Mark of Kane

Part 2

By Kathleen T. Berney

“Uummmm UM!” Joe murmured softly, with eyes closed and a beatific smile on his face, as he lifted the plateful of fluffy scrambled eggs to his nose and inhaled the delicate aroma. “So light . . . so fluffy . . . so yellow!”

“Little Joe supposed to EAT egg, not SMELL egg,” Hop Sing admonished the youngest Cartwright son with a dark glare, as he entered the small dining room, where the entire family had gathered for breakfast, bearing a large platter piled high with steaming hot pancakes.

“I never thought I’d live t’ see the day my li’l brother’d be fawnin’ over s plate full o’ scrambled eggs the way he’s doin’,” Hoss muttered under his breath, all the while shaking his head.

“You and me both!” Adam agreed.

“Say, Adam?” Joe queried as he reverently set the plate down on the table before him.

“Yeah, Buddy?”

“Would you please pass the salt, pepper, and tabasco sauce?”

Adam grimaced. “Tabasco sauce?!” he echoed, incredulous.

“Joseph Francis, you may put a little bit of salt on those eggs,” Ben said in a very brisk, very firm tone, “but the key words regarding your present diet are ‘soft’ AND ‘bland.’ Tabasco sauce and pepper do NOT come under either category, not by any stretch of the imagination.”

Joe’s face fell.

“Here’s the salt, Son.” Ben slid the salt shaker across the table to within Joe’s reach. “Remember what Doc Martin said about using it sparingly.”

“Yes, Sir,” Joe exhaled a long melancholy sigh, meant to tug very hard on the heartstrings. He picked up the salt shaker and began to lightly salt his scrambled eggs.

“Joseph, I said SPARINGLY,” Ben admonished his youngest son with a stern glare.

“But, Pa . . . . ” Joe protested. “I hardly used ANY.”

“I hate to tell you this, Little Brother, but that’s exactly what sparingly means,” Adam quipped, as he reached for the platter of sausage.

Joe favored Adam with a sharp glare, as he set the salt shaker down on the table next to his plate. “Oh well,” he finally sighed. “At least I get to have a couple of pancakes this morning.”

“One,” Ben snapped, as he picked up the salt shaker and placed it well out of Joe’s reach.

“One?!” Joe echoed, incredulous.

“One,” Ben sternly reiterated.

“One.”

“That’s what I said.”

“Maple syrup, Grandpa?” Stacy asked, as she held up the pitcher.

“Yeah . . . thanks, Kid,” Joe said gratefully, as he accepted the proffered container from his sister. He dribbled a little syrup over his pancakes, then as an after thought, poured a little over his eggs. “I . . . uhhh guess a taste of that sausage is kinda . . . well, out of the question, hunh.” He looked over at his father through whipped puppy dog eyes, round as saucers.

“You guess right, Son.”

“Not even a little, teensy-weensy, very tiny little taste? Please?”

“Joseph, let me put it this way,” Ben said, making a point of not looking his youngest son directly in the eyes. “You’re progressing along very nicely. In fact you’re all the way up to soft and bland foods now . . . one week AHEAD of schedule, I might add.”

“I know, Pa.”

“Then maybe I need to remind you that if you indulge yourself in that taste of sausage . . . and it comes right back up . . . Doc Martin said you begin at square one,” Ben said.

Joe paled. “Y-You mean . . . b-back t-to . . . to clear liquids?!”

“That’s EXACTLY what I mean.”

Joe sighed mournfully.

“Tell ya what, Son. You eat what’s on your plate now . . . give it a couple of hours to settle . . . I’ll letcha have a peppermint stick,” Ben offered by way of compromise.

“Can I have a little of that gingerale with it?” Joe asked.

“We’ll see,” Ben said evasively.

“Adam, it’s ‘bout time you ‘n me was moving’ along,” Hoss said, as he finished up the last of his third helping of eggs, pancakes, and sausage. “You said we was meetin’ George at eight?”

“Yes . . . that’s right, I did.” Adam quickly downed the remainder of his coffee in a single swallow.

“So what have YOU two got planned for today?” Ben asked, turning his attention to his oldest sons.

“We’re going to be hiring men to work on the house until lunchtime,” Adam replied. “After we have lunch, we’ll be taking Mister Farlyn out to the Ponderosa, so he can see for himself what’s what and what’s where.”

“You boys seem to be moving right along,” Ben said, visibly impressed. “Will you be home for supper?”

“I will,” Adam replied. “Mister Farlyn needs to be back in time to report for work over at the International Hotel.”

“I’ll be checkin’ out the horses whilst Adam ‘n George are lookin’ over what’s left o’ the house,” Hoss said, “but, unless somethin’ unusual comes up, I expect I’ll be back, too.”

“See you guys later,” Stacy sighed, wistful, not without envy. A great big yawn followed on the heels of her words.

“Pa, I think I’m going to get myself dressed, then g’won across the street and see Doc Martin about calling in that colleague of his,” Joe said, after Hoss and Adam had left. “I won’t be very long.”

“Alright,” Ben said dubiously, “but you watch yourself going across that street . . . and don’t you dare forget to stop and look both ways, you hear me?”

“Yes, Pa,” Joe said very solemnly, then grinned. “Of course if you don’t trust me to cross the street by myself, I guess you can always take my hand and lead me across . . . like you did when I really was Little Joe!?”

“Scamp! Get on upstairs with ya . . . before I take you up on that suggestion,” Ben growled back in tones of mock outrage.

“Yes, Sir,” Joe said with a chuckle and a crisp salute.

“As for YOU, Young Woman,” Ben turned, and addressed his daughter in a more kindly tone, “would you like to sit down and play a few rounds of checkers with the best checker player in this family?”

“You, Pa?” Stacy asked.

“Darn right.”

“ . . . uhhh, Stacy?”

“Yeah, Grandpa?”

“If you DO sit down and play checkers with Pa?”

“Yeah?”

“Don’t you dare take your eyes off the board for a single minute.”

“Joe? Joe Cartwright?! Well! Ain’t THIS a pleasant surprise,” Hilda Mae Graves, the Martins’ housekeeper declared with a broad grin, upon opening the front door. “Good to see ya up ‘n about.”

Joe returned her grin with a warm smile of his own. “Thank you, Mrs. Graves . . . it’s good BEING up ‘n about. I was never much for lying around in bed for any length of time . . . except, maybe for sleeping.”

“Scalawag!” she retorted, knowing all too well the youngest Cartwright son’s solid, well earned, and much deserved reputation for being the good doctor’s second worst patient. The absolute worst, of course, was the clan patriarch, who by his own admission had a few more years of experience. “Well, don’t just stand there, come in.”

“Thank you.”

“AFTER you wipe your feet!” she snapped, pointing down at the mat.

“Yes, Ma’am,” Joe returned, his smile never wavering. He very dutifully complied with her request, then followed her into the house.

“The doc’s with a patient, ‘n the missus is out shoppin’,” Hilda Mae said, as she led Joe down the short length of narrow, dimly lit hallway to the Martins’ formal parlor. “Doc won’t be but a few minutes, if ya wanna wait.”

“Thank you, Miss Graves. I’ll wait.”

“You g’won in, make yourself at home,” Hilda Mae said, inviting him to enter the parlor with a broad, sweeping gesture of her left arm. “I’ll tell the doc you’re here soon as he’s through.”

“Thank you.”

“Can I getcha anything while you’re waitin’? Tea? Coffee, maybe?”

“No thank you, I’ll be fine,” Joe said, as he settled himself comfortably on the small settee.

A few moments later, Paul Martin entered, still wearing his lab coat. “Good morning, Joe,” the physician greeted his favorite patient, with a weary smile.

“Howdy, Doc,” Joe quipped, as he slowly, stiffly rose to his feet. “Wow! So early in the morning and already no rest for the weary.”

“Indeed!” Paul agreed. “Sit down, Joe. I need to take a load off myself.” He dropped down into the wingback easy chair, positioned between the settee and the small fireplace, set into the wall directly opposite the door. Joe sat back down in the middle of the settee. “So far today, I’ve had all the usual appointments, an emergency, and Ellen Fox like as not giving birth before the day is out.”

“Sounds like you got a full plate ahead of you today.”

“Joe . . . you’re not here to . . . well, to somehow make my full plate even more so . . . are you?” Paul queried, favoring Joe with a jaundiced eye.

“What do you mean?” Joe asked, with all the solemn innocence of a choir boy.

“I mean your sister hasn’t tried anything foolish like attempting to ride that horse of hers, or anything like that . . . has she?”

Joe threw back his head and laughed out loud. “No, Doc. Stacy’s behaving herself,” he said, as his merriment began to fade. “Not that she’s got a whole lot of choice in the matter right now.”

“Still tires easily?”

“Actually, she’s doing better in that department,” Joe replied. “I meant with Pa and Hop Sing looking after the two of us . . . well, I’m sure you know as well as I do that the two of ‘em can be a pair of real rough customers when set their minds. That’s why I’VE been as good as gold.”

“Glad to hear it,” Paul said sternly, then smiled. “So . . . what CAN I do for you, Joe?”

“Pa said you had made mention of a couple of colleagues who specialize in treating problems mental and emotional in nature,” Joe said, his smile fading.

“Yes . . . . ”

“I’d like to consult with one of ‘em.”

“Your timing’s very fortuitous, Joe,” Paul said. “One of those colleagues . . . Doctor Carl Jefferies, wired me just this morning. It seems he and his wife are on their way east to work in that new hospital for the mentally ill in Washington D. C.”

“Saint Elizabeth’s Hospital?”

“Yes,” Paul replied, surprised that Joe knew of it.

“A good friend of Pa’s in a patient there,” Joe said very quietly.

“Ah yes. Mister Rowan,” Paul murmured sadly.

“Yeah.”

“Carl and Jennie plan to spend a few days with Lily and me on their way east,” Paul said. “They’ll be arriving on the stage out from San Francisco day after tomorrow. I know he’ll be more than happy to consult with you, Joe. After they arrive, and have a chance to collect themselves a little, we’ll set up an appointment.”

“Thanks, Doc. I really appreciate this,” Joe said, rising.

“Sure.” Paul followed suit. “ . . . and, Joe?”

“Yeah?”

“I want to let you know that I find it very heartening . . . very heartening indeed . . . to see you not only making the decision to consult with Carl, but following through on it,” Paul said, in all sincerity. “That shows a lot of courage and maturity on your part, AND it tells me you’re heading in the right direction mentally and emotionally.”

“Maturity?! Now that’s a word I don’t hear too often in the same breath with my own name,” Joe said, half teasing, half awed and gratified. “Seriously though . . . thanks. Right now . . . you have no idea how much it means to me hearing you say that,” Joe said quietly.

“How does your pa feel about you consulting with Doctor Jefferies?”

“He said that sometimes there’s wisdom in talking to a third party,” Joe replied. “He also said he’s for it, if it helps bring me some peace of mind.”

“Certainly no surprise there.”

“Well, I’d best be going and let you get some rest yourself, before you have to go running out in the dead of night to help Ellen Fox with bringing that baby into the world,” Joe said.

“Alright, Joe . . . and I’ll get back to you about that consultation with Doctor Jefferies . . . . ”

One Week Later . . . .

“Are you still having the nightmares, Mister Cartwright?”

“Yes,” Joe Cartwright replied. “But, they don’t come as often now . . . and when they do? They don’t really scare me anymore.” He frowned for a moment, as he silently mulled over his words. “I just thought of something . . . . ”

“What’s that?”

“If they don’t scare me anymore . . . they’re not really nightmares, are they?”

Doctor Carl Jeffries smiled. Aged in his late thirties, he was roughly the same height and build as Joe, though thirty pounds heavier. He had full head of light brown hair, graying around the edges, a neatly trimmed goatee, and warm golden brown eyes, framed by a pair of gold wire framed glasses. Though a much respected friend and colleague, Doctor Paul Martin took special pride in the fact that the young man was also his godson.

Doctor Jefferies’ specialty was in the field of psychology. He had spent the better part of the afternoon, comfortably ensconced on the settee in the living room of the Fletchers’ home, next to the fireplace, conversing with Joe Cartwright.

“You tell me, Mister Cartwright. Are they dreams? Or are they nightmares?”

“Dreams,” Joe decided. “If I don’t wake myself or my family up in the middle of the night, screaming in terror . . . then, they’re dreams.”

“When did the nightmares become dreams?”

“It was a little over a week ago,” Joe replied. “The day my oldest brother arrived from Sacramento, in fact. I was in the midst of a really bad one, when . . . all of a sudden . . . I remembered Lady Chadwick was dead . . . that I had actually seen her body at the undertaker’s, all laid out in its coffin. When she tried to tell me again that the dream was real and my waking hours the dream, I told her flat out SHE was lying. She got this real funny look on her face, then poof! The dream was over.” He grinned. “I woke up screaming that night, but it was a scream of victory, not of fear.”

“Sounds to me like you’re progressing in the right direction,” Carl said.

“You . . . really think so?” Joe asked, his voice edge with doubt.

“The nightmare becoming a dream is most heartening,” Carl said, speaking candidly to Joe’s doubts and fears, “and I feel encouraged by the fact of you making the decisions about seeing Lady Chadwick’s body, making your deposition to sheriff, and especially by the way you confronted Mister Crippensworth. It took a lot of courage on your part to decide upon those courses of action, and follow through on them.”

“Pa said the same thing.”

“Your pa sounds like a very wise, very intelligent man. I hope you pay attention to him.”

Joe grinned. He had been nervous and apprehensive about this meeting all morning long. But, Carl Jefferies’ easy going, friendly demeanor had put Joe very much at ease within the first few minutes. “I do . . . most of the time.” His smile faded. “Doc?”

“Yes?”

“You wanna know what DOES scare me?”

“If YOU wish to tell me.”

“Like I just said . . . it’s not the nightmares, not since they’ve become dreams,” Joe said. “It’s what I call the WAKING dreams?”

“The waking dreams?”

Joe nodded.

“What . . . exactly . . . are these waking dreams, Mister Cartwright?”

“I call ‘em waking dreams because they happen when I’m awake,” Joe explained. “I’ll see or hear something, and suddenly, I’m back there again with her. It looks and feels just as real as . . . well, as you and I are right now.”

“Do you recall when the waking dreams started?”

“I sure do. They started the same day my brother, Adam, arrived . . . the same day my nightmares became dreams,” Joe replied. He looked up at Carl with a wan smile, and quipped, “You don’t suppose it’s all ADAM’S fault, do you?” He saw immediately that his attempt at humor had fallen flat on it’s face. “Sorry, Doc,” he immediately apologized. “Bad joke.”

“Probably more along the lines of an INSIDE joke,” Carl offered with a kind smile. “I have no idea what kind of relationship you have with your oldest brother, so your joke goes right over my head. Getting back to the waking dreams you just mentioned . . . what sights and sounds trigger them? Is it something specific?”

Joe dolefully shook his head. “It can be anything,” he replied. “That’s one reason why they scare me so much.”

“Can you tell me about the first time you experienced one of these waking dreams?” Carl probed gently.

“Yeah. Like I said, it was the day Adam arrived from Sacramento,” Joe replied. “It was late in the afternoon, and I was feeling kinda tired, so I went upstairs to rest.” He frowned. “I’m not sure what set it off, exactly . . . whether it was the ticking of the wall clock in my room . . . the glare of the sunlight in the glass over the clock face . . . or maybe the position of the hands. I don’t know . . . it could’ve been a little of all three.

