JOHN BEAL
I am sorry to make you do it. You are sad that you have to do it. Yet it must be done.
DAOUD
Yes, I am sad, great master.
JOHN BEAL
But why are you sad, Daoud?
DAOUD
Great master, in times you do not know these gods were holy. In times you have not guessed. In old centuries, master, perhaps before the pass. Men have prayed to them, sorrowed before them, given offerings to them. The light of old hearths has shone on them, flames from old battles. The shadow of the mountains has fallen on them, so many times, master, so many times. Dawn and sunset have shone on them, master, like firelight flickering; dawn and sunset, dawn and sunset, flicker, flicker, flicker for century after century. They have sat there watching the dawns like old men by the fire. They are so old, master, so old. And some day dawn and sunset will die away and shine on the world no more, and they would have still sat on in the cold. And now they go... They are our history, master, they are our old times. Though they be bad times they are our times, master; and now they go. I am sad, master, when the old gods go.
JOHN BEAL
But they are bad gods, Daoud.