Cherie's Attempts to Flee From Bo:

Back at the boarding house, Cherie evaded Bo and Virgil on her front porch by hiding (with some help from her deceptive landlady). Vera was packing Cherie's bag in her room and helping her to prepare to leave. Cherie fearfully told Vera:

"If I'm not careful, I'm gonna end up in East No Place, Montana, with nothin' but him and a bunch of cows."

Vera proposed stashing her bag at the club for a quick getaway: "We're gonna pack your stuff and we're gonna stash your suitcase at the club, just in case you have to make a quick getaway." Vera urged Cherie to go to the club and daringly ask for an advance on her paycheck by lying about her sick grandmother. She also assured Cherie that she was safe until the rodeo ended.

As Virgil and Bo stomped back down the street, Bo was still persistent, telling Virgil:

"I'm gonna find her and I'm gonna marry her, and that's all there is to it."

Virgil was able to convince Bo to finish out the rodeo, while he promised to find and hold Cherie for him at the Blue Dragon: "I'll have her there at the Blue Dragon when you get through."

In the cafe, Virgil located Cherie at work and took her side: "Take it easy. I'm on your side. I don't want him to marry you neither." He also informed Cherie that Bo was a country-boy virgin who had never even been kissed before: ("You're kinda sophisticated for Bo"), causing her further concern. Although Bo seemed to be "as pure as a bunch of driven snow" according to both of them, Cherie remembered Bo's first kiss that he had honored her with: "He sure didn't kiss like it was the first time."

Virgil admitted what he had promised Bo: "I promised him I'd keep you here till he got back. Course, I didn't say anything about where you might take a notion to go after that." Both Vera and Virgil coached Cherie and plotted with her on how to avoid Bo and get away, by escaping out her dressing room window with her suitcase bound for the bus station.

When the rodeo ended that evening and Bo arrived in the Blue Dragon, he announced to Virgil that he had bought three tickets back to Montana - including one for Cherie. Bo boasted that he had been awarded $4,000 for winning almost every event. He told them that he was ready to leave with Cherie:

"I got our gear all packed up and waitin' outside in a taxi. All we gotta do is stop by Cherry's house and pick up her suitcase."

This was Cherie's cue to leave for her dressing room to "powder her nose" for the evening's show - and escape forever. Just before leaving to flee from him for good, Cherie told Bo point-blank that she couldn't marry him:

"I just can't lie to you and I can't marry ya, and I ain't goin' to Montana with you. And good-bye forever."

As she walked off, she became angered when he grabbed her costume's tail and tore it off - she hysterically screamed at him and then stalked off:

"You ain't got the manners they give a monkey! I hate you! And I despise you! And give me back my tail!"

Vera assisted Cherie in escaping out the back dressing room window with her suitcase and heading for the bus depot (bound for Los Angeles). Bo broke into the locked door and noticed that Cherie wasn't present. At the bus station, Cherie bought a one-way bus ticket to LA, where Bo followed after her in his taxi, while Virgil tried to dissuade Bo:

"Forget her, Bo. You'll find somebody else. Hank and Orville was tellin' me about this new schoolmarm who's stayin'...Bo, you just can't take people places like that! There's laws against it, Bo!"

But Bo was determined: "I'm gonna get her. Ain't gonna take 'no' for an answer....Anything I ever wanted in this life, I just went out and got!" As she stood in line at her bus, he literally roped her as if she was a wayward steer and dragged her onto his bus to Helena, Montana.

Abducted Cherie On a Bus Bound For Montana With Bo:

During the trip to Montana, Cherie retrieved her suitcase and moved forward in the bus to converse with fellow bus traveler Elma Duckworth, the waitress from Grace's Diner who was returning home after visiting Phoenix. She confessed that she needed help because she had been "abducted." She asked for Elma to help her change into warmer clothes to replace her skimpy chanteuse-costume under her coat.

In the back of the bus, when Bo asked Virgil: "Why don't she like me? Why?", Virgil offered advice to Bo about the alleged kidnapping and how most women didn't want to be treated like cattle:

"There are some gals who don't like to be pushed and grabbed and lassoed and drug into buses in the middle of the night."

