In a hurry? Read the recaplet for a nutshell description! Finished? Click here to close. Alma is proud to open the Bank of Deadwood. Come for the apparently-not-fighting-anymore Ellsworths. Stay for Trixie's unique spin on customer service. Langrishe wants to turn the Chez Amie into a playhouse, but Joanie is still holding on to the warm fuzzies (and pangs of regret) she gets from lending the building out as a schoolhouse. She makes him promise to build Mrs. Bullock a brand new school before she sells. Then she and Jane contemplate whether they'll get a house together right away, or take a vacation on one of Rosie O'Donnell's cruise ships first.
Hostetler and the N*gger General ride back in town on their child-trampling steed. Steve the Drunk, predictably, pops a vein or five about losing control of the livery, and pretty soon Bullock is stuck brokering a compromise between two incredibly stubborn men. Steve gets the livery from Hostetler in exchange for a handsome sum (for which Bullock must clenchily arrange a loan). Unfortunately, neither man will sign the agreement before the other, leaving Bullock to wait until morning when cooler heads may or may not prevail. And while he gets slapped around a couple times, Steve is depressingly alive at episode's end. Boo!
Al's got a lot on his plate this week, emotionally speaking. He's feeling disregarded by Hearst when he and Cy are summoned to Hearst's quarters and treated like glorified lackeys. Then he chooses Adams to be his spokesperson with Hearst and has to deal with Dan's hurt feelings. And then he has to work though his finger-related PTSD, delving into his childhood abandonment issues in the process. Yes, this is the week Al gets in touch with the cocksucker within, particularly when he can't maintain a hard-on for the cocksucker without.
Also: Doc's still hacking up a lung or two, Con Stapleton foists his sweaty awfulness upon Rita Sue, and it's strongly implied that Leon's selling dope to Mrs. Ellsworth. Want more? The full recap starts right below!
Weirdly, we open in what looks like darkest night, but is actually early morning, with Doc making his calls to the Bella Union. I had gotten used to starting episodes with Al, so this feels unusual. He goes to see Cy, who complains about the hour, though he says he understands and is grateful. "At least half that statement's a fuckin' lie," Doc says. The merest flicker of concern or, more likely, fear, passes across Cy's face as Doc coughs his way through the exam. Doc looks at Cy's stab wound, still healing, orders him to get up and around, and goes out, still hacking.
Later in the morning, Jane is startled by Blazanov who comes upon her to deliver a telegraph. She must be hungover, because she's, uh, a little cagey. "Telegraph for Miss Jane Cannary," the good Russian says. "Oh, yeah?" Jane growls back. "Well, here's a pistol for whatever your fuckin' name is." Blazanov cringes. "Now, please," he says. "Do not kill me. I am only messenger." Haahha! Good one, Tedd Mann, writer of this episode. Jane tells him to shut up and read the message.
Meanwhile, big bidness is about to go down in Deadwood's new bank. Alma nervously sits behind her little desk -- complete with nameplate -- and glances over to Trixie and Sol. They look on encouragingly as she goes out to greet the crowd and unveil the new sign for the Deadwood Bank. Al watches from his balcony before slowly turning to see Hearst on his own makeshift balcony, looking over at him. Hearst has the balls to give him a big wave hello. Johnny and Dan see all from below. "How'd Al answer?" Johnny asks. Dan tells him Al didn't answer the wave at all. Hearst sees them standing there and decides to try his wave on them. "Mornin'," he calls out, and while Johnny replies with a friendly wave, Dan is...a little less enthused. "Mornin'," he calls. "Best time of day to go fuck yourself." I file this one away to use on tomorrow's commute to work.
Blazanov tells Jane that her telegram is from one Samuel Fields, her old pal the NG. She snatches it away and commands that he keep the contents quiet.
Joanie is making her way through the thoroughfare when she is joined by Langrishe, who respectfully tells her of the real purpose for his visit: he wants to purchase the Chez Amie. Joanie is surprised and defensive. She asks what he wants to use it for, and when he tells her he'd like to make it a theater, she looks upset. "It's a schoolhouse, now," she says. He jokes that it's a very well-appointed building for a schoolhouse. She says she doesn't think she'd want to sell, and he graciously suggests that perhaps she'd consider renting. "Perhaps you'd consider fucking yourself," is her answer, and Langrishe is left wondering just what it takes in this town to get a polite response out of anybody.
Al's back on his balcony with his coffee when he sees Captain Turner, that blight for sore eyes, blundering across the thoroughfare. Al turns quickly to be sure to meet him downstairs at the door. "If I was approaching you backwards, Captain, had a mirror to observe your activity, just now I'd be most trepidatious, for, Johnny," he says, nodding to his cautious lackey, "this is a man when acting from behind and advantaged with a weapon...very much to be feared." Captain Turner, who speaks with the voice of a cartoon gorilla, says he was just doing his job. Al walks up and, with his still-bandaged hand, takes the letter he's brought from his boss. From the back, Dan comes out toweling off his face. "You don't want to speak like that again to Mr. Hearst," Turner warns him. "Yeah. I do," Dan says, stoney-eyed. "You want to try and change my fuckin' mind?" Captain Tuner: "Not only will I change your mind, I'll rip your whole fucking head off." If Dan wasn't so mad, you know he'd roll his eyes, because, please, he's heard far more creative threats than that. Al gives his eyebrows a morning workout as he reads Hearst's note. "Another fuckin' invite," he says. "Fuckin' Hearst must take me for an optimist." Seriously, because...what could it possibly say? "Dear Al, you are cordially invited to get your other nine fingers chopped off"? "Your presence is my present"? "BYOB"? Dan's still mad. "I'm 'on kill that cocksucker," he says. Al assures him: "All in good time."
