A Man Comes Down - Inst. 1
Installment 1
I wrote the first full draft of this story, intended as a film and originally conceived of 15 years ago when I finished grad school. I was unable to finish it in all that time but then, out of options, after getting my eye-typing device, I finished within 6 months. I did this with the help of my friend Josh Windmiller, whom many of you know.
The way we did it: I would email him chunks of text, and we would get together, and he would read it back to me while attempting to edit for punctuation mostly and, ahem, run-on sentences. Editing this way, with minimal space for discussion, worked surprisingly well, drawing on our long history of collaboration. But fundamentally, it's extremely difficult to edit details.
While we were working this way, my friend Stan expressed interest in making some kind of documentary with his production company Fathom (it's in the works, headed as a short, to festivals). As a result of this, Kelton Arcado, who works with Stan, worked with us to turn it into a script format. Anyway, sometime in the summer, we finished the first draft.
Because of the challenge inherent in editing details, how I was going to handle subsequent drafts was always a question for me. In the event, it's turned into a rewrite that is also an overwrite, in the sense of memory on a disk. I am simply writing it again, without regard for whether I've changed it or not. This works for the beginning, which I know extremely well. As we continue, I hope to move to more traditional, selective editing, because this is too inefficient.
I came up with the idea of writing this draft in installments because it will provide structure for my year. The plan, subject to change, is to complete the story over 26 installments, which, if I average an installment every two weeks, takes us through next Christmas. At the same time, the new draft only exists as far as I've written it, and it can be a new story that evolves over the year (possibly with your participation!). This, to me, is the most appealing aspect of the installment format: an audience, however small, out there anticipating the next part of the story, giving feedback, and generally living through the experience with me.
For this draft, the screenplay aspect of the text has been reduced (with apologies to Kelton), leaving us somewhere between a novel and a script. The reader is consistently addressed as a collective viewer—"we see"—which has always come naturally to me for this project. At the same time, in this version, we will occasionally be given access to a character's thoughts or a psychological account of events.
Throughout, musical suggestions are interspersed; these shouldn't be taken as part of a future soundtrack but rather as optional mood-setting reading music. In this vein, I would like to start by suggesting "Big Sky Country" by Leif Vollebekk, (listen here) which is a song that Ray has introduced to me over the course of last year. (We both agree that Leif's oeuvre as a whole pales a bit when compared with this song, but the song itself is really good.) The song works really well to set the scene for this story for a few reasons: first, the Red Wing is a bird from the western United States; secondly, the use of the place names "Big Sky Country" and "Land of the Living Sky" rather than the state names Montana and the province of Saskatchewan in Canada, respectively, leads nicely into a story which is set in a poetically reimagined California called simply "the Coast." The central image of the bird on the edge of the cattail evokes the precarious nature of meeting and knowing others in the stream of their lives—how the contingency and fragility of such encounters where people actually "match up" with one another feel all the more precious. That feeling throughout that Rowena and Ezekiel's timing is just right for helping one another escape the loops that they are in is, for me, one of the great joys and releases of the story, one of the ways I know Ezekiel isn't me: "This guy is acting in time and on time; whatever problems he may have, what a hero!" Enjoy the story!
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Character List
Harry
Tall, fairly thin but more solid than Ira. About 50 years old, clean-shaven. Is the leader of a small cattle herding group based around his family. His assistant is his kid brother Erik.
Erik
A tall, quiet man, about 40, with a distinctive black beard. He is forever stuck in the kid brother role, although almost too capable at all the practices he is supposed to be good at. He is largely silent and defers to Harry, almost pointedly at times. He is a suitor to the lady, insofar as she is suitable.
Nick
A younger cousin of Harry's. Short, bandy-legged. From the south, a talker, probably gay though not explicitly so. It is his first season working with Harry.
Anton
Goes by the nickname "Stomp" because of his big boots and relatively small size. An experienced cowman, he is very independent. Early 40s, expert rider, shaved head.
Knocks
Second season with the team. Big guy. Kind of quiet, tabula rasa.
