Collinsport. It is the year 2012 and as Angelique Collins has journeyed into the past, in search of an ancient artifact, with the hope she shall be able to use it to restore her beloved husband to this dimension of the multi-verse, old acquaintances and adversaries have begun to make their bold sojourns to the small Maine community on Frenchman’s Bay. Past and present will soon give up their secrets “ as will the dead, and the living too.
Opening: [www.youtube.com]
Act 1
Fade in
The low Sodium lights illuminate the parking lot and the serene and well manicured environs of the Woodward Memorial Hospital, which would have no doubt been named the Lang Memorial Hospital, except of course for those inauspicious circumstances surrounding the mysterious events that occurred in fall of 1968 “ which, although still spoken of as infamous rumor and scandalous speculation, by those more senior citizens of Collinsport, had never been fully disclosed. A cover-up by Sheriff Patterson, instigated at the behest of the Collins Family, was chiefly the conclusion reached in any discussion of the alleged improprieties of Steven Lang. Whispers about the strange activities rumored to have taken place after dark in the Eagle Hill Cemetery, oh, nothing was ever proven of course, but nothing was ever disproven, which would have been extremely beneficial to the rehabilitation of the reputation of a once well respected physician “ and there were those persistent reports of strange lights and the odd sounds escaping from his house well after midnight . . . all of which you could be certain were somehow connected with the Collins Family “ which was no doubt why they had given such a large endowment to the cancer ward of the hospital.
The traffic light before the entrance/exit to the main parking lot winked a red light to lime as a black limousine turned slowly into the entrance and wound its way toward the curved access to the front of the Woodward Memorial Hospital.
Under the portcullis, near a yellow and white newspaper dispenser for The Collinsport Star, the heavy car comes to a halt.
With the last drag of a cigarette, glowing embers tossed into a last dying arc to scatter a crash of red sparks upon the asphalt, a nurse on her well deserved smoke break, watches with interest as the driver’s door of the limo opens and the chauffer gets out and moves around the car to open the left rear door.
A long leg is revealed as a maroon high heel steps to the pavement and a tall blonde dressed in a rich, off the shoulder, silk dress, with a maroon print, exits the car. Marian Corey slips her pack of cigarettes and small pale, purple plastic butane lighter into her uniform pocket as she continues to watch the tall, blonde woman step away from the car. She carries a small clutch purse, and wears a single strand of pearls that match her small earrings. She very haughtily pulls the rust hued wrap across her shoulders to ward off the chill breeze.
Marion Corey takes an instant dislike to the woman “ rich, supercilious, and no doubt connected to the Collins” she thinks, as she pities whomever she has arrived to visit.
As the limo door is closed behind the tall blonde, the door on the opposite side of the car opens and Paige Katz, the Vice-President of Media Relations for the Mimecom Corporation’s entertainment division, The Wild Palms Group, exits the limousine and strides around the vehicle, all the while never looking up from her smartphone into which she seems to be engrossed in typing perhaps the single longest text message ever composed.
Together they walk past Marion Corey without the slightest indication that they have even noticed her in passing as they enter the automatic doors of the hospital.
The tall blonde in the rust wrap approaches the Information Desk.
Julie Shelley, who was on the first hour of her part-time shift, looks up to see the two women approaching.
They were certainly not locals.
“May I help you?’
“Mr. Collins, please.” The blonde replies without the slightest glance toward Julie.
The young receptionist frowns as she looks at both of the women idly giving the hospital one of those quick glances of barely concealed disdain.
Julie Shelly stifles a yawn, having been out much too late with her boyfriend, Chris Jennings, the night before, she has struggled to stay awake, as there have been too few visitors arriving at the hospital tonight. She directs her attention now to her computer monitor as she types on her keyboard. Not looking up at the woman, she reads the monitor’s information aloud: “Mr. Collins is in Collins Cancer Ward, Room 2”
Paige Katz looks up from her phone with a slightly off-hand expression and then quickly looks about the antiseptically clean interiors of Woodward Memorial.
“Thank you.” The regal woman with the wrap replies and the two women step away from the Information Desk.
