EPILOGUE

ooooo

"A penny for your thoughts."

Joe Cartwright blinked. For a moment, he didn't know where he was. Then the familiar room, with its floral wallpaper and picture of a pair of puppies at play, came into focus. It took most of the energy he had, but he managed to muster a smile.

"We have to…stop meeting like this."

Julia smiled back and then sniffed before reaching out to touch his face. The touch hurt, but he didn't say anything.

"Welcome back."

He knew he'd been gone a long time, and maybe pretty far away. He'd seen Laura again. She'd scolded him and told him to remember from now on that he was left-handed, not that he had two left feet.

Joe chuckled, and then coughed. His chest felt tight. "Pneumonia?" he asked.

She nodded. "Doc Scully said it came from already being sick and hanging upside-down so long. He didn't know if you had the strength to fight it."

"Did I hear my name?"

Joe looked up to find the larger-than-life physician he remembered from his last bout with mortality. "Hi, Doc," he managed.

"How do you feel?" Scully asked even as the familiar stethoscope came out and landed on his bare chest. It was as cold as he remembered.

"Fine," he replied.

One of the doctor's eyebrows reached toward his thinning hair. "Well, then, there must be a new definition for the word."

"Is he going to be okay?" Julia asked.

The doctor frowned. "We might have to come up for a new definition for that word as well before I can employ it. Let's just say that Mister Cartwright is mending."

"What else?" Joe asked.

"Excuse me?" Scully asked as the stethoscope retreated back into his black bag.

"What…else is wrong with me?"

The doctor was wiping his glasses on the tail of his coat. "Let's see, a bullet wound, which from what I understand was deliberately contaminated, resulting in a high fever that lasted nearly a week. Severe exhaustion complicated by a beating and," he scowled, "a certain someone driving himself too hard instead of resting." The heavy-set man smiled. "Shall I go on?"

"You sound…just like Doc Martin," Joe groused.

"Would that be the man who had the dubious pleasure of being your family physician?"

"It would!" a strong baritone voice rumbled.

Joe swallowed over a lump as his father, battered and showing bruises, but whole and alive entered the room.

"Next he'd…tell Pa I was young and strong…and it was up to me whether or not I…got better."

"A wise man," the physician said. "You could start by keeping quiet and resting. Your lungs are not healed."

Joe shrugged.

Julia had shifted aside to let his pa move in. The older man sat on the side of the bed. Pa hesitated a moment and then reached out to brush his curls aside with his fingers, and then placed a hand alongside his face.

"How are you, son?"

"Alive, I guess," he replied.

His father must have noted something in his tone. "Is everything all right?"

How could he answer that? He wasn't completely sure that everything he'd seen was real, but what he'd experienced had left him with a kind of sadness. He wanted to be here with his pa – with Julia – but he longed for Laura's touch and his brother's voice.

For his mama.

"I'm okay, Pa. Just tired."

The older man stared at him a moment longer and then nodded. "Well, then, we'd best let you rest."

"How come this always happens at haying season?" a strong voice asked.

Joe smiled. It was an old joke with them, one that had begun with that fall from Cochise when he was around twenty.

"Just lucky, I guess," he answered, giving the expected reply.

Pa rose and made way for Adam. He paused at the door and said, "I'll be in the kitchen, son."

Adam nodded. It seemed from their faces that this was the end of a conversation and not the beginning. Joe stared at his brother for a moment and then turned to the doctor and Julia.

"Could I talk to Adam? Alone?"

Disappointment shone out of Julia's eyes, but she nodded. "Come on, Doctor Scully. I'll get you some coffee before you head back to town."

"Julia?" Joe called.

She turned at the door. "Yes?"

"Come back."

A smile lit her face and she nodded. "Someone has to make sure you don't fall out of bed after all."

He watched her go and then looked at his brother. "You're leaving."

"Not yet, and not now. But soon."

"Why? Why can't you stay?"

Adam pursed his lips. "There are a couple of reasons, Joe. One is I have contracts to fulfill. The other is, you don't need me."

