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AL! IS! BACK!
Alma, on her morning walk to the bank, is the victim of warning shots fired by Hearst's goons. She is rescued by none other than Al, resulting in her first ever visit to the Gem Saloon. Al talks her into taking the sweet, sweet path of revenge served cold. She completes her walk to the bank, solo, under the watchful eye of Al's team, and against the wishes of a nervous Ellsworth.
Drama of a non-theatrical variety is going on with Langrishe's troupe. Two women -- one the dancer who we saw last week at the amateur night, the other the reserved artist staying at the Grand Central (and possibly his...wife?) -- cause Jack no end of personal torment. He invites the dancer to move into the theater, which causes the artist to leave camp. Lord only knows what any of it means, but it really upsets Claudia.
Hearst thinks he's shown Al and the rest of the camp who's boss, and who could blame him? After all, Al's been on the fence for nine episodes, not making any sudden moves. Well, NO MORE! When Hearst sends the Head Brick over with a thinly-veiled brag about the Alma incident, Al stomps the guy nearly to death and THEN slits his throat. Oh, it's good to have him back. Want more? The full recap starts right below!
It's morning at the Bella Union and Doc has come to check up on Cy who has apparently messed around and reopened his stab wounds somehow and...nobody cares at all. Doc gives him a speech about how stupid he is, says if Cy ever does this again he won't treat him, and leaves on a powerful, but not quite as painful as earlier this season, coughing fit.
At Shaunessey's, Langrishe is modestly asking the prissy little innkeeper if the mysterious "gypsy" woman who danced at the amateur night is staying there. Shaunessey turns on his snoot meter. "And what would your business with her be, if she had?" he asks, giving Langrishe pause. "To hear my fortune told," he answers, cold. Shaunessey draws himself up, offended. "There'll be none of that on these premises," he says, like a one man chapter of Focus on the Family, and Langrishe calls him out. "Nor were those my true intentions," he says, flatly. "Your query is impertinent." With that, he smacks a handful of coins down on the desk and asks again if the lady is there. The money causes Shaunessey to have the sudden memory that she is in 2-C. Langrishe smiles, looking pointedly at all the innkeeper's self-righteous Bible verse signs tacked up everywhere. "As your faith must proscribe receiving bribes," he drones, "credit the five toward her stay."
Aunt Lou brings Hearst his breakfast in the dining room where he sits with the disgusting Jarry. He melodramatically tells her that he'll call her as soon as hears anything from the freight office about Odell's remains. She barely mutters a frigid "all right" before walking away.
Langrishe has found his mystery woman. Y'all...okay. I have no IDEA who she is. What has become of me and this show? Normally, even if I have to translate it, I at least get it. I have a few theories -- she's Langrishe's daughter; or his lover; or...a really well made-up Thai transvestite he picked up on his travels...I don't know. And this is what makes me sad about this show ending in two episodes -- I bet this storyline was eventually going to be crazy good and interesting. I know we can't see it now, and that the troupe has generally been getting on all our nerves, but...wait, wait. What if she's AL'S DAUGHTER? Huh? Huh? How you like that one? No, fine, I don't really think that, but I'm at a loss. Langrishe is mixed up with two mystery women in this episode, and this is merely the first. Anyway, he is in her room, telling her that should she wish to do so, she can apply to The Countess to join the troupe. "The devout Shaunessey," he says, "has a week in advance to your account." In some indiscernible accent, she tells him to get the cash back from Shaunessey. "I will not," she says, "take money from you." Langrishe is exasperated. "Are you not being quite absurd," he yells, "in the self-serving way of your sex?" She says she's come to Deadwood "for learning." He points out that to learn, she must live, and wonders how she'll make a living amidst the thoroughfare's depravities. Holding her head high, she moves toward him. "Let me stay in the theater," she says, and he is once again nonplussed. "At a minimum for the career to which you aspire," he laughs at the would-be actress, "you show the requisite presumption."
In the Grand Central's restaurant, Jarry is kissing Hearst's ass, saying how great the Grand Central is now that he's bought it. Hearst seems bored by this and looks out the window to watch Mrs. Ellsworth as she makes her way down the street to the bank. She nods to Al, who also watches from his balcony as he has his coffee.
A few tables over, Langrishe is congratulating his staff on a job well done at amateur night. Claudia puts on a little performance of her own -- there were apparently points in the evening she didn't quite love. "What about the beautiful harem dance," she snarks, passive-aggressively, "by that darling little dark-haired prostitute?"
Back outside, Alma continues her stroll. Suddenly, a bullet whizzes past her face and into the side of a building. For a split-second, she freezes, shocked. Charlie is already running toward her when the second shot hits right behind her head. "Make yourself fuckin' small, Ms. Ellsworth," Charlie yells as she scrambles. Hearst watches all from his seat the restaurant window, calmly commenting to Jarry about the events, while all around the thoroughfare, everyone takes cover. Everyone, that is, but Al. Because, y'all, Al is running for the balcony's edge. He doesn't even pause before jumping over, scanning the area like he's in Nam, and racing to help Charlie drag Alma across the street. Adams comes flying out to assist, ready for action, but Al is thinking ten steps ahead. "Get to the fuckin' schoolhouse," he yells. "[Give] particular attention to the foundling. And send fuckin' Trixie over here." Adams reverses quickly, throwing a hand up in understanding, and takes off in the other direction. Meanwhile, Hearst has casually made his way out to the hotel's porch, hands in pockets, not a care in the world. Langrishe, behind him, looks worriedly toward the action. "Oh, just some nonsense among the ordinaries, sir," Al calls to Hearst. "Getting' Mrs. Ellsworth under cover." Hearst looks mildly upset, perhaps wondering why none of his ingenious plans ever seem to work out in Deadwood. "Excess of fuckin' caution," Al goes on, shoving Alma ahead, "but you, yourself, sir, are absolutely safe!" HA. In your bloated, bearded, buttface, Hearsty. Seriously y'all, when Al jumped off that balcony, I leapt from my seat with my arms in the air like a Venezuelan soccer fan.
