COUNTESS
Oh fool as I am, I have outwitted the most crafty and treacherous monster under the sun. Yes, I was a fool when I married you, and gave up other and nobler hearts for your sake -- yes, I was a fool when I forgot my name and lineage to unite myself with a base-born adventurer -- a fool to bear, without repining, the most monstrous tyranny that ever woman suffered; to allow my property to be squandered; to see women as base and low-born as yourself...
TAPEWELL
For heaven's sake, be calm.
Tapewell bounds back behind the constables, seeing a threatening look in Roderick's eye.
The Countess continues in a strain of incoherent fury, screaming against Roderick, and against his mother, and always beginning and ending the sentence with the word "fool."
RODERICK
You didn't tell all, my lady - I said "old" fool.
BROOKSIDE
I have no doubt that you said and did, sir, everything that a blackguard could say or do. This lady is now safe under the protection of her relations and the law, and need fear your infamous persecutions no longer.
RODERICK
But you are not safe, and as sure as I am a man of honor, I will have your heart's blood.
TAPEWELL
Take down his words, constables; swear the peace against him.
BROOKSIDE
I would not sully my sword with the blood of such a ruffian. If the scoundrel remains in London another day, he will be seized as a common swindler.
RODERICK
Where's the man who will seize me? He draws his sword, placing his back to the door.
RODERICK
Let the scoundrel come! You -- you cowardly braggart, come first, if you have the soul of a man!
The Countess and the bailiffs move away.
TAPEWELL
We are not going to seize you! My dear sir, we don't wish to seize you; we will give you a handsome sum to leave the country, only leave her ladyship in peace.
BROOKSIDE
And the country will be rid of such a villain.
As Brookside says this, he backs into the next room.
The lawyer follows him, leaving Roderick alone in the company of the constables who are all armed to the teeth.
RODERICK (V.O.)
I was no longer the man I was at twenty, when I should have charged the ruffians, sword in hand, and sent at least one of them to his account. I was broken in spirit, regularly caught in the toils, utterly baffled and beaten by that woman. Was she relenting at the door, when she paused and begged me to turn back? Had she not a lingering love for me still? Her conduct showed it, as I came to reflect on it. It was my only chance now left in the world, so I put down my sword upon the lawyers desk.
Roderick puts his sword down on the lawyer's desk.
RODERICK
Gentlemen, I shall have no violence; you may tell Mr. Tapewell I am quite ready to speak with him when he is at leisure.
Roderick sits down and folds his arms quite peaceably.
RODERICK (V.O.)
I was instructed to take a lodging for the night in a coffee house near Gray's Inn, and anxiously expected a visit from Mr. Tapewell.
Tapewell talking to Roderick.
TAPEWELL
I have been authorized by Lady Cosgrove and her advisors to pay you an annuity of 3 00 pounds a year, specifically on the condition of you remaining abroad out of the three kingdoms, and to be stopped on the instant of your return. I advise you to accept it without delay for you know, as well as I do, that your stay in London will infallibly plunge you in gaol, as there are innumerable writs taken out against you here and in the west of England, and that your credit is so blown upon that you could not hope to raise a shilling. I will leave you the night to consider this proposal, but if you refuse, the family will proceed against you in London, and have you arrested. If you accede, a quarter salary will be paid to you at any foreign port you should prefer.
RODERICK
Mr. Tapewell, I do not require a night to consider this proposal. What other choice has a poor, lonely and broken-hearted man? I shall take the annuity, and leave the country.
MR. TAPEWELL
I am very glad to hear that you have come to this decision, Mr. Cosgrove. I think you are very wise.
There is a knock at the door and Roderick opens it. Brookside enters with four constables armed with pistols.
The dialogue for this scene has to be written.
Brookside has gone against the bargain, and has decided to have Roderick arrested upon one of the many writs out against him for debt.
Mr. Tapewell is surprised and complains weakly that Brookside is acting in bad faith.
Brookside brushes aside his objections.
Roderick is defeated, and meekly sits down in a chair.
The following lines are read over Roderick being shackled and led out of the room.
NARRATOR
Mr. James Cosgrove's personal narrative finishes here, for the hand of death interrupted the ingenious author soon after the period which this memoir was compiled, after he had lived nineteen years an inmate of the Fleet Prison, where the prison records state he died of delirium tremens.
His mother, now very old and hobbled with arthritis, enters the prison, carrying a basket on her arm.
NARRATOR
His faithful old mother joined him in his lonely exile, and had a bedroom in Fleet Market over the way. She would come and stay the whole day with him in prison working.
Signing a payment draft, the Countess sighs and gazes out of the large window.
NARRATOR
The Countess was never out of love with her husband, and, as long as she lived, James enjoyed his income of 3 00 pounds per year and was, perhaps, as happy in prison, as at any period of his existence.
Brookside tearing up the payment draft presented to him by his accountant.
NARRATOR
When her ladyship died, her son sternly cut off the annuity, devoting the sum to charities, which, he said, would make a nobler use of it than the scoundrel who had enjoyed it hitherto.
Roderick, now grey-haired, blacking boots.
NARRATOR
When the famous character lost his income, his spirit entirely failed. He was removed into the pauper's ward, where he was known to black boots for wealthier prisoners, and where he was detected in stealing a tobacco box.
Roderick and his mother. Action as per voice over.
NARRATOR
His mother attained a prodigious old age, and the inhabitants of the place in her time can record, with accuracy, the daily disputes which used to take place between mother and son, until the latter, from habits of intoxication, falling into a state of almost imbecility, was tended by his tough old parent as a baby almost, and would cry if deprived of his necessary glass of brandy.
TITLE CARD
It was in the reign of George III that the above-named personages lived and quarreled; good or bad, handsome or ugly, rich or poor, they are all equal now.
FADE OUT.
THE END