Joe scoffed and then held his side. His ribs were broken, he could tell. "Like…Hell I don't," he managed.

His brother paused, obviously moved by his honesty. "I made you a promise, that I wouldn't treat you as a kid. Joe, it's a promise I can't keep." Adam closed his eyes and sighed. "When I saw you go over the edge of that cliff…."

"You 'saw'?"

He looked right at him. "I outpaced Pa. I got there just as you went over. Joe, I'll never stop wanting to protect you. I don't care if your hair is white and you're gumming your food." Adam laughed. "Come to think of it, that's when it started."

He'd been a towhead, after all, and without teeth for a while.

"It's okay. I understand." Joe hesitated. "You want to take…care of me like I want to take care of Julia." He was growing weary. It hurt to breathe.

"You still feel the same way?"

He nodded. Gingerly. "I'm going to…ask her to marry me once I…well…once I know I'll live until the wedding."

His brother looked toward the window. "Well, then, I suppose I'll have to stick around for that."

Joe caught his brother's wrist in his fingers. "Stay, Adam. Pa needs you. I need you. We need our…family."

It had remained unspoken between them except for brief moments where they had shared a common pain.

"The big galoot would have wanted to be there," Adam said with a sigh.

Joe smiled. It was the first time he'd done it when thinking about Hoss since….well, since his brother had died for him.

"He will be, Adam. He will be."

ooooo

It took nearly a month for Joe to regain his strength. He'd had pneumonia before and it clung to him like a long, lost friend. He'd get up and out of bed, and then end up back in it in less than two shakes of a steer's head. The fever was persistent and it drained him. Doc Scully said he would recover fully, but he wanted to be certain and so he had said nothing to Julia about his plans. She continued to care for him and they talked about everything and anything other than their feelings and what they were going to do about them. After accompanying a recovered Sheriff Strait to Lone Pines and testifying to what had happened, Adam and Pa returned to the Ponderosa. It was hard for a spread as big as theirs to run itself. His brother told him he'd written to his clients explaining everything and they'd delayed the project in San Francisco by two months.

If he was going to ask Julia to marry him – and wanted his brother there – it had to be soon.

Joe was sitting outside on the Griswolds' porch, rocking and soaking in the sun. Julia had chided him and dropped a shawl around his shoulders before going inside to help her ma prepare supper. The coarsely woven garment smelled of her – of lavender and vanilla. It was funny. Since he'd been ill, they hadn't kissed or touched each other in a special way. He wondered if she was frightened. She wouldn't be the first woman to realize what it would be like to be married to a Cartwright, who had bolted at the first chance. For him, he thought it might be the lingering memory of Laura. She'd been his first love and a part of him longed for her still. Seeing her – if he did see her – had only made that longing stronger.

He'd come to peace with his brother's death. Mostly, at least. When he'd arrived at the Griswolds' he'd been an angry man – angry at himself and at God. Adam's return had helped with the deep agonizing sense of emptiness Hoss' passing had left. Older brother had made it clear that he had to stop blaming himself for middle brother's death. Adam told him in plain terms that he would have sacrificed himself too, and that he knew he would have done the same. It was God who chose to take Hoss out of this life when He did and Hoss seemed fine with it. Happy as a pup eatin' burrs, the big man would have said.

Joe wiped away a tear.

"Do you want to come inside to eat, or should I bring your food out here?" Julia asked tentatively.

He looked over his shoulder at her and smiled. "How about out here, and how about you join me?"

She brightened. "Sure. I'll tell Ma." The beautiful young woman paused. "Besides, Ed Flanders is coming over and I think they want to be alone."

Joe nodded. Ed had proposed again to Pat. She hadn't given him an answer…yet. He was a good man. Better than he'd thought. Ed saved his life and, in a way, Julia's, and for that he would be eternally grateful.

It was about ten minutes later that she appeared with a tray. On it were two plates of steaming hot food. Julia was a good cook. When it came to cooking steak, she wasn't Hop Sing, but then, no one was. She'd made apple dumplings for desert tonight.

On that one, she had the Asian man beat.