He and Charlie have made it into the Gem with Mrs. Ellsworth, and while everybody stumbles around, blown away by these events, the old Al emerges, powerful and in control, and ready to KICK some ASS. He commands Charlie to go and wire Bullock in Sturgis with a telegram saying his return is urgently required. "In fuckin' generalities only," he cautions, "otherwise that maniac'll come back shooting." Charlie nods, still speechless, and turns to go out the front door. "No, not that way!" Al yells. "Don't want that cocksucker knowing nothing of our business." He has Johnny show him the secret passage. Sweet, sweet, sweet. There is nobody I love more than sneaky, hatin', Vengeful Al.
Back at the hotel, that cocksucker is strolling back inside. "Oughtn't someone look out for who fired?" he drones and E.B, ever prepared to play both sides, sends Richardson to look into it. Oh, yes. Richardson is perfect for that job. He's quite the detective. At the troupe's table, the Countess asks her boss what happened. Langrishe: "The business of others."
Alma's visit to the Gem has caused quite a stir among the employees. Not enough of a stir to get them to put their clothes on, mind you, as is evidenced by one of the girls standing in the saloon completely topless. A bit much, wouldn't you say? I mean, what is it, eight in the morning? Does the joint get that much business from the breakfast crowd? Mrs. E is flabbergasted by this entire turn of events and sits, breathing heavy. "Shall we review the biddin' in my fuckin' office?" Al asks, as politely as he can. "I need to take off my corset," Alma answers, breathless and choking. Al shakes his head and assures her that "no one objects to that, here."
Mrs. Bullock is happily sorting the school kids when she sees Adams arrive outside the window. One of the boys stares out at their sudden visitor, but Adams sternly motions for him to turn back around and pay attention. Martha is confused by his presence but doesn't protest. (Who would?! Come stand outside my schoolhouse any time, Titus Welliver.) From her window across the street, Joanie watches all of this go down.
After nearly three seasons, Al has Alma right where he wants her -- in his office. She is still freaked out, and in his own way, Al is trying to comfort her. "Easily as it could have been some hooplehead, not knowing who or what he was shooting at," he remarks, "it's likely prudent to credit you as the target." Alma agrees as he pours them a round of shots. "If I'd been aimed at, of course," he jokes, "dozens of authors would need be considered." Still breathless, she agrees to that statement as well. Al sighs. "So I know someone's in there," he crabs, "vary your replies, such as, 'Yes, and I'd be one of them.'" To this, she can't agree. She raises her whiskey to him. "That wouldn't be very grateful of me," she says, downing the shot and gasping at the strength of it. Al has a moment of real sympathy. "It's horrible being shot at," he commiserates. "Never gets no better." They are interrupted by Trixie's arrival. "What the fuck?" she asks, rushing in. Al tells her to sit with the shell-shocked Mrs. E and Trixie follows him out for a quick consultation, asking who the fuck shot at Alma. "Who the fuck knows?" Al says, obviously stressing. "Hearst? Her first husband's family? They both work with the fuckin' Pinkertons. Maybe they're now allied...just you fuckin' look after that one 'til matters clarify." Dan comes upstairs, all suited up (with a tie!) for his rescheduled trip to Cheyenne.
"Cheyenne's off," Al announces. Dan's pissed. How many ties does Al think he has, anyway? He can't be getting all gussied up every other day for this trip tease! "Second-rate deployment, Dan," Al explains, "sending you off for reinforcements to come back to a camp in ruins." It's a good point, and proves that Al's tactics and fuckin' strategies are as sharp as ever. Dan gets it, but is still bitchy. Al makes him a generous offer, straight out of the Gem HR Benefits Handbook. "Whoever you intended to fuck [in Cheyenne]," he says, "send monies to bring her here." See? MY boss won't even reimburse my gas expenses. Dan purses his lips and stomps off. "Who I intended to fuck won't ride a stagecoach," he says, sourly. "Makes her puke."
Speaking of puking, Jewel has put a tray together in the Gem's kitchen (blech). "Toast and eggs or toast and bacon," she proudly announces to Al, as she heads for his office. "She can choose or she can mix 'em, whatever she wants." Al looks at her for one beat. "Why the fuck are you telling me?" he asks and Jewel scowls. Why's he got to ruin the excitement of having Alma in the joint? She starts her laborious ascent up the staircase. "Every step a fuckin' adventure," he mutters. He yells to Dan to go collect fuckin' Ellsworth, but says to tell him nothing of the shooting. "What am I to say I'm collecting him for?" Dan asks. Al: "Just knock him out and bring him in." Dan, aware of all the drama, asks Al if he wants to close the Gem for a while. "No, I don't want to close," Al insists. "Fuckin' Hearst's to see not one single sign on any fuckin' front that he's had half a c*nt hair's effect on any of the comings and goings in this camp." That's right, Al! Never let 'em see you sweat.
Charlie is back, reporting that the telegram has been sent to Bullock. Of course, since it's Charlie, he can't really get the story out without about nine paragraphs, but Al doesn't really bust him for it. "Should I relieve Adams at the schoolhouse?" Charlie asks, and Al actually responds, sincerely, with "Please." Charlie turns to leave, muttering all the way out the door. "Let Adams come back here, be available for whatever nefarious fuckin' carryings-on you assign him," he grumbles, "'cause I do not take orders from you." Now, now, Charlie.
