Summary:  My Camp in the Pines, 2017 story.  In this sequel to The Daring Deeds of the Deadeye Kid, Little Joe once again draws inspiration from his favorite dime novels when he is kidnapped and held for ransom.

Rating:  K+   Word count 15,138

The Deadeye Kid Series:

The Daring Deeds of the Deadeye Kid
The Deadeye Kid Rides Again

The Deadeye Kid Rides Again

With a sigh the warden closed the folder on his desk.  Everything was in order, and there was no reason to delay the release of the prisoners.  He wasn’t even sure keeping them here in Nevada State Prison would do any good.  Two years was a fair sentence for what the quartet of siblings had done, so maybe it was best to get them away from the more hardened criminals before they turned to stone themselves.  Trouble was, he’d already seen signs that the hardening process had, at least, begun.  Yes, it was time.  If these four had any hope of redemption, it would have to lie outside these walls, not here where they could learn to be worse.  He stood and walked into his outer office, where one of the more trusted prisoners worked.  Giving the four names, he told the man to have them prepared for release and brought to his office.

An hour passed, little enough time for four inmates to take a decent bath and clothe themselves in a set of donated apparel.  Ushered into the warden’s office, they stood in a line before him.  He remained silent until each set of eyes was focused on his face.  “I trust these two years have taught you something,” he began, while secretly fearing the lessons they might actually have picked up, “I sincerely hope that I will not see any of you here again.”  He paused, apparently waiting for an answer.

“You sure won’t, warden,” the oldest man said, and the other three quickly echoed the sentiment.  And they meant it.  Maybe not the way he wanted them to, but one way or another, they’d be certain not to end up back in this place!

“I wish you well, then,” the warden said.  “You’re free to go.  The trustee will escort you to the gate.”

They filed out of the office, and the warden closed the door behind them.  Shaking his head, he returned to his desk.  They’d said the right words, but what had glittered in their eyes was not the sparkle of new purpose, but the glint of bitterness that he so often saw from departing “guests” of the State.  Two years, a fair sentence.  Not even a hard one, considering the crime had been attempted robbery and imprisonment of an entire family, but long enough to do the damage.  Those four would be back; he’d lay odds on it.

**********

            Hauled into Carson City, courtesy of the State, the four former convicts didn’t make it past the nearest bar that first day.  Two years without liquor was far too long, they mutually decided, even the woman.  She plunked down at a table with her brothers, her expression challenging the bartender to spew the usual nonsense about not serving ladies.  She needn’t have bothered; a bar this seedy had no scruples about serving anyone, so long as they had a short bit to pay for the drink.  It was, in fact, quite accustomed to being the first stop for the shipwrecked lives departing the State Prison, and the bartender could smell an ex-con a mile coming.  He didn’t care: money was money.

The eldest brother took a long quaff of his beer and set the mug down with a curl of his lip.  “Ain’t the best I ever tasted.”

“That’s for sure,” muttered his next younger brother.

“The best was the last drink we had,” the youngest boy put in.  “That was prime liquor them folks had.”

“It was,” the woman agreed, “but it was hanging around for that prime liquor—and the Chinaman’s roast pig—that got us caught.”

“Naw, that ain’t what got us caught,” argued the oldest brother.  “It was that dadgum Deadeye Kid.  If’n it weren’t for him, we’d’ve had plenty of time to eat the pantry bare.”

“Yeah,” the youngest agreed.  “Not to mention him nigh-on to killin’ us with his wild shootin’.”

The middle brother nodded grimly.  “He owes us, that stinkin’ Deadeye Kid . . . for the two years he took from us.”

The woman, her face as hard as that of any of her brothers, said, “He owes us . . . and he’ll pay for every miserable day we spent in that place.”

**********

            Little Joe jumped down from the buckboard and cocked his tan hat at a jaunty angle, quite literally setting his cap for the next pretty face, before he sauntered into the general store in Virginia City.

“Casanova Cartwright appears to be on the prowl,” Adam observed as he more sedately stepped down from the seat of the wagon.

Moving still more slowly, Hoss joined him.  “When ain’t he?”

“An excellent point,” Adam said dryly.  “Perhaps we should hasten inside to rescue any fair damsels in distress from his attentions.”

Hoss chuckled.  “Got a feeling that don’t distress ‘em much, older brother.”

“True, but it might well distress Pa, given the youth of his baby son.  And when Pa frets over Little Joe. . . .”

“Well, now, when you put it like that. . . .”  Laying a beefy arm across his brother’s back, Hoss steered him toward the store.

As both he and Adam could have predicted, Little Joe was engaged in animated conversation with a girl, even if the only one available was the storekeeper’s daughter.  Despite her being closer to Adam’s age than his own, whatever Little Joe was saying had Sally Cass held in captivated giggles.

“We didn’t bring you along to entertain the populace, younger brother, although that does seem to be your idea of what comprises a day’s work,” Adam said, as he gave Sally a conspiratorial wink over Little Joe’s shoulder.

“I handed Miss Sally our list,” the youngest Cartwright said.

“And I’d better get to filling it,” she said, smiling warmly at Adam as she slipped away.

“Thanks a heap, older brother,” Little Joe said peevishly.

“Pa strictly ordered us to bring you home single,” Adam said with a provoking grin, “and unbetrothed.”

“Always does give us the hard chores,” Hoss said, making his best effort to copy Adam’s expression.  On him, it looked more like a petulant child’s pout.

“Ha, ha,” Little Joe said without a trace of humor.  “You ain’t here to entertain the populace, either, brothers, and that’s a good thing ‘cause you sure ain’t as good at it as me.”

Lips pursed, Adam arched an eyebrow.  “I’d be interested in your demonstrating that you can load supplies as well as you entertain ladies.”

Little Joe shrugged.  “I’ll do my share when the time comes.”

“I’ll hold you to that!” Hoss declared.  “‘Bout time you did your share of some kind of work.”

Will Cass, the store’s proprietor came in from the back.  “Hey, boys.  Mighty good to see you.  Get over to that candy jar and help yourself, Hoss.  Save it ‘til you get out on the street, though, so’s you can drum me up some business.  Got some new books in, too.  Not sure it’s the sort you favor, Adam, but, Little Joe, the latest Deadeye Dave came in this week, so I know you’ll want a look at that.”

“Sure thing, Mr. Cass,” Hoss said and headed straight for the counter.

“Thank you, Mr. Cass,” said Adam.  “I’ll take a look.”  The storekeeper had never been able to pick books for Adam’s esoteric and evolving tastes, once he’d passed the dime novel stage, so he doubted that there’d be anything of interest to him, but it never hurt to look.

Little Joe thanked the man, but muttered something about needing a new neckerchief.  A man could always use a new neckerchief.

Cass smiled in satisfaction.  He’d been giving out free candy to the Cartwright boys since they were little—well, all but Adam.  That boy had never been much for sweetening, even as a little tyke preferring a new book to candy.  In the early days, before Ben had become a prosperous rancher, the storekeeper would sometimes slip one of the dime novels into the Cartwrights’ crate of standard supplies.  Ben had seemed to understand that it wasn’t charity, so much as a second chance for Cass to share in the upbringing of a son.  Later, he’d taken pleasure in giving the same candy and cheap books to Little Joe as he had the older two, but now both the oldest and the youngest seemed to shy away from taking gifts.  Nowadays, even Hoss wouldn’t take more than a piece or two of sweetening, and then only because Cass had convinced him that he viewed the big fellow’s sucking candy on the street as the cheapest and best advertising a man could get.

Little Joe dawdled around the none-too-stylish neckerchiefs as long as he could stand and then slowly began to inch his way toward the book table.  He was hoping Adam would have moved elsewhere by the time he reached it, but unless he wanted to hover near a display of ladies’ underthings (which he decidedly didn’t) there wasn’t much to interest a man between those two points.  Apparently, against all odds, the Plato of the Ponderosa had found something to intrigue his peculiar taste in literature, ‘cause he wasn’t budging an inch, like some kind of cougar, ready to pounce once his prey came into range.  Finally, Little Joe had to take the final step and brace himself for what he knew was coming.

At first Adam said nothing, and Little Joe began to hope that his older brother’s book choice was so fascinating that his own selection might go unnoticed.  Hopes dashed when Adam, without even looking up from the text, said, “When I was a child, I thought as a child, I read as a child: but when I became a man, I put away childish things.”

That was a more subtle mode of attack than Little Joe had expected, so it took a moment for him to come up with a response.  “Pa won’t think much of you disrespecting Scripture, older brother.”

Adam’s head slowly turned, and he raised his eyes from his book to his brother’s face.  “You know perfectly well I wasn’t doing that.”  He pointed his chin toward the paperbacked book in Little Joe’s hand.  “Of course, I wouldn’t expect you to recognize the difference between a quote and a literary reference, when you fuel your mind with that sort of fodder.”

“What’s he got?” Hoss asked, as he ambled over, peppermint stick in hand.  Then he gave what passed, for him, as a wicked grin.  “Oh, let me guess: Deadeye Dave savin’ some pretty little gal . . . again.  Ain’t you a mite old for such as that, little brother, now that you’re out of school and workin—well, sort of—full time on the ranch?”

“Keep it up, and I won’t share this one with you,” Little Joe threatened, effectively quelling any more sass from Hoss.  He turned to Adam.  “As for you, maybe you oughta remember that I owe my life to Deadeye Dave, not to mention yours and Hoss’s and Pa’s!  And you never know when I might need his inspiration again to get the three of you out of trouble.”

“If you’re referring to the supposed threat from the Stumblefoot Gang,” Adam snorted, “I believe we were in far greater danger from a certain fool kid with a gun, the one who styled himself the Deadeye Kid, as I recall.”

