Big Jim is going to shoot the Jack of Hearts but is killed by a penknife in the back wielded by Rosemary (her "one good deed before she dies").
He is described at the end of the song only as "missing", as Rosemary is on the gallows, his gang across the river with the safe from the bank, and Lily contemplating the events of her life.
The version on Blood on the Tracks was recorded later, in Minneapolis, and reflects Dylan's attempts, following his brother's advice, to make the album less difficult and intense.
According to Tim Riley of National Public Radio, "'Lily, Rosemary and the Jack of Hearts' is an intricately evasive allegory about 'romantic facades' that hide 'criminal motives', and the way one character's business triggers a series of recriminations from people he doesn't even know".
[3] In their book Bob Dylan All the Songs: The Story Behind Every Track, authors Philippe Margotin and Jean-Michel Guesdon note that the "protagonists seem to play with their life as if it were a game of chance.
[6] The New York recording session of "Lily, Rosemary and the Jack of Hearts" was released on the deluxe edition of The Bootleg Series Vol.