Upstairs, Alma has released herself from the confines of her whalebone and is being offered a Gem breakfast by Jewel, who is so thrilled by her presence she doesn't even know what to do with herself. Mrs. Ellsworth doesn't quite know how to react, either. Trixie has to step in as the translator. "Before she eats," she jokes to Jewel, "she somersaults and don't want no one to see." Alma sighs. "In fact," she says, very politely, "I rarely eat before noon." Jewel, still smiling, says that maybe Mrs. E just hasn't found anything she likes to eat, yet. Trixie's had enough, and overly sharp, tells Jewel to beat it. Jewel frowns at her like she's ruining her fun, but she goes out, smiling at their guest. "Did you ever have bacon?" she asks Alma from the door. "I very well might," Alma says, cringing but still polite. Trixie gets up and shuts the door on Jewel, giving her the brush as Alma calls out a last thank you. "That was so considerate of her," she says to Trixie when they are alone. "Fascinated by you," Trixie explains, lighting up a cigarette. She sees that Mrs. E is still very upset about the morning's events. "If you saw who it was and want to say," she offers, "I wouldn't have to tell Al." Alma assures her she didn't see the shooter. "And," she adds, "I'm very grateful to be under Mr. Swearengen's protection." Trixie gives her the mildest of smirks. "Yeah," she says, "he's a prince." Alma: "In the sheriff's absence, I mean." This gets a bigger smirk. "Good a place as any for you to be," she pointedly agrees, "in the sheriff's absence." Pondering all this bullshit, she laughs a little and goes out on the landing to see Jewel still making her way down the stairs. "She somersaulted and et and says her entire fuckin' dietary outlook has changed," Trixie calls. Jewel is thrilled. "What plate did she et from?" she asks. "She et," Trixie says, smiling, "from them fuckin' both." Aw. Sometimes the cycle of abuse is so fast on this show, I get whiplash.
For some unknown reason, Hearst has invited the sickening Jarry back to his room for a chat. "What a world," Jarry facetiously remarks. "A woman in innocent transit. A wayward shot from some watering hole, do you suppose, prompted by a surfeit or spirits, exuberant punctuations of some sort?" Hearst sighs, hating him as much as the rest of us do. "Do you believe anything you say?" he asks. Jarry says he is merely hypothesizing. "And have you some private hypothesis," Hearst asks, sick of all him frontin', "as to my possible role?" Jarry pretends to be confused: "In the shooting at Mrs. Ellsworth?" he asks. "In the rising of the sun," Hearst shoots back, his massive ego clearly still intact. Jarry continues to lay on the smarm. "I would hypothesize as to the latter possibility, sir," he says, "before imagining you involved with the first." Hearst is over all this foolishness. "Oh come, Jarry. My holdings butt up against hers; I value efficiencies and economies of consolidation," he points out. "Haven't I reason to nudge her toward a sale?" Jarry puts on airs like he is offended anyone would even suggest such a thing. Hearst is obviously contemplating the ethics of murdering someone for merely kissing his ass. Still, Jarry continues. "Men of a certain caliber cannot allow fastidious morality to distract them from the exigencies of commerce, can they, Mr. Hearst?" he asks. "And did you heave up your responsibilities upon broad and reconciled shoulders?" Hearst answers this bloviation with a terse "no." Jarry postulates that "perhaps then, rather, at this moment you are Socrates to my Alcibiades, taken it upon yourself to edify me." Vrrrt! The needles comes off the record at this little party. Hearst gets in Jarry's face. "Are you saying," he asks, "you want to fuck me?" Whoa! Sex in the Not-Yet-Incorporated City! For his part, Jarry looks just as shocked as the rest of us. "Well, you keep calling yourself Alcibiades to my Socrates," Hearst snaps. "Are you proposing some sort of homosexual connection between us?" Jarry swallows hard (eeek! not like that!). "I forgot that part of the story. He says, and gulps again as Hearst has a whispered conversation with someone who has just knocked on the door. When Hearst turns back, Jarry is on his knees. I cover my face in pain thinking that we're finally going to see some man love on this show and it will be between the last two guys I'd want to see get it on. But no, Jarry's just pledging his loyalty. "But, if I were courting you, Mr. Hearst, I claim no allure of my own," he says, "suggesting only the mutuality of our interests concerning the upcoming elections grants my suit some small virtue. As you gaze upon me, sir, recall that some unions of convenience may outlast those conceived in passion." Wow. Hearst is not impressed. You have to wonder if, in dealing with all these idiots, he ever regrets firing ol' Wolcott who, though he was, you know, a sadist and a killer, at least did not get on every last one of Hearst's nerves. He tells Jarry to get up and get back to Yankton. "Elections cannot inconvenience me," he reminds him. "They ratify my will or I neuter them." Jarry agrees that this is a compelling perspective.
The Gem has another unlikely visitor this morning. Al is at the bar, face to face with none other than a terrified Richardson. "What are you doin' here?" Al asks. Richardson says he's too afraid to explain. Johnny notices that Richardson has a note pinned to his shirt. "Take it off him," Al says, still staring at Richardson like he's in the zoo. "Then stick him in the eye with the fucking pin." Aw, Al. Uncalled for. Richardson winces, but Johnny assures him that Al didn't mean it. Al reads the note and looks back at his guest. "Tell him: 'Nothing,'" he says to Richardson who nods, saying he'll just keep quiet. "No," Al explains, exhausted by all this. "Tell E.B., 'Nothing's going on,' and then tell him 'If I wanted to tell you anything, I'd have told you. Don't send the imbecile over with no more notes.'" Richardson finally looks at Al's face. "I cain't remember awl thayut!" he says. Al asks if he can remember "nothin's going on." Richardson says yes, and leaves, saying "thank yeewww." Heeee! Al watches him go out, and then turns to see Dan depositing the knocked-out Ellsworth in Barney's barber chair. Tom Nuttall comes in. "The Mrs. Ellsworth was shot at?" he asks, incredulous. "Got her upstairs," Al clarifies, pulling out a bottle of whiskey. "I figured...we'd hunker down till matters clarify." He asks Davey, who has been at the door, what Richardson said as he walked out. Davey: "'The girls in here are pretty.'" Al shakes his head and they all take a shot.
