Summary: The Wilde family arrive in Virginia City, the eldest daughter becoming the focus of Joe and Hoss’ attentions, causing chaos within the family while Mr.Wilde’s peculiarities force Adam into eating a surfeit of cake.

Rated: K+ (40,090 words)

The final page contains reviews/comment left on the Old BonanzaBrand Library.

 

Deborah Wilde

Chapter 1

The woman in the mercantile placed the sack of flour, the side of bacon, the bags of coffee and sugar into the box and after handing over the necessary funds to Sally, very carefully began to manoeuvre the box into her arms. She was a small, slight woman, and looked so frail that Hoss Cartwright could have blown her over with a single puff of breath had he a mind to do so, instead he approached her and without a word took the box from her arms and smiled, his blue eyes twinkling down at her as he did so.

She looked at him and flushed a dark pink, which made the hazel of her eyes more luminous and Hoss nodded and grinned again

“Jest lead the way, ma’am” he said warmly

“It’s kind of you, but…”

“No problem…” and without another word he strode out of the store, followed by the woman who was followed, in turn, by a young girl of about fourteen who had stood sullenly by her mothers side without a word.

Joseph Cartwright smiled and then winked over at Sally who was watching the little entourage with a rather sad look on her face

“Penny for your thoughts, Sal?”

“Oh, I was just thinking how tired Mrs Wilde looked today.” Sally replied, snapping out of her reverie and picking up the list of groceries that Joe had placed on the counter.

“Mrs Wilde?” Joe frowned “New in town, isn’t she?”

“Oh, Joe, where have you been for the past few weeks?” Sally exclaimed in exasperation “Mr and Mrs Wilde moved in to the Brannigans old place about a month to six weeks ago…”

“The Brannigans? But that’s been empty for about two years now! It’s falling to bits…”

“Mrs Wilde is Mr Brannigan’s niece. She only found out about her inheritance last year…”

“I bet had she seen the state of the place she wouldn’t’ve bothered to come out here at all…” he smiled and began to put the groceries she had placed on the counter into the box, “You can leave that sack of flour right there, Sal.” He pointed to the large sack that stood on the floor awaiting collection “Hoss can take that out to the wagon when he gets back…” he grinned and lounged against the counter as she continued to collect the items of grocery for the Ponderosa order “So what was the matter with the girl? She could have given her ma a hand with the groceries, couldn’t she?”

“Like you do with Hoss?” Sally snapped “It seems to me, Joseph Cartwright that you don’t realise just how well off you are with a brother like Hoss.”

“Of course I realise how well off I am with a brother like Hoss.” Joe grinned and slapped his bigger brother on the back “Hey, Hoss…Sally here doesn’t think I appreciate you at all…”

“Oh, shucks, really?” Hoss grinned sheepishly at Sally who smiled at him before giving Joe a frosty glare whilst she put down a bag of sugar alongside the tea

“Take that flour, Hoss…and put it with the rest of the stuff in the back of the wagon…”

“Sure will, Joe..” and with his usual amiable manner Hoss leaned down, hauled up the sack of flour with the ease of a child picking up some dropped toy and with the box of groceries under the other arm, he left the store.

“See what I mean?” Sally said with a shake of the head

“See what? What?” Joe exclaimed, looking innocent and opening his hands wide in appeal.

“What you just did then? You could have taken out the box of groceries at least….”

“Why?”

“Because what you did wasn’t fair…”

“Shucks…what wasn’t fair about it? If’n he’d just taken the flour he’d have damaged his back more than likely…with the box he was all evened up…”

The bell over the door tinkled and both of them turned to see who the new comer could be, Joe was ready to tease Sally a little more had it been Hoss, but instead a young girl stepped inside and glanced about her shyly before approaching the counter and smiling at Sally who smiled instantly back, as did Joe!

“Has my mother and sister been here? I was supposed to meet them here, but I got delayed.”

“They’ve just left, Deborah” Sally said quietly, glancing sideways along at Joe who was clearing his throat loudly and tapping his fingers on the counter for attention

“About five minutes ago.”

“Five minutes” she frowned slightly “Oh well, I guess it won’t take me too long to catch them up, they were going to the hardware store next…” she turned quickly and called out a pleasant “Thank you” as she hurried out of the store, colliding with Hoss in the process who gently steadied her up and stepped aside for her to run by him into the street.

“That’s a mighty purty gal” Hoss observed, watching as she hurried down the sidewalk to the hardware store.
“Yep, and I saw her first..” Joe grinned, slapped down the money onto the counter and turned to go “See you at the Bucket of Blood in about five minutes.”

Hoss shook his head and raised his eyebrows and looked over at Sally who was scowling at Joe’s retreating back as he left the store

“I’ll have the change, Sally” he said quietly

Without a word the young woman counted out the change and slipped it into the palm of Hoss’ huge hand…a hard working calloused hand….and she smiled up at him

“Hoss, how do you put up with him?” she laughed

“Sometimes…” he grinned and slipped the money into his pocket “with great difficulty, Miss Sally”
…………………………

Deborah Wilde was standing beside the wagon outside the store when Joe sauntered past, his hat at a rather rakish angle on his unruly mass of chestnut brown hair. He paused and then did a double take and turned to look at her

“Miss Wilde?” he took off his hat and smiled

“Yes….do I know you?” she frowned a little at him, her eyes wary and she stepped closer to the wheel of the wagon

“I’m sorry. No, of course you don’t know me, Sally forgot to introduce us…” he raised his eye brows as though it was the greatest misfortune on Sally’s part to have forgotten the introductions and the girl smiled slowly

“Then how do you know my name?”

“Because I asked…”

“Then…..I suppose you had better tell me what your name is…before you have to go into the hardware store and get whatever it is you came for…” and the large hazel eyes twinkled.

“The hardware? 0h yes, of course.” he cleared his throat, and twisted the hat in his fingers.

“So? What is your name, Mr…?”

“Cartwright, Joseph Cartwright” he extended his hand which she took and shook very lightly

“From the Ponderosa?”

“Yes, that’s right.” he flashed a mega ten oil lamps and a hundred candle power smile at her and she laughed, a pleasantly light laugh that made her eyes almost disappear amongst the folds that the dimples caused in her cheeks.

“The one they call Little Joe?” she smiled again, although she put her fingers to her mouth as though forcing her lips not to laugh anymore.
“Yes, that’s right.” Joe frowned very slightly and looked a little ill at ease “Er…you don’t want to believe everything you hear, you know.” he said in a low voice, twisting his hat nervously round and round between his fingers

“Oh, I know.” she said, opening her eyes wide, “I just couldn’t possibly believe EVERYTHING they said about you.”

“Everything?” Joe bit his bottom lip and looked at her with his large hazel eyes wide in his most innocent and puzzled expression, “What’s ‘everything’?”

“Goodness me, didn’t I just say that I couldn’t possibly repeat the half of it.” she said and then began to laugh again, “Excuse me, I have to go.”

“Debbie! Debbie!”

A mans voice came from across the street and Joe turned to watch as a short stocky man with dark hair and a bright beaming face came running towards them.He was holding something in his hands as though it were the most precious thing in the world. This item he held out towards Deborah Wilde with his eyes wide in excited appeal.

“Isn’t it the most pretty thing?” he said, looking from Deborah to Joe

They both looked down at the item in his hand and smiled for it was indeed a pretty thing, a dainty little fob watch which gleamed with the blue of lapis lazulli and the soft glow of several pearls.

“OH!” she breathed and touched it with her index finger “Oh, Papa, it really is the most lovely little thing I’ve ever seen.”

“I couldn’t resist getting it.” he said breathlessly, “I thought your Ma would love this. What do you think?”

“Oh, Papa, yes, yes, Mama will love it.” she exclaimed and clasped her hands together in delight before turning to Joe, “Oh, still here, Mr Cartwright?”

“Yes, Ma’am, still here.” Joe smiled weakly and looked at the older man, before extending his hand “Good morning, Mr Wilde, I’m Joe Cartwright from the Ponderosa.”

“Why, I’m more than pleased to meet you, young man.” Mr Wilde shook the young mans hand enthusiastically and his smile was as warm and genuine as Joe felt sure the man was, through and through. “We moved into the Brannigan house. He was my wife’s uncle of sorts.”

“Oh, we never knew he had relatives. Kept himself to himself mostly” Joe paused and turned as he felt the sidewalk boards tremble and knew that Hoss was approaching, “Oh, this is my brother, Hoss.”

“Hoss?” the man and woman looked at one another and then smiled, nodded and greeted Hoss with smiles and warm hand shakes as Joe made the introductions
“You were the gentleman who helped ma with the groceries.” Deborah said as she
retrieved her hand from his with a smile “Thank you so much. I should have been there to have helped, but got delayed over at the library.”

“It weren’t nothing’.” Hoss said, going just a little pink, “I sure hope you all settle in well at the Branni.gans. If I recall rightly there’s a deal of work to be done to the place. Could always ride by and give a hand, should you need it.”

Mr Wilde slipped the fob watch into his pocket and smiled at his daughter and then at the two young men.

“That’s a very generous offer.” he said quietly “We certainly would appreciate it. But,” he smiled at them both “you should know any of our neighbours are welcome to come on by at any time. You’ll always be welcome. I think the womenfolk get a mite lonely at times out there, it’s a lot different to life in Boston.”

“Boston? Is that where you come from?” Joe frowned, sensing a small cloud of apprehension hovering at the back of his mind.

“We were only there for a few years.” Deborah laughed “We come from Albany originally.” she turned and the laugh vanished as she watched her mother and sister emerge from the hardware store. A gentle look settled over her features and very quickly she walked over to them and took the articles from her mothers hands as though they were much too heavy for the older woman to carry.

Mr Wilde sighed and brought back the attention of the young men to him and away from the sight of the three females walking back to the wagon

“My wife doesn’t enjoy good health.” he said very quietly, “We thought bringing her here might just help her regain her former robust constitution.” a note of excitement entered into his voice, “I bought the little foible as a gift, an anniversary gift for our being here two months tomorrow.” He lowered his voice in a soft murmur to them. “It’s a secret. She’ll love it.”

Joe and Hoss smiled and looked at one another, but before they could say a word the three women had joined them at the wagon.

“Joe. Hoss. This is my mother, Abigail Wilde and my sister, Jenny”

Both men swept off their hats once more and murmured their greetings and the woman looked at them with tired eyes and smiled, a gentle luminous smile. The girl lowered her head and merely nodded, a veil of dark brown hair covering her features.

“Hoss,” Mrs Wilde smiled again “Thank you so much for helping me with those groceries.”

“Ma’am, the pleasure was all mine.”

“You come on by anytime you wish to.”

“Thanks, ma’am, I’ll …we’ll remember to do jest that!”

“Jamie?” she looked at her husband who was standing there smiling at them all

“Jamie, I think we’ve finished getting everything we need now.”

“Then I’ll take you home, my darling.” and with a gallant air he took her arm and helped her onto the wagon seat before turning to his daughters and with the same gentlemanly manner helped them into the wagon.

“Don’t forget to call on by.” Mrs Wilde said with a wave of her hand as the wagon passed them both. “There’s always a pie cooking and coffee brewing.”

Joe and Hoss nodded and smiled and waved, three of the four waved back. When the wagon finally turned the corner Joe turned to Hoss and grinned,

“That is some pretty gal.” he said with a twinkle in his eyes.

“Sure is.” Hoss sighed, his blue eyes going rather dreamy.

“And I saw her first, remember?” Joe gave his brother a nudge in the belly with his elbow.

“As it happens, little brother, I saw her first, at the doorway when she collided with me, remember?” and Hoss gave HIS brother a nudge that sent him staggering back against the hitching post.

Chapter 2

The smell of breakfast wafted through the house, ham and eggs and a pile of freshly baked rye bread and dark welcoming coffee.

Ben yawned as he went downstairs still tucking his shirt tails into his pants and rubbing his face to remove the last traces of sleep. He sat down and opened his napkin and glanced around the table. Footsteps on the stairs heralded his first born who was stretching to the ceiling to loosen the muscles in his back and who greeted the man at the table with a smile,

“Beat me to it, Pa.” Adam chuckled, warm and deep in his throat. His dark eyes were still heavy with sleep, but the smile was endearingly fresh.

“Seems so; there’s a lot to do today, Adam, I don’t want to miss a minute of it.” he paused to load his plate while Adam took his seat and poured out coffee. His dark eyes glanced around the table,

“Hi, Pa. Adam.” yawned Joe as he stumbled down the stairs and rubbed his face to get everything back to working order after a heavy nights sleep. He pulled out a chair and sat down, and groped for the coffee pot as he yawned once again

“Didn’t you get any sleep last night?” Adam asked with a half smile

“Hardly any,” Joe piled his plate with ham and eggs and then frowned “Where’s Hoss?”

“Already eaten and outa here.” Adam said, indicating the used plate with his fork
“He left …”

“Why the rotten…” Joe jumped up and threw down his napkin and pushed back the chair “And I bet I know exactly where he’s gone too.”

“Joe, your breakfast…” Ben called

“Forget it, Pa, I’m on a mission of mercy.”

“What’s he talking about?” Ben asked of his eldest son, who only shook his head and continued to eat his food with a determined look on his face. This was one meal he didn’t intend to have interrupted this particular day “Do you know what’s going on?”

“Nope” Adam forked another portion of food into his mouth and raised his eyes to the ceiling.

“Who’s in trouble? What mission of mercy is he talking about?”

“Well,” Adam swallowed and picked up a glass of water “If Joe’s face is anything to go by, I should say Hoss is the one in trouble. As for the answer to the second question, I don’t want to know.”

……………

The Brannigan place looked cleaner. The shingles on the roof were all in place and looked sturdy and strong, although patched. Within two months the Wildes had certainly made some improvements on the place and as Hoss dismounted, he felt slightly embarrassed in coming out to offer help where, quite obviously, help was not needed.

He could hear something squeaking, the sound of a chair upon a board not yet nailed down perhaps, he glanced about him and then walked quietly along the porch to the side of the house where the girl, Jennifer, was seated, rocking back and forth, sewing industriously and oblivious to his presence. He coughed politely, but there was no response.

“She’s deaf.”

He turned and took off his hat immediately, and then smiled as Deborah walked towards him. She was beautiful. He felt his legs weakening and his heart pounding as she came nearer. Her hair, dark chestnut brown, was braided like a crown about her head, and her eyes, a brilliant blue, twinkled like two sapphires. He swallowed the lump in his throat and opened his mouth to speak, but she started speaking first, reached his side, and began to walk alongside him towards the house

“Jenny was ill when she was little. It made her deaf. Ma was ill at the same time, that’s why she’s still so frail. When we found that uncle Matthew had died and left us this place, Papa said it was like a miracle. He said the air was so clean and fresh here, and that it was so lovely here. He was sure that mama would get better. Jenny never will, of course.” she smiled sadly and looked at him “It’s nice to see you again, Hoss.”

“Shucks, Ma’am, I mean, Miss Deborah, I thought I’d ride by and see if there was anything you needed doing here, but it seems that it’s all been done already.”

“Yes, Papa’s a hard worker, he wanted it to look good for Ma, and to be safe and secure before the winter. He read all about the climate here, and he knows just about everything.” she smiled up at him “It was kind of you, Hoss.”

“Weren’t nothing’.’” he said, flushing slightly pink and nearly dropping his hat “Did your Ma like her present?”

“The little watch? Oh, Papa hasn’t given it to her yet. He said timing is everything, and the times not right yet. He’ll probably give it to her when they’re alone and there’s a big bright moon.” she smiled as though the thought amused her “He reads a lot. He’s a bit of a romantic.”

“That’s kinda nice.” Hoss sighed, “I guess you like reading too, huh?”

“Oh yes,” she nodded and put her hand to the door and pushed it open “Are you coming in for something to eat, Mr Hoss. You’re more than welcome.”

Hoss had been inside the Brannigan house several times but nothing prepared him for what he now saw. That a family could bring about such a transformation in such a short time took his breath away and he stood in the doorway with his eyes wide and his mouth open in amazement.

“Shucks, Miss Deborah, you sure made this place mighty pretty” he breathed

“You like it?” she smiled again and walked further into the rooms interior “Come on in, Hoss” she pulled out a chair by the table, “Take a seat.”

Books lined the walls, and where there were no books there were pictures. Carpets were on the floor, and the curtains that fluttered at the window were dainty and feminine, in a way that was pleasing for a mans eye to rest upon. He frowned as he thought of the dirt and mess that the little family had to clean up before bringing about this miracle and he felt ashamed that they had had so little help from the Ponderosa. He put his hat down carefully and glanced over at the woman who was taking a pie from the stove.

“Mrs Wilde, I sure feel bad that you had to do all this work without any help from us at the Ponderosa. We usually like to be among the first to help out our neighbours.”

“So we heard.” She walked to the table and placed the pie down, while Deborah came with the coffee pot and several pieces of crockery. “We’re used to being on our own, Mr Cartwright, and working hard. The place was in sound condition though, just needed a tweak here and there to get it looking nice.”

“We slept in the wagon most nights until Papa and Ma thought it was clean enough for us to sleep in.” Deborah arranged the cups and saucers and plates “Shall I go and get Papa?” she turned to her mother, smiled, and waited for her reply.

“No, dear, he’s busy just now.” Mrs Wilde smiled at their guest “You don’t mind it being just us females for company, do you, Mr Cartwright?”

“Shucks, ma’am, not at all.” Hoss grinned and opened his eyes wide in pleasure, “Is that a cherry pie?”

“It certainly is.,” she laughed now, a pleasant laugh that reminded one of a younger woman “Debbie, get Jenny in, dear” she smiled as her daughter left the house and pulled out a chair opposite Hoss, “Have you lived here all your life, Mr Hoss?”

“No, ma’am, but almost all of what I can remember.”

“Then you must know how hard it is, to get everything started.” she cut a slice of the pie and frowned “You don’t mind cherry pie so early in the morning, do you? It’s the last jar of the cherries we preserved from our home in Boston, and Jamie just mentioned last night, how much he fancied some cherry pie.”

“Ma’am, I’m jest about ready to eat cherry pie anytime of the day…or night come to that…” and Hoss grinned as the large slice was pushed towards him. He turned as the door opened and Deborah came in with her sister walking by her side. He stood up politely and nodded “Good morning, Miss Jenny”

The girl just hung her head, the long dark hair fell like a soft veil across her face, she said nothing.

Deborah sighed and smiled over at Hoss, as though a little embarressed at her sisters actions, but Hoss merely sat down and watched as she poured out the coffee. The four of them sat down and faced one another, and Hoss bit into his cherry pie and sighed, and half closed his eyes in pleasure

“Do you like it, Hoss?” Deborah said with a smile in her voice

“It’s perfect” he said, his mouth full of pie, and he swallowed “Ma’am, that’s just about the best pie I’ve ever tasted…Boston cherries sure taste different..”

“Jenny cooked it…” Mrs Wilde said touching her youngest daughters hand and squeezing it gently. The girl drew her hands away and sat with them clenched tightly in her lap.

“She’s the best cook I know then…” Hoss smiled and took another bite.

……………

He rode home slowly, thinking over the things that they had talked about, pondering on the things that had been left unsaid. He had enjoyed the meal, and he had enjoyed their company, although of course, Jenny’s company was barely noticeable as she had sat there the whole time, mute, her hands clenched in her lap, not eating, not drinking…

“Hey, you…”

He glanced up, broken from his reverie by his youngest brothers voice, and he sighed…

“Morning, Joe…I thought you’d be up by the south pasture today with Adam and Pa..”

“Yeah, I thought perhaps you would think that.” Joe turned Cochise’s head and rode up to his brother, so that they were soon riding along the track, side by side.
“Got an early start, brother?”

“Yep, thought I’d get up early and ..”

“I meant, you got an early start on Deborah?” Joe’s eyes flashed and he gave his brother a tight little smile.

“I jest thought to ride on by, case they needed some help.” Hoss shrugged, “Fact is, they didn’t need no help at all, they got the place looking really good.”

“So what’ve you been doing all this time?”

“I’ve not been gone that long!”

“Several hours only.” Joe snarled “I rode by and saw your horse there, so decided to wait and see how long you’d be. You were there over two and a half hours, from when I got there anyhow.”

“Shucks, Pa sure will be mad when we get to the South Pasture.” Hoss frowned, “I didn’t realise I was gone so long. Why didn’t you ride down and get me?”

“What? Interrupt a guy when he’s courting? As if I’d do a thing like that?” Joe’s voice actually had a little tremble in it, of suppressed rage sadly, not because of any other more tender feeling towards his brother.

“Why not? You have done before ?” Hoss looked confused, and darted a look at his brother who rode by his side with a look of dogged determination on his face. Hoss was not, at that time, exactly sure why.

Joe frowned and said nothing to that, knowing that it was true. He rode in silence for some time and then glanced over at his brother who looked deep in thought.

“So? How’d you get on?” he prompted, trying to soften the edge to his voice.

“Wal,” Hoss pushed his hat to the back of his head and scratched his head through his thinning hair, “Miss Debbie sure is a purty thing alright. Mrs Wilde told me all about their family, and how they came to get here, like we knew that already, and Miss Jenny, ” he paused, “never met a sadder little gal than that one.”

“Because she’s deaf, you mean?”

“I’ve know other folks have the same problem, but,” he sighed “ seems like she’s all locked up inside of herself and not wanting to reach out far enough for anyone to help her out of it. I felt real sorry for her, Joe.”

Again, Joe said nothing. He looked up at the sky and sighed, “We’d best get a move on, Hoss, the last thing we need right now is a blazing row with Pa and Adam” and he put spurs to his horse which leapt forward, prompting his brother to stop his pondering and follow close behind him.

Adam glanced up and narrowed his eyes and then sighed, and shook his head. He glanced over at his father who stood up, legs apart and his hands on his hips and his eyes narrowed.

“So you finally decided to show!” Ben said acidly

“Sorry, Pa,we got delayed” Hoss mumbled, glancing rather sheepishly at Adam who gave him a cold glare and little else.

Ben watched as the two men dismounted and walked towards him, both looking contrite. His lips formed a tight line of discontent and annoyance and the black eyes went hard as he narrowed them once again.

“We’ve been sweating our hides off here while the two of you have been riding over half the county doing what? Nothing, a great big fat nothing….well? What were you doing?” the words were barked out and both men quailed back

“Eating cherry pie at the Wildes, Pa” Hoss stuttered

“Eating cherry pie at the Wildes?” Ben scowled “Who exactly are the Wildes?”

“They took over the Brannigan place, Pa” piped in Joe.

