This story is set in season one of Bonanza and follows the airing dates of the first 18 episodes. It is a WHN for 'A House Divided'. References are made to several of the earlier episodes including 'The Truckee Strip' in which a very young Joe Cartwright intended to marry Amy Bishop before her death. Some fans have placed 'A House Divided' in 1861 due to Frederick Kyle's mention of states seceding from the Union. What he actually indicates is that there are states that are 'thinking' of leaving the Union, not that they have. Due to this, I have placed this tale in 1859 very shortly after Kyle's initial appearance in Virginia City.
The anachronistic use of a paraphrase of Lincoln's inaugural address as the title and quote are intentional.
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The Darker Angels of Our Nature
"We are not enemies, but friends. We must not be enemies. Though passion may have strained, it must not break our bonds of affection. The mystic chords of memory will swell when again touched, as surely they will be, by the better angels of our nature." A. Lincoln
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Late September, 1859
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ONE
"Hey Adam! You seen Little Joe around here lately?"
Adam Cartwright paused with one hand on his saddle horn and the other in the stirrup. He'd been getting ready to ride out of the yard with the intention of heading into town when he'd heard the door to the house open. It could have been Pa instead of Hoss. It wouldn't have mattered. The question and his answer would have been the same.
"He's out with those two new friends of his," he replied succinctly, while being only slightly successful at hiding the accompanying sigh.
"Again?" Hoss asked.
The way middle brother wrinkled his nose with disgust when he asked made it look like Hoss had come upon a dung heap and mistaken it for a posy.
The black-haired man removed his foot from the stirrup and turned to face him. "Again."
"What's Little Joe see in them two anyway?"
'Them two' being Val and Ab Latham. They were twins, about Joe's age, and about as useless as a four card flush. He knew the minute he set eyes on the pair that hiring them had been a mistake. Pa was away and the current foreman, Jake Bowers, whom he'd left in charge, had taken them on as he was in need of young muscle for a couple of jobs, including clearing out the residue of a collapse at one of the mines. Pa'd given him that power, so there was nothing he could say. Well, that wasn't entirely true. He had said a lot, it was just that the foreman didn't listen.
Little Joe, of course, had taken to them in an instant.
"Like a moth to flame," he muttered, not quite as under his breath as he thought.
"You talkin' about little brother?" Hoss asked. "You think them two are gonna get him in trouble?"
Adam snorted. "Oh, no. Joe doesn't need any one to 'get' him into trouble. He comes by it naturally. You remember how it was with Marie?"
Hoss cocked his head. The gesture was comparable to him pulling back the trigger of a gun. "Now don't you go bad-mouthin' mama, Adam."
He held his hands up in a gesture of peace. "I'm not. I assure you." Adam paused. "We knew Marie, what, all of six years?"
The big man's lips pursed as he counted it up. "Pert near."
"And in that time how many times did she get trouble?"
Hoss' frown deepened. "I don't rightly remember her gettin' into no trouble."
Adam's dark brows winged heavenward. "No? What about that wild buggy ride that nearly killed her just after Pa brought her to the Ponderosa?"
Hoss shoved his hands into his pockets. A sure sign he was growing uneasy. "Now, Adam, she couldn't help it none if the horse done got spooked."
"The horse Pa told her not to use? The one that wasn't ready for the harness?" He paused, thinking. "And what about the time Marie defied Pa and rode into Winnemucca's village because she wanted an Indian rug to hang over the stair rail and almost ended up being given to one of the chief's sons?"
The big man chuckled. "It sure was funny to see old Winnemucca's braves turn tale and run after they brought her back." Hoss' smile died and he sighed. "I miss her somethin' fierce, Adam."
The black-haired man nodded. He missed her too. But it was Little Joe who missed her the most of all, and mostly because he knew her the least of all. Joe had no memories of his own. Only theirs. He might have suckled at Marie's breast and known the beat of her heart, but he knew very little of her.
Which could prove dangerous.
