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Of all the people who have been born... and have died... while the trees went on living.
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Their true name is Sequoia Sempervirens: always green, ever living.
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I don't like them.
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Why?
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Knowing I have to die...
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Do you hear anything?
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Only silence. It's always like this.
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And no birds sing.
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No birds live here.
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No.
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Would you like a drink of water?
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No, thank you.
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Somewhere in here I was born... and here I died and it was only a moment for you... you took no notice...
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Madeleine!
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Where are you now?
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Here with you.
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Where?
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The tall trees...
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Have you been here before?
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Yes...
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When?
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Where were you born?
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Long ago...
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Where?
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No!... No!
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Tell me what it is. Where do you go? What takes you away?
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No, don't ask me!
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When you jumped in the bay, you didn't know where you were. You guessed but you didn't know.
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I didn't jump, I fell! You told me I fell!
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Why did you jump?
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No!
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What was it inside that told you to jump?
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No, I can't tell you!
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What?!
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No! Please! Please, please, please, please, don't ask me!
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Take me away from here?
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Home?
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...somewhere in the light.
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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.
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And you'll go on saving me? Again and again?
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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.
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Yesterday.
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But the small scenes, the fragments in the mirror: you remember them.
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Vaguely...
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What do you remember?
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A room... there is a room, and I sit there alone... always alone...
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Would you know the room?
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No... it's in shadow.
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What else?
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A grave...
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Where?
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I don't know. An open grave. I stand by the gravestone looking down into it. And it's my grave.
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How do you know?
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I know.
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There's a name on the gravestone.
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No. It's new and clean, and waiting.
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What else?
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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.
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A portrait? Do you ever see a portrait?
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No.
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Of the woman in the mirror. Would you know her if you saw her?
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But I'm the woman in the mirror!
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No!
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If I could find the key... find the beginning put it together...
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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?
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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!
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I'm here, I've got you...
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I'm so afraid... ...you won't let it happen...
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Don't leave me... stay with me...
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All the time.
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I should have phoned... but I wanted to see you... be with you...
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Why? What's happened?
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I had the dream. The dream came back again...
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No, don't go away!
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Only this far.
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Where's your husband?
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I didn't wake him. I don't want him to know...
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It was a dream, you're awake, you're all right, now. Can you tell me?
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It was the tower again... and the bell, and the old Spanish village...
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Yes
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But clear... so very clear... for the first time... all of it...
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Tell me.
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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.
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Go on.
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At the end of the green there was a whitewashed stone house with a lovely pepper tree at the corner
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and an old wooden hotel of the old California days, and a saloon... dark... lowceilinged... with hanging oil lamps.
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Yes?! But
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It's all there. It's no dream.
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You've been there before. You've seen it.
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No, never!
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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!
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No, never! I've never been there! Scottie, what is it? I've never been there!
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Go on with your dream. What was it that frightened you?
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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...
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Here with you.
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And it's a all real.
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Yes.
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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!
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My love... because I love you.
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I love you too... too late... too late...
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