Act IV(int. Police Dept. Maddie and David come walking into the lobby.)
David: “It’s a good this we let ‘em stamp our hands the last time we left. Done a lot with this place since the last time I was here.”
Ms. Kendall: (off camera) “Oh, Mr. Addison. Ms. Hayes.” (they meet) “I uh, I feel ashamed.”
Maddie: “Why’d you do it, Ms. Kendall? Why’d you confess to a murder you didn’t commit? To protect Robert?”
(She nods)
(cut to: Police department interrogation room. Robert Murphy sitting at the table with David.)
David: “I have a small confession to make. I never have danced with a guy. Although, that is to say that I wouldn’t some other time. If the guy was interested, and he let me lead….My name’s David Addison. I’m a detective. Ya wanna tell me about it?”
Murphy: “So um, Kendall calls me at the bar…you were there. And he says to me if I marry his daughter she gets dropped-kicked from the will. Not that I didn’t see that coming. But he tells me that he’s called his lawyer. Got him working on the paperwork. So I go over there. Try to talk him out of it – like I got a chance in hell, right.”
David: “And?”
Murphy: “And um, we argue. I hit him. He falls-knocked unconscious. Ah….turn on the gas. Bang.”
David: “That’s it?”
Murphy: “That’s it.”
David: “No ‘why’.”
Murphy: “You want a ‘why’? Do you have any idea how much she’s worth.”
David: “What about love?”
Murphy: “What about it.”
David: “Lots of hearts and flowers in our last conversation. You do love her, don’t ya?”
Murphy: “Love her? Love what she’s worth.”
(cut to: David and Maddie driving in the car. David is driving. Maddie, however, has chosen to ride in the backseat.)
David: “I resent this.”
Maddie: “Don’t resent it. There’s nothing to resent. It’s just a good, intelligent way to make sure nothing…transpires.”
David: “Yeah. Right.Transpire this.” (steps on the gas for a moment) “I’m sorry, I, I didn’t mean to say that. Rewind. Forget the last minute of your life. Look, if it makes you feel more comfortable to ride in the back seat. By all means, stay in the back seat. I’m ju’…It’s late, that’s all. I haven’t had much sleep the past couple nights. I’m sorry.”
Maddie: “You’re forgiven….Love doesn’t count for much in the world, does it?”
David: “Oh, I don’t want to talk about this now.”
Maddie: “I’m not talking about us. I’m talking about them. Margaret and Robert. Loved each other. Wanted each other. Should have been to have a life with each other.”
David: “How do you know they loved each other? Maybe they do, and maybe they don’t.”
Maddie: “They said it. You just said they said it. Not ten minutes ago, you walked out the interrogation room, looked Margaret in the eye and said…”
David: “He told me to tell you he loves you very much. Yes, I said that. Did I ever mention to you when I was in high school, I was in the senior play. I played Emily in Our Town.”
Maddie: “Emily? That’s a girl’s part.”
David: “Yeah, it was a hell of a challenge. All boys school. We had a motto in the theatre department: ‘When the going gets tough, the tough shave their legs’.”
Maddie: “Is there a point to all this?”
David: “I’m a hell of an actor, Maddie.”
Maddie: “You mean you lied to Margaret? You told her he loved her, and he didn’t say any such things did he? Why would you lie to her? Why you make her carry a torch for a man who’s going to spend the rest of his life on death row?”
David: “I didn’t lie to her, Maddie.”
Maddie: “But you told her Robert Murphy loved her.”
David: “Exactamundo.”
Maddie: “And you just admitted to me that he told you he didn’t.”
David: “Yeah, a great big Double Whopper with cheese. Huh, Maddie?”
Maddie: “David.”
David: “Best lie I heard since I’ll sleep with you but I won’t touch with you.”
Maddie: “David.”
David: “His lie, Maddie. His lie, ok. When I walked into that bar today he told me her loved her. I heard it. I felt it. And I believed it. Regardless of what he said down at the station house.”
Maddie: “And you have a theory to explain why he’s lying now.”
David: “Look, I don’t know. Maybe Margaret did bake the old man. Maybe Robert did it. Maybe it was just an accident. I don’t know. The one thing I do know is, that guy loves that girl. There’s no denying that. And nothing. No rule about the way life oughta be. No pact. Not the Warsaw Pact, not a whale-pact of pacts is gonna make any difference, or make that otherwise. Which is why we’re going back to the Kendall joint.”
(cut to: int. Kendall home. Charred remains of the living room strewn around.)
Maddie: “Hmmm. My goodness.”
David: “My favorite style. Well done. Look at this. (tosses a lamp shade) Me without my sac cloth.”
Maddie: “This is awful. David, why are we here? What are we looking for?”
Mr. Kendall: (off camera) “Perhaps I can help.”
Maddie: David, it’s...” (Mr. Kendall emerges from the dark and lights a cigarette.)
David: “…the late Mr. Kendall, I presume. So what’s the story? Check for the coffin bounce? Or was this one booked round-trip from the start?”
Mr. Kendall: “I hope you’ll excuse the mess.”
David: “Us? Don’t give it a thought. We’re casual people ourselves. Just have one question though. And don’t get me wrong. But aren’t you supposed to be dead?”
Mr. Kendall: “Quite dead.”
David: “Ya hear that, Maddie. ‘Quite dead’. People say we don’t have good plots. So dead, uh?Ya probably got a lot of time on your hands. Mind if we ask you a few questions. (tosses a burned chair over to Mr. Kendall, and it smashes on the floor) “Have a seat. Let me hold your halo.”
Mr. Kendall: “No halo, Mr. Addison. Quite the contrary.”
Maddie: “I don’t understand, Mr. Kendall.”