“I dead sure was in more danger from the Kid than them four,” Hoss grunted, rubbing the back of his britches in remembrance of the sharp pain of that encounter two years before.

“All right, all right,” Little Joe said, reaching up to pat Hoss on the shoulder.  “Didn’t mean to bring up bad memories for you, big fella.  Looks like Miss Sally and her pa has got our order together, so I reckon it’s time the Cartwright men got back to work.”

“Men,” Adam scoffed.  Seeing his youngest brother’s mouth tighten, he said conciliatorily, “You’re right, though; we do owe a small debt to Deadeye Dave.  Go ahead and get the silly book, solely in the interest of encouraging the virtue of loyalty.  Just so you don’t start styling yourself the Deadeye Man.  I’m afraid that’s more than I could stomach.”

“Me, neither,” Hoss declared.

Little Joe laughed.  “And we all know you got an iron one!”  Laughing, the Cartwright brothers set to work loading the supplies and were soon back in the buckboard, headed for home.  Little Joe lay in the back, enjoying another dime adventure with his hero.  Though he would not for the world have admitted it to Adam, he really was getting too old for dime novels, as a general rule, but he still couldn’t pass up a Deadeye Dave, for exactly the reason he’d put forth to his older brothers.  No matter how many times they teased him about rescuing them from a gang so clumsy that Adam’s name for them made perfect sense, Little Joe was sure it had been Deadeye Dave’s inspiration that had helped him save them all.  His brothers knew that as well as he did, and while Adam might not share his loyalty to the little books, Joe knew perfectly well that Hoss would be asking him what ole Dave was up to now, just as soon as Adam was out of sight.

**********

            A week later Little Joe was dawdling his way home from Virginia City, simply because he needed more time to relish his satisfaction with the way his first solo excursion to town (at least, his first with responsibility attached) had gone.  Oh, it wasn’t any big responsibility, not like bringing home the payroll or anything that might put him at risk of being waylaid on the road; he’d just had to deliver some signed papers to Hiram Wood, the family lawyer, pick up a few small items for Hop Sing at a Chinatown store and “come straight home.”  The first two items on the list were quickly and easily accomplished, and as for the final one, well, he hadn’t exactly come straight home, but he was sure Pa had meant that to be interpreted loosely.  He’d only added a little purchase for himself at the general store, which hadn’t taken more than a few minutes, and it hadn’t been a dime novel, either, so there was nothing for Adam to sneer at.  Then, he’d made one short stop by the Bucket of Blood for a beer . . . or was it two?  No matter.  Pa couldn’t fault a fellow for quenching his thirst on a hot day like this, could he?  Of course not!  On second thought, given the fact that he was still only sixteen, Pa might not be as easily persuaded about that last stop.  Best keep it to himself.

He blew a few somewhat less than musical notes into his newly purchased harmonica and shook his head with a frown.  Apparently, he was going to need more practice, if he planned to serenade some girl like Adam did on his guitar.  Adam would probably be happy to help him master the thing, though.  After all, he was always harping at his younger brother about putting his mind and his time to good purpose, and he loved music, and it would give them something in common, and maybe they could even play duets together to entertain Pa and Hoss of an evening, as soon as Joe got a mite better.  He liked the picture he was painting in his head, but he had a feeling he’d be painting one a whole lot darker if he didn’t stop dawdling and get on home.

Moving the instrument toward his pocket, he tapped his heels lightly to Cochise’s flanks.  Responsive to his master’s touch, the horse sprang forward.  Suddenly a lariat dropped over Little Joe’s head and cinched his arms to his side.  The harmonica flew from his fingers as he was jerked from the saddle and hung suspended in midair for a moment before crashing to earth.  Momentarily dazed, he could not recognize the hazy figure bending over him, but he heard the man’s nasty cackle.

“Well, well,” a voice that sounded as grizzled as the man’s beard scoffed, “if it ain’t the Deadeye Kid.  Shot up many backsides lately, Kid?”  Not waiting for an answer, he straightened up and hollered to someone on Joe’s left, “Get his horse, Jack!  Don’t want it headed home just yet, do we?”

“Sure don’t, Zack,” the other man called as he spurred his horse in pursuit of Cochise.

Jack . . . Zack—the names sounded familiar, but Little Joe couldn’t place them.  “What you want, Mister?” he demanded as he was pulled to his feet.  “I ain’t carryin’ much cash, if that’s what you’re after.”  Truer words were rarely spoken, since he had exactly twelve cents left to his name after buying the harmonica and beer in town.  He was never more glad that he had ignored Adam’s persistent advice that he save more of his money.  Riches only made a man a bigger target he’d tell his big brother next time he saw him, confident that he’d soon be on his way to deliver that message.

Zack’s nasty laugh rang out again.  “Carryin’ cash?  No, I wouldn’t expect ‘em to trust you with more than enough for penny candy.”

“You ain’t got any of that stashed in your pockets, do you, Kid?” another man asked as he ambled over.  “My sweet tooth could favor some, if’n you do.”

Zack pulled Little Joe’s pearl-handled handgun from his left-sided holster.  “Hang on to that, Mack,” he ordered.  “If there’s one thing we can’t afford, it’s lettin’ this kid anywhere near a gun!”

Mack laughed, and though the sound carried none of the menace of the older varmint’s, it still wasn’t pleasant.  “That’s the truth!  You been practicin’, Kid?  Got to where you can hit anything smaller than a long clock yet?  Or is the big ‘un still willin’ to let you do your target practice on him?”  He bent over, slapping his hands to his knees and grinning like a fool.

Little Joe’s eyes narrowed.  Zack . . . Mack . . . Jack . . . a shot-up clock and some “big un” he was supposed to be using for target practice.  Little Joe groaned as the picture started to clear.  He wasn’t sure Hoss had forgiven him yet for his wounded backside.  Then there was what had happened to Little Joe’s own, once Pa had realized . . . oh, yeah he knew exactly who these men were.  He had fallen, once again, into the hands of what Adam had all too aptly called the Stumblefoot Gang only days before.  “What do you want?” he demanded again.

“We got what we want,” Zack said, a snide curl lifting the left side of his lip.

Jack came back with the pinto, and Little Joe was thrown into the saddle and his hands tied to the horn.  Jack lifted the boy’s chin with the end of his pistol.  “Don’t try nothin’,” he warned.  “We’ll be watchin’, every minute.”

“And keep quiet, too,” Zack ordered.

“Aw, there ain’t no one around to hear,” Mack muttered, “especially not where we’re goin’.”

“Where’s that?” Little Joe asked.

“Keep your mouth shut!” Zack snapped.  “Now, come on, boys, we got to get off this road ‘fore anyone comes along.”

As they headed for the woods, Little Joe weighed his chances of breaking free.   Three-to-one odds against him, and not one of his captors hampered by having his hands tied.  They’d said they’d be watching, too, so he probably wouldn’t get far, but poor as his chances were, they weren’t likely to get better once they reached the cover of the trees.  Would Deadeye Dave let a bunch of hooligans run off with him without lifting so much as a finger to help himself?  Hardly!  Neither would either of his big brothers.  No question then; he had to try.  Tightening his hold on the saddle horn, he kneed his pinto hard in one flank.  Faithful Cochise spun to the right in response and took off.  “Ride, boy, ride!” Little Joe urged.

He headed for the road, where the packed ground would help him gain speed.  For a moment he thought he might make it.  Catching the Stumblefoot Gang off guard had bought him precious seconds, but not enough.  He soon found himself surrounded by angry faces.

Zack drew back his arm and slapped the boy across the face.  “I told you not to try nothin’!” he yelled.

“All right, all right,” Little Joe said. “but I had to try, didn’t I?  Couldn’t call myself a man otherwise.”

The other three hooted.  “Did you hear ‘im, Zack?” Mack snorted.  “Thinks he’s a man!”

“You’re just a kid—the Deadeye Kid, remember?” Jack said with a grin.

“Yeah, and you’ll be just a dead kid if’n you try that again,” Zack grunted.  “You hear me, Deadeye?”

Little Joe barely opened the lips he had instinctively pursed at the vile phrase “just a kid” and  grunted “I hear you.”

“You’re comin’ along peaceable then, ain’t you?” Zack pressed.

“Yeah.”  The word dragged out with an air of defeat that apparently convinced Zack that he had effectively intimidated his prisoner this time.

Deadeye Dave never gave up, though, no matter how many pages stood between him and final victory, and the Deadeye Kid had been weaned on his exploits, not to mention the real life ones of the courageous Cartwright clan.  The gang would be watching him even more closely, at least for a while, so he’d bide his time, wait until they weren’t being so careful or, maybe, pick a time when one or more of them had taken off.  Yeah, that’s what Deadeye Dave would do.  For now, he’d just keep his eyes and ears open.

As they quickly moved behind the cover of the trees, he concentrated on where they were headed.  If he could get away later, he’d need a clear idea of where he was, so he could find his way home or go for help or find a place to hide, if all else failed.  So far, that was no problem; they were crossing the Ponderosa, where he knew every stick and stone on the property, and that was barely an exaggeration.

Little Joe cast his mind back to his first meeting with . . . for the life of him, he couldn’t remember their real last name.  He must have heard it at the trial, but it hadn’t been important enough to remember.  He’d thought he was shed of them for good, back then.  Well, the name Adam had come up with would do for now, at least inside his own head.  Probably best not to call them that to their faces.

