IN THE SHADOW OF DEATH
CHAPTER 21
Early on Monday morning, Jess found Slim in the barn and asked him to hitch up the wagon for him.
"You going into town again?" Slim asked.
"Yeah. Dan wasn't in his office when I was there last week. I told his housekeeper I'd come back today."
Without another word, Slim went into the corral to fetch the horses and the harness. He kept himself busy hitching up the wagon, studiously avoiding any conversation with Jess. He couldn't tell him what Higgins had said and he couldn't lie to him. It was better to say nothing.
It was hard for Jess not to notice Slim's evasiveness. His partner wouldn't even look at him. He'd suspected all along that the doctor said something to Slim that Slim didn't want to talk about ever since their walk to the gate and back the other night.
When the wagon was ready, Jess climbed into the driver's seat without breaking the unnatural silence except to say, "I'll go get Mike at school and let him ride back with me. Tell Daisy to make us something good for lunch. We'll be hungry."
Slim nodded and watched, frowning, as his partner drove down the road to Laramie. There was nothing good to hope for from Jess' trip into town but if Higgins told Jess the truth about his condition and about the possible treatment available in Colorado Springs, at least they could talk openly about things again.
Jess made good time and made his first stop Hanson's shop to ask about the pump. It still hadn't come in but Hanson said it might arrive in the cargo delivery coming in later that day.
Jess turned Traveler over to the livery stable and walked down to Doc Higgins' office. Dan was waiting for him.
"Jess!" he said, welcoming him in. "Mrs. Howard told me you'd be coming by today - but I don't remember giving you permission to ride into town."
"You didn't." He grinned a little but his eyes were serious. "I got tired of stayin' in one place."
"Yes, I know how that is, but still, you should be more careful."
"Would that make a difference?" Jess asked sardonically as he took off his jacket and gun belt and hung them on the coat rack.
The doctor didn't answer the question. "Sit down, Jess, and take off your shirt while I wash my hands."
A few minutes later, Higgins started cutting away the old bandage around Jess' wound. When it was removed, he took his stethoscope and listened very intently to his patient's heartbeat and breathing. He made encouraging noises for Jess to hear but his face was grim. He knew he was listening to the internal sounds of a dying body. After he was finished, he examined the wound itself. It was healing externally, leaving an ugly scar, but that wasn't the problem.
He rewrapped the bandage, then asked Jess, "You're still having a problem with breathing, aren't you? And the pain is still bad?"
"Yeah, sometimes. It gets worse at night when I lie down. And since the weather has changed, I can start coughin' out of the blue. Mostly when I go from a warm place to a cold one - or the other way around. One night I woke up and felt like I was suffocatin'." He let Dan help him back into his shirt. "What did you hear with that trumpet of yours?"
"Why do you ask?"
"Cut it out, Dan. I know something's wrong with me."
Higgins turned away and went to take a seat behind his desk. Despite his remarkable medical skills, the doctor with the thinning hair and bright, kind eyes looked a little lost in his massive leather chair. He started fiddling with his fountain pen.
"Has Slim talked to you?" he asked.
"About what?" Jess' eyes narrowed. "Did he came to see you?"
"No. Not directly. We ran into each other when he was in town the other day."
"Well, at least he didn't lie about that. But that ain't the all of it. He wouldn't talk to me about it. Why not?"
"Because I asked him not to."
"Why couldn't you just tell me? It's about me, right?"
"Yes."
"Well, spit it out!" Dan's reticence was irritating him. "If you want to tell me I probably won't get well, just get on with it! You think I don't know what's goin' on?" He jerked his thumb at his chest. "I've known it for a long time! Is that what you can't tell me? Well, I done it for you! It ain't enough my partner can't talk to me. My doctor can't either!"
"Are you done?"
Jess threw his head back and closed his eyes. He needed a minute to calm down. He tried to take a deep breath but couldn't. Finally, he lowered his head, stared at the floor and said, "Sorry." He ran his thumb over his forehead. "You saved my life. I don't have the right to talk to you like that."
"It's all right," Dan said sympathetically. "But before we go on, I want you to do me a favor. Don't blame Slim. I'm sure it wasn't easy for him."
"Yeah. I noticed."
"It's my doing. I made him promise not to say anything to you. He insisted he wouldn't lie to you."
"He didn't. I didn't give him the chance. But I knew…. I knew something was botherin' him. And I knew what it was." He looked up. "What did you tell him?"
