{Drawing room.}

Dame Hilda: What are you doing, Evadne?

Dr. Hinge: Writing.

Dame Hilda: Well, I can see that, dear. And I'm full of admiration for the way you've mastered the ballpoint pin. Having been brought up on the quill. But what are you writing?

Dr. Hinge: Mind your own business. And I don't want you sitting opposite me across the table like that.

Dame Hilda: You know, Evadne, I think your writing's more legible upside down than it is the right way. Dear Mr... Well, go on, dear.

Dr. Hinge: Go on, what?

Dame Hilda: Put the next word in. Dear Mr. Who?

Dr. Hinge: I'm not writing another word while you're sitting there.

Dame Hilda: You haven't got a suitor have you?

Dr. Hinge: Oh, don’t be ridiculous.

Dame Hilda: It isn't by any chance Mr. Tombs. The undertaker?

Dr. Hinge:  And why should I be writing to Mr. Tombs?

Dame Hilda: I've noticed the way he smiles and waves at you. Every time you walk past his chapel of rest.

Dr. Hinge: Hilda, we happen to sit on several committees together.

Dame Hilda: I never thought I'd feel sorry for a committee. I'd like to see you two sitting side by side. You must look like a couple of Walt Disney Carrion crows. Evadne, dear, Evadne, please, don't take up with him.

Dr. Hinge: I have no intention, whatever, of taking up with Mr. Tombs, the undertaker.

Dame Hilda: On Valentine's Day, he'd probably send you a bunch of Madonna lilies, or a bottle of embalming fluid, tied with a big black bow, or a little bag of marble chippings.

Dr. Hinge: Hilda, shut up.

Dame Hilda: And wouldn't it be a funny wedding? I suppose you'd come out of the church and walk under an arch of inverted shovels. And we'd all chuck handfuls of soil at you. Mind you, I'd enjoy that.

Dr. Hinge: That does it!

Dame Hilda: Where do you going?

Dr. Hinge: To my room.

Dame Hilda: Before you go, just answer me one little question.

Dr. Hinge: What?

Dame Hilda: Who are you writing to?

Dr. Hinge: Well, I suppose if I don't tell you, you will continue to persecute me until I do. I'm writing to my mother.

Dame Hilda: Your mother? Then why have you started, dear Mr? Or is there something I should know about?

Dr. Hinge: I have not started, dear Mr. Oh, here, read it the right way up if you must.

Dame Hilda: At last, now, why couldn't you have done that in the first place? It would have saved us both all that bother. Oh, yes. Dear mother. No wonder my mind's being preoccupied with death all morning.

Dr. Hinge: Now, Hilda, you're going too far. I will not have you making that sort of joke about my mother.

Dame Hilda: I'm sorry, dear. I don't mean anything. You know that, I’m very fond of your mother, very fond indeed.

Dr. Hinge: Well, she is a wonderful woman. I love my mother.

Dame Hilda: And what are you writing to her about?

Dr. Hinge: Well, I'm telling her she can't come and stay.

Dame Hilda: Why ever not?

Dr. Hinge: Because I don't want her to. I'm always much more devoted to her when we're apart. And

I think it best we remain that way.

Dame Hilda: Oh, but, Evadne, your own mother, does she want to come and stay?

Dr. Hinge: Yes, she does. I had a letter this morning.

Dame Hilda: From Mexico?

Dr. Hinge: No, no. She's in Scotland for a while at the castle. She wants to come here on her way back to Mexico.

Dame Hilda: Are we en route?

Dr. Hinge: Well, as far as mother's concerned, we're on route to anywhere in the world.

Dame Hilda: Is that handsome husband of hers going to be with her?

Dr. Hinge: No, no, Monty's still in Acapulco.

Dame Hilda: Oh, what a shame. But tell that letter up, Evadne. Of course she must come and stay. How long does she want to come for

Dr. Hinge: A month.