The Lady (Rowena with long 'e')
Early-mid thirties. She was married in love 10-11 years ago to the husband, James Frey. She came from far away to the east, settling down where his family is based here on the coast. She is clever and restless on the one hand, yet deeply steadfast on the other. A worry line between her brows, characteristically creased in thought. Narrow shoulders that somehow make her seem tougher. Men's coat over calico dress, boots.
The Husband
Lives with the lady 2 to 3 years. Has a prior lieutenant commission and training. His family bought the commission, as was the system at the time. He's clever and dexterous, skilled at boat building. Been around the sea his whole life, loves it to an almost unhealthy degree. Concerned about the effect violence will have on him. Becomes...
Nat Taylor
Famous violent outlaw leader of The 7. He finds he has skill in planning covert ops and maintains a very uncompromising stance toward the violence he commits. His lack of romantic notions makes him capable of especially brutal schemes. His best friend in the army is The Man.
The Man (Tom / Ezekiel)
Tall, black, 35, somewhat intimidating and forbidding in initial impression. Everyone loves to compare him to an icon, in part because of his beard. A somewhat unusual soldier who likes to read and think, but whose social place is assured by his being the best shot in the regiment. After the war, he becomes the second person to join the 7 after Charlie.
He's not a natural killer, or even a violent person, but because of his skill in shooting, he is used as a tool first by the army and then, for years, by Nat Taylor, and becomes habituated to it. Because he exercises skill rather than bravery in it, he expects to be successful at it.
Charlie
A former Sergeant of Nat's from the army and early member of the 7. He still has the bearing of a tough soldier.
Ira
Harry's son. It's a unique situation in that Harry had an affair with Ilene Frey while she was still married to her first husband Nathaniel Benjamin, a tailor by trade. This creates a strange dynamic between Harry and him. The stepson who is clearly a natural son—on the one hand, he's close to him for a stepfather; oppressively so on the other, he pushes him without acknowledging him. Ira has a close family-type relationship with The Lady, who is nearly his aunt. He is a very rough equivalent to Telemachus.
The Ferryman
A man who ferries people across the river who talks too much.
George
A fence for the 7. Sort of civilian member. A musician who coordinates other musicians in his regular life. This gives him useful license to go places and meet people to set up jobs.
Michael
A sailor (the smuggler, oilskin himself). Tall, broad, impassive, light hair cut very short like a shaven-down grizzly bear. Clean-shaven, deeply manly in his harsh, silent, wall quality. Not everyone has him in mind as a pirate captain, yet he is so practical as one. True neutral personality: tough, enduring, smart, and experienced.
Emma Torwinson
Emma is a thin, dark-haired woman about 40, maybe a few years older than Nat. She gives an attractive yet distant, uncompromising impression. Around the yard, she is all business, rough and ready, seeking to make up for her father's lack of a son. She herself is not interested in marrying.
Art by Alex Murray Clark
CHAPTER 1 DAY 1
A FIRE AT NIGHT A lone fire is visible through trees, then visible at a great distance, as a pinpoint. The gloves of a rider who turns his horse.
ENCOUNTER It's a chilly morning far from the ocean, high in the mountains, on the edge of dawn. An American badger can be perceived in the shadow of a clump of rocks on the edge of a dry, barren plain, hunting and shuffling.
The plain is in menacing and unfriendly shadow, due to the first shafts of a thin dawn just cresting some knife-like mountains to the east. The light, having escaped over the mountains, touches with reluctance the edge of an aspen wood on the far side of the high plain.
The equivocal light casts the shadow of a rider, coming jogging along on a black horse, worn thin by hard riding, the edge of the wood from some distance a long way from the left. The rider is cast in periodic shadows against the bare aspen trunks. The rider in question is Charlie, a man in his early 40s. A big, grizzled man, with sideburns and a heavy face. He has been riding a long time in an enduring way, but now he glances over to observe those first shafts of light coming over eastern mountains, and he accelerates his pace.
Shortly, he comes to a part of the edge of the wood without a distinct hill behind it. At the edge of the trees, he dismounts with a swift, furtive air. He ties his horse up on some low, bare branches of a sapling, lifts them out of his way, and enters the wood. As he does, he takes out a large silver revolver, which he holds close to his face. Thoughtful, he chews on a toothpick in a menacing way, with his thick lips.
