"Madam, if I have to make a choice between fighting the marshal and fighting you," "I'm gonna choose the best way to survive, and chivalry can wait." "Tsk, tsk, tsk, tsk." "So very sad." "All right, Hey Boy." "What is it?" "I read here of bloody ax killer man who goes berserk." "He kills all people on isolated farm where he works." "Hey Boy, do you remember when I taught you to read English?" "Well, there must have been a reason." "Let me see it." "Paper Chinese." ""An itinerant farmhand is known to have killed at least nine persons, including two women and three children."" "Poor children." "So very sad." "Yes, it is, Hey Boy." "So very sad." "And someone must catch that fellow." "Poor children." "Hey Boy," "I am going after the man." "But I am not going after him because you would make my life miserable if I didn't." "No, sir." "I'm going because I'm tired of low ceilings." "And the taste of champagne." "I'd like some sunshine and fresh air for a change." "You know, if I hadn't found you, I was just about to take your lifeboat." "Step away, Jeri." "Mister, you put your left hand over, take out your gun and put it on the table there." "No, I'm not I the habit of handing my gun over to just anyone who asks for it." "You better do as he says, mister." "I'm Jim Buell, marshal from Pine Bluff." "Oh, you're afraid I came after him." "I'm taking any chances." "That's flat." "He's the marshal, all right." " Mister, please..." " Shut up, Davy." "Now, let's get this over with." "I'm not asking much." " Don't put your gun down, mister." " Shut up, Davy." "Let me hear what he has to say." "I guess if I were in your position, I'd ask the same thing." "All right, Davy." "Speak up." "The Marshal here is a little overstepped hisself." "He's got me here on an attempted murder warrant." "I'm afraid he's gonna be judge, jury, and hangman hisself." "You shot at me, Davy." "I'd taken a couple of shots at the jail." "I was drunk." "Drunk!" "Like it was an excuse." "Get yourself liquored up, fight like an animal, wake up the next morning, forget everything that happened." "There was no excuse for Paley Bradford." "That's a man he killed last July." "Self-defense." "The jury said so." "They let me off!" "A man half your size, just married, a child four months off." "He come at me with a pitchfork!" "He was drunk, so it didn't matter." "Is that what you're gonna say to me?" "Buell, you don't have the right." "You get me back to that jail where I belong." "If you'd only hit him once, Davy." "But you kept beating him with that two-by-four till there was nothing left but a resemblance." "I had to take Paley's wife there to identify him." "Please..." "That's what he did." "Well, Marshal, where are you planning on taking him?" "That's none of your affair." "But do you think I have reason enough to ask you to cooperate?" "Mister, you're a gunfighter, ain't you?" "I guess you'd better answer that." "Look, Paladin, what's your price?" "I'll pay it." "I got near $40 on me and a couple hundred at home I can dig up." "Just gun him down." "I'll pay you." "He's old." "You can do it." "I don't want to die." "I'm hiring you!" "Kill him!" "Well?" "Please, it ain't just the money." "Jeri, get that grub." "Oh, I..." "I couldn't find the coffee, Jim." "Well, all right." "Bring it dry." "But hurry it up." "I could use some of whatever that is that's about to burn." "Oh, my biscuits!" "And need a room and somebody to take care of my horse." "Well, you ride, and you curry him." "She doesn't keep a stable boy." "Not on the business this place does." "She oughta get married again, stop doing a man's work." "Oh, don't go on with that." "Well, it's true enough, isn't it?" "Well, that doesn't matter." "It's my place." "Why should I give up everything I've worked hard for just to marry you?" "Jeri, I am not going to come here and be your stable boy." "I don't want you to be my stable boy." "Please, Jim, not tonight." "Jeri, I'm a Marshal." "I can't give it up." "Not even for her." "Oh, I'm hungry for her." "I get better proposals every Saturday." "Well, whenever you make up your mind, just sing out." "Jeri, don't worry about the horse." "Where you going?" "I'm gonna take care of my horse." "You might have a rifle in your saddle boot." "Yes, as a matter of fact, I do." "You stay