FOUR

Jamie looked over his shoulder at his older brother. It was late October and Joe was standing in a patch of mud left behind by a some early snow that had melted, stringing some of Glidden's new-fangled 15.5 gauge barbed wire along the top of one of the Ponderosa's boundary fences. The roll of wire, partially opened and played out, was laying in a tangled mess at his feet. They'd traveled out about as far as they could go before Joe had chosen a spot to begin. Pa hadn't been too keen on using Glidden's wire on the fence here. He said he thought it seemed right unneighborly, to which Joe had replied that their neighbors weren't going to be the ones trying to jump a fence and rustle cattle. In the end big brother had stormed off to town, bought a bale of it, grabbed him on his way through the yard, and come up here to start putting it out.

Joe'd done a lot of that the last five days.

Storming.

Pa had a couple of words for it. He said everything Joe had been through in the last seven months had left him 'touchy' and 'irritable'. The men were using other words for it. When the redhead had been out with the ranch hands , the words he'd heard whispered behind Joe's back were 'thin-skinned' and 'cantankerous'. The miners said Joe was 'short-fused' and 'volatile', just like dynamite. They all agreed on one word though – dangerous.

Sooner of later, they said, Joe was gonna get either himself or someone else killed.

Which was why he'd followed Joe today without asking Pa's permission. Jamie knew he'd get it when he got back to the ranch house, but he didn't care. It wasn't safe to leave Joe alone. He knew it.

Someone had to take care of Joe and since the mysterious Adam and big brother Hoss were gone, it was up to him.

Jamie studied Joe's rigid figure. The older man was standing still, facing the bale of wire and staring at it like it was an enemy. He'd seen him do it before, like he was working out strategies so the wire wouldn't win. It was kind of frustrating. Joe had brought him along to help, but so far he hadn't let him do anything. The teenager glanced at the sky and realized it was about noon.

Maybe if he offered to cook...

"Are you hungry, Joe? I could fix us some grub."

Joe was kneeling by the wire now, straining hard with his gloved hands to unwrap one prickly strand from the other. His jaw was tight and his green eyes narrowed. The muscles in Joe's arms, built up over a lifetime of hard physical labor, rippled in the sunlight. Even though the air was chilly, he was covered with sweat. It bathed the front of his shirt. To someone just walking by, it wouldn't look like anything was wrong, but he knew better. Something was definitely wrong.

Joe was shaking like a man with a fever.

Wincing at the blow of words he expected to get for asking, Jamie moved a little closer. "Joe? Hey, Joe. Are you all right?"

Joe's head came up; that head of silver curls that were shining in the sun. He looked puzzled and then he said his name, "Jamie..."

Almost like he'd forgotten he was there.

Jamie sniffed. It wasn't fair! He wanted his older brother back the way he'd been. The older brother that always had a smile and a joke, who loved to laugh; the brother who had accepted him and taken him under his wing and been so patient to teach him all the things he needed to know to be a part of the Cartwright family.

This man was a stranger.

Jamie took another step. "Joe, let me help. Maybe together we can figure out what's wrong."

For a moment it looked like Joe was considering it.

And then all Hell broke loose.

Joe rose to his feet. He pulled his leather gloves off and threw them to the ground and marched toward him. Stopping several feet away, he growled, "You do it then, if you think I'm so incompetent!"

It took a second before Jamie realized that Joe thought he was complainin' about how long it was taking to get the wire unrolled.

"That's not what I meant. I'm worried –"

Joe flashed him a warning look. He knew enough to heed it. After living with the Cartwrights for near four years, he knew that set of older brother's jaw and the flash in his eye well enough to be aware that fists ususally followed. Jamie stepped back as Joe headed for Cochise and the canteen that hung from the saddle horn.

"Why isn't the food ready?" the older man demanded as he recapped the canteen and turned back toward him.

"I didn't know you wanted me to cook –"

"Well why the hell did you think I brought you out here? You didn't think I was going to trust you with that wire, did you? You're a child."

Every word was meant to hurt. Every one.

Jamie fought back tears as his own temper flared. "Will you just stop it!" he shouted. "What is wrong with you?"

Joe's jaw remained tight. His voice was just as tight – and quiet. "There's nothing wrong with me. I'm fine."

"You keep sayin' that and it just ain't true! " His jaw was tight too, but it was from fighting back tears. "I know it. All the men know it." He paused. "Pa knows it too, Joe, and it's killin' him!"

His brother's eyes were trained on his face. "Don't you mention my pa."

