Quotes / No Country for Old Men

"I sent one boy to the gas chamber at Huntsville. One and only one. My arrest and my testimony. I went up there and visited with him two or three times. Three times. The last time was the day of his execution. I didn't have to go but I did. I sure didn't want to. He'd killed a fourteen-year-old girl and I can tell you right now I never did have no great desire to visit with him let alone go to his execution but I done it. The papers said it was a crime of passion and he told me there wasn't no passion to it. He'd been datin' this girl, young as she was. He was nineteen. And he told me that he had been plannin' to kill somebody for about as long as he could remember. Said that if they turned him out he'd do it again. Said he knew he was goin' to hell. Told it to me out of his own mouth. I don't know what to make of that. I surely don't. I thought I'd never seen a person like that and it got me to wonderin' if maybe he was some new kind. I watched them strap him into the seat and shut the door. He might've looked a bit nervous about it but that was about all. I really believe that he knew he was goin' to be in hell in fifteen minutes. I believe that. And I've thought about that a lot. He was not hard to talk to. Called me Sheriff. But I didn't know what to say to him. What do you say to a man that by his own admission has no soul? Why would you say anything? I've thought about it a good deal. But he wasn't nothin' compared to what was comin' down the pike."

Cashier: Y'all gettin' any rain up your way?
Chigurh: And what way would that be?
Cashier: I figured you was from Dallas.
Chigurh: ... What business is it of yours where I'm from, friend-o?
Cashier: ... Oh, I didn't mean nuthin' by it.
Chigurh: 'Didn't mean nuthin'?
Cashier: I was just passin' the time: if y'all don't want to accept that, I don't know what else I can do for ya... Will there be anything else?
Chigurh: I don't know, will there?

Cashier: [clears his throat] Is something wrong?
Chigurh: With what?
Cashier: With anything.
Chigurh: ... Is that what you're asking me — 'is there something wrong with anything'?

"I don't have a 'way to put it': that's the way it is."
— Chigurh

Chigurh: [flips a coin, catches it, places it on the counter, covers the face of it] Call it.
Cashier: 'Call it'?
Chigurh: Yes.
Cashier: For what?
Chigurh: Just call it.
Cashier: ... Well, we need to know what we're calling it for here.
Chigurh: You need to call it. I can't call it for you, or it wouldn't be fair.
Cashier: I didn't put nuthin' up.
Chigurh: Yes, you did: you've been putting it up your whole life — you just didn't know it. You know what date is on this coin?
Cashier: No.
Chigurh: 1958: 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.
Cashier: Look, I n-need to know what I stand to win.
Chigurh: Everything.
Cashier: How's that?
Chigurh: You stand to win everything. Call it.
Cashier: ... Alright: heads then.
Chigurh: [reveals and looks at the face of the coin]
[the face is heads]
Chigurh: Well done. [slides the coin to the cashier]
Cashier: [takes the coin]
Chigurh: Don't put it in your pocket.
Cashier: Sir?
Chigurh: Don't put it in your pocket: it's your lucky quarter.
Cashier: ... Where do 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.

Loretta: Be careful.
Sheriff Ed Tom: Always am.
Loretta: Don't get hurt.
Sheriff Ed Tom: Never do.
Loretta: Don't hurt no one.
Sheriff Ed Tom: [laughs] ... If you say so.

"Aw, Hell's bells: they even shot the dog."
— Deputy Wendell

Deputy Wendell: Well, it's a mess, ain't it Sheriff?
Sheriff Ed Tom: ... If it ain't, it'll do 'til the mess gets here.

Carson: What do you do?
Llewellyn: I'm retired.
Carson: What did you do?
Llewellyn: Welder.
Carson: Acetylene? Mig? Tig?
Llewellyn: Any of it: if it can be welded, I can weld it.
Carson: Cast iron?
Llewellyn: Yeah.
Carson: I don't mean braze.
Llewellyn: I didn't say braze.
Carson: Pot metal?
Llewellyn: What did I say?

