Whoa, riders.
I see them.
$100, Harland.
Same as every ranch in the valley.
Every ranch in the valley’s scared, Boyd.
And you ain’t?
Scared cost a hundred a month.
I can’t afford it.
Egg money.
That’s what Walt Harland’s come down to.
[laughter] That’s far enough.
[screaming] Able 30 days, $100 or a shovel.
Nobody’s coming for you, old man.
You should have killed me too, [music] Boyd.
Why is that?
Cuz now my boys are coming.
[laughter] I’m so sorry.
If the bank can do anything, you’ve been [music] patient with me, Simus, more than most.
Writing to family to my boys.
I didn’t know you had boys.
Most folks [music] don’t then.
I hope they come quick.
That was my brother.
This come in on yesterday’s stage.
That’s the fifth day tonight, friend.
My mother only taught me four.
Letter for you, Mr.
Ashby.
30 days just got shorter.
Harland Six.
Seven.
Sign it.
Haron.
Ask me again tomorrow.
Same answer.
Ranch is closed, [music] mister.
I’m here to see my father.
The eggman.
He’s busy cooking our supper.
Cracked one on his head [music] last month.
He cried like a baby.
Did he?
That’s the red poncho.
The bounty man from Dead Hole.
There’s two of him.
Throw him down or he’s dead.
Boys, Abel’s whistle.
What are you doing here?
Paul wrote me.
He wrote me.
Put him away.
Both of you.
Abel’s watching.
That evening, the three of them stood at Abel’s grave, hats in hand.
“They want [music] the place signed over,” Walt said.
“To some Bitter Creek land company.”
“Outlaws want money, P,” said Jesse.
“These want land.
[music] Somebody’s paying them.”
Cutter drank at the Silver Dollar in Larks.
The brother in Red would see him in the morning.
Walt owed the bank $800.
Silus Crane’s been kinder than he had to be.
Then the old man touched both ponchos.
Your mother wo these from one bolt, one wool, two colors.
Ask him, [music] Jesse said, who got Jim Avery killed in Kansas?
And he walked away without one look at his brother.
Mule’s dead, Boyd.
All of them but me.
It’s the red poncho, the bounty man.
And there’s another one.
Same face, no beard, green poncho, black horse with a white blaze.
That’s Jesse Ashby Pinkerton.
He broke the Doyle gang in Abalene.
I signed on to scare ranchers.
Not this.
Anybody else?
The man said, “Farm boys, fine.
We don’t fight him.
We hurt the old man.
[bell] Walt, I heard there was shooting at your place.”
[music] There it was.
This is my boy Jesse.
Jesse Ashbet.
Ashb.
His mother’s name.
He liked it better.
And my offer still stands.
2000.
[music] Go somewhere safe.
Generous for a ranch with no cattle on it.
I’m a generous man.
Ever hear of the Bitter Creek Land Company?
Never Boyd Cutter.
Who’s asking?
Tell them Abel’s asking.
So, you’re the famous one.
Come down.
Not here, Poncho.
[music] Too many folks watching.
I’ll come to you.
P.
A man in a red poncho.
Just you.
How’d you shave that fast?
That’s my [music] brother.
There’s two of you.
Only one with manners, ma’am.
Poor [music] Walt.
Those boys will get him killed.
Burn the barn first.
Bring me the old man alive.
[sighs] Hey, What the [ __ ] are you?
You came to my town, Poncho, so I came to your [music] house.
Your paw signs or he swings.
You walked into that saloon and lit the fuse.
Same as Kansas.
And you sat on a hill a whole day counting.
[snorts] Somebody in this family has to think.
Say his name if you’re going to say it.
Jim Avery.
He had my back every day.
You went in early.
He died on that floor.
You want to blame me?
Go on.
I’ve had eight years of practice.
[music] Off their boots.
Red dust.
Of Canyon.
One road in.
[music] Six guns, maybe more.
Wait for dark.
P doesn’t have till dark.
Just like P.
Just like me.
Drop it.
The famous red panchcho [music] came all this way to hang in a shed.
Sunrise Harland, you sign or your boy hangs from that beam.
Don’t sign, P.
[music] He kills us either way.
Touch him again and I sign nothing ever.
If it comes [music] to it, son, I’ll sign.
He’ll kill us anyway.
[music] I hoped you’d come, Mr.
Ashby.
I’ve been here an hour.
Your pen stopped when I said the name.
That’s my father’s handwriting.
Bitter [music] Creek Land Company.
It’s his.
I keep every book in this bank except this one.
Be cutter.
Wages.
My father pays the man who killed Abel.
Sunday night, Paw rode out after supper.
[music] I followed him to the old Abop in mine.
I thought he [music] had a sweetheart.
I wish he did.
Abel gave us peppermints after church.
Every Sunday since we came to Lark, Ben, Ivy, eight years of Sundays.
My brother rode into that canyon alone this morning.
[music] Then he’s dead.
No, he’s too horny to die.
He’s tied up somewhere being rude.
[music] If it’s gone, Paw runs.
It stays in that drawer till Saturday.
