Blind Man’s Bluff

Bad Acrobat-itude; or

If You Don’t Like That Ending, Blame God

(a recap by Will Kaiser)

Title: Blind Man’s Bluff

Airdate: January 15, 1979

Written by Arthur Heinemann

Directed by William F. Claxton

SUMMARY IN A NUTSHELL: You may experience déjà vu as the show reimagines a previous episode. See if you can guess which one.

(This time it’s on a circus theme, though.)

[EDITOR’S NOTE: An earlier version of this recap used the word Jordache several additional times, but after receiving some helpful feedback I decided I didn’t like it. Thank you.]

RECAP: Well, we begin this time by looking at a house we’ve never seen, from some distance.

This title of this one is “Blind Man’s Bluff” – a clever pun, we shall learn, but don’t let’s get ahead of the story.

The house has a strangely moveable look – not only the porch, but the house itself is built up on supports.

To distract us from this, the show soothes us with more familiar sights and sounds: the Yellow-Wheeled Buckboard, a Viennese waltz from David Rose.

As he often does, David instantly changes his mind, shifting to circus music – grinding the gears to do so in fact.

But this time the shift is appropriate, since inside the house we see a lithograph of a lion tamer pictured with three lions, a tiger, and two lion-leopard cross-breeds that people can’t seem to agree on a name for. 

(“Leopon” seems to be the most common choice, but “liard,” “leonard,” and “lipard” all have their partisans.)

Such animals really do exist, though only in captivity.

I wasn’t sure if the lion tamer in the picture was a man or a woman. Well, at first I thought it was a man in some variation on the traditional Greek fustanella.

However, I was able to ID the picture, and its title is The Lion Queen.

It was produced around 1874 by a printer called Gibson & Co., which still exists today (as Gibson Greetings, now owned by the American Greetings card company).

A fun picture, I think.

It’s hanging on a wall, and the camera moves on to another such poster, depicting more circus personnel.

Sometimes advertised, unkindly, as “human oddities,” or, even more unkindly, as “freaks,” these people appear to be sideshow performers.

I was able to find this poster too. It’s an ad for the Barnum and Bailey Circus by the Strobridge Lithographic Company (from 1899).

Barnum and Bailey still exists, though it’s fallen on hard times in recent years. In 2023, under intense public pressure, it dropped its animal acts altogether. 

(I’m no animal rights activist, and I quite like zoos, but I hated those circus animal acts. The last time I went to one, many years ago, I got so depressed watching a pig walk on its hind legs that I decided never to go to the circus again.)

(I did, however, greatly enjoy an elephant ride I won when I entered a circus coloring contest in the third grade. So I guess that makes me a hypocrite.)

Anyways, this poster, titled The Peerless Prodigies of Physical Phenomena and Great Presentation of Marvelous Living Human Curiosities, is quite well-labeled. 

We can see the performers include “an East Indian dwarf,” “tattooed people” (hardly freakish today), a bearded lady, a sword-swallower, “The Living Skeleton,” and “the Egyptian Giant.”

A number of these performers were hugely famous in their day and can be identified by name. The bearded lady, for instance, is probably Viola Myers, who starred in the Barnum circus in the 1870s and 1880s. She was also a fortune-teller. 

“Madame Meyers,” as she was known, is thought to have had either hirsutism or hypertrichosis, conditions which cause excess hair growth.

“The Living Skeleton” is John Coffey, who performed as “The Skeleton Dude” (“dude” being Nineteenth-Century slang for a man in dandified dress).

Coffey’s precise medical condition, if he had one, is unknown. But whatever it was, it wasn’t permanent: Later in life he gained weight until he was more or less of average size.

The “Egyptian Giant” is Ali Hassan or “Hassen Ali,” who stood somewhere between 7’11” and 8’2”, depending on your source.

The “East Indian Dwarf” might be Che Mah. He was Chinese, not Indian, but the costume and pose seem to match.

There’s also “the Human Skye Terrier,” who was Fedor Jeftichew, better known as “Jo-Jo the Dog-Faced Boy.” 

He did have hypertrichosis.

Then there’s a “moss-haired girl” (most likely Zalumma Agra). 