With the supportive Elma, Cherie spoke about her beliefs concerning love and the kind of man she was looking for. She said she definitely wasn't in love with Bo, and fortunately hadn't married her cousin Malcolm in the Ozarks when she was 14 years old. She also was uncertain whether she had ever been in love before:

"I don't know why I keep expecting myself to fall in love, but I do.... I'm seriously beginning to wonder if there's the kind of love I have in mind....Well, you see, I've been goin' with guys since I was about 12....I almost married a cousin of mine when I was 14. But Pappy wouldn't have it....I never married my cousin Malcolm. 'Cause he turned out real bad, just like Pappy predicted. But I sure was crazy about him at the time. And I've been losin' my head about some guy ever since. Bo was the first one that ever wanted to marry me, since my cousin Malcolm. Naturally, I'd like to get married and have a family and all them things....

Maybe I don't know what love is. I want a guy I can look up to, and admire. But I don't want him to browbeat me. I want a guy who'll be sweet with me, but I don't want him to baby me either. I just gotta feel that whoever I marry has some real regard for me aside from all that loving stuff. You know what I mean?"

Stranded En Route to Montana in Grace's Diner Due to a Snowstorm:

The bus became stranded en route northward, due to a blizzard-snowstorm, and the passengers had to seek shelter inside Grace's Diner, where the bus had stopped earlier on the way to Arizona. Cherie made another attempt to get away from Bo - she exited the bus and entered the diner with Elma, while Bo and Virgil remained sleeping in the back of the bus. It became common knowledge that cowboy Bo was bullying and harrassing Cherie after kidnapping her. Elma asked Grace to hide Cherie until the bus pulled away, so that she could escape from her abductor. However, it was unclear how long it would be before the road opened up to all traffic. Cherie's plan to hide out in the diner and take the first southward-bound bus was definitely going to be delayed.

Carl hinted to Grace that this was their opportunity to spend some time in her apartment: "I was just thinking about that apartment you got upstairs. Sure would be nice to sit up there for a while, listen to the radio or somethin'. Maybe have a couple of beers." He bragged about his big hands and how he used to be the state wrestling champion.

The "bull-headed" Bo woke up and marched into the diner, and was still stubbornly determined to have Cherie. He brow-beat and questioned her, asking why she deserted him in the bus and took her suitcase with her into the diner: "Was you tryin' to fool me again? Is that what it was?...Tell me. Cherry, you tell me!" The tough bus driver Carl intervened to firmly denounce Bo's outrageous behavior ("Okay, cowboy, leave the lady alone"), feeling responsible for the welfare of his passengers. Bo refused to listen to the driver: "You still got no right interferin' between two people gonna get married!" and continued to sexually harrass Cherie. The two began to viciously argue as he grabbed her:

Cherie: "We ain't gettin' married! That's what I've been tryin' to tell ya. But you're too bullheaded and mean to listen!"
Bo: "Cherry, I'm tellin' you, you're gonna marry me, and I ain't gonna discuss it no more!"

He asked if there was a preacher nearby to conduct a ceremony. Bo picked her up and threw her over his shoulder while promising ("I'll make ya a good husband. You'll have nothin' to be sorry about"), but Virgil and Carl blocked his way out the door. Resistant, Virgil explained the reason for not opening the door for Bo, with backing from Carl:

Virgil: "That's right. First 'cause I figured the lady wasn't good enough for you. But now 'cause I figure you ain't good enough for her!"
Carl: "That's how it is, cowboy. Now, are you gonna put her down?"

Both Carl and Virgil accused Bo of being a bully for fighting for what he wanted: "There's a big difference between a fighter and a bully, Bo. But there's only one way you're gonna learn it. For once in your life, somebody's gotta beat the livin' tar out of ya!" Both Virgil and Carl challenged Bo, and Virgil gave permission for Carl to step in and physically fight against Bo outside the diner.

In the heavy falling snow, Bo continued to refuse to apologize to everyone that he had offended in the diner. Virgil became exasperated with Bo and actually punched him in the face, and then threatened more punishing blows would come from Carl: "But remember this, Bo. Every time he hits ya, it's me hittin' ya!" After Bo was "whipped" and subdued by Carl's many punches and a head-and-arm lock, he ordered Cherie to not witness his defeat: "Get away, damn it!" and then surrendered. Virgil and Carl insisted that Bo promise to apologize to everyone he had offended in the place, including Cherie, and to "quit(s) molestin' that poor little girl." Bo was reluctant to have Cherie see him lose: "I-I can't go in there. She's seen me get whipped." Shortly later, Carl told Grace: "I think maybe I earned me a bottle of that cold beer you got in the icebox upstairs."

