In the evening, Joe and Hoss regarded their dinner with a sort of weary resignation. It seemed like the only thing Lacy knew how to prepare was a brown something akin in texture to shoe leather. They hadn't eaten lunch, and the simple fact of the matter was that they were hungry, and had nothing to do except for sit and think about how hungry they were, which made it difficult -if not impossible- to ignore.
"I suppose we should count ourselves lucky," Joe remarked, frowning at his plate, "Wherever Candy is right now, I bet he hasn't had a chance to eat anything."
Hoss poked at his dinner, and contemplated not eating it. He didn't feel especially lucky. Whatever was going on with Candy, at least he was doing something. The waiting, the not knowing what was going on beyond these walls, the awareness that the people holding him and his brother captive intended to eventually to kill them was driving him mad. Whatever was happening to Candy, at least he could do something.
Hoss continued to poke the meal listlessly, but Joe looked up at the sound of a horse somewhere outside. He stood up and went to the barred window, which was too high for him to look out of.
"That was Cochise," Joe reported.
"Aw, Joe, you can't know that," Hoss said, even though he knew Cochise's demanding neigh of hunger as well as Joe did, "It could be any horse in town."
"It could be, but it's not," Joe said, not moving away from the window, "I bet that lazy livery owner hasn't done a thing with the horses all day. They're probably hungrier than we are."
Rather than move away, Joe simply turned his back to the wall and sank down to a sitting position while leaning against it. He sighed miserably. Joe had never been any good at waiting. He was impatient, and from his earliest days had been a person of action.
It had been hard work for Hoss, their pa and big brother Adam to break Joe to cattle driving. The boy was always trying to run the cattle. He wasn't content with the animals going the right direction, he wanted them to do it swiftly, and it took a long time for him to understand that running cattle made them lose condition and lowered their value, even aside from the risk of stampeding them or injuring either the cattle or the cowboys herding them. Young Joe would blast into a tight knit group of cattle, scattering them in all directions and then wasting effort and time chasing them all back together. Joe had too much fire in him to manage a cattle drive on his own, his temper and impatience made him disastrous with cattle and cowboys alike.
Though he'd been chasing after and imitating his older brothers from the time he learned to walk, Joe had never managed to emulate Adam's mild disposition or Hoss' genial personality, both of which gave them patience and a certain calmness when they dealt with people and cattle. In the years since Adam left, Joe had mellowed some, but he still sometimes got this blaze in his eyes and seemed to revert back to his old ways.
Hoss remembered when Joe had been training Cochise. Joe had rushed things, wanted to move on too soon from basic gentling to advanced tricks and difficult maneuvers. Cochise was a smart little horse, but even now he had a few bad habits that were the direct result of Joe's impatience. The pinto chewed on his bit pretty incessantly, and he would rear up when drawn to a stop from a canter, and also tended to take nips at any horse that put their head down in front of him when he was bridled. With a little patience and persistence, Joe probably could have cured the behaviors when they first cropped up. After years though, it was probably too late, and Joe never seemed to mind his horse's antics.
Joe and that pony were about as close as two beings of different species could be, and Joe knew the horse's every little quirk. Of course he knew that neigh was Cochise, and that Cochise was hungry.
But he also knew he couldn't do anything about it.
Seeing a dark look coming into his brother's eyes, Hoss decided to try and distract him.
"Hey, Joe, you remember that Christmas Pa went out to get a tree an' his horse pulled up lame?" Hoss inquired.
Joe was silent for a moment, then allowed himself to be distracted, "I remember you and Adam trying to convince me he wasn't really late. I almost believed you when you said he was hunting a wild turkey for Christmas dinner. But the more time went by without him getting back, the wilder your stories got."
Joe had been about eleven or twelve years old at the time and Adam -recently returned from college- had been having trouble reconnecting with his family, Little Joe in particular. He'd felt the need to keep Joe from worrying about their father being late, and had enlisted Hoss' aid. But as the minutes ticked away into hours and his own worry mounted, Adam's concocted stories had become gradually more outlandish. Joe had pretended to believe him, but eventually had slipped out the upstairs window.
