"First off I want to say I love you, son. But my god, I wanna slap you so hard you'll need the human equivalent of a horse revive." Dutch paced around the small area of Arthurs tent like a caged lion. Poised and tense in equal measure. "going to Saint-Denis to trade yourself? By that logic I should do the same. My bounty is twice what yours is!"
"Dutch, no." Arthur said immediately, sitting up on his bed.
"You hypocrite! You can't expect to... we can't lose you, son. You're worth more than all the money in blackwater." He said it for a bit of levity but it seemed to really hit home for Arthur. He turned his head and blinked away tears, pursing his lips to hide the tremble.
"I'm, I'm sorry Dutch. I just thought it would have been better for everyone to have the money. Especially since I thought I was dying. I thought it'd be enough to give everyone a decent chance at a new start. I saw it as something I could leave for you all. A way to keep you safe."
"The government prints new bills every day, Arthur. But YOU," he broke off hiding tears of his own and Arthur refused to look. "Son, if it turned out you had TB, I still wouldn't let you go through with that." His voice quivering at the thought."Knowing that you died that way, at the end of a rope, alone. I can't imagine, I don't want to imagine. Arthur... You're my boy."
"I'm sorry Dutch." Arthur hung his head and lay back down. Dutch felt like shit. Guilting Arthur wasn't what he wanted. He wanted him safe, he wanted him happy. But all the pressure he'd been putting on Arthurs young shoulders was taking its toll. Arthur carried the weight of the world, or at least their little corner of it. Arthur was the pin that held the entire camp together, the central key point they all pivoted around.
"I... have been a terrible father," Dutch admitted. "I have managed to raise you into believing you are expendable and you are not." Dutch breathed deeply "A new start at the cost of your life would drive me mad, I'd jump off a cliff."
The sincerity in Dutches words left no room for denial, Arthur didn't even try.
"You are loved far more than you know." Silence filled the tent and Dutch and Arthur still refused to look at each other. Dutch pretended not to see Arthur wipe his face.
"John met your nun accomplice in Valintine." Dutch continued, raising his tone to something a bit more friendly. "She told him about your little plan." Dutch laughed without humor. He finally sat down on the empty chair beside the cot. He felt heavy, drained and tired. "He gave it back." Dutch whispered, half to himself.
Arthur turned to look at him, perplexed.
"The nun, she gave the bar of gold to John and he gave it back." Dutch's eyes were soft as he spoke, a ghost of a smile as he looked out through the gap of the tent entrance. "He held five hundred in gold and gave it away because he wanted his brother to know he was worth more."
Dutch finally turned to face Arthur. "I certainly didn't teach him that but I wish I had."
"You're not mad at him?" Arthur asked tentatively.
"Under the circumstances? He absolutely did the right thing." Dutch huffed a bit. "And in doing that, he proved to be a stronger man than I. I who have led my children to believe their worth is dictated by the government. An arbitrary amount Uncle Sam is willing to bribe others to apprehend them for." Dutch's voice twisted in destain as he spoke, shaking his head sadly. "I promise Arthur, I will make this up to you. Tho to be honest, I will probably fail... Since Micha left, I've become more aware of my own flaws. And how I treat you is a big one. I don't have the right to ask Arthur, but will you give me a chance to make things right?"
"Of course Dutch, always."
Dutch smiled fondly.
Someone outside the tent cleared their throat and both men turned to see John peaking through. "Sorry to interrupt, I'll go.-"
"No," Dutch said hastily, I've been here a while and I'm sure Arthur is sick of me."
"I'm fine Dutch." Arthur assured.
"No, I think you boys need a moment to talk things through yourselves. I'll check in on you later Arthur." Dutch promised. As he passed John he made sure to clap a firm hand on his shoulder, a show of strength and approval.
"How ya feeling?" John asked sitting in the chair Dutch had just vacated.
"Fine, much better." He answered honestly.
"I'm glad." John said... and Arthur was mortified to see him pull out a familiar folded scrap of paper. The page he had given to the nun. He wanted to dig a hole and bury himself.
Ignoring Arthurs childishness, John began to read. "John, It occurs to me I never officially forgave you for running away. Nor did I explain why it was so difficult for me to welcome you back. Tho to you it may seem my anger was unfounded, I have only myself to blame for misleading you. Now that I am dying I have no reason to keep the truth form you. I had a son." Johns' voice broke around the word but he cleared it with a stiff cough before continuing.
