yes, sir. absolutely. i've learned my lesson. i can honestly say i'm a changed man. i'm no longer a danger to society. that's the god's honest truth. no doubt about it.
there's a con like me in every prison in america, i guess. i'm the guy who can get it for you. cigarettes, a bag of reefer if you're partial, a bottle of brandy to celebrate your kid's high school graduation. damn near anything, within reason.
yes sir, i'm a regular sears & roebuck.
so when andy dufresne came to me in 1949 and asked me to smuggle rita hayworth into the prison for him, i told him no problem. and it wasn't.
andy came to shawshank prison in early 1947 for murdering his wife and the fella she was bangin'.
on the outside, he'd been vice- president of a large portland bank. good work for a man as young as he was, when you consider how conservative banks were back then.
there they are, boys. the human charm bracelet.
bear catholic? pope shit in the woods? smokes or coin, bettor's choice.
high roller. who's your horse?
that's five cigarettes on fat-ass. any takers?
i must admit i didn't think much of andy first time i laid eyes on him. he might'a been important on the outside, but in here he was just a little turd in prison grays. looked like a stiff breeze could blow him over. that was my first impression of the man.
little fella on the end. definitely. i stake half a pack. any takers?
c'mon, boys, who's gonna prove me wrong? floyd, skeet, joe, heywood. four brave souls, ten smokes apiece. that's it, gentlemen, this window's closed.
the first night's the toughest, no doubt about it. they march you in naked as the day you're born, fresh from a bible reading, skin burning and half-blind from that delousing shit they throw on you.
and when they put you in that cell, when those bars slam home, that's when you know it's for real. old life blown away in the blink of an eye. a long cold season in hell stretching out ahead. nothing left but all the time in the world to think about it.
most new fish come close to madness the first night. somebody always breaks down crying. happens every time. the only question is, who's it gonna be?
it's as good a thing to bet on as any, i guess. i had my money on andy dufresne.
i remember my first night. seems a long time ago now.
the boys always go fishin' with first-timers. and they don't quit till they reel someone in.
his first night in the joint, andy dufresne cost me two packs of cigarettes. he never made a sound.
give him some'a your cigarettes instead, cheap bastard.
the wife-killin' banker.
i keep my ear to the ground. why'd you do it?
hell, you'll fit right in, then. everyone's innocent in here, don't you know that? heywood! what are you in for, boy?
people say you're a cold fish. they say you think your shit smells sweeter than ordinary. that true?
ain't made up my mind yet.
i'm known to locate certain things from time to time. they seem to fall into my hands. maybe it's 'cause i'm irish.
what is it and why?
if you wanted a toothbrush, i wouldn't ask questions. i'd just quote a price. a toothbrush, see, is a non-lethal sort of object.
rocks.
quartz?
so?
yeah, that or maybe plant your toy in somebody's skull?
no? just wait.
word gets around. the sisters have taken a real shine to you, yes they have. especially bogs.
neither are they. you have to be human first. they don't qualify. bull queers take by force, that's all they want or understand. i'd grow eyes in the back of my head if i were you.
that comes free. but you understand my concern.
then i guess you wanna escape. tunnel under the wall maybe? i miss the joke. what's so funny?
what's this item usually go for?
my standard mark-up's twenty percent, but we're talkin' about a special object. risk goes up, price goes up. call it ten bucks even.
i'll see what i can do. but it's a waste of money.
folks who run this place love surprise inspections. they turn a blind eye to some things, but not a gadget like that. they'll find it, and you'll lose it. mention my name, we'll never do business again. not for a pair of shoelaces or a stick of gum.
red. the name's red.
i could see why some of the boys took him for snobby. he had a quiet way about him, a walk and a talk that just wasn't normal around here. he strolled. like a man in a park without a care or worry. like he had on an invisible coat that would shield him from this place. yes, i think it would be fair to say i liked andy from the start.
he was a man who adapted fast.
years later, i found out he'd brought in quite a bit more than just ten dollars.
when they check you into this hotel, one of the bellhops bends you over and looks up your works, just to make sure you're not carrying anything. but a truly determined man can get an object quite a ways up there.
