3

At first, the children were equally wary of both Joe and Mr. Gainsby. The four of them sat together on one side of the carriage, stone-faced, glancing from one of the two strange men sitting opposite them to the other. Joe could only imagine what thoughts were going through their young minds. Yet, even despite their fear and uncertainty, the youngest two, Mary and James, began giggling when they were still barely a mile out of Virginia City, clearly surprised by the constant jostling of the bumpy ride that kept tossing them right off their seats. They warmed up to Joe for the way he giggled along with them. The other middle boy, Matthew, started smiling before too long, though the oldest, Martin, tried to remain stern.

Joe felt sorry for that boy. At just eleven years of age he’d been thrust into the role of man of the house, and now he was being forced to play mother to his brothers and sister as well. Joe found himself wondering if Adam had looked so severe after Hoss’s mother died. The thought made him work especially hard at pleasing young Martin. That boy needed to have the chance to be a child for a while longer.

Matthew’s giggles came when Joe started pulling faces to imitate Mr. Gainsby’s gruff expressions. Soon both Matthew and James were pulling faces as well, and giggles became full, gut busting laughs that had the children bouncing more than the bumpy ride. After a while, even stern Martin joined in, by which time Gainsby’s expressions grew gruffer still, clearly showing his displeasure at having to share such a long journey with a bunch of loud, bouncing, bothersome children—Little Joe included.

But the game could not keep the children content forever. About four hours into the journey, the endless bumps and the increasing heat in the coach made the ride less appealing for everyone, and young Mary’s giggling shifted to whimpering. Joe noticed Martin watching her. The boy clearly didn’t know what to do. Joe wasn’t too sure himself. Games can only turn their attention so much. There would always come a time when their mother’s love was all they really needed. Even so, Joe’s own experience had taught him the love of an older brother could work some pretty strong miracles, too. He was about to encourage Martin along those lines when a particularly spectacular bump bounced Mary nearly to the ceiling. An instant after she landed back on her rump, she cried out in such a high-pitched shriek Joe figured his ears would be ringing for days afterwards.

The limits of Mr. Gainsby’s tenuous patience had been shattered. “If someone doesn’t shut that child’s mouth, I certainly will!” he shouted above the girl’s subsequent wailing.

“Don’t you dare touch her!” Martin hollered right back at him.

Joe nodded his approval to Martin and shot Gainsby a look intended to remind the man Joe was still wearing his gun.

“Come on, Mary,” Joe said softly, reaching out to pull her toward him. “Why don’t you ride with me for a while?”

“It’s okay,” Martin said. He grabbed his baby sister and took her to his lap. “I’ll take care of her.”

Smiling at the boy, Joe winked. “Of course you will.” And then he sat back.

The children were adjusting fine. It was Gainsby who concerned Joe the most now. Joe was feeling increasingly disturbed by the man’s character—and increasingly eager to confront him under rules Joe himself understood.

XxXxX

As the journey progressed, the children’s boredom grew, as did Mr. Gainsby’s discomfort, a fact made known to everyone aboard due to his persistent grumbling. Yet boredom and irritation weren’t the only issues affecting the children. The constant swaying motion of the coach combined with the day’s heat was taking a toll on them as well. In the desert just beyond Dagget Pass, James and Mary both started complaining of nausea.

Mr. Gainsby, oblivious, lit a cigar.

“You’d better put that out,” Joe told him.

“Why?”

“Because Mary’s about two breaths away from vomiting, that’s why!”

Gainsby eyed the girl, his lip curling in disgust. “And what has that got to do with me?”

“The smell of that cigar will make her sick!”

Gainsby looked away and took another puff.

“I asked you to put it out!” Joe made a grab for the cigar with his right hand. He’d barely pinched it between his finger and thumb when the coach took a turn that thrust Joe right up against Gainsby. The cigar fell, briefly searing Joe’s palm before he lost all sense of where it might have landed.

“Get away from me, you filthy saddle tramp!” He tried to push Joe away from him, but the motion of the coach worked against them both.

Struggling to right himself, Joe reached behind him with his left hand, hoping to make connection with the seat and gain leverage. The action caused his right elbow to dig into Gainsby’s abdomen.

“Why you—” Using both hands now, Gainsby heaved Joe up and away from him just as the coach hit another large bump.

