Twist of Gold

  COLONEL: You are all farmers. You know your land, you know your stock, you can read the weather from the wind, from the clouds. You know when to plough and when to till.

  The FARMERS murmur their assent.

  I can do none of those things. But I am – or was – a soldier. My business was to lead men into danger – and to bring them through it. I have also been Captain of a ship. I have to tell you that as a soldier I never lost a battle, and as a ship’s Captain I never lost a ship. Those are my qualifications.

  FARMER: We need a younger man.

  COLONEL: We need young men to drive the wagons and the stock, young men to forage, to hunt and to scout. Every one of you here – man, woman, and child, young and old, has their part to play. Ahead of us lie two thousand miles of some of the worst terrain on earth: scorching plains, flooding rivers, and the deserts. I will get you across it all, if you will let me. As your leader I will have to make harsh decisions on your behalf, decisions you may not approve of, decisions you may not like. But if I lead you, I make the rules. I know no other way to command. I don’t expect you to like me. But I do expect to reach California, with all of you – alive.

  FARMER/MATT COLBY: That’s straight talkin’, Colonel. I’m Matt Colby, farmer from Illinois, and I surely like what I hear. You get my vote. We got all the wagons we need. We got all our cattle. We got our families. And I wanna be first on the trail, first to the grazing, first to every water hole. I don’t want the prairies eaten and hunted out in front of us. I don’t wanna eat dust for two thousand miles. I say we puts our trust in this Colonel and makes him our Captain.

  The FARMERS voice their assent.

  COLONEL: I thank you Matt Colby, friends; I thank you for your confidence. We should leave at dawn. And we should post a sentry at every fourth wagon as we await sunrise. Tomorrow when we leave, I want two tight lines of wagons. No stragglers. If you have got a problem with a wheel and a shaft, you let the out-riders know and they’ll tell me. We’ll be leaving no one behind. And we shall want two men to ride upfront with the guide – we do have a guide, I hope?

  FRENCH CHARLIE steps forward.

  FRENCH CHARLIE: Charlie Charbonnier: French Charlie they call me.

  COLONEL: Well, French Charlie, here’s the rules: no one leaves the camp alone at night; no one goes unarmed outside the perimeter of the corral; and no alcohol – water is our fuel. Fill the barrels to the brim, Mr Colby.

  FRENCH CHARLIE: No whiskey?

  COLONEL: No whiskey. Guns and whiskey do not mix. Whiskey saps a man and we shall need all our strength to reach California. Now, goodnight to you all: to your beds and sleep well. We’ve an early start tomorrow.

  The FARMERS leave.

  SEAN: Well, that was quite something, Colonel.

  ANNIE: I didn’t know your name was Paul.

  COLONEL: You never asked. Now you take a blanket and sleep, both of you.

  SEAN: But I’m too excited to sleep.

  COLONEL: Lie down and look up at the stars.

  They do so. Quiet, apart from the cicadas.

  (In a lullaby voice.) Always a source of wonder to me, children, that up there somewhere in the stars could be an old Colonel looking right up at us and saying to his children: ‘Always a source of wonder to me, children, that up there somewhere in the stars could be an old Colonel looking right up at us and saying to his children: “Always a source of wonder to me, children, that up there somewhere …”.’

  And they have fallen asleep.

  * * *

  Dawn. The braying of horses. The lowing of cattle. The preparations of the wagon train. FRENCH CHARLIE approaches.

  FRENCH CHARLIE: Morning, Colonel.

  COLONEL: French Charlie. You will ride out a mile ahead of the column and send back a scout to report any problems to me – Indians, river crossings. I reckon we should be travelling fifteen, twenty miles a day, all being well.

  FRENCH CHARLIE: You’ll be lucky.

  COLONEL: I hope so, Mr Charbonnier. Now, Mr Colby, we have a heck of a way to go, so let them wagons roll!

  Yee-hah! And they’re off. SEAN plays a jig to set them on their way.

  * * *

  The journey passes – hot, dusty – and passes some more. Music. Weeks, months go by and are endured.

  MATT COLBY serves up the water from the barrel – equal ladles to each.

  FRENCH CHARLIE: I’ll have some more water, if you please.

  MATT COLBY looks at the COLONEL.

  COLONEL: Mr Charbonnier?

  FRENCH CHARLIE: I work harder than the others. ’Sonly right.

  COLONEL: If you take more than your fair share, then that means there’s less for the next person – and none for the next. No one will have more than his ration. We survive only if we share.

