Bullock is in the woods. As we saw in the last episode, he has gone out in search of Bill Hickok's murderer, Jack McCall. Suddenly, he hears a noise behind him and turns just in time to see an arrow whiz through the air, striking his horse. Ah, turns out this isn't just some random section of the hills. It's an Indian burial ground. Way to go, Bullock. Immediately, an Indian swoops in, on the attack. He and Bullock go at it with gusto. The Indian is whooping and hollering and after knocking Bullock to the ground with a stunning blow, he even takes time to do what appears to be a victory dance. This is his downfall; Bullock grabs his leg and hauls himself up and back into the beatdown. He shoves his attacker up against a tree, getting leverage for a devastating punch, and while the guy is knocked out, takes the opportunity to pick up a rock and finish him off with, if you'll excuse the pun, serious overkill. He slams the Indian's head with a rock about fifteen times before passing out right to him.
At the Gem, Merrick is pulling a day drunk. "May I say, Dan," he says, holding his shot glass aloft, "ever since I resumed drinking alcohol, I cannot for the life of me figure out why I ever gave it up." Dan does not seem in a chatty mood, but says yes, "it takes the edge off the tough ones." Merrick is drunk enough to be impressed with this statement, and goes on to say that he has always found Dan to be full of helpful philosophies. Dan thanks him flatly, but Merrick is already on to his toast: "The Hickok murder; exoneration of the coward McCall; stain on the escutcheon of the camp." Through the doors now come Johnny with the Doc, who Merrick attempts to invite to join him at the bar. "Doc!" he says. "Libation!" The doc, however, moves swiftly past, only glancing at him, annoyed. "I wonder," Merrick mumbles, "if he thought I said 'live patient.'" Ha! Merrick, to me, is one of the big mysteries of this show. The character is really an innocent (so far) and passionate about his work as a newspaperman, but afraid enough that he is often a pawn of the bigwigs in town. I have to wonder how they're going to use him as the series continues.
Doc finds Al in one of the whore's rooms. "Couldn't get it up," he says, indicating a writhing man on the bed. "Gave her a dollar to wait." The whore in residence comments that the man just keeps getting sicker, and Al tells her to shut up. The guy on the bed is in bad shape, and tells Doc his back is torturing him.
Down at the Bella Union, Ellsworth is at the bar when Joanie sidles up, asking if he'll keep her company. "Well, I will," Ellsworth says. "But I'm expensive." A truckload of Emmy nominations for Ellsworth would not be enough. Joanie asks if this is his first time in the Bella Union, and he says yes, that his leisure time is normally spent at the Gem. He tells her also that he has one hell of a working gold claim. "Is that a damn fact?" Joanie says, delighted. Ellsworth says it is, and that if he knew her a little better, he'd "throw a 'fuckin'' in there somewhere." Joanie laughs. "If you did," she says, "I'd try to catch it." Cute. Ellsworth takes a big breath and confirms that it's a "working fuckin' gold claim then, Joanie, and thank you for allowing me my full range of expression." Joanie asks him if he's ever shot craps, and he says no, but that he's a "lethally quick study." As she leads him to Eddie's craps table, we see Joey, who Cy sent out in the last episode to get the smallpox vaccine, return to the saloon. Cy is not pleased. "I'm sick, boss," Joey says, and it's clear that is true. Cy tells him to lay up until he feels better, and tries to shoo him off, but Joey wants to explain. He pulls out the list Cy gave him. "Fella who could read says one of the items is for the smallpox," he says. Cy gets mad, saying he shouldn't have shown the list to anyone, but Joey says since he knew he wasn't going to make Nebraska, he tried to fill the list in Buffalo Gap. Joey is scared and asks Cy if he's got smallpox. "How do I know?" Cy says. "Maybe you got yourself a dose." Joey shakes his fevered head. "No," he says. "I wouldn't. I'm...a virgin. That's how come I jumped when you told about Nebraska pussy." Cy is over all this talk, and tells him again to lay up. Eddie sidles up and observes that Joey didn't make Nebraska. Cy says that Joey's come down with what felled Andy Cramed. "I wonder," Eddie says, "if Joey was after a remedy for Andy? Maybe without even knowing." Cy's eyes go squinty. "Ain't you clever, Eddie," he mutters. Eddie: "Was I being clever? I thought I was worrying about the plague." Aw, snap. Eddie sees and knows all. Cy tells him he should be concentrating on running his craps scam on Joanie's mark, Ellsworth, and Eddie wanders off. Here's the difference between the evil of Al and Cy: When Al gets mean, his minions are righteously afraid of him. Because they know his evil is a means to an end. Cy, however, is mean without purpose, and though his lackeys are afraid of him, they don't really respect him, because he's not smart.
