It's not easy to play a woman both tough and vulnerable, a woman who can commit serious crime but still make you think at the end that she was the victim of the good guy and feel bad for her.
Barbary Red is in the Shanghai business with a tough named Thatcher (George Kennedy) who has her under his thumb, but then they make the mistake of shanghaiing Nick Barkley, on his birthday no less. The family is baffled, but Jarrod (Richard Long) knows right away what's going on - Barbary Red had been his client in San Francisco and gone to prison for the same activity. But Jarrod knows more - go after the crimps head-on and they just dump the evidence - the men they've shanghaied - into the river.
Jarrod starts "courting" Barbary Red in hopes of finding out where Nick is, but Red is stubborn, suspicious, while at the same time wishing that it was true, he really wanted her. By the time it all sorts out, St. John has us feeling bad for the criminal and being mad at good guy Long for using her, even though we understand why he did.
Long was good as a phony lover conflicted about what he was doing. We had to feel both good and bad about his actions in this episode, and he made me do it. I can't think of another actor who could have done a better job than St. John as Barbary Red. She had that great combination of tough and soft that really worked for her here and by the end, I could feel for her.
A good episode for examining how people can be a combination of both good and bad at the same time.