YOU'VE GOT A FRIEND
A Laredo/Bonanza crossover story based on the Carole King Song

YOU’VE GOT A FRIEND

by Carole King

When you’re down and troubled
And you need some loving care,
And nothing, nothing is going right
Close your eyes and think of me
And soon I will be there
To brighten up even your darkest night

You just call out my name
And you know wherever I am
I’ll come running to see you again
Winter, spring, summer or fall
All you have to do is call
And I’ll be there
You’ve got a friend

If the sky above you
Grows dark and full of clouds
And that old north wind begins to blow
Keep your head together
And call my name out loud
Soon you’ll hear me knocking at your door

You just call out my name
And you know wherever I am
I’ll come running to see you
Winter, spring, summer or fall
All you have to do is call
And I’ll be there
Ain’t it good to know that you’ve got a friend

When people can be so cold
They’ll hurt you, and desert you
And take your soul if you let them
Oh, but don’t you let them

You just call out my name
And you know wherever I am
I’ll come running to see you again
Winter, spring, summer or fall
All you have to do is call
And I’ll be there
You’ve got a friend

YOU’VE GOT A FRIEND
by the Outrider

The rifle shots came in rapid succession -- more than one man, up on the ridge overlooking the road they‘d been traveling.  There was scant cover close to the road at this spot; rushing for what little there was left Chad and Joe out of each other’s sight.  Joe guessed they’d gotten careless after they’d turned over their two prisoners to the marshals in Ogden.  But why would someone want to ambush them after it was too late to free Washburn and Sully?

From his spot keeping low behind a small boulder, Joe looked around for Chad.  He’d gone left when Joe went right.  He froze when he spotted Chad’s horse headed down the road followed by his.  His own horse was riderless; Chad’s wasn’t.  Chad was slumped in the saddle, his head low over the horse’s neck, not shooting.  And now the men above seemed to be directing their fire at Chad, maybe hoping to finish him off while he was an easy target.

Joe emptied his rifle, keeping the men cautious long enough for the horse to carry Chad into the cover of the far trees.  The men returned the fire, keeping Joe pinned, unable to follow after his partner.

 When there was a lull, maybe for reloading, Joe ran as though to go after his horse.  Instead he moved around to climb up and get behind the shooters.  But there wasn’t enough cover and one shooter still had some bullets left.  Joe felt a bullet nick his left collarbone and another pierce his left shoulder.  He didn’t have time to think about damage from the bullets; their force sent him skidding in the bad footing of the loose rock on the skree-covered slope.  He ended up on his back with his left ankle wedged between two rocks, twisted at a painful angle.

 When he tried to move the foot, hot pain shot through the ankle.  If it wasn’t broken, something was sure pulled bad.  Either way, he wasn’t running anywhere.  He tried to brace himself on his left arm and use his right hand to work his foot out of the rocks but the left shoulder was so badly damaged it had no strength to support him.  The downward angle he’d landed in made it hard to work with just his right arm.

He lay back to clear his head.  He’d banged it up some in the fall; blood was trickling into his eyes.  Before he could get himself loose, he heard the sound of someone descending fast from the ridge above, dislodging shale as he came.   His revolver had been knocked out of his hand during his fall.  He’d left the empty rifle down below to ease his climb.  Any one coming now would think him helpless.  And they’d be close to right.

Joe carefully took his knife out of its sheath and slipped it out of sight under his right coat sleeve.  But he’d only be able to use it close up.  He wasn’t in a good position for a throw, not a throw strong enough to pierce a winter coat and put the wearer out of action.  Joe hoped whoever it was would want to get close to check him rather than put a bullet in him from a distance.

But his luck just wasn’t running good today.  He braced himself when he heard the hammer pulled back on a revolver, still some distance away. .  All he had left was to play dead as best he could.  And somehow he managed to stay still as a bullet plowed through his left thigh, leaving a trail of bloody fire before it lodged deep near the hip bone.   Only then did the man approach.  But he didn’t bend over to check for a pulse.  Instead he landed a vicious kick on the leg he’d just shot.

As the fierce pain radiated from both the trapped ankle and the bullet wound, Joe was afraid he’d black out.  He had to act now.  As the man knelt down to go through Joe’s pockets, Joe marshaled his remaining strength and lunged at the man, getting a solid grip on the knife as he moved.  He couldn’t reach high enough to get the man in the chest.  But the man had lowered himself enough for Joe to put his knife to the hilt in the man’s belly.

The man was still screaming when Joe lost consciousness.  But Joe’s last thought wasn’t of how hard that man would die, but of what he could do to pull himself together enough to go after the second man.  If that man hadn’t come  to back up his partner, he must be after Chad.  It was Joe’s business to stop him.

Two hours before dusk, consciousness brought back the pain.  Joe breathed deep, letting it wash over him, assessing what he could do and what was beyond him.  His left arm was almost useless, at least it wouldn’t support his weight.  His pants were sodden with the blood flowing slowly from the wound in his left thigh.  His left foot was swelling in his boot.  He knew he’d have to cut the boot off before it cut off his circulation.

The man he’d stabbed was no longer screaming.  Joe looked around. The man was close by, not dead, moaning, maybe unconsciousness.  He held no interest for Joe except that he’d need his knife and it was still sticking in the man’s belly.

First he had to get his foot loose from the rocks.  Using his right arm for support, he raised himself to a sitting position and inched forward.  As his knees bent slightly, his ankle made a painful protest.  The thigh wound responded with a dull throb and a spurt of blood.   He had to use his sleeve to brush the blood from his head wound out of his eyes.

He inched forward until he could grab his left foot with his right hand and lift it free of the rocks.  He ignored the pain until it was free, then stopped to let it wash over him with a half dozen deep breaths.

Using his right arm and leg, he dragged himself over to the dying man.  When he could grab his knife, he freed it with a fierce yank.  The man screamed but much more weakly than when it had gone in.

 The man looked at Joe plaintively, his face pale and sweaty.  “Help me,” he said weakly.

Joe had no pity for him, not with the picture of Chad maybe dying strong in his mind.  “Guess if you’d  wanted my help, you shouldn’t a put that extra bullet in me,” was all he answered.

The man closed his eyes in defeat.

As he sawed through the stiff leather of his boot, Joe asked in an almost conversational tone, “What’d you want with us anyway?  We don’t know no one in Utah or Nevada neither.  Don’t have any enemies outside Texas.  Weren’t carrying nothin’ valuable.”

The man opened his eyes a little, maybe wanting some distraction from his pain.  He spoke slowly,  “Cooper killed my cousin Dan in El Paso four years back.  I was with Dan’s brother in Ogden when you came with your prisoners.  Burke recognized Cooper.  Heard him braggin’ ‘bout putting one over on your Captain with a side trip to Frisco.  Followed you on the train.  Coulda killed you there, but Burke’s got plans for Cooper.  When he heard you were goin’ horseback to Elko, Burke went to fetch his three brothers to cover another road, leaving me ‘n my brother Sam to ambush you if you came this way.  Burke’s got a place nearby.  Like I said, Burke wants some fun with Cooper.  Bet they’ve got him by now.  If you ain’t dead by the time they come this way, they’ll get you too.   And maybe when they see what you’ve done to me, they’ll keep you alive long enough to get some fun outta you.”

And with that, the man had no more strength for talking.

Joe ignored him.  It took all his strength to cut the boot off his swollen foot and then he almost wished he hadn’t.  The boot had been cutting off his blood flow and when it came back the pain was horrendous.  But, he thought philosophically, at least it took his mind off the bullet holes.

Now to get out of here, find his horse and find Chad before the others did.   Standing up was out of the question.  He’d have to drag himself down to the road.

He didn’t have the strength to look for his own revolver, but he managed to reach the other man’s gun where he’d dropped it when Joe stabbed him.

It took him at least half an hour to drag himself down to where he’d left his empty rifle.  And it cost him.  Both his pant leg and shirt were soaked with blood by the time he got to level ground.  The sheepskin lining of his coat had a spreading red stain.  He was exhausted and getting numb, whether from cold or loss of blood he didn’t know.

He saw no sign of his horse.  Joe lay back, rifle in hand and closed his eyes.  He had to think, but everything was so hazy.  He had to get to Chad before the others did.  Warn him if nothing else.  But how?    Last he’d seen his horse, it had been heading east after Chad.  But he didn’t know which direction the others would come from.

Joe decided to head east, figuring if he heard horses, he’d take cover.  But deciding and figuring were not the same as actually doing. His head was pounding.  It was getting harder to make decisions, much less carry them out.

When he heard horses coming his way from the east, he could do nothing but roll down the slope on the down side of the road.  Some coyote brush stopped him about twenty feet down or he might have slid to the bottom, well beyond any chance of making his way back up.

When the two men found the saddled horse loose on the road, they knew it meant serious trouble for the rider.  There was a big storm closing in and a man on foot would never make it the fifteen miles to Elko before it hit.

They checked the saddle bags for some clue as to the rider.  There was paperwork showing extradited prisoners Percy Washburn and Bart Sully had been delivered to two Oregon marshals at a meeting place in Ogden, Utah by Texas Rangers Chad Cooper and Joe Riley.  It appeared the horse belonged to one of the Rangers.  Maybe they were both down somewhere.  But the two men didn’t have time to scour the area for a man on foot.  Dark wasn’t too far off and neither was the storm.  They’d be in trouble themselves if they didn’t make it to Elko before the snow got heavy.  They hoped they’d find the man on the road or maybe riding double with his partner looking for a spooked horse.

They would have missed him but for the dog.  About a half mile from where they found the horse, the dog went  off the side of the road. They could hear him barking a short way down

The sound of the barking dog roused Joe from a hazy half-sleep.  He looked up to see a small black and white dog barking at him.  Not a mean bark, more like he wanted Joe to wake up and play with him.  But never mind the dog’s intent, he could bring the rest of the killers down on him.

He poked at the dog with his empty rifle, hoping to scare him off.  The dog backed up out of reach, but continued to bark.  Joe took the knife out of its sheath.  It was a big knife and a small dog.  It would shut him up sure.  He put his arm back to throw and hesitated.  The dog was leaping up and down in excitement, still barking, apparently thinking Joe was going to throw something for him to chase.  He was an easy target.

And damned if he could do it.

Oh, hell, would someone who’d back shoot a couple of Rangers have a friendly dog like that?  Joe hoped not.

From up on the road, Joe heard a voice calling down to the dog.  “Charles, you got something?”

Well, that decided him.  The scum who were after Chad would never call a dog by a silly name like Charles.  But he kept a firm grip on the knife as someone came down the hill after the dog.  When he saw two dark-haired men approaching; he was sure one of them was Chad coming back with help.  And from the way he was moving, he wasn’t hurt bad at all.  The relief Joe felt let him give into the haze that was clouding his mind.

What the two men saw when they got to the big man lying tangled in the coyote brush wasn’t encouraging.  His bootless left foot was badly swollen, blood covered half his face and soaked his left pant leg.  When they checked under the sheepskin coat, both the shirt and the coat lining were stained with blood.

It was only twenty feet up to the road, but it was steep and slippery with skree and shale.  The man was bigger than both of them and his injuries wouldn’t give him much way to help himself on the way up.  They bandaged up his wounds first, hoping the pressure of the bandages would reduce the blood loss.  With the help of a rope they managed to get him onto the road but it took a while to do it without causing more damage.  They laid him out on a blanket and checked the bandages.  There was some spotting, but the bleeding had slowed considerably despite his having been mostly dragged up that slope.

The younger of the two men used his bandanna and some water to wipe the blood off the big man’s face.  They were relieved to see the head wounds were fairly superficial.  And the water seemed to revive him.

Joe opened his eyes and said, “Chad boy, why’d it take you so long to . . . . “   His voice trailed off in disappointment as he realized the dark-haired man next to him was not his partner.

The man who answered him was just a kid, maybe nineteen or twenty.  “Sorry, we haven’t seen anyone else out here.  We looked at the paperwork in your saddle when we found the horse.  Are you Joe Riley?”

The other man was closer to Joe’s age, at least thirty, maybe older.   “What happened here?  We heard shooting about an hour ago from a distance.  But nothing since then.  You get the shooters?“

It took Joe some effort to form a response.   “Got one.  Think the other went after my partner.  We were ambushed.  Chad was shot but still on his horse.  Headed east.  You should’ve run into him.  He’s bad hurt or he would’ve come back for me. Before he died, the man I killed told me there’s four more on the way.  It‘s Chad they‘re after, but I guess they‘ll be wantin‘ me now too. I need to get moving after him.  He’s hurt and doesn’t know  more’s comin’.”

The two men looked at each other.  It was obvious this Ranger was going nowhere and would be no help to his partner even if he did manage to find him.  He was certainly in no condition to fight off four more killers.  The older of the two decided he should check things out before trying to argue with Joe about what to do next.  “Can you show me just where the man is you killed and where the men were shooting from?  Is there any chance your partner wasn’t as hurt as bad as he let on so he could circle back of the shooters?”

Joe looked hopeful at that thought, then shook it off.  “He would’ve made it up by now.  More likely the shooter went after him.”

The man answered thoughtfully.  “Could be your friend is just as reckless as you.  You think you’re fit to go after him.  Maybe he thought he could get to the shooters who had you pinned and collapsed on the way up.”  The man checked his rifle and revolver.  “No use just guessing.  I need to check that whole area.”  He looked at Joe’s bare head.  “Your hat up there somewhere?  You‘re going to need it.”

 “Hat and revolver.”  He patted the one at his side.  “This one belongs to the man I killed.  Mine‘s better.  Dropped it fallin’.  Shouldn’t be too far above the body. ”    He pointed out the places on the ridge as best he could.

Before the man left, he took another rifle out of his saddle scabbard and handled it to the boy.    “We can hope the coming storm will keep those other four holed up someplace.  But you’d better keep this ready.  You think that fool dog of yours can help me check things out?”

“Just tell him to search.  And take some of this.”  The boy dug in his pocket, took out a couple of strips of jerky and handed them up to the man.  “Go search Charles,” he said as he sent the dog off.  The boy looked at Joe.  He’ll find your hat, the gun too.  And if you’re friend’s anywhere around that ridge, he’ll find him the same as he found you.”

Joe hoped he was right.  “If Chad fell off his horse near the road you came in on, would the dog’ve picked him up?”

“It’s not foolproof.  He can only pick up what the air currents bring him.  But he tends to make little explorations from side to side anyway.  If Chad’s horse was near the edge of the road when he fell off him, it’s real likely Charles would have found him if he’d ended up no further off the road than you were, further if the wind was right.   And we never saw any sign of a horse except yours.  If the horse had been close by, he probably would have been attracted to ours like yours was or Charles would’ve found him.”

Joe had to ask.  “What the hell kind of name is Charles for a dog?  I’ve heard dogs called Charlie."

The boy smiled as he pushed some of his unruly black hair out of his eyes.  The kid had a smile that made Joe think he’d fallen into good company.  “Girl who gave him to me called him Jack.  She was trying to train up him and his sister.  She was good at it too.  She had the little bitch doing anything she wanted.  Said she never ran into a dog as determined to do things his own way as Charles.  She let me give him a try.  I think he just wanted to be a man’s dog.  Or he knew I needed a good dog more than she did right then.  Anyway, he worked for me easy as you please.  She couldn’t figure how I did it.  I told her it was because he wanted respect. that all I had to do was call him Charles.  Mostly I was just putting her on with that, but he’s been Charles ever since.”

“He finds my partner, I’ll call him Mister Charles if he wants.”

“Don’t you do that.  He’d start thinkin’ it was his due and makin’ us all call him that.  He’s demanding enough now.”

Joe knew the boy was running on to take Joe’s mind off his pain and his worry for Chad.  But he had a soothing way about him.   And Joe needed to rest up enough to get back on his horse.

The wind was picking up, bringing a greater chill to the air.  The boy got another blanket out of his bedroll and covered Joe with it then pulled a wool shirt out of Joe’s saddlebag.  While he wrapped it around Joe’s bootless foot, he had a question. “If you two were headed back to Texas, how come you were headed West?  You lost?”

“Not so much we didn’t know West from South.  Chad got it in his head that bein’ so close to Frisco, we needed to take a little side trip and spend a few days there.”