Neither says anything, which Julie thinks is a bit odd, as usually, for the most part, those coming to the hospital are always busy talking about what they needed to do right after they paid their visit to whichever patient they had come to see, making it all sound as if they were only there out of some kind of mandatory old school cultural etiquette thing toward the hospitalized, having to make some enforced courtesy call, or, they were there on behalf of their church’s visitation rounds and so were quickly dropping in between errands so as to get the visit over with and be able to fill in some card to hand back into the church office, while they were actually far more eager to just find out the room number, make the visit, have a brief Father God prayer and then get back out of Woodward Memorial so that they could get back to their busy lives. But these women, Julie properly surmised were not a part of some congregation’s visitation group. And neither one of them had ever said a Father God prayer in their lives. The blonde just seemed way too much of a bit of a bitch “ and the other one, the brunette, the one who looked like she should be walking around some artists loft in New York and not in some harsh, fluorescently illuminated hospital in Collinsport, never seemed to let up on that smartphone of hers.
Together they walk down the corridors “ which even for this early evening hour seems oddly deserted.
The sound of their heels echo loudly along the stark white corridors as they head toward the Collins Cancer Ward.
“Seems they are close to signing the contracts with Snow,” Paige says without looking up from her phone.
“I would like to review the contract with Castaigne, when we are done here.” The tall blonde replies.
Paige Katz walks past a sign advising the disabling of electronic devices, but she keeps texting, attempting to seal the deal for an advertising contract she’s been working on most of the afternoon, “And why is that?” she glances up, vaguely, her thumbs a blur.
“Let’s say I am aware Louis has a miraculous way of getting clauses added which never appeared in the original negotiation.”
Paige smiles wickedly, “Well that makes two of us.”
They around the corner and come upon the closed door to room number 2.
The blonde, her maroon heels striking the floor purposefully, strides forward and opens the door.
With a brief aside to Paige, just as they enter, she whispers, “I so do hate the smell of a hospital.”
“It’s going to take awhile to get it off,” Paige agrees and opens another message.
They enter the room and see the single hospital bed, the curtains pulled up around it, with several sinister looking medical monitors are lit and flashing.
The blonde steps over to the bed, pulls back the curtains, and notices the blonde nurse checking a piece of equipment, to whom she gives a vague smile, and then looks down at the wizen old man in the hospital bed. How frail and small he looks now, she thinks.
Paige Katz slides over and takes a seat in the horrid green faux leather chair.
“Hello Roger.” The blonde woman says with a smile.
The old man turns his head slowly from the nurse, the voice hauntingly familiar, but not at all possible, he thinks, and with his weak and watery eyes he peers up at her, “You!”
“Yes. It has been a while hasn’t it?”
“So, you could not let a man die in peace?”
“Where would be the fun in that?” Paige says to herself with a smile.
“Now Roger.” And the blonde pulls her wrap closer to her and looks over at the nurse, who stares at her for a long moment, wondering who she is, and then, there is something in those green eyes that instructs the night nurse that it would be wise if she were to leave. The nurse nods, almost as if spoken to, and steps out from beside the bed and exits the room.
The blonde stands silent, waiting till the door closes.
“I hear you are not doing well Roger and so I thought I should stop by and, before you depart this rather horrid life your are living, give you an update on a few things that are happening at Collinwood.”
“Just how many godd***ed times do I have to kill you?” He asks with a strained voice.
She laughs.
“Now Roger dear, you have never killed me—others have, but not you.”
“So you’ve come to finish me off have you.”
“Oh, no, Roger. If I were to kill you “ I mean, well, cancer is far less merciful, don’t you think.”
His eyebrows knitted as he scowls at the woman “ how he had ever fallen for her was beyond him “ well, it had all been a spell that was for certain.
“There are so few of you left, Roger. Elizabeth is dead “ and I am sure it was such a shock to find out what she had been hiding all those years . . . the terrible things she had done . . . ah, well, yet another murderous, Collins scandal cleverly concealed.” She adjusts the wrap, “And, you do know that HE is back “ here in Collinsport.”
Roger begins to grow agitated “ his cardiac monitor registering now his growing anger, for Roger Collins was forever known for two things, his temper and his fondness for drink. “That’s impossible. He’s””
“Now Roger, as you should well know, anything with him is possible.”
