True Grit

Content Warning: This section of the guide features depictions of violence and death.

The following day, Mattie wakes up. She goes to fetch water with her father’s pistol in the bucket. At the stream, she notices another man beside a group of horses. She recognizes him as Chaney, who turns quickly and aims a rifle at her. He recognizes her as the daughter of Frank. He is surprised to see her so far from her home, lowering his rifle as Mattie quietly draws her pistol. Mattie announces her plan to take Chaney back to Fort Smith. She claims that are large group of law enforcement officers are behind her, waiting to make the arrest. Chaney does not believe her. He goads her into firing her pistol, which is not even cocked. When she tries to cock it, he corrects her technique. Rather than going with her, he says, she will be going with him. Mattie fires the gun. She hits Chaney in the side, though the force of the shot propels her back into the water. She drops the gun, and as she tries to pick it up, Rooster and LaBoeuf call to her. At the same time, Chaney’s gangmates call to him from the other side of the stream.

Chaney is astonished that Mattie could shoot him. He fears that she has broken his rib. Chaney killed her father, Mattie reminds him. Chaney shares his regret that Frank died. He had been drinking, he claims, and he was angry. Nothing has “gone right” (229) for him, he mourns. Chaney grabs for a piece of wood. When Mattie fires the pistol, nothing happens. She struggles to reload as Chaney knocks her to the ground. He grabs her, cursing her father and taking her gun. He shields himself behind the moving horses as he drags Mattie away just as LaBoeuf and Rooster reach the stream. Ned’s gang lines the banks and opens fire on the two men. Chaney deposits Mattie before Ned, who demands to know who is on the other side of the stream. She lies again but, when Ned threatens her, confesses that there is only Rooster and another man. Ned calls out to Rooster, threatening to kill the girl. Rooster claims that she “is nothing to [him]” (230), but he accepts Ned’s demands to leave the area.

With Rooster and LaBoeuf retreating, Ned takes Mattie to his camp. The camp is situated on top of a hill. Mattie observes The Original Greaser Bob and a “simpleminded” (231) man named Harold Permalee. Chaney nurses his wound by the fire. Farrell Parmalee treats Chaney without sympathy until Chaney spots Mattie and leaps to his feet. He wants to kill her, but Ned tells him not to do so. Ned sits Mattie by the fire, where she is given food, as per her request. Mattie tells Ned that Chaney killed her father and stole from him. She blames her gun for not killing him when she had the chance. Chaney interrupts, claiming that he was ambushed. Mattie disputes him, at which point Chaney threatens to throw her into a nearby pit of rattlesnakes. Mattie is sure that Ned will not allow this. Rooster still has not reached the agreed-upon distance, but Ned is willing to give him more time. He quizzes Mattie about her time with Rooster, then talks about more genial matters. He chats breezily about the train robbery until Rooster and LaBoeuf are spotted far away, leading Blackie with them.

Mattie is shocked that the two men would actually leave her. Ned prepares to depart the camp, but he orders Chaney to stay behind with Mattie. They are short a horse, he claims, so he will send someone back for Chaney. When Mattie complains that Chaney will harm her, Ned orders him not to do so. If he hurts Mattie, he will give up his share of the loot from the train robbery. Ned then reluctantly divides up the loot, even asking Mattie to read the checks from the registered mail bag taken from the train. She describes to him that the checks could be valuable if Ned signs them correctly. Mattie forges the signatures on the checks; she does so poorly, hoping that such a shoddy job will not actually count as a crime. Ned leaves with his gang and the loot.

Mattie heats water on the campfire to wash her hands. Chaney threatens to throw her in the pit again, so Mattie reminds him about Ned’s orders. Chaney fears that Ned has no intention of paying him. Reviewing his options, he demands silence. Mattie throws the hot water over Chaney and runs, only for him to catch her. He hits her head with his pistol, and Mattie is dazed. She hears LaBoeuf’s voice as Chaney releases her, allowing Mattie to snatch his pistol from his belt. With Chaney under guard, LaBoeuf and Mattie look down on the clearing where Rooster is confronting Ned and the gang. Rooster tells the other men to step aside, leaving Ned to him. They refuse. Placing his reins between his teeth, Rooster charges down the bandits with a pistol in each hand. Harold and Farrell are killed as The Original Greaser Bob tries his horse-riding tricks, allowing him to escape with the loot. Rooster is caught across the face by pellets from a shotgun, but he keeps riding. His horse is hit and collapses, trapping his leg. Ned is hurt, but he rides over to the trapped Rooster. LaBoeuf takes his rifle and aims for Ned, killing the gang leader just as he is about to execute Rooster. Mattie cheers.

