Summary:\u00a0It is 1875. Two years later, Joe Cartwright’s inability to cope with his wife’s death is ruining his life. His Pa thinks getting away might be the answer. Little does Ben know that his decision will put Joe’s life in danger, as well as the lives of the Ingalls’ family who take a wounded Joe in and bring the wrath of a man who hates him down on their heads.<\/p>\n
Rated PG-13 \u00a0\u00a0 (54,680 words)<\/p>\n
A Bonanza\/Little House on the Prairie crossover<\/p>\n
Rating based on violence, brutality and adult situations<\/p>\n
A Tale Told by an Idiot<\/strong><\/p>\n Life’s but a walking shadow, a poor player<\/p>\n That struts and frets his hour upon the stage<\/p>\n And then is heard no more. It is a tale<\/p>\n Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury<\/p>\n Signifying nothing.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n \u2014 Macbeth (Act 5, Scene 5)<\/p>\n <\/p>\n PROLOGUE<\/p>\n <\/p>\n The handsome young man finished latching his satchel and then rested his trembling gloved hands on the case\u2019s leather exterior.\u00a0 He stood in silence for a moment, thinking, and then crossed to the window and looked out at the fading October day, forcing his mind back to the moment when he had chosen to walk away from everything he had known.\u00a0 At the time, he hadn\u2019t decided if he would ever go back.<\/p>\n He still didn\u2019t know.<\/p>\n Of course, he\u2019d said nothing about leaving for good to his father that day or any of the other days before when they had talked over, decided on, and planned this trip.\u00a0 There were big innovations happening in the timber and milling industries in Minnesota and Wisconsin and his pa thought it would be a good idea for him to take an extended trip and see just what they were.\u00a0 There was also hope that with the expansion of the railroad and the opportunities for transporting goods it provided, there might be a place for Ponderosa lumber in the East.\u00a0 He had several old friends in the area \u2013 mill owners and operators \u2013 his pa had said as he slipped a paper into his hand with three men\u2019s names written on it.\u00a0 Pa said the trip would do him a world of good.\u00a0 It would be a chance for him to get away, to see new sights and gain a new perspective.<\/p>\n He didn\u2019t want a new perspective.<\/p>\n He wanted his old one back.<\/p>\n Lifting his hands, the young man placed them a foot apart on the window panes.\u00a0 It was raining.\u00a0 Hard.\u00a0 Water coursed down the bubbled glass echoing the tears flowing down his cheeks.\u00a0 In it he saw a reflection of the life he had tasted for a little less than a year.\u00a0 If he had known what was to come, he would have savored it like a fine wine, rolling it on his tongue, considering the flavor, the bouquet \u2013 the sweetness <\/em>\u2013 of each and every moment so he could hold onto that taste for eternity.\u00a0 But there had been cows to rope and horses to break and fences to mend and a house to finish, and the time he had spent with her had been no more than one or two deep inhaled breaths.<\/p>\n Then, with a suddenness he still could not comprehend, she was gone.<\/p>\n Utterly devastated, the young man rested his curly head between his hands, touching his forehead to the cold pane of glass.\u00a0 In his life, he had seldom questioned his father\u2019s wisdom.\u00a0 He questioned it now.<\/p>\n Pa should never have sent him alone.<\/p>\n He\u2019d rarely been alone in his life, being the baby in the family and all.\u00a0 For those first five years he\u2019d been only one in a crowd that included his mama and Pa, as well as his two older brothers.\u00a0 Then, though Pa continued to insist that God was watching over them and that the man upstairs was<\/em> in control, that crowd started to thin like a herd exposed to winter kill.\u00a0 First, it has been Mama.\u00a0 And then his oldest brother had left, never to return.\u00a0 Next, his middle brother died so suddenly and unexpectedly that the thought of it still had the power to take his breath away.<\/p>\n When Alice died, it had all but stopped his heart.<\/p>\n Joseph Francis Cartwright, the only remaining son of Benjamin Cartwright, once one among many and now only one, turned and dropped into the chair beside the window.\u00a0 Leaning back, he rested his head with its tousled silver-grey curls on the cheap hotel wallpaper and closed his eyes.\u00a0 The tears were unstoppable now.\u00a0 The all-too-familiar soul-wracking sobs were forming, rising from the darkness within.\u00a0 In time, if he didn\u2019t stop them, his too-thin body would shake and convulse until he was spent.\u00a0 Joe\u2019s green eyes flicked to the table beside the bed that held the cure.\u00a0 The bottle of whiskey sitting on its scarred top was a new one.\u00a0 It was almost full.\u00a0 As he looked at it, a chagrined smile curled the corner of his lips.\u00a0 You\u2019d think a man crying himself out would be enough to wear him down and let him rest.\u00a0 But it wasn\u2019t.\u00a0 It only left him empty.\u00a0 And an empty thing needed to be filled, now, didn\u2019t it?\u00a0 Least, that\u2019s what he told himself every time he tossed back enough liquor to become numb and fall in a drunken stupor to the bed.<\/p>\n \u2018Course when he woke the next day he just felt twice as empty.<\/p>\n His pa was worried about him.\u00a0 He knew that.\u00a0 It had taken about all the older man had in him to send him away.\u00a0 Alice had been gone for close to two years now.\u00a0 Life had moved on and for a time he thought he had too.\u00a0 Then, as the endless days marched forward, sometimes pointless, most times painful, he began to doubt there was<\/em> a purpose to it after all.\u00a0 His Pa\u2019d been taken hostage not once, but twice, coming close to being killed.\u00a0 He\u2019d lost that beautiful black stallion that had made his heart soar above the constant grief.\u00a0 \u00a0Candy had left.\u00a0 Griff had been hired on and left.\u00a0 Jamie was still with them, but he was a man now and soon he\u2019d be gone as well.\u00a0 Joe sucked in air as another face from the past came to mind.<\/p>\n Then, just under a year back, there\u2019d been Tanner and the torture he\u2019d suffered at the insane soldier\u2019s hands.<\/p>\n His soul and his body longed for Alice.\u00a0 He missed his brothers more than he could say.\u00a0 But it was his nightmares of that time in the desert, still so potent after so<\/em> long a time, that had capped it all and uncorked the bottle of his despair.<\/p>\n His black moods were what had made his pa send him away to gain that \u2018new\u2019 perspective.<\/p>\n Joe rose and went over to the bedside table.\u00a0 Picking up the whiskey bottle, he held it in his hand and looked at it as he sat on the edge of the bed.\u00a0 He\u2019d never considered himself a weak man.\u00a0 He would have decked the first man-jack who suggested he was.\u00a0 He still didn\u2019t know if he was weak, really, but he was certainly broken.<\/p>\n Joe snorted and shook his head as he removed the stopper from the bottle.\u00a0 He thought of all those years he\u2019d spent breaking the spirit of those wild, beautiful horses.\u00a0 He wondered now if this was how they felt when he did.<\/p>\n He wondered if they hated him busting them as much as he hated himself for being busted.<\/p>\n Lifting the bottle to his lips Joe took a good, long swig.\u00a0 Still holding the bottle, he lay back against the cool feather pillows.\u00a0 Tomorrow would begin the last leg of his journey to La Crosse, Wisconsin.\u00a0 The hotel, such as it was, that he was staying in was located in a town called Medary, established by the Dakota Land Company out of Minnesota in eighteen fifty-seven. \u00a0It hadn\u2019t grown up much due to the railroad passing it by, but things were improving \u2013 at least that was what everyone he\u2019d run into in the town told him since it seemed now that the train might just be coming this way after all.\u00a0 That train would make or break the small town that was mostly made up of Norwegian immigrants.\u00a0 He\u2019d made some inquiries about the man he was supposed to look up for his pa in Minnesota on his way through and found he was a relative of one of the families in Medary.\u00a0 They\u2019d given him instructions on how to find the mill the man owned and operated. \u00a0Traveling there was the reason he\u2019d left the train behind and bought a horse of the man who owned the livery for the final part of his journey.\u00a0 The small town was off the beaten track and had only been platted a year or so back.\u00a0 \u00a0It had been named for a grove of Black Walnut trees standing nearby.<\/p>\n Taking another long drink Joe closed his eyes and waited for the whiskey\u2019s numbing qualities to wash over him.\u00a0 He\u2019d been a hard-drinking man in his youth, wild at times but rarely out of control.\u00a0 Even his brothers \u2013 who were no saints themselves \u2013 had been amazed at how much liquor he could hold and stay in possession of his wits.\u00a0 He opened one eye and measured the golden-brown liquid in the bottle.\u00a0 About three more gulps and he\u2019d be done.\u00a0 Done with another day without his brothers.\u00a0 Done with twenty-four more hours without his wife.<\/p>\n Done with every single minute he\u2019d lived since he\u2019d lost his child.<\/p>\n Done with life.<\/p>\n Joe took another drink.\u00a0 This time he felt that edge, like the world was tilting slightly and if he timed it just right, he might just slide out the open door and be gone.<\/p>\n Yeah.<\/p>\n Pa should never have sent him alone.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n ONE<\/p>\n <\/p>\n \u201cLaura Ingalls, what do you think you\u2019re doing?!\u201d<\/p>\n The brown-haired girl looked over her shoulder.\u00a0 Her sister Mary wasn\u2019t really asking a question, she was shouting.<\/p>\n \u201cWhat does it look like I\u2019m doing?\u201d Laura snapped back as she took another step, careful to avoid the thorns in the ankle-deep underbrush.\u00a0 \u201cI\u2019m gonna find out what\u2019s makin\u2019 so much noise.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cIf you rip up your new socks Ma\u2019s gonna be awful mad.\u201d<\/p>\n She\u2019d thought about that.\u00a0 If she could have found somewhere to sit down, she would have taken her new striped socks off.\u00a0 But there wasn\u2019t anywhere to sit down \u2018cause everywhere she looked there was blackberry bushes.\u00a0 She\u2019d lifted up her skirts and tucked them behind the waistband of\u00a0 her pantalettes to keep them safe.\u00a0 If Ma\u2019d seen that, the scolding would have been even worse \u2018cause even though she wasn\u2019t gonna tear her dress and underpinnings, she was showing her ankles \u2013 well, even her knees \u2013 and that was what Ma called \u2018scandalous.\u2019\u00a0 She said it was the kind of thing disorderly<\/em> ladies did.<\/p>\n Whatever that meant.<\/p>\n \u201cI can already see a run in the back of the left one!\u201d Mary yelled.<\/p>\n \u201cWell, then, ain\u2019t no point in me stoppin\u2019, is there?\u201d she countered, her tone churlish.\u00a0 \u201cI\u2019ll just take what punishment I get and be happy for it if it means I helped somethin\u2019 or somebody who needs it!\u201d<\/p>\n That took her sister back a little bit.\u00a0 \u201cCan you see anything?\u201d Mary asked, her voice softer.<\/p>\n Laura peered ahead.\u00a0 It was late in the day.\u00a0 The sun was sinking down toward the horizon.\u00a0 It was almost sitting right on top of the ripened corn and, for the moment, was throwing its light across the bottomland by the creek.\u00a0 They were coming up on the place where Middle Ridge-fire Road turned north toward town and had about two more miles to go to the east before they\u2019d be home.\u00a0 Mary\u2019d been tutoring one of the Mason girls who lived west of Walnut Grove and she\u2019d gone along to play with Janie\u2019s little sister, to keep her out of Mary\u2019s hair.\u00a0 Jennie was just about Carrie\u2019s age.\u00a0 She was real cute and fun and she didn\u2019t mind. \u00a0Mrs. Mason had paid Mary fifty cents for the tutoring this week and they\u2019d been talking about how her sister was gonna spend it when they heard a funny little noise off to the side of the road.\u00a0 It kinda sounded like a baby crying.\u00a0 They knew the place \u2018cause they\u2019d been berry picking here before.\u00a0 The land beside the road fell away gently and sloped down toward the creek, moving through the area she was in now.\u00a0 On the way down was a riot of flowers, as Pa liked to say, and dozens of blackberry bushes.\u00a0 She\u2019d gotten more than her fair share of thorns in her fingers for picking them, but the berries were always plump and juicy here and sure were worth it.<\/p>\n Sometimes it seemed the things that hurt you the most were the ones that meant the most too.<\/p>\n Of course when she\u2019d heard the noise she\u2019d taken off like a shot down the slope to see what it was.\u00a0 It hadn\u2019t taken Mary two seconds to start yelling at her that she was being foolish, that she needed to look before leaping, and that she was gonna get her hide tanned for ripping her clothes and making them late.\u00a0 Laura sighed as she took another step forward.<\/p>\n Sometimes it seemed like she had two<\/em> Mas.<\/p>\n Carefully putting her foot down in a place surprisingly clear of thorns, Laura found a new purchase and then peered into the descending dark.<\/p>\n \u201cThere\u2019s somethin\u2019 movin\u2019.\u00a0 I can see it.\u00a0 I think it\u2019s caught in the bushes.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cWhat is it?\u201d Mary called.<\/p>\n Laura rolled her eyes.\u00a0 If she\u2019d of known what it was, then she would have said<\/em> what it was.\u00a0 \u201cI don\u2019t know yet. \u00a0That big old willow tree is casting big old shadows.\u201d\u00a0 Narrowing her eyes she looked for another partially clear spot.\u00a0 Finding one, she lifted her right foot and put it in it.\u00a0 Then she lifted her left \u2013 and heard her stocking rip.<\/p>\n She sighed.<\/p>\n Well, there went that orange in her Christmas stocking.<\/p>\n Lifting her foot anyhow, she put her it down next to the other one and then leaned forward, peering into the shadows.\u00a0 \u201cThere\u2019s definitely somethin\u2019 moving, Mary.\u00a0 Looks kind of fuzzy and brown.\u00a0 Maybe it\u2019s a puppy.\u201d\u00a0 She inched closer and as she did the little animal began to whine with fear.\u00a0 \u201cHush,\u201d she said, \u201chey, it\u2019s okay.\u00a0 I ain\u2019t gonna hurt you.\u00a0 You\u2019re….\u201d<\/p>\n Laura sucked in a breath.<\/p>\n \u201cWhat is it?\u201d her sister asked instantly.<\/p>\n She was looking at the little thing.\u00a0 It was all caught up in berry branches like it had rolled in a bail of barbed wire.\u00a0 Little beads of blood dotted its light brown coat and it was howling to wake the dead.<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s a bear cub,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n Mary gasped.\u00a0 \u201cLaura, get out of there!\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cIt ain\u2019t gonna hurt me,\u201d she replied.<\/p>\n \u201cNo, but it\u2019s mama<\/em> will if she finds you there and it\u2019s howling like that.\u00a0 You get back up here now!\u00a0 Now<\/em>, Laura!\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cBut it\u2019s bleedin\u2019….\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cFor Gosh sakes, Laura!\u00a0 It\u2019s mama\u2019s gonna smell that blood!\u00a0 You know what pa told us about grizzlies.\u00a0 You back out of there now!\u201d<\/p>\n She eyed the poor little thing.\u00a0 It had stopped howling and was staring at her just as hard as she was staring at it.\u00a0 Then she saw it turn its little head.\u00a0 It made a funny little bleating noise, kind of like a lamb, and started to struggle again.<\/p>\n It was then she heard it.\u00a0 A huffing noise and the sound of something running hard through the trees, charging, crashing through the undergrowth and heading straight toward her.<\/p>\n \u201cLaura, get out of there!\u201d<\/p>\n For some reason, she couldn\u2019t move.\u00a0 It was like her legs had been planted in that berry patch just as sure as those tall stalks of corn were planted in Pa\u2019s field.\u00a0 As Mary continued to scream hysterically, Laura continued to stare.\u00a0 It was about ten seconds later that she saw a big five hundred pound grizzly bear with a light brown coat break through the tree-line in front of her.