Sacrificial Lamb
Part 3: Deliverance
By Kathleen T. Berney

“Lil, why?” Adam demanded.

“If you’re lookin’ for an apology, don’t hold your breath!” Lil said, favoring Adam with a defiant, angry glare.

“I’m NOT looking for an apology,” Adam said, struggling to keep his own anger in check. “I simply want to know why.”

“I told you when we left the other day that our conversation wasn’t over,” Lil said.

Adam glanced over at Laura, riding on the other side of her aunt, with her eyes glued to her hands, clutching the reins. “Laura?” he prodded gently.

Laura glanced up sharply, upon hearing her name. Her face, with its pallid complexion, and wide staring eyes, reminded him of a frightened deer, trapped amid a circle of hunters.

“Laura, perhaps YOU can tell me why,” Adam addressed her in a kindlier tone.

“Laura, keep your mouth shut!” Lil snapped.

“Laura, you and Lil are in a lot of serious trouble,” Adam said, taking care to keep his tone well measured and even. He, Joe, and Candy were escorting two prisoners to the Virginia City jail. One of them was an old, once very dear friend. The other was a woman that the first had long ago introduced to him as her favorite aunt. Less than a half an hour ago, Aunt Lil had ambushed himself, his wife, his big brother, Hoss, and young sister, Stacy, as they were returning home from a brisk morning ride. One of the bullets fired branded the side of Stacy’s head, and panicked Blaze Face, her horse. The terrified horse reared upward, dumping his unconscious rider, before fleeing. The others horses also fled in terror. Adam had given Stacy a brief glance over, while he, Teresa, and Hoss huddled together behind a couple of boulders, away from Lil Manfred’s rifle fire. Thankfully, she didn’t APPEAR to have been seriously hurt by the bullet brand and her fall off of Blaze Face. Only Doctor Martin could make that determination, however . . . .

“Laura?”

Laura Dayton looked over at Adam, her eyes round with fear.

“Please, Laura,” Adam began in a gentler, more conciliatory tone, “if you’d just tell me what’s going on here . . . why your aunt was taking pot shots at us just now . . . maybe my father and I can do something to help you.”

“We don’t need YOUR help, Adam,” Lil stated imperiously.

“Why don’t you let Laura speak for herself, Lil?” Adam countered in a tone that dripped icicles.

“Why don’t the two of you just leave me alone?” Laura suddenly burst into tears.

“Thanks a lot, Adam,” Lil growled. “NOW I’m gonna be locked in a jail cell, forced to put up with her bawling and whimpering all day and probably all night as well.”

“Adam, you’re not going to get anything out of those two,” Joe said, his own voice taut with anger. “Pa tried, too, when he found out they, rather Lil. was the one doing the shooting.”

“You’re probably right,” Adam was forced to agree. He sighed and shook his head. “I just don’t understand,” he murmured aloud, addressing no one in particular.

The five of them reached the sheriff’s office in record time. Roy Coffee turned the prisoners, Laura Dayton and Lil Manfred over to his deputy, Clem Foster. Clem immediately escorted both women to the jail cells in the room adjoining Roy’s office.

“You can jail us now, if you want, but Laura and I will be free as a couple of birds by this time tomorrow, Sheriff,” Lil crowed, as Clem literally dragged her back to the jail cell. “You mark my words.”

“Joe . . . Adam, now that we have Mrs. Manfred and Mrs. Dayton handed over to Sheriff Coffee’s tender mercies, why don’t I mosey on down to the clinic and see if Doc Martin’s in?” Candy offered.

“Good idea,” Joe agreed immediately. “The sooner he can check Stacy over ‘n, hopefully, give her a clean bill of health, the better I’m gonna feel.”

“I agree with Joe completely,” Adam said with an emphatic nod of his head.

“We’ll see you back at the house later, Candy,” Joe said.

Candy nodded, then set off.

“What happened to Stacy?” Roy asked anxiously.

“The third shot Mrs. Manfred fired branded the side of Stacy’s head and spooked her horse,” Adam said, scowling. “Blaze Face reared, and sent her tumbling.”

“That bullet brand must’ve knocked her senseless,” Joe said grimly, “or else she would’ve stuck to that saddle like glue, no matter how spooked Blaze Face was.”

“Adam, what happened out there?” Roy asked. He sat down on the chair behind his desk and gestured for the two Cartwright brothers to pull up a couple of chairs.

Adam pulled the nearest chair at hand up close to the desk and sat down. He told Roy everything that happened from the time he, Teresa, Hoss, and Stacy left Ponderosa Plunge and ending with his father and youngest brother coming to their rescue. Roy took careful notes of all that Adam told him.

“Joe?”

Joe sat straddling his chair, resting his head on arms folded atop its back. He started at the sound of his name.

“You all right, Son?”

Joe shook his head to clear it of all the mental cobwebs. “Sorry, Sheriff Coffee. I’m a little worried about Stacy, that’s all.”

“I gotta question for YOU, if I may.”

Joe shrugged. “Sure.”

“How’d you ‘n Ben know Adam an’ the rest were in trouble?”

“We figured something was amiss when their horses showed up in the front yard without ‘em,” Joe replied. “Pa ran in to ask Hop Sing to keep close tabs on our, um . . . houseguest, while I went to the bunk house to get Candy, Hank, and a couple of the other men. We rode out along the main road, and . . . I guess we were about a quarter mile away, if you measure along the curve of the road . . . we heard the sound of rifle fire.”

“Did you know that was your family bein’ fired upon?”

“We didn’t know for sure. We went off the road, and cut through the meadow in back of the trees where Lil and Laura were holed up,” Joe continued. “Lil . . . Mrs. Manfred . . . was so intent on shooting at Adam, Teresa, Hoss, and Stacy, she never saw Pa ‘n me comin’.”

“Mrs. Manfred was the only one doin’ to shootin’?”

“Yeah,” Joe nodded curtly. “Laura wasn’t even armed. We found HER sitting on a fallen log, with her hands tight against her ears.”

“What happened when you ‘n Ben snuck up on ‘em from behind?”

“Pa ordered Mrs. Manfred to drop the rifle. Like I said just now, SHE was the one doing all the shooting. I kept my rifle on her while Pa stepped in and took hers.” Joe’s angry scowl deepened. “Mrs. Manfred told us straight out that she’d been shooting at Adam ‘n Hoss.”

“Adam . . . . ” Roy returned his attention back to the eldest of the Cartwright offspring. “You got any idea as t’ WHY Mrs. Manfred was shootin’ at ya?”

Adam recounted the brief conversation he had with Lil as they rode into Virginia City. He also gave Roy the details of what had transpired the day Lil and Laura drove out to the Ponderosa looking for Peggy.

Roy cast a furtive glance over his shoulder, noting that the doors between his office and the room housing the jail cells had been closed. “Adam, do they . . . . ” he inclined his head in the general direction of the jail cells, “ . . . know where Peggy is, exactly?”

“They never saw her, of course,” Adam said, taking great care to keep his voice low. “When they showed up at the Ponderosa, Pa did pretty much all the talking, and HE never admitted anything. The only thing they have to go on is Lil’s suspicions.”

Roy dutifully made note of that on the pad of paper he used to note down Adam’s testimony. “I’m gonna hafta talk to Ben, Hoss, Teresa, an’ Stacy, too, if she’s up f’r it,” he said, rising. Joe and Adam followed suit.

“Any time, Sheriff,” Joe said quietly. “I’ll let Pa know.”

“I’d offer to buy you a beer, Oldest Brother, but all things considered, I think we oughtta be gettin’ on back,” Joe said as he and Adam untethered their horses from the hitching post in the street, right in front of the sheriff’s office.

“You’re right, about returning home posthaste,” Adam agreed. “As for the beer, you’ve still got the rest of the summer yet.”

“I hope you’re not too put out about Little Sister wanting to go home with Pa, instead of you,” Joe said, as he swung himself up onto Cochise’s saddle.

Adam smiled. “No, I’m well used to THAT,” he said affably.

Joe favored his oldest brother with a puzzled frown. “Oh. You mean because Benjy and Dio want their MOTHER whenever they’re sick or hurt?”

Adam shook his head. “Actually, I was thinking about you and Hoss, back when the two of YOU were Stacy’s age . . . and younger. As I recall both of YOU wanted Pa, too, whenever you were sick or injured.”

Ben, meanwhile, took Stacy home with him on Buck. Through out the entire way home, she rested against him, firmly anchored in place by his left arm wrapped securely around her, drifting in and out of consciousness. Hop Sing and Jacob Cromwell, one of Ben’s most loyal and trusted ranch hands, were on hand to meet him.

“Jacob, is Mitch in the bunkhouse?” Ben asked as he carefully handed Stacy down to the waiting arms of Hop Sing.

“Yes, Sir,” Jacob nodded curtly.

“Ask HIM to look after Buck,” Ben ordered, as he quickly dismounted. “I’d like you to hitch up the buckboard and go back ‘n fetch Hoss, Teresa, and Hank. You’ll find them near that clump of trees, just past the bend in the road.”

“Yes, Sir.”

As Jacob led Buck to the barn, Ben took Stacy back from Hop Sing, and carried her into the house. Hop Sing followed anxiously at his heels.

“What happen to Miss Stacy?”

“I’ll explain later, Hop Sing,” Ben said tersely. “Right now, I need hot water, a little soap, and a wash cloth.”

Ben carried Stacy upstairs to her room, and carefully placed her down on top of her bed. She began to stir again as he set himself to the task of removing her boots

“Pa?”

“I’m right here, Stacy,” Ben said as he placed her boots on the floor, next to the bed. He drew up a chair alongside the bed and took her hand. “You warm enough?”

“Yeah . . . I think . . . . ”

“If you’re feeling chilly, I can put the quilt at the foot of your bed over you.”

Stacy slowly opened her eyes, one at a time, and glanced around at the four walls of her room in complete bewilderment.

“Pa?”

“Yes, Stacy?”

“How’d I get here?”

“I brought you home on Buck. Don’t you remember?”

Stacy frowned, then shook her head. “No . . . . ” she yawned, “I don’t remember very much about . . . about coming home, Pa.”

“You WERE pretty much out if it, Young Woman,” Ben said quietly.

“I remember us leaving Ponderosa Plunge,” Stacy said slowly. “Hoss, me, Adam, and . . . . ” She yawned, “ . . . and Teresa. It was getting late. You know . . . you know how Hop Sing is about eating while it’s hot . . . . ” Her voice drifted away to silence. Her eyelids dropped like a pair of millstones in deep water, and her breathing fell into a slow, regular pattern.

Hop Sing entered the room balancing a bowl of steaming hot water in one hand. A clean washcloth and face towel were draped over his other arm, and in his hand, he carried a cake of soap. “Hop Sing bring hot water,” he announced quietly, as he made his way around to the other side of Stacy’s bed. He placed the bowl down on the night table beside the bed and dipped the washcloth in the water. “Let Miss Stacy sleep not good Mister Cartwright. She fall, maybe hit head. Maybe have . . . . ” he frowned trying to recall the English word he sought.

“Concussion?”

“Concussion! Miss Stacy maybe have concussion.” He carefully sat down on the edge of the bed and began to gingerly wash the blood from Stacy’s cheek and hair.

Stacy stirred and groaned softly. “No! T-too hot,” she protested weakly, as she instinctively raised one hand to push the washcloth away.

Ben took both her hands in his and held them in a gentle, yet firm grip. “It’ll only be a few minutes, Young Woman. Hop Sing’s just cleaning you up a little.”

Stacy winced as Hop Sing began to cleanse the bullet wound on the side of her head.

Hop Sing passed Ben the face towel, then rose. “You dry, Mister Cartwright. Hop Sing take dirty water outside.”

“Alright, Hop Sing.” Ben accepted the proffered face towel and began to blot the side of her face gently. “As for YOU, Young Woman . . . how about sitting up a little more? Hop Sing’s right about keeping you awake.”

Stacy slowly eased herself up to half way between sitting up and lying down. “Pa, I . . . I feel kinda light headed.”

Ben immediately stacked both of her pillows one on top of the other. “That’s it, just lie back down . . . there! Is THAT a little better?”

“A little. Pa?”

“Yes?”

“What happened? I . . . I hurt all over.”

“You were starting to tell ME,” Ben said. “You, Adam, Teresa, and Hoss had just left Ponderosa Plunge. You didn’t want to be late for breakfast.”