that's how andy joined our happy little shawshank family with more than five hundred dollars on his person. determination.
andy was right. i finally got the joke. it would take a man about six hundred years to tunnel under the wall with one of these.
dufresne.
i wish i could tell you that andy fought the good fight, and the sisters let him be. i wish i could tell you that, but prison is no fairy-tale world.
he never said who did it. but we all knew.
things went on like that for a while. prison life consists of routine, and then more routine.
every so often, andy would show up with fresh bruises.
the sisters kept at him. sometimes he was able to fight them off.  sometimes not.
he always fought, that's what i remember. he fought because he knew if he didn't fight, it would make it that much easier not to fight the next time.
half the time it landed him in the infirmary.
the other half, it landed him in solitary. warden norton's "grain & drain" vacation. bread, water, and all the privacy you could want.
and that's how it went for andy. that was his routine. i do believe those first two years were the worst for him. and i also believe if things had gone on that way, this place would have got the best of him. but then, in the spring of 1949, the powers-that-be decided that.
it was outdoor detail, and may is one damn fine month to be workin' outdoors.
more than a hundred men volunteered for the job.
wouldn't you know it? me and some fellas i know were among the names called.
only cost us a pack of smokes per man. i made my usual twenty percent, of course.
crying shame. some folks got it awful bad.
hey, you nuts? keep your eyes on your pail!
andy! come back! shit!
god damn it.
and that's how it came to pass, that on the second-to-last day of the job, the convict crew that tarred the plate factory roof in the spring of '49.
wound up sitting in a row at ten o'clock in the morning, drinking icy cold black label beer courtesy of the hardest screw that ever walked a turn at shawshank state prison.
the colossal prick even managed to sound magnanimous.
we sat and drank with the sun on our shoulders, and felt like free men. we could'a been tarring the
as for andy, he spent that break hunkered in the shade, a strange little smile on his face, watching us drink his beer.
you could argue he'd done it to curry favor with the guards. or maybe make a few friends among us cons. me, i think he did it just to feel normal again. if only for a short while.
king me.
and totally fuckin' inexplicable. hate that game.
you come to the right place. i'm the man who can get things.
that'd take you years.
how's that rock-hammer workin' out anyway? scratch your name on your wall yet?
andy? i guess we're gettin' to be friends, ain't we?
i ask a question? why'd you do it?
murder. same as you.
the only guilty man in shawshank.
here's the good part. bugs come out of the walls to get his ass.
sure. what do you want?
no problem. take a few weeks.
don't have her stuffed down my pants this very moment, sorry to say. relax. what are you so nervous about? she's just a woman.
sure. what do you want?
no problem. take a few weeks.
don't have her stuffed down my pants this very moment, sorry to say. relax. what are you so nervous about? she's just a woman.
bogs didn't put anything in andy's mouth, and neither did his friends. what they did do is beat him within an inch of his life.
andy spent a month in traction.
bogs spent a week in the hole.
two things never happened again after that. the sisters never laid a finger on andy again.
and bogs never walked again. they transferred him to a minimum security hospital upstate. to my knowledge, he lived out the rest of his days drinking his food through a straw.
i'm thinkin' andy could use a nice welcome back when he gets out of the infirmary.
man likes to play chess. let's get him some rocks.
horse apple.
no, horse shit. petrified.
despite a few hitches, the boys came through in fine style.
and by the week andy was due back, we had enough rocks saved up to keep him busy till rapture.
also got a big shipment in that week. cigarettes, chewing gum, shoelaces, playing cards with naked ladies on 'em, you name it.  . and, of course, the most important item.
tossin' cells was just an excuse. truth is, norton wanted to size andy up.
makin' yourself some friends, andy.
got you out of the laundry, didn't it?
so andy started writing a letter a week, just like he said.
and just like norton said, andy got no answers. but still he kept on.
the following april, andy did tax returns for half the guards at shawshank.
year after that, he did them all.  including the warden's.
year after that, they rescheduled the start of the intramural season to coincide with tax season.
the guards on the opposing teams all remembered to bring their w-2's.