“Oh, they took over the Brannigan place.” Ben took a deep breath, “And I suppose you’ve been eating cherry pie over at the Wildes too, is that it?”

“No, sir.” Joe gulped, and pulled his hat lower to shade his eyes.

“No, sir? So what, sir, have YOU been doing?”

“I …er …I was just looking for Hoss.” Joe scrambled for something to say and shot a frantic appeal to Hoss for some assistance.

“You must have found him hours ago,” Adam muttered under his breath but loud enough for them to hear.

“I was waiting for him to come out of the Wilde’s place, Pa.” Joe said quietly and then turned to his eldest brother, “Not that it’s any of your business.”

“When I end up doing your chores as well as Hoss’ and on top of my own, I reckon it’s plenty of my business.” Adam growled, standing up now and turning to face them with a dark scowl on his face.

“Sorry, Adam” Hoss mumbled contritely and ambled over to join his brother, receiving a slap across the head from his loving parent as he did so “Ouch, sorry, Pa.”

“You will be,” Ben promised in a voice that seemed to hiss through his teeth. He then turned onto Joe who stepped back a pace or two, “Right, Joseph, as you’ve wasted so much of everyone’s time, and patience, this is what I want you to do for the rest of the day…”

Chapter 3

The smell of breakfast swept over the house and Ben Cartwright came down the stairs one at the time. The sole occupant of the breakfast table glanced up and frowned. It took Adam no time at all to accept the fact that his father was in a foul mood so with a sigh he poured the older man a cup of the scalding black coffee and waited for the tirade that was sure to come.

Ben sat down and glanced around the table, he frowned and his lips narrowed, his dark eyes flashed over at Adam who raised his eye brows before raising the coffee cup to his lips.

“Hey, Pa, Adam.” Hoss took the stairs with the obvious air of a man with not a care in the world. He smiled at his parent and elder brother and sat down and without pausing, as though in one swift movement, he had forked food in a pile onto his plate and had coffee steaming in his cup at his elbow. He glanced around at the two silent men and frowned as he forked a large slice of ham towards his mouth.

“What’s up?”

“Nothing” Ben growled, surveying the pile of food on his sons plate and comparing the barren waste on his own “You intend to eat all of that?”

“Yep!” Hoss winked over at Adam who lowered his head in order not to laugh out aloud, “That’s why it’s on my plate, Pa.” And he ladled in the ham and began to slice through the eggs.

“Hoss, has it ever occurred to you that Hop Sing cooks for more than just one of us here?” Ben asked quietly.

“Yep, the thought does cross my mind every so often.” Hoss paused and glanced at the empty seat beside him, “Where’s Little Joe?”

“He left the house about an hour ago.” Adam said quietly, his eyes fixed on his brothers face to see what reaction he would get from that comment.

“He did, huh? The little skunk. Wait until I ketch a hold of him.” Hoss pushed himself away from the table and towards the door, collecting his hat and gun belt on the way out. The door slammed behind him.

“Do you know what’s going on?” Ben asked Adam in an affable tone of voice, much like a man would ask whether the sun was shining because the sky was blue or what were the price of eggs today.

“Nope,” came the quiet response, and Adam put down his cup and frowned, “But I’ll find out, eventually.”

…………

Joseph dismounted and tethered Cochise to the hitching post and paused a while to listen to the sounds about him. Somewhere someone was using a hammer and nails to good effect; someone inside the house was singing quite pleasantly and someone else was sitting on a rocking chair where a loose board was squeaking. He looked down at the flowers he held in his hand and smiled.

Even before he had reached the door, it was opened and Abigail Wilde stood in front of him. She jumped a little, as though in surprise and then gave a shy little laugh as she put her hand to her throat in order to catch her breath.

“Goodness, Mr Cartwright, you made me jump.” she explained as her cheeks reddened and brought a little colour to her usual pallor.

“Sorry, Ma’am, but I came to see Deborah.” he smiled at her “Is she around anywhere?”

“In the barn,” she gestured to the building opposite, “It’s nice to see you again, Mr Cartwright. I’ve coffee and some cookies in the stove, you know you‘ll be welcome to join us.” the invitation hovered between them and he smiled his generously captivating smile,

“Why, thanks, Ma’am, I’ll just go and ..er…have a quick talk to Deborah, if that’s alright with you?” and he tipped his hat politely and after her nod and closure of the door he turned and walked to the barn.

He was whistling as he approached the barn and for a moment the hammering stopped, before it was resumed with renewed vigour. He frowned, Mr Wilde was certainly a hard worker. He noticed the orderliness of the yard and the way the house and out buildings had been so well repaired. It was such a marked contrast to the way the Brannigans had left it.

The hammering stopped as he opened the barn door and he looked around him as he wondered where exactly Deborah could be. A milk cow and her calf looked over at him with large enquiring eyes before resuming their morning feed and he walked over to them and leaned over the bar to stroke their silky ears.

“Watch out, I’ve not secured that bar yet.” came a voice from above him, and wisps of straw floated downwards.

He turned and surveyed the figure of the youth who was descending the hayloft ladder with a hammer and a bag of nails hanging loose from the belt. Joe smiled as she pulled off the hat and let her dark hair tumble down her back.

“You make a nice boy.” Joe grinned, as she wiped her hands down the pants of her dungarees.

“I’m a hard working boy then.” she smiled, rolling back the cuff of one of the sleeves of her check shirt, “Have you come to give me a helping hand?”

“Well, if that’s what you need…” Joe replied, and then self consciously held out the flowers “Do you want to put these someplace first?”

“Oh.” she smiled and took them from him and looked at them thoughtfully, before looking at him again “They are lovely. You are kind, Joe.”

“Well, if you’ll just tell me what you want me to do?” Joe tossed away his hat and began to pull off his jacket, “You do want me to give you a hand, don’t you?”

“I’d almost finished and I guess it would do no harm to take a break.”

“What were you doing exactly?”

“One of the beams up there in the hay loft was loose. It needed nailing back into place. I guess I overlooked it the first time round, but there was just so much to do I must have skimped a bit.” She frowned, her smooth brow furrowed in concentration “And I have to fix the bars of those stalls too….”

“That’s a bit high up,” Joe muttered, looking up into the hayloft from the bottom of the ladder.

“Oh, I’m used to it.” She smiled “Don’t you like the idea of a woman doing such work, Joe?”

“I – guess I hadn’t really expected it,” He replied very slowly, looking at her thoughtfully “Did you do most of the work around here?”

“With Jenny’s help.”

“I got the impression that your father was a pretty good hand at that kind of work.” He walked slowly alongside her, as she strolled along in her faded blue dungarees and the open necked check shirt, and her face buried in the sweet smelling bouquet. He sighed, no doubt about it, she was beautiful to look at, even dressed like that, perhaps even more so, and he averted his eyes gallantly and looked towards the house.

“He tries, sometimes.” she replied quietly with a slight frown once again creasing her brow and she sighed, “I pretended to your brother that Papa did all the work around here, but seeing as you caught me – like this –” and she gestured to indicate her working clothes and the hammer and bag of nails attached to her belt “there’s not much point in lying to you.”

“Debbie, Debbie…”

They both turned at the excited cries that came from behind them and once again Joe watched as Mr Wilde ran over towards them. There was the same excited look on his face that Joe had seen a few days earlier. He was holding in his hand a paint brush, the kind an artist, rather than an artisan, would carry, and he wore a smock, liberally splattered with different colours of paint.

“Come and see, Debbie. Come and see what I’ve done now, your Mama is going to be so surprised and pleased when she sees this.” and pulling at the girls arm the excited man led them to where he had been working.

Joe opened his eyes in pleasurable amazement as he saw the picture that had been painted on the stretched canvas before him. He stepped closer and took in each detail, and then he stepped back to take in the whole scene. After some moments had ticked by he smiled, shook his head, and put a gentle hand on the mans shoulder,

“Did you paint this?”

“Of course I painted it.” Jamie Wilde looked at the young man indignantly, “Anyway, who are you?”

“I’m Joe Cartwright, I met you in town the other day.” Joe smiled and the older man frowned and looked at his daughter who smiled at him and slipped her arm through his,

“Mr Cartwright was in town when you got Mama the little watch, don’t you remember, papa?” she smiled at her father so sweetly that something in Joe’s heart snapped, and he felt a wave of emotion sweep out from him towards her.

“Oh yes, I remember now that you have reminded me.” He shook his head and then looked at the picture and smiled like an innocent excited child “Well, Debbie, what do you think?”

“I think it’s one of your very best, Papa,” she replied softly and kissed his cheek “It’s beautiful.”

“And your Mama will be pleased, won’t she?” he asked this with an earnestness that Joe recognised as that of a child wanting to make happy a beloved parent rather than a husband pleasing a wife. There was obviously something not quite right about dear Jamie Wilde.

“She’ll love it, daddy.” Debbie assured her father again, and once more she planted a gentle kiss on his cheek.

Now he seemed content and reassured, he nodded and stepped back to survey the painting with a delighted sigh. But within minutes the childlike joyfulness disappeared to be replaced by the earnest, discerning features of a man, a skill artist, who, with a slight frown, now picked up the palette and brush and began to work on some part of it which obviously did not seem sufficiently good enough for him. Joe watched him for a second or two before turning and following Deborah back to the house.

“I didn’t realise your father was such an accomplished artist.”

“He’s brilliant” she replied simply “He used to paint for a living you know? He was a student in Paris when he was young, before he met mother. He even spent a year in London and had an exhibition there. He’s very clever, Joe, the most clever man I know” she laughed then “Not that I know or have known that many, we have always lived a rather solitary life.”

“He loves your mother very much.” Joe observed, turning his hat round and round in his hands as he followed along beside her towards the house.

“Don’t husbands always love their wives as much?” she turned and looked at him with mischief in her eyes and her lips curved in a strange smile.

“My Pa loved my Ma like that, he always used to do everything he could to please her.”

“Yes, I heard about your Mama.” Deborah said softly, averting her eyes from his face in case he resented her sympathy.

“Did you?” Joe frowned, and for a few seconds there was silence. Realising she was not going to speak he said, “I was only five when she died so I don’t see what folks would find to talk about, not now.”

“They just said how she had died young, when you were very small. They said how your Pa was married three times in all, and had a son by each woman.” she held the flowers close to her nose and smiled again, “Come in and have some coffee, Joe.”

Just as Hoss had done the previous day, so Joe looked about the room and opened his eyes wide in surprise. He noticed the shelves lined with books and the paintings on the walls. He shook his head and grinned as he sat down on the chair that she had pulled out for him at the daintily set out table.

“This place looks just great. The Brannigans, if you don’t mind my saying so, lived in a constant mess.”

“Oh, that’s just all it was, just a mess. It took no time at all to straighten it out.” Mrs Wilde said with a smile as she placed a plate of cookies, still warm, on the table. A dish with golden butter and various other things were placed beside them, and she began to pour out the coffee very carefully. “Deborah works hard, and so does Jenny.”

“We all do what we can to help one another.” Deborah said quickly “That’s how we’ve always worked.”

“That’s how we work too.” Joe said with his mouth full of delicious fresh baked cookies, and his eyes on the biscuits now cooling on the platter beside them

“Mama, look at the lovely flowers Joe got for me.” she displayed the flowers and set them aside, with a smile at him, “Joe, you’re really a whole lot nicer than I expected, you know.”

“Really? How come?”

“Well, from what I’d been told I had expected quite an unpleasant character to come sidling around the place, but you’re really rather sweet.”

“I am? “

“I think so. Do you want sugar in your coffee?” and she smiled at him with her eyes twinkling that mischievous sparkle again.

…………

Hoss scowled as he saw Cochise nodding over the hitching rail.

“Thundering tarnation,” he muttered beneath his breath and dismounted Chubb and tethered his reins to the post, “That darn Little Joe!” he exclaimed, his mouth tightening into a knot of misery as he thought of the unfair advantage his sibling had gained on him.

The squeak of the rocking chair came to his ear. He frowned and remembered that the previous day it had been Jenny, all alone, and having recalled that fact he crept very quietly around to see if it was, once again, the little deaf girl.
Head bowed she sat as before, her fingers working deftly with the needle as she embroidered some intricate pattern on a large square. He watched her for some moments before she paused, sensing she was being observed, and turned to survey him for a fraction of a moment, before bowing her head and allowing the veil of dark hair to cover her face while her fingers froze into inaction.

Hoss stepped forward and stood in front of her, to survey her thoughtfully. She sat so still she could have been a statue. He leaned forward after a little while and very gently stroked back the veil to reveal one side of her face but her reaction was far different to the one he had expected for she gave a cry as though of physical pain and slapped his hand away, threw aside her work things, and ran into the house, crying all the while “Mama, Mama.”

Mrs Wilde, followed by Deborah and Joe, were promptly at the door, and as Jenny was taken inside the house by her mother, Deborah and Joe stepped out onto the porch

“What did you do to her?” Joe demanded, grabbing at Hoss’ arm.

“Nuthin’” Hoss replied “How d’you mean what did I do to her? You know better’n ask such a tom fool question as that, Joe.”

“Well, something made her cry like that,” his brother retorted hotly

Deborah shook her head and shrugged “It doesn’t take much for Jenny to react like that. Just the sight of a stranger can set her off. She’s been very strange since she lost her hearing.”

“I didn’t realise she would be able to speak.” Hoss said slowly

“She was ten when she got ill. She has not forgotten how to speak, she isn’t stupid or anything like that, she’s just not very well still. The Doctor in Boston said it could be years before she was ever well again,” her bottom lip quivered a little and she bowed her head “It was all my fault, you know. I was to blame for all of it really.”

“Why? What happened?” Joe asked quietly, searching all the while in his pocket for a clean handkerchief which he gently passed over to her.

“Mama said not to go to a particular friends house, but I went anyway. She told me they had had sickness, but I had seen my friends mother that morning and she said that they were all quite well again. As it happened I took the sickness home with me. I was never sick at all but Mama was, and then Jenny” she blew her nose and looked at Hoss who was looking at her and thinking how lovely she looked and how he wished he could make her smile and be happy “I was to blame for poor Mama being so frail now, and for Jenny being as she is, and all the time I was never even sick at all.”

“It’s not your fault, Debbie” Joe said quietly, taking hold of her hand in his much to his brothers annoyance, “Things like that happen all the time, it’s all part and parcel of life.”

“Papa read all about the sickness and he said that my friends mother had been the blame because she should have known that there was a quarantine period to that sickness, but she never said anything to me about it.”

“There then, your Pa was right, Miss Deborah, It weren’t your fault” Hoss said very gently, trying to take hold of her other hand but fumbling too much and not succeeding, much to Joe’s amusement.

“But when I see them like this,“ she sighed and shook her head “You don’t know what they were like before this happened. Jenny loved music, she played the violin and now she can’t even hear us singing . It breaks my heart sometimes to hear her trying to sing, or trying to play her violin.” a tear trickled down her cheek and plopped onto the back of Joe’s hand and when another tear threatened to fall he reached out and brushed it away very gently from her cheek, “She cries sometimes – in her room at night.”

“You have to learn to forgive yourself, Debbie.” Joe said softly “Pa always says that it starts with you.”

“No, it doesn’t.” she whispered glancing back into the house “It starts with them,
and I don’t think they’ve forgiven me yet.”

…………..

They rode side by side. Cochise and Chubb stretched out their legs as though knowing only too well the mood of their riders, and their eyes rolled every so often as though expressing for themselves the angst each of the young men felt against the other.

“If you saw me there, why’d you have to come on down and interfere?” Joe finally snapped at his brother, his eyes narrowed and his lips thinning against his teeth.

“Because I thought it more honest than to hang around and wait like you did,” Hoss replied immediately, his honest face getting ruddier by the moment.

“Honest? You call that honest, coming down and creeping around and scaring that poor kid half to death?” Joe’s voice cracked on a high note.

“I didn’t creep around and I didn’t scare Jenny to death. Anyhows, you shouldn’t’ve been there this morning. You knew Pa needed us down the South pasture to help him and Adam, and now you’ve got us both into trouble again.”

“I’ve got us both into trouble? Just who do you think you are, Hoss Cartwright, blaming me for your problems?”

Cochise and Chubb rolled their eyes at one another once again, and stretched out their legs even further while their ears were pricked forwards as though to ignore the tirade raging above their heads.

…………….

Adam wiped sweat from his brow and glanced up as the two younger members of the family rode up towards them. He shook his head and turned his back on them, squatting on his haunches and prodding the fire into a greater heat before he could place the branding irons into it.

“Where’s Pa?” Joe asked quickly, a slight measure of relief in his voice

“Is he here?” Hoss muttered, pulling out some gloves from his back pocket

“He’s here and he’s right behind you!” Ben’s dark voice boomed in a growl behind them “And he’s waiting for an explanation from you – BOTH OF YOU!”

“I – we- we just went to see Mrs Wilde and make sure they were all okay.” Joe replied promptly in as matter of fact manner as possible, but stepping backwards slightly when he realised just how close to striking distance he was from his beloved Papa. He bumped into Hoss who was standing just a mite too close.

“Cherry pie again, huh?” Adam murmured from his position by the fire but without lifting his eyes or turning his head into their direction.

“No … cookies and biscuits…” Joe ventured unashamedly.

“Cookies and biscuits?” Hoss groaned “Shucks, you had –?”

“That’s enough.” Ben snapped with his eyes blazing. “Who are these Wildes
anyway? Are they running some kind of restaurant out there? Don’t answer. Don’t think of answering. I don’t want to know.”

“But, Pa, you jest asked – ?” Hoss ventured as, after so many years, he still had not come to fully understand the workings of his fathers brain.

“All I want from the pair of you is a good days work. As half the days already gone you had better start now and prepare yourselves to work until mid-night.” Ben glared at them both, “Do I make myself clear?”

Chapter 4

“Hey, Adam?” Hoss nudged his brothers elbow just as Adam was about to unload a crate of groceries into the back of the wagon, “Adam, it’s her, over there at the Mercantile.”

“Who?” Adam snapped as he reassembled the goods back into some order after some had tumbled out of the crate. He turned and looked in the direction that Hoss was gazing. After some seconds had passed in which he had seen no one except a rather plump fifty year old if she was a day woman sauntering out of the Mercantile he gave his brother a rather narrow eyed look and shook his head “Who was that?” he asked.

“Deborah. Miss Wilde from..” Hoss twittered, his face dreamy and his blue eyes as round as two blue berries.

“Yeah, don’t tell me, the Brannigans place.”

“S’right.” Hoss beamed, his eyes now soft and faraway, “Shucks, Adam, she is just about the most beautiful thing I have ever seen.” Hoss drew in a deep breath and half closed his eyes as his mind drifted away to some regions his brother did not want to know about. Adam bit his bottom lip and gave his brother another narrow eyed look, then with a frown he returned to sorting out the groceries into the crate.

“So, this Miss Wilde, she’s the one with the cherry pies and cookies, huh?”

“Yep – well – I reckon on her sister being the one cooked the cherry pie, so her ma said anyhow.” Hoss frowned and looked thoughtfully at Adam, he scratched his head “Adam, didn’t you think you was – well – kinda nice to look at?”

Adam turned, looked at his brother and opened his mouth to comment, then quickly closed it again “Why’d you ask?” he held his head at an angle so as to get a clearer picture of his brother as he tried to think of any specific good feature about the woman he had just seen leave the Mercantile and over whom Hoss was eulogising.

“It’s just that I kinda thought you might be a bit of a problem in this here matter. You see, you know how you like pretty gals, and pretty gals seem to like you,” Hoss paused and folded his arms across his chest and looked at his elder brother thoughtfully, “She likes reading and writing, poetry and stuff like you do. She was in Boston for a time, and, as you could see, she sure is pretty.” his voice drifted a little again before he returned to the theme of his conversation “And I thought for sure you’d take one look at her and I’d have trouble with you as well!”

“As well as?”

“As Joe, of course. He reckons he saw her first and that I should step right out of the picture as usual. You know how it is, Adam, Joe sees a pretty girl and as far as he’s concerned no one else gets a chance and I really like Deborah. But I really do.” and he thumped the corner of the wagon and made the groceries in the crate bounce.

“Well, has she shown any preference to Joe over you?” Adam asked, leaning against the wagon with HIS arms folded across his chest.

“Nope, not that I can tell anyhow.”

“Well, in that case you have as much right to pursue her as he has. All’s fair in love and war!” Adam sighed and glanced sidelong at his brother who was chewing his bottom lip and frowning rather more deeply than normal, “You are sure about this, aren’t you, Hoss? I mean, it ain’t just the thought of those cherry pies?”

“I already told ya, her sister made the cherry pie.” Hoss said rather heatedly, “Adam, you saw her? You can see for yourself what a lovely girl she is, surely you can understand how I feel? For once I want a gal to look at me and not be cajoled over to him.”

Adam opened his eyes wide and shook his head in disbelief,

“Cajoled, Hoss?” he smirked slightly, and crooked one eyebrow.

“Yeah, that’s what I said, cajoled, as in being cadged away from what was intended, as in I’m the one she needs in her life, not Joe Cartwright.”

Adam took off his hat and fanned himself. Once again he conjured up the picture of the woman outside the Mercantile and tried to align her with the way his brother was describing his feelings for her. It all seemed to be getting a little out of his depth and he was feeling just a slight touch of hysteria beginning to stir in the back of his mind when Hoss slapped him on the back, sending him staggering several steps away from the wagon.

“That’s it, my minds made up, dadburn it, I’m going to go and ask her to let me take her to the Town Hall dance on Saturday.”

“This Saturday, you mean?”

“The very same.” Hoss took a deep breath and with nostrils flaring and a set look on his face he strode off towards the Mercantile.

Adam took a deep breath and raised his face heavenwards and closed his eyes

“Praying for rain?” Joe quipped, appearing at Adam’s side with sufficient stealth to make his brother jump.

“Joe?” Adam looked at his brother as though he had not seen him in about twenty years.

“Yeah, Joe, that’s me.” Joe smirked and glanced around, “Where’s Hoss?”

“He’s over at the Mercantile.” Adam said slowly and then, as Joe was about to stride off in that direction, he grabbed his youngest brother by the arm “Joe, tell me something?”

“Yeah, what? Hurry up, I have to go.” Joe replied impatiently, and trying to release his arm from Adam’s grip.