He'd gone out to the barn and saddled up his young pinto, who was still mostly wild at that point. Cochise had at the time balked any time pressure was put on his mouth by the bit, but Joe had ridden out on him anyway. He'd always been at his most reckless with horses.
"Pa got home and we were there, Adam an' me," Hoss said, "We didn't even know you'd gone until Pa turned to Adam. 'Adam,' he said in that stern voice of his, 'Where's Joe?' And Adam just turned dead white. He knew. He didn't even look upstairs, went right out and checked the barn for Cochise. Pa was about ready to wup us both for losin' track of you, but first we had to find you."
"I remember," Joe said, "And I remember going up this steep incline and trying to pull Cooch to a stop so I could look around. I yanked him too hard, and he threw me. I rolled all the way down that hill and wound up buried in the snow, unconscious."
That might have been the first time Cochise threw Joe, but it was far from the last. Joe was completely fearless on the back of a horse. He rode too fast, turned to sharp, jumped too high, asked too much. Through it all, Cochise had never turned mean on Joe, not like most horses would. The two of them had a kind of rapport that Hoss believed hadn't really started until that cold winter's night when the half-wild horse had decided not to run back home, an action that had undoubtedly saved Joe's life.
"We'd never have found you if that pinto hadn't gone and stood right next to where you'd landed, just like he'd been tied there," Hoss said, "Pa had been thinkin' he was too much horse for you, but -even though he threw you in the first place- that he stayed with you was enough to win Pa over."
"Cochise has been looking out for me ever since," Joe said, "No matter what trouble I get into."
Outside, the pinto's demanding neigh cleaved the silence of the town in two, a piercing clarion call carried on the icy air. Joe flinched, and closed his eyes, knowing he could do nothing, praying that God would keep Candy safe, and that they would somehow get out of this with their lives.
"That was a good Christmas," Joe said finally.
"Yeah," Hoss agreed, "It sure was."
The red dun mare was one of the nicest horses Candy had ever ridden, though he couldn't much appreciate the sleekness of her red-gold coat or the brilliance of the white blaze on her face, or the silken dark red of her mane, tail and lower legs under the circumstances. At present, rather than her lovely conformation and coloring, he appreciated other traits.
Firstly, she wasn't terribly tall, which had made getting on her back as easy as could be, something Candy needed since it had taken more strength to get up than he'd expected. She'd stood quietly for it, not trying to wander off, which was good because he was in no shape to catch her if she drifted.
She responded to the gentlest touch, and seemed not to resent it if he was clumsy in his cues. She didn't object to the leaden way he sat in the saddle, which he did simply because he had no energy to do anything else. She tolerated it when he wobbled where he sat. She made no attempt to go off her own way, and instead took every instruction with grace. If he failed to give her one, she would pick her own footing without altering the course he'd set her on.
And that was the greatest thing about the mare. Her strides were long, effortless and smooth, whether they were in shallow snow or deep. Candy could barely feel her moving because she kept her back very still as she went along, even in the clear areas where he could let her canter instead of walk. She never changed pace of her own accord, though he supposed she might have if he'd asked her to gallop over rough ground. As it was, she walked, trotted or cantered as he asked it of her.
The mare seemed tireless as she went, and never impatient with her directions, even though she bore a strange rider who had pulled her out of her warm barn to canter about in the cold and snow. Her breath came in great frosty plumes, and she carried herself as if she had great and dignified business somewhere. In short, she was a much fancier horse than he would have expected on seeing the house and barn belonging to Clint Tanner and Laura Kailen.
He understood now their reluctance to send him out on this horse, as she was clearly worth her weight in gold, especially if she could produce foals like herself.
And then he found out that she wouldn't spook. The mare's hooves disturbed a hare that had been hiding in the snow and it bolted suddenly right in front of her. Candy expected her to blow up at the sudden flash of unexpected motion, but her head merely lifted a fraction and her nostrils widened, and then she settled right back down without any intervention from her rider or even a break in stride.
