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Wow. Mrs. Ellsworth, feeling much better and full of herself, finds out what life is like among the big boys. Tired of being relegated to the womanly sidelines, she goes to Hearst to offer him a buy-in on her claim but pretty much offers him her neck for boot-stepping. He humiliates and threatens her -- something Ellsworth warned her would happen -- and she is now more vulnerable to his evil than ever before. We'd no doubt feel for her, but she's mean to Ellsworth, which puts her on the hate list.
Al, recovered from his Hearst-induced wound, is genuinely happy (in his way) to see his old friend Langrishe arrive with his traveling entertainment show. Who else is in camp? Wu, that's who! Newly Americanized in an ugly suit, he comes back bearing news about the men he's hired to work in Hearst's mines. Along for the stagecoach ride from San Fran is Hearst's cook, Aunt Lou, who takes over Richardson's culinary duties, most likely to the great delight of everyone's internal organs.
Also: Hearst brings Cy off the DL. Doc might have the TB. Want more? The full recap starts right below!
Al is in his office, looking slightly itchy about the injury we saw him receive in the last episode. I'm still mad about that, by the way, and frankly, I am still unsure to what degree Al was wounded. Did Hearst chop OFF a finger, or just bang it, or partially remove it, or what? That is not yet clear. What is clear is that Al is uncomfortable, but not necessarily in pain over it. Not at a gleets level, I mean.
Trixie comes in looking downright fresh-faced but for the cig in her hand. Apparently she hasn't seen Al in a while. "When did you turn recluse?" she asks with a laugh in her voice. He asks if she and Sol have settled in. "The Jew," she says, astonished, "is a born fuckin' householder. Scouts furniture in the fuckin' catalogues mornin' and night." She rants on about Mrs. Ellsworth and how she's up and about after her abortion, seemingly unscathed by the whole event. One eye on Al like she's waiting for an explosion, she goes on to announce that Alma has a meeting coming up with Hearst. Trixie figured Ellsworth would have been able to talk her out of such a thing, but he hasn't, and she offers to Al to attempt to dissuade Alma herself. "Don't you get in the fuckin' middle," Al says, pretty blasé about it all. Trixie is shocked. "She might as well set herself afire," she says. A pause ensues while she stares at the Al. He just goes on looking out the window like he's depressed. "I can't imagine that cocksucker got to you, or you're foldin' your fuckin' tent!" she says, talking about Hearst. "The last shot ain't yet fired!" That's right, Al! Come on! It's time to get crazy, right? This defeatist shit is going to bring me down.
To Al's clear relief, he's spared any further discussion by the arrival of the stage. They go out on the balcony to see the coach roll in. Riding on top is Wu, newly Americanized, making his triumphant return. He's wearing an awful suit and hat -- hey, when Wu chopped off his hair and practically burst into Lee Greenwood's greatest hits last season, he was not messing around. "Oh my God, look at Wu," Trixie says. "He lost his mind in San Francisco." Al glances to Wu's side where rides a very large black woman carrying a parasol. "You think he married the n*gger?" he asks. I pause to appreciate the unspoken "Left My Heart in San Francisco" jokes floating in my head. "I'm talking about his suit," Trixie says.
The coach also contains Blasanov, who is greeted warmly by Merrick. Al is distracted from this scene by the arrival of another wagon. Evidently, he recognizes it, and perhaps not with fondness. "Oh, God," he says, as the thing rolls toward him. The sign on the side says Langrishe's Theater Troupe, and before it even stops moving, the man inside points up at Al on his balcony and declares in that way only old friends can declare: "I am barely speaking to you." You know when you are trying to be in a bad mood and some buddy of yours who really knows you comes along and won't let you wallow? Such is the pain Al is now experiencing. Trixie asks who the fuck the new guy is, but Al screws up his mouth and doesn't answer. Langrishe, meanwhile, continues his scolding from the thoroughfare. "A shabby, shabby exit from Virginia City," he says. "No 'farewell, Jack;' no 'by your leave,!' Nothin'!" Al: "Did you notice I was being pursued?" Hee. This means little to Langrishe, who ignores Al's and remarks that he will only communicate with him from now on with the most minimal civilities. Al looks, dare I say it, mildly chagrined, but you'd think he might mention that what passes for minimal civilities in Deadwood is stopping short of stabbing your breakfast companion in the gut.
Langrishe goes off to check into the hotel and is passed by Hearst, rushing out to warmly greet the black woman. "Hearst's meals are about to improve," Trixie says, figuring correctly that she is Hearst's cook. The appearance of Hearst wakes Al up a little. He orders Trixie to go away and keep her eyes and ears open in regard to the whole Alma/Hearst thing going on and report back to him. Trixie smiles. "That's more fuckin' like it," she says.
