Summary:  Adam’s first trip to Cooperville was at the  insistence of Cooperville’s Sheriff; his second trip there he planned.  He finds himself facing an outlaw’s gun; then finds something special in someone.  His third and final trip results in tragedy.
Rating and Reader Alerts: G
Words:  18,800

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The Brandsters have included this story by this author in our project: Preserving Their Legacy. To preserve the legacy of the author, we have decided to give their work a home in the Bonanza Brand Fanfiction Library.  The author will always be the owner of this work of fanfiction, and should they wish us to remove their story, we will.

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DISCLAIMER: This story is fiction.  The Cartwright characters were created by David Dortort and as such I claim no rights or privileges to their characterizations.  Other characters in this story are products of my own imagination.  Any resemblance to any other person, whether living or dead, is coincidental.  Places may be fictitious.

 

“What’s your name, mister?”

“Adam Cartwright.  Why?  What’s this about?”  His dark eyes traveled to the eyes of the one pointing the weapon at him, then noticed the Sheriff’s badge.

“Get down off your horse nice and easy like and hand over that pistol, butt first…also nice and easy like,” the Sheriff demanded.

Adam’s mouth quirked into an amused smile.  “Alright…what’s the joke?” he said with a laugh in his voice.

“This is no joke and I said get down off that horse and hand me that pistol.  I won’t hesitate to use this if I have to tell you again,” the Sheriff said in a definite tone, still pointing the weapon at Adam.

His quirky smile was immediately replaced by a  more serious expression.  “I believe you,” Adam replied and stepped down out of his saddle.  The Sheriff did the same and walked up to face him.  Adam removed his gun and handed it to the Sheriff and raised his hands.  “I believe I asked you what this was all about,” Adam said, puzzled and confused. 

“So you did.  You’re under arrest.”

His eyes traveled from the Sheriff’s badge, to the weapon pointing at his chest, to the eyes of the one holding the gun on him. “Under arrest?  For what?” Adam responded, taken aback and becoming ill at ease at the situation.

“The Wells Fargo Office in Cooperville was robbed.”

“What’s that got to do with ME?”

“Somebody answering your description was seen running away from there,” Cooperville’s Sheriff replied, while removing Adam’s rifle from its scabbard.

“Well, it wasn’t ME,” Adam responded and turned around.  “And if I could show you this…” he added, reaching for the flap of his saddlebags, but stopped all movement when he heard the click of a gun hammer being pulled back, and felt a cold, steel gun barrel in his side.

“Just turn right back around,” the Sheriff ordered.

Being thoroughly annoyed at being stopped on his way back home; being accused of being in some town he knew he hadn’t been in; being accused of something he knew he hadn’t done and having a gun barrel poked in his side, he set his jaw firmly and with his hands still on his saddlebags, slowly turned his head sideways and with steady eyes, peered at the Sheriff.

“I said…turn back around,” the Sheriff said in a low, definite tone, meeting Adam’s gaze with determined eyes.  “I won’t hesitate to use this if I have to tell you again.”

Adam let go of his saddlebags and raised his hands again while he turned to face the law official.  “What now?” he asked in a thoroughly exasperating tone.

“I’m taking you back to Cooperville to see if the witness can identify you.”

“Well I’ll tell you right now, that witness can’t identify me, because I wasn’t there.”

“Then you won’t mind coming back with me will you, Mr. Cartwright…IF that’s your name,” the Sheriff responded coolly.  “So…mount up,” the Sheriff added, gesturing towards Adam’s horse.

“I mind because I’m already a day late getting home and I’m not guilty of any robbery…but I guess there’s no use to resist, is there.”

“None whatsoever.”

Adam nodded.  “I didn’t think so.  I do have just one question though before we go,” Adam said as he took the reins to his horse and climbed into the saddle.  “Just what kind of place is this…Coopstown…or whatever the name is?”

“Cooperville.  Worried about whether or not you’ll get a fair trial, if you ARE identified as the robber?” the Sheriff asked, climbing up into the saddle.

“No.  I was wondering what kind of town it is that needs a WOMAN Sheriff.”

She smiled.  The trousers and shirt she wore did little to hide the fact that she was a woman.  Her blue eyes twinkled merrily as she answered him.  “Head in that direction…and you’ll find out,” she said, with a toss of her head.  “Let’s go,” she added, still smiling.  When she noticed Adam hesitated slightly before moving forward, she said, “I won’t hesitate to….”

Adam held up a palm in front of her and nodded his head knowingly.   “I know…you won’t hesitate to use that if you have to tell me again.”  She smiled at him again and nodded her head.

Adam did as instructed and moved in front of her.  The Sheriff followed close behind him, her gun trained at his back.

******

Hours later, in the Sheriff’s Office, she stood in front of Adam holding out his gun and holster and rifle to him.  “Well, Mr. Cartwright, I’m glad that it turned out you were NOT the one who robbed the Wells Fargo office,” she said to him.

Adam took his holster from her and smiled slightly.  “I told you it wasn’t me,” he said, bringing his holster around his waist, then buckling it.  He took his rifle from her and placed his hat on his head.  “Although I must say I’ve never been arrested by a more…lovely Sheriff,” he said, his eyes glinting with mischief.

“Your flattery doesn’t mean a thing, even though you’ve been cleared of all suspicion,” she answered with mischief in HER eyes as well.  “Cooperville really IS a nice little town, Mr. Cartwright.  Maybe the next time you pass through, it’ll be under more pleasant circumstances and I’ll tell you how it was that I became Sheriff,” she added.  Adam looked at the name plaque on her desk.  “C.J. Garrett, Sheriff…what does the C.J. stand for, so I know what name to write in my journal about you.”

“You can call me Sheriff or Sheriff Garrett, whichever you prefer.  Goodbye, Mr. Cartwright,” she replied and extended her hand.  Her eyes twinkled merrily.

Adam took her hand and keeping his eyes on hers, he brought her hand up to his lips and kissed the back of it, then lowered it.  “I’ve never kissed a Sheriff’s hand before,” he said as he grinned and winked at her.  He let go of her hand then stepped towards the office door, but stopped and turned around to look at her one more time.  “Sheriff,” he said simply, as he touched his hat brim with two fingers, then turned, opened the door, and walked out, closing the door behind him.  On the other side of the door, he paused and raised an eyebrow in curiosity.  “A woman Sheriff…most intriguing,” he said out loud to himself. 

At the same time Adam paused outside the door, Sheriff Garrett paused on the inside.  “What a charmer,” she said, out loud.  Adam pushed away from the door, stepped off the walk, took the reins to his horse and stepped up into the saddle, and turned Sport East.
Now he would be TWO days late getting home, but he didn’t mind so much, because…like he said…he had never been arrested by, nor kissed the hand of a more lovely Sheriff, and he wouldn’t have missed THAT for the world.

He rode away thinking that one of these days he would do as she suggested and go back to Cooperville, just so she could explain how it was that she came to wear that badge. 

******

After a full day of riding, Adam stopped near a shady grove to camp for the night.  After his meager dinner of  cold beans, hard jerky and cool clear water from the nearby stream, he settled down into his bedroll.  Placing his hat over his face, and his gun within easy reach, he exhaled a comfortable sigh and felt the beginning slumber of sleep overtaking him.

He hadn’t even heard them ride up nor their footsteps as they neared him.  He did, however, hear the click of a gun hammer being pulled back.  He was awake and his hand on his gun and hat off his face in a flash, but stopped dead cold as he looked into the barrel of a Colt .45.  His eyes traveled up to the face of the one behind the weapon, and then he slumped back in a relaxed position.  “Well, Sheriff, we meet again.  But we’re going to have to stop meeting like this or people will begin to talk.”  He replaced his gun in the holster and stood up.

“Hello, Mr. Cartwright.  You always manage to be near Cooperville after we’ve had a robbery.”  Sheriff C. J. Garrett remarked with a mischievous smile on her face.  She holstered her gun riding low on her hip.  “Just passing through again?”

“No.  Actually, I’m taking you up on your invitation.”

“Invitation?”  Sheriff Garrett crossed her arms and looked up at him.  Even by the small campfire light she thought this man was as handsome as he was charming.

“Before I left your nice little town three months ago, you gave me an invitation to return.  You promised you’d tell me how you became Sheriff.”

“Oh yes.  I remember.  Well, I’m sorry you came at this particular time, Mr. Cartwright, because I’m leading a posse, perhaps next time you pass through.”  Sheriff Garrett grabbed the reins to her horse and stepped up into the saddle.

“Would you object if I rode with you?”

“I don’t know how long we’ll be gone on this.”

“I’ve got time.  Just give me a couple minutes to saddle up.”  Adam quickly doused the fire by heaping dirt on it, then gathered up his gear.

“I don’t have a deputy badge with me to give you but I can swear you in anyway,” Sheriff Garrett said to him before he mounted his horse.  “Raise your right hand.”

“There’s no need to swear me in, Sheriff.”

“Anyone who rides in my posse is a bona fide deputy or they don’t ride. So if you want to go along…Raise your right hand.”

Raising his right hand, Adam agreed to uphold the law to the best of his ability and without any malice or vengeance towards the one being sought after.  Just as soon as Adam mounted his horse, Sheriff Garrett led the posse forward across the stream.

Riding and searching until sunup, the ones carrying the torches doused them and stopped when Sheriff Garrett stopped and dismounted.  Letting her hat hang on her back by its cord, she crouched down beside her horse and picked up a handful of dirt.  Letting it sift through her fingers, she sighed deeply.  Adam crouched down beside her and picked up a smooth stone.

“What pushes you on so hard after this particular culprit?  Besides the robbery, I mean.  You really haven’t told me much, but I get the feeling it’s something more than just a robbery.”

She turned her eyes up to him and brushed her hands together ridding them of the dirt.  “No, it isn’t just the robbery, Mr. Cartwright.  They shot and killed the victim.  They shot and killed her so she wouldn’t be able to identify them.  They shot and killed her for twenty-six dollars.  That’s all she had.”

“Who was she?  And if they killed her so she couldn’t identify them, how do you know who you’re looking for?”

“Who was she?  Erma Collins, an eighty-six year old woman…Granny Erma to everybody in Cooperville  And how do we know who we’re after?  She lived just long enough to give us a description of them…the Hardin gang.  Eighty-six, Mr. Cartwright, and twenty-six dollars.  Do you suppose they’ll think it’ll be worth hanging for when we catch them?  And we WILL catch them and bring them back to hang.  Before she died, I promised Granny Erma we would.  And if I fail to do that, then I’ve failed her and everybody else who I took an oath to protect.”

Sheriff Garrett wiped her hands on her pant legs and stood to her feet.  She adjusted her hat to shade her face from the sun and placed her hands on her hips.  “We’ll go back to Cooperville and get some rest, then we’ll start out again.”  She turned towards her horse and took hold of the reins.

“Don’t you think they’re in the next county by now?”

“Maybe, Mr. Cartwright, but I still have to search for them.”  Stepping into the stirrups and swinging her leg over the saddle, she settled herself and spoke to the other men.  “We’ll go back and get something to eat and some fresh horses, then we’ll start out again.”  She turned her horse towards Cooperville.  Adam threw down the stone, mounted his horse and followed with the others.

******

Dismounting their horses in front of the Livery, Sheriff Garrett and Adam handed the reins to the stableman.  “Would you like some coffee, Mr. Cartwright?” she asked, rubbing the back of her neck and then her face with the palm of her hand.  “I sure could use some.”

“It’s Adam, and I think you could use some rest.  Where do you live?  I’ll walk you home.”

“I have a small living quarters behind the jail.  But I won’t rest until I catch up with the Hardin gang.  But I DO want some coffee, join me won’t you.”

“Alright.”

Adam followed the Sheriff down the street towards her office, but they stopped when they heard a gunshot in the saloon.  Sprinting across the street, she pushed through the saloon doors and surveyed the scene in front of her.  Adam stood just inside the doors.  He unhooked the leather hammer strap from his gun just in case.