“I remember! Hoss took us back to the main road. When we got there? Someone started shooting at us. The last thing I remember after that is Adam telling us to take cover. After that, everything’s hazy . . . . ” Suddenly, she gasped. Ben could see the color literally drain right out of her face and cheeks. “Pa . . . was I . . . . ?” Her voice died away to stunned silence.

“Hit?” Ben quietly filled in the blank. “Yes, but thank the Good Lord that bullet merely grazed the side of your head. I’m more concerned about possible injuries you many have suffered when you took that tumble off of Blaze Face.”

“I f-fell off of Blaze Face?”

Ben nodded. “I asked Joe and Candy to fetch Doc Martin back here to check you over, make sure you haven’t injured seriously.”

“Oh no!” she groaned, her voice breaking.

Ben saw very clearly that she was on the edge of tears. “Don’t worry, Stacy,” he smiled, and gave her hand a gentle, reassuring squeeze. “You’re going to be just fine. I want Doc Martin to check you over as a precaution, that’s all.”

“I . . . I know I’m gonna be ok, Pa, . . . but will I be ok in three weeks?”

“Three weeks?!” Ben echoed, favoring his daughter with a bewildered frown. “What’s . . . in three weeks?”

“The Independence Day Race! I’m riding Sun Dancer!”

Heartened by her deep concern over her fitness to participate in the upcoming Independence Day Race, Ben’s smile broadened. “We’re going to have to see what Doc Martin has to say about that, Young Woman,” he said firmly.

Stacy lapsed into a sullen silence, mixed with a healthy dose of apprehension and concern. “Pa?” she ventured at length.

“What is it, Stacy?”

“If Doc Martin tells me I can’t ride Sun Dancer . . . I’ll . . . I’ll . . . so help me, I’ll hunt down whoever it was shooting at us and give ‘im a real big taste of his own medicine.”

“Uncle Ben? Stacy?”

Ben and Stacy both turned and saw Peggy standing in the open doorway. “Come on in, Peggy,” the latter invited. Ben quietly rose and drew up a chair next to Stacy’s bed. He invited her to sit down with a gesture.

“Thank you, Uncle Ben,” Peggy said gratefully, as she entered the room. She walked the short distance from the open door to the chair and sat down. “Are . . . are you ok, Stacy? I saw Uncle Ben carrying you into the house a little while ago.”

“I, uh . . . . had a little bit of a mishap when I was out riding with Hoss, Adam, and Teresa earlier,” Stacy said evasively.

“Did you just say something about someone . . . sh-shooting at you?”

“Well, uhh . . . yeah,” Stacy admitted reluctantly. “

“Oh m-my God . . . I . . . I hope it wasn’t--- Oh, Stacy, WAS it Brett?”

“No,” Ben shook his head and he carefully sat himself back down on the edge of Stacy’s bed.

“Thank God,” Peggy murmured, her voice barely audible.

“Peggy, it WAS your Aunt Lil,” Ben said quietly.

“Aunt Lil?” Peggy echoed, incredulous.

Ben nodded.

“What about my mother?”

“She was there, although I don’t think she was doing any shooting.”

Peggy shook her head. “Mother’d never shoot anybody. She’s scared to death of guns . . . and just about everything ELSE. Uncle Ben?”

“Yes, Peggy?”

“Where are they now? Aunt Lil and Mother?”

“Adam, Joe, and Candy took them to the Virginia City jail,” Ben said quietly. “I’m afraid one of the charges against Lil is going to be attempted murder.”

“I’ve always known Aunt Lil was a hard woman, capable of a lot of terrible, underhanded things,” Peggy said apologetically. “But I never dreamed she could actually be capable of murder. Oh, Stacy, I . . . I’m s-so- sorry . . . . ”

“Peggy, it’s not YOUR fault,” Stacy said earnestly.

“Excuse me!” Peggy rose and fled from the room, leaving Ben and Stacy staring after her, helplessly.

“I’m sorry, Pa, I . . . I didn’t WANT to tell her . . . . ”

“YOU didn’t. I’M the one who told her.”

This drew a puzzled, bewildered look from Stacy.

“I told Peggy because the truth has its own way of making itself known,” Ben said quietly, answering the why question unspoken, yet still posed by the look on Stacy’s face. “It’s usually a lot easier in the long run to be up front and honest right from the start.”

“Even times like now?”

“ESPECIALLY times like now.”

Downstairs, the front door opened, then closed. Ben and Stacy exchanged apprehensive glances.

“PA?!” It was Hoss.

Ben exhaled a long, slow sigh of relief, and with it a heartfelt prayer of thanks. “UP HERE, SON!” he yelled back.

Hoss and Teresa appeared a few moments later. “I’m glad t’ see you’re lookin’ none t’ worse f’r wear, Li’l Sister,” the former said smiling. “How’re y’ feelin’?”

“My whole body still hurts,” Stacy replied, “and I’ve got a real humdinger of a headache, but I’m not feeling sleepy anymore . . . . ”

“I think she’s too worried right now to sleep,” Ben said, trying his best not to smile.

“Oh? What about?” Teresa asked, favoring Stacy with a bemused look.

“That Doc Martin’s going to tell her she can’t ride Sun Dancer in the Independence Day Race this year,” Ben said.

“If he does, Li’l Sister, it ain’t the end of the world,” Hoss said. “There’s always NEXT year.”

“I know, but that’s a WHOLE YEAR away,” Stacy said dejectedly.

“Ben, is Peggy in her room?” Teresa asked quietly.

“Yes, I was getting ready to go look in on her, when you and Hoss came in,” Ben said regretfully. “Teresa, she . . . knows . . . all about Lil Manfred shooting at you earlier, and I’m afraid it’s upset her terribly.”

“I’ll see to Peggy,” Teresa promised. “You stay here with Hoss and Stacy.”

“If there’s anything I can do . . . . ”

“I’ll let you know, Ben,” she promised.

Teresa went back down stairs, and a few moments later, found herself standing before the closed door of the guest room down on the first floor. She knocked.

No answer.

Teresa knocked again. “Peggy?”

“Yes?” a small voice answered from within.

“Peggy, it’s Teresa. May I come in?”

“If you want to,” came the indifferent reply.

Teresa opened the door and stepped inside. She found Peggy lying down on the bed, with her back to the door. Teresa walked over to the bed and carefully seated herself on the edge. “Peggy . . . . ” she reached out and gently touched the younger woman’s shoulder.

Peggy turned. Teresa knew from the red cheeks, standing out in stark contrast against a pallid face, the red swollen eyelids, and the unusual brightness of her eyes, that Peggy had just now been crying. “Teresa, I . . . I c-can’t stay here,” she sobbed. “N-not now, not after . . . after wh-what happened to Stacy . . . and the r-rest of you.”

“Peggy, you’re NOT to blame for what happened this morning,” Teresa said in a brisk, firm, no nonsense tone of voice. She frowned. “Surely Stacy didn’t accuse you . . . . ”

“No! She even went so far as to tell me it wasn’t my fault, but . . . it IS, Teresa. It IS! If I wasn’t here, my aunt wouldn’t have been out on the road this morning taking pot shots at you.”

“You’re not responsible for your aunt’s actions.”

“Aren’t I?”

“No, you’re not.”

Peggy exhaled a short, curt frustrated sigh. “I should NEVER have come here.”

“You did the absolute right thing in coming here, Peggy. That night you left, you knew you had friends here, who would be more than willing to help you. We . . . all of us . . . still want to help you.”

“You could get killed.”

“If you left here, where would you go?”

“Back,” Peggy replied in a stone cold monotone.

“You surely don’t mean back to Brett.”

“It was a mistake to have left in the first place.”

Teresa closed her eyes and forced herself to take slow, deep even breaths. “Peggy, what about your baby?”

“I told Adam yesterday. If I go back now, Brett will treat me like an absolute queen,” Peggy explained. “He won’t be able to apologize enough. He’ll be kind and attentive. I know . . . it doesn’t last, but . . . his business surely must be close to winding up. It HAS to be. Mister van Slyke, Brett’s father, promised me we wouldn’t be here for any longer than a month. That month is almost up.”

“Peggy . . . . ”

Peggy, her face set with a grim, fatalistic resignation, held up her hand. “No, Teresa, let me finish.”

“All right,” Teresa agreed through clenched teeth.

“I figure Brett’s nice period, as I call it, should last until we get back to San Francisco,” she continued. “After we get back, I . . . I can ask my father-in-law to help me.”

“Peggy, do you know anything the nature of the business that brought Brett to Placerville? Anything at ALL?!”

“Mister van Slyke told me that there was some trouble back home in San Francisco, and that Brett’s name had come up in connection with it,” Peggy said. “He has property outside of Placerville. He told me it would be best if Brett looked after business matters here, while he took care of things back home.”

“You don’t know any details about the trouble back home?”

“That’s all Mister van Slyke told me. That Brett’s name had come up in connection with . . . some kind of trouble, and it would be best if Brett left town for a little while.” Peggy sighed, then added bitterly, “I’m pretty sure it had to do with another woman. ALL of Brett’s troubles have to do with another woman!”

“What business matters did Mister van Slyke want Brett to look into while he was in Placerville?”

“I don’t know.”

Teresa looked over at Peggy askance.

“Neither Brett nor his father have ever discussed business matters with me.”

“Did you ever ask?”

“Yes, when Brett and I were first married. Mister van Slyke told me they never discussed business matters with women.”

“Not even their wives?”

“No.”

“Is the name Rosemary O’Malley familiar to you?”

Peggy shook her head. “No. Why should it be? And why are you asking me all these questions?”

“I’ll be right back.” Teresa rose and walked out to Ben’s desk. She yanked open the bottom drawer, on the right, the force of her movements nearly pulling the drawer out completely. Looking inside, she immediately located and pulled out a large, unsealed envelope labeled “van Slyke” in Ben’s strong, unmistakable hand, before slamming the drawer shut.

She returned to the guest room, her scowl dark as the clouds of an approaching thunderstorm. “Here!” she tossed the envelope down on the bed in front of Peggy. “Inside are clippings from what I assume to be from a newspaper in San Francisco. They’ll shed some light on the exact nature of the ‘business’ that brought Brett to Placerville.” She paused. “After you’ve read them, Peggy, let’s see if you’re still of a mind to go back to Brett.” With that, she angrily left the room.

A knock on the front door stopped Teresa in her tracks, mid-stride. She walked over to the door, pausing to gingerly remove Ben’s gun from its holster. It had been a few years since she had last indulged in any target practice, but she still knew how to use the weapon in her hand. She hoped and prayed she would find the inner wherewithal to do so, should circumstances prove necessary.

The caller without knocked again.

“Who is it?” Teresa asked in as steady a voice as she could muster.

“Doctor Paul Martin.”

Teresa heaved a heartfelt sigh of relief as she returned Ben’s gun to its holster. She opened the door, and stood aside gesturing for the sawbones to enter. “Come in, Doctor. Stacy’s upstairs.”

“Thank you, Teresa.”

Teresa dutifully escorted the doctor upstairs, where Ben and Hoss still remained.

“Paul, come in,” Ben invited rising. “We’re pretty sure Stacy wasn’t seriously injured . . . . ”

“Ben, I’M the doctor here, I’LL make that determination,” Paul said sternly. “Now why don’t you and Hoss g’won and wait downstairs. Teresa?”

“Yes, Doctor?”

“I’d like YOU to remain, if you would. In case I need assistance.”

“Certainly.”

“I’ll be up a little later to check up on you, Stacy,” Ben promised.

“OK, Pa.”

Ben gave his daughter a reassuring smile and gentle squeeze of the hand before leaving the room with Hoss. Father and son silently walked down the steps, single file, the former leading.

“May as well see if I can get LAST month’s figures to finally balance,” Ben murmured as he turned at the bottom of the steps and walked over toward his desk.

Hoss reluctantly followed, while silently praying with each step that Doc Martin’s examination would move along swiftly. He quietly pulled up a chair alongside the desk, while his father began to add the expenditure column yet again.

An uneasy silence reigned.

The door of the guest room opened. Hoss glanced up, favoring Peggy with a warm, reassuring smile, as she ventured hesitantly out into the great room. He waved her over, while, at the same time putting his first finger to his lips.

“DAMN!” The expletive exploded from Ben’s lips, shattering the tense silence that had settled over them. Both Peggy and Hoss jumped as Ben threw the pencil in hand across the desk in angry frustration.

Peggy’s involuntary cry of alarm caused Ben’s head to snap up. As his eyes met Peggy’s, now round with wary apprehension, his anger and frustration underwent a swift and immediate transformation to remorse. “Peggy, I . . . I’m sorry,” he stammered out an apology, as he stepped from around the desk. “I should know better than to try adding figures when I’m worried about someone . . . . ”

“Stacy?”

