The Ninth Gate
120. CHATEAU: WINE CELLAR INT/NIGHT
The MUSTACHE prods CORSO through the doorway until ALL THREE are on the landing, then throws a light switch.
Bare bulbs shed little light on the steps but illuminate a large vaulted chamber below. it’s the chateau’s wine cellar: oak barrels and racks of bottles thick with dust and cobwebs are housed behind an iron grille with a door in it. The door is ajar, the key in the lock.
MUSTACHE (to THE GIRL): Move!
THE GIRL sets off down the steps. CORSO follows with the MUSTACHE at his heels.
Halfway down, CORSO pretends to stumble: he crouches and turns in a single movement. The MUSTACHE, following close behind, trips over him. CORSO seizes his robe and yanks at it, helping him on his way. Simultaneously:
CORSO (to THE GIRL): Watch out!
THE GIRL plasters herself against the wall to avoid the MUSTACHE’s somersaulting body. The automatic escapes from his hand and slithers across the flagstones as he comes to rest, with a sickening thud, at the foot of the steps. THE GIRL follows him down and picks it up.
CORSO reaches the foot of the steps and rolls the MUSTACHE over on his back. He’s out cold, with blood oozing from a broken nose.
THE GIRL (faintly admiring): I didn’t know you had it in you.
CORSO: Another thing you didn’t know?
He takes hold of the MUSTACHE’s ankles and, with THE GIRL’s assistance, hauls him through the grille into the inner cellar. He stares down at the man for a moment.
CORSO (cont.): Hey, give me a hand. I want his gear.
He starts to peel of fthe MUSTACHE’s robe from the feet up, revealing a pair of exceptionally hairy legs.
121. CHATEAU: WINE CELLAR INT/NIGHT
CORSO shuts the grille door, locks it, and tosses the key into a corner. The MUSTACHE’s naked, motionless body can be vaguely discerned through the bars.
122. CHATEAU: PASSAGE INT/NIGHT
CORSO and THE GIRL cautiously retrace their steps along the marble-floored passage. CORSO is wearing the Mustache’s robe and pentacle over his clothes with his shoes and trouser bottoms incongruously visible below the ham. They pass the stairs they descended and continue on their way.
They turn a corner. As they do so, they hear a faint, intermittent hum. They pause to listen, then walk on. The sound grows louder and more distinct: somewhere in the chateau, voices are chanting in unison.
Turning another corner, they find themselves in an anteroom that terminates in two massive double doors. The chanting is coming from beyond them.
CORSO walks over to the doors with THE GIRL at his heels. He grasps the handle.
THE GIRL (hisses): No! Up to the gallery.
123. CHATEAU: BACK STAIRS, GALLERY INT/NIGHT
The chanting is even louder now. CORSO and THE GIRL reach the top of some uncarpeted stairs and cautiously open a small door. A wave of sound hits them.
124. CHATEAU: GALLERY, GREAT HALL INT/NIGHT .
They steal through the doorway into the shadowy gallery, which runs around three sides of the Great Hall, and peer over the balustrade. They’ve emerged near the top of a spiral staircase leading down from the gallery to a point near the double doors at the rear of the hall.
At the far end of the huge room in a dais draped in black with some shallow steps leading up to it. On the wall above the dais hangs an inverted silver crucifix; on the dais itself, which is flanked by a pair of outsize black candles in three-foot silver candlesticks, LIANA stands facing the hall from behind a silver lectern on which reposes ‘The Nine Gates’. Arrayed in the body of the hall are the 50 GUESTS, now cowled, each holding a lighted black candle. The flickering candle flames bathe the whole scene in tremulous chiaroscuro.
LIANA and the GUESTS are taking it in turns, like priest and congregation, to intone passages from the Latin text of ‘The Nine Gates’.
CORSO (quietly, to THE GIRL): You stay here and cover me. I’m going down.
Pulling the cowl over his head, he sneaks down the spiral staircase, secretes himself in the rear rank of GUESTS, and concentrates on LIANA and the book as the litany continues.