"I admit, at first it was a frightening notion to be the father of a kid. Someone who would be permanently stained as the bastard son of an outlaw. I had condemned an innocent and it would always be my responsibility for whatever misfortune fell on him due to his association with me. I felt guilty long before he was born. But the moment I saw him I fell impossibly in love. He was my child. Blue eyed boy we named Isaac, he was so small. Tiny little fingernails and soft fuzzy little head. I would destroy the world a dozen times over to save my boy form any law or gang that threatened him."
"I had spoken to Dutch and Hosea at length for ways to keep them safe. Should they come travel with us or would it be safer for me to leave them alone entirely? Perhaps it would have been but I was selfish, and cutting all ties was impossible for me. In the months since Isaac's birth, I grew to need to see them. A need as important as air. I also would not allow them to join us, as I feared it would be more dangerous to travel with a bunch of hucksters. So, with Dutche's permission, I had a house built just for them. Every month I would come back with food supplies and more money. Whatever they needed."
"For the first time since riding with Dutch and Hosea, I began to dream of settling down. Start a ranch. Rase horses and teach my son to shoot tin cans off the picket fence. I began to dream of a home. But I realized this all too late."
"One day I rode home and found two crosses out back. John, it broke me in ways I haven't been able to heal from. I lost the most important thing in my life and there was no way of ever getting it back. And when you disappeared for that year, I saw you walk away from everything, everything I had stolen from me. The lives I still mourn for to this day. I find it difficult to put into words how angry I became with you. YOU had EVERYTHING, and you walked away."
"John, I love you. You are my brother in every way that matters. But don't make the same mistake I did. Value what you have now because it is not permanent. The reason I have been so angry with you is because I am afraid you will one day wake up to find you have destroyed the greatest thing you have ever had. I am afraid you will live with the same pain I do. And I would not wish that on anyone. It has come to define the very pits of hell for me. As I simply can not imagine a greater pain on any plain of existence."
John sighed, wiping tears from his eyes as he stared at the floor. Arthur sniffed, not even caring he was openly crying. An old wound, lanced. Splayed open in ways it hadn't in over a decade.
Time had not eased this wound. It still felt like it did the day he found their graves.
"Arthur," John said gently, refolding the letter. His voice cracking again. "I need you to look at me."
After a moment of panting breaths, struggling to steady himself, Arthur turned to face John. His brother's eyes puffy and red, his mouth pinched tight and tears streamed down his face. "Arthur." He repeated, tho this time it was whispered. "I need you to understand something, something I've never be able to get you to understand before. You need to look at me and not look away as I speak ok?"
Arthur could only manage a nod.
"Arthur, you are not alone. You are my brother and best friend. Don't lock me out of your life by keeping these secrets anymore. Micah, the TB... your son!" his face contorted with raw pain as it became physically difficult to speak. "I am your family as much as you are mine! I love you, Arthur. Don't push me away anymore. You said in your letter, it is how you define hell... " John gasped "You've been living this hell in silence for YEARS." John leaned forward and grasped Arthur in a tight embrace. "I can't imagine what I'd do if I ever lost Jack, he's become so important. I don't even know how to express it and I keep messing it up... but Arthur, I'm a father too, I don't want to imagine what losing him would feel like but I know I'd be devastated." He gasped as a suppressed cry got caught in his chest.
"And now to learn our family should have been bigger, that I should have had someone calling me 'Uncle John' all this time. God Arthur, I'm so sorry." His voice growing soft as it choked off again. "You don't have to go through this all alone, Arthur. Let me in... you're not alone."
Arthur hickuped and sobbed into his brother, pulling him tightly as the love from his brother began to wash his festering wound. Tho it didn't heal him, it couldn't close a wound so great, the scars would always exist... It did make him feel permission to grieve in ways that broke open his soul and allowed for the promise of recovery.
He cried until he was physically spent, the fabric beneath him wet with tears. Tired and limp, still not completely recovered from his sickness, he saged against John. Eyes already closed and his breathing gradually evening out. "I miss them so much, John." he whispered, and John could do nothing except hold him tighter. They stayed there till he finally fell asleep.
When he woke, the sun was shining and John was asleep in the chair next to his bed. Arthur couldn't help a fond smile play across his face. Perhaps Dutch was right, he had no idea of just how much he was loved.