New Worlds (2014) s01e02 Episode Script
Episode 2
I'm Colonel William Goffe.
Fought alongside Oliver Cromwell and signed Charles Stuart's death warrant.
My father fought for a true Republic.
He's a hero, like Edward Sexby.
Edward Sexby was my father.
Can you smile into the teeth of the King's enemies? If it would keep my father from the hangman.
I will never sell you my land.
Children now work day and night, digging clay to make you rich and themselves wretched.
The King wants a new capital to replace the one burned down by the Catholics.
That plot was got at by wicked men.
It's high treason to deny the popish plot.
Young Americans like you must seize true liberty.
We shall have no need of your help, sir, we are complete.
Oh, we shall have need of each other the chaos will envelope us all.
Goffe spoke of a woman in England.
Send Goffe's ring to her.
But where shall I send it?! There is a house in Oxfordshire.
If I am to be your eyes and ears at Fanshawe House what shall I see and hear there, my lord? Bring me something to ensnare the old Papist.
Once the rabbit is snared it squeals.
I am not hurt, Mother.
Nor am I dishonoured.
How long must he hang there? The magistrate will decide.
Hardwick.
The owner of the clay pits.
Would you have ever told me about Edward Sexby? About your part in those times? It belongs in the past.
John Francis is the best of fathers.
He has loved and protected us both all these years.
We have made a place where you - where all of us - will be safe from the madness beyond these walls.
The madness has come over the walls.
Come and see me tomorrow.
We'll discuss your duties.
When does he leave? I have to get him out of Boston right now.
Randolph's only a day behind.
If he knows Ned helped William Goffe there'll be trouble.
Our offices in Bristol will find work for you.
Stay there till I send for you.
I'll help John Russell all I can and I'll take care of Randolph when he comes calling - which he will.
There's something I want you to do for me, Father.
Hope Russell? So you have eyes for that skinny little thing that never wore a skirt if she could wear breeches, hmm? She's grown into a woman like no other.
Oh, has she now? Go.
You risk all by this, my Lady.
You told me to listen to my heart.
The saintly Earl denied the Popish Plot.
He denied the Catholics tried to kill the King? In front of witnesses? Too cunning.
Damn him! Shaftesbury - little sincerity himself - fans the flames of rebellion in London.
I am prepared.
I have a store of arms to defend the King if his enemies make war.
And your price?Oh, it's my duty to support the King.
You ask nothing in return? Well No, let me guess, my lady's land for more clay pits.
If that land should become forfeit to the Crown when you expose her as a traitor BARKING AND SHOUTING IN DISTANCE Now to Hardwick's gun store.
Quick! Look at this.
Move! BANG! Her Catholic husband did this! He said to my face he wished my clay pits blown to Kingdom come and me with them! Then bring him down.
God bless you, Pru, for taking this risk.
For the Good Old Cause.
Thank you, Prudence.
God help us.
What have you done? You didn't stand by while others suffered and nor will I.
Because of what I did, I have enemies.
And they will not rest till they destroy me and all I hold dear.
You put us all at risk.
Psst! Are you mad, Sir? Men are scouring the county for you and the guns.
I am a thief come to steal a kiss.
Steal another.
My Lady! The Countess is asking for you.
Were you with the outlaws when they stole Hardwick's guns last night? Blood and violence will not bring a better world.
Look at Sarah and Esther.
Quakers both - their husbands cut down at the last rebellion both fighting for a better world.
And these two lonely widows will sleep in joyless beds and no sons to bury them.
And live in an England where they are still persecuted for their faith.
But not here, not in our little commonwealth.
Liberty behind closed doors? And only for the few.
Is that enough for you, Mother? For 20 years I have held in my heart the dream of a new world.
For everyone.
Without kings, without courts, where good people will live their lives together in peace and I believe this will come in time but by the pen, not by the sword.
Must they wait and suffer? Why should they not take up arms as their fathers did? As Sarah and Esther's husbands did.
As your husband did.
I remember all too well the sickening violence.
The pain, the grief.
I remember the loss and I don't want that for you, Beth.
Promise me.
Promise me you will never go into the woods again.
Do you remember the love, Mother? For two long months you have warmed your feet by the fire of the King's enemies.
Are you comfortable at Fanshawe House, Master Gore? I look, I listen, I have searched for papers and found nothing.
I fear that she is blameless.
Blameless? Where was the Earl the night the clay pits were blown up? At his prayer, my Lord.
Does he hear Mass? I do not know! You have a week to find out! Or your father swings.
Will? Will! I hope it was his friends and not the body-snatchers that took him.
I am sure it was his friends.
God bless you, Will.
Shall we say a prayer for him? To Our Blessed Lady? Not here in the open.
You hear the Mass.
You trust me with your life, my Lord.
I believe it's God's Providence that brought you to me.
It was my good fortune.
Abe? What is? The woods are alive with militia.
They shot my horse.
I don't want you to come here anymore.
