Awakening, The (2011) Movie Script

Miss Emerson?
Are you prepared?
I brought this.
Just get it ready. Get it ready.
Life given. Life returned.
Life given. Death lifted.
Take this life force,
consume its flesh.
Open our eyes to what is lost.
Memento mori. Memento mori.
Memento mori. Memento mori.
Memento mori.
Memento mori. Memento mori.
Who? Whose loss?
This woman?
This grieving woman?
- Darling?
- Oh, God!
Don't look away. You mustn't look away.
Rose? Rose, darling.
I can see you.
I can see you.
Life given. Death lifted.
Life given. Death...
Get off me!
Sergeant Evans, the curtains.
The door! The door!
- Stay there, Captain.
- Get off me!
If you're a captain at all.
Sergeant Evans, fetch the others.
You bastard. You'll kill him!
I'll fetch a doctor.
I'll manage.
- Ah! Ow!
- Another miracle.
Miss Cathcart,
you shouldn't do that.
Cathcart. Florence Cathcart.
How dare you come here
under false pretences?
Is your soldier boy even dead?
And this grotesque charade
won't bring him back.
Neither will your blood capsules
which you slipped from your cup
and your handkerchief as we started.
Nor your free hand pulling the wick
from this woman's candle.
As if the dead had
something against naked flames.
You're charlatans.
And poor ones at that.
Get them out of here, Evans.
Get off! You bastard.
- I've got your brooch.
- Oh, thank you, Evans.
Miss Cathcart, when you do these things
you've taken to
ordering me around a little.
I just think with you being...
What, you don't want your colleagues
seeing you bossed by a civilian woman?
Uh, I mean, if anyone was going to
order me around, it'd be...
I mean, if Mrs Evans wasn't Mrs Evans...
But she is.
And she's very lucky, she is.
I won't bully you any more. Promise.
You've never had a child, have you?
No, of course you haven't.
- Allow me, miss.
- Thank you, Katie.
It's all right.
Oh, for heaven's sake. Um...
- Who shall I make it out to?
- I'm sorry?
- Please, Mr...
- Mallory.
Mr Mallory, you'll excuse my brevity,
but this is my home.
- Very glad you enjoyed the book.
- I didn't.
- Excuse me?
- I didn't much like your book.
I found it too certain.
Perhaps that's only fitting
for someone so rude to strangers.
I'm a history master
at a boy's prep school.
Forgive my daughter, Mr Mallory.
She's not taking on any more work.
She's quite exhausted.
Um, let him speak, Harry. Please.
Um, I'm afraid Harry's right.
I'm really not taking on any more work.
But you are a ghost hunter
as well as an author?
Well, you can't hunt
what doesn't exist.
Ah, well, that's just it.
We think we have one that does.
I need to change.
Katie, will you show
Mr Mallory to my study.
- Yes, miss.
- I'll be fine.
You're fine?
Mmm.
We always know
why you throw yourself into this.
And we don't blame you
for thinking that it will help.
But every time now, all we can see
is the pain it causes you.
Yes.
I know. I'm sorry I keep
doing this to you.
It's not fair.
"May your skin be flayed from your body"
"in the hell you so arrogantly claim
does not exist."
An elderly woman in Dorset,
I seem to remember.
Our school matron
is a devotee of your book
and has told the headmaster
about the work you do.
She assures him you're quite respected
and your book sits alongside the Bible
on many bookshelves.
Miss Cathcart,
rumour is a dangerous thing.
Conversations in this room
are confidential, Mr Mallory.
Especially if I don't take the case.
Our school is called Rookford
in Cumbria.
Some years ago, a child
was said to have been murdered there.
Not a pupil.
It was a private house then.
Well, who? Did they catch the killer?
There's no record. It was
an important family. All hushed up.
Still, it's perfectly possible
someone died there.
So you're here about a death
that may or may not have happened
however many years ago?
No.
I'm here about another death.
A pupil. Three weeks ago.
His name was Walter. Walter Portman.
The day before he died,
Walter went to see the headmaster,
quaking with fear,
convinced he'd seen a ghost.
The ghost of the murdered child.
Well, how did he know
what the murdered child looked like?
This was taken 18 years ago.
Mr Mallory, this is...
