Night Gallery (1969–1973): Season 1, Episode 4 - Make Me Laugh/Clean Kills and Other Trophies - full transcript

On display this evening, a pastiche
of painting from oddball-land.

The poet Sir Max Beerbohm reflected
that no one ever died of laughter.

Object of brush and
palette: the rebuttal.

The clown is Jackie Slater.
His occupation, a comedian.

His aspiration is to collect funny bones
and hang them on the walls of his life...

to hide the cracked plaster
and yellowed wallpaper...

that is part of the interior
decoration of failure.

Poor Jackie Slater: A bad joke told
in a foreign language in an empty hall.

The comic unable
to coax laughter.

The painting is called
Make Me Laugh.

And this lightless limbo
is called the Night Gallery.



Hi, folks. I wanna tell
you you're a wonderful

audience to work for. I
get a lot of love out of you.

That's what I dig about you. Hey, one
of the troops. Good to see you, marine.

I tell you, man, supporting
the country, it's beautiful.

I did one of those veterans hospitals
shows, you know, to help the boys.

Got hit with a crutch.

Hey, uh, folks, uh,

do you wanna hear the one about the
astronaut who got stuck up in space?

He says, "How long am I
gonna be up here?" 'Cause he

called mission control. They
said, "A millennium or so."

He says, "Where am I gonna stay?" He says,
"There's a hotel." He goes to the hotel.

The guy says, "How
long will you need the

room?" And he says,
"Oh, about a millennium."

The guy says, "That'll cost
you eight cents." He says,



"Eight cents for a
millennium? I'm a little hungry."

He says, "I'm gonna
have a sandwich." Then

the guy says, "Okay,
that'll cost you $800."

He says, "Eight cents for a room for a
millennium and $800 for a sandwich?"

He says, "Yeah, in this hotel,
we get you by the sandwich."

Uh, do you know how
to make a venetian blind?

Poke your finger in his eye.

My wife went to the West Indies.

Jamaica? She went
of her own accord.

Hey, how do you like this suit, huh?
Sort of a chopped liver gray, huh?

The wife, uh... Well,
it's a nice fit, you know.

But the wife says it looks
more like a convulsion, huh?

Hey, uh, folks, uh, you
know, I was standing out

in front of the Plaza
Hotel talking to my friends.

Uh, matter of fact,
that's where I was living...

In front of the
Plaza Hotel. Yeah.

Well, I know you're out there, folks.
Uh, yeah. Uh-huh. And I'm up here, folks.

Of course, if the
lighting is bad in here and

you can't find me,
just listen for the sound.

Well, ladies and gentlemen,
I want to present to you...

four of the loveliest
girls you've ever seen

in your life, The Rocky
Mountain Rockettes.

Yeah!

♪♪

How did it go, booby?

Not so bad for a first shot.

I'm gonna rework it a
little before the next show.

So say it!

Say what? What
do you wanna hear?

It would have been
nice to hear you out

there, pushing a couple
of yocks over for me.

Beating your hands
together a couple of times.

I'm playing Forest Lawn.

I got the only agent who
makes it like it's a federal act...

that says he's got to be
horizontal after sunset.

Hmm. Didn't go over
so good, huh, booby?

The only tomb
with a stage in it.

That's the only stage
with a corpse on it.

He warms up slow, Mr. Mishkin.

It's 102 out there. The stiff
couldn't warm up in a boiler room.

Tough audience, Mr. Mishkin.
You'll give me that, won't you?

Tell you what I'll give you, papers
to walk. Do the next show, then cut.

But you said three weekends.

That was before I heard him.

Look. You are his
agent. Isn't that the idea?

Sixteen years, Mr. Mishkin.

Then book him in
the Air Force Museum.

This guy doesn't tell jokes.
He goes on bombing missions.

Hey, you can't ace me out
after one lousy show, Mr. Mishkin.

I can't? Read your contract.

Gimme a break. What
do you got to lose?

I mean, an act's gotta build. I-I mean, a
couple of weeks for the word of mouth.

