"I need six men." "The job may last three days or three weeks." "We'll be covering rugged country and the men we're after are clever and dangerous." "They stole a piano." "Being a very attractive and a very wealthy young lady, you're taken everywhere." "Rare and exotic dishes are all too commonplace and too familiar to you." "So I have taken the liberty of preparing for you a dish" "I believe you have not tasted before." "Mr. Paladin." "What is that?" "Buffalo haunch." "Which I have re-christened ragout buffalo ala Provencal." "Buffalo haunch?" "That's correct." "Buffalo haunch prepared according to an ancient formula handed down from one chuck wagon cook to his son and to no one else." "First, the fresh meat is beaten with a tent stake, then it is hung on the back of a wagon for 21 days, exactly." "21 days no more, no less." "21 days?" "That's correct." "21 days." "No more, no less and then it is shaved." "Shaved?" "Well, Hey Boy, a woman who would forego ragout buffalo would be incapable of enjoying other rare pleasures." "I will dine alone." " May I serve you?" " Please." " Mr. Paladin." " Mm-hmm." "My mother doesn't know I'm here." "She'd be quite furious if she knew, but I think she's so wrong in her attitude." "Don't you?" "I mean about paying the ransom." "There's much more than a piano involved." "It's a matter of principle." "If you can't fight for principle, what can you fight for?" "Do you want to know Franz's exact words?" ""Not one zloty for tribute." "Not one!"" "Please, from the beginning." "What is your name?" "I'm Sybil Lansing." "My mother is Mrs. Bosley Lansing." "The woman, who at one time, operated the most elaborate, uh... saloon in the Oklahoma Territory." "When she married Father, he wanted to be close to his canneries." "Lansing Salmon." "For the past 20 years, Mama has been converting the heathen." "Culture, you know." "Plays, concerts, recitals." "Papa built Mama a theater, which she operates at a loss." "Her latest brainstorm was to induce Franz Lister to invade the hinterlands." "Franz Lister is here in America?" "For $50,000, Mr. Paladin," "I do believe Mr. Lister would play his precious piano in a Siberian igloo, wearing gloves, of course." "Oh, he agreed all right." "But mother had to import his piano, nothing else would do, and insure it for $25,000." "Now the kidnappers want $20,000 in cash." "Franz wept like a baby and beat down the door of the guest room with his bare feet." "Well, I quite understand his feelings." "I am authorized to pay you the sum of $1,000 out of my allowance, of course, if you'll help us retrieve the piano, and I have taken the liberty of ordering your horse to be saddled." "What is that absolutely tantalizing aroma?" "Buffalo haunch." "Not buffalo haunch!" "Would you mind terribly if I had some of this while you were changing into your traveling clothes?" "I've been away at school, you know, and you wouldn't believe how difficult it is to find buffalo haunch in London." "Mama always wanted a Southern plantation in the North." "She says anybody can have a Southern plantation in the South." "Well, you might at least have left us a note or something." "I was well-guarded, Mother." " This is Mr. Paladin." " Don't tell me." "I know him." "Paladin." "Mona, the years have been very kind to both of us." "You're a liar, but I love it!" "Paladin, I've come a long way, but this concert is gonna tie the ribbon on it." "Franz Lister all the way from Vienna, sponsored by Mrs. Bosley Lansing." "The former Mona Manning, a shoeless sharecropper from the Oklahoma Territory." "Now just let 'em try and top that." "Mona, even Franz Lister cannot give a concert without a piano." "Exactly." "I've got the $20,000 all ready." "And you are going to deliver it." "I absolutely forbid it." "I will not let you buy back my piano, Mrs. Lansing." "Well, if you won't use any other piano, how can we give a concert?" "We do not buy back the piano." "We take back the piano." "How?" "When you tell me where they are keeping it," "I will go there and take it away from them." "Herr Lister, if Mrs. Lansing is willing to pay the asking price, what's your objection?" "I've engaged Mr. Paladin to deliver the money." "May I?" "If you please." "Mmm." "Danke." "Yeah." "I have your gun, Mister..." "Paladin?" "It is yours, but I have it." "Suppose I refuse to return it?" "Do you buy it back, or do you take it back?" "Your gun, Mr. Paladin, your instrument, your identity." "How much do you pay me?" " Maestro, your hands!" " Freddie!" "Mr. Paladin, this permanently terrified creature is my manager." "His life is a nightmare." "Even when awake, he dreams that I might injure my hands." "Have you ever heard me play, Mr. Paladin?" "Regretfully, no, but I'd like very much to make it possible." "It is an experience which never fails to impress even myself." "A divine Providence saw fit to create out of the unity of a Gypsy mother and a Hungarian cattle baron, a human instrument of greatness." "At the age of 7," "I was taken to the palace of King Harold of Austria." "With these hands barely able to reach half an octave," "I played the "Appassionato."" "When I finished, the King placed me upon his knee, and kissed me, and