Hearst is in conference with the Head Brick re: the shooting. "The fool husband ought soon appear," he says. "Some small number to deal with his dudgeon, main force in reserve for Bullock." The HB pauses a little, maybe he doesn't like his job all that much, and says okay. Oooh, I hates the Hearstses. Small number to deal with Ellsworth? How bout I take a small number...two pencil and shove it up your nose? HUH?
Al's pacing behind the bar while the fellas shoot the breeze with Nuttall, who wants to know their opinions on how the election's going. "How did sentiment incline in this joint when Bullock and Harry spoke last?" he asks. Dan says everybody was glad when the speeches were finished. "As to who had the upper hand?" Tom clarifies. Adams can't control a laugh. "Fuckin' cross-legged pose your man struck, Tom," he says, "[he] may have swayed the diarrhea faction." Johnny nods. "Creek was having its way with Harry," he confirms. Al's not listening to any of this scatological chat. "The fuck was the logic," he asks Dan, "when [Hearst] sent that giant Captain to fight you?" Dan: "Get me killed." Al disagrees. "It wasn't to get you killed," he says, as if he's just seeing it all clearly. "His man finally kills you after a more or less equal fight? Out of boredom's why he put that fight together. Same with this too -- fucking shots at her fore and aft." Trixie steps out, saying she's got to run back to the hardware store to reassure her Jew. Tom ruminates on Hearst's emotional problems. "Wants to see he's made people afraid," he says, "so he knows he's a fucking big shot." Al says he's exactly fucking correct. "If this was overture to an onslaught," he says, "he'd have let them pistoleros loose by now to start the actual killing." He congratulates Tom on making the keenest of fucking assessments. Dan, who has not yet changed out of his traveling clothes, points out that these keen fucking assessments might argue for him making that trip to Cheyenne. But Al says no, the trip would take too long. "He ain't waiting no fuckin' week, Dan," he says. Trixie, on her way out, makes a parting shot. "I leave here full of confidence," she snarks, "knowing you're all thinking in concert." Good one, Trixie.
Al continues. "I'd as soon not die fighting twenty-five against four," he says to Dan, "you being my missing fifth, the equal of ten of Hearst's fucking mercenaries, and Bullock, who's no fucking slouch either, if he ever gets the fuck back, bringing the odds closer to even." Johnny reminds everyone that Trixie's Jew's got sand when the chips are down. Al is at a loss. "I'd trust a fucking wire to Cheyenne," he says, "if I knew someone to send it to." Leaning on the bar, Adams pauses. He doesn't want to say it, but..."Far as that," he tells Al, "there's Hawkeye." Al doesn't even pause before he punches him in the face. Come on, Al! I know you're stressed out, but uh, don't go smacking my man. "You were told never to say his name," he reminds Adams, who doesn't appreciate being punched, even by his mentor. "Well, now I did," Adams says, his voice raised. "And I'd trust him to hire the guns." Al is not having it. He really hates that little leprechaun. "And the hiring to take place where?" he snaps back. "Up that squaw's c*nt he's fucking?" Adams says Hawkeye's squaw is in Lead, not Cheyenne. Still, Al is all skepticism. "Did he take vows of abstinence in Cheyenne?" he says. "Do they let him have wires in his monastery?" Good one, Al. Adams is offended on behalf of his tiny pal. "I'd trust Hawkeye, once he learned the situation," Adams assures him in a put-upon tone, "to hire the guns without stealing, to herd 'em back here to help us out, not stopping to get laid in Lead." (That has a very musical lilt to it, doesn't it? "Get Laid In Lead?" I file it away for future use.)
Johnny asks the important question: can Hawkeye read? "He can," Adams says, "and I can put my words such in the wire, he'll take my meaning and prying cocksuckers won't." Al concedes. "Go get the fucking Russian," he says, "send the fucking wire." Adams goes off with this unspoken half-apology from Al, who turns his rage back on Hearst. "We want his piss pot's play hours occupied by confusion and grievance," he declares, with menace. "We want him sitting, sulking like a three-year-old whose toys won't do his biddin'. As Johnny takes the metaphor a step too far, talking about his jack-in-the-box that never worked, Al studies Alma's discarded hat. "If she'd complete her walk to the bank," he says, thinking aloud, "she'd confound this motherless c*nt." With his plan in place, he yells for Jewel to prepare tea for two, on a fucking tray.
Jane and Joanie are talking to Charlie at his post outside the schoolhouse. They've come to ask him if they can relieve him, but he wonders if they've gotten this directive from Al. "When did you start giving that cocksucker Swearengen a 'by your leave' and 'if you fucking say so?'" Jane asks him, loudly. "All's I asked, Jane," Charlie says, "[is] did he know you was relieving me?" Jane makes Charlie's bad day worse, suggesting that maybe Al's taken charge in Bullock's absence because Charlie isn't up to the job. Pure mean drunkenness. "We just thought we could release you to other responsibilities, Mr. Utter," the sweet Joanie assures him. "And I could run get you if they hetted up." Jane snaps that this is, of course, assuming the unlikely need to do so. Charlie grumbles an "all right" and heads off, leaving Joanie to grimace about Jane's behavior. Jane senses this: "That's how you have to fuckin' deal with him."