Inside the wood, there is a carpet of dead leaves. Charlie attempts to move forward quietly; the space is shadowed and calm. Twigs snap underfoot and a jay cries out.
Suddenly there is a terrific sound close at hand in the underbrush. Charlie whirls round ready to shoot, but only a wild pig breaks cover and charges downhill. Charlie relaxes. A short way through the trees uphill, Charlie perceives the place, at the base of an escarpment of red rocks, where a fire has been. In the wake of the chaos of the wild pig, he now moves briskly toward the place. Crouching down by the residue of the fire like a huge, black bird in his black duster, with his heavy gloves holding his weight like the handless elbows of the bird's wings. But now he must use his hands to carefully pick a few pieces of ash. Placing them in his mouth, he says, "Few hours. Well, Nat is coming for you... But I'll get there first."
He stands up and climbs to the top of the hill beyond the rocks. Here at the top, the trees are thinner and the morning light is warm. Stepping around a large tree, he looks down the far slope of the hill where a faint path winds through the aspen and, in the sparse trees, barren hills are visible to the west. He pulls out a tobacco pouch, and with the combination of satisfaction and disgruntlement typical of the activity of giving oneself a smoking reprieve, he rolls a cigarette.
At the same time, it becomes clear to us that another man—Ezekiel, a bearded black man about 35—is standing like a shadow on the far side of the large tree Charlie just passed.
As often happens when you've been hiding in stillness, Ezekiel finds he cannot move. Not from the terror of shooting his former friend, but rather through a mechanical law, a magical law of those who hide themselves in plain sight. He finds he cannot act. The moments go by. He is pointing his short-stock rifle, stock reddish in the morning light, at Charlie's back. Charlie begins to turn around.
The spell is broken; Ezekiel fires just before Charlie, who makes a little sound and falls dead, shot through the heart. Birds screaming alarm, the silence broken violently. For a moment, our camera has no focus, then we focus on Ezekiel's face. He stares intently. After a moment, he slides a few inches down the tree he is backed against, leaving a trail of dark blood. He has been shot, ambiguously badly.
In the cold stillness, he gazes out toward the untroubled, sunny tops of the aspens, and to the quiet, unjudging, dry hills. He imagines being unable to move yet waiting here for Nat to arrive. He realizes Nat would never find him here, off the road. He imagines passing away slowly and peacefully from cold, while Nat passes by, unknowingly, in the sunny morning. He has a vision of three sparrows flying with sporadic, energetic wingbeats—hup, swoop, hup, swoop—through springy ground cover. For a moment, the first sparrow lands in relative peace and quiet in a bush, then the second lands beside him. A pair, then. The third flits with jealous hesitancy onto the same bush, though he tries to mind his own business. He has invaded their space. After a moment, the first flies off; for a moment, he shares the bush with the second, then it too flies; then, at last, he too takes flight.
We look directly at Ezekiel's face; he is somewhere faraway dealing with the pain. At length, he forces himself to stand free of the tree and move; after a few steps, it gets easier. He stumbles downhill towards Charlie's body and touches it on the lifeless chest. "I'm sorry, Charlie," he takes the big silver revolver from the lifeless hand, then continues, stumbling down the hill. All is silent.
Afterwards, the pig returns and begins shuffling around Charlie's big, coated body.
A MAN COMES DOWN The shadow of the form of a strange leafless tree is visible at a great distance up a harsh rocky path that climbs the unverdant east slope of a mountain, winding steeply uphill in switchbacks. The tree is visible, now not, behind the shoulder of rocks that defines the left side of the path.
Up the path, riding slowly and painfully in a lopsided way due to his injury, comes Ezekiel. As he approaches the tree and the top of the mountain, the defile through which he is passing becomes narrower and narrower, becoming a forbidding pass, on the sides of which miserable patches of desecrated snow on the one hand, bits of dying vegetation on the other, make it seem a desolate place where neither winter nor life really wants to stay. He hunches his shoulders, pulls his collar up around his face, and continues on, withdrawn into himself.
