Bonanza s01e04 Episode Script

* * You think I'd trade you this, this beautiful cloth for them few measly skins? Not many beaver left in mountains.
Too many hunters.
Well, that's your problem, Injun.
You want some more cloth, you bring us in some new skins.
Good skins, savvy? But I told my wife here that I'd get her new, bright cloths.
Oh, get out of here.
I got no time, no nothing for Injuns.
Take these skins with you.
No, wait a minute, Bern.
Party's been kind of dull the past couple of days.
Well, Brother Mike, you found some more booze, huh? Yeah, I found some more booze.
We go now.
Oh, what's your hurry, friend? You can have all the cloth you want.
Just give us some good pelts, and we'll keep your squaws till you bring 'em in.
No, these wives.
I don't care what they are.
We'll just hold onto 'em till you bring in the pelts, huh? (chuckles) No, Mr.
Wilson! (yelling and screaming) (laughs) (talking indistinctly) You get out of here, Indian.
You come back here again and I'll kill you.
(man laughs, woman screams) You heard what my brother said.
We'll kill you! (laughter) Yeah.
That's a little better, huh? Now we got a little more privacy.
(laughter) (theme song playing) Now, you boys have a good time in San Francisco, and be careful of that Barbary Coast.
Don't want either one of you shanghaied.
Pa, you just relax.
Yeah, Hoss gets in any trouble, I'll take care of him, Pa.
(chuckling): You just make sure one of those spangly woman don't take care of you.
BEN: And get back as soon as possible.
Now, business is business, but we need you back here in the Ponderosa.
Now, git! (laughs) Hope they make out.
Ah, don't worry, Pa.
San Francisco's no worse than Virginia City.
I'm gonna check on those new steers down at the bottom camp.
I'll see you at dinner.
Yeah, well, don't wait for me.
I got some business in Virginia City.
(horse neighs) (man mumbling) (horse neighs) (groans) Bruno.
(groans) What happened to you? Ah.
Who did this? They took my wife.
Your wife? Wilson's Wilson's Station.
They are drunk, them.
They have guns.
Numta's wife, my wife.
And they did this when you tried to stop them? My wife-- they have her.
They will You don't have to tell me.
We'll get 'em.
Can you ride? Numta ride to Ringnose for braves.
Ringnose is a hothead.
Why didn't he go to Winnemucca? This is Paiute land, not Bannock.
Numta say Shoshone people not coward like Paiute.
He say Bannocks ride, kill Wilson men.
If they attack Wilson's Station, this whole country'll go up in flames.
Come on, Bruno, we got to beat them there.
Adam Cartwright.
Ringnose calls braves, Adam Cartwright.
Then we still have time.
(horse neighs) (slurring words): I don't know what's the matter with them.
You'd think we weren't treating 'em right or something.
(slurring words): I've tried to be friendly.
I even offered 'em some of this good booze.
Yeah.
All right, squaws, come on out.
Outside.
We're going to teach you some manners.
Come on.
(women yelling) Come on, what are you? Come on.
(laughs) Come on, you're going to have a drink.
No.
Look, when a white man offers you a drink, you take it! Let her go.
Cartwright.
What are you doing here? I said let her go.
(grunts) I wouldn't try it.
Now, drop it.
Easy.
Now kick it over here.
You, too.
What's all this fuss over a couple of women? Indian women.
Bruno, get 'em back to the Ponderosa.
We'll take care of 'em there.
(men grunting) (groans) Bern.
Bern? (groaning) Bern.
I'm sick.
That Cartwright stole our women.
Let's go get him.
Go on.
I'm sick.
Phil.
Phil, wake up.
Dirty squaw stealer.
Teach him when I get him.
Dirty Indian lover.
We'll see about that Adam Cartwright.
(gunfire, whooping) Look inside.
(indistinct shouting) No, no! (gunfire) Enough.
We head for Sun Canyon.
We go.
(whooping) (gunfire) (gunfire and whooping continue) Quiet down, quiet down, quiet down.
Give the man a chance.
All right, Wilson.
