my ears as though it were a sperm of language. It was an encounter I found bracing, and I don’t regret it. [CLARE stands where he is a moment or two longer, idly gazing at the unresponsive HUSBAND and WIFE. When they do not move or speak, he sadly and resignedly turns to shuffle back towards his alcove at the CENTRE/RIGHT REAR of the STAGE, where he sits down, staring mournfully at the motionless couple in the foreground. After a few moments more there is the SOUND from OFF of the CHURCH CLOCK STRIKING ONCE. Sitting on their step, the WIFE looks up at this as if appalled, while the HUSBAND does not react.]
WIFE: It’s still one o’clock. How can it still be one o’clock? Why is it always one o’clock?
HUSBAND: [Unsympathetically.] You said yourself, it’s too late from now on. It’s always half past nothing to be done.
WIFE: But that was you. You were the one who brought this down upon us. Why is it still one o’clock for me?
HUSBAND: Because you were as much a part of them as I was, all the goings on. And that’s the thing I’ve learned with goings on. They go on. They continue. Nothing’s ever done with.
WIFE: [After a horrified pause, as she reflects on this.] Is this hell? Johnny, have we gone to hell?
HUSBAND: [Wearily, not looking at her.] Celia, I don’t know.
JOHN CLARE: We talked about that earlier, and we thought purgatory to be the greater likelihood. Not that I’m claiming any great authority upon the subject. [A pause.] You can’t hear me. What’s the point of any of it? [Along with the HUSBAND and WIFE, CLARE lapses into a gloomy silence. After a few moments a HALF-CASTE WOMAN ENTERS STAGE LEFT beneath the portico. After a few steps she stops and appraises the scene, looking first at the couple on the steps and then at JOHN CLARE sitting in his alcove.]
WOMAN: You’re the poet, ain’t yer? You’re John Clare.
JOHN CLARE: [Surprised.] I am? You’re sure of it? Not Byron or King William?
WOMAN: [Kindly and sympathetically.] No, love. You’re John Clare. From what I heard, it’s just you get a bit mixed up from time to time.
JOHN CLARE: That’s true. I do. And you don’t find it off-putting?
WOMAN: No. To be honest, darling, when I heard about you, I thought that you sounded like a laugh. And some of what you wrote, it’s lovely. Is that true, about you walking eighty miles back here after you’d legged it from a nut house down in Essex?
JOHN CLARE: Nut house?
WOMAN: Yeah, you know. The funny farm. Napoleon factory. Laughing academy. The loony bin.
JOHN CLARE: [Laughing, amused and delighted.] Oh, you mean the coney hatch. You should have said. Yes, that was where I was. You seem to know a lot about me.