How can we be together? We cannot.
Why not? Because it is the thing that I most want.
You possess my thoughts.
I grow weary of the hard ground and long to share your soft bed.
Then share it, Abe.
Let us be together, this does not Hear me, Beth.
The more I think on you and warmth and comfort the less I think on killing our enemies.
Come with me.
For months I've put your life at risk.
Look what's happened to Prudence.
Hardwick had her flogged and hanged.
I'll feed him to his own dogs.
Beth, if this would happen to you my heart would break.
If you love me as I love you then let us leave these woods tonight and make a new life together in a new world.
The fight is here and now.
Hardwick dies tonight.
NEIGHING Come.
She helped the rebels steal her master's guns.
Guns.
Served the King's father at Edgehill, God bless his memory.
We'll all be brought to ruin sir, now the old quarrel's breaking out again.
What happened to the rebels? They ran away, they just left her.
They should hang for their cowardice.
They would hang me, sir, if they could catch me.
Mark him.
Do not harm him.
He's only guiding me through these woods.
Go.
Be gone, sir.
But first I shall have your horse.
You steal horses as well as guns? Guns are the only law when this counts as justice.
Dealt out by magistrates handpicked by the King.
I am a stranger here, sir.
I have no part in this argument.
All men should be enemies to tyranny.
Go home.
Never come into these woods again.
Agh!Ugh! My Lady, forgive me You were set upon, Mr? Hawkins.
Hawkins.
I should not have travelled through the woods at night, but my business with you is pressing.
"William and Frances Goffe, 1630.
" Dead.
Hounded down by Charles Stuart's agents in Massachusetts.
He asked that this be returned to his widow who you have helped these last 20 years, my Lady.
Frances Goffe died three months ago.
Did Colonel Goffe not know that, Mr Hawkins? No.
Who told you I helped her? Hope Russell.
You wrote letters to Colonel Goffe at her house.
The Russells risked everything to help him.
I come to you as a friend, my Lady.
William Goffe was a brave comrade.
His papers were seized.
Edward Randolph will tell the King you sent money to a regicide.
KEYS RATTLE IN LOCK DOOR SLAMS John Hawkins is a good man.
When I am gone, be guided by him.
Please, father, please let me go back to Hadley.
It's not safe.
Hope, promise me you will be ruled by John Hawkins.
I promise.
HE EXHALES PRIEST:Amen.
Look, children.
Will Pastor Russell be with God now, Father? He led a godly life, but we cannot know whom God has chosen.
No! Look! And you must think on your own deaths everyday, so you will be ready.
MUTED WHISPERING She is better shamed than damned, Hope.
You must put Ned out of your mind.
Ned? My husband tells me everything.
My stepson's recklessness could have ruined us.
Ned tried to save a persecuted old man.
I'm proud of that.
Are you not? Pride is a sin, Hope Russell.
You will forget Ned when you have a husband.
Henry Cresswell has consented to take you under his roof as wife and mother to his children.
But before that union can take place, you must be purified.
Purified? Hope, you must purge your sins.
How have I sinned? You are proud, Hope Russell and you are defiant and immodest.
You wear your hair loose and undressed.
And I have seen your forearms bare in the street.
Our ways are different on the frontier.
And you speak out of turn! You must go to the Meeting House tomorrow and beg the Lord's forgiveness.
Or God will bring down His wrath on Boston, as He did on Hadley.
I will not.
SOFT FOOTSTEPS IN THE GRASS He wanted you to be ruled by me.
I would rather be cast out than do what you ask of me.
Hope, we have a covenant with God.
He has planted us here in this New Israel and we must obey His laws.
If you put yourself beyond those laws, then you put us all at risk and you must be gone from Massachusetts.
I cannot marry a man I do not love.
Ned is not here, Henry Cresswell is.
And his children need a mother.
While we build this New World there is no time for the love of the poets.
We need strong women to marry strong men if we are to tame this wilderness.
But I cannot.
There is no "I", there is only "We" in this, Hope.
And God wants this for you.
BOY SOPRANO SINGS NOISE AND CHATTER HE STARTS HE PANTS DOOR LATCH CLICKS OPEN DOOR SHUTS OWL HOOTS ANIMAL SQUAWKS HE EXHALES I made it across the Atlantic Ocean.
But I nearly didn't make it through Wightham Woods thanks to you and your highwayman.
He is no common thief, Mr Hawkins.
He is the bravest of men and all he does he does for others.
He has opened my eyes to the injustice of the world.
And you risk everything, for love? Can you understand that? Aye, I can.
Love.
Not just for each other but for all mankind, for justice and liberty.
Do you think me foolish, Mr Hawkins? Do you not hold these things dear in America? I do not think you foolish, my Lady.
And in truth I wish I could tell you what we hold dear in America.
My eyes are opening too.
ROWDY CHANTING IN BACKGROUND CHANTING: And all through honest men.
