Summary:  In this fifth story in the Traci Series, there’s trouble in relationships, a bank robbery, and an illness which somehow work out to resolve some family issues.
Rating:  T
Word Count:  7,623

Traci Series:
First Love, and Tragedy (by BettyHT)
A Triangle (by BettyHT)
Another Angle (By BettyHT)
A New Angle (by BettyHT)
A Trust Broken and Fixed (by BettyHT)
I Still Love You (by BettyHT)
The Black Egg (by BettyHT)
Another Guise (by BettyHT)
Runaways (by BettyHT)
A Boy and His Horse (by BettyHT)
Frogs and Other Stuff (by BettyHT)
An Island (by BettyHT)

 

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A Trust, Broken and Fixed

Chapter 1

It was a feeling of going back in time. Ben Cartwright was lecturing Adam, and Adam was once again thinking of leaving finding life on the Ponderosa growing more and more intolerable.

“What do you mean you fired Jenkins?”

“Pa, I gave him a direct order, and not for the first time, he said he wouldn’t do it. I mapped out a new line for the fence, and he said the crew wasn’t moving it.”

“Adam, why is this the first I’ve heard of the fence line being moved.”

With a deep sigh and a deep breath, Adam continued. “We talked about it last week. I told you that there had been some shifting of the rocks and such on that south slope of the lowest pasture and that we needed to move the fence line so that it would be more stable.”

“Well, you may have mentioned that, but I’m asking when I gave the okay to it because I do not remember saying that was all right.”

“So I have to check out every little thing before I can do it. This wasn’t a major project. It was just moving a fence line over by about one hundred feet.” Adam’s anger was building. More and more he felt impotent with every decision evaluated by his father and often found lacking not on merit but because it wasn’t the way his father would have done it.

“Yes, if your decisions end up costing us a valuable employee, then yes.”

With no way to answer that without making the argument worse, Adam remained silent. Although a hard worker when he wanted to be, Jenkins was a troublemaker and rarely did what he was told to do the way he was told to do it.

“Is Jenkins still here?”

“Yes, he’s in the bunkhouse packing up his gear. I decided to stay away from him because he already took one swing at me today.”

“What did I pay all that money for an education for you if this is how you learned to handle people who work for us? I’m going to go talk with him. Wait here. This conversation is not over.”

Adam walked over and sat in the blue chair dropping his head into his hands. Traci had overheard much of the argument but waited until Ben left. Now she walked slowly down the stairs. At over seven months pregnant, she had to be careful with her balance on the stairs. She walked to Adam and started to massage his neck but he pulled away. He had had a headache for the last two days and the pressure on his neck made it worse.

“You don’t have to be mad at me.”

“I’m not. I’m sorry. I have a headache and that didn’t help.”

Adam reached around to pull his wife to his side. He rested his head against her swollen abdomen and tried to sense his child inside there.

“He hasn’t been kicking much today. Maybe he’s sleeping.”

“You’re still sure you’re going to have a boy?”

“As sure as I can be.”

Traci smiled and Adam managed to return the smile but she saw that the smile didn’t reach his eyes. There was a squint about the eyes that suggested anger or pain. She thought it might be a combination of both. Ben walked back in and his anger softened a bit as he saw Traci. No matter how much he questioned Adam’s judgment lately, his choice of Traci as a wife had been a great decision. However the matter of Jenkins was another story altogether in his mind.

“I’ve talked to Jenkins. He’s apologized and agreed that he was in the wrong, and tomorrow I want you to work it out with him. And please with no fighting and no firing. After that you can go to town and pick up the month’s payroll. You’re always going into town anyway.”

Traci felt the tension in her husband and was angered as much as Adam by Ben’s behavior. Inexplicably, he seemed to be targeting Adam with complaints as he worried about the spring work that had to be done. With work on the two houses for Adam and for Hoss progressing nicely, Adam did need to go into town a lot to pick up supplies and order what was needed next. For some reason, Ben didn’t see that as work. Adam dropped his head into his hands again. His headache had gotten worse. For a moment, it looked like Ben was going to say more, but wisely, he did not. He felt his position as head of the family and the ranch threatened by his eldest son and found himself striking out at him more and more. He knew he needed to stop doing it, but there were times like with the firing of Jenkins whom he had hired, that it got the best of him. He had given Adam more authority to get him to stay, but ironically had set up the very situation that might make it more likely he would leave.

