EIGHT

It was early morning. Outside the dining room window of the Ponderosa ranch house birds were wheeling through the sky, singing out the joy of a new day. Inside the house was quiet. It was that hour just before Hop Sing rose to begin his food preparations for the day, the hour before Ben Cartwright stirred in his bed, placed his feet on the floor and headed for the clothing he had laid out the night before; an hour before the hands stirred in the bunkhouse and the business of the day began.

Joe Cartwright savored it. It was one of the only times when he could be alone.

He'd gone to the kitchen and made a pot of coffee. The wonderful aroma came with him into the great room as he carried the enamel pot in and filled one of the delicate china teacups on the table – the teacups his pa insisted they use so they remained 'civilized'. Sitting on his 'civilized' mother's French settee, Joe broke the rules by placing his socked feet on the sofa table, easing the strain on his wounded back.

Taking a sip, he savored the brew.

It was the first time he had been downstairs since...since he'd lost his temper and made a tangle of everything. He'd awakened to the birdsong – and to Bella Carnaby laying beside him. For a moment he had felt a jolt. He'd moved his hand and encountered a woman's thigh. For just a moment, laying there with his eyes closed, he wondered if it had all been a dream – Alice's brother's poor choices, the men who had come to make John Harper pay, his house on fire with his wife and child inside. He had nightmares. Always had.

Maybe this was just one more...

He'd rolled over carefully, sucking in the agony the motion brought, to find not his shy, pretty wife with her bashful smile and straight honey-blonde hair, but a beauty with spiraling blonde curls, a pert upturned nose, and full lips that beamed even while in sleep.

In a second it had all come back. The nightmare was real. Alice and his child had died. This wasn't Alice. It was Bella.

His big sister had come home.

Joe's lips curled at the thought of Bella being his 'big' sister. The idea had been absurd when he was seventeen and she was eleven, but the term had stuck after she rescued him out of that creek. It had seemed even more absurd when she came back at eighteen. Then, his thoughts of the vivacious beauty had been anything other than brotherly. And now, here she was again. Older. Wiser. Perhaps a bit world-weary like him. But she still looked so young. Staring at her, lying there beside him, he had not seen a child but a young woman who had all of her life before her.

She didn't deserve to be saddled with a broken old cowpoke like him.

Joe shifted his feet off the table and leaned over to pour more coffee. He felt ancient. The life he'd believed would happen had gone up literally in smoke, and along with it had burned away all of his youthful desires. He'd made Bella a promise that first time he met her – that one day he'd marry her. It was a shame. He didn't know if she was still in love with him, but if she was, he was going to have to break her heart. He'd never marry again. Never be a father.

Never take...that chance.

As he shifted back, Joe heard a sound. He looked up to find his father descending the stairs. A quick glance at the tall case clock showed him it was only four-thirty.

Before the older man noticed him, Joe said, "You're up early, Pa. Goin' somewhere special today?"

Ben Cartwright started and then smiled. "It's good to see you up, son, but are you sure you're strong enough? Doctor Martin wanted you in bed through the rest of this week."

He shrugged. "You know Paul. He knows if he tells me Friday, I'll be up on Wednesday. So he always adds at least two days to his orders."

His father laughed. "I suppose he does." The older man paused. "Fresh coffee?" Pa asked as he inclined his head toward the pot.

"Just made it."

"Mind if I join you?"

"Your company is one of the things I value, Pa. I'd be pleased to share the morning with you."

The white-haired man crossed to him, touched his shoulder briefly, and then went to get a cup and saucer from the cupboard. He returned with it, filled it from the pot, and then sat down by him on the settee.

Before the older man could ask, Joe said, "I'm okay, Pa."

"Just okay?" Those white eyebrows rose high. "Not 'fine'?"

Joe's eyes went to the table before him. He'd placed the amber bottle that had been clasped in Bella's fingers on the center of the table by the fruit bowl. He'd made his mind up to tell his Pa about it. He assumed Bella had found it in his nightstand drawer, though what she was rummaging around in there for he had no idea.