here." "Now, Marshal," "I have put myself in a very bad position here tonight without any real explanation from you as to what this is all about." "I've done that out of respect for your badge and nothing more." "If you want to come to the door, I'll hand you the rifle." "But I will not chance ruining a good animal just because you're more nervous than any lawman has a right to be." "Paladin, I don't play games." "Back shoot him, Marshal!" "Back shoot him!" "You're good at it!" "I could drop you in the doorway." "Marshal, I hope not." "Jim, you are nervous, like he said." "Jeri, get that grub." "We've got to get out of here." "They'll be following us, rain or no rain." "What happened, Marshal?" "Your gun jam?" "Davy, shut up or I'll..." "Or you'll what?" "I can't stand it, Buell." "I can't stand waiting for it." "I want it now if it's going to happen." "Mr. Paladin." "Aha." "Mine at last." "That's if you can get it down and keep it down and pay 25 cents for it." "Then it most definitely is mine." "He's a good man, mister." "He shouldn't have to die just because he's got a passion for the law." "I'll go along with that, Jeri." "What are you driving at?" "This." "If he thought you'd been sent here to... to kill him, he'd kill you." "And I don't want that." "But as God is my judge, if you hurt him, I'll kill you." "Jeri, what's going on here?" "You don't know?" "I came from Coleville." "How could I know what's happening in Pine Bluff?" "Could you take Buell?" "Jeri, one minute, you're going to shoot me to protect Buell." "The next minute, you want me to shoot him." "No!" "Just take his gun away from him without hurting him." "You don't just take somebody's gun away from them without hurting them." "Now, either you use that shotgun, or you hang it back on the wall where it belongs." "Jeri, we're ready." "All right, Davy." "All right, Davy." "Stop wasting time." "You get your poncho." "I'm sorry, Jeri." "I forgot." "You should chain the dogs outside." "Here." "This'll pay for the food and the busted crockery." "All right now." "Snap it up." "It's a hard night's ride to get to Coleville." "Coleville?" "What about it?" "Marshal, you've got 60 yards of white water between you and Coleville." "Well, you came that way, then." "You went over the bridge." "There isn't any bridge." "Well, then, we'll swim the horses." "Tried that." "I almost didn't make it, and it's rained three inches since then." "So the marshal can't cross the divinity." "Talk about the end of the road." "You shut up!" "Well, let's face it, Marshal." "They got you trapped." "You try to go on, you'll get drowned." "Try to go back, and you get shot." "You stay here..." "Well, we'll find out, won't we?" "'Cause Roy Bissell's coming, Marshal." "Don't laugh too loud, boy." "I'll see you behind bars or I'll see you dead." "Marshal, you think it's just about time you explained this whole thing to me?" "This is none of your affair." "I told you to keep out of this." "Now, if Roy Bissell and his friends are coming here for you, it's my affair, whether you like it or not." "I will take my guns back." "It's up to you whether or not I use them to help you." "But I will defend myself." "Paladin, are you from Roy Bissell?" "Ask her." "I don't know." "Jeri, what did he mean, "ask her"?" "What did you two talk about in there?" "She tried to shotgun me one minute... to save you." "The next minute, she asked me to take you." "I can't blame her for that." "I've put her through a good deal of trouble." "Davy there's her brother's oldest boy." "Jim, turn Davy loose." "Paladin, Jeri thinks she's doing this to help me." "Jeri, the first thing I did when I came here was to take these shells out of that shotgun." "Sooner or later, everyone thinks he can handle this job just a little bit better than I can." "Even Jeri." "Even Bissell and his posse." "Well, Davy, if they want you alive, they better leave you with me, because nobody's gonna take you away from me alive." "What if Bissell calls your bluff?" "Let's put it this way, Paladin." "It's our last chance, Davy's and mine." "Either we live together, or we die together." "Oh, no, you don't." "Keep away from me, Marshal." "Davy, I warned you just once." "I got nothing to lose, and I ain't gonna die easy." "Come on." "I told you, Davy!" " Why don't you stop it?" " Which