Speaking of smart and dumb, Al is in his office now, dealing with E.B., who has still not made an offer on Mrs. G's gold claim. E.B. says he can't outflank Trixie, who is there to take care of the little girl, and who is also guarding Mrs. Garret like a mother hen. "She's dosed her with opium," Al argues. "Priming her for your approach." E.B. tries again to make an excuse, but Al has had enough. He tells him to go over there and tell Trixie that Al wants to see her, get inside, and make the offer to the widow. "Can you circumnavigate the child," Al smarts, "or must I map that for you, too?" Duly chastised, E.B. walks away, mumbling under his breath. Al is not one for passive-aggressive behavior, though. "Don't play that shit where you make me drag the words out of you," he says. "Declare, or shut the fuck up." If Al wasn't my hero before, that sealed it. I'd like to paint those words on a billboard and mount it over my house.
Doc comes in as E.B. exits and tells Al that it's bad downstairs. "Plague?" Al asks, and Doc says it's smallpox. "Would land in my joint," Al sighs, but Doc tells him the Gem wasn't the disease's first stop. The infinitesimal movement of Al's left eyebrow speaks volumes as he calculates the significance of this.E.B. is sputtering across the thoroughfare, chagrined at his continued charge of being Al's go-between on this widow job. "Al Swearengen's a cue," he rants to himself, "and Farnum merely his billiard ball." I am not sure why the writers continue to give E.B. all these little explanatory speeches -- we certainly get it by now that E.B. is just about the biggest Igor to hit the screen since Lugosi. Arriving back at the hotel, he goes to the widow's room, tells Trixie that Al wants her over at the Gem. "I'll be there when I get there, E.B.," she says as E.B. cranes his neck around, trying to see into the room. He asks how Mrs. Garret is, and Trixie says she's "hunky-dory."
The thing is, she's neither hunky nor dory. She's in a bad way, lying over the bed in her gorgeous green robe which I wish was mine, moaning and sweating. Trixie says she's got to go and, as she wipes the widow's brow, assures her that this bad part of kicking laudanum does pass. "All right," Mrs. G clenches out, and Trixie leaves.
The Bella Union crowd is still working Ellsworth over when Doc and Al stride purposefully through the door and straight to Cy. Al dispenses with pleasantries, instead asking loudly, "What do you hear on that vaccine?" Cy cringes and tries to lead them to privacy, "or shall the three of us jump up on tables and shout questions to each other across the room?" Al and Doc ain't got time for this, though. Al forcefully repeats his question and Cy admits that Joey has returned, sick and without the vaccine. "How the fuck long has that been?" Al asks, and Cy has the nerve to get offended. "You don't want to pursue that tone," he says, once again proving what a dumbass he is because, as we know, Al will pursue whatever tone he sees fit. Al doesn't even have to get mad here, though, because he so clearly knows he's in the right. "You sat on news," he says, pointing, "no one went after the meds, and I'm asking the duration." Cy thinks he's all steely when he responds that "questions in that tone and pointin' your finger at me will get you told to go fuck yourself." Big talk, Cy, but would you actually say it? I think not. Nor does Al think so, because he merely looks surprised at your nerve, rather than knifing you right through your eyeliner. Doc asks to see Joey, and they all go back, while Ellsworth continues his run at craps. "How long they been playin' this without me?" he hollers.