What did he actually know about the Stumblefoot Gang?  Deadeye Dave always said it was important to know as much as you could about an enemy, but Little Joe had to admit he didn’t know much about this crew of would-be cutthroats.  There’d been four of them, a sister in addition to the three bungling brothers, and they weren’t the sharpest knives in the drawer, but that was about all he remembered.  He wondered if they’d smartened up any in the last two years.  He’d grown up plenty himself, grown from a boy into a man or, at least, next door to one, no matter how Hoss and Adam poked fun at the plain fact.  He’d outwitted this bunch back then; surely he could now, too.  Just a kid, indeed.  He’d show them.  The Deadeye Kid would ride again!

His confidence plummeted with a thud of chagrin when he abruptly realized that he wasn’t exactly Deadeye Dave, manly hero and rescuer of frail females, in this real-life dime novel.  This time he was playing the part of the frail female!  It left a sour taste in his mouth, because some of those gals had been helpless, simpering ninnies.  They were was no examples to follow!  A few, though, had been sharp-witted enough to aid in their own rescue.  Yeah, those were the ones to take his ideas from.

Miranda May from down New Orleans way had been his first literary sweetheart, and she still remained his favorite.  It helped, of course, that her city of origin reminded him of his mother, but beyond that, Miranda was no cowering female.  She had wit and she had spunk.  The first thing she’d done to help Dave find her was to drop clues as she was being dragged off by the villain, Scarpathio McSwain.  With his hands tied, Little Joe didn’t see much way to drop anything, other than the harmonica he’d lost when he was first grabbed.  However, as he passed beneath one of the trees, he raised his head just high enough to let a branch knock off his hat with its distinctive band, which any of the other Cartwrights would recognize in a blink.  The Stumblefoot brothers just laughed and let it lie where it fell, a sure sign that they were still the least savvy bunch of would-be outlaws in the entire West.

It wouldn’t be enough, though, given all the debris littering the floor of the woods.  Little Joe finally realized he had only one way of helping anyone follow him.  It took him a moment to steel himself against the pain, and then he rode directly into another low-lying branch and let it smack him in the face.  He shook his head as much as possible, as if he couldn’t get it untangled from the branches, and his cackling captors never suspected that he was marking his path in the only way open to him.  Hoss was a good enough tracker to know that those bent and broken branches meant someone had passed this way.

He wasn’t sure he dared risk the maneuver again, but he had to try, so the next time their path made a significant turn, he pulled the same stunt with the same result.  He dared one more time and was sure his ruse had been discovered when Zack stopped his horse and sat staring at his captive.  “You sure ain’t a fast learner, are you, Kid,?” he finally said with a disgusted shake of his head.

“We was plannin’ to hand you back to your folks in the same shape we found you,” Mack added with a mocking grin, “but you don’t make that easy.”

“Make sure you tell ‘em the mess on your face was all your own doin’, you hear, Kid?” Jack, not to be left out, put in.

“I think I’ve got the hang of it now,” Little Joe said quickly.  “Probably won’t happen again.”

“See it don’t,” Zack grunted.  “If’n I didn’t know better, I’d think you was tryin’ to slow us down.”

“How do you know better?” Mack asked, giving Little Joe a suspicious look.

“‘Cause anyone too dumb to duck can’t hardly think out a plan like that,” Jack snickered.

“Yeah, but you’re dumb as him, dawdlin’ here, flappin’ your jaws, when someone might miss him any time now,” Zack snorted.

“If’n I was his kin, I’d miss him ‘bout as much as a toothache,” Jack snickered.

“Forget that foolishness,” Zack said sharply.  “Time’s wastin’.  We got to get back to Tildy by dark.”

They finally passed beyond the tree line into higher ground.  At first, Little Joe had no notion of how to mark his path.  Then, with a stifled grin, he used his knees to direct Cochise into a subtly weaving pattern that would look odd to the trained eye.  The rocky terrain would make tracking him harder, but Hoss would keep looking until he found those strange tracks again, and Pa and Adam would be right there to point out any stray sign he might miss.  Against the three of them—four, counting Joe himself—the Stumblefoot Gang had no chance.

It took them the better part of an hour to notice anything.  Then Zack pulled them up short and demanded, “What’s the matter with you, boy?  Can’t you even sit a straight saddle?”

Little Joe almost panicked in that moment, as his brain raced to come up with an answer short of the truth that would make at least one lick of sense.  Sadly, the only one of Deadeye Dave’s damsels in distress that came to mind was the one Little Joe always referred to as Simpering Sue, who pretty much whined her way through the pages of her dime novel.  Though it killed his manly soul, he put her whine into his own throat and bleated out, “I’m tryin’ the best I can, fellas, but it’s mighty hard to steer a horse with my hands tied.  Couldn’t you cut ‘em free, now we’re so far from nowhere, so’s I could hold the reins.”

“Do I look like a blame fool, boy?” Zack snorted.

Keeping his true opinion close to his vest, Little Joe said, “No, sir, ‘course not, but I won’t try nothin’.  I promised, didn’t I?”

“He did, Zack,” Mack offered.

“And I kept my word, didn’t I?” Little Joe asked quickly, praying they’d stay blind to what he had been trying to do all through their trip into the high country.

“I think he’s gonna commence to bawlin’,” Jack snickered.

Little Joe’s lip curled.  It might help if he did shed a few tears, of course, but to playact being any more of a Simpering Sue than he already had was more than his manly soul could stomach.  He swallowed hard, as if trying to keep sobs down, and begged in a quavering voice, “Please, mister.”

“Now, you asked real pretty,” Zack said, “but I ain’t a blame fool.  Don’t want you hurtin’ yourself no worse, though, so Jack here will take your reins.”

Little Joe sighed.  Maybe the Stumblefoot Gang had picked up a little outlawing savvy in prison, after all.  With someone else leading Cochise, he probably wouldn’t be able to leave behind any more suspicious tracks.  Hoss was good, though; surely he’d be able to figure it out somehow.

As he was led further into the hills, he tried to recall some of Deadeye Dave’s other gals that had helped themselves somehow.  Most of them were plumb worthless for the purpose, but Lucinda Louise, familiarly known as Lucy Lou, had managed to make her captors think she was friendly to them and that had made them careless enough so she could get away.  Seemed like a slow, not to mention distasteful, way of helping himself, but he couldn’t see any other option open at the moment.  “So, uh, how’s your sister?” he made himself ask cordially.  “She decide to stay on the straight and narrow after her time in prison?”

Hoots and snorts met that suggestion.  Little Joe nodded.  It figured.  The sister, as he recalled, had been the brains, such as they were, behind the foursome.  These three didn’t have the sense to blow their own noses, much less plot a successful kidnapping.  He focused his thoughts on ways to charm the woman.  He’d become pretty good at charming ladies the last year or so.  If he could just disarm her, so to speak, maybe he’d get a chance to disarm her worthless brothers of their real hardware.

**********

            At the sound of hooves entering the ranch yard, Ben Cartwright halted his edgy pacing of the front porch.  The expectant light in his eyes faded when he saw his two older sons ride in and dismount; it was replaced by a glint of frustration and irritation, tempered only slightly by concern.  “You didn’t happen to see your young brother while you were riding in, did you?” he asked Adam and Hoss as they approached him after looping their horses’ reins around the hitching rail.

“Ain’t seen hide nor hair of ‘im all day, Pa,” Hoss said.

“Nor did we expect to,” Adam added with a trace of tartness.  “We, after all, have been working all day.”  While he understood his father’s purpose in giving Little Joe the assignment he’d had, it was hard not to begrudge the boy a trip to town that any one of them would have preferred to mending fence.

“Ain’t he back yet?” Hoss asked, his brow furrowing in unconscious imitation of his father’s.

“No, he’s not,” Ben stated curtly, “and he’s had more than enough time to do everything he was told, which included, I might add, coming straight home when finished.”

“You surely didn’t expect him to heed that part of your instructions, did you?” Adam asked with an arched eyebrow and a half smile on the same side of his face.

“I most certainly”—Ben cut short his sharp answer.  “Well, no,” he admitted.  “I expected a certain amount of dilly dallying, of course.”

“Probably stopped off for a beer or two, Pa, is all,” Hoss suggested.

“Since when does your young brother drink beer?” Ben demanded.

Realizing his mistake, Hoss looked frantically to his older brother for help.

“No one’s saying he does,” Adam inserted quickly, “but it is a temptation fellows Joe’s age are subject to, and if a friend were in town, pressing him”—he spread his hands to suggest the likely result of such pressure.

“If he’s been drinking all this time,” Ben snorted, “he’s probably passed out in some alley, completely besotted.”

“Not likely,” Adam hurriedly said.

“Shoot, no, Pa,” Hoss assured his father.  “He ain’t no drunk; he don’t hardly ever finish even one beer.”

Adam moaned under his breath, as Ben rounded on his middle son.  “Then you have seen him drinking, perhaps even furnished the beer yourself?”

Hoss hesitantly held up one index finger.  “Well, I—I did once . . . for his birthday.”

Ben merely grunted, although he seemed somewhat mollified.

“On the other hand,” Adam said, in an attempt to change the subject before Ben figured out the discrepancy in Hoss’s statements, “if an attractive skirt happened to swish past him . . .”

Eyes wide with gratitude for the diversion, Hoss nodded his complete agreement.

Ben exhaled in exasperation.  “Well, he’d best enjoy it while he can, because he isn’t likely to see town again for quite some time, and if he doesn’t manage to get home by suppertime, he can dine on bread and water for all I care!”

Adam exchanged a knowing wink with Hoss.  As they both well remembered from numerous previous edicts, dietary discipline had never had much effect on their younger brother.  As far as Little Joe was concerned, if there were a choice between food and fun, fun would win out every time.