This is an old school prank.
As the camera sweeps across
to expose the plate...
One of the boys runs behind the row
to appear at both sides.
He was still moving
when it reached him.
I know. That was 1902.
This was '03.
'04.
And, lastly, '06.
All the boys in the school
are accounted for.
All of them. In all the photographs.
Including this one,
taken just one month ago.
Miss Cathcart, I can understand a child
running the length of the line
in the 15 seconds it takes
for the camera to make its sweep.
What I can't explain is
how he could get there.
The Millford woman.
Either a batch of partially exposed
photographic plates
or the same ghost was
in my mother's potting shed.
It's half-term in two days.
We'll be lucky to get any of
the children back unless...
I'm not interested in the
commercial fortunes of your school.
There have been other sightings.
The boys believe...
Boys believe in Santa Claus
and the Tooth Fairy.
I'm sure some of them
even believe in God.
You don't need me
to tell you what happened
to that generation of boys, Mr Mallory,
and yet you don't see their ghosts
stalking the halls of your school.
Rookford is a boarding school,
Miss Cathcart.
Most of the boys
are as good as orphans.
I don't say that
just because of your circumstances.
Well, then, why say it?
"Fear is all I remember of my childhood.
"I have glimpses of my parents' death
"but nothing of our life in Kenya,
nor coming to London.
"Nothing but a feeling
of perpetual black terror."
Your tactics are despicable.
"Fear swallows children
and the adults we become."
These boys aren't worried
about bumps in the night.
They are frightened to death.
Please leave.
I was sent to request your help
and I've done that.
You strike me as a woman who won't
do anything she doesn't want to.
I'm at the Wellington Hotel.
Thank you for your time.
Semper veritas.
Latin gives a new school
an air of respectability.
Means they can add a pound to the fees.
And I should imagine a bona fide ghost
knocks it right off again.
Latin puns. What fun.
"Always the truth."
Let's see, shall we?
You can't wait.
You're that keen that
people believe in nothing?
No, without science
people don't believe in nothing.
They believe in anything,
including spirits.
So we need them. But you don't.
I believe in evidence.
Need has nothing to do with it.
And yet you carry
someone else's cigarette case.
Touch.
I'm sorry.
Mr Mallory, am I...
Go on.
Judd.
Hey! Knees, boys!
Miss Cathcart, this is Miss Hill,
the school matron. Maud to you and me.
- How do you do?
- Maud?
She's taken this very hard.
She's an odd fish at the best of times.
For a start, she liked your book.
I feel like I know you.
I've read your book
a dozen times at least.
It's on my bookshelf next to the Bible.
I've never met an educated lady before.
Not Cambridge and everything.
Never mind someone famous.
Oh, the Kaiser was famous, Miss Hill.
I... I just wrote a book.
Maud.
Mr Mallory told you to call me Maud.
Maud.
- Hello.
- Hello.
Did Mr McNair not say
all boys inside, Thomas?
Tom.
Everyone's nerves are shot to pieces.
I've been here 14 years.
I know this place.
And I don't hold with
any ghostly nonsense.
I just wanted you to know
I'm at your service.
Hello.
Stop it. Go on.
Howell, stick up for yourself.
And get that hair cut.
All of you, downstairs.
Thank you, Maud. I'll take
Miss Cathcart to the headmaster.
Came with the building.
It's the boys' favourite.
John the Baptist, I think. This way.
It's actually Judith
slaying Holofernes.
Story of a woman
who stole into the enemy camp
and seduced then beheaded
their highest general.
Hmm. Those were the days, eh, Maud?
I'm not in, I'm out.
At least I was out. Now I'm in.
You must be the ghost lady.
Come through.
Reverend Purslow,
this is Miss Florence Cathcart.
An educated woman.
Well, well, well. Glad you're here.
Presume you know
you've a matron to thank.
So I believe. Glad I can be of service.
Child dying before a parent.
Dreadful thing.
I lost three of them.
I imagine you don't believe
in the afterlife, Miss Cathcart.
No, I don't.
Terrible, isn't it?
Mr Mallory will give
you a tour of the school.
I'm on my way to the dining room
should you wish to see it.
Mr Mallory.
So I'm the guide now?
He's coming. He's coming.
