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Of all the people who have been born... and have died... while the trees went on living.
Their true name is Sequoia Sempervirens: always green, ever living.
I don't like them.
Why?
Knowing I have to die...
Do you hear anything?
Only silence. It's always like this.
And no birds sing.
No birds live here.
No.
Would you like a drink of water?
No, thank you.
Somewhere in here I was born... and here I died and it was only a moment for you... you took no notice...
Madeleine!
Where are you now?
Here with you.
Where?
The tall trees...
Have you been here before?
Yes...
When?
Where were you born?
Long ago...
Where?
No!... No!
Tell me what it is. Where do you go? What takes you away?
No, don't ask me!
When you jumped in the bay, you didn't know where you were. You guessed but you didn't know.
I didn't jump, I fell! You told me I fell!
Why did you jump?
No!
What was it inside that told you to jump?
No, I can't tell you!
What?!
No! Please! Please, please, please, please, don't ask me!
Take me away from here?
Home?
...somewhere in the light.
I'm responsible for you now, you know. The Chinese say that once you have saved someone's life, you are responsible for it forever. And so I'm committed. And I have to know.
And you'll go on saving me? Again and again?
There is so little I know. It is as though I were walking down a long corridor that once was mirrored, and fragments of mirror still hang there, dark and shadowy, reflecting a dark image of me... and yet not me... someone else, in other clothes, of another time, doing things I have never done... but still me... And I can't stop to ask why, I must keep on walking. At the and of the corridor there is nothing but darkness, and I know when I walk into the darkness, I'll die. But I've never come to the and; I've always come back, before then. Except once.
Yesterday.
But the small scenes, the fragments in the mirror: you remember them.
Vaguely...
What do you remember?
A room... there is a room, and I sit there alone... always alone...
Would you know the room?
No... it's in shadow.
What else?
A grave...
Where?
I don't know. An open grave. I stand by the gravestone looking down into it. And it's my grave.
How do you know?
I know.
There's a name on the gravestone.
No. It's new and clean, and waiting.
What else?
This part is dream, I think. There is a tower and a bell and... a garden below... but it seems to be in Spain... a village in Spain. And then it clicks off, and is gone.
A portrait? Do you ever see a portrait?
No.
Of the woman in the mirror. Would you know her if you saw her?
But I'm the woman in the mirror!
No!
If I could find the key... find the beginning put it together...
And so explain it away? But there is a way to explain it, you see. If I'm mad? That would explain it, wouldn't it?
I'm not mad. I'm not mad. And I don't want to die, but there's someone inside me, there's a somebody else, and she says I must die... Scottie, don't let me go!
I'm here, I've got you...
I'm so afraid... ...you won't let it happen...
Don't leave me... stay with me...
All the time.
I should have phoned... but I wanted to see you... be with you...
Why? What's happened?
I had the dream. The dream came back again...
No, don't go away!
Only this far.
Where's your husband?
I didn't wake him. I don't want him to know...
It was a dream, you're awake, you're all right, now. Can you tell me?
It was the tower again... and the bell, and the old Spanish village...
Yes
But clear... so very clear... for the first time... all of it...
Tell me.
There was a village square, a green with trees... and an old whitewashed Spanish church with a cloister. Across the green: a big, grey, wooden house with a porch and shutters and a balcony above... a small garden, and next to it, a livery stable... with old carriages lined up inside.
Go on.
At the end of the green there was a whitewashed stone house with a lovely pepper tree at the corner
and an old wooden hotel of the old California days, and a saloon... dark... lowceilinged... with hanging oil lamps.
Yes?! But
It's all there. It's no dream.
You've been there before. You've seen it.
No, never!
Madeleine, a hundred miles south of San Francisco there's an old Spanish Mission, Mission San Juan Bautista. It's been preserved exactly as it was a hundred years ago as a museum. Now, think hard, darling. You've been there before. You've seen it!
No, never! I've never been there! Scottie, what is it? I've never been there!
Go on with your dream. What was it that frightened you?
I stood alone on the green, searching for something, and I started to walk to the church. But then the darkness closed in, I was alone in the dark, being pulled into darkness, and I fought to wake up...
Here with you.
And it's a all real.
Yes.
Not merely as it was a hundred years ago. As it was a year ago, or six months ago, whenever you were here to see it. Madeleine, think of when you were here!
My love... because I love you.
I love you too... too late... too late...