Synopsis: Adam receives devastating news from the Ponderosa.
Rating: PG
Words: 2,500
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Author’s Note: At the end of Karen Fedderly and the Outrider’s wonderful, suspenseful story “The Murder of Joe Cartwright.” are three epilogues, written respectively by the story’s authors, Helen Adams and the Tahoe Ladies. There is a tongue- in-cheek invitation for a fourth epilogue. I had the unmitigated gall to take it seriously. When I read the story I found myself wondering if Adam was being kept informed of what was happening, and how he was reacting. I know Griff thought he’d heard that there was “another brother in Europe”, but I decided that it was not unrealistic for his information not to be up to date. I put Adam in Boston, which is where I left him at the end of “Responsibilities”, which would have taken place about two years prior to the action in this story.
Thank you Karen and Randy for taking the time to read this story, for your kind and helpful comments, and for letting me post it.
This is kind of a “What Was Happening at the Same Time” story.
Distant Grief
Sunday, May 2
It was so hard to concentrate on anything. Losing his beloved youngest son made any concern with what was going on around him seem pointless and even unseemly, as if it were a betrayal of Joe’s memory. But no, Ben reminded himself, Joe was not his youngest. He may have been the last natural born son in the family, but there was a grieving young man in the house whom Ben had adopted. As Griff had reminded him, Jamie was Ben’s son too and had come to mean as much to him as his other three. Ben had just resolved to find the boy and reassure him of that fact when Jamie came into the room and tentatively approached his father’s desk.
Ben couldn’t form any words to convey what he was feeling to Jamie, so he rose and gathered the young man in his arms and held on tight. The two embraced wordlessly for a few minutes before Jamie pulled away. Something had been troubling him, which he felt he had to ask. “Pa, have you let Adam know…you know… about Joe?” Jamie found he couldn’t say his slain brother’s name without choking back a sob.
Ben sat down heavily in his desk chair and put his head in his hands. “I mean to write him a letter before I go to bed tonight.” As if there was any point in going to bed. How could he sleep?
“But Pa,” continued Jamie, diffidently, “A letter might take weeks to get to him. Shouldn’t we send him a telegram?”
Ben replied through pursed lips. “How can I tell Adam his brother is dead in a few clipped sentences? How can I do that to him? I want to see him, but if he drops everything and comes rushing out here in response to such a wire, he might feel compelled to turn around and go back as soon as possible to tend to his business, just like he did the last time. If he does come, I want him to stay for a while.”
Jamie persisted. “Can’t we say that in the wire? It just seems to me that if he gets a letter and finds out that he’s spent a few weeks acting like nothing is wrong when something so terrible is wrong he ain’t gonna feel too good about that. I know I sure wouldn’t.”
The usually decisive Ben Cartwright was genuinely undone by the effort of resolving this dilemma. Jamie offered to compose a telegram and show it to Ben for approval before he sent it. Ben agreed with the slightest of nods.
The message that Jamie delivered to the telegraph office the next day was sent out over the wires as follows:
DEAR ADAM,
I AM SO SORRY TO TELL YOU THAT JOE WAS KILLED THIS WEEK STOP
PA SAYS PLEASE DONT COME TILL YOU GET HIS LETTER STOP
I KNOW ITS HARD TO BE SO FAR AWAY STOP
YOUR LOVING BROTHER JAMIE
After the wire was sent, Jamie worried about using the words “loving brother”. He hardly knew Adam. Maybe Adam would think his adopted brother was presuming too much. But the youth reassured himself with the thought that the important thing was to help Adam maybe feel not quite so bad at getting the terrible news. Let him know he was as much part of the family as if he were here with them, just as Jamie needed to know he was as much part of the family as if he were born to it.
Monday, May 3
Adam stared at the flimsy sheet of paper from the telegraph company, as if he could will its words not to be true, or at the very least force them to provide more information. Joe killed! How? By whom? Or could the message mean he died in an accident? Oh, Pa, how can you stand it? Another loss, another piece of you gone!
“I’m not sure I can stand it,” he thought. “Since I was twelve I’ve been the oldest of three brothers. It was always Adam, Hoss and Little Joe. How can I be the only one left? How could this have happened?”
