The weather throughout January of 1859 was uniformly frosty.  Snow drifts piled against the Ponderosa ranch house, locking its inhabitants indoors, never a pleasing prospect with two lively boys in the house.  Toward the end of the month, however, a sudden break in the weather brought sunny skies, and Marie gladly sent her youngsters outdoors to play for an hour or two each day.  Ben welcomed the warm weather as an opportunity to give closer attention to his cattle.

    The first of February arrived with a clear sky, but the air seemed cooler, a harbinger of returning cold.  Though no storm clouds loomed on the horizon, and though the Ponderosa’s huge stone fireplace kept the front room warm, Marie shivered, dreading the blizzard she felt sure would arrive within days.

    What actually arrived late that morning was something that brought more warmth to her heart than the fireplace possibly could.  Hoss, taking a break from his schoolwork to romp outside with a ponderously bundled Little Joe, flung open the door.  “Mama!” he cried from the doorway.  “We got company!”

    Marie dropped the mending she was doing in the mauve chair by the fire and began to pat her hair into place as she stood.  “Oh, who is it, Hoss?  The Thomases?”  The two families had not been able to meet for several weeks.  Even though the weather had been warm on Sunday, the roads had still been packed with snow.

    “Naw, it’s Mrs. Ellis and Jimmy,” Hoss reported.  “I know recess is ‘bout over, but we can stay outside and play, can’t we?”

    “No, Hoss, it is time to come in,” his mother said as she hurried to the door.

    “Aw, Mama,” Hoss whimpered.

    “Bring your brother in at once,” Marie said firmly, “and take off his wraps.”  She hastened across the yard to welcome her friend.  “Oh, Laura, it is so good to see you!” she cried.

    “The way the sky looked, I thought I’d better take a chance while I could,” Laura laughed.  “Of course, if it snows quicker than I think, you may have two houseguests for a long time to come.”

    “They would be most welcome,” Marie smiled, gently touching Jimmy’s cheek.  “My, you are cold, child!  Come in by the fire at once.”  She took the boy’s hand and led her visitors inside.

    Hoss stood sulking in the middle of the room, his warm jacket still on.  “I reckon it’s long enough for Little Joe to be out, but me and Jimmy can play outside, can’t we, Mama?” he pleaded.

    “I think not, Hoss,” his mother replied.  “Jimmy has had a long, cold ride and should warm himself.”

    “Yes, he must,” Laura added.  “You youngsters have plenty of toys to play with inside, I know.”

    “But no lessons, right, Mama?”  The pathetic expression on Hoss’s face made both mothers laugh.

    “No, no lessons,” Marie tittered.  “You have a guest, Hoss.  Please stable Mrs. Ellis’s horse, then you and Jimmy may play upstairs, if you like.”

    Little Joe tugged on Marie’s skirt.  “Doggie, Mama?”

    “Look in the box by the fireplace, Jimmy, and get him his seal, s’il te plait .”

    “Yes, ma’am,” the Ellis youngster replied, immediately digging into Little Joe’s toy box while Hoss headed for the barn.

    “Come here, you pretty thing,” Laura cooed, scooping Little Joe into her arms.

    “You may find him a squirming thing,” Marie laughed.  “He doesn’t sit still for long.”

    “Probably a good thing,” Laura chuckled as she sat on the maroon-striped sofa with alternating stripes of cream strewn with blue flowers.  “As cold as the weather’s been, he likely stays warmer that way.”

    “It is terrible, no?” Marie said.  “I wish this warm weather could last, but I know better.”

    “You and half the miners in the territory,” Laura smiled.  “I doubt you’ve heard of the new strike.”

    “I have heard nothing,” Marie moaned.  “So far Ben has managed to ride in for the mail when it comes, and, of course, he brings a paper then, too, but I have not left the house since New Year’s Eve.”

    “Doggie,” Little Joe whimpered.

    “Jimmy, haven’t you found that toy yet?” Laura asked sharply.

    “Yeah.  I was just lookin’ at the other things,” Jimmy said, nose in the carved box.  “It’s all baby stuff.”

    “Mais oui,” Marie laughed.  “That is Little Joe’s box, Jimmy.  Hoss’s is upstairs.  The seal, s’il te plait?”

    Jimmy handed the stuffed toy to Little Joe.  “Can I go up to Hoss’s room?” he asked.

    “When Hoss returns,” his mother said sternly, “though if you continue to whine like a baby, Jimmy, perhaps Little Joe’s toys would make more appropriate playthings for you.”

    “No, ma’am!  I’ll be good,” the four-year-old declared.

    “You mentioned a gold strike?” Marie probed, bending to pick up the toy seal when Little Joe made it dive off Laura’s arm into an ocean of air.

    “Yes, and this is real news,” Laura announced.  “Hasn’t even appeared in the Territorial Enterprise yet.”

    Marie clapped her hands.  “Good!  I will have news to share with Ben for a change.”

    “Well, you may not know that several of the miners had planned to winter in Franktown,” Laura began, “squatting in some of the houses the Mormon settlers left behind.”

    “No, but it is good to put the houses to use,” Marie mused.  “That is where Madame Cowan is living, too, I think.”

    “Not anymore,” Laura giggled, “but that’s getting ahead of my story.”

    The door flew open and Hoss rushed in.  “Let’s go upstairs, Hoss,” Jimmy cried.  “Ain’t no good toys down here.”

    “That’s for sure,” Hoss agreed.  “Okay, Mama.”

    “Oui , and you may take Little Joe, as well,” Marie said.

    “Okay,” Hoss muttered.  He was always glad to play with his little brother when no one else was around, but Jimmy was closer to his age, and Hoss would have preferred not being saddled with the baby while he had company.

    Laura gave the top of the toddler’s curly head a kiss and relinquished him to his brother.  “Play nicely, Jimmy,” she cautioned.  “Remember, Little Joe is smaller than you.”

    “Let’s bring your water doggie,” Hoss suggested to Little Joe, whispering conspiratorially to Jimmy as they mounted the stairs, “He’ll stay out of our way better if he has his favorite toy.”

    “Yeah,” Jimmy whispered back, quick to align himself with the bigger boy he admired.  “Good idea.”

    “Now we can visit undisturbed,” Marie said.  “Shall I have Hop Sing prepare tea?”

    “Or coffee.  Whichever’s easier,” Laura replied.  “I could use a hot drink.”

    “I should have thought of it earlier,” Marie apologized, “after your long drive.”

    “Had my arms full before now,” Laura laughed.

    When Marie returned from her consultation with Hop Sing, Laura continued her tale of the new mining strike.  “The weather looked so nice last Friday that several of the miners decided they might as well go back to work,” she began again.  “Let’s see:  there was Pancake Comstock, Old Virginny, Big French John Bishop, Aleck Henderson and Jack Yount.  Probably some others, too, but those are the ones who found the gold.  You know any of them?”

    “I have met Messieurs Comstock and Finney,” Marie replied, “and I think Monsieur Bishop was at the New Year’s Ball.  The others I don’t know.”

    “Customers, of course,” Laura commented.  “That’s how I know them.  Haven’t seen much of any of them while they’ve been at Franktown, though.  Eilley’s been running a boardinghouse for the boys, and with the weather being so cold, none of them have wanted to drive to Carson City for what they could find a few doors down.”

    “It would be worth the ride,” Marie declared loyally.

    “True, she doesn’t serve much besides salt pork and beans, but her batter biscuits are real good, according to the miners I’ve talked to.  Anyway, like I was saying, the warm weather convinced these miners to head for Gold Canyon.  The melting snow gave them plenty of water to swish in their pans.”

    “And they found gold?” Marie asked.

    “On Saturday——a nice-sized pocket of it,” Laura said, “enough to make everyone down the canyon scramble up to Gold Hill.”

    “Gold Hill?”  Not recognizing the name, Marie tilted her golden head inquiringly.

    “That’s what they’re calling the new strike,” Laura explained.  “It’s just a mile or so up the canyon from where the miners left off working when winter hit.”

    Hop Sing entered, bringing a tray with a china teapot, sugar and creamer, as well as two cups and saucers.  “Velly good see you again, Missy Laula,” he said smoothly.

    “Thank you, Hop Sing,” Laura replied, smiling.  “You make the best tea in the territory.”

    Hop Sing beamed.  “You got good sense, like Missy Cahtlight.  Hop Sing like cook for ladies got good sense.  You stay lunch?”

    “Of course, she will,” Marie answered.  “Please prepare something special, Hop Sing.”

    “Velly special,” Hop Sing promised and shuffled quickly back to the kitchen.

    “The miners are making Gold Hill their headquarters now,” Laura said, as she added sugar and cream to her tea, “so you’ll have to add that name to your list of prominent places in western Utah.”

    “Mais oui,” Marie laughed, stirring her own cup, “but how sad for Madame Cowan that all her boarders have moved to a new town, despite the fame of her batter biscuits.”

    “Don’t waste your sympathy on Eilley Orrum!” Laura hooted, using Mrs. Cowan’s maiden name, by which most people knew her since her separation from her Mormon husband.  “That one can take care of herself.  I’ll have you know she’s moved to Gold Hill, too, boardinghouse and all!”

    “But how is that possible?” Marie queried.

    “Oh, she had help,” Laura laughed.  “Some of her boarders——Sandy Bowers, for one——loaded everything from pots and pans to the boards from her house on pack mules and carted it to Gold Hill.  She’s sharing a wall with a bar run by a fellow called Old Nick.  Between the two of them, they manage to see most of the new town’s residents every night.”

    “So, Madame Cowan has made a wise business move?” Marie asked.  “One which will hurt you?”

    Laura shrugged and took another sip of tea.  “I’m not worried.  I get enough business in Carson City to get by.  Besides, if you ask me, it’s gold Eilley’s chasing, not customers.  She always did have a touch of gold fever, used to pester the Grosch boys to distraction about their claim.”

    Marie smiled.  “I think, perhaps, it is not gold fever, but husband fever, that afflicts Madame Cowan.  Surely you noticed how she eyed with favor every unattached man at our Christmas Eve party——especially poor Dr. Martin.”

    “She won’t snare him,” Laura giggled.  “Some of these newer folks may not be as quick to spot danger as he, however.”

    Marie shook her head.  “So many new people in the territory, and I know so few.”

    “You know Sandy Bowers,” Laura said.  “You couldn’t miss that big Scot.  That’s why I mentioned him before.”

    “Oui , him I know,” Marie smiled, “but he is not new to the territory.  I have seen him at several New Year’s Eve balls.  He dances most enthusiastically.”

    “He surely does, but I’ll take him over Old Pancake or James Finney any day!” Laura declared.

    “Ah, perhaps so will Madame Cowan,” Marie teased.

    “I have a feeling she’d take anything in pants!” Laura snickered.

    “What gossips we have become this morning,” Marie smiled.

    “Comes from lack of opportunity,” Laura admitted, “but you’re right.  We should mind our tongues a bit better, or we’ll be teaching our boys bad ways.  Besides, I like Eilley, even if she is man-hungry.”  Determined to turn the conversation to safer ground, she asked if Marie had heard from Adam lately.

    “Mais oui, he is always faithful to write,” Marie replied, “and the mail has not once failed this winter, as you know.”

    “So, what’s Adam up to?”

    Marie sighed.  “I am afraid his last letter brought most distressing news.”  She proceeded to relate the unpleasant tale of Adam’s sortie into the darker side of San Francisco society.  “Adam, of course, took all the blame to himself,” she finished hotly, “but Sterling Larrimore is four years older than our boy!  He knew he was taking Adam where no young boy should go.”

    Laura nodded soberly.  “And Adam’s at just the age when sampling so-called grown-up entertainment can be most enticing.”

    “Oui , but we depended on Monsieur Larrimore to provide only appropriate entertainment for our son,” Marie fumed on, “and Ben is so provoking!  I have told him he should write to his friend at once and tell him what his boy has done to ours, but Ben refuses.”

    “Why?” Laura probed.

    “Oh, he says it is not a message to be delivered by mail,” Marie sputtered, “that he must talk face to face with Lawrence, so there will be no misunderstanding.”

    “Well, I can see Ben’s point,” Laura said softly.  “God forbid I should ever receive such news about Jimmy, but I know it would come easier if an old friend spoke with me directly.”

    “But when can that be?” Marie cried, throwing up her hands in frustration.  “We will not see the Larrimores before spring.  Probably not even then, for I do not think they will travel to Placerville for Katerina’s wedding.”

    “Is the date set for the wedding?” Laura asked, deftly changing the subject to one less inflammatory.

    The subterfuge worked, for Marie was easy prey to anything romantic.  “Oh, yes,” she replied, her smile returning.  “Letters have been flying between here and Placerville.  Enos tells us they will exchange their vows the fifteenth of May, just after Little Joe’s birthday.”

    Laura laughed.  “You’ll celebrate that on the road, then.  No birthday cake this year, I take it, but you must promise to let me bake one for the little sweetheart’s third birthday.”

    “Mais oui,” Marie agreed readily.  “He will be old enough then for a small party.”  She clapped her palm to her lips.  “Oh, I forgot to mention that the Reverend Wentworth will come to Placerville for the ceremony.  Ben is paying his way.”

    “How nice!” Laura said, sharing her friend’s enthusiasm.  “It’ll mean a lot to Enos and his bride to have the minister who traveled west with them witness their vows.”

    “Oui, and with the Paynes planning to come, as well, it will be almost a reunion of the Larrimore train,” Marie bubbled on.

    “Except for the Larrimores, I take it?”

    “No, there is one other family everyone has lost track of,” Marie replied.  “I do not recall their name, but Ben sometimes wonders about them.”

    “It’s a wonder the rest of you have kept in touch,” Laura commented.  “Most folks just went their separate ways.  Ben must have come west with a good group.”

    “Oui, from all I have heard,” Marie said.  She stood and picked up the tea tray.  “You will meet some of them this spring.  Reverend Wentworths’ two younger children will be visiting us until fall.”

    “You told me.  I’ll be looking forward to meeting them,” Laura replied.  “May I help you with those?”

    “No, no, I will be back in a moment,” Marie said, “then we can”——she paused, hearing a horse trot into the yard.  “Oh, that will be Ben, coming home for lunch.  Do not tell him what gossips we have been this morning.”

    “I’m no tattletale,” Laura laughed, “especially not when I’m as guilty as you!”

    Adam scurried up the stairs to his room, for Mrs. Maguire had told him he had mail waiting.  “Sure, and it’s just the usual letters from your family,” she laughed.  “It’s homesick you are, Adam Cartwright.”

    Homesickness was not the malady that made the boy tear up the stairs, however.  Malaise of the heart came closer to the truth, for Adam had lived in sick dread of his father’s reaction to his escapade through the back streets of San Francisco.

    Flinging open the door to his room, he saw two letters propped against the books on his desk.  He reached for the one from his father first.  Whatever Hoss had to share could wait.

    Harold Lissome, coming in right after Adam, halted when he saw the envelope in his roommate’s hand.  “Is it from your father?”  Adam had shared everything with Harold, and the older boy knew how anxiously Adam had been awaiting his father’s response.

    When Adam nodded solemnly, Harold laid a compassionate hand on the other boy’s shoulder.  “You’ll want to read it alone,” he said, “so I’ll clear out for awhile.”

    “Thanks,” Adam said.  “I won’t be long.  I know you’ve got a test to study for.”

    “Take all the time you need,” Harold replied softly.  “I’ll be downstairs in the parlor.”

    Adam unsealed the letter, took a deep breath and began to read:
 

My dearest Adam,

How grieved I was to learn of your difficulties in San Francisco.  I must first beg your forgiveness for putting you in the path of such temptation.  I naturally assumed I could entrust you to Mr. And Mrs. Larrimore, but never thought of their leaving you unsupervised.  I am most disheartened to learn that my trust was misplaced.

As to your own behavior, I was, of course, disappointed that you yielded to the temptation to drink.  I know that without the influence of an older boy you would not have done so, and I am grateful that even under the influence of liquor, you could not be persuaded to do worse.  Perhaps I am at fault for not making my feelings on the consumption of alcohol plain to you, but I did not anticipate the need at your early age.  Again, I ask your forgiveness for my laxity in parenting.

Let me express to you my sincere hope that you will not again taste liquor until you are at least eighteen.  Even then, I trust you will be moderate in your consumption, as I have always tried to be.  Excess lowers resistance to other unsavory behavior, as I think you observed in Sterling Larrimore.  I know I can trust you to respect my wishes in this matter.

Thank you for the carved walrus tusk.  The scene does indeed remind me of my days on a similar ship with your grandfather.  I will keep it on my desk beside your picture, two special reminders of the young man I miss so much.

Study hard, but please stop confining yourself to your quarters.  As you have been doing so since the first of January, I consider that discipline enough.  I order you to spend a night at the theater with your friends, young man!  (Legitimate theater, however——no more melodeons.)

Your loving father,
Benjamin Cartwright
 

    As Adam folded the letter, he felt his eyes begin to water.  He’d been so afraid that he had lost his father’s respect, but Pa sounded like he was blaming himself more than Adam.  Adam never wanted his father to feel that way again, so he determined to evaluate every decision he made in light of what his father would want him to do.  If I do that, I can’t go far wrong , Adam concluded.  He was ready to read Hoss’s letter now, but in fairness to Harold, he went downstairs first.  “Everything’s all right,” he said when his friend looked up inquiringly.

    “I told you it would be,” Harold grinned.  “You’ve got a good father.”

    “The best in the world,” Adam boasted warmly.  “He ordered me to go to the theater.  How about Friday evening?”

    “Sounds good,” Harold replied, slamming his book shut.  “Now, upstairs and finish your homework, my boy, so you can quiz me for my history test.”

    Adam grinned and the two boys returned to their room, each wrapping an arm around the other’s shoulder.  The first thing Adam did on reaching the room was to read Hoss’s short letter:
 

Hey, Adam,

What’s up?  Pa wouldn’t read me your letter to him, so I know something’s the matter.  You in trouble?  Not me, I am doing good.  Little Joe, too, except he makes his water doggie bark too much.

We got good and stuffed on them turkeys Pa and Billy shot at the contest.  Billy came in first and Pa third.  We ate Billy’s bird right off, but saved ours to butcher for New Year’s.  Had Hangtown Fry for breakfast then, too.  Bet you ain’t had nothing that good at that boardinghouse.

Guess what.  There is gonna be a horse race in Carson City, the first ever, on February 2.  Pa says him and me will go, if it don’t snow too deep for the horses to run.  You ever seen one?

I like that walrus tooth you give Pa.  I want one, too.  Okay?  Don’t study too hard.  You know I won’t!

Your brother,
Hoss

    Glancing up, Harold grinned.  “Back to your books, boy.”

    Adam tipped his desk chair back on two legs and folded his arms behind his neck.  “I don’t know.  My little brother seems to think I study too much as it is.”

    Harold reached over to push Adam’s chair to the floor.  “Yeah, he’s probably right, but you can’t help me ‘til you finish your own work, and I need help!”

    Adam popped his roommate a sharp salute.  “Aye, aye, sir.  Back to my books, sir.”

    Harold gave a satisfied nod as Adam opened his algebra text and, propping his forehead with his hand, returned to his study of the Medes and Persians.

    The very night Laura Ellis and Jimmy headed back to Carson City, the weather turned horrid again, so Hoss wasn’t able to go into town for the anticipated horserace.  A hard wind blew from the southwest, bringing three inches of snow by morning.  Within ten days a foot covered the valleys and even more fell in the Sierras.  The new telegraph to Placerville was knocked out, but that didn’t matter to Hoss.  Adam couldn’t afford to send an expensive wire, anyway.  What mattered to Hoss was that on the twentieth of the month, for the first time that winter, the mail didn’t arrive.  First it had come by stage, then as the weather worsened, by sled and later by mule.  Now the snows in the mountains were too deep even for Snowshoe Thompson, a tragedy unknown before.  Hoss, who had begged permission to ride in for the mail, had nothing but that bad news to deliver when he returned to the Ponderosa.

    Though Hoss pleaded every morning, it was six whole days before his hard-hearted father would let him brave the cold roads once again, and there still wasn’t any mail.  “Can I check again tomorrow?” Hoss pleaded at supper that evening.  “I just know the mail will get through tomorrow.”

    “You can’t go traipsing off every day, boy,” Ben snorted.  “You have chores and lessons to be done.  Do your work well and you can do whatever you like come Saturday again.”

    “Saturday!  Another whole week?” Hoss moaned.

    “There is no need, however, to go even then,” Marie interjected.  “We plan to take dinner with the Thomases the next day, so you can get your mail then, Hoss.”

    “Pa said Saturday,” Hoss squealed.

    Ben lifted a silencing hand.  “If you’re so impatient you can’t wait one more day, you may go to Carson on Saturday, Hoss——provided I don’t hear another word about it until then!”

    From the tone of his voice, Pa meant business, so Hoss quickly agreed to the terms and kept his impatience carefully checked until the designated day.  He rode into Carson City that morning with a heart full of hope, for while snow still remained on the valley floor, it was beginning to melt and the last two days had been warm, without a cloud in the sky.

Hoss tied his horse to the rail in front of Ormsby’s mercantile and hotel and went in to see if the mail had arrived.  “Sure did, son,” Mrs. Ormsby told him.  “Got in on Thursday.”

Hoss groaned.  Adam’s letter had been sitting here two whole days without his getting a chance to read it!

“Reckon your pa will be wanting a copy of the paper, too,” the storekeeper suggested.

“Yes’m,” Hoss said.  He tucked the latest copy of the Territorial Enterprise under his arm, stuffed Pa’s two letters in his jacket pocket and tore open his personal letter from Adam.  Getting his own mail was fun, and Adam never let him down.

    The letter read:
 

Dear Hoss,

You guessed right.  I did get in some trouble in San Francisco.  Sterling Larrimore took me to some places I shouldn’t have gone.  One of them was the saloon where I bought Pa’s walrus tusk.  I had a couple of beers.  That was two too many, little brother, so don’t get any ideas!  I doubt I can get you a walrus tusk, since I don’t ever intend to go back to that saloon or even to San Francisco anytime soon.  Maybe Pa will buy you one sometime.  It came from the Cobweb Palace.  You’d like the place because it had cages of monkeys and parrots——carved whale’s teeth, too.  Maybe you’d like one of those better.  It would fit in your treasure box easier than a big tusk.

I will try not to study too hard if you promise to study harder.  Judging by your last letter, your grammar could use some work.  Don’t let that water doggie bite you!  I’m guessing his bark’s worse than his bite, though.  Ha!

Yours,
Adam

    Tucking away his letter, Hoss ambled over to the Thomases to beg a meal and a bag of cookies, if he was lucky.  Since he’d been cautioned about dawdling today, Hoss left right after lunch, putting the family’s mail and a dozen sugar cookies carefully in the saddlebags he’d gotten for Christmas.

    Later that evening Hoss waited impatiently for his father to peruse Adam’s letter.  “Can I read this one,” he asked as soon as his father finished, “or is Adam in more trouble?”

    Ben arched an eyebrow.  “What do you know about that?”

    Hoss gulped.  Maybe Adam was supposed to have kept things secret from his little brother, and here Hoss had gone and spilled the beans.

    “I asked you a question, Hoss,” Ben said sternly.

    “Y—yes, sir,” Hoss stammered.  “J—just what Adam wrote me.  He said he went some places he shouldn’t——like saloons——and drank beer.”

    “Is that all?” Ben probed.

    “Yeah.  It’s okay he told me, ain’t it?”

    “If he wanted to,” Ben said, relieved that Adam had omitted the more sordid visit to Chinatown in his letter to his eight-year-old brother.  “There’s nothing like that this time, if you were hoping for more juicy details.”

    “Oh, no,” Hoss assured his father.  “I was wantin’ to find out what he got for his birthday.  He didn’t say in my letter.”

    “Oh, Hoss,” Ben chuckled.  “His birthday was less than two weeks ago.  This letter was posted before that.  Unless he peeked, he couldn’t have known what was in those packages I left with Mrs. Maguire.”

    “He wouldn’t peek,” Hoss sighed.  Straight-laced Adam never did step over the line.  Of course, he had drunk those beers.  Maybe he was easin’ up some, after all.  Then again, maybe not.  He had gone and confessed the whole thing, a really stupid move in Hoss’s eyes.  Why court trouble when you could avoid it just by keeping your mouth shut?  “So, can I read the letter or you just wanna tell me what’s in it?”

    “You can’t read it,” Ben said.  “It’s in cursive, Hoss.”

    “I would like to hear Adam’s news,” Marie smiled from her chair by the fire.

    Ben laughed.  “I guess I should have read it out loud to begin with.”  He’d been reluctant to do that, though, after having to stop suddenly in the midst of Adam’s last epistle to avoid Hoss’s hearing what it contained.  “Adam just thanked me for forgiving him, and he promises he’ll never abuse our trust again.”

    “It was not our trust in him that was abused,” Marie muttered.

    “Don’t start,” Ben warned.  To distract her, he hurried on with the other details of Adam’s letter.  “He also said his studies were more difficult this term, but he’s still doing well and finds his lessons interesting.”

    “That is good news,” Marie smiled.

    Ben sobered.  “Yeah, but there was bad news, too, my love.  You remember young Jamie Edwards?”

    “Mais oui.  Such a sweet boy.”

    “Adam had a letter from him.  You know the boy was always frail.  Well, he was sick so much in November and December that he couldn’t complete the first term, and Josiah is making him take the rest of the year off to recuperate.”

    “What a shame,” Marie sympathized.  “He loved learning as much as Adam, I think.”

    “Don’t sound bad to me,” Hoss grunted.  “I wouldn’t mind takin’ some time off from school.”

    Ben guffawed.  “You’re out of luck, you healthy boy!”

    “I am sure Adam is more sympathetic with his friend than Hoss is,” Marie smiled.

    “Indeed,” Ben agreed, “although he seems to relish that he and Jamie will be back on the same level again next year.  Jamie started his academy work a year earlier than Adam, you know.”

    “I remember,” Marie said quietly, bending over her sewing.  Though she said nothing else, Ben knew she was thinking about those troubled early days of their marriage when Adam had been so confused and hostile.  The reason Adam had started school a year later than planned was his father’s unexpected trip to New Orleans, and Ben’s bringing home a new bride had only made the boy more miserable at delaying his education in Sacramento.

    “Shall I read the letter from John now?” Ben asked softly.

    “Oui, s’il te plait.”

    Ben cleared his throat and began:
 

Dear Ben, Marie and boys:

Will and I are in good health and hoping this finds you in the same.  We are getting along better now.  Will’s really caught up in the excitement of our booming town of Denver.  He was particularly pleased with the holster and handgun I gave him for Christmas and is growing proficient in handling it.  I can almost hear you criticizing, little brother, but I beg you to withhold judgement.  You don’t know what it’s like in a rough mining town.  Even a boy needs to be able to protect himself.

    “About six months,” Ben muttered.  “Of all the fool notions!  Giving a handgun to boy of sixteen.”

    “That what you got Adam for his birthday, Pa?” Hoss queried excitedly.

    “No!” Ben shouted.

    Little Joe, playing on the rug by the fire, started to cry.  “There, there, sweet boy,” Marie soothed, gathering him into her lap.  “Papa does not mean to frighten you.”

    “Yeah, I’m sorry, little fellow,” Ben murmured, “and I’m sorry I yelled at you, Hoss.  Your question was ridiculous, however.  Both your brother and your cousin are too young to be toting weapons.  That just invites trouble.”

    “Uncle John says Will needs protectin’,” Hoss argued.  “You wouldn’t want him to get hurt, would you?”

    “No, of course not,” Ben replied with strained patience, “but I believe that Uncle John should avoid putting his boy in a position where he needs protection.”

    “Like you puttin’ Adam in with that stinkin’ Sterling?” Hoss asked.  “That’s what got him in trouble, ain’t it?”

    Marie giggled at the sudden discomfort on Ben’s countenance.  “Oui, mon chéri , but I believe your father has learned his lesson.”

    “If not, I have ample folk to remind me,” Ben said dryly and returned to his brother’s letter:
 

We have found no big strike yet, but continue to pan enough to get by.  Neither Will nor I feel ready to give up, although I appreciate your offer to help us relocate.  I never was cut out for a farmer, and Will seems to have had his fill of it, too.

    Ben groaned.  The words reminded him of ones once spoken by his second wife’s brother, Gunnar Borgstrom.  Not thinking himself cut out for a shopkeeper, Gunnar had headed for the gold fields across the Isthmus of Panama and had never been heard from again.

    “Is that all?” Marie queried.

    “Umm?” Ben muttered, attention slowly returning.  “Oh, yeah.  Just sends his love, requests I write soon, that sort of thing.  No more news.”

    “Ben, I think you must give up this dream of John’s coming here,” Marie said softly.

    “I guess so,” Ben sighed, “though if it’s the thrill of seeking gold he craves, he might as well do it at Gold Hill.  Sure seems to be growing since Old Virginny staked out the first claim.”

    “We gonna move to Gold Hill, Pa?” Hoss asked anxiously.

    Ben closed his eyes and shook his head.  Sometimes he despaired of his middle boy’s ever following a conversation closely enough to understand what had actually been said.  “No, son,” he replied with as much patience as he could muster.  “No, we’re gonna stay right here on the Ponderosa.”

    “Stay here,” Little Joe babbled from his mother’s lap.  Ben laughed.  Hoss might miss the point of any conversation, but not that youngest son of his.  Little Joe didn’t miss a thing.

    Arms akimbo, Nelly Thomas stood in the kitchen doorway, looking into the parlor.  “Ain’t that Billy back yet?” she demanded.  “Dinner’s nigh on to ready.”

    Clyde looked up from the game of checkers he was playing with Ben Cartwright.  “You serve it up when it’s done,” he ordered brusquely.  “No call for that boy holdin’ up the rest of us.  He knows when dinner’s served.  Had no business traipsin’ off this mornin’, anyhow.”

    Ben chuckled.  “Just where did he traipse off to?  Down the street to the Martins?”

    “Doc’s got better sense than to let that scamp chase after his daughter that early of a Sunday morning,” Clyde muttered.  “Naw, he took off for Genoa right after breakfast.”

    Ben looked puzzled.  “What’s the attraction at Genoa?  Somebody plant a new daisy there?”

    Clyde guffawed.  “I’d understand him chasin’ a skirt; he’s of an age for that, but it ain’t nothin’ that sensible.  Says he’s just plain sick of the sight of Carson.”

    “Oh, itchy feet.”  Ben smiled as he jumped one of Clyde’s red markers.  “He’s of an age for that, too, Clyde, although I wouldn’t think Genoa rated much as a cure.”

    “Fur as he could get and not miss dinner, I reckon,” Clyde cackled, then frowned in concentration over his next move.

    Billy’s devotion to his stomach proved the inspiration for his return, just as his mother and Marie finished setting out the food.  “High time you got home,” his father complained.

    “I said I’d be back for dinner, and here I am,” Billy grinned.

    “Well, make yourself useful, son,” Nelly said.  “Tell the younguns it’s time to eat.”

    “Sure, Ma,” Billy said.  He sauntered into the narrow hall and hollered up the stairway, “Hey, come and get it!”

    “Oh, you scamp!” Nelly scolded.  “You know that ain’t what I had in mind.”

    Billy shrugged.  “It’ll work.  That Hoss has got mighty sharp ears where food’s concerned.”  The clatter of feet rushing down the stairs proved his words.

    Everyone gathered around the table and folded their hands while Ben said grace over the meal.  Then, as Clyde carved the roast teal, Ben asked, “What’s the big news over to Genoa, Billy?”

    Billy laughed.  “Aw, Uncle Ben, you know there ain’t never much goin’ on there, any more than here.  Was kind of an interesting poker game at the Stockade, though.”

    “The Stockade Bar?” his mother squealed.  “You been drinkin’ and gamblin’ on the Lord’s Day?”

    “No, Ma,” Billy sputtered, “though I don’t see as it’d be such a sin.  John Herring’s a year younger than me, and he was playin’.”

    “Age has nothin’ to do with it,” Nelly scolded.  “It’s a sacrilege, that’s what it is.”

    “No better than I’d expect from a Mormon,” Clyde snorted.  “What you doin’ runnin’ with such trash?”

    “Bein’ Mormon don’t make him trash,” Billy snapped.

    “You been listenin’ to your Uncle Ben too much, boy,” Clyde grunted.

    “That Herring boy’s got a pretty rough reputation, Billy,” Ben said, ignoring Clyde’s thinly veiled criticism.  “Why, I’ve heard he’s been threatening to shoot people all over the valley.”

    Billy shrugged.  “Yeah, I heard him do that once, but I figured it for just talk.  Anyway, he was peaceable enough this morning, even when he lost his bridle to Elzy Knott.  You know, the one that runs the sawmill.”

    “And the grist mill,” Clyde added.  “Knott’s a decent fellow.”

    “Not if he’s gamblin’ on the Sabbath,” Nelly insisted.

    “Aw, you’re too strait-laced, Ma,” Billy muttered as he piled his plate with mashed potatoes and ladled duck gravy over them.  “Ain’t much else to do in a town the size of Genoa.”

    “Well, at least, that Herring boy’ll think twice about doin’ it again,” Nelly stated.  “Losing his bridle should be a good lesson to him on the dangers of gambling.”

    Billy hooted.  “Some lesson!  His uncle waltzed in and said the bet was no good, ‘cause it was his bridle and John didn’t have permission to gamble it.”

    “You mean his stepfather, don’t you?” Ben asked, a twinkle in his eye.  Like everyone else at the table, except the children, he knew that Herring had married his brother’s widow, giving him a dual relationship to the boy.

    “I hope there was no trouble, no gunplay,” Marie observed after a brief titter circled the table at Ben’s remark.

    “Naw, Elzy just gave up the bridle,” Billy said.  “Told me afterwards he figured Mr. Herring must have needed it.”

    “That Knott boy’s a considerate young fellow,” Ben commented.  “He’s always impressed me as a hard worker and a fair dealer.”

    “Boy!” Billy protested.  “Why, he must be twenty-five, twenty-six years old, Uncle Ben!  Just how old does a fellow have to be before you quit callin’ him a boy?”

    “Older than you, boy,” Clyde grinned.  “Older than you.”

    Two days later, after the sun had dipped behind the mountains edging the Ponderosa, Billy Thomas rode into the yard, tied his horse’s reins to the hitching rail and pounded on the front door.

    “You’re late,” Ben commented dryly when Hop Sing had admitted the young man.  “We just finished dinner.”

    “Do not be rude, Ben,” Marie chided, then smiled at Billy.  “I am sure Hop Sing can prepare you a plate if you have not eaten.”

    “I haven’t, but I’m not hungry, ma’am,” Billy said twirling his hat between his hands.

    Ben arched an eyebrow.  Lack of appetite in Billy Thomas was a sure sign of trouble, just as it would have been in his own boys.  “What’s wrong?” he demanded.

    Billy dropped his hat, then leaned over to snatch it up from the floor and started twirling it again.  Marie gently took it from his fingers and laid it on the cabinet to the left of the front door, then stroked his arm soothingly.  “Have you come to visit or to bring news, Billy?” she asked.

    Billy bit his lip.  “I come——uh——I come to invite you to a funeral.”

    As Marie uttered a sharp cry, Billy grabbed her arms quickly.  “Oh, no, ma’am,” he assured her at once.  “Not any of my folks.  Not anyone you know.”

    “Who is it?” Ben demanded through tense jaws.  “Quit stammering around and speak plain, boy.”

    Billy jerked a nod at Ben.  “Elzy, Elzy Knott, Uncle Ben.  You’ve done business with him, but I didn’t figure Marie knew him.”

    “The young man who so kindly returned the bridle he’d won in the poker game?” Marie asked.  “You told us about him Sunday.”

    “Yes, ma’am, the same one,” Billy replied.

    “Not more trouble over that bridle?” Ben queried.

    “Yeah,” Billy grunted.  “Don’t it beat all, Uncle Ben?”

    “Sit down and tell us what you know, boy,” Ben said, pointing toward the sofa.

    Billy seemed glad to sit.  “Hey, Hoss, how you doin’?” he asked of the youngster seated by the hearth building blocks with his little brother.

    “I’m doin’ good, Billy.  How ‘bout you?” Hoss replied.

    “It’s scarcely a time for small talk, Billy,” Ben stated firmly.

    “And it is scarcely talk for small ears,” Marie added.  “Hoss, please take Little Joe to your room to play.”

    “Aw, Ma,” Hoss protested.  “I wanna hear.”  He’d deliberately kept quiet until he was spoken to in hopes his parents wouldn’t notice he was eavesdropping.

    “Do as you’re told,” Ben ordered in a voice that told Hoss no argument or disobedience would be tolerated.

    Once the boys had left Ben turned to Billy.  “All right, son.  What started the trouble up again?  Knott have second thoughts about that bridle?”

    “You might say that,” Billy said.  “I can only tell what I heard, Uncle Ben.  I reckon the whole story’ll come out at the trial.”