“I heard her first before I actually saw her. I heard her pacing the floor, slapping her riding crop against her hand. Then, I was back there again. Back in that room with the sun shining right in my eyes . . . tied down to that bed . . . with her pacing, trying to make me acknowledge HER version of things.”

“Her version being that she and Mister Crippensworth had come upon you injured, and had stopped to help?” Carl asked.

“Yeah,” Joe said, his voice shaking. “It was a lie, of course. A great big, ugly bald faced lie.”

“Yes. Lady Chadwick and Mister Crippensworth really came with the intention of abducting you,” Carl said, reiterating what Joe had told him earlier.

“Yeah.”

“Do you remember how you felt when you found yourself in the midst of that first waking dream?”

“Scared outta my mind for one thing,” Joe replied immediately, “and so low, I think I could’ve walked upright under the belly of a snake. I kept telling her over and over she was dead, but it was like she never heard me. For a minute, I honest and truly believed I WAS back there . . . that my being home again with my family was the dream.”

“How did you come out of the waking dream?”

“The first time it happened, it was Hop Sing calling me. He had come upstairs to tell me that Hoss, my BIG brother, was back from picking up Adam at the stage depot.”

“How did you feel when you came out of that waking dream?”

“At first, I had no idea in the world where I was,” Joe replied. “Though I think part of that was my family and me having just moved into THIS house a week before.”

“That’s a reasonable assumption.”

“I also have this awful feeling of being completely helpless, Doctor Jefferies, because I never know when they’re going to happen, or what’s going to trigger it.”

“It must’ve been very close to the way you felt the entire time Lady Chadwick and Mister Crippensworth held you prisoner,” Carl said slowly, after a moment of thoughtful silence.

Doctor Jefferies’ observation drew a sharp glance from Joe. “Doc, I . . . I think you just hit the nail on the head,” he murmured in a voice barely audible. “I never thought of it before but . . . yeah. I WAS scared the whole time, and except for the two days I was locked up in that attic room, I was tied to a bed . . . completely helpless.

“I also never knew what to expect whenever Lady Chadwick came into the room,” Joe continued. “One minute, she could be stone cold rational like you and me . . . or maybe more like my oldest brother, Adam . . . the next, screaming with rage . . . and the next, living in her own dream world somewhere. Her mood would change . . . just like that!” He snapped his fingers for emphasis.

“Do you know what, exactly, would trigger her changes?”

“Sometimes she would get angry because I refused to allow her to sway me. Other times . . . . ” Joe shrugged. “It could’ve been anything from something I said to looking at her cross eyed. I just wish to heaven I could understand.”

“What would you like to understand, Mister Cartwright?”

“I want to know why,” Joe replied. “Why did she hate Pa so much? SHE’S the one who turned him down when he asked her to marry him all those years ago in New Orleans. Then, when she came to visit us . . . she tried to ruin Pa, so that he’d have to marry her for her money. Fortunately for us, we found out about her scheme, and Pa called her on it. But . . . she had the gall to claim that Pa humiliated HER. Then, toward the end of my captivity, she started acting like she and Pa were married.” He sighed. “I know . . . there’s no rhyme or reason to insanity.”

“In this case, perhaps there is,” Carl said. “There’s a very fine line separating love and hate. I’ve found that to be very true in living life, and certainly in my practice. Both are very intense, very passionate feelings, to which people often invest their all emotionally. One wrong move, word, gesture, or glance . . . love can very quickly turn to bitter hatred.”

“I’m not so sure I can accept that, Doctor Jefferies.”

“About love quickly turning into hate?”

Joe nodded. “One of my favorite passages in the Bible is the one about love,” he said. “It’s usually read at weddings. According to THAT passage, love is always patient, kind . . . and it’s not selfish, or riled up very easily. I think if Lady Chadwick had felt anything even remotely resembling love for my father, she would have been up front about Lord Chadwick back in New Orleans, and when she came to visit, she would have tried to woo Pa, not destroy everything he’s ever worked for.”

“You have a valid point there, Mister Cartwright,” Carl said thoughtfully.

“ . . . and there ARE a lot of feelings and emotions that can be part and parcel of love, but are also very often mistaken FOR love,” Joe continued.

“You speak of passion perhaps?”

Joe nodded. “I could see THAT not only as being mistaken for love, but also turning to hate real quick when it DOESN’T come along with love.”

Carl Jefferies smiled. “Mister Cartwright, I dare say, YOU could probably teach ME a thing or two when it comes to dealing with human emotion,” he said quietly. “If you ARE certifiably insane, would that we all were as crazy. The world would be a lot saner place, no question about it.”

Joe found himself returning Carl’s smile. “Is that your way of telling me I’m NOT crazy?”

“Indeed it is,” Carl said. “My diagnosis, for what it’s worth is . . . that you’re a young man, who’s survived an incredibly harrowing and painful experience, but who seems to be well on the way toward eventual healing and becoming a stronger, better man for it.”

“Thanks, Doc,” Joe said gratefully, the relief evident in his voice, his face, and especially his eyes, glowing a deep emerald in the waning late afternoon light. He rose.

Carl Jefferies followed suit, knowing that their time together had reached a mutually satisfying end. “If you wish to speak with me further, my wife and I will be with the Martins’ for another couple of days. Don’t hesitate to let me know, if you need me.”

“I won’t,” Joe said, as they shook hands, knowing full well that he wouldn’t need to see Doctor Jefferies again, at least not on a professional basis. “I’ll see you to the door.”

The pair walked to the front door in companionable silence.

“Thanks again, Doc,” Joe said again, with deep, heartfelt gratitude as they came to a stop at the front door. “Our talk has really given me real peace of mind . . . the first, I think, since I came home.”

“My pleasure, Mister Cartwright. Would that ALL my patients’ difficulties could be resolved so quickly and easily.”

Joe reached for the door knob and opened the door for Doctor Jefferies. He was mildly surprised to see his father and sister stepping up onto the porch. “THAT was good timing,” he remarked, favoring Ben and Stacy with his infamous smile, dubbed his ‘lady killer smile,’ by the latter. “Doc, this is my pa . . . the ELDER Mister Cartwright . . . and my sister, Stacy.”

“A pleasure,” Carl declared with a grin, as he shook hands with Ben first, then Stacy. “Now I have faces to put with your names.”

“ . . . uh oh,” Stacy murmured, casting a wary glance over at her brother.

“Don’t worry, Kid,” Joe said. “It was all good.”

“I can certainly vouch for that,” Carl Jefferies said with a smile.

“Thanks again for talking with me, Doctor Jefferies,” Joe said gratefully. “I . . . realize it must’ve been on real short notice.”

“Truth be known, Mister Cartwright, my godfather’s told me so much about you, and the rest of your family— ”

“Uh oh. I hope SOME of it was good.”

“Some of it was, and the rest . . . well, let’s just say I was hoping I’d get a chance to meet my godfather’s . . . now how did he put that?!” Carl frowned, then brightened almost immediately. “Oh yes. He said that you, your brothers, and your sister especially numbered among the most IMpatient of all his patients, but that your father’s the absolute worst.”

“That’s because Pa’s a few years up on the rest of us,” Joe said with a smile. “Well . . . if I don’t get to see you before you leave Virginia City, I hope you and your wife have a safe trip, and I hope everything works out well for you both in Washington.”

“Thank you, Mister Cartwright. I wish you and your family all the best as well.”

Upon stepping back inside the house, Joe found Ben and Stacy comfortably seated together on the settee, facing the small fireplace. Stacy’s injured leg rested on the coffee table, cradled on the center of one of the larger cushions, normally placed at either end of the settee. Joe slowly ambled across the room, and plopped down on the settee, on the other side of his sister.

“Grandpa?”

“Yeah, Stace?”

“If you want to talk to Pa, I can make myself scarce for a little while.”

“Thanks, Kid, but that won’t be necessary,” Joe said.

“So . . . what DID Doctor Jefferies have to say?” Ben asked.

“He said a lot of the things YOU’VE been telling me all along, Pa,” Joe said, as he and Ben together settled Stacy on the settee between them. “At one point, I even told him that he sounded a lot like you.”

“Really?” Ben queried with a smile. “What did Doctor Jefferies say about THAT?”

“He said . . . and I quote . . . ‘your pa sounds like a very wise, very intelligent man. I hope you pay attention to him,’ ” Joe replied.

“Really?” Ben queried.

“Uh oh, Grandpa,” Stacy warned, her eyes dancing with impish merriment. “I don’t think Pa’s ever gonna let you live THAT down.”

“Darn tootin’!” Ben agreed, smiling.

“The upshot of his diagnosis is also something else you’ve been telling me all along, Pa . . . in one way or another,” Joe said, turning serious. “Doctor Jefferies said that I’m a young man, who’s gone through a painful and harrowing experience, but who’s well on his way toward healing . . . and something else . . . . ” He frowned for a moment, trying to remember, then brightened. “Oh yeah. He also said that I’m gonna come out on the other side of this a stronger, better man.”

“Sounds like Doctor Jefferies has a thing or two on the ball himself,” Ben said quietly. “Do you feel better about things now, Son?”

Joe nodded. “I feel LOTS better.”

“You wanna know something? You LOOK lots better, too,” Stacy said as she impulsively reached over and gave him a big bear hug.

“Thanks, Kid,” Joe said, hugging her back. “You up for a game of checkers?”

“Ok, but I’m not taking my eyes off the board for a second,” Stacy declared, as they divvied up the pieces and began to set up for play.

“Pa, you wanna play the winner?” Joe asked.

“No, thank you,” Ben replied, as he rose and moved over to the easy chair, in order to allow his two younger children room to play. “I thought I might just relax and read for a little while before we sit down to supper.”

“So . . . how’s the rebuilding going Adam?” Matt Wilson asked, raising his voice so that he might be heard over the din generated by the crowd of people thronging the Silver Dollar Saloon.

Matt and Adam had been close friends since they were boys. After leaving the Ponderosa and Virginia City to make his own way in the world, Matt Wilson was one of the few in Nevada, apart from his family, with whom Adam had maintained a regular correspondence. He had also had the honor and pleasure of standing up for Matt three years ago, when he married the former Clarissa Starling at what continued to be spoken of as ‘The Wedding of the Century.’

“Everything’s coming along just fine,” Adam replied, smiling. He took a big gulp from the beer mug in front of him, then continued. “In fact . . . we’re actually AHEAD of schedule. I didn’t expect to have the repair work on the foundation done until about the middle of next week, and from the looks of things, we’re going to be finished by the end of THIS week.”

“That George Farlyn’s a wonder, ain’t he?” Hoss said with a smug grin.

“That he is,” Adam agreed wholeheartedly, “that he is. He’s an excellent manager and overseer, he’s very good with people, and you were right, Hoss, when you said that everyone has a lot of respect for him. We wouldn’t be so far ahead of the game without George, that’s for sure.” He looked over at Hoss, his smile widening. “Thanks for recommending him.”

“Glad everything’s going so well, Adam,” Matt said. He finished the last of the beer in the mug before him, then asked, “How’s the rest of the family doing . . . especially Joe and Stacy?”

“Joe’s still limping, but he’s breathing a lot better, and a lot easier than he was when I arrived last week,” Adam replied. “His bruises are fading, and the other wounds . . . ” the physical ones, though Adam didn’t say that aloud, “ . . . are nearly healed, including that bad one on his right arm that Doctor Martin was concerned about.”

“Glad to hear it,” Matt declared with a grin. “How’s he eating?”

“He’s graduated to soft and bland,” Adam replied. “He enjoyed those scrambled eggs the first couple of mornings, after he was finally allowed to try them, but now, I think he’s getting a little tired of having to eat them without salt, pepper, and tabasco sauce.”

“Tabasco sauce?!” Matt wrinkled his nose in utter disgust.

“Yes, tabasco sauce.”

Matt shuddered. “How’s Stacy doing?”

Adam waved to the bartender, and pointed to his empty mug. “Doctor Martin wants to remove her cast in another week or two so he can check and make sure everything’s healing up properly,” he replied. “Assuming everything IS alright under all that plaster-of-paris, he’ll put on another cast, for four more weeks. She’ll have some hard work ahead of her before she’s walking and riding again, but Doctor Martin’s confident that she’ll make a full and complete recovery.”

“Glad to hear it. I heard things were really touch and go with Stacy for a while there . . . early on.”

“Yeah,” Hoss said quietly. “But the worst is over.”

“Physically, at any rate,” Adam sighed with a droll rolling of the eyes heavenward. “Patience is a virtue, but NOT one of Stacy’s, I’m afraid . . . especially when she’s convalescing. Joe’s just as bad . . . if not WORSE.”

“The one I’M feelin’ sorry for right now is PA,” Hoss said with a chuckle. “HE’S the one who’s really been lookin’ after the pair of ‘em.”

“So . . . what can I getcha, Adam?” It was Sam, the bartender. “Another beer?”

“Yeah, Sam . . . for me and for Matt, at least. How are YOU doing, Hoss? YOU ready for another beer?”

“I will be in just a second,” Hoss replied. He lifted the mug in hand to his lips and downed the remainder in a single gulp. “NOW I’m ready.”

Adam placed three fifty-cent pieces down on the bar. “This round’s on me,” he said.

Hoss frowned. “Didn’t you buy the last round, Adam?”

“No, he bought the last TWO,” Matt said. “Put your money away, Adam . . . you, too, Hoss. I’M buying this round.”

“Matt, I SAID this one’s on ME,” Adam argued.

“Tell ya what. While you boys sort out who’s buyin’, I’ll go refill your mugs,” Sam said, as he reached for the empties.

“Howdy, Boys . . . Adam . . . Hoss . . . Matt . . . . ” Roy Coffee greeted each of the younger men with a smile and a nod of the head, as he stepped up to the bar.

“Howdy,” Hoss returned the greeting and the smile. Adam and Matt both grinned and nodded by way of greeting.

“How’re things going, Sheriff Coffee?” Adam asked.

“Can’t complain,” Roy grunted. “How ‘bout with YOU? How’s that house comin’ along?”

“I was just telling Hoss and Matt that so far, we’re ahead of schedule,” Adam replied. “We’ll be finished with the repairs to the foundation by the end of the week, and THAT being the case . . . we’ll be completing the necessary repair work on the fireplace and chimney by the end of the following week, and who knows? Keep on like we’re going, we may be laying down the floor for the downstairs.”

“That puts him ahead of his own plans by almost a whole week, Sheriff Coffee,” Hoss said proudly.

“You always was a fast worker, Adam,” Roy said with a grin.

“Gentlemen, to give credit where it’s due, George Farlyn’s the one who deserves the lion’s share for all the fast work,” Adam said. “Every last one of those men we hired would walk a mile across hot coals barefoot for George. THAT’S what’s put us so far ahead of schedule.”

“Here y’ are, Boys,” Sam, the bartender returned with a big grin and three mugs of beer.

“ . . . and here YOU are, Sam,” Adam said, as he placed two silver dollars onto the bartender’s large, beefy palm. “Consider the change as a thank you note.”

“Thank you, Adam . . . thank you very much,” Sam’s grin widened appreciably, as he pocketed the extra silver dollar. “ ‘Evenin’, Roy. What can I getcha?”

