D.A.

You had a gun with you?

ANDY

Yes. I did.

FADE TO BLACK: 3RD TITLE UP

D.A.

When they arrived, you went up to the house and murdered them?

ANDY

No. I was sobering up. I realized she wasn't worth it. I decided to let her have her quickie divorce.

D.A.

Quickie divorce indeed. A .38 caliber divorce, wrapped in a handtowel to muffle the shots, isn't that what you mean? And then you shot her lover!

ANDY

I did not. I got back in the car and drove home to sleep it off. Along the way, I stopped and threw my gun into the Royal River. I feel I've been very clear on this point.

D.A.

Yes, you have. Where I get hazy, though, is the part where the cleaning woman shows up the next morning and finds your wife and her lover in bed, riddled with .38 caliber bullets. Does that strike you as a fantastic coincidence, Mr. Dufresne, or is it just me?

ANDY

(softly)

Yes. It does.

D.A.

I'm sorry, Mr. Dufresne, I don't think the jury heard that.

ANDY

Yes. It does.

D.A.

Does what?

ANDY

Strike me as a fantastic coincidence.

D.A.

On that, sir, we are in accord…

FADE TO BLACK: 4TH TITLE UP

D.A.

You claim you threw your gun into the Royal River before the murders took place. That's rather convenient.

ANDY

It's the truth.

D.A.

You recall Lt. Mincher's testimony? He and his men dragged that river for three days and nary a gun was found. So no comparison can be made between your gun and the bullets taken from the bloodstained corpses of the victims. That's also rather convenient, isn't it, Mr. Dufresne?

ANDY

(faint, bitter smile)

Since I am innocent of this crime, sir, I find it decidedly inconvenient the gun was never found.

FADE TO BLACK: 5TH TITLE UP

INT -- COURTROOM -- DAY (1946)

The D.A. holds the jury spellbound with his closing summation:

D.A.

Ladies and gentlemen, you've heard all the evidence, you know all the facts. We have the accused at the scene of the crime. We have foot prints. Tire tracks. Bullets scattered on the ground which bear his fingerprints. A broken bourbon bottle, likewise with fingerprints. Most of all, we have a beautiful young woman and her lover lying dead in each other's arms. They had sinned. But was their crime so great as to merit a death sentence?

He gestures to Andy sitting quietly with his ATTORNEY.

D.A.

I suspect Mr. Dufresne's answer to that would be yes. I further suspect he carried out that sentence on the night of September 21st, this year of our Lord, 1946, by pumping four bullets into his wife and another four into Glenn Quentin. And while you think about that, think about this…

He picks up a revolver, spins the cylinder before their eyes like a carnival barker spinning a wheel of fortune.

D.A.

A revolver holds six bullets, not eight. I submit to you this was not a hot-blooded crime of passion! That could at least be understood, if not condoned. No, this was revenge of a much more brutal and cold-blooded nature. Consider! Four bullets per victim! Not six shots fired, but eight! That means he fired the gun empty…and then stopped to reload so he could shoot each of them again! An extra bullet per lover…right in the head.