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JOHN CLARE: You know the most of it, apparently. The wife berated him a while until he upped and made a full confession, whereat she berated him some more. A little while ago he raised the point of her being aware of what was going on and in this sense being complicit in their abject circumstances.
WOMAN: How did she take that?
JOHN CLARE: Not noticeably well, in the first instance. She made her outraged denials though I could not help but feel they were half-hearted at the bottom of it. Then, after some time it seemed that she accepted what was said, whereafter she became more haunted and contrite. Most recently she seemed concerned by the idea that they might be in hell, although it seems to me a more widespread and popular opinion that the whole of this is purgatory.
WOMAN: What, this? Nah, bollocks, this is heaven. All of this is heaven.
JOHN CLARE: Is it?
WOMAN: Well, of course it is. Look at it. It’s miraculous.
JOHN CLARE: What, even with the incest and the misery?
WOMAN: That there’s anything alive at all to interfere with its own children; that there’s children; that there’s sexual interference; that we can feel misery. The way I see it, on the whole there’s not much to complain about. Its heaven. Even in a concentration camp or when you’re getting beaten up and raped, even if it’s an off day, it’s still heaven. You’re not telling me that you wrote all that stuff about the seasons and the ladybird and everything and you don’t know that?
JOHN CLARE: Are you sure you’re not a proper saint?
WOMAN: If you knew half the things I did when I was younger then you wouldn’t even ask. We’re either none of us saints, or we all are.
JOHN CLARE: Not just an appointed few of us as Mr. Bunyan was suggesting?
WOMAN: I don’t know who that is, but no. Definitely not. It’s all or nothing, shit or bust across the board. We’re saints and sinners both, the lot of us, or else there’s no saints and no sinners.
JOHN CLARE: Oh, I think there’s sinners, right enough, though I don’t know about the saints. For my own part, I think that in my life I may have done a monstrous and ignoble thing.
WOMAN: Aw, love. You shouldn’t slap yourself about. We’ve all done bad things, or we think we have. It’s only when you can’t face up to ’em and put ’em in perspective that you end up stuck to them, so that that’s who you are and where you are forever.
JOHN CLARE: That’s an awful long time to be stuck to something dismal.
WOMAN: Well, you’re not wrong. [JOHN CLARE and the HALF-CASTE WOMAN lapse into thoughtful silence, gazing at the HUSBAND and WIFE seated on the steps.]
WIFE: [After a long pause, in which her expression has changed from guilty and haunted to a more cold-eyed and pragmatic look.] So, what are we going to do about it?
HUSBAND: [Looks up at her, surprised.] We?
WIFE: You spelled it out. We’re both involved.
HUSBAND: We are. I’m glad you see it.
WIFE: And if it comes out for either of us both of us are done for, or at least round here and where else should we go? I see that, too.
HUSBAND: What are you saying, then?
WIFE: I’m saying that there’s people round here know us. We’ve got friends here, Johnny, and acquaintances. We’ve got our lives here. We’ve got prospects.
HUSBAND: Have we?
WIFE: [Hissing with urgency.] Yes! We’ve got more prospects than if anyone finds out you’ve put that filthy thing of yours in Audrey! And what should they think of me? I won’t let you destroy us, Johnny. And I won’t let her destroy us.
HUSBAND: But … I mean, it isn’t going to come to that for certain. Is it? I mean, perhaps if when she’s calmed down I talked to her …
WIFE: Oh, yes. That’ll help the situation. Evidently you can talk her pants off, and that’s how we got here! She’s out for revenge, you silly sod. She flirts with you and leads you on with all her skirts and brassieres and when you’re Muggins enough to fall for it, she wants her bit of drama, her theatricals.
HUSBAND: She did. She led me on.
WIFE: And now she’s staging her performance so that everyone can hear.
HUSBAND: [Suddenly confused and alarmed.] You were the one said it had stopped!
