Remembrance Photo: The Screenplay

PARTMENT - DAY

  Richard and the police officers stand behind the super as he unlocks the door.

  INT. CHAN'S BEDROOM - DAY

  The officers look around. Everything's neat, orderly. The whiskey bottle, half empty, sits on the nightstand. Chan's not there.

  EXT. STREET, FRENCH QUARTER - DAY

  Richard returns to the taxi, climbs in. The taxi pulls away.

  EXT. PARK, MARIN COUNTY - DAY

  TITLE: SIX MONTHS LATER

  Steven Haggerty plays baseball with his FRIENDS. The sun drops below the horizon.

  STEVEN

  Hey, Kevin! What time is it?

  KEVIN

  7:30.

  STEVEN

  I gotta go.

  Steven grabs his bat and glove, sprints off the field. He pulls his bicycle out of a rack. The back wheel's flat.

  Steven walks the bike down a deserted dirt path. He hears the sound of CRACKLING LEAVES behind him. He turns.

  INT. RICHARD'S LAW OFFICE - NIGHT

  Richard's at his desk. The PHONE rings.

  EXT. HAGGERTY HOME - NIGHT

  Richard parks in the driveway behind two police cruisers. Steven's bike leans against the garage door.

  INT. LIVING ROOM, HAGGERTY HOME - NIGHT

  Richard's talking with a SHERIFF'S DEPUTY.

  DEPUTY

  His tire was flat. He probably went to find another one.

  RICHARD

  Four hours to find a tire?

  DEPUTY

  Four hours missing is actually not that long, sir.

  RICHARD

  (angrily)

  You don't have children, do you?

  DEPUTY

  He could be at a friend's house. He's ten years old. Sometimes kids just forget to call. I'm just saying it's too early to panic.

  INT. LAW OFFICES - DAY

  COLLEAGUES look on with concern as Richard walks down the hallway and into his office. Richard's SECRETARY follows him in.

  RICHARD'S OFFICE

  SECRETARY

  Any news?

  Richard shakes his head.

  SECRETARY

  We all just want you to know, if there's anything we can do --

  RICHARD

  Could you shut the door?

  The secretary exits. Richard collapses into his chair. A large stack of mail sits on the desk in front of him. He sorts through it. Near the bottom of the pile, a manila envelope with a New Orleans postmark. Above Richard's address, typed neatly in capitals: "PERSONAL". No return address.

  Richard opens the envelope, dumps out the contents: a mixture of old photographs and pages torn from "The Crescant City Murders." He flips through them slowly.

  INSERT - PHOTOS

  -- The murder victims;

  -- A paddlewheel steamer;

  -- A large grey stone church;

  -- An Antebellum mansion;

  -- A New Orleans cemetary;

  -- The photo of Shirley Wells and Chandra on the courthouse steps.

  BACK TO SCENE

  Richard turns to the next page: the torn out epigraph from "The Crescant City Murders."

  INSERT - EPIGRAPH

  "The fathers shall not be put to death for the children, neither shall the children be put to death for the fathers: every man shall be put to death for his own sin. (Deut. 24:16)"

  BACK TO SCENE

  Richard turns to the last item in the envelope:

  -- a sepia-toned photograph virtually identical to the remembrance portrait in the Cabildo, except --

  The boy in the photo is Steven.

  INT. AIRLINER - DAY

  Richard's anxious in First Class, his briefcase pressed into his lap.

  EXT. CHAN'S APARTMENT BUILDING, FRENCH QUARTER - DAY

  It's blisteringly hot, oppressively humid. Inside the courtyard, the SUPER waters his garden. Richard tears open the iron gate, flies past the super and up the stairs.

  SUPER

  Hey, pal! What you doin'?

  The super follows Richard up.

  AT CHAN'S A