Before joining up with Chris and the other's Nathan's income had been
sporadic at best with his patients paying when they could with what they
could. More often than not repayment had come in the form of food, or
clothes, or mending, and if he happened to mention that he had need of
something in particular it usually found its way to him. He appreciated
these things as the honest expressions of gratitude that they were, just as
he appreciated the fact that able to "pay" or no, people needed doctoring
from time to time.
Which, luckily enough, wasn't so different from Yosemite's view on the subject .
Having lived nearly the whole of his life on the frontier the burly businessman knew the value of any Doctor/Healer who cured more often than he killed, as few who hadn't lived such a life as his ever could. And he wasn't a stupid man, not by any measure, though you didn't have to be the next Edison to realize that if Doctors were in short supply out west, so, for a certain and large group of people, was ready cash.
Seeing the advantages that could give him and knowing Nathan needed a place to set up shop, he'd gone to the young Healer about using the space above the stables as a clinic with a fully profitable plan already worked out.
One which Nathan, whose options had been anything but abundant, had readily accepted.
All of which explained why Buck found him kneeling in a stall, his calm and even tones soothing an irate chestnut mare as he carefully rewrapped her leg in bandages.
"How she doin'? , "He was careful to keep his own voice down, he knew the mare and knew she still had trouble around men. And no wonder with the condition she'd been in when Yosemite (who had a soft spot for most animals, but especially for horses) had bought her off the son of a bitch rancher who'd, apparently, raised her.
"Better.," Nathan murmers, and with his back turned he misses the tightening of Buck's feature's at the word. The lanky man realizes Nathan's wording has nothing to do with the conversation he'd just ended at the jail house, but five minutes is hardly enough for his temper to cool. He takes a deep breath and reminds himself that having a temper tantrum all over Nate isn't gonna clear a damn thing up.," She'll be even better as soon as this leg heals. Still doen't like most men, but she's warming to Yosemite a bit."
"That's good.," He means it. No one, man, woman, child, or beast, should have to go through what this horse has faced.
Finishing with the mare he rises to his feet, moves to a stall further away from the door and a dun gelding who immediately lays his ears flat against his head. Ignoring the animal's blatant hostility he proceeds to rub his hands down its legs and over it's back and belly. Talking as he does so over his shoulder to Buck. ,"Chris still up with Ezra?"
Picking up the medical tome he'd seen Nathan reading over the last week or so, he thumbed through the pages, absently skimming over random passages, "Nope came down hours ago."
"He come down mad?"
Reaching a detailed illustration he cringes away from it and quickly flips ahead, "Not as mad as when he went in. And he hasn't gone after Maude's hide yet."
"Heard he tried to earlier."
Unable to stop himself he snorts, "Hell no, that was just ole Chris makin' his presence known.," He's not lying. If Inez was tellin' it right Chris hadn't even begun to tear into the woman when J.D. and, indirectly, Ezra'd interrupted.
Still in that calm, soothing voice of his Nathan asks, "Is that what you call bullying a woman, a mother, whose son is lying in a sick-bed, a giant hole in his stomach, and nothin' but luck keepin' him alive?"
It always comes to this with Nathan, no matter how hard you tried to avoid it. Usually it's Ezra on the receiving end, but he himself hasn't been blind to the duller barbs sent his way, masked behind the groups own tilted sense of humor. He supposed it came from all those years of being worked and abused, of being owned and considered worth less than he could be sold for, whatever the reason you could always find Nate sticking up for whoever he thought was being victimized or taken advantage of. Or, as Ezra had once put it during one memorably inebriated incident, standing upon his tower of righteousness, pointing fingers and looking down on those less pristine than his own saintly self. And maybe that wasn't particularly fair, but it was particularly accurate, which was the only reason he could still remember it.
After all, Ez wasn't the only one who was inebriated that night.
It doesn't take much to get Nathan up on that tower either, as he's just demonstrated, and Buck guesses from that high up it must be pretty hard to see your own faults and mistakes. Still, he doesn't answer with as much force as he might have," It's what I call force-feeding' all the bullshit that woman's tried to spew all over us from the begining back down her own throat. I don't know 'bout you, but I hope she chokes on it."
Just then the gelding turns, trying to clamp his jaws on Nathan's shoulder. The Healer merely dodges the attempt and calmly asks, "There's a tin in my bag, says "Horse Salve", can you get it for me?"
He sets the book on the railing of the nearest stall and rummages through the black medical bag sitting on a nearby chair until he finds the tin. Not wanting to spook the dun, he walks back to the stall and hands the tin to Nathan.
Busy applying the medicine to the horse's saddle-sores Nathan still isn't looking at him when he speaks," He told her to leave."
"Josiah can help her pack."
"She's his mama."
Now he gives his temper rein, though not enough for it to runaway with," She's supposed to be his ma, just like you're supposed to be his friend."
Nathan turns and blinks at him with a look of such utter disbelief that Buck finds himself floundering, if for no more than a handful of seconds. He knows he's the first to say it, knows because he's been waiting for someone to say it for nearly a year. He didn't mean to say it, not in that moment, but he doesn't regret it. Why else was he here? Why else would Chris have sent Vin to Josiah but to say the very same thing to the ex- preacher? And even if that wasn't what the Gunslinger wanted then to hell with him, he was done waiting
It was time, more than.