His eyes grow more lucid.
“Carolyn’s still in New York “ writing . . . some urban fantasy novels I hear, I haven’t really read one. But they say write what you know and she has so much background material to draw upon “ now of course, her daughter’s gone really quite wild. But then, Carolyn was always the wild one, now wasn’t she.” She steps closer, pulling her wrap tighter about her shoulders, “And Quentin, he is still, well who knows where he is “ although he did surface just long enough to make contact with our old, old friend Peter, so that he could dredge up what really would have been better off left forgotten, that salacious throve of journals, and memoirs, and of course those volumes of his dusty old books “ all to be sent to her — that bastard daughter of his, Samantha Evans “ who now knows she’s a Collins.”
He stares at her, anger growing.
“One more mouth to feed,” She leans forward with a sly smile, “But not to worry, my dear, I shall soon see to that . . . “
“Laura! You leave them alone.”
“Oh, Roger, if there is one thing you should remember in that terrible, old wizen head of yours, it is that it may take me some time, but, I always come back . . . and I always get even because I never, ever forget. And Quentin does so deserve whatever I decide he should get, or, whatever I plan for that daughter of his, especially since deserted me to be left all alone on that pyre in Egypt back in 1896. So,” Shifting the wrap on her shoulders haughtily, “If I can’t have my revenge upon him “ then the daughter will just have do. Speaking of which – revenge, I hear Barnabas” . . .”
“Barnabas . . . yes! Barnabas. When he finds out you are back he will destroy you.” He says trying to sit up to point angrily at her.
She laughs, “Oh, I am sure he would if he could. Now as far as the family business, which Roger you were never really any good at, seeing as how that was always the domain of Elizabeth, I want you to know that David is doing an excellent job of putting the Collins Family financial house back in order. As always, he has done an outstanding job. He’s recovered the Collins Family fortune for us after you so nearly drank it all away.”
He reaches up and grasps the rails of the bed, “You, you leave David out of this.”
Paige Katz, leaning forward to finish a text cannot help a slight snicker.
“Now, now, Roger, you know I can’t do that. I mean, after all the work I have done in supporting him . . . arranging the various business deals . . . government contacts . . . the Interfaith transactions . . . the European acquisitions, the financial arrangements made in Prague, all of course with the clandestine support and underwriting by The Stockbridge Foundation. I have finally restored my son’s financial birthright, and now I am here to assure he receives the remainder of that birthright.”
“No, not David, never.”
“Roger, you know, what I am. Just as you well know what David is capable of “ all I need to do is awaken that which is within him. . . . that which has lain dormant.”
Hands grasping the rails of his bed, he pulls himself up further, “I swear Laura if you touch David I will kill you.”
“Yes, well dear that is a threat which doesn’t really deter me very much as you well know.” She tells him with a sardonic look.
Roger’s expression grows florid, “You’re as insane has you ever were.”
“Whether I am or not, what I do have is time Roger. Time is on my side, and as you can see time is sadly not on yours.”
“As comforting as when we were married.” He says and looks away for a moment at the tubes and needles, the IV stands. Yes, time is running out for him “ how he as withstood the ravages of the years this long he is truly amazed. Put away in Assisted Living until the cancer had gotten so bad and they trapped him in this bed . . .
“It is really too bad dear that you aren’t out and about “ I mean, you would be surprised to see just how many of the old forces are gathering here in this quaint little town Isaac worked so hard to build. It’s like a slow storm brewing “ you can almost feel it in the air “ just before that first lightening strike unleashes the full fury.”
Her hand clutching the rust hue wrap, a fist of material at her breasts, she leans forward over the rail, closer to him: ” I did so want to stop by, before you, well expire, and let you know that everything you had fought so hard to keep away from me, I will finally have, and when I do, when I take David with me, I want you to know that I plan to raze this place in my wake . . . Collinsport. And your beloved Collinwood. I have so grown to dislike this horrid little town.”
“You have been stopped before Laura and you will be again. Upon that I can assure you!” He coughs and a trace of crimson appears at the corners of his mouth.
Paige Katz looks up from here smartphone and eyes the man, “I don’t think your gonna’ be getting out of bed anytime soon, Mr. Collins.”