“So close?  Is that some kind of Texas way of lookin’ at things?”  The boy was clearly confused.  “You had a good bit of Utah, all of Nevada and the width of California to cross before you got to San Francisco.  You were crossin’ all that territory on horseback in winter just for a side trip?  Didn’t they ever hear of the Donner Party in Texas?”

“You don’t know Chad.  He’ll work harder at havin’ a good time than he ever would for wages.  He’s sure the two best places in this whole country to have a good time are New Orleans and San Francisco.  Chad was raised in New Orleans so he just had to see Frisco.  We were goin’ by train.  There was a delay near the Utah border. We were kinda tired of trains by then so we bought a coupla horses.  Thought we’d catch the train again round Elko.

While Joe was talking, the boy got a flask out of an inner pocket and offered Joe a drink.  Joe declined.  “It’s gonna be hard enough to stay on my horse.  Don’t think I’d better be drinkin’.”

The boy insisted, “It’s not whiskey just water.  I was keeping it a little warmer inside my coat.  Be better for you than water cold from the canteen.  You drink all you can. Sometimes a man forgets how much he needs water when he's cold.   I can warm up some more.”

Joe wanted it more than he expected.  Drained at least half.

Joe needed to talk to keep his mind off waiting for the other man to come back.  “Where you two headed?  And now I know what to call your dog, what do I call you?”

“Name’s Griff.  My partner’s name is Canaday but everyone calls him Candy.  We just delivered some horses for our boss.  We were headed back to Virginia City when we found your horse.  Glad Charles found you so fast.  With this storm coming on there wasn’t time to do a big search.  We should be able to get you to a doctor in Elko before the storm breaks if we get a move on.”

Joe shook his head.  “I know you two have to move on.  But I need to find Chad.  He’s hurt out there someplace.  You get me on my horse, I’ll take it from there.”

Candy was gone for at least half an hour.  During that time, Joe got from the boy the lay of the land back on the trail they’d come from especially the cross trails Chad’s horse could have carried him down.   There was a good bit to search.  He wondered if he could get the men and the dog to help him.  The boy he thought he could convince.  But his partner he couldn’t read so well.

And while he was thinking how to get help on his search, it finally came to him who was after Chad.   He’d been mulling the names Dan and Burke over in his mind.  But only when he had his mind elsewhere, did their identity come to him.  The Reids.  There were four or five of them.  Burke was the worst.  They were all wanted in Texas for stealing whatever they took a mind to and not worrying if they had to kill someone to do it.  They didn’t specialize, going from stage robbery, horse stealing, cattle rustling and back again. Chad had tried to arrest the youngest in El Paso but the kid had called him out instead.  As Joe remembered it, Chad hadn’t wanted to kill Dan and wouldn’t have except his brother had goaded him into forcing Chad into fight.  He heard they’d taken their business to Utah and Nevada after that.  Leastways, they hadn’t been seen in Texas in a few  years.

By the time the dog came running back to them with Joe‘s hat in his mouth, Joe’s head was clear enough that he could see the grim look on Candy’s face.  But Joe didn’t ask, couldn’t ask.  He just waited for what was coming.

“What’s your partner look like?”

Joe tried to keep his voice steady, “Hair dark like yours.  ‘Bout your height, six foot.  Slim, blue shirt, brown hat, sheepskin coat.”

When Joe saw relief on Candy’s face at that description, he felt the knot go out of his stomach.

The man‘s words confirmed his look.  “Wasn’t him.  There’s a second body up there.  Sandy hair, beefy man.  Got a couple of bullets in him.  Any chance your partner could have put them there?”

“No, he was shootin’ at Chad.  I fired up there, markin’ position  by sound.  Couldn’t see nothin.  Didn’t figure I’d hit anyone.  Guess I got lucky.”

“Guess you did.  We gave a good look up there.  Dog found your revolver.   No one else around.  The wind was coming up from the backside of the ridge.  The dog would have picked up your partner’s scent if he was there.  Only found two horses.   If there were only two men, looks like no one went after your partner and he didn‘t come in the back way.  Maybe he just took cover.”

Joe knew what he meant was, maybe Chad turned tail.  “Chad wouldn’t leave me here less he was hurt so bad he couldn’t make it back.  Just help me on my horse, I need to get lookin’ for him."

Griff and Candy got Joe on the horse, not an easy thing.  He had enough strength in his right arm to hoist himself up, but no way to swing his damaged left leg over the saddle.  His left arm offered no help.  If they hadn’t been there, he wouldn’t have made it.

Candy figured once the Ranger got mounted, especially needing so much help, he’d know he couldn’t do any riding on his own and had no choice but to let them take him to a doctor in Elko.   But he’d figured without knowing how far stubbornness coupled with Joe’s natural srength would take him.  The fact that this badly injured man still had enough strength to sit his horse without help put Candy in a dilemma.   The Ranger was determined to go after his partner.  And even as the strength drained out of his body, he was likely to continue on his fool’s errand until it was too late for him to save himself.

So Candy had a hard choice.  They could help Joe on his search and risk getting them all stranded in the middle of a bad snow storm.  Or they could force him to head for town with them.  That latter course would likely lead to resistance and this big Ranger would be a formidable opponent even in his current condition.  He’d hurt them and worse, hurt himself.  Of course, there was a third option.  They could just ride off and leave the Ranger to keep on his search until he had nothing left and he met the same fate his partner had likely met.

But that last option had to be ruled out.   Candy could tell the boy wouldn’t allow it even if he himself had been able to make that hard choice.  He shouldn’t have left Griff with the Ranger so long.  The boy acted like a hardcase with most people but it was clear he’d let the Ranger get to him.  Griff  admired loyalty and friendship, maybe more so because he didn’t open himself to friendship easily.  Griff was going to help Joe search as long as the Ranger was strong enough to resist any other option.  Candy could see it in his face.

So Candy made a bargain with Joe.  They’d help him search until dark fell in an hour or until the first hint of snowfall, whichever came first.  The dog would help them to cover more ground in an hour than the Joe could cover by himself in four, even if he could last that long.  Joe seemed to accept the reason in that.  If the snow held off, they’d be able to keep to the road all the way to Elko, even in the dark.  If it came sudden and hard instead of coming gradually, this could be a devil’s bargain.  Likely the Ranger had no experience with snow down in the Texas border towns.  He’d have no idea how easy it would be to lose the road in a heavy snow.

They gave it an honest effort, Griff especially.  He ranged out, going down all the side trails with his dog, wearing out his horse probably more than was wise.  But there came a time when it had to stop.  It got dark almost simultaneously with the first sprinkling of snow flakes.  Candy intercepted Griff as he came up from one of the trails.   “You have to help me boy.  We’ve got to head for town.  Can’t wait any longer.  We have to get the Ranger to accept that, even if it means tricking him or forcing him.  Otherwise we have to leave him.”

Griff’s face tightened at that last.   “I’m not leavin’ him.” “Then help me.  While I talk to him, you get a lead rope on his horse.  Then I’ll get the reins away from him.  I’ll lead his horse while you ride close on his right side to stop him from falling.”

So Candy rode close up beside the Ranger, facing him as he came down from a trail that intersected the road on the high side.  He could see the only thing keeping the big man in the saddle was his strong right hand holding onto the saddle horn.   “It’s time Joe.  We might have waited too long.  You’ve done everything you could.  With the help of that dog, we’ve done much more than you could have on your own.  I won’t risk that boy any longer.  We’re heading for town.  Now.”

Joe looked at him bleakly, seeming to understand and accept for a brief moment.  But that acceptance was quickly replaced with fresh determination.  Joe didn’t seem to notice the boy putting the lead rope on his horse, but when Candy tried to take the reins, Joe grabbed his wrist.  The force of his grip left no doubt that had he wanted to, this Ranger still had the strength to break a man’s wrist.  Griff saw what was happening.  He took a little folding knife out of his pocket and cut the leather thongs that attached the reins to the bridle.  As soon as he did that, Joe had no way to control his horse, not with one useless leg.

But as Griff started to lead the horse west on the trail to where he’d tied his own, Joe’s right hand brushed back his coat and moved toward his revolver.  Candy reached over and gently restrained the Ranger’s hand with his own.  “Joe, you gonna shoot that boy there?  You gonna shoot me?”

Joe seemed to search for words as if he was too cold for them to flow naturally.  “Don’t wanta shoot no one.  Just need to keep on.  Not askin’ you to stay.”

Candy looked up at the big Ranger, obviously spent, moving on nothing but loyalty to his partner.  “You’ll die out here if we leave you.  The boy knows it.  He won’t leave without you.  I can’t leave him.  So there we are.  You go with us or shoot us.  Your choice.”

For a moment Candy felt the Ranger’s muscular arm tense under his restraining hand.  Then it relaxed and the hand moved away from the gun.  Candy saw the fight go out of him.  He slouched in the saddle and made no more protest as Griff led the horse away.   But Candy hoped this stubborn Ranger had enough heart still in him to sit his horse for the next fifteen miles.  They had to make good time to beat the worst of the storm.

They made almost ten miles in the two hours before the snow started coming full force.  They’d been able to set a decent pace even with the wind and snow, with Griff riding knee to knee with the Ranger, holding him up at times, just being there to steady him the rest.   They’d spelled their own horses by riding the two dead men's mounts for a couple of hours.   Then they'd taken the saddles off, put the bridles in their own saddle bags and let them go their way.  Not worth the effort to tow them along.  If they followed, they might use them again and so far they had.

When they started to lose the road in the deepening snow, they had to slow to make sure they kept to it.  They lost it twice in open spots where there were no trees to mark the edges of the road.   They were lucky enough to realize the error while they could still get back to the road.  But there came a time when the visibility got so bad there were no clues.  Nothing to distinguish a side trail through an open meadow from the road to town.

The decision on direction was left to Candy and it weighed heavy on him.  A mistake would cost them dearly.  The boy’s concentration was all on keeping the Ranger in his saddle.  If the Ranger even cared where they were going, he gave no sign.

They had to be close unless they’d lost the direction earlier without knowing it and were already a long time lost.  And finally it was the dog again.  He’d been riding on the back of Griff’s horse, resting on the bedroll.  When they stopped, he jumped down and bounded through the snow, seeming sure of his course.  He was light enough that he didn’t sink in too deep, but he’d still get tired if he tried to lead them all the way.  So Candy coaxed the dog up onto his own saddle and followed the path he indicated.  Every time they stopped, the dog jumped down and gave them a direction.  Maybe it was foolish to rely so heavily on a dog but it was all they had to go by.

And finally Candy realized there was a building to his right.  And a light coming from another next to it.  They’d passed buildings on either side without even knowing.  The light was from a saloon where they got directions to the doctor’s office.

It took some heavy pounding on his door to wake the doctor but he seemed competent enough to inspire some confidence once he was fully awake.  They got Joe on the doctor’s operating table where the doctor cut off his clothes and washed out the wounds.   The foot was still badly swollen but the doctor felt it posed the least threat to Joe’s life so he ignored it in favor of tending to the damage the bullets had wreaked.

Candy tried to get Griff to leave, to take the horses to the livery and then get them both some food at the saloon.  The doctor had no morphine and what was going to come next was sure to put the Ranger in considerable pain.  There was no need for the boy to see it.  But Griff was determined to follow it through.  He’d formed some kind of attachment to this Ranger and wouldn’t be dissuaded.  The doctor made it clear he’d need one of them to stay, so in the end Candy took the horses and fetched the food.

He got back for the worst of it and wished he could have spared the boy from it.  The doctor had straps on the table to hold the Ranger’s whole body still, especially the leg.  The left arm had been strapped to his side after the through and through  bullet wound in his shoulder had been cleaned out.  But the Ranger had refused to let them tie his right arm down.  So he was holding onto the knot in a rope tied off to a table leg, the impressive muscles in his arm bunched against the pain the doctor was inflicting.  The boy’s long fingers were curled tight around the Ranger’s fist as he held the rope, maybe mostly to make sure he didn’t let go, but maybe a little for the reassurance of a human contact that didn’t cause pain.

The same abhorrence of helplessness that made him refuse to have his arm tied down, seemed to make the Ranger fight the blessing of unconsciousness.  He  was either too strong or too stubborn to let go.  The doctor had to dig deep for the bullet in his thigh with nothing more to dull the pain than a little laudanum.  Candy couldn’t bear to look at the big Ranger struggle to stay on top of the anguish.  He turned away and busied himself building up the fire in the little woodstove that warmed the room.  But the boy refused to back off or even turn his head away.  He spoke to the Ranger quietly in a reassuring tone Candy recognized as the same one Griff used on horses when he had to stitch a gash or do something else that was likely to cause an unreasoning horse to react with violence.  One of his tricks was to repeat the horse’s name over and over.  Damned if he wasn’t doing the same thing with this Ranger.

Part  Three  JOE

Joe tried to brace himself against the pain.  He knew what was coming.  Wasn’t the first bullet he’d had cut out of him. And at least this time he had a doctor.  Chad had cut out the last one.   Been surprisin’ how a man with such a light touch with women, horses and guns had such a heavy hand when it came to pulling out lead.  So this had to be easier.

But the first few seconds told him his luck hadn’t turned for the good yet.

He’d swallowed the thick bitter liquid the boy held to his lips.  Laudanum he said.  It helped a little at first but he’d have to swallow a bucket full to cut this pain.  It felt like a branding iron going all the way to the bone.  And it just didn’t stop.  What the hell was wrong with this doctor?   Joe knew how it was supposed to go.  Sharp pain in, a little probing, sucking pain as the bullet was pulled out, maybe a couple of stitches then it was over.  But this kept going on and on.  Stabbing, cutting, pain.

His grip tightened around the rope.  He wanted to let go, to hit something, someone.  Stop the pain.  But then there was a hand around his, keeping his fist closed tight.   He struggled against it.  He was stronger.  But then the  voice was in his ear.

Joe barely knew what the voice was saying but his mind kept going away from the pain to the voice.   He heard his name over and over.  “Joe, when you can’t stand it, I’ll make him stop for minute.  Joe, you tell me.  You need to rest, I’ll stop him.  Joe, he’s getting to the bullet.  It’s deep Joe.  But he’ll get it.  Hold tight Joe.”

Knowing he could make the pain stop made it easier.  He let it go on.  And kept his mind focused on the voice.

Finally it stopped.  But it wasn’t over.  The voice told him that.  “He’s got the bullet Joe.  It was real deep, but he’s got it.  Joe, he has to clean the wound.  When you’re ready Joe.”

Joe took a deep breath.  “Do it.”  He was in control.  The voice told him he was in control.  They wouldn’t do anything he didn’t let them do.  It hurt.  But not as much.

Then it stopped.  But it still wasn’t over.  “Joe, got to stitch you back up.  You can’t get back on a horse until you’re all stitched up.”  The voice was matter of fact, but reassuring.   “Joe, you tell us when.  It’s the last thing Joe.”  There was something at his lips again.  “Joe, take some more of this.  It helps.”  He swallowed the bitter liquid.  “Tell us when Joe.”

His hand loosened its grip on the rope.  The boy moved his hand away.  He wiped Joe’s face with a damp cloth.  Joe flexed his cramped fingers.  Then he grabbed hold again.  “Get it over with.”

But acting brave didn’t stop the pain.  It wasn’t bone deep this time, but it was bad.  How much stitching could there be for a little bullet hole?  It went on and on.   Joe concentrated on the voice.  The voice was calm.  It must be all right if the voice was so calm.  And when he was all stitched up he could ride out.  The voice almost said as much.  “Got to have it done right Joe.   Don’t want to have to do it again later.  He’s doin’ a good job Joe.”

And finally it was over, at least for a while.  The doctor was concerned that infection had already started to set in.  He’d cleaned out as much of the damaged tissue as he could.  Lucky they hadn’t been out even longer.  The amount of bleeding the wound had done had weakened the patient but in the end could have served him well by taking most of the contamination with it.  Now they’d just have to wait and see if he rode out the inevitable fever.  Someone would have to stay with him, get him to take liquids whenever he was awake, change the hot compresses on the thigh wound and wake the doctor if there was any change.  The doctor had a spare room he sometimes used as a hospital room.   He wasn’t likely to get any other patients what with the storm now raging at full force outside, so they were welcome to use it as long as it was needed.  He advised them to get a room over at the hotel as well as the hospital room had only one bed.

