Summary: A little vignette following (at some later time) the events of ‘A Dime’s Worth of Glory’. Written for the Sept 1 Pinecone challenge and expanded for inclusion here. Prompt: Whisky for my men, beer for my horses (by Scott Emerich\/Toby Keith).\u00a0 Contains various phrases from both the song and the episode throughout (and a few of my own ;-).<\/p>\n
Rating: G\u00a0 Word Count: 628<\/p>\n
Gusty Gumption<\/strong><\/p>\n Their companionable silence was broken by the sound of the front door opening, followed by two sets of footfalls in the entryway.\u00a0 Ben exchanged a glance with his eldest son, sprawled out in the blue chair with a book of poetry.\u00a0 He hadn\u2019t expected Hoss and Joe back for hours yet\u2014usually a night in town would keep them occupied well past any sane man\u2019s bedtime.\u00a0 Adam\u2019s expression didn\u2019t change, but his eyes flickered regretfully back to his book and Ben knew he was mourning the loss of his quiet evening before the fire.<\/p>\n Come to think of it, though, his two youngest weren\u2019t talking\u2014which could mean nothing good.\u00a0 They couldn\u2019t possibly be trying to sneak in, not at this hour, so what \u2026\u00a0 Ben froze, eyeing warily the two young men grinning at him from behind the settee.<\/p>\n Grinning at both<\/em> of them.<\/p>\n Oh, what now?<\/p>\n \u201cThere they are, Hoss.\u00a0 Ain\u2019t they somethin\u2019?\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cYep.\u201d\u00a0 His middle son\u2019s gap-tooth grin flashed.\u00a0 \u201cSure are.\u00a0 And here we never knew.\u201d<\/p>\n Across the room, Adam\u2019s expression said that he was preparing for flight.<\/p>\n \u201cBoys, what\u2019s this all\u2014\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cThe intrepid Cartwrights, father and son.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cCouldn\u2019ta told it by me, not in that there ordinary business garb.\u201d<\/p>\n Ben was already in his robe and Adam his stocking feet.\u00a0 The statement might have made no sense\u2014except it did.\u00a0 Oh, it did.\u00a0 Adam mumbled inaudibly and slouched into his chair, book inching up to shelter him from the impending storm.\u00a0 Ben gaped.<\/p>\n How?\u00a0 He and Adam had been very careful not to talk about that blasted article at home.\u00a0 How had those two possibly found out?<\/p>\n Then again, what was he thinking?\u00a0 Tobias Finch had spread those newspapers all over that town, and apparently Chicago too, and who knew what other parts of creation.\u00a0 If there was even one copy left anywhere in Nevada, of course Hoss and Joe would find it.<\/p>\n \u201cWas sure a good thing they was ridin\u2019 that ill-fated Virginia City stage, weren\u2019t it, Joe?\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cWell yeah!\u00a0 There\u2019da been no daring decimation and capture otherwise.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cIt wasn\u2019t like that,\u201d Adam muttered.\u00a0 Ben was surprised\u2014it wasn\u2019t like Adam to waste his time.<\/p>\n \u201cWhat I wanna know, is when we\u2019re gonna get ta see \u2018em in action closer ta home.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cYeah!\u00a0 Actually, Hoss, I\u2019m a little hurt.\u00a0 Here we are family, and didn\u2019t get first chance at the story.\u201d\u00a0 Oh, help us.<\/em>\u00a0 \u201cWe coulda done it way better justice.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cBoys\u2026\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cFer sure.\u00a0 \u2018The Gusty Gumption an\u2019 Dashin\u2019 Ta-Do of Ben an\u2019 Adam Cartwright, Ranchers Extra-Ordinary an\u2019 Savored Saviors of the Sierra.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n If there was more Ben missed it, distracted by Adam\u2019s silent repetition of \u2018savored saviors of the Sierra\u2019 into the lines of Emerson\u2019s \u2018Boston Hymn\u2019 before him.\u00a0 The interruption, Ben suspected, was seeming crueler by the moment.<\/p>\n Of course, the boys had been planning this the whole ride home.\u00a0 There was no stopping them now.<\/p>\n \u201cHaving bested yet another notorious threat to the safety of Virginia City\u2019s worthy citizens, the father and son duo tie up outside the Silver Dollar saloon.\u00a0 As the gun smoke settles, the town hoists the intrepid Cartwrights onto their shoulders, cheerin\u2019\u2014\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cNaw, Joe, singin\u2019.\u201d<\/p>\n Adam\u2019s head began to disappear below the armrests.<\/p>\n \u201cRight!\u201d\u00a0 Ben was going to murder whoever had shown his sons that story, slowly, and enjoy himself tremendously.\u00a0 \u201cSingin\u2019<\/em> a victory tune.\u201d\u00a0 Joe\u2019s eyes flickered to the blue chair.\u00a0 \u201cTo the tune of \u2018Oh Susanna.\u2019\u201d\u00a0 Adam exhaled slowly.\u00a0 \u201cSam\u2019s got the drinks ready\u2014he knows how this goes by now, such is the fame and adoration of Ben and Adam Cartwright in these parts\u2014and they all raise up their glasses against evil forces.\u201d<\/p>\n Adam bolted for the stairs.<\/p>\n \u201cWhisky for my men!\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cBeer for my horses!\u201d<\/p>\n Ben wasn\u2019t far behind.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n Tags:\u00a0 Adam Cartwright,\u00a0Ben Cartwright,\u00a0Hoss Cartwright,\u00a0Joe \/ Little Joe Cartwright<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Summary: A little vignette following (at some point later) the events of ‘A Dime’s Worth of Glory’. Written for the Sept 1 Pinecone challenge and expanded for inclusion here. Prompt: Whisky for my men, beer for my horses (by Scott Emerich\/Toby Keith).\u00a0 Contains phrases from both the song and the episode throughout.<\/p>\n Rating: G\u00a0 Word Count: 628<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10468,"featured_media":18229,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"template-full-width-post.php","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_members_access_role":[],"_members_access_error":""},"categories":[4,13,40],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-18230","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-humor","category-whn","category-challenges","wpcat-4-id","wpcat-13-id","wpcat-40-id"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/bonanzabrand.info\/library\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/09\/A8B95BC9-E53D-40E8-BD21-6DC03B08C9BF.jpeg?fit=1178%2C1034&ssl=1","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/bonanzabrand.info\/library\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18230","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/bonanzabrand.info\/library\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/bonanzabrand.info\/library\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bonanzabrand.info\/library\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/10468"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bonanzabrand.info\/library\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=18230"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/bonanzabrand.info\/library\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18230\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bonanzabrand.info\/library\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/18229"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/bonanzabrand.info\/library\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=18230"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bonanzabrand.info\/library\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=18230"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bonanzabrand.info\/library\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=18230"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}