And 24 to justice bring - Amen! Amen! Amen! Your Popish plot and Jesuit priests we do not fear at all, For lo, beneath Judge Jeffrey's feet - you fall! You fall! You fall! Now God preserve great Charles our King and all true honest men.
And traitors all to justice bring - Amen! Amen! Amen! Your Popish plots and Jesuit priests we do not fear at all, What is this? It's a Pope burning.
These are our neighbours?! Husband.
No.
No.
They mock you, John Francis.
CHANTING: Amen! Amen! Amen! Forge a plot! Fire London! Destroy the King! Burn John Francis! No! No, no, no, no, no.
There's a trap for you, my Lord.
They provoke you to deny the Popish plot.
CROWD: Burn! Burn! Burn! Look, my Lady.
Agnes? Oh, God be praised.
I have been cured by the touch of the Protestant Duke.
Long live Monmouth! No! Long live Monmouth! Long live Monmouth! ALL: Long live Monmouth.
Burn all Catholics.
Long live Monmouth.
Catholics must all burn in hell! Go home.
All of you! To your homes! And you to your beds! Go home! Burn all Catholic plotters! Father, no! You are deluded! There was no Catholic plot to kill the King.
Traitor! CROWD: Traitor! He denies the Popish Plot! No, stop, please! GUNSHO HORSE'S HOOVES THUNDER My next will send a man to meet his maker.
Which one of you will it be? LOUD GUNSHO I walked into their trap.
Denying the Popish Plot.
SHE PANTS Abe.
You shall bleed to death.
Listen close, Beth.
Hardwick got up the Pope burning.
Warn your mother.
You must leave England tonight.
I beg you, sir.
Make them go.
You must leave England at first light.
Make a new life, in the New World.
John Francis.
I love you with my whole heart.
If we must leave this house, we leave it together.
HE STARTS TO SAY SOMETHING No.
HE SOBS Shall there never be a life for us? Some water.
Take her and go.
Come! Quickly.
Where is he, where is he? BANGING Open in the name of the King! You shall not take him! You shall not take him! Move! Wait! Husband! Husband! BEADS CLATTER TO FLOOR They will not leave without you, my Lord.
Well, tell them I will follow.
The King knows me for a loyal subject.
My hot words will be forgiven, once I explain to his judge.
Judge? Aye, my Lord Jeffreys comes today.
Jeffreys holds my father in the Tower under pain of death.
The price for his life is that I betray you.
I gave him nothing.
My Lord, you have been as a father to me.
Ah, Will Blood.
I have a message from your dear father.
Let me think Ah, yes, "Tell my son I forgive him for abandoning me.
" But I did not abandon him.
I saved Hardwick so Too late, Will, did I not say? Your father has shuffled off this mortal coil.
I ran out of patience with you.
Go and weep for him.
CROWD CHANT: Long live the King! Long live the King! CROWD CHANT: Long live Monmouth! CROWD CHANT: Magna Carta! Magna Carta! Long live Monmouth! Beth wouldn't leave without her father.
Where is she now? She's petitioning Monmouth for her father's release.
Monmouth will not help her.
Tell her to be of good heart.
I'll find a way to help her father.
Why has the King brought the parliament to Oxford? To fright his enemies into submission away from the London mob.
He means to crush Shaftesbury's plans to set Monmouth on the throne in his brother's place.
Abe, the King has arrived.
The streets are lined with soldiers.
They're as thick as flies.
Now is the moment, Abe.
The moment for what? Tell Beth that she must leave England without delay.
Tell me how you got that ring.
From a man called Goffe.
Why did he give it to YOU? To bring to his widow.
Dead? How? He jumped to his death.
To escape the King's agents.
Did he have a message for me? For you? For his son.
He said his son should remember the words of Colonel Sidney.
"Let your hand be an enemy to tyrants.
" That I shall before the day is out.
59 men signed Charles I's death warrant.
One of them - William Goffe - was shielded from justice by republican fanatics.
SCREAMS OF TORTURE IN BACKGROUND People like your wife.
Is that not so? MAN SCREAMS IN BACKGROUND Ah.
They all break in the end.
I love you.
I love you.
Look after your mother until we can all be together again.
I love you.
Take Beth and go, now.
I will follow.
Dearest heart I love you.
I love you, John Francis.
Remember this .
.
until we are together again.
CROWD CHANT: Long live Monmouth! CROWD CHANT: Magna Carta! Magna Carta! Ned! Ned! Where's Abe? He's over there.
The King has taken a back road to Christchurch.
He was warned of an attempt to kidnap him.
Our moment is lost, Abe.
We have to follow him.
I must say goodbye to him.
Your faith will keep you strong, my Lord.
When I was a boy, a priest lived with us, secretly.
Father Arrowsmith.
One day he was arrested as he said Mass and dragged to the gallows tree.
He ascended the ladder like a man going up to Paradise.
He hung there very long and in great pain.
And through all this, Will, his faith kept him strong.
He would not name the Catholics that had sheltered him.