He saw his father pale as he followed his gaze. There was a pause and then he said, "Joe, why? Why would you do such a thing without consulting me?"

He could have said he was his own man and old enough to make his own decisions. He knew, though, that even though that was a part of it, it was not the main part. He could have asked Doc Martin for help. No, he'd been ashamed. Ashamed that he needed help. Ashamed that he was not strong enough to overcome this on his own.

Just...ashamed.

"Joseph," his father began. "I..." He drew a deep breath and expelled it very slowly. "I'm sorry if I have been too demanding as a father."

It was his turn to be surprised. "What? Pa, that's not – "

The white-haired man held his hand out. "Hear me out. When Paul and I talked, after you and Jamie had been brought here, he said something that got me thinking. Paul said I cast a 'long shadow'. That being Ben Cartwright's son was not easy. That I made you, and your brothers, feel that you had to be as good and as great as you thought I was."

Joe wasn't sure what to say. Finally, he admitted, "Well, living up to the example you set hasn't always been easy. But I wouldn't have had it any other way. You're a good man, Pa. The best. What more could there be to strive toward other than bein' like you?"

His father swallowed. There were tears in his eyes. His voice cracked as he said, "Thank you, Joseph. There's nothing a father could want more than to hear those words." He paused and his lips pursed for a moment. "I think your brother Adam ran to escape that shadow. I don't want you to...drown in it. I know you are making comparisons, son, and it saddens me."

Joe rolled his eyes. "Well, Pa, what can I say? You did lose three wives and I only lost one, and I'm here to tell you I don't know how after Adam's ma died you ever had the courage to try again."

His father studied him. "Are you telling my you believe you won't ever marry again?"

He shifted and sat up. His father didn't fail to notice how gingerly he moved. The grin he favored his pa with was sheepish.

"I woke up with Bella in my bed this morning," he said.

The older man nodded.

"You knew?"

"I left her there," Pa laughed. "I remember the last time you were hurt and that young woman was in the house. I fought a losing battle to keep you two away from each other."

He snorted. "I guess we were pretty persistent."

"She is a determined young woman. Just about as determined as you."

Joe's eyes flicked to the other man's face. There was a hint of disapproval in his tone when he asked, "Pa, did you invite her here?"

His father finished his coffee and placed the cup on the table. "No. I received a letter that told me she was coming about a week ago. She asked me not to tell you."

Joe scowled. "Why?"

"She believed you would forbid her to come."

He was going to rebuke that, but then he thought better of it. Given his mood, that was exactly what he would have done.

"I guess I haven't been the easiest thing to live with this last few months," he admitted.

His father's eyes went wide. He snorted and shook his head. "No, you haven't. You've been so angry." The older man's gaze went to the table and the amber bottle again. "Is that why you sought help from a doctor in another town and began to take medication?"

Joe leaned forward and picked up the bottle with the harmless looking little blue pills inside. He'd spoken briefly to Bella and she'd explained that her husband had been put on them too and it had remarkably changed his personality.

"No. The anger came later, after I started to take these." His eyes went to his father's face. "I couldn't sleep, Pa. Couldn't get those...images out of my head. Couldn't forget the sound of Bill Tanner walking behind me, whistling that devil's tune. Doctor Brandon said these pills would help me to relax so I could sleep. They'd keep me from getting so low."

"Did they?"

Joe shrugged as he put the bottle done. "Pardon me, Pa, but Hell if I know. I guess I wasn't sad anymore, I was just mad – so mad I could have torn the world apart." The curly-headed man sighed as his eyes went to the stairs. "How's Jamie doing?"

"He's sleeping naturally now. Like you, he's hurting pretty badly."

He closed his eyes to try to shut out yet another image of loss and pain. "I wish I could remember just what happened. I was standing by Cooch, getting a drink of water. I'd just gone back to the wire when Jamie said something. Can't even remember what it was. It made me so angry that I..."

