SCENE TWO. AGNES kneeling before her father, LORD BROWNLOW, then sudden action BROWNLOW: Throw her out, Mrs Grimwig! AGNES: (Screams) No! No, I am your daughter! BROWNLOW: You are no daughter of mine! See, see this portrait, this beautiful, pure and innocent girl upon this canvas, why that is my daughter! AGNES: That IS me, father. I am your loving and dutiful daughter. BROWNLOW You hussy! Look at your swollen stomach! Has my daughter a stomach swollen with shame? No. No. Has my daughter fornicated with a married man? No, no. Such a thing would be beyond the wildest fantasy of my pure and angelic daughter. She would not take the good and ancient name of Brownlow and drag it through the mud of scandal! Where is my Agnes? AGNES: She?s here, helpless before you. (She throws her self down and grabs his ankles). BROWNLOW Get away from me! Take your fingers off me, my flesh creeps to think of your hands upon him that impregnated you with his bastard child,! AGNES: This is your grandchild, feel, feel, he kicks against my belly. BROWNLOW : (Pulling hands away) Away, away! Never lay your hands on me again. I retch to think of it. Out, out woman, demon out and never return to darken my door again! AGNES: Lost, lost! (Going to door which is the coffin.). BROWNLOW : Wait! AGNES: Papa? -~ BROWNLOW: You gave me this, Agnes, it contains your picture. AGNES: Yes! BROWNLOW: It's of no use to me now, young hussy, I would not recognise it! (Throws it to AGNES who takes it.). AGNES:You are cruel, sir! Cruel! May you get what you deserve!! (Exits through Coffin). BROWNLOW: (Puts head in hands and staggers.) O, Sweet Lord, what have I done? My daughter, my only child, my one blood, my one family. What have I done? O, Agnes. (Goes to coffin/door and shouts through it). Agnes! Agnes! Come back! Agnes! Forgive me, let us all be forgiven. Agnes! (Goes out and down to audience) FAGIN: Look at him! Trying to make us feel sorry for him! That's the very murderer there! Now watch the consequence of his crime! Agnes fled through the storm, life in her belly but death close behind, hard upon her heals! ALL SING: Nature bled on Heath and Moor, Nature red in tooth and claw, Only seen by the eye of the storm Blackened sky, rolling thunder Nature's laughter, see her wander Wonder where she can find shelter Helter skelter through the storm Raising eyes for help from heaven But the eye of the storm is blind To pity and fear And the rain drowns her tears The clouds'swirl above Where is hope, where is rest, where is love? (AGNES staggers to the coffin/door and knocks). Wind is moaning, Wind is moaning, Wind is moaning.... Aaah. AGNES: Let me in, let me in! Give me sanctuary, please God. Mercy! mercy! For pity's sake! (The lid of the coffin opens and Mrs CORNEY appears). MRS CORNEY: Apply here between the hours of nine and noon tomorrow. The workhouse is closed!. (Tries to shut the coffin, AGNES grabs the lid). AGNES: No, please let me enter for the sake of the child! CORNEY: Nine O'clock! AGNES: We shall be dead at nine! CORNEY: Dead or alive, you'll be treated the same! We don't favour the living here! At nine! AGNES: Wait! This, this! (Holds out locket). CORNEY: Gold? AGNES: Gold. CORNEY: Let me see! (CORNEY grabs the locket but AGNES has a spasm and cannot release it). AGNES: Ah, the child is coming! CORNEY: Damn you, you'd better come in! And at this hour of the night! (Pulls her in by the hand) Ah, no wedding ring! Sinner! (Inside the workhouse) CORNEY: Sally, Sally! Where are you, you old fool? SALLY (enters with empty bottle, drunk) Shall I fetch another bottle? It's almost dry. My, (of rain-soaked AGNES) she's wet. Wish my bottle were as wet as her. CORNEY: Listen, you half dead crone, fetch the Beadle. I want the Beadle! SALLY: (She nods) I want a bottle, she wants the Beadle. (Mutters and exits). AGNES: I feel it! I am going to burst! CORNEY: That's God's way, woman. The pain's your punishment. (SALLY returns with the BEADLE). BEADLE: What's to do, Mrs CORNEY, what?s to do? Can't a man take his tea in peace?? (He has a tray of tea in his hand) CORNEY: Mr Bumble, I've a woman with no husband here as is about to have a baby. We require the Parish Beadle (said with pride) to register the child. BEADLE: Oh the burden of office, Mrs CORNEY. The burden of responsibility. (She wipes his brow and sighs). I must say, Mrs CORNEY, you look the