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In the old dog city and in the territory on west, there's just one way to handle the killers
and the spoilers, and that's with a U.S. Marshal and the smell of Gun Smoke.
Gun Smoke, starring William Conrad.
The story of the violence that moved west with young America.
And the story of a man who moved with it.
I'm that man, Matt Dillon, United States Marshal.
The first man they look for and the last they want to meet.
It's a chancey job and it makes a man watchful and a little lonely.
Oh, man, dear liver by golly.
Dear liver.
Matt, that was the best goddamn breakfast I've had since way last spring.
Yeah, it was pretty tasty, it's that one, I thought.
I could have ate two pounds all by myself.
You did eat two pounds, Chester.
I did?
That's the best thing about the winter's coming on.
You start getting some decent food for a change.
You get antelope and you get venison, prairie chicken, mallard.
Oh, instead of that stinking salt pork every morning.
You know, Doc, you're a lucky man.
You only got two worries in life, your next meal and your next fee.
Worries?
Oh, this is as well.
Those are both pleasures, Matt.
Now, speaking of fees, there hasn't been a killer in town for quite a spell.
Why don't you stick to curing people, Doc?
Because I can't live on fine promises from starving sodbusters.
That coroner's fee is cash in the pocket.
Oh, well, here we are.
This is where I leave you, gentlemen.
See you later, Doc.
Yeah.
What are you aiming to do, Matt?
Go down to your office and prop your feet up and cheat the government for the next 12
hours?
No, I'm going to ride out to the traj place.
He's been losing some stock the last few nights.
You're talking about old Silas Traj?
Uh-huh.
Yeah, he called me out there three years ago when his wife died, after it was too late to
help her.
And he talked me down to half fee.
And then he didn't even pay me.
Well, I'll admit he's not too easy to get along with.
Hey, Doc, look.
Yeah?
Up there in front of your office.
Well, I've got a patient already.
That's just a kid.
He's hanging onto the door.
He can't even stand up.
Come on.
Why, it's a young Indian boy, Matt.
Yeah.
Here, now take it easy, son.
Here, let me give you a hand.
Get his other arm, Chester.
Yes, sir.
Let me open the door here.
Yeah.
Let's set him down here, Chester.
That's all right, boy.
There.
What do you think's wrong with him, Doc?
Well, I don't know.
He doesn't seem to be cut up or shot in.
What's the trouble, boy?
What happened here?
Maybe he just don't know the language, Doc.
Yeah, that could be.
He kind of gives the impression he knows what we say to him, though.
Is that right, boy?
Looks like a coy away from us, Marcusons and that head man.
About nine years old, wouldn't you say, Doc?
Yeah, eight or nine.
His pulse is jumping like a scared rabbit.
Nobody's going to hurt you, boy.
Chester, go over to the Dodge house and see if there's a scout or a buffalo hunter in
town, huh?
Somebody who can speak Kiowa.
I like you.
It's funny, he won't even try to talk.
He keeps his mouth tight shut.
Yeah.
Now, wait a minute, Doc.
What is it, Matt?
Son, open your mouth.
Come on now.
Open it.
Good Lord, man.
Somebody's cut his tongue out.
Free yourself of old-fashioned ideas.
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Good morning, Matt.
Hello, Kitty.
Pour me a drink, will you?
All right, Matt.
Thanks.
It isn't often you have a drink before noon.
No, no, I guess it isn't.
That Indian boy?
Rumors get around fast, don't they?
Chester's stopped in.
Have you found out anything more about it, Matt?
Not yet.
Chester's asking around town, trying to get some line on him.
Does Doc think he's going to live?
Yeah, he'll live with it.
Might be better if he didn't.
It's always better to live, Matt, no matter what.
Yeah, I guess so.
It would take a monster to do a thing like that.
Well, it might even have been some of his own people that did it.
I like him, though.
I was not ordinarily mutilate that way, even in battle.
He had patches, didn't I?
But there aren't any this far east.
Besides, I'd only treat a warrior like that.
That's the kids only eight or nine years old.
Horrible.
He's still in pretty bad shape.
Oh, there you are.
I've been looking all over Dodge for you, Marshal.
That's where I've been, Mr. Trach.
All over Dodge.
Of course, I can see now why you ain't been on the job.
If you'll excuse me, Matt.
No, stay here, kiddie.
Why don't you stick to business, Trach?
No offense, Marshal.
I expected you out at the ranch this morning.
Yeah, I know.
I lost six more head last night, calves and yearlings.
Yeah?