    “Billy,” Ben said with strained patience.

“Yes, sir,” Billy said.  “Well, what I heard was that after giving the bridle back, Elzy saw Herring——the uncle——well, stepfather——”

    “Go on,” Ben ordered tersely.

    “Okay, okay.  I’m sorry, but this thing’s got me shook to pieces,” Billy stammered.  “I ain’t never had to testify at a trial before.”

    “You?  Were you there when it happened, Billy?” Marie asked.

    “No, ma’am.  It’s what happened Sunday I got to give witness to,” Billy explained.

    “All you need do is tell the truth,” Ben said.  “No need to be so nervous about that, boy.”

    “Yeah, but I counted ‘em both friends, Uncle Ben,” Billy moaned.  “Now one’s dead and the other likely to hang for shooting him.  I don’t want no part of puttin’ that noose around his neck.”

    “Unless you know more than you’ve said so far, your testimony couldn’t possibly do that,” Ben assured him.

    Billy uttered an edgy laugh.  “I guess I don’t know enough to do much harm or good, do I?  All I saw was that poker game and the return of the bridle.”

    “Please continue, Billy,” Marie urged.  “You said Monsieur Knott saw Monsieur Herring.”

    “Yeah, and he——the uncle——step——”

    “Let’s just use uncle, son,” Ben chuckled, “or we’ll never get to the end of this tale.”

    Billy returned a lop-sided grin.  “Yeah, the uncle, he was gamblin’ that bridle hisself, and when Elzy saw that, he took it away.  Said if the bridle was gonna be gambled off, he’d already won it!”

    “Well, he had a point,” Ben admitted, “but I’m not sure it was wise to contest it.  So Herring shot Elzy over it?”

    “Not the way I heard it,” Billy said.  “I guess he thought Elzy was right and let him take the bridle.  That was Sunday or Monday.  I ain’t got it straight which.  It was today Elzy got shot and it was the kid, John Herring, that did it.”

    Ben was tempted to throw his hands in the air.  If it was this hard for Billy to state a few simple facts, maybe he was right to be nervous about testifying in a trial.  “What caused the quarrel today?” Ben pressed.

    “The bridle, like I said,” Billy declared.  “Meanin’ no disrespect, Uncle Ben, but if you’d quit interruptin’, I might could get this told.”

    “I’ll try,” Ben muttered.  “Go on.”

    “Okay, what I heard was that this morning John saw a young fellow that works for Elzy puttin’ the bridle on a horse and took it away from him.  Then Elzy went after John, barged right in his house to get the bridle back and John shot him.”

    “They have young Herring in custody?” Ben asked.

    “Yeah, he took off for the hills, but he’s been caught.”

    “When is the funeral, Billy?” Marie asked.  “If Ben knew this family, we should pay our respects, oui?”

    “Yeah, that’s why I came,” Billy said, “so you could.  Pa says most everybody in the valley’ll be there.  The funeral’s tomorrow afternoon, at the Knott place.  His pa’s mighty wrought up, said he wouldn’t have his boy buried in the Mormon Cemetery, since it was a Mormon shot him, so he’s gonna start his own.”

    “We’ll be there,” Ben said.

    “You will sleep here tonight and go with us, oui?” Marie asked.

    “Yes, ma’am,” Billy said, looking relieved that his errand was accomplished.  “I brung a change of clothes so I could do just that, and, if you don’t mind, I reckon I’ll take that plate of food now.”

    Ben sat beside Clyde in the front row of benches in the courtroom.  The room was starting to fill up, now that the time for the trial was near, but it had been almost empty when they arrived.  Clyde had wanted a good seat to see his boy testify, and since the Cartwrights had spent the night in Carson City after the funeral, it had been possible to get to Genoa early. “Almost as big a crowd as yesterday,” Ben commented.

    “Yeah, Knott was well-liked.  Folks are interested in seein’ justice done,” Clyde said.

    “You think it will be?” Billy, sitting on the other side of his father, asked.

    “If they don’t load the jury with Mormons,” Clyde grunted.

    “Or vigilantes,” Ben added wryly.  “Mighty hard to get a fair trial in these parts, with so many opposing factions.”

    “The Knotts don’t hold with vigilantes,” Billy said, “and I never heard of John’s bein’ part of it.”

    “His uncle’s connected to ‘em,” Clyde mumbled.  “Now, that’s the last I want to hear of such talk, at least in public.”

    “Yes, sir, Pa,” Billy said quickly.  He knew his father was warning him that it wasn’t safe to voice your opinions too strongly, when the man sitting next to you might take the opposite side and be all too willing to shoot you for disagreeing with him.  Billy figured he had enough to be nervous about, just being a witness in this trial, without riling his father or, worse, some vigilante in the process.

    Billy was one of the first witnesses to testify, and the look of relief as he left the stand was evident to all.  Ben clasped the boy’s hand as he moved past him to take his place beside his father again.  Clyde nudged his son’s leg with his knee and gave him a nod of approval.  Ben couldn’t help thinking, however, that it was a good thing the prosecutor had kept the questions short and simple or they might have been listening to Billy’s rambling testimony ‘til past noon.  Even with expert questioning, the trial hadn’t covered much ground by the time it adjourned for the midday meal.

    “You want to eat at Singleton’s?” Ben asked as they exited the courtroom.  “My treat.”

    “Good as any,” Clyde said, “though with provisions as short as they’ve been, we’ll be lucky to get more than bread and beans.”  Not many freight wagons had made it over the Sierras yet, and everyone’s supplies were running low.

    “At least, that colored cook of his does a good job with ‘em,” Billy said with a grin, “and I’m half-starved.”

    “The usual result of skipping your breakfast, young fellow,” Ben teased.  Nervous about his testimony, Billy hadn’t wanted to chance filling his belly with fatback and biscuits.

    The dining room of Singleton’s Hotel was crowded, so the trio had to wait for a table.  By the time the food arrived, Billy was not the only one ready to wolf it down.  As predicted, the best the menu had to offer was brown beans and cornbread, but the beans were seasoned flavorfully and the cornbread was moist and tender.

    “You plan to stay for the afternoon session, Ben?” Clyde asked as he crumbled cornbread into his beans.

    Ben chuckled before answering.  Ostensibly, his reason for being there this morning was to lend moral support to his young “nephew.”  That reason no longer applied, since Billy’s testimony had ended, but Ben had to admit he had a certain curiosity to see how the trial ended.  “Oh, I might as well,” he said casually.  “By the time I collected my family and got back to the Ponderosa, the best part of the working day would be over.  How about you?”

    “Well, Billy here wants to stay,” Clyde said, “seein’ as how he was friends to that Herring boy.”

    Ben’s lips twitched.  Clyde wasn’t fooling him: he wasn’t staying just for Billy’s sake; Clyde was curious himself.

    “Elzy was my friend, too,” Billy insisted.

    “Kind of old for you, wasn’t he?” Ben twitted.  “A man of twenty-six?”

    “Well, we weren’t close——and I ain’t tight with John, either, for that matter——but you know how it is, Uncle Ben.  You see someone day in, day out and you feel like they’re part of you.  Then, suddenly, they’re gone, and even if you weren’t close——”

    “I understand, Billy,” Ben smiled.  “I think we’d all be better off if we felt that kind of kinship with our fellow man.”

    They finished the meal and hurried back to the courtroom, just as the trial reconvened.  Though they weren’t back in time to get a good seat, they had no trouble following the testimony, for the room was small.  The prosecutor was slow to elicit the facts, however, and court adjourned that afternoon with nothing more established than that Herring had taken the bridle back from Knott’s employee.

    “Might as well stay over and see how it ends,” Clyde suggested as they arrived back at Carson City.  “Be dark by the time you got to the Ponderosa.”

    “I should get back,” Ben said.  “We need to get our garden in.”

    “Ah, it’ll keep,” Clyde urged.  “Ain’t hardly warm enough yet to think of plantin’.”

    “You tempter,” Ben laughed.  “Are you sure you’re not just using me for an excuse to get out of work yourself?”

    Clyde grinned.  “Never claimed otherwise.  How ‘bout it?”

    “I’ll leave it up to Marie,” Ben said.

    “You’ll be stayin’ then,” Billy predicted.  “She don’t get that many chances to pay long visits.”

    Ben guffawed.  “Well, we wouldn’t want to deprive the ladies of their chance to socialize, would we, Billy?”

    “Be downright unchivalrous,” Billy declared with a twinkle in his blue eyes.

    Marie was more than willing to extend her visit to Carson City, while the boys were positively delighted.  “I don’t never get enough time to play with Jimmy,” Hoss declared.

    Leaving the others to their chosen amusements, Ben, Clyde and Billy returned to Genoa the next morning.  Again the prosecutor built his case slowly, questioning first the youngster employed by the Knotts as to what he had told young Knott about Herring’s actions and the attitude with which Elzy Knott had received the news.

    The most painful testimony of the morning was given by Thomas Knott, Elzy’s father.  “The reason me and my younger son went to Herring’s house with Elzy was to see the boys settled their differences peaceably,” Knott stated, “but that hot-headed Mormon just up and shot my boy!”  The grief-stricken father broke down, weeping, and a recess was called to give him time to recover his equilibrium.

    Back on the stand, Knott described entering the Herring household and asking to speak with John.  “The boy’s mother told us he was in the back room, armed, threatening to shoot anyone who opened the door,” Knott testified.  “I told Elzy to let it go, but he said he’d have that bridle or lose his life.  And that’s just what he did——over a bridle!”  Again, the elderly Knott broke down.  Again, a brief recess was called.

    “Against my advice, Elzy opened that door,” Knott said when the trial resumed, “and just like he’d threatened, Herring shot first and asked questions later.  Why, it could have been his own mother opening that door, but Herring didn’t care!  The bullet tore through my boy’s cheek and he fell down, bleeding out on the floor.  My boy died there, before my eyes, before his younger brother, who’d just got in from back east.  Hadn’t had a week together when——when——”

    It was obvious to all that Knott had taken all he could, so the judge suggested dismissing early for lunch and conducting the cross-examination afterwards.  “They ain’t gonna finish today even, at this rate,” Clyde grumbled as they again headed for Singleton’s to eat.

    “Yeah, we haven’t even heard from Herring’s family yet,” Ben sighed.  “I don’t think I can give another day to this.  If I hadn’t promised Marie and the boys they could have today to visit, I’d head home this afternoon.”

    “Can’t last much longer,” Billy said.  “Not much happened after Elzy was shot.”

    Ben laughed gruffly.  “Boy, you have no idea how a pair of lawyers can stretch out ‘not much.’”

    The lawyers ably proved Ben’s point that afternoon.  Little new information was elicited, although several other witnesses were examined, including Elzy Knott’s wife, although she hadn’t seen the shooting at all.  Mrs. Knott had been summoned to the Herring house immediately after the shooting and had thrown herself on her young husband’s body, severely lacerating her hand on the bone fragments pushing out through his cheek.  Though it had little bearing on Herring’s guilt or innocence, her testimony was the kind that stirred the emotions of the courtroom and made Ben wonder if young Herring might be found guilty, in spite of the jury box packed with vigilante-friendly members.

    The case finished that afternoon, but as the hour was late, the jury’s deliberations were held over for the next morning.  Ben decided he’d give them until noon to reach a decision.  “We’re leaving after lunch,” he told his family, “verdict or no verdict.  I’ve neglected the Ponderosa long enough.”

    Compared to the trial itself, however, the jury’s deliberations were strikingly brief.  In little over an hour, fleet-footed young men, Billy among them, were racing through the streets of Genoa yelling that the jury was in.  Everyone interested, and that was almost everyone in town, ran to the courtroom.  Not everyone managed to squeeze in, but Ben and the two Thomases did.

    The foreman of the jury delivered the verdict and the judge read it:  not guilty.  The crowd milling Main Street afterwards seemed divided in its opinion of whether justice had been done.  While Elzy Knott had not appeared to intend violence against Herring, he had entered the Herring house uninvited, and many felt that he had incurred the predictable penalty for invading the privacy of another’s home.  Others declared this was just another case of vigilantes protecting their own, regardless of what was right.

    Not long afterwards a copy of the Valley Tan, a Salt Lake City newspaper independent of Mormon interest, reached Genoa, and one of its prominent articles increased the feeling that justice in Utah  Territory would always be bridled by special interests.  In it, Judge John Cradlebaugh, after a futile attempt to indict those he held responsible for the Mountain Meadows Massacre, charged that it was impossible to mete out justice to the criminal in Utah and accused the Legislature of enacting laws for the express purpose of protecting the guilty.
 

    As the days warmed, the grass aimed its blades at the nourishing sun, and Ben Cartwright decided to move his herd to better pasture.  The cattle had come through the winter well, and with a few weeks’ fattening, some should be ready to market.  As he rode through the herd, Ben evaluated the stock according to their readiness for sale.  Though he didn’t plan to take many over the Sierras this spring, he would, at least, drive a few to Placerville when his family headed there to attend Enos and Katerina’s wedding and to escort Mark and Mary Wentworth back to the Ponderosa for a visit.

    Ben felt he was keeping faith with his second wife in welcoming the Wentworths to his home, and the thought warmed his heart.  Even before their arrival, however, the Ponderosa was to serve as the refuge Inger Borgstrom Cartwright had envisioned.  Ironically, the threat was the same one that had sparked her dream back in St. Joseph.

    The Cartwrights first became aware of the trouble in Carson City when Billy Thomas drove up late one evening in April in a buckboard with his sister Inger.  “Howdy, folks.  Am I in time for dinner?” the irrepressible redhead asked, sweeping off his slouch hat when Hop Sing ushered the two youngsters into the dining room.

    Ben and Marie both stood from their places at the table, and Marie greeted the little girl with a hug and a kiss.  “Mais oui.  Hop Sing was just ready to serve dessert, but we can have him fill plates for you both.”

    “Sounds good,” Billy grinned.

    “Like Ma didn’t feed us before we left!” his little sister muttered irritably.

    Billy shrugged.  “I can always eat.”

    “Me, too,” Hoss agreed cheerily.

    Ben chuckled, then turned to the Chinese cook.  “Prepare a plate for young Mr. Thomas, please, Hop Sing.”

    “Little girl, too?” Hop Sing asked.

    Inger shook her head.  “I ain’t hungry.”

    “You gotta have dessert, anyway,” Hoss declared.  “We’re havin’ poppy seed cake.”

    “Cake good,” Little Joe added, having had a piece at noon.

    Inger shook her head, but pulled out a chair and sat down next to her brother.

    “It is good to see you children,” Marie said tentatively, “but it is late for you to come alone.  Is something wrong at home?”

    “Sort of,” Billy mumbled, reaching for a yeast roll although he as yet had no plate to put it on.

    “Yes!” Inger snapped indignantly.

    “What is it, Billy?” Ben demanded.  “And no more beating around the bush.  You know if your folks need help——”

    “They don’t,” Billy said quickly, taking a plate of roast beef, potatoes and carrots from the Chinese cook.  “That is, except for a favor they sent me to ask.”

    “Mais oui,” Marie said at once.  “We will be most glad to do whatever they ask.”

    Billy snickered.  “Don’t be so quick to speak up, ma’am.  What Ma wants is for you to take care of this nuisance for a few days.”  He hooked a stubby thumb toward Inger as he shoveled potatoes in with the other hand.

    “I’m not a nuisance!” Inger snapped, then started to cry.

    “Of course you are not,” Marie soothed as she knelt beside the distraught child.  “You are a most welcome guest.”

    “Billy, I said no beating around the bush,” Ben said bluntly.

    “Yes, sir,” Billy said, suddenly serious.  “Ain’t no real problem yet, at least not for us, but when Ma heard there was cholera in town, she got to frettin’.”

    “Cholera!” Marie cried.  “Oh, no!”

    “Are you sure?” Ben asked hoarsely.

    “Yeah, Sally told me,” Billy replied, slicing off a piece of beef.  “Just a few cases, her pa says, but you know how Ma is where cholera’s concerned.”

    Ben nodded.  Having lost one child to the disease, it was no wonder Nelly wanted to send her precious daughter as far from danger as possible.  “You and your folks are welcome to stay here, too, ‘til the threat’s past,” Ben suggested.

    Billy sopped his meat in the gravy on his plate.  “Naw, Pa’s busy at the trading post, and Ma says she ain’t afraid for herself.  We figure, her and me, that we ain’t likely to get it since we had it before.”

    “But, Billy, you might as well stay here,” Ben countered.

    “And have somebody jump my claim?” Billy hooted.  “No thanks.”

    “Don’t tell me you finally talked your folks into lettin’ you go minin’,” Hoss cackled.

    “Yup, and my claim’s showin’ some good color, so I reckon I’ll stick close to it,” Billy reported, polishing off the last bite on his plate.  “Now, how ‘bout that poppy seed cake?”

    Ben nuzzled his wife’s cheek as they lay side by side in their rosewood four-poster, but Marie did not respond with her usual ready passion.  She allowed Ben to hold her and stroke her, but instead of returning his kisses, she merely lay in his arms and trembled.  “What is it, dearest?” Ben whispered.

    Marie turned an anxious face to him.  “B—Ben, you do not think Inger is ill, do you, that——that she already has the cholera?”

    “No, I don’t,” Ben said, perplexed.  “Nelly wouldn’t have sent her here if she’d shown any signs of the disease.”

    “She did not act like herself tonight,” Marie murmured.

    “Oh, that,” Ben replied lightly.  “She’s upset about being sent away from home, I suppose——maybe worried about her folks.”

    “I hope that is all it is,” Marie whispered, still trembling.

    “Surely, you don’t want to turn the little girl away,” Ben said, disturbed.

    “No, no, we cannot do that,” Marie replied.  “I—I just do not want any harm to come to—to——”

    Ben smiled, at last understanding.  “To your baby,” he said.

    “To both our sons,” Marie corrected, “but Little Joe is so small, Ben, that I worry.”

    “You shouldn’t,” Ben soothed, holding her closer.  “He’s small, but sturdy.  Marie, my love, you have got to get over this constant concern for that child.  It’s needless.”

    “Do not mock my fears, Ben,” Marie begged, keeping her voice low to avoid waking the baby in the next room.  “You have never lost a child.”

    The words stabbed Ben’s heart.  As if he hadn’t known abundant loss in his own life!  The deaths of his parents, then Elizabeth and Inger.  Still, the thought of losing one of his boys was agonizing.  He took Marie’s slender hand.  “This isn’t yellow fever, dearest.”

    “Oh, and cholera does not kill?” Marie asked hotly.

    Ben laid his hand across her lips to remind her to lower her voice.  “Yes, of course, it does, but just because you lost one child to yellow fever does not mean you will lose another to cholera.  That’s superstition, Marie, and you really must not give in to it.”

    “I told you once that death follows me,” Marie wept, burying her head against his chest.

    With his fingertips Ben raised her chin and gazed consolingly into her shimmering eyes.  “And then I told you that was in the past, that there was life ahead for us, remember?  Have I been wrong?”

    Marie smiled weakly.  “Oh, no, Ben.  With you I have known only life.”

    “Then, relax,” he urged.  “I’m sure there’s nothing worse than homesickness afflicting our little guest, but if Inger’s in any danger, it’ll show up in the next day or two and we’ll isolate her.  I really think you’re worrying over nothing, though.  Try to sleep, my love.”  He pulled her head onto his shoulder and stroked the golden head until her breathing grew more regular.

    “How come I gotta do lessons when I got company?” Hoss whined.

    “If you wish to have your summer free, you must do your work now,” Marie explained patiently.  “You know we leave for Placerville next month, so we cannot afford to miss a day.  Besides, Inger can study with you.”

    Inger frowned.  If anything, she was less successful with books than Hoss, for Nelly wasn’t as diligent about regular lesson time as Marie.  She tended to give more attention to her daughter’s domestic education, feeling that was what a girl child needed most.  “I’m not too good at this,” the little girl muttered as she knelt next to Hoss at the low table before the fire.

    “Me help,” Little Joe offered, squeezing in between the other two children and patting the open book they would share.

    Marie pulled him away quickly.  “No,” she said, with more sharpness than usual.  “You play over here.”  She placed the toddler a good distance away from the others.  Little Joe started to protest.  “Oh, don’t cry, mon petit,” Marie murmured.  “Here is bun-bun and your seal, your blocks and your ball.  Now play quietly while Hoss and Inger study.”

    “Me play HaHa, Inggy,” Little Joe whimpered.

    “No, you play here, with your toys,” Marie said firmly and walked away to begin teaching her small class.

    Little Joe wasn’t used to being denied what he wanted, however, so he promptly pushed up and headed for the table.  This time he sat beside Inger and smiled beatifically up at his mother.  Inger giggled.

    “It is not funny,” Marie said, picking up the child once more.

    Hoss and Inger exchanged an amused glance and bit their lips to keep their laughter contained.  Anything that interfered with the hated lessons was funny to them.

    That morning Little Joe demonstrated that he had either inherited or absorbed the characteristic Cartwright stubbornness, for nothing, not even receiving his first-ever spanking from his doting mother, discouraged his efforts to join the class.  Marie finally burst into tears and sent the two older children outside to play, while she held the wailing youngest, who couldn’t understand why he couldn’t go with the others.

    The other children couldn’t understand, either.  “What’s wrong with your ma?” Inger quizzed as soon as she and Hoss were alone.

    “I dunno,” Hoss muttered, brow creasing.  “She always lets Little Joe come out with me, and I ain’t never seen her swat him.”

    Inside, Marie laid her tear-streaked cheek against the baby’s equally damp one, and rocked her indignant child back and forth on her lap.  “Don’t you understand I am trying to keep you safe?” she moaned, then shook her head.  How could Little Joe possibly understand?  He knew nothing of the dangers of disease, nothing of how fragile life could be.

    Finally, Marie wiped her cheeks dry and kissed her still-whimpering child.  “There now, mon petit, Mama is sorry to make you sad.  Your papa was right to scold me last night.  I am being superstitious and making everyone miserable.”  She carried Little Joe outside and handed him to Hoss.  “Play,” she said.

    Little Joe gave a cry of delight and flung his arms around Hoss’s neck.

    “Okay, Mama,” Hoss said, face screwing up in thought.  “You okay, Mama?”

    Marie took a deep breath and lied.  “Oui, I am fine.  You may play outside another half hour, then we will try again with your lessons.  If you study hard, I will ask Hop Sing to let us use the kitchen to bake gingercakes this afternoon.”

    “Ooh, that’ll be fun!” Inger cried with the brightest grin she’d shown since her arrival the night before.

    Marie smiled and gently touched the girl’s soft cheek.  This child had more cause to worry than she, and Marie resolved from that moment to forget her own concerns by alleviating those of the little girl separated from her family.  I wish I could be more like your namesake, she thought.  To that Inger, all this would come naturally, I know.  Though she didn’t realize it, however, Marie’s heart, wounded by a tortured past, was beginning to open, and as she matured, she was becoming more like that sacred memory of Hoss’s mother than she could have imagined.

    Though several residents of Carson City died of cholera that spring, the Thomases were spared.  Little Inger remained at the Ponderosa for three weeks, until her mother was certain no one in town was showing signs of cholera.  When she left, she threw her arms around Marie.  “I want to come back sometime,” she declared earnestly.  “You bake fancier stuff than Ma, and it’s fun!”

    Marie kissed her cheek warmly.  “You will be welcome anytime.  Perhaps you can stay a week while Mary is here, and we will have an all-girls’ party.”

    “Hey, how ‘bout me?” Hoss protested.  “I like makin’ cookies, too.”

    “You can be our taster,” Inger giggled.  “That’s the part of bakin’ you like, Hoss.”  Unable to deny the obvious, Hoss grinned, satisfied that he’d partake of the best part of the fun this summer.

    With the beginning of May, Marie marshaled her troops to finish planting the garden.  Next to the onions, potatoes and other vegetables planted late in April, she, Hop Sing and Hoss (with Little Joe’s dubious help) sowed cucumbers, melons, pumpkins and beans, as well as herbs such as sage, thyme, mint and mustard.  Everything had to be done by the end of the first week, in preparation for the family’s departure the next Tuesday.

    On Sunday, the eighth of May, the Cartwrights and Thomases dined in their own homes, rather than sharing a meal.  They would, after all, being seeing plenty of each other over the next week or so.  Marie and Nelly planned to meet the next day at the Montgomery cabin to give it a final sprucing, then the following day they would all leave for Placerville.

    Although the Cartwrights were not expecting company that afternoon, a knock sounded at the door of the Ponderosa ranch house, and Hop Sing scurried to answer it.  Ben rose from his armchair at once and strode to welcome Frederick Dodge with a warm handshake.  “Haven’t seen you since Christmas Eve, my boy,” he said.  “That’s much too long.”

    “Indeed,” the federal Indian agent replied, “and I wish this visit could be as pleasant as that evening.”

    Ben caught the sober tone in Dodge’s voice and at once offered him a seat on the sofa.  “Is there a problem?  Anything I can help with?”

    “Yes, to both questions,” Dodge said softly.  “Perhaps, the children——”

    Marie caught the hint.  “Hoss, it is time for Little Joe’s nap.  Would you take him upstairs and read him a nice, long story?”

    “Yeah, okay,” Hoss muttered.  I may not be the brightest kid in the world , he sighed, but I know when someone’s tryin’ to get shed of me.”

    Once the two boys had disappeared, Dodge leaned forward.  “There’s been a murder, Cartwright——or a massacre, depending on whom you talk to.”

    “Massacre!” Marie cried, growing pale.

    “Who’s been killed?” Ben asked.

    “I think you know at least one of the victims,” Dodge replied.  “Peter Lassen.”

    “Of course,” Ben said, his face grave.  Though he wasn’t well acquainted with the old Danish settler, everyone had heard of the Lassen Cutoff through the Black Rock Desert.  Many, Ben’s brother among them, cursed the day they’d decided to take it.  Not only did the so-called short-cut add so many miles to the journey that it was commonly referred to as Lassen’s Horn Route, it also led through some of the most dry, desolate country the emigrants had ever encountered.  Lassen, however, had proven himself a friend to the Paiutes, and Ben respected him for that.

    “Lassen, Lemericus Wyatt and a young fellow called Edward Clapper set out from Susanville to take supplies to William Weatherlow’s party,” Dodge related.

    “I know Captain Weatherlow,” Ben said.  “He’s not——”

    “I don’t know,” Dodge said, anticipating Ben’s question.  “A relief party was sent out, but hadn’t returned by the time the message was sent to me.  All I know is that Lassen and Clapper are dead.”

    “Wyatt escaped?”

    Dodge nodded.  “Yes, in bad shape from what I hear.  Not injured.  Just the rigors of the ride.  A man of his age——he’s past sixty, I’m told——finds it pretty rough running for his life on an unsaddled horse with nothing but a picket rope to hang onto.”

    Ben grunted his agreement.  Though little more than half Wyatt’s reported age, he knew he’d find such a ride a rugged experience.

    “You mentioned a massacre,” Marie quavered.  “Did this Monsieur Wyatt accuse the Indians?”

    “I don’t what he said, ma’am,” Dodge answered, “or whether he was in any condition to say anything.  There are people accusing the Paiutes, though, so I need to investigate.”

    Ben shook his head.  “That doesn’t make sense.  The Paiutes and Lassen got along well.  Winnemucca’s nephew Numaga even helped him and the Honey Lake settlers fight off an invasion by the Pit River Indians.”

    “I agree,” Dodge said sharply.  “I personally suspect the Mormons.”

    “No proof of that, either,” Ben argued.  “As you say, you need to get the facts.”

    Dodge leaned forward, hands on his knees.  “That’s why I’m here.  I need to talk to Wyatt and the relief party and, of course, Numaga.  That’s where you come in, Cartwright.  I may need an interpreter.”

    “Walter Wasson?” Ben suggested.  “He lives up that way.”

    “True, but he may not be available,” Dodge said, “and, frankly, as hot as the town is, I’d welcome two sane voices I could count on.”

    “Of course,” Ben agreed at once.

    “But, Ben,” Marie protested, laying a trembling hand on his arm.  “We are to leave for Placerville day after tomorrow.  You cannot possibly return from Honey Lake by then.”

    Ben put his arm around her.  “No, you’ll have to go on without me.”

    “Oh, Ben, no,” she objected.

    “I’m sorry if I’m causing a problem,” Dodge said quietly, “but if the Indians are to blame, or even if they’re only believed to be, this whole territory could erupt.  I consider the situation grave, Mrs. Cartwright.”

    “So do I,” Ben said solemnly.  “Marie, I will do my best to be in Placerville by the fifteenth, but this must take precedence.  I can scarcely bring Ebenezer’s children here for the summer if we’re going to be in the midst of an Indian war.”

    The suggestion of warfare made Marie tremble all the more, as she suddenly began to fear for her own children.  “Yes, I will take the boys to Placerville, as planned,” she whispered.  “They will be safe there, and, Ben——you will be careful?”

    Ben took her face between his hands.  “I will be careful.  Don’t fret, my love.  Hopefully, we’ll settle this quickly, and I’ll be standing at your side when Enos and Katerina exchange their vows.”

    Marie nodded, giving him a weak smile.  “I will pack your things at once.”

    “My suit, too,” Ben suggested.  “I won’t have time to stop by home.”

    When he heard horses outside, Little Joe charged out of what would soon become the Montgomery cabin.  “Aunt Nelwy!” he cried happily.  “Inggy!”

    Marie came storming after him.  “Little Joe, come back here,” she demanded, then whirled on Hoss, who had followed her outside.  “I told you to watch him!”

    “I am watching him,” Hoss insisted, “but he’s fast, Mama.”

    Nelly scooped the toddler up and planted kisses on both cheeks.  “Now, Marie, he’s just bein’ friendly.”

    “Mama’s in a bad mood,” Hoss whispered to Inger when she jumped off the wagon.

    Marie’s cheeks flamed.  “I heard that, Hoss,” she informed him, palms planted on her hips, “and if you do not wish to see what a truly bad mood I am in, you will watch your little brother while we work.”

    “Yes, ma’am,” Hoss muttered.  “Come on, Inger.”

    “I’m helping in the house,” Inger announced loftily.  “You play with the baby.”

    Nelly laughed at Hoss’s clouded countenance as she handed Little Joe to him.  “Here you go, Sunshine, though you’re not livin’ up to that name today.”

    Hoss broke into a grin then and, hefting Little Joe over his shoulder, headed toward the creek.

    “Hoss, don’t go in the water,” Marie chided.  “It’s chilly for this time of year, and I don’t want you or Little Joe catching cold.”

    “Yes, ma’am,” Hoss sighed, wondering what in the world he was supposed to do to entertain his little brother until the ladies’ work was done.

    “Lands, honey lamb, you are in a mood,” Nelly commented.  “No need to fret yourself so; we’ll get the cabin ready in time.”

    Marie clenched her fists until the knuckles turned white.  “I am not worried about that.  It is Ben that worries me.”

    “Men are a bother, all right,” Nelly chuckled while she unloaded the buckboard.  “What’s Ben up to this time?”

    “Riding into an Indian war!” Marie sputtered.

    Nelly dropped the package of curtains and spun around.  “What are you sayin’, girl?  We ain’t had no trouble with injuns.”

    Marie quickly described Frederick Dodge’s visit the previous day.  “Ben left with him at once, and he expects me to just go on to Placerville without him!”

    “You won’t be alone,” Nelly soothed.  “You’ll be with us.”

    “But not Ben!” Marie ranted, then choked.  “He——he may be in danger, Nelly.”

    Nelly stroked the younger woman’s arm.  “Ben can take care of himself.  Besides, we don’t know it was Paiutes murdered them folks.”

    Marie took a deep breath.  “Monsieur Dodge thinks it was Mormons.”

    Nelly laughed.  “Well, my Clyde would be quick to agree with that!  Come on, honey lamb, we got plenty of work to occupy our minds today.  Don’t the Bible say to think on things that are good and pleasant.”

    Marie smiled.  Having been reared in a convent, she could have quoted the verse more accurately, but she didn’t wish to embarrass the less learned woman.  “Oui,

    “Let’s do it, then,” Nelly advised.  “Think about how Katerina’s gonna love her new home.  Now, let’s get to sprucin’!”

    Marie laughed then.  “I’ve started sweeping.  Only the front room remains.”

    “Inger can do that,” Nelly said, “while we hang the curtains.  She’s a good hand at sweepin’, aren’t you, sugar pie?”

    “Yes, ma’am,” Inger replied, proud of the compliment.

    Just then Little Joe rounded the corner of the cabin to clutch at Inger’s skirt.  Hoss came puffing after him.  “I’m tryin’, honest I am,” he panted defensively.

    “Well, try harder,” Inger scolded.  “We got work to do.”

    “Wanna play house, Inggy?” Little Joe suggested.  He pointed to the cabin.  “See?  Big house.”

    Marie laughed.  “He became most fond of that game while Inger stayed with us.”  She removed Inger’s skirt from the toddler’s clutching fingers.  “We are not playing house today, mon petit; we are making a real house.”

    “Me help,” Little Joe offered with a bright smile.

    “Hoss,” Marie pleaded.

    “Yes, ma’am, I’ll try,” Hoss said, taking Little Joe by the hand.  “Come on, Punkin.  Let’s see if we can find some squirrels.”

    “Swirwy?  Okay,” Little Joe conceded and began to pull Hoss toward the woods.

    “Good thing they distract easy at that age,” Nelly chuckled.  “Let’s get to work.”

    “While we have a chance,” Inger giggled.

    When the two boys entered the woods, Little Joe broke free and trotted ahead.  “Swirwy!  Here, swirwy!” he called to the trees.

    Hoss grabbed his hand again.  “You stay with me,” he scolded, “and quit that yellin’.  You’ll scare off every squirrel in twenty miles.”

    Little Joe nodded and walked quietly by his brother for a few minutes.  Then he stooped to scoop a handful of acorns from the ground.  “Lookee, HaHa——nuts!”

    Hoss laughed.  “Them ain’t nuts, they’re acorns.  Squirrels eat ‘em, though; Indians, too.”

    “Swirwy nuts!” Little Joe insisted.

    “Yeah, guess so,” Hoss conceded.  “Let’s sit down awhile.”  Little Joe seemed agreeable so the two brothers flopped side by side beneath a towering oak.  “Maybe a squirrel will come by if we’re real quiet,” Hoss suggested.

    Little Joe was rarely quiet for long, but his voice was not the first the break the silence.  Above them a sharp trill sounded.  Looking up, Hoss pointed at the bird perched in a nearby pine.  “You remember what kind of bird that is, Little Joe?  I told you last week.”

    “Blue jay,” Little Joe chirped readily.

    Hoss ruffled the younger boy’s golden brown hair.  “That’s right.  You’re a smart little whippersnapper, ain’t you?”

    Little Joe was about to agree when Hoss clamped a hand over his mouth.  “Look, it’s a squirrel,” he whispered.  “Maybe, if we’re real quiet, I can coax him over.”

    Hoss held out a handful of acorns and whistled softly.  The squirrel eyed the acorns with desire, his dark eyes furtively flickering this way and that.  He crept a step closer, then another, and finally drew near enough for Hoss to pick him up.  At first the wild animal reacted with fear, but gradually his trembling body quieted under the gentle boy’s touch.

    Little Joe reached out to stroke the squirrel’s soft gray back.  “Go easy,” Hoss cautioned.

    “Me hold,” Little Joe pleaded.

    “Okay, but be real easy.”  He handed the squirrel to his little brother.

    Little Joe’s arms closed tightly around the squirrel.  The animal reacted with a sharp cry and slashing claws.  Little Joe turned the animal loose and began to bawl.

    “Aw, you ain’t hurt, are you?” Hoss asked, carefully examining his brother’s arm.  “It’s just a scratch, nothing to cry about.  What’d you squeeze him so tight for?”

    “Love swirwy,” Little Joe sobbed.  “Hug.”

    Hoss laughed.  “How’d you like me to hug you that tight, huh?”

    “Like!” Little Joe claimed, his lower lip protruding.

    “Oh, yeah?  Well, let’s see,” Hoss snickered, engulfing the little boy in a bear hug.  “You like that, do you?”

    Little Joe began to cackle with glee.  “More, more!”

    Hoss guffawed.  “I’ll break you in half if I hug more, you silly thing.”  He looked at the sun peeking through the trees.  “Hey, it’s gettin’ on toward noon, Little Joe.  We better head back and see if they’re ready to spread out the food yet.”

    “Hungwy,” Little Joe agreed.  “Eat, HaHa.”

    “Hoss,” the older boy corrected as he helped the younger to his feet.  “You’re talkin’ good enough now to say it right.”

    Little Joe shook his head vigorously.  “HaHa,” he insisted.

    Hoss rolled his eyes.  “You learn what you want to learn, don’t you, Punkin?  Well, we’ll work on it.”

    The sun stood directly overhead when the boys reached the cabin.  “Hey, Mama, ain’t it about time to eat?” Hoss asked as they entered.