very picture of rude health. May I tweak your cheek? CORNEY: Mr Bumble, there are ladies present. BEADLE: I see no ladies, Ma?m. Merely paupers, dregs and dross. CORNEY: (To Sally) Stop gawping and do your women's thing! (SALLY grunts and attends to AGNES by lowering the coffin and laying AGNES on it for a bed and pulling a sheet over her). You shall be able to return to your tea and comfort very soon, Mr Bumble. BEAD: You are an angel, Mrs CORNEY, a regular angel. CORNEY: And you are a Devil to flash your eyes so at a widowed woman. BEAD: Tis nature, Ma?am, nature. And not to be denied. AGNES: It comes, mercy! (SALLY has lit her pipe and has her beneath AGNES's skirts.) CORNEY: Sally, put down that pipe and help the woman! BEADLE: Mrs CORNEY, you have a silver tongue! (drinks the tea) Quite refreshed, quite restored, quite robust and ready to perform my official and unofficial duties! I shall fetch the Parish register, call me when the child is born. (Exits). AGNES: Agh! Mercy!! CORNEY: Well? SALLY: (Wipes hands on her filthy skirt) The Doctor says that it ain't safe to deliver unless I scrubs me hands with alcohol. CORNEY: You're as foul as the night. (Woman screams) Can't you tie a rag around the thing's mouth? I'll have a headache soon! SALLY: There. there. Push! Push! Must I do everything!! (Gags woman, pulls her legs apart. Swigs from alcohol bottle and breathes on her hands). All disinfected now. Where's its little head? (SALLY delivers the child, then nurses the bottle instead of the child - CORNEY grabs the child. Sounds of child's cries.) (Next lines sung) AGNES: Can I see the child? CORNEY: It's a boy! BEADLE: It's a boy! CORNEY: He would cry louder if he knew what a world he was born into. AGNES: I must tell you something. CORNEY: I've no time for you! AGNES: I beg of you. BEADLE & CORNEY: We've no time for you! AGNES; He's richer than he seems! This golden locket! SALLY: (Waking) Gold? (Next lines spoken. SALLY hides and listens). AGNES: This child is not the poor child he seems, the golden locket. Open it. CORNEY: A picture, a painting of...you. AGNES Take it to, take it to- the boy's grandfather. He is a ...a respectable man, a Lord. CORNEY: A Lord? Is there a reward? AGNES: oh yes! CORNEY: Yes?!! AGNES: In heaven! CORNEY: What? Is there no money in this? AGNES: His grandfather is rich. CORNEY: Where is his grandfather, who is it? Who is this Lord, answer me! (Shaking AGNES.) AGNES: Take the locket to... CORNEY: Speak, stupid woman - ah! Wake up! Speak! Give me that bottle! (Dumps child and seizes bottle - forces alcohol down AGNES's throat who chokes and dies) Speak, you stupid woman!! Ah, what! Dead! Mr Bumble! BEADLE: (Enters) Is the child alive? CORNEY: Yes. But the mother's dead. BEADLE: A lesson to us all. A punishment from God. She was not married you know. And, Mrs Corney, neither am I. If you get my meaning? CORNEY: And the meaning of this, Mister Bumble, according to the dead mother, is to prove the child's nobility. Hmm, see it has a name engraved upon it: Agnes. SALLY: (hidden) Agnes! BEADLE: Sh - hush. Did the crone see or hear anything? (SALLY has in fact overheard everything as the audience can see but CORNEY shakes her head). Let us be philosophical, M'am and keep this golden locket and let the secret of the child's birth die with his mother. We cannot go a wasting time on paupers. Will this scrap of a child live? (Sounds of child's cries throughout this.) CORNEY: He seems healthy enough. BEADLE: Hah! Another burden on our charity. Born selfish! Well. I have the register and I shall name him. A boy you say? CORNEY: He is. BEADLE: I am strictly alphabetical in these matters. The last orphan was an S ~so I called him Swubble. This thing is a therefore a T - (pondering the problem of a name the BEADLE notices the way he is twisting his pen in thought) - Twist I shall call him, Oliver Twist. CORNEY: Oh, Mr Bumble, what a poet lies inside your mighty form! (Snuggling up to him. OLIVER cries. The BEADLE uses the opportunity to sneakily relieve MRS CORNEY of the golden chain). SALLY: (Knocking and entering) 'scusing me. There is work to be done. (Sticks empty gin bottle in child's mouth). CORNEY: Well, do it!! SALLY: O good lord, in heaven above, how is it that things turn out so bad for the poor and the vicious rich alike? Scene 3 ©Paul Stebbings and Phil Smith 1994, 1996, 2001.