Speaking of Mrs. Ellsworth, she is down at Doc's right now and has apparently received a follow-up exam. She is smugly chipper, and though Doc is glad she is well-recovered, he advises against rushing back into full activity. Clearing his throat, he asks if she has finished the course of laudanum he prescribed her. She very haughtily says that she disposed of it, knowing her weakness for it. "You seem incapable of crediting me as a full and normal person," she complains, like a teenager feeling her oats. Doc patiently insists that in fact he credits her as exactly that -- a normal person with limits, just like the rest of us. He adds that refusal to make good judgments is sometimes a symptom in women who have endured the rigors of her recent ordeal. Hormones are a bitch, in other words. "You say this as my physician?" she sniffs. "Not my reprover or rebuker?" Doc says that, of course, he does not rebuke her. "Then thank you, doctor," she trills, on her way out the door, "and good morning."
Speaking of rebuke, Hearst is receiving some as we speak from Aunt Lou, his cook and maid. She won't make him any cobbler, she says, until he hands over his boots for polishing. She helps him take them off, and I am unhappily reminded of Hattie McDaniel chastising Vivien Leigh about her corset. Now, I have hated Hearst since he got to Deadwood, but this scene makes me hate him all the more. Gerald McRaney plays this so perfectly -- he goes on a bit about how much he misses the good ol' days back in Missouri where the air was clean, even the birds sang better, and yadda yadda, good times. Lou half-listens, obviously having heard this before. Yes, I am sure she longs for the days back in Missouri, where she was most likely enslaved to this blowhard. He tells her that he's arranged for her to live right in the building. "I wouldn't even think about any other arrangements," he says, all magnanimous. "Mighty generous, Mr. Hearst," Lou says, Mammy-style. "Mighty brave." I have a feeling Aunt Lou is sick of having to remind Hearst how grateful she is to him. He asks her if she'd like to see the camp, but she opts instead to see her kitchen. "Is this here a rich place, Mr. Hearst?" she asks. "Oh, very, very rich, Aunt Lou," he answers. "For pure scale, may be the richest find I've seen." Lou, proving herself to be a savvy businesswoman: "Guess we can live without them birds, then." She goes out, carrying his dirty dishes, and he falls back on his bed, happy and relaxed.
In his office, Al welcomes Wu back from his trip. "The highpoints of the highpoints," he says, indicating to Wu that he needn't hear every detail of his journey. But, you know, when Wu has a story to...draw...he can't be distracted. He scratches out some figures of big buildings and then a stick figure of himself and a bunch of other little stick figures on the side. "Wu. San Francisco. Hearst," he says, with significance. "Yeah," Al says, like this is the dumbest game of Clue he's every played. "You. In San Francisco. Collectin' workers for Hearst." And Johnny did it in the library with the revolver! Al wants to know how soon the workers are coming. Wu, despite his new haircut and suit, is still not down with the lingo. Al gets up for a physical demonstration. He goes to the door and whips it open, welcoming in a line of invisible Chinese workers. Wu is still not getting it. "How soon?" Al says again, waving his pocket watch. Ah! "Ten day," Wu says. "Ten day, Wu?" Al smiles. ("Ten Daewoo!" I shout.) "Clever cocksucker, you've come back with more fuckin' English." They go through their old Al/Wu charades, in which Al tries to get across that as soon as he gets his act together, he'll call Wu in for a meeting with Hearst "so we can gauge his attitude toward me." Wu nods. "Wu...Hearst..." he says. Then, with reverence: "Swedgin." Al: "And Swedgin must act as translator as he is the only one in camp versed in both languages." Heh. Has Al been Berlitzing the Chinese in Wu's absence? To demonstrate his fluency, he goes to his desk and pulls out Wu's dish. "Things are not going so well over at the Ellsworths'. Sophia plays downstairs while her new mom and dad have it out upstairs. We hear Ellsworth declare that this meeting with Hearst is nothing more than goddamn arrogance. Mrs. E snipes at him to not use profanity when speaking to her. He apologizes, clearly loathe to do so, but asks her to consider his point. She says it hardly seems arrogant to her to go to Mr. Hearst for a meeting about selling her claim. "Then spare him that paper with your pretty ideas," he says, referencing the notes she's made for the meeting. "Tell him your price for how much you'll sell, because Hearst don't let his partners set his policy." Alma takes a tone. "I hadn't realized," she says, dripping with condescension, "you were so intimate with his business methods." Ugh. And wait a second -- didn't you just say last week how you'd spare Ellsworth all this Hearst bullshit, considering his history with the man? Now, don't get me wrong -- I feel for Alma. I really do. Being bossed around by a man, even if it's a man who has your own interests at heart, is about the last thing most women can tolerate, even in this day and age when the bossing ainât nearly as bad. We already know how Alma feels about this, and now, here she is again, trapped in a marriage she doesn't want for reasons which are now moot. It must be maddening. This time, lucky for her, she's married to the wonderful Ellsworth, but still, she chafes at being put in her "place," and I don't blame her. On the other hand...chill, beyotch. You're very smart, yeah, but how many gold claims have you assayed, worked, or sold? What's that? Zero? I thought so. You may have had tea with Al, but you're bush league when it comes to these dudes. Bitingly, she tells Ellsworth, pointedly not asking him, that she will meet with Hearst and that she'll be "delighted" if he would come along. "Oh," he snarks in frustration, "I ain't one to miss a train wreck." With a slight sneer, knowing that she ultimately holds all the cards, she reminds him again to watch his patronizing tone and leaves the room with the last word. "All right, Mrs. Ellsworth," he mutters to himself. "All right."