asked me to name anything I wanted in the world." "Anything." "I laughed." "His beard tickled me, but I asked for a piano." "That is the piano he gave to me, and throughout my life, that piano has been my life." "She was my mother when I was hurt, my wife when I was lonely." "My shield from attack, my shelter when I was weary and sick at heart." "That piano you do not buy like a harlot in a street." "You fight for her like a woman you love." "Herr Lister, I'll get your piano back for you." "I need three or four men." "The pay is $5 a day and keep." "I'll need you for from three days to three weeks." "And there is a chance you could get killed." "Who are we after?" " Thieves." " What did they steal?" "A piano." "Is that your idea of a joke, mister?" "This piano is worth $25,000 to the man who owns it." "Now I need four men." "I ain't risking my neck for no music box." "We got one in there that's good enough for all of us." "I wish you people could see what I'm looking at." "A pack of filthy, unwashed animals." "That's right." "Animals." "Grub in the ground like moles, eat and drink like pigs." "You... you people who have risked your lives for a bottle of cheap whiskey." "Cheaper bullets." "You are now offered by a sardonic fate with a sense of humor." "You are offered a chance to touch the hem of music." "Music like very few people have ever been privileged to hear." "And you, you blather on about music boxes and wallow here in this." "You talk pretty flowery, mister." "Do you draw the same way?" "Well, sir, there's one good way to find out." "I wouldn't want to hurt you, sonny." "Now you're talking pretty flowery." "The only difference is you and I both know you're bluffing." "You think so, huh?" "Yeah." "I do think so." "You just said you don't have the stomach for trouble." "I never." "Then you do have the stomach for trouble?" "Anytime, anyplace." "That's fine." "Gentlemen, I have one volunteer." "Now who else, huh?" "All right." "All right!" "I'll go wherever he goes, and I'll carry him home." "We'll see about that." "Come on, who else?" "Come on!" "Well, we'll start looking for a place to camp." "It's still light." "Why do we not go on?" "For one thing, because it's easier to find a place to camp while it is still light." "And for another, if you a look at Sybil, you'll find she's about ready for a rest." "Sybil?" "Sybil." "Hello." "Anything wrong?" "I'm just jealous I suppose." "That's all." "Jealous of?" "How much easier it would be if only it were another woman." "Someone I could see, touch, and possibly destroy, but a piano." "Can I make myself more beautiful, more desirable than this eternal rival, one who responds to his every mood, listening even as she sings to him, embracing him whenever he reaches out his hands for her," "receiving a love I'll never know?" "Good night." "Good night." " What is it?" " I think we may have found your piano." "What does it say?" "Let me see." "It says, "If you're looking for a piano," ""take the right fork a quarter of a mile up trail." "You better be alone if you want the piano in one piece."" " I'll go." " You'll relax." " But who will get it?" " I will go and get it." " We will both go." " Don't you see what this note says?" "I'll tear them apart!" "Maestro, watch your hands!" "Freddie's right." "While you're tearing them apart, they'll be tearing your piano apart." "Sybil, keep him here." " Was it there?" " It was." "What are you going to do?" "Pay the ransom." " You're not going to pay it." " I certainly am." "What are they for?" "They, like the clarinetist's spare reed, are for emergency use only." "Paper." "We give them paper instead of bank notes." "Never bluff, Herr Lister, unless you're prepared to be called." "But I am prepared." "And to lose the piano?" " You are going back alone?" " I am." "I must go back with you." "I insist on it." "Herr Lister, I was hired to get your piano back and to keep you alive in the process if I can." "You've come along over my objections." "The presence of your entourage, however charming it may be, has caused dissention among my men." "Now I must call your attention to the fact that we are not engaged in a Viennese operetta." "Mr. Paladin!" "Herr Lister, at the piano, you are the acknowledged master." "In this situation, I am." "Freddie!" "Draw, Freddie." "Freddie, 20 paces." "Danke." "Your gun, Mr. Paladin, please." "Your gun." "Danke." "Stand back." "How true is your weapon, Mr. Paladin?" "One inch to the right at 50 feet." "Danke." "Stand perfectly still, Freddie." "You will be careful of your hands, won't you, Maestro?" "Yeah, Freddie." "I will be careful." "That you never saw in a Viennese operetta." "That's very true." "However, may I point out, Herr Lister, that the cigar did not shoot back?" "Come on." "Keep your hands away from those guns and come on out." " Did you bring the gold?" " I did." "I told you to come alone." "I want Lister to check that piano before I pay you off." "Go ahead." "I've got guns laid on you." "Don't you forget it." "Scratched." "It is scratched." "They have scratched my piano!" "I'll teach you to touch my piano!" "Closer." "I have been paid." ""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"