E.B. is back on the job over at the hotel. He goes into Mrs. G's room with a stack of fresh linens, and I am distracted for the moment wondering if we're supposed to believe now that people in this town change their sheets, ever. Mrs. G is still feeling awful and tells him to leave, immediately. "Of course," he says, and walks slowly out, knowing now that she is not at all high.
Doc is attending to the shivering Joey as Al and Cy look on. "We should chat this all out," Al says to Cy, who grudgingly agrees. "Why don't we do something together?" Al continues. "Us and several others." Cy mutters "all right," but it's painfully obvious that he doesn't care about any of this.Meanwhile, Jane has made her way back to camp. Staggering down the street, she is confronted by a miner, with whom she has a brief staring contest. She wins. "If I had that mug on me," she slurs, "I believe I'd cut down gettin' told how butt-fuckin' ugly I was by not starin' at fuckin' strangers." She's classically drunk, talking to herself, rambling on about how she has a right to come back and inquire after the little girl, whom she helped save. She's surprised to find the Doc's shack door unlocked and yells loudly that "it's Jane Canary callin' for Doc fuckin' Cochran." Receiving no answer from within, she announces to no one that she believes she'll fuckin' wait.
Al hurries back to the Gem, where Dan tells him that Trixie's waiting upstairs and E.B. is waiting in the kitchen. "Quit drinkin' a few hours," Al says to Merrick, who is still at the bar. "We're having a get-together." Turning to Johnny, Al tells him to "buy some fuckin' fruit or the like." (Heee. Y'all don't know this, but in a future season of Deadwood, Al's going to open a party-planning company and call it Fuckin' Get-Togethers. Dude's gonna make a fortune on his fruit trays.) He heads back to the kitchen to see E.B. "If that widow was high," E.B. says, "I am a monkey's uncle." Al pauses, no doubt wondering if the obvious joke is too easy, here, and we cut away.
Johnny is worrying about his cater-waiter orders from Al. "How much fruit?" he asks Dan, in a panic. "How many's a fuckin' get-together?" Dan can't say, but he suggests that now is not the right time to go asking Al.
Upstairs, Trixie is waiting alone in Al's office. It always makes me nervous to see them alone together, considering the many beatings we have already seen him give her, but instead of a boot on the neck, he comes in jokingly asking if she tossed his office while he was gone. "I know what's in this room," she says. Al gets right to business. He asks her directly if she's been giving the widow the dope like he asked her to do. Trixie says she has, and that Mrs. G goes behind the screen where she dresses to take it, to spare the little girl from seeing it. "And when she goes behind where she dresses to spare the child," Al says, "do you see billows of fuckin' dope smoke rising?" Trixie says that Mrs. G says she eats the dope. "Does she look high to you?" Al asks, and Trixie answers that she can't be sure, really, as she's never seen a rich person get high. Too bad she wasn't watching Oprah the other day when stupid James Frey was on. Everybody involved with that show was rich AND high. Anyway, Al smiles at this, and goes to the safe. Getting a new ball of dope, he tells Trixie that time, she's to go behind the screen with Mrs. G and watch her eat it. "How am I supposed to do that, Al," she asks, "without arousing her suspicion?" Al puts the brows into overdrive and tells her that the only suspicion she needs to be worried about is his, "of if you're giving it to her all." Aw, damn. Trixie plays the innocent. "Why wouldn't I?" she asks, all big-eyed. Al crosses his arms. "I'd rather try touching the moon," he says, "than take on a whore's thinking." He reminds her that if the widow is not high the time E.B. comes to call, Trixie will be held responsible.Downstairs, Trixie passes E.B. with a withering look. When she's gone, Al joins E.B. at the bar and updates him on his chat with Trixie. The whore who had the smallpox john that morning goes running by in the background. "Damsel in distress," E.B. says. He asks Al if he'll want him back for the get-together. "How the fuck could we do it without you, E.B.?" Al says. E.B. smirks. "The truth isn't in you, Al," he says. Al takes a shot and responds that "that makes two of us."
