SCENE FOUR
(All of them, except ELLEN. They are singling turnips. In their large hats and headhankies tied over their chins, they are not individually recognisable. The five of them are part of a larger squad, the ‘field’ onstage is part of an enormous field — thirty or forty acres. They work fast, each moving along her own drill, keeping more or less in pace with the others. (TOTTIE is slower, maybe much slower.) The dialogue, when it comes, is fast, fragmented, overlapping. It comes in spurts with pauses between. And they never stop working. Obviously the gist of the dialogue is important, equally, though, every phrase does not have to be heard. The only lines that have to be spoken by particular characters are JENNY’s and LIZA’s. Two of them sing.)
Woo’d and married and a’
Kissed and carried awa
And is no the bride well off
That’s woo’d and married and a’
I’d bind more rags round your hands, if I were you lass! I’ve nane.
Straw, then, Rope. We’ll have to mak mair.
The saddler’s come! That’s him just passed the gate!
Aw, now, there’s a bonny callant!
He’ll no be staying more than a week!
That’s what makes him bonny!
I’ll get a bit crack with him when I redd up the stables!
I’ll redd up the stables.
No, you’ll no!
Saddler’s mine!
(Laughter. Pause)
Is he married, the saddler?
No.
Can he dance?
Can he dance!
Fiddle and dance all at once — as good as yon dancing maister
frae Jeddart!
We’ll hae a big dance, then!
I’ll hae a bit dearie!
(Laughter)
Ye’re an awful lassie, Jenny!
A’body wants the saddler!
A’body want a bit dearie!
(Singing) Woo’d and married and a’
Kissed and carried awa
Was she nae very well off
Was woo’d and married an a’
Was Sara married?
Dinna ken. Was Sara married?
Dinna ken.
She was going to marry Wabster, my mother said.
She was never married.
She was never neglected.
(JENNY and LIZA together)
JENNY: Can ye spin, Liza — ye get to work up at the Big House if ye can spin.
LIZA: Don’t want to spin.
JENNY: It’s good work on a rainy day. Better than being laid off. And you get your meat, sitting down in the kitchen.
LIZA: I can’t spin.
Ye ken yon plooman with the curls?
Kello?
By, he can dance! Tappity with his clogs — and a kind of singing he makes all the while — right there in the glaur, at the tweak o a bonnet.
Is he a Gyptian?
Dinna ken. His eyes are black!
Of course he’s a Gyptian!
A mugger!
A tinkler!
Maister Elliott hiring Gyptians!
The maister’s brown as a peatbog himself!
Maister’s a gentleman!
Married one of us, though!
He’s still a gentleman!
Maybe the other gentry don’t think so!
Nellie makes a braw lady!
Aye — the besom!
Mistress Ellen.
Mistress Elliot!
Was she no very well off
Was woo’d and married an a’
(Shouts coming from the far end of the field) Ye can stop now, stop at the end of the drill. We’re stopping — Jenny! Liza!
(They rest on their hoes, flex their backs, leave the field. JENNY and LIZA, slightly apart from the others. Stop to talk)
JENNY: You’re lucky biding with Maggie. She keeps a good
kitchen.
LIZA: I’m aye starving all the same. And I sleep with the bairns.
JENNY: So do I — I’m glad of the bairns!
LIZA: Could you not sleep in the roof?
JENNY: And have him creeping all over me?
LIZA: Who?
JENNY: Who! Who do you think? (As LIZA gapes, astonished)
Close your gob, Liza, the flies’ll get in!
LIZA: But — his wife?
JENNY: It’s his bairns keep me safe, and not his wife. I can teach ye to spin, Liza. If you’re wanting work up at the Big House.
LIZA: (suddenly irritable) I’m not wanting work at the house.
JENNY: Oh, well —! (Walking off, then stops to call back at LIZA) besom you!