But Nathan doesn't waist much time being shocked or offended, he quickly pulls himself together and moves right into the offensive, "I never agreed to help him Buck. None of us did."
"You think that excuses goin behind his back and helping Maude?! You didn't have to help him, but Lord Nathan did you have to destroy him?!"
Nathan rises to his feet, forgetting the danger represented in the form of the gelding," That place didn't matter any more to him than anything else in this town and you know it."
"Oh yeah, it mattered so little to him that he never says a damn word about it, and never even mentions the fact that three of his friends sold him out!"
"I made an investment Buck, and I'm sorry if I didn't want to throw all my money away on someone with no experience, no scruples, and absolutely no reason to stay in this town."
Nathan's quiet composure does nothing for Buck's temper, which was only simmering until this moment. ," He had a reason up til then God-damn it!"
"Oh and what was that?"
"We were his Goddamn reason Nate! Six people who trusted him, and treated him as if he were their friend! Though that turned out to be worth about as much as a bag of shit!"
"What do you want me to do?," And the way it comes out makes it clear that he doesn't expect to do anything, that if he feels any guilt or responsibility at all it's well buried.
With a final certainty Buck says the one thing he can say, the one thing he's sure of these days," He'll leave. You know that, we all know that. But he doesn't have to Nate. We don't have to let him."
And then with the same finality, "He always wanted to. Why should I care now?"
At a loss Buck searches his face and sees that he means exactly what he's saying. Shaking his head he backs away and then turns to leave. Nathan's book catches his eye and he moves toward it, picks it up. He notices Nathan's place marker near the back, and something in him smiles and not in a friendly way, "Damn you're almost done, didn't Ezra get this to ya just last week? Must be good reading."
Then, tossing the book down by the medical bag he turns and leaves.
Seizing the moment the gelding trumpets and lunges, burying his teeth into Nathan's shoulder. Caught completely off guard the Healer shrieks, and once free, exits the stall with all do haste, hand pressed firmly against the wound in a reflexive attempt to stem the bleeding.
Buck never looks back.
***
Five minutes now spent in silence and Chris is ready to give the boy credit, he'd been sure he'd crack as soon as he'd come around the bend and seen him there waiting for him. Instead, giving the impression that he was totally unsurprised, the kid'd merely nodded politely and slowed his trot to a walk as Chris pulled up beside him.
And whatever he'd expected of J.D. it was nothing like the quite acceptance he heard when the he asked," Are you gonna yell?"
He wanted to, wanted to scream and rage at all of them, himself no less, but he would not because he couldn't. Raging at anyone now, when the actions he was yelling about were a year or more in the past would only serve to emphasize the fact that it took him a year or more to start yelling. Lord knew there were plenty in town, such as Inez who'd told himself and Buck and Vin the tale of the Tavern and Ezra's "friends", who'd expected him to do just that. Wanted him to do it. But he hadn't then, and wouldn't now; they were all of them grown men and he wasn't their daddy. What was more Ezra wouldn't thank him for it, which, more than anything else right now, held him back. His drawing the whole town into the raging battle that would inevitably ensue would only insure the very private Gambler's departure. Jesus, was there anyway out of this bog?,"No, I'm not going to yell."
"I wish you would. ," J.D. licks his lips, pointedly staring at the space between his horses ears, his so young, so open face showing every thing he's feeling, "Yell, I mean. It'd make this easier at any rate."
He thinks of Ezra, and how for so long the man fielded every barbed comment, every thinly veiled insult in such a way that they seemed as much apart of him as his wardrobe and his vocabulary, thinks of never realizing the extent of such things until he'd started paying closer attention to the interaction between Ezra and the three who'd sold him out. He'd been so sure in those first few days after talking with Inez that Ezra would leave, and couldn't have blamed the man for doing so had he tried.
But, though he drew further into himself and away from them, the gambler stayed on. Chris was as sure now, as he had been then, that he wouldn't have stayed if driving him outta town hadn't been Maude's intention all along.
He supposes he should thank her for that and someday he might.
Still, as Ezra drew away from them, managing to seem as if he were doing anything but, Chris had started seeing the casual cruelties dealt him everyday as he hadn't been able, or maybe, allowed, to see them before. People who didn't know the man to speak to never hesitated to drag his character through the gutter, and losing the Tavern had only made it that much worse.
What made him, and he supposed the others if they were seeing what he saw, even more terribly certain that Ezra would leave, and sooner rather than later, was that while he rarely, if ever, let his mask of urbane charm and civility slip, he was not for one moment unaware of what people thought of him.
And how they didn't think it of Vin, though after Eli Joe's little stunt more than a few of them knew damn well the law had more than a casual interest in him.
How they didn't think it of Buck who spent his every waking moment trying to seduce their wives and daughters.
Or Josiah, an ex-preacher with a past he wouldn't talk about and was still seeking forgiveness for.
Or Nathan, whose skin color was even more hated now than before the war.
Or J.D., whose careless shot had killed a much loved member of the community, a wife, a mother.
Or even himself, a gunslinger, someone who, by definition, killed impunity and with only the slightest provocation.
He hates seeing and knowing these things, hates himself for not seeing them sooner, hates every damn person in town for doing these things, and , with every bit as much feeling, hates Ezra for letting them.
"You don't deserve easier. , "His voice his harsher than he intended, but he wouodn't take it back if he could.
