Summary:  A love story of Ben from the perspective of his three wives.
Rating:  G  (4,450 words)

 Ben, My Love

The large room reverberated with silence, punctuated at steady intervals by the persistent ticking of the grandfather clock near the door. The darkness that enveloped the room was relieved on one side by the faint flickering of the fire that was nearly spent, struggling to live out the last of it’s life amongst dull embers that still glowed.  Across from the fireplace a shaft of moonlight pierced the windowpane and cut through the darkness with an illuminated line that caused the three silver frames on the large mahogany desk to sparkle brightly.

The dark solid base of the large desk provided a stark contrast to the delicate, finely worked frames that rested so comfortably upon it.  Within the sparkling silver outlines, the faces of three young women gazed out upon the stillness that surrounded them.  One, a raven-haired young lady with a classical profile, another a golden-haired Madonna with a sweet smile, and the third a chestnut beauty with sparkling green eyes.

Three women, all so different in appearance and life, yet possessing in death a bond that was impossible to break.  The love of a man.  A man who had brought to each of them so much, a man who had been the centre of their world, a man who had given each of them a son.

Elizabeth

When first I met you, my love, we were both so impossibly young.  Children really, not knowing what was ahead of us and not at all worried about it.  With the recklessness of youth we lived only for the present and for each other.  I remember clearly the first time we met, you were so eager to show me your boyish charms that you became quite tongue-tied.  Little did you suspect that you had no need to try quite so hard to impress me.  For I loved you from the very day my father first introduced you to me.

First mate Benjamin Cartwright – how noble that sounded to a young girl like me.  I know my father was impressed with you, otherwise he would never have taken you on for that first voyage, young as you were.  I remember him telling mother and I that in spite of your youth you showed promise and had already experienced enough of life at sea to be a strong support to him.  You were a young man with a great future ahead of you.

Not that I really cared at that stage about your capabilities as a seaman.  All I knew was that you were dark, handsome and caring, and the man of my dreams.

I was a young sheltered Boston girl when you burst upon my world and opened my eyes to the wonder of it.  As the months progressed I sought to get to know you as best I could without making it obvious.  So many times I would persuade mother to take me with her when she visited father on the docks, just praying for a glimpse of you.  Did you ever suspect that it wasn’t really father I was coming to see?  I think perhaps you did.  It must have been obvious to you in the way I would hang on your every word when you talked to me about your adventures at sea.  To me you were so worldly, so full of life.

It was only when father suspected what was developing between us that he turned against you.  After all, I was his only child and I don’t think that he was ready to give me up to anyone, let alone a penniless young seaman.  Father had great ambitions for me.  He saw my future very clearly – marriage to a prominent Boston doctor, lawyer or perhaps businessman.  He hoped that I would be secure in my role as the wife of a respectable Boston citizen, and never want for anything.  Then you came along and destroyed all that.  As our relationship grew and blossomed father became more anxious to keep us apart, and then the inevitable clash came.

Thank God mother was there to make him see sense.  Even so, I don’t think he ever really forgave you, my darling.  He felt I should have had more sense, and maybe I should have.  After all, I had watched mother struggle all those years as the wife of a man who was married to both her and the sea.  A man who spent as much time apart from her and I as he did with us. Did I really want the same for myself?  Perhaps not, but all I knew was that I loved you and wanted you, and that I would take you whatever your profession happened to be.

You were so young and restless in those days, striving to prove yourself to everyone.  Your ambitions were enormous, and you really wanted to make your mark upon the world in some way.  I know that is why you loved your life at sea so much.  Remember our favourite book ‘Paradise Lost’ that we would read together? You were searching for your own paradise, my love.  You needed to travel and find a place to call your own, and at that stage you did not know where that was. You only knew that there was a spot on this earth that was perfect for you – somewhere just waiting for you to find it.

Your dreams became mine too as you opened my eyes to a world outside Boston and gave me the desire to experience it.  I would have followed you to the ends of the earth if you had asked me to Ben, and if things had turned out differently I know we would have achieved our dreams.  But our dream was not to be my love, at least not together.  So little time we had together after father had finally consented to our marriage.  Yet that time was the sweetest I had in my whole life.

