CORMAC McCARTHY

Winner of the National Book Award
and the National Book Critics Circle Award

“McCarthy’s prose [is] the most laudable, his characters the most fully inhabited, his sense of place the most bloodworthy and thoroughly felt of any living writer’s.”

—Esquire

“McCarthy has a voice that is unmistakably his…. Its elegiac rhythm captures the badlands of Texas and northern Mexico with a passion most writers either couldn’t muster or wouldn’t dare.”

—The Boston Globe

“The deity that presides over Mr. McCarthy’s world has not modeled itself on humanity: its voice most resembles the one that addressed Job out of the whirlwind.”

—The New York Times Book Review

“McCarthy meditates on creation, stares at it. He does not look past appearances, he looks through them… The world is set before us with fever-dream clarity … and then, with simile and metaphor, he sweeps everything into profound animation… McCarthy is writing entirely against the grain of our times, against the haste and the distraction and the moral diffusion… As an old, more spacious world rises up, we experience a more vivid and consequential feeling about human destiny, about good and evil and matters of the spirit.”

—The New Republic

“Like the novelists he admires—Melville, Dostoyevsky, Faulkner—CORMAC McCARTHY has created an imaginative oeuvre greater and deeper than any single book. Such writers wrestle with the gods themselves.”

—The Washington Post Book World

This is a room in a tenement building in a black ghetto in New York City. There is a kitchen with a stove and a large refrigerator. A door to the outer hallway and another presumably to a bedroom. The hallway door is fitted with a bizarre collection of locks and bars. There is a cheap formica table in the room and two chrome and plastic chairs. There is a drawer in the table. On the table is a bible and a newspaper. A pair of glasses. A pad and pencil. A large black man is sitting in one chair (stage right) and in the other a middle-aged white man dressed in running pants and athletic shoes. He wears a T-shirt and the jacket—which matches the pants—hangs on the chair behind him.

Black

So what am I supposed to do with you, Professor?

White

Why are you supposed to do anything?

Black

I done told you. This aint none of my doin. I left out of here this mornin to go to work you wasnt no part of my plans at all. But here you is.

White

It doesnt mean anything. Everything that happens doesnt mean something else.

Black

Mm hm. It dont.

White

No. It doesnt.

Black

What’s it mean then?

White

It doesnt mean anything. You run into people and maybe some of them are in trouble or whatever but it doesnt mean that you’re responsible for them.

Black

Mm hm.

White

Anyway, people who are always looking out for perfect strangers are very often people who wont look out for the ones they’re supposed to look out for. In my opinion. If you’re just doing what you’re supposed to then you dont get to be a hero.

Black

And that would be me.

White

I dont know. Would it?

Black

Well, I can see how they might be some truth in that. But in this particular case I might say I sure didnt know what sort of person I was supposed to be on the lookout for or what I was supposed to do when I found him. In this particular case they wasnt but one thing to go by.

White

And that was?

Black

That was that there he is standin there. And I can look at him and I can say: Well, he dont look like my brother. But there he is. Maybe I better look again.

White

And that’s what you did.

Black

Well, you was kindly hard to ignore. I got to say that your approach was pretty direct.

White

I didnt approach you. I didnt even see you.

Black

Mm hm.

White

I should go. I’m beginning to get on your nerves.

Black

No you aint. Dont pay no attention to me. You seem like a sweet man, Professor. I reckon what I dont understand is how come you to get yourself in such a fix.

White

Yeah.

Black

Are you okay? Did you sleep last night?

White

No.

Black

When did you decide that today was the day? Was they somethin special about it?

White

No. Well. Today is my birthday. But I certainly dont regard that as special.

Black

Well happy birthday, Professor.

White

Thank you.

Black

So you seen your birthday was comin up and that seemed like the right day.

White

Who knows? Maybe birthdays are dangerous. Like Christmas. Ornaments hanging from the trees, wreaths from the doors, and bodies from the steampipes all over America.

Black

Mm. Dont say much for Christmas, does it?

White

Christmas is not what it used to be.

Black

I believe that to be a true statement. I surely do.

White

I’ve got to go.

He gets up and takes his jacket off the back of the chair and lifts it over his shoulders and then puts his arms in the sleeves rather than putting his arms in first one at a time.

Black

You always put your coat on like that?

White

What’s wrong with the way I put my coat on?

Black

I didnt say they was nothin wrong with it. I just wondered if that was your regular method.

White

I dont have a regular method. I just put it on.

Black

Mm hm.

White

It’s what, effeminate?

Black

Mm.

White

What?

Black

Nothin. I’m just settin here studyin the ways of professors.

White

Yeah. Well, I’ve got to go.

The black gets up.

Black

Well. Let me get my coat.

White

Your coat?

Black

Yeah.

White

Where are you going?

Black

Goin with you.

White

What do you mean? Going with me where?

Black

Goin with you wherever you goin.

White

No you’re not.

Black

Yeah I am.

White

I’m going home.

Black

All right.

White

All right? You’re not going home with me.

Black

Sure I am. Let me get my coat.

White

You cant go home with me.

Black

Why not?

White

You cant.

Black

What. You can go home with me but I cant go home with you?

White

No. I mean no, that’s not it. I just need to go home.

Black

You live in a apartment?

White

Yes.

Black

What. They dont let black folks in there?

White

No. I mean of course they do. Look. No more jokes. I’ve got to go. I’m very tired.

Black

Well I just hope we dont run into no hassle about you gettin me in there.

White

You’re serious.

Black

Oh I think you know I’m serious.

White

You cant be serious.

Black

I’m as serious as a heart attack.

White

Why are you doing this?

Black

Me? I aint got no choice in the matter.

White

Of course you have a choice.

Black

No I aint.

White

Who appointed you my guardian angel?

Black

Let me get my coat.

White

Answer the question.

Black

You know who appointed me. I didnt ask for you to leap into my arms down in the subway this mornin.

White

I didnt leap into your arms.

Black

You didnt?

White

No. I didnt.

Black

Well how did you get there then?

The professor stands with his head lowered. He looks at the chair and then turns and goes and sits down in it.

Black

What. Now we aint goin?

White

Do you really think that Jesus is in this room?

Black

No. I dont think he’s in this room.

White

You dont?

Black

I know he’s in this room.

The professor folds his hands at the table and lowers his head. The black pulls out the other chair and sits again.

Black

Its the way you put it, Professor. Be like me askin you do you think you got your coat on. You see what I’m sayin?

White

It’s not the same thing. It’s a matter of agreement. If you and I say that I have my coat on and Cecil says that I’m naked and I have green skin and a tail then we might want to think about where we should put Cecil so that he wont hurt himself.

Black

Who’s Cecil?

White

He’s not anybody. He’s just a hypothetical… There’s not any Cecil. He’s just a person I made up to illustrate a point.

Black

Made up.

White

Yes.

Black

Mm.

White

We’re not going to get into this again are we? It’s not the same thing. The fact that I made Cecil up.

Black

But you did make him up.

White

Yes.

Black

And his view of things dont count.

White

No. That’s why I made him up. I could have changed it around. I could have made you the one that didnt think I was wearing a coat.

Black

And was green and all that shit you said.

White

Yes.

Black

But you didnt.

White

No.

Black

You loaded it off on Cecil.

White

Yes.

Black

But Cecil cant defend hisself cause the fact that he aint in agreement with everbody else makes his word no good. I mean aside from the fact that you made him up and he’s green and everthing.

White

He’s not the one who’s green. I am. Where is this going?

Black

I’m just tryin to find out about Cecil.

White

I dont think so. Can you see Jesus?

Black

No. I cant see him.

White

But you talk to him.

Black

I dont miss a day.

White

And he talks to you.

Black

He has talked to me. Yes.

White

Do you hear him? Like out loud?

Black

Not out loud. I dont hear a voice. I dont hear my own, for that matter. But I have heard him.

White

Well why couldnt Jesus just be in your head?

Black

He is in my head.

White

Well I don’t understand what it is that you’re trying to tell me.

Black

I know you dont, honey. Look. The first thing you got to understand is that I aint got a original thought in my head. If it aint got the lingerin scent of divinity to it then I aint interested.

White

The lingering scent of divinity.

Black

Yeah. You like that?

White

It’s not bad.

Black

I heard it on the radio. Black preacher. But the point is I done tried it the other way. And I dont mean chippied, neither. Runnin blindfold through the woods with the bit tween your teeth. Oh man. Didnt I try it though. If you can find a soul that give it a better shot than me I’d like to meet him. I surely would. And what do you reckon it got me?

White

I dont know. What did it get you?

Black

Death in life. That’s what it got me.

White

Death in life.

Black

Yeah. Walkin around death. Too dead to even know enough to lay down.

White

I see.

Black

I dont think so. But let me ask you this question.

White

All right.

Black

Have you ever read this book?

White

I’ve read parts of it. I’ve read in it.

Black

Have you ever read it?

White

I read The Book of Job.

Black

Have. You. Ever. Read. It.

White

No.

Black

But you is read a lot of books.

White

Yes.

Black

How many would you say you read?

White

I’ve no idea.

Black

Ball park.

White

I dont know. Two a week maybe. A hundred a year. For close to forty years.

The black takes up his pencil and licks it and falls to squinting at his pad, adding numbers laboriously, his tongue in the corner of his mouth, one hand on his head.

White

Forty times a hundred is four thousand.

Black

(Almost laughing) I’m just messin with you, Professor. Give me a number. Any number you like. And I’ll give you forty times it back.

White

Twenty-six.

Black

A thousand and forty.

White

A hundred and eighteen.

Black

Four thousand seven hundred and twenty.

White

Four thousand seven hundred and twenty.

Black

Yeah.

White

The answer is the question.

Black

Say what?

White

That’s your new number.

Black

Four thousand seven hundred and twenty?

White

Yes.

Black

That’s a big number, Professor.

White

Yes it is.

Black

Do you know the answer?

White

No. I dont.

Black

It’s a hundred and eighty-eight thousand and eight hundred.

They sit.

White

Let me have that.

The black slides the pad and pencil across the table. The professor does the figures and looks at them and looks at the black. He slides the pencil and paper back across the table and sits back.

White

How do you do that?

Black

Numbers is the black man’s friend. Butter and eggs. Crap table. You quick with numbers you can put the mojo on you brother. Confiscate the contents of his pocketbook. You get a lot of time to practice that shit in the jailhouse.

White

I see.

Black

But let’s get back to all them books you done read. You think maybe you read four thousand books.

White

Probably. Maybe more than that.

Black

But you aint read this one.

White

No. Not the whole book. No.

Black

Why is that?

White

I dont know.

Black

What would you say is the best book that ever was wrote?

White

I have no idea.

Black

Take a shot.

White

There are a lot of good books.

Black

Well pick one.

White

Maybe War and Peace.

Black

All right. You think that’s a better book than this one?

White

I dont know. They’re different kinds of books.

Black

This War and Peace book. That’s a book that somebody made up, right?

White

Well, yes.

Black

So is that how it’s different from this book?

White

Not really. In my view they’re both made up.

Black

Mm. Aint neither one of em true.

White

Not in the historical sense. No.

Black

So what would be a true book?

White

I suppose maybe a history book. Gibbon’s Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire might be one. At least the events would be actual events. They would be things that had happened.

Black

Mm hm. You think that book is as good a book as this book here?

White

The bible.

Black

The bible.

White

I dont know. Gibbon is a cornerstone. It’s a major book.

Black

And a true book. Dont forget that.

White

And a true book. Yes.

Black

But is it as good a book.

White

I dont know. I dont know as you can make a comparison. You’re talking about apples and pears.

Black

No we aint talkin bout no apples and pears, Professor. We talkin bout books. Is that Decline and Fall book as good a book as this book here. Answer the question.

White

I might have to say no.

Black

It’s more true but it aint as good.

White

If you like.

Black

It aint what I like. It’s what you said.

White

All right.

The black lays the bible back down on the table.

Black

It used to say here on the cover fore it got wore off: The greatest book ever written. You think that might be true?

White

It might.

Black

You read good books.

White

I try to. Yes.

Black

But not the best book. Why is that?

White

I need to go.

