 Around Dodge City and in the territory on west, there's just one way to handle the killers and the spoilers, and that's with the 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 chance-y job, and it makes a man watchful, and a little lonely. Do you mind stopping in Jonas' store for a minute? No, it won't take long. What are you going to buy, Doc, another diploma to hang on your wall? Oh, another diploma to hang on. Anybody can shoot bullets in the people the way you do. What takes real brains is digging them back up. But between the two of us, we manage to make a living, don't we? Barely, just barely. Hello, Jonas. Hello, Marshal. Doc. Hey, Mr. Jenner. What can I do for you? Well, I'm looking for a saw. What? You're looking for a saw. And some nails, Mr. Jenner? Sure, Doc. Sure. I'll have to fetch him from the storeroom out back. Doc, what do you want a saw for? See, Matt, looky here. You got a batch of new derbies in. Doc, what are you going to use a saw for? I bet they're expensive, too. Here! Stop there! Stop! What's that? Yeah, stay here, Doc. He's over there behind them barrels, Marshal. Who is? I don't know, but I'll shoot him dead if he moves. Sure, kill me. I ain't armed. All right, come out of there with your hands up. Here, Lamber. Yeah, it's me. I can't believe it, Amber. I was going to pay you later. Pay me later? You're on my books now for over $300 and stealing from me on top of that. Marshal, I want this man arrested. Were you stealing, Amber? No, I never stole nothing in my life. I was going to pay him later. Then what was you doing running off with that sack of seeds? I had to have them received, Mr. Jonas. I got to raise something. My wife and I are about to starve out there. Out where, Amber? A little patch of land near Pawnee Wells, north of here, Marshal. Ain't much. We had nothing but bad luck. I've been keeping you going for nearly a year, Amber. This is a fine show of gratitude. How can I pay you? Let's erase something. The man's desperate, Mr. Jonas. He owes me money, too, Matt. I don't hold with stealing to pay off your debt. Well, I'll pay you, Doc. Someday, I will. But right now, we got nothing. That's good land up there, Amber. What's been your trouble? Everything, Marshal. First, I raised a little corn. Then Pete Fletcher's cattle busted in and ruined it. Then Mrs. Amber's goats swelled up and died. She had two of them. Charlotte's wanted goats all her life. She wanted them. And then some mean devil shot one of my horses. Oh, I don't know what all, Marshal. We just ain't making out very good. Still no excuse for thieving, Amber. You throw him into jail, Marshal. Amber, you take your seeds and you go on home. What? You can put them on my bill, Mr. Jonas. You mean you're going to turn him loose? Go on, Amber. Oh, thank you, Marshal. I won't forget this. It's a fine thing when the law starts encouraging crime. I hold you guilty as he is, Marshal. Come on, Doc. Let's get out of here. You know something, Mr. Jones? If the government would maybe cough up a little expense money, I'd got an idea. The government won't even supply me with ammunition, Chester. Go ahead. Well, sir, if we were to buy two or three buffalo hides and kind of sew them together, we could make a nice rug for this office. And it wouldn't make so much noise when people plomping around all the time. Well, I tell you, Chester, I don't have to take that up with Washington, but in the meantime, you work on some other ideas. All right, sir, I got a hold of you. Hello, Marshal. Yes, sir? Well, if it ain't Pete Fletcher. Oh, Pete. Marshal, I heard about your refusing to arrest Neil Amber yesterday. Oh? It seems like a lot of people have. I'm a cattleman, Marshal, and I got no use for sod busters, especially when they don't know when to quit, like the members. There's room enough out there for everybody, Pete. Not for thieves, sir. I don't think Amber will try to steal anything again. I come to tell you you're wrong, Marshal. Oh, why? One of my riders, Jim Baird, found a calf in Amber's shed. Been stole, slaughtered, and half-skun. One of your calves? We're in my brand. Baird's standing guard over it right now. Look, Pete, the Ambers are nearly starving. What's one calf to you? Now, is there a law against cattle-heaving, Marshal, or ain't there? Yeah, there is. Then you do something about it. Right out and have a look. I want that woman arrested, Marshal. Woman? Well, it happened yesterday while