The tree at the top of the pass is a very remarkable one. It stands as a strange, eerie sentinel. His attention, however, is caught by the strange patterning of the tree's bark, which is ripped and torn in a way that appears significant and intentional. The bark has been stripped, leaving livid patches of bare tree wet in the mist. As he perceives this, despite his injured state, he is electrified by some particular foreboding we can't understand as yet. He approaches the tree closely to stare at it. He approaches side-on to it within a few yards. On closer examination, the strip of bark appears natural, or at least nothing more than a foible on the part of passing travelers to hasten the natural process along and pull off a strip as they pass by.
With relief, he removes his own hand from the damaged tree. Breathing and aching, he looks back the way he has come—dry hills upon dry hills upon a distant mountain. He is momentarily lost in thought, as his grey horse stands undirected and sideways to the path. A brisk, chill mountain wind has come up, and the mist, which had been so thick, is being lifted like a magician's cloak. Standing high on the rock together, horse and man look like an equestrian statue somewhere on some well-groomed common. His piercing gaze and his untrimmed beard springing from beneath his face scarf, and his corrugated brow, give a great impression of desolation and heroic endurance to that fictional, civilized place. The bottom half of the statue seems to be straying into less than impressive life, as the horse sidles and snuffles restively at their inactivity, which rather spoils the impressive effect.
Responding to this restlessness, Ezekiel at length speaks to the horse. He wheels it to the right and the west, down the mountain. Before them both, an immense view opens up: blue hills on blue hills, a hawk lazily ribboning the space between them, and even more distantly the shining, silver, reflective sea. The horse begins steadily walking down the path towards the Coast.
Music - "Departure Gates" by The Dead Sea (listen here)
At the feet of the horse, the last of the mist gathers and bursts about the path lower in the valley of willows. Directly to the left of the path, the mist still clings. There are a great number of elk grazing in that narrow valley. The shafts of pale sunlight mix with the mist, striking tones of yellow out of their backs. The path continues down the south shoulder of the mountain. The path goes steeply down; large chunks of shale make up the way, reflective in the mountain sun. The horse's feet slip and skitter, but he continues steadily. Steadiness is his chief characteristic.
Credits roll.
THE VALLEY (OR STILL A MAN COMES DOWN?)
Now we are in a shadowed valley, and the sound of a river is constant. He is riding in the sandy, flat land that immediately joins a river. Over a knoll covered with rough grasses, he comes to the shore. The river is swirling and deep with rainwater, flowing strong. He looks at it thoughtfully, then turns temporarily away from crossing. The land in the hollow place by the river is sandy, all willows and harsh grasses. On the opposite bank, there are thick pine woods, which has the effect of blanketing those fallen boughs from the opposite shore that make it over to this near one in sand. Green needles and sand over them—it's an unnatural combination that feels vibrant and specially messy in a strange way, he thinks.
As he prepares to leave the hollow by the shore, he notices something remarkable. There, in the sandy soil, a small apple tree is growing. He quietly moves up to it, looking intently at the small red and yellow fruits. He takes one and polishes it, then rips it from its green stem, places it in his pocket, and rides on.
THE RIVER A little along the shore to the left that he has been riding along looking for a place to cross, he comes to a place where a track leads down to a stony beach. There is a manually pulled ferry, a raft on a rope.
Several people are gathered on the shore waiting for the ferry to be pulled over by the grizzled ferryman. There are four people waiting for the ferry, one woman and three men. They look more like village inhabitants than rough riders. As he approaches, he hears the muttered name "Nat Taylor" and something about a shadow. He pulls his collar up to conceal his face; every eye is staring at him. He backs away from the beach. The Ferryman is staring at him.
Riding back north along the edge of the river, he is looking for a place to cross. Near to the first place where he came to the river, a Grey Fox emerges from the trees on the opposite shore, stares at him, and then noses a short distance along the pine shore, keeping to the north of where Ezekiel is. After a moment, the Fox comes to a place where a narrow path cuts through the woods on its side, taking this path into the interior. It disappears swiftly among the trees.
Ezekiel determines to cross there. It is wide—and deep—he will certainly need to swim his horse—but it appears calm. The horse slowly wades into the middle of the water. Eventually swimming, the current is surprisingly strong, the river being swollen with recent rain. As he begins to swim, the water comes up around Ezekiel's waist and his wound, causing a trail of blood to swirl in the water. As the horse begins swimming, he swims for a time parallel to the flow for ease. Eventually, he regains his footing and climbs to the bank.