Once again J.D. surprises him with a sigh and the murmured, "I know that. You don't think I do, but you're wrong."
Though weary, there is a reprimand in the younger man's voice and Chris is taken aback by it, though he resists his reaction and lets him continue unimpeded.
"I wasn't gambling just for the hell of it you know. I barely had any cash left when Ezra bought the Tavern and since it wasn't enough to give him I didn't see the harm is taking the chance. Then I won.," Now he turns to look Chris full in the face, his darker, guilt laden , gaze meeting Chris's own as few have been able to do., "And I kept winning and I thought if I won enough I'd be able to give Ezra enough so that he'd be okay even if no one else would help him. I knew 'Siah was courting Maude, and I watched Nathan go upstairs with her and then to the bank. The rest of you were so busy that you didn't have the time to think about anything but what you were dealing with, though, of course, "there's a darker sarcasm in the words than Chris would've thought the kid capable of, " Josiah had time enough to help Buck with HIS problems."
J.D.'s expression changes and he looks younger than he did the day he stepped, er jumped, of the stage, "Why do we do it to him Chris? Why don't we ever try to stop it!? We stick up for Nathan, for Vin and I know you stick up for me! Why...why?"
"Because he lets us., "It's a simple answer, an honest answer. They treat him like crap because he lets them.
"Am I the only one who sees that's Ezra's not the type who LET'S people do these things to him?! I mean, he'd never say anything because that would show that what other people say counts, but he wouldn't just stick around for it! He'd leave! He'd fleece everyone at the poker tables, and then he'd leave! He sure as hell wouldn't throw himself into every possible fight he could to PROVE that he deserves better, to try and EARN better!"
This mirrors what Maude said so closely that Chris is no less startled by it than he had been by Ezra's slip up. Responding to the silent signals of his rider Job stills beneath him and J.D.'s little mare takes several steps before he reins her in.
The younger man turns in the saddle, puzzlement written across his features, "Chris?"
For a moment there is nothing. He cannot think, cannot act, and cannot speak. Everything tumbles together in his mind and he is simply lost.
And then, like waking from a dream, he nods, once, facing J.D. with as open an expression as he is capable of mustering at this late date, "You explain any of this to Ezra?"
He shakes his dark head, and Chris thinks absently that the he needs a haircut and a good shave, "Every time I try he changes the subject, and by the time he's through with me I don't know which way's up. Chris I...I think he doesn't want to heart it because he's afraid that if he does he won't be able to stop himself from forgiving us and he doesn't want to forgive us. He...he thinks he deserves it, or at least that he should've expected it. And today when I was sittin with him he was..sad maybe, but it was more than that. He... Chris he's gonna leave. Not today or tomorrow, but soon. As soon as he can maybe."
***
Vin is unsurprised to fin Josiah unsurprised as he hoists himself onto the roof.
The bigger man says nothing, merely hands him a hammer and indicates the bucket of nails. One way or another he'd have expected one of them to join him in the repair work; they usually do if they don't have anything else to do.
Nodding his thanks he pauses only to roll up his sleeves as far as they'll go and unbutton several of the top buttons on his shirt. Were they not smack in the middle of the areas' populace and there weren't quite so many to offend he'd take the thing off. It was the middle of July and, later in the day or no, the sun was still hot enough to warrant working without a shirt. He figured he'd make do. He could gage his own stamina well enough to stop before he had a heatstroke and he'd be damned if he was gonna make a spectacle of himself like that.
Josiah's own shirt is already soaked with sweat and Vin knows well enough to assume working up here, in this kinda heat, is 'siah's own brand of repentance.
Soon enough the sound of their hammers is ringing through the air as they diligently and expertly seek out and repair the shingles damaged in the most recent of the summer storms.
Ten or fifteen minutes into their labor they see Buck, not so much storm as stalk, out of the stable back to the Jail. Once there he goes inside, slamming the door behind him.
Sometimes Buck can match Chris for brooding, Vin thinks, and it looks like this is 'bout to be one of them times.
Josiah is thinking much the same thing, though neither of them gives voice to the thought nor do they pause in their work.
'Bout forty minute after that Chris and J.D. ride into town, and ten minutes after that J.D. heads back up to the clinic, no doubt to take Billy's place. Chris goes back to his chair outside the Jailhouse, angling it in such a way that he can watch the stables, and thus the clinic, as well as the direction Mary 'n Maude should be returnin' from at the same time.
Again this is observed without a word or pause.
Finally, Josiah pauses in his work, gaze searching across the horizon.
Judging the time to be as right as it ever will be Vin breaks their silence, "It's like walkin' on eggshell ain't it 'Siah?"
He sighs, faces Vin with a weary companionship etched into his features," Worse Brother, far worse., "A pause, much like Vin himself, Josiah can appreciate not speaking until you're ready to. Then, "Do you think he'll leave?"
"I don't think he WANT'S to."
"But will he?"
"A lot of who he is takes a beatin so he can stay. He'll leave when he thinks he there ain't any other choice."
"Every time he's hurt we go through this," It sounds like a curse the way he says it, "Waiting to see if he'll live, waiting to see if he'll leave. If I've ever seen a worse mess I don't recall it."
"Yep."
"What does Chris want to know?"