I heard that holler and there was hundreds of 'em all over the place coming right at me, all painted up and naked.
Who was it-- Winnemucca? Yeah.
Yeah, that's who it was-- Winnemucca.
Old Winnemucca hisself.
(chuckles) Well, I had to git.
I started to ride.
I saw some of 'em break into the station and drag out Bern and Phil.
I heard 'em scream.
My own brother and my partner, and I couldn't do nothing to help 'em.
It was awful.
ORMSBY: But why? Why Winnemucca of all people? Hey, them Paiutes are running wild.
Killed seven or eight men over in Sun Canyon.
Seven or eight men.
Do you know who they were? Not all of 'em, but they flat butchered Joe and Ellie Lawrence right outside their cabin.
Killing women.
I don't need to know no more.
Let's go get 'em! ALL (clamoring): Yeah! Hold it, hold it! I agree the Paiutes must be punished.
If it's war, it's war, but you just can't stampede out the door.
We've got to get organized.
Maybe you're right, Major.
You go ahead and start organizing.
Well, I agree.
I wasn't a major in the Army for nothing.
We'll do this the army way.
We'll get as many men as we can.
Oh, we'll get you close to a hundred! Don't reckon we'll need that many to handle a mangy mess of Paiutes, but anybody who wants to join us, tell 'em to come along.
We'll march at daybreak.
(men clamoring) Yee-ha, yee-ha! BEN: Stewart, you carry a lot of weight around here, more than anybody.
They say you're the first citizen of Virginia City.
Now, you and I-- we haven't always seen eye to eye, but we both know that an Indian war would be disastrous.
Ben, I just don't believe it's as serious as you make out.
You didn't see them down there.
Ormsby's raising an army.
It's hysteria.
Well, Ormsby's no drunken fool.
He's a good soldier, at least he used to be.
That has nothing to do with it.
We just can't stand by and let them march.
Did you talk to them? With no chance of being heard? Anyway, I'm not the man for it.
I need someone like you.
someone from town, someone they know.
All right, Cartwright, I'll be there at daybreak, but I don't believe there'll be much of an army once our brave soldiers sober up.
Hmm, well doesn't take much of an army to start an Indian war.
(door opens) (door closes) They'll be all right now.
They're in good hands.
I think it might be a good idea if you were to stay here tonight.
Thank you, Adam Cartwright.
Fools-- everybody's gone mad.
What's wrong? Oh, the Paiutes ran wild.
Wiped out Wilson's Station, killed seven or eight people in Sun Canyon, and now Virginia City's gathering an army to go after them.
Well, it wasn't the Paiutes, it was the Bannocks or the Shoshone tribe, Ringnose's people.
What makes you say that? Bruno, Numta-- their wives are inside being cared for.
Why? What happened? Ah, Wilson and that drunken brother of his, they held them prisoner and mistreated them.
So that's the truth of the matter.
Well, why would Wilson accuse the Paiutes for what happened? Shift the blame from himself.
Protect his own dirty skin.
Pa, we can't let them attack Winnemucca and the Paiutes.
We've got to stop them tonight.
Oh, not tonight.
Dozens of them were gathering when I left there.
Drunken, loud, boisterous-- nobody could talk to them tonight.
Well, what about Bill Stewart? They listen to him.
I've already talked to Stewart.
Oh, he'll reason with them in the morning.
But we better be along, too.
Nobody will believe it wasn't the Paiutes.
Oh, I felt like killing those Wilsons myself when I saw their women.
But why did Ringnose have to kill those people on his way back to the mountains? Oh they're primitive people, son.
Primitive and proud.
Once they've tasted blood (indistinct shouting) Turner, Wilson.
Yes, sirree, General.
This is a sorry army.
Where are all those men you promised me? Well, you know something, General? Overnight, most of them boys sobered up.
(laughter) Ah, we got enough.
All I want to do is get out there and shoot me some Indians.
(crowd laughing and agreeing) You may have your chance, Mr.
Wilson, with a few dozen men against the Paiute nation.
(all clamoring) All right, you men, listen to me! Listen to me! What do you want here, Stewart? I want to stop you from making fools of yourselves.
