August 12th, 2017

FADE IN:
INT. MARGARET’S COUNTRY ESTATE - AUTUMN DAY
PARLOR
THE FIRST PAGES OF MY SCREENPLAY, TO BE FREE:

In contrast to the elegant environment, HARRIET JACOBS, 18, mulatto, in a laced dress, struggles to get out of the arms of Dr. JAMES Norcom, 60s, a white doctor and landowner in gentleman’s clothing. 
HARRIET
Get your hands off of me. I’m free. Miss Margaret freed me. 
NORCOM
No, she didn’t.
HARRIET
That’s a lie. You changed her will.
He smacks her so hard she falls onto the floor. He swallows his rage, holds his hand out to her. 
NORCOM 
Do like I tell my patients. Set your mind on what you know you must do, and your body will follow.
She refuses to take his hand. He continues to speak somewhat gently. 
NORCOM (cont’d)
You’ll have servants all to yourself.
HARRIET
Slaves! All I want to do with slaves is see them all freed.

She scoots on her bottom to get away from him. He lunges toward her, throws his body on top of hers.
He pulls up her skirts. She rolls away from him. He grabs her by the arm; jerks her up from off the floor. 
HARRIET (cont’d)
I’m pregnant.
NORCOM
Liar!
She moves far enough away from him so that he can’t hit her.
NORCOM (cont’d)
Too many patrollers watchin’ this house, and that black boy’s the whole time I was gone.
HARRIET
That man you refer to is freed. I quit seeing him a long time ago. He’s not the father.  
NORCOM
Who is?
HARRIET
It’s not lawful to say.
He approaches her, his hands ready to choke her.
NORCOM
Pull up your skirts. Let me feel if you’re pregnant or not.
He’s about to grab her. She kicks him in the balls. He doubles over in pain. She races toward the door, and then out it.
EXT. MARGARET’S COUNTRY ESTATE
Harriet races down A DIRT ROAD. 
Still in pain, Norcom exits the door, of this two-story cottage-style estate with hardwood veranda and ornate balustrades. He heads toward FOUR PATROLLERS bivouacked across the road. They look in Harriet’s direction, understand what they have to do; hurry toward Norcom, with a horse he mounts as best he can.
EXT. WOODS - DAY
Harriet streaks through the woods. She jerks to a stop as her lace dress catches on a branch, and rips herself free
She hears horses' hooves thundering down the dirt road in pursuit.
EXT. DIRT ROAD - DAY 
Norcom sits as best he can upright on his horse, takes in deep breaths to alleviate the pain he feels in his genitals. 
He and the patrollers reach the spot where Harriet disappeared into the Woods. They dismount. 
RUFUS 30s, ruddy-complected, flaming red hair and a temper to match, a cap and ball pistol smartly stuck in his belt, gruffness in his voice and stance that declare he’s in charge of the other three Patrollers.  
RUFUS 
Shoot her in the leg. 
(nods toward Dr. Norcom)
Dr. Norcom wants her alive.
Norcom nods his agreement. He sees on the branch the snagged piece of lace; holds it up.
NORCOM
Fan out. See if she’s left more of this. Don’t miss a single tree. You’re all accountable. Don’t let this prissy slave be the first to escape Edenton.
Rufus signals that the Patrollers fan out, which they do. They smack their lips. Can already taste their captive. 
Alone, Norcom fondles the lace as if he’s fondling Harriet.
EXT. WOODS - CONTINUOUS
Harriet ducks into a stand of thick cypress trees.
Rufus stomps through the woods as if he owns them; spots the stand of cypress. He thrashes in.
STAND OF CYPRESS
He looks around. Doesn’t see Harriet. 
HARRIET ON A HIGH BRANCH
She elongates her body, wrapped in leaves, her limbs at one with them. She sighs relief as Rufus leaves.  
HARRIET (V.O.)
I was such a happy child, till I was six. That was when I learned... 
CLOSE ON Harriet. 
HARRIET (V.O.) (cont’d)
... I was a slave.
Harriet looks out, through the trees, sees a few miles away a long, narrow WHARF, longboats tied up alongside it. A STEAMER is moored on Edenton Bay. Another steamer steams from the sound into the bay.
MATCH FADE TO:
FLASHBACK - EXT. WHARF, 1823 - DAY 
The same vantage of the Wharf. A SAILING SHIP, its sails unfurled, awaits in the bay.
CLOSE ON 6-YEAR-OLD HARRIET 
She races to the edge of the wharf, where there are sacks of grain in a pile. Rufus, 20s, already in charge, straw bosses PATROLLERS that jab oars into the sacks, checking for stowaways before the sacks are slung onto the longboat.  
A man grabs Harriet. He’s Peter, nicknamed SAILOR PETE, 40s, golden brown mulatto, in sailor garb and tarpaulin hat that he seems to have been born wearing. He picks up Harriet; carries her toward WATER STREET where the wharf ends.
A PATROLLER sees movement in one of the sacks. He jabs it extra hard. A YOUNG MAN’S VOICE cries out in pain. 
Rufus rips open the sack with a long sharp knife. He pulls out a YOUNG BLACK MAN, about 15. He’s bleeding. Rufus’s knife has slashed him.  
Sailor Pete stops Harriet as best he can from looking back at the scene as he races with her in his arms off the wharf. 
A Patroller puts the Stowaway, bleeding profusely, in chains, throws him over a horse.
EXT. SLAVE GRAVEYARD, EDENTON - DAY 
Sailor Pete delivers Harriet to the MOURNERS lined up in front of a grave. A weathered but dignified PREACHER MAN (50s) leads a group of men and women in even more threadbare clothes in song. 
