I Walked with a Zombie Page #4

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HOLLAND:

(looking at the food)

It seems very nice, Clement. I'll

take it to Mrs. Holland.

He starts to take the tray. Betsy rising, also reaches for

it.

BETSY:

Can't I take it for you?

HOLLAND:

(taking tray)

No, thank you. Tomorrow's time

enough for you to begin work.

He goes off with the tray. Betsy picks up a coffee cup.

LONG SHOT of tower. Holland enters the tower and closes the

door behind him.

DISSOLVE:

INT. BETSY'S ROOM -- NIGHT

Betsy, dressed in a trim negligee and slippers, is getting

ready for the night. She plumps up the cushion, tests the

softness of the mattress and then, yawning, turns out the

Aladdin kerosene lamp which lights the room. Level rays of

moonlight filter through the rattan blinds into the room.

Betsy crosses the room and peers out through the rattan

strips into the garden.

EXT. THE GARDEN -- NIGHT

AS BETSY SEES IT. Lights are on in the living room. This

light, barred and diffused by the strip-blinds, softly

illuminates the garden. The black shadows of trees and

shrubbery loom over the paths. Through these shadows a

woman, dressed in filmy white, walks stiffly, her arms

hanging immobile, close to her slim body. She is blonde and

as far as the light will reveal, she seems beautiful. She

makes the circuit of the garden, pacing slowly along the

paths. Betsy watches her. Then, from the living room, a

man's voice calls out to her.

HOLLAND'S VOICE

Jessica.

The woman at once turns toward the living room, mounts the

porch and enters through a door held open for her.

INT. BETSY'S ROOM -- NIGHT

Betsy turns back into the room. She has crossed over to the

bed and is removing her negligee when the sound of hesitant

notes on the piano attract her attention. In her nightgown

she goes back to the window and peers through the cracks

between the laths.

INT. A CORNER OF THE LIVING ROOM -- NIGHT

From where she stands, Betsy can see the big, square,

rosewood piano. A lamp had been lit beside it and the light

from this lamp falls on the blonde hair and gleaming

shoulders of the woman who had walked in the garden. Her

face cannot be seen. Her fingers move strangely over the

keyboard, now and again striking a hesitant note, but making

no music, only an occasional dissonance.

INT. BETSY'S ROOM -- NIGHT

Betsy, still watching through the slit in the jalousie,

endeavors to get a better view of the living room. She

changes her position and looks out again through the blinds.

INT. ANOTHER CORNER OF THE LIVING ROOM -- NIGHT

As seen from Betsy's NEW ANGLE. Paul Holland is seated in a

low armchair. His eyes are fixed on the woman at the piano.

She continues to strike odd notes on the piano.

INT. BETSY'S ROOM -- NIGHT

Betsy leaves the window, crosses to the bed and lies down.

Then, sighing, she makes herself comfortable on the pillow,

settling herself for sleep. Outside the nightjars whistle

softly, the cicadas twitter and the Hammer tree frogs make

drowsy, somnolent little croaks: it is a tropic lullaby of

bird, batrachian and insect sound. The faint, groping notes

on the piano continue.

DISSOLVE:

EXT. THE FIGURE OF ST. SEBASTIAN -- NIGHT -- (MOONLIGHT)

In the moonlight, the pin-cushioned figure of St. Sebastian

broods over the dark water in the cistern. Above the

constant sound of the water flowing over the saint's

shoulders can be heard the sound of a woman crying,

mournfully and as if from deep-seated sadness.

INT. BETSY'S ROOM -- NIGHT

Betsy is asleep. The sound of the woman's weeping is

persistent in the room. Finally, it has its effect. The

young nurse stirs restlessly, then wakes. She listens, gets

up, then listens again.

EXT. THE TOWER DOOR -- NIGHT -- (MOONLIGHT)

INT. BETSY'S ROOM -- NIGHT

It is obvious to her this piteous keening comes from the

direction of the tower. It is in this direction she had seen

Holland carry the tray of food to her patient. She pulls on

her slippers and negligee and leaves the room.

EXT. THE FIGURE OF ST. SEBASTIAN -- NIGHT

Betsy crosses in front of the fountain and goes to the small

postern door of heavy, iron-bound oaks which leads into the

ruin. The sound of weeping continues. She tries the door.

It opens and she goes in, leaving it open behind her.

INT. THE GROUND FLOOR OF THE TOWER -- NIGHT

Betsy comes hesitantly in and looks around her. She can

still hear the sound of a woman's crying. It seems to come

from above her. A circling flight of shallow stone steps

lead upward into the dark. To one side of them, but almost

hidden from her in the darkness, is another door leading back

into the house. She hesitates a moment and then, slowly,

begins to climb the stairs.

INT. TOWER -- SECOND FLOOR -- NIGHT

Betsy comes up to the level of the second floor. It is in

pitch blackness. High above her is a narrow slit through

which a single shaft of white moonlight drives sharply into

the well-like darkness of the room. Very slowly, almost as

if feeling her way on the stone floor with her slippered

feet, she crosses the room. Then, one hand groping along the

rough, stone wall, she begins to circle the room, searching

for some doorway, or an ascending flight of stairs.

Above her in the massive rafters of the tower, bats stir and

squeak. One bat, dropping from his perch, sweeps past her

with a rushing of air against the taut membranes of his

wings, then flies laboriously up and out through the narrow

slit high in the wall. Betsy stands stock still, frightened.

Then she resumes her groping progress. A rat squeals and

slithers across the floor. Again she stops. Then, more as a

request for guidance than as a cry for help, she calls out

softly.

BETSY:

(calling)

Mrs. Holland! Mrs. Holland!

There is no answer. She gropes forward a few more steps,

then stops again and again calls, a little louder now.

BETSY (CONT'D)

(calling)

Mrs. Holland?

INT. FIRST FLOOR OF THE TOWER -- NIGHT

A white-robed female figure comes out from under the stairs,

walking slowly, her movements drift-like as if walking in

deep sleep. She begins slowly to climb the stairs.

INT. TOWER -- SECOND FLOOR -- NIGHT

Betsy is still groping her way around the circling walls of

the tower. The shaft of moonlight strikes down between her

and the stairs. Through it she sees the drifting, diaphanous

whiteness of the other woman as she comes up from the dark

stairwell.

BETSY:

Mrs. Holland?

There is no answer. The other woman continues to walk toward

her.

BETSY (cont'd)

(embarrassed; trying to

explain)

Mrs. Holland -- I didn't mean to

get you up --

The white woman keeps walking toward her with the same

entrance tread. Betsy takes a step forward to meet her. The

two women come together in such a way that the white-clad

woman stops directly in the shaft of moonlight.

CLOSEUP of Jessica. This is the face of the dead; bloodless,

cold-lidded, eyes open and unseeing, washed white with the

pallor of the moonlight, framed in lank, lifeless tresses of

blonde hair.

BETSY (cont'd)

(a frightened questioning

whisper over the closeup)

Mrs. Holland -- ?

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