- [How murderers are executed]
- Leroy: They got a little blue chair for little boys and a little pink chair for little girls.
- Christine Penmark: Rhoda, what happened to old Mrs. Post in Wichita?
- Rhoda: There was ice on the steps and I slipped and fell against her, and that was all.
- Christine Penmark: That was all?
- Rhoda: No. I slipped on purpose.
- Hortense Daigle: [drunkenly] I just want to have a talk with your little girl. She was one of the last to see my Claude alive.
- Christine Penmark: I know.
- Hortense Daigle: Where do you keep the perfect little lady who was the last to see Claude? I thought I'd hold her in my arms and we'd have a little talk where maybe she'd remember some little thing... any little thing.
- Christine Penmark: She's out playing, I think.
- Hortense Daigle: Well, I'm unfortunate, that's all. Drunk and unfortunate, ladies and gentlemen.
- Christine Penmark: This is my daughter, Rhoda.
- Reginald 'Reggie' Tasker: Hello, Rhoda. Well, isn't she a little sweetheart!
- Rhoda: Thank you.
- [she curtsies]
- Reginald 'Reggie' Tasker: That's the kind of thing that makes an old bachelor wish he were married.
- Rhoda: Oh, you like little girls to curtsy?
- Reginald 'Reggie' Tasker: The best thing left out of the Middle Ages.
- Rhoda: I'm having dinner upstairs.
- Reginald 'Reggie' Tasker: The loss is ours. All ours.
- Christine Penmark: You may go now, Rhoda.
- Rhoda: Yes, Mommy. It's been a pleasure to have met you, Mr. Tasker.
- [She exits]
- Reginald 'Reggie' Tasker: Now there's a little ray of sunshine.
- Christine Penmark: Oooh, I've seen her stormy.
- Hortense Daigle: He was such a lovely, dear little boy. He used to say I was his sweetheart and he was going to marry me when he grew up. I would laugh so. "No you won't. You'll forget about me long before then. You'll find a prettier girl and marry her." And do you know what he said then? "No, I won't. 'Cause there isn't a prettier girl in the whole world than you are."
- Christine Penmark: You hit him with the shoes, didn't you? You hit him with the shoes, that's how he got those half moon marks on his forehead and on his hands. Answer me, Rhoda. ANSWER ME!
- Leroy: You want to know what you done after you hit him? You jerked the medal off his shirt and then you rolled that sweet little boy off that wharf from under them pilings.
- Rhoda: You don't know anything. None of what you've said is true.
- Leroy: You know I'm telling the gospel truth. You know I got it figured out.
- Rhoda: You've figured out something that never happened. And so it's all lies. Now take your excelsior to the basement and put it where you can sleep on it when you are supposed to be working.
- [last title card]
- Title Card: You have just seen a motion picture whose theme dares to be startlingly different. May we ask that you do not divulge the unusual climax of this story. Thank you.
- Christine Penmark: Do you really mean to say that nice family surroundings and advantages could make no difference at all?
- Reginald 'Reggie' Tasker: Yes. It's as if these children were born blind permanently and you just couldn't expect to teach them to see.
- Christine Penmark: Well, would you notice any brutish expressions on their faces?
- Reginald 'Reggie' Tasker: Sometimes. But more often they present a more convincing picture of virtue than normal folk.
- Christine Penmark: But that's horrible!
- Reginald 'Reggie' Tasker: It's just that they are bad seeds. Plain bad from the beginning. And nothing can change them.
- Hortense Daigle: I always considered Christine a gentle name. Hortense sounds fat. That's me, Hortense. "My girl Hortense", they used to sing of me, "hasn't got much sense. Let's write her name on the privy fence!"
- [laughs]
- Hortense Daigle: Children can be nasty, don't you think?
- Rhoda: What will you give me for a basket of kisses?
- Col. Kenneth Penmark: A basket of kisses? Why, I'll give you a basket of hugs!
- Christine Penmark: [End credits scene; Christine Penmark marches over towards Rhoda angrily] And as for you...!
- [Christine bends Rhoda over one knee and begins spanking her repeatedly]
- Rhoda Penmark: No! NO! AHH, NO! Ooh, ow! No...
- [the End text fades in on the screen]
- Leroy: They got what they call stick bloodhounds to help them look. And them stick bloodhounds can find any stick there is that's got blood on it.
- Monica Breedlove: What has she DONE?
- Christine Penmark: It isn't what she's done, it's what I've done...
- Leroy: [to Rhoda] I thought I'd seen some mean little gals in my time, but you're the meanest. You wanna know how I know how mean you are? 'Cause I'm mean. I'm smart and I'm mean, and you're smart and you're mean. And you never get caught and I never get caught.
- Leroy Jessup: [after Mrs. Breedlove is out of earshot] Ooh, that ol' know-it-all Monica Breedlove! Thinks don't nobody know anything but her!
- [scoffs]
- Leroy Jessup: ... Well, she ain't got long to go, anyway.
- [Leroy grins in a perverted manner as he sits down on the lawn]
- Leroy Jessup: But that young trough-fed Mrs. Penmark?... She might get kinda lonely with that soldier-boy o' hers gone! Yes sir... she might. Now, that Rhoda... she's a smart one. Smarter than most of 'em, that's for sure! She sees through me... and I see through her! Swallow me a frog, but she's smart, huh?
- Christine Penmark: Operator? I'd like to... to call... Washington... D. C., please...
- [breaks down crying]
- Christine Penmark: Oh Kenneth, my darling, my love! What am I going to say to you? That our baby isn't... never mind, operator. Cancel the call.
- Rhoda: Oh, I've got the prettiest mother. I've got the nicest mother. That's what I tell everybody. I say I've got the sweetest mother in the world. If she wants a little boy that bad, why doesn't she take one out of the orphans' home?
- Christine Penmark: Get away from me. Don't talk to me! We have nothing to say to each other.
- Rhoda: Okay, mother. Okay.
- Christine Penmark: All right. All right now, we're gonna... We're gonna start at the beginning and you're gonna tell me the truth. I know you killed him, so there's no sense lying. Rhoda, I want you to tell me the truth!
- Rhoda: I can't tell you, mother! I want you to...
- Christine Penmark: I'm waiting for your *answer*.
- Rhoda: He wouldn't give me the medal like I told him to, that's all. So then he ran away from me and hid on the wharf. But I found him there and I told him I'd hit him with my shoe if he didn't give me the medal! But he shook his head and said no. So I hit him the first time. Then he took off the medal and gave it to me.
- Christine Penmark: And then what happened?
- Rhoda: Tried to run away from me. So I hit him with my shoe again! But he kept on crying and making a noise and I was afraid somebody would hear him... So I kept on hitting him, mother! I hit him harder that time and he fell in the water.
- Claudia Fern: Smooth the wrinkles from your brow my dear, your face is so much prettier when smiling.
- Monica Breedlove: Oh, how wonderful it is to meet such a natural little girl! She knows what she wants and she asks for it! Not like those over-civilized little pests who have to go through analysis before they can even choose an ice cream soda.
- Henry Daigle: Come, Hortense. It's time to go home.
- Hortense Daigle: Oh, my god! My god! It's time to go home!