New Gold Mountain (2021) s01e04 Episode Script

1
Me and you didn't get off
to a good start.
All of us workers
got to stick together.
I saw her paying him off, one
of them darkies. Which darky?
What happened to the woman?
It was a Chinaman who killed her.
What do you think will happen
to you if the 'gwailou' find out?
She talked to you
about her pregnancy.
She was obviously afraid the birth
would expose her lover as a Chinese.
SHING: You cannot print that story.
We leave, or we're both dead.
You really were
disappointingly easy.
You will be relieved,
since you clearly
care for him so much,
that he is very, very well.
As for the seam,
we can continue as before.
Your man, Ah Gok,
can help manage it.
Your brother
will adjust the accounts.
You'll continue
to keep the seam off the books?
Surely it would be better
to tell Hing Dai Wui now
so they can start collecting.
I am deciding
how I will explain to my father
why the seam has been hidden.
Not to mention
the fate of his prized surveyor.
Ten.
Twenty.
Twelve.
WRIGHT: When did you arrest him?
HARKEN: Last night.
He's a little reluctant to speak.
Tell us again, Tommy.
What did you see?
I'm not asking again.
(SCREAMS)
(MUMBLES) Moonface.
(SHOUTS) Say it again!
Moonface!
Moonface
How is it I'm only
finding this out now?
I'm not certain that 'Moonface'
necessarily means Chinese.
Because that
would make you responsible?
If it comes out that a Chinaman
has killed a white woman,
and there are no arrests,
it will make the Buckland riots
look like a dinner party.
Assuming we have the right
Chinaman.
Right Chinaman, wrong Chinaman -
that's up to you.
Keep the peace
so the Crown gets its tax.
I don't care how.
Sir, I thought you should see this.
Perhaps it's time
to pay your headman a visit.
Shing
Where have you been? I thought
Cheung Lei must have killed you.
Operation continues.
We get 12%.
Why wouldn't Hing Dai Wui
take the lot?
She's not telling them about it.
All I know
is that we're only alive
because she needs us
to keep it that way.
There's something more
she's not telling us.
There was a messenger.
From her father.
She is to be married off.
Cooking meals, making babies.
Doesn't seem the type.
Enough to betray her own father?
We will know for sure
with what happens to him.
The messenger?
Keep an eye.
Why aren't you on Main Street?
Sold out.
Even Mr Cummins bought a copy.
To regurgitate
for his next edition, no doubt.
People are angry.
Because of the story you wrote.
This is our job. We tell the truth,
no matter how difficult.
(DOOR OPENS)
If you have a complaint,
there's a queue.
All on the word of a prostitute.
And a quack doctor.
I simply wrote she was with
a Chinese travelling companion.
I have no problem who she wanted
to be with, who she loved.
It's not your fault?
It's what's true.
Then why Annie Thomas?
Why is she so special?
Because she's one of yours?
That's nonsense.
Really?
You would go through
all this effort
if it was a Chinaman's body
they found out there?
And you're all about the truth?
A woman
pretending to be
her own dead husband.
Running a paper she neither earned
nor has the sense to manage.
Best thing is to save his memory
any further shame
and pack it up
before you do any more damage.
Come to my office again,
I'll have you arrested.
Yes, make yourself at home.
You have a problem.
There was a tracker there
that night. He saw.
Who?
Couldn't be more specific
than it being a Chinaman.
Standish, it's not always
One of your people is going to
hang.
It's too late to change that.
I'm trying to give you a chance
to make sure it's the right one.
You decide or we will.
HARKEN: The Commissioner wants
him alive, so give him what you have to.
Don't leave me.
They're gonna hang you
if you can't say who it was.
Is there anything you can tell
them?
She paid me.
With this.
Can I help?
Are you the one wrote this?
That fella they have in jail, Tom,
he'll die unless
someone does something.
He needs a lawyer.
I print stories.
That all it is to you? A story.
It's a turn of phrase.
You people are all the same.
Say one thing, mean another.
Lot of effort,
just to fool your own self.
Let's call this conversation done.