Promoted as “Circassians,” supposedly the “purest stock of the Caucasian race,” these were mixed-race women who passed for white but could grow their naturally kinky hair into enormous Afro hairstyles. (They apparently used beer as a styling product!)

There’s “the Double-Bodied Wonder,” a very famous performer named Jean Libbera, who had a vestigial twin growing out of his belly. 

This twin was named “Jacques,” and is not believed to have had a consciousness, thank God.

Finally, there is a microcephalic person or “pinhead,” billed on the poster simply as “What Is She?” 

Having underdeveloped heads, these people were popular performers at circuses dating back to ancient times. 

This one is probably Bartola Velasquez (or possibly Nunez), who appeared with her brother Máximo (billed as “Aztec Children”) in the Barnum show for several years.

“Human oddities” were considered exploitative and out of fashion by the 1950s – much to the chagrin of many disabled performers, who had no other means of making a living. 

In circuses today, you do still see some “freak shows,” but these mostly have people who stick pins all over their bodies, hang weights from their tongues, and the like. (Not my cup of tea.)

The camera moves again, and we see another Barnum ad (also by Strobridge, 1895), this one for “the Meers Sisters” (“Marie and Ouika”), who were trick horse riders.

There were also two other Meers sisters, named Rose and Lillie, in their equestrian act.

Then there’s a poster for “The Great Zambini,” a tightrope walker. I wasn’t able to track him or his picture down.

Sorry for the Ripley‘s Believe It or Not! lecture and imagery. Such things cannot be helped, I’m afraid. Blame the wonderful research and props teams at NBC, circa 1979.

Our actual story begins one minute and 37 seconds in, as we see a boy doing acrobatics on a trapeze in his bedroom.

DAGNY: Ooh, I remember this one.

The boy jumps down and, smiling, takes a bow before an imaginary crowd.

(Arthur Heinemann of “Doctor’s Lady” fame is back as writer, with Clax as director.)

But the boy’s smile evaporates (as does the circus music) when he hears his parents arguing about the cost of a sugar bowl downstairs. (Eighteen cents, or about five dollars today.)

In a weird transition, David returns to the circus music for exactly three seconds.

Then we join the family at the breakfast table, where the kid’s parents are doing that thing where they only talk to each other through him. (Does this actually happen in real life, or just on television programs? I don’t remember ever doing it myself, and I’m divorced.)

WILL [as MICHAEL BOLTON, singing]: “How can we be lovers if we can’t be friends?”

[UPDATE: Dean Butler notes in Prairie Man: My Little House Life & Beyond that this was actually the dynamic of Michael Landon’s real-life parents. So I guess it really does happen!]

The father, who looks a bit like Corbin Bernsen of The Dentist fame, heads off to work the fields. 

The mother, a very pretty woman wearing the tartan of Clan Buchanan (which is loud enough to induce blindness itself), tells the kid in a husky, emotional voice that his father will be leaving them soon, for good.

“Where’s he goin’?” the kid asks in alarm.

ALEXANDER [as THE MOM]: “To the circus.”

(Alexander was home for Thanksgiving weekend when we watched this one.)

The mom says she doesn’t much care where he’s goin’, since they’ll be staying here.

WILL [as THE MOM]: “Don’t worry, I’m sure that nice Mr. Ingalls will come do all the farmwork here for free.”

Addressing her son as “Jordan,” the woman says she doesn’t understand why her relationship with his father has come apart, but it has. “God alone knows why, but it happens, it happens,” she says.

ALEXANDER [as JORDAN]: “Shit happens!”

Jordan leaves his mother alone at the table.

WILL: They’re always drinking milk on this show, have you noticed that?

DAGNY: Seriously.

Jordan’s mom is Kathryn Leigh Scott, a distinguished actor, writer and publisher who’s probably best known as a star on ABC’s legendary Dark Shadows soap opera (about vampires).

Another claim to fame is that Scott was an early Playboy Bunny. 

Later, she would write books and documentaries about the women who worked as Bunnies in the sixties, seventies and eighties.

She founded her own publishing company, Pomegranate Books, and acted in movies including The Great Gatsby and a TV adaptation of The Turn of the Screw by the Dark Shadows production team (which I’ve seen – pretty scary!). 