    “Eat, Mama,” Little Joe smiled, certain she wouldn’t refuse him.

    “Now, you younguns can wait a bit,” Nelly chided.  “We’ve just about got things set to rights.”

    “You sure do,” Hoss said.  “The old cabin never looked so fancy!”

    Marie laughed, remembering her first disheartening look at this cabin when, as newlyweds, she and Ben had returned from New Orleans.  Though the cabin’s furnishings were still simple, they were, indeed, “fancy” by comparison.  Yellow calico curtains graced the spotless kitchen windows and elegant, white lace ones the simple parlor, Ben and Marie’s old bedroom.  So far, the parlor held only a rocking chair and round occasional table, both crafted by Clyde Thomas, but Enos had sent Katerina the money to purchase any sofa she wanted.  She’d written back that Lawrence Larrimore had refused her money, insisting the sofa be his gift to them.  That and a large package addressed to Mrs. Cartwright were waiting in Placerville.  Marie couldn’t wait to see the expression on Ben’s face when he uncrated it.

     “Hoss, please bring the bedding from our buckboard,” Marie requested, “then you may spread the picnic.  We will join you shortly.”

    Hoss cheerfully carried the bedding into the back bedroom, then with an even brighter countenance ran outside to unpack the picnic basket.  Little Joe tagged behind him like a faithful puppy.

    The two women, assisted by Inger, made the bed with crisp, new muslin sheets and down-filled pillows in snowy cases, then covered it with a colorful patchwork quilt.  While Marie had sewn the bedding and made the pillows, the quilt was a gift from the larger community.  Though she had never met Katerina Zuebner, Laura Ellis had insisted they hold a quilting bee in her home and had invited every woman in Carson City.  Young girls like Sally Martin and the Winnemucca girls had come, as well, and even little Inger had taken a few stitches.

    “Curtains turned out real pretty,” Nelly said as they stood back to admire the room.  “Making them match the blue band of the quilt pulls everything together, and that lace you tatted on the edges sure sets ‘em off, Marie.”

    “Oui, ” Marie smiled.  “The good sisters taught me well.”

    Nelly flinched momentarily.  Having been raised to believe that all Catholics had one foot in hell, she didn’t like being reminded that Marie was a Papist.  Out here, of course, where there were no churches anyway, there weren’t any idols to bow down to, and Marie seemed a god-fearing sort, even if she had been reared in a false faith.  She was right about one thing, anyway:  whatever else those nuns might have been, they were good teachers.

    Nelly hooked an arm through the younger woman’s elbow.  “We’ve done all we can here.  Let’s get on outside.  If Little Joe’s helpin’ spread that picnic, like I figure, we may have to scrape my apple pie off the tablecloth.

    “Don’t worry about that,” Inger giggled.  “Hoss ain’t likely to let that baby near the apple pie!”

    The ladies laughed and went out to find a neatly spread lunch waiting for them.  After a relaxed meal, they separated, each having a number of last-minute preparations to make for their trip on the morrow.  The work and the fun had effectively taken Marie’s mind off the difficulties into which Ben might be riding.  As she lay alone in bed that night, however, her fingers tightened on the corner of his pillow slip, and it was late before she fell asleep. something like that,” she said.

    The streets of Susanville roiled with heated accusations when Ben and the Indian agent rode into town.  “What you gonna do about them murdering savages?” a grizzle-bearded rancher demanded of Dodge moments after they dismounted.

    “We’ll all be slaughtered in our beds!” a hysterical woman cried.

    Dodge raised both hands to gain the attention of the crowd.  “Mr. Cartwright and I have just come from the Paiute encampment on Smoke River.  Numaga, whom you know as Young Winnemucca, denies having anything to do with the deaths of Lassen and Clapper.”

    “What’d you expect him to say?” another rancher shouted.  “That he killed ‘em in cold blood?”

    “Gentlemen, please,” Dodge pleaded.  “We’re here to ascertain the facts.  I need to speak to anyone who has direct knowledge of the incident.  Is Mr. Wyatt here?  Has the relief party returned?”

    A man of imposing stature stepped forward.  “I am William Weatherlow, sir.  With the relief party that came to my assistance, I investigated the sight of the murders and will be pleased to offer what testimony I can.”

    Dodge nodded.  “Thank you, Mr. Weatherlow.  If you could assemble any others with pertinent information, I would like to meet you as soon as possible.”

    “We’re all here,” another man said, “and the saloon’s open.”

    Dodge, Cartwright, Weatherlow and five others entered the saloon, taking seats at adjoining tables.  The streetmongers drifted in after them, settling into chairs around the room.  One aspiring author took out paper and pencil, intending to send a report to the Territorial Enterprise.

    “The men have asked me to act as their spokesman,” Weatherlow said, “but you’re free to question any of the others if you need confirmation.”

    “I’m sure they’ll speak up if they have anything to add,” Ben commented, and murmurs of agreement circled the group.

    “As I said outside,” Weatherlow began after introducing the others, “when the relief party told us what had taken place, we proceeded to Lassen’s campsite.  We found his body and that of Edward Clapper and buried them immediately.”

    “Them bodies was ripe,” another man muttered.

    “Yup, weren’t no stayin’ in camp ‘til they was planted,” another offered.

    Dodge nodded.  “Did you examine the scene after the burials?”

    “We did,” Weatherlow replied, “but found no clues to identify the killers.  Footprints and hoofprints of all kinds——boots and moccasins,  horses shod and unshod, but some of the tracks looked quite old.  The supplies were still there, untouched.”

    Ben arched an eyebrow.  “Indians on a raid wouldn’t leave food or any other useful gear behind.”

    Weatherlow’s eyes narrowed as he glanced at Ben.  “Not their usual way,” he admitted, almost reluctantly.  Ben cocked his head to examine Weatherlow, trying to figure why so reasonable a man seemed to want to blame the Indians.

    Dodge nodded.  “It certainly seems unlike the behavior of Indians who, basically, live by scavenging.  Mr. Wyatt, you were the only actual witness to this attack.  Were the attackers Indians or not?”

    Wyatt shook his head.  “Can’t say.  Everything happened so fast.  I woke up to the sound of shots and a heap of hootin’ and hollerin’.  Couldn’t see clear ‘cause a frosty haze was hanging low, and I didn’t aim to make myself a target.  I ran for the horses fast as my old legs would carry me, grabbed the picket rope and jumped on back.  Hung on like that for a hundred and forty miles.  I never was much of a horseman, and without a saddle——well, I burned my hands, hanging tight to that rope, but I didn’t stop for nothin’ ‘til I got here to Susanville.”

    “You saw no Indians?” Dodge pressed.

    “Some Paiutes came into camp the night before,” Wyatt recalled, “but they seemed friendly enough.  Lassen was good friends with the Paiutes, you know.”

    “That’s what Numaga said,” Ben commented.  “The Paiutes are grieved by Lassen’s death.”

    “I can’t believe the Paiutes had anything to do with this affair,” Weatherlow concluded.  “None of the local Indians seem to know anything about it, and, after all, we have a treaty with them.  They fought side by side with us against the Pit River Indians, who, I believe, are the ones behind this massacre.”

    “They wouldn’t have left the supplies either,” Ben argued.  “Did Lassen or Clapper have any enemies?”

    “Look, Cartwright, my men and I were the only ones out that way,” Weatherlow snapped.  “If you’re accusing me, say so straight out.”

    “I’m accusing no one,” Ben said firmly, “least of all you, Weatherlow.  I know you for an honorable man.”

    “Sorry,” Weatherlow muttered, “but there’s been talk.”  He cast a reproachful look at the silent observers of the meeting.

    “To answer your question, though,” Wyatt inserted, “Lassen had a passel of enemies.  Plenty of folks blamed him for what happened to them along that cutoff of his.”

    “Unless other evidence develops,” Dodge concluded, “I find that the most logical explanation.  Lassen and Clapper were the victims of a revenge killing, most likely having been trailed for that purpose.”

    Rumbles of dissent were heard, some still accusing the Paiutes, others finding their old foes, the Pit River Indians, likelier suspects.  Only a few nodded approval of Dodge’s decision, but since the settlers couldn’t determine which Indians were to blame, neither Ben nor the Federal agent thought they would seek reprisals against the Paiutes.    Satisfied that the territory was not about to explode into open warfare, Ben pushed his mount over the Sierras and south toward Placerville.  Thankfully, he was a better horseman than Lemericus Wyatt, for he had a hard ride ahead.

A party of four stood waiting when the Sacramento stage pulled into Placerville late Friday evening.  “Hey, Adam!” Hoss hollered as soon as his brother descended from the coach.

    “Hey, yourself,” Adam grinned.  He chucked Little Joe under the chin.  “And hey and happy birthday to you, little fellow.”

    “Howdy, stwanger,” Little Joe gurgled, pleasantly parroting the greeting he’d been taught.

    Adam arched an eyebrow at Hoss.  “That your doing?”

    Hoss shook his head in adamant denial.  “Not me, no, sir!  I don’t teach him nonsense.”

    “Here’s your culprit,” Marta laughed, swatting a smirking Billy Thomas on the arm.  “If there’s devilment bein’ done, you should know where to look for its source, Adam.”

    Adam chuckled.  “I sure should by now.  Hello, Marta, good to see you.”

    “Hey, how ‘bout me?” Billy demanded.

    Adam cocked his head.  “Don’t believe we’ve met, stranger.”

    Billy scowled and clapped his friend on the back.  “Well, bein’ new in town, you likely ain’t heard that the best place to eat is Mama Zuebner’s Cafe.”

    “Figured to ask the hefty fellow,” Adam drawled, laying a hand on Hoss’s shoulder.  “He looks like he knows all the best places.”  They all laughed, Little Joe loudest of all, although he had no idea what the joke was.

    “We better hurry,” Hoss said.

    “Mama is closing early tonight,” Marta explained, “but she won’t ‘til we’ve eaten.”

    “I’m with Hoss,” Billy said.  “Since your ma ain’t gonna open at all tomorrow, I don’t want to miss my last chance for a good meal.  All them bags yours?”

    “Afraid so,” Adam laughed.  “Give me a hand, will you?”

    “Yeah, sure,” Billy said.  “Hey, Hoss.  Give that boy to Marta.  You’re big enough to tote a bag or two.”

    “You bet I am,” Hoss bragged, dumping Little Joe into Marta’s outstretched arms.  “We’re stayin’ at the El Dorado, Adam,” he said as he hefted a carpetbag under each arm.

    “Always do,” Adam chuckled.  “Where’s Pa?  I thought he and Marie would be here to meet me.”

    “Oh, Adam, he’s not here,” Marta murmured sympathetically.

    Adam stopped dead still.  “What do you mean he’s not here?  He wouldn’t miss your sister’s wedding.”

    “May have to,” Billy muttered, “if we got injun trouble.”

    “We don’t know that,” Marta said sharply.  “Don’t go worryin’ Adam over nothing.”

    “An injun war ain’t nothin’, missy,” Billy bit back.

    “Would you two quit sniping at each other and tell me what’s going on?” Adam demanded.

    “Yeah, sorry,” Billy muttered.  “Your Pa rode off to Honey Lake——”

    “With that agent feller,” Hoss added.

    “Mr. Dodge?” Adam queried.  Though he had never met the Federal Indian agent, he knew the name from his father’s letters.  Hoss nodded.

    “Old Peter Lassen got hisself killed,” Billy continued as they walked toward the hotel, “and some folks think it was injuns done it.”

    “Pa don’t think so,” Hoss inserted.

    “Yeah, but he went with Dodge to check it out,” Billy concluded.

    “He’s comin’ here after,” Hoss said.

    “Marie here?” Adam asked, nodding at the hotel entrance.

    “No, she’s with Mama,” Marta answered.  She opened the door, holding it for the others.  “Don’t worry about your pa, Adam.  I’m sure he’s fine.”

    “Yeah, sure,” Adam said, though his voice was edged with concern.  “Enos here yet?”

    “Oh, yeah, he’s over at the cafe, mooning over Katerina,” Marta laughed.  “Billy, help Adam get his things upstairs.  I know two little boys who are getting hungry, if you aren’t.”

    Billy scowled playfully at the girl.  “Just like a woman——orderin’ around the first man she spots.”

    “Who spotted one?” Marta giggled.  “I don’t see nothin’ but little boys here.”

    “Oh, you two,” Adam muttered with a patronizing shake of his head.  “To listen to you, no one would guess you liked each other at all.”

    “Oh, we don’t,” Billy assured him.

    “Not a bit,” Marta affirmed with a mischievous grin.

 Throughout the day Saturday the wedding guests arrived, first the Paynes, then just past noon the Wentworths.  The female members of each party immediately disappeared into the kitchen of Mama Zuebner’s Cafe to help prepare refreshments for the wedding reception the next day.  That evening the former members of the Larrimore train commandeered several tables in the dining room of the El Dorado Hotel.  While the food didn’t compare to what they’d feast on tomorrow, everyone enjoyed talking over old times and reminding one another of amusing incidents along the trail.  No one mentioned the sadder memories of that journey, for this was a time for celebration.

    Marie tried to join in the festive mood, even though the memories they shared were not hers.  Her attention repeatedly drifted away from reminiscences of the Overland Trail, however, to imagined dangers of one nearer home, the trail to Honey Lake.  She toyed with her food, unable to escape her fears for Ben.

    Since the friends spent so much time talking, they were only half-through their dinners when Ben walked in to complete the circle.  Eight (almost nine)-year-old Susan Payne was the first to see him.  “Uncle Ben!” she cried.  “Pa!” soon followed, then “Oh, Ben!” as friends and family rose to welcome the man for whom they’d all felt concern.

    Ben embraced his wife, then each of his sons.  “Ben?” Marie asked, and he understood the question she hesitated to put into words.  “Everything’s all right,” he said.  “I’ll give you the details later.”  He began moving around the room, greeting friends he hadn’t seen in months.

    “Your injun-lovin’ ways is gonna get you killed yet,” Clyde scolded.  “Why didn’t you tell me what you was up to?”

    “Didn’t have time,” Ben replied, giving his old friend a hearty clap.

    “Ridin’ smack into a Paiute camp,” Clyde ranted on.

    “Do it all the time,” Ben chuckled and continued greeting his other friends.

    Finally, he came to the table the Zuebners were sharing with the man soon to be a member of their family.  “Oh, Mr. Cartwright,” Katerina murmured, circling his neck with her slender arms, “I am so glad you have come.  I wanted so much for you to be at my wedding.”

    Ben tenderly kissed her cheek.  “I wouldn’t have missed it for anything, Katerina.”

    “Sir?” Enos queried.

    “No problems,” Ben assured him.  “You can feel at ease about bringing your new bride home.”  Enos smiled broadly, clearly relieved.

    The sun shone bright Sunday, as if heaven itself were smiling on the lovers’ nuptials.  The ceremony was held beneath the towering pines with almost half the town of Placerville in attendance.  Not all had been specifically invited, but the miners who ate regularly at the cafe felt as if Katerina were one of their own and they had every right to add their good wishes to the occasion.  The Zuebners, being simple folk themselves, were flattered, rather than offended.  In fact, the huge baking the day before had been done in anticipation of a crowd.

    Stefán stood tall as he escorted his sister to the place where her groom waited beside the Reverend Wentworth.  Ben found it hard not to picture Frederich Zuebner as the young man walked past.  Stefán had stepped into his father’s shoes at an early age, and year by year he looked more like the stalwart farmer they had all been indebted to in the early days of their journey west.

    Katerina had grown taller, but she still looked the same to Ben, making it hard for him to believe she was actually old enough to marry.  He smiled when he realized the little girl he remembered from the trail was only three years younger than his own wife.  No wonder Marie was so excited about having Katerina come to live near them!

    The biggest change, to Ben’s eyes, was in Katerina’s sister.  The tomboy of the trail, though spunky as ever, was blossoming into a young lady as lovely and graceful as Katerina.  And since Marta was only a year younger, no doubt they’d soon be celebrating another wedding.  The thought jolted Ben for a moment as he wondered how far his own boy, now sixteen, might be from standing, red-faced, waiting for his bride as Enos now waited for Katerina.

    When the two sweethearts stood together, the Reverend Wentworth smiled and addressed them directly.  “Enos, Katerina, it is a pleasure to witness the love that blooms between you.  Its seed was planted in fertile soil, the soil of shared struggles and triumphs.  You have each known both sorrow and happiness in your lives, and you will find your life together no different.  That is why your vows will be for better and for worse, in sickness and in health.  Knowing the fires in which your love was forged, however, I have no doubt that you will keep your vows and in the keeping find a love still greater than that which you feel today, when your hearts seem so full.”

    The minister led the couple in a simple reciting of their vows, and after the glowing pair exchanged a shy kiss, Katerina enveloped her mother in a warm embrace, then turned to kiss her brother on the cheek.  The miners, growing misty-eyed at the memory of their own wives and daughters back east, demanded their right to kiss the blushing bride; then everyone adjourned to the cafe for all the strudel, crepes (Marie’s contribution), wedding cake and punch they could possibly hold. Hoss was heard to comment that he wished someone would get married every day.

    The next morning the Cartwrights, Thomases, and the two younger Wentworth children boarded the stage, while  the newly married Montgomerys headed over the Sierras in a buckboard with two large crates and several smaller boxes.  As Ludmilla stood on the boardwalk, tears streaking her normally cheery cheeks, Marta stepped close to place a bolstering arm around her mother, as if to remind her that she still had a daughter at home.  When the stage pulled away, Billy Thomas leaned out the window to flap his hat in farewell.  Marta laughed and wagged a flaxen braid at the redheaded mischief she liked more than she cared to admit.
 

    Ben looped his horse’s reins around the hitching rail in front of Ormsby’s Carson City store and waited for the stage to pull in.  He helped the ladies descend, then, with the help of Clyde, Adam, Billy and Mark, unloaded the baggage.

    “You all come up to my place and rest yourselves before headin’ on to the Ponderosa,” Nelly invited.

    “Oh, yes, thank you,” Marie sighed.  “That stagecoach always leaves me exhausted.”

    “On one condition,” Ben inserted quickly.

    “What’s that?” Nelly queried suspiciously.

    “That you come with us when we go,” Ben said.

    “Oh, yes, you are much too tired to cook tonight,” Marie urged.

    “Well, now, I don’t know about that,” Nelly demurred.  “It’s a long ride.”

    “Easiest way to get your buckboard back,” Ben smiled.  Since the newlyweds were using the Cartwright’s wagon, he had planned to borrow Clyde and Nelly’s to return home.

    Clyde cackled.  “He’s got a point, Nelly girl.”

    “Well, if we come back tonight,” Nelly conceded.  “I been lookin’ forward to sleepin’ in my own bed.”

    The men hefted all the bags and the entire party walked down the street to the Thomases’ sunny yellow frame house.  Mary caught her breath when she saw it.  “Oh, is this your home, Mrs. Thomas?  It’s charming.”

    Adam chuckled.  “Wait’ll you see the Ponderosa!”

    Billy gave him a shove.  “Aw, quit braggin’ up your own place.”  He gave Mark a wink.  “Adam here thinks the Ponderosa’s got the best house in the world, just ‘cause he helped plan it.”  Tossing a smirk at Adam, he added, “After all, smarty britches, my Pa planned and built this place, and without the help of no fancy San Francisco architect, neither.”

    “Oh, you two quit scrappin’ at each other,” Nelly scolded.  “Come on in, folks, and we’ll show you around our mansion.”  She was teasing, of course, but to the Wentworth youngsters, whose home was the renovated hulk of a beached sailing vessel, even the modest rooms looked stately.  Mary cooed with delight over Inger’s cozy bedroom, especially the corner where Clyde had constructed a play kitchen for his little girl.

    Watching her, a grim look came into Mark’s hazel eyes.  His little sister had never had the opportunity to play at being a housewife.  Practically from childhood, the motherless girl had been forced into being the real thing, and Mark, who adored her, couldn’t help taking up the offense she refused to carry.

    As they started downstairs, Nelly told Inger to run to Mrs. Ellis’s for a loaf of bread.  “And tell her Billy’ll be ‘round shortly to fetch our cow——and say thanks for her keepin’ it.”

    “Yes, ma’am,” Inger responded, leaving at once.

    “Now, what are you up to, Nelly?” Ben chided.  “You don’t have to feed this mob.  We’ll eat at the Ponderosa.”

    “You know these younguns can’t wait that long,” Nelly argued.  “I’m just gonna slice some bread and cheese to tide ‘em over.”

    “Yeah, Pa, I’m hungry,” Hoss added.

    “Tell me something I don’t know!” Ben scoffed.  “You stay hungry from sunup to sundown.”

    “Probably dreams about cookies all night, too,” Adam snickered.

    “Naw, his taste runs more to pie,” Billy cackled.

    Hoss scowled.  “How come you’re always funnin’ me ‘bout eatin’ good?  Don’t nobody fuss if Little Joe says he’s hungry.”

    “How often does he say it?” Billy hooted.  The youngest Cartwright’s appetite was, by reputation, as small as Hoss’s was large.

    Now, however, Little Joe patted imperiously at his father’s leg.  “Hungwy, Pa,” he whimpered.

    Chuckling, Ben tousled the boy’s curly hair.  “Yeah, I guess we all are.  Give me a knife and I’ll slice that cheese, Nelly.”

    Laughing, everyone entered the kitchen, sitting or standing around the table while Ben cut slice after slice of cheese.  Inger soon returned with two loaves of bread.  “Mrs. Ellis says you don’t owe her nothin’ for the bread,” the girl declared, “on account of she’s been usin’ our milk while we been gone.”

    “Fair enough,” Clyde agreed.

    Ben snatched the first sandwich.  “I’ll take this with me,” he said.  “I’d better get out to the Ponderosa and warn Hop Sing he has guests for dinner.”  He kissed Marie as he passed.  “Stay and rest as long as you like, my love.”

    “But not too long,” Hoss added fretfully.  “Hop Sing don’t like folks bein’ late.”

    “Who’s Hop Sing?” Mark asked Adam in an undertone.

    “Our cook,” the oldest Cartwright boy replied, nonchalantly taking a sandwich, quartering it and handing one portion to his baby brother.

    “I didn’t know you had servants,” Mark muttered.

    Adam laughed.  “Servant!  Tyrant is more like it.”

    “Let me know when you plan to tell him that,” Billy commented dryly.  “I want to be across the Sierras when the storm breaks out.”

    Amid the laughter Marie explained.  “Hop Sing is more a part of our family than a servant, Mark.”

    “Yeah, after Pa saved his life, he just moved in,” Adam snickered, “and we haven’t been able to budge him out of the kitchen since.”

    “Who wants to?” Hoss demanded seriously.  “He cooks good!”  Even Mark laughed then.

    If the Thomas house looked like a mansion to the Wentworth children, the Ponderosa ranch house seemed almost a castle, albeit a rustic one.  “Oh!” Mary gasped with delight.  “It’s so——so——”

    “Big,” her brother suggested bleakly.

    “Well, that, too,” Mary smiled, patting his arm to soothe the resentment she could see building, “but I was thinking beautiful.”  Mark took her arm tenderly and escorted her into the house with the others.

    Inside, the guests and returning members of the family were greeted by a beaming Hop Sing.  “Welcome to Pondelosa,” the Chinaman announced, like a king admitting subjects into his realm.  “Dinnah leady one hour, maybe less.  You sit down, lest flom tlavel,” he ordered so imperiously no one thought of disobeying——with one exception.  Little Joe, instead of heading for the designated seating area, wrapped small arms around Hop Sing’s leg and rubbed his cheek against the cook’s blue pantaloons to say how much he’d missed him.

    “No, no, go with mother,” Hop Sing dictated, lightly patting the toddler on the head.  “Hop Sing cook now.”  Marie came quickly to dislodge her child, but it was obvious the little Cantonese was pleased by the display of affection.

    Watching the scene, Mark had to admit that Adam had told the truth.  Hop Sing was, indeed, more part of the family than a servant.  Never had the Wentworth boy seen any of the Larrimore servants hugged by a child or treated with the deference the Cartwrights showed Hop Sing.  So far, however, he didn’t see any signs of the tyrannical behavior their oldest son had credited to the cook.

    “Well, let’s show our guests to their rooms,” Ben said.  “You boys each grab a bag and follow me.”

    The procession headed upstairs, stopping at the first open door.  “This will be your room, Mark,” Ben said.

    Mark’s brow knitted quizzically.  “I thought I’d be bunking with Adam.”

    “Can if you like,” Adam offered, “unless you snore.”

    “This is fine,” Mark replied, secretly thrilled to have a room to himself for the first time in his life.  Setting his carpetbag just inside the door, he followed the others down the hall.  He wanted to see where his sister would be sleeping.

    “This is my room,” Hoss told him as they passed the next door, “and that one across the hall is Adam’s.”

    “Giving him the full tour, are you, Hoss?” Ben chuckled.  As they came to the end of the hall, which branched both directions, he pointed to the left.  “Our room is down there, with the nursery beside it.”  He turned to the right.  “And Mary’s room with be at the end of the hall.  It’s the sunniest in the house.”

    Mark smiled when he saw windows on two walls of his sister’s room.  The only window in her bedroom at home was a porthole.  This looked much brighter, the kind of place he wished their father would provide for the fragile flower of their family.

    “You’ll all want to freshen up before dinner,” Marie suggested, then smiled at the youngster clinging to her hand.  “I will be in the nursery cleaning this one if you need anything.”

    “Oh, may I help you?” Mary asked eagerly.

    Marie smiled.  “You may bathe him after dinner, if you like.  I’m only going to wash his face and hands now.”

    Mary smiled and nodded.  “I can’t wait,” she murmured.  “I love babies——especially you, sweetie pie.”  She blew a kiss to Little Joe.

    When dinner was served, Hop Sing effectively demonstrated how he had earned the title of tyrant, for he loudly castigated anyone he felt did insufficient justice to the food on his plate.  Little Joe, chief culprit, as always, just smiled and ignored the rebuke, but Mary seemed fearful of giving offense.  “I’m sorry, Hop Sing,” she murmured.  “You’ve worked hard to prepare a special feast, but I’m not used to seeing so much wonderful food at one setting.”

    Hop Sing’s head tilted quizzically.  He’d been specifically ordered by Mr. Cartwright to keep the meal simple and had reluctantly complied, but the young lady seemed impressed nonetheless.  “Is nothing,” he alleged.  “Hop Sing fix ploper meal for you ‘morrow.  You see.”

    “I hope you’ll let me help you in the kitchen,” Mary suggested softly, and the countenances of both her brother and the Chinese cook darkened.  Bathing a baby was one thing, but Mark bristled at the thought of his sister working as a servant in this home, while Hop Sing responded with characteristic defensive of his domain.

    “Hop Sing not need help,” he sputtered.

    “Oh, no, it’s I who need help,” Mary said, smiling sweetly.  “I do all the cooking at home, but Mama died before she could teach me much.  I know I could learn a great deal from you.”

    Hop Sing, as addicted to praise as a bear to honey, melted at once.  “You come kitchen anytime, missy,” he said.  “You got good sense.”

    Marie giggled into her napkin until the cook had returned to the kitchen.  “It is a high compliment, Mary,” she said.  “Hop Sing rarely lets even me in his kitchen, and there are few people he admits have good sense.”

    “But I meant it,” Mary protested.  “I really don’t cook this well.”

    “You do fine with what you have to work with,” Mark muttered.  “Can’t make crown roast out of tripe.”

    “Mark, please,” Mary whispered.

    “Better dig in and clean your plates,” Ben suggested.  “Peach pie for dessert.”

    “Yes, sir!”  Hoss obeyed his father’s command with relish.  Peach pie was among his favorite foods.

    Mary had risen early to help Hop Sing in the kitchen, and by breakfast’s end, everyone knew the sweet-tempered child had found a home there.  “Missy Maly make velly nice biscuit,” Hop Sing reported.  “Almost good as Hop Sing.”

    “Almost,” Ben agreed tactfully, knowing Hop Sing to have a touchier ego than Mary.  He winked at the girl, however, to make certain she didn’t think he found her biscuits in any way lacking.   Then Ben looked at her brother, seated beside Mary.  “How well do you sit a horse, Mark?”

    The young man flushed.  “Not too well, I suppose.  I haven’t touched an animal of any kind since we came to San Francisco.”

    “You’d better take Hoss’s mare then,” Ben suggested.  “She’s gentle.  I thought we’d ride out and take a look at the herd.”

    Mark sat rigid in his straight-backed chair.  “That your way of telling me I have to work for our keep?”

    Everyone at the table fell silent.

    “Oh, Mark,” Mary moaned miserably.  Mark bit his lip, suddenly aware of how rude he had sounded.

    “No, son,” Ben said after a moment’s thought.  “You and Mary are our guests, and you certainly don’t have to do anything to earn that.  I thought you might enjoy riding out with us men, but if you prefer to stay around the house with the women and children, that’s fine.”

    “Children!” Hoss protested.  “I ain’t a kid, Pa.”

    Ben frowned at his middle son.  “I meant Little Joe, Hoss.”

    “But you said children, Pa, not just child,” Hoss argued.  “That ain’t good grammar, Pa.”

    Adam laughed and, smirking at Hoss, mimicked, “‘I ain’t a kid, Pa.  That ain’t good grammar, Pa.’  Since when do you give a hoot about grammar?”   Hoss winced.

    “Since it gives him a chance to rebuke his father,” Ben remarked dourly.  “It’s rather ridiculous, Hoss, to correct someone else’s grammar while making worse mistakes yourself; furthermore, if you intend to debate your maturity, interrupting your elders is not a good way to start.”

    “Sorry, Pa,” Hoss muttered and gave quick attention to his final flapjack.

    The Wentworth youngsters had both looked nervous during the exchange between father and son, but they soon saw that neither Ben nor Hoss was disturbed.  It gave Mark hope that his own misbehavior might be similarly excused.  He took a deep breath.  “I’m afraid there was nothing mature about my surliness, either, sir.  I—I’m sorry, too.  I—I would rather ride with the men, if you’ll still have me.”

    Ben smiled.  “You’re more than welcome, Mark.  Perhaps I should have explained myself better to begin with.  While you’re here, it’s my intention to treat you as I would one of my own boys.  They have chores to do, of course, but I pay them a salary, and I would expect to do the same for you, if you choose to work with us.  I assumed you would find that more satisfying than a summer of idleness.”

    Mark smiled slightly.  “That sounds fine, sir.”

    “Pa, Pa,” Little Joe piped up demandingly.  “Pay me, too, Pa.”

    Ben guffawed.  “For what?  What chores do you do?”

    “Feed chickens, Pa,” Little Joe insisted seriously.

    Ben arched an eyebrow at Hoss.  “I thought that was your chore.”

    Hoss scowled at Little Joe.  “It is and I do it.  He just scatters a handful or two.”

    “Oh, ho ho,” Ben scoffed.  “If you’re gonna contract out your chores, boy, you’ll have to pay your hired help yourself.”

    “I don’t get much to start with, Pa,” Hoss complained, “and he don’t help enough to earn a cent.”

    “Then pay him in kind,” Ben chuckled.  “One bedtime story should be about right.”

    “Yeah,” Adam grinned.  “You can read him one of Aesop’s fables, like I used to do you.”

    Hoss shrugged.  He’d pay up, since he had to, but he still thought he was being overcharged.

    Mary quickly and Mark slowly began to settle into life at the Ponderosa.  Mary’s serene spirit seemed to have a calming effect on Hop Sing, and she spent many hours in his kitchen.  Though Mark was less skilled at the chores Ben assigned him than his sister in her domestic ones, he began to be more comfortable on horseback and graduated from Hoss’s gray mare to animals with a bit more spirit.  He seemed to grow more at ease around the Cartwrights, too, though Ben sometimes caught an unhappy look on the boy’s face that made him think Mark was comparing his own home to the one he and Mary were sharing this summer.  Ben hoped that the change, while obviously good for both Wentworth youngsters, would not simply increase Mark’s resentment of the austerity to which he would ultimately return.

    When Paul Martin and his daughter Sally came to dinner the first Saturday after his arrival, Mark Wentworth clearly found the Ponderosa an even more appealing place.  He almost gasped when he saw the doctor’s beautiful daughter, and for the first time he earned a scolding from Hop Sing for neglecting his dinner.

    “Just what we need,” Ben chuckled to Paul later as they sat down to a game of chess, “another fish to snap at that bait you keep dangling.”

    “I’m not dangling it,” Dr. Martin grunted, “and that boy’s too old for Sally.”

    Ben arched an eyebrow.  Sally was only sixteen to Mark’s twenty-one, but having just attended the wedding of a couple separated by more than that made five years seem a narrow gulf to cross.  Ben could understand his friend’s attitude, though; Adam was the same age as Sally, and Ben certainly wasn’t ready to see his boy tie the knot with anyone.  Girls tended to marry younger than boys, however, and Dr. Martin might just have to face up to it.

    Everyone was surprised when they heard a knock at the door.  Hop Sing set down the dishes he was clearing from the dining table and scurried over to answer it.  “Is too late fo’ visitor come,” he ranted.  “Dinnah over.”

    “I doubt anyone came to eat at this hour,” Ben scolded.  “It’s probably one of the men.”

    The figure in the doorway was, indeed, one of Ben’s employees, but the last one he expected to see.  “Enos!” Ben cried.  “Come in, boy.”

    Enos doffed his hat and entered.

    “Now, where’s that pretty wife of yours?” Dr. Martin asked.  “I’ve been looking forward to seeing her again.”

    “Me, too,” Sally said.  “There aren’t nearly enough young women in this territory.”

    Enos grinned.  “My wife is at the cabin, and she loves the way you and Mrs. Thomas fixed it up, Mrs. Cartwright.  She’s unpacking our things, but I wanted to make that special delivery for you.”

    “Oh, Enos, you could have waited until morning,” Marie rebuked gently.

    “What special delivery?” Ben demanded.

    Marie laughed lightly.  “Well, it is a little early, but I suppose you will not object to receiving your anniversary gift tonight.”

    “Reckon not,” Enos chuckled, “but I need help bringin’ it in.”

    “I’ll help,” Adam offered at once.  “Mark?”

    “Sure,” Mark agreed.

    Mary clapped her hands.  “Oh, how romantic!  I love presents!”  Obviously, the generous-hearted girl didn’t need to receive a gift herself to take pleasure in the giving.

    Dr. Martin joined the three younger men outside and helped to carry in the long, rectangular crate.

    “What on earth could that be?” Ben muttered to himself.

    “One way to find out,” Dr. Martin chuckled.

    Amid everyone’s laughter, Ben removed the lid from the crate.  Almost at once his youngest son stood on tiptoe to peer over the edge.  “Ooh,” he cooed, grabbing a handful of straw.

    “It’s not for you,” Adam scolded, lifting the toddler out of the way.

    Ben, meanwhile, was hastily pulling aside the packing material.  When he saw the rich mahogany case, he stood silent in surprise.  “It’s a clock,” he whispered at last.

    “No, you don’t say,” Paul scoffed saucily.

    “But——but how did you know I’d like——” Ben sputtered to his wife.  “When did you——”

    “You ask too many questions,” Marie smiled.  “Do you like your gift or not?”

    In answer, Ben enwrapped her slender frame with his strong arms.

    “Enough of that, you two,” Paul scolded.  “There are innocent children here.”

    “Aw, we see that all the time,” Hoss grinned.

    “Tut, tut, shameless display,” Paul twitted.  “Decide where you want this monstrosity while we get it out of the crate.”

    “That’s easy,” Ben chuckled.  “Right by the front door.”

    “To the left.  Yes, that is perfect,” Marie agreed.

    The four who had carried the grandfather’s clock inside hefted it from the box and set it in the designated location.  Paul positioned the hands and set the long pendulum swinging.

    “It is not quite like the one you enjoyed your first winter here,” Marie said, her voice tremulous.

    Ben squeezed her hand.  “It’s better.  It’s ours.”

    “They’re gonna start again,” Hoss informed the doctor soberly.

    “One kiss to say thanks,” Dr. Martin instructed.  “Then let’s get on with our chess game.”

    “Yes, let’s,” Ben agreed quickly.  “With inspiration like this, I’m bound to emerge victorious.”  He gave his wife a lingering kiss.

    “We’ll see about that!” the doctor hooted.

    Hop Sing shuffled in to hand a package of hurriedly constructed sandwiches to Enos.  “You take you missy,” he ordered.

    “Huh?” Enos replied.  He didn’t have much experience in deciphering Hop Sing’s unique phrases.

    “He wants you to take them to Katerina,” Marie interpreted.

    “Missy not want cook after long tlavel,” Hop Sing explained.

    “Oh, well, thanks, Hop Sing,” Enos said.  “Reckon I best be gettin’ back.  Katerina’s a little edgy about stayin’ alone in this wild country of ours.”

    “If I didn’t know better, I’d think Katerina had been listening to Mrs. Larrimore,” Ben chuckled from his seat across a chessboard from Paul Martin.  “Give her our love.”  Promising that he would, Enos departed.

