31 Plays in 31 Days, #31 - “Marginalia”
Aug. 31st, 2023 07:46 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
breakinglight11I did it. I finished 31 Plays in 31 Days 2023, the scene I’ve been struggling with all month, and the first draft of Mrs. Hawking part 7. And here it is.
It doesn’t completely work in sequence with all the other pieces drafted for version 1. But that’s okay; complete is the first step on the path to finalized. And I think I managed to work out some stuff that was delaying me, which will inform the edit when I go in for version 2. I’m really happy and relieved, as it was delayed as hell and I was really struggling. But there’s some interesting stuff in here that can be polished into something real.
This piece goes after 2022’s #14 - “Another Young Girl” and before 2023’s #11 - “Hurt.” Also, I changed the name of a minor character mentioned in here from Faith Tanner to Maggie Tanner. I needed to use the name Faith elsewhere.
And that’s 31P31D 2023, scene 2.4, and Hawking part 7.
Photo by Dan Fox
Day #31 - “Marginalia”
From the Mrs. Hawking series
By Phoebe Roberts
London, England, 1890
VICTORIA HAWKING, lady’s champion of London, early fifties
BEATRICE HAWKING, her grandniece, mid teens
~~~
MRS. HAWKING: Indeed, you a bright young creature with a brain in her head and fire in her guts. And that, I’m afraid, is the problem.
BEATRICE: Why ever would that be?
MRS. HAWKING: Because I am not good for bright young creatures who take an interest in my work. And I can’t bear to go through it again.
BEATRICE: I don’t know what that means.
MRS. HAWKING: No. You wouldn’t. But it’s late, girl; you’ll stay in the blue room tonight, and we’ll call you a cab first thing in the morning.
BEATRICE: (Sighing) Yes, Auntie. But not yet— not while you’re still working. You are working, aren’t you?
MRS. HAWKING: Trying to. But… I’ve a great deal on my mind.
BEATRICE: This picture… is this you when you were a little girl? Who is the lady with her hair in a scarf?
MRS. HAWKING: Madam Amina. My amah.
BEATRICE: What’s an amah?
MRS. HAWKING: Like a nanny, but… more to me.
BEATRICE: And the book… Pride and Prejudice, the missing girl’s favorite. But you have two copies?
MRS. HAWKING: One is… well, it’s mine. The other, the one found in the girl Maggie Tanner’s room.
BEATRICE: Oh, she’s written all through it. Notes in the margins, and passages underlined— “Mary wished to say something very sensible, but knew not how.” And she writes “Road to Hell paved with good intents.” (Laughs) She’s funny.
MRS. HAWKING: Be careful, girl! That is evidence!
BEATRICE: How do you know? Because of the notes?
MRS. HAWKING: Because the housekeeper, who loved the girl like a daughter, said this book was her most treasured possession. When she disappeared, all her most precious things went with her— except for this. There must be some significance to it.
BEATRICE: Oh, Auntie— that is a cracking mystery! You must let me help you puzzle it out!
MRS. HAWKING: This is not a game, Beatrice!
BEATRICE: I know! That’s why it’s too important for you not to try anything you can. You said this girl is about my age, wasn’t she? I could tell you about what we do!
MRS. HAWKING: You think a petted princess like yourself would know anything of how a kitchen maid thinks?
BEATRICE: Better than you. If you think she’s told her mother everything.
(Pause.)
MRS. HAWKING: Hm. Then… see here what you think of this. When I examined the book, I found several pages, very precisely cut out from the binding, contained to a very specific part of the story.
BEATRICE: Really? What part?
MRS. HAWKING: According to my copy, it’s Mr. Darcy’s letter to Elizabeth, after she rejects his proposal of marriage.
BEATRICE: Ohhhhhhh!
MRS. HAWKING: What? What about it?
BEATRICE: Well, there’s so much in it— and it must mean something to her! How he warned Mr. Bingley away from Jane, because he thought she was a fortune hunter. How Mr. Wickham was a cad, who tried to seduce Darcy’s little sister.
MRS. HAWKING: So you think she cut it out because it bore some significance to her own life.
BEATRICE: We know the story meant a great deal to her! It wasn’t that she needed a few scraps of paper— why would she cut it with such care?
MRS. HAWKING: By why cut it at all? If the book was so precious to her, even if it spoke to her so deeply?