After supper there's an hour of scrubs,
that's compulsory reading to you.
Then lights out at 8:00.
I'll show you where Walter was found.
I'd like to see everywhere
the boys claim to have seen the ghost.
And perhaps you'd ask Maud to join us?
Most of the sightings
were in here, including Walter's.
In fact, he was found outside
here on the terrace.
Many of the boys are now
too frightened to come in here.
Mr Mallory.
She doesn't like any superfluous sound.
"Ego contemno Latin." I hate Latin.
That you, Mallory?
Walter was found there.
Mr Broad found him
just before breakfast.
- And these doors were locked?
- Mmm-hmm.
Did he have a bear or a toy animal?
- It's in the front office, yes.
- Could you?
You don't like him.
I have my reasons.
It would be indiscreet.
Where are his glasses?
He used to keep up the pretence.
Used to have a limp, too.
Kept him out of the trenches.
- His mother couldn't bear to keep it.
- Thank you.
And this was still on his bed
the morning he was found?
Yes.
You said there were other sightings
elsewhere in the house?
Yes. Mostly in the west dormitory.
Maud, perhaps I could
leave this to you?
- Why aren't you at scrubs?
- My book, sir.
Are you all right?
And it's half-term tomorrow?
Boys with parents in
far-flung places stay behind.
Apart from that,
we have the place to ourselves.
Was he bullied?
They called him "Wheezy Walter".
He was asthmatic.
Who were his friends?
Did he have any friends?
Miss Cathcart, this is a good school.
But if you're different,
the wrong kind of different...
His isn't the only mattress like this.
"Then spake King Arthur
to Sir Bedivere."
"The sequel of today unsolders all"
"The goodliest fellowship
of famous knights."
"Whereof this world hold record.
"Such a sleep they sleep,
the men I loved."
"I think that we shall...
"We shall never more, at..."
"I think that we shall never more,
at any future time,
"Delight our souls
with talk of knightly deeds."
Dowden!
Now.
Matron, I presume you've brought this
young lady to my classroom for a purpose
besides subjecting her to the
outrageous behaviour of Mr Dowden?
Mr McNair. Boys,
I know you're all upset and
frightened at the moment.
Well, Miss Cathcart is here
to put your fears to bed.
She's one of the cleverest people
in England. Miss Cathcart.
Stand.
- Good evening.
- Good evening.
Sit. Please sit.
How many of you did
Walter Portman talk to about this ghost?
Well, did any of you
see this ghost boy for yourselves?
I did, miss. I saw it.
Stand, boy.
Would you like to come with me
and describe...
It was horrible.
It was on the upper corridor.
- Wouldn't you rather...
- His face was twisted.
Blurred and sort of twisted.
Like in the photographs.
But he was in pain. Crying out.
It was him. Please kill it, miss.
Yes, please. Kill it, miss.
Silence.
Pocket Premo,
Sound recorder, part Bell-Tainter.
Fumigator for measuring contact traces.
Can Walter's dormitory sleep
elsewhere in the house?
We could move their mattresses
to the dining room.
Marconi magnetic field detector.
Third of an ounce of magnesium
and potassium chlorate per tray.
As the wire is tripped the aperture
opens for a thirtieth of a second,
and an electrical charge
ignites the powder.
- What about these?
- Those are footprint catchers.
Ghosts have footprints?
No, people pretending to be ghosts do.
They must hate you.
Who? The spiritualists?
No, the ghosts.
Be quiet.
You'll be quiet or so help me!
Victor, you did the run today.
- What's the matter?
- Nothing.
What's this mess?
Will she do what they say? The lady?
And what do they say?
That she'll kill the ghost.
And that one boy a night will die
until she does.
She's not here to catch ghosts.
She's here to catch
naughty boys up to mischief.
Silence now. Eyes closed.
It'll be dark soon.
Pary.
Parry.
Nobody...
Likes...
You!
Be quiet.
You'll be quiet or so help me!
Shh! Keep still.
Hello?
I heard bells. Are you all right?
First bell!
First bell!
Next three boys, please.
Quieten down.
Next.
Boys who have been seen
can go to their classrooms at once.
They couldn't have
been made with socks?
The prints I followed
were definitely barefoot.
- Get back!
- Come on. Come on.