yes sir, andy was a regular h&r block. in fact, he got so busy at tax time, he was allowed a staff.
got me out of the wood shop a month out of the year, and that was fine by me.
and still he kept sending those letters.
what the hell's going on?
no. we'll handle this. ain't that right, brooks? just settle down and we'll talk about it, okay?
why? what's heywood done to you?
yeah, that's right. that's what everybody says.
you've had worse from shaving. what'd you do to set him off?
ain't that bad, old hoss. won't be long till you're squiring pretty young girls on your arm and telling 'em lies.
heywood, enough. ain't nothing wrong with brooksie. he's just institutionalized, that's all.
man's been here fifty years. this place is all he knows. in here, he's an important man, an educated man. a librarian. out there, he's nothing but a used-up old con with arthritis in both hands. couldn't even get a library card if he applied. you see what i'm saying?
believe what you want. these walls are funny. first you hate 'em, then you get used to 'em. after long enough, you get so you depend on 'em. that's "institutionalized."
goddamn right. they send you here for life, and that's just what they take. part that counts, anyway.
he should'a died in here, goddamn it.
is that jake?
it never would have occurred to us, if not for andy. it was his idea. we all agreed it was the right thing to do.
lord. brooks was a sinner. jake was just a crow. neither was much to look at. both got institutionalized. see what you can do for 'em. amen.
i have no idea to this day what them two italian ladies were singin' about. truth is, i don't want to know. some things are best left unsaid. i like to think they were singin' about something so beautiful it can't be expressed in words, and makes your heart ache because of it.
i tell you, those voices soared. higher and farther than anybody in a gray place dares to dream. it was like some beautiful bird flapped into our drab little cage and made these walls dissolve away. and for the briefest of moments -- every last man at shawshank felt free.
it pissed the warden off something terrible.
andy got two weeks in the hole for that little stunt.
oh, they let you tote that record player down there, huh? i could'a swore they confiscated that stuff.
played a mean harmonica as a younger man. lost my taste for it. didn't make much sense on the inside.
forget?
hope is a dangerous thing. drive a man insane. it's got no place here. better get used to the idea.
yes sir, without a doubt. i can say i'm a changed man. no danger to society, that's the god's honest truth. absolutely rehabilitated.
same old, same old. thirty years. jesus. when you say it like that.
it's very pretty, andy. thank you.
not today.
andy was as good as his word. he kept writing to the state senate. two letters a week instead of one.
in 1959, the folks up augusta way finally clued in to the fact they couldn't buy him off with just a 200 dollar check. appropriations committee voted an annual payment of 500 dollars, just to shut him up.
those checks came once a year like clockwork.
you'd be amazed how far andy could stretch it. he made deals with book clubs, charity groups. he bought remaindered books by the pound.
i got here an auto repair manual, and a book on soap carving.
maybe that should go under educational too.
by the year kennedy was shot, andy had transformed a broom closet smelling of turpentine into the best prison library in new england.
that was also the year warden norton instituted his famous "inside-out" program. you may remember reading about it. it made all the papers and got his picture in life magazine.
nobody asked you.
none of the inmates were invited to express their views.
'course, norton failed to mention to the press that "bare minimum of expense" is a fairly loose term. there are a hundred different ways to skim off the top. men, materials, you name it. and, oh my lord, how the money rolled in.
and behind every shady deal, behind every dollar earned.
there was andy, keeping the books.
got his fingers in a lot of pies, from what i hear.
money like that can be a problem. sooner or later you gotta explain where it came from.
it's clean as a virgin's whistle?
jesus. they ever catch on, he's gonna wind up wearing a number himself.
i'm sure you're good, but all that paper leaves a trail. anybody gets too curious -- fbi, irs, whatever -- that trail's gonna lead to somebody.
who then?
who?
yeah, okay, but who the hell is he?
you can't just make a person up.
jesus. did i say you were good? you're rembrandt.
does it ever bother you?
to keep you happy and doing the laundry. money instead of sheets.
tommy williams came to shawshank in 1965 on a two year stretch for b&e. cops caught him sneakin' tv sets out the back door of a jc penney.
