Thunder Rolls

Chapter Nine

The sun had just started to rise as Callie stood on the porch of the Cartwrights home. She loved sunrises and took every chance she had to watch one. As the sun's rays hit the far horizon the sky turned a bright glowing red and blew a breeze through the air. So engrossed in the picture was she, that Callie jumped three feet in the air as Ben stepped onto the porch and spoke, "Storm's going to be hitting in the next day or so." He threw a smile her way. The smile reached out and wrapped itself around her. Instantly uncomfortable, Callie gave him a quick smile and stepped off the porch.

"So it seems. I guess I should be in preparing breakfast; I just…" she shrugged her shoulders, "Couldn't pass this opportunity up." She kept her eyes on the sunrise before her.

Ben was puzzled. She was enjoying the sunrise; he could see that, but why did she act so nervous all of a sudden? It's not like she was in any danger. "…I sent him there when he was twenty and he did fifteen years." Her words from the night before came back to him. Ben felt his gut instinct start to tell him there was something that needed to be told…like yesterday. He also knew he'd not get the answers by pushing her. "Don't worry about it. Breakfast can wait." He leaned against the pole and kept his eyes on her. "Sunrises are too good to pass up. I remember watching many of them with your father. To be honest, I was more than shocked when you said you were his daughter. You're young enough to be his granddaughter."

Callie found herself turning around and laughing. "I am, aren't I? Well, they say if you play the game you take the chances of paying up. What can I say? I was the one that wasn't supposed to happen." She laughed as a grin that stretched from one end of the Ponderosa to the other came across Ben's face. She sure liked that smile. The moment the thought came into her head, Callie straightened up and excused herself. "Breakfast will become more like lunch if I don't get into that kitchen." She smiled, to be polite, and hurried back into the house.

Ben sighed and looked at the sunrise once more. "Adams you old seadog how about finding a way to get her to tell me what's going on; after all, that Mitchell fellow is still out there. I don't' like the idea that one day he'll show up here and endanger either one of us, and he will show up. My testimony can put him behind bars, bars that she apparently helped put him behind once before, and," he paused and then shook his head, "I have a feeling she's hiding something; something bad." Ben didn't like the idea of Mitchell showing up and harming their new cook and housekeeper. Callie was too good a woman to be hurt by that man. There were deeper feelings niggling at the patriarch, but he shrugged them off as his innate gratitude and the debt he owed Callie for saving his life. Slowly, Ben turned away from the disappearing sunrise and went inside. As he did, he decided to have Adam do some more checking into this Mitchell fellow.

Ben needn't have worried about asking Adam to do any such thing though. Adam, who had just finished wrapping yet another piece of barb wire around a brand new fence post, was one step ahead of him. Unbeknownst to anyone, ever since Adam had seen Tyler Mitchell he had the oddest feeling he'd seen him somewhere before. Only problem was, he hadn't been able to put his finger on it. His thoughts and feeling had only intensified over time. So Adam had already started to check out the man's background.

When his good friend Tom had personally delivered a wire, as he worked on the north pasture fence line, Adam was sure the news must important. He read the telegram; "Tyler Mitchell from Boston. Worked at a bank. Did time for fraud and embezzlement."

Adam slipped the paper in his back pocket and continued to work on the fence line. The words in the telegram the Pinkerton agent had sent him came to his mind, as did a forgotten memory. While in college, Adam had been a customer of the bank Mr. Mitchell had stolen money from. He'd seen the man a thousand times, but always did his business with another clerk. He figured that's why he'd been unable to place him when he first saw Mr. Mitchell; he'd never really associated with the man. The minute the memory was brought up he remembered an article he'd read during the trial. While he could not remember the whole article, Adam remembered the title. "Miss Meribeth C Adams 'Callie' of Boston to testify in the Mitchell Fraud case."

Adam stopped working and wiped the perspiration off his forehead. He wondered how long it would be before Tyler Mitchell found his way to the Ponderosa. And find it was something Adam felt strongly the man would do. He would do it if he ever learned Ben Cartwright had survived the bullets. It was his father's allegation that put Mr. Mitchell's name on a wanted poster now being distributed around the territory. The same thing, his father's word, that would see the man tried in court once more and perhaps sent back to prison, for much longer this time. After all, robbery and attempted murder were much more serious. Adam also wondered if Tyler would he seek revenge against the woman who had a large hand in sending him there in the first place. Remembering how the man had bold faced lied to him in the Carson City jail and the lack of anything ethical or good reflected in the eyes of the criminal, Adam believed the man was indeed capable of hurting an innocent woman.

Adam stiffened and then smiled just a little as he saw his father off in the distance riding Buck while Callie was riding one of their other horses. How come he got the strangest feeling their new "cook and housekeeper" just might not be leaving once Hop Sing got back? These musings and others were interrupted when Hoss and Little Joe rode up. They'd promised their pa they'd help Adam out and neither one of them wanted to face him without having done so.

"I hope they don't ride too long," Hoss said as he followed Adam's gaze and saw what his big brother was looking at.

"I'm sure Callie will have your lunch ready for us by the time we get home," Adam grinned as he went back to work while Hoss shot him a red faced look of annoyance.