Without saying anything more, Adam kissed Traci on the cheek and walked outside to saddle his horse and head to the lower pastures where some sick cattle had been quarantined. There weren’t any supplies to pick up or order for the new houses because he had done that the day before but didn’t want any more negative interaction with his father.

Once he arrived at the pasture, Shorty said he thought the cattle might have anthrax for he had seen it before and these cows looked the same as those had. The word made the hair on Adam’s neck stand up.

“Are you sure?”

“Boss, there’s no way to be sure without waiting for them to get sicker and start dying. But it sure looks like it. You want to take the chance?”

“Like drawing two to fill a flush.”

“That’s about it. You might get lucky, but the odds aren’t with you. Listen, I can do the shooting if you don’t want to do it. I know how upset your brother is going to be, and you got to live in the same house with him.”

“No, it’s my job. I’ll do it, but I better get started. The faster I do, the more likely I’ll be done before he has to see any of this.

Adam pulled his rifle and walked over near the cows and their calves but only as close as he needed to be to make sure each shot was a kill shot. He didn’t like doing this and knew Hoss would be upset with him, but it had to be done. He thought it better to get it done before Hoss had to see these animals suffering any more or worse yet might have to do it himself. He wanted to spare his brother that. Once he finished with the shooting, he told Shorty to have the men dig pits and push the cattle into them.

“Don’t touch them though. Cover your mouths with bandanas until this is all done. Use some poles to do it or rope and pull them. Throw the poles in and the ropes too or burn them here. Once the cattle are all buried, cover this area with small fires and scorch the whole area they have been in. Whatever they had can’t be allowed to spread to the rest of our herd or worse that someone here catches it.”

From the ranch house, Hoss had heard the shooting and immediately feared what it was. He hurried to saddle up and ride toward the pasture only to see Adam heading his way. Once he neared him and saw his face, he knew what Adam had done. All the hurt and pain of how he felt for the sick animals who had been killed came pouring out.

“You couldn’t wait to slaughter them animals, could ya.”

“Hoss, it had to be done.”

“No, it had to be your way. It’s what you wanted to do since the day we found them there. Now you got your way, but don’t expect me to forgive ya for it this time. I’m just so tired of you making these decisions without asking us.”

Hoss rode off toward the site before Adam could respond. His headache was worse now with the shooting and then Hoss’ anger at him. At the house, Ben was talking with Roy and unknowingly creating another problem for Adam.

“Now, Ben, you know how that youngest of yours is always a gettin in trouble. Well usually Adam pays the bill and the fine to get him outta jail, so this time I just let him go and told him to have Adam settle up with me and with Cosmo. But Adam was in town yesterday and didn’t do that. So I need to ask you to settle that up. It’s one hundred for the saloon damage and twenty for the fine. Just disorderly conduct cause nobody got seriously hurt.”

Ben handed over the cash, and Roy thanked him. “Roy, I’m sorry my boys made you have to ride all the way out here. I’ll have a talk with them.”

“Now, Ben, Joe was just letting off some steam. It was a long winter, and he ain’t been the only young one in town doing that.”

“Well, Adam should have told me. I’ll be talking with him too.”

“Well now, good day to ya, and I hope next time we can have a more agreeable conversation.”

Before Joe returned home, Roy was gone so Joe had no idea of the hornets’ nest he was walking into when he got home. His father really let him have it and then sent him to the barn to do chores. That’s where Joe was when Adam arrived back at the stable.

“Adam, you just couldn’t wait to tell him, could you? Just had to stick your nose in my business again. Would you just stay out of my life and leave me alone.”

“Joe, what are you talking about?”

“You know what I’m talking about. You had to be a tattletale to Pa that I got in trouble in town, and now he’s really pissed at me, and it’s your fault.”

“Wouldn’t that be your fault for getting in trouble in town in the first place? And I did not ‘tattle’ on you. I have better things to do.”

“Oh yeah, maybe reading one of your stupid books or plucking that guitar while the rest of us work. Well let me alone here so I can work, and you can go do some ‘important’ stuff” like you always seem to think what you’re doing is.”