All at once, unseen by us, the doors swing open with a crash and BALKAN’s deep bass voice punctures the air on a derisive note.
BALKAN (O.S.): Mumbo-jumbo-mumbo-jumbo-mumbo-jumbo –
The GUESTS stop chanting, and fifty cowled heads turn to look for the source of this unseemly interruption. Up on the dais, LIANA freezes.
BALKAN: Mumbo-jumbo-mumbo-jumbo-mumbo-jumbo-
Looking over-life-size in his dark and elegant double-breasted suit, he strides toward the dais. Any GUESTS who fail to get out of his way in time are brusquely elbowed aside. LIANA watches him, transfixed, as he climbs the steps and turns to face the bemused GUESTS.
BALKAN (cont.): Look around you – yes, all of you. What do you see?
The GUESTS involuntarily turn to look at each other.
BALKAN (cont.): I’ll tell you: a bunch of buffoons in fancy dress. What are you expecting, an apparition? I’m the only apparition you’ll see tonight. You really think the Prince of Darkness would deign to manifest himself to the likes of you? He never has and he never will – never!
He closes ‘The Nine Gates’ with a snap and holds it up.
BALKAN (cont.): You read from his book, yes, but you have no conception of its true power. I alone have grasped its secret. I alone have fathomed the Master’s grand design. I alone am worthy to enjoy the fruits of that discovery: absolute power to determine my own destiny.
LIANA finds her voice at last.
LIANA: You’re insane, Boris. (puts out her hand): Give it back at once.
BALKAN rounds on her.
BALKAN: As for you, Liana de Saint-Damien, you’re even guiltier than the rest of this pathetic rabble. You have at least some idea of what this book can do in the right hands, yet you lend yourself to these farcical proceedings, these orgies of ageing flesh conducted in the Master’s name. You’re a charlatan!
LIANA tries to grab the book, but BALKAN holds it above his head.
LIANA claws his cheeks in desperation. BALKAN clasps his face, dropping the book.
LIANA makes a dive for it, but BALKAN pounces on her. They roll over in a clinch, struggling fiercely.
BALKAN grabs LIANA by the throat. She tries to break his grip, but he redoubles it. Halfway down the dais steps with BALKAN on top of her, she fights for breath. Her suffocated, agonized face is turned toward the hall.
The GUESTS shrink back in horror, some of them dropping their candles. Hysterical screams rend the air.
CORSO comes to life. Hampered by his robe, he makes for dais as fast as he can, scattering frightened GUESTS in the process. He takes hold of BALKAN’s shoulders and tries to haul him off LIANA.
BALKAN, still throttling her, turns to look. He glares at CORSO through his heavy hornrims, his features contorted with rage and stupefaction. Then, removing one hand from LIANA’s throat, he deals CORSO a backhanded blow that sends him reeling.
LIANA seizes the chance to break free. She crawls away and almost regains her fact, but BALKAN is too quick for her: grabbing her pentacle chain from behind, he proceeds to garrotte her with it.
LIANA, now on her knees, scrabbles unavailingly at the chain that is biting into her neck. Her face turns purple, her tongue begins to protrude.
CORSO looks around wildly for a weapon. He seizes one of the three-foot candlesticks and raises it over his head. Suddenly:
THE GIRL (O.S.): Don’t, Corso!
Startled, he lowers the candlestick and looks up: THE GIRL is perched on the gallery balustrade just above him.
Too preoccupied with Balkan and Liana to wonder what her game is, CORSO raises the candlestick once more.
THE GIRL lands on top of CORSO, bearing him to the ground, and immobilizes him with a hammerlock.
CORSO: Get off me! He’ll kill her!
THE GIRL Leave them.
BALKAN completes his grisly work: LIANA’s purple face is all too reminiscent of Baroness Kessler’s. With a final tug at the chain, he plants one foot in the small of LIANA’s back and sends her limp body sprawling across the floor of the hall.
Screams and cries of horror go up from the GUESTS, who have recoiled still further.
BALKAN straightens up, a somewhat dishevelled but still imposing figure despite the scratches on his cheeks. Even his hornrims are still in place. He leans fonward, eyes narrowed in a mock menacing way, and stamps his foot.
