CARTER: I am resting! I’m supposed to be home but I’m resting. I’m supposed to be taking care of business! I’m the backbone of the whole operation and I’m laying here in Vinnie’s bed.

CECILIA: Just breathe softly through your nose. Try to relax.

CARTER: Don’t tell me how to breathe! I know how to breathe.

CECILIA: You’ll be all right.

CARTER: Why did you let him kiss you! Why’d you let him do that?

CECILIA: Mr Carter—

She reaches out and touches his back softly. CARTER jerks up and sits on bed.

CARTER: DON’T TOUCH ME!

CECILIA backs off.

CECILIA: All right. Take it easy. I was just going to—

CARTER: He wants me to crawl, see. That’s what it is. He wants me to suffer. It’s not enough that I pay through the nose—that I cater to each and every little need of his—that I send him T-shirts and socks and see that all his bills are paid—HE WANTS ME TO SUFFER!! It’s a vendetta!

CARTER takes another belt from the bottle, gets up and starts to move through the room.

CECILIA: You should really try to calm yourself down. It’s not good for your blood.

CARTER (on the move): He was the one, see—That’s what everybody forgets. He was the one with the big ideas. Right from the get-go. “All we’ll do is switch a couple a’ racehorses. That’s all.” That’s what he said. “Happens all the time. Nobody’ll know. They’re both bay. Both geldings. Two white socks. Doctor the lip tattoos. They’re identical. Who’s gonna know? Public always loses anyway!” That’s what he said. “The track’s robbing them ten times worse than we are. It’s not like it’s murder or rape or something monumental. It’s nothing monumental! It’s just deception! Just plain old-fashioned deception, that’s all. Happens all the time. It’s going on right now.”

CECILIA: Mr Carter?

CARTER (drinks and rants): We almost pulled it off too. If it hadn’t been for Simms, we woulda pulled it off. Simms could’ve closed one eye and no one would’ve been the wiser. We even offered him a piece of the action but he wouldn’t take it.

CECILIA: Simms?

CARTER: Vinnie took the pictures, see. I had nothing to do with it. Vinnie set the whole thing up. Him and—this chippie he hired. It was him who rented the motel room. I told him it was going to backfire on him. Sooner or later. I told him that. Way back when he first got the idea.

CECILIA: Do you want me to call your wife for you?

CARTER: My wife?

CECILIA: Maybe you could talk to her.

CARTER: My wife?

Pause.

CECILIA: Yes. Don’t you want to go back home, Mr Carter?