Sandy's Chance
By Badgergater
Summary: A small ficlet for the Season 2 episode Dark Trail: July 1st has come and gone, and Slim is starting to worry. Part of my Porch Series
x -x
Slim Sherman knew that Jess Harper could take care of himself.
After all, the Texas-born cowboy had been on his own since age 15. He'd served in the war and spent the five years after on the drift, fending for himself in some pretty rough territory and even rougher company. Jess was as good with a gun as anyone Slim had ever seen, and he was as trail savvy as any man the rancher had ever ridden with. But as the last days of June ticked by and there was no sign of Jess Harper returning from the horse-buying trip to Colorado, Slim grew more and more worried.
The first of July came and went, and still his hired hand hadn't returned.
Jess had ridden out with a pocketful of cash, $500 of Slim's hard-earned money, on a trip south to buy stock. The tall man didn't for a moment imagine that his hired hand might have taken the cash and absconded with it, because the rancher knew with an absolute certainty that Jess Harper would never do such a thing.
Yet, at the same time he knew all too well that there were a lot of dangerous miles, and dangerous men, between Laramie and Sam Bradford's Colorado ranch. The trail crossed long lonely stretches where a man could be ambushed for the money he carried on his way south, and for the horses he trailed north on his way home.
They'd known there were risks in the deal, Slim more concerned about them than was Jess, as was his nature, but this had been too good of an opportunity to let get away. It was a much-needed chance to turn a good profit by buying horses at a low price and selling them at a higher one, income the always cash-strapped Sherman Ranch desperately needed to survive.
And a chance for Jess, the not-so-long ago drifter who still had a yearning for the big open, to get away from the ranch routine for a few days and satisfy that underlying wanderlust.
But one thing Slim knew with certainty- Jess had definitely intended to be home by July first.
And that was yesterday.
He shouldn't worry. So Jess hadn't made it back in time to get the delivery bonus, but they'd still make a profit, and a good one, on the deal. And a delay when traveling that far with a string of horses wasn't all that unexpected; a whole slew of common place, ordinary things could have gone wrong, delaying the cowboy's return. Maybe it took a bit more dickering to make the deal with Bradford. An extra few days to round up good stock. A detour to a longer route due to Indian trouble. Maybe a river had flooded, and Jess had been forced to wait until the high water subsided. Bad weather might just have muddied up the trail, making slow going. Jess was as good a horseman as Slim knew; he'd be sure to take good care of the stock and bring the animals back in prime condition, so maybe they'd needed a day to rest and graze. Maybe… there were a hundred maybes, all logical and normal occurrences.
Still, as Slim sat alone that evening on the front porch of the ranch house, sipping his coffee and watching the shifting colors of sunset, he couldn't brush aside his growing concerns. He suddenly very much missed Jonesy's presence and the old man's intuitive assessment of the circumstances. It would have helped to have someone to talk the situation over with, someone with a whole lot more life experience than he had, especially when it concerned Jess, who was drawn to trouble like a duck to water.
There was nothing he could do about things at the moment, though, Slim decided. He'd give it another day, and then it might be time to start making inquiries. Maybe ride into Laramie and talk to the sheriff, send a telegram down to Colorado, or make a trip south, if there was no news.
Still worried, the tall man took the coffee cup back inside, rinsed it, set it in the dish pan, and strolled toward the bedroom, acutely aware of how quiet and empty the ranch house seemed.
He slept restlessly that night.
x -x
Morning dawned cool and fresh, and Slim rose early as he always did, the optimism he normally felt at the start of a shiny new day marred by the uneasiness that had settled its heavy weight on his shoulders. He set right to work, diving into the day's long list of chores before pausing for breakfast. He had the teams ready before the early stage pulled in and was glad to have Mose to talk to over a mid-morning cup of coffee. Funny, how a man got used to having company around the house all the time, making the place seem like a home, not just a shelter from the whims of the Wyoming weather.
As soon as the stage rolled out of the yard, Slim saddled up his stout chestnut horse and headed out to check fences. He felt uncomfortable leaving the place standing empty all day, considering how many people travelled along the Laramie road these days, far too many of them with less than honest intentions. Still, fences were too important a chore to let slide, and a job he and Jess together were hard pressed to keep up with.
And dang near impossible to hogtie working all by himself.
Slim sighed. Nothing at all would get done if he stayed at home worrying.
Once again as he rode and worked his thoughts turned to wondering about Jess' whereabouts.
It was late in the afternoon by the time he loped Alamo over the hill and down toward the ranch yard. To his delight he spotted a bunch of unfamiliar horses dozing in the corral alongside a familiar chunky bay, and there was smoke drifting lazily upward from the house's chimney.
The wanderer was home. Slim sighed with relief as he pulled his horse to a halt in front of the barn and began stripping the gear from the animal. Before he was done he heard the kitchen door open and familiar footsteps cross the yard.