“I’ll have a beer, Sam,” Roy said.

“Comin’ right up.”

“Adam Cartwright, I said I was buying,” Matt said, leveling a ferocious glare at his old friend.

“You?!” Hoss echoed, glaring at Matt first, then over at Adam. “As I recall . . . I said I was buyin’ this round.”

“Now you boys’d best settle down right quick, or else I’m gonna run the lotta ya in.” Though Roy Coffee spoke in his sternest, most authoritative sheriff’s tone of voice, the devilish twinkle in his eyes wasn’t lost on his three younger companions.

“On WHAT charge?” Adam demanded. A wry half smile tugged hard at the corner of his mouth.

“Disturbin’ the peace,” Roy quipped without missing a beat.

Sheriff Coffee, can I buy YOU a drink?” Matt asked.

“Much as I’d love t’ take ya up on it, Matt, I’m afraid I’m gonna hafta turn ya down,” Roy said. “Elections are comin’ up, an’ I don’t want nobody t’ think I’m on the take or somethin’.”

Adam, meanwhile, finished his beer and set the mug down on the bar. “Gentlemen, I hate to break this up, but I need to be moving along,” he said.

A bewildered frown creased Hoss’ brow. “What for, Adam? Supper ain’t for another couple o’ hours yet.”

“I know, Big Brother. I wanted to review the final drawings on the first floor of the house and start working out what we’re going to need in the way of building material . . . for THAT much of the house, at least. If YOU want to stay a little longer— ”

“Nah, I’d best mosey along with ya,” Hoss decided. “Poor Pa could probably use a break after spendin’ all day cooped up with a pair o’ cranky, stir crazy young ‘ns.”

“Adam . . . Hoss, you boys say hello to your pa for me,” Roy said, “an’ tell Joe ‘n Stacy I’m thinkin’ about ‘em.”

“That goes for me, too,” Matt said.

“Excuse me, Sheriff Coffee?” It was Garth Parker. He was a young man, who had started work at the Western Union Office in Virginia City three and a half weeks ago.

“What’s up, Garth?” Roy asked.

“This just came in from the Overland Stage Office in Freedonia,” Garth said, passing the slip of paper in hand over to the sheriff. “Something about an overdue stage coach.”

A nebulous sense of foreboding settled over Adam like a thick, heavy shawl.

“Seems it left Virginia City . . . day after YOU arrived, Adam,” Roy said, as he quickly scanned the note.

“How many days overdue IS that stage?” Adam snapped out the question drawing sharp glances from Hoss and Roy.

“If that stage left day after you arrived . . . it’ll have been missin’ little over a week,” Roy answered, with a frown. “You alright, Adam?”

“Sorry, I . . . didn’t mean to take your head off, Sheriff,” Adam said contritely.

“Any particular reason why you’re askin’?”

“If that was the stage that left here in the morning, the day after I arrived . . . I may know two of the passengers.”

“Friends o’ yours, Adam?” Hoss asked.

“Acquaintances, actually. Hoss, you met them.”

“I did?”

“Remember? Lorenzo and Maria Estevan. We gave them a lift to the International Hotel.”

“Oh yeah . . . the newlyweds,” Hoss said quietly.

Adam, then, turned to Roy Coffee. “The Estevans and I traveled together from Sacramento,” he explained. “Charming young couple. They were returning home to Santa Fe from their honeymoon trip.”

“I see,” Roy murmured thoughtfully.

“Has anything been done to try and locate that stage?” Adam asked.

“The Phoenix office would’ve sent out search parties,” Roy said, “but, considerin’ that stage is two weeks overdue, I hafta assume those search parties didn’t find nothin’. Next step’s t’ check the relay stops between here ‘n Freedonia, find out who saw ‘em last. That would take a while since most relay stations don’t have a telegraph station.”

“Sheriff Coffee, I’d be much obliged if you kept me posted?”

“Sure thing, Adam,” Roy promised. “First thing t’morrow, I’ll send wires t’ Freedonia ‘n the Overland Stage Company’s main headquarters. I’ll letcha know what they say.”

“Thank you,” Adam said gratefully.

“It’ll be dark before long. Time we thought about stoppin’ t’ make camp,” Hugh O’Brien wearily told his eldest daughter, Crystal McShane, and foreman, Darryl Hughes. He and his family had been close friends and neighbors of the Cartwright family for many years. Hugh was the owner of a small spread called Shoshone Queen, in honor of his late wife, Angelina Thundercloud Woman, a full blooded Shoshone. Crystal McShane had served well as his “right hand man,” in the years following the deaths of her mother and husband.

“There’s watering hole up ahead, Pa,” Crystal said, pointing straight ahead, slightly to her left. “It’s nestled in the midst of that rock circle up yonder.”

“How far you figure?”

“Quarter of a mile at most,” Crystal replied.

“Alright, we’ll make camp there,” Hugh decided.

The three were on their way home from Eastgate, where they had sold a dozen saddle horses at auction for a whopping ten thousand dollars. Crystal had wisely insisted on having a bank draft drawn up, rather than carry a that large amount of cash on a four day trek back home. They reached the water hole that Crystal had pointed out, just as the sun began to dip down behind the jagged line of mountains in the far distance. Hugh and Darryl immediately set themselves to the task of settling the horses for the night, while Crystal took an arm load of wood from their pack horse for their camp fire.

“Darryl, Crystal ‘n I’ve decided t’ give ya a couple o’ days off,” Hugh said, as he unsaddled his own horse, Tarannis. “Official just as soon as we get home.”

“You deserve it, Darryl,” Crystal added, in complete wholehearted agreement. “You worked real hard not only helping Pa ‘n me get OUR horses saddle broke, trained, and ready for that auction, but in giving Hoss a hand with that string they we’re trying to get ready to fill that army contract, as well.”

Darryl looked from one to the other, his cheeks flaming scarlet. He had unsaddled Dagda, Crystal’s big palomino gelding, and his own horse, Kentucky Blue. “Gee, I . . . I dunno, Mister O’Brien . . . Mrs. McShane,” he stammered modestly, as he turned to unload their pack horse. “I . . . well, it IS my job after all . . . . ”

“Which you’ve performed admirably . . . ‘way above and beyond the call of duty, especially with Joe and Stacy Cartwright being sidelined the way they were,” Crystal said, as she arranged the wood and lit the camp fire. “Pa?”

“Yeah, Crys?”

“SPEAKING of Joe and Stacy . . . what’s the latest?” she asked. “You told me you’d bumped into Mister Cartwright over at the general store just before we left for Eastgate.”

Hugh smiled. “Ben told me they’re goin’ stir crazy.”

“THAT’S a good sign,” Crystal said, with a smile. The entire Cartwright family, especially the youngest son and only daughter, had, over the years, established a solid reputation for being Doc Martin’s worst patients in times of illness or injury.

“He also said Stacy wrote Jason a nice long letter.”

“Good.” Crystal smiled. “That would’ve been a couple of weeks ago. Jason oughtta be getting it about now. I know he’s been worried sick since we wrote and told him about the fire and about Stacy being hurt.”

Hugh and Darryl approached the campfire carrying dishes, cooking utensils, three large cans of beans, and a small sack of coffee.

“Darryl?”

“Yes, Mrs. McShane?”

“Would you mind fetching us some water?”

“Not at all, Ma’am,” Darryl replied, as he picked up their coffee pot and a large bucket.

“Say, Darryl . . . . ” Hugh called after his young foreman, as he and Crystal set to work opening the cans of beans.

“Yes, Sir?”

“I was just thinkin’ . . . it’s gonna be a while before Joe Cartwright’s able to attend any Saturday night dances, what with that bum ankle o’ his,” Hugh said with a sly smile. “I’ll betcha Lilly Beth Jared’s just dyin’ for an invitation.”

“Pa! That’s TERRIBLE!”

“What’s terrible?”

“Encouraging a nice young man like Darryl t’ take shameless advantage of another man’s misfortune is bad enough,” Crystal sternly admonished her father, as she emptied the first can of beans her father had just opened into a large pot. “But when the man suffering misfortune is a friend . . . . ” She sighed and shook her head. “You oughtta be ashamed of yourself!”

“Lilly Beth and Joe ain’t engaged, are they?”

“No . . . . ”

“Do they have any kind of an understanding?”

“No, not that I know of.”

“Ok, then,” Hugh said reasonably. “T’ ain’t nothin’ wrong with makin’ hay whilst the sun shines.”

“Mister O’Brien?”

“Yes, Darryl?”

“Joe and Lilly Beth broke up last year,” the younger man said, as he returned to the campfire with the coffee pot and bucket filled with water.

Hugh’s face fell. “Really?”

“Yup.”

“Well, I’ll be damned,” Hugh murmured, shaking his head in mild surprise. He handed the second can of beans, he had opened, over to Crystal, then set to work opening the third. “You know how come?”

“Pa, I don’t think that’s any of our business,” Crystal admonished her father severely.

“I only wanna know,” Hugh immediately defended himself in a lofty tone of voice.

“Why? So you can tell your friends at the Cattlemen’s Association?”

“Well . . . . ”

“Honestly! You MEN are worse gossips than the likes of Mrs. Kirk and Miss Mudgely put together,” Crystal said as she finished opening the third can of beans and poured it into the pot. The two women she had referred to were unofficially known among the populace of Virginia City and the surrounding environs, as the walking branches of the Territorial Enterprise.

“Mister O’Brien?”

“Yes, Darryl?”

“I can’t tell ya all the whys ‘n wherefores behind Joe ‘n Lilly Beth breakin’ up,” Darryl said. Joe Cartwright had sworn him to secrecy so not to besmirch Lilly Beth’s reputation. Though he remained firmly of the opinion that Lilly Beth Jared deserved no such consideration, Joe had been adamant. In the end, Darryl agreed to keep the matter secret for the sake of the girl’s family, and because Joe had asked it of him . . . not out of any concern or consideration for Lilly Beth Jared. “I, uhhh . . . agree with Joe ‘bout WHY they broke up, but that’s all I can say. As for Lily Beth, well she’s got a new fella and I’ve got me someone else t’ be sweet on.”

“Oh yeah? Who?” Hugh prompted.

“Pa . . . . ” Crystal growled threateningly.

“It’s ok, Mrs. McShane,” Darryl said. “Her name’s Rebecca Sullivan.”

Hugh lapsed into a moment of thoughtful silence. “She the gal who just started work over at the bank a couple o’ months ago?”

“Yes, Sir.”

“She DOES seem t’ be a real nice, down t’ earth kinda gal,” Hugh said, grinning from ear-to-ear, “an’ she’s pretty as a picture t’ boot. You gonna ask HER t’ the Saturday night dance?”

“Already did, Sir,” Darryl replied. “A man don’t go ‘n keep a gal like Rebecca Sullivan waitin’ around. Not if he’s smart.”

“What’d she say?”

Darryl smiled. “She told me she’d love to go to the dance with me.”

“That’s wonderful, Boy,” Hugh declared, grinning from ear-to-ear himself. “Now if you need any advice as to how t’ handle women . . . . ”

“ . . . uuhhh, M-Mister O’Brien, meanin’ no disrespect, Sir, but I’ve already got someone givin’ me advice ‘bout handlin’ women.”

Hugh’s face fell. “Oh yeah? Who?”

“Mrs. McShane.”

Hugh looked over at the eldest of his three offspring, and frowned.

“Well, you know what they say, Pa,” Crystal quipped with a smug grin, “that the only person who knows best how to handle a woman is another woman. Now why don’t you two gossipy ol’ roosters make yourselves useful, and set out our bedrolls?”

“I’ll go get ‘em,” Darryl quickly offered.

“Smells good, Crys,” Hugh said, licking his lips in anticipation.

“It should. It’s Ma’s recipe.”

“I remember,” Hugh said with a wistful, nostalgic smile. “There was no trail cook in the world anywhere near as good as your ma.”

“Nor will there ever be,” Crystal declared. “Ma could take a dried out ol’ tumbleweed and make it taste like a gourmet meal.”

“Nights like this I miss her most.”

“I know . . . nights like this I miss Robert most,” Crystal said as she gave her pot of simmering beans another stir, then set herself to the task of fixing their coffee. Robert, her late husband, had died seven years before, when her youngest son was a baby.

“Crys?”

“Yeah, Pa?”

“Can I ask ya a personal question?”

“Ask all ya want. I make no promises I’ll answer.”

“Fair ‘nuff,” Hugh grunted. “How come you ain’t ever remarried? Not like you never had no prospects.”

“I probably never remarried for the same reason YOU never remarried,” Crystal said.

Hugh frowned. “What reason is that?”

“You know how you’re always telling folks no one’s ever quite measured up to Ma?”

“Yeah . . . . ”

“Well, it’s the same with ME. Sooner or later, usually sooner, I start making comparisons between the fella I’m with . . . and Robert,” she said with a touch of sadness. “So far, all the fellas I’ve ever been with come up wanting.”

“Your boys could use a pa.”

“My boys have a perfectly good GRANDpa, thank you very much . . . and a perfectly good uncle, besides,” Crystal quipped, then grinned. “ . . . and if things keep going the way they seem to be going between our boy and Stacy Cartwright . . . they’ll have two more perfectly good uncles in Hoss and Joe.”

“ . . . and I imagine ol’ Ben’ll become like a SECOND grandpa to your boys,” Hugh grunted.

“I just hope HE doesn’t spoil ‘em rotten like YOU do.”

Hugh chuckled. “Grandpa’s privilege, Gal. You get to turn the tables when your boys git themselves hitched, ‘n start presentin’ YOU with grandkids.”

“Well, supper’s about ready,” Crystal said, then frowned. “I wonder what’s taking Darryl so long with those bed rolls.”

“I’ll go check on him,” Hugh said.

“N-No . . . oh no, no . . , please, G-God, n-no . . . . ”

Darryl, with bedrolls clasped firmly in hand stared down at the frightened, cowering young woman in dismay, not knowing what to do. She was very young, not much older than his employer’s youngest daughter, Susannah, who was eighteen going on nineteen. She was barefoot. Her only clothing was a tattered, soiled chemise, with a long, jagged tear, reaching from the neckline, clear down to the waist. Her long, dark brown hair was matted, and caked with sweat, grime, and dust. She had an oval shaped face, with enormous eyes, a pixie-like upturned nose, and small, rosebud mouth with full lips. The exposed portions of her skin were bright red, very much like the shell of a steamed lobster.

“P-Please, Miss . . . I-I ain’t gonna hurt ya,” Darryl said as he tried to edge closer.

“Stay BACK!” the woman snarled.

“Darryl? What’s goin’ on, Boy?”

“It’s . . . I mean . . . SHE’S a l-lady, Sir,” Darryl stammered, his gaze moving back and forth between Hugh and the young woman.

“A lady?!” Hugh echoed incredulous.

“Oh no . . . oh, G-God, no . . . please . . . oh please, no!”

Hugh turned and found himself face to face with a badly frightened young woman, not much older than his youngest daughter.

“I . . . I think she n-needs help, but . . . she won’t let me anywhere near her.”

“Miss, it’s alright . . . . ” Hugh said in a low, soothing voice, as he knelt down, bringing himself nearly eye level with the young woman. “My name’s Hugh O’Brien. This here’s m’ foreman, Darryl Hughes.”