  FRENCH CHARLIE draws a gun on the COLONEL.

  FRENCH CHARLIE: I suggest you change your mind, Colonel.

  The COLONEL draws his gun on FRENCH CHARLIE.

  COLONEL: If you force me to shoot you, I will.

  A THIRD MAN draws his gun on the COLONEL.

  THIRD MAN/BOUNTY HUNTER: I bin’ meanin’ to catch up with you, Colonel.

  The BOUNTY HUNTER spies the CHILDREN.

  BOUNTY HUNTER: Well, lookee who’s here. Now I got a nice surprise for you. French Charlie here wanted to kill you all, but I said no, that ain’t right. We’ll just leave ’em out here in the middle of nowhere without a drop of water. An’ French Charlie agreed. Now ain’t that just fine? Course, ’fore we leave, I’d be obliged if you’d open that fiddle case of your’n young man, and hand me that gold necklet.

  SEAN: I won’t!

  COLONEL: Do as he says, Sean.

  SEAN reluctantly does as he says.

  BOUNTY HUNTER: You’ll have to kill me to get this off me again. An’ you ain’t about to do that, is you? ’Fraid we ain’t got no water to spare – a man dries out slowly in the sun…

  FRENCH CHARLIE: (Addressing MATT COLBY.) Now yous all be comin’ with us. I’m the only one knows the way through this wilderness. And you can drink as much whiskey as you like to help you through.

  ANNIE: (Railing at BOUNTY HUNTER.) You take our torc with you, Mister, an’ you’ll die. ’Tis the O’Brien torc.

  BOUNTY HUNTER: We all gotta die, girl.

  MATT COLBY: I’m staying with the Colonel and the children.

  FRENCH CHARLIE: We ain’t leaving you no water. You gotta know that.

  MATT COLBY: I reckons I got more chance with the Colonel than yous got without him.

  COLONEL: No, Matt. You go with them. He’s the only one knows the way out of this hell. He’s your best hope.

  MATT COLBY: But Colonel –

  COLONEL: That’s an order, soldier.

  MATT COLBY: Colonel. Take my drinking bottle.

  COLONEL: I will. Thank you. Now you get along back to your family – there’ll be someone along the trail to relieve us afore too long. On your way now.

  MATT COLBY leaves with the BOUNTY HUNTER and FRENCH CHARLIE.

  We’ll not be downhearted, will we? Remember California – less than a week or so over those mountains. I’m very sorry you lost the torc after all you’ve been through – but you’ve lost it before and got it back. We may have lost the battle, but the war is still to be won.

  ANNIE: Will we be travelling on

  COLONEL: Yes we will. While there’s a full moon, we’ll travel in the cool of the night – save our water. Rest up by day; march at night. Will you play something, set us off to rest til’ nightfall, Sean?

  He plays something melancholic. ANNIE rests. When SEAN has finished playing, he sleeps too. The COLONEL takes a long look at them, checks that they have the water bottle and then walks off into the desert, alone.

  * * *

  The moon rises. ANNIE awakes.

  ANNIE: Mister Colonel! Where are you Mister Colonel?

  SEAN awakes.

  SEAN: What is it Annie?

  ANNIE: The Colonel. He’s gone.

  SEAN: W
here has he gone?

  ANNIE: He’s left us the water. I think he’s gone in order to save us. He’s left us so that we can march on with the water, helping us that little bit further.

  SEAN: But we can’t go on. I can’t go on. I have no strength in me any more, Annie.

  ANNIE: (Shaking him by the shoulders.) We’ll not be giving up, Sean. Not after what the Colonel has done for us. We have to try, Sean. For the Colonel’s sake. We have to try.

  SEAN: Oh, Annie. I think you’re right. Perhaps we should follow the Colonel?

  ANNIE: There is no trail to follow.

  SEAN: Shouldn’t we try to find him?

  ANNIE: Like he said, we’ve a heck of a way to go.

  There’s a growl.

  SEAN: What was that?

  The growl is even louder, closer.

  ANNIE: I’m not sure. But I’m not staying to find out.

  And they exit, pursued by a BEAR.

  * * *

  Dawn. SEAMUS FINN looks down across the desert from the trees, through a telescope.

  SEAMUS FINN: (To himself.) A graveyard of a place. Sure, there’s not a bear fool enough to set a foot out there. (Raises his voice to the non-existent bear.) You cost me a week of me life, you divil! I been trackin’ you for a week now. Don’t think you’ve seen the last of me, mister bear. You may have got away this time, but there’s always the next time.