Ellsworth is coming to in one of the Gem's back rooms. He's all tied up, laid out on one of the sofas. "How you doin' Ellsworth?" Dan asks, casually. "What the fuck did you hit me for?" Ellsworth asks, wincing from the pain in his head. "You realize that was me?" Dan asks, surprised his knockout is so well known. 'All right, I'll tell you what happened; fill you in on the full fucking circumstance." He helps the abused Ellsworth sit up and takes a seat on the stool in front of him. "Now, uh," he starts, sighing, "Mrs. Ellsworth is completely safe." It's a good try, but Ellsworth immediately freaks and starts struggling with his bonds. "Calm down or I will hit you over the fuckin' head again," Dan cautions. "Maybe use some more of them spirits under your goddamn nose." Please calm down, Ellsworth! The awesome, awesome W. Earl Brown wrote this episode and can kill you at any time! Ellsworth, as calmly as he can, asks what happened. "Well," Dan tries again, choosing his words carefully, "there was some completely-no-fuckin'-damage-done gunfire taken at Mrs. Ellsworth, fore and aft." As Ellsworth freaks anew and recommences his fight with the ropes, Dan quickly adds that "she couldn't be no better!" Somehow, call him crazy, Ellsworth does not find this reassuring. "I'll kill that cocksucker!" he spits. "You get out of my way or I'll kill you fucking first." Um, Ellsworth, did you not just wake up with a dent in your head? Placed there by this guy in front of you, himself? Right. "Fruitless struggle, Ellsworth," Dan reasons, "and stupid goddamn thinkin'." He rhetorically asks why the shooters wouldn't have just blown Alma's head off if they really wanted to, but Ellsworth is in no mood for logic and puts up an even bigger fight on his bindings. "Calm down and think about it!" Dan shouts. "They took shots at her fore and aft so that you would come running; so they could do to you what they could have done to her but they didn't," he explains. "And to Bullock too, maybe." Have I mentioned how much I adore the way Dan says "Bohllock?" That's not really the right phonetic spelling, but his Kentucky accent is so fabulous on that name, I smile every time. Ellsworth is beginning to at least understand the issue, no matter how much he may hate it. "So," Dan concludes, "do you see how goddamn irresponsible it would have been of me to allow you full fucking conscious movement?" He puts Ellsworth's hat back on for him, and reaches for his knife. "I'm gonna cut loose them throttles," he says, "but you best not make me regret it."
Upstairs, Al is spelling it out to the once again corseted Alma. "Them shots were meant for maybe rethinking your tenure here, huh?" he suggests, as they calmly take tea. "Maybe too, in the aftermath, the shots' author had designed Mr. Ellsworth would be moved to take steps -- or Sheriff Bullock would -- that would justify a violent answer." Alma sees all. "The author," she notes, totally nauseated with rage, "being Mr. Hearst." Al nods. He says that it's either Hearst alone or in conjunction with Brom Garret's family, with the Pinkertons thrown in to make it all worse. He brings her up to date on his plan, and I must say, this is possibly my favorite Alma scene ever. I love, for one thing, the way Al talks to her, with the utmost respect, and secondly, how quickly she processes it all. "We've wired Bullock to counsel restraint," Al tells her. "We've Ellsworth trussed up downstairs." He pauses, seeing that she is worried. "Little in the past commends me to your trust," he goes on. "I'd ask you, accepting the premise that you were bait, not quarry, [to] complete your walk to the bank." She looks past him, considering the implications, but Al's on a roll. "Get that fucking angler fulminatin'," he rallies, shaking his fist, "tanglin' his fuckin' tackle and the fuckin' like." Even lost in thought, Alma is present enough to whisper an admonition for his cursing. "Mr. Swearengen," she breathlessly says, and Al says he's sorry. And the thing is, y'all, he is. Can I just... I mean, you know, why is this show cancelled? Is anybody at HBO actually watching it? Is that the problem? Because these performances are unparalleled. It's simply the truth. Who do I have to blow to get every single person on this show, down to the extras, nine Emmy's and Golden Globes each? I mean, I won't do it, myself, but I'll send my proxy. Who's willing? You do not want to see the veins in my head bulge out whenever I see those Entourage ads, man.
Alma thinks for another second, expels a big sigh and nods. She'll do it. Moments later, she steps out of Al's office, fully rearranged in her jacket and hat, to see Ellsworth standing at the foot of the stairs. She smiles very sweetly at him and walks down. I am reminded of their wedding. Al watches, thoughtful. He lets her handle the whole thing with her husband.
Ellsworth's face is a mass of emotions. "I'm quite all right," she tells him, smiling. He sighs, very serious. "I thank God for it," he says. "And I'd be glad to keep you company the rest of your day." She takes a quick breath and tries to get through this part without upsetting him. "I'd be glad if you'd join me at the bank in a few minutes' time," she says, to his great confusion, "having made my way to the bank alone." He asks, frustrated, why she'd want to do that. Now, she was trying to be nice, but Alma is in no frame of mind to be second-guessed. She takes a tone. "To demonstrate," she explains, "his tactics' failure, and to bid defiance to him who shot at me." Ellsworth says he has an idea who it was that did this, and wouldn't mind killing him for it. Her patience is at its limit. "If the shots meant not to harm me but to provoke certain others," she asks, "wouldn't attempting that be playing into our adversary's strategy?" I agree with her, of course, but man, it kills me that she's telling off Ellsworth, who just wants to protect her. You know if this was Bullock swinging his dick around she'd be all about it. "If it ends with one between Hearst's eyes," Ellsworth says, "let me play to his strategy, and welcome." Well, you know, I see his point, too. Alma, however, is exhausted by all of this, and isn't backing down. "I hope instead you'd have dinner tonight with Sofia and me," she says, firmly, "all of us having passed the interval uneventfully." Ellsworth, very upset, shoots a look up to Al, who pretends not to be listening. "In any case," Alma goes on, strong, "please accede to my walking to the bank alone." She walks away, leaving him to stand there with his mouth open. She passes the Gem whores on the way out. They all stare after her, spellbound.