At the bar stood a burly man with a heavy beard and a floppy hat that looked like it had been some animal’s dinner, then spit back out.  His clothes were badly stained and dirty.  In his hand, down at his side, he held a long barreled pistol.  Motionless, on the floor, half way between the door and the bar, in a pool of blood, lay a man with a gaping hole in his back.  Sheriff Garrett knelt down and checked him.  Adam watched her closely and thought that all of the women he knew, would have fainted by now.  She raised her eyes and looked at the man at the bar, then stood up slowly.  All activity in the saloon had stopped until it was as quiet as  an empty church.

All eyes were trained on Sheriff Garrett as she advanced slowly towards the mountain man.  “You want to tell me what happened here?  I don’t believe I’ve seen you in Cooperville before.  What’s your name, mister?”

The man raised the pistol up and pointed it at her.  She stopped moving.  Adam slowly removed his gun and held it waist level pointing directly at the man.

“No need for that mister,” she said to the burly man with a wave of her hand at his gun.  “Just tell me what happened.”

“Who are YOU?”

“I’m the Sheriff.  Now just tell me what happened.”  She took two more cautious steps towards the man who towered above her.  Adam began moving slowly around the room to try to come in from the side.

“The Sheriff?” the burly man bellowed, then guffawed with laughter.  “Ain’t this town got no backbone that it needs a female woman Sheriff?” He guffawed again.

She took two more steps towards him and stopped.  “What happened?  Do you know him?” she asked pointing to the man on the floor but keeping constant eye contact with the mountain of a man in front of her.

“Yeah, I knowed him.  He was my pardner, Chick Wells.”

“Why did you kill him?”

“He wouldn’ pay fer my drink, so’s I shot him.”

“Then it wasn’t self-defense.”

“Naw, Missy.  I just shot him.  I was gettin’ tired of him anyhow.”

Out of the corner of her eye she saw Adam creeping slowly towards the big man.

“Then I’m going to have to ask you to hand over your gun and come with ME.  You’re under arrest for murder.”

“Under e-rest?”  He guffawed again and bent over in laughter.  She took two more quick steps towards him, but he raised up with his gun still trained on her.

He looked at her with cruel eyes.   “Ya jist run along now, Missy, ‘fore ya git yerself hurt.” 

“I guess we’ll have to do this the hard way,” she said.  With lightening speed, she drew her pistol and shot the man’s gun out of his hand all in one movement.  Adam stopped and widened his eyes in awe at her.  He thought even Little Joe couldn’t outdraw her.

“Now, mister whatever-your-name is, come along with ME.”  She gestured with a wave of her gun towards the door and took the man’s gun that a saloon patron handed her.

Holding his bleeding hand, the man sneered and growled at her and went towards the door, being quite upset that he had been outsmarted by a female woman.  She followed him and Adam followed HER.

“You didn’t need MY help at all did you,” he said, holstering his gun as they stepped outside.

“None whatsoever.”  She smiled as she marched her prisoner to the jail. 

Placing the keys back on a peg behind her desk, she sat down in her chair and pulled open the top drawer of her desk.  Adam placed a cup of steaming hot coffee in front of her and she rewarded him with a warm smile.  “Thanks.”

He sat down in a chair opposite her and took a sip of his coffee and studied her as she leafed through a stack of Wanted Posters.

“You’re all business, aren’t you.”

“When you’re a Sheriff you have to be.  And when you’re a WOMAN Sheriff, you have to be more so.”

“What about a social life?”

She raised her eyes and peered at him over her coffee cup, then took a sip before answering him.  “That ended when I took this job.”  She went back to looking at posters.

Adam leaned back comfortably in his chair and took another sip of coffee.  “Yeah, you promised to tell me about that if I came through here again.  I’m still waiting.”

She looked at him and smiled slightly.  “So I did.”  Finishing with the posters, she placed them back in the top drawer and cupped her hands around the blue speckled coffee mug.  “Dave, my husband, was Sheriff of Cooperville.  One day a gang of five men rode in and tried to rob the bank.  Dave was inside at the time and managed to prevent it by shooting and killing two of the gang members.  When he went outside to arrest the other three, gunshots went off everywhere…his and THEIRS.  He managed to kill two more before he was shot himself.  He returned more shots, but the last member got away.”

She stopped and took a long sip then began again.  “I got to my husband as quickly as I could push my way through the crowd.  I fell down beside him and laid his head in my lap.  I told him I loved him and he told me he loved ME, then he was dead.  I was too shocked to even cry.  Of course I knew that being Sheriff, he could lose his life at any time, but I still wasn’t prepared for it.  I don’t know if a person is EVER prepared to accept the death of a loved one even though you know it could come any day.  I promised myself that his killer would be brought back to stand trial.  I unpinned the badge he gave his life for and held it out in front of me offering it to anyone who would go after the killer.  No one took it.”

She paused again and lowered her head for a few seconds then raised it.  “After Dave’s funeral, I dressed in some of his clothes and pinned on his Sheriff’s badge.  A year earlier, he had taught me how to shoot and hit my target, so I struck out in search of the last gang member.”

“By yourself?  No one went with you?”

“No one went with me.  I tracked him for two days before I caught up with him.  I found his lame horse so I knew he was on foot.   I came up behind him hiding behind some rocks, waiting to jump me.  He already had his gun drawn but I was able to shoot his gun out of his hand and bring him back to town so he could stand trial for my husband’s murder.”

“Did he?”

“Yes.  He was found guilty and was hanged.”

“So how did you end up being Sheriff?”

“None of the men in the town wanted the job and we were laughed at by other lawmen at the meager salary we could afford to pay.”

“And the people offered you the job?”

“They offered me the job.  I wasn’t afraid to face the enemy…they said.  I told them I would take the job to keep Dave’s memory alive.”

“How long have you been Sheriff?”

“Three years.  It’s a hard job, Adam.  You have no close friends…no one to listen to your problems…no social life.  Being Sheriff makes you hard.”

“Why didn’t you get married again?”

She cocked her head at him and smiled a playful smile.  “Now tell me, Adam, what man in his right mind would want to marry a Sheriff.”

That caused him to grin at her.  “You could give up being Sheriff and just be a wife.”

“Then who would be the Sheriff of Cooperville?  This town needs me.  They need me to keep them satisfied and comfortable.  And they feel safe with me as Sheriff.  Besides…I’m doing this to keep Dave’s memory alive.  He was a hero and he deserves no less than being remembered.”

“Well, I can’t argue with that, and I’m beat.  I think I’ll get a room at the hotel and catch a few winks before we go out again looking for that hombre.”  He set his mug on her desk and stood up.  “Thanks for the coffee, Sheriff.  How soon do you want me to be here to go out again?”

“You don’t have to go, Adam.”

“I know, but I want to go.  To ride in a posse led by a woman Sheriff…It’ll be something I can write about in my journal.”

She laughed and stood up and walked out from behind her desk.  “I think I’ll be ready in a couple hours.”

“Alright.  I’ll meet you back here in two hours.”

“Before you go, Adam, tell me something.  Why do you want to get involved?  You have no interest in Cooperville.”

“Mm no, but I have an interest in Cooperville’s Sheriff.”  He winked at her then was gone.

She smiled.  “That man is definitely a charmer, and if I could be a woman instead of a Sheriff, for about ten seconds, I just might find myself attracted to him.”  She sighed deeply, but was drawn back into her role as Sheriff when her prisoner called for her.

*****

From outside his hotel window, in the street below, Adam heard whoops and hollers and pounding of horses’ hooves and sounds of breaking glass, then women screaming.  He immediately got up off his bed and went to the window.  He looked down and saw three riders galloping out of town, then several people running towards the Sheriff’s office.

He grabbed his gunbelt and hat and strapped on his holster as he made his way out of his room.  Reaching the street, he saw people still running towards the Sheriff’s office.  He made his way there also.  When he reached the crowd, Sheriff Garrett was standing in the open doorway.

Holding up her hand for quiet, she said, “Alright people, let’s have a little quiet!  Let’s not get panicky!”  In her hand she held a piece of paper as did some of the others.

“Sheriff, they’re gonna come back and rob and kill all of us!”  a man exclaimed as he thrust a piece of paper in her hands.  “It says so right there!”

“I know, Mr. Tillman, they threw a rock and a note through my office window too.”

“What do we do, Sheriff?” another man asked.

“We go after them, Mr. Jackson, just like we’ve always done when outlaws have committed crimes here.  I have an idea they’re the same ones who killed Granny Erma.  So if you fellas will get your horses, we’ll get started.”

“And leave our wives and children unprotected?” Mr. Jackson exclaimed.

“If we go now, we can probably catch them.”

“But they said they’re coming back!  We can’t go riding off!  They’ll come when we’re gone!” Mr. Tillman exclaimed.

“A thief and killer doesn’t give you advance notice they’re coming,” Sheriff Garrett said.  “They come when you least expect them.  They’re trying to keep you prisoners in your own town…afraid to leave or even move about.  We can’t let them do that.  We have to fight to keep our freedom.”

“But what if they come back while we’re gone?”

“We must go now and get them FIRST.  I know I haven’t been a perfect Sheriff, but have I ever failed to protect this town before?  Now who’s coming with me?”  She scanned the faces of the people of her town and waited for them to step forward.  One man pushed his way through the crowd and stood beside her.

“Thank you, Adam, but this isn’t your fight.  It’s Cooperville’s fight.”

“Well it doesn’t look like you’re getting too many deputies to help go along,” he answered as they both watched the crowd dwindle down to just the two of them.  “Why do you stay here?  It’s obvious they don’t care about what happens to their town, or to YOU.”

“They’re like children, Adam.  You have to protect them whether they want you to or not, whether they appreciate it or not.  They elected me as their protector.  I can’t shirk that responsibility just because they may not appreciate it.  I owe them that.”

“YOU owe THEM?  It seems to me it’s the other way around.”

“Maybe, but time’s wasting.  I have outlaws to round up.”  She turned and went inside her office.  A few minutes later she entered the livery and stuck a box of rifle cartridges in her saddlebags and began saddling her horse.  She observed Adam tightening the cinch on his saddle.

“I hope you brought along enough shells for the both of us,” he said to her.

“I told you, Adam, you don’t have to go along.”

“Maybe not, but I’m going with you anyway.”

“I’d rather you didn’t.  You’d just be in my way.  This is MY job.”

“True, but don’t forget, Sheriff…I’m still your deputy, so that gives me the right to go with you.”

“That’s right, you are, so I could order you to stay here.”

“But you won’t, and even if you did, I’d go along anyway, so either way you look at it, you’re stuck with me.”

“I could lock you up for obstruction,” she said and tightened her saddle cinch.

“But you won’t.  So come on Sheriff Garrett, time’s wasting, we have outlaws to round up.”  Adam took the reins to Sport’s bridle and headed for the door.  “We’ll need some supplies, don’t you think, Sheriff?”

She smiled and followed him out.  “Yes…Deputy…we’ll need some supplies.”

******

The sun was just beginning to set as the two leaned from their saddles, studying the ground while slowly riding south.  Adam saw the set of tracks where the horses had turned.  “It looks like they’re heading up into the hills,” he said, looking up to the hills beyond.  “We’ll stop here for the night and pick up their trail in the morning.”

“I’M the Sheriff.  I’LL give the order when to stop.”  Her tone had somewhat of an edge to it.

Adam’s eyes arched.  “Oh…sorry,” he said, and cleared his throat.

She turned her full attention on his face.  The faint break of a smile softened her countenance and took the edge off her voice.  “But, their trail WILL be easier to pick up in the morning.”  She looked all around her and then spotted a group of boulders a short distance away.  “We’ll make camp over there.”  She headed in that direction.

“My choice exactly,” Adam commented.  She threw a smile back over her shoulder at him and continued forward.

