FOYER OF A POSH HOTEL IN DOWNTOWN BELFAST. CIRCLE OF PEOPLE LISTENING INTENTLY TO AN ORNATELY DRESSED MAN. OUR HAPLESS DUO AGGIE AND SADIE FALL THROUGH REVOLVING DOOR. AGGIE LANDS ON FLOOR. SADIE HURRIEDLY ATTEMPTS TO REARRANGE HERSELF AS FACES TURN TOWARDS THEM.
MAN: Yes, well, as I was saying, you are about to enter another realm, be lifted onto a Higher Plane, experience the power and emotion of thought. Madame Sheila will astound you with her wisdom, you will climb higher than you have ever climbed, share in the mysteries of the Other Side.
AGGIE: (loud whisper)Sadie, did you bring your passport. You didn’t tell me I had to bring a passport. Jesus, I haven’t got one, I’ve only been as far as Salthill for me holidays and it rained the whole bloody time and the caravan leaked, the loo was half way down the friggin’ field. I was shivering something shockin’ by the time I’d peed I’m sure it turned into a fuckin’ block of ice, whoops, sorry Sadie I can’t help it. It just slips out like butter on me baked tatie. Oooh! I love them baked….
SADIE: Aggie, shssh! Would you forever shssh. What are you blatherin about? Passports? What for? We’re not going any further than here and here is the friggin’ Ormeau Road. I shouldn’t have let you talk me into this, Aggie Spence. Bloody mediums and talking to the dead. I don’t wanna talk to Danny again. Good riddance I say. He only looked decent when he was laid out in the coffin and that’s only because I bought him a new suit to get buried in.
AGGIE: Sadie you’re awful, so ye are. Well anyway I have a few words for Jimmy. He hid the fuckin’ Post Office book and all our savings in it. Ach sure I shouldn’t speak ill of the dead. He didn’t know he was going to get run over by a bus.
SADIE: Jesus, Aggie he was poleaxed drunk. Thought he was waving down a bloody taxi. Walked in front of it , he did. Did the friggin’ size of it and the big sign on the side trying to sell extra large condoms not give it away. Anyway what’s all this about a passport?
AGGIE: Well, yer man there said we were going on a higher plane. Can you do that Sadie? Hire a plane like you hire a car. Do you have to show yer driving licence and take out insurance. Fuck that would be some money, wouldn’t it? Ihope there’s enough people getting on this plane to pay for it. Do we pay, Sadie? I haven’t any more money after I payt twenty quid for the ticket. Do we have to go on a plane, Sadie? I get awful carsick you know.
SADIE: Aggie shut up! God you talk some rubbish most of the time. Higher plane, not hire plane and no, you don’t need a passport.
AGGIE: There’s no need to be insulting, Sadie (takes out hankie and loudly blows her nose.) Man and crowd turn to look with disapproving glares. Aggie sniffs even louder.)
What’s a higher plane, Sadie?
SADIE: It’s …It’s… It’s up there somewhere.
AGGIE: You mean the next floor. Fuck, don’t tell me we’re going on the roof, are we?. It’s brass monkeys out there the night.
SADIE: Aggie! Stop! In the name of God, stop! It’s not the roof or the second floor. It’s where ye go when ye die.
AGGIE: What? Those fuckin’ priests. Telling us lies like that, trying to get us into chapel on a cold Sunday morning when we’d rather be staying in bed. Would you credit it? And I wanted to go to Heaven with all the angels. Even Daniel might have been there, don’t ya think, Sadie? He’s a lovely boy and awful good to his Ma.
SADIE: Jesus! Daniel fuckin’ who? Now see what you made me do, cursing like that. That’s another pound in the swear box for me holiday. The way you’re going,Aggie you should have enough for a round the world trip.
AGGIE: Oh, Sadie, you make me laugh, so you do. Daniel O’Donnell, I mean. That nice wee singer who is so good to his-
SADIE: I know, I know. His mother. Well if he’s in Heaven I’ll take me chances with the other place. Couldn’t spend eternity listening to that whiny voice in my ear all day. C’mon we’re moving.
MAN: Ladies and Gentlemen if you would follow me, we will soon be entering Lady Sheila’s pyschic chamber. Do not be afraid. You will feel only peace and harmony.
AGGIE: Psychic, did he say. Chamber. Why are we going into her toilet? God, it must be big. Do we have to go before we can talk to them ghosts? Cleanse ourselves, like. Jesus, that’s queer. I had to give our Brian one of them psychics to get his wee insides right. Hadn’t been for a week, wee soul. In agony he was. But two psychics did the trick. We had to leave the privy window open for a week.
AGGIE: Oh, God, Aggie. Psychics, psychics, not physics you, you….I can’t take anymore .My head’s going. I’m away for a gin to get my sanity back .I’d rather spend twenty quid on a few bevvies than give it to thon fancy lookin’ bloke. C’mon, the bar’s this way. (TAKING AGGIE BY THE ARM AND PULLING HER)
AGGIE: But, Sadie, what about my post office book?
SADIE: Agnes, you don’t have any money now, you never had any money and what little there was slid down the throat of that sozzled man of yours. The only spirits I wanna see the night are in a glass.
AGGIE: You’re dead right!
(ARM IN ARM, GIGGLING, THEY EXIT)
AGNES AND SADIE CROSS STAGE TO BAR LOCATED AT SIDE. SÉANCE ATTENDEES FILE OFF OPPOSITE.
End of Part One
My play was part of the ‘Fetch-a-Sketch’ live rehearsed reading on the Belfast Barge, 28th September 2015.
Phyllis McKenna 