Tell him, Julie.
Tell him, Julie.

Tell him about that gig in
Buffalo. Six weeks held over!

Capacity audience
in a tough room!

I mean, when I start
to grow, man, I-I zoom.

I can fill the Hollywood Bowl.

Unasked, the following opinion:

You couldn't fill a men's
room with free shoe shines.

Wanna know something?

I was a fat...

ugly little kid.

And when I used to
go to boy's camp...

all the kids used to...

push me off the dock.

And everybody used to laugh.

So I decided that's
what I'd do with my life.

I'd make people laugh.

You made some
people laugh, booby.

Jules, my loyal,

steadfast friend and
artist's representative.

I'm a second-rate
schlep going nowhere.

Sixteen years we
scratched each other's backs.

I was still digging around in
garbage dumps for one-nighters.

Well, what does he know?

I-I mean, can you picture that
creep laughing at anything, huh?

I got a funny bit.

Now that's funny,
me thinking I'm funny.

That's funny.

I wish I could make
somebody laugh.

I'd give up everything I got.

Everything I got...

just to make somebody laugh.

Hey, barkeep, doesn't
this thing ever pay off?

- Jackie Slater?
- Hmm?

Your agent called, Jackie.

Loyal, steadfast and true.

Bankrupt, dispossessed and on his way
to Philadelphia with a steel guitar band.

Without me?

I gather you didn't kill
them in Perth Amboy.

They were dead
already in Perth Amboy.

I give you Perth Amboy.

I give you Michigan's Palladium.

Six tables with a pallbearer
at each one of them.

We have not met, yefendi.

Chatterje is the name.
Miracles by profession.

Miracles. Miracles.

That's just what I
need, Mr. Chatterje.

You are now face-to-face
with Mr. Unlucky.

Forgiveness, Mr. Slater,
but compared to me,

you are the winner of
the Irish Sweepstakes.

You are the owner of
the 1969 New York Mets.

And on the day they repealed prohibition,
you are the Little Old Winemaker.

Your indulgence, Mr. Chatterje,
but I am a-a ship maker in the desert.

I am a diamond
cutter with the palsy.

I am an opera
singer with laryngitis.

Reflect if you will, Mr. Slater, on this
undersized guru who sits beside you;

this child of adversity.

They booked me in a
Democratic dinner in New Rochelle.

They wanted to replace
me with William F. Buckley.

180,000 guys roaming
the streets, looking for a bar.

And what do I get?
The formaldehyde twins.

Now for laughs, why don't you two guys
go out in the park and get mugged, huh?

Preferable. Decidedly preferable
to what is in store for me...

Death, certainly
before dishonor.

You, Mr. Slater, are yet a young
man with much ahead of you.

It need not always
be Perth Amboy.

You could yet make it on
The Andy Williams Show.

I, on the other hand, am fingering
the tassels at the far end of my rope.

By midnight tonight, if I
do not perform a miracle,

I am relieved of my powers and
I have dishonored my ancestors.

So work a miracle.
Who's stopping you?

There is no willing recipient.

No soul trusting enough to allow
this poor guru to conjure up a blessing.

I am without hope.

I am a dispossessed
soul, tiptoeing in agony...

across the wasteland
of my shattered dreams.

Wait a minute. What's
with this miracle bit?

Ah, you are now diddling
with the essence, yefendi.

Every miracle-working guru must
work a wonder at least once a month.

I am in arrears, hence disaster.

What kind of miracle?

Name it.

Could you get me on
The Dean Martin Show?

You should only ask.

Could you get me four weeks
at The Sands in Las Vegas?

With options.

Could... Could
you... Could you...

Speak, yefendi, speak!

Could you fix it so I
can make people laugh?

Hysterically. Uncontrollably.

Beyond your wildest dreams.

So do it.

Do it? Make a miracle.

Th-This moment?

You got until midnight to make
a miracle, so... so be my guest.

I-It shall be done, but...

But what? But what?
The payoff, huh? Huh?

