EPI-LOG ARTICLE on Beauty and the Beast
review by Nina Johnson. Click here for contents.

Episode 32 (Season 2, Episode 10)

A Gentle Rain

A Gentle Rain  (airdate: Feb 17, 1989).  Catherine and Vincent are decorating a chamber with candles and lilacs for a tunnel dweller, Kanin, who is surprising his wife on their anniversary.  They finish up and leave as Kanin and his wife arrive.  The next day Kanin is in a hardware store looking for tools to use in his stonemasonry work.  He is looking at a hammer when he sees a middle-aged woman stop across the aisle and look at him.  The woman walks on, then stops to look at Kanin again.  When she turns around, he is gone.  She goes out the back of the store hoping to catch him but he has vanished.  Kanin runs through the tunnels.  Mouse and Pascal see him and ask what is the matter, but he keeps running.  Vincent comes to Kanin later while his is carving out a new chamber.  Vincent knows something is wrong as Kanin attacks the rock instead of working on it.  Catherine is at work on the phone trying to get a court ruling.  Joe drops a stack of folders on her desk and she says "No".  He tells her it is her turn to check into the active cases.  She flips through the file while she waits on the phone.  One of the files contains a photo.  The picture is Kanin's and the file says he is wanted for bail jumping.  The charge: manslaughter.  Catherine goes to the tunnels and interrupts Kanin, Mouse and Kipper.  She wants to speak with Kanin alone and they go to the Great Hall.  She tells him about the file and that she is supposed to find him.  He explains about the accident and that he had been drinking for the first time ever.  He has not done so since and hid in the tunnels before the final verdict.  He asks Catherine what she is going to do and she says that the question is, what is he going to do.

    Kanin goes to his wife and tells her the whole story.  He says that he has had to live with the accident every day for sixteen years.  Olivia is understanding and decides to remain with him in the tunnels.  Catherine has a visitor in her office.  It is Mrs. Davis, the mother of the little boy that Kanin killed.  Catherine begs Joe not to maker her see the woman and he finally agrees to help her out.  Armed with the file, Catherine goes in to talk with Mrs. Davis.  She tells her that she has seen Kanin and wants to know how they are progressing.  She apologizes to Catherine for being any trouble.  Joe enters as planned, but Catherine sends him away because the woman's sorrow has reached her.  Catherine agrees to try her best.  Catherine talks with Vincent that night hoping for his advice.  He knows that Kanin feels remorse that the child's mother is in pain.  Catherine wants to know if she is to be a friend or a prosecutor.  His answer is for her to follow the path of truth.  Later Vincent and Father talk with Kanin and Olivia.  Father is insistent that Kanin face up to the consequences since tunnel law will not allow sanctuary from broken above laws.  Kanin points out that his life has been a model one since he came to live in the tunnels.  He says he is serving a life sentence and that should be enough.  Kanin and his wife then tell Father and Vincent that they will live in an unprotected part of the tunnels.  His wife will not leave him and he will not face the woman.  Catherine and Joe are talking when Mrs. Davis appears.  Catherine takes her to a coffee shop where she tells her that the police are handling the case.  Mrs. Davis calls her bluff saying that she was just at the police station.  They don't have any men on the case.  Mrs. Davis says that Kanin ruined her life before and since she saw him, he is ruining it again.  She can't sleep or work and is having trouble with her boyfriend.  She describes the accident to Catherine.  She couldn't miss the oncoming car, then there was a fire that trapped her son.  She could barely reach him.  She told him she loved him but doesn't know if he heard her.  Catherine tearfully tells Mrs. Davis that she will find and prosecute Kanin.  But Mrs. Davis is unconvinced.  The Tunnel Council is meeting to determine Kanin's fate.  Almost all approve of letting them stay.  Catherine shows up to explain how Mrs. Davis' life is being ruined.  Someone says that the woman is not a member of the community and that her situation has little to do with them.  Vincent speaks up and says "Does justice belong only to the people we know?"  Kanin and his wife are packing.  Vincent comes to the chamber and Olivia takes her child out.  Kanin tells him he can not face the woman, but Vincent tells him that he needs to face his mistakes.  His family can wait in the tunnels until he comes back.  Kanin tells Vincent that there is nothing he can do to help the woman.  Vincent says that there is, he can change her life.  Beaten, Kanin asks Vincent what he can say to her?  Mrs. Davis waits in a conference room.  Kanin turns himself in and Catherine tells her about him and his family, which includes a three-month old baby.  She too has no idea what to say to the man she has waited for years to confront.  Kanin enters the room and Mrs. Davis looks at him with an accusing and uncaring face.  Kanin tells her he is sorry and then begins to cry.  He repeats how sorry he is and she replies "so am I."  She comes over to him but stops just before touching him and leaves the room.  Kanin hangs his head and continues to cry.  Vincent and Catherine lie on her balcony that night while he reads poetry to her.  She is snuggled up to him and he stops when he sees her eyes close.  She tells him that she isn't asleep that she is just happy.  She is glad that now Mrs. Davis and Kanin can begin to heal over sixteen years worth of pain.

Guest cast: Piper Laurie as Mrs. Davis, Elaine Heilveil as Olivia, Scot Jaeck as Kanin Evans, Chris Paul Davis as John, Ritch Brinkley as William.

Writers: M. M. Shelly Moore and Linda Campanelli

Director: Gus Trikonis.