One by one they throw dirt onto the wooden coffin in the open grave. A thick wooden cross at its head bears the name DELILAH carved into it. 
A 10-YEAR-OLD BOY, MICHAEL MURRAY, approaches Harriet just as she stands in front of the grave. With wide, sad eyes, he presents a bouquet of wild flowers to her.
She smiles through tears, throws the flowers instead of dirt onto the coffin below.
MARGARET HORNIBLOW, late 30s, a comely but sickly, porcelain-skinned and fashionably dressed White woman leans on Dr. Norcom, 50s, for help as she walks toward Harriet. 
Margaret wraps her shawl tightly around her torso to ease her chills; buries her frequent coughs in a laced handkerchief. She holds her hand out to Harriet. Harriet doesn’t take it.  
6-YEAR-OLD HARRIET
Mama warn’t no slave, I ain’t none neither.
NORCOM
Take yo’ mistress’s hand. Yo’ mama’s mistress’s hand. Now!
Harriet doesn’t follow his order. Margaret takes away her hand. Norcom grabs her hand, extends it toward Harriet.
NORCOM (cont’d)
You want to work in my cornfields in the hot sun, or serve Miss Mary at my home in town, she beats slaves, or serve this fine lady in her fine home in the countryside?
Finally Harriet very reluctantly puts her hand in Margaret’s.
END FLASHBACKS
EXT. STAND OF CYPRESS - DAY
Harriet on the high branch, hears Rufus and the Patrollers shouting.
RUFUS AND PATROLLERS
Harriet, Harriet, Miss Prissy, Minx, you hear us? C’mon out, show yo’self. 
Harriet hears GUN SHOTS. 
RUFUS
Show yo’self ‘n we won’t shoot. When we find you, we gonna shoot you in the arse!
Harriet hears their VOICES GET SOFTER, THE GUN SHOTS FURTHER AWAY. With stealth she climbs down the tree; heads off in a specific direction, hiding behind tree after tree.  
Harriet almost reaches the shore of Edenton Bay, visible through the trees. She heads toward the bay, hears PATROLLERS IN THE NEAR DISTANCE, races back into the woods, ducks behind a cypress; climbs up it.
Rufus and a few of the Patrollers stomp along the shore, look out. An especially vigilant Patroller points toward the left, at a marshy area with the tops of cypress as its canopy.
VIGILANT PATROLLER
She could’a done swam to Snaky Swamp.
RUFUS
Nah! She ain’t no suicide type.
VIGILANT PATROLLER
How ‘bout a few of us put on high boots ‘n go lookin.’
RUFUS
She more likely go to Molly’s. Tha’s where we gonna go.
They leave. Harriet listens until their march through the underbrush is far enough away for her to shimmy down the tree, and go to the shore.
She looks toward Snaky Swamp, then looks to the right, at the wharf a few miles away. She undresses down to her lacy underwear. Tied around her waist is a leather pouch. She secures it tighter.
She puts her fancy clothes in a bundle, looks around for a place to hide it. Finally rapidly digs a hole deep into the dirt near a tree; crams her clothes into it; covers it with dirt and brush.
She looks toward a cypress tree that grows out of the water near the wharf. She enters the bay; walks out to deep water; dives down.
EXT. UNDERWATER - DAY
Harriet swims as deep underwater as she can. She needs to come up for air but sees she hasn’t yet reached the cypress.   She struggles not to breathe.  
CLOSE on Harriet’s face. Her nostrils flare. She considers breathing the water in, ending her life. Finally she swims upward, just high enough for her nostrils to be out of water. She looks up at the sparkling blue sky.
FLASHBACK EXT. MARGARET’S COUNTRY ESTATE - DAY
Under a blue sky, filled with cumulous clouds, A 17-YEAR-OLD HARRIET jerks higher and higher a swing that hangs from an oak tree in view of Margaret’s house.
NORCOM’S HANDS ON HERS     
NORCOM
Always this infernal swing.
He pulls her body on the swing close to his.
Harriet pushes him away, jumps off the swing, runs as fast as she can toward the trellis filled with rose bushes; hides behind a particularly thorny bush. 
Norcom takes out a knife, whacks the ropes on the swing, tears the swing down. He throws it to a nearby handyman, called HANDY, 50s.
NORCOM (cont’d)
Handy! Chop this into little pieces.
END FLASHBACK
EXT. EDENTON BAY, UNDERWATER - DAY
Harriet grabs the roots of the cypress, pulls herself up to a branch above water; gasps for air. Sees the Wharf about 80 yards away.  
A PATROLLER is at the edge of the Wharf, looking out. She sinks deep into the water,
EXT. UNDER THE WHARF - DAY
Harriet puts her hand over her mouth to keep her gasps silent. She swims to one of the thick cypress posts that hold up the planks of the Wharf.
Harriet shudders at the sound of JABBING she knows all too well. 
EXT. WHARF - DAY
A PATROLLER, with all of his might, jabs with an oar every part of each sack piled up on the wharf. Once he determines it’s all clear of stowaways, he orders A BLACK SAILOR to load that sack onto a longboat tied to the wharf.
UNDER THE WHARF - DAY
Harriet shivers as much from the JABBING SOUND as she does from the near unbearable cold.
Harriet hangs on the post with all the strength she can muster. She looks out, sees glimmers of the red glow of early sunset.
HARRIET
(mutters under her breath)
Please, Sun, go down. Please, Moon, give me enough light.