Merrick is at the bar bloviating unnecessarily about how he'd love to hear the details of Al's past relationship with Langrishe. Al's full of anxious, scrubbing energy, and not in the mood to deal with Merrick's carrying on. He says he doesn't want to talk to or about Langrishe. "He makes me fuckin' nervous," he says. Merrick asks why. "I can't say on what account," Al says, frustrated. "That type -- the type you don't know exactly how you feel about him -- is who you're made nervous by." At this, Langrishe enters. "Young man," he shouts to Al, who continues to scrub. "Keeping the wolf away, I see." Merrick smiles eagerly, waiting to be introduced. "Jack," Al says, by way of greeting, and Langrishe takes it on himself to make the niceties. "John Langrishe, sir," he says, shaking Merrick's hand and nodding towards Al. "The operator has the manners of a pig." Merrick laughs his little laugh and introduces himself as local editor, winning much praise (and possibly the hint of a come-on? I can't tell, and neither can Merrick) from Langrishe. Al: "Shit blizzard's early today." Langrishe comments that Merrick and Al seem to know each other, and Merrick says they're well acquainted. "Ah, new friends," Langrishe says, appreciatively. He indicates himself and Al, now, calling them "old campaigners." Al remarks that they have shared the infrequent, bloody win. "Always superfluous, bloodshed," Jack says, taking a shot. "The deeper damage is best."
At the hotel, E.B. is in a crisis of emotion. He thinks his and Richardson's firings are eminent. "Candidly, Richardson," he starts, worried, "as I imagine you foraging for berries and grubs, and flicking at insects with your sticky tongue... I feel a certain dismay." GOD, E.B. got the best lines this week. Richardson represents us all when he deadpans: "What are you talking about?" E.B. explains that they're probably both going to be discharged. Richardson asks what they did wrong. "Your error, surprisingly enough, is not to be a grotesque of inconceivable stupidity," E.B. says, "but that you are white and male and not repulsively obese." Ah, an anachronistic anti-Affirmative Action argument, Al Lowe alliterated. (How'd you like that?) "As for my own," he continues, "I wonder if it lies in an excessive courtesy and eagerness to please." Oh, E.B. Ya think? He immediately gets a chance to put the theory of his downfall into practice when Hearst descends from above. Hearst asks for a moment to talk, and E.B. decides that, instead of sycophantically hopping around him, he'll cut straight to the chase. "Come, Hearst. I've seen the Ethiop," he says. "Who indeed could miss her? And even as she supplants Richardson, what person, I wonder, of what depraved exotic origin have you engaged to take my place?" Hearst is, of course, repelled and confused. He says that he has no intention of replacing E.B. and that Richardson can stay on, doing whatever it is he does besides cooking, with no reduction in wages. At once, E.B. resumes his fawning. Actually, throughout this conversation, he has been doing this weird scraping and bowing thing, which...whatever William Sanderson was going for here, it didn't come across. Hearst feels him out on whether or not he knows what's up with Mrs. Ellsworth's appointment with him that afternoon. E.B. is caught at a loss and offers to find out, but Hearst, disgusted, just tells him to send her the fuck up when she arrives. Richardson, without, has heard all and peeks his head back in to exchange a double-thumbs-up with E.B., causing me to nearly faint with laughter.