Candy tried to get Griff to let him take the first watch.  He might as well have tried to move a half ton boulder from the middle of a muddy pasture by kicking it.  So he brought in an upholstered rocker and forced Griff to eat the supper he’d brought over from the saloon.  He left him with a jug of water on the night table and a pot of broth on the back of the little potbellied stove.  Then there was nothing for it but to get some sleep himself so he could take over when the boy finally collapsed from weariness.

Joe finally found Chad’s tracks, boot tracks, not horse tracks.    He tried to hurry up the hill but his bad leg slowed him down.   As he struggled through the snow, falling, getting up, slipping, sliding backwards, moving forward, he found the freshest tracks were filled with blood, frozen blood.  He tried to move faster but his leg just wouldn’t cooperate.  Finally he was barely crawling, using only his right arm and leg.  Soon they were protesting as badly as the bullet ridden left.   He collapsed, rested, went on, repeating that cycle over and over as he slowly progressed up the hill.  Soon he was so numb nothing hurt.  The bloody tracks disappeared at a small mound in the snow.   He tried to dig but with only one good arm and nothing to support himself, it was slow going.  When he hit something that wasn’t snow. he drew back as if he’d been burned.  Yet how could he be surprised?  He’d been tracking Chad.  But that didn’t make it any easier to feel Chad’s coat, the fancy sheepskin one, stiff with ice under the snow.

Joe took a deep breath and forced himself to keep digging.  His worst fear was realized when he uncovered Chad’s face.  His eyes were frozen open, not laughing green brown but black as deep river ice.  Black with accusation.

Joe cried out in his sleep.  He woke up to see the boy hovering over him.  A moment later his head was lifted slightly and there was a cup of cool water at his lips.  He was so hot and thirsty.  He drank until the boy took the cup away.   He wanted more but fell back to sleep before he could ask.

Part Five -- CHAD

It was barely dawn when Myra heard the noise of horse conversation coming from the barn.   When she checked there was a strange horse by the barn door looking like he wanted inside with hers.  He had a saddle, but no rider.  She took him into the barn, unsaddled him and put him into a stall with some hay.

She checked the saddlebags for identification and drew a sharp breath at what she found.  A letter from a Texas Ranger captain, introducing Ranger Chad Cooper to the marshal in Ogden.  Chad Cooper.  Burke must have gotten him like he planned.  They’d purposely set the place for the ambush just a couple of miles away so they’d have a place to bring Cooper afterwards.  But he’d planned to take Cooper alive, have some fun with him before killing him.  So why was the horse here?  They might have thrown Cooper over his dead partner’s horse, but why would this stray have gotten here first?

She decided to take a look around.  It had been snowing all night and promised to start up again soon, but it was clear for the moment.  She saddled up one of her own horses, grabbed her shotgun and rode in the direction of the place where the ambush had been set up.

She didn’t have to go far, probably couldn’t have with the snow so deep.  Less than an eighth of a mile from her barn she found a man sprawled face down in the snow.   There was blood on his pants leg around the calf and when she flipped him over, blood from a wound in his side below the ribs stained his shirt and pants.  She looked at the man’s face.   He matched the description Burke had given her.  This was the man who’d killed Dan, the one man she’d ever had in her life.  She hoped the Ranger was still alive so she could watch Burke kill him slow.

She felt the side of his neck for a pulse.  Weak and irregular but at least he was alive.  She’d keep him that way and maybe even get him conscious so Burke could get to work on him as soon as he and his brothers showed up. ####

For Chad every dream had a separate pain.

First a burning pain under his ribs and the sharp one in his leg, then another.   Things were hazy.  When his head got a little clearer, he tried to go back.  He needed to go back.  They were shooting at Joe.  But the horse kept moving away.  He couldn’t find the reins.  He couldn’t get the horse to turn around.  He couldn’t lift his head from the horse’s neck.

Then the cold, the piercing cold.  He was lost in the cold.  But then the cold was a welcome protector against the burning agony that radiated from his side.  If he just gave into it, there would be no pain.  But he had to fight it.  Joe was counting on him, counting on his gun.

And then there came the fire.  Desert.  He was riding through desert.  A sand storm swirled around him.  He was burning up.  He wanted the cold again.  And finally he got it.  He fell and was buried in cold.  He wanted to surrender to it.  He was supposed to be fighting it, but he forgot why.

Chad finally woke.  At least he thought he was awake.  But he couldn’t move.  He lay with his eyes closed because he couldn’t open them.  He was so hot.  His eyes would melt if he opened them.  He surrendered to the blackness again.

He woke.  This time his head was almost clear.  Not a dream.  But if it wasn’t a dream, he should be able to move.  Finally he realized why he couldn't.  He was tied, spread-eagled on a hard surface.   He opened his eyes and looked around.  A wood stove, a kitchen.  He was lying on a table naked with a thin blanket over him, his wrists and ankles were each held in a noose and tied off tight to a table leg.  There was a rope around his chest that also went around the table; another at his thighs.

His clothes were draped on a chair next to the table on the right.  And under them he could see his gunbelt.  But he had no way to reach it.

He worked at the bindings on his right wrist.  If he could get it free, he could get his gun.  He needed his gun.  If he had the gun, he'd be safe.  Nothing could hurt him if he had his gun.

In order to loosen the noose around his right wrist he had to make some slack.  Doing that forced him to pull the loops around his other limbs unbearably tight.  But it gave him enough give to scrape the knot against the table edge and loosen the noose.  He managed to free his right wrist and then his left.  The struggle brought pain that radiated from his side to his whole body.   The rope around his chest must be knotted under the table.  At least he had no success finding the knot to untie.   Giving up on getting untied, he stretched his arm out to the gun belt.  He could just touch it.  He could run his trigger finger over the familiar pearl handle.  But he wasn’t quite close enough to get a good grip on it.  He might be able to hook his finger under the handle, but if he dropped it, it would be lost.   He inched over.  He was in danger of falling off the table, which with his ankles still tied would mean it would go over with him.   But he had to try.  The gun would set him free.

He reached for the gun again.  Pain shot through him, radiating from his side.  He had to struggle to keep ahead of the darkness.  He rested a moment, trying to control his breathing.  He reached again, ignoring the pain.  He just barely touched the pearl handle again before the pain drove him back, but he’d been close.  He could do it.  He stretched out again and got his fingers around the grip.  He rested there, his arm outstretched, his hand on the butt of the gun.  He could feel its power.  It gave him strength.

He worked the gun slowly out of the holster.  Carefully, a fraction of an inch at a time.  It dropped back once and he almost gave up because the pain of the effort was so intense.  But he started over.  The gun was hope.  The gun was freedom.  It was his life.  But once free, the gun dragged his right arm down and increased the pain coming from the hole in his side.  He couldn’t lift it.  But he wouldn’t drop it.  The weight of the gun would give him power once he had control of it.

He tried to concentrate on using only the muscles of his right arm or the pain might put him out.  If he dropped the gun, it would be gone forever.

Then he heard steps from outside, wherever outside might be.  With a superhuman effort that broke through the pain, he got the gun up and beside him.  He got his hand around it in the familiar grip.  He was safe.  They couldn’t hurt him if he had his gun.

A door opened with a blast of icy air.  At first it felt good against the fever heat and then it made him shake with a deep chill.  Someone approached him.  He struggled to keep his eyes open.  Maybe he should pretend to be asleep and take the man by surprise. But there was no way to hide the gun or the fact that his wrists were unbound.  He had to act now.  As the man came toward him, he brought the gun up to rest on his right thigh.  It was heavy.  He couldn't have held it up.

“Untie me.”  He tried to make his voice sound strong.  “Untie me or you’re a dead man.”

The voice that answered sounded like a boy’s voice, not a man’s.  “Take it easy.  You’ve got a couple of bullets in you that have to come out.  Can’t have you moving while I do it.”

“You left me here tied so I couldn’t get away.”  Chad was so tired.  He didn’t have the strength to argue.  He just wanted to be untied before the gun got too heavy.

“I was just bringing more wood in while the water’s getting to boil.  I wouldn’t have to tie you to keep you from getting away.  You wouldn’t have made it ten feet out the door.”

The man was ignoring the gun.  Didn’t he know he had to obey the gun?  “Untie me” was all Chad could say.  “Untie me.  I have the gun.”

Then the man was beside him holding his wrist, clamping it against his thigh.  Chad couldn’t move the gun.  He struggled against the hand to no avail.  But the man couldn’t make Chad drop the gun.  He had it in his hand, that familiar powerful grip, his finger on the trigger.  If he fired the man would know he was in control.   He pulled the trigger; he heard glass shatter.  But then the gun was wrenched out of his hand.  And someone slapped him.  Hard.

“My father brought that clock from France.   You put a bullet right through the face.  I ought to put another bullet through you or dump you back out in the snow.”  The voice was harsh and pained.

Chad tried to focus on the face behind the voice.   And when he finally did, the relief almost washed away the pain.  It was a woman.  And one young enough for Chad to sweet talk.  She was plain, but not so unattractive  she wouldn’t believe Chad was interested, if making her believe it was to his advantage.  A woman wouldn’t hurt him, not if he could concentrate on making her want to be good to him.

He soon found out that being good to him in his current condition was a very hurtful proposition.  Bullets rarely came out easy even with a good woman like this one trying to spare him pain.

Myra couldn’t believe how careless she’d been.  She’d thought sure Cooper was too far out of it to wake up much less untie himself and get that damn gun she’d left too close to the table.  She wouldn’t underestimate him again.

She buckled the gunbelt around her own waist.  Best way to keep it close.  And it would come in handy if Cooper’s partner came nosing around.   Not that she wanted to kill the partner.  Not if he had nothing to do with killing Dan.  But she’d need to control him until Burke arrived.  Most likely Sam and Eli had already killed the partner as instructed.  They’d been instructed to keep Cooper alive and nevertheless had almost killed him.

Now to do what was needed to keep Cooper alive.   She got out the box of medical supplies that Burke had stolen last year.   Burke kept them here so they’d have someplace in the area to come when one of them got shot.  In Burke’s line of work, someone who could extract bullets was a valuable asset.

She opened the box.  There were two doses of morphine left.  She smiled when she saw it.  Morphine could make it so much easier on him when she got to digging deep for the bullet in his side.  Her smile broadened as she pushed the morphine aside.   Not likely she’d waste it on that bastard.  She’d need boric acid for the infection.  Maybe the willow bark to keep the fever down.  Clean bandages.  She got out her little kit of medical tools.   Then she pulled out a couple of vials of laudanum and weighed them in her hand, trying to figure on whether she’d have to give him the little relief they could afford.  How much pain could Cooper endure without having it push him into a state that would kill him?   She wanted to see.  She wanted to push him right to the edge but she dare not take the chance of pushing him over.

She put the laudanum aside.  She might have to use it.  But not to start.  She wanted to hear him scream when she took those first slices into his flesh.

She was disappointed at first.  She didn’t try to spare him but she couldn’t get him to scream.  The pain was there.  She could see it in the contortions of his face, in the way he strained against the ropes, the sweat that covered his body.  But he gritted his teeth and refused to scream.  So it became a game.  She would give him the laudanum, but only after he screamed.

She dug deep for the bullet in his side.  It was a close thing, avoiding slicing into something vital.  Burke would be mad as hell at Sam and Eli for coming so close to killing this man outright.  An inch further over and he wouldn’t have made it through the night.  The infection might kill him yet.  Looked like they’d tried to knock him off his horse.   But they’d come close to killing him without even accomplishing that.  Even those extra shots they’d taken at his lower leg hadn’t accomplished that.  Could be they were shooting at the horse with those shots.  Fools.

Finally her efforts were rewarded in two ways.  She found the bullet and when she took hold of it and pulled it out, he screamed.

Every time Joe woke up the boy was giving him something, water, tea, broth.   Sometimes he was so hot all he wanted was cool water.  Other times a chill came over him and he needed broth hot as he could take it.  The boy was obliging and usually knew what he wanted.  He seemed to have made Joe his project.

Joe never stayed awake long, but he was starting to be aware of his surroundings.  Small room.  One window covered with a heavy drape to keep out the cold.  A table by the window with a lamp turned down low.  Even in that dim light, Joe could see that the boy was always awake, watching him from the chair by his bed, always ready to give him something to drink.  Several times Candy tried to force the boy to leave and Joe saw him refuse.

But finally Candy took the boy by the arm and led him out.  Candy came back and sat in the boy’s chair.  Joe hadn’t asked what the relationship between the two was.  The boy had referred to them as partners so they weren’t brothers but they weren’t quite equals.  At least Candy seemed to feel responsible for the boy.  And mostly he seemed to be in charge.  Except that he’d told Joe out on the trail that he couldn’t make the boy leave without Joe.

Once they had their big winter coats off, Joe saw Candy had the trappings of a gunfighter.  At least he’d never seen anyone wearing two guns like this man did, who didn’t fancy himself that way.  And he looked sure of himself: capable and always ready to react.  Like a gunfighter.  Or, Joe thought, a Ranger.  The boy didn’t wear a gun at all, but he looked like he could hold his own anyway.  As he drifted off to sleep again, a picture in one of Chad’s books came to mind.  It was one of those poetry books Chad used when he was writing those fancy letters to some girl or another.  It showed a knight and his squire.  That’s what those two reminded him of.  That, or closer to his own experience, a tough, smart coyote in his prime showing  a gangly, adolescent pup how to survive in a tough world.

Finally Joe woke with an almost clear head.  When he opened his eyes, Candy was still there. He got up and brought over a cup of broth.  He lifted Joe’s head up and helped him drink.  He didn’t have the boy’s gentle touch, but Joe had no trouble getting it down.

Joe lay back, but found he didn’t want to drift back to sleep this time.  When Candy saw his eyes were still open, he stayed by the bed.  “You think you could take some real soup?  The doctor said we should try to get some inside you as soon as you stayed awake long enough to take a few spoonfuls.  If you can keep it down, you can have more.”

Joe’s stomach was still working on the broth.   “Later.  You make the boy lie down somewheres?”

“We have a room at the hotel three doors down.  It’s not officially open, but we rousted the clerk who lives in the back long enough for him to give us a key.  There's some locals stranded by the storm stayin' there too.  We won’t be getting any clean sheets or room service but it’s a warm place to stay as long as we keep the woodstove burning.  Griff didn’t want to leave but he fell asleep soon as he lay down.  Can you make do with me for a while?”

Joe nodded.  “Glad you got him to bed.  Never saw anyone so willin' to put himself out for a stranger.  You’ve done more than most would.  But the boy, goes further with him.  Hard to put a finger on it.”

Candy shrugged.  “Griff usually keeps people at a distance.  He’s seen a lot of the worst in men.  But he’s adopted you in some way.  Maybe he sees in your loyalty to your partner the kind of friend he’s always wanted.”

“You’re his friend.  I can see that.”

“But our friendship’s never been tested the way yours has.  We’re not lawmen, just ordinary cowhands.  I hope I measure up if it comes to somethin' hard.”

Joe figured that wouldn't be a problem.  They’d both put themselves at risk to help him look for Chad, an unknown stranger.  He told Candy,  “Should’ve made him go to bed hours ago.  He’s been here all night.  Seemed to be awake most of it.”

“Best of two nights and a day actually,” Candy contradicted gently.  “Couldn’t get him to leave you.  But I think he got some sleep in that chair.  When he’s tending a horse, he has a way of sleeping light.  Wakes up when the horse needs him or shows a restlessness no one else would notice.  I guess he can do it with people too.”

Joe didn’t take offense at being compared to a sick horse, but he was startled at how much time had passed.  “Two nights! I gotta get out a here.”  He managed to sit up against the pain, but when he tried to swing his legs off the bed, the pain in his thigh and ankle combined with a general weakness drove him down even as Candy reached over to force him back.