******

Taking the cup of coffee she handed him, he said, “I’m glad I brought you along, Sheriff…you’re a better cook than I am.”

“Oh is that how it is, huh.  YOU brought ME along.”

He chuckled at her as he touched his coffee cup to his lips.  “I’ll take the first watch if you want me to.”

“You can if you want.  We’ll watch and sleep in two hour shifts.”  She stood up and stretched then sat busied herself unrolling her bedroll.  Adam studied her.

“You know, even though I’ve been with you for the last two days, all I’ve heard you called was Sheriff or Sheriff Garrett and I’ve asked you this before, but…what does the ‘C.J.’ stand for?”

“Well until I cease to be the Sheriff, you can call me Sheriff, or Sheriff Garrett, because that’s what I am,” she said as she lowered herself onto her bedroll.

“Uh…right.  Well, I’ll wake you in two hours…Sheriff.”  Adam turned his attention to the blackness of the night in front of him.

Sheriff Garrett settled herself down in her bedroll and turned her back to him and pulled her blanket up over her.  “Adam?”

He didn’t turn around when she called his name, but kept a watchful eye for intruders.  “Yeah?”

“Carolyn Jo.”

“What?”

“C.J., it stands for Carolyn Jo.”

He smiled.  “That’s a very pretty name.  Thanks for telling me…Sheriff.”  He smiled again.

Sheriff Carolyn Jo Garrett smiled and closed her eyes.

******

Off in the distance a wolf cried out its lonely howl, cutting and echoing through the stillness of the night.  From another distant point he was answered by a higher pitched and lonelier sounding howl.

Adam paced back and forth, keeping watch while Carolyn slept.  Four hours had passed.

Towards the end of the fourth hour, she began to stir and then opened her eyes and looked around.  Adam was still walking guard.  She looked up into the sky and saw the position of the moon.  Throwing off her blanket, and standing up quickly, she grabbed her rifle.  She walked up to Adam and glowered at him.  “You were supposed to wake me in two hours.  Why didn’t you?”

“Well, you were sleeping so soundly, I didn’t have the heart to wake you.  I thought you could use the extra sleep.”

“I appreciate you thinking of the woman part about me, Adam, but at the moment I’m a Sheriff, and I can decide for myself how much sleep I need.”  She stepped away from him and took up a guard position, her back to him.  “You better get some sleep, I want to be ready to pull out right after breakfast.”

“Of course.”  Making his way to his bedroll, he lay down and was soon asleep.

******

Adam awoke to the aroma of coffee, and bacon and sat up and stretched.

“Good morning,” Carolyn greeted him with a warm smile and hot cup of coffee.  “Breakfast is almost ready.”

“You know I could get used to this,” he said while he sipped his coffee.

“What?”

“Waking up every morning on the trail with my breakfast already fixed and a pretty woman serving it to me.”

Looking up from the frying pan, she cast him a penetrating gaze, but couldn’t help but smile at him.  “Just eat your breakfast,” she said and handed him a full plate.  Taking one herself she sat down opposite him.  “We have a few minutes before we pull out, tell me about yourself.  Any family?”

“My father and two brothers, Hoss and Joe.”

“Hoss?”

“Well, it’s really Eric, but to me he’s been Hoss since he was born.  What about you?  Any folks?”

“No.  My parents died when I was six months old and they had no relatives who could or WOULD take me, so I grew up in an orphanage.  I met and married Dave.  We were never able to have children, though we wanted them.”

“I haven’t gotten around to experiencing the wedded bliss of marriage yet.”  He raised a sarcastic eyebrow.

“You make it sound like marriage is some kind of dreadful disease.  Are you against getting married?”

“It’s alright.”  He shrugged and drained his cup.

“But it’s not for YOU.”

He shrugged again.  “They tell me I’m too set in my ways.”  He spread a handful of sand on his plate and rubbed it around with his hand to clean it, then did the same with his cup.

“Well when you meet the right woman, you’ll change.”  Carolyn spread a handful of sand on her plate and in her cup also, then began packing up the rest of her gear.  “Well, it’s time we got moving.  I want to catch those outlaws TODAY.”

“Why today?”

“Because it would have been Granny Erma’s eighty-seventh birthday and the town was planning a surprise party for her.  The outlaws stole that from her.  I want them to be brought back on her birthday.  Dead or alive.  Preferably alive so they can stand trial but one way or the other, I want it to be today.  You ready?”

“I’m ready.”

The two saddled their horses and tied their bedrolls behind their saddles.  With Sheriff Garrett in the lead, they made their way towards the mountains.

******

Always watchful and wary of an attack by their quarry, Sheriff Garrett and Adam perused the landscape around them constantly.  One would watch for tracks while the other watched for any signs that their foes may be nearby.

The sun was now at its highest peak of the day and Sheriff Garrett stopped and uncorked her canteen.  Adam stopped behind her and lifted his hat to use as a shade for his eyes against the blazing sun while he scanned their surroundings.  “Don’t you think we should stop and rest awhile?  We’re going to cook in this sun if we keep going like we’re going.  Besides, the horses could use a rest.”

Sheriff Garrett wound her canteen strap around the saddle pommel and pulled her long, fluffy dark hair up under her hat and fixed it firmly back on her head.  She unbuttoned the two top buttons of her shirt and rolled the sleeves up past her elbows before she answered him.  She said, “We haven’t seen one single sign of them.  Either they’re already in the next territory, or they’re well hidden somewhere up there.”

“You need to rest.”

She turned around quickly in the saddle to look at him and opened her mouth to say something to him.  He put up a hand in front of her.  “I know…you can decide for yourself, it was just a suggestion.”

“I suppose it wouldn’t hurt to rest for a few minutes.  A VERY few minutes.”  She swung her leg over the saddle  and stepped down.  At that second, they both heard the crack of a single rifle shot and scrambled for cover behind some nearby boulders.  Their horses scattered.  They each drew their sidearms.

“You alright?” Adam asked her.

“Yes.  Did you notice which direction it came from?”

“It sounded like somewhere over there,” Adam pointed in front of them and slightly to their left.  “Do you think it’s our outlaw friends?”

Sheriff Garrett squinted her eyes to peer at something in the not too far away distance.  “Sun glinting on metal.  Whoever it is, is right over there.”  She leveled her Colt .45, steadied it and placed her finger on the trigger.

“You’re not going to try to get them from HERE are you, with just your pistol?”

Very calmly and controlled, she said, “I’m going to try…At least until one of us can get to our rifles.”  She looked down the barrel and squeezed the trigger.  The echo from the Colt filled the air around them.  Shots in succession of two’s flew in their direction.  Crouching down, Sheriff Garrett said, “If that’s the Hardin gang, I must have hit one of them.  There were three, but only two are shooting back.”

“They could just be making you think that.”

“Maybe, but we’ll never know unless we make them show themselves.  Do you feel daring?”

“No, but what do you have in mind?”

“Split up and try to get behind them from either direction.”

“You believe in living dangerously don’t you.”

“Got any better ideas?”

“We still don’t know if they’re the Hardin gang.  Shouldn’t we figure that out first?”

“I already have, I’m going around them.”  With that she pushed away from the rocks and headed up the slope before Adam could stop her.

“Get back here!” he called out, but she heeded him not.  Seeing one of their attackers moving in the same direction as Carolyn, Adam took careful aim and pulled back on the trigger, hoping his bullet would travel the distance needed to stop, or at least slow down,  the culprit.  The bullet met its mark and the man dropped, rolled down the slope and lay motionless in the rocks below. 

“Adam?!  Are you alright?!” came Sheriff Garrett’s concerned call since she couldn’t see who had done the shooting.

“I’m alright!”

“It’s the Hardin’s, there’s one left!” she called back to him. 

“That’s right, Sheriff!” came the reply from a different voice in front of her.  “You killed both my brothers, and you’ll have to kill ME too!  I ain’t goin’ back to stand trial!”

“Don’t make it hard on yourself!  Give yourself up, it’ll go easier on you that way!  Am I talking to Cy, Ray or Luke?!”

“Cy and Ray are dead and you killed ‘em!”  Luke Hardin yelled and began filling the air with bullets.  Sheriff Garrett returned the fire, but Hardin was well hidden and managed to remain unscathed.

Adam managed to get his and the Sheriff’s rifles from their horses and made his way up the slope towards her.  The shooting had stopped and he could hear them talking but he couldn’t hear what they were saying.  He continued to climb the steep slope.

Sheriff Garrett and Luke Hardin talked to each other, while they both remained hidden.  “All you have to do is give yourself up willingly, Luke.  I’ll tell the Judge you cooperated that way.”

“I didn’t kill that old woman, Cy did.  And Ray was the one who stole her money.  I just held the horses.”

Sheriff Garrett thought she detected some remorse in his voice.  “All you have to do is throw down your rifle and give yourself up.  You were with your brothers when they committed the crimes so that makes you an accessory, but since you weren’t the one who did the act, the Judge might show some leniency and just give you a prison sentence.”

“Can you promise that?”

“No, I can’t promise, but I’ll do what I can.  Just throw your gun down and give yourself up.”

“I want your word, Sheriff, that you’ll do what you can for me.”

“I already said I would.  Now I’m going to come out into the open and you do the same and give yourself up.  Prison is better than hanging.”

Adam made his way up to her and crouched down beside her.  “Don’t trust him.  He still has his rifle in his hands.”

“I know, but I have to show him he can trust me so he’ll give himself up.”  Sheriff Garrett turned away from Adam and directed her next words to Luke.  “I’m standing up, Luke, to show you I can be trusted.”

Adam placed a firm hand on her arm and she looked at him.  “Don’t, please,” he said to her.

“Don’t interfere with my business, Adam.”

He removed his hand and she stood up slowly and looked down at him.  “Thank you, though, for caring.”  She started towards Luke Hardin.  Adam stood up and watched, his rifle poised and aimed at Luke Hardin.  Hardin stood up also and showed himself.  Though Luke Hardin knew Carolyn was the Sheriff, when she neared him and he saw her badge, he panicked.  He raised his rifle at her, and pulled back on the trigger all in one motion.

“Noooooooo!” Adam’s voice rang out immediately after Luke’s rifle shot did.  He watched Sheriff Carolyn Jo Garrett fall to the ground, and squeezed the trigger on his own rifle, but Hardin had already ducked behind the rocks and disappeared.

Forgetting about Hardin, Adam went to Sheriff Garrett and knelt down beside her and turned her over gently, holding her in his arms.  Her forehead was bleeding and flesh torn, where it had been hit by Luke Hardin’s bullet.  Her eyes fluttered, then opened.  She groaned and looked up into Adam’s face.  “Are we dead?”

Adam chuckled.  “No.  But you had me worried.  He just creased you.”

“Only just?  My head feels like a bass drum.”  She moved to sit up, so Adam propped her up against his chest and tied his bandana around her head, covering her wound.

“Let’s get you to the doctor.”

“Luke Hardin?”

“He managed to get away.  I’ll come back after him after I take you back to the doctor.”

“We’ll go after him now,” she said and moved forward to stand up, but only felt herself being pulled back against Adam’s chest.

“You’re in no condition to ride after him.  I said I’d go after him after I take you back to the doctor.”

“I’m going after Luke Hardin,” she said, still trying to stand up against Adam’s restraint.

“And I say you’re not.”

She relaxed hard against him. “Now look, Adam…I’m trying to not lose my patience or my temper with you, but it’s fast becoming more difficult.  Now, let me stand up, so we can go after Luke Hardin, who just keeps getting farther and farther away the longer we sit here!”  Her voice rose with each word.  “Don’t make me put you under arrest for obstruction of the law…and don’t think I won’t do it.”

He looked down into her fiery blue eyes.  “What makes you so stubborn?”

“What makes YOU so stubborn?” she retorted.

