Strange Paradise:  Episode 18
Episode 18:  Slideshow
Holly is asleep on the couch in the Great Hall. Jean Paul comes down the steps, seeing Holly he smiles and walks over to her. He takes a blanket and covers her.  "Hi dad, I had a dream and I thought that..." Holly says in her sleep. She awakens and sees Jean Paul kneeling behind the couch. "Mr. Desmond?"  "Yes Holly, what's the matter didn't you like your bed?" Jean Paul asks with a smile.  "You're going to think I'm pretty weird but I guess I just conked out for a while. I thought I was at home waiting for my dad to come." Holly tells him.  "I know. I know the feeling only to well. Sometimes you know when memories haunt dreams, nightmares can follow." Jean Paul stands then walks around the couch to the front. "Now what you need is a good cup of coffee."  "To down the bumpy feeling that comes in the night." Holly says as Jean Paul helps her up.  "Well if we are going to do that the coffee is going to have to be extra hot." Jean Paul says before kissing her hand. 
 
Back on the Mainland Vangie is pouring two cups of coffee. "Good morning Dan." she says as Dan comes into the room.  "It's to early, let's wait and see."  "Have some coffee, maybe it will help." Vangie tells him.  Dan sits down. "Two cups? E.S.P, clairvoyance or witchcraft?"  "Observation. I saw you heading up from the docks."  "Let's hope this coffee is better than usual." Dan says picking up the cup and sipping from it.  "It can't be any worse. Perhaps today will also be an improvement." Vangie says.  "I never realized how short my temper fuse really is. I've toured every dock on this Island and I can't find a single soul who will run me over to Maljardin." Dan tells her.  "To treacherous, to dangerous and to superstitious. The channel trip and the belief in that order." Vangie tells Dan.  "I can't accept that nobody runs that channel except Quito and Jean Paul Desmond."   : Some have tried. And have died." Vangie tells him.  "You're saying there is a jinx of some kind?" Dan asks taking a sip from his coffee.  "There's a fear..."  "That's it, fear not fact. That's what's infuriating." Dan says.  "Combine the two, fact and fear. That channel is a cross between a tide and a tornado. It's full of rocks and other underwater dangers. Actually it hasn't been properly charted. Maybe it's Jean Paul's protection against a world trying to beat a path to his door." Vangie tells Dan.  "A door that seems locked always from the inside. Now, all right that channel is tricky. Why can't some native run it by instinct?"  "It's the instinct that prevents them from even trying. Dan, it's no accident that Island is called Maljardin." Vangie says.  "Yes the old Garden of Evil legends. That goes way back to Jean Paul's ancestors, back almost three hundred years." Dan tells Vangie.  "It's the history of death that keeps being updated." Vangie says.  "Oh come on Vangie, it's to early in the morning for me to buy that."   Vangie lowers her head.  "What is it? Did someone else over there die?" Dan asks.  "Someone controlled by what goes on there. Haven't you heard about my father?" Vangie asks.
 
