Mary Longstreet [about Prof. Charles Rankin]
Hello, father. Has anybody seen my brand new husband?
Judge Longstreet
Don't tell me he's deserted you already.
Mary Longstreet Yes, it looks as if, the brute.
Played by Loretta Young 
The Stranger (1946) · 16 quotes
The Stranger (1946) · 16 quotes
2nd most-quoted character in The Stranger (1946): in 8 of its 16 quotes
Most scenes with: Professor Charles Rankin (4), Mr. Wilson (3)
Why wasn't it I... Franz Kindler? Kill me. Kill me, I want you to. I couldn't face life knowing what I've been to you and what I've done to Noah. But when you kill me, don't put your hands on me! [Picks up a fireplace poker] Here! Use this!
Scenes with Mary Longstreet
7 scenes Mary Longstreet Mary Longstreet 
Do you know Germany, Mr. Rankin?
I'm sorry, I...I have a way of making enemies when I'm on that subject. I get pretty unpopular.
Well, we shall consider it the objective opinion of an objective historian.
Historian? A psychiatrist could explain it better. The German sees himself as the innocent victim of world envy and hatred, conspired against, set upon by inferior peoples, inferior nations. He cannot admit to error, much less to wrongdoing, not the German. We chose to ignore Ethiopia and Spain, but we learned from our own casualty list the price of looking the other way. Men of truth everywhere have come to know for whom the bell tolled, but not the German. No! He still follows his warrior gods marching to Wagnerian strains, his eyes still fixed upon the fiery sword of Siegfried. And in those subterranean meeting places that you don't believe in, the German's dream world comes alive when he takes his place in shining armor beneath the banners of the Teutonic Knights. Mankind is waiting for the Messiah, but for the German, the Messiah is not the Prince of Peace. No, he's... another Barbarossa... another Hitler.
Well, then you have no faith in the reforms that are being effected in Germany.
I don't know, Mr. Wilson. I can't believe that people can be reformed except from within. The basic principles of equality and freedom never have and never will take root in Germany. The will to freedom has been voiced in every other tongue. "All men are created equal", liberte, egalite, fraternite - but in German...
Noah Longstreet
There's Marx. "Proletarians, unite. You have nothing to lose but your chains."
But Marx wasn't a German, Marx was a Jew.
Judge Longstreet
But, my dear Charles, if we concede your argument, there is no solution.
Well, sir, once again, I differ.
Judge Longstreet
Well, what is it, then?
Annihilation. Down to the last babe in arms.
Mary Longstreet Oh, Charles, I can't imagine you're advocating a Carthaginian peace.
Well, as an historian, I must remind you that the world hasn't had much trouble from Carthage in the past 2,000 years.
Mary Longstreet Why are you packing? Are we going somewhere?
We aren't, dearest. I am.
Mary Longstreet What are you talking about?
As a rule, men leave their wives because they don't love them, but...I must leave you because I do. Oh, you won't object once you know the kind of man you've married.
Mary Longstreet But you are the man I've married, and that's all that matters. Darling, I meant it when I said for better or for worse. Even to...
To killing Red?
Mary Longstreet You couldn't have. It was an accident.
No, I meant to kill him. Murder can be a chain, Mary, one link leading to another until it circles your neck. Red was digging at the grave of the man I killed. Yes, your little man.
Mary Longstreet You killed him?
With these hands. The same hands that have held you close to me. Now are you satisfied to let me go?
Mary Longstreet Mr. Wilson, I've never... I've never so much as even seen a Nazi.
Well, you might without your realizing it. They look like other people and act like other people - when it's to their benefit.
Mary Longstreet Why do you want me to look at these horrors?
All this you're seeing, it's all the product of one mind. The mind of a man named Franz Kindler. Franz Kindler. Yes, he was the most brilliant of the younger minds from the Nazi party. It was Kindler who conceived the theory of genocide, mass depopulation of conquered countries. So that regardless of who won the war, Germany would emerge the strongest nation in Western Europe, biologically speaking.
Mary Longstreet Did you kill Noah?
Yes, if he goes to the church and climbs up that ladder!
Mary Longstreet It was I you intended to kill, wasn't it?
Mary Longstreet Why wasn't it I? Franz Kindler! Kill me. Kill me, I want you to. I couldn't face life knowing what I've been to you and what I've done to Noah. But when you kill me, don't put your hands on me! [hands Charles a gun] Here!
Mary Longstreet I came to kill you.
No, no, Mary, it's you that's going to die. You were meant to fall through that ladder.
Mary Longstreet You're going to fall. I don't mind if I take you with me.
You are a fool. They've searched the woods. I watched them. Here, like God, looking at little ants. I'll hide in the woods. They won't search there again. In a day or two, they'll be sure I got out of town.
Mary Longstreet When they find me, they'll know you're still here.
But, darling, you're on the verge of a breakdown. Now you've cracked. Why else would you leave your bed, climb to an empty church tower in the dead of night? Any child could see you'd wind up killing yourself. Killing is what led you here. It won't help you now.