"That…," Dan was finding it hard to be open with Jess. It hurt him as a doctor and he was also Jess' friend.
"It looks bad," Jess said, helping him even if it was his life they were talking about it. "Is that what you're tryin' to tell me?"
The doctor nodded almost imperceptibly. "Yes," he said softly. "Yes, Jess. I'm sorry."
Jess' throat tightened and he swallowed hard, his jaw clenching. Under the dressing, the wound was burning like fire.
"How bad is it?"
"It's very serious." The doctor was still having trouble looking him in the eye.
"That sounds like…." Now that he could finally talk with his doctor, he found it hard to put his own dark thoughts into words. "I'm goin' to die, right?"
"Don't talk like that!"
"Damn it! How am I supposed to talk?"
Dan shook his head. His own throat was dry and swollen. He couldn't find the words to say. He hadn't expected this to be so hard. It would be a lot easier if he didn't know his patient so well. He made a great effort to raise his head and meet Jess' eyes.
Jess stared at him, waiting for him to say something but Dan just looked at him, compassion and sorrow filling his eyes. It was Jess who finally looked down. All of a sudden, he felt miserable. The realization hit him that it was his life they were talking about, not someone else's.
There was an enormous difference between the idea of dying and the certainty of it. At that moment Jess knew how much he valued his life - even if he sometimes handled it carelessly.
"How much longer?" he asked quietly. His voice was hoarse, nearly inaudible.
"That...that might depend on you," came the answer, just as quietly.
"On me!" Jess exploded. "You better explain that! Don't tell me I got a chance if I just try hard enough! I've tried for three months! You kept tellin' me to fight like hell and now you're tellin' me it was all for nothing!"
"Hold on there!" Dan said, finding his voice again. "Do you understand what I'm talking about here?"
"My death sentence! What else? Sorry you don't like what I have to say about it but maybe I'm talkin' so much because you ain't! Go ahead! Explain it to me! Tell me all about dyin'!"
"You sound like you want to die! You haven't even asked me about the possibility of…"
He hesitated too long for Jess. "Alright, I'll do you a favor and ask! What're you talkin' about?"
"You're impossible, you know."
"How do you expect me to be? Happy that I'm goin' to cough myself to death? That's what's goin' to happen. Right?"
When Dan had talked to Slim about this, he hadn't experienced what now felt like an insurmountable reluctance to tell things like they were, but with Jess in front of him, he had to make a determined effort to fulfill his duty as a doctor and educate his patient about his fate.
"If you stay here," he said slowly, "yes. That is what will happen sooner or later."
"What do you mean, 'if I stay here'"?
"You ought to have a different climate."
"A different climate? Like where?"
"The Southwest would be the best. New Mexico or Arizona. It's especially warm and dry there."
"And dusty."
"You wouldn't be herding cows, Jess."
"Oh, yeah? But what if I got bit by a Gila monster? You ain't thought of that, have you?"
"This isn't a joke. You need to listen to what I'm saying."
"I heard you. You think goin' down there might help."
"It might."
"Or it might not."
"There's no more than a fifty percent chance - at most."
"Then you can forget it. I'm not goin' a thousand miles away from home to die in the desert. I'd rather stay here."
"If you stay here, you won't survive the winter. That's what you need to understand."
"I understand."
"I don't think you do. You have a chronic inflammatory lung condition. It can't heal because it's beneath the scar tissue from the bullet wound. Any small infection - a sniffle, a cold - will turn into pneumonia almost at once. You won't survive that. Do you want that to happen?"
"Do I have a choice?"
"You could at least try. After all, a slim chance is better than none."
"You think I could survive the thousand mile trip to Arizona? It ain't likely."
Dan didn't answer. He didn't think he could survive a two hundred mile trip.
Jess understood his silence. "Until you come up with something better, I'd just as soon wait it out here."
"I won't let you!"
"How're you goin' to stop me? You can't make me go somewhere I might never get to. I want to stay at home."
"You must get away from this weather. Winter is coming…"
"And I my number is about up."
"Good Heavens, Jess. You're still acting like you want it to be."
"Sure. I'm in hurry to bite the dust after three months of fightin' to get back on my feet! It would've been a lot better to throw in the towel in the first place." He ran his hand over his hair and down the back of his head, then stared at Dan for a long moment without really seeing him. He was exhausted. Finally, he blinked as if he was waking up. He tried to take a deep breath. "Sorry, Dan," he said, his voice quieter. "Instead of arguin' with you about this, I'd need to do some thinkin' about what you've said. Or at least act like I am."
