Storm of the Century Read online

  LLOYD turns, and THE CAMERA HINGES to show us FERD, leaning in the door. His hands are plugged into the tops of half a dozen boots, which he begins to arrange by pairs below hooks holding slickers and helmets.

  FERD ANDREWS

  If we get in trouble . . . we're in trouble.

  LLOYD grins at the younger man, then turns back to his polishing.

  LLOYD

  Easy, Ferd. It's just a cap of snow. Trouble don't cross the reach . . . ain't that why we live out here?

  FERD isn't so sure. He goes to the door and looks up at: 4 EXTERIOR: APPROACHING STORM CLOUDS DAY.

  We HOLD a moment, then PAN DOWN to a TRIM WHITE NEW ENGLAND HOME. This house is about halfway up Atlantic Street Hill that is, between the docks and the center of town. There's a picket fence surrounding a winter-dead lawn (but there's no snow at all, not out here on the island), and a gate that stands open, offering the concrete path to anyone who cares make the trip from the sidewalk to the steep porch steps and the front door. To one side of the gate is a mailbox, amusingly painted and accessorized to turn it into a pink cow. Written on the side is CLARENDON.

  MIKE (voice-over)

  The first person on Little Tall to see Andre Linoge was Martha Clarendon.

  In the extreme foreground of the shot, there now appears a SNARLING SILVER WOLF. It is the head of a cane.

  5 EXTERIOR: LINOGE, FROM BEHIND DAY.

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  Standing on the sidewalk, back to us and before the open CLARENDON gate, is a tall man dressed in jeans, boots, a pea jacket, and a black watch cap snugged down over his ears. And gloves yellow leather as bright as a sneer. One hand grips the head of his cane, which is black walnut below the silver wolf's head. LINOGE'S own head is lowered between his bulking shoulders. It is a thinking posture. There is something brooding about it, as well.

  He raises the cane and taps one side of the gate with it. He pauses, then taps the other side of the gate. This has the feel of a ritual.

  MIKE (voice-over)

  (continues) He was the last person she ever saw.

  LINOGE begins to walk slowly up the concrete path to the porch steps, idly swinging his cane as he goes. He whistles a tune: "I'm a little teapot."

  6 INTERIOR: MARTHA CLARENDON'S LIVING ROOM.

  It's neat in the cluttery way only fastidious folks who've lived their whole lives in one place can manage. The furniture is old and nice, not quite antique. The walls are crammed with pictures, most going back to the twenties. There's a piano with yellowing sheet music open on the stand. Seated in the room's most comfortable chair (perhaps its only comfortable chair) is MARTHA CLARENDON, a lady of perhaps eighty years. She has lovely white beauty-shop hair and is wearing a neat housedress. On the table beside her is a cup of tea and a plate of cookies. On her other side is a walker with bicycle-grip handholds jutting out of one side and a carry-tray jutting out from the other.

  The only modern items in the room are the large color TV and the cable box on top of it. MARTHA is watching the Weather Network avidly and taking little birdie-sips of tea as she does. Onscreen is a pretty

  WEATHER LADY. Behind the WEATHER LADY is a map with two large red L's planted in the middle of two large storm systems. One of these is over Pennsylvania; the other is just off the coast of New York. The WEATHER LADY starts with the western storm.

  WEATHER LADY

  This is the storm that's caused so much misery and fifteen deaths as it crossed the Great Plains and the Midwest. It's regathered all its original punch and more in crossing the Great Lakes, and you see its track

  The track appears in BRIGHT YELLOW (the same color as LINOGE'S gloves), showing a future course that will carry it straight across New York, Vermont, New Hampshire, and Maine.

  WEATHER LADY

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  (continues)

  before you in all its glory. Now look down here, because here comes trouble.

  She focuses her attention on the coastal storm.

  WEATHER LADY

  (continues)

  This is a very atypical storm, almost a winter hurricane the sort of knuckle-duster that paralyzed most of the East Coast and buried Boston back in 1976. We haven't seen one of comparable power since then . . . until now. Will it give us a break and stay out to sea, as these storms sometimes do?