He rises up, the monitors beeping, “I-I . . . If I can’t stop you, then godd**ned it, Barnabas will—he has before!”
Laura cackles, “Barnabas Collins? Oh, Roger you are so behind the times.”
“I would not be so certain of your grand plans Laura.” Only he collapses back into his bed. “ They all thought they would destroy us “ there have been so many . . . so many . . . and yet . . . any yet, we have endured.” He muttered as if to himself.
“Yes, well I can promise you the end is near. Now do get some rest even though you will be soon sleeping for an eternity.” She turns, “Good bye Roger.”
He tries to reach out for the telephone and knocks over a plastic cup of water.
Laura Collins Stockbridge turns and smiles at Paige, “Sorry for the delay, but we can be on our way now. Oh, excuse me, Paige, this is my ex-husband. Roger this is Paige, she’s going to help me destroy your little town.”
“A real pleasure Mr. Collins, “ Paige dead pans before rising from the chair.
“Leave . . . David . . . Alone . . .” Roger yells at her.
“He is the light of my life, Roger, you know that.” And she turns and walks out of the hospital room.
Objects on his end table topple over as he reaches for the light green phone, clawing through the rails of the bed that are pulled up and locked. His fingers grab the curled cord of the receiver and he tugs it toward him, dragging the phone within reach.
He dials a number and lies back gasping from the exertion, only he does not receive the answer he is hoping for as instead the phone tells him: “The number you are attempting to call is no longer in service.”
He slams the phone down, “Not in service! We shall see about that!”
He begins to pull the IV connectors free from his arms as he forces himself upward from the bed in order to sit so as to work at lowering the rails, “I have to see Barnabas. I have to see him now.”
Act 2
Fade In
The headlights of the car cut illuminates the tangled underbrush growing thickly along side uneven access road as the car takes the sharp curve. Ahead, in the glow of the lights, the quick breeze of the chill fall night stirs the curled brown and rust hued leaves like so many rodents scurrying now away from the approaching car’s high beams.
Roger’s fingers grip the steering wheel tightly, so tightly that his knuckles have gone white. He can feel the sweat running down his temples, down along his lower back. He has to sit forward, hunched over the wheel, peering into the night “ his vision having gone to hell years ago, and he could not find his glasses . . .. He just wants to be there “ before he runs completely out of the momentum his anger has given him . . . but it has been a very long time since he was out of the hospital “ out of his bed.
His muscles feel almost useless “
But he must stop her!
The front of the car hits a deep rut and he fears he may have damaged the under carriage as he takes a curve too wide, but the road levels out toward the large stone mansion in the gloom.
Odd that the Old House always seemed to be draped in gloom, he thought “ but of course it should be. Always would be.
The Oldsmobile that Roger has taken from the hospital parking lot pulls to a halt outside the mansion, which as he stares through the windshield is not the Old House of his memory. It’s all changed somehow.
The door opens and he slowly pulls himself out from behind the wheel, stepping out of the car, his bare feet on gravel and grass as he moves unsteadily away from the open door, the gown embarrassingly flapping open “ but at his age he has given up on modesty.
His bare feet take him painfully across the drive.
He stops and takes a deep breath. God not yet, give me just a few more minutes!
Then he moves on toward the front door.
Roger leans against the dark wooden entry and catches his breath, wipes the dampness from his brow as he gathers the strength to open the door.
“Barnabas,” His voice weakly calls out. “Barnabas, are you here. It’s Roger “ I need to talk to you.”
The voice that replies is not Barnabas Collins “ but it is one he well knows.
“Roger Collins as I live and breathe” The lamp beside the sofa is turned on and Victor Fenn-Gibbon sits calmly watching the old man, dressed far too indiscreetly in his hospital gown, open at the back, standing in the darken foyer rather unsteady on his feet.
Madelyn Atwell suddenly looks up from the script she had been reading, curling her legs up under her as she turns in the high-backed chair to watch the elderly man in the foyer.
“Fenn-Gibbon?” Roger all but stammers, “My god, it’s true!”
“Roger perhaps you should have a seat, you look like hell.”
“Hell is where you should be.”
“There are so many of us that should””
“Where is Barnabas!”
