User Reviews

This episode begins with a man named Harry Cagle asking for more time to pay off his gambling debt. When he is told that he only has a month he begins thinking about how he can get together the scratch. Since he is part owner of a freight company, the only way that he believes he can get the money is have his partner, Carl Anderson, killed and then he will be in full control of the business and can get to the cash. So Harry hires a gunman, Dave Reeves, to do his dirty work for him.

Well it just so happens that the victim, Carl, is dating Anne Madison (get this twist) she is the former wife of the gunman, Dave Reeves. And to make matters even more bizarre, the gunman has a son by Anne that he has never met. Wow- what a story!

The story will continue as all of the sudden Dave wants to be a part of the his young son's life. This puts him at odds with the man he was hired to kill plus his former wife. But there just happens to be one person in all of Dodge City that knows about Anne and Dave's past relationship, that will be Marshal Matt Dillon.

This is a situation, maybe not the same odd circumstances, that has been played out many times in most western shows. The killer learns he has a child but knows that he wants more out of his child than running from the law. So it was a rather routine script. But it will be the performance of Pernell Roberts that separates this show from the rest. He does a wonderful job of playing the rough gunfighter that wants to be back in his child's life. When the credits roll this is far from routine. Good watch.

This story opens inside a saloon in a town that is not Dodge City. A slimy character named Harvey Cagle, who lives in Dodge, owes a gambler a lot of money. The gambler gives Cagle a month to pay the debt.

Dave Reeves is a gunfighter, and he is in the town Cagle is visiting to complete a job. Reeves makes his living traveling around and enticing men he has been paid to kill to draw on him. Fortunately for Reeves, he has not yet encountered anyone in his work faster on the draw than he is.

Cagle sees Reeves kill a man, learns that Reeves is a professional gunfighter, and is told Reeves will kill someone for as little as $100. Cagle sees Reeves as a solution to his cashflow problem. Cagle invites the gunfighter to come to Dodge City and kill Carl Anderson. Anderson is Cagle's partner in a freight business, and Cagle thinks if Reeves kills Anderson, Cagle will get full ownership of the business. With full ownership of the business, Cagle will have the means to obtain the funds he needs to pay his gambling debt.

(One wonders why an astute businessman, as Anderson seems to be, would partner with someone so clearly untrustworthy as Cagle.)

What Cagle does not know until later is that Reeves has an ex-wife and son in Dodge. In a stroke of astounding coincidence, Cagle's business partner happens to be in a relationship with Anne Madison, who is -- you guessed it -- the former spouse of Reeves.

After spending time with the son he has never known, Reeves begins to imagine a future with Anne and his son, Billy. Thus, we have the primary points of tension in this story. Will Reeves entice Anderson into a gunfight? If he does, will Anne be willing to rekindle their relationship? Is a future with Reeves as a father in the best interest of Billy? Will Cagle obtain the money he needs to pay Reeves and pay off his gambling debt?

Pernell Roberts, who by this time had left his role as Adam Cartwright on Bonanza, is Dave Reeves. It would have been interesting to know how the viewers in 1967, when this episode first aired, viewed Roberts as a heavy. Fifty-plus years later, Roberts certainly plays the part with enough expressionless, cold-blooded demeanor to be convincing. Prior to his Bonanza days, Roberts had played another heavy way back in Season 3's "How to Kill a Woman" Gunsmoke episode.

Jacqueline Scott appeared in eight different Gunsmoke episodes, and she plays the role of Anne Madison in this story. She had played another wife faced with the return of a man in her life in Season 12's "The Whispering Tree" as the wife of the character played by John Saxon.

The great R. G. Armstrong is another familiar face to any fan of the Westerns genre. Here he is Carl Anderson. In many ways, Carl Anderson in this story is the same character as Jud Briar in Season 10's "The Lady."

Henry Jones often played shady -- or even dark -- characters. Here he fills the Henry Cagle role with the appropriate level of cowardly deceit.

Eric Shea plays Billy Madison in this episode. He played the same sort of cute, inquisitive kid in three different Gunsmoke episodes. Shea was one of those child actors whose success did not follow them into adulthood.

I will not give away the resolution to this story, but it is odd and unexpected...and not necessarily in an effective way. There is a certain stoic nature to Reeves's actions in the end, but I find them implausible given Reeves's chosen profession.

Watching this episode just kept forcing me to focus on the character of gunfighter Reeves (Pernell Roberts) Although this was a decent episode worth watching being that Gunsmoke was famous for blending western drama with domestic issues which isn't a bad thing because i loved 90% of all Gunsmoke episodes from season 1 to season 20. I'm also a fan of Bonanza and my favorite Cartwright was the eldest boy Adam Cartwright played by Pernell Roberts. I like the character of Adam for his leadership, knowledge, independence and courage. And although i not alive when Pernell left Bonanza i did some research as to why he left the show from his self- dignity as an actor and a man having to call his father "Pa" being a man over 30 years old to being forced to wear his hair piece under his cowboy hat Blah Blah Blah! In my opinion they were stupid reasons to want to drop out of one of the most successful TV shows on the air at that time to doing guest spots on other westerns . And watching this episode was no upgrade for an actor who hated a show about a father and his three sons. It took Pernell 14 years to bring his name back to prominence with "Trapper John M.D" I didn't watch it because i never watched Bonanza at that time so i didn't know who Pernell Roberts was and i just didn't like the show for my age. I read that a lot of people in Hollywood at the time thought Pernell was crazy to leave such a successful TV western and to think he left for a higher or equal level of success elsewhere he was just regulated to being a guest star on other westerns TV shows so in my opinion he did nothing to throw in the face of Bonanza producer David Dortort that he's too good of an actor to play a grown man living with his father Ben Cartwright on The Ponderosa. He was just still a television actor becoming a television character actor popping up every now and then on other popular shows not having his own show for 14 years and not being quite successful in the theater (which he wanted to return to so he said) After leaving Bonanza although he didn't have to succumb to calling anyone "Pa" again and he didn't take off his hair piece till the mid 70's when he started to get gray haired. I will still admire Pernell Roberts as a wonderful actor on Bonanza and a good human being but i will always remain disappointed on how he turned his back on automatic success with Bonanza and having too much pride and personal dignity to just go to work, say your lines, and get your check and you never know, the producers may have eventually allow Adam Cartwright to address Ben Cartwright as "Father" and allow him to take off the hair piece at least by the tenth season. Instead there was no upgrade for Adam Cartwright leaving The Ponderosa. RIP Pernell...

Can't stand alumni of Bonanza and I double can't stand the homely Jacqueline Scott! Pernell Roberts grubbin for a part, comes to Dodge and he's a gunfighter. Why is Jacqueline Scott always the wife of wayward cowpokes and jailbirds? She's back at it hard again in this episode, Her coal black dead eyes, I just don't like this woman. She always has a yelling scene, browbeating the seasonal itinerant man. The only redeemable thing about this episode is R.G. Armstrong, he was a charming Southerner.