She was on shows like Dynasty, Police Squad!, Mr. Belvedere, Dallas, Matlock, Jake and the Fatman, Star Trek: The Next Generation, and many, many more.

She also had a cameo in Tim Burton’s movie homage to Dark Shadows.

Outside, Jordan wanders away from his Baba Yaga stilt house and puts on the kind of hat Canadians call a “toque.”

Jordan jumps up onto a fence and walks the length of it, to more circus music.

ALEXANDER: They won’t get any farmwork done if he’s playing circus all day.

DAGNY: Yeah, she should insist the dad take him.

Laura appears, chomping an apple, and laughs, “Bet you fall.”

Jordan scoffs at this and says, “I better not, it’s a hundred feet from the ground.”

“Doesn’t look like more’n four feet to me,” Laura says. (Climb off it, Laura. There’s no way you didn’t understand what he meant.)

“Don’t distract The Magnificent Jordan!” Jordan says.

“Ahoy, Magnificent!” Laura says, bowing. (I have no idea why she says “ahoy,” but I like it.)

Jordan then does a backflip and falls off the fence, quite hard.

If you pause the playback, you can see it’s a different kid doing the flip, but it’s a good illusion.

WILL: I wonder what the laws were around child stunt performers? I know for child ACTORS they had all kinds of restrictions on how long they could work, etc. It’s hard to imagine them allowing a kid to do dangerous tricks like this.

And it is a real kid this time, not just Mustache Man in disguise like when Laura rides a horse.

Laura drops her books and rushes to Jordan’s side; but he smiles and says, “I’m dead.” (I love the natural morbidity of children.)

So, Jordan is played by Ronnie Scribner, who was in a lot of stuff back in the seventies and early eighties. You can read all about it in his exceptionally detailed Wikipedia entry, written by somebody who cares perhaps a little too much about Ronnie Scribner, though I suppose I’m no one to talk.

Scribner’s credits include The ABC Afterschool Special, a Gilligan’s Island reunion movie, Fantasy Island, Kenny Rogers’s The Gambler (I watched those with my grandma), and CHiPs.

I know him from two other things, though.

First, he was on Love Boat. 

I don’t remember his plotline very well, but he and Vicki try to help a Mexican stowaway reunite with his mom.

WILL: Ha! Love Boat anticipated a lot of our Twenty-First Century issues and obsessions, didn’t it?

DAGNY: Yeah, they’re just like The Simpsons.

His storyline was called “Tres Amigos,” but I remember one of the other stories from the episode, “Dumb Luck,” better. (All Love Boat episodes have three titles, but let’s not get into that today. We’ve already wasted enough time on the circus!)

In “Dumb Luck,” Your Cruise Director Julie McCoy helps nerdy professor Shelley Hack find romantic success by telling her all she needs to do around men is “T.D. . . . talk dumb!” 

(I discussed this episode once with a friend who was a teenager when the show was on, and she said, “Is it any wonder the women of my generation are so fucked up?”)

(Not to change the subject, but if there are other Love Boat fans out there who haven’t yet tried Ryan Murphy’s Doctor Odyssey, do it. It’s exactly like Love Boat: a little raunchier and more medical than the original – also gayer – but just as stupid and just as fun. You won’t be sorry.)

Anyways, the other thing I know Ronnie Scribner from is the old miniseries of Stephen King’s Salem’s Lot (which was pretty good). He plays a child vampire who in one of the show’s most memorable scenes tries to get into his friend’s bedroom window.

Now back to our tale. Jordan notes that, had it been a real tightrope, he would have been killed. 

Nevertheless, he says he’s ready to join the circus next time it comes to Mankato, and he shrugs off Laura’s suggestion his parents will object (without explaining why).

The two kids run off to more circus music. (If you like circus music, you’re in luck this week. A lot of luck.)

Meanwhile, at the Harriet Oleson Institute for the Advancement of Blind Children, an expensively dressed couple, attended by Mary and Hester-Sue, are praising their daughter for how well she’s doing at the school.

These are the Herzogs, Mr., Mrs. and Hannah.

They’re nice people, and they speak lovingly to each other (in stark contrast to Jordan’s parents).