one do you want me to shoot?" "All right, Marshal." "This is it!" " Oh!" " Jeri." "All right, Davy." "That's enough." " No!" " Suit yourself." "Get them back here." "Get them back here!" "Come on!" "Well, Marshal, do I get an explanation now?" "Roy Bissell and about 15 men are riding after us." "They want to take my prisoner." "I never lost a prisoner." "They're not so hot to see that Davy's set free." "They want to get at me." "Davy... he's nothing but the sneeze." "The sneeze?" "Years ago, I used to ride trail drive." "Once, we're out about three weeks, and we ran into a dry well." "That night, there was a summer storm." "Thunder and lightning." "You could smell water in the air, but there was no rain." "Every time the sky lit up, we thought the beef would be up and running." "Long about 4:00 in the morning, one of the boys sneezed." "That beef was up and running like the sneeze was dynamite." "Now, you could say that sneeze started the stampede, but I wouldn't." "What would you say, Marshal?" "I'd say those beef were all ready to run, and if it hadn't been the sneeze, something else would've started them." "Davy... he's nothing but a sneeze." "Still, those cattle did have a reason to run." "You think those men coming here don't?" "For the love of mercy, gimme a drink!" "I need a drink!" "They're not gonna get me outta here alive." "I'm gonna die." "I can feel it." "Roy Bissell will be riding lead horse." "He's a good man." "Two years ago, I had to bring his youngest son in to hang." "That was your job." "That's right." "Well, it catches up with you, Jeri." "Sooner or later, it all catches up." "Please, if you won't make him give Davy up, help him get to Coleville." "Marshal, you want my help?" "I need it." "You have it." "Mister, he's gonna gun me." "Will you help me?" "I know." "I heard it." "Jeri, get on back in the kitchen and stay there." "I love him!" "Then leave this door locked, if you love him." "Hey, Bissell, I found their horses." "They must be in there." "Buell!" "Buell, you in there?" "Can you hear me, Buell?" "This is Roy Bissell!" "Roy, you go on back to town and take your hooligans with you." "Jim, I did all the talking that I'm gonna do back in town!" "Now, you send Davy out here, and you send him out alive!" "Roy..." "Roy, listen first." "You start firing at me, I'll shoot Davy before you can kill me." "Jim, where's this all gonna end?" "You thought about that?" "Now, we're coming in, and, Jim, I better find that boy alive!" "Go and shot through that window." "Well, they called your bluff." "Mrs. Marcus." "Mrs. Marcus, open the door." "No." "Mister!" "Buell!" "Roy, it's over!" "Hold it, Buell." "You too, mister." "We're the law." "He is." "It's true." "So this is the end of it, Roy." "I'm afraid so, Jim." "Well, you can drag me down." "I'm just a man." "But you can't drag down 23 years of good law." "Jim, we didn't drag down the law, you did." "The first time was when you killed that drifter last January." "How many others were there, Jim?" "Remember?" "And, Jim, Davy here was drunk when he shot at your jail, that's all." "Lately, you've begun to think that you are judge, jury, and hangman." "He's going to kill again." "You know that." "Maybe." "Well, what am I going to say to the family of the next man he kills?" "That won't be your problem, Marshal." "That will be another man's." "Now, Jim, give me the keys for this boy's leg irons." "Take those chains off of him, get him outside, get him ready to ride." "I'm sorry, Jim." "They won't understand." "They understand." "And I understand." "Twenty-three years of intimacy with the misery and madness of men," "wrapping bodies in ponchos, and kicking dust over the blood, and telling a wife you just shot her husband, or a father that his son must hang, and telling yourself that the law will be done no matter what the personal pain," "anguish." "I understand that 23 years of anguish, torture can twist a man." "The ironic thing, Marshal, is that only the very best survive long enough to break." "Let's go, Davy." ""Have Gun Will Travel"" "Reads the card of a man" "A knight without armor in a savage land" "His fast gun for hire" "Heeds the calling wind" "A soldier of fortune" "Is the man called Paladin" "Paladin, Paladin, where do you roam?" "Paladin, Paladin, far, far from home"