BALKAN (in a voice like thunder): Boooh!
With more hysterical screams and cries of dismay, the GUESTS turn tall and flee the hall like a herd of panic-stricken cattle, jostling each other in their eagerness to get out the door.
Calmly, without so much as a glance at THE GIRL, CORSO, or LIANA’s corpse, BALKAN smooths his hair down, picks up ‘The Nine Gates’, and strides majestically after them.
Silence falls. THE GIRL releases her grip on CORSO’s arm, gets off him and rises to her knees. He sits up, nursing his elbow and staring at her with blank incomprehension.
CORSO: Why did you do it?
THE GIRL Some things are meant to happen. That was one of them.
CORSO: Don’t give me that crap again! You were working for him all along!
THE GIRL Funny, I thought you were.
CORSO: You played me for a sucker, the two of you. I don’t intend to take the rap for that maniac.
THE GIRL He just murdered someone with a roomful of witnesses. That lets you off the hook for the other killings. You should be grateful.
CORSO: I’m ecstatic.
He gets to his feet. We hear the sound of cars starting up and driving off in a hurry.
THE GIRL rises too, starts to pat the dust of fhis robe. CORSO impatiently evades her hand.
CORSO (cont.): Where’s he off to?
THE GIRL What do you care? Your job is done. This is as far as you need to go.
CORSO: The hell it is! The sonofabitch owes me the other half of my fee.
THE GIRL (ironically): Of course, it’s just business. I thought your curiosity had gotten the better of you.
CORSO: Okay, so what’s meant to happen next?
THE GIRL You really want to know?
125. MERCEDES/MINOR ROAD EXT/DAWN
THE GIRL, with CORSO red-eyed and unshaven beside her, is driving along a country road bordered by rolling fields wreathed in gray mist. They’ve appropriated Liana’s Mercedes sedan.
126. MERCEDES/FREEWAY EXT/DAY
CORSO has taken over the wheel. THE GIRL is fast asleep with her heed on his shoulder. The deserted freeway runs across a viaduct that spans a valley hundreds of feet below. The hazy blue shapes of mountains can be glimpsed in the distance.
127. MERCEDES/MOUNTAIN ROAD EXT/SUNSET
THE GIRL is back behind the wheel, CORSO smoking. Dazzled by the setting sun, THE GIRL lowers the visor. The landscape has become bleaker and more mountainous. Switchbacks are visible ahead.
128. MERCEDES/MOUNTAIN ROAD EXT/DUSK
The Mercedes rounds a bend.
Visible in the distance, crisply silhouetted against the afterglow, is a castle.
It’s the one of which we saw a backlighted photograph on Balkan’s wall.
129. CASTLE EXT/DUSK
THE GIRL pulls up some distance from the archway that was once the castle gate. A dark green Range Rover is already parked beside it. CORSO and THE GIRL get out and briefly survey the derelict building. A glimmer of light is issuing from the arrow slits in one of the turrets.
130. CASTLE COURTYARD EXT/DUSK
CORSO and THE GIRL cross the deserted courtyard, which is littered with fallen masonry.
131. CASTLE STEPS, BATTLEMENTS EXT/DUSK
CORSO and THE GIRL climb a dilapidated flight of stone steps to the battlements and walk along them to the tower.
They pause outside the moldering old door and listen. A man’s voice is faintly audible.
CORSO puts his hand on the handle. THE GIRL gropes in the pocket of her duffel coat and produces the chromium-plated automatic, holds it out.
CORSO hesitates briefly, then stuffs it in his jacket pocket. He op ~ the door and enters, followed by THE GIRL.
132. TURRET CHAMBER INT/NIGHT
CORSO and THE GIRL are looking down into the interior of the turret, which forms a cylindrical chamber. They’re on a small landing from which a steep flight of unprotected stone steps curves down and around the inner wall to the floor of the chamber. The floor, littered with debris including worm-eaten
beams that have fallen from the ceiling far above, consists of massive, age-old planks.