“This Deborah Wilde -”

“You’ve seen her?” Joe’s face flushed and his eyes widened and began to get that well known sparkle of conquest in them “What did you think, huh? Isn’t she lovely? I tell you, Adam, she is just about the most beautiful girl I’ve seen in years. She’s clever too.” he frowned and looked at his brother and bit his lip “Umm, see here, Adam, I know how you kinda like clever girls, especially when they’re -”

“It’s alright, Joe, I’ve already had this conversation with Hoss. Believe me, your Deborah Wilde really isn’t the type of girl I’m interested in.” Adam interrupted Joe hurriedly, while at the back of his mind he was wondering whether either of his brothers were completely sane.

“She isn’t?” Joe’s voice ended in a squeak of amazement and he looked at Adam in much the same way that Adam had only recently looked at Hoss “What did Hoss say about her?” he glanced warily over at the Mercantile now, wondering whether or not his brother was taking advantage of his, Joe’s, absence.

“He’s smitten.” Adam said simply, “And he assures me it isn’t because of the cherry pies.”

“No, well, it wouldn’t be, Jenny baked them,” Joe looked at Adam as though he couldn’t believe that his brother could be so stupid in coming out with such a statement.

“Jenny?” Adam shook his head and pushed Joe gently away from him “Excuse me, Joe, I think I had better get home with these groceries. You and Hoss and your Deborah and Jenny are getting a bit too heady for me.”

“Yeah, well,” Joe shrugged and looked at his brother thoughtfully and then looked in the direction of the Mercantile again. He set his hat straighter onto his head and narrowed his eyes “I’ll see you back home.”

“Just another minute there,” Adam grabbed at his brothers arm a second time and looked him in the eyes, “Don’t you think that perhaps this Deborah is a little too old for you?”

“Too old for me?” Joe’s eyes opened wide, and he gave a cackle of a laugh which ended quite abruptly as a thought suddenly crept into his head and he stepped back out of reach of his brothers hand, “Is this your way of getting me to back off? You’ve decided to – “ he paused, clenched his fist “All the time I thought I had to worry about Hoss and –“

“Aw, for Pete’s sake,” Adam pushed his brother away from him “I was only thinking of you, as a brother should, seeing as you seem so bent on pursuing the woman.”

Joe pursed his lips and cast another doubtful look at his brother, before turning and striding towards the Mercantile. Adam could only shake his head and muse on the folly of men, and in particular, his brothers.

…………..

“Hoss, I’m really flattered,” Deborah Wilde looked down modestly, and then, from under her eyelashes looked up at the young man and felt a surge of affection for him. She knew, by the way he looked and the clumsy way he had asked her to the dance, that it had been difficult for him, that he was shy and lacked confidence, that he was afraid that what he wanted so much could very well be denied him and she sighed and placed a gentle hand on his arm, “Hoss, that’s very kind of you.”

“Yeah, well, I thought I’d just ask,” Hoss said gruffly, trying to look her in the face but knowing that if her eyes caught his then he would feel and look as though he were roasting in flames. He shuffled his feet and addressed the stack of books piled on the shelf behind her, “I guess, probably you would prefer to go with someone
Else, but I wanted you to know that…”

“Hoss, I’d love to go to the dance with you, really I would” she smiled at him gently and squeezed his arm “But it’s a long drive to our place and then into town.”

“That’s true,” he frowned and, her acceptance giving him courage, he looked at her full in the face and felt his heart melt. Such a pretty face, but strong too, with a
dimpled chin, and clear intelligent eyes, and she was smiling at him, “But I ain’t minding that, if you don’t, Miss Deborah?”

“I’ll meet you here, in town,” she smiled again and then stood on tip toe and kissed him on the cheek “Thank you, Hoss!”

“Aw…I – well – I – thank you, Miss Deborah.” he breathed and taking a deep breath he watched her walk away. Then he closed his eyes and shook his head and tried to convince himself that what had happened had indeed taken place. He was standing this way when Joe stalked up to him, hands on hips, face red, eyes blazing,

“SO?”

Joe Cartwright simmered like a volcano about to erupt. He stood with arms folded across his chest and glowered at his brother with his lips set into a narrow thin line and his hazel eyes narrowed and hard as they stared into his brothers face. Hoss shrugged and looked about him, and then looked at his brother

“What’s up, Joe?”

“What’s up? What’s up?” Joe threw his arms heaven wards and then began to prod his brother in the chest with his forefinger, “You know what’s up? Fancy asking me what’s up when you know darn well what’s up and what kind of expression is that anyhow?”

“I dunno,” Hoss replied sheepishly, “I jest didn’t know what else to say.”

“I saw you, I saw you kiss Deborah Wilde right here in front of me.”

“I didn’t kiss Miss Wilde.” Hoss protested and then with a soft glow spreading throughout his body he smiled in a slow intoxication of ecstasy, “She kissed me!” and without another word he brushed past his brother and walked out of the Mercantile feeling, well, feeling at least ten feet tall. Deborah Wilde HAD kissed HIM. And she had accepted his invitation to the dance Saturday night. Hoss felt as though he were floating on air.

Chapter 5

Jennifer Wilde stepped back into the shadows at the sight of the horse approaching the yard and stood as still as she possibly could as she pressed back against the rough wooden wall of the barn. The wood had been soaking up the sun all day long so it was pleasantly warm against her body, and she could smell the dark throaty smell that damp sun saturated wood gave off in the evening coolness. It was pleasant and heady, and she wished she could have stayed there longer but good sense forced her to inch forwards a little to see exactly who the rider on the horse could have been and why he had ridden to their home.

When she saw Little Joe dismount from Cochise she sighed and her shoulders as well as her lips drooped a little as she watched him stand by the horse and look around. There was no doubt about that look on his face. She had seen it often enough before and very quietly tip toed her way into the warm interior of the barn. Deborah looked up and smiled at her younger sister,

“He’s here again,” Jenny said in that slightly indistinct way she now spoke. She could hear the words in her head, but not how they came out of her mouth.

“Who’s that?” Deborah asked, looking at the younger girl so that she could read not only her lips but the expression in her eyes and on her face

“Josephcartwright” she rolled the name into one word and watched the other girls expression before running out of the barn and out of sight in the shadows.

The movement had been enough for Joe to notice and he walked hurriedly over to the building, meeting Deborah as she emerged carrying a old trug filled with eggs. She smiled a welcome and watched him with her head tilted to one side and her blue eyes twinkling mischievously,

“I expected to see you sooner than this, Joe.” she said with a smile on her mouth that made her cheeks dimple rather more deeply than usual.

“Oh, why so?” the young man frowned slightly.

“Just a feeling I had.” she shrugged prettily, and the frill of her white apron shimmered in the sunlight and he had the strange urge to reach out and straighten the folds over her shoulder.

“Hoss told me that he had invited you to the dance on Saturday”

“Yes, and I’ve accepted too.”

“I wanted to take you, Deborah, after all, it is the first dance in Virginia City that you would have been to and I thought that if I asked you then you would get to meet more people and get to make new friends.”

“I know what you thought, Joseph. But I wanted to go with Hoss”

“You like Hoss better than me?” he looked at her askance, with his hazel eyes clouded with disbelief and dismay.

“In some ways,” she replied honestly and then she smiled, “Look, Joe, I hardly know either of you and I’m very new here. Hoss is so shy and asked me so sweetly I couldn’t say no, but -” and here she paused and looked thoughtfully at him.

“But?” Joe hovered over the word and licked his lips “Yes? But?”

“Do you think you could me a big favour?”

“If I can.” he said, his voice trailing away miserably.

“Would you ask Jenny?” she turned her eyes to him, opened them wide, appealingly.

“Jenny? Your sister, Jenny?”

“That’s right, my sister, Jenny. If you ask her then we could go as a foursome, and we could share out the dances too, don’t you think?” and she looked at him beguilingly with large blue eyes and a sweet innocent smile on her pink lips.

“But – can she dance?”

“She’s deaf, Joe, not a cripple.” she retorted back with some heat in her words, as though dismayed that he could say such an unkind thing, suggestive of much worse.

“No, I didn’t mean that .” Joe replied sharply, although he looked rather crest fallen at the sharp manner in which she had responded.

“Then what did you mean?” she looked at him fiercely, protective of her little sister and angry with his tactlessness and lack of feeling. Joe, aware that he had committed a gross breach of familial loyalties shook his head and looked miserably down at his feet,

“I didn’t mean what you think I meant. It just came out wrong.” he glanced up at her, his hazel eyes wide with appeal, “Look I’ll take Jenny if you agree to dance at least half the dances with me.”

“I don’t even know now whether I’ll bother to go at all.” she tossed her dark head in the air and pushed past him, still angry at his rather cavalier attitude

“You can’t let Hoss down.” Joe began to walk alongside her, hurrying as she lengthened out her stride in an attempt to get away from him.

She paused and thought about Hoss for a moment. Then she shook her head and looked at the young man standing contritely before her, twisting his hat round and round in his hands. She sighed and nodded,

“Alright,” she looked at him thoughtfully, “I’ll go and get these eggs inside and that’ll give you time to ask Jenny to go to the dance with you.”

“What if she refuses?”

“Ask her first,” came the sharp retort back as she walked briskly to the house.

“Ask her?” Joe bit his lip, sighed and glanced about him, “That’s easier said than done!” he muttered to himself.

Jennifer Wilde glanced up as the shadow fell across her and she saw the young man standing between her and the sunlight. She raised a hand to shield her eyes as she looked up at him,

“Jenny?”

She looked about her. Her hair was in tight braids so there was no way she could hide behind her natural veil, she hung her head down so as to avoid eye contact but then felt the gentle touch of his hand beneath her chin. Tenderly Joe raised her face up to look at him.

How handsome he was, and what beautiful eyes. She took a deep breath and swallowed hard and could only stare into that lovely face. His eyes were more green than her mothers, for Abigail Wilde had hazel eyes too. His eyelashes were longer than most of the women she knew and his nose was strong and straight and his lips were smiling and generous. She liked the way his hair seemed to spring alive about his head, a deep chestnut brown and thick and waving, and when he smiled his eyes sparkled and his face came alive,

“I’m Joseph,” he held out his hand, “We’ve not met properly yet have we?”

She shook her head, and Joe frowned very slightly, not knowing whether that meant she had not understood due to not hearing him, or whether she meant no, they had not met properly. But then she took his hand and shook it gently and smiled up at him

“I’m Jennifer, everyone calls me Jenny”

Joe smiled and looked at the young girl again. She lacked Deborahs spirit, the sparkle that made a man look twice at a woman but despite being so young, she was a pretty little thing with her big grey eyes and rosebud shaped mouth. He looked down at his feet and thought how tragic it must be to have lost such a vital sense as hearing but that the blessing, for her, was that she had enjoyed such a pleasure for enough years to remember sounds. She would still recall the singing of birds, and the sound of her parents voices, and sounds that one took so much for granted. He glanced down when he felt a light tug on his sleeve

“Is your brother here too?”

“No, Hoss is busy.” he frowned and looked at her again, “Look, Miss Jenny, can I ask a favour of you?”

“Yes!”

“There’s a dance at the town hall on Saturday night. I wondered if you would like to come, as my guest. If you wouldn’t mind?”

Her young features contorted into a spasm of emotions, fear, joy, excitement, apprehension rolled one after one so clearly that Joe could take note of everyone of them. He felt miserable for her and wished that he had not been put into such an awkward situation. She looked down, obviously longing for her mantle of hair to cover her face.

“Well, what do you say?” Joe asked and then after a few seconds realised she had not hear him. He put his finger under her chin and raised it so that her eyes were once again fixed to his face, “What do you say?”

“Is it because she won’t go with you?”

“She? You mean, Deborah? Oh, she’s going with Hoss. I didn’t even ask her.” He said rather glibly.

“You didn’t ask her?” she frowned as though she found it hard to believe and then she smiled “So why do you ask me?”

“It’s a chance for me to get to know you better for one.” Joe smiled, and even his eyes twinkled for she was a sweet looking girl with such an air of innocence about her.

“And two?”

“It’s a chance for you to get to know me better.” his smile broadened as he thought how well she could lip read, and his eyes softened,

“And three?”

“You’re new to town, and it’ll give you both a chance to meet other folk socially,” Joe looked at the serious little face and frowned, what other reason could there be?
“I’d like to take you, Jenny.”

She said nothing to that, but her grey eyes were fixed on his as though to read through them exactly what was going on in his mind and heart. Eventually she nodded,

“Yes, thank you, I’ll come then to meet everyone else would be nice.” and she smiled and ran off into the house leaving Joe feeling that he had been well and truly corralled.

Chapter 6

“Adam?”

“Yes, Pa?”

If there was the slightest hint of a sigh or irritation in Adams voice Ben Cartwright ignored it, instead he wandered from his chair in the study area and approached Adam who was sitting with his legs stretched out on the table, reading one of his books. Joe was sitting on the hearth polishing his revolver and the smell of rags and oil lingered over the room. Hoss was engrossed in the Virginia City tabloid that had been brought from town with the mail,

“We’ve hit a problem with the Ramsay’s offer on the bull.” Ben muttered, walking towards his chair and tapping Adams feet along the way as a gentle reminder that feet, especially those wearing boots, were not meant for tables.

“What’s wrong?” Adam asked, closing his book, removing his feet from the table and leaning forwards to hear more about this bull and the Ramsays who lived two days ride away just beyond Carson City.

Hoss and Joe smiled at one another and continued with what they were doing. It was always gratifying to them when Adam got a gentle reminder of house rules!

“I’m not sure. Here, read this?” he passed the letter over to his son who perused it carefully before handing it back,

“Seems like they’re still interested enough in the bull, but want to haggle a bit over the price.”

“That’s what I thought.” Ben frowned and looked up at his son with narrowed eyes, and Adam, sensing what was about to come, clenched his teeth “Had you made any plans for the week-end?”

Joe and Hoss winked at one another and smirked smugly as they continued with their tasks. Adam, took a deep breath and forced himself not to look in their direction,

“You want me to go over and visit them?”

“It might be a good idea. I don’t want this deal to fall through, Adam. That bulls worth the price we put on it, and I want it settled before we take the bull there. I like Ramsay but sometimes he pushes things a bit too far.”

“I’ll leave tomorrow morning if that’s okay?” Adam glanced over at his brothers and frowned “I’ll be back on Wednesday at the latest.”

“I’m sorry if it interferes with any plans you may have made over the week end, I know the town as a dance organised but… ” Ben paused and looked at his son with a helpless look on his face, a kind of desperation which feigned or not always succeeded where words often failed.

“It’s okay, Pa. I hadn’t made any arrangements to go with anyone, so I won’t be letting anyone down.” Adam smiled and slapped his father reassuringly on the arm “Don’t worry, I’ll get this sorted out.”

He resumed reading his book, quite aware, uncomfortably aware of the fact that his two brothers were secretly congratulating themselves on not being included on the little jaunt.

………………..

“Jenny, pinch your cheeks,” the eldest sister advised, glancing down at Jennifer’s reflection in the mirror at which they both were standing.

“Why?”

“It’ll make them nice and pink.”

“Like ladies who wear blusher?”

“That’s right…and bite your lips like this.” and leaning towards the mirror Deborah bit her lips hard making them look red and more clearly defined against her sallow skin. Jenny leaned towards the mirror and frowned at her reflection and sighed

“I look like a school girl on her first outing!” she exclaimed sadly.

“You look very pretty” Deborah replied as she stooped to kiss her sisters cheek.

They looked at one another in the reflections of the mirror and shared a mutual smile. They looked like sisters, dark and pretty, but Deborah was as vivacious in her boldness as Jennifer was serene in her timidity.

“Are you ready to go now?” Deborah whispered and when Jenny nodded rather slowly she took hold her the girls hand and together they ran lightly down the stairs

“Let me see, let me see my two gorgeous girls” Jamie Wilde cried as they entered the room and he stood up and stared at them and clapped his hands and nodded

“Beautiful, beautiful. I shall paint a sketch of you both as soon as you leave so as not to forget.” And he turned to Abigail who was stretched out on the couch looking tired and rather more frail than usual. “Aren’t they beautiful, mother, our two girls ..our two angels.”

“Yes. ” she smiled at them and took each of them by the hand and looked into their faces and sighed, “You both look lovely. Now, off you go, behave yourselves, have a lovely time and don’t be late home.”

“We won’t, mother.” Jenny whispered as she stooped down for an exchange of kisses before running to her father and not hearing her mother telling Deborah to make sure that Jenny was kept safe.

“Look after your sister, Deborah.”

……………….

Hoss Cartwright presented Deborah with a corsage of pale apricot roses which she pinned to her dress with a smile while her eyes watched as Joe offered his corsage to Jenny. The younger girl looked at it uncertainly and then picked it up and smelt it and sighed, it was a pretty little corsage of forget me nots and two rosebuds and with practised gallantry Joe helped the girl pin it to her gown.

Hoss noticing Joe’s gallantry moved in to help Deborah with hers, but seeing it already neatly attached to Deborah’s dress he could only blush and mumbled something incoherently under his breath before taking her arm and lead her into the hall.

Everything was noise, colour, and all the things one associated with the large gathering of people for a social evening. Tables groaned under the weight of an array of food, bowls of punch gleamed in the candlelight. The small orchestra played soft music, awaiting their cue to play something more lively later on.
Now faces turned towards them, ladies with eyes full of curiosity, kindness, hospitality, generosity, and men who smiled and nodded and shook their hands. Younger girls looked them up and down carefully, their eyes sharper as they noted the style of dress, the coiffure, and the escort. Particularly the escorts!

“Where’s Adam?” one young woman asked Joe, looking pointedly at the young girl standing awkwardly by his side.

“He’s had to go away on business, Miss Emmie.” he replied honestly “This is Miss Jennifer Wilde, her folks have just moved into the Brannigan old place.”

Miss Emmie glanced over to Hoss and took in Deborah Wilde with a long lingering look and smiled, before looking once again at Joe and raising her eyebrows

“Interesting.” she murmured and drifted away once she had said a few words to
both the young women.

“Why did she say that?” Jenny asked Joe.

“Who? What do you mean?”

“She said ‘Interesting’ . Why did she say that?”

“I don’t know, but Emmie’s had her eye on Adam for years, probably a bit piqued
at not seeing him here.”

She said nothing to that but looked at the orchestra and smiled softly, her face taking on a dream like quality that made her look even more attractive

“Do you like the music?” he asked and then touched her hand to get her to look at him before he could repeat the question.

“I love music. I play the violin, badly now though.” she took the glass of lemonade that was offered to her and sipped it although her slim young body was swaying to the music all the while, “I feel the music,” she explained to Joe who was watching her thoughtfully, “Through the vibration of the floor that the instruments make.”

“That’s good, you’ll enjoy the dances then.” and with a chuckle Joe turned to talk to Hoss only to find him deep in conversation with another couple while his big hand held tightly to Miss Deborah’s elbow.

…………

“My feet ache!”

“So do mine!”

The two girls smiled at one another as they rode along the track towards home, beside them Hoss and Joe rode, one on either side, having agreed that they would escort the girls home and falling foul of any romance en route when they realised the girls had arrived in town for the dance in a two seater buggy.

“Did you enjoy yourself?” Joe asked, leaning forward and although his lips addressed the question to Jenny his eyes lingered in Deborahs direction

“Yes, I did, thank you” she replied and Deborah smiled and lowered her lashes before turning to talk to Hoss.

Jenny sat back, and watched as Joe rode by her side of the buggy. She enjoyed the sight of him riding on Cochise, his back so straight and sitting so neatly on the saddle. He had a natural riding ability, and she could see the strength in his fingers as he held the reins through which Cochise would get the sense of his masters control. Everything about Joseph Cartwright she liked. She liked the way he looked with his flashing eyes, wide smile, the way he would throw back his head and laugh. She tried to imagine the way he would have laughed, the sound of it and then she tried to imagine the sound of his voice and the way he would pronounce her name.

They had danced together and she had thrilled at the way he had held her hand and placed his arm around her waist and swung her so manfully through the dances. They had danced all the regular barn dances, in and out of ‘arches’, swirling around other dancers, forming patterns, high stepping and heel rapping and hand clapping….it had been so exciting, so colourful and breath takingly energetic.
Everyone had laughed and clapped furiously when Hoss swung Deborah so high, much higher than anyone else, and she had laughed, yes, laughed aloud at the sight of her sister being swung in the air by that gentle big man whose blue eyes were filled with such tenderness when he looked at Deborah. And he had swung her around and around so that her skirts and petticoats had swung out for everyone there to see. Then Deborah had said she was too tired to dance another one until Joe came and asked her for a waltz.

Jenny frowned slightly remembering how Hoss had returned with two glasses of punch to find Deborah’s chair empty and he had looked so forlornly over at the dancing couples and seen Deborah and Joe dancing together. Jenny had watched as Hoss looked at them for some time before looking at the two glasses in his hands. Sensing her looking over at him, he had offered her one and then sat down beside her, but he had not offered to dance with her.

The journey home did not seem to take so long as the journey into town, she had always noticed that, and when Joe offered his hand to help her down from the buggy she smiled at him a grateful thanks and realised, once again, that his eyes were watching Hoss and Deborah.

“Thank you, Joe,” she said softly and then tugged his hand to get his attention
“Thank you” she repeated.

“My pleasure.” He looked down at her and smiled. She was a pretty little thing, no doubt about it. When she was a grown woman she would make any man proud to call her his wife. His eyes twinkled, “I’m glad you enjoyed it, Jenny.”

“I did.” she said honestly, simply in her clear young voice.

“You made some new friends tonight ?” he asked, a smile on his lips.

She looked at him doubtfully, unsure whether he had made a statement or asked a question, such nuances of language were a problem with those unable to hear and she sighed and looked away,

“Sleep well, Jenny” he said quietly and leaned forward and kissed her cheek before putting on his hat and walking back to his horse.

She touched her cheek gently still able to feel the impression of his lips upon her skin, still able to smell his breath as it had wafted about her nostrils. She blinked and swallowed hard some emotion that made her heart beat so fast that it propelled her to run towards him and call out his name. When he turned, surprised, she took hold of his face between her hands and kissed his lips as hard as she could, and then his hands gently held her shoulders and very tenderly held her away.

“Good night.” she whispered before picking up her skirts to run as fast as she could back to the safety of her home.

Hoss and Deborah held hands lightly as they walked to the house, and he swung his hat too and fro in his free hand. She twirled the little corsage in between the fingers of her free hand. They paused only when Jenny ran past them and disappeared inside, then resumed their slow walk.

“Thank you for a lovely evening, Hoss, I did enjoy it,” Deborah said softly, smiling over at him briefly before turning her attention back to her sister’s flight homewards.

“I’m mighty glad that you did, Miss Debbie,” he looked at her and frowned slightly, and then stopped walking, “You really did, didn’t you?”

