“You mean it’s a case of kill or be killed?” Barnes shook his head. “I hate to think that, Nick.”

“Maybe that’s not what I mean,” I said. “Maybe I’m not sure what I mean. I guess mostly what I mean is that there can’t be no personal hell because there ain’t no personal sins. They’re all public, George, we all share in the other fellas’ and the other fellas all share in ours. Or maybe I mean this, George, that I’m the savior himself, Christ on the Cross come right here to Potts County, because God knows I was needed here, an’ I’m goin’ around doing kindly deeds—so that people will know they got nothing to fear, and if they’re worried about hell they don’t have to dig for it. And, by God, that makes sense, don’t it, George? I mean obligation ain’t all on the side of the fella that accepts it, nor responsibility neither. I mean, well, which is worse, George, the fella that craps on a doorknob or the one that rings the doorbell?”

George threw back his head and roared with laughter. “That’s priceless, Nick! Priceless!”

“Well, it ain’t exactly original,” I said. “Like the poem says, you can’t fault a jug for bein’ twisted because the hand of the potter shipped. So you tell me which is worse, the one that messes up the doorknob or the one that rings the bell,and I’ll tell you which got twisted and who done the twisting.”

“But—but suppose the same person does both?”

“It ain’t likely,” I said. “As a fella that’s had to deal with plenty of high jinks, and god-dang if I don’t feel I’m hiving in a joker’s paradise sometimes. I can say that these little chores is usually divided up. But if that wasn’t the case, George, then we’ve opened up another field of obligation and responsibility. Because this fella had to eat before he could crap, didn’t he, and where did the food come from?”

We went on talking and drinking until Myra came home.

She fixed dinner for George and me, she an’ Lennie having already eaten at Rose’s place. George was real courtly to Myra. God-dang if she didn’t hook almost pretty the way he shined up to her, and god-dang if he didn’t look almost handsome because he done it.

Then we finished eating and I walked George toward the railroad station, and things weren’t so nice any more. We were friendly, but it was just one of those have-to-be things. There wasn’t no real warmth or hiking in it.

I reckon that’s the bad part of whiskey, you know?—the bad part about a hot of things. Not the indulging of ‘em, but the not being able to indulge. The afterwards, when the oh’ familiar taste of piss is back in your mouth, and you want to spit it out at everyone. And you think, god-dang, why for did I want to be nice to that fella? And I bet he thought I was a goddanged fool.