All language subtitles for AH Presents S2 E19 A bottle of wine

Good evening.

I came down here because I
understand that the current year

is a very good year for wine.

For drinking it, that is.

I'm looking for
some champagne.

"Not to be taken internally. "
Oh.

"For bathing only. "

Fortunately, my tastes
aren't so expensive.

I bathe in ginger beer.

That way one doesn't
have to add a softener.

All this is by way of
introducing tonight's play.

It is called, by
an extraordinary coincidence,

"A Bottle of Wine. "

Grace.

Hello, Judge.

I came to get my clothes.
So you're going.

You're really going,
after all.

I won't be long upstairs.
Grace.

Isn't there...
Nothing.

I see.

Ten years, and one word
seems to take care of it all.

"Nothing. "
Such a merciless word.

Judge, we've been
through all this.

Have we?
Have we really, Grace?

Or is it just that I've been
doing all the talking?

And all the listening, too?

If you'll excuse me, please.

Why is it that the less use people
have for another human being,

the politer they become
to him.

Relentlessly politer.

Really, Judge, I don't have time
right now for any of your handy,

pocket philosophy.

I see.

Where's Wallace?
Waiting for you?

Counting the seconds
at some adjacent bar?

Go ahead.
Tear him down.

See if I care.

Forgive me. I didn't
mean to be ungracious.

Well, he's not in a bar.
He's... He's outside in the car.

Of course.

You'll need someone
to help you with your luggage.

Oh, that's just about
what I'd expect you to say.

Oh, you're gracious
all right, Judge.

Believe me,
you are gracious.

Mr. Donaldson, come wait inside.
The sun's too hot out there.

It's all right,
I can wait here.

Don't be foolish.
This heat will kill you.

Afternoon, sir.
Afternoon.

It's hot, isn't it?

You are the judge?

I mean Judge Condon.
Grace's... Grace's husband.

Does it always
get this hot in town?

Not always. Just mostly, mostly
August, around this time of year.

I didn't want to come here.

I can imagine.

But Grace said that it would be all
right. That she wouldn't be very long.

You're young.

Younger than I thought
you'd be.

And money?
I daresay you have money?

Oh, don't be ashamed of it.

I think I'd better wait
in the car. Nonsense.

This isn't an everyday
occasion.

A perfectly civilized
conversation,

while one's wife gathers
the wardrobe of 10 years.

Actually, this is a new experience for
me. One wonders what to say, exactly.

Certainly there should be something
in common we could talk about.

Well, for example, Grace.

Let's go inside.
It's cooler there.

You don't know Grace.

At least, not quite as well as I do.
She'll be a good 5 or 10 minutes yet.

Let's wait in the library.

The only room in the house
with a fan.

Sit down, young man.

You stand there like a buck
I once shot in Wisconsin,

feeling the wind
for danger.

And after all, you're
virtually one of the family now.

I'm sorry we had to meet.

Oh?

Yes, I'm not up to this sort
of thing. I can see you're not.

Well, if it will make you feel any
easier, I don't feel much up to it myself.

Well, sit down. It's an old
habit of mine to be on a slightly

higher level than the court.

Good.

And while you wait,
we'll have a little sherry.

I have some very good sherry
outside here in the cabinet.

Very dry.

By the way, Mr. Donaldson,
what do you do for a living?

I'm an architect.

What? Here in Cartersville?

No, my father's firm
in Chicago.

I came here on a job.

Oh.

Now we can relax.

This is a very old wine.

Very old.

Very good.

Very special.

Amontillado.

Yes.

We shall not taste
its like again.

To Grace.

Can you propose a more
fitting toast?

To Grace.
To Grace.

It is good.

Rich and smooth.
Yes. We've been

saving it for quite a
long time, Grace and I.

For our 10th anniversary.

I bought it for her
in Spain.

On our honeymoon.
Quite a story.

Ten years from now, we told each
other, we'll share this wine.

The wine of a decade.

Sir...
Oh, it's quite all right.

Grace doesn't touch
alcohol anymore.

We may as well drink it,
you and I.

Sir, I think its better
that I wait...

Not that she ever did
drink very much really.

She takes pretty good care of
herself. Given to diets and massage.

Oh, mind you. She like an
occasionally glass of sherry.

Something like this,
for example.

She got to like it
on our honeymoon.

I'm sorry, Judge.

I'm just not comfortable.
I mean all this.

I mean, it's one thing to... To take
another man's wife and quite another

to drink a toast to doing it.
Is that it?