And if he burns it, [music] P would burn the church before he’d burn a ledger.
Your voice is calm, Mr.
Ashby.
Your hands aren’t.
Don’t tell my brother.
There’s a goat path down the back of that canyon.
Pon never knew I followed him.
I know the way in.
Wednesday, [music] sunrise at the old OIR mine.
Inside the timber shed, Walt Harland sat at a plank table with a pen in his hand and a bill of sail in front of him.
Across the shed, his son in the red poncho stood on a wooden stool, hands tied behind him, a rope from the roof beam around his neck.
Boyd cutter tapped the paper.
“Sign, pa,” his son said quietly.
“Don’t.”
Walt looked at the boy a long time.
“I buried Abel,” he said.
[music] “I won’t bury you.”
He dipped the pen.
And up on the ridge, a rifle cracked.
A rider in a long dark coat was firing into the air, stampeding the gang’s horses out of their corral and [music] down through the camp in a storm of red dust.
Cutter ran for the door.
Pike ran after him, and on his way out, he kicked [music] the stool.
Walt was out of his chair before it could fall.
Both old hands holding it up.
The moment Pike was gone, Jesse Harland slipped in.
One arm in a sling, a knife in the other hand.
One stroke and the [music] rope parted.
Jesse caught his brother with his good arm, cut him free, and tossed him his gun belt and hat off the peg.
Walt kicked the table over.
The bill of sale [music] went into the dirt unsigned.
Stay down, Paw.
The brothers ran out to draw the fire away from the shed [music] and dove behind a rusty orcart, bullets ringing off the iron.
And there, with half the canyon shooting at them, Jesse asked the question he had carried for 8 years.
Kansas, why’d you go in early?
Doyle had a gun on your back.
You never saw him.
Jesse went very still.
8 years.
You never said I was fast enough for you, not for Jim.
Slowly, a grin [music] broke through on Jesse’s face.
This time, we go together.
Two short whistles, one long.
They stepped out side by [music] side, red and green.
Three outlaws stood up to meet them, and three outlaws went down.
A fourth drew a bead from [music] the bunk house roof, and a rifle from the ridge dropped him before he fired.
By the last two tied horses, [music] Boyd Cutter watched Red and Green walk toward him through the dust.
The hard little smile he always wore was gone.
He and Pike were in the saddle and gone before the brothers came in range.
The rest of the gang chased the loose horses, [music] and not one of them ever rode for Cutter again.
Up on the ridge, the rider pushed back that hat, and long aurn hair fell loose in the wind.
Who’s that?
Crane’s [music] daughter.
The bankers.
Long story.
Jesse said you’ll like her.
In the yard, a dead man’s revolver lay in the dust.
Walt bent toward it.
His hands stopped an inch above the grip.
Then he straightened up and left it lying there.
Whatever that cost him, he never said.
One long whistle [music] and Scout trotted out of the rocks, saddle bags still on.
Walt caught his old bay as it drifted back with [music] the strays.
They rode home across the big valley in the low gold light.
Three [music] riders, the old man in the middle, a sun on either side.
Nobody said much.
Nobody had to.
Up on the ridge, [music] Rose Crane watched them a long while.
Then she turned her horse back toward town.
Take your hat off.
This is a church.
They got loose, all three of them.
I wanted his own hand on that paper.
Sell a dead man’s land and his boys fight it for years.
So, no boys [music] I can sign his name better than he can.
And the Harlins.
Not one left to argue.
I’ll wire beat tonight.
[music] Walt Haron $500.
[music] You never said Abel and me were the [music] bad men, son.
The night you two were born, your mother put one of you in each of my arms.
No hand left for a gun, so I buried it.
I taught you to [music] shoot so you’d never need a man like me.
Instead, you grew up to be me.
The better half of you, Pa.
Mostly four men rode [music] in from Butour Morning.
From Paw’s lock drawer with the wire [music] he promised to send the marshall in Hela.
It never got sent.
Your name on the paper, Paw, and you in the ground.
[music] We could meet the railroad man on the road.
Show him the book.
Quiet.
No.
Abel died in front of my house in daylight.
Ivy, tell your father I’ll be at his bank Saturday noon to pay my note.
He’ll tell Cutter.
I’m counting on it.
And I still owe that bank $800.
$500.
Deadwood.
300.
Shy man won it fair.
The other fella didn’t.
You boys.
P thinks we’re at choir practice.
[laughter] He’s never heard us sing.
Do you ever say more than 10 words when they’re [music] worth it?
Am I worth it?
Ask me someday.
My father will be in that bank tomorrow.
I know.
Will you kill him?
Not if he lets me talk.
He won’t.
Saturday dawn.
Walt Harlon knelt at the kitchen hearth and pried up a flat stone.
Under it lay a bundle wrapped in oil cloth.
Inside was an old gun belt [music] and a heavy cult draon that hadn’t seen daylight in 32 years.
He [music] loaded it slow, the old way, with powder and caps from Abel’s shot pouch and buckled on the belt.
Then he took [music] one brown egg from the basket and slipped it into his pocket.
Jesse watched from the table.
Breakfast, not mine.