“Yes.”

“That was quite a spill she took fallin’ off Blaze Face,” Hoss agreed, “but I think I’m MORE worried about what’s gonna happen if Doc Martin says she can’t ride in that race comin’ up in three weeks.”

Ben rolled his eyes heavenward. “I don’t want to even THINK about THAT,” he said soberly. He, then, turned and gave Peggy a warm, reassuring. “Peggy, why don’t you come on over and join us. No more adding columns, I promise.”

“Uncle Ben . . . would you mind if I had a look?”

Ben pondered for a moment, then shrugged. “Why not?” he decided as he and Peggy walked over toward the desk. “Sure can’t hurt.”

“I like playing with numbers,” she said, taking the chair behind the desk. “When Aunt Lil found THAT out, she made me her bookkeeper, telling me it was high time one of us Daytons made herself useful. I enjoyed doing it.” She lapsed into silence as began to add the long column of figures.

Ben and Hoss both watched anxiously over her shoulder. Peggy finished adding the numbers in short order, then compared her total to Ben’s.

“Well, that now makes NINE times that column’s been added, with NINE different totals to show for it,” Ben said feeling a surge of perverse satisfaction.

Peggy picked up the slip of paper with Ben’s grand total number eight and compared it with her own. She mentally subtracted Ben’s from hers. “I come up with a difference of eighty-one dollars,” she said slowly. “That means one of us has probably transposed something.”

Ben frowned. “How do you know THAT?”

“The difference . . . eighty-one dollars, is divisible by nine. Uncle Ben?”

“Yes?”

“Did you add the figures in your head or on paper to get this total?”

“By the time I arrived at THAT figure, I was writing it out on paper,” Ben said ruefully. “You’ll probably find it in the trash can over there, on your right.”

“I’ll find it,” Hoss said. He picked up the small trash can, and after a few moments rummaging, found the paper with Ben’s addition. “Here y’ are, Peggy.”

She accepted the paper from Hoss. Lying it on the desk next to the sheet with her own addition, she glanced down both columns very carefully. “Here it is, Uncle Ben,” Peggy said, pointing to a figure just past the center on both sheets. “I show this as three hundred and nine dollars, you show it as three hundred ninety.” She immediately checked the ledger itself. “You have three hundred nine dollars entered here . . . uhh, where do you keep the receipts?”

Ben leaned over and grabbed the pile sitting at the edge of the desk, directly in front of the place where Peggy sat. She nodded her thanks as he set the pile directly in front of her. “According to the receipt, that figure’s three hundred and nine dollars.” She looked up at Ben with a satisfied smile. “Your expenditures balance, Uncle Ben.”

“Well, I’ll be dadburned! Peggy, you’re a genius!” Hoss proclaimed, awestruck.

Even Ben couldn’t help smiling. “Peggy, if you’d like to take a crack at the income, you’re more than welcome. I haven’t even started on that.”

“Sure!” Peggy readily agreed. “I’ll start on it right after supper.”

“That’ll be fine!”

“It sure will!” Hoss voiced his own heartfelt agreement. “I can live with Pa tryin’ to make those dadburned ledgers balance, OR I can live with Li’l Sister upstairs bein’ told she can’t be in that race in three weeks. But, I sure as shootin’ can’t stomach the idea of livin’ with BOTH.”

“Oh come on, Hoss . . . I’m not THAT bad . . . am I?”

“Pa, y’ taught us, all four o’ us t’ tell the truth no matter what, right?”

“Of course.”

“Pa? Y’ ARE that bad . . . maybe even WORSE.”

“Uncle Ben?”

He turned his attention to Peggy, still seated at the desk, hoping against hope for a change of subject. “Yes, Peggy?”

“Speaking of Stacy . . . is she going to be alright?”

“As you probably know, Doctor Martin’s with her now, but I expect good news,” Ben said quietly. “I asked him to check her over as more of a precautionary measure than anything else.”

“Thank goodness . . . that she’s going to be alright, I mean.”

“Peggy, I want YOU to know that what happened out there with Lil is NOT your fault,” Ben’s voice was very quiet, and firm as granite with conviction. “LIL’S the one who decided to take pot shots at Hoss, Stacy, Adam, and Teresa, NOT you.”

“So everyone keeps telling me,” Peggy said ruefully.

“ . . . and so everyone’s going to keep on telling you until you get it through your head,” Ben said gently.

“I . . . I know you have to press charges against Aunt Lil, but what about Mother? What’s going to happen to HER?”

“Laura . . . your mother . . . wasn’t doing any of the shooting,” Ben said. “She didn’t even have a rifle. The worst that COULD happen is that she might be charged as an accessory to what Lil did.”

“Peggy, I’M not inclined t’ press any charges against your ma,” Hoss spoke up for the first time. “Pa, I hope that doesn’t getcha upset with me . . . . ”

“Not at all, Hoss.” Ben shook his head, not surprised. This gentle giant he was privileged to call son couldn’t carry a grudge in a bucket.

“I can’t speak f’r Stacy, Adam, ‘n Teresa . . . . ” An amused smile tugged at the corner of his mouth, “except t’ say that Li’l Sister upstairs might go after your Aunt Lil herself with a pot full o’ tar ‘n a sack full o’ feathers if Doc Martin tells her she can’t ride in that race in three weeks.”

“I’m beginning to think someone SHOULD’VE tarred and feathered Aunt Lil years ago,” Peggy said. The thought prompted a bare hint of a smile.

“The way she was the other day, all the stuff she’s done to you AND your ma, now this business o’ shootin’ at us . . . . ” Hoss shook his head. “Well, it seems t’ me, she’s turned just plain ol’ mean somewhere along t’ way. But your ma ain’t like that, not if she’s still the way I remember her.”

“She is, pretty much,” Peggy said in a small, sad voice.

“I know your ma had her problems, Peggy, but I also know she didn’t have one single mean bone in her whole body.”

“I know. That’s why . . . even with everything that’s happened, everything she may have done or not done, I could never, ever bring myself to hate her,” Peggy said ruefully. “I think I feel sorry for her more than anything else.”

“Ben?” It was Paul Martin, standing near the bottom of the stairs.

Hoss rose from the chair he occupied. He, Ben, and Peggy all turned their attention to Doctor Martin.

Paul walked over, with his black bag in hand, and stood in front of the desk, where Peggy sat. Ben walked around to meet him. “That daughter of yours is very lucky, Ben. Fortunately, that bullet brand must’ve knocked her out, so when she fell off her horse, her body was limp when she hit the ground. Had she been conscious, she would’ve tensed more ‘n likely, which could’ve contributed to some potentially serious injuries.”

“Doc, if Stacy’d been conscious, she wouldn’t have fallen off blaze Face at all,” Hoss said quietly.

“I won’t argue with you, Hoss,” Paul said. “In any case, she didn’t break anything, she can walk just fine. She’s got a lump on the back of her head the size of a hen’s egg . . . probably from hitting a rock or the ground. As for the bullet brand, fortunately, it was only a superficial wound. I washed the wound again, applied a salve, then bandaged it. Other than that, Stacy’s going to have some nasty looking bruises for the better part of a week or so, AND she’s going to be plenty stiff ‘n sore.”

“That last might not be such a bad thing, if ya think about it, Doc,” Hoss said affably. “If Li’l Sister up there’s feelin’ stiff ‘n sore, she just might be inclined t’ sit still long enough t’ get herself better.”

“You said it, Hoss, I didn’t.” Paul’s wry tone gave strong indication that he had at least given thought to what Hoss had just voiced. “Ben, would you mind seeing me out? I have a few instructions.”

“Sure, Paul,” Ben agreed. After exhorting Hoss and Peggy to sit still, he quietly followed the doctor out to his buggy.

Paul opened his bag and drew out a tube of salve. “I want you to change Stacy’s bandage twice a day, when she gets up in the morning and at suppertime would be good,” he said, all business. “When you change the bandage, apply this generously to the wound.”

Ben nodded as he took the tube of salve from the doctor.

Paul imparted the remainder of his instructions. “Any questions?”

“One. The Independence Day Race is coming up in three weeks, as you know . . . . ”

Paul nodded and smiled. “You want to know if Stacy can ride that big palomino.”

“Yes.”

“I want to see her again in about a week, Ben, just to make certain everything’s alright. I’ll give you an answer then.”

“Thanks a lot, Paul. To say that a whole week of not knowing’s going to try her patience is the understatement of the year.”

“WHAT patience?”

Ben smiled. “You have a point.”

“Don’t be so smug, Ben. I’ve known you to be even worse than Stacy is,” Paul retorted with mock severity. “Also . . . you MIGHT tell that hard headed young woman upstairs that if she does what I tell her, she’ll stand a better chance of my telling her she can ride in that race in three weeks.”

“I’ll keep that in mind.”

“Ben . . . . ”

“What is it, Paul?” he queried, picking up on the doctor’s change in demeanor.

“I heard from Doctor Phillips in San Francisco this morning.”

“And?”

“I wish I had as good news about this as I did about Stacy,” Paul said somberly. “According to this Doctor Phillips, it seems Peggy’s father-in-law called for a hearing to determine whether or not she’s mentally competent.”

Stunned by this revelation, all Ben could do was stare over at Paul, dumbfounded.

“Ben, the judge found Peggy to be mentally incompetent,” Paul said grimly. “Her husband was granted full custody.”

“WHAT?” Ben roared the minute he found his voice. “Paul, she’s no more insane than . . . than you and I are!”

“I agree with you one hundred percent.”

“I . . . I don’t understand this! How could they possibly hold such a hearing without Peggy even being there to defend herself?”

“Money talks, Ben, and from what little I’ve heard, the van Slyke family has enough to do a powerful lot of talking.”

“Especially in San Francisco,” Ben said through clenched teeth.
“Fortunately, for Peggy, WE’RE not in San Francisco.”

“What are you going to do, Ben?”

“Two things. First thing tomorrow morning, I’m going to ride into town and talk with Lucas.”

“I’ll see that he gets Doctor Phillips’ telegram when I return. What’s the second thing you’re going to do?”

“The second thing I’m going to do is turn Peggy over to that monster, Brett van Slyke, when hell freezes over.”

That night Ben lay in bed, flat on his back, staring up toward the ceiling. The relentless tick . . . tock . . . tick . . . tock of the clock hanging on the wall opposite his bed sounded for all the world like Sam Hill striking his anvil. Just as loud, just as strident. He heard the grandfather clock downstairs strike midnight, then one, followed by two . . . .

Ben sat up, and angrily threw aside the covers. He stood and felt for the bathrobe he kept hanging on the post at the head of his bed. The instant his fingers touched it, he snatched it up with a broad sweep of his arm, slipped it on.

At the top landing, Ben paused, noting the telltale flicker of lamplight that seemed to emanate from over next to the fireplace. He slowly, cautiously made his way down the stairs.

“Good evening, Pa. Or perhaps I should say good morning.” It was Adam, similarly attired in nightshirt and robe. He sat on the middle of the settee, with a glass of brandy on the coffee table in front of him, untouched by all appearances. “You couldn’t sleep either, I see . . . . ”

Ben shook his head. “I got tired of lying in the bed, staring up at the ceiling, listening to the clock down here striking every quarter hour. I thought maybe a glass of brandy might help.”

Adam picked up the full glass in front of him and offered it to his father. “Here. Be my guest.”

“That’s alright, I can get my own glass.”

“Suit yourself. The two I’ve already had haven’t helped . . . as you can see.”

Ben walked over and sat down on the red chair. “Peggy took this latest bit of bad news better than I though she would, given how upset she was when she found out Lil Manfred was the one shooting at the four of you,” he remarked casually.

“Teresa told me that Peggy was pretty adamant about going back, after what happened this morning,” Adam said somberly. “Peggy and I had pretty much the same conversation early yesterday morning, but . . . I thought I had convinced her otherwise.”

“Those articles from San Francisco gave Peggy pause at any rate.”

Adam nodded. A mirthless half smile pulled at the corner of his mouth. “Peggy’s insistence on going back to Brett must have been a bit more than my loving wife could stomach. Teresa and I had initially agreed we weren’t going to show Peggy those articles, unless we absolutely had to.”

“Teresa must’ve felt she absolutely had to.”

“At any rate, with this latest development, Peggy knows now that there’s no going back. The only thing she CAN do now is fight it out.”

“Yeah.”

“So. What’re we going to do, Pa?”