Using a strip of rawhide from his pocket he ties his hair back, letting the slight breeze cool his sweat dampened neck. , "Why. How. Mostly the why of it though."
"It's not an answer, but I could point out that I never promised Ezra anything. In point of fact I encouraged him to look elsewhere for funding."
"Fair enough. It was your money and ya didn't have to give it t' anyone ya didn't want to. Still don't., " He means what he says. He's not so sure that he'd have given Ezra his money, come to that, at least not without a hell of a lot of convincin'. ," But why'd you hav't'give it to HER?"
The ex-preacher's smile is something close to mocking, but not quite there, "The affections are like lightening: you cannot tell where they will strike till they have fallen. Jean Baptiste Lacordaire. "
"I don't know about that, "but that's a lie, he thinks, remembering for a moment what he'd willing turned away from his life, and, on that count, sympathizing completely with Josiah, "But I do know she used you against our friend, and what's worse, you let her."
"A little wanton money, which burned out the bottom of his purse. Sir Thomas Moore."
"And she used it to drive Ezra outta business, and prob'ly into leaving."
"Is Ezra not a man then, capable of taking care of himself?"
Something occurs to him, that he hadn't considered before, and silently aghast he asks, "You don't much like him do you Josiah?"
If he notices that Vin's dropped the informal pronunciation of his name, and realizes all this implies, it doesn't show, "I wouldn't go nearly that far into it, brother."
"Josiah?," his voice is hard, the demand clear.
"I don't understand how a man can do the things he's done and not feel even the slightest bit of remorse, of guilt. He'd swindle a family of their last dime, using any and all means necessary to do so, and not think twice about it. He treats people, most people, as if they're nothing. I'm not going to pretend to you that I don't have difficulty with that, with him and who and what he is, but , to some extent, I surely am fond of him. I don't understand him mind, but I don't dislike him on account of it."
No, he thinks, but it makes it so much easier to stab him in the back, doesn't it 'Siah? " I thought it was a Preacher's job to help people like that."
"When they want help.," Something crosses the older man's face, something of guilt and remorse, and it doesn't take much imagination on Vin's part to figure he's thinking of the money and how he'd thrown it at Ezra when the Southerner CAME to him for help.
Remorselessly he pounces on that guilt, "What, ya want 'im to sit around weepin' fer the things he's done? To spend his days cryin' to ya, begging forgiveness? That's not remorse or repentance Josiah, that's as pure an example of selfishness as anything else you can point to. Remorse is when ya' stand up an' do something 'bout it. Repentance is moving toward a new and better life 'Siah. All of which he's been trying to do, and with precious little help from anyone around here."
Josiah sighes, picking up his hammer and reaching for a nail, "He likes being the way he is, I might even go so far as to say he DELIGHTS in it."
And Vin understands now that the difficulty of this situation is not that Josiah is trying to change Ezra without results, it's that he's NOT trying to change him. From the beginning the ex-preacher has made a point of accepting people as they are and the problem is that Ezra makes that more difficult, quite a bit more, than everyone else. If the Southerner would show even the smallest hint of remorse or guilt, then, at least, Josiah could understand him.
But Vin, who would never say as much, also understands that showing either of those things is something Ezra will never allow himself. He's seen the man with his mother, and he's seen from the beginning how he interacts with those around them, and knows beyond a doubt that whatever physical hurts he may take Ez will never willing risk any emotional hurts or vulnerability.
He doesn't have to guess the cause; it's not hard for him to see the Southerner as a kid, to empathize with the pain he'd suffered through his mother. At least when he'd lost his own Ma, young as he was, he'd known she wasn't leavin' him 'cause she wanted to, known that she'd stay if she could. Buck's own story wasn't so different, and that might explain their current stand on the whole Ezra situation. Their mothers, who were forcibly taken from them, would've given anything and everything to stay with them, yet Maude sent Ezra away and even now only seeks him out when she needs him for something. What's more, if she's nothing else, Maude's a user, a person who, once they've found it, will take the smallest of weaknesses and exploit it like you wouldn't believe.
He doesn't know how many weaknesses she found in Ezra before he pokered up, but he knows pretty damn well that once learned Ezra takes his lessons to heart.
Setting his own hammer down by the bucket of nails Vin moves to the edge of the roof, saying as he does so," Well, there's no denying the man likes money, and fancy clothes, and does take some pride in them five dollar words.," Reaching the ladder he begins his decent, "He'll do just 'bout anything to get out of WORKIN' for a livin', no denying that.," he's shouting now, and the heads of those near the church swivel curiously in his direction, but for once he doesn't care.," And maybe Maude ain't so bad as all that, I can't says as I've spent anytime with her to know. But I do know one thing," Josiah's face appears over the side and Vin forces him to meet his eyes," Men are what their mother's make them."
Releasing Josiah's gaze, he bends down and picks up his hat from where he left it behind the ladder before going up, puts it back on his head, tips it to the older man, turns on his heal and heads to the saloon. From the looks of things at the Jail he's not the only one who could use a drink.
****
Author's Note: First I'm going to repeat myself and thank everyone for taking the time to review. It is very much appreciated! Now. Okay, so maybe the horse didn't need to bite Nathan, but, at least in the Old West AU, the man drives me nuts. I was hard on him because he's hard on Ezra, maybe understandably so considering his past, but I really do think that the man enjoys walking around with his holier-than-thou attitude. I love Nate as much as I love the rest of them, I just think HE needs to learn to look beyond appearances. I think, in his own way, he's as capable of racism as any white man. And, just for the record, Josiah should be repentant.