At the Bella Union, one of Langrishe's actresses is making call. According to the HBO website, her name is Claudia and yeah, she was in the last episode, and she's great, but I wish I could just leave all her scenes out because...y'all, nothing has happened yet in this episode with the main characters. We're on minute NINE, here. I don't have time for the new girl. Anyway, she's beautifully, if garishly, dressed, and as unlikely and stomach-turning as one may find it, she flirts shamelessly with Con Stapleton, asking him to teach her how to play craps. Her attentions cause him some, siiiiiigh, testicular discomfort, which he blames on the Chinese laundry shrinking his pants and he whips out (haaa!) his lucky dice for her to blow on (heeee!). Leon and I look on in fascination and disgust as Con deals with the inflammation of his clap, and I run and take a quick shower, though I may never be clean again.
Harry's late for his job at the No. 10, and Nuttall ain't happy. This is a weird scene to me, mostly because Nuttall is acting so angry and defensive from the jump, but also because his voice sounds really different than in seasons. Hey, Leon Rippy, don't be trying to act like you're ashamed of that North Carolina accent we've been listening to for the last two years. Anyway, he says Harry's whole plan is stupid -- he's running for sheriff because when he's beat, he hopes to become second deputy in case a fire department is started. "Why not build a fuckin' fire wagon that you then rent out to the camp?" Nuttall asks, with significance. Harry says he would if he had the money. Nuttall has to spell it out for him. "If you had a loan for the wagon's makings and help with the fuckin' carpentry," he asks, "would you build the wagon then?" Harry finally understands. He excitedly says that he'd repay Nuttall, with interest. "Well, that's the 20 percent, pre-deducted from the makings' purchase," Nuttall furiously explains. "We build the fuckin' wagon, then rent it to the camp." Slamming his rag down on the bar, he tells the confused Harry to never speak of this again, adding his closing demand that they get "two fuckin' fire hats." Awesome -- wasn't Charlie fire inspector, though, ordained as such during the peaches meeting? I know that's not the same as a fireman, but...I'm just saying.
Speaking of Charlie, he's back at his place right now, looking over Jane's telegram from the NG. They quickly determine that the NG intends to come back to camp with Hostetler and the horse that killed William Bullock and both start sweating because, as they say, only a drunkard would figure that for a good idea. Jane is kind of flipping out and driving Charlie crazy -- she wants him to help her compose a return telegram to warn him off, but as she rants, Charlie looks out to see that the NG, Hostetler and the horse have already arrived. Jane immediately sizes up the situation: "Aw, ffffuck."
She ain't kiddin'. Hostetler and the NG ride up on the livery to see it being run by none other than their old enemy and mine, Steve. "It's always possible I'm having a nightmare," the NG says, nervous. Steve, who is taking good care of the horses there, looks up and sees them and doesn't even miss a beat. He was, of course, expecting this bad turn of luck. "That's right," he spits. "You've come to take my place away."
Joanie has arrived down at Charlie's, fidgety and worried. She takes a seat in the holding cell (get it?! She's trapped!) and tells him about Langrishe's offer on her place. He asks how she responded. "I told the man to go fuck himself," she says, clearly wondering if that was the best answer. She's so obviously distraught, Charlie suggests that he close his place for a while so they can talk it out. "Oh, please don't," she says, so he changes the subject, telling her about Hostetler and the gang arriving back in camp. "Wherever the two of them was," he says, "I guess they didn't feel their lives were in enough danger." Joanie speaks the truth of the ages and says that people will sometimes do strange things. "For years at a time," Charlie agrees. "Pick any part of my life, for example." Oh, Charlie. I feel you. The whole of my 20s are a mystery decade for which I have no explanation. Joanie goes back to talking about selling her place -- the idea of selling it, she says, just doesn't seem right, though she can't exactly say why. "I'll tell you what I like," she tries. "What I like is knowing these children are learning. I like that, and I like watering their garden the days they ain't in session." Charlie smiles, trying to make her feel better. "The day that school opened," he says, "I remember sayin' to Sheriff Bullock what a nice thing it seemed, watching them little ones walk off to your place." Exactly. "That's what I goddamn like," she says, emphatically, "imagining them walkin' into it. I ain't seen it yet, but I'd like to, and when he wanted to buy it, all I thought's 'Now I never will.'" She breaks down now, crying, and Charlie asks what's wrong. "I wish," she says, catching her breath, "I could care for those little ones. Just once instead of doin' what I did." We cut away as she is comforted by her friend.
We now come to the part of the episode that made me want to hurl things at the TV. All the words in the English language would not be enough to describe the absolutely roiling racist anger brewing. The actor that plays Steve is so outrageous and over the top, from here on out, I became physically uncomfortable whenever he was on screen. I'm not saying he's bad, I'm saying he's playing it so big and with such emotion that we would easily get it even from the back row of Giants' Stadium. His bug-eyed vitriol very quickly got on my nerves, and I already hated the character.