Knowing that there was no talking with Joe when he was this angry, Adam took care of Sport and headed to the house for what turned out to be another go round with his father. This time Ben took him to task for not letting him know what Joe had done. Adam had not known about it this time and told his father that. So Ben asked about all the other times Roy had mentioned and Adam couldn’t deny that.

That night, Adam and Traci retired early. There had been tension and not much talking so it was too uncomfortable to be with the other members of the family. Jillian and Traci had talked and neither of them could understand all the anger among the four men. In bed, Adam had a headache and nothing Traci did could entice him to do anything so for the first time in their married life, all they did in bed was sleep.

The next morning, Adam saddled up Sport for the trip to town. He skipped breakfast because he wasn’t hungry and didn’t relish sitting with his father and brothers either. After kissing Traci goodbye, he headed out but soon slowed his pace for his headache was still there. Arriving in town in the late morning, he headed directly to the bank. It seemed to be a busy place with all of the horses in front. One man stood outside the bank and gave a glower at Adam as he walked to the bank’s door making him wonder how he could possibly have made anyone else angry with him. Once he stepped inside, though, he knew. He had a gun poking him in the back almost immediately and saw the tellers packing money into saddlebags. A hand pulled his pistol and emptied it.

“Well, well, well, lookee who we got here, boys. This here is Adam Cartwright. Couldn’t have planned things this well if we tried.”

“Jenkins.” Adam almost spit the name out. Jenkins slammed him in the gut with his fist doubling him over.

“This is really your fault. I was making an attempt to go straight, but you were just never satisfied. Since you ruined that opportunity for me, you can help with this one. You’re gonna carry that loot for us and ride out of town with us. Gonna make people think twice before shooting when they see you riding with us.”

After straightening up and looking Jenkins in the eye, Adam retorted: “What makes you think I’ll do that?”

“Oh, I know where your wife lives. You do anything to mess this up, and little Traci and that brat she’s carrying are gonna join you in the graveyard out by that lake you love so much. Or maybe, better yet, I’ll let you live so you know what you caused.”

Adam’s shoulders slumped, and Jenkins knew he had won. They had their hostage and their shield. Later Jenkins thought of ways he could make Adam pay for all the wrongs he had inflicted or what Jenkins considered to be his grievances. Oh yeah, this was going to be fun was his thought. Once the tellers finished packing up the saddlebags, Jenkins handed Adam his empty pistol and told him to holster it. Then he was handed the saddlebags and ordered out of the bank ahead of them. No one knew yet that the bank was robbed, and with Adam, they ought to be able to ride out quite a ways before there was pursuit.

Walking to the bank to talk with Adam after seeing him arrive earlier, Roy was almost ridden down by Adam as the gang headed out of town. Adam did not acknowledge him except for saying ‘Roy’ and then the group rapidly rode away. Roy picked himself up from the street and headed to the bank with strong misgivings seeing the bank door standing open and no one in sight inside the bank. Within minutes, he had the answer he feared: the bank was robbed and Adam was a hostage carrying the loot. He wondered how he was going to tell Ben even as rumors spread through town that Adam Cartwright had robbed the bank.

At first, Roy wondered what Adam had done riding him down like that, but then he realized Adam had done the one thing he could do to save his friends life.

Chapter 2

Roy sent a rider to the Ponderosa to alert them to what had happened. As quickly as he could, he rounded up a posse and headed out to find the gang. From what the tellers had overheard, it appeared that Adam might be in grave danger. Within two hours, the posse saw two men riding their way. By the size of them, it wasn’t difficult to recognize that Joe and Hoss were joining the posse. At first the posse had made good progress but soon there were very few signs of where the gang had gone, and the posse had slowed down as each sign caused them to start looking for the next sign. If they had to track them this slowly, they would never catch them. Hoss was one of the best trackers around so the men in the posse hoped he could help them speed up their pursuit. The gang appeared to be headed north and soon would be in untracked wilderness of mountains and desert. If they got that far, catching up to them would be unlikely.

The posse was more successful in their pursuit with Hoss leading, but they were still walking their mounts and had to assume the gang was riding away at a much faster pace. They continued until it was too dark for even Hoss to find a trail. The plan was to head out at dawn as soon as Hoss could pick up the trail.

“Gotta wonder how hard he’s really looking. What if his brother was in on the robbery?”