he was in town. And if Mrs. Amber wasn't a woman, I'd have shot her. Calf's in the shed, right over there, Marshal. I don't see the Ambers anywhere. I told Baird to make him stay in the house. Now, you had no right to do that, Pete. I got a right to protect my property, ain't I? Yes, sir. Yes, sir. Go tell the Ambers to come out to the shed here. All right, sir. Get back, Pete. This is Marshal Dillon, Baird. Where I come from, we hang car thieves ourselves. Now, it's been done around here, too, Baird. Good. The man that headed the last lynching got 25 years in prison. You trying to scare me, Marshal? I hate lynching, Baird. I hate even the talk of it. All right, Pete, where's the calf? Right over here, Marshal. I was trying to butcher it on the ground. Now, a man would have hung it up. There's Pete's brand right there. Marshal? I thought I told you to stay in the house. You're not telling anybody anything, Baird. She didn't do this, Marshal? Ms. Amber, would you mind telling us about it? Baird can tell you all you need to know, Marshal. I want to hear what Ms. Amber has to say. I feel guilty, Marshal. They made me feel guilty accusing me this way. Oh, it's hurt your bad, Marshal. My life's an honest woman. If you're innocent, you got nothing to worry about, Ms. Amber. Now, you tell me what happened, huh? Well, Neil was in town, and I come out to the shed to get a potato for my dinner. And I see that little calf lying there. And I was standing here looking at it. And then he come in and grabbed me and said, I'd stole it. Oh, Marshal, they're saying that makes me want to die. I'd tracked that calf here, and I caught his skin in it, Marshal. She's just trying to work on it. Nobody's going to believe a couple of things. Well, I know what you're doing, Pete Fletcher. But I ain't leaving this land. Not now or ever. Well, you're going to arrest her, Marshal? You, uh, you're going back to the house, ma'am. Why? In my whole life, I never done anything wrong. Now I feel I ought to be hung. You'd be better off dead than like this. If she was a man, she would be dead, Amber. That's enough, Baird. I'm not arresting anybody, Pete. Are you calling me in bed, Liar? I'm saying there isn't enough evidence. Now you take your calf and you get out of here and you leave these people alone. All right, Marshal. But the next time we ain't coming to the law, we'll handle this ourselves. Matt, I want you to meet Lysinda. She's new here. Huh? Huh. Hello. Welcome to the lodge, Lysinda. Kitty's told me a lot about you, Marshal. I was hoping you'd come in tonight. Uh, where are you from? Well, I've been in Abilene the past two years. Yeah. Abilene? Why, you must know Bill Hickock over there, huh? I sure do. He told me to look you up when I got to Dodge. He said you'd keep me out of trouble. Well, I can't do that, but I'll tell you what, if you ever do get into trouble, you come see me. Thanks, Marshal. Mr. Hickock said Dodge is a lot wilder than Abilene. Is that true? I don't know, but you'll soon be able to judge for yourself. But I won't be here very long, Marshal. I'm working my way out to California. She's got a man in California, ma'am. Oh, well, fine. I hope you make it loose on her. Thanks, Marshal. I'll see you later. Sure. She's a nice girl. Yeah, all girls are, Kitty. Look, I just made 50 dollars. Hey. I hope you're not going to put it back in the game. No, no. I'm through the fell. I might buy into that poker game a little later, though. Well, you can have Chester seat in a few minutes. I'm going to put him to work. Chester was telling me about the Amber's map. I feel awful sorry for that poor woman. Yeah, so do I. Kitty has nothing I can do about it. You don't think she's guilty, do you? Well, it can't be proven either way. But one way or another, Pete Fletcher has managed to get rid of every nester anywhere near him. Except for the Amber's, huh? Yeah. It's like he says they're pretty stubborn. Oh, Matt, isn't this that fellow bad? Oh, yeah. I was kind of hoping he'd spoken his neck some. Good evening, Marshal. Ma'am? It's miss, not that it matters. All right, miss. I come by the Amber place today, Marshal. You made a big mistake the other day. Oh, did I? You sure did. You remember how Amber kept saying his wife would be better off dead? Why? Well, he's sitting out there now, and he won't even look at your talk. And the woman ain't nowhere around, Marshal. I think Amber's gone and killed it. That's