\u00a0 It halted, reared up on its haunches, and bellowed.<\/p>\n Terrified, Laura turned.\u00a0 She was about to run when a man\u2019s voice shouted.<\/p>\n \u201cStay where you are!\u00a0 Stay still!\u201d<\/p>\n A second later the man appeared.\u00a0 He was about Pa\u2019s size and had a head of curly shining hair that glinted as the dying rays of the sun struck it.\u00a0 He was wearing a bright green jacket and light-colored pants and had a holster tied around his left leg just like the gunfighters did in the newspaper pictures.\u00a0 He moved in-between her and the big animal and started yelling and waving his hands like he was trying to scare the she-bear away.\u00a0 She knew sometimes that bears were only bluffing, but she didn\u2019t think this was gonna be one of those times.\u00a0 That mama bear looked right mad.\u00a0 Even as the man reached toward the gun hanging on his hip, the grizzly crouched low and charged.\u00a0 Seconds later it plowed right into him.\u00a0 He threw his arm in front of his face when it hit, trying to keep her fangs off his throat. The bear caught it in her teeth as she drove him to the ground.<\/p>\n Mary shouted something and she turned and saw her sister running.\u00a0 Laura wanted to follow her but she just couldn\u2019t.\u00a0 Whoever he was, the man had just saved her life and she couldn\u2019t just leave him.\u00a0 Shaking like she\u2019d been in the cold for hours, the little girl closed her eyes and turned back.\u00a0 Drawing a shuddering breath, she asked God to make sure the man was all right, and then she opened her eyes.\u00a0 The mama bear had the man\u2019s left leg in her mouth, holding it up around the thigh.\u00a0 She was shaking his body from side to side.\u00a0 Then, she just stopped and dropped him.\u00a0 That old bear turned to her cub and made a low noise in her throat.\u00a0 The little bear answered and then it wriggled free of the berry branches and ran away.\u00a0 Its mama watched it for a minute and then turned back to the man and nudged him with her nose.<\/p>\n Then she just walked away like nothing happened.<\/p>\n Laura was breathing so hard she was lightheaded, and shaking so hard she didn\u2019t know if she could take a step.\u00a0 The man was just laying there, not moving.<\/p>\n She was sure he was dead.<\/p>\n During the attack the sun had all but set, so it was hard to make her way over to him without hitting every thorn in her path. \u00a0The berry bushes shredded her stockings and cut her legs as she went.\u00a0 Still she figured with how bad the man had to hurting \u2013 if he was still alive \u2013 that was nothing.\u00a0 Laura stopped and glanced back to make sure Mary hadn\u2019t reappeared . When she didn\u2019t see her sister, she started forward again.\u00a0 She\u2019d seen an awful lot of things in her short life, from Minnesota to Kansas and back, but she hadn\u2019t ever seen a dead man other than one all dressed up and laid out in a coffin.\u00a0 She could smell blood as she approached him, and see that that pretty green jacket wasn\u2019t so pretty anymore.\u00a0 It was all stained with what looked like black spots, though she knew they were really red.<\/p>\n And growing.<\/p>\n The man\u2019s face was scratched, but the bear hadn\u2019t mauled it.\u00a0 His arm inside his ruined jacket looked like a big old mess.\u00a0 Worse than that, though, was his left thigh where the mama bear\u2019s teeth had taken hold of it.\u00a0 His gray pants were torn into pieces so you could see his skin was all ripped up underneath.<\/p>\n Laura bit her lip.\u00a0 She shuddered again and started to cry.\u00a0 It was all her<\/em> fault.\u00a0 If she hadn\u2019t been so goldarned certain she had to save that little cub, she wouldn\u2019t have needed rescuing, and then the stranger wouldn\u2019t have gotten killed.<\/p>\n And the cub didn\u2019t need saving after all!<\/p>\n Near sobbing, Laura fell to her knees and put her hand on the man\u2019s face.\u00a0 He startled her by moaning.<\/p>\n He wasn\u2019t<\/em> dead!<\/p>\n She reached down and took his hand in hers.\u00a0 It was covered in a black leather glove.\u00a0 The leather wasn\u2019t like Pa\u2019s work gloves.\u00a0 It was so soft and smooth it felt like skin.\u00a0 Reaching out with her other hand, she hesitantly touched his cheek.<\/p>\n \u201cMister?\u201d<\/p>\n He moaned again but didn\u2019t open his eyes.<\/p>\n \u201cMister?\u00a0 Can you hear me?\u201d<\/p>\n His lips parted slightly, like he was trying to answer.<\/p>\n \u201cI think my sister went to get help.\u00a0 You just hold on, you hear?\u201d<\/p>\n This time he sort of nodded.<\/p>\n Laura shook her head. \u201cYou were awful brave, takin\u2019 on that big old grizzly bear.\u00a0 That was just about the bravest thing I ever <\/em>seen.\u201d\u00a0 When he didn\u2019t react, she touched his face again and was rewarded by another moan.\u00a0 Her tears continued to flow.\u00a0 \u201cI bet you\u2019re hurtin\u2019 awful bad.\u00a0 We\u2019ll have to get you to the Doc as fast as we can.\u201d<\/p>\n It was then she heard one of the most wonderful things she had ever heard in her whole <\/em>life.<\/p>\n Her Pa\u2019s voice.<\/p>\n \u201cHalf-pint!\u00a0 Where are you?\u00a0 Laura, you answer me!\u00a0 Answer me now!\u201d<\/p>\n She stood up, still holding the stranger\u2019s hand.\u00a0 \u201cI\u2019m here, Pa.\u00a0 I\u2019m over here!\u00a0 There\u2019s a man, Pa.\u00a0 He saved me, but he\u2019s hurt awful<\/em> bad!\u201d<\/p>\n A second later she watched as her father broke through the trees.\u00a0 He was holding a lantern.\u00a0 It lit his face and right then, with that light shining up on him, he looked just like an angel out of the reverend\u2019s picture book.\u00a0 Pa halted and looked around as its soft glow reached out to touch her.\u00a0 When he saw her, he began to move forward.<\/p>\n Mary was right behind him.<\/p>\n Her pa came to her side and dropped to the ground beside the stranger.\u00a0 As he did, she looked at her sister.\u00a0 \u201cWhere\u2019d you go?\u201d she asked.<\/p>\n \u201cI heard a wagon on the road. \u00a0I didn\u2019t know who it was.\u201d\u00a0 Mary\u2019s gaze went to their pa.\u00a0 \u201cMa got worried and sent Pa after us.\u00a0 He was heading to the Masons.\u201d<\/p>\n Their father\u2019s hands were moving quickly over the stranger\u2019s supine form.\u00a0 Pa whistled once and then shook his head.\u00a0 \u201cHe\u2019s right lucky that she-bear was giving him a warning and not trying to kill him.\u00a0 Still, he\u2019s pretty bad off.\u00a0\u00a0 She bit him, and it looks like dirt and maybe more got pushed into that wound when she did.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cCan we get him in the wagon, Pa?\u201d Mary asked.<\/p>\n He looked up at her.\u00a0 \u201cI need to stop the bleedin\u2019 first.\u00a0 You girls start tearin\u2019 strips off your petticoats.\u201d\u00a0 At their horrified look, he added quietly, \u201cI\u2019ll settle it with your ma.\u00a0 This man\u2019s life is more important that a yard of cloth.\u201d<\/p>\n It took Pa about a half an hour to tie off the man\u2019s arm wound so it wouldn\u2019t bleed no more and then to make a splint for his leg.\u00a0 All the time he kept talking to the stranger, asking him questions and telling him he needed to stay awake.\u00a0 The man would moan and from time to time, say a word.\u00a0 There was only one they could make out.\u00a0 He kept saying \u2018Pa\u2019 over and over again.\u00a0 \u00a0It was kind of funny \u2018cause she knew he wasn\u2019t talking about her pa even though he was right there.<\/p>\n He was probably calling for his own.<\/p>\n \u201cAre you gonna take him to town to see Doctor Baker?\u201d Laura asked as her father rose.<\/p>\n \u201cThe Doc\u2019s out of town.\u00a0 He went to pick-up supplies in Sleepy Eye and won\u2019t be back for days.\u201d\u00a0 Pa wiped his forehead with his shirt sleeve.\u00a0 He was sweating.\u00a0 \u201cWe\u2019ll take him to our house where your ma can look after him.\u00a0 After that, I\u2019ll go to town and send a wire to Doc Baker.\u201d\u00a0 He glanced at the man again.\u00a0 \u201cI think he needs to come back right away.\u201d<\/p>\n Laura looked at the man too.\u00a0 She couldn\u2019t see him well, but he looked so small and sad laying there on the ground all quiet-like.<\/p>\n \u201cIs he gonna die, Pa?\u201d she asked, her voice hushed.<\/p>\n He put a hand on her shoulder.\u00a0 \u201cHonestly, Half-pint,\u201d Pa replied, \u201conly God knows.\u201d\u00a0 He bent then and took up the lantern.\u00a0 \u201cI want you and Mary to stay here with him,\u201d he said.\u00a0 \u201cI\u2019m gonna go unhitch the horses.\u00a0 I\u2019ll put him on one and ride behind him.\u00a0 I want you two to ride the other one.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cWhat about the wagon, Pa?\u201d Mary asked.<\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019ll come back for it in the morning.\u00a0 I\u2019d take him in it, but I need the horse to get him up the hill and I don\u2019t want to move him anymore than I have to.\u00a0 It might start the bleedin\u2019 again to try to get him in the wagon.\u201d<\/p>\n Darkness descended as her pa walked away.\u00a0 Standing there beside Mary, listening to the stranger moan, she was suddenly overwhelmed with guilt.\u00a0 Her shoulders started shaking and she began to cry.<\/p>\n Mary came close and put her arm around her.\u00a0 She pulled her in real tight and held onto her as the two of them waited for their father to return.\u00a0 He appeared a few minutes later leading one of the horses.\u00a0 Laura took the lantern from him and held it up high as she could while Mary helped their pa lift the man up and onto the horse\u2019s bare back.\u00a0 Her sister kept hold while Pa climbed up behind the stranger, and then the two of them followed as he walked the animal back to the road.\u00a0 Her sister helped her up onto the other horse and then used a boulder to climb on its back.<\/p>\n Then the three of them and the man who had saved her headed for home.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Caroline had been peering out the window by the door for some time, waiting for Charles and the girls to appear.\u00a0 She\u2019d been looking for Mary and Laura to come back from the Masons when Charles arrived home from his work at the mill.\u00a0 He\u2019d agreed with her that it was getting too late for them to walk.\u00a0 Her handsome husband had grabbed a couple of pieces of bread and headed out the door almost before he made it all the way in.\u00a0 She was sure nothing was wrong.\u00a0 The girls had probably started out late.\u00a0 She knew how much Laura liked to play with Jennie Mason.\u00a0 Still, even though Walnut Grove was about as safe a place as there was for children to grow up in, there were untold dangers awaiting two young girls traveling alone after dark on the road.<\/p>\n As she dropped the curtain back into place, the blonde woman glanced into her youngest girl\u2019s room.\u00a0 Carrie was already asleep.\u00a0 She\u2019d had a long day, poor thing.\u00a0 It started out that morning when their youngest had accidentally locked the outhouse door behind her, progressed through a fall from a stall wall into the cow pen, and ended with a disastrous visit to the creek where Carrie tumbled in and ruined her clothes.\u00a0 Caroline sighed.\u00a0 She was afraid she\u2019d yelled at her about that last one.\u00a0 Money was so tight, it was all they could do to afford two sets of dresses and underpinnings for all the girls.\u00a0 She had a few scraps left over from a shirt she had made Charles.<\/p>\n She wondered idly what Carrie would look like in a dress made of that rugged blue and green plaid!<\/p>\n Crossing back to her rocking chair in front of the fire, Caroline picked her Bible up and sat down.\u00a0 Her evening prayers had driven her to a heartrending passage and she had put it down for a time, admittedly disturbed.\u00a0 Opening the worn book, she read Psalm Thirty, verses eight to ten once more.<\/p>\n \u2018I cried to thee, O Lord; and unto the Lord I made supplication. What profit is there in my blood, when I go down to the pit?\u00a0 Shall the dust praise thee?\u00a0 Shall it declare thy truth?\u00a0 Hear, O Lord, and have mercy upon me: Lord, be thou my helper.\u2019<\/em><\/p>\n Caroline closed it again and placed her hand on the worn leather surface, wondering just who<\/em> the plaintive words were for.<\/p>\n Unexpectedly, she heard the sound of horses\u2019 hooves striking the ground in the yard instead of wagon wheels rolling over it.\u00a0 Rising quickly, the blonde woman crossed to the door and threw it open and stepped outside.\u00a0 The moon was high now.\u00a0 She could see her two girls seated on the back of one of their team.\u00a0 Charles followed close behind on the other one.<\/p>\n He was holding someone in front of him.<\/p>\n \u201cCharles, what happened?\u201d she asked as she stepped off the stoop and approached him.<\/p>\n \u201cNo time now.\u00a0 I\u2019ll tell you about it when we get him settled,\u201d he said, his voice ragged.\u00a0 \u201cHelp me get this man off the horse and into the house.\u00a0 He needs help now<\/em>.\u201d<\/p>\n Without another word she stepped up to help him, holding the man on the animal\u2019s back while Charles slipped off.\u00a0 Her husband grunted as he took hold of the stranger and pulled him down and then lifted him in his arms.\u00a0 They were about the same size, she thought, though Charles was more muscled.\u00a0 The stranger had silver-gray hair, but the body of a young man, so she wasn\u2019t entirely certain how old he was.\u00a0 He seemed a little bit younger than Charles.<\/p>\n His face, left arm, and leg were covered in blood.<\/p>\n \u201cGrizzly,\u201d her husband offered in explanation as he carried him toward the house.<\/p>\n In spite of the fact that the action should have caused the stranger pain, he didn\u2019t make a sound.\u00a0 He must be unconscious, poor thing.<\/p>\n Looking at him, it was probably a mercy of God.<\/p>\n As they passed into the house, Charles said, \u201cWe\u2019ll put him in our bed for now.\u00a0 You can sleep with the girls tonight.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cWhere will you sleep?\u201d she asked as they reached the kitchen.<\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019m heading back into town.\u00a0 It isn\u2019t too late.\u00a0 If I can rouse Nels, I\u2019ll get him somethin\u2019 for the pain.\u00a0 Then I\u2019m headin\u2019 out to Isaiah\u2019s.\u00a0 I\u2019m hopin\u2019 Grace is up.\u00a0 If she is, I\u2019m gonna have her send a letter in the morning to Doctor Baker in Sleepy Eye.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cOh, that\u2019s right,\u201d she said as they reached the bedroom. \u201cHiram\u2019s away.\u201d<\/p>\n Charles grunted as he lowered the wounded man to their bed.\u00a0 Placing his hand under the man\u2019s head, he rested it gently on the pillow.\u00a0 Then he stood back and let out a long sigh.<\/p>\n \u201cIs he still breathing?\u201d she asked.\u00a0 She hadn\u2019t seen any movement since they\u2019d taken him off the horse.<\/p>\n Charles sat beside the stranger.\u00a0 Leaning over, he placed his ear on the man\u2019s chest and listened.\u00a0 Finally he nodded.\u00a0 \u201cHe\u2019s breathin\u2019.\u00a0 His heart\u2019s beatin\u2019 mighty fast.\u00a0 Kind of thin and thready.\u201d<\/p>\n She had always feared that Charles would come home in this condition from hunting one day.\u00a0\u00a0 \u201cYou said it was a grizzly?\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cYes.\u201d\u00a0 Her husband turned and looked toward the other room where their girls were waiting.\u00a0 \u201cWhoever he is, we owe him a lot.\u00a0 He saved Half-pint\u2019s life.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cOh, dear God!\u2019 she exclaimed as her hand flew to her lips.<\/p>\n Charles rose and took her in his arms.\u00a0 His breath was warm against her cheek as he spoke.\u00a0 \u201cMary caught me on the road.\u00a0 She was cryin\u2019 and scared.\u00a0 She told me there was a bear cub trapped in some berry bushes and that Laura was tryin\u2019 to help it.\u201d\u00a0 He smiled.\u00a0 \u201cYou know Half-pint, she was worryin\u2019 over it.\u00a0 The mama bear charged her and this man stepped in.\u201d<\/p>\n Caroline looked over her husband\u2019s shoulder at the stranger.\u00a0 \u201cWho is he, Charles?\u00a0 Where did he come from?\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cI didn\u2019t see a horse.