**********

            When the Stumblefoot brothers finally pulled up before an unassuming one-room building, Little Joe felt his jaw drop, but quickly pulled it back into place.  Really?  Their idea of a good hiding place was a line shack on the Ponderosa, his own land?  Far be it from him, however, to point out the place’s fatal flaws.  If they wanted to make it easy on his family by picking a hideout that was both close at hand and completely familiar to the folks looking for him, Little Joe had no objection whatsoever, no siree.  He only hoped he’d been able to leave enough clues behind to point them in this direction, for surely they’d think of this shack, once they got close.

After fastening the reins of both his own horse and Cochise to the top rail of the small corral at the side of the line shack, Jack came back and, untying Little Joe’s hands, reached up and grabbed him beneath both arms.  “Down you come, little feller,” he said.

Just in time Little Joe stopped his eyes from rolling.  Obviously, they still thought of him as a kid.  It was an easy mistake to make and lots of folks made it.  He’d always been small for his age; Hoss even called him the “runt of the litter,” one of the few faults he found in his big brother and best friend.  Ordinarily, he took instant issue with it and had even been known to punch a few noses over it.  Here, however, letting them think he was younger, dumber and altogether more helpless than he really was could be an advantage, so he just suffered the indignity and even forced himself to wipe his sniffling nose and mutter, “Thanks, mister.”  It earned him a small pat on the head; he pressed his lips tight together and endured it.

The door opened, and the woman came out.  She was cleaner than Little Joe remembered, but that was about it.  Must not have been out long enough to get greased up, he realized with gratitude.  Even so, he didn’t think he had the stamina to put up with what his poor brother Adam had endured when she’d pressed her attentions on him.  So, he’d have to concentrate on keeping his charm boyish and never let her dream how he’d grown into a man in whose embrace any woman would happily swoon.

She stomped over to him and grasped his chin between strong fingers, turning his head this way and that.  “What you done to this boy?” she demanded of her brothers.

“Not a thing, Tildy,” Jack protested.  “Dumb-as-dirt Deadeye here rid hisself straight into ‘most every tree in the woods.”

“You sure this ain’t your work?” she asked skeptically.

“We’re sure,” Zack said.  “It’s a miracle we got the Kid here in one piece, the way he rides.”

Matilda harrumphed.  “You’d best hope his kin don’t pay less for damaged goods or it’ll come out of your share.”

So that was it!  They planned to hold him for ransom.  Now that Little Joe thought of it, it was the only thing that made sense out of this caper.

“I wouldn’t pay a red cent to get ‘im back,” Mack snorted, “but the way I hear it, them Cartwrights is kinda fond of each other.”

“That’s the way it is, right, boy?” Matilda asked, head cocked and eyes narrowed.  “Your kin is fond of you, ain’t they?”

“Kind of.  I been kind of troublesome of late, so I couldn’t promise they’d pay much,” Little Joe replied.  He was still hoping for escape or rescue, but if his father did have to pay for his release, maybe he could, at least, keep down his captors’ expectations of sudden riches.

“Huh!  You’d better hope they do.  Well, get on inside,” she said, giving him a shove toward the door, “and I’ll see what I can do to make you look a mite more presentable.”

Mindful of his plan to lower their guard by acting friendly, Little Joe offered her a small smile and said, “Thank you, ma’am.  I’d appreciate that.”

*********

            Dinner at the Ponderosa that night was devoid of the banter and laughter that commonly circled the table.  Not surprising, Adam thought, with the chief merry-maker absent.  Beyond that, a heaviness hovered over their heads, for reckless of rules as Little Joe could be, he rarely pushed his luck this far.  “Something’s happened to him,” Ben finally said, pushing away his barely touched plate.

“Don’t say that, Pa,” Hoss pleaded.

“I shouldn’t have sent him into town alone,” Ben chided himself.

“Now, Pa, there’s no reason for anyone to bother a kid like Joe,” Adam argued.  “He wasn’t carrying anything of value.”

“There are men who don’t need a reason to bother a boy!” Ben snapped.  “And don’t trot out that tired joke about chasing skirts, either.  No young lady merits this amount of attention!”

“Maybe the bank got robbed, and Little Joe joined the posse,” Hoss suggested.

The glare Ben threw his direction made the big man gulp and cower back in his chair.

“If Roy Coffee agreed to that, he’ll be looking for a new campaign manager next election!” Ben snapped.

“I’m sure he didn’t,” Adam pacified.  “He’d want seasoned men for a job like that.  Look, why don’t Hoss and I ride into town and look around.  He’s probably just lost track of time . . . or he might have had too much to drink, after all, if some of his friends egged him on.  Either way, we’ll find him and bring him home.”  Patting his mouth with his napkin, he tossed it onto his plate and stood up.

Hoss automatically did, too.  As soon as they were out of Ben’s hearing, he asked, “Where you think we oughta look for the youngun, Adam?”

“We’ll check with Hiram first, make sure he got there safely,” Adam said.  “Then we’ll see Roy.”

Hoss’s jaw dropped.  “You don’t really think Little Joe’s out with the posse?”

Adam slowly turned to face his brother and with a look of strained patience asked, “What posse?  Oh, you mean the one out chasing your made-completely-from-whole-cloth bank robbers?”

Hoss chuckled edgily.  “Yeah, that one.”

“What possessed you to plant an idea like that in Pa’s head?” Adam demanded with a perturbed shake of his head.  “Don’t we have troubles enough without a fretting father to make it worse?”

“Sorry,” Hoss said with a sheepish shrug of his shoulders.  “It was all I could think of.”

“Next time, leave the thinking to me.”  With a brother like Little Joe, Adam was completely confident that there would be a next time.  The two older brothers quickly saddled fresh horses and rode down into Washoe Valley.

**********

            Little Joe had eaten even less than his family, but not because he was worried.  With complete confidence, both in his own resources and the abilities of his family, as well as the utter invulnerability the young customarily feel, he was sure he’d be rescued.  It wasn’t for lack of food, either.  The Cartwrights kept their line shacks well stocked at all seasons of the year.  The Stumblefoots had commented on it.  “Even the Cartwright help lives higher on the hog than most folks,” Mack had said with a bitter grunt.

“It’s for folks passin’ through, too,” Little Joe had told them.  “If’n a man was to get stranded by bad weather or some such thing, this gives him a place to stay and something to feed on ‘til he can move on.”

Jack had snickered at that.  “Well, that’s us, then—just folks passin’ through, needin’ a place to stay ‘til we gets rich as Cartwrights.”

Mack had whooped, then.  “Bet that’s not what ole Ben Cartwright put it here for!”

“Not exactly,” Little Joe had admitted without a trace of the friendliness with which he’d been trying to disarm them.

No, neither worry nor lack of food had left Little Joe hungry, but the sheer selfishness of four supposedly grownup people.  He finally swallowed his pride and asked if he could have some beans, too.

“Maybe, if’n there’s enough,” Matilda said.  “My brothers come first.”

“And you, ma’am,” Little Joe said with a renewed show of meekness.  “After all, you cooked it, and the Good Book says the laborer is worthy of his hire—hers, in this case.”

“Do it?” she asked, impressed.  “And you know its words good enough to pull that out on the spot, do you?”

“Some of ‘em,” Little Joe replied.  “Pa uses that one a good bit, ma’am.  I can tell you where to find it, if you want to see for yourself.”  He pointed toward a small cupboard in the corner, where supplies were kept.  “Pa keeps a Bible in there, just to give folks something to read if they do get stranded here.”  He’d tried to convince his father that a few of his old dime novels would take up no more space and be a lot more entertaining, but that hadn’t gone over well at all.  Pa had insisted that the Good Book was full of exciting stories of its own and better fitted to meet the reading needs of a wide variety of people than Deadeye Dave and his lot.  Little Joe supposed he had a point, but what he wouldn’t have given for a stack of those old adventures right now!

“Never learned how,” Matilda said.  “Ma dyin’ early like she did and me bein’ the only girl, I had to cook and clean for the family, so I never got much schoolin’.  Zack don’t read, neither, but Mack and Jack both had some schoolin’ and can read a mite.”

Little Joe smiled at her in genuine sympathy for once.  “I lost my ma early, too,” he said.  He felt sorry for that little girl, who’d given up her own childhood to care for others.  Probably never had a choice, he thought.  Small wonder she turned out poorly.  Then he realized with sudden insight that his friendliness had just netted him his first piece of usable information: only Mack and Jack could read and, maybe, not all that well.  No doubt he’d be asked to write his own ransom note, and if he worded it carefully enough, he might be able to drop some kind of clue to his family!

By the time the others had eaten their fill, only a couple of spoons full of beans remained in the pot, but Little Joe didn’t complain.  Despite the rumbling in his stomach, food didn’t seem half as important as coming up with the right words to let his family know who had him and where.  Even being ordered to wash up the dishes didn’t faze him; dawdling with his hands in the suds just gave him more time to think.

**********

            Adam and Hoss stood stymied on the main street of Virginia City.  After verifying that Little Joe had delivered the contract to Hiram Wood, as directed, they’d visited with Roy.  He’d seen Little Joe in town earlier, he said, but had no idea of his present whereabouts.  Then they’d made a thorough search of all the places in town a boy of Little Joe’s tender years had any right to enter, as well as a few he had no business in.  All they’d learned was that he’d been to the general store and bought a harmonica, the very thought of which made Adam’s musical ears cringe, and to the Bucket of Blood, where he’d had one beer.

“Well, you have any other notion where he could be?” Adam finally asked his brother.

“Nary a one,” Hoss said.  “You reckon we could have missed him on the way in?”