Back at the hotel, the little squarehead is singing "Row, Row, Row Your Boat" to the shaking Mrs. G when Trixie comes back. It's cute as hell, especially when she sings the first line "gently down the steam." Trixie tells Mrs. G that she needs her to do something for her. "When Farnum is here," she says, "so we can buy you time to get well, you have to fake being high." Mrs. G looks on wide-eyed and sweaty, and comprehends. "You can do it, Alma," Trixie says, gently. "Look at all the practice you had."
Al enters the whore's ready room to find the sobbing woman who ran past him a moment ago. She is huddled up on a bench, her arms around her knees. "You'd better have a paying dwarf underneath you," Al says in what is possibly the best throwaway line of the episode. The woman can't stop crying, and Al tells her to shut up and tell him what she did with the guy. He's less mean than his normal self. "I know you didn't fuck him," he says. "Did you suck his prick?" The woman says the john didn't want to show it to her until he had a hard-on. "That's what you call a mistake of youth," Al says. He asks if she kissed the guy, French-like or normal. "Normal," she says, a tad too offended considering what she gets up to all day. Al says that considering all these answers, any hooplehead who drank from the same water glass as the sick guy would have the same cause to sit around weeping, "except I can't kick his ass and send him out to work." Funny, Al, but there's subtext here you don't yet know. "My mom died of it when we was coming out," the whore says. "And that's when Daddy gave us up." The merest, briefest flicker of...something...passes across Al's face. "Well," he says, "that sad story makes me believe maybe you was exposed and ain't a candidate for it no more." He lingers a moment while she cries and, walking swiftly out, tells her quietly to "stick to hand-jobs a day or two, if you like." Oh, Al, you are the soul of sympathy.
Trixie comes down to the front desk of the hotel, saying they need new linens in Mrs. G's room. E.B. says he just provided new sheets. "And now they got sick on 'em," Trixie smarts back. E.B. sends her out, telling her to take them to Wu for cleaning. She heads out, running into Sol in the thoroughfare. He's all sweet to her, asking how she is, and trying to help with the sheets. He reminds her to tell Mrs. G that he has been calling for her, according to Bullock's wishes.Doc returns to his shack, and has already taken off his coat and put down his bag when he realizes Jane is sitting in the corner at a table. "Jesus CHRIST," he says, trying not to jump. Jane finds this hilarious. "I take it," Doc says, "you've been out on a...hoot." Doc talks just like my grandmother sometimes. thing I know, he's going to say something about being so mad he's going to snatch someone baldheaded or jerk a knot in their tail. I did not grow up in the country, but half of my family did, and sometimes when I watch this show it feels uh, like Thanksgiving dinner, if you know what I mean. Jane says yes, she's been drunk a while, and what about it. "Question was well meant," Doc smarts. "Like, if you was a farmer, I'd ask you how the farmin' was going." Good one, Doc. Jane huffs that she did, you know, lose her best friend and all, so she comes by this drunkenness honestly, and Doc says he does know that. He's sorry about it, that's clear. Jane asks about the little girl, and Doc tells her she's fine and that the widow is taking care of her. "A whore from the Gem's with her, too," he adds, and Jane has the balls to get mad about it. "The widow has health problems of her own," Doc explains, "and Trixie's taking care of her." Jane ramps up the 'tude: "Oh, Trixie being the whore?" Doc cuts through the bullshit. "Well," he says, "you have high standards pertainin' to other people." Exactly, Doc. Jane says she's not judging anyone, she's just seeking information, but Doc can't take any more. "Well, are you adequately informed?" he asks, opening the door for her leave. "Because I am in the midst of a situation." Jane shrugs: "Oh, smallpox?" Doc is shocked to hear that she knows about it. She tells him about running across Andy in the woods. "Unless he caught it from a trout," she says, "I figured some in the camp had it, too." Doc wonders what the guy was doing in the woods. "Someone threw him there," Jane says. "Anyway, he's better now." Doc asks her how she feels, herself, and Jane gets uppity. "This is my point," he says. "You been caring for a sick man who doesn't seem to have gotten you sick." Jane calls him a wise fucking owl, but he goes on, asking if, seeing as she has a gift for it, she'll stay in camp and help him in the sick tents. "My best friend died," she says as an answer, and Doc yells that Bill ain't coming back. "Now," he says, "will you help me? You can do your drinkin' off work, like I do."