\u00a0 Bear probably scared it off.\u00a0 There might be somethin\u2019 in his pockets.\u201d\u00a0 He shook his head.\u00a0 \u201cThere\u2019s no pullin\u2019 his clothes off with those injuries.\u00a0 We\u2019ll have to cut them off and we can check his pockets then.\u201d\u00a0 He stared at the injured man.\u00a0 \u201cI don\u2019t want to try to move that arm or leg, Caroline, but those wounds need cleaned.\u00a0 I didn\u2019t have any way to do it on the road.\u201d\u00a0 Charles shook his head.\u00a0 \u201cOdds are, infection\u2019s gonna set in.\u00a0 I don\u2019t see much hope unless we can get Doc Baker back here soon.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cYou go ahead, Charles.\u00a0 Mary can help me get his coat and shirt off and clean the wounds to his upper body and face.\u00a0 I\u2019ll send her out to boil some water while I remove the rest of his clothes and finish up with his leg.\u201d\u00a0 The blonde woman moved to the side of the bed and looked down at the wounded man.\u00a0 The moonlight spilling in the window struck his face.\u00a0 In spite of that silver-grey hair, she\u2019d been right, he was<\/em> young.\u00a0 His face was still unlined and actually quite handsome.\u00a0 Caroline sat beside him and shoved a matted mass of curls off his bloody forehead.<\/p>\n Her breath caught.<\/p>\n \u201cWhat is it?\u201d Charles asked, moving closer.<\/p>\n She looked up at her husband and then back at the man, and then up at Charles again.<\/p>\n \u201cWhy, Charles!\u00a0 He could be your younger brother.\u201d<\/p>\n Her husband nodded.\u00a0 She could see he had noticed the resemblance already.\u00a0 \u201cMy younger brother doesn\u2019t look a bit<\/em> like me,\u201d he said with a hint of an ornery smile.<\/p>\n She batted his hand.\u00a0 \u201cGet out of here.\u00a0 I have work to do.\u201d<\/p>\n He snorted and then leaned down and kissed the top of her head.\u00a0 \u201cLove you too.\u00a0 I\u2019ll be back soon.\u201d<\/p>\n <\/p>\n When Charles emerged into the kitchen he found Mary sitting alone at the table.<\/p>\n \u201cWhere\u2019s your sister?\u201d he asked as he cast his gaze around the darkened interior.<\/p>\n \u201cShe said she had to go to the privy.\u00a0 She\u2019s awful upset, Pa.\u00a0 She thinks it\u2019s all her fault.\u201d\u00a0 His daughter\u2019s ice blue eyes went to the corridor he had just left behind.\u00a0 \u201cIs he gonna die?\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cNot just yet,\u201d he said, resting a hand on her shoulder, \u201cand if God\u2019s willin\u2019, not at all.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cWho do you think he is, Pa?\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cAt the moment, I think he\u2019s a man in need,\u201d he replied.\u00a0 \u201cThat\u2019s all we need to know.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cDid you notice….\u201d\u00a0 Her voice fell off.<\/p>\n \u201cNotice what?\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cHe was wearing a gun, Pa.\u00a0 Tied down to his leg.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cSo?\u201d<\/p>\n Mary\u2019s eyes were troubled.\u00a0 \u201cIsn\u2019t that what gunfighters like the James\u2019 brothers do?\u201d<\/p>\n Charles lifted his hand.\u00a0 \u201cNot every man who ties his gun to his leg is an outlaw, Mary.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cBut what if he is?\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n He briefly touched her face.\u00a0 \u201cHe could be Jesse James himself, Mary, and we\u2019d still owe him a debt.\u00a0 No matter who he is or what he\u2019s done, he saved your sister\u2019s life.\u201d<\/p>\n At that moment Caroline\u2019s voice rang out.\u00a0 \u201cMary, I need your help.\u201d<\/p>\n He lifted his hand. \u201cThere, your Ma\u2019s calling\u2019 you.\u00a0 You go help her, and don\u2019t you worry about who that man is.\u00a0 It\u2019s goin\u2019 to be a long time before it matters.\u00a0 If <\/em>he makes it, he\u2019s got a lot of healin\u2019 to do.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cYes, sir,\u201d she said as she rose from her chair.\u00a0 Mary took a couple of steps toward the hall and then turned and came back to give him a hug.\u00a0 \u201cI love you, Pa,\u201d she said against his shirt.<\/p>\n \u201cI love you too, darlin\u2019.\u201d \u00a0Charles kissed her shining hair.\u00a0 \u201cNow, go help your ma.\u201d<\/p>\n The brown-haired man watched until Mary disappeared into the passageway and then went to the front door.\u00a0 Opening it, he stepped out into a brilliant wash of moonlight.\u00a0 It didn\u2019t take him long to spot Laura.\u00a0 She was sitting on the stump to the right of the pile of firewood that he and Caroline sometimes occupied.<\/p>\n He crossed over to her and stood there for a moment before saying anything.<\/p>\n \u201cMm-mm,\u201d he said at last, looking up and not at his child.\u00a0 \u201cIt\u2019s a mighty pretty night.\u201d<\/p>\n Laura wasn\u2019t looking up, she was looking down.\u00a0 Her elbows were on her knees and her chin rested on her rolled up fingers.\u00a0 \u201cI don\u2019t see what\u2019s so pretty about it,\u201d she muttered.<\/p>\n \u201cMind if I sit down?\u201d he asked.<\/p>\n She shook her head and then scooted over so he could sit beside her on the stump.<\/p>\n After a few moments of silence, he said, \u201cYou\u2019re worried about the stranger.\u201d<\/p>\n He could see her little shoulders shaking.\u00a0 It took her a few seconds, but she managed a nod.<\/p>\n \u201cYou\u2019re afraid he\u2019s gonna die, is that it?\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cOh, Pa!\u201d she exclaimed, finally looking at him.\u00a0 \u201cHe wouldn\u2019t be hurt if it wasn\u2019t for me.\u00a0 I shouldn\u2019t have tried to help that baby bear.\u00a0 I should have just left it alone like you told us.\u00a0 It was just….\u201d\u00a0 She sniffed and tears rolled down her cheeks.\u00a0 \u201cI thought it was gonna die.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n He nodded.\u00a0 \u201cYou\u2019re right.\u00a0 You should\u2019ve left it alone.\u201d\u00a0 Charles paused.\u00a0 \u201cDid you learn from your mistake?\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cI sure did, Pa, only…only…that don\u2019t help him<\/em> any.\u201d<\/p>\n Charles took her hand in his.\u00a0 \u201cHalf-pint, one of the hardest lessons we have to learn is that there are consequences for our actions.\u00a0 Now, I know you didn\u2019t mean for that man to get hurt, but the choice you made had a part in it happenin\u2019.\u201d\u00a0 At her horrified look, he added softly, \u201cStill, whether or not he lives or dies isn\u2019t up to you or me.\u00a0 It\u2019s up to God.\u00a0 All the days ordained for you and me were written in God\u2019s book long before the first one of them came to be.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cThat\u2019s from the Psalms, ain\u2019t it?\u201d<\/p>\n He nodded.\u00a0 \u201cOne-thirty-nine.\u00a0 You know, Half-pint, the number of that stranger\u2019s days were written in God\u2019s book too before he was born.\u00a0 He ain\u2019t gonna die unless God wants him to.\u00a0 You can\u2019t take that on yourself.\u201d<\/p>\n Her voice was very quiet.\u00a0 \u201cIt\u2019s hard not to, Pa.\u201d<\/p>\n He rose to his feet.\u00a0 \u201cI know.\u00a0 Best thing you can do now is stop sittin\u2019 out here feelin\u2019 sorry for yourself and go in there and ask your ma if there is anything you can do to help him.\u00a0 There\u2019s gonna be a load of work takin\u2019 care of that man and the only thing you can do for him now is be a part of it.\u201d\u00a0 Charles laid a hand on his daughter\u2019s brown head.\u00a0 \u201cYou understand what I\u2019m sayin\u2019?\u201d\u2019<\/p>\n Laura stood too.\u00a0 \u201cYes, sir,\u201d she said, her voice brightening a bit.<\/p>\n \u201cCharles?\u201d<\/p>\n He raised his hand from Laura\u2019s head and turned toward the door.\u00a0 Caroline was coming out of the house.\u00a0 She had a piece of paper in her hand.\u00a0 As she held it out to him, he noted it was half-ruined with blood.<\/p>\n \u201cI found it in his coat pocket.\u00a0 It seems to be a list of names,\u201d she said in explanation.\u00a0 As he took it, his wife\u2019s finger pointed to one of the two that was partially obscured by the brown-red stains.\u00a0 Enough of it was showing to make out at the Christian name and the first initial of the man\u2019s surname.<\/p>\n Lars H<\/em>., it said.<\/p>\n Charles sighed.<\/p>\n It seemed there would be a fourth stop on the long road to his bed tonight.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Caroline was waiting up for Charles.\u00a0 It was well after ten and he had been gone about three hours, but then, considering what he needed to accomplish \u2013 waking Nels, traveling out to the Edwards and connecting with Grace, returning to town and talking to Lars \u2013 she didn\u2019t really expect him until midnight.<\/p>\n Maybe later.<\/p>\n The girls were in bed and, she hoped, fast asleep.\u00a0 Laura had spent about an hour sitting at the stranger\u2019s bedside watching over the young man, holding his hand and talking to him like she did to her children when they were sick.\u00a0 It was sweet and sad at the same time.\u00a0 Laura felt terribly guilty about what had happened.<\/p>\n She hesitated to think what it might do to her sweet girl if the man died.<\/p>\n While Laura sat on the bed, Mary stood at the back of the room, staring at the forlorn figure on the bed.\u00a0 Caroline\u2019s lips curled in a little smile.\u00a0 Even though he wasn\u2019t all that much to look at right now with all the bruises and swelling, it was obvious he was a handsome man and she thought her oldest daughter might be just a bit<\/em> smitten.\u00a0 It was one of those times when she was grateful for the large gap between their ages.\u00a0 While Mary was attracted to him, the man himself was old enough to be her father and would no doubt find her attention either irritating or amusing once he came back to himself.<\/p>\n She turned to look at the room where he lay.<\/p>\n If<\/em> he came back to himself.<\/p>\n Caroline put down her sewing and rose from her chair and headed for the sick room.\u00a0 The last time she had checked on the young man he had been developing a fever. \u00a0She\u2019d brewed a bit of Feverfew tea in the hopes that she could get him to sip some when he woke up.\u00a0 Unfortunately, so far, he had not awakened and lay like one dead.\u00a0 His visible injuries were bad enough \u2013 a terribly torn arm, the ragged chewed leg, contusions and scratches over most of his body \u2013 but it was the internal injuries they feared.\u00a0 From what Laura said, the bear, which had probably weighed four or five hundred pounds, had slammed into the stranger full force and driven him to the ground.\u00a0 He had a great deal of bruising on his chest and abdomen that could be indicative of trouble within.<\/p>\n With care, she sat on the bed beside him.\u00a0 If he was sleeping naturally, she didn\u2019t want to wake him and at the moment she couldn\u2019t be sure.\u00a0 From that position she studied him.\u00a0 He was young.\u00a0 She\u2019d put his age at thirty at most.\u00a0 More likely in his late twenties.\u00a0 His hair was thick and curly as Charles\u2019 and had as many shades of gray in it as a moonlit night.\u00a0 The thick strands went from white to a dark gun-metal shade, and all of it was shot through with silver.\u00a0 He was of an average height and well-proportioned; well-muscled too, though it seemed he might have lost bulk of late.\u00a0 He had about him the look of someone who has just weathered some kind of storm.\u00a0 At the moment he was wearing little more than his skin.\u00a0 She couldn\u2019t dress him without help.\u00a0 It would have caused him too much pain.<\/p>\n She hoped he wasn\u2019t too cold.<\/p>\n Leaning over Caroline gripped the top blanket, which had slipped down, and began to draw it up about his shoulders.\u00a0 She stopped at the sight of the right one.\u00a0 For such a young man he was covered with scars.\u00a0 He had obviously been shot and more than once.\u00a0 Taking hold of one of his hands, she noted that both had shiny smooth places with no color.\u00a0 They had been burned and not all that long ago.<\/p>\n She also noted as she touched him that his skin was incredibly hot.<\/p>\n Releasing his hand, Caroline leaned in and placed her own on the stranger\u2019s forehead.\u00a0 His fever was definitely rising.\u00a0 Between the bear\u2019s saliva and the fact that hair and other debris had been driven into his wounds, there had been little hope they could keep any infectivity contained.\u00a0 They really needed Doctor Baker.\u00a0 A regular illness was something she knew how to treat, but this was a different kind<\/em> of infection.<\/p>\n As she tucked the blanket under his chin, the wounded man stirred.\u00a0 \u00a0He moaned and his eyelashes fluttered, but he didn\u2019t open his eyes.<\/p>\n Caroline touched his arm.\u00a0 \u201cYou\u2019re safe,\u201d she said, seeking to reassure him.\u00a0 \u201cNothing will harm you here.\u201d<\/p>\n His eyes rolled beneath the lids.\u00a0 He tried to shift and groaned when he couldn\u2019t.\u00a0 A moment later his eyes opened and his lips quirked at the end in a little smile.<\/p>\n \u201cWhat…hit me?\u201d the stranger asked, his voice no more than a whisper.<\/p>\n Caroline was fighting for composure.\u00a0 With the exception of the color of his hair, it was like looking at Charles ten years before.<\/p>\n Even his eyes were green!<\/p>\n After a second, she replied, \u201cA grizzly bear, I\u2019m afraid.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cA bear…?\u201d\u00a0 For a moment he was silent.\u00a0 Then, he grew agitated.\u00a0 \u201cThe…girl.\u00a0 There was…a little girl.\u00a0 She \u2013\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cShe\u2019s safe.\u201d\u00a0 She touched his cheek and waited until his eyes found her.\u00a0 \u201cThat was my daughter.\u00a0 You saved her.\u00a0 It\u2019s how you were hurt.\u201d<\/p>\n He licked his lips.\u00a0 \u201cDang fool…kid.\u00a0 Worried about…a…cub….\u201d<\/p>\n She frowned.\u00a0 Taking his hand in hers, she squeezed it gently.\u00a0 \u201cWe\u2019re so sorry.\u00a0 Laura….\u00a0 Well, trouble just seems to find her.\u201d<\/p>\n Again, there was that little smile.<\/p>\n \u201cMy pa always…says the same about…me.\u201d\u00a0 His eyes were fevered and slightly unfocused.\u00a0 \u201cWho…?\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cCaroline Ingalls,\u201d she said.\u00a0 \u201cYou\u2019re in my house.\u00a0 My husband Charles brought you here.\u201d<\/p>\n The stranger frowned.\u00a0 \u201cWhere\u2019s…here?\u201d<\/p>\n He was weakening.\u00a0 It wouldn\u2019t be long before he was unconscious again.<\/p>\n \u201cYou\u2019re just outside of Walnut Grove.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cBlack…walnuts….\u201d he said as he began to drift off.<\/p>\n Caroline suddenly realized she\u2019d missed an opportunity. The injured man had been awake and she hadn\u2019t thought to ask him his name.\u00a0 She felt awful, but she reached out and touched his face and tried to call him back.\u00a0 \u201cPlease.\u00a0 Tell me who you are.\u00a0\u00a0 We need to let your loved ones know what\u2019s happened.\u201d<\/p>\n His silvered brows knit together in the center as if he was in pain.\u00a0 \u201cNo…one left….\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cThere has to be someone.\u00a0 You mentioned your father.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cToo far…away….\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cA name then.\u00a0 At least give me a name<\/em> I can call you.\u201d<\/p>\n His lips parted.\u00a0 \u201cMy name…is Joe,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n A second later he was unconscious.<\/p>\n Caroline caressed his cheek as she would have one of her children\u2019s.\u00a0 Then she rose and went to the window and looked out at the black night, noting how crisp the stars were in the mid-autumn sky.\u00a0 At the moment the man in her bed was far from home and alone.\u00a0 He was severely injured and in danger of losing his life.\u00a0 But even more important he was someone<\/em>, and somewhere there were people who loved him and missed him in spite of what he said.<\/p>\n She smiled as she looked at him again.\u00a0 He was a stranger no more.<\/p>\n He was Joe.