Back at the Gem, Langrishe is doing a bored soft-shoe number in silence as he and Al wait for Merrick to leave. "Why don't you see to your type?" Al asks Merrick, who doesn't get it. "Type. Don't you use type to print out your words?" Merrick says he was hoping to get an interview first with Langrishe, who jumps in to, much more politely than Al, brush him off. "Where is your lair," he asks dramatically, "that I may beard you?" (Y'all, "beard the lion in his lair" is a phrase that I am familiar with, but I am not clear on the origins and can't find a decent link for it; my apologies. Derivatives are often found in poetry and song, and I really want to find the origin, so I welcome your inevitable e-mails.). Merrick laughs, a little uncomfortable by all these theatrics, chuckles and says that his lair adjoins the Gem and he can be bearded there most hours. Al watches this exchange with what passes for amusement with him, and they are both relieved when Merrick finally leaves. "You're looking fucking well, Jack," Al tells his old campaigner, who shakes his head. "It's the learning fucking nothing, Al," he explains, "that keeps me young." Right on. In that case, Paris Hilton will never age, and planet Earth will have to endure her on the covers of magazines until we are all well in our graves.
Hearst welcomes the Ellsworths into his rooms at the hotel. Mrs. E...she looks a little too happy to be there. Clearly, she has no idea what she's up against, as her anxious husband has tried to explain. Alma and Hearst exchange pleasantries -- Hearst attempts to put everyone at ease by saying he feels just like he did when he was twelve, now that his Aunt Lou has come to camp from where he left her at other diggings. "Your aunt prospects, too?" Alma asks, all innocence. "My aunt's my n*gger cook," he answers flatly, as Alma smiles and titters. Blahdie blah she's a wonderful cook "and a tyrant, as the best ones always are." Oh, my God. I beg someone to stab this man. I put a bounty on his head. We'll keep it in a box! Hearst continues his jocular stupidness about Aunt Lou, saying he quite quakes before her, just as he quakes now in anticipation of this meeting with Alma. Ugh. Ellsworth, who has been fidgeting throughout this exchange, finally calls bullshit. "Don't disappoint him," he snarks to Alma, "being as he's twelve with his Aunt in camp." Hearst turns his evil eye on Ellsworth, saying he's learned that they shared time in the Comstock and that he's sorry they've never met. Ellsworth goes on talking like Hearst's not there, saying the man will say anything to serve his own purpose, no matter how soaked in blood the subject is. Alma chides him. "That talk serves no purpose," she says. "What talk to a murderer does?" Ellsworth retorts and it's ON. Hearst says he won't be insulted in his own rooms and Ellsworth, drawing on his two seasons' worth of experience of watching Bullock and his patented clench, lays it out. "Then where," he growls, "shall we go for me to do it?" Alma, embarrassed, asks calmly if Hearst will be in that afternoon, but Ellsworth rants on, clutching his arms and saying he can see bodies in the room, all around him. Alma stands to leave, trying to pretend none of this is happening, and Hearst says he looks forward to seeing her later. "You don't look forward to nothing far as her, you murdering cocksucker," Ellsworth breaks in. "You hear me?"
Alma pushes him out the door, in a snit, and like I said, I feel her on all this, but it pisses me off, because you know if this was Bullock brandishing his manhood in her defense, she'd be hot for it. Not now, though. In the thoroughfare, she says she should have realized before the depth of Ellsworth's hatred for Hearst. "I know him," he says, still upset. She says she still plans to present her offer to him, but he clenches that he forbids her to do it. "You behave in his rooms as virtually a maniac," she says, shocked "and now assert your superior prerogative?" He reiterates, though you can tell he hates to do it, that yes, he forbids her. Let me explain to you what would happen if my husband tried to roll up and forbid me to do anything, any time, ever: nutstomping. So, again, I do identify with her emotions, however ill-conceived I find her mission. She turns away to collect herself and sigh a deep sigh of female resentment. "Well," she says, turning back, full of tired sarcasm, "I suppose that settles it." Ellsworth feels bad and asks if she can possibly understand where he's coming from. She smirks. "Mr. Ellsworth," she snarks in a full-on Emmy-worthy moment, "you hardly need explain yourself to me. Your wife. In the thoroughfare. Having once laid down the law." Ooohhh, snap. How the bonds of holy matrimony do sometimes chafe.
At the mailhouse/jailhouse, Charlie takes statements from two of Hearst's foremen as Bullock listens to some sobbing Cornish workers in the cell. It seems one of their friends was killed at the mining operation today, and they think it was because he was organizing the men. Go, you crazy Cornishmen! Norma Rae! Union Now! Bullock listens to all this in growing concern. As the two foremen leave, one tries to lean in to the workers and offer their condolences. "Get the fuck away from him," Bullock barks. Charlie pushes the men out as the Cornish guys continue grieving loudly. Bullock clenches. He steps out and tells Charlie to let the men stay until they can get themselves together. "Make them understand," he cautions, knowing what he's up against and not wanting to get anyone's hopes up that he can battle Hearst on this issue, "that I was only talkin' to them."