Steve strides into Nuttall's telling the story of this recent beatdown he has received from the Universe. With trepidation, Tom asks what's happened. "What I swore up and down was gonna happen, and nobody paid me any heed," Steve bellows. "What happened to me in Utica and every other fuckin' place I've ever been in my fuckin' life! The livery's gone. All my labor, efforts are gone for naught. And they walked in like they never fucking left, and they didn't take responsibility for trampling that white boy!" He makes some ominous remarks about wondering what the sheriff is going to say about that, and stomps out. Nuttall, no fool, loads his gun.
At the Grand Central, Con Stapleton is renting a room. E.B. regards him with an open smirk. "If you stay in camp long, sir," he says, mocking, "you may have the delightful surprise of meeting your identical twin." Con snatches the key and goes upstairs. "He has appointed to degrade himself," E.B. says, Greek-chorus-style, watching him go. "The open question is with whom."
Steve has begun his Tour of Justice. He walks into the hardware store and starts in on Bullock as if he knows at all what's going on. "At the Saloon Number fucking 10!" Steve says indicating his unexplained drama. "Well, are you coming?" Bullock doesn't even pause to clench. "Yeah, I'm fucking coming."
Ellsworth visits the bank and sweetly places an apple on his wife's desk. "You don't confuse me with Mrs. Bullock?" she asks, joking, and then realizes the faux pas a split-second too late. Oops. Nice one, Mrs. E. Her husband, for his part, lets it roll. "Well, as far as the conjugal enterprise," he winks, "I'll admit often feeling like a schoolboy." Ellsworth! Gracious me. I guess they aren't fighting anymore. Alma smiles and thanks him for the apple. "Speaking further," Ellsworth says, with pride, "'twixt your mine and now this bank, however much I mayn't be good at it, I feel I married rather well." Aw. Over at the teller window, Trixie is having her customer service skills to the test. A typical Deadwood citizen is bitching her out about always having his money available to him, day or night. "Mayn't I draw you a map then in case it's night you want it," she smarts, "to lead you to where I live so you can wake me?" The guy doesn't take kindly to this. "Now, fuck you then," he says, "I ain't depositing." Trixie: "Oh no? Oh, say it ain't fuckin' so, you stupid fucking asshole!" Ellsworth decides to step in and tries to calm the situation. The depositor, though, he doesn't appreciate this, and snappily asks who the fuck Ellsworth is, anyway. Alma stands now, firmly trying to insert herself, but Ellsworth tells her to stay out of it. "Deposits here, if we fucking let you make them," he says, "are backed by this lady's gold mine. So do not confuse her with some paper palace fly-by-night who means 'catch me if you can, turn me upside down and whatever falls out of my pants pocket is what's behind my scrip,' when his note says 'full faith and credit.'" Alma, watching all this, gives an imperceptible smile. He's no Bullock, sure, but he can clench pretty damn well and seeing Ellsworth stick up for her gives her no small thrill. Finally, after Ellsworth shouts the guy down, she is able to introduce herself. "I am Mrs. Ellsworth," she says, all smiles. "How do you do?" the hoople asks, nervously glancing at Ellsworth, "I guess I'll try you out." Trixie smirks and writes the bank's first marketing tagline: "Our hearts fuckin' leap with joy."
Bullock returns to Nuttall's with Steve. He tells Tom to keep Steve there and walks back out. Steve starts his bullshit again, and Tom has to tell him to shut up. Right on. Poor Nuttall, man. How did he get elected to babysit this mess? Why wouldn't they do it anywhere else?
Over at the livery, Hostetler is trying to run off the NG. "Yeah, that's why I come back with you, Hostetler," the little man says, rolling his eyes, "to worsen my chances when I try to flee." They are interrupted by Bullock who is just now striding up from the No. 10. "I was coming to find you once I had the horse cleaned," Hostetler starts before Bullock can say anything. "This is the horse that hurt your boy. We collected him and we brung him back." Bullock is intense, but not angry. "He died," he says, of William. Hostetler and the NG look sick. Hostetler, with dignity, says that Bullock can blame him for the death. The NG jumps in to explain that they had taken precautions, but that the castration of the horse has just gone wrong, but Hostetler shushes him. "I collected the horse and brought him back," Hostetler says to Bullock. "I'm back, too. You say what you think is right." Every single day, every single conversation is a trial of fairness for Hostetler. You have to feel for him. Bullock, as sad as he must be, is equally interested in fairness. He tells them he won't act against them for an accident, that he's come to talk about the livery. "Your boy..." Hostetler says. "I'm as sorry as I can be. I hope you will take that to his mother for me." He says that he is sorry, also, for running away from the livery. The NG pipes up again. "Wanting not to be killed will put you to some difficult choices," he says and I am again struck at how some scripts of Deadwood could easily be repackaged into like, pocket volumes of Chicken Soup for Cocksuckers & Hooples. Seriously, sometimes these nuggets of wisdom would come in handy at the odd staff meeting or the like. Bullock points out, with no irony towards the shared past of these three men, that Steve has been looking after the livery. Hostetler says yes, it seems like he's done a good job, too. I wish here the NG would bust in like, "Oh, yeah, like he did a good job that day when he TARRED me. Or that other time when we caught him getting busy with the leg of a horse. He's great. Tell Steve to suck my dick," but, uh, he doesn't. Bullock asks Hostetler if there's any chance all this can be resolved without hell breaking loose between them, and Hostetler says, as far as he's concerned, hell does not have to break loose.
