"How does a man get like this, Jonah?" "How does a fish become so important to him that he keeps a fishing pole in one hand and a shotgun in the other?" "Is that supposed to be a boat or what?" "It is a boat." "Don't look much like one." "Well, an artist paints not what he sees but what he is." "You mean you see yourself as a boat?" "Colors nice, but, uh..." "Yes, Hey Boy?" "Why don't you paint something everybody knows?" "Like what?" "Like a boat." "I read." ""Gold Shipment Troubles." ""Crystal Lake, Oregon, July 6, 1976." ""Hope has been abandoned" ""for early recovery of $20,000 in gold bullion lying on the bottom of Crystal Lake," ""it is announced by the Baron Insurance Company today." ""Although, the box contained the bullion can be seen in the clear water," ""the depth of the lake make it impossible to retrieve it." ""Bartons have sent to Baltimore for deep-sea drivers who are en route over land." "Gold was thrown off stage coach during a hold-up attempt two weeks ago."" "Hmm." "What are you looking for?" " A card." " Here." "Mr. Barton, I realize there's nothing on that card that particularly qualifies me for this kind of work." "Well, we've sent east for divers." "At considerable expense, I imagine." "Plenty." "If I can do the same work for half the price, you'll be satisfied, won't you?" "I'd be delighted, but the trouble of that is you can't do it." "Can you head the divers off?" "Oh, I suppose I could." "I could telegraph Chicago and have them stop." "Why don't you do it?" "Let me tell you something, Paladin." "Every fortune hunter in the territory has had a crack at getting that gold up out of that lake." "What makes you think you can do any better?" "Mr. Barton, my partner is a genius." "Oh?" "Who is he?" "A fellow named Leonardo da Vinci." "da Vinci?" "I thought he was a painter." "Inventor as well." "He had an idea that if a man took a goatskin full of air down with him, he could breathe underwater." "Did he ever try it?" "Not to my knowledge." "What other fine ideas does he have?" "Well, he had a design for a boat that went underwater and a machine that flew through the air." "Mm-hmm." "Well, I think I'll wait for the divers." "You're making a bad mistake, Mr. Barton." "I could you save you a lot of money." "Think that fella in black's nosing around." "All right." "I'll give you a crack at it." "I'll give you two days." "All right." "That's enough." "Now, you tell me where the gold is?" "There's an old man that fishes the north shore of the lake." "Name's Jonas Quincy." "He'll show you where it is." "And, Paladin, don't turn your back on him." "Oh?" "Why?" "He's as big a lunatic as that friend of yours da Vinci." "Your name Jonas?" "You doing any good?" "Barton at the insurance office told me you might be able to tell me where the gold is." "Next one goes in my fishing hole is gonna get a shotgun blast in the back." "That where the gold is, in your fishing hole?" "There's a fish in that hole is what there is." "A fish like you or me or nobody else in this world ever seed before." "Now, you just take heed, Mister." "I ain't a patient man, but I been pushed." "Ever since the day that gold went over the side, the folks have been swarming around this lake, and churning up the water and scaring all the fish." "Well, I have had enough, Mister." "I've had enough." "Now, if that ain't clear, I'll make it clearer." "What in blazes you up to?" "You stay away from my trout." "I'm a-warnin' you." "Well, I've heard tell it's an easy way to go." "I don't reckon that fella's going to come up." "What do you mean?" "He weighted hisself down with rocks to let him sink fast." "Took him down to the bottom." "And then I guess it took him to the bottom, all right." "Ah, that does it." "Might as well pull up stakes." "You mean leaving the gold down there?" "Well, not me, I ain't leaving." "If we stick around much longer, Angel, they're gonna tie us in with the hold-up." "Now you do what you want." "I'm pulling out." "Twenty-thousand." "I sure do need a drink." "Well, let's go have one for him." "He was our last hope." "It's all right, Jonas." "It's all right." "I saw your fish." "You what?" "I saw your fish." "Now you just wait a minute." "That..." "That fish is dead serious with me." "I mean, don't you be saying nothing ain't true." "Jonas, how does a man get like you?" "Are fish the most important thing in your life?" "You got a fishing pole in one hand and a shotgun in the other?" "How big was he?" "That's all I want to know is..." "confound it, is how big." "Well, he'd have to go sixty or seventy pounds." "Sixty or seventy pounds?" "That's right, Jonas." "If you're gonna catch him, you better do it soon because it's going to be very unhealthy for fish around here before much longer." "No, it ain't." "He come up." "They told me you killed yourself." "An exaggeration." "Your box is lodged under some big rocks." "I'm gonna have to blast it out of there." "Blast it?" "Whoever heard tell of blasting underwater?" "A man named Alfred Nobel, about two or three years ago." "He came up with a theory that a mixture of 7 to 10 of nitro-cotton to nitroglycerin would form a explosive gelatin that will detonate under water." "I'm going to the next town to get the chemicals I need." "You meet me at the lake at dawn." "And I wouldn't mention this to anybody else." "Come on." "Where'd he go?" "I said where'd he go!" "We'll dig in here." "you reckon he'll be back tonight, Orrie?" "Whenever he comes, I'm ready for him." "Orrie, here he comes." "Get 'em ready, just in case." "Stirring up my fish again." "Better back up, Jonas." "And you better just keep on movin' because you ain't never going near my trout again." "Jonas, it'll all be over soon." "It's over now." "Now, when I give a pull on this wire, that's going to cause some chemicals to mix down there, and that's going to cause an explosion which might just about knock you down if you don't get back from this water." "You're gonna kill my trout?" "I'm only going to do today what somebody else will do tomorrow." "I'll kill you first." "And I'll kill anybody else comes down here, too." "You'd kill a man over a trout?" "You heard me." "Now you just back off." "Put the gun down, Jonas." "Well, maybe you can kill a man over a trout, but I can't." "I'm going back into town." "I'm going to get a pick and shovel." "Because of you, I've got several hours of back-breaking work down there to get that gold out." "Now you stay out of my way." "Old man, you put that shotgun on me again, and I'll break it in two." "Keep going!" "Huh." "Reckon I scared him that time." "Fish in peace for a change." "What in tarnation is going on here?" "Get off my property!" "What are you..." "Orrie!" "Get with the horses." "All right." "Jonas, it might be a good idea if you have a doctor take a look at that." "Do you know what you done to me?" "I could fish out there the rest of my life and never know whether he was down there or not." "Jonas, three men died here in the last few minutes." "You're gonna talk to me about a fish?" "You're dad-blasted right I'm gonna talk to you about a fish." "Twelve years I been after him." "Twelve years." "I've made every kind of lure and gadget known to man to catch that fish." "My business went to pot over that fish." "My woman left me over that fish." "All I asked was to be left alone." "All I wanted in this world was just to catch is that fish." "Now I don't know whether he's alive or dead." "He's dead, Jonas." "If that fish was what you loved, I'm sorry." "Loved?" "I hated that fish." "I hated him so much, I'd just get the shakes thinking about what he done to me." "I just wanted to kill him myself, was all." "And man must make the angels laugh." ""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"