Al is giving Langrishe a tour of the camp, leading him out the back door of the Gem, I guess, so as to avoid having Hearst see them. "Prudent," Jack agrees. They arrive at Wu's where Jack admires the HUGE pigs in the sty and their future potential to be bacon. "Might have a bit of a human aftertaste," Al warns, and Jack nods in understanding. Jack makes a wide gesture of the area, calling the camp lurid with Chinese. Al cautions against figuring this part of camp for a theater. Though, come on. How awesome would it be to see Wu in a play? I can see the signs: "Guys and Dolls! Starring...Mr. Wu...as Nicely Nicely!" No? No, you're right. As if on cue, Wu now bursts into a rapid fire smackdown of one of his cronies. "Boss of the neighborhood," Al explains to Langrishe a little proudly. "Won a war to take over." Seeing Wu's suit, Langrishe jokes that he hopes Al is Wu's backer and not his tailor. Heee. Even Al laughs, which is practically unprecedented, proving that Jack must really be his friend, or as close as he can get to a friend. "You're the first I've fucking revealed this to," he says, holding up his wounded hand to Jack. "Fucking throbs all the way up." Jack says he'll take this knowledge to the grave, and they head back up the thoroughfare, Jack greeting people right and left along the way. "You fuckin' tip your hat to everybody?" Al asks. Jack: "Everybody."
At the hardware store, Sol is poring over his furniture catalogues when Bullock comes in. He starts to make excuses about looking at inventory for the hardware store -- I guess he doesn't want Bullock to finally realize that he has suddenly turned into Christopher Lowell, moments away from painting the walls of the store a luscious cherry, but Bullock isn't pay any attention to him, anyway. He's pissed about this Hearst business, saying that Hearst just sees them all as pawns he can laugh at. "Well," he says, determined. "I'm going to write it up anyway, Hearst's phony fucking accident, I'm gonna present it to him and put him on notice." Sol, who seems to be used to the obtuseness of the dialogue of everyone he has to deal with these days, simply goes back to looking at his catalogue.
Trixie is, for whatever reason, back at Doc's. He tells her he's concerned about Mrs. Ellsworth. Taking a drag of her ever-present cigarette, she assures him that Alma is not using laudanum again. Doc says that's not what worries him -- it's that he temperament is "labile." Trixie laughs. "I guess that means," she says, "she's talking through her c*nt?" Doc, continuing to cough and clear his throat as he talks -- we're supposed to assume it's from Trixie's smoking -- says that he means that Mrs. E's moods are inappropriately variable. Trixie starts to agree when Doc's coughing gets worse until he can't stop. "Don't throw a fit, Doc," she says, worried and stomping out her cigarette. "Look! I put it out." But, it's not the smoking, as she's about to find. His coughing worsens until he spits up blood. Trixie is horrified, and without words, he waves her to run out. People, if they kill Doc, I will never get over it.
Al and Jack are still on their tour. He points out a new area, where the Ellsworth house is located. This is when the geography of Deadwood is weird to me. Can't we see the Ellsworth's house from the middle of camp? Al explains that Alma has the richest gold claim to Hearst's. Jack becomes thoughtful. "What sort of play does she like?" he asks. Al rolls his eyes: "Oh, Christ, she told me and I fucking forgot." Smiling, he adds that Mrs. Ellsworth goes through her men like "Sherman to the fuckin' sea." Al goes on, pointing out different structures. He can't remember who one place "fuckin' belongs to," and Langrishe asks who the open space, what passes for a park in Deadwood, fuckin' belongs to. Al squints. "Well, I guess this belongs," he says, "to fuckin' everybody." He shows Jack where Bullock lives. "Fucking Sheriff," he mutters, but not angrily. "Insane fucking person."