Why are we here, sir?
All right, turn around,
stick your feet up.
Headmaster.
Parry.
- Sir.
- Parry.
What would your father have thought?
The night Walter died,
he got up to use the latrine.
He wasn't wearing his spectacles.
Mr Parry here frightened him,
using this to blur his face.
I didn't. I didn't do it to Walter.
And last night he tried to do
the same thing to me. Didn't you?
Victor.
They said if I did it
then they'd be nice.
- Stop snivelling.
- Malcolm, please.
Who?
- Them.
- Scab!
- Quiet!
- But I didn't do it before.
Not to Walter.
I liked Walter. We shared grots.
- Victor.
- I didn't scare him.
- No one knows who did.
- A boy is dead.
- Wasn't me!
- All right, it wasn't just him.
There was another boy last night.
I saw him down in the stairwell.
What?
Dowden?
- There wasn't another boy.
- Ah-ah-ah. You're behind this.
- Honestly, sir.
- You will name this other boy now.
There wasn't another boy. Please!
You will name this boy or you'll be
thrashed where you stand. Mr McNair.
Honestly. No, there wasn't
another boy, sir.
Please, I tell you, sir.
There wasn't another boy!
Please, sir, I promise,
it was only me!
Wait, stop!
Honestly,
I'm telling you the truth.
For God's sakes. You've done quite
enough damage, you will not do this.
What did you say?
You use a balsam for your chest.
I just smelled it on you.
I also found it smeared on the glass of
the French doors and on the handles
and on Walter's bear.
You were... You were there
the night he died.
I protest. This is...
And did he protest
when you found him downstairs,
ripped the bear from him
and left him out in the dark?
I came here to protect children
from fear and you...
You are hell-bent
on making them live in it.
- You can't die of fear.
- No.
But you can die of an asthma attack
brought on by it.
- He was alive when I left him.
- Malcolm.
He was crying,
insisting he'd seen a ghost.
I thought...
I thought I'd toughen him up.
It's not enough
to be mollycoddled, Robert.
These boys must be strong.
Stronger than us.
Malcolm, there's not
a man on earth I'd rather protect.
But the parents arrive shortly,
and I must ask you to leave this school
at once.
# Be still, my soul
# Though dearest friends depart
There was a chap in a trench
not far from ours.
He used to sing this hymn most sunsets.
It's odd separating the past
from the present.
The boys are transformed.
You should be pleased.
Semper veritas.
- Mmm.
- Truth comes at a price.
Ruined a damaged man.
Oh, I'm not thinking about Malcolm.
Nor are you.
I saw you.
As soon as you proved the ghost was
a fraud, something happened to you.
- You were suddenly...
- Please, Robert.
I've done what was asked of me.
Proved there's nothing to fear.
Nothing.
You left church early.
Mr Judd.
You going home?
Found your ghost?
Another case to write up
while McNair's thrown to the dogs.
After all he's been through.
You know, I wonder
whether any of us really know
what he went through, Mr Judd.
- You shouldn't talk to me like that.
- Excuse me?
- I'm sorry. I didn't mean to...
- You think I don't know?
Staying at home was wrong?
Come down here
and tell me that?
Let me tell you something, ghost lady.
It's the living you wanna watch out for.
Not the dead.
There she is. Now try to forget
all about it. The headmaster will.
Getting to go home. Cakes and puddings.
Lucky beggars.
Still, we'll have a nice time.
You always say that.
Lucky beggars. You always say that.
No!
There's nothing.
There's nothing.
Goodbye. See you in a week.
Check the out buildings
before you go, Mr Baxter.
There are gypsies on the Tarrow farm.
Your ma and pa overseas, Tom?
They live in India.
Takes three weeks to travel to India.
They have tigers there.
Goodbye, Matron.
Mary.
Have you been?
No.
No, but I've seen the lions in Africa.
One of them even attacked me.
How come you're not dead?
Apparently I was rescued
by one of the villagers.
Actually, a tribal chieftain.
Did he kill the lion?
I was very young. I think so.
The villagers took me in
and looked after me until help came.
They called me their "Mowa-Zee".
White doll.
I wonder what they'd think of me today,
seeing me in such a silly state.
- Tom, can you leave us now?
