Bonanza
~*~*~ Advent Calendar ~*~*~
* Day 3 *

Summary:  It might be white outside, but inside?  Being a day like no other, was an understatement; and long after the sun had set Ben Cartwright was almost ready to declare that all three of his sons would be receiving lumps of coal in their Christmas stockings.
Rating: G
Words: 2,350

Sterling and Bright

“Hop Sing no have time for little boy questions,” the harried servant spoke in clipped tones as he bustled about the kitchen, preparing the daily meals as well as the baking that was expected this time of year.

“Okay, but I can help you,” Little Joe spoke, following like a shadow as his friend entered the pantry.

Hop Sing reached for the sack of flour and turned to exit the small room.  Not realizing the child had followed him, he tripped and dropped the opened bag, spilling its contents all over…. everything…. except the five-year-old.

“Out!” Voice pitched higher with his arm and finger pointing the way, “Now!  Go!  Hop Sing now have mess to clean up!  No time for Lit’le Joe!  Go bother brotha!”

Dejectedly walking through the short hallway from the kitchen to the dining room, Joe heard, “And bundle up.  No time to take care of sick child because he not dress warm!”

Stopping in front of the credenza, Joe began to pull on his winter coat and knit hat.

“Don’t forget your mittens and wear your scarf!”

*****

Slowly Joe exited his home.

“Come on Hoss!  Ya gotta tell me!” Joseph Francis Cartwright begged and pleaded, essentially pestering his older brother for what felt like hours to the older boy.  “Adam won’t tell me anything.”

“Shortshanks,” Eleven-year-old Hoss, towered over his little brother, with a fearsome face trying to prove he meant business.  “I’m gonna dump ya in the water trough if ya don’t stop askin’ questions.  Ya gotta let me get back ta work.  I promised Pa I’d have my chores done afore lunch, and Amos needed my help with shoeing these horses.  Now, I’m right powerful hungry.  So why don’t ya go pester someone else.”

Turning his back to Joe, Hoss returned to the forge, picked up a set of tongs and pulled a red-hot bar of iron from the fire.

Hefting the heavy mallet overhead, and with deliberate strokes, he began pounding the metal into shape over the anvil.

Miserably walking away, Little Joe stuffed his hands into his coat pockets while shuffling his boots along the snowy pathway and kicking an imaginary stone out of his way.

As if he’d aged seventy years in the span of sixty seconds, Joe’s forward movement slowed to molasses in wintertime.  With a deep sigh, he reached for the doorlatch and slowly pushed the heavy oak door open and quietly closed it behind him.

Unwinding the heavy scarf that Hop Sing had insisted he wear, Joe let out another sigh before wadding up the cloth and setting it on the credenza.  Plopping down onto the floor, he pulled off one boot and then the other before setting them aside.  Rising to his stocking feet, the unbuttoned his heavy coat and hung it on the lower peg of the coat rack placed by the long clock.

Sighing once more, he walked farther into the great room and stopped when he heard a drawer to the desk his father used close.  “Pa!” Joe hollered as he hurried across the floor, “Oh, it’s you.  Sorry ta bother you, Adam.”  Turning, he slipped his hands into his pant pockets, lowered his head, and headed towards the settee.  “No one’s got time for me,” not realizing he’d said it aloud.

Having finished with the ledgers as Ben had requested, Adam had planned to review an upcoming Army contract for beef, but hearing his brother’s comment, “Joe, wait a minute.”

“Na, that’s okay Adam.  I know everyone’s got important work to do and can do without me pestering them.”

Rising from the chair, he followed Joe to the settee, where he picked his brother up and set him on his lap as he sat down.  “Joe, I’m sorry.  Sometimes I forget what it was like to be so young.”

Wiping a tear from his eye, “Ya, you had Pa all to yourself, and traveling across the country and all.  Lot’s different than me.”

“Which doesn’t mean that I should shut you out.  Pa always had time for me and my questions, and I guess in wanting to please Pa in getting all my work done by ignoring you, Pa wouldn’t be too happy.  I’m sorry I snapped at you earlier this morning.”

Snuggling up against his brother’s chest, “Just ain’t nothing I can do, and I can’t go anywhere on my own riding Patches.”

“Not with all the snow out there.  You know Pa would have a fit.  How can I help you, buddy?”