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n TWO<\/p>\n Eighteen year old Jamie Hunter Cartwright left his room on the second floor of the Ponderosa ranch house behind as he moved to the top of the stairs.\u00a0 Once there he halted and listened to the tall case clock by the door chime the hour of midnight.\u00a0 He\u2019d tried to sleep but for some reason found he couldn\u2019t. \u00a0He wasn\u2019t usually one for nightmares, but tonight his sleep had been troubled by disturbing images that vanished as soon as he opened his eyes.<\/p>\n Images that, he was pretty sure, had to do with Joe.<\/p>\n He missed his older brother; physically now as well as in just about every other way.\u00a0 When he\u2019d first met Joseph Cartwright, the silver-haired man had always had a ready laugh and seemed to be one of the most grounded and content men he had ever known.\u00a0 Oh, Joe had a heck of a temper.\u00a0 It was legendary as a matter-of-fact.\u00a0 He\u2019d heard stories about it since he arrived at the Ponderosa and about all the trouble it had gotten Joe into when he was around his age.\u00a0 But it seemed, most of the time when Joe got mad, that there was a good reason for it.\u00a0 His \u2018mad\u2019 was usually not for himself but for someone else.\u00a0 Pa said Joe couldn\u2019t stand injustice.\u00a0 That he just couldn\u2019t it go when he thought something wasn\u2019t fair.<\/p>\n That probably explained why Joe\u2019d been mad ever since….\u00a0 Well, ever since everyone died. \u00a0First it had been big brother Hoss.\u00a0 Boy, he sure missed him too.\u00a0 Hoss had been just about the best big brother anyone could have wanted, always helpful and so understanding.\u00a0 With Hoss around you knew you were all right.\u00a0 Maybe that was what was wrong with Joe.<\/p>\n Maybe without Hoss he just couldn\u2019t be \u2018right\u2019.<\/p>\n \u2018Course then, it hadn\u2019t been very long after Hoss died that the fire happened.\u00a0 Jamie drew a sharp breath and tears entered his eyes as he considered the pain his brother had been through.\u00a0 He couldn\u2019t imagine losing anyone<\/em> in a fire \u2013 knowing that someone you loved was burning up and not being able to do anything about it.\u00a0 Joe\u2019d almost died too, running back, trying to get into the house; getting all burned.\u00a0 He just hadn\u2019t been the same since….\u00a0 Since Alice and his baby died.<\/p>\n That was why Pa sent him away.<\/p>\n They\u2019d talked about it a little.\u00a0 He didn\u2019t like to bring up Joe and how he was hurting because it made Pa hurt too, but sometimes it seemed the older man just needed to hear things in words.\u00a0 Even if they hurt, it seemed like saying them took the sting away for a little bit.<\/p>\n Still, it always came back.<\/p>\n After a few months it had seemed Joe was getting back to normal.\u00a0 He was working with the horses again and taking care of Ponderosa business.\u00a0 Joe smiled and laughed some, though not as much as before.\u00a0 It was about six months later \u2013\u00a0 after that soldier Tanner hunted him down and tried to kill him \u2013 that the laughing stopped all together.\u00a0 Joe got quiet.\u00a0 Real <\/em>quiet.\u00a0 He\u2019d go past his brother\u2019s room on the way to the privy and hear him pacing and talking low to himself all hours of the night.\u00a0\u00a0 He never could make out the words.\u00a0 They were soft and low and sounded almost like a moan.\u00a0 And then Joe started to get angry.\u00a0 He got so angry he drove just about every one away.\u00a0 Everyone but Pa who said Joe needed time to heal, and that every man healed at his own pace and in his own way.\u00a0\u00a0 So when Joe started to forget about his chores, when he didn\u2019t\u2019 feel like handling the family business \u2013 when he walked away from the horses \u2013 Pa said they needed to be patient and wait.<\/p>\n He\u2019s been all right with that, right up to the time he came down at four o\u2019clock in the morning and found Joe sitting on the porch in Pa\u2019s rocking chair dead drunk.\u00a0 His older brother had a bottle of whiskey in his hand and it was near gone.\u00a0 Joe tried to hide it when he came out but he wasn\u2019t quick enough, so he confessed he\u2019d been drinking hard and he\u2019d been wrong to do it and swore he wouldn\u2019t do it again.<\/p>\n But he did.<\/p>\n It started happening so often that, just out of curiosity, he\u2019d begun to open the liquor cabinet every couple of days to check and see how many of the bottles were empty or missing.\u00a0 One time Pa caught him doing it and boy, did he think he was gonna get a tanning.\u00a0 Only the fact that he\u2019d just turned eighteen stopped it.\u00a0 He\u2019d never really had a lot of interest in liquor and he was sure Pa knew that.\u00a0 Pa had <\/em>to know who was drinking the whiskey and the brandy. \u00a0He just didn\u2019t want to admit it.\u00a0 He thought Pa would be mad at Joe too.\u00a0 But he wasn\u2019t.\u00a0 He was just sad.<\/p>\n Really <\/em>sad.<\/p>\n Gripping the stair rail with his fingers, the young man began his descent.\u00a0 He\u2019d gone by his pa\u2019s room and the older man hadn\u2019t been inside, so he figured he was sitting on the porch in that rocking chair, looking at the stars and thinking about things.\u00a0 Pa\u2019d been doing that a lot since Joe left a little over a month before to check out the lumber industry in Minnesota.\u00a0 It was a long way to go.\u00a0 To him, it seemed traveling almost two thousand miles should have taken his older brother pert near to China!\u00a0 When he\u2019d asked Pa about the time he spent outside, the older man told him he felt closer to Joe out under the stars, knowing that they might be looking at the same stars.<\/p>\n Jamie walked to the door and took hold of the latch.\u00a0 Pa was probably gonna skin him for being up so late, but he didn\u2019t care.\u00a0 For once he<\/em> needed to talk to someone.\u00a0 That nightmare still had a grip on him.\u00a0 Maybe because he couldn\u2019t remember it.<\/p>\n Or maybe because he remembered just enough.<\/em><\/p>\n Opening the door, Jamie stepped outside.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Ben was not surprised at all when he heard the door to the house open.\u00a0 Jamie was a sensitive boy and he probably felt it too \u2013 something in the air, some wind of change.<\/em>\u00a0 The older man looked down at the piece of paper he held in his hand and sighed.\u00a0 Roy had brought it out earlier.\u00a0 His old friend was retired as a sheriff, but that didn\u2019t mean the sheriff in him had retired.\u00a0 Roy still haunted the streets of Virginia City watching for trouble and could often be found at the telegraph office sniffing out news.\u00a0 That was how Roy had come to volunteer to bring the message from his business associate Daniel Jacobs in La Crosse to him.\u00a0 It had arrived mid-afternoon.<\/p>\n TRAIN ARRIVED TWO DAYS BACK.\u00a0 STOP.\u00a0 JOE NOT\u00a0 ON IT. STOP.\u00a0 SHOULD WE START SEARCH? STOP.<\/p>\n Stop.<\/p>\n It was as if his heart had stopped when he read it.\u00a0 Oh, Joseph was a grown man and could take care of himself.\u00a0 The west was not so wild as it had once been and it was unlikely he would have run into any trouble on the train unless it had been robbed, which it hadn\u2019t.\u00a0 No, when he had sent his youngest boy off in search of himself he had feared only one<\/em> thing and it seemed it had happened.<\/p>\n Joe was not to be found.<\/p>\n Ben said nothing as Jamie came to his side and sat down.\u00a0 This young son, who was a man now, was all he had left.\u00a0 The boy was quiet and thoughtful and such a contrast to Marie\u2019s boy.\u00a0 He\u2019d always known Joe felt things too deeply and feared Alice\u2019s death might be enough to break him.\u00a0 It had been hard enough when his own wives died \u2013 Elizabeth in childbirth, Inger through violence, and Marie as she rode her horse into the yard.\u00a0 But each time he had held the woman he loved in his arms as she passed to her reward, and he had had fine sons to ground him and give him a reason to continue living.<\/p>\n Ben lowered his eyes and closed them.\u00a0 His son\u2019s arms had been empty \u2013 were empty.<\/p>\n Joe was empty.<\/p>\n Joseph hadn\u2019t said anything when he left \u2013 he didn\u2019t have to.\u00a0 There was another deeper loss, even greater than that of his family that he mourned.\u00a0 It was evident in his son\u2019s face.\u00a0 It was there in the deep dark pools of Joe\u2019s green eyes. The loss was written in the lines that had formed at the edges of those always ready-to-laugh lips.\u00a0 It pulled them down into an unending frown and moved them toward the bottles of liquor he had found stashed in the barn and hidden in his son\u2019s room.<\/p>\n Joe had lost his way.<\/p>\n His son had lost his faith.<\/p>\n It took about five minutes of silence, but Jamie finally worked up the courage to ask, \u201cWhat\u2019d the telegram say, Pa?\u201d<\/p>\n Jamie loved Joe.\u00a0 Everyone<\/em> loved Joe.<\/p>\n Everyone but<\/em> Joe.<\/p>\n \u201cYour brother seems to have gotten off the train somewhere along the line.\u00a0 He didn\u2019t arrive in La Crosse as expected.\u201d\u00a0 Ben folded the paper and tucked it in his pocket.\u00a0 \u201cI imagine he took a detour, maybe to do some sight-seeing.\u00a0 Or maybe he went to see my old friend Lars.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cThat the one in,\u201d he paused, \u201cwhat was it?\u00a0 Elm Grove?\u201d<\/p>\n Ben smiled.\u00a0 \u201cWalnut Grove.\u00a0 It\u2019s a small town in Minnesota, not too far out from La Crosse.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cWho\u2019s Lars?\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cLars Hanson.\u00a0 We met on the way out west and became friends during the time we traveled together.\u00a0 He went north to found Walnut Grove, while Adam and Hoss and I continued on to Nevada.\u00a0 Lars has been the city\u2019s mayor and is now the owner of a prosperous saw mill.\u00a0 I gave Joseph his name and told him to look him up if he had time.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cBut wasn\u2019t there some meeting Joe had to go to first?\u201d<\/p>\n Ben nodded.\u00a0 There was a sort of conference; a gathering of all the timber barons in the area and of those who were seeking lumber for a multitude of uses including town building, railroads, and mines.\u00a0 Joe was to represent the Ponderosa and its interests there.\u00a0 His travel plans would have brought him into town two days before the meeting.\u00a0 In other words, the meeting had been today.<\/p>\n And Joe had missed it.<\/p>\n \u201cYes, there was.\u00a0 Many of the men at that meeting have interests in the West.\u00a0 Among other things I sent Joe to get a feel for whether or not they would be willing to do business with us.\u00a0 The Cartwright name carries weight, son.\u00a0 There would be those who would come to us rather than use one of the companies in the East for their needs.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cWouldn\u2019t that make the men back East sore?\u00a0 Like you\u2019re buttin\u2019 in or something?\u201d<\/p>\n The boy was shrewd.\u00a0 \u201cMaybe.\u00a0 But that\u2019s how it works. \u201c<\/p>\n They fell silent again.\u00a0 Jamie lifted his head and looked at the sky.\u00a0 Several heartbeats later, he said, \u201cI miss Joe.\u00a0 And not just \u2018cause he took the trip.\u201d\u00a0 His son\u2019s blue eyes flicked to him.\u00a0 \u201cIf you know what I mean….\u201d<\/p>\n He knew all too well.\u00a0 It had been Joseph who had brought up the idea of going east though, at the time, he was fairly certain his son had no intention of actually traveling there.\u00a0 There had been an article in the paper about the burst of new ideas in Minnesota and how those innovations were powering the growing lumber industry there.\u00a0 Joe had said, at the table over supper, that new thinking and maybe new blood might help them turn a better profit.\u00a0 As he watched his son sink deeper into disorderly habits and despair, an idea had formed in the older man\u2019s mind.\u00a0 Maybe Joe just needed to get away \u2013 away from the Ponderosa and the constant reminders of all he had lost.\u00a0 New land and new people would give his mourning son a fresh perspective, remind him that he was alive<\/em> \u2013 maybe even get him interested in that life again.\u00a0 He had formulated a plan and laid it before Joseph and his son had agreed.\u00a0 Only one thing had held him back \u2013 one thing made him uneasy about letting him go.\u00a0 Joseph insisted on going alone.<\/p>\n And Joe had never been<\/em> alone.<\/p>\n Ben stood up.\u00a0 He placed a hand on Jamie\u2019s shoulder.\u00a0 \u201cI know, son,\u201d he said.\u00a0 \u201cJoe\u2019s been away for a long time.\u00a0 I had hoped….\u00a0 I hope this trip will return him to us in all the ways that matter.\u201d<\/p>\n Jamie\u2019s young face was turned up.\u00a0 On it was written a portion of his own misery.<\/p>\n \u201cWhat if he doesn\u2019t ever come back?\u201d<\/p>\n The older man drew a breath and held it.\u00a0 He had started this life with nothing but the skin on his back.\u00a0 He had married three times, to three wonderful women, and lost every one of them, but he had not been<\/em> lost.\u00a0 Each one left him with a son.\u00a0 Adam.\u00a0 Hoss.\u00a0 Joe.\u00a0 He\u2019d had them with him, held them in his arms, loved them and taught them to be men, and then he had watched them leave one by one.\u00a0 His eldest by choice.\u00a0 Hoss, through death.\u00a0 And Joe….<\/p>\n Joe was still living but he might as well have been dead.<\/p>\n Ben drew Jamie to his feet and placed his arm around his son\u2019s shoulder.\u00a0 It was what he had told Joseph when he\u2019d said goodbye as his youngest boy stepped onto the train.<\/p>\n \u201cYou must have faith, son.\u00a0 With it you can move mountains.\u201d<\/p>\n The white-haired man looked to the east.\u00a0 The words were for him as well.<\/p>\n You must have faith. <\/em><\/p>\n <\/p>\n Lars Hanson stood in the Ingalls\u2019 home, looking down at the injured man and shaking his head.<\/p>\n \u201cCharles,\u201d he said, \u201cI haf <\/em>no idea who he is.\u00a0 I haf <\/em>never seen this man before in my life.\u201d<\/p>\n He\u2019d gone to Nels\u2019 house first, but no one had answered when he knocked.\u00a0 Moving on to the Edwards he had roused Grace and Isaiah from their bed and explained his need, giving a letter to Grace so she could send it to Doctor Baker in Sleepy Eye first thing in the morning.\u00a0 Returning to town he had pounded on the Oleson\u2019s door again.\u00a0 By God\u2019s providence, the storekeeper had just come down to make certain he had locked the door.\u00a0 Nels let him in and gave him a small bottle of laudanum to ease the stranger\u2019s pain.\u00a0 Bottle in hand, he had gone on to Lars\u2019 home.\u00a0 When the older man answered, his nightcap on his head, he had apologized and explained why he was calling so late.\u00a0 At the end of the story he handed Lars the ruined paper with the dried bloodstains on it.\u00a0 Seeing his name, \u00a0Lars agreed to return with him to their farm to take a look at the young man.\u00a0 The older man had brought his own wagon so he could go back on his own.\u00a0 It was a good thing.<\/p>\n He was about dead on his feet.<\/p>\n Caroline moved past them.\u00a0 She had just returned from fetching fresh cold water from the well.\u00a0 The injured man\u2019s fever had risen dangerously high.\u00a0 His wife said she\u2019d gotten a little tea down him but it didn\u2019t seem to help much.<\/p>\n Charles sighed.\u00a0 Another couple of degrees and he\u2019d be heading back to town for ice to pack the man\u2019s battered form in.<\/p>\n \u201cYou\u2019re sure?\u201d he asked.<\/p>\n The older man nodded.\u00a0 \u201cJa<\/em>.\u00a0 I vould<\/em> remember that face and hair.\u201d<\/p>\n Charles pulled the piece of paper out of his shirt pocket.\u00a0 He unfolded it and took another look.\u00a0 Lars\u2019 name was about all he could make out.\u00a0 There was another, nearly illegible.\u00a0 \u2018Benson\u2019 or something like that.<\/p>\n \u201cHas he told you his name?\u201d Lars asked.<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s Joe,\u201d Caroline said as she put the bucket on the bedside table and then sat down on the bed by the restless man.\u00a0 \u201cHe told me just before he lost consciousness.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cJoost <\/em>Joe?