There's something really, truly chilling about the ending of "A Good Man is Hard to Find," isn't there? Almost like that moment, at the beginning of "Nebraska" where Springsteen sings "Mister, I guess there's just a meanness in this world." The criminal, the misfit who is seems almost uncomprehendingly amoral. "Nome," says the Misfit, "I ain't a good man." He isn't. But neither, as he says, is he the worst in the world, either. Those, surely, must be his companions, the ones who take joy in murder. There is no joy in murder for the Misfit.
I think he may be amoral as opposed to actually evil because he is the Misfit. He doesn't fit in. He doesn't quite seem to know what he's done. When he does evil he seems confused by it. I think his companions are evil. No benefit comes from their killings. When the Misfit kills, he is an instrument of grace - that is, he affords the woman to extend grace. If the old woman becomes truly good, truly Christian, by imitating Christ by extending grace, saying that the Misfit is one of her children, then the Misfit is the sin of the world, the opportunity for grace, the Fortunate Fall, the Fall that leads to redemption. The Misfit seems to somehow know his part, too. The murder gives him no pleasure. His companions enjoy the killing; the instrument of grace does not.

Anyway, Sufjan Stevens has a song called "A Good Man is Hard to Find." It gives me chills every time.