Black

You dont need to go, Professor. Stay here and visit with me.

White

You’re afraid I’ll go back to the train station.

Black

You might. Just stay with me.

White

What if I promised I wouldnt?

Black

You might anyways.

White

Dont you have to go to work?

Black

I was on my way to work.

White

A funny thing happened to you on your way to work.

Black

Yes it did.

White

Will they fire you?

Black

Naw. They aint goin fire me.

White

You could call in.

Black

Aint got a phone. Anyways, they know if I aint there I aint comin. I aint a late sort of person.

White

Why dont you have a phone?

Black

I dont need one. The junkies’d steal it anyways.

White

You could get a cheap one.

Black

You cant get too cheap for a junky. But let’s get back to you.

White

Let’s stick with you for a minute.

Black

All right.

White

Can I ask you something?

Black

Sure you can.

White

Where were you standing? I never saw you.

Black

You mean when you took your amazin leap?

White

Yes.

Black

I was on the platform.

White

On the platform.

Black

Yeah.

White

Well I didnt see you.

Black

I was just standin there on the platform. Mindin my own business. And here you come. Haulin ass.

White

I’d looked all around to make sure there was no one there. Particularly no children. There was nobody around.

Black

Nope. Just me.

White

Well I dont know where you could have been.

Black

Mm. Professor you fixin to get spooky on me now. Maybe I was behind a post or somethin.

White

There wasnt any post.

Black

So what are we sayin here? You lookin at some big black angel got sent down here to grab your honky ass out of the air at the last possible minute and save you from destruction?

White

No. I dont think that.

Black

Such a thing aint possible.

White

No. It isnt.

Black

Well you the one suggested it.

White

I didnt suggest any such thing. You’re the one put in the stuff about angels. I never said anything about angels. I dont believe in angels.

Black

What is it you believe in?

White

A lot of things.

Black

All right.

White

All right what?

Black

All right what things.

White

I believe in things.

Black

You said that.

White

Probably I dont believe in a lot of things that I used to believe in but that doesnt mean I dont believe in anything.

Black

Well give me a for instance.

White

Mostly the value of things.

Black

Value of things.

White

Yes.

Black

Okay. What things.

White

Lots of things. Cultural things, for instance. Books and music and art. Things like that.

Black

All right.

White

Those are the kinds of things that have value to me. They’re the foundations of civilization. Or they used to have value. I suppose they dont have so much any more.

Black

What happened to em?

White

People stopped valuing them. I stopped valuing them. To a certain extent. I’m not sure I could tell you why. That world is largely gone. Soon it will be wholly gone.

Black

I aint sure I’m followin you, Professor.

White

There’s nothing to follow. It’s all right. The things that I loved were very frail. Very fragile. I didnt know that. I thought they were indestructible. They werent.

Black

And that’s what sent you off the edge of the platform. It wasnt nothin personal.

White

It is personal. That’s what an education does. It makes the world personal.

Black

Hm.

White

Hm what.

Black

Well. I was just thinkin that them is some pretty powerful words. I dont know that I got a answer about any of that and it might be that they aint no answer. But still I got to ask what is the use of notions such as them if it wont keep you glued down to the platform when the Sunset Limited comes through at eighty mile a hour.

White

Good question.

Black

I thought so.

White

I dont have an answer to any of that either. Maybe it’s not logical. I dont know. I dont care. I’ve been asked didnt I think it odd that I should be present to witness the death of everything and I do think it’s odd but that doesnt mean it’s not so. Someone has to be here.

Black

But you dont intend to stick around for it.

White

No. I dont.

Black

So let me see if I got this straight. You sayin that all this culture stuff is all they ever was tween you and the Sunset Limited.

White

It’s a lot.

Black

But it busted out on you.

White

Yes.

Black

You a culture junky.

White

If you like. Or I was. Maybe you’re right. Maybe I have no beliefs. I believe in the Sunset Limited.

Black

Damn, Professor.

White

Damn indeed.

Black

No beliefs.

White

The things I believed in dont exist any more. It’s foolish to pretend that they do. Western Civilization finally went up in smoke in the chimneys at Dachau but I was too infatuated to see it. I see it now.

Black

You a challenge, Professor. Did you know that?

White

Well, there’s no reason for you to become involved in my problems. I should go.

Black

You got any friends?

White

No.

Black

You aint got even one friend?

White

No.

Black

You got to be kiddin me, Professor. Not one?

White

Not really. No.

Black

Well tell me about that one.

White

What one?

Black

The not really one.

White

I have a friend at the university. Not a close friend. We have lunch from time to time.

Black

But that’s about as good as it gets.

White

What do you mean?

Black

That’s about all you got in the way of friends.

White

Yes.

Black

Mm. Well. If that’s the best friend you got then I reckon that’s your best friend. Aint it?

White

I dont know.

Black

What did you do to him.

White

What did I do to him?

Black

Yeah.

White

I didnt do anything to him.

Black

Mm hm.

White

I didnt do anything to him. What makes you think I did something to him?

Black

I dont know. Did you?

White

No. What is it you think I did to him?

Black

I dont know. I’m waitin on you to tell me.

White

Well there’s nothing to tell.

Black

But you didnt leave him no note or nothin. When you decided to take the train.

White

No.

Black

Your best friend?

White

He’s not my best friend.

Black

I thought we just got done decidin that he was.

White

You just got done deciding.

Black

You ever tell him you was thinkin about this?

White

No.

Black

Damn, Professor.

White

Why should I?

Black

I dont know. Maybe cause he’s your best friend?

White

I told you. We’re not all that close.

Black

Not all that close.

White

No.

Black

He’s your best friend only you aint all that close.

White

If you like.

Black

Not to where you’d want to bother him about a little thing like dyin.

White

(Looking around the room) Look. Suppose I were to give you my word that I would just go home and that I wouldnt try to kill myself en route.

Black

Suppose I was to give you my word that I wouldnt listen to none of your bullshit.

White

So what am I, a prisoner here?

Black

You know bettern that. Anyway, you was a prisoner fore you got here. Death Row prisoner. What did your daddy do?

White

What?

Black

I said what did your daddy do. What kind of work.

White

He was a lawyer.

Black

Lawyer.

White

Yes.

Black

What kind of law did he do?

White

He was a government lawyer. He didnt do criminal law or things like that.

Black

Mm hm. What would be a thing like criminal law?

White

I dont know. Divorce law, maybe.

Black

Yeah. Maybe you got a point. What did he die of?

White

Who said he was dead?

Black

Is he dead?

White

Yes.

Black

What did he die of?

White

Cancer.

Black

Cancer. So he was sick for a while.

White

Yes. He was.

Black

Did you go see him?

White

No.

Black

How come?

White

I didnt want to.

Black

Well how come you didnt want to?

White

I dont know. I just didnt. Maybe I didnt want to remember him that way.

Black

Bullshit. Did he ask you to come?

White

No.

Black

But your mama did.

White

She may have. I dont remember.

Black

Come on, Professor. She asked you to come.

White

Okay. Yes.

Black

And what did you tell her?

White

I told her I would.

Black

But you didnt.

White

No.

Black

How come?

White

He died.

Black

Yeah, but that aint it. You had time to go see him and you didnt do it.

White

I suppose.

Black

You waited till he was dead.

White

Okay. So I didnt go and see my father.

Black

Your daddy is layin on his deathbed dyin of cancer. Your mama settin there with him. Holdin his hand. He in all kinds of pain. And they ask you to come see him one last time fore he dies and you tell em no. You aint comin. Please tell me I got some part of this wrong.

White

If that’s the way you want to put it.

Black

Well how would you put it?

White

I dont know.

Black

That’s the way it is. Aint it?

White

I suppose.

Black

No you dont suppose. Is it or aint it?

White

Yes.

Black

Well. Let me see if I can find my train schedule.

He opens the table drawer and rummages through it.

Black

See when that next uptown express is due.

White

I’m not sure I see the humor.

Black

I’m glad to hear you say that, Professor. Cause I aint sure either. I just get more amazed by the minute, that’s all. How come you cant see yourself, honey? You plain as glass. I can see the wheels turnin in there. The gears. And I can see the light too. Good light. True light. Cant you see it?

White

No. I cant.

Black

Well bless you, brother. Bless you and keep you. Cause it’s there.

They sit.

White

When were you in the penitentiary?

Black

Long time ago.

White

What were you in for?

Black

Murder.

White

Really?

Black

Now who would claim to be a murderer that wasnt one?

White

You called it the jailhouse.

Black

Yeah?

White

Do most blacks call the penitentiary the jailhouse?

Black

Naw. Just us old country niggers. We kind of make it a point to call things for what they is. I’d hate to guess how many names they is for the jailhouse. I’d hate to have to count em.

White

Do you have a lot of jailhouse stories?

Black

Jailhouse stories.

White

Yes.

Black

I dont know. I used to tell jailhouse stories some but they kindly lost their charm. Maybe we ought to talk about somethin more cheerful.

White

Have you ever been married?

Black

Married.

White

Yes.

Black

(Softly) Oh man.

White

What.

Black

Maybe we ought to take another look at them jailhouse stories. (He shakes his head, laughing soundlessly. He pinches the bridge of his nose, his eyes shut.) Oh my.

White

Do you have any children?

Black

Naw, Professor, I aint got nobody. Everbody in my family is dead. I had two boys. They been dead for years. Just about everbody I ever knowed is dead, far as that goes. You might want to think about that. I might be a hazard to your health.

White

You were always in a lot of trouble?

Black

Yeah. I was. I liked it. Maybe I still do. I done seven years hard time and I was lucky not to of done a lot more. I hurt a lot of people. I’d smack em around a little and then they wouldnt get up again.

White

But you dont get in trouble now.

Black

No.

White

But you still like it?

Black

Well, maybe I’m just condemned to it. Bit in the ass by my own karma. But I’m on the other side now. You want to help people that’s in trouble you pretty much got to go where the trouble is at. You aint got a lot of choice.

White

And you want to help people in trouble.

Black

Yeah.

White

Why is that?

The black tilts his head and studies him.

Black

You aint ready for that.

White

How about just the short answer.

Black

That is the short answer.

White

How long have you been here?

Black

You mean in this buildin?

White

Yes.

Black

Six years. Seven, almost.

White

I dont understand why you live here.

Black

As compared to where?

White

Anywhere.

Black

Well I’d say this pretty much is anywhere. I could live in another buildin I reckon. This is all right. I got a bedroom where I can get away. Got a sofa yonder where people can crash. Junkies and crackheads, mostly. Of course they goin to carry off your portables so I dont own nothin. And that’s good. You hang out with the right crowd and you’ll finally get cured of just about ever cravin. They took the refrigerator one time but somebody caught em on the stairs with it and made em bring it back up. Now I got that big sucker yonder. Traded up. Only thing I miss is the music. I aim to get me a steel door for the bedroom. Then I can have me some music again. You got to get the door and the frame together. I’m workin on that. I dont care nothin about television but I miss that music.

White

You dont think this is a terrible place?

Black

Terrible?

White

Yes.

Black

What’s terrible about it?

White

It’s horrible. It’s a horrible life.

Black

Horrible life?

White

Yes.

Black

Damn, Professor. This aint a horrible life. What you talkin bout?

White

This place. It’s a horrible place. Full of horrible people.

Black

Oh my.

White

You must know these people are not worth saving. Even if they could be saved. Which they cant. You must know that.

Black

Well, I always liked a challenge. I started a ministry in prison fore I got out. Now that was a challenge. Lot of the brothers’d show up that they didnt really care nothin bout it. They couldnt of cared less bout the word of God. They just wanted it on their resumé.

White

Resumé?

Black

Resumé. You had brothers in there that had done some real bad shit and they wasnt sorry about a damn thing cept gettin caught. Of course the funny thing was a lot of em did believe in God. Maybe even more than these folks here on the outside. I know I did. You might want to think about that, Professor.

White

I think I’d better go.

Black

You dont need to go, Professor. What am I goin to do, you leave me settin here by myself?

White

You dont need me. You just dont want to feel responsible if anything happens to me.

Black

What’s the difference?

White

I dont know. I just need to go.

Black

Just stay a while. This place is got to be more cheerful than you own.