“Now Roger that is a matter of some contention, you see, there are those with varying opinions. There are three possible locations in which he may currently reside. I myself favor Chapter Nine, Verse 14 through 37 of Alhazred’s book as the most likely whereabouts of that distant cousin. But, of course, you may have better luck in discovering his location by asking your ex-wife.”
“Laura “ yes, she came to see me tonight.” He says, remembering what got him out of his bed as he moves over to have a seat, his strength rapidly fading. “She’s threatening David.”
“Ah, always the boy.”
“She means him harm of this I am certain.”
Victor Fenn-Gibbon sits placidly watching the exhausted Roger Collins fall into his chair, “Well now, Roger, that remains to be seen, as I understand it, she has been secretly helping the boy for years.”
“I am not talking about finance, or shipping, or whatever it is that David is into now “ I am talking about who and what that hellish woman truly is.”
“Yes, well, there is of course that to consider.”
Roger looks up suddenly, “What are you doing here, Petofi? Why are you back? Haven’t you done enough to destroy my family.”
“Yet another point of contention, Roger. For you see, I have done so much FOR your family.” Count Andreas Petofi, a.k.a Victor Fenn-Gibbon, tells him calmly as he adjusts the cuff of his black leather glove, “I am after all tied to the Collins family whether you care to admit it or not.”
Roger scowls at him, “I dare say yes, through that b***h of a daughter of yours.”
“Yes, but in more ways than one, Roger.”
“More of your cryptic nonsense. Well, I need a drink.” Roger, as always, impatient turns to look about the room, eyeing a decanter, before turning his attention once again upon Fenn-Gibbon, “I am sorry. What are you saying? Angelique? She hates you as much as the rest of us. And if you are alluding to Nicole? Well, Count, I am sorry to disillusion you, but from what I hear, she’s dead.”
“Undead.” Victor corrects the elderly Roger Collins, “She shares her father’s infection.”
“The poor girl. Why, do they all die so young?” He ponders for a moment, and then glances at the decanter, “I guess being undead is better than . . . better than the fate of the other one.”
“Yes, the other one—that’s why I am here Roger.”
Roger looks at him now with disgust, “The despicable things that my sister Elizabeth did – in order to keep you alive. God! What she was thinking is beyond me. Liz . . . poor, poor Liz . . . she should have let you rot, decompose in the basement, if that is what you do. But no, not Liz, poor, poor Liz, so beholden to decorum. Instead she had to . . . “ He slowly rises not wanting to think about it any more, the horrible things she had done; and he walks over to a table to find the decanter to be empty, “Doesn’t Barnabas have a drink in this godd***ed house?”
“This is Nicole’s house.”
Roger looks around, for a moment disoriented, hands on his hips and for a brief instant he looks like the Roger Collins of old. “Yes, this isn’t the Old House. Not the one Barnabas used. It burned down years ago. “
“Nicole restored it.” Petofi explains.
“Handy-work of Laura’s you know. She hates your daughter!” Roger nods and points a waving finger to Fenn-Gibbon, “And now, she’s come back again for my boy . . . my David; well I won’y have it. No sir. Not ever—the b***h.”
“She’s been back for some time, Roger.”
“Yes, you said she had her father’s infection, the poor girl.”
“No, I mean Laura.”
“Laura is a b****h, sir and an evil one at that.” He puts the empty decanter down, “She never forgets— “ He grows angry and petulant, “I need a drink.”
“Stage Four, Roger, I am surprised you have gotten this far. Morphine?”
“Yes, as they say Sweet Sister Morphine, she comes around.” Roger rubs his fingertips together anxiously, “But at the moment what I need is a drink.”
“I can help you with that.”
Madelyn, sitting silently as she looks over the script lifts a stainless steel flask wordlessly, and waves it a bit.
“Well then man don’t just sit there get the brandy.”
“Certainly, only, I need you to agree to assist me.”
“Assist you?’ He laughs, eyes narrowing. “Never.”
Madelyn continues to wave her flask.
Roger looks at it, his lips are very dry, it has been so long since he had a drink, a REAL drink. He looks back over at Fenn-Gibbon and cocks an eyebrow inquisitively toward him, “This help from me? What precisely does it consist of?”
