By Jay Squires
CHARACTERS:
Fanny Barnwarmer: Eighty-five-year-old woman with plenty of spark and sizzle still in her. Has been performing at the Tavern for forty-four years.
Juniper Albright: Seventy-six-year-old woman who was Fanny’s former companion from their first years at Brady City.
Reporter: Mid-thirties. Works for the New York Times; now in Brady, Texas to write a human-interest story on the famous Fanny Barnwarmer.
SETTING: Front porch of Fanny Barnwarmer’s home. Rocking chair, DOWNSTAGE RIGHT, facing kitchen chair CENTER, and front steps behind, descending to street level with a flowerbed to the side. UPSTAGE LEFT, is like a separate SET placed at an angle to the main stage with indistinct, smoky walls (conveying a sense of unreality). A very plain cot faces DOWNSTAGE. This section is always in shadow when downstage is in full light—and vice-versa [Remember this is from the actors’ perspective, not the audience’s. What is “left” to the actor would be “right” for the audience. What is far back on the stage to the audience is designated “upstage” to the actor.]
PLACE/TIME: Brady Texas, Aug. 8, 1929
AT RISE: FANNY sits in rocking chair facing REPORTER. She is wearing a flowered housedress and he is wearing a suit with the tie loosened at the neck and askew, a hat on the floor beside him. JUNIPER sits on the cot, in shadow.
FANNY:
You might as well hear it from my mouth, young man. This face sure ain’t gonna hide it none. I’m eighty-five years old. Back in my sixties, when I looked in the mirror I saw a forty-year-old woman smiling back. Now I cain’t even find the mirror without my specks.
[The young REPORTER smiles genuinely, then scratches a spot above his right ear. FANNY watches this, then looks above his head, a slight smile lingering on her lips]
[Stagelight dims on FANNY and the REPORTER, and falls full on JUNIPER, sitting on her cot, the letter held in both hands]
JUNIPER:
(Reading)
Well, I watched him smile, sweet Juniper, and scratch a spot just north of his right ear. Now, I know you always want me to get to the point—and I know they only give you a few minutes for letter-reading time—but if I don’t get the details right, it’ll all just flutter ’round like a butterfly on this dried up field of my memory till it can’t find a fresh flower stalk to light on, and it’ll be gone. So, yes, the place he scratched was just north of his right ear. Then, I said to him:
[Full light on FANNY and REPORTER, while JUNIPER goes into shadow. NOTE: hereinafter stage directions will be shortened to “Switch to”]
FANNY
Hells bells, son, don’t bother now sayin’ how wrong I am—how I’m still a charmer! It’s too late. Your timing’s way off. If mine’d been that bad I wouldn’t’ve lasted so long at the Tavern. And you wouldn’t be here now interviewin’ me.
REPORTER:
That’s right. Forty-four years!—It’s hard to imagine? Tell me about that, Miss Bar-Barn … um, Miss Barnwarmer.
[Switch to:]
JUNIPER (Reading):
I wait for him to finish tussling with my name. Then I smile at him and I say ...
[Switch to:]
FANNY:
That’s how it all started, you know. With the name.
REPORTER:
What do you mean?
FANNY:
That first night. Back in eighty-five. Juniper and me, we was sittin’ at the table in Hazel’s Tavern—that’s what it was called before she shortened it to the Tavern. A couple of unescorted ladies, sittin’ in a man’s bar.
REPORTER:
(Writing on his tablet)
Your friend … Juniper’s her name? J-U-N-I—
FANNY:
P-E-R- yep, we was travlin’ companions. Sisters, we’d say if’n it ever came up. You could say we was more grit than brains. But the stagecoach left us thirsty and besides, Juniper wanted Brady City to know we weren’t plannin’ on leaving any time soon.
REPORTER:
Why was that, Miss Barn—warmer? Brady’s not a big city even now. But back then—
FANNY:
There was close to a hundred. But outta that hundred was one … Thurston Flourney!
[With the name “Thurston Flourney” the REPORTER is seen writing intently on his tablet]
[Switch to:]
JUNIPER:
(Reading)
Juniper, I watched that young man write that name down just as quick as I said it, then underline it, not once, but twice. And before the day was done, he had it circled. Oh, I tell you, love, he was a reporter, true to his story.
[Switch to:]
REPORTER:
(Tapping his pencil on his tablet)
So, Thurston Flourney—You’re saying that’s the name it all started with?
FANNY:
No … an’ you’re gettin’ ahead of yerself. I cain’t believe your editor sent you fifteen hundred miles to write a story ‘bout Thurston Flourney.
REPORTER:
No, Ma’am.
[Switch to:]
JUNIPER
(Reading)
Just then, I watch the color leave his face like a south-goin’ bird in winter. I think he was afraid I’d send him away without his story.
[Switch to:]
FANNY:
Then get your pencil ready again, and listen. Juniper an’ me was at the table. I had my sarsparilla and Juniper had her shot of whiskey alongside a glass of water. A couple of fellas walks up to our table an’ one of ’em flattens his hands on it and gets up real close.
(Hunched forward, her hands on her knees,
elbows out, her voice takes on a deeper, more
threatening tone as she acts out the character
in her story)
He says to us, looking from one to th’other, ‘Think yer mama’d approve you bein’ in a ’stablishment like this—two little things like you? What’s yer names?
(Beat)
Well, Sir, Juniper just stares at him, like a rattlesnake would afore it struck. I knew I had to say somethin’, and quick. I was just hopin’ he couldn’t see my heart poundin’ through my dress, cause he sure was lookin’ hard enough at where my heartbeat was comin’ from.
REPORTER:
(Animated, a slight smile)
Okay … yes ...
FANNY:
I says, ‘Sir, my name is Fanny—Fanny Barnwarmer.
(Sitting up straight, holding up a finger
to REPORTER)
You see, son, it’s all in that timing I talked about earlier. I wait till the timing was just right and I tells ’em —now remember, there was only about ten in the bar back then—and so I says right through that curtain of bad breath … and it was baaaaaad—
(Suddenly, leaning in again toward the
REPORTER)
I says, ‘Now, I ask you, Sir, who’s gonna saddle a pretty little thing like me with the name Barnwarmer?’
(Beat)
Now I gotta interrupt myself, Mr. Reporter, cause this next part’s very important—details, details—but just as soon’s I says ‘pretty little thing’ I let drop my right eyelid, not like a flirty wink, but like one o’ them curtains ya pulls down over a window—like this …
(Demonstrating)
[Switch to:]
JUNIPER
(Clearly showing her emotion, stopping
her reading now and then to stare off in
space)
Juniper, Darlin, I wish you coulda seen his face when I did it! His laugh came so sudden-like when I dropped my eyelid, that he, hisself, lets go his pencil and he had to get up and fetch it from where it rolled to, off the porch, and into the flower bed …. Oh, I know, sweet Jun, how you hated that look, 'specially when it came to be a part of my act. You thought it was a cheap trick, and made a clown of me and all … and was disrespectful. For a woman, I mean. Sometimes, I’d catch the look on your face from my one open eye as you was sitting where you always did in the audience—I miss you sittin’ there, Jun. Nowadays, I insist that table be always empty now, but with a whiskey and water glass aside it—Anyhow, I know how my clownin’ around pained you. But it worked, Darlin. It worked! …. Anyways, once the reporter got his pencil and settled a bit I went on ….
[Switch to:]
FANNY:
So after I raise the curtain on my one eye and then look at them so innocent-like, I says, ‘I ask ya, kind Sir, who’d saddle me with the name Barnwarmer, and then plop a first name like Fanny on top of it?’ Well, he stood straight up, and he looked at the other fella, then looked back at me, and then he let out a guf-faw that came all the way from his gut, and the two start laughin’. And that goes on for near-five minutes, while I keeps a straight face.
REPORTER:
I’d like to have been one of those ten who were in there, just to lean back against the bar and watch you perform.
FANNY:
Turns out the fella’s sister was Hazel. Now, he may o’ been no more’n a turd in the hen house full ’o turds, but his sister—ah, well, sir, she was one sharp Gal. She knew if she’s gonna make Hazel’s Tavern a respectable success, she’s gotta draw families in from miles away. That you do through entertainment … an’ advertisin’.
REPORTER:
And so he tells her about you?
FANNY:
It happens she’d been keepin’ an eye on her brother all along to see as he didn’t get hisself in any trouble. So she saw what I’d done. Then, after he stops laughin’ he goes up to her and I see him pointing at his eye and tryin’ to do what I did. He’s tryin’ to hold his eyelid down with his other hand, and I see they’s both laughin’ by now.
REPORTER:
Well, it is funny, Miss Barnwarmer. It was kind of a one-liner and a sight gag, wasn’t it? Like on vaudeville. But still, it’s not an hour and a half performance, is it?
FANNY:
(Pauses, as to study him)
No, it ain’t. So she buys Juniper a whiskey an’ me another sarsparilla and she plops herself down at our table. She asks me if I knew I had a knack for makin’ people laugh. I tell her people usually come around to laughin’ if I talk long enough. For some reason that makes her laugh. She asks about Juniper and me’s stagecoach trip from Springfield to Brady City. And she laughs some more. Afore I finish my sasparilla she’s offerin’ me two dollars a night, twice a week, just to talk to the people. And that, young man, is how it all started.
REPORTER:
I can’t wait to see you perform tonight.
FANNY:
Well … It’s a differnt Fanny Barnwarmer you’ll see tonight. Back then I had my legs. And some would say …
(With difficulty, bending to raise
her housedress to just above her ankles)
they was mighty fine legs. Now they just cross at the ankles underneath my rockin’ chair. Up till five years ago, the stage curtains would open and there’d be only the rockin’ chair on the stage. And I’d come from the backstage side carryin’ my newspaper in one hand an’ my specs in the other. Now, I’m sittin’ there, my specs on an’ the newspaper unfolded in my lap. But when I open my mouth, young man—well. Forty-four years! And things just keep gettin’ better. You know why?
REPORTER:
Tell me.
FANNY:
Because the world just keeps gettin’—crazier. An’ it’s all right there in the newspaper. The good old Brady Sentinel. There’s nothing I cain’t find to talk about that ain’t in the Sentinel.
REPORTER:
(With a small shake of his head, and a
skeptical look on his face)
Is that a fact, Miss Barnwarmer?
FANNY:
That is a fact, son.
(Her head tilts, and she seems again to
study the REPORTER)
I been startin’ out my act like that at the Tavern since the get-go. But listen … you been squirming round your chair like you got more to say, but you jus’ don’t know how to say it.
REPORTER:
It’s just that—Ummm … Well … there was someone, the name of Will Rogers, who got very famous saying that. He said, “All I know is just what I read in the papers, and that’s an alibi for my ignorance.”
FANNY:
I have heard the young fella’s name. I’ll give you that. I’d have to check Hazel’s logs.
REPORTER:
Her logs?
FANNY:
Up till she died, ten years ago, everyone who bought a ticket for my act had to sign the register, including their address. She’d use it in advertisin’. Said it was good for business.
REPORTER:
I’m not sure I understand. You’re saying Mr. Rogers …?
FANNY:
Mighta been. Might not o’ been. Don’t know. What I’m sayin’, young man, is that I didn’t steal that sentence from no Will Rogers.
REPORTER:
No … Steal? No, no, I didn’t mean to infer that—
FANNY:
See … my Daddy always brought me up to read the newspaper, front to back, every day. So, the day our stage got into town, the first place I went to was the Sentinel—an’ I was loadin’ up with all the back issues—while Juniper was introducing herself to Sheriff Clayton Peckham.
(Looking up, smiling at a thought)
But that last part, about bein’ an alibi for his ignorance … Dang! That was good! I wish I’d thought of that.
REPORTER:
(Chewing on his pencil and looking
intently at FANNY)
Miss Barnwarmer, I’d like to get a kind of timeline for what happened. So, the first thing you and Miss Juniper did was go into the tavern?
FANNY:
(Showing impatience)
Nope. An’ if’n you check your notes … first thing I did was go to the Sentinel. On account of I wanna know about Brady City and the people and what they care about every day.
REPORTER:
(Frowning, but recovering with a
puzzled smile)
Sorry, Miss Barnwarmer. I—I just need this to go well. And there are a few things I don’t … that are just—just a little hazy. Like, well, like Miss Juniper.
(Beat)
So … Miss Juniper goes straight to Sheriff—
(He turns back a page on his notes)
—Sheriff Peckham? While you’re loading up on past issues of the Sentinel?
FANNY:
That’s right. She was lookin’ to see if there was a Thurston Flourney in Brady City.
REPORTER:
Yeeeeees. Yeeeeees. I see. So—so, Miss Barnwarmer … was—was … um … was this Thurston Flourney … was he Miss Juniper’s—beau?
FANNY:
Her what? HAW! No! Now, what’d make you think o’ that, young man? Her beau!
REPORTER:
Well … I don’t know. To come all the way to Brady City from across the United States—I just wondered—
FANNY:
No, ha-ha! no—we come to Brady City ’cause she aimed to kill Thurston Flourney—kill him dead.
By Jay Squires
Warning: The author has noted that this contains the highest level of violence.
Bird’s-eye view of Scene 1: Brady City, Texas 1929 and Fanny Barnwarmer is being interviewed by a New York City reporter about her lofty career as a comedian. But the subject soon finds its true focus on Fanny’s companion, Juniper Albright, who had come to Brady City to kill Thurston Flourney.
CHARACTERS:
Fanny Barnwarmer: Eighty-five-year-old woman with plenty of spark and sizzle still in her. Has been performing at the Tavern for forty-four years.
Juniper Albright: Seventy-six-year-old woman who was Fanny’s former companion from their first years at Brady City.
Reporter: Mid-thirties. Works for the New York Times; now in Brady, Texas to write a human-interest story on the famous Fanny Barnwarmer.
Voice (OFFSTAGE LEFT): Female, age indeterminate.
SETTING: Front porch of Fanny Barnwarmer’s home. Rocking chair, DOWNSTAGE RIGHT, facing kitchen chair CENTER, and front steps behind, descending to street level with a flowerbed to the side. OFFSTAGE LEFT are street sounds of traffic: of vintage 1929 cars, some horse whinnying, etc., that continue as a kind of white-noise background throughout the scene. UPSTAGE LEFT, is like a separate SET placed at an angle to the main stage with indistinct, smoky walls (conveying a sense of unreality). A very plain cot faces DOWNSTAGE. This section is always in shadow when downstage is in full light—and vice-versa.
PLACE/TIME: Brady Texas, Aug. 8, 1929
AT RISE: FANNY sits in rocking chair facing REPORTER. She is wearing a flowered housedress and he is wearing a suit with the tie loosened at the neck and askew, a hat on the floor beside him. JUNIPER sits on the cot, in shadow. OFFSTAGE LEFT is the occasional, but faint, sound of 1929 street traffic, which is the unsonorous blend of vehicles with backfire, the whinnying response of horses, and creaking of wagon wheels.