    Marie’s gift must, indeed, have inspired Ben to great heights, for he easily defeated the more expert Dr. Martin in two games of chess that night.  And he found even greater cause for glee in the look on Dr. Martin’s face when Mark hooked his arm through Sally’s elbow to escort her to the buggy at evening’s end.

    In the days after that visit, Mark could be heard humming as he went about even the most mundane chores.  Ben was glad to see his young guest happy, for he had been asked to attend another mass political meeting and had delayed accepting the invitation, not wanting to leave Marie to cope with a difficult guest.

    The meeting was scheduled for Monday, June 6th.  Though the Cartwrights normally honored the Sabbath, they and their guests had worked the day before so that Ben might feel secure in leaving the ranch for the meeting.  To reward the boys for their extra effort, Ben gave surprise orders that morning.  “I fancy having fish for supper, boys,” he smiled, “so I’ll expect you to spend the day dangling a pole in some nearby creek.”

    Adam grinned, understanding that his father was giving them the day off.  “Thanks, Pa.”

    “Yeah, thanks!” Hoss bubbled.

    Mark looked puzzled for a moment, not quite able to comprehend the gift of a day’s pleasure, especially on a weekday.  His own father’s strong work ethic rarely permitted any rest except on Sunday, if you could call spending all day in church restful.  When he realized Ben was serious, he began to smile.

    “Would you have time to stop by the Thomas place and see if Billy could come, Pa?” Adam asked.

    “I’ll ask,” Ben promised, “but he’ll probably be out at his claim by the time I come by.”

    Little Joe plucked at his father’s sleeve.  “Me fish, too, Pa.”

    Ben laughed.  “I don’t think so, Little Joe.”

    Adam tweaked the toddler’s nose.  “Couldn’t risk it, wiggleworm.  The fish might think you were bait.”

    As Little Joe’s face started to pucker, his mother lifted him onto her lap to console him.  “Hoss and Adam will bring back a special fish, just for you, won’t you, boys?”

    “Sure thing,” Hoss promised.  “One just your size.”

    “Fish that size are too small to keep,” Mark grinned, getting into the spirit of the banter.

    Ben smiled.  It was good to see all the boys content——well, with one pint-sized exception.  Little Joe still looked none too pleased at being left behind.

    The toddler, however, was the first to welcome Ben home, and he did so with a hug and his characteristically bright smile.  “Hop Sing fwying my fish for supper, Pa,” he declared.

    “Is that so?” Ben chuckled.  “Will you share with me?”  Little Joe’s head bobbed happily.

    “Dinnah leady now,” Hop Sing declared petulantly.  “You almost miss.”

    “But we’re so glad you came while the fish is hot,” Mary added, giving Hop Sing’s arm a soft pat.

    “Dat light, velly glad,” Hop Sing agreed, suddenly all smiles.  “Sit table now, please.”  Ben tossed Mary a grateful wink.

    The family and their summer visitors filed into the dining room.  Still holding his youngest, Ben pulled out a chair and sat down.  Marie reached for the boy to lift him into his high chair, but Little Joe protested vociferously.  “No, stay Pa!”

    “Leave him,” Ben conceded.  “I rather like the feel of his arms around my neck.”

    “They’re not likely to stay there,” Adam teased.  “I didn’t call him wiggleworm for nothing.”

    “I know that,” Ben chuckled, “but let me enjoy my baby while I can, before he grows into a great lout like his big brothers.”

    Hop Sing entered with a platter piled high with fish, rolled in cornmeal and fried crisp.  “Mine, Pa.  Eat my fish,” Little Joe insisted.

    “And just which fish is yours, little one?” Ben asked, lips twitching.

    Little Joe couldn’t seem to decide, for the fried fish looked different from the one Hoss had brought in on the end of a string and donated to his little brother.  Mary pointed to the largest piece visible.  “It must be that one, Little Joe,” she suggested.  “It’s just right for sharing.”

    Little Joe beamed.  “Mine!” he chortled.

    “And the tastiest of the lot, I’m sure,” Ben chuckled.  Eating with a fidgety toddler in his lap was awkward, but he managed to fork in a bite here and there between seeing to his son’s needs.

    Marie shook her head at her husband’s foolish fondness, conveniently overlooking how often she gave in to their youngest’s whims.  As she cut off a bite of fish, she asked how the meeting had gone.

    “I was very encouraged,” Ben replied.  “There’ll be an election the fourteenth of next month to select fifty delegates to a constitutional convention, as well as one to send to Washington with the document we create.”

    “We, Pa?” Adam grinned.  “You sound like you plan to be one of those delegates.”

    “I’d sure like to,” Ben admitted, fingering through a piece of fish to remove the bones for Little Joe.  “I always dreamed of being part of the building of a state.  Of course, we’re a long way from that.”

    “Is it important to you, sir, being part of a state?” Mark asked.  “Seems to me you folks are doing well just like you are.”

    “We have a good life,” Ben admitted, “but I do want the advantages of state government for my family, Mark.  There’s no real authority here to deal with lawbreakers, just vigilante justice.  In fact, I heard there’s been another murder, at Gold Hill this time, and still no appropriate way to deal with such cases.”

    “Anyone we know, Pa?” Adam asked.

    “We don’t know no miners except Billy,” Hoss declared, then looked worried.  “It ain’t Billy, Pa?”

    “No, son,” Ben assured him, then turned to answer Adam’s original question.  “The victim was a newcomer, fellow named John Jessup, but you might know the accused, William Sides.  I don’t know him as well as I do his brother Richard, but we’ve met.”

    Adam whistled.  “If Dick’s brother is like him, he’d have the temper to do murder.”

    “That’s not evidence, Adam,” Ben stated sternly.

    “Yes, sir,” Adam agreed quickly.  “Is there going to be a trial?”

    “If you can call it that,” Ben muttered.  “Since Sides is a vigilante member, the verdict will undoubtedly be not guilty.”  He looked back at Mark.  “That’s why we need a proper state government, to give some semblance of justice.  And there are other reasons.  Now we have no public education, none of any kind really.  Even civil matters have to be taken to Salt Lake City, and that’s just too far to be practical.”

    “California was a state when we got there,” Mark argued, “and I can’t see that it helps that much.  Father would tell you we have a very wicked city in San Francisco.”

    Ben chose to ignore the note of cynicism in Mark’s voice.  “He’d be right, most likely——about parts of it, at least.  You’ve seen the Barbary Coast.  Think how much worse it would be if there were no control on the vices there.”

    Mark flushed.  He wasn’t sure, but he suspected that his father had told Mr. Cartwright about his adventures on the Barbary Coast, adventures Mark wasn’t proud of anymore.  He’d gone there the first time to defy his father’s rigid concept of righteousness, and every other trip had been after some major argument with the minister, as well.  Mark cleared his throat.  “Well, I hope you achieve your dream, sir,” he said, hoping to divert Ben’s attention from allusions to the Barbary Coast.

    Ben sighed.  “I’m afraid we’re destined to failure, as usual.  It’s hard to believe Congress would ever grant territorial status to such an unpopulated area, but, at least, we’re doing what we can.  Work, hope and prayer——sometimes they can make dreams come true.”

    Ben may have thought western Utah’s small population would place any hope of a separate territory beyond reach.  Looming on the horizon that warm June night, however, were events that would bring an influx of new residents and give a value to the sparsely-settled land Congress could not afford to ignore.

The following Saturday evening, as a buggy was heard rolling into the yard, Mary Wentworth jumped up from her seat on the sofa beside Marie and clapped her hands.  “Oh, that must be Sally and her father!”  Mark, warming himself by the fire, kept his feelings masked as he turned around.  Yet he was, if anything, more delighted than his sister that Sally Martin would be spending a week at the Ponderosa, his first look at the doctor’s pretty daughter having only whetted his appetite for further viewing.  Both youngsters were surprised, however, when Hop Sing admitted Billy Thomas, instead of Dr. Martin, with the girl they had expected.  Everyone stood and moved toward the door to welcome the two young people.

    “What’s for supper, Hop Sing?” Billy demanded as soon as he passed through the doorway.

    “You stay eat?” Hop Sing demanded.  “Who invite you?”

    “I did,” Billy grinned.  “You got plenty, ‘cause her pa ain’t gonna make it.”  As Hop Sing stomped back to the kitchen, ranting in Chinese, Billy lifted Little Joe under the arms and tossed him in the air.  “Hey, there, short shanks.  How’s life treatin’ you?”

    Although Little Joe crowed with exhilarated rapture, Marie gave a cry of terror and snatched her child away.

    “Oh, Billy, you’re just awful,” Sally scolded.  “My father says no baby should be tossed around like that.  They’re too delicate.”

    “Mais oui,” Marie sputtered, wrapping protective arms around her precious boy.

    Billy just shrugged.  He couldn’t see that the flight had done the baby any harm.

    Ben cleared his throat.  “Speaking of the good doctor, where is he?  He was supposed to bring Sally here tonight, not you, you rapscallion.”

    “Oh, that was Billy’s doing, all right,” Sally tittered.

    “Figured as much,” Adam said drolly.  He winked at the Wentworth youngsters.  “If there’s mischief marching, you can pretty much expect Billy to be leading the parade.”

    “Hey!” Billy protested.  “Ain’t my fault that miner decided to do a belly roll down the side of a hill and break his leg.  I just fetched the doc, is all.  Seemed only neighborly to bring Sally on, since her pa was occupied.”  Everyone snickered, knowing it didn’t take neighborliness to inspire Billy to take a pretty girl for a drive, especially when a good meal waited at the end of the excursion.

    Ben clapped the boy on the shoulder.  “Didn’t anyone ever tell you that no good deed goes unpunished, Billy?” he laughed.

    “I believe it!” Billy scowled, glaring at both Sally and Adam, who merely laughed in return.

    “Oh, no, Mr. Cartwright, you mustn’t say so,” Mary inserted seriously.  “Father would say you should never discourage good deeds, for, indeed, they are rewarded.”

    Ben chuckled.  “I stand corrected.  You’re right, of course.  We shouldn’t discourage good deeds, especially in Billy’s case.  They’re so few and far between.”  The remark brought another round of laughter.

    “Keep it up, and I won’t tell you the latest news from Gold Hill,” Billy threatened.

    Ben tweaked the boy’s ear.  “Oh, well, if you come bearing news, I guess we’ll have to feed you.”

    “Humph!” Hop Sing fumed from the dining room.  “You not haf feed.  Hop Sing haf feed.  Dinnah leady now!”  He plunked a bowl of mashed potatoes onto the table and shuffled back to the kitchen, muttering to himself.

    No one hesitated, knowing how volatile Hop Sing could become if they didn’t respond promptly.  Billy nonchalantly hooked an elbow through Sally’s arm, and she, just as nonchalantly pulled free to link arms with Adam, who grinned saucily and pulled out a chair for the young lady.  Billy was so put out he didn’t see Mark sidle up to take a seat on Sally’s other side.

    Ben gave Billy’s freckled neck a consoling rub.  “Looks like you’ve been outflanked, my boy.”

    “You can sit by me,” Hoss offered.

    “Thanks all to pieces,” Billy scowled, but he took the offered chair.

    Ben took two smoked pork chops and passed the platter to Mark on his left.  “Now, what’s this hot news from Gold Hill?” he demanded of Billy.

    “Yeah, you hit it big, did you, buddy?” Adam grinned, taking the platter from Sally and forking a chop into his own plate.

    Having made the mistake of sitting where Hoss would get first crack at the food as it passed, Billy eyed the diminishing meat platter with concern.  “Not me, not yet,” he muttered, “but there’s those that have.”

    “Billy, Billy,” Ben chuckled.  “When are you gonna give up this wild goose chase?”

    “Not such a wild goose chase now, from what I hear,” Sally smiled.

    “O’Riley and McLaughlin sure don’t think so,” Billy declared, forking the final pork chop, thankful Hoss had left him at least one.  “You know them, Uncle Ben?”

    Ben shook his head.  “Don’t think so.  I don’t get a chance to meet many miners since I quit running the trading post with your father.”

    “Yeah, that’s so,” Billy said.  “Well, they took out close to three hundred dollars yesterday.”

    “Three hundred!” Ben exclaimed.

    “Aw, he’s joshing,” Adam snorted.

    “I ain’t neither,” Billy snapped back.  “If it weren’t so, would Old Pancake be hornin’ in on the claim?”

    “Comstock?” Ben asked, ladling gravy over his meat and potatoes before passing the bowl.  “I know him, of course.  I thought he’d taken over the Grosch brothers’ old claim.”

    Billy sawed his pork chop into bite-sized pieces and laid them on a slice of bread in anticipation of drowning them in the gravy when it reached him.  “You know Comstock——always layin’ claim to everything in sight.  Now he says the land them other two found the gold on belongs to him, claims old man Caldwell sold him the spring they was usin’ and a hundred sixty acres for a ranch.”

    “Ranch,” Ben scoffed.  “Old Pancake never saw the day he’d work a ranch.”

    “Yeah, that’s what I think,” Billy agreed.  “Wish I could’ve been at that meeting this afternoon.  Bunch of miners near Gold Hill is gonna organize a new district, laws and all, and I hear there’s some got words to say about what Comstock done.”

    “Well, you missed it in a good cause,” Sally smiled.  “Someone had to get help for that injured miner, and as Mary says, I’m sure your good deed will be rewarded.”

    “In heaven, maybe,” Billy grunted, looking as though he’d rather receive his reward on earth.

    “Heaven!” Adam hooted.  “Since when do they let the likes of you in heaven?”

    “Oh, I’m sure Billy will be in heaven,” Mary declared, ever the minister’s daughter, “and I know his good deed will be rewarded there.”

    “Better be,” Billy muttered.  “Sure ain’t much reward bein’ passed out around here.”

    “What do you want, Billy?” Sally teased.

    “Kiss comes to mind,” Billy suggested, but his cocky grin faded when Sally merely blew one across the table.

    “We got chocolate pie for dessert,” Hoss reported.  “That oughta be reward enough for anyone.”

    “Reckon so,” Billy cackled, giving the youngster’s sandy hair a tousle.

    “You will stay the night, oui, Billy?” Marie asked as Hop Sing cleared the dinner dishes in preparation for serving dessert.

    “Figured I would,” Billy concurred.  “You know how Ma is about me minin’ on Sunday, so ain’t much point in goin’ home.”  He moaned slightly.  “And all the best claims’ll be took by Monday, I just know they will.”

    “I wouldn’t worry about it,” Ben said dryly.  “Those two miners probably found the only pocket of gold in all of western Utah.”

    Billy shrugged.  “Yeah, maybe so.”

    “You want to bunk downstairs or with me or Mark?” Adam asked.

    “Or me,” Hoss offered.

    Little Joe banged his spoon on the table.  “Me, me!” he cried, not really sure what he was volunteering for, but anything involving the big boys was always enticing.  They shut him out so often.

    “Anything but that!” Billy hooted.  “I’ll take Adam, I reckon.  Hey, Adam, how ‘bout haulin’ the old boat up to Tahoe and doin’ some fishin’ tomorrow?”

    “Nope,” Ben answered for his son.

    “Aw, Uncle Ben,” Billy wheedled.  “Them Washos ain’t gonna miss one mess of fish.”

    “Pa doesn’t let us go up to Lake Tahoe before July,” Adam explained to Mark and Mary.  The others already knew of Ben Cartwright’s restriction.

    “It’s only fair to give the Indians first rights during their fishing season,” Ben stated firmly.  “By July, they’ll start gathering, instead.  Then you can fish.”

    “How kind of you to care about the Indians, Mr. Cartwright,” Mary commented, blue eyes sparkling.  “Father says what has happened to the California Indians since the white man came is a sin black as midnight.”

    “A tragedy,” Ben agreed.  “Entire nations wiped out.  I pray that never happens here, which is why Tahoe is off limits until July.  Understood?”

    “Sure, Pa,” Hoss and Adam agreed readily.

    “Yeah, sure,” Billy mumbled.

    Finishing his pie, Ben patted his lips with a red-checked napkin.  “Well, Billy, since you’re taking the doctor’s place tonight, I guess that means you’ll be my chess partner.”

    “Unh-uh!” Billy snorted.  “I don’t play nothin’ harder than checkers.”

    “Why don’t you play, Mark?” Sally suggested.  “My, but you’ve been quiet this evening!”

    Mark flushed, hoping no one guessed that the reason for his almost total silence had been his absorption in watching the pretty girl.  “I——uh——I’ve never played chess before, Miss Sally.”

    “Oh, I’m sure you’ll be good at it,” Sally said, “and I’ll be glad to help you.”

    “I have to take on two of you, do I?” Ben chuckled.

    “I was going to play you the song I’ve been learning,” Adam complained to Sally.

    The girl laughed lightly.  “Play away, Adam.  I’ll hear it.”  As she started to rise, Mark quickly stood and pulled out her chair.  Sally rewarded his gentlemanly manners with a gracious smile.

    Hoss tapped Billy’s arm.  “I’ll play checkers with you, Billy.  I ain’t much good at it, but you’ll like that better than chess with Pa or listenin’ to old Adam strum that guitar of his.”

    “Me, me play,” Little Joe demanded.

    “You play what?” Ben chuckled.  “Chess, checkers or guitar.”

    “Bath,” Marie tittered.  “He plays bath time.”

    Mary reached for the toddler.  “Let’s have a nice, warm bath, Little Joe,” she suggested, “then I’ll read you a story.  Okay?”

    “Okay,” Little Joe agreed.

    The evening ended quietly as everyone settled into his or her chosen activity:  Marie and Mary upstairs bathing Little Joe; Ben and Mark (with Sally perched beside him) concentrating over the chessboard on the cleared dining table; Hoss and Billy matching wits at checkers at the table before the fire; and Adam, seated in his father’s mauve armchair, strumming a soft ballad as background to the idyllic scene.

    Having begged his father for a day off to check out the mining excitement, Adam hurried through his breakfast, for Billy was anxious to get an early start.  Clucking indulgently, Ben turned to Mark.  “You off with them, my boy?”

    Mark felt torn in two directions.  The day the boys had planned sounded interesting, but Sally’s presence at the Ponderosa made staying home with the ladies a much more inviting proposal than before.  Mark was certain he’d be in for hours of ribbing, though, if he made that choice.  “Yeah, I’ll come along,” he decided, “if the boys don’t mind.”

    “No problem,” Billy said.  “Maybe you’ll ‘divine’ the best spot for my claim.”

    Ben groaned and Mark scowled, Ben because he didn’t care for puns and Mark because he didn’t like being connected with his father’s ministry.  “The three of you get out of here,” Ben grunted, “and don’t show your faces until suppertime.”

    “But don’t be late,” Sally urged.  “Katerina’s coming over and we’re all going to spend the day baking marvelous things.”

    Mark smiled.  If there was going to be that big a hen party here, he’d obviously made the right choice, but he couldn’t resist the opportunity to advance his standing with Sally Martin.  “That sounds wonderful, Miss Sally,” he said in a transparent attempt to flatter.  “I’m sure anything you bake will be marvelous.”

    Marie exchanged a knowing glance with Ben.  He nodded, accepting her analysis, for Marie was usually sharp in reading people’s hearts, especially when romance was in the air.  Mark was evidently attracted to Sally, and the warmth with which she responded to him indicated the attraction might be mutual.

    The exchange of glances, both between Ben and Marie and between Mark and Sally, didn’t escape Billy’s notice.  As he and the other two boys prepared to leave, he caught Sally in a light embrace and gave her a peck on the cheek.  “Still my best girl, ain’t you?” he asked, loud enough for Mark to hear.  “‘Course, you are.”  He pecked her again.

    “Don’t be ridiculous,” Adam teased.  “You know Sally prefers me.”  He kissed the girl on the opposite cheek.

    Sally just shook her head, eyes dancing.  Like most girls, she relished being the object of contention by multiple suitors.  She stole a glance at Mark, secretly hoping he’d say something flattering and follow it with a kiss, but the Wentworth lad stood silent, red-faced and flustered, and his farewell kiss was given to his sister.  Sally smiled softly at him, seeing something touching in his hesitance and in his tenderness with Mary.  No doubt, he’d be the same way with his future wife.

    “Can’t you ride any faster?” Billy complained as the three young men left the Ponderosa slopes and moved into the openness of the valley floor.

    “Nope,” Adam responded placidly, taking a long, satisfying whiff of the sage-scented air.  “Mark doesn’t sit a horse well enough to race.”

    Mark’s lower lip thrust out.  “Sorry to hold you back,” he muttered tautly.

    “No problem,” Adam assured him, turning quickly in his saddle.  “You’re getting to be a pretty good horseman, and, besides, Billy doesn’t need to be in such an all-fired hurry.”

    “Ought to leave the both of you behind, that’s what I ought to do,” Billy grunted, but made no move to quicken his roan’s pace.

    “Suit yourself,” Adam grinned.  “Mark and I are in no hurry, and the company’s not that congenial.”

    “Toss around any more of them big words,” Billy threatened, “and I’ll take off for sure.”

    Adam just snickered, knowing an idle threat when he heard one.    “I never know when to take the two of you seriously,” Mark said.

    “Hardly ever,” Adam said with a wink, “and Billy, next door to never.”

    The three exchanged similar banter periodically throughout the lengthy ride to Gold Hill.  They made their way through Devil’s Gate, where walls of gray rock towered on both sides of the narrow path of a sinuous stream.  As they approached the bustling camp, Billy gave a loud groan.  “I knew it; I just knew it.”

    “Look at the people!” Adam exclaimed.  Tents dotted the barren hillsides in every direction, and two-legged drones milled in service of a golden queen.

    “I told Ma the best claims would be took if I waited ‘til Monday.”  Billy growled.

    “Hey, there’s Old Pancake,” Adam said and ambled his sorrel mare forward.  “Howdy, Mr. Comstock,” he called when he drew close.

    “How do, my boy.”  The lanky man benevolently scratched his chin whiskers.  “Welcome to the Comstock Lode.”  Riding up behind Adam, Mark grimaced, for Comstock’s dark clothing and sanctimonious air reminded him of a minister, making him uneasy with reminders of home.

    “The Comstock Lode?” Adam queried with a grin.  “That what they’re calling Gold Hill now?”

    Comstock squared his shoulders.  “If they ain’t, they soon will be.  Reckon you heard about the strike on my claim.”

    “What I heard is that the claim belonged to a couple other fellers and you just horned in on it,” Billy asserted boldly as he reined in next to Adam and Mark.

    Adam winced.  Sometimes Billy had just about the sense God gave a goose.  Other times, like today, he didn’t act that well endowed.

    “Callin’ me a claim-jumper, are you, boy?” Comstock drawled.  “It’s a good thing for you I’m an easy-goin’ sort.  You’d find yourself starin’ down a shotgun barrel if you said that to most men.”

    “I figure I’m safe,” Billy snorted, “with a man too lazy to cook more than flapjacks.”

    “Billy,” Adam hissed in warning.  “You better watch your tongue, boy.”

    “Watch your own,” Billy advised.  “Thought there was a meetin’ Saturday to settle who owned that claim, Pancake.”

    “Like I said, the claim’s mine,” Comstock reported with a smile.  “Of course, O’Riley and McLaughlin have their shares——Old Virginny and Manny Penrod and some others, too.  We’re all partners.”

    “Just who ain’t got a share in this claim?” Billy snickered.

    Comstock rubbed his hairless upper lip as if in deep thought.  “Well, I’ll tell you, sonny, who ain’t got a share.  You ain’t, that’s who.”

    Billy gave a short laugh, appreciating a joke, even when he was the butt of it.  “Yeah, and if I stay here jawin’ with you, I ain’t likely to stake one of my own.”  He headed his roan up the canyon.  “You boys comin’?” he asked, looking back over his shoulder.

    “Go ahead,” Adam said.  “I’m gonna look around awhile and catch up with you later.”  He glanced over at Mark.  “Go with whichever of us you like.”

    “I’ll stick with you,” Mark replied.  He welcomed the chance to be alone with Adam.  He needed to get some things straight and figured the Cartwright boy was the best source for the information he wanted.

    It was awhile before the Wentworth lad had a chance to talk, however, for Adam seemed intent on investigating the length and breadth of the “Comstock Lode,” stopping to chat amiably with practically every miner whose path they crossed about the worth and extent of his claim.  None seemed to have struck color approaching the value of the original strike, but each felt confident the next shovelful of earth would reveal shining nuggets of astounding size.

    When the sun stood overhead, Adam’s stomach finally reminded him that his body needed feeding as much as his brain.  “Eilley Orrum’s place is here somewhere,” he told Mark.  “Nothing like Hop Sing fixes, but we can, at least, get beans and biscuits there.  The biscuits are supposed to be first-rate.”

    “Back that way,” Mark said, pointing.  “About half a mile.”  Unlike Adam, he hadn’t been so absorbed in conversing with miners that he’d lost sight of more basic attractions.

    The two young men rode back to the building Mrs. Cowan shared with Old Nick’s Bar and grabbed one of the few tables.  The proprietress greeted Adam warmly.  “What brings you hill boys up to the diggings?” she asked jovially.  “Decided to leave ranching for better-paying work?”

    “Never,” Adam replied decisively.  “We just heard about the excitement and rode over with a friend of ours to see how the place was booming.”

    “Booming it is!” Eilley cackled gleefully.  “More customers than I can serve comfortably, but there’s beans and bacon left, boys——coffee, too.”

    “No biscuits?” Mark asked.  “I hear they’re good.”

    Eilley leaned over to give his cheek a soft pinch.  “You hear right, sonny, and you’re in luck.  I just set a batch to bake.  Be ready soon.”

    “Eilley,” a tall, light-haired fellow called.  “You save me some of those biscuits, you hear?”

    “I hear you, Sandy.”  The Scottish lady, who had broken ranks with the edicts of the Mormon Church to remain near the diggings, gave the miner an encouraging wink.  “Wouldn’t let one of my regular boarders go hungry, now would I?”  She went after the coffeepot and two tin cups for her newest customers, stopping to refill Sandy Bowers’ cup first.

    Adam leaned close to Mark’s ear.  “Looks like Mrs. Cowan’s casting bait.”

    “Widow?” Mark whispered back.

    Adam grinned and shook his head.  “Divorced, I think——twice over, and man-hungry again.  Dangles bait for Doc Martin every chance she gets.  He pays her no mind, but maybe Sandy will take the bait.”

    “Kind of looks like it appeals to him,” Mark smiled.

    The two boys fell silent as Eilley approached their table, coffeepot in hand.  When she left to dish up their beans and bacon, Mark traced the rim of his coffee cup with his index finger.  “Speaking of Dr. Martin,” he began.

    “Didn’t know we were,” Adam mumbled into his coffee cup.

    “You mentioned him,” Mark said sharply.  “Anyway, there’s something I’ve been wanting to ask you——about his daughter.”

    “Sure, I’ve known her for years,” Adam replied.  “Know about all there is to know.”

    Mark looked uneasy and began to stammer out his query.  “Well——uh—I was just wondering if——well——”

    “Spit it out,” Adam laughed.  “It can’t be that bad.”  He took a long sip of coffee.

    “Well——all this talk Billy does about her being his girl,”  Mark said quickly.  “Is——is it just talk or are they really——”

    “Billy talks that way about any girl within ten yards,” Adam snickered.  “He sparks Sarah Winnemucca when Sally’s not around, even Marta, Katerina’s sister, over to Placerville, when he passes through.”

    “Then he’s not serious about Miss Sally?” Mark asked, sounding relieved.

    “Billy’s never serious about anything,” Adam grinned.  “You should know that by now.”

    “What about you?” Mark pressed.  “You said this morning that she preferred you.  Were you just teasing Billy or did you mean it?”

    “Aiming to rile Billy, mostly,” Adam chuckled.  “Why?”

    “Oh, no reason,” Mark mumbled.

    Adam looked up quickly, for something in Mark’s tone told him exactly why the other young man was so interested in Sally Martin’s possible attachments.  “I used to be kind of sweet on Sally,” he said more seriously.  “She was the first girl I ever took interest in, but there’ve been others since I went to school in Sacramento.  Not sure how I feel about her now.  Maybe just friends, maybe more.  Don’t mind competition, though, if that’s what you’re asking.”

    Mark flushed.  “Am I that obvious?”

    “Oh, yeah!” Adam laughed as Mrs. Cowan brought their plates.

    “Now, what’s all the fun?” she demanded playfully.

    “Just killing time ‘til the biscuits came,” Adam rejoined, smiling impishly, and Eilley wagged a remonstrative finger under his nose.

    Adam and Mark returned to the Ponderosa late that afternoon.  As he swung off his sorrel, Adam waved to his father, who had just exited from the barn.  Wrapping the reins around the hitching rail, Adam hustled across the yard.  “Pa, you won’t believe the folks crawling all over that mountain!” he exclaimed.

    “Wouldn’t I?” Ben snorted.  “I can even tell you where some of them came from!”

    “Here?” Adam queried, quick as ever to read his father’s meaning.

    “Yup.  Enos was by earlier to report how many men took off for the gold fields over the weekend,” Ben muttered.  “We’re mighty short-handed, boy.”

    “Aw, the excitement’ll wear off and they’ll be back,” an unconcerned Adam prophesied.  “In the meantime, you can count on us, right, Mark?”

    “Yeah, right,” Mark muttered.  He lingered outside, twisting the strands of his horse’s reins through his fingers, as Adam headed for the house.

    Ben gave his guest a long, thoughtful appraisal.  “Something on your mind, son?”

    “Yeah, sort of,” Mark admitted.  “I was just thinking.  My father sends me out here for you to straighten out, and it turns out you really need me.  Kind of ironic, huh?”

    Ben’s brown eyes narrowed.  “What makes you think that’s why you’re here, Mark?”

    Mark laughed harshly.  “I know my father.  He favors steady work too much to smile on a summer off unless he thought being out here on the backside of the wilderness would keep me from worse temptations.  Didn’t he tell you I’m the black sheep of his flock?”

    “Not quite the way he put it,” Ben said quietly, “but, yes, he told me you’d had some problems holding a job——and some in the wise use of what you did earn.”

    “And he thought you could turn me around,” Mark muttered bitterly.

    “Any turning around that’s done will be done by you,” Ben said firmly.  “I’ve got three boys of my own to raise, and you have a father, one who loves you dearly and is only concerned for your welfare.”

    “What he’s concerned about is the embarrassment to his ministry,” Mark sputtered.  “Quite a joke, don’t you think, if the minister’s son turns into the town drunk?”

    Ben’s visage turned to granite.  “I don’t find that amusing, young man,” he said sternly.  “Is that really the goal of your life, Mark, embarrassing your father, hurting him the way he’s hurt you?”

    Feeling that the older man had seen straight through to his tortured heart, Mark flushed darkly.  “I——I’m not trying to hurt anyone,” he stammered defensively.

    Ben’s salt-and-pepper eyebrows met in a straight line.  “Aren’t you?”

    Mark’s flush deepened.  “Yeah, all right, maybe.”

    Ben touched the boy’s shoulder.  “What is it you’re holding against your father, Mark?  His poverty?  Surely, you know he does the best he can for you and Matthew——and Mary.”

    At the mention of his sister’s name, Mark’s hazel eyes shimmered.  “It’s killing her,” he murmured.  “That awful ship.”

    “Yeah, I know,” Ben said softly.  “She deserves——even needs——a tightly-framed house.”

    “Try convincing our father of that,” Mark muttered, bitter again.

    “Oh, I think he knows,” Ben said swiftly.  “When I think back on all the years I dragged Adam around from place to place with nothing but a succession of boardinghouses to call home——well, there’s no greater frustration for a father than to want more for his child than he can provide.  I think that’s what your father feels, Mark.”

    “He cares more about the derelicts on the Barbary Coast than he does about Mary,” Mark accused, jaw tight.

    Ben folded his arms and leaned his hips against the hitching rail.  “Evidently, so do you.”

    “What?” Mark demanded, his fists knotting.

    Ben jabbed a broad finger at Mark’s chest.  “You’re a grown man, Mark, able to bring home a man’s wage.  Between you and Matthew, there ought to be plenty to provide for your sister, even without help from your father.  But, no, you squander your pay in the cesspools of the Barbary Coast, and not even with the lofty goal that takes your father’s funds.  He, at least, is trying to help the poor wretches trapped there.  You’re trying to become one of them!  How does that help Mary?”

    Mark backed away, his mouth moving, but no sound emerging.  Suddenly, he stopped and his chin began to tremble.  “You’re right,” he murmured sadly.  “I haven’t been any help at all.  All I’ve done is worry Mary, make her miserable.  I meant to hurt my father, but it’s her I’ve hurt.”

    “Both of them,” Ben said softly.  “Matthew, too, I imagine.”

    Mark nodded, willing now to see good in everyone except himself.  “What do I do, Mr. Cartwright?  How do I turn it around?”

    Ben stepped forward to encircle the young man’s shaking shoulders.  “Wanting to is half the battle, son.  As to the rest, you’ve got a chance to start fresh here.”  Ben laughed abruptly.  “You said earlier that your father had sent you to the backside of the wilderness.”

    “I meant no offense——against you, anyway,” Mark said quickly.  “The Ponderosa’s a grand place.”

    “I wasn’t offended,” Ben smiled.  “I was just remembering a sermon your father preached on the trail, about God sending Moses to the backside of the wilderness to grow him into the leader he needed to be.”

    A half-smile lifted one corner of Mark’s mouth.  “Guess that’s where I picked it up.”

    “Probably,” Ben chuckled.  “Well, Mark, why don’t you put your time in the wilderness to good use, like Moses did?  Of course, he had forty years, while you have only one summer, but I just bet you could do a lot of growing up in that time——if you choose to.”

    Mark’s head lifted at last.  “I choose to,” he said.

    Ben gave him a hearty clap on the back.  “Good!  Now, let’s get inside and sample those goodies the ladies have been baking this afternoon.”

    “You can’t fool me,” Mark laughed.  “You’ve already had your samples.”

    “Guilty as charged,” Ben chuckled, “but if you want yours, you’d better hustle.  Hoss was wheedling for more when I left.”  Laughing, they walked arm in arm to the house.

    No one remarked on how long Mark had remained outside after Adam came in, but, looking up to welcome him, Sally noted a certain somberness in his face that hadn’t been there before.  To coax back his smile, she paid him extra attention that night, even agreeing to a walk in the moonlight, the first of several during her stay at the Ponderosa.

    On her final night, Mark surprised himself by telling Sally everything: his fears for Mary, his anger with his father, his days of idleness and nights of drunken rambling through the dark alleys of the Barbary Coast, and, finally, his confrontation with Mr. Cartwright.  He wasn’t sure what made him unburden himself that way, except that he was beginning to care for the girl and wanted no secrets cropping up later to shock and disillusion her.  Better to know from the start that there was no hope than to build dreams only to see them shatter when the truth was revealed.

    When he’d talked himself empty, Sally took both his hands in hers, smiling radiantly.  “I’m honored that you trusted me with your problems, Mark, and so glad you’ve made the decision to change.”

    He looked earnestly into her sapphire eyes.  “You really think I can, then?”

    She squeezed his fingers encouragingly.  “Oh, I know you can!  I’ve seen it happen, and here’s the best place, too.  It did wonders for my father.”

    “Your father?”

    Sally nodded.  “He’s a changed man since he met Uncle Ben.”  She described for Mark the terror-filled night when irate miners, convinced of Dr. Martin’s malpractice, had set fire to the Martin cabin, not realizing a woman and child lived there, too.  “After Mother’s death, Father fell to pieces,” Sally explained to a sympathetic listener.  “He sent me away almost immediately——to school in Hawaii.  I thought then that he blamed me for Mother’s death——because he’d saved me first and couldn’t get back to her in time——but I know now that he was afraid to keep me near him, afraid those miners would harm me to get back at him.”

    “Must’ve been rough on you,” Mark murmured.  “I know what it is to lose a mother, but, at least, I had the rest of my family.”

    “Yes, it was hard,” Sally recalled, glancing up as if seeing those sad memories enacted on the face of the moon.  “Father came here——to the backside of the wilderness, as you called it——to lose himself.  Instead, he found a friend and a new life.”

    “That’s what I’m looking for,” Mark said earnestly, “a new life.”

    “You’ll find it,” Sally replied.  “And——and you’ve already found a friend.”  She leaned forward to tenderly kiss his cheek.

    Mark took her in his arms.  He didn’t kiss her that night.  He only gazed deeply into her eyes and found in them the inspiration he needed to become the man Sally envisioned him to be as they stood together under the stars.

Ben lifted his gray felt hat and wiped his brow.  The longest, hottest day of the year, and he had to spend it doing one of the chores he liked least.  Bringing in a crop of hay was vital to his cattle’s survival during the winter, but it had to be done at the time of year the sun made a man’s skin glisten with sweat.  Chuckling, he shook his head.  Having Adam home must be rubbing off on him, if he’d taken to that kind of poetical descriptions.  His brown shirt was drenched, and the skin beneath it didn’t glisten; more likely, it trickled his back in muddy tracks from neck to waist.