Hannah is played by Ronnie Scribner’s sister, Lisa Scribner. (Her only TV or film role.)

Mrs. Herzog, Maureen Lee, appeared on Dallas, and Mr. Herzog is Wesley Bishop, who apparently used the name “Wesley Grant” when he was acting.

Better known as a writer, Wesley Bishop went on to script a whole lot of Lifetime or Hallmark Channel-type movies. Unfortunately, since I’ve never dug into (or dug) that subgenre (no judgments), I don’t know which ones are noteworthy and which aren’t. 

What I do know is a lot of them are Christmas-related: Miracle on the 17th Green, The Christmas Blessing, The Christmas Hope, The Christmas Secret, The Christmas Note, and Christmas Town.

He also wrote The Christmas Shoes, a movie adaptation of the song, which, if you know it, you either love, or – not.

The other thing I recognize the name of, though I’ve never seen it, is the notoriously funny Cyber Seduction: His Secret Life, a cautionary tale of porn addiction which our favorite Minneapolis indie cinema just screened as part of their “Trash Film Debauchery” series.

Laura interrupts to tell Mary she’s written a children’s story in Braille – the first mention ever of Laura’s attempts at writing, I think, unless you count the propaganda she produced for Mary’s election campaign.

Hester-Sue tells the kids she’s made some donuts, and they scream and run to the kitchen. “That was my shy little sister,” Mary says.

If you look closely, you’ll notice Adam puttering around in the background.

In the kitchen, we immediately observe some Granny Smiths cohabiting with Red Deliciouses in a bowl.

Hester-Sue, knowing Jordan’s tendency to walk on his hands and the like, makes him wash them at the spigot. (His hands, that is, not the apples.)

WILL: Hester-Sue’s got such a stick up her ass sometimes.

Jordan remarks casually that since the Herzogs live in Minneapolis, they can’t get to see their daughter very often. He follows up with some questions about how it feels to live away from a parent.

Hester-Sue says it’s a little hard, but “distance doesn’t make any difference about loving.”

It’s apt Hester-Sue would be unsentimental about such things; as a Mississippi native, she’s presumably a former slave who may have no idea where or who her parents are. 

Ketty Lester was 44 at this time, so if we’re now in the spring of 1882-I, that would make Hester-Sue born in . . . wait a second, Ketty Lester was 44 in this episode? My God, she looks terrific.

Anyways, so if we’re now in the spring of 1882-I, that would make Hester-Sue born in 1838 – 25 years before the Emancipation Proclamation.

When Jordan returns home, his dad is unloading two-by-fours (or whatever) from the Y-Wheeled B.

Jordan asks him about his leaving.

The dad says he agrees with Jordan’s mother about one thing: that they have irreconcilable differences. (Mind you, not the delightful 1984 divorce film with Drew Barrymore.)

Jordan’s dad reassures the kid they both still love him; but Jordan says angrily that he’s running away, and he does so, immediately.

Not-Corbin Bernsen yells after him, to little avail.

Well, maybe to some avail. At any rate, Jordan’s plans are foiled in an untelevised adventure, since the next thing we see is him back in his room, again listening to his parents downstairs.

DAGNY: I know that kid’s supposed to be cute, but I don’t find him cute.

WILL: He’s cuter than he was in Salem’s Lot.

Not to be outdone by Michael Landon’s flamboyant visuals, Clax puts a hellish red light on the Lion Queen poster, the snarling beasts a sad symbol of Jordan’s quarreling ma and pa.

DAGNY: This is the Walt Disney version of divorce. The kid takes it on himself to engineer their reconciliation.

ALEXANDER: Spoiler alert, Grandma Kaiser!

(A favorite family joke. Once we were watching the Eric Shea/Ernest Borgnine vehicle The Poseidon Adventure with the kids for the first time. During arguably the most suspenseful scene in the entire film, my mom got very excited and yelled out, “Oh! I remember this! She makes it through and then she dies!” (If you know the movie, you know the scene I’m talking about.))

(Since then, “Spoiler alert, Grandma Kaiser!” has been a running gag in our house. We love you, Mom.)

Then we cut to Laura, Albert and Carrie scrambling through the wood. They find Jordan high in a tree, tying up a tightrope.