“What did you say?”

Joe overheard the conversation among some of the other posse members and was incensed. He sometimes got quite angry with his oldest brother but always had the utmost respect for his high standards. The last person who should be accused of something like this was Adam. Roy stepped forward because he had heard the same grumbling.

“Now all a ya heard what the tellers told me. He was forced to do it and had an empty gun in his holster. They done said those men threatened his wife and unborn baby if he was to resist them. Now how can you question his role in this mess?”

“Well you’re the only one we heard it from the tellers, and you and them Cartwrights are mighty tight.”

“If you feel that way, maybe you oughta head back to town come morning.”

“Yeah, that would suit you fine, wouldn’t it. Then he’d get away for sure.”

“Now I know you and Adam have had some run-ins in the past, but that ain’t no call to say he done this. You need to cool down and start thinking straight. If you ain’t got it worked out by morning, then you just are gonna have to go back to town. And that goes for anyone else in this here posse. We came out here to get the money back and rescue Adam Cartwright. If you ain’t going to help us do that, then you ain’t a part of this posse no more. You got that?”

“Thanks, Roy.” Hoss said it but Roy knew it was from Joe too.

“Boys, I know Adam didn’t have nothing to do with this. That Jenkins has been causing trouble ever since he got into town. Now he did look familiar, and when I get back, I’m going to look through all those wanted posters I got stacked up because I think I may find him in there. I know now that Adam only knocked me down so those men couldn’t shoot me down although I did wonder a lot about it at first. But I reasoned it out. I didn’t know there was a robbery, but they would have seen me as a threat with the badge and all. Your brother saved my life. Now I have to do the same for him. Let’s get some sleep.”

The next morning, the posse headed out as soon as Hoss could find signs of the trail they had taken. Tracking them was as difficult as it had been the day before.

“Roy, these tracks are a day old. We’re falling too far behind.”

“Hoss, what do you suggest?”

“Well, they been heading due north. Maybe we should just ride hard north and see if we can catch them.”

“Probably the right idea. Soon they could head in a different direction though, and then we’d never find them.”

“We’ll find them, Roy. One way or another, we gotta find them.”

The posse rode hard that day and by the end of the day had not found anyone. They camped as darkness fell, and the mood in the camp was bleak. The gang had apparently gotten away with the money and with the hostage. However, just a few miles away, the gang had camped. They had plans to rob a bank in Reno before heading to the mountains to hide out, but Adam was sick. He had caused them to stop a number of times that day as he retched.

“Jenkins, this ain’t working out. He ain’t much of a hostage if he’s dying, and his pappy ain’t gonna pay to get a corpse back either. He’s gonna want to have some proof his son’s alive before he pays us anything. All that pounding you did on him early today made it worse.”

“Is that how the rest of you feel?” Jenkins’ question got a murmur and nodding of heads.

“All right then, in the morning, we’ll head out and leave him here. If the posse catches up, they’ll be busy taking care of him, and won’t follow us. All right with you?”

From his bedroll, Adam listened. He did have a severe headache and had been nauseous most of the day. But he had forced himself to retch in order to buy time and leave some sign for the posse he hoped was following them. He did have a fever, and had doubled over in obvious distress that morning as Jenkins hit him and then kicked him when he was down. That did hurt, but he had played at being seriously hurt not only to stop the assault that he couldn’t stop with his hands tied, but also to make them think he needed all those stops as they traveled. The one concern he had had was that Jenkins would kill him instead of leaving him behind, but apparently he didn’t want a murder charge hanging over him. Adam was relieved on that point.

Back in the posse’s camp, Hoss stood and sniffed the air.

“Do you smell that?”

“You’re not going to tell me you know what Hop Sing is cooking for dinner, are you? Cause I won’t believe it if you say you do.”

“Nah, I smell wood smoke, and I’m away from our fire. There’s another campfire out here and not too far away. I’m going up to that rise and take a look around.”

Walking purposefully up the hill, first Joe and Roy and then the others followed behind. Once they were on the top of the rise, they could see quite a way and no one could see anything. Joe started to climb higher and a couple of the other men followed him because up here all of them could smell the wood smoke coming up the slope. There had to be a camp there somewhere. Finally, one of the men grabbed Joe and pointed. At first Joe couldn’t see anything but then he saw it too: small flashes in the trees just a few miles away. They hurried down the hill to tell the others.