“It’ll be at least a week before you can even travel by train.  Much longer before you can walk or ride.  That bullet tore a long track in your thigh and it went deep.  Got infected some.  Took some doing to get it out.  You’ve got a lot of stitching holding that leg together.  The doc said it would have been easier with a bank clerk or something.  The muscles in your legs are so well developed won’t take much movement to rip those stitches and open the whole thing up.  The shoulder wound is healing up okay so far but it wouldn’t do to chance getting it infected too. ”

Joe leaned back and closed his eyes.  Two days.  It had already been two days.  Well two days was enough time for healing.  “Candy, get the doc.  Tell him to find some way to bandage me up so I can ride.  I’m headed out.  Can't wait a week.”

Candy went over to the window and drew back the heavy drapes, adding some chill to the air in the room.  “Take a look Joe.”  It was light out but the air was so thick with snow, Joe couldn’t see across the narrow street to the buildings on the other side.

Candy came back to Joe’s bedside.  “It broke for a few hours yesterday morning but started back up in the afternoon.  No one’s going anywhere until it passes completely.  Can't even think about trying to find a way to get movin' til this storm quits.

“Chad’s out there.  He can’t wait for the storm to quit.”

Candy sat down in the bedside chair.  “Joe, if Chad’s still alive its because his horse carried him to shelter somewhere.  If that’s what happened, he may be all right.  If not . . . .”  There was no point finishing that thought.  “Either way, you need to get your strength back before you can help anyone.  So lets see if we can get some of this soup down you.”

Joe turned his head away and closed his eyes.  He just wanted to go back to sleep.  But his mind was too unsettled to sleep right away so he pretended.  Two nights – Chad had been out in that storm for two nights.  His mind kept playing that thought over and over until he finally did sleep.

When he woke, Griff was back.  As soon as he saw Joe was awake, he got up and put some pillows behind him and helped him sit up a little.  He ladled out something from a pot on the stove.  He grabbed a spoon and sat himself as gently as he could on the bed, facing Joe.  “Let’s see how much of this soup you can get down.”

Joe shook his head and turned away, still too disheartened to feel like eating.  But the boy wasn’t as easy to resist as Candy had been.  “It’s real soup this time.  Not just broth.  There’s real pieces of meat in here.  Doc said you could have a cup now.  See how it stays down.   Then more in half an hour.”

As Joe continued to lie there with his head turned away, Griff just became more insistent.  “There was a time in my life I would have killed for this cup of soup.  I’m not moving until you eat it.”

Joe turned to look into the steady gaze of the boy’s blue-gray eyes and gave up resistance.  He couldn’t give him any trouble.  This boy had put his life at risk to help Joe search. Then he’d tended him for two nights and a day.  Joe didn't have the will to refuse him.  He held out his hand for the cup.

Candy watched the little interchange from the doorway.   He saw the look exchanged between the boy and the Ranger.   The Ranger had just given himself over to the boy was how he saw it.  He’d seen it before with Griff, watching him work those willful, hard-headed mustangs.  A horse might not be actively fighting the boy, but with every movement show he was just waiting his chance.  But even as Candy watched Griff talk to the horse, he’d see the horse bend to the boy’s will.  Suddenly the horse was no longer just obeying Griff, he was giving himself over to him.  This looked the same.  This Ranger had a will only to get on his horse and continue his search for his partner.  But he was too weak to do it or to focus on the steps necessary to make him fit to do it.  So he’d let the boy do it for him.  The boy was in charge.  At least until the Ranger got strong enough to assert his own will again.

Candy decided not to interrupt.  As Griff smiled and put the soup cup in Joe’s hand, Candy left to go back to the saloon, the only place still open in town.  A lot of the townfolk and some outsiders caught by the storm, were there waiting it out.  He’d started to map out the places the other Ranger’s horse could have headed for shelter.  He might as well finish.  He knew they’d be out looking soon as the storm blew itself out.  The boy would insist on it and truth to tell, he’d have done it on his own if need be, small as the chance was that the other Ranger had survived both the bullets and the storm.   Maybe the Ranger’s determination had infected him almost as much as it had the boy.

Joe drained the liquid from the cup and what little pieces of the meat and vegetables came with it.  Then Griff held the cup while Joe spooned out the rest.  Once the food hit his stomach, Joe realized he was ravenous.  That little cup was hardly a start for someone used to eating as hardy as a Ranger.

“When can I have more?  Can’t say, I’d kill for it, but I’m a lot hungrier than I thought.”

“Doctor said half an hour.  Course, I don’t have a watch.  We’ll just wait long enough to make sure it stays down.”

Griff put the cup and spoon on the little table by the bed and sat down in the chair he’d already spent so many hours in.  “You want  to get some more sleep?”

“Hell no.  Accordin’ to your partner, I’ve been sleepin’ for goin' on two days.  Maybe if we talked that half hour would go faster."

Griff pulled the chair closer to the bed.  "I reckon talkin' would be more fun than watchin' you sleep."

 "You put yourself out considerable for me; stood up to your partner even.  Why is that?”

Candy was just as willin' to help.”  Griff was a little defensive, as though he was afraid Joe didn’t think the best of his friend.  "He's just more sensible."

Joe hastened to set him straight.  “Wasn’t for Candy’s good sense, I’d likely died out there.  Maybe dragged you with me.  I know that now, but I came close to drawin’ my gun on you."

“You wouldn’t have shot me.”  Griff spoke with absolute conviction.

“You didn’t know that. I’ve shot a lot of men.  Maybe you’re too trustin’.”  Joe knew from what Candy had told him that he wasn’t.

Griff said as much.  “Not hardly.  But you knew we were helping you.  A man like you wasn’t gonna to shoot someone tryin’ to help him.”

Joe knew he’d never have pulled the trigger.  “Guess I thought to bluff you.  Candy called me on it.   But you would’ve done the same thing if it’d been your partner out there.”

The boy nodded. “And if you’d come along, you’d have helped me.”  He paused and said more softly.  “And maybe you would’ve pulled me off when to stay would’ve killed me.”

Joe saw the truth in that.

Griff seemed anxious that Joe admit they’d done right.  “You see that don’t you?”

Joe wanted to reassure him.  “You’re right.  I’d most likely have brought you in.  Seein’ how weak I am now, even after all you’ve done,  I couldn’t have helped Chad, specially with him being wounded too.”

Griff looked relieved, until he saw the reservation in Joe’s face.  “But. . . ?”

“Man like Chad doesn’t deserve to die alone,” Joe said almost to himself.

She took a long look at the man lying naked on the bed.  She’d fixed him good.  Enough she thought so he’d live to beg Burke to kill him fast instead of dragging it out.  She sat there taking pleasure in thinking of the ways Burke would savage him.  He was a good looking man, probably never had trouble finding a girl.  Six foot tall at least.  Dark hair.  Handsome face.  Slim body.  The kind of man who'd never give her a second look.  But he’d be looking at her soon.  Thinking maybe a woman would take pity on him and end his misery.  He’d be so wrong. She wondered what color those entreating eyes would be.  When he’d opened them before she couldn’t tell if they were green or brown.  Maybe she’d never know for sure.  Burke might burn them out before she could really see them.  She hoped not.  The begging would be most interesting coming from those eyes.

She took his right hand in both of hers.  He had long graceful fingers for a man.  She could visualize them wrapped lovingly around the gun he’d used to kill Dan.  The hand wasn’t soft, but it wasn’t a working man’s hand.  Probably always wore those black gloves he’d had on under the big fur-lined ones.  He’d want to keep his hands from getting too rough.  Keep them nice for caressing whatever woman was handy.  Burke told her that only an hour after killing Dan he’d been in a saloon drinking beer with two woman draped over him and an hour after that he was in a bed with at least one of them, maybe both.  He’d thought nothing more of killing Dan than swatting a fly.

She ran her thumb and index finger lovingly down the length of his trigger finger.  She brought the tip to her lips.  This was the one Burke would lop off first.  She’d watch him struggle as one of the other brothers held his wrist down on the table, his other fingers curled under as Burke brought her meat cleaver down on the finger that had pulled the trigger on her man.

Then maybe Burke would go to work on that pretty face.  Burke hated men who attracted women he had to take by force.  She brushed the dark, sweat-soaked hair off the man’s forehead where there was a small scar that looked like it might have been there since childhood.   She ran her fingers over the fine cheekbones to the cleft in the chin, wondering if Burke would use  those little cigars he enjoyed burning into bare skin.  He’d disfigure this man’s face then force him to look into her mirror so he’d know no woman would ever look at him again.

He used those cigars on her sometimes if she wasn’t moving fast enough to suit him or just when he felt like reminding her who was head man.  Dan had smoked those same little cigars but he’d never used them against her unless she really deserved it.  Once when she talked back to him; another time when she’d spilled hot coffee on him.  And he just poked them at her in reprimand.  Burke liked to grab her wrist and hold the burning cigar to her flesh until she screamed.   She hated him for that, but she’d stop hating him for a while when he held those same burning cigars to this man’s face and made him scream.

She ran her hands down the lean muscles of his arms, expecting that’s where Burke would use his razor sharp little pocket knife.  He’d make delicate patterns of blood as he cut fine slices in those arms like filleting a fish.  She stroked the firm musculature of his smooth chest.  An empty canvas suitable for patterns of blood.   She looked closer.  Not quite empty actually:  This man’s body bore a few scars as evidence of prior gun battles.  Other men he’d cut down who’d gotten a shot back before dying.

As she moved her hands down his ribs and flat stomach she prodded the spot where she’d removed the bullet, satisfied to hear him cry out with the pain even in his fever sleep.

As she moved her hands down to his slender hips she took in how well proportioned he was.  Everywhere.  And that gave her an idea.  When she was twelve and thirteen, before her father had taken ill, she’d helped him geld the young colts off the range.  They’d recovered quickly enough.  She was sure the same thing could be done to a man without killing him, just making him wish he was dead.  Maybe she should do that even before Burke showed up.  He might be pleased with her.   And just maybe the idea of it would bother him enough that  he’d leave her alone this time.

Burke and his brothers didn’t come by more than every few months, usually when there was a bullet to pull out of one of them.  They ate all her food, treated her house like a pigsty and sat around drinking for a week.   And Burke expected her to give him what she’d only wanted to give to Dan.  He hadn’t bothered her while Dan was alive.  But on his first visit after Dan’s death, on the very day he’d informed her of that death, he’d gestured with his thumb toward her bedroom.  She’d tried to argue that he should have respect for his dead brother’s woman.  But he’d merely unbuckled his belt and pushed her onto the bed.  And when she’d tried to fight him off, he’d used the buckle end of the belt on her.

She’d never fought him again, just submitted.  Burke wasn’t one to care whether a woman felt pleasure or pain so long as he got what he wanted.  She wondered if this man lying here helpless cared about things like that.  She could make it so he’d never have reason to care again.

She took out the instruments she’d used to remove the bullet.  She honed the little knife until it was razor sharp.  She ran the edge ever so lightly down his thigh, rewarded with a little line of oozing blood and a restless moan.  She could do it now, so easy.

But she dare not do it while there was any chance it would kill him.  Burke wanted to take his own pleasure with this man’s death.  So she would wait.  Wait until he was stronger, conscious, until he’d know exactly what she was doing.

So she put away her instruments and worked at bringing the killer’s fever down.  She got water into him every time he was conscious enough to swallow it.  And she bathed his face and lay cool compresses on his forehead.  Just like she cared.

Joe was still hungry, but the half hour wasn’t near over.

The boy tried to keep him talking.  “Tell me about being a Ranger.”

Joe knew he was just trying to distract him, but that was okay.  He wanted to be distracted.  And the boy deserved to know something about him.

“Been a Ranger over twelve years now, longer than most I guess.   Lot of border to patrol, lot of places we’re the only law folks ever see.  Rangers can’t be family men like a town sheriff might be.  No way to have a family.  Usually comes to a place a Ranger has to decide to quit and get married or see his girl leave him for a man who will.  Far as Chad’s concerned, that’s an advantage to bein’ a Ranger.  I sorta have somethin’ starting with a real special girl, leastways I’d like to get somethin’ started.  But I haven’t really thought things through.  Being a Ranger’s most all I know.”

“This girl.  She wouldn’t understand?”

“Well, she’s an understandin’ sort of woman.  One thing different about her, she’s got her own life.  Like maybe she’s not waitin’ for some man to be responsible for everythin'.  But she ain't ready to call Texas home.  Can’t see her wantin’ to throw in with a Ranger.”

“So what’s it take to be a Ranger?”

“Just be able to shoot and ride mostly.  An’ not be wanted in Texas, leastways not for somethin’ real serious.  We have men who joined to maybe avoid a little jail time.”

“You take men who’ve been in prison?”

“Sure.  If they’ve served their time.  Or sometimes they join the Rangers stead of doin’ time.   Chad 'n me have another partner back in Laredo who committed bout every crime on the books before joinin’ up.  Now he’s the most cantankerous, self-righteous pain in the neck ‘bout followin’ orders you ever did see.

“You’ve got criminals in the Rangers?”

“Guess we think of ‘em as former criminals.  A Ranger caught committin’ crimes though, he's got real trouble.”

“Prior sins  forgiven, new sins not,” the boy filled in.

Joe nodded.

“So Rangers have to be good with a gun.  A lot of former gunfighters?”

“Some.  Not most.  I’m not a fast gun, not like Chad.   He’s fast and he hits who he draws on.  But I’ve never seen ‘im go out lookin’ for a gunfight.  I wasn’t there when he killed that man, but I can tell you it was a fair fight.  Man called out the wrong Ranger.  Me, I’m someone who’s better at taking time for a good aim.  Then I usually hit what I’m aimin’ at.  I  have a feel for gaugin’ the wind, things like that.”

Joe didn’t want to talk about Rangers any more.   Just reminded him he’d let down his partner.   “So what’s yer story boy?  How’d you get to feelin’ so responsible for strangers.  You’ve had a pretty tough life just bein’ responsible for yourself if there were times you woulda killed for soup like you just gave me.  I mean, it tasted fine to me after nothin’ but water and broth for two days but it weren’t worth killing over less you were starvin’.”

Joe saw the boy’s face close up a little so he backed off.  “Sorry boy, none a my business.  Guess I just wanted to talk ‘bout somethin’ to take my mind off things.  Say, where’s that dog a yours keepin' hisself?”

The boy’s face opened up at mention of his dog.  He pointed to the closed door.  “Just on the other side of that door waitin’ for me.  Doc didn’t want him in here.  Worried about that wound of yours getting dirty I guess.”

Joe smiled.  “Do me good to see ‘im.”

Griff got up and opened the door.  “Quiet now,” he said as the little border collie came in the room wriggling all around in happiness at being released from his banishment.  As Griff sat back in his chair, the dog jumped into his lap and pushed his head against the boy’s hand, demanding to be petted.  The boy obliged.

 “He’s supposed to be a herding dog and he’s pretty decent at herding horses but mostly he’s just handy to have around.  He can find things, fetch things, keep watch when we’re camped at night.  And I want you to know, he’s not all that much of a tracking dog, but he’s real good at finding people by airscent.  If your friend had been anywhere downwind of Charles, I’m sure he would’ve found him.  He found you fast enough.”

Joe wanted to have the same confidence in the dog the boy had.  The dog had found him right enough.  And his hat and gun.  “So knowin’ how your dog searches and knowin’ you never saw Chad on the trail, you have any ideas ‘bout where Chad might be?”

“How good a horse was he on?”

“We just bought ‘em when we got off the train.  They’re sturdy enough.  But don’t know much ‘bout their character like we do our own.  Can’t predict what that horse would’ve done under gunfire.  They were shootin’ at Chad; bullets were spraying ‘round the horse.  Might’ve panicked.”

Griff thought a moment.  “Well, if the horse was anxious enough about the gunfire, he might have gone a long way before slowing down.  I’d guess you two have a lot of practice sleeping in the saddle.  So even unconscious, your friend might naturally have stayed on his horse.   If he’d fallen off close by, we would have found him.  Once the horse felt himself safe, he would go looking for a place to be with other horses.  Candy says there’s some ranches in the area within two to five miles of where you were ambushed.  It’s possible Chad’s horse found one.”

Joe was glad the boy sounded hopeful about Chad being alive.   Then he thought of something else,  “The man I killed said they had a place nearby.  Maybe Candy could find out about some abandoned place out there.  Needs to be checked before the rest of the Reids have a chance to get here.”