The woman tried desperately to scuttle away, but her arms and legs simply would not support her weight. She collapsed down onto the sand, sobbing in despair and angry frustration. “No, oh no, no, no . . . . ” she murmured, amid the torrent of weeping, that wracked her diminutive body.

Hugh watched with an anxious, bewildered frown, as the woman, amid her heart wrenching sobbing, tried desperately to close the torn bodice of her chemise with trembling hands. Then, suddenly, revelation slammed into him hard, like the powerful kick of a good strong mule to the solar plexus. “Dear, God . . . . ” he whispered, utterly shaken to the core.

“M-Mister O’Brien . . . . ?! Are you al— ”

“I . . . I . . . No!” One minute Hugh saw the woman as she was, the next he saw his own youngest daughter, Susannah in her place. His entire body trembled with a swift rising black tide of rage, that threatened to consume him. “Darryl . . . . ”

“Y-Yes, Sir?”

“ . . . I want ya t’ git up . . . slow ‘n easy,” Hugh ordered, laboring mightily to speak calmly in the face the murderous fury within him toward the man who had so terribly hurt the young woman cowering away from him and his foreman. “Go back ‘n send Mrs. McShane over here.”

“But— ”

“Do as I tell ya, Boy. I’ll be alright.”

Darryl nodded, then reluctantly rose to his feet and set off. A few moments later, Crystal appeared. “Pa?”

“Over here, Crys,” Hugh responded in a low voice, while keeping a wary eye on the woman now lying on the sand, weeping piteously, with her back to him.

“Pa, Darryl just came to me with a wild story about a— ” Her words died a quick and sudden death when her dark, chocolate brown eyes fell on the tiny young woman lying several yards from her father’s feet, sobbing.

“I don’t know where she’s come from,” Hugh said very softly, as his eldest daughter knelt down beside him. “She musta blundered into our campsite when Darryl was fetchin’ our bedrolls. She’s in a real bad way . . . but she won’t let Darryl or me within ten feet of her.”

Crystal turned and favored her father with a bewildered frown.

Hugh sidled over closer to Crystal, then lowered his voice to a mere whisper. “I . . . I’m pretty sure she’s been . . . violated, Crys.”

The blood drained right out of Crystal McShane’s face, as her own eyes took in the woman’s chemise, reduced now to filthy tatters and rags, along with the telltale jagged, angry red rope burns on her wrists and ankles. “Wait here, Pa,” she said, feeling terribly sick at heart. “Miss?” she called out, speaking at normal volume, struggling against her own feelings of grief and rising anger to keep her tone of voice calm.

The woman raised her head, and regarded Crystal through eyes as dark brown as her own. “No, p-please . . . no, no . . . . ” she sobbed.

“It’s alright, Miss. I’m not going to hurt you. I want to try and help you.”

“Oh, G-God . . . dear, God, please . . . no, please . . . n-no more, no more . . . . ”

Keeping to her hands and knees, Crystal very slowly, very carefully moved toward the woman. “My name is CRYSTAL McShane,” she continued in a low, soothing tone of voice. “This is my father, Mister O’Brien. He won’t hurt you either. We want to help you.”

The significance of the higher pitched speaking voice and the name finally penetrated. The young woman regarded Crystal warily, but made no attempts to flee as she continued her slow and easy advance.

“Please . . . . ” the woman began to sob anew when Crystal finally reached her side. “St-stage robbery . . . my husband . . . sh-shot. Please? Please help him . . . . ”

Crystal could feel the heat of fever radiating from the young woman even before she touched her. “Pa?” she said very softly.

“Yeah, Crys?”

“I need you to fill my canteen . . . you’ll find it with my saddle,” Crystal said, as she gathered the young woman gently into her arms. “I’ll also need a clean cloth. When you get the canteen, grab the extra bedroll from our supplies. Have Darryl roll it out next to mine.”

“You gonna be alright?” Hugh asked, his voice edged with worry.

“I’ll be fine, Pa. Shape she’s in right now, if she DID put up a fight, I can safely guarantee it’ll be a real short one.”

“Ok, Crys. If you need me, yell.” Hugh began to back away very slowly, taking great care to keep his movements fluid and easy.

Crystal turned her attention back to the woman. “It’s alright, Miss. It’s going to be alright . . . . ” As alright as it ever can be, ever again, she mused in angry silence, upon noting the mottled purplish skin under her eyes, and across her chest, its lurid hues muted by the what had to be a very painful sunburn, her bruised, swollen lips, split and cracking, caked with dried blood. “We’re not going to hurt you . . . we only want to HELP you.”

“H-husband . . . hurt . . . shot . . . p-please,” the woman murmured, her voice painfully hoarse, barely audible, before collapsing against Crystal, sobbing.

Crystal held her as she wept, in manner not unlike the way she gathered her own sons, or even her younger sister, Susannah to herself whenever they were hurt or injured.

“Crys?”

She glanced up and saw her father emerge from the deepening shadows, his face pale and drawn, with clean cloth and full canteen in hand. “Bring ‘em to me, Pa,” she murmured, in a low voice, calm to the point of monotone. “Slow and easy.”

Hugh nodded, then took a deep breath as he willed the muscles in his body to relax. He took another deep breath, then another, before moving toward Crystal, in the silent, easy manner of a Shoshone hunter moving through the forest in search of prey, all the while thanking the Good Lord, he had been man enough to ask his late wife to teach him. Upon reaching his eldest daughter and the young woman, she clasped so tenderly in her arms, he handed her the cloth, then knelt down to unscrew the cap in the canteen.

Crystal mutely nodded her thanks, as she accepted the proffered canteen from her father, then returned her attention back to the woman. She carefully settled the woman, with her head resting on her lap, taking care to see that her face was turned away from Hugh. She poured a generous amount of water into the cloth, the started to gently blot the woman’s face.

The woman moaned softly. “F-feels good . . . water . . . . ” She opened her eyes, and peered up into the face of the kind woman ministering to her. “Please?” she begged. “Water . . . drink . . . ?!”

Crystal set the nestled the canteen in the sand beside her, then carefully raised the woman in her arms from almost prone to half way between lying down and sitting up. As she brought the canteen down to the woman’s mouth, she seized hold of the canteen, yanking it from Crystal’s grasp with surprising strength.

“Hey, easy! Take it easy!” Crystal said firmly, as she gently wrested the opening of the container from the woman’s lips. “I know you’re very thirsty, but you can’t gulp it like that. You have to drink very slow, very easy.” She returned the opening to the woman’s mouth, open and gasping.

The woman drank briefly, then pushed the canteen away.

“M-My husband . . . . ” she moaned softly.

“Where is he?” Crystal asked as she handed the canteen back to her father, still kneeling in front of her.

“Shot . . . stage robbery . . . left back . . . left back THERE . . . w-with others . . . b-back . . . with stage.”

“She’s gonna need a doctor, Crys,” Hugh said quietly.

“I know it,” came Crystal’s grim reply. “How far are we from Virginia City?”

“If we move out first thing in the mornin’, we’d get there by late morning . . . early afternoon, at the latest,” Hugh replied.

Crystal silently debated the consequences of moving the woman through what her late mother had wryly referred to as the garden sport of the desert verses remaining here with her father, and sending Darryl back for help. “Pa,” she finally said.

“Yeah, Crys?”

“We got any of that beef jerky left?”

“Yeah . . . we do.”

“Good. We’ll make do with that for breakfast tomorrow,” Crystal said. “After we eat supper tonight, I’d like you and Darryl to get things washed and packed up ready to be loaded on our pack horse. I’d like to leave as close to first light as we possibly can.”

“You gonna be able to manage her on your horse alright?”

“Pa, I can easily manage Susannah,” she hastened to point out. “This woman is probably every last bit of a head shorter and twenty . . . maybe twenty-five pounds lighter. But, we need to get her into town . . . to a doctor . . . sooner the better.”

“No!” the woman protested with surprising vigor. “Please . . . m-my husband . . . he n-needs . . . needs h-help.”

“We’re going to get him that help,” Crystal ardently promised, “but, if there’s a stage . . . and other passengers, who are hurt . . . they’re going to need more help than just the three of US can give.”

“Robbers . . . they . . . they took everything,” the woman moaned. “Then they . . . they . . . m-made my h-husband watch while they . . . they . . . oh, Madre de Dios, they sh-sh-shot h-him . . . they . . . they SHOT m-my husband . . . left him . . . left all of them t-to . . . to die. Took m-me . . . took m-me away . . . oh, L-Lorenzo . . . I’m s-sorry . . . I’m so sorry, please . . . please f-forgive m-me . . . .” Her words were downed in a brief, yet very fierce torrent of agonized weeping.

Crystal had never, in her entire life, ever heard such depths of grief and hopeless despair pour fourth out of another human being.

“Mister O’Brien?” Darryl ventured hesitantly, hours later, with a belly full of coffee and beans, as he watched Crystal diligently caring for the young woman, who had blundered into their campsite, through a translucent curtain of leaping flames.

“What is it, Boy?”

“She’s pretty feverish . . . . ”

“Yeah.”

“You think there’s anything to that story about a stage hold up . . . ‘n others out there . . . hurt, maybe dyin’?” Darryl asked. “ . . . or does it come from a hot desert sun workin’ on a fevered mind?”

“I dunno, Darryl. I do know one thing though . . . . ”

“What’s THAT, Sir?”

“That gal’s been through hell ‘n back, stage robbery or NO stage robbery,” Hugh said grimly.

“Damn!” Adam swore softly under his breath as the paper directly beneath his kneaded eraser disintegrated, leaving an oblong hole, with ragged edges, in the place where he had been trying to put the finishing touches on the final sketches for the second story of his family’s new house.

The hour was very late, or perhaps very early, depending on one’s perspective. His eyes automatically moved up to the wall clock, upon hearing it strike the three-quarters hour. The time was fifteen minutes before three . . . in the morning.

“Damn, damn, damn, damn, DAMN!” he swore. On that last, he savagely wadded the entire sheet of paper into a tight ball, and hurled it across the room with all his might.

You’re pathetic, Cartwright.

Adam’s entire body went rigid.

Lines and rectangles. That’s all it is . . . just a bunch o’ friggin’ lines ‘n rectangles all put together. A CHILD could draw that. Y’ hear me, Mister High-‘n-Mighty-Thinks-He’s-So-Friggin’-Smart Cartwright!? A child!

That harsh, grating voice, made painfully hoarse by years and years of over indulgence in whiskey, mostly the rot gut variety, could only belong to one man: Randy Paine. He saw himself as Virginia City’s answer to the likes of Plato, Socrates, and Aristotle. Nearly everyone else saw him as Randy Paine-in-the-ass. When sober, he had no word for anybody, kind, unkind, or indifferent. However, when drunk, he was mean, cruel, and verbose.

By the time Adam was old enough to go into saloons without necessarily being in the company of his father, Randy Paine had been holding court at his round table in the very back of the Bucket of Blood Saloon for many years. He was a very bitter, very angry old man, made so by circumstance, according to the rumors. No one seemed to know where he had come from, nor did anyone much care.

Most evenings, by the time the regular patrons arrived, Randy Paine had been seated at his table, quaffing cheap whiskey since noon. Every night, he targeted one man, occasionally two, as the bull’s eye for all his vitriolic barbs, slings, and arrows. The Bucket of Blood’s regular patrons ignored him for the most part. Occasionally, tempers would flare, and violence erupt. It usually ended with Randy Paine being hauled off to jail, where he could sleep off his intoxication and the chosen victim of his verbal abuse being asked to leave.

“This is crazy! I haven’t thought of Randy Paine in YEARS!” Adam murmured softly, while vigorously shaking his head, as if to physically dislodge those unpleasant memories. Not since Pa had told him in a letter about Randy’s death within a month of his having left the Ponderosa for good.

A harsh bark of laughter, accompanied by the tell-tale rattle of the thick accumulation of phlegm that had always seemed to be present within the man’s lungs. “I ain’t dead, Cartwright, not to YOU, I ain’t. I just been waitin’ all curled up inside ya . . . just like an old rattler.”

“Shut up,” Adam growled.

“That the best you can do, Cartwright?”

“Shut UP! You’re dead!”

“ . . . an’ YOU’RE just another rich man’s pathetic son.”

“Shut up, you hear me? Shut up, damn it, SHUT UP!”

“A-Adam?”

Adam turned abruptly with enough force and momentum to almost send him toppling to the floor. A wild, flailing hand reaching out, and snaring the edge of the massive roll top desk in his room, by sheer luck, kept himself and his chair upright. Barely.

“Adam . . . you ok?” It was his youngest brother, Joe. Clad in a pair of pajama bottoms, no top, he stood framed in the open door, his face a shade or two paler than normal, his hazel eyes round with shock, astonishment, and concern.

“Y-Yeah,” Adam murmured. “I must’ve dozed off for a moment. Sorry I woke ya.”

“ ‘S ok, Adam.” Joe yawned. “I can always sleep in. One of the few advantages of convalescing.” He entered the room, carrying the crumpled up wad of paper upon which his oldest brother had laboriously agonized over, in trying to get the drawings for the new house exactly right. “I, uuhh . . . found this. It was lying out in the middle of the hall.”

“Thanks,” Adam sighed disparagingly, as he held out his hand.

“It’s awfully late for YOU to be awake, Adam,” Joe said, as he watched his oldest brother crumple the paper again and lob it into the waste basket. “YOU alright? You were awfully quiet at the supper table tonight.”

“I’m fine,” Adam lied right through his teeth. The anxious scowl in his youngest brother’s face told him that Joe saw right through it. “I was kinda tired. We got a lot of good work done today, though.”

“I remember Hoss saying that you guys are running ahead of schedule.”

“We are,” Adam affirmed. “That’s another reason I didn’t say much at the supper table. All I could think of was getting up here and finishing up the final drawings, so I can begin to figure out what we’re going to need in the way of building supplies.”

“Oh. Then, maybe I’d better g’won back to bed and letcha get back to work then,” Joe said with another yawn.

“You don’t have to leave so soon, Buddy.”

“You sure?”

“Yeah,” Adam said ruefully. “I, umm . . . have a whole wastebasket full of paper wads just like THIS one . . . . ” he held up the wad his youngest brother had retrieved from the hall, “ . . . to show for an entire evening’s work. Kinda pathetic, isn’t it?” He punctuated his words with a sardonic chuckle, as he dropped the paper wad in hand on top of its brethren, filling the waste basket beside his desk.

“You SURE you’re ok, Oldest Brother?” Joe asked anxiously as he walked over and sat down on the edge of Adam’s bed.

“Yeah, I’m fine,” Adam replied just a hair too quickly. “I probably need to put it aside for a little while. How’d things go with you and with Doctor Martin’s friend this afternoon.”

“Very well,” Joe replied with a broad grin.

“Glad to hear it,” Adam said, returning his younger brother’s smile. “I know you we’re a little nervous this morning.”

“A LITTLE nervous?!” Joe laughed with genuine mirth. “If you thought I was only a LITTLE nervous, I’d hate to see what you call a LOT nervous, Oldest Brother of Mine.”

Adam found himself laughing along with Joe. “So . . . what was his diagnosis?” the former asked, as their laughter began to wane.

“Doctor Jefferies told me that the things I’m feeling and experiencing right now are normal responses to what I went through with Lady Chadwick,” Joe replied. “He also told me that eventually, I’m going to come out of all this a better and stronger man for it.”