“I wouldn’t think so,” Adam said.  “More likely, he slipped out of town while we were here chasing our little wild goose, and if that’s the case, I’m ready to head home and pluck his feathers.”

“And I’ll be glad to help you,” Hoss said, looking disgruntled.  Then his countenance perked up a bit.  “After we have a beer ourselves, maybe?”

“I think we’ve earned it,” Adam said, throwing his arm around his brother’s brawny shoulders.

**********

            “Now, don’t try nothin’, you hear me?” Zack said with a threatening scowl.

Little Joe was seated at the table, blank paper before him, pen in hand.  “I hear you,” he said.

Zack grunted his acceptance of the response, no more aware that Little Joe hadn’t actually promised anything than Pa usually was when the boy employed the same strategy at home.  “Get to writin’, then; we aim to deliver that there ransom note tonight.”

“Oh, sure.  Good thinking,” Little Joe said as he started filling the page with the words he’d planned out over the soapsuds.  He’d been told what to say, but since the exact wording had been left to him, he was pretty sure he could carry out his plan to drop a couple of subtle hints.  “Dear Pa,” he began.

Sorry I didn’t come straight home, like you told me.  I tried to toe the line, but was prevented by getting myself kidnapped.  Now, here I am shack led in fear of who knows what happening to the Deadeye Kid if you do not come up with $10,000.  Bring it to the old Cooper Mine entrance and leave it just inside.  Then ride away without looking back.  Come back in one hour and you will find me there.  I hope I’m worth it to you, Pa, four these are scary people.

Your son,

Stumblefoot Joe

“Okay, all done,” Little Joe said, laying down the pen and starting to fold the note.

“Not so fast,” Zack ordered.  “Jack, get over here and read this, make sure he ain’t said more than he should.”

Jack walked over and took the note.  Squinting, he mouthed each word, as if he were sounding them out, syllable by syllable, although he made no sound.

Little Joe bit his lower lip, pretty sure Jack was skipping over some of the words and praying wholeheartedly that he’d slide right over anything he shouldn’t see.

Jack finally set the note down in front of Little Joe and pointed at the final two words.  “That don’t look right,” he said.

“Just signed my name,” Little Joe said.

“Yeah, I seen ‘Joe,’” Jack grunted, “but there’s somethin’ in front of it.”

Little Joe almost breathed a sigh of relief.  That was probably the least important clue he’d put in, so maybe there was no harm in losing it.  Still, if Adam remembered their conversation at the store a few days ago, it would tell him who the captors were, so in hopes of keeping it, Joe said, “Oh, you mean Stumblefoot.  That’s just a nickname Pa gave me ‘cause I’m always stumblin’ into trouble.”

That answer set Mack to snickering.  “That you are, boy; that you are.”  He picked up the note and pointed to the word.  “Yep, that’s what it says, all right, Zack.  F-o-o-t spells foot, right enough.”

“All right, then,” Zack said.  “You and Jack ride over to the Ponderosa and tie the Kid’s paint pony up in the front yard with that note pinned to the saddle blanket, so’s they’ll see it plain.  Just make sure they don’t see you.  Easier to get away clean, if’n they don’t know who we is.”

“Yeah, yeah, good thinkin’, Zack,” Jack said.

Just in time Little Joe stopped himself from laughing out loud.  Were they really so stupid as to think he wouldn’t tell his family who’d grabbed him the minute he was free?  Unless, he realized with a gulp of sudden discernment, they killed him as soon as they had the money.  The Deadeye Dave books were full of that dire possibility, and this bunch had just spent two years with people who knew how to keep the law off their tails.  When it came down to it, maybe the stupid one in these four walls was actually . . . him.

**********

            Adam and Hoss had indulged in glorified fantasies of all they would do to their rascally little brother once they got home, but when they rounded the final bend, Adam reined up in the darkness at the side of the barn.  Hoss automatically followed his older brother’s lead.  “Uh-oh, bad sign,” Adam muttered, staring at the brightly lit front window.

“Huh?” Hoss asked.

“Pa’s still waiting up,” Adam said.  “That, I fear, means that baby bird has not yet flown back to the nest.”

“Maybe Pa’s waitin’ up for us,” Hoss suggested with a sloppy grin.  “We may be big birds now, but we’re still his little birds, ain’t we?”  The grin faded when Adam slowly shook his head.

“Our baby brother is a bird of a whole different feather.  Pa knows where we were and knows we can take care of ourselves, especially when we’re together,” Adam explained.  “No, if Joe were home, he’d go on to bed, confident that we’d be along soon.  He’s still up, so that means only one thing.”

“Little Joe ain’t home yet,” Hoss said soberly.  “And he ain’t in town, neither, so”—he swallowed down the enormous lump that had catapulted into his throat—“somethin’s happened to him.”

“Don’t panic,” Adam advised.  “We don’t have a snowball’s chance of keeping Pa calm unless we act that way ourselves.”

“Good luck with that,” Hoss returned with a sickly scowl.

“Yeah.”  Adam needed no one to tell him that he was elected to be whatever calming influence was to be found inside the house tonight.  Some things just went with the territory of who a man was and his place in the family.  “Come on.  Might as well get it over with.”  He moved his mount forward and after a moment’s hesitation, so did Hoss.

Ben Cartwright was out the door before they could dismount in the yard.  “Where is he?” Ben demanded.  “Hiding in the barn?”

“No, Pa,” Adam said with studied steadiness.  “We couldn’t find him.”

“Then why are you here?” his father asked testily.

“Because we’ve already looked any and everywhere he might be in town,” Adam said.

“Searched high and low, Pa,” Hoss said.  “He ain’t there.”

Ben’s face washed free of anger, only to be replaced with a nameless fear.  “No sign of him on the road?  Or . . . or”—his voice wavered—“to the side?”

“No, Pa,” Adam said quietly.  He laid a hand on his father’s shoulder.  “We’ll go out again at first light, but with only a sliver of moon tonight, we can’t see well enough to look for signs until then.”

“We’ll find him in the morning, Pa,” Hoss said.  “I promise you we will.”  The determined set of his face added emphasis to the words.

Ben raked anxious fingers through gray locks so tousled that it was obvious he’d already done that multiple times throughout the evening.  “Yes . . . yes . . . I suppose there’s nothing we can do until morning.”  He gathered himself and looked at the two birds he had back in the nest.  “You must be hungry.  I think Hop Sing left food warming in the oven.”

“We grabbed a sandwich at the Bucket of Blood,” Adam said.  “We’ll stable our horses; then, if you don’t mind, I think I’ll head up to bed, get a couple hours sleep before we head out again.”

“Yes, yes.”  Ben was all but babbling.

“Don’t fret, Pa,” Hoss said, although his own brow was wrinkled with fret lines and he hadn’t even perked up at the mention of food.  He followed Adam into the barn, where they made quick work of grooming their horses.  Then they returned to the house to find Ben seated in his armchair, staring into the fire.

“Why don’t you go on up to bed, too, Pa?” Adam suggested as he laid his gear on the table by the door.  “Worrying won’t get him home a minute sooner.”

“I think I’ll wait up just a little longer,” Ben said.

“Sure,” Adam said, knowing a hopeless battle when he saw one.  “Come on, Hoss.  First light comes early.”

“Yeah, I reckon.”  Hoss moved toward the stairs, but halted at their foot to look back at their father.  “Don’t sit up frettin’, okay, Pa?”

A half-smile tweaked at Ben’s mouth.  Fool boy, didn’t he know that’s what fathers did?  “Okay, Hoss.”

It was an idle promise, and Adam saw right through it, but Hoss, always willing to believe the best, tapped the stair post in satisfaction and headed up to bed.  Ben settled back, again staring into the fire, and prayed that his youngest would soon come sneaking through the front door.  Then he could go back to feeling simply angry, instead of afraid.

He must have drifted into a light sleep, for he found himself suddenly shaken awake by a vague awareness of having heard something outside.  He sat up, listening carefully for the slightest sound.  There!  That’s what he’d heard: a horse whickering in the yard.  Since Sport and Chubby were already in the barn, it had to be Cochise, didn’t it?  Relief washed over him, but he pushed it down and adopted a stern visage as he rose and headed for the front door.  That boy had a serious talking-to coming, and middle of the night or not, he was going to get it!

When he opened the door, he saw the black-and-white pinto tied to the hitching rail, but no sign of his youngest son.  The rapscallion was hiding from his just reward, was he?  “Must’ve seen the light and known I was up, waiting,” Ben muttered.  Raising his voice, he yelled, “Joseph!” and when there was no response, he called again, louder this time, “Joseph!  You’d best show yourself, young man, if you don’t want more trouble than you’ve already got!”

Still no answer.  Frowning, Ben strode toward the barn, stopping at the hitching rail to pick up Cochise.  Whatever his young master might be up to, the poor horse didn’t deserve to stand untended in the cool night air.  As he reached for the reins, however, he saw an envelope pinned to the saddle blanket, and his heart again leaped into his throat.  Something very strange was going on here.  He took the envelope in hand and headed back toward the house, where the light was better.

Adam was coming down the stairs in his bare feet.  Hoss was still snoring like a grizzly bear in hibernation, but Adam tended to be a light sleeper.  Though he hadn’t been able to discern the words, his father’s shouts in the yard had wakened him.  “What is it, Pa?” he asked.  “Did Joe finally make it home?”

Ben raised anxious eyes to his oldest son’s face.  “No, but Cochise did.  This was on the horse.”  He lifted the envelope.

Adam padded down the stairs as his father opened the envelope and removed the short note.  Seeing Ben blanch, he hurried forward and placed a supportive hand beneath the older man’s elbow.  “Pa?”

