"(BEEPING)" "(KNOCK ON DOOR)" "Come in." "Am I interrupting?" "Well, I was sort of on a roll, but go ahead." "There's a maple syrup man out front." "A what?" "That's what he says." "Hi, I'm Andy, your local White Mountain Maple Syrup man." "Hi." "I'm Dick Loudon." "This is my wife Joanna." "Well, I just thought I'd stop by and see about getting you folks on my route." "You see, I deliver maple syrup to all the inns around here." "So how much do you folks need?" "Well, I guess one would probably do it." "Right." "One gross." "No." "One jug." "We don't sell by the jug." "We don't need a gross." "We don't need a jug." "Dick, Dick, Dick." "Let me explain something to you." "This is Vermont." "I'm with you so far." "You see, people come here from all over the country, all over the world, and they don't leave without picking up some maple syrup." "You see, it's a tradition." "Be like going to the beach, not picking up a shell." "Going to the moon, not picking up a rock." "Going to the..." "That's all right." "I think I see where you're going." "Honey, maybe we could give them to our guests as mementos of their visit." "Or better yet, you sell it to them." "I mean, this stuff goes like hot cakes." "Or on them." "Don't laugh, it's an old joke." "You make it hard." "So what do you say, Dick?" "Well, if that's the only way you sell them, put us down for a gross." "Great!" "I'll be right back with your order." "You think I was had?" "Why?" "Because you bought 144 jugs of syrup?" "I guess not." "Hi, guys." "I came over to see if your heat's working." "It's working fine." "Mine's out at the cafe." "I just wanted to see if it's out all over the block." "You mean like a heat-out?" "Yeah." "Any chance George could take a look at it?" "Well, he would, but he's getting ready for the health and safety inspector." "There's going to be an inspector in the area?" "Tomorrow." "We are all in trouble." "Don't start, Kirk." "Dick, these inspectors are brutal." "They live to close down places like ours." "Dick, he could have a point." "Joanna, you can't believe anything this man says." "What are you talking about?" "You said yourself, you're an habitual liar." "And you believed that?" "Joanna, if there was anything to worry about," "I mean, don't you think I would have taken care of it?" "I mean, I've been running this inn for several weeks now." "I think I know what I'm doing." "Here you go, Dick." "Where do you want it?" "How long do you think the inspector's going to be here?" "Honey, for the last time, stop worrying." "You're treating this man like he's some kind of monster." "And if you'll come this way, I'll show you the basement." "Right." "George, how's it going?" "Can't complain." "I mean the inspection." "So far, so good." "He's not what you'd call real sharp." "Half of the things he found wrong, I had to point out to him." "Now can I worry?" "Hi." "I saw the inspector's car out front." "Has he said anything about coming to my place?" "No, but thanks for your concern." "Yeah." "You know, I tried to get into his car to see where he's headed next, but the paranoid clown locked it." "Kirk, I'm sure if your place was on his schedule, you'd know it." "Not if the mailman is withholding my mail." "Well, Dick, I guess we're done." "So how'd we do?" "Yeah, I've seen worse." "You don't know how happy we are to hear you say that." "This would do it for me." "All right, enjoy your inn." "By the way, do you know a place to eat around here?" "Gee, it's too bad the café next door is closed." "Oh, there's a café next door?" "Who said anything about a café?" "Let me show you the shortcut out of town." "It's lined with cafes." "Excuse me, could somebody help us with our luggage?" "Coming." "You're checking out, Mr. Carlson?" "Yeah." "I hope you enjoyed your stay." "We had a wonderful time." "Oh, good!" "Well, I have your bill right here." "Let's see, that's six nights in the Martin Van Buren room, plus tax, would be $274." "When we called, you said you'd give us a 50% discount because you were still fixing the place up." "Right." "So that would be $137." "And you said something about giving us a discount if we didn't eat breakfast here." "Right." "Right again." "That's $1.50 a day, for six days, times one, two, three, four, five people." "It would be $45 from $137, $92." "Right, and we sent you a $100 deposit." "Right." "So I owe you $8." "Honey, do you have any money on you?" "How much are your jugs of maple syrup?" "Funny you should bring that up." "They're three for $8." "Fair enough." "You all come back real soon." "Hope you enjoyed your stay." "I got all your bags in the car." "Oh, thank you." "There you go." "Where do I cash this in?" "Forget it." "Hi, George." "Hi." "I hurried home from class as fast as I could." "How did the inspection go?" "Fine." "Thank goodness." "Is there any color left in my face?" "Kirk, what's wrong?" "The inspector." "I couldn't keep him away from the cafe." "I guess something I said made him suspicious." "Well, he wasn't there very long." "What did he