12 Years a Slave2013

Edwin Epps:
[Having awakened Solomon in the middle of the night, Epps coaxes him outside, puts his arm around him as if consoling a friend, and guides him into the woods] Well, boy. I understand I've got a larned n*gger that writes letters and tries to get white fellows to mail 'em. Well, Armsby tol' me today the devil was among my n*ggers. That I had one that needed close watchin' or he would run away. When I axed him why, he said you come over to him and waked him up in the middle of the night and wanted him to carry a letter to Marksville. What have yah got to say to that?

Solomon Northup:
There is no truth in it.

Edwin Epps:
You say.

Solomon Northup:
How could I write a letter without ink or paper? There is nobody I want to write to 'cause I hain't got no friends living as I know of. That Armsby is a lying drunken fellow. You know this, just as you know that I am constant in truth. Now, master, I can see what that Armsby is after, plain enough. Didn't he want you to hire him for an overseer? That's it. He wants to make you believe we're all going to run away and then he thinks you'll hire an overseer to watch us. He believes you are soft soap. He's given to such talk. I believe he's just made this story out of whole cloth, 'cause he wants to get a situation. It's all a lie, master, you may depend on't. It's all a lie.

Edwin Epps:
[reveals a pocket knife he'd had pressed against Solomon's gut the entire time] Well I'll be damned... Were he not free and white, Platt. Were he not free and white.