REPORTER:
(A full anticipatory grin as of one waiting for a joke’s punchline, which then transforms to a look of perplexity when he realizes that punchline is not forthcoming)
Miss Barnwarmer! You must realize this stretches credibility to the breaking point. One just doesn’t go to the Sherriff when one wants to know the whereabouts of the person one wants to kill.
FANNY:
One-one-one! By this one yer a-one-in’, are ya meanin’ Juniper?
REPORTER:
Well …
FANNY:
No, Juniper ain’t stupid, if that’s what you mean.
[A female voice from OFFSTAGE LEFT (the street) intrudes]
VOICE:
Whatcha got there, Miss Fanny, a gentleman caller?
FANNY:
That you, Grizzy? Cain’t rightly see ya fer the dust yer automobile's kickin’ up. Now Grizzy, you jes mind yer way with yer own Howard, ya hear? an’ stay ’way from this young man who be jes' fool enough to give up his hog-sloppin’ time to court me fer a spell.
VOICE:
Haw! See ya tonight, Miss Fanny.
FANNY:
(To REPORTER)
Where was we?
REPORTER:
(Grinning)
Hog sloppin’?
FANNY:
There’s worse callin’s a body can have. So … where was I? Oh, yes, you was thinkin’ our Miss Juniper was a mite dim-witted.
REPORTER:
(Chuckling, wagging a finger, comically, at her)
No … I—
FANNY:
Fact is, she come from mighty fine stock. Juniper Eileen Albright—that’s her full name—was the gran'chil' of Isabella Baumfree ….
(Watching till recognition forces his jaw to drop before he goes on)
You may know Isabella Baumfree as—
REPORTER:
Oh yes! Sojourner Truth … yes, Miss Barnwarmer, I wrote an article about Sojourner Truth for the Times. She was a champion for women’s rights and abolition.
(Beat)
She was—also—was also a-a-a Negro, Miss Barnwarmer. That means Miss Juniper Albright was—she was—
FANNY:
—as white as you or me. Her hair’s a right bit curlier than mine an’ her lips a little fuller, but she's white to the point o' her skin blisterin’ in the sun. An’ beautiful. She was tall, like her Grandma, an' so—so pretty to look at.
[Full light on JUNIPER, while FANNY and REPORTER go into shadow. NOTE: hereinafter stage directions will be shortened to “Switch to”]
JUNIPER:
(Reading, stopping occasionally to dry a tear)
Oh, Jun, darlin’, I tried to keep my feelin’s outta my describing you. But I think my eyes mighta filled a mite, as I talked about you, and I watched him kinda look away to give my feelings some privacy. And right then, Juniper, I could see the story he came halfway cross country to write wasn’t gonna get writ the way his editor wanted. You know why? I could see the workings of his brain right then and there. This was gonna be your story, Jun, and my heart was about to crack outta my chest and fly away with happiness. So, after a spell, I reach out and touch his knee.
[Switch to FANNY and REPORTER]
FANNY:
(Removing her fingertips she had briefly put on the REPORTER’S knee)
So … let me jes’ tell you the story ’bout Juniper Eileen Albright.
REPORTER:
I would like that, yes.
FANNY:
Juniper’s Mama, a fine woman, near six-foot-tall, like her Mama, Sojourner, was smitten by a proper Englishman, as handsome an’ polite an’—an’ as wealthy a man as Chicago’d ever seen. He owned stock—not cattle stock, mind ya, but paper stock, like steel an’ railroad an’ such. An’ he loved Elizabeth so much. He wooed her an’ courted her … but all in them secret places, ’cause, well, she was a nigra. Juniper tells me her Mama and Daddy never got married, but not for want o’ tryin’.
REPORTER:
Of course. A white man and a negro. As it was, people probably figured she was his chattel. His slave.
FANNY:
Yep. Then, came the children. Juniper was the youngest, an’ the lightest skin of the bunch. The others—they all died from smallpox. Only Juniper lived through it. They had themselves a right pretty home outside o’ Chicago. A quiet life in the country. Well, sir, Juniper was just five when Lincoln was elected an' in a month the South started secedin’ from the Union, one after t’other. An’ she tells me—I mean, later on, she tells me, cause she heard it from her Mama—that it waren’t safe for anyone to step outside their front door ….
REPORTER:
Yes, I read that political division was rife in the north. Especially when Mr. Lincoln started gearing for war.
FANNY:
That musta been true, ’cause long about that time, one early evenin’, Mr. Albright, Juniper’s Daddy, hears a knockin’ at the door. He looks through the window to see his neighbor on the porch. But when he opens the door he finds hisself face-to-face with a gunnysack-hooded gang, and his neighbor just a-walkin’ away. By then, Juniper’s Mama was pleadin’ with the gang while they drag Mr. Albright off the porch steps an’ to the big tree in the front yard.
[From now until the end of the scene …in shadowy silhouette, JUNIPER can be seen slumped forward from the edge of her cot, her head in her hands, her body rocking]
REPORTER:
(Looking physically ill, he retches and makes a horrible face)
Oh Lord, don’t tell me they—
FANNY:
I’m tellin’ ya, son. But that’s not the worst of it. While the gang’s leader an’ two others, throw a rope over a limb, another two was forcin’ Juniper’s Mama … then Juniper herself out onto the porch. Well, Juniper’s Mama faints outright, an’ that jest leaves Juniper.
REPORTER:
Sweet Jesus, not the child!
FANNY:
—Out on the porch, with them forcin’ her to watch. By now they have Mr. Albright, a noose 'round his neck, atop an’ ol’ gray plowhorse, an’ strugglin’ to get off, but them holdin’ him on … an’ then they swats that horse’s rump, an’ Mr. Albright—
[FANNY stops in mid-sentence when the REPORTER shoots to his feet, his eyes glazed, his lips moving as he half-stumbles across the face of the porch to the parapet (stage right), then returns to slump into his chair]
FANNY (Continues):
You want I should stop fer a spell?
REPORTER:
(Tearfully, holding his tablet in one hand)
No … it needs to be recorded.
FANNY:
So, one of ’em gives that horse’s rump a swat. an’ Juniper—her head clamped atween two strong hands—is forced to watch her daddy, his eyes big as silver dollars, grabbin’ for that dang rope till his arms give out and he just swings there, twitchin’ an’ starin’.
| Author Notes |
A special thanks for RGStar for his very thoughtful review in which he enlightened me about the unimportance to the reader of the note I FORMERLY HAD placed at the beginning, to wit: "[NOTE TO READER: Remember this play is from the actors' perspective, not the audience's. What is "left" to the actor would be "right" for the audience. What is "far back" on the stage to the audience is designated "upstage" to the actor.]"
Not only is it unimportant, but as he explained (very gently, I might add), every time he came across my "Stage Left" or "Upstage Right" he found himself abstracting from the action taking place 'on the stage of his mind' and making those crazy reversals in his mind. As I told RGStar, I've removed the offender as a director would an obtuse actor who kept muffing his lines. Thank you, RGStar. Truly. |
By Jay Squires
Warning: The author has noted that this contains the highest level of violence.
BIRDSEYE VIEW OF PREVIOUS SCENE: The focus of the reporter’s assignment shifts from a human interest story about the famous comedian, Miss Fanny Barnwarmer, to the unfolding tragic story of her life-partner, Juniper Albright.
CHARACTERS:
| Author Notes |
NOTE TO READER: Remember this play is from the actors' perspective, not the audience's. What is "left" to the actor would be "right" for the audience. What is "far back" on the stage to the audience is designated "upstage" to the actor.
Thanks to Google Images for the picture of an elderly lady in a rockingchair. |
By Jay Squires
Warning: The author has noted that this contains the highest level of violence.
BIRDSEYE VIEW OF PREVIOUS SCENE: The reporter persistently brings Fanny’s focus back to the old gray horse she had earlier described Juniper’s Daddy as straddling just before the gang lynched him. When she finally admits this horse is hers, the whole backstory begins unraveling and we learn that Fanny’s father is implicated.
CHARACTERS:
Fanny Barnwarmer: Eighty-five-year-old woman with plenty of spark and sizzle still in her. Has been performing at the Tavern for forty-four years.
Juniper Albright: Seventy-six-year-old woman who was Fanny’s former companion from their first years at Brady City.
Reporter: Mid-thirties. Works for the New York Times, on assignment in Brady, Texas to write a human-interest story on the famous Fanny Barnwarmer.
Messenger: Telegram delivery boy, early teens.
SETTING: Front porch of Fanny Barnwarmer’s home. Rocking chair, DOWNSTAGE RIGHT, facing kitchen chair, CENTER, and front steps behind, descending to street level with a flowerbed to the side. OFFSTAGE LEFT are street sounds of traffic: of vintage 1928 cars, some horse whinnying, etc., all of which continue as a kind stew of white-noise background throughout the scene. UPSTAGE LEFT, is like a separate SET placed at an angle to the main stage with indistinct, smoky walls (conveying a sense of unreality). A very plain cot faces DOWNSTAGE. This section is always in shadow when downstage is in full light—and vice-versa
PLACE/TIME: Brady Texas, MId-afternoon, August 10, 1929
AT RISE: FANNY sits in a rocking chair facing the REPORTER. Stepping out of the shadowed area, JUNIPER, in a long white gown, a misty nimbus of light surrounding her, glides from the shadows toward FANNY and stops behind the rocking chair. FANNY brings her shawl together at her neck and crosses her arms.
REPORTER:
You have a chill? Should we finish inside, Miss Fanny?
FANNY:
We’ll stay here a spell, Robert. These mid-Texas summers. Poor Richard* says they’s a norther comin’ ‘Spect the Almanac's* right. It’s like y’all’s sittin’ in a tub o’ muggy, till all at once’t a chill slaps ya like a washrag ‘crost yer face.
REPORTER:
(Smiling, regarding her for a long while without speaking; then …)
Miss Fanny …
FANNY:
I know. I know. Y’all ain’t forgot … an’ I ain’t forgot neither. ’Twas jes like ya thought. ’Twas my daddy what knocked on the Albright’s door.
[At this point, JUNIPER begins to gently massage FANNY’S shoulders, bends, and lays the side of her face atop FANNY’S head]
REPORTER:
That had to be a hard truth for you to swallow. He was—was he part of that gang, then?
FANNY:
(Quickly)
No!
REPORTER:
Oh … but then …
(looking away from FANNY then back)
I don’t want to ask you, but …
FANNY:
But ya gotta …
REPORTER:
Yes, I suppose I do. Miss Fanny … were you ever planning to tell me about your daddy if I hadn’t asked?
FANNY:
I don’t rightly know. T’would a been the same endin’ if’n ya didn’t know.
REPORTER:
With all due respect, Miss Fanny, you know that’s—well, it’s just not true. I’d have wanted to know why Mr. Albright would have opened the door if he’d peeked out of his window and saw the gang standing there instead of your daddy. That goes against common sense.
(Beat)
But I think you planned to tell me anyway, Miss Fanny. It’s who you are.
FANNY:
I did. But not ’till you knowed my daddy was a good man. He was a carin’ man.
REPORTER:
I know he was all that, Miss Fanny. But he was also a carrying man, wasn’t he? He was carrying a big burden. I mean, he did owe a sizeable amount of money to Mr. Albright.
FANNY:
Robert!
[At the REPORTER’S words and FANNY’S response, JUNIPER comes around to face FANNY, and kneeling at her feet, she rests her cheek in FANNY’S lap]
REPORTER:
I’m sorry, Miss Fanny. Please forgive me. That was uncalled for.
FANNY:
No, Robert, it's me .... I left too much unsaid. Y’all don’t need no forgivin’.
(Shaking her head, vigorously)
Daddy warn’t no part o’ the gang, though.
REPORTER:
Well … and I believe that. But it still leaves unanswered questions.
FANNY:
And I was fixin’ to answer ’em… ’afore y’all asked me ’bout Daddy bein’ that neighbor.
REPORTER:
But still ... I needn’t have pounced. I’m sorry, Miss Fanny.
FANNY:
Them was rough times, Robert. E’vn ’afore Mr. Lincoln got hisself elected, back in—eighteen ’n sixty? I know I’s only fourteen then, but I remember many’s the night Daddy’n Mama be talkin’ at the dinner table ’bout the deep rumblin’ ’mong the farmers ’n ranchers ’n their nigras. They’s most called freed, but they’s moneyed chattel jes the same—an’ they sure warn’t freed.
REPORTER:
So … your folks were worried?
FANNY:
Daddy was plenty scared. An’ he warn’t alone. They’s talk ’o some states in the south secedin’ the Union, an’ Daddy tellin’ Mama the nigras … they knew. They could feel it in their bellies—an’ Daddy … he’d say you could see it in they’s eyes.
REPORTER:
The negros' eyes …?
FANNY:
Course!
REPORTER:
Your daddy had these free negros on his farm?
FANNY:
No! An’ he say that be our savin’ grace—leastways fer a while. Says you could see it in they’s eyes. They’s brewin’ fer an uprisin’.
REPORTER:
But miss Fanny, I don’t understand. Be patient with me, but I don’t—where was your daddy seeing all those—those negro's eyes?
FANNY:
I’s fixin’ to tell y’all. Daddy were one of the deacons at the Methodist church where most all the farmers therebouts ’tended. He heard ’bout the farmers’ fears from they’s own mouths. Afore long, they’s fears became his, an’ Daddy started lookin’ in the eyes o’ the few nigra freedmen ’n women what ’tended the services, an’ he swan he saw somethin’ in them eyes, too. ’Spect that’s the way fears go. Afore long Daddy organized meetins ’mong the farmers. Onest a week they was.
REPORTER:
Ohhhh, I think I see where this is going.
FANNY:
Don’t reckon ya do, young man. Jes listen. See, Daddy’s hankerin’ to bring some Christian principles o’ spirit’al love ’n carin’ twixt the farmers an’ their nigra he’p—him bein’ a deacon an’ all.
(Beat)
Well … maybe he jes gettin’ kinda preachy ’n all—don’ rightly know, but someone or ’nother o’ them farmers … they splits off—is what Daddy thinks—an’ they gits with the Army o’ Uriel.
REPORTER:
Excuse me—Say again … Army of what?
FANNY:
(Impatiently)
Uriel. Uriel.
REPORTER:
(Writing)
U-R-I?
FANNY:
E-L—A-L—I don’ know, young man. They’s the gang, though. It’s in the papers. How they’s lots o’ little Armies an’ they makes one big Army. An’ they all wear gunnysacks with a big red U on the backs of ’em. They’s mostly in the south.
REPORTER:
Like the Ku Klux Klan?
FANNY:
They’s before the Klan.
REPORTER:
(Scratching his head)
So … Miss Fanny …. The Army of Uriel got to your Daddy?
FANNY:
(Pointing to his tablet)
’Spect y’all have to … write all this ….