White

I dont think you have any idea how strange it is for me to be here.

Black

I think I got some idea.

White

I have to go.

Black

Let me ask you somethin.

White

All right.

Black

You ever had one of them days when things was just sort of weird all the way around? When things just kindly fell into place?

White

I’m not sure what you mean.

Black

Just one of them days. Just kind of magic. One of them days when everthing turns out right.

White

I dont know. Maybe. Why?

Black

I just wondered if maybe it aint been kindly a long dry spell for you. Until you finally took up with the notion that that’s the way the world is.

White

The way the world is.

Black

Yeah.

White

And how is that?

Black

I dont know. Long and dry. The point is that even if it might seem that way to you you still got to understand that the sun dont shine up the same dog’s ass ever day. You understand what I’m sayin?

White

If what you’re saying is that I’m simply having a bad day that’s ridiculous.

Black

I dont think you havin a bad day, Professor. I think you havin a bad life.

White

You think I should change my life.

Black

What, are you shittin me?

White

I have to go.

Black

You could hang with me here a little while longer.

White

What about my jailhouse story?

Black

You dont need to hear no jailhouse story.

White

Why not?

Black

Well, you kind of suspicious bout everthing. You think I’m fixin to put you in the trick bag.

White

And you’re not.

Black

Oh no. I am. I just dont want you to know about it.

White

Well, in any case I need to go.

Black

You know you aint ready to hit the street.

White

I have to.

Black

I know you aint got nothin you got to do.

White

And how do you know that?

Black

Cause you aint even supposed to be here.

White

I see your point.

Black

What if I was to tell you a jailhouse story? You stay then?

White

All right. I’ll stay for a while.

Black

My man. All right. Here’s my jailhouse story.

White

Is it a true story?

Black

Oh yeah. It’s a true story. I dont know no other kind.

White

All right.

Black

All right. I’m in the chowline and I’m gettin my chow and this nigger in the line behind me gets into it with the server. Says the beans is cold and he throws the ladle down in the beans. And when he done that they was beans splashed on me. Well, I wasnt goin to get into it over some beans but it did piss me off some. I’d just put on a clean suit—you know, khakis, shirt and trousers—and you only got two a week. And I did say somethin to him like hey man, watch it, or somethin like that. But I went on, and I’m thinkin, just let it go. Let it go. And then this dude says somethin to me and I turned and looked back at him and when I done that he stuck a knife in me. I never even seen it. And the blood is just flyin. And this aint no jailhouse shiv neither. It’s one of them italian switchblades. One of them black and silver jobs. And I didnt do a thing in the world but duck and step under the rail and I reached and got hold of the leg of this table and it come off in my hand just as easy. And it’s got this big long screw stickin out of the end of it and I went to wailin on this nigger’s head and I didnt quit. I beat on it till you couldnt hardly tell it was a head. And that screw’d stick in his head and I’d have to stand on him to pull it out again.

White

What did he say?

Black

What did he say?

White

I mean in the line. What did he say.

Black

I aint goin to repeat it.

White

That doesnt seem fair.

Black

Dont seem fair.

White

No.

Black

Hm. Well, here I’m tellin you a bonafide blood and guts tale from the Big House. The genuine article. And I cant get you to fill in the blanks about what this nigger said?

White

Do you have to use that word?

Black

Use that word.

White

Yes.

Black

We aint makin much progress here, is we?

White

It just seems unnecessary.

Black

You dont want to hear nigger but you about to bail out on me on account of I wont tell you some terrible shit the nigger said. You sure about this?

White

I just dont see why you have to say that word.

Black

Well it’s my story aint it? Anyway I dont remember there bein no Afro-Americans or persons of color there. To the best of my recollection it was just a bunch of niggers.

White

Go ahead.

Black

Well at some point I had pulled the knife out and I reckon I’d done dropped it in the floor. I’m wailin on this nigger’s head and all the time I’m doin that his buddy has got hold of me from behind. But I’m holdin on to the rail with one hand and I aint goin nowhere. Course what I dont know is that this other dude has picked up the knife and he’s tryin to gut me with it. I finally felt the blood and I turned around and busted him in the head and he went skitterin off across the floor, and by now they done pushed the button and the alarm is goin and everbody’s down on the floor and we’re in lockdown and the guard up on the tier is got a shotgun pointed at me and he hollers at me to put down my weapon and get on the floor. And he’s about to shoot me when the lieutenant comes in and hollers at him to hold his fire and he tells me to throw that club down and I looked around and I’m the only one standin. I seen the nigger’s feet stickin out from under the servin counter where he’d crawled so I throwed the thing down and I dont remember much after that. They told me I’d lost about half my blood. I remember slippin around in it but I thought it was this other dude’s.

White

(Dryly) That’s quite a story.

Black

Yeah. That’s really just the introduction to the actual story.

White

Did the man die?

Black

No he didnt. Everbody lived. They thought he was dead but he wasnt. He never was right after that so I never had no more trouble out of him. He was missin a eye and he walked around with his head sort of sideways and one arm hangin down. Couldnt talk right. They finally shipped him off to another facility.

White

But that’s not the whole story.

Black

No. It aint.

White

So what happened.

Black

I woke up in the infirmary. They had done operated on me. My spleen was cut open. Liver. I dont know what all. I come pretty close to dyin. And I had two hundred and eighty stitches holdin me together and I was hurtin. I didnt know you could hurt that bad. And still they got me in leg irons and got me handcuffed to the bed. If you can believe that. And I’m layin there and I hear this voice. Just as clear. Couldnt of been no clearer. And this voice says: If it was not for the grace of God you would not be here. Man. I tried to raise up and look around but of course I couldnt move. Wasnt no need to anyways. They wasnt nobody there. I mean, they was somebody there all right but they wasnt no use in me lookin around to see if I could see him.

White

You dont think this is a strange kind of story?

Black

I do think it’s a strange kind of story.

White

What I mean is that you didnt feel sorry for this man?

Black

You gettin ahead of the story.

White

The story of how a fellow prisoner became a crippled one-eyed halfwit so that you could find God.

Black

Whoa.

White

Well isnt it?

Black

I dont know.

White

You hadnt thought of it that way.

Black

Oh I’d thought of it that way.

White

And?

Black

And what?

White

Isnt that the real story?

Black

Well. I dont want to get on the wrong side of you. You seem to have a powerful wish for that to be the real story. So I will say that that is certainly one way to look at it. I got to concede that. I got to keep you interested.

White

String me along.

Black

That okay with you?

White

And then put me in the what was it? The trick bag?

Black

Yeah.

White

Right.

Black

You got to remember this is a jailhouse story.

White

All right.

Black

Which you specifically asked for.

White

All right.

Black

The point is, Professor, that I aint got the first notion in the world about what makes God tick. I dont know why he spoke to me. I wouldnt of.

White

But you listened.

Black

Well what choice would you have?

White

I dont know. Not listen?

Black

How you goin to do that?

White

Just dont listen.

Black

Do you think he goes around talkin to people that he knows aint goin to listen in the first place? You think he’s got that kind of free time?

White

I see your point.

Black

If he didnt know I was ready to listen he wouldnt of said a word.

White

He’s an opportunist.

Black

Meanin I guess that he seen somebody in a place low enough to where he ought to be ready to take a pretty big step.

White

Something like that.

Black

And you think that maybe I think that you might be in somethin like that kind of a place you own self.

White

Could be.

Black

Well I can dig that. I can dig it. Of course they is one small problem.

White

And that is.

Black

I aint God.

White

I’m glad to hear you say that.

Black

It come as a relief to me too.

White

Did you used to think you were God?

Black

No. I didnt. I didnt know what I was. But I thought I was in charge. I never knowed what that burden weighed till I put it down. That might of been the sweetest thing of all. To just hand over the keys.

White

Let me ask you something.

Black

Ask it.

White

Why cant you people just accept it that some people dont even want to believe in God.

Black

I accept that.

White

You do?

Black

Sure I do. Meanin that I believe it to be a fact. I’m lookin at it ever day. I better accept it.

White

Then why cant you leave us alone?

Black

To do your own thing.

White

Yes.

Black

Hangin from them steampipes and all.

White

If that’s what we want to do, yes.

Black

Cause he said not to. It’s in here. (Holding up the book)

The professor shakes his head.

Black

I guess you dont want to be happy.

White

Happy?

Black

Yeah. What’s wrong with happy?

White

God help us.

Black

What. We done opened a can of worms here? What you got against bein happy?

White

It’s contrary to the human condition.

Black.

Well. It’s contrary to your condition. I got to agree with that.

White

Happy. This is ridiculous.

Black

Like they aint no such a thing.

White

No.

Black

Not for nobody.

White

No.

Black

Mm. How’d we get in such a fix as this?

White

We were born in such a fix as this. Suffering and human destiny are the same thing. Each is a description of the other.

Black

We aint talkin about sufferin. We talkin about bein happy.

White

Well you cant be happy if you’re in pain.

Black

Why not?

White

You’re not making any sense.

The black falls back clutching his chest.

Black

Oh them is some hard words from the professor. The preacher has fell back. He’s clutchin his heart. Eyes is rolled back in his head. Wait a minute. Wait a minute folks. His eyes is blinkin. I think he’s comin back. I think he’s comin back.

The black sits up and leans forward.

Black

The point, Professor, is that if you didnt have no pain in your life then how would you even know you was happy? As compared to what?

White

You dont have anything to drink around here do you?

Black

No, Professor, I aint. You a drinkin man?

White

Are we about to get a temperance lecture?

Black

Not from me.

White

It’s been a difficult day. I take it you dont drink.

Black

I dont. I have done my share of it in my time.

White

Are you in AA?

Black

No. No AA. I just quit. I’ve had a lots of friends was drinkers. Most of em, for that matter. Most of em dead, too.

White

From drinking.

Black

Well. From drinkin or from reasons that dont get too far from drinkin. Not too long ago I had a friend to get run down by a taxicab. Now where do you reckon he was goin? Drunk.

White

I dont know. Where was he going?

Black

Goin after more whiskey. Had plenty at the house. But a drunk is always afraid of runnin out.

White

Was he killed?

Black

I hope so. We buried him.

White

I suppose there’s a moral to this story.

Black

Well, it’s just a story about what you want and what you get. Pain and happiness. I’ll tell you another one.

White

All right.

Black

One Sunday they’s a bunch of us settin around at my house drinkin. Sunday mornin. Favorite time for drunks to get together and drink and I’ll let you think about why that might be so. Well here come one of my buddies with this girl. Evelyn. And Evelyn was drunk when she got there but we fixed her a drink and directly Redge—my buddy—he goes back in the kitchen to get him a drink only now the bottle’s gone. Well, Redge has been around a few drinkin people in his time so he commences to hunt for the bottle. Looks in all the cabinets and behind everthing. He cant find it but of course he knows what’s happened to it so he comes back in and he sets down and he looks at Miss Evelyn settin there on the sofa. Drunk as a goat. And he says: Evelyn, where’s the whiskey? And Evelyn, she goes: Ah ghaga baba lala ghaga. And he says: Evelyn, where did you put the whiskey? Ah lala bloggle blabla. And Redge is settin there and this is beginnin to piss him off just a little and he gets in her face and he goes: Ah loddle loddle blabble ghaga blabla and she says I hid it in the toilet.

White

That’s pretty funny

Black

I thought you might like that.

White

And is that where the whiskey was?

Black

Oh yeah. That’s a favorite place for drunks to hide a bottle. But the point of course is that the drunk’s concern aint that he’s goin to die from drinkin—which he is. It’s that he’s goin to run out of whiskey fore he gets a chance to do it. Are you hungry? I can come back to this. I aint goin to lose my place.

White

I’m all right. Go ahead.

Black

If you was to hand a drunk a drink and tell him he really dont want it what do you reckon he’d say?

White

I think I know what he’d say.

Black

Sure you do. But you’d still be right.

White

About him not really wanting it.

Black

Yes. Because what he really wants he cant get. Or he thinks he cant get it. So what he really dont want he cant get enough of.

White

So what is it that he really wants.

Black

You know what he really wants.

White

No I dont.

Black

Yeah you do.