Back on Maljardin Jean Paul and Holly sit on the couch drinking coffee. "Since my father's death everything has become so complicated." Holly says.  "I know but that was some time ago Holly."   "But not enough time." Holly tells him.  "Yes but enough time to make an adjustment, don't you think?" Jean Paul says.  "That's strange coming from you. You, yourself won't make an adjustment about your wife's death. You think you can give her a chance to make the scene again. You really believe that?"  "I do. Erica will return again." Jean Paul looks at Holly. "I'm sorry that your father wasn't given the same chance to return to you. Well I must be off." Jean Paul stands then carries his coffee cup to a table. Putting it down he tells Holly. "Quito and the boat are waiting. I have to go to the Mainland to pick up some flowers for the service today. You will attend wont you?"  "If Matt Dawson is conducting it, no thank you."  "I'm asking for Erica’s sake. Will you come?" Jean Paul asks looking down at Holly.  "I guess I'm kind of on a swing that pushes me out then pulls me right down again." Holly says.  "Well if your attitude levels off then the swing will stop and you'll be better off for it." Jean Paul tells her.  "Please, don't you play the good padre to. One's enough." Holly says as she stands and walks away." "You've already hung Matt Dawson around my neck." She stops and looks back at Jean Paul.  "Now that wasn't my doing, Doctor Carr asked that he be brought over for the service for her sister." Jean Paul says walking up to Holly.  "And you agreed?"  "Well yes, to ease her mind." Jean Paul says.  "And your conscience?"   "It's no trouble I assure you. What I'm doing for Erica is correct."  "I don't know about ceyronics." Holly says.  "No cryonics." Jean Paul corrects her.  "Cryonics, I sure dig the idea. If you can bring your wife back to life go to it."  "Nothing on earth or in heaven will stop me." Thunder and lightening, rumble and flash. The lights go out. Holly turns to Jean Paul.  "It's alright it's just the generator. It's about as temperamental as the weather." The lights come back on.  "Temperamental? Wow I promised to pose for Tim this morning. I better get going or he'll throw a tantrum." Holly tells Jean Paul, then turns and runs up the staircase.  Jean Paul watches her go.  "Generator indeed, that inanimate I'm not. Now that little thunder and lightening show was to change the subject so that sweet child will prepare to pose for dear Erica's portrait if it's to be finished."   "It will!"  "Unless the artist or his temporary model is finished first. Dear me, it does pose a dilemma Pose, portrait, dilemma. A little play on words. But I assure you I'm not playing games." Jacques says.  "I warn you, even the devil can go too far." Jacques says.  "Warn me, let me warn you to never warn me again or the lights may go out forever. Now where were we? Oh yes you were on the way to the Main Island. Get a move on and don't just bring back flowers." Jacques tells Jean Paul.  "That's all I need!" Jean Paul says angrily.  "How about Dan Forrest? The one loose end that needs to be tied."  "He doesn't work for me!" Jean Paul says angrily.  "I want to be sure he doesn't work against you." Jacques tells him.
 
Back on the Mainland "Forces of evil are at work." Vangie says.  Dan is standing. "Your father and Erica dead. Are you certain about her?"  "The tarot cards do not lie." Vangie tells him.  "You mean these fortune telling cards? I thought you would use something more concrete." Dan says.  "I do. Erica Desmond is dead."  "Based on your bag of E.S.P. tricks. I'm a lawyer, I need substantial facts." Dan tells her.  "Let's start with these. For over a week now, death on that Island has been flashing warnings and signs of more to come."  Dan sits down. "Come on Vangie purely circumstantial."  "Then how do you explain why the minister was taken there? Why Doctor Menkin died? Why Mrs. Desmond's sister Alison Carr never returned and why she wrote a letter asking for help? And why was Holly, the little stowaway kept there? Why was her mother taken there to join her? And why were you fired? Answer one and you answer all."  "A series of unique happenings which will probably clarify themselves." Dan says.  "A convenience of unconvincing conclusions that would be thrown out of court." Vangie says.  "Along with E.S.P." Dan adds.  "Before my father The Conjure Man died he told me."  "You know that little evidence wont stand up before a judge either." Dan says.  "Except the Almighty."  "Do you mean to say that when Alison and I first came down here it already had happened? Dan asks.  "I believe it already had."   "Then why didn't Jean Paul tell us when he saw us here?"  "If it was Jean Paul?" Vangie says to him.  Dan laughs. "Who else could it have been?"  The man who signed your document, Jacques Eloi Des Mondes."  "Why, he's been dead for three hundred years. My office researched it and history proves it." Dan tells her.  "My father feared and I fear, to that he walks again."  "Ghosts, reincarnation are we back to that?" Dan asks.  "Transmutation, perhaps he is trying to possess Jean Paul's body."  "If he does, and mind you I don't for a minute believe it. What happens to Jean Paul?"  "And everyone on Maljardin? That's why they all need help." Vangie lays down a card and points to it. "This way a man of immense wealth and prestige and power in the world. Reverse it." Vangie turns the card upside down. "It becomes the traditional card of ill-omen. The devil himself." She picks up the card. "Jean Paul Desmond or Jacques Eloi Des Mondes."  Dan looks at the card then looks away.
 