“Yes, I really did.” She smiled and leaned forward and kissed him gently on the cheek “I hope you didn’t think me too forward, kissing you like that, but I wanted
you to really know how much I enjoyed this evening.”

Hoss said nothing, his heart beat too fast for him to speak and he looked down at the ground feeling the colour mantling his cheeks as he stood there. Then he glanced up and smiled at her, his blue eyes bluer than ever

“Thanks, Miss Deborah, I enjoyed it too,” he said, his voice slightly lower than usual.

He leaned forward to kiss her but she had already stepped back, and turned, she squeezed his hand and said “Goodnight” very softly and then was gone.

He stood in the yard for a moment, listening to the sound of the door swinging shut. A large man standing in the dusky light of late evening, bathed in the glow of the moon and the light shining from the window of the house. Finally he put on his hat and turned to walk back to where his brother and his horse were waiting for him.

Chapter 7

Adam Cartwright paused, took off his hat and glanced up at the sky. It was hot and he had ridden hard to get home as soon as he could from the Ramsay ranch. He had reached the junction from the main road to where the track led to the old Brannigan place and curiosity getting the better of him, he turned Sport in the direction of the old track and galloped down towards what he had remembered as a ramshackle huddle of buildings.

Like his brothers before him, he was pleasantly surprised at the sight that now befell his eyes. He slowed the big horse to a walk, surveying the buildings as he rode past them, and then, dismounting at the hitching rail, he paused to look at the house.

It was much like most of the early ranches there in Nevada. Rough stone and timber had been their building materials and the windows and smart looking doors had come later when civilisation in the form of stores, and mail order catalogues had come into vogue.

A rocking chair was on the porch. By its side was a table. Nothing unusual about that except that it was toppled onto its side and the sewing basket and garments that had been getting worked on were scattered everywhere. The door was swinging open, and shut, creaking slightly in the softest of breezes. He took off his hat and very cautiously approached the door and knocked. A sound came to his ear, but he was unsure of what exactly it was so he knocked again before pushing it open and stepping inside.

A slightly built woman was on the floor. not lying there, but reclining there, her body leaning against a chair and her hands clutching the spindles of its back as though for their support. When she saw Adam she relaxed, as though from relief, and her body slumped down but only into his arms.

He carried her very carefully to the couch where some colourful cover was had been cast over it earlier. Now he lay her down, covered her with the blanket and returned to the table for a glass which he filled with water and carried over to her. He offered it to her lips and then set it down when there was no movement to drink.
He sat there patiently, holding one hand in his, while with the other he checked her pulses. They were beating fast, fluttering lightly, it reminded him of the beating of the heart of a small trapped animal, too frightened, too terrified to use its senses to escape, only aware of death and strangers.

“I’m Adam Cartwright, from the Ponderosa. Is there anything at all that I can do to help?” he said very gently, very soothingly in his dark voice

She sighed now and her eye lids fluttered open and for an instant her hazel eyes were fixed onto his own. She lay still, just looking at his face, as though those precious moments were the most important of her life.

“Adam Cartwright?” she whispered, “I’m Abigail Wilde,” She raised a thin hand and pointed to a dresser in the far corner, “Medicine, in there, please.”

She drank the medicine hurriedly and then sunk back against the pillows, her hand resting lightly upon her breast which for a few minutes seemed to be struggle to sink and rise as normal and then slowly her breathing became more regular, stronger and she slipped into what he assumed to be a light slumber.

He wondered what to do now, whether or not to wait for other members of the family to return home and tend to the invalid, or whether to stay in case she were in need of help before their arrival home. He sat there for some minutes, looking at the back of the books on the shelves and mentally registering the ones he had already read and the one he would like to borrow for future use. The he stood up to stretch his legs and walked about the room and looked at the paintings on the walls. One was so new that he could smell the turpentine and oil. He stood back to survey it for some minutes before admitting to himself that it was a beautifully executed piece of art.

Something burning in the stove prompted him to immediate action in order to rescue the families forthcoming meal. It was the clattering of the stove that stirred Abigail and when he turned back to survey her she was already leaning upon one elbow, watching him carefully.

“Your dinner was burning. I hope I did the right thing in taking it out of the stove.” he gave an apologetic half smile.

“Yes, thank you, Mr Cartwright” her voice was stronger now and there was a little colour back in her cheeks and her eyes, well, they were so sunken into the hollows of their sockets that it was difficult to notice whether or not there was any sparkle left in them. “Thank you for your help, you’ve been very kind.”

“I’m glad I came along at the right time.” he sat down and looked down at her, “Do you need the doctor?”

“No, the medicine is fine. I’m feeling much better already.”

“Is your family far from here? Would you like me to go out and get them?”

“No, I’d rather they were not worried. It upsets my husband.” she smiled slightly and closed her eyes, “I saw you looking at the paintings, did you like them?”

“Very much so.”

“My husband painted them all. He was a scholar in Paris, France….he could have been very famous, wealthy even.”

Adam said nothing but straddled the chair, resting his folded arms upon its back and leaning his chin upon them. His dark eyes regarded her thoughtfully, kindly and she smiled at him, who could help but smile back at this handsome stranger dressed all in black.

“He’s an extremely clever man, Mr Cartwright, knows so much about everything.” she paused and closed her eyes again and when she opened them there were tears standing on the tips of her lashes, “ I met him after he had been very ill and his family called me in to nurse him. We fell in love, and married. Well, his family did not think very highly of that and disinherited him. He came from a very wealthy family, and had never known a days hardship, not even when he was a student in Paris. We had to move away of course, and his paintings paid for our livelihood, and he had to work as an art teacher but it was too much for him, and he had a break down.” she frowned and looked at him “I don’t mean by that, that he went mad, he just went a little, erratic, eccentric,” she paused and frowned slightly, “Yes, I think that would be the right word, eccentric.”

Adam blinked his dark eyes and wondered why people felt the need to tell complete strangers such intimate details of their lives. He wondered whether or not he would ever do the same, perhaps in his dotage?

“So, what kind of things does he do as an eccentric? Apart from painting lovely pictures and not selling them?” he smiled softly and was pleased to see her returning smile. She raised her hand and pointed to a small box on a shelf

“Would you get it down for me, please?”

It was a pretty box, one that had at one time cost a lot of money and he resumed his seat and watched as she opened the lid. She took out a small fob watch and held it out to him.

“Do you recognise this?”

“Yes, Mrs Hawkins has one similar to it. I think I’ve seen it pinned to her coat.”

“It is Mrs Hawkins’ and so is this,” she produced a small brooch which Adam could remember seeing the widow wear at funerals, “There are probably other items in there that you may remember seeing elsewhere.”

“ You mean, your husband stole these?” Adam took the box and ran a finger through the items with a frown furrowing his brow as he recognised item upon item.

“NO!” she cried involuntarily, and then she shook her head and sighed, “I mean, technically, I suppose so.” She sighed and ran a thin hand over her brow before sinking back against the pillow, “HE doesn’t understand that he’s stealing them, he doesn’t understand that concept anymore you see. You do see, don’t you?” she turned begging eyes, wide with appeal, to him, searching the lean dark features hungrily, as though the opinion of a stranger was of immense importance to her. Her hand stole out and touched his, “Paul said you would understand.”

“Paul?” Adam frowned and put the box to one side, along with its contents, “Paul Martin?”

“Yes, he said that you had had an experience of a friend.” she paused when she saw the dark veil that seemed to fall across his face, shutting her off from him and for some minutes left him to his thoughts.

Ross Marquette was the name that flashed through Adams mind. Ross and Delphine both victims to what Paul had referred to as a Dark Gate where the mind wanders and could not find the way back sending the lost ones hurtling into the horrors of a world alien to everyone else. A world where medical science still struggled to unravel the strands that tied, even locked, these ones away from the real world. So many different paths beyond that dark gate. He bowed his head and stared down at the floor before eventually looking up at her

“Was there any particular reason why Paul mentioned me?” he asked quietly.

“He felt you would understand more then anyone else, and that people respect you. You’re sensible, down to earth, discerning and, most importantly, you’re kind.”

He said nothing to that but looked at her thoughtfully, then he looked at the little box again and closed its lid.

“You want me to do something about this?”

“Yes. I want you to return the things to the rightful owners. You could do that, couldn’t you?”

“What if they’ve already been reported to Roy as being stolen?”

“Please, Mr Cartwright?” she closed her eyes and said nothing for a moment as she struggled to get back her breath, perspiration shone on her pale skin and he leaned forward and gently wiped her face with a damp cloth .

“If they have been,” he looked down at her and frowned, “and the owners demand an explanation, do you want me to tell them the truth?”

“Of course!” her eyes widened as though surprised that he would even think of lying. “I just want Jamie to be protected, sometimes people don’t always understand.”

“So this has been happening for some time in other places ?”

“At first, when we were married, things were alright. He was just absent minded and sometimes did strange things, like once he got worried about the horses getting cold in the stables during a blizzard and insisted on bringing them indoors, into the house.” she smiled thinly, remembering the chaos of that evening, the snow twirling through the open door, the children crying, the horses frightened and dropping dung on the carpets as a result and Jamie begging her not to turn them out into the cold ‘not just yet, ,darling, not just yet.” he had cried.

She clutched at his hand and looked vaguely over his shoulder so that he turned to see if anyone had entered without his knowing, but everywhere was just shadow

“When I was taken ill some years ago and then Jenny, he had a kind of seizure. He claimed that he was not ill, but it was obvious that something had happened and the doctor who was treating us thought that was the best explanation. Well, Jenny and I survived, but I‘ve been ill ever since, and Jenny has been deaf.”

“And Jamie? Your husband?” he looked down at her, his dark eyes large with his concern and compassion for the whole family of them.

“He became like a frightened child. He wouldn’t leave me alone, followed me everywhere like a shadow. Deborah helped as best she could but it was hard for her, and Jenny had to learn to come to terms with her own problems. Eventually Jamie changed, instead of following me around, he became more assertive. He painted more and read more. He acted just as though he were the young man I first met,” she paused.

“And that’s the problem?” he said very softly.

“I knew you would understand!” she flashed him a smile of gratitude. “Yes, that’s the problem. He thinks he’s that very wealthy young man who can pick things up and present them to his wife as gifts and someone else pays for it. He never understood economics although he’s so brilliant in other things.” she took a deep breath “At first people are very tolerant, they laugh at little about it and then they become a trifle patronising, and then they get irritated.” she frowned and then gave a soft chuckle, “At times the things he does are so outrageous that they’re almost funny. Once he saw a house he liked and decided that was where we were going to live. The owners came home one day to find he had moved all our furniture into the house, and their things were left out on the lawn.” she sighed “It was a shame, a nice town but we had to leave.”

Adam glanced around the room with a slight frown furrowing his brow but before he could open his mouth she shook her head,

“It’s alright, Mr Brannigan was a relative of mine, and we do own it, legally.” she sighed again now and closed her eyes, “Now, I’m so tired. Could I just leave it to you, Mr Cartwright? Please?”

“Your daughters, do they know about your husbands eccentricities?”

“Oh yes, they could not BUT know,“ she frowned slightly “I don’t want it to blight their lives . Your brothers seem very kind but – but I don’t know if they would understand.”

“My brothers?” Adam bit his bottom lip and stood up and nodded, oh yes, of course,
Hoss and Joe. He picked up the box and then his hat and looked at her, but she was already sleeping, the medication and the talking had exhausted her. He gently lifted the coverlet over her shoulders and let it fall to cover her over and then quietly left the house.

Chapter 8

The clatter of crockery and the smells of food drifted over the rooms and Hoss made his way to the breakfast table with a look of concentration on his face. With a distracted air he sat down and surveyed the table and then raised his eyes to look at his father who was surveying him thoughtfully.

“Anything wrong, Hoss?”

“No, Pa” Hoss reached out and took several slices of the bread, still warm and fresh.

“You came down those stairs as though you were about to attend a funeral.”

“Did I? Sorry, Pa.” Hoss frowned and chewed his bottom lip and then looked at his father who raised his dark eye brows at his second son, as though urging him to talk

“Wal, I gotta small problem. There’s this gal, y’see. She’s pretty, and feisty, and I think I could love her as easy as,” he clicked his fingers with a sharp snap and then looked up as the sound of Joe’s feet on the stairs came to his ears “but,” he jerked his thumb in the direction of the stairs, “that’s the small problem I gotta deal with.”

“You’ve managed to deal with – er – with it before,” Ben said with a small smile hovering on his lips.

“I think he cares for her too,” Hoss mumbled.

Ben nodded and looked at his youngest son who walked towards them, hesitated when he saw Hoss looking at him, then jutting out his jaw, came to the table and sat down. Hazel eyes glared defiantly over at his older brothers blue ones and both faces settled into deep scowls as they glared over the platters of food at one another.

“Are you alright, Joe?” Ben asked gently, passing the platter of bread to his youngest son.

“Yeah, apart from one big problem I’ve got!”

“Which is?” Ben prompted.

“Him!” Joe jerked his thumb in the direction of Hoss who scowled more darkly .

“I take it this is over a young lady – again?”

“Ain’t it always?” Hoss mumbled

“There wouldn’t be a problem if he would just butt out!” Joe growled, nearly choking
on his coffee.

“Well, don’t you think it would be a good idea to let the lady in question decide the matter for you?” Ben looked at one and then the other but before either could comment the sound of Adam descending the stairs distracted them.

Adam walked towards them in silence, his face already shut off while his brain thought over the myriad things that buzzed there night and day. When Ben greeted him, he was acknowledged with a mere nod and a request for the coffee pot.

“Did you sleep badly, Adam?” Ben asked gently, as he passed the coffee pot to his eldest son in a rather conciliatory manner.

“So-so.” Adam sighed, pouring the coffee into his cup in a rather distracted fashion.

“I see,” Ben frowned and glanced at his three sons and sighed “Adam?”

“Yes, Pa?” Adam turned to his father with an unusually deep frown on his brow and
his eyes dark and sombre. He looked like a man with all the worries of the world on his shoulders, although they were really mostly contained at present in a little box residing in his saddlebags.

“Any problem we can help with ?” his father asked with a kindly smile on his face, the smile he often used when attempting to coax some hint of what was going on among his sons.

Joe and Hoss looked at one another, the collective ‘we’ not having escaped their notice. It did nothing to bridge the gap between them, they merely scowled at one another and resumed eating. Adam, his eyes switching one from the other, raised his dark eyebrows before shaking his head and picking up some bread and staring at the pile of eggs as though they were his mortal enemies.

“Do you want to talk about it?” Ben prompted.

“Nope.” Adam put his cup down and stood up “I’ll see you all later.”

“Adam?” Ben’s voice was a rumble of a growl but his son merely continued walking to pick up his gun belt and hat.

“Sorry, Pa, I have some important business to deal with in town today. I’ll see you later”

Ben frowned as the door slammed shut and shook his head. Hoss, standing up, drained his cup of coffee and excused himself.

“Have to get going, Pa,” he mumbled and made a hasty exit leaving his father and younger brother staring at one another over the breakfast things.

“Well, any idea what all that’s about?” Ben asked Joe who only shook his head and stared blankly at his plate before bouncing out of his chair.

“Gotta go, Pa.” he cried as he grabbed at his hat and gun belt, the door closing behind him before either article touched his person.

The door crashed open and shut; silence settled over the room, over the cluttered table, over the solitary man seated at the head of the table and presiding over a solitary plate of ham, eggs and bread. Ben sighed and shook his head in the forlorn hope that eventually sense would prevail and normality would resume once more – someday.

…………………
Paul Martin said nothing as Adam emptied the box’s contents onto his desk and told him about his conversation with Abigail Wilde, he merely nodded here and there before the young man became silent and stood looking down at him as though he had the right to a reply. Paul gestured to the chair on the other side of the desk and when Adam was seated he still said nothing.

“What exactly am I supposed to be doing with these things, Paul?” Adam eventually asked.

“I was going to leave that to you.” The doctor replied slowly

“Why me?”

“Because you need to help Jamie.”

“I do? I’ve never even met the man .”

“No, but he’s a man in trouble, just like your friend Ross Marquette. You couldn’t help Ross, nor Delphine, but you can help Jamie and Abigail”

“He’s stealing.” Adam said sternly, looking down at the familiar articles that he had seen adorn a number of ladies in town.

“Ross Marquette was stealing too. In fact, when Ross’ mind went for a walk behind that dark gate he knew exactly what he was doing, he was systematically stealing your herd, and he robbed and stole and murdered to do it. You couldn’t help him, Adam, because you didn’t know he had a problem.”

“I killed him though.” Adam replied, and his lips tightened together as though regretting the words, the action, the past.

“Yes, and hated yourself for doing so, even though Delphine’s death, well, you could justify what happened if you hadn’t cared so much about him as a friend.” Paul sighed and stood up and walked to the window and stared out into the main street. “Look at them, Adam, all going about their own business, all with their own problems and worries, fears and joys.” he shook his head and then turned to look once more at the younger man who was sitting in the chair biting his thumb nail anxiously “This little man, Jamie Wilde, needs your help. I don’t know how you can help him, Adam, but he’s got lost behind that dark gate just as much as Ross ever did, in fact, he’s lost himself so thoroughly behind that barrier to real life that I doubt if he’ll ever find his way out of it again.”

“Then how can I help him?”

“Do what you think best. You’ve enough good sense and compassion for that.” he smiled and placed a gentle hand on the mans shoulder and looked into the dark eyes “Adam, may be if you do something for him, you may stop punishing yourself for what happened to Ross.”

“You mean, help him to help myself?” Adam frowned.

“Possibly!”

Adam said nothing for a while, but scooped the trinkets back into the box and then looked at Paul, his head a little to one side.

“Paul, what happened to Jamie Wilde? Why does he do this? Do you know?”

“Not really, although since Ross Marquette’s case I’ve tried to look into everything there is being done about mental illness. Jamie was a brilliant young man from a very wealthy, prominent, influential family. They wanted him to go into politics or the law, he wanted to be an artist. He developed a brain fever and as far as the family was concerned he ‘changed’. So he studied art in Europe, still wealthy and still indulged.”

“But he became ill again?”

“As soon as his family put pressure on him to conform to what they wanted, yes, he
became ill again. He fell in love with the one person who could help him, his nurse.”

“The family disinherited him”

“Yes, quite a ruthless cutting off I believe. Abigail was his strength and her love for him kept them both going. Now she could die at any time and his mind has taken him back to when he was young and wealthy and he wants to give her everything beautiful that he can now, to make up for what she had never had before,” he frowned and shook his head “Of course, unlike Ross, Jamie has no concept of right or wrong. He sees something Abigail would like, and takes it.” he looked at Adam “Legally it is stealing, but if he were arrested for theft he would probably go completely mad.”

“And then what would happen?”

“He’d be locked up, depending on the severity of his illness, of course.”

Adam nodded and with a sigh stood up and put out a hand which Paul took and shook with a smile, “Paul, you know me better than I know myself.”

“I know, that’s because I’m a doctor,” Paul replied with a gentle smile.

……………………….

Deborah and Jenny Wilde squealed and squeaked with delight as they swam and splashed one another with the cool water in the pool that was fed by the river that flowed through the Ponderosa to their home.

It had been hot and the two sisters, with their father, had taken a picnic hamper and gone to this favoured spot for an hour of pleasant relaxation. The girls had eaten sufficiently and after a little rest had stripped to their undergarments and jumped into the pool. Over the hill, in a pleasant oasis of waving grass and wild flowers, Jamie Wilde sat and sketched, an old battered hat on his head and his face blank of emotion as he carefully transferred the beauty he saw in Gods own creation onto the blank pages of his sketch book.

Joe Cartwright pulled Cochise to a standstill and listened to the squeals and cries of pleasure and grinned mischievously. He tied Cochises’ reins to a bush and walked in the general direction of the sounds and peeked through the bushes. He could not suppress a chuckle when he saw Deborah, now dressed, with her long dark hair blackened by the water, hanging to her waist. Jenny, still swimming, was lost to his sight behind some shrubs.

“Boo!”

Deborah jumped, startled, and stepped back with her hand on her heart. The colour drained from her face and then rushed back in, mantling it scarlet

“Joseph Cartwright!” she exclaimed, struggling to regain her composure

“Sorry, I didn’t mean to scare you so much,” he said contritely, although his hazel eyes twinkled as he spoke.

“Scare me? You near took ten years off my life.” she stammered

“I’m sorry.” he stepped closer and took hold of her hand “I am sorry, Debbie”

“So you should be,” she frowned and then smiled and looked at him with that bold way of hers that always made his heart race beneath his ribs “Not that I’m forgiving you, you understand.” she pulled her hand away and turned to pick up a towel with which to rub at her hair, “What are you doing here, anyway?”

For a moment he couldn’t think of what to say, he could see, from the corner of his eye, Jenny clambering out of the water and reaching for her clothes, and gallantly he averted his eyes and found himself looking into Deborahs’ face. She raised her eyebrows, reminding him that she was waiting for an answer

“I thought I’d ride to your house and see if you would like to come for a picnic with me tomorrow?”

“Tomorrow? Oh, I have a lot on tomorrow. It’s a busy day…” she smiled and rubbed her long hair with the towel, her eyes smiling teasingly up at him.

“What about later today?” he asked, reaching out and taking hold of her hand again.

“Oh, no, not to day, I’ve had a picnic already.” and she laughed “What did you really come here for, Joe? Is it to ask me to ask Hoss -.”

“Nothing to do with Hoss,” he interrupted her quickly, tightening his hold on her hand.

“Really?” she frowned, a small pucker between her eye brows “What do you mean, Joe?”

“You, Deborah, I can’t stop thinking about you. I – I think I’ve fallen in love with you.”

“In love with me? But I thought it was Hoss –?”

“No. I mean, Hoss likes you, I know that, but I love you, Deborah.” and very gently he pulled her towards him, held her close and kissed her lips.

She smelt clean with the river water smell on her body and her eyes gentled into the soft look of tenderness as his lips touched hers that made a man feel he could climb mountains. He drew her closer,

“Noooooooooo Noooooooooooo” the shrieks sent them spiralling apart as they turned to face the younger girl who ran towards them with her fists clenched. She kicked at them both, threw her fists at them, punched and kicked and bit as fiercely as she could while all the time she moaned aloud, “No, no, no.”

Finally she pulled herself away from them both and threw herself down upon the ground, sobbing bitterly. With the greatest tenderness Joe leaned forward and raised her up, and held her closely in his arms, while he stroked away wet strands of hair from her face,

“What’s the matter, Jenny?” he asked “What’s the matter?”