When they thought he was quite dead, he was cut down and brought to Master Tunstall, the butcher, to quarter him.
And as we watched the knife enter his bowels, he screamed and sat up.
And as Tunstall's hand tore his heart from his chest, Edward Arrowsmith called out the names of my mother and father.
HE SOBS When Jeffreys does his worst to me, Will, I am very afraid that I will betray Angelica.
I pray to God she's out of the country by then.
CROWD CHANTS IN DISTANCE No! For my father.
Come on.
Stop them! I know where we'll find them.
Leave that, Agnes.
Mother! DOOR CLOSES Help us! He tried to kill the King.
Were you followed? I don't think so.
We can take him into the woods when the bleeding has stopped.
There's no time, Beth.
Abe, look at me.
Look at me.
Look at me.
Hold him.
HE GROANS Ned, get him into the woods.
Beth, you and I must leave.
There is another way.
This leads to the edge of the woods.
Go with him, Beth.
I'll send for you when it's safe.
Beth, please! No, Mother, I will not leave you ever again.
Take them! Why does Jeffreys not come for me? Shall we try and pray once more, my Lord? I cannot pray! God sees into my heart.
My Lord? I would rather end my own life than betray Angelica.
You must not think on self-slaughter, my Lord, for your soul would be eternally damned.
Follow them.
Take care of them all their days.
Promise me, Angelica will never suffer.
I swear on my life.
I can pray now, Will.
Holy Mary, mother of God pray for us sinners.
Now and at the hour of our death.
Amen.
You stand here indicted as false traitors against the most illustrious and excellent King Charles II, your supreme and natural lord.
Not having the fear of God in your heart, nor weighing the duty of your allegiance, but being seduced by the Devil, on the 21st day of March, in the parish of Wightham, well knowing Abraham Goffe to be a false traitor and assassin, you did wickedly and traitorously conceal him in your dwelling house.
How do you plead? Not guilty.
GASPS AND MURMURING Not guilty.
Bring her to me! Do you hope to evade justice as your husband did? For taking his own life, he burns in hell.
He would not have taken his own life.
So may you burn in hell.
Doubt not, madam, my jury will condemn you of high treason.
You will burn at the stake with your daughter in full public view.
So you would use the awful spectacle of our deaths to remind the King's enemies, now met in this city, what fate awaits those who oppose him? You have a quick wit for a woman.
But it will not save you.
Were you my own mother, I would see you burn for your wanton depravity.
I do not ask you to save me.
Spare my daughter's life.
Declare your guilt and your deaths will come more quickly.
The executioner will strangle you both before the flames take hold.
Do not presume to bargain with me, madam! Let His Majesty transport Beth to his plantations in the New World .
.
and I will submit .
.
to your will.
SHOUTING My lords My lords, it is a very hard thing to say that we cannot trust the King and that we have already been deceived for so long.
Where is the Catholic Duke of York which both houses have declared dangerous and must be excluded from the succession? Why? He is in Scotland raising an army to march upon us.
No tears for me, sweetheart.
I've had a good life.
SHE SOBS Soon I shall be with John Francis.
God will be with you and he will give you strength to endure.
You will be in chains for a while but they cannot enslave your spirit.
Survive.
Make a new life in a new world.
LOCK CLUNKING DOOR OPENS I will live in your light always.
Always.
Always, mother.
I love you.
I love you with all my heart.
Mother.
Mother! Be brave, my Beth.
I love you, my most precious girl.
Mother! God bless you, my lady.
God bless you.
God bless.
You deserve everything you get! God bless you, my lady.
SHOUTING AND JEERING Gentlemen, friends, neighbours.
I die in the expectation of the Lord's pardon.
I forgive all persons that have had a hand in my death.
I acknowledge His Majesty's favour in altering my daughter's sentence to transportation.
CROWD JEERS No.
No! I stand accused of harbouring a would-be regicide.
LOW MURMURING To that I say when a king subjugates his Parliament, subverts his judges and suppresses his own people .
.
he is become a tyrant.
CROWD ROARS England will not suffer tyrants.
Tell them to silence her.
We are freeborn! He will name you as his successor.
He must or there will be civil war.
When a king turns tyrant he breaks covenant with his people and they have a right and a duty to bring him down.
England should be a commonwealth .
.
where men and women strive together for the common good.
This Parliament is hereby dissolved.
If we but love one another SCREAMING Fire!Hardwick, Jeffreys and Charles Stuart will pay for today with their own blood.
You should go my friend.
Marry Hope Russell if she'll still have you.
Love, what does a boy like you know about love? There's been gossip and rumour about your wife and my stepson.
I will have you both hanged as adulterers.
Who dares buy and sell my sovereign territory? Men like John Hawkins, you have carved up this colony in your own interests.
Your father never gave up hope that England would one day be a republic.
I hope to see that day.
That day is closer than you think.
A knife at your throat? Why? Stackpole saw something.