Jordan tells them as soon as he’s mastered acrobatics, he’s gonna join the circus.

Albert scoffs at this.

ALEXANDER: Albert’s not impressed, huh.

DAGNY: Well, he knows this kid’s dream of running away is idiotic. He’s actually lived an independent life on the streets, and it was awful. 

Laura, however, finds the idea exciting.

Carrie too. (I mean Carrie too, not Carrie Two. This is Carrie One.)

The younger kids push off, and the Magnificent Jordache steps onto the rope as David deploys the circus band again.

Unless I’m wrong, this time the tune is “March of the Horrible Clowns,” last heard at the Redwood County Fair in 1880-E.

Ronnie Scribner must have had gymnastics skills, because it does appear to be him doing the stunts in some shots.

Well, Jordan makes it a little way . . . then falls to the earth!

Laura races away, and we cut to Pa bringing everybody to Doc’s office.

Jordan has not regained consciousness, though Doc says he doesn’t have any broken bones.

Addressing Jordan’s dad as “Timothy,” Doc asks the parents to stand back while he administers the old smelling salts.

ALEXANDER: Do you think that smells as bad as Buckley’s?

WILL/DAGNY: No.

Canadians out there may be familiar with Buckley’s Original Mixture, a cough syrup made, if its taste and smell are any indication, from gasoline.

Its sale is banned in the United States. It’s quite effective, though, and we always bring a bottle back when we visit The Peg.

The smelling salts bring Jordan to; but he’s gone blind.

ALEXANDER: Looks like the Blind School got another customer.

WILL: Yeah. Mary probably greased the rope to make it happen.

Jordan’s parents don’t wail operatically like Ralphie’s when he fantasizes about going blind in A Christmas Story, but it’s fair to say they’re pretty upset.

ALEXANDER: Has any TV show ever had more blind storylines than this one?

WILL/DAGNY: No.

Doc asks Timothy to take his wife outside. Charles and Laura get to stay, despite their tangential relationship to the patient. 

Embarrassed at last about their sick voyeurism, Pa and Laura go too.

DAGNY: No words of inspiration, Charles? That’s not like him.

Doc examines Jordan again.

WILL: Oh, Doc doesn’t know anything about eyes. That’s why he sent Mary to Dr. Mixter. And she just needed glasses!

DAGNY: Yeah. Actually, they should have Hester-Sue take a look, she probably knows more than Doc does.

Outside, Guilt Gopher Laura blames herself, just for being there.

WILL: That doesn’t make any sense. Actually, if she hadn’t been there, wild dogs or a bear probably would have come along and eaten him.

Pa shuts down this line of talk, then sends Laura home.

WILL: Wouldn’t this be traumatic for Charles, after what Mary went through?

DAGNY: Nah. He’s made of stronger stuff than that.

Inside, Doc gives Jordan’s parents a detailed diagnosis.

ALEXANDER: How does he know that? Did he open the back of his head?

Doc tells Jordan’s mom, whom he addresses as “Belle,” that he can’t tell if the blindness will be permanent.

ALEXANDER: Could this really happen?

Yes, apparently.

The parents go back into the surgery, and Timothy tells Jordan he won’t be leaving town until they know his prognosis.

Timothy is Bert Kramer, an actor also in tons of stuff, including Mission: Impossible, M*A*S*H, Another World, Dynasty, Max Headroom (awesome), Full House, and Power Rangers.

He also did voices for the animated Transformers show in the eighties.

That night, in Jordan’s bedroom, Timothy tries to comfort Belle, but she starts screaming “That damn fool circus!” and tearing posters off the walls.

ALEXANDER [screaming]: “IT WAS THE GODDAMN BLACK SHOES!!!”

Timothy, who while not exactly Fedor Jeftichew is pretty hairy, tells her they’ll need to be strong together for Jordan’s sake, and holds her.

Commercial.

Next we see Timothy making a stop at the Little House to update Charles on Jordan’s condition.

He says while Belle is hesitant to accept the boy’s blindness, they’ve decided to enroll him in the Blind School.

DAGNY: Is Charles the new intake social worker for the Blind School? Like, “I’ll do a full assessment, don’t worry.”