“I don’t want you to love her.” The girl child cried passionately, her clenched hands held close against her heart “I want you to love me…me…not her!” she looked angrily at Deborah and then at Joe, “Hoss was supposed to love her, and she could love him. She could, couldn’t she?” and sobbing she buried her face in her hands and gave herself up to the arms of her father, who had hurried, breathless and frightened, up to them.

……………..

Several families in Virginia City were more than pleased to have a visit from Adam Cartwright. Just passing through and thought he would drop in and see how things were with them, that was what he had said. He had smiled and chatted with them about nothing in particular, drank cups of coffee and ate slices of cake. Walnut cake, raisin cake, chocolate cake. Of course, no one seemed too sure as to why exactly he had visited them. They had just closed their doors and smiled at one another and said “What a nice surprise to have a visit from Adam Cartwright” and those with single daughters of a marriageable age had looked significantly at one another and smiled knowingly.

If they had only known!

As cups and saucers had rattled in one room, and cakes had been produced with alarming alacrity, Adam had found strategic places to return the little precious items that Jamie had ‘borrowed’. He knew exactly what piece belonged to what person, having spent years seeing them paraded on many an ample bosom at most July 4th fetes, and various other social occasions. He also knew with an amazing discernment just exactly where they would be most likely to have misplaced the item and on finding it again, exclaim “Ah, so that was where it was” without even thinking that it had been stolen.

Everything was going well until he came to Widow Hawkins home and had been ushered in with horrifying haste into the widows parlour. As she rattled cups and saucers and sorted out plates and cakes, he tried to mentally tally up just how many slices of cake he had eaten that day, and how many cups of coffee he had consumed. All the time listening to her narrative about Dear Ben and hoping his replies were slipping in at the right time for them.

When she arrived and the tray of things had been set down on the table beside them, he realised that the amount of cake and coffee he had already imbided had caused him to forget to put down the little fob watch and brooch that Jamie had become so attached to as to take them home for his wife. Widow Hawkins poured out the coffee and eyed him thoughtfully,

“You look a bit jaundiced if you ask me,” she said in her gravely voice

“I must admit I don’t feel too good.” he sighed, looking anxiously at the huge slab of fruit cake that was being presented to him, “Ma’am, I’m not Hoss,” he muttered

“I know that, but the best way to beat off jaundice is a good amount of food in yer belly. Now eat up.”

He took a deep breath and looked about him,

“I see you’ve still got the Burma Rarity under glass?” he smiled and looked at her with a twinkle in his eye and she laughed and for the next five minutes he had to listen to her telling him yet again the great adventure of Ben and the boys and the Burma Rarity. His stomach rumbled mid narrative, but Widow Hawkins pressed on regardless.

He stood up and walked, with increasing discomfort, towards the dumb bells of which Hoss had been so proud and which Widow Hawkins claimed to be her pride and joy, because they had once been ‘’er ‘arry’s”. He glanced up and down the room and saw from the reflection in the mirror that she was well away, talking as though she were addressing a whole roomful of people, and very carefully he took the fob watch and brooch from his pocket and placed them on the table behind the bar bells and was startled when a firm hand gripped him round the wrist

“Ooooh, Adam Cartwright!” she exclaimed “I never took you to be a tea leaf!”

Chapter 9

Ben Cartwright waited patiently for his eldest son to re-emerge from behind a shrub

“Feel better now?” he asked sarcastically.

“A bit.” Adam replied as he unscrewed his water canteen and took a gulp of fresh water, swished it around his mouth and spat it out.

“Can we get on now?”

“Sure, Pa.” Adam sighed and re-mounted Sport carefully.

“Why didn’t you tell me about Jamie Wilde?” Ben eventually said in exasperation “I could have helped and saved you a lot of embarrassment.”

“I promised Mrs Wilde to keep it as private as possible, Pa. Anyway, I wasn’t even sure what to do myself until I had talked to Paul about it.”

“And some advice he gave you.” Ben barked, making a mental note to check the matter over with Paul himself next time he was in town.

Adam said nothing but sat miserably and uncomfortably in the saddle and let Sport take his own way home. He re-called with horrifying clarity Widow Hawkins’ disgusted look on her face when she had caught him in the act of stealing her fob watch and brooch, or so she told Roy.

With terrible misgivings and much queasiness of stomach he went over the dialogue with Roy and the Widow and then the way Ben had been involved. He shuddered, Widow Hawkins’ twitterings, Roys’ ramblings and Bens furious tirades had just about killed him, that and all the helpings of cake he had had during the day.

Paul Martin had eventually been summoned, to administer some medication to Adam, who now proved to everyone without a doubt that his stomach capacity was no where near the volume of his brother Hoss’, and also to give ‘evidence’ to the fact that Adam was not taking, but returning, lost property.

“I ain’t lost no property.” Widow Hawkins’ had protested loudly.

“Had you realised that you had and reported it to Roy,” Paul said with the patience of a saint, “It would then have become STOLEN property,” he then explained in as simple and kindly a fashion as possible the situation with regard to Jamie and warned Roy to expect to receive regular reports of small thefts of ‘pretty’ but valuable objects, all of which would be ‘returnable’.

The Widow expostulated at length. Roy wandered around the subject at volume, Ben had thundered volubly, and Adam had merely asked very politely for a bucket!

…………..

When the door of the ranch house was thrown open with a loud thud, Joseph Cartwright practically fell out of the chair. The relief on his face as he saw his father and elder brother walk into the house was obvious, as were the scratches and bruises and the red imprint of a hand on his left cheek.

“What happened?” Ben asked quietly, a faint note of resignation in his voice.

“I had a run in with the Wilde sisters, very aptly named if you ask me.” Joe groaned “I thought you were Hoss.” he glanced over at Adam and frowned, “What’s
the matter with you, Adam, you look mighty green.”

“Shut up!” came the brief reply as his brother sunk gratefully into the big leather chair and stretched out his legs. With a groan, he closed his eyes.

“What’s the matter with him?” Joe asked of his father but Ben only shook his head and advised his son that it was better not to ask, or to know.

“Which one was it?” Ben asked finally as he dabbed at Joe’s cuts and bruises with the iodine.

“Both,” Joe frowned and winced “Careful, Pa.”

“Sorry, son.” Ben leaned closer to his sons face and shook his head “Whoever gave you that sure packed a punch.”

“Like a mule,” Joe groaned.

“I’m afraid you’ll have a black eye,” Ben sighed and leaned forward to apply more iodine when the door crashed open.

“Dabgummit. Where’s Little Joe?” Hoss bellowed, rolling up his sleeves as he strode purposely into the room. Behind him the door slammed shut.

Adam cringed in his seat as the voice and door slamming pounded through his head. Joe tried to make himself as small as he could as he hid behind his father.
Hoss Cartwright advanced into the room before he stopped, with his hands on his hips, nostrils flaring and teeth bared.

“Where is he? I tell you, when I get my hands on him they won’t be calling him Little Joe for nuthin’” he growled, clenching his hands slowly into ham like fists.

Adam leaned forward with an amazing return to some form of alertness as he noticed his brothers face. A red hand print on both cheeks was only too evident for all too see.

“What happened to you?” he asked which prompted Joe to peer from under his fathers arm pit to look up at his ‘big’ brother with interest.

“Wow!” Joe whistled and his eyes went round with astonishment “Hoss Cartwright!”

“You little varmint.” Hoss bellowed, lunging forward to grab at his brother, “I’m going to kill you, very slowly; and when I’ve done that, I’m going to kill you all over agin.”

“STOP IT.” Ben yelled, stepping back hurriedly to avoid colliding with Adam who had lurched out of his chair in an attempt to prevent Hoss from reaching Joe who had ran behind the big couch to escape the flailing hands of his giant sized and very angry brother.

“Tell him to stop it, Pa.” Joe yelled in panic as Hoss threw Adam to one side and took a leap towards Joseph, catching him by the leg and bringing him down to the floor with a resounding crash. “Pa, Pa, tell him to stop it.”

“HOSS STOP IT THIS MOMENT.” Ben once again yelled, falling into the big leather chair as Adam pushed him out of the way in order to throw himself on top of Hoss and make some attempt to haul the enraged man away from Joe who was beginning to turn a rather livid puce colour.

“Alright,” Adam gasped, finally managing to get the two men separated and standing between them “What’s the matter? What’s going on?”

“That little varmint. I dunno what he done but when I saw Debbie this afternoon she told me to scoot. She said she had had her fill of Cartwright men and when I tried to persuade her to think otherwise she slapped me.” he pointed to his left
cheek “and when I didn’t go as quickly as she thought I should she slapped me agin!” and he pointed to his right cheek “Then she said if I wanted an explanation to ask my baby brother.”

He lunged forwards, pushing Adam so hard that his elder brother staggered back and collided with the grandfather clock. Joe, realising that Hoss was still intent on beating the life out of him, crawled on his hands and knees as fast as he could for cover under the table.

Hoss stopped abruptly as his father stepped in the way. With thunderous eyes Ben folded his arms across his chest and glowered at the three of them,

“I have had more than my fair share of the three of you today,” he growled in the voice of doom that was spat out in the staccato manner of a Gatling gun “Hoss – stop being so ridiculous. If the woman treats you with that much disrespect be glad to see the back of her. Joseph, get out from under that table and apologise to your brother. Adam, get up and put that clock to rights.”

The three younger men silently did as commanded, Joe shook Hoss’ hand and apologised very humbly, and Hoss, recognising the hand print on his brothers face, accepted with warmth, giving his younger brother a hug into the bargain.

“No more arguing over women. Agreed?” Joe asked Hoss, with a twinkle in his eye.

“Agreed.” Hoss chuckled, rubbing his sore cheeks

Hop Sing, after peering into the room to make sure the dust had settled and peace now reigned, stepped forwards to the table with a smile wreathing his face.

“Suppah all lead-y now,” he said “You come –eat.”

Adam took one look at the laden table and groaned and slowly sunk back down into the red leather chair, holding his head behind his hands he muttered something incoherently beneath his breath.

“What did he say?” Joe asked Hoss as he walked hurriedly towards the laden table.

“Sounded something like – pass me a bucket.” Hoss replied without any sympathy in his voice at all. He sat down at the table and rubbed his hands together before stabbing at a large steak with the tines of his fork.

Part 2.

Chapter 1

“Did you do that on purpose?”

“Are you accusing me of doing that?”

“You did, didn’t you? Dadburn your hide, Joseph Cartwright, I’ve a good mind to-”

“Yeah? Yeah? A good mind to do what? Go on, Hoss Cartwright, a good mind to do what?”

Hoss Cartwright reared up from his chair and leaned across the table as opposite him his youngest brother did exactly the same, so that their noses met and they stared eye ball to eye ball like two bull mooses challenging one another for battle.

“Do we have to have this every morning?” Adam growled, “It’s getting so a man can’t eat his first meal of the day in peace.”

“Just shut up, Adam.” his youngest sibling hissed, darting a poisonous glare in his direction .

“Yeah, and that’s about the most sensible thing you’ve said in weeks,” Hoss growled.

Adam shook his head and pushed his chair back from the table, throwing down his napkin as he did so. Ben scowled at the three of them and then realised that Adam was striding towards the door, he got to his feet,

“Adam? Where are you going?”

“To town.” Adam turned to look at the three men as he buckled on his gun belt
“Possibly those two hot heads will have cooled down by the time I get back.” He narrowed his eyes and surveyed Hoss and Joe who had settled back into their chairs but were still scowling at one another “I thought the pair of you had agreed not to disagree about women in future?”

“Yeah, I had, but tell him,” Hoss stabbed the air in Joe’s direction with his fork, nearly skewering his father in the process,

“You’ve a nerve” Joe exclaimed “It was you-”

“I don‘t want to know,” Adam muttered, cutting any explanations short, “I’ll get the supplies while I’m in town, Pa and do you want me to warn Roy to get a cell ready?”

“A cell? Ready for what?” Ben asked, his dark eyes widening in puzzlement

“Whoever survives out of the two of them?” came the abrupt reply which was made more emphatic by the door slamming shut behind him.

………….

Sally Cass glanced up as the bell rang above the door and gave Adam a friendly smile and nod of the head. She continued to hand over the items to the young woman at the counter while another woman, although perhaps too young to be correctly described as such, stood beside the first, taking the items and carefully placing them in a box.

“Is that all, Miss Wilde?”

“Yes, that’s just about everything.” Deborah Wilde replied and opened her purse
“How much do I owe you, Miss Cass?”

Adam leaned against the counter and took off his hat and watched, not deliberately inquisitive but merely curious as he surveyed the young woman over whom Joe and Hoss had been locked in battle for some weeks. He had to admit to himself that they possibly had every good reason for feeling the way they did, for Miss Deborah Wilde was indeed a most lovely looking young woman. Even the sound of her voice was pleasant to the ear, soft, warm and mellow. His eyes turned to apprise the girl standing beside her and he correctly deduced that this was Jenny, who, despite her tender years, certainly promised to become a most attractive woman.

“I think I brought the wrong purse with me..” Deborah stammered, the colour slowly mantling her cheeks to a soft blush pink.

Adam shook himself out of his reverie as the words filtered into his hearing and he looked at Deborah Wilde again and realised that she was blushing and looking obviously embarrassed as she looked at the money in her hand and the receipt for the goods in Sallys. Jenny tugged at her sleeve and without speaking asked the question ‘what’s wrong?’ by a mere lift of an eyebrow. Deborah turned to her sister and shook her head,

“I’ve not brought enough money to pay for the things we have here. We must put some things back.”

Jenny nodded and began to take out some items, some she lingered over, looked at again, and then replaced, before she took another item out instead and put carefully onto the counter.

“Can I be of any help?”

Deborah Wilde turned and looked at the tall man who was standing now quite close to her. Her eyes travelled up to his face and she felt the colour deepening from her neck upwards. It was not only for being caught in this particular situation but at the impact upon seeing such a man in Cass’ General Store. She shook her head and mumbled something that was quite incoherent to anyone listening

“It would be just a loan, if you’d prefer?”

“That’s alright, but thank you anyway.” She mumbled, quickly counting out the money into Sally’s hand, “Is that enough now?” she asked the other girl who looked at the items on the counter and nodded, “Thank you, Miss Cass, I’m really very sorry about that, I don’t know how I happened to have picked up the wrong purse.” she leaned forwards to pick up the box, only to have it lifted from her arms by the young man who smiled now at her in such a charming way that she felt the warmth of her blush sweep over her from head to toe.

“Sally, could you get this order packed up for the Ponderosa while I take this out for the lady?” Adam asked, glancing over his shoulder as he led the way out to the street.

“The Ponderosa?” Deborah said rather sharply, with her eyes widening and the colour now fading rapidly from her face.

“Mmm” Adam nodded, holding the door open with his foot as he balanced the box in his arms “I’m sorry, I should have introduced myself, I’m Adam Cartwright.”

“And I’m perfectly capable of taking my things to the wagon myself, Mr Cartwright, thank you very much.”

She pulled the box away from him with a violence that took him quite by surprise. Jenny, passing close to her sister, gave him a puzzled look but said nothing, only held the door open to pass through and then closed it firmly, before he could follow.

Adam shook his head and returned to the counter, where Sally and he exchanged glances. She shook her head

“They’re a strange family,” was all she volunteered to say as she returned to sort out the Ponderosa order.

“I’ll be back in a minute, Sal.” He paused and then gathered the discarded items that were still on the counter into his arms “Put these on the bill, I’ll settle up with you when I get back.”

“You’ll probably get them thrown back in your face, Adam.” Sally warned.

“We’ll see.” he smiled and without another word strode to the door, pulled it open
and made his way to the wagon.

Deborah and Jennifer were putting the groceries in the back when he reached them, and without a word he placed the other items beside the other items. Jenny smiled gratefully, her eyes lighting up at the sight of the goods and the thought of the kindness behind the action. Her sister however began to pick up the items one by one.

“I’m not taking them back, Miss Wilde.” Adam said in his quiet deep drawl, “If you don’t need them, your family do.”

“What do YOU know about MY family,” she snapped, her blue eyes as hard as sapphires “Don’t talk to me about my family, Mr Cartwright. I refuse to take charity from any Cartwright.”

“Miss Wilde, you can pay me some other time if it hurts your pride so much as to take them.”

“You know very well,” she paused, and the hard blue eyes softened as they misted over with tears, she lowered her head and looked at the things in her arms “You know I can’t pay you for them.” she said in a much quieter, emotionless voice.
“Please take them back.”

He looked at her thoughtfully, and then at Jenny who, in her wordless world, stood there by the side of the wagon watching them both and wondering what was going on. He sighed and shook his head,

“I met your mother a few weeks ago, Miss Wilde.”

“She told me.” came the quiet reply and she bowed her head.

“I think we got off to a bad start.” he smiled and looked at them both with a kindly expression in his eyes, “Shall we start again?”

“You’re right.” she frowned and looked up at him, looking immediately into the dark brown eyes and the tanned skin with freckles and the black hair and the white teeth behind the parted lips “Mr Cartwright, I can’t accept these things. My mother always said not to borrow things.”

“Take them as a gift then” he smiled, holding his hat by the brim between his fingers and his dark eyes looking at her without any other expression but kindliness and, perhaps, faint amusement.

“It’s silly to take tins of peaches and such as a gift,” she smiled, softening under the firm stand he was making before her.

“If you need them, take them home, and tell your mother I’ll be riding by soon to see her. How is she, by the way?” he leaned forward, glad now to see her putting the items in with the other things “Is she any better?”

“No, she gets weaker every day,” came the very quiet reply “She seldom leaves her bed now. She told me about your visit, Mr Cartwright, and how you had helped her with regard to my father. That’s another reason why I didn’t want to accept your gift,” She looked at the back of the wagon and bit her bottom lip, “I felt embarrassed just then. We owe you so much already.”

“Forget it, it was nothing” he said quietly (Nothing? He was sick for three days as a result of eating a mountain of cake on their behalf. As well as that there was the humiliation when Mrs Hawkins accused him of being a thief and hauled him down to Roys to be arrested) “Er – is your father in town to-day?”

“No,” she smiled again, her sharp eyes noting the look of relief that came into his own, “No, Mr Cartwright, since mother has been taken so ill, he refuses to leave the house. He just paints all the time.” Deborah’s brow furrowed slightly “I don’t know what we will do when he realises he needs new brushes or some more paint and canvas. He’s very clever in some respect, you know. Once when he ran out of canvas he tore up some sheets and soaked them in glue that he had made from boiling calf hooves which he had got from the market. Then he stretched them out to dry and they were just perfect for painting on.” her voice trailed away as though even that spark of ingenuity on the part of her parent was not going to save them from poverty, She turned to Jenny and took her hand to get back her attention “Come along, Jenny, time to go.” she smiled again at Adam and extended her hand, which he took and shook politely, “Thank you for your help, it was very kind of you.”
He nodded and watched her turn away to walk to the head of the wagon, Jenny coughed to get his attention and smiled at him,

“I miss Joe” she said quickly.

“I’ll tell him.” he smiled at her, dark eyes twinkling.

“Thank you.” she nodded and turned away. When she had taken her seat on the wagon beside her sister and looked back, he was still standing there, watching them both. She touched her sister by the elbow and when Deborah looked at her she nodded and said “He likes you too.”

“I think he likes everybody, Jenny, not just me.”

Jenny said nothing but her lips tightened into a small red button of protest and the little flame of resentment and anger in her heart burned a little more brightly.

Chapter 2

“Hey, Joe,” Eddy Burgess gave the younger man a wave of the hand “Coming in for a beer?”

“Yeah, it’s a hot one today,“ Joe observed trailing in behind the other man, and taking off his hat to wipe his brow.

“Didn’t expect to see you in town today,” Eddy leaned against the counter and placed an order for two beers, “Saw your brother Adam earlier.” he pushed a filled glass over to Joe, who took it gratefully. Both men swigged down half of the glass before they were replaced on the counter and then wiped their mouths on the back of their hands,

“Saw him talking to that gal you were so keen on a few weeks back.”

“What gal do you mean?” Joe’s glass hovered mid way to his lips and his eyes narrowed and darted furtively over at Eddy.

“That gal with the deaf sister. She was in town getting groceries and your brother was there by her wagon talking to ‘em for some time, held her hand too seemed to me.”

Joe drained the glass dry and placed it carefully on the counter before looking thoughtfully at Eddy, then he pulled some coins from his pocket and tossed them onto the counter

“Hey, my treat, Joe,” Eddy protested as the coins scattered in front of him

“Your way of making trouble more like.” Joe growled and turned away quickly, wishing he had never had to come into town, or seen Eddy, or heard about Adam talking to Deborah.

Once on the sidewalk he slapped his hat on his head and stalked over to the mail and telegraph depot and collected the Ponderosa’s mail for the past few days. He glanced up and down the street, saw no one that he wanted to talk to and decided to go to Cass’ General Store just for a few minutes to chat with Sally.
She looked up from behind the counter and smiled

“I didn’t expect to see you today, Joe. Adam has already collected the supplies for the Ponderosa.”

“So I heard.” he looked around the store and picked up a book rather listlessly before replacing it, “How’s things with you, Sal, is everything okay?”

“Yes, Joe, everything is fine. Why do you ask?”

“Just showing a friendly interest.” He flashed her a smile and his hazel eyes twinkled. Sally shrugged, and picked up some linen towels that she had been folding into a pile and carried them to the necessary shelf. “Is your Pa alright?”

“Yes, he’s fine to.” she knelt down and straightened a few ornaments on the bottom shelf and then glanced over at him, before standing up to face him “You didn’t come in here to find out our state of health, did you, Joe?”

“I was in town, thought there’d be no harm in just calling in.” he picked up a small box and rattled it against his ear, wondering without too much interest what exactly was inside it. Sally came and snatched it from him and replaced it from where he had taken it,

“Did you want to buy anything, Joseph?”

“No, not really.” Joe leaned against the counter and pulled his hat forward a little, and watched as Sally resumed her place behind the counter “Ever get bored standing there, Sal? Ever wished to just close shop and go places else?”

“Mostly every day,” she smiled at him thoughtfully “But I can’t – not many of us can just up and go any other place at a whim, Joe.”

“No, I guess not.” He frowned and looked about him “I hear that Deborah Wilde was in town earlier.”

“Yes, that’s right,” her voice lowered a little, and she looked him straight in the face and shook her head “Well? What’s on your mind, Joseph Cartwright?”

“I was just wondering how she was,” he muttered.