I just don't feel
I should stay.

I should have waited
in the car.

Thanks for the drink.
Goodbye.

But I would like to
say again, I'm sorry.

You know, you disappoint me.

Disappoint you? Yes, I
thought you loved Grace.

I do.

If I loved a woman,
I'd be curious about her.

I should want to know
everything about her.

I know all I need to
know about her. You do?

You'll stay because there are
things about Grace you want to know.

I love her. That's enough.
No. That's not enough.

You have questions you'll
never dare ask her yourself.

Questions to which you'll never
get the answers, except from me.

You must hate her.
Hate her?

I'm an old man
with a young wife.

And I love her with all the
foolishness the young never know.

Oh, they know ecstasy.
They know desire.

But they never know the wondrous
foolishness of an old man in love

for the first time.

No, the young never know.

They never understand.

Believe me, sir,
I'm sorry.

I wish
it were otherwise.

This is a small town.
I've lived here all my life.

My father and grandfather
before me.

I've been the lawyer here.
I've been the judge.

Yes, I've been the judge
for a long time.

Have you read Aristotle,
Mr. Donaldson?

No.

"When people dispute,"
Aristotle wrote,

"They take refuge
in the judge. "

Incidentally, do pour yourself
some more wine.

He also said, Aristotle,

"To go to the judge
is to go to justice. "

The judge restores equality.

It is as though there were a
line divided into unequal parts.

And he took away that by which
the greater segment

exceeds the half.

And added to it
the smaller segment.

Therefore, the just consists
in having equal amounts

before and after
the transaction.

Do you follow me,
Mr. Donaldson?

What, only half finished?

Help yourself, Mr. Donaldson.

No, sir,
I think I've had enough.

Help yourself!

Drink.

This is one bottle of wine
that deserves to be appreciated.

And we're
going to finish it.

Every last drop of it,
Mr. Donaldson.

I could shoot you, Mr.
Donaldson, and get off scot-free.

You couldn't find 12 men
among our 33,000

who would convict a man
for shooting his wife's...

Well, that's the way it is.
That's not the law...

That's just the way it is.

For a long time
I believed I'd kill you.

"If I ever set eyes on him for one
instant," I told myself, "I'll kill him. "

Strike him down
on the street without mercy.

I spent nights
wrestling with it,

nights when Grace
was out and

this house was
empty of everything

except my thoughts.

But I'm a weak and foolish old man, and
I haven't the will to pull the trigger.

I can't make myself do it.

You respect the law.
I respect the law,

but I despise myself.

Had you ever planned

to come to me, face me,
tell me your intentions?

I mentioned it to Grace.

But she didn't think it was
necessary. And neither did you, eh?

I guess I was...

afraid.

Not so much physically,
but of a scene.

In a situation like this,
any man would be.

You know, you really had me
going there a minute back.

It never occurred to me that you
might misunderstand and be afraid.

After all, the magistrate
is the guardian of justice.

But now that I've seen how reasonable
you are and your approach...

Oh, I don't know
how to say what I mean.

You're trying to say that

all we most needed was to drink a
bottle of old wine between ourselves, eh?

Yes. Yes, that's it.

And that's the way
I felt about it.

There.
Just one more each.

Grace should be down
by then.

No label.

Hmm? No, no label.

What kind of sherry
did you say that was?

Amontillado. From Spain.

Yes, when Grace and I were married,
we went to Europe for our honeymoon.

Well, it was
one of her conditions.

She had never traveled
and she wanted to.

I was 54
when I met Grace.

Incredibly enough, I had
never been in love before.

Grace was my secretary.

She was young
and she was very beautiful.

From the moment I saw her,
I loved her.

And I wanted her. Any way I
could get her, I wanted her.

A year it went on like that,
and I, longing for her.

A year, Mr. Donaldson,

an interminably long,
long time.

One bag's ready from the sound
of it. It won't be too long now.

Grace was new in town.

But she knew exactly
what she wanted.

Marriage, and a name,
and money.

I doubt if she ever looked on me as a
man, with a man's feelings and desires.

No, no, I was just
"the Judge. "

And I loved her, even though
she had no pity for my love.

I didn't know this then,
understand.

I learned it slowly
over these past 10 years.

She's not like that,
what you're saying.

She's different now, isn't she? I
mean, you think she is different.

She's the most understanding woman
I've ever known. Sympathetic, helpful...

It was in my office one
morning we agreed to marry,

much as you'd settle
a case out of court.

She closed her bargain.
I closed mine.