Adam spent the morning secluded in his office. At first, he couldn’t begin to make any rational plans. Then he contemplated defying the telegram’s directive and rushing straight to Nevada. Finally he was able to read more deeply between the lines. “Pa remembers how I had to hurry back here after Hoss died. I know that hurt him. This time, in addition to the grieving, there are going to be some complicated legal and financial matters to work out, things we won’t even be ready to think about for a while.” Adam wrote out a return wire and sent it to the telegraph office with his office clerk.
PA JAMIE,
I AM SORRIER THAN I CAN SAY TO HEAR ABOUT JOE STOP
WHILE I AWAIT YOUR LETTER I WILL ARRANGE THINGS HERE SO I CAN MAKE AN EXTENDED VISIT HOME STOP
MY THOUGHTS ARE ALL WITH YOU STOP
YOUR LOVING SON AND BROTHER ADAM
That night, sitting in his parlor, glass in hand, a bottle of whiskey on the side table, Adam thoughts were all recollections of his brother Joe. For someone who put such stock in language, Adam found that his most powerful memories did not involve words. He remembered–
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- the tiny fist of a squalling baby, born too soon, wrapped around a worried twelve-year-old brother’s finger,
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- sticky hands of a little boy reaching around a big brother’s neck as they went for a “horsy ride”,
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- the surprisingly powerful punch of a hot-tempered, near-grown youth thrown at the jaw of a bossy older brother,
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- gentle hands wiping cool water on the burning face and parched lips of a man who was at the brink of madness and death in a remote desert wilderness,
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- urgent hands practically dragging an older brother into a buggy to get him home in time to say goodbye to his beloved middle brother,
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- a strong handshake from a man saying a reluctant farewell.
Adam shuddered as the realization hit him that that last memory was of his final goodbye to Joe.
Monday, May 17
Pa’s letter arrived in Boston.
I know the news about Joe must have shocked you to the core. I cannot believe it is true myself, though we buried him today, next to his mother. Near as we can tell, he and one of the hands were tricked into stopping to help a man with a broken wagon as they road home from selling some horses. This man killed them both. We suspect that the murderer is Wolfgang Reinhardt, whose brother was hung on my testimony seven years ago. Reinhardt recently escaped from prison, and he left his knife at the scene of the crime. Clem is organizing a posse, but Candy and Griff are going off on their own search. Griff has a notion they might have a better chance of catching him. I know that I want the bastard caught and punished, killed actually, but I also know that that will not bring my Joseph back.
Joe showed such strength of character this past year. You would have been so proud of him. While grieving deeply for Alice and the baby she carried, he was not letting his grief prevent him from moving on with his life. I hope I can follow his example. You know better than anybody that I have had to do this before. I just don’t know if I can do it one more time. Griff reminded me that I can’t forget about Jamie, and I won’t. He is truly my fourth son. I can’t forget about you either, my firstborn. Adam, I do not want you to think that Joe’s death should alter your decision not to return to the Ponderosa permanently. As I told you when you left, your life is your own. I do hope that you can arrange things so you can come for a lengthy visit. If for some reason that is not possible, I will understand.
Pa
Adam shuffled through the rest of his mail. He was surprised to see another letter with a Virginia City postmark. The return address was even more startling, ‘Helen Gantry’. It took a moment to attach a face to that name. She had served on the school board with Pa for many years. Adam remembered her as honest and dedicated, but rather a busybody. He slit open the envelope. Inside were a handwritten note and two folded newspaper clippings. He read the note first.
I wanted to express my condolences on your terrible and sudden loss. All of Virginia City’s hearts are with the Cartwrights at this terrible time. I thought you might appreciate the enclosed clippings as remembrances.
Yours truly,
Miss Helen Gantry
Adam gently smoothed out the clipping with his hands and placed it between the pages of a book. He then turned his attention to the second clipping. The side that was showing contained the bottom of a dry goods store advertisement and the top of an article about the condition of the pedestrian boardwalks in Virginia City. He turned the piece of paper over and what he read took his breath away. “Joseph Cartwright’s body was found chained and burned alive…”
A wave of nausea passed through Adam, but he was hardly conscious of it. “Oh, Joe! Oh, Pa, why didn’t you tell me?”