Dame Hilda: A month?  In that case, I'll leave you to finish your letter. I really couldn't face the two of you fighting each other for a whole month. Ah, that sounds like Maud. Come to think of it. There wouldn't be just the two of you fighting. There'd be six.

Dr. Hinge: Six? Well, how'd you make that out?

Dame Hilda: You and your mother, you and Maud and Maud and your mother.

Maud: Good morning, Dame’ilda. Doctor.

Dr. Hinge: Good morning, Maud.

Dame Hilda: Hello, Maud, dear.

Maud: I ‘ope you won't think I'm prying, Dame ‘ilda, nor that I've been listening at doors. But did I just ‘ear you mention me in connection with the Doctor's mother?

Dame Hilda: Yes, dear you did. You remember Maureen, don’t you?

Maud: I should jolly well think I do.

Dame Hilda: Well, she wants to come and stay again.

Maud: Ooooh!

Dr. Hinge: Is that all you have to say, Maud?

Maud: No, it ain't, Doctor. But I bit me tongue in time. Me and your mother’ed not see eye to eye, if we were stood on either side of the same door and each ‘ad an eye to the key ‘ole.

Dr. Hinge: And I wonder whose fault that is. Mother tries.

Maud: She tries me all right. Follows me round the ‘ouse when I'm cleaning.

Dr. Hinge: Yes, I must say, that while she's here, the place is always spotless.

Maud: Stands over me in the kitchen while I'm cooking.

Dame Hilda: And we do have some deliciously exotic meals.

Maud: ‘as me washin’ an ironin’ all the ‘ours god give. Last time I were washin’ an ironin’ things I didn't even know we ‘ad. In fact, I'm sure we didn't ‘ave ‘alf of ‘em.

Dr. Hinge: You know, I have got a cupboard full of things that really do need doing.

Dame Hilda: Me too, dear.

Maud: I'm ever so sorry, Dame’ilda, but if the Doctor's mother's coming again, I'll not be coming meself. Just for the duration like, as we used to say, when it were ‘itler as were the bother.

Dr. Hinge:  Well, that settles it then. It would be cruel not let mother come, I'll tear this letter up.

Dame Hilda: And so Maureen, Evadne’s mother, eventually arrived. As the taxi driver carried her suitcases into the hall, I counted them. Much as one tends to count the sacks of coal, being carried to the coal house by the coal man. There were seventeen. By the time that taxi driver had finished, we had more alligator skin in our hall than they do in the Everglade swamps. Despite Evadne’s protestations, I had persuaded Maud to come and work as usual each day. Well, when I say persuaded, I'd bribed her. What's more, I'd taken the money from Evadne's purse. Oh, can I live with myself? Well, for the first two days, all went reasonably well. And on the third day, we invited Major Dyrenforth, whose wife was away, to join us for the evening.

{Drawing room.}

Major: Well, I must say Maureen, it's extremely pleasant to see you again.

Maureen: Nice to see you, Major.

Major: I've never forgotten that last New Year's Eve we were all together. Remember?

Maureen: Oh, aye

Major: You decided to mix a drink, celebrating the country of your birth and the country of your adoption. I seem to recall it was a lethal mixture of malt whiskey and tequila.

Maureen: Oh, aye, Major, a little invention of my husband's. What he calls Acapulco kilt twister.

Major: Do you know, I still have a hole in my car blanket.

Maureen: I'm sure it wasn't that powerful.

Major: Oh, no, no. You may remember that just before midnight and at your instigation, we each grabbed a blanket, cut a hole in the centre, stuck our heads through, and donning lampshades as hats, filed off first footing, Mexican style.

Dame Hilda: Oh, I remember that, Major and Evadne fell into the duck pond on the green.

Dr. Hinge: I did not fall. I was pushed. You pushed me, Hilda

Dame Hilda: I did no such thing. I may have bumped you ever so slightly. But then we were bumps- a-daisying!

Dr. Hinge: You may have been bumps-a-daisying, Hilda. I was ring-a-ring a-rosying with the rest.