Which, luckily enough, wasn't so different from Yosemite's view on the subject .
Having lived nearly the whole of his life on the frontier the burly businessman knew the value of any Doctor/Healer who cured more often than he killed, as few who hadn't lived such a life as his ever could. And he wasn't a stupid man, not by any measure, though you didn't have to be the next Edison to realize that if Doctors were in short supply out west, so, for a certain and large group of people, was ready cash.
Seeing the advantages that could give him and knowing Nathan needed a place to set up shop, he'd gone to the young Healer about using the space above the stables as a clinic with a fully profitable plan already worked out.
One which Nathan, whose options had been anything but abundant, had readily accepted.
All of which explained why Buck found him kneeling in a stall, his calm and even tones soothing an irate chestnut mare as he carefully rewrapped her leg in bandages.
"How she doin'? , "He was careful to keep his own voice down, he knew the mare and knew she still had trouble around men. And no wonder with the condition she'd been in when Yosemite (who had a soft spot for most animals, but especially for horses) had bought her off the son of a bitch rancher who'd, apparently, raised her.
"Better.," Nathan murmers, and with his back turned he misses the tightening of Buck's feature's at the word. The lanky man realizes Nathan's wording has nothing to do with the conversation he'd just ended at the jail house, but five minutes is hardly enough for his temper to cool. He takes a deep breath and reminds himself that having a temper tantrum all over Nate isn't gonna clear a damn thing up.," She'll be even better as soon as this leg heals. Still doen't like most men, but she's warming to Yosemite a bit."
"That's good.," He means it. No one, man, woman, child, or beast, should have to go through what this horse has faced.
Finishing with the mare he rises to his feet, moves to a stall further away from the door and a dun gelding who immediately lays his ears flat against his head. Ignoring the animal's blatant hostility he proceeds to rub his hands down its legs and over it's back and belly. Talking as he does so over his shoulder to Buck. ,"Chris still up with Ezra?"
Picking up the medical tome he'd seen Nathan reading over the last week or so, he thumbed through the pages, absently skimming over random passages, "Nope came down hours ago."
"He come down mad?"
Reaching a detailed illustration he cringes away from it and quickly flips ahead, "Not as mad as when he went in. And he hasn't gone after Maude's hide yet."
"Heard he tried to earlier."
Unable to stop himself he snorts, "Hell no, that was just ole Chris makin' his presence known.," He's not lying. If Inez was tellin' it right Chris hadn't even begun to tear into the woman when J.D. and, indirectly, Ezra'd interrupted.
Still in that calm, soothing voice of his Nathan asks, "Is that what you call bullying a woman, a mother, whose son is lying in a sick-bed, a giant hole in his stomach, and nothin' but luck keepin' him alive?"
It always comes to this with Nathan, no matter how hard you tried to avoid it. Usually it's Ezra on the receiving end, but he himself hasn't been blind to the duller barbs sent his way, masked behind the groups own tilted sense of humor. He supposed it came from all those years of being worked and abused, of being owned and considered worth less than he could be sold for, whatever the reason you could always find Nate sticking up for whoever he thought was being victimized or taken advantage of. Or, as Ezra had once put it during one memorably inebriated incident, standing upon his tower of righteousness, pointing fingers and looking down on those less pristine than his own saintly self. And maybe that wasn't particularly fair, but it was particularly accurate, which was the only reason he could still remember it.
After all, Ez wasn't the only one who was inebriated that night.
It doesn't take much to get Nathan up on that tower either, as he's just demonstrated, and Buck guesses from that high up it must be pretty hard to see your own faults and mistakes. Still, he doesn't answer with as much force as he might have," It's what I call force-feeding' all the bullshit that woman's tried to spew all over us from the begining back down her own throat. I don't know 'bout you, but I hope she chokes on it."
Just then the gelding turns, trying to clamp his jaws on Nathan's shoulder. The Healer merely dodges the attempt and calmly asks, "There's a tin in my bag, says "Horse Salve", can you get it for me?"
He sets the book on the railing of the nearest stall and rummages through the black medical bag sitting on a nearby chair until he finds the tin. Not wanting to spook the dun, he walks back to the stall and hands the tin to Nathan.
Busy applying the medicine to the horse's saddle-sores Nathan still isn't looking at him when he speaks," He told her to leave."
"Josiah can help her pack."
"She's his mama."
Now he gives his temper rein, though not enough for it to runaway with," She's supposed to be his ma, just like you're supposed to be his friend."
Nathan turns and blinks at him with a look of such utter disbelief that Buck finds himself floundering, if for no more than a handful of seconds. He knows he's the first to say it, knows because he's been waiting for someone to say it for nearly a year. He didn't mean to say it, not in that moment, but he doesn't regret it. Why else was he here? Why else would Chris have sent Vin to Josiah but to say the very same thing to the ex- preacher? And even if that wasn't what the Gunslinger wanted then to hell with him, he was done waiting
It was time, more than.
But Nathan doesn't waist much time being shocked or offended, he quickly pulls himself together and moves right into the offensive, "I never agreed to help him Buck. None of us did."