“She’s fine and well, and so is Jenny” she brusquely turned aside and began to arrange things on one of the shelves behind her.

“I guess she must have been here when my brother was in town.” he pushed his hat to the back of his head, trying to appear blasé and unconcerned.

Sally Cass sighed and put down the item she had in her hand. She had not been in Virginia City for ten years without learning something about the ups and downs of the Cartwright family. Their loyalty to one another was quite unique, but introduce a woman, and for some reason things would go slightly awry. She sighed again and looked at him thoughtfully,

“If that’s what you wanted to know, why didn’t you ask in the first place.”

“Well, I was just trying to be polite.” he doodled on the counter, making smear marks on the polished surface. She slapped his hand away and pulled out a duster and began to polish it,

“He was here when they came in, and he very kindly offered to pay for their groceries because she had brought the wrong purse with her. But she refused and said she didn’t want to have anything to do with anyone on the Ponderosa,” she gave him a direct cold stare to emphasise the point, “And I just can’t think why she would feel that way? Do you?” she shoved his hand away from the area of counter he had once again smeared, polishing it furiously.

“So.” Joe frowned and thought for a second or two, “So he didn’t get on very well with her then?”

“He seemed to get along with her just fine, Joe.” she tilted her chin defiantly. “He bought the groceries she needed and took them out to her and when he came back in he looked quite happy with things. I think he was quite impressed with her. It seems most of the men in town are for some reason.”

Joe looked at her oddly, strange how women could never fathom out what made another woman so attractive to the men in town. He shook his head,

“So, Deborah and Adam seemed to have hit it off then?”

“Oh, for goodness’ sake, Joe, why not go home and ask him. As if I would know what goes on in that brain of your brothers?”

“Hoss hasn’t been in town, has he?” Joe asked as he reached the door and half turned to address the question to her.

“Not that I’m aware of,” she muttered and with a sullen glare watched as he closed the door sharply, setting the little bell jangling overhead. “Joe Cartwright!” she hissed and threw the duster onto the counter in exasperation. “You notice every woman in town from the age of 12 to 120 – except me.”

Chapter 3

Ben Cartwright knocked lightly on the door. For some seconds he stood patiently waiting on the porch, looking around at the neat yard with the washing fluttering like oversized butterflies from the line. He was about to return to Buck when the door opened and he was looking down at a woman younger than himself but who looked much older. Her frailty and delicate health had ravaged the beauty she had once possessed, although when she looked up at him, her hazel eyes still held something serene and precious within them.

“I’m sorry, Mrs Wilde,” he removed his hat briskly, and smiled down at her, a gentle smile that softened his near black eyes and made his deep voice less frightening. “I did not mean to disturb you.”

“I was not in bed, if that’s what you meant.” she smiled back at him, for who could resist one of Bens rare smiles, “I was waiting for my husband to come home, and my daughters.” she looked up at him then, a slight anxiety in her eyes “Have you seen them?”

“No, should I have?”

“Well, Jamie was supposed to be painting just over the way there.” she gestured in the direction of the hills behind the house, “And my daughters were going to town to get some supplies in.”

“Oh, in that case I would have missed them as I just rode over from the Ponderosa.”

“The Ponderosa?” she leaned nearer, clutching the door frame for support with one hand and holding more tightly to the shawl across her shoulders. She narrowed her eyes to take in the features of the man standing in the sunlight and then she nodded, “You must be Ben Cartwright?”

“I am.”

“Then please come inside and take a seat, I’m Abigail Wilde and I’ve already had the pleasure of making the acquaintance of your three sons.” she smiled then and glanced over her shoulder at him as he made his way into the gloomier environs of the house.

He watched her carefully as she sunk, quite gratefully, into a rocking chair and with a sigh pulled over the quilt across her legs.

“I’m afraid I’m not the best of hostesses at present, Mr Cartwright. Please do sit down and tell me what I can do for you? Would you like some coffee, there is some still hot on the stove…”

Ben glanced at the stove and then smiled, and shook his head, then he sat down, pulling the chair a little closer to hers.

“I should have come earlier and welcomed you to Virginia City, but sadly I’ve been rather neglectful of my duties lately, due to one thing and another…”

“No need to apologise, Mr Cartwright. Goodness me, you’re a very busy man, everyone knows that……..” she frowned slightly and looked at him thoughtfully “It’s
very good of you to come today.”

“I wanted to come. Your daughters seem to have made quite an impact on two of my sons and that, in turn, has made quite an impact on our family life!” he chuckled in a friendly manner and she smiled, her eyes half closed as though keeping them fully open was beyond her strength. “I thought I ought to come and meet them as well as you and your husband”

“Jamie isn’t here – of course, you know that, I’ve already explained-“ her voice trailed away and she glanced anxiously to the window “Did your son, Adam, explain about Jamie?”

“Er – yes – but only because he was in a position where he had to do so. My other sons know nothing about – “ he paused, wondering how exactly to phrase what he had meant to say “Can I get you something, anything at all?” he asked abruptly, deciding a different subject would get him off the rather sensitive matter of Jamie Wilde’s rather strange habit of helping himself to other peoples possessions.

“Thank you for asking, but there’s nothing I need just yet.” She smiled then, a gentle smile, “I am glad that I had the chance to meet you, Mr Cartwright. You have three very handsome young sons. You must be very, very proud of them.”

“Yes, I am.”

“Very different in temperment though.”

“Yes, that’s a fact –“ Ben smiled and thought of his three boys and sighed “but they’re good men”

“Yes, Mr Cartwright, I can see that they are…” she smiled still, her eyes half closed as though she were thinking more about the subject than she had said. It was quite obvious to Ben that she was a very sick woman and he leaned forward now and touched her hand gently

“Are you sure that there is nothing I can get for you?” he asked

“You’re very kind. Your sons must have got that quality from you……..”

“From their mothers more likely” he smiled and glanced at the picture on the wall close to where she was seated “Is that one of your husbands paintings?”

“Yes, all the pictures on the walls here are Jamie’s. There are some more in the barn. He paints in the same way people breathe” she glanced around the room and then frowned “Mr Cartwright, I do hope you don’t mind but……..”

“But?” he prompted very gently

“Sometimes Jamie rides over onto your land and paints the views there. He says that the light is so perfect that the colours seem to leap in front of his eyes. He has painted some beautiful scenes from the Ponderosa.” Her brow creased very slightly again “You don’t mind, do you? He knows I cannot get out to sit with him anymore, so he likes to think he is bringing the views to me….”

“I understand.” He said very softly “There’s no problem, Mrs Wilde, your husband and daughters are free to ride over the Ponderosa at any time they wish. They’d always be welcome at the house too…”

“Some of the most recent paintings of the Ponderosa are over there…” she pointed to the wall just left of the window and he turned to look at the three paintings

“Jamie mounted and framed them himself. He’s very clever at carving too….” Her voice trailed away a little and he wondered whether or not he should leave, perhaps his being there tired her too much. “Do tell me what you think of them?” she asked

“It’s such a long time since anyone has seen any of Jamie’s paintings, I’d like to hear another persons opinion of them again!”

He smiled and stood up, towering over her as he did so for he was a big man, tall and well built with his strong dark features and white hair. He walked across the room to the paintings, on the stove the coffee pot was steaming, so he moved it a little to prevent it boiling dry, and then he pushed pass the table and stood in front of the paintings. It was the middle one of the three that drew his attention most of all, his eyes were drawn to it immediately, as though pulled by a magnet

“Don’t you like them?” she asked, her weak voice holding a slight tremor in it as though his disapproval would be almost too much to bear

“They’re beautiful, Mrs Wilde, but..”

“You’re angry? You don’t think Jamie should intrude on your land.” she had interrupted when his pause had become too long, too protracted for her to bear any longer.

“No, no.” he turned and looked across at her, and forced a smile to his lips before turning to the pictures again and then pointing to the centre one “It’s just this
View.”

“Oh, it’s my favourite one. I hope that, one day perhaps, the whole earth could look like that, it takes my breath away…..”

“She used to say that.” Ben said with an inward sigh.

“Who was that, Mr Cartwright?”

“My wife, Marie. This was where we often went together, to share a little time. to talk, share secrets.” he sighed and looked at the painting again “Beneath that tree we read poetry to one another, it’s where she told me that she was expecting our son.” he swallowed the lump in his throat and turned to her “It’s a very special place for me, Mrs Wilde. I never expected anyone to be able to capture its beauty like this.”

“I’m sorry if it makes you sad,” she said wistfully, looking at him with a thoughtful expression on her pale face.

“No, it doesn’t make me sad. It reminds me of some wonderful moments in my life, and for that I am very grateful.” he turned his head and smiled over at her.

“Would you like it, to take home and keep, I mean.” her voice held a note of excitement in it, giving it some energy and strength.

“Yes” he said slowly, looking at the picture again and feeling that it was so real that he could walk right into it “I’d like to buy it from your husband, if I may?”

“No, no, take it, as a gift.”

He smiled and walked back towards her and picked up his hat and shook his head

“Mrs Wilde, no amount of money could buy the memories that picture evokes “ he took hold of her hand, holding it very carefully for it was like holding the frail body of a frightened little sparrow, he could feel her pulse beating just as a birds heart beat against the broad palm of his hand “I’ll pay you for it or leave it here!”

She frowned and remembered Deborah saying that there was no more money, she remembered her daughter grumbling that very morning because there were groceries to be bought, medication too, and what about when Jamie needed more paint and brushes. Perhaps this visit from Mr Cartwright was a blessing in disguise, perhaps it was Gods provision. She looked up at the honest face, the dark eyes and thought how this was a man one could love passionately, for the quality of him was all there, shining in his face, from his eyes.

“Mr Cartwright, I don’t know what price to ask for it.”

He smiled and took out his wallet and held it up for her to see,

“I’ll give you everything I have in here” he said with a twinkle in his eyes, for he knew exactly how much the wallet contained, “Agreed?”

“Agreed,” she smiled and leaned back against the chair, pulling the shawl closer. Perhaps it would be enough to pay for the bills, Deborah had said there was more than groceries to be paid for , or medication, there was equipment for more repairs to the house and, oh, so much more. She nodded and smiled again, too tired to think about it anymore, too tired to talk even though she would have liked for him to have stayed longer.

He emptied his wallet and placed the money upon the table,

“I’ll call by and see you another time, if I may?” he said quietly, but she was already asleep and very quietly he took the painting from the wall and left the house, closing the door softly behind him.

Chapter 4

Joseph dismounted and left the reins of his horse trailing as he walked swiftly to the hollow into which he threw himself down. He rolled over onto his back and folded his arms beneath his head and stared up at the sky. White clouds puffed their majestic way across the blueness, and beyond them white streaks pierced the blueness on the horizon, all touched by the light that shone from the sun that was burning overhead. He stared and stared in to the blueness while his thoughts strayed to Deborah Wilde.

He could feel the pressure of her body against his when they had danced together, the touch of her hand against his as their fingers had entwined together, and the smell of her hair as her gleaming soft curls had touched his cheek. He remembered the gleam of her eyes as she had laughed up at him, or the spark of them when she had challenged him, and the earnestness in them when she had asked him to invite Jenny to the dance, instead of her. He sighed and closed his eyes and let the warmth of the sun and the silence of the moment wrap themselves about him and carry him away to the realms of a never never land where promises were always kept and love always blossomed just the way he wanted it.
……….

The two brothers stood back to back. For years they had worked together like this in a warm intimacy that did not need words to express. When Hoss was very small his elder brother had stood him on a box and shown him how to curry and comb the horses they rode, or used to pull the wagons, and Hoss had loved it.

Years had passed by since then, but even so there were the occasional times when they would share an hour together, currying and combing Sport and Chubb. Their arms swept back and forth and every so often their bodies would touch, in a companionable way, in a way that brought a quiet smile of acknowledgment to their lips.

As Chubbs coat began to take on its customary gleam Hoss’ sombre mood began to lighten. He could smell the body heat of the animals there, and the hay and straw, and he could smell his own body, sweat and toil, and when Adam drew alongside him, he could smell his brothers body too. He stroked Chubb’s sleek neck and smiled,

“Hey, Adam, seems like forever since we spent time together doing this.”

“Huh, I guess at least a week” Adam smiled and put down his horses tack and then stroked the soft muzzle as Sport nudged him in the shoulder for more attention.

“Seems longer,” Hoss frowned and turned to look at his brother and then he smiled
“Remember when I was a kid, how we shared time together to groom the horses?”

“I remember the times I used to have to pick you up and put you back on the box, every time you overreached yourself.” Adam smiled, stroking Sports neck now, his fingers hidden behind the horses mane.

“Yeah, guess I make a habit of over reaching myself, don’t I?”

“What do you mean, Hoss?” his brother surveyed him thoughtfully, walking towards the bucket of water as he did so, but now he paused and turned to face Hoss, knowing his brother well enough to sense that there was something more profound to be said.

“Miss Wilde is what I mean.” Hoss frowned very slightly, and leaned against the bar of Chubb’s stall and letting his hands dangle as he tried to work out the right words that would express what he felt to his more erudite brother “You’ve met her now, Adam, what did you think of her?”

“Very attractive, spirited, intelligent.” Adam replied, approaching his brother now and leaning beside him against the stall, “I should think she’s a young woman who knows her own mind.” He stroked Chubbs nose and glanced at Hoss’ thoughtful face and then smiled and slapped his brother on the shoulder, “You’ve tamed horses wilder than that one though.”

“Yeah, I guess so.” Hoss ran his fingers through what remained of his hair making it stand up on end and reminding Adam more than ever of the little boy who would work all day long grooming the horses way back some years, “Adam, I care a lot about her, you know.”

“Yeah, I had gathered that, Hoss. The way you and Joe….”

“But that’s just it, Adam, Joe cares for her too. I’ve bin thinking and thinking about this a whole lot and I don’t reckon, if push comes to shove, that Miss Debbie would give a fig for me compared to how she’d feel about Joe.”

“How’d you work that out?” Adam crossed his arms and leaned against the stall and watched his brother closely.

“She’s everything you said, Adam. And I reckon I could handle the attractive and spirited bit, but when it comes to being intelligent.” he sighed and shook his head.

“Wal, Hoss, you ain’t stupid, you know.”

“Fact is, she’s too good for me.” Hoss flashed his brother a grateful look, not many credited him with brains, but then Adam knew him better than most “I reckon she’d git plain sick and tired of me soon enough, were she ever to git down to the courtin’ an’ all.”

“Fact is, Hoss, I rather got the impression that getting down to the courting was the last thing on her mind, with either you or Joe.”

“I jest can’t reckon out why she let me take her to the dance and not Joe. Why’d she ask him to take Jenny, huh? Surely she’d know that would hurt a guy, to let him think she rated him enough to take her to the dance and then – well – not really care at all.”

“Hoss, if you’re asking me to explain to you the workings of a woman’s brain, forget it. You’re treading on dangerous ground when you try working out a females reason for dong anything.”

“I think she likes Joe.”

“I think perhaps you’re right, so what do you intend to do about it?”

“Nuthin’.” Hoss sighed and pushed himself away from the bar and walked to the bucket of water, which he picked up and carried over to his horse “Thanks, Adam, talking to you always gets things sorted out proper in my head.”

“My pleasure.” Adam smiled and once again slapped his brother on the arm “My pleasure.” he repeated quietly as he watched Hoss pour the water from the bucket into Chubb’s trough.

…………………

“Mama? Mama?”

Jenny leaned over her mother with panic fluttering within her heart. Sometimes when she looked in upon her mother sleeping, she had that fearful dread that she was never going to wake up again and that life would never be the same again. Even now, looking down at the sleeping woman, so vulnerable and frail as she reclined in her chair, so pale and haggard when once she had been so very lovely

“Mama?”

Abigail opened her eyes slowly, coming awake as though she had been a very long long distance away. She saw her daughters face and saw the fear in the girls eyes and felt sadness touch her own heart. If they only knew how tired she was of life now, and that only her love for them both kept her fighting to live another day, another hour. She forced a smile to her lips and touched Jenny’s hand

“I had a strange dream.” she said softly, framing her words carefully for Jenny to lip read them well, “I dreamt that a man came here, tall and dark and very handsome.” She sighed and stretched a little, “He bought one of your fathers paintings and said he would give me the contents of his wallet.” She laughed just a little and took Jenny’s hand in hers “Wasn’t that a strange dream?”

Deborah looked at the two of them and then at the money on the table. She picked it up and counted it slowly,

“It wasn’t a dream, Mama.”

Abigail turned to face her other daughter, which caused Jenny to turn to wards her sister. They opened their eyes wide when they saw the wad of notes in Deborah’s hand

“How much is it?” Jenny asked, her eyes wide in disbelief at what she could see.

“Over one hundred dollars” Deborah said in a voice shaking with emotion “Can you imagine it? One hundred dollars.”

“Fancy walking around with that much money in your wallet.” Jenny said quietly, touching the money very reverentially “It hardly seems possible.”

“We could once.” Abigail sighed, leaning back in her chair “There was a time once when it seemed that money grew on trees but it was all a very long time ago!”

“We can pay the doctors bill now, and the other bills. We can get some new equipment for the barn.” Debbie forced herself not to laugh out loud, the relief to be free from struggling even if just for a few weeks made her feel giddy with joy and she turned and hugged Jenny tightly.

“A new dress, Debbie. Please say I can have a new dress?” Jenny whispered

“Yes, yes. New dresses for us all.” Debbie laughed and tossed the money in the air so that it fluttered down upon them. Jenny shrieked with laughter as she ran to catch several dollars that were floating towards the stove.

Abigail Wilde sighed and closed her eyes. So it had not been a dream after all. There had been a tall, handsome man in her parlour and he had left money on the table. Perhaps he would come again – one day.

Chapter 5

Hop Sing opened the door to the polite tapping and stood back to confront the young woman standing before him. She smiled at him and he smiled at her. She nodded and he bowed.

“Is Mr Cartwright at home?” she asked even as she stepped into the room and lowered the hood of her cloak.

“Yes, missy. You say which one and I go get him. You come in side and see fo-ah yo-ahself.”

Hop Sing closed the door behind her as she stepped further into the body of the room and like so many before her, she stopped to look about her. She was impressed by the size of the room, its proportions were more than pleasing to the eye, and she liked the way the fireplace dominated one section of the room. In that brief moment she took in the sight of Hoss who had been engrossed in studying a brochure about cattle breeding, his brow now creased in confusion as he rose to his feet and faced her. Joe had been busy cleaning his pistol, jabbing the rod down into the barrel and with a rag and oil close at hand by his side, but this was set down onto the table as he turned to look, with a whimsical smile,at her. Adam had been sitting by the fire, in a faded back blue chair and reading a book, his face blank with concentration as he had scanned the words on the page before him, like his brothers he also rose to his feet to look towards her, the book still in his hand.

“I – I came to see your father…” she stammered, her voice drifting off at the sight of them and it was Adam who nodded, and stepped forward to lead her to where Ben was standing, close by his desk and looking at the painting that she recognised as one of her fathers but which was now hanging on the wall behind the big desk in the area that was obviously designated their office.

“Pa, you have a visitor,” Adam said quietly as though somehow he had still not shaken off the pleasantness of that homely scene, one of peace and harmony, that she now felt guilty for intruding upon.

“I’m sorry to intrude like this,” she blurted out before Ben had a chance of saying anything “But Mama said that you had been to see her, Mr Cartwright, and ….” she broke off as her voice began to wobble slightly. It was better to stop, she thought, than disgrace herself totally by bursting into tears.

“So you’re Deborah Wilde?” Ben smiled and approached her, extending his hand to take hers “It’s good to meet you at last. Would you care to join us with something to drink?” he had edged around the desk and had gently turned her to face the main room again, while Adam had retreated back to his blue chair.

“Sure, have a drink, Debbie, you’ve ridden some distance.” Joe blurted out, anything to get her to stay a while longer than she obviously intended.

“Thank you, but I can’t stay. I just came to thank you for being so kind , Mr. Cartwright. You paid so much for that picture.” she produced a purse from somewhere and was about to pull out the money when Bens hand clasped hers, “It was far too much.”

“Not to me,” he said very quietly in his deep voice “Miss Wilde, that picture was worth much, much more than the amount I paid for it.”

“But Mama was worried that you would think we had taken advantage of your generosity, especially after you had all helped us so much already.”

Ben shook his head and smiled, “Well, I don’t know about that, but I do know that I am the one indebted to your father for that picture. If he ever decides to paint any others of the Ponderosa, please let me know.”

“Oh he has,” she cried, her heart lightened by his kindness.

“Yes, so I recall your mother telling me. I’ll have to ride along again some other time and see what views he has captured .”

“Mr. Cartwright.” she now turned to Adam, who was looking on the scene with his customary caution and politeness, “Mr. Cartwright, would you be so kind as to take the money I owe you now? I did say that it would be only a loan.”

“Certainly.” he replied “But only if you are sure you can manage.”

“Perfectly sure, Mr. Cartwright.” She smiled then and placed the money on the table and then looked at Hoss and Joe, “It’s good to see you two again. I guess I should apologise for the way I treated you both the last time I saw you. Would you accept
my apologies, please?”

The two brothers glanced at one another, then looked at her and nodded, mumbling incoherently like two school boys and blushing a little as she smiled at them. Ben glared and Adam had that superior smirk on his face that got Joe riled every time.

“Thank you.” She took a deep breath and turned to leave, “Thank you all so much, you’ve all been so kind to us.”

There was a slight waver in her voice then, she turned, opened the door and was gone before they had time to insist on her staying. Joseph was the first to move, sprinting across the room and pulling open the door and running to catch her up. He caught at her elbow and turned her to face him, despite her attempt to pull away from him,

“Debbie, I – I never thought to see you again after the last time.”

“Are you so easily put off then, Mr Cartwright?” she smiled and her eyes sparkled with mischief, making the blue of them even more alluring and attractive.

“Shucks, not usually. But you seemed so definite,” unconsciously he raised a hand to his cheek, and put on an injured air.

“I know.” She frowned a little and started to walk towards the buggy, with Joe by her side, frightened that if she were to ride away now he would lose any chance of seeing her again. “Joe, I am sorry, believe me, I treated you and Hoss badly, I know that.”

“I just didn’t understand as to why?” he interjected “At first I thought perhaps you cared for Hoss and that was your way of putting me off, but then Hoss came home and it all seemed so confusing.”

“Look, Joe, I do care for Hoss, a lot. He’s sweet and gentle and kind. He was just what I needed when I first came here, just the kind of man I felt could help me then.” She looked down at the ground and then raised her eyes, looking at him helplessly, from under her lashes, “I was wrong to make him think that what I felt for him was more than it was. The only way I could end it was by being – being rather cruel, I guess.”