At the hotel, the little girl is sleeping in a chair when E.B. comes into Mrs. G's room once again with new linens. In her bed, the widow responds to his voice by sitting up and putting on her show. She's all whispery, saying she's better and kind of leering at him, all sexy, though it must make her even sicker to do so. E.B. buys it, and leaves, and the little girl smiles to see that the charade has been pulled off -- though I am not sure how she's supposed to know what's going on, since she allegedly speaks very little English.
Back at the Bella Union, Ellsworth's luck has turned, no doubt because Eddie has switched him off the loaded dice. How to Hook a Gambler 101: Let him win a little, then watch him lose a lot, thinking he can win again. Joanie is the key to all this, and she's starting to feel guilty about it. She asks him if he wants to stop for a while, and Cy overhears and comes running. He'd hate to lose Ellsworth, the perfect mark, who seems willing to keep losing all day. He suggests that maybe Joanie is the one who should take a break. "Maybe you should stop for a while, honey," he says. "You need to piss?" Joanie rolls her eyes and leaves -- and I have to note that she is wearing an absolutely gorgeous dress in this scene -- and Cy rolls a few bones himself (with the secret, winning dice) to draw the hooples back in. It works, of course. Joanie watches from above, disgusted, until she notices one of her girls crying behind a post. She's sad about Joey, whom she has seen with spots coming up all over his body. "Joey was cherry," she says. "He didn't want us to do it 'til he knew how." Aw. No time for crying over your dying virgin boyfriend, girlie. Joanie says she knows, but that the girl would do better "if the tricks didn't think lookin' at 'em made you cry." Back in the woods, Charlie comes upon a dead horse laid out on the ground with an arrow in his side. He dismounts, pulling out his rifle, and surveys the scene, where he finds the dead Indian, the Indian's painted horse, and the unconscious Bullock.
In camp, the Rev is resting in his tent when Johnny comes in to invite him to the get-together at the Gem. The Rev is so sweet and polite, it almost breaks my heart. He asks what the meeting will be about, and Johnny says he isn't sure. "He's havin' me get fruit," he says. "I know that much."
Charlie leans over Bullock, talking to him while he wipes blood off his face. He explains all the markings on the Indian's horse. The three red hands stand for men killed in face-to-face fighting. The red circle means one killed on horseback. "The white lines on the pony's legs," he goes on, "was times that he's counted coup." Charlie explains the counting coup system, saying that it doesn't matter whether or not the Indian intended to kill him, it was just important for him to get close enough to Bullock to touch him. "That's why he come for you instead of picking you off with an arrow," he says, "like he did your horse." Bullock comes around during this history lesson, and I guess that Indian hit him pretty hard, because he's not even clenching. "Charlie," he says, sadly, and as messed up as he is, he gives it to him straight. "Bill's dead, Charlie." So sad. The brilliant Dayton Callie takes it in and his voice goes even scratchier than usual. "I heard it spoke of two days ago," he says. "But as often as he wasn't [dead] before, I hoped he wasn't this time, too." Bullock sits up, saying he rode out after the bastard that killed Bill. Charlie asks Bullock if he can ride, and hearing the affirmative, says they should go get the cocksucker who killed their friend. Bullock wants to dig a grave for the Indian, though, of course, because he's Mr. Perfect and he has to do everything he's supposed to do, all the time, no matter the stakes, no matter how annoying his self-righteous clenching. Charlie says they won't be doing the warrior any favors, since his way to Heaven is above ground, looking West. "Let's do that, then," Bullock says to Charlie's extreme annoyance. "Don't you want to carry him over the ridge and put him with his headless fuckin' buddy?" he yells, full of sarcasm. "I mean, that's what you nearly got killed for, interfering with his big fuckin' medicine." See how it all comes together, people? Someone chopped off this Indian's buddy's head for Al's bounty, and Bullock wanders through and nearly gets killed for it. Charlie's creating problems for himself, really, because now that Bullock knows there's a burial place over the ridge, of course he's going to want to go to it.
