The Audit: A Play in Five Acts — Act II

ACT II, SCENE 1: The Parley at the Threshold

(A second blow strikes the outer oak, louder, iron upon timber: clank. The Ticket-Lad presses his back flat against the wainscot by the hearth, gripping his broom. The PROVOST gestures sharply with his linen handkerchief toward the double doors).

PROVOST

Slip the latch only, Crump. Three inches. On no account admit the boots until the precinct jurisdiction is declared.

(CRUMP hobbles to the doors. His hickory stick strikes the floorboards:

tock. tock.

He draws back the heavy iron bolt half an inch:

screee.

He cracks the left leaf three inches into the passage.

Through the gap appears the shoulder of a rough drab box-coat, soaked through with road-mist, and the snout of a japanned black tin cylinder held crosswise in a buckskin glove).

APPARITOR (from the dark passage):

Open for the Commissary of the Archdeacon of Ely! Service of Inhibition under the seal of the Consistory.

PROVOST (without leaving the hearth, voice hard and resonant):

You stand upon College pavement, sir. The precinct of St. Jude-in-the-Fen within these walls is extra-episcopal by charter of the third Edward. No apparitor crosses the inner sill during an open sitting of the Bursary without permission of the Master.

APPARITOR

I have an inhibition against the living, Dr. Wriothesley! The living is sequestered for the dilapidations of the chancel. All temporalities, dues, firkins, and entries of account are stayed until the bishop’s court takes inventory.

(Arthur does not look up from the page. His steel nib moves with steady, rhythmic friction across the ruled leaf:

scratch. scratch.

Hester’s eyes do not leave the memorandum book. Beside her right hand, the six-inch iron vestry key holds the bottom corner of the open page flat).

HESTER

Item two. Two ash rungs for the belfry ladder. Ninepence.

ARTHUR (muttering to the vellum):

Ninepence.

PROVOST (to the door):

You may enter to the hearth-bench, Mr. Sizer, as a traveler seeking shelter from the freeze. But if that tin cylinder touches the Spanish mahogany of the High Table before the quire is closed, I will have the college porters tip your chaise into the ditch.

(Crump turns his head toward the Provost, who nods once.

Crump opens the leaf just wide enough for a man).

ACT II, SCENE 2: The Japanned Cylinder

(The APPARITOR enters, stamping the greasy slush from his riding gaiters onto the bare oak boards:

thump. thump.

He is forty, thick-set, red-faced from the north wind, wearing a drab multi-caped driving coat stiff with dried mire. Under his left arm he carries the two-foot black japanned tin cylinder, sealed with a red wax wafer at the cap.

He stops ten paces from the High Table, staring across at the books and the inkpots).

APPARITOR

You are entering arrears.

PROVOST

We are auditing parish repairs completed before Michaelmas. The foundation is prior creditor.

APPARITOR

The parish church is a roofless barn, Mr. Provost. The snow lies three inches deep in the curate’s stall. The Archdeacon will not suffer the College to pocket the firkin while the Queen’s subjects sit under dripping thatch.

(He takes two heavy strides toward the High Table.

Arthur does not turn his head. He lays down the goose-quill, lifts his second pen—a steel barrel—dips it into the cold stoneware jar, and wipes the belly against the rim:

clink.

Hester lays her left hand flat upon the calfskin memorandum book).

HESTER

Item three. Ten bundles of water-reeds from the north fen for thatching the south aisle. Fourteen shillings.

APPARITOR (pointing the tin cylinder at Hester):

Woman, that thatching was never laid. The reeds were rotted in the stack before Martinmas.

HESTER (her voice level, cold as the room):

The reeds were delivered to the lych-gate by Nicholas Peake, carrier. The parish disbursed the fourteen shillings. His acquittance is sewn to folio six.

(Arthur’s pen moves:

scratch. scratch. scratch.

He blows lightly upon the wet ruling).

ARTHUR

Fourteen shillings.

APPARITOR (turning sharply to the Provost):

The curate’s daughter has no standing here. Her father is dead four months; the parsonage is vacant; the key of the chest belongs to the Archdeacon’s sequestrator.