“I’m sure PA could’ve told you that.”

“He DID, Adam . . . many times,” Joe admitted, feeling ever so slightly on the defensive. “He also told me that there’s wisdom in consulting with an impartial third party.”

“I suppose.”

Joe found himself inwardly bristling against Adam’s condescending, dismissive tone. He closed his eyes, took a deep breath, then slowly, silently counted to ten. “Adam . . . . ”

“Yeah, Buddy?” Adam queried as he returned his attention back to the task of drawing up the final plans for the first floor of his family’s new home to be.

“For awhile there . . . before I talked with Doctor Jefferies, I was scared,” Joe said quietly, his smile fading. “I thought sure I was gonna end up spending the rest of my life in a snake pit somewhere, wrapped up tight in a straight jacket, drooling and messing myself.”

Adam laid down his pencil, then looked up, favoring his youngest brother with a bewildered frown. “Where in the world did you get an idea like that?”

“I kept having these waking dreams, just like Pa’s friend . . . you know, the guy who was sheriff over in Concho?”

“Paul Rowan?”

“That’s the guy. One day, he fell into a waking dream and couldn’t find his way back out,” Joe said. “Pa told me it wasn’t a sudden thing . . . that there’d been a lot of things building up over time, but I was still scared to death. Talking with a doc who specialized in dealing with that sort of thing help me to realize I don’t have to end up like Paul Rowan and . . . that Pa was right.”

“About?”

“About me coming out on the other side of all this stronger and better than I was before Lady Chadwick kidnapped me. To say I feel a lot better about things now is a gross understatement.”

“You’re certainly LOOKING the best I’ve seen you since I arrived,” Adam remarked, upon seeing the easy smile back on his youngest brother’s face, the posture more relaxed, a return of the old twinkle in his eyes.

“Thanks. Adam . . . . ”

“Yeah, Buddy?” Adam murmured, as he once again picked up his pencil and turned back to the black sheet of paper spread out on the desk before him.

“Can I ask you something?”

“May,” Adam corrected automatically, without thinking.

An exasperated sigh, soft, barely audible, escaped from between Joe’s lips.

“I’m sorry, Joe,” Adam immediately apologized, with sincere regret. “I guess I’m so used to correcting Benjy and Dio these days, I— ”

“It’s ok, Adam.”

“What did you want to ask me?”

“About your time in the desert with that guy, Kane,” Joe replied.

Adam groaned softly.

“You went through hell with the man, Adam,” Joe continued. “We all pretty much figured THAT out. What I’m wondering is . . . well . . . I guess what I’m wondering is how did YOU come through, with your sanity intact?” His question drew a sharp glare from Adam. Joe flinched away from its intensity and the raw fury he saw smoldering in his oldest brother’s golden brown eyes.

Adam was immediately filled with remorse upon seeing the horrified, frightened look on Joe’s face. “Joe, I . . . I’m sorry, I . . . . ” He sighed and shook his head.

“It’s alright, I’m sorry I asked.”

“I . . . think, perhaps right now ISN’T a very good time,” Adam said quickly. “It’s late, for one thing . . . VERY late! . . . and just before Hoss and I left the Silver Dollar this . . . LAST evening, I heard that the Overland Stage, the one that left the day after I arrived, is missing. It should have arrived in Freedonia a week and a half ago, A young couple I met in Sacramento and with whom I became acquainted on the trip out, may be among the passengers on that missing stage.”

“You taking about that young couple . . . the newly weds?”

“Yes.”

“Hoss told me a little about ‘em,” Joe said. “Adam, I’m sorry . . . I had no idea.”

“Please, don’t give the matter another thought,” Adam said quietly. “There’s certainly no way you could’ve known.”

“I hope they turn up ok.”

“I hope so, too.”

Joe rose, and stretched. “I’m gonna g’won back to bed and let YOU do the same. I’ll see you at breakfast.”

“Good night,” Adam said, then smiled. “Spending the afternoon today with Doctor Jefferies seems to have worked wonders for you, Joe. I meant it when I said that you’re looking the best I’ve seen you since I arrived.”

Joe smiled back. “Thanks, Adam,” he said, before quietly leaving the room.

“ ‘Mornin’, Pa . . . ‘mornin’, Stacy,” Joe greeted his father and sister affably, with a big, sunny smile. There was a definite spring in his step, and a sparkle in his gray-green eyes that had not been there since the night the Cartwrights’ home had burned down.

“Good morning, Joe,” Ben responded, returning his youngest son’s smile with a warm one of his own. “You’re in a good mood this morning.”

“Yeah . . . I am, Pa.”

“ ‘Mornin’, Grandpa,” Stacy returned his greeting, then sighed. “I think I’m envious!”

“Envious?” Joe echoed, favoring his young sister with a bewildered frown. “Of who? For what?!”

“You!” she quipped. “I just noticed you’re not walking with a limp!”

Joe walked behind her, paused, and acting purely on impulse, planted a big kiss on top of her head. “You hang in there, Kid. You’re gonna be walking ‘n riding again before ya know it,” he said as he continued around to his place on the other side of the table.

“Your brother’s right, Young Woman,” Ben said, offering his daughter a reassuring smile. “As for YOU, Joseph . . . I don’t care how well you’re getting around, you don’t do anything strenuous before Doctor Martin tells ya you can. You understand me?”

“Yes, Sir,” Joe replied with a big, bold grin.

“Make sure that you do,” Ben admonished.

“Is . . . Adam up yet?” Joe asked, as he sat down in the place across the table from his sister.

“Up and gone, Son,” Ben replied.

“Oh.” Joe’s face fell. “When?”

“He and Hoss rode out at the crack of dawn this morning.”

“I hope he took plenty of good, strong coffee with him,” Joe murmured, shaking his head.

“Why do you say THAT, Grandpa?” Stacy asked.

“Because he was up pretty late.”

“Oh?” Ben queried, favoring his youngest son with a bemused look.

“Yeah. He woke me up in the wee early hours of the morning, yelling at somebody to shut-up,” Joe explained. “I went to his room to see what was wrong, and I found him still up, still dressed, laboring over those drawings of what’s gonna be our upstairs. I guess he must’ve dozed off and dreamed of whoever he was telling to shut-up, because when I went in and called his name? He must’ve jumped ten feet. Pa . . . I’m worried about him.”

“Why?” Ben queried, trying hard to ignore the uneasiness that had gnawed at him ever since Paul Martin had made that offhand remark in the post office, about being more worried if what had happened to Joe . . . had happened to Adam instead.

“When I ran in to check up on him, he told me about a stage being missing,” Joe said, “and said that he may have known two of the passengers.”

The lines already present in Ben’s brow deepened as his eyebrows came together to form an anxious frown. “Really? I don’t recall him saying anything about that last night.”

“He didn’t . . . leastwise not at the supper table,” Joe said. “I wanted to see him this morning, though . . . just to make sure he’s alright . . . and I wanted to ask him something.”

“What was it you wanted to ask him?”

“It’s certainly nothing that can’t wait ‘til later, Pa. I mainly wanted to make sure he was alright.”

“He didn’t say very much this morning,” Ben said slowly. “I know he’s got a lot on his mind, now that work on our house has begun in earnest, and if he’s also concerned about missing friends . . . . ”

“We’re those people close friends of Adam’s?” Stacy asked.

“No, I don’t think so,” Joe replied. “Hoss told me they’re a young couple, just married, headed home to Santa Fe. They got on the stage in Sacramento, when Adam did.”

“There’s a lot of way stations between here and Santa Fe,” Ben said, turning a deaf ear and blind eye to his own, steadily growing uneasiness, “and a pretty fair number of ’em are in remote areas, with no access to telegraph or wire services. Chances are, they’ll turn up at one of those stations.”

“I hope so, Pa,” Joe said quietly.

As Adam and Hoss rounded the corner behind the barn and rode into the yard, they were very much surprised to find a small crowd gathered around the dug hole, that would soon be Hop Sing’s root cellar. They were mostly women and children, all family members of the ranch hands who worked on the Ponderosa.

“I wonder what’s going on,” Adam murmured, as he and Hoss dismounted.

“Uh oh. THAT looks like Doc Martin’s buggy over there,” Hoss said, with an anxious frown.

George Farlyn and Jacob Cromwell, upon catching sight of the two older Cartwright brothers, left their places at the edge of the hole, and started moving toward Adam and Hoss.

“ ‘Mornin’ Jacob . . . George,” Hoss greeted both men with a curt nod. “What’s goin’ on?”

“Hoss, I . . . doggone it, I don’t know what t’ say,” Jacob said, flustered, shaking his head at the utter futility. “I know I’VE told those kids, time ‘n time again, t’ stay away from the buildin’ site. So have Hank ‘n Candy . . . ‘n their folks, too, I dare say.”

“It’s a young fella by the name o’ Jeremy Watkins,” George said. “He and a couple of friends were playing near the construction site and . . . somehow . . . Jeremy ended up falling into the hole we dug for Hop Sing’s root cellar.”

“Unfortunately children, especially little boys, seem drawn to building sites like iron to lodestone,” Adam remarked wryly, as his thoughts drifted back to memories of some of his youngest brother’s exploits, when HE was a child. “Was he badly hurt?”

“Doc’s pretty sure Jeremy’s got a busted leg, maybe a cracked rib or two,” Jacob said grimly, as Adam and Hoss handed their horses’ reins over to one of the younger hands. “Other than that . . . . ” He shrugged.

Upon reaching the edge, the Cartwright brothers saw that someone had placed a ladder down into the hole. Doctor Paul Martin, clad in a pair of brown pants and the white shirt he had worn the previous day, both hastily donned, was hard at work splinting the boy’s left leg. Thelma Watkins, Jeremy’s mother knelt down on the other side of her son, facing the doctor. Hoss climbed down first, followed by Adam.

Thelma looked up at the two older Cartwright sons, as they approached. “Hoss, I . . . I just plain don’t know WHAT to say,” she said in the same helpless tone, they had heard in Jacob Cromwell’s voice moments ago. “These kids have been told, over ‘n over ‘n over again . . . . ” She directed a meaningful scowl in the general direction of her young son, lying before her on the ground.

Hoss knelt down beside the flustered, distraught, and angry young mother. “Is Jeremy gonna be alright?” he asked, directing his question to Thelma and to the doctor.

“His leg’s broken,” Paul Martin glanced up at Hoss, then over at Adam. “Simple fracture. I’ve already set the bone, and I’m just about through splinting it. That’ll keep everything in place long enough to get the boy up out of here and to my office in town where I can put a proper cast on it.”

“Is he hurt elsewhere, Doctor?” Thelma asked anxiously.

“He’s covered with cuts and bruises . . . par for the course with a tumble like Jeremy took, but nothing serious . . . apart from the broken leg,” Paul said in a calm, reassuring tone of voice. “I’ve cleaned all the cuts, and bandaged a couple of the larger ones, but they should all heal up pretty quickly.”

“Well, Jeremy, looks like you got t’ stay home from school for a li’l while,” Hoss said with a grin.

“Really?” Jeremy smiled, delighted at the prospect.

“You may be home from school for a time, Young Man, but you’re gonna keep up with your lessons,” Thelma said sternly.

Jeremy’s face fell. “You mean . . . I STILL gotta do my homework?!”

“Yes, Jeremy, you’ve still gotta do your homework.”

“Awww, Ma . . . . ”

“Don’t you ‘aww, Ma,’ ME, Young Man. Furthermore, when that cast comes off, ‘n you’re up ‘n about again, you’re gonna be gettin’ a few more chores added to your list. Maybe THAT’LL keep ya outta mischief.”

“DOC MARTIN??! DOC MARTIN!!!”

Adam, Hoss, the Watkins, and the doctor all glanced up toward the edge of the hole, from whence the frantic voice issued. A moment later, the pale, worn face of Darryl Hughes, the O’Briens’ young foreman appeared.

“Doc, y’ gotta come back to town with me,” Darryl said. “Mister O’Brien, Mrs. McShane ‘n me . . . we found a lady in the desert coming back from Eastgate last night. She’s in a bad way, Doc. A REAL bad way!”

“Eastgate?!” Adam echoed, his earlier feelings of foreboding deepening.

“Adam . . . . ” An anxious frown creased Hoss’ brow upon noting his older brother’s ashen gray complexion and round, staring eyes. “ . . . y-you alright?”

“Hoss, did he say Eastgate?!” Adam anxiously pressed. There was a troubling edge to his voice Hoss had only heard there once before . . . when his older brother had insisted upon seeing a man named Peter Kane lying dead in his grave.

“They have that big horse auction there twice a year, Adam . . . remember?” Hoss said in a quiet, calm tone of voice. “The O’Briens musta gone there ‘n sold that string o’ horses they been workin’ on for the last six months.”

“MISTER HUGHES?!” Paul Martin called out to the O’Briens’ foreman, as he scrambled to his feet. “WHERE IS THIS YOUNG LADY NOW?”

“I LEFT HER WITH YOUR WIFE, ‘N MRS. McSHANE BACK AT YOUR OFFICE.”

“DARRYL, YOU G’WON BACK TO TOWN . . . TELL MY WIFE AND MRS. McSHANE I’M RIGHT BEHIND YOU,” Paul yelled.

“ ‘EY . . . JACOB?!” Hoss called out to Jacob Cromwell, who still remained standing at the edge of the hole.

“YEAH, HOSS?”

“TAKE DARRYL IN THE BARN ‘N GIVE HIM A FRESH HORSE,” Hoss ordered, “AND GIT MITCH OR BOBBY T’ LOOK AFTER KENTUCKY BLUE.”

“YES, SIR,” Jacob replied, as he turned and started moving away from the edge.

“THANKS, HOSS. MUCH OBLIGED.”

“YOU’RE WELCOME, DARRYL.”

“I’ve finished splinting Jeremy’s leg, Mrs. Watkins,” Paul Martin said, returning his attention to the anxious mother of his young patient. “That’ll hold until you can get him into town.”

“I’ll be bringing him in myself soon as we can get him up outta this hole and situated in the back of a buckboard,” Thelma said, as both she, Adam, and the doctor rose to their feet.

“Adam . . . Thelma . . . ‘n you, too, Doc. Why don’t the three of ya go ahead on up?” Hoss said. “I’ll bring Jeremy up with me.”

“You sure you can manage him alright, Hoss?” Thelma asked anxiously.

“Hoss CAN manage, but if it’ll make you feel better, I’ll follow him up the ladder and keep a close eye on Jeremy,” Adam offered.

“Thank you, Mister Cartwright . . . yes. That WOULD make me feel a lot better.”

“Alright, Mrs. Watkins, up YOU go,” Paul Martin said, gesturing toward the ladder.

Thelma nodded curtly, then started up the ladder, with Paul following a few moments later.

“Ok, Jeremy, you ‘n me’s next,” Hoss said, as he knelt down beside the injured youngster. “Y’ remember how y’ used t’ play ‘Horse’ with your pa ‘n me, when you was younger?”

“Yeah, I remember.”

“Good, ‘cause I’m gonna have ya climb on my back like y’ used t’ do back then,” Hoss said. “I’m also gonna need ya t’ wrap your arms around my neck real tight.”

“Mister Hoss?”

“Yeah, Jeremy?”

“It’s a pretty good long way up, and . . . well, I’m kinda scared.”