“I need to find the one I have lost.”
“HER?” Roger lifts a brow.
“Yes.”
His weak and watery eyes peer at the flask, wondering what is within it: “Well, she’s dead! Victor, you know that quite well. Your fellow cohort, Blair or Orne, or whatever he calls himself these days “ he saw to that. His little monster tossed her off Widows Hill.”
“Yes, well once again Roger that is yet another incorrect conjecture, whereas in fact: she is alive. She survived the fall from the cliffs and I need to find her.”
“If she’s alive, then she’s hiding from you, no doubt.” Roger smiles, “She’s a smart girl. I always said she was a smart girl from the moment I first laid eyes upon her in that threadbare coat.”
Count Petofi rises now from the sofa and steps around the large coffee table in order to move over to stand beside Roger at the side table, “As I said, I can fix you a drink Roger “ I make you one that will make you feel better than you have felt for quite some time “ only I need some assurances you will agree to help me.” He takes up a different decanter than the one Roger had been previously waving about.
“If she’s alive, I am not at all sure I want to help you find her, Petofi.” He waves a dismissive hand, eyes on the decanter, “Besides, why don’t you ask Dark God of yours where she is?”
“We are not, at the moment, properly on speaking terms.” Petofi says making sure that Roger is well aware of the decanter within his hand, the amber liquid within.
Roger laughed, “So even he got tired of your megalomaniac ego! Good for him.”
Count Petofi reaches over with his good hand and takes an old fashion glass, rights it and sits it forward on the table.
He looks at Roger Collins, who, at ninety-four tires to glare back at him with all of his infamous derision.
Petofi smiles as he detects the slightest flicker now of a recognition in Roger Collins’ eyes of just what he is offering, as he watches him rather casually remove a small bottle from his inner jacket pocket.
He turns with his usual dramatic flare to hold the small antique bottle up to the light; slowly turning it in his fingertips so the cerulean blue liquid inside can catch Roger Collins” attention “ as if to mesmerize the old man.
It’s the same supercilious bastard, Roger thinks, everything having to be so overly dramatic.
What did Elizabeth ever see in the man? “More sleight-of-hand from the sleight-of-hand man, heh, Victor?”
Petofi twists the cap off the old bottle breaking the purple wax seal and pours the cerulean contents into the glass, “Here Roger, this drink’s on me.”
Roger coughs, aware of the specks of blood on his hand where he had covered his mouth.
“Just as I told you Victor! He is just as hard-headed dying . . . as he was in living.” Aristede says as he walks into the parlor now, having made his too silent entrance from somewhere in the darken recesses of the back of the mansion. He steps past the grand piano, his hands casually stuffed into his pants pockets.
Roger peers into the darkness and then recognizes Petofi’s man “ Aristede: “Ah, the murderer and thief.”
“As were you Roger.” Aristede replies evenly. “As were you.”
“What are you up to Petofi? Why are you here? In this house?”
“Looking for something, Mr. Collins.” Aristede answers.
“Now, Now my boy, we all need our little secrets.” The Count tells Aristede and holds out the drink, “Now about that drink.”
“What—what do I have to do?”
“As I said, agree to be of assistance.” He offers up the drink.
“Do it for the Boy.” Aristede says with a wide toothy smile.
Roger takes the glass and drinks.
He makes a horrid face, “God that is the worst whiskey I have ever tasted.”
Then he suddenly drops the glass.
He feels a strange sensation of warmth radiating through his limbs.
He suddenly feels incredibly nauseous
“Damned you—poison. I should have known, Petofi!”
“Patience my dear Roger, patience.”
Aristede walks over and stands beside the Count, “Patience and Roger Collins? I don’t know if even you have a bottle for that Victor.”
Suddenly Roger Collins stumbles into the table and grabs the edges in order to keep from falling – for if he falls he will never get up!
He looks down at his hands, aware now of the clear focus of his eyes as he takes note that they are the hands of his youth.
He steps back, feeling much stronger.
“What . . . What have you?”
He heads over to a window in order to find a reflective surface in this house without mirrors.
The pale reflection is Roger Collins of his mid-thirties: “Good lord! I am young again!”
Cue Music End of Episode