“It’s a ransom note,” Ben said, voice quavering.  “They want $10,000.”

Adam snatched the note and read it for himself.  “Odd wording,” he mumbled.

“It strikes you that way, too?” Ben asked.  “What on earth does he mean by ‘shack led’?”

“I think he meant ‘shackled,’ just put too much space between his letters,” Adam said.  “A bit melodramatic, which only proves what I’ve been saying for some time: he reads far too many of those trashy dime novels.”

“Is that where this Deadeye Kid nonsense comes from?” Ben queried.

“I suppose,” Adam said, “although . . .”

“What?”

Adam shook his head.  “Not sure.”  Something was niggling at the back of his mind, but he couldn’t quite pin it down.  “Let me take a closer look at this, Pa.  The wording really is odd, even for Joe.”  He walked toward his blue chair and, sitting down, read the note through again, searching for significance in each individual word.

“Odd way to sign his name, too,” Ben observed as he stood behind the chair, reading the note over Adam’s shoulder.  “Stumblefoot Joe.  Does he mean he just stumbled into this trouble?”

“That’s it!” Adam cried.  “I know who has him, Pa!”

“Who?” Ben demanded.

“Do you remember a couple of years ago, when the house was invaded by that quartet of louts who caught us off guard and tied us up and then proceeded to eat us out of house and home before a certain youngster burst in, gun blazing, shooting everything but what he was aiming at?”

“Yes.”  Ben’s slow drawl was a clear request for more information.

“Do you remember what our so-called rescuer called himself?”

“The Deadeye Kid,” Ben said after a moment’s reflection.  “He really had been reading too many dime novels back then.”

“Well, we were talking about that gang in town just the other day,” Adam said, “and I made a joke about how inept they were.  I called them the Stumblefoot gang, and we all laughed about it.”  He pointed at Little Joe’s signature.  “That’s what he’s trying to tell us, that the same Stumblefoots have him again.”

Ben shook his head.  “There’s one flaw in your reasoning, Adam: that gang is in prison.”

“Maybe not,” Adam argued.  “They weren’t considered serious criminals, so they got a short sentence.  With good behavior, they might be out by now.”

“Roy should have told us,” Ben grumbled.  “See if I manage his campaign next election!”

“Again, not considered a serious threat,” Adam said, ignoring the overused one directed at the absent sheriff.  “Here’s another confirmation, Pa.  Look at the last few words Joe wrote: ‘four these are scary people.’  Now, I grant you that Little Joe is not the world’s best speller, but even he knows it’s ‘f-o-r,’ not ‘f-o-u-r.’  It’s another clue.  All four of that same gang is in on this, and he wanted us to know exactly what we were up against.  Smart kid.”

Ben nodded in sober acceptance of Adam’s interpretation.  As another snore rattled the suddenly silent house, he looked toward the sound.  “Get your brother up,” he said.  “We leave at first light . . . or sooner.”

“Yes, sir,” Adam said, taking the stairs two at a time.  It never occurred to him that his little brother was even smarter than he’d given him credit for or that he himself had missed the one clue that would have led him straight to Little Joe.

**********

            Little Joe curled up as close to the fire as he could.  It went without saying that he hadn’t been offered one of the line shack’s two narrow cots.  Those had gone to Zack, as the oldest man, and to Matilda, the only lady in residence.  Mack and Jack were stretched out on the floor, too, but they, at least, had a blanket to cover them.  Little Joe had nothing but his corduroy jacket and whatever heat from the fire the two younger brothers didn’t block with their larger bodies.  Thankfully, it wasn’t winter, but this high in the mountains the nights were always cool.  At least, he’d only have to bear it a single night.  He was certain he’d dropped enough hints in his ransom note to insure that he’d be rescued quickly, probably not by breakfast, but surely not long after.  He’d soon be home with Hop Sing frying him up a platter of bacon and a mountain of scrambled eggs.

**********

            After more than an hour of ranging out from both sides of the Virginia City road, Hoss suddenly dismounted and bent over.

“You find something?” Adam called.  He wasn’t the tracker that Hoss was, but he felt foolish, just following along in his brother’s wake, so he’d occupied himself with a so-far vain search on the opposite side of the road.  Now he walked Sport toward Hoss, keeping on the road, so as not to damage any tracks his brother had found.

“Yeah,” Hoss said, holding up a harmonica.  “Didn’t Mr. Cass say Little Joe had bought hisself a harmonica when he was in?”

Adam took the instrument and examined it.  “This is brand new.  It probably is the one Joe bought.  You think this could be where he was taken?”

“Ground looks considerable disturbed,” Hoss reported.

“Well, is it anything or not?” Adam asked sharply.

Hoss looked up, perturbed.  “Adam, what I can’t figure is why we sent Pa off to town, if’n you’re gonna act just as fretsome as him.”

When they’d met before the first rose-lilac rays of light touched the dark evergreens of the Ponderosa, they’d decided—that is to say, Adam and Hoss had decided and Ben had been reluctantly persuaded—that the two brothers would do the searching, while the frantic father rode to town.  “The kidnappers might just have a man posted in town, to see if one of us came in to the bank for the ransom money,” Adam had argued.  “After all, it doesn’t take all four of them to guard one skinny kid.”

“Wanna bet?” Hoss had mumbled under his breath, but a pointed glare from his older brother had made him quickly change his tune.  “Yeah, that’s right, Pa.  We for sure gotta make ‘em think we’re doin’ like we was told.”

“Exactly,” Adam had quickly agreed, and that final shot had won the day.  Hoss was right, though: Adam himself had become as anxious as their father would have been to find some sign of his little brother.  An hour gone and, so far, there’d been nothing but this harmonica, a good sign, but not one that would lead them far.  “Anything else?” he asked again, although more softly this time.

“Looks like there was some kind of kerfuffle here, all right,” Hoss said.  “Let’s scout around easy-like and see if we can figure out what kind.  Pity Pa had him change that cracked shoe on his horse last week.  Would’ve made it easier to know which tracks was his.”

“Yeah,” Adam returned with an uneasy laugh.  “Makes you wonder whether we oughta just let the kid be the kid sometimes.”

“Yeah.”  Hoss’s echoing laugh was equally edgy.  Joe bein’ home, just bein’ Joe was all he could have asked for, this side of heaven.  He kept looking around; then he straightened up and pointed west.  “Four horses, headed that way.”

“That would make sense,” Adam said.  “Little Joe and the three Stumblefoot brothers.  The woman probably wouldn’t be with them for the capture.”

“Yeah,” Hoss agreed, beginning to walk in the path of the four horses.  He hadn’t gone far before he stopped again and stared at the ground.  “Something happened here.  One horse headed that way, riding hard.”  He pointed north and then back at the ground.  “The other three followed.”

“Looks like little brother made a break for it,” Adam said.

“Yeah, he would,” Hoss agreed.  “Reckon we better follow.”  At Adam’s nod of agreement, Hoss mounted Chubby and walked the horse alongside the tracks.  He’d almost gotten back to the Virginia City road when he stopped.  “Even bigger kerfuffle here.  Farther off the road than I was scoutin’ or I’d’ve seen it before.”

“You’re doing great, brother,” Adam said with enthusiastic encouragement.  “Can you tell where it leads from here?”

“Yeah,” Hoss said with a note of sourness.  “Back the way they came.”

“Must’ve headed for the trees, to get under cover,” Adam said.  “Might as well ride straight there ourselves.”

“Yeah, make a beeline for the trees, and I reckon we’ll pick up the trail again.”

They did, with little problem, but once the trail entered the woods, tracks became harder to follow.  Hoss was able to pick up prints here and there, mainly because four horses tended to make more marks and stir up more dead leaves and fallen pine needles than a single animal would have done.

“Wait up,” Adam suddenly called, urging his horse forward.  He dismounted and scooped up what he’d seen lying on the ground.  Holding the hat aloft, he shouted back to his brother, “It’s Joe’s!  I’d know that band anywhere.”

“Ought to,” Hoss said, joining him.  “You give him that hat for his last birthday.”  He took it from Adam, turning it in his hands as a big grin split his face.  “It’s his, all right.  We’re for sure on the right track now, Adam.”

“Thanks to little brother.”

“You reckon he lost it apurpose?” Hoss asked.

“I think that’s possible, given that savvy little ransom note he composed.  Let’s hope he dropped a few more bread crumbs for us.”

“Bread crumbs?”  For a moment Hoss looked puzzled; then the childlike grin returned.  “Oh, yeah, Hansel and Gretel.  Reckon all them bedtime stories you read us is paying off, huh?”

“It would appear so,” Adam replied with a satisfaction he would scarcely have felt had he realized that the real inspiration for the clues came from stories of a type he’d never approved.

No matter how carefully they scanned the ground, however, they found not a single “bread crumb.”  It wasn’t until Hoss looked up at the trees that he noted something unusual.  “Hey, Adam,” he finally said, “don’t these branches look a mite peculiar?”

“Some of them are broken,” Adam said with a shrug.  “I’m not sure it’s significant, Hoss.”

“Yeah, but they’re fresh broke, and these ain’t the first I’ve seen.”

“Really?”  Adam looked at the cluster of mangled twigs with greater interest.

“The third I’ve noticed,” Hoss said.  “I think, maybe, little brother is marking his path, best he can.”

“Maybe, though I can’t imagine them leaving his hands free.  Still, let’s keep an eye out for them.”