“I understand, Jeremy,” Hoss said kindly.

“You ain’t mad?”

“No, I ain’t mad,” Hoss quickly assured the boy. “One thing t’ help ya NOT be scared is t’ hold on t’ me real tight, an’ t’ just look up. Think y’ can do that for a little bit?”

“Yeah . . . as long as it’s just a little bit.”

“Jeremy, I’m going to be following right behind Hoss,” Adam said.

“In case I . . . slip?”

“You’re not going to slip,” Adam said. “You look to me like you’re a big, strong young man. Not big like my brother, Hoss, but getting there . . . and I can plainly see that you’ve got plenty of strength to hold on long enough for us to get out of here.”

“Ready, Jeremy?”

“I’m ready, Mister Hoss.”

Adam carefully helped the boy rise up onto his good foot, while Hoss edged closer. Jeremy wrapped his long, bone slender arms around Hoss’ neck and clung for dear life. Hoss rose, with Adam’s assistance, keeping one hand on Jeremy to keep him steady. Three long, quick strides brought Hoss and Jeremy to the bottom of the ladder.

“Hang on, Jeremy. I’m startin’ up.”

A few moments later, everyone gathered around the hole exhaled a collective sigh of relief, as Hoss and Jeremy stepped from the lost rung of the ladder onto terra firma.

“Thelma, if y’ want t’ use our buckboard, I’ll ask one o’ the men t’ get it ready,” Hoss said, as he knelt down, so that the boy’s mother and Adam might help him down off Hoss’ back.

“Thank you kindly, Hoss . . . but, my man’s gone t’ fetch ours,” Thelma said, “but, I’d be much obliged if we could use some fresh straw t’ line the bottom.”

“Help yourself,” Hoss readily assented. “You can borrow a blanket, too, if ya need it.”

Thelma nodded her thanks, then, with the able assistance of Ellen Cromwell, turned her attention to the task of helping Jeremy over to the water trough.

She woke from her daze to find herself lying on a cold, hard metal examination table, stark naked, save for the thin white sheet covering her upper torso. Her dark eyes were glued to the ceiling, to a small dark spot directly over head.

“The spot,” she silently told herself. “Think of the spot. Nothing else but that spot. It’s a dark spot, not very big. I can barely see it from here. Concentrate on the spot . . . nothing else . . . but . . . the spot.”

She caught movement at the very edge of her peripheral vision, slight, but enough to break her concentration, to draw her focus away from the spot. She shuddered as a shadow passed over her eyes, long and thin, enough to dim the late morning sunlight shining in through the window.

. . . and in the shadow, she found herself lying once more on the desert sands, with two big, burly men holding her down. She struggled mightily to free herself, to rise, but her efforts were in vain. It was like struggling with all her might, with every last ounce of her strength to push over one of those giant redwood trees, she and her husband saw in California . . . so long ago . . . .

. . . almost a whole other lifetime ago.

Three faces moved into view . . . frightening faces, unshaven, smiling down at her as if she were something good to eat, their eyes burning with an evil, bitter hatred. Two large, well muscled hands seized the neckline of her chemise, the only piece of clothing that still covered her body.

Somewhere, off in the far distance, she heard the sounds of someone sobbing . . . .

“No . . . no, please . . . pl-please . . . not again!” the young patient sobbed, as she struggled desperately to keep the sheet in place over her upper torso. “Oh, D-Dear G-God . . . n-not again . . . not again!”

Paul Martin immediately removed his hand from the edge of the sheet covering the patient, and stepped back away from the table. Though certainly not the first time a woman, who had endured the pain and humiliation of having been raped, ever recoiled from his touch, it nonetheless cut deep to the heart.

Crystal McShane, who had not left the young woman’s side since she had stumbled into their camp the night before, stood next to the examination table, with the patient’s small hand clasped gently, yet firmly in her own larger one. She leaned over and slipped her arm under the young woman’s heaving shoulders and held her close.

Lily Martin, who had taken up position on the other side of the examination table, now moved toward her husband. She quietly slipped her arm through the crook of his, then gently squeezed his hand as she pressed close to his side. “Paul, you have no choice,” she whispered. “You can’t treat her wounds until you examine her.”

“I know,” Paul whispered back, his voice unsteady. “Problem is, despite my intention to heal, to treat her wounds, as you say . . . leastwise the PHYSICAL ones . . . I’M forced to violate her every bit as much as the man, or the men who raped her.”

“Could you give her a dose of laudanum, or better yet chloroform?”

Paul shook his head. “She’s running a high fever, and is dangerously weak, from being out in the desert as long as she was with no food or water. I give her too much of either one . . . it could kill her.”

At length, the young patient’s deep, heart wrenching sobbing gradually subsided to an occasional soft hiccup. Crystal hugged her closer, and gently pushed back a stray lock of hair that had fallen down into the young woman’s face. “I’m here,” she said softly, “and I’m going to stay right here for as long as you need me.

“I . . . I’m not going to insult you by telling you I know how you feel right now, when I don’t. I know you’ve been hurt physically and in here . . . ” She touched the place of her own heart, “ . . . in just about the worst way a woman CAN be hurt. You’re also alone in a strange place among strangers. I . . . can’t begin to imagine how frightening that must be.”

“I . . . I want t-to die,” the woman sobbed. “Please . . . please let me die.”

“I hear you say that with your lips, and with your heart, but somewhere . . . deep down inside, I see a part of you that wants very much to live,” Crystal said gently. “That part of you gave you the strength, the courage, the iron will to leave the place you were and travel I don’t know HOW many days across harsh desert to our camp last night.”

“Courage,” the woman murmured bitterly. “You confuse courage with cowardice. I was plain and simply too afraid to die.”

“As I said before . . . I have no idea in the world what you’re feeling right now, but, I DO know the difference between courage and cowardice,” Crystal said in a very gentle, yet very firm tone of voice, “and I’ve not seen one bit of cowardice in you.”

“But . . . I AM afraid.”

“That’s very understandable. But there’s also a big world of difference between being afraid and being a coward.” Crystal paused to allow her words, what she felt to be her poor wisdom given the circumstances, to sink in. “Courage is finding the wherewithal to act when you ARE afraid.”

The young woman began to cry again. “I . . . I . . . I always th-thought . . . c-courage was n-not being . . . afraid.”

“If you’re NOT afraid, then you have no need of courage,” Crystal said gently. She held the hurt, frightened young woman, and allowed her to cry on her shoulder for a time.

When, at last, the young patient’s weeping once more began to subside, Crystal took a deep breath, and mentally braced herself for what had to be said next, while at the same time, wishing with all her being she didn’t have to utter her next words. “You’ve been so courageous. I . . . to be honest, I . . . I have doubts as to whether or not I could summon the strength and courage you have, had I gone through what you’ve endured,” she said very quietly. “Even so, I need to ask of you one more act of courage.”

The young woman looked up at Crystal, her eyes filled with dread.

“Doctor Martin needs to finish examining you,” Crystal continued. “To do that, and to treat your injuries . . . the physical ones . . . he needs to go into the places where you’ve already been so badly hurt. I wish it didn’t have to be. I wish that with everything that’s within me. But, unfortunately, wishing can’t change what needs to happen.

“I want you to know that, if you want me, I’ll be right here . . . right by your side,” Crystal continued. “I also want to let you know that I’ve known Doctor Paul Martin all my life. He helped my ma bring me into this world, and he helped me bring my two boys into this world. He’s a very kind, very gentle man, who I believe was put on this earth to HEAL.”

“You . . . you’ll b-be with me?” the woman asked.

“Yes, if you want me.”

“Alright. I . . . I will try to endure . . . so the doctor c-can finish . . . . ”

Crystal raised her head, looked over at Paul Martin, stricken and weary . . . and nodded.

She turned her eyes once more to the ceiling, to that spot directly overhead, forcing herself to think of the spot . . . the spot . . . nothing else . . . just the spot. In that spot, she beheld the image of a man, an older man, aged twenty-eight, very soon to be twenty-nine. Their family and friends had a surprise birthday party planned for him, when they arrived home from their honeymoon trip.

The man was tall, and thin, clean shaven, with eyes the same dark brown, almost black as her own, and a full head of wavy, jet black hair. He smiled down at her with that beautiful smile, a row of straight, pearl white teeth, against the darkness of his olive complexion. Its warmth flooded her entire being.

Then the image changed, as in a dream. The man now stood before the woman she saw lying on the doctor’s examination table, as she must have appeared before the terrible evil that had befallen her. She was so very young, no more than eighteen, maybe nineteen at the most. The top of her head barely reached the middle of the man’s chest. Her long, luxuriant, coal black hair framed her delicate oval shaped face like a halo.

She smiled as the man kissed the woman. She could almost feel his lips gently pressing against her own, his hands caressing her face, her hair . . . .

Suddenly, the vision was gone . . . .

. . . leaving her all alone, except for the kindly, white haired woman, standing next to the examination table, on her right, holding her hand firmly clasped in both of her own . . . .

. . . and Mrs. McShane, standing on her left, holding her other hand, and gently stroking that matted, tangled mass, once her crowning glory . . . just the way Mama did, when she was very little . . . .

. . . and the doctor, examining her, cleaning and salving the raw, wounded places. Though his were the gentle hands of a well practiced healer, his touch violated her every bit as much as the evil monsters who had so cruelly used her.

Lorenzo . . . .

My Dear, Sweet, Beloved Lorenzo . . . .

Now, when I need you most of all, the hand of Cruel Providence has snatched you up and taken you away from me . . . .

Leaving me to face this alone.

No . . . .

No . . . .

“No!” she whimpered. “Oh, God, no . . . please . . . . please don’t t-touch me . . . don’t l-let him touch me . . . . ” She tried to pull her legs together, to roll over and curl up as she was when she lay in her mother’s womb.

“Lily . . . Crystal . . . please . . . try and hold her for just a few more minutes,” Paul Martin begged, his face mirroring the hopeless anguish in that of his patient. “I’ll be through in just a few more minutes.”

Crystal moved in closer, and slipped her arm under the young woman’s shoulders. “Hold on to me,” she whispered. “The doctor’s almost finished. Just hold on to me.”

She wrapped her arms tight around Crystal’s neck, and wept, as the doctor quickly finished his ministrations.

“I’m finished,” Paul Martin said wearily, as he rose to his feet.

Crystal continued to hold onto the young woman, until finally, she had cried herself into a deep, exhausted sleep.

“Would you like me to stay here with her for a few days, Doctor?” Crystal asked.

“If you could, yes! I would appreciate that very much,” Paul Martin said wearily. “She knows you . . . she obviously TRUSTS you. Being in a strange place among strangers after all she was forced to endure . . . to say she could use someone willing to be a friend would be a gross understatement.”

“In the meantime, I’ll stay here while you two speak with Hugh,” Lily offered.

“Thank you, Mrs. Martin,” Crystal said gratefully. “I promise you . . . I won’t be long.”

Upon entering his formal parlor, located on the first floor of the townhouse he and his wife, Lily shared, Paul was surprised to find Roy Coffee waiting with Hugh O’Brien and Darryl Hughes.

“I sent Darryl to fetch him, Doc,” Hugh said by way of explaining the sheriff’s presence. “Somebody put that poor li’l gal through hell, ‘n I figured the sheriff oughtta know about it.”

“Hugh ‘n Darryl also said she was mumblin’ somethin’ about a stage coach robbery,” Roy added. “It just so happens, yesterday evening, I got a wire from the Overland Office in Phoenix about a stage bein’ overdue. It would’ve left Virginia City . . . . ” He lapsed into silence, as he did some mental figuring. “It wouldda been nearly a week ago now, or somewhere there abouts.”

“Roy, my patient’s sleeping right now,” the doctor said, “and for the time being, I’d like to let her sleep.”

“Will I be able t’ speak with her in the mornin’, maybe?”

“I wouldn’t count on it,” Paul replied. “She’s running a high fever . . . she’s dangerously dehydrated . . . her fingers and toes show signs of frostbite . . . she’s so badly sun burnt, I fear she may have sun poisoning, and inside . . . . ” He shuddered. “Inside, she looks like a piece of raw beef, freshly skinned and butchered.”

Roy Coffee’s face lost nearly every bit of color that it had. “Y-You mean . . . she’s been . . . . ”

Paul nodded, accurately discerning the question the sheriff couldn’t bring himself to voice. “The only patient I’ve ever treated who was in WORSE shape was Lotus O’Toole,” he said very quietly.

Roy sighed and shook his head. “It’s a real sad comment of our kind the way some men out there figure every woman’s free for their takin’,” he observed, his face darkening with anger. “My ma ‘n pa really pounded this business o’ treatin’ a woman with respect real hard. If my pa even so much as caught me lookin’ the wrong way at a gal, my butt got warmed with his razor strap real quick.”

“Same here, except MY pa contented himself with using his belt,” Paul said. “Lily taught me a thing or two about respecting women also, and SHE was every bit the exacting taskMISTRESS as my pa was the taskMASTER. Only difference was, my wife didn’t beat me with a belt, though there were a couple of times I wish she had. At any rate, Roy, I can’t tell you for certain right now when or if my patient be up for questioning.”

“Alright,” Roy murmured, then turned to Crystal. “Mind if I ask YOU a couple questions, Crystal?”

“Not at all, Sheriff Coffee, especially if it may help you catch the **** it was that did this to her,” Crystal assented with a grim, angry look on her face. The word was Shoshone. From the way her father blanched, Roy knew it had to be a real bad one.

“Has she told ya her name?”

Crystal shook her head. “She cried out for somebody named Lorenzo a few times during the night, this morning on the way here, and a couple of times in there, while the doctor was examining her. Though, she hasn’t told me who Lorenzo is . . . I’m pretty sure he’s her husband.”

“How do ya figure?”

“When she first spoke of the stage robbery, she begged us in the same breath to help her husband . . . who had been shot.”

“Did she tell ya anything about where this stage robbery took place?”

“All she said was her husband . . . the others, presumably the other passengers, and the stage itself was back there,” Crystal replied. “To be perfectly up front and honest with ya, Sheriff Coffee, I can’t tell you for sure whether or not this stage robbery isn’t the product of several days exposure to the desert sun.”

“There IS a stage coach out there missin’ . . . . It left here a week, maybe a week ‘n a half ago, ‘n should’ve reached Freedonia . . . five goin’ on six days ago,” Roy said. “I sent wires off this mornin’ to Freedonia an’ to the Overland Stage’s main office for more information. I’ll have a better idea what’s what when I hear back from ‘em. One more question, Crystal.”

“Sure.”

“Where’d ya meet up with this woman anyway?”

“At the water hole, about fifteen miles southwest of here,” Crystal replied. “I have no idea how long she had been out in the desert, but I figure it couldn’t be anymore ‘n three . . . four days. That’s all a body can go without food AND water.”

“Big difference between three or four days ‘n pert near the week ‘n a half what’s passed since that stage left HERE,” the sheriff mused thoughtfully.

“She was also going on about being taken away,” Crystal added. “Assuming there WAS a stage robbery, it’s possible the robbers abducted her so they could go right on using her for awhile.”

“Thank you, Crystal. Much obliged,” Roy said as he rose. “Now I gotta big favor t’ ask ya.”

“Alright . . . . ”

“If she says anything to you about who she is . . . anymore about that stage robbery . . . or anything about where the stage ‘n the others are, I’d sure appreciate it, if ya’d let me know.”