young punk, mr. rock n' roll, cocky as hell.
we liked him immediately.
as it turns out, tommy had himself a young wife and new baby girl.
maybe it was the thought of them on
whatever it was, something lit a fire under that boy's ass.
so andy took tommy under his wing. started walking him through his abcs.
tommy took to it pretty well, too. boy found brains he never knew he had.
after a while, you couldn't pry those books out of hands.
ass in gear, son! you're putting us behind!
before long, andy started him on his course requirements. he really liked the kid, that was part of it. gave him a thrill to help a youngster crawl off the shitheap. but that wasn't the only reason.
prison time is slow time. sometimes it feels like stop-time. so you do what you can to keep going.
some fellas collect stamps. others build matchstick houses. andy built a library. now he needed a new project. tommy was it. it was the same reason he spent years shaping and polishing those rocks. the same reason he hung his fantasy girlies on the wall.
in prison, a man'll do most anything to keep his mind occupied.
by 1966. right about the time tommy was getting ready to take his exams. it was lovely racquel.
that's crap, son. he's proud of you. proud as a hen. we been friends a long time. i know him as good as anybody.
smart as they come. used to be a banker on the outside.
murder.
you wouldn't think, lookin' at him. caught his wife in bed with some golf pro. greased 'em both. c'mon, boy, back to work.
andy?
like hell. you didn't pull the trigger, and you didn't convict him.
since '47. going on nineteen years.
board of education.
looks that way. you gonna open it or stick your thumb up your butt?
well, shit.
that don't make you a murderer. bad husband, maybe.
feel bad about it if you want. but you didn't pull the trigger.
bad luck? jesus.
sure. when i got a long white beard and about three marbles left rolling around upstairs.
zihuatanejo?
jesus, andy. i couldn't hack it on the outside. been in here too long. i'm an institutional man now. like old brooks hatlen was.
bullshit. in here i'm the guy who can get it for you. out there, all you need are yellow pages. i wouldn't know where to begin. pacific ocean? hell. like to scare me to death, somethin' that big.
goddamn it, andy, stop! don't do that to yourself! talking shitty pipedreams! mexico's down there, and you're in here, and that's the way it is!
andy?
lots of hayfields there.
what? what's buried there?
i tell you, the man was talkin' crazy. i'm worried, i truly am.
every man's got a breaking point.
yeah. sure. that's right.
i have had some long nights in stir. alone in the dark with nothing but your thoughts, time can draw out like a blade.
that was the longest night of my life.
well what?
no sir, he didn't!
they got this skinny kid named rory tremont to go in the hole. he wasn't much in the brains department, but he possessed the one most important qualification for the job.  . he was willing to go.
probably thought he'd win a bronze star or something.
it was his third day on the job.
and then came the unmistakable sound of rory tremont losing his last few meals. the whole cellblock heard it. i mean, it echoed.
i laughed myself right into solitary. two week stretch.
it's shit, it's shit, oh my god it's shit.
andy once talked about doing easy time in the hole. now i knew what he meant.
in 1966, andy dufresne escaped from shawshank prison.
all they found of him was a muddy set of prison clothes, a bar of soap, and an old rock-hammer damn near worn down to the nub.
i remember thinking it would take a man six hundred years to tunnel through the wall with it. andy did it in less than twenty.
andy loved geology. i imagine it appealed to his meticulous nature. an ice age here, a million years of mountain-building there, plates of bedrock grinding against each other over a span of millennia.
geology is the study of pressure and time. that's all it takes, really. pressure and time.
that and a big damn poster.
like i said. in prison, a man'll do most anything to keep his mind occupied.
it turns out andy's favorite hobby was totin' his wall out into the exercise yard a handful at a time.
while the rest of us slept, andy spent years workin' the nightshift.
probably took him most of a year just to get his head through.
i guess after tommy was killed, andy decided he'd been here just about long enough.
andy did like he was told. buffed those shoes to a high mirror shine.
the guard simply didn't notice. neither did i. i mean, seriously, how often do you really look at a man's shoes?