Soon there was no doubt in either brother’s mind that Little Joe was, indeed, trying to show them the way he had passed.  It wasn’t as clear a track to follow as horses’ hoof marks on clear ground, but it worked until they came out of the woods.  At first, there seemed to be no trail at all to follow, for the ground was too stony to show the tracks of any horses and there were no trees with branches to break.  A hoofprint here or there kept them encouraged, but they were getting harder to see.  Then Hoss noticed that one set of tracks appeared to be meandering aimlessly.  “Little Joe again?” he asked his brothers.

“Could be,” Adam said.  “Not sure how many we’ll pick up on this ground, but let’s try.”  They were only able to pick up those odd tracks for a short time, however, before they disappeared, along with the straighter ones, along the rocky shelf overlooking the valley they’d left behind.  Apparently, Little Joe had run out of options and so had his brothers.

“Now what?” Hoss said.

“I don’t know,” Adam replied.  “Obviously, they’re headed west, into the mountains, but that covers a lot of territory.”

“Got to be somewhere close, don’t it?” Hoss said.  “Else how could they reach the Cooper Mine to pick up the ransom?”

“Good point,” Adam said.  “What’s close enough for that, in this direction?”

Hoss shrugged.  “Onlyest thing I can think of is a line shack.”

“On our own land?” Adam scoffed.  “Can they be that stupid?”

“They weren’t none too bright,” Hoss pointed out.

“No, but—wait a minute.”  Adam pulled the ransom note from his pocket and scrutinized it, line by line.  Then he looked up at Hoss and grinned.  “They are that stupid, and I’m feeling none too bright myself, to have missed this.  Look.”  He held the note so his brother could see and pointed to the pertinent lines.

“‘Here I am shack led,” Hoss read, face crinkling.  “Still don’t make sense.”

“It does if you look close enough,” Adam said spiritedly.  “See how the swirl at the end of the ‘k’ pulls your eye to the word above.  I thought his hand had just slipped, but I think it may have been intentional.”  He let his finger slide almost directly upward.

“‘Line,’” Hoss read in an awed whisper.  “They do have him in a line shack, and it’s nigh on got to be the closest one, don’t it?”

“I’d say so, since they only gave themselves an hour to get Joe to the mine after collecting the ransom, or,” Adam said, mulling it over quickly, “it might be the Reynolds’ northernmost one, if they were, by some miracle, bright enough to stay off the Ponderosa.”

“I’m bettin’ they ain’t,” Hoss said.

“I’m prayin’ they ain’t,” Adam said.

“Well, let’s go get ‘im!”

“Wait a minute,” Adam said.  “We’d be outnumbered.”

“Aw, the woman don’t count,” Hoss argued, “and if we can catch ‘em off guard, like they did us the first time around. . . .”

Adam shuddered at the remembrance of what that woman had done to him ‘the first time around.’  “She counts some, even if her weapons don’t operate on gunpowder,” he grunted.  “I think we’d better meet Pa at the rendezvous point and formulate a plan.  Safer all around.”

“Yeah, I reckon.”  There was no missing the deflation in the big man’s spirits.  “Just don’t like to think about Little Joe bein’ in the hands of them louts any longer than necessary.”

“Come on now, Hoss,” Adam said in bolstering tones.  “Those louts will just have to look out for themselves until we can get there to rescue them.”

That brought a bubble of mirth soaring up Hoss’s throat.  “Yeah,” he chuckled.  “They’ll just have to deal with the Deadeye Kid ‘til we get there.  Maybe he could grab a gun and shoot up their backsides, even the odds a mite.”

**********

            The Deadeye Kid was feeling decidedly put out.  He hadn’t expected his family to begin their search until dawn, of course, but with the great clues he’d sent them, he had fully expected to be home by lunch time.  Instead, he was still here, still waiting hand and foot on a quartet of grub grabbers as greedy as ham on the hoof.  He’d gotten a single piece of bacon and an undersized biscuit for breakfast, and it was beginning to look like his prospects for lunch weren’t any better.  What was keeping those lazy, no-good brothers of his, anyway?  It went without saying that it couldn’t possibly be Pa’s fault.  Pa didn’t have faults, except for the completely convenient one of being a mite too willing to accept some of his youngest’s fanciful excuses at face value.  Pa, of course, would do everything he could to find his beloved boy.  Joe wouldn’t have thought that even Hoss and Adam would be willing to see him suffer like this, but they should have been here by now.  Looks like I’m on my own, he concluded.

“Hey, Kid, bring me some more coffee,” Mack ordered.

“Yeah, yeah, keep your shirt on,” Little Joe said.

“Don’t get smart-mouthed with me, boy!” Mack growled.  “You ain’t too big to have your britches tanned.”

Little Joe pursed his lips tightly.  He most certainly was!  He’d kept up his strategy of friendly cooperation, still hoping they’d stop watching him so carefully, but he’d draw the line at submitting to a tanning.  Not even Pa punished him like that anymore!  But since making his captors see him as younger and more helpless than he was still formed part of his plan, he just said, “Okay, okay, I’m comin’.”  As he took the pot of steaming coffee from the stove, however, it occurred to him that this was a chance to sweeten the odds for when he did make his escape attempt.  He just had to make it look like an accident, so it didn’t get him killed first.

Wrapping the handle of the pot in a cloth, he approached the table.  Just as he came to Mack’s right side, he appeared to stumble over his own feet.  He kept a firm grip on the handle, but the scalding contents of the coffee pot flew forward, landing on the back of Mack’s gun hand.  Little Joe backed away, looking horrified as Mack yelped and almost fell from his chair.

“Oh, wow!  I’m sorry!  That must sting,” Little Joe said.  “Let me wet you a cold rag to put on it.”

“You keep away from me!” Mack yelled, cradling his burned hand.

“I’m just trying to help,” Little Joe protested.  “It was a mistake, honest!”  He held his crossed fingers behind his back.

Zack flew from his chair and across the room.  Drawing his hand back, he struck the boy’s left cheek with his open palm and then backhanded his right one.  Holding his hands before his face, Little Joe cringed back with a whimper of fear that was only half feigned.

“That’s enough, Zack,” Matilda protested.  “He tripped; you saw him.”

“I ain’t so sure of that,” Zack said with a snarl.  “Even so, he’s got to pay for hurtin’ Mack.”

“True enough,” the woman agreed, “but you can’t go damagin’ the goods, if’n we’s to get top dollar from his pa.  I’ll work him extra hard this afternoon, and he’ll go without food the rest of the day.  Reckon that’ll make him think long and hard about gettin’ careless again.”

“Huh!” Jack snorted.  “Pa never let us boys off that easy.”

“Pa was a hard man,” Matilda said, “and you was hard-headed boys, the lot of you.  This one’s been raised gentle-like.  I reckon it’ll take less to make him mind.”  She turned on Little Joe.  “You are gonna mind all you’re told, ain’t you, boy?”

Little Joe let his head bob in frenetic agreement.  “Yes’m, I sure am.”

“All right, then.  You get out to the pump and bring in some cold water, so’s I can tend Mack’s hand,” she ordered.  “The pump and no further or I’ll blister your britches myself!”

“Yes, ma’am!”  Little Joe grabbed the bucket and hightailed it out the door.  It was a simple enough chore and had the further virtue of putting him out of reach of Zack’s heavy hand.

Mack scowled at Little Joe all through the process of having his hand coated in grease and bandaged up.  “You better hope your pa thinks you’re worth what we asked,” he growled, “or I’ll take the rest out of your hide my own self.”

“Now, Mack,” Matilda soothed.  “Don’t fret yourself over such as that.  Just rest that hand and let it heal, instead of plottin’ ways to hurt it worse.”

“Reckon you’re right, Tildy,” he said.  He slouched over to one of the cots and stretched out full length, figuring that not even Zack would deny a bed to an injured man.  And if he tried, Tildy could be counted on to stand between ‘em.

Unfortunately for Little Joe, Tildy could also be counted on to carry out the punishment she had laid down for him, and as soon as Mack was settled, she put the boy to work.  “Fetch some fresh water and get them dinner dishes scoured up, and when you’re done with that, get on your knees and scrub this here floor.  I aim to leave the place better’n I found it.”

“Since you got me to do it,” Little Joe grumbled.  She landed a wallop on his backside painful enough to make him reconsider giving her any more sass.  He dragged through the dishes, wondering if the damage done had been worth it.  His odds had improved, of course, if he did spot a chance to make a break.  The way Matilda was watching over his work, to make sure he didn’t shirk a minute made that chance less likely, though, and doing chores to ingratiate himself in hopes of escape was a far cry from doing them as punishment, he decided.  That wouldn’t get him any closer to freedom.  And, doggone it, where were his ornery brothers?

In a blink his odds improved still more.  Zack poked his head in the door.  “It’s time.  I’m ridin’ out to fetch our ransom money.”

“You takin’ the boy with you?” Matilda asked.

“And risk him hollerin’ out to his folks?” Zack snorted.  “Naw, keep him here.  If’n all goes like it should, we’ll just put him on his horse and send him off.  You can find your way to the Cooper mine, I reckon?”

“Yes, sir, I can,” Little Joe said.

Zack pointed a bony finger at him.  “Don’t try nothin’ while I’m gone.  Jack’s still here, and he’s got a steady trigger finger.  No Deadeye Kid shenanigans, you hear?”

“Yes, sir,” Little Joe said with a semblance, if not the weighty substance of meekness.  As he finished up the dishes, he pondered whether he should try to escape or not.  If Pa really was gonna pay the ransom, instead of trying to rescue him, maybe he should just sit tight and let it play out.  Most kidnappers he’d read about in his dime novels would have just killed their captive as soon as they got the money, but he had a feeling this set wouldn’t, mostly thanks to Matilda’s influence.  Maybe Pa was betting on that, too, although it sent a lump up Little Joe’s throat to think that his pa would place bets on his life.  It wasn’t a sure thing, after all.  Neither was trying to escape.  Jack might get trigger happy without Zack around to keep him in line, and Mack was sure to hold a grudge after that coffee business.  By the time he finished the dishes, Little Joe still wasn’t sure which way to go.  With a sigh he set the final plate aside and put the dishpan full of soapy water on the floor.

