Ann-Marie MacDonald - Belle Moral - A Natural History

Scene 8 The Drawing Room

The next morning . MR ABBOTT is waiting. He is fastidiously groomed, wears a pince nez, and carries a leather briefcase . DR REID enters .

DR REID. Ah, Mr Abbott, a word sir –

ABBOTT. Good morning, Doctor –

REID. It appears you failed to receive the note I sent you, last –

ABBOTT. I received it.

DR REID. Why, then, your reply must have gone astray.

ABBOTT. No, my reply is forthcoming, to wit: it is more than a little irregular to seek to embargo a will before the contents are known.

DR REID. But you know the contents –

ABBOTT. I do not, Doctor. My late father drew up Judge MacIsaac’s will –

DR REID. Forgive me, I ought to have –

ABBOTT. Not at all.

DR REID. A stroke, was it?

ABBOTT. Thrombosis.

DR REID. He didn’t linger.

ABBOTT. Nay.

DR REID [sympathetic aspirated, “ay”] .

ABBOTT [corroborating aspiration] .

DR REID. The fact remains, my dear Abbott, that the contents of Ramsay MacIsaac’s will are as good as known to all who knew him. The judge was a stubborn traditionalist, which is why this matter is of no little urgency; I have reason to fear that Victor MacIsaac is of unsound mind.

ABBOTT: The law is very clear in that case, Doctor. According to the Act Respecting Lunatics, [intoning] “the committee [pron. comeetay]of the estate, shall within six months, file in the office of the Master to whom the matter is referred, or for such officer as may be —”

DR REID. Yes, quite, if young Mr MacIsaac is found to be mentally unfit, his estate will be administered by duly appointed guardians, but Abbott, if we proceed with the reading of the will this morning before that finding can be made, we risk tipping him into an acutely disturbed state from which he might not recover.

ABBOTT. You wish me to suppress the late Judge MacIsaac’s will?

DR REID. Certainly not. I ask only that you delay the reading long enough for the course of Victor’s illness to become apparent. If his sanity does deteriorate, he can be delivered calmly into care before ever tasting the bitter fruit of inheritance. Your father would do no less, were he here.

ABBOTT. I am not my father, Doctor.

DR REID. Son, this family has suffered enough. Commit one humane sin of ommission and spare the lad a world of pain: misplace the will for a few weeks.

ABBOTT. What you suggest is not merely impossible, it’s implausible; no one for a moment would believe me capable of misplacing anything.

A beat .

DR REID. Certain … chattels await the heir to Belle Moral that might prove too much for the lad.

ABBOTT. What “chattels”?

DR REID. [silent] .

ABBOTT. One hears things.

DR REID. What things?

ABBOTT. Rumours. To do with the late Mrs MacIsaac. They do not bear repeating.

DR REID. Then a gentleman need not so much as allude to them, sir.

ABBOTT. A gentleman would not have me compromise my professional integrity, sir.

DR REID. I am a doctor. I too have integrity to uphold, indeed an oath: “First, do no harm.” I beg of you, heed it.

FLORA and PEARL enter .

PEARL. Mr Abbott, good morning to you, sir.

ABBOTT [bowing]. Miss MacIsaac. [and to FLORA] Miss MacIsaac.

FLORA. Will you take a drop of coffee, Mr Abbott? [Yanking the cord, hollering.] Young Farleigh! Refreshments in the drawing room!

ABBOTT [to PEARL]. Miss MacIsaac, may I venture to express how immensely diverting I found to be your lecture on “Cambrian Invertebrates: A Comparative Anatomy of Stomachs and Guts”.

PEARL. Why thank you, Mr Abbott.

ABBOTT. Incidentally, have you read Mr Edgar Allen Poe’s, “The Conchologist’s First Book: —”?

PEARL. “A System of Testaceous Malacology”, I couldn’t put it down.

ABBOTT. Nor could I.

PEARL. Mr Abbott, I had no idea you were a fossil enthusiast.

ABBOTT [blushing] . Indeed, I’ve conceived a passion for … paleontology.

DR REID. Where’s Victor?

FLORA. I let him sleep late. The laddie’s still on the delicate side.

VICTOR [singing lustily from off] . “Oh you tak the high road and I’ll tak the low road and I’ll be in Hades afore ye!”

VICTOR enters, bare-chested, kilted, wearing a tartan sash as a turban, the bridge of his nose bandaged where YOUNG FARLEIGH punched him .

PEARL. Victor, you’re drunk.

VICTOR. Oddly, no. I am about to become the Sultan of Belle Moral. Today I inherit Daddy’s noble pile, so let a thousand and one Scottish nights begin. Every true Scot knows the bagpipes originated in Arabia.

FLORA. They never did.

VICTOR. Abbott, [clapping his hands twice] on with the show. Reveal the will of our father.

DR REID clears his throat . ABBOTT ignores him, pulls a document from his briefcase, adjusts his pince nez, and reads:

ABBOTT. “Whereas I, Ramsay MacIsaac —”

VICTOR. Don’t worry, Pearl, I’ll no turn you oot o’ hoos and haim.

ABBOTT. “— being of sound mind —”

VICTOR. I intend to throw wide the doors and let the twentieth century blow hard through the halls.

PEARL. Hush, Victor.

ABBOTT. “— do hereby designate the disposal of my worldly goods —”

VICTOR. I shall put an ad in The Times: “All Welcome”.

ABBOTT. “— my will to be executed by Mr Edward Abbott, senior solicitor of Abbott, Abbott, Brodie and Bloom, except that, in the event that he predecease me, my will to be executed by his son, Mr Lorenzo Abbott.”

VICTOR and PEARL exchange a look, stifle a giggle, “Lorenzo”?

“I was born heir to solid Protestant traditions, the transmission of which from father to son ensured my portion in this world and the next. But in a moment of weakness I cast my seed upon stony ground. I broke the pure chain of descent and sullied the MacIsaac bloodline in an unholy alliance with the papist, Régine MacPhail. For my wayward desire have I atoned enough in life —”

VICTOR. God bless wayward desire!

ABBOTT. “— but that atonement must extend beyond the grave. My one break with holy tradition can be set right by one more such break: to this end do I disinherit my son, Victor MacIsaac. Upon my daughter Pearl whose parts recommend her as a true MacIsaac, do I bestow Belle Moral and all its goods and chattels. With one condition: that the sins of the mother not be visited upon the daughter, it is my will that she remain childless. In the event that she bear progeny, my estate to revert to the Presbyterian Kirk.”

Shock . VICTOR exits through the window. A beat, then FLORA follows .

Miss MacIsaac … good day. [aside to DR REID] As you can see, Doctor, you underestimated Ramsay MacIsaac. He was every bit as humane as you.

ABBOTT exits .

DR REID. Pearl –

PEARL [crisp, as though nothing had happened] . Doctor Reid, I’ve had an insight into the ear–

DR REID. It’s a tragedy you’ll never be a mother. ’Tis every woman’s dearest wish –

PEARL. It has never been mine. You insist the ear is a mere curiosity, but –

DR REID. Pearl –

PEARL [acid] . Well what would you have me do, Doctor? Weep and moan ‘cause I’ll never be saddled with a welter of brats mewling for “Mummy”? I only wish Father, in his munificence, hadn’t entirely disinherited Victor; it’ll feed the boy’s romantic martyrdom and give him an excuse to drink himself to death at my expense. I suppose that’s why Father cut me off at the ovaries: to prevent me spawning a breed of hysterical little boys. [suddenly struck] Doctor …