She paid Tom with this.
Chinese gold.
Look at the shape.
Headman at the camp moved her body
off the Chinese trail.
Set up those two outlaws
to take the blame.
All him, all along.
Print that if you want a story.
Can I keep that?
No good to Tom now.
SHING: I need to hand over a
killer.
I could pick anyone.
Some nobody.
Did I ever tell you
how my parents died?
Soldiers killed them.
And I took my brother and ran.
Promised we'd never be like them.
Disposable.
You are not responsible
for what he does.
It can't be him.
What now?
Mr Leung, I'll be brief.
I hope so.
Simply, if you'd be good enough
to share your expertise.
This is how Annie Thomas paid
the tracker to take her that night.
Where'd you get that?
Not familiar?
Came from one of your people.
The question is whom.
I could look into it.
I look forward to your report.
Sun!
I didn't want to believe it.
You could have
at least had the sense
to put it back
where you stole it from.
I wanted to. It was
the only thing left of her. I
No.
No, I swear I didn't
I didn't hurt her.
I only wanted
I loved her.
Tell me.
Tell me!
I took the gold.
We were running away, together.
In the bush,
we were attacked by outlaws.
And?
We ran.
They were getting closer.
It was dark.
We got split up and
She was dead when I found her.
I don't know how.
That gold belonged to us!
I only took my share.
You don't care about me.
You don't care about anything
but your damn money.
Why?
(BOTH SHOUT)
(BOTH SHOUT AND GRUNT)
(WHISTLE BLOWS)
HARKEN: Get 'em out!
Get 'em out of their tents.
Get 'em all out.
Line 'em up!
Get 'em all out.
You, in line!
What's happening?
You were warned.
What about that one?
What about that one?
Or him? What about him?
Bloody waste of time.
I said it, they all look the same.
Hands off, I'm the headman!
What about
..him?
All right. Him?
Well, get a move on, Jackie.
It's got to be one of them
fucking bastards.
Him.
Him!
Hoi, you! Wait!
(GUNSHOT)
But what if it wasn't him?
The Englishwoman wrote
there was a lover involved.
I wonder, now,
who else could there be that you
would go to such lengths to protect?
Don't have long for your
jibber-jabber.
The Commissioner will be here
soon enough.
I didn't do it.
I swear.
I didn't kill anyone.
Sun was the one with her.
I know.
Shing
Shing!
"The night she died,
"Annie Thomas
was escaping the goldfields
"with a 'companion'
"connected to the celestial
camp."
Means she was fucking a Chinese.
You know how they do it?
They dope them up
with that Chinese tar.
Then have their way with her.
Probably more than one of them.
And then when they're done with
her,
not enough just to kill her, no.
They've got to cut her fucking
open.
Shut up!
No.
You've got to hear it.
We have to make order.
Not just for your girl,
but for the next one.
And the next.
Mrs Roberts.
Mr Standish.
The arrest.
I want to speak to him.
You really think it's as simple
as he just killed her for no reason?
Not for me to judge.
No.
Because you'd rather just go
with what spares you trouble.
You have me wrong, madam.
Do I?
You're Shing's man.
Gok, is it?
You have no reason to trust me, but
it seems like you're thin on options.
They're saying
you were Annie Thomas's lover.
You got her with child, took her
into the bush and killed her.
You can take the truth with you
or you can speak it.
But one thing's sure.
If you don't you will hang.
Night before
the mid-Autumn festival
I was going about my business
in the camp.
I saw Sun leaving Shing's hut.
He was carrying his travel case.
He was headed north,
so I followed him.
It started to get dark.
I lost him.
I figured he was headed
onto the trail to the gorge.
I was about to give up
and turn back when I heard
(GUNSHOT)
(WOMAN SCREAMS)
SUN: Run!
MAN: Run, run, run, run!
Oh agh!
It was a white woman,
in Chinese clothing.
Agh
(CRIES IN PANIC)
That's when I saw
BELLE: Annie Thomas?
I could see something
was wrong with her.
Blood.
Where's Sun?
She must have thought
I was there to kill her.