White

No I dont.

Black

Hm.

White

Hm what.

Black

You a hard case, Professor.

White

You’re not exactly a day at the beach yourself.

Black

You dont know what he wants.

White

No. I do not.

Black

He wants what everbody wants.

White

And that is?

Black

He wants to be loved by God.

White

I dont want to be loved by God.

Black

I love that. See how you cut right to it? He dont either. Accordin to him. He just wants a drink of whiskey. You a smart man, Professor. You tell me which one makes sense and which one dont.

White

I dont want a drink of whiskey, either.

Black

I thought you just got done askin for one?

White

I mean as a general proposition.

Black

We aint talkin about no general propositions. We talkin about a drink.

White

I dont have a drinking problem.

Black

Well you got some kind of a problem.

White

Well whatever kind of a problem I have it’s not something that I imagine can be addressed with a drink of liquor.

Black

Mm. I love the way you put that. So what can it be addressed with?

White

I think you know what it can be addressed with.

Black

The Sunset Limited.

White

Yes.

Black

And that’s what you want.

White

That’s what I want. Yes.

Black

That’s a mighty big drink of whiskey, Professor.

White

That I dont really want.

Black

That you dont really want. Yes.

White

Well. I think I do want it.

Black

Of course you do, honey. If you didnt we wouldnt be settin here.

White

Well. I disagree with you.

Black

That’s all right. That’s the hand I’m playin.

White

I dont think you understand that people such as myself see a yearning for God as something lacking in those people.

Black

I do understand that. Couldnt agree more.

White

You agree with that?

Black

Sure I do. What’s lackin is God.

White

Well, as I say, we’ll just have to disagree.

Black

You aint closin down the forum for discussion are you?

White

Not at this juncture.

Black

Cause I had a little more to say.

White

How did I know that?

Black

I did go to one or two AA meetins. Lot of folks didnt like the God part of it all that much but I hadnt set there too long fore I figured out that the God part was really all the part they was. The problem wasnt that they was too much God in AA it was that they wasnt enough. And I got a pretty thick head about some things but I finally figured out that what was true about AA was probably true about a lot of other things too.

White

Well I’m sorry, but to me the whole idea of God is just a load of crap.

The black puts his hand to his chest and leans back.

Black

Oh Lord have mercy oh save us Jesus. The professor’s done blasphemed all over us. We aint never gone be saved now.

He closes his eyes and shakes his head, laughing silently.

White

You dont find that an evil thing to say.

Black

Oh Mercy. No, Professor. I dont. But you does.

White

No I dont. It’s simply a fact.

Black

No it aint no simply a fact. It’s the biggest fact about you. It’s just about the only fact.

White

But you dont seem to think that it’s so bad.

Black

Well, I know it to be curable. So it aint that bad. If you talkin about what that man up there thinks about it I figure he’s probably seen enough of it that it dont bother him as bad as you might think. I mean, what if somebody told you that you didnt exist. And you settin there listenin to him say it. That wouldnt really piss you off, would it?

White

No. You’d just feel sorry for them.

Black

I think that’s right. You might even try to get some help for em. Now in my case he had to holler at me out loud and me layin on a slab in two pieces that they’d sewed back together where some nigger done tried to core me like a apple but still I got to say that if God is God then he can speak to your heart at any time and furthermore I got to say that if he spoke to me—which he did—then he can speak to anybody.

The black drums his fingers lightly three times on the table and looks at the professor.

Silence.

Black

Well. Wonder what this crazy nigger fixin to do. He liable to put the mojo on me. Be speakin in tongues here directly. I better get my ass out of here. He’s liable to try and steal my pocketbook. Need to get my ass down to the train depot fore somethin happen to me. What we goin to do with you, Professor?

White

I need to go.

Black

I thought you was goin to stay and visit with me some.

White

Look. I know I owe you a good deal. In the eyes of the world at least. Cant I just give you something and we’ll call it square? I could give you some money. Something like that.

The black studies him. He doesnt answer.

White

I could give you a thousand dollars. Well. That’s not very much, I guess. I could give you three thousand, say.

Black

You dont have no notion the trouble you in, do you?

White

I dont know what you mean.

Black

I know you dont.

White

I’d just like to settle this someway.

Black

It aint me you got to settle with.

White

Do you really believe I was sent to you by God?

Black

Oh it’s worse than that.

White

How do you mean?

Black

Belief aint like unbelief. If you a believer then you got to come finally to the well of belief itself and then you dont have to look no further. There aint no further. But the unbeliever has got a problem. He has set out to unravel the world, but everthing he can point to that aint true leaves two new things layin there. If God walked the earth when he got done makin it then when you get up in the mornin you get to put your feet on a real floor and you dont have to worry about where it come from. But if he didnt then you got to come up with a whole other description of what you even mean by real. And you got to judge everthing by that same light. If light it is. Includin yourself. One question fits all. So what do you think, Professor? Is you real?

White

I’m not buying it.

Black

That’s all right. It’s been on the market a long time and it’ll be there a while yet.

White

Do you believe everything that’s in there? In the bible?

Black

The literal truth?

White

Yes.

Black

Probably not. But then you already know I’m a outlaw.

White

What is it you would disagree with?

Black

Maybe the notion of original sin. When Eve eat the apple and it turned everbody bad. I dont see people that way. I think for the most part people are good to start with. I think evil is somethin you bring on your own self. Mostly from wantin what you aint supposed to have. But I aint goin to set here and tell you about me bein a heretic when I’m tryin to get you to quit bein one.

White

Are you a heretic?

Black

You tryin to put me in the trick bag, Professor.

White

No I’m not. Are you?

Black

No more than what a man should be. Even a man with a powerful belief. I aint a doubter. But I am a questioner.

White

What’s the difference?

Black

Well, I think the questioner wants the truth. The doubter wants to be told there aint no such thing.

White

(Pointing at bible) You dont think you have to believe everything in there in order to be saved?

Black

No. I dont. I dont think you even have to read it. I aint for sure you even got to know there is such a book. I think whatever truth is wrote in these pages is wrote in the human heart too and it was wrote there a long time ago and will still be wrote there a long time hence. Even if this book is burned ever copy of it. What Jesus said? I dont think he made up a word of it. I think he just told it. This book is a guide for the ignorant and the sick at heart. A whole man wouldnt need it at all. And of course if you read this book you goin to find that they’s a lot more talk in here about the wrong way than they is about the right way. Now why is that?

White

I dont know. Why is it?

Black

I’d rather hear from you.

White

I’ll have to think about it.

Black

Okay.

Silence.

White

Okay what?

Black

Okay go ahead and think about it.

White

It might take me a little longer than you to think about something.

Black

That’s all right.

White

That’s all right.

Black

Yes. I mean they’s two ways you can take that remark but I’m goin to take it the good way. It’s just my nature. That way I get to live in my world instead of yours.

White

What makes you think mine’s so bad?

Black

Oh I dont know as it’s so bad. I know it’s brief.

White

All right. Are you ready?

Black

I’m ready.

White

I think the answer to your question is that the dialectic of the homily always presupposes a ground of evil.

Black

Man.

White

How’s that.

Black

That’s strong as a mare’s breath, Professor. Wouldnt I love to lay some of that shit on the brothers? Whoa. Now. Just the two of us here talkin. In private. What did you just say?

White

Your question. The bible is full of cautionary tales. All of literature, for that matter. Telling us to be careful. Careful of what? Taking a wrong turn. A wrong path. How many wrong paths are there? Their number is legion. How many right paths? Only one. Hence the imbalance you spoke of.

Black

Man. I’ll tell you what, Professor. You could go on television. Goodlookin man such as yourself. Did you know that?

White

Stop.

Black

I’m serious. I wasnt even all that sure you was a professor till you laid that shit on me.

White

I think you’re having fun at my expense.

Black

Aint done no such a thing, Professor.

White

Well. I think you are.

Black

Honey, I swear I aint. I couldnt say a thing like you just got done sayin. I admire that.

White

And why do you keep calling me honey?

Black

That’s just the old south talkin. They aint nothin wrong with it. I’ll try and quit if it bothers you.

White

I’m just not sure what it means.

Black

It means you among friends. It means quit worryin bout everthing.

White

That might be easier said than done.

Black

Well yes it might. But we just talkin here. Just talkin.

White

What else?

Black

What else what?

White

Any other heresies?

Black

At this juncture?

White

At this juncture. Yes.

Black

Yeah, but I aint tellin you.

White

Why not?

Black

Cause I aint. Shouldnt of told you what I did.

White

Why not?

Black

You settin here at my table dead to God as the fallen angels and you waitin on me to lay another heresy on you to clutch to your bosom and help shore you up in your infidelity and I aint goin to do it. That’s all.

White

Dont then.

Black

Dont worry. I aint.

White

I have to go.

Black

Ever time the dozens gets a little heavy you got to go.

White

What’s the dozens?

Black

It aint really even the dozens. It’s really just a discussion.

White

What’s the dozens.

Black

It’s when two of the brothers stands around insultin one another and the first one gets pissed off loses.

White

What is the point of it?

Black

Winnin and losin is the point of it. Same as the point of everthing else.

White

And you win by making the other guy angry.

Black

That’s correct.

White

I dont get it.

Black

You aint supposed to get it. You white.

White

Then why did you tell me?

Black

Cause you asked me.

White

So if I find you a bit irritating and decide to leave then I lose.

Black

Well, like I said, this aint even the dozens. We just talkin.

White

But that’s what you think.

Black

Oh yeah, that’s what I think.

White

Well how long do you think I might have to stay before I could leave without losing?

Black

That’s kindly hard to say. I guess the best way to put it might be that you’d have to stay till you didnt want to leave.

White

Stay until I didnt want to leave.

Black

Yeah.

White

And then I could leave.

Black

Yeah.

The professor runs one hand alongside his head and then holds the back of his neck, his head down and his eyes closed. He looks up.

White

Why is it called the dozens?

Black

Dont know.

White

What sorts of insults?

Black

Oh, you might say somethin about the other man’s mama. That’s a sensitive area, you might say. And he might lose it and come after your ass but when he done that it’s like he’s sayin that what you just got done tellin about his mama was true. It’s like he sayin: You aint supposed to know that about my mama and you damn sure aint supposed to of told it and now I’m fixin to whip your ass. You see what I’m sayin?

White

I suppose.

Black

Well, probably not.

White

And is this something you do with your friends?

Black

Me? No. I dont play the dozens.

White

Tell me something.

Black

Sure.

White

Why are you here? What do you get out of this? You seem like a smart man.

Black

Me? I’m just a dumb country nigger from Louisiana. I done told you. I aint never had the first thought in my head. If it aint in here then I dont know it.

He holds the bible up off the table and lays it down again.

White

Half the time I think you’re having fun with me. I dont see how you can live here. I dont see how you can feel safe.

Black

Well you got a point, Professor. About bein safe anyways.

White

Have you ever stopped any of these people from taking drugs?

Black

Not that I know of.

White

Then what is the point? I dont get it. I mean, it’s hopeless. This place is just a moral leper colony.

Black

Damn, Professor. Moral leper colony? Where my pencil at?

He pretends to rummage through the kitchen table drawer.

White

Well it is.

Black

I aint never goin to want you to leave. Put that in my book.

White

In your book?

Black

In the Moral Leper Colony. Damn, I like the sound of that.

White

You’re kidding me.

Black

You know I aint writin no book.

White

Well I still dont get it. Why not go someplace where you might be able to do some good?

Black

As opposed to someplace where good was needed.

White

Even God gives up at some point. There’s no ministry in hell. That I ever heard of.

Black

No there aint. That’s well put. Ministry is for the livin. That’s why you responsible for your brother. Once he’s quit breathin you cant help him no more. After that he’s in the hands of other parties. So you got to look after him now. You might even want to monitor his train schedule.

White

You think you are your brother’s keeper.

Black

I dont believe think quite says it.

White

And Jesus is a part of this enterprise.

Black

Is that okay with your

White

And he’s interested in coming here to this cesspool and salvaging what everybody knows is unsalvageable. Why would he do that? You said he didnt have a lot of free time. Why would he come here? What would be the difference to him between a building that was morally and spiritually vacant and one that was just plain empty?

