(THEME)
SS: THE LIVES OF THE COWBOYS.....brought to you by Home On The Range Brand lawn statuary....deer, antelope,penguins and flamingoes, all durable and realistic.
(OUTDOOR AMBIENCE, CATTLE, ETC.)
GK: Looks like Yellow Gulch is just up over those hills, Dusty.
TR: I believe so. You going into town?
GK: I am.
TR: You going to see Miss Evelyn Beebalo?
GK: I hope so.
TR: You still carrying a torch for her?
GK: I guess you could say that.
TR: How long since you've seen her?
GK: About seven years.
TR: How come the long absence if you were in love with her?
GK: I was sure she was going to dump me and I didn't want to be around when it happened.
TR: Yeah, well, that makes sense.
GK: What were these scrambled eggs you made for breakfast, pardner?
TR: Buzzard eggs. Found em up the arroyo.
GK: No wonder they tasted funny. Buzzards feed off dead bodies.
TR: Yeah? So do you.
GK: Not quite the same. (SIPS COFFEE) Wish you'd told me that before.
TR: You didn't ask.
(PAUSE FOR RUMINATION)
TR: So what you going to do if Miss Beebalo is no longer Miss but has become somebody's Missus?
GK: I guess I will be gracious and grown-up and I'll meet him and we'll have a very civilized lunch with a nice salad and a glass of white wine and then I'll go off in the weeds and cut my throat.
TR: You want me to stop you from cutting your throat? Or just watch?
GK: I want you to stop me.
TR: Okay.
GK: I wish I hadn't eaten buzzard eggs though. Hard to get that stuff off your breath. (BUZZARDS SHRIEK ABOVE, WINGS FLAPPING) And those buzzards are none too pleased either. (BRIDGE, PASSAGE OF TIME)
SS: Oh Lefty. It's good to see you. I worry about you. Riding that lonely trail, year after year. Why do you do it? They haul cattle in trucks now, you know.
GK: I know, but some cattle are too ornery to ride in trucks. So they have to be driven. Down the dusty godforsaken trail.
SS: But you're getting old for that.
GK: I am. But what else am I going to do?
SS: You could do what my boyfriend Pete does. He wears jeans and gets them faded and torn and they sell them in New York for more than they cost brand-new.
GK: So you have a boyfriend----
SS: Yes. I wrote you a letter about him.
GK: Oh. Well, that's fine.
SS: Wrote you a letter in Durango.
GK: Haven't been in Durango for several years.
SS: Well, it's waiting for you when you get there.
GK: What sort of work does Pete do, other than wear jeans?
SS: He is a gambler. And a rambler.
GK: I see.
SS: He knows when to hold em and when to fold em.
GK: You mean, the cards----
SS: Yes. ---- What'd you think I meant?
(RUNNING FOOTSTEPS)
TR (OLD-TIMER): He's a-comin! I told you he'd be a-comin and now he is. Big Messer. . He's on his way back. Time to skedaddle.
(RUNNING FOOTSTEPS AWAY, DOOR SLAM)
GK: Big Messer , he's the one who went to church and shot the organ, right?
SS: That's right. So he went to prison up in Yuma. I guess he got out now.
(DOOR OPEN, RUNNING FOOTSTEPS)
TR (OLD-TIMER): Did I say that Big Messer is coming back?
SS: Yes, you did, Jimmy!
FN (OLD-TIMER): Okay. Couldn't remember if I did or didn't. Just making sure.
(RUNNING FOOTSTEPS, DOOR SLAM)
(FOOTSTEPS)
DR: Let's go, Evelyn. Got the horse hitched to the wagon. Who's this?
SS: This is Lefty, Pete. Lefty, want you to meet my boyfriend.
DR: This the guy who you were engaged to for fifteen years? Him?
GK: Fifteen wonderful years, sir. Fifteen years of contemplating paradise. Hope you two are very happy.
DR: I'm a gambler, mister. I can read a man's face like other people read a book. You're a man with a broken heart. If you plan to slit your throat, be sure to use a sharp knife. ---- Let's go, Evelyn. (BRIDGE)
(TRAIN WHISTLE, OFF. THEN STEAM ENGINE APPROACHING)
GK: Reckon this is the train from Yuma. (TRAIN WHISTLE, BRAKES) And there's a gentleman getting off. Slope-shouldered gentleman with squinty eyes and his hand on his six-gun. Must be him.
FN: Okay, people. It's me. I said I'd come back and now here I am. I am trouble on wheels, I am the avenging angel, I am death on toast, I am smallpox, cholera and testosterone all in one package. I was spawned by a tornado and a cloud of pestilence and every bone in my body is meaner than a skunk. ----(PAUSE) Who are you?