"You think that excuses goin behind his back and helping Maude?! You didn't have to help him, but Lord Nathan did you have to destroy him?!"
Nathan rises to his feet, forgetting the danger represented in the form of the gelding," That place didn't matter any more to him than anything else in this town and you know it."
"Oh yeah, it mattered so little to him that he never says a damn word about it, and never even mentions the fact that three of his friends sold him out!"
"I made an investment Buck, and I'm sorry if I didn't want to throw all my money away on someone with no experience, no scruples, and absolutely no reason to stay in this town."
Nathan's quiet composure does nothing for Buck's temper, which was only simmering until this moment. ," He had a reason up til then God-damn it!"
"Oh and what was that?"
"We were his Goddamn reason Nate! Six people who trusted him, and treated him as if he were their friend! Though that turned out to be worth about as much as a bag of shit!"
"What do you want me to do?," And the way it comes out makes it clear that he doesn't expect to do anything, that if he feels any guilt or responsibility at all it's well buried.
With a final certainty Buck says the one thing he can say, the one thing he's sure of these days," He'll leave. You know that, we all know that. But he doesn't have to Nate. We don't have to let him."
And then with the same finality, "He always wanted to. Why should I care now?"
At a loss Buck searches his face and sees that he means exactly what he's saying. Shaking his head he backs away and then turns to leave. Nathan's book catches his eye and he moves toward it, picks it up. He notices Nathan's place marker near the back, and something in him smiles and not in a friendly way, "Damn you're almost done, didn't Ezra get this to ya just last week? Must be good reading."
Then, tossing the book down by the medical bag he turns and leaves.
Seizing the moment the gelding trumpets and lunges, burying his teeth into Nathan's shoulder. Caught completely off guard the Healer shrieks, and once free, exits the stall with all do haste, hand pressed firmly against the wound in a reflexive attempt to stem the bleeding.
Buck never looks back.
***
Five minutes now spent in silence and Chris is ready to give the boy credit, he'd been sure he'd crack as soon as he'd come around the bend and seen him there waiting for him. Instead, giving the impression that he was totally unsurprised, the kid'd merely nodded politely and slowed his trot to a walk as Chris pulled up beside him.
And whatever he'd expected of J.D. it was nothing like the quite acceptance he heard when the he asked," Are you gonna yell?"
He wanted to, wanted to scream and rage at all of them, himself no less, but he would not because he couldn't. Raging at anyone now, when the actions he was yelling about were a year or more in the past would only serve to emphasize the fact that it took him a year or more to start yelling. Lord knew there were plenty in town, such as Inez who'd told himself and Buck and Vin the tale of the Tavern and Ezra's "friends", who'd expected him to do just that. Wanted him to do it. But he hadn't then, and wouldn't now; they were all of them grown men and he wasn't their daddy. What was more Ezra wouldn't thank him for it, which, more than anything else right now, held him back. His drawing the whole town into the raging battle that would inevitably ensue would only insure the very private Gambler's departure. Jesus, was there anyway out of this bog?,"No, I'm not going to yell."
"I wish you would. ," J.D. licks his lips, pointedly staring at the space between his horses ears, his so young, so open face showing every thing he's feeling, "Yell, I mean. It'd make this easier at any rate."
He thinks of Ezra, and how for so long the man fielded every barbed comment, every thinly veiled insult in such a way that they seemed as much apart of him as his wardrobe and his vocabulary, thinks of never realizing the extent of such things until he'd started paying closer attention to the interaction between Ezra and the three who'd sold him out. He'd been so sure in those first few days after talking with Inez that Ezra would leave, and couldn't have blamed the man for doing so had he tried.
But, though he drew further into himself and away from them, the gambler stayed on. Chris was as sure now, as he had been then, that he wouldn't have stayed if driving him outta town hadn't been Maude's intention all along.
He supposes he should thank her for that and someday he might.
Still, as Ezra drew away from them, managing to seem as if he were doing anything but, Chris had started seeing the casual cruelties dealt him everyday as he hadn't been able, or maybe, allowed, to see them before. People who didn't know the man to speak to never hesitated to drag his character through the gutter, and losing the Tavern had only made it that much worse.
What made him, and he supposed the others if they were seeing what he saw, even more terribly certain that Ezra would leave, and sooner rather than later, was that while he rarely, if ever, let his mask of urbane charm and civility slip, he was not for one moment unaware of what people thought of him.
And how they didn't think it of Vin, though after Eli Joe's little stunt more than a few of them knew damn well the law had more than a casual interest in him.
How they didn't think it of Buck who spent his every waking moment trying to seduce their wives and daughters.
Or Josiah, an ex-preacher with a past he wouldn't talk about and was still seeking forgiveness for.
Or Nathan, whose skin color was even more hated now than before the war.
Or J.D., whose careless shot had killed a much loved member of the community, a wife, a mother.
Or even himself, a gunslinger, someone who, by definition, killed impunity and with only the slightest provocation.
He hates seeing and knowing these things, hates himself for not seeing them sooner, hates every damn person in town for doing these things, and , with every bit as much feeling, hates Ezra for letting them.
"You don't deserve easier. , "His voice his harsher than he intended, but he wouodn't take it back if he could.
Once again J.D. surprises him with a sigh and the murmured, "I know that. You don't think I do, but you're wrong."