Higgins gave him a searching look, his face full of compassion. "I understand. I don't how I would have reacted in your situation. Probably a lot worse."
"That ain't much comfort." Jess' mouth crooked in a sideways smile that only made the sadness in his eyes seem more intense. "I was pretty sure what you were goin' to tell me when I came in here. I didn't think it would hit me like this."
"It's a hard thing to deal with."
"Is there anything I can do if I don't go to Arizona besides twiddle my thumbs and wait?" Despite his efforts to calm down, there was an angry undertone in his voice.
"There is another possibility, but it has a lower chance of success than going to the Southwest."
"How much lower?"
"It's impossible to be exact. Thirty, twenty percent perhaps."
"That's not very good odds."
"No, but it's still better a better bet than staying here."
"I have to leave Laramie?"
"Yes. But you don't have to go so far away."
"Where?"
"Colorado Springs."
"Why is that any better than here?"
"Two reasons. The climate is drier there in the winter. It's bitterly cold with lots of snow but the air is very dry and very clean."
"What's the second reason?" His dark brows drew together suspiciously, feeling like his doctor was trying to get rid of him.
"I have an old friend there, Jonathan Tyler. He's a doctor, a specialist in lung diseases with years of experience. He's lectured in all the major cities in the East and in Europe. Two or three years ago he opened a treatment center, a sanatorium of sorts, in Colorado Springs. He has wealthy clients who come to him for rest cures but his primary interest is in the miners in the area who suffer from many different kinds of lung disease."
"A sanatorium?"
"Yes."
"A hospital for consumptives," Jess said uneasily.
"Don't get all huffy again! Hear me out!"
"Sorry. Keep on goin'. I'm all ears."
"You're not taking this seriously."
"I take everything seriously at this point."
The doctor took a deep breath of his own and continued. "As I was saying, he's established a sanatorium and had already achieved some notable success. If anyone can help you, it's him. He dealt with serious injuries on the battlefields during the Civil War and then went abroad to study with the best doctors in the Germany and France. He would probably have done a more elegant job on the bullet wound you sustained. Who knows? You might not have had the problem you're having now if he had been your surgeon."
Jess looked at him with a crooked smile. "You did good enough, Doc."
"Thank you." A fleeting smile of his own underlined the doctor's gratitude for this recognition. Jess sometimes had a gruff way of expressing his appreciation but Dan knew he was always sincere.
"In any case," he continued, "I contacted him about you some time ago. He's given me some good advice on your treatment."
"How come you're just now tellin' me about this?"
"I didn't want to worry you or give you inaccurate information. Neither Tyler nor I wanted to jump to conclusions. Your condition is too serious. I had to wait to see how things developed with you so I could give Jonathan a reasonably correct picture."
"So what did he say? That he can't do anything either?"
"He didn't say that. He said he would like to try. Jess, he is really a most capable specialist. I don't have the knowledge or expertise to improve your condition in any way. The only thing I can do for you now is put a bottle of laudanum in your hand so you can numb the pain and know as little as possible about what's going on. Is that what you want?"
"You know I hate that stuff."
"Exactly! It doesn't heal anything. You must realize that it's a miracle you're still alive. Don't throw that miracle away by failing to seize this opportunity."
"I got to think about it first."
"Don't think too long. You don't have much time."
"Damn it! I got to take as much time as I need to think things through and do the right thing! I got to talk to Slim about it - even if he didn't talk to me. And then there's Mike...I mean...I...I got to think about it."
"You can think about it, Jess, but you really don't have much choice. Listen, I don't want to lose a good friend - not this way. You need to decide as soon as possible. You need to decide to go to Colorado Springs."
"How long would I have to be there?"
"It's hard to know."
"A couple of weeks?"
"More like several months. You most likely need to stay over the winter. There must be time for the inflammation to heal completely or there's no point in going."
"For months? I can't do that, Dan. We got a ranch to run. I can't leave Slim with all that work!"
"You're not being realistic. You're not able to help him now. And if you don't go, you'll never be able to help him."
"You already said the odds are against me. Why should I go to all that trouble for nothin'? And how much is it going to cost? You ain't told me anything about that yet."