“There’s a camp in the trees about two miles away. Looks like they got the campfire screened somehow but when people move around the light flashes off any metal they’re wearing.”

Roy started planning. “Joe, how close do you think we could get without them hearing us?”

“With the horses, we could probably be within about a half mile. Walking in there’s a lot of cover so right on top of them before they know it if we move quietly.”

“All right, then, everybody start saddling up and padding the tack.”

The posse’s horses were saddled and anything that might clink or make a noise was wrapped in bandanas or torn pieces of blanket. They doused the fire and buried it. They walked out to a clearing and all mounted up and followed behind Joe as he led them in the direction of where they had seen the flashes. When he signaled, each dismounted carefully and ground tied his horse. They walked in single file toward the outlaws’ camp. At Roy’s signal they halted and started to move off to either side. Earlier Roy had said to take their time and be very quiet. Joe began to crawl to the camp. He had volunteered to locate Adam and get to him as soon as the shooting started for no one expected these men to surrender. It was probably close to four in the morning before Roy thought he had everyone in position. He waited just a while longer to be sure Joe had time to do his surveillance and then had Hoss do a night owl hoot to let the men in the posse know they should move toward the camp. The outlaws were so overconfident, they had not left anyone on guard but before the posse could make a move on the camp, one of the men stood up and yelled at the others. Hoss and Joe both recognized the man. It was Jenkins.

“I been laying here thinking and there’s a couple of big problems with our plan. He knows my name and he can identify all the rest of you. We may get away now, but those wanted posters are gonna have bounty hunters on our tails forever.”

“All right, so what do we do?”

“That big crevasse off to the side a ways. I say we drop him down that and drop some brush down after him. Even if they find our trail and get this far, they’ll never find him. We’ll keep all the horses so there will still be the same number of tracks.”

“You sure this ain’t because you want to kill him?”

“Sure I want to kill him. I want to make him suffer some too. I’m gonna take my knife and go gut him right now and let him bleed out. We can drag him to that crevasse after we have some breakfast.”

The posse had heard enough. When Roy yelled out for them to surrender, the outlaws scrambled to get weapons except for Jenkins who rushed toward Adam probably to try to use him as a hostage and a shield. Joe fired point blank into his chest stopping that. Shooting commenced almost immediately against the others. Joe had gotten to Adam’s side and rolled him away from the gunfire as soon as he could.

“What took you so long?”

“Adam, would a simple thank you be too much to ask?”

“Thank you, Joe.”

Joe started to fumble to untie Adam’s wrists when there was suddenly more light. The outlaws had placed a screen of brush to hide the campfire from anyone looking for them. Hoss had kicked a bunch of the brush into the fire to light up the area so they could see what they were doing. The shooting had stopped.

“Darn fools. They never had a chance. Looks like they’re all dead, Roy.”

“Hoss, we gave them a chance to surrender, and that’s all we owed them.”

Having freed Adam’s hands, Joe stood to walk to where the posse had gathered but looked back when he heard Adam grunt. He was on all fours and trying to stand but not successfully.

“What happened to you?”

“Well, Jenkins let me know this morning that he didn’t appreciate having me around. I’ll be all right if you’ll just help me stand.”

As Joe helped Adam stand he realized he seemed very warm and placed his hand on Adam’s forehead. Before Adam could swat his hand away, Joe had detected a fever.

“You’re sick.”

“I’ve been better. But I haven’t had anything to eat in a day, and very little to drink.”

Alerting Hoss to their brother’s illness didn’t make much difference. They couldn’t do much for him out here in the wilderness anyway so the best thing was to get him home as quickly as possible. They rode as quickly as they could as soon as it was light enough to travel. Hearing what Jenkins had said and seeing Adam’s hands had been tied and he had obviously taken a beating convinced the rest of the posse that he had nothing to do with the bank robbery. Everyone did as much as they could to make Adam’s return as pleasant as it could be, but he retched a number of times and had trouble even drinking water without being nauseous. At first Adam said he had faked being so sick, but eventually he admitted he wasn’t faking anymore and the retching was out of his control. Several times Adam seemed to have forgotten details of what had happened and most worrisome to Hoss was that he seemed confused about how to get home as if he hadn’t ridden there thousands of times before. His memory lapses and his confusion worried his brothers more than the fever he had.