At the Gem, Johnny is dishing out canned fruit into bowls on the bar. E.B. sidles up to Al, reporting that Trixie did her duty doping the widow. "Did you happen to offer on her gold claim?" Al asks, but E.B. says the timing wasn't right. "The dope had made the widow randy," he says. "Lustful looks, heavy breathing, outthrust chest. The full catalogue." Love it. Al gives him an eyebrow and says he hopes E.B. comported himself as a fuckin' gentleman. E.B. looks offended: "There was a child in the room!"Al calls the meeting to order. "Peaches and pears on the fuckin' bar," he says. "Spoon it out amongst yourselves." Sadly, after all of Johnny's hard work, nobody rushes for the fruit. Al gets down to business. "Plague's in the fuckin' camp," he says. Doc clarifies. "Smallpox," he says. "Plague is spread by rats." Al sighs. "I was raised calling it 'plague,'" he says, "but Doc wants that in reserve in case our luck holds and the rats decide to descend on us, too." E.B. laughs too loudly at this little joke, while Al goes on. "Whatever you fuckin' call it," he says, "the point is for no one to raise their fuckin' dresses over their heads." Al says the thing to do is wait it out. He says he's outlasted several outbreaks, and though they are not pretty, they do pass. Ever the humanitarian, Al says they need a place to treat the sick and keep them out of sight so that the rest of the men in town don't freak out and run. Sol offers the lumber he and Bullock have left from their building. Al says no, that a tent would leave a better impression, showing people it's only a temporary phase. They go on to discuss the vaccine and how to get it. Al suggests sending teams of five riders to Fort Kearney, Bismarck, and Cheyenne, the three places they figure would have it. He thinks they should offer sixty bucks a rider, ten in advance, and fifty on the return. E.B. does some impressive math, figuring it all up to be $900 if all the riders survive. Adding in the price of the vaccine and payment for the Doc, Al figures they need to come up with $1,500, and immediately lays down $500 to start. Cy also puts in five hundred. Nuttall throws in two hundred, and when E.B. tries to follow suit, he gets admonished by Al -- "are you fuckin' kidding me?" -- and lays down fifty more. Sol puts in fifty, and Al excuses Merrick from contributing, which is sweet. Merrick says he'll work on a statement for The Pioneer, and asks for an interview with the Doc. "Give some sort of positive fuckin' angle to it," Al says, mulling it all over. "Like say 'vaccine's on it's way' or about how it's the mild fuckin' type." From the sidelines, the Rev pipes up, saying it would be useful to avoid apocalyptic predictions. Al agrees. "Yeah," he says, "nip that Sodom and Gomorrah shit in the bud," he says.
Doc wonders where they'll set up the tent, and Cy says he has a lot in the Chinese section they can use. Al is impressed. "Gonna build a joint in the future and cater to the Celestials, ain't you, Cy?" he says. "You clever cocksucker." They talk now about recruiting the riders, and as the group breaks up, the Rev can no longer hold himself together. He has a severe seizure, right there in front of them all, and falls to the floor, flailing. Doc rushes over and asks for something to put in his mouth. Johnny offers his trusty fruit spoon, but Al puts on the kibosh. "Not a fucking metal spoon, Johnny," he yells, rushing to the Rev. "You'll break every tooth in his mouth." Dan comes through with a piece of...something...it actually looks like a wallet or a holster, or something, and Doc wedges it in, getting bit in the process. "You ever see him do that?" Al quietly asks Sol, who shakes his head. Rev. Smith finally comes out of it to see the whole get-together gotten together over him."Used to have a fucking brother given to that," Al says, in a tone like he's trying to save Rev. Smith from embarrassment. "We'd make pennies off it when it'd come over him in the street. Hey, Reverend. You could have just said 'amen.'" What is WITH Al today, being all nice to everybody? I mean, he has stood on no necks; he's giving out fruit, letting that one whore stick only to hand jobs; he's trying to buck up the Rev and is not even calling him names? Honestly, he's practically Gandhi.