“Touche, Sheriff Garrett.  However…since I appear to be the stronger one of the two of us, I would deduce that we will do it MY way.  Dost thou not agree?”

 “No, I dost not!  Now let go of me, so we can go after Luke Hardin.”

“Not until you promise we’ll go back to town so the doctor can check out your wound first.”

“Adam Cartwright…You can be the most exasperating man…”  She let out a deep sigh of impatience at him.  “Alright…we’ll do it your way…THIS time.  But I warn you, don’t try to dominate me again.”

“Oh, I wouldn’t think of it,” he replied as he lessened his grip on her and helped her to stand.

“Yeah, well that I’ve got to see,” she retorted.  “You enjoy it when I give in to your dominance don’t you.”

He was standing very near her, still holding her hand.  “Carolyn…” His voice was quiet when he spoke her name.

She withdrew her hand gently from his.  “I..uhm…think we better get Cy and Ray Hardin’s bodies back to town so we can start looking for Luke,” she replied, then turned to make her way down the slope to their horses.  He stood in his place a few seconds, watching as she descended, then followed.

******

“All this fuss over a little scrape.  Hurry up, Doc, I have to get after Hardin before he gets too far away,” Sheriff Garrett said as she sat on an examination table in Doc Winters office.

“This is more than just a little scrape, Sheriff,” the doctor replied, as he applied astringent to her head wound.  “A fraction of an inch lower and you would be needing the undertaker, not a doctor.  Now, hold still while I stitch it up.”

With his arms folded across his chest, Adam leaned his shoulder against the wall behind where she was sitting.  “All I can say is that she was lucky the bullet hit her head.  It’s hard as rock…her head, not the bullet.”

“Remind me to utilize your talent for comedy, Adam, the next time I need a court jester,” she retorted. 

Adam chuckled as did the doctor.

“And I’ll kindly just ask YOU to finish up, Doc, so I can get back out there.”

“I’m trying, but you have to hold still, so I CAN.  Tell me if you can feel this,” the doctor replied, as he took the first stitch and waited.

“I don’t know if I can feel it or not, my head inside is pounding so hard.”

“That’s to be expected.  When I’m finished here, I’ll give you something for the headache, then you can lie down and sleep for awhile.”

“Nothing doing, Doc.  Luke Hardin needs bringing in.”

“I already told you that I would go after him,” Adam said as he came around to stand in front of her.

“It’s MY place to go after him, Adam.”

“I realize that, but you need to do like the Doc says.”

“If you insist on moving around, my stitches will look like a child worked on you, and you’ll have ugly zig-zag scars.  Now hold your head still,” the doctor implored before he took the next stitch.

Adam stepped to her side and placed both hands, one on each side of her head, to hold her still. She moved only her eyes to look up, then placed her hands over his and gave a small tug.  “I’ll sit quietly,” she said, then Adam removed his hands from her head, letting one hand rest on her shoulder.  As long as his hand rested on her shoulder, she felt tingles up and down her spine and felt all warm inside.

“It’s hot in here, Doc,” she said, then glanced up at Adam.  The faintest of smiles appeared on his face, because he knew the affect his touch was having on her.  He didn’t want to make her more uncomfortable than he knew she was, so he removed his hand, but continued to stand near her.

“It’s probably this wound of yours.  It might even make you feel nauseated.  That’s why you need to rest,” Doc Winters stated.

“I’ll rest when Luke Hardin is in jail, not before.”

“There’s no use talking reason to a stubborn person, especially when that stubborn person is a woman.  Maybe you can talk some sense into her, Mr. Cartwright.”

“I’m afraid she listens even less to ME, Doc.”

Doc Winters tied off the last stitch and cut the thread.  “There.  Now, please, Sheriff…please won’t you rest, even for an hour?”

“Doc…” she began, then looked at him, then at Adam, who quickly turned his gaze away, giving the appearance of being indifferent to her decision.  “Alright…I’ll rest,” she added, then looked at Adam, who was looking back at her now.  “But it’s MY decision to do so.”

“Of course,” Adam replied, looking satisfied.  “And while you’re resting, I’ll poke around town.  I’ve never really had a chance to see Cooperville.”  He made his way to the door then turned around.  “I knew you’d see it my way, Sheriff,” he said and after a quick wink and a grin, he was gone.

“Oh, that man!  He can be so exasperating!” she said, then smiled, as she lay back against the plump pillows.

******

Almost an hour after Adam left Sheriff Garrett in Doc Winters’ office, he came back to check on her.  He walked in the office and Doc Winters was standing in the doorway of the examination room, looking back at him.  The look on the doctor’s face concerned Adam.

“What’s wrong?” he asked.

“She’s gone, Mr. Cartwright.”

Adam went immediately to see for himself.

“I stepped out a few minutes ago and when I came back, she was gone.  She shouldn’t be roaming around by herself with that head wound.  She could pass out.”

“She went after Luke Hardin.  Darn that woman!  I should have known she would try something like this.”  Adam turned and hurriedly left the office.  “Just wait until I catch up with her,” he grumbled as he left.

He quickly mounted Sport  and put him in a full gallop in the direction he knew Sheriff Garrett would be headed.

******

He saw her in the distance and urged Sport on faster.

Meanwhile, up ahead, Sheriff Garrett heard the fast approach of a horse and turned around in the saddle to see who it was.  She turned back around and continued to look for Luke Hardin’s tracks.

Moving up alongside her, Adam reached down and grabbed the reins to her horse, halting them.  He dismounted quickly and pulled her out of the saddle and planted her firmly in front of him.

“Don’t you know you’re in no condition to travel alone after someone who tried to kill you.  You need a good spanking…Sheriff or no Sheriff…woman or no woman.”

“Making all the noise like you are, you probably gave us away to Luke Hardin.”

“Forget Luke Hardin and get it through that thick skull of yours, you can’t go off like this by yourself!”

“Are you finished?”

“For the time being.”

“Good!”  She jerked her arms out of his grasp and looked at him with a fiery look in her eyes.  “Now let me tell you a thing or two, Adam Cartwright!  In the first place, I AM a Sheriff!  And in the second place, I’m my own boss, so I don’t have to answer to YOU!  And in the third place, I’m letting you tag along only because I like you!  And in the fourth place, I dare you to try and spank me and in the fifth place…what are you smiling about…I’m bawling you out!”

“I know.  And you’re very cute when you do it.  And I know just how to curb that temper of yours,” he said, stepping closer to her.

“Don’t you dare try to spank me, Adam Cartwright.  I’ll have you arrested for assaulting an off…” she said, but was cut off suddenly by Adam’s kiss.  He took her in his arms and pulled her to him and kissed her tenderly and fully, then pulled back and looked down at her.

“…officer of the law, and I should slap you for that,” she said quietly.

“Are you?”

“No…but I should.  We’ll talk about this…assault…later.  Right now, I have a prisoner to track down.”  She turned to remount her horse, but faltered and fell back against Adam.  He caught her and held her gently against him.

“Well, I didn’t know my kiss would have such an effect on you.”

“Don’t flatter yourself…I just felt a bit lightheaded.  I expect it’s because of this wound.”

“Darn…you really know how to step on a man’s romantic pride.”

“You’re exasperating, you know that.”

He grinned at her.  “Feeling better?” he asked when he saw color returning to her cheeks.

“Yes.  Much.  We better get going, it’ll be dark in an hour or two.”

“Don’t you think you should…”

“No, I don’t.  I’m going after Luke Hardin and that’s final.”

“Now look who’s being exasperating,” he said as he turned her to face him fully.  She looked up at him and their eyes met.  He leaned down to kiss her again, but she turned abruptly and took hold of the reins to her horse.  Adam helped her up into the saddle, placing his hand over hers after she settled.

“Carolyn, don’t be afraid to be a woman.”

She looked at him for several seconds before she spoke.  She said, “I’ve been a Sheriff for so long, I don’t know how to be a woman anymore.”

Before he could answer, she turned her horse and said, “I think Hardin’s tracks lead over that way.”  She urged her horse forward.  Adam slowly mounted his horse and followed her.

******

The going was slow because Sheriff Garrett kept feeling faint and nauseous from her head wound and so they had to stop several times for her to rest before they could continue on.

Carolyn stopped and leaned forward in her saddle in hopes of curbing the nausea that made her stomach churn like butter.  She closed her eyes and took deep breaths.

Adam came up beside her.  “You alright?”

“I will be in a minute,” she replied between the breaths and hoped the tone in her voice was convincing.  Adam took her canteen and uncorked it and handed it to her.  She took several swallows and handed it back to him.  She raised her head slightly.  “Feel like going on now?” he asked her.

She looked at him.  “You mean you’re not going to try to talk me out of going on?”

“No.  In the first place, it probably wouldn’t do any good, and in the second place, I decided I could get on your good side by agreeing with you every now and then.”

She leaned forward again and took another deep breath then straightened up, her eyes were closed.  Adam watched and wanted desperately to force her to go back to town, but he knew she was being driven by a desire that came under the heading of something that a person just had to do.  He watched her as she placed the back of her hand against each cheek and then placed her open palm over her eyes.  He moved Sport a couple steps closer just in case she should happen to fall out of the saddle.

When her nausea subsided she looked over at him.  “Ready?”

“If you are, Sheriff.”

She nodded and heeled her horse forward.  Adam rode as close to her side as was possible.  After awhile they came upon a ravine and Adam placed his arm in front of her and they stopped.  He pointed to his left.

“Look down there,” he said.

“What do you see?”

“A horse carcass.”

“Would you mind checking it out?  It’s probably Luke Hardin’s horse.  See if he’s down there too.”

Adam dismounted and made his way down and seeing only the dead animal, he checked it.  “I’d say from the angle of his front leg, it’s broken and his rider shot him.”  Adam placed his hand on the dead animal’s flank.  “It must have happened last night or this morning.  He’s on foot now, so he can’t be too far ahead.”

“It’s probably Luke Hardin.  Come on, Adam, we have a job to do.”

Adam climbed out of the crevice and mounted his horse, Sheriff Garrett had already started in the direction of the tracks on the ground.

******

With dusk beginning to fall, it became hard to follow the tracks, so Sheriff Garrett looked for a place to camp for the night.  Some distance away Adam spotted a spiraling smoke.  “Smoke, from a campfire,” he said to her, and they stopped.

“At last,” she breathed in relief.  Sheriff Garrett dismounted and feeling lightheaded, leaned against her horse until her legs could support her weight.  Adam was immediately at her side, steadying her.  The touch of his hand on the small of her back, sent chills up and down her spine and she gave a shudder.

“You’re sick, Carolyn…come over here and sit down,” he said and tugged on her to follow him, however, she had a firm hold on the pommel of her saddle.

“No…I-I’ll be alright in a minute.  Just give me a minute.”  She leaned her head against her saddle while Adam continued to support her.

“How much good are you going to be if that IS Luke Hardin over there?  You should have stayed at the Doc’s.”

She then pushed away from her horse and out of Adam’s steadying embrace, and walked around to the other side of her horse.  “We’ll leave our horses here and come up on him on foot.  Bring your rifle,” she said as she removed hers from the scabbard.

“I’d feel a heck of a lot better if you’d stay here and let ME do this,”  Adam said while removing his rifle from his scabbard also.  “But sometimes stubborn people have to learn things the hard way.”

She gave him an irritated look, then said, “You go around that way, and I’ll come in from behind, and once we have him cornered, let ME handle things.  Do you think you can follow that simple instruction?”  She turned to go forward when Adam grinned that scrumptious grin of his and spoke to her retreating back.

He said, “Don’t I always?”

Without turning around, she wagged her head back and forth and said, “You’re an exasperating man, Adam Cartwright.”

Nearing the campfire, Adam silently inched his way around the camp while Sheriff Garrett inched her way around the other side.  Nearing a form under a blanket, Adam raised his rifle and spoke.  He said, “Alright you…on your feet.”

