AIt is open to interpretation and speculation regarding the exact nature of the closest thing to an encounter between Chigurh and Bell in the movie. There are at least four possibilities. The first is that Chigurh is indeed behind the door when we (and Bell) see what looks like his reflection through the lock tube. Bell draws his weapon and some time passes as he prepares himself to enter under the assumption that Chigurh is still inside. This may have given Chigurh some time to hide somewhere in the motel room. When Bell does enter, Chigurh is no longer behind the door (Bell doesn't even check there, although he does push the door open enough that if Chigurh were there he would probably know it). Bell checks the bathroom and finds the rear window locked. He then returns to the main room and sits down on the bed. He soon sees that the vent has been removed, implying that the money is gone and that Chigurh has it. During the time that Bell was in the bathroom it is possible that Chigurh left the room and escaped. Since Chigurh has the money he has no reason to go out of his way to kill Bell, and it is possible that he simply did the practical thing and escaped to avoid any further complications. The second and third possibilities are similar but still distinct. They would be (2) that Chigurh is either in an adjacent room (the one to the left as we face the rooms as Bell walks towards them, for example) when we see him hiding behind the door (in what would have to be a mirrored shot due to the arrangement of the rooms) or (3) that we see him hiding behind the door earlier in time by several minutes, being cautious about exiting the room. The first would make sense considering Moss' earlier method of hiding the money and making it accessible from another room. Other evidence to suggest this is the fact that both the room Moss was killed in (room 114) and the adjacent room (room 112) are behind police tape, implying both were part of the crime scene. It is difficult to determine by the film whether the lock was punched out in the adjacent room, however. The second would fit with the usual situation of Bell arriving moments too late to find Chigurh, which is one of the reasons he says that he might call him a "ghost." The fourth possibility is that Chigurh is already long gone and the reflection in the lock tube and the image of Chigurh waiting behind the door are all in Bell's imagination as expressions of his fear, the fear that he confronts (or attempts to confront) by entering the room anyway. There is strong evidence against any theory that Chigurh was not there when Sheriff Bell arrived. That evidence is the crime scene tape, the shadow of which can be seen on the door just as Sheriff Bell enters the room, projected by the headlights of Bell's car. This crime scene tape shadow is also projected on the wall of the hotel room after Bell opens the door. After Bell leaves the bathroom, he sits on the bed and we can see that the shadow of the crime scene tape is no longer on the wall, implying that it has been broken by someone escaping the hotel room, or the adjacent hotel room. However, it should be noted that the two pieces of crime scene tape are actually still intact when Bell sits on the bed, in other camera angles. While the tape shadow no longer appears on the large wall nearest the bathroom, the tape shadow still appears intact on the wall with the TV, when the camera is on Bell's face as he notices the ventilation grate has been removed. Just before the camera cuts away from Bell's face and to the ventilation grate, the two pieces of crime scene tape can briefly be seen flapping in the wind, showing they are still intact. Therefore, it is difficult to make any strong conclusions regarding a theory of someone (Chigurh) leaving and breaking the tape. It may be nothing more than an oversight in the scene's continuity.Because we know that Chigurh was indeed there at some point, we could consider a combination of either possibility 2 or 3 combined with 4 as being what actually happened or what we are being shown. This would mean that we aren't seeing something that is purely Bell's imagination (although what we see may have been influenced by it), but instead what actually happened "5 minutes ago" or "in the next room over" might be shown to illustrate what Bell is feeling: that Chigurh is somewhere around and that he will be in danger upon entering the room. In other words, there was some trick editing where we are being shown a different time or a different place interlaced with the current time and/or location in such a way that makes it appear to be happening concurrently to the scenes with Bell. Other movies use this technique to fool the audience into thinking two things are happening in the movie at the same time in the same place, when in reality one has already happened or happened in a different place, or both.In the end, it matters little where Chigurh was (which is one of the reasons it was left ambiguous). What is important is that we are shown that Bell thinks he is still in there and enters the room anyway, confronting his fear and possibly putting his soul at hazard. Once again he is too late and Chigurh is gone with the money, but he didn't know that before he entered the room. This matches closely the description of the scene from the book. The scene has been changed but the end result is basically the same. In the book it is clearly stated to the reader that Chigurh is still at the motel when Bell arrives. Chigurh is in the parking lot, notices a car coming and hides in his car as he watches Bell park and go inside the motel room. After Bell has finished searching the motel room he prepares to exit the room, and we "hear" what he is thinking. Just as he is about to exit the room he indicates that he is aware that Chigurh could be in one of the many cars in the parking lot, and that he would be helpless if Chigurh were to open fire on him from that vantage point. He exits the room anyway, gets in his car and drives down the road where he stops and watches the parking lot. He has called for backup and he waits until backup arrives, and when they do, a search of the parking lot returns nothing. The reader doesn't know how Chigurh escapes.
AThe two dreams can be seen as expressions of what Bell is struggling with throughout the course of the story and the change of perspective that allows him to come to terms with his struggle. In the first dream he says his father entrusted him with some money, but he (Bell) lost it. This can be seen as Bell feeling as if he was entrusted with a responsibility and has failed to uphold it. His failure to keep and protect something valuable like the money is analogous to his failure as a law enforcement officer to protect people like Moss and Carla Jean, other civilians, and to make a significant impact on crime in general. This dream explains what is troubling him and that he feels or is afraid that he may be a failure. Because his father is mentioned explicitly it is likely that he may feel he has failed his father, who was also a law-man, on a personal level.The second dream is a reconciliation of the problem from the first. In the second dream, he says he and his father were riding through the mountains in the old times. His father rode up ahead of him and went on into the cold and dark with some fire. Bell said that he knew when he got to where his father was going, his father would be there waiting for him. This indicates that Bell realizes that his father is waiting for him nonetheless, whether he is a failure or not. The dark and cold would represent the unknowable near future and eventual certain death, and the fire represents comfort, protection and hope. His father carries it onward, and Bell knows he will be waiting with it for him when he joins him in the future. The dream seems to be an encouragement to continue in his dangerous profession, rather than retire. The second dream also indicates that Bell has come to a realization, at least on some level, of the concept that Ellis spoke of in their earlier conversation. Ellis says, "Whatcha got ain't nothin new. This country's hard on people, you can't stop what's coming, it ain't all waiting on you. That's vanity.", meaning that Bell can not expect himself to succeed at the standard he has held himself to, and so it is unreasonable to do so. Bell felt compelled to continue on past a reasonable age and into unmanageable situations in order to uphold the responsibility he felt had been passed down to him. When he realizes he can't do this he feels overmatched and quits by retiring. He had tasked himself with the impossible (in an attempt to live up to his father, or previous law-men, etc.) and blamed himself for failing to succeed. Bell may not realize it consciously yet, but the dreams show that on some level after his talk with Ellis he realized that the world had always been this way and always would be (dark and cold) but that there are sources of refuge and comfort waiting for him.And then he wakes up.