"That you what?" his father's voice was even, there was no condemnation in it.

"I shoved him. Hard. I didn't realize he was that close to the unbaled wire. He fell...into...it..." Joe shuddered. "I tried to catch him, but it already had hold. It started cutting him right away. He..." His eyes flew open and locked on his father's. They mirrored each other in tears. "Jamie pulled away from me, Pa. He was terrified. Not of the wire. Not of being hurt. Of me. Terrified of me!"

He felt his father's hand grip his arm. "Jamie loves you."

Tears spilled down his cheeks. "Are you sure, Pa? How can you be sure he does anymore?"

"Because I know Jamie, like I know you. One bad day cannot outweigh the power of over a thousand good ones."

"One bad day," Joe snorted. "That was one hell of a bad day!"

"So was the one when your brother Adam shot you." His father lifted his hand. "You almost died, Joe. Did you stop loving your brother?"

"Of course not. It was an accident." He stopped, thought and then said, "My hurting Jamie wasn't."

"You meant to hurt him then?"

"No. But I shoved him on purpose."

"Into the wire?"

Joe paused. Then he sighed. "You should have been a lawyer, Pa."

"I have been a lawyer, and a doctor, and a rich man and poor man, if not an Indian chief," he smiled. "A man has to be all those things when he raises four boys in the hopes of making them into men he can admire." His father's hand cupped his cheek. "And I do admire you, Joseph."

He sniffed back tears and then nodded toward the stair. "I suppose I should go see if Jamie is awake."

As he stood up, he reached for the bottle. His father's hand prevented it.

"You're not planning on taking these again, are you?"

Bella had told him a little about the fight between Doctor Martin and Doctor Brandon. He wasn't sure what to think.

"If I do, Pa, I won't hide it."

"Paul thinks they caused your unreasonable anger."

"And Doctor Brandon thinks they keep me from sinking down so far into sorrow I can't climb out." He eyed the bottle. "I like Doctor Brandon and I trust him, but I don't think I'll need them anymore, Pa."

"But..."

He shrugged. "I'll just put them in the drawer."

His father sighed. "Will you talk to Paul about it? Please?"

Joe nodded.

"Before you take them again?"

"Sure, Pa. Like I said, I think I'm on the mend." Joe smiled wanly. "Besides, now that Bella's here, she's not gonna let me sit around and stew."

"You've got that right," a light voice proclaimed.

Joe turned to find Bella standing at the top of the stair.

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Bella kept a hand on the rail, steadying herself as she descended. It was as if, in a rush, eight years had simply fallen away. There was a pang of guilt and maybe a shade of regret when she thought of Michael, but this man, sitting on the old striped settee she remembered so well, was the one she loved.

The one she had always loved.

But did he still love her?

Ben Cartwright was rising to his feet. "You're up early, Bella," he said.

She merely nodded. She'd awakened to find Joe no longer in the bed and the bottle of Blue Mass gone and she'd grown frightened. She was still dressed from the night before, so she'd hastened into the hall and, after checking the room Jamie was in and finding Joe was not there, headed for the stairs.

She'd slowed down when she heard Joe and his father talking.

A slight smile lifted her lips. He was a stubborn one, Joe Cartwright. Obstinate and determined, with a need to do things for himself and not let anyone else show him or pave the way. If they told him not to take those pills, he would probably take them just to prove he knew better. She prayed that there would be no need. She had asked God to allow her to help him heal. God seemed okay with the idea.

Now she had to see if Joe was as well.

Ever the gentleman, Joe rose shakily to his feet. "Seems I missed you letter telling me you were coming," he said with just a bit of that ornery smile she remembered.

"Must have gotten lost in the post," she replied as she took a seat in the blue chair near the fire, knowing that if she sat down, the two men would as well. Bella smiled sweetly. "I'm sure I sent one."

Joe's father sat down but, surprisingly, Joe remained standing. "Next time I'm in town I'll have to give the postmaster a piece of my mind."