Cy returns to the Bella Union with his top hat (I just typed "top hate," which is frankly much more accurate) smugly perched on his smug head. Eddie jokes that he's quite the civic figure. "Oh, that's me," Cy smarms. "That's what I live for." He asks if Eddie thinks they got Ellsworth appropriately hooked on the craps, and Eddie says he'll be back. Cy complains about Joanie, who nearly ruined the Ellsworth mark with her pesky conscience. He tries to compliment Eddie about how smooth his scam game still runs, but Eddie is in no mood. "Yeah, Cy," he smarts back, "you give a good hand job, yourself." Cy doesn't like being teased, apparently. He gives Eddie some orders to go and talk to Joanie. "If I talk to her right now," Cy says, "I'll break her fucking jaw. And if we keep talking, I'll break yours, too." Oh, shut up, Cy.
Doc is giving the Rev a little exam, and I have to comment here about the beauty of these two actors working one-on-one together. Brad Dourif is like...I don't know. He's a genius. And he promotes genius in others when he's on screen. This is a very small moment, but it's so sweet. The Rev. says he figures his convulsion was possibly brought on by fatigue. "Oh, I see," Doc says with a twinkle. "And I expect you'll soon be hanging up your shingle in competition with me?" The Rev says no, sir, and they both do a good job showing their nice friendship in this horrible town. Doc asks how he felt right before the seizure, and Smith says he noticed a burning smell in the air. He tells him he's had one other spell, after the service for Bill. Al busts in, now, saying Merrick needs to consult Doc about the smallpox article, and actually, literally, seriously WINKS at the Rev as he tells Doc to "prescribe this malingerer a can of peaches and show him the fuckin' door." The Rev asks if he'll be allowed to help Doc attend to the sick, and Doc gives him the go-ahead.
Cy interrupts Joanie's rest in her room, asking what the hell is wrong with her and complaining that she's not doing a very good job "creating atmosphere" in the saloon. She gets all mopey, saying this fresh start in Deadwood isn't very fresh after all. Girlie, even the peaches aren't fresh in Deadwood. Cy doesn't like it that she's unsatisfied, and says he'd do anything to make her happy. Of course, he says it in megasmarm, stroking her face like Dr. Creepy, saying he only wants to touch her in a nice way: "Don't make me do it different." In front of the Pioneer offices, Merrick is setting the type for his smallpox story, guided by possibly the most unqualified editorial committee of all time: Al, Cy, and E.B. He goes over what he already has, reading the part about riders being sent out to secure the vaccine. "Maybe you should add there," Al says, "that they're already probably on their way back." Merrick is not thrilled with this suggestion, but puts it in. "Thanks also to the aforementioned merchants," he says, meaning these three gathered here, "the vaccine will be distributed gratis." Al thinks. "Free gratis," he says. Merrick can't let that go, and says that "free gratis" is redundant. "Then leave gratis out," Al says, solving the issue. Merrick sighs. "What luck for me, Al," he says, "that you have such a keen editorial sense."
Cy pulls Al aside now, and thanks him for not "putting the stink" on him with the rest of the get-together -- he's relieved Al didn't tell anyone about Cy bungling the first mission to get the vaccine. Al, so magnanimous, doesn't even blink. Jane strides up at this moment, heading into the hotel and saying she's going to call on Mrs. Garret and the little girl. Disgusted, E.B. tells her to be brief. "Be fucked," Jane answers with a head snap, and damn if I don't rewind it ten times to see it over and over, it's that brilliant. In the creative quagmire into which the writing on this show can occasionally sink, that's a two-word moment that is worthy of much praise. "Her gutter mouth and the widow in an opium stupor," E.B. says to no one. "A conversation for the ages."