“And me? What about me?” Joe lowered his voice and stood a fraction closer “Are you saying that you didn’t care for me either, and that all that fist and claw stuff was your way to end it?”

“You can’t end a thing that has never started, Joe.” she smiled and her eyes twinkled again.

“Never started?” Joe’s voice trembled a little, and his hazel eyes darkened slightly as he looked down at her “Do you think there’s any chance of anything starting?” he murmured, reaching out for her hand.

“Do you?”

They stood close together for a second or two, just long enough to look into one another’s eyes and see there the mutual attraction, the mutual longing

“There’s a dance to-morrow night, can I take you?”

“If you really want to.” she whispered softly in reply.

“I do. I really do want to.”

“Then, thank you. I’d love you to take me.”

“And Jenny?” Joe’s eyes twinkled now, and his smile widened as he recalled the way his last request to take her to the dance had ended and she smiled,

“Jenny will stay at home with Mama and Papa,” was all she said before she turned and made her way to the buggy.

“Tomorrow night then?” and he raised his hand in salute as she drove away.

…………………………………….

Jennifer Wilde watched as the hands of the clock turned round and round. Had it really been just an hour since her sister had left the house. What would she be doing now ? Would she be at the Ponderosa now, or would Joe have met her on the road and escorted her into town? What would they be talking about? Would they mention her? Would Debbie tell Joe how her little sister had cried and stamped her feet and pounded on the table with her fists when told that she was to stay at home while Debbie was going to spend the evening in the arms of Joseph Cartwright? What would he say in reply to those details? How would he feel about her when Debbie told him ?

She poured out the measure for her mothers medicine and filled the glass with water and crossed the room. She paused to look out of the window and stare up at the moon that could be seen so clearly from her position there in the centre of the room. Would Joe take Debbie in his arms and would they look up at the moon and tell one another that they cared, for each other? Would he kiss her?

Her hand was shaking by the time she had mounted the stairs to her mothers room. She placed the glass by her mothers side on the little table and stepped back and sat down and looked at her mother thoughtfully.

What would happen to her when her mother died, she pondered. Would she be left alone to care for their father and the house that she detested. Would she be able to return to Boston or even better, to the home back east? Who would want to marry a girl like her – a girl who could barely speak coherently now, who could not hear, who had a mad father?

Abigail heard the door close and opened her eyes. She had expected to see Jennifer sitting by her bedside, as was her custom in the evenings, but the chair was vacant although the glass with her medication in it was there on the bedside table. She reached out for it and wondered where her girl had gone.

Jamie Wilde was asleep by the fire, his chin resting upon his chest which heaved up and down as he snored very, very quietly. Jenny stood for a second by the door and looked at him. She thought what a strange way it was to live, so creative, so talented and yet so locked up in a world all of his own where no one intruded, and in which only one other person existed and that was Abigail, and when she died, Jenny wondered, what would happen to him then? Would his world cave in around him?

She took her shawl and flung it about her shoulders and silently left the house. The yard was bathed in moon light and cast long shadows all about her. Sometimes she drifted into the shadows and became a shadow herself. In the barn she mounted her pony and without a glance back at the house she rode as fast as she could away from the buildings, from her parents, from the clock that ticked away the minutes of all their lives.

Chapter 6

He kissed her. He kissed her lips and her cheeks and her finger tips. He told her that he loved her and that he had never loved any other girl as he loved her now.

She whispered to him how much she loved him, that no one could ever know the depth of the feelings she had for him now.

When he touched her it was as though electricity surged through his blood and sent his heart pounding so loud that it made his ears ring. When she touched him shivers of ice cold touched all her nerve endings and made her long to fold into his arms and be held close.

The dance had been gaudy and crazy and fun. They had danced, and they had laughed. They had watched each others faces and looked into one another’s eyes and held hands and whirled round and round in all the dances. He had twirled her high and swung her low, they had held hands and danced through the arches of other couples arms then at the end had squeezed each others fingers because they knew that they loved one another.

“I’ll see you tomorrow,” he whispered as he stroked back another curl from her forehead.

“Yes, I’ll see you tomorrow.” she whispered as she kissed him and her lips tingled from the soft pressure of her flesh upon his and she smiled “Thank you.”

He sat in the saddle and watched as the buggy made its way along the worn track to her home and then, with a sigh, he turned Cochise around and galloped home, stopping mid way to toss up his hat and give a whoop of quite hysterical joy.

…………….

Hoss stood in the entrance to the barn, his hands thrust into the pockets of his pants whilst he surveyed his youngest brother thoughtfully. Adam sat perched on the highest bar of the stalls, twisting a blade of straw between his fingers as he also surveyed his youngest brother. And Joe talked. He brushed his horse and as he brushed, he talked.

Hoss thought his head would burst as he listened for the tenth time about the way Debbie had looked, how she had danced, how she had held his hand, how she had told him she loved him and how she had looked when he told her he loved her.

“So she really loves you then?” he blurted out eventually and Joe paused in his task and turned to look at his brother as though noticing for the first time that he was there.

“Yeah, I said so , didn’t I?”

“About ten times over.” Adam muttered, tossing the straw away and plucking out another from the bales close by. “Do you really love her though, Joe? I mean, not do you think you love her, but do you really love her?”

“Shucks, what kind of question is that?” Joe scowled and tossed the brush to one side and then stroked Cochise’s foreleg, and then the other, just to make sure that there was no undue heat to cause the animal any discomfort. “I love her and I’m going to marry her.”

“Have you asked her yet?” Hoss frowned, and leaned against the door frame, struggling to keep his composure, to make the words sound calm, normal, while all the time his heart was pounding so hard within his breast that he felt choked.

“No, I’m going to ask her today, when I see her.”

“Does Pa know?” Adam leaned forward, to catch the expression in Joe’s face as he answered and Joe nodded,

“Sure, he knows, I told him after breakfast.”

“What did he say?” Hoss frowned again, his blue eyes narrowed a little.

“He said it was up to me,” Joe paused and glanced up at Adam whom he knew would want to know more than that to confirm to him their fathers approval. “He said he thought Debbie was lovely, but he suggested I waited a while longer, but when I told him I couldn’t he said it was up to me.”

“He was right. You should wait a bit longer.” Adam pursed his lips and raised his eye brows before tossing the straw away.

“Well, you ain’t me and I ain’t waiting.” came the impatient reply.

“It might be a good idea to wait awhile,” Hoss said quietly “After all, you hardly know her really. Her mother needs her now too.”

“I know that.” Joe replied rather testily.

Hoss said nothing but shrugged, he glanced at Adam who merely nodded, clambered down from the stall, and walked to his brother. He gave Joe a friendly slap on the back as he passed him, and then walked with Hoss back to the house. Joe watched them go, feeling a sense of frustration and irritation that his happy bubble had been burst by their lack of enthusiasm and pleasure at his decision to ask Deborah to marry him.

As he thought of Deborah his pleasure in the day returned and he began to feel like a man in control of the world. He told Cochise that he was the luckiest horse having him as a master, because he, Joseph Cartwright, had found the most beautiful girl in the world and she was going to marry him.

Chapter 7

He was a tall man and carried himself well despite the slight limp of his left leg. Had anyone thought about him at all in order to describe him later they would have said he was a handsome man despite the close set eyes that made them think of a snake and the thin lips that seemed to be constantly smiling.

He wore eastern style clothes that were store bought, neat and tidy and immaculately pressed. He was well groomed and walked with the aid of a golden topped walking stick which he used in an attempt to disguise the fact that he had a limp. He wore grey or buff coloured leather gloves but when they were removed his hands were long and slender and his fingers thin and nervous.

He narrowed his eyes against the glare of the sun and looked up and down the street and then removed a speck of dust from his jacket. He had been there nearly a week now and still had not seen what he had come to see and he began to wonder if he ever would.

“How’re things with you, Mr Holmquist?” Roy Coffee asked as the easterner paused by the sheriff as he lounged in his chair on the porch of the jail house.

“Slow, sheriff, very slow.”

“I’m right sorry to hear it,” Roy tilted his hat a shade lower, for some reason he had taken an instant dislike to Mr Holmquist and had not been overly helpful in his search for the family for whom he was seeking. “No news then?”

“No news just yet” came the cool response.

“Tchah!” Roy wriggled himself more comfortably into his chair and pulled his hat even lower.

“I’d have thought that after a week I would have found out something.”

“Yep, so’ould I!” Roy yawned, as thought the conversation was one they had pursued too often before, even if there acquaintance was only a week long.

“Perhaps not having the full assistance from the law might have had something to do with it” Holmquist suggested.

“I gave you all the help I could.” came the laws reply.

“Jest saying yes or no to a few questions isn’t my idea of assistance, sheriff!”

“Was all I could do in the circumstances” Roy murmured, hiding yet another yawn.

Holmquist said nothing more, but disgruntled and dissatisfied he walked on, his stick tapping on the sidewalk as he went his way. Roy shuddered inwardly and was about to close his eyes and surrender to the much needed afternoon doze when Adam Cartwright touched his shoulder.

“Roy? You sleeping on the job again?”

“Nope,” Roy smiled, he could hear the smile in the words of the younger man and steadied his chair up to survey him more closely “How is everything back home?”

“Pretty good.”

“The wars over, huh?”

“I reckon so, Hoss has abdicated and Joe’s star is in the ascendent.”

Roy frowned and shook his head “That don’t mean a durn thing to me, young man, talk sense for pete’s sake!”

“Hoss has decided romance is not for him and left Joe for a clear running. Who was that guy with the walking stick?” he nodded in Holmquists direction.

“That guy is a reptile who crawled into town last Tuesday. He’s looking for a family that don’t exist.”

“Now you’re not making any sense,” Adam grinned, and leaned forward towards the sheriff and raised his eye brows.

“Wal, he came in asking all manner of questions about a family name of Shepperton. They were s’posed to have moved here about six months ago. There ain’t no family hereabouts by that name but he’s still hanging around.”

“Maybe you missed someone. The towns growing all the time and you can’t keep track of every single body.”

“True enough, but I know he ain’t looking for a family called Shepperton.”

“So who is he looking for?” Adam asked quietly.

“Wal, he’s asking a lot of questions about folks that seem pretty much like the Wildes and if you ask me, Adam, I reckon he’s trouble.”

“Has he told you who he is?”

“Claims to be an old family friend of the Sheppertons, and has some good news for them.”

“But they don’t exist?”

“S’right! And if he has good news for the Wildes why don’t he just come right on out and ask about them?”

Adam nodded slowly and after bidding goodbye to the sheriff, he followed in Holmquists direction towards the General Store.

Sally Cass looked over anxiously as the bell rang over the door and the look of gratitude as Adam walked in was enough for him to expect trouble. Holmquist, hands on the counter, glanced over his shoulder and seeing the younger man approaching, stood more erect and sideways on to look the newcomer right in the face.

“Everything alright, Sally?” Adam asked, deciding that the direct approach was no doubt the best.

“It is now.” Sally said quietly.

Adam looked at the smartly clad man and said nothing. He walked up to the counter and leaned against it in a waiting attitude, his arms folded across his chest . Holmquist merely allowed a brief smile to flit across his face, before tilting his hat and bidding Sally good bye.

“What was all that about?” Adam asked the young woman who was staring at the door as though expecting Holmquist to burst back inside right that moment.

“That man gives me the creeps,” she muttered “Thank you for coming in when you did, I don’t suppose he means any harm, but he just makes my blood run cold.”

“Was he being a nuisance, Sally?”

“Not really. He just keeps coming in and asking questions.”

“What about?” Adam glanced over his shoulder as though he had caught her fears and was expecting Holmquist to be right behind him.

“More like about whom! I think he’s looking for the Wildes, but he keeps calling them by the name of Shepperton. If he were not so, well, strange, I would ask him if he meant the Wildes but something just makes me say nothing.”

“It might be a good idea to keep doing just that.”

“Do you think he’s come to make trouble for them? I know Jamie Wilde is a strange man, in a different way, of course.” Sally’s pretty face crumpled with concern, strange or not, little Jamie had won over her heart.

“Just don’t tell him anything, Sally.” Adam cautioned and without another word he left the store and after closing the door behind him looked up and down the street to see where Holmquist could have gone.

But he had gone, disappeared out of sight.
………………..

Jenny watched from her mothers bedroom window as the buggy gradually became too small to see any longer. She fought the tears and as a result her throat ached intolerably. She stood there for minutes, staring out at the horizon until there was nothing more to see.

Abigail looked at her youngest daughter and felt her child’s heart ache and longed to soothe her. She called her name several times, before remembering that the girl could not hear her voice. How she suffered for her girl, and longed to put her world back to rights. How she wished she could turn back the clock and that illness never come to their home nor Jenny have to suffer so much. All her talents had been set aside, all her feelings had been locked within her heart, and she had hidden behind her veil of dark hair for days upon days, weeks upon weeks, never speaking, never giving of herself, just a shadow of what she could have become until the day Joseph Cartwright had appeared on the scene and she had been like a young butterfly emerging from a dark cocoon. Now it was all fading away again.

“Jenny…Jenny…” she called and stretched out her hand in an attempt to reach and touch the girls hand.

Jennifer sighed, turned and saw her mother reaching out to her and her mothers mouth framing the word that was her name. She took her mothers hand and held it close, raised it to her cheek and held it there awhile,

“Jenny, look at me,” Abigail whispered, and touched her child’s cheek with her thin hand.

She sat at the edge of the bed and drew herself up so that she was lying by her mothers side, close to her, cuddled up to her and her mother put her arm about her daughters shoulders and held her close.

“Momma, I love Joe,” she whispered “Why won’t he love me?”

She could feel her mothers lips moving against her hair, but could not hear the words that were spoken. Her misery exhausted her and she clung more tightly to her mother, held her close and wept until she wept herself to sleep.

Paul Marten opened the bedroom door. He paused on the threshold and looked at the bed. The sunlight streamed cheerily into the room and touched the bed with golden beams, making it look a quite hallowed place to be. He put down his bag and stepped forward until he reached the foot of the bed and looked at them both as they lay there, arms entwined about one another, and the girls head rested, as a childs would be, upon the breast of her mother.

Asleep how alike they looked, although one so frail from illness and age, and the
other so delicate from sadness and misery. Abigail’s greying hair was spread out upon the pillows to mingle with the gleaming dark chestnut curls of the young woman. Upon her lips there was a final sweet smile, almost of contentment, as she held her child close to her heart.

………………..

“I thought you the most beautiful creature I had ever seen, the very first moment I saw you.” Joseph Cartwright said honestly, as he reclined upon the grass and looked up into the face of the young woman who sat by his side. “Now, tell me, honestly, what was the first thing you thought about me?”

“When I first saw you?” she smiled, her white teeth gleamed and the blue eyes shone, with love or mischief, Joe could not tell, he did not care.

“Yep.”

“I thought you were the most arrogant young man I had ever seen and you needed to be taught a lesson.”

“Ohoh….not really?” he caught hold of her hands and held them tightly against his chest.

“Quite truly, Joseph.” She laughed and tried to wrestle her hands free.

“Do you still think that?”

“Yes, I do.” she laughed again, innocent, warm, light heartedly.

“I love you” he said and pulled her towards him.

“I love you” she replied and allowed him to hold her close and kiss her once again.

“JOE. DEBBIE.”

The voice drifted over the grass that wafted too and fro and with a sigh the couple
stood up and beckoned over to Ben and Hoss.

“What’s the matter?” Joe asked with a scowl upon his face as his father and brother galloped towards them,

Ben dismounted even before Buck had stopped, he flung the reins over to Hoss and walked directly over to Debbie and extended his hand to take hold of hers

“Debbie, my dear, I have some bad news,” he said gravely and seeing her stricken look he glanced over at Joe and merely nodded.

“Mama?” she whispered and when he nodded again she could only close her eyes and cling to Bens hand and turn her body for comfort into the arms of her beloved Joseph.

Chapter 8

“Is it over now?”

Jamie Wilde twisted his hat round and round and looked with wide eyes from one face to the other,

“Can I go home now?”

Lost and bewildered. He looked like a frightened child who, wandering about a dark stairway at night supposed that he had seen a ghost. His eyes swivelled about him, trying to make sense of all the strange faces that looked back at him.

“I have to go home now, don’t I?” he asked Deborah as she came and took his elbow and led him towards the buggy.

“Yes, Papa, we go home now.”

“I have to tell Abbie about the picture I’m going to paint for her. Lots of flowers like those,” he pointed to the flowers that stood at the graveside where they had just buried his wife.

Jenny sat there on the seat of the buggy with her hands clasped tightly in her lap. She did not look up to see the looks of sympathy and sadness from those who were there. She did not want to see the face of the one man she loved looking at Deborah and feeling Deborah’s pain and not her own. Her hair fell across her face like a veil and behind it she wished to stay hidden with her anguish and pain and her loss and her anger.

In the shadows of the small graveyard a tall thin shadow detached itself and stood isolated for some minutes in the sunlight. He held his hat against his leg, and stood bare headed in respect for the dead. As the buggy passed him he stepped back into the shadows, and a slow smile touched his thin lips so that they curled away from his teeth the way a wolf bares its fangs at the sight of its prey.

“I’ll go with them, Pa,” Joe said quietly, mounting Cochise as he spoke “I don’t want Debbie to deal with this on her own.” and when it looked as though Ben were about to remonstrate or give some word of counsel Joe shook his head, “I’ll be home as soon as I can.”

“Do you want me to come too?” Hoss offered, stepping forward with his hat still in his hand and forcing himself not to react visibly when Joe shook his head and said he would rather go on his own. He glanced at Adam, who placed a consoling hand on his shoulder, then he shrugged and walked to where Chubb waited alongside Sport and Buck.

“We can call in tomorrow, Hoss.” Adam said quietly, in his deep voice that held a slight edge to it, for Joe’s lack of empathy for Hoss had been like having cold water dashed into the mans face and he felt for his gentle brother. He caught Hoss’ eyes and smiled and was consoled by the smile that his brother returned to him.

A movement by the trees caught his attention and he turned quickly. A man reared in a young fast growing town where guns spoke too loudly and too often could never afford to be slow when shadows moved on bright sunny days. He narrowed his eyes and watched as the slim figure of the stranger detached itself from the trees and without looking in his direction, walked away towards where a horse had been tethered further away .

“Now that’s interesting,” Adam murmured beneath his breath and his eyes followed the man as the stranger mounted the horse and slowly galloped away.

“Who was he?” Ben asked, already mounted on Buck and looking in the direction of the horseman.

“I don’t know,” Adam replied “But I aim to find out.” he turned to Hoss “Coming, Hoss?”

…………

The house was like that of a strangers. Deborah looked around the room and recognised the paintings on the walls, the odd bits and pieces that meant it was home, their home, but the heart of it had gone. Mother was the heart of the home and she was no longer there, and so the home had lost its heart beat.

She dropped her hat, it slipped from her fingers without her even realising it, and she half turned and found herself falling into Joe’s arms. She felt the comforting warmth of his body enfold her against him, and his hand gently caress her damp cheeks.

Jamie wandered to the stove and stared at it for some time before turning to look at the couple, and then at Jenny who stood like some dark avenging angel in the door way. The older man shook his head and beckoned to her,

“Jennifer, come here. Look, there’s no coffee to drink.” he cried, “We’ve guests, we should have coffee, we should have some wine. Where’s the food? Where’s Abbie?”

Joe detached himself from Deborah and walked to the old man and put an arm around the old mans shoulders, he forced a smile,

“Come and sit down, Mr Wilde, I’ll get us something to drink. Just sit and rest awhile.” when he turned to look at the two women, only Deborah stood there, looking at him with the tears streaming down her cheeks but Jenny had gone.

He heard the creaking of the rocking chair on the loose board of the porch and looked at her thoughtfully. Just as she had sat there weeks ago, her hands clenched tightly in her lap and her hair falling across her face, shutting her away from the rest of the world. He walked to her and squatted onto his haunches and gently parted the hair away and looked at her.

She was a child changling. A girl on the brink of womanhood. That still vulnerable little girl look becoming the more angular broad features of a very attractive young woman. Freckles peppered her nose and cheeks, but her eyes already held the mysteries of womanhood. He reached out and took hold of her hands, covering them both with one of his own while with the other he gently wiped away her tears

“Look at me, Jenny,” he said, framing the words for her to read them, but she closed her eyes in refusal.

Undaunted he still held her hands and then stroked her hair. She was the youngest, like him. She would feel the pain more, as he had long ago. She would be angry, sad, lost and confused, as he had been too.

“I didn’t want her to go,” she whispered suddenly, drawing her hands back to her chest, away from his touch, and her eyes looked at him and were hot and angry and filled with tears “I loved her and now she’s gone and left me all alone and no one loves me anymore nor cares how I feel nor notices no one notices no one cares.”

“I care, Jenny.” he whispered, trying to take hold of her hands again. His hazel eyes filled with tears of his own now, her misery touched his heart in a different way to that of Deborahs. Hers was the anguish of a lost child crying for her mother, and it touched the heart of a young man who had also been a lost child crying for his mother and he shook his head, “Oh Jenny, I understand how you feel, truly I do.”

“No” she moaned.

“I do, Jenny.” He took hold of her hand and held it tightly, and looked into her face “My ma died when I was very young, and I felt lost and angry too. I wanted her home so much.”

“She didn’t come home did she?”

“No.”

“And Mama will never come home again will she?”

“No, but…”

“She won’t come home” and with a wail of heart rending proportions she rose to her feet and ran as fast as she could to the barn.

Joe bit his lip and dithered for an instant. In the house he knew that Deborah needed him, and here, a distraught child needed him.

“I’ll see to her.”

Jamie Wilde stood in the doorway, watching the girl run to the barn and it was as though suddenly reality had opened a door through which he could walk from his lost world. He took a deep breath and nodded to himself and looked at Joe.

“Thanks for your help, Joe, but I’ll see to her now.”

Chapter 9

A week had passed and there had been no sight of the stranger in town. No one knew of him, other than that he asked a lot of questions about a family called Shepperton. Adam Cartwright felt like a man with an itch that would not go away and was out of reach of a good scratch.

Virginia City was not too busy at noon time on a Wednesday. He drove the wagon slowly though the main street, with his hat low to shade his face, and his eyes narrowed, moving as any frontiers mans eyes would move, from left to right, noticing the shadows that moved and the shadows that did not. He drew the wagon up outside the General Stores and swung himself down onto the sidewalk and walked to the door which opened as he touched the handle,

“Hello, Adam.”