[The REPORTER lowers his eyes briefly and in that same moment, JUNIPER raises her head from FANNY’S lap and gazes up into her eyes]
REPORTER:
I think you know, Miss Fanny. The story needs it.
FANNY:
Ain’t never tol’ nobody ’bout it ’afore—least of all Juniper.
REPORTER:
All those years that you and Juniper were—together … that must’ve been ….
FANNY:
Figgered her mama musta tol’ her. Why stir up the coals?
REPORTER:
But … how would Miss Elizabeth have known if—
[The REPORTER is interrupted by a voice from the street behind him]
VOICE (Messenger):
(Post-adolescent, reedy)
’Scuse me, Miss Fanny—Barnwarmer … I’s Timmy—I’s Brady’s telegraph messenger.
FANNY:
(Cautiously)
Yes … Timmy.
MESSENGER:
I’ve’s a telegram from the—the Texas State Corrections Institute. Want I should read it to you, Miss Barnwarmer?
FANNY:
No!
(Placing her hand on her chest)
Bring it—bring it to me.
MESSENGER:
Yes’m.
[The MESSENGER Ascends steps, hands FANNY the telegram with multiple bows. The REPORTER removes a coin from his pocket and hands it to the boy, who, smiling, descends. FANNY presses the sealed telegram to her chest, her eyes closed tightly. Meanwhile, JUNIPER rises and slowly makes her way back to her shadowed cubicle, and sitting on her cot, remains in silhouette]
REPORTER:
Should I excuse myself for a moment?
FANNY:
No … I ain’t holdin’ back nothin’ now. You be wantin’ the whole story. ’Spect this be a part of it.
(Putting the telegram in her lap)
But ’afore I read it, I needs to put to rest the other matter—’bout my Daddy … an’ why he’d a did what he did—whether the Army ’o Uriel got to him.
(Draws in a deep breath, fingering the corners of the telegram)
Plain truth is—Daddy never tol’ Mama’n me.
REPORTER:
(Waiting a long moment for FANNY to continue before he breaks the silence)
Then … then I’m back to being confused, Miss Fanny. Didn’t you say you figured Elizabeth told her daughter—told Juniper—why your daddy did what he did? How did Elizabeth know?
FANNY:
’Cause—’Cause ’lizabeth found out about it the same’s I found out about it. It all come out in the trial.
REPORTER:
The trial!
FANNY:
But ’afore I tell ya ’bout the trial, I best be puttin’ to rest another chapter of the story.
(holds up the telegram, briefly closing her eyes before removing the sheet from the envelope. Opening it, she reads it aloud, slowly)
Miss Fanny Barnwarmer:
As warden of the Texas State Corrections Institute, it is my unfortunate duty to inform you of the passing of Juniper Eileen Albright on August 10th, in the year of our Lord, 1929.
Miss Albright died of natural causes during the overnight.
FANNY
(Stops reading, and with a large in-rush of breath, holds her free hand over her heart while still staring at the telegram):
That be las’ night! Or early mornin’—I ’member wakin’ up an’ rollin’ to my side an’ puttin’ out my arm to pull her to me, ’cause I swan I feels her shiver clean through the springs ’n mattress an’ I aims to pull her over to me an’ keep her warm.
(Shaking her head and looking away from the telegram)
But my Juniper’s been ’carcerated fer nigh on to forty years.
(Looking directly at the REPORTER)
Now, ain’t that peculiar? Don’ that jes beat all?
REPORTER:
(Smiles at her weakly, then breaks eye contact)
I’ve heard of such things. But not often.
FANNY:
Forty years!
(Sighing, she returns to reading aloud the telegram)
Miss Albright was loved and respected by all her fellow inmates, and she spoke adoringly of you. Her passing will leave a void here at the institute, and I am sure, in your heart.
Please contact my office within 48 hours to make arrangements for the shipping of Juniper Eileen Albright’s remains.
Sincerely,
Harold G. Stannel
Warden
REPORTER:
May she rest in peace.
FANNY:
(Running the back of her hand across each eye, sniffing)
Reckon as she rested in peace the minute Thurston Flourney laid in the dirt at her feet. As fer the remainin’, took her forty years o’ jes bidin’ her time fer that final rest.
(Folding the telegram and returning it to the envelope)
Now, young man, y’all want the short version of the trial? Or the long one?
REPORTER:
(Removing his pocket watch, glancing at it, then returning it)
Shouldn’t you relax before tonight’s show? I’m so looking forward to it.
FANNY:
’Spect that would be best.
REPORTER:
Tomorrow, then? After church?
FANNY:
(Chuckling)
’leven be fine, young man.
END OF SCENE FOUR
| Author Notes |
Thanks to Google Images for the picture of an elderly lady in a rockingchair.
*Referencing "The Poor Richard's Almanac", an American publication used (and still in use by some today, I believe) to predict the weather as well as offering other homespun wisdom. |
By Jay Squires
Birdseye View of Previous Scene: Fanny admits her father had been the one who knocked on Mr. Albright’s door on the night the latter was lynched by a gang called The Army of Uriel (early version of KKK). She insists he was not in the gang. Fanny’s father, before his involvement, had organized weekly meetings with the farmers on how to deal humanely with their black farmworkers, who were caught up in the abolitionist pre-civil war frenzy. Before she has a chance to explain her father’s involvement with the “gang”, a delivery boy for the local telegraph company gives her the message that Juniper has died in Prison.
| Author Notes | Thanks to Google Images for the picture of an elderly lady in a rocking chair. |
By Jay Squires
Warning: The author has noted that this contains the highest level of violence.Birdseye View of Previous Scene: Fanny explains to the reporter how she was in the Tavern and just beginning her act while, outside, she knew that Juniper’s plan to kill Thurston Flourney was already unfolding and she, Fanny, was just waiting to hear the shots. The Reporter was dumbfounded because her foreknowledge made Fanny an accessory to murder.
| Author Notes |
I am sorry for the rather anti-climactic Intermission that I tossed in, but you know you want some popcorn and some sweet tea. Oh, and be sure to ask if they have any stickyberry crullers. It's worth a shot. Or a pip, as it were.
Thanks to Google Images for the picture of an elderly lady in a rocking chair. |
By Jay Squires
Warning: The author has noted that this contains the highest level of violence.
| Author Notes |
Thanks to Google Images for the picture of an elderly lady in a rocking chair.
|
By Jay Squires
Warning: The author has noted that this contains the highest level of violence.
Bird’s Eye View of Previous Scene: We see in our reporter the still respectful and courteous man, but one who is more aggressive in ferreting out the truth in Fanny’s painful past.
| Author Notes | *For those history buffs, the Great Depression began two months later, in October 1929, and many depression historians thought it was brought about largely by Mitchell's reckless banking practices. |
By Jay Squires
Bird’s Eye View of the Previous Scene: The Reporter pursues Fanny’s account of her Daddy’s motives for aiding the Army of Uriel.
| Author Notes |
AN APOLOGY TO THE READER: This and the next scene are probably the most important scenes of the entire play. It would be best if it were read all of a piece. The reality is, though, that it would be so long that only the masochists among you would read it. Therefore, I must have one (and possibly two) intermissions before the final curtain.
On the other hand, to offer them in three separate posts requires me to accumulate enough member bucks to adequately promote each one. Plays have a hard time attracting an "audience" as they are. NOT to have each placed high on page one would be tantamount to a death warrant. Since I take my reviewing (to earn those bucks) seriously, and spend a lot of time on them, I won't be able to post my play weekly. Those are just realities I must live with. I hope you live with them patiently and kindheartedly, as well. |
By Jay Squires
Bird’s-Eye View of the Previous Scene: The prosecuting attorney has his witness, Mr. Barnwarmer, point to each of the defendants as members of the Army.
M. Barnwarmer's testimony explains how his motive for luring Mr. Albright to the door, and the latter's ultimate death, was his fear of the Army’s reprisal against his family.
By Jay Squires
Final Words From the Previous Chapter: (Reporter) Miss Fanny … I find I won’t be able to write this story at all. No amount of good reporting will get us over this final hurdle. No one—by that, I mean no reader—is going to believe the trial from the memory of a fourteen-year-old girl.
| Author Notes | NOTE TO READER: Again, it is not easy to cut the fabric of one entire Court proceeding into a number of frayed pieces while struggling to maintain a sense of the whole damn quilt. I've lost a few of you, I know. Buh-bye. Peace. Those who've stayed seem to be still in good humor. So ... Love you all. |
By Jay Squires
The previous chapter, in a nutshell: After the judge renders his verdict of not guilty for the members of the Army of Uriel, but before he adjourns, he delivers a cruel pronouncement against Caleb Barnwarmer that leaves him emotionally broken.
CHARACTERS:
Fanny Barnwarmer: Eighty-five-year-old woman with plenty of spark and sizzle still in her. Has been performing at the Tavern for forty-four years.
Reporter: Mid-thirties. Works for the New York Times, on assignment in Brady, Texas to write a human-interest story on the famous Fanny Barnwarmer.
SETTING: Front porch of Fanny Barnwarmer’s home. Rocking chair, DOWNSTAGE RIGHT, facing kitchen chair, CENTER, and front steps behind, which descend to street level with a flowerbed to the side. OFFSTAGE LEFT are street sounds of traffic: of vintage 1928 cars, some horse whinnying, etc., that continue as a kind stew of white-noise background throughout the scene.
PLACE/TIME: Brady Texas, 2 PM, Sunday, August 11, 1929
REPORTER:
That’s uncanny—it was unconscionable! The judge did nothing less than to sentence your father, right there, for murder. He swept the rest of the trial under the rug like it was dust, while engraving on the mind of the town only the memory of the guilty sentence he imposed on your daddy.
(Shaking his head, frowning)
If it weren't for Mister Jenkins …
FANNY:
Aye, Mister Jenkins, he did keep liftin’ the corner o’ thet rug, dint he, an’ pullin’ out th’ dirt. But not jes Mister Jenkins—theys other reporters what wrote theys stories in theys newspapers—’specially on account o’ what thet jedge done next.
(Beat)
But you’s right ’bout what thet jedge’s words done to Daddy. Best they’d o’ hung him. He already be a dead man inside. Th’ outside jes ain’t cetched up yet.
REPORTER:
(Lifting his finger from its kept-place in the album, where he was about to begin reading again)
Sounds like what you’re telling me is not entirely metaphorical, Miss Fanny.
FANNY:
What I’s sayin’ is Daddy’s friends an’ neighbors, they soured again’ him. His church frozed up. ’Afore long, he’s voted outta bein’ one o’ theys deacons. An’ then he had no one but fambly.
REPORTER:
Which, for practical purposes, meant he had just you to talk with.
FANNY:
An’ that be only a spell …. T’was narry a month since thet jedge’s words cast theys curse when Daddy be found ’longside River Road—twixt home an’ th’ store what supplied us twice a month—his head creshed agin a boulder.
REPORTER:
Sweet Jesus!—Geez, I’m sorry, Miss Fanny.
FANNY:
Speck’lachun was thet a rabbit or other critter spooked the horse an’ flipped th’ wagon, an’ Daddy be throwed like a rag doll agin thet boulder—the boulder what be a marker named the five-mile boulder account o’ it bein’ five miles from it to town. T’onliest boulder ’longside River Road fer twenty miles either way from town. Y’all see what I’m sayin’?
REPORTER
But … so, you don’t think a ground squirrel could’ve spooked the horse?
FANNY:
Pshaw! What with the critters alles scamp’rin ’crost the road? Why me’n Josiah’d never made a trip with Daddy what we din’t hear n’ feel the crench an’ bump o’ one or two o’ them critters under th’ wheels. Ain’t no horse gonna be spooked by no sech critter.
REPORTER:
It does sound suspicious, then.
FANNY:
By then, t’warn’t a paper in t’ county, big or small, what didn’t have stories ’bout the trial. Some in New York, even, an’ up in Boston … an’ when word Daddy died, theys a reporter from Chicago come down to interview Mama.
REPORTER:
Not Mister Jenkins, though?
FANNY:
No, no … he be busy diggin’ up information ’bout the jedge’s leanin’s an’ his part in th’ anti-abolishunist mob riots o’ eighteen an’ thirty-four … ’afore he becomed a jedge …
REPORTER:
So, the reporter who did interview your mama—
FANNY:
(A brief laugh)
He soon seed thet Mama waren’t no good source fer a story. An’ he took no stock o’ my words. ’Asides theys bigger fields t’ plow what with the endin’ of th’ trial—
(Stopping short, and staring at the REPORTER)
I swon, Robert, ain’t ya gonna read ’bout th’ endin’ o’ the trial? Or, do ya want me t’read it for y'all?
REPORTER:
(Expelling a lungful of air)
I’ve got it here ….
(Reads)
The judge patiently gathered the eyes of all present, most of whom were still reeling over the sentence he’d just delivered to Mister Barnwarmer about spending the rest of his life in the prison of his mind. Satisfied, the judge cleared his throat and began:
“Now, I have one more matter before this court adjourns. You recall, a few moments ago, I asked the defendants to approach the bench. Mister Thurston Flourney …” (and here, protruding from the armholes of his midnight-blue robe, his Honor’s arms extended like two slender white stalks, at the end of which two soft, white palms, opened like lillies in Mister Flourney’s direction.) … “will kindly approach the bench again.”
Mister Flourney did, with shoulders held well back, and head high.
“Mister Flourney, do you have the note you prepared?”
“I do, Your Honor.” He placed a small rectangle of paper before the judge.
The judge picked up the paper, smiled, and looked directly into the eyes of Elizabeth Albright. “After many years as a judge, Missus Albright, it’s been my experience that most people who have been wrongly accused of a horrendous crime such as this, but are acquitted, harbor deep anger and hatred against their accusers for what they’d been put through.”
“The four gentlemen seated there” (indicating them with an opening palm) “on behalf of whom Mister Flourney will be speaking) do not feel such anger. Nor does Mister Flourney. Do you, Mister Flourney?”
“No, your honor, I do not. We do not.”
“They don’t feel such hatred. They feel, instead—if I may act as interpreter—compassion for a widow whose husband had been cruelly ripped from her life, and had been left alone to raise her lovely daughter in a country torn asunder by war.
“While these five gentlemen, wrongly accused, but rightly acquitted, know that Mister Albright cannot be replaced as the family breadwinner, they wish to illustrate their humanity by offering this note, representing eight hundred dollars from each of the five gentlemen, and drafted by Mister Thurston Flourney, against his personal account at the First Bank of Illinois. Missus Albright, please accept this offering of four thousand dollars to help guide you and your daughter, Juniper Albright, through the turbulent and tortuous times ahead.”
The judge then smiled (the way a father would) into the cold , black face of Elizabeth Albright, whose ebony eyes stared straight at him, until the judge cleared his throat.
“And with that… these court proceedings from Lake County, in the fine State of Illinois … are hereby adjourned.”