Though weary, there is a reprimand in the younger man's voice and Chris is taken aback by it, though he resists his reaction and lets him continue unimpeded.
"I wasn't gambling just for the hell of it you know. I barely had any cash left when Ezra bought the Tavern and since it wasn't enough to give him I didn't see the harm is taking the chance. Then I won.," Now he turns to look Chris full in the face, his darker, guilt laden , gaze meeting Chris's own as few have been able to do., "And I kept winning and I thought if I won enough I'd be able to give Ezra enough so that he'd be okay even if no one else would help him. I knew 'Siah was courting Maude, and I watched Nathan go upstairs with her and then to the bank. The rest of you were so busy that you didn't have the time to think about anything but what you were dealing with, though, of course, "there's a darker sarcasm in the words than Chris would've thought the kid capable of, " Josiah had time enough to help Buck with HIS problems."
J.D.'s expression changes and he looks younger than he did the day he stepped, er jumped, of the stage, "Why do we do it to him Chris? Why don't we ever try to stop it!? We stick up for Nathan, for Vin and I know you stick up for me! Why...why?"
"Because he lets us., "It's a simple answer, an honest answer. They treat him like crap because he lets them.
"Am I the only one who sees that's Ezra's not the type who LET'S people do these things to him?! I mean, he'd never say anything because that would show that what other people say counts, but he wouldn't just stick around for it! He'd leave! He'd fleece everyone at the poker tables, and then he'd leave! He sure as hell wouldn't throw himself into every possible fight he could to PROVE that he deserves better, to try and EARN better!"
This mirrors what Maude said so closely that Chris is no less startled by it than he had been by Ezra's slip up. Responding to the silent signals of his rider Job stills beneath him and J.D.'s little mare takes several steps before he reins her in.
The younger man turns in the saddle, puzzlement written across his features, "Chris?"
For a moment there is nothing. He cannot think, cannot act, and cannot speak. Everything tumbles together in his mind and he is simply lost.
And then, like waking from a dream, he nods, once, facing J.D. with as open an expression as he is capable of mustering at this late date, "You explain any of this to Ezra?"
He shakes his dark head, and Chris thinks absently that the he needs a haircut and a good shave, "Every time I try he changes the subject, and by the time he's through with me I don't know which way's up. Chris I...I think he doesn't want to heart it because he's afraid that if he does he won't be able to stop himself from forgiving us and he doesn't want to forgive us. He...he thinks he deserves it, or at least that he should've expected it. And today when I was sittin with him he was..sad maybe, but it was more than that. He... Chris he's gonna leave. Not today or tomorrow, but soon. As soon as he can maybe."
***
Vin is unsurprised to fin Josiah unsurprised as he hoists himself onto the roof.
The bigger man says nothing, merely hands him a hammer and indicates the bucket of nails. One way or another he'd have expected one of them to join him in the repair work; they usually do if they don't have anything else to do.
Nodding his thanks he pauses only to roll up his sleeves as far as they'll go and unbutton several of the top buttons on his shirt. Were they not smack in the middle of the areas' populace and there weren't quite so many to offend he'd take the thing off. It was the middle of July and, later in the day or no, the sun was still hot enough to warrant working without a shirt. He figured he'd make do. He could gage his own stamina well enough to stop before he had a heatstroke and he'd be damned if he was gonna make a spectacle of himself like that.
Josiah's own shirt is already soaked with sweat and Vin knows well enough to assume working up here, in this kinda heat, is 'siah's own brand of repentance.
Soon enough the sound of their hammers is ringing through the air as they diligently and expertly seek out and repair the shingles damaged in the most recent of the summer storms.
Ten or fifteen minutes into their labor they see Buck, not so much storm as stalk, out of the stable back to the Jail. Once there he goes inside, slamming the door behind him.
Sometimes Buck can match Chris for brooding, Vin thinks, and it looks like this is 'bout to be one of them times.
Josiah is thinking much the same thing, though neither of them gives voice to the thought nor do they pause in their work.
'Bout forty minute after that Chris and J.D. ride into town, and ten minutes after that J.D. heads back up to the clinic, no doubt to take Billy's place. Chris goes back to his chair outside the Jailhouse, angling it in such a way that he can watch the stables, and thus the clinic, as well as the direction Mary 'n Maude should be returnin' from at the same time.
Again this is observed without a word or pause.
Finally, Josiah pauses in his work, gaze searching across the horizon.
Judging the time to be as right as it ever will be Vin breaks their silence, "It's like walkin' on eggshell ain't it 'Siah?"
He sighs, faces Vin with a weary companionship etched into his features," Worse Brother, far worse., "A pause, much like Vin himself, Josiah can appreciate not speaking until you're ready to. Then, "Do you think he'll leave?"
"I don't think he WANT'S to."
"But will he?"
"A lot of who he is takes a beatin so he can stay. He'll leave when he thinks he there ain't any other choice."
"Every time he's hurt we go through this," It sounds like a curse the way he says it, "Waiting to see if he'll live, waiting to see if he'll leave. If I've ever seen a worse mess I don't recall it."
"Yep."
"What does Chris want to know?"
Using a strip of rawhide from his pocket he ties his hair back, letting the slight breeze cool his sweat dampened neck. , "Why. How. Mostly the why of it though."
"It's not an answer, but I could point out that I never promised Ezra anything. In point of fact I encouraged him to look elsewhere for funding."
