HOME IS WHERE THE HEART IS

The story takes place after the Season 2 episode Greater Love.

Chapter 1

The loud rap on the wooden door broke the tense silence in the cabin. Adams knew who it was even before the voice followed it. Butler almost jumped at the sound but recovered himself quickly.

"Who's that?" he yelled, his voice gravelly and aggressive.

The unmistakable voice of Matt Dillon answered, announcing that he was unarmed and coming in.

"Dad-blamed fool," Adams cursed. Butler had ordered him to open the door but all he wanted to do was tell the lawman that he shouldn't have come. There would still be time for him to leave, but he knew his friend better than that. The marshal entered, hands raised, and an empty holster by his side.

"Why didn't you stay outside Matt?" Doc pleaded, he was sure now that both of them would be killed. Dillon would die, and it was all because of him.

Matt looked at Butler with cold, fearless eyes. "I've got one man outside, Butler," he explained, "And that gun you're holding only fires one shot, then you have to reload. The second you pull the trigger you're done for."

Butler looked at the lawman and quickly swung the rifle towards him.

"You forgot one thing, Dillon, I'd rather kill a United States Marshal than a doctor any day. I'll shoot you before your man can kill me."

"Go ahead." Matt almost looked pleased with himself, "Nobody's stopping you."

Butler seemed confused for a moment and Adams took the opportunity to draw attention to himself.

"Matt, why didn't you stay outside?"

The words were hardly out of his mouth before the blast from the rifle shook the cabin and made the ground tremble under his feet. It was followed almost instantaneously by the crack of a pistol coming from the small window behind Butler. The cabin was dark and had that musty aroma, but now the unmistakable smell of gunpowder and fresh blood assaulted his nostrils. He stood in horror as his tall friend took the rifle bullet that was originally intended for him. In the dim light he watched, helpless, as the massive figure grabbed at his chest and fell lifeless to the ground.

"No!" he screamed. "Matt, why didn't you listen to me? I told you not to come."

There were two bodies lying on the floor at his feet. Jed Butler was a murderer. He hated to see the death of any man, but Jed mattered very little. The other body he could not believe, a man who had led a seemingly charmed existence, enforcing the law and somehow avoiding death, often by the slimmest of margins. Now he lay dead in a pool of blood mingled with the dirt and dust of the cabin floor. He had been brought down by a coward like Jed Butler. Matt Dillon had walked into this shack unarmed, with his hands raised in an effort to free the physician and Butler had murdered him. Before he even knelt down beside his friend he knew the unthinkable had happened. Matt Dillon was dead. He had more than willingly given his life to save that of his friend Doc Adams. So many thoughts were rushing through his mind. Such sorrow mingled with guilt. Guilt because Adams knew it was he who had summoned this untimely death upon his friend.

He was aware of the rapid pounding of his heart within his chest. He was sweating. He could feel salty tears welling in his eyes.

"No!" he screamed again, to any entity that might be listening. "Not this, it's my fault. He gave his life so I would live."

He buried his face in his hands and his tears mingled with the pooled blood staining the floor.

ooo000ooo

It was dark when Galen Adams awoke. He knew it had been a dream, but it left him sweating and shaken. His heart rate was elevated and he could feel tremors passing through his body. It could so easily have happened that way. Jed Butler could have killed Matt Dillon right there in that shack, and Dillon would have let him do it just to save Adams' life.

Earlier the previous day Doc had returned to town from that terrible scene. He remembered the awful moment when Matt Dillon had banged on the door, and Butler had ordered Doc to let him in. He should have refused, but Butler had the barrel of the rifle poking his back. He tried to tell the lawman to go away, that he could handle this, but of course Matt wouldn't listen. Instead he entered the cabin unarmed with hands raised, willing to die to protect the physician.

It was a horrible feeling to think that his friend, almost a son, was willing to give his life in that way. Fortunately Butler was confused by the action. He said that there was no one in the world who would have walked through that door to save his life. He had never seen such love in his entire life. Matt had eventually arrested the man and taken him back to jail, but it all could have ended so differently, just as it had in his nightmare.

Adams left the warm confines of his bed and shuffled towards the old roll-top desk in the front office where he kept a bottle of whisky hidden at the back of a drawer. Not the rough stuff he used for patients, but the smooth, finer variety he got Kitty Russell to order especially for him. He opened the bottle and took a swallow, then followed it quickly with a second before replacing the cap and putting it back where he found it. He wiped some of the sweat from his face with his left hand as he thought of Kitty Russell. Kitty, whatever would have happened to her if he had had to ride back to town with Dillon's body. She would know that it was because of him that Dillon had died. The thought almost brought tears to his eyes as he pictured the scene.