“I’m riding into town first thing in the morning to see Lucas. Do you want to come along?”

“Yes, just so long we have enough men here to protect Peggy while you and I are gone.

“I’ll ask Hoss and Joe to keep close to home while we’re gone. Jacob Cromwell and half dozen of the men are out checking the fences on the north pastures. The rest are out in the bunkhouse. I think, for the next few days at least, we can find plenty of work for ‘em to do close by.”

The two men lapsed into silence for a time, each wrapped up in his own thoughts.

“Adam?” Ben broke the silence a few moments after the grandfather clock chimed the quarter before the hour of three.

“Yeah, Pa?”

“Are you going to press charges against Laura?”

“I don’t know,” Adam shrugged. “I’ve been turning that question over and over in my mind . . . ever since Joe and I left Sheriff Coffee’s office yesterday morning. I’m no closer to a satisfactory answer NOW than I was then.”

“When Joe and I came upon them, Lil was the one holding the rifle,” Ben said quietly. “Laura . . . . ” He sighed and shook his head. “She was just sitting there on a fallen log, her arms wrapped tightly around herself, staring up at me like a lost, frightened child.”

“She’s always been a lost, frightened child . . . in one way or another. Right after Frank died, I wanted to take her in, protect and shelter her . . . see to it that nothing bad ever happened to her . . . or to Peggy . . . ever again.”

“I think a lot of people felt that way toward Laura, Adam.”

“But, most people weren’t in position to ACT on it, as I was,” Adam said contritely. “Frank wasn’t even cold in the grave before I stepped in, started advising her on financial and business matters, giving orders to her ranch hands, firing her foreman, telling her how to raise Peggy . . . . ”

“As I recall, Laura ASKED for your advice regarding business and financial matters, her ranch hands were for all intents and purposes getting paid to sit around, drink, and play cards all day, and her foreman refused to follow through on the few orders she DID give. You were ALSO concerned . . . and rightly so . . . about the fact that Laura hadn’t at that time told Peggy her father was dead,” Ben adroitly recited the litany.

“If I had REALLY been as smart as I thought I was, I wouldn’t have interfered, Pa. I would’ve forced Laura to stand on her own two feet. Both she AND Peggy would have been a lot better off right now if I had.”

“Hind sight is often far clearer than foresight, but not in this case.”

Adam glanced over at his father sharply.

“If YOU hadn’t stepped in, someone else WOULD have.”

“How can you be so sure?”

“A woman, and a man, too, for that matter, needs a certain core of inner strength in order to pull themselves up and stand on their own two feet. Call it gut instinct, but I don’t think Laura ever had that kind of inner resource . . . not then and certainly not now,” Ben said somberly. “If YOU hadn’t stepped in, Laura would have turned to someone else. And that someone else may have been unscrupulous enough to take advantage of her.”

“As Lil has,” Adam said with a touch of bitterness.

“Yes, but I’m sure Laura has equally taken advantage of her aunt, too, over the years.”

“I know. I can see how that would be. I think what really galls me is that Peggy’s the one suffering all the consequences.”

“We’re going to find a way, Son, to free Peggy from her husband and his family, once and for all,” Ben said with quiet conviction. “I can’t tell you right now, how that’s all going to work out, but I do know this. Peggy DOES have that inner core of strength to fight, not only for herself, but for her baby.”

“Yes, Pa. I know that.”

“The only problem is . . . PEGGY needs to know that.”

Lark Meredith rose shortly before sunrise, dreading the horrendous day that lay ahead. As of late last night, he had gone down to the desk and checked one last time before finally retiring at shortly past one in the morning. There had been no further word from Horace van Slyke. He had used money from his own pocket to purchase that one way ticket to Carson City for Mrs. Dressler, then sent a messenger to their home instructing them to pick up the ticket at the Overland Stage Office.

Lark had also withdrawn all that remained of his own personal savings and left it at the Overland Stage office, sealed in an envelope with Cameron Dressler’s name hastily scrawled on the front. There was also a note inside instructing the lodge caretaker to purchase the necessary supplies, enough staples to see them through until Horace van Slyke released the funds deposited in the bank here in Placerville.

Last night, Brett van Slyke had thrown a royal fit to end all fits along with everything else he could lay his hands on, when Lark told him of the plans to relocate to the lodge. The screaming, the obscenities, the unholy ruckus brought Nathan Jamison to the door in very short order . . . .

“MISTER MEREDITH, THIS IS FAR WORSE THAN ANY OF THE PREVIOUS INCIDENTS,” Nathan had to shout at the top of his lungs in order to be heard. “I WANT MISTER VAN SLYKE AND EVERYONE ELSE IN HIS PARTY OUT OF HERE IMMEDIATELY.”

Lark stepped out into the hallway, and closed the door firmly behind him, leaving Hoyt to deal with the rampaging younger van Slyke. “We have an agreement, Mister Jamison,” he tersely reminded the manager. “Check out is tomorrow morning at eleven sharp. We are not budging until then.”

“You have fifteen minutes to quiet Mister van Slyke down,” Jamison countered in a cold, angry tone. “In SIXTEEN minutes, I send someone to fetch the sheriff, and THIS time, I can assure you, charges WILL be pressed. Do I make myself clear, Mister Meredith?”

“As glass,” Lark snapped.

It took the better part of the next half hour to finally quiet the raging young man. True to his promise, Nathan Jamison sent for the sheriff sixteen minutes later. He reappeared at the door to Brett van Slyke’s room, his face a veritable black thundercloud of fury, with the lawman in tow.

“SHERIFF, I DEMAND THAT YOU ARREST THAT MAN!” Nathan screamed at the top of his voice.

“WHAT’S THE CHARGE?”

“WILLFUL DESTRUCTION OF PRIVATE PROPERTY, DISTURBING THE PEACE, ASSAULT AND BATTERY . . . . ”

Again, Lark had left his employer’s son to the tender mercies of Hoyt Pyle, in order to deal with the hotel manager and the sheriff.

“Sheriff, Mister van Slyke is going through a horrendously difficult time,” Lark pointedly ignored Nathan Jamison. “His pregnant wife was been missing since the night of his birthday party, his father in San Francisco is ailing . . . . ”

“From what I saw of that room the night before Mrs. van Slyke’s disappearance, she was probably murdered by her husband and her body dumped into the waters of Lake Tahoe,” Nathan said, his voice dripping with acid sarcasm.

“One more remark like that, Mister Jamison, and so help me, I’ll haul your sorry ass into court and sue you for slander,” Lark rounded on the small, wiry man, furiously.

“Mister Meredith’s right,” the sheriff said blandly. “Remarks like that ain’t helpful.”

This drew an icy, withering glare from the hotel manager.

“Tell ya what,” the sheriff drawled. “I’ll go through, make note of all damages AND lost business due to the fracas, then I’ll sit down with Mister Jamison here and figure up how much it’ll cost t’ fix or replace. Seein’ as how Mister van Slyke’s understandably distraught, with his wife still missin’, he’s free t’ go, IF he pays the damages, and for any lost business. Is that fair ‘nuff?”

“I suppose it’ll HAVE to do,” Nathan said, taking no pains to conceal his anger and his disdain.

“Alright, then s’pose we go ‘n see . . . . ” The sheriff reached out to open the door to Brett van Slyke’s room.

The door opened just enough for Hoyt Pyle to stick his head through, before the sheriff could so much as touch the doorknob. His hair was mussed, and his face white as a sheet. A rivulet of blood poured freely from a cut on the lower lip. “Mister Meredith, I . . . I can’t manage him. Y’ gotta get a sawbones to knock him out, quick!”

“I’ll go,” the sheriff grunted.

The local doctor came and heavily sedated the raging young man. It took the combined efforts of Lark Meredith, Hoyt Pyle, Nathan Jamison, a bellhop, and three big, strapping men, who happened to be guests, to hold Brett van Slyke down.

Nathan Jamison, his jacket torn, and his tie missing, turned and favored Lark Meredith with a look meant to kill. “Eleven o’clock tomorrow morning, Mister Meredith,” he said in a low, quiet voice that sent a shiver racing down the length of Lark’s spine. “Not one second longer . . . . ”

Lark quickly washed, shaved, and dressed. He thought for a moment of running down to the hotel restaurant for a bite of breakfast, then decided against it. The sooner Brett van Slyke was moved to his new lodging and secured there, the better for all concerned. He quickly packed up his razor, cup, and shaving soap, and set his luggage, a single, well worn carpet bag next to the door. Grabbing his off-white hat from its place on the dresser, he left the room and made his way down stairs to the front desk, hoping that a telegram from San Francisco waited.

“Sorry, Mister Meredith,” the hotel clerk, a middle aged gentlemen by the name of Morty Convers shook his head. “No messages in your box.”

“Thank you, Mister Convers,” Lark sighed.

“I understand Mister van Slyke is checking out this morning.” The man’s face and tone were carefully neutral.

“Yes. Mister van Slyke decided to take time off and do some fishing,” Lark lied. “We’re headed for the lodge.”

“Any word as to the whereabouts of MRS. van Slyke?”

“I have reason to believe that she’s visiting with friends. She’ll be joining her husband at the lodge in a few days.”

“I will begin preparing your bill now, Mister Meredith. It will be ready when Mister van Slyke comes down to check out.”

Lark nodded curtly, then trudged back upstairs to the room, occupied by Brett van Slyke. He paused outside the closed door, and knocked.

“Come in, Meredith.”

Lark was mildly surprised to hear Brett’s voice. He opened the door and stepped inside. His employer’s son was up, and very nattily dressed in a gray linen three piece summer suit. “I’m almost ready,” Brett said as he ran a brush through his thick, wavy hair.

“Where’s Mister Pyle?” Lark asked warily. The big caretaker was nowhere to be seen.

“I sent him to the bank with a draft,” Brett replied.

“Y-you sent him . . . t-to the bank?” Lark echoed, stunned. “You can’t cash a bank draft without your father’s ok . . . . ”

“I’ve got Father’s permission to withdraw funds. He sent his ok to loosen up the money bags at the bank in a telegram this morning.”

Lark felt as though he had just taken a hard blow to his solar plexus.

Brett reached into the inside pocket of his jacket, removed a folded piece of paper and carelessly tossed it down on the bed. “Read for yourself.”

Lark picked up the paper and slowly unfolded it:

“Brett [stop]

Releasing funds at First Mercantile [stop] Use what you need [stop] Second wire following [stop] Present to Horace McGreevy at bank [stop]

Hearing on mental competency of wife held [stop] Declared mentally incompetent [stop] Placed in your custody [stop]

Wire on arrival in Virginia City [stop]

Father [stop; end of message]”

Lark lowered the telegram with trembling hand, his face pale and eyes round with horror. “V-Virginia City? We’re n-not going to Virginia . . . City?”

Brett’s lips slowly curved upward, forming a malevolent smile, as he turned from the mirror over his dresser. “Oh. Didn’t I tell you, Meredith? There’s been a change of plans. We’re not going to that damned lodge stuck out in the middle of nowhere. We . . . ARE . . . going to Virginia City.”

“Now look here . . . . ”

The smile faded into a glare of venomous, bitter hatred. “No, Meredith, YOU look here. We’re going to Virginia City so’s I can fetch back my pretty Peggy, all nice ‘n legal.”

“Mister van Slyke, I said we were going to do this MY way,” Lark said, his jaw tightening with anger and apprehension.

“I gave you three days to do it YOUR way, Meredith. As of this morning, we do it MY way.”

Lark blanched. “N-no, don’t . . . n-not like that . . . . ”

“I said we’re fetching MY wife back . . . MY way,” Brett maintained with a grim, stubborn determination.

“You don’t have to do it THAT way. Didn’t you read this telegram? She’s been placed in YOUR custody! You don’t have to do this.”

“Oh! There’s something else I forgot t’ tell you, Meredith.” He reached into his pocket and whipped out a small pistol. “You’re fired.” With that, he squeezed the trigger.

Lark Meredith’s face contorted with agony as the bullet from Brett’s pistol ripped into his abdomen. He collapsed to the floor, his arms wrapped protectively around his wound, now bleeding profusely. Brett noiselessly dropped to his knees beside Lark and removed the latter’s pistol from its holster. Rising to his feet, he fired toward the outside wall, then removed the remaining ammunition.

“Brett . . . p-lease . . . don’t d-do this. G-go to the sh-sheriff, please. Sh-show him your papers . . . he’ll h-have to . . . have t-to help you . . . . ”

“I don’t need no sheriff or no damn papers,” Brett said coldly as he tossed Lark’s gun down on the floor within reach, “and I sure as hell don’t need YOU.”