  He puts his telescope to his eye for one last look – and spots something unexpected.

  (Crossing himself.) Jasus, Mary Mother of God. Will you look what is out there? Will you just look. What the divil’s a young boy like that doing out there all on his own? Don’t I have enough troubles without addin’ to them? No gold, no bears in my traps, and now this? ’Tis not fair on a man, not fair at all.

  SEAMUS makes his way towards SEAN and ANNIE.

  An’ where the divil did you come from, young man? An’ who is that you have with you?

  SEAN: ’Tis my sister, Annie, and she’s near dying, mister, for want of water. Would you have some water, mister?

  SEAMUS FINN: To be sure I have, young man.

  He hands SEAN his canteen and SEAN pours the water onto ANNIE’s parched lips. As the water trickles down her throat, she coughs herself back to life.

  SEAN: Thank you, mister.

  SEAMUS FINN: Sure, ’tis nothing. An’ I should say you are about as lost as a young man could be. By the talk of you, you would be an Irishman, would you not? No, but ’tis not possible. ’Tis years since I heard those dulcet tones from a man. ’Bout here they grunt and spit more’n they talk. There’s no one speaks English as sweet as an Irishman. An’ that’s an Irish smile you’re wearin’. You’re never Irish, young man, are you?

  SEAN: (Smiling.) County Cork!

  SEAMUS FINN: (Laughing.) Kerry! I’m Seamus Finn from Kerry. Jasus, Mary Mother of God, it can’t be true. Out here in the middle of nothin’ and I run into a lad from County Cork! An’ would she be from County Cork too?

  ANNIE: ’Course I am. I’m his sister, am I not?

  SEAMUS FINN: Sure you are, darlin’ – an’ welcome back to the land of the livin’.

  SEAN takes a big glug of water.

  Now, when your brother’s finished my water, then I’ll see yous both be gettin’ out of this terrible place. You’ll be on your own, I suppose?

  They say nothing.

  I suppose so then. (To ANNIE.) Can you walk, or shall I be carryin’ you?

  He doesn’t wait for an answer and picks ANNIE up and carries her.

  And to think I nearly didn’t see you. If it hadn’t been for the bear that I’ve not seen or heard…maybe it was meant. I’ve been talkin’ to nothin’ but the birds and beasts and a few Indians –

  SEAN: Indians?

  SEAMUS FINN: Sure – no one but these creatures for ten years or more. Been trappin’ up here all that time. Bears. Met a Russian or two, a few Frenchmen. And I’ve known the odd American: you see them all down at the Fort where I take my bear skins for trading. But in all this time I’ve never met another proper Irishman. Jasus, Mary Mother of God, I think I could die of happiness.

  ANNIE: Don’t die, mister.

  SEAMUS FINN: Oh, I won’t die ’til I’m entirely happy.

  SEAN: What would make you happy?

  SEAMUS FINN: Gold.

  SEAN: Gold?

  SEAMUS FINN: Gold. The fur trade’s all but finished, you know.

  ANNIE: No, I don’t know.

  SEAMUS FINN: The creatures are scarcer now and more wily. So it’s gold I’ve been after these past two summers. An’ all I find is fool’s gold, by the bucketful. An’ now you. But I wasn’t lookin’ for you, now, was I?

  He puts ANNIE down.

  I suppose it would be too much to hope that one of you plays that fiddle?

  ANNIE: Sean plays it.

  SEAN gets the fiddle out of its case.

  SEAMUS FINN: What a fine instrument, a fine sight indeed. An’ would you want to play it for me, young man? ’Twould stop old Seamus Finn from prattling on, now, would it not?

  SEAN raises the violin to his chin – then lowers it.

  SEAN: Mr Finn. My heart would not be in it. Fiddler Donnelly – him that taught me how to play it – he said you should never play the fiddle if your heart’s not in it. I’m thinking I won’t ever have the heart for it again.

  ANNIE: We’ve lost our mother, Mr Finn. And the golden torc, the ancient saviour of the O’Briens. We’ve lost our friends in shipwrecks, waved goodbye to people we’ll never see again – and now we’ve lost the Colonel too, out there in the desert. We be looking for our father, out West in California. But now I fear we’ve lost him too.

  SEAMUS FINN: But we are out West, on the edge of California.

  SEAN: We are?

  SEAMUS FINN: For sure we are. And you’ll not need that torc of yours if she be lost.

  ANNIE: Why not, Mr Finn?