He may be right, for at this moment Bullock is putting the finishing touches on his big eff you to Hearst. "The one at Swearengen's, too," he says to Sol, who is still clueless and unconcerned. "I'm gonna put him on notice about it all." Just when he could hope for a moment of silence without someone walking in and talking to him like he can read their minds, Trixie enters and goes right to it. "Wouldn't be looking for anyone coming through the wall to deal with your Johnson," she says, rolling a new smoke. "And don't you try fucking coming to my side either, or your Jew head will be wearing that fucking dresser as a tiara." Sol takes this in stride, as usual. "All right," he says. "We're supposed to read your mind," she rants on, really talking about Doc, "understand what you fucking mean." He tries to determine what she's going on about, but sees she's upset and backs off. "Shut the fuck up," she bites at him. "'Please don't smoke' means 'I'm at death's fuckin' door.'" Sol tries again to get on track with her. "You can smoke," he says. "I'd prefer if...you did it outside." Now, Sol, did you not just hear her say to shut up? I am sure it would make sense if she walked in and said that she was sad that Doc is maybe dying, but that's not the way people act in Deadwood -- they need to use a lot more words than you do. "You're a fucking idiot, anyways," she says, and stomps out, throwing down her cigarette.
Outside, Al and Jack have arrived at the front of the hotel. Al examines his wound more closely and announces that the pus is a deeper yellow. He shakes his fist at Hearst's upstairs balcony, loudly declaring him a cocksucker. Jack notices the stares they are attracting from the citizens in the thoroughfare and cuts the tour short. "I started this job," Al insists. "I'll fucking finish it." Jack looks back at the hooples in the street. "Al," he says, quietly. "It's not the first impression I'd make." Wishing Al his heartfelt thanks, he bids him farewell. Merrick, watching from his front door looks hopeful that Langrishe will come and speak with him, but he doesn't, instead waiting on Al to turn his back and striding on to look around without him.
Upstairs, Bullock is putting Hearst on notice about the patter developing with these organizing-worker-related deaths. He...doesn't like it. "Why in fuck should I care what pattern you identify?" he says. Bullock reminds him that the camp has a sanction against murder. Hearst says that mine accidents happen all the time, but Bullock won't let him get away with it. "I now learn," he says "that your worker who died in the Gem last week was killed by two of your guards." Hearst defies him to prove it, and adds that those two guards happened to have been murdered, themselves, with two other guards as witnesses. "Certainly, the guards who survive are capable of naming the killers. Shall I have them make complaint?" he asks, banging his shot glass to the table. "I put you on notice." Bullock clenches, almost in confusion -- does this Hearst bastard have no weaknesses? He fears neither Al nor the law? What is the dude's kryptonite?
We cut to a cute scene between Merrick and the newly-returned Blasanov. The Russian goes to great lengths to explain the concept of differential duplex transmission of the telegraph to Merrick, asking the newspaperman to speak in a low voice while he speaks in a high one. It is very funny, but impossible to recap.
Hearst meets with Cy in the Bella Union. My hopes, for all involved, is that they will somehow kill each other in this scene, but that doesn't happen. In fact, Hearst is there to hire Cy, who is so apologetic about his last meeting with Hearst, that he has almost reached E.B. levels of ridiculousness. It is revealed that there is no Wolcott letter. Cy plays it big, kissing Hearst's ass like it's never been kissed, and Hearst is just as disgusted with the theatrics as we are. "You have no letter from Wolcott, Mr. Tolliver," Hearst says, stating the obvious. Cy: "Let's say that's the case." Hearst: "You're a lying, blackmailing sack of shit." Cy nods, and asks what Hearst wants. "I want you," Hearst says, "to go to work for me." Cy looks surprised that he will live another day.
Al is at the bar having a drink when Johnny gets up the nerve to ask how his walk went. "Seemed to get along with that dandy," he remarks of Langrishe. "Yeah," Al says, casual. "He's all right." Johnny can't let it go. "The-a-ter fella, huh?" he asks with hidden significance. Al gets defensive. "He's a fucking promoter of the first fucking quality, I can tell you that," he says. "I don't go to plays so I can't speak to his worth as an actor." He takes a shot, reminiscing. "Tuesdays, he'll tend to have amateur nights. Been to plenty of those. Virginia City...guy farted seemed near an hour." Dan, understandably, cannot control himself: "Well, that don't seem like no amateur." Al gives him a look but they are interrupted by a clenching Bullock, who arrives bitching about Wu not giving him access to the dead guy in his meat locker. "What did he do instead?" Al asks. Here, Bullock does an awesome Wu impression: "[He] said 'Swedgin,' and barred my way." Al: "Had you eyes to select your own cut?" Bullock squints, not in the mood for jokes: "Are you gonna fuck with me?" he asks, getting an eyebrow from Al. Bullock says he went there to get a look at the dead Cornishman and he knows Wu understood him. Dan asks if Wu moseyed over to the corner and lifted up a tarp and Bullock says, yeah, he did. Al explains that that's where the body was. "That's our nook in Wu's shelter," Johnny says slowly, as if to a child. "Why Wu delayed cooperating," Al explains, "he hadn't known the croaker was under there. His stupid suit so overcome me, it slipped my mind to tell him." Bullock clenches that he wants the body, and tells Al about the recent worker murder at Hearst's mines. Al intuits the whole Hearst/Bullock/everybody's-put-on-notice thing and asks Bullock what good will come of confronting Hearst about it now. "Now," Bullock says, his own eyebrows raised, "is when he's killing people!" Al: "What, you feel he'll leave off, soon?" Bullock says that tactics and timing ain't the issue. "The hell you say," Al says, and he raises a glass as we all think fondly of his many strategies and fuckin' maneuvers.