When the form remained still, he nudged it with his boot.  The blanket fell away revealing only brush.  Behind him he heard the click of a gun hammer.  “Drop it,” the voice said.

Adam complied and threw down his rifle.

“Now the gunbelt.”

Adam reached down, untied the leather strap from around his leg and unbuckled his holster, letting it fall at his feet.

“Kick it over here.”

He did.  “Well, Hardin…we meet again,” Adam said, recognizing the voice.

Luke Hardin came around Adam into the firelight and faced him.  “I wondered how long it would take you to come after me.”

Sheriff Garrett saw and heard, then sneaked back out of sight, working her way around behind Luke Hardin.

Adam looked at the man holding a gun on him and thought him to be no older than Joe.  “Why don’t you give up and come back with me?  It’ll go a lot easier on you if you do,” Adam said to him.

“Well, since I’m the one holding the gun, I don’t think you have too much to bargain with.  Besides, I didn’t mean to kill the Sheriff.  I just got scared when I saw her badge.”

“I’m still alive, Luke.  Drop your gun.”

The sound of her voice behind him caused him to straighten up, while still holding his gun on Adam.  “No.  If you don’t drop YOURS, I’ll shoot your deputy here.”

“Then I’d have to shoot YOU, and I don’t want to do that.  Hand your gun to my deputy there, and nobody will have to get hurt.  I have to take you in to stand trial for your part in Granny Erma’s murder, Luke.”

“I won’t let you take me back!  Now, I’m warning you, Sheriff, if you don’t drop your gun, I’ll shoot him.” 

“Now Luke, don’t make me have to do this the hard way.  Just hand over your gun to my deputy.  Don’t make me tell you again.”

“No!”  Luke cocked the hammer, then turned suddenly on Sheriff Garrett and she pulled the trigger on her gun.  Luke Hardin lay dead where he had stood.  She looked at Adam.

“He was only a boy.  I tried to talk him out of it.”

“I know you did.  There for awhile I thought I might end up just like him.”

“I don’t know of any family he has left.  Let’s bury him as best we can, then we’ll go home.”

******

Straggling in a day and a half later, Adam and Sheriff Garrett reached her office.   She dismounted her horse and looped the reins around the hitching post, and stood beside it.  “I want to thank you, Adam, for going along with me.”

“My pleasure.  I rather enjoyed doing deputy work.”

She glanced at him sideways and smiled.  “I suppose you MIGHT consider your little bit of help in capturing Luke Hardin deputy work,” she said, teasing.

“Only MIGHT?  Don’t forget it was MY life being threatened back there.  I’m kind of partial to my life and I don’t like taking chances with it and I like it even less when other people take chances with it such as you did.”

“I wasn’t going to let him shoot you.  I had everything under control.”

“Everything under control.  He would have killed me…or have you forgotten.”

“But he didn’t.  Besides, I don’t know what YOU’RE squawking about; I’M the one who got her head almost shot off by an assassin’s bullet.  See…” she said and lifted a lock of hair and showed him her stitches.  “…while YOU, Mr. Man In Black, remained unscathed…unhurt…unmarked…un…”

“I know what it means.  However…I don’t know whether to be grateful to you for saving my life or to be angry with you for almost losing it for me.”

“Oh take the grateful route, Mr. Man In Black, it’s much better for your digestion.”  She reached up and patted his face for sarcastic emphasis, then turned.

“My digestion.  I’ll be lucky if I get all the nervous knots in my stomach out in a week.”

She turned and laughed at him.  Then he laughed also, while he followed her into the office, and stopped just inside the door.  “Out there I said I enjoyed doing the deputy work, but what I really meant was that I enjoyed being with YOU,” he said to her and touched her face softly.

She immediately stepped back from him and went over behind her desk, keeping it between them.  “I suppose you’ll be going back home now.”

“Trying to get rid of me?”

“How’d you guess,” she said, but she smiled and her eyes twinkled when she said it.  She unstrapped her holster and dropped it into her desk drawer and placed her hat on the corner of the desk.  She raised her eyes to look at Adam, then said, “You’re staring at me.”

“Am I?” he replied and walked to stand directly in front of her.  “I was just thinking…all the women I know are…”

“Tea, petticoats and ruffled dresses ladies?”

“I guess that’s what intrigues me most about you, Carolyn Garrett.  You’re not like any woman I have ever known.  You’re confident and sure of yourself and you have a great deal of refined courage and strength when you’re facing opposition.  You’re a bit stubborn, but I can live with that.”  He placed his hands on her upper arms and looked down into her eyes.  “I guess what I’m trying to say is, you’re the kind of woman I feel I’ve been look…”

He was stopped by her fingertips over his mouth.  “Don’t say it, Adam.  Don’t give yourself something to hope for.  When you leave here, we’ll probably never cross paths again.”  She removed her fingers from his lips and continued.  “Besides, I’m not ready to give up being Sheriff…and until, or if, that day comes, there can’t be any chance for us.”

“Not even a small one?”

“I AM attracted to you, I admit, but…”

“Well, that’s a start,” he cut in and smiled down at her.  “Come back to the Ponderosa with me, Carolyn.  Stay for a couple of months.  You’ll love it there…the lake; the mountains; the sunsets…I want to show them to you.  And I want my family to meet you.”

She closed her eyes and shook her head slightly then opened her eyes and looked up at him.  “I can’t, Adam.  For five seconds, I thought I would say yes, but I can’t.  I know Cooperville is hardly a dot in the road and I don’t earn my keep as Sheriff, but when things DO go wrong, the people here look to me to bring Cooperville back to normal.  During those times I’m Sheriff Garrett…no more…no less.  I’m not just a gun-toting woman wearing trousers, I’m the Sheriff.  The people accept and respect that and they feel safe with me being Sheriff.  I can’t leave them high and dry.  Please understand, Adam.”

“I DO understand…that’s the trouble.  But do you know Luke Hardin could have killed you that first time?  I felt my heart stop when I thought he had.”

“I know he could have…and it’ll probably happen again, but I can’t let might be’s scare me.”

“I’ve never known a woman like you.”

“Hopefully, I’m one of a kind.  I don’t think this world could handle TWO Sheriff C.J. Garrett’s.”

“Carolyn…come back with me.”

“You…uhm…better get started home.  You have a long way to travel.”  They gazed into each other’s eyes and he placed his palm against her cheek and stroked her face with his thumb.

“Do you REALLY want me to go?”

She hesitated a few seconds before she spoke.  Then she said, “You HAVE to go, Adam.  You MUST go.”

He nodded.  “We’ll see each other again.”

“Maybe…some day,” she said softly.  “But please don’t make a trip here just for that, it’ll be better that way.”

Silently, they walked out to Adam’s horse together and she looked up at him when he turned back to her.  “Good-bye, Sheriff C.J. Garrett.  If you ever need a good deputy…”

“I’ll put an ad in the paper.”

He grinned then they looked at each other once more, then she did something that surprised him.  She leaned up and kissed him quickly.  “Goodbye, Adam,” she said, then turned quickly and walked away from him.

He took the reins to Sport and patted the shiny chestnut colored animal with an affectionate hand.  “Come on boy…let’s go home,” he said while he watched Carolyn walk away.  He mounted Sport and walked him slowly out of town.  He admired Carolyn Jo Garrett, but he didn’t see her as a Sheriff, he saw her as a woman…a lady.”

******

“You know something, Hoss,” Joe said while observing Adam sitting in the blue velvet chair and staring at nothing.  “If I didn’t know our older brother so well, I’d say he was in love.”

Hoss eyed Adam carefully.  “Yeah…he does sorta have that calf-eyed look ‘bout him, don’t he.”

“Alright you two, stop with the jokes.  I’m just thinking,” Adam replied.

“About that female Sheriff you haven’t stopped talking about since you got home two months ago?” Joe replied.

“I guess I AM thinking about her.  It seems she’s all I EVER think about,” Adam admitted.  Then he did something he seldom did, he revealed his heart to his brothers and his father, who had remained quiet.

“I wake up with her on my mind; I go through the day with her on my mind; I try to keep my mind on my work, but sometimes that doesn’t happen.  This thumb I smashed with the hammer is proof of that,” he said, holding up his bandaged left thumb.  He continued:  “She’s the last memory I have before I go to sleep and I even dream we’re married.”

“Boy, if she’s got YOU, King of Bachelorhood, thinking like THAT, she MUST be some kind of woman,” Joe remarked.

“She is.”

“Are we ever going to get a chance to meet this young woman who has you so mesmerized, Adam?” Ben asked, joining the conversation.

“Yeah, I ain’t never met a little gal Sheriff b’fore,” Hoss said.

“Is she really as good a shot as you say, Adam?” asked Joe.

“She’s as good, and I believe she could even outdraw YOU, Joe.  I saw her draw on and shoot a man’s gun out of his hand before he could even raise it and point it at her.”

“How come yer interested in a gal like that, Adam?”  Hoss asked.  “I always thought you liked them prissy kind a-gals.”

Adam grinned.  “Well, Hoss, you thought wrong.”  Adam stood up and stood beside his chair.  “I’d like some more time off, Pa.  I have a trip I need to make tomorrow.”

“Let me guess,” said Joe.  “Cooperville.”

Adam looked to his father and Ben nodded.  “Of course you can have the time off.  Any idea how long you’ll need?”

“Long enough to talk a stubborn woman into something.”

“That long, huh.”

The family laughed, then after Adam asked Joe, and Joe agreed to drive him into town the next morning, Adam retired for the night.

“And with Adam away for who knows how long, you two will have to divide up his duties…starting bright and early in the morning,” said Ben to his two remaining sons.  They groaned loudly then said their goodnight’s to their father.  Ben chuckled at them and settled back in his chair, a happy father and he hope a father-in-law in the very near future.

******

The stage bounced and jostled along the Virginia City road, shaking up the passengers inside; a middle-aged couple; a salesman; a businessman; and a woman wearing trousers, a gun and a tin star on her shirt.  She held her hat in her lap.  Her fluffy dark hair blew in the breeze that came through the window.

All the way from Cooperville  at every stage stop, she was asked why she was dressed the way she was and if that was a real Sheriff’s badge.  She was so weary of explaining, she thought about having all the information printed up in handbills and just hand them out to everyone who questioned her about it.

She tried to sleep, but the deep ruts in the road caused the stage to bump and bang constantly, making it nearly impossible to do much more than just doze.  The driver kept urging the horses forward to their next stop…Virginia City for a two hour stopover.

******

Having conducted his business at the bank, Adam Cartwright stepped outside and made his way down the street to wait for the early morning stage to arrive, for his trip to Cooperville.

Coming out of the barbershop, Joe smoothed his freshly trimmed hair and situated his hat forward on his head, almost covering his eyes.  He made his way across the street towards the saloon.  The brothers converged on the corner of the building where Whitney Parker had his law office, then continued on their way to their destinations. 

“Sure you don’t want to have a beer first before you go, Adam?” asked Joe.

“No.  I don’t want to miss the stage.  Here it comes now.”

They saw the stage pull in up the street and watched as the passengers emerged.  One passenger sparked Adam’s interest and he hurried towards them, leaving his brother behind.  Joe looked after Adam and shrugged.  He widened his eyes and opened his mouth like a codfish when he saw his eldest brother greet the fluffy haired man who had just stepped off the stage in a rather odd way for one man greeting another man…a hug and kiss on the cheek.  Joe picked up his pace and hurried forward.

Adam pulled back from embracing the passenger and smiled.  “I knew it was you the minute you stepped off the stage.  How are you, Carolyn?  And what are you doing in Virginia City?  I was just getting ready to come and see you again.”

“It’s good to see you too, Adam,” she said.  “I’m on my way to Reno to pick up a prisoner.”

Joe had reached them by now and he said, “You’re not a long-haired man…you’re a…woman.”

Carolyn turned around to look at him.  “Joe…I’d like you to meet Sheriff C.J. Garrett.  Carolyn, my youngest brother, Joe,” Adam said making the introductions.