"All I am saying is that Little Joe gets caught up in the moment. He...leaps without looking, so to speak, and that leads to trouble."
Hoss was nodding. "And when he gets in trouble, he's too dang stubborn to admit he needs help, and so he just digs himself in even deeper."
Adam couldn't help it. His lips twitched with a smile. "Exactly."
Hoss was gazing south. Adam wondered if he knew more about where Little Joe was than he was telling him. "You really think them two is trouble? Ab and Val?"
He hesitated.
"Adam, speak your mind."
He did it with a little shrug. "They're from the South."
Hoss looked stunned. Then he rolled his eyes. "Adam, I thought we agreed we weren't gonna take no sides. I thought we put all that behind us when that sorry son-of-a-snake Frederick Kyle rode out of town last month."
He nodded. "So did I." Adam's gaze went to the south-east, beyond their father's lands and past the New Mexico territory, through Texas and on into the southern states. "But I'm not so sure Little Joe has."
"Have you two had words again?"
It was Adam's turn to grimace. Had they had 'words'?
He'd never told his father or his middle brother, but that day he'd been ready to ride off and leave the Ponderosa behind had been just about the worst in his life. He and Little Joe had sparred that day – to his everlasting shame – before the corpse of Frederick Kyle's wife had had time to grow cold. It was bad, but that wouldn't have been enough to make him leave. He and Joe had gotten into it later in the barn as they stabled their horses. Joe had taken his 'Northerner's' opinion of the South and southerners as a personal slight against his southern-born mother, Marie. Joe's attack had been instant and actually rather well-thought out, dragging up old pain and reopening scars he had long thought healed. In retaliation he had said things to Joe about Marie, things about where she came from and her...dubious beginnings... Things he would regret until his dying day. That's what he'd meant when he'd told his Pa, 'Things can't be the same between us. There's no other way.'
Adam snorted.Good old Pa, he'd made another way.
But the rift was still there.
Oh, he and Joe pretended it wasn't. And they were good at it – pretending. They worked together. They even played together. They sat together at the table and in the church pew, but they weren't...together.
Maybe they never would be again.
"You're awful quiet, Adam," Hoss said softly.
He sniffed and ran a finger under his nose and then turned back to Sport. "Damned changeable weather. Think I'm catching a cold."
Hoss wasn't fooled, of course, but he pretended he was.
That's what brothers did.
"You think I oughta go lookin' for baby brother?" the big man asked.
Baby brother. Little Joe would turn nineteen in about a month's time. He'd matured a lot in the last year, since the whole thing with Julia Bulette and Amy Bishop's death. Joseph Francis Cartwright was an intelligent, intuitive, incorrigible, incredible bundle of anger and joy mixed with a thousand other contradictions that stood poised on the brink of manhood.
There was only one problem with the brink – one nudge the wrong way and a man went over the edge.
"Nah," he said as he settled into the saddle. "I'm heading out anyway. I'll see if I can find him. I think Jake assigned Ab and Val to one of the mining crews. I'll head over that way and see if I can find them. Sad to say, Little Joe's probably with them."
Hoss caught hold of Sport's reins and held him back. "You think them two are fillin' Joe's head with that there rebel nonsense, 'cause of his mama bein' from the South. Don't you?"
Their Pa had never said, but it was pretty likely the de Marigny's had slaves. Living in Louisiana, it would have been unusual if they hadn't. He'd been too young when Marie was alive to consider asking her about it. He wondered now if she would have believed owning another human being was acceptable.
Could her son?
"Adam, I think I better go with you," Hoss said, his tone concerned. "You're thinkin' too much for your own good. You're gonna fall off of that horse or hit your head on a low-lyin' branch or somethin'."
The black-haired man forced a smile. "No. I'll go. Little Joe and I need to...clear the air about a few things. Maybe this will give us the chance."
Hoss was silent a moment, then he asked, "Adam, what happened between you two that day after you went for each other? What was it made you think you and Little Joe couldn't live under the same roof?"
It humbled him still to think it had been Joe who had offered the olive branch to him – after all that he'd said.