Ben wrinkled his nose.  He reeked, too, but the work had to be done, especially in view of the decimation inflicted by grasshoppers on Washoe Valley’s crops of both wheat and hay earlier that month.  And there was no delegating it to the hands this year; there weren’t many, and he couldn’t risk offending the ones he had by taking them away from the cattle for this kind of work.  He’d enlisted, instead, the kind of helpers who put the needs of the ranch above their personal pride.  Adam and Mark were spread out to his right, while Enos and Hoss flanked him on the left.

    Seeing the youngster put his back into the work, Ben smiled.  Just short of nine now, Hoss was almost man-size, and he was doing the work of a man this summer, in place of men who’d deserted their positions.  Ben felt proud, and he intended to see that the boy was rewarded with a man’s wage for his efforts.  Goodness only knew what he’d spend it on, though.  After he’d bought up all the candy in the territory——there wasn’t much to be had——he’d likely still have money left.

    Ben crammed his hat back on his head, but as he did, he caught sight of a rider heading his way.  Glad of an excuse to postpone the hated haying, he moved toward the rider, his brow wrinkling as he recognized his neighbor, Augustus Harrison.  By all rights, a confirmed rancher like Harrison should have been in his own hay fields, bringing in his own crop.  As Ben raised a hand in greeting, he wondered what had brought Harrison to the Ponderosa this sultry first day of summer.

    Harrison swung down from a chestnut gelding.  “Howdy, Cartwright.  See you’re busy bringing in your hay.”

    “Yup, that time of year,” Ben offered amiably.  “Surprised you’re not doing the same.”

    Harrison grunted.  “Been to the diggings, tryin’ to hire hands for the job.”

    “Find any?” Ben asked.

    Harrison shook his head.  “Not a one.  All crazy for gold and not a one interested in an honest day’s work.”

    “Yeah, most of my hands took off, too,” Ben commiserated.  “Don’t know what I’d do without my boys here.”  The younger men had quit working to walk up behind Ben.

    Harrison smiled at them.  “Looks like you’ve got a fine crew here, Cartwright.  I rode by hopin’ I might hire ‘em off you for a few days.”

    Ben laughed.  “Can’t spare them.  Like I said, I’m short-handed myself.”

    Harrison chuckled.  “Yeah, I figured it was a fool’s errand, but I’m gettin’ desperate enough to try anything.”  He pulled a rock from his pocket.  “Had another reason for stoppin’ by.  I picked this up in Gold Hill this morning.  Thought you might know what it is, you bein’ an educated man.”

    Ben laughed heartily as he turned the blue-black clay over in his hand.  “When it comes to minerals, I’m as ignorant as they come.”

    Adam stepped to his side and took the ore sample.  “This looks like the blue stuff the miners claim is gumming up their sluices,” he commented.  “Practically every miner I talked to the other day complained about it.”

    Harrison nodded.  “Yeah, but I’m wonderin’ if it doesn’t have some value of its own.”

    Ben cocked his head.  “Don’t tell me you’re giving up ranching for a pick and pan.”

    “Might have to if I can’t hire any workers,” Harrison jibed.  “Naw, I’m just the curious sort.  Figured I might send this sample to Nevada City for assay, see what that ‘blue stuff’ is.”

    “I’d sure like to see the report,” the ever inquisitive Adam said.

    “You going to Nevada City during haying season?” Ben asked.

    Harrison shook his head.  “Naw, J. F. Stone’s headed there for supplies.  You know him, don’t you, Cartwright?  Runs the Stone and Gate trading post on the Truckee River.”

    “I’ve met him,” Ben replied, “but I’ve never traded with him.  I do my business in Carson and Genoa.”

    “Fair man,” Harrison commented, “and an obliging one.  He’ll be glad to take the sample for me.”

    “I’d sure like to see the report,” Adam said again.

    Harrison grinned.  “Heard you the first time, son.  Sure, I’ll be glad to let you see it——especially if you’ll think over bringin’ in my hay.”

    “None of that!” Ben snorted.  “The audacity of the man——trying to hire away my best crew right under my nose.”

    Hoss moved close to his father’s side.  “I won’t leave you, Pa, whatever them others do.”

    Smiling, Harrison swung onto his chestnut.  “Loyal hand you got there, Ben.  Reckon I’m wasting my time tryin’ to tempt him away.”

    Ben laughed and circled Hoss’s shoulders with an affectionate arm.  “Maybe you’ve got something in common with those miners after all, Augustus——wasting time, I mean.”

    Harrison tipped his hat.  “Won’t waste anymore of yours, at any rate.  I’ll let you get back to your hayin’.”

    As Harrison rode away, Ben gave a low moan of displeasure.  “Back to work, boys,” he grunted, his own steps dragging as he turned back in begrudging duty.

    As Mary struggled to squeeze shoes onto Little Joe’s reluctant feet, Marie tied her bonnet ribbons in a pert bow to the left of her chin.  The boys were outside saddling their mounts, but Ben had remained behind for a final cup of coffee and a farewell kiss for his lady.  “Have a good time,” he said as he bestowed it, “and bring home lots of tasty treats.”

    “Oh, but there will be none today,” Marie advised him.

    “I thought that’s what this hen party was about,” Ben declared, looking puzzled.  “Isn’t Katerina teaching you all to make some of her German specialties.”

    “Just one,” Marie replied.  “Lebkuchen, but it is not for now; it is for Christmas.”

    “Christmas!” Ben exclaimed.

    Marie started to respond, but before she could, Hop Sing bustled into the front room.  “This what you want, Missy Cahtlight?” he queried.

    Marie took the two clay jars he was holding.  “Oui, those look perfect, Hop Sing.  Thank you.”

    “Those had better be full of cookies when you return,” Ben admonished playfully.

    “Do not be perverse, Ben,” Marie scolded.  “They will be full of dough, not cookies.”

    “Dough?” Ben sputtered.  “I thought you were doing the baking at Laura’s, in that big oven of hers.  Isn’t that why you had to wait ‘til Saturday, so she’d have her regular baking done?”

    Marie looked at Mary and sighed.  “Men——they simply do not listen.”

    “Even small ones,” Mary agreed, tweaking Little Joe’s toes.  “Please be still, baby,” she pleaded, “and let me put on this last shoe.”

    “Don’t want shoes,” Little Joe whimpered, kicking his foot against her knee.  Keeping shoes on his feet, never an easy task, had become an unending battle with the arrival of warm weather.

    Ben had allowed Adam to run barefoot as a toddler, sometimes of necessity when he didn’t have the price of a pair of shoes, but that had been back east.  Here, where rattlesnakes could crawl across a baby’s path with little warning, Ben insisted the boys wear shoes.  Besides, it was a point of pride with him that he could now afford to keep his children well-clothed and solidly shod, year round.  “Sit still,” he ordered, and seeing the look on his father’s face, Little Joe frowned, but quit wiggling.

    The minor rebellion curbed, Ben turned to reason with his wife.  “Now, dearest,” he said slowly, “I know you’re a good enough cook to——”

    Marie’s cheeks flamed.  “I am an excellent cook, as you should know.  I did not ask you to bring another into this house!”

    Ben grimaced, hoping Hop Sing hadn’t heard her tirade.  In contests between his virulent Chinese cook and his fiery Creole wife, Ben felt there was no safe ground.  He laid a soothing hand on Marie’s slender neck.  “Your cuisine is beyond compare, dearest,” he murmured, treading softly, “so surely you realize that you can’t keep cookie dough fresh for six months.  It’ll draw maggots.”  Or worse, he added silently.

    Mary giggled.  “That’s what I said, too, but Katerina says not.”

    “It is a special process,” Marie declared, dipping her chin sharply, “and that is what we must learn today.”

    “Well, it’s a new one on me,” Ben chuckled.  “I’ll be mighty interested in tasting the results——come Christmas.”

    Marie smiled and gave his cheek a forgiving kiss.  Slipping an arm around her waist, Ben escorted her to the buckboard.  Mary followed, with Little Joe, both feet snugly laced into sturdy brown shoes, toddling beside her.  After helping both ladies mount the wagon, Ben lifted Little Joe up to Mary and handed the reins to Marie.  “Be sure to find out what time the celebration starts on the Fourth,” he said.  “We don’t want to be late.”  Abraham Curry was again planning festivities in Carson City for Independence Day, and the Cartwrights were planning to attend.

    “I’ll remember,” Marie promised.

    When she returned that afternoon, Ben, who had spent that day doing needed chores close to home, met the buckboard in the yard and helped both Marie and Mary down.  Mary immediately carried the sleeping baby up to his room, but Marie stayed outside to fulfill a commission given her by Nelly Thomas.  “Nelly hopes we will host a private celebration at Lake Tahoe instead of attending the one in town,” she told Ben.  “She says Billy is much too absorbed in this latest mining nonsense and wants to get him as far away from talk of gold as possible.”  Marie smiled persuasively into her husband’s face.  “I told her I was sure you would agree.  After all, our guests have not yet seen the lake.”

    “Fine with me,” Ben chuckled, “if Billy will go along with it.”

    “And why should he not?”

    “He’s getting to be a pretty big boy to be ordered around by his mother,” Ben said.

    “Ah, but will you say the same about your boys when they come to his age?” Marie teased.

    Ben wagged a remonstrative finger beneath her nose.  “Only one close to his age is Adam, and I already give him a fair measure of freedom.”

    “Well, but Adam is mature for his age,” Marie demurred.

    “Don’t expect any argument from me when you’re praising my son!” Ben laughed and kissed her lips firmly.  “Now, I suppose you want those crocks of dough carried inside.”

    “S’il te plait, mon amour,” she said with a gracious smile.

    Brilliant sunlight glinted off the surface of the azure lake the Fourth of July as a small vessel, painted a yellow almost as vivid as the sun, skimmed north toward Cave Rock.  In the bow Mark Wentworth, eyes closed against the glare, lay sprawled, basking in the warm rays splashing his face, sucking in the pungent pine as if it were the breath of life.  For Mary, he was sure it was.  His sister was with the other ladies, combing the hills for succulent strawberries.  Mrs. Cartwright had promised that if they found enough, she and Mary would make strawberry jam tomorrow and that Mary could take a share home to San Francisco.  Mary had babbled happily to her brother about what a wonderful Christmas they would have with both that jam and the lebkuchen.  How like Mary to be planning ahead for other people’s pleasure!

    A chubby hand shook his shoulder.  “Hey, Mark, wake up!” Hoss insisted.  “You gotta see the Lady of the Lake.”

    “I’m not asleep,” Mark said, obediently sitting up and shading his eyes to examine the landmark Hoss was so eager to show.  Mark wasn’t really interested, but he didn’t want to disappoint his young tour guide.  He smiled.  Maybe some of Mary’s kind ways were finally rubbing off on him.  He bet Sally would be proud, if she could see him now.

    In the stern of the sailboat an animated conversation was being conducted, although debate or even quarrel might have been a more apt description.  “Why don’t you mind your own business?” Billy demanded hotly.

    “My best friend is my business,” Adam snapped back, “especially when he’s making a fool of himself.”

    “If I’m a fool, I got plenty of company,” Billy snorted.  “Lately, there’s more of us miners than you ranchers around here.”

    That remark hurt, and Adam glowered with indignation.  He, along with Hoss and Mark, had been carrying a much heavier load than usual since the strike at Gold Hill, and he was just plain tired.  Too tired, he decided suddenly, to waste his one free day arguing with a hardhead like Billy.  “I just don’t want to see you turning out like my Uncle John and Cousin Will,” he said in a less irritated tone.

    “Who says they’re doin’ bad?” Billy countered.

    “Aw, you know how it was, Uncle John traipsing all over the world, leaving his wife and son to get by as best they could.”

    “I ain’t got a wife,” Billy pointed out.  “If I did, sure, I might have to settle for a regular job, but I’m footloose and fancy free and aim to enjoy it while I can.”

    Adam laughed.  “Billy, you’re incorrigible!”

    Billy gave his friend a hard push that sent Adam to his back on the boat’s floor.  “Lay off the big words, smarty britches.”

    Adam sat up, waving his hands to make peace.  “Okay, okay.  I’m just saying you’d probably make better wages coming to work with us, and we could sure use the help.  How much color are you finding on that claim of yours, anyway?”

    “Some,” Billy muttered defensively.  “All right, I admit it ain’t much, but, at least, I don’t have tons of that blue stuff gumming up my sluices, like some of them others.”

    Had the citizens of Nevada City, across the Sierras, been able to hear Billy’s boast, they would have laughed him to scorn.  Only three days before, the results of Augustus Harrison’s assay had been printed in the Nevada Journal .  The “blue stuff” the miners bemoaned turned out to be almost pure silver.  With the trace of gold contained in the sample Harrison had sent in, the assay estimated the ore’s value at $3,876 a ton.

    A new wave of miners was already headed for western Utah.  As journalist J. Ross Browne would later report, the roads were jammed with a serpentine line of people of every description:  “Irishmen wheeling their worldly goods on wheelbarrows; Americans, Frenchmen, and Germans on foot leading horses heavily packed; Mexicans driving long trains of pack mules; dapper-looking gentlemen riding fancy horses; women dressed in men’s clothes mounted on mules or burros; organ grinders; drovers; cripples and humpbacks; and even sick men got up from their beds all stark mad for silver.”

    Through the first two weeks of July the ranchers of Washoe remained in blissful ignorance of the flashflood roaring toward them.  As election day approached, Ben grew antsy.  He wanted to be named a delegate to the constitutional convention more than he cared to admit.  He’d been tied so close to home by the shortage of workers, however, that he hadn’t had much chance to let his feelings be known to any but close friends.  He was sure he could count on Clyde’s vote and Dr. Martin’s, but didn’t know how many others he might secure——or how many might actually get counted.  At last year’s election, the votes from four out of six precincts had been thrown out, due to alleged irregularities.

    Ben arrived early in Carson City to cast his ballot, then spent the remainder of the day either sitting in the Thomas’s parlor, downing gallons of coffee, or roaming the streets, greeting friends and acquaintances as they arrived to vote.  “Fool notion,” he muttered back in the parlor as the time drew near when the polls would close.  “I’m no politician.”

    “Point in your favor, I’d say,” Clyde chuckled.  “Quit frettin’, Ben.  Folks in these parts know a good man when they see one.”

    Ben arched an eyebrow.  “They generally define ‘a good man’ as one who thinks like them, and I, my friend, have taken some pretty unpopular stands.”

    Clyde folded his hands behind his neck and leaned against the sofa back.  “Don’t remind me,” he grinned.  “Might have to change my vote if you keep bringin’ up what a fool you been.”

    Ben knew he was being teased, but he scowled anyway.  However lightly Clyde Thomas might take the election, it was serious to him.  When the polls officially closed, Ben, along with other hopeful candidates, paced the street outside Curry’s trading post, where the ballots were being tallied.  Finally, the door opened and Abraham Curry himself stepped out to announce the results.

    A shout of approval met the name of the man chosen as the representative who would be sent to Washington, D. C., with the memorial to be drafted by the convention.  James Crane, formerly a journalist from California, was a popular choice.  Ben had voted for him and had been virtually certain Crane would be elected.  If only I felt that sure about myself, he moaned inwardly.

    Involuntarily, he held his breath as the delegates’ names were read.  They were listed in alphabetical order, so Ben had a mercifully short wait.  As he heard his name read, his mouth dropped in amazement, but he quickly closed it, sensing the expression an inappropriate way to respond to such an honor.  Clyde clapped him on the back, and numerous others came to shake his hand.

    When all the names had been announced, Curry shouted to get the crowd’s attention.  “Gentlemen——congratulations to all the fine men elected to represent us at the constitutional convention.  All delegates are directed to convene in Genoa on the eighteenth of this month.  Come prepared to stay several days.”

    Ben’s stomach jumped into his throat.  The eighteenth!  Only four days away, and a million things to tend to, especially if he were to be gone several days.  He pressed his bay back toward the Ponderosa to share his good news and elicit the support he’d need to make his dream of serving the community a reality.

    Though Ben rose in darkness, the entire family, except Little Joe, was assembled in the front room when he brought his carpetbag downstairs.  He had given the sleeping toddler’s forehead a kiss before descending and now gave Marie and both his older sons a farewell embrace.

    “You are not leaving yet,” Marie laughed gently.  “You will not neglect your breakfast and leave me to deal with Hop Sing, monsieur.”

    Ben chuckled.  “No, I couldn’t do anything that cruel.  Goodness knows, I feel bad enough about leaving at all, things being the way they are.”  In the four days since the election, the first wave of newcomers had poured over the Sierras in search of silver, and most of the hands who hadn’t deserted before were now staking claims on the Comstock Lode.

    “Don’t give it a thought, Pa,” Adam urged.  “We’ll manage just fine, and what you’re doing is important.”

    “Mais oui,” Marie agreed, her face radiant with pride.

    “We’ll take good care of them cattle, Pa,” Hoss promised.

    “That’s right,” Mark added.  “You can trust us, sir.”

    Ben gazed gratefully at each reassuring face.  “I know I can, and I thank you all for making this possible for me.”

    “Bleakfast leady,” Hop Sing called insistently from the dining room.  “You eat now!”

    “Yes, sir!” Ben replied, spinning on his heels and popping a snappy salute at the cook.

    Many times during the days that followed, Ben found himself remembering that final morning at home and drawing sustenance from the support so freely given.  There were moments during the convention when he doubted that he was making any contribution worth leaving the burden of his ranch to such young men.  Adam and Hoss still seemed little more than children playing at man’s work, and while Mark was, of course, older, he was far less experienced with livestock.  Enos Montgomery had promised to send word if problems arose, but to Ben, who’d first known him as a young fellow along the trail, even the foreman seemed barely more than a boy, despite his being past thirty.

    The opening days of the convention were frustrating.  At first, the delegates could not even agree on why they were there.  Most felt their purpose was to frame a constitution for a provisional government, but a vocal minority believed they were only there to provide a foundation for a later constitutional convention.

    Ben was amused to find himself siding with the majority after so often being the lone voice in opposition to some widely held position.  He favored appealing to Congress for separation from the Territory of Utah on the basis of need, asking the legislators to overlook the small population of their area.  Others pointed out that their population was booming, with more people pouring in from California every day in response to the new silver strike.  Ben, personally, didn’t consider that a stable population base, but hoped Congress would think otherwise.

    As the discussion turned to grievances against the present territorial government, Ben began to think Clyde Thomas should have been a delegate in his place.  He, at least, would have enjoyed the virulent attacks upon the Mormons.  Ben thought a number of the charges unfair and said so.  While he agreed that the Mormons themselves adhered too slavishly to the views of Brigham Young, to say that they exercised absolute spiritual despotism over the western parts of Utah was, Ben felt, going too far.

    “Furthermore,” he declared, “I find no basis for accusing the Mormons of inciting the Indians to attack gentiles.  We’ve had no Indian trouble here, and while the Mountain Meadows Massacre was a tragedy that can be laid at the Mormon’s doorstep, it was a single, unrepeated incident.”

    “What about Lassen’s murder?” a delegate from Susanville demanded.

    Ben shook his head.  “The official investigation concluded that was a revenge killing, and there’s no proof otherwise.  We cannot base our memorial to Congress on supposition, gentlemen.  It must stand solidly on truth.”  He took a breath and continued.  “I believe, as you do, that this region must separate from the Territory of Utah——not because of unproven allegations, but because geographic distance produces governmental failure.  To provide genuine justice for the eastern Sierra, we must have our own territory.”  A shout of approval met his last sentence.

    Hearing Hop Sing’s irate ranting amid the clatter and clash of pans, Mary Wentworth rose at once from her seat at the breakfast table.  Marie lifted a restraining hand as she stood herself.  “No, Mary, please finish your breakfast.  I will tend to Hop Sing.”

    Marie whisked toward the kitchen, her own temper surging to the surface.  Whatever problems the Chinese cook thought he was having, he had no more right than any of the rest of them to take it out on innocent pots and pans, and the lady of the house was determined to make that point crystal clear.

    In the week since Ben had left for Genoa, everyone’s temper was set on short fuse.  The boys’ edginess was understandable.  In order to make up for the shortage of workers, they’d been starting their work day at the first crack of dawn and ending it only when they could no longer see what they were doing.  Mary had wanted to rise even earlier, to help Hop Sing prepare breakfast before the sun rose, but Marie had firmly insisted the girl remain in bed as long as the rest of them.  Mary’s health seemed renewed by the dry climate and crisp air, and Marie thought it unwise to jeopardize the progress the girl had made by overextending herself.  Mark agreed, and Mary submitted meekly.  Though she wanted to help, she couldn’t argue against them both.

    Upstairs, Little Joe awoke to a black sky.  Of them all, he was having the most trouble dealing with Ben’s absence.  For him, it wasn’t just Ben who’d left in the dark of night, never to return, but Adam, Hoss and Mark, as well.  Since the older boys left before he woke and didn’t arrive home until after he went to bed, Little Joe had seen nothing of them for a week, either.  Mama and Mary paid him extra attention, but even they were growing weary of repeating explanations the toddler simply couldn’t comprehend and thoroughly exasperated with his insistent question of when Pa was coming home.

    Connecting the darkness with the disappearances, Little Joe felt certain he could discover where everyone had gone, if he went looking before the sun came up.  So, although he was usually content to stay in his crib and cry until someone answered his summons, on that Monday morning he flung his short leg over the wooden rail and clambered down.

    He pattered into his parents’ adjoining bedroom, ready to spring onto the bed and nab Pa before he had a chance to get away, but Pa wasn’t there.  Little Joe frowned with frustration, then his emerald eyes flew wide with fear.  Mama wasn’t there, either!  What if she, too, had disappeared into the night and left him all alone?  Little Joe charged pell-mell down the hall.

    Heedless by nature, and more so in his panic, the toddler  plunged——literally——down the stairs.  His bare foot slipped on the well-polished first step, and he tumbled, head over heels, to the landing several feet below.

    Marie was still in the kitchen, castigating an equally vociferous Hop Sing, but everyone remaining in the dining room jumped up at the sound of the little body bumping against each step in its descent.  Nimble Adam reached the stairs first, just as Little Joe hit bottom with a loud thud.  He leaped the four steps to the landing and snatched the baby up.  “You okay?” Adam asked anxiously.

    Little Joe said nothing, didn’t, in fact, even seemed to be breathing.  His little legs kicked furiously, but no sound escaped.  Just as Adam began to be really frightened, the toddler finally caught his breath and began to wail.

    Laughing in relief, Adam pulled him to his chest.  “There, there, you’re okay,” he soothed.

    Though Marie hadn’t heard the tumble down the stairs, she was, as always, alert to the sound of her child’s cry.  Rushing into the front room, she snatched Little Joe from Adam.  “What have you done to him?” she demanded hotly, still smarting from her unfinished quarrel with Hop Sing.

    “What have I done to him?” Adam sputtered.  “Picked him up off the floor, that’s what I’ve done to him!”  He stalked to the front door, jerked it open and turned back toward Marie.  “You’ve sure got a long memory, lady!”  He stormed out, slamming the door so hard the grandfather clock beside it gave an extra chime.

    “Little Joe fell down the stairs, Mrs. Cartwright,” Mary explained, her gentle eyes pained by the exchange of harsh words.  “Truly, Adam did nothing but try to help.”

    Marie blanched.  My temper, my horrible temper, she thought. When shall I ever master it?  She tried to soothe her wailing baby, but Little Joe screamed on, whether from fear, pain or just the absorbed tension of those around him, no one could have said.  Deciding she couldn’t let Adam leave with such ugliness between them, Marie hastily deposited her baby with Mary, whose soft lullaby eventually quieted the child.

    “Adam,” Marie called as she entered the barn.  “Adam, I must speak with you.”

    “More accusations?” Adam snapped, flinging a striped saddle blanket onto his sorrel mare.

    Marie flushed, but, reminding herself that she was the one in the wrong, she spoke softly.  “No, Adam, an apology.  I should have known you would do nothing to harm your little brother.”

    “Ought to by now,” Adam muttered, still offended.  “Even at my worst, I wouldn’t have done that.  I know you used to think I would, but it was never true.”

     “Because you disliked me so much.”  Marie closed her eyes to shut out the painful memories.  “That is what you meant by my long memory.  Oh, Adam, I thought we were past those terrible days.”

    “I thought so, too,” Adam mumbled.

    Her fingertips touched his arm.  “Can we not lay aside ill feelings and begin again, mon ami?  Truly, I know what a fine young man you are; I would trust you with my life.”

    “But not with your baby,” Adam accused.  The wound, though less sharp, still smarted.

    Marie sighed.  “It is a great fault with me, I know.  You cannot imagine what he means to me, after so many hard things in my life.”

    Adam didn’t know everything about Marie’s background; in fact, he was sure there were things so awful Pa had deliberately kept them from him and Hoss.  He remembered enough, suddenly, to wash away his anger in compassion.  He’d faced hard circumstances in his life, too, and, after all, Marie’s clinging to Little Joe was no different than his clinging to his memory of Inger when another woman appeared to take her place.  “You——uh——should get back to the little fellow,” Adam said softly.  “He probably needs you.”

    “Please come back and finish your breakfast,” Marie pleaded.

    “No, I’ve had plenty,” Adam assured her.  “Honest, I’m not mad; I’m just full.  Tell Mark and Hoss I’ll meet them in the north pasture.”  To seal their renewed friendship, he brushed her cheek with a light kiss, then led his horse into the yard.

    Smiling, Marie returned to the house.  Mark and Hoss were back at the table, polishing off the last of the flapjacks.  “Where is Little Joe——and Mary?” Marie asked.

    “She was afraid he’d take a chill in just that little nightshirt,” Mark explained.  “She took him upstairs to dress him.”

    “Without finishing her own meal,” Marie scolded.  “I will send her down at once.  I can dress my own baby.”

    Before she reached the stairway, however, a piercing scream echoed down the hall.  Marie ran up the stairs and into the nursery.  “Mon petit,” she cried, gathering the weeping boy into her arms.  “What is wrong?”

    “I don’t know,” Mary replied, looking worried.  “I had him settled down nicely, but when I tried to put on his dress, he screamed.  I think I hurt him.”

    Whispering words of endearment, Marie took the tiny dress and guided Little Joe’s arm toward the sleeve.  Again, the child screamed.    “That’s just what happened with me,” Mary said.  “What can be hurting him?”

    “Is your brother still here?” Marie asked quickly.

    “I’ll see,” Mary replied at once and immediately hurried out of the nursery.  “Mark,” she called from the stair landing, “Mrs. Cartwright wants you.”

    Mark wiped his lips with the checked napkin and came toward his sister with long strides.  He followed her down the hall, with Hoss at his heels.  Although he hadn’t been summoned, the younger boy wasn’t about to be left behind.

    “Oh, Mark, I’m glad you have not left yet,” Marie said.  “I think Little Joe has hurt himself in his fall.  Would you ride to Carson City and ask Dr. Martin to come, s’il vous plait?”

    “Sure, ma’am, be glad to,” Mark said.

    “Yeah, I’ll go, too,” Hoss offered.

    “No, mon chéri, you must go to your brother,” Marie directed.  “If no one meets him, he will worry and come looking.”

    Hoss didn’t see that as much of a problem.  So what if Adam took a day off.  He was probably ready for one.  Hoss sure was!  And nobody was getting one, except Mark.  It didn’t seem fair, but Hoss had a feeling he’d get nowhere arguing about it.  He did as he was told.

    Mark was glad of the opportunity for a trip to Carson City, especially one that took him in close proximity to Miss Sally Martin.  He was sorry Little Joe was hurt, of course, but it was hard not to enjoy the prospect before him.  Though he had intended to buzz around the doctor’s fragrant flower for awhile after delivering his message, Mark found himself riding back to the Ponderosa at the doctor’s side.  Something about Dr. Martin’s quick response, maybe, triggered the boy’s concern, or perhaps his curiosity.  He wanted to see Sally’s father at work.

    When the doctor arrived, Marie was sitting in the rocker in the nursery holding her child.  Little Joe had cried for an hour, first because he was hurt and, then, because his cruel-hearted mother wouldn’t let him down to play.  He’d finally cried himself to sleep, but he woke when Dr. Martin lifted him from his mother’s arms and back into his crib.

    Marie and Mary stood back, while Mark peeked through the door, as the doctor tenderly examined the baby.  When his right arm was moved, Little Joe yelped, though not so loudly as before.  “I’m sorry, baby,” Dr. Martin murmured, “but I have to see where you’re hurt.”  He probed gently around the toddler’s neck, then raised up, giving Little Joe’s head a soft pat.  “It’s his collarbone,” he told Marie.

    Marie’s hand flew to her mouth to stifle a shriek.  “He’s broken his neck?” she whispered.

    Dr. Martin’s rested consoling hands on her shoulders.  “No, no,” he soothed.  “It’s not that serious.  It’s what we call a green twig break, Marie.  The bones of a child this young are still flexible.  They bend, rather than break.  It’ll hurt for a few days, but, I assure you, it’s not serious.”

    Marie sighed with relief.  “Will you give him something for the pain, doctor?” she asked.

    Dr. Martin shook his head.  “I don’t think he needs it.  It’s movement that brings the pain, so what we’ll do is immobilize the arm.  A large napkin should do the trick.”

    “I’ll get one,” Mary offered.

    When she returned, the doctor folded Little Joe’s tiny arm close to his chest and pinned the red-checked napkin around his neck.  Then he lifted the little boy and sat in the rocker with him.  In words the toddler could understand, he explained the purpose of the sling.  “Don’t try to take your arm out, Little Joe,” he concluded.  “It will hurt if you do.  Okay?”

    “Okay,” Little Joe promised solemnly.

    Dr. Martin smiled.  “That’s probably good for the rest of the day,” he told Marie, “but you’d better watch him.  I predict by tomorrow he’ll have forgotten both the pain and my instructions.”

    From the doorway, Mark looked on, fascinated.  Dr. Martin had a real way with kids.  He couldn’t help admiring the man, even wishing he could do something as useful with his own life.

    Over the next couple of days, the family seemed to recover their good spirits as they rallied to support Little Joe.  Since they’d managed to get all the cattle moved to the upper pastures, where the grass wasn’t over-grazed as it was beginning to be in the valley, the boys shortened their working hours.  They all wanted to be home early enough to see how Little Joe was getting along.

    Hoss stayed with his little brother both Tuesday and Wednesday.  Marie declared that job as essential as herding cattle, for, as Dr. Martin had predicted, Little Joe soon wearied of having his arm in a sling and repeatedly tried to remove it.  Having Hoss to play with helped keep him content, and Hoss felt content, too, to take a rest from man’s work and be a boy again.

    Near suppertime on Wednesday, July twenty-seventh, Ben finally arrived home after nine days of labor he considered harder than ranch chores.  He was glad he’d accepted the responsibility and proud of the memorial the convention had drafted petitioning Congress for redress of their governmental woes.  He’d had his fill of politics, though, at least for the time being.  What he wanted most was to embrace his family and have a quiet, relaxing smoke on his pipe.

    Adam and Mark weren’t home when he arrived, but Hoss immediately engulfed his father in a bear hug, while Marie rose from her mending to welcome her husband home.  With one arm, Little Joe pushed himself up from the rug in front of the fire and toddled happily toward Ben.  “Pa!” he cried, his face rapturous.

    Ben started to kiss his wife, but turned to smile at the baby first.  Seeing the checkered napkin confining his son’s arm, he lifted the boy gingerly.  “What happened to you, precious?”

    “He fell down the stairs,” Hoss reported, “but he’s okay.”

    Ben looked reproachfully at his wife.  “Why didn’t you send for me?”

    “There was no need,” Marie said.  “Dr. Martin says he only needs to keep his arm still a few days.  We did not want to take you from your important work.”

    “Where you been, Pa?” Little Joe demanded.

    “Genoa, baby,” Ben said, sitting in his mauve armchair with the boy in his lap.  “Did you miss Pa?”

     “Yes, and those bad stairs hurt me!”

    “I know,” Ben sympathized.  “I guess Pa will have to give those stairs a very necessary little talk.”

    Little Joe’s head bobbed emphatically.  “‘Pank ‘em good, Pa!”

    Ben threw his head back and laughed, then cuddled his baby.  “Well, they sure deserve a good ‘panking, hurting Pa’s precious like they did.”

    “How was the convention?” Marie asked as she settled in the blue armchair across from him.  “Did all go as you wished?”

    Ben shrugged.  “There’s some statements in the memorial I don’t agree with, but it makes a strong case for our own territory.  That’s what matters.  We did our best; the rest is up to Congress.”

    Marie smiled proudly, certain Ben’s best would be more than ample to move the stoniest heart among the nation’s legislators.

    Hoss’s birthday fell on the final Saturday of July and was celebrated almost exactly as it had been the previous year.  The same group of friends, with the addition of the Wentworths and newly married Montgomerys, met at Washoe Lake for another afternoon of picnicking and swimming.  This year Hoss didn’t have to be coaxed into the water.  He splashed and cavorted with the rest of the youngsters, not quite as if he’d been born to it, but with far more confidence than before.  Even Little Joe, at last released from his confining sling, dog-paddled happily with the older children, Mary hovering over him like a clucking hen with her chick.

    Leaving the younger men to watch over the children, Ben lay sprawled on a blanket near the shore, perusing with avid interest the latest Territorial Enterprise , which Clyde had brought to the picnic.  The entire issue had been devoted to the convention at Genoa, and Ben was pleasantly surprised to find himself lauded as an oratorically gifted moderate in favor of separation from Utah.

    “Look at him soppin’ up the sugar sauce about hisself,” Clyde cackled from a nearby blanket, where he, too, was resting after the huge meal.

Ben flushed crimson, knowing the charge was true.  He was enjoying the flattering words of the paper’s editor.  But, then, who wouldn’t?

    “You’re just jealous.”  Dr. Martin, lying next to Ben, yawned and turned to sun his other side.

    “No such thing,” Clyde contradicted.  “Me, I got no taste for politics, but Ben here has got his appetite whetted for it.  Next thing you know, he’ll be runnin’ for governor of the territory.”

    “Not ‘til they move the capital from Salt Lake City,” Ben chuckled.  He turned his back on Clyde, fearing his thoughts might be as easily read as the newsprint of the Territorial Enterprise.  Governor Cartwright.  It had a nice ring to it.  Ben had little expectation of rising that high in government, but now that he’d had a few days to recuperate from his first plunge into politics, he was looking back on the experience as one he wouldn’t mind repeating.

    The slow, sultry days of August weren’t so slow this year.  Normally, August was a time to relax from the rigorous work of the summer.  Crops laid by, little to do but let the cattle graze and grow fat, maybe escort a calf or two into the world.  This year, due to the shortage of hands and Ben’s prolonged political absence, the ranch was running behind schedule, so August was a time to catch up on work that couldn’t be done before.

    Ben had assumed the latest mining craze would subside by now and some of his hands drift back to more regular employment.  It wasn’t happening, however.  Instead, Californians continued to pour over the Sierras into the new camp, now called Ophir.  A four-stamp mill had even been set up on the Carson River to process the ore with equipment hauled by oxen from Sacramento, a sure sign the strike was expected to last.  The lure of silver was keeping the mining excitement alive, though few were making much money.  Old Pancake Comstock seemed to have done the best so far, having just sold his share in the claim he had finagled from McLaughlin and O’Riley for $11,000.  Billy Thomas might arguably be considered to have fared the worst, his miniscule pocket of gold having so little “blue stuff” mixed in that its value was virtually nil.

    As in most new mining camps, it was the businesspeople who made the greatest profits.  Eilley Orrum, for instance, was making enormous profits, serving meals and washing laundry for the miners, but she had also become a mine owner herself.  Espousing great faith in the Comstock Lode, she gladly accepted abandoned claims as payment for unpaid bills.  One of those claims adjoined that of Sandy Bowers, a dowry neither seemed able to resist.

    Knowing of the geographic motivation, Ben scoffed the day he received the hand-written invitation to Sandy and Eilley’s wedding.  “Of all the stupid reasons to tie the knot,” he muttered, “merging claims has got to take the cake.”

    “But, Ben, perhaps they are truly in love,” Marie argued.

    Ben shook his head, laughing.  “My love, only a romantic like you would believe that.  Eilley wanted a man, any man.  The fact that they can combine their claims and have twenty feet of mining property only adds to Bowers’ allure.”

    “I disagree,” Marie said, lifting her chin to proclaim her feminine superiority in affairs of the heart.  “Monsieur Bowers has many fine qualities.  He is, perhaps, a bit shy for Madame Cowan——”

    “Not to mention a bit young,” Ben inserted slyly.  Sandy Bowers was fourteen years younger than Eilley Orrum.

    Marie tilted her head coyly.  “For you to bring up a difference of age is trés drôle, mon mari.”

    Ben had the good grace to blush and acknowledge himself outflanked.  “Can’t imagine why they invited us, anyway,” he grunted.  “We’re neighbors, of course, but not that close.”

