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gc #35221
NIGHT GALLERY
"WHISPER"
FADE IN
1 INT. COUNTRY HOUSE KITCHEN - DAY 1
Camera pans slowly to establish details. The room is brightly
sunlit and empty...but during pan we hear the familiar, homely
sounds of a kitchen in use: a kettle set down on a cast-iron,
wood-burning stove...crockery, dishes, silverware being washed
...things boiling, etc. Perhaps the oddest sound is the
steady squeak of a pump-handle and the gush of water into the
sink...since we see there are faucets at the sink, and no water
running in any case. Also during this pan we hear voices --
indistinct, quick, overlapping -- accompanying the sounds of
the kitchen chores. These voices have the faintly-Elizabethan
music still heard in isolated hill communities of Kentucky,
Virginia and the Carolinas:
WOMAN'S VOICE
Mind you don't fall with --
Crashing sound of a metal pail on the stone floor. Eagerly:
GIRL'S VOICE
't ain't broke, missus!
WOMAN'S VOICE
The pail's of tin, that's why!
and see where the water's gone all
over my fl--!
MAN'S VOICE
Ah Meg, the child's not well t'day,
cain't y'see?
WOMAN'S VOICE
T'day?? more like all this month.
GIRL'S VOICE
I'll pump it full agin!
WOMAN'S VOICE
I'll do...whilst you, can I trust
ye to carry up a thing'r two from
the root-cellar?
GIRL'S VOICE
Oh yes'm!
WOMAN'S VOICE
G'on then, Rachel, I don't see even
yesself smashin' a turnip...!
CONTINUED
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gc #35221 2
1 CONTINUED 1
GIRL'S VOICE
Oh, no'm...!
Voices are fading into inaudibility as angle includes Irene,
a young woman, whose eyes scan the kitchen as camera did. She
goes to a corner of one of the counters where we saw a piece
of fabric, folded away. She opens it -- an old-fashioned
shawl -- and drapes it carefully over the shoulders of her
cheerfully contemporary dress. Camera pushes closer on Irene
as she runs her hand along the border of the shawl...not idly,
but rather as if she wants to learn from the design or weave
of it, perhaps something about the one who made the shawl or
wore it. She turns to the fireplace...She doesn’t respond to
a distant call from outside:
CHARLIE'S VOICE
Irene...?!
2 NEW ANGLE - FAVOR IRENE'S HAND 2
holding an airline ticket-folder. She passes one corner
through the flames, teasingly...An edge browns, begins to
smoke...She withdraws it, kills the tiny glow with her fingers.
Camera pans to favor Irene's face. She sets the ticket-folder
down on the raised hearth and slips the shawl off her shoulders,
examines it more carefully...Again, from outside:
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CHARLIE'S VOICE
Hey, where are you? Hello-o-o!
Irene...?
But she concentrates on the shawl, fingering each woven detail
...Then, quiet and plain, without eeriness:
IRENE
Did you wear it...? or was it some-
one close...?
She waits, not so much to hear as to understand...something.
Then; more urgently:
IRENE
...Get word to me! whisper to me!
...I think I know what too do, but --
She straightens! A moment ago there was the o.s. sound of
the front door, but now - right from the next room:
CHARLIE
Hey, where are you? the kitchen?
In panic, she hides the shawl, crushes it into the kick-space
under the hearth...!
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gc #35221 3
3 FAVOR CHARLIE 3
as he comes into the kitchen, behind her. He smiles...but we
see some worry in his face. He embraces her, and:
CHARLIE
Didn't you say you wanted to pick
some flowers?
IRENE
Daisies...
CHARLIE
Well, somebody planted a whole flock
of them in the meadow, you know,
along the edge of the woods...?
IRENE
(light laugh; over-
lapping)
They grow wild, Charlie!
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CHARLIE
Y'kidding me?
IRENE
(knows he's teasing now)
Charlie...
But over her shoulder - still in the embrace - he's just
noticed:
4 CHARLIE'S POINT OF VIEW - AIRLINE TICKETS 4
quite close to the fire, on the hearth.
IRENE'S VOICE
...you know they...
5 TWO SHOT - FAVOR IRENE 5
She's sensed something amiss...leans back to see his ex-
pression...She knows what it is...remains silent.
ABRUPT CUT TO:
6 EXT. A MEADOW - FULL VIEW - DAY 6
In distant b.g. Irene is gathering flowers. In f.g. of frame,
sitting on a low stone fence watching her, his back to camera,
is Charlie.
CONTINUED
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