Joanie is watering the school's vegetable garden when Langrishe comes up, looking around. She mistakenly assumes he's looking for action and shoos him off, saying the Chez Amie no longer engages in that business.
Mrs. Ellsworth has arrived back at the hotel to have her second meeting with Hearst. She acts all whispery and cute with him, and apologizes for her husband's behavior. Hearst, naturally, sympathizes. "My dear Phoebe, Mrs. Hearst, like your Mr. Ellsworth, while pleasantly conversable on most subjects, finds others not to suit her at all." Instead of punching him in the mouth, as I so hoped she would, Alma demurs. Oh, this is all going so swimmingly, isn't it? That's what he wants you to think, Alma! Dammit! She's so high on life, she smiles and asks if he'll hear her claim offer. He says of course and she goes and pulls out a little note card with her thoughts on it, proceeding to make as big an ass of herself as possible. It's so very sad, because she's so excited to be playing Big Business Woman, and the whole thing is really just pitiful. She offers him a 49 % ownership in her claim in return for 5% of his holdings in the hills. There's some other crap about transportation fees for the ore and the like, and...I don't know whether he's just sick of people trying to take 5% of his shit, or whether he's just over Alma, in general, or both, but Hearst ain't having it. "Your proposal is thoughtful," he says, with deadly calm, "but I'm afraid I lack the qualities that minority participations require." She primly assures him that these are merely her most preliminary thoughts. "A vulgar man," he goes on, "would ask before preceding any further if you would require him to produce his jackknife and make himself a capon before you." Alma is surprised by this turn of the tides. She's a little afraid as she asks what it is about the offer that he finds emasculating. "I can offer no inside explanations, Mrs. Ellsworth, as I am not a capon," he answers, now showing how angry he is, "which details offend me and why your proposal offends completely. It mistakes my nature absolutely." Alma blanches, beginning to understand what a rat's nest she has just stepped into. "All right," she says, trying to play it cool and standing quickly to get out of there. Hearst jumps up, blocking her, asking aggressively if she will hear his counter-proposal. "I think not," she says, beginning to be fearful. "Do hear it, Mrs. Ellsworth," he says, pushing. "Let me name an amount to buy you out." No, she tells him, she won't hear it, and when she tries to leave, he blocks her again. "Let me out," she says, barely holding it together. "Shall I scream?" He's all up in her dance space when he creepily tells her that at this hour, the thoroughfare is uncertain. He asks if she'll take an escort until she's safely back at home. She shakes her head and he steps in very close, very threatening. "You are reckless, madam," he whispers, all sniffy and creepy. "You...indulge yourself." Thoroughly skeeved and unable to hide it, she walks out, shamed.
She comes out of the hotel shaken. Bullock, from the door of the hardware store, sees her troubled face and steps out. They share a pensive moment, unable to speak to one another now, I guess for propriety's sake, and she rushes away. OK, Doc dying + a Bullock/Alma reunion will really push me over the edge.
Richardson is following Aunt Lou around as she greets guests like he's in training for the waitstaff of T.G.I. Fridays. He seems very happy with these new arrangements and proud of Aunt Lou's new menu. She seems happy to have him along. Langrishe's two lady companions tell her they have very much enjoyed their dinners. Jack himself comes in, followed closely by Blasanov who happens to have a telegram for him. The Russian mangles his name, but makes his delivery, and then waits silently by for several moments before Langrishe's costumer, also Russian, finally hands over a tip.