“Candy’s making a map with all the possible places on it.  Soon as the storm lets up, we’re going to check them all out.”  Griff must have read Joe’s look.  “No, you won’t be goin’.  You’d just slow us down.”

Joe wasn’t ready to accept that, but he didn’t argue.  He had another worry though.  “Don’t want you two running into the Reids.  I guess your partner is some kind of gunfighter but even so there’s four of them.”

“What makes you think Candy’s a gunfighter?”  The boy seemed astonished at the thought.

“Never saw a man with two guns who wasn’t ‘cept maybe a couple who just want folks to think they’re tough.  Your partner doesn’t seem like the kind to be doing things just to look tough.”

Griff smiled a little.  “Candy doesn’t usually carry two guns. He borrowed that second holster from a friend who’s left handed.  I can’t carry a gun.  Candy figured if we got into trouble somewhere, he didn’t want to have to nursemaid me.  So he’s got an extra gun he can toss me.”

Joe raised an eyebrow at that, but didn’t ask the obvious question.

But Griff knew the question was out there.  “You might as well know.  I’m on parole.  Haven't been out of prison too long.”  The boy looked at Joe as though defying him to show a negative reaction but hoping he wouldn’t.

Joe tried to hide his surprise.  He was shocked, but not the way Griff expected.  What could this good-hearted kid have done to warrant prison?  But he didn’t want to pry.   Instead he said, “Think I could have more soup now?  What I got before’s soaked up good.”

The boy grinned. “If you promise not to get me in trouble by throwing it up, I guess we could give it a try.”

He got up and refilled the cup.  He sat down carefully on the bed and held the cup out to him.  Joe reached out, but didn’t immediately take it.  Instead, he wrapped his big hand around the boy’s long fingers as they held the thick porcelain cup.  He let the contact emphasize his words.  “In my job I’ve sent men to prison.  Mostly been real proud of it.  Saved other folks from bein’ preyed on.  But I can’t imagine anyone bein’ proud of putting you in prison.”  He looked  into the boy’s  eyes, forcing him to see how strongly he meant what he said.

“Well, my stepfather was.”  The boy answered with some bitterness.  He reached over with his left hand to support the cup so Joe could take it.   As Joe sipped the contents, the boy continued.  “The law didn’t care how often my stepfather beat me.  But when I’d finally had enough and hammered him with his own pick handle, I ended up in prison.  He was my legal father so the court listened to him.”

Joe could picture the scene.  The boy had a gentleness about him, but a strength too.  A strength that wouldn’t let him be a victim too long.  But he must have been so young.  How had prison not hardened him?

“How old were you boy?”  Joe spoke as gently as he could.

“No quite seventeen.  Got out just after my nineteenth birthday.  Been on parole for a few months.  Don’t like it much, but it’s better that finishing the five years in prison.”

“How’d you get through more than two years in prison without turning mean?”

Griff shook his head.  “You should have seen me the first weeks after I got paroled.  I saw attacks in everything.  Felt like I had to defend every bit of ground with my fist.  I resented everyone except maybe Candy.   Can’t say I trust people easily even now.”

Joe handed Griff the cup he’d drained of most of the liquid, so he could hold it while Joe spooned out the rest.  “You’re not talking about mean.  Angry, maybe a little scared.”  Joe hoped he wouldn’t take offense at that last.

Didn’t appear he did.  “Yeah, I didn’t want to admit it then, but I guess I was scared a lot.  Scared I’d get blamed for something that would get me sent back.  Scared I’d displease the family who had my parole and they’d send me back.  Candy’s mostly my boss at the ranch but I guess when it comes to staying out of prison, I belong to the family he works for.  Don’t get me wrong.  They’re good people, real good.  It’s just . . . “

Joe understood.  “It’s just no man should have that much power over another.  My Captain’s the fairest, best man I know.  But I wouldn’t want even him havin’ that kind of power over me.”

Griff added ruefully, "And if you think it's hard for a Ranger to keep a steady girl, just imagine how  thrilled a girl's father is to have an ex-con come calling, specially one who's still on parole.."

Joe finished off the rest of the soup in short order.  “Think I might get some more without waitin’ another half hour?”  While Griff was at the stove, Joe commented, "When you get off parole, you come down my way and join up with the Rangers.  I was younger than you when I joined."  He added with a smile.  Then you'll have two reasons why you can't get a steady girl."

 As Griff handed him the cup, Joe asked, “I guess you had to cut up my clothes pretty good.  You think you could bring up the spares out of my saddlebags?”

“Sure, as soon as the doctor says you can to put them on.  As long as he has to keep changing those dressings, there’s not much you can put on.  The wool shirt we wrapped around your foot and ankle that night got a little blood on it.  I washed it out some and dried it by the fire.”

“I’d feel better if I had them here.  This storm quits and you two go out lookin’ for Chad, those men could show up here.  Wouldn’t want to face them with nothing on but these wool socks.  I’ll need my guns too.”

“Okay Joe, I’ll bring your clothes and guns if you’ll give me your word you won’t try to get on a horse.”

Joe didn’t answer. The boy nodded.  “That’s what I thought.  You’ll just undo all the doctor’s work.  I guess I’ll have to bring them up when we leave, but not before then.”

“How tall are you boy?”

“Six foot, two there abouts.  But you can’t be thinking my clothes would fit you?”

They both smiled at the comparison between Joe’s bulky muscular build and Griff’s slim lanky body.  Height was about the only thing they had in common.

“Not clothes. I need a crutch.  Maybe you could find one or get one made. You could measure it on yourself is what I was thinking.”

Griff looked over the Ranger’s wounds.  “I can do that.  But don’t see as how a crutch will do you much good.  With that bad shoulder bein’ on the same side as the bad ankle and that stitched up thigh, you got nothing to work the crutch with.  Be awkward workin’ it under the right arm next to the good leg.”

Joe sighed and lay back.  “Got to do the best I can.  And Griff, I know you’re tryin’ to protect me, keepin my clothes.  But I need the guns.  Bring me those at least.”

Griff nodded.  “Can’t see you running out in the snowstorm with nothin’ but your gunbelt.  If it’ll make you feel safer, I’ll bring the guns.  Didn’t want them here while here was some chance the fever would make you mistake me for someone you wanted to shoot.”

Chad had a vague idea about things being done for him.  Cool water held to his lips, cool compresses on his forehead, hot compresses on the hole in his side.  He had a hazy memory of her holding his hand, gently stroking his face and arms.  She was being so sweet to him.  He’d tried not to show how much her cutting out that bullet had hurt him.  He’d tried to make it as easy on her as he could.  That kind of woman would feel real bad about causing a man pain.  A plain woman out here away from things.  Probably didn’t have her own man.  She might be getting notions about him.  He didn’t want to lead her on, but it wouldn’t hurt his situation if she was getting fond of him.

But he had other things on his mind now.  He needed to get back and find Joe.  They’d been shooting at him.  He’d need Chad to back him up.

He looked around for his clothes.  They were neatly laid out on a chair in the corner.  He tried to sit up and was shocked over how hard it was.  He lay there for a minute, needing to catch his breath.   Then instead of sitting up, he inched his legs over to the side of the bed.  His right leg hurt something fierce but it was bearable.  He held on to the bedpost with his left hand as he put his bare feet on the floor.  He pulled himself up to a sitting position and was almost overwhelmed with dizziness.  He sat there taking deep breaths.

He tried to stand, bracing himself against the bed post.  He made it, but his first step saw him crumpled to the floor as his right leg gave out underneath him.   So he stayed down.  He’d get to his clothes that way.  He dragged himself over to the chair.  The shirt and pants were stiff with dried blood but he couldn’t stop to worry about that.  He pulled his boots on over his bare feet.  No time to look for socks.  He pulled on his sheepskin coat.  No gunbelt.  She must have taken it, worried he’d pull another fool stunt while he was feverish.  She’d give it back when she realized he was leaving.  Anyway, his rifle would be on his saddle.

He pulled himself up and this time was careful about his right leg.  Bracing himself on furniture as he moved, he made it from the bedroom to the kitchen door which led outside.  There was a broom leaning against the wall.  He grabbed it and turned it brush up.  Using it as a staff, he made it outside.

It was a clear, cold morning.  He was almost blinded by the sun reflecting off the snow.  Morning.  Morning already.  Joe had been out in this all night.  He had to get moving.  He looked around and was disheartened at how far away the barn was.  His horse must be there.  Maybe the woman would bring it to him.  Maybe she’d even go with him to find Joe.

He was barely aware of it when his boot slipped on the ice.    But suddenly he was flat on his back on the porch.  His head was the last thing to hit with a solid thump.

Part Nine:  JOE & GRIFF

When Joe woke next, Griff was at the little table by the window cleaning Joe’s rifle by the flickering light of the lamp.   Joe’s gunbelt with his revolver was laid out on the bed next to his right hand.  Joe pulled out the gun and checked it.  Clean and loaded.  The boy looked up to the sound of the cylinder spin.  He set the rifle down and walked over to stand by the bed.

“Your clothes are over there.”  He pointed to a second chair by the table.   “After the doctor changes those bandages, I’ll help you get them on.  Your boot, coat, hat, scarf and gloves are still in our room.  I’ve got a crutch made too.   It looks like the snow’s slowing down.  If it’s clear by first light we’ll be heading out.  I guess I won’t have any choice but to bring you those things then, but only if you promise you won’t try to get on a horse and go out yourself.”

Joe didn’t answer.  He didn’t want to lie so he didn’t want to promise.  Griff had no trouble reading this silent evasion.

“I’m not going to leave here at all unless you promise not to follow.  You’ll just undo all the stitches.  The infection hasn’t cleared up yet.  You get it reinfected you could lose that leg, or worse.  Your fever’s down but not gone.  You need to trust us to do the lookin’ for you.  If we have to worry about you it’s gonna slow us down.”  With that he sat down in the bedside chair as though he was going to start a vigil right then.

They were both silent for a few long minutes.  Both stubborn.  Both being protective of someone else.  Joe could see that he’d worried the boy.  For some reason Joe still didn’t fully understand, he’d taken responsibility for Joe’s welfare.  Joe didn’t want to him to hesitate to leave him to look for Chad.  Candy might be willing to go out alone, but it wouldn’t be wise.  And the dog might not work for him as well as for Griff.  And underneath it all, Joe had the feeling it was Griff who would supply the driving force to push them farther, harder than anyone but Joe himself was likely to push.  So Joe gave in first.  He couldn’t have Griff staying behind or even getting so worried he’d be want to come back early.

“Griff, I’ll  promise you this.  Won’t follow you out.  I’ll trust you and Candy to do the same lookin’ I would do.  The only thing that’ll get me on that horse is the Reids forcing my hand in some way.”

Griff looked him in the eye, obviously trying to determine if Joe was just telling him what he wanted to hear or meant what he said.  “Joe, I understand no promise from you would mean anything if you thought lyin’ would help Chad.  I need you to believe you can’t help him by gettin’ out of this bed before the doctor says so.  We need to concentrate on searching, not worryin’ about you.  I swear we won’t leave this area until we find out for sure what happened to Chad.  And Joe, it's a lucky day tomorrow, so maybe we'll find Chad in time for a celebration."

"What's tomorrow, your birthday or somethin'?  Don't think I slept through 'til Christmas."

Griff smiled.  "It's the Winter Solstice.  Sort of like Christmas.  My father used to tease my mother about how the Christians tricked the pagans into celebrating Christmas.  According to him they changed the celebration of Jesus' spring birthday to the time of year when the pagans were celebrating the return of the sun.  They figured  to sort of cash in on the big celebration, maybe help with conversions.   The winter solstice is the shortest day of the year and marks the time when the days start becoming longer.  Sounds lucky to me."

"Well, I was raised by Comanches after my parents died so Christmas wasn't part of most of my childhood anyway.  But you find Chad, I expect we'll both be celebratin' the Winter Solstice here on out."  Joe changed his tone and added a caution.  “No matter what happens, I don’t want you goin’ up against the Reids.  No matter what, even for Chad.”  As Griff stood up, Joe grabbed his wrist.  “Promise.  I want Chad back, but not at the cost of your life, or Candy's.  You understand?”

When Chad woke up he was back in bed.  His clothes were nowhere to be seen.  And worse, his wrist was shackled to the heavy oak bedpost.  With the shackles from his own saddle bag.

The woman came in carrying a bowl of soup.  She put it down on the bedside table and stood over him.  “What did you think you were doing?  You could have died out there if I’d taken any longer to feed my livestock.”

Chad looked up at her with his most winning smile.  “I’m sorry to cause you so much trouble.  I need to get back to my partner.  He’s been out in this all night.  He might be shot.  If you could just saddle my horse and help me get on, I know I could get back to him.  It’s walking on my own feet that’s not so easy.”

She shook her head.  “You’ve been here two nights and a full day.  If your partner was out in this, shot or not, you can forget about him.”

Chad sank back on the pillow, sick as the meaning of her words set in.  He hardly noticed as she fed him a bowl of soup.  And it was only when she was leaving with the empty bowl that he thought to tell her his mind was clear enough that she could unlock the shackles.  But she must not have heard him.  He was still shackled when he fell into a troubled sleep after wearing his mind out running it in circles trying to think of ways Joe might have made it through the storm.

And he was still shackled when he woke up.

Myra wondered how long she could keep that fool Ranger thinking she’d shackled him to protect him from hurting himself.  It would be easier on her if he wasn’t trying to think of ways to escape.  But he couldn’t be gullible enough to buy that gambit for long.  Not unless he was so used to getting his way with women that he’d never suspect his charming smile wasn’t surefire protection from any harm a woman might think to do to him.

Where the hell were Burke and his brothers?

Candy and Griff were on their way by dawn.   Two hours later Joe was riding after them.

Waiting wasn’t Joe’s long suit but he’d intended to keep his promise.   But once again his luck had turned bad and he wasn't going to let it take Griff and Candy down with him.

Candy paid a couple of town boys to keep watch on Joe, fetch him food, keep the woodstove burning, run errands.   And Joe bet they’d been paid to make sure he didn’t get near a horse either.  Tim and Jase were real go-getters.  Ran errands all over town and the surrounding area.  They’d helped Candy map out all the places to check and were obliging about making another map for Joe.  They’d seen the Reids come into the saloon and heard them talking.   And they’d managed to get Joe on his horse and guide him as far as Joe thought it safe for them to ride.  Then he’d sent them back to town.

And once again it was the dog who found Joe.

When Joe saw the black and white dog headed his way through the snow he couldn’t help but think that the only good luck he’d had this week was wrapped up in that little bundle of fur.   He followed the dog back and met Griff and Candy coming his way after the dog.  They rode up on either side of him, both looking grim, Griff looking betrayed as well.

Joe headed off the recriminations.

“Those kids you hired saw Burke with one of his brothers in the saloon.  Came in on the eastbound train, gettin’ supplies before heading out to the Brannon place.  The kids recognized Burke.   The older boy’s been doin’ chores for Myra Brannon for over six years.  Cordin’ to him, Burke had a kid brother Myra told him was her fiancé.   That must be the man Chad killed.  After Dan was killed, Myra told the boys never to come to the house if they saw any of the Reids hanging around.   Said they were trouble, specially without Dan.  I figured you’d be headed for the Brannon place.  Had to warn you.  Kid says he’s seen Burke there with men besides his brothers at times so no tellin' how many there are total.”

Candy nodded.  “We’re warned.  Now you can go back.”

Joe shook his head.  “Could meet them going back.  Burke’s seen me with Chad.  Now I’m on this horse, might as well keep on. And you’ll need another gun.”

Griff rode up closer to Joe.  He reached over and pulled back Joe’s coat where it covered his upper leg.  He looked over at Candy.  “It ain’t bleeding through yet anyway.”

Candy considered.  “We can either try to beat them there or just avoid the Brannon place and hope we don’t run into them.  They probably figure those two cousins will have Chad there waiting for them at her place since you didn't go down the road they were watching.  When he’s not there, they’ll probably head back for the spot they set up the ambush, find the bodies.  Then what?  Figure you both got away and try to track you down on the road to Frisco?  Hole up for a while and then go after you?  Give up?”

Joe had only one answer.  “You had three places you thought most likely for Chad’s horse to carry him.  Brannon’s was one.  We have to get there before the Reids.”