On Maljardin Jacques laughs. "Card tricks but fascinating aren't they."
 
Dan looks at Vangie. "All I know is that I'm going over to that Island and get some answers."  "You should be warned though, your mission is a dangerous one." Vangie tells him.  "I've faced that before."  "When you can see your enemies that's one thing."  "Search and destroy, that's a modern technique of warfare."  "Or be destroyed." Vangie says.  "You can't frighten me anymore Vangie, I'm already as frightened as I can get."  "The boat from Maljardin should be over here." Vangie says.  "And I'm going to on it on the return." Dan tells her standing. "I've got to find out what's going on over there." 
 
Back on Maljardin Tim is working on the portrait. Holly is posing in her chair.  "Hey, don't squirm." Tim tells her.  "My neck is killing me." Holly says.  "Some model. I wonder if Whistler had as much trouble with his mother?"  "I wish my mother was on canvas instead of always being on my back."  "Cool it Holly will you."  Matt Dawson walks down the staircase "Capturing all her beauty?" He asks as he walks up to Tim "May I?"  "No you may not, no admittance while under construction."  "All right." Matt says with a smile.  "You have a real talent for butting in where you don't belong." Holly tells him.  "Cool it Holly." Tim tells her.  "Well he just knocked me that's all."  "I didn't intend anything." Matt apologizes to Tim.  "That's not the picture I get Reverend." Holly says. 
 
Back on the Mainland. "And when you get the picture of what's going on over there. Then what?" Vangie asks Dan.  "I'll take whatever steps as necessary." Dan says walking back to Vangie.  "Provided your still on your feet."
 
Back on Maljardin. "Take a walk Reverend. Tim and I have work to do." Holly tells Matt.  "I belong just where I am Holly." Walking over to Holly. "I've decided to conduct the service for Mrs. Desmond after all. I think her husband would appreciate cessation in all our hostility."  "Temporary." Holly says.  "The Reverends right, let's pack it in. Better clean up." Tim says.  "I didn't mean any disrespect." Holly says, then looking at the Reverend she stands. "At least not to Mr. Desmond." Holly leaves and heads upstairs.  Tim looks at the Reverend as he covers up the portrait. "Underneath the pretty blond hair and protective armor she's really a nice kid."  "We don't have any quarrel Tim there is no need to defend her to me. It seems we both know Holly. It's a pity she can't learn to know herself."  Moving the portrait out of the way, Tim asks. "You ever met Erica Desmond?"  "No."  "I really wish I were painting Holly instead of substituting her for a dead woman."  "They say that Mrs. Desmond was very beautiful."   "Oh yes she was a knockout alright. Just like Holly who is a very much alive knockout, isn't she."  "You are the artist." Matt says with a smile.  "You're a man."  "And a minister, and I know my place."  You know it doesn't feel right what I'm doing. It's like going to one of those county fairs. You stick your head through a hole with a painted body beneath it, it all comes out distorted."  "Like death. Here you are painting a portrait of a dead woman and here I am planning to conduct a service for her. Both at the bidding of Erica Desmond's husband, who is positive she will live again." Matt says.  "Strange isn't it."  "Strange enough to make me wonder if what I'm doing is right or wrong."  "You mean conducting the service?"  "I can command a soul to God. I can comfort a bereaved man, but I can also condemn his actions."  "You mean you think what Mr. Desmond is doing may spoil his wife's chance for eternal rest?"  "A welcome to God's heaven, no. No the question is Mr. Desmond himself."  "He doesn't think so. His rent isn't due, like he owns half the world."  "An obsession more powerful than all his little world." Matt says,  "You know enough about cryonics to doubt his faith in it? It's success?"  "I'm only trying to understand it and it's a great strain. It might be to much even for Jean Paul Desmond." Matt says as he and Tim walk out of the room.  Jacques portrait goes blank.
 