What? The small print, huh?

Candor dictates certain
prior admissions, Mr. Slater.

Before a miracle is wrought, it is
necessary that I leave no truth unspoken.

This is a cardinal rule amongst the
Order of Working Miracle-making Gurus.

In the hierarchy of
my art, how shall I say,

I am something
less than proficient.

That is to say I am given to small
imperfections in the miracles wrought.

Which is why I find
myself at this 11th hour...

so precariously in the
proximity of the proverbial creek.

What imperfections?

Insignificant imperfections.
Small, itsy-bitsy.

But it is necessary
that I acquaint you with

the fact that in the
circle of my peers...

I am known as... as a klutz.

So I'm obliged to tell you of
certain miracles wrought by me...

where small ironies intruded,

and the results were,
how shall I say, unfortunate.

I don't care.

There was a wrestler in Vero Beach,
Florida, who wanted to visit Tibet.

That was his dream. He awoke to find
himself stranded atop Mount Everest,

in the midst of an
unmerciful blizzard.

They finally had to fetch him
down with a pair of ice tongs.

I wanna make people laugh!

I have in mind another
ill-starred venture,

having to do with a retired
schoolteacher in Spokane, Washington.

A Civil War buff. A passionate
admirer of the Great Emancipator.

Wanted only one thing:
to be in Lincoln's shoes.

Wound up in an insane asylum,
claiming he was a woolen sock.

Had to be restrained from sticking
darning needles into his head.

Am I getting through
to you, Mr. Slater?

There are miracles,
and there are risks.

But I don't care. I'll
take the risks. Just do it!

It is done. It is done! Done!

What? Done.

- What? Wh-What's done?
- "What's done?"

What did you say? Did
you say, "What's done?"

What's done? What's
done? What's done?

What's done?

I can't believe you
said "What's done?"

Oh, I can't believe it.
He said, "What's done?"

Come here. Come
here. This guy has got the

greatest routine. Say
it again. "What's done?"

What's done? Come here.

Do it. Do it. Give it
to them. What's done?

What's done?

Hey, guru, you done it.

You made a miracle.

Yes, yefendi. I'm
afraid you're right.

You know how to make a venetian
blind? Poke your finger in his eye.

♪♪

Hi, booby.

Aw, you killed 'em. You
were fantastic. I was listening.

I mean, all you had to do
was to open up your mouth.

Yeah.

I was, uh,

I was really proud
of you, Jackie.

You should be. I
done it all myself.

I thought steel guitar
bands was your current thing.

Was, is right. They
rusted out on me.

I got 'em a fair date in Columbus,
Ohio, and they got booed off the stage.

I had no choice, Jackie. I had to
take on somebody else or starve.

Forget it. I understand.

What I don't
understand though...

is how come I'm
not getting any kicks.

What do you mean?

I mean I'm boffo wherever I am.

I mean, every time I open up my
mouth, everything I say, they scream.

I mean, I tell old jokes, Julie. I don't
mean just old, I mean with cobwebs on them.

I mean antiques, and
they roll all over the floor.

Well, that's great.

It should be great.

But it isn't. It's... dull.

But isn't that what you
wanted, to make people laugh?

Well, isn't that
what you're doing?

Look. I-I read the Variety reviews
about the bit you did on the Skelton show,

and they said you
broke up the joint.

I broke up the joint. You
wanna know what I did?

I put on my hat,
walked on-camera.

I took off my hat.

They screamed
all over the place.

I finished my routine. I put back
on my hat. I walked off. That's it.

Big deal. I took off my hat.

It's a wonder Skelton didn't
fire his writers right on the spot.

I mean, he's the guy who works months
to work on a little piece of business...

in a hope that it'll pay
off in a couple of chuckles.

And I walk on, take off
my hat, and they scream.

I mean, I haven't heard such laughs
since they pushed me off the dock.

- So?
- Jules.

Don't you understand? I'm bored.

I used to have to work
for it. No, fight for it.

And now it's all...