Candy felt trapped.  It was true the Brannon place was one of the most likely places for a horse to have carried a man from the spot where the Rangers were ambushed.  But it was a slim chance at best.  Wasn't likely Chad was alive anywhere.  It was one thing to relieve the Ranger’s mind by checking on the bare possibility his partner was alive.  He didn’t mind running himself into the ground to do it either.  But to risk taking on the Reids?  Likely they’d all get killed for nothing if Burke Reid recognized Joe.  And how could he not?  He'd seen him with Chad and Joe wasn’t exactly a man who melted into a crowd.  So Candy made a quick decision.

“Griff, you’ll take Joe back to Elko by an indirect route.  I’ll check the Brannon place for Chad.  Once you get Joe back, you can meet me at one of the other places on our map.”

Of course Joe spotted the weakness in that plan.  “What if Chad’s there?  How you gonna get him out?  We don’t know what kind of shape he’s in.  What if the Reids catch you alone with him?”

So an hour later, all three of them were at the  treeline above the little valley with the ranch house at its far edge.  It didn’t look like any one had been there since the snowfall.  The only tracks led from the barn to the house.

Instead of going in on the road, they kept inside the treeline and worked their way to the trees closest to the back of the barn.  Candy left the other two behind while he worked his way on foot to the barn, trying to avoid making tracks that could be observed by someone coming in from the road.

There were only three horses in the barn.  Two of them had a rocking B brand, probably B for Brannon.  Candy was honestly surprised to see on the third horse the same double C brand he’d seen on Joe’s horse.  So Chad’s horse was here.  That didn’t mean Chad was; the horse could have wondered in on his own.  But now they’d have to check the house.   Of course, Candy thought, Joe would never have left here without checking it anyway.

By the time he got back to the others, Candy had decided what to do and he wasn’t going to give Joe time to come up with something else.  “Griff, you get Joe and your horses into the barn.  You get up in the loft with a rifle in case we get company before I get back.  You’ve got a good view from there.  I’m going to ride back around and then ride in from the road and go right up to the door.”

Joe started to protest, just as Candy expected.  “Joe, it’s a good bet none of the Reids have been here yet or we'd see tracks.  I just ride right up and say Burke sent me to find out if she knows anything about how the ambush went bad.  Tell her they found three bodies and Cooper’s missing.  She’ll volunteer whatever she knows.  At least I’ll have a chance to look around.”

Joe wasn’t worried that Candy couldn’t handle the woman alone, but he’d feel better if he was at the front window with a rifle in case any of the Reids showed up.  But Candy didn’t want to let the woman know he wasn’t alone until he'd found out whether Chad was there.  Joe was in no position to argue.

As Candy rode back around through the treeline, Griff and Joe rode their horses into the barn.  Joe was reluctant to let Griff help him dismount because he had no mobility once he was off the horse.  He wouldn’t even be able to remount by himself.  So he stayed on the horse while Griff kept watch from the loft.

Part Twelve -- Candy

Candy rode right up to the house from the road.  He was going to tie the horse up by the porch, but realized if any of the Reids rode up, seeing a strange horse would make them cautious.  He’d seen someone watching him through the window.  She might as well watch him put his horse in the barn as if he had every right to do it.

When he made his way by foot back to the house, the woman greeted him on the porch with a shotgun at ready.  He pretended to ignore it.  He tipped his hat and mounted the first step.  “Ma’am, Miss Brannon, Burke sent me.  There’s been a hitch in his plans.  We rode by the spot where his cousins were supposed to ambush those Rangers.   Found three bodies.  Both his cousins, Cooper’s Ranger partner.  But no Cooper.  They’re all out looking for him.  They want to make sure he’s dead.”

She looked at him warily.  “You must be Tom Bradley.”

Candy thought fast and decided not to risk falling for a trick.  Man like Burke probably had cohorts come and go.  Maybe there was a Tom Bradley, maybe not.   “No ma’am, name’s Kennedy.  Brent Kennedy.   I was recruited to help with some big plans Burke had but this Cooper thing has put them on hold.   This revenge thing isn’t puttin’ any money in my pocket, so if you’ve heard any news of another body being found around here somewheres I’ll go let Burke know so we can get moving.”

She stepped aside and let him into the kitchen.  Looked like she’d decided to trust him for the moment, although she didn’t let go of the shotgun.  And she was wearing a gunbelt with a revolver in the holster.  She kept a nervous distance, not letting him get close enough to grab either.

Candy gestured toward the pot on the cookstove.  “Mind if I pour myself some coffee?”

She shrugged her indifference.  Candy saw a pot of soup on the stove when he poured the coffee.  There were two bowls on the table.  And a meat cleaver.

Candy sat down and put his feet up on a chair as if he owned the place.  “So you heard anything?”

She sat down opposite him, keeping her finger near the trigger of the shotgun  she laid in front of her at the table.  “You know where Burke is now?  Can you bring him here?”

"Sure, but he probably won’t come until he finds Cooper’s body.”

“Tell him Cooper’s here.  All ready for him.”  She sounded proud and a little impatient.

“Dead?”  Despite the fact that he’d meant it when he’d promised Joe they’d keep searching until they found Cooper, Candy had never really expected to find him alive.

“No.  He was close to it when I found him.  But I saved him for Burke.  It would have been too easy to let him die.”

“Where you keeping him?”

There were two closed doors on the far side of the kitchen.  She gestured toward the one on the right.  As Candy got up and walked toward the door, she raised the shotgun.  “No need to go in there and let him know he’s being held prisoner.  Easier to keep him quiet this way.”

Candy looked at her in mild astonishment.  “You telling me he doesn’t know you’re keeping him for Burke?”

“No, he thinks I’m just nursing him back to health.  He was hurt pretty bad so he couldn’t have caused much trouble anyway.”

“That must be hard on you, considering how much you must hate him.”

“Not so bad.  I just concentrated on imagining what Burke’s going to do to him.”  She picked up the meat cleaver from the table.  I’ve spent some time sharpening this.  Burke said he’d take his trigger finger first.”

Candy gave an involuntary shudder.  But his reaction to the meat cleaver was nothing compared to what came next.

She picked up a little scalpel type knife he hadn’t noticed before.  “This is what I’m looking forward to.”

“Doesn’t look like much of a knife.”

“You’d be surprised how small a knife you need to castrate a man if it’s sharp enough.”

Candy flinched outwardly, but she laughed softly, seeming to enjoy his reaction.

“I won’t let on he’s a prisoner.  But I need to see him.  You know how Burke is.  He’ll want to know I’ve seen him alive.”

Of course, Candy had no idea how Burke was, but apparently, he’d hit on something because she agreed.

She let Candy open the door into the bedroom where he saw a slim, dark-haired man apparently asleep on a large oak four-poster bed.  To his surprise, the man’s wrist was shackled to one of the sturdy oak posts.  Candy would have liked to let Cooper know they were there, but the woman was too close.  She gestured for him to close the door.

“I thought you said he didn’t know he was a prisoner.  You’ve got him shackled.  Is he so close to dead he hasn't noticed?”

This comment sparked an outright grin.  “While he was still delirious with fever, he tried to go out and find his partner, the one Eli and Sam killed.  Slipped on the ice and banged his head.  I just told him I was using the shackle to keep him safe in case the fever overtook him again.”

Candy didn’t say anything.  He figured Cooper must have been playing along, letting her think he didn’t know what she was up to.   Now all he had to do was get the two guns away from this woman.  Even if Cooper was still too much out of it to use a gun, he thought two of them in the house and one in the barn could take on half a dozen men if Burke had that many.

He figured to distract her by asking for some soup, this time demanding she get it for him.  She was standing by the window as he moved to sit down again.  But just as he started to demand the soup, she spotted something outside.  Candy hoped Griff hadn’t decided he needed help.

“Looks like a couple of the men are coming in.”

Candy tried to react casually.  “Hope Burke’s  with them.  That would save me one cold ride out to fetch him.”

She looked more closely out the window.  “No, just Mac and Cody.”

While she was still concentrating on the men approaching the house on horseback, Candy moved closer and grabbed her.  He put one arm around her, pinning her arms to her sides.  With the other he covered her mouth, stuffing it with the bandanna he’d taken off his neck.  She fought him hard, harder than he’d expected because she wasn’t a large woman. Much as it went against his nature, the only way he could get her under control as fast as he needed to was to hit her hard in the face.  She didn’t lose consciousness, but most of the fight seemed to go out of her.

He dragged her into the second, smaller bedroom.  He got her arms behind her back and looked around for something to tie her with.  He ended up having to rip wide strips from the sheets, twist them up and use them for ropes.   He tied her securely to the bed.  Once he threw a quilt over her and drew the drapes, someone looking in casually couldn’t tell she was there.

Candy grabbed the revolver she'd been wearing, checked that it was loaded and stuck it into his belt behind his back.  He just had time to grab her shotgun when through the window he saw one of the men ride toward the barn with the other horse in tow.  The second man was walking up the steps.

Candy didn’t want to shoot and alert the man heading for the barn or any others that might be close by.  He'd told her they were all out looking for Cooper.  But it was unlikely they had reason to check out the ambush site before coming here.   He went into the room where Cooper was being held.  Leaving the door partially open, he hid behind it.

He heard the man come in the door shouting for Myra.  "Hey woman, get out here.  Burke wants you to get a big supper going."  The man came to the door where Candy was hiding.  He caught sight of Cooper shackled on the bed.  “Well, what's this?”  As he walked over to the bed to get a closer look, Candy bashed him in the skull with the shotgun.  The man dropped like a stone, falling over Cooper as he went down.

Candy heard a yelp of pain.  When he pulled the man’s limp form off the bed, he saw  Cooper was awake.  Nothing like a two hundred pound weight dropping on a fresh bullet wound to get a man moving.

“You know where she keeps the key to these shackles?”

Cooper didn’t look all too clear in the head.  “Who are you?”

“Friend of Joe’s.  Where’s the key?”

From the look on Cooper’s face, Candy realized he’d probably been told Joe was dead.  “Joe’s alive.  A little shot up but too stubborn to act like it.  Left him in the barn with another friend.  He’s not too mobile at the moment.  We need to get set up before the other two Reids arrive.  They could have others with them.  So where’s the key?”

Cooper still wasn’t thinking too clearly it seemed.  “Just ask her.  She’ll give it to you.  She just put this on because I wandered outside when the fever had control of me.”

Candy shook his head.  He didn’t have time to waste trying to explain things to this deluded Ranger.   The fever must still have him.

He worked the shackle on the post.  The intricate turnings on the post were thicker above the shackle and he couldn’t slide it over the top even if he got Cooper’s wrist up to the top of the post.  The post was as thick as a man’s wrist at its smallest and bigger than a balled fist in others.  He hoped he could find the key so they wouldn’t have to take an ax to it.

He went into the second bedroom and checked the woman’s pockets.  No key.  He took the gag out of her mouth long enough for her to tell him where it was but she just glared at him with hostile eyes.   He knew he could probably force it out of her.  He wouldn’t have hesitated to hit her again.  At least not much, not after seeing the grin on her face as she showed off her little scalpel.  But he didn’t have time.  He trusted that Joe and Griff could take care of the one man headed for the barn, but he needed to make sure.  And he needed to get Joe in here with his rifle to keep guard over Cooper before anyone else joined the party.

There was a wood stacked on the porch.   And an ax she’d been using to split kindling.  He grabbed the ax and went back to Cooper.   He didn’t look too good, but at least he was still awake.   Candy helped him into a sitting position.  “You in any condition to use an ax on this bedpost?”

Cooper nodded, but didn’t seem all too sure.  “No key?”

“Couldn’t find it,” Candy responded briefly.  Then he saw where Cooper was wounded under the ribcage.  Using that ax would be impossible.   There was nothing for it but to have Candy do it.    Damn oak post was tougher than a fresh tree would have been, took a few minutes he didn't want to waste but he couldn't leave Cooper here helpless.  It finally split apart.  Left Cooper with a heavy shackle around his right wrist.  But he didn't look like he be doing any fast draws in his condition anyway.

I’m going out to the barn.  I'll be back with Joe in a few minutes.  He laid the shotgun on the bed next to Cooper.  "Be careful who you shoot with this.  My partner's a tall, slim, dark-haired kid, only nineteen.  Don't be shootin' him."

Cooper nodded.  "Joe's all right?"

Candy grinned.  "If you two used less energy fretting about each other and more energy taking care of yourselves, you'd both be better off.  I'll let you see for yourself in a few minutes."

Part thirteen -- Joe & Griff

Keeping watch from the window in the loft, Griff saw the two men approach on horse back and then split up with one bringing the two horses to the barn.  Griff hastily climbed down.  Joe needed to get off his horse or he'd be seen first thing.  He got Joe concealed in the tack room and managed to get up to the loft again before the man opened the big barn door and brought in the two horses.  They didn't want to shoot him and alert the man in the house.   And they didn't want him shooting either.   Joe might be able to get a clear shot with his knife but they had to make sure the man was one of the Reids first.  Couldn't be killing someone who would turn out to be some visiting neighbor.

Leaning against the door of the tackroom, rifle at ready, Joe stopped the man with a question.  "Where's Burke?  You've got three guns pointed at you.  Your only chance is to tell us."

"You do anything to me, Burke will see you dead."

That was enough for Joe.  No innocent neighbors here.  But he couldn't just kill the man in cold blood even with the silence of his knife.  "Toss the gun toward me and lie down."

The man pulled his revolver out of his holster and tossed it toward Joe.   He started to go down slow, but a split second later he was down fast, with Griff sprawled on top of him.

"What the hell?"  Joe wouldn't have expected Griff to try grandstanding like that.  "The ladder would have been fast enough Griff."

Griff rolled off the man he'd taken down, pulling a second revolver from the man's belt with his right hand as he did so.  "He was goin' for this."

Joe had his eyes on the other man, watching for another move, but something in Griff's voice made him look more closely his way.   The second revolver still in his hand, he was clutching his left shoulder, white with agony.

"Griff boy, what'd you do?"

Griff shook his head.  "I'll be okay in a minute.  Just bruised something I think."

Joe could see that wasn't true.  Griff was talking above serious pain.  Damn.  If he'd broken something, Joe was in no position to help him much.  "Can you get over here and let me look?"

Griff struggled to his feet.  The man on the ground took advantage of the distraction and lunged for the gun he'd tossed in Joe's direction.  Joe was almost glad for the excuse to get rid of a problem.  Practically without thinking, he switched the rifle to his left hand.  With one swift motion he pulled his knife out of his belt where he'd hidden it behind his back and threw it deep into the man's jugular.

Griff looked  startled, but it appeared  to Joe the boy had seen men die violently before, maybe with less reason.   He made his way over to where Joe was keeping his balance braced against the tack room door.  With the boy standing in front of him, Joe unbuttoned Grifff's  coat and shirt and ran his hand up his chest and shoulder.  Griff flinched when he got to the shoulder.  Joe found the problem right away.  It was a familiar one to him.  Usually easily fixed.  Not so easy now.  But it had to be done.  His turn to talk Griff through some pain.

Joe slid to the ground, protecting his left leg and ankle, keeping the leg straight out in front of him.  "Griff lie down  front of my right leg here.  Shoulder's dislocated.  I can fix it.  Done it lots of times for old Reese.  Usually do it standin' but we can do it this way."  As Joe manuevered himself into position, he kept talking.  "Reese he pops his shoulder out regular.  We've all learned to fix him up.  You'll feel better in a minute."  Joe got his right foot braced against Griff's side.  He bent Griff's left arm at the elbow.  "I'm gonna count to five and pop it back."

Joe started counting but didn't wait to five.  On two, he gave a sharp pull and was rewarded when the shoulder popped back in place.  His hand on Griff's chest and shoulder had told him the boy had much better muscle development than his lanky frame suggested.  Better a little surprise so those muscles weren't fighting him when he pulled.  Griff yelped a little and said through his teeth, "what happened to five?"

"I ain't no math genius.  Feel better?"

The color was coming back to Griff's face.  He smiled a little wanly.   "Well, you're probably the only one I could take on in a fight right now.  But it  feels  a lot better.  Think I can handle a rifle at least."