Jamie steeled himself. "I may not have been born a Cartwright, but he's my pa too. Every day, most every time you open your mouth, you hurt him. Can't you see it, Joe? The worry is wearin' him away!"

Something different flashed in the older man's eyes.

Was it fear?

"Well, I'm sorry," Joe snarled, in a tone of voice that said he was anything 'but'. "I'm sorry if you don't like the new 'me', but it's who I am now, so you're just going to have to get used to it. I'm going back to work."

"Can I help?"

"No!" he snapped. "It's too dangerous. You get to cooking!"

"But Joe..."

"I said, 'No!'."

Still fighting back tears, the young man followed his older brother's progress as he headed toward the fencing. Just as Joe bent down to take hold of the barbed wire, he saw Joe's gloves on the ground.

Snatching them from the grass, Jamie barreled toward him, shouting, "Joe! Hey Joe! Don't! You'll get hurt!"

Joe stood up abruptly and took a step toward him. They met about three feet away from the opened bale of wire. Before Jamie knew it, Joe's fingers gripped his shirt. He started shaking him and yelling. Jamie didn't know what was happening, but he knew he was scared as Hell and he had to fight back. When he did, it only enraged Joe more. The redhead saw it coming before it happened.

The awful thing was he could do nothing to stop it.

"Joe! No!"

Joe pivoted, still holding onto him. As he yelled again, screaming, 'I told you to stay away! Don't you ever listen?' his older brother shoved him.

A rat's nest of barbed wire was a mighty hard place to land.

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Bella Carnaby Ashton glanced over at her brother. Ben made her laugh. Due to her connection to the Ponderosa, Ben had spent his young life reading penny dreadful novels and dreaming of the life of a cowboy hero. Maybe it had been a mistake to pass on the books Joe sent to her, she thought as she watched her little brother gawk out the stagecoach window at every cactus that passed by.

Ben was no doubt looking for hidden Indians or highwaymen.

Bella shuddered at the thought. She hadn't taken the stage since that dreadful trip through the Sierras five years before when Fleet Rowse had led a band of Indians to attack it and murdered nearly everyone on the coach. It hadn't been easy, but she'd managed to ride a horse or take a buggy or train since then. Michael had known about her fear and always arranged things so she was able to avoid it. Unfortunately, as they were heading to Virginia City, Nevada from Placerville, California, there was really little choice if they wanted to make good time. She'd done her best to hide her terror from her brother, but she thought he suspected. Ben had taken the seat beside her and was always sure he made physical contact from time to time to let her know he was there. He knew from what she'd told him that this was the same route she had taken all those years ago. Ben kept up an endless line of chatter as well, annoying the preacher and his wife who sat across from them. So far, they were the only other passengers traveling on the coach. More passengers might join them, of course, at one of the upcoming way stations. In fact, they probably would.

Then Ben could irritate them too.

"What are you snickering at?" her little brother asked.

She turned to look at him. Though Benjamin was going on seventeen, she couldn't help but think he was the cutest thing. He had a round face like their ma and the biggest chocolate-brown eyes. His hair wasn't quite as curly as Joe Cartwright's except when it was wet, which it was now because Ben was sweating in the close confines of the coach. The trailing ends of the reddish-brown curls that spiraled down onto his forehead made him look like a Wensleydale sheep.

"You," she fessed up.

Ben was mock indignant. "Well, if you ain't got anything better to do than laugh at a fellow..."

"I'm not laughing," she corrected.

His brown brows popped. "No?"

"No, I'm snickering." Bella reached out to brush one of the errant curls away. "You are just so cute!"

He batted her hand aside. "For Gosh sakes, Bella, you don't tell a grown man he's 'cute'." His eyes flicked to their fellow passengers who were pointedly ignoring them . "I'm almost – "

"Almost seventeen. I know." She stifled another giggle. "You're just ancient!"

His anger was a little less 'mock' now. "And I suppose you are ancient and all-wise at the grand old age of twenty-six?"

It was at that moment that Bella recognized the scenery speeding past. She could see it through the open window behind her brother. The low rise of the hill. The long stretch of open land.

The high ridge made of rock where she had hidden with Little Joe Cartwright and where she thought she had lost him.

Where she thought he had died.

Bella shuddered. She barely swallowed the sob that followed it.

Any trace of annoyance on her brother's face vanished. He took her by the hand. "Bella? What's is it?" Following the trail of her gaze, Benjamin looked over his shoulder and out the window at the passing landscape. When he turned back, his lightly tanned skin had paled a shade. "Was it here?" he asked.

All she could do was nod.