Upstairs, Jane knocks on the door to find the little girl all pretty and cleaned up since she last saw her. "Hello, Jane," the squarehead cutie says, and Jane is overcome. So much so that she's even polite to Trixie, whom she so recently badmouthed to Doc. She tells Mrs. G that she looks like shit, and fights back tears when the widow expresses her condolences about Bill. "You ought to get your husband out of that creek," Jane continues, talking of where Brom's body is continuing to cool, and Mrs. G says she will when she's feeling better. Jane says that she's glad to see the little girl, and Trixie tells her to come see her any time. "I'm a fuckin' drunk," Jane says. She goes on to say that she might be helping out with the smallpox soon, but she's going to always remember the little girl's pretty face, "and put a penny aside every time I curse."
Al is having a hard time letting go of his editorial duties. After all the type is set, and Merrick runs a copy, he worries that the headline should have a question mark. "The Plague in Deadwood?" he reads aloud, for dramatic effect. Merrick tells him he can't change it, now, and Al shrugs with that "well, I guess if you want it to suck" shrug, like he's in charge of the features desk at Vogue magazine, and someone has just suggested putting Gwyneth on the cover in a pashmina instead of a cashmere wrap.
Dan and Johnny deliver the Gem's john down to the sick tent. They're both holding their breath, trying not to get the smallpox germs. The Rev begins his ministering immediately, sweetly calming the sick man and trying to relax him. Fat chance, since Jane comes barreling up right this second, accompanying the Bella Union folks who have brought Joey on a stretcher. "Are you sure you're up to this?" Doc asks Rev. Smith. The preacher smiles. "Oh, yes," he answers. "I'm right where I'm supposed to be." Doc looks sad about this. Damn, surely nobody is supposed to be in Deadwood. He goes out to see Jane directing another stretcher into the tent area. "Well," he asks her, "you already been exposed. You want to follow him in?" Jane says she might, and finally does after Doc gives her a low bow.Back out in the woods, Bullock and Charlie are dealing with bodies, too. They shove the dead Indian up on his funeral pyre to his headless comrade. Charlie looks frustrated the whole time, but when the Indian's leg slips off the thing, he turns back to push it back up.
At the Gem, Al reads the paper aloud. "'The Pioneer is assured of their imminent return,'" he says. Dan smarts off that he'll believe it when he sees it, and Al is mildly offended. "'Imminent return' is one of my contributions to the fucking article!" he says. Aw. Al's so proud of his foray into journalism. He ought to check into other kinds of writing jobs available around town. Shoot, Al would be a great recapper for TWoP. Oh, how I would love to read what he'd have to say about the Gilmore Girls. He'd have that shit down to one page, and it would be like: "What the fuck is wrong with Rory? She needs to shut the fuck up, coming in here with her books and donuts and the like. And if that bitch Emily were to say shit like that to me, it'd be a shank to the ribs and a boot to the neck before the hooples could fart twice." Reading more of the article, he is suddenly reminded of Cy's lot being used for the sick tent. "What about that fucking Tolliver," he says, amazed, "buying up property on the QT." Al says it shows that Cy has good ideas and a long-term vision for the future. He returns to the article, showing Dan where Merrick wanted to use the word "gratis." "Now, is the idea to inform your reader," he says, "or make him feel like a fucking dunce?" The balls of David Milch for suggesting that less is more when it comes to the English language...my God, the man's balls.
Dan shakes his head and channels Sars. "Don't see why the fuck he don't have news of the baseball," he says. "That new league started a team in Chicago." This causes Al to go all reflective for a moment. "Different path taken at certain forks in the road, who knows what kind of a joint we'd be in now, huh?" he asks, before shrugging it off. "'Course, truth is, as a base of operations, you cannot beat a fuckin' saloon. And, giving a rustle to the paper, he goes again to study his article.