(The Apparitor advances another stride, raising the black cylinder to lay it across the High Table).

ARTHUR (without looking up, his steel nib still poised two inches over the leaf):

If you set the tin on that vellum, Mr. Sizer, you will smear the iron-gall. And if you smear the iron-gall, the total cannot be cast.

PROVOST

Stand back to the peat-fire, sir. Crump, give the officer a horn of small-beer. He is frozen through and mistakes an audit for an execution.

(Crump pours a cloudy horn of beer from the stoneware jug on the bread-chest and thrusts it at the Apparitor.

The Apparitor hesitates. He looks at the table, at Hester’s motionless hand, at Arthur’s rigid back.

He snatches the horn).

APPARITOR

I take the drink under protest of the jurisdiction.

(He gulps the beer, his eyes fixed on the moving pen).

ACT II, SCENE 3: The Cold Run to Thirty

(The peat-fire smolders, throwing thin blue smoke into the room.

The frost glazes the lower panes of the tall leaded windows.

Under the table, the black firkin remains silent, its shadow long against the floorboards).

HESTER

Item four. A pound of tallow candles for the morning prayer. Sevenpence.

ARTHUR

Sevenpence.

(A pause.

The Ticket-Lad leans his broom in the inglenook and sits upon an upturned scuttle, rubbing his blue ears).

HESTER

Item five. To James Callow for scotching six jackdaws in the belfry tower. Sixpence.

PROVOST (from the hearth):

Disallowed. Jackdaws are vermin under the statute of Elizabeth; the parish may pay for their heads from the sparrow-tax, not from the tithe-composition.

HESTER

The birds nested in the works of the striking-clock, Mr. Provost. The tenor hammer was choked with straw. If the clock does not strike, the fen-men know not when to close the sluice-gates.

(A beat.

The Provost waves his handkerchief once, impatiently).

PROVOST

Pass the sixpence. Let the sluice be kept.

(Arthur’s pen bites the leaf:

scratch.

The Apparitor sets the empty horn upon the chimney-breast with a sharp clatter).

APPARITOR

You may scratch till noon, Peake. Every stroke of that nib is contempt of the Consistory. The Archdeacon’s chaise has returned to the post-house to bring the Registrar. When Mr. Grose arrives with the great seal of the diocese, this room will be locked by the Bishop’s bailiff.

ARTHUR (quietly, writing):

Mr. Grose is eighty-two, sir. He will not venture past the five-mile drift until the sun has reached the willow-line.

HESTER

Item six. A new bell-rope for the sanctus. Two shillings twopence.

ARTHUR

Two shillings twopence.

(The minutes stretch.

The scratching of the pen and the turning of Hester’s calfskin leaves measure the silence.

Outside, the church bells across the river strike nine heavy, muffled strokes through the fog).

HESTER

Item twenty-nine. Five iron staples for the bier-bench. Fivepence.

ARTHUR

Fivepence.

HESTER

Item thirty. To mending the sexton’s spade with a new iron plate. Eightpence.

(Arthur writes the eightpence.

He dips the pen. The inkpot is thick; a small skin has formed upon the dark surface. He stirs the steel point through it with a faint scrape:

skrrk.

He looks up for the first time—not at the Apparitor, not at the Provost, but at the frost gathering on the double doors).

ARTHUR

The fog is turning to hard rime, Hester.

HESTER

Item thirty-one. Pitch and oakum for caulking the font-drain. One shilling.

(Crump looks out through the leaded window toward the quadrangle, then pulls his green cloak tighter about his throat).

CRUMP

The wind has backed into the east. The flags in the passage are already taking a grease of ice.

(He lifts his hickory stick from the wall).

CRUMP

We shall have to secure the precinct doors before the draft freezes the ink in the pot.

(Crump begins his slow, lame hobble toward the High Table.

Arthur’s hand pauses over item thirty-one.

Under the table, the bottom hoop of the butter firkin gleams black in the shadow).

(END OF ACT II)