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Absolute Bearing is a nautical term which means that a navigator knows the ship's location in reference to the North Star. It's the clockwise angle between the north and an object observed by the vessel.

(Courtesy of Wikipedia)

Absolute Bearing

PART 1

Ben Cartwright came down the stairs and saw Adam sitting in the semi-dark, the only light coming from the fireplace; there had been a cold snap and the house was chilly so Adam had built up the fire and the flames cast an eerie glow around the room as well as creating dancing shadows on the walls. He sat on the settee, staring into the fire.

"Adam," Ben said, as he descended, "problems keeping you awake?" Ben finished coming down the stairs and Adam turned to look at him.

Adam Cartwright had been home for a few months after having been away at sea for a few years. He was trying to fit into the calmness of domestic life but had trouble resisting the siren's call of the sea. And then there was Lucy; he was having trouble resisting her as well.

"A man always has problems, Pa," Adam said, staring back into the flames. "That comes with life, doesn't it?"

Ben sat down in the blue, high-backed chair flanking the fireplace and looked at his eldest son. He had marveled how Adam had come back a different person-he didn't even look the same with his beard, the deep scar on his left cheekbone and his different view on life but there were the vestiges of the Adam that had been. He still thought deeply about things that other people only gave cursory attention to but yet, he now reacted instinctively to anything that threatened him or any of the people he loved and that made him dangerous. And Ben wondered what was keeping Adam awake, what prevented him from sleeping.

'What are you reading?" Ben said, noticing the book on the table in front of Adam.

"Actually nothing," Adam said, glancing at the book. "It's strange, Pa. I can't seem to be able to stay interested in anything. I find poetry sophomoric and novels full of lies-such simplistic takes on the world. And despite what literature says, love doesn't bring happiness-only misery so why do all these authors and poets glorify it? Besides, I think that I have now officially reached old age-I do believe that I need glasses-even with the lamp I had on, I still was having problems distinguishing letters; I was more or less guessing at what was written."

Ben smiled and gave a small laugh. "You think you're old? Think of me-I'm your father. When I see how you're all men-grown men, it frightens me because I feel that my end may be soon, that I won't live to see all of you happy and contented with life."

"You talking about me, Pa?"

"Well, not just you; I want all three of you to be happy and content."

"Are you happy and contented with life?" Adam asked. "Can you honestly say that you have everything you want? Don't you wish that you would fall in love again just one more time-to feel that joy, that ecstasy again?"

Ben paused. Adam always challenged him and since Adam rarely shared his thoughts with anyone, when he shared them, Ben wanted to be able to help and although Ben always felt that he wasn't his son's intellectual equal, up to this point in their lives Ben had been the one with more experience with the struggles in life and pain and misery and suffering-but not anymore. Adam had now been through more than he and so Ben considered his words carefully.

"Is it Joe's upcoming wedding that has you pondering love and women? I've noticed that since his engagement party two weeks ago, you've been more, oh…I guess, reclusive."

Adam looked at his father. Having been away for a few years, what had struck Adam the most was how his father had aged in the time that he had been gone and Adam felt that he had been the primary cause of it. He therefore tried to be gentle with his father, not to give him anything to worry about but he knew that his father worried about everything that concerned any of his sons. His father loved him, that Adam knew; they had a bond denied his younger brothers. He and his father had gone through the meager early years together and Adam had to grow up sooner than Hoss and Joe. Adam had also suffered through the loss of three mothers. Both Adam and Ben experienced the loss of Inger and Marie, their deaths destroying Adam's security and the images of the limp bodies of the two women still haunted him in his dreams as well. But the loss of the one woman he had loved more than his own life, more than the lives of his family even had changed his outlook on life and destroyed his faith. And although his last glimpse of her was as she tumbled backwards to the ground, he still had haunting visions of her when he closed his eyes and then Adam would be more determined than before to never love anyone again-it wasn't worth the cost.

"Maybe it is Joe's engagement, I'm not sure." Adam looked back into the fire. Joe and Polly did seem suited for each other; Joe loved her, that was obvious, but it wasn't a consuming love and therefore, Joe wouldn't be destroyed should something happen and that comforted Adam; he didn't want his brother to go through anything similar to what he had.

"Oh, I forgot to tell you," Ben said, "I saw Lucy Fairmont in town yesterday and she asked about you. But then she always did."

"What do you mean by that, she always did?" Adam said sharply.

"Nothing particular except that Lucy always asked about you, even when she was on her fiancé's arm, she would ask about you, if I had heard from you and such." Ben thought he saw a slight change on Adam's face, just a shadow, a nuance of interest. Ben decided to take a chance. "Is it Lucy who's keeping you from sleeping?"

After a slight pause, Adam barely whispered, "Yes."

"I felt that something must have happened between you two at the engagement party. Am I right?" Adam slightly nodded in response. "My guess is that she's in love with you and let you know. Why does Lucy disturb you?" Ben was stumbling in the dark, feeling his way but when he saw how Adam turned to look at him, Ben knew he was correct in his surmise that Lucy had somehow touched Adam in a manner more than as an old acquaintance.

"I…," Adam said quietly, "she disturbs me-she's so young and so…. And you're right, she told me she loved me and I kissed her. I never should have-I shouldn't have led her on, had her think I cared. I don't. I don't love her but I can't stop thinking about her. It's just lust-desire I feel-she's so young and vulnerable and I want to have her but she deserves someone who loves her, who cherishes her and that's not me. I don't love her, can't love her but if she would let me, I would have her. I would take her and then leave her lying there on her back with nothing to hope for." Adam sat silent for a moment and then, with almost a sense of desperation, Adam said, "I'm having the worst time struggling with this, Pa. It doesn't matter what I do. If I go to town and visit the cat house, I still come out thinking about her. I close my eyes and see her face in front of me, feel her lips on my cheek where she kissed me and her hands on mine and I just want to destroy her for what she's done to me."

"What is it that she's done that's so awful, Adam? Make you feel some emotion that you thought you had buried? Let me tell you something, Adam, and then I'll leave. You can't kill your feelings. You can deaden them with alcohol if you choose, deaden them in consorting with whores and try to wipe out your thoughts by working yourself half to death, but no matter how much you try to drown them, they'll always rise to the surface and maybe you should just stop trying to fight the feelings that Lucy stirs up in you and act on them. Not the violent desire to smother them, but the desire, the need to have someone love you. Despite your wanting to avoid feeling anything, you can't deny that the need to be loved is still alive in you and if Lucy loves you, and I believe she does, then you should drop to your knees and thank God that you haven't become so alienated from humanity that no one could love you. Remember when you were small and would sit on the floor to read or play with your toys and one of your legs would fall asleep? Remember how it would hurt when the feeling came back? Well, emotions, feelings, are the same way. When they come back, when you start to feel them again, it hurts. And that's all I have to say." And with that, Ben stood up and went up the stairs to bed.

And Adam sat and felt overwhelming sadness; he wanted to feel love again-to be loved and to hold a woman in his arms that he adored-but he couldn't allow it. He wished that the last five years had never happened and he also knew that despite what anyone else thought, he was a coward; he was afraid of feeling love again, afraid of any more pain in his life.

TBC