  Unfortunately, the Weather Network's Storm-Trak computer says no. So the states east of the Big Indian Waters are getting pounded from one direction She taps the first storm.

  WEATHER LADY (continues)

  the mid-Atlantic coast is going to get pounded from another direction She goes back to the coastal storm.

  WEATHER LADY

  (continues)

  and northern New England, if none of this changes, tonight you're going to win the booby prize.

  Look ... at ... this.

  A second BRIGHT YELLOW STORM TRACK appears, this one hooking north from the blob of storm off New York. This track makes landfall around Cape Cod, then heads up the coast, where it intersects the first storm track. At the point of intersection, some Weather Network computer genius with too much time on his hands has added a bright red blotch, like an explosion graphic on a news broadcast.

  WEATHER LADY

  (continues)

  If neither of these two systems veer, they are going to collide and merge over the state of Maine.

  That's bad news for our friends in Yankee land, but not the worst news. The worst news is that they may temporarily cancel each other out.

  MARTHA (sipping tea) Oh, dear.

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  WEATHER LADY

  The result? A once-in-a-lifetime supersystem which may stall over central and coastal Maine for at least twenty-four hours and perhaps as long as forty-eight. We're talking hurricane-force winds and phenomenal amounts of snow, combining to create the sort of drifting you normally only see on the Arctic tundra. To this you can add region-wide blackouts.

  MARTHA Oh, dear!

  WEATHER LADY

  No one wants to scare viewers, least of all me, but folks in the New England area, especially those on the Maine coast and the offshore islands, need to take this situation very seriously. You've had an almost completely brown winter up your way, but over the next two to three days, you're apt to be getting a whole winter's worth of snow.

  SOUND: DOORBELL.

  MARTHA looks in that direction, then back at the TV. She'd like to stay and watch the WEATHER

  LADY, but nevertheless sets her teacup down, pulls over her walker, and struggles erect.

  WEATHER LADY

  We sometimes overuse the phrase "storm of the century," but if these two storm tracks converge, as we now think they will, the phrase will be no exaggeration, believe me. Judd Parkin's in next to talk about storm preparations no panic, just practicalities. But first, this.

  An ad comes on it's a mail-order disaster video called Punishments of God as MARTHA begins working her way across the living room toward the hall, clutching the bicycle-grip handles of her walker and clumping along.

  MARTHA

  When they tell you the world's ending, they want to sell cereal. When they tell you not to panic, it's serious.

  SOUND: DOORBELL.

  MARTHA I'm coming fast's I can!

  7 INTERIOR: THE FRONT HALL OF MARTHA'S HOUSE DAY.

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  She makes her way down the hall, holding tight to the walker. On the walls are quaint photographs and drawings of Little Tall as it was early in the twentieth century. At the corridor's end is a closed door with a graceful glass oval in its upper half. This has been covered by a sheer curtain, probably so the sun won't fade the carpet. On the sheer is the silhouette of LINOGE'S head and shoulders.

  MARTHA (puffing a little)

  Hold on ... almost there ... I broke my hip last summer and I'm still just as slow as cold molasses

  . . .

  And the WEATHER LADY is continuing:

  WEATHER LADY (voice-over)

  Folks in Maine and the Maritimes saw one
heck of a storm in January of 1987, but that was a freezing-rain event. This one is going to be a very different kettle of chowder. Don't even think about the snow shovel until the plows have come by.

  MARTHA reaches the door, looks curiously at the shape of the man's head on the sheer curtain, then opens it. There stands LINOGE. His face is as handsome as that of a Greek statue, and a statue is sort of what he looks like. His eyes are closed. His hands are folded over the wolf's head at the top of his cane.

  WEATHER LADY (voice-over)

  (continues)

  As I've said before and will say again, there's no cause for panic; northern New Englanders have seen big storms before and will again. But even veteran weather forecasters are a little stunned by the sheer size of these converging systems.