He stood there, like he was planning on going somewhere. The morning light fell in wide beams through the eastern window of the ranch house, settling in his hair and turning the silver curls to gold. Looking at Joe Cartwright, Bella saw the man before her but also the skinny, brown-haired boy she had fallen in love with when she was barely old enough to know what love was. Knowing he would balk at any show of affection before his father – maybe any show of affection at all – she drew in a deep breath and held it against the sight.

"Joseph, aren't you going to sit down?" Mister Ben asked softly.

Joe favored his father with one of those half-smiles he had, the ones that lifted his lips but failed to reach his eyes.

"I need to go talk to Jamie, Pa."

"He's asleep," Bella said, hoping it wasn't too quick. Praying Joe didn't know she wanted him to stand there just a little while longer.

"I'll sit with him, then," he said. "He'll be waking up soon. I..." Joe swallowed. "I need to talk to him, Pa. It's for me as much as for him."

Ben Cartwright nodded. "We'll call you when breakfast is on the table."

Joe returned the nod. "Thanks, Pa." As he moved past her, Joe stopped to place a hand on her shoulder. "I'm glad you're here, Bella," he said. "I've missed you."

She covered his hand with hers. "I've missed you too, Joe."

And with that, he continued on until he reached the stairs.

Bella turned to watch him ascend. She knew Mister Ben had too. They had a shared concern and it was that Joe heal; that he become the man they had known or maybe, just maybe, even a better one for all he had been through.

Pivoting in her seat, she looked at Joe's father.

He nodded and then said, "He's very wounded, Bella. You know Joseph. He feels things deeply. Alice's death hit him hard. But I think," the older man paused, "the loss of his child hit him even harder."

Joe loved his pa. Loved him in a way that almost passed understanding. She could imagine how the thought – the hope – of being a father to his own child had given him a joy that also went past expressing. And then, to have not only his wife but that baby murdered...

She shook her head. "I can't imagine."

"Joe has...had a hard time letting go. He feels responsible." Ben hesitated. "There was nothing he could have done, of course."

Bella was silent a minute. "What can I do to help him?"

The older man considered it. Finally, he said, "Be his friend."

She nodded, understanding. Not his lover. His friend.

"I can do that."

The older man rose and came over to her. He sat on the low table in front of her and leaned forward to place his hand over hers. "I know you love my son. I know you always have." He paused. "Forgive me for thinking you were too young to know what you were doing when you were here before."

She smiled. "I was too young. That's why I ran away. I was a child with a child's perception of life. Somehow," she drew a breath and held it a moment, "somehow I thought that, if I lived in a city, bad things would not happen." Bella's laugh was wistful. "Apoplexy and cancer are not limited to the west."

He nodded. "No, they're not." The older man straightened up. "How are you, Bella? I've been so consumed with Joseph and Jamie since you came that I haven't asked. You lost your husband..."

"Michael was an amazing man." She hesitated, unsure of how much to say. "He...knew I loved your son, but he was all right with that. He took me in, took care of me and my family. He loved me although he knew he had only half of my heart." She winced. "Maybe less."

"I knew him as a young man. I'm sorry I did not get to know the man he grew into."

"Before he died, he said he was content. He knew I would be taken care of. Michael left fifty-one percent of the family's concerns to me, with the other part going to his brother and sister." She paused. "Rafe was all right with that. Mary was quite bitter."

"Rafe? He was the younger boy? I vaguely recall him as a little scamp always on his brother's heels."

Bella nodded. She hesitated and then said, "He was determined to accompany me to the Ponderosa. That's why Benjamin came, to keep him from doing so."

"Oh? Is there trouble between you?"

She made a face worthy of the eleven-year-old she had been. "Rafe thinks he's in love with me."

The older man smiled. "Thinks?"

She rolled her eyes. "Well, maybe he is. But I'd rather marry a rattler!"

This time Mister Ben laughed. "I see, like my son, that you aren't short on opinions."