Back on the Mainland Jacques takes over Jean Paul's body as he walks into the French Leaf cafe. "Well, well, well Dan Forrest as I live and breath. You look as though you lost your last friend." Jacques says walking up to Dan's table.  "I thought I had. You."  "That was yesterday, today clasp friends in friendship." Jacques says extending his hand.  Dan stands and shakes hands. Jacques lays his left hand over their clasped hands. "Or whatever." Jacques says.  "Jean Paul answer a question. Is Erica dead?"  "Now you know why I wasn't really myself yesterday."  They both sit down.  "Vangie guessed it. I couldn't believe it. Why didn't you tell me?"  "Well I just can't dispense sorrow and gloom all the time. Isn't there anyone to decant a little cheer me up?"  "They aren't open yet. Anyway for a man so recently bereaved, you seem almost to cheerful."  "Purely a pseudo. Inside I assure you I'm in proper mourning."  "Knowing how much you loved Erica, I can appreciate your courage."  "Well it was either that or letting myself go to the devil."  "You have to much at stake, to much ahead of you." Dan says.  "That's what enables me to go on, and on, and on."  "It must have been very sudden?"  "What?" Jacques asks.  "Erica's death."  "Oh yes, it was a terrible shock to all of us. Me especially."  "I still can't believe it."  "I know sometimes I have to pinch myself to make sure it's not just a hellish dream."  "I can understand that."  "Can you really?" Jacques says with a smile.  "Well Erica wasn't my wife but I think I can imagine how I would react."  "Well, sometimes it's beyond the wildest imagination some of the things I've been through and what lies ahead of me."  "Well all our futures are unknown, except perhaps to Vangie Abbott."  "Yes but if one of her cards or all of her cards should tear or burn she would be just as much in the dark."  "Provided one believes in witchcraft for beginners."  "Don't you?" Jacques asks.  "Do you? Dan asks back.  "Well for years I've doubted it."  "You mean you don't anymore?"  "After what's happened to me, I can't gamble on doubting anything."  "No it hasn't been easy for you has it? Even with all that you've got, because you no longer have Erica."  "I will have her again." Jacques says.  "Vangie thinks something funny is going on at that Island of yours."  "Funny? I assure you no one is laughing." Jacques says.  "Well I was ready to break down the wall to get over there to see just what is happening."  "Why bruise yourself, be my guest."   "Exactly what I've been waiting for. It'll be my pleasure." Dan says.  "Believe me the pleasure will be all mine. Well, I came for some flowers for a little service for Erica. Why don't you pick up your bags and meet me at the dock." Jacques tells him.  They both stand. "I will, thank you." Dan tells him then walks away.  Jacques takes a couple of steps; he knows Vangie is coming up behind him. "Did you hear it all Vangie?" With a smile he asks, with his back to her.  "Enough to make me wonder if I should contact the newspapers. Let find out really the kind of man you are."  Jacques no longer smiling nods his head, turning towards her he says. "You wouldn't do that, because you are afraid of my power."  "In this world or the next?"  "Next world? What are you talking about?" he says with a laugh. "You have been playing cards to much, it's dulling your senses."  "My father is dead. I am now the Conjure Woman. My senses are greater than ever. There is evil roaming on Maljardin. It must be destroyed."  "Vangie, you and your witchcraft. It will be the death of me yet." he says grinning.  "I'm after the devil."  Jacques with a serious look, nods. "And he's after you." He turns and walks away.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Summaries written by Debby Graham .  The slide presentation is the work of Ron Janick.
~Ron/Bella~
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Episode 19