Ben moved closer and slipped his arm around her shoulder. He was quiet a moment and then he asked, "Do you want to talk about it?"

She closed her eyes against the memories, but it didn't helped. Everything was there. The Indians attack. The renegades deadly race to overtake the coach. Men falling; arrows piercing their chests and backs. Seeing Joe stuck with a club. Thinking he'd been mortally wounded.

And the smell. She'd never forget that.

The smell of roasting meat.

Showing unexpected concern, the pastor's wife – who had traveled most of the way with her nose in a copy of the periodical, The People's Literary Companion – asked, her voice soft with worry, "Are you all right, child? Do you need the stage to stop so you can get some fresh air?"

In that moment it dawned on Bella that she might have misjudged the pair. Perhaps their silence had been a way to let her and Benjamin enjoy what was obviously his first trip to the West together and not a judgment on her or her brother.

She shook her head. She knew if she spoke, the words would come out with tears.

Benjamin answered for her. "My sister took this route five years ago. There was an attack on the stage. A lot of people died." He looked at her and smiled. "Bella survived."

As the minister's wife responded, Bella drew in several slow, steadying breaths in an attempt to slow her heartbeat, which was galloping like a racehorse. She smiled at the woman and then turned to her brother. She didn't think it was possible, but he held her even closer as the pastor reached over and closed the curtains on the window.

Ben said she had survived.

Sometimes she wondered if there was any truth in that.

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Joe Cartwright stared in horror at the aftermath of his unreasonable anger. His violent reaction to Jamie's concern had sent the boy directly into the nest of barbed wire that had been created when he unrolled the bale. When he'd shouted for him to keep still, hoping to minimalize the damage, Jamie had fought even harder, his blue eyes wide with fear.

Fear of him.

He'd been so terrified as he saw the barbs bite into his little brother's skin that he'd dug in and fought to keep the wire away from him. The boy was surrounded by it. It cut into Jamie's back, arms and legs, but even more frightening had been the large portion of it that dangled perilously above the teenager's head. Joe had thrown all caution to the wind as it shifted and began to descend. Regardless of the danger to himself he'd moved in, placing his body above the boy's, and then reached up and taken hold of the menacing metal.

Forgetting that he was no longer wearing his gloves.

They'd both emerged alive, as he knew they would, but their battered and wounded flesh showed they'd been through a battle. His upper left shoulder was deeply gashed and his lower legs were covered with deep, jagged cuts as were his arms. Wherever it struck, the wire had not only pulled the skin away but had driven the cloth and sweat and dirt covering it into his open wounds. Every single gash was hot and crimson with blood and hurt like hell.

Jamie was much worse.

Joe ran the back of his bloody arm across his face, driving away tears, mud, and more blood. His little brother's skin was ashen white and clammy to the touch. Jamie's heartbeat was too rapid. The redhead's chest was rising and falling, but the breaths were short, troubled, and came too fast. There was a slight tinge of blue to his lips.

He was in shock.

Joe had done the best he could. He'd managed to untangle himself just as Jamie passed out from the pain. Drawing his thick leather gloves on over hands that looked like something in a meat house, Joe had located the wire cutters and returned to his brother. Taking advantage of Jamie's unconscious state, he'd begun the most onerous part of freeing him, pulling the wire barbs out of the boy's tender skin.

And all the while the tears had flown.

As he worked, Joe's thoughts had gone to Adam, recalling that day when his brother had accidentally shot him while they were hunting a wolf. He remembered Adam's pain and guilt. His never ending remorse. It drove home again to him the fact that he was the older brother now. That he had to be the responsible one.

Joe's eyes moved to the silent form lying on the ground before him.

For the last few weeks he'd been anything but responsible. Somewhere over the last month he'd lost it. He'd behaved in only one of two ways – enraged or unhinged.

He'd kept telling himself it didn't matter. That it didn't effect anyone but him. Jamie's earlier words – so true that they were a spear thrust to his heart – had caused him to go berserk. The moment the anger in him had turned to rage and boiled over, he had become incapable of rational thought. He told himself he didn't realize the boy would fall into the wire, that he hadn't wanted to hurt Jamie.

Joe wet his lips. He struck away more sweat and tears.

Yeah, he kept telling himself that. He had to.

Otherwise, he'd go insane.

It was all Joe could do to rise to his feet and stagger over to where he'd left Jamie lying. He'd bandaged the worst of the boy's wounds the best he could using strips torn from an extra shirt he'd brought in his saddlebag along with other clothes. Jamie had been shivering and so he'd gone and gathered every piece of cloth he could find – their extra shirts, pants, their bedrolls, and even the saddle blankets from their horses – and wrapped the redhead in them to keep him warm. At the last minute he'd rolled one of the saddle blankets up and placed it under the boy's feet. That was after he remembered Doc Martin always told them to elevate a victim's feet to increase circulation.