We were made for each other, you and I. We were so happy Ben, that sometimes it took my breath away just thinking of you.   I will never forget your eyes when I told you that the two of us were to become three.  You were so proud and brave.  You did not hesitate to put your dream aside for our child and I, knowing that the time had come for our priorities to shift.  I watched you grow up during those months when you needed to make the hard decisions that would keep you closer to my side and that of our child.

Our child!  How we both longed to hold him or her, to see a reflection of ourselves in that tiny face that God was about to give us.  Yet cruelly that chance was snatched away from me my love, and made your life so very difficult.  Our darling little Adam.  At least I got to hold him that one time and tell him how much I loved him before we were parted.  Poor Ben.  My heart bled for you as you mourned for me.  I wanted to reach out to you and comfort you, but I could not.  I could only sense your misery as you struggled to come to terms with the pain of your grief and loss.

I felt it too, my darling.  The hopelessness of not being able to do anything about it was overpowering. Yet I hope that you came to realise that I was eventually at peace.  Cruel as it was to be parted from you both it was the way it had to be, and I have accepted that now.  The hardest part was being so alone without you and our baby, having no real memories of him to sustain me during the years after you had left to find that paradise that we both knew you had to pursue.

And then – oh joy!  You gave him back to me for a while.  I knew him as soon as he appeared – our darling little baby boy.  Our Adam – a baby no longer, but now so tall and grown up. A handsome boy on the verge of manhood.  He is so like you Ben, do you know that?  He reminded me so much of you at that same age – the age I met you.  He came to me during those precious years he lived with my father in Boston.  It was wonderful to feel their presence together as they became acquainted with each other and got to know each other as grandfather and grandson.

Do you know how many times he came to be with me?  He would sit near me to talk, and his words were such sweet music to me.  Our child told me of your lives, my love.  He made it so clear to me that you had found your paradise.  He called it your Ponderosa.

Yet, happy as I was to have found him again, I sensed the conflict that raged within him.  He struggled so hard, not knowing what to do with his life.  He has your restlessness, you know, and was torn between remaining here in Boston or returning to your Ponderosa.  How I longed for him to stay and remain with me.  Yet I knew that he couldn’t, that he would be pulled back to you and the brothers that he had told me about.  I knew that was where he belonged.

So he left me again my love, just had he had before when you took him with you to find your paradise.  I sense that you are both happy in your world, as I am again at peace in mine.  You are too far away for me to reach you now, yet you must know that my spirit still thinks of you and loves you dearly.  I lie and wait for you my love, and I know that one day we will be together once again.

Inger

My darling Ben, how you impressed me the first time we met.  You were so brave and proud, struggling to care for yourself and your little boy while still nursing a broken heart. My heart went out to you as I watched you struggle to cope with no money or job and all the responsibilities that a young child brings. You were such a good father to little Adam, trying to be both parents to him and provide for him at the same time.  I think it was this that made me notice you that very first time you walked into our store.

You were so proud my darling, it took quite some doing to finally convince you that I wanted to help you.  Believe me, it was no hardship, because I loved minding Adam while you worked in the store for us. He was such a wonderful little boy and you so obviously needed the money, I’m sure you would have forgiven me if you’d known that the truth was slightly bent when I told you we needed the help.  After all, it worked out well for all of us didn’t it? I know that I needed to help you as much as you needed the help, it was only your pride that stood in the way.

My brother Gunnar was a problem of course, keeping him quiet about it was very difficult.  I know he resented you at first, because you were everything he wanted to be. You were such a caring man, my love, and a real gentleman.  Gunnar resented that because you showed him up to be the wayward boy that he really was.  I know you found it difficult to understand why I continued to put up with him and his problems, but you must understand my love, that he had experienced many difficult times throughout the years and he was all that I had.  Since my parents had died and left us in this strange place, so different from our native land of Sweden, we had clung to each other to survive.  I had a great responsibility to make sure that my brother found his place in this world.  I can hear you asking me even now – and what about myself?

Ben, you know how I felt about my life at that time.  I had resigned myself to the fact that I would never find happiness, or that no one would ever want such a plain woman to love.  How wrong I was, my darling, for you showed me that love was waiting for me all along, if I would only look for it.  As I reached out to you in your pain love blossomed, and I can still not believe that you felt the same about me. Never in my wildest dreams did I think that a man such as you could love me.