GK: The name's Lefty, Messer.
FN: Best put a Mister in front of that Messer and add a sir to it.
GK: I'll give it some thought.
FN: So where is the marshal? I don't see him.
GK: I guess he found business elsewhere, Messer.
FN: So you represent the law in this town??? Haw haw haw haw haw.
GK: De facto, I do.
FN: DE FACTO!!!! That is fancy lawyer talk. Lawyers are the ones who stuck me in that filthy prison. You a lawyer?
GK: Nope.
FN: A friend of lawyers?
GK: Can't think of any.
FN: So what do you know about the law that you stand here and defend it????
GK: I know that the energy of a particle is equal to its mass times the square of the speed of light.
FN: Ha!!! You just read that in a book. You never seen it done. How about this law? For every action there is an equal and opposite reaction. (HE SWINGS, KAPOW, GK REACT. GROANS) And while you're lying there, how about Newton's law of gravity. Every mass attracts every other mass by a force proportional to the product of the two masses and inversely proportional to the square of the distance between them. Like this.....(HE JUMPS ON GK, WHO WRITHES IN PAIN) And how about old Archimedes.
Archimedes. A body that is submerged in a fluid is buoyed up by a force equal in magnitude to the weight of the fluid that is displaced. --- See how that works?? (HE LIFTS GK, THROWS HIM INTO WATER TANK. BIG SPLASH. BUBBLES.) Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha.
(GK STANDS UP, SHAKES WATER OFF)
GK: I believe you may be forgetting about the infield fly rule---- a pop fly that is hit with runners on base and that can by caught by an infielder with ordinary effort shall be declared by the umpire an automatic out before it is touched by a fielder.
(PAUSE)
FN: What in heck does that have to do with anything?
GK: It's a rule. It's meant to be respected.
FN: Ha! Who are you to talk about respect? You got buzzard breath.
GK: Nonetheless, I stand by my principles.
FN: Your principles!!! Haw haw haw. You just prove Parkinson's law: In a hierarchy, every employee tends to rise to his level of incompetence.
GK: You are forgetting about Mr. Murphy.
FN: What about him?
GK: Look behind you.
FN (TURNING): What? I don't see anything.
(BIG METALLIC BWANGGG)
(FN FALLS UNCONSCIOUS)
(BRIDGE)
GK: A favorite law of any cowboy. If anything can go wrong, it will. Right, Dusty?
TR: It's always worked out that way for me, that's for sure.
SS: Lefty?
GK: Evelyn. You all right?
SS: Thanks for standing up to Big Messer.
GK: Hey. Somebody had to do it.
SS: Right. So you leaving town?
GK: I reckon so.
SS: You going to just ride away and not say goodbye?
GK: Goodbyes are too emotional, Evelyn. They get all weepy and there's hugging and kissing and everything. So I just ride away.
(FOOTSTEPS)
DR: You leaving, Lefty?
GK: Reckon so, Pete.
DR: Well, I owe you a hundred bucks. I bet fifty bucks, ten-to-one, that you'd run Messer out of town and I won $500 and you get 20% commission.
GK: Who'd you make the bet with?
TR: Guess.
GK: You bet against me? My own pardner?
TR: Yep.
GK: Where'd you get the money?
TR: Borrowed it from you.
GK: Oh boy. So I get punched and stomped and dumped in a water trough and on top of it I'm out four hundred bucks? Oh well. It was worth it to see you again.
SS: Same here. You sure you don't want to stay another day or two? We have so much to talk about, Lefty. So much.
GK: Staying another day or two would just make it harder to leave you, Evelyn. But I wrote a song for you. (STRUMS)
I love you so, Miss Beebalo
For years I've been dreaming of you
I love you Evelyn just as it's level in
North Dakota, it's true.
Although I have drifted away
I'm thinking of you night and day
If I only had some WiFi nearby
Then I would send you an email
Or even sit down and Skype with you, Dear,
But I cannot here on the trail
I have in my saddle bags pictures of you
And I look at them often with tears
And so I hope you'll forgive me, my girl,
For being gone seven long years.
So long, Evelyn. See you.
SS: Could you give me a hug, Lefty?
GK: I'd only burst out weeping. It wouldn't be pretty. Ciao. Take care.
(THEME)
TR: THE LIVES OF THE COWBOYS.....was brought to you by Home On The Range Brand lawn statuary....deer, antelope,penguins and flamingoes, all durable and realistic.