The horse, called Morning Smoke as a reference to his color, does everything slowly, calmly, and methodically, whether his rider wished for that particular style of motion or not. In the case of our particular rider, Ezekiel, the contrast between the motions of his mind and the pace of the horse seems absurd, to mention his practical need, from time to time, to go somewhere rather suddenly, which was absolutely no chance of, on Morning's back. Still, he has become attached to his horse's personal, unchanging, somewhat enforced, somewhat alien pace. It gives him the opportunity to live in two ways at once. Morning slowly and methodically swims to shore and slowly climbs to the bank.
The sky is very dark with rain. Ezekiel glances at it, then ducks under the low-hanging branches and proceeds down the path. Following the fox, he quickly disappears from sight. We are left following the dark swirls in the river, eternal and instantaneous. After a moment, we notice that there are raindrops in the swirl. A gust of wind surges among the tendrils of a weeping willow, hanging over the river in the rain. The water disturbs and moves again.
CHAPTER 2
Music: “House by the Sea” by Iron and Wine (listen here)
THE HOUSE (METICULOUS OVER-EXPLAIN 1) There is a house, nestled between two low hills. Immediately beyond it, cliffs and the sea. The eastern sun is just beginning to edge above the higher inland hills. The area around the house itself, as well as the cliffs and surf line, is still in shadow, while further out to sea, whitecaps cast bright.
As I say, the house is between two green hills, the more northerly of which is covered by a bay wood; to the south of the house runs a creek. It runs in a deep gulley on the southside of the house, filled with ferns and such. Beyond the house to the side of the substantial front yard, the stream comes temporarily out of its gulley, where stepping stones have been set up to cross it, leading to the path up the promontory to the south overlooking the beach. Where the stepping stones cross the stream on the side of the house, a track comes down from the hill and runs beside the stream for the length of the field in front of the house. During this period, the stream widens into a pond, in which shape it continues until it turns again in the shadow of the rock of the promontory, where it becomes a broad stream again, crossing the beach and flowing into the ocean. On dry land, the track borders the stream and creates a natural border for the fenced area of the yard. Where the pond creates a corner with the promontory rock, the track turns a rough corner, made more by usage than planning, and heads north. The rock between the pond and the promontory is also forested in steep hillside before the bare cliff top. The first light of the morning is crawling out to meet the objects there on the west side of the big hills; the tips of the two hills are turning green, the wet patches in the mud of the track are purple and silver, the hoar frost white where the pale light can reach it.
ROWENA (METICULOUS OVER-EXPLAIN 2) The house is dark. There is a slight amount of light coming in from a small south-facing window; its interior framing is solid, of plain darkwood. The pale light illuminates a bread board with a crust of bread on it, and a knife. A solitary life, interrupted for the night.
The room is a large multipurpose room occupying the west and front of the house. The large room is perhaps 20 by 25 feet, divided north to south by the door and a kind of natural passage through the room. To the north of the path through the room is the fireplace, built into the western wall. It's not a particularly high ceiling, but it is of a design where the rafters are bare and rise 15 feet or more at the center of the room.
At the front of the room, to the right of the fireplace, is a large, slightly incongruous window of glass that is thick but fine. Through it we can see the fresh-turned earth of an active vegetable garden. A woman—tall, thin, narrow shoulders, rough-cut brown hair—Rowena, enters from the adjoining room, separated from this one by a hall space which doubles as a pantry, neat shelving on both sides. Only a curtain separates the front from the back room.
Rowena moves with the unselfconsciousness of a person moving in her own home. After the previous scenes of Ezekiel in outside spaces with which he too is unfamiliar, her energy feels intimate, bordering on a bit claustrophobic. However, we have the impression that this morning for Rowena has a reason for being a particular one. She has come into the room in stocking feet. Fumbling with cold and sleep, she sits at a little bench she uses for the purpose and puts her slightly incongruously large tough boots on, fumbling with the metal eyes for the laces. Shoes more or less on, she reaches behind the door for her coat. Again, it's a long, big leather man's coat, rather incongruous with her impression otherwise, which isn't to say it's unattractive by any means. She puts a scarf around her neck and steps into the yard.