Wait, wait. I'm not
I found her at the bottom
of the cliff
body on the rocks.
So I picked her up.
I could feel her spirit leave her.
That's when I heard something.
(STICKS CRACK)
Must have been the tracker.
STANDISH: Then how was
she cut open? I don't know.
It matches with what the doctor
said about her body.
And that the cut happened later.
Why didn't you say something before?
That I killed a white woman,
but only by mistake?
Shing would not forgive that.
So I kept quiet.
I was loyal.
So now I hang.
Yes? May I help?
(INHALES) God, it stinks in here.
Is that shit
or just a natural smell
of a Chinaman?
Was she here?
I'm sorry, I don't know.
Annie Thomas! Was she in here?
This whole fucking place is a
sewer.
No, no! I don't No woman!
Tell me the truth.
Best just to burn
the place clean, eh?
Now, or fucking never.
No.
Do it!
Just wait.
Oh!
Not just a traitor, eh,
but a fucking coward too.
Agh!
May I sit?
Your man didn't do it.
How do you know?
She slipped. Fell.
Your man Gok was there.
Said he was following your brother.
The cut happened later.
Who's responsible is still a mystery.
I didn't know.
He was afraid to tell you.
I thought
I could protect my brother.
Perhaps even that was a mistake.
Do you have proof?
Just Gok's word.
But I believe him.
That's not enough.
I never should have written
what I did.
I thought it was right.
We all just try to survive.
Surely there's something you can do.
There is.
But I need your help.
HATTIE: Okay. Can you move?
Here.
Wait, and I'll boil some water.
I'm dying.
Leave.
Find your mob.
(SNIFFLES)
There's nothing here.
(SOBS QUIETLY)
PATRICK: Do not judge,
and you will not be judged.
Do not condemn,
and you will not be condemned.
Forgive,
and you will be forgiven.
Came to say
you won't be seeing me around here.
I'm off to find my family.
Try, anyway.
Heard Sydney, maybe.
Good luck to you, then.
Don't need your shite luck.
You said to me once
"Don't let the bastards
turn you into one of them."
I remember.
I'm not.
I can see.
Good. You're both here.
So you have new information
to add to this debacle?
I have.
Good.
We'll need it in writing.
We'll get this out of the way
with a brief trial.
It was me.
That is not the way
to fix things.
I can write a confession.
In full.
No trial.
No fuss.
Just a coach ride to Melbourne.
And then hanging. Am I right?
There you have it, Standish.
Your own headman.
Right under your drunken nose.
First, you free my man.
And that's all there is to it,
then?
That's all.
(CROWD SHOUTS ANGRILY)
Luck not going your way, Captain?
(CLEARS THROAT) Mrs Roberts.
I seem to have hit a bad streak.
Well, perhaps I have a way
to make that change.
From our mutual friend.
Would you like to know
where it was found?
(CURSES IN HAKKA)
Where is the licence
for this claim?
(GROANS)
No?
Well, in the absence
of a valid licence,
I hereby claim all gold
derived from these diggings
to be the rightful property
of the British Crown.
Now
Where's this boss woman?
No sign, sir.
Well, then?
And with the discovery
of this rich seam,
we give you this chance
for every man to make his fortune,
under the hospitality
and protection of the Crown.
(CHEERS)
Gentlemen
Doesn't seem convenient, does it?
That the Commissioner single-handedly
discovers the largest seam in years?
It will make a lot of men rich. And
he'll be Lieutenant-Governor for this.
That's the story.
Very good.
(HORSE WHINNIES)
Miss Roberts told us
where the seam is.
You were right
about the size of it.
There's a crossroads 20 miles east.
Shing
Remind me
to teach you poker some day.
Annie
You came.
I'm sorry.
Not safe here.
Go. We go now.
Quickly, swallow the gold
before they come.
(GUNSHOT)
(ANNIE SCREAMS)
Run!
(PANTING) Annie
Annie
Annie! Annie!
Help! Annie
(SOBS)
(HORSE WHINNIES)
(BIRDS CHIRP)