It’s morning, and Charles gives his kids a lift as far as the Blind School, which we’ve established is about two thirds of the way to town from the Little House.

David gives us another rich waltz, with a sunny trumpet bringing in the Little House theme over it. Almost a college grad or coronation processional feel this time.

DAGNY: Rose is having a great day.

WILL: A great season.

Before she leaves, Laura tells Pa she can help Jordan get from place to place when he’s well enough, and Pa says, “Sure, I’ll ask Mr. Harrison.” (Finally a surname for this family.)

Suddenly Laura, who’s still blaming herself, bursts into tears.

Pa wisely and firmly tells Laura she must be a friend to Jordan now, and let go of her “false sense of guilt.”

That night at the House of Harrison, Timothy is reassuring Belle that the Blind School is the best place for Jordan at the moment.

WILL: How much is tuition at the Blind School? These people can’t even afford a five-dollar sugar bowl. In real life, it would have been all rich kids.

Gently, Belle thanks Timothy for being there for Jordan, and for her.

DAGNY: She’s got a lot of makeup on compared to other women on this show. You can tell she’s not a regular. 

WILL: Well, I’m sure her makeup was done by the same guy.

DAGNY: Nah, I bet she went behind his back to Landon’s hottie makeup girl and she said, “Sure!”

That night, we see Jordan get out of bed to close the shade because the moonlight coming through his window is too bright. Hm.

I’m pretty sensitive to light myself. Once we went to a performance of Thaïs where they had this, like, huge pile of mirrors onstage reflecting the lights into the audience’s faces. I couldn’t see for three hours afterward.

The next morning, the Ingalls kids stop by bring Jordan to school. (So Harrison House must be between the Little House and the HOIABC.)

Then we see Mary teaching Jordan his Braille letters.

Behind them, Adam is sitting at a desk doing nothing. He doesn’t speak at all in this one. Maybe they’re giving each other the silent treatment too.

The classroom is full of kids, including Thomas the Blond Freckle-Faced Moppet.

[UPDATE: I’ve been made aware they recast Thomas in this story. For the first part of the season, it was Ivan Wideman, but as of this episode an actor named Vince Tortell takes over. Thanks as always for the cards and letters. – WK]

Also there are Pigtail Annie, Hannah Herzog, Little Eli, and Sue Goodspeed.

WILL: Hey, do you think Malika Goodspeed’s name on Cross is a tribute to Little House?

DAGNY: Definitely.

(Cross is also worth watching in a fun schlocky Twentieth-Century-show kind of way.)

As for Jordan, he seems to be looking around the room at the other kids. Hmm.

Hester-Sue comes in and declares that lunch is ready.

DAGNY: Wasn’t Hester-Sue the principal in St. Louis?

WILL: Yes. Remember, Mr. Ames was all excited because he’d be able to learn at her feet.

DAGNY: Yeah. And now they just have her cooking?

Hester-Sue and Jordan have a brief conversation about how today chicken is on the menu instead of horsemeat.

After she leaves, we notice Jordan appears to be looking at his Braille alphabet. Hmmm.

Then we see the kids and teachers sitting down to lunch. There are only eight students, including Jordan; since we counted about twenty total blind kids in “Blind Journey,” I don’t know where the rest have gone. All killed in accidents, I suppose.

Hester-Sue teaches Jordan the twelve-o’clock-six-o’clock method for identifying the food on his plate, but once she leaves the room he starts looking around again. Hmmmmm.

Then we cut to the blind kids playing outside. Hester-Sue has erected a pair of chutes in the yard with stakes and some rope, and the kids are relay-racing back and forth along them.

First up are Freckles (whom H-S addresses as “Mark”) and a girl with another Princess Leia do.

Hannah Herzog and Janis go next.

Then it’s a little dungareed kid vs. one of the new kids, who looks sharp in a crisp white shirt and suspenders.

Then it’s Jordan’s turn – only he frightens Hester-Sue by doing some circus flips instead of running.

ALEXANDER: This kid is obnoxious.

Hester-Sue kindly tells him he can’t do stunts that would risk hurting him.

ALEXANDER: What stunts worth doing wouldn’t risk hurting him? Walking in a circle?