Back at home, Alma is severely berating herself for having thought she should go up against Hearst. "Now you know," Ellsworth says, in the Old West version of told-ya-so. He's so mad and so full of hate for Hearst, he can't comfort her. "He grinned at me like a jackal," she says. "Was there more?" he asks, nearly beside himself. Still embarrassed and angry at herself, she says it seemed there could have been more, though she was so afraid, she couldn't totally be sure of Hearst's intentions. "What the hell do you mean?" Ellsworth asks, getting angry at her, now. "Did you try to leave, and did he prevent you?" She gets pissed and tells him not to use that tone with her. He takes her non-answer to reveal that Hearst did try to prevent her from leaving and, before he can stop himself, calls her a goddamn fool who almost got what she deserved. Not a good day for the Ellsworths, I must say. Oh, not good at all. "And what," she bites back, "would that have been? And WHY would I have DESERVED it?!" Mommy's mad, OK? I hope Sophia's sleeping under a pillow tonight. Especially when Ellsworth croaks out that he only wanted to protect Alma and she snidely answers back that "you can't." Ugh.
In what I guess is the kitchen or store room at the hotel, Hearst is gobbling up some peach cobbler. Excuse me, but how gross did that just sound? Cobbler gobbler? Apologies. Aunt Lou is uncomfortable being alone with him in the room, worried no doubt what others will think. He makes a big show of saying how he doesn't care. Aunt Lou, I'm guessing, wonders who gives a damn what he cares about, seeing as how it's her safety that would be in jeopardy from some kind of racist attack. He talks about how much he hates camps like these and how he barely likes big cities any better. "Goddamn truth is I'd rather be off by myself, Aunt Lou," he says. "Free to do my work. 'Boy-the-Earth-Talks-To.'" Aunt Lou says that yeah, that is his Indian name -- she's probably been reminded of it every damn day of her life like a kid having to hear about his father's one moment of high school football glory. "Only goddamn conversation I care to have," he says of his dialogue with the Earth. "Her telling me where to dig into her."
Later, in his rooms, Hearst has a visit from his new Igor, Cy, who humbly wishes to hear his duties in this new service. "Your duties will be to answer like a dog when I call," Hearst says, and by God if it doesn't make me feel sorry for Cy. "Complications of intention on your part in dealings with me or duplicity or indirectionâbehavior, in short, which displeases me," he goes on, "will bring you a smack on the snout." Seriously, I feel bad for Cy -- what is happening? Hearst further explains that Al himself recently came to understand the seriousness of this threat. "I gather it cost him a finger," Cy observes. Hearst has a moment of discomfort remembering his recent ragings. "I should say too that in these rooms just this afternoon such displeasure brought me near to murdering the Sheriff and...raping Mrs. Ellsworth," he says. "I have learned through time, Mr. Tolliver, and as repeatedly seem to forget that whatever temporary comfort relieving my displeasure brings me, my long-term interests suffer." He concludes that his proper business is with the Earth (thank goodness, for now, he's not saying "with the color" anymore), and that it's best if any people he has to deal with just respond to him like dogs. Cy, probably scared to death, complies. "If he hadn't meant me to wag it, sir," he says, "why would the Lord give me a tail?"
Down in the alley, Aunt Lou is mixing it up with the Chinamen, throwing down tiles in a serious game of Mahjong. She has a smiling Richardson nearby with his antlers in hand to bring her luck. Get this: Aunt Lou speaks Chinese. We need to remember that. "I love yo' cobbler like sunset, Lou," she says, making fun of Hearst, "and backbroke n*ggers in the field." See, I knew she hated him, too. She rails about how much he loves digging up gold, so much that he doesn't even care about the nuggets he kicks up. She chews a cigar and handily whips some Chinese ass in the Mahjong game, immediately insisting on another: "Shall we clatter them motherfuckers again?"
Jack is sharing a drink with Al on his balcony as the night comes to a close. They discuss the big hole in Hearst's hotel. "Americans," Jack muses. "It never occurs to them to try the window." Truer words, Jack, have never been spoken. Al sighs, unburdening his deep thoughts. "I'll tell you the truth," he says. "I begin to wonder if I mightn't be fucking queer." Hee. Come on, Al. Don't get all the cowboys excited. They hear about you and Heath Ledger will get dropped like yesterday's news. Jack: "You see more to admire in the male asshole than you'd, uh...realized hitherto?" Al means that he must be soft if he hasn't yet gone for Hearst's throat. "Ambition and the blessed simplicities of action don't always quarter in comfort," Jack says, but Al says he really has no ambition past trading to his favor "and coming...once a day." Jack calls bullshit -- surely, he says, Al would not see his hard-won town ruined or in cinders. "I will if I fuckin' have to," Al says, sadly. "Avoiding it, if I could." Jack chuckles, takes a last shot and says goodnight. "Few enough, I find tolerable," he says, of their friendship. "Lucky our paths have crossed again." Going inside, he pauses to smack Al on the ass. "Don't misinterpret that," he says, and Al, still making his sad face, answers "All right, Jack," as we leave him, staring out across the thoroughfare at the camp he built.