In his room at the Grand Central, Con is...wait for it...happily chatting post-coitally to the actress, Claudia. Come on, now. Am I going to have to start writing these recaps from the shower?! Huh? Seriously, Claudia is with me, too -- she's laying there looking all depressed and grossed out while Con goes on and on about Leon remarking on her well-stacked "front porch." Aiiieeee. She sits up, skeeved and sad, and says it's time to go. Con massages his herniated johnson, commenting that "in a few days, we can do this again." Say, if I was to pour Listerine directly into my ears, would it cause me to forget that any of this just happened?
Joanie and Charlie are doing a little role playing back at his place. Oh, not like that, now, come on. She's practicing her speech to Langrishe. "Mr. Langrishe, I couldn't possibly consider your offer," she says, testing it, "unless you would agree to building a new schoolhouse, at your expense, for Mrs. Bullock and the children." Charlie says he can't imagine why anyone would turn that down. Joanie is worried, though, that Mrs. Bullock might not want a new building. "People are strange about things, Charlie," she says, when he protests. Charlie says he'll check with Martha about it. Joanie puts on her gorgeous hat and leaves, satisfied.
Bullock is having what has to be the worst of his many irritating, scary days as sheriff. He returns to Nuttall's with Hostetler and suggests to Steve that they all go to the hardware store to talk. Steve, of course, can't even imagine SHUTTING UP for the five seconds it would take to walk there, so he refuses. Thus begins a tirade of him further screwing himself while Bullock tries to arrange a fair deal for him. "No one's here to fuck you, Steve," Bullock says, and I wish he'd print it on a t-shirt, "if you'd just quit running your mouth." Fat chance. Hostetler summons all his strength to thank Steve for his good care of the livery. Steve can't take it, though, and smarts that he can't understand what Hostetler is saying without Bullock translating from "ape." This does not sit well with Bullock, who smacks Steve in the mouth and clenches down on his neck and tells him not to insult Hostetler again. Hostetler goes on, though it pains him, saying he'd like to pay Steve for all the work he's done and that he'd be willing to keep him on, if Steve is interested in the job. "Look at him, gritting his teeth, holding onto his fucking nose!" Steve spits. "Don't you do me any fucking favors, Hostetler! I didn't ask permission of anyone to look after that stock, and I'm not gonna start with a fucking n*gger!" Bullock, still holding the man's shirt collar, just has to look away. I mean, you know he wants to kill him, so he's got to be on the brink of saying the Serenity Prayer right out loud up in the No. 10.
This is just not going well. Hostetler tries to explain why he left camp, and is again hit with Steve's barrage of ignorance. The livery owner has reached his dignity's limit of abuse. After another hateful spew from Steve, he finally has to turn around and put his back to him. "Motherfucker," he grumbles even while he tries to force himself to stay cool by covering his own mouth. Steve, still choking under Bullock's clench, stirs up the shit as much as possible and things escalate until Bullock, for everyone's safety, has to haul Hostetler outside by the seat of his pants. "Put me down until you're ready to kill me or run," Hostetler says, but Bullock won't do it. "You're gonna leave this to me. Do you understand?" he asks. "You leave it to me." Hostetler rightly says that he came with his end of the bargain, but Steve wouldn't meet him. "I'll take care of it," Bullock says, still holding him. "Will you let me try? It's what I want for my son." Hostetler again insists to be put down. "If I do," Bullock says, "it won't be to kill you and I'm not running. So what are we gonna do then?" With emotion, Hostetler says that he would stick to his original plan of going to Oregon if Steve buys him out fair and square. He leaves, and Bullock goes right back in to Steve.
"He'll sell to you," he says. "Do you want to take it on?" Oh, now Steve is all complacency -- he doesn't, he says, have the means to buy it. "If you had the means at loan?!" Bullock asks, still jacked up from preventing this bitch's homicide. "Yes," Steve says, fully reasonable, "I'd be willing. Very much so." Ugh. Bullock, you should have shot this mofo when you had the chance. Bullock says there will be no bargaining -- Sol will make a price and Steve will have to take it and that will be that. Steve says okay, and Bullock strides out. "What do you think of that?" Steve asks Nuttall, smiling as if all that insanity just did not go down in his joint. Al would have stabbed him long ago.