“I want to know about Santa Claus.”

“Oh, you want to know about St. Nicholas, the Jolly Ol’ Man himself.  That’s a tall order.”

Looking up, out from under a headful of hair that was well past needing a trim, “But you do know him, right?”

“No, I don’t know him,” wanting to forestall disappointing Joe any further, “but I do know of him.”

“Tell me about him.”

So, for the next fifteen minutes Adam told Joe all he thought the youth needed to know, that is until their foreman, Charlie Yeagle pounded on the door before opening it and telling Adam he was urgently needed in the forge and that he’d already sent someone into the settlement to fetch the newly arrived doctor and to see if they could find Ben.

Setting Joe to his feet, Adam left the room, grabbing his heavy coat before heading out the door.

*****

“Lit’le Joe what you doing!” Hop Sing asked as he began setting the table and looked to see his young charge standing in front of the fireplace.

“The fire went out, and I was just lookin’.”

“There still warmth from cast iron stove in fatha’s office.  Mr. Ben, he start fire when he get back with brothas.  You too young.”

“I know Hop Sing.”  Shaking his head in exasperation, “Pa’s told me, and Hoss’ told me, and Adam’s told me.  I’s just looking.”

“You come help Hop Sing set table.  Honorable fatha and brothas return home.  Food be ready for them.   Chop, chop.”

“Hop Sing?”

“Yes Lit’le Joe?”

“You know about Santa Claus, right?”

“I know only good boys and girls get presents,” hoping that would encourage Joe to do as he asked, he turned around and headed back towards the kitchen.

*****

Fifteen minutes later, having not heard Joe opening the dish cabinet nor any noise that the boy normally made when setting the table, Hop Sing cautiously made his way back towards the great room and called out, “Lit’le Joe?”

He heard a muffled, “Here.”

Walking farther into the room, towards the staircase, he stopped and called out, “Lit’le Joe!” one more time while looking upstairs.

“Here Hop Sing!” sounded louder.

“Lit’le Joe!  Where are you?”  With fisted hands on his hips, “Hop Sing want you come here right now!”

“I can’t.”

“Lit’le Joe, your fatha not be happy you hide from Hop Sing.”

“I’m not hiding, I’m looking.”  The voice was louder, but still a bit muffled.

Turning around, he noticed black dust sifting down from within the fireplace.  Carefully walking across the floor, Hop Sing bent over and looked up.

It was at that moment, that everything happened.  Hop Sing reached up into the chimney, grabbing hold around the ankle bearing a no longer white sock.  With a startled yelp, having lost his footing and his handhold, Joe plummeted down.

Landing with a thud and a scream.  A large, plume exploded into the room just as the front door opened.

Ben’s back was to the room, helping guide his middle son across the threshold.  At hearing the commotion, Ben forgot about Hoss and the crutches he was using due to his splinted left leg, and turned around, only to shout, “Jumping Jehosaphat!  What the…?”

*****

Not knowing which son needed him more, Ben looked left and right before hearing Adam state, “I’ll take care of Hoss, you go check on your youngest.”

*****

Adam managed to get Hoss into the bedroom just off the dining room, even though his brother was complaining that he didn’t want to go to bed.  He’d heard Hop Sing shouting and he wanted to plead and beg the cook to not go back to China.

“Hoss, right now Pa’s got his hands full, and adding you to the mixture just might make him want to join Hop Sing.”  Adam pulled the crutches out from under Hoss’ armpits and pushed his sibling onto the bed.

“Adam, don’t forget my boot out in the buggy.”

Reaching down to grab his brother’s lower leg, Adam worked to remove Hoss’ other boot.  “I’ll get it when I get back.”

“Back?” Pulling himself up to rest against the headboard and trying to slip under the covers, “We just got home, where ya goin’?”

Holding the boot while trying to ignore the odor emanating from within, “I have a feeling Pa’s going to want the doctor to make sure you didn’t do any more damage to your broken leg when you fell.”

“I didn’t fall, Pa dropped me.”

“Well, you tell him that.”  Dropping the boot with a thud, Adam straightened up and said, “And I’m sure he’ll want to make sure Little Joe didn’t get hurt.”

“What’d he do anyhow?”

“Probably trying to start a fire in the fireplace from what I saw.”