"I just figured there wasn't room enough for both our big heads." Adam made a kissing noise as disentangled Hoss's fingers and backed his horse away from his brother. "Pa should be home soon. Don't tell him where I've gone or why. He'll be mad enough to eat the Devil with his horns on when he realizes Joe went off without his permission. Just let him think he's out mending fences or something. Okay?"
"Sure 'nuff. You find little brother, Adam, and you haul that skinny little hiney of his back here. You hear me? Don't you let him go and give you none of his guff."
Adam crossed his heart with his fingers. "Though, if you don't mind, I think I'll haul all of him back here and not just his skinny little hiney."
"How come? It's the only thing Pa needs to take to the woodshed," Hoss said with a wink.
Poor Joe, Adam thought as he let his horse take the lead.
So much for being grown-up.
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So much for being grown-up.
Little Joe Cartwright felt as green as spring grass. Laughter followed him to the river as he ran to it and dunked his head, surfacing and spluttering as the icy cold water ran from his spiraling curls into his eyes and nose. It had been all he could think of to do.
That, or he could've laid on the ground and puked his guts out.
It had all started out innocently enough. Ab and Val were good guys in spite of what his stone-cold blue-blooded Yankee brother thought. They knew Adam wanted to fire them and they'd all had a good laugh as Val described Adam's face when Jake said he couldn't. If it had stopped at that he would have been fine, but it didn't. Ab, who was the older twin by about ten minutes, had gone on about New England women and feeling the frost down south and Val had joined right in makin' references to Adam's mother and how she must of thawed at least once.
Now, that didn't set right with him. After all, he and Adam had nearly come to blows after Adam said, well, what he said about his mother.
Val, who was closer to his age by that ten minutes, seemed to get a sense that they'd gone too far and that was when he pulled out a bottle of coffin varnish and passed it around and, well, bein' a man, he couldn't rightly turn it down as it went round and round.
And then the world started goin' round and round.
And he ended up at the river.
It was gettin' dark and the sun was setting. It must have been nigh onto seven and he was gonna get it good for missin' supper when he got home. Unless Pa was still away. Adam would lecture him, but he wouldn't really care.
Of course, there was Hop Sing to consider. When it came to missin' a meal, Pa paled in comparison.
A shadow fell across him as Joe looked up through the fringe of sodden brown curls that dangled in front of his eyes. It took him a second to recognize Ab. Bein' twins, Ab and Val looked just alike. Both had long, lean faces and a scrub of beard his pa would have tanned his hide for not shaving. Both had pale blue eyes and sandy eyebrows and hair the color of a buckskin in winter. Sitting in the middle of both brothers' faces was a boney nose that flared at the end. But it was there the similarities ended. Val always had an easy way about him and a ready smile.
Ab near always looked like he was sizing you up and considering whether or not to shoot you.
"Seems like Val was wrong," Ab droned in that lazy southern way of his. "General Lee don't need no sissy boy what can't hold his liquor in his ranks. Then again – seein' as how you've had it so easy – them Yankees would fill you so full of holes the first time you stepped on a battlefield, it'd come leakin' out right soon enough."
He was thinking about it. Going with them to defend his mama's home and way of life.
Or he had been.
"You take that back," Joe growled between chattering teeth.
"Or what, sissy boy?" Ab snorted as he lifted the near-empty bottle to his lips and took a deep drink. "You gonna do somethin' about it?"
He might be chilled to the bone, but he was also steaming. Here, he'd thought these men were his friends. But now they were...well... Joe drew a deep breath and held it against his rising anger.
They were drunk as a skunk just like he was and probably had no idea what they were saying.
"Leave him alone, Ab," he heard Val remark. "Don't say somethin' you'll regret later."
Ab stared down at him for several heartbeats. Then his face broke into a smile. "You oughta see your face, Cartwright!" the blond snorted as he reached out a hand to help him up.