You don't love her.

Everything you say
proves you don't.

I keep reminding myself
when I sit in judgment of her,

she was an ambitious girl.

You may not be able to
understand this, or to believe it,

but I love her.
Of course, of course.

But you're not the first young
man. Nor will you be the last.

I don't intend
to listen to this.

Grace began to drift
about two years ago.

I saw it coming,
but I couldn't stop it.

She was searching
for someone to love,

someone to leave me for.

The right man, the
right step up. It's you.

You're the one.

I wonder what it is you have
that she wants. I wonder.

And I believe I know.

It's youth. She wants
the youngness of you,

just as I wanted her
youngness a long time ago.

I don't know.

I don't know.

But whatever it is, youth
or money or whatever it is,

if I can give it
to her, I will.

You will?

If I say it,
I will.

Look, I know
this is rough on you,

but these things happen. Nobody
plans them, they just happen.

Sometimes
somebody gets hurt.

I asked you
about Aristotle before,

now I ask you about Socrates.
Are you familiar with his story?

No.

Oh, then you're not familiar
with his last words to his judges,

a panel of Athenian noblemen who
had just sentenced him to death.

I really think I ought
to run up and help her.

I know Grace.

She'd not be even
close to being ready.

She'll call
when she wants you.

Socrates took poison.

Hemlock juice, very deadly.

It's rather stuffy in here.
Don't you feel it?

Um, no. Well, it's the wine.
It's just the wine, not the heat.

I did gulp it.

One should sip wine,
I drank it rather fast.

Socrates, Mr. Donaldson, listen to
what a wise man facing death had to say,

"Wherefore, O judges,
be of good cheer about death,

"and know of a certainty, that
no evil can happen to a good man,

"either in life
or after death.

"He and his are not neglected
by the gods,

"nor has my own approaching
end happened by mere chance.

"But I see clearly that the time had
arrived when it was better for me to die

"and be released from trouble.

"The hour of departure
has arrived,

"and we go our ways,

"one of us to die
and one to live.

"Which is better
God only knows. "

Yes, I feel it, too.

I suggest you sit down. The pain
will be less severe that way.

Pain? What pain?

The wine, Mr. Donaldson.
The wine.

What about the wine?

You'll recall, I went
out of the room to get it.

But I heard you
open the bottle.

You couldn't have possibly put
anything in it while you were outside.

You heard me open
a bottle but not that one.

I opened another one
just to deceive you.

I prepared that bottle
days ago.

I've been saving it.
For us.

That's impossible.

You have two,
maybe three minutes to live.

But you drank the wine, too.
Glass for glass.

You're sure?
No pain yet?

I shall remember that and be grateful
I didn't cause you any suffering.

It's too late
to call a doctor.

Why don't you feel it?

I do.

And that's why
I leave you now.

So you may die alone
and in peace.

Particularly because
I don't intend to join you.

Grace! Grace!

You said you'd give her
anything, Donaldson.

What more can you give
her than your life?

Help me! Help me!

I've laid out the various
items which I now go to take,

emetics, antidotes,
they're not pleasant.

But they'll save me from accompanying
you, young man, on your long, long voyage.

Help me, Judge, please.

Please, don't let me
die in here by myself.

I seem to remember you and
my wife were ready to leave me

to live and die by myself.

I'll go away. I'll go away,
but help me, please. Help me!

I say to you, Donaldson,
what I have had to say

To other condemned men,

May God have mercy
on your soul.

I'll never bother
you and Grace again.

Judge! What are you
doing to him?

Just having a little fun, my
pound of flesh, my moment of glory.

Judge!
Judge Condon!

You see, my dear, your man turns
out to be not a man after all,

but an hysterical child.
I had to prove it to you.

Listen to him. The man you
preferred to me. Listen.

Grace!
Grace, open the door!

Grace!

Grace, he's poisoned me.
Poison?

You think the Judge could...
Yes, I know it!

No. No, he couldn't do...

Why, in 20 years he never
once sentenced a man to death.

But he told me.

The bottle of wine, the one he bought
for you in Spain, on your honeymoon.

We never had a honeymoon
in Spain, Wallace.

There was nothing wrong
with that bottle of sherry.

Forsooth.

Such knavery.

Naturally the police
apprehended Wallace

and he paid for his
ungentlemanly conduct.

After all, one should not
shoot one's host

before dinner.

This concludes our little
preachment on the evils of drink.

Tune in next time,

when we shall again present a
charming little horrific fairy tale.

Good night.