“I will,” Crystal promised. “Pa?”

“Yeah, Crys?” Hugh replied.

“I . . . hate leavin’ ya short handed, but I think I’d best stay with our young friend in there . . . at least for the next couple of days,” Crystal said. “I’m probably the closest thing she’s got to a friend here in Virginia City.”

“I kinda figured ya might,” Hugh said, “so I talked Darryl into takin’ his days off not THIS weekend comin’ up, but the next weekend.”

“While we’re at the dance, I’m gonna ask Rebecca to go to the church social with me comin’ up Sunday a week,” Darryl said with a big, wide grin. “I could use the Saturday before to gussy up a little.”

Crystal smiled. “Glad to see you’re taking my advice, Darryl.”

“Oh yeah?! What advice is THAT?” Hugh demanded.

“My advice on handling women . . . remember?”

“Sheriff Coffee, we got a reply from Freedonia,” Deputy Clem Foster said grimly, by way of greeting, upon Roy’s return to his office that afternoon.

“Thanks, Clem,” Roy murmured softly. He took the sheet of paper from his deputy, and read over the message scrawled there. Brief, succinct, and to the point, it read:

“Sheriff Coffee [stop]

Stage still missing, six days overdue [stop] So far search parties find nothing [stop]

A [stop] D [stop] Dewey
Manager Freedonia Depot [stop; end of message]”

“Looks like that stage never got t’ Freedonia,” Roy mused grimly. “Was there anything from Overland’s headquarters over at the telegraph office?”

“No, but I DID get a passenger list from the depot manager here,” Clem replied. “I left it on your desk.”

Roy nodded his thanks, before walking over to his desk and sitting down. The passenger list lay square in the middle of the desk, amid a half dozen piles of paperwork. Clem had weighted it down with his lucky horseshoe, a memento left over from his very first horse, Palomino Joe, a distant cousin several times removed to his present horse, Tin Star. Roy returned the horseshoe to its place in the top, right hand drawer, then sat down to look over the list:

Sally Johnson
Annie Johnson, her daughter (5 years old)
Brentwood J. Carroll
Maria Estevan
Lorenzo Estevan
Tom Haney
Ezekiel Cruthers
Ruth Cruthers

He was personally acquainted with four people on that list. Mrs. Johnson had gone to Carson City to help care for her ailing mother. She had taken her youngest child with her, leaving her husband and three older children, all boys, to fend for themselves at home. Roy remembered overhearing Zeb Johnson telling a couple of friends in the C Street Café, that his wife and daughter had, in fact, arrived safely in Carson City, the day after they had left. He had received a wire from them that morning.

His eyes moved down to the names listed at the very bottom: Ezekiel and Ruth Cruthers. They had owned a pretty fair sized farm that earned them and their family a good living for a number of years. Their children, numbering five, were grown. The two youngest, both boys, were attending college back east somewhere. The three eldest, two daughters and another son, were married, the two daughters with growing families of their own.

With their children gone, and Ezekiel ailing, the Cruthers had sold their farm, earning a handsome profit. Doc Martin had told Ezekiel that living through another winter here in Nevada would, at best, be very detrimental to his health. If severe, he may not even survive it. They had made the decision to move down to Prescott, where their eldest daughter lived with her husband and children, and had left the same day as Mrs. Johnson and her daughter.

Roy made a mental note to wire his friend, Amos Dudley, the sheriff over in Carson City, to verify that the missing stage did reach Carson City, and to ask for a passenger list to see if anyone new got on board. He, then, scanned down the list of names once again, this time stopping abruptly in the middle. “Estevan . . . . ” he murmured. “Estevan . . . . ” The name niggled at the edge of his memory. “Estevan,” he repeated the name very softly. Then, he remembered.

The newly wed couple who had traveled from Sacramento to Virginia City with Adam Cartwright! THEIR last name was Estevan! Her name was Maria and his—

Roy gasped, as the blood suddenly drained right out of his face.

“Sheriff Coffee?!” Clem glanced over at him, noting his paled complexion with an anxious frown.

“The Estevans,” the sheriff murmured softly, his voice barely above a whisper.

Clem’s frown deepened. “Who . . . are the Estevans?”

“Maria and Lorenzo Estevan! Adam Cartwright was tellin’ me about ‘em last night over at the Silver Dollar,” Roy explained, feeling horribly sick at heart.

“They friends of his?”

“He met ‘em when they all got on board the stage in Sacramento.”

“I take it their names are on your passenger list?”

Roy nodded.

“That’s too bad.”

“It’s worse ‘n that, Clem,” Roy said grimly. “That gal the O’Briens found in the desert kept cryin’ out for a fella named Lorenzo, leastwise accordin’ t’ what Crystal McShane said.”

“You think she’s Mrs. Estevan?”

“I’m almost sure of it now that I got two ‘n two t’ put together.”

“Then . . . her story about a stage robbery . . . is true?”

“It’s beginnin’ t’ look that way.” Roy opened the bottom left hand drawer of his desk and drew out a blank sheet of paper. He jotted down a simple message, then handed it over to Clem. It read:

“Amos Dudley Sheriff Carson City. Confirm safe arrival Overland Stage Tuesday three weeks ago Carson City late afternoon. Send passenger list same stage leaving following day. Thank you. Roy Coffee Sheriff Virginia City.”

“I’d like ya t’ take that down to the telegraph office ‘n have that sent t’ Amos,” Roy ordered, rising.

“You want me to wait for a reply?”

“No, you best get back here. Tell whoever’s on duty if he gits a reply, to bring it here t’ the sheriff’s office,” Roy said, as he removed his gun belt from the back of his chair and strapped it to his waist. “In the meantime, I’m gonna stop by Doc Martin’s again, t’ see how things are with that li’l gal, then, I’m gonna stop by the Fletchers house ‘n leave word there for Adam about his friends.”

“Joseph Cartwright, you put that checker piece right back where you found it!” Susannah O’Brien turned on her opponent with a dark, murderous glare.

Joe gasped in pure melodramatic mock outrage. “Susannah, are you insinuating that I— ”

“Nope! I’m not insinuating a thing! I’m saying it straight out. YOU moved that piece.”

“Of COURSE I moved that piece! It was MY turn, wasn’t it?”

“I told you, Susannah . . . you’ve gotta watch HIM like a hawk,” Stacy chuckled.

“Now, Susannah . . . did you actually see me move . . . whatever piece you’re accusing me of moving . . . out of turn?” Joe asked, all too wide eyed and innocent.

“Well, no, I— ”

Joe smiled. “All right, then,” he said in a reasonable tone of voice. “Now why don’t you just put aside all those nasty lying pieces of slander my brother and sister have no doubt filled your pretty little head with . . . . ”

This prompted a sigh and a sarcastic roll of the eyes from Stacy.

“ . . . and let’s enjoy the rest of our game,” Joe blithely rambled on. “Half the lies Hoss and Stacy have told you aren’t even true, anyway.”

“ONLY half?” Susannah quipped, grinning from ear-to-ear.

A knock on the door forestalled the reply sitting at the edge of Joe’s tongue. “Looks like its up to ME,” he said rising, casting a pointed glance at Stacy cast.

Stacy stuck out her tongue.

Joe returned the gesture, then thumbed up his nose for good measure, before turning and walking over to the front door. He was surprised to find Roy Coffee standing out on the doorstep. “Sheriff Coffee! Come on in. I guess you want to see Pa about something?”

“If he’s around,” Roy said, as he stepped inside.

“He’s upstairs,” Joe said. “I’ll call him.”

“Howdy, Stacy . . . Susannah,” Roy walked over toward the settee, occupied by the two young women. “How’re things goin’?”

“I’M doing fine,” Susannah said immediately.

“ . . . and I’m coming along,” Stacy said with a rueful glance down at her cast. “Hopefully the cast comes off and stays off in another five weeks or so.”

“Now you behave yourself,” Roy said sternly, “ ‘n make sure y’ mind what the doc says.”

“You have no cause to worry about that, Roy,” Ben said by way of greeting, as he and Joe walked over toward the settee. “Stacy, and Joe, too, for that matter have been good as gold.”

“Pa, you want Susannah and me to go upstairs or something?” Stacy asked, noting the grim look that had settled on Roy’s face.

“No, the three of you stay put and finish your game,” Ben said, “and Joseph?”

“Yeah, Pa?”

“Put back that piece you moved.”

Ben’s admonition elicited a bark of merry laughter from Susannah. Joe favored her with the meanest glare he could possibly summon, as he complied with his father’s request.

“Roy, why don’t the two of us step outside?” Ben invited, gesturing toward the front door.

Roy nodded mutely, then fell instep behind Ben.

“I wonder what Sheriff Coffee wants?” Stacy asked, after her father and the sheriff had stepped out onto the front porch, closing the door behind them.

“I don’t know,” Joe said slowly. “If it had anything to do with Crippensworth and Lady Chadwick, I would’ve thought they’d ask ME to step outside too.”

“I kinda think it has something to do with that young woman Pa, Crystal, and Darryl found out in the desert last night, coming home from Eastgate,” Susannah said slowly.

“What woman?” Stacy asked.

Susannah told Joe and Stacy all she knew.

“What’s up, Roy?” Ben asked, as he and the sheriff stepped out onto the Fletchers’ front stoop.

“When Adam gets back— ”

“Someone mention my name?” It was Adam. He had already dismounted from Sport II, and was leading him up the drive, which lead to the stable in back.

“You’re home early, Son,” Ben said.

“Yeah. I need to get moving on those final drawings for new house, so I can begin to work out how much more we’re going to need in the way of logs, lumber, and other building supplies,” Adam said, as the three walked together, toward the back of the house. “I’m afraid I didn’t get very much done last night.”

“How’re things comin’ along with that new house otherwise?” Roy asked.

“The repairs to the foundation are nearly done,” Adam began to cheerfully, with a touch of pride, recite the litany of progress thus far made, “ . . . we’ve already dug out Hop Sing’s new root and wine cellar.”

“Heard about the Watkins boy,” Roy grunted.

“What happened to the Watkins boy?” Ben demanded anxiously.

“You know how young boys are about construction sites, Pa,” Adam said. “Young Jeremy and a couple of his friends were playing near the hole in the ground that’s going to be Hop Sing’s root cellar, and . . . Jeremy took a tumble down into the hole.”

“I tell ya . . . that boy’s as bad as Joe was at the same age,” Ben muttered darkly under his breath. He sighed, and shook his head, before turning to gaze over at Adam. “Is Jeremy all right?”

“He broke his leg,” Adam replied. “Doc Martin said it was a simple fracture.”

“I saw his ma ‘n pa carryin’ him into the Doc’s office a li’l while ago,” the sheriff said.

“It won’t happen again, Pa,” Adam said. “I asked Hank and Candy to put a couple of men on the site, after Mister Farlyn and the other men leave for the day.

“Good,” Ben declared with an emphatic nod of his head. “Not that I’m happy about the boy being injured mind you, but . . . now that it’s happened . . . I sure hope it serves as a real good object lesson to Jeremy’s friends and the other children we have living on the Ponderosa.”

“I’m sure it will, Pa.”

“So, Roy . . . what can I do for ya?” Ben asked, turning his complete attention to the lawman.

“Actually I came t’ leave ya a message for ADAM, but seein’ as how he’s here . . . . ”

“What can I do for ya, Sheriff Coffee?” Adam asked.

“I . . . have news ‘bout that young couple you was tellin’ me about last night over at the Silver Dollar,” Roy said, as the three entered the stable.

The stricken look on the sheriff’s pale face immediately told Adam that the news, in all likelihood, wasn’t good. “What did you find out?” the eldest Cartwright son asked warily, as he tethered Sport II to one of the support beams, and set himself to the task of removing the saddle.

“Hugh, Crystal, ‘n their foreman found a young woman out in the desert on their way back from that horse auction over in Eastgate,” Roy began.

An anxious frown deepened the lines of Ben’s brow upon hearing a sharp intake of breath from his eldest when Roy mentioned Eastgate.

“Last night, they made camp at a water hole, ‘bout ten . . . fifteen miles, t’ the south west o’ here,” the sheriff continued. “This woman . . . I don’t think she’s any older ‘n Stacy, kinda blundered into their camp. She was in a real bad way. It was real clear she’d been wanderin’ around out in the desert for awhile . . . she was feverish, goin’ on ‘bout a stage robbery, her husband bein’ shot— ”

Adam removed the bridle and blanket, handing both to his father. “You think this woman is . . . Mrs. Estevan?” he asked, as he reached for a brush.

“Almost certain of it,” Roy said grimly. “That overdue stage ain’t shown up in or around Freedonia, ‘n your friends, the Estevans WERE on the list of passengers who left Virginia City on that stage a week ‘n a half ago.”

“Where is this young woman now?” Adam demanded curtly.

“She’s over at Doc Martin’s,” Roy replied. “Crystal McShane’s with her.”

“Pa, as soon as I get Sport II stabled, I’m going over to Doctor Martin’s and see this young woman,” Adam said.

“Adam, there’s one more thing y’ gotta know,” Roy Coffee said.

“What’s that?”

“That li’l gal’s been . . . . ” Two bright splotches of red appeared on his cheeks. “Adam, that li’l gal’s been used. Real bad.”

Adam could feel the blood draining right out of his face, and his knees suddenly turning to jelly. He automatically reached out and held onto his horse for support. A vision of the young couple, as he had last seen them, standing on the porch of the hotel . . . smiling, happy, their arms about each others’ waists, waving good-bye to Hoss and himself . . . flashed before his mind’s eye. The thought of Lorenzo Estevan lying somewhere out in the desert shot to death, and his beautiful young wife, Maria . . . .

Suddenly, Adam didn’t want to think anymore.
“Adam?” Sheriff Coffee prompted, disturbed by the younger man’s sudden silence. “Adam, didja hear what I said?”

No answer.

“Adam?”

“I heard you, Sheriff Coffee, alright?! I heard you,” Adam snarled back. “What happened to that young woman has a name, you know. It’s called rape!”

“Adam!” Ben snapped out his oldest son’s name, as grave concern mingled with outrage.

“It’s . . . It’s all right, Ben . . . . ” Roy murmured, stunned by Adam’s sudden outburst. He would have expected something like that from Joe, Stacy . . . or occasionally even from Ben. But, Adam? Never.

“No, Roy,” Ben said tersely. “It’s NOT alright— ”

“I’m sorry,” Adam said in a voice stone cold.

“We’ll talk about this when you come inside,” Ben said in that low, quiet voice that carried in it the lull before the proverbial storm.

Ben’s words drew a sharp, angry glare from his son. “No, we WON’T talk about this when I come inside,” Adam said tersely. “I’ve already apologized. I don’t see any point in discussing it further. Now if you’ll BOTH excuse me, I’d like to finish stabling my horse, so I can go over to the Martins and visit this young woman.”

“I, umm . . . need t’ be moseyin’ along anyhow,” Roy said, as two bright spots appeared on his cheeks and a third in the middle of his forehead. Through out that brief, angry exchange between father and son just know, Roy had wished with all his might for a hole into which he could’ve crawled.

“I’ll see you out,” Ben said, his voice deceptively calm. The dark angry glare he directed toward Adam in parting, the jaw, rigidly set, and the steel glint in his eyes, gave very strong indication that the conversation between himself and Adam was NOT over, not by a long shot. In fact, it hadn’t even, as yet, begun.