His main worry for Jamie wasn't the blood loss though, in truth, both of them had lost more than their fair share. It was the threat of infection. While the wire had been clean , the mud he'd been standing in and filthy sweat-soaked cloth they both wore were not.

Some of the cuts on Jamie's skin already looked angry.

Joe looked up at the sky. It was late afternoon. His father would be wondering where they were. The trouble was, he'd been so enraged when he left that he hadn't told anyone what he was doing or where he was going. Pa wouldn't have any idea where to begin the search. In the hopes that it might help, he'd removed Cochise's saddle and slapped his horse's hind-quarters and sent him on his way. When the animal returned home without gear or rider, and with a bloody handprint just above his tail, Pa would understand and send someone out to find them. They still had Jamie's horse. The other one they'd brought along with them – the one attached to the sled that had carried the wire – had spooked and disappeared. He was afraid to go after it and leave Jamie alone, so he'd decided to rig a travois to carry the boy. Joe didn't know how he was going to manage it, given that his hands looked like Hop Sing had taken a meat mallet to them, but he was damn well going to do it. This was his fault.

Whatever pain he experienced, he deserved.

Joe knelt down beside his little brother. Carefully, with his teeth, he tugged the leather glove off his left hand. He would have preferred to leave it on since the tight fit was stifling the blood flow, but he needed to touch Jamie's skin to see if he was developing a fever. From the thin sheen of sweat on his brother's pale freckled face he was pretty sure he was. As crimson blood began to flow between his thumb and forefinger, Joe placed his palm on Jamie's forehead. The boy's fever was low, but it was there.

As Joe removed his hand, Jamie stirred. His brother moaned and his eyes opened. At first they were without focus. Then, they lighted on him. As recognition dawned, Joe saw it.

Terror.

Penitent, he placed his hand on the boy's chest. As he took in the cuts on Jamie's face, the deep gash at his hairline that had bled like a stuck pig, and the wounds he could see on other parts of the boy's lanky frame, Joe sobbed. The words were wrenched out of him.

"Jamie, I am so sorry. I never meant..." He paused. "I never meant for this to happen."

The boy's reddish lashes brushed his pallid cheeks as he fought toward consciousness. Jamie swallowed, winced, and then his blue eyes opened on a world of unendurable pain.

"Joe!" His name came out with a moan. "Joe. God, Joe! It hurts!"

Jamie's left hand was the least effected, so Joe took hold of it and gripped it tight. "Squeeze, Jamie! Squeeze my hand. Give it all you've got! When you can't stand the pain, squeeze!"

The boy did as he told him. Joe was somewhat surprised by the strength of his grasp.

"Good! Keep at it!" he commanded, biting back his own pain.

Jamie was looking around, puzzled. "What... What happened?" he asked.

What happened?

God, he wished he knew.

"I...I lost my temper, Jamie. I pushed you. I swear I didn't know the bale of wire was there. I wasn't thinking..."

A small smile – very small – lifted one corner of the boy's lips. "You...ain't been...doin' much of...that lately."

Joe frowned. "What?"

"Thinkin'."

Joe touched the boy's face with his right hand. "I guess I haven't."

"Or...maybe too much. 'Bout...the wrong thing..." Jamie winced and his back arced a bit. When it came back down to earth, he moaned and the light in his eyes dulled.

Joe forced a smile. "You get some sleep, you hear? I'm going to build a travois so I can get you home."

His brother roused a bit as he said that. "No. Hurt..."

"I know it will hurt, buddy, but we have to get you – "

"No." Jamie's voice was firmer. His gaze went to Joe's hand. "Hurt...you. You're...hurt...too..."

Joe opened his mouth to tell the boy he was fine, but decided he didn't deserve that. He swallowed once and admitted. "Yeah, I hurt like Hell."

His little brother's lips curled in a small. "Don't...let Pa...hear you talk...like that." Jamie drew a sharp breath as pain shot through him. "He'll wash...your...mouth...with..."

He was out again.

Thank God.

Joe rose wearily to his feet. He'd been pretending all month that everything was fine, that he wasn't out of control; that he could manage whatever was happening to him. It was a lie. Plain and simple. A lie he had been telling to everyone, but mostly to himself.