9 1
A large circle has been chalked in the middle of the floor, and within it a square divided into nine boxes numbered 1-9. Each box contains some unrelated object: a rusty knife, a piece of cord, a stone, a gold ring, a serpentine bracelet, a glass vial, a small pile of earth, a quill pen, an hourglass.
The chamber is illuminated by half a dozen kerosene lamps located around the circle but outside it. Also near the circle is a camper’s collapsible table with various objects on it: a black briefcase, ‘The Nine Gates’, a magnifying glass, a vacuum flask and mug. On the floor beside the table are a large jerrican and an open suitcase with more books spilling out of it.
The voice we heard from outside is that of BALKAN, but a BALKAN unlike any we have seen before: no jacket or necktie, shirt sleeves rolled ‘ up, vest half unbuttoned, strands of gray hair falling over his scratched and sweating face, cheeks flushed, eyes ablaze with excitement.
He’s kneeling in front of the numbered boxes and gabbling to himself in an expressionless monotone:
BALKAN … eight doors come before the Serpent that guards the word, Teth, Enea, Novem, Oded, the number nine, which holds the final secret, the mystery of mysteries. The Serpent is the beast that always sleeps with one eye open and is reflected in the Mirror of Knowledge. (giggles triumphantly) Eight engravings plus one, or one plus eight, which coincides with the number that St. John of Patmos attributed to the Beast: 666-
CORSO (to THE GIRL): He needs therapy-
Feverishly, BALKAN proceeds to scrawl some numerals on the floor with a piece of chalk, muttering as he does so.
BALKAN: Six plus six plus six equals eighteen. One and eight. (even more triumphantly): One plus eight equals nine!
CORSO starts to descend the steps. THE GIRL stays behind, sits down on the top step, props her chin on her hand, and watches the proceedings.
BALKAN rises with chalk dust all over the knees of his pants. He goes to his briefcase and takes out a sheaf of torn engravings.
CORSO has reached the foot of the steps. BALKAN, turning to resume his place in the circle, catches sight of him. He freezes in disbelief, and a long moment passes before he speaks.
BALKAN (cont.): What are you doing here?!
CORSO: I thought I’d drop in before they put you behind bars.
BALKAN: Go away!
CORSO: We had a deal, remember?
BALKAN: A deal?! What impertinence! You bungled it, damn you! You failed me all along the line! Thanks to your lack of initiative,Ii was compelled to do my own dirty work. And I did it! I got these myself! See, here they are! (brandishes the engravings, speaks with mounting vehemence) Nine engravings or nine doors, and only an initiate can open them. Each door has two keys, each engraving discloses a number, a secret element and keyword to be interpreted in the light of reason and the Cabbala, the one true philosophy!
CORSO: I want my money.
BALKAN: Don’t you understand what’s going on here?
He returns to the circle, kneels down again, and deals out the engravings like playing cards, one to a box, leaving three boxes empty. Meantime:
BALKAN (cont.): You have before you the mystery of which men have dreamed throughout the centuries. Thousands have died an agonizing death in hopes of just a glimpse of what you’re about to see!
CORSO: Yeah? What’s that, Old Nick in person?
BALKAN: Don’t be ridiculous! He has never appeared to anyone, never! He’s a spirit – the spirit of pure evil. He manifests himself through his servants, of whom I’m proud to be one!
He rises, walks quickly over to the little table, and opens ‘The Nine Gates’ . Turning over several pages, he tears out an engraving. His voice betrays rising excitement, his face assumes a look of insane fervour.
BALKAN (cont.): Three copies, but only nine of their twenty-seven engravings hold the key, and I have them all! (tears out two more engravings in quick succession) 1 have only to complete the sequence. Then the Serpent will enter the seal of Saturn, and I – I shall enter the Ninth Gate!
CORSO: Cut the crap and write me a cheque.
BALKAN returns to the circle, kneels down once more and neatly positions the three engravings in the empty boxes. Then he rises, goes’ to the table, and pours himself a drink from the vacuum flask. He gargles with it, swallows, and shakes himself like a wet dog. Whatever the flask contained, it seems to have invigorated him.
