The Miracle of the Salt by John Allman
Setting: New England, circa 1870.
Act 1. Bony, an orphan raised by relatives on the bay side, mourns Old Bucker, his dead dog; a ‘miracle’ pink salt spring bursts forth. His Aunt Geneva wants it kept secret; Bony’s friend Jake does too – but Bony, more than anything, wishes to share Old Bucker’s ‘miracle’ salt with the world. Clarissa, who’s from the valley side like Jake, saw the spring happen,...
Setting: New England, circa 1870.
Act 1. Bony, an orphan raised by relatives on the bay side, mourns Old Bucker, his dead dog; a ‘miracle’ pink salt spring bursts forth. His Aunt Geneva wants it kept secret; Bony’s friend Jake does too – but Bony, more than anything, wishes to share Old Bucker’s ‘miracle’ salt with the world. Clarissa, who’s from the valley side like Jake, saw the spring happen, and tells Bony that their village also has pink salt, which they believe to have life-prolonging qualities, but not to be miraculous. Bony and Clarissa are attracted to each other; they kiss. Aunt Geneva dreams of her sister, Bony’s dead mother, Calliope, who comes to warn her against the pink salt; Calliope and her husband were killed when they tried to market the pink salt as saltpeter, to be used for making gunpowder. Bony’s Uncle Groat is a sea salt merchant who also happens to be appointed by Mayor Slade as the local tax assessor - local merchants pay excise taxes in order to control market pricing. Bony hears that Groat intends to mine the pink salt, also for use as saltpeter in the manufacture of gunpowder – but Groat has to prove that it’s really saltpeter first. To prevent the pink salt from being used for gunpowder, in the presence of Jake & Clarissa, Bony digs and chops at the spring – but instead of destroying it, as he hacks at it, he hits solid pink rock salt! His faith in the miracle is renewed.
Act 2. Uncle Groat’s financier, Mayor Slade, has invested in the saltpeter; he’s funded the building of a new windmill for the drying, and now for the dyeing - of sea salt, to pass it off as pink salt; he’s hired a local workforce and dug a mineshaft opening in order to mine the actual pink salt - or is it saltpeter? Jake is the new foreman – if he’s ‘in’, he’ll benefit from the funds that Slade and Groat skim from the merchant taxes. Clarissa also works for the newly-formed ‘All Your Salts’, of which Bony has been named VP; she & Jake both confront Bony: why are vats & drains installed at the windmill? Why are the workers being forced to sign non-disclosure forms, and why is the company taking so long getting the miners to work? Bony defies Uncle Groat’s plan to dye sea salt pink in order to develop a niche market as ‘insurance’ if the mine’s not saltpeter after all. Bony asks Geneva how his parents died; she believes they were killed by the gunpowder syndicate for trying to sell their interest in the pink salt, which they thought was saltpeter. Clarissa & Jake decide that Groat’s plan for marketing the pink salt must be stopped; with the Mayor’s power to drum up demand, the mine could strip the vein, ruining not only the natural resource, but also prospects for the villagers through taxation on the stuff they have used for years. Jake declares that saltpeter isn’t pink anyway. Groat tests the pink salt for saltpeter by mixing it and trying it out as gunpowder; it works! In the distance, the new windmill burns - Clarissa confesses to starting the fire; an explosion’s heard, and Jake appears – he has blown up the mine using a new invention - TNT. Groat aims to kill; Jake attacks him & they both die, falling into the mineshaft as it explodes again. Bony says that he himself put actual saltpeter in Groat’s gunpowder to fool his uncle into mining the pink salt, and ensure fulfillment of Bony’s wish to share his dog’s miracle with the world. Slade is impressed with Bony’s vision, and names him the new tax assessor. Bony rejects it, but Slade reminds him that as VP of the new company, Bony endorsed the gag orders that had been forced on the mill workers, to conceal production of faux pink salt; Clarissa confirms that the villagers would never trust Bony now. Bony accedes, on condition that Clarissa is promoted to Director of Quality Control. Slade declares: Bony will now be known as ‘Bony the Salinator’.
Book, Music & Lyrics copyright 2022 John Allman