\u00a0 No last name?\u201d<\/p>\n She shook her head.\u00a0 \u201cI tried to get him to tell me his full name so we could wire his relatives.\u201d\u00a0 She dipped a cloth in the cold water and placed it on the man\u2019s forehead.\u00a0 \u201cHe said there was no one left, but I didn\u2019t believe him.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cI vonder vhat<\/em> happened to his horse,\u201d Lars said.<\/p>\n Charles looked at the older man.\u00a0 \u201cWhat?\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cHe had to haf <\/em>a horse or a vagon,<\/em> didn\u2019t he?\u00a0 Unless he valked<\/em> all the vay <\/em>to town from the train station.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cI didn\u2019t see anything, but then it could have been scared off by that grizzly.\u201d\u00a0 Charles paused and then added with a rueful smile, \u201cI know I<\/em> would have been.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cIf that is true, then it might still be in the voods<\/em>,\u201d Lars said.\u00a0 \u201cI vill <\/em>go back to town and first thing in the morning, I vill<\/em> take some men and go look for it.\u201d<\/p>\n Charles nodded.\u00a0 \u201cI\u2019ll come with you.\u201d<\/p>\n Lars shook his head.\u00a0 \u201cYou vill <\/em>do no such thing. \u00a0Go to sleep, Charles.\u00a0 You haf <\/em>done enough.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cListen to him, Charles,\u201d Caroline said as she wet the cloth again and wrung it out.\u00a0 \u201cYou look exhausted.\u201d<\/p>\n It was near four o\u2019clock in the morning.\u00a0 It would be time to get up in two or three hours.<\/p>\n Caroline left the cloth on the man\u2019s head and came to his side.\u00a0 Once there, she took his hands.\u00a0 \u201cYou\u2019ve done everything you can.\u00a0 You brought him here and put him in your bed.\u00a0 You\u2019ve got your family tending him.\u00a0 You sent for Doctor Baker and brought back something to help his pain until Hiram can get here.\u00a0 There\u2019s nothing else to do, Charles, except wait.\u201d<\/p>\n He didn\u2019t like waiting.\u00a0 He liked \u2018doing\u2019.<\/p>\n His wife caught a blanket off the bottom of their bed and pressed it into his hands.\u00a0 \u201cGo.\u00a0 Find some corner somewhere and bed down in it.\u00a0 The best thing you can do for this young man \u2013 and for yourself \u2013 is to get a few hours sleep.\u00a0 You\u2019ll be no good to anybody <\/em>if you don\u2019t.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cWhat about you?\u201d he asked as he accepted the blanket.<\/p>\n \u201cI slept a few hours in the chair.\u00a0 I\u2019m fine.\u201d<\/p>\n The circles under her eyes had circles under them<\/em>.\u00a0 \u201cOh, you\u2019re fine, are you?\u201d<\/p>\n Caroline\u2019s hands went to her hips, which was always a bad sign.\u00a0 \u201cYes, I\u2019m fine<\/em>.\u00a0 Fit as a fiddle and ready to fly.\u00a0 While you look like you\u2019ve just about broken every string.\u201d\u00a0 His wife shook her head. \u00a0\u201cReally, Charles, sometimes I think you believe you could save the world single-handed.\u201d<\/p>\n He stared hard at her.\u00a0 After a second, he said, \u201cAre you tellin\u2019 me I can\u2019t?\u201d<\/p>\n Placing her hand on his face, she pulled him into a kiss and then whispered in his ear.\u00a0 \u201cGo to sleep!\u201d<\/p>\n He gave her a half-salute. \u201cYes, Ma\u2019am!\u201d<\/p>\n She pointed at the passageway. \u201cNow!\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cYou have your orders, Charles,\u201d Lars snorted.<\/p>\n Yes, he did, and for once, he was going to obey them.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n The world was on fire.<\/p>\n Everything \u2013 trees, grass, buildings, even the water was ablaze.\u00a0 The whole world was bathed in a hellish glow and there was nothing anyone could do about it.<\/p>\n When the water was on fire, what was left to put it out with?<\/p>\n Joe moaned and thrashed from side to side as a wall of flames rose up before him, shutting him out, keeping him back from saving the life that was burning up inside.\u00a0 He refused to believe it.\u00a0 Refused to give in, to stop.\u00a0 He ran through it and toward the burning house and took hold of the blazing hot handle and pulled for all he was worth.<\/p>\n All the time Alice was screaming.\u00a0 Their child within her was screaming.<\/p>\n \u2018Joe, save me!\u00a0 Joe!\u2019<\/em><\/p>\n \u2018Pa!<\/em>\u2019<\/p>\n He spent his strength throwing himself against that door, ramming his shoulder into it, pounding with his fists.\u00a0 As Alice screamed again, he redoubled his efforts, striking the wood that had turned to embers, thrusting his fingers through and into the flames until he was on fire as well.<\/p>\n God<\/em>, he was on fire.<\/p>\n God, let me burn <\/em>with them.<\/p>\n God….<\/p>\n Something cool touched his forehead and for a moment, he resented it.\u00a0 Weakly, Joe raised a hand to chase it away.\u00a0 He didn\u2019t deserve it.\u00a0 He didn\u2019t save them.<\/p>\n He couldn\u2019t<\/em> save them.<\/p>\n \u201cMister?\u201d<\/p>\n Like a man whose lungs had breathed smoke for so long he forgot the meaning of air, Joe gasped.\u00a0 His eyes flew open and his hand shot out, catching the one that hung suspended above his face.\u00a0 He held that hand tightly, as if it were a lifeline he dare not let go.\u00a0 Slowly his eyes focused on the fingers he clutched and he realized they belonged to a child.<\/p>\n Shamed, he let her go.<\/p>\n \u201cAre you okay, Mister?\u201d she asked.<\/p>\n Joe blinked and looked at her.\u00a0 She was a little girl, maybe eight years old.\u00a0 She had light brown hair and eyes and freckles.\u00a0 Her hair was pulled into two tight braids, one on either side of her head, and she was wearing a blue dress with a white pinafore over it.<\/p>\n She wasn\u2019t on fire.<\/p>\n Her small hand reached out.\u00a0 She laid it alongside his face.\u00a0 He almost shuddered with the cold touch.<\/p>\n \u201cYou\u2019re awful hot.\u00a0 Ma said you need to drink some water.\u00a0 Can you do that?\u201d<\/p>\n He was staring at his hands.\u00a0 There was no fire there either.\u00a0 As the girl continued speaking, Joe\u2019s gaze went to the window and the world outside.\u00a0 The sky was blue.\u00a0 There were white clouds.\u00a0 He could hear birds singing.<\/p>\n It wasn\u2019t fair.<\/p>\n A second later he felt one of her little hands touch his hair.\u00a0 She pressed a tin cup to his lips with the other.\u00a0 He didn\u2019t want it, but he didn\u2019t want to hurt her so he drank a little.\u00a0 The water was so cold it stole his breath and set him to coughing.<\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019m sorry, Mister,\u201d she said, her voice a worried whisper.\u00a0 \u201cI didn\u2019t mean to hurt \u2013 \u201d<\/p>\n \u201cDidn\u2019t….\u201d he rasped.\u00a0 \u201cThank…you.\u201d<\/p>\n The girl beamed.\u00a0 \u201cHey!\u00a0 You\u2019re awake!\u201d<\/p>\n So she\u2019d been talking to him, caring for him, when she thought he was asleep. That said something for her tenaciousness.<\/p>\n \u201cJoe,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n She blinked.\u00a0 \u201cJoe?\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cCall me…Joe.\u201d<\/p>\n The smile returned.\u00a0 \u201cI like that.\u00a0 Joe.\u00a0 Joseph, like Jesus\u2019 pa.\u201d<\/p>\n Pa<\/em>.\u00a0 The word held everything in it he needed and everything he must deny in order to keep his sanity.<\/p>\n Joe turned his face toward the wall.<\/p>\n The girl was silent a moment.\u00a0 \u201cI\u2019m sorry, Mister…Joe, if I made you sad.\u201d<\/p>\n \u2018Made<\/em>\u2019 him sad.<\/p>\n How could she make him something he had become?\u00a0 <\/em><\/p>\n Drawing a deep breath, he turned his face toward her.\u00a0 \u201cWho….?\u201d<\/p>\n She started and then pointed toward her chest.\u00a0 \u201cWho am I?\u201d<\/p>\n He nodded \u2013 marginally.\u00a0 \u201cYes….\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cLaura.\u00a0 Laura Ingalls.\u00a0 Though Pa calls me \u2018Half-pint\u2019 on account of I\u2019m so small.\u201d<\/p>\n With a faint smile he said, \u201cMy mama called me…Little<\/em> Joe.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201c\u2018Cause you were small too?\u201d<\/p>\n That made him laugh.\u00a0 \u201cStill…am….\u201d<\/p>\n Laura fell silent for a moment.\u00a0 When she spoke again, her voice shook.\u00a0 \u201cI\u2019m sorry, Joe.\u201d<\/p>\n He knew for what<\/em> \u2013 for putting him in the path of that angry mama bear.\u00a0 \u201cI\u2019m…not,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n The little girl frowned. \u00a0\u201cYou\u2019re not?\u201d<\/p>\n \u201c \u2018Bout time…I waltzed with…a grizzly….\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cLaura.\u201d\u00a0 The voice was deep. Not angry, but on the edge of it.\u00a0 \u201cAre you wearin\u2019 our guest out?\u201d<\/p>\n Guest.<\/p>\n \u201cSorry, Pa.\u201d<\/p>\n Oh, God.\u00a0 Pa.<\/em><\/p>\n \u201cHalf-pint, your Ma needs help fixin\u2019 dinner.\u201d\u00a0 Joe watched as the man, just outside of his vision, bent over and kissed the little girl on her head.\u00a0 \u201cYou go now.\u00a0 Tell her I\u2019ll be there soon.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cYes, sir.\u201d<\/p>\n Joe felt the girl rise.\u00a0 Felt the emptiness left by her going.\u00a0 Felt the man\u2019s weight bend the bed ropes as he took her place.\u00a0 Joe heard water being wrung from a cloth and then felt the cool relief as the man placed it on his hot forehead.<\/p>\n \u201cHow are you feelin\u2019?\u201d he asked.<\/p>\n Joe\u2019s jaw tightened.\u00a0 Lost.\u00a0 Empty.\u00a0 Hopeless.<\/p>\n \u201cFine,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n \u201cOh.\u00a0 Well, if you don\u2019t mind my saying so, you don\u2019t look \u2018fine\u2019.\u201d\u00a0 The man paused.\u00a0 \u201cYou got quite a fight on your hands. \u00a0Are you up to it?\u201d<\/p>\n Honesty.\u00a0 How refreshing.<\/p>\n Joe\u2019s lips quirked.\u00a0 \u201cNo.\u201d<\/p>\n The man paused.\u00a0 \u201cWell, I\u2019m here to tell you that I ain\u2019t exactly pleased with the thought of you dyin\u2019 in my bed.\u00a0 Maybe you could get better so we could move you before you give up.\u201d<\/p>\n There was a hint of humor in his tone, but he was serious.<\/p>\n Joe turned his head to look at the man and froze.<\/p>\n His host snorted.\u00a0 \u201cScary, ain\u2019t it?\u201d<\/p>\n It could have been him.\u00a0 Older.\u00a0 With hard-won wisdom crinkling the skin at the edge of his eyes and plowing lines at\u00a0 the corners of his lips.\u00a0 The man\u2019s hair was the color his had been years before and his eyes were just as green.<\/p>\n It was like looking into the future.<\/p>\n \u201cWho?\u201d<\/p>\n The brown-haired man smiled.\u00a0 \u201cCharles.\u00a0 Charles Ingalls.\u00a0 My wife tells me you\u2019re Joe.\u00a0 Care to tell me \u2018Joe\u2019 who?\u201d<\/p>\n He turned his head away.<\/p>\n Charles was silent a moment.\u00a0 \u201cAll right.\u00a0 I\u2019d hate to have to bury you with no last name on the stone and no way for your family to find out what became of you, but I won\u2019t press you.\u00a0 At least for now.\u00a0 But Joe….\u201d<\/p>\n He waited until he looked at him.<\/p>\n \u201cIf anything you are<\/em> threatens my family, I promise you, you\u2019ll answer to me.\u00a0 You understand?\u201d<\/p>\n He knew that tone.\u00a0 Those words.<\/p>\n This kind of man.<\/p>\n Joe nodded even as the flames rose up before his eyes again, brilliant, bright, burning; tantalizingly dark.<\/p>\n \u201cOkay,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n \u201cPa.\u201d<\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n THREE<\/p>\n Charles took the girls to the Edwards\u2019 the next morning.\u00a0 During the night Joe had taken a turn for the worse.\u00a0 The injured man woke them all with his raving.\u00a0 In no time at all Carrie was crying out of fear and he found Laura and Mary \u2013 though they had been exposed to illness and death before \u2013 huddled together in the loft, their sweet faces streaked with tears.\u00a0 It was apparent Joe had come to some sort of crisis point and just as apparent that he might not make it through.\u00a0 The small amount of laudanum Nels had given him was gone and there was nothing to dull the pain, and so the injured man screamed out in his delirium, calling for someone named Hoss and for his pa.<\/p>\n And a woman named Alice.<\/p>\n Charles looked up as Caroline entered the sick room.\u00a0 He was bodily holding the man on the bed. \u00a0Sweat poured down his face, plastering his brown curls to his cheeks, stinging in his eyes.\u00a0 He was afraid to let go.\u00a0 Joe had already tried to rise from the bed once, putting an unbearable strain on his wounded leg, opening the tear in his flesh again and setting it to bleeding.<\/p>\n His wife placed a fresh bowl of cold water by the bed.\u00a0 Her eyes were haunted with lack of sleep and by compassion.<\/p>\n \u201cOh, Charles.\u00a0 He\u2019s so sick.\u201d<\/p>\n He nodded as the man quieted momentarily and he was able to sit back.\u00a0 \u201cThere\u2019s nothing to do, Caroline, but pray.\u201d<\/p>\n She glanced at the window.\u00a0 \u201cDo you think Doctor Baker is on his way?\u201d<\/p>\n Charles sighed.\u00a0 \u201cIf God is watching.\u201d<\/p>\n He felt her hand on his shoulder.\u00a0 She waited until he looked up at her.\u00a0 \u201cCharles, you know He is.\u201d<\/p>\n Reaching up, he covered his wife\u2019s hand with his own.\u00a0 \u201cI know.\u201d\u00a0 The brown-haired man\u2019s eyes went to the restless figure on the bed.\u00a0 \u201cIt\u2019s not just the fever or the bear attack, Caroline.\u00a0 I don\u2019t think Joe wants<\/em> to live.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cBut he\u2019s so young.\u201d<\/p>\n He rose and took her in his arms.\u00a0 \u201cThere\u2019s somethin\u2019 dark gnawing at his soul.\u00a0 I\u2019m not sure, but I think there was somethin\u2019 \u2013 some one<\/em> he lost \u2013 a wife, a child.\u201d\u00a0 Charles paused.\u00a0 \u201cMaybe both.\u201d<\/p>\n Caroline moved past him and went to sit on the other side of the bed.\u00a0 She reached out and pushed the tousled mass of silver-grey curls off of the injured man\u2019s forehead.<\/p>\n \u201cHe needs a reason to live.\u00a0 Something or someone to fight for instead of to mourn.\u201d\u00a0 She paused and then looked at him.\u00a0 \u201cI know you\u2019re worried about her, Charles, but maybe Laura….\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cCharles!\u00a0 Caroline!\u201d<\/p>\n They turned in unison toward the door.<\/p>\n It was Doctor Baker.<\/p>\n A moment later the golden-haired man appeared in the passage leading to their bedroom.\u00a0 As he removed his coat, he asked, \u201cI thought maybe it was one of you.\u00a0 Thank God, it\u2019s not.\u00a0 Who\u2019s this?\u201d the doctor asked as he rolled up his shirt-sleeves.<\/p>\n \u201cAll we know is Joe,\u201d Caroline responded as she rose from the bed.<\/p>\n \u201cNels told me you had come for laudanum.\u00a0 A she-bear attack, he said.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cWe did our best to clean and bind his wounds, Hiram.\u201d\u00a0 Charles shook his head.\u00a0 \u201c \u2018Fraid it didn\u2019t help much.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cIt may have.\u00a0 Just because there\u2019s fever, doesn\u2019t mean it couldn\u2019t have been worse,\u201d he said as he sat on the bed and reached out to lay a hand on the sick man\u2019s forehead.\u00a0 After that he lowered the coverlet and examined Joe\u2019s wounds, ending with the leg.\u00a0 After replacing the covers the doctor looked over his shoulder and said, \u201cCharles, I think you better go for ice.\u00a0 From the look of that leg wound, the fever\u2019s going to go higher before it falls \u2013 if it does.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cDo you think he has a chance?\u201d Caroline asked.<\/p>\n The blond man smiled.\u00a0 \u201cThere\u2019s always a chance.\u00a0 It\u2019s up to God and him.\u201d<\/p>\n <\/p>\n He\u2019d found as many barrels as he could and then gone to the ice house.\u00a0 After filling them, he placed them in the back of his wagon and covered them with a tarp.\u00a0 It was a crisp cold morning and so he knew they would keep while he finished a few other chores.\u00a0 Doc Baker had asked him to go to his office while he was in town to pick up some supplies and a change of clothes for him.