The next day in the diner, Bo finally apologized to diner owner Grace for the "ruckus" and for acting like a "hoodlum" to bus passenger Elma, but he felt so humiliated that he was hesitant to speak to Cherie: ("I can't face up to her. She's seen me get beat"). However, when Virgil insisted that he apologize: ("You made me your promise. You owe that girl an apology whether you got beat or not, and you're gonna say it to her"), Bo finally realized that he had overstepped his bounds and humbly asked for Cherie's forgiveness:

Bo: "Cherry, it wasn't right of me to do what I did to you, treatin' you that way, draggin' you on the bus, and tryin' to make you marry me whether you wanted to or not. Do you think you can ever forgive me?"
Cherie: "I guess I've been treated worse in my life."
Bo: "Well, I reckon that's all there is to be said. I wish you luck, Cherry."
Cherie: "I wish you the same, Bo."

He also returned her good-luck green bandana-scarf, but when she gave him back his engagement ring, Bo asked her to keep it.

Bo and Cherie Reconciled, And On Their Way to Montana:

Once it was announced that the roads had cleared and the bus was ready to depart, Bo was prepared to go on alone with Virgil to Montana. Virgil volunteered to help Carl put chains on the bus' tires and bring the bus closer to the diner's front entrance.

As Bo sat in the diner by himself, Cherie came up to Bo to admit that she was more "wicked" than he was led to earlier believe, because she had a lot of boyfriends who had sexually used her in the past: "I ain't the kind of gal you thought I was....Well, I guess a lot of people'd say I led a real wicked life, and I guess I have, too." Bo sheepishly admitted his total inexperience with women: "You are the first gal that I ever had anything to do with....You see, I lived all my life on a ranch and, I guess I just didn't know anything about women, 'cause they're different from men."

As the bus was ready to leave (without Cherie), Bo shyly asked for her permission to give her a serious goodbye kiss - and Cherie agreed. After their sweet kiss and embrace (while Virgil strummed on his guitar), Bo quickly withdrew to have a few words with Virgil. Afterwards, Cherie began to realize that she had seen a new side to Bo - and that he might be a man who could show her respect.

Bo returned to Cherie's side a few moments later after speaking to Virgil, who had suggested that their wild and inexperienced natures averaged out between the two of them and made them the perfect couple: ("It kinda averages out to things being proper and right"). Bo asserted that he loved Cherie just the way she was, no matter what her past was like, even though she had admitted to slutty behavior:

"Well, I've been thinkin' about them other fellas, Cherry. And well, what I mean is, I like you the way you are, so what do I care how you got that way?"

Bo professed his sincere love for Cherie and asked her to marry him. Her heart was visibly touched and moved, and she gave a heartwarming, kind reply after being touched by his good-hearted sweetness: "Bo, that's the sweetest, tenderest thing anyone ever said to me." Then, he bolstered up his courage ("guts") to tell her what was in his heart, and gently asked her to resume their relationship: "I still wish you was goin' back to the ranch with me, more than anything I know" - and she breathlessly responded:

"I'd go anywhere in the world with you now. Anywhere at all!"

They happily hugged and spun around in complete surprise - deciding to get married and live on his Montana ranch. Bo was overjoyed and announced: "She's gonna marry me!", and Cherie was ecstatic also: "Ain't it wonderful when somebody so terrible turns out to be so nice?" Bo also exclaimed: "Our ranch is gonna be the nicest place in the world, 'cause we're gonna have an angel on it!" And to show her commitment to him, Cherie crumpled up and threw away her road-map to Hollywood.

Outside as the bus was ready to leave, Bo told Carl there was another passenger joining them. However, Virgil decided to remain behind, to give them more freedom and independence: ("You don't need me to look after you. Fact is, you got someone you gotta look after"). Virgil handed Bo the wedding ring he had been entrusted with. When Bo attempted to coerce Virgil to change his mind, Cherie stepped in to remind Bo, once again, that he couldn't impulsively order Virgil to do what he wanted (or rope Virgil into obeying him):

"You just can't do it that way. You just can't! If he don't wanna come, you can't make him."

After they said all their goodbyes, the couple were about to board the bus to Montana. The gallant-acting Bo wrapped his heavy, fleece-lined leather jacket around the shivering Cherie still in her skimpy outfit (with a thin coat), and she gratefully leaned and cuddled back against him and closed her eyes. And then she restored her scarf around his neck: ("But what about you? You'll need something").

After a hearty "Ya-hoo!", Bo was ready to jump up onto the bus first, but reminded himself to politely step aside to let Cherie board before him. The film concluded as the bus pulled away.