In the street, Charlie catches up to Bullock, who tells him about trying to broker this stupid livery deal. Charlie catches the tone and says he'll meet up with him later. "Be quick," Bullock says, "and you've got me now." Y'all know Charlie can't be quick, though. He tries, but..."Must've been unwelcome to Mrs. Bullock, that horse being brought back," he says. "Not wantin' to intrude on her, Miss Stubbs was having asked me to find out, might I ask you to speak in her stead as to something I believe we both know where she stand on?" Heeeee. Bullock looks at him like he's speaking Cornish, which hell, he practically is, and asks if that's his goddamn idea of "quick." Charlie tries again, going slowly, but makes it even more convoluted and, seeing Bullock's extreme frustration, finally has to straight out ask if Mrs. Bullock would be loathe to leaving the Chez Amie. His wife teaching children in a non-whorehouse seems like a no-brainer to Bullock, and he sends Charlie away with his answer. "'Be quick,'" Charlie mumbles on his way back to Joanie. "Fuckin' delicate operation."
Langrishe is in the Grand Central, locking up his room when he is confronted by Claudia coming out of Con's. "One thought he'd engaged a room for you at the other end of the hall," he says, with curiosity. "I'm going to it now," she says, smirking, and leaves him there to his nausea when he sees who she's been messing with.
Finally, we are back with Al. Dudes, there are too many people on this damn show these days. You take the viewer away from Al at your own peril. Don't mix me up with a bunch of Claudias and Cons when all I want is Swedgin. He strokes his mustache as he reviews his most recent Hearst communiqué with Dolly, who is doing her duty as she so often does when Al needs to think. Ah, the first blow job monologue of the season, how I've...not missed them at all. This one, in particular, is not working for Al. He accuses Dolly of changing her technique, which she denies. "No?" he asks, grabbing her head and putting her back to work. "Is my dick in your mouth?" She nods. "Do I have a hard-on?" Dolly affirms the negative. "Then you change your action. Go back to your fucking method." She goes back to it, while he continues to muse angrily about Hearst. "Does he construe my forbearance as weakness, is that what the fuck nags at me? Or my considerations of alternatives for being fucking intimidated?" he wonders. "Because the time's coming he sees what I'm up to beyond any fucking mistake, and I only hope you don't doubt it." Satisfied with his own position, he is still not satisfied with Dolly's. "You don't think that counts as altering your action?" he asks, frustrated. "You would change your entire fucking mouth pattern." Dolly mutters that she's sorry, which goes over about as well as you'd expect. "Sorry? Oh, I guess that's okay then," Al asks, full of sarcasm, "because my goal before my meeting wasn't to come and clear my fucking head, not so much as to hear you say you're sorry, you stupid fucking mutt." Sigh. Poor Dolly. Her only defense is that she really is stupid. She flatly asks if she should go. "No," Al says, sighing, and now speaking to her like she's a child. "Tell me who you want in the election. "Star for mayor," she says, "And Harry Manning for sheriff." What's this? "Star for mayor," Al corrects, "and Bullock for fucking sheriff." But her position is logical to Dolly: "Bullock," she says, "yells at you." Al, you know, knowing himself so well, can't take someone loving him. "Get out," he says. "Shut up and get out." With Dolly gone, he quickly turns back to his original subject. "Does he think I'm fuckin' afraid?"
Downstairs, Dan is having a smoke when Langrishe comes in. Al comes down to greet him. "Less throb today, one hopes, in the phantom digit," Jack says, indicating Al's missing finger. "Not to fucking mention elsewhere, huh?" Al mumbles. One begins to worry that Dolly's reputation is going to suffer from what appears to be Al's Hearst-induced stress impotence. Langrishe asks him what he knows about Joanie. He tells him about her former work as a whoremistress, and about Wolcott's activities at the Chez Amie. "Hearst's geologist killed three of her girls," he explains. "The three he didn't she hid under canvas and spirited out of camp." He says that he has the impression that Joanie donates, rather than rents out, her building as a school house. "To cleanse the camp's idea of her?" Langrishe wonders. "Would that base her turning away a theater type's offer to buy?" Al says no, that wouldn't enter into it. "Cares for a gut-shot shitbird no one in camp has time for, nor she has any love for either. Loyal, see? That type." Jack wonders if she has some sentimental reason for not selling to him. "I wouldn't know, Jack," Al says, distracted by other issues on his mind. "She's all right." He starts mumbling about Hearst again. "Must think I'm a fucking dog," he says, scratching his bandage, "[that] forgives the blow, first friendly scratch of the ear." Langrishe is confused and Al explains that Hearst has sent another invitation for Al to come to his rooms. "Shall I accompany," Langrishe asks with noble theatrics, "as your second? My obvious unsuitability might confuse him." Al gives a little laugh and goes out. "Do survive," Jack says, and turns to see Dolly, giving him her best come-hither glance.
Al meets Cy in the lobby of the Grand Central. "Titans gather!" E.B. says, earning a quiet rebuke from Al. They ascend the stairs to Hearst's rooms. "I think Cochran's a lunger," Cy says. Al scoffs, indicating their various wounds: "Bit motley ourselves, huh?"
Outside, Bullock is still going up and down the thoroughfare, taking care of bidness. He strides up on Sol and with no preamble asks how much he'd say the livery was worth. Sol tries to say that he'd have to look into it, but Bullock interrupts that he needs an answer right now. "Twelve hundred, if you'd make me say without investigating," Sol says, but Bullock is already walking away. Okay, I'm not busting on him, but -- sometimes, because Olyphant doesn't really move his arms when he does his Bullock walk, he has a bit of Muppet flair when he makes a quick exit.