- Were your mother and father with you?
Were they killed?
Afraid they were.
Tom, Miss Cathcart and I
want a grown-up conversation.
I like grown-up conversations.
Now.
Goodbye, Mowa-Zee.
Maud, it was an accident.
I lost my cigarette case.
How could someone like you
want to do such a thing?
I don't want to talk about it.
Don't go. Miss,
something has happened to you.
You can't leave this house now.
Please stop calling me miss.
It's Florence.
And I can't stay here.
I'm sorry.
Thank you.
I'll be gone in an hour.
I fell.
I fell.
I know you're there, Robert.
Please don't go away.
Don't go.
You must be the ghost lady.
Come through.
Good evening.
Be quiet.
You'll be quiet or so help me!
Mr Mallory, I need your help.
You're not going?
Some of the equipment needs resetting.
- Can I...
- I don't understand.
You have your culprit.
You're doing more?
- Oh, would you...
- No, thank you.
Don't you like sherry?
I need to keep my wits about me.
I don't think
I shall ever drink alcohol.
- It makes you cross and sick.
- Mr Judd,
you're welcome to join us.
Things to do, Matron.
Mallory.
Mr Mallory.
Florence, what are you doing?
I was brought here to explain
a phenomenon in this house,
and whatever everyone else may believe,
I have yet to do that.
A collective delusion
has been experienced here,
a child moving through the house
as if there were no walls or floors.
You said that a child was murdered here.
What if that was also caused by...
You're doing this because of a feeling?
- This morning, you were...
- This is not a feeling!
This is a thesis. It's science.
- Tell me about the original murder.
- One can't even be sure there was one.
- Something is causing this.
- Two hours ago, you...
- Florence, why are you doing this?
- Florence.
- What is it?
- A differential thermometer.
It means this side of the corridor
has suddenly become
much colder than that side.
You said this was a private house.
Housemaids often had hidden cupboards
for mops and brooms and so forth.
May even be stairs to the upper levels.
I know this.
It's an old nursery rhyme.
Ladybird, ladybird,
fly away home.
Your house is on fire.
Your children are gone.
All except one.
We need to work. Lock the house.
- Florence, you don't need...
- Robert, lock the house.
This is nothing,
it's a silly nursery rhyme.
I'm frightened.
Tom.
- Tom.
- He wants to get me.
Tom, nothing is going
to happen to you. Nothing.
I promise you that.
Now I must work.
I'll be upstairs if you need me.
Can I sit with you? I won't talk.
Of course.
I get in trouble for talking.
But I don't talk much.
Did you have any friends at school?
You can talk to me.
I have make-believe friends. Sometimes.
There's nothing wrong with that.
Many children do. I know I did.
What was his name?
I'm not sure he had a name.
- Do yours have names?
- You're still lonely.
Aren't you?
I can tell.
With the boys at school, too,
I can tell.
You had a real friend once.
And you don't any more.
Did you love him or something?
Yes, I loved him.
He was a very kind man,
a very good man.
But I was...
I did something
very silly and very cruel.
I think I was frightened of losing him,
I loved him so much.
He was in the war.
What did you do?
I wrote to him and told him
I couldn't marry him
and I didn't love him any more.
What did he say?
He died.
Not long after he got the letter.
But you did love him.
That's why you want him back.
Thank you. Mowa-Zee.
I don't think there's a place on earth
people understand loneliness
better than here.
You're torturing yourself.
Is that what you're doing here?
Proving again and again
that he's really gone?
- Twisting the blade in deeper?
- You tell me.
Why? Is it guilt?
Preaching to me while
you rip your leg to shreds
as if that'll make you feel better
for having survived!
You don't know what
you're talking about.
Robert.
I'm frightened.
And I can't live with that.
And yes, you're right,
what I do comes at a price.
I hate myself more and more,
but I can't live with fear.
I'd sooner be dead myself.
Red four goes on the black five.
Every card has its place.
When they're back where they should be,
you win the game.
And that goes there.
That one there.
Black eight can go on red nine.
It takes time.
That's why they call it "patience".
She's downstairs.
- Mowa-Zee.
- Tom. Tom!
Tom!
I know it's you, Tom.
I won't chase you.
Keep playing.
Florence.
Why are you doing this? You!