Once he had a head building, it was nearly impossible to blow it off. Still, he tried. Joe drew several more deep breaths and reached out – only to have Ab take his hand and shove him backwards so he ended butt-down in the water.
"Didn't that college-educated brother of yours ever tell you the first rule of war is that its based on deception?" Ab laughed. "Never let your enemy know what you're thinkin'.'
"I didn't think I was your enemy!" Joe countered sharply.
Ab sneered as he lifted the bottle to his lips. "You ain't signed up yet."
Val was pushing past his brother. "Here, Joe, let me give you a hand," he said.
Ab stopped him. "Leave him be, little brother. Cartwright's got some thinkin' to do." The older twin pinned him his pale, cold eyes. "We leave day after tomorrow for Virginia. You need to decide if you're comin' with us or not – if you are a true son of the South or not – or if livin' among all them Yankees has made you soft as a snake's underbelly and good for nothin' but some blue coat wipin' his feet clean on you." The blond paused and then asked, "You ever killed anyone, boy?"
'I could kill you now', Joe thought.
"Sure I have," he snarled and then instantly felt guilty for feeling proud of it.
Ab was looking at him, but it seemed he was also looking through him to some distant place. "The fields will run red with Yankee blood, Joe. It's the only way. Those northerners want to destroy our way of life – the life your mama loved. We have to keep it safe. It's a sacred trust." The pale man's eyes sought him out. "You think about that, Cartwright. You think about your mama."
"Ab, come on." Val was pulling at his brother. "Come on. You're drunk as a peach orchard sow ."
Ab stumbled a bit as he gave in to his brother. He went a few paces and then turned back and saluted. Joe began to right himself as the two brothers headed for their horses. Ab mounted and so did Val just as he cleared the muddy bank and headed for them. Then, Ab did something he hadn't expected.
He pulled his gun and shot it off, sending Cochise flying toward the Ponderosa.
"Nothin' like a nice long walk to give a man time to think," Ab said as he and Val rode away and his voice receded into the growing darkness. "Johnny Reb will be here waitin' for you tomorrow, Cartwright, if you got the balls to put on the gray."
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Ben Cartwright stood in the doorway of his elegant timber home watching as his middle boy slowly walked an elegant golden brown horse in circles around the yard. She was favoring her left foreleg after a mishap where she bolted and took her rider into a fence. The mare couldn't really be blamed. There had been a disagreement about a bet that had been placed on how quickly Charlie could break her. One of the hands had become angry and drawn his gun. It had gone off unexpectedly. Needless to say that man was no longer employed on the Ponderosa, and the rest of them had been severely reprimanded after being reminded that no gambling was permitted on the Ponderosa.
Leaving the porch, the older man approached his son and asked, "How's she doing?"
Hoss' face lit with a brilliant smile. "She's just about happy as a fly in a current pie, Pa. That leg of hers is gonna be fine in a day or two."
"Let's hope the same can be said for Charlie," he said with a wry smile. Their hand had broken his leg when he went flying into the fence.
"I sure hope so, Pa," his son replied, sobering. "I sure wouldn't want to have to put Charlie down." A moment later, the smile returned. "Then again, maybe he's just buckin' for a cushy job."
This time he laughed out loud. Charlie was one of their best wranglers and bronco riders. Getting him to take a 'cushy' job would be tantamount to getting Little Joe out of bed in the morning without a battle royale.
Joseph...
Ben looked at the stable and then to the path leading up to the house.
"Hoss, where exactly are your brothers?"
Hoss had bent down and was checking the mare's leg. He didn't look at him. "Little Joe was out mendin' fences last I heard. Adam was headed to town. He said he'd stop by and tell Joe it was time to head home."
The rancher eyed the setting sun. "And how long ago was this?"
Still, his son didn't move. "I ain't right sure, Pa. Four, maybe five o'clock."
"Hoss, put the mare's leg down and look at me."
Ben watched his giant of a son grimace and then do as he was told. Hoss wiped his hands on his brown pants as he came toward him.
"Yes, sir?"
"What aren't you telling me?"