    “Ah, but you are a man of importance now,” Marie smiled.  “Certainement , they would want an esteemed delegate to the constitutional convention to attend their nuptials.”  As she breezed into the kitchen to check on how soon supper would be served, Ben sat puffing his pipe and trying to decide if she had been serious or teasing.

    A close perusal of the other guests crowding Old Nick’s Bar the day of the wedding shed no light on the reason for their invitation.  Ben spotted a few other delegates from the convention, which seemed to suggest a desire to associate with the leaders of the community, certainly not all neighbors like the Cartwrights.  Maybe they were friends of Sandy’s, though, Ben conceded.  The hearty young man who had first come west as a teamster for John Reese was universally, usually instantaneously, liked.  It was conceivable he counted among his friends people Eilley——or Ben himself for that matter—–didn’t even know.

    After the brief ceremony the party adjourned to the adjoining boardinghouse for refreshments, which consisted primarily of Eilley’s famous batter biscuits and beans.  So much for social pretensions, Ben chuckled to himself, but with so many to feed, the simple fare was probably the most practical, especially since flour was now selling in Genoa for only twenty cents a pound, a sure indication their community was no longer considered a frontier settlement.  The miners, some invited, some not, squeezed in for the free meal, then carried their tin plates outside to perch on nearby rocks or squat on the ground when all available seating was taken.  As a fiddler grated out melodies on an ancient violin, those who had finished eating began to dance.

    Darkness had already fallen when Ben gathered his family for the ride home.  “Do we have to go now?” Adam complained.  “There’s gonna be a shivaree, Pa.”

    Ben arched an eyebrow.  “Do you consider that a proper way to fete newlyweds, young man?”

    Adam grinned.  “Sure do.  Mark does, too.”

    Ben’s eyebrow arched higher, but his chin quivered with unreleased laughter.  “Let Mark speak for himself, Adam.”

    “I’d like to stay,” Mark admitted.  “I’ve never been to a shivaree.”

    “Me, either,” Adam pressed.

    “No doubt an essential element of a gentleman’s education,” Ben commented dryly, then laughed.  “All right, you can stay.  Just remember we have a full day’s work ahead tomorrow, so try to get some sleep tonight.”

    Adam nodded.  “We will.”  He fixed his eyes on a pebble near the toe of his boot.  “I——uh——don’t suppose you’d let me borrow your pistol.”  Though Ben hadn’t worn his sidearm to the wedding, it was in the wagon in case of trouble along the road, a precaution Ben considered reasonable with so many strangers in the territory.

    “You suppose correctly,” Ben stated, eyes growing stern.

    “Just for noise-making,” Adam argued.  “I don’t plan to shoot anyone, Pa.”

    “Fine.  This way there won’t be any unplanned shootings, either,” Ben said sharply.  “You need a pistol about as much as you needed that tour of the Barbary Coast with Sterling Larrimore.”

    Adam’s face, flushing furiously, jerked up.  “Pa, it’s not fair to bring that up when you said it was over and done.”

    Ben’s countenance softened.  “Yeah, you’re right.  I apologize, and I promise I won’t hold it over your head again.”  Then he grinned.  “But you’re still not getting the pistol.”

    Adam sighed and gave the pebble at his foot an irritated kick.  “How are we supposed to make noise for the shivaree?”

    Ben gave his son’s backside a playful swat.  “You’re young; making noise comes natural.”  He tossed Mark a wink and turned to help Marie and Mary into the buckboard.  “Have fun,” he called over his shoulder as he drove away.

    “Honestly, you’d think I was a little kid,” Adam grumbled.  “My cousin Will’s only a year older than I am, and he carries a handgun all the time.  Haven’t I been pulling a man’s share around the ranch?”

    “Sure have,” Mark conceded, “but your pa’s right about the gun.  You don’t need it, Adam.”

    “You’re a fine one to be giving advice about listening to fathers,” Adam snuffled, then winced.  “Sorry, that was a lousy thing to say.”

    “Yeah, it was,” Mark muttered, “even if it is true.  What was that about a tour of the Barbary Coast?  Never figured you for the type to get in that kind of trouble.”

    Adam scowled.  “I had help.  Listen, I don’t mind telling you, but now’s not the time.  We got to figure some way to raise a racket.”

    Mark snatched up a tin plate some miner had left on the ground while he danced.  “I’m gonna find another plate to hit against this one.”

    Adam frowned.  Banging two plates together was the kind of noise Little Joe might relish, but Adam wasn’t a baby.  Compared to the crack of a pistol, he didn’t think it would be loud enough to satisfy him.  By the time the miners descended on the recently bedded bride and groom, however, he hadn’t come up with anything else, so he and Mark stood side by side, clanging plates and yelling at the top of their lungs.  Miners added to the cacophony with the clamor of drills striking pans and firearms exploding skyward.  The newlyweds took it all in good grace and were finally allowed to enjoy their marriage night alone.

    As they rode back to the Ponderosa, Mark again brought up the subject of Adam’s excursion to the Barbary Coast.  When Adam had freely confessed what happened, Mark shook his head in disgust.  “That Sterling!  That’s who talked me into my first trip to the Barbary Coast, too, but I didn’t think even he would take a kid like you to Chinatown.”

    Adam didn’t appreciate being called a kid, but chose to overlook it in his curiosity about another point.  “He ever take you there?”

    Mark flushed.  “Yeah, just once; about the same thing happened as with you.  I went out drinking with him a lot, but I couldn’t stomach the other.”

    “Then, you didn’t——”

    Mark shook his head.  “No, heard too many of my father’s sermons, I guess, or seen too many sailors scraping themselves raw after visiting those girls.  Sterling used to laugh and call me ‘preacher boy,’ just to rile me, but I’m glad now I didn’t give in.  I could never hope to win a decent girl like Sally if I’d done what he pushed me to.”

    Adam nodded.  He felt the same way.  “You’re serious about Sally, aren’t you?”

    Mark smiled dreamily.  “Yeah, and I think she likes me, too.”

    “I guarantee it!” Adam laughed.  “She moons over you.”

    “You don’t mind?  You said once you weren’t sure how you felt about her.”

    Adam looked thoughtful for a moment.  “I couldn’t have very deep feelings for Sally ‘cause it doesn’t bother me at all to see you with her.  No, you’ve got a clear road where I’m concerned.”

    “Hope I’ve got one with her father, too,” Mark murmured.  “I’m gonna ask for her hand before I head back to California.”

    “Good luck,” Adam laughed.  “She’s the apple of his eye.”

    Mark moaned softly, suddenly wishing he were on better terms with the Almighty.  He had a feeling approaching Sally’s father was a subject for heart-felt, long-winded prayer.

    At breakfast a few days after the Bowers’ wedding, Ben was apportioning out the day’s assignments when Marie interrupted.  “You must spare Adam today,” she said.  “Laura is coming to measure him for his new clothes.”

    “I don’t need new clothes,” Adam said quickly.

    “Mais oui, you do,” Marie insisted.  “You have grown much this last year, Adam, and there is little time left before you return to school.”

    Adam laid his fork aside and placed both hands, palms down, on the table.  “I’m not going to school,” he stated, dark eyes determined.

    “Yes, you are,” Ben, who was sure he knew the reason behind Adam’s decision, said quietly.

    “Pa, you know I can’t,” Adam argued.  “Mark and Mary will be going home soon, and if I leave, too, what help will you have?”

    “Me,” Hoss asserted loudly.  “I’m a good hand, ain’t I, Pa?”

    “One of my best,” Ben smiled with pride.

    “My point, exactly,” Adam said bluntly.  “If Hoss is the best you’ve got——”

“Hey!” Hoss hollered.

    “Nothing against you, Hoss,” Adam explained quickly, “but you’re just”——he started to say “a kid,” then finished, instead——“one person.  Pa needs more help than just you.”

    “And I’ll have more,” Ben said.  “Tuquah will be coming back to work soon.”

    Adam hooted.  “Yeah, and stick with you ‘til piñon harvest.”

    “True,” Ben admitted, “but I’ll manage, Adam.  You are not curtailing your education, young man, even if the whole world goes raving mad for silver.”

    “Pa,” Adam protested.

    “No argument,” Ben said firmly as he rose from his chair.  “You will stay home today for your fitting, and you will begin packing for Sacramento as soon as your things are ready.  That’s an order, Adam.”

    Mark followed Ben outside.  “I’m sorry to leave you short-handed, Mr. Cartwright,” he said.  “I’d be glad to stay on longer, but I have to take Mary back before the first storms.”

    “Of course, you do,” Ben replied at once.  “She mustn’t risk being caught here for the winter.  I think it best you return with Adam, as we originally planned.  I don’t want your father to be concerned.”

    “Nor do I,” Mark said, surprised that he cared about the man he’d felt only bitterness toward when they parted last spring.  “You’re sure you’ll be all right.”

    Ben wasn’t sure at all.  He could probably get by with the help of Tuquah and a few other Washos, and if the mining fever died down, there’d be others to choose from, but neither was a reliable source of help.  Ben decided to lie.  “I’m sure,” he said.

    While the younger men worked with the cattle, Ben had assigned himself the task of inspecting the grass of Washoe Valley.  Ordinarily, he waited until September to move his herd back to the lower pastures.  By then the grass had had two months to grow back after the haying season and was ready to support cattle again.  He’d hoped the grass might be tall enough to move them earlier this year so Mark and Adam could help with the roundup.  The grass wasn’t ready, though, so the cattle would have to wait, and Ben would have to find someone else to drive them down from the hills.

    Though the forage was inadequate, Ben could see a few cattle grazing close to the lake.  Coming toward him from that direction was a young man on a chestnut gelding.  “Hey, Mr. Cartwright!” the fellow called when he drew near.  “Mr. Fowler recognized your bay.  He’d like you to ride over to the lake.  Got a problem he needs your help with.”

    “Sure,” Ben said, turning his horse to the east.  “Anything serious?”

    “Yeah, dead serious,” Fowler’s wrangler muttered.  “Think we may have some rustlers cornered.”

    Ben’s brow furrowed.  Rustling was a serious crime to cattlemen like himself and Fowler, the kind that couldn’t be ignored.  As he galloped toward Washoe Lake, however, Ben found himself hoping Fowler was mistaken or, if not, that the evidence against the men was irrefutable.  Law and order still resided in the hands of vigilantes in Carson County, and if the men were found guilty, they were likely to pay a painful penalty.  Ben didn’t relish the thought of another futile fight to protect the rights of men he believed innocent.  It would just be Lucky Bill all over again.

    Ben reined in close to the neighboring rancher.  “You think you’ve caught some rustlers, Fowler?” he asked.

    “Yeah, I get suspicious when anybody offers me a yoke of oxen for what these fellows were asking,” Fowler grunted, and when he quoted the price, Ben gasped.  No genuine cattleman would price his stock at the ridiculously low figure Fowler named.  The two buckskin-clad men tied to a tree beside the lake didn’t look naive enough to be greenhorns from the east, and once ignorance was ruled out, the logical conclusion was that the oxen were indeed stolen and the thieves wanted to convert them to cash quickly.

    “You have any proof?” Ben queried.

    Fowler shook his head.  “Just suspicious, like I said.  Wondered if you’d lost any cattle.”

    “No,” Ben replied quickly.  “I don’t keep oxen anymore, just beef cattle, and we’re not missing any.”

    “Well, I sent riders out to most of the ranchers in the county,” Fowler went on.  “I think we ought to hold these men ‘til we hear if anyone’s missing a span of oxen.”

    Ben nodded soberly.  “Let’s get solid proof, though, before we do anything more.”

    “Never intended otherwise,” Fowler muttered.  “Don’t aim to take part in no lynching, even if they’re guilty, like I think.  There’s better ways.”

    Ben didn’t know whether to feel relieved or not.  He was glad to have at least one man’s support against a hanging, but Fowler’s dark countenance made Ben wonder what “better ways” the rancher had in mind.

    One by one other ranchers drifted in.  Some had simply sent word by Fowler’s messengers that they had no cattle missing, but most were concerned enough about the threat of rustlers in the territory to come themselves to evaluate the situation.  Ben began to breathe easier as each man reported no losses from his ranch.

    Finally, a rancher from McMarlin’s Station rode in.  “They’re my oxen,” the man declared, black eyes snapping.

    “You sure, Campbell?” Fowler asked.

    “I’m sure,” Campbell snarled.  “Look at the way the ears are notched.  Any of my neighbors can tell you that’s my mark.”

    “That’s right,” another rancher from near McMarlin’s Station vouched when he had examined the notches.  “Seen Campbell’s mark many times.  These oxen are his, beyond any doubt.”

    Ben’s stomach knotted.  With the legal authority in Salt Lake City four hundred miles away, none of the ranchers would consider delaying justice.  There wasn’t even a place in the county where suspected criminals could be held while awaiting trial.  The trial would take place immediately, under the scant shade of the big pine on the west side of Washoe Lake.  And from the evidence already presented informally, Ben was certain the verdict would be guilty.

    Sick at heart, he walked away, hating himself for his reluctance to intervene.  He refused to take part in vigilante justice, but couldn’t bring himself to oppose it, either.  Not this time.  Not for guilty men.  But while he wouldn’t be a participant, he couldn’t leave without knowing the men’s fate, however impotent he might be to change it.

    The jury was chosen quickly, the evidence presented and the decision rendered with even greater dispatch.  Determining the sentence took longer.  Some ranchers favored stringing the two defendants, Ruspas and Reise, to the big pine.  Others seemed reluctant to countenance another hanging, dreading the kind of division that had split the territory after the hanging of Lucky Bill.  One man suggested flogging the two culprits, another branding their cheeks with the letter T to designate them thieves to all they came in contact with.  Then an even more severe penalty was suggested by the Washoe rancher whose suspicions had been originally aroused.  “Where I come from, the standard punishment for rustling is removal of the left ear,” Fowler decreed.  “Gives a man reason to think twice before he steals again.”

    A wave of nausea swept over Ben.  “That’s barbaric!” he shouted, striding forward.

    “You haven’t shown any interest in my problem before, Cartwright,” Campbell snapped.  “Why mix in now?”

    “Better keep out, Cartwright, unless you want more of what happened the last time,” a rancher who had been present at the hanging of Lucky Bill threatened.

    Ben took a deep breath.  “Look, I know I’m only one man.  I can’t prevent your doing whatever you decide, and I won’t be foolish enough to try.  But I’m begging you not to do something that may bring reproach on our territory for decades to come.  Campbell has his oxen back, so why not just banish these men?”

    “Yeah, into the desert without a canteen,” another rancher, Jim Sturtevant, suggested.

    “That’s a death sentence, and a more cruel one than hanging,” Fowler interrupted sharply.  “I say we banish this scum from our territory, sure, but give ‘em something to remember us by, something to remind them that Carson County don’t tolerate rustling.  Taking an ear’s a lot less barbaric, to use Cartwright’s word, than taking a life.  Gives a man a chance to mend his ways if he’s so inclined.”

    From the murmurs of agreement, Ben knew the decision had been made, so he wasn’t surprised when the jury, after briefly conferring, ordered the removal of the left ear of each convicted rustler.  He started to stalk away, to distance himself from the gruesome business.  Then he halted.  Undoubtedly, the men would require medical assistance once the sentence was carried out.  If he couldn’t prevent the mutilation, perhaps he should, at least, remain long enough to see that the rustlers’ wounds were properly tended.

    Sturtevant, the chosen executioner, seemed almost gleeful as he sharpened the straight, double-edged blade of his “Arkansas toothpick” on a rock.  Looking visibly pale, the older rustler was led forward.  Sturtevant pulled back the brown hair that barely covered Reise’s left ear and with a quick downward slice, severed it from his head.  Reise groaned and clutched the bleeding surface.

    Kneeling beside the older rustler, trying to stanch the flow of blood, Ben couldn’t understand the grin on Ruspas’s face as he was led forward for removal of his ear.  When Sturtevant jerked back the greasy, shoulder-length, black hair, however, Ben and everyone else could see that Ruspas had no left ear to remove.  Obviously, this was not his first unsuccessful attempt as a cattle thief, and the rustler was hardened enough to laugh at frustrating the jury’s decree.

    The humor of the situation struck the jury, too, and everyone, even Ben, laughed when they realized there was no way to carry out the sentence.  The jury quickly reconvened, though, and changed the penalty to removal of the right ear, a decision which effectively wiped the smug smile from Ruspas’s face.

    Sturtevant again stepped forward, grasping the walnut handle of his sharply pointed blade, and swiftly severed the right ear of the now sober Ruspas.  Tossing the ear to the jury, Sturtevant laughed.  “Now, you’ve got both rights and lefts, and the ears are properly mated.”

    “So we have,” Fowler chuckled, then his face darkened as he turned to the two bleeding men.  “You men are ordered to depart this territory at once.  Get to your feet and head for the Sierras, boys, and don’t let Carson County see your faces again.”

    “Wait a minute,” Ben protested.

    “Mixin’ in again, Cartwright?” Campbell snarled.

    “Only to ask one concession,” Ben said quickly.  “You’re sending injured men into rugged mountains.  If you truly don’t intend this to be a death sentence, let Dr. Martin tend their wounds first.  I promise I’ll see them out of the territory myself once the doctor says they’re fit to travel.”

    There were murmurs both of approval and dissent.  Then Fowler raised a weathered hand.  “All right.  I’ll suggest a compromise:  just to prove we’re not barbarians, Cartwright, we’ll let your doctor friend bind up their wounds, if you’ll see these men out of our county by sundown tomorrow.  Is that agreed?”

    Seeing the nods of the other ranchers, Ben knew he could achieve no further leniency.  “Yeah, that’s agreed,” he said.  “I’d appreciate it if one of you men heading south would stop by Carson City and ask Dr. Martin to come by my place.  I’ll take these men there.”

    “I’m willing,” Campbell said.

    As the other ranchers rode away, Ben helped Ruspas and Reise to their saddles.  Moving west, toward the Ponderosa, Ben thought ironically that these two bloody men were not the kind of guests he had originally expected when he built all those extra rooms in his home.  The rooms were the fulfillment of a promise to his second wife, who yearned to open their home to souls in need.  It was not Inger to whom he’d be bringing these unsavory guests, however, and at first Ben wasn’t sure how Marie would react.

    Then he rebuked himself for the unworthy thought.  Marie might not share Inger’s all-encompassing compassion for humanity, but she would not tolerate any man’s suffering alone when she could ease his pain.  No, Marie’s only concern would be for her children.

    The children! Hoss was working away from the house with the older boys, but Ben suddenly saw a vivid picture of the effect seeing these mutilated men would have on impressionable Little Joe and tender-hearted Mary.  He’d have to get them both safely out of the way before letting Ruspas and Reise enter the Cartwright home.

    Though Ben was arriving home earlier than usual, the hour was late enough that he knew both Mary and Little Joe would be inside.  He told the two rustlers to wait on the porch.  “I need to get my children out of the way,” he explained.  The older man, Reise, nodded, seeming to understand, but Ruspas merely sneered, shrugging off Ben’s concern.  Not wanting to lose a free night’s lodging and the promised medical attention, however, he did as he was told without audible comment.

    The minute Ben edged in the door, Little Joe scampered to meet him, lifting his arms, as he did each evening when his father returned from work.  Ben picked the child up and gave him the expected hug.  “Mary, take Little Joe up to your room,” he suggested softly, “close the door and stay there until I call you.”

    Mary looked puzzled, but, obedient by nature, immediately stood.

    “Ben?” Marie, coming in from the kitchen where she and Hop Sing were consulting about dinner, queried.

    “Go on, children,” Ben said, handing Little Joe to Mary.  The toddler whimpered and stretched his thin arms back toward his father.  “Later, baby,” Ben promised.  “Go with Mary now.”

    As the youngsters mounted the stairs, Marie glided to her husband’s side.  “What is it, Ben?”

    “We’ve got guests,” Ben muttered, “not the kind I relish having the children see.”

    Marie frowned.  “Why have you invited such people to our home?” she demanded.  As Ben explained briefly, her face softened.  “But, Ben, you should not leave injured men outside so long.  Bring them in at once.  We will put them in the downstairs bedroom.”

    Ben nodded, relieved.  He brought the men into the bedroom, where Marie was turning down the covers.  “Please help them undress and get into bed, Ben,” she said.  “I will have Hop Sing heat some water so we may dress their wounds.”

    “Dr. Martin’s coming,” Ben said.

    Marie frowned at him.  “And he would prefer to work on clean patients, I am sure.”

    Reise doffed his hat quickly.  “Thank you, ma’am.  We’re much obliged.”  Ruspas flopped on the bed and started to pull off his boots, revealing a grimy big toe poking through his left sock.

    Ben grimaced.  The sheets would surely need a good boiling after these two left.  If his beautiful young wife noticed the filth of her two guests, however, nothing in her expression revealed her feelings.  She sat first on one side, then the other, of the bed, gently washing away the caked blood, seemingly undisturbed by the gaping, jagged edges of skin or the sight of earless men.  “I have seen men injured before,” she later explained to Ben.  “Scarcely a night passed in New Orleans without the flash of dagger or epee.”

    When Dr. Martin arrived, Marie went upstairs to explain to Mary what was taking place and why Ben had asked her to leave the room.  Ben left the doctor to his ministrations and wandered outside.  Leaning on the hitching rail, he took a deep breath of the pine-scented air.  Clean, crisp, pure——how Ben wished he felt as unsullied as the air!  He thought back over everything he’d done that afternoon and kicked the dust in disgust.

    Was there ever a right way to deal with these situations?  He’d tried to do the right thing in the affair with Lucky Bill, but his effort had been futile.  Today he hadn’t really tried, at least not like he had then.  Had he held back because he knew the effort would again be futile or simply from fear of a beating?  How could a man look deep enough inside himself to know why he did the things he did?  But how could he afford not to when he had sons looking to him for example?

    When Dr. Martin came out, he saw Ben still leaning over the rail and ambled to his side.  Ben turned to look at his friend.  “Will they be all right?”

    Martin nodded.  “No giving them back what they’ve lost, of course, but they’ll live.”

    “Can they travel?  I gave my word I’d see them out of the county by sundown tomorrow.”

    The doctor frowned.  “Well, it wouldn’t be my first recommendation, but if they have to, they can travel.”  He looked closely at Ben.  “You all right?”

    “Yeah, sure,” Ben muttered.  “I didn’t give anyone an excuse to punch me this time.”

    “And that bothers you?” the doctor chuckled.

    Ben turned abruptly, stuffing his hands in his pants’ pockets and scuffing at the dirt.  “Yeah, it bothers me.  Who am I, Paul?”

    “A knight on a white horse?” Paul suggested.

    Ben spun around to find the doctor smiling at him.  “That was your dream, as I recall,” Ben said.  Paul had once described his reasons for coming west with that idealistic phrase.

    Paul nodded, then laid a hand on Ben’s taller shoulder.  “It’s every man’s dream, one time or another, and most of us fall short of it.  You, my friend, attain it far more than any man I know.  Don’t torture yourself over the times you can’t.”

    Ben looked up and smiled.  “Good advice, doctor.  Any extra charge?”

    Paul chuckled.  “As a matter of fact, yes.  A good meal, to which Marie has already invited me, and a rousing game of chess.”

    “You’re on,” Ben replied as they headed back inside.

    Between work and preparations for the coming departure, the final days of August skittered by.  Mark, Mary and Adam would board the Pioneer Stage on Friday, the second of September, but before they did, Mark had one last call to make, one he had both dreaded and anticipated for weeks.  Unable to put it off longer, he rode nervously into Carson City Thursday morning and knocked at Dr. Martin’s office.

    When he answered the door, Dr. Martin smiled.  “Did Little Joe take another tumble down the stairs or has Ben brought home more rustlers that need my attention?”  Mark shook his head, but Dr. Martin, noticing the young man’s edginess, grew grave.  “Anyone else ill or injured?”

    Mark again shook his head.  “No, sir.  I came to see you, to ask a question.”

    “Ah, well, come in, then,” Dr. Martin said, relieved.  “Have a seat,” he offered, indicating one of the two he kept for arriving patients in the small area curtained off from his examining room to the back of the cabin.

    Mark perched on the edge of the chair, fingers tapping his knees like the keyboard of a piano.  Dr. Martin pulled a chair so he could face the young man and sat down.  “Now, what’s this question you had?  Something regarding your sister’s health?”

    “No,” Mark said.  “She’s feeling much stronger than when we came.”

    “Yes, our dry climate’s proved invigorating for her,” Dr. Martin commented.  “I’m glad.”  He waited silently.

    Mark took a deep breath.  “I’ve come to ask, sir, for your daughter’s hand in marriage.”

    Dr. Martin’s face sobered.  “I see.  I thought you might; but when you delayed so long, I decided the threat was past.”

    Mark gulped.  “Threat, sir?”

    “Hard for me to see it otherwise,” Dr. Martin responded.  “Surely, you realize how I treasure my daughter.”

    “As do I, sir,” Mark countered.

    The doctor sat back, eyeing the young man cautiously.  “Perhaps.  You must also understand that I want nothing but the best for her.”

    “As do I,” Mark repeated.

    The doctor’s mouth quirked slightly.  “And do you consider yourself ‘the best’?”

    Mark bit his lip.  “I don’t know what you mean.”

    Dr. Martin folded his arms.  “I’m referring to your history of carousing, young man.  I will not see my daughter married to a drunkard.”

    Mark flushed deeply.  “I don’t know how much Mr. Cartwright has told you, sir, but——”

    “Mr. Cartwright has told me nothing,” Dr. Martin interrupted.  “It was Sally herself who told me.  Evidently, you felt no shame in telling her.”

    “I was——and am——ashamed, sir,” Mark said earnestly.  “Sally must have told you how deeply I regret my former behavior and how determined I am to change.”

    Dr. Martin nodded perfunctorily.  “How determined you are remains to be seen.  You’ve been sheltered from temptation out at the Ponderosa.  You may find it harder to resist once you’re back in San Francisco, and until you convince me you have changed, you will not gain my permission to wed my daughter.”

    “If you mean I need to prove myself,” Mark said slowly, “I’m willing to do that.  It’s my intention to return home tomorrow, find a steady job and, with my brother’s help, provide a proper home for my sister.  Then I’ll begin to save money for my future with Sally.  I plan to be gone almost a year, sir.  Is that not time enough to prove the seriousness of my intentions?”

    Dr. Martin only delayed his answer a couple of minutes, but to Mark the time dragged past like as many hours.  Finally, the doctor said, “A year——yes.  If you return home and put yourself under your father’s authority for that time, and if there are no further indiscretions, I will reconsider my answer.  Before you ask for Sally’s hand again, however, I want a letter from your father assuring me that your conduct has been above reproach.”

    Though his relationship with his father had broken down, Mark knew the Reverend Wentworth for a fair man.  His father would not withhold that letter of approval if Mark earned it.  Neither, of course, would he hesitate to report unfavorable incidents, but with a prize like Sally to reach for, Mark was certain he’d find the fortitude to meet even his father’s high standards.  He stood and reached for the doctor’s hand to seal the bargain.  “I’ll see you next spring, sir, shortly after my father’s written that letter.  May I write Sally?”

    “Provided there is no discussion of love or marriage, you may write,” Dr. Martin agreed.  “We’ll both be interested in what you’re doing and the progress you’re making.”

    The way he said it told Mark that Sally would not be the only one reading those letters.  He’d be sure to keep them circumspect.

    Ben hated farewells on principle, but the ones exchanged as the Pioneer Stage prepared for boarding in Carson City were unusually difficult.  Having not understood until the last moment that his playmate of the summer was leaving, Little Joe was clinging to Mary Wentworth and weeping inconsolably, and the baby’s grief seemed to set the mood of everyone else’s good-byes.  Hoss, with his new aspirations of manliness, was handling himself better, but it was obvious he, too, hated to see Mary go.  In fact, he expressed the fervor of his feelings by informing Mary that he intended to marry her when he grew up, so she could stay at the Ponderosa forever.  Between gently dealing with his boyish love and wiping Little Joe’s tears, Mary had her hands full.

    With the stage depot in full view from Dr. Martin’s office, Mark didn’t dare hold Sally’s hand, much less speak of marriage, nor did she use the forbidden word.  Their eyes, however, communicated clear messages of love.  Mark’s dark eyes were warm with promise, while Sally’s blue ones shone with confidence the pledge would be kept.

    Even Adam, usually dreamy with anticipation of a new school term, seemed reluctant to board the stage this time.  He still felt that he was abandoning the Ponderosa in its hour of greatest need.  When he’d expressed that a few days earlier, however, his father had opened the Bible and pointed out a verse that advised against thinking of himself more highly than he ought.  Adam got the point and said nothing further.

    When the time came to board the stage, Little Joe still refused to release his precious Mary, so Nelly Thomas, who with Inger and Billy was there to see everyone off, took the baby from her.  “Come on, Sugarfoot.  Let’s see if we can’t find some cookies in Aunt Nelly’s kitchen.”  Marie smiled, hopeful a tasty distraction would take her child’s attention off his loss.  Hoss hadn’t been specifically invited, but cookies sounded like the perfect solace to him, too, so he trotted after Nelly and his brother.

    Ben helped Mary into the stage.  The girl paused in the doorway to take a clay crock of lebkuchen dough from Marie.  “Oh, I’m leaving so much richer than I came,” she enthused.  Packed in her carpetbags, one more than when she arrived, were containers of strawberry jam and a number of new dresses she and Marie had made.  “Thank you for a wonderful summer.”

    “It’s been a pleasure to have you,” Ben said warmly.  He turned to shake Mark’s hand.  “And you,” he added.

    Mark nodded.  He knew he’d been anything but a pleasure when he first came, but hoped he’d made up for that by his faithful work later.  “I can’t express what this summer has meant to me,” he said.

    “Oh, I think I know,” Ben smiled.  “Give your father my best.”  Contained in that greeting was the certainty that a wonderful reunion awaited father and son in San Francisco.

    For Ben and his boy, however, it was months of separation that loomed before them.  Seeing that Adam had finished his farewells to Billy and Sally, Ben gave his son a final embrace.  “Write all about your studies,” he dictated.  “I’ll be real interested in that course on surveying you’re hoping to take.”

    “Yes, sir,” Adam replied soberly, “and you write all about the ranch.”

    “Everything you need to know,” Ben smiled.

    The answer didn’t please Adam, who felt his father meant to hide any worries from him, but he saw no point in protesting.  “Tell those ornery little brothers of mine good-bye,” he laughed, instead.  “They really know how to make a fellow feel important, running after cookies instead of staying to see me off.”

“They’ll miss you,” Ben chuckled, “despite appearances to the contrary.”

    When he’d given Marie a swift peck on the cheek, Adam mounted the stage, wondering whether his father’s parting remark was true.  Hoss, he was sure, would miss him, but he’d find consolation in the letters that came with every mail.  On the other hand, Adam had been too busy working to see much of Little Joe this summer.  The little fellow would probably just forget him again.  However, Adam didn’t waste time regretting what he couldn’t change.  As the stage pulled out, the oldest Cartwright boy found his thoughts turning toward Sacramento and the nuggets of knowledge waiting to be mined there.

    Ben entered, blowing on his fingers, and headed straight for the Ponderosa’s massive stone fireplace.  “Brr!  Cold out, boy,” he told Hoss, the only member of the family in sight.  Ben looked with irritation toward the stairs.  “Go see what’s keeping your mother, will you, son?”

    Hoss shrugged.  “I know what’s keeping her——my little brother.  He fights bein’ bundled up tooth and toenail, Pa.”

    Ben chuckled.  “If he could get a feel of that wind, he wouldn’t.”

    “It couldn’t be much colder than it is in here,” Marie complained as she escorted her puckered-lipped toddler down the stairs.  “I do hope it will be warmer in Carson City.”

    “Maybe a little,” Ben conceded, “but I wouldn’t count on it.  I just hope the cold doesn’t affect the turnout for the election.”

    Marie came to him, lifting her face for a kiss.  “I hate to see you worry about such things on your birthday, mon amour.  It should be a time for celebration.”

    “Yeah, for picnics and swimmin’ parties,” Hoss grinned, recalling his own birthday with fond remembrance.

    Ben tousled the boy’s sandy hair.  “In July, maybe!  Please spare my aged bones any picnics or swimming today.”  Ben’s bones were feeling every minute of his thirty-eight years this frosty morning.

    Little Joe patted his father’s leg to get his attention.  “Swim, Pa?  I wanna swim.”

    Ben guffawed as he tossed the little boy up to his shoulder.  “You would!”  The tiny toddler seemed to relish cold weather.  A dip in an icy lake would probably suit Little Joe to a T, even if the teeth of everyone else in the family were chattering loud enough to make music for Adam’s ears in Sacramento.

    “It was nice of ‘em to put the election on your birthday, Pa,” Hoss commented as they started toward the door.

    Ben gave his middle boy a hearty slap on the back.  “Don’t think that was their reason, Hoss, but the only present I want for this birthday is to see that constitution adopted.”

    As they exited the house and moved toward the buckboard, Marie shivered under her rabbit skin cape.  “I am glad now that Mary left when she did.  This cold would be terrible for her.”  Since the weather normally didn’t turn chilly until October, there’d been some discussion of the Wentworths’ staying through September.  Feeling homesick for her father, however, Mary had decided they, too, should leave when Adam returned to school.

    “Mary?” Little Joe asked, head lifting from his father’s shoulder.  “Where Mary?”  It hadn’t been a week since the Wentworths and Adam had boarded the stage, and Little Joe was just beginning to get over his sense of loss.

    “Did you have to mention her name?” Ben chided.

    Marie smiled contritely.  “You are going to play with Inger and Jimmy today, Little Joe,” she offered as a quick alternative.

    “Oh, good,” the toddler crowed, happy again.

    The Cartwrights loaded into the buckboard, the boys in the back, and drove through a gray mist that shrouded them in damp cold.  Hoss gratefully huddled beneath wool blankets, but Little Joe, seemingly oblivious to the wind and wet, stood behind the wagon seat, chattering to his longsuffering parents.

    On arriving in Carson City, Ben went immediately to the polling place, while the rest of the family sought the warmth of the Thomases’ parlor.  After casting his ballot, Ben ambled over to the trading post to converse with Clyde and encourage any prospective voters who wandered in to support the constitution.  Most agreed that they would, but the main topic of conversation around the pot-bellied stove was the sudden turn in the weather.  None of the long-time settlers could remember such an early cold snap, and several fretted that they might be in for a harsh winter.  Newer residents, especially those accustomed to the milder weather of California, scoffed.

    “I, for one, am going to lay in my winter supplies early——and in quantity,” Ben commented to Clyde, but loudly enough for everyone else to hear.

    “Good idea,” Clyde announced to the room, though most tossed off his advice as salesmanship.  “Just have time to take down your order before we head to my place for dinner.”

    “All right, but I’ll need to check with Marie before we finish,” Ben replied.

    “Make more sense to talk to Hop Sing, wouldn’t it?” Clyde cackled.  “He still rules the roost at your place, don’t he?”  The comment drew laughter from everyone in the room who’d ever been a guest at the Ponderosa.

    “He’s right, Ben,” Augustus Harrison jibed.  “Doesn’t pay to rile the cook.”

    “Cooks,” Ben chuckled.  “I’ve got two of them to keep appeased, and neither one shy about expressing his or her opinion.”

    Supply list tentatively completed, Clyde herded Ben toward his place, where a surprise awaited the birthday celebrant.  The dinner of New England pot roast and Boston-baked beans didn’t surprise Ben; he’d suspected Nelly meant to treat him to his favorite foods when she extended the invitation.  He hadn’t, however, expected to find a party of people waiting to share the meal, as well as the huge sponge cake Laura Ellis had baked.

    “Surprise, Pa!” Hoss shouted needlessly when Ben entered the house to see Dr. Martin and Sally, in addition to the Thomases and Ellises.

    “’Prise, Pa!” Little Joe chortled, jumping and down as he clapped his hands.

    Ben scooped him up and shared the laughter.  “It sure is!” he declared.  “Now, who planned this?”

    “We all had a part,” Nelly chuckled.  “Just sort of fell together without much plannin’.”

    “And if you thought you were going to spend this birthday canvassing for votes, you are much mistaken, my friend,” Paul Martin observed.  “Barring the intrusion of patients, you and I will be spending the afternoon over a chessboard.”

    “Sounds good,” Ben smiled.  “I could use something to take my mind off the election.”

    Marie nodded her satisfaction.  Just as she’d thought when she’d made the suggestion to Dr. Martin.

    By the time two strongly contested chess games had been completed, the polls were closed.  Although the final results wouldn’t be known until news of other precincts came in, Ben wanted to stay long enough to get a feel for how the constitution was being received.  As would be proven later, the election in Carson City was a fair gauge for how the rest of the proposed territory was voting.  The constitution was adopted and Isaac Roop elected provisional governor.  Although Ben had received a substantial number of votes for that office in the Carson City balloting, outlying precincts all went for Roop.  Ben received an unexpected birthday present a few days later, however, when he learned he’d been elected to the territorial legislature to convene in December.