At the Ponderosa, Paul was dealing with the other medical crisis to strike the family. Traci had gone into an early labor with the stress of Adam’s kidnapping and worries about his safety. The baby was coming about five weeks early if their first estimates had been correct. More than ever, Paul hoped they had been wrong and that the baby was due earlier than they first thought.

Chapter 3

Nearly a half day later as the posse neared the Ponderosa boundaries. Roy and the others rode toward Virginia City leading the horses carrying the bodies of the outlaws. Roy had the saddlebags with the bank’s money. Adam had been getting worse, and Hoss and Joe were anxious to get him home. They asked Roy to send the doctor out to the Ponderosa not knowing that he was already there. With Jillian and Hop Sing helping, Paul had helped Traci had deliver a five-pound boy who was healthy although a little small. They had cleaned up the afterbirth and changed the bed linens and gotten Traci into a clean gown. Paul handed her the baby then and told her to try nursing him. They waited and when the baby started suckling after a short time, sighs of relief could be heard. Paul and Hop Sing left, and Jillian sat by Traci’s side.

“He is definitely his father’s son.”

Suddenly grasping what Traci had meant, Jillian started laughing but stopped when she saw the change come over Traci’s features as she worried about Adam.

“He’ll be home soon, I’m sure. Hoss would never let anything bad happen to Adam. And Joe is helping. They’ll bring him back.”

Soon they heard horses in the yard, and Jillian went to the window. She saw Hoss helping Adam dismount and then holding him up. There didn’t appear to be any serious injury so she supposed that it was exhaustion that had affected her brother-in-law so.

“They’re back, and Adam’s with them.”

Traci started to get out of bed and Jillian moved quickly to stop her.

“You need to stay right in that bed. Hoss will bring him up here to see you.”

There was a lot of noise as Hoss, Joe, and Ben helped Adam up the stairs. Paul was following along behind because he didn’t like how Adam looked. He was pale, sweating, and his eyes appeared glazed. He had not greeted Paul nor his father when he entered. Once Paul said that Traci had done well with the labor, he wanted to go upstairs. At their bedroom door, Adam paused and leaned on the doorjamb. He was the most precious sight Traci could imagine at that moment despite the beard, the bruises, and the dirty clothes. Traci had a light towel over their son as the infant nursed.

“Oh my God, Adam, this is the second miracle of the day. If the other men could leave us alone, I’ll show you our son.”

Adam moved into the room as if to comply and fell to the floor. Paul pushed through the three men and knelt at Adam’s side. He checked vital signs and found he had a very high fever. He asked Hoss to carry him to another bed for a more complete examination. Jillian had moved to console Traci who was extremely shocked by what had happened. Without preamble, Hoss explained what they knew.

“Doc, he was sick when we caught up to them. He couldn’t eat anything without throwing it up again. We got him back here as fast as we could but he seemed to be having trouble remembering things and he was confused about some things too.”

Ben added a critical bit of information that Traci then reinforced. “He complained of a headache even before he was gone.”

Within an hour, Paul had a diagnosis but everyone was scared when they heard it.

“Adam has encephalitis. It is an inflammation of the brain. The fever, the vomiting, the headache, the memory loss, and the confusion are symptomatic of that. Has he been sick with anything in the last few weeks?”

Traci answered. “He was a substitute teacher for a week when the teacher had chickenpox. He didn’t get it, but he was sick for at least a week after he finished. He had a fever and he was very tired.”

“He may actually have had chickenpox, Traci. Some patients don’t get the major breakout of pox. He may have had one or two, and they could have been in his hair or someplace else where they wouldn’t be noticed. The reason that is important is that illness may have led to this. With rest and good care, he should recover. His symptoms are actually rather mild for his disease. The memory problems are the most serious symptom, but his exhaustion from his ordeal may have exacerbated that.”

Hearing ‘should recover’ was sobering for all of them. Ben asked what they could do.

“It’s not contagious. Do whatever you can to bring that fever down. Keep him comfortable and try to get him to drink. Otherwise, sit with him, and talk with him. Give him something to come back to. He may be out much of the time for a day or two.”