  SEAMUS FINN: Can you not see: ’tis nothing short of a miracle that you have survived to tell this tale. The torc has worked this miracle for you. But now, you won’t be needin’ it no more.

  SEAN: I don’t know…

  SEAMUS FINN: Well I do. There’s nothin’ at all to be sad about. Sure, that Fiddler of yours wouldn’t want you to stop fiddlin’, now, would he? It’s the fiddle too that has kept you alive in this beautiful world. Your friends gave their lives so you could live, and will you repay them now by grievin’? No. After a fine life, back home in Ireland, do we not hold a wake? Do we not dance and sing? We do not mope! We do not weep! Never! So now, right now, we’ll hold a wake and we’ll dance and we’ll sing. Take the fiddle, Sean O’Brien, for that’s your name – and make music! And all the Angels will sing.

  SEAN plays his fiddle – tentatively, melancholy at first, then faster, stronger, happier – and ANNIE and SEAMUS FINN dance together. All the ANGELS sing.

  ANNIE: Mr Finn. Would you take us to find our father?

  SEAMUS FINN: No bother, darlin’, no bother at all. But first you can help me with my pannin’ –

  SEAN: ‘Pannin’’?

  SEAMUS FINN: Panning for gold.

  ANNIE: I thought you said we didn’t need gold no more?

  SEAMUS FINN: You do not. But I surely do.

  SEAN: How do you pan for gold?

  SEAMUS FINN: Sure there’s nothin’ to it. (He demonstrates.) You just shovel the pay dirt from the river bank into the frying pan, take out the few sticks, add a touch of water and swirl it round so that the soil is taken off by the water. The gold, when you find it, will lie heavy and stay in the bottom of the pan. You’ll notice it for sure for ’tis yellow as the sun and will glow at you. Sure, ’tis simplicity itself. Nothin’ to it.

  ANNIE: Then why haven’t you found any, Seamus Finn, seeing as it’s that simple?

  Pause.

  SEAMUS FINN: You have a cruel tongue for such a pretty girl. Do you not cut to the quick? There’s hundreds of folk diggin’ away down-river, but they don’t know what I know. No one
does. ’Tis me secret… (His lips are sealed – but he’s bursting to tell his secret.) But I’ll share it with you because I’ve been longin’ to share it with someone I can trust, an’ there’s not many of them about. Two years ago, an old Indian chief came by while I was camping by the river an’ he told me I would find gold, so much gold that I’d be the richest man in the world. He told me there was so much of it that the water ran yellow from the mountain! A man believes what he wants to believe. So I built me cabin and for two hot summers long I’ve dug an’ I’ve panned. ’Tis here, I know ’tis here. I feel it in me nose. But I’ve not been able to find it. Not yet. Now, with two extra pairs of fresh young eyes on the job we could snap up a fortune, a mighty fortune. And I could be off back home to Ireland where I belong – but I’ll not go back a poor man: I’ll return with enough money to buy half of Kerry, or I’ll not go back at all.

  He shoves a frying pan into each of their hands, and they get panning. SEAMUS FINN moves upstream.

  (Muttering when there’s nothing in his pan again.) Damn, damn, damn and damnation!

  ANNIE: Listen.

  SEAN: ’Tis only Seamus cursing again, Annie.

  The rumble of horses’ hooves.

  ANNIE: Not Seamus. Listen.

  The horses’ hooves thunder – there’s the whooping of RED INDIANS, and SEAN and ANNIE run like gazelles to SEAMUS FINN.

  ANNIE + SEAN: Seamus! Seamus! Seamus Finn!

  SEAMUS FINN: An’ what are you two hollerin’ about, you little divils?

  SEAN + ANNIE: Indians! Indians! Indians!

  SEAMUS FINN: Will you stop your nonsense! Stop your hollerin’! You’ll frighten them away.

  SEAN: We’ll frighten them?

  SEAMUS FINN: They’ll not be hurtin’ you. They’re just Indians, friends of mine, you might say. The old chief I was tellin’ you about – every time he sets eyes on me, he laughs until he cries, the old divil.

  And sure enough, the INDIANS led by their RED INDIAN CHIEF are there bent double, consumed by laughter.

  (To ANNIE + SEAN.) Will you just stay where you are, an’ there’ll be no trouble. They need to know whether you’re a friend or an enemy. There’s nothing much in between. They’ve been here for ever and now we’ve all turned up and are taking their land. If they get in the ways, too many of them get killed, and so they fight back, who can blame ’em?