Sheriff Ed Tom: You know Charlie Walser's got that place out east of Sanderson?
Carla Jean: [shakes her head]
Sheriff Ed Tom: Well, you know how he used to slaughter beeves — hit 'em [indicates his forehead] right there with a maul, truss 'em up, and slit their throats? Here, Charlie's got one all trussed up; all set to drain him, and the beef comes to — starts thrashing around: six hundred pounds of very pissed off livestock... you'll excuse the... well. Charlie grabs a gun there [to] shoot the damn thing in the head, but, with all the swingin' and the thrashin', it's a glance shot: ricochets around, comes back, hits Charlie in the shoulder. You go see Charlie: he still can't pick up his right hand for his hat. The point bein' that, even in the contest between man and steer, the issue is not certain.
Carla Jean: [waits]
Sheriff Ed Tom: [sighs] When Llewellyn calls, [hands Carla Jean a card] just tell him I can make him safe.
Carla Jean: [takes the card]
Sheriff Ed Tom: [sighs] ... Course they slaughter steers a lot different these days: use a air gun — shoots out a little rod about [indicates] that far into the brain, sucks right back in. Animal never knows what hit him.
Carla Jean: ... Why you tellin' me that, Sheriff?
Sheriff Ed Tom: I don't know.... [sighs] My mind wanders.

Carson: You go to hell.
Chigurh: Nnnn... alright. Let me ask you sumn': if the rule you followed... brought you to this... of what use was the rule?

Carson: Do you have any idea how crazy you are?
Chigurh: You mean the nature of this conversation?
Carson: I mean the nature of you.

[via phonecall]
Llewellyn: Hello?
Chigurh: Yes.
Llewellyn Is, uh, Carson Wells there?
Chigurh: ... Not in the sense that you mean.

[via phonecall]
Chigurh: [sighs] You know how this is gonna turn out, don'cha?
Llewellyn: ... Nope.
Chigurh: I think you do, so this is what I'll offer: you bring me the money and I'll let her go; otherwise, she's accountable — same as you. That's the best deal you're gonna get. I won't tell you 'you can save yourself' because you can't.
Llewellyn: Yeah, I'm goin' [to] bring you sumn' alright. I've decided to make you a special project of mine: you ain't gon' have to come look for me at all. [cuts the call]

[regarding drug dealers]
Sheriff Ed Tom: It sounded like these old boys died of natural causes.
Deputy Wendell: How's that, Sheriff?
Sheriff Ed Tom: Natural to the line of work they was in.
Deputy Wendell: Yes sir.

Sheriff Ed Tom: Here: last week, they found this couple out in California; they rent out rooms to old people, kill 'em, bury 'em in the yard, cash their Social Security checks. They'd torture 'em first. I don't know why — maybe their television set was broke. And this went on until, here I quote: "Neighbors were alerted when a man ran from the premises wearing only a dog collar." You can't make up such a thing as that. I dare you to even try. But that's what it took, you notice, to get somebody's attention; diggin' graves in the backyard didn't bring any.
Deputy Wendell: [laughs, stifles himself]
Sheriff Ed Tom: ... Oh. That's alright. I laugh myself sometimes.... Ain't a whole lot else you can do.

Sheriff Ed Tom: [enters house]
Ellis: [in the next room] Out back.
Sheriff Ed Tom: How'd you know I was here?
Ellis: Who else'd be driving up in your truck?
Sheriff Ed Tom: You heard it?
Ellis: How's that?
Sheriff Ed Tom: [enters the next room] Did you hear my... You're havin' fun with me.
Ellis: What give you that idea? I seen one o' the cats heard it.
Sheriff Ed Tom: How'd you know it was my truck?
Ellis: I deduced it when you walked in.