Maureen: Come on, Mona, fill us up, pass the jug.

Dr. Hinge: Mother, I thought we'd agreed that you would stop calling me Mona.

Maureen: Oh, don't be such a Moaner, Mona.

Dr. Hinge: I hate it.

Dame Hilda: King George V, hated Bognor, dear, but he learned to live with it.

Major: And what about the Mona Lisa?

Dame Hilda: Did she dislike Bognor?

Maureen: I, personally, see nothing whatever wrong with Mona.

Dame Hilda: Well, of course you don't, you're her mother, dear.

Maureen: I mean as a name. Mona's your name, Mona. That's what you were christened.

Dr. Hinge: It is not my name. It is my second name. If you had wanted to call me Mona, you should have put Mona first, which god forbid.

Major: That was in fact my intention dear, but alas your father made a silly mistake. That was my first husband, Major, dear Hector Hinge. He was a musical man. God rest his old tuning fork. You see, she was actually christened. Evadne Mona Montpellier Hinge.

Major: I say, how jolly interesting.

Maureen: Evadne, of course, being Greek and meaning well-tamed. Mona being Irish and meaning noble.

Dame Hilda: What about Montpellier?

Maureen: That's a town in the south of France. Her father and I enjoyed a holiday there shortly before she was born.

Dr. Hinge: Thank heavens you didn't go to Bridlington that year? Surely, mother Montpellier in France is spelled with two l’s. I spell my name with only one.

Maureen: Another foolish slip of your fathers I'm afraid, dear, when he was registering the birth.

Dr. Hinge: He didn't have a very good day, did he?

Maureen:  He was never very good at christenings. Why, if they'd let him launch the Mary Rose, it would probably have ended up as the Rosemarie.

Major: Of course, Evadne was the wife of Capaneus, the Greek hero, who took part in the first expedition of the Seven against Thebes. Did you know that?

Dame Hilda: No, but I knew she went back quite a long way.

Major: He was struck by lightning by Zeus while attempting to scale the walls.

Dame Hilda: Nasty!

Major: And Evadne threw herself onto his funeral pyre.

Dame Hilda: Always the little tragedy queen.

Maureen: Evadne is also the name of the heroine of Beaumont and Fletchers little Play, ‘The maid's tragedy.’ That's why her father chose it. Aye, Evadne, thou art young and handsome, a lady of a sweet complexion, and such a flowing carriage that it cannot choose but inflame a kingdom.

Dame Hilda: Of course, neither of you could possibly have foreseen how she'd grow up.

Dr. Hinge: Mother, do we have to go on talking about me?

Dame Hilda:  I agree. Let's talk about me for a change. Do you know what the name Hilda means?

Dr. Hinge: It's probably Arabic for rubbish.

Dame Hilda: Well, there's no call to be like that.

Maureen: I say, Major, why do you keep staring out of that window with such a puzzled expression on your face? Is there something going on out in the garden that we should know about?

Major: It's erm.. Maud and Arthur.

Maureen: Then it is definitely something we should know about. What are they doing?

Major: They're being furtive.

Dame Hilda: Well, thank heavens, they're doing it in the garden.

Major: Do you know, they’ve walked past this window four times in the last half hour or so, each time carrying a table between them.

Dame Hilda: Probably trying to find the best place to put it, dear. We are dining al fresco tonight, you see, Major. Assuming we have no more rain. Maud and her husband are preparing things.

Maureen: We hope. I best go and see what she's doing.

Dame Hilda: Now Maureen, you promised. You told her what to do, you told her how to do it, you even told her where to do it. Now please, please leave her alone, dear, she’ll muddle through.

Maureen: I must say you do let your domestics get away with an awful lot over here these days.

Dr. Hinge: And what you do with them in Mexico, then mother? Chain them to a wheel and whip them.

Dame Hilda: They don't do that to that, Evadne, not in Mexico.

Maureen: Mind you, the more one sees of Maud, the more one wishes they'd revive it.