    The temperature continued to drop throughout September.  Feeling the frosty air that greeted him each morning, Ben thought it prudent to bring the cattle down from the upper pastures to the warmer valley where grass would survive longer.  Hoss was excused from lessons to assist in the roundup, but only escape from the hated schoolwork made up for the icy wind that swept over the Sierras and crept down the neck of his jacket.  Snow flurries drifted through the air almost every afternoon, although there was no accumulation, and the snow melted almost as soon as it hit the ground.

    Once the cattle had been moved, Ben made a concerted effort to lay in a huge stockpile of firewood.  Even if his own intuition had not been sufficient impetus, the warnings of Tuquah and the other Washo herdsmen would have alerted Ben to the severity of the winter to come.  He intended to be prepared and hoped his neighbors would take similar precautions.  Clyde, he knew, would, but Ben felt concerned about the miners who had poured across the Sierras that summer.  He had assumed they would return to California for the winter, as local miners usually had, but as the weeks passed, it seemed evident most intended to stay.  Few of them, Ben was sure, had the least idea of the hardships they would face before spring.

    Carson County suffered a temporary setback in its quest for self-rule toward the end of September when James Crane, who was to carry the proposed constitution to Congress, died of a sudden heart attack.  After the funeral in Carson City, several friends suggested Ben run as his replacement in the special election set for November 12th, but Ben declined, feeling he couldn’t afford to travel to Washington and remain as long as it might take to see the proper legislation through Congress.  The Ponderosa and his family came first, so Ben willingly laid aside his political aspirations.

    In an attempt to reestablish the authority of Utah’s territorial government, Judge John S. Child, an appointee of non-Mormon governor Alfred Cummings, had convened a session of the probate court on September 12th and set separate elections for October 8th.  The court had closed for lack of business, and only three of the ten precincts bothered to open for the election.

    Ben abstained from voting for the first time in his civic life, for it seemed to him that Salt Lake City was about as responsive to the needs of western Utah as the British had been to their American colony’s cry against taxation without representation.  The situations were similar in Ben’s mind, and while he didn’t advocate revolution, he no longer felt obliged to support the territorial government.  Child and Cummings issued commissions to those elected in October, but not one candidate wanted to take the oath of office under such uncertain conditions.  Those who cared at all chose to await Congress’s action on their bid for a separate territory.

    Most of western Utah’s residents were too caught up in the almost daily changes on the Comstock to be concerned with who governed them.  Small settlements were springing up all through the mining region:  American Flat, Silver City, Gold Hill, Flowery Ridge and more.  According to Billy Thomas, faithful reporter of all activity on the Comstock Lode, the mining district originally called Ophir or Ophir Diggings had earned a more auspicious name.  In a typical drunken stupor, James Finney, known as Old Virginny to long-time residents of the area, had stumbled and broken a bottle of whiskey.  Not wanting to waste it, Billy said, Finney had used the remaining liquor to baptize the ground as Virginia Town in honor of his home state.  Ben and Clyde had a hearty laugh at the foolishness of calling the small congregation of miners a town, but the miners, gambling on a bright future, soon raised the ante by dubbing their town Virginia City.

    As the area continued to boom, Ben, too, began to catch the excitement of new developments.  Not only was Virginia City being laid out in lots, but on one of them Wells Fargo soon established the first bank in the region.  The growth was also affecting Carson City, supply station for the mines.  A telegraph, called the grapevine (either affectionately or from maddening frustration with its frequent breakdowns), was strung from tree to tree, linking Carson City with Placerville.  Then, in response to the northward population shift, the Territorial Enterprise announced it would print its last issue from Genoa on October 29th, thereafter relocating to Carson City.  Finally, when John Musser, who had presided over the constitutional convention, was selected as the new representative to Washington, Ben was sure the region was well on its way to becoming a territory.
 

    Collar turned up against the howling wind, Ben glued his chin to his chest and plowed through the whirling snow to the side of the house where firewood was stacked and covered in an attempt to keep it dry.  Gathering an armload, he headed back toward the front door.  Entering through the kitchen would have been closer, but Ben preferred to endure the cold a few moments longer rather than listen to the castigation of his Chinese cook.  Besides, Marie was in the kitchen now, too, and suffered even more than Hop Sing from the icy gusts that blew white powder across the floor whenever any door was opened.

    The first snow had fallen on the twenty-second of November, the second four days later, blanketing the ground to a depth of five to six feet.  Since then, scarcely a day had passed without more inches being added to the drifts piled against house and fence post, bunkhouse and barn.  Even when the sun condescended to come out, never for longer than three days at a time, its frail beams dispensed no warmth.  As November gave way to December, the temperature dropped to freezing on good days and below zero on others.

    Little Joe was still giving vent to his displeasure at being left indoors when Ben came in and dumped a load of logs in the wood box by the fireplace.  Hoss, usually adept at handling his little brother, was scolding the toddler soundly for the racket he was creating.  “Hoss,” Ben chided softly, “you’re not helping the situation.”

    “Well, how’s a feller supposed to study with him carryin’ on?” Hoss demanded.

    A smile flickered at Ben’s lips.  Ordinarily, Hoss would have preferred any chore to sitting at his books, but he didn’t share his younger brother’s delight in winter weather.  Even arithmetic seemed more enticing than waltzing through snowdrifts, though Ben’s chunky middle son dutifully did that morning and evening to see to the needs of the animals in the barn.  Unlike Little Joe, he was willing to stay in the house between those necessary trips outside, but even good-natured Hoss was showing the effects of too much time indoors.  Cabin fever was the only explanation for his impatience with his adored little brother.

    Ben lifted the baby and sat down by the fire, gently stroking the heaving back as he whispered soothing syllables. “You have those sums worked yet?” he asked Hoss when Little Joe began to quiet down.

    “Yeah, no thanks to squall-bawl there,” Hoss grunted.

    “Shh; let me see your slate.”

    Frowning, Hoss presented his work, sure he’d done it incorrectly, as usual.

    There were mistakes, but Ben corrected them with as gentle a tone as he’d used with the baby.  Both boys were irritable, and while Ben normally didn’t tolerate poor attitudes, he understood the tension underlying his sons’ crankiness and made allowances.  He wrote out new sums for Hoss to total and suggested the youngster try again.  “Supper should be ready by the time you finish,” Ben said encouragingly, then went back to letting Little Joe ride his knee like a bucking bronc.  “Ride a little horsey; go to town; buy my baby——”

    A loud thumping sounded at the door.  Ben waited a moment for Hop Sing to respond, but the Chinese cook was far less defensive about his prerogative to greet all callers now that exercising it meant a blast of cold air in his face.  Chuckling to himself, Ben set Little Joe down and went to answer the door, the toddler pattering after him.

    Ben had expected the caller to be one of the men from the bunkhouse.  Not that he’d known any reason even they would need to see him.  He just couldn’t imagine anyone living further away braving the freezing cold.  To his surprise, the elderly man who stood outside his door was no one Ben knew, though he recognized the distinctive clothing of the Washo tribe.

    Ben held the door wide in invitation to the old Indian, who entered and extended a piece of paper to Ben.  Ben scanned the letter quickly, frowning as he read:
 

This Indian is a damned old thief.  He will steal anything he can lay his hands on.  If he comes about your camp, break his head.  A Friend.

    Ben looked sorrowfully at the gaunt old man.  The Indian seemed to think Ben had not understood the letter, so he brought his fingers to his mouth repeatedly to simulate eating.  Ben nodded.  He’d have guessed the Indian’s purpose even without the gesture.  A man with skin stretched that tight over his bones had to be hungry.  “Yes, I have food for you,” he said, motioning the Washo toward the fire.  Little Joe, still at his father’s heels, reached out to stroke the Indian’s frayed rabbit skin blanket.  Ben pulled the child back and pushed him toward Hoss, who sat on the hearth with Little Joe between his knees

“You savvy English?” Ben asked as the old man spread his hands eagerly toward the flames.

    The Indian shrugged.  “English?  Maybe so, some.”

    Ben held out the letter.  “This letter bad.  Say bad things of you.  Make white men not help you.  You savvy?”

    When the Indian nodded grimly, Ben wadded the letter up and tossed it toward the fire.  The missile fell short, but Hoss scooped up the offending paper and sent it to its destination.  “Thank you, son,” Ben said.  “Ask your mother to put together a generous packet of food for our friend.”

    “Yes, sir,” Hoss said and, taking Little Joe by the hand, shuffled into the kitchen to deliver the message.

    While they waited for his return, Ben offered the Washo a draw on his pipe, and the gap-toothed Indian grinned his pleasure in the smoke.  Hoss came back, lugging a feed bag heavily loaded with supplies.  Marie followed, looking apprehensive until she saw the age and condition of the Indian Ben had invited in.  After he left, she moved into Ben’s embrace.  “Oh, Ben,” she sighed.  “Are they all as hungry as that?”

    “Could be,” Ben replied.  “Those miners over at Sun Mountain are fools.  They cut down the piñon tree for their fires and deplete the wild game for their own stew pots.”

    “They are hungry, too, Ben,” Marie murmured.

    “I know,” Ben said, “but if they destroy the food supply of the Indians, they just might end up paying for it with their lives.  Desperate people sometimes take desperate action.”  He led his wife to the sofa and sat on the table before it, facing her.  He took her hands between his.  “Marie, I know you won’t like this, but I told Poito last spring that I would bring some beef up to his people when the weather turned bad.”

    “Ben, it is not safe!” Marie protested.  “You have told me there is ill feeling now.”  Misunderstanding had piled on misunderstanding, from the killings of McMarlin and Williams back in 1857, to the murders of Lassen and Clapper in the Black Rock Desert that spring of 1859.  White men held red ones in suspicion, and the misgivings were mutual.

    “All the more reason to assuage it,” Ben pointed out.  “I don’t believe I’ll be in any danger, my love, and I may do a great deal of good.  I’ve been waiting for the weather to improve, but if the Paiutes are suffering like that old Washo, I don’t think I dare delay any longer.  Then, too, there’s that meeting of the legislature coming up the fifteenth.  If I’m to be back in time for that, I probably should leave in the morning.”

    “You were right to say I would not like this,” Marie sputtered, cheeks growing crimson.

    “I’m sorry, but I have to do what I think is right,” Ben said bluntly.

    Marie flounced up from the sofa.  “No matter what I say?” she demanded hotly.

    Ben stood and tried to pull her into an embrace.  She resisted him with rigid body, flinging his arms away.  “Is this really the way you want to part, Marie?” he asked, grasping her by both wrists.

    “I do not wish to part at all!” she snapped.  “That is your choice, monsieur.”  She struggled, but could not escape his iron hold.

    “Marie, you’re behaving like a child,” Ben shouted.

    Little Joe, always sensitive to loud noises, bellowed, and Marie broke free to soothe her distressed baby.  “Do not cry, mon petit,” she said, looking reproachfully at Ben.  “Your father cares nothing for your tears——or mine.”

    “Marie!”

    “Go to your Indians,” Marie sputtered as she carried Little Joe toward the kitchen.  “I will care for our children, as I shall have to do when the Indians take the life of their father!”

    As she stormed out, Ben threw his hands in the air.

    “Maybe you shouldn’t go, Pa,” Hoss muttered, shifting uneasily from foot to foot.

    Ben sat down by the fire and pulled Hoss to his knee.  “I have to go, son.  I gave Poito my word.”

    “Yeah, promises are important,” Hoss conceded, “but I hate it when you fight.”

    “Not overly fond of it myself,” Ben said wryly.  “Your mother’s worried, and I understand that, but I need understanding, too.”

    “I understand you, Pa,” Hoss said loyally, “and if you want me to come with you, I’ll sure do ‘er.”

    Ben smiled and gave the boy a hug.  “I appreciate the offer, son, but your mother would have my hide if I took you to the Paiute camp.  Besides, I need you to look after her and your little brother while I’m away.”

    “In case you don’t come back,” Hoss stated, brow creasing.

    Ben gave him a tighter squeeze.  “I’m coming back, Hoss.  Don’t worry, and help them not to, if you can.”

    “I’ll try, Pa,” Hoss promised, taking his vow as seriously as his father did the promise to the Paiute leader.

     Ben told himself that once Marie’d had time to cool down, he could make her understand.  She, however, refused to speak to him throughout an unpleasant dinner.  Not wanting to upset the children, Ben waited until they were asleep to reason with his wife.  Nothing he said, however, changed Marie’s opinion that he was risking his life needlessly, and for one of the few times in their marriage, they went to sleep with their backs to each other.

    Ben had never before driven cattle through such appalling weather.  Fortunately, the snowfall was light, but even so his progress was slow as he herded several beeves toward Pyramid Lake, where the Paiutes were camped for the winter.  He’d chosen animals that were in top physical condition to ensure their surviving the drive, and though the cattle were suffering, they’d make it.  Pyramid Lake lay just ahead.

    The atmosphere of the Paiute camp seemed different as he rode in.  Usually, young children ran to greet him, but today they hung back, or perhaps were held back by vigilant mothers.  Ben and the cattle reached the middle of the encampment before anyone approached him.  Ben recognized Sarah Winnemucca hurrying toward him, a wool blanket——no doubt a gift from the Ormsbys, with whom she’d lived until the increased tensions had driven her home——protecting her dark braids from the drifting snowflakes.  “Mr. Cartwright,” she cried.  “You have brought us beef!”

    “As I promised your father,” Ben said, raising his voice to be heard above the wind.  “Is he here?”

    “Not in camp,” Sarah replied, “but my grandfather will wish to thank you.”

    “And I wish to see him,” Ben said.  “I brought him some tobacco.”

    “He will be pleased,” Sarah said.  She motioned for some older boys to take charge of the cattle, then led the way to Captain Truckee’s karnee.  Ben found the old man looking frail, but in reasonably good health, considering the cold, and they enjoyed a pleasant conversation, though each expressed sorrow for the strained relations between white man and red.  Captain Truckee had always looked upon white men as brothers and had frequently argued against his own people when they blamed the white men for such calamities as decimating disease or this year’s unusually harsh winter.

    Ben rode away from Pyramid Lake, satisfied with the success of his expedition.  If he could have spoken with Poito or Numaga, a better understanding might have been reached, but the gift of cattle would express his good intentions and, hopefully, make the Paiutes think more favorably of their white neighbors.  Even if no good came of this trip, Ben was glad he’d made it.  He couldn’t feed two tribes single-handed, of course, but what he could spare, he would, if only to make amends for what other white men had taken.  As Marie had said, they probably had hungry white neighbors, as well, but Ben’s sympathies lay with the Indians, whose food supply those white neighbors had usurped.

    The thought of Marie reminded Ben that he had another peace conference awaiting him.  Marie had said little the morning he left, evidently feeling words were futile.  She’d let him kiss her on the cheek in parting, but had said nothing other than a whispered admonition to be careful.

    It was a different woman who greeted him when he rode in.  Marie, oblivious of the snowflakes splattering her bare head, rushed outside to fall into his arms.  “Oh, Ben, I am so sorry,” she cried.

    “Dearest, you’re freezing,” Ben scolded.  “Go back inside.  I’ll be in as soon as I stable my mount.”

    Marie shook her head.  “Kiss me,” she demanded.

    Laughing, Ben wrapped sturdy arms around her shivering ones and forcefully pressed her lips.  She returned the kiss with passion that warmed him better than the hottest fire, and that night in bed she more than made up for the rigid back she’d turned the last night they’d spent together.

    An article in the next issue of the Territorial Enterprise made Ben feel even more gratified that he’d done what he could to assist the neighboring tribes.  Isaac Roop, newly elected governor of their unrecognized territory, had made his way from Susanville to Carson City, no doubt in anticipation of the following week’s convening of the territorial legislature.  On the way Roop had passed through Truckee Meadows and through the paper reported on the condition of the Washos camped there.  “The Indians in Truckee Meadows are freezing and starving to death by scores,” Roop reported in the newspaper’s columns, telling how he had found three children dead and dying in one cabin. “The whites are doing all they can to alleviate the miseries of the poor Washos,” the article continued.  “They have sent out and built fires for them, and offered them bread and other provisions.  But in many instances the starving Indians refuse to eat, fearing that the food is poisoned.  They attribute the severity of the winter to the whites.”

    “White folks don’t like the cold no better than Indians,” Hoss protested when his father had finished reading the article aloud.  “Besides, we don’t tell it when to snow.  God does that.”

    “I know, son,” Ben explained, “but when things happen that people don’t understand, they often look for someone to blame.”

    “I’m glad you took them beeves up to the Paiutes,” Hoss declared.  “At least, they won’t be blamin’ us if they’re hungry.”

    “They will blame whom they please,” Marie said curtly, then dipped her chin in apology.  “Still, I, too, am glad you took the cattle, mon mari.”

    “How about you?” Ben chuckled, bouncing Little Joe from his lap to his shoulder.  Little Joe chortled with delight.  “That’s a consensus, then,” Ben laughed, “and may all we legislators come to one as easily next week.”

    When the provisional legislature met the following Thursday in the home of J. B. Blake of Genoa, however, Ben discovered that his prayer should have been for a quorum, not a consensus, for only four legislators showed up.  Governor Roop delivered a message, a few resolutions were passed and a committee was appointed to draw up a memorial to Congress.  Then the legislature adjourned to the first Monday in July, when, hopefully, the weather would favor a higher attendance.

    Ben spent that night in Genoa and the following one in Carson City.  Marie wasn’t expecting him home for several days anyway, so Ben decided to lay over for a visit with Clyde and Nelly, an infrequent luxury due to the increasingly bitter weather.  As soon as the Territorial Enterprise was available that Saturday, however, Ben tucked a copy in his saddle bag and headed for home.  He pushed his mount, for another storm seemed to be brewing.

    Marie was surprised to see her husband home so early, for he had expected the legislature to be in session about a week.  As she pulled off his boots so he could warm his feet at the fire, Ben explained about the poor attendance.  “Well, it is terribly cold,” Marie empathized.  “Perhaps it was to be expected.”

    “Roop made it all the way from Susanville,” Ben said gruffly.  “If anyone had reason to stay home by the fire, he did.”

    Marie smiled.  “But he is the governor, Ben.  How could he not come?”

    “Would look bad, wouldn’t it?” Ben chuckled.  He unfolded the newspaper and began to read while Marie massaged his bare soles.  “One year today,” he murmured.  “Hardly seems possible.”

    “What?” Marie asked, looking up.

    “The Enterprise,” he replied.  “Been in publication a year now.  And what a year it’s been!  Never dreamed the little paper would have so much news to report.”

    After placing slippers on his feet, Marie perched on his knee to view the paper with him, her attention drawn more to the advertisements than to the news.  “So many new businesses,” she said.

    “Mostly hotels,” Ben smiled.  “We don’t have much use for them, unless we go to Genoa.”

    “No, but I am interested in this one in Carson City,” Marie giggled, pointing to the ad for the Pioneer Hotel.

    “Ah, yes, the one with the bakery attached,” Ben chuckled.  “Good move for Laura to join her business with the hotel.  Should bring in more customers.”

    “And help her keep the business separate from her home,” Marie added.  “That is her real reason.”

    “Now, here’s a notice that might interest Dr. Martin,” Ben said.  “Looks like he’ll have some competition.”

    “What you mean, Pa?” Hoss, doing his lessons at the table before the fire, asked.  Uninterested in the conversation around him, Little Joe just continued to build fragile towers with his blocks.

    “Captain Anton Tjader, late of U. S. Marine Hospital, Chelsea, Massachusetts, offers professional services,” Ben read.  “Gunshot wounds a specialty.”

    “But we’ll stick with Doc, won’t we?” Hoss asked.  “He’s the best.”

    “In my book, he is,” Ben smiled.  “Yeah, Hoss, we’ll stick with him.”

    Hoss scrambled up and came to lean on the arm of his father’s chair.  “Anything else interestin’ in that paper?” he asked.

    Ben chucked the boy’s chin.  “Any excuse to shirk your lessons, eh?”

    “Aw, Pa,” Hoss scowled.  “I ain’t so all-fired lazy as you make out.”

    “No, you’re a good worker——in all ways but that,” Ben admitted.  “Well, here’s something you might find interesting.  Seems a Mr. F. Horn is offering a twenty-five dollar reward for the return of three boxes of assaying equipment lost in the recent snowstorm somewhere on the King’s Canyon Grade.”

    “I know where that is!” Hoss said.  “Could I go look for it, Pa?”

    “Absolutely not,” Ben answered firmly.

    “I could sure use that money,” Hoss grumbled.

    Ben guffawed.  “Hoss, use your head!  Or better yet, stick it outdoors and take a look at the weather.  The last place you need to be is further up the mountains.  For that matter, you’d have a hard time getting to town to collect that reward.”

    “Don’t know what I’m gonna do for Christmas presents,” Hoss mumbled as he went back to his lessons.  “I got a good sum of money saved, thanks to you payin’ me so good this summer, but I ain’t been to town for weeks.”

    Marie reached across Ben to stroke the youngster’s pudgy cheek.  “You do not need to buy presents, mon chéri.  That is Santa’s job, and he is well prepared.”

    “Sanna?” Little Joe piped up, finally hearing a subject that interested him.  “Sanna come back?”

    Ben chuckled.  “Oh, you remember Santa, do you, my bright little boy?”

    Little Joe, dragging his bunny by one ear, toddled over and squiggled beneath the paper into his father’s lap.  “Hey, it’s getting kind of crowded in this chair,” Ben protested, but his velvet eyes were twinkling.

    “Pa, we’re gonna have that party, like we do every Christmas, ain’t we?” Hoss asked, face puckered with sudden worry.

    Ben shook his head.  “I’m sorry, Hoss, but no one’s gonna want to come up here with the kind of weather we’ve been having.”

    “Aw, doggone it!” Hoss muttered, pulling away.  “No Thanksgiving and now no Christmas.”

    Ben and Marie exchanged a commiserating look.  They, too, had been disappointed when they couldn’t celebrate their traditional Thanksgiving meal with the Thomases.  Marie had done her best to prepare a special meal, and the hired hands, at least, had seemed appreciative.  Hoss had obviously missed seeing his friends and had looked forward to the annual Christmas Eve party as a chance to make up for the omission.

    “We will have a fine Christmas,” Marie promised, “even if we must celebrate it alone.”

    “A real old-fashioned one,” Ben added brightly, “like we used to have when it was just you and me and Adam.  Won’t that be fun?”

    “Stinkin’ snow,” Hoss muttered and flopped down at the table to return to his studies.

    Little Joe squirmed out of his father’s lap and into Hoss’s.  He patted his brother’s face to get his attention.  “Snow not stink, HaHa,” he soothed.  “Snow pwitty.”

    “Yeah, well, if you don’t quit callin’ me HaHa, I’m gonna toss you out in that pretty snow,” Hoss grumbled.

    Little Joe clapped his tiny hands.  “Fun!” he cried.  “Go play!”  The others moaned.  Even Ben and Marie had lost their appreciation for the beauty of snow.  There’d been just too much of it lately.

    And still the snow descended.  Day by day the drifts piled higher, and three days before Christmas a ferocious blizzard blew in.  Ben dug a path from the kitchen door to the barn, so he and Hoss could get to the animals stabled there.  Through chattering teeth Hop Sing loudly protested when Ben burst back in, wind howling after him.  “Hop Sing, for the umpteenth time, it’s our house!” Ben shouted, “and you’d better make up your mind that it’s our kitchen, too, because we’re all gonna be in here today.”

    Leaving Hop Sing to grumble to himself, Ben hurried through the chilly front room and up the stairs.  “Get the baby dressed and bring him to the kitchen,” he ordered Marie, sticking his head into their bedroom.  Marie, shivering beneath the covers, sensed something wrong.  “What is it, Ben?”

    “Snow and more snow,” he grunted.  “Looks like a real siege of it, so I think we’d better conserve our wood supply, just heat the one room.”

    “Oui , that sounds wise.  I will wrap Little Joe in his blankets and dress him by the fire,” Marie said, getting up.  She gave a cry of dismay as her bare feet touched the icy floor and hurried into her clothes.

    Ben hustled down the hall to wake Hoss, and together father and son plunged through the wintry blast to the barn.  When they returned to the kitchen, Marie was sitting by the fire in a straight-backed chair, rocking a still drowsy Little Joe back and forth on her lap.  “I’ll bring down the rocker,” Ben offered and Marie nodded her appreciation.

    He carried the rocking chair from the nursery to the kitchen, as well as some extra blankets to tuck around his wife and over her knees.  “Thank you, Ben,” she whispered, folding a blanket around the now sleeping baby.  “The cold is so bitter this morning.  Do you think it will last long?”

    “Could,” Ben said.  He sat in one of the chairs Hoss had dragged in from the dining room and held his hands to the fire.

    “Will we lose many cattle, do you think?”

    Ben nodded soberly.  “Quite a few, I imagine.  There’s no getting to them ‘til the blizzard dies down.”

    “Too many people in this kitchen,” Hop Sing grumbled.  “Hop Sing cannot do his work.”

    “Just fix some breakfast, would you?” Ben snapped.

    “Gentlemen,” Marie pleaded, “if you quarrel, this kitchen will seem even smaller and more crowded.”

    “Yeah, I know,” Ben conceded.  “You do the best you can, Hop Sing, and we’ll try to stay out from underfoot.”

    “Humph!” Hop Sing snorted, but he dutifully began to fry flapjacks and sausage.

    Little Joe woke just as Hoss was polishing off the final flapjack and began to whimper.

    “No, no cly,” the cook pleaded.  “Hop Sing make mo’ light away.”

    “Okay,” Little Joe lisped, flashing his ready smile.  The toddler slid from his mother’s lap and, trotting to the door, stretched for the handle.  Unable to reach it, he patted the door with his open palm.

    Ben came behind the baby to scoop him up and hold him to the window.  “It’s too cold, Little Joe.  See all that nasty snow.”

    Little Joe nodded happily.  “I like snow.”

    “It’s over your head, silly son,” Ben chuckled.  “Come back to the table and have your breakfast.”

    Breakfast proved a satisfactory distraction from the enticing snow.  Pulling a chair up to Hop Sing’s work table, Ben held the boy in his lap and cut his pancake.  Little Joe was still awkward with a fork, but he insisted on feeding himself.  After the youngster had eaten half of what Hop Sing had cooked for him, Marie washed the effects of his independence from his cheeks with water heated on the stove.

    To Ben, that day seemed like one of the longest of his life.  Being cooped up in a kitchen with two restless children and one crotchety Chinaman was not his idea of a pleasant way to idle away several hours.  Marie and Hop Sing were keeping themselves occupied with cooking and washing the dirty dishes, so Ben delegated himself the responsibility of entertaining the children.  Lessons took up the morning hours for Hoss, and having nothing else to do with the younger boy, Ben made Little Joe part of the class, the brighter part if the truth be told.  When the lessons ended just before lunch, Little Joe proudly recited the numbers from one to ten for his mother and identified several letters of the alphabet when his father pointed to them.

    No one had worked up much of an appetite, but Marie and Hop Sing, during a morning in which they’d had nothing to do but cook, had prepared a meal fit for field hands.  Even sharing it with the three men in bunkhouse didn’t make the huge roast disappear, though most of the vegetables were gone.  “For mercy’s sake, keep it light tonight,” Ben pleaded, “or we’ll all have nightmares.”

    “Oui, a soup, perhaps,” Marie mused.  “We could add potatoes and carrots to the beef, Hop Sing.”

    “Hop Sing not need Missy tell him how cook,” Hop Sing grunted.

    “Hey, I know something better,” Hoss inserted eagerly, “something we ain’t had in a long time.”

    “What’s that, Hoss?” Ben asked, pleased with any idea that might add interest to this interminable day, especially for the youngsters.

    “Remember how you used to put leftover beef in gravy and pour it over biscuits?” Hoss asked, face glowing with nostalgia.

    “Oh, Hoss,” Ben laughed.  “That was because Pa didn’t know how to cook well enough to do better by you.”

    “I liked it!” Hoss declared, his face forming a pout.

    That was so rare an expression for even-tempered Hoss that Ben knew the boy really needed a silver lining in this cloudy day.  “All right,” he soothed, “that’s what we’ll have for supper.  Beef in gravy over biscuits, Hop Sing.”

    Hop Sing frowned.  “Not sound like velly good suppah, Mistah Cahtlight.”

    “It is, too, good,” Hoss shouted, “and Pa said I could have it!”

    “Allight, allight,” Hop Sing muttered.  He, too, could read the signs in Hoss’s unaccustomed crankiness and judged it wise to give in to him.  The way the snow was coming down, everyone would be camping in his kitchen again tomorrow, and the one thing that would make that worse was crying children.  Since he had plenty of time, though, Hop Sing decided to make the beef and vegetable soup, too.  Missy, at least, would show sense and choose the better meal——maybe Mistah Cahtlight, too.

    As the snow fell in ever larger clumps, the afternoon dragged on.  Ben played patty cake with Little Joe, then turned him over to his brother while he went to look for a book the boys and Marie might enjoy.  When he returned, Hoss was all fours with Little Joe riding his back.  The toddler was squealing with joy, though the squeals that poured from the diminutive cook when horse and rider passed between his feet were less jubilant.

    “Ride over here, boys,” Ben suggested.  “Stable your mount, Little Joe, and come listen to the nice story Pa’s picked out to read.”

    Hoss crawled to his father’s feet, where his younger brother dismounted and began to rub his sides.  “Hey!  What are you doin’?” Hoss demanded.

    “Stable HaHa,” Little Joe replied smoothly.  “Always give HaHa rubdown after ride, huh, Pa?”

    Ben chuckled.  “Yeah, that’s right, but a boy who’s bright enough to learn his letters and numbers shouldn’t cling to baby talk, Little Joe.  Say your brother’s name properly or no story.”

    “Hoss,” Little Joe said obligingly.  “Gotta give Hoss rubdown.”

    Hoss clambered up from the floor.  “I’m rubbed enough.  What’s the story, Pa?”

    Ben showed him the book he’d chosen, Ivanhoe.  “It’s about knights in armor and damsels in distress.”

Marie looked up with interest at the final phrase, though it made Hoss scowl.  “Can’t we skip that damsel in distress part,” he suggested.

“No,” Ben laughed.  “If we do, there’s no one for the brave knight to rescue.”

    Hoss cackled.  “Yeah, I guess that’s right.  Okay, Pa, we’re ready.”  He sat on a folded blanket near Ben’s chair and put Little Joe between his legs.

    Ben began to read to an enrapt Hoss.  Little Joe had more trouble following the story and soon became bored.  Seeing his wide yawns, Marie made him a pallet to nap on, then sat down by Ben, listening with sentimental ecstasy to the story of Winfred of Ivanhoe and the two women who loved him.  Even Hop Sing drew ever closer to the family circle and eventually gave up all pretense of work as he leaned on the table, mouth open, eyes excited.  When the time came to cook dinner, he and Marie worked together, grateful to be preparing simple dishes so they could keep most of their attention on the words Ben read.

    Seeing that dinner was ready, Ben stopped reading at a particularly exciting point in story.  “Aw, Pa, what happens next?” Hoss pleaded.

    “Dinnertime, boy,” Ben chuckled, “and if you’re not hungry, I am.”

    “I’m hungry,” Hoss admitted, “but will you finish the story after we eat?”

    Ben shook his head.  “The light’s fading, son, but looks like we’ll be spending tomorrow in this kitchen, too.  I’ll read some more tomorrow afternoon.”

    Hoss looked disappointed at having to wait that long, but he was easily appeased by a heaping platter of beef gravy over biscuits.  Little Joe woke up, rubbing his eyes, in time to join the family at supper and while he couldn’t consume nearly as much as his big brother, his smile declared his satisfaction with the simple fare, especially the chocolate cake that followed the meal.

    “What we gonna do now?” Hoss asked once dinner was over.

    “Why don’t we tell stories?” Marie suggested.  “I will begin so your father may rest his voice.”

    “What kind of stories?” Hoss asked suspiciously, feeling certain ladies were inclined to sappy love stories.

    “Ah, I think I shall tell you of the duel your father fought for my honor,” Marie said with a sly look at Ben.  “Truly, he was as gallant as Sir Ivanhoe.”

    “Well, I think that’s stretching it a bit,” Ben sputtered.

    “But I, monsieur, do not,” Marie said, head lifting proudly.  “We will let our sons decide if you did not, indeed, play the part of a noble knight that morning.”

    Hoss pulled his chair close, so as not to miss a word.  When Marie had finished the tale, he stood to pat his father on the head.  “Sir Pa,” he declared, “a noble knight.”

    “Pa night?” Little Joe queried, looking through the window at the dark sky.

    “Not that kind,” Hoss scoffed, “a knight in armor——well, except he didn’t have none.”

    “Give it up, Hoss,” Ben chuckled.  “It’s all the same to him.”

    “It’s still too early for bed,” Hoss pointed out.  “You tell a story now, Pa.”

    “All right,” Ben agreed and launched into a yarn from one of his sailing trips.

    When the story ended, Hoss begged for another, but Marie objected.  “Little Joe is getting very sleepy.  I think I should take him to bed before any more stories are told.”

    “No more stories tonight,” Ben said.  “Let me build a fire in our room; then I think we’d all better hit the hay.  It’s been a long day.”

    “The fire will not keep the nursery warm,” Marie worried.

    “He can sleep with us tonight,” Ben replied.

    “What about me, Pa?” Hoss asked.  “You gonna build a fire in my room?”

    “No, I’d rather save the wood, son,” Ben explained.  “You can either sleep here in the kitchen or up in our room.”

    “With you,” Hoss decided, “but it’s gonna get awful crowded in that bed.”

    Ben laughed.  “Get a spare mattress from the bunkhouse, boy.  We’ll bed you down right by the fire.”

    “Okay,” Hoss grinned.  “I’ll get it now.”  He passed through the hands’ dining room that adjoined the kitchen and into the bunkhouse to retrieve his bed.

    Ben returned shortly and carried his drowsy youngest upstairs, putting him in the middle of the large rosewood bed.  Hoss lugged in the narrow bunk mattress and stretched it before the fire.  Marie brought Hoss’s nightshirt from his room, and Hoss hustled into it and under the covers in record time.  Ben and Marie both knelt to kiss him good-night.  “Keep toasty,” Ben smiled.

    “You, too,” Hoss grinned.  “Night-night, Little Joe.”

    “Night-night,” Little Joe yawned and burrowed into his mother’s pillow.

    The parents crawled in, one on each side of the little boy and reached across him to stroke each other’s cheek, the closest good-night embrace they could manage under the circumstances.

    Friday’s activities followed much the same pattern as the day before:  lessons in the morning, Ivanhoe after lunch and stories after supper.  Little Joe was awake more that afternoon and, uninterested in the book Ben was reading, set about exploring the kitchen cupboards, much to Hop Sing’s vocalized ire.  “I don’t know how we’re gonna keep these boys occupied tomorrow,” Ben whispered to his wife after they’d gone to bed.  “They need to move around more.”

    “Oui, ” Marie agreed.  “I will think of something, mon amour.  You have done so much already.”  She lay awake, trying to imagine some activity the boys might enjoy which could be done in a kitchen.  If only they were having their usual Christmas Eve party.  There’d be almost more to do than they had time for.  Slowly, a smile touched her lips as she made a decision.

    She shared it with Ben and the boys after breakfast the next morning.  “I have decided we will have our Christmas party this evening after all.”

    “Hurray!”  Hoss shouted.  “Who’s coming?”

    “No one,” Ben muttered, casting a reproachful look at his wife.  “You know no one can get here.  It’s still coming down as if the heavens were a factory for snow.”

    “The people who are coming will not have to come through the snow,” Marie said.  “They are not our usual guests, but we have three men in the bunkhouse who would enjoy a party, I am sure.  We have been thinking only of ourselves, Ben, and that is not the true spirit of Christmas.”

    “Indeed not!” Ben smiled.  “Yes, we must have a party, for our boys and for our men.”

    “You think we have enough wood to heat the front room?”

    “We do,” Ben assured her.  “I was just taking extra precautions in case the storm lasted several days, as it still may, but we can spare enough for one evening, even if we spend another week in this kitchen.”

    “And can we put up a big tree, like before?” Hoss asked enthusiastically.

    Ben rolled his eyes, but declined to comment when he saw his son’s dejected face.  Ben had never had a Christmas tree when he was a boy, but to his sons it was an important symbol of the season.  He didn’t think he could provide one this year, but, at least, he wouldn’t mock the boys’ desire for it.

    “Now, I think you must excuse Hoss from his lessons this morning,” Marie began, “for there is much to be done.”

“Double hurray!” Hoss sang with glee.

“Yes,” Marie smiled, “I want to make the lebkuchen and gingercakes, as well, so I will need my two boys to help.”

    “Not good idea, Missy,” Hop Sing objected.  “Little boys not good help in kitchen.”