He thinks SHE GASPS .
.
it was a white woman.
Fought alongside Oliver Cromwell and signed Charles Stuart's death warrant.
My father fought for a true Republic.
He's a hero, like Edward Sexby.
Edward Sexby was my father.
Can you smile into the teeth of the King's enemies? If it would keep my father from the hangman.
I will never sell you my land.
Children now work day and night, digging clay to make you rich and themselves wretched.
The King wants a new capital to replace the one burned down by the Catholics.
That plot was got at by wicked men.
It's high treason to deny the popish plot.
Young Americans like you must seize true liberty.
We shall have no need of your help, sir, we are complete.
Oh, we shall have need of each other the chaos will envelope us all.
Goffe spoke of a woman in England.
Send Goffe's ring to her.
But where shall I send it?! There is a house in Oxfordshire.
If I am to be your eyes and ears at Fanshawe House what shall I see and hear there, my lord? Bring me something to ensnare the old Papist.
Once the rabbit is snared it squeals.
I am not hurt, Mother.
Nor am I dishonoured.
How long must he hang there? The magistrate will decide.
Hardwick.
The owner of the clay pits.
Would you have ever told me about Edward Sexby? About your part in those times? It belongs in the past.
John Francis is the best of fathers.
He has loved and protected us both all these years.
We have made a place where you - where all of us - will be safe from the madness beyond these walls.
The madness has come over the walls.
Come and see me tomorrow.
We'll discuss your duties.
When does he leave? I have to get him out of Boston right now.
Randolph's only a day behind.
If he knows Ned helped William Goffe there'll be trouble.
Our offices in Bristol will find work for you.
Stay there till I send for you.
I'll help John Russell all I can and I'll take care of Randolph when he comes calling - which he will.
There's something I want you to do for me, Father.
Hope Russell? So you have eyes for that skinny little thing that never wore a skirt if she could wear breeches, hmm? She's grown into a woman like no other.
Oh, has she now? Go.
You risk all by this, my Lady.
You told me to listen to my heart.
The saintly Earl denied the Popish Plot.
He denied the Catholics tried to kill the King? In front of witnesses? Too cunning.
Damn him! Shaftesbury - little sincerity himself - fans the flames of rebellion in London.
I am prepared.
I have a store of arms to defend the King if his enemies make war.
And your price?Oh, it's my duty to support the King.
You ask nothing in return? Well No, let me guess, my lady's land for more clay pits.
If that land should become forfeit to the Crown when you expose her as a traitor BARKING AND SHOUTING IN DISTANCE Now to Hardwick's gun store.
Quick! Look at this.
Move! BANG! Her Catholic husband did this! He said to my face he wished my clay pits blown to Kingdom come and me with them! Then bring him down.
God bless you, Pru, for taking this risk.
For the Good Old Cause.
Thank you, Prudence.
God help us.
What have you done? You didn't stand by while others suffered and nor will I.
Because of what I did, I have enemies.
And they will not rest till they destroy me and all I hold dear.
You put us all at risk.
Psst! Are you mad, Sir? Men are scouring the county for you and the guns.
I am a thief come to steal a kiss.
Steal another.
My Lady! The Countess is asking for you.
Were you with the outlaws when they stole Hardwick's guns last night? Blood and violence will not bring a better world.
Look at Sarah and Esther.
Quakers both - their husbands cut down at the last rebellion both fighting for a better world.
And these two lonely widows will sleep in joyless beds and no sons to bury them.
And live in an England where they are still persecuted for their faith.
But not here, not in our little commonwealth.
Liberty behind closed doors? And only for the few.
Is that enough for you, Mother? For 20 years I have held in my heart the dream of a new world.
For everyone.
Without kings, without courts, where good people will live their lives together in peace and I believe this will come in time but by the pen, not by the sword.
Must they wait and suffer? Why should they not take up arms as their fathers did? As Sarah and Esther's husbands did.
As your husband did.
I remember all too well the sickening violence.
The pain, the grief.
I remember the loss and I don't want that for you, Beth.
Promise me.
Promise me you will never go into the woods again.
Do you remember the love, Mother? For two long months you have warmed your feet by the fire of the King's enemies.
Are you comfortable at Fanshawe House, Master Gore? I look, I listen, I have searched for papers and found nothing.
I fear that she is blameless.
Blameless? Where was the Earl the night the clay pits were blown up? At his prayer, my Lord.
Does he hear Mass? I do not know! You have a week to find out! Or your father swings.
Will? Will! I hope it was his friends and not the body-snatchers that took him.
I am sure it was his friends.
God bless you, Will.
Shall we say a prayer for him? To Our Blessed Lady? Not here in the open.
You hear the Mass.
You trust me with your life, my Lord.
I believe it's God's Providence that brought you to me.
It was my good fortune.
Abe? What is? The woods are alive with militia.
They shot my horse.
I don't want you to come here anymore.
How can we be together? We cannot.
