Scene 3

[OPEN]

Land

[JOSIAH] Good land.

Sure Enough

[JOSIAH] Farmin’.

Farmin’.

[JOSIAH] Ain’t for the faint of heart.

Always said.

[JOHIAH] Still, it’s there

The Land

[JOSIAH] Coffee? No, I got to be getting back.

But it’s not on account of the coffee, that you don’t want more coffee?

[JOSIAH] And the winter bein’ just ‘round the corner.

Because the coffee ain’t such a bad pot, Joe?[

[JOSIAH] No, sir, the coffee’s right fine.

Got a nice flavor. Little something extra…

[KITTY] Just slithers down your throat.

Kitty, I’ll have a touch more.

[KITTY] Hear that, George?

I’m standing right here, Kitty.

[JOSIAH] Show you anytime, George, just come ‘round the farm.

I’d appreciate that. And - many thanks, Joe. For bringing by those fence posts.

[JOSIAH] Use as many as you like, I finished mine up last week.

Did ya.

[KITTY] All them alive now, too?

Kitty…

[JOSIAH] Many thanks for the coffee, Mrs. Clarke. George.

Joe.

[KITTY] Hear that, George.

I’m standing right here.

[KITTY] Seems children are being born. Right here in Kansas.

Seems that way.

[KITTY] Seems some farmers got their fences up. Houses sealed -

You heard it. Right from the farmer’s mouth.[

[KITTY] They got kitchen herbs.

And what use have we got for kitchen herbs?

[KITTY] And I’m just wondering what’re you doing just standing there?

Right now? I’m finishing my morning coffee. And I’m looking out over the land, which is our land. And I’m thinking on the moon.

[KITTY] Of course you are. On the moon.

The Kansas moon, Kittson. Did you not see it last night?

[KITTY] No, George, I did not see the moon.

Because I thought you did. When I looked over at you, thought I saw you eyes out the window. And if you were looking anywhere near that window, you could see nothing but the moon.

[KITTY] As in - the snakes.

They say the Kansas moon’s so beautiful, it’s like the moon over Venice, Italy.

[KITTY] As if any of these Missourians have ever set foot in -

Don’t have to. Just look out the window. Like you were doing last night.[

[KITTY] I was someplace else.

Looking at the moon…

[KITTY] it fills up the whole darned window, how could I not see -

That moon that could inspire poetry and Italian love songs -

[KITTY] and then get back into your wagon and move on.

Wasn’t nothing more we could do.

[KITTY] I know that.

This is a good place here, Kitty.

[KITTY] I know, George.

The opportunities. We went west, just like your parents and mine. And today, west means Kansas. What was there for us in Indiana?

[KITTY] like you could make out what might be reflected in my eyes.

Your back’s beautiful in the moonlight.

[KITTY] George, I love you. I do. Like a -

Wild cat.

[KITTY] between us both we don’t know three beans about turning this land into farm.

We got the belief.

[KITTY] In what?

Kansas.

[KITTY] Kansas.

We can do this, Kitty. Together, we’ll do it. And it will be good here. I know it will. This is good land. Just give it a little time.

[KITTY] Because we only got a little time before winter -

Time enough for me to get that fence up. Time enough for you to be makin’ friends with the snakes, or at least showin’ ‘em that we’re here to stay. That they can slither around all they want, we ain’t gonna pay them no mind, because we’re busy here drinking our coffee, looking at the moon, planting out feet in this soil - making this land here our own.

[KITTY] Kansas.

Kansas.[

[KITTY] Wild cat, huh?

Always said.

[KITTY] Uh-huh.

Kitty, you and me - the two of us together - we got all the time in the world.

[KITTY] As long as we got time for sealing up the spaces in the walls of this cabin.

Tomorrow.

[KITTY] Tomorrow morning

First thing - I’ll stop in at Joe’s on my way into town.

[KITTY] town - ?

Lecompton.

[KITTY] And George Clarke, what business have you got going to town tomorrow?

Got the business of voting.

[KITTY] And what do you care to vote?

I care because this land is going to be our state.

[KITTY] You don’t give a boot about polotics!

It ain’t politics, it’s my right.

[KITTY] yer God-given right to stand in front of McGreevy’s store -

Kansas is home now.

[KITTY] Shooting the moon, shooting the red eye with those men…

And I won’t have any of

And I won’t have any of ‘em telling us how things are gonna be here.