Seizing the jerrican, he removes the cap and dribbles gasoline around the circle, then picks up one of the kerosene lamps and hurls it at the floor. The lamp smashes and ignites the gasoline. instantly, he’s ringed with fire.
He draws himself up and stands erect in the canter of the circle with flames dancing all around him.
BALKAN: I give you my allegiance, Master. I surrender myself unto you body and soul. Let me fear neither noose, nor sword, nor poison. Let me walk unscathed among lepers and the plague-ridden. Erase me from the Book of Life and inscribe me in the black Book of Death. Let it be no! Let it be so now!
His fervent voice and the wild-eyed, demented look on his face are such that not even CORSO is tempted to break the momentary silence that ensues.
BALKAN (cont.): (ecstatically): Yes, master, yes! Oh, thank you, thank you! I can feel the power flowing through me like an electric current, rendering me capable of any achievement, mental or physical! I could float on air, walk on water.
He stoops and dabbles his hands in the ring of fire.
BALKAN (cont.): See? 1 plunge my hands in fire and feel no heat:
He picks up the jerrican and inverts it over his head, dousing himself in the contents, then hurls it aside.
CORSO: Hey, don’t be stupid!
But BALKAN is deaf to reason.
BALKAN (in a mounting frenzy): Admay, Eloy, Agla, Zatel, Gebal, Elimi, Ashtoreth, Moloch, Shamash, Dagon-
With a whoosh, he himself catches fire. Flames play over his ecstatic figure.
BALKAN (cont.): It’s miraculous! I feel nothing, nothing at all!
He emits another triumphant laugh that soars up the scale until it becomes a high-pitched scream of agony. He starts to caper around, slapping at his clothes, his face, his hair.
CORSO has regained his feet. He takes the automatic from his pocket and sends it slithering across the floor and through the ring of flames.
CORSO: Here, you idiot!
He retreats up the steps with horror written on his face. THE GIRL has risen to her feet. He takes her hand and, with a last backward glance, hustles her outside.
133. CASTLE COURTYARD EXT/NIGHT
Balkan’s wild screams reverberate around the walls as CORSO and THE GIRL hurry across the courtyard.
134. CASTLE EXT/NIGHT
CORSO and THE GIRL are standing beside the Mercedes. Smoke and tongues of flame are issuing from the arrow slits of Balkan’s tower. His screams rise in a crescendo. Then a gunshot cuts them off like a knife.
CORSO: He really thought it would work.
THE GIRL He wasn’t to know it wouldn’t.
CORSO stares at her, momentarily puzzled, then at the blazing castle, then back at her.
CORSO: You didn’t do anything to help him, Greeneyes, not this time.
THE GIRL I’m your guardian angel, remember?
She lays her palm against his cheek, then crooks her hand around the nape of his neck and draws his face toward hers, kisses him tenderly on the lips. CORSO returns her kiss. He folds her in his arms and holds her close. The fiery glow dances over their entwined figures.
135. CASTLE EXT/NIGHT
LONG SHOT of the castle ablaze. The flames have spread from Balkan’s tower to the rest of the building. Smoke and flames are now belching from it. The sky overhead is tinged with crimson.
136. PARIS HOTEL: BATHROOM, BEDROOM, CORRIDOR INT/EARLY MORNING
CORSO, his hair damp from the shower and a towel around his waist, is halfway through shaving when there’s a knock on the bathroom door.
One cheek daubed with foam, he opens it to find himself confronted by the FLOOR WAITER, check pad and ballpoint in hand
FLOOR WAITER: Bonjour, m’sieur. Votre petit dejeuner.
CORSO: Oh. Sure.
Taking the pad, he emerges into the bedroom and scribbles his signature, then stops short: there’s a breakfast cart in the middle of the room, but the bed is empty. No sign of The Girl or her clothes.
CORSO (cont.): Where is she?
WAITER: Pardon?
CORSO: Madame, ou elle est?
FLOOR WAITER Je ne ”ai pas vue, m’sieur.
