4
"Hoss you can't leave."
"I've got to."
"No."
"It's his dyin' wish."
"He's not dying."
"You don't know that." Hoss spat at him, his voice low.
"Neither does he." Adam bit back. "He's afraid for Joe. He's out of his mind with fever and pain. We could tell him that Joe is in the next room knitting a sweater and he'd believe us."
"Adam…" Hoss said, his voice low with an angry, unspoken warning.
"Hoss, if you leave, whether you find Joe or not, he'll wake up, find you gone and start begging me to go out after you and Joe! What happens then? Who does he wake up and beg then?"
"What if Joe is in trouble?"
"We're all in trouble." Adam said. "We're in deep trouble, and splitting up has never been the wise option. And I seem to remember that less than 24 hours ago you were telling me I was the wise one in the family."
"Boys…"
Both Adam and Hoss dropped their chins to their chests, the conversation dying as quickly as it had begun. Adam sat on the bedside and picked up his cup, turning and sliding his hand under Ben's head. "Drink more of this, Pa."
Ben lifted his head a little on his own and drank from the cup, draining what was left of Adam's tea slowly. Adam could feel the heat radiating through the thick white hair on his father's head. "We need cold water, or snow. A cloth." He said and he heard Hoss grunt, then leave the room.
"You're...disobeying me, Adam."
Adam brushed the stray hairs back from Ben's forehead.
"Yes, sir. I am."
"Why?"
"Because you would do the same, if a man mad with fever insisted that you go out into the snow on foot and hunt down a man on horseback."
"You..know...your brother is on horseback."
"No." Adam admitted. "I'm hoping."
"That's...some comfort...for a dying man." Ben said.
"Cold comfort. And you aren't dying."
"I'm...too tired to argue...Adam." Ben said. His hand rose and his palm met the back of Adam's hand. He held his eldest son's to his chest and closed his eyes. "You…look after them. Be fair...kind...loving. Encourage your brothers...to marry. They both...they both need it."
Adam's eyes began to burn and he bared his teeth when he asked. "What do I need? Do I need marriage? Do I need someone to be loving and kind and fair?"
Ben sighed. "I don't...mean to put so much..on you."
Adam opened his mouth and took in a breath, then closed it. "Is that what it's like?"
"What?"
"Being our pa? Bearing the responsibility of always being fair, always being kind, always being loving. Worrying after our futures. Repairing our pasts. And on top of that you're Ben Cartwright, THE Ben Cartwright. Town council member, rancher, timber baron, with the political and financial clout to free unfortunates from bondage and tear down corruption where 'ere it stands. No wonder you had three sons. One of us alone could never live up to that!"
His father was smiling at him, softly. He would have been chuckling if his ribs would have allowed it.
"That Ben Cartwright." Adam said, "Doesn't get taken down by a rock rolling down a hill."
"Adam!"
Adam got to his feet and his father let his hand go. The eldest Cartwright son grabbed the working rifle from where Hoss had leaned it against the wall as he dashed out into the hallway and ran for the stairs.
"Goliath...he's out by the barn. He tried gettin' into the chicken coop but I think he's hurt bad enough he can't get on his hind legs anymore."
"Get Pa's buffalo gun. I'll get the shells."
Hoss went for the gun, lowering the lever that opened the breech and holding it open for Adam. Once the cartridge was loaded, Hoss dug his hands into the box and headed for the door.
"Hoss!"
His brother ignored him, slipping out the door and into the shadows on the porch. Adam dropped the box of cartridges and grabbed another rifle, tucking shells into his pockets before he ducked into the kitchen. He stayed behind the door until he knew where Hoss was, then slipped through it and into the side yard.
He stilled his breathing and listened until he could hear the chickens, still unsettled in their coop, and then the shuffling, heavy step of Goliath. He spotted the bear on the other side of the corral, one forepaw lowering to break the ice that had formed in a watering trough, before the animal bent to drink, one side of his skull and snout still glistening with blood.
Adam felt the tea and whiskey turning in his stomach. He could feel the animal's pain from there and wanted no more part in being the cause of it. It had never been sport for him, but now it was even worse. "Why don't you go back on up to your cave, Goliath...leave us be." Adam whispered.
He heard a board creak in the barn and looked up to see Hoss standing in the hay loft door, the buffalo gun pointed down at the bear as he wandered toward the dooryard. He could see Hoss' face from there. His brother looked like he was preparing to shoot a best friend.
Adam saw the muscles in Hoss' forearm turn, gaining tension, saw his finger tightening on the trigger. Before he could fire, Goliath lay down on his belly, one leg at a time folding under him. The bear lay his head down with a grunt and Adam watched dirt fly out from in front of the animal's snout, the great chest heaving at the same rate as their father's.
Adam stood and walked out into the pale light coming from the moon. He made as much noise as he could, but the bear didn't react.
"He's dyin', Adam." Hoss called down.
How reckless, how foolish, how stupid...Adam thought. How mindless was this sudden urge to help the behemoth that had killed two of their hands, who knew how many cattle, possibly Sport, Chub and Cochise, plus two mules.
Adam got close enough to smell the sweat and blood, the foul air coming from the bear's mouth. He looked at the damage he had done, struggling to hold what was in his stomach. Hoss came up beside him, holding a lit lantern. The big man knelt on the other side of Goliath's massive head and winced at the damage.
"I don't know what did the most damage, but he's caught his head in some barbed wire, looks like." Hoss said, his fingers lightly pressing at the rolls of flesh around the bear's ears. Adam leaned in, pulling hair and flesh away from the other ear and he found rusted barbed wire there too, so tightly wrapped around the bear's neck that the wounds had healed over some of the barbs.
"Been there a while." Adam said, swiping at his face. "Is there a point to cutting it off?"
Hoss bit at the inside of his cheek. "Maybe...might make him more comfortable. And it might make him more angry."
Adam set his lips in a thin line then said, "I'm willing to try it, if you are."
Hoss nodded. "Get those wire cutters from the barn, and some gloves."
Adam left, returning with his hands full and a second lantern hanging from his pinky. He lit it off a piece of straw, then set it to the side, donning one of the pairs of gloves.
"We should do this from behind his head. That way, if he rears, we're as far from his teeth as we can get." Hoss said. "I'm gonna cut that loop...and free up the ends. It's...gonna hurt him, and it won't be pretty. But we best do it fast as we can and get out the way. Got it?"
Adam moved the lantern, then nodded. He held the folds of fur and fat lined flesh away from the barbed wire as Hoss went in with the wire cutters, struggling to get the cutting teeth around the metal. It took several cuts to be sure they had gone through it, and freeing the ends was an ugly task.
Adam counted to three, and they both pulled, unwinding the wire from around the great neck and stumbling back away from the bear as they did. Goliath got to his feet, tossing his head back and roaring, backing away from the pain and swaying his head as if to fling the source of it into the heavens.
Hoss had kept hold of his end of the loop of wire. It was a barbarous, grotesque thing. Rusted and embedded as it had been, had Goliath been a man he would have been dead from infection or tetanus or both. Hoss stood with Adam in the yard watching the bear turn and limp into the woods. They heard him thrashing through the underbrush and watched the trunks of the trees tremble as he passed them. Hoss carried the loop of wire into the barn and set it on the forge, leaving it there.
Adam went to check on the chicken coop then stood at the head of the road, studying the mix of tracks.
"I'm gonna go get that water...sit with Pa." Hoss said quietly.
Adam nodded without turning and stood at the head of the road, waiting.