"As quickly as you can, snatch the pebble from my hand." "When you can take the pebble from my hand, it will be time for you to leave." "Walk the rice paper softly as you can." "Be careful not to tear it." "Turn around." "Look at the paper." "When you can walk the rice paper without tearing it then your steps will not be heard." "Time for you to leave." "Best this side of the Rockies." "No, the whole country." "I've heard less wind in a blizzard." "You get out your musket." "I'm gonna make you a believer." "I've got 50 Mexican pesos says Ezra can shoot this jug off my head at 1 5 paces." "All right." "One." "Two." "Three." "You're walking like an old lady." "How do you know how I'm walking?" "Ten." "Eleven." "Twelve." "Thirteen." "Fourteen." "Yankees." "Now, you stay behind that line." "Get out of here." "One." "Two." "Three." "Four." "Five." "Six." "Get out of the way." "l counted them right." "Thirteen." "Fourteen." "Fifteen." "Now, you stay behind that line." "All right." "Ezra?" "Ezra?" "Yeah." "Well?" "They're back, Daddy." "The whole regiment." "After all these months." "Shoot that hog." "Shoot." "Daddy?" "Daddy?" "Daddy!" "What troubles him?" "He's got consumption." "Can you please help me get him to a doctor?" "Annie, a husband won't be hard to find out here." "A short supply of girls makes men blind to any little mistake." "We gotta get some meat on those bones." "You're eating for two now, you know?" "l'm fat enough already." "When's the last time you saw a doctor?" "You're the first." "Well, from now on, you stay put." "I have to drive the wagon." "You do, and that baby will be stillborn." "Good." "And you'll die giving it birth." "Master?" "Yes, Student Caine." "What is it?" "An infant." "Where did you find it?" "Left to die by the river." "You wonder how this can be." "Hunger is everywhere." "is it better to let the infant die than force it to live?" "All life is sacred." "Thus the joining together of man and woman is always honored." "Apart, there is no life but from such union life may proceed." "Then life must be always defended." "The thorn defends the rose." "It harms only those who would steal the blossom from the plant." "Daddy, I'm not gonna go back with you." "You've got to, Annie." "I heard what the doctor said." "You take the stagecoach." "When you get home you can send Samuel to help me." "Mister, I'm in your debt." "No more than the leaf owes the root." "In water and sunlight, both grow together." "If you've a mind, you can do me another service." "The doctor said somebody ought to take care of Annie on the way to the Army post till her brother comes." "I can't pay you none." "I will take her to the Army post." "He was wearing that around his neck." "Was there anything else?" "He had three stripes, very tall, blond hair." "He had a droopy mustache." "And his two friends were privates." "Sergeant." "A good-luck piece from the war." "Sgt. Straight, sir." "He fought with Cotton and Barr from Harpers Ferry to Shiloh." "Them two are on patrol." "You get Sgt. Straight." "Yes, sir." "Well, miss, a soldier leads a very hard life and sometimes when he sees a very pretty girl he's tempted to makes promises that he fully intends to keep but which he cannot keep." "Do your parents know you're here?" "My mother's dead." "My father's ill." "Now, sometimes when a man suddenly sees a girl he's apt to forget the feelings that he had for her under more romantic circumstances." "Come." "Yankee, I'll kill you!" "I'll kill you!" "Ma'am." "l'll kill you" "Sergeant..." "...do you know this girl?" "l don't think I've had the pleasure, sir." "She described you." "Accurately." "Well, sir, I can't help it if she's seen me, but I don't know her." "Looks a little bit like one of them dance-hall girls down at the Hurdy Gurdy in Sunday but, well, they all look alike with the rouge on and their clothes off." "Miss, do you have any proof?" "Anyone who might back up your identification?" "It was rape." "The only other two were his friends." "Captain, some of these dancing girls they get a problem, they name the handiest soldier." "Like picking a name out of a hat." "Sir, if it was me, I'd pass out cigars." "But...." "Sir, you can't really believe a woman running around alone with a Chinee, now, can you, sir?" "Well, in the absence of any supporting evidence...." "l'm sorry." "Miss." "A horse." "It's a long ride, sis." "I found him." "Good girl." "His name's Straight." "All right, you just leave him up to me." "Halt." "State your business." "l'd like to speak to your post commander." "You can't. Indians