\u00a0 As he was coming out of the office, Charles ran into Lars Hanson who was headed to the Oleson\u2019s mercantile.<\/p>\n When Lars saw where he was coming from, the older man asked, \u201cDid Hiram make it out to your place, Charles?\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cEarlier this morning.\u00a0 He came straight out without stopping in town.\u00a0 That\u2019s why I\u2019m here gathering some of his things.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cHow is the young man?\u201d<\/p>\n He shook his head.\u00a0 \u201cSick.\u00a0 Real sick.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cYou know, Charles, I\u2019ve been thinking.\u00a0 That other name on the list….\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cOther name?\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cBenson.\u201d<\/p>\n He\u2019d forgotten about it.\u00a0 \u201cIt mean something to you after all?\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019m not sure.\u201d\u00a0 The older man shook his head.\u00a0 \u201cBut I haf<\/em> been thinking.\u00a0 Maybe it vas <\/em>not Benson, but \u2018Ben\u2019s son\u2019.\u201d<\/p>\n He considered it.\u00a0 \u201cMaybe, but that doesn\u2019t get us anywhere.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cPerhaps.\u201d\u00a0 Lars had a curious look on his face.\u00a0 \u201cCome vit<\/em> me, Charles.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019ve got ice in the wagon.\u00a0 I\u2019d best be going.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s important, Charles.\u00a0 It vill<\/em> only take a minute.\u201d<\/p>\n The brown-haired man nodded and then followed his friend and employer to the mill office.\u00a0 Once inside, Lars went immediately to the desk and opened the drawer.<\/p>\n \u201cI received this several months back.\u00a0 I\u2019d forgotten about it.\u201d\u00a0 When he straightened up, he had a letter in his hand.\u00a0 \u201cIt may be nothing, but….\u201d<\/p>\n Charles took it.\u00a0 He looked at Lars and then at the envelope.\u00a0 It was addressed to Mister Lars Hanson and had several postmarks on it.\u00a0 Some were from as far away as Nevada.<\/p>\n \u201cWhat\u2019s this?\u201d he asked.<\/p>\n \u201cA letter from an old friend.\u00a0 A very <\/em>old friend.\u201d\u00a0\u00a0 Lars sat down behind the desk. He nodded.\u00a0 \u201cGo ahead and read it.\u201d<\/p>\n Charles took the inner letter and opened it, noting how fine the paper was.\u00a0 The hand that covered it was a bold one with broad sure strokes, as if the man who penned it was a man of purpose.\u00a0 It was a letter of introduction from someone named Benjamin Cartwright.<\/p>\n The person he was introducing was his son.\u00a0 Joseph Francis.<\/p>\n \u201cBenjamin and I traveled vest<\/em> together over forty years ago,\u201d Lars said.\u00a0 \u201cHe had two young sons vit<\/em> him at the time, one a motherless baby.\u00a0 Ve<\/em> parted ways vhen<\/em> I came to Minnesota.\u201d<\/p>\n Charles looked at him.\u00a0 \u201cYou think this is another son?\u00a0 One you never met?\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cI heard Benjamin married again.\u00a0 A voman<\/em> out of New Orleans.\u201d\u00a0 He shook his head. \u201cThere vas <\/em>some scandal attached to it.\u201d<\/p>\n He looked at the letter again and then he folded it and returned it to the envelope.<\/p>\n \u201cWill you ask him?\u201d Lars inquired.<\/p>\n \u201cIf I get a chance.\u00a0 There\u2019s no guarantee he\u2019ll live.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cDo you think ve <\/em>should send a letter to Benjamin?\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cNo.\u00a0 Not yet.\u00a0 There\u2019s no proof yet that the man in my house is this<\/em> Joseph Francis Cartwright.\u00a0 And besides, if he is, he\u2019s old enough to make his own choices.\u00a0 He knows who and where he is and so far he\u2019s not sayin\u2019.\u201d\u00a0 Charles looked at the other man.\u00a0 \u201cDo you mind if I keep this?\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cGo ahead.\u00a0 Maybe you will have a use for it one day.\u201d<\/p>\n Charles nodded as he tucked it in his pocket.<\/p>\n \u201cMaybe.\u201d<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Doctor Hiram Baker rose from his vigil at the young stranger\u2019s side, stretched, and walked out into the Ingalls\u2019 kitchen, drawn by the scent of coffee brewing.\u00a0 The day had passed and night was falling.\u00a0 Charles had returned earlier in the day bringing the items he\u2019d requested.\u00a0 They\u2019d packed the young man in ice and it had helped to keep his fever from spiking.\u00a0 He\u2019d slept in his old clothes by the side of the bed and only changed a short time before into the fresh suit Charles brought him. \u00a0He\u2019d done everything he could to alleviate Joe\u2019s suffering but it could only go so far.\u00a0 He didn\u2019t dare weaken the man by giving him drugs.\u00a0 He needed the strength to fight.<\/p>\n He needed a will <\/em>to fight.<\/p>\n \u201cHow is he?\u201d Caroline asked as he emerged from the passage.<\/p>\n \u201cHolding his own.\u00a0 The fever\u2019s broken several times, but gone right back up. \u00a0The bite on his leg\u2019s infected.\u201d\u00a0 The man\u2019s skin was hot and the wound continued to ooze with a whitish discharge.\u00a0 \u00a0There were red streaks running from his leg toward his heart.\u00a0 It was his fear that the bite was so deep complications might set in.\u00a0 \u201cI\u2019ve given him what medicine I can.\u00a0 It\u2019s up to his constitution now and, as I told Charles, to God.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cWill you go?\u201d<\/p>\n He shook his head wearily.\u00a0 \u201cNo.\u00a0 It\u2019s too close yet.\u201d\u00a0 Hiram ran a hand through his disarrayed hair trying to tame it and smiled.\u00a0 \u201cI could use a cup of that coffee and somewhere to lay my head for a few hours.\u201d<\/p>\n She smiled.\u00a0 \u201cIn that order?\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cTrust me,\u201d he laughed. \u201cWhen you\u2019re a doctor it doesn\u2019t make any difference.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cYou can lay down in Carrie\u2019s room,\u201d she said as she poured and then handed the coffee to him.\u00a0 \u201cWhat do you need me<\/em> to do?\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cKeep watch.\u00a0 If Joe rouses and seems to be in pain or out of his head, call me.\u00a0 Otherwise, just try to make him as comfortable as possible.\u201d\u00a0 He took a sip and then asked, \u201cWhere\u2019s Charles?\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cHe just got back.\u00a0 He\u2019s in the barn. Why?\u00a0 Do you need him?\u201d<\/p>\n Hiram shook his head.\u00a0 \u201cI just wanted to talk to him.\u00a0 It will keep until later.\u201d\u00a0 Handing the cup back to her, he said, \u201cThank you.\u00a0 Now, I think I\u2019ll go get some sleep while I can.\u201d<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Caroline watched the doctor head for the room up front and then turned back to the stove. It took an hour or so to finish what she was doing and then she went into their room to check on Joe.\u00a0 She felt heartsick as she entered.\u00a0 It nearly broke her heart to see the young man covered with wet blankets and packed in ice.\u00a0 Not only did she feel deeply for him, but the sight brought back such horrific memories of the plague that had ripped through their town the year before, carrying off several of Walnut Grove\u2019s citizens.\u00a0 She went to the window and opened the curtain and looked out and then turned back to look at the injured man.<\/p>\n She was surprised to find him awake.<\/p>\n \u201cWell, hello,\u201d the blonde woman said as she sat on the edge of the bed.\u00a0 \u201cHow are you feeling?\u201d<\/p>\n He looked at her but he didn\u2019t see her.\u00a0 She realized then that, though his eyes were open, he was lost somewhere in a fever dream.<\/p>\n \u201cJoe?\u201d she called.\u00a0 \u201cJoe?\u201d<\/p>\n His cracked lips parted.\u00a0 \u201cThirsty….\u201d<\/p>\n Caroline went to the other side of the bed where she\u2019d left a cup.\u00a0 After filling it, she sat by him again.\u00a0 Placing her hand behind his head and entwining her fingers in his sweat-soaked hair, she lifted him up and placed the cup to his lips.<\/p>\n \u201cHow\u2019s that?\u201d she asked as he finished.<\/p>\n A little smile appeared.\u00a0 \u201c…good.<\/p>\n \u201cYou look a little better.\u201d\u00a0 It was true.\u00a0 Though Joe was hot to the touch, the color in his cheeks was not as high as it had been.\u00a0 After placing the cup on the table, she touched his forehead with the back of her hand.\u00a0 \u201cI think your fever\u2019s down.\u201d<\/p>\n The smile had faded into a frown.\u00a0 He looked at her obviously confused.<\/p>\n The blonde woman took his hand.\u00a0 \u201cJoe?\u201d<\/p>\n He didn\u2019t pull away.\u00a0 Instead, feebly, his fingers tightened on hers.\u00a0 \u201cAlice…how?\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cJoe, I\u2019m not \u2013 \u201d<\/p>\n \u201cCaroline.\u201d<\/p>\n She turned to find Charles standing behind her.\u00a0 He shook his head.\u00a0 Then he nodded toward Joe.<\/p>\n At first she frowned and then, realizing what he meant, scowled.\u00a0 It seemed, well, unkind somehow.\u00a0 Still, she knew why Charles wanted her to do it.\u00a0 They were desperate to learn something \u2013 anything<\/em> \u2013 that would help pull this man back from the brink.<\/p>\n \u201cYes, Joe,\u201d she said at last.<\/p>\n His brows drew together as if he was puzzled.\u00a0 \u201cThought…you were…dead.\u201d<\/p>\n Tears entered her eyes.\u00a0 She squeezed his fingers.\u00a0 \u201cI\u2019m here.\u201d<\/p>\n For a moment Joe relaxed and then he began to breathe quickly.\u00a0 He tossed violently from side to side and a shiver ran the length of him. \u00a0\u201cNo.\u00a0 …fire.\u00a0 Fire! <\/em>\u00a0Burning.\u00a0 You<\/em>…were burning…. No!\u00a0 Not you.<\/em>\u00a0 Not the baby<\/em>…inside you….\u201d<\/p>\n Caroline was stricken.\u00a0 She turned to look at Charles and found him crying as well.<\/p>\n \u201cYou better let me take over,\u201d Hiram Baker\u2019s weary voice intruded.\u00a0 \u201cSeems we\u2019ve got another crisis on our hands.\u201d<\/p>\n She rose and made way for the doctor and then looked at Charles again.\u00a0 A moment later, unable to contain her sorrow, Caroline ran through the kitchen and out the door and into the yard.\u00a0 Once there she gave way to sobs that wracked her slender form.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Charles spotted her as soon as he stepped out of the house.\u00a0 Crossing to his wife, he took her in his arms.\u00a0 Soon he was caressing her head, shushing her and telling her it would be all right.<\/p>\n \u201cOh, Charles!\u201d his wife sobbed against his shirt.\u00a0 \u201cThat poor man!\u201d<\/p>\n He held her close.\u00a0 It had shaken him as well.\u00a0 Visions of his own house going up in flames with his wife and one or more of his babies trapped inside \u2013 himself unable to prevent it \u2013 had risen up before his eyes and nearly unmanned him.<\/p>\n \u201cI know, Darlin\u2019,\u201d he said, pressing his cheek against her hair.\u00a0 \u2018I\u2019m sorry I had to put you through that, but we had to know.\u00a0 Maybe now we can help him.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cBut his wife.\u00a0 His…child….\u201d<\/p>\n He understood.\u00a0 It struck entirely too close to home for him as well.\u00a0 Their only son, Freddie, hadn\u2019t been dead a year yet.\u00a0 Still, as deep and as painful as that loss was, at least they had gotten to touch him and to know him for a little while.\u00a0 Joe was left with the emptiness of a man who never got to hold his child, and whose arms ached for a wife who was no more.<\/p>\n No wonder he didn\u2019t want to go on.<\/p>\n Taking his wife by the hand Charles led her over to the stump they often shared and sat her down.\u00a0 Dropping beside her, he put his arm around her shoulders and pulled her close.\u00a0 Caroline laid her head on his shoulder.\u00a0 As she softly sobbed, he told her about something that had been forming in his mind ever since they\u2019d carried the wounded man into their home.<\/p>\n \u201cI think Joe was brought to us on purpose,\u201d he said softly.<\/p>\n She glanced at him and then returned her head to his shoulder.\u00a0 \u201cBy God, you mean?\u201d<\/p>\n He nodded.\u00a0 \u201cYou feel it too?\u201d<\/p>\n She took his hand.\u00a0 \u201cHe\u2019s so alone and so sad.\u00a0 Maybe we can help him.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cIf he\u2019ll let us,\u201d he snorted.<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s like any wounded thing, Charles.\u00a0 It\u2019s so frightened, it wants to hide.\u201d\u00a0 She drew a breath.\u00a0 \u201cJoe is afraid.\u00a0 Afraid of life.\u201d<\/p>\n He sat a moment thinking, and then reached into his pocket and drew out the letter Lars had given him.<\/p>\n \u201cWhat\u2019s that?\u201d Caroline asked.<\/p>\n \u201cThe answer to who he is, I think,\u201d he replied.<\/p>\n His wife sat up.\u00a0 \u201cDid you find his horse?\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cNo. \u00a0This came by way of Lars.\u00a0 It was sent to him some time back and comes from a Benjamin Cartwright of Nevada state.\u00a0 Seems his son Joe was traveling this way and he asked him to look in on Lars.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cJoe Cartwright?\u00a0 That\u2019s his name?\u201d\u00a0 A hopeful smile brightened her cheerless face.\u00a0 \u201cCharles, that\u2019s wonderful!\u00a0 Have you written his father?\u201d<\/p>\n He stared at the letter.\u00a0 It was a hard call, but he felt he\u2019d made the right one.\u00a0 \u201cNo.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cWhy not?\u00a0 His family would want to know.\u201d<\/p>\n He pursed his lips and sighed.\u00a0 \u201cI think Joe\u2019s running, Caroline, and \u2013 if he finds out we\u2019ve sent for his father \u2013 then he\u2019ll just keep <\/em>running.\u00a0 Maybe….\u00a0 Maybe God landed him here so he could rest and, well, find himself.\u201d<\/p>\n She looked back toward the house.\u00a0 \u201cHe\u2019s going to have a long recovery with that leg wound.\u201d<\/p>\n He knew what she meant.\u00a0 If they accepted Joe into their home, he would be with them for quite some time.\u00a0 \u201cAre you all right with him stayin\u2019?\u201d he asked.\u00a0 Most of the burden would be on her in the beginning, until Joe was well enough to be outside.\u00a0 \u201cWe don\u2019t really know him.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cOh,\u201d she said,\u00a0 her voice wistful, \u201cI think we know him well enough.\u00a0 He was willing to put himself in danger to save our child.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cMary thinks he\u2019 one of the James\u2019 gang,\u201d he said, hiding his smile.<\/p>\n Caroline started and then sputtered.\u00a0 \u201cAn outlaw?\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cWears his gun tied down.\u201d<\/p>\n Her eyes widened.\u00a0 \u201cCharles, you don\u2019t think he could be \u2013 \u201d<\/p>\n \u201cNo.\u00a0 I don\u2019t.\u00a0 And don\u2019t you go thinkin\u2019 it either.\u00a0 That letter was postmarked Nevada.\u00a0 He\u2019s a rancher, that\u2019s all.\u00a0 Things are different in the West.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cCharles,\u201d Doctor Baker called as he stepped out of the house.\u00a0 \u201cIs there any more ice?\u201d<\/p>\n He turned toward him.\u00a0 \u201cIn the sod house.\u00a0 Is Joe worse?\u201d<\/p>\n The blond man\u2019s face was grim.\u00a0 \u201cHis fever\u2019s well over one hundred and two and climbing higher.\u00a0 If we don\u2019t get it down and he lives, he\u2019s liable to have damage to his brain.\u201d\u00a0 Hiram ran a hand over his chin.\u00a0 \u201cI think this may be it.\u00a0 From here he\u2019ll live or he\u2019ll die.\u00a0 I just don\u2019t know.\u201d<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Ben Cartwright felt like a fool.<\/p>\n It was late at night, after another day with no responses to the multiple telegrams he had sent out about Joseph, and his wandering feet had brought him to Marie\u2019s son\u2019s room where he sat on the bed.\u00a0 He\u2019d passed Jamie\u2019s room on the way and seen a light under the boy\u2019s door.