Episode 1509

Aired: Thursday April 5, 1972

Barnabas walks through a hallway in the old house carrying a candle. He looks very sad as he turns a corner and opens a door that leads to a stairway. He walks up the stairway, and puts the candle down in a small room with a large bay window. He puts the candle down on a table and blows it out before looking out the window. He's high up in the old house - and the view extends to the sea. At the horizon, the first morning rays of the sun begin to break through the clouds. Barnabas watches emotionless as the sun begins to rise - the sky changes colors, black to purple to reds and oranges.... it's just as beautiful as he had always described it to others, but he watches it without batting an eye. The rays of the sun begin to shine into the window and onto him. He takes a deep breath and only says "I'm all alone...."

After the titles, Barnabas is still sitting in the small room, only now the sun is high and some time has gone by. He hears footsteps coming up the stairs, and then sees Sarah leading Vicky into the room. "I thought he was up here," Sarah says. "He likes to come up here in the morning." Vicky says "Yes, I know. You can see a beautiful sunrise out that window." Sarah asks Barnabas if she can go into town with David, and he says yes. She stops a moment and says "Don't be sad, Barnabas. I don't like when you're sad." He tells her that she always makes him happy, and she smiles before running off. Vicky tells Barnabas "You'll never really be alone while you have her." Barnabas says "Yes, you're right. But... I've felt very odd since my return from Widow's Hill the other night." Vicky tells Barnabas that everyone feels odd during a period of mourning and that "I didn't feel like myself when I'd lost Burke years ago." Barnabas smiles and says "Burke is just as I remember him." Vicky smiles and says "Well, if that's the case, it might not be a good thing, considering how you once felt about him." Barnabas says "Things are very different now. Though I must admit, I can confuse a man's strong self confidence with arrogance. It's a good thing that a lovely woman like yourself provides a civilizing effect on the souls of men." Vicky looks out the window and says "I think he was suspicious of you when he came over here... he was expecting the Barnabas he remembered. He was surprised, to say the least. His attitude towards you will be very different than it was in the past, I think." Barnabas answers "You're inviting him to become a part of our family. We will get along, we must." Vicky says "He and Quentin seem to have taken to each other quite well. I think it's because they're both so fond of David and both so bristly around Roger." Barnabas smiles and replies "Well, I suppose that's something." Vicky tells Barnabas he should come over to Collinwood for dinner after they all see Carolyn off at the station and "stop cocooning yourself. You need people around you at a time like this." Barnabas gets a bit shy at the prospect, but Vicky takes his hands and says "Barnabas, you're a wonderful and fascinating man. You have so much to offer, please don't deny yourself to people." He kisses her hand and smiles. "I'd be delighted to come to dinner," he says.

Barnabas is downstairs getting his cape to go out when Julia enters. She tells Barnabas she came by to see how he was, and he says "I'm coping with the circumstances." Julia says "If there's anything I can do...." but before she can finish, he says "You've already done so much... saving me from Brian at the laboratory before he got hold of his powers again... I always owe you so much, Julia." She turns away and says "What are friends for?" Barnabas says "Of course." There's an awkward pause (and it's not cue-card related but intentional) before Barnabas says "Vicky was here earlier. She made me feel a little better." Julia says "That's good. You shouldn't lose hope, Barnabas...." Barnabas replies "Hope... so many times in my life, I had no hope. I wonder if it was fate or my own decisions that caused all the complexities of things." Julia answers "I'm not sure if I believe in fate. I think our own decisions are what create our destinies." Barnabas says "I'm not sure if that should make me happy or miserable." Julia says "Back when I was in medical school, there was enormous pressure on me to give up my ambitions and find a husband... but I told myself that I would only accept a man who accepted me for what I am. I couldn't repress my ambitions. I was married to my work." Barnabas says "That doesn't mean it would always be so." Julia says "I know, that's what I'm trying to tell you." Julia tells Barnabas that he must "let go of the past" if he is to go on. "You found yourself in this time, with these people. In a way, in this house, you've preserved a part of your own time, as a sanctuary of sorts... but it can't be a fortress, Barnabas. You've got to move forward and think of your future." Barnabas answers "My future...." Julia says "You'll find...someone, I'm sure..." Barnabas replies "Someone..... yes, perhaps. Then again, perhaps not. I...." Julia turns to him and says "Yes?" He stammers a bit and says "I need to take a walk and think..." He's halfway out the door before he turns and says "Thank you for your concern, Julia. It.... you mean a lot to me." He leaves as Julia sighs and wonders.

