Dialogue 10 - Planning the Concert

The patients are now back inside, having finished their tea and the final round of medicine. They are spending the last few hours before bedtime preparing for their upcoming concert.

 

Alun: Well I’d quite like to sing in the concert but you lot can’t even hold a note, let alone a tune.

 

Brendan: How do y’ fancy a comedy sketch? We could all do with a laugh. 

 

Fred: Maybe we could get the Nurses to join in. Nurse Chambers! Fancy doing a song with us for the concert?

 

Netta: I can guess what sort of song you’d have me singing, Fred Davies. I don’t think Matron would approve. 

  

Brendan: Let’s ask Lady Wood to sing with us! Matron won’t be telling her off.

 

Tom: Don’t talk like that, Brendan. She’s a Lady. Show some respect.

 

Brendan: She gets the same respect I give anyone else, Tom. Just because she has herself a fine house changes nothing for me. 

 

Fred: Sounds to me like you’d have been out on the streets of Dublin with them Fenian rebels, Brendan.

 

Brendan: Well , aren’t we all just standing up for what we believe in?

 

Kathleen: All right now. I think we are all on the same side. Let’s not argue over politics, it just upsets everyone. (Beat) How about a game of billiards? Alun?

 

Alun: Now there’s a good idea. Come on, Brendan, I’ll take you on.

 

Netta: And I’ll get the cocoa ready. 

 

Fred: Sound like a plan, Nurse. (Quietly to Tom) If I play my cards right maybe she’ll tuck me in as well. (He laughs at the idea.)

 

Our soundscape is taken over by the boiling kettle and the slow stirring of a spoon in a cocoa cup. In the background we hear the clunk of the billiard balls.