02x23 - Deaf Smith

[bunniefuu]

♪ Jim Bowie Jim Bowie

♪ He was a bold adventurin' man ♪

♪ Jim Bowie Jim Bowie

♪ Battled for rights with a powerful hand ♪

♪ His blade was tempered and so was he ♪

♪ Indestructible steel was he

♪ Jim Bowie Jim Bowie

♪ He was a fighter a fearless and mighty adventurin' man ♪

- [Narrator] You could almost tell the history of Texas

just by calling the roll of her 254 counties,

most of them named after the men

who made her what she is today.

There's Bowie County up there in the northeast tip,

named after Jim Bowie.

Over here in the northwest,

there's a county named after another early Texian,

by the name Deaf Smith, usually called D. Smith.

Why?

What kind of man was he?

Well for one thing, he wasn't always deaf.

[g*n fires]

At least he wasn't deaf

when his trail first crossed Jim Bowie's about 1828,

long before either one of them became Texas heroes.

When in fact Americans were considered foreigners in Texas.

- Get off your horse!

[birds chirping]

[g*n firing]

- [Man] Get the horse!

[hooves clopping]

[pleasant vocal music]

- Gracias senor.

That was a good shot.

I'm trying to thank you for your help, mister.

What's the matter, you deaf?

- Him I can bury.

I don't know rightly what I can do about you.

[pleasant vocal music]

- Who's the man?

[pleasant vocal music]

- Good morning

- It's not morning.

- You boys, run outside and play.

[speaks foreign language]

- Well I sure didn't expect to wake up

in a nice place like this.

- No mortification.

Clean, healthy wound.

Move the leg. - Huh?

- Move it!

There's your duds and there's the door.

I'd be much obliged if you kept traveling.

- What?

[pleasant vocal music]

[Jim groans]

[pleasant vocal music]

- Care for the loan of a horse?

Only a fool would try crossing Texas on foot.

- There you are.

- Gracias senor.

- You're welcome.

[speaks foreign language]

- Well, I would do what the lady tells you, fellas.

You'll find it saves a lot of trouble in the long run.

Go on then, go on.

[speaks foreign language]

[speaks foreign language]

[speaks foreign language]

[Jim chuckles]

Well they're real nice boys, senora.

Oh come on, senora.

You haven't said a word to me since he brought me back here.

Are you afraid of me, or is it just

that you hate Americans too?

I'm gonna get out of here.

I've had just about enough of this.

[speaks foreign language]

Now let me up, come on come on.

- You must not leave.

- Why not?

Oh, was it you who made him bring me back here?

You sent him out to get me, did you?

- He went after you his own free will, senor.

- You mean he was sorry for me?

- No, no senor.

Pity and sorrow are the cousins of weakness,

and Senor Smith would never act out of weakness.

- Well he sure didn't act out of kindness

or out of friendship.

- You are a man of courage and pride, senor.

Maybe he did not think to find those virtues in an American.

- What's he got against Americans?

- I do not know.

Maybe it was something of the heart.

Those are the deep wounds.

The father of my boys died when they were so.

- [Jim] I'm sorry.

- Senor Smith is kind to me and to my boys,

but he's deeply troubled by this hatred of his own people.

That is why I would like you to stay.

Be patient with him.

I think you might be good for him.

- Well, just don't pin your hopes on it.

I'm no reformer.

- With your permission Senor Smith, I will stable the horse.

- Gracias Lupe.

Well I found your horse.

He's over in Gonzalez, know the place?

It's an American colony a short ride east.

Fella named Dewitt started it about three years ago.

I guided his party in from Nacogdoches.

- [Jim] You guided him there?

- I got paid.

- Oh so you can hear American money when it talks huh?

- Kind of Americans come to Texas,

I don't wanna hear.

- Well, what do you have in mind about my horse?

- Nothing.

And to that end, I'll make you the loan of a horse

and point you in the direction of Ringtail Jack's.

Rest is up to you.

You sleep on it, Bowie.

Good saddle horses are hard to come by out here.

It's a long way across Texas on foot.

[speaks foreign language]

[speaks foreign language]

[pleasant vocal music]

Just turn the horse loose before you get to Ringtail's.

He'll come home by himself.

- What happens if I don't get my own back?

- Then you'll be past the need of one.

[hooves clopping]

- Whoa.

[horse whinnies]

[birds chirping]

Here boy!

Here boy.

[hooves clopping]

[suspenseful vocal music]

[dramatic vocal music]

- Yes sir, Mr. Bowie.

Sure glad to meet up with you again.

Specially glad you might say to see you alive and kickin'.

Here, let's drink to your continuing good health.

Now there's no sense in wasting good rot gut.

You drink it Scholar.

You wanna know why I'm glad to see you alive, Mr. Bowie?

Well I'll tell ya, seeing as you're so itchin' to know.

It's these letters we found in your saddlebag.

You're a real important man, Mr. Bowie.

Worth more alive than dead, I'd say.