The motion threw Joe into the south facing side of the coach, his lower back connecting with the bottom of the window-frame and his head bouncing into the iron bar at the top. Dazed, he wasn’t sure if was losing his sense of balance or the coach was starting to lean and wobble. His answer came when they hit one more bump.

The already unsteady coach toppled sideways.

In the next moments, Joe found time passing in a bizarre, desperately slow silence. It was as though the air went still, or maybe the whole world went still while the coach itself moved on. It scraped along the trail, dragging Joe with it, battering his back, his arms, his neck against the wood and sand beneath him while shoes and elbows rained down from above. And then, even time stopped, as Joe succumbed to the stillness.

XxXxX

Mary was the first to find her voice, some moments after the coach finally came to rest. While a small dust cloud began to settle, her frightened cries called the coach’s occupants, one by one, back into reality. They slowly extricated themselves from the heap they’d fallen into, both pushing against and holding onto one another until each could find a sense of balance. Martin quickly took charge of his family, lifting first his sister and then each of his brothers to the driver’s waiting arms before climbing out himself.

When it was Gainsby’s turn, he hesitated, grumbling that he couldn’t get to his satchel.

“Leave it,” the driver, Jebediah Ralston called down to him.

“I can’t! It’s too important!”

“It’s more important now to make sure everyone’s alright.”

“That satchel is important!”

“Mister,” the guard, Ed Burke shouted from behind Ralston, “I don’t give a good goddamn about your stinkin’ satchel! You get your hide out of there right now or I will remove you myself!”

“How dare you!”

Burke cocked his shotgun to make an exaggerated show of his daring. Gainsby scoffed, but finally gave in, half pulling himself and half allowing himself to be pulled from the damaged coach. Finally, only one passenger yet remained.

“Joe?” Ralston shouted.

“Mr. Cartwright?” Burke added.

When it was clear Joe wasn’t rousing, Burke jumped down into the coach to check on him.

“He…he ain’t dead. Is he?” Martin asked in a small, worried voice.

Minutes passed before the guard finally responded. “No. He ain’t dead.”

And then Burke carefully passed Joe on up to Ralston, who held onto him, waiting for Burke to climb back out and help him lower Joe to the ground.

The whole activity seemed to be taking far too long for Mr. Gainsby’s patience.

“Now that you know everyone’s alright,” he shouted down to Burke, still in the belly of the fallen coach, “you get me that satchel before you come on out of there!”

Ralston shot him with a chilling glare. “Everyone ain’t alright, Mister. Joe Cartwright ain’t alright.”

“Just have your colleague get me that satchel!”

But Burke ignored him. When he climbed out, his hands were free to help Ralston with Joe.

XxXxX

A child was crying. It was a tired sound, as though the tears were not new. A horse huffed somewhere in the distance. He heard the rattle of a harness.

Opening his eyes to a fire in the sky that seemed intent on singing his eyeballs, Joe closed them right up again, scrunching down tightly as though that might somehow help to fortify them for his next try.

“Mr. Ralston!” a boy called out.

That was Martin, Joe realized. And the crying child was Mary. The odd events of the day starting to come back to him, Joe forced his eyes open again. Two children were accounted for, but what about the other two?

“Hey, Little Joe!” Jeb Ralston’s voice was right next to him. “Good to see you comin’ around. These kids you’re lookin’ out for won’t let me get any work done.”

“Are they okay?” Joe’s voice was strained. “All of them?”

“Bumps and bruises.” Ralston sounded easygoing about it. Joe took that to be a good sign. “No broken bones. It’s you they’ve all been wonderin’ about.”

“I’m fine.” Joe figured if he said the words, maybe they might prove to be true. Yet when he tried to sit up, the world started spinning around him.

“Yep. You’re fine, alright.” Ralston chuckled.

Lying back down, Joe closed his eyes again and willed the whirlwind to stop. “How’s the stage?”

“I was just about to find out. Burke’s been settling down the team, and ’til now I’ve been caught up here on account of you.”

“Yeah, well there’s no need to fuss over me. Why don’t you see to that stage?” The idea of spending the night in the desert with four children turned Joe’s stomach maybe even more than the dizziness. At least in the stagecoach he wouldn’t have to worry about any of them wandering off or running into nervous snakes.