Somehow he managed to put the vision behind him. He had to get some sleep before the sun came up, and it would be time to go make rounds in the countryside west of Dodge City .

The same dream haunted him for several nights. Just the thought that he could so easily have been the cause of Matt Dillon's death disturbed him. It hadn't happened, but it could have. The thought stuck with him for many days. Strangely enough it was Chester Goode who brought him the solution.

The marshal's assistant always looked forward to picking up the mail for his boss. It gave him a sense of importance to accept all those official looking government envelopes. It was usually nothing more exciting than wanted circulars or warnings regarding the suspected whereabouts of gangs intent on robbing banks, or stage-coaches, or anything else that could possibly be robbed. Occasionally the marshal's pay check would arrive. That was supposed to be a monthly event but often those envelopes got delayed or never showed up at all.

That morning the clerk handed Chester Doc's mail as well as the marshal's. There were two packages and three journals for the doctor, which were, as usual quite heavy, accompanied by a stack of four personal letters. It was a long established understanding that Chester would collect Doc's packages for him so, after leaving the official mail on Mr. Dillon's desk, he climbed the stairs to Adam's office and deposited the bundle on the corner of Doc's accepted a cup of coffee in return for his trouble, then stayed talking for a few minutes until Adams shooed him out saying he had several patients to visit that morning and didn't have time to waste. It was, therefore, late in the afternoon when Doc sat down in the old swivel chair at his desk and started going through the stack of correspondence.

Two journals were from back east. He had a standing subscription so they arrived every month or at least as close to that as the stage lines could manage. The third one was different. It had come all the way from Tolands Medical College in San Francisco. He was aware that the Medical College had recently become a part of the University of California, and was already becoming quite well known for its research. How did it get to him? He had no idea. He flipped through the pages, glancing at the titles of the articles, then set it aside, definitely planning to look at it in detail later. Next he reached for the old rusty scalpel he used as a letter opener, and began opening the private correspondence. The first two letters were from pharmaceutical companies advertising their latest wares. The third one looked more interesting. It, too, had come from California.

He opened the envelope and pulled out a single sheet of velum covered with vaguely familiar handwriting. He looked at the bottom for a signature - Ben Williams. Goodness! He hadn't thought of Ben for ages. Their paths had crossed in Baltimore many years ago. The two men had spent a year working together in a small practice in a poorer part of town. The note was very simple. It told him to refer to page 24 in the journal from San Francisco. There was an advertisement there he wanted Adams to read.

The final line read, "I know you must be tired of living in such an isolated, uncivilized town as Dodge City. Do you remember how much we enjoyed working together in Baltimore? Consider it."

Doc smiled to himself for a moment. He did remember those days. Both men were fresh out of medical school at the time, and full of idealism, were out to change the world. Of course things never work out quite the way the eyes of youth visualize them. There is always disillusion and compromise along the way. He couldn't really leave Dodge, could he? Oh, he had thought about it many times and had to admit he wanted to see California - in fact earlier that week he had told his friend Matt Dillon just that very thing. He was tired of Dodge City and was going to leave town and head for San Francisco. Matt had threatened to put him in jail if he tried it. He had even gone so far as to tell him he would have to run his practice from there if that's what it took to keep him in Dodge.

He opened the journal and turned to page 24. There was a quarter page advertisement extolling the virtues of Drs. Mortimer and Williams and how they were looking for someone to join their practice. "A physician skilled in General Practice and Surgery" is what it said. That pretty much described Galen Adams.

At first he tossed the journal aside. No use even considering it. He set off to make his afternoon rounds, but as he drove his dilapidated buggy and looked at the sad state of people living in this god-forsaken land, the idea began to grow inside him.

It wasn't really money he was after, although occasionally getting paid in cash instead of potatoes, or more often than not, just "thank you's", did get old after a while. Mostly he missed the opportunity to meet with colleagues, to discuss a case here and there, or even mull over some new ideas. He was totally isolated from that. On the other hand what of his Dodge City friends and "family"?. He was sure he would find friends in a new town, but what of Matt Dillon, Kitty Russell and, yes, even Chester? He would miss them for sure, but then there was nothing to prevent them visiting him in San Francisco. He might even make it back to Dodge one day. The railroads were getting faster and more efficient all the time.

