The famous coin toss scene.  GAS STATION / GROCERY SHEFFIELD At an isolated dusty crossroad. It is twilight. The Ford sedan that Chigurh stopped is parked alongside the pump. INSIDE Chigurh stands at the counter across from the elderly proprietor. He holds up a bag of cashews. Chigurh How much? Proprietor Sixty-nine cent. Chigurh This. And the gas. Proprietor Y'all getting any rain up your way? Chigurh What way would that be? Proprietor I seen you was from Dallas. Chigurh tears open the bag of cashews and pours a few into his hand. Chigurh What business is it of yours where I'm from, friendo? Proprietor I didn't mean nothin by it. Chigurh Didn't mean nothin. Proprietor I was just passin the time. Chigurh I guess that passes for manners in your cracker view of things. A beat. Proprietor Well sir I apologize. If you don't wanna accept that I don't know what else I can do for you. Chigurh stands chewing cashews, staring while the old man works the register and puts change on the counter. ...Will there be somethin else? Chigurh I don't know. Will there? Beat. The proprietor turns and coughs. Chigurh stares. Proprietor Is somethin wrong? Chigurh With what? Proprietor With anything? Chigurh Is that what you're asking me? Is there something wrong with anything? The proprietor looks at him, uncomfortable, looks away. Proprietor Will there be anything else? Chigurh You already asked me that. Proprietor Well... I need to see about closin. Chigurh See about closing. Proprietor Yessir. Chigurh What time do you close? Proprietor Now. We close now. Chigurh Now is not a time. What time do you close. Proprietor Generally around dark. At dark. Chigurh stares, slowly chewing. Chigurh You don't know what you're talking about, do you? Proprietor Sir? Chigurh I said you don't know what you're talking about. Chigurh chews. ...What time do you go to bed. Proprietor Sir? Chigurh You're a bit deaf, aren't you? I said what time do you go to bed. Proprietor Well... A pause. ...I'd say around nine-thirty. Somewhere around nine-thirty. Chigurh I could come back then. Proprietor Why would you be comin back? We'll be closed. Chigurh You said that. He continues to stare, chewing. Proprietor Well... I need to close now - Chigurh You live in that house behind the store? Proprietor Yes I do. Chigurh You've lived here all your life? A beat. Proprietor This was my wife's father's place. Originally. Chigurh You married into it. Proprietor We lived on Temple Texas for many years. Raised a family there. In Temple. We come out here about four years ago. Chigurh You married into it. Proprietor ...If that's the way you wanna put it. Chigurh I don't have some way to put it. That's the way it is. He finishes the cashews and wads the packet and sets in on the counter where it begins to slowly unkink. The proprietor's eyes have tracked the packet. Chigurh's eyes stay on the proprietor. ...What's the lost you've ever lost on a coin toss? Proprietor Sir? Chigurh The most. You ever lost. On a coin toss. Proprietor I don't know. I couldn't say. Chigurh is digging in his pocket. A quarter: he tosses it. He slaps it onto his forearm but keeps it covered. Chigurh Call it. Proprietor Call it? Chigurh Yes. Proprietor For what? Chigurh Just call it. Proprietor Well - we need to know what it is we're callin for here. Chigurh You need to call it. I can't call it for you. It wouldn't be fair. It wouldn't even be right. Proprietor I didn't put nothin up. Chigurh Yes you did. You been putting it up your whole life. You just didn't know it. You know what date is on this coin? Proprietor No. Chigurh Nineteen fifty-eight. It's been traveling twenty-two years to get here. And now it's here. And it's either heads or tails, and you have to say. Call it. A long beat. Proprietor Look... I got to know what I stand to win. Chigurh Everything. Proprietor How's that? Chigurh You stand to win everything. Call it. Proprietor All right. Heads then. Chigurh takes his hand away from the coin and turns his arm to look at it. Chigurh Well done. He hands it across. ...Don't put it in your pocket. Proprietor Sir? Chigurh Don't put it in your pocket. It's your lucky quarter. Proprietor ...Where you want me to put it? Chigurh Anywhere not in your pocket. Or it'll get mixed in with the others and become just a coin. Which it is. He turns and goes. The proprietor watches him. | The pharmacy scene.  RAMCHARGER We are close on a patch of its front seat. Day. The pickup is parked. The piece of upholstery we are looking at has blood soaked into it. On the sound of the door opening we cut wider. We are in the parking lot of a Wal-Mart. Chigurh, climbing in, tosses a brown paper bag onto the passenger side; He has a dark towel wrapped around one leg. As he slides behind the wheel the wrapped part of his leg slides over the bloodstain. TRAVELING POINT OF VIEW A small-town main street. We are driving past a pharmacy. Chigurh, looking. He parks. He takes a scissors from the Wal-Mart bag and a box of cotton. He opens the box and cuts a little disc out of the cardboard. He takes a new shirt out of the bag and begins to cut through one sleeve. SHOOTING PAST A PARKED CAR Chigurh limps toward us. He holds a coathanger bent straight with the balled-up shirtsleeve hooked to one end. Chigurh arrives, looks up and down the street. He unscrews the gascap, feeds the coathanger in to soak the shirt, pulls it back out. He tapes the cardboard disc over the open gas tank. He unhooks