  MARTHA is puzzled of course by the appearance of this stranger but not really uneasy. This is the island, after all, and bad things don't happen on the island. Except for the occasional storm, of course. The other thing at work here is that the man is a stranger to her, and strangers on the island are rare once the fleeting summer is over.

  MARTHA Can I help you?

  LINOGE

  (eyes closed) Born in lust, turn to dust. Born in sin, come on in.

  MARTHA I beg pardon?

  He opens his eyes . . . except there are no eyes there. The sockets are filled with BLACKNESS.

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  His lips peel back from HUGE, CROOKED TEETH they look like teeth in a child's drawing of a monster.

  WEATHER LADY (voice-over)

  (continues)

  These are monster low-pressure areas. And are they really coming? Yes, I'm afraid they are.

  MARTHA'S intrigued interest is replaced by stark terror. She opens her mouth to scream and staggers backward, losing hold of the walker's handles. She is going to fall.

  LINOGE raises his cane, the SNARLING WOLF'S HEAD JUTTING FORWARD. He grabs the walker, which is between him and the old woman, and throws it out the door behind him, where it lands on the porch, near the steps.

  8 INTERIOR: HALLWAY, WITH MARTHA.

  She falls heavily and SCREAMS, raising her hands, looking up at: 9 INTERIOR: LINOGE, FROM MARTHA'S POINT OF VIEW.

  A SNARLING MONSTER, hardly human, with the cane upraised. Behind him, we see the porch and the white sky that signals the oncoming storm.

  10 INTERIOR: MARTHA, ON THE FLOOR.

  MARTHA

  Please don't hurt me!

  11 INTERIOR: MARTHA'S LIVING ROOM.

  On the TV now is JUDD PARKIN, standing in front of a table. On it are: a flashlight, batteries, candles, matches, prepared foods, stacks of warm clothing, portable radio, a cellular phone, other supplies. Beside him is the WEATHER LADY, looking bewitched by these goods.

  JUDD

  But a storm doesn't need to be a disaster, Maura, and a disaster doesn't have to be a tragedy.

  Given that philosophy to start with, I think we can give our New England viewers some tips which will help them prepare for what, from all indications, is apt to be a pretty extraordinary weather-

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  maker.

  WEATHER LADY What have you got there, Judd?

  JUDD

  Well, to begin with, warm clothing. That's number one. And you want to say to yourself, "How are my batteries? Have I got enough to keep a portable radio going? Possibly a small TV?" And if you've got a generator, the time to check your gasoline supplies or your diesel or your propane is before, not after. If you wait until it's too late . . .

  During all this, THE CAMERA MOVES AWAY from the TV, as if losing interest. It is drawn back toward the hall. As we begin to lose the dialogue, we begin to hear far less pleasant SOUNDS: THE

  STEADY WHACK-WHACK-WHACK of LINOGE'S cane. At last it stops. There is SILENCE for a little bit, then FOOTSTEPS. Accompanying them is a CURIOUS DRAGGING SOUND, almost as if someone were pulling a chair or a stool slowly across a wood floor.

  JUDD (voice-over)

  (continues) . . . it'll be too late.

  LINOGE comes into the doorway. His eyes aren't ordinary a distant and somehow unsettling blue but they aren't that HIDEOUS BLACK EMPTINESS that MARTHA saw, either. His cheeks, brow, and the bridge of his nose are covered with FINE STIPPLES OF BLOOD. He comes to EXTREME

  CLOSE-UP, eyes focused on something. A look of interest begins to warm his face up a little.

  WEATHER LADY (voice-over)

  Thanks, Judd. Words of wisdom our northern New England viewers have probably heard before, but when it comes to storms this size, some things bear repeating.

  12 INTERIOR: THE LIVING ROOM, FROM OVER LINOGE'S SHOULDER.

  It's the TV he's looking at.

  WEATHER LADY Your local forecast is next, right after this.