“What are you about, boy?” Matilda asked, frowning.

“You said I had to scrub the floor,” Little Joe said, adding with a hint of hope, “unless you’ve changed your mind.”

“I ain’t,” the woman declared, “but I’m of no mind to have it scrubbed with that greasy water.  The very idea!  You pick that up and empty it outside.  Then bring in fresh water and lather up a pile of suds and get to scrubbin’.  No dawdlin’.  I know how boys is about housework, and Cartwrights what ain’t never done a hard day’s work in their lives is probably lazier than my brood, any day.  Now, get to it!”

“Yes, ma’am,” he said with an even deeper sigh.

“And stop that mopin’,” she ordered.  “You sure wasn’t this fretsome yesterday.  What’s got into you?”

“I’m hungry!” Little Joe snapped.

“Well, you’re gonna stay that way,” she stated firmly.  “After what you done to Mack, an empty stomach is the least you deserve.”

“You can say that again, Tildy,” came from the cot in the corner.

“Once had better be enough,” she said with a stern look at Little Joe.  “I told you to get to work!”

“Yes, ma’am,” he said.  Looking docile enough to satisfy her, he picked up the dishpan and headed for the door.

Jack looked up from his perch on a stump in the yard, where he was whittling a stick to pass the time.  “What you up to, Kid?”

Little Joe hefted the dishpan up.  “Just emptyin’ this.  Then I got to fetch more water to scour the floor.”

Jack laughed.  “Got your comeuppance, didn’t you, Deadeye?  Well, dump it, then; just don’t do it here in the yard.  No sense makin’ mud to track in, right?  Or maybe you like floor scrubbin’ so much you wouldn’t mind makin’ more work for yourself.  Wouldn’t bother me none to see you on your knees all afternoon, like a sinner at the mourners’ bench.”  He let loose another string of cackles that almost had him doubled over.

“I’ll take it over yonder,” Little Joe said, gesturing to his left with his head.

“Don’t go past the end of the house,” Jack ordered.

Little Joe nodded curtly and moved toward the side of the shack.  As he approached the edge of the yard, though, he was stopped in his tracks by the “quee-ark” call of a mountain quail.  It was almost perfect, differing mostly from the real thing in its softer volume.  A grin split his face.  Hoss!  It had to be Hoss.  And, probably, Adam was out there somewhere, too.  And Pa!  His gaze falling to the pan of water in his hands, Little Joe decided there was one more thing he could do to sweeten the odds for his family.

Peeking over his shoulder, he saw that Jack had his eyes fixed on his whittling.  Little Joe turned, took a step toward him and then another, wracking his brain for an explanation if Jack happened to glance up and catch him.  Suddenly, a loud crack came from the opposite side of the yard, and Jack automatically turned that way.

It was hard to move fast with a full pan of soapsuds, but Little Joe did the best he could to cover the ground between them before Jack turned back toward him.  When he did, Little Joe splashed his load forward, aiming for the gun holstered at the man’s side.  He hit his target with far greater success than the Deadeye Kid had done with a gun two years before.

“Why you little brat!” Jack hollered, coming after Little Joe, who turned and ran toward the sound of that quail, which suddenly got as loud and sharp as that of a real bird.

As Hoss rose up from the brush, Jack reached for his gun.  He got it out, but the grease from the dishwater made it slick, and before he could get a good enough grip to pull the trigger, Hoss hollered at Joe to get down and fired a warning shot at the other man’s feet.  Startled, Jack dropped the gun, started to stoop for it, but halfway down he apparently realized he’d never make it, and he squatted there, hands in the air.  “Don’t shoot!” he hollered.

The front door flew open, and Matilda stood on the porch, yelling at Jack to get inside.  Another warning shot landed between them, this one coming from the opposite direction.  “You’re surrounded,” Adam called, moving from the brush beside the corral.  “Throw down your weapons.”

“And go back to prison?  Not likely,” Matilda shouted.

“Better that than the alternative, ma’am,” Ben Cartwright said as he walked up the hill directly in front of her, holding Zack by the arm.  He tugged off the gag he’d employed to keep the oldest brother quiet during their siege.

“Give it up, Tildy,” Zack said.  “Dadgum Cartwrights hold all the aces again.”

Matilda slumped, letting the rifle hang loose from her hand.

Adam came forward and gingerly plucked it from her, keeping as much distance between them as possible.  “Where’s the other one?”

“Inside,” she said.  “He won’t give you no trouble.  The Deadeye Kid seen to that.”

Adam arched an eyebrow at the mention of that notorious name.  Edging past her, he carefully peered around the door and saw Mack sitting up on the cot, bandaged hand and its mate both held over his head.

Little Joe, lying prone in the brush, finally raised his head.  Then he jumped up and made a beeline for his father, shouting, “Pa!  Pa!  I knew you’d come!”  Whatever moments of doubt he’d felt had vanished at first sight of his father’s face.

“Joseph!” Ben cried, pushing Zack aside so he could open his arms to receive the exuberance propelling toward him.  “My boy, my boy,” he crooned as he stroked the tousled chestnut curls.  For the two of them, time stood still, while all around them, culprits were corralled and tied in preparation for delivery to Sheriff Coffee.

Finally, Adam and Hoss felt free to join the other Cartwrights.  Hoss took one look at his little brother’s face and grabbed it between thumb and fingers.  “What’d they do to you, boy?” he demanded angrily.

“Hey, hey, that’s all his own doin’,” Mack protested.  “Don’t go blamin’ us.”

“Yeah, he rid hisself into every tree in the woods,” Jack chimed in.

“Truer than true,” Matilda said.  “I cleaned him up best I could, Mr. Cartwright, but you might wanna take that youngun in and get him fitted for spectacles.”

Adam and Hoss exchanged a glance of sudden understanding, and then Adam looked over at Little Joe.  “Hard way to leave a trail, kid,” he said.

“He did it apurpose,” Zack growled as the light finally dawned.  “Should’ve known the Deadeye Kid would be neck deep in nasty tricks.”

“See?  Told you it wasn’t our fault,” Jack snorted.

Adam drew back his fist and slugged the man.

“What’s that for?” Jack demanded as he lay splayed on the ground.  “Tell him, Kid; tell him you did it to your own self.”

Adam grabbed the man by his shirt front and hauled him to his feet.  “Why did he need to?” he challenged.  “Could it have anything to do with you kidnapping him in the first place?”

“Uh . . . well . . . maybe,” Jack sputtered.

Adam thrust him away in disgust, and Jack again fell sprawled on the ground and began scooting out of reach on his backside.  Adam turned to Little Joe.  “Are you hurt any other way, boy?”

Little Joe shook his head.  “Just hungry.  They plumb starved me.”  It was the closest he’d come to an outright whine since the whole thing had begun.

At that, Hoss hauled off and slugged the nearest man, which happened to be Zack.

“We’ll take care of that as soon as possible,” Ben soothed, holding his son closer.

“There’s a sandwich in my saddlebag,” Adam said with a smile.  “That should hold you until we can get to town.”

“Yeah.  Thanks,” Little Joe said.  He really did have a fine pair of brothers; he’d known it all along.

**********

            Little Joe jumped down from the buckboard and cocked his tan hat at a jaunty angle.  Not only did it give him the devil-may-care look girls seemed to relish, but it effectively hid the few cuts and abrasions remaining from his ordeal of two weeks earlier.

“Rein it in, Cassanova,” Adam advised as he stepped down from the wagon.  “This is a quick trip, ‘load the supplies and get home’ being Pa’s exact words.”

“We can stretch that to include lunch at Daisy’s, cain’t we?” Hoss asked.

Adam chuckled.  “I think so, provided we don’t dawdle here.”

“Well, come on, then,” Little Joe urged.  With the quick steps habitual to him he entered the general store and greeted the shopkeeper.

Busy with another customer, Will Cass just waved and said, “Be with you soon, boys.”

Since Adam had the list this time, Little Joe wandered around the store, checking first to see if the proprietor had gotten in any new fancy neckwear.  With the big barn dance coming up at the end of the month, he wanted something to give his plain white shirt a bit of flash.  Eventually, though, he ended up at the table of books and aimed, of course, for the paperbacked ones that cost only a dime, about all he ever had available to splurge on a book.  A quick glance told him that there weren’t any new Deadeye Dave novels available, but he didn’t feel the surge of disappointment he used to when he was just a kid.

As he looked over the other books on the table, he found himself wondering whether Adam hadn’t been right about him needing to raise his horizons a mite when it came to reading material.  Despite the techniques for manipulating kidnappers that he’d gleaned from Deadeye Dave, he had to admit that the little books didn’t hold a whole lot of suspense anymore.  Given his recent experience, too, maybe it was time he took a more serious interest in genuine crime detection, instead of fanciful adventure tales.  He casually picked up a title that looked promising by an author with experience handling real criminals, not made-up ones like Scarpathio McSwain and his ilk.  Yeah, maybe this little book by Inspector Foote of the Yard was exactly what he needed.  He pulled a dime from his pocket and headed for the register.

           The End

© June, 2017

Required words from the fishing pond:  shipwreck, lariat, harmonica

Tags:  Adam Cartwright, Ben Cartwright, Hoss Cartwright, Joe / Little Joe Cartwright, Ransom