Downton Abbey Script Book Season 1 (13 page)

CLARKSON: Hard at work, I see.

ISOBEL: May I borrow your stethoscope, Doctor? Just for a moment.

He is a little taken aback but he gives it to her. She now addresses the patient, John Drake.

ISOBEL (CONT'D): May I?

He nods weakly and she listens to his chest. She gestures for the doctor to come away and speak to her.

CLARKSON: I must compliment you, Mrs Crawley. When you made your offer, I thought you might be a ‘Great Lady Nurse' and faint at the sight of blood. But I see you're made of sterner stuff.

ISOBEL: It's definitely the heart. It's almost too quiet to hear at all.

CLARKSON: I'm afraid so.

ISOBEL: I've been thinking about the treatments that are available.

Clarkson isn't quite sure he is pleased by this.

ISOBEL (CONT'D): Considerable success has been achieved in the last few years by draining the pericardial sac of the excess fluid and administering adrenaline—

CLARKSON: Mrs Crawley, I appreciate your thoroughness …

ISOBEL: But you're unwilling to try it.

CLARKSON: Injection of adrenaline is a comparatively new procedure.

ISOBEL: It was a while ago now, but I saw my husband do it. I know how.
*

CLARKSON: Please, Mrs Crawley. Don't force me to be uncivil. We would be setting an impossible precedent. When every villager could demand the latest fad in treatment, for each new cut and graze.

ISOBEL: I would remind you we are not talking of a cut or a graze, but of the loss of a man's life and the ruin of his family.

CLARKSON: Of course. And I don't mean to be flippant. But I beg you to see that it is not … reasonable.

Isobel is anything but convinced.

They're having tea. O'Brien holds forth as Anna returns.

O'BRIEN: I'm sorry but I have standards.

During this Anna is speaking to Bates in a low voice.

ANNA: I've just seen something ever so odd.

BATES: What sort of odd?

O'BRIEN: And if anyone thinks I'm going to pull my forelock and curtsey to this Mr Nobody from Nowhere—

CORA (V.O.): O'Brien!

Cora is in the doorway. They scramble to their feet. O'Brien is slower than the others. She stares at Cora.

CORA: Were you discussing Mr Crawley?

O'BRIEN: Yes, m'lady.

CORA: Is it your place to do so?

O'BRIEN: I've got my opinions, m'lady. Same as anybody.

Now Mrs Hughes has appeared, flustered by Cora's presence.

MRS HUGHES: Can I help your ladyship?

CORA: This is the button
we're
missing from my new evening coat. I found it lying on the gravel.

Mrs Hughes takes the button, puzzled by the atmosphere.

CORA (CONT'D): But I was shocked at the talk I heard as I came in. Mr Crawley is his lordship's cousin and heir. You will therefore please accord him the respect he's entitled to.

O'BRIEN: But you don't like him, yourself, m'lady. You never wanted him to come here. I remember distinctly—

CORA: You're sailing perilously close to the wind, O'Brien. If we're to be friends, you will not speak in that way again about the Crawleys or any member of Lord Grantham's family. Now I'm going up to rest. Wake me at the dressing gong.

O'Brien gives a slight nod. Cora goes.

THOMAS: I don't think that's fair. Not here in the Servants' Hall.

O'BRIEN: I agree. If she was a real lady she wouldn't have come down here. She'd have rung for me, and given me the button. That's all.

THOMAS: This isn't her territory. We can say what we like, down here.

MRS HUGHES: Who says?

THOMAS: The law. And Parliament. There is such a thing as free speech.

MRS HUGHES: Not when I'm in charge.

Thomas has annoyed her.

MRS HUGHES (CONT'D): Don't push your luck, Thomas. Now. Tea's over. Back to work. You'd better take this.

She hands the button to the lady's maid. The others go, leaving Anna and Bates with

O'Brien. She laughs bitterly.

O'BRIEN: Friends? Who does she think she's fooling? We're not friends.

ANNA: No?

O'BRIEN: No. And you're not ‘friends' with the girls neither. We're servants you and me. And they pay us to do as we're told. That's all.
*

With a bleak expression, she stalks out.

Matthew is trying to knot the white tie. Molesley hovers.

MOLESLEY: May I—?

MATTHEW: I can manage. Where have I put my cuff links?

Molesley darts forward with a pair to fasten them.

MOLESLEY: I thought these would make a change.

MATTHEW: I want my usual ones.

Molesley turns back to the link box, but Matthew gets there before him and takes out a pair which he inserts.

MATTHEW: I know I'm a disappointment to you, Molesley, but it's no good. I'll never get used to being dressed like a doll.

MOLESLEY: I'm only trying to help, sir.

MATTHEW: Of course. And if I've offended you, I apologise. But surely you have better things to do?

MOLESLEY: This is my job, sir.

MATTHEW: Well, it seems a very silly occupation for a grown man.