The only other thing left to work out was who would take care of his patients, not the least of whom was the marshal - who probably utilized his services more than most. On the other hand if he left town Matt would never have to face the possibility of sacrificing his own life for that of the physician.

There were many other doctors who could well take his place here. It didn't take a lot of skill to remove bullets and set broken limbs, even delivering babies wasn't all that difficult. He knew one or two people who might be willing to come to a frontier town like Dodge and escape the very staid and ordered life back east.

By the time he got home that evening, he had almost managed to convince himself that it was the right thing to do.

ooo000ooo

Adams didn't like to drink alone, shut away in his office. He had seen too many physicians succumb to that temptation. So after a less than satisfying meal at Delmonico's, he found himself heading for the Long Branch. Kitty Russell was helping out behind the bar, but she saw him come through the swinging doors from the street. She had looked up and smiled, then without asking, poured two shots of whisky and carried them to a quiet table at the back of the saloon.

The doctor sat staring at the glass she had placed in front of him.

"What's the matter Doc, did you lose a patient today?"

"Not quite," he answered without raising his eyes.

"Well something's troubling you."

The man just nodded, twisting the shot glass between his fingers, "Did Matt ever tell you what happened with Jed Butler?"

"You know Matt doesn't talk about anything like that very much. He told me Butler had tried kidnapping you, but it didn't work and he managed to arrest him without any bloodshed."

The physician lifted his glass and took a swallow of the whisky, hoping it would numb his fears. Kitty followed his lead, raising her drink to her lips.

"Matt almost got killed trying to rescue me, Kitty. He entered that cabin unarmed, and tried to get Butler to kill him in order to save me."

Although she hated the risks that Matt took as part of his job, she also knew his feelings about the physician. The marshal and the doctor could be heard taunting each other with words many times - not quite the same as between Doc and Chester, but friendly teasing none-the-less. Kitty knew how much Matt Dillon admired the doctor and his skills and understood how fortunate Dodge was to have such a knowledgeable and caring physician.

"You know Doc, I hate that Matt lays his life on the line every day to protect what he believes in, but that is who he is. If he'd died out there, it wouldn't have been your fault, it would have been something he did because that's how he feels about his friends and his badge. He would give his life to protect any of us, or this town, if he thought it was the right thing to do."

"That doesn't mean I have to like it. I couldn't have lived with myself if it had happened that way."

She reached out and put a hand on his arm, smiling into his weary, blood-shot eyes. "Doc, there is no way any of us can influence what Matt Dillon does. Even if the worst had happened it would've been Jed Butler's doing, not yours."

Doc had no answer, he knew what he felt. He lifted the glass to his lips and swallowed the remainder of its contents in one go. As he set it down he looked across at Kitty. He could not explain his feelings for this remarkable woman. She had clawed her way through one of the roughest, toughest businesses in Dodge City. She had competed with men on equal terms and come out on top. Through it all she had not lost her feminine charm nor had she become bitter and hardened. He knew from his own observations that she helped any number of people by giving away meals, lending money, or organizing some of the best celebrations Dodge City had ever seen. He also knew that when all was said and done there was only one reason she'd stayed in Dodge City in the first place, and that reason was Matt Dillon. Neither of them shared their feelings for each other in public, but he had witnessed on several occasions the deep bond developing between those two young people.

The first time had been when Matt had been shot, right there on Front Street a year or more ago. He had seen with his own eyes how Kitty had tried to rush to the lawman as he lay there in the street. She had stayed by the man's bedside for days, and he saw how the lawman had responded to her when he was delirious with fever. On the other hand he had witnessed Matt throwing drunken cowboys out of the Long Branch when he thought they were harassing Kitty beyond what she could deal with, but if all was going well he let her handle the situation in her own way. Oh yes, there were definitely deep feelings and understanding there.

He watched her now. She had left the table to take a tray of drinks to a group of poker players. She moved with a confidence and charm that fascinated him. The red hair and the dancing blue eyes - well, if he wasn't old enough to be her father - but enough of that thought. If anything were to happen to Matt Dillon it would devastate her, and he knew there was no way he could accept responsibility for that. There was nothing he could do to control much of what happened to the marshal, but he could at least prevent himself from becoming the cause of the man's demise.

He got up from the table. Kitty turned towards him while still placing beer mugs in front of the poker players. She had questions on her face. He managed to smile.

"I'll see you later, Kitty."

TBC