Dullsville, U.S.A.

What do you want?

I mean, you all the time
wanted to make people laugh.

Well, look. Now it's happening.

I mean, what else is there?

A comic wants to get laughs.

There's gotta be something more.
There's gotta be more to it than that.

Anybody can get laughs.

A dum-dum takes a pratfall. A
fat kid gets pushed off the dock.

Hardy-har-har. Big deal!

Look at this, man. I got... I got a
telegram. Look at these telegrams.

I got... I got offers. I got
deals. I got guarantees.

But to be what? A rum-dum
baggy pants schnook. Look here.

♪♪

Look at this.

Well, who's David Garrick?

Julie, get outta the tent
shows. Forget the carnivals.

You wanna manage donnickers
and ragbag operators all your life?

This is legit. This is Broadway.

"We'd like to discuss
with you the possibility

of your playing a
straight dramatic role...

in play I have under option."

Julie, you dig it? A
straight dramatic role.

Jackie Slater, an actor.

Now look, booby. You
never did no acting.

You were never a straight
man. You are a comic.

Was a comic. Was a clown.

Was a dolt, was a
dunce, was a klutz.

No more, understand?
An actor... Jackie Slater.

No, make that Jack Slater.

No, John Slater.

No... Jonathan Slater.

For the best actor
in a starring role...

The envelope, please.

The winner...

Jonathan Slater.

All right, Mr. Slater. I'd
like your reading now.

Page one. Of act
two. From the top.

Oh. Now just keep in mind
that you're a circus clown.

You've just discovered
that your wife has

left you. In fact, you've
just read the note.

And at this moment, there isn't a single
thing in the world that you wanna live for.

Yeah, I got it. I got it. Right.

Oh, uh, Miss Wilson. Would
you read the girl acrobat, please?

What's the matter,
Bimbo? You look odd.

Sure, odd. I'm a clown.

A clown's supposed to look odd.

A funny thing happened to
me on the way to the big top.

My life just got dissolved.

A clown isn't supposed to cry!

He's supposed to laugh.

But the smiles...
are just painted on.

I-I'm sorry, Mr. Garrick,
but the guy's a comic.

No matter what he reads,
it comes out like a gag.

I thought he had what we needed.
Something... Something in his face.

Face, gestures, everything.
He's strictly for laughs.

Look at him.

Just look at him.

Okay, I made a mistake. Shake his hand, pat
him on the back and get him out of here.

You wanna know what you are?

You're a bunch of dirty,
rotten, insensitive people.

That's what you are.

You're the kind... the kind
who pushed me off the dock.

"Pushed him off the dock."

As must be obvious, yefendi,
miracles are not without risks.

Unforeseen little addenda.

"Unforeseen little addenda"?

Thanks to you, I can't
say "How are you? Good

morning. A glass of
orange juice, please"...

without people breaking
up in screaming convulsions.

It was as you wished, yefendi.

Well, I don't wish it
anymore. Understand?

I want you to fix it so that I never
have anybody laugh at me again.

Yefendi, there is
an unwritten law:

One miracle to a customer.

I don't care, you second-rate
swami. I want another miracle.

I want you to fix it so that I
can touch people, move them.

Make 'em cry, not laugh.

You get that? And
I want it done now.

Because if you don't,
what's left of you...

will be able to
be stuffed in that

moth-eaten turban and
dumped in a doggie bag.

It is done.

"Done." Done.

You'll never again be
laughed at, yefendi. Never ever.

Well, we'll just
see. We'll just see.

Hey, lady! Hey! Hey, lady!

Hey, lady, did you hear the
one about the two Arabs...

who met on a streetcar,
while the first one...

Now try to keep calm. I just told
you, we've already called the police.

They're on their way here now.

♪♪

I wonder if I'll ever
get the hang of this.

♪♪

Our second painting this evening
has to do with the stalker and the victim.

The hunter and the hunted.

That rare breed of Homo
sapien whose love of

butchery is not a sport
but a consuming passion.