Bella laughed too. "I suppose Rafe is all right, but he is so irritating. He won't take 'no' for an answer. I'm surprised he didn't hop on a coach and follow me out here like some lovesick pup!"

As she finished speaking, the door to the ranch house opened. Along with a strong, bitter wind, Candy Canaday, Mister Ben's foreman, blew in. He was covered with dirt and dust and looked exhausted. Candy glanced over his shoulder as he settled on the rug near the door and then turned back.

"There's been a stampede, Mister Cartwright," he announced.

Bella was on her feet instantly. "Benjamin?"

"I'm all right, big sister," Ben announced as he too entered the house. Ben looked like he'd been through a whirlwind, but he was grinning from ear to ear. "I haven't ever seen anything so exciting!"

Candy threw her brother a look. "Kids. 'Exciting' ain't exactly the word I would have used."

"Are the cattle settled?" Joe's father asked.

"Yes, sir." Candy hesitated. "We caught 'em all."

The older man nodded. "And you are both all right?"

Bella saw the foreman and her brother exchange a look. Neither responded.

"Well?" the older man demanded.

"Well, we're fine, sir. Trouble is, there was a man got caught up in all the trouble. He's..."

Benjamin snorted. "He ain't too happy."

From outside there came a voice, pitched high, nearly hysterical and definitely piqued.

"Of all of the impossible, brainless, backwoods idiots that I have been forced to endure on this journey, Mister Canady, I swear you are the worst! It wasn't bad enough that I had to be subjected to the indignity of a bovine making a seat of me, but to be forced to ride on the rear of a ferocious animal..."

Candy sniggered. "Mister Canaday," he repeated, lifting one eyebrow and putting on airs.

There was something about that voice. Something familiar that sent shivers up Bella's back.

Candy was scratching his head. "Sorry, Mister Cartwright. I tried to be accommodating. Seems that city slicker just didn't like ridin' on the tale end of that pack horse."

"City slicker?" Bella blinked.

A tall, lean figure with sandy red hair and brown eyes and brows stepped into the house. His elegant suit was covered with noxious brown stains and there were bits and pieces of branches and leaves in his hair.

Ben Cartwright stepped past her. "Candy, who is this?"

Bella sighed. She gritted her teeth and told him.

"This is Raphael Ashton, Michael's brother." The blonde woman's lips pulled into a thin line. "Rafe," she demanded, "what are you doing here?"

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Joe sat beside Jamie. It was a funny feeling because it was his room and this was the chair Pa usually occupied while he was waiting for him to wake up after something bad had happened. His little brother was scrunched down under the covers. His breathing was even like he was asleep, but Joe wasn't fooled. He'd pulled that one too many times. Jamie was awake.

He just didn't want to talk to him.

Joe closed his eyes. All of his life he'd been, well, what he would have called self-indulgent. It was a hard word and he knew his father would disagree, though Hoss and Adam might have seen it differently. They would have at least smiled and winked at him, knowing they understood what he meant even if that wasn't the word they would have used.

Probably the word they wouldn't have used.

He knew some of it had to do with being the baby in the family. He'd been protected and, probably more than he should have been, allowed to have his way. Adam had told him once that, though their pa had loved Elizabeth and Inger, he had doted on his own ma, Marie. Adam's ma had been his pa's first love and Inger, the companion of his journey out west. His ma, the fiery woman from New Orleans, was their pa's prize. The older man had loved her with a love that was as fierce as she'd been and grieved just as deeply when she died.

Joe knew he was all that was left of Marie. He knew his pa saw her when he looked at him. He always had and nothing was going to change that.

So when, as a little boy, he had pulled the same kind of fits his ma had, pushing a little harder than he should, defying his pa's rules, disobeying orders and such, Pa hadn't tanned his hide but smiled. It wasn't that he was a bad man or spoiled or anything like that, but he had kind of come out of it thinking that the world owed him something. And when it didn't deliver, well...

He just hadn't known what to do about it.