Ben sat with him first. Hoss and Joe were exhausted from riding with the posse, and Traci obviously was exhausted after delivering their baby but she had still insisted she needed to see Adam. Joe had helped her walk down the hall and sit briefly at his side.

“Adam, I love you so much. Please come back, love. Our baby needs his father to teach him to sing, to fish, to ride horses. He needs his father to teach how to grow into a man. Please.”

With tears in his eyes, Joe helped Traci back to her room when Ben arrived with a cup of coffee and a book to read. Once everyone had retired to their beds, Ben began to talk.

“It’s not easy being a father. You worry. You wonder. But most of all every day you try to make the right decisions so that your child will grow into that loving, capable, and caring adult. Then they grow into that man, and you want to hang onto them as your child. I know that over the last months I’ve tried to convince you to stay living here with me. It’s that I fear losing you. Instead of convincing you to stay, I think my actions only reinforced your decision to leave. Please know that I have had a lot of time to think over the last few days when I feared for your safety and your life. I know that I have been hard on you many times. I try to justify it by thinking that it was because you were so capable you could handle anything. However, I truly believe I may be a bit jealous of you and all you have now. I always wanted a woman to grow old with, to be by my side in everything, and to raise our children together. That didn’t work out for me. I see you with Traci and I see a wonderful husband. Now I know you’ll be a great father too. Please come back to us so you can be both.”

Trying to read didn’t work for Ben. So he sat quietly and watched his son sleep. He used a cool cloth to wipe Adam’s face and his chest. He tried to get him to drink, but he was too far under to do that. He opened the window to let in a cool breeze when he thought the room was getting too stuffy. After three hours, Hoss walked in to take a turn. Ben was reluctant to leave but Hoss said he would wake everyone if Adam awoke. He continued the careful ministrations that Ben had done. He also had some things to say and had to say them now not knowing if there would be another chance to do it.

“Shorty told me about them cattle. He told me what you told him. He said you shot them right then so he didn’t have to do it and so I wouldn’t have to see them suffer. I know you always do what you think is the right thing for everyone, and I had no call to blame you or say those things I said. I let my pain come out and I put it on you. That wasn’t fair. It wasn’t right. You’re the best older brother a man could have. So would you please come back to us. There’s a lot of people in this house who love ya. We need you too. People always say how strong I am, but you are the strength of the Ponderosa cause you’re the one who holds us all together. You make a lot of the hard decisions and then you carry them out. Please come back and do that for us.”

Despite their best efforts to cool Adam down, his fever remained high. His body was fighting the infection and inflammation, but it was taking a lot from him to do that. Joe came in the room early in the morning to take a turn. Again he bathed Adam in cool water and tried to make his comfortable. Then he had something to say.

“Pa told me that Roy is the one who told him about the mess I made in town. I was wrong not only to blame you but also not to believe you. You have never lied to me. Sometimes I didn’t like it when you told me the truth, but I always know I can trust your word. I promise you now. If you will just wake up healthy and strong, I will never make a mess in town like I have been. I’ll do my best to be a responsible man, and you won’t have to bail me out of trouble again. I’m always complaining that people don’t treat me like a man, but then I don’t always act like a man either especially when I get in trouble and need you to take care of things. Well I’m going to be a man and take care of my own business. After all, I have great examples of men to follow: Pa, Hoss, and you. Every one of you have shown me how to be a man. Thank you. And now if you would just wake up, this would all have worked out so well. You know how you like things to work out well. Well you gotta do your part now. Please.”

Joe had nothing left to say. He continued to bathe Adam with the cool cloths and try to bring that fever down. As dawn broke, he thought the fever might be less but couldn’t be sure. There was a shadow at his side and he looked up to see that Traci was there with their son.

“I’m going to feed him, and I’ll be up now anyway, so let me take a turn sitting with Adam. And could you please carry the cradle in here?”

After nursing their son, Traci placed him in the cradle. Then she crossed the room to sit at Adam’s side and bathe him with the cool cloths. She took a spoon and put water at his lips which opened and he swallowed. She continued doing that until a cup of water was gone. She knew this had to be a good sign. She talked with him about all sorts of things.

“I haven’t told anyone what our son’s name is. I wanted us to do that together. So unless you want them to be calling our son ‘baby’, you need to wake up.”

