Days of Heaven Page #17

CHUCK:

Nothing to worry about. Just shows the land is

good.

213SERIES OF ANGLES

Various wonders of the prairie: a charred tree,

a huge mastodon bone, a flowering bush, a pelican, the

rusted hulk of an ancient machine, etc.

ABBY (o.s.)

How strange this new world is! You walk out in

the morning

sometimes to find a lake rippling where the day before solid

land

was.

214EXT. STONE BOAT

Chuck has laid out the outline of a 50-foot boat

in whitewashed stones. He walks around the imaginary deck

showing Abby where the cabins will be.

ABBY (o.s.)

Chuck wants to build a boat and take us off to

Java, which he's

never seen.

215EXT. FIELDS

Ursula goes out to the fields with an organist

named JOEY

whom Chuck has hired to play for the crops. He and Ursula

seem to hit it off.

ABBY (o.s.)

Last month he brought in a kid to play the

organ. He claims it

helps the crops grow. Personally I doubt it.

216EXT. MIDDLE OF FIELDS

They have brought an organ out into the middle

of the fields. Ursula pumps up the bellows. Joey sits in

front of the keyboard and shoots his cuffs.

His fingers strike the keys.

217CLOUDS, CLOSEUPS OF PLANTS - TIME LAPSE

PHOTOGRAPHY (STOCK)

Clouds build in huge toadstools. Thunder rolls

across the

plains. A rain begins to fall. The music seems to work a

magic on the crops, to draw them forth. The seeds germinate

in the darkness of the

soil. Water finds its way down. Roots, tiny hairs at

first, spread and grow.

218DOLLS, TIGHT ANGLES ON THEIR FACES

Rude dolls fixed at the ends of pointed

sticks--agricultural fetishes that Chuck's father brought

with him from the Old World--stand around the field to join

in aiding the crops.

219EXT. BELVEDERE

Flags and bunting adorn the porch for

Independence Day. Ursula sets off some fireworks.

ABBY (o.s.)

Time has flown, and once again harvest is near.

220EXT. GREEN FIELDS(TRIFFIDS)

The bald earth has, as though by a mystery,

become a sheet of grain, its green already fading to gold.

The music dies away, replaced by the whirr of summer

crickets.

ABBY (o.s.)

It will be a year that we have been here.

The camera holds and holds on the fields until in their

vacant depths, we begin to sense the presence of a deep

malevolence, still biding its time but growing every minute.

Seagulls--like strange emissaries from another world--glide

back and forth over the fields in search of grasshoppers.

221INT. LANTERN - NIGHT

Ursula takes curling irons from the chimney of a

lantern where she has set them to heat, and applies them to

Abby hair.

URSULA:

Suppose I never fall in love, Abby?

ABBY:

Don't be silly. Everybody does. What do you

think all those songs

are about? You need to be careful, though, and not throw it

away.

URSULA:

Throw what away?

ABBY:

You know, your chances. It's too hard to explain

to a little

squirrel like you.

URSULA:

That sounded just like Bill. Don't you miss him?

ABBY:

Sometimes.

From her tone, however, we sense that she finds it easier

with him gone.

222INT. MASTER BEDROOM

Abby whispers something to Chuck in bed that

evening.

CHUCK:

You ever said that to anybody else?

She giggles.

CHUCK:

You're lying, aren't you? Well, go right on

lying.

The camera moves to the window, beneath the eave. Outside,

peacocks strut back and forth.

223EXT. MUDDY ROAD

Bill rides an Indian motorcycle along a muddy

road back to the bonanza. His rabbit is strapped to the

back. He stops for a moment to look at the new fields.

224EXT. BELVEDERE - BILL'S POV

Abby sings to herself as she beats out a carpet.

Bill appears on the ridge behind her. Hope leaves him like a

ghost. She looks happily settled into a new life with Chuck.

All at once she turns around.

ABBY:

Bill!

She rushes up and embraces him, but her warmth just seems a

tease to Bill. She is different. She looks different. The

tutors and tailors Chuck has brought in over the winter have

given her more polish. Her hair is nicely

coiffed. Where she used to dress in cotton shirtwaists, she

wears crinolines now.

BILL:

How's everybody been?

ABBY:

Including me? Okay. Gee, you look good.

BILL:

Thanks. And Chuck?

ABBY:

Still the same.

BILL:

Actually I didn't mean it that way.

(pause)

I came back to help out with the harvest.

He feels humiliated at not having a stronger excuse. But he

loves her. He aches with love. He hoped their last fight was

just another storm in the romance. Evidently it was more.

BILL:

I thought about you a lot. Wrote you a letter,

but it was no good, so I tore it up.

ABBY:

How'd you come?

BILL:

Train.

He looks her up and down.

BILL:

Nice dress.

ABBY:

I'm glad you like it.

He admires her garden. His familiar cockiness vanishes as

little by little he sees the old feeling is not there.

BILL:

This is new, too.

ABBY:

The daffodils were already here, but I put in

the rest. You

really do like them?

At a shriek from Ursula, Bill turns around. She runs into

his arms, and covers him with kisses.

URSULA:

I've missed you! I thought about you every day.

You should've written. Did Abby show you what she got?

Abby scowls at Ursula. With no choice but to show him, she

opens the top button of her blouse and draws out a diamond

necklace.

ABBY:

(apologetically)

For Christmas.

URSULA:

Plus a music box. He spoils her. Why don't they

spoil me, too?

(whispering)

You oughta be glad you didn't have to spend the

winter. You

would've gone crazy.

225TIGHT ON ABBY

The winter's peace is gone. Abby is sick with

fear. Now that she loves Chuck, too, she can never again be

honest with Bill. The truth of her feelings would crush him.

Moreover, there's no telling how he might react. He could

ruin everything, even get them killed.

226EXT. BEDROOM WINDOW

Chuck looks on from behind the bedroom window.

227EXT. DINNER TABLE

They dine in awkward silence. Benson has joined

them.

Abby, for all her winter's polish, still eats with the back

of her knife.

CHUCK:

How was Chicago?

BILL:

Great.

ABBY:

How's everybody doing?

BILL:

Okay.

They are silent for a moment. Bill senses that nobody except

Ursula is really glad to see him back.

ABBY:

How's Blackie?

BILL:

Still hasn't wised up. Know what I mean? He

asked how you were

doing, though.

(pause)

I told him. Ran into Sam, too. He'd been in a

fight.

ABBY:

Oh yeah?

Bill can see that her interest is only polite. He knows that

he should turn around and leave, but he cannot. The sight of

him with his confidence gone is painful to behold.

BILL:

His nose was like this.

He pushes his nose to one side. Ursula and Abby laugh.

228EXT. STOCK POND

Bill plants willow slips in the soft earth by

the stock pond. Ursula orders a dog around.

URSULA:

Look at this dog mind me. Sit! You've got to say

it like hitting a nail.

BILL:

Has she asked you anything about me?

URSULA:

No.

Ursula flirts with him, running the shoots along his back.

She waits to see what he will do. He gets up and after a

short chase catches her. He holds her at arm's length for a

moment, then kisses her.

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