andy crawled to freedom through five hundred yards of shit-smelling foulness i can't even imagine. or maybe i just don't want to.
five hundred yards. the length of five football fields. just shy of half a mile.
the next morning, right about the time racquel was spilling her little secret.
a man nobody ever laid eyes on before strolled into the casco bank of portland. until that moment, he didn't exist -- except on paper.
he had all the proper i.d. driver's license, birth certificate, social security card. the signature was a spot-on match.
mr. stevens visited nearly a dozen banks in the portland area that morning. all told, he blew town with better than 370 thousand dollars of warden norton's money. severance pay for nineteen years.
i wasn't there to see it, but i hear byron hadley was sobbing like a little girl when they took him away.
norton had no intention of goin' that quietly.
i like to think the last thing that went through his head. other than that bullet. was to wonder how the hell andy dufresne ever got the best of him.
not long after the warden deprived us of his company, i got a postcard in the mail. it was blank. but the postmark said, "mcnary, texas."
mcnary. right on the border. that's where andy crossed. when i picture him heading south in his own car with the top down, it makes me laugh all over again.
andy dufresne, who crawled through a river of shit and came out clean on the other side. andy dufresne, headed for the pacific.
those of us who knew him best talk about him often. i swear, the stuff he pulled. it always makes us laugh.
sometimes it makes me sad, though, andy being gone. i have to remind myself that some birds aren't meant to be caged, that's all. their feathers are just too bright.
and when they fly away, the part of you that knows it was a sin to lock them up does rejoice. but still, the place you live is that much more drab and empty that they're gone.
i guess i just miss my friend.
but there are times i curse him for the dreams he left behind.
dreams where i am lost in a warm place with no memory.
an ocean so big it strikes me dumb. waves so quiet they strike me deaf. sunshine so bright it strikes me blind. it is a place that is blue beyond reason. bluer than can possibly exist. bluer than my mind can possibly grasp.
i am terrified. there is no way home.
andy. i know you're in that place. look at the stars for me just after sunset. touch the sand. wade in the water. and feel free.
i heard you. rehabilitated. let's see now. you know, come to think of it, i have no idea what that means.
i know what you think it means. me, i think it's a made-up word, a poli- tician's word. a word so young fellas like you can wear a suit and tie and have a job. what do you really want to know? am i sorry for what i did?
not a day goes by i don't feel regret, and not because i'm in here or because you think i should. i look back on myself the way i was. stupid kid who did that terrible crime. wish i could talk sense to him. tell him how things are. but i can't. that kid's long gone, this old man is all that's left, and i have to live with that. rehabilitated? that's a bullshit word, so you just go on ahead and stamp that form there, sonny, and stop wasting my damn time. truth is, i don't give a shit.
sir? restroom break sir?
thirty years i've been asking permission to piss. i can't squeeze a drop without say-so.
women, too, that's the other thing. i forgot they were half the human race. there's women everywhere, every shape and size. i find myself semi-hard most of the time, cursing myself for a dirty old man.
not a brassiere to be seen, nipples poking out at the world. jeezus, pleeze-us. back in my day, a woman out in public like that would have been arrested and given a sanity hearing.
they're calling this the summer of love. summer of loonies, you ask me.
yes sir. that i am.
things got different out here.
guess the world moved on.
there is a harsh truth to face. no way i'm gonna make it on the outside.
all i do anymore is think of ways to break my parole.
terrible thing, to live in fear. brooks hatlen knew it. knew it all too well. all i want is to be back where things make sense. where i won't have to be afraid all the time.
only one thing stops me. a promise i made to andy.
get busy living or get busy dying. that is goddamn right.
for the second time in my life, i am guilty of committing a crime.
parole violation. i doubt they'll toss up any roadblocks for that. not for an old crook like me.
mcnary, texas?
i find i am so excited i can barely sit still or hold a thought in my head. i think it is the excitement only a free man can feel, a free man at the start of a long journey whose conclusion is uncertain.
i hope i can make it across the border. i hope to see my friend and shake his hand. i hope the pacific is as blue as it has been in my dreams. i hope.
i'm known to locate certain things from time to time.