    “I want their help,” Marie said firmly.  Ben nodded, understanding that she meant the boys needed to be kept busy and playing with scraps of cookie dough was as good an option as she’d been able to imagine.

    “Good idea,” Ben said.  “I’ll take charge of setting up the front room for tonight.  You boys help your mother now.”

    “You bet, Pa,” Hoss grinned, “and we’ll sample all the goodies for you, in case you don’t get back in time.”

    “That’s very thoughtful, son,” Ben replied wryly.  He went into the front room and hurried into his coat, for without a fire the room was chilly.  “Let’s see,” he mused, his breath condensing in white puffs before his face, “four Cartwrights, three men from the bunkhouse and Hop Sing.  That’s eight.  Might as well leave the chairs around the table and all eat together.  No fiddler, so no need to clear space for dancing.”

    Ben smiled as his thoughts turned to his eldest son.  If Adam were here, they could dance to his strumming on the guitar.  Adam was the lucky one this Christmas, spending his holiday with the Paynes at Rancho Hermoso, nothing worse than rain to dampen his spirits——probably not even that.  It was too cold to stand around missing his boy, however.  Ben decided to pull the sofa and chairs closer to the fireplace, so everyone could sit near its warmth after they’d eaten.  He started to move the low table out of the way, then decided the men might like to play chess or checkers.  He set out the game board and pieces, then made a final inspection of the room.  “Doesn’t look too festive,” he muttered.

    He crossed to the alcove where his desk stood and looked out the window.  The snow was still falling, though it appeared to be slowing down.  Maybe he’d get lucky and be able to gather a few boughs before the party.  Satisfied he’d done all he could for now, Ben removed his coat and returned to the kitchen.

    Little Joe was standing in a chair by the work table, dish cloth tied around his neck, patting a wad of dough into a distinctly lumpy shape.  “Lookee, Pa, I’m cooking,” he announced.

    “Tasty looking treat,” Ben said, “but it’s kind of big, son.”

“Big cookie, just for Pa,” Little Joe declared.

“We will have others for the guests, won’t we?” Ben whispered as he drew near his wife’s ear.

She smiled and nodded.  “Don’t worry, we won’t touch your special cookie,” she promised, then tittered at the expression on Ben’s face.

    The noon meal consisted only of soup, for Marie and Hop Sing wanted to concentrate their efforts on refreshments for the party.  The snow finally stopped while they were eating, so Ben bundled up, determined to provide a little festive greenery.  He didn’t plan to go far, though, merely to strip a few limbs from nearby pines.

    Just south of the house he found what he was looking for, and gathered an armload.  As he started back, he spied a small pine, not as large as the tree they usually chopped down for Christmas Eve, but Ben though it might suffice today.  He piled the branches by the front door, then got his axe and went back to attack the trunk.

    Dragging it inside, Ben called out, “Hoss, get in here.”

    Hoss hustled in.  “You need me, Pa?”  He stopped when he saw the tree.  “You got one!” he cried.

    “Sure did,” Ben said brightly, “and I need your help if we’re to get it set up and decorated in time.  Put on your coat first, boy; I’ll light the fire, but it’ll take the room awhile to warm up.”

    While Ben laid a fire, Hoss, bundled in his coat, started to drag the tree to its usual spot between the fireplace and the stairs.  “No, Hoss, let’s put it closer to the dining room this year,” Ben suggested.  The smaller tree was dwarfed by the large space it had to fill near the stairs.  It looked better standing against the wall near the table.  “It’ll give extra light at dinner, too,” Ben said.

    “Yeah, that’s good,” Hoss agreed.

    “I’ll get the decorations,” Ben said, “and it’s probably warm enough in here now for Little Joe, if he wants to help.”

    “He’s asleep,” Hoss reported.

    “Just as well,” Ben chuckled.

    Between cooking and decorating and setting the table with their finest linen and crystal, the afternoon passed quickly for the Cartwrights.  When everything was ready, Marie had the boys dress in their best suits and she donned her favorite coral satin and jewels to make the occasion seem even more special for the men.  The three hands trooped in to supper decked out in their best, as well, obviously delighted to be the boss’s special guests.

    Only Hop Sing refused to take a seat at the table.  The little Cantonese, with his strict ideas of propriety, would not yield to anyone his right to serve the meal.  He and Marie had tried to make it a gala one.  The ham had been baked with a brown sugar glaze and was served with a sauce made from dried peaches.  There were candied sweet potatoes and white ones, too, layered and fried in a buttered skillet, then inverted on the serving platter, as well as boiled carrots in a creamy cheese sauce.  Mountains of yeast rolls waited to be slathered with butter and jam, and pickled beets and cucumbers rounded out the meal.

    When they’d all eaten their fill, Hop Sing brought in a chafing dish filled with rolled pancakes swimming in sauce.  To everyone’s amazement and the youngsters’ awestruck delight, Marie took a candle from the candelabra and touched the flame to the sauce.  The sauce, made with brandy, caught fire and burned for a few moments, then went out.  “Maybe we’d better not give the boys any of that!” Ben laughed.

    “Don’t be foolish,” Marie scolded.  “The alcohol burns out.”

    “Ain’t that, ma’am,” one of the hands joked.  “Them pancakes just look so delicious Mr. Cartwright wants ‘em all to hisself.”

    “You are right,” Marie smiled, “but you shall have the first crepes, Monsieur Johnson.”  The ranch hand smirked at his good fortune, knowing Ben could take a joke, while the other guests wished they had been quicker on the trigger with a jibe to earn first crack at those intriguing pancakes.  The two remaining hands didn’t have long to wait, however, for Marie served them next, then her two little boys and, lastly, the head of the house, who feigned great displeasure at having to wait.

    After dinner they adjourned to the sofa and chairs near the fire, where Hop Sing served coffee and cookies.  No one had room for anything else to eat then, but as the evening passed, the plate of cookies diminished visibly.  The men politely turned down Ben’s invitation to play checkers or chess.  “Ain’t had much to do in the bunkhouse except play checkers these last few days,” Lafe Johnson explained.

    “How about a songfest, then?” Ben suggested.  “Some good, old-fashioned Christmas carols to mark the occasion.”

    When the men nodded their approval, Marie smiled at Ben.  “You must lead us, mon mari.”

    “All right,” Ben chuckled, “but you tell me if I pitch it wrong.  Let’s start with——”

    “Joy to the World!” Hoss shouted.

    “His favorite,” Ben explained.  “Yes, son; we’ll start with that.”

    For nearly an hour voices, more or less tuneful, rang in songs remembered from happy years at childhood hearths.  The songs made everyone nostalgic, so Ben suggested they each share a favorite Christmas memory.  He began by describing the last Christmas he’d shared with his parents. “It didn’t differ from previous Christmases in any particular way,” Ben said, “but I cherish the memory because my parents died a couple of months later, and that Christmas was my last special memory of them.”

    “I have no memories of my parents,” Marie said.  “They died when I was very young, but the sisters at the orphanage always made Christmas a special time for us.  I remember most vividly being sent to bed right after supper on Christmas Eve, so that we might have a few hours sleep before being awakened to go to midnight mass.”

    “What’s that?” Hoss asked.

    “A service to welcome the birth of the Christ Child, mon chéri,” his mother explained.  “We would go to the church and sing an advent hymn at the very stroke of midnight.  We wanted our voices to be the first thing Christ heard on his birthday.”

    “Let’s do that tonight!” Hoss cried.

    His father arched an eyebrow.  “Are you saying you’d like to go to bed right away?”

    Hoss’s face fell.  “Aw, no, Pa.  I just want to get up at midnight, and so does Little Joe.”

    “Does he?” Ben laughed.  “Well, I’m afraid you boys can’t have it both ways.  Late to bed and early to rise makes boys too cranky to open a surprise.”

    “Surprise?” Little Joe queried, eyes brightening.

    “Tomorrow,” his mother whispered, snuggling him.  “What Christmas memory do you treasure, Monsieur Johnson?”

    “Reckon the last one, ma’am,” Lafe Johnson replied.  “Like Mr. Cartwright said, weren’t nothin’ real special about it, except I spent it with my wife.”

    “Where is she?” Ben asked.  “Back east?”

    “Naw, not that far,” Johnson cackled, “but might as well be.  She’s in California, and I been missin’ her a heap this Christmas season.”

    “Mais oui,” Marie murmured sympathetically.  “Do you have children, too?”

    “No, ma’am, ain’t been so blessed yet.  Seein’ your sweet younguns, though, makes me want to get back to my missus soon as the snow melts and start up a family.”

    Ben smiled fondly at his sons.  “Well, they’re on their best behavior tonight, of course, in expectation of Santa’s arrival.”

    “Sanna?” Little Joe lisped and looked at Hoss.  “Now?”

    “In the morning,” Hoss promised, then glanced significantly at his parents.  “Real early in the morning.”

    “Don’t you dare,” Ben warned with that significant arch of his eyebrow.  Then he chuckled.  No sense tryin’ to sleep in tomorrow.  Both boys were still sleeping in their parents’ room, so when they woke, Ben and Marie would, without fail, be awakened, as well.

    “I wanna share my favorite Christmas then,” Hoss announced.  “Can I go next?”

    “Wait for your elders, boy,” Ben said.

    “Oh, no, Señor,” Diego, their off-and-on Mexican ranch hand, remonstrated.  “We like to hear what the muchacho say.”

    “Sure,” Lafe Johnson agreed.  “Christmas is for younguns, Mr. Cartwright.”

    “All right,” Ben conceded, then chuckled.  “Which of your many Christmas memories is your favorite, Hoss?”

    “That first one in the old place,” Hoss replied quickly.  “I ‘member how you popped a big bowl of popcorn and read that ghost story to us.”

    “Story!” Little Joe cried.

    “What I remember,” Ben smiled, “is that you fell asleep with your hand in the popcorn and didn’t hear much of the story.”

    “Story!” Little Joe demanded.

    “Yeah, let’s hear that story, if you still got it,” the third hand suggested shyly.

    “Popcorn and all!” Hoss insisted.

    Ben looked at Marie and she nodded, so Ben found his copy of A Christmas Carol while she and Mr. Johnson popped huge quantities of the fluffy treat.  As Hoss had when Ben first read Dicken’s tale, Little Joe fell asleep before it was done, but the men and Hoss sat enthralled to the end.  Then, while Marie took the youngsters up to bed, Ben gave each of the men the small gift he’d purchased long before, as well as some hard candy, originally intended for young guests at the annual Christmas Eve party.

    After banking the fire and building one upstairs to keep them warm through the night, Ben brought gifts for the boys and Marie and put them under the tree.  Then he crawled into bed, knowing he’d get little sleep that night, but content that he’d made that Christmas a happy one for his men and his family.  With their help, what he’d thought would be a miserable day had turned into a memory he’d always cherish.

    The sun finally came out after an absence of two months on the first day of February.  There’d been a few clear days during that time, of course, but the sky remained overcast and threatening.  Ben always took advantage of the brief reprieves to ride out and inspect the herd, usually coming home discouraged.  Rarely did one of these trips not reveal the frozen carcass of at least one beef.  Between the animals lost to winter kill and those given to starving natives, the ranch was likely to show no profit whatsoever for the winter of 1859-1860.

    The losses would have been even greater but for the efforts of Ben’s foreman.  When Ben had finally gotten out of the house during the week between Christmas and New Year’s Day, he’d been surprised to find how well the cattle had fared.  Pushing on to the Montgomery cabin, he learned why.  Enos, with little regard for his own health, had gone out into the storm to make sure the cattle had sufficient feed.  The weakest ones he’d brought home on a rope, housed in his own barn and gone out to feed every day.

    As a result, the foreman lay in bed with a racking cough.  Though the sky looked menacing, Ben had volunteered to ride to Carson City for the doctor, but Katerina had insisted there was no need.  She trusted her mother’s folk remedies, and with their aid Enos eventually recovered, having suffered enough to heed his employer’s stern admonition to remember that people were more important than cattle.

    Marie took advantage of the first sunny day to boot both boys outdoors, and Little Joe happily constructed his first snowman with Hoss’s help.  The days continued fair, many of them almost as warm as summer, so the snowman didn’t survive its third day.  Soon the ground around the house was slushy, but Marie considered muddy floors a small price to pay for having the rowdy youngsters out from under foot.  Much as she loved her children, she’d seen too much of them this winter.

    With the return of warmer weather, both boys were banished from their parents’ bedroom.  Hoss went gladly, but Little Joe had grown fond of sleeping between them in the big bed and protested at the top of his lungs the return to his crib.  Hating to hear him cry, Marie almost relented, but Ben stood firm, even when he had to direct a “very necessary little talk” to his son’s buttocks.  The spanking softened the cries to a whimper, and Little Joe finally fell asleep.  Unfortunately, the “little talk” had to be repeated nightly for almost a week before the youngster seemed to retain its message.

    The Cartwrights eagerly began exchanging weekly visits with the Thomases, the first Sunday in Carson City and the second at the Ponderosa.  The nineteenth of February would have been Nelly’s turn to play hostess again, but the two families met the day before, instead, to celebrate Billy’s eighteenth birthday.

    Billy swooped a squealing Little Joe into the air when the toddler trotted into the house.  “Howdy, Short Shanks,” Billy teased.

    “Happy birthday,” Little Joe repeated by rote, having been schooled by Hoss on the trip into town.

    “Thanks, Short Shanks,” Billy chuckled.  “You aimin’ to help me eat my birthday cake, are you?”

    Little Joe grinned.  “I’ll help you, Billy, and Hoss will, too.”

“I reckon I could count on that!” Billy cackled, “seein’ as how we’re havin’ his favorite cake.”

    “Chocolate with white icing?” Hoss asked, blue eyes gleaming in anticipation.

    Little Joe tugged at Billy’s sleeve.  “My favorite, too, Billy.”

    “Is it now?” Billy laughed.  “Well, I’ll see to it you get the first slice, Short Shanks, else Big Boy here’ll likely eat it all up from you.”

    From the shelter of Billy’s arms, Little Joe glared ominously at his brother.

    “Aw, I wouldn’t do that,” Hoss muttered.  “Quit pickin’ on me, Billy.”

    “I’m entitled,” Billy grinned.  “It’s my birthday.”

    “Which may just entitle you to a birthday paddling,” Ben said with an upraised eyebrow, “if you don’t set that boy down and give your Uncle Ben a proper greeting.”

    Giving Little Joe’s backside a light swat, Billy let him down.  “Go upstairs and pester Inger awhile,” he suggested, and Little Joe, with Hoss tagging after, ran off in search of a new playmate.

    Ben gave Billy a bear hug and rubbed his knuckles across the boy’s scalp.

    “Ouch!” Billy yelped.  “Doggone it, Uncle Ben; that ain’t no way to tell a man ‘happy birthday.’  I reckon I’ll take the younguns back if that’s the best you can do.”

    “Man,” Nelly scoffed from the kitchen doorway.  “Just turned eighteen and full of himself today.”

    “As he should be, Nelly, as he should be,” Ben laughed.

    “Happy birthday, Billy,” Marie said, placing a gentle kiss on the boy’s cheek.  Billy flushed and offered to unhitch the Cartwright’s team.

    “On your birthday?” Ben chuckled.  “Hoss can see to that.”

    “Don’t seem to be around,” Billy grinned.  “Man has to work, even on his birthday, I reckon.  Seen you and Pa do it many a time.”

    Ben shook his head as the young man left.  “Billy sure seems to be emphasizing his manhood today,” he commented as he sat next to Clyde on the parlor sofa.  Marie hurried into the kitchen to help Nelly put the finishing touches on the meal.

    “What you fussin’ about?” Clyde snorted.  “I been listenin’ to such as that all mornin’.”

    “You have the latest issue of the Enterprise?” Ben asked.

    “Yeah,” Clyde grunted, “but you’d be better off waitin’ ‘til after dinner to read it.”

    “Why’s that?”

    “Might spoil your appetite,” Clyde muttered sourly.  “Looks like we’re in for more injun trouble.”

    “Oh, no,” Ben groaned.  “Now what?”

    “Trouble up Susanville way,” Clyde replied.  “Might as well read it, I reckon.  Half the tale really will twist you in knots.”

    “That it will,” Ben said, taking the paper from his friend.  He scanned the front page articles quickly, then went back to read in greater detail the account of the murder of Dexter Demming, a settler in Honey Lake Valley and the subsequent manhunt for the Indians believed responsible.

    He tossed the paper aside in disgust.  “Why do they always assume the Paiutes are to blame?” Ben demanded, more of the air than of the man beside him.  On learning of the murder, Governor Roop had sent two men as emissaries to Numaga, war chief of the Paiutes, to demand an explanation and to ask why his people were not keeping the treaty made with the Honey Lakers.

    “Why do you always assume they ain’t?” Clyde asked pointedly.

    “Aw, Clyde, don’t start that,” Ben growled.

    “Look, Ben, I ain’t sayin’ that your friend Winnemucca had anything to do with it,” Clyde argued, “but the way I read that paper, Smoke River Sam’s bunch has turned renegade, broken away from Winnemucca’s control.  They’re the ones I think did the killin’.”

    Ben nodded gravely.  “Yeah, looks that way, since the tracks led to their camp, and some of the stolen supplies were found near there.  But Numaga’s the one Roop tried to hold responsible.”

    “And he weren’t none too cooperative, either,” Clyde asserted, “tellin’ Roop he wouldn’t bring the other chiefs to Susanville to talk it over.”

    Ben’s head came up quickly.  “How cooperative would you be, if you were accused of a crime you knew nothing about?  A crime committed by people not under your control?  Remember what happened when the Paiutes “cooperated” back in ’57.  I can understand Numaga’s wanting to avoid that kind of catastrophe, but it’s this demand he’s reported to have made for $16,000 to pay for the Honey Lakers’ land that seems out of character.”

    “You think it ain’t so?”

    Ben shook his head.  “No, Weatherlow’s a reliable man.  I have to accept his word, but it just doesn’t make sense.  What would the Paiutes do with that kind of money?”

    “Buy guns, maybe?” Clyde asked, his brow wrinkling.  “Roop seems to think the Paiutes are plannin’ war——Weatherlow, too.”

    Shaking his head, Ben picked up the paper and read again the words of Governor Roop, stating that the settlers of Honey Lake were “about to be plunged into a bloody and protracted war.”  Dear God, no, he prayed. Spare us that.  Spare our red brothers that.

    Primarily for Billy’s sake, Ben managed to set aside his concerns when Nelly called them to dinner.  He didn’t want to see the boy’s birthday tarnished with words of war.  Instead, he asked Billy how things were going up at the mines.  “Have they started prospecting again with this break in the weather?”

    “Probably,” Billy said, “but I ain’t been up there for a couple of months.  I think I’m through with mining, Uncle Ben.”

    “Finally come to his senses,” Clyde cackled.

    “Looking for a job?” Ben asked.  “I’m short of hands.”

    “Naw, I reckon I’ll stay here and help put in the crops,” Billy answered.  “Then, come spring, I may do some haulin’ for Mr. Curry.”

    “You’d be good at that,” Ben smiled, “and there should be a tremendous demand for supplies, the way the territory’s booming.”

    “Yeah, and the sooner the passes clear, the better,” Clyde commented.  “I expect there’s folks goin’ hungry up to Gold Hill.  Most of ‘em didn’t lay in supplies like we warned ‘em to.”

    “Fools,” Ben muttered.  “I didn’t tell you, but I spotted a couple of rustlers butchering a beef on the Ponderosa.”

    “You lynch ‘em?” Clyde asked mischievously.

    “Clyde!” Nelly screeched.  “You know better.”

    “Sure do,” Clyde grinned.  “Knowin’ old Ben, he probably made them rustlers a gift of the meat.”

    “Well, almost,” Ben admitted.  “The cow was already dead, and scrawny to boot, but it wasn’t an outright gift.  I took a few feet of their claim in exchange.”

    Clyde tipped back his chair and guffawed.  “Like I said, you made a gift of that meat!”

    Ben chuckled.  “Probably, but you never know.  They just might hit a rich vein and make me a millionaire, my friend.”

    “Oh, Ben, what nonsense,” Marie chided.  “You know you did it because you could not see men go hungry.”

    “Been hungry too many times myself, I guess,” Ben smiled.  “I’ll deal with any man in need of food, but I won’t tolerate rustling.”

    Billy couldn’t contain himself any longer.  “Just think, Uncle Ben.  After all the times you made fun of me minin’, you end up in the business yourself!”

    Ben wagged a finger at Billy from across the table.  “You, young man, are just asking for that birthday paddling I offered you earlier.”

    Over the next few weeks, however, Ben found himself more involved in the mining business that he’d dreamed possible.  Hearing of his generosity with those first rustlers, other miners made their way to the Ponderosa, hat in hand, to ask for similar consideration.  Those who could, paid cash, but Ben couldn’t turn away a hungry man, even if all he received in return was a worthless stock certificate.  After all, he told himself, he was investing in the future of a man and in the future of the territory.  Before the passes through the Sierra Nevadas opened, Ben found himself the owner of a few feet in a good many claims on Sun Mountain.  Most would never amount to much, but Ben held on to the stock and, over the years, earned enough in dividends to justify his investment of trust in his fellow man.

    Even before the passes were open, thousands of Californians, responding to Washoe fever, tried to break a trail through the snow.  Few succeeded.  The wise ones turned back when they found the way impassable; others, mad for silver, pressed on and paid for their obstinacy with the loss of legs and feet.  Broken wagons, discarded packs, and dead animals littered the route, telling a grim tale of devastated dreams.

    When the road finally opened, it quickly became so clogged with travelers coming east that almost nothing headed the other direction could get through.  In Sacramento, Adam Cartwright couldn’t understand why no mail arrived from his heretofore faithful family and began to fear the recent rumors of an Indian uprising were perilously true.  A news article in the Sacramento Bee explained the situation just in time to prevent his joining the serpentine line writhing its way across the Sierras.

    Billy headed a team toward Placerville, intending to bring back a wagonload of supplies, but he got no further than Strawberry before he found himself fighting a losing battle.  Even freighters headed with the general flow of traffic were finding the going rough, and the hungry miners of Sun Mountain had to tighten their belts another notch because food simply couldn’t reach them.  Ben began to wonder if his own supplies would hold out until fresh ones arrived.  He’d bought more than usual, in expectation of a hard winter, but if this craziness continued, even that might not be enough.

    At last a wagon made it through the melee to Virginia City, and miners rushed from all directions, determined to purchase at any price whatever food it held.  To their disappointment, that first wagon contained nothing but blankets, tin plates and a consignment of liquor.  Even whiskey would warm their empty bellies, however, and Moore, the man who owned it, took in two hundred dollars the first night, as well as renting blankets and sleeping space in his hastily erected saloon to forty men for a dollar apiece.

    Fortunately, the second wagon brought flour, quickly auctioned off for five dollars a pound.  Some of the miners were so hungry they mixed the flour with snow and ate it raw.  The Cartwrights didn’t barter for any of it.  They had enough food to wait, in hope of better prices, for Billy’s wagon to return.  When the young man finally arrived, however, they discovered that even a fair price was higher than they were accustomed to paying.  Flour now went for seventy-five cents a pound, bacon for forty and coffee was a luxury at fifty.  As for hay and lumber, their prices made Ben deeply thankful that he grew his own on the Ponderosa.

    Curiosity sent Ben, with Hoss as companion, on an exploration of Virginia City one Saturday morning.  Hoss found the growing town exciting, although to Ben’s more experienced eye, the place looked like a hodgepodge thrown together by a committee who hadn’t consulted each other in the planning.  Here and there a frame shanty had been tossed onto the side of the mountain, but most of the miners lived in, at best, tents of varied construction.  The better ones were made of canvas, but blankets, brush, potato sacks, and even old shirts made acceptable building material, in lieu of expensive lumber.  Empty whiskey bottles served as makeshift chimneys.  Down the social scale from these more fortunate residents were the miners who simply usurped a coyote’s hole or dug one similar and called it home.

    “Hey, Pa, they got hotels,” Hoss cried excitedly.  “Look at that one!”

    Ben followed his son’s pointing finger and snorted at the one-story building of planks whipsawed from local timber.  It couldn’t have held more than a dozen rooms, but it boasted a prestigious name, painted by a rough hand on its signboard.  “International Hotel, my eye!  Well, at least, they’ve got ambition, giving it a name like that.”  Ambition that would ultimately develop from that simple beginning to a hotel truly deserving of its name, though only its owners could see that bright future when the International Hotel first opened its doors in March.

    “Three streets worth of shanties,” Ben reported to his wife upon their return.  “It’ll never amount to anything.”

    Marie just laughed.  “You said that about the silver strikes, too, mon mari, and yet people continue to come.  You are not establishing much reputation as a prophet!”

    Ben grinned.  “I’m not, am I?  Well, maybe good will come of it yet.  I hope so.”  As spring progressed, however, the only benefit Ben saw to the thousands flooding into the area was the improvement of the Old Emigrant Road made by the freighters and stage line owners.  Avalanches and the neglect of time had virtually destroyed the old road to Placerville, but if things continued as they were, by summer it should easily accommodate four-horse teams.

    April was a month of contrasts, comprising highs of exhilaration and lows of loss.  Even the weather had its ups and downs, for after three weeks of beautiful, sunny, spring-like days, snow fell again on the fourth day of the month.  It melted quickly as the day warmed, but before the moisture could evaporate, night came with temperatures cold enough to refreeze the melting snow.  The next morning the ground was again white with fresh snow over the ice, and the pattern repeated itself day after day:  ground icy in the morning, muddy by noon and slick with ice again by nightfall.  Miserable, Marie lost her temper and demanded of the heavens when spring would ever come, then wished she had a priest to whom to confess.

    Ben and Hoss took the weather with better grace, perhaps because they were able to work outside while Marie was confined indoors with a petulant Little Joe.  Or it might have been the anticipation of the arrival of the first Pony Express rider that consumed their thoughts and made them forget the cruel weather.  The rider was supposed to have left St. Joseph, Missouri, on the third of April and planned to reach the West Coast in ten days.  “News from the East in ten days!  Just imagine,” Ben had enthused when he first heard of the new postal service.  “We won’t feel cut off from the world anymore——not with news traveling that fast!”

    Three of the pockets in the Pony rider’s mochila would remain locked until he reached Sacramento, but one, Ben had heard, would carry mail to be dropped off or picked up in transit.  He hoped that his Missouri friend, Josiah Edwards, or his brother John would send him a letter by the very first Pony, but even if he didn’t get any personal mail, the rider was bound to have news from back east.  Hoss begged to come along, and Little Joe took up the cry, too.  He didn’t really understand what the commotion was all about, but he always hated being left out and, besides, he’d have been in favor of anything that let him escape his mother’s protective confinement in the house.

    In the end, everyone went, for Marie wanted a chance to visit with her friends, if nothing else.  The men lounged on the street or in the plaza, feeling the occasion momentous enough to warrant the suspension of work.  Ben kept the boys with him to free his wife to visit her friend Laura Ellis at the bakery.

    Just before 2:30 that afternoon, Billy Thomas, who’d stationed himself outside town as lookout, charged down the main street, yelling at the top of his lungs, “Pony’s comin’!”  The loud announcement and the commotion that ensued brought his mother running to the porch.  Marie and Laura dashed out from the bakery.

    Billy spotted his father and swung off his roan next to him.  “Any minute now,” he grinned.

    Ben, standing beside Clyde, swung Little Joe up to sit on his shoulders.  “Get a good look at history in the making, boy,” he said, then looked down at his side.  “You, too, Hoss.”

    “Yes, sir, I aim to!” Hoss whooped back.

    As Billy’d promised, they didn’t have long to wait.  A bugle sounded, and at near blinding speed a wiry mustang raced down the street to the relay station.  A young man dressed in the Pony Express company uniform of red shirt and blue britches swung off his horse and threw the locked moquila full of letters onto a new mount.  The only mail dropped in Carson City was an eastern newspaper.  Within two minutes the rider was off again, headed for Genoa.

    The men and women of Carson City crowded around the stationmaster, hoping for a crumb of news from the outside world.  “Best news there could be,” the stationmaster hollered to make sure everyone heard him.  “Congress has introduced a bill to create Nevada Territory!”  He held the newspaper up for all to see the bold headline.  A shout of exultation went up from the crowd.

    Still carrying his youngest on his back, Ben turned away, satisfied with the fruit of his long ride into town.  He smiled down at Hoss, walking at his side as they headed back to Clyde and Nelly’s place to pick up their buckboard and team.  “Well, what did you think, boy?” he asked.

    “I wanna be a Pony Rider, Pa!” Hoss declared.  “They ride like the wind!”

    Ben laughed.  “You’re a mite young, son.”

    “And a mite hefty,” Billy teased.  “Me, on the other hand, I’m just the right size and age.  I got me a notion to sign up straight away.”

    “You’d better get a notion not to,” his mother scolded.

    “Aw, Ma,” Billy groaned.  “You’re always frettin’ over nothin’.”

    “Wouldn’t say nothin’, boy,” Clyde inserted.  “It’s a dangerous job, especially for them that rides through Paiute country.”

    “Yeah, there’s a reason their advertisements say, ‘Orphans preferred,’ Billy,” Ben added soberly.  Then he grinned.  “Still, if I were your age, I think I’d want to be part of something this exciting, too, so I can’t fault you.”

    “Well, I can!” Nelly snorted.  “Put it right out of your head, boy.”

    Little Joe tugged at his father’s ear.  “Pa, Pa,” he uttered insistently.

    Ben pulled the boy’s fingers from his aching lobe.  “You’ve got my attention, son,” he muttered wryly.

    “Pa, I wanna ride, too,” Little Joe declared urgently.

    Ben guffawed.  “For the Pony Express?  I know they don’t take riders that young!”

    “I be good rider, Pa, please,” Little Joe pleaded.  “You get me horse?”

    “Well, let’s see how well you stay on a real bucking bronc,” Ben laughed and started toward the Thomas house at a trot.  Little Joe, squealing with delight, kicked his pony’s flanks.  “Ouch!  Cut that out!” the pony yelled.

    Billy came running up behind them.  “Time to change mounts, like a real Pony rider, Little Joe.”

    Ben chuckled and swung his son over to Billy’s shoulders.  “Take him, by all means,” he said, “while his old mount takes a well-deserved rest.”  While Billy, not much more than an overgrown youngster himself, romped with the little boy, Ben slowed his steps to give the rest of the party a chance to catch up.

    “You folks are stayin’ to dinner, ain’t you?” Nelly queried.

    “Now, Nelly, we already took lunch here,” Marie chided.

    “Yeah, we need to get home,” Ben said, sitting on his friends’ porch step, “but I need a brief rest first.  This old horse isn’t used to that kind of exercise.”

    Clyde flopped beside him on the step, grinning.  “Pretty good little rider you got there, though.  Hung on right good.”

    “Yeah, he’ll make a good one, when the time comes,” Ben responded proudly.

    Clyde cackled.  “It’s gonna come quicker than you think, I bet.  You better be on the lookout for a mount for that youngun.”

    Ben scoffed.  “He’s not three years old yet.”

    “Almost,” Marie smiled.  “Just one more month.  Laura wants to bake him a cake and make a little party at her house.”

    “Sounds fine, but he is not getting a horse for a birthday present,” Ben said firmly.

    “Mais non!” Marie agreed quickly.  “He is much too young.”

    “You better get set to listen to some bawlin’, then,” Hoss warned.  “He don’t like bein’ told no.”

    Ben arched an eyebrow.  “In that case, what he’s likely to get for his birthday is a ‘very necessary little talk.’”

    “Pa, you wouldn’t!” Hoss protested.

    Ben chuckled.  “Probably not.  No, he’d have to be pretty naughty to earn a spanking on his birthday.”  Before Little Joe’s birthday arrived, however, events in the territory would ensure that there’d be no birthday celebration at all for the toddler that year.

    “You boys had best be comin’ down from there,” Molly Maguire called up toward the roof, “else you’ll not be feedin’ at me table tonight!”

    “Who needs food tonight, Miss Molly!” Adam Cartwright called down from his lofty perch.

    “Be an angel and save us a plate,” another boy pleaded.  “You know we can’t miss a sight like this!”

    “I’m promisin’ nothing,” Molly said as she headed back toward the kitchen, feeling disgruntled because she had no acceptable way to see what the boys were so earnestly expecting.  Other ladies in town had strategically placed themselves on balconies to await the arrival, but the boardinghouse had none.

    Deciding no one was coming to supper on time anyway, Molly set the food off the stove and headed up to the top floor, hoping she could see something from a window.  “Wish I was a man,” she muttered.  “I’d climb up with the lads, I would.”

    “Hope she does feed us after,” Harold Lissome, Adam’s roommate, said.  “My stomach’s rumbling.”

    “She will,” Adam assured his friend.  “Miss Molly has a heart as big as all Erin.”

    “Yeah, she does,” Harold agreed.  “She won’t let her boys go hungry.”

    “Wish I’d had my horse here,” Adam sighed.  “I’d sure like to have ridden out to meet the Pony rider.”  About eighty people, in addition to the Sacramento Hussars, had met at Old Fort Sutter and lined both sides of the road the Pony rider would follow.

    “Look!” Harold yelled, leaning forward to point at a cloud of dust moving toward them down J Street.

    In his excitement Adam almost lost his footing.  “It’s them!” he cried as a horseman carrying a small flag dashed past, followed by about thirty other riders, leading the way for the long-awaited Pony.  Bells from church steeples and fire stations rang all around the city.  A cannon from the square on Tenth Street boomed nine times, signifying the number of days they’d waited for the Pony rider, and was echoed by the discharge of other firearms from the roofs lining the street where the Pony would pass.  Men without guns waved their hats and ladies their handkerchiefs, and the boys on the roof of the boardinghouse, having no other way to express their enthusiasm, stood and waved their arms and shouted as only boys could.  Amid the roar of the crowd, the red-shirted rider galloped up to the Pony Express office, having brought the mail through from St. Joseph in one hour less than the ten days promised.

    “Let’s get down to the Post Office,” Adam suggested.

    “Not me,” Harold laughed.  “I’m starving, and I’m not expecting mail from back east.”

    “Yeah, well, maybe I am,” Adam declared.  “My friend Jamie’s at school in St. Louis, and I’ll bet he wrote me!”

    “Wouldn’t that be something?” Harold grinned.  “One of the first letters to come by Pony Express!  Yeah, that’d be worth seeing.  I’ll go with you, but let’s snatch a couple of rolls from the kitchen first.”

    “Good idea,” Adam agreed.

    Each taking two rolls, the two boys raced from the kitchen down J Street.  The sidewalk in front of the express office was crowded, but Adam and Harold pressed through, squeezing into spaces too small for adult bodies, and soon Adam was asking if there were a letter for him.

    “Not likely, son,” the postal clerk laughed.  “Only six letters in the pouch.  Now, who’d be paying five dollars to write a young lad like you?”

    Adam gulped.  He hadn’t realized the rates were that high.  Unless Jamie had a lot more pocket money than Adam did, he wasn’t likely to squander five dollars on a letter.

    Seeing him turn away, Harold grabbed his arm.  “You’re not giving up, are you?”  Then he stared the postal clerk down.  “You check, mister; the name’s Adam Cartwright.”

    “All right, all right,” the clerk conceded, flipping through the thin envelopes.  “Well, I’ll be,” he mumbled, then held out a letter.  “Looks like someone thinks a powerful lot of you, son.  Got a girl back east, have you?”

    Adam just grinned and shook his head.  He didn’t figure it was any of the clerk’s business who was writing him.  As he and Harold walked back toward the boardinghouse, Adam broke open the seal on the letter and gobbled up its contents.

Dear Adam,

I hope your father won’t be too disappointed.  Father and I could only afford to send one letter by express, and he was kind enough to let me be the one.  Isn’t it exciting to think how much closer you and I are becoming, in terms of time, at least?  I am enjoying my studies this term, much more so than last, perhaps because my health has been better.  It always is once winter is past.  Have you thought about coming back east to further your education once you graduate from the academy?  I am thinking about either Harvard or Princeton.  Wouldn’t it be grand if we could attend the same university?  We always studied well together.  Do think about it and write me your thoughts.  I always enjoy your letters, especially the ones you write from the Ponderosa.  I guess you’ll be going there within a few weeks of receiving this letter.  Write me from there and tell me all the adventures of those little brothers of yours.  Having no siblings myself, I always find your tales of their antics amusing.

Your friend,
Jamie Edwards

    Adam laughed.  “I always keep Jamie’s letters in a safe place.  His journals, too.  They’re special to me, even without the history attached.  Say, why don’t I treat you to dinner out, to celebrate the occasion?”

    “Good idea,” Harold said.  “I have a feeling we won’t be in Miss Molly’s good graces tonight.”

    “I have the same feeling,” Adam chuckled.  “Good thing for us she’s a forgiving woman.”  Arm in arm, the two friends headed for one of the less expensive restaurants of Sacramento.