Later, back in his bedroom, Jordan hears his ma coming and puts on Blind Face.

She tells him she’s making his favorite for supper – veal and ham pie. (Sounds good to me.)

Jordan notes that she and his dad are getting along better. She says that’s true, but she’s not sure what it means in the long run.

WILL: Do you think he could really fool his parents and Hester-Sue into believing he was blind if he wasn’t?

DAGNY: Probably not.

Back at the school again, we see Jordan asking Mary if he can go to the bathroom.

WILL [as MARY]: “Silence!”

Once he’s outside, on goes the hat again.

DAGNY: So, does he always wear that toque to conceal the real kid doing the gymnastics?

WILL: Yeah. The real kid probably had a mohawk.

After another break, we see Hester-Sue running into the schoolyard – the sighted kids’ schoolyard, that is.

There are a lot of kids out playing: Not-Ellen Taylor, Midsommar Kid, the Gelfling Boy, the Kid with Very Red Hair (Mean One), Miniature Art Garfunkel, an AEK, the Auburn-Haired Bellringer, Not-Linda Hunt, a bunch of others.

In a very nice touch, we can also see Charles in the far distance, carrying some lumber at the Mill.

With alarm, Hester-Sue asks if anyone has seen Jordan, who never came back from his privy break.

Laura says the kids will help look for him, and when Hester-Sue goes inside to ask Alice Garvey if it’s okay, Laura says, “She’ll say it’s all right, come on!” 

DAGNY: Laura’s like, “I’m the real boss of this school.”

She orders her classmates into action.

ALEXANDER: Good thing it’s not a blizzard.

Out in the woods, then, Laura is stunned to find Jordan up in a tree doing balance training, or what have you.

DAGNY: This is just a variation on the horse one with Nellie, isn’t it. 

WILL: She is good at catching people faking infirmities.

ALEXANDER: Does she push him down the hill?

Laura starts screaming at him.

DAGNY: Her eyebrows are a little heavy today.

WILL: Should I add a new section to the recaps called “Eyebrow Watch”?

She actually seizes him physically.

ALEXANDER: Is she gonna strangle him?

WILL: She’s gonna blind him. With a stick!

Then she bursts into tears.

WILL: She wasn’t this emotional when she caught Nellie.

DAGNY: She wasn’t this emotional when Mary went blind.

Jordan explains he’s only continued the ruse because it’s made his parents get along so much better.

Given this new info, Laura grapples with the ethics of the situation.

Along come Albert and Carrie, as dogged as Javert. A decision must be made, fast.

And Laura makes her choice: She won’t tell.

But after school, she meets Pa in the barn to unpack things.

Pa isn’t able to fully evaluate based on the limited information he has, but he says he knows Laura will make the right call.

The next morning (?) at Harrison House, we see Mr. H and Jordan sawing a log with a crosscut saw.

ALEXANDER: That seems safe.

Meanwhile, Laura lurks in the field, Busby-style.

Mr. Harrison heads off to work, and Laura approaches, bearing cookies.

Mrs. H says she’ll get some lemonade for them to have with ’em (at dawn?), but Jordan says, “Yeah, to wash the taste out.” 

WILL: That was nasty.

DAGNY: It was!

WILL: But maybe she’s a bad baker, like the Purple Pieman with his kohlrabi cookies.

Jordan’s mom goes inside, and Laura presses him to confess.

Ma Harrison comes back out, and Jordan asks if in the future, Laura could lead him to school on one of their horses. (Who would bring it back?)

And sure enough, as instantly as AI this concept morphs into an image before our eyes.

WILL: Wouldn’t it be dangerous to have a blind kid ride a horse? 

DAGNY: Yes.

WILL: I mean, what if a bird flew down and attacked him? He’d never see it coming.

DAGNY: I’m not sure that’s the best example why.

The horse, it must be said, resembles Bunny.

Jordan has come up with a crazy plan: They’ll fake a horseriding accident, and claim the head trauma brought his sight back!

Laura tells him this idea is insane.

She stomps off, and Bunny 5 suddenly goes mad, tossing Jordan.

Rather than check on his wellbeing, Laura simply turns around and resumes her lecture.