Offered to you now, Clean
Kills and Other Trophies.

I call this my trophy
room, Mr. Pierce.

Oh, I'll take care of
that, Tom. Very good, sir.

Tom here is an Ibo.

He's the son of a tribal chief.

He's a highly
educated young man.

His father sent him
to school in England.

Will that be all, sir? That'll
be all. Thank you, Tom.

Excuse me, gentlemen.

Quite a specimen, isn't he?

Specimen?

He's an African,
Mr. Pierce. Don't be misled

by the Oxford accent
or the tailored clothes.

For all the outward
accoutrements of civilization,

he's never left the jungle.

He still carries amulets and
fervently believes in black magic.

A pagan savage,
Mr. Pierce, like all his breed.

About the trust fund, Colonel.
I'll only require your signature.

I've made all the arrangements for
the money to go to the beneficiary.

Plenty of time, Mr. Pierce.

Plenty of time for
Archie's inheritance.

Do you know anything of
hunting, Mr. Pierce? Or guns?

I'm afraid not, sir.

- That's your hobby, my father said.
- Hobby?

Hardly a hobby.

It's what I do with my life.

I don't think there's any game
in the world that I haven't stalked.

Stalked and killed.

This, uh, baby here is
a... a Thompson gazelle.

I got him in the Nyeri Forest.

Those horns are 16 and
three-quarter inches long.

It's mentioned in Ward's
Records of Big Game.

I understand you just
graduated college, Arch.

Yes, his sole, remarkable
achievement to date.

That is, if you don't give points
for excessive brandy consumption.

This might interest you, Pierce.

That chap gave me big trouble.

I got him on a rainy night.
Lions are temperamental beasts.

They're subject to moods.

Rainy weather
makes them nervous.

But darkness stimulates them.

They hunt at night, and
I hunted him at night.

One other trouble about lions
is that they can see in the dark.

So, for openers, he
had all the advantage...

Rain, night...

and his uncanny sense of smell.

All the advantages,
Colonel, except a gun.

A lion on a charge can
run 40 miles an hour, Pierce.

If you haven't got a gun
or a marksman's eye,

he can spread you
over the map of Africa.

Do you hunt, Arch?

Archie hunt?

Does that look like
a hunter, Pierce?

Can you picture that dish of jellied
consommé squaring off to a wild animal?

No, Archie does little
but occupy space.

Hunting requires traits of
character that he fails to possess.

Not the least being guts.

But not everyone goes
in for hunting, Colonel.

I am not concerned
with everyone.

I'm concerned with that
pallid handwringer over there,

who would take his inheritance and
give it to one of his myriad causes...

Senegalese unwed mothers,

pickaninny's free lunch program.

Or perhaps something dearer
to his heart and character...

The Women's Liberation Movement.

My father would prefer that
I do a little random killing.

Why not? Man has been
killing for a million years.

And man is not the
only animal in the jungle.

If we don't kill
others, they'll kill us.

That's the equation of survival.

What if you both survive?
Do you hear that, Archie?

You have a colleague,
a kindred soul.

And do you think that is
wrong to kill something like that?

If it's done unnecessarily.

"If it's done unnecessarily."

So the criterion of cruelty
is not the act but the motive.

There is a certain tribe in
Africa called the Masai, Pierce.

Every now and then,

they pick out some of their
less active senior citizens...

and put them out in the bush
so the hyenas can eat them alive.

Didn't Adam Smith have some
theory about overpopulation?

The painted savages don't
need fancy economists...

to tell them how to keep
the population down.

They act upon instinct.
The instinct of survival.

I suppose you would
call that cruel, would you?

I'd call it savage, uncivilized.

But at least it's death
with some purpose.

I kill with a purpose.

And my purpose is to prove
that I am superior to what I kill.

Archie?

A point of information.

Mr. Pierce has a briefcase with
some papers in it for me to sign.

There's a couple of million
dollars worth of securities,

stocks and bonds
waiting for you.

Are you aware of that?
I'm quite aware of that.