You touched me Ben and opened a world for me that I never knew I could be part of. Your dream of finding your special place was so real to you, that it became real to me as well.  Yet it was that very dream that held us back in a way.  For I was so torn, my darling!  How could I ask you to stay with me, when you needed so desperately to follow that dream of yours, yet how could I leave Gunnar when he needed me so badly as well?

You gave me so much Ben that I desperately needed to give you something back.  I think it was this that finally convinced me to go with you.  That and the realisation that Gunnar’s needs would always be great even though I held back for him.  You were right Ben, I know it now.  Gunnar needed to grow up, and I needed to allow him to do so by leaving him.  It still doesn’t completely heal the guilt I have carried all this time though and all I can do now is hope that he is happy, and that he found his dream.

What a wonderful time we spent together on the trail, the three of us.  Adam was as dear to me as if I had given birth to him, and when his brother – our darling baby Eric – joined him as part of our family it filled my heart to overflowing to see them together. Adam loved that baby so much, and I know that he will still be looking out for him and tending to him as only a big brother could. This was what I had been created for, to be a wife and mother – I had found my perfect role in life by your side.

Do you know how much I loved our time together?  You showed me your beautiful country in such a way that I became a part of it too.  It was so different to Sweden, yet still the same in so many ways.  The land breathed life with every mile that we crossed as we headed our way west towards that dream.  Oh Ben, life was so sweet!  I had you and our two boys to enjoy it with me, and I was truly content.  I felt free for the first time in my life, and looked forward to watching our dream become a reality.

My love, I hope you do not blame yourself or the others for what happened.  It was no one’s fault, and I hope you have not carried the burden of it with you for long. We were intruding upon their land and their liberties, and the natives who stood against us knew no other way to voice their rights to us.  I do not blame them for what occurred.

My darling, we had our time together and I cannot ask for more.  I am alone now, as alone as a spirit can be, but I have our wonderful time together to cling to.  Here in my peaceful and beautiful place I have truly become as one with nature, and I am in the company of the many spirits who inhabit this land.  Those who were native to this land rest here with me and around me, and we have made our peace.

Do not grieve for me, my love.  Go forward with your life as you went forward towards your destination on that day when you left me behind.  It broke my heart when you took our boys and went, but you had no choice.  You owed it to them and yourself to go forward.  I only hope that one day you might return to me to let me know how you fared with your dream.  I pray that my Eric is a comfort to you, and I know that you will have raised him to be a fine and noble man just like his father.  Perhaps one day he may return to me too and give me the proof of this.

I reach my spirit out to you, my darling, but you are far from me.  In many ways I was a brief encounter in your life, but one that I know changed us both forever.  I live on in our darling son, Ben, and I live on in your love for me.  Never forget that there is a small piece of this earth here in faraway Missouri that will be forever sacred to the memory of our love together.

Marie

It still amazes me that we ended up together, my love.  We were from such different worlds with nothing really in common except our love for each other.  A love that I fought against so hard at first!  I was determined that no man was ever going to use me again as Jean my first husband had – that I would never open myself up to the pain of loving another living soul – when you arrived in my life and turned my world upside down.

You were so worldly Ben, so wise and strong.  You seemed to know exactly what you wanted in life and had reached out with both hands to grasp it.  I so admired you for that! You had worked so very hard to realise your dream. When you talked to me of your wonderful sons and your great ranch your eyes shone with the very joy of it all. You painted a picture for me of a world I had never known existed, and made me not a little envious that someone could have so much joy in their life.

I know that was unfair, my love, for you had been through so much pain and suffering before you had reached the stage of contentment you had then found.  Yet it was the very way in which you described to me your heartaches that made me see the sort of man you were.  Your strength of character made me feel so unworthy of your love.  I was only a poor girl from New Orleans, trying to prove to the world that I was something I was not.  Funny how it was all so important to me then – the parties, the frivolous relationships, the masquerades – none of it was real. You showed me that.

You opened my eyes to another world, my darling, where life was wholesome and sweet, and the promise of a future was real.

I still feel guilty about Jean at times, and the way in which I greeted you when you came to tell me that he had died.  I have no excuse for my actions except to say that I was overwrought with guilt about the way in which our lives had developed, and guilt about my feelings for you.  After all, I was supposed to be a grieving widow, when all I could think about was your gentle touch, your expressive eyes and your voice that sang to me of your love.  I never meant to fall in love with you Ben – it was beyond my control – but I thank God that I did!