“So you’re the lady with the badge Adam told us about,” Joe said, taking her hand.  “He told us you were pretty, but he didn’t say HOW pretty.  No wonder he wanted to go back to Cooperville.”

Carolyn eyed him curiously and cast a quick glance at Adam, then back to Joe.  “Charm must be your main family trait.  It’s nice to meet you, Joe.”

“You say you’re on your way to Reno to pick up a prisoner?” asked Adam.

“Yes, is there some place I can go to wait until the stage leaves?  There’s a two hour layover.”

“Well, we can go to the hotel dining room; or we can walk and I can show you Virginia City; or we can rent a buggy and go for a nice ride.  Your wish is my command, my lady,” Adam said with a small bow at the waist and a wide sweep of his arm.

“Do you have to do that in public, Adam?  I’m goin’ to the saloon, before somebody thinks we’re related,” Joe said and hurried across the street.

Adam grinned.  “Works every time.”

“What?”

“All I have to do is quote Shakespeare or do something in public to embarrass him and he leaves right away.”

“Not only are you free with expelling your charm, you’re also scheming and crafty.”

“So what’ll it be?”

“Well, I’m tired of riding, so the buggy ride is out; and I’m tired of sitting, so the dining room is out; looks like you’re going to show me Virginia City.”

“Alright, a tour it is.”

“Howdy there, Adam.”  It was Sheriff Roy Coffee.

“Hello, Roy.  Roy, I’d like you to meet Sheriff C.J. Garrett of Cooperville.  Roy Coffee, our Sheriff.”

“How do you do, Sheriff Coffee,” said Carolyn with an extended hand.

“So yer the female Sheriff, huh.  Little Joe is tellin’ everyone in the saloon ‘bout ya, and I jest had to come see for myself.”

“Well, I’M the female Sheriff…sorry to have disappointed you, Sheriff Coffee.”

“Oh, I ain’t disappointed ma’am…it’s jest I don’t b’lieve I ever met a female Sheriff afore.  Fact is, I never even knowed they WAS sech a thing.”

“Well, it was nice meeting you, Sheriff Coffee, I hope we meet again sometime,” Carolyn said and took a couple steps away from him.

“I was wonderin’ somethin’…don’t ya find that bein’ a Sheriff is kind a-hard on a little thing like you?”

“Uh, Roy…I think I heard a ruckus in the saloon,” Adam said, speaking up suddenly.

“Did ya?  Well I guess I better go see what it’s about.  Probably somebody don’t believe there really IS a female Sheriff.  Nice meetin’ ya, ma’am,” he said touching his hat brim.  “See ya, Adam.”

“Thank you,” Carolyn said to Adam when Sheriff Coffee was out of hearing range.

“You owe me.  Let’s walk before somebody else comes along.”  Adam took her elbow and together they walked down the street.  Passing the dress shop, she stopped and glanced briefly at the dark green dress in the window.  Adam took notice.  “That color would look good on you,” he said.  She looked up at him then moved on.

“It’s very pretty, alright, but I have no chances to wear a dress.”  She stopped and walked back to the shop window and gazed at the dress some more.  “Dave always liked that color on me.”  She looked at it wistfully a few seconds more, then stepped away and moved on down the street.

“You’re going to Reno for a prisoner?”

“Yes.  Jack Torrence.”

Adam let out a low whistle.  “Jack Torrence.  He’s about as mean as they come.”

“I know that all too well.”

“Why do YOU want him?”

“He came through Cooperville about two months ago.  Right after you left, in fact.  He was loud and mouthy and making trouble in the saloon and I told him I’d run him out of town if he didn’t settle down.”  She paused several seconds which prompted Adam to ask her a question.

“What happened?  You didn’t come all the way from Cooperville just to go to Reno to pick up Jack Torrence for being loud and mouthy…what did he do?”

“You remember one of our citizens, Mr. Tillman?”

“Yeah.”

“He’s dead.  Jack Torrence killed him.”

“What happened?  If I remember right, Mr. Tillman was sort of a quiet sort.”

“He was and one of the kindest and gentlest men I knew.  Torrence kept making fun of Mr. Tillman’s hat and said it would look better mashed flat.  So that’s what he did.  He took Art’s hat off and stomped it, then placed it back on his head, Art left the saloon then, and came and told me, so I went to talk to Torrence.  Torrence left the saloon later and saw Art walking home.  He got on his horse and rode right over the top of Art, one of the horse’s hooves landed on Art’s head.  It killed him instantly.   Torrence knew that Art had been the one to come to me to tell me he was causing trouble, so that’s how he got back at him.  By the time I was summoned, Torrence was already leaving a trail of dust out of town.”

“I’m sorry, Carolyn.  I know you liked Art…I wish I had known.”

“I thought about sending you a telegram about it, but I just never got around to it.”

“How’s Mrs. Tillman?”

“She moved back East.  She said she couldn’t stay in Cooperville because everywhere she looked, she saw Art.  I told her I knew exactly how she felt and I made her a promise I would find Jack Torrence and bring him back for trial.  I put out wanted posters on him in every town within a hundred miles in every direction.  Then when the Sheriff in Reno telegraphed me telling me he had Jack Torrence in custody, I left on the first stage out and have been traveling ever since.”

“You plan on taking him back to Cooperville alone?”

“That’s my plan.”

“Don’t you think that’s a little dangerous on your part?”

“What do you mean?”

“He’s a killer, Carolyn.”

“Well if you’re worried about whether or not I can handle him, you should know by now that I CAN.  I’m not afraid of Jack Torrence.”

“Maybe not, but I think that maybe you should get a federal marshall to go with you…or SOMEONE.”

“I can handle it.  I don’t need any help.”

“I’m going with you.”

She stopped walking and looked up at him with a determined look in her eyes.  “Now, Adam…”

“Now nothing.  You need someone to go along and help you bring him back.”

“I don’t need any help.  And I certainly don’t need YOU telling me I need help. I better get back to the stage, I’ll just wait around there until it’s ready to go.  Don’t let me keep you from anything, Adam.”

“You’re not.  I’ll keep you company.”

They walked back to where the stage was and saw the driver inspecting the hitch pins and braces.  “Anything wrong, driver?” Carolyn asked.

“I’ll say.  Three broke hitch pins and two braces.”

“Well, will it take long to fix them?”

“The Smithy can’t get to them till tomorrow.  We’ll have to make this stop an overnight stay, I reckon.”

“I can’t do that, driver.  I have to be in Reno to pick up a prisoner this afternoon.”

“Sorry, guess you’ll have to get there some other way or wait till tomorrow.”

“Why don’t you send the Sheriff there a telegram and tell him you’ll be a day late?” Adam suggested.  “You can stay at the Ponderosa tonight, then leave when the stage is ready tomorrow.”

“I need to get there today.”

“What’s one more day?  I think there’s something else pushing you.  What is it, Carolyn?”

She looked at him.  “I suppose you’re right.  One more day won’t change the outcome.  Where’s the telegraph office?”

“Over there,” Adam said, pointing across the street.  “I’ll hire another buggy, so Joe can take this one back home; then load your bag, while you send your telegram.”

She nodded and headed across the street.  Adam wasn’t satisfied with her answer and felt she wasn’t being straightforward with him.  Reason being, she agreed with him and didn’t scold him for making a decision for her.  He decided he’d let it ride for now.  Maybe he’d get a chance to bring it up again before she left.

After she sent her telegram to the Sheriff in Reno, they headed for the Ponderosa.

******

“Your brother seemed friendly and didn’t make too big a deal out of the fact that I wear a gun, trousers, and a Sheriff’s badge.   But what about your other brother and your father?  How will THEY perceive me?”

“They’ll look at what kind of person you are, not what you’re wearing.”

“I suppose I’ll be eating dinner with your family?”

“Of course.”

“Oh.”

“Is something wrong?”

“Well, it’s just that…”

“What?  Carolyn, you know by now you can tell me anything.  What is it?”

“It’s just that I won’t be suitably dressed to have dinner in your home.  I don’t even own a dress anymore.  I wasn’t expecting to do any socializing on this trip.  I’m so used to wearing trousers, I wouldn’t even know how to wear a dress, so if you could just show me your place and then take me back to town…”

“Nothing doing.  You agreed to spend the night, so that’s what you’re going to do.”

“Are you telling me or asking me?”

“Oh asking…asking…naturally.”

“Naturally.  But like I said…”

“I told you they wouldn’t look at what you’re wearing, but if it’s that important to you…Look in the back seat.”

“The back seat?  Why?”

“That package…it’s for you.”

“For me?  What is it?”

“Well, open it and see.”

Carolyn eyed him suspiciously, but reached in the back seat and brought out the packaged wrapped in brown paper and unwrapped it.

“It’s the dress in the window.  But when did you have a chance to buy it?  When I was sending the telegram?”

“Mm Hmm.”

She began to re-wrap the dress and shake her head at the same time. “I can’t accept such a personal gift.”

“Why not?”

“A woman just doesn’t normally accept such a personal gift from a man.”

“That’s ridiculous.  You like the dress or not?”

“It’s very beautiful.”

“Then you keep it and wear it tonight at dinner.  What do you say?”

“I don’t know if I’d even know how to wear it or walk properly in it.  I’d probably trip over the skirt and fall flat on my face and embarrass myself silly.”

“You’re a woman, I’m sure you’ll get along with it just fine.  Where is that confident Sheriff C.J. Garrett that I know so well.”

“She seems to be a little muddled right now.”

Adam grinned.  He stopped the carriage and took her hand.  “Come on, I want to show you something,” he said and both of them stepped out.  Walking to the edge of the lake, they looked across its expanse.

“Oh Adam…the water looks like rippling glass; and the trees across the lake look so tall even from here.  They reach the sky!  And the mountains…!”

“When the sun first rises, they look purple and orange.  And from here on a clear day you can almost see all the way to Boston.”

“I believe you.  It’s beautiful.  You must love this place.”

“I do, but there’s one thing missing for it to be perfect.”

“What on earth could possibly be missing from all this?!”

“Someone to share it with.”  Adam turned her to face him.  “Carolyn…”

“I think we better be going,” she said, pulling away from him.

“Why do you always pull away from me?  Don’t be afraid to be a woman, Carolyn.”

“It isn’t that.”

“Then what?”

“I’m not ready for anything like that, Adam.  I’m just not ready.”

“Will you let me know when you are?  I’ll wait as long as I have to if I thought there was a chance…even a small one.”

“Adam…please…can we…can we go?”

“What are you afraid of?”

She took a deep breath and let it out slowly and looked up at him.  “Coming here with you was a bad idea.  Take me back to town, I’ll stay at the hotel.”  She took a step, but he snagged her arm and stopped her.

“Wait…If I promise to not pressure you anymore, will you stay at the Ponderosa?”

“You won’t bring up the subject of romance again?”

“Not unless you bring it up first.”

“I’m going to trust you to keep your word.  Alright…I’ll stay.”

“Will you keep the dress?”

“I’ll keep it.  And I’ll wear it tonight at dinner.”

He smiled slightly and took her elbow.  “I’ll show you the horses before we go to the house.”

All the way to the house he tried to think of topics of conversation to talk about, topics that were as distant from romance as East is from West.  He did it for Carolyn’s benefit more than for his.  He knew if he alienated her from him she would never let him near her again.  He would do whatever it took to keep that from happening, even if it meant giving up hope of sharing his life with her.  He would be content with just friendship.  She knew how he felt about HER; the next move in this chess game was HERS.

******

Pulling up in front of the house, Carolyn’s eyes were wide with wonder.  “It’s wonderful!”

“Wait until you see the inside.”

“I CAN’T wait!”

At that time, Hoss came from the barn and Ben strolled out of the house towards them.  “Adam…I thought you left to go to Cooperville,” said Ben, as they stepped out of the buggy.