Black

Mm. Professor you a theologian here and I didnt even know it.

White

You’re being facetious.

Black

I dont know that word. Dont be afraid to talk down to me. You aint goin to hurt my feelins.

White

It means. I guess it means that you’re not being sincere. That you dont mean what you’re saying. In a cynical sort of way.

Black

Mm. You think I dont mean what I’m sayin.

White

Sometimes. I think you say things for effect.

Black

Mm. Well, let me say this for effect.

White

Go ahead.

Black

Suppose I was to tell you that if you could bring yourself to unlatch your hands from around your brother’s throat you could have life everlastin?

White

There’s no such thing. Everybody dies.

Black

That aint what he said. He said you could have life everlastin. Life. Have it today. Hold it in your hand. That you could see it. It gives off a light. It’s got a little weight to it. Not much. Warm to the touch. Just a little. And it’s forever. And you can have it. Now. Today. But you dont want it. You dont want it cause to get it you got to let you brother off the hook. You got to actually take him and hold him in your arms and it dont make no difference what color he is or what he smells like or even if he dont want to be held. And the reason you wont do it is because he dont deserve it. And about that there aint no argument. He dont deserve it. (He leans forward, slow and deliberate.) You wont do it because it aint just. Aint that so?

Silence.

Black

Aint it?

White

I dont believe in those sorts of things.

Black

Just answer the question Professor.

White

I dont think in those terms.

Black

I know you dont. Answer the question.

White

I suppose there’s some truth in what you say.

Black

But that’s all I’m goin to get.

White

Yes.

Black

Well. That’s all right. I’ll take it. Some is a lot. We down to breadcrumbs here.

White

I really have to go.

Black

Just stay. Just a little. We can talk bout somethin else. You like baseball? Tell you what. Why dont I fix us somethin to eat?

White

I’m not hungry.

Black

How about some coffee then?

White

All right. But then I’ve got to go.

Black

(Rising) All right. The man says all right.

He runs water in the kettle at the sink and pours the water into the percolator.

Black

You see I wouldnt be this rude under normal circumstances. Man come in my house and set at my table and me not offer him nothin? But with you I figure I got to strategize. Got to play my cards right. Keep you from slippin off into the night.

He spoons coffee from a can into the percolator and plugs the percolator in.

White

It’s not night.

Black

Depends on what kind of night we talkin bout.

He comes back to the table and sits.

Black

Let me ask you kindly a personal question.

White

This will be good.

Black

What do you think is wrong with you that has finally narrowed all your choices down to the Sunset Limited?

White

I dont think there’s anything wrong with me. I think I’ve just been driven to finally face the truth. If I’m different it doesnt mean I’m crazy.

Black

Different.

White

Yes.

Black

Different from who?

White

From anybody.

Black

What about them other folks tryin to off theyselves?

White

What about them?

Black

Well, maybe them is the folks that you is like. Maybe them folks is your natural kin. Only you all just dont get together all that much.

White

I dont think so.

Black

Dont think so.

White

No. I’ve been in group therapy with those people. I never found anyone there that I felt any kinship with.

Black

What about them other professors? They aint no kinship there?

White

(Disgustedly) Good god.

Black

I’m goin to take that for a no.

White

I loathe them and they loathe me.

Black

Well now wait a minute. Just cause you dont like em dont mean you aint like em. What was that word? Loathe?

White

Loathe.

Black

That’s a pretty powerful word, aint it?

White

Not powerful enough, I’m afraid.

Black

So how come you be loathin these other professors?

White

I know what you’re thinking.

Black

What am I thinkin?

White

You’re thinking that I loathe them because I’m like them and I loathe myself.

Black

(Sitting back in his chair) Damn, Professor. If I had your brains aint no tellin what all I might of done. I’d of been a drug king or somethin. Ride round in a Rolls Royce.

White

You’re being facetious again.

Black

No I aint. I wasnt the first time. Let me ask you this.

White

All right.

Black

Is you on any kind of medication?

White

No.

Black

They aint got no medication for pilgrims waitin to take the Sunset?

White

For suicidal depression.

Black

Yeah.

White

Yes. They do. I’ve tried them.

Black

And what happened?

White

Nothing happened.

Black

You didnt get no relief.

White

No. I think the coffee’s percolated.

Black

I know. Does these drugs work for most folks?

White

Yes. For most.

Black

But not for you.

White

Not for me. No.

Black

(Rising) And what do you make of that?

White

I dont know. What am I supposed to make of it?

Black

(Crossing to kitchen counter) I dont know, Professor. I just tryin to find you some constituents out there somewheres.

White

Constituents?

Black

(Unplugging percolator and getting down cups) Yeah. You like that?

White

Is that a word they use on the streets?

Black

Naw. I learned that word in the jailhouse. You pick up stuff from these jailhouse lawyers and then it gets used around. Be talkin bout your constituents. Some other cat’s constituents. Your wife’s constituents. You use cream and sugar?

White

No. Just black.

Black

Just black.

White

Why do I have to have constituents?

Black

I aint said you got to. I just wondered if maybe you do and we just aint looked hard enough.

He brings the percolator and the cups to the table and pours.

Black

They could be out there. Maybe they’s some other drugproof terminal commuters out there that could be your friends.

White

Terminal commuters?

Black

Got a nice sound to it, aint it?

White

It’s all right.

Black

(Sitting) Nobody.

White

Nobody. No.

Black

Hm.

White

I’m not a member. I never wanted to be. I never was.

Black

Not a member.

White

No.

Black

Well. Sometimes people dont know what they want till they get it.

White

Maybe. But I think they know what they dont want.

Black

I dont know, Professor. I try and go by what I see. The simplest things has got more to em than you can ever understand. Bunch of people standin around on a train platform of a mornin. Waitin to go to work. Been there a hundred times. A thousand maybe. It’s just a train platform. Aint nothin else much you can say about it. But they might be one commuter waitin there on the edge of that platform that for him it’s somethin else. It might even be the edge of the world. The edge of the universe. He’s starin at the end of all tomorrows and he’s drawin a shade over ever yesterday that ever was. So he’s a different kind of commuter. He’s worlds away from them everday travelers. Nothin to do with them at all. Well. Is that right?

White

I dont know.

Black

I know you dont. Bless your heart. I know you dont.

They sip their coffee.

Black

You ride that subway ever day, Professor?

White

Yes.

Black

What do you think about them people?

White

On the subway?

Black

On the subway.

White

I try not to think about them at all.

Black

You ever speak to any of em?

White

Speak to them?

Black

Yeah.

White

About what?

Black

About anything.

White

No. God no.

Black

God no?

White

Yes. God no.

Black

You ever curse em?

White

Curse them?

Black

Yeah.

White

Why would I do that?

Black

I dont know. Do you?

White

No. Of course not.

Black

I mean where they cant hear it.

White

What do you mean?

Black

Maybe just under your breath. In your heart. To yourself.

White

Because?

Black

I dont know. Maybe they just in your way. Or you dont like the way they look. The way they smell. What they doin.

White

And I would mutter something ugly under my breath.

Black

Yeah.

White

I suppose.

Black

And how often do you reckon you might do that?

White

You really dont get to interrogate me, you know.

Black

I know. How often?

White

I dont know. With some frequency. Probably.

Black

Give me a number.

White

A number?

Black

Yeah. Say just on a average day.

White

I’ve no idea.

Black

Sure you do.

White

A number.

Black

I’m a number man.

White

Two or three times a day, I would guess. Something like that. Maybe.

Black

Could be more.

White

Oh yes.

Black

Could be five?

White

Probably.

Black

Ten?

White

That might be a bit high.

Black

But we can go with five. That’s safe.

White

Yes.

Black

That’s eighteen twenty-five. Can we round that off to two grand?

White

What’s that, per year?

Black

Yeah.

White

Two thousand? That’s a lot.

Black

Yes it is. But is it accurate?

White

I suppose. So?

Black

So. I aint goin to guess your age but let me put you on the low side and say times twenty years of commutin and now we got forty thousand curses heaped on the heads of folks you dont even know.

White

So where is this going?

Black

I just wondered if you ever thought about that. If it might have anything to do with the shape you has managed to get yourself in.

White

It’s just symptomatic of the larger issues. I dont like people.

Black

But you wouldnt hurt them people.

White

No. Of course not.

Black

You sure.

White

Of course I’m sure. Why would I hurt them?

Black

I dont know. Why would you hurt yourself?

White

It’s not the same thing.

Black

You sure about that?

White

I’m not them and they’re not me. I think I know the difference.

Black

Mm.

White

More mm’s.

Black

You sure you aint hungry?

White

No.

Black

You aint eat nothin.

White

That’s all right.

Black

I see you eyein the door. I got to strategize, you know.

White

I’m really not hungry.

Black

Active morning like you had you aint worked up no appetite?

White

No.

Black

I see you lookin around. Everthing in here is clean. No, dont say nothin. It’s all right.

The black pushes back his chair and rises.

Black

I could eat a bite and I think you could too.

The black goes to the refrigerator and takes out some pots. He turns on the stove. He washes his hands and dries them with a towel.

Black

You break bread with a man you have moved on to another level of friendship. I heard somewheres that that’s true the world over.

White

Probably.

Black

I like probably. Probably from you is worth a couple of damn rights anywheres else.

White

Why? Because I dont believe in anything?

The black has put the pots on the stove to warm and he brings napkins and silverware to the table and sets them out. He sits down.

Black

Well. I dont think that’s the problem. I think it’s what you do believe that is carryin you off, not what you dont. Let me ask you this.

White

Go ahead.

Black

You ever think about Jesus?

White

Here we go.

Black

Do you?

White

What makes you think I’m not Jewish?

Black

What, jews aint allowed to think about Jesus?

White

No, but they might think about him differently.

Black

Is you Jewish?

White

No. As it happens. I’m not.

Black

Whew. You had me worried there for a minute.

White

What, you dont like jews?

Black

(Shaking his head, almost laughing) Pullin your chain, Professor. Pullin your chain. I dont know why I love to mess with you. But I do. You need to listen. Or you need to believe what you hearin. The whole point of where this is goin—which you wanted to know—is that they aint no jews. Aint no whites. Aint no niggers. People of color. Aint none of that. At the deep bottom of the mine where the gold is at there aint none of that. There’s just the pure ore. That forever thing. That you dont think is there. That thing that helps to keep folks nailed down to the platform when the Sunset Limited comes through. Even when they think they might want to get aboard. That thing that makes it possible to ladle out benediction upon the heads of strangers instead of curses. It’s all the same thing. And it aint but one thing. Just one.

White

And that would be Jesus.

Black

Got to think about how to answer that. Maybe one more heresy wont hurt you. You pretty loaded up on em already. Here’s what I would say. I would say that the thing we are talkin about is Jesus, but it is Jesus understood as that gold at the bottom of the mine. He couldnt come down here and take the form of a man if that form was not done shaped to accommodate him. And if I said that there aint no way for Jesus to be ever man without ever man bein Jesus then I believe that might be a pretty big heresy. But that’s all right. It aint as big a heresy as sayin that a man aint all that much different from a rock. Which is how your view looks to me.

White

It’s not my view. I believe in the primacy of the intellect.

Black

What is that word.

White

Primacy? It means first. It means what you put first.

Black

And that would be intellect.

White

Yes.

Black

What about the primacy of the Sunset Limited?

White

Yes. That too.

Black

But not the primacy of all them folks waitin on a later train.

White

No. No primacy there.

Black

Mm.

White

Mm what.

Black

You tough, Professor. You tough.

The black rises and goes to the stove. He reaches down plates and stirs the pots and ladles out the dinner. He takes down a loaf of white bread and puts four slices on a plate and brings the plate of bread to the table and sets it down.

Black

Yeah you tough.

The black brings the two plates to the table and sets them out and takes his seat. He looks at the professor.

Black

You see yourself as a questioner, Professor. But about that I got my doubts. Even so, the quest of your life is your quest. You on a road that you laid. And that fact alone might be all the reason you need for keepin to it. As long as you on that road you cant be lost.

White

I’m not sure I understand what you’re saying.