what. Maybe something has happened to miss Amber. It may be. Look down there. That door is wide open. Just walking into somebody's house. Neither do I, Amber. I don't know where she is. Chester? How long have you been sitting here like this? I don't know. She went away, Marshal. She went away? She went away. Back east. Home. When did she go? The other day. Did you have an argument with her or something? Is that why she went away? Oh, I loved her, Marshal. She's all ahead. I don't know what she's got. I'll go ahead and try. I'm going back and try to talk to her, and you take a look around. You take a good look around, huh? I understand. I sure do hope I don't find nothing. Well, if you do, you come in and tell me. You won't tell me what happened, Amber. She's gone, Marshal. Did Barrett or Peak Fletcher have anything to do with it? They said she stole a calf. She didn't do that, Marshal. No, I don't think she did either. There hasn't been any more trouble like that, has there? Has there? Barrett came by yesterday, but he didn't do nothing. Oh, I'm ashamed about my wife, Marshal. Ashamed? I mean, her not being here is just too much for her. She just couldn't take it no more. Bet she shouldn't have gone off like that. Well, how does she go? She was married 30 years, Marshal. I was real proud of her. Of course you were. Tell me when she left here. How did she go? She rode away. You mean she took your horse? Yeah, yeah, she took my horse. Dylan? Yes, I sure did. Lay him in the blanket right out in the shed there. He didn't even bury her. She'd been shot, Mr. Dylan. Who shot her, Amber? I couldn't bury her. I couldn't get that nearer yet. Did you shoot her? I shot her, Marshal. What do you eat, Mr. Dylan? He's going to die of starvation before they can hang him. He hasn't been tried yet, Chester. Well, no, sir. He'll keep taking his meals and he'll eat sooner or later. Hello, Marshal? Hello, Beak. Where? Guess you'll believe me next time I tell you something, Marshal. What do you want here? When they're going to hang Amber? What an effort-judge and a court of law says so, Beak. He'll hang. Meantime, I'm going to burn that house and shed to his down for some other nest who takes a notion to move into that place. You do that and I'll throw you in jail. What? You've done enough to Amber. Both of you went bad. Are you accusing me of anything direct, Marshal? If I could, I'd have you both try it. Now, you better be careful what you're saying. Oh, never mind, Beak. Looks like we won anyway. We got out of here, both of you. Come on, Beak. What'll it be? Glass of beer, Sam. Sure. See, Marshal? Yeah. That fellow Beak over there's been making a lot of talk about you. That peak fletcher, too, probably, huh? Not like Beak. That's okay, Sam. Well, I taught you how to know. Thanks. I'll get you beer, Marshal. Hey, Amber, he's gone. What? Well, I unlocked his cell to bring him some supper, and then I... Well, I must have went off and got to lock it up again. He took one of our rifles, too. Well, let's go, Clive. Wait and see him look. What? There he is. He just came in. Over there by Beak and Beak fletcher. Yeah, come on. Hey, I'm gonna kill you. Hold it, Amber. I'll kill you. He's unarmed now. I ain't gonna shoot him. Leave him right in his chest. Go get Doc Chester. Yes, sir. Amber, Doc will be here in a minute. He can't help me. This is gonna save me from hanging, Marshal. There had been even worse disgrace. Worse? Worse than what? Come closer, Marshal. I don't... I don't want nobody else to know. But... my wife... I didn't shoot her. She killed herself, is that it? That made me terrible ashamed, Marshal. I'd hung rather than anybody know it. You... You won't tell, will you? No. Marshal... You... you've been good to me. You... you've been good to me. Thanks. Thank me, Marshal. Saved the law the expense of a rope. He didn't kill his wife, Pete. What? You did. You were trying to devil him off that line, making her look like a thief, did it? And I'd see you hung for it if I could. By Norman McDonald, stars William Conrad as Matt Dillon, U.S. Marshal. The story was freshly written on Smoke by John Meston. Featured in the cast were Ralph Moody, Vic Tarran, Barney Phillips, Virginia Dreg, Harry Bartels, James Nussar and Gene Bates. There is Chester Howard McNeer, is Doc, and Georgia Ellis is kidding. This is George Walsh inviting you to join us again next week when CBS Radio presents another story on Gunsmoke.