Oh, he's quite aware of that.

And are you aware that
you will be a millionaire...

in a few weeks? Yes.

And are you aware that it
only requires my signature?

I'll, uh, just get my briefcase.

That will not be necessary. I
know the contents of that briefcase.

I know the nature
of those securities...

Their number, their
names, their current values.

I want to make a codicil.

A codicil? Correct.

If within 15 days, my son has
not killed himself an animal,

I wish to dissolve the trust.

Are you aware of the
condition I have just imposed?

I wish you to kill an
animal... by yourself.

With a gun.

Exhibit "A," Mr. Pierce.

The illustrious heir having
just been given due notice...

that his father has arbitrarily
diddled him of what is his,

does nothing but
stand there and suffer.

Colonel...

By rights, he should by now have
been rifle-butting me into oblivion.

But that is not Archie's breed.
He has no aptitude for violence.

He's been taken on
trips through the jungle,

to hunting preserves,
the African velt...

Places which most boys would
welcome as high adventure.

But whenever a gun was fired, I
found him cowering under a bush.

Sir, none of this
is my business.

I'm here for a specific reason,

to handle the reversion
of the trust fund.

That's all I'm supposed to do.

As to any disagreement
you may have with your son...

As to any disagreement
between me and my son,

that is very much your business,

Mr. Pierce, because
it relates to the trust.

I am not going to hand
a gravy bowl over to

this simpering vegetable
who has dishonored me.

I'm afraid you don't have
any choice in that matter.

I could refuse to sign.

That would be most unwise, sir.

You've been paying
fiduciary taxes on...

Don't give me that
fiduciary nonsense.

- What could he do to me?
- He could sue you.

Sue me?

This vegetable get a battery
of lawyers and sue me?

He could start proceedings in
the morning in a court of law.

That would be my advice to him.

And my advice to you, Mr. Pierce,
is to go to bed and get some sleep.

Because tomorrow, Archie
and I are hunting deer.

And my son is
going to fire a gun...

for the first time in
his miserable life.

Because if he doesn't,

I'll take every security
in that trust fund...

and I will drivel it away
on every high-risk venture...

that I can find
in either market.

By Wednesday morning, I will turn
that two million dollars into wastepaper.

Father! Is it really so
incomprehensible to you...

that I can't kill anything?

How about an animal?

Come on. M-Maybe a child.

How about any living thing?

You answer me!

It is incomprehensible to me
that I have managed to sire...

a muling, sniveling,
self-indulgent milksop,

who is unable to grasp the
most elementary fact of life:

The whole world is a
bloody hunting jungle.

You stalk with the hunter,
or you run with the quarry.

You have no other choice.
The beasts have no choice.

Only man. That is
why he is superior.

Oh, no, no, no, no. Not
superior, j-just deadlier.

You take away his
gun, and he's a beast.

You are currently in
possession of a gun, Archie,

a bolt-action .458, which could
make a hole in me the size of two fists.

What are you waiting for?

Nothing.

Send him off to bed, Tom.

Leave the door open
and a light in the hall.

I imagine darkness
frightens him too.

Archie, listen to me.

You don't have to kill a deer...

or swat a fly or step on
an ant if you don't want to.

You don't have to do anything.

All you have to do
is sign your name.

Naturally, since we represent your
father, we couldn't take the case,

but I'll send you to
a first-rate law firm.

By tomorrow lunchtime,

they can get a court
order impounding the trust.

Do you think he's different?

Do you think he's
a special case?

Mm-mm.

He's 20th-century man.

That's his big passion,
to... to commit murder...

under the protection of a... of
a state-issued hunting license.

Why, I know he's a whole lot
closer to the norm than I'll ever be.

And tomorrow...

Tomorrow... I will
try to shoot a deer.

That's the only choice I've got.

That's the only
choice he's given me.

It is not the trust, Mr. Pierce.

It has nothing to do with that.

You know, a moment ago,

I almost killed him.

And I would have,
because it was in my heart.

But Tom...