At one point after he'd been riding almost an hour, he fell from the saddle and lost consciousness. He didn't have any means of judging how long he'd been out, but when he woke up he found the mare had stopped the moment her reins dropped to the ground, and stood with her head lowered and back humped against the cold, waiting for him to get up.
"Good girl," Candy managed to say, before weakly climbing back up on the mare's back.
He patted her frequently, not just to praise her, but as a means of keeping himself awake and also to reassure himself in a way. He couldn't quite believe his good fortune in getting this horse, it seemed like a heaven sent gift, and he was afraid of what would happen if he lost it.
But though the mare was a good one, travel was slow, and Candy had to stop more than once to catch his breath and get his bearings. It had been a long ride from Elodie, at least it had felt like the longest one of his life. Snow covered the road, and Candy could never be sure if he was following it or if he'd wandered off at some point because he didn't know this particularly stretch of land very well.
Candy had no way of knowing it, but if he'd just trusted the mare, she would have picked her way to town. Regardless of his business, if Jeff Kailen was going that way at all, he always made at least a brief stop in Dewton, and the mare had learned the habit years ago. She must have found Candy's questionable guidance to be rather interfering, but she held any temper she might've had. She'd been a real spitfire in her youth, but Jeff Kailen had tamed the rebel in her without also breaking her spirit, and with age had come to her a great patience and placid disposition.
But Candy didn't know any of that. He couldn't.
And so because his of doubt, hesitation and fatigue, it took far longer to reach Dewton than it would have otherwise. The early darkness of winter had closed in by the time they rode slowly into Dewton. On his first pass through town, Candy bypassed the sheriff's office and hunted for the telegraph office.
He managed to find the telegraph office on his second pass, but it didn't do him any good. The telegraph office had been closed for the night. Still, he dismounted, left the mare tied to a hitching post and went to knock on the door, just to be sure. He gave up before long, as clearly there was no one inside. He stood leaning against the locked door for a moment, thinking and weighing his options.
Candy preferred to avoid the local law enforcement, because it never went well for him when he talked to sheriffs. They had the annoying tendency to arrest him for things he hadn't done. He was in town riding a horse that wasn't his, carrying a gun belt that had no gun in it, and having no money nor paper of any kind on his person. In short, he looked like someone who'd busted out of jail and was on the run from the law. In a peculiar kind of way, that's exactly what he was.
He didn't much fancy his chances of explaining the peculiarities of his situation.
But his other option wasn't very good either. He could wait for the telegraph office to open. But he had no way of knowing if it was closed for bad weather or just for the night. Possibly it would remain closed indefinitely. Aside from which, he wasn't sure he could survive a night out on the street in his present condition, and he had no money to give him an alternative to that.
Momentarily, he entertained the notion of seeing the town doctor. But Candy knew doctors. If he got near one, they'd prescribe bed rest and hogtie him if they had to. Doctors were often quite serious about their patient's following their instructions. He didn't need some doctor sticking him in a back room and refusing to let anyone talk to him. No time for that sort of nonsense.
He knew that any attempt to make it all the way back to the Ponderosa now would kill him. Noble as that might sound, he knew there was no logic to it, as he had to be alive to relay what he knew. He didn't particularly like the fact that he didn't know much, but he realized that he knew enough. He knew where Hoss and Joe were, and he knew who was holding them. He knew that whatever was going on, it was definitely crooked, as there was no lawful excuse for ordering Candy shot before he even attempted to escape. It wasn't much of a stretch for him to concoct a believable theory as to what was going on, but the plain and simple fact of it was that it didn't really matter. The Cartwright boys were in trouble, and their father needed to know about it. The why didn't matter like the who and where did.
Pushing off the door of the telegraph office, Candy made it to where the red dun mare was waiting. He untied her, but made no attempt to get up on her back. Instead, he simply turned her in the direction of the Dewton sheriff's office and, using her shoulder for support, headed off in that direction.
Let the sheriff lock him up for something he didn't do, just so the knowledge he was carrying got passed to Ben Cartwright. It was all he cared about now.