BEATRICE: She… she wouldn’t, would she? She wrote her thoughts in it, she read it again and again. Why would she need to— oh! To give it to someone else! Someone she thought ought to read it!
MRS. HAWKING: So it isn’t her circumstances she saw in the text— it was someone else’s. Someone she wanted to see it. Perhaps learn from it.
BEATRICE: Did she know anyone like that? Someone with a caddish suitor, or chased by a fortune hunter?
MRS. HAWKING: I doubt a kitchen maid had the ear of anyone who’d attract fortune hunters… but cads, I’d be sure her friends would find in force. But who?
BEATRICE: You could ask the housekeeper!
MRS. HAWKING: If she knows all the girl’s friends… and as you suggest, even if she did, they might not confide their romantic escapades to her. Particularly the unsuitable ones. But how are we to— perhaps… her margin notes!
BEATRICE: Yes! See what she’s written in the parts about Mr. Wickham, and Lydia. Or Georgiana Darcy!
(MRS. HAWKING flips through the book.)
MRS. HAWKING: Begin when Wickham first appears, bearing a tale about a robbed inheritance… “Cry Tears, tin soldier— men tell such Lies.” Heh, a clever girl indeed, it seems.
BEATRICE: Are there many men like George Wickham?
MRS. HAWKING: If there were not, my dear, I might have become a ballet dancer. And here, “Sounds much like Faith,” when he begins to charm Elizabeth. And here, “Faith sees much the same.”
BEATRICE: What does she mean? That… these women had faith in him?
MRS. HAWKING: Perhaps, but… here! “F, how can you? Be wiser!” Oh, that’s her! Do you see?
BEATRICE: You mean— Faith is a person! A woman deceived by a cad! Who Maggie Tanner wanted to warn her away from!
MRS. HAWKING: If we find this Faith, we can find that cad. And see what they know of what’s happened to Miss Tanner.
BEATRICE: What if— what if this man did something to her? That made it so she had to disappear? Or— made her disappear?
MRS. HAWKING: Then he’ll have to answer to me.
BEATRICE: What will you do?
MRS. HAWKING: We’ll have to sound him out first. But I have saved women from dangerous men before. Blast it, if not for this shoulder, I could string him up by his heels and wring the truth from him that way!
BEATRICE: Yes, but… you can’t do that.
MRS. HAWKING: I beg your pardon?
It doesn’t completely work in sequence with all the other pieces drafted for version 1. But that’s okay; complete is the first step on the path to finalized. And I think I managed to work out some stuff that was delaying me, which will inform the edit when I go in for version 2. I’m really happy and relieved, as it was delayed as hell and I was really struggling. But there’s some interesting stuff in here that can be polished into something real.
This piece goes after 2022’s #14 - “Another Young Girl” and before 2023’s #11 - “Hurt.” Also, I changed the name of a minor character mentioned in here from Faith Tanner to Maggie Tanner. I needed to use the name Faith elsewhere.
And that’s 31P31D 2023, scene 2.4, and Hawking part 7.
Photo by Dan Fox
Day #31 - “Marginalia”
From the Mrs. Hawking series
By Phoebe Roberts
London, England, 1890
VICTORIA HAWKING, lady’s champion of London, early fifties
BEATRICE HAWKING, her grandniece, mid teens
~~~
MRS. HAWKING: Indeed, you a bright young creature with a brain in her head and fire in her guts. And that, I’m afraid, is the problem.
BEATRICE: Why ever would that be?
MRS. HAWKING: Because I am not good for bright young creatures who take an interest in my work. And I can’t bear to go through it again.
BEATRICE: I don’t know what that means.
MRS. HAWKING: No. You wouldn’t. But it’s late, girl; you’ll stay in the blue room tonight, and we’ll call you a cab first thing in the morning.
BEATRICE: (Sighing) Yes, Auntie. But not yet— not while you’re still working. You are working, aren’t you?
MRS. HAWKING: Trying to. But… I’ve a great deal on my mind.
BEATRICE: This picture… is this you when you were a little girl? Who is the lady with her hair in a scarf?
MRS. HAWKING: Madam Amina. My amah.
BEATRICE: What’s an amah?
MRS. HAWKING: Like a nanny, but… more to me.
BEATRICE: And the book… Pride and Prejudice, the missing girl’s favorite. But you have two copies?
MRS. HAWKING: One is… well, it’s mine. The other, the one found in the girl Maggie Tanner’s room.