Adam got up and began pacing his small office, the phrase “burned alive” repeating itself over and over in his mind. Coherent thought was impossible. Adam felt like a caged animal. When the four walls that surrounded him became too confining he burst abruptly through his office door and headed for the stairs that would take him down to the building exit. In his turmoil he didn’t notice the clerk laden with files approaching from the opposite direction. They collided, and Adam tumbled down eight steps to the next landing.
Adam lay there speechless and immobilized from the shooting pains that ran from his lower back down his left leg. When he had recovered enough to try to rise, he found that the offending leg buckled under him. The effects of his ten-year-old back injury, which had become just a minor, nagging disturbance in recent years, were reasserting themselves in full force.
The apologetic clerk, with the assistance of several warehousemen, managed to get him home and into bed. A physician was summoned who prescribed prolonged bed rest. This would prove to be one of the most frustrating periods of Adam Cartwright’s life. He barely tolerated the ministrations of the aide who was hired to tend to him. He virtually ignored the visitors who came to pay sick calls, so that only one friend made the effort to return more than once.
Thursday, May 27
“Useless! Useless to my family, useless to my business, useless to myself! Charlie, I shouldn’t be lying here in Boston, I should be with my father and Jamie on the Ponderosa.” Other than variations on this refrain, Adam had hardly spoken during the past ten days. Charles Weston sat at his bedside, at a loss how to comfort his broken, suffering friend.
They heard the sound of a muffled conversation from the townhouse’s entry hall. A minute later, the aide knocked on the bedroom door. “Come in already,” Adam growled.
The aide entered and handed his boss an envelope containing a telegram. “What now?” muttered Adam, as he unfolded the envelope’s contents. His eyes opened wide and he gasped as he read:
Wednesday, July 14
Adam graduated from complete bed rest to hobbling out to his parlor to spend part of each day reading and catching up with work which was brought to him from his office. Monday he had read with extreme horror and profound relief a letter from his father detailing Joe’s ordeal and rescue, at least as much of the story as Ben had been able to pry out of Joe, Candy and Griff. Though Adam knew Candy only slightly, and had never met Griff, he felt overwhelming gratitude to the two men who had persisted beyond all reason and put their lives on the line to find Joe.
Today’s mail contained a letter addressed in a familiar backwards-slanting hand, which Adam tore open eagerly.
Sorry I gave you and everybody else such a scare. Also sorry to hear you’re laid up. I meant it when I told you last time that I’d like to visit you in Boston some day. So how about a bet? I bet you I’ll be fit to travel before you are and I’ll come there and you’ll show me the sights. But betting’s only fun if you try to beat me, so get better soon big brother. Sorry this note is so short, but if Pa thinks I’m strong enough to write a long letter he might decide I’m ready to keep the books or something and I’m kind of enjoying my leisure.
Joe
The tall, dark-haired (but balding and graying) gentleman stood on the rail station platform, leaning heavily on two canes, scanning the crowd of disembarking passengers for a familiar face. He almost missed the small, gaunt man who was also peering around, looking just a bit lost. But when the latter’s face lit up after catching Adam’s eye, Adam recognized Joe’s broad smile and laughing eyes. Adam put both canes in his left hand and reached out to shake Joe’s right hand, but Joe lifted his still bandaged appendage apologetically. In place of a handshake, Joe reached up and carefully put his arm around his big brother’s shoulders.
“So where can a fellow buy his brother a drink in this town?” he asked.
“Depends on which brother is doing the buying,” came the reply.
“You are, of course, big brother,” responded Joe with a smirk.
Adam had an immediate comeback. “Uh-huh. Well, then I know a cheap, tawdry place that should suit you perfectly.”
With that Joe picked up his bag with his left hand and the brothers began making their way slowly up the platform and out to the street, shoulder to (a bit below) shoulder.
END
This was quite a story. Poor Adam thinking his baby brother was burned to death. Glad Joe was okay. Thanks