“Fire!” Gainsby shouted from somewhere off to Joe’s left. “The stage is on fire!”

Joe’s eyes shot open. He rolled carefully to his side and then gingerly propped himself up onto his elbow. Seeing smoke puffing from the interior of the stagecoach, he was immediately reminded of Gainsby’s cigar, and his palm stung anew from where it had burned its mark. Joe had no doubt that cigar was the cause of this fire now.

Mr. Gainsby brought nothing but trouble, nothing at all. And Joe wanted nothing more than to give Gainsby back some trouble of his own. Feeling helpless and furious, Joe could only watch as Burke and Ralston worked frantically to get the money box and as many mailbags as they could away from the flames.

Gainsby worked against them at every turn. “My satchel!” he shouted repeatedly. “You must get that satchel!”

“Those flames is inside the coach, mister!” Ralston shouted back. “Ain’t nobody going inside right now!” He grabbed two more mailbags and tossed them one by one to Burke.

“But you don’t understand! My money is in that satchel. Your guard over there is duty-bound to protect all valuables aboard.”

Burke shouted back. “I am duty-bound to protect the treasure-box and the mail. If you wanted that money of yours protected, you should have told us about it right off so’s we could put it where it belongs.”

“What? And subject it to robbers?”

Both Burke and Ralston ignored him.

“I demand you retrieve that satchel!”

Neither responded.

“I will have both of your jobs for this!”

Joe watched Burke stop where he was. The guard straightened his back and then turned, approaching Gainsby with slow, deliberate steps.

“You think you can do this job, Mister?” Burke was less than a foot away from Gainsby when he spoke.

Clearly uncomfortable by the man’s proximity, Gainsby backed away. “I wouldn’t even think of it,” he sputtered. “I was merely suggesting someone else would surely do a superior service to their passengers. At the prices you people charge for these fares, you should do everything in your power to please us.”

“Us?” Joe shouted toward him. “Or just you?”

Gainsby stared back at him. Burke tipped his hat. By the time both men returned their attention to the stage, flames flickered from the windows and were beginning to lick away at the surrounding wood. It was clear they’d removed everything they could. Nothing else would be saved—not even the money Mr. Gainsby had legally stolen from Mrs. Hansen.

Joe lay back and closed his eyes, as comforted by Gainsby’s loss as he was saddened by Mrs. Hansen’s.

XxXxX

“Little Joe?”

When Ralston’s voice pulled at Joe’s awareness, it bothered him to realize he’d fallen asleep. He blinked to find the sun lower than it had been just a few moments earlier—or what seemed just a few moments to Joe. A quick glance around helped him account for each of the children before he gave his attention to the driver.

“I’m headin’ to Peter’s,” Ralston explained as soon as he saw Joe looking toward him. “The station’s just back yonder a ways. One of them horses and me, we get on just fine. He’ll take me quick enough; should be before full dark. We’ll get word back to Virginia City and see if there’s any chance of a replacement rig.”

“And if there’s not?”

Ralston shrugged. “It’ll get figured out. Least ways the company’ll know what happened. I’ll head back out here at sun-up, and if Gordo’s in I’ll have him come out with me to check on you.”

“Gordo?”

Ralston grinned. “Gordo’s real good with the horses. Sometimes does doctorin’ for folks, too.”

“I suppose I ought to be glad I didn’t break my leg.”

As Ralston moved away, Joe experimented with propping himself up on both elbows. The stress to his muscles told him right away he had bruises he was only beginning to discover. He figured if there was any good from all of this, at least he’d provided a soft spot for the children to fall upon when the stagecoach tipped over. His only real regret was he’d provided a soft spot for Gainsby as well. Too bad it hadn’t been the other way around.

Actually, Joe did have one other regret. He regretted the fact that the world was still spinning, although he was glad it seemed to have slowed somewhat.

Holding himself in that partially upright position and ignoring complaints from his chest all the way to his backside, Joe watched as Martin pulled a doll out of one of the bags that had been salvaged thanks to the fact it had been thrown from the stage during the accident.

“I’m sorry, Martin,” Joe found himself saying.

The boy looked his way as he closed up the bag. “For what?”

“I’m not doing a very good job of taking care of you.”

