Cato and Rosalee, with the help of the Native American man and the White man who was helping them to the next station, managed to get themselves and a delirious Noah into the coffins to be taken to the next station, which would have been the Hawkes' home. After being unloaded in a small town, Cato and Rosalee get out of the coffins. Cato thinks they should go on without Noah, who is dying and having hallucinations of Henry. But Rosalee insists they go to the home of the doctor they overheard the drivers mention while they were in the coffins in the wagon. Rosalee convinced Cato to do it when she pointed out she was given the information about the next station, not him. So he could either go along with her plan to get medicine for Noah, or try to unsuccessfully make it on his own.
So Rosalee and Cato go into an abandoned store to steal nice clothing, and then go to the doctor's home and pretend to be free. The doctor checks her vitals, and says she is fine. Using her knowledge about decor from her life in the big house, Rosalee is able to extend their stay in the house and get them invited to dinner with the doctor and his brother. While Cato is quick to want to resort to killing the doctor, after they find the medicine cabinet is locked, Rosalee suggests the house girl probably has a key. So she goes to speak with the house girl and eventually shares with her that they are runaways and need to get to the medicine for Noah. The house girl is hesitant, and Cato is closing in on her prepared to stab her for the key, but she ends up giving the key to Rosalee, never having noticed Cato was about to stab her.
Meanwhile, Jeremiah is beating the White man that helped Cato, Rosalee, and Noah get into the coffins. Jeremiah knows that the system is broken up into units so no one man can take the whole system down, but he also knows each man has to know who's in the system after him. But the man refuses to give information about the next station. After seemingly knocking him out with the butt of his rifle, Jeremiah walks away from the man. But the man gets up and is about to stab Jeremiah, when August comes into the doorway and throws a knife into his back, seemingly killing him. Jeremiah and August agree to be partners, with Jeremiah getting Cato and Noah, and August getting Rosalee. They make it to the town where Rosalee, Noah, and Cato were dropped off and ask the sheriff if they could look around for some runaways. They soon realize Rosalee and Cato took clothes from the abandoned store, due to prints in the dust and finding their old clothes.
Later, Ben confronts his father about his choice to be a slave catcher, asking him if he caught Jay too. August shows him a letter from the bank, and says, slave catching isn't personal but it's the only way to keep their home for them, Jay, and his mother who was on her way to the house. Ben stands his ground and asks his father if it's the only way or just his father taking the easiest way! And later, recall from episode 1 August cannot read, August has Jeremiah read the letter from the bank to him. Jeremiah tells him the letter says August's land is full of mercury, which means it's hard to grow crops, and the bank would like to buy it back at a premium. August questions the use of the word premium, and Jeremiah tells him mercury is used to mine for gold. He adds, if he knew August was rich he wouldn't have let him get Rosalee out of the deal. So...August may not need the money after all. When he tells Ben to get the horses ready, Ben asks if they are going home, and August doesn't give a clear answer.
Back at the doctor's house, it turns out the doctor's brother is the sheriff! The sheriff begins a game of 21 questions with them after dinner, asking Cato how he burned his face (he says from lye, as he claims to be a soap maker) and Rosalee about her background and if she is an octaroon. His brother chided him for calling her an octaroon, but she says it's alright and makes up a story about who her parents are. The sheriff tells her she talks like she went to finishing school, and she says as an octaroon she couldn't go to school so she had a tutor where she learned etiquette, how to play the piano and so on. So the sheriff asks her to play the piano. She seems a little shocked by the request, but gets up to play and plays well. So well, Cato almost seemed enchanted by her (he was certainly a bit enchanted by how she cleaned up in their new clothes). He stood up and went to stand next to her by the piano. I almost thought he would give them away, because as her husband he shouldn't be that in awe of her ability to play the piano. The doctor steps out the room, having something in his eye. And the sheriff is straight forward with them. He tells them he doesn't think it's a coincidence that he's told there are runaways in his town and the same day his brother has them in his home for dinner. He basically tells them that they seem very cultured, but he still thinks they are the runaways. So he asks to see their papers. Rosalee seemed a bit worried, but Cato pulled papers out of his coat (phew!). But then he seemed nervous as he went through them, and the sheriff asked if something was wrong. Rosalee said no and took the top two papers and placed them on the table. The sheriff asked her to push them closer to him, which is when we see the top one has Pearly Mae's name (not the name Rosalee gave them, and everyone is familiar with the Macon 7 now and thus Tom's name). Luckily, a man runs in to tell the sheriff they are about to catch a runaway in the cane field (Noah followed his hallucination of Henry into the cane field), and the sheriff jumps up to follow the man. Rosalee tells Cato to go help Noah while she gets the medicine.
