Mad Jack (Scene 1) Poem by John Fenton Mcleish

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A young boy, Siegfried Sassoon, walks through the hallway of weirleigh mansion.He notices the living room door on his right is half open, he sticks his head in and peeks inside.The room is filled with smoke from pipes and cigars.Seated with their backs to him are about ten gentlemen.At the front facing these men are his father and lord rothschild.All these men are english lords, rothschild, sassoon, montefiore, goldschmidt etc.Quite literally, the bank of england.
Siegfried makes a beeline for the sweets and refreshments he notices, on a table at the back of the room.
Rothschild speaks, 'so gentlemen, the world war will be upon us in three years.We expect it to last at least five'.
One of the lords interjects, 'I can't see the kaiser lasting five years rothschild'.
Rothschild, 'the arrangements have already been made.Oue bank(bank of england) has transferred surplus funds to the kaisers account'.
'What about the blockade? ', interjects another lord.
Rothschild, 'Gentlemen, must i remind you, the americans are still neutral.We will use them to tranfer supplies through the neutral baltic states to germany, thus circumventing the blockade'.
Another lord, 'And how will we get our money back? '
Rothschild, 'When the germans surrender, unconditionally of course, they will be forced to pay reparations.The terms of which we will decide.After five years of war, germany will be so financially devastated they will have no choice'.
Another lord, 'And the king? '
Rothschild, 'I care not which puppet sits on the throne of england.Who controls the purse, controls the nation, and we gentlemen, control the purse'.
The lords interject, 'Here, here'
Siegfried fills his pockets full of cakes, sneakes out the door and runs upstairs to his toy room.
There is a big table in the middle of the room and on the table, lined up in formations, are toy soldiers, cavalry, artillery etc.
Hamo, siegfrieds younger brother, walks in.
'What are you doing ziggy? ', asks hamo
Siegfried, 'I'm making a world war, hamo'.
Hamo, 'What's that? '
Siegfried, 'That's when all the countries of the world have a big fight'.
Siegried takes a big marble from his pocket and rolls it along the table towards the figurines, scattering them everywhere.
Hamo, 'Can i play? '
Siegfried, 'Sure, here'.Siegfried hands hamo some marbles.
They begin rolling their marbles towards the figurines.The more soldiers that are scattered, the more they laugh, till they're nearly in hysterics.

*Suddenly the scene changes to the western front during WW1.
An artillary shell hits a red cross horse and wagon carrying wounded soldiers and explodes.Limbs from both human and horse go flying everywhere.
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// this poem may contain copying errors