American Buffalo by David Mamet Read Free Book Online Page B

gets me mad, when you get loose.
    DON : What do you mean?
    TEACH : You know what I mean.
    DON : No, I don’t.
    TEACH : Yes you do. I come in here. The kid’s here.
    DON : He doesn’t know anything.
    TEACH : He doesn’t.
    DON : No.
    TEACH : What was he here for, then?
    DON : Sell me the buffalo.
    TEACH : Sell it tonight.
    DON : Yeah.
    TEACH : A valuable nickel.
    DON : We don’t know.
    Pause.
    TEACH : Where is Fletch?
    DON : I don’t know. (Picks up phone and dials.)
    TEACH : He’s not home. He’s not home, Don. He’s out.
    DON (into phone): Hello?
    TEACH : He’s in?
    DON : This is Donny Dubrow.
    TEACH : The Riv?
    DON : I’m looking for Fletcher.
    Pause.
    Okay. Thank you. (He hangs up.)
    TEACH : Cocksucker should be horsewhipped with a horsewhip.
    DON : He’ll show up.
    TEACH : Fucking Riverside, too. (Thirty-seven cents for takeout coffee . . .)
    DON : Yeah. (Picks up phone.)
    TEACH : A lot of nerve you come in there for sixteen years. This is not free enterprise.
    DON : No.
    TEACH : You know what is free enterprise?
    DON : No. What?
    TEACH : The freedom . . .
    DON : . . . yeah?
    TEACH : Of the Individual . . .
    DON : . . . yeah?
    TEACH : To Embark on Any Fucking Course that he sees fit.
    DON : Uh-huh . . .
    TEACH : In order to secure his honest chance to make a profit. Am I so out of line on this?
    DON : No.
    TEACH : Does this make me a Commie?
    DON : No.
    TEACH : The country’s founded on this, Don. You know this.
    DON : Did you get a chance to take a nap?
    TEACH : Nap nap nap nap nap. Big deal.
    DON (Pause) : Yeah.
    TEACH : Without this we’re just savage shitheads in the wilderness.
    DON : Yeah.
    TEACH : Sitting around some vicious campfire. That’s why Ruthie bums me up.
    DON : Yeah.
    TEACH : (Nowhere dyke . . .) And take those fuckers in the concentration camps. You think they went in there by choice?
    DON : No.
    TEACH : They were dragged in there, Don . . .
    DON : . . . yeah.
    TEACH : Kicking and screaming. Gimme that fucking phone.
    TEACH grabs phone. Listens. Hangs up.
    He’s not home. I say fuck the cocksucker.
    DON : He’ll show up.
    TEACH : You believe that?
    DON : Yes.
    TEACH : Then you are full of shit.
    DON : Don’t tell me that, Teach. Don’t tell me I’m full of shit.
    TEACH : I’m sorry. You want me to hold your hand? This is how you keep score. I mean, we’re all here . . .
    DON : Just, I don’t want that talk.
    TEACH : Don . . . I talk straight to you ‘cause I respect you. It’s kickass or kissass, Don, and I’d be lying if I told you any different.
    DON : And what makes you such an authority on life all of a sudden?
    TEACH : My life, Jim. And the way I’ve lived it.
    Pause.
    DON : Now what does that mean, Teach?
    TEACH : What does that mean?
    DON : Yes.
    TEACH : What does that mean?
    DON : Yes.
    TEACH : Nothing. Not a thing. All that I’m telling you, the shot is yours. It’s one night only. Too many guys know. All I’m saying. Take your shot.
    DON : Who knows?
    TEACH : You and me.
    DON : Yeah.
    TEACH : Bob and Fletcher. Earl, the phone guy, Grace and Ruthie, maybe.
    DON : Grace and Ruth don’t know.
    TEACH : Who knows they know or not, all that I’m telling you, it’s not always so clear what’s going on. Like Fletcher and the pig iron, that time.
    DON : What was the shot on that?
    TEACH : He stole some pig iron off Ruth.
    DON : (I heard that . . .)
    TEACH : That’s a fact. A fact stands by itself. And we must face the facts and act on them. You better wake up, Don, right now, or things are going to fall around your head, and you are going to turn around to find he’s took the joint off by himself.
    DON : He would not do that.
    TEACH : He would. He is an animal.
    DON : He don’t have the address.
    TEACH : He doesn’t know it.
    DON : No.
    TEACH : Now, that is wise. Then let us go and take what’s ours.
    DON : We have a deal with the man.
    TEACH : With Fletcher.
    DON : Yes.
    TEACH : We had a deal with Bobby.
    DON : What does that mean?
    TEACH : Nothing.
    DON : It