Dame Hilda: Shh! Maureen, she's coming, dear.

Maud: Excuse me, Dame ‘ilda. But would you mind if I were to take that table over there out into the garden?

Dame Hilda: What for?

Maud: Well, you'll be wanting something to eat off, won't you? Should your dinner be ready in time for tonight?

Maureen: And what pray have you done with all the other tables that you've taken out there then, Maud?

Maud: ‘as she been spying on me, Dame ‘ilda?.

Dame Hilda: No, dear, she hasn't. But the Major, has.

Dr. Hinge: That's spiked your guns, hasn't it, Maud? You can't very well be rude to him.

Maud: Wanna bet?

Dr. Hinge: Now, answer my mother's question. What have you done with all those tables?

Maud: I put them in the shed, Doctor.

Major: Oh, I say, it isn't raining again, is it? It'll spoil the picnic.

Maud: It ain't raining just at present Major, but it's clouding up nicely. And it's getting dark, and it's getting cold. And my Arthur reckons as you'll all catch your deaths, anyhow.

Maureen: Maud, I'm sure we all have the very greatest respect for your husband's ability as a soothsayer, but we are not eating in the shed. It's meant to be a Mexican barbecue, not a wood choppers ball.

Maud: Are you sure she ain't been spying on me?

Dr. Hinge: Maud, you haven't for any curious reason of your own chopped those tables up, have you? We don't need a bonfire, It's not Guy Fawkes night.

Maud: I've not chopped them up, Doctor. Well, not exactly.

Dame Hilda:  What have you done with them, dear?

Maud: Oh, Dame ‘ilda, I do wish you ‘adn't asked that. I didn't want to spoil yer party.

Maureen: Maud, you are to a social gathering, what that iceberg was to the Titanic. Now, what have you done, woman?

Maud; Well, do yer see, Dame ‘ilda. Me and my Arthur carries the kitchen table out, just like you says, and we puts it on the patio. But it were wonky. My Arthur were all for wedging it, but I says to ‘im, I says, Arthur, if a job's worth doing, it's worth doing properly, and I fetches ‘im the saw.

Major: Oh, Jiminy!?

Maud: All you gotta do, I says, is take a little tiny bit off the bottom of that leg there, it’ll even it up like. So ‘e did.

Dr. Hinge: But it didn't.

Maud: No, it didn't. Funny thing were, it made it worse. Only in another direction, if you know what I mean.

Dame Hilda:  I think I'm beginning to only too well, dear.

Maud: Oh, just look what you've done now, says I. Give us the saw, I'll do it meself.

Major:  Oh, jumping, Jiminy

Maud: And I takes a bit off the opposite leg, and then the ‘ole thing leans. So I takes a bit off the other two. Well, after a while, I ‘ad that table, steady as a rock.

Dame Hilda: Oh, good. Well done, dear. Well done.

Maud: They were just one little snag.

Maureen; And what prey, might that have been.

Maud: It were too low to get a chair under. Still, it'll come in ‘andy as a coffee table. Let's fetch another table out, says I, and start all over again.

Major: Jumping, Jiminy Cricket.

Maud: Well, we've just run out of tables. So can I ‘ave that one there?

Dame Hilda: No, you most certainly cannot. dear. That is a Chippendale, and I don't want it chipped.

Dr. Hinge: I know, Hilda. Why don’t we use that old ping-pong table you sometimes sit under when you're sulking? or are you planning on sulking tonight?

Dame Hilda: That will depend very largely on how you make my nerves jangle. dear. But we may as well fetch it down and have it handy anyway. You know where it is, Maud? It's in the box room. And, er...Maud, if it wobbles, don't saw it, dear, wedge it. It's quite low enough as it is.

Maureen: And the food should be ready by now, shouldn't it, Maud?

Maud: ‘ow should I know? I don't ‘ave X-ray eyes.

Maureen: Well, I think you'll find that it is. So as soon as you've got that table set, perhaps you'll dig it up.