Al follows Ellsworth out onto the Gem's front boardwalk as Alma begins her walk of defiance. "I'd not have you step one more foot forward, Ellsworth," he says as they watch. Ellsworth doesn't even look at him: "As I fuckin' understand."
Alma's walk is a thing of beauty. Shooting a devastating glare up to Hearst, who has just stepped out on his roof, she goes, head high, down the thoroughfare. There are Pinkertons everywhere, but there is also Adams, with his shotgun. And Johnny, with his. And Dan, further down, still wearing his tie and ready for anything. Ellsworth's eyes pierce through the haze of the camp as he watches, and Alma makes it almost all the way to the bank before her nerves overtake her and she has to jog the last few steps. Up yours, Hearst. She slams the door.
Hearst is back in his room now, scribbling a communiqué for the HB to deliver to Al. "Last man took a note for you to Swearengen wound up dead," the HB says, kind of worried. Hearst's head snaps up. "The man you refer to knew the note he bore might bring about that outcome," he says in defense of Captain Turner's bloated honor. "This note's import's more innocuous. Will it make you less afraid to read it?" FIRST of all, fucker, it wasn't you who faced down Al's scorn and then had your eye gouged out, okay? You're just the dick who thought up that brilliant plan. The HB quickly backtracks. "I ain't afraid," he says, gesturing that he doesn't need to read the note. "I guess I made a poor joke." But, you know, Hearst is on his high-horse now and can't come down. "You do read?" he asks, pissy. The HB says yes, he does. Hearst demands, evilly, that he read it aloud "to prove you are lettered and not a liar unfit for my employ!" The HB, for being so tough last week, is nervous with the boss man. It won't be the last time I feel sorry for him before the hour is over. "'Thanks from all for your rescue of Mrs. Ellsworth,'" he reads. "'Who could have shot at her? Do you wish her guarded at the bank with the sheriff away? I saw you let her walk alone. Answer via bearer.'" Finished, he nods at Hearst, who can't be satisfied with having his orders followed and has to make sure the guy knows who's boss. "You don't read easily, do you?" Hearst taunts.
The fellas are at the bar, chilling, while Al reads over the note. They all stay perfectly still when Al invites the HB up to his office to wait while he composes his reply.
The Gem girls are back in their common room, sighing over the greatness of Mrs. Ellsworth. They wish aloud that they could sit and talk with her and ask her questions. "I'd have asked Jewel ask her, if I thought to ask," Jen says. "If I'd foreseen in time." Dolly says (in a voice far more sophisticated than we've ever heard her use with Al) that Jen would have only put Jewel in a bad position. "She talks to Trixie, the bank woman," Jen points out. "Why wouldn't she talk to us?" Another of the girls points out that Alma and Trixie know each other. None of them would have anything to talk to her about, she says, though she supposes they could start by mentioning Philadelphia, where she's from. "Got beautiful gracious manners there," another girl says of Philly, causing me to laugh long and hard and duck out of the way in fear of flying batteries. "Philadelphia," the other girl says, sighing, "its many gracious attractions." Dolly dreamily thinks of other subjects: "Her dress, her comportment." Jen blows out a plume of smoke from her cig. "She'd have fucking talked to us." Aw. Alma fangrrls.
We come now to Langrishe's meeting with his second mystery woman. She is the very lovely unknown woman we've been wondering about for a few episodes. Well, keep wondering. Here's what is clear: Her name's Mary and she's an artist who loves Langrishe and has been waiting for years to live with him openly, so she followed him to camp thinking, I guess, that Deadwood would be the perfect place for their love nest, only to find that the harlot gypsy woman is also there and will be moving into the theater. For some reason, this ruins everything, even though Jack swears he's "laid no carnal hand" to the other woman. "What does installing her accomplish [that] acknowledging me could not?" she asks, pained, sending Langrishe into a tizzy. "Jesus Christ!" he shouts. "Jesus Christ. That I'm old, that I've lost my belly for sham!" But...what's the sham? Isn't she asking him to STOP the sham and acknowledge her? Why can't I figure this out? I'm offended by the obtuseness. It's possible that, since Mary is staying in the hotel, he's been seeing her this whole time, but if so, they haven't made that clear enough. I could go insane trying to speculate, but since they concentrate on her artistry so heavily, I figure they're trying to reference a particular American artist or painter, but I don't know who it is, which makes me even madder. She picks up her book of drawings, imploring him to understand. "Every drawing I made in this sketchbook, every one I've dreamed of painting from," she says, "near a home where we'd live." Langrishe is upset by all of this and asks her to at least admit that he never asked her to love him. Bad form, Jack. Mary is shocked. Langrishe asks if she wants him to keep the sketches she's made. When she says no, he looks into her eyes and tells her to paint every fucking one. It'd be a very lovely scene -- the woman is gorgeous -- if 1) I understood it at all; and 2) that other woman didn't look a hell of a lot like this one, adding to my confusion.