Never did I think that you would return my love.  I tried my best not to show you my feelings, for the pain of rejection was very great. I still cannot believe that my love was returned, that you spoke the words I had been longing to hear since the day I met you.  I blushed to think of the way I flung myself on you with a declaration of my feelings that took both of us by surprise.  But then you always said I was impulsive, and that I acted before I thought.  Lord knows, I had a very fiery nature!

Did you know what you were taking on in me when we married?  Sometimes I think you were very brave to do it!  After all, I knew nothing about your world, and I know I must have been a burden to you in those first few months of our marriage.  You were so much older and cleverer than I, and I was so scared that I would not fit into that world of yours that you loved so much.  In truth Ben, I was terrified of so many aspects of your life and so uncertain whether or not I would be able to cope.

I know now that I shouldn’t have worried so much, that I should have trusted you more to take care of me.  The problem was, of course, that I was so used to taking care of myself and I wanted to prove to you that I could continue to do it.  It certainly made for some interesting times, didn’t it?

When I think of the mistakes I made!  How did we ever survive with our love intact, my darling?  Of course we had some different challenges than other newly weds, mostly in the form of those two wonderful boys of yours – of ours.  The fight I had to win them over!  Especially Adam.  I didn’t blame him for the way he reacted to me, you know.  It was to be expected.  The boy had lost so much in his life, and just when things were beginning to settle down for him, I arrived.  Poor Adam must have wondered what he had done to deserve someone like me.  It’s funny how we ended up the best of friends after we both gave up trying to prove ourselves to each other and to you.  He is so like you, my love, how could I help but love him?

Hoss was much easier, of course! As soon as both boys realised how much I loved their wonderful father, things improved.  And of course our darling Little Joe helped.  Never have I seen anyone so besotted over a child as you three were!  Not that I blamed you, as I was quite a bit besotted myself!

My darling Little Joe, my darling treasured boy!  He brought us all together Ben, and made us a complete family.  When he was laid in my arms that very first time, I knew that he was the one thing that was still missing from my life.  My four wonderful men – how had I ever survived without you all?  Yet survive without you I have had to do haven’t I?

My darling it is so hard!  What I have found the hardest to come to terms with is the fact that we never got to say goodbye.  I never got to tell you just how much you and the boys meant to me at the end.  How much you still mean to me.  I know I am so blessed Ben.  I know I should feel grateful that I am still close to you and the boys – that you have the opportunity to come to me and share your thoughts with me – that I have the chance to watch them grow.  But my love, it is still so hard!

I felt your grief for me, and still do!  I watched you as you tried bravely to pick up the threads of your life again for the sake of our boys.  I know how hard that was for you and them, and was so proud of you all for doing it. I wanted more than anything to let you know I am at peace, but did not know how.  So I watched you struggle with all the problems of bringing up three boys on your own, and tried to send you the strength to help you carry on.

Was I able to do it, my darling?  Have I been able to help you?  Have you felt me near to you?  I hope so.  I know it helps my spirit when you and the boys visit me, and I hope it helps you too.  You have done a wonderful job with them all Ben, I hope you know that.

They are all such caring and wonderful young men – yet how could they be anything different with a father like you? I know it has not been easy for you my love, especially with our Joseph.  I know you worry about him a lot, but I know that he will make it through these difficult years and turn out to be a son that you are proud of.  I know you’re proud of him now.  You may think that he is like me, but I see a lot of you in him too, Ben.  He has your strength of character and is growing into a fine young man.  I bless you for making him so.

I know you grieve for me still, my love, as I do for you.  Just know that we are still together in so many ways.  Death is not enough to separate us Ben, it would take more than that for our love to fade.  Hold on to your memories my darling, as I do to mine.  For it is those memories that keep us connected to each other and our beloved boys.  Your memories of me will always keep me alive in your hearts, and my spirit will surround you with my love for as long as I am able.

The shaft of light shifted slightly as the moon moved across the sky on its journey, and highlighted the colours in the Indian blanket hanging on the banister of the staircase. At the top of this staircase three young men slumbered in their respective rooms secure in the knowledge that they were loved – not just by their father who showed his love to them in countless ways every day, but also by the three women who had given them birth.  For a mother’s love surpasses all boundaries and overcomes all obstacles – even in death.  For as long as they were needed, three spirits would forever be connected to these young men, to each other, and to the man who loved them all.

The End