"I was beginnin' to think you'd gone off to Denver chasin' women or somethin'," Slim suggested, grinning at the dark-haired cowboy who had joined him beside the corral.
"Now that would have been a lot more fun than what I did do, gettin' shot at an' chased across half the state of Colorado by a bunch of no-good horse thieves," Jess groused.
Slim paused in his work and looked Jess over carefully, pleased to see no fresh bullet holes. "Well, it appears you, and those horses, managed to get here in one piece."
"It wasn't easy, I'll tell you that."
Slim ignored the snappish remark and, his horse cared for, looked over the stock Jess had brought. "Nice lookin' horses."
"Yup. Good mounts all around, despite the rough trip they had. Even without the bonus, we'll still make a tidy profit on 'em."
Slim slapped his friend on the shoulder and grinned. "That we will, pard."
Over their evening meal, Jess told the story of his adventures. Slim could read his pard's disappointment over missing the bonus, but something else seemed to be troubling him, too. Obviously, there was more to the story and sooner or later, when he was ready, Jess would tell him the rest.
Slim would just have to be patient.
x -x
When supper was done, the two men moved out to the small front porch. They sat in companionable silence, their booted feet propped up on the railing, Jess with his chair rocked back to rest against the side of the house. He was chewing on a toothpick and wearing a frown that finally prompted Slim to ask, "So you want to talk about the rest, about what's botherin' you?"
"Ain't nothin' botherin' me."
"Suuuure. You can convince me of that about as easy as you can convince me that the sun's gonna rise in the west tomorrow mornin'."
Jess looked over at the tall man. "What makes you think I didn't tell you somethin'?"
"That look on your face. I've seen it before."
"Reckon you have." Jess let a grin play across his lips and shrugged, reminding himself that he should never play poker against Slim because the tall man had learned to read him like a book. Then the grin vanished and his voice lowered as he added, "I told you about Sandy savin' my hide from those horse thieves."
"Yeah."
"And that he didn't make it."
Slim nodded.
"There was a whole lot more to it." Jess leaned forward, letting his chair thump down on its two front legs, resting his elbows on his knees. "I tried to help him, Slim, I really did try."
"I believe it."
"I gave him a chance, more than one, to make things right."
Slim could hear the regret, and even more the confusion, in Jess' deep voice. "That's all you could do."
"Was it?"
Slim nodded, suddenly understanding. "It was. But you think you failed him somehow."
"Yeah." Jess tossed the toothpick in the dirt, frustrated. "Sandy kept sayin' he'd never had any breaks in life but I offered him one, a real one, a shot at making things right with the law an' goin' straight. He even had that girl willin' to wait for him, right there to back him up. He had a real chance to make his life better." Jess shook his head in consternation. "But it wasn't enough. After I took him to the doc, an' then let him ride with me, he still skulled me and stole the horses."
He threw an apologetic look over at Slim. "I guess I didn't get it right."
"You think it's your fault he turned down your help?"
Jess stared at the ground, clenching his restless hands into fists, then finally added, softly, lifting his gaze to stare away into the darkness, "I wanted to do for him what you done for me…"
"All I ever did, Jess, was offer you a chance," Slim reminded him.
Jess disagreed. "You did more."
"More? Like what?"
"You did a whole bunch more," Jess paused, struggling to find a way to put his feelings into words, then finally gave up with an uncomfortable shrug. "I guess I don't know how to say what it was, just, it was what I needed. An' whatever it was, I didn't do it for Sandy."
The tall man swung his feet down from the railing, dropping them to the porch floor, and leaned forward to sit shoulder to shoulder with his pard, elbows on his knees, making eye contact.
"Jess, that's where you're dead wrong. You gave Sandy a real break. From what you said about him, you offered him the kind of thing he said he was looking for, and that's all you or anyone could do, provide him with a chance. The failure wasn't yours, it was his, in not takin' up your offer. Maybe he wasn't ready to make a fresh start, maybe he would never have been; maybe it wasn't in him to turn his life around and accept what you were offerin' to him. Some men can't; some men never will. Some men, a lotta men, just aren't strong enough."
"You convinced me to change," the cowboy insisted.
"No, Jess, it wasn't me or what I did, it was you. You convinced yourself to give it a try. And that's the difference. It wasn't me helpin' you so much as it was you bein' ready to latch onto the good life. You just needed someone to point it out to you, to offer you the opportunity, and you grabbed onto it and wouldn't let go. See, Sandy Kale was no Jess Harper, and I mean that in the best possible way."
The tall man got stiffly to his feet. "Now, I gotta turn in or I'm gonna fall asleep in this chair. We got a lot of work to do in the mornin'. You comin'?"
Jess shook his head. "Not just yet. I guess I got me some thinkin' to do."
"Well, don't think too much, pard," the tall man answered lightly. "It'll just make your head hurt."
With a yawn, Slim opened the door and stepped into the house, leaving Jess on the porch, thankful for the good friend he'd been lucky enough to find.
- the End -
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