Al and the HB are throwing back a few shots in his office. "How well do you know the other guy?" Al asks Hearst's current note bearer. "We served in the 69th in New York," the HB says of Captain Turner. Al takes a swig. "Was that a Mick regiment?" he asks. The HB drinks and smiles. "Mm-hmm," he says, "what were you doing?" Al raises an eyebrow and shrugs. "Cuttin' throats," he says. The HB, somehow, does not hear the bell fuckin' tolling for him over here. "I was asking whose flag you were under," he says. Al raises his glass as if in salute. "The famous cocksuckers' brigade," he says, reverently. "Command of the all-whore detachment." He drinks and pours another. When he asks if the HB was distressed by the death of the Captain, the guy has the gall to smirk. "Let me tell you something, Mr. Swearengen," he says, making the first of many tactical conversational errors. "You don't scare me, and you don't fucking know what happened with the 69th New York." Al listens, seemingly with interest. (I listen, seemingly, to my mother, the unstoppable JoLowe, who does that same Southern-born "let me tell you something/let me ask you this/my question to you is/I'll tell you this" preamble at the start of every conversation.) "I will tell you this," the HB goes on (ha!), "I didn't like what happened to Joe Turner. Mr. Hearst came to him and said, 'Make it last, even if you gain the upper hand and can kill him.'" He says he feels this was selfish on the part of Hearst, drawing out the fight, and that if he hadn't, Turner might be alive today. "But," he concludes, taking a drink, "that's as much as I feel like saying, and that's neither here nor fucking there." Al can't argue with that. He takes another fortifying drink himself. "Fair enough, he says, standing. "All right, then." How the other guy doesn't feel the cold hand of fate circling his jugular, I don't know, but he doesn't. "All right," he says back, all reasonable. "But I'll tell you this (see?): You don't seem halfway like such a halfway bad fucking person." Al smiles and laughs a little as he walks to the door. The HB stands to follow. "So, should I tell Mr. Hearst that there's no messa..." he starts, but can't get out the full question before Al KNEES him in the CROTCH and knocks him down, grabbing away his gun.
Nutstomping Al, how we've missed you. "So," Al sneers, "you'd shoot at a fucking woman?" The HB groans on the floor. "Beat that poor newspaper bastard?" Al goes on. "Scare that Chinese with your fucking horses?" That's right, Al! Score three for the little people! Heng dai! He kicks the HB in the ribs, which causes the guy to scream, which just encourages Al to kick him again. "How many ribs you think you broke?" he asks. The HB grunts out that he feels like two or three are broken. "I'm talking," Al spits, "about that newspaperman's ribs, you fucking c*nt." With that, he gives him another good one to the groin and while the whole world cheers, we see Hearst step out onto his balcony, no doubt waiting for the HB to come striding cockily out the front door. Keep on waiting, beyotch!
Also waiting: Con Stapleton. He's outside Claudia's door at the hotel, imploring her to render her gigantic rack unto his loving care. Man. I just made myself gag. "I prayed it would pass!" he cries to her. "But it's a constant fucking sore spot and throb." This reminds him of his purpose and he pulls a prepared statement from his pocket. "Uh, you are a constant vision before me, you and your fabulous bosoms," he reads. "I beg you, release your man-stallion from his he-stable for another gallop round the ring." Y'all, are they trying to kill me? I mean, for one thing: man-stallion. And secondly: he-stable. And THIRD OF ALL: Do you see the banana they have stuffed down this man's pants? Frankly, we must pray it is a banana, for if it is an accurate representation of uh, reality, none of us are safe. Claudia, laid out on her bed, has had it. "Not today, Con!" she says, wishing he would vanish. She tells him to come back late the day. "Perfect!" he says. "We'll be waiting!" And y'all know he means him and his gonorrheal man-stallion, right? I KNOW.
Al hasn't quite finished with the HB. "Listen to me, listen to me," the suffering man says, "and I'll tell you one fucking thing. Do you hear me?" Al: "I don't hear nothing." The HB groans again. "I'm telling you," he says, "that I'm gonna tell you one fucking thing." Damn, did my mother write this? Al says all right. "Do you hear me?" the HB moans. And Al, like his namesake over here, has had ENOUGH. "What the fuck?" he asks, sick of it. "I'm not fucking deaf." The HB rattles on and on saying he needs to know if Al is going to understand what he's saying and finally Al beats it out of him -- Hearst has already wired for more Pinkertons and that they're on the way. "If he finds out I told you..." he cries, as Al leans over him, thinking. "Don't worry," he says, quietly while the HB continues to sob in pain. Later, he is still crying as Al has a rejuvenating drink. "He's got twenty-five more guns coming, twenty-five Pinkertons," the man groans on the floor. "When they get here, he's gonna move on the camp." Al picks up the discarded gun and calmly asks if this will happen before the elections. "I don't know. I don't know," the HB says, begging for his life. "Please don't hurt me. It's all I fucking know." Al is moved. Not. He uses the butt of the gun to turn the loser onto his back. "Come on, come on," he says, almost encouraging. "Don't give up hope." He stands, puts the gun on the chair right to the bloody HB, and steps out onto the balcony. Looking out over the thoroughfare, he looks up and pretend to just notice that Hearst is there on his roof. "Passing a little wind," Al calls, the picture of casualness.