“We done told him he’s too young ta do that.  That he needs to let Pa or one a us do it.”

“Well, I have a feeling there’s going to be a different kind of fire started; seems our little brother is going to get his britches warmed.”

“If Pa asks, I’m going for the doctor.”  And with that, Adam slipped from the house, jogged across the snow filled yard to the barn, and saddled his horse before heading out.

*****

“I go back to China!”

Panicked, Ben wanted to follow the Oriental man as he headed back to the kitchen and subsequently, his sleeping quarters, but all he could do was listen to the ranting.

“I go back to China!  I cook, I clean, I no deal with naughty boy!  Him make more work for Hop Sing!”

Turning his attention back to his youngest, who was trying to pry his arm from the firm grip he held, “Just what were you thinking?  Evidently you weren’t!”

“But Pa!”

“If you’re not hurt, get up to your room!”  Turning the misbehaving child and swatting him on his back side, Ben looked at his blackened hands that mirrored the mess on the hearth, the floor, the table, and the furniture.  Shaking his head, he finally forced his feet to move when he heard the bedroom door upstairs slam closed.

*****

Adam returned with the doctor in tow.  Quietly they followed the voices to the kitchen, both heard Ben pleading with his employee.  Neither could help it; the doctor and Ben’s eldest burst forth with laughter.

Turning and glaring, Ben shouted, “I’m paying your services as a doctor, not to stand there and laugh like a hyena!  And you, you braying like a, a jack….  Keep it up and I might just rethink your going to Boston to go to college.”

With healthy blushes and good graces, the two backed away with Adam showing the doctor the room where Hoss was resting.

*****

The doctor had left after examining Hoss, again.  Much to everyone’s relief, no further damage had been inflicted during the unplanned tumble.  With only damage to his pride, Joe was left to his own in his room.

Hop Sing was still not convinced he would stay; and thusly warned his employer that as a result of everything that happened, he was done working for the day.

“I need get cleaned.”  Walking toward Ben, and pointing a finger into Ben’s chest, “You clean mess.  You clean son.  You finish cooking dinner.  You clean dishes.  You clean kitchen.  Maybe I come back to work in morning.”

*****

With almost everything set right, Ben settled down with his pipe in hand, and looked up at hearing footsteps on the staircase.

“I’m sorry for laughing Pa.”  Adam walked across the floor, taking a seat on the now clean low table in front of the fireplace.

“I’m sorry for getting mad, and don’t worry, I’m not going to prevent you from heading to Boston come spring.”  Tamping down the tobacco in his pipe, “Sometimes, I just don’t know what to do with that boy.  Where does he get all these ideas.”

“Pa, he’s only five and he did ask me to tell him about Santa Claus. That’s what I was doing before Charlie came to tell me about Hoss getting injured.”

“And you just had to mention that he came down the chimney?”

“Sorry.”

“I just hope I can convince Hop Sing to stay.  Somehow get him to understand what a precocious child your brother is.”

“Pa, I’ll admit that Joe is sterling and bright…”

“And twice the trouble you and Hoss ever were.”

Pinching the bridge of his nose in an effort to hide the grin threatening to appear, “Pa, you have to admit…”

Arching an eyebrow, “Adam, don’t defend him.”

Shaking his head, “I’m not talking about Joe.”  Giving a slight laugh, while leaning forward into his shoulders, both hands on the wooden table beside his hips.  “Come on Pa, when the doctor and I peeked around the corner to the kitchen, you have to admit it was funny.  Hop Sing yelling at you, arms going every which way, standing there, his clothes were all tarnished with ashes and soot*, just like Good Old Saint Nick.”

Failing to prevent his own smile, “Yes son, Happy Christmas to all and to all a good night**. And all that.”  Pointing with the mouthpiece of his pipe, “Now upstairs to bed.”

Obeying his father; taking the stairs two at a time, “Now dash away, dash away, dash away all!**” proclaimed Adam as he disappeared from sight.

My Character:  Hop Sing
My phrase:  “His clothes were all tarnished with ashes and soot.” (*)from A Visit from St. Nicholas, better known as ‘Twas the Night Before Christmas by Clement Clarke Moore.

Link to Bonanza Brand 2023 Advent Calendar – Day 4 – How Can You Mend a Broken Heart by BluewindFarm