“I cancelled it.  This is my father, and my brother Hoss.”

“Howdy, ma’am.” Hoss greeted her with a nod of his head and a smile.

“And you’re Sheriff C.J. Garrett,” Ben said taking her hand.  “From Adam’s description of you, I’d know you anywhere.  He told us all about you.  You’re even lovelier than he described.”

“You’re too kind, Mr. Cartwright.  I’m afraid Adam may have exaggerated.  And charm is definitely a Cartwright trait.  Thank you for such a warm welcome.”

“We’re glad to have you.  Will you be staying for awhile?”

“Only overnight.  I have to go to Reno tomorrow to pick up a prisoner.”

“It shore is hard to think of a little thing like you as a Sheriff,” Hoss commented.

Carolyn shrugged her shoulders and smiled at him.  “Well…I am.”

“And you must be tired from traveling.  Perhaps you’d like to rest before dinner,” said Ben.

“Yes, I would, and a bath would be nice.”

“Of course.  I’ll have Hop Sing prepare it for you.”

“Hop Sing?”

“Our cook…launderer…and according to him, boss of the house,” Ben replied, then laughed.  Carolyn laughed too as they made their way to the house, Adam following carrying the bags.

“Oh, Mr. Cartwright, your house is marvelous!” she said when she entered and looked around.  “It suits the four of you.”

“I suppose, but it makes it nicer when we have guests as lovely as you to pretty it up.”

Adam smiled at Ben’s approval of her.

“Adam, you’ve been quiet,” Ben remarked.

“I’m just enjoying listening to you two talk.  Come on, Carolyn, I’ll show you to your room.”

She nodded and walked beside Adam and up the stairs.  Placing her bag and the parcel with her dress in it, inside her room, he paused.  “I hope you like the room.  Hop Sing will be up with your water pretty soon.  Let us know if you need anything and we eat at eight o’clock.  Will that give you enough time to rest and get ready?”

“Oh, more than enough.”

When Adam turned to leave, she called his name.   He stopped and turned around.  “Thank you,” she said.  “For everything.”

He smiled then he was gone.

******

Carolyn, dressed in the dark green dress, looked at herself in the long mirror.  Her eyes traveled from her just brushed hair all the way down to the hem of her dress.  Peeking out from under, were the toes of her boots, the only footwear she had with her.

“Oh well,” she said, humping her shoulders.  “They’re better than going barefooted.  Maybe the Cartwright’s won’t notice…too much.”

Meanwhile, downstairs, the Cartwright’s waited for her.  “How much longer ‘fore we eat,” Hoss complained.  “I’m starved,” he added, holding his belly for added emphasis.

“As soon as our guest comes down,” Ben replied.  “Just be patient.”

“Be patient?  A feller could become plumb puny by bein’ patient.”

“You have a long way to go before you reach the puny stage,” Adam teased, and Joe laughed.

“Speaking of being puny…not that she is…but Adam, I just can’t see your lady friend as bein’ a Sheriff; leading posses and shooting outlaws,” Joe said shaking his head.  “I mean I saw the badge she was wearing and all, but that’s not exactly something you see…a woman Sheriff.”

“Well, Joe, the citizens of Cooperville feel safe with her as Sheriff.  I’ve seen her get the drop on  a man bigger than Hoss, and he had his gun in his hand and she still outdrew him.  She’s a faster draw than even you.”

“Faster’n Joe?” asked Hoss, unbelieving.

“Faster,” Adam replied, then noticed his father was looking past him and he turned.  He saw Carolyn standing on the staircase landing.  He smiled an approving smile and walked slowly over to her while she descended the last few steps.  Before she reached the bottom, he glanced down at her feet.  His smile broadened.

“You look lovely, Carolyn.”

“I feel awkward in a dress and I guess my boots make me look stupid.”

“You look lovely.”

“She sure does, and I was wondering if I might escort you to the table, Mrs. Garrett,” said Ben, walking over to her and offering her his arm.

“You know that I was married?”

“And how your husband died.  Adam told us all about you.  May I?” he said, still offering her his arm.

“And may I?” said Adam, offering her his arm as well.

“Well…TWO escorts for dinner…how lucky can one woman be.  I’d be delighted, kind sirs,” she said, slipping each arm through theirs.

******

“Missy eat more sup-puh,” said Hop Sing as he stood beside Carolyn’s chair with a full plate of fried chicken and a big smile on his face.

“Oh, no Hop Sing, I can’t eat another bite.  It was a wonderful dinner, I haven’t tasted food so good in a long time.  I just might kidnap you and take you back to Cooperville with me.”

“Hop Sing like cooking foh pretty lady.  Make job moh enjoyable.”

Carolyn dipped her head at Hop Sing and spoke to him in his own language.  He smiled widely, then turned back to the kitchen, singing in  his native tongue.

“You never cease to intrigue me, Carolyn.  I didn’t know you knew Chinese,” Adam said, looking at her in surprise.

“I learned it in the orphanage, and I kept up with it.  Once in awhile we’ll get some Chinese through Cooperville, so it comes in handy.”

“What was that you said to him?” Adam asked.

She tilted her head to the side and a glint came in her eyes.  “It’s our secret,” she replied.

“What else don’t I know about you?”

“THAT…Adam Cartwright, is a deep dark secret, too,” she said, pushing her chair back, and standing up.  The men all stood when she did.  “If you gentlemen will excuse me, I think I’ll get some fresh air.”

They watched as she exited the house.  “She’s a lovely girl,” Ben commented.

“She shore is, but she still don’t look like no Sheriff,” Hoss commented.

“That’s what she is though, Hoss, first and foremost.  Being Sheriff of Cooperville is her whole life,” said Adam, while still looking at the closed door.

“I take it she hasn’t fallen under the spell of your charm yet, hey brother,” Joe said with a mischievous smile on his face.

“It hasn’t been because I haven’t tried.  She let me know in no uncertain terms she didn’t want any kind of a relationship…with ME, or any other man.  She’s content to just being Sheriff C.J. Garrett,” said Adam with a notable sadness in his voice.  “And I’ll just have to be content with being her friend until she’s ready for something more,” he added.
“Can you be content with just friendship, Adam?” asked Ben.

For the first time since Carolyn walked outside, Adam took his eyes off the door and looked at his father.  “I’ll have to be, otherwise I’ll lose her completely,” he answered, then walked to the door and outside.

“We’re gonna have to do something to change her mind,” Joe suggested.  Hoss nodded in agreement.

“Oh no, you’re not.  You two stay out of Adam’s personal life.  He can handle it just fine without the help of you two.”

“Yeah, but Pa…”

“Yeah but Pa, nothing, Joseph.  Mind your own business,” Ben said then put a finger to Joe’s chest.  “And that’s an order.”

Joe grumbled as he walked away, Hoss grinned and Ben went to his favorite chair.

Adam’s footsteps on the plank boarding caused Carolyn to turn around and look at him.  “Are the nights always this beautiful on this Ponderosa of yours, Adam?”

He walked up beside her and looked up at the clear sky sprinkled with millions of stars.  “Most nights.  But my favorite nights are when it’s just started snowing and the crisp mountain air makes my nose inside cold; and my nose and cheeks red.  Then I step into the house where the fire is blazing and I sit in front of the fireplace drinking a hot cup of coffee.”

“Or you sit in your favorite chair and read…or write in your journal,” she added.  “Sounds nice.”

“What about you?  What’s your favorite night, Carolyn?”

She didn’t answer him right away, but when she DID answer, her voice was soft and quiet.  “I think my favorite night is one just like this one.  It’s been a good evening, Adam.  I’m glad I accepted your invitation.”

“So am I.”

Carolyn began walking out into the yard, Adam walked with her.  “Do you think you could ever leave this Ponderosa, Adam?”

“I haven’t really thought about leaving.”

“I don’t blame you, it’s beautiful here.”

“What about you?  Would you ever stop being a Sheriff?”

“Before tonight, I would have said no.  But…”

Adam moved a couple steps closer to her and looked down at her.  “But…” He paused allowing her to finish the statement.

“I remember how it was, being Dave’s wife.  Cooking…cleaning…all the things a wife does for her husband.  I remember the nights when he came in from a long day and we sat in front of the fireplace and we’d talk.  Not about anything of real importance, but we were together…just us.  Then before we went to bed, I’d sit at his feet and he’d take my brush and brush my hair.  I’ve forgotten his gentle hand on my cheek, and I’ve forgotten the sound of his voice, and I miss all that.”  Her voice choked with emotion and in the moonlight, Adam saw a tear creep down her cheek.  He reached out and wiped the tear away with a gentle touch.  She smiled and raised a hand to feel where he had touched her and their hands touched.  Still smiling, she looked over at him and when she saw his face, her smile left and she stepped back from him.

“I’m tired…I think I’ll go to bed.  Goodnight, Adam,” she said quickly and left his side just as quickly.  He watched while she crossed the yard back to the house and then inside.  He exhaled deeply and stuck his hands in his back pockets and walked slowly to the house.

******

Carolyn was up early the next morning and had her satchel setting beside the door when three of the four Cartwright’s came down for breakfast.

“Mr. Cartwright, I want to thank you and your sons for your generous hospitality.  I truly appreciate it and now I must be going.  Would it be alright if I use your buggy and leave it at the livery stable for you?”

“Of course, but I can ask one of the hands to drive you in.”

“I’ll drive.”  Adam’s voice came from the staircase.  He walked down the stairs and in his hand he was carrying a bag.  “I’m going with you to Reno, Carolyn.”

“That really isn’t necessary, Adam, but I will take you up on your offer of driving me in.”  Turning to the other Cartwright’s she smiled and extended her hand.  “Thank you again, Mr. Cartwright…Joe…Hoss.  Perhaps we’ll meet again.”

“It’s been our pleasure,” Ben replied and Joe and Hoss nodded in agreement.  She reached down for her bag, only to find Adam was holding it in his other hand.  She looked up at him, then pulled the door open and Adam followed her outside to the buggy, he had hitched up earlier.  He placed the bags in the buggy.  Carolyn stepped in and sat down, Adam sat beside her and guided the buggy towards Virginia City.

Down the road, Adam turned to look at her.  “I know you’re angry with me.”

“That’s putting it mildly.”

“Carolyn, about last night…”

“Stop the buggy, Adam.  Stop it right now.”

“Whoa, boy.”  He pulled back on the reins and the horse stopped.  “Alright, we’re stopped.  What is it?”

Turning full body to him, she looked him square in the eyes.  “I was caught up in a long ago memory last night, and I was weak and vulnerable for a few moments.  I’m telling you again…I’m not ready for that kind of life again, and I won’t let last night be repeated.  Do you understand?  And as for going to Reno with me, I’d just as soon you wouldn’t.  It isn’t any of your concern.”  She turned her whole body and looked straight ahead once more.  “Now let’s get going.  I don’t want to miss the stage.”

“Let’s get two things straight, Carolyn.  I’ll abide by your wishes and be only a friend, if that’s all you want me to be.”

“You said two things.  What’s the other?”

“I’m going to Reno with you, regardless of what you say, so you might just as well accept it.” 

Before she could answer, he put the horse into a trot towards Virginia City.

******

Arriving in Reno, the Virginia City stage was greeted by the Sheriff there.  Adam stepped out of the coach and the Sheriff held out his hand to him.  “Sheriff Garrett, I’m Sheriff Doug Pierce.  I have your prisoner all ready.”

“I’m Adam Cartwright.  There’s Sheriff Garrett,” he said, pointing to Carolyn as she stepped out of the stage, holding a small bag.

Sheriff Pierce’s eyes grew big when he saw her.  “But you’re a wom…”

“I’m a Sheriff.  Sheriff C.J. Garrett.  You’ve already met my deputy.  Now let’s take care of all the paperwork shall we, Sheriff,” she said and made her way down  the street to the jail.

