Days of Heaven Page #20

264BILL

Bill runs through the night, still carrying his

lantern. Chuck bears down on him. Abby chases along behind

him, screaming for him to stop.

Bill realizes the lantern is giving his position away He

blows it out and vanishes from sight. All we can see is the

thundering horseman, sowing fire.

265CRANE SHOT

With a rough idea where Bill is, Chuck begins to

lay a ring of fire around him, fifty yards in diameter.

266BILL AND ABBY INSIDE RING

Abby spots Bill against the flames. She rushes

up, gasping. They have been caught inside the ring.

BILL:

What're you doing? This is a bad place to talk

He throws his coat over Abby's head, picks her up by the

waist and crashes through the flame. They have to shout to

make themselves understood. The locusts roar like a cyclone.

BILL:

Did you see that? He was trying to burn me.

What's got into him?

ABBY:

He knows. He must.

BILL:

A whole year's work. All wasted! These bugs,

once they make up

their minds...

Bill stalls. The fire races toward them through the wheat.

They appear as silhouettes against it.

BILL:

I need to get out of here. I think you probably

should, too.

(pause)

Hell of a life. Damned if you do and damned if

you don't.

He leaves. Abby wonders if she ought to run after him.

ABBY:

Bill!

But this moment's hesitation has been too long. Already he

is swallowed up in the night, her voice swept away in the

roar of the flame and the locusts, who seem to wail louder

now, and with a great mournfulness--like keening Arab

women--as if they knew the fate shortly to envelop

them.

Abby turns back. She, too, has reason to fear Chuck and must

escape.

267NEW ANGLE

Benson rallies the workers.

BENSON:

There's still a chance they're going to fly.

VOICES:

Get the tractor out! The pump wagon! Blankets!

They rush off to find equipment to fight the fire.

268ISOLATED ON CHUCK - NIGHT

Chuck rides through the dark like a lone

Horseman of the Apocalypse, setting his fields on fire.

269EXT. PLAINS ON FIRE - SERIES OF ANGLES -

NIGHT:

Tractors attempt to plow a firebreak. Mad

silhouettes run back and forth, slapping at the blaze with

wet gunny sacks fixed to the ends of sticks. Two dormitories

burn out of control.

Ursula throws open the barn and lets the horses out. They

have raised thunder kicking at their stalls. The light above

the barn door pulses erratically.

270EXPLOSIONS - NIGHT (MINIATURES)

Oil wells explode along the horizon. Huge balls

of flames roll into the heavens.

271EXT. BURNING PLAINS - NIGHT

Panic spreads among the workers as the holocaust

threatens to engulf them. They throw down their tools and

run for their lives.

272ANIMALS - NIGHT

Animals flee in all directions: birds and deer

and rabbits, pigs, buffalo and the horses from the barn. The

locusts mill around crazily on the wheat stalks, backlit

against the flame.

273BILL - NIGHT

Bill, fleeing on his motorbike with his rabbit,

holds up

for a moment to watch the fire--a Biblical inferno of

spectacular sweep.

274EXT. BEDROOM WINDOW--TRACKING SHOT

(CHUCK'S POV)--NIGHT

A single light burns in the Belvedere.

275INT. BEDROOM - NIGHT

Heaving with sobs, Abby throws her things into a

bindle. She has lost Chuck forever. Their life is destroyed.

She glances out the window. She still has time to get away,

but she must hurry. She bolts for the door. Sud-

denly Chuck steps from the shadows, blocking her exit.

His face, black with soot, looks gruesome in the gas1ight.

The locusts have chewed up his clothes.

Abby is like a frightened deer. Did he see her packing?

CHUCK:

You look as though you'd seen a ghost.

(pause)

Where you going?

(pause)

Off with him?

The wind cuts gaps in the death wail of the locusts. From

time to time we hear the thump of an exploding well.

CHUCK:

He's not your brother, is he?

How much does he know? She edges toward the door.

ABBY:

Why do you say that?

CHUCK:

Come here a minute. Who are you?

(no reply)

Where'd you come from?

ABBY:

I told you.

He shakes her. She quivers like a child in his grasp. She no

longer has the audacity to lie.

ABBY:

How long have you known?

He drops his eyes. Shamefully long -- and his anger is

partly just at this.

CHUCK:

What'd you want? He punches in the shade of a

lamp, extinguishing it.

CHUCK:

Tell me. He shoves over the chest of drawers.

She does not move.

He tears down the drapes, already in shreds.

CHUCK:

This? Show me what you wanted! I would have

given it all to you.

ABBY:

Please, Chuck.

CHUCK:

Please what? You're not going to tell me you're

sorry, I hope..

ABBY:

But I am.

Outside the window fires rage along half the horizon. He

sits down. He wants to sob, but cannot.

CHUCK:

You're so wonderful. How could you do this?

ABBY:

I'm just no good. You picked me from the gutter,

and this is

how -- I never deserved you.

CHUCK:

(interrupting)

The things you told me.

ABBY:

I love you, though. You have to believe me. It

may sound false after...

CHUCK:

(interrupting)

Down at the cave. Don't you remember? I believed

them.

ABBY:

All right. I'm going away. You'll never have to

see me again.

CHUCK:

Away?

He gets up, suddenly alarmed, walks to the mantel and opens

a chest.

ABBY:

What're you doing?

Chuck drapes his neck with the stole he used in slaughtering

the hog. Her face goes empty. He gets his razor strop from

the shaving basin. She shrinks back in the corner. He looks

at her for a moment, then leaves the room.

276INT. STAIRCASE - NIGHT

Abby pursues him down the stairs. He throws her

aside.

ABBY:

Where are you doing? Chuck! What are you doing?

I won't

let you! Come back!

Again he throws her aside, and again she keeps after him,

desperate to prevent any harm coming to Bill. Finally he

picks her up and drags her outside.

277EXT. PORCH - NIGHT

He lashes her with a rope to a column of the

porch. She struggles vainly to free herself. Does he intend

to use the razor on her?

ABBY:

No, Chuck! Please, darling! It wasn't his fault.

It was mine.

Let him go. I love you, Chuck. Do anything, only please...

CHUCK:

I'm sick of hearing lies.

He stuffs a handkerchief in her mouth and leaves.

278TIGHT ON CHUCK - NIGHT

Chuck wanders through the night with a lantern,

calling his mare.

279EXT. BURNT-OUT FIELDS - DAWN

Dawn breaks. Chuck rides over the burnt-out

fields looking for Bill. The feet of his lank white mare are

wrapped to the fetlock in wet burlap, to protect them from

the smouldering grass. It prances warily along, without

making a sound, wreathed in a mist of blue smoke. With him

he carries a stool. The camera pans up to the smoke which is

carrying his fortune off.

280CHUCK'S POVS

Burnt, blind deer stand and look at him in utter

terror, as though they understood his intentions. The

roasted corpses of sharptail grouse, coyotes and badgers lie

scattered here and there. Piles of dung burn on after the

grass is out.

A peacock from the Belvedere wanders around, angry and

perplexed.

281BILL

Bill is repairing his motorbike by a rock in the

middle of the scorched landscape. The tires are soft as

licorice from the heat. Suddenly, he looks up. Chuck has

found him.

He jumps behind the handlebars and fishtails off. Chuck

breaks into a gallop, rides him down, knocks him to the

ground with the stool, dismounts and stamps in the spokes of

the front wheel to make sure he goes no further.

Rate this script:3.0 / 3 votes