REPORTER:
No, no, no, no, no!
FANNY:
An’ yet, thet be the whole trial.
REPORTER:
But no! Miss Fanny! Money—you told me money was never a problem with Missus Albright. She and Miss Juniper would be taken care of in perpetuity because of her husband’s foresight. But that reporter, Jenkins—I kept waiting for him to write about how Missus Albright—oh, it would have been so good—how she looked the judge square in the eyes and ripped that draft into pieces and fluttered them in his face!
FANNY:
(With an open-mouthed belly laugh)
Lord a’mighty, Robert, no! Mister Jenkins, he had it right with what he writ. ’Bout 'lizabeth’s stare—what be the same stare my Juni ’herited—what I call the rattlesnake stare. But what Mister Jenkins dint write … ’acause he dint know … was thet 'lizabeth Albright—she had better uses for thet money.
END OF SCENE 2
By Jay Squires
The previous scene in a nutshell: After Fanny explains how the judge’s virtual death sentence on her daddy left him a pariah among his neighbors and church, and may have led to his unexplained actual death a month later, she urges the reporter to read the rest of Mr. Jenkins editorial. He does, and the reader is privy to the most stunning part of the Judge’s decision.
| Author Notes | * From the above notation: Many thanks to Liz O'neil who offered me this gem of southern dialect, one of many she picked up from a group of Appalachian youngsters she taught. |
By Jay Squires
At the end of the previous scene. The reporter speaking: “So … Missus Albright figured she couldn’t risk taking out her revenge until Miss Juniper was of age. Is that right? (Not waiting) “But—but at some point … when Miss Juniper was old enough to understand her mother’s obsession … Missus Albright decided not to carry out her revenge herself, but to groom her daughter to do it instead? Is that what happened, Miss Fanny? Is that what you’re driving at?
By Jay Squires
The end of the previous scene: The Reporter is perplexed, but won’t let go of the idée fixe, despite Fanny’s insistence to the contrary, that the very determined Mrs. Albright at some point transferred her commitment to murder Thurston Flourney to her daughter, Juniper. That all changed when Fanny explains that Elizabeth Albright died after her second stroke … but before telling her daughter about her assassination plans … to which the Reporter says, “But … But somebody had to [tell her].” …. Fanny leaves us with the words, “Yep. Somebody did.”
| Author Notes | I guess I can never stop apologizing. I thought this would be the last scene, but it appears (hell, no appearing about it) that there has to be one more scene. Don't blame me that Fanny's such an entertainer. |
By Jay Squires
End of Previous Scene: Fanny had just explained how Juni’s Aunt Pikki, on the train, en route to Sojourner Truth’s funeral, had disclosed to Juni what Elizabeth had sworn her sister to secrecy about, i.e., her intention to murder Thurston Flourney. Here are FANNY’S last words, closing the scene: “They’s two wimmin, young man. … They’s two wimmin alone … on a long, hot, bone-rattlin’ train … an’ they’s headin’ fer a fune’ral. Dyin’ ’as in th’ air.”
ACT III
Scene 5
CHARACTERS:
Fanny Barnwarmer: Eighty-five-year-old woman with plenty of spark and sizzle still in her. Has been performing at the Tavern for forty-four years.
Reporter: Mid-thirties. Works for the New York Times, on assignment in Brady, Texas to write a human-interest story on the famous Fanny Barnwarmer.
SETTING: Front porch of Fanny Barnwarmer’s home. Rocking chair, DOWNSTAGE RIGHT, facing kitchen chair, CENTER, and front steps behind, which descend to street level with a flowerbed to the side. OFFSTAGE LEFT, street sounds of traffic: of vintage 1929 cars, some horse whinnying, etc., that continue as a kind stew of white-noise background throughout the scene.
PLACE/TIME: Brady Texas, 4: 05 PM, Sunday, August 11, 1929
AT RISE: As with the previous scenes, FANNY and the REPORTER sit facing each other.
REPORTER:
I gather you had to find out about …
(putting strong emphasis on the next two words)
Aunt Pikki’s disclosure from … Miss Juniper, herself?
FANNY:
(Seeming to have caught the inflection)
Reckon’ as how I din’t need to. I seed it in her face thet day they step off th’ train—thet she’s a—oh! she’s a diff’runt Juni from ’afore.
(Daubing her eyes)
T’ boot—T’other Juni, I knowed I’d ne’er git back agin.
REPORTER:
To this day, you feel the pain of it?
FANNY:
Seein’ her … thet be the beginnin’ o’ th’ pain, young man. Today jes’ be the reco’lectin’ of it.
(Bracing herself)
’Course, Ain’t Pikki—she seed th’ change too. Right off … an’ she feeled turr’ble bad ’bout bein’ th’ one what brung it on.
REPORTER:
(With the same curious inflection)
Good ol’ Aunt Pikki.
[FANNY cocks her head and stares, slack-jawed, at the REPORTER for a long moment. Then her eyes seem to unfocus in an odd manner. The REPORTER watches this with his head atilt]
REPORTER (Continues):
Are you okay, Miss Fanny?
FANNY:
(Using her frail arms to push her weight off her chair)
GAO ….
REPORTER:
(Putting album and tablet on the floor, he scrambles to his feet and stretches his arms toward FANNY)
Miss Fanny! What’re you doing?
FANNY:
(Sinking back heavily into the rocker, blinking, looking for the moment confused)
Thet …? Oh, thet be a-a stage trick fer when the crowd git sidetracked.
REPORTER:
(Still standing)
A stage trick?! No, no, Miss Fanny. I noticed—oh, fifteen minutes or so ago that you seemed pale, but then I thought it was my imagination, so I didn’t say anything. What—what can I do for you? Should I send someone for the doctor?
FANNY
I’s fine, young man. It be a trick—no more. Sit down.
REPORTER:
My story’s not more important than you are, Miss Fanny.
FANNY:
We’s almost there—now sit!
[The REPORTER reluctantly complies, replacing the album and tablet on his lap]
FANNY (Continues):
They’s one o’ Ain’t Pikki’s brothers at Sojourner Truth’s fune’ral thet my Juni meeted.
REPORTER:
That would be Peter …. It was a pity—after Sojourner Truth had won his freedom from slavery through the courts, and raised him to be a fine young man—that he took a job on a whaling ship and—and he only returned to attend his mother’s funeral.
FANNY
(Who had been staring at his mouth as he spoke, her own mouth a-gape.)
How ’d’y’all know more ’bout thet than I does?
REPORTER:
I’m ashamed of myself for not taking the time to tell you, Miss Fanny … but three days ago, at the end of my first evening with you—when I made the discovery that it was no longer going to be a story about your career as an entertainer, but would, instead, be about you and Miss Juniper ... well … I hope you understand, I had to do some … snooping.
FANNY:
Snoopin ….
REPORTER:
I had to lock down some facts. So that first evening, I telephoned my editor, Mr. Villard, and convinced him I had sniffed out a bigger story than the one I was sent to write. Miss Fanny, as colorful and important as your career was, it would end up being only a human interest story, and would soon be forgotten.
FANNY:
Don’t need no sugar-coatin’, young man.
REPORTER:
I know now you’d feel that way, but I didn’t after the first day. Still, I phoned my editor anyway and what followed was twenty-four hours of intense research. You would not believe Mr. Villard’s connections … but I won’t go into that. Just know that I discovered some things that authenticate your and Juniper Albright’s background.
FANNY:
Thet be what y’alls confessin’?
REPORTER:
(Somewhat bemused)
Yes. But the net result of part of the research is this: Miss Fanny … there was no Aunt Pikki.
FANNY:
Why … sure as I’s sittin’ here, they was!
REPORTER:
Not by Isabella Baumfree.
FANNY:
Ya’ll’s sayin’ as how I ’as straytchin’ th’ blanket?
REPORTER:
Stretching the …
FANNY:
That I’s lyin’?
REPORTER:
I’m not drawing any conclusions. I’m just saying that Isabella Baumfree—Sojourner Truth—didn’t give birth to a “Pikki”.
(Reading from his notebook)
She had five children: James, Diana, Peter, Elizabeth, and Sophia. Four of the five were sired by a slave named Tom, one of the many slaves, including Isabella, owned by one John Dumont.
FANNY:
Tell me ’bout t’chil’ what din’t have Tom as a daddy.
REPORTER:
That would be Diana. Turned out Isabella Baumfree had been raped by her master, John Dumont, probably many times. One of them produced Diana.
FANNY:
Diana. That be Pikki, then. I never knowed her given name. She’s alles Pikki to me, but I did hear-tell they’s a white man somewheres guardin’ th’ woodpile.
REPORTER:
I don’t understand … guarding the woodpile ….
FANNY:
Means Pikki ’as diff’ernt from th’ rest o’ her siblin’s. ’Bout her name—pshaw! What Mama’d name her chil’ Pikki, anyhows? Pro’ly seed Diana pickin’ at her nose or th’ like, an’ … she gived her th’ name an’ it jes’ stuck. Pikki, though, she be Diana, an’ Diana … she be Pikki.
(Beat)
Now, what ot’er blanket y’all’s paper tryin’ t’ prove I straytched?
REPORTER:
(Grinning at her folksy language, he then gets serious)
I assure you, Miss Fanny, the paper’s research wasn’t aimed at pulling the wool over anyone’s eyes or stretching blankets, as you so colorfully put it. I just needed to be sure that the story I write is based on the rock-bed of truth. You don’t know how happy I am to put Aunt Pikki back in the narrative.
(Beat)
About the rest of the research … I do want to tell you about that, believe me, I do—but before I tossed Peter’s name into your narrative about Miss Juniper meeting her uncle at the funeral, and it took us far afield, I have a strong feeling you were about to mention something important to our story. So … can we first —?
FANNY:
I heered this first from Ain’t Pikki, then theys gaps filled in by my Juni. See … Ain’t Pikki ain’t seed her brother ’afore neither, so they’s some acquantuncin’ goin’ on twixt them, too. But Ain’t Pikki … she seed thet lotsa folks at th’ fune’ral knowed ’bout Juni’s daddy’ lynchin’ … an’ they read ’bout the trial an’ all. Juni ’as like the sun t’ theys earth—they’s all pulled t’her. An’ Peter be no diffurnt, once’t he heerd ’bout it from t’others. He be pulled t’ her too. But much as Pikki could tell, no one knowed ’bout ’Lizabeth’s murd’rin’ plans— ’cause I ast her.
(Beat)
Now, Pikki, herse’f … she’s lighter skinned then all her kinfolk—bout the color’ve a hik-rey nut … counta Massuh Dumont’s blood—But none’s lighter’n my Juni.
REPORTER:
So … are you saying she was—I don’t know—was she persecuted by her own for her skin color? I mean this was the funeral for one of the greatest champions of Negro rights and women’s rights.
FANNY:
Not so’s Ain’t Pikki could tell. Leastways, no one said it out loud. But she tells me theys a lotta headshakin’ an’ whispirin’ goin’ on.
REPORTER:
(Pausing to see if FANNY was going to continue, then seeing she wasn’t)
In all fairness, though, it could’ve been because they knew her daddy had been lynched.
(Beat)
So … where does Miss Juniper’s uncle Peter fit in?
FANNY:
Ain’t Pikki seed as how he alles kept his eyes on Juni from a ways off, at first. Later—like as a big hawk—he swooped down on her.
REPORTER:
Oh, my!
FANNY:
Don’ mean it thet-a-ways. Keep y’all’s mind outten th’ horse droppin’s. Pikki … she be alles watchin’ from the side, an’ she seed how he be diff’runt, an’ all.
(beat)
Th’ rest I heered from my Juni, herse’—how Peter ’peared set apart from his kin, pro’lly accounta all th’ world he be seein’ made him diff’runt—
REPORTER:
(Carefully)
And what did you make of your Miss Juni’s reaction to her uncle Peter? Aunt Pikki saw there was something different about him … how did Miss Juniper describe it to you?
FANNY:
She say he’s a big’un wit’ big arms an’ shoulders—prolly from his whalin’ work. He’s over six-foot, like his mama. But … but somthin’ more. In t’way he hol’s hissef up all higher’n everone—an’ his eyes—well dey jes’ throwed off sparks.
REPORTER
(Puffing out his chest and taking on the demeanor of a superior acting person)
He had a kind of swagger, then? Like he was proud?
FANNY:
Kindly like he’s better’n t’others, but without sayin’ it. An’-an’ … Juni say he make her feel better’n t’others, too. Soon … soon he be comiz’ratin’ ’bout ’Lizabeth.
REPORTER:
You mean—
FANNY:
’Bout her apop—’bout her stroke.
REPORTER:
And you’re sure he didn’t know about Elizabeth’s plans before he talked—?
FANNY:
He only knowed ’bout ’Lizabeth feelin’ too poorly to come. They all knowed thet.
REPORTER:
Aunt Pikki couldn’t have told him when they were getting acquainted as brother and sister? After all, She did seem to find it hard to keep a secret.
FANNY:
Ain’t Pikki din’t tell nobody. Least ways she say she din’t.
REPORTER:
But he knew about it, just the same, didn’t he? Oh, Miss Fanny, please … Forgive me, but something—or someone—had to light a fire in Miss Juniper’s soul … that changed her into the driven woman she was when you saw her step off that train.
(Beat)
No one knew Miss Juniper as intimately as you. Do you think that Aunt Pikki’s breach of Elizabeth’s secret on the train would have been enough to totally transform your Miss Juniper?
FANNY:
No … no, Robert … Seemed as sech Ain’t Pikki’s words be jest th’ tick what burruhed under my Juni’s skin—leavin’ jest an angwishin’ itch …
REPORTER:
(Slowly. Deliberately. Keeping his eyes fixed on FANNY’S)
Miss Fanny … Did your Juni tell her uncle Peter … that, before her stroke, Elizabeth—his sister—had planned to kill Thurston Flourney?
[THE HEAVY CURTAIN ON THE STAGE GIVES A JUDDER … BUT STAYS OPEN]
END OF SCENE 5
| Author Notes |
As this scene has drawn to a close and I look out on your faces in the audience, I am more aware than ever before that I have failed you. You may have been counting on the curtain call at the end of today's scene. Your maid has prepared your food at home and it is sure to get cold before this play's final act-and you're allowed to leave the theater. (Oh, yes, the doors are locked and chained!)