They rode for larks across the golden [music] valley, red, green, and the old man between.
At the edge of town, they left [music] the horses.
Late that morning, the railroads man stepped off the stage.
[music] A nervous fellow named Puit.
Silas Crane walked him straight into the bank.
He meant to have that [music] sale signed by noon with Walt Haron lying in the street.
Out on Main Street, they [music] were waiting.
Boyd Cutter, Pike, and four hired guns from But before noon, the Harlins walked in from the far end of the street on foot.
Red and green side by side, Walt one step behind.
High in the church [music] bell tower, Rose Crane laid a rifle across the rail.
Inside the bank, Ivy [music] sat at her desk and never looked up.
On the saloon porch, one of the but men lowered his rifle an inch.
That’s the red poncho.
And Ashby, [music] nobody said it was them.
You’re paid, Cutter said.
Hold.
Not for them.
He and his partner leaned their rifles [music] on the rail and walked away.
“That’s far enough, Harlon,”Qutter called.
“Abel said that,” Walt answered.
“You shot him for it.”
Then the last two but men opened up.
The one at the saloon corner fell to the brother in red.
The one on the livery roof fell to a rifle from the bell tower.
Pike broke for the water [music] trough, turned and fired wild, and Jesse dropped him with a single shot.
Behind the bank window, [music] Silas Crane watched his men go down.
And then there was only Boyd Cutter [music] alone in the street.
“Just you and me, Poncho,” Cutter called.
Up in the tower, Rose set her rifle down and took hold of the bell rope.
It was [music] noon.
[bell] egg.
Money Boyd paid in full.
The street had gone quiet when Walt and Jesse [music] walked into the bank.
Puit sat at Crane’s big desk with a pen in his hand.
Silas Crane [music] stood at his shoulder.
In front of them lay a bill of sale already signed at the bottom.
Walter Harlon.
Mr.
Crane [music] says Mr.
Harlland sold to his company.
Puit said, “I’m Haron,” Walt said.
[music] “And I never signed a thing.”
Jesse laid Crane’s practice pages beside it.
The same Walter Haron [music] written over and over.
“Walt, you’re confused.”
Crane said, “It’s been a hard.”
Ivy rose from her desk.
She came through the little gate, unlocked her father’s drawer with her own key, [music] and laid a thick black ledger in front of Mr.
Puit.
It’s all in his own hands, sir.
Every dollar he took from nine [music] ranchers and every dollar he paid Boyd Cutter.
Ivy Walt set two leather pouches on the counter.
$800.
Mark my note paid.
For a moment, [music] Silus Crane only looked like a tired old man.
I was building a town, Walt.
You were sitting on its water.
You built it on Abel’s grave, [music] Jesse said.
Puit closed the ledger.
The Northern Pacific doesn’t buy from murderers, Mr.
Crane.
Crane’s hand came out of his waist [music] coat with a little daringer aimed at Jesse.
Ivy stepped in front of Jesse.
P.
Put it down.
Step aside, Ivy.
Dear.
He raised it past her shoulder.
One shot.
And Walt Harlland’s old colt was smoking [music] in his hand.
Crane fell back against the counter.
P.
Ivy was on her knees beside him.
Rose stopped in the doorway, the rifle hanging at her side.
I’m sorry, girls, Walt said gently.
And then, almost to himself, 32 years, that gun [music] stayed buried.
Ivy closed her father’s eyes.
Walt held out his hand.
[music] For a long moment, she only looked at it.
Then she took it and stood, and Rose came and put her arm around her sister.
Spring came late that year [music] and it came green.
Cattle grazed the green valley.
A new barn stood where the old one burned.
And down by Harlland Spring, [music] the railroad was raising a water tower.
In the Larks Cemetery, [music] Rose and Ivy laid flowers on their father’s grave beside their mothers.
Walt stood back with his hat [music] in his hands.
Nobody said a word.
At the bank, Ivy slid an envelope across the counter to a weathered old rancher.
$700, Mr.
Daws, every month he took.
It had taken her all winter.
Mr.
Daws was the last name in the ledger.
Up on the rise, Walt set a new stone [music] at Abel’s grave.
Abel, he stood in front, and on top of it, one peppermint railroad rents the water.
Abel, the land stays [music] Harland.
Down at the creek, Ivy walked with Jesse.
He was a good father to us, she said.
Just [music] not a good man.
Then let’s be both.
She understood him and she kissed him.
By the [music] corral, Rose found the brother in red.
You said ask you Sunday.
That [music] was 30 Sundays ago.
She looked up at him.
What’s your name?
He leaned in and told her, “Only her.”
She smiled.
[music] “That’s a good name.
Why hide it?
Never met anybody I wanted to give it to.”
And she [music] kissed him.
That Sunday after church, Walt cracked eggs into a skillet, five plates on the table.
“You still eat eggs, Mr.
Haron?”
Rose asked.
Every morning they’re better in a pan.
Later, from the porch, he watched his sons ride out across the [music] green valley toward the herd.
Side by side, red and green.
One wool, Martha, [music] he said softly.
Two colors.
[music]