\u00a0 He hoped that meant that he was reading and not that he too<\/em> was unable to sleep.\u00a0 Ben ran a hand over his face.\u00a0 This was interfering with his work.\u00a0 At sixty-five years old he couldn\u2019t afford sleepless nights.<\/p>\n How many had he had since Joseph was born?<\/p>\n It had started when Joe was a baby.\u00a0 His son had been small like his mother, delicate and fragile.\u00a0 But the boy had strengthened quickly and so had his lungs and the house rang for months with the sound of his independent cries.\u00a0 As a child Joe had alternately raced, bounced, and stormed through life.\u00a0 As a teenager, well, the joke about his own hair turning white due to this youngest son\u2019s antics had roots in the truth. \u00a0As a young man he watched Joseph mature.\u00a0 All the fire of his youth was not damped or put out, but it became a refining flame that burned away the dross and left pure silver.\u00a0 Ben snorted.\u00a0 Including in his son\u2019s riotous untamed hair!\u00a0 By the time Joe had chosen to marry he was a man in every way, strong, confidant in himself, sure of his path in life and what he wanted \u2013 content in what he possessed.<\/p>\n And then….\u00a0 Ben drew a deep breath and looked up, past the ceiling above his head, past the sky and clouds, into Heaven itself.<\/p>\n Then, there was the fire.<\/p>\n The older man opened his eyes and slapped his hands on his knees as if to rouse himself, and then stood up and went to the window and looked out once again, wondering if his son \u2013 wherever Joe was \u2013 \u00a0looked at the same rising sun.<\/p>\n He wondered if Joe was still alive.<\/p>\n It wasn\u2019t something he wanted to think about.\u00a0 In fact, he barely could.\u00a0 But Paul had been worried when Alice died that Joseph might try to take his own life. \u00a0His son had seemed to be healing, but then came the terrible encounter with the mentally unstable Corporal Bill Tanner.\u00a0 Joe had been driven mercilessly, tormented and tortured and, worst of all, for no reason other than he had done his Christian duty by offering sustenance and succor to a fellow traveler.<\/p>\n His own faith in God was what had gotten him through the dark days in his life \u2013 the death of his wives, all the times his sons had gone missing and were presumed dead, the loss of two in the end.\u00a0 It had taken him through floods and fires; through storms both manmade and ones that were acts of God.\u00a0 Each time he believed that there was a reason for it, a higher purpose, whether it be to mold him or someone he loved into a better, higher, and finer type of man.<\/p>\n But this.\u00a0 This….<\/p>\n Ben\u2019s gaze shifted to the barn where their horses were housed, including his missing son\u2019s current incarnation of Cochise.\u00a0 He thought about the sight, years before, of watching Joseph break his first feisty mount in.\u00a0 Most times the taming of an animal\u2019s spirit \u2013 like the rearing of a spirited boy \u2013 brought about a maturity that was profitable to both the horse breaker and the animal itself.\u00a0 But there were those rare times when the animal\u2019s wild untamed spirit was such a part of it that, once broken, it was of no use anymore.\u00a0 Without that spark, it simply pined away.<\/p>\n Joseph was pining away.<\/p>\n Turning, Ben walked to the door of Joe\u2019s room and took hold of the knob.\u00a0 Without a backward glance, he entered the hall and headed down the stairs into the great room where a small fire still burned.\u00a0 The fact made him smile and yet feel sad at the same time. \u00a0His nocturnal wanderings had become so commonplace that Hop Sing always kept it burning, at least until the pale fingers of dawn crept through the window.\u00a0 They were there now, caressing the back of the old blue velvet chair that was a fixture by the hearth.\u00a0 Ben crossed to it and sat down.\u00a0 Reaching over, he took his Bible up from where he had left it laying on the hearth and opened it to the passage he had been reading the night before.\u00a0 This well-worn friend \u2013 ancient now with its whisper-thin pages notched from use and stained at the edges with years of trail dust and a father\u2019s tears \u2013 had been his constant companion through all the hours of trial he had had to endure.\u00a0 It was a much a part of him as his eyes, his lips, his heart and his lungs.\u00a0 Without the Word of God a man could not see or speak.\u00a0 He couldn\u2019t feel or breathe.\u00a0 He was made deaf and dumb; left unfeeling and uncaring.<\/p>\n He\u2019d found his son\u2019s Bible in his room.\u00a0 Joseph had left it behind.\u00a0 His youngest boy had never been one to open the book daily or to study it by the hour.\u00a0 Joe was a man of feeling and for him God was everywhere and in everything, in this house he lived in, in the land he was born to, and in the people he loved.\u00a0 Sadly at this moment, from what he had seen, his son\u2019s faith in a loving Father was as dead as the wife and child he had buried in the meadow nearly two years before.<\/p>\n Ben ran his fingers across the aged paper. He found the verse where he had left off the night before.\u00a0 It was near the end of Hebrews in chapter ten.<\/p>\n For yet a little while, and he that shall come shall come, and will not tarry.\u00a0 Now the just shall live by faith, but if any man draw back, my soul shall have no pleasure in him.\u00a0 Bu we are not of them who draw back unto perdition, but of them that believe to the saving of the soul. <\/em><\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n The older man closed the book with his finger still in it and bowed his head.\u00a0 As he placed his other hand on its battered surface, his lips began to move.<\/p>\n \u201cLord, it\u2019s Ben, the child You love.\u00a0 I come to You this night in humility, asking for the life of the child I <\/em>love.\u00a0 Father, hard as it is, I accept that there is a reason Joe is in this place, but he\u2019s so lost, Lord, so alone.\u00a0 So scared.\u00a0 I\u2019m….\u201d\u00a0 Ben drew a sharp breath and let it out slowly.\u00a0 \u201cI\u2019m afraid for him.\u00a0 I\u2019m afraid he will try to do harm to himself, or that he\u2019ll simply give up and fade away.\u201d\u00a0 The older man straightened in his chair.\u00a0 \u201cI know, Father, that this is not what You want, that Joseph is a unique creation and You have allowed him to pass through this fire \u2013 through so many <\/em>fires \u2013 in order to make him into a man after Your own heart.\u00a0 As it says in Isaiah, You have refined him, but not as silver.\u00a0 You have chosen him in the furnace of affliction.\u201d\u00a0 His voice choked as an image of Joe going up in flames came before his eyes.\u00a0 He closed them even tighter, accepting blindly that the fire his son was going through at this moment was of<\/em> God and not of the enemy.\u00a0 \u201cLet him walk through the fire and not be burned, but only strengthened.\u00a0 Wherever he is, Lord, bring strong people of faith into his life to support him. Amen.\u201d<\/p>\n Ben felt a tear land on his gnarled hand.\u00a0 He drew a breath like he was coming up for air and opened his eyes.\u00a0 He\u2019d had no idea he was crying.<\/p>\n A quiet voice, always there but never intruding, spoke from close by.\u00a0 \u201cMistah Ben need anything Hop Sing can bring?\u201d<\/p>\n He looked at his old friend and shook his head.<\/p>\n No.<\/p>\n Not unless he could bring him Joe.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Charles had risen early from his bed of hay in the barn and gone into the house.\u00a0 After looking in on his sleeping wife and daughters, he went to the sick room and checked in with Doctor Baker.\u00a0 The weary physician told him it had been a long night and, while Joe was not out of danger, he was holding his own. \u00a0After grabbing a cold breakfast from the larder and downing a little of the cold coffee in the pot, he\u2019d headed back outside to begin the day\u2019s chores.\u00a0 It was early morning and the world outside was hushed in anticipation of the new day.\u00a0 The breaking rays of the rising sun streamed through the line of trees at the edge of their property, reaching with fiery pink fingers toward the house he had built, turning all that God had given him to gold.\u00a0 It was a rare moment, peaceful and unhurried, and Charles found himself humbled.\u00a0 He put down the bucket he had picked up when he intended to head to the well, and walked out into the bountiful field of corn and sat down amidst the ripening stalks.\u00a0 There were so many things that raced through his mind as he sat there.\u00a0 At first they turned on the family\u2019s needs and wants. \u00a0On the girls safety and how they were growing.\u00a0 On Caroline and all the work she had to do.\u00a0 Then, his mind went to the injured man laying in his bed.\u00a0 Who was<\/em> this man God had deposited on their doorstep?\u00a0 Why was Joe Cartwright here?\u00a0 Was there something the Lord wanted him to do?\u00a0\u00a0 Some way he could ease Joe\u2019s burden?<\/p>\n Something only he<\/em> could provide?<\/p>\n Closing his eyes there in the midst of his crops, Charles bowed his head, admitted his sin, offered himself, and waited.<\/p>\n Into the silence came an early morning breeze that rustled his curly brown hair.\u00a0 The still small voice it contained spoke to him, bringing visions of a sad but resolute older man with pure white hair sitting by a fire.\u00a0 His hand was on his well-worn Bible and his eyes were turned toward the waxing sun.\u00a0 The man\u2019s lips were moving.\u00a0 He was praying.<\/p>\n Praying for his lost son.<\/p>\n Charles turned his palms upward and rested them on his knees, entreating God\u2019s wisdom.\u00a0 This man, Benjamin Cartwright, was hurting.\u00a0 He had it in his power to relieve Joe\u2019s father\u2019s pain \u2013 to send him word of his son\u2019s whereabouts \u2013\u00a0 but at what price?\u00a0 If Joe lived, he would be little more than a dead man walking \u2013 his spirit broken, all hope lost.\u00a0 It was autumn; the season of dying, when all things turned to dust and returned to the earth.\u00a0 Hope was born in the spring as green shoots pushed up through the remnants of the cold white blanket that lay upon the land.\u00a0 \u2018He giveth snow like wool. He scattereth the hoarfrost like ashes\u2019<\/em>, he thought, hearing the words of the Psalm.<\/p>\n And then other words came to him.\u00a0 This time from Lamentations.\u00a0 \u2018He hath filled me with bitterness, he hath made me drunken with wormwood.\u00a0 He hath also broken my teeth with gravel stones, he hath covered me with ashes.\u00a0 And thou hast removed my soul far off from peace.\u00a0 I forgot prosperity.\u2019<\/em>\u00a0 Charles shifted and opened his eyes.\u00a0 Looking up, he contemplating the dawning day with all its promise.\u00a0 \u2018It is of the LORD’S mercies that we are not consumed, because his compassions fail not. \u00a0They are new every morning: great is thy faithfulness. The LORD is my portion, saith my soul; therefore will I hope in Him. The LORD is good unto them that wait for Him, to the soul that seeketh Him.\u00a0 It is good that a man should both hope and quietly wait for the salvation of the LORD.<\/em><\/p>\n \u2018 It is good for a man that he bear the yoke in his youth.\u2019<\/em><\/p>\n No, he would not wire Joe\u2019s father.\u00a0 Not yet.\u00a0 Right now Joseph Cartwright was walking through the valley of the shadow of death in more ways than one.<\/p>\n It was in his hands and the hands of his family to show him the light<\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n FOUR<\/p>\n \u201cSo just who<\/em> have you got hidden away at your house, Laura Ingalls?\u00a0 I hear its a gunslinger.\u201d<\/p>\n Laura closed her eyes and sighed.\u00a0 Her peaceful swinging time outside of the school was over.<\/p>\n Nellie.<\/p>\n \u201cWell?\u201d the blonde girl demanded in that way she had, making it sound like you\u2019d done something wrong just by living.<\/p>\n Drawing that sigh back into herself, Laura slid off the swing seat and turned to look at her nemesis.\u00a0 She liked that word.\u00a0 Pa\u2019d taught it to her when they were reading Moby Dick.\u00a0 The white whale was Ahab\u2019s nemesis<\/em>.<\/p>\n Laura\u2019s lips quirked with a smile.<\/p>\n Nellie kind of looked like a white whale.<\/p>\n \u201cHe ain\u2019t no gunslinger,\u201d she replied.\u00a0 \u201cHe\u2019s just a man who got hurt.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cSaving you<\/em>, I hear.\u00a0 It\u2019s a wonder you didn\u2019t get him killed being so stupid about that little bear cub.\u201d<\/p>\n Laura scowled.\u00a0 Now how did Nellie know about that?\u00a0 She hadn\u2019t told much of anyone.\u00a0 Then she remembered.\u00a0 Pa went to Mister Oleson for medicine.\u00a0 He probably told the storekeeper everything.<\/p>\n And Nellie probably sneaked and listened at the top of the stairs.<\/p>\n \u201cI wasn\u2019t gonna leave it there all tangled up in the brambles.\u00a0 It might have died!\u201d she snapped back.<\/p>\n \u201cSo that man is gonna die instead? \u00a0I saw your Pa coming to get ice at the icehouse.\u00a0 He must be real bad.\u201d\u00a0 Nellie shook her head, making her perfect blonde ringlets swing.\u00a0 \u201cBut I suppose if you think a bear cub is more important than a man….\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cI didn\u2019t know he was gonna come rushin\u2019 out of the woods!\u00a0 I didn\u2019t even know he was there!\u201d she all but shouted, her own guilty feelings making her temper rise.\u00a0 \u201cI would of done anythin\u2019 I could for Joe not to get hurt.\u201d<\/p>\n Nellie smirked.\u00a0 \u201cSo the gunslinger\u2019s name is Joe?\u201d<\/p>\n Laura let out a deep sigh.\u00a0 Why she let Nellie get under her skin, she didn\u2019t know.\u00a0 Still it was hard not to since just her existing was irritating.<\/p>\n \u201cI told you he\u2019d not<\/em> a gunslinger.\u00a0 His name\u2019s Joe and Pa says he\u2019s a rancher from out West.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cOoh.\u00a0 A rancher?\u201d\u00a0 Nellie made a face.\u00a0 \u201cDoes he stink like cattle?\u00a0 Ma says they all stink like sweat and cattle.\u201d\u00a0 The blonde girl let out an exaggerated sigh.\u00a0 \u201cMa says never to marry a man that smells like a stable.\u201d\u00a0 She paused and then leveled her eyes like a bull before it charged.\u00a0 \u201cI guess your <\/em>Ma never heard that.\u201d<\/p>\n Laura\u2019s fingers were clenched.\u00a0 That was never a good sign.\u00a0 \u201cYou take that back, Nellie Oleson!\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cTake what back?\u201d\u00a0 She rolled her eyes skyward. \u201cI didn\u2019t say anything.\u00a0 You\u2019re just overly sensitive <\/em>Laura Ingalls.\u00a0 You need to develop some backbone.\u201d<\/p>\n Laura breathed in and out a couple of times.\u00a0 Given half a chance, she\u2019d snap Nellie\u2019s!<\/p>\n \u201cWhy I do declare, you\u2019ve gone all red.\u00a0 You look like the top of your head\u2019s going to blow off.\u201d\u00a0 Nellie placed a finger along her chin and tilted her head.\u00a0 \u201cI\u2019d say that would be an improvement.\u00a0 Wouldn\u2019t you?<\/p>\n Laura lifted her fists.\u00a0 \u201cI\u2019ve had just about enough of you!\u00a0 Why don\u2019t you just get <\/em>before I for<\/em>get I\u2019m supposed to be forgivin\u2019?\u201d<\/p>\n Nellie cackled.\u00a0 \u201cLike there\u2019s anything to forgive me<\/em> for!\u201d\u00a0 Growing sober, the tall blonde girl moved forward.\u00a0 Poking her finger against her pinafore, she drove Laura back.\u00a0 \u201cYou\u2019re the one who\u2019s going to be responsible if that gunslinger dies!\u00a0 It\u2019s all your fault for being so stupid!\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n She wanted to punch her.\u00a0 But she couldn\u2019t.<\/p>\n Nellie was right.<\/p>\n Tears streamed down her cheeks.<\/p>\n \u201cGirls!\u00a0 Time to come in.\u00a0 Class is about to begin!\u201d Miss Beadle called from the church steps.\u00a0 \u201cEveryone else is inside.\u201d<\/p>\n Nellie stared her down for a minute more, and then with a flounce of her perfect curls and her New York City dress she crossed the school yard, moved past Miss Beadle, and went inside.<\/p>\n Her teacher waited a moment and then called her again.\u00a0 \u201cLaura, you need to come.\u201d<\/p>\n The tears were still flowing.\u00a0 She was crying so hard, really, that she couldn\u2019t even answer.