As the curly-haired man headed for the tree limbs he'd gathered to build the rig with, recent memory took him unawares. He saw himself on the travois Tom Griswold and Ern had built. He was being pulled toward the Griswolds' home. The whole way there he was plagued by delusions. The one that held the most horror for him was that of Hoss aiming a gun at him and pulling the trigger. Joe staggered to a stop and looked back. Wasn't that what he had just done with Jamie? Aimed his anger at him and then pulled the trigger? After that nightmare, he had shied away from his big brother until he was able to come to terms with the fact that it wasn't real. Hoss wouldn't hurt him.

This was real. He had hurt Jamie.

Wouldtheir relationship ever be the same?

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Candy had come to the main house to talk to Joe, only to be told by his friend's father that he hadn't returned and the older man had no idea where he was. As he'd listened to his boss, he'd reached up and fingered the bruise on his chin without thinking and it hadn't taken Mister Cartwright more than two heartbeats to figure out who had put it there. He'd crossed Joe one time to many the day before and his friend had let him have it. He'd tried to pass it off as something that happened during a friendly disagreement – boys will be boys – but the older man would have none of it. Ben Cartwright knew his son was in trouble.

Like they all knew Joe was in trouble.

Worried for his friend, Candy had made a point of running into Doc Martin's new assistant and possible replacement while he was in town the day before. He'd invited the man for a beer and then proceeded to pump him for all the information he had. He'd listed Joe's symptoms from A to Z, starting with the uncontrollable anger and ending with the fact that he'd caught Joe sitting in the barn one day shaking from head to toe and mumbling about things that weren't there. He told the Doc he was afraid his friend was going crazy.

Unfortunately, Julian Corwin agreed.

The young doctor went on to explain that, while the kind of melancholia Joe was suffering from had once been thought as a matter of choice, science had recently proven it to be a 'biomedical disorder' of the emotions and beyond the sufferer's control. Julian said there had been a mental 'reflex' in Joe's mind to all he had gone through. The sensation, he said, passed through the victim's brain without alerting the consciousness. In other words, Joe had no idea of what was going on. It seemed the brain stored up all kinds of images and ideas. When an increasing amount of these 'impressions' were negative – say, being chased down like an animal by a madman or watching your wife and child burn to death – these ideas and images became distorted.

In other words, the brain became diseased.

He'd asked. So far as Doctor Corwin knew there was no cure. Julian said the fact that it had been seven months and Joe was getting worse instead of better was not a good sign.

Corwin recommended an asylum.

Ben Cartwright cleared his throat. Candy'd almost forgotten the older man had asked him a question – his boss had asked him what he thought they should do about Joe.

He sure wasn't about to give him Doctor Corwin's answer.

Candy shrugged. "Some men carry grudges for decades. No one thinks anything about that. It's only been a little over half a year. I say we give Joe more time."

The older man sighed. "I'm not sure how much more time I can give Joseph. His behavior is disrupting not only this household, but the business of the ranch. I've had half a dozen men in here in the last five days telling me they will no longer work with him."

Must have been the new ones. The old hands, like him, were worried sick about Joe.

Candy ran fingers over his stubbled chin. "I suppose you've tried talking to him?"

"Tried and failed." Joe's father paused. He got a wistful look in his eyes. "It's times like these that I miss Joseph's brothers the most. Adam would have given him a strong talking to and Hoss..." He paused. "Hoss would have simply been there for him."

Candy nodded. He missed the big man too.

"It seems like Joe gets along well with Jamie. Maybe he could talk to him," Candy suggested with a smile. It was fun watching the two of them together.

Well, it had been until lately.

"The trouble with Jamie is that Joseph has to be the strong one, the one who has all the answers." His boss went to the door and put his hand to the latch. Apparently he'd made the decision to go after his sons. "Right now I don't think Joseph has any answers for his little brother or for himself."

"It's gettin' cold out there," Candy warned as the door opened "You might want to put on a coat..." The foreman's voice trailed off as the older man stiffened and then shot outside. He didn't know what he expected to see, but it certainly wasn't what he saw.

Joe's horse was standing in the yard. Cochise's saddle was missing. Well, actually everything was missing including his rider.

Candy went to join Ben Cartwright where he stood at the animal's side.

The older man shot him a look. "Something's wrong."

It didn't take much to figure that out. "I'll get some of the hands and we'll form a search party."

The white-haired man had moved. "Candy," he called softly.

Joe's father stood to the rear of the animal and he was pale as the day. His boss nodded him over and when Candy looked, he saw why.

Above Cochise's tail there was a handprint stamped in blood.

Ben Cartwright's look was grim.

"Better make it fast."