It was killed and butchered right on my range.
Their hides throwed into a gully.
I'd have trailed the ones that done it if you got there before the frost melted off.
Same way with the rest of the cattle you lost, huh?
They've been killing and dressing them.
That's right.
Ah, it could be Indians.
Meat rustlers couldn't sell in Dodge, not get away with it very long.
It's engines all right. Of course it's engines.
It doesn't make much sense though this time of year.
There's too much game around.
Ain't no engine going after game as long as there's meat around for them to steal.
Do you find any wagon tracks?
Of course not.
Why?
Meat rustlers would have to haul this stuff somewhere.
Well, there's a tribe of Indians not more than six miles south of my place,
camped along the river bottom.
One of my riders seen them last week.
Are they Kiowas?
How do I know? They all look alike to me.
They're all a sneaking pack of thieves.
That might be where the boy came from, Matt.
What boy?
Young Indian boy. Somebody nearly killed him.
That's why I couldn't get out of your place this morning.
You're fooling around over some engine whelp while I'm losing stock?
Wait a minute.
You figure cattle are more important than human beings?
Human beings? I thought you said he was an Indian.
Get out of here, Trich.
Huh?
I said it real plain.
You get out of here.
What about my cattle, Marshal?
Whenever I get time off.
For more important jobs.
It's a fine thing when the law spends its time with Indians and dance all girls
while an honest rancher gets robbed.
It takes all kinds, Matt.
I'll argue that with you sometime, Kitty.
I'll see you later.
The
Let me tell the Chief Marshal.
It's his own son.
He's going to take it hard.
Yeah, I imagine.
How'd you find out the boy was Koto if he can't talk?
Now, Just Smiley's been buying game for his restaurant from a Kiowa boy by that name.
He came over to Doc's office and identified the kid.
That's where the boy was headed this morning.
He left camp here just before dawn with a dressed antelope carcass he was taking into Smiley.
We've been trying to sell all the game we could to get some rifles and ammunition.
Right now we have to hunt with bows and arrows.
What do you mean, we?
I am part Kiowa, Marshal.
I scout for the 7th Cavalry most of the year.
And I live with the Grey Feather Clan for the winter.
You're making out with just bows and arrows, huh?
You getting enough meat for the tribe?
Right now this river bottom is filled with game.
Later, I don't know.
Two men came down here in a wagon night before last.
Had eight or ten carcasses of young beef they wanted to trade for horses.
We laughed at them.
They left mad.
You know who they were?
No, Marshal.
But they must have rustled the meat someplace.
The Trach Ranch about five miles north has been losing stock.
They must be the ones getting it then.
They're hanging around here somewhere.
Look, when Kodo took game into dodge, which way did he usually ride?
He would head out north, cut through the Trach Ranch,
then pick up the Cimarron stage trail.
The two men said they'd get even with us, Marshal.
Yeah?
Well, it looks like they did.
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Ain't we getting pretty close to old Trachy's Ranch, Mr. Jones?
We're on it, Chesson.
The house ought to be about four miles north of us.
Could be 400 feet and we'd never see it in this cussed underbrush.
That's the way the kid came.
When this trail leaves the bottom land, we'll leave it too.
There's another patch of soft ground, Yonnie.
Yeah, let's go take a look.
Yeah, those are his pony tracks, all right.
Dug in deep, too.
He still had that antelope carcass with him.
Let's take a breather.
That's a mighty welcome word, Mr. Dillon.
It goes right along with payday and soup song.
That's right, Chester. There's nothing like having ambition.
It keeps a man on his toes.
Hey, listen to that.
Wait a minute.
It's a wagon coming this way.
You reckon it's him too, fella?
I don't know, but let's get these horses off the trail. Come on.
This is far enough. Get your rifle.
Let's get as close to the trail as we can.
The boy could have rode on from some work here in the bottoms.
That kind of figure's all right.
Now keep that rifle on him when I step out, huh?
Yes, sir. I sure will.
Hold up there. Hold up. Come on.
What's the trouble, mister?
Get down off that wagon.
Is this a holdup?
Down on the ground, both of you. Come on.
Now keep your hands up.
Chester, come on up.
Take our guns.
Yes, sir.
We ain't got nothing worth stealing.
Stealing? He's a U.S. Marshal.
He's a Marshal?
That's right. Where you heading?
Well, we was just going through.
Going through from where?
Look, Marshal, we ain't done nothing.
What are you hauling back there?
Just supplies is all.
Keep them covered, Joseph.
You're making a big mistake, Marshal.