Black

Well, Professor. I have got some very serious doubts about you not understandin anything I say. Now I’m goin to say Grace.

The black puts his hands on the table at either side of his plate and bows his head.

Black

Lord we thank you for this food and we ask that you keep us ever mindful of the many blessins we have received from your hand. We thank you today for the life of the professor that you have returned to us and we ask that you continue to look after him because we need him. (Pause) I aint sure why we need him. I just know we do. Amen.

The black looks up. He smiles at the professor.

Black

All right. You tell me if you like this.

White

It looks good.

They begin to eat.

White

This is good.

They eat.

White

This is very good.

Black

Supposed to be good. This is soul food, my man.

White

It’s got what in it? Molasses?

Black

Mm. You a chef, Professor?

White

Not really.

Black

But some.

White

Some, yes. Bananas, of course. Mangos?

Black

Got a mango or two in there. Rutabagas.

White

Rutabagas?

Black

Rutabagas. Them aint easy to find.

White

It’s very good.

Black

It gets better after a day or two. I just fixed this last night. You need to warm it up a few times to get the flavors right.

White

Like chile.

Black

Like chile. That’s right. You know where I learned to fix this?

White

In Louisana?

Black

Right here in the ghettos of New York City. They’s a lot of influences in a dish like this. You got many parts of the world in that pot yonder. Different countries. Different people.

White

Any white people?

Black

Not if you can help it.

White

Really?

Black

Messin with you, Professor. Messin with you. You know these French chefs in these uptown restaurants?

White

Not personally.

Black

You know what they like to cook?

White

No.

Black

Sweetbreads. Tripe. Brains. All that shit they dont nobody eat. You know why that is?

White

Because it’s a challenge? You have to innovate?

Black

You pretty smart for a cracker. A challenge. That’s right. The stuff they cook is dead cheap. Most folks throws it out. Give it to the cat. But poor folks dont throw nothin out.

White

I guess that’s right.

Black

It dont take a lot of skill to make a porterhouse steak taste good. But what if you cant buy no porterhouse steak? You still wants to eat somethin that tastes good. What you do then?

White

Innovate.

Black

Innovate. That’s right, Professor. And when do you innovate?

White

When you dont have something that you want.

Black

You fixin to get a A plus. So who would that be? That aint got what they want?

White

Poor people.

Black

I love this man. So how you like this?

White

It’s very good.

Black

Well let me have your plate.

White

Just a small portion.

Black

That’s all right, Professor. You need to eat. You done had yourself a pretty busy day.

The black puts more of the dish on the professors plate and comes to the table and sets it in front of him.

Black

You want some more coffee?

White

Yes. That would be great.

He brings the pot to the table and pours his cup and sets the pot on the table and takes his seat and they continue to eat.

White

You dont think a glass of wine would have been good with this?

Black

Oh no. I think it might of been good.

White

But you wouldnt drink it.

Black

Oh I might. One glass.

White

Jesus drank wine. He and his disciples.

Black

Yes he did. Accordin to the bible. Of course it dont say nothin about him hidin it in the toilet.

White

Is that really a favorite hiding place?

Black

Oh yes. I’ve knowed drunks to lift the tops off of toilet tanks in strange places just on the off chance.

White

Is that true?

Black

Naw. It could be, though. Wouldnt surprise me none.

White

What is the worst thing you ever did.

Black

More jailhouse stories.

White

Why not?

Black

Which why not you want to hear?

White

Is bludgeoning the man in the prison cafeteria the worst thing you ever did?

Black

No. It aint.

White

Really? What’s the worst?

Black

Aint goin tell you.

White

Why not?

Black

Cause you’d jump up and run out the door hollerin.

White

It must be pretty bad.

Black

It is pretty bad. That’s why I aint tellin you.

White

Now I’m afraid to ask.

Black

No you aint.

White

Have you ever told anyone?

Black

Oh yeah. It wouldnt leave me alone. The soul might be silent but the servant of the soul has always got a voice and it has got one for a reason. The life of the master depends on the servant and this is one master that has got to be sustained. Got to be sustained.

White

Who did you tell it to?

Black

I told it to a man of God who was my friend.

White

What did he say?

Black

He didnt say a word.

White

But you’re not curious about the worst thing I ever did.

Black

Yeah I am.

White

But you wont ask me what it is.

Black

Dont have to.

White

Why is that?

Black

Cause I was there and I seen it.

White

Well, I might have a different view.

Black

Yeah. You might. You want some more?

White

No. I’m stuffed.

Black

Hungrier than you thought.

White

Yes. I was.

Black

Good.

White

Is this some kind of a test of your faith?

Black

What, you?

White

Me. Yes.

Black

Naw, Professor. It aint my faith you testin.

White

You see everything in black and white.

Black

It is black and white.

White

I suppose that makes the world easier to understand.

Black

You might be surprised about how little time I spend trying to understand the world.

White

You try to understand God.

Black

No I dont. I just try and understand what he wants from me.

White

And that is everything you need.

Black

If God aint everthing you need you in a world of trouble. And if what you sayin is that my view of the world is a narrow one I dont disagree with that. Of course I could point out that I aint down on the platform in my leapin costume.

White

You could.

Black

A lot of things is beyond my understandin. I know that. I say it again. If it aint in this book then they’s a good chance that I dont know it. Before I started readin the bible I was pretty much in that primacy thing myself.

White

Primacy thing.

Black

Yeah. Not as bad as you. But pretty bad. I was pretty dumb, but I wasnt dumb enough to believe that what had got me nowheres in forty years was all of a sudden goin to get me somewheres. I was dumb, but I wasnt that dumb. I seen what was there for the askin, and I decided to ask. And that’s all I done. And it was hard. I’ll tell you right now, Professor, it was hard. I was layin there all cut up and chained to that hospital bed and I was cryin I hurt so bad and I thought they’d kill me if I did live and I tried to say it and tried to say it and after a while I just quit. I put all of that away from me. And I just said it. I said: Please help me. And he did.

They sit.

Black

Long silence.

White

It’s just a silence.

Black

Well. That’s my story, Professor. It’s easy told. I dont make a move without Jesus. When I get up in the mornin I just try to get ahold of his belt. Oh, ever once in a while I’ll catch myself slippin into manual override. But I catch myself. I catch myself.

White

Manual overrider.

Black

You like that?

White

It’s okay.

Black

I thought it was pretty good.

White

So you come to the end of your rope and you admit defeat and you are in despair and in this state you seize upon this whatever it is that has neither substance nor sense and you grab hold of it and hang on for dear life. Is that a fair portrayal?

Black

Well, that could be one way to say it.

White

It doesnt make any sense.

Black

Well, I thought when we was talkin earlier I heard you to say they wasnt none of it made no sense. Talkin bout the history of the world and all such as that.

White

It doesnt. On a larger scale. But what you’re telling me isnt a view of things. It’s a view of one thing. And I find it nonsensical.

Black

What would you do if Jesus was to speak to you?

White

Why? Do you imagine that he might?

Black

No. I dont. But I dont know.

White

I’m not virtuous enough.

Black

No, Professor, it aint nothin like that. You dont have to be virtuous. You just has to be quiet. I cant speak for the Lord but the experience I’ve had leads me to believe that he’ll speak to anybody that’ll listen. You damn sure aint got to be virtuous.

White

Well if I heard God talking to me, then I’d be ready for you to take me up to Bellevue. As you suggested.

Black

What if what he said made sense?

White

It wouldnt make any difference. Craziness is craziness.

Black

Dont make no difference if it makes sense.

White

No.

Black

Mm. Well, that’s about as bad a case of the primacy as I ever heard.

White

Well. I’ve always gone my own way. Ich kann nicht anders.

Black

What is that you talkin?

White

It’s german.

Black

You talk german?

White

Not really. A little. It’s a quotation.

Black

Didnt do them Germans much good though, did it?

White

I dont know. The Germans contributed a great deal to civilization. (Pause) Before Hitler.

Black

And then they contributed Hitler.

White

If you like.

Black

Wasnt none of my doin.

White

I gather it to be your belief that culture tends to contribute to human misery. That the more one knows the more unhappy one is likely to be.

Black

As in the case of certain parties known to us.

White

As in the case.

Black

I dont believe I said that. In fact, I think maybe you said it.

White

I never said it.

Black

Mm. But do you believe it?

White

No.

Black

No?

White

I dont know. It could be true.

Black

Well why is that? It dont seem right, does it?

White

It’s the first thing in that book there. The Garden of Eden. Knowledge as destructive to the spirit. Destructive to goodness.

Black

I thought you aint read this book?

White

Everyone knows that story. It’s probably the most famous story in there.

Black

So why do you think that is?

White

I suppose from the God point of view all knowledge is vanity. Or maybe it gives people the unhealthy illusion that they can outwit the devil.

Black

Damn, Professor. Where was you when I needed you?

White

You’d better be careful. You see where it’s gotten me.

Black

I do see. It’s the subject at hand.

White

The darker picture is always the correct one. When you read the history of the world you are reading a saga of bloodshed and greed and folly the import of which is impossible to ignore. And yet we imagine that the future will somehow be different. I’ve no idea why we are even still here but in all probability we will not be here much longer.

Black

Them is some pretty powerful words, Professor. That’s what’s in your heart, aint it?

White

Yes.

Black

Well I can relate to them thoughts.

White

You can?

Black

Yes I can.

White

That surprises me. What, you’re going to think about them?

Black

I done have thought about em. I’ve thought about em for a long time. Not as good as you said it. But pretty close.

White

Well you surprise me. And you’ve come to what conclusions?

Black

I aint. I’m still thinkin.

White

Yes. Well, I’m not.

Black

Things can change.

White

No they cant.

Black

You could be wrong.

White

I dont think so.

Black

But that aint somethin you have a lot of in your life.

White

What isnt?

Black

Bein wrong.

White

I admit it when I’m wrong.

Black

I dont think so.

White

Well, you’re entitled to your opinion.

The black leans back and regards the professor. He reaches and picks up the newspaper from the table and leans back again and adjusts his glasses.

Black

Let’s see here. Story on page three.

He folds the paper elaborately.

Black

Yeah. Here it is. Friends report that the man had ignored all advice and had stated that he intended to pursue his own course.

He adjusts his glasses.

Black

A close confidant stated (he looks up)—and this here is a quotation—said: You couldnt tell the son of a bitch nothin. (He looks up again) Can you say that in the papers? Son of a bitch? Meanwhile, bloodspattered spectators at the hundred and fifty-fifth street station—continued on page four.

He wets his thumb and laboriously turns the page and refolds the paper.

Black

—who were interviewed at the scene all reported that the man’s last words as he hurtled toward the oncomin commuter train were: I am right.

He lays down the paper and adjusts his spectacles and peers over the top of them at the professor.

White

Very funny.

The black takes off his glasses and lowers his head and pinches the bridge of his nose and shakes his head.

Black

Oh Professor. Mm. You an amazin man.

White

I’m glad you find me entertaining.

Black

Well, you pretty special.

White

I dont think I’m special.

Black

You dont.

White

No. I dont.

Black

You dont think you might view them other commuters from a certain height?

White

I view those other commuters as fellow occupants of the same abyssal pit in which I find myself. If they see it as something else I dont know how that makes me special.

Black

Mm. I hear what you sayin. But still I keep comin back to them commuters. Them that’s waitin on the Sunset? I got to think maybe they could be just a little bit special theyselves. I mean, they got to be in a deeper pit than just us daytravelers. A deeper and a darker. I aint sayin they down as deep as you, but pretty deep maybe.

White

So?

Black

So how come they cant be your brothers in despair and selfdestruction? I thought misery loved company?

White

I’m sure I don’t know.

Black

Well let me take a shot at it.

White

Be my guest.

Black

What I think is that you got better reasons then them. I mean, their reasons is just that they dont like it here, but yours says what they is not to like and why not to like it. You got more intelligent reasons. More elegant reasons.

White

Are you making fun of me?

Black

No. I aint.

White

But you think I’m full of shit.

Black

I dont think that. Oh I dont doubt but what it’s possible to die from bein full of shit. But I dont think that’s what we lookin at here.

White

What do you think we’re looking at?