  She is replaced by an ad for Punishments of God 2 all the volcanoes, fires, and earthquakes you could ever want for $19.95. Slowly, back to us again, LINOGE crosses the room to MARTHA'S chair.

  The

  DRAGGING SOUND recommences, and as he approaches the chair and his lower half comes into the frame, we see it's the tip of his cane. It's leaving a thin trail of blood along the rug. More blood is oozing through the fingers of the fist clamped over the wolf's head. That's mostly what he hit her with, the head of that wolf, and we probably wouldn't want to see what it looks like now.

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  LINOGE stands, looking down at the TV, where a forest is going up in flames.

  LINOGE

  (sings)

  "I'm a little teapot, short and stout. . . . Here is my handle, here is my spout."

  He sits down in MARTHA'S chair. Grasps her teacup with a gory hand that smears the handle.

  Drinks. Then takes a cookie with his bloody hand and gobbles it down.

  LINOGE settles back to watch JUDD and MAURA talk disaster on the Weather Network.

  13 EXTERIOR: MIKE ANDERSON'S STORE DAY.

  This is an old-fashioned general store with a long front porch. If it were summer, there would be rockers lined up out here and lots of old-timers to fill them. As it is, there is a line of snowblowers and snow shovels, marked with a neat handmade sign: SUPERSTORM SPECIAL! LET'S TALK PRICE!

  The steps are flanked by a couple of lobster traps, and more hang from the underside of the porch roof. We may also see a whimsical display of clamming gear. By the door stands a mannequin wearing galoshes, a yellow rain slicker, goggle eyes on springs, and a beanie with a propeller (the propeller now still) on his head. Someone has stuffed a pillow under the slicker, creating a fairly prominent potbelly. In one plastic hand is a blue University of Maine pennant. In the other is a can of beer. Around the dummy's neck is a sign: GENUINE "ROBBIE BEALS BRAND" LOBSTERIN' GEAH

  SOLD HEAH, DEAH.

  In the windows are signs for meat specials, fish specials, videotape rentals (WE RENT OLD 'UNS

  THREE FOR $1), church suppers, a volunteer

  fire department blood drive. The biggest sign is on the door. It reads: STORM EMERGENCY

  POSSIBLE NEXT 3 DAYS! "TAKE SHELTER" SIGNAL IS 2 SHORTS, 1 LONG. Above the display windows, now rolled up, are slatted wooden STORM SHUTTERS. Above the door is a lovely old-fashioned sign, black with gold gilt letters: ANDERSON's MARKET*ISLAND POST

  OFFICE ISLAND CONSTABLE'S OFFICE.

  There are several WOMEN going in, and a couple more OCTAVIA GODSOE and JOANNA STANHOPE coming out. TAVIA (forty-five-ish) and JOANNA (late forties or early fifties) are clutching full grocery bags and chatting animatedly. TAVIA looks at the ROBBIE BEALS dummy and elbows JOANNA. They both laugh as they go down the steps.

  14 INTERIOR: ANDERSON'S MARKET DAY.

  This is a very well equipped grocery store, and in many ways a charming throwback to the groceries of the 1950s. The floors are wood and creak comfortably underfoot. The lights are globes 18

  hanging on chains. There's a tin ceiling. Yet there are signs of our modern age; two new cash registers with digital price-readers beside them, a radio scanner on a shelf behind the checkout counter, a wall of rental vi
deos,

  and security cameras mounted high in the corners.

  At the rear is a meat cooler running nearly the length of the store. To its left, below a convex mirror, is a door marked simply TOWN CONSTABLE.

  The store is very crowded. Everybody is stocking up for the oncoming storm.

  15 INTERIOR: MEAT COUNTER.

  MIKE ANDERSON COMES out of the door leading to the meat locker (it is at the other end of the rear from the constable's office). He is a good-looking man of about thirty-five. Right now he also looks harried half to death . . . although the little smile never leaves his eyes and the corners of his mouth. This guy likes life, likes it a lot, and usually finds something in it to amuse him.