"No, I haven't. But the cost is no reason not to take this opportunity."
"For you maybe. How much do you think I got in the bank? Not enough for a months-long stay at this sanatorium I probably won't come back from."
"Don't you understand if you don't go you're going to be lying in your grave?" Dan was brutal. Jess seemed to have forgotten how serious his illness was.
"Goin' to Colorado Springs might not change that."
"Why isn't your health not worth the risk and the sacrifice? I always thought you didn't belong to those people who give up because it's the easiest thing to do. And I thought you wanted to be healthy again - not just for own sake but for the sake of the people who are important to you - especially Mike. And now, a fighter like you throws in the towel when difficulties arise. If you don't care about disappointing me, so be it. You're not accountable to me. Do what you want, but remember, others will be disappointed. Mike most of all. Didn't you promise him you'd try anything and everything to get well?
Dan had played his ace in the hole - Mike. Jess' lips tightened to a thin, straight line. "You know how to get to me, don't you?" he said, his voice a low rumble.
"I had no other choice."
Jess stared at the floor like he was staring at the door to hell. "I wish I'd never opened my eyes after that bullet hit. It would've been easier on him. But now… How's he goin' to understand this, Dan?"
"You'll know what to say to him - and Mike can sort it out for himself when you talk to him. Maybe he already understands more than you give him credit for."
"Is there any other way?"
"I wish it were different." He paused a moment to let that sink in, then said, "I need to know your decision about Colorado Springs as soon as possible so I can notify Jonathan."
"You think this is a done deal, don't you?"
"Isn't it?"
"Maybe for you and your doctor friend, but not for me. I can't see much difference between dyin' here or in some hospital except that it'll be faster here. But if I go, Mike won't have to see it. Maybe that'll make it easier for him."
"Now listen, Jess, even if your chances are low it still makes sense for you to go."
"This reminds me of Russian roulette - one bullet, gun to your head, pull the trigger six times. Maybe I should play. It don't sound like such a bad way of passin' the time."
"You think that's a solution?"
"Why not? Not the worse way to go - faster and less painful. I'd make sure I hit the right spot."
"That's nonsense."
"Not really."
"I've always thought of you as a very sensible person. Don't change my opinion now."
"Who knows what pain can make a person do?" I ain't goin' to drown in a laudanum dope dream. I'd rather stay in my right mind."
"Right now you're talking as if you've already lost the fight."
"If I had, I wouldn't be sitting here talking to you about all this. But you ought to know…. I don't wear a gun for decoration - and I won't let anybody take away my right to use it if I decide to."
"You're scaring me, Jess!"
"If you knew how serious I am, you'd really get scared." Jess sat up straighter in the chair. "Forget it, Dan. I'm just thinkin' out loud. Don't worry about it."
"Jess," the doctor said gently, "let me make something clear. I don't want you to go to Colorado Springs to never come back. I want you to go there to get well again."
Jess looked down again. "It would be easier if it weren't for Mike."
"You must not forget the promise you made to him and have fought so hard - and successfully - to keep. You can't give up now, otherwise, you've not only lost the battle at the very end but you've failed to keep your word."
"I'm not sure I got the strength to keep on fightin'. It's gettin' harder - probably because there's no point in it."
"It's never pointless to resist the urge to give up, whether the tide turns negative or positive. I thought you knew that - that it was your outlook on life. Could I really have been so wrong about you? You're no greenhorn. How many times has your resistance won the day, even when things looked hopeless? And you, of all people, tell me you have no strength left because of your current physical weakness? The power for the fight doesn't come from your body but," he tapped his forehead, "from the mind. You just told me how much you value a clear mind. Now is the time to use it."
"Dadgum it, it ain't fair for you to use my own words against me," Jess complained.
A knowing smile crossed Dan's face and his bright eyes rested with benevolent affection and approval on the young man sitting opposite him. Jess had just confirmed in his nonchalant way that he was the fighter the doctor thought he was. "I think you'll make the right decision," he said.
Jess didn't have an answer for that. "Well," he said, hitting the arm of his chair with his fist and getting up, "thanks for tellin' me like it is. I'll think about it."
"Don't wait too long, Jess," Dan said, rising also.
"Anything else I need to do in the meantime?"
"No, nothing you don't already know. Make sure you get enough sleep - and let Daisy spoil you. Avoid poorly ventilated rooms and large crowds of people. But you're doing that anyway."