“Well, Sheriff, you heard what Sheriff Garrett said,” Adam said and followed Carolyn, leaving Sheriff Pierce standing alone.

“But, she’s a…woman!”

“Good observation, Sheriff,” Adam called over his shoulder.  Sheriff Pierce hurried and followed them inside his office.

“Now Sheriff Pierce, here are the extradition papers, giving you authority to release Jack Torrence in my custody.  I’ve already signed them, so if you’ll get the prisoner, we’ll be on our way,” Carolyn said, holding out the paperwork to him.

“I don’t think this is legal, turning a prisoner over to a woman saying she’s a Sheriff.  Not such a thing.”

“Well I’m one.  Now if you’ll just get the prisoner,” she said, placing the papers on his desk.

“No, I can’t turn him over to you.  If women can’t vote, women can’t be Sheriff’s.  I’m sorry, I just don’t believe you’re for real.”

“Now look Sheriff Pierce…I’m only going to tell you this one more time, then me and my deputy are taking custody of Jack Torrence.  The stage is waiting to take us back to Cooperville, so I want this handled, and I want it handled NOW.  I AM Sheriff C.J. Garrett of Cooperville, and I’m taking custody of your prisoner right now.”

Sheriff Pierce looked over at Adam, who stood casually with his arms folded across his chest and with a  glint in his eyes.  “She means business,” Adam said.  “I’d do what she wants, if I were you.”

“She’s for real?”

Adam nodded and smiled.  “She’s for real.”

Though not completely convinced, Sheriff Pierce grabbed the keys and headed for the cell block.

“On your feet, Torrence, you’re going on a little trip,” Sheriff Pierce called out to the man lying on the cot in his cell.

Torrence turned over and stood up when the cell door opened.  Adam perused him closely and kept his hand on his gun.  Jack Torrence stood at least six feet tall, his dark hair in back curled over his collar, and his blue eyes looked cold and callus and moved slowly up and down Carolyn’s figure, drinking in every curve.  A slow grin spread across his face and Adam saw the hungry nefarious look in his eyes.  His hand clutched his gun butt just a little bit tighter.

“Well, lady Sheriff, we meet again,” Torrence said in a taunting tone.

Out of the small bag she carried, Carolyn pulled out a set of hand and leg manacles and handed them to Sheriff Pierce.  “Put these on him, Sheriff…his hands behind his back.”  She pulled out her gun and held it on Jack Torrence while Sheriff Pierce did as she requested.  “Alright, Torrence, let’s go.”

“You’ll never get me back there alive.”

She looked him square in the eyes and without blinking, she said, “That’ll be up to you.  Now move.”

Jack Torrence sauntered out of his cell in a cocky manner and stopped in front of her.  He looked down into her eyes.  “You sure are pretty, you know that.  I sure would like to…”

“Get moving, Torrence,” she cut in.  “Keep your dirty thoughts to yourself.  Now, move.”

He grinned arrogantly at her and moved forward, the ankle manacles clinked and rattled with each step he took.

******

Per Carolyn’s request, the three of them were the only occupants in the stage.  Jack Torrence squirmed and moved about on the coach seat while Carolyn and Adam kept their eyes glued to him from across the way.  She held her gun across her lap.

“It’s kind of hard to lean back with my hands behind my back,” Torrence complained during one of his many squirmings.

“Get used to it,” she retorted.  “We’ve got a ways to go, but I don’t feel sorry for you one little bit.”

“You think you’ll get me there, don’t ya, lady Sheriff.”

“Alive or dead,” she stated in a cool, steady tone.  Adam glanced over at her.  She kept her eyes glued to Jack Torrence.  “It’s your choice, Torrence.”

“If I ever get the chance on this trip, Sheriff, I’ll kill you, I swear I will.”

Without wavering her gaze at him, she said, “Save your breath for praying, Torrence,  when that noose is around your neck.”

Jack Torrence glared at her, then leaned back as best he could.  All the while, his mind raced as to how to escape.

******
The stage rolled into Cooperville and Carolyn escorted her prisoner to jail and locked him securely inside.  “Well, I’m glad THAT trip’s over,” she said to Adam, placing the keys on the peg behind her desk and placing her hat on the corner of her desk.  “After I feed Torrence, I’m going to talk to the Judge about his trial.  When are you heading out?”

“Tomorrow, after I’ve had a good night’s sleep.  How about having dinner with me after you talk to the Judge?”

She smiled warmly and nodded her head.  “Alright.  I’ll meet you at the café in…let’s say an hour?”

“Fine.  I’ll get a room at the hotel, get some of this coaching dust off and meet you there.”

She smiled and Adam left.  Making sure once again Torrence was secure, she left for the café and brought back Torrence’s food, then went to the Judge’s chambers to set up a trial date.  When she returned to the jail to take Torrence’s food dishes back to the café, she found him writhing on his cot, begging for the doctor.

“Alright, Torrence, I’ll get the doctor and be right back,” she said and left.
She let Dr. Winters into Torrence’s cell and relocked the door and waited while the doctor examined him.

“Alright, Torrence, sit up, so I can listen to your back,” Dr. Winters said to him.  Torrence did as requested and looking in the Doc’s bag, he spied a pair of scissors.  He reached in the bag quickly, grabbed them, stood up and spun the doctor around, holding the scissors to his throat all in one movement.  Carolyn’s gun was already out, but she was unable to get a clear shot at Torrence, without endangering the doctor.

“Hand that gun to me, lady Sheriff, and let me out of here, or the Doc will die where he stands.”

Carolyn remained with her gun pointing at them.  Seeing the frightened look on the Doc’s face, she unlocked the cell doors.  Holding the doctor tight against him, he pushed him forward, out of the cell, taking Carolyn’s gun from her.  He pushed the doctor into her, causing them to fall down, while at the same time, he made his escape out the side door.

Getting quickly to her feet, she ran to the gunrack in her office, grabbed a rifle, and ran out the back door.  Seeing Torrence running, she dropped to one knee, leveled the rifle and squeezed the trigger.  Torrence faltered, but continued to run, limping and staggering down the street.

From across the street, Adam heard the shot and sprinted across to the Sheriff’s office, then out the back, following Carolyn down the street.  Catching up to her, she said, “Torrence escaped.  He’s probably heading for the livery.  I hit him, but I don’t know how badly.”

She made a move to go in that direction, but Adam held her back.  “Don’t you think we should get more men, you shouldn’t go in there by yourself.” 

“I don’t need you telling me my job, Adam.  Now stay out of the way.  Torrence is in there and I’m going in after him.”

“Carolyn, at least wait until I can round up a couple more men.  Torrence isn’t going anywhere if he’s in there, and he’s wounded.”

“Let go of my arm, Adam.”

“You’re signing your own death warrant.”

“Let go of my arm.”  Her voice was low and cold and she said it slow and demanding.  Adam turned loose of her arm. 

“Then I’m going in with you.”

“Now Adam…:”

“You can arrest me and put me in front of a firing squad later if you want to, but I’m going I with you whether you like it or not.”

“Alright, come on…but don’t get in my way.”

“I wouldn’t dream of it, Sheriff,” he replied sarcastically.

Reaching the livery stable, Carolyn opened the door.  It squeaked.  She motioned for Adam to go one way while she went the other.  Hearing two shots, Adam called out to her.

“Over…here.  Torrence is…dead,” she called back.

Adam found Torrence in one stall, face down.  He found Carolyn lying on her back in the next stall.  He crouched down beside her and cradled her in his arms.  The wound in her stomach had already made a large red stain on the front of her shirt.  “I should have listened to you, Adam…about getting more help.  Torrence…he was right there…waiting for me.”

“Shhh.  Don’t talk, I’ll get you to the doctor.”

“No, Adam, I’m dying…you know I am.”

“I know, hon.”

She managed a smile.  “What will you write about me in your journal, Adam?”  She groaned and her breath became labored.  She grimaced in pain and her eyes watered.  “It hurts, now…I think I’m scared, Adam.”

“What can I do to make you more comfortable, Carolyn?”

“Just hold me…and talk to me.  Take me to the Ponderosa…I want to see it again, Adam.  That day at the lake…help me remember it.”  She coughed and blood dribbled from one corner of her mouth.  Adam took out his bandana and wiped it away, then held her close to his chest.  Picking straw from her hair, he talked to her.

“The lake sparkles like rippling glass; the tall, towering Ponderosa pine trees, reach the sky; the mountains are purple, orange and red when the sun rises and on a clear day you can see all the way to Boston.”  He paused because he could feel her slipping away from him.  She looked up into his eyes and raised her hand slowly to touch his face.  She began to weep, though she smiled.  “I see it, Adam.  I can see it again…”  She coughed and struggled to clear her throat, then choking, drew in one more labored breath.

He saw the life go out from her.  “No Carolyn, don’t.”  He knew the instant she died.  Her hand went limp at the wrist and dropped from his face and caught in the open neck of his shirt.  Her head lolled against his chest and stayed there.  He closed his eyes and placed his head face down on top of her head.  In silence, he mourned her.

******

Every man, woman and child in Cooperville attended the graveside service of Sheriff Carolyn Jo Garrett.  Adam was asked to say words over her grave.  Standing at the head of the open grave with his hat in his hands, he began:

“I feel privileged to have known Sheriff Carolyn Jo Garrett.  I probably knew her better than some of you.  She was determined and sure of herself; even in the face of danger, she was fearless.  She was the kind of Sheriff any town would be proud to have; she was the kind of Sheriff that other Sheriffs should envy.  She was a hero when she went after the Hardins, and took Luke Hardin’s bullet; and again when she took a bullet from Jack Torrence…the bullet that ended her life.  More than being a hero, she was a lady.  I’ll never forget her and neither should all of you.  You owe it to her to never let her be forgotten.”

He knelt and placed her badge on her coffin and stood up.  “While living, she wore this Sheriff’s badge proudly and honorably.  Now in death, it’s her Badge of Courage.”

He stepped back from the gravesite while all the townspeople filed by and sprinkled their handful of dirt on her coffin.  After her grave was filled in, only he and two of the men from town were left standing.

One of the men cleared his throat, Adam looked over at him.  “Uh, Mr. Cartwright, we…that is, the people of the town…were wondering…we were wondering if you’d stay here and be our Sheriff.  We could tell from your speech how much you admired Sheriff Garrett, and we know how brave you were to go along with her after the Hardin gang, and all.  We…”

Adam held up a hand in front of the man.  “I’m sorry, but I have a ranch to run with my father and brothers.  I appreciate you thinking I could do the job, but frankly speaking, you’ll have to find a better man than me to fill her shoes as Sheriff.  I’m sorry.”

Both men nodded their heads in understanding and left Adam standing alone.  He stepped closer to her grave marker.  “Goodbye, Carolyn Jo Garrett, the only woman Sheriff and the most courageous woman I have ever had the privilege to know.  You were greatly admired and you’ll be greatly missed.”

He placed his hat on his head, stepped over to a waiting buggy that would take him back to town to catch the stage.  Before climbing in, he looked back at Carolyn’s grave and touched his hat brim, smiled and said, “Goodbye sweet lady.  I’ll never forget you.”  He stepped in and directed the buggy back to town.

******

“You’ve been writing in that journal ever since you got home, Adam. You haven’t said much since you returned from Cooperville.”

“Someday, I’ll let you read about it in my journal, Pa, but for now it’s private.”

“I understand.  Well, I’ll leave you to it, then.  Goodnight, son.”

Goodnight, Pa.”  After Ben left, Adam read out loud what he had just written:

“BADGE OF COURAGE”
By Adam Cartwright

A story of one woman’s determination and courage.  Carolyn Jo Garrett was the first woman Sheriff I’ve ever met.  A woman of the rarest kind…a real lady…and the kind of woman a man could love………………”

THE END
Author: Eileen K
Author’s Note:  This is the story I struggled with the ending, and this is the one I was encouraged to go with.