Why not? Because it is the thing that I most want.
You possess my thoughts.
I grow weary of the hard ground and long to share your soft bed.
Then share it, Abe.
Let us be together, this does not Hear me, Beth.
The more I think on you and warmth and comfort the less I think on killing our enemies.
Come with me.
For months I've put your life at risk.
Look what's happened to Prudence.
Hardwick had her flogged and hanged.
I'll feed him to his own dogs.
Beth, if this would happen to you my heart would break.
If you love me as I love you then let us leave these woods tonight and make a new life together in a new world.
The fight is here and now.
Hardwick dies tonight.
NEIGHING Come.
She helped the rebels steal her master's guns.
Guns.
Served the King's father at Edgehill, God bless his memory.
We'll all be brought to ruin sir, now the old quarrel's breaking out again.
What happened to the rebels? They ran away, they just left her.
They should hang for their cowardice.
They would hang me, sir, if they could catch me.
Mark him.
Do not harm him.
He's only guiding me through these woods.
Go.
Be gone, sir.
But first I shall have your horse.
You steal horses as well as guns? Guns are the only law when this counts as justice.
Dealt out by magistrates handpicked by the King.
I am a stranger here, sir.
I have no part in this argument.
All men should be enemies to tyranny.
Go home.
Never come into these woods again.
Agh!Ugh! My Lady, forgive me You were set upon, Mr? Hawkins.
Hawkins.
I should not have travelled through the woods at night, but my business with you is pressing.
"William and Frances Goffe, 1630.
" Dead.
Hounded down by Charles Stuart's agents in Massachusetts.
He asked that this be returned to his widow who you have helped these last 20 years, my Lady.
Frances Goffe died three months ago.
Did Colonel Goffe not know that, Mr Hawkins? No.
Who told you I helped her? Hope Russell.
You wrote letters to Colonel Goffe at her house.
The Russells risked everything to help him.
I come to you as a friend, my Lady.
William Goffe was a brave comrade.
His papers were seized.
Edward Randolph will tell the King you sent money to a regicide.
KEYS RATTLE IN LOCK DOOR SLAMS John Hawkins is a good man.
When I am gone, be guided by him.
Please, father, please let me go back to Hadley.
It's not safe.
Hope, promise me you will be ruled by John Hawkins.
I promise.
HE EXHALES PRIEST:Amen.
Look, children.
Will Pastor Russell be with God now, Father? He led a godly life, but we cannot know whom God has chosen.
No! Look! And you must think on your own deaths everyday, so you will be ready.
MUTED WHISPERING She is better shamed than damned, Hope.
You must put Ned out of your mind.
Ned? My husband tells me everything.
My stepson's recklessness could have ruined us.
Ned tried to save a persecuted old man.
I'm proud of that.
Are you not? Pride is a sin, Hope Russell.
You will forget Ned when you have a husband.
Henry Cresswell has consented to take you under his roof as wife and mother to his children.
But before that union can take place, you must be purified.
Purified? Hope, you must purge your sins.
How have I sinned? You are proud, Hope Russell and you are defiant and immodest.
You wear your hair loose and undressed.
And I have seen your forearms bare in the street.
Our ways are different on the frontier.
And you speak out of turn! You must go to the Meeting House tomorrow and beg the Lord's forgiveness.
Or God will bring down His wrath on Boston, as He did on Hadley.
I will not.
SOFT FOOTSTEPS IN THE GRASS He wanted you to be ruled by me.
I would rather be cast out than do what you ask of me.
Hope, we have a covenant with God.
He has planted us here in this New Israel and we must obey His laws.
If you put yourself beyond those laws, then you put us all at risk and you must be gone from Massachusetts.
I cannot marry a man I do not love.
Ned is not here, Henry Cresswell is.
And his children need a mother.
While we build this New World there is no time for the love of the poets.
We need strong women to marry strong men if we are to tame this wilderness.
But I cannot.
There is no "I", there is only "We" in this, Hope.
And God wants this for you.
BOY SOPRANO SINGS NOISE AND CHATTER HE STARTS HE PANTS DOOR LATCH CLICKS OPEN DOOR SHUTS OWL HOOTS ANIMAL SQUAWKS HE EXHALES I made it across the Atlantic Ocean.
But I nearly didn't make it through Wightham Woods thanks to you and your highwayman.
He is no common thief, Mr Hawkins.
He is the bravest of men and all he does he does for others.
He has opened my eyes to the injustice of the world.
And you risk everything, for love? Can you understand that? Aye, I can.
Love.
Not just for each other but for all mankind, for justice and liberty.
Do you think me foolish, Mr Hawkins? Do you not hold these things dear in America? I do not think you foolish, my Lady.
And in truth I wish I could tell you what we hold dear in America.
My eyes are opening too.
ROWDY CHANTING IN BACKGROUND CHANTING: And all through honest men.