“Oh, hello, Miss Wilde, Deborah.” he touched his hat and smiled and took it off as she passed him “How is everything at home?”

“As well as can be expected I suppose.” She looked at him thoughtfully and then smiled “Adam, did Joe tell you about Papa?”

“Yes, he did. That’s good news, isn’t it?” he watched her face while he remembered someone else who had found an open door to the real world, only for Ross Marquette, the door had opened too late.

“It’s like a miracle in a way.” She began to walk slowly towards her buggy, the purchases she had made somehow made their way to his arms, “I wish Mama had lived to see it happen, she always said it would.”

“Perhaps he preferred to be as he was, don’t you think?” he looked at her and she looked back at him with a small frown furrowing her brow.

“No, I don’t think he did.”

“Miss Wilde, Deborah, I mean…”

“Do you know, Adam, almost everytime I see you, you refer to me as Deborah I mean. Can’t you just get used to saying Deborah or Debbie?” she smiled, trying to take the frost out of her voice as she did so.

“I’m sorry and I guess you’re right.” he smiled, his dark eyes twinkling, after all, this woman would soon be his sister in law, if Joe had his way about it.

“Anyway, I have to rush. I promised not to be late and Jenny worries if I am even a few minutes late.” she took the purchases from him and turned to put them in the buggy “I’m seeing Joe later this evening.”

“Yes, he did mention it.” Adam watched her arrange the things on the seat and wondered how she would settle into life on the Ponderosa.

“So I had better hurry,” she smiled and allowed him to help her up onto the buggy and once there she smoothed down her skirts and picked up the reins and looked down at him, “We’ll have to have a good long talk one of these days, Adam, I feel as though I hardly know you.”

“Well, that would be a good idea, seeing how you don’t.” he grinned, looking up at her with dark eyes twinkling.

“I don’t?”

“You don’t ‘hardly know me’” he replied slowly and stepped back as the buggy rolled and then began its way out of town. He shook his head thoughtfully “And I don’t ‘hardly know you’ either.” he murmured to himself as he turned and made his way back to the General Store.

“Adam?”

He smiled as Sally opened the door to him,

“This is quite some service, Sal,” he said, twirling his hat round and round between his fingers.

“I’m sorry, I just wanted a quick word with you.”

“About?” he prompted.

“About that man, Holmquist. He was here this morning asking lots of questions again but not about the Sheppertons this time, it was about Deborah and Jenny Wilde and the old man, Jamie.”

“What did you tell him?”

“I didn’t tell him because he didn’t talk to me, he was talking to Pa. Pa told him all about how the Wildes came here some months ago and how strange Jamie Wilde had been until his wife died and what a wonderful artist he was. I tried to get him to stop talking but he just went on and on. You know what Pa’s like when he gets started.”

Adam sighed. He knew only too well what Will Cass was like when he got talking, like many frontiers town store men he made the most of any tit bit of gossip that drifted past his door. He shrugged and put his hat down on the counter.

“Well, can’t be helped now, Sally, what’s done is done.” he pulled out the order list from his pocket and passed it to her, chewing the inside of his cheek as he thought over and over what the implications could be for a man like Holmquist to be so interested in a family like the Wildes.

…………………….

Joe checked his string tie and grinned, he tugged it a little to the left and raised an eye brow. It looked quite smart and he glanced over at Hoss, who was sitting on the edge of the bed, watching him,

“Tonight’s the night, big brother,” he said gaily, slapping Hoss on the foot as he passed the bed.

“You mean you’re going to ask her to marry you tonight?”

“That’s right,” he picked up his hat and checked it over for dust, he just wanted to really look smart for Deborah this particular evening. Everything just had to go right, better than that, it had to be perfect.

“Do you think Jamie and Jenny can handle a wedding so soon after a funeral?”

“Don’t be so morbid, Hoss.” Joe scowled at the thought and looked uneasily at his reflection in the mirror “Look, Hoss, they know how we feel about one another. What’s the point in hanging it out? I don’t expect to marry her next week after all! Maybe in the spring.”

“That seems fair enough,” Hoss nodded thoughtfully, they were still enjoying summertime, and winters were pretty long drawn out seasons “Yeah, that sounds pretty good.”

“They’ll have the whole winter being closed in together in that cabin. Be only too glad to see her go, I reckon.” he chuckled and messed with his tie again.

“Are you nervous, Joe?”

“Nah. Me? Nervous? As if?” he grinned again, and flashed his brother a smile and too quickly was gone from the room.

Hoss stood up and surveyed himself in the mirror and sighed again “Wal, I am.” he groaned within himself.

Chapter 10

“And I know I’ve not known you too long, Debbie, but I love you more than words can say.”

“I know that, Joe.” her words were like a soft sigh against his cheek, and Joe swallowed a gulp.

“I’d give you the whole world if I could.” he whispered, after kissing the tip of her nose.

“I know.”

“But, as I can’t, would you just settle for me? I mean, Debbie, would you marry me?”

“Joe, I love you more than anything in the world and I’d love to marry you, but…”

“No buts. Just say yes.”

He held her face between his hands and smiled down at her and raised her face to wards his own and his lips touched hers.

“I’m sorry, Mister, She ain’t able to say yes to that particular question you jest asked her.”

Joe sprung back, as far back as he could go before the familiar prod of a gun jabbed him in the spine. Deborah gave a muffled cry, half sob, half whimper, and turned as though to run, but then realising that she had no where to run, and that Joe would be alone, she stopped and turned to face their intruder.

“Just don’t say nothing’, just walk to the house.” Holmquist nodded in the direction of the building “And don’t try anything clever, pretty boy, you and me’s got a whole lot to talk about.” He turned and scowled at Deborah “Ain’t that right, Debbie?”

“I thought you were dead.” she whispered with a sob in her voice.

“You hoped I was dead. You wanted me to be dead.” Holmquist gave her a shove and when Joe stepped forward to put a protective arm around the girl, the tall thin man jabbed him harshly in the chest with the gun barrel, causing Joe to back off with a gasp of pain.

They had left the house less than twenty minutes earlier and to all intents and purposes it looked just as they left it. The warm welcoming light from the doorway and the windows still gleamed a lightsome pathway to draw them to the comforts of the house and smoke still coiled from the chimney.

But a lot can happen in a few minutes, which was plain for them to see as they stepped through the door into the room. Jamie lay prostrate on the floor, his head bleeding from a deep gash in his head which Jenny was attempting to staunch with a rag, her dress and hands stained red with the blood. Not hearing them as they entered the building she did not turn towards them, but carried on with her task, tears dripping down her cheeks and leaving damp splodges on her red stained skirt.

“Sit down, over there.” Holmquist pushed Deborah towards the chair by the stove
“And you..” he swung the gun towards Joe “You sit over there where I can see you. Don’t try being a hero, boy, it won’t be worth it.”

Joe looked from one to the other of them and tried to make some sense of what was going on around him. Deborah looked terrified. Her blue eyes were like washed out marbles staring out at Homsquist, but they were the only specks of colour that still remained in her face. Her hands, limp in her lap, were shaking as though she had a fever and no longer possessed any control over them, and her lips were as white as the rest of her face, white and trembling.

Jenny was still tending to her father, whether or not she realised now that they were there made no difference. Her hands moved gently over the wound and every so often she would lean towards her father and put her fingers near his mouth as though to assure herself that he still breathed.

Holmquist stood by the doorway, having closed the door now he seemed to fill the entrance with his presence. Joe, having never seen him before in his life, did not have to have known him for long to sense that the man was touched with evil and inwardly the young man shuddered.

“That’s enough, you can leave him alone now.” Holmquist yelled at Jenny.

“She can’t hear you” Joe said quietly “She’s deaf.”

Holmquist turned and looked at him as though he couldn’t believe what he had just heard and then he looked once again at Jenny and shook his head.

“I didn’t know,” he said in an amazingly civilised and gentle voice and he stepped further into the room and very gently touched Jenny on the shoulder.

She spun round as though bitten by a serpent, her teeth bared in a snarl and her fingers like claws as she lunged at him. He immediately staggered back in surprise at the onslaught and Joe, seizing his chance, flung himself forward only to feel the pain of a pistol barrel smashing into his face. The sounds in the room of the girl screaming and furniture overturning were all muffled as he fell back against the wall and the taste of blood filled his mouth. He began to feel as though he were suffocating and then there was just a strange and vague nothingness.

………

“Where’s Adam?”

Hoss glanced up as Ben took his arm chair by the fire and reached for his pipe. He turned a page of his brochure and glanced at the clock,

“He said he wanted to have a talk with Jamie Wilde, left about an hour ago.”

“Didn’t you remind him that Joe was going to propose to Deborah tonight?” Ben struck a match and brought the flame to the tobacco

“Sure I did, Pa, but you know what Adams like, once he gets a bee in his bonnet he has to get it sorted out. Said Joe and Deborah would be too busy then to interrupt
his conversation with Jamie.”

“All the same, it isn’t very tactful,” Ben drew in smoke and puffed out a smoke ring
“What do you think of her, Hoss? Do you think she’ll fit in alright here on the Ponderosa?”

Hoss winced and looked at his father with his blue eyes looking pained, but Ben seemed oblivious of the emotion he had aroused in his sons heart by his question so Hoss swallowed hard and shrugged,

“I guess so.” was the only answer he could put into words.

Chapter 11….

Joe ran his tongue over his teeth and then swallowed. No blood and no missing teeth but one terrible head ache and his eye sight seemed strangely misty. He struggled into a sitting position and realised that Jenny was by his side, helping him to sit up.

“Give him something to drink.” Holmquist said in what was, yet again, a gently cultivated voice. He watched closely as Jenny filled a cup and carried it over to Joe.

Joe slurped at the water and looked at Jenny to make sure that she was alright. Apart from the smudges under her eyes from crying, there was little evidence of the fear and terror that seemed to have gripped Deborah who clung to the chair as though without its support she would have fallen to the floor in a heap.

“Do you mind telling me what this is all about?” Joe asked, trying to sound calm although his voice seemed strangely thick and then he realised he had bitten his tongue and it had swollen in his mouth.

“Perhaps your young lady here –“ Holmquist swung the gun towards Deborah “perhaps she could explain.”

Joe looked at Deborah and then at Jenny. Both girls now stood together, supporting one another. Deborah looked over at him and then turned away

“I’m sorry, Joe. I was going to tell you tonight,” her voice was shaking, she could barely pronounce the words coherently and he had to strain his ears to hear what she was saying “But I meant you no harm, truly not.”

“What exactly are you trying to say, Debbie? That you didn’t love me?”

“Tell him.” Holmquist hissed.

“When I was 16 we lived in Albany. Papa got into debt due to one of his mad schemes. Joe, please believe me.”

“Get on with it,” Holmquist banged the wall with his fist making them all jump, even Jenny.

“He…”

“I’ve got a name, use it.”

“Ashleigh Holmquist paid off the debt and for some time we thought he was a very good friend.” Deborah stammered, tears welling up in her eyes and splashing down her cheeks.

“I was a very good friend,” Holmquist hit against the wall again “I was the best friend you could ever have hoped for then. I paid your debts and kept you living on the fat of the land. You were feted and courted everywhere and you made me think I was something special to you. Just like you made that young fool think he was something special, more fool him. At least I spared him the trouble you caused me.”

“I don’t understand,” Joe murmured, his left hand was getting some feeling back to it, and very cautiously he slid it down towards his holster, the comforting smoothness of the gun butt touched his fingers, but he paused as he wanted to know more about Holmquist’s accusations.

“It wasn’t like that.” Deborah protested, colour now rushing into her cheeks and her eyes blazing and in some strange way Joe thought he had never seen her look so beautiful, “It wasn’t like that at all. You made us think you were our friend and benefactor, you made us trust you.”

“You were quick enough to spend the money I gave you.” Holmquist said in a voice that trembled slightly. Looking at him now, Joe could see that the anger had left him, but the pain and misery the man was feeling screamed at them in a voice far louder than words.

Deborah turned to face Joe, “Joe, I didn’t love him, believe me, I could never love him.” her voice quavered into a sob, she bowed her head and fought for some self control and then whispered “He forced us into a position where I had to marry him.”

“Marry him? You mean he’s your husband?” Joe stammered, his head whirling now, and the words swimming back and forth in his ears.

“You’re quick.” Holmquist smiled slowly, “Sharp and quick, well done!”

“We trusted him but all the time he knew that if he married me he would get all the money and land and investments I would inherit from my grandparents. They didn’t want to acknowledge Papa, but they did care about us, Jenny and I.” her voice was shrill with the pain of the revelations she was making to the young man who was listening to her, the young man who only a few minutes previously wanted to make her his wife. She saw the look of betrayal and pain in his eyes, the disgust in his face and the disbelief. “Joe, I was forced into marrying him, believe me, please
believe me.”

“You loved me once.” Holmquist said in the voice of a broken man as he heard his wife’s words of denial of all that he had held so dear to him.

“Never! Never!” she replied, stepping back and away from him “The day I married you was like stepping into hell. Your cruelty, your evil distorted cruelty tormented my very soul, my heart. How could I ever love a man as evil as you?”

Joe’s gun was in his hand and he had fired even as Holmquist fired his pistol and Deborah fell. Joe lunged forward, to place himself between Deborah, Jenny and Holmquist and he fired wildly, several times. He heard the retorts sharp in his head, and he felt the gun kick against the palm of his hand.

Jenny screamed as she saw the young man stagger back, make a half turn and then slide into a heap on the floor. Holmquist stood with the gun still smoking in his hand and a half puzzled expression on his face as he looked down upon the scene, then he turned and opened the door.

Adam Cartwright was still breathing heavily from running from his horse to the doorway. When he saw the gun and the expression on Holmquists face he instinctively drew his own gun. Holmquist hesitated, he opened his mouth as though to speak but then changed his mind and fired, the bullet slid through Adam’s shirt and left him unharmed. Simultaneously however Adam had already squeezed the trigger of his own gun and watched as Holmquist slid slowly to his knees and then fell prostrate upon the boards.

Jenny knelt by Joe’s side, her hands covered in the blood that she was vainly trying to stop from flowing from the gaping wound in the young mans side.

“Joe, Joe” she sobbed “I love you so much. I only ever ever loved you. You mustn’t
die. You mustn’t die. Oh Joe….Joe….”

Adam slid his gun back into its holster and stepped into the room. He knelt at his brothers side and gently slid his arm beneath Joe’s head, rested it upon his knee and looked down at the ashen face. He felt for the pulse at his brothers throat and then very gently laid him back down.

Jenny felt the warm blood pumping into her hands, through her fingers. It seemed that no matter what she did she could not stop it from flowing and as she looked at the youths face it seemed that he was getting greyer and greyer.

“You mustn’t die, you mustn’t die.” She sobbed “I love you so much, Joe.”

Chapter 12

Sunlight streamed through the windows of the bedroom, bathing it with a warmth that began to thaw out the strangely numb limbs of the young man in the bed. He dreamt that he was sinking in warm thick mud, first his legs and then his arms and then his body…sinking, sinking. He tried to call out for help but the mud cloyed into his mouth and slid into his throat and slowly, warmly, crept over his face and covered his eyes.

Ben Cartwright opened his eyes and rubbed his face with his hands as though in an attempt to put back life into his own flesh. He looked down at the ashen face of his youngest son and swallowed the lump in his throat and put a trembling hand to his brow.

“Oh my God, I love my son, don’t take him away from me just yet.” he whispered.

The door opened and Hoss peered into the room and frowned

“Any change, Pa?”

“No….nothing…”

“Do you want me to sit with him for a while. You should rest.”

Ben looked at Joe and then at Hoss and with a sigh he got to his feet and nodded, yes, he should rest. Hours had slipped by and it had become a struggle to keep his eyes open despite the fear that should he fall asleep he would perhaps miss some way to help his son.

“Hoss, he just doesn’t seem to want to fight.” He whispered as he stood by the bed looking anxiously, fearfully, down at Joe.

“Perhaps he’s just too tired, pa, after all he lost a lot of blood.” Hoss put a placating hand upon his father’s arm, tightening his hold as he felt it trembling beneath his fingers.

“No, it’s more than that, it’s as though he’s lost the will to live.”

“Maybe he has, for a little while, but he’ll come round, Pa, he’ll start to fight again, you’ll see.”

At the door to the room Ben paused and looked back at the youth in the bed, for a moment his gaze lingered there, before he looked at his other son with dark troubled eyes, “Call me if there’s the slightest change?”

“Sure I will.”

The door closed and Hoss stood for a moment or two at the foot of the bed and looked down at his brother. He shook his head and struggled to stop the tears falling down his cheeks as he willed his brother to live, to fight – “There’s a lot to live for , Joe.” he whispered “You can’t jest give up on living.”

It seemed to Joseph Cartwright that he was flying. He wasn’t aware of flapping his arms up or down, but he was flying and for someone afraid of heights he wasn’t sure as to why he felt so calm about it all. Straight as an arrow he was heading right up towards the sun and it was hot, really seriously hot.

He could hear his brother, Adam, talking to him “You’re just like Icarus. He tried to fly towards the sun and you know what happened to him?”

“Adam, I really couldn’t care less. I’m cold and I’ve been cold for so long that all I want is to get warm again now just clear off and leave your Icarus to wherever.”

“You can’t fly up there on your own.” Hoss was saying now, his voice very stern and reproaching.

“Yeah, and who are you to stop me? I can jest imagine you flapping your wings, you great oversized elephant.”

“I don’t like the idea of you being out there on your own, son” Ben murmured gently.

“I’ve got to grow up some time and be my own man, Pa.” and then he exclaimed in a voice filled with awe “Chicken soup!”

Whoever would have thought it? The sun was made of chicken soup after all! Of course everyone knew the moon was made of cheese but the sun? Chicken soup?

Huh, wouldn’t Adams pal Icarus be surprised. Perhaps he wouldn’t bother flying up to the sun after all and anyway why was Hop Sing there?
…………..

Adam leaned forward and turned the flame in the lamp up a little higher and looked more closely at his brothers face. The hazel eyes looked back up at him, not exactly twinkling,
but showing signs of alertness, of life.

He put a hand on the younger mans shoulder and smiled “Stopped flying then, little brother?”

“It was just chicken soup, Adam.” Joe murmered still trapped in his dream “Just chicken soup!”

Adam smiled slowly and in a gesture so much like his fathers, he ran his fingers through his brothers thick mane of hair and then gently touched the pale cheek “I’ll go and get Pa and Hoss” he said gently.

He turned from the bed but was then surprised when Joe’s hand grabbed at his wrist, “No, wait a moment, Adam.”

So he paused while Joe struggled to come out of his dream and blinked his eyes until he could see Adam’s face in full focus. “Sit down, Adam, tell me what’s happened?” he sighed and shook his head, “Come on, don’t give me that blank look, what happened after Holmquist shot me?”

“Well,” Adam resumed his seat and turned the flame up higher “Do you really want to know?”

“Of course I do. Where’s Deborah? Was it true about Holmquist? Was he her husband?” he heaved in a deep breath, “He shot her, I remember seeing her fall …” he raised a hand to his brow and closed his eyes, “She’s dead. You’re worried about telling me she’s dead.”

Adam shook his head and leaned forward “No, she’s not dead, Joe. Deborah’s alive and well.”

“Then why isn’t she here? Is she loved me, she’d be here, wouldn’t she?”

Adam ran the tip of his tongue over his lips and then slowly put his hand to his pocket from where he removed a slip of paper which he gave to his brother. “She gave me this for you. No, Joe -” he put his hand over his brothers “Read it later, when you’re alone.” he sighed, “I got to the Wilde’s place just as Holmquist had shot you, Jenny was on her knees doing all she could to stop you from bleeding to death and Deborah looked as though she had been shot also as she was sprawled out on the floor. Holmquist saw me, aimed at me but I got him first.”

“He’s dead?” Joe cried, his eyes widening and his fingers screwing up the paper in his fingers, “Deborah?”

“Holmquist survived with a bullet in the arm, Deborah had fainted and recovered as I was seeing to you. Mr. Wilde was recovering and when he saw Holmquist was – well – amazingly calm and considerate. We checked over the wounds, and while doing so Mr. Wilde told me the story of Holmquist and Deborah.”

“He forced her to marry him …” Joe groaned, “Poor Deborah.”

“No, on the contrary she encouraged him to marry her. He loved her, was very wealthy and prominent, and she led him to believe that his love was reciprocated. Jamie and Abigail tried to persuade her that she was too young to know her true feelings but they eloped and were married anyway.”

Joe groaned and fell back against the pillows, he shook his head “No, no, Adam, that’s not how it was, she told me -”

“She told you what she wanted you to hear. Holmquist adored her, he helped the family, sponsored Jamie’s painting, did all he could for her, but gradually realised that she didn’t love him. The marriage became an unhappy broken one and he resorted to the bottle, lime many disappointed men do. She threatened to leave him, and he locked her in the house. But she escaped and went to her parents, told them what a cruel husband he was, and they believed her.”

“Did Holmquist tell you this? It’s a lie, Adam, he beat her, was cruel to her -”

“No, Joe, he wasn’t, and it was Jamie who told me, and Holmquist confirmed it.”

“But, Adam, you can’t believe him, you can’t. And as for Jamie, he’s out of his head anyway.”

“No, Mr. Wilde is perfectly alright, he found that way out his mental wilderness and doesn’t intend going back there again. He found out the truth through Abigail. It seemed she learned the truth a long time ago.”

“So why did they keep on running from him?”

“The illness, Jenny’s deafness, Jamie’s mental collapse and Abigail so frail. Deborah arranged their leaving, the Brannigan’s place was the perfect refuge.” he sighed, “I’m sorry, Joe.”

For a moment they were silent, Adam’s hand gently rested upon Joe’s shoulder while the younger man stared down at the piece of paper in his hand, then with a shake of the head Joe asked Adam where Deborah was now and turned his face into the pillows when Adam told him that she had left on the stagecoach, with her husband.

—————————————————————-

Conclusion: Jamie Wilde recovered from his wounds and returned to his family in Albany in full possession of his senses. He took Jenny with him and she became a teacher in a school for the deaf, later marrying a fellow teacher. Deborah remained with Holmquist for some years before leaving him for another. In his wallet, close to his heart, Joseph Cartwright kept the letter that Deborah had written to him the day she had left. It was very brief.

“My darling, I would have been proud to have said yes. I love you with every ounce of my being. I love you body, heart and soul. I love you, Joe. Forgive me for not being honest with you but I was too afraid of losing something wonderful. Deborah.”

THE END……..