DANIEL:
I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t. No rats, no leaky roof dripping on me, no late night interrogations. . .this is one night’s sleep I am really going to enjoy!
MUSIC:
EPISODE SCORE MARKING PASSAGE OF TIME.
NARRATOR:
Sleep comes easily for Daniel, as well it should. With the welcome fragrance of clover gently wafting in through his open window, he drifts off shortly after his head hits the pillow. But his slumber is short-lived.
SOUND:
DANIEL’S ROOM LATE AT NIGHT. WE HEAR ONLY THE CRICKETS THROUGH THE WINDOW. SUDDENLY, IN THE DISTANCE WE HEAR A MAN SCREAM. HE IS CLEARLY IN TORMENT.
DANIEL:
(waking up) Wha. . .? What was that? What time is it? (a beat) Three AM.
SOUND:
THE MAN SCREAMING AGAIN, THIS TIME EVEN MORE AGONIZED. THE BED CREAKING AS DANIEL SITS UP.
DANIEL (cont’d):
Who is it? What’s going on?
SOUND:
THE MAN SCREAMING.
HANGMAN:
(off in the distance, with a Vietnamese accent, very angry) You tell us now?
DANIEL:
It. . .it can’t be!
HANGMAN:
(off) You tired, no? You tell me, I let you go nighty-night.
DANIEL:
How could he be here? Come on, Daniel. . .you’re not in ’Nam anymore. You’re back in Clover Ridge - and Charlie isn’t in Iowa. (pause) It was obviously a nightmare. (sighs as he settles back into his pillow)
SOUND:
JUST THE CRICKETS, THEN. . .THE MAN SCREAMING.
HANGMAN:
(off) I can do this all night! I not sleepy!
DANIEL:
Sounds like he’s right in the field behind the house. I must be losing my mind. I’ve got to get it together. . .
SOUND:
THE MAN SCREAMING. IT IS A SUSTAINED, AGONIZING SCREAM. . .THE SOUND OF A MAN AT THE END OF HIS ROPE.
HANGMAN:
(off) You no talk, you die. We have deal now?
SOUND:
SHEETS RUSTLING, BED CREAKING, AND BARE FEET PADDING ACROSS FLOOR, UNDER.
NARRATOR:
Frightened, yet mesmerized, Daniel gets out of bed and heads toward the sound. Before long, he finds himself walking through the clover behind his house.
SOUND:
DANIEL WALKING THROUGH CLOVER OUTSIDE.
DANIEL:
This is ridiculous. . .It’s the middle of the night and I’m walking through a field in Iowa looking for Viet Cong.
SOUND:
HIS WALKING STOPS.
DANIEL (cont’d):
I don’t even hear anything anymore. I’m going back to the house before I. . .
SOUND:
MAN SCREAMING, MUCH CLOSER NOW.
HANGMAN:
(off) You no like how that feel? Okay – I give you one more chance!
DANIEL:
It’s coming from the edge of Jud Parker’s cornfield!
SOUND:
DANIEL WALKING AGAIN, UNDER.
HANGMAN:
(off) You tell me what I want to know!
SOLDIER:
(off, in agony) I don’t know what you’re talking about!
HANGMAN:
(off, but closer) I losing patience!
SOUND:
DANIEL STOPS.
DANIEL:
(a whisper. . .astonishment, terror) Oh my god!
HANGMAN:
(no longer off) You no talk, you pay consequences!
SOLDIER:
But there’s nothing to tell you!
HANGMAN:
We going in circles. I tired of you.
DANIEL:
It’s The Hangman! How could he be here?
HANGMAN:
My patience gone. (an order) Guard. . . pull him up higher!
SOLDIER:
No!
SOUND:
THE SQUEAL OF A PULLEY.
SOLDIER (cont’d):
Please! Stop!
SOUND:
MAN SCREAMS IN AGONY AND TERROR AS WE HEAR THE PULLEY STRAIN WITH HIS WEIGHT.
SOUND (cont’d):
THEN. . .SLOWLY, AGONIZINGLY. . .THERE IS THE HORRIBLE CRACKING OF BONES DISLOCATING AND BREAKING.
DANIEL:
(a panicked whisper) No! This can’t be happening, not here!
SOUND:
DANIEL RUNNING BACK TO THE HOUSE THROUGH THE BRUSH, UNDER.
NARRATOR:
Daniel runs back to the house in a panic, tormented by what he has just seen: a Viet Cong officer torturing an American soldier. It is a sight he knows all too well. But how could he be seeing it here. . .in the field behind his serene Iowa home?
SOUND:
DANIEL RUNS INTO THE KITCHEN, LETTING THE DOOR SLAM BEHIND HIM.
DANIEL:
I can’t let him get me! He can’t know I’m here!
PA:
(off) What’s going on?
DANIEL:
Pa! He’s here! He’s followed me home somehow!
PA:
Okay now, just settle down, son. You’ve had some kind of nightmare.
DANIEL:
I’ll never be rid of him, Pa, never.
PA:
Just sit down and take a few deep breaths.
SOUND:
CHAIR SCRAPING ON FLOOR, UNDER.
PA (cont’d):
You know, when I came back from Germany I had a lot of nightmares. You just got home yesterday. . .you have to give yourself time. Trust me, the nightmares will go away.
DANIEL:
(calmer now, but still upset) But this was real. It was. . .it was one of my cellmates. . .he was being tortured. But Pa, worst of all. . .He was there.
PA:
Who was there, Daniel?
DANIEL:
(a beat) You know how I told you I got moved around to two or three POW camps while I was in country?
PA:
I remember.
DANIEL:
Well, in the last camp there was a Viet Cong officer who ran the place. He was a sadist. . .you could tell he wasn’t just following orders. . .he loved to torture American soldiers. He knew all the tricks: nightly beatings, sleep
DANIEL (cont’d):
deprivation - and a few other. . .nastier things. He would torture guys right in their cells, so their roommates could see it. . .even guys who didn’t get physically tortured were traumatized by what they’d witnessed. I finally decided if that was the game he wanted to play, then I wouldn’t let him inside my head. So I started thinking about home. I’d fantasize that I was in my bedroom. . .I’d mentally put together one of my model airplanes, or lay out my baseball cards on my bed and recite the stats for each player.
PA:
Sounds like you found a good way to ride out the storm. But you said he did other. . .nastier things.
DANIEL:
When I first got to the camp, I had two cellmates. One was a marine named Keith Molloy. You’d have liked Keith, Pa. He had a good sense of humor despite the circumstances. My other cellmate was a Vietnamese prisoner named Lai Kim. He was captured and accused of being a
DANIEL (cont’d):
spy. . .even though he wasn’t. One night, The Hangman came in with his guards and started interrogating Kim.
PA:
The Hangman?
DANIEL:
That’s what we called the Viet Cong officer.
PA:
I’m afraid to ask, but why?
MUSIC:
OMINOUS, UNDER.
DANIEL:
(grimly) Because of what he used to do to prisoners. . .because of what he did to Kim that night. The Hangman had a rope and pulley mechanism he’d bring to the cell when he wanted to torture a prisoner. His guards would attach this pulley setup to a beam in the ceiling with both ends of a rope hanging