And 24 to justice bring - Amen! Amen! Amen! Your Popish plot and Jesuit priests we do not fear at all, For lo, beneath Judge Jeffrey's feet - you fall! You fall! You fall! Now God preserve great Charles our King and all true honest men.
And traitors all to justice bring - Amen! Amen! Amen! Your Popish plots and Jesuit priests we do not fear at all, What is this? It's a Pope burning.
These are our neighbours?! Husband.
No.
No.
They mock you, John Francis.
CHANTING: Amen! Amen! Amen! Forge a plot! Fire London! Destroy the King! Burn John Francis! No! No, no, no, no, no.
There's a trap for you, my Lord.
They provoke you to deny the Popish plot.
CROWD: Burn! Burn! Burn! Look, my Lady.
Agnes? Oh, God be praised.
I have been cured by the touch of the Protestant Duke.
Long live Monmouth! No! Long live Monmouth! Long live Monmouth! ALL: Long live Monmouth.
Burn all Catholics.
Long live Monmouth.
Catholics must all burn in hell! Go home.
All of you! To your homes! And you to your beds! Go home! Burn all Catholic plotters! Father, no! You are deluded! There was no Catholic plot to kill the King.
Traitor! CROWD: Traitor! He denies the Popish Plot! No, stop, please! GUNSHO HORSE'S HOOVES THUNDER My next will send a man to meet his maker.
Which one of you will it be? LOUD GUNSHO I walked into their trap.
Denying the Popish Plot.
SHE PANTS Abe.
You shall bleed to death.
Listen close, Beth.
Hardwick got up the Pope burning.
Warn your mother.
You must leave England tonight.
I beg you, sir.
Make them go.
You must leave England at first light.
Make a new life, in the New World.
John Francis.
I love you with my whole heart.
If we must leave this house, we leave it together.
HE STARTS TO SAY SOMETHING No.
HE SOBS Shall there never be a life for us? Some water.
Take her and go.
Come! Quickly.
Where is he, where is he? BANGING Open in the name of the King! You shall not take him! You shall not take him! Move! Wait! Husband! Husband! BEADS CLATTER TO FLOOR They will not leave without you, my Lord.
Well, tell them I will follow.
The King knows me for a loyal subject.
My hot words will be forgiven, once I explain to his judge.
Judge? Aye, my Lord Jeffreys comes today.
Jeffreys holds my father in the Tower under pain of death.
The price for his life is that I betray you.
I gave him nothing.
My Lord, you have been as a father to me.
Ah, Will Blood.
I have a message from your dear father.
Let me think Ah, yes, "Tell my son I forgive him for abandoning me.
" But I did not abandon him.
I saved Hardwick so Too late, Will, did I not say? Your father has shuffled off this mortal coil.
I ran out of patience with you.
Go and weep for him.
CROWD CHANT: Long live the King! Long live the King! CROWD CHANT: Long live Monmouth! CROWD CHANT: Magna Carta! Magna Carta! Long live Monmouth! Beth wouldn't leave without her father.
Where is she now? She's petitioning Monmouth for her father's release.
Monmouth will not help her.
Tell her to be of good heart.
I'll find a way to help her father.
Why has the King brought the parliament to Oxford? To fright his enemies into submission away from the London mob.
He means to crush Shaftesbury's plans to set Monmouth on the throne in his brother's place.
Abe, the King has arrived.
The streets are lined with soldiers.
They're as thick as flies.
Now is the moment, Abe.
The moment for what? Tell Beth that she must leave England without delay.
Tell me how you got that ring.
From a man called Goffe.
Why did he give it to YOU? To bring to his widow.
Dead? How? He jumped to his death.
To escape the King's agents.
Did he have a message for me? For you? For his son.
He said his son should remember the words of Colonel Sidney.
"Let your hand be an enemy to tyrants.
" That I shall before the day is out.
59 men signed Charles I's death warrant.
One of them - William Goffe - was shielded from justice by republican fanatics.
SCREAMS OF TORTURE IN BACKGROUND People like your wife.
Is that not so? MAN SCREAMS IN BACKGROUND Ah.
They all break in the end.
I love you.
I love you.
Look after your mother until we can all be together again.
I love you.
Take Beth and go, now.
I will follow.
Dearest heart I love you.
I love you, John Francis.
Remember this .
.
until we are together again.
CROWD CHANT: Long live Monmouth! CROWD CHANT: Magna Carta! Magna Carta! Ned! Ned! Where's Abe? He's over there.
The King has taken a back road to Christchurch.
He was warned of an attempt to kidnap him.
Our moment is lost, Abe.
We have to follow him.
I must say goodbye to him.
Your faith will keep you strong, my Lord.
When I was a boy, a priest lived with us, secretly.
Father Arrowsmith.
One day he was arrested as he said Mass and dragged to the gallows tree.
He ascended the ladder like a man going up to Paradise.
He hung there very long and in great pain.
And through all this, Will, his faith kept him strong.
He would not name the Catholics that had sheltered him.