Ben, Ben Cartwright knows Indians better than any man in Nevada.
Now, he tells me that the Wilson Station massacre was not done by the Paiutes.
But it was done by the Bannocks of the Shoshone tribe higher up in the Sierras.
That's a lie.
Well, I was there, wasn't I? You were there, all right.
Maybe they ought to know what you did there.
Listen to him.
Wasn't for Adam Cartwright, this whole thing wouldn't have happened.
It were his fault.
What do you mean, Wilson? He come in just before it happened with one of his Indian friends.
Said he wanted me to sell the Indian some booze.
When I said I wouldn't do it, he said he'd have the whole Paiute tribe down on me.
And I saw it.
I was there and I saw them Paiutes with my own eyes.
They took my brother and they took my partner, and they tore them up in little pieces.
Now are we gonna let them get away? CROWD: No! All right, now.
No time to stand here and argue.
If you men go out drunk and disorganized against Winnemucca's warriors, you'll be destroyed.
I tell you, the Paiutes are innocent.
Cartwright, that massacre took place before noon.
Within an hour, there wasn't a Paiute in town.
And Wilson didn't get back here with the news until late afternoon; explain that if you can.
The Indians have ways.
I thought so.
Murder has been done by Indians.
We move to punish them.
All right, men, let's go! Just a minute! All right, Ormsby, go out to Winnemucca.
But go seeking a parley, not as a war party.
Find out what the Paiutes have to say about all this.
You going to ride with us, Mr.
Stewart? No, I'm not.
I can do more for you by staying here and keeping in touch with the authorities in Washington.
We'll go along with you, Major, my son and I.
All right, we need every man.
Those of you with horses, mount up.
The rest of you, fall in.
TURNER: General.
Fall in what? (crowd laughing) With this, I go to fight Indians.
(indistinct chatter) Major! Hold up! Whoa! Oh! Look there.
Signal fires.
They've heard us coming for miles.
Forward, ho! We do not know how many there are, or what their purpose is.
Paco will tell us.
The figures from Sun Mountain come.
How many are there, Paco? Maybe three tens.
Ben Cartwright and his son, the one called Adam, ride at their head.
Must Sharp Peak itself fall upon my father to make him see? I see nothing but a great mistake.
It is a mistake that will kill your people.
Even your friend, Ben Cartwright, rides with them.
Ben Cartwright rides to talk.
With a rifle in his hand? Would my young war chief see his people die? I will protect them.
Since when is war a better protection than peace? We have asked for no war.
We have killed no one.
But the white man's army moves not toward the sky home of the Bannock people.
They come toward us.
Though we want only peace, we would be fools if we did not think that war might come.
This we will do.
My son will take the warriors of the tribe to the Place of Tall Rocks.
Each brave will have a white man in his gun sights.
But do not fire unless we are fired upon first.
I and the other elders will meet below the rocks.
We will take council with the whites.
We will speak for peace.
But should there be war, you are the war chief of our people, my son.
Defend them.
(drumbeats) Ho! Ho! He's got a lot of brass.
It's a call for parley, Major.
It's too late for a parley.
We'll take him in.
I wouldn't try it.
What'd you say? Take a look around.
One behind every rock.
Treacherous devils.
What'd you expect, a welcome mat? Come along, Major.
We'll parley.
Cover them! They're going to parley! It is an evil thing to see Ben Cartwright ride to war.
I ride for peace, oh, Chief of the Paiutes.
Then my eyes fail me, for I see men ready for battle.
Let's stop beating around the bush.
Now look here, Indian Shut up, Ormsby! Do you want to get us all killed? The Paiute wants peace.
We want peace.
Will we talk? We will talk.
Talking to them murdering devils.
If I had me a clear shot at one of 'em, I'd show 'em how to talk.
Mike, look! I got a Paiute for you.
Yeah.
Well, this one's for my brother.
Stop your firing! Stop shooting! Stop firing! Stop it! (indistinct shouting) (groaning) Enough Indians for you, Mike? My son No time for that! My, my son! Come on! They're everywhere! Let's get out of here! * * Good Lord.