"Yeah. I've never lived a healthier life, and I've never felt worse."
Dan walked with Jess down the long hallway that led to his waiting room. At the front door, he shook hands with him and said, "I expect an answer soon, Jess."
A wistful, sweet smile flickered across Jess' face. "Thanks, Doc. I'll see you soon," he said and left the office.
The doctor thoughtfully watched him walk away before he closed the door and went to his study where he sat down at his desk and conscientiously wrote the notes of his examination of Jess. More than ever he wished that the medical records he was working on had another name on them, preferably the name of someone he didn't know.
After Jess left Dan's office, he walked toward Laramie's main street. He felt unsettled, almost dazed by the doctor's assessment of his condition and by the advice to go to Colorado Springs for treatment. The future seemed very dark. Jess was sure of only one thing. He was determined to make sure that Mike's future would be secure no matter what happened.
John Wentridge's law office was tucked between the cafe and the general store. Jess made straight for it. Wentridge had helped Jess get guardianship of Mike when the boy first came to the ranch. He would know what needed to be done. Jess spent half an hour talking with him about Mike's legal and financial future. When he left, he felt as if one burden had been lifted from his shoulders. He and Slim would need to come back and sign the papers securing Mike's rights to Jess' portion of the ranch and legalizing Slim's guardianship of the boy should anything happened to him, but Jess was still faced with making the gut wrenching decision to leave home for a very uncertain future of his own.
Jess pulled his hat low over his forehead and headed for Mort Corey's office. Maybe talking to him would help him to see things more clearly.
"Jess!" Mort shouted when he saw him come through the door. "Come on in! You're lucky to have caught me. I was about to go on rounds, then go get some lunch."
"Is this a bad time?"
"No! Not at all! I don't think the town's going to be robbed if I wait a while. I'd rather stay in here where it's warm and talk to you."
"You sure I'm not botherin' you?"
"You know I'm always glad to see you." Mort dropped into his comfortable swivel chair behind his desk. "You look pretty rough."
"I guess I am." Jess took off his hat and sat down, then leaned back and stared up at the ceiling. "You need to paint your office again."
Mort glanced up but then took a sharp look at Jess and frowned. "You didn't come by here just to tell me that."
"No." Jess was talking to the ceiling.
"What's going on, Jess? This isn't like you."
Jess dropped his head and looked intently at Mort, his eyes hard, then made a pretense of a smile. "I guess I ain't so good at pretendin' right now."
"You went to talk to Doc Higgins, didn't you?"
"What makes you think that?"
"Just a feeling I had."
Jess turned his head away for a moment as if he were listening to something, then he turned back to face Mort, his eyes narrowed suspiciously. "That sounds like you already know about it. Do you?"
Mort avoided Jess' piercing blue eyes. "Slim told me about it when he came by last week."
"So everybody knew but me. Have I got that right?"
"Now hold on, Jess. Slim ran into Dan on the street. After he heard what Dan had to say, he had to talk to somebody. He was pretty torn up about it - and Dan made him promise not to say anything to you. You can't blame him - or Doc Higgins."
"So now everybody in town is lookin' at me and wonderin' how I feel about dyin'."
"You got that wrong, boy. Do you really think Slim or me, or Doc, would spread that kind of news around? You know us better than that."
"Yeah," Jess admitted reluctantly, "I guess I do."
"Slim had to talk to somebody who he knew wouldn't run his mouth about what Doc told him. So he came to me." Mort looked long and hard at Jess, waiting for his response but when Jess just kept staring grimly at the floor, Mort added gently, "Just like you've come to me. That's why you're here, isn't it?"
Jess finally looked up at Mort. "Yeah, I guess so," he said slowly. "But you already know everything…"
"I doubt that I know everything. Even if I did, you can still talk to me about it. Maybe it would make you feel better."
"Maybe I don't want to talk about it." He stared down at the floor again. "Or if I can… You ever been told you got no chance?"
Mort's mouth tightened and he frowned, trying to think of what he could say. It had been easier to talk to Slim but Jess was right here in front of him, outwardly comfortably slouched in the chair next to the desk but underneath as tense as fence wire. Finally, Mort sighed and said, "No."
"Then it'd be hard for you to understand how I feel."
"You might be right about that."