Well, thank God for Tom.

Anyway, better a-a deer
than a... than a patricide.

Wouldn't you say
that, Mr. Pierce?

Judging by your expression,
I guess you wouldn't.

I'm okay now, Tom.
I'm... I'm okay. Good night.

Had you never met
Colonel Dittman before?

No. My father's been his lawyer for
years, but I know very little about him.

He has a strange
god, Mr. Pierce.

He... He worships death,
and then he nails it to the wall.

And yet you came here
with him and you've stayed.

For the boy. That is why I came.

And that is why I stay.

A legacy of 50
years, Mr. Pierce.

Bullet holes, punctured
bodies, chopped-off heads.

A convocation of victims.

And now he wants to add his son.

Another trophy of the kill.

This rain is a gift, Tom.
Excellent for tomorrow's hunting.

I am speaking to you.

Why will you make
him kill tomorrow?

You have had 21 years
without it. Why tomorrow?

It's my last chance.

I want to give him his manhood.
Can't you understand that?

That is what you will strip
him of if you give him a gun...

and make him use it.

If you had refused to hunt, what
would your father have done?

We hunt for food.

We hunt to stay alive.

I was never taught
to kill for pleasure.

The day I can kill
without pleasure,

my son can have
everything I own.

If you're praying to your gods,
pray that the rain quits before dawn.

Then the deer will come out
and enjoy the good weather.

That is not what I pray for.

Keep your eye on the
canyons over there.

The whitetails
don't like the wind.

We'll be out of
their scent up here.

When you see the deer,
Archie, line up the forelegs.

Place your shot so as to
kill or anchor him at one.

Line up the upright part of
the "T" with the back crossbar.

Aim to break the shoulder just
above the middle of the body.

That way you'll
bring him down quick.

If you aim high,
you'll break his back.

A low shot can hit his heart. But if
you're high and in front, you get the neck.

So make a clean kill, Archie.

Look. He's yours.

Take it slowly. Aim carefully.

Just squeeze it off.

Squeeze it, Archie.

Squeeze it.

Remember, just above
the middle of the body.

How you lined it up.

What are you waiting for?

He's not going to stay there
all day, damn it. Take your shot!

Take your shot, damn
it. Take your shot!

I told you a clean kill.

Now we've got to
follow his tracks.

We've got to check
the blood marks,

find out where you did hit him.

You want to butcher an
animal, I could have ordered one.

I could have tied him down
and let you get at him with an ax.

It's the same bloody thing.

I could have predicted it.

We tracked for three and a half
hours because the great white hunter,

sneaking up the stairs,
hit him in the lungs.

But he did get a deer.

In the lungs.

When I saw the blood, I
knew we had a long hunt.

He tried. Heaven knows he tried.

That's supposed
to make me proud?

You've got nothing
to be proud of.

Not a damn thing.

Open a window, will you, Tom?

It's hot in here.

Much too hot.

My head... My
head is burning up.

Didn't you hear me?

Why do you stand there?

My head. Something's happening.

My dear God, my head.

You're leaving, Mr. Pierce?

Yes.

Look after him, Tom.

He shot himself a
deer a few hours ago.

Just remind him that it
was a deer and only that.

And make him understand
that he wasn't the executioner.

It was his father.

Why, his father has
been punished, Mr. Pierce.

Punished?

Properly and
befitting the crime.

Where is he?

The colonel? In there.

Best not go in
there, Mr. Pierce.

Why not? Sometimes the
punishment is as ugly as the crime.

Last night I prayed to
my gods, Mr. Pierce.

It was the only
thing left to do.

What did you pray for, Tom?

That the hunter should know
what it is like to be the victim.

Best go now, Mr. Pierce.
Take the boy with you.

How? How could...

There are gods, Mr. Pierce.

Gods of the bush, of the
Congo, of the rain forests.

And with them,
vengeance is an art.

Let's go. We're
getting out of here.

What about my father?

Don't worry about him.
He's in good company.

Now there is a trophy.

The king of the jungle.