Maud: Never ‘eard the likes, burying your dinner, whatever next. Still, I'll not be long.

Major: I say, this meal sounds rather intriguing. It's not an ordinary barbecue, then?

Maureen: Why no, Major? Certainly not. It's a Mexican barbacoa.

Dame Hilda: And not an easy meal to prepare, Major.

Maureen: You see, Major, you begin by digging a large pit, which you then line with lime stone, or volcanic rock.

Dame Hilda: Or, in our case, Cotswold stone from the Stackton garden centre.

Maureen:  And you keep a fire blazing in it for five or six hours until the stones are almost red hot. Then you let the fire die down, and you partially fill the pit with the magaya stalks, Major, from the century plant agave americana.

Major: And you managed to find that at the garden centre?

Dr. Hinge: No such luck, Major. We had to scrounge round the supermarkets and make do with yuccas.

Maureen: It is very difficult to be authentically Mexican in this neck of the woods, I'm afraid, Major, with never an armadillo, nor an iguana in sight.

Major: So it won't be armadillo we'll be partaking of tonight?

Maureen: Alas, no, we've had to make do with beef, but it will not taste like any beef you've tasted before. You see, it's rubbed with chilli, garlic, herbs, and spices, and laid in the pit. The pit is then filled in, and the meat cooks for several hours in the aromatic steam of the magaya juice.

Dame Hilda: Or, in our case, yucca.

Major: I say that does indeed sound splendid.

Maureen:  And as it's dug from a pit, we all join hands and sing the cucaracha! I say Mona er.. Evadne. Why don't you give us a song while we're waiting?

Dr. Hinge: Very well. Now what would you like to hear, mother? As if I didn’t know.

Maureen: How about when the midnight choo choo leaves for Alabam?

Dr. Hinge: Oh, I didn't know. I thought you were going to ask for Ramona.

Maureen:  To tell you the truth I was, dear, but I didn't want you walking out just before dinner, and I saw you had the other song on top of the piano there.

Dame Hilda: Very well then. The train now standing at Platform 4 is the midnight choo-choo, and it is about to leave for Alabam.

Maud:  I say, Dame ‘ilda, can I have a word with you?

Dame Hilda: Well of course, Maud, dear, what is it?

Maud: Well I don't know ‘ow to tell you this, but I don't quite know what I've done with the dinner.

Dame Hilda: Well, you haven't made a mess of it have you now.

Maud: I've not made anything of it, Dame’ilda, I can't find it.

Dr. Hinge: Can’t find it?

Maud: Well, what with all the rain an’all and it being there so long, we seem to ‘ave mislaid it in the mud. My Arthur's been digging all round where we thought we'd buried it but ‘tain't there.

Major: Can't you see where the soil's been disturbed?

Maud:  Well we found several places where it looks as though it's been disturbed, Major. But all My Arthur's come up with so far is a bucket full of dog bones and where your cats have been burying their…..

Dame Hilda: That’s quite enough of that dear!

Maureen: I did tell the stupid man he'd no need to bury our dinner as deep as Captain Flint's treasure.

Maud: That stupid man ‘appens to be my ‘usband.

Maureen:  You can't blame me for that, you chose him.

Dame Hilda: Where's Arthur now, dear?

Maud: ‘e's still digging. All round like, but ‘e's not come across it so far and it's becoming difficult to see because now it's gone dark.

Major: Do we have any lights we can use out there in that garden of yours?

Dr. Hinge: Oh yes, there's a hurricane lamp and a tilley somewhere, Major, right? And there are several more shovels in the shed.

Major: Well I must say this is proving to be a refreshingly different evening. I mean I've often been at dinner parties where one's been expected to sing for one's supper. But I've never before been at one when I've been expected to dig for it.

Dame Hilda: Come on then everybody, outside, are you ready?

Hey ho, hey ho?  It's off to work we go.  With a shovel and a pick and a walking stick, Hey ho, hey ho.

Transcribed by Lorraine Taylor