say?" "He said the Minuteman was an eyesore and a disgrace." "And until it's up to code, I'm condemned." "Well, this is it." "Now you know why I've never invited any of you over here." "Don't think we're not grateful." "The electricity still works." "If you're cold, I could plug in the toaster oven." "No, that's okay." "Kirk, where did you get all this stuff?" "Here and there." "It's mostly cheap junk I try to push on the tourists." "See anything you like?" "''I ate a ton at the Minuteman Cafe." You sell these?" "I tried." "Now I just go out and stick them on their cars while they're eating." "Eating what?" "Mostly Minuteman burgers." "That's a burger I cook in one minute." "My motto is," ""|f| can cook it in a minute, you can eat it in a minute."" "Interesting challenge." "You know, Kirk, you didn't have to let the place get like this." "Hey, you think I'm proud of this?" "But this isn't exactly what I wanted to do with my life." "Then what are you doing here?" "It's a long story, and I'd rather not go into it." "Actually, that's not true." "I'm dying to go into it." "I bought this place for a woman." "Victoria." "She was beautiful, witty, intelligent." "Leslie, this isn't making you uncomfortable, is it?" "No." "Anyway, it was a few years back." "She was a young coed, headed for Middlebury College." "I was posing as a brilliant young internist with a promising future." "And then I decided to throw it all away, to follow her here from Nebraska." "I didn't know you were from Nebraska." "Okay, South Dakota." "Kirk, you don't have to lie." "If you're from Nebraska, just say Nebraska." "It was Big Sky country." "That's Montana." "What is this?" "An inquisition?" "The point is, I followed her here because we had a dream." "We were on our way to Middlebury when she spotted this place from the highway." "Then suddenly she said, "Wou|dn't it be incredibly bohemian" ""if we bought this place and opened up a little café?" ""You know, the kind of place that sells pastries and antiques," ""and everyone sits around drinking herb tea and listening to poetry." ""And on cold winter nights, we'd wrap ourselves in a down comforter" ""and sit in front of the hearth, sipping hot spiced wine and reading Proust." ""And upstairs, our children, Adrianne and little Francois," ""would be snuggled in their beds, dreaming the dreams of the innocent."" "Well, at least that's the way it was supposed to have been." "What happened?" "We were at the real estate office." "I had just put down every penny I had on this place and signed all the papers." "I turned to her, she looked at me, and I said, "Well, what do you think?"" "And she said, ''I think I like someone else more than you."" "And she walked out the door, climbed in my car and drove away." "Oh, Kirk, that's so sad." "Thank you." "Anyway, I guess my heart wasn't in it after that." "Then why haven't you sold it?" "Would you buy it?" "Besides, I'm not so sure I want to sell it, not as long as there's still a chance that someday she's going to walk through that door, carrying her suitcase and say, "Jean Carlo, I'm back!"" "I can see where that would be worth waiting for." "Honey, could I speak to you for a minute, in private?" "Isn't there something we can do to help him?" "Kirk, what would it take to fix up the café?" "A lot of time and hard work." "He says there's nothing we can do." "There's gotta be." "Why, I bet if we all pitched in, we could get the Minuteman back up to code in no time at all." "Would you be willing to help, Leslie?" "Absolutely." "And I know George wouldn't mind." "Joanna, could I talk to you for a minute?" "Dick, before you even start, remember you told me one of the reasons we moved here was for the sense of community." "Neighbors helping neighbors." "Remember that story you told me about the old days, how when somebody's barn would burn down and everybody would just jump right in, and pitch in, and help rebuild it?" "You wanna burn this place down, fine." "Dick, we can't just abandon him." "I guess you're right." "Kirk, we've decided to help get the Minuteman back up to code." "You'd do that?" "For me?" "Apparently." "That's wonderful." "But you have your own problems." "When would you ever find time to help me?" "We'll make time." "Yeah." "How does tomorrow afternoon sound?" "The morning's out, right?" "Hi, Kirk." "Hi, guys." "What's the matter?" "I thought you'd be glad to see us." "I don't know." "I've been going over this list, and there's just no way we're gonna get this place up to code." "There're just too many things wrong with it." "Like what?" "One thing, the place is filthy." "I can help you with the cleaning." "I've got all kinds of electrical problems." "I can help you with that." "I've got trouble with the plumbing." "I can help Joanna with the cleaning." "Hey, listen, before we start scraping off the grime," "can I make you something to eat?" "I'm..." "I'm not hungry." "What if!" "went out and got something?" "Unless of course, you'd like me to hang around here and help?" "No." "We'll be