ACT I
The interior of a blacksmith shop. Right centre, a forge. Left, a loft, from which are hanging dried cornstalks, hay, and the yellow ears of cattle-corn. Back centre, a wide double door, closed when the curtain rises. Through this door—when later it is opened—is visible a New England landscape in the late springtime: a distant wood; stone walls, high elms, a well-sweep; and, in the near foreground, a ploughed field, from which the green shoots of early corn are just appearing. The blackened walls of the shop are covered with a miscellaneous collection of old iron, horseshoes, cart wheels, etc., the usual appurtenances of a smithy. In the right-hand corner, however, is an array of things quite out of keeping with the shop proper: musical instruments, puppets, tall clocks, and fantastical junk. Conspicuous amongst these articles is a large standing mirror, framed grotesquely in old gold and curtained by a dull stuff, embroidered with peaked caps and crescent moons.
Just before the scene opens, a hammer is heard ringing briskly upon steel. As the curtain rises there is discovered, standing at the anvil in the flickering light of a bright flame from the forge, a woman—powerful, ruddy, proud with a certain masterful beauty, white-haired (as though prematurely), bare-armed to the elbows, clad in a dark skirt (above her ankles), a loose blouse, open at the throat; a leathern apron and a workman’s cap. The woman is Goody Rickby. On the anvil she is shaping a piece of iron. Beside her stands a framework of iron formed like the ribs and backbone of a man. For a few moments she continues to ply her hammer, amid a shower of sparks, till suddenly the flame on the forge dies down.
GOODY RICKBY Dickon! More flame.
A VOICE [Above her.] Yea, Goody. [The flame in the forge spurts up high and suddenly.]
GOODY RICKBY Nay, not so fierce.
THE VOICE [At her side.] Votre pardon, madame. [The flame subsides.] Is that better?
GOODY RICKBY That will do. [With her tongs, she thrusts the iron into the flame; it turns white-hot.] Quick work; nothing like brimstone for the smithy trade.
[At the anvil, she begins to weld the iron rib on to the framework.]
There, my beauty! We’ll make a stout set of ribs for you. I’ll see to it this year that I have a scarecrow can outstand all the nor’easters that blow. I’ve no notion to lose my corn-crop this summer.