Must be a passel of folks up there in the states

that'd pay real handsome to see that smiling face again.

Mr. Bowie here's a modest man.

He doesn't go around singing his own praises.

So why don't you read 'em, Scholar?

- I'd be happy to, sir.

This one's signed Monsieur Debigny, governor of Louisiana.

- Yes sir, the governor.

- John James Audubon.

[man laughs]

- What's so funny?

- The name, senor.

John James Audubon, very funny.

- You water the stock?

- I was going to water the stock--

- Do it now, get!

Read on.

[hooves clopping]

[birds chirping]

- And Stephen F. Austin, empresario de San Felipe.

- Well then, suppose you take your pick, Bowie.

Which one of them gents you figure pay the biggest ransom?

- I pick the gent by the window.

- If you boys will back up a little

and allow Mr. Bowie free and easy access

to the door, I'll be much obliged.

- Well what do you know?

Look and see who's come a-visitin', old Deaf Smith himself.

Put down that sh**ting pole you got there Deaf,

and join us in a little sociable drink, sir.

What do you say?

- Can't hear a word, Ringtail,

but you sure better hear me.

Now back up or this goes off.

- I've been wondering how we'd get the good news

to Bowie's rich friends.

You got a shrewd, nasty mind, Scholar.

Would you be thinking the same as me?

- If you're considering Mr. Deaf Smith

for this delicate mission, I think he has

just the proper qualifications,

if he can be so persuaded.

- Well persuading shouldn't be no problem,

seeing he's got a nice, pretty brand new wife

and a couple of cute little boys,

just as cute as a hound dog's pups.

- Leave 'em out of this, it's my fight.

- He dealt himself in.

Tell him nobody's yapping, give me a civil answer.

- He can't hear you, you know that.

You called him Deaf yourself.

- Folks here about say he ain't deaf at all.

Just his way of snubbin' folks he don't like,

and I don't happen to be the kind that likes being unliked.

- Cowards, dirty filthy American riffraff scum!

Why just to talk to the likes of you is to foul my mouth.

- You heard what I told you about your wife and kids.

You hearin' me now?

I'll show him, give me your g*n.

Find out whether he can hear or not.

[g*ns fire]

What do you know?

- [Jim] If he wasn't deaf before, he's certainly deaf now.

- Yeah well deaf or not, he's the man we need.

He's a writing man like you, Scholar.

You write to him what I told him about his wife and kids.

[somber vocal music]

- Senor Scholar.

[speaks foreign language]

[hooves clopping]

- To chivalry.

- What did you do to him?

- When the power of the printed word failed to move him,

measures more physical were employed.

For the common good as it were,

you might try to persuade the gentleman

to be more compliant.

- What are we doing here?

- Hurts pretty bad huh?

- Don't tell me what to do, Bowie.

- What's the matter, you all right?

- Stop fretting.

I got you into this, and I'll get you out.

No riffraff bunch of ignorant Americans

are gonna shove me around.

You can count on that.

- It's getting so loud in here a man can't think.

Come on, Pedro.

- Nobody's gonna shove me around.

My pa tried it, set upon by everybody and anybody

just 'cause I was puny.

Since I come to Texas, I'm my own man.

I taught myself to hunt and sh**t

and fight as good as any American ever come by here.

So just stop ordering me what to do,

and move over here so I can get at those knots.

- You wait for me, I'll handle her.

Mrs. Smith?

[knocking] Senora?

Senora?

There's nobody home.

Back to the house, there's other ways to soften him up.

[somber vocal music]

- Here.

Tie 'em up while I saddle the horses.

Meet me outside.

[birds chirping]

Hurry up Smith!

I've just gotta get my saddlebags.

[birds chirping]

Come on Smith!

- [Deaf] Bowie, where are ya?

- Hey Smith, what are ya doing?

Smith!

Deaf!

Smith, look out behind ya!

[g*n fires]

[g*n fires]

[g*ns firing]

- Do you have to sneak up behind a man like that, Bowie?

What's going on here?

- Mr. Dewitt.

- Looks like Dewitt and his Americans is it?

- Si.

- Well what do you know about that?

Finally got up enough spine to chase off that riffraff.

What are you doing here Lupe?

- I told Mr. Dewitt what this one had to do all by himself.

I told him now would be the time

to rid us all of the robbers.

- What?

Stop mumbling, Lupe.

- Something has happened to his hearing now, senora.

He's not pretending, I'm afraid.

[dramatic vocal music]

- [Narrator] It is told that in the years that followed,

Deaf Smith developed a sixth sense

to compensate for his loss of hearing.

A sixth sense and a blind courage

that was to make his name a synonym for bravery

as Sam Houston's personal scout

in the w*r for Texas independence.

Deaf Smith and Jim Bowie,

immortalized in the list of Texas counties.

[pleasant vocal music]

♪ Jim Bowie Jim Bowie

♪ He was a fighter a fearless and mighty adventurin' man ♪