Leon is at the bank, meeting with Mrs. Ellsworth under the close eye of Trixie. He tells her he's laying by for the future and makes a deposit. Their whole conversation is loaded with a weird tension, which we will no doubt come to understand at a later time. He mistakenly calls her Mrs. Garret and is very apologetic when corrected. They are interrupted when Bullock strolls in. "I'd like that drunk Steve to have a loan," he says. "Twelve hundred, title to the livery as collateral. I'll cosign the note." Alma calmly asks if Steve has clear title, and Bullock says he will, once he's bought out Hostetler. "What is Steve-the-Drunk's surname?" she asks. Um, Asshole? Buttface? Chickenshit? No, apparently, it's Fields. Hello! Isn't that also the NG's surname? How I love it. She takes him over to Trixie and asks her to write out the paperwork, which she does, though it's clear Trixie hates doing anything for Bullock. Leon makes a big show of signing his deposit slip, causing Alma to look on in what appears to be fascination and disgust.
At the big meeting in Hearst's rooms, Al stands right by the door as Cy sits before Hearst who, complaining of back pain, leans back against an angled board. "We pass another milestone," he says. "Bank of Deadwood opens its doors. Is not Mrs. Ellsworth a dynamo?" Al ain't in the mood for chit-chat. "What's the occasion?" he asks. "I've my physician to see." Hearst asks how he's indisposed. Maybe, Hearst, he's indisposed by that missing FINGER that YOU chopped OFF. Al says instead that he's sick at his stomach. Hearst begins his roundabout discussion. The camp's progress impedes his own, yadda yadda, blabbity blab, he doesn't like Bullock, etc., etc., and Al finally has to interrupt and ask if he's leaving and, if so, "can you say it straight out before I have a fucking birthday?" Awesome. Hearst confirms that yes, he'll be coming and going from camp for the foreseeable future -- which is weird and makes me wonder why he had Aunt Lou come all the way there -- and Al again grows impatient. "What's the task you'd give us?" he asks, belligerently. "And what's our fuckin' piece for doing 'em?" His directness makes Cy nervous. "Al..." he cautions, but Al tells him to shut up. Hearst says their task will be "to not let become over-onerous my interests encounter with the camp's retrogressive elements." Oh, okay then. This is too circumspect even for Al, and it pisses him off. "Meaning what, you phony bastard?" he yells. "Who do we kill? What's our pay?" May I say how happy I am to see Pissed Off Al returned to us? Thank you. Cy, ever cautious, remarks that it's not fair for Al to put it in such simple terms. "Fuck you," Al counters. "He took the pick to me simple enough." Hearst says they will get to numbers quickly once they've agreed in principle. "Numbers," Al explains, "are the only principle I believe in, and naming what the numbers buy." He looks at Cy. "When you and [Hearst] come to 'em," he says, "tell fucking Adams and he'll bring you my reply later." He points a thumb at Hearst. "Him and me," he tells Cy, "we've had our last word." With that, he makes a swift exit. Downstairs, E.B. jovially asks what the gods have decreed. "Too fearful and upset to relive it, E.B.," Al declares, not at all fearful, and waves his bandaged hand.
Outside, Bullock is talking to Jane and Charlie about this whole Steve/Hostetler drama. "Charlie read me the telegram, then I seen 'em come into camp..." she recounts, "my exact fuckin' thought: Look, Jane, two dead n*ggers leading a dead fucking horse." Charlie says that should the matter have come to rope, it would be Steve the Drunk cinching the noose. Man, how did Steve get this nickname out of all the drunk bastards in camp? Jane says that Charlie's right. "Fucking Steve," she says, shaking her head. "The exact type malicious cocksucker tars every fucking drunk with his brush." Brilliant on so many levels.
They are interrupted by Trixie who begrudgingly delivers the loan documents to Bullock. "This succeeds, Bullock, what you're trying to work out here," Jane tells him as he walks away, "I will doff hat to you, and no fuckin' mistake." Charlie comments to Jane now about Joanie maybe selling her building, and a look of real worry crosses her face. Aw, Jane. Bullock picks up the documents from Trixie who tries to communicate, to no avail because she won't come right out with it, her concerns about the bad element hanging around the bank. I watched this a few times before I got it -- she's worried about Leon selling dope to Alma. Of course he doesn't get it, and you know how it makes Trixie mad when people don't divine her meaning out of thin air, so she calls him an asshole and marches away.
A very pretty, unknown woman descends the stairs at the Grand Central. "Trailing clouds of glory," E.B. says, complimenting her loveliness. "Do you read Wordsworth?" she asks, polite. E.B., no doubt surprised that she would speak to him, answers that he does not, and asks why she would ask. "You've just quoted him," she explains. "Well, I have a digest from which I memorize," he says, "suppressing the authors' names." He tells her to enjoy her supper and she turns to go into the restaurant. "When," E.B. whispers to himself, "will I raise courage to search that woman's room?" Whoever this woman is, and I hope we soon find out, she already has a rep with Aunt Lou. "Don't look to take her order," the cook whispers to Richardson about the woman. "She likes to draw awhile before she eats." Nearby, Claudia and the other member of Langrishe's company, the countess, read mail from the rest of their troupe who are reportedly having a difficult time getting out of Nebraska or some place like that -- I can't worry about, and do not care about, these damn people until they show up! Quit taking me away from the action! There are too many fools to keep up with already without adding invisible ones.