Maybe he should have expected it. The West was a hard mistress. His pa had lost three wives. But somehow, he had thought it would be different. When he married Alice, he had expected to lead a happy life, to have a loving wife and a passel of kids that would call him 'Pa'. He wanted to be 'Pa'. He wanted to be to his children what his father was to him. He'd wanted it so bad that when it didn't happen, he'd dropped the reins and let the team run away.

He still wasn't sure if he had the strength to chase them down.

Joe sighed. He glanced at the figure on the bed and said softly, "Jamie, I know you're awake. I don't blame you for not wanting to look at me, but there's nothing you can do to keep from hearing me. I..." He hesitated. "Sorry ain't enough to say. I wish I knew what was."

There was no motion from the figure on the bed.

He scoffed. "You're not foolin' me. I perfected the 'pretend-you're-asleep-and-they'll-all-go-away' technique, you know?"

Jamie shifted then. He had been laying on his back. Now he was on his left side, facing him.

"You know," Joe said, "it seems this medicine I'd been taking, the one the city Doc gave me, might have made me lose my temper, but you know," his smile was chagrined, "I've been losing my temper for years and those pills had nothing to do with it." Joe shifted. He was still in pain, but he didn't care. He leaned forward and touched the boy, like his pa had always touched him. "There's no excuse for those things I said to you. There's no excuse for treating you like I did." He drew a deep breath and let it out slowly.

This was it.

"Can you forgive me?"

Jamie was staring at him. His blue eyes were open but not quite focused. Joe recognized the effects of one of Doc Martin's 'powders'.

"I ain't sore at you, Joe," he said softly.

"Oh?" Joe pursed his lips. "You oughta be."

The boy frowned. "I know you didn't mean for me to get hurt. It's just..."

"Just what?"

Jamie drew a breath. "You scared me, Joe."

He leaned back in the chair, wincing as his injured shoulder contacted the wood. "You want in on a secret?" As Jamie nodded, he continued, "I scared myself too."

The redhead pulled himself up a little higher on the pillows. Joe noted all the cuts he had on him, most of which were healing pretty well due to Hop Sing's ministrations. Jamie just stared at him for a minute and then said, with words way beyond any wisdom he should have had.

"I forgive you, Joe. But can you forgive yourself?"

He was honest. "I don't know."

Jamie scowled. "How come you're so hard on yourself?"

It was a question he'd asked before. Joe shrugged. "I don't know that either."

The boy was silent a moment and then he said, "You know what Hoss told me?"

Joe's eyes teared. He shook his head.

"He told me that when your mama died, you thought it was your fault."

He stiffened. He had never heard this before. "Go on."

"Hoss said after your pa took you in to say goodbye to your ma, you came to sleep with him in his room. You were just a little kid. He told me he wrapped you in his arms and held you, hoping you'd go to sleep. When you didn't, when you kept crying, he asked you what was wrong." Jamie was looking right at him – through him, maybe. "You said if only you had told your mama not to ride that big black horse, she wouldn't have died. Hoss said you were sure it was your fault. All the bad things aren't your fault, Joe. They just happen." Jamie paused. "Hoss told me something else. Do you want to hear it?"

Joe nodded. Slowly.

"It was just before he died. Hoss and I were sitting in the barn working some leather. Braiding it, you know? I was upset because that filly had died. The pretty one with the dappled nose." Jamie's voice was weakening. He could tell the boy was tired. "I said I didn't understand why she had to die and Hoss told me he didn't know why either, but there was a reason. He was sure of that. 'Jamie,' he said, 'there's a reason and a purpose to everythin'. You hear me, just everythin'! We may never know it this side of Heaven, but I'm sure as shootin' sure there is. You just gotta trust.' " The redhead stopped. He waited until he met his stare. "Joe, you gotta believe that too. You just gotta trust."

Out of the mouths of babes, he thought.

Joe blinked back tears. He nodded.

This time it was Jamie who reached out to touch him.

He really didn't need to. Jamie had touched him already. Deeply.

In his soul.