All these men! Ormsby, too.
It's a massacre.
My son is dead.
Dead They're stampeding out there.
They're out of their heads with fear.
We've got to do something.
Yeah, well you better do it quick.
There's a couple of thousand Indians out there, and they on their way here by now.
Instead of cleaning him up, you better put a rope around his neck.
What do you mean? He led us into a trap, that's what I mean.
Everybody knows him and the Paiutes are thicker than blood.
They killed his son.
His son ain't dead.
Soon as the shooting started, I saw his son run off with the Indians.
Talk, Wilson, but you better be telling the truth.
Well, I saw old Winnemucca dragging him off himself.
From the looks of things, it didn't take much dragging.
Wilson? Is this true? I wouldn't count on it, Ben.
If Adam is alive, it'll just mean that a lot of people will ask questions as to why he was the only man spared.
I don't care what questions people ask.
Just as long as he's alive.
Ben, go back to your ranch.
Go on now.
If the word gets around, it'll just mean trouble.
Now go on! Mm.
You're letting him get away with murder.
Shut up, Wilson.
Well, we need help, that's for sure.
Charley Hungerford commands a battalion and a militia on the other side of the Sierra at Placerville.
We can send messengers there.
I'll go.
All right.
We'll send a couple of men along with you.
Come up to my office, and I'll make out an official request.
I know what to tell 'em.
I'd rather put it in writing if you don't mind.
Winnemucca, have you gone mad? Be silent! Why does our enemy yet live? There are many weapons.
Some take lives.
Some save them.
We have beaten them.
Everywhere they run before us.
Even now, the diggers cry in fear over what awaits them.
Before morning, their Virginia City could be ashes.
If we were to move now.
It is plain to see the son of Winnemucca thinks he was sired by a fool, for he talks like one.
Adam Cartwright, but for my hand, you would have long ago have fed the fires.
Answer me in truth.
If I can.
Now that we have beaten them, what will the diggers do? You know that as well as I do.
Tell them with your lips.
They will send to California.
The militia will come.
The army.
How many? One hundred tens.
He lies! Let me kill him now! No! Are you a woman? Did not his father kill Grey Bear before your very eyes? My young wolf grows careless in his howling! Winnemucca, speak to my father.
There are men of honor in Virginia City.
There can yet be peace.
Can there be peace, Adam Cartwright? But there has to be peace.
You can't fight the California troops.
They are as trees on the Ponderosa without number! They cannot fight.
Did we not destroy them? Did not the remaining handful run back to their caves like cringing dogs? You fought a bunch of half-drunken miners out on a picnic, a lark.
But next time, you'll fight soldiers, and they'll outnumber you two to one.
Tell them, Winnemucca.
I speak the truth.
He speaks the truth.
But Ben Cartwright's words hang heavy on the ears of the whites.
He will stop the army.
He can't do that.
Only you can.
We will send word to him.
We will meet him.
He will know it from Winnemucca himself that if the army from California moves on the Paiute nation, his son will die.
Winnemucca has said it.
Take him to his tepee.
Little Joe.
We heard about the trouble in Sacramento.
Decided Hoss ought to go on up to San Francisco, I'd come back and see if I could give you and Adam any help.
Where is he? Winnemucca's holding him prisoner.
Prisoner? Was he all right? Well, I received word through a messenger last night.
Winnemucca's bringing Adam to Truckee Rock.
I'm to meet him there.
Yeah, well, how did this whole? Not now.
I'll tell you all about it later.
Come on! Hyah! Where's my son? Stay.
Are you all right, boy? I'm all right, Pa.
Vigilantes run you out of San Francisco? Do the soldiers come from across the Sierra? They've been sent for.
Then you will stop them, or your son will die.
Winnemucca, we're friends.
You must not do this.
My people are my friends.
Did not Ben Cartwright shoot a Paiute brave even as we parleyed at Sharp Peak? He would have killed my son.
I have a hundred sons.
But you will stop the soldiers, Ben Cartwright, or you shall have no more than two.