BEATRICE: Oh, she’s written all through it. Notes in the margins, and passages underlined— “Mary wished to say something very sensible, but knew not how.” And she writes “Road to Hell paved with good intents.” (Laughs) She’s funny.
MRS. HAWKING: Be careful, girl! That is evidence!
BEATRICE: How do you know? Because of the notes?
MRS. HAWKING: Because the housekeeper, who loved the girl like a daughter, said this book was her most treasured possession. When she disappeared, all her most precious things went with her— except for this. There must be some significance to it.
BEATRICE: Oh, Auntie— that is a cracking mystery! You must let me help you puzzle it out!
MRS. HAWKING: This is not a game, Beatrice!
BEATRICE: I know! That’s why it’s too important for you not to try anything you can. You said this girl is about my age, wasn’t she? I could tell you about what we do!
MRS. HAWKING: You think a petted princess like yourself would know anything of how a kitchen maid thinks?
BEATRICE: Better than you. If you think she’s told her mother everything.
(Pause.)
MRS. HAWKING: Hm. Then… see here what you think of this. When I examined the book, I found several pages, very precisely cut out from the binding, contained to a very specific part of the story.
BEATRICE: Really? What part?
MRS. HAWKING: According to my copy, it’s Mr. Darcy’s letter to Elizabeth, after she rejects his proposal of marriage.
BEATRICE: Ohhhhhhh!
MRS. HAWKING: What? What about it?
BEATRICE: Well, there’s so much in it— and it must mean something to her! How he warned Mr. Bingley away from Jane, because he thought she was a fortune hunter. How Mr. Wickham was a cad, who tried to seduce Darcy’s little sister.
MRS. HAWKING: So you think she cut it out because it bore some significance to her own life.
BEATRICE: We know the story meant a great deal to her! It wasn’t that she needed a few scraps of paper— why would she cut it with such care?
MRS. HAWKING: By why cut it at all? If the book was so precious to her, even if it spoke to her so deeply?
BEATRICE: She… she wouldn’t, would she? She wrote her thoughts in it, she read it again and again. Why would she need to— oh! To give it to someone else! Someone she thought ought to read it!
MRS. HAWKING: So it isn’t her circumstances she saw in the text— it was someone else’s. Someone she wanted to see it. Perhaps learn from it.
BEATRICE: Did she know anyone like that? Someone with a caddish suitor, or chased by a fortune hunter?
MRS. HAWKING: I doubt a kitchen maid had the ear of anyone who’d attract fortune hunters… but cads, I’d be sure her friends would find in force. But who?
BEATRICE: You could ask the housekeeper!
MRS. HAWKING: If she knows all the girl’s friends… and as you suggest, even if she did, they might not confide their romantic escapades to her. Particularly the unsuitable ones. But how are we to— perhaps… her margin notes!
BEATRICE: Yes! See what she’s written in the parts about Mr. Wickham, and Lydia. Or Georgiana Darcy!
(MRS. HAWKING flips through the book.)
MRS. HAWKING: Begin when Wickham first appears, bearing a tale about a robbed inheritance… “Cry Tears, tin soldier— men tell such Lies.” Heh, a clever girl indeed, it seems.
BEATRICE: Are there many men like George Wickham?
MRS. HAWKING: If there were not, my dear, I might have become a ballet dancer. And here, “Sounds much like Faith,” when he begins to charm Elizabeth. And here, “Faith sees much the same.”
BEATRICE: What does she mean? That… these women had faith in him?
MRS. HAWKING: Perhaps, but… here! “F, how can you? Be wiser!” Oh, that’s her! Do you see?
BEATRICE: You mean— Faith is a person! A woman deceived by a cad! Who Maggie Tanner wanted to warn her away from!
MRS. HAWKING: If we find this Faith, we can find that cad. And see what they know of what’s happened to Miss Tanner.
BEATRICE: What if— what if this man did something to her? That made it so she had to disappear? Or— made her disappear?
MRS. HAWKING: Then he’ll have to answer to me.
BEATRICE: What will you do?
MRS. HAWKING: We’ll have to sound him out first. But I have saved women from dangerous men before. Blast it, if not for this shoulder, I could string him up by his heels and wring the truth from him that way!
BEATRICE: Yes, but… you can’t do that.
MRS. HAWKING: I beg your pardon?
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