“Do you hear me?” Laura yells.

But Jordan is silent.

ALEXANDER: Is he deaf now too?

Bunny 5 runs off guiltily.

Finally Laura comes over and barks at him, but when she touches him she sees he struck his head on a rock, which is covered with gore!

WILL: Oh my God, is she gonna bury him?

DAGNY: I think we’ve been watching too much Forensic Files.

DAGNY: That toque’s seen a lot of action this week.

Terrified, Laura races away into another commercial!

On the other end of it, Doc Baker is again looking at Jordan’s eyes.

Out in Doc’s lobby, the rapid-response team has assembled.

Doc says the kid might have fractured his skull, and if he doesn’t come out of his coma, he’ll need to be sent to Minneapolis.

WILL: Doc really jumps around with his surgery referrals. Mankato, Minneapolis, Rochester . . . 

DAGNY: He’s probably on a listserv so he knows which hospitals have openings.

Laura makes a sort of “oops” face and excuses herself – but not before Pa notices.

He pursues her to the creek, where she turns the conversation to the philosophical. 

She asks if God punishes people for the evil they do, and Pa says, “Well, sometimes it seems so. I don’t think so myself.”

Pa jumps to the heart of the matter.

ALEXANDER: Cough it up, Laura.

But Laura doesn’t, really. Then Pa tells her she can skip school if she wants.

WILL: He’s always doing that!

I can’t remember on which occasions Pa said he didn’t care whether she went to school or not, but it’s Saturday and I’d like to get this recap out and enjoy the rest of my evening, so I’m not going to bother hunting for them. I think there were a couple of them.

Anyways, Laura says she’s going to take a walk.

She crosses the Old Rustic Bridge, under which the water is incredibly still.

DAGNY: I’m not sure that’s real water. It’s probably glass, that way they didn’t have to waste money filling it up with hoses.

WILL: . . . You think making a fake lake out of glass would be cheaper than using water?

Laura sits down and prays to God for guidance.

WILL: Is Ernest Borgnine gonna appear and talk her though this?

Since she’s Laura Ingalls, she’s soon yelling at Him, though.

Realizing she’s her own worst enemy, she apologizes.

Then dark cellos and basses lead her into Doc’s office.

Doc goes to pout in a corner, but Laura says, “Dr. Baker?”

WILL [as DOC, hopelessly]: “I’m not a doctor anymore!”

DAGNY: Yeah, he should have another nervous breakdown.

They, too, consider weighty questions.

But Jordan suddenly wakes up – and he can see!

However, he has amnesia about everything that happened since the original accident.

Under Doc’s questioning, Jordan reveals his birthday is the 17th of June.

That’s good enough for Doc to declare Jordan fine, and if he isn’t, who cares, we’re going to see Burt Reynolds!

Laura isn’t sure what to make of this development.

After vomiting time, all the kids walk home from school.

Laura tells Albert she’s going to stop at Doc’s and check on Jordan.

DAGNY: Albert should be, like, “I never liked that kid.”

Once they’re alone, Laura confronts Jordan about whether he’s lying or not.

DAGNY: She should just hit him on the head with her lunchpail till he confesses.

Well, the parents decide to stay together, and the Harrisons drive into the sunset.

WILL: That’s a weird ending.

DAGNY: Yeah, it’s kind of unsatisfying.

ALEXANDER: Do they roll down a mountain now?

Anticipating such complaints, Voiceover Laura tells us if you don’t like that ending, blame God.

DAGNY: But how would you improve it? What would be the better ending?

WILL: When it seems like everything’s fine with Jordan again, he sits up, his brain falls out, and he dies. Tragedy.

ALEXANDER: Yeah, it’s Little House, Mom.

Bum-Bum-Ba-Dum!

STYLE WATCH:

Belle Harrison wears one of those medieval-peasant-woman hats that have been popping up all season.

And Timothy Harrison wears his own unique version of Pinky.

Charles appears to go commando again.

THE VERDICT: If you can stand the circus music, this one is strongly constructed, and different enough from “Bunny” to stand on its own. The ending falls a little flat, though. (As it were!)

And Ma is absent from it, which is strange.

UP NEXT: Dance With Me