One of the slave catchers reaches Noah and punches him down. He seems to be out, until his hallucination of Henry tells him not to quit, because he has to help the others. And with that, Noah fights back and is able to take the catcher out. Cato later finds Noah laid out next to the catcher. Which surprised me, because knowing Cato's history I didn't expect him to actually go help Noah. Meanwhile, when Rosalee runs out the house with the medicine she is caught by Jeremiah and August! They force her out by the cane field as they call out for Noah and Cato. Surprisingly, it is Cato who heads to run for her, and it is Noah who stops him, telling him they can't help her if they get caught too! Cato has definitely taken a liking to Rosalee, and Noah has somehow went from practically dying and hallucinating to walking on his own and thinking logically (don't know if I buy this swift recovery). August seems to be walking ahead of Jeremiah, who is holding Rosalee. When Jeremiah says he guesses they don't care about Rosalee, August tells him they're just waiting for the right time and will be after Jeremiah and his men. So maybe August is going back home. He's letting Jeremiah hold Rosalee, and he says they will be after Jeremiah and HIS men. Hmmm... I honestly for a moment thought he might help Rosalee get away, with the knowledge that he may be into some money and may not have to resort to catching slaves. But I guess not. And I also wonder if Jeremiah lied to him about the mercury on his land and the bank wanting to pay him a premium, just to get him to go back home so they don't have to split the money with him. We'll see on the next episode.
Now back on the plantation, John is in town for his brother's big political event. While Ernestine is serving him, he confirms that her daughter is one of the Macon 7 and tells her he heard they made it to Kentucky. Later, when the reverend and Tom join him at the table, the reverend comments on John being a sympathizer. John ensures him that his brother Tom never listens to him anyway. Then he leaves to handle business in the city, ensuring his brother he'd be back in time for the event. Later, Tom and Ernestine agree to keep Sam's running away just between the two of them, as it would make Tom look bad. However, later, a man arrives to the Macon plantation, not early for Tom's event like Tom thought, but to deliver Sam back to Tom. He tells Tom Sam tried to bribe him to help him, and he adds that perhaps if Tom had hung the other runaways (I suppose he means Noah and Pearly Mae) his other slaves wouldn't try running away. With the reverend there, it seemed Tom's only option was to hang Sam, but he says he thinks he wants Sam to be a living example of why they shouldn't run away. So he makes plans to have Sam's heel cut off, crippling him! Ernestine goes in to see Sam, and tells him she asked to do it, because if it's done too deep it won't heel correctly. Though her position is at least he's alive, Sam doesn't understand why she and Tom seem to think it's better to be alive. When Tom and the reverend come in, Sam says he's ready and goes to lay on the table. He looks Tom in his eyes as he waits for his mother to chop his heel off. As she's preparing to do it, Tom tells her to stop and says he won't do it. Which of course seems to damage the likelihood of the reverend backing him.
Later at the event, Ernestine approaches Tom before he heads into the room with the other men. She tells him not to worry about what happened and to just be him and show them he's the best candidate. But when he goes in there, all they talk about is slaves and how slavery is a benefit to slaves. The reverend asks him if he wants it bad enough. And later, when Ernestine doesn't find Sam in his quarters, she runs around looking for him and asking the other slaves if they've seen him. Then the overseers grab her. Then we see Tom giving a speech to the men from his balcony, and as the camera zooms out we see Sam hanging from the balcony!!! And Ernestine is naked in the same hole in the ground they had Zeke in!!!
After the event, John returns to the Macon plantation. Tom points out John missed it, and John asks if him being there would have stopped Tom from killing Sam. Tom tells him he doesn't have the moral legs John and their father has.