A loud, frantic pounding on the door drew a sharp glance from Brett. “Who is it?”

“Hoyt Pyle, Mister van Slyke.”

“Come in.”

Hoyt opened the door and walked in. “I have the money you--- ” He abruptly stopped mid-sentence, upon seeing Lark Meredith lying on the floor, ominously still, blood flowing freely up under the hand clutching the wound.

“Get the sheriff, Pyle,” Brett said quietly, as he held out his hand for the money.

Hoyt handed over the cash. “Wh-what happened, Sir? Are you alright?”

“Meredith and I got into a . . . disagreement over our travel plans for today. He pulled a gun and fired. I fired back. I had no choice.”

Another knock on the door, loud and insistent, drew Hoyt’s attention from Brett and Lark.

“Yes? Who is it?”

“Mister van Slyke, I am Mister Jamison, hotel manager. I have the sheriff with me.”

“N-no . . . lying! H-he’s . . . lying,” Lark protested, his feebleness increasing.

Brett delivered a hard, swift kick to the small of Lark’s back. The wounded man gasped. A soft gurgle issued from somewhere deep in his throat, an instant before he lost consciousness.

“Let them in, Pyle.”

“Yes, Sir.”

Lark Meredith, who incredibly remained alive though unconscious, was carried down to the doctor’s office a block away by the deputy and three strong bell hops from the hotel.

“Sheriff, I want Mister Meredith to receive the best medical care possible,” Brett said earnestly. “You may instruct the doc to send his bills to my attention at the International Hotel in Virginia City. I’ll be THERE for the next two or three days.”

“That’s very magnanimous of you, Mister van Slyke, seein’ as t’ how Mister Meredith tried to KILL you,” the sheriff drawled.

Brett van Slyke frowned, and slowly drew his fingers one by one into a pair of tight, rock hard fists.

“Mister Meredith HAS been under a terrible strain for quite awhile, Sheriff,” Hoyt Pyle immediately stepped in. “Compulsive poker player, has been for years. Doesn’t know when to stop, if you know what I mean?”

The sheriff nodded. “I know whatcha mean all too well, Mister Pyle.”

“The van Slyke family had been covering his debts whenever Mister Meredith got in over his head, which, I’m ashamed to say was quite often,” Hoyt continued in a smooth tone, dropping his voice slightly to a confidential decibel. “About three, maybe four months before Mister van Slyke and his wife arrived in Placerville, his father, the ELDER Mister van Slyke sent Mister Meredith a letter, I think it was actually from a lawyer, telling him that the van Slykes would no longer bail him out of his poker debts.”

“I see,” the sheriff murmured thoughtfully.

“Mister Meredith apparently disregarded the letter from Mister van Slyke’s father,” Hoyt continued with just enough wistfulness. He sighed softly, and shook his head. “A bit more than a month ago, the elder Mister van Slyke got a letter from the bank, where he keeps his deposits, informing him of discrepancies in totals. He sent his son to come here ‘n check things out.”

Brett favored Hoyt with a bright smile, filled with sunshine. “I found out Mister Meredith had been embezzling funds from my father’s account,” he himself took up the tale. “I confronted him the night of my birthday party. I’m afraid things got pretty hot ‘n heavy. I apologize for that sheriff.”

“You paid for the damages,” the sheriff grunted. “Any word as to the whereabouts of Mrs. van Slyke?”

“As a matter of fact, yes,” Brett said, his warm smile a stark contrast against the stiff, rigid way he held his body, with arms poker straight at his side, and fists still clenched. “An associate of mine over Virginia City way . . . you may know him, Sheriff, seems everyone ‘round here does . . . . ”

“What’s his name?”

“Cartwright. Mister Benjamin Cartwright.”

“Ponderosa?”

“Yeah.” Brett nodded. “You know him?”

“I know OF him,” the sheriff replied. “Like you just said yourself, Mister Cartwright’s pretty well known ‘round this neck of the woods.”

“Well, it turns out that my wife and mother-in-law knew the Cartwrights very well, when they lived near Virginia City many years ago,” Brett said. “Mister Cartwright wired me just this morning to let me know that Peggy’s with THEM . . . safe ‘n sound.”

“Too bad Mister Cartwright didn’t think to wire you before this,” the sheriff remarked with a touch of sarcasm.

“Sheriff, as you know, my wife’s . . . well, in the family way,” Brett said, his smile rapidly fading. “She lost two babies . . . miscarriages, both of ‘em . . . and unfortunately it’s left her quite unbalanced. I should never have brought her here, Sheriff. I regret having done so with . . . with every fiber of my being. I just thought, hoped, maybe a change of scene, new faces might restore her equilibrium. I was very sadly mistaken.”

“You meant well, Mister van Slyke,” the sheriff said quietly.

“Since Peggy’s been pregnant again . . . . ” Brett let his voice trail ominously into silence. “I don’t think she honestly knows what’s real, and what’s made up by her crafty, devious li’l mind. Unfortunately, she CAN be quite convincing.”

“She must’ve told Mister Cartwright you were out t’ git ‘er, or something,” the sheriff remarked thoughtfully.

“I cringe t’ think what horror stories she’s fabricated for Mister Cartwright, but as I just said, she can be very convincing. Seeing as how she and the Cartwrights are old friends, while I’VE never met the man . . . . ”

“I understand,” the sheriff said, nodding once again.

“Thank goodness Mister Cartwright’s somehow realized that there’s something amiss with Mrs. van Slyke, and thought to wire her husband,” Hoyt added.

“All’s well that ends well, Mister van Slyke,” the sheriff said. “I’ll need to know where I can reach you if I need you to testify against Mister Meredith, once he’s well enough to stand trial.”

Brett grimaced at the thought of returning to his god-forsaken patch of wilderness stuck in the middle of nowhere, far away from the luxuries he had long ago come to define as the necessities of life. “You can ask Mister McGreevy over at the bank to wire my father’s lawyer in San Francisco, if you need me.”

“In that case, Mister van Slyke, you and Mister Pyle are free to go,” the sheriff said.

Brett glanced up at the clock hanging on the wall behind the desk in the sheriff’s office. “Mister Pyle and I will be in plenty of time to catch the ten a.m. stage outta Placerville. I expect we’ll be in Virginia City around this time tomorrow morning . . . . ”



“Adam . . . Uncle Ben, I want to go with you.” The next day, early, Peggy, still clad in a nightshirt and robe, borrowed from Joe and Teresa respectively, stood at the foot of the dining room table, with arms folded across her chest, glaring at both father and son.

“Peggy, there’s no need for you to come,” Adam said. “Pa and I can . . . . ”

“No, Adam,” Peggy stubbornly stood her ground. “This is MY fight. It’s high time I started fighting it.”

Ben and Adam stared up at Peggy for a long moment, their faces twin masks of shock and amazement.

“Day before yesterday, your aunt was out there shooting at us. Today, it might be Brett,” Adam protested, the minute he found his voice. “No, Peggy, it’s much too dangerous for you.”

“It’s much too dangerous for you, too, Adam . . . and YOU, Uncle Ben . . . and for everyone else in this house,” Peggy said firmly. “Maybe Brett IS out there, waiting, but I want to tell you both something. After . . . after reading those articles Teresa gave me? The ones about Rosemary O’Malley? I’d much rather he shot me down in cold blood out there on the road than have to go back with him . . . in HIS custody.”

“Peggy’s absolutely right.”

Adam and Ben looked up and saw Teresa standing behind Peggy, with her hands resting lightly on the younger woman’s shoulders.

“I can’t argue against BOTH of you,” Adam sighed.

“I’ll have Candy unhitch the buckboard and hitch up the buggy,” Ben said, rising.

“Peggy, why don’t you come on upstairs with me,” Teresa invited with a smile. “I think I might have something that would be suitable to wear for going into town.”



Ben, Adam, and Peggy arrived at the office of Lucas Milburn, Esquire at a few minutes past eleven o’clock.

“Why don’t the two of you go on inside?” Adam suggested. “I’ll join you in a few minutes after I tether the horses.”

“All right,” Ben agreed. He alighted from the buggy, then turned and carefully helped Peggy to get down.

Inside, they found Lucas Milburn waiting for them. “Come in, Ben,” the lawyer invited his old friend and client. “I’ve been expecting you since Paul Martin gave me that wire from Doctor Phillips a couple o’ days ago.”

“Thank you,” Ben nodded politely. “Lucas, this is Peggy van Slyke . . . the young lady I told you about a few days ago. Peggy, my lawyer, Mister Milburn.”

“Please come in, Mrs. van Slyke, and sit down.”

“Thank you.”

Peggy and Ben seated themselves in the two plush chairs, placed directly in front of the lawyer’s massive desk.

“Adam, will be joining us in a few minutes,” Ben said.

“M-Mister Milburn?” Peggy ventured hesitantly.

“Yes, Mrs. van Slyke?”

“What are my chances? Of divorcing Brett AND getting custody of our child? I . . . I have to know.”

Lucas studied her face, set with an angry, rock like determination, for a moment. “To be honest, we’re fighting an up hill battle all the way . . . at best. You add the van Slyke family fortune, and this . . . this travesty of a competency hearing, the slope’s gotten even steeper,” the lawyer said soberly. “That’s just getting the divorce. Getting you custody of your child’s going to make things that much harder.”

“Thank you, Mister Milburn. I had to know what I’m facing.”

“Ben, how much longer do you think Adam’s going to be?”

“I’m getting a mite concerned, actually,” Ben said with an anxious frown. “Our buggy’s right out front. All he was going to do was tether the horses.”

“Perhaps some other matter came up requiring his attention,” Lucas suggested, hoping to ease his friend’s anxiety. “Why don’t we get started? I can recap for Adam later, when we . . . . ”

The sound of someone pounding insistently on the door interrupted the lawyer mid-sentence.

“Come on in, Adam,” Lucas invited.

The door opened slowly. Adam’s inert body was thrown into the room, bound hand and foot. Blood flowed like a swift river from an open wound on the back of his head, congealing and matting in his raven locks as it dried.

“ADAM!” Ben cried, as he leapt to his feet with lightening swiftness.

“Now you hold on right there, Mister Cartwright.”

Ben glanced up sharply and found himself looking into a pair of eyes, blacker than even the darkness of the deepest mining tunnel. There was no light, no life. He shuddered, unable to help himself.

Peggy felt the blood literally drain right out of her face, upon hearing and recognizing that voice. Her fingers wrapped around the ends of her chair arms and squeezed so hard, her knuckles turned snow white. “Oh, God, please . . . no,” she moaned softly.

The man entered the law office, armed with a rifle. He quietly closed the door, then looked over at Peggy and favored her with a brittle, mirthless smile. “Why hello, Pretty Peggy, M’ Dear!” he said by way of greeting. “ ‘N here I thought sure ol’ Jake was joshin’ when he told me he saw ya comin’ in here.”

“Mister van Slyke, so help me . . . if my son . . . . ”

Brett raised his weapon, taking dead aim at Ben’s chest. “Your concern for your boy’s touching, Mister Cartwright. Most touching, indeed! Why, it just warms the very cockles o’ my heart, it really does. But I’m having a reunion here . . . a reunion with my loving wife, whom I haven’t seen in nearly a WEEK now, so I’d advise ya to sit down and keep your mouth shut.” He turned at glared over at Lucas Milburn. “That goes f’r you, too, Lard Bucket.”

Lucas, his face pale and hands trembling, slowly lowered himself back down in his chair.

Peggy rose slowly and stepped back away from her chair. “Brett, I’m not going with you.”

“Aawww, now don’t be difficult, Peggy . . . my Pretty Peggy.”

“I mean it, Brett.”

“Is THAT any way t’ greet a loving husband who’s been worried sick about you?”

“I doubt that!”

“I guess I can’t blame ya for being angry, ‘n all, Darling, but I promise ya, Peggy . . . I promise ya, my word ‘n honor . . . things’ll be different.”

“No, Brett. I said I’m not going with you, and I mean it.”

The brittle smile relaxed into an angry sneer. “I’d strongly suggest ya change your mind, Pretty Peggy, ‘cause if ya don’t? I’m gonna kill your friend here.” He gave the unconscious Adam a hard swift kick in the rib cage for emphasis.

Ben was out of his chair and half way across the room before Brett even realized. Upon finally catching Ben’s movements out of the corner of his eyes, he pivoted and raised the rifle once again. “I’m not gonna tell ya again, Mister Cartwright. SIT DOWN.”