Black

I dont know. You got me on unfamiliar ground. You got these elegant world class reasons for takin the Limited and these other dudes all they got is maybe they just dont feel good. In fact, it might could be that you aint even all that unhappy.

White

You think that my education is driving me to suicide.

Black

Well, no. I’m just posin the question. Wait a minute. Fore you answer.

He takes his pad and his pencil and begins to write laboriously, his tongue in the corner of his mouth, grimacing. This for the professor’s benefit. He looks sideways at him and smiles. He tears off the page and folds it and puts it in his shirtpocket.

Black

All right. Go ahead.

White

I think that’s the most ridiculous thing I ever heard.

The black takes the folded paper from his pocket and hands it across. The professor opens it and reads it aloud.

White

I think that’s the most ridiculous thing I ever heard. Very clever. What’s the point?

Black

The point dont change. The point is always the same point. It’s what I said before and what I keep lookin for ways to say it again. The light is all around you, cept you dont see nothin but shadow. And the shadow is you. You the one makin it.

White

Well, I dont have your faith. Why dont we just leave it at that.

Black

You dont never think about maybe just startin over?

White

I did. At one time. I dont any more.

Black

Sometimes faith might just be a case of not havin nothin else left.

White

Well, I do have something else.

Black

Maybe you could just keep that in reserve. Maybe just take a shot at startin over. I dont mean start again. Everbody’s done that. Over means over. It means you just walk away. I mean, if everthing you are and everthing you have and everthing you have done has brought you at last to the bottom of a whiskey bottle or bought you a one way ticket on the Sunset Limited then you cant give me the first reason on God’s earth for salvagin none of it. Cause they aint no reason. And I’m goin to tell you that if you can bring yourself to shut the door on all of that it will be cold and it will be lonely and they’ll be a mean wind blowin. And them is all good signs. You dont say nothin. You just turn up your collar and keep walkin.

White

I cant.

Black

Yeah.

White

I cant.

Black

You want some more coffee?

White

No. Thank you.

Black

Why do you think folks takes their own lives?

White

I dont know. Different reasons.

Black

Yeah. But is there somethin them different reasons has got in common?

White

I cant speak for others. My own reasons center around a gradual loss of make-believe. That’s all. A gradual enlightenment as to the nature of reality. Of the world.

Black

Them worldly reasons.

White

If you like.

Black

Them elegant reasons.

White

That was your description.

Black

You didnt disagree with it.

The professor shrugs.

Black

It’s them reasons that your brother dont know nothin about hangin by his necktie from the steampipe down in the basement. He got his own dumb-ass reasons, but maybe if we could educate him to where some of them more elegant reasons was available to him and his buddies then they’d be a lot of folks out there could off theyselves with more joy in they hearts. What do you think?

White

Now I know you’re being facetious.

Black

This time I think you’re right. I think you have finally drove me to it.

White

Mm hm.

Black

Well, the professor’s done gone to layin the mm hm’s on me. I better watch my step.

White

Yes you had. I might be warming up the trick bag.

Black

But still you think that your reasons is about the world and his is mostly just about him.

White

I think that’s probably true.

Black

I see a different truth. Settin right across the table from me.

White

Which is?

Black

That you must love your brother or die.

White

I dont know what that means. That’s another world from anything I know.

Black

What’s the world you know.

White

You dont want to hear.

Black

Sure I do.

White

I dont think so.

Black

Go ahead.

White

All right. It’s that the world is basically a forced labor camp from which the workers—perfectly innocent—are led forth by lottery, a few each day, to be executed. I dont think that this is just the way I see it. I think it’s the way it is. Are there alternate views? Of course. Will any of them stand close scrutiny? No.

Black

Man.

White

So. Do you want to take a look at that train schedule again?

Black

And they aint nothin to be done about it.

White

No. The efforts that people undertake to improve the world invariably make it worse. I used to think there were exceptions to that dictum. I dont think that now.

The black sits back, looking down at the table. He shakes his head slightly.

White

What else do you want to talk about?

Black

I dont know. Them sounds to me like the words of a man on his way to the train station.

White

They are those words.

Black

What do you think about that man?

White

I’m like you. I dont. I used to. Now I dont. I think about minimalizing pain. That is my life. I dont know why it isnt everyone’s.

Black

You dont think gettin run over by a train might smart just a little?

White

No. I did the calculations. At seventy miles an hour the train is outrunning the neurons. It should be totally painless.

Black

I’m goin to be stuck with your ass for a while, aint I?

White

I hope not.

Black

If this aint the life you had in mind, what was?

White

I dont know. Not this. Is your life the one you’d planned?

Black

No, it aint. I got what I needed instead of what I wanted and that’s just about the best kind of luck you can have.

White

Yes. Well.

Black

You cant compare your life to mine, can you?

White

In all honesty, no. I cant.

Black

Mm.

White

I’m sorry. I should go.

Black

You dont have to go.

White

I’ve offended you.

Black

I got a thicker hide than that, Professor. Just stay. You aint hurt my feelins.

White

I know you think that I should be thankful and I’m sorry not to be.

Black

Now Professor, I dont think no such a thing.

White

I should go.

Black

I’m diggin a dry hole here, aint I?

White

I admire your persistence.

Black

What can I do to get you to stay a bit?

White

Why? Are you hoping that if I stay long enough God might speak to me?

Black

No, I’m hopin he might speak to me.

White

I know you think I at least owe you a little more of my time. I know I’m ungrateful. But ingratitude is not the sin to a spiritual bankrupt that it is to a man of God.

Black

You dont owe me nothin, Professor.

White

Do you really think that?

Black

Yes. I really do.

White

Well. You’re very kind. I wish there was something I could do to repay you but there isnt. So why dont we just say goodbye and you can get on with your life.

Black

I cant.

White

You cant?

Black

No.

White

What do you want me to do?

Black

I dont know. Suppose you could wake up tomorrow and you wouldnt be wantin to jump in front of no train. Suppose all you had to do was ask. Would you do it?

White

It would depend on what I had to give up.

Black

I started to write that down and put it in my pocket.

White

What is it that you think I’m holding on to? What is it that the terminal commuter cherishes that he would die for?

Black

I dont know. I dont know.

White

No.

Black

You dont want to talk to me no more, do you?

White

I thought you had a thick skin.

Black

It’s pretty thick. It aint hide to the bone.

White

Why do you think it? Why do you think there is something?

Black

I dont know. It just seems to me that a man that cant wait for a train to run over him has got to have somethin on his mind. Most folks would settle for maybe just a slap up the side of the head. You say you dont care about nothin but I dont believe that. I dont believe that death is ever about nothin. You asked me what I thought it was you was holdin on to and I got to say I dont know. Or maybe I just dont have the words to say it. And maybe you know but you aint sayin. But I believe that when you took your celebrated leap you was holdin on to it and takin it with you. Holdin on for grim death. I look for the words, Professor. I look for the words because I believe that the words is the way to your heart.

White

You think that anyone in my position is automatically blind to the workings of his own psyche.

Black

I think that anybody in your position is automatically blind. But that aint the whole story. Because we still talkin bout the rest of them third railers and them takin one train and you takin another.

White

I didnt say that.

Black

Sure you did. They got a train for all them dumb-ass crackers that just feels bad and then they got this other train for you cause your pain and the world’s pain is the same pain and this train requires a observation car and a diner.

White

Well. You can think what you want. You dont need my agreement.

Black

I know. But that aint the way to the trick bag.

White

Well. The trick bag seems to have shaped itself up into some sort of communal misery wherein one finds salvation by consorting among the loathsome.

Black

Damn, Professor. You puttin me in the bag. Where you come up with stuff like that?

White

It was phrased especially for you. For your enjoyment. You see what a whore I am?

Black

No you aint. You a smart man. Too smart for me.

White

I feel the bag yawning.

Black

I wish I knew how.

White

Do you really think that? That I’m too smart for you?

Black

Yes I do. If you can jack you own self around nine ways from Sunday I’d like to know what chance you think I got.

White

I see.

Black

What I need to do here is to buy more time. But I dont know what to buy it with.

White

You dont know what to offer a man about to board the Limited.

Black

No. I dont. I feel like I’m about traded out.

White

Maybe you are. Have you ever dealt with suicides?

Black

No. You the first one. These junkies and crack-heads is about as far from suicide as you can get. They wouldnt even know what you was talkin about. They wake up in pain ever day. Bad pain. But they aint headed for the depot. Now you can say, well, they got a fix for their pain. Just need to hustle on out there and get it. And that’s a good argument. But still we got this question. Just what is this pain that is causin these express riders to belly up at the kiosk with the black crepe. What kind of pain we talkin about? I got to say that if it was grief that brought folks to suicide it’d be a full time job just to get em all in the ground come sundown. So I keep comin back to the same question. If it aint what you lost that is more than you can bear then maybe it’s what you wont lose. What you’d rather die than to give up.

White

But if you die you will give it up.

Black

No you wont. You wont be here.

White

Well. I cant help you. Letting it all go is the place I finally got to. It took a lot of work to get there and if there is one thing I would be unwilling to give up it is exactly that.

Black

You got any other way of sayin that?

White

The one thing I wont give up is giving up. I expect that to carry me through. I’m depending on it. The things I believed in were very frail. As I said. They wont be around for long and neither will I. But I dont think that’s really the reason for my decision. I think it goes deeper. You can acclimate yourself to loss. You have to. I mean, you like music, right?

Black

Yes I do.

White

Who’s the greatest composer you know of?

Black

John Coltrane. Hands down.

White

Do you think his music will last forever?

Black

Well. Forever’s a long time, Professor. So I got to say no. It wont.

White

But that doesnt make it worthless, does it?

Black

No it dont.

White

You give up the world line by line. Stoically. And then one day you realize that your courage is farcical. It doesnt mean anything. You’ve become an accomplice in your own annihilation and there is nothing you can do about it. Everything you do closes a door somewhere ahead of you. And finally there is only one door left.

Black

That’s a dark world, Professor.

White

Yes.

Black

What’s the worst thing ever happen to you?

White

Getting snatched off a subway platform one morning by an emissary of Jesus.

Black

I’m serious.

White

So am I.

Black

Before this mornin. What was the worst thing.

White

I dont know.

Black

Well, let’s pretend you dont know then. Still, do you reckon it was about you? Or about somebody close to you?

White

Probably someone close to me.

Black

I think that’s probably right. Dont that tell you somethin?

White

Yes. Dont get close to people.

Black

You a hard case, man.

White

How else could I win your love?

Black

You probably right. Let me try this. I dont believe that the world can be better than what you allow it to be. Dark a world as you live in, they aint goin to be a whole lot of surprises in the way of good news.

White

I’m sure that’s true.

Black

Well jubilation. Listen at the professor.

White

But I’m at a loss as to how to bring myself to believe in some most excellent world when I already know that it doesnt exist.

Black

Most excellent.

White

Yes.

Black

I sure do like that. Most excellent.

White

Do you actually believe in such a world?

Black

Yes I do, Professor. Yes I do. I think it’s there for the askin. You got to get in the right line. Buy the right ticket. Take that regular commuter train and stay off the express. Stay on the platform with your fellow commuter. You might even want to nod at him. Maybe even say hello. All of them is travelers too. And they’s some of em been places that most people dont want to go to. They didnt neither. They might even tell you how they got there and maybe save you a trip you’ll be thankful you didnt take.

White

Yes. Well, that’s not going to happen.

Black

Why not?

White

Because I dont believe in that world. I just want to take the train. Look, why dont I just go?

Black

How about some more coffee?

White

No thank you.

Black

What can I do?

White

Maybe you just need to accept that you’re in over your head.

Black

I do accept it. It dont let me off the hook though.

White

You think I dont understand. But I’m not sure you’d want to listen to the things I do understand.

Black

Try me.

White

It would just upset you.

Black

I been upset before.

White

It’s worse than you think.

Black

That’s all right.

White

You dont want to hear this.

Black

Yes I do. I got no choice.

The professor leans back and studies the black.

White

Okay. Maybe you’re right. Well, here’s my news, Reverend. I yearn for the darkness. I pray for death. Real death. If I thought that in death I would meet the people I’ve known in life I dont know what I’d do. That would be the ultimate horror. The ultimate despair. If I had to meet my mother again and start all of that all over, only this time without the prospect of death to look forward to? Well. That would be the final nightmare. Kafka on wheels.

