American Ghosts & Old World Wonders Read Online Free PDF Page B

Johnny and Annie-Belle, dwarfed by the landscape, hand in hand, heads bowed. Their hands slowly part.
     
                                    Now they walk with gradually increasing distance between them.
     
                The light, the unexhausted light of North America that, filtered through celluloid, will become the light by which we see America looking at itself.
                Correction: will become the light by which we see North America looking at itself.
     
                                    EXTERIOR. FARMHOUSE PORCH. DAY
                                    Row of bottles on a fence.
                                    Bang, bang, bang. Johnny shoots the bottles one by one.
                                    Annie-Belle on porch, washing dishes in a tub. Tears run down her face.
                   
                                    EXTERIOR. FARMHOUSE PORCH. DAY
                                    Father on porch, feet up on railing, glass and bottle to hand.
                                    Sun going down over prairies.
                                    Bang, bang, bang.
     
                                    (Father's point of view) Johnny shooting bottles off the fence.
     
                                    Clink of father's bottle against glass.
     
                                    EXTERIOR. FARMHOUSE. DAY
                                    Minister's son rides along track in long shot.
                                    Bang, bang, bang.
     
                                    Annie-Belle, clean dress, tidy hair, red eyes, comes out of house on to porch. Clink of father's bottle against glass.
     
                                    EXTERIOR. FARMHOUSE. DAY
                                    Minister's son tethers horse. He has brushed his Sunday coat.
                                    In his hand, a posy of flowers -- cottage roses, sweetbrier, daisies.
                                    Annie-Belle smiles, takes posy.
     
                                    ANNIE-BELLE : Oh!
     
                                    Holds up pricked forefinger; blood drops on to a daisy.
                   
                                    MINISTER'S SON: Let me . . .
     
                                    Takes her hand. Kisses the little wound.
     
                                    . . . make it better.
                   
                                    Bang. Bang. Bang.
                                    Clink of bottle on glass.
     
                                    (Close up) Annie-Belle, smiling, breathing in the scent from her posy.
     
                And, perhaps, had it been possible, she would have learned to love the Minister's gentle son before she married him, but, not only was it impossible, she also carried within her the child that meant she must be married quickly.
     
                                    INTERIOR. CHURCH. DAY
                                    Harmonium. Father and Johnny by the altar.
                                    Johnny white, strained; father