XxXxX

13

When Adam saw that the trail made a sudden turn, all the pieces came together just as suddenly in his mind. He knew then how two men could be responsible for all of it, for the false trail he had followed, for the trail Hank and the men would have taken after Adam and Hoss had left them, and also for the attacks that had left Hoss dazed and Joe…gone.

Those two men would have to have made camp somewhere nearby, somewhere within a reasonably short distance from the Ponderosa and the ends of both false trails, a central point that would have given them time to carry out each calculated move.

…A place with an empty barn to hide their horses and an empty cabin to hide the men, themselves. The very place to which this new direction was bound to lead: Micah Ferguson’s cabin.

With a fierce kick and a scream of complaint from his already straining horse, Adam flew toward the cabin, compelled by a sense of urgency that stole all conscious thought. Joe was there. He knew Joe was there. But in what condition? Was he even still alive?

As the southeastern corner of the cabin came into sight just beyond that last hill, Adam tried to push faster, but his horse was already at its limits. Time felt immeasurably slow. He could almost believe he was crawling when he needed to run.

Then he rounded the hill. A flash of movement caught his eye. He saw riders. Two riders were racing from the cabin, looking every bit as desperate to flee as Adam was to arrive.

Acting on instinct alone, Adam drew his gun and fired. Once. Twice. A third time. And then a volley of bullets started coming toward him.

Damn it! You fool! Cursing himself for his carelessness, Adam ducked low in the saddle, but he wasn’t fast enough or low enough to avoid the barrage as they fired back. A bullet dug a furrow across the top of his shoulder. Another sent his hat flying and left a hot tingling in his scalp. He had no choice but to take cover.

With the cabin so close, Adam, himself, had made it unreachable.

XxXxX

Ben abandoned the trail the instant he heard gunfire. Turning Buck toward the sound, he kicked his horse into a gallop, certain that Roy Coffee would do the same. It wasn’t long before he caught view of two gunmen in the distance. They were in the trees beyond that hill, that…hill?

The hill that sat just behind Micah Ferguson’s cabin. …The cabin!

Ben had been so focused on reaching Adam, he’d paid no attention to the direction he’d been headed. But now, suddenly, he knew. Yes, he knew Joe was inside that cabin.

Adam had known too, hadn’t he? Had he reached it safely? Was he inside? Had he found his brother?

Ben kicked his horse harder, rounding the hill to discover that the men weren’t shooting at the cabin itself. They were aiming at a collection of boulders at least fifty feet to this side of it. There. Adam was there. Ben could see Adam’s pistol….his hand reaching over the boulder to fire…a tuft of dark hair.

Enraged and desperate to reach both Adam and the cabin, Ben opened fire, only then realizing that Roy had already done the same. In fact, Roy and Adam weren’t the only ones shooting back at those gunmen. A passel of men had come blazing out from around the other side of the hill…. A passel of men led by Ben’s foreman, Hank. And they already had those gunmen on the move. The direction of the shots had changed, leaving Ben free to holster his gun and focus on getting to Adam.

He found his son leaning back against the rock with his eyes closed and his chest heaving. “Adam?” Then Ben drew closer and saw that Adam’s hair was matted with blood. “Adam!”

Dropping to his knees, Ben reached toward the yet unseen wound, but Adam grabbed hold of his arm. “I’m fine, Pa. I just needed…to catch my breath.” He sounded winded certainly, but also confident.

Ben curled his fingers inward, hesitantly drawing his hand away. He would tend to Adam after. After he saw to the cabin. After he learned whether Joe was there, and whether the boy was…. After he was able to know, to truly know that Joe was all right.

Swallowing back his thoughts, Ben started to rise, and then noticed blood on his son’s shoulder–evidence of yet another wound. “Stay here,” he said simply, firmly, keenly aware that there would be no point to arguing about Adam’s own assessment of his wellbeing. “I’m going to check the cabin. I’ll come back just as soon as I–”

“I’m coming with you.” Adam’s words were as firm as Ben’s at that moment. The only indication of his pain was in the grimace he wore as he pulled himself stiffly to his feet, using the rock for leverage.

Having no choice but to grit his teeth in acceptance, Ben blinked back a disturbing twitch in his eye…and then turned his attention to the cabin.

XxXxX

The sound of gunfire outside somehow awakened a spasm in Joe’s calf muscle, shooting a jolt of sharp, agonizing pain through his leg. He would have cried out if his throat had been open enough to allow for the sound. Instead, his cry emerged as a heavy groan, almost a growl that sounded so raw he could hardly believe it had come from him. For the flash of a second he thought an animal had clawed its way into the cabin.

Then he lost his tenuous balance. On instinct, he’d tried to shift his weight entirely to his good leg; but propped on his toes as he’d been, the effort was careless…clumsy…futile.

He fell, drawing the already taut rope firmly around his neck.

Little Joe Cartwright had sucked in his last gasp of air. Nothing more would come. He couldn’t even so much as growl anymore.

His ears rang from the pressure. His eyes throbbed.

The pain in his leg was nothing to the thick feeling in his head and the uselessness of his lungs; but he couldn’t seem to get his feet under him again. He couldn’t anchor his toes.

He couldn’t hope to avoid the inevitable. He could only close his eyes to fend off the dark spots swirling around him, letting spill a wash of tears.

“Joe!”

The sound of his pa’s voice over the roar of an ocean pulled Joe’s eyes open again. He saw images of Pa and Adam floating through the encroaching blackness, and he painted Hoss in among them. He knew the vision wasn’t real, but found solace in it just the same. His family was there with him. Even if they weren’t, they were, as thoughts of what they’d given him in his fifteen years of life wrapped around his heart even tighter than the rope at his throat…at least until the blackness was complete.

 

This story is posted in chapters, to move from page to page, click the next page number below.