Mr. Kendall: “Three months ago, my doctor told me, I had six months to live. It seems that it’s true what they say about smoking. I told no one. Two months ago, Margaret met this Mr. Murphy. As her love for him blossomed, my distrust of his intentions grew proportionately. Yet, nothing I would say or do would convince her to let him go. So knowing I was dying anyway, I planned my own murder. I called Mr. Murphy at the salon he’s employed by, asked him to come over. Told him we needed to talk. And he came. We fought – loudly – for the neighbors. And then he left. And I turned on the gas, and blew up this room. My intent, of course, was to pin my murder on him and get him out of my daughter’s life. I even initiated a change in my will so there would appear to be a motive.”
David: “What about the body? There was body here.”
Mr. Kendall: “I own thirteen hospitals, Mr. Addison. I found what I needed.”
Maddie: “But Mr. Kendall, don’t you see what you’ve done? Both your daughter and Robert Murphy are taking the blame for a murder neither one committed.”
Mr. Kendall: “Have you even seen a love so eloquently. Each thought the other guilty. And each stepped forward to spare the other’s life. I guess that makes me a damn fool. Ms. Hayes. Mr. Addison. It’s disconcerting, for a man to realize that, uh, his death was his greatest failure. So little opportunity to rectify it, but I got to try. I can’t face my daughter now. I couldn’t bear to feel the hate she’d surely have for me if she’d known. I think I’m better off dead. I’ve written a note. A suicide note, explaining simply that I couldn’t live with the pain of my illness. Now what I ask, is that you take it to the police. Use it to free Mr. Murphy so that he and my daughter might have the chance at happiness they deserve.”
(cut to: Lobby of police station. Margaret and Robert are kissing passionately at the desk. An officer is trying to get his attention.)
Officer: “I need a signature, pal.” (Robert reaches over and scribbles his name while they’re still kissing. Camera dollies over the Maddie and David.)
David: “Boy meets girl. Boy won’t take know for an answer. Boy gets girl.”
Maddie: “No matter how wrong they seemed for each other.”
(cut to: David and Maddie once again driving in the car. David driving.)
David: “Yes siree bob, when you’re right, you’re right”.
Maddie: “Me? Right? About what?”
David: “Love. Sex. The pact. Us.”
Maddie: “I was? I am? I are?”
David: “You is. And you know what I got. Back there in that police station. Watching those two kids. I think it’s really ok that those two kids ride off into the sunset together. Spend the rest of their lives warm and cozy in some little breakfast nook. It’s better than ok, it’s right. But you and me, we’re different.”
Maddie: “Oh yeah. How’s that?”
David: “Well, we’re two sides of the same coin. We eat sexual tension for breakfast.”
Maddie: “Thrive on sly repartee, double entendra.”
David: “Bawdy innuendo. You take away that, you know what happens?”
Maddie: “They move us to Sunday night.”
David: “Seven thirty….Yeah, we let animal magnetism get the best of us who knows what’s gonna happen.”
Maddie: “It’d be terrible. It’d be wrong.”
David: “I’d be worse than wrong. It’s be ‘tellicide’.”
Maddie: “Well, I want you to know. I’m really glad you finally came around. In fact, I’m excited, I’m elated, I’m grateful.
David: “Don’t be grateful. I’m not doing this for you. I’m doing it for me, too. Having this other agenda with you had me wound tighter than a watch spring. Not having it, if I get any more relaxed I won’t have a pulse. There’s just one thing though.”
Maddie: “What’s that?” (David immediately pulls the car over at the top of a hill-screeching the tires. And turns towards her.)
David: “Now, don’t take this the wrong way, but there is one teensy, tinsy, nitpicky question mark gnawing at the base of my noggin.”
Maddie: “What’s that?”
David: “Well, the past few days have been quite a clam bake. And I really didn’t exactly come dressed for the party. If everything…?”
Maddie: “Oh! That! Is it…Oh, you mean is it safe. (he nods) “Absolutely.”
David: “You sure?”
Maddie: “Of course, I’m sure. David, I’m a grown woman. I take responsibility for my body, and what I do with my body. That’s something I don’t take chances with.”
David: “Good, that’s good. You don’t mind me asking.”
Maddie: “No, I don’t mind at all. It’s a good question. It’s an important. A little irrelevant knowing what we know and feeling what we feel.”
David: “Yeah, right.”
Maddie: “Although, I will say that I’m glad what happened happened. I’m also glad it’s not going to happen anymore, but I am glad it happened. I mean it was pleasurable. And I do think it’ll deepen our friendship, know what I mean?”
David: “Yeah. But…Yeah. I mean…no. It was pleasurable for me too. Umm. Very pleasurable as a matter of fact. Especially now that I know that you do what you do. Did what you did.”
Maddie: “No, I do. I did.”
David: “Yeah….Kinda makes me wonder, how much more pleasurable it would’ve been, had I known that you do what you do, when we did what we did, you know.”
Maddie: “I guess we’ll never know.”
David: “Guess you’re right…Although…it does kinda make ya wonder how much better still our friendship would be, umm…if we did do, what we did, knowing that you do what you do, or did what you did, doesn’t it?”
(Maddie gives him a smoldering smile, and leans over to kiss him. They smile at each other and recline their seats. Sounds of them kissing and trying to move around in the car.)
Maddie: “David….David, this is really uncomfortable.”
David: “Here, let me get this out of your way.” (We hear him release the emergency brake. The BMW starts to roll backward down the hill away from sight. David and Maddie are in the throws of passion.)
David: “So let me get this straight. It’s absolutely….”
Maddie: “….safe? Absolutely….it’s absolutely…safe.”
David: “Oh….”
(We hear the car roll down the hill and hit a car, car horns going off. A woman screams. A man says “Look out! I’m hit!”)
THE END 
;D
;D