Decoy
WILLIAM F. CODY MEETS BART THE BEAR IN ONE OF THE BIGGEST ADVENTURES OF HIS LIFE...
Aspiring showman William Frederick Cody reads about the adventures of the Man In Black (not Will Smith) and imagines himself in the Western hero's shoes. An opportunity to become a real hero comes up when the Army sends a special dispatch from Fort Laramie to Fort Miles. When Teaspoon tells the riders about the job, Cody volunteers saying "a job such as this one should go to the braves, best looking, best read rider you've got and I just happen to be available."
Cody
arrives in Fort Laramie and gets the special dispatch. He also receives
special instructions to give the envelope only to the undersecretary of
war. The importance of the letter was stressed by the major who gave Cody
the letter, "a lot of lives are riding on you, son." On the way
out, Cody bumps into a captain who insults him and the Pony Express.
A lot of people are after Cody and the special dispatch. Apparently, the rider is carrying with him a list of army officers who have "divided loyalties", men who might have leanings towards the South. Ben Fetterman, a government agent and a friend of Teaspoon says war is coming. Cody's first encounter with trouble comes in the form of three men dressed as soldiers. Suspicious, Cody declines to hand over the letter to them. They try to draw on him but he outsmarts them, however, and continues on his increasingly perilous journey.
Later in the day, Cody finds a dying man who asks the rider to save "Bart" who, in turn, is being sought by butchers. It turns out that the man's friend is a huge bear who is peculiarly attached to the man's handkerchief. Cody buries the man but couldn't get the bear to leave him. It finally occurred to Cody to just leave the handkerchief on the man's grave.
Meanwhile, it's three riders and a baby at the Sweetwater station when Kid finds an abandoned infant on the porch. A note found inside the baby girl's basket suggests that the mother is in trouble. Buck, Ike, Hickok and Teaspoon take on the task of caring for the baby, which is easier said than done ("How hard could mothering be," Hickok says). For toys, Jimmy tries to give the baby his sharp spurs... to Teaspoon's dismay. Fortunately, the gentlest of the riders -- Ike, who else? -- turns out to be a very good baby-sitter. Later, the mother came and explained that her husband died and she became terrified. The mother knew Emma and thought to leave the baby with her, not knowing that the housemother was away.
Cody meets with the three soldiers for the second time but he outsmarts them again and leaves them behind. He finds a house in the middle of nowhere, and a woman whose mind is not quite in the right. After warding off her attack, Cody comforts the young woman whose husband was killed by claim-jumpers. Men attack them in the middle of the night but Cody manages to kill them. In the morning, the woman gives Cody her horse. He promised to come back and help her.
The men who are after Cody meet their doom when they go after an Indian woman and rape her. Her relatives find her and the killed the men. Cody, who stumbles into one of them, manages to finish off the man before the Indians arrived. Cody arrives in Fort Miles and hands over the letter to the undersecretary of war. He was shocked, though, when the man threw the letter directly into the fire without opening it. It turns out that Cody was a mere decoy and the man who got the real message was the captain who insulted him back in Fort Laramie.
IN THEIR WORDS: Cody's advice to Sam when he and Emma leave to attend a wedding: Now, Sam, remember when she catches the bouquet don't go shooting it out of her hand.
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