Philomena    Goodness, no. They were all very kind in the village back home. (Pause.) Well, most of them were. Some of them gave us food. Then the nuns . . . the nuns picked me up and looked after me. Not all big people are bullies.

Bert    OK, but you’re from the land o’ the little people, right? Maybe us types get a better deal where you’re from, honey.

Charles recoils as if in memory. Raymond turns to him.

Raymond    Does the name Jeffrey Hudson ring a bell?

Charles    Jeffrey. . .?

Raymond    Jeffrey Hudson was a small person who was a retainer at the court of Charles I. ‘The King’s dwarf’ they called him. He was born in Rutland, the smallest county in England, I believe. Motto: ‘Multum in Parvo’ – much in little. He was probably one of the first small-people performers, a forerunner – in a crude way of course – to the thespians of today.

Bert    A fucken court jester!

Raymond    I’m sure that you would look at it like that.

Bert    What other way is there to look at it, Ray? He was there to amuse the fucken King, like little Charlie here. Only it wasn’t even no king that Charlie had to amuse, it was that mob o’ green-fingered cocksuckers, right, Charlie?

Charles    I should never have left home, should never have left my garden. I was safe at home. I thought I’d be taken care of at Kew, but those big bullies – all I wanted was to be left in peace to do my job of work – I . . .

Raymond    What you need to do with such people is give them a taste of their own medicine.

Bert    You’d know all about that, Ray . . . Big Jim Murdock, right?

Raymond    What are you, talking about, Kowalski?

Bert    Big Jim was the circus strongman with Fred Corelli, back in Wichita, ’twenty-nine . . .

Raymond    I’ve told you, Kowalski. I –

Bert    Nice guy. Couldn’t handle the sauce though. Turned into a real mean bastard on the sauce. Like a different fucken guy.

Charles is looking uncomfortable.

Bert    Know the type, Charlie?

Charles    Yes, the big gardeners . . . they . . . they . . .

Philomena notes his distress and comforts him.

Bert    Big Jim’s been on the hooch all day playin cards and I’m takin him and his buddies for the dumb schmucks they are, cleanin those big assholes right out. Well, Jim gets sore and he gets the notion that he’s gonna throw some dwarf ass around. Like see how far he can throw us . . .

Raymond    Kowalski . . .

Charles    They hung me upside down from a tree . . .

Philomena    No! Surely not. Never in the gardens of the King himself!

Bert    . . . We all had shit, Charlie, we all had shit. Thing is, instead of me, this asshole picks on Ray here, Ray with those fucken mitts like vices . . .

Raymond is about to react to Bert when Philomena runs her hand up and down his arm.