"Fair enough. It was your money and ya didn't have to give it t' anyone ya didn't want to. Still don't., " He means what he says. He's not so sure that he'd have given Ezra his money, come to that, at least not without a hell of a lot of convincin'. ," But why'd you hav't'give it to HER?"
The ex-preacher's smile is something close to mocking, but not quite there, "The affections are like lightening: you cannot tell where they will strike till they have fallen. Jean Baptiste Lacordaire. "
"I don't know about that, "but that's a lie, he thinks, remembering for a moment what he'd willing turned away from his life, and, on that count, sympathizing completely with Josiah, "But I do know she used you against our friend, and what's worse, you let her."
"A little wanton money, which burned out the bottom of his purse. Sir Thomas Moore."
"And she used it to drive Ezra outta business, and prob'ly into leaving."
"Is Ezra not a man then, capable of taking care of himself?"
Something occurs to him, that he hadn't considered before, and silently aghast he asks, "You don't much like him do you Josiah?"
If he notices that Vin's dropped the informal pronunciation of his name, and realizes all this implies, it doesn't show, "I wouldn't go nearly that far into it, brother."
"Josiah?," his voice is hard, the demand clear.
"I don't understand how a man can do the things he's done and not feel even the slightest bit of remorse, of guilt. He'd swindle a family of their last dime, using any and all means necessary to do so, and not think twice about it. He treats people, most people, as if they're nothing. I'm not going to pretend to you that I don't have difficulty with that, with him and who and what he is, but , to some extent, I surely am fond of him. I don't understand him mind, but I don't dislike him on account of it."
No, he thinks, but it makes it so much easier to stab him in the back, doesn't it 'Siah? " I thought it was a Preacher's job to help people like that."
"When they want help.," Something crosses the older man's face, something of guilt and remorse, and it doesn't take much imagination on Vin's part to figure he's thinking of the money and how he'd thrown it at Ezra when the Southerner CAME to him for help.
Remorselessly he pounces on that guilt, "What, ya want 'im to sit around weepin' fer the things he's done? To spend his days cryin' to ya, begging forgiveness? That's not remorse or repentance Josiah, that's as pure an example of selfishness as anything else you can point to. Remorse is when ya' stand up an' do something 'bout it. Repentance is moving toward a new and better life 'Siah. All of which he's been trying to do, and with precious little help from anyone around here."
Josiah sighes, picking up his hammer and reaching for a nail, "He likes being the way he is, I might even go so far as to say he DELIGHTS in it."
And Vin understands now that the difficulty of this situation is not that Josiah is trying to change Ezra without results, it's that he's NOT trying to change him. From the beginning the ex-preacher has made a point of accepting people as they are and the problem is that Ezra makes that more difficult, quite a bit more, than everyone else. If the Southerner would show even the smallest hint of remorse or guilt, then, at least, Josiah could understand him.
But Vin, who would never say as much, also understands that showing either of those things is something Ezra will never allow himself. He's seen the man with his mother, and he's seen from the beginning how he interacts with those around them, and knows beyond a doubt that whatever physical hurts he may take Ez will never willing risk any emotional hurts or vulnerability.
He doesn't have to guess the cause; it's not hard for him to see the Southerner as a kid, to empathize with the pain he'd suffered through his mother. At least when he'd lost his own Ma, young as he was, he'd known she wasn't leavin' him 'cause she wanted to, known that she'd stay if she could. Buck's own story wasn't so different, and that might explain their current stand on the whole Ezra situation. Their mothers, who were forcibly taken from them, would've given anything and everything to stay with them, yet Maude sent Ezra away and even now only seeks him out when she needs him for something. What's more, if she's nothing else, Maude's a user, a person who, once they've found it, will take the smallest of weaknesses and exploit it like you wouldn't believe.
He doesn't know how many weaknesses she found in Ezra before he pokered up, but he knows pretty damn well that once learned Ezra takes his lessons to heart.
Setting his own hammer down by the bucket of nails Vin moves to the edge of the roof, saying as he does so," Well, there's no denying the man likes money, and fancy clothes, and does take some pride in them five dollar words.," Reaching the ladder he begins his decent, "He'll do just 'bout anything to get out of WORKIN' for a livin', no denying that.," he's shouting now, and the heads of those near the church swivel curiously in his direction, but for once he doesn't care.," And maybe Maude ain't so bad as all that, I can't says as I've spent anytime with her to know. But I do know one thing," Josiah's face appears over the side and Vin forces him to meet his eyes," Men are what their mother's make them."
Releasing Josiah's gaze, he bends down and picks up his hat from where he left it behind the ladder before going up, puts it back on his head, tips it to the older man, turns on his heal and heads to the saloon. From the looks of things at the Jail he's not the only one who could use a drink.
****
Author's Note: First I'm going to repeat myself and thank everyone for taking the time to review. It is very much appreciated! Now. Okay, so maybe the horse didn't need to bite Nathan, but, at least in the Old West AU, the man drives me nuts. I was hard on him because he's hard on Ezra, maybe understandably so considering his past, but I really do think that the man enjoys walking around with his holier-than-thou attitude. I love Nate as much as I love the rest of them, I just think HE needs to learn to look beyond appearances. I think, in his own way, he's as capable of racism as any white man. And, just for the record, Josiah should be repentant.