Seething with rage and frustration, Ben returned to his chair and sat town, poised on the edge. Every muscle in his body was tensed, ready to spring.

“Here!” Brett tossed a length of rope over toward Peggy. It landed in the chair she had just occupied. “Make yourself useful, an’ tie these two up.” He nodded toward Ben and Lucas.

Peggy stood unmoving, as if she had just taken root.

“G’won! Do as I say!” Brett snapped.

Peggy stepped over toward the chair and picked up the rope in her trembling hands.

“Better tie Mister Cartwright up first,” Brett ordered, “and while you’re workin’, you’d better be doin’ some real hard thinkin’.”

“There’s nothing to think about,” Peggy replied in a wooden monotone.

“Oh yeah, there is. Y’ see, My Pretty Peggy, I got custody of ya. I can just come in and take you away, no questions asked,” Brett said in a low, menacing tone, as Peggy walked over toward Ben with the rope in both hands. “But, I don’t want it like that.”

“How DO you want it?” Peggy asked, her voice trembling with her own growing fear and anger.

“I want you to come with me, ‘cause ya WANT to.”

“Well, I DON’T want to, Brett. I don’t want to go back with you. I wish you’d just go away and leave me alone.”

“I can’t do that. You’re my wife. I love ya.”

“Love!” Peggy spat angrily. “You don’t even know the meaning of the word.”

“You wound me, Pretty Peggy.”

“I doubt it.”

“You just keep on thinking things over,” Brett said. “You’ve got ten minutes to say you’re gonna come with me. If you refuse, I’ll give you another ten minutes . . . AFTER, I kill him.”

He nudged Adam with his foot.

“If after the next ten minutes, you don’t decide to come with me, I’ll kill Mister Cartwright, and ten minutes after THAT, I kill the lawyer.” He favored her with a malevolent smile that made the hair on the back of her neck stand on end. “And it’ll be all YOUR fault, My Pretty Little Peggy.”

“Peggy, don’t listen to him,” Ben said sotto voce, as she tied his hands together behind his back.

Three brisk running steps brought Brett directly in front of Ben. “You . . . SHUT-UP!” he screamed, as he balled his fingers into a tight, iron hard fist. He lashed out, striking Ben across the face hard enough to rattle his teeth.

“Brett, stop it!” Peggy snapped.

“You won’t get away with this, Mister van Slyke.”

Brett turned and glared over at the lawyer. “I’ve gotta wire from my dear ol’ daddy back home in San Francisco that says I CAN. Y’ see, I got custody o’ Peggy now. Me! She’s all mine! I can take her anywhere I want.”

“You won’t get away with murder.”

Brett laughed. “What murder?”

“Killing US . . . Ben, Adam, and ME in cold blood.”

Peggy quickly tied Ben’s ankles, then rose, taking Ben’s gun from its holster. She quickly stepped to Ben’s right, taking care to conceal the weapon in the folds of the jumper she wore. “Brett?”

“What do YOU want?” Brett turned and rounded on her furiously.

“I’ll go with you.”

“Peggy, NO!” Ben protested.

“It’s . . . all right, Uncle Ben. I don’t want to see any of you killed. I’ll go with him.”

Brett smiled triumphantly. “My buggy’s outside. You g’won, get in it. I got some business t’ take care of first.”

“What business?” Peggy asked, taking care to keep her voice calm and even.

“Just business! Now g’won, do as I tell ya.”

Adam’s words, from the time they had played cowboys all those years ago, echoed back to the forefront of her mind and thoughts, just as clear now as they were the day he uttered them: “Peggy, always remember, a good cowgirl NEVER draws her gun, UNLESS she intends to USE it. You might end up NOT having to use it, and that’s well and good. But once you draw that gun, you must be prepared to follow through if you have to.” She tightened her fingers around the gun hidden within the folds of her jumper skirt.

“Peggy, GO! NOW!”

Her eyes fell on Adam, lying ominously still at her feet, cruelly trussed up like a calf for branding. She looked over at Ben. He was sick with worry over Adam, and at the same time, desirous of wrapping his fingers around Brett’s throat. She had come to know all of those feelings intimately, through two miscarriages, and over the last five months with the child she now carried. Her eyes moved to Lucas Milburn’s face, set with a fatalistic resolve . . . waiting.

“PEGGY . . . . ”

Finally, her eyes came to rest on Brett’s face, a veritable mask of insane, murderous fury. Looking into his eyes, she knew without even the slightest doubt that he intended to kill them . . . Adam, Uncle Ben, and Mister Milburn.

“PEGGY, YOU GET YOUR ASS OUTSIDE IN THAT BUGGY RIGHT NOW!” Brett screamed, red faced, on the edge of hysteria.

Peggy’s heart thudded wildly in her chest. She wavered, on the edge of fainting.

“Aww, come on, Li’l Love Bug.” Brett’s face and tone abruptly changed. The raw, murderous fury was suddenly gone, almost as if it had never been. In its place was the face of a whipped puppy, eagerly returning to the master who had so cruelly abused it. “I promise ya, Peg, I’ll do better . . . . ” he wheedled.

Peggy squeezed her eyes shut against the sight of his face. “Brett, you’ve made that promise to me so many times, I can’t count them anymore. Every time, every last time, you’ve BROKEN that promise.”

“Just one more chance, Li’l Love Bug, please? Pretty please?”

She was surprised at how much she desperately yearned to give him that one last chance he begged for so ardently. In spite of all the chances she HAD given him, all the promises made only to be broken, a part of herself still longed to give him yet another chance. Her eyelids lifted, and her hold on the weapon concealed in the folds of her skirt lessened.

“You won’t regret it, Peg, I swear . . . you won’t regret it this time.” Smiling, sensing victory within his grasp, Brett stepped closer. “Now you, g’won! Get yourself out in that buggy. I’ll be right out just as soon as I finish up in here.”

Peggy looked into his face, her eyes meeting and locking onto his. There, much to her horror, she saw his anger, his desire to murder burning with the same blinding intensity as the sun. Her hand tightened once more on the gun. “No, Brett,” she said very quietly, and very firmly. She withdrew the gun from its place of concealment and aimed it square at his chest. “Drop that rifle right now.”

Brett gazed down at the gun in complete astonishment, then back up at her. His smile twisted into a sneer. “Come on, Peg, quit the kiddin’.” He took another step closer.

“I’m NOT kidding, Brett, you stay right there where you are . . . and put down that rifle.” She took another step back.

“Aww, Peg, you ‘n I both know you’re not gonna use that thing on me,” Brett said as he continued moving toward her, with the same relentlessness of a cougar stalking its prey. He put out his hand. “Now why don’tcha hand it over, before someone gets hurt?”

“Brett, I told you no closer.”

Brett laughed at her.

Peggy, without further word, lowered the barrel of her weapon and squeezed the trigger. The weapon discharged, sending a bullet tearing into Brett’s thigh with enough force to knock him off his feet. The rifle flew out of his hands, landing within inches of Ben’s feet.

Brett looked up at her, his eyes round with shocked horror and his lower jaw flapping uselessly.

“You so much as bat an eyelash, Brett, the next bullet will find itself in your chest or your head.” Peggy’s voice had a distinctly audible edge of steel. “Mister Milburn, would you please untie Mister Cartwright?”

“It’ll be my pleasure, Ma’am.” Lucas moved out from behind his desk with astonishing swiftness, given a man of his bulk. He immediately set to work freeing Ben’s hands and feet.

The instant Ben was free, he bent down and seized Brett’s rifle in both hands. He quickly aimed both barrels square at Brett’s chest. “Lucas, Peggy and I have him covered. Get Sheriff Coffee, and please . . . send someone to fetch Doc Martin.”

“Right away, Ben.”

After Lucas left, Ben looked over at Peggy, astonishment mixing with a touch of pride and a generous portion of gratitude. “You saved our lives, Peggy,” he said simply. “Thank you.”

On the floor, Adam groaned softly and began to stir. Peggy and Ben both glanced upward for a brief second and whispered a heartfelt “Thank YOU” in unison.

Peggy glanced down at Brett. He remained exactly where he fell staring up at her as he might a stranger. “Uncle Ben?”

“Y-yes, Peggy?”

“I’ve got Brett well covered, if you want to look after Adam.”

Ben immediately placed the rifle on Lucas Milburn’s desk. He paused to nod his thanks to Peggy, before dropping to his knees beside his oldest.

“P-Pa?”

“It’s all right, Adam, you lie still,” Ben said, his voice unsteady.

“M-my head hurts. Wha— happened?”

“That, Son, is quite a story,” Ben replied as he set to work untying the knots that bound Adam’s wrists together. He looked up at Peggy and smiled. “I think I’ll let the heroine of the tale tell you as soon as you’re feeling better.”

“Adam . . . are you SURE you want to do this?”

Upstairs, in the bedroom he and his wife shared in the house where he spent his adolescence and much of his young adult years, Adam stopped, and turned with stiff, agonized slowness to face Teresa, standing behind him. His smile, pained and forced, was meant to reassure. It did nothing of the sort. “Yes, Teresa, I WANT to do this . . . very much.”

His slow, torturous gait, that poker stiff posture, the stiff smile made her wince.

“I’ll be fine, Teresa,” he promised, duly noting the naked anxiety in her face and eyes. “Honest!”

“Promise?” she queried in a small voice.

“I cross my heart.”

Two weeks ago, Adam, his father, and Peggy went to Lucas Milburn’s office, to find out what Peggy’s options were and to begin setting them in motion. There, on the street just outside, Brett van Slyke, Peggy’s husband, had taken him wholly and completely unaware. One minute he was securing the horses to the hitching post, the next he was bound hand and foot, staring up into Pa’s anxious face. Later on that evening, after supper, Peggy had supplied both himself and Teresa with the intervening details. Adam was flabbergasted when she came to the part about borrowing Pa’s gun and shooting Brett in the leg, and every bit as proud of her, for her courage and quick thinking, as he would have been of his own daughter, Dio.

In the days that followed, neither Adam, Teresa, nor any of the other members of the Cartwright family could help BUT notice a new quality strength and confidence in Peggy’s voice and in the way she carried herself. Adam had known that she had this kind of strength within, from the time she was a child. Now SHE knew.

Though Adam’s head wound had almost completely healed, he suffered a couple of fractured ribs when Brett kicked him. Doctor Martin had dutifully done all HE could. He bound Adam’s torso so tight, drawing a deep breath became a difficult task, at best. The doctor sternly admonished Adam to rest.

“ . . . perhaps the many years you’ve been away from the Ponderosa and from certain influences will incline you to follow doctor’s orders, unlike others I could name . . . . ” Paul Martin delivered the words of that last injunction with a stern, pointed glare at his father, whose subsequent feigned innocence was almost comical.

Doctor Martin had also dispensed a strong painkiller, “to be used ONLY when absolutely necessary.” The long, interminable ride home from the doctor’s office in town over the bumpy dirt road leading from Virginia City to the Ponderosa was one of those absolutely necessary times.

All in all, that first week might have actually been tolerable despite of his injuries, had it not been for Hop Sing’s malodorous poultices, all applied with the blessing of Doctor Martin, and being forced to share close quarters with a young sister, impatiently recovering from her own injuries. Last Friday afternoon, the good doctor had stopped by to look in on Adam, Stacy, and Peggy . . . .


“Stacy, by all the medical authority vested in me, I now pronounce you fully recovered,” Paul declared with a broad grin.

“Thank heaven!” Adam’s sardonic response shot right out from between his lips without his even thinking.

“A . . . MEN !” Stacy immediately retorted, favoring her brother with a murderous glare. She then returned her attention to the doctor. “Doctor Martin, you didn’t tell me! Can I ride Sun Dancer in the Independence Day Race in two weeks?” she posed her question, then anxiously held her breath.

“I see no reason why not, just so long as you don’t take anymore nasty spills off of Blaze Face, Sun Dancer, or any OTHER horse, Young La— ”

Stacy turned the same murderous glare on the good doctor, that she had on Adam a scant moment before.

“ . . . er, uhh make that Young WOMAN!” Paul quickly amended, trying very hard not to smile.

Satisfied with the doctor’s answer to her question and his immediate correction of address, Stacy let out a deafening, “YEEEEEE HA!” then bolted for the great outdoors.

“Doctor Martin, you have my undying gratitude,” Adam said with a sarcastic roll of his eyes.

“What can I say, Adam?” Paul said with a shrug. “Your sister’s a very lovely young woman, EXCEPT when she’s recovering from illness or injury.”

