This is a scene-by-scene recap of 1923 Season 2 Episode 3. Click that link for a discussion of the episode.
The blizzard has passed, leaving the wagon relatively free of snow. It’s a beautiful, sunny but freezing day.
They need a fire, and Zane tells them to burn the wagon. Jacob is skeptical Zane can make it out on horseback, but he climbs out of the wagon. If he can sleep on horseback, sitting won’t be a problem.
The wolf is on a stake in the yard. Elizabeth is gone. The doctor carries the body outside.
The surprise is that it wasn’t Elizabeth. She’s alive, cowering in her room, fearful of getting another shot. She’s still screaming about the wolf being rabid, but Cara knows it was rabid. Animals run from man. She’s unaware of the woman who was killed downstairs.
If this is all she needs to worry about, she’s doing pretty good. As she’s screaming, Cara slaps her. She’s a woman, and it’s time to act like it. Things could have gone a lot worse.
That gets Elizabeth’s attention. She’ll stand for the injection, and Cara gives it to her. Afterward, Elizabeth crawls into bed, crying. Cara will call her when the stew is ready.
Alexandra has made it to New York. The ship is pulling into the harbor. She’s got to go through Ellis Island since she didn’t secure her travel documents at the embassy in London.
Ellis Island isn’t particularly welcoming, and the fellow giving her a cursory exam is even less so. When she makes a joke, he threatens to send her back where she came from.
When she’s asked her name, she says Alexandra of Sussex, ultimately settling on Alexandra Dutton with a slight smile. She’s also asked why her American husband didn’t secure her travel papers, but she manages well enough.
Her next stop is for a medical assessment, where she discovers from a very pregnant woman that they are not allowing pregnant women into the country because they are two mouths to feed and unable to work. They process her for potential employment, such as lifting a stool above her head.
When they tell her to disrobe, she’s hesitant. When she’s down to her slip, she eyes the doctor defiantly, but he wants her completely naked. She complies, hoping that her pregnancy is not visible.
She’s visibly shaking and upset when he listens to her heart. She is required to spread her legs so that he can look for venereal diseases. She’s crying as he puts his hand up inside of her. Next, he feels her tummy. He knows she’s pregnant.
He notes her pregnancy for the next examiner. There are three in total. She wants to get dressed, but the nurse says she cannot yet. Another doctor enters the room and does a similar exam.
Yes, she knew she was pregnant — four months. She’s sobbing uncontrollably as the doctor continues his exam. Did he terminate her pregnancy?
She’s back with all of the other expectant mothers. One of the other women wonders if she’s got any food in that fancy bag of hers. They wind up in an argument, and Alex slaps her in the face. Her name is Collins, and she intends to use sex to gain entry into the US.
When she’s called into an office, she finds an examiner fixing his outfit. He doesn’t believe that she’s got a husband in Montana, let alone that he’s handsome and having a limp from being so full of action.
The conversation goes from bad to worse. He’s underestimated her intelligence, and she cuts him down to size, saying all of their advertising was bullshit and Lady Liberty is looking down on him in disgust.
He asks what skills she possesses, such as reading. She chooses a specific passage from Whitman, one relevant to their conversation. She has had enough, and he knows he’s no match for her. He welcomes her to America after she tells him he’d best wipe the lipstick off of his neck before he goes home to the missus.
Finally free, Alex walks through Manhattan with her bags. They cast the show so that she stands out like a bright angel amidst the darkness. From her hair to her clothes, she’s a beacon of light.
She finds a nice fellow on the street who helps her find her way to the train station. They look at a map together, and he gives her advice on how not to get taken advantage of and robbed. He gets her into a cab to Grand Central.
She’s gotten the message, though, and she tells the cab river she’s meeting a friend. Then, she tucks her money away in her shoe.
At Grand Central, she gets a shared sleeper that takes her first through Boston. When she gets her money from her shoe, the man tells her to put it somewhere else now, as every pickpocket in the terminal has now seen her hiding place.
No matter where you are in the US, pickpockets will take advantage of a woman traveling alone.
Runs His Horse checks in with the local cowboys, one offering him a job and unlimited camping if he’ll look for strays. OMG. It’s C. Thomas Howell.
A Native woman rides into town and goes to the Marshal’s office. Mamie Fossett accompanies her to their camp, where Renaud and the other dude slaughtered her people.
She plans on getting justice for these people. The Natives don’t want justice. They want vengeance, and she’ll have to get to them first if that’s not what she wants.
Cowboys can be any race or gender, according to the nasty Marshal.
Cara is on the porch looking for signs of Jacob and Jack. They should be home by now. As the doctor leaves, everyone is coming up over the hill, a little worse for the wear. There is no buggy, so she knows something is wrong.
The doctor has more work ahead.
This winter just won’t end, Jacob says, as he looks around the living room that has been changed due to the wolf.
The doctor examines Zane. Zane took a good knock on the head. The doctor believes that Zane has a subdural hematoma, which is now pushing against his brain.
They should have done it at the hospital. He’s got to drill into Zane’s skull to release the fluid. If he doesn’t, he’ll die. He has the drill; what he needs is the anesthesia. Jacob will have a word with him.
He’s got some good news and some bad news, he begins.
Jack finds Elizabeth packing in their room. She’s going back east. She doesn’t want this place or this life anymore. She wants no part of this life anymore. Nowhere in their vows did it say to live in that frozen hell and fight for her life every day. If he wants to be her husband, he needs to do so in Boston.
It’s time for her shot, and Jack is like, what? Cara says he should step out, but Elizabeth wants him to watch to get a better understanding of why she wants to go.
Luca has never seen so many cows. They’re all so fat. They run into a roadblock of sorts, a payment might be needed to continue. Spencer decides to walk a spell to get a better look. It’s armed men in uniform, and for some reason, they scare Spencer. They have to find another road.
Spencer says they have to get rid of this truck. He’s not dying for a bunch of fuckin’ booze. They spot a barn and pull inside.
They can wait until dark and then move. Luca wants him to keep driving so much so that he pulls a gun on Spencer. Spencer punches him in the face. His cousins aren’t sharing with him; they’re getting rid of him.
Luca can either walk with him to the train station or take his chances with the truck. Luca wants to take his chance for his family. After all, look what Spencer does for his family.
Before driving away, Luca asks for his pistol because he can’t defend himself without it. Spencer says he can’t defend himself with it, either. They part ways, and not much longer, Spencer hears gunfire. Luca is overpowered and shot while Spencer watches.
He leans back in the grass.
Alexandra writes a letter about her travels. She should be in Montana within a week.
She dreams of them being reunited, but she imagines there is a fresh hell ahead of them that will work to keep them apart. It’s absolute terror that the world will not let her have him. Just then, a pickpocket begins to tail her.