Before I began writing this scene, I had every intention of covering all the bases, tying up all the loose ends, and leaving y'all a tidy package. I'd even told some of you that in my comments that attended your last reviews. In the ordinary course of playwrighting, my intentions would have been fulfilled. I'd have accomplished those ends in the editing process. But looking at that blank screen I faced a week ago, I had to solve a couple of problems. Just being told by Aunt Pikki that her mother had planned on murdering Thurston Flourney, would NOT have been enough to bring about a complete transformation in Juni, and make her driven to kill Thurston Flourney. (And you'd have picked up on that, too.) It took something else. That "something else" was Peter, Sojourner's son. To make his presence that powerful, I had to make him a special entity. So, I got hung up on the character of Peter "Baumfree". He wouldn't let me go. So, if you're looking for a scapegoat to blame for your cold dinner, blame Peter. Not me! |
By Jay Squires
End of Previous Scene: Robert was wondering aloud to Fanny whether: “Aunt Pikki’s breach of Elizabeth’s secret on the train would have been enough to totally transform your Miss Juniper?” And it was followed by Robert’s final words of the scene: “Miss Fanny … Did your Juni tell her uncle Peter … that, before her stroke, Elizabeth—his own sister—had planned to kill Thurston Flourney?”
ACT III
Scene 6
CHARACTERS:
Fanny Barnwarmer: Eighty-five-year-old woman with plenty of spark and sizzle still in her. Has been performing at the Tavern for forty-four years.
Reporter: Mid-thirties. Works for the New York Times, on assignment in Brady, Texas to write a human-interest story on the famous Fanny Barnwarmer.
SETTING: Front porch of Fanny Barnwarmer’s home. Rocking chair, DOWNSTAGE RIGHT, facing kitchen chair, CENTER, and front steps behind, which descend to street level with a flowerbed to the side. OFFSTAGE LEFT, street sounds of traffic: of vintage 1929 cars, some horse whinnying, etc., that continue as a kind stew of white-noise background throughout the scene.
PLACE/TIME: Brady Texas, 4:20 PM, Sunday, August 11, 1929
AT RISE: As with the previous scenes, FANNY and the REPORTER sit facing each other.
# # #
FANNY:
I don’ spect as so. I don’ ’spect my Juni knowed anythin’ ’bout her mama’s plans ’til she seed her uncle Peter.
(Glancing up and to the right, as though dragging down words and images to her mind)
My Juni say she seed Peter swoop down on her like he be a hawk an’ she be a-a lone nestin’ critter. He seed her standin’ alone from where he be conversatin’ with a bunch o’ theys kin a'ter the fune'ral broke up—prolly Ain’t Pikki be there with ’em—an’ he swoops down on Juni, an’ he plops down ’aside her, an’ ...
(introducing her thin shoulders into an eruption of tremors)
an' kindly-like shakes out an’ ruffle his feathers.
REPORTER:
(Smiling)
You like that image of him, don’t you, Miss Fanny? A hawk. A killer. You didn’t like the man, did you?
FANNY:
’Til the day he died, Glory be to God, I din’t. I het th’ man—Thet be th’ truth! I het th’ pwoison he dripped in her—the—the pwoison what got inside her an’ dried up all her beaut'ful inn’cence an’—an’—
[She suddenly thrusts both hands to just below her neck and clamps her eyes shut, her chest heaving]
REPORTER:
(Leaping to his feet, tablet and album sliding to the floor, and glancing over his shoulder, frantically)
Okay, that’s enough! I’m calling the doctor!
FANNY:
(Dropping her hands, pleading)
No! You turn back ’round, Robert! We’s so close—so close! I jes go through me some angwishin’—us wimmen, we do thet. Ain’t nothin’ wrong. Doc Hayhurst jes’ laugh at y’all fer worryin’! Now, sit y’sef down an’ give me back my album. I bes’ be pertectin’ it, meself.
REPORTER:
(Retrieving the album and giving it to her with a concerned look on his face, he sits, shaking his head)
I don’t want to be the one to give you a heart attack …
FANNY:
Oh, pshaw! Now y’all jes’ lissun t’me an’ what my Juni tell me.
(Her chest is still rising and falling, though, with deep, but rhythmic, breaths)
Th’ ol’ black hawk, he be standin’ by my Juni with th’ pwoison jes’ drippin’ from his—his—
REPORTER:
Beak?
FANNY:
Thet be it! See? Y’all’ll make a dec'nt writer yet.
(Beat)
So, my Juni, she be tellin’ me how ’as Peter be preachin’ to her like it be th’ Gosp’l ’bout th’ law o’ man and the law ’bout what be right—an’ all th’ time he be lookin’ all o’er her like he be hankrin’ fer the bestes’ place to sink in his beak.
REPORTER:
(Speaking jerkily, struggling with the dilemma of wanting to get the story right, but fearing to engage FANNY’S emotions)
I’m sorry, but—Miss Fanny—but-but were you thinking Peter was trying to-to—trying to be more than an Uncle to Miss Juniper?
FANNY:
No! I don’t think thet. But I do know as how if’n Peter was hank’rin fer thet kind o’—whatcha call it?—prey … thet my Juni woulda follered along like thet inn’cent nestin’ critter an’ … an’ never knowed what ’as happ’nin’ till it ’as too late. A-a charmin’ black hawk he be … a-a-a slurpin’ back his pwoison at jest th' right time so as no one be th’ wiser.
(Beat)
An’ he tells her, “They be da law of man, and den they be da law what be right. They be a whole tangle o’ laws, afore abulishun what ’llowed the white massur to own slaves, but thet cain’t be the law o’ what be right. Cain’t be! Ain’t no man should own another. Ain’t thet right, Juniper? Thet’s what he say, “Ain’t thet right, Juniper?” An’ my Juni be bobbin’ her haid, an’ lookin’ up at him like a teeny peeper, waitin’ fer him to drop thet pwoison worm in her beak.
REPORTER:
(writing frantically)
Let me just get that. “ … drop that poison worm in her beak.” Honestly, Miss Fanny, it must be your years of entertaining, but you could be a poet. Please, though, don’t lose your connection with Miss Juniper and Peter.
FANNY:
Well, sir, firstus he tells her ’bout those two kinds o’ laws an’ then … blamed if’n he din’t throw in another law. “Den they be th’ law thet ’llowed da Army o’ Uriel mob what lynched yo’ daddy—who be my sist’rin’s law-’bidin’ husband—to go skat-free. Oh, I seed the papers! Oh, yeah, I readed ’em all. An’ I readed ’bout you bein’ at da trial—you be all growed up now, but you be a chil’ then with yer rag baby ... an’ I cried fo’ you, Juniper.”
(Interrupting herself with a comment)
An’ slip-dang if he din’t sneak a pulluva nose-hair or some sech trick, ’acause gets his own tears a’flowin’ in the tellin’ … an’ he say:
Oh, yeah, I cried fo’ you … an’ I cried fo’ ’Lizabeth, too—yo mama, an’ th’ sistrin I din’t ev’n know. Oh, yeah, an’ I cain’t tell ya how proud I was thet yo’ mama was fixin’ to right thet wrong what snaitched her husban’—what snaitched yo daddy ’way.”
An’ then—an’ then th’ black hawk, he say,
“Do you be proud o’ yo mama too, Juniper?”
REPORTER:
(Cautiously, and yet with conviction)
Okay, but don’t you agree that we should take your belief that Aunt Pikki wouldn’t have told Peter about Elizabeth’s plot off the table right now, Miss Fanny? It’s obvious she did, regardless of what she told you. Can we just accept it that Aunt Pikki had her weaknesses?
FANNY:
Well … she swawn she din’t—an’ she took it to her grave.
REPORTER:
Okay … but anyway … Peter was proud that his sister would seek the only justice left to her, that of murdering her husband’s murderer. I’m sorry—I don’t want you to get upset again, but can you go on from there?
FANNY:
No … if I be frownin’ it be ’acause I be tryin’ to rec’lect what my Juni tol’ me from her conversatin’ with her uncle Peter at th’ fune’ral—which I ’member so well acounta I repeat ever word near a hun’ret times to try to git to Uncle Peter’s pow’r o’er my Juni. But then they’s the letters my Juni showed me what he sent her a’ter th’ fune’ral.
REPORTER:
The letters!?
FANNY:
Yees, th' letters ... So, it's like they's two pwoisons. Theys th' pwoisons from th’ fune’ral an’ then they's the pwoisons from th’ letters—they be like two flocks o' butterflies
(holding her hands up on either side of her head and wiggling her fingers, first of her right hand, then her left)
… a flock comin’ from here an’ a flock comin’ from there and theys both flocks be aimin’ to own th’ same flower. Pretty soon, they’s jes’ one flock an’ ya cain’t rightly tell which is which.
(Beat)
But I ’member this from my Juni’s mouth. Uncle Peter, a’ter he say how proud he be, he say, “An’ den I got angry, my purty li’l niece, I got blist’rin angry when I heered thet yer mama's plans got cut short by two strokes what leaves th’ fire in her gut, but takes ’way th’ arms an’ legs she be needin’ to carry out her plans.” An’ then he finished with, ’Don’ thet make you blist’rin angry, too, Juniper? Huh, don’ it?”
REPORTER:
You’re right though. It sure sounds like uncle Peter was trying to recruit his niece ….
FANNY:
It do. Now, the next, I knowed come from one o’ Peter’s letters, not from my Juni’s recollectin’. I knowed, ’acause I keeped it here in my album. He sended it on accounta … well, see, ever since she come home all rattlesnake-eyed an’ fired up fer doin’ this, I’d be tryin’ to talk sense into my fool Juni’s haid, thet this warn’t her fight. An’ I do b’lieve she be comin’ ’round an’ I knowed she tol’ him so in a letter, ’cause o’ his letter thet he sen’ back.
(She fishes the letter from the album and holds it out to the REPORTER)
REPORTER:
(Reading aloud but slowly, having difficulty with spelling)
My Dear Juniper.
I get ur letter. I see u startin to dout my truth-tellin. So, I best show you agin what the truth be. I wisht u is here. It be hard cuz the truth be here in my eyes. But U cant see my eyes, can U? So jus U try to pitcher in yer mind talkin direct to my face here.
Littul Juniper, U seed the truth here afore U leaved and U hold it there inside U a spell. How be it difrunt now? U say U be proud of the truth my daid mama fight fer. An U say U be redy to fight fer her truth now—even tho she be daid. Truth be truth! How be Ur mamas truth diffrunt?
Juniper, lissun to Ur oncle. Back near tweny year ago, durin the War of the Rebelyun, theys a lotta Yankee boys, yunger then U, be givin theys lifes—I mean dyin, Juniper—fer the truth. They be in the mud an freezin, an they bones be aken. An sumtimes they fergit why theys evun here. Sumtimes. So, they rekalect fer each othur. Kindly like I be rekalectin fer U now. An like as how the soljurs, they be rekalectin theys fightin an theys dyin fer the truth thet slavery is evul—U need be rekalectin thet Ur daddy be linched by Thurston Flourney, an Thurston Flourney be evul. An evul need be done way with. Evul need be kilt. That be Ur mamas truth, Juniper. An U be dammed—U be dammed an U be burnt in Hell if it aint gon be Ur truth too!
Oncle Peter
[In the silence that ensues after the REPORTER finishes the letter, he folds it and stares at FANNY, slowly shaking his head]
REPORTER (Continues):
To think that this letter was written by an uneducated, illiterate man, Miss Fanny. As far as rhetoric goes—as far as the manipulation of half-truths goes, he was a genius!
(Hands the letter back to FANNY)
FANNY:
(Eyes filling)
Why would he do thet? Why would he do thet to my Juni?
REPORTER:
Aw, Miss Fanny … probably because he could!
(Reaching over and patting her hand)
Maybe for the same reason he stayed away from his mother and only returned for her funeral … because he was only truly alive when he was outside of her shadow. If I’m right, Miss Fanny, then your Miss Juniper was simply an opportunity for his genius to flourish. Without a formal education … unable to read and with just the rudiments of writing, he was, nevertheless, a brilliant and dangerous man.
(Beat)
Miss Fanny, while all the time you tried to dissuade Miss Juniper … did Elizabeth ever catch on to Juni's transformation that was happening right under her nose, as it were?
END OF SCENE 6
| Author Notes |
This is a long one .... But as Miss Fanny would say, "We's so close t' th' end. So Close!"
Hell, she doesn't care what I think! Oh, and if you had read "To the Friends of Fanny Barnwarmer" maybe you'll agree with me now, after having read this scene: Wouldn't it have been grand if I had had the foresight to have brought Fanny along for the Funeral? Wouldn't it have been better than having Fanny explain how she remembered Juni's and Uncle Peter's words so clearly because she had repeated them a hundred times. Clearly, Ben Franklin was right. "An ounce of prevention IS worth a pound of cure." |
By Jay Squires
Parting Dialogue from Previous Scene: (REPORTER): Miss Fanny, while all the time you tried to dissuade Miss Juniper … did Elizabeth ever catch on to the transformation that was happening right under her nose, as it were? (Repeated below)
ACT III
TO CURTAIN
CHARACTERS:
Fanny Barnwarmer: Eighty-five-year-old woman with plenty of spark and sizzle still in her. Has been performing at the Tavern for forty-four years.
Reporter: Mid-thirties. Works for the New York Times, on assignment in Brady, Texas to write a human-interest story on the famous Fanny Barnwarmer.
Herbie: Son of Brady Inn’s owner. Has been given the assignment to take the Reporter to the train station.
SETTING: Front porch of Fanny Barnwarmer’s home. Rocking chair, DOWNSTAGE RIGHT, facing kitchen chair, CENTER, and front steps behind, which descend to street level with a flowerbed to the side. OFFSTAGE LEFT, street sounds of traffic: of vintage 1929 cars, some horse whinnying, etc., that continue as a kind stew of white-noise background throughout the scene.
PLACE/TIME: Brady Texas, 4:20 PM, Sunday, August 11, 1929
AT RISE: As with the previous scenes, FANNY and the REPORTER sit facing each other.
###
REPORTER:
Miss Fanny, while all the time you tried to dissuade Miss Juniper … did Elizabeth ever catch on to the transformation that was happening right under her nose, as it were?
FANNY:
Not so’s a body could tell. Mama ’Lizabeth, she jes’ be layin’ there, those big brown eyes th’ onliest thing be movin’.
REPORTER:
But surely, behind those eyes … thinking was going on.
FANNY:
(Showing some annoyance at his questions she couldn't answer)
Mama ’Lizabeth died ’bout a week inter th’ new year. Th’ year o’ eighteen an’ eighty-four. I a’ready telled ya ’bout th’ bequeathin’.
REPORTER:
Yes, you did. So, Elizabeth died in eighteen-eighty-four. And … still—a whole year passed before you left for Texas.
FANNY:
Y’ain’t lettin’ nothin’ git past y’all, are ya, Robert?
REPORTER:
But why? I thought she had the spirit in her after that last letter. So, why did she wait a year?
FANNY:
(A weary sigh)
’Acause … as hard as she be pushin’ t’ward it, I be pullin’ back jes’ as hard. Oh, Robert … you don’ know whet all I did! I sended fer books an’ maps o’ th’ whole dad-blamed world. They come in boxes an’ I ’splained how we’s young an’ theys a whole world o’ ’venurin’ to do. Any fool o’ knowed money opens up da world—an’ Lordy how we gots th’ money. So I gits her to study up ’bout those places right ’long with me—th’ Oryent an’ Arraby an’ Englund an’ Paree … an’ what all … an’ soon I git her to travul with our fingers on th’ maps from one t’other … an’ then when I git her laughin’ ...