Griff got himself back in the loft using one hand on the ladder with the dead man's gunbelt around his waist.  They didn't figure the parole board would be checking on him here.  Joe tossed him the rifle after he'd made it up.  Joe saw Charles looking down at him.  Amazing.  Griff had told the dog to stay quiet and he had.  If only he could get Reese to listen so good.

Griff had barely gotten himself in position when Candy came in.  He glanced briefly at the dead man.  "Took care of the other one.  But I expect we'll be getting more company soon.  The other one came in shouting for the woman to get a lot of food cooking."  Then he realized what Joe needed to hear.  "Your partner's alive.  A little worse for wear, but looks like he'll be dancing in San Francisco before you are."

Joe leaned against the wall, weak with relief.  But he straightened up fast enough.  They weren't in the clear yet.  "You need to get me in the house before the rest get here.  Griff can cover us from the loft window."  Then to Griff,   "Griff, you stay up there.  You stay quiet if someone comes in with the horses.  No need to take 'em on here.  You think you can shoot ok?"  He headed off Candy's question.  "The kid dislocated his shoulder savin' me from getting shot by our dead friend there.  I popped it back in but it'll be plenty sore for awhile."

They figured the best way to get Joe to the house was on a horse.  Easier than having Candy carry him.  They used the dead man's horse and took the other one for good measure.  That way it would look like Mac and Cody hadn't bothered to put the horses in the barn at all.

Candy cautioned Joe as he helped him off the horse and into the house.  "Don't have time for no big reunions.  Those other men could get here any time."  But Candy figured neither man would rest easy until they'd seen that the other was not at death's door.

And when he opened the bedroom door to find Cooper sprawled on the floor holding the shotgun, he knew he'd been right.  Cooper hadn't waited for him to get back.  Candy headed Joe off as he went in and got Cooper back in the bed.  "He's all right; just got impatient.  Don't know how Texas Rangers got such a big reputation if they're all as danged foolish as you two."

He got Joe over to the bed.  "You see if you can talk some sense into him.  Make him understand he'll get us in trouble if he tries to get out here again.  Surprise is most of we've got going for us.  If he's too feverish to understand, I'm going to shackle him to the bed again."

Joe saw the damage to the bedpost and the shackle around Chad's wrist.  "So the woman was holding him prisoner.   Where is she?"

"Tied up in the other bedroom.  Best I can figure, his horse came in here so she went out looking for him.  Found him where he'd fallen and brought him back here.  Apparently Cooper was so  delirious with fever, he didn't even know he was a prisoner.  Burke and whoever he has with him will probably be here any time unless they actually did ride over to the ambush spot.  But since they can't know it went bad, they'll probably come here.  We'd best get in position."

Joe was listening, but looking at Chad.  "Give me a wet cloth and a cup of water first.  Better for us if he's awake.  Don't want him startled into doin' somethin' foolish."

Candy shook his head,   "Hell, no, wouldn't want one of you doin' somethin' foolish.  Not with all the good sense you've shown so far."  But he fetched the water and then watched Joe revive his friend by gently bathing his face with the cool water.

"Chad boy, best you wake up now.  There's most likely going to be some shootin' and I know you'd hate to miss that."

Candy saw Chad open his eyes and look at his friend.  "You dead too Joe?"

Joe grinned, "Nobody's dead yet Chad.  You need to get yourself together and then just maybe we'll live to see Frisco after all."  He gave him a cup of water which he sucked down greedily.  He took the second one slower.  It seemed to revive him.  At least he looked a little more alert.

"There were two men in here before.  One bashed the other good.   Said he was your friend."

Joe gestured for Candy to come in.  "This is Candy.  He's on our side.  There's another one, he's ..."

Chad interrupted.  "I remember now.  He told me.  Tall kid, don't be shootin' 'im."

Candy smiled.  "Well, even if that's all he remembers, I'll be happy."  He helped Joe arrange pillows and a quilt behind him so Chad could sit up.  Joe put the shotgun across Chad's lap.

"You stay here Chad.  If we need you, we'll come get you.  Understand?"

Chad nodded.

Candy left the room to check the view of the road from  the kichen window with absolutely no faith that Chad would stay put if he got it in his head Joe needed backup.

They didn't have to wait long for things to get started.  Joe spotted two men riding toward the house while they were still some distance off.  He could have just waited until they got in range and picked them off, but he had the same problem he'd had with the man in the barn.  He couldn't shoot without being absolutely sure the men weren't neighbors.  They were still a good distance away.  "Candy, the woman knows Burke.  You think you could persuade her to tell us if these two men are part of his group?  I just can't shoot two strangers.  Wouldn't have a problem with Burke or his brothers.  They're wanted dead or alive in three states.  But I hate to wait until they're shooting as us to figure out who they are."

Candy looked doubtful.  "I guess it's worth a try."  He got the woman out of the bedroom, hands tied.  He tried to treat her gently, but it wasn't likely she'd forget how hard he'd hit her.  "Ma'am, there's two men ridin' up from the road.  We'd like you to tell us who they are."

"You think I'm going to help you.  Cooper's friends?"  She had the coldest, most lifeless eyes Candy had ever seen.

"Ma'am, despite whatever intentions you had, you haven't really done anything more illegal than harboring fugitives.  Whatever the reason you  had for keeping Cooper alive, fact is, you saved his life.  You can choose to help us now and likely you won't face anything from the law."

She looked indecisive.  Then she appeared to have made a choice.  "Let me look."  Candy walked with her to the window.  Joe was between her and the door.  Candy had no reason to anticipate what happened next.  He still had hold of her arm when she threw herself hard against the window glass.  It broke under her weight.  As she fell out she screamed at the approaching men, "Rangers, Cooper and his friends."

The damage was done so Candy let go of her and took up his rifle.  The two men split up, but not before Joe got one.   Candy got off a couple of shots but if he hit the man before he disappeared around the corner of the house, he didn't show any sign.

"Joe, I'm going out the side window in the bedroom.  You keep watch here.  You don't need to get out of that chair."

But Joe couldn't keep good watch on where the man might be up to from the chair.  Using the chair and then the door, he got himself in the door way and then out on the porch.  The woman had disappeared..  When he heard shots from around the side of the house, he held his breath until he saw Candy come around the corner carrying the woman.

"Got that last man.  Thanks to her.  He was hidden behind a couple of cords of wood back there.  She came around there and he must have thought it was one of us.  He turned and fired, exposed his position to me.  Must have been a bitter thing for her, taking her last breath knowing she'd probably saved one of us."

Joe leaned heavily against the post he'd used for support.  Finally he could breath easy.  He and Chad were a little worse for wear, but at least his two new friends were all right.  Griff's shoulder would heal up fine.   It would just keep him away from hard ranch work for awhile.   How much of a hardship could that be?

"Might be best to put her body in the barn Candy.  You can fetch Griff at the same time.  He must be freezing out there."

They both looked toward the barn.  And immediately Joe realized that if it wasn't for bad luck he'd have no luck at all.   There had been more than four men and at least one of them had circled around to the barn.  Probably the same way they'd come in.  Probably following their tracks  Joe had been foolish enough to hope no one would notice.  And he had Griff.

Griff was taller than the man holding the gun to his belly, so neither Joe nor Candy could get a clear shot.  Griff's face bore the marks of a beating.  His hands were tied behind him which had to be painful on the sore shoulder.   The man had his other arm around Griff's throat as he pushed him along, kicking him in the ankle if he stopped moving.  The man brought Griff up close to the house where Joe was barely managing to stand on a porch step by leaning heavily against one of the support posts.   Candy was off to the side of the house where he come up from the back.   He'd put the woman's body down as soon as he'd seen what was happening.  They'd had no choice but to drop their rifles and gunbelts.  But Candy still had Chad's revolver stuck in the belt behind his back so they knew if Joe could distract the man and give Candy a chance for a shot, he could take it.

The man didn't seem to be worried about them.  He just wanted Chad.

“You got the count of ten to have Cooper out here.  If he ain’t here by then, this one gets it in the belly.”

“One."  He taunted them as he counted down.    "Either of you ever been gut shot?  Won’t kill him fast.”

“Two.  He’ll be screaming enough that you’ll know he’s alive.”

“Three.   Bet neither of you have the balls to put him out of his misery.“

“Four.   You’ll just stand there listening to him scream and watching his guts spill out in a steaming pile in the snow.”

“Five.  And he’ll keep screaming until you drag Cooper out here.”

“Six.  And if you don’t bring Cooper out, maybe I’ll shoot out his kneecaps.”

“Seven.  Might take his mind off the burning in his belly, for a while anyway.”

Neither Candy nor Joe moved at first.  They weren’t going to trade Chad for Griff any more than they’d have made Griff’s life forfeit for Chad’s.  But they had to stall.  Finally Joe gestured toward the door of the house.  “Candy, get Chad.”

When Candy hesitated, the man holding Griff said, “Eight” and moved forward with him.

Before Candy could get to the door, Joe heard it open behind him.  Chad was coming out, supported by some kind of cane shrouded by the  blanket around his shoulders.  He leaned up against the wall of the house, pale, looking barely able to stand.

The man holding Griff moved the barrel of his revolver away from Griff to point at Chad.  Joe knew he had to act now while the boy was clear.  If his body would just let him.

 He could ignore the pain, but he couldn’t do anything about the fact that his left leg plain didn’t work.  He launched himself off his right leg and landed on the left.  As it crumpled under him in a bolt of pure pain, he rolled into Griff and his captor, hitting their knees and knocking them both backwards into the snow.  He threw himself on top of Griff as several guns went off.  His chest protected the boy’s head as he tried to stay low.  Bullets were passing close overhead.

Joe reached around with his right hand, trying to grab the man's gun hand.  When the man stopped moving, Joe figured Candy had gotten him.     From the gunfire coming from the direction of the barn, the one who'd come out with Griff hadn't been alone.  But Joe had expected that.  He'd guessed it had taken at least two to get the drop on Griff.  The kid was no fool.

He was right.  Joe saw movement by the barn just as his hand found the gun the man had dropped.  A man with a rifle running low and heading toward the back of the house.  Joe took quick aim and fired.  The man went down but as though dropping to avoid fire, not because Joe’s bullet had hit him.  Out of the corner of his eye, Joe saw another man behind the trough fall over it with Candy’s bullet in him.  Joe rolled off Griff, keeping his own body between the boy and that last shooter who’d been headed toward the house.   And what he saw made him sick.

The boy’s coat was open and there was a heavy red stain covering the whole front of his shirt around the belly and trailing down the front of his pants.  One of those shots must have been the man somehow getting off the shot he’d  threatened them with.

 “Candy, Griff’s been shot.”  Joe knew he was screaming louder than necessary for Candy to hear.  And he couldn’t keep the panic out of his voice.  “I’ll keep that last one down.  Get over here.”

  Immediately Candy was there, kneeling by the boy.  Joe heard him cuss at the location of the blood -- and the amount.  Joe emptied the revolver in the direction of the last man, giving Candy time to gather the boy up in his arms and run for the door, putting Chad's revolver in Joe’s hand as he left.

 Knowing Candy had already used at least four of the shots in this revolver, Joe fired only one to keep the distant man down long enough for Candy to get Griff inside.  Then he stopped firing, hoping he had one left, hoping the man would rise up some.  The man finally did come up, rifle at ready.  Pointed at Joe.  Maybe he figured Joe was too hurt to continue, maybe just that he was out of bullets.  Joe took careful aim and clicked empty.  But an instant later, the sound of a shotgun came from the direction of the house and the man’s rifle swung away from Joe.   There was an exchange of gunfire.  The man went down, hit this time Joe thought.  He looked toward the house to see Chad, shotgun in hand, braced against the wall.  As he watched, Chad slid to the ground, a growing patch of blood darkening his shirt as he collapsed.

 And suddenly, now that Chad needed him one last time, Joe’s strength left him.    There'd been so much blood.  Griff couldn’t survive a wound in that place.  Not with so much blood and no doctor.  So damn much blood.  Chad couldn’t survive another bullet but he’d taken one for Joe.  The last thing Joe did before everything went black was to vomit what little he had in his stomach onto the snow.

It was warm.  Joe was in bed, his clothes off, a pillow under his head.  He was vaguely aware of Candy changing the bandage on his leg but he couldn’t lift himself out of the black hole his spirit was in to acknowledge him.  Maybe Candy wouldn’t want to talk anyway.  Not to him.  Joe had pushed two good men into helping him find his partner, a partner who never would have gone missing if Joe had done better right at the start of this thing.  Now Chad was dead or dying and the boy he wasn’t willing to sacrifice for Chad had been sacrificed for nothing.

Candy left and came back a few minutes later, sitting on the bed next to Joe.  “Joe, you need to drink this tea.  You haven’t had anything for hours; you need something warm.”

Joe opened his eyes; he slowly, deliberately reached for the cup.   As soon as he had his hand around it, he used every bit of strength he had to hurl it against the wall.  The crash of shattering china and the spray of warm tea was almost satisfying.  But he’d need a whole china cabinet to begin to drain the rage and self-loathing that was building up inside.

Candy grabbed his arm an instant too late.  “Joe, what the hell’s gotten into you?”  Then his voice softened.  “Thought you were unconscious, but you heard Griff didn’t you?”

Joe’s self-loathing turned to pure pain.  “Heard him scream his life out you mean?  No, missed it.  Guess I’ll just have to imagine it for the rest of my life.”

“My God Joe, is that what you think?  Griff’s fine.”

”Candy, I’m not so bad off you need to lie to me.  I saw the blood.  I know what it meant for Griff.  No one survives that kind of close up gunshot.  And I saw Chad go down protecting me.   Everyone would have been better off if I’d just died in that snowstorm.”  The bitterness in his words didn’t begin to disgorge the bitterness rising up inside.

Then Joe heard a familiar voice.  “Is that what’s got you making so much racket an injured man can’t sleep.  You wrote me off a little premature pard.”  Joe looked up to see Chad leaning against the wall by the door.  Not looking too good, but not looking at all dead.

 “Chad, I saw you go down.  Saw the blood.”

 “Oh that,”  Chad grinned.  “Saving your sorry carcass was just a little more strenuous than I’d expected.  Got real tired all of a sudden and had to sit down  to rest a bit.  Wound opened up some while I was working that shotgun.  Nothin’ serious.  You’re the most contrary fella I ever did see.  Way I heard it from Candy, you wouldn’t believe I was dead when it seemed a pretty sure thing I was.  Then you’re ready to write me off after some little bit of gunplay couldn’t possibly put a Ranger in his grave.”

 Joe started to grin back until he remembered the boy, his lifeblood spilling from the hole in his belly.  “But Griff.  There was so much blood.”

 Candy smiled grimly.  “Wasn’t his blood Joe.  You opened up that thigh wound jumping around like some kind of fool.  Bled all over him when you threw yourself on top of him using your muscle bound carcass to block all those bullets flying around.  Ruined a perfectly good shirt.  The pants too.”

 “My blood?  Well, why the hell didn’t he say something?”

 “That man choked him out.  And then he ended up on the bottom of a pile of Ranger.  You knocked the breath clean out of him.   I had him halfway through the door before he could catch his breath enough to tell me to put him down and go after you.  And then I didn’t believe him until I’d ripped his shirt open and didn’t find his guts spilling out.”

 “If he’s okay, where is he?”

 Candy shook his head.  “Thought that’s why you threw the cup.  They got the drop on Griff when they shot his dog.  He felt guilty about putting us all at risk on account of the dog.  Then he felt he should stay here and make sure you and Chad were all right though it seemed pretty clear you weren’t gonna die, at least not any time soon.  He needed to see to the dog and I made him do it.  Had the excuse of moving the woman's body.  He’s out there now.”

 Joe felt sick.  And then almost guilty about the feeling.  Chad and Griff were both alive.   He shouldn’t feel so bad about a dog.  Was he so greedy he couldn’t stand things not to be perfect?  Or were his feelings not for the dog so much as for the boy’s undeserved grief?

“Damn.  Wasn’t for that dog I’d be out there under a snow drift.   And if Chad wasn’t dead by now, he’d be wishin’ he was.  Not fair that everyone makes it through such bad odds and the boy should lose that dog.”