Black

Damn, Professor. You dont want to see you own mama?

White

No. I dont. I told you this would upset you. I want the dead to be dead. Forever. And I want to be one of them. Except that of course you cant be one of them. You cant be one of the dead because what has no existence can have no community. No community. My heart warms just thinking about it. Silence. Blackness. Aloneness. Peace. And all of it only a heartbeat away.

Black

Damn, Professor.

White

Let me finish. I dont regard my state of mind as some pessimistic view of the world. I regard it as the world itself. Evolution cannot avoid bringing intelligent life ultimately to an awareness of one thing above all else and that one thing is futility.

Black

Mm. If I’m understandin you right you sayin that everbody that aint just eat up with the dumb-ass ought to be suicidal.

White

Yes.

Black

You aint shittin me?

White

No. I’m not shitting you. If people saw the world for what it truly is. Saw their lives for what they truly are. Without dreams or illusions. I dont believe they could offer the first reason why they should not elect to die as soon as possible.

Black

Damn, Professor.

White

(Coldly) I dont believe in God. Can you understand that? Look around you man. Cant you see? The clamor and din of those in torment has to be the sound most pleasing to his ear. And I loathe these discussions. The argument of the village atheist whose single passion is to revile endlessly that which he denies the existence of in the first place. Your fellowship is a fellowship of pain and nothing more. And if that pain were actually collective instead of simply reiterative then the sheer weight of it would drag the world from the walls of the universe and send it crashing and burning through whatever night it might yet be capable of engendering until it was not even ash. And justice? Brotherhood? Eternal life? Good god, man. Show me a religion that prepares one for death. For nothingness. There’s a church I might enter. Yours prepares one only for more life. For dreams and illusions and lies. If you could banish the fear of death from men’s hearts they wouldnt live a day. Who would want this nightmare if not for fear of the next? The shadow of the axe hangs over every joy. Every road ends in death. Or worse. Every friendship. Every love. Torment, betrayal, loss, suffering, pain, age, indignity, and hideous lingering illness. All with a single conclusion. For you and for every one and every thing that you have chosen to care for. There’s the true brotherhood. The true fellowship. And everyone is a member for life. You tell me that my brother is my salvation? My salvation? Well then damn him. Damn him in every shape and form and guise. Do I see myself in him? Yes. I do. And what I see sickens me. Do you understand me? Can you understand me?

The black sits with his head lowered.

White

I’m sorry.

Black

That’s all right.

White

No. I’m sorry.

The black looks up at him.

Black

How long you felt like this?

White

All my life.

Black

And that’s the truth.

White

It’s worse than that.

Black

I dont see what could be worse than that.

White

Rage is really only for the good days. The truth is there’s little of that left. The truth is that the forms I see have been slowly emptied out. They no longer have any content. They are shapes only. A train, a wall, a world. Or a man. A thing dangling in senseless articulation in a howling void. No meaning to its life. Its words. Why would I seek the company of such a thing? Why?

Black

Damn.

White

You see what it is you’ve saved.

Black

Tried to save. Am tryin. Tryin hard.

White

Yes.

Black

Who is my brother.

White

Your brother.

Black

Yes.

White

Is that why I’m here? In your apartment?

Black

No. But it’s why I am.

White

You asked what I was a professor of. I’m a professor of darkness. The night in day’s clothing. And now I wish you all the very best but I must go.

He pushes back his chair and rises.

Black

Just stay a few more minutes.

White

No. No more time. Goodbye.

He turns toward the door and the black rises.

Black

Come on, Professor. We can talk about somethin else. I promise.

White

I dont want to talk about something else.

Black

Dont go out there. You know what’s out there.

White

Oh yes. Indeed I do. I know what is out there and I know who is out there. I rush to nuzzle his bony cheek. No doubt he’ll be surprised to find himself so cherished. And as I cling to his neck I will whisper in that dry and ancient ear: Here I am. Here I am. Now open the door.

Black

Dont do it, Professor.

White

I’m sorry. You’re a kind man, but I have to go. I’ve heard you out and you’ve heard me and there’s no more to say. Your God must have once stood in a dawn of infinite possibility and this is what he’s made of it. And now it is drawing to a close. You say that I want God’s love. I dont. Perhaps I want forgiveness, but there is no one to ask it of. And there is no going back. No setting things right. Perhaps once. Not now. Now there is only the hope of nothingness. I cling to that hope. Now open the door. Please.

Black

Dont do it.

White

Open the door.

The black undoes the chains. They rattle to the floor. He opens the door and the professor exits. The black stands in the doorway looking down the hall.

Black

Professor? I know you dont mean them words. Professor? I’m goin to be there in the mornin. I’ll be there. You hear? I’ll be there in the mornin.

He collapses to his knees in the doorway, all but weeping.

Black

I’ll be there.

He looks up.

Black

He didnt mean them words. You know he didnt. You know he didnt. I dont understand what you sent me down there for. I dont understand it. If you wanted me to help him how come you didnt give me the words? You give em to him. What about me?

He kneels weeping rocking back and forth.

Black

That’s all right. That’s all right. If you never speak again you know I’ll keep your word. You know I will. You know I’m good for it.

He lifts his head.

Black

Is that okay? Is that okay?

THE END

Cormac McCarthy is the author of eleven novels. Among his honors are the National Book Award, the Pulitzer Prize, and the National Book Critics Circle Award.

Books by Cormac McCarthy

The Road
The Sunset Limited (a novel in dramatic form)
No Country for Old Men
Cities of the Plain
The Crossing
All the Pretty Horses
The Stonemason (a play)
The Gardener’s Son (a screenplay)
Blood Meridian
Suttree
Child of God
Outer Dark
The Orchard Keeper

BOOKS BY CORMAC MCCARTHY

“McCarthy puts most other American writers to shame.”
—The New York Times Book Review

THE ORCHARD KEEPER

Set in a small, remote community in rural Tennessee between the two world wars, this novel tells of John Wesley Rattner, a young boy, and Marion Sylder, an outlaw and bootlegger who, unbeknownst to either of them, has killed the boy’s father. Together with Rattner’s Uncle Ather, they enact a drama that seems born of the land itself.

Fiction/Literature/978-0-679-72872-6 (trade)
978-0-307-76250-4 (eBook)

OUTER DARK

Outer Dark is a novel at once fabular and starkly evocative, set in an unspecified place in Appalachia around the turn of the century. A woman bears her brother’s child, a boy, whom he leaves in the woods and tells her the baby died of natural causes. Discovering her brother’s lie, she sets forth alone to find her son.

Fiction/Literature/978-0-679-72873-3 (trade)
978-0-307-76249-8 (eBook)

CHILD OF GOD

Child of God is a taut, chilling novel that plumbs the depths of human degradation. Falsely accused of rape, Lester Ballard—a violent, dispossessed man who haunts the hill country of East Tennessee—is released from jail and allowed to roam at will, preying on the population with his strange lusts.

Fiction/Literature/978-0-679-72874-0 (trade)
978-0-307-76248-1 (eBook)

SUTTREE

This is the story of Cornelius Suttree, who has forsaken a life of privilege to live in a houseboat on the Tennessee River. Remaining on the margins of the outcast community—a brilliantly imagined collection of eccentrics, criminals, and squatters—he rises above the physical and human squalor with detachment, humor, and dignity.

Fiction/Literature/978-0-679-73632-5 (trade)
978-0-307-76247-4 (eBook)

THE STONEMASON

The setting is Louisville, Kentucky, in the 1970s. The Telfairs are stonemasons and have been for generations. Ben Telfair has given up his education to apprentice himself to his grandfather, Papaw. Out of the love that binds these two men and the gulf that separates them from the Telfairs who have forsaken—or dishonored—the family trade, McCarthy has crafted a drama that bears all the hallmarks of his great fiction.

Fiction/Literature/978-0-679-76280-5

BLOOD MERIDIAN

This is an epic novel of the violence and depravity that attended America’s westward expansion. Based on historical events that took place on the Texas-Mexico border in the 1850s, it traces the fortunes of the Kid, a fourteen-year-old Tennesseean who stumbles into a nightmarish world where Indians are being murdered and the market for their scalps is thriving.

Fiction/Literature/978-0-679-72875-7 (trade)
978-0-307-76252-8 (eBook)

ALL THE PRETTY HORSES

All the Pretty Horses tells of young John Grady Cole, the last of a long line of Texas ranchers. Across the border, Mexico beckons—beautiful and desolate, rugged and cruelly civilized. With two companions, he sets off on an idyllic, sometimes comic adventure, to a place where dreams are paid for in blood.

Fiction/Literature/978-0-679-74439-9 (trade)
978-0-307-48130-6 (eBook)

THE CROSSING

In the late 1930s, sixteen-year-old Billy Parham captures a she-wolf that has been marauding his family’s ranch. Instead of killing it, he takes it back to the mountains of Mexico. With that crossing, he begins an arduous and dreamlike journey into a country where men meet like ghosts and violence strikes as suddenly as heat-lightning.

Fiction/Literature/978-0-679-76084-9 (trade)
978-0-307-76246-7 (eBook)

CITIES OF THE PLAIN

It is 1952 and John Grady Cole and Billy Parham are working as ranch hands in New Mexico. Their life is made up of trail drives and horse auctions and stories told by campfire light, a life they value because they know it is about to change forever.

Fiction/Literature/978-0-679-74719-2 (trade)
978-0-307-77752-2 (eBook)

NO COUNTRY FOR OLD MEN

McCarthy returns to the Texas-Mexico border, the setting of his famed Border Trilogy. A good old boy named Llewellyn Moss finds a pickup truck surrounded by dead man. A load of heroin and two million dollars in cash are still in the back. When Moss takes the money, he sets off a chain reaction of catastrophic violence that not even the law can contain.

Fiction/Literature/978-0-375-70667-7 (trade)
978-0-307-39053-0 (eBook)

THE SUNSET LIMITED

A startling encounter on a New York subway platform leads two strangers to a run-down tenement where a life or death decision must be made. In that small apartment, “Black” and “White,” as the two men are known, begin a conversation that leads each back through his own history, mining the origins of two fundamentally opposing world-views. White is a professor whose seemingly enviable existence of relative ease has left him nonetheless in despair. Black, an ex-con and ex-addict, is the more hopeful of the men—though he is just as desperate to convince White of the power of faith as White is desperate to deny it. Their aim is no less than this: to discover the meaning of life.

Fiction/Literature/978-0-307-27836-4 (trade)
978-0-307-49812-0 (eBook)

THE ROAD

A father and his son walk alone through burned America. Nothing moves in the ravaged landscape save the ash on the wind. It is cold enough to crack stones, and when the snow falls it is gray. The sky is dark. Their destination is the coast, although they don’t know what, if anything, awaits them there. They have nothing; just a pistol to defend themselves against the lawless bands that stalk the road, the clothes they are wearing, a cart of scavenged food—and each other.

Fiction/Literature/978-0-307-38789-9 (trade)
978-0-307-26745-0 (eBook)

VINTAGE INTERNATIONAL
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FIRST VINTAGE INTERNATIONAL EDITION, OCTOBER 2006

Copyright (c) 2006 by M-71, Ltd.

All rights reserved. Published in the United States by Vintage Books, a division of Random House, Inc., New York, and in Canada by Random House of Canada Limited, Toronto.

Vintage is a registered trademark and Vintage International and colophon are registered trademarks of Random House, Inc.

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, business organizations, places, events, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. The author’s use of names of actual persons (living or dead), places, and characters is incidental to the purposes of the plot, and is not intended to change the entirely fictional character of the work or to disparage any company or its products or services. The book has not been prepared, approved, or licensed by any persons or characters named in the text, their successors, or related corporate entities.

The Cataloging-in-Publication Data is on file at the Library of Congress.

eISBN: 978-0-307-49812-0

www.vintagebooks.com

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Table of Contents

Cover

Title Page

Chapter 1

About the Author

Other Books by This Author

Books by Cormac Mccarthy

Copyright