How do you expect us to stop an army? Pa, Bruno.
Bruno and Ringnose.
If Ringnose were to tell the truth about Wilson's Station, perhaps the army will not attack the Paiute.
But you must give us time to ride to the high mountains.
We will attack no one.
But we will defend ourselves and our homes.
Winnemucca, I would talk to my son.
You may talk.
Looks like you got yourself in a little hot water this time, older brother.
Yeah.
Me this time instead of you.
Hate to leave you this way, boy.
I'll be all right, Pa.
Junior here'd like to cut my throat, but Winnemucca won't let him.
Said that Young Wolf and Adam Cartwright used to ride the Washoe together as brothers.
Children do foolish things.
But they become men.
We'll be back with Ringnose.
What makes you think he'll want to come? He'll come whether he wants to or not.
Good-bye, Pa, Joe.
* * Ho! Ho! Ben Cartwright.
Major Hungerford.
I didn't expect you so soon.
We got here as soon as we could.
Captain Kelly! We'll take a few minutes rest.
Yes, sir.
Lines down! Troop dismount! What Mr.
Wilson says, we couldn't get here too soon.
You know Mr.
Wilson? Oh, yes.
Yes, I know Mr.
Wilson.
My son, Adam, told me what happened at his station.
Hungerford, ask him how come his son, Adam, is with the Paiutes alive.
When the rest of the men they caught were chopped to bits.
He and his whelp led us into a trap.
Major, it was not the Paiutes that raided his station, it was a party of Bannocks, part of the Shoshone tribe.
Cartwright, you're a liar.
Mr.
Wilson.
Major, I was there.
I saw my own brother killed right before me.
Winnemucca and some Paiutes, they came in and shot up my place.
It was not the Paiutes, it was the Bannocks.
And the reason they killed your brother is because of what you and he did to a couple of Bannock women.
The husband of one of them worked on my ranch.
Look, everybody knows that he's been on the side of the Paiutes right along.
Ormsby and his men were killed by Paiutes, weren't they? The Paiutes were defending themselves.
They didn't attack Ormsby.
My son, Adam, is being held hostage by Winnemucca.
That's why we're riding to the Bannock Chief Ringnose.
He can prove that I'm telling the truth.
Suppose Ringnose won't talk? He'll talk.
WILSON: Look, he's not telling you a word of truth.
I was there! I saw it all with my own Mr.
Wilson You open your mouth once more and I'll have you gagged.
Ben, I prefer to believe your story.
But I'm under express orders from the governor of the state of California to attack the Paiutes and punish them.
This much I can do.
If you can bring me proof that it was the Bannocks and not the Paiutes that attacked Wilson's Station, then I'll parley with Winnemucca, and try to make peace.
You must give me time, Major.
I'll march to Pyramid Lake by the longer route.
I'll stop once an hour to rest.
More than that I can't do for you, your son or any man.
I'm a soldier, Ben.
I'm under orders.
I hope you get to Ringnose.
And get him back here in time.
Thanks, Major.
You don't believe him, do you? If what he says is true, you go back to Sacramento with me, Mr.
Wilson.
In irons! Captain Kelly! (tribal chanting) YOUNG WINNEMUCCA: Leave us.
It'd have been better if you'd lied.
Then the soldiers are coming.
You will never see them arrive.
Stay your hand! Already, the soldiers march.
It was your word that Adam Cartwright die.
They are not yet here.
Leave us, my son.
Is there not a battle to make ready? Do you remember this knife? I remember.
My father gave it to you.
Yes.
I go to return it to him now.
Once the wild bear knew Washoe.
Now he is gone.
The white man killed him.
That is so.
And then the antelope, who is the friend of the Paiute he, too, is gone.
White man killed him.
That, too, is so.
And now, the great Sun of the Paiute weakens.
And as it crosses the sky, even today it will drop behind the mountains and be gone.
Perhaps my father will return in time.
Soldiers already march along Chief Truckee's river.
Your father's in the land of the Bannocks.
I would like to see your father.
A man should see his friends on the day of his death.
At the head of the California soldiers rides a man named Hungerford.