I heard you giggle.
- I heard him giggle.
- Florence!
You took me to a man.
Who was he? Who was he?
There was a... There was a man!
There was... There was a man!
Stop this!
It's... It's all of you!
You're all doing this!
You, you...
You cruel and horrid little boy.
Florence!
I hate you.
Thomas Hill, you will come back here
at once and apologise.
Stop bossing me around.
I haven't done anything wrong.
I don't recognise you.
I thought you were a kind,
loving girl but there's...
There's nothing left.
You're a shell.
She's very troubled.
You have to understand that.
She likes you very, very much.
She doesn't care about me.
I may as well be dead like Walter.
I hate her.
Robert, I need your help.
He had a shotgun, and he was there,
and one of these will prove it.
I can leave an amber light on,
but are you...
I'll be fine.
If you could just lift them.
That's good.
The dark used to bother me.
Later, of course, it came to mean
safety, no sniper fire, or...
- Thank you.
-...shells, but
as a lad I'd huddle into my bed,
wanting to see what was there
but too frightened to open my eyes.
Thank you.
It's never darker than when we close
our eyes and yet we keep them shut.
Why is that?
Thank you.
The motion's not blurred,
so even if he's moving
one of these will have him clearly.
Why do you keep
your eyes closed, Florence?
Where is he?
Oh, God.
No.
You're real.
I am.
Why are these things here?
What do they want with me?
Maybe they aren't here for you.
Tom, stay here. Do not leave this room.
No! No! No!
Open the door.
Have you left this room?
Something's happened to Florence.
- Promise me you'll stay here.
- All right.
Tom!
I promise.
Maud! Florence!
I saw you.
I saw you with him.
The war hero.
I don't know what you...
I've seen plenty through these windows
making my rounds, but never that.
Women. Just lap up
the sob stories, don't you?
They were sent, you know.
They didn't sign up.
Suddenly they're heroes.
How dare you!
You did nothing,
and you think you can mock men like him?
You take care of what you're saying.
You did... You did nothing
when men gave every...
No!
Robert! Robert!
Whatever happened?
What's happened, Florence?
- Florence, what is it? My darling girl!
- Florence!
Judd attacked me.
He tried to... He tried to...
I think I killed him.
- I think I killed him.
- Maud, get a blanket.
And run a bath. Now, please.
Where? Where's Judd?
By the trees at the end of the driveway.
No, go inside. Get to Maud
and stay there. You hear?
Robert. Robert, don't tell Tom.
Tom?
Little Tom. He's frightened enough.
He's the only child here.
Florence, there are no children here.
It's just us three!
What?
Mowa-Zee.
Mowa-Zee.
Mowa-Zee.
Mowa-Zee.
I didn't mean to
scare Walter that night.
I know.
I believe you.
You can control that?
Sometimes I can.
But I don't know why he could see me.
No one sees me.
I can't make them.
We see what we need to.
He needed a friend.
So did I.
But you were frightened. When you
heard the music from that rabbit doll
you said someone was going to get you.
- Who were you frightened of?
- I can't tell you.
Please. Tell me, please.
You have to see for yourself.
It's the only way we can be together.
Again.
What?
Promise you won't go away again.
Mousie.
Mow-zee?
Look at the doll's house. Look at it.
- No.
- You started to remember,
- I know you did.
- No.
Look at it. You'll remember the rest.
- Look at it.
- I don't want to look.
You started to remember, I know you did.
Look at the house.
- I don't want to look! Get away from me!
- Look at the house.
Mousie.
You started to remember!
You started!
You started to remember!
I know you did!
But you go on and on!
I don't even wanna look at you!
I can't live like this!
Look at it.
You'll remember the rest.
You don't know! You scheme
and you laugh at me and plot!
No one is plotting.
It's just that we can't care any more.
You make it impossible to care.
You don't speak for days.
You don't speak to me.
You won't even look at her.
Be quiet. You will be quiet,
or so help me!
Your own child?
You despise her.
- You're a monster!
- She's not a boy!
She's bright,
and she's sweet, and she's...
- Give me a son! Stay here!
- You have one!
How do you think that makes me feel
watching your bastard boy
running around with... Your bastard boy
running around with Florence!
Leave Tom out of this!