Ben, who had been sitting quietly on the settee through out the exchange, shook his head, chuckling. “I sure can’t disagree with you on THAT score, Paul.”

Adam rose stiffly from the blue chair next to the fireplace and glared down at Ben, seated on the settee. “Pa, I’M ready to throttle her! How can YOU sit there and . . . and laugh like that?”

“Very easy, Son,” Ben retorted without missing a beat. “I’m also remembering a certain young man, oohhh around the same age Stacy is NOW, who fell and sprained his ankle while he was out hunting about a month before the first time HE rode in the Virginia City Independence Day Race. If I remember correctly, there was some question as to whether or not he was going to be able to ride Beauty, that new horse of his.”

“Atalanta, Pa, NOT Beauty,” Adam said sullenly. “Beauty was later.”

“Well, as I recall, that young man was fit to be tied, too, until the doctor could tell HIM whether or not he’d be able to race Atalanta,” Ben continued.

“Aww, come on, Pa. I was no where NEAR as difficult to live with as Stacy has been this past week,” Adam vigorously protested.

“That’s quite true. You WERE no where near as difficult to live with as your sister has been this past week.”

A smug, triumphant smile slowly spread across Adam’s lips.

“I’d say you were at least ten times WORSE,” Ben declared with a broad grin.

Adam’s smile quickly evaporated into a dark scowl. “I most certainly and assuredly was NOT.”

“Oh yeah you were, Adam,” Hoss immediately chimed in.

“Hoss, it’s a well known fact that as person gets OLDER, the memory grows dimmer,” Joe added. His eyes twinkled with mischievous bedevilment. “You and I need to refresh our OLDEST brother’s faulty memory.”

“That’s NOT necessary.”

“No, it’s not necessary, Adam, but it IS the well-mannered, courteous thing to do,” Joe returned.

“It certainly is,” Teresa agreed wholeheartedly, “and besides. I’d like to hear all about this myself.”

“Hey!” Adam growled. “You’re supposed to be on MY side . . . . ”


“I AM on your side,” Teresa said favoring her husband with a bemused look.

“Sorry. I had no idea I was thinking aloud,” Adam said, as the last vestiges of reverie faded from his mind and thoughts.

“Need some help getting down the stairs?”

Adam shook his head, wincing as stiff, sore muscles protested the move. “I can manage.”

Teresa nodded and moved in front of him. Adam and Teresa descended the stairs together, slowly, the latter keeping herself three steps ahead. This morning, he was nattily dressed in the same gray cotton suit he had worn as best man at Matt and Clarissa Wilson’s wedding, going on two months ago now. Thank goodness Hop Sing had successfully removed all the wedding cake and icing, end results of a cake fight in which he and his youngest brother had become embroiled during the reception.

Ben and Peggy, both seated on the settee, waiting patiently, rose and turned expectantly toward the stairs, just as Teresa and Adam reached the bottom step. Ben was also well dressed this morning, in his own gray linen suit, fresh pressed and starched white shirt, and navy blue tie. Peggy wore the first of Mrs. Pomeroy’s creations, a loose fitting cotton jumper, the same color green as tree leaves at the height of summer. She also wore a white long sleeved blouse, with a sash for a collar, tied in a bow.

“Looks like were all ready,” Ben said, as he and Peggy joined Adam and Teresa.

The front door opened. Joe entered, grinning from ear to ear. “Peggy, your chariot awaits,” he declared, as he offered her his arm.

“Thank you, Joe,” Peggy took his arm with a warm smile. “You know, you’re starting to sound a little bit like Adam.”

“Don’t look now, Folks, but I think I’ve just been insulted,” Joe retorted good-naturedly.

“I know I have,” Adam quipped, without missing a beat.

Outside, Joe dutifully held the horses while Ben helped Peggy to climb up into the buggy first, then Adam.

“Joe . . . Teresa, I don’t know when we’re going to get back, but we should certainly be home by suppertime,” Ben said.

“You’d better be, Pa,” Joe said. “Hop Sing’s been cooking up a special supper to celebrate since the crack of dawn this morning.

Ben climbed up into the buggy, and took up the reins. “We certainly have a lot to celebrate,” he declared, before setting off.



A companionable silence descended upon the trio as they made their way to Virginia City. Adam leaned back against the seat, closed his eyes, and allowed his thoughts to drift back once more to that last trip to Lucas Milburn’s office. He had vague memories of his father and Mister Milburn untying his hands and feet, then carefully helping him up off the floor over to the plush chair behind the lawyer’s desk. Peggy stood, tall and proud, glaring down at Brett like a veritable Bellona, the Roman Goddess of War. She held his father’s gun firmly in hand, her chin set with a fierce, stubborn determination, and the hard glint of steel in her vivid blue eyes.

Brett van Slyke never moved from the spot where he fell, after Peggy had put that bullet in his thigh. His mouth hung open slightly. Though his eyes were glued to Peggy’s face, his focus was elsewhere, many, many miles away. Adam remembered his father telling him later that, when Sheriff Coffee came, Brett offered no resistance. In fact, he never moved, never so much as batted an eyelash. Clem Foster and another man lifted and carried him down to the jail, after Doctor Martin had examined him.

“He was like a dead man walking, Adam,” Ben had told him privately, the following morning. “His heart’s still beating, he walks if someone leads him by the hand, he even eats if someone feeds him, but . . . . ” Ben shuddered, “that vital part of himself, that makes him . . . that makes all of us the people we are, each different from everyone else . . . is gone.”

Adam was reminded, then, of Ross and Delphine Marquett, old friends, now many years dead. He and Ross had been the best of friends since they were children. When Ross married Delphine, Adam had the honor of serving as best man. Five years after the wedding, Ross began to grow jealously possessive of Delphine, beating her for offenses, mostly imagined. At the same time, a deep-seated hatred for Adam took root and festered. Ross murdered Delphine in a jealous fit of rage, and shot down four men in cold blood in the course of a stagecoach robbery.

In the end, Adam was finally forced to kill Ross Marquett in self-defense. But, in those last, final moments before death, Ross, the Ross HE knew, was back. He had no memory of the preceding ten months, no memory of having killed Delphine, or of trying to kill Adam. Ross didn’t even know he was mortally wounded. Adam remembered the words of the doctor he consulted, regarding Ross’ mental deterioration. Insanity was akin to the person stepping through a dark gate. Had that also happened to Brett van Slyke at some point along the way . . . . ?

“Adam? Adam, were here.”

The sound of Peggy’s voice drew Adam from his melancholy musings.

“Wake up, Adam,” Ben said quietly.

“I wasn’t sleeping, exactly, just lost in thought.”

Ben nodded, then alighted from the buggy. “Peggy, why don’t you go ahead in,” he suggested after helping her down. “Tell Mister Milburn that Adam and I will be in directly.”

“Sure thing, Uncle Ben.”

Ben stood watch as Adam, at his own insistence, climbed down from the buggy. Lucas Milburn met them at the door. “Ben . . . Adam, please come in,” he invited them with a warm, and weary smile. “Everyone else is already here.”

Inside the lawyer’s office, two men, both strangers sat primly in chairs placed side by side, perpendicular to Lucas Milburn’s desk. Peggy occupied the padded chair, directly opposite the two men. Ben and Adam both were surprised to see that Laura Dayton was also present. Clad in the blue suit she had worn the day she and Aunt Lil visited the Ponderosa, she stood demurely behind the chair in which Peggy sat, with head bowed, with hands clasped in front of her.

“Laura . . . . ”

She glanced up sharply upon hearing Adam speak her name. “H-hello, Adam . . . Ben,” she greeted them with a timorous voice and a rueful smile. “If . . . if you don’t want me here, I’ll leave . . . . ”

“Laura, speaking for myself, I’m glad you came,” Adam said quietly. “You’re more than welcome to stay . . . if it’s alright with Peggy, of course.”

“See, Mother?” Peggy looked up at Laura and smiled. “I TOLD you it would be ok.”

“Please . . . sit down,” Adam invited, gesturing toward the empty chair next to Peggy.

“I thought I’d save that for you, Adam,” Laura said quietly. “I heard you’d been injured recently . . . . ” She suddenly broke off, and looked away.

“Thank you, Laura, I appreciate your thoughtfulness,” Adam said in all sincerity as he sat down beside Peggy.

“Ben . . . Adam, this is Mister Horace van Slyke . . . . ” Lucas nodded to the elder of the two strangers, “and his lawyer, Alistair Farnell. Mister van Slyke and Mister Farnell, this is Mister Adam Cartwright, Mrs. van Slyke’s advisor, and his father, Mister Benjamin Cartwright. I understand you both already know Mrs. Dayton.”

Cool, polite nods were exchanged, by way of acknowledging the introductions.

The man introduced as Horace van Slyke was a small, fragile man, his body thin, and emaciated. He appeared to be roughly the same age as Ben, maybe a little older, with iron gray hair, that encircled the sides and back of his head with a halo of fine wispy tendrils leaving his crown of his head completely bare. His face, cadaverously pale and deeply lined, with sunken cheeks, and perpetual down turned mouth, rigidly set, lent him the appearance of one always weary. His grayish white eyebrows, locked in a permanent scowl were a disturbing contrast to his sharp, piercing black eyes, round and staring, like those of a frightened boy caught with his arm shoulder deep in the cookie jar.

Horace van Slyke’s frail appearance shocked Adam. Surely a man capable of sweeping a murder under the proverbial rug by having the death in question declared a suicide, and having a daughter-in-law declared mentally incompetent in a court of law because she sought to extricate herself from a life threatening situation, would project a more imposing presence.

“Now that everyone is FINALLY here . . . . ” Horace van Slyke directed a withering glare in the general direction of Adam and Peggy, “maybe we can get on with things. I’ve got a stage to catch this afternoon.”

Alistair Farnell, a big, robust man with jet-black hair, poker straight and full beard, all neatly trimmed, opened the leather briefcase on his lap and extricated a six-page document. “Mister van Slyke has agreed to allow Mrs. Peggy van Slyke to divorce her husband, Brett van Slyke, on grounds of adultery and cruelty,” he began. “Mrs. van Slyke will also have full custody of their unborn child. No member of the van Slyke family will in any way interfere in the lives of Mrs. van Slyke and her child. They also agree not to make any attempts to find or contact her, or the child until said child comes of age, and is legally able to decide for him or herself.

“Brett van Slyke has been released into the custody of his father. He stands accused of assault and battery in Virginia City, Nevada; assault and battery, rape, and first-degree murder in San Francisco; and assault and battery, attempted rape, damage to private property, and murder in Placerville . . . . ”

“What?!” Horace protested in a vigorous tone at complete odds with his gaunt appearance.

“Murder, Mister van Slyke,” Alistair reiterated. “I got word from Placerville earlier this morning that Mister Meredith finally died late last night.”

“I thought he was unconscious the whole time.”

“It seems he briefly came to a few hours before he died. In those few minutes, he named your son as the man who shot him, Sir.”

“I thought it was established that my son shot Mister Meredith in self defense,” Horace snapped, his dark eyes burning with fury.

“It was, until the sheriff investigated the allegations both your son and Mister Pyle made concerning Mister Meredith, and found them all to be false.”

“I’m STILL well rid o’ him!,” Horace muttered bitterly. “That Meredith was a damned incompetent fool! Botched everything from start to finish.”

“That didn’t entitle your son to take his life, Mister van Slyke.” Though Adam’s words were calm, Ben and Peggy saw his lips thin and jaw tighten with anger.

“To, ummm continue,” Alistair said pointedly. “Court hearings will be held in all the afore mentioned jurisdictions to determine Brett van Slyke’s mental competence. In the meantime, pending the outcome of such hearings, Brett van Slyke will be kept confined. The last items include overturning the ruling against Mrs. van Slyke at the trial held to declare her mentally incompetent, and establishing a trust fund for the child. Responsibility for managing said trust fund will be granted to the child’s mother.”

“Mrs. van Slyke, are the terms agreeable to you?” Lucas turned and looked over at her expectantly.

“They are.”

“Excellent,” Alistair said briskly, “all we need is your signature . . . . ”

“Not so fast,” Adam said. “I’d like to look those documents over first.”

Alistair bristled, but handed the documents over to Adam.

Horace van Slyke focused the intensity of his angry, withering glare solely on Adam. “You don’t trust me, do you, Boy.”

Adam lowered the pages of the document in hand and returned Horace’s glare with a particular look of disdain he, for the most part, used on his own children the times they very blatantly tried to put one over. “Mister van Slyke, taking the probable age of your son into account, you can’t be all that much older than I am.” His tone carried that subtle condescending note that had always set his youngest brother off, during their growing up years. “I would appreciate it if you addressed me as MISTER Cartwright, as would certainly be more appropriate.”