To the left immediately is the door to a small chicken coop. Entering, she quickly scans the dozen boxes. In two rows, only 3 or 4 are occupied, but there are several more chickens in the coop moving about. She quickly locates 7 eggs, and then, looking around, she locates an 8th off in a corner. She shakes her head at a black chicken wandering off by itself, smiles, and picks up the egg.
Out in the yard, she shakes her shoulders and breathes smoke in the chill air. She thinks of all the tasks she has still to do this morning, and the several more she will have to do if the delivery of oil she's expecting comes through. Far from being oppressed by them, she relishes thinking about and itemizing them. She needs to make the bread and clean the light of course, also refill the barrel if the delivery comes. It's rather lucky that she did laundry only yesterday because the rain there was might easily come back and spoil the drying. Speaking of which, it probably is not the day for dyeing the new fleeces, although she'd like to.
THE WOOD
Music: "I Ridin' So" by Gjallarhorn (listen here)
She exits the gate, fence now splashed in morning light to dry the cool, wet wood. She closes it behind her, takes a deep breath, and walks north.
As for the missing core of her life, the absence which animates it, she only occasionally thinks of it, in a carefully rationed way, but she is always close to it. She is like someone drawing a shape by shading around, coming all the time deliciously close to it through the meticulous rendering of its neighboring shape.
She walks up the path by the fence.
She walks along the path on the ridge between the hills northward. The wind teases her hair and supplies energy to walk. She looks back periodically, as if enclosing the entirety of space and taking it with her, to be wrapped up again at the next pause. After a short while, she comes to a rise in the path where shadows and the exposed roots of trees herald a bay wood. Inside the wood, the sounds from outside—the sea, the wind—are muted within a few steps. It's quiet but for the gentle rustling of the long bay leaves and the call of a mourning dove sounding the space.
She puts her hand on the trunk of a large tree, its moss soft, the light coming down green and dappled. She walks onto a narrow path bordered by ferns and thick undergrowth with fallen trees just out of sight. As Rowena starts down the path, she hears a faint sound, as of bells, coming towards her. Instinctively, she stops. After a moment she steps to the side. There is a lightning-struck tree immediately to the side of the road with its top blasted away at about 7 feet. For a few moments, due to a quirk of the acoustic situation, the sound stops altogether, and then restarts. Suddenly close, it becomes clear that the bell sound is the surprising sound of a completely silent rider coming steadily forward with a jangle of harness. Right before he draws parallel with her position, he is again eerily silent and invisible, but then suddenly, the rider's head and shoulders appear above her. It's Ezekiel!
We see him in profile. He looks to be in a state of semi-consciousness; his lips are dry and crusted, there are tremendous dark marks under his eyes, which are closed. His chin is folded down against his chest, supported by his massive beard; he looks like a black Byzantine icon. Despite his state, he is attractive in part because he gives the impression of somehow hiding just below his own surface, like a sleeping knight in a romance. She has the urge to call out to him and wake him up. He is passing by rapidly.
Suddenly she notices the distinctive leather satchel at his side. On impulse, she calls out to him using the code phrase she expected to use later that day: "The moon has been in cloud this fortnight." His eyes shoot open, burning, all-seeing. He has dark eyes flecked with green. She feels as if all the beasts of the wood just looked at her, into her, at once. Having summoned this terrible gaze upon her, for a moment she freezes; he freezes a moment too, surprised, processing.
His eyes change, perhaps registering amusement. "I don't steer by the moon, I'm not a ship. I should be alright." She must swallow the embarrassment of the apparent misidentification as he rides on.
We see The Man on his horse from the front. A rumble of thunder is heard and as he rides, he winces and an expression of thought comes over his face. He reaches down to his gunshot wound and holds it as he rides. Once he is out of sight from The Lady, he looks at his bloody hand and down at the wound. He winces again—more concerned this time.
The Lady is alone. She shakes her shoulders, in a characteristic gesture, to release pent-up energy and wryly acknowledge embarrassment, then walks along the path, out the other side of the wood.