(She looks to the ceiling with a wistful smile)
gall-blamed if I ain’t ’bout got her convicted we should jes’ shove our pockets full o’ money an’ jump on th’ nex’ big ol’ plane—
REPORTER:
And …
FANNY:
Thet’s when Ain’t Pikki come over with a letter.
REPORTER:
Oh, geez!
FANNY:
We ain’t seen much o’ Ain’t Pikki since th’ fune’ral though she only live down th’ road a piece. I knowed she still feeled terr’bul ’bout her words on th’ tren what started th’ whole thing with my Juni.
REPORTER:
I bet she did. So … the letter?
FANNY:
I think I tol’ you ’afore thet Ain’t Pikki got two letters.
REPORTER:
Maybe … I’d have to check my notes.
FANNY:
They’s th’ one letter what tol’ all th’ sisternly things, what she readed to me’n Juni. An’ she kept thet letter. But th’ last part o’ thet letter was kindly tagged on later, at th’ end by Mama ’Lizabeth. An’ I do b’lieve as how thet part be writ a’ter her first stroke … an’ y’all be seein’ why directly. Th’ tagged on part be what to do with th’ secon’ letter if’n she pass on t’ glory—she bein’ Mama ’Lizabeth. Thet secon’ letter be all thick an’ puffy-like.
REPORTER:
Okay … Excuse my confusion, Miss Fanny. But I have to make sure I have this down right. So stop me if I’m wrong. The letter which she read to you, but later kept, was of personal, sisterly matters, but had something tagged on at the end concerning the second letter. Right?
FANNY:
Right as rain!
REPORTER:
And you saw her get both these letters at the reading of Elizabeth’s will? Both sealed?
FANNY:
Both sealed.
REPORTER:
So … Well … Okay, so then she read the tagged-on part of the letter to you, right?
FANNY:
(Nodding)
It sayd thet Ain’t Pikki be th’ care-keeper o’ what be inside t’other letter—th’ thick an’ puffy one—what be thick an’ puffy ’acause it be crammed with money. Th’ tagged-on part, it tell Ain’t Pikki to see to it thet the money go to a cause what benefits other people.
REPORTER:
But Elizabeth could have bequeathed that in her will. Still ... that’s beside the point.
(beat)
And yet, Aunt Pikki brought the sealed second letter to Miss Juniper?
FANNY:
It waren’t sealed. Narry a thing in th’ first letter telled her she shoun’t open the second letter. Which she do. An’ now she put it in my Juni’s hand.
(With a wry smile)
An’ to save you y’all’s infernal questionin’, Mister Reporter … I tell ya what Ain’t Pikki telled Juni. She say, “Since ya got y’all’s haid turned ’round an’ ya got th’ fool notion to finish yo’ mama’s doin’s … this be fer you.” An’ she turned. An’ she left.
REPORTER:
(A perplexed smile on his face)
But that’s so bizarre! What?
FANNY:
’Spect y’all’d like t’read th’ paper what be with th’ money.
(Fishes through the album; stops to take a few breaths through her nose, then plucks out a sheet and holds it out to the REPORTER)
REPORTER:
But you’re okay? Miss Fanny?
(Scrutinizes her for a long moment, until she nods, then he reluctantly looks down at the sheet)
Why this is an accountancy ledger of sorts, with marginal notes and scrawled comments, and with a starting amount of eleven-thousand six-hundred and seventy-one dollars. Interesting. What is—
FANNY:
Look at th’ bottom.
REPORTER:
Yes. I see … there was an asterisk after the amount.
(His forefinger traces to the bottom)
Let’s see. It says, "$4,000 @ 5.5% int. = $11,671."
(Glancing up from sheet to FANNY)
The four-thousand dollars …?
FANNY:
From th’ trial …
REPORTER:
O-kaaay, so, as soon as she got the money from the judge, she immediately put it in a bank account, earning the going rate for close to twenty years which would grow to $11,671. You know, it could have been a lot more if she’d let it grow in her husband’s investment portfolio. A lot more.
FANNY:
Spectin she din’t wanna put dirty money t’ sully th’ clean.
REPORTER:
(Reading)
So, the first entry after that was for $17.23. In parentheses beside it, Oct. 13, 1882, Train fare, St. Lous to Dallas. Oh … I see!
FANNY:
The ticket be there, with th’ money. My Juni used it hersef fer her trip to Dallas. I buyed m’own ticket.
REPORTER:
(Back to the ledger)
Of course. And the balance brought down was $11,653.77. There’s another entry after that for, let’s see, Jun. 23, 1885, $6.92, and in the margin—oh, I see; this is in a different handwriting. It would have been written by Juni since she took over her Mama’s ledger—
FANNY:
Nope. By me … akshully. It be for th’ stagecoach—see it there?—from Dallas t’ Brady City. Back in eighteen an’ eighty-five, no train be goin’ to Brady City. I buyed m’own stagecoach ticket.
REPORTER:
I see that. And the balance brought down after Juniper's ticket is $11,646.85.
(Chuckling)
I see it had been rounded up to 11, 647.00. But the double noughts were scratched out and the eighty-five cents replaced it.
FANNY:
Yep. I reck’lect that. I aimed to make it easier. But Juni wanted ever penny ’counted fer.
REPORTER:
But, Miss Fanny, I seem to find a flaw in your … or Miss Juniper’s reasoning. I can kind of see where Miss Juniper would exclude the cost of your tickets from the reckoning, but I’m sitting here on the porch of your lovely and spacious home. Back in 1885, I’m guessing this would have cost Miss Juniper at least two thousand dollars. Yet, it is not shown on this ledger sheet.
FANNY:
Yer reas’nin an’ mine, be ’bout th’ same, young man. But I cain’t budge her nohow. She say, "This be our house. Not Thurston Flourney’s house."
REPORTER:
Well … this ledger obviously existed for its own purposes. There is a huge gap—a four-year gap—in the ledger between the cost of Miss Juniper’s stagecoach ticket and the next two—which are the last two—entries. You know what I’m going to ask, don’t you, Miss Fanny?
FANNY:
’Spect as how I do.
REPORTER:
Why, then … if Miss Juniper moved halfway across the United States for the sole purpose of murdering Thurston Flourney—and being driven by such unforgiving hate—why did she wait four … more … years before completing her mission?
FANNY:
Reckon as how we jes’ settled in, an’ I did everthin’—everthin’ I could to keep those rattlesnake eyes ’way from thinkin’ ’bout Thurston Flourney. An’ I think I did a might good job … ’cause deep down my Juni, she warn’t no killer.
(Shakes her head, eyes closed, lips pinched … and she continues slowly shaking her head for so long that the REPORTER looks up from his tablet)
You know … my Juni, she love goin’ to my shows. She tell me how proud she be o’ me … ’til she made me feel peacock proud o’ m’sef.
(Smiling, now, looking up with remembrance)
Oh, yes … right there in the front row, she was—she’s followin’ me with her eyes, smilin’-like. See, back then, I din’t have no rockin’ chair. I walk ’round the stage an’ even down ’mongst th’ tables. An’ al’es I be feelin’ Juni’s smilin’ eyes on me all warm like th’ sun.
REPORTER:
She seemed happy. You both seemed happy. Contented—in love.
FANNY:
Oh, we be in love. Ain’t never stopped bein’ in love. An’ my Juni be happy durin’ the show, an’ any time we’s together thinkin’ o’ each other. But …
(her mood palpably turns dark)
But when she be alone in that big ol’ bed—there ’aside me but alone in her black imaginin’s—she cain’t never be reached then.
REPORTER:
I’m sorry Miss Fanny. It seems it always came back to that … but there must have been one moment toward the end of that four years, one thing that … um … that forged her commitment so strong in her that you could never get her back.
(beat)
What was it that got her to put her advertisement in the Brady Sentinal?
(Pointing to ledger)
Here it is: $00.25, Sept. 5, 1889, ad in Brady City Sentinal. And the same day, beneath the revised balance you brought down, was the next, and final, entry in the ledger, $5.50, Sept. 5, 1889, purch. Derringer & am—I’m guessing am is ammunition.
FANNY:
Yes. It be Jerold … He be th’ one.
REPORTER:
Jer—excuse me, what?
FANNY:
Y’all wantin’ to know why she had th’ ad writ. An why she bought Li’l Liz. It be Jerold, th’ Pinkerton man.
(Watching the REPORTER’S face pull a baffled look)
He be the knowin’est, the sneakiest ’tective on this green earth. He tells my Juni thet Flourney has cancer … an thet, young man, be what lighted th’ final far.
[A train whistle moans in the distance. The REPORTER glances anxiously over his shoulder, then at FANNY.]
FANNY (Continues):
The story be finished anyways. Ain’t no more to tell. I already tells y’all ’bout th’ shootin’ o’ Thurston Flourney.
REPORTER:
Because Flourney’s dying of cancer wouldn’t be enough. I recall you said—I have it in my notes somewhere—that she needed to have witnesses that a judge couldn’t have in his pocket. That’s why she waited for a crowd to gather.
(Beat)
Miss Fanny … One last thing before my ride gets here.
(Holding up the ledger)
This sheet had been longer. Something was torn off the bottom. Were there other entries?
FANNY:
(Reaching out for the sheet)
Jes’ a po’m writ at th’ bottom.
REPORTER:
Oh … I’d love to read it. By You? Or Miss Juniper? Or—sure, it would’ve been by Elizabeth, wouldn’t it?
FANNY:
(With an impish grin)
Well … Reckon as how you’d have t’ see Tom Maples ’bout thet.
REPORTER:
Tom Ma—oh, yes, the editor of the Brady Sentinal.
FANNY:
An’ my onliest friend in these parts now as my Juni be gone. He has th’ po’m thet was torn off th’ ledger.
(Beat)
When God’s Angel be lookin’ fer me t’ take me t’ Glory—I hopes t’ Glory! —I needs be ready. So t' make sure I be ready … Tom Maples be in th’ receivin’ end o’ my las’ will an’ test’ment.
REPORTER:
He knows about those arrangements?
FANNY:
’Course he do. An’ he knows ’bout you, too. Thet y’all might as not be snoopin’ ’round fer y’all’s story. If he’s a mind to, he’ll be helpin’ y’all.
(Pointing)
Lookee …
[HERBIE’S voice from the street, OFFSTAGE LEFT]
HERBIE:
Y’all ready, Mr. Holmdahl? Th’ train be leavin’ in half n’hour.
REPORTER:
(Over his shoulder)
I’ll be there directly, Herbie.
(To FANNY)
Miss Fanny. This has been the event of my lifetime. I wish it didn’t have to end. May I—do you suppose I could give you a hug?
FANNY:
You think I’s lettin’ you get ’way without one?
(Struggles to rise from her rocker, then collapses back in it with a sudden painful grimace)
REPORTER:
Oh God! Herbie, you’d better get the doc!
FANNY:
(Loudly)
Don’ you dare, Herbie!
(To REPORTER)
I jes’ pull somethin’—these ol’ bones! Now, you jes’ bend on down heah.
REPORTER:
(Standing, bending down for an embrace)
I’ll never forget you, Miss Fanny.
(Pulls back after a hug and stares at FANNY, concerned)
Promise me you’ll see the doctor.
FANNY:
Yes. Yes. Now you skedaddle or yer gonna miss y’all’s train.
[The REPORTER gathers his things and exits STAGE LEFT, smiling back at her all the while]
FANNY (Continues):
(For a full minute, she sits in her rocker, alone, her eyes closed, her cheeks glistening. Then she opens her eyes and casts scattered glances right and left. Speaking in an audible whisper …)
Ohhh, I c’n feel y’all’re here. I c’n feel ya. Ohhhh, love ….
(A second Ohhhhh blends into an exhale that seems to go on forever as she lowers her chin to her chest, her lips part. Eyes stare at the floor)
[From STAGE LEFT, Juniper, clad in a wispy, white gown, slowly ascends the steps. STAGE LIGHT dims to a white mist and falls only on the two of them. Juniper’s face and hands glow with an inner luminescence; she stops, smiles down on Fanny, then kneels and rests her head gently in Fanny’s lap. After a long moment, STAGE LIGHT DIMS TO DARK]
CURTAIN
| Author Notes |
Author Note: Answering a question one of my reviewers asked, "What is the significance of "Beat"? Beat is used by many playwrights as a kind of change of subject, mood, or emotion. You can liken it to a paragraph break or, better yet, to replace parenthetical stage directions describing the action of the speaker, such as "he sighs", or "he stares at her, then looks away". I hope that helps.
Have you had enough of Fanny for one lifetime? Well, expect a sigh-generating or rotten-tomato-throwing surprise in a couple of weeks. JS |
By Jay Squires
Summary of the previous scene: In the interest of space, and since the regular Fanny readers likely remember the closing scene, I have included a rather longish summary, for those new to the play, in Author’s Notes
SETTING: Dusk at the Brady Cemetery. DOWN-CENTERSTAGE, a large pile of dirt skirts the edge of a wide, deep, rectangular hole. Alongside the opposite lip of the hole, a wider-than-usual, silver-lidded mahogany coffin rests on the lawn; coiled ropes, pullies, and other paraphernalia are piled at either end. Behind, and covering the remainder of the stage, are tombstones and plots, some current. As a backdrop, oak trees line the cemetery, and a few are scattered among the plots. A beautiful Texas sunset blazes through the trees (but dims to gray, then black as the scenes progress). DOWNSTAGE CENTER stands a podium; to its side, three chairs.
PLACE/TIME: Brady, Texas, 5:30 PM, Saturday, August 17, 1929.
AT RISE: THE REPORTER stands DOWNSTAGE LEFT, his notebook and pencil clutched in his hand at his side. A little to his left is MR. MAPLES.
REPORTER:
(Looking straight ahead at the audience, speaking confidentially, in a low and level voice—think of a golf announcer)
Good to see you again. Tom Maples and I arrived a few minutes in advance of what is anticipated to be a huge crowd for Miss Fanny’s and Miss Juniper’s burial. I’m here early to say a few words to you personally—you who were with me here in Brady a week ago. I was privileged to share Miss Fanny with you for three long, thoroughly enjoyable days—enjoyable at least for me. What began as a New York Times interview with the Incomparable Fanny Barnwarmer, the entertainer, soon grew into a profoundly deep and troubling history of our times—or if not that broad a scope, then a history of death, love, and redemption as it affected two families.
(Beat)
As with all history, including news reporting … not all facts—and fewer feelings—get recorded. I had no doubts when I left Miss Fanny, at the end of my three days, that there were things left unsaid … uninterpreted smiles or gestures, sentences truncated by, well, by life’s interferences … hence unrecorded.
