Flowers for a Lady is a Stranger side-mission featured in Red Dead Redemption.

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Story

Marston comes across an elderly man named Billy West, picking flowers on the side of the road. The man wants to give his wife, Annabel, a bouquet for their Golden wedding anniversary. He asks for Marston's help in gathering the flowers.

Walkthrough

Mission Prerequisites

Before this Stranger will appear on the world map, the player must complete:

Mission Objectives

After speaking with Billy West, the player must:

Mission Details

Start the mission by speaking to Billy. He can be found just east of MacFarlane's Ranch and just west of Stillwater Creek. Billy will be marked with a " ? " to trigger this mission.

He needs three flowers of each kind; Wild Feverfew, Red Sage and Desert Sage. Wild Feverfew grow around Hennigan's Stead, Red Sage near Rio Bravo, and Desert Sage grow west near Gaptooth Ridge. Collect three of each to make the desired bouquet for Billy and bring them to his cabin later.

After giving the flowers to Billy, he invites Marston into his cabin and insists that he try his wife's tea. Upon entering, Marston quickly discovers that Annabel is actually a long-dead and rotted corpse, positioned in a chair. It seems as if Billy is in extreme denial that his wife is even dead at all. When Billy asks Marston again to stay for the tea, Marston says "Sorry, but I have an appointment with planet Earth" and walks away.

Tips and Tricks

In General Stores in MacFarlane's Ranch, Armadillo, Thieves' Landing and Blackwater, you can buy a Survivalist Map, which lets you see all herbs on your mini-map for 20 minutes (or 40 minutes after completion of survivalist rank 5). Buy one of these as it will decrease the time it takes you to complete the task drastically.

Trivia

This is the first Stranger side-mission that becomes available to the player, since it becomes available after the main storyline mission "New Friends, Old Problems".

It is possible to go behind the house on horseback and see Annabel in her entirety through either the window or gap in the wall. Annabel is clearly dead when viewed like this.

If playing as Jack, Billy will still say he and Annabel have been married for fifty years, despite the actual year being 1914, thus they would have been married fifty-three years.

If you re-enter the cabin and bump against the corpse, her head will fall off. If Billy witnesses this, he will be shocked and say something about it.

If you return after a day or two, Billy will be outside talking either about the tea or another general invite into the house. However, Annabel is nowhere to be seen. Her rocking chair can also be seen outside the house with no body.

The corpse is somewhat reminiscent of the 1960 film Psycho, in which a delusional son believes his mother to be alive after her death and keeps her hidden from the world, leaving her corpse in a rocking chair. The hair of Annabel is similar to the mother's.

The story is hauntingly similar to William Faulkner's 1930 short story "A Rose for Emily".

If the mission is started as John but finished by Jack, Billy will say "You look like a man who passed by here a couple years ago".

If you put on subtitles and initiate the quest as Jack Marston, the subtitle will have a spelling mistake in it. When Jack says "Well, that very kind of you." the subtitles read "r/Well, thats very kind of you." It can be assumed it is just a coding prefix that was overlooked during production.

Annabel's blackbird pie may be a reference to the well-known English nursery rhyme "Sing a Song of Sixpence".

After you've completed the mission, if you run into the shelves behind Annabel, her head will fall off.

John and Billy call each other by their names, even though they never told each other what their names are. Strangely, Billy refers to him as stranger at the beginning of the ending cutscene, yet at the end of the same cutscene as John is walking out the door, Billy refers to him by name. Interestingly, this is not the case for Jack.

Gallery

Video Walkthrough

Flowers for a Lady - Stranger Mission - Red Dead Redemption

Achievements/Trophies

Aiding Strangers will contribute toward the following Trophies/Achievements:

STRANGE THINGS ARE AFOOT gamerscore 10 Bronze bronze Complete a task for a Stranger

PEOPLE ARE STILL STRANGE gamerscore 25 Silver silver Complete 15 tasks for Strangers