butchered five white settlers up north." "He took most of the company on patrol." "is there a Sgt. Straight?" "Did he go out with them?" "Straight?" "No." "He'll be over in the captain's office, likely with his feet up on a desk." "What's that?" "Water." "The powdered root of a plant." "Oh, I don't need it." "Please." "Thanks." "l'm all right now." "You can go." "l will stay till your brother returns." "It's just the traveling." "The life within you is a gift of beauty." "Well, I don't want this gift." "A child cannot be made ugly by the unhappiness that begins it." "It's all ugly." "The only beautiful thing I want to see is the face of that sergeant, dead." "Will that bring beauty to your child?" "Nothing could." "Nothing?" "Do you know about the war?" "I know about war." "It is a word men use to clothe the nakedness of their killing." "Well, the Yankees burned our farm." "My daddy...." "Well, there was nothing left to come home to." "So me and Samuel and Daddy packed up and we came out here." "Found this piece of land to scratch a living from." "Then one day, Straight and his friends visited our farm while Daddy and Samuel were in town." "And he paid his respects to grow here in my body." "I guess that doesn't bother you any, does it?" "You are hurt?" "You feel pain?" "Well, I'm going to feel better soon." "Will vengeance ease your pain?" "Yeah." "It's gonna taste real sweet." "ls injury wrought by oneself?" "No, grasshopper." "Then by another?" "No." "Then by oneself and another?" "Did your eye meet your own fist?" "Then shall I seek ways to repay?" "What is the debt?" "My suffering." "Vengeance is a water vessel with a hole." "It carries nothing but the promise of emptiness." "Shall I then repay injury always with kindness?" "Repay injury with justice and forgiveness but kindness always with kindness." "She's a liar." "I'm forced to ask you for satisfaction." "Son, do you know what you're doing, walloping a sergeant in the Union Army?" "I'm challenging him to a duel." "At your convenience." "Well, I thought that was old-fashioned, sort of like powdered wigs." "Well, it takes all kinds." "You Rebs, you sure are slow to learn your lesson." "We was killing old men and fuzz-faced kids there at the end." "You were a Confederate officer?" "l was." "And a gentleman." "Yes, sir." "l apologize, I will have to borrow a saber." "Saber?" "Ain't I the one that..." "...gets to choose the weapons?" "lf you like." "You got a .45?" "l have." "Sabers just maim." "Forty-fives, they kill." "You know those three oaks up on Lookout Mesa?" "I'll be there at dawn." "Against Army regs, a duel." "Well, captain's on patrol." "Now, who's to tell?" "You'll have to go by yourself." "lt won't take more than me to kill that Reb." "I'll be back on post before reveille." "Caine." "Would you please stay?" "There's no danger for you." "It's a duel of honor." "Where is the honor in what you do?" "Well, I am a marksman but if I was the one to die I don't know how she'd get home like she is." "I will wait with her." "I'm in your debt." "Will you witness this?" "I want to see him die." "Both men hold guns." "Please stay." "Does this now taste sweet?" "As agreed, two cartridges in the cylinder." "Let's get it over. I'm due back." "As agreed, back to back, six paces counted, turn and fire." "Survivors can use the second shot." "You ready?" "Ready." "One." "Two." "Three." "Four." "Five." "Enough." "You've traveled enough for one day." "l want to go back to the Army post." "Your brother is dead." "The other two, Cotton and Barr, they're still alive." "You are alive." "And soon your child." "lt's only justice." "Our house, my brother, me...." "l want those two killed." "If I don't have a right to revenge, who does?" "Giddap!" "He was our pard, sir." "We were together for three years." "With Sherman." "Five more out there." "How long?" "About a week, I figure." "It shouldn't be too hard to track down a belly-swollen girl and a Chinaman." "And when you find them?" "Them three against his one?" "The sergeant, he couldn't be taken fair." "They killed our friend, sir. lf we don't got a right to revenge him, who does?" "l'm scared." "Help me." "Be in touch with what you feel." "From these actions you will bring a new life." "Feel the sand." "Once mighty waters hurled themselves against rock and from these two harsh strengths came this most gentle sand." "I'm scared. I don't know what to do." "See the graceful things around you." "Hear the peaceful sounds." "I hear my own heart beating and the pains." "The butterfly floating in sunlight." "The