the wet shirtsleeve and jams it up over the disc. He lights it and exits. INSIDE THE PHARMACY A beat pulling Chigurh limping up the aisle, and then the car explodes out front. The plate glass storefront blows in. The few people inside rush out; Chigurh doesn't react. The pharmacy counter in back is deserted. Chigurh lifts a hinged piece of counter to enter and starts looking through the stock. He pulls out a packet of syringes; Hydrocodone tablets, penicillin. MOTEL ROOM Chigurh dumps the harmaceuticals into the bathroom sink. In the room outside he sits on the bed and takes off his boots. He unknots the towel from around his leg and stands and unbuttons his pants and starts cutting from the crotch down with a heavy scissors. One thigh is a mess of clotted blood and torn fabric. BATH Chigurh lowers himself into bathwater that quickly turns pink. He laves water over his bloody thigh. There is a dark red hole, one half inch across, pulsing blood into the bathwater. Torn pieces of fabric from his pants are embedded in the bleeding skin. A SHAVING MIRROR We are looking at the wound in a magnifying mirror. Forceps enter and pluck a tiny piece of blood-soaked fabric from the skin. RUNNING WATER A bathroom tap. The forceps enters. They are rinsed, shaken off. Wider: Chigurh sits on the closed toilet with the mirror sitting on the edge of the tub, angled toward the wound. Chigurh works on cleaning it. The main room. The TV is on now. Chigurh enters from the bathroom with his leg bandaged. He sits on the bed and tears open the packaging of a syringe. He plunges it into an ampule of penicillin. He injects himself. | The Wells murder scene.  EAGLE HOTEL LOBBY Twilight. Carson Wells enters the hotel and crosses the lobby. STAIRWAY Carson Wells appears around the corner and we pull him as he mounts the stairs. When he is about halfway up a figure - focus does not hold him - rounds the corner behind and silently follows, holding a fatbarreled shotgun loosely at his side. After a few steps Carson Wells stops, frowning, cued by we don't know what. Focus drops back as he turns. Chigurh raises the shotgun. Chigurh Hello Carson. Let's go to your room. HOTEL ROOM Chigurh sits into a chair drawn up to face the armchair Carson Wells sits. Wells We don't have to do this. I'm a daytrader. I could just go home. Chigurh Why would I let you do that? Wells I know where the money is. Chigurh If you knew, you would have it with you. Wells I need dark. To get it. I know where it is. Chigurh I know something better. Wells What's that. Chigurh I know where it's going to be. Wells And where is that. Chigurh It will be brought to me and placed at my feet. Wells wipes his mouth with his hand. Wells You don't know to a certainty. Twenty minutes it could be here. Chigurh I do know to a certainty. And you know what's going to happen now. You should admit your situation. There would be more dignity in it. Wells You go to hell. A beat. Chigurh Let me ask you something. If the rule you followed brought you to this, of what use was the rule? Another beat. Wells Do you have any idea how goddamn crazy you are? Chigurh You mean the nature of this conversation? Wells I mean the nature of you. Chigurh looks at him equally. Wells holds his look. ...You can have the money. Anton. The phone rings. Wells looks at the phone. Chigurh hasn't moved. Wells looks at Chigurh, waiting for a decision. The low chug of the shotgun. Aside from his finger on the trigger, Chigurh hasn't moved. He sits staring at Wells's remains for a beat. Now his look swings onto the phone. He watches it ring twice more. He picks it up and listens without speaking. After a beat: Moss's Voice ...Hello? Chigurh Yes? Another beat. Moss's Voice Is Carson Wells there. A longer beat. Chigurh Not in the sense that you mean. Moss doesn't answer. Chigurh gives him a beat, and then: ...You need to come see me. We intercut Moss, in his hospital robe, at a public phone on the ward. He stands tensed with the phone to his ear. Finally: Moss Who is this. Chigurh You know who it is. A beat. ...You need to talk to me. Moss I don't need to talk to you. Chigurh I think you do. Do you know where I'm going? Moss Why would I care where you're going. Chigurh Do you know where I'm going? No answer. Chigurh cocks his head, noticing something on the floor. He adjusts to sit back and raise his boots onto the bed. On the floor where his feet were, blood is pooling out from Wells's chair. ...I know where you are. Moss Yeah? Where am I? Chigurh You're in a hospital across the river. But that's not where I'm going. Do you know where I'm going? Moss Yeah. I know where you're going. Chigurh All right. Moss You know she won't be there. Chigurh It doesn't make any difference where she is. Moss So what're you goin up there for. A beat. Chigurh You know how this is going to turn out, don't you? Moss No. Do you? Chigurh Yes, I do. I think you do too. So this is what I'll offer. You bring me the money and I'll let her go. Otherwise she's accountable. The same as you. That's the best deal you're going to get. I won't tell you you can save yourself because you can't. Moss Yeah I'm goin to bring you somethin all right. I've decided to make you a special project of mine. You ain't goin to have to look for me at all. Moss slams the phone onto its hook, then slams it twice more for good measure. Chigurh, in the hotel room, cradles his phone. |
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