They'd finished and Julia had gone inside for a minute to wash up. As he sat there, watching the sun sink below the horizon, Ed Flanders rode in through the gate. The older man tethered his horse to the rail and then tipped his hat.

"Joe. Glad to see you up."

"I had to fight to be here, I can tell you that," he replied.

"Women. Needful as water and twice as dangerous."

That made him laugh. "So how come you're trying to saddle yourself with another one?"

Ed was his usual droll self. "Can't live without water."

Julia returned after the older man had gone inside. She sat on the step at his feet and looked out. The land beyond their place, barren and nearly lifeless, took on a special beauty when the dying rays of the sun struck it. She was dressed again today in the crimson gown she'd worn when they'd bid goodbye that first time. It was cut low and showed the tops of her breasts.

Joe laughed when he saw what she had in her hands. They'd grown close enough, she knew what he was thinking.

"When you rode away that day," Julia began, looking at the leather gewgaw he'd braided, "I had this in my hand. I told myself it was a kind of charm." She glanced at him before continuing. "I told myself if I kept it under my pillow, I'd dream about you. I told myself…if I wished hard enough…it would bring you back." She placed the item on the porch board. "Silly, I know, but I was young then."

His hand fell on her head. "Not so silly. Here I am."

She sniffed. Fighting tears, he supposed. "Are you?"

Joe's fingers trailed the length of her hair. "What do you mean?"

"Well, since we brought you here this time, half-alive…." She drew a breath against the memory. "…you seem different."

"Different how?" he asked.

Julia shrugged. He noted how it made those white breasts rise and fall within their crimson sheath. "Quieter. Older, maybe. Maybe too old for me."

He knew he'd hurt her by keeping silent, but he had to be sure he had something to give her before he offered it. He was about to turn thirty-two and he'd been close to death more times than any man he knew. This time, like the last time in the Griswolds' house, had been close.

"Oh," he said, "so you think I'm an old man?"

She turned to look at him again. "Well, you do have gray hair."

He laughed. "I had gray hair when I was your age. Why do you think I always wore my hat?"

Julia laughed as well, but sobered quickly. "Joe, I have to know. Do you love – "

It hurt, but he slipped from the chair to sit beside her. The shawl fell across them both, warming her with its presence even as its absence chilled his shoulders. He pressed a finger to her lips, and then followed it with his own. Julia's lips were firm; her breath, fresh. The scent of her skin delightful. His hand went to her breast, lifting it within its tightly corseted prison until the top resembled one of her apple dumplings where it spilled out of her dress. He kissed that too.

Julia gasped.

Joe kissed her skin again, teasingly, and then looked into her eyes. "Julia Griswold, will you marry me?"

It stunned her for a second, coming so suddenly. Julia lowered her eyes and said, "Well…I don't know…."

"You don't know?" he asked in surprise.

She glanced at him. "How soon were you thinking, Mister Cartwright?"

He shrugged. "Well, I know you women have things you have to do. A dress and such. Flowers, and all those invitations."

She frowned. "How long will it take your Pa and Adam to get here?"

He'd thought of that. "If I send a telegram, two days at most."

It was Wednesday.

Julia kissed him back. "How about Saturday?"

ooooo

It actually ended up being Sunday. Julia wasn't worried about any of the finery, but her mother insisted, saying a girl only got married once. The day dawned beautiful and blessed. In the end, it turned out to be a double-ceremony. Pat had accepted Ed Flanders proposal at last. His pa was there, and Adam. So were Damien Strait and his wife – and children. Clem Foster showed up along with Barney Fuller, who even agreed to leave his signature cigar behind. And when he'd kissed the bride and turned to walk out of the church, Joe saw the others he loved. They were there, just as they'd promised. His mama was standing arm in arm with Laura. Hoss hooted and tossed his hat in the air.

God was there too. The Man upstairs had been patient with him. Pa said everything had a reason and a purpose. The Almighty had let him wallow in self-pity, had stayed silent as he wrestled with guilt and grief – been patient all the while he'd been blind-sided by what life had handed him.

And was smiling now that he'd finally come home.

ooooo

END