It ain't the way it looks, Marshal.
Can you explain a half dozen beef carcasses in the back of your wagon, Mr.?
We bought them from a ranch down south.
Why haven't you still got to hide on it showing the traich brand?
Marshal, I'll tell you the straight of it.
We got that beef real cheap from a tribe of Kiowas down the bottom of the ways.
I reckon they stole it, all right?
Those Kiowas got nothing but bows and arrows, Mr.
That calf in the back of the wagon was shot with a rifle.
You've been hanging around here killing traich stock for the last two weeks.
Now where have you been selling the meat?
To the quartermaster at the fort.
We told him we was commission agents.
Then you're under arrest for cattle theft. Now get back in the wagon.
Chester, we'll stop at the ranch house so Traich can identify that calf and sign a complaint, huh?
All right, sir.
And then you're going under dodge, Mr.
And I'm going to tag you with the real charge I came out here on.
Well, what do you mean?
Utilating that Indian boy.
I don't know what you're talking about. We ain't even seen no Indian boy.
Well, he's going to see you and I think he'll remember you.
You fixed him so he can't talk, but he can still point his finger at you.
Now come on, let's go.
I do pull up that team.
Right.
Hey, Traich.
You wait here, Chester.
Well, so you finally did make it out here.
Yeah, I made it, Traich. I got the two men who've been stealing your beef.
You have?
They've been selling it over at the fort. Chester's got them up there in their wagon.
You guess I won't need this rifle then.
I'm about to ride out and have a look around.
What's the matter, Marshal?
I just noticed that antelope carcass hanging there in the barn.
Looks like a good fat one.
I shot it early this morning down in the bottoms.
I was just fixing to cut it up.
You shot it, huh, Traich?
I'm sure I did.
With a bow and arrow, that's not a rifle wound.
I don't know what you mean, Marshal.
So you're the one who hurt that boy, huh?
It was a mistake, Marshal.
One anybody might make.
I seen him riding through the bottoms this morning with that carcass on his horse.
I thought it was one of my calves.
So I roped him off and the horse ran on and I...
He took a knife to him.
I figured it might teach all them thieving engines a lesson.
I didn't find out until later it was an antelope he had.
Traich, you were the rottenest man I ever ran into.
Now let's be reasonable, Marshal.
There ain't no harm done.
He's just an engine brat, worthless, sneaky.
You're under arrest, Traich.
I reckon I ain't gonna go along with you on that, Marshal.
Well, I got a rifle in my hands.
Maybe you'd just better come to your senses.
I said you're under arrest.
You're talking mighty brave for a man with a gun on him.
Don't do it. You haven't got a chance.
I can try.
Kill it!
I'm glad you tried.
Mr. Dillon, you all right?
Yeah, I'm all right, Chester.
Why, why that Silas Traich?
What happened? What did he do?
What did he do?
That little boy back in Dodge would tell you, Chester.
If he couldn't.
In a moment, our star, William Conrad.
The world is in a chaotic state these days.
Maintaining world peace requires much more than military strength.
It takes moral strength, too.
That moral strength can come from our spiritual advisors, our ministers, priests, and rabbis.
Educating our children in the right way, teaching them to love and fear God,
can help to build morally and spiritually strong young men and women out of them.
Many of us have personal troubles, some of which seem insoluble.
Contact with God will provide the necessary comfort and strength
to carry on under even the most trying circumstances.
Get into the habit of attending your church or synagogue regularly, and don't go alone.
Take a friend with you, or better still, take your whole family.
Families who worship together, stay together.
There come times in all our lives when we feel the need of advice or comfort from a spiritual advisor.
How much more helpful he can be if we are in regular communication with him through weekly worship.
Make America spiritually strong. Attend your church or synagogue each week.
And now, William Conrad.
You know, on the frontier, a man's reputation was sometimes based on his ability as a gunfighter
and the number of men he'd kill.
But next week, Dodge watches a man lose everything he values without a shot being fired.
And that was the West.
Gunsmoke, produced and directed by Norman MacDonald, stars William Conrad as Matt Dillon, U.S. Marshal.
The story was specially written for Gunsmoke by Les Crutchfield, with editorial supervision by John Meston.
The music was composed and conducted by Rex Corey.
Sound patterns by Ray Kemper and Tom Hanley.
Featured in the cast were Harry Bartel, Vic Perrin, and John Danaer.
Harley Bear is Chester, Howard McNear is Doc, and Georgia Ellis is Kitty.
Join us again next week for another story on Gunsmoke.
Music