He makes for the door and exits.
CORSO catches hold of the door just as it’s closing, puts his head out into the corridor, looks right and left. No one in sight but the FLOOR WAITER, who casts a puzzled glance over his shoulder as he walks off.
137. PARIS HOTEL: LOBBY, RECEPTION DESK INT/DAY
CORSO, now dressed but unshaven, hurries over to the reception desk, where GRUBER is on duty.
GRUBER greets him with an almost imperceptible inclination of the head.
GRUBER: Good morning, Mr. Corso.
CORSO: Morning, Gruber. The young lady I came with, have you seen her?
GRUBER: Yea, sir. She went out not long ago.
He reaches behind him and produces a folded message slip from one of the pigeonholes.
GRUBER (cont.): She asked me to give you this.
He hands the slip to CORSO, who opens it. With him, we read:
‘See you around, maybe.’
And below:
‘PS. The 9th Engraving was a forgery.’
138. TOLEDO STREET, ALLEY EXT/DAY
CORSO’s footsteps echo as he walks along one of Toledo’s narrow medieval streets. The steel-framed glasses with the cracked lens have been replaced by a new pair with gold frames. He’s wearing a smart new overcoat and has a new leather bag slung from his shoulder.
He rounds a corner and heads down the deserted alleyway we saw in Scene 27. No scaffolding, just sandblasted walls and freshly painted window frames and grilles.
He reaches the doorway leading to the inner courtyard, hears a woman’s strident cries, bumps into THE BOY, who comes running out as before.
139. TOLEDO: COURTYARD, CENIZA BROS. WORKSHOP EXT/DAY
CORSO crosses the courtyard to the steps that led down to the Cenizas’ workshop. He stops short and stares.
The old door – ‘HERMANOS CENIZA – RESTAURACION DE LIBROS’ – has been taken of its hinges and propped on its side against the basement wall. The display window is just a gaping hole: the window frame has been ripped out, exposing the masonry surrounding it. The whirr of a power tool can be heard.
CORSO, looking puzzled, descends the steps.
140. TOLEDO: CENIZA BROS. WORKSHOP INT/DAY
CORSO pauses in the doorway and surveys the interior. The hand press has disappeared and the floor is littered with debris. Pale rectangular patches on the grey walls indicate where counters and cabinets have been ripped out.
TWO SPANISH WORKMEN are busy detaching an old cabinet from the wall with an electric screwdriver.
CORSO: Oiga!
He has to repeat himself before they interrupt their activities.
1ST WORKMAN: Seftor?
CORSO: Los Hermanos Ceniza?
1ST WORKMAN: Los Ceniza? (glances at the 2ND WORKMAN): Est&n muertos.
CORSO: Como muertos? Quando?
1ST WORKMAN: Oh, hace anos, anos.
CORSO ANOS?!
The 2ND WORKMAN comes over, wiping his hands on his apron.
2ND WORKMAN: Ingles?
CORSO: Americana.
2ND WORKMAN (as if that explained everything): Ah- They dead, many years.
CORSO (more and more puzzled): But they were here not long ago – I spoke with them.
The 2ND WORKMAN looks at his colleague, shrugs and chuckles as if to convey that Corso is crazy, like most foreigners.
1ST WORKMAN: Disculpe.
He indicates that CORSO is in the way.
Utterly disconcerted, CORSO backs up as they manhandle the cabinet away from the wall and tilt it forward prior to laying it face down on the floor.
As they do so, a dusty piece of paper slides off the top of the cabinet and seesaws to the floor like a falling leaf.
Instinctively, CORSO stoops and picks it up. He looks at it idly, then more closely. His eyes widen.
It’s the Ninth Engraving: THE WOMAN RIDING A SEVEN-HEADED DRAGON WITH A CASTLE ABLAZE IN THE BACKGROUND.
The woman’s face bears a strong resemblance to that of The Girl.
141. TOLEDO: ALLEY EXT/DAY
CORSO walks back along the alleyway with the engraving in his hand. His receding figure dwindles to a speck.
T H E E N D