After Adam had finished stabling his horse, he went into the house, upstairs to his room to change his shirt, splash a little water on his face, and run a comb through his thinning hair. He emerged from his room upstairs, and started down the short corridor toward the steps, mentally bracing himself for the inevitable face off with his father. Every step of the way, he reviewed the exchange between himself and Roy Coffee, over and over and over again, trying to figure out what bedevilment had possessed him to turn on the sheriff like that.

No answers were forthcoming.

“HEY! NOW who’s cheating?!” Joe’s voice, filled with indignation, assailed Adam’s ears as he neared the bottom of the stairs.

“Joseph Cartwright, how DARE you!” That was Susannah O’Brien, one of Stacy’s closest friends, equally indignant.

“Don’t you get all huffy on ME, Miss Susannah Beee-youu-llah O’Brien!”

Use of her middle name elicited a deafening shriek of outrage. “STACY ROSE CARTWRIGHT, SO HELP ME IF YOU TOLD HIM . . . . ”

“Hey! Back off!” Stacy giggled, fending off her enraged opponent with an upraised crutch. “How COULD I tell him? I didn’t even know what your middle name was myself . . . until NOW.”

“When I find out who told, so help me, my vengeance will be horrible to behold!” Susannah fumed.

“Susannah, I believe there’s a passage in the Bible that says something about vengeance belonging to the Lord,” Adam said, as he stepped down off the last step onto the first floor. In his own ears, his voice sounded as if it had come from a place far distant, almost as if someone, other than himself, had spoken.

Adam’s words drew a murderous glare from Susannah.

Adam favored her with a complacent smile. “By the way, Susannah, HIS middle name is FRANCIS.”

Susannah’s dark, angry glare evaporated into a bright sunny smile of utmost evil. “Oh it IS, ‘ey?”

“Thanks a LOT, Adam!” Joe growled.

“Don’t mention it,” Adam said. “You, uhh . . . happen to know where Pa is?”

“He told us he was going to go upstairs and catch a quick catnap before dinner,” Joe replied.

“I’m going to run across the street for a few minutes,” Adam said.

“To Doc Martin’s?!” Joe queried in surprise.

“He has a patient who . . . well, I think she’s someone I know,” Adam said. “If Pa comes down before I get back, would you mind telling him where I am?”

“We’ll tell him,” Stacy promised.

“Thanks,” Adam murmured, before slipping out through the front door. A within a few minutes, he was standing on the Martins’ front stoop, ringing the doorbell. He was very much surprised, when Hugh O’Brien, Susannah’s father, opened the door.

“Come on in, Adam,” Hugh moved aside, allowing the eldest of the Cartwright offspring to enter. “Good seein’ ya.”

“Thank you.” Adam grinned as the two shook hands. “Good seeing you, too, Mister O’Brien. You’re looking well.”

“As are you. If you’re here lookin’ for the doc, he’s in fittin’ Jeremy Watkins’ broken leg with a plaster cast,” Hugh said as they walked the short distance to the Martins’ formal parlor. “His pa’s been waitin’ in the parlor with Crys ‘n me.”

“M-Mister Cartwright?”

Adam looked up and found Carl Watkins, the boy’s father, standing framed in the open door to the Martins’ parlor, holding his wide brimmed hat clutched in both hands, his eyes round with shock and apprehension.

“I’m real sorry ‘bout what happened. Thelma ‘n I done warned Jeremy time ‘n time again ‘bout— ”

“I KNOW you have, Mister Watkins,” Adam said quietly. “I also know there’s something about a construction site and a great big hole in the ground that draws small boys like a magnet. My own son, Benjy was every bit as . . . shall we say adventurous? . . . as your son. For THAT matter, my youngest brother was the same way, and he’s got the scars to prove it.

Carl nodded, visibly relieved by Adam’s understanding.

“Is Jeremy going to be alright?”

“Yes, Sir.”

“That’s the important thing,” Adam hastily assured the anxious young father.

“Mister Watkins?” It was Paul Martin, stepping from his examination room, covered in plaster-of-paris from head to toe. “Your boy’s ready to go home. He and your wife are waiting for you in my examination room.”

“Thanks, Doc,” Carl said wearily. “Mister O’Brien, good talkin’ with ya.”

“I’ll remember your boy in my prayers tonight,” Hugh promised. “I’m glad he’s gonna be alright.”

“Thanks, and Mister Cartwright, thank you for everything YOU done,” Carl said with heartfelt sincerity and gratitude. “When ya see Hoss, wouldja mind tellin’ HIM thank you for me?”

“I’d be more than happy to do so,” Adam replied.

“Hugh . . . Adam, I have some final instructions to give the Watkins,” Paul Martin said, after Carl Watkins had left the parlor. “I’ll be right with you.”

Adam and Hugh nodded, then moved into the parlor. “I, ummmm hope Joe ‘n Stacy ain’t took a turn for the worse,” the latter said quietly as the latter resumed his place on the settee.

“No, Sir . . . Joe and Stacy are doing just fine. In fact, I left them playing a game of checkers with YOUR daughter, Susannah,” Adam replied, as he settled himself in the easy chair, to Hugh’s right. “My reason for coming here was to see the young lady you found out in the desert.”

“Oh?” Hugh frowned.

“I may know her,” Adam explained.

“Friend o’ yours?”

“She and her husband might have been, I think . . . had fate been much kinder,” Adam said sadly. “When I boarded the stage in Sacramento, a young couple . . . newly weds . . . got on board with me. Their name was Estevan . . . Lorenzo and Maria. They were on their way home from their honeymoon trip.”

“This li’l gal cries out for somebody named Lorenzo,” Hugh said quietly, “though she can’t be much older than Susannah . . . or Stacy, either, for that matter.”

“That sounds about right,” Adam said in a hollow voice.

“Pa . . . oh! Adam! I’d heard you were coming . . . . ” It was Crystal McShane. She stood next to the settee, at her father’s elbow, with arms folded across her chest, regarding Adam with mild surprise.

“Yes,” Adam said, as he and Hugh both rose to their feet. “I’m here to oversee the building of my family’s new house. Crystal . . . . ”

“Yes?”

“Would it be possible for me to see the young woman you and your father found out in the desert?” Adam asked. “I may know her.”

“He and a young couple got on the stage in Sacramento, Crys,” Hugh said. “They traveled together from there to here.”

“Their last name was Estevan,” Adam said. “Maria and Lorenzo Estevan. They had planned to leave here the next morning on the stage bound for Freedonia.”

“Sheriff Coffee stopped in a few minutes ago, Crys,” Hugh said quietly. “He got a passenger list for that missin’ stage. There WAS a Lorenzo ‘n Maria Estevan on that list. Adam, here, thinks that li’l gal in there’s Maria Estevan.”

“She’s still sleeping, bless her heart. Doc Martin wants her to sleep as long as she can . . . that it’s the best thing for her right now.”

“I . . . wanted to see whether or not she is, in fact, Maria Estevan,” Adam said. “I’ll understand if you say no.”

“Whether or not you’re able to see her is entirely up to Doctor Martin . . . not me,” Crystal said quietly. “If that poor woman DOES turn out to be Maria Estevan, she can use all the friends she can get.”

“Thank you, Crystal.”

“Crys, I’m gonna amble on across the street, ‘n collect Susannah,” Hugh said. “I . . . kinda want the two o’ us t’ git home before dark.”

“I understand, Pa.”

Hugh and Crystal embraced briefly. “I’ll see ya in the mornin’, Gal.”

“You, too, Pa. You and Susannah be careful going home.”

“We will,” Hugh promised. He kissed his eldest daughter’s forehead, then nodded to Adam, before taking his leave.

A few moments later, Paul Martin entered the parlor, this time without his lab coat. “Crystal? Your pa left?”

“Yeah,” Crystal replied, as she and Adam both rose to their feet. “He wanted to get himself and my sister home before dark. I . . . can’t say as I blame him.”

“Neither can I,” Paul Martin said grimly. He, then, turned his attention to the eldest of the Cartwright offspring. “Adam, what can I do for YOU?” he asked. “I hope Joe and Stacy . . . . ”

“Please . . . don’t worry about them, Doctor. BOTH of ‘em are fine . . . following doctor’s orders to the letter, and behaving themselves.”

“THAT’S a novelty,” Paul said with a wry smile. “If memory serves, it’s also a FIRST.”

“There’s a first time for everything, Doctor,” Adam returned. “My reason for stopping by is that I would like to see the young woman Mister O’Brien, Crystal, and their foreman found in the desert. I . . . I’m almost certain I know her.”

“She’s upstairs sleeping in our guest room,” Paul said wearily. “I can only let you stay for a minute, but . . . if there’s any chance you can verify this woman’s identity— Please, come with me.”

Adam silently fell in behind Paul Martin, leaving Crystal McShane to bring up the rear. The guest room was on the second floor of the Martins’ townhouse, last door on the left. Inside, the patient was lying on the bed, next to the window over looking the backyard, eyes closed, breathing shallow, her form ominously still. Crystal McShane quietly slipped past Adam and the doctor. Adam silently followed her across the room, as she moved toward the bed, and the diminutive young woman, almost swallowed up by the bedcovers.

As he stepped close to the bed, Adam took a deep, ragged breath, and closed his eyes, fervently praying that their suspicions were all wrong, that the woman he was about to see would NOT be the young newly married wife, he had come to know so well on the trip out from Sacramento. At length, he opened them, and forced himself to gaze down into the woman’s face. “Oh, God . . . no . . . . ” he murmured, with a heavy heart.

Even through cuts and bruises, skin burned to the same hue as the shell of a steamed lobster . . . and worst of all, in spite of those lustrous, shining coal black tresses, now cut shorter than his own, there was no denying the woman’s identity.

“Adam?” Paul Martin prompted.

“Yes,” Adam quietly answered the doctor’s unspoken question. “Your patient is Mrs. Maria Estevan.”

“Hugh, you sure you can’t stay long enough for a cup of coffee?” Ben asked. “Hop Sing’s just put on a fresh pot.”

“I wish I could, Ben,” Hugh O’Brien said with much reluctance, “but, I think Susannah ‘n me need to be pressin’ on toward home. You . . . heard about the young lady Crys, Darryl, ‘n me found out in the desert?”

“Yes,” Ben said, “and I understand.”

“Susannah . . . let’s get a move on,” Hugh exhorted his youngest daughter.

“Coming, Pa,” Susannah replied. Turning to her hosts, she smiled. “Stacy, Joe . . . I really had a nice time, even if Joe DID find out my middle name . . . .” She looked over and favored Joe with an impish grin. “I also found out what HIS middle name is, so we’re even.”

Joe stuck his tongue out at her.

“Joseph Francis Cartwright, is that anyway to behave when we have a guest?” Ben admonished his youngest son with mock severity.

“It is when she cheats at playing checkers and beats me seven games out of ten,” Joe growled back.

“You gotta watch this li’l gal like a hawk, Joe,” Hugh said with a chuckle.

“ . . . and in any case, isn’t accusing Susannah of cheating kinda like the pot calling the kettle black?” Stacy asked.

“I don’t recall asking for YOUR opinion, Kid,” Joe retorted in a lofty, imperious tone of voice.

Stacy responded by sticking out her tongue.

Joe thumbed up his nose.

“Alright, CHILDREN, both of ya . . . settle down,” Ben growled, glaring first at Stacy, then over at Joe. He, then turned his attention to the O’Briens. “Hugh . . . Susannah . . . I’ll see ya to the door.”

“Mister Cartwright, I had a wonderful visit with Stacy and Joe,” Susannah said, in all sincerity, after the three had stepped outside. “I’m glad to see they’re both doing so well.”

“I couldn’t agree with you more, Susannah,” Ben said with a smile. “You feel free to come back and visit again, whenever you want. You being here this afternoon has lifted both their spirits tremendously.”

“How’re YOU coping, Ben?” Hugh asked. “I understand Joe ‘n Stacy can be a real handful bein’ sick or hurt one at a time. Now y’ got BOTH on the mend all at once.”

“I have to remind ‘em that they’re not too big to turn over my knee once in a while, but other than that, they’re behaving themselves,” Ben said. “I’ve also given Hoss strict instructions to leave Cochise and Blaze Face at the ranch, unless or until I say otherwise.”

“Good thinkin’,” Hugh murmured. “Well . . . you ‘n me’d best move along, Li’l Gal. It was good seein’ ya, Ben, even if it was brief.”

“Good seeing the both of you. Take care riding home.”

Ben waited behind the closed gate until the O’Briens had mounted up and ridden off. As he turned, with the intention of heading back into the house, he caught movement at the outer edges of his peripheral vision. He turned back again, just in time to see his eldest son crossing the street between the Martins’ townhouse and the Fletchers’. Ben waited.

“Pa, I— ”

“I was seeing Hugh and Susannah off,” Ben said, suddenly feeling very much on the defensive. He lifted the latch, then stood aside, so that his son might enter. “I just happened to glance up in time to see you coming out of the Martins, so I waited.”

“Did Joe and Stacy tell you where I was?” Adam asked, as he fell in step alongside his father.

“They told me you had gone over to the Martins,” Ben said quietly, as they slowly walked up the sidewalk together, toward the front stoop. “Adam . . . . ”

“Yeah, Pa?”

“The young woman Hugh and Crystal found in the desert . . . is she . . . . ?”

Adam nodded. “Yes,” he said in a voice, barely audible.

“I’m sorry, Son. From what you and Hoss told me . . . the Estevans sounded like a lovely young couple,” Ben said quietly, as he placed a paternal hand on his eldest son’s shoulder, with the intention of offering a small measure of comfort and reassurance.

Adam reached up and covered his father’s hand with his own for a moment, before politely shaking him off. “I’m all right,” he said, favoring Ben with a wan smile.

Ben had serious doubts as to the veracity of Adam’s statement, but wisely decided against voicing them . . . for the time being, at least.

“I . . . also went to see Sheriff Coffee.”

Ben glanced up sharply, remembering Adam’s angry outburst earlier.

“I apologized properly for my churlish behavior earlier,” Adam said very quickly. “I also told him who the young woman is.”

“Good.”

“Pa . . . . ”

“Yes, Adam?”

“The sheriff and his deputy are out banging on doors, trying to get a search party together,” Adam said.

“To find that missing stagecoach?”

Adam nodded. “We leave tomorrow morning at first light.”

“We?!”

“I volunteered to go with them.”

“Oh?” This came as something of a surprise to Ben.

“I have to know what happened, Pa. However, if you have any objections— ”

Ben fell silent for a moment, trying desperately to come up with a plausible excuse. None were forthcoming. “I have no objections, Adam,” he said finally. “Any particular reason why you have to know what happened?”

Ben’s question drew a sharp glare from his eldest son.

“I’m NOT trying to talk you out of it, Son,” Ben said quickly. “Heaven knows, you’re ‘way too old for THAT. I was just curious, that’s all.”

“Sorry, Pa, I . . . . ” Adam frowned, wondering what had prompted him to apologize. True, his father’s question rankled him, but he didn’t respond in a manner offensive or disrespectful. In fact, he hadn’t responded at all.

“When do you ride out?” Ben asked.

“Tomorrow morning, first light,” Adam replied.

End of Part 2

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