fine." "Then I'm going to treat you to the best meal money can buy." "You need a little money, Kirk?" "Just until I get my tax refund." "What about them?" "They don't eat?" "Back in a flash." "Well, this should be easy to fix." "Good." "Does anybody know what it is?" "I never want to hear the name Kirk Devane again, as long as I live." "Dick, just take it easy, honey." "I'm sorry, I can't help it." "I mean, we work our tails off trying to fix up his cafe, and then he pulls something like this." "We don't know that Kirk's pulled anything." "He left at 8:30 in the morning to get us breakfast." "It's now night." "Something could have happened to him." "Or maybe we're just being impatient." "Before you say anything, I just want you to know" "I'm all right." "Where have you been?" "The hospital." "What happened?" "I don't know what happened." "All I know is I went out to get you something to eat, and the next thing I remember I was on a gurney, and they were wheeling me out ofan operating room." "You're trying to tell us you had surgery this afternoon?" "Of course not, Dick." "Ifl had surgery, I wouldn't be here." "Fortunately, as they were about to go in, the tests came back negative." "Anyway, I got back here as soon as I could because I knew you wouldn't be able to sleep, wondering what happened to me." "And because you have my keys." "And you really expect us to believe that story?" "If you don't, you can call the hospital." "Saint Joseph's." "Emergency Admitting." "Ask for Mrs. Halpin." "H-A-L-P-I-N." "The attending physician was Dr. Julius Forbes." "F-O-R-B-E-S." "I believe he's Chief of Neurosurgery." "The girl who took blood was named Carol." "If you talk to her, tell her thanks from a guy named Grateful." "I suppose it's possible." "Good." "I'm sorry this happened, but I don't want you to worry." "Tomorrow I'm going to be there bright and early, helping you guys out." "It's done." "What do you mean?" "We finished it, the whole cafe." "We worked all day." "We got it back up to code." "Is that right?" "It's all straightened up and ready for inspection." "Yeah." "It's so clean, you could eat over there." "Well, what are we waiting for?" "Let's go over and see it." "Let it go, Dick." "Well, what do you think?" "I don't believe you did this." "It was mostly just a little cleaning and straightening." "Cleaning and straightening?" "I could have had strangers come in and do that." "This is different." "This says friends were here." "We're glad you like it." "Gee, I gotta tell you, I really didn't expect this." "I wish there was some way I could show you how much I appreciate it." "You mean that?" "Yeah." "Why?" "If you really value our friendship, you can prove it." "How?" "'st°P |ying_" "No more excuses, no more phony stories." "Just stop lying." "To you, or everyone?" "It's not that I don't want to, I'm just not sure I can do it." "Kirk, nobody's going to hate you for being honest." "That's what real friends do, they accept you for what you are." "Even if it's not pretty." "And that's what you all want me to do?" "Well, I guess I owe it to you." "Okay." "Starting right now, the truth." "I wasn't at the hospital today." "No kidding." "Where were you?" "Boston." "You're kidding?" "No." "Why?" "Because I love Boston." "Boston's a terrific city." "It's rich in American heritage." "It's one of the great cultural centers of the world." "What did you do there?" "Played video games and ate ice cream." "It was selfish and thoughtless, and I'm sorry." "And I give you my word, I'm never gonna treat my friends like this again." "Are you sure you don't hate me?" "We may hate what you did, but we don't hate you." "Kirk, at least you told the truth." "Don't you feel better?" "You know, I do." "Don't you feel better, Dick?" "This is unbelievable." "I never knew I could talk to people like this." "I always thought I had to lie to make everything right." "I feel terrific." "Great." "I feel so good, I wanna confess a few more lies I've told you." "I've never played Major League Baseball." "I've never lived in Athens." "And I've never helped Elvis get dressed." "God!" "What a feeling this is." "It's incredible." "I feel so good, I have one more confession to make." "What's that?" "This place was never really condemned." "I mean I got scared..." "What?" "...so I made the whole thing up." "God, I love you people so much." "Champagne on me!" "I can't believe we worked all daylong for nothing." "I am really miffed." "I'm livid." "I think when Kirk comes back, we should all tell him how we feel." "He's not coming back." "I mean, the man walked out when we were cleaning his cafe." "He's not coming back with a bottle of champagne." "Hi, guys." "JOANNA: "Hi, guys"?" "Where's the champagne you said you were going to get?" "I got it." "Don't start, Kirk." "No really." "I bought the best bottle I could find. $65." "I'm warning you." "The guy let me charge it." "Where is it?" "Wouldn't you know it, I was on my way back, and what do you think I was stopped and asked to do?" "Christen a ship."