No Country for Old Men

3

The exterior of downtown Houston is hazy under a noon sun. Inside, a man is standing behind a large desk with floor-to-ceiling windows. Carson Wells is sitting in front of the desk, his manner affable and he rests a booted foot across one knee. He knows Anton Chigurh by sight.

Wells is a man who has seen Chigurh on November 28th, last year. He remembers dates, names, and numbers, and is sure of the date. The man gazes at Wells and nods. They have a loose cannon and are out a lot of money, and the other party is out of their product. The man slides a bank card across the table, which will only give up twelve hundred dollars in any twenty hours. 

Wells rises to take the card and then reseats himself. The man asks Wells how well he knows Chigurh.

Chigurh is a psychopathic killer who killed three men in a motel in Del Rio yesterday and two others at a colossal goatfuck out in the desert. Wells is sure of himself and has led a charmed life, but he thumps once in his chest and asks if he can get his parking ticket validated. The man replies that he is not sure if charm has anything to do with it.

The man is making an attempt to make a joke, but he regrets it and leaves.

Dusko Moss is getting out of a station wagon and entering a town square with the Hotel Eagle, identified by a neon above the front door. Moss enters the Hotel Eagle Lobby at night, where an older man is reading Ring magazine and smoking a hand-rolled cigarette. Moss pays $26 for one room, and the clerk asks Moss to stay until 10 tomorrow morning. Moss pushes a $100 bill across the desk, but the clerk looks at it without reaching. Moss is not asking Moss to do anything illegal, and the clerk is waiting to hear Moss' description of it. Someone is looking for Moss, not the police, and needs to be contacted if anyone checks in.

Moss is mounting the stairs from the lobby. The carpeted hallway is lined by transom-topped doors. Moss goes to a door halfway down on his left. Moss enters a room with old oak furniture and high ceilings. He sets the document case next to the bed. He unzips the duffel and takes out the shotgun which he lays on the bed, and then goes to the window. He parts the curtain to look down. The street is empty. Mexican music floats up faintly from a bar somewhere not far away.

The room is dark. The music is gone. We are looking straight down at Moss lying, clothed, on the bed. We are booming straight down toward him. After a beat, he shakes his head. He opens his eyes, grimacing. "There just ain't no way." He sits up and turns on the bedside lamp. The shotgun and document case are on the floor by the bed. Moss swings the document case onto the bed and unclasps it and upends the money onto the bed. He feels the bottom of the case, squeezing it with one hand inside and one hand out, looking for a false bottom. He eyeballs the case, turning it over and around. He starts riffling money packets. He finds one that binds. It has hundreds on the outside but ones inside with the centers cut out. In the hollow is a sending unit the size of a Zippo lighter. He holds the sender, staring at it. A long beat.

From somewhere, a dull chug. The sound is hard to read-a compressor going on, a door thud, maybe something else. The sound has brought Moss's look up. He sits listening. No further sound. Moss reaches to unscramble the rotary phone by the bed. He dials 0. We hear ringing filtered through the handset. Also, faintly, offset, we hear the ring direct from downstairs. After five rings Moss cradles the phone. He goes to the door, and reaches for the knob, but hesitates. He gets down on his hands and knees and listens at the crack under the door. An open-airy sound like a seashell put to your ear. Moss rises and turns to the bed. He piles money back into the document case but freezes suddenly for no reason we can see. A long beat on his motionless back. We gradually become aware of a faint high-frequency beeping, barely audible. Its source is indeterminate. Moss clasps the document case, picks up his shotgun, and eases himself to a sitting position on the bed, facing the door. He looks at the line of light under it. The beeps approach, though still not loud. A long wait. At length, a soft shadow appears in the line of light below the door. It lingers there. The beeping-stops. A beat. Now the soft shadow becomes more focused. It resolves into two columns of darkness: feet planted before the door. Moss raises his shotgun toward the door. A long beat. Moss adjusts his grip on the shotgun and his finger tightens on the trigger. The shadow moves, unhurriedly, rightward. The band of light beneath the door is once again unshadowed. Quiet. Moss stares.