At another table, Joanie is putting her deal forward to Langrishe. They come to an understanding about the Chez Amie/theater/schoolhouse arrangement. Langrishe is very kind to Joanie, which makes me like him even more (as if that's even possible, considering he played by the insanely brilliant Brian Cox).
The NG strains to look over Bullock's shoulder at the livery as they watch Hostetler review the sale agreement. "Why ain't he sign first?" Hostetler asks of Steve. "Why ain't I half a foot taller?" the NG asks, attempting levity, but Bullock quietly says that Hostetler is the one he came to first. Hostetler says the deal looks fair and good to him, and that when Steve signs it, so will he. "I'm not a goddamn errand boy, Hostetler," Bullock angrily reminds him, "to mule this thing back and forth." The NG is just as worried and desperate as Bullock to see this shit done with and says he'll sign the damn thing, himself, but Hostetler is firm. He won't sign until Steve does. Bullock is over it, but snatches the paper and walks out.
My boyfriend -- I MEAN -- Adams is finally on the scene, though he gets a berating from Al for having been off visiting Hawkeye. Someone remind me why Al hates Hawkeye specifically? I recall that he dresses like a leprechaun. Maybe that's why? Oh, wait -- is he on the dope? Anyway, Adams is slightly offended that Al hates his little buddy so much and says that Hawkeye isn't really the douchebag Al claims. For this, he earns a smack in the mouth. Not the day to be arguing with Al. "Who you believe you can salvage, Adams, is the douchebag you must avoid, and no effort of yours can preclude some point past help," Al says, and rightly so. Do y'all know how many women would be so much better off if they'd just heed that advice about their scummy boyfriends? ARE YOU LISTENING BRITNEY? The one you think you can save is the very one you should stay away from! Al goes on that if he one day finds Adams dead as a result of his friendship with Hawkeye, "I'll kick your corpse in the ear for the waste of my fucking time." Adams is sufficiently chagrined and gives Al an "okay, Dad," look, finally asking what Al needed to see him about in the first place. Al tells him he's named him to represent him and Cy in this new arrangement with Hearst. Adams is a little surprised he's chosen him over Dan, but Al explains that he needs to have someone who can at least give the appearance of having a willingness to betray Al. "If that's supposed to be a compliment, thanks," Adams says, sighing. Al says he knows Adams is loyal -- and, really, he's right. Dan could never fake a betrayal of Al.
Al leaves him to greet Langrishe, who announces his ownership of the Chez Amie. He tells Al about Joanie's schoolhouse stipulations. "That should go up prior," Al says, "not to interrupt the fucking teachin'." Jack smirks. "Your law-giving tone," he says, "is noted." He looks over to see Dolly working her magic on him, again, and comments that she has a lovely smile. "She sucks my prick," Al says, remembering the utter failure of his earlier BJM. "Her methods deserted her completely." Jack suggests that varying the hour of his, er, Dolly activities, might produce a different result. "What's the hour's relevance?" Al asks, angrily. "It's her technique's fuckin' awry." He waves Jack off, saying he's got to go have his ear pissed in, says he's glad about the new theater, and walks off. "Thank you, young man. Glad you're still amongst us," Jack calls after him. "Nor, one imagines, is the local creek rife with oysters." Haw? I can only assume this is an aphrodisiac reference to Al's sexual issues, but it's so weirdly tacked on as the last part of Jack's suggestion about varying the hour, that I had to pretty much write out the whole paragraph and diagram that mess to figure it out. And I'm not completely sure I'm right.
"I'm on board, Bullock," Steve is saying as he looks over the livery agreement down at Nuttall's. He makes a big show of thanking the sheriff for his hard work on the matter, but the ASS won't SIGN the thing. Bullock is so through with this crap, he smacks Steve in the mouth AGAIN and chokes up on his shirt collar AGAIN. Ah, but now Nuttall's is full, and Steve is not going to be caught in front of all these hooples signing the agreement before Hostetler. I'm with the NG -- I've got a bad feeling about all of this.
Back at the Gem, Al's getting his ear pissed in. Dan's feelings are hurt, he says, over Al choosing Adams to be his second. Once again, Al has to placate one of his boys and their PMSy moods. "Fucking point is," Al repeatedly tries to explain, "you'd never go against me. Tolliver knows. I need someone he don't know that about." Dan says that though he and Al have never been through stuff with Adams as they have with each other, he doesn't think Silas would go agin' them. Al agrees. He pauses before sighing heavily. "Fuckin' Doc," he says. "What's his problem?" Dan asks. Al: "Think he's a fuckin' lunger." Dan can hardly stand it. "Jesus Christ," he says quickly, shaking his head. "It is one fuckin' thing after another."
Al makes his way back onto the saloon floor, passing Dolly. "Observe a decent interval," he says, not looking at her, "and we'll give it another fuckin' whirl."
Bullock is stuck, frozen in front of the hardware store. The crazy gleam in his eye is indicative of his absolute fatigue related to this livery crap. Sol comes out of the store and sees him there. "Keep 'em separate. Agree on a time tomorrow when their dicks will be down," Sol says. "Have 'em sign simultaneous." Bullock turns to face him, smiling, and Sol shrugs as if to say "you should have asked me in the first place."