I know him.
He's a soldier.
Is this the same Hungerford who defeated Shining Brow of the Cheyenne? It's the same.
and a cannon.
All this to defeat an old man, his son and 30 tens of Paiutes.
Do our small lives mean so much to your people? Don't fight them, Winnemucca.
Wait.
Surrender if you must, but give my father time enough to return with Ringnose.
There will be no more talk, even though I willed it.
If we must die, we must die, for the ways of the wild things are the Paiutes' ways, and the wild things, too, are dead.
I am sorry for you, Adam Cartwright, for you are a friend and the son of a friend, but the first shot that is fired by the California soldiers will be a signal to my son and you will die.
And even as you die, it will be like a small part of myself that dies with you.
We will talk with Ringnose.
You are brave to ride into the camp of the Bannock.
Well, Bruno, is this the way the Bannock repays his friend? If you have anything to say, say it to me.
The acts of the Bannock people are the acts of their chief.
My son will die if the California army attacks.
But more than that, the whole Paiute people will die if Ringnose allows them to take the blame for the raid on Wilson's Station.
War is war, Ben Cartwright.
Do you ask that the Bannocks walk into the white man's rope? My son brought back the wives of Bruno and Numta from the dark land.
I ask the Bannock to do the same for my son.
What about us, Ben Cartwright? What will happen to us? I don't know.
The debt must be paid.
Get Numta.
We ride.
* * * * Ho! Ho! Indians up in the rocks, sir.
There's a lot of them.
Mr.
Kelly? Yes, sir? Any sign of Ben Cartwright? No, sir, the rear guard is looking for him.
We can't delay any longer.
Have the men from Fort Alcatraz cut around to the high ground.
I want a flanking fire on the Indians.
Have Sergeant O'Banion move his field piece to the high ground on the other flank.
Deploy your companies on both sides of the trail as foragers.
Send the bugler to me.
We'll advance at my command.
Return fire if fired upon, but otherwise, let no man fire without orders.
Move your men out.
KELLY: Very good, sir.
Sergeant O'Banion, move your fieldpiece to the high ground.
First platoon, give him support to his position! Then dismount and form as foragers! Do not fire unless fired upon! Move them out, Sergeant.
Yes, sir.
First platoon, forward! Ho! Ho! Do not fire unless fired upon.
Dismount and form as foragers.
Carry out the order.
Dismount! There are many.
I told you there would be.
Many eyes to see you die.
(indistinct command) Corporal Hollister, deploy your men on the high ground to the right of that big rock.
Carry on! Follow me! Come on, men! Foragers form! Fall in! Come on, fall in, way up there! Up there, hurry up! Hurry up! Fall in! Take an interval! Take your interval, men! Form as foragers! Come on, men! Form as foragers! Fall in! Come on! Fall in, way up there! Up there! Hurry up! Hurry up! All ready, sir.
Very good, Captain Kelly.
Form as foragers.
Bugler, sound the advance.
(bugle plays) Follow me! (bugle continues in distance) Stand on the rock.
* * * * Don't fire! Don't shoot! Get back! Don't shoot! Fire at will! (gunfire continues) (screaming) I've been waiting for this, Cartwright.
I'm going to kill you.
(distant gunfire continues) Adam! (men screaming) (gunfire ceases) Adam, are you all right? I'm all right.
Pa, we've got to stop them.
Listen.
They've already stopped.
God help us.
What have we done? Is it true, Major, that it was all a mistake? Yes, Captain Kelly, it's true.
Then I'd better not tell the men.
You tell them, Mr.
Kelly, loud and clear.
I want every one of them to know what happened here today.
And why it happened.
Yes, sir.
What about the Bannocks? I appreciate your honesty.
That took courage.
You will go to California with me.
Major? What will happen to them? I don't know.
They'll have to stand trial.
I'll do what I can for them.
There's been too much killing already.
Pa? (distant chanting) (chanting continues) Winnemucca? Your son lives.
We mourn your dead son.
I do not mourn for my son.
I mourn for all my sons.
(chanting) (chanting continues)