Cast

Lord Byron

Joe Murray

Nanny Smith

Lucy

Susan

John Hanson

the Hon. Catherine Byron

 

 

 

 

Scene 1

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Newstead Abbey library, 1807

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JM: My Lord (raps on door) - my Lord?

B(yawns): Murray - what is it, you've interrupted a most unpleasant dream (to self: and excellent fodder it was too to reflect gloomily over with what's left of my brandy)

JM: Your solicitor man Hanson - from London - is here with his man-servants, grooms and cooks - where am I to put them? - there is only sea-coal enough for 'ere and t'kitchen! Lucy 'n Susan have taken t'warming the bed sheets by themselves - what are we to do my Lord?!

B: Hanson, is it? Well, show him in Murray - perchance it is good news and he has finally sold my mines

JM: But his staff - his luggage - where are they to go - what are they to eat..

B: Good god Murray...

JM: What are they to drink?

B(starts, violently): Send them to mothers in Southwell

​Bless me! did I ever? No, I never

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H's man Thaddy opens the door, bows low

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JH: Good day t'ye, Byron (screws up nostrils) - Thaddy - fetch me my decanters (sneers at sopha) the green velvet cushion and a bottle of cologne - off with you! (T bows, departs) - well, my lord, you can assume by my coach and four - humph! - and it's months-old upholserty - that the state of my diminished fortunes are tied with your own - your Rochdale mines are unsold - you have not been collecting rents or kept me in ready cash - and you remain unbetrothed to any class of fortune

B(sneers painfully): Good day, Mr. Hanson (looks out to glossy yellow carriage) - my sympathies are indeed with you, I'll have Joe and Nanny remember you in their prayers

H: Sarcasm ill-becomes you - my lord - and will not pay for slates or window panes (yells) Thaddy?!

B: You'll have brandy, Hanson

H: I'll await my own bottle - I am unused to the coarser vintages

B: You'll sit - here - by the fire?

H: I should not want to appropriate such a meagre feast of heat - and will await my own seating apparatus

B: Just so - you shall take some direction standing upright and sober, Mr. Hanson (grinds teeth, inhales with force) - thou - as my employee - Hanson - are responsible to collecting my rents, you are responsible to clearing the deed to my mines 

JH: I find my stay has prolonged beyond Expectations at Rochdale, only in furthering your Lordship’s Interest & that I have no great report to make

​your silence {has been} so protracted, that I fear some personal accident or illness has prevented you from fulfilling your intentions in both these respects – – As to myself I have no great curiosity in the business o

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Thaddy enters with goods

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H: Thaddy - take them back to my coach, we are leaving - Byron, I will not tolerate such calls to account you shall have to sell or raise funds another way - good day

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H leaves, swipes a silver candlestick on his way out

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​​​Scene 2

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​​Byron calls staff into library

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B: I shall not mince my words (paces) - the Abbey is in peril - and your employment - unless funds are raised - and pronto - it will fall to one of Hanson's cronies

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Gasps and weeping ensue

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​​NS: I heard tell in Sir John of the Little Beard's time there was a deal of money buried about the Abbey by the monks in old times

JM: Aye - my father spaked of taking up the flagging in the cloisters - they digged and digged, but found nothing but stone coffins full of  old bones

Then he must needs have one of the coffins put in one end of the great hall, so that the servants were afraid to go there of nights. Several of the skulls were cleaned and put in frames in his room. I used to have to go into the room at night to shut the windows, and if I glanced an eye at them, they all seemed to grin; which I believe skulls always do. I can’t say but I was glad to get out of the room.

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Sir John Byron the Little with the great Beard

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“There was at one time (and for that matter there is still) a good deal said about ghosts haunting about the Abbey. The keeper’s wife said she saw two standing in a dark part of the cloisters just opposite the chapel, and one in the garden by the lord’s well. Then there was a young lady, a cousin of Lord Byron, who was staying in the Abbey and slept in the room next the clock; and she told me that one night when she was lying in bed, she saw a lady in white come out of the wall on one side of the room, and go into the wall on the opposite side.

“Lord Byron one day said to me, ‘Nanny, what nonsense they tell about ghosts, as if there ever were any such things. I have never seen any thing of the kind about the Abbey, and I warrant you have not.’ This was all done, do you see, to draw me out; but I said nothing, but shook my head. However, they say his lordship did once see something. It was in the great hall—something all black and hairy, he said it was the devil.

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