When they thought he was quite dead, he was cut down and brought to Master Tunstall, the butcher, to quarter him.
And as we watched the knife enter his bowels, he screamed and sat up.
And as Tunstall's hand tore his heart from his chest, Edward Arrowsmith called out the names of my mother and father.
HE SOBS When Jeffreys does his worst to me, Will, I am very afraid that I will betray Angelica.
I pray to God she's out of the country by then.
CROWD CHANTS IN DISTANCE No! For my father.
Come on.
Stop them! I know where we'll find them.
Leave that, Agnes.
Mother! DOOR CLOSES Help us! He tried to kill the King.
Were you followed? I don't think so.
We can take him into the woods when the bleeding has stopped.
There's no time, Beth.
Abe, look at me.
Look at me.
Look at me.
Hold him.
HE GROANS Ned, get him into the woods.
Beth, you and I must leave.
There is another way.
This leads to the edge of the woods.
Go with him, Beth.
I'll send for you when it's safe.
Beth, please! No, Mother, I will not leave you ever again.
Take them! Why does Jeffreys not come for me? Shall we try and pray once more, my Lord? I cannot pray! God sees into my heart.
My Lord? I would rather end my own life than betray Angelica.
You must not think on self-slaughter, my Lord, for your soul would be eternally damned.
Follow them.
Take care of them all their days.
Promise me, Angelica will never suffer.
I swear on my life.
I can pray now, Will.
Holy Mary, mother of God pray for us sinners.
Now and at the hour of our death.
Amen.
You stand here indicted as false traitors against the most illustrious and excellent King Charles II, your supreme and natural lord.
Not having the fear of God in your heart, nor weighing the duty of your allegiance, but being seduced by the Devil, on the 21st day of March, in the parish of Wightham, well knowing Abraham Goffe to be a false traitor and assassin, you did wickedly and traitorously conceal him in your dwelling house.
How do you plead? Not guilty.
GASPS AND MURMURING Not guilty.
Bring her to me! Do you hope to evade justice as your husband did? For taking his own life, he burns in hell.
He would not have taken his own life.
So may you burn in hell.
Doubt not, madam, my jury will condemn you of high treason.
You will burn at the stake with your daughter in full public view.
So you would use the awful spectacle of our deaths to remind the King's enemies, now met in this city, what fate awaits those who oppose him? You have a quick wit for a woman.
But it will not save you.
Were you my own mother, I would see you burn for your wanton depravity.
I do not ask you to save me.
Spare my daughter's life.
Declare your guilt and your deaths will come more quickly.
The executioner will strangle you both before the flames take hold.
Do not presume to bargain with me, madam! Let His Majesty transport Beth to his plantations in the New World .
.
and I will submit .
.
to your will.
SHOUTING My lords My lords, it is a very hard thing to say that we cannot trust the King and that we have already been deceived for so long.
Where is the Catholic Duke of York which both houses have declared dangerous and must be excluded from the succession? Why? He is in Scotland raising an army to march upon us.
No tears for me, sweetheart.
I've had a good life.
SHE SOBS Soon I shall be with John Francis.
God will be with you and he will give you strength to endure.
You will be in chains for a while but they cannot enslave your spirit.
Survive.
Make a new life in a new world.
LOCK CLUNKING DOOR OPENS I will live in your light always.
Always.
Always, mother.
I love you.
I love you with all my heart.
Mother.
Mother! Be brave, my Beth.
I love you, my most precious girl.
Mother! God bless you, my lady.
God bless you.
God bless.
You deserve everything you get! God bless you, my lady.
SHOUTING AND JEERING Gentlemen, friends, neighbours.
I die in the expectation of the Lord's pardon.
I forgive all persons that have had a hand in my death.
I acknowledge His Majesty's favour in altering my daughter's sentence to transportation.
CROWD JEERS No.
No! I stand accused of harbouring a would-be regicide.
LOW MURMURING To that I say when a king subjugates his Parliament, subverts his judges and suppresses his own people .
.
he is become a tyrant.
CROWD ROARS England will not suffer tyrants.
Tell them to silence her.
We are freeborn! He will name you as his successor.
He must or there will be civil war.
When a king turns tyrant he breaks covenant with his people and they have a right and a duty to bring him down.
England should be a commonwealth .
.
where men and women strive together for the common good.
This Parliament is hereby dissolved.
If we but love one another SCREAMING Fire!Hardwick, Jeffreys and Charles Stuart will pay for today with their own blood.
You should go my friend.
Marry Hope Russell if she'll still have you.
Love, what does a boy like you know about love? There's been gossip and rumour about your wife and my stepson.
I will have you both hanged as adulterers.
Who dares buy and sell my sovereign territory? Men like John Hawkins, you have carved up this colony in your own interests.
Your father never gave up hope that England would one day be a republic.
I hope to see that day.
That day is closer than you think.
A knife at your throat? Why? Stackpole saw something.
He thinks SHE GASPS .
.
it was a white woman.