From the time he'd been a little boy, Hoss had always made faces. Sometimes they were comical. At other times, heart-wrenching. The one he favored him with now was somewhere in-between.
"Well, Pa, it's like this, there ain't really anythin' to tell. Little Joe weren't home yet and Adam went to fetch him." Those mountain spring clear blue eyes met his. "If you remember right, Pa, you told Little Joe that south fence needed mendin'. Adam figured he'd gone out there and..."
Ben's dark eyebrow peaked. "Figured?"
Hoss gulped. "Yes, sir."
"Did your brother go out to mend fences or not? Surely he told you before he left."
"Well, that's the problem, Pa. Didn't neither one of us see him go off. Little Joe just sort of – go'd, if you know what I mean."
Yes, he knew what he meant. Joseph had some burr under his saddle and he'd flown off the handle yet again.
What was he going to do with that boy?
Ben corrected himself. Joseph was almost nineteen.
Young man.
"You ain't sore, are you, Pa?" Hoss asked, sounding and looking like that cherubic-faced little boy he remembered so well.
Ben glanced at the sun. It wasn't quite set yet. There was still time for both of his sons to make a late supper. He shook his head.
"No, I'm not. At least not yet."
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He was finding out that it was a mighty long way back to the Ponderosa on foot.
Joe wasn't sure exactly how far he and the Lathams had been out from the ranch when they parted. Seven, maybe eight miles at most he guessed. On a bright sunny day he could have done it in two, maybe three hours, but it wasn't sunny, it was night and black as pitch and he had to watch every step he took since his steps were, well, less than straight. He'd flown out of the yard in a hurry without eating, anxious to be on his way before Hoss or Adam could ask him where he was going. He didn't lie. Well, he didn't like to lie and really didn't do it much. He just made it a habit of kind of not telling the whole truth when it suited his purposes.
Like when he was meeting up with a couple of men who were trying to talk him into signing up to fight for Frederick Kyle's grand 'Cause'.
The whole thing with Kyle had left him confused. The man had seemed genuine enough. Even with how it ended, Joe found it hard to fault a man for standing up for somethin' he believed in so strongly. While they'd been together, wooing the mine owners, he and Fred – that's what Kyle said to call him – had time to talk. Fred explained that what northerners said wasn't true. The war wasn't about slavery. It was about the threat to a way of life that was centuries old. There wouldn't be a United States without the South, he'd told him. After all, it was a southern state – Virginia – that had first proposed independence.
How could her cause be wrong now?
As Joe plodded along, ruminating, he was seized with a sudden desire to escape it all. He was so torn up inside he didn't know what to do. He loved his family. He loved the life he led. He didn't want to be anywhere else.
But.
But there was somethin' in him that called him to the place his mama had called 'home'. The people in Virginia City, they liked to call him names. Kids mostly, but sometimes the grown-ups did it too. 'Course, the only time they did it was when they thought he couldn't hear. He couldn't count the number of times he'd gotten into a fight over some hurtful word hurled his way like a knife meant to cut deep. Pa always said words couldn't hurt you. That you had to be a man and grow strong enough they bounced right off of you. But Pa was a Yankee too. He was like Adam in some ways; like a great granite boulder that nothing could touch. He wished he was more like his pa.
It was Pa always told him he was like his mama.
Joe halted in place as he felt a drop of moisture hit his nose. He looked up at the sky and saw a change coming. A bank of black clouds had moved in and it looked like they were going to have one of those cold late September rains.
"Great. Just great," he sighed. "So much for God looking out for drunks and fools."
A he pulled the collar of his coat up more tightly about his throat, Joe looked around. There wasn't much either way. A small pile of rocks to his left with a bit of an overhang about three feet off the ground offered the best possibility of shelter.
Sniffling – and shuffling – the weary young man left the road. Dropping to his knees, he squeezed his thin frame into the opening and was asleep before he knew it.
So fast, in fact, that he missed the brown bay that went riding past not five minutes later with his oldest brother on its back.