Sheriff Ed Tom: That man that shot you died in prison?
Ellis: ... Angola. Yeah.
Sheriff Ed Tom: What'd you done he'd been released?
Ellis: Oh, I don't know. Nuthin'. Wouldn't be no point in it.
Sheriff Ed Tom: Kindly surprised to hear you say that.
Ellis: Well, all the time you spend tryin' to get back what's been took from you, more is goin' out the door; after a while, you just have to try to get a tourniquet on it."

Ellis: Loretta tells me you're quittin': how come you doin' that?
Sheriff Ed Tom: I don't know, um... I feel over-matched... I always figured, when I got older, God would... sorta come into my life, somehow... and he didn't... I don't blame him: if I was him, I'd have the same opinion of me that he does.
Ellis: You don't know what He thinks.

Ellis: I sent Uncle Mac's thumb buster and badge over to the Rangers [to] put in their museum. Your daddy ever tell you how Uncle Mac come to his reward?
Sheriff Ed Tom: [shakes his head]
Ellis: Gunned down on his own porch over in Hudspeth County... Seven or eight of 'em come up there — all wantin' this, wantin' that. Uncle Mac went back in the house to get the shotgun — well, they was ahead of him: shot him in his doorway. Aunt Ella come out, tried to stop the bleedin'; Uncle Mac all the while tryin' to get that shotgun. They just sat there on their horses, watchin' him die. After a while, one of them said sumn' in Indian, and they turned — left out... Uncle Mac knew the score even if Aunt Ella didn't: shot through the left lung. And that was that... as they say.
Sheriff Ed Tom: ... When'd he die?
Ellis: Nineteen zero, and, uh, nine?
Sheriff Ed Tom: No, I mean... was it right away, or in the night, or... when was it?
Ellis: I believe it's that night. She buried him the next morning. Diggin' in that hard old caliche... [sighs] What you got ain't nuthin' new: this country's hard on people... You can't stop what's comin'... It ain't all waitin' on you... That's vanity.

Carla Jean: You got no cause to hurt me.
Chigurh: No. But I gave my word.
Carla Jean: You gave your word?
Chigurh: To your husband.
Carla Jean: That don't make sense: you gave your word to my husband to kill me?
Chigurh: Your husband had the opportunity to save you; instead, he used you to try and save himself.
Carla Jean: ... Not like that... Not like you say.

Carla Jean: You don't have to do this.
Chigurh: People always say the same thing.
Carla Jean: ... What do they say?
Chigurh: They say, "You don't have to do this."
Carla Jean: You don't.
Chigurh: ... Okay; [flips a coin, catches it, places it on his knee] this is the best I can do — call it.
Carla Jean: ... I knowed you was crazy when I saw you sittin' there.... I knowed exactly what was in store for me.
Chigurh: Call it.
Carla Jean: No... I ain't goin'a call it.
Chigurh: ... Call it.
Carla Jean: The coin don't have no say; it's just you.
Chigurh: ... I got here the same way the coin did.

Loretta: How'd ya sleep?
Sheriff Ed Tom: I don't know. Had dreams.
Loretta: Well, you got time for 'em now. Anything interesting?
Sheriff Ed Tom: They always is to the party concerned.
Loretta: ... Ed Tom, I'll be polite.
Sheriff Ed Tom: ... Alright then: two of 'em — both had my father in 'em. It's peculiar: I'm older now than he ever was by twenty years, so, in a sense, he's the younger man. Anyway, the first one I don't remember too well, but... it was about meetin' him in town somewheres, and he give me some money — I think I lost it.... And second one... it was like we was both back in older times... and I was a-horseback, goin' through the mountains of a night — goin' through this pass in the mountains. It was cold, and there was snow on the ground, and he would— rode past me and kept on going. Never said nuthin' goin' by: just rode on past. And he had his blanket wrapped around him, and his head down... When he rode past I seen he was carrying fire... in a horn, the way people used to do, and I... I could see the horn from the light inside of it — about the color of the moon.... And in the dream I knew that he was... goin' on ahead.... And he was fixin' to make a fire somewhere out there in all that dark and all that cold.... I knew that whenever I got there he'd be there... Then I woke up.

---