Pugwash

Vern Thiessen

• Publisher: Playwrights Canada Press
• Year: 2019
• Print ISBN:
  9780369100603
• eBook ISBN:
  9780369100627
• Topic: Literature
• Subtopic: Canadian Drama
• Index: Literature

1957. Barely a decade after the first use of atomic bombs, the world is divided and fearful of the real threat of nuclear weaponry.In an effort to understand the devastating effects of radiation, leading scientists and academics—world-renowned "Thinkers"—are invited to a conference in the small town of Pugwash, Nova Scotia.

Two local children, Conni and Jamie, take interest in some of the Thinkers, who are humbled by their innocent welcome. But a spy disguised as a reporter has conned Jamie for information to use against the Thinkers, putting the entire conference—and the town of Pugwash—at risk.

Act One

Conni speaks to the audience.

Conni: The sunrise here is always quiet.

Have you noticed that?

It rises soft and slow.

Gliding over Fox Harbour like a gull.

Floating past the Lower Gulf Shore like a big red balloon.

Easing over Matheson’s Cove like a breeze.

Waking us all up.

Again.

She sighs, restless.

This place, this place.

So small, it slides off a map.

So empty, there’re more streets than people.

Why would they come here?

Why would they come to a place of shallow, warm water.

When the war they were fighting was so deep and cold?

Jamie appears. He’s been there all along in the shadows of her memory.

He hauls two bundles of newspapers. He sets one down and stands on it, holding aloft a copy. This is now the post office steps.

And here you are. Jamie Gillis.

Your face, red as the lighthouse on Pugwash Point.

Your lanky hands, blackened from newsprint.

Your eleven-year-old heart full of fire.

Jamie: Fi-re!

Conni: July 4th, 1957. Pugwash, Nova Scotia.

Jamie: Read all about it! Raging fire once more strikes the town of Pugwash, Nova Scotia! Fi-re!

Conni is thirteen years old now.

Conni: For Pete’s sake, Jamie Gillis! Stop that! What in the devil’s name do you think you’re doing?

Jamie: What’s it look like? I’m crying the news.

Conni: The news? Hanging onto the post office steps, hollering “fire” to the dirt road, when it’s obvious there is no fire.

Jamie: It’s my job to sell the Amherst Daily News, Conni McPhee. And a good fire always sells a newspaper.

Conni: If people were listening! Do you see anyone down Prince Albert Street there? No. And do you see anyone coming up Water Street here? No. You know why? They’re working. They’re out fishing and farming and doing what they need to make a living.

Jamie: What are you doing here then?

Conni: My daddy’s running the mail, fool!

Jamie: I thought your daddy was working the mill.

Conni: He was, until he got the asthma.

Jamie: I thought Mr. Deekan was running the mail.

Conni: Deekan’s helping Old Man Mundle at the funeral home.

Jamie: Why’s Mundle need help at the funeral home?

Conni: His wife died.

Jamie: Deekan’s?

Conni: No, Mundle’s! So Deekan’s helping him out with the dead.

Jamie: His wife?

Conni: The other dead. And that means Daddy’s running the mail.

Jamie: Why’s your daddy not helping Mundle with the dead so Deekan can still do the mail?

Conni: My daddy doesn’t know nothing about preparing the dead!

Jamie: But —

Conni: If you spent half the amount of time listening to what’s going on in Pugwash as you do crying the news to crows on the post office steps, you’d know what I was talking about.

Jamie: That still doesn’t answer why you’re here when your daddy’s out running the mail.

Conni: Bringing him lunch.

She holds up the lunch.

Satisfied?

She sits down on the steps. She takes out a sketchbook and pencil crayons. She draws.

Jamie: What you got there?

Conni: Sketchbook and pencils. Eaton’s catalogue.

Jamie: What you gonna draw?

Conni: Cat.

Jamie: You don’t have a cat.

Conni: Don’t have to have a cat to draw one.

He stands and shouts:

Jamie: Fi-re, fi-re!

Conni: For Pete’s sake, Jamie. Stop yellin’ like that or you’re going to end up like one of those drunks in front of the Tide’s Inn.

Jamie: I’m a paper boy, what else am I supposed to do?

Conni: Deliver yo...

Table of contents

• Preface
• Act One
• Act Two
• Afterword
• Acknowledgements
• About the Author