incense of sage." "The laughter of the wind." "Think on these." "Oh, I feel him now." "Trust." "I don't know what'll happen." "I've never seen a birthing." "See?" "The sheathe which held the seed has opened." "And from within this bursting growth reaches out." "As simply and with more beauty your seed will find its own accord with nature." "Seeking air and sunlight in its own free life." "But I'm scared of it of what'll happen." "Fear is the enemy." "Trust is the armor." "But knowing not what will happen, am I not wise to be afraid?" "He who conquers himself is the greatest warrior." "Do what must be done with a docile heart." "Master, how can I know if this is possible for me?" "Listen for the color of the sky." "Look for the sound of the hummingbird's wing." "Search the air for the perfume of ice on a hot day." "If you have found these things, you will know." "Will you not feed your son?" "I have no milk." "Will you not look at your son?" "l don't have a son. I have a child." "They will do nothing until morning." "What then?" "I do not know." "Grasshopper, what troubles you?" "I am ashamed." "To feel shame for no cause is a waste." "To feel shame for a cause is also a waste for you must rather spend time correcting that of which you are ashamed." "Master I woke last night and seeing nothing, hearing nothing yet I was afraid." "Of what?" "Death." "He who knows how to live need not fear death." "He can walk without fear of rhino or tiger." "He will not be wounded in battle." "How can this be?" "ln him, the rhino can find no place to thrust his horn." "The tiger, no place to use his claws." "And weapons, no place to pierce." "Why is this so?" "Because a man who knows how to live has no place for death to enter." "The child...." "My son is dead." "One day old." "Before we wake, we cannot know that what we dream does not exist." "Before we die, we cannot know that death is not the greatest joy." "He's my my own son." "I loved my brother, but this my own son, is me." "I want to love him." "I want to hug him. I want to love him." "What can I do?" "What can I do?" "Mourn." "No." "No!" "No, no, no." "Oh, no, no." "No, no." "What do I have left?" "A home, a loving daughter, enough to eat." "And an ache inside that burns my soul." "My father's home plundered." "My son murdered." "And Annie, my little girl...." "A life of contentment." "There's no more to do, Daddy." "My only legacy." "Your grandfather's." "Yours when I die." "Take it now." "Sell it." "Find a way to exact payment for my life." "Kill them." "Revenge is all, Daddy?" "l can't do it myself." "You're all I have to hope on." "I must leave soon." "What should I do?" "What do you feel?" "Hate." "It fills the emptiness where my child grew." "To hate is like drinking saltwater." "The thirst grows worse." "Don't you understand what I feel?" "I have seen the silkworm." "It spins a thread, thinking itself to be safe." "It has spun a tomb." "Hate is the tomb you weave." "It will not save you from your suffering." "But that's what I feel." "What can I do with it?" "Perhaps there is room to bury your hate in that small grave where we have come from." "I need time to think alone." "To weigh this against your seedling." "You better tell us, old man." "If I had a gun...." "Cotton, somebody's coming." "Where is she?" "lf there's a God in heaven he'll strike you dead." "I said, where is she?" "Hold it." "Don't move, or I'll kill him." "You should have killed them." "Where is she?" "It's the girl for Sgt. Straight." "Now, we gotta do our duty for our old pard." "No!" "I forgot how young she is." "She's young enough to be my daughter." "How is she?" "When we come by that time we'd been drinking, but you was flying that regimental flag on a pole out there." "That old Virginia regiment." "You killed a lot of good boys no older than her." "The doctor says it'll take a long time." "Will I never be whole again?" "To be one with yourself is a power within you." "What kind of man are you?" "A man like other men." "No." "Different." "You have known too few others." "Leaving?" "She is better." "I've seen what you can do." "All I have in this world is this sword." "It's yours, if you do what I want done." "An eye for an eye." "Keep your sword." "You're a man." "You feel." "Don't you care what happened?" "They raped my little girl!" "l am a man. I care." "Then do something about it!" "I will do something." "I will break the necklace whose beads are vengeance." "There has been enough killing." "I will end it." "If I don't have a right to revenge, who does?" "No one."