All characters in this script are over eighteen where there is reference to sexual content.
The story looks at the world through the eyes of Nancy Templeton and how she sees herself and how she changes over time, overcoming her inertia to grow into a woman of substance, controlling her own identity and destiny. There are sixteen chapters in this story. I would appreciate your comments on what you think of the main character, Nancy Templeton. Is she manipulative or a woman of her time looking for equality in her marriage and in her life.
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Mrs. Templeton's Secrets
Chapter One
At the end of the Second World War, John and Nancy Thomas Templeton had been married for ten years. Nancy was young when they married and John was twenty-seven. The marriage was encouraged by her father who'd, for the past five years, worked with John and his father and were family friends. Nancy fell pregnant soon after the wedding with Steven, with Clive their other son, born the following year.
The war years were difficult for everyone, especially so for young Nancy with two children. John firmly believed it was a woman's work to look after the house even when she was called upon to work in a munitions factory to help the war effort while her mother looked after the children. The house was her responsibility and John was strict, like her father, in making sure everything was correct. Nancy had never kissed a man intimately until she married John and he became her protector, provider and father figure.
John owned the house before they were married and after the wedding, he gave her housekeeping to purchase groceries but made all the decisions and paid the bills. When she was working to help the war effort, she was allowed a little extra to spend and was grateful for his generosity, accepting, without hesitation, when her parents and John told her how fortunate she was to be married to such a fine man. The war had passed; rationing was no longer an issue and the standard of living was rising. They'd been married for twenty-two years. John would be fifty next birthday, Nancy thirty-nine. John had insisted her place was in the home looking after their children Steven and Clive, even though they were now independently working as recently qualified electricians in the pit. Their relationship with their father was always strained and a constant worry to her, having to continually intervene to keep the peace. Eventually, they'd had enough of the squabbling and emigrated to Australia as soon as Clive qualified. It had been hard for the parents to accept; they wanted the best for them but the job offers were good and they wished them the best, Nancy crying for days after they left.
They wrote regularly but their loss was still keenly felt by both, especially since John's health had deteriorated over the last two years. Working underground, in dark, often damp, warm, cramped conditions among minute specks of coal dust and silica, which floated in the air, affected most colliers. Pneumoconiosis or lung disease, colloquially known as the coal worker's illness, came from inhaling these airborne particles. A toxic mix leading to severe inflammation of the lung tissue, silicosis, bronchitis, and lung cancer.
Most long-term miners had these diseases in varying degrees, which lowered the immune system, impaired concentration, resulting in a severe shortage of breath. Many miners had crippled bones twisted or broken out of shape by crawling in confined spaces and from accidents and rock falls. Many developed beat knees, a joints disease in the kneecaps from kneeling all day, which built fluid on the knees, and unless removed early, caused the walls of the bursa to permanently thicken, poisoning and crippling the person.
Often, when out of doors, it was common to see a miner walk a few hundred yards and stop, unable to breathe from the exertion of simply walking, gasping for breath. John was one of these; even to walk down the stairs from the bedroom was a major feat. Neighbours often called to see him and when the weather was clement he would, with Nancy's help, take a short stroll outside. John wasn't alone; it was a common occurrence throughout the village, men broken and old before their time. The wives managed the best they could, but it was hard seeing their loved one waste away.
Nancy had an easy-going personality, always smiling and ready to help others. She missed her sons more than John and cried when alone while her husband rested upstairs. John had a small pension and, providing she was careful, they managed to make ends meet, especially when the neighbours brought fresh vegetables from their garden. She had her own little patch of garden at the back of the house which John used to tend, now she had to do the work. Often when in the garden, little Phil, living a few doors away, would help her. He was eighteen but looked twelve because he was so short, had a cherubic face and always smiled when he saw her. His sister, Alice, was three years younger and straight as a bean pole, always pleasant and ready to help when she saw them in the garden. Their parents, David and Joan, were firm friends with John and Nancy, often calling around each other's houses. David also suffered with his lungs but not to the same extent as John so life went forward in their little community with neighbour helping neighbour.
The houses were in rows of terraces, mostly two bedroomed. A reasonably sized kitchen and a small front room, which everyone called the parlour, believing it sounded better than calling it the small front room. John and Nancy's bedroom was directly above it. The other bedroom, of similar size, the boys used but now Nancy often slept there, especially when John was up most of the night coughing. John handled the household budget and paid all the bills, advancing Nancy an allowance for food but he always insisted on checking the receipts. Not because he was mean, it had been always been that way so why change, even telling her what clothes she should wear. His father did it with his mother, so did her parents and he carried on in the same tradition. With John's illness, that all changed. He was no longer able to do those things and it fell to Nancy to take over and became the dominant one when it came to running the home.
One afternoon, while Joan and Nancy were nattering over a cup of tea, Nancy excused herself hearing John coughing upstairs and went to see to him, returning later with tears in her eyes. "I'm so worried about him and with the children gone, oh, it's difficult not to cry in front of him. I can't let him see me crying. I must stay strong for him," she sobbed, taking a sip from her cup. "I'll soon be a widow at this rate. I can't live without him. Often with his coughing, he can't even sleep and insists I go into the boy's old bedroom to sleep. I hate it but what am I to do? He's up most of the night coughing and dozes most of the day. I know coal helps to keep our country afloat but is the price worth it with the lives it destroys? I often wonder."
"David is the same but not as bad as John. He hasn't been himself for the last few years but can still, you know, do the married thing."
Nancy smiled. "I used to enjoy that but John is no longer up to it. I have tried on a few occasions and it worked sometimes, but with his coughing and shortage of breath, any exertion takes a toll and I'm afraid to do anything remotely energetic, not that I moved much, John preferred me to lie still. That part of our marriage is over for us. I tried recently but he gets embarrassed and I feel for him and pretend I'm only doing it to make him happy.
"I can tell you miss it."
"Sometimes... No, a lot if I'm truthful, but I don't dwell upon it, sickness and in health forsaking all others, that's what we promised each other; over time I'll get used to it. At least you are getting a bit so be grateful while it lasts."
"I am, believe me, for every one man in our village, there're at least six widows and a lot of the husbands are dead from the waist down. You know what I'm saying. In our street alone out of thirty houses, only twelve have husbands and half of them are out of it. So we are luckier than most and should be grateful for small mercies. Look at Johnson two streets down, he volunteered to leave the pit to go to war, now look at him, a shell of a man coming home, both legs gone, one arm useless. He doesn't know what day it is and sits outside in his wheelchair when it's not raining, often asleep. So what's the point of moaning. My John has always treated me right."
Joan looked around the room and whispered. "Talking of Johnson, I heard Daisy is putting it out a bit."
"She's so house-proud. He's outside when it's not raining so he's not in the way when she cleans the house."
"What's being house-proud got to do with Daisy putting it about?"
"Nothing, I suppose. What are you saying?"