“I can take care of myself just fine.” He looked toward his sister. “Hey, Mary!”

The girl’s eyes widened when she saw the doll in her brother’s hands. She ran to him and took it gently into her arms as though it was the most important thing in the world. Joe and Martin both watched her move back to the rock she’d claimed as her own, hugging the doll so fiercely Joe could almost imagine her squeezing the stuffing right out of it.

“I know you can take care of yourself,” Joe said then, his gaze still focused on Mary. “But that’s a lot of responsibility, taking care of your brothers and sister too.”

Martin shrugged and then reached for a canteen, walking over and handing it to Joe. “Everybody’s got to take care of their own.”

Joe took a grateful sip of water and passed the canteen back to the boy. “It takes a special kind of man to look out for others while he’s at it.”

“Is that why you came? To prove you’re that kind of man?”

“I wasn’t talking about me, Martin. I was talking about you. I came along to make sure you were all okay; but look at the way it’s turned out. Now you’re looking out for me.”

“I’m not a man yet.”

“Could have fooled me.”

“If I was a man, I’d gun down that miserable Mr. Gainsby.”

Joe stiffened as he heard something of himself in Martin’s words. “No, you wouldn’t,” he said, feeling as though his pa was right there, whispering over his shoulder. “That would be murder. You can never let a man like that turn you into something even worse than he is.”

“Murderin’s not worse than him. He killed my pa.”

“Your pa got sick. Mr. Gainsby didn’t have anything to do with that.”

“My pa worked himself to death on account of Mr. Gainsby. He might as well’ve shot my pa as work him to death. It’s no different to me.”

“There’s a world of difference, Martin. It might not seem like it now, but believe me. It’s true. Mr. Gainsby doesn’t hurt people, not directly. I doubt he’d have the courage to even try. But what he does might be even worse, because what he really does is turn us against ourselves. He causes us to do things we shouldn’t. Like your pa did.” Joe gazed inward, still hearing his own pa. “And like I did,” he found himself admitting.

“What did he cause you to do?” Martin stared at Joe. His brows were pulled down low over his eyes, showing an innocent sort of confusion that made him appear more like the child he was and less like the man he felt he should be.

“He made me angry, Martin. He made me so angry I wanted him to fight me. All I needed was a reason, just one good reason. And then he lit that cigar. If I hadn’t struggled with him over that cigar we probably wouldn’t be stuck out here like this. That stagecoach would still be on the road, getting you closer to your uncle in San Francisco every minute.”

“You don’t know that for sure.”

“You’re right. I don’t. Just like you don’t know for sure whether or not your pa would have gotten sick if it weren’t for his obligations to Mr. Gainsby. Sometimes bad things just happen. We can’t always stop it from happening. What we can do is stop ourselves from doing bad things because of what happened.”

“I can’t stop myself from hating Mr. Gainsby.”

“Me neither. But we can both stop ourselves from acting on that anger.”

“Can you, Mr. Cartwright?”

“I have to keep trying. That’s all any of us can do.” Joe took a deep breath and smiled despite the discomfort all that air brought to his ribs. “Why don’t you just call me Joe?”

“Why?”

“We’re friends, aren’t we? I like my friends to call me Joe.”

“Momma says it ain’t right for me to call men by their given names until I’m as growed as they are.”

“Okay, then. How about Uncle Joe?”

“You’re not my uncle.”

“Not by blood, maybe. But after all we’ve been through today, and the way we’ve been looking out for each other, don’t you think it’d be okay to pretend we’re family?”

Martin seemed to shrink in on himself, his shoulders sagging out of the straight posture he’d held since he’d proclaimed his desire to gun down Mr. Gainsby. “I’m not so good at pretendin,'” he said in a soft voice. “Not anymore. I used to pretend my pa weren’t dead. That didn’t last too long. Then this morning I tried to pretend my ma would meet up with us in San Francisco. But I know better.”

“Why do you say that?”

“I saw it in her eyes when she was sayin’ goodbye. It was like a forever kind of goodbye.”

Joe sighed, disappointed the boy had been perceptive enough to voice Joe’s own concerns—and disturbed to consider that while Martin and Joe were looking out for each other, who was looking out for Mrs. Hansen?

XxXxX

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