A hoarse ‘All right’ made Traci gasp.

“Oh, Adam, love, can you open those beautiful eyes for me please?”

“No.’ was followed by “Feel stuck together.”

Traci moistened a cloth and bathed his eyes. Then she wet the cloth and placed it over his eyes.

“Now don’t fall asleep. I’m going to wake the others and let them know you’re awake.”

As Traci rushed into the hall, Ben was emerging from his bedroom where he had slept far longer than he intended.

“He’s awake.”

With a big grin, Ben went to knock on Joe’s door and Hoss’. Within minutes all of them had crowded into the guest room where Adam lay. Traci had removed the cloth and was again bathing Adam’s eyes which were gritty and clogged with matter. As she cleaned all of that away, she used another clean cloth to wet his eyelids again.

“Can you open your eyes now?”

Opening his eyes to the dimly lit room caused a huge response from those there who sighed in relief almost like a chorus and then each called out a greeting. Adam had trouble speaking but each word was clear once he was able to say it. Noticing Adam’s son lying in the cradle, Hoss had to ask.

“What did you name your son? We ain’t just gonna call him baby.”

Adam smiled as Traci chuckled. Adam whispered that Traci should tell them.

“Well I wanted to name him after an old boyfriend. He was my first love until I lost him, but I never forgot him. I have many wonderful memories of him. He will always be in my heart.”

Her words had made the group slightly apprehensive but Adam was smiling and suddenly Ben knew the baby’s name.

“You named him Adam?”

“Yes we did. He’s Adam Maxwell Cartwright. My oldest brother’s given name and my father’s with his father’s. Adam said we can call him AC like my brother was called MJ for Maxwell Joseph Maxim.”

Epilogue

Building two new homes, organizing the spring roundup, and making preparations for Hoss and Jillian to welcome their baby took most of the next few months. Adam slowly recovered from his illness and had lots of time to spend with his son and wife. It was over two weeks before he was strong enough to venture from the house and ride in the carriage to his home site. Once there, he was amazed at the progress. He looked at Hoss who had driven him there and knew his big brother must have put in some very long days to get all the ranch work done and get to these home sites to supervise construction too.

“Thank you, big brother. I don’t know what I would ever do without you. This is wonderful.”

The two brothers walked through the house with Hoss watching Adam so he didn’t tire himself too much. Fatigue had turned out to be another symptom but the doctor said it would pass. There was finishing work to be done but the walls, ceilings, and floors were ready. It wouldn’t be long before Adam’s house was ready to move in.

“Is your house this far along too?”

“Nah, Jillian wants to have the baby at the big house. Then she says it wouldn’t be too bad to live there for a month or two letting Hop Sing help her like he’s been helping Traci. So there was no rush with my house. We’ll plan on moving you and Traci here in about a month. Then in about two or three months, Jillian and I want to move to our house and it should be finished by then. So the plan is when the crew finishes here, they’ll head over to my house and work on that.”

“Sounds like a good plan. You have done very well.”

Hoss sat up a little straighter with that compliment. He knew Adam never threw out meaningless compliments. If he said it, he meant it. When they got back to the carriage, Hoss pulled a blanket from the back and threw it up on the seat.

“Who’s that for?”

“As if you don’t know. I can tell how tired you got with all this walking. I want you to take that blanket and tuck it behind you, lean back, and close your eyes. You need the rest. I’ll drive slowly.”

Lacking the energy to argue and knowing that alone should tell him Hoss was correct, Adam pushed the blanket up against the carriage side and leaned into it closing his eyes and relaxing. Hoss assumed he fell asleep.

“There, now, I figured you’d go to sleep.”

“I’m not sleeping but I am resting. I heard you, you know.”

“Well of course you did. I’m right here.”

“No, that night when I fell. I heard all of you but I couldn’t answer. It was like I was in quicksand and couldn’t fight my way to the surface. But I heard you, I heard Pa, and Joe, and Traci. Every one of you helped pull me out of that abyss. I had to get to you when I heard those things you said. It was just so hard and took so long.”

“Well, older brother, I’m real glad ya made it back.”

“Me too. I’m glad to be back and feeling better about everything.”

 

 

Tags:  Adam Cartwright, Ben Cartwright, Hoss Cartwright, Joe Cartwright