Horace averted his gaze away from Adam’s face to his own hands, lying one over the other on top of a plain, unadorned mahogany cane.

“As for the matter of trust, Mister van Slyke,” Adam continued. “Neither Mrs. van Slyke nor I have any reason at all TO trust you.” He returned his attention to the documents.

Ten minutes, passed, then fifteen. Ben stopped counting the number of times Horace van Slyke pointedly took his watch from his pocket to check the time after the first dozen. Finally Adam finished reading over the sixth and last page of the document. “Everything APPEARS to be in order,” he said slowly.

“Then let’s get the damned thing signed,” Horace snapped.

“Mister Milburn, have YOU had a chance to look this document over?”

Lucas shook his head. “No, Adam, I haven’t.”

“Before Mrs. van Slyke puts pen to paper on ANYTHING, I would like Mister Milburn to look over that document and advise us accordingly,” Adam said.

“I agree with Mister Cartwright completely,” Peggy added firmly.

“Mister van Slyke is not used to having his integrity so harshly questioned,” Alistair Farnell said, glaring over at Peggy, then Adam.

Adam favoring Horace’s lawyer with a thin, brittle smile. “As I said before, neither Mrs. van Slyke nor I have any reason whatsoever to trust Mister van Slyke. Both of us agree that her interests are best served by erring on the side of prudence.” He handed the document over to his father, who in turn, passed it on to Lucas Milburn.

“Mister Cartwright, I assure you . . . . ”

“Yes, I know. That Mister van Slyke is an honest man, whose integrity is above reproach,” Adam said in a wry tone. “I would also like to see a copy of that court order overturning the verdict of Mrs. van Slyke’s mental incompetence.”

Alistair lapsed into a sullen silence, as he opened his briefcase and pulled out the document Adam had requested.

“Thank you,” Adam nodded, accepting the proffered document. He glanced over it, then nodded. “I AM correct in assuming this is Mrs. van Slyke’s copy?”

“Yes,” Alistair growled, reluctantly.

“I will look over these documents this afternoon,” Lucas Milburn said as he gathered all of the papers together. “Where are you gentlemen staying?”

“At the International Hotel,” Alistair said.

“Splendid. As I said, I will make these documents top priority,” Lucas continued. “Assuming everything is in order, I’ll bring these documents to you at the International Hotel for Mister van Slyke’s signature. After that, you’re both free to catch that stage. I’ll forward Mister van Slyke’s copy of the agreement to San Francisco. Mrs. van Slyke’s copies will remain with me.”

Horace van Slyke rose stiffly, leaning heavily on his cane. “Let’s go, Farnell,” he snapped imperiously.

“One MORE thing, Mister van Slyke,” Adam said. “Mrs. van Slyke’s financial advisor will be wiring instructions regarding the money to be placed in her child’s trust fund. We would appreciate it if you left the name and address of the individual responsible for handling the transfer of funds.”

Horace’s entire body went rigid. He turned slowly and favored Adam with an angry glare meant to kill. “I had planned to deposit that money in the financial institution with which I do most of my business.”

“That will be fine for the time being,” Adam countered taking care to keep his tone measured and even. “However, Mrs. van Slyke does not intend to return to San Francisco. Since she IS to be in control of the trust until her child comes of age, it would be far more practical to deposit those funds in a bank nearer to wherever she decides to establish residency.”

“You may instruct her financial advisor to wire his instructions to Mister Farnell,” Horace spat.

Alistair reached into the inside pocket of his jacket and extracted a business card with the address of his office in San Francisco. He silently handed the card to Adam.

“Will that be all?”

Adam nodded. “Yes, Mister van Slyke, that will be all.”

Horace turned heel and walked out, without bothering to acknowledge the others present, including his own lawyer. Alistair Farnell followed meekly behind his employer.

“Mister Milburn, thank you so very much!” Peggy said gratefully, after her soon to be EX-father-in-law and his lawyer had left. “You, too, Uncle Ben.”

“I’m glad I could be of help,” Lucas said, smiling broadly. “This may be highly unprofessional of me, but anytime I can get the best of a stuffed shirt like Horace van Slyke and his hot shot city lawyer, well . . . that makes my day, too.”

“We’re always here to help out our friends, Peggy,” Ben said quietly. “We certainly count you as one of our friends.”

Peggy then turned to the man who had been the most supportive. “Adam, a mere thank you seems horribly inadequate. If it weren’t for those fractured ribs I’d give you . . . and Teresa . . . a big bear hug and a kiss.”

“Teresa will probably insist on collecting HER bear hug and kiss the minute we reach home,” Adam said with a smile. “As for me, you can hug gently for now. I’ll collect on the bear hug when Doc Martin pronounces ME fully recovered.”

Peggy stepped over and very carefully slipped her arms around Adam’s waist and hugged gingerly. “Thank you, Adam. I don’t know what I would have done without you.”

“I’m glad I was here to help,” Adam said, placing his own arms around her shoulders. “But YOU’RE the real heroine, Peggy. I don’t want you to EVER forget that.”

“We’d best be moving along,” Ben said.

“Peggy?” Laura Dayton, who had remained silent throughout the proceedings, ventured hesitantly. “May I . . . I’d like to talk with you, uh privately . . . if I may?”

“It’s all right with Adam and me, if YOU’RE of a mind, Peggy,” Ben said. Adam nodded in agreement. “We’ll be outside.”

“Mrs. van Slyke, I just remembered a matter that I need to take up with Ben,” Lucas said, moving out from behind his desk. “You and Mrs. Dayton . . . please, feel free to take all the time you need.”

“Peggy,” Laura turned to her daughter, once they were alone, “I . . . I know this may seem like only a drop of water compared to a whole ocean, but . . . I’m sorry. I am so sorry for what’s happened to you over the years, since Will left, and . . . and for all that you suffered with Brett. God help me I . . . I knew, I couldn’t help knowing, b-but I never did anything . . . oh, Peggy . . . . ” A torrent of weeping drowned the remainder of her words.

Peggy immediately put her arms around her mother and held her close as she wept. “Apology accepted, Mother,” she said quietly, with all sincerity. “We were both scared, not only with Brett, but with Aunt Lil, too. That’s all over now. You and I are free to pick up and go on.”

“Y-you might not b-believe me when I say this . . . but I love you, Peggy. I tried to do the best for us, even . . . even though I failed miserably.”

“I know, Mother, and I love you, too.”

Laura hugged Peggy closed and held on tight for a long moment. “I sure wish you were coming with me to Denver . . . to Aunt Marian’s.”

“I can’t go anywhere much until the baby comes, and I’m back on my feet,” Peggy said. “After that, I need to decide about how I’m going to make my own way in the world.”

“Do you know yet what you want to do?”

“After I got Uncle Ben’s books caught up for him, Adam told me I seemed to have a flair for bookkeeping, maybe accounting. I’ve always loved working and playing around with numbers.”

“Are you still going to Sacramento with Adam and . . . and his wife?”

Peggy nodded. “They know of a good school there, where I can learn more about accounting, bookkeeping, and some things about other secretarial work. Adam said they would even help me find a job.”

“I’ll write when I get to Aunt Marian’s . . . if you want me to . . . . ”

“I’d like that very much, Mother. I’ll be leaving Uncle Ben’s within the next few days,” Peggy said. “Teresa’s mother will be arriving with their children . . . Adam’s and Teresa’s, that is. I thought it might be more considerate on my part to move out and give the Cartwrights a chance to visit with each other, without an interloper butting in.” She smiled. “Doc and Mrs. Martin have very kindly invited me to move in with THEM until the baby comes and I’m back on my feet. For now you can write to me at the Martins here in Virginia City. When I get to Sacramento, I’ll send you my address there.”

Laura smiled. “I’m so glad thing are working out so well for you, Peggy.” Her smile faded. “I only wish . . . that things had turned out better for Aunt Lil.”

“She shot and wounded Stacy, Mother, and I understand she came very close to hitting Adam. She could very easily have killed THEM, along with Teresa and Hoss. Aunt Lil’s got to stand trial for that, and pay the consequences.”

“She was desperate, Peggy.”

“That doesn’t mean she’s allowed to shoot at people.”

Laura nodded, and looked away. “I . . . I suppose . . . . ”

“Have you been able to see Aunt Lil, Mother?”

Laura morosely shook her head. “She won’t let me see her. Hasn’t, since Ben and Adam had the sheriff release me.”

Peggy felt a measure of relief in that knowledge. Her mother was now completely free of Aunt Lil’s domination and influence. She very much wanted things to remain that way. “When do you leave for Denver?”

“This afternoon on the two o’clock stage.”

“Do you want me there . . . to see you off?”

Laura shook her head. “I think I’d rather say good-bye here, Peggy. Do you mind?”

“Not at all, Mother,” Peggy hugged Laura again.

“Good bye, Peggy, and I wish you and your baby all the best.”

“I wish the same for YOU, Mother.”

“I hope you’ll come see me and Aunt Marian in Denver.”

“You and Aunt Marian will be more than welcome to come visit me in Sacramento, too, Mother.”

“I love you, Peggy.”

“I love you, too.”

Epilogue . . . .

That evening, the Cartwright family, which by extension included Hop Sing, Candy, and Peggy van Slyke gathered around the table for a special meal to celebrate Peggy’s heroism and her newly won freedom. The men were all attired in their best suits, with tie. Hop Sing had also dressed for the occasion in a long tunic, reaching to his ankles, made of green silk hand printed with Chinese dragons and other animals. Stacy wore the dress she had worn to what had come to be known as the Wedding of the Century. Teresa looked stunningly beautiful in the beautiful scarlet silk ball gown she had insisted on bringing, “just in case.” This afternoon, Mrs. Pomeroy had dropped off a new dress, made of a blue material that complimented Peggy’s eyes, “suitable for church,” as the old woman had declared so pointedly.

“ . . . and now for main dish,” Hop Sing announced as he entered the dining room bearing an enormous platter with a roast pig, complete with apple, decked with garlands of herbs and other vegetables. He dutifully set the meat tray down at the head of the table, directly in front of the Cartwright clan patriarch, then handed him the carving utensils.

“Hop Sing, you’ve . . . well, you’ve plain and simply outdone yourself,” Ben declared with a broad grin. “This roast pig is magnificent!”

“It’s got a magnificent aroma, too . . . which is makin’ me hungry enough t’ eat a whole herd o’ horses,” Hoss declared with a pointed, longing glance at the roast pig.

“Now you just HOLD those horses a minute, Son,” Ben admonished Hoss with a smile. “It’s only good manners to serve up the woman of the hour first.” He glanced down at Peggy seated near the foot of the table. “Peggy, if you’d please pass your plate up this way.”

“Uncle Ben, may I propose a toast first . . . before we eat?” Peggy asked.

“You’d better make it quick, Peggy,” Joe quipped. “It’s getting a little too creepy with Hoss looking at me like that . . . and drooling.”

Smiling, Peggy started to rise.

Hoss was out of his chair in an instant. Moving with surprising speed, given his size, he was standing behind Peggy’s chair within seconds. “Here y’ are, Peggy, please . . . allow me.” He graciously held her chair, as she rose.

“I’d like to propose a toast,” Peggy said in a voice, loud, clear, and confident. “First to the entire Cartwright family. I’ve always remembered you as kind, decent, generous people, always there, ready to lend a helping hand to family, friend, and stranger alike. I’m very grateful none of that changed, because . . . if it hadn’t been for your kindness and generosity . . . I wouldn’t be here right now. Uncle Ben, Hoss, Joe, Stacy, and Hop Sing, for all the blessings you give others, may you receive back again a hundred fold.”

Everyone seated around the table touched glasses each with his or her neighbor, before drinking in unison.

“Second,” Peggy continued, after everyone had drunk the first toast, “last maybe, but hardly least, to Adam and Teresa, for being there. I don’t know WHAT I would have done without YOU.”

Adam took a slow, deep, ragged breath, then closed his eyes momentarily, steeling himself. He exhaled then rose stiffly from his place at the dining room table, trying his best not to wince at the pain and stiffness in his chest and abdomen. “I’d also like to propose a toast . . . to Peggy, a strong, courageous, lovely young woman, who a couple of weeks ago saved not only MY life, but the lives of my father and Mister Milburn as well.” Smiling, he raised the wine glass in hand. “To Peggy,” Adam said quietly, favoring her with an affectionate smile. “My heroine!”

The End.

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