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Chapter 96

Chapter 96

Summary

Augustus wakes minus his left leg, with the drunken Dr. Mobley beside him and a consumptive whore playing piano across the street; he throws her gold pieces out the window to keep her playing. Told the other leg must come off or he dies, he draws his pistol and refuses: he has walked the earth in his pride and will not outlive it. Call arrives that night, having ridden the Hell Bitch nearly to ruin, and cannot argue or fight him out of it. Augustus asks two things: that Call haul his body three thousand miles to be buried in Clara's orchard on the Guadalupe, where he had his best happiness — a favour he frames as a job only Call could do — and that the Lonesome Dove sign stand over the grave. He leaves his half of the herd to Lorena, writes notes to both women, tells Call he has already told Newt the truth, and urges him to give the boy his name. Then he closes his eyes and dies.

Analysis

Augustus dies arguing, and wins. Refusing the second leg is vanity and he says so; Call calls it that too, and cannot move him. The Texas burial request is his last and best trick — a task engineered to keep Call occupied and to punish him for a year.

Plates

Augustus surfaces from the red water in a small hot room in Miles City and looks down to find his left leg gone.
00 Augustus surfaces from the red water in a small hot room in Miles City and looks down to find his left leg gone.
Mobley jerks awake with both hands on his head, and Augustus asks for the whiskey.
01 Mobley jerks awake with both hands on his head, and Augustus asks for the whiskey.
Told the right leg must come off too, Augustus takes the pistol out of the gun belt hanging on the chair while Mobley opens the bandage.
02 Told the right leg must come off too, Augustus takes the pistol out of the gun belt hanging on the chair while Mobley opens the bandage.
Augustus levels the cocked pistol at Jim and the young giant leaves so fast he forgets to stoop and strikes his head on the door frame.
03 Augustus levels the cocked pistol at Jim and the young giant leaves so fast he forgets to stoop and strikes his head on the door frame.
The music stops; Augustus sails a twenty-dollar gold piece out of the window into the street, where the pockmarked girl in the black dress bends for it and looks up.
04 The music stops; Augustus sails a twenty-dollar gold piece out of the window into the street, where the pockmarked girl in the black dress bends for it and looks up.
The end of a whole afternoon's drinking — the will unwritten, the venison brought up again into the spittoon, the remaining leg gone as black as the one already lost.
05 The end of a whole afternoon's drinking — the will unwritten, the venison brought up again into the spittoon, the remaining leg gone as black as the one already lost.
Call arrives in the night, sets the lantern on the bureau, turns back the covers and looks at the black leg.
06 Call arrives in the night, sets the lantern on the bureau, turns back the covers and looks at the black leg.
Augustus cocks the pistol on his old partner — "You don't boss me, Woodrow" — and Call, weak of a sudden, sits down and takes off his hat.
07 Augustus cocks the pistol on his old partner — "You don't boss me, Woodrow" — and Call, weak of a sudden, sits down and takes off his hat.
Having asked to be hauled three thousand miles to Clara's orchard on the Guadalupe, Augustus draws himself up and writes his two notes, and his hand drops before he can fold the second.
08 Having asked to be hauled three thousand miles to Clara's orchard on the Guadalupe, Augustus draws himself up and writes his two notes, and his hand drops before he can fold the second.
Call wakes from a doze to the doctor's lamp, the blood dripping off the sheet onto the floor, and Augustus dead.
09 Call wakes from a doze to the doctor's lamp, the blood dripping off the sheet onto the floor, and Augustus dead.