He turns and goes back inside where the HB is futilely reaching up for the gun. Al kicks him aside, and the man cries out. Maybe Hearst hears it on his roof, maybe he just senses what's going down, but whatever the case, it gives him a hankering to throw his weight around and he goes off in search of the easiest target he can find: E.B. He pounds on his door, scaring the hell out of E.B., who reluctantly comes and opens it. "Have you enjoyed yourself today, Farnum?" Hearst demands, apropos of nothing. E.B. thinks for a moment. "For reasons I find elusive," he says, "the day has quite displeased me." Hearst asks if it will help to find a name for his feelings, and suggests cutting open his belly in order to wrap his guts around a pole. Um...now, what? E.B. is wigging. "You seem distraught," he says, nervously. Oh, but Hearst says he's not. "I await an outcome!" he yells. "And the readying for it wearies me." E.B. tries to sympathize: "Oh, dear." Hearst rages on, doing his Biblical foretelling of doom act he loves so much. "Have you smelt human flesh on the spit?" he asks E.B. who, despite the many pre-Aunt Lou meals he ate at the Grand Central, says no. "I know the smell," Hearst says, crazy intense like he's going to put E.B. on one right now. "You have been to and fro in the world," E.B. remarks, trying to participate in this conversation. Hearst says he just loved that whole human flesh burning thing. "Well then, fine," E.B. says, completely out of things to say. I guess Hearst is also finished talking, because, well, um, he hocks a quarter-sized loog onto E.B.'s face. Let me mention, here, that my gag reflex, when it comes to mucus, is set to eleven with the knob ripped off. So, this was difficult. (Apparently, it was also difficult for Gerald McRaney, who did not want to spit in anyone's face, even for the sake of the craft -- the spit is digital.) E.B. is frozen, not understanding what's going on. "Don't you want to wipe that off?" Hearst asks, mega evil. E.B.: "...No?" So, Hearst does it AGAIN. "You would regret my coming back," he bitches, "and finding that you had cleaned your face." And E.B., though he certainly does not, says he understands.
Al comes out of his office and calls for Dan and Johnny. "Wouldn't want you to dirty your hands," Dan teases at Adams, who doesn't really seem to mind being left out. Upstairs, Al is finishing up with the half-dead HB. He assures him that all that shouting before about how much he sucked for shooting at a woman and beating up Merrick was just for show. "Just trying to frighten you a little," he says, "encouraging you to chat." He goes on, commiserating with the HB's whole position. "Who amongst us hasn't wanted to shoot at women once or twice, hmm?" Good one, Al, but the guy can't quite talk right now. The HB wheezes as Al bends over him. "Anything you want to say else before I let you rest," Al asks, "knowing I don't sit upon you in judgment?" For that kind offer, he doesn't give him much time to answer before matter-of-factly slitting his throat, Al-style and leaving him to choke on his own blood and strolling out onto the balcony without a look back. Outside, he calls to Hearst who is back on his roof. "Did he come to you by a different path, Mr. Hearst?" he hollers. "Did he somehow circumnavigate to bring my reply to you without me seeing?" Hearst asks what he's talking about. Al says that well, the HB went out the back of his place "and I've been hoping against hope for reasons beyond my understanding that it was to return to you, unseen by me." Hearst is strangely disturbed. "He has not come back," he says, slowly. Al lays it on thick. Real thick. "Jesus Christ, maybe he was telling the truth!" he says, throwing up his hands. "That he was lighting out for fucking Bismarck. Jesus Christ Almighty!" Al rambles on and on, postulating that Hearst and the HB must have had some kind of fight, leading the hired goon to make a run for it. He's still yelling his mock outrage. "Well, then I say, Mr. Hearst, you are well the fuck rid of that cocksucker, that he'd show so little loyalty or sense of responsibility to the delivery of communications," he says. "Jesus Christ Almighty, were do we find good help?" The shit is beginning to dawn on Hearst, now. He is slowly backing into the hole in the wall, easing away from Al's voice when Al delivers the stinger. "Oh, and in reply to your letter, sir, my opinion only," Al says, "she don't need no escort or guarding, but it's the kind of generous inquiry I'd expect you to make." Hearst is freaked by Al's whole powerful demeanor and is trying to get away. "How's your back, Mr. Hearst?" Al calls, a little less loud, now, and more menacing. "How's the fucking back there, pal?" Al goes back inside to find Johnny and Dan wrapping the dead HB in the rug. He tells them to take the guy to Wu. "Longest a rug's lasted so far," Johnny notes as they head out, and I figure the way Al's feeling now, they ought to just keep rugs in stock for a weekly rotation.
Outside, Charlie is messing around with the mail when Bullock rides up, full steam and clenching. "What's going on, Charlie?" he asks, and for once, Charlie doesn't have the words.
In their room at Shaunessey's, Jane and Joanie are talking over their day, undressing for bed. They congratulate themselves on their good job, protecting Sophia from Hearst's potential attack. Jane, somehow, is drunk, and tells a long, winding story of dream she had the night before. In it, she's as clamoring up a creek bank ("often required of a drunk") when she comes upon Charlie. He tells her, in the dream, that this is the night that Bill is to be killed. She asks why he has to remind her of that, when her life is miserable enough. He reminds her, though, that the same night, she was frightened by Al in Doc's cabin and later spirited Sophia away where they sang her to sleep. "'Now,' Charlie says to me," she says, "'don't you understand what I'm trying to tell you? Any evenings in your life you made mistakes, remember where even evenings you was as most ashamed as you ever thought you could ever be are able to wind up, and don't fucking only remember the middle of the dream!'" She says, if she had analyze the dream, it would surely have something to do with Joanie sending Mose to find her to help walk the kids to school...Joanie is trying to follow all this, but soon Jane's brilliant, boozey plan is revealed. All she wants is for Joanie to kiss her again. It makes her feel safe. She can't say it, outright, but I think that's what she's saying, and I guess Joanie does, too. Once again, they kiss, and I don't want to seem unromantic, but maybe Joanie does to make her shut up.
At the Bullock's house, things are tense. Martha gingerly lays out the evening's dinner while Sol rambles on about some stuff he'd done for the livery, in the absence of any new owner. "I went ahead and reordered hames he says, though Bullock is only half-aware he is even present. As Sol continues on, Bullock clenches in every single direction -- for his one line in the entire episode, Olyphant certainly steals this scene -- he is so full of emotion over what has happened, he's hardly breathing. Tentatively, Martha takes her seats and looks at them. "Let us give thanks," she says, and bowing their heads, they pray.