\u00a0 Taking a couple of breaths, she said, her voice shaky. \u201cI don\u2019t feel so good, Miss Beadle.\u00a0 Can I go home?\u201d<\/p>\n Her teacher crossed the yard and came to her side.\u00a0 When she saw the state she was in, the blonde woman knelt beside her.<\/p>\n \u201cOh, Laura,\u201d she said, wiping away some of the tears with her hanky, \u201cwhat did Nellie say this time?\u201d<\/p>\n Her chin was on her chest.\u00a0 She muttered a reply.<\/p>\n \u201cWhat?\u00a0 Speak up, Laura.\u201d<\/p>\n After drawing a breath, she looked up.\u00a0 \u201cNothing but the truth,\u201d she said in a whisper.<\/p>\n Miss Beadle looked at her and then she took her by the hand.\u00a0 \u201cCome with me to the steps,\u201d she said, and led the way.\u00a0 After they sat down, her teacher faced her.\u00a0 \u201cTell me what Nellie said.\u201d<\/p>\n It all poured out like milk running from an upturned crock.\u00a0 She told Miss Beadle about how stupid she\u2019d been to try to save the bear cub and how she\u2019d talked her sister into it even though Mary was against it.\u00a0 How she remembered what their pa had told them about mama bears, but thought that \u2013 this time \u2013 the cub\u2019s mama couldn\u2019t<\/em> be around because he was all wrapped up in brambles and she wasn\u2019t there trying to get him out.\u00a0 Laura\u2019s voice grew quiet as she related what she had seen \u2013 first the mama bear, so angry and running toward her \u2013 and then the man stepping into the path of the bear.\u00a0 She described how that old mama bear took him down and then swung him from side to side with her teeth in his leg and all the time there was blood flying everywhere.\u00a0 She told her teacher about how the man was sick and how his fever was real high.<\/p>\n She told her how he was going to die and it was all because of her!<\/p>\n There were tears in Miss Beadle\u2019s eyes too.\u00a0 \u201cOh, Laura….\u201d she said.<\/p>\n Laura looked up at her.\u00a0 \u201cCan I go home, Miss Beadle?\u00a0 I just need to know that Joe\u2019s still livin\u2019.\u00a0 I can\u2019t think about my schoolwork.\u00a0 All I can think about is him!\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n Miss Beadle took her hand.\u00a0 \u201cLaura, I can\u2019t let you go home early. Not without your parents permission.\u00a0 However….\u201d\u00a0 Her teacher wiped a few more tears away.\u00a0 \u201cI can take you and Mary by your house after school and we can see together how he is doing.\u00a0 Would that help?\u201d<\/p>\n Laura nodded.\u00a0 \u201cYes, Ma\u2019am, but….\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cBut?\u201d<\/p>\n She shook her head.\u00a0 \u201cI can\u2019t keep my mind on my schoolwork, Ma\u2019am, like I said.\u00a0 I don\u2019t know how I\u2019ll get anything done.\u201d<\/p>\n Miss Beadle stroked her hair.\u00a0 \u201cThat\u2019s all right.\u00a0 You just do the best you can do.\u00a0 And don\u2019t you let that old Nellie Oleson bother you.\u201d\u00a0 The blonde woman scowled.\u00a0 \u201cIt would take just about all of eternity for that girl to apologize for all the things she\u2019s <\/em>done wrong.\u201d\u00a0 Her teacher\u2019s hand flew to her lips.\u00a0 \u201cOh!\u201d she laughed.\u00a0 \u201cI shouldn\u2019t have said that!\u201d<\/p>\n Laura frowned \u2013 just for show.\u00a0 \u201cYou\u2019re always s\u2019posed to tell the truth, Miss Beadle.\u00a0 Isn\u2019t that right?\u201d<\/p>\n Her teacher rose and held out her hand.\u00a0 \u201cYou\u2019re right, Laura.\u201d\u00a0 She hesitated a moment and then said, \u201cAnd Harriet Oleson is a busybody!\u201d<\/p>\n This time she laughed.<\/p>\n Then she followed Miss Beadle into the school.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Lars Hanson pulled his team to a halt.\u00a0 It was early afternoon and he had closed the mill early to come out to the Ingalls\u2019 place to find Charles.\u00a0 He could have waited until later but, with what he knew of the condition of the young man who had saved Laura\u2019s life, he felt it was important to bring the new information he had to his friend\u2019s attention as soon as possible. He had, in his vest pocket, two telegrams a rider had brought him that morning.\u00a0 One was to him from Benjamin Cartwright and the other from the sheriff in Sleepy Eye, both inquiring as to whether or not anyone had seen a young man with curly silver-grey hair and green eyes.\u00a0 Joseph Francis Cartwright, it seemed, was a highly sought after man.\u00a0 And while he understood Charles reasons for not wiring Joe\u2019s father and respected them, he also feared that \u2013 in some way \u2013 Charles might be held responsible should it be found out he was harboring him and had done nothing to confirm that he was alive.<\/p>\n Lars looked at the Ingalls\u2019 household.<\/p>\n At least he hoped <\/em>Joe was alive.<\/p>\n He hadn\u2019t thought about his journey west for a long time.\u00a0 He\u2019d been a young man then in his twenties.\u00a0 His wagon had not been a part of the train young Benjamin Cartwright traveled in but, for a time, they had joined forces for the safety of those heading west.\u00a0 Benjamin had just lost his second wife and was journeying with his young son, Adam, and the boy\u2019s baby brother.\u00a0 They had talked about their dreams \u2013 Benjamin\u2019s of buying land in Nevada and building an empire and his, of starting a town.\u00a0 In time they parted ways when he went north and Benjamin and his small family continued west.\u00a0 They had corresponded a few times over the years, but it had been a decade or more since they had exchanged letters.\u00a0 It moved him that Benjamin remembered him well enough to ask his youngest boy to contact him on his way east.\u00a0 It grieved his heart that the young man had been so badly injured.<\/p>\n He did not want his first letter to Benjamin in all that time to carry the news of the death of his son.<\/p>\n As he sat there, thinking, the door opened and Hiram Baker stepped out.\u00a0 The doctor looked drained.\u00a0 His golden hair was unkempt and he had the beginnings of a beard.\u00a0 When Hiram saw him he stopped.\u00a0 His lips curled in a weary smile.<\/p>\n \u201cWhat brings you out here, Lars?\u201d he asked.<\/p>\n Lars climbed down from his rig.\u00a0 His eyes went to the house. \u00a0\u201cHow is the boy?\u201d<\/p>\n The doctor ran a hand along the back of his neck.\u00a0 \u201cFinally sleeping naturally, I am happy to report.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cSo is he out of danger?\u201d<\/p>\n Hiram shrugged.\u00a0 \u201cIf the fever remains down and no new infection occurs, I would say he\u2019s on the road to recovery.\u00a0 The fever broke last night.\u00a0 Still….\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cJa?\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s going to be a long road.\u00a0 He won\u2019t be going anywhere very fast \u2013 or even getting out of that bed for some time.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cCan he speak?\u201d he asked.<\/p>\n Hiram frowned.\u00a0 \u201cNot yet.\u00a0 At least, not coherently. Why?\u201d<\/p>\n The older man shook his head.\u00a0 \u201cVhere <\/em>is Charles?\u201d<\/p>\n The doctor indicated the building behind him.\u00a0 \u201cIn the barn.\u201d<\/p>\n Lars looked.\u00a0 \u201cI vill<\/em> be speaking to him then.\u00a0 Good day, Hiram.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cIs something wrong?\u201d<\/p>\n He halted and turned back.\u00a0 \u201cNo,\u201d he lied.\u00a0 \u201cIt\u2019s joost <\/em>some mill business.\u201d<\/p>\n The doctor held his gaze for a minute and then nodded.\u00a0 \u201cAll right.\u00a0 Tell Charles to come in the house when you\u2019re done speaking with him. I want to go over some of the care instructions for Joe.\u201d\u00a0 He looked toward town.\u00a0 \u201cNow that he\u2019s better, I need to see to some of my other patients.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cI vill <\/em>tell him.\u201d<\/p>\n As Doctor Baker nodded his thanks, the older man headed for the barn.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Charles looked up when he heard a noise to find Lars Hanson standing, framed in the barn\u2019s open doorway.\u00a0 Anchoring the rake he\u2019d been using to clean out the horse stall against the stall wall, he headed for his employer and friend.<\/p>\n \u201cWhat\u00a0 brings you out here, Lars?\u201d he asked as he wiped his hand on his pants and offered it to the other man.<\/p>\n The older man shook it and then reached into his pocket.\u00a0 He held out two telegrams.\u00a0 \u201cThese.\u201d<\/p>\n Charles took them.\u00a0 One was addressed to Lars.\u00a0 The other to \u2018whomever it may concern\u2019.<\/p>\n \u201cGo ahead.\u00a0 Read them both.\u00a0 You haf<\/em> my permission and, Charles, you are<\/em> the one concerned.\u201d<\/p>\n Opening the first envelope he pulled out the piece of paper that contained the message: SON MISSING.\u00a0 STOP.\u00a0 JOE CARTWRIGHT.\u00a0 ANY WORD. STOP. CONTACT BEN CARTWRIGHT. STOP. VIRGINIA CITY NEVADA. STOP.<\/p>\n His eyes flicked to Lars as he switched the envelopes and read the second message.<\/p>\n FROM SHERIFF SLEEPY EYE.\u00a0 STOP.\u00a0 MAN MISSING.\u00a0 STOP.\u00a0 JOE CARTWRIGHT. STOP.\u00a0 FOUL PLAY SUSPECTED.\u00a0 STOP. IF SIGHTED INFORM LAW. STOP.<\/p>\n Charles\u2019 brown eyebrows danced toward the tumble of curls on his forehead.\u00a0 He let out a low whistle.<\/p>\n \u201cIt could mean trouble, Charles.\u00a0 If someone realizes who the young man is you haf <\/em>in your house.\u00a0 I did not vant<\/em> to trouble you, but….\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s no trouble, Lars,\u201d he said, slipping the second note into the envelope.\u00a0 \u201cI saw you talking to Doc Baker.\u00a0 Did he tell you how Joe was doing?\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cJa.\u00a0 <\/em>He said he is better.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019m hoping to be able to talk to him tonight.\u201d\u00a0 Charles\u2019 eyes went to the house.\u00a0 \u201cHe\u2019s a grown man, Lars.\u00a0 It has to be up to him.\u201d<\/p>\n The mill owner nodded slowly.\u00a0 \u201cAnd yet, if I vere <\/em>his father, I vould<\/em> hope someone vould<\/em> tell me where my boy vas<\/em>,\u201d he said quietly.<\/p>\n Charles had thought long and hard about it.\u00a0 If one of his children was missing \u2013 no matter how old \u2013 and he was looking for them and found out someone knew where they were and had not told him, he would be furious.\u00a0 And yet, as he said, Joe was a grown man and, reasonable or not, he had the distinct feeling Joe Cartwright did not<\/em> want to be found.<\/p>\n He reached out and placed a hand on the older man\u2019s shoulder.\u00a0 \u201cLet\u2019s give it one more day.\u00a0 Hopefully, Joe will be up to talking tonight and he can make the decision himself.\u00a0 All right?\u201d\u00a0 Lifting his hand, he asked, \u201cCan I keep these and show them to Joe?\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cJa.<\/em>\u00a0 You keep them.\u00a0 And you let me know vhat <\/em>he says as soon as possible.\u201d<\/p>\n He nodded.\u00a0 \u201cI will.\u201d<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Caroline checked the chicken she had cooking in the stove and decided she had a few minutes to step in and check on their guest.\u00a0 Before Doctor Baker had gone to lay down to rest, she had helped him remove the soaked blankets and ice, and together they had dressed the young man in one of Charles\u2019 nightshirts.\u00a0 Joe was still fevered, but it was nothing compared to the temperature he\u2019d had before.\u00a0 He felt slightly warm to the touch now like a youngster did when fighting a mild infection.\u00a0 The high fever had broken about midday and Joe had fallen into a deep sleep.\u00a0 She\u2019d checked on him periodically and he\u2019d been sleeping every time.<\/p>\n Poor thing!\u00a0 He needed it.<\/p>\n After wiping her hands on her apron, Caroline hung it over the back one of a chair.\u00a0 After stopping at the mirror to pin a few stray strands of blonde hair out of her eyes, she headed down the passage to their bedroom.\u00a0 The late afternoon sun was shining in through the window, casting a warm glow over the room and its occupant.\u00a0 Moving quietly she checked to make sure the pitcher by the bed had cool water in it and that there were adequate cloths should they have need of them again.\u00a0 Then she crossed to the window and began to draw the curtains together.<\/p>\n \u201cLeave them.\u00a0 Please,\u201d a quiet voice said.<\/p>\n Caroline spun.\u00a0 The man in her bed was alert and watching her.\u00a0 She smiled.\u00a0 \u201cYou\u2019re awake!\u00a0 How wonderful.\u201d<\/p>\n He blinked several times and then looked about the room.\u00a0 It was obvious he was puzzled.\u00a0 \u201cWhere am I?\u201d<\/p>\n She came to the bed and sat down beside him.\u00a0 \u201cYou\u2019re in my home.\u00a0 Mine, and my husband\u2019s.\u201d<\/p>\n He licked his lips and swallowed.\u00a0 \u201cCan I have some water?\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cOf course!\u201d\u00a0 She jumped up and went to the pitcher on the opposite side of the bed. \u00a0After filling the cup, she again sat beside him and held it to his lips.<\/p>\n \u201cBetter?\u201d<\/p>\n He nodded as she drew it away.\u00a0 \u201cHow….\u00a0 How did I get here?\u201d Joe asked, his voice rough from disuse.<\/p>\n \u201cYou were hurt,\u201d Caroline said as she put the cup down.\u00a0 \u201cCharles brought you here.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cWhat happened?\u201d<\/p>\n The blonde woman laid her hand on his.\u00a0 \u201cYou saved our daughter\u2019s life and nearly lost your own.\u201d<\/p>\n His gun-metal grey brows knit together in the center and he frowned.\u00a0 \u201cThe little brown-haired girl….\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cThat was Laura.\u00a0 She was very foolish.\u00a0 She tried to help \u2013 \u201d<\/p>\n Joe nodded.\u00a0 \u201cBear cub.\u00a0 I remember.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cWe\u2019re so sorry you were hurt.\u201d<\/p>\n His lips curled.\u00a0 \u201cI\u2019m not.\u201d<\/p>\n His words surprised her.\u00a0 \u201cYou\u2019re not?\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cWouldn\u2019t have met…you nice people otherwise.\u201d<\/p>\n Tears entered her eyes.\u00a0 \u201cThat\u2019s very gracious of you.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cCaroline.\u201d<\/p>\n She looked up to find her husband standing in the bedroom doorway.\u00a0 He had one hand on the jamb and the other in his pocket and was staring at the injured man, a resolute look on his handsome face.<\/p>\n \u201cYes?\u201d she asked.<\/p>\n \u201cI need to talk to our guest before he gets too tired.\u201d\u00a0 Charles moved into the room and stood at the end of the bed so the injured man could see him.\u00a0 \u201cIf that\u2019s all right with you,\u201d he said, addressing Joe.<\/p>\n She saw Joe\u2019s eyes widen and then narrow.\u00a0 Though the sick man had seen her husband before, he probably didn\u2019t remember.<\/p>\n She had to admit, the resemblance was startling.<\/p>\n Slowly, Joe nodded.<\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019ll go finish supper.\u201d<\/p>\n Charles caught her arm.\u00a0 \u201cI told Lars to find someone to bring the girls back home.\u201d<\/p>\n Caroline beamed.\u00a0 She missed her little ones!<\/p>\n He leaned over and kissed her lips.\u00a0 Then he nodded toward the hall.<\/p>\n Understanding, the blonde woman hurried from the room.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Charles pulled up a chair and sat by the bed.\u00a0 He looked at the man laying there, staring out the window.\u00a0 Joseph Francis Cartwright \u2013 if that\u2019s who he truly was \u2013 looked to be about thirty.\u00a0 He had a boyish face that seemed out of place surrounded as it was by an unruly halo of curly silver-grey hair.\u00a0 Joe was thin, but he thought that might have come recently because his body was that of a man who wasn\u2019t afraid to work.\u00a0 He\u2019d seen it all when they undressed him.\u00a0 Charles frowned.\u00a0\u00a0 He\u2019d seen as well the record of the multiple injuries the man had suffered.\u00a0 They were written in scars and tough knots of tissue on his shoulders and back.<\/p>\n In fact, he looked like he might just be<\/em> that gunfighter Mary was worried about.<\/p>\n