The Reckoning Page #2

from holy grace and with him, all.

I, God,

great in majesty,

in whom no first

or last can be.

Heaven and Earth are made through me.

And at my bidding

now... be light.

( audience member chuckles )

With breath and body...

him to bless,

above all creatures...

both great... and less.

The serpent...

( hisses )

...came with song...

and smile, but Adam slept,

free from his wiles.

And while he slumbered,

thus alone,

I drew from him a single bone...

and fashioned forth

a human mate...

that mankind might itself cre--

( clears throat )

Create.

( dog barks in distance )

( Tobias shouts ):

Ghostly paradise...

I was in.

But thence I fell,

and through my sin...

( hisses )

...Earthly Paradise, my God's gift,

men and women dwell within.

I have tried my all, but in vain,

by my wiles to bring them pain.

( hissing )

By my wiles to bring them pain.

By my wiles to bring them pain!

Or must I say that line again?

If the world belong to thee,

lord of all things thou wouldst be.

TOBIAS:

If the world belonged to me,

women all would ready be

to harken

to the devil!

( roars )

I'm-- I'm sorry.

( cries )

MARTIN:

Two measly shillings.

We used to make ten.

TOBIAS:

Not exactly a fortune, is it?

Well, it is enough to bury

Brendan and be on our way.

Oh, Brendan, Brendan.

Who would have thought he would

end up in this hellhole?

MARTIN:
Father?

Father?

We'd like to have a word with you.

There's a friend of ours

we'd like to have buried.

Dead, I trust?

PRIEST:
As you can see,

we're a little busy here.

( woman shouting indistinctly

in distance )

A child's grave.

Thomas Wells.

MAN:
Come now.

NICHOLAS:

The boy murdered by the woman?

MAN:
Aye.

She, uh, strangled him.

Yeah.

- Six shillings.

- Six?

Six.

Six shillings.

Are you, by any chance,

related to the innkeeper?

I am not some tinker

to be bartered with.

We'll bury him in a wood

out of town.

I promised him hallowed ground.

We have no choice, Martin.

You understand?

What kind of God

inflicts such suffering

on his loyal servant?

Or, indeed, his own son?

( Nicholas speaking Latin )

- Amen.

- ACTORS:
Amen.

TOBIAS:

Goodbye, old friend.

Nicholas, thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you, Father.

( attempts to speak Latin )

- It's just you, a priest.

- Martin, shh. Please.

What did you do?

A priest on the road,

traveling incognito.

A man's secrets are his own, Tobias.

No, no, no, it's fine.

I should tell.

I lay with a woman from my village...

another man's wife.

Ahh...

I thought that went with the job.

- MARTIN:
Enough said, I think.

- No, no, no, no, no.

I want to know every

sordid little detail.

Get off.

Get off of me.

It's been so long.

STEPHEN:

You're the devil, my guest.

- TOBIAS:
Stephen!

- Tobias!

( grunts )

( laughs loudly )

Stay.

( soft romantic theme playing )

What are you really running from?

I see it in you.

Not the woman.

Some darker secret.

As long as you're with us...

...you force us to carry it too.

( light snoring )

( bird flutters )

( distorted scream )

( woman vocalizes )

( groans )

Where will you go?

The traveler's friend.

Saint Christopher.

It was my mother's,

and her mother's before her.

Where is she now?

Plague.

Who did you lose?

A sister.

I begged to be taken with her.

And God had another purpose for you?

I--

I think he's given up

hope on me by now.

Without you,

a good man would not have

received the burial he deserved.

You've earned our thanks,

I daresay.

Our friendship will follow.

It may not be much...

but it's more than lies out there.

( rooster crows, dog barks )

Nicholas, would you have paid

good money to have seen

our play last night?

You're not alone.

No one comes to see us anymore.

Our purse is always empty,

our stomachs rarely full.

In Wakefield and York

the guilds put on cycles

of all of the mysteries in a week,

everything from the fall of Lucifer

to the Day of Judgment.

In Coventry, I saw Christ

resurrected from the tomb,

hoisted up to the heavens

on a cord not visible to the eye.

- How can we match them?

- You can't.

Not unless we change our stories.

You can't change stories,

they're written in the Bible.

I'm talking about new stories.

Ask yourself--

What matters more

to the people of this town,

Eve's temptation of Adam,

or the murder of a young boy

who's lived among them for years?

( pig squeals )

Feast of Saint Lazarus.

Bad day for pigs.

I'll settle up with the cartwright.

Martin?

It's a gift.

( Stephen clears throat )

STEPHEN:
That ass-faced

innkeeper and his poisonous ale,

I'll be glad to see

the back of both of them.

Bad news.

The axle can't be repaired.

It has to be replaced.

TOBIAS:
How much?

We must perform again.

I can barely stand upright,

let alone prance about

a yard on stilts.

You may not have to.

I have a proposal.

We change our play.

Oh, please, please,

not the Crucifixion.

All that hollering.

A new play.

A play about greed,

temptation and mortal sin.

A tale in which

virtue and vice contend

for the soul of a young woman,

and justice prevails as she must.

- Thomas Wells?

- STRAW:
Thomas who?

He's the young lad

who sleeps beneath Brendan.

I knew it.

The one that girl murdered.

STEPHEN:
Who dares play things

that happen in this world?

It was just a question of time.

I believe this is the way plays

will be made in times to come.

Ah, so you've been saying

for years.

But what did your father

think of your ideas?

By naming me as his successor,

I believe he was condoning them.

Lies! Lies, Martin.

Even at the last.

Lies, and you know it.

Your father'd turn in his grave

if he could hear you now.

I don't know about that.

It's a tight fit in there.

Martin, it's just a killing.

So was Cain and Abel,

and we've played it often.

Cain and Abel is in the Bible.

God has not revealed to us

the meaning of this story.

So much of God's meaning

remains hidden to us.

Why does he visit blights

upon our crops,

plagues upon our people?

The priests spout empty words

from the pulpit,

but we can show the people

God's hand at work

with real stories,

in events that touch us directly.

Why did she kill him?

You've no voice in this.

But I have.

Greed. The boy was carrying

his father's purse at the time.

She lured him off the road,

then strangled him.

Then the road is the way of life.

- The path of righteousness.

- MARTIN:
Yes.

And by turning aside for temptation,

the boy found death lurking for him.

Don't you see?

It's a morality play.

Only the figures are different.

So where are the words for this play?

We can do it in mime,

speak words as we think them.

Tobias?

The minds of men may change...

but we have no authority

from God on this.

Aye, yeah.

- I'm still against it.

- So am I.

Well, why not?

We are stuck here till tomorrow,

like it or not.

Springer?

MARTIN:

Three for, two against.

The deciding vote is yours.

An equal split

goes against the proposal.

Remember, you're a priest.

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