Ellsworth and Sophia are playing checkers as Mrs. E looks out the window. Ellsworth proudly tells the little girl how lovely Alma was at the bank, and how strong and important a business woman she is. Alma smiles until she sees Leon skulking around outside across the way. "I'll take the air just briefly," she tells her family, going out, presumably, to meet her dealer. "I'll continue," Ellsworth says, so happy, "to get beaten at checkers." Dammit, dammit. When I said it would be interesting for Alma to get back on the junk, I really did not mean at the expense of Ellsworth. Boo.
Mose keeps watch over Joanie's place while she and Jane drink inside. They must be talking about where they'll live after the Chez Amie is sold, because without provocation, Jane boozily says that "any fucking domicile but the graveyard suits me fine. Don't you worry about me. I got things taken care of over here." Joanie is quiet. I don't know, either," Joanie says. She is more firm when she says that what she does know is that Jane is welcome wherever she goes. Jane is moved. She strides to Joanie and takes her hand and shakes it. I wait for them to embrace, but Jane backs away. She covers her emotion with a joke, asking if Mose is invited to their new destination. "'Cause I think you'd have to widen some doorways, if he is." Joanie says she hasn't talked to Mose about it. "Well, he can be watchman, then," Jane says, officially. "I have no issue with that." As much to herself as to Jane, Joanie says they will figure the rest out when the time comes. They stand there for another minute in this profound silence before Jane breaks it to ask "where would the stage be?" Joanie says she doesn't know. "Yeah," Jane says, "I don't know either. Ain't our line, I guess."
The Bullocks are in bed. Hot married action! No, sorry. They are holding hands, though, and he has been telling her about his ridiculous day. "Please see that no harm comes to that horse," she asks. He says he will and sighs. "And then," he goes on, "after their watches were synchronized, another hour studying them like idiots to see if one gained on the other." Poor Bullock. He sighs again, and remembering the one who helped him out this evening, says his friend's name: "Sol."
Al and Dolly are at it again. And...again, it ain't happening. "It's not the fucking hour," Al insists. "It's not the fucking vantage of the chair. It's you -- that's changed the level of your suction somehow. That's the fucking sum and substance of it." Dolly wonders if it will help if she gets up on her knees. "You're the cocksucker," Al says, for once using that word in its proper context. "Change the fucking angle." She moves around and tries again. This time Al complains of too much suction. It's like the three bears of blow jobs in here. Dolly tries yet again as Al continues to complain. "Advice from third fucking parties," he grumbles. "Place a table on the boardwalk, people can jot their suggestions, roll in the muck of the thoroughfare in gales of fucking laughter." Without acknowledging it, he makes the connection between his Hearst drama and his limp dick. "I did not shame myself," he says, grabbing Dolly's hair and looking her in the eyes. "I keep an open mind in that area. Kid yourself about your behavior, you'll never learn a fuckin' thing." He lets her go, saying he knew the whole finger-chopping thing was coming, anyway. "Fucking Captain, holding me down," he says. "I knew what the fuck was ." Dolly, like a dumbass, need clarification, wondering if he's talking about the Captain chopping off his finger. "He didn't chop off my finger," Al angrily corrects."Hearst chopped my fucking finger off. The other fuck held me down. They hold you down, you...you can't get at them to help yourself." Perhaps sensing his own vulnerability, Al hugs himself, saying it's cold. Dolly innocently asks if he wants a blanket. "If I do I'll put it round me," he snaps. "You ain't boss of the fucking bedclothes." He sighs again. "They hold you down from behind, then you wonder why you're helpless," he goes on. "How the fuck could you not be?!" Very quietly, Dolly shows she understands all too well: "I don't like it, either."
But Al's off down memory lane, letting his new beating get mixed up with the old. "Another one that held me down, that fuckin' proctor when I tried to get to that ship," he says, talking again about his mother leaving him. "He fuckin' held me, fuckin' wouldn't let me go." He says in his mind, his mother was being restrained and couldn't get off the boat to "go suck prick in Georgia." He wanted to go to her -- in his head, she had changed her mind and wanted to stay with him, "and I was being restrained by that fat bastard orphanage proctor." God, the sadness. "Anyway, that's it. That's the end of it," he says, throwing up his hands. "That's the fucking conclusion." His emotion overcomes him and he pounds his fist on the desk, shouting. "Christ, I'd have wished to...!!" He remembers that he's not alone and turns back to Dolly. "Though probably she'd have thrown me overboard anyway," he says, "but I'd have wished to get to that fucking ship." But, he says, he was being restrained. "I couldn't get from where she'd left me," he says. "He held me to that bed, her calling from the ship that had changed her mind." Dolly feels his pain. "I don't like it, either," she says, again. "No, huh?" Al says, half-listening through his drunken sadness. Then, of course, he realizes he doesn't know what she means. "When they hold you down," Dolly explains, her lip quivering. Al has a moment of clarity. "I guess I do that, huh," he says, "with your fucking hair?" Dolly, protecting herself now, says no. "No?" he asks, and smile, toasting her with a shot. "Well, bless you for a fucking fibber."