(Smiling to his right)
Excuse me for getting philosophical, Mr. Maples.
MAPLES
I suspect it’s the mood of the place. Besides, you’ve taken voluntary ownership of a lot of Fanny’s life over those three days—you and
(Gesturing to the audience)
the others who were there. You left, I gather, feeling there were still a few areas you’d like to have fleshed out a bit. Perhaps with ten minutes more … and a turn around that corner, or down the road a piece. Eh? Fanny does that to folks.
REPORTER:
(Turning back from Thomas to face front, and speaking again confidentially and low with just the trace of a smile)
Yes, ten more minutes … or an hour … or a day more … would have been sufficient. I felt so relieved when I learned about the train’s delay. I thought that a half-hour more was just what I needed … and yet—
MAPLES
When she gave me written instructions—I think it was after the first day of your interview—asking me to notify you when she passed and to wire you a hundred dollars for your expenses … I’m sure it was to give you a little more time to follow and gather together a few final threads to tie up her life in a tidier package. It wasn’t her expressed reason in her note, but I think it’s what she wanted.
REPORTER:
(Puzzled)
When she passed? Then she knew?
MAPLES:
Of course, she knew. She confided in me a month ago that Doc Hayhurst warned that her heart was failing her and that if she didn’t give up her performances at the tavern, with all its smoke and noise, and such … she’d likely collapse and die right there on stage.
REPORTER:
Did you wonder why she confided that in you?
MAPLES:
Pshaw! She’d been confiding in me for better than forty years, Robert.
REPORTER:
I recall from my notes that you were the first person she met in Brady.
MAPLES:
Went by Brady City, back then, before incorporating. But yep, back in eighty-five. She was fresh off the stagecoach. Still had the prairie dust on her dress and on her eyebrows. Came by to get a copy of the Sentinal whilst Juniper was visiting with Sherriff Peckham.
REPORTER:
Miss Juniper was verifying information about someone, I believe.
(Beat)
How much did Miss Fanny confide in you about their reason for moving to Brady?
MAPLES:
You mean about Juniper Albright’s plan to kill Thurston Flourney?
(Shakes his head, slowly, frowning)
Sadly … no. I pieced that together, like most Bradians, from the trial. I do believe that was the only thing she kept from me. It remained her and her sister’s dark secret.
REPORTER:
Her sister? You mean her step—kind of step—sister.
MAPLES:
I mean Juniper. Now there was a strange, sad, quiet … driven person.
REPORTER:
But if you knew she was driven … you must have surmised something.
MAPLES:
You’re a reporter, Robert. You’re young—If you haven’t yet, you’ll learn over time to read people. You can see it in their expression. In their eyes. In Juniper’s eyes, certainly.
REPORTER:
Miss Fanny called them rattlesnake eyes.
MAPLES
That’s it! That’s it exactly. Like the eyes of a rattlesnake about to strike.
(With a sudden, wounded look, and an attempt at a smile)
It appears that Fanny confided more in you about Juniper’s obsession than she did me.
REPORTER:
Well … I-I might have been doing some surmising, myself—some guesswork along the way.
(Beat)
Mister Maples?
MAPLES:
Yes?
REPORTER:
You—loved Miss Fanny, didn’t you?
MAPLES:
(With a quick, dismissive laugh)
Why no—I wouldn’t call—no … not at all. I mean, I was older than her, by maybe five years, and I was a widower with two youngens … and a brand new newspaper that barely made ends meet. What would I have to offer a pretty, young lady with the whole world before her?
REPORTER:
Sorry. Just another hunch … gone to seed. I had to ask.
MAPLES:
(Watching something in the distance, smiling, raising a hand)
Jonathon. Good to see you.
(Back to REPORTER)
Looks like a few are starting to arrive. Did you have any other questions to ask me before someone interrupts us?
REPORTER:
So you were mentioned in her will …. Do you mind telling me—well, as much about her will as you or Miss Fanny would want me to know?
MAPLES:
I don’t know that there’s that much to tell. Doc Hayhurst notified me on the night of the day you left Brady, that Fanny had died. The next day, I got a call from Brady’s only law firm Jinkins and Son, Attorneys at Law, that I had been named in Fanny Barnwarmer’s will. Well, I don’t mind telling you, I was flabbergasted. You see, Fanny had already told me, years earlier, that when Juniper Albright went to prison with a life sentence over her head, she turned over her entire fortune to Fanny.
REPORTER:
(Stares at him with open mouth)
I guess that was one of those things that Fanny hadn’t gotten around to telling me.
MAPLES:
It didn’t come all at once to Fanny. There were some legal snags and bickering among the Stockholders and the Bank trust department, but inasmuch as Juniper had no other living kin, the courts ruled she could do with her fortune as she pleased. Within a few years, Fanny was the sole beneficiary of the Thomas Albright fortune, and …
(Interrupting himself with a smile aimed at someone to the left of the REPORTER)
Yes, and you, too, Missus Frinzer. Good to see little Todd is back on his feet.
(To REPORTER, under his breath)
The little blighter! Got off with just a warning after he shot himself in the foot running away with the gun he stole from Charlie Powell.
REPORTER:
Yes … it’s a … whole … different world!
(Glancing at what he’d just written in his notebook)
So, Jinkins and Son law firm contacted you about Fanny’s will?
MAPLES:
Right. You could have bowled me over with a feather. Fanny told me about the codicil she added to her will the first day you interviewed her. It had the instructions to notify you if—when she died.
REPORTER:
(Looking straight ahead, speaking in low tones to those who were with him during his interview)
It had never struck me with such force before, until just now, how desperately Miss Fanny needed to unburden herself of her past and carry the responsibility forward, even past her death, to bring the story to a conclusion.
(Beat)
You know … I wonder if her father—if he had not died so suddenly—would have been as bedeviled as Miss Fanny to have his story told to the end.
MAPLES:
Her father?
REPORTER:
(To MAPLES)
Sorry, I let my mind ramble on past where it should have stopped. Tell me, though, Mister Maples … there was a poem Miss Fanny told me to ask you about.
MAPLES:
The poem, yes. It was one of the three things included in the rather well-stuffed envelope given me at the reading. It included … the poem, of course, and then a rather odd sheet with sums written on it.
REPORTER:
You mean like a statement of accounts?
MAPLES:
You know of it?
REPORTER:
There was another one, I think like the one you received. Only it ended with the purchase of “Li’l Liz” the gun that Miss Juniper used to kill Thurston Flourney with. After the cost of the gun was deducted it left a balance … of …
(Looking at his notebook)
$11, 641.10.
MAPLES:
That was the balance on the sheet I received. I know because I added up the currency in the envelope which accounted for its bulge. There were eleven one-thousand-dollar notes—I had to verify their legality at the Brady Bank—a five-hundred-dollar note, a one-hundred-dollar note, two twenties, and a one. Then … tucked into the corner was a dime.
(Glancing to his right, then under his breath)
I was afraid this would happen. What a poor advertisement for his calling.
(To someone approaching)
Pastor Rabbins …
PASTOR RABBINS:
(Voice only … coldly)
Thomas … I’m not happy. We’ll talk.
MAPLES:
(To REPORTER)
Okay ... where were we …? Oh, yes, the money matched the balance sheet.
REPORTER:
Sorry about that with the … Pastor … Um … did you—I don’t suppose you have that balance sheet with you today?
MAPLES:
Oh, no … It needed to stay with the currency, and I didn’t think it was prudent to bring that much money—
REPORTER:
Of course not. But do you recall the entries on that sheet?
MAPLES:
The only one that Fanny entered was the cost of the plot, the burial, and the marker for Thurston Flourney.
REPORTER:
Say again!—for Thurston Flourney?!
MAPLES:
(Nodding rapidly, eyes wide, a smile)
Yes! Yes! Thurston Flourney! One hundred and fifty dollars. The balance brought down … eleven-thousand, four-hundred and …
(scrunches his face in concentration)
ninety-one dollars … and a dime.
REPORTER:
And that's it. Well … I’ll be!
MAPLES:
Truth be told, there was another deduction of two-thousand, two-hundred dollars, but it was only entered as miscellaneous.
REPORTER:
What? Miscellaneous? What?
MAPLES:
It was a complicated undertaking, and it wasn't part of Juniper's original plan for the use of the money, which had ended with the marker.
(Scratching his head)
I don't think Fanny ever cleared it with Juniper who was, of course, in prison. She worked through me ... and I made all the arrangements.
REPORTER:
(Showing signs of impatience)
What was it, then?
MAPLES:
(Chuckling)
You should know Fanny better than that! The entertainer that she was ... she'd want you to wait for the big reveal.
REPORTER:
It was enough of a reveal when you told me Juniper's fund paid for the marker and plot for the scoundrel her Juni had murdered.
MAPLES:
Turns out Thurston Flourney had no living relatives at the time of his death. He had been a fairly well-to-do man, but all his money stayed with his cattle ranch. He was a miser and treated his ranch hands poorly. He was so disliked by the people of Brady, generally, because of his business dealings—and his employees specifically—that Juniper’s attorney said at her trial, that if she hadn’t killed him first someone else would likely have preempted her.
REPORTER:
Not a good defense statement.
MAPLES:
There was no defense. She knew she was guilty. All her defense attorney tried to do was to keep Juniper from the gallows. To get her a life sentence.
(Beat)
Anyway, after a lot of finagling, our Miss Fanny arranged, anonymously, to pay for Thurston Flourney’s burial—done without fanfare, of course—and for the small marker …. A hundred and fifty dollars. On the sheet.
REPORTER:
Here? He’s here in the Brady cemetery?
MAPLES:
Yep.
REPORTER:
I need to see that.
MAPLES:
(Smiling)
I’m sure Fanny knew you would.
END OF PART I OF THE EPILOGUE
| Author Notes |
SUMMARY OF THE CLOSING SCENE:
With the three-day interview at its close, and the sound of the train whistle moaning in the background, Fanny attempts to rise to give the reporter a hug but slumps back to her rocker. She pooh-poohs his concern and he reluctantly leaves. Sitting there alone, she begins to get agitated, glancing about the porch, talking in disjointed sentences until her chin slowly dips to her chest, and her open eyes are staring at the floor. At this point, Juniper, dressed in a white gown ascends the steps, stoops to her knees before Fanny, and puts her head in Fanny's lap. THE CURTAIN. I hope you enjoyed your time with The Incredible Fanny Barnwarmer. I'm confident you'll find the three-scene epilogue satisfying as well. |
By Jay Squires
CHARACTERS
Reporter: Robert Holmdahl. Mid-thirties. Back in Brady, Texas from New York City where he works for the New York Times. It was but a week earlier that he had been on assignment in Brady to write a human-interest story about the famous Fanny Barnwarmer.
Thomas Maples: Owner and editor of the Brady Sentinal. The first person Fanny met when she moved to Brady, in 1885. Age 89, he is thin and spry, walking without support.
Pastor Rabbins: Pastor of the Brady Baptist Church. Tall man, 6'4" and husky; an imposing figure.
SETTING: Dusk at the Brady Cemetery. DOWN-CENTERSTAGE, a large pile of dirt skirts the edge of a deep, rectangular hole. Alongside the opposite lip of the hole, a wider-than-usual, silver-lidded mahogany coffin rests on the lawn; coiled ropes, pullies, and other paraphernalia are piled at either end. Behind, and covering the remainder of the stage, are tombstones and plots, some new-looking, others, needing attention. As a backdrop, oak trees line the cemetery, and a few are scattered among the plots. A beautiful Texas sunset blazes through the trees (but dims to gray, then black as the scene progresses). DOWNSTAGE CENTER stands a podium. To its side are three chairs.
PLACE/TIME: Brady, Texas, 6:00 PM, Saturday, August 17, 1929.
AT RISE: Pastor Rabbins is at the podium. Thomas Maples and the Reporter sit in the chairs, an empty one, nearest the podium, reserved for the Pastor.
###
PASTOR:
(Clearing his throat, scanning the audience)
It’s good to see so many familiar faces here this evening, as we prepare to send off Brady’s own … Fanny Berneice Barnwarmer …
(looking over at THOMAS MAPLES, his eyes narrowing just for an instant)
… and Juniper Eileen Albright … their journey on this earth completed.
(After a long, mournful-sounding sigh)
As the Pastor for many of you out there, I would be remiss not to tell you that I am opposed—to the depth of my Christian soul—to today’s undertaking.
[THOMAS MAPLES sneaks a smile to the REPORTER]
[Enter UPSTAGE RIGHT, a young—twenty-ish—FANNY AND JUNIPER (see note below), both attired in the purest white, diaphanous gowns. They are within a vaporish glow. For the most part, they wander, hand-in-hand among the graves but occasionally stop to watch the proceedings. They are seen by no one but you.]
PASTOR (Continues):
While I know of nothing in the Good Book which eschews the service I am about to perform … and while it is not forbidden within the federal, state, and our city’s regulations … I know in my heart that God did not intend for two people—particularly not two people who are unrelated to each other—being buried together in the same coffin. I’m sorry, my brethren, but that is simply WRONG.
[Some gasps, but also some scattered “Amens” from the unseen audience]
Pastor(Continues):
(With a forced smile, aimed first at THOMAS MAPLES, then at the audience)
Still… as Pastor of the church to which Fanny had been known to attend on occasion, it is my responsibility to include her as one of the lambs in the flock I am here to shepherd. As for Juniper Albright … she could not be faulted for not attending services, having been detained elsewhere for some forty years.
(Throwing up his hands and tilting his head as though in defeat)
And so … here we are. I shall say a few words of earnest prayer over these two souls and then turn over the podium to Thomas Maples, who may be able to educate us—me, at least—as to the moral … rectitude of today’s double-barreled burial.
[General laughter]
[FANNY AND JUNIPER glance at each other, then slowly make their way to a grassy spot next to the podium where they sit, amidst the foamy waves of their gowns. Their eyes are trained on the PASTOR and they respond appropriately to his various comments.]
PASTOR (Continues):
(Closing his eyes)
May we all bow our heads. Father. Holy Father. Father of the living and the dead. Only you know who will enter the gates of Heaven and into your Holy embrace. And only you know who will be turned away from the door, unworthy of stepping through. Yours is the Holy Law.
(Beat)
Today the earth offers up two souls. There is nothing I can say of them that you don’t already know and have already judged them by. Lord, you don’t need our petty funeral to help you decide their worthiness. We are not bargaining for their souls. You know this funeral is not for the sake of your Holiness; nor is it for the sake of the departed, Fanny Berneice Barnwarmer and Juniper Eileen Albright; this funeral is for the living—these humble people sitting before me now. May you bless them Lord and enable them to shoulder the burden of their grief here on earth … as we all await our final judgment. I pray this in thy Sweet, Holy Name—in the name of Jeeee-sus I pray—and let us all resound with Aaaaa-men.