He takes the tail coat and shrugs it on, then goes to the door. But he is a nice man. He has no wish to be offensive.

MATTHEW (CONT'D): Look, I'm sorry if I—

Molesley stands. Matthew doesn't know how to finish it.

MATTHEW (CONT'D): I'm sorry.

Anna finishes Mary's hair, with Edith and Sybil watching.

SYBIL: Why are you so against him?

MARY: Aside from the fact he's planning to steal our inheritance?

EDITH:
Your
inheritance. It makes no difference to Sybil and me. We won't inherit, whatever happens.

Edith is on the bed. Seeing a letter in a book she pretends to read the book, but really reads the letter. Mary shrugs.

MARY: He isn't one of us.

SYBIL: But Cousin Freddie's studying for the bar, and so is Vivian MacDonald.

MARY: At Lincoln's Inn. Not sitting at a dirty little desk in Ripon. Besides, his father was a
doctor
.

SYBIL: There's nothing wrong with doctors. We all need doctors.

MARY: We all need crossing sweepers and draymen, too. It doesn't mean we have to dine with them.
*

CORA (V.O.): Whom don't we have to dine with?

She has come into the room, dressed for dinner. Anna gathers the discarded clothes and leaves.

EDITH: Mary doesn't care for Cousin Matthew.

CORA: Sybil, be a dear and fetch my pink evening shawl. O'Brien knows which one. And Edith, can you see that the drawing room is ready?

The sisters know they have been dismissed, and go.

CORA (CONT'D): I'm glad to catch you alone—

MARY: You've driven the others away.

Cora laughs.

CORA: Oh, perhaps I have. Pretty.

She admires some flowers as she gathers her thoughts.

CORA (CONT'D): The point is, my dear, I don't want you, any of you, to feel you have to dislike Matthew.

MARY: You disliked the idea of him.

CORA: That was before he came. Now he's here, I don't see any future in it. Not the way things are.

MARY: But you and Granny are going to overturn all that.

CORA: Suppose we can't?

MARY: I don't believe a woman can be forced to give away all her money to a distant cousin of her husband's. Not in the twentieth century. It's too ludicrous for words.

CORA: It's not as simple as that. The money isn't mine any more. It forms a part of the estate.

MARY: Even so, when a judge hears—

CORA: For once in your life, will you just
listen
!

She has shouted at her daughter, shocking them both.

CORA (CONT'D): I believe there is an answer which would secure your future and give you a position …

MARY: You can't be serious.

CORA: Just think about it.

MARY: I don't have to think about it. Marry a man who can barely hold his knife like a gentleman?

Cora laughs.

CORA: Oh, you exaggerate.

MARY: You're American. You don't understand these things.

A real insult from a daughter. Cora comes back, fighting.

CORA: Really, Mary, anyone would think he'd turned
you
down.

MARY: Don't be ridiculous.

But her tone suggests Cora may be on to something.

MARY (CONT'D): Have you mentioned this to Granny? Did she laugh?

CORA: Why would she? It was her idea.

Carson is coming downstairs. Anna going up.

CARSON: Anna, I'm glad I've caught you.

She waits patiently while he gets his nerve up.

CARSON (CONT'D): When I was … collecting that food earlier … for his lordship.

ANNA: Yes, Mr Carson?

CARSON: I hope you didn't feel the need to mention it to anybody?

Anna hesitates. She never actually told Bates, but …

CARSON: When his lordship makes donations—to charity, you understand—he doesn't like notice taken of it.

He goes downstairs and she continues up, seriously puzzled.

William is waiting as Daisy loads a tray. He is reading a book, which is making him smile.

DAISY: What've you got there?

WILLIAM: A book of the new dance steps. My Mum sent it.

DAISY: Let me see.

He shows her a page with drawings of a couple dancing the Grizzly Bear. They study the foot pattern, curiously.

DAISY (CONT'D): Go on, then.

William holds the book and starts to execute the steps, but somehow he gets them wrong, trips himself up and crashes into the table. Daisy roars with laughter.

DAISY: Whatever will they think of next?

MRS PATMORE: They'll think there's a hyena loose in my kitchen.

She has stolen up on them.

DAISY: Sorry, Mrs Patmore.

William enters the dining room, where the two families are at dinner. There is a slightly stiff atmosphere.

ISOBEL: I thought the hospital a great credit to your father's memory.

She smiles at Robert, which he receives pleasantly.

ISOBEL (CONT'D): But I'm afraid the good doctor and I did not see eye to eye.

VIOLET: You amaze me.

ISOBEL: He's treating one of your tenants, John Drake, for dropsy, but he seems reluctant to embrace some of the newer treatments.

ROBERT: Drake is a good man and far too young to die, but I suppose the doctor knows his business.

VIOLET: Not as well as Mrs Crawley, apparently.

But Robert wants things to go well. He changes the subject.

ROBERT: By the way, if you ever want to ride, just let Lynch know and he'll sort it out for you.