Chaney appears, smashing LaBoeuf across the head with a rock. Mattie shoots Chaney in the head, but the recoil from the gun sends her falling backward into the snake pit. She falls until she gets stuck in a ledge of rocks on her way down, her arm broken. A flurry of bats flies out past her. Mattie calls for help, but LaBoeuf is silent. Fearing that she will fall deeper into the hole, she spots something beside her. It is a corpse. Reaching for the torn clothes of the skeletal figure, she disturbs a nest of rattlesnakes. Snapping the skeleton's arm, she uses the bone to beat back the snakes and wedge herself in a safer position. She calls for help.

Chaney mocks her from above. His words are cut short, however, as she hears Rooster knock Chaney down with the butt of his rifle. Rooster kicks Chaney into the snake pit. He lands in the nest, enraging the snakes. The snakes move for Mattie, and she writhes out of their reach, only for a baby snake to bite her hand. Rooster rappels into the hole, grabs her, and LaBoeuf heaves them up with the help of Blackie. By the time she is out of the pit, Mattie is already made weak by the snake venom. Rooster grabs her up and mounts Blackie, riding hard for help. He rides as hard as he can until the horse can run no more. He whips Blackie harder and harder, only for the horse to collapse and die. Rooster gathers Mattie in his arms and carries her. When they pass a wagon, Rooster steals it at gunpoint. They reach Fort Smith, and Mattie is taken to the doctor.

Mattie spends a week in recovery. Her arm is amputated above the elbow. Her mother, sitting beside her, does not flinch. Mattie is impressed by this, as she knows her mother’s “delicate temperament” (255). Rooster visits twice. LaBoeuf was rescued by the marshals, he tells her, but insisted on recovering Chaney’s body from the pit. LaBoeuf has taken the body back to Texas.

Mattie signs a check for the outstanding $75 owed to Rooster, which she gives to Lawyer Daggett to send to Rooster. Rather than criticize Rooster for taking her on the journey, Mattie insists that the lawyer commend Rooster for his grit and for saving her life. Mattie writes to Rooster, inviting him to visit her. He never comes. Mattie writes that neither Judy the horse nor the second gold piece were ever recovered. She did keep the first gold piece, though she lost it in a house fire years later.

Mattie writes about the weeks after the last time she saw Rooster. He killed Odus in a duel. In typical Rooster Cogburn fashion, however, the duel was controversial because two other men were shot. They were with Odus at the time but not wanted by the law. As such, Rooster was forced to resign from the US marshals. He met up with the widow of his friend Potter and moved to San Antonio, working as a range detective. Mattie received intermittent updates through the rumor mill. After 25 years, she learns that he is now with a traveling circus. Mattie’s brother sends her a flyer for the show, in which Rooster is performing as part of a Wild West spectacle event. He is performing alongside the noted outlaws Frank James and Cole Younger. He is billed as having ridden with and for Quantrill and Parker, respectively. Mattie goes to Memphis, where the show is scheduled to stop.

On the train, the now-older Mattie wonders whether Rooster will know her. She sees the circus trains at the station and searches for Rooster. She finds Younger and James, only to be told that Rooster died two days earlier. Younger mentions the “lively times” (259) he enjoyed with Rooster. Mattie thanks him, but as she turns to leave, she castigates Frank James as “trash” (259). She remembers that Rooster told her that James killed a man whose murder was pinned on Younger, a version of events, she writes, which is now widely held to be true. Younger spent 25 years behind bars for James’s crime.

In her old age, Mattie owns a bank. She makes arrangements for Rooster’s body to be shipped to Yell County, where she buries him in her family plot. His headstone announces him as a “RESOLUTE OFFICER OF PARKER’S COURT” (259). The local people gossip about Mattie. She has never married, so they spread rumors about her relationship with Rooster. Mattie insists that she pays them no mind. She is not desperate to be married, she explains, as she is devoted to her church and her bank. Mattie reaches the end of the “true account of how [she] avenged Frank Ross’s blood over in the Choctaw Nation when snow was on the ground” (260).