...making us pay because you...
Mummy! Mummy!
Stay back, Florence.
You can't help Mummy now.
Move out of the way!
You can't help Mummy now.
Move out of the way!
You can't help Mummy now.
Move out of the way!
I need you to move out of the way.
Please, Daddy.
Mousie, Mousie, run! Run!
Think I don't know
your little hiding places?
Know where my little mouse
hides herself for hours on end?
Little Mousie.
Little Mousie.
I really am sorry, Little Mousie.
I will find you, darling.
You have to go with Mummy now.
Mousie.
Mousie.
Little Mousie.
You never said school.
From the moment you arrived,
you called this place a house.
You, nanny.
Tom's mother.
I thought bringing you here
would be enough.
But you didn't remember me,
let alone the terrible things.
I knew your little mind had
blacked it all out.
But one thing kept me certain.
You saw him.
You saw my...
My
darling
murdered child,
who's lived here all these years
with friends he could never have.
I was his friend.
We shared everything.
A father,
everything.
But you needed to see.
That's why I sent Tom
to frighten you those times.
To make you stay.
Because I know what's best for you.
I always did.
Because I raised you.
I wet-nursed you.
I watched you
taken away,
adopted.
You were ripped from me
like my boy had been.
I never asked anything of the world.
And it's a perfect hell on earth
to give a woman children to love
and to rob her of them.
Little Tom.
Little Tom.
I'd forgotten everything.
Well, perhaps not everything.
"Eaten by lions."
Well, all memories are
a hoax of some sort.
You can't blame anyone
for letting you believe that one.
Mmm.
You needn't worry.
No one will find Judd's body.
I've buried better men than him.
You see your own ghosts, too?
Are they with us now?
Your friends.
They look like my friends.
They don't have the right.
No amount of guilt deserves
the pain you inflict on yourself.
- They died. I lived.
- No, you didn't.
A life haunted
isn't a life at all.
We may as well
be ghosts ourselves.
Light a fire, get some glasses.
Someone once told me
it makes one cross and sick.
Tom, what... What is it? What's wrong?
Mother said it would be all right.
She said that you would want us to.
The loneliest boys are
starting to see Tom now,
but will he listen to me?
Will he hide? He needs you.
Maud, I'm going home.
Imagine what a fright you gave me
going in the lake like that
before you saw the truth.
But it's all right now.
Because he can have you forever.
Everything in its place.
Maud
knows best.
Robert!
Florence?
- Florence?
- Mr Mallory!
Florence and I will be leaving now.
Tom needs his family with him.
Florence? Florence?
Robert, the medicine cabinet
in Maud's room. Quickly.
Something to make me sick.
Something to make me sick.
Oh, God! No! No!
Tom?
Tom?
Don't be angry,
I just miss you.
All the time.
My whole life I've never been happy,
not one second since you left me.
But I can't... I can't... I can't come.
You know that, don't you?
You're the only friend I've ever had.
But if I go with you now,
my soul will never be happy, and I...
I can be, thanks to you.
But you won't need me.
No one will need me.
Tom, you must be brave.
Can you move through the house
like there are no walls?
No walls and no floors.
Help her, help her, help her!
Then fly, little Tom.
Fly.
Are you dead?
Are you dying?
I don't know.
I need to sleep.
I need to close my eyes.
I'll stay with you.
I promise.
Even if you can't see me.
I can...
I can feel you now.
I'll tell the boys
it was an accident, of course.
They'll be devastated. They adored her.
We all did. Uh-uh-uh.
I can only think the Walter incident
hit her harder than we thought.
Mind you,
the Cathcart girl didn't help.
I suspect she wasn't
altogether well herself.
You know, I read a study last term.
Ladies' minds often can't cope
with further education.
I know you're there.
That's more than your headmaster does.
I used to play here.
Hide and seek.
She would...
Maud would sit over there.
I'm thinking of writing another book.
The Interpretation of Ghosts.
Oh, God help us.
Victor, do your laces.
- Hello.
- Hello, again.
Actually, Robert,
can you tell the driver to wait for me
at the end of drive?
I like the walk.
I always have.
Till Saturday week.
Not seeing them...
It's not the same as forgetting.
It isn't.
- Hello.
- Hello.