"IN THE EYES OF GOD"
In the opening scene Isabel and her father argue because he has promised her hand in marriage to a mysterious nobleman. Isabel's frail father wishes this marriage as he is dying (or so he constantly fantasizes) and his daughter will be well cared for with Ezra’s riches. But something about Ezra is just not right, his very face chills Isabel. Steadily, Isabel’s father’s poetic delusions of his own demise increase, and by the time he invites Ezra to dinner-behind Isabel’s back- he believes he is seeing the gates to heaven. When Ezra appears on her doorstep for dinner, he is more handsome and charismatic than Isabel had remembered, but she is still suspicious and acts
coldly. The night before, in her nightmare, Ezra’s hands dripped with blood. As the night progresses though, the two debate over religion and philosophy, and Isabel is drawn in by Ezra’s honesty and magnetic personality. As the sun rises, Ezra leaves Isabel with a mysterious protective pendant, and invites her to visit his home in the woods. In the morning, Isabel enters to find what she believes is her father’s corpse. She begins to weep and mourn his passing, when he suddenly wakes and
slowly tells the tale of his own demise. A furious Isabel is faced with a very confusing turning point in her life. She lives with a ghost of a father, whom she dearly loves, but who is faced with senility and constant delusions of death. She is being married off to a strange man she knows nothing of and feels a mixture of suspicion and admiration for.

In which life would she be better off? From
his bed of decaying flowers, Isabel’s father tells her of “heaven”. More information is revealed to theaudience about Ezra. In nobly giving his shirt to a poor beggar, he reveals a strange tattoo-a mark that matches the necklace that he gave to Isabel. Later, when Isabel wandersin to the woods to meet Ezra, a beggar who has attacked her is frightened away when he sees her pendant. There must be a great fear of Ezra for this pendant to wield such protective power. When Isabel finally sees Ezra she tells of her trauma with the beggar, and they both agree to the pendant’s strange power. “In what you wear around your neck you will find justice” Ezra states. Isabel returns home to tell her father that Ezra has proposed to her. But she opens his bedroom door
to find a “corpse” once again, so she turns to other matters. Isabel desperately needs to quell her curiosity about Ezra’s home and his mysterious business dealings.

That night she travels into the woods once more, leaving a trail of flowers behind her, despite warnings of thieves and other scoundrels. Finally, she throws her bouquet into the air-she has arrived at her destination. Slowly opening the door, she sees what must be the stark hovel of thieves, not of her bridegroom, but in the corner leans his walking stick. Isabel jumps and hides when a rowdy parade of men enters, followed by Ezra. In a rage Ezra mounts a table, wrapping himself in an altar cloth. The men have dragged in a drugged prostitute, which Ezra proceeds to berate from his lofty pulpit. His life’s work has been to rid the world of filth and decay, and the prostitute embodies all that is evil. Isabel cannot believe her eyes when Ezra dismembers the prostitute’s finger to retrieve a stolen ring, and then tosses the finger aside, ordering the men to dispose of her. Running all the way home, Isabel is only greeted by her father’s “corpse” once again. He reminds her that he cannot be released from his mortal coil until she is married to Ezra. Isabel’s two life options are equally disturbing, which leads her to
an anguished night of soul-searching and rage.

Her wedding day is as pleasant and sunny as can be. Isabel and Ezra talk intimately by a tree, where he again comments on the wonderful power of the pendant, and of their eternal bond as a fortress against evil. But as Isabel turns a walks away,
lost in thought, she slowly pulls the amulet out, and instead of the pendant there hangs
her greatest protection of all...