Candy helped Chad to the big bed next to Joe.  This bedroom with the little potbellied stove was the warmest in the house.  It would be easier to look after them if they were both in here.   And Chad maybe could take Joe’s mind off that last bit of bad news.

A few minutes later, they heard the outside door open into the kitchen.  Griff  came to the doorway of the bedroom  holding the dog limp in his arms.  Joe could see blood mixed with snow in the black and white hair.  They all looked up, waiting, but the boy said nothing, just sat down with the dog on his lap in the rocking chair by the little stove.   Joe could see Griff was on the edge of crying but wouldn’t give in to it.  He was also shivering violently.  He’d gone out without hat or gloves.  Hadn’t even buttoned up the coat.  The bloody shirt was still ripped open where Candy had looked for the nonexistent gunshot wound.  Now there was blood on the collar and shoulder where he’d held the dog to his chest.

Candy went over and knelt in front of him.  He tried to get his arms under the dog, to take him from the grieving boy.  Griff reacted almost violently, hugging the dog closer to him.  “He’s dying but he ain’t dead yet.  I ain’t letting go 'til he lets go.  Least I can do for him now.”

Then Griff spoke low, almost to himself.  “He was shot twice but if he’d just stayed put in the barn he might’ve been okay.  But he crawled out looking for me.  I wasted time looking all over the barn.  He was lying out in the snow right in the tracks where that man dragged me.  When he needed to be warm to prevent shock, he was lying in the snow, trustin’ me to find him or more likely still trying to help me.”

 Joe heard nothing but the pain in the boy’s voice and that one thing.  “He ain’t dead yet.”  Joe pulled himself up to a sitting position but knew he’d need help to get further.  “Candy, you get me to that chair.  Griff you get up and let me hold him.  You ain’t got no body heat left in that skinny body of yours.  I got plenty.  Think the fever’s back some.”  When Candy didn’t jump up right away, Joe raised his voice.  “Candy, now.”

    As Candy helped him up, Joe told Griff, “You get somethin' to clean out those wounds and somethin' to dry him off.  Get me a blanket.  You didn’t give up on Chad.  I ain’t givin’ up on this dog.”

With Candy’s help, Griff and Joe traded places in the chair by the stove.  Joe hugged the wet dog tight to his bare chest, willing him to take every bit of warmth Joe had.  The dog’s coat was freezing against his fevered skin, but Joe barely noticed as the frigid snow melt trickled from the dog ran down his bare chest, belly and finally down between his bare legs.  He felt the inside of the dog’s leg where the strongest pulse would be.  He thought he could feel it but maybe it was wishful thinking.

The boy was back in a flash with towels and hot water --  and a tea kettle he put on the stove to make some steam the dog could breath in -- if he was breathing.  He dried the dog as best he could, then washed out the two bullet wounds.  The boy was right, the wounds wouldn’t have been so bad if the dog had stayed warm, not gone into shock.  One had left a track across the side of his neck.  Most of the blood had come from that wound.  The other had hit him in the flank and gone through.  The boy bandaged up both wounds.  Joe braced himself not to flinch when Griff knocked his bad leg while he was working on the dog.  At this point Joe thought he would have let them cut off his leg if it would have saved the boy from the grief of losing his dog.

Candy brought in a blanket warm from being held in front of the fire.  He wrapped it around Joe and the dog.   Joe cradled the dog snugged up to his chest.  He kept a hand near the dog’s hind leg, checking the pulse periodically.  Not that he knew what he’d do if the pulse quit for sure.  He just willed that not to happen.

 Griff was still wearing clothes wet from the snow but Candy couldn’t persuade him to put on dry ones.  He sat on the floor at Joe’s feet, his hand on the dog’s ribcage, trying to feel breathing  maybe, but mostly making sure the dog knew he was there.  Candy could do no more than periodically add wood to the fire in the stove so it would warm the dog and dry off the boy.   Candy tried to get Joe and Griff to take some soup, but neither was willing do anything but watch for a change in the dog.

Candy found Chad more cooperative about taking some soup but neither he nor Chad could  take their attention off the little tableau by the stove.  As they watched and waited, Candy very quietly filled Chad in on what had gone on since the dog found Joe off the side of the road.  “You had it a lot easier than Joe looks like.”

 “How’s that?  At least he had a doctor to take out the bullet he got in him.”  Chad shuddered when he thought of the crudeness of the surgery performed on him .despite the woman’s best efforts to be gentle.

“Don’t know how things are in Texas, but morphine can be real hard to come by out here.  Joe had nothing more than a little laudanum to see him through and that bullet cut a long track and went deep.  I’m not trying to down play the seriousness of your wound, especially since it got infected, but at least you had morphine to see you through the surgery.  I’ve seen that stuff work.  One of the hands shattered a leg real bad last year.   He was white with the pain but once the doctor gave him some morphine he was able to set the leg without him feeling anything at all.”

    Chad hastened to set him straight.  “The only thing I got for my pain was tied out to the table so I couldn’t move too much.  She didn’t have laudanum, not even whiskey.”

Candy looked at him oddly.  He wondered if Chad was a natural complainer who didn't appreciate the painkiller he'd gotten.  He couldn't believe the woman had risked killing him by operating with nothing at all to kill the pain.  Not when she'd seemed to want him alive for Burke to work on.  He got up and brought in the medical box he’d found by the kitchen table.  He set it on the dresser as he said softly.  “You see this box before Chad?”

 “Well, I wasn’t in such an observin’ state of mind when she was cutting me up, but she got those little tools of hers out of there and bandages.”

Candy pulled out a couple of vials of amber liquid, a little bottle with some white powder and a mostly full pint of whiskey.  He silently displayed them to Chad.   Chad went pale as he realized the meaning of what he saw.    “Is that powder. . . ?”

Candy filled in, “Morphine, at least a couple of doses.  Nice of you and her to save it for Joe.  He’ll need it when that leg gets restitched.  This laudanum might come in handy later too.  Maybe you’d like the whiskey now.  You look sort of green around the gills.”

 “And I thought she was getting romantic notions about me.”  Chad sighed.  Just maybe he’d been wrong.  But he didn't know just how wrong he'd been until Candy filled him in on her real plans, including the intended use of that little knife she'd been sharpening.  That made him reach for the whiskey.  Joe could have the morphine.  But Chad was saving  the whiskey for himself.  Not likely he'd sleep easy without it.  Not for a long time.

Half an hour into their wait, they saw Griff and Joe look at each other with something like real hope.  Candy got up and stood by them.  Griff looked up at him.  “You check Candy.  Feel for a pulse inside his leg there.  We’re looking so hard, we might be imagining things.”

 Candy put his hand where the boy showed him and damned if it didn’t feel like a steady pulse.   And the dog seemed to be breathing stronger now too.  Candy felt almost as relieved as the other two looked.

Griff stood up.  “Candy, you get Joe back in that bed.  I’m all warmed up now.  I can take over.”

Joe didn’t argue.  His leg hurt something fierce and the hole in his left shoulder was throbbing.  He was cramped up from sitting in the chair and holding the dog so close.  And he couldn’t even feel his ankle.  It would feel good to stretch out flat in the warm bed, especially knowing the dog might make it.  He carefully handed the now warm bundle of fur up to the boy and let Candy help him out of the rocker.  As he stood and got eye level with Griff, the boy said simply, “Thanks Joe.  Thanks for not lettin' me give up.”

Joe just smiled and watched Griff sit down with the dog.  He lay back on the bed and let Candy give him some soup.  He swore when this was over, he'd never look at another bowl of soup.  But he kept his eyes on the boy and the dog until he swore he saw the dog looking back.  The dog’s head was resting on Griff’s shoulder as Griff supported the rest of his body.   And he was looking at Joe.  Joe called out, “Hey, Mister Charles, you back with us?”  The dog perked his ears at the sound of his name.

 When Griff heard Joe talking to the dog, he shifted Charles so he could  look in his eyes.  Joe could see Griff's whole body relax with relief as the dog weakly licked him in the face.

And hour later, Charles had a bowl of chicken broth in his belly and a more lively look on his face.  His wounded flank prevented him from running around but he looked like he wanted to.  Joe had Griff put the dog on the bed where he could be kept quiet but get all the petting he wanted.  Griff looked over at Chad, still nursing the whiskey bottle.  "Guess you think we're being pretty foolish getting so worked up over a dog."

 Chad reached over and stroked the dog's muzzle.  "Dogs are a little more reliable than women it seems.  Too bad he's so useless here."

"Useless!"  Joe sounded incensed but he knew Chad was kidding.  "That dog saved my life."

Chad smiled for the first time since he'd had his  conversation with Candy.  "Exactly.  What's more useless in the middle of Nevada than a dog that saves Texas Rangers."  He looked over at Griff.  "Now you let us take this boy back to Laredo and he'll spend the rest of his life eating good Texas Longhorn beefsteak.  Not a week goes by when there isn't a Texas Ranger needs savin'.   He'd be kept busy full time just keepin' Joe and Reese out of trouble.  He'd have a real useful life with us."

Then Chad winked at Griff and continued, "Besides I'm gonna get lots of laughs in the barracks when I describe how Joe here looked sitting stark naked in that rocking chair hugging a wet dog, letting melting snow trickle down in places where I don't even like women to touch me if they have cold hands."

 "Or a knife, eh Chad." Candy said as he came in with a plate of sandwiches.  "Joe, I'd guess  if Chad tries to make too much of a joke out of you sitting with that dog, the boys in the barracks will forget it when you tell them  how Chad was gullible enough to think a woman was getting sweet on him when all the while she was sharpening a knife to use in that place where Chad don't like a woman to touch him with cold hands."

Joe and Griff hadn't overheard the whispered conversation between Candy and Chad while they were concentrating on the dog.   Chad stopped with his arm outstretched over the sandwich plate and tried to gesture to Candy to keep quiet.  Candy ignored him.  He figured Joe had gone through too much to find his partner not hear the details of what would have happened to him had he given up.

 When Candy finished explaining about the meat cleaver and the knife, Joe was laughing at Chad's ability to delude himself about women.  But underneath the laugh was an overwhelming gratitude for these two men who had risked their lives to save Chad when he was only an hour or two away from a nasty, drawn-out death.

Joe settled back on the pillows, a sandwich in his hand, grateful for  food that needed to be chewed.   He looked over at Chad, a sandwich in one hand and the whiskey bottle in the other,  then at the little dog curled up on the bed between them.  Griff was sitting on the edge of the bed, a sandwich in his hand too, still wearing that ripped shirt stained with Joe's blood.  Candy was watching them from the doorway holding the empty plate.

Joe knew he was facing another long session with the doctor to get his leg sewed back together.  But he wasn't going to worry about that now.  Just a little more pain, but no loss.  No friends to bury.  He could take the physical pain and consider it a real fair trade.  Joe smiled.  “You're right about that Winter Solstice Griff.  A time to celebrate.”

 After a few days of rest and good weather, the doctor in Elko gave reluctant consent for Chad and Joe to travel by train.  Chad was already scheming.  They couldn’t expect Candy and Griff to stay on indefinitely taking care of them in Elko.  And they weren’t well enough to go all the way back to Texas alone so there was nothing for it but for them to go back to Virginia City with their new friends.  Virginia City was practically down the road from San Francisco as far as Chad was concerned.  And when Christmas day saw them ensconced in the Ponderosa ranch house, sleeping in soft beds and eating the superior food from the Cartwright kitchen, Chad practically had Joe believing he’d planned it all ahead.

Joe never got to San Francisco, but Chad did.  By New Years Chad insisted he was well enough for some fun.  And Candy and Joe Cartwright were just the two men to show him where to have it in Frisco.

Candy and Joe tried to persuade Griff to go with them, but Griff declined.  Even if he hadn’t thought his Ranger friend might need his help, it was too humiliating to go through getting permission to leave Nevada.

And Joe didn't feel he'd missed anything important except maybe a look at the Pacific Ocean.    Any trip to a city with Chad meant gambling, drinking and women.  How different could the saloons in Frisco be from the ones in Austin and New Orleans?  Wasn't like Joe was all that eager to hear an opera or visit an art museum.  He  was perfectly content to spend a good part of the day just  napping and watching Griff catch up on his work with the horses.  His leg and ankle still had a lot of healing to do and this was a decent way to bide time once the weather turned mild.  Couldn't have taken the forced inactivity for long, but while his body was still so tired it wasn't so bad to have no responsibility.     And Joe got his first look at Lake Tahoe in a buggy when Griff had a horse to train to harness.  The Pacific Ocean couldn't have beat the beauty of that view.

On the third day after the others left for Frisco, Joe was in the barn lying back in the chair with his eyes closed while Griff doctored a horse that had gotten into a roll of barbed wire.  And suddenly he was back on the doctor’s table hearing that soothing voice that he gotten him through the surgery.  He woke with a start from a half-sleep and was amused to realize that the boy was seeing that horse through his doctoring exactly as he’d seen Joe through the surgery.  He kept using the horse’s name, telling him what he was doing, letting him know he’d stop to give him a breather if it got too bad, telling him when it was almost over, assuring him he’d be out running in winter pasture in no time.

After Griff put the horse back in a stall, he came back to wheel Joe into the house for the noon meal.  Joe cocked his head as he looked up at Griff.  “And here I thought you were so clever talkin' me through that doctor’s cuttin’ and stitchin’.  You were just treatin’ me like one of your horses.”

Griff grinned.  “Had to go with what I know.  Horses are pretty much all I know.”

“Well, boy.  Now you know it works on people, I’d advise you to be thinkin’ on how to work that spell on women.   You do and even Chad'll be back up here wantin’ lessons.”

Toward the end of the week, Griff spent part of a day showing Joe the sights of Virginia City.  Sipping a beer with his bad leg propped up on a chair at the Bucket of Blood, Joe didn’t miss Frisco at all.   He doubted the beer was any better there or that the food could beat what the Cartwrights had at their table.  Of course the young Cartwright would probably take Chad to some exclusive places with some fancy women, but Joe was still too far from mobility to take advantage of anything like that anyway.

And that just brought to mind the woman in Laredo his thoughts strayed to more and more.  By the time Joe could travel by train, he was ready to get back to Laredo to see if the woman was really as he remembered or just wishful thinking.  If she was still there.  If she hadn't stayed in Virginia when she went to visit her parents.  It was never far from his mind that she had never yet called Laredo home despite the fact that she'd come so far in adapting to the rigors of life in Texas.

Candy and Griff drove them to Reno to the train instead of having them take the stage.  Joe found it hard to say good-by, knowing that the distance between them probably meant he’d never see these two good men again.

He shook hands with Candy and thanked him.  He then turned to Griff, not only giving the boy a handshake but putting his left arm around Griff's shoulder, giving him as firm a hug as he could using his partially-healed left arm. He stepped back, leaving his hand on the boy's shoulder. "You know Griff, Chad and I built friendship and trust on watchin' each other’s backs in tight situations. Our kind of partnership took time to build with long hours in the saddle.  But you?  Well, it was like findin’ a kid brother with the blood ties makin’ for trust overnight."

Griff smiled, almost wistfully.  “Never had a brother.   Wish you were sticking around here.  They need lawmen in Nevada too.”

Joe tousled the boy’s hair, an affectionate gesture he wouldn’t normally have tried on a boy tall enough to look him straight in the eye and old enough to order him a beer.  “Sorry boy.  If I never see snow again, I wouldn’t be unhappy about it.  You just remember,  you’ve got friends in Laredo.  You need help, we’ll come running.”  He leaned down awkwardly to pet the dog at Griff's feet.  "That goes for you too Mister Charles."

As the train pulled out, Joe settled himself in a window seat.  Once the station was out of sight, he leaned back with his left leg fully extended, his hat over his face and his eyes closed.  He knew exactly what Chad would be doing.  He’d bought himself a leather bound book of poetry in San Francisco.  Soon as the train started he’d be walking down the aisles looking for a nice looking woman who might be impressed with a man who read poetry.  Or with  a man sweet enough to his sister to read the book she’d given him for Christmas but who needed some help with the interpretations.  Or a man who’d bought a book of poetry to give a little girl in a wheelchair back home and wanted reassurance that he’d bought the right thing.  Chad had a different story for every woman and Joe could sleep through them all.