Storm of the Century Read Online Free PDF

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    (sipping tea)
    Oh, dear.

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.
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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.

    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.
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    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. His lips peel back from HUGE,