[The audience repeats, Amen]
PASTOR (Continues):
Now the rest of this service will be for the celebration of Fanny Barnwarmer’s life. I realize that most of you don’t even know Juniper Albright. She’s been—how can I say this—away. For forty years. Only a few of the eldest of the townspeople have ever seen her. For the youngest of you, this is likely the first time you’ve heard of her. But inasmuch as she is lying beside Fanny Barnwarmer, I invite you who come up to this podium that I’m now vacating, to include a few words about Miss Albright, if you’ve a mind to, along with Fanny Barnwarmer.
(Beat)
And now, Mr. Thomas Maples, I believe you have a few words to start us off with about Fanny Barnwarmer …?
[MAPLES takes his place at the podium, while the PASTOR sits. FANNY and JUNIPER gaze up at him]
MAPLES:
Thank you Pastor Rabbins.
(Smiling, waiting for the gathering of eyes)
Who among you hasn’t heard of Fanny?
(Chuckling, nodding)
I didn’t think so. If you live in the city, you may have watched one of her twice-weekly acts which she has performed at The Tavern for forty-four years. Even if you hadn’t attended one of her performances, hardly a day passes when someone doesn’t laugh with a friend or neighbor—in the store or barbershop, or even before or after church—over one of her lines. Or maybe something she said altered, just a little, how you looked at the world. Oh, yes, our Fanny helped us lighten our burden with laughter; she made us think about life differently. And because most of the material for her performance was plucked from the pages of the Brady Sentinal, the burdens shouldered by this businessman were lifted almost overnight …
(General laughter)
… with the paper doubling its subscription rates—thank you, Jesus! … and … thank you Fanny.
[With the juxtaposition of Jesus with FANNY, the PARSON glares, and the REPORTER grins, at MAPLES]
MAPLES (Continues):
I believe I was the first person in Brady who met Fanny. She had come to my office to get a copy of the Sentinal. And she waited there reading it until Juniper arrived to get her.
(Releasing a large exhale, he starts and stops a few times before resuming)
I love Fanny. Oh, we all loved Fanny … but I confess …
(Looks past the PASTOR to leave his gaze on the REPORTER, who nods)
I confess, from the first moment I saw Fanny, I loved her in a very personal …
[During the ensuing silence, as the tears well in MAPLES’ eyes, FANNY AND JUNIPER look at each other; and as JUNIPER continues to do so, FANNY unlocks her gaze and lifts it to MAPLES.]
MAPLES (Continues):
Oh, would someone please stop me! I-I-I loved Fanny in a-a heart-fluttering, throat-drying, um … a thoroughly disorienting way.
(Beat)
But when she was joined, not ten minutes later, by Juniper … and I saw the way they looked at each other … I knew right then that this young warrior had been knocked off love’s stallion, had—without a word from Juniper’s lips—been outmaneuvered, outwitted by this young interloper.
(Chuckling, throwing up a dismissive hand)
Okay, okay, I’m letting poetry cover up what my reason doesn’t want me to say simply … that Fanny could never love me in the way Fanny loved Juniper. There, I said it.
(Turning to the PASTOR)
And yes, Pastor Rabbins, no two people deserve more to be lying side-by-side through eternity than Fanny Barnwarmer and Juniper Albright. When Fanny told me a week ago that she had altered her will to include a request to be buried alongside Juniper Albright in the same coffin, and she had given me, at that time, complete instructions as to the construction of the coffin, knowing it would take time to have it built, I immediately complied with her wishes. They were to be buried—they ARE to be buried together in that coffin with or without your blessing.
[Without a word PASTOR RABBINS gets up from his chair and exits STAGE LEFT. FANNY and JUNIPER’S eyes meet and still sitting there, they lean into each other and embrace]
END OF PART II OF THE EPILOGUE
| Author Notes | [Author Note: I foresee a problem with the lack of instruction given at the beginning of the play that both Fanny and Juniper should be acted by young women, costumed and made up to look old. That should have been easy enough, but I didn't know early on that I would have this scene, with the younger version of the two in the epilogue.] |
By Jay Squires
EPILOGUE PART III
THE CONCLUSION
Reporter: Robert Holmdahl. Mid-thirties. Back in Brady, Texas from New York City where he works for the New York Times. It was but a week earlier that he had been on assignment in Brady to write a human-interest story about the famous Fanny Barnwarmer.
Thomas Maples: Owner and editor of the Brady Sentinal. The first person Fanny met when she moved to Brady City, in 1885. At age 89, he is thin and spry and walks without support.
The Spirits: The much younger version of Fanny and Juniper.
SETTING: Nearly dark, at the Brady Cemetery. DOWN-CENTERSTAGE, a long, wide rectangle of impacted dirt, slightly rounded. Some bouquets and stemmed flowers on top. Behind, and occupying the remainder of the stage, are tombstones and plots. As a backdrop, a silhouette of oak trees lines the cemetery, and a few oaks grow among the gravestones.
PLACE/TIME: Brady, Texas, 7:00 PM, Saturday, August 17, 1929.
AT RISE: THE REPORTER and THOMAS MAPLES stand DOWNSTAGE CENTER in front of the freshly covered grave. The podium, chairs, ropes, and pulleys have been removed. All funeral guests have gone. FANNY and JUNIPER are still sitting, leaning together near where the podium had stood before. They fairly glow in their white gowns, billowing about them.
REPORTER:
Thank you for standing strong against Parson Rabbins. Without you doing your work in the background, I doubt that he would ever have let this happen.
MAPLES:
Well … no, I suspect he wouldn’t. I had some people working on it with me, though. The attorney Jenkins had his son check out the precedence. Double-occupied caskets had been done … usually when both mother and child die in childbirth. But all it takes is precedent to squelch it. Young Jenkins confirmed there have been no legal rulings against it federally, or on the state, county, or city level. Even so, it was new to Brady.
REPORTER:
Still, I’ll bet Parson Rabbins didn’t take the news lying down—I mean, you know, without resistance.
MAPLES:
Reckon not. I knew he’d exert his power with his congregation. That’s him. He couldn’t let the funeral go on without a protest. But the bottom line is that he knows the power of the press, especially in a small town—most especially when there is only one newspaper.
REPORTER:
(Shifting his balance from one leg to the other)
Mister Maples …
MAPLES:
It’s Tom.
REPORTER:
(Scratching behind his ear)
Sorry. It’s the way I was raised, I guess. I could never get past calling her …
(Dipping his head toward the fresh grave)
... Miss Fanny.
[FANNY and JUNIPER pull back and smile at each other, then lean their heads back together]
MAPLES:
Well, she earned it. Now me … I’m just a tired old ink and paper man—an older version of yourself, probably. So, try the name on for size, Bob.
REPORTER:
It’s kind of awkward just coming out and saying it now … Tom. Oh, and I prefer Robert.
MAPLES:
Oh. So, what were you going to ask before we got sidetracked?
REPORTER:
I was —well … it’s not important. Not really.
MAPLES:
I think it was … from the way you’re fidgeting.
REPORTER:
Back when you were speaking in front of the folks, talking about you and Miss Fanny… were you …? I don’t know—
MAPLES:
Pshaw, Robert! Don’t you recognize posturing when you see it? I just borrowed from Fanny's act and dang well convinced every last one of 'em why Fanny and Juniper should be buried together.
[FANNY and JUNIPER pull away from each other to look up inquiringly at MAPLES]
REPORTER:
(Studying MAPLES)
Hmmm. Gotta say, though, you sure brought it off well. The tears and all … I saw their faces. I don’t think a person there—
MAPLES:
Good! It worked! Now … It’s starting to get dark. You wanted to see Flourney’s gravesite.
REPORTER:
Then … we’re finished … here?
(Drifting to silence)
MAPLES:
(Glancing first at the grave, then at the REPORTER, he takes in some air and lets it out through fluted lips)
Yes. It is over. Time to move on.
REPORTER:
Tell you what. It won’t take me a moment. But how about if, first
(pointing OFFSTAGE LEFT)
I go over to that grassy spot there for just a few minutes? I’d like to organize my notes before we get to the other gravesite.
MAPLES:
As you wish …
[MAPLES watches him turn his back and amble off, UPSTAGE LEFT and then OFFSTAGE. Then MAPLES looks back at the grave, turns, and takes the few steps to stand beside it. FANNY AND JUNIPER’S eyes stay fixed on him. Shoulders slumped, he looks down at the grave, then bending, plucks a stemmed flower from a bouquet and slowly spins it in his fingers continuing to stare at the mound. As if by silent agreement, FANNY gets up from the still-sitting JUNIPER and moves in behind MAPLES. Then, just as she begins to open her arms, he kneels down, with some difficulty, to the grave. FANNY’S gown blooms beneath her as she kneels, as well. MAPLES casts a quick glance at the REPORTER, and then places the flower on the grave and flattens his palm beside it. Breathing out something between a sigh and a moan, he falls face forward upon the mound and lies still, save for his shoulders, which are bobbing. FANNY watches him for a moment, then gently lowers herself until she’s lying obliquely across his back, her head next to his. For a long moment, they remain in that position, then FANNY slowly disengages, gets to her feet, and joins Juniper. MAPLES continues lying on the mound, very still.]
REPORTER’S VOICE, OFFSTAGE:
Mister Maples—Tom!
(He enters, UPSTAGE LEFT, and sprints to MAPLES’ side)
MAPLES:
(Jerking at the REPORTER’S voice, he pulls himself up, with quivering arms) to the hands-and-knees position)
I hear ya Robert—I’m fine. I’m fine. If you’ll just hoist me to my feet …
REPORTER:
(Helping him up)
But are you okay? Did you fall? I thought you were dead? I don’t think I could endure another funeral here!
MAPLES:
It’s these damn legs. Dead?! Oh, hell man—don’t be so dad-blamed dramatic!
REPORTER:
You almost gave me a heart attack!
MAPLES:
I told you I’m fine! Now … Robert … If we’re gonna see Flourney’s grave before it gets pitch dark, we’d best be heading out.
REPORTER:
(Draping his arm across MAPLES’ back)
Let me help you. How far away is it?
MAPLES:
It’s over yonder. Past where you were sitting.
(As they cross to UPSTAGE LEFT, MAPLES can be seen squirming to get out from under the REPORTER’S arm)
Quit being such a mother hen!
[The two EXIT UPSTAGE LEFT, continuing to talk (extemporaneously). FANNY and JUNIPER follow behind and EXIT as the curtain closes]
BRIEF INTERMISSION
[The curtain opens to a new setting: CENTERSTAGE is a huge statue that looms above all the small gravestones covering the rest of the stage. The statue sits within a ten-foot square of wrought iron fencing. MAPLES and the REPORTER enter DOWNSTAGE RIGHT, followed by FANNY and JUNIPER, who overtake them, arriving at the statue, where they turn, smiling, watching the others’ faces intently]
REPORTER:
(Staring, mouth hung open, first at the stature, then at a grinning MAPLES)
What?! I see it but I can’t believe—is that—?
MAPLES:
I wish Fanny could see your face.
(beat)
It’s Flourney, all right, but I reckon it's unlike any Flourney you could ever imagine seeing. Fanny got an old newspaper cartoon from eighty-five … of Flourney with a judge hanging out of his pocket.
REPORTER:
I know it! I know the one. So the stone carver made Flourney’s head in caricature from that cartoon.
MAPLES:
Yes, but what I like is how he captured Flourney’s comical expression just after fate had unraveled the threads at the top of the gunnysack and had it fall to his shoulders. You can even make out one of the eyeholes—see it?—within the folds of gunnysack on his right shoulder. See…? It’s like Hemslin—that’s the carver I commissioned—caught Flourney’s face with the baffled look of someone who’d just been discovered! And now he can never hide behind his anonymity.
REPORTER:
Genius! I can see why it would cost twenty-two hundred dollars!
(Beat)
But wait! Speaking of that … there would still have been better than nine-thousand dollars left in that account.
MAPLES:
You mean what happened to it?
(chuckling)
Always the reporter! Yes, it’s about that amount. Fanny called what remained miscellaneous upkeep. As a matter of fact, I’m putting it all in the Brady Bank Monday morning. Might as well draw interest—pull it out only when needed.
REPORTER:
But upkeep!
MAPLES:
Yes! They’d just done the cleanup this morning, on account of today’s funeral. Usually, they’d wait until after the weekend to haul away the trash.
REPORTER:
What! What trash? Why would there be— What are you —?
MAPLES:
Just wait … You’ll see why soon enough.
REPORTER:
(They move closer and he squints, leaning in)
What is that … a carved inscription…? I wish we had a flashlight. I can hardly make it out.
[FANNY and JUNIPER smile broadly, watching THE REPORTER read the words. It is already nearly dark, and as he reads, he moves his head to various angles to catch the last rays of the light, (the stage light dimming more and more as he progresses through the poem).]
REPORTER:
(Standing at the base, the statue looming above him, he reads aloud, but with some difficulty in the nearly complete darkness.)
The world won’t soon forget you, Thurston Flourney
Although I’m sure you wish they would.
Eternity won’t let you conceal your journey
’Neath that scraggly gunnysack’d hood.
Oh, you’ll get your right-proper judgment someday
Where naked you’ll squirm and you’ll gnash your teeth.
But that will be private—leave our needs unallayed;
Down here we need something your deeds have bequeathed.
So, bold visitors! Raise high your rotted fruit—your spoiled eggs
And with nary a qualm, let them fly;
For any part that they hit will be gilding the dregs
Of a life I refuse to let die.
[By the time he finishes, the stage is completely dark, except for a powdery nimbus of light surrounding FANNY and JUNIPER, holding hands and watching, some distance away; only the REPORTER and MAPLES' laughter can be heard continuing on in the darkness]
REPORTER (Continues):
(A significant pause follows the laughter)
But wait! The poem! It’s the poem!
MAPLES' VOICE:
Fanny tore it off the bottom of what I recognized later as the ledger sheet and she gave it to me.
REPORTER'S VOICE:
Written by Elizabeth Albright?
MAPLES' VOICE:
Yes.
REPORTER'S VOICE:
Seems like she’d always intended it to be an inscription—but not necessarily at the base of a huge statue.
MAPLES' VOICE:
We’ll never know. But even if she had … the idea of that unstatue-like Thurston Flourney face could only come from the twisted genius of our Fanny Barnwarmer.
[With all else in darkness, FANNY BARNWARMER within the nimbus of shimmering sight, touches the fingertips of both hands to her lips and offers a kiss out toward both men, consumed by darkness]
REPORTER'S VOICE:
Hear, hear!
[FANNY bows deeply]
CURTAIN
| Author Notes |
A million thankyous to those of you who stuck it out from the beginning. Looking back, I think I owe myself a huge congratulations for finishing it. With all its flaws, and they are there aplenty, I have pushed through till the final curtain. I have learned something about perseverance. I don't like it.
JS |
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