Jess nodded. After a while, he said, "I've known… or guessed… all along...since the first time I could think about things again. But today… I felt like I'd been punched in the gut when Dan told me." He stopped for a long minute, then said, "Dan told me I should go down to Colorado Springs to see a friend of his… a doctor. He's some kind of expert on lung diseases. The odds are still against me and I would have to stay all winter… Damn it, Mort!" he suddenly snapped. "The more I talk about it, the worst I feel."
"That's easy to understand. I'd be surprised if you felt any other way." Mort couldn't catch Jess' eye - the younger man wouldn't look at him. "What will you do?" he asked gently.
"I don't know." Jess ran his thumb nervously back and forth along the arm of the chair. "Find some peace and quiet - somewhere I can think about everything."
"What do you need to think about?"
"You got to be kiddin'!"
"No, not that I know of. You don't need to think about this Jess."
Now Jess glanced up at him, frowning fiercely. "What'd you mean?"
"You've been given an opportunity - a chance. You need to take it."
"I won't come back from that place! Unless it's in a wooden box!"
"That's nonsense, Jess. You're talking like you've already given up. It doesn't sound like you."
Jess slapped the arm of his chair. "What'd you mean it's not like me? How come I got to be different from everybody else?" he asked angrily.
"Because you are. You're the one who never gives up when everybody else does. Now, when it's about you - when it's for your own sake - you want to throw in the towel."
"You sound like Dan."
"If both of us are saying it, maybe we're right. You better think about that. I always thought you had enough common sense to deal with facts without ducking them."
"Yeah," Jess growled, "Dan thought he had to talk sense into me, too, but what neither one of you understands is I ain't thinkin' about my future - I'm thinkin' about my funeral! I used to think dyin' would be fine with me. But now it ain't fine! I'm not as brave as you all seem to think I am. I'm scared…" He stopped, trying to take a deep breath, then dropped his head, embarrassed by his outburst, "...or maybe I just talk too much…"
"We all get scared, Jess. That's nothing to be ashamed of."
Jess lifted his head and looked at him. "I guess you're right," he said quietly, "but it's not death itself that scares me. I've seen too much of that."
Mort nodded. "I know," he said, glad that Jess seemed calmer. "So what is it?"
Jess paused to take another breath, then let it out. "At first, I was afraid for Mike. But I just talked to John Wentridge and he's drawin' up all the legal papers to make sure he'll be OK. I feel like I got that settled and that he'll be alright. What I'm scared of now is just wastin' away. That's worse that dyin' - dyin' quick, I mean."
"Who says you're going to die? Aren't you getting ahead of yourself?"
"Have you taken a good look at me? And you should've seen Dan's face after he examined me! All his medical talk's gonna give me worse nightmares than I already got."
"Why do I have this feeling you're thinking about a way to solve this problem that has nothing to do with Colorado Springs?"
Jess looked at him, his eyes harder than before.
Mort didn't back off. "If it's what I think it is, it really isn't like you."
"What're you talkin' about?" Jess asked, staring unblinkingly at Mort, his voice toneless and very quiet.
"Come on, Jess. You know what I'm talking about. But I can't believe you would turn that thing…," he nodded at the gun on Jess' thigh, "against yourself. Damn it! I hope not!"
Jess looked down at the Colt and brushed his hand over the walnut leather handle of the pistol. With a flick of his fingers, he pulled the gun out of the holster and aimed it toward the ceiling.
"What do you think you're doing?" Mort said evenly. "Showing me you can do it - or that you're planning to do it?"
"It's a dangerous thing," Jess said, focusing on the gun before he lowered it to rub it against the hairline at his temple. "It can take down anything if you know how to use it."
"Would you quit scratching yourself with that thing?"
"Why? Am I makin' you nervous?" The blue-grey barrel wandered around his forehead a few times as if he were caressing himself with the gun. Then, with a jerk, he yanked the Colt down. "Don't worry," he said, whirling the pistol around on his finger before slipping it back into its holster, "I'm not ready to do anything - but that don't mean I won't, if the time comes."
"You're scaring me, Jess."
"Don't worry," Jess said again. "I won't do it in front of you - or anybody else."
"I am worried, boy. I'm worried about you. When I look at you right now, I see somebody I don't know."
"I didn't think you scared that easy."
"It's not just you I'm worrying about. How about Mike? What will it do to him if you take the easy way out? And Slim? And Daisy? You got to fight this thing with everything you got, Jess. You're thinking too much about dying and not enough about how to keep on living. I know you want to live. Or am I just fooling myself?"