Barnabas walks through the woods. We hear him think "Perhaps I should've brought Julia with me on my walk... I'm not sure. So much is going through my mind now.... if only I had done things differently in my life.... I may have avoided the strange destiny that has been my fate..." He reaches Widow's Hill and looks over the horizon. "A viewpoint on an enormous world... a world of so many places and possibilities.... here and also in the past..." he thinks as we dissolve to a memory in Barnabas' mind..... In a small room, Angelique finishes getting dressed in 18th century clothes. She brushes her hair in the mirror with a smile when Barnabas, also dressed in his 18th century garb, moves behind her and kisses her. "I hope that's not a good bye kiss," she says. "No," Barnabas answers. "I'm sure we will see each other again before my father and I depart for Boston." He walks to a window and looks outside. "I can never understand how people can live in such a climate as Martinique... where's it's summer all year round." Angelique answers that you get used to it. "Why are you in such a rush to return to Boston?" she asks. "I would think you'd want to stay here..... now." Barnabas stammers a bit, and says that "It's beyond my control. I simply cannot." Angelique grows a little angry and says "It seems many of your passions are out of your control as well." Barnabas takes her hand. "I'm sorry. I just.... I just need time. Please don't ask me anymore. This moment is difficult as it is." Angelique holds back her hurt and says "Indeed." Barnabas hurriedly leaves and Angelique grumbles. "You will be mine, Barnabas....I swear it..." she mutters. Outside, Barnabas sighs a deep sigh. "Why did I do that..." we hear him think. "What am I doing here? Only because Josette finds me invisible did I even notice her handmaiden.... a lovely woman, but..... a handmaiden.... my father would surely disown me if he knew. He must never know. Gentlemanly discretion must apply." Barnabas walks away a little and thinks "Why should I live for my father and not for myself?" He starts to turn back towards Angelique's servants' quarters when a messenger boy gives him a note. Barnabas reads it and his eyes open wide. We cut to Josette (Kathryn Leigh Scott) standing on the balcony of a large house. She walks back inside, and there is a knock at her door. The room looks very much like what will be her room in the old house, but larger. "Come in," she says, and Barnabas enters. "I got your note," he says. "Please tell me you mean it." Josette smiles at him. "Did you really think I could play hard to get for the rest of your life? All the time you tutored me in English, all I did was watch your eyes...." Barnabas smiles, and takes her hand. "My eyes were fixed upon you, as they are now," he says, kissing her hand. She leans towards him, and he kisses her passionately. "Finally!" he says. "I finally know how you really feel!" Josette says "And how do you feel?" Barnabas smiles and says "Like a man in love," before kissing her again. We dissolve back to Barnabas sitting alone, looking out over the waves on Widow's Hill. "A man in love..." we hear him think. "But with whom? Did I really love them both that day? What if I had turned back and gotten that note after I damned my father's snobbery and told Angelique what was in my heart... everything would be different.... " He stands up and thinks a moment. "Though in an odd way, I wonder what would have happened to Quentin and Vicky and David and all the others if I hadn't been here now.... if I hadn't made that choice...." His thoughts are interrupted by Harrison's shouts of "Barnabas! Is that you?" Barnabas looks up and says "Harrison? I'm over here!" Harrison walks up and says "There you are! Somehow I thought I'd find you here when you weren't at the old house." Barnabas says "I was just sitting and thinking." Harrison answers "I need your help with something." Barnabas wonders what.

Harrison tells Barnabas that he successfully closed the time portals in Quentin's old laboratory, "but the problem persists in the West Wing. You must come with me there." Barnabas is confused, and asks "What can I do? I thought perhaps Stokes would be the one to..." Harrison says "No, it has to be you. I can't really explain it all now, only that you must come with me to the West Wing." Barnabas tells Harrison that "When I passed into the strange world of parallel time almost two years ago, it didn't have any affect on the structure of the doorway. I don't understand how you think I can help." Harrison answers "Barnabas, the doorways are created by the subconscious desires of the different people who come within the temporal field left over from the laboratory, the same field that opened the original passageway in the east wing." Barnabas says "You want me to create a doorway?" Harrison answers "Yes, Barnabas. Because I know the doorway that you'll create, the one that leads to the time and place where you'd want to live, is the key to everything." Barnabas gasps.