Jess waited a long time to respond, drawing invisible patterns on his forehead with an outstretched finger as he thought about what Mort said.
"You ain't been fooled," he said at last, surprising Mort with a soft but clear answer. He lifted his head and dropped his hand from his face. "I'll think about it. I just don't know if I can do it. I want to take that easy way out - but then I hate myself for even thinkin' about it." His dark brows crinkled in confusion as he looked at Mort. "I even get scared of myself - like I don't know myself any more than you do."
"I can understand after all you've been through."
"That ain't an excuse."
"No. It's a reason. You don't need to make any excuses."
"I wouldn't if I didn't feel so useless."
"Where did you get that idea?"
"It ain't an idea. It's a fact. I get out of breath if I move around and I get bored if I just sit around. Even coming to town feels like it's too much."
"Those sound like pretty good reasons to go to Colorado Springs."
"I don't think I can make it there."
"You have to try, Jess! Nobody thought you'd get this far. Not even me. You can't quit now. Come next Fourth of July we'll be laughing about this."
"I'd like to be able to laugh."
"You'll be the one laughing the loudest."
"I'd like that."
"I know things look bad right now. You've had a hard time and you've got some more hard times ahead of you. But that Texas stubbornness of yours will get you through this. Next July we'll drink each other under the table and have ourselves the worst hangovers in the Territory the next day."
"I wish I was as sure about that as you are. The only kind of celebration I can think of is my own funeral."
"Are you sure you're not making the decision to go to Colorado Springs because you're feeling a mite sorry for yourself?"
"Maybe. I know I ain't thinkin' straight right now…," he flashed a wry grin at Mort, "...but talkin' to you has helped. I need to talk to Slim and see what he says, then I'll decide what I'm goin' to do."
Mort nodded and his weathered face softened in a smile. "You'll do the right thing. You always do." Then he slapped the top of his desk and said, "I'm getting hungry. Are you going to eat in town today?"
"No," Jess said, following Mort's lead. "I'm goin' to pick Mike up at school and we'll go on home. I'll let him do the drivin'." When he got up, he his hand involuntarily pressed against the wound. "Dan did a good job of examinin' me today," he joked.
"Clem will drive you home if you'll let him."
"No, thanks. Mike can handle the horses now. He'll get us there."
"Well then, I'll walk out with you. Where're you heading?"
"Over to Hanson's. The new pump we ordered should be there by now."
"Since I'm supposed to be making rounds anyway, I'll go over there with you. I've been sitting at that desk all morning, writing reports. You know, this job is eighty percent paperwork, ten percent patrols, five percent locking up drunks. No more than the last five percent is real police work."
Jess grinned and reached for his jacket. "Now you see why I didn't take you up on your idea of bein' a lawman. Me and all that paperwork don't get along." He pulled on his jacket, still grinning but the smile didn't reach his eyes. "Slim won't let me anywhere near the account books."
Mort laughed and slapped Jess affectionately on the back. "I think you say that just to get out of doing it."
When they got to Hanson's Hardware, they found out the cargo wagon had come but the pump wasn't on it. Only a few tools and a box of horseshoe castings that Slim had ordered last week had been delivered.
"All these castin's mean Slim's goin' to give Pierce some competition - unless Kellington's got the bright idea we ought to take on all the ironwork, too."
"From what I hear," Mort said, "the company wants to cut back on the number of runs this winter."
"That's what we're hopin' for. And not just for the winter. We're thinkin' about reworkin' the franchise anyway. We got enough to keep us busy with the ranch."
"Slim told me you all have been talking about buying that land down near the river."
"Yeah. We're thinkin' about it. Maybe this spring."
Mort was glad to hear Jess talking about the future but all he said to him was, "I'm glad things are going well for you two."
"We aren't where we want to be yet but right now, we're just happy to be debt free."
"You've earned it."
"It's been worth it." Jess unwrapped the reins from the hitching rack and with some effort, climbed into the seat of the wagon. "I better get on over to the school. Mike'll be waitin'."
"When are you coming to town again?"
"Pretty soon, I guess. John Wentridge has some papers he wants me and Slim to sign about Mike."
"See you soon then." Mort lifted his hand in farewell as Jess drove off.
Jess drove over to the school and got there just as the doors opened. Mike came running out, shouting with joy as he raced toward the wagon.
END OF CHAPTER 21