Summary: This is the
story of Jane Halcrow and the way she met and fell in love with Adam Cartwright?
Does she marry him? Not if Laura Dayton has anything to do about it,
but then….?! Read the story to find out………………
SLIPPING THROUGH MY FINGERS!
Author: Krystyna Woollon. August 2002
Chapter 1 - 1847
“Come here, darling?”
I was cold, standing beside my bed in my nightgown, with the cold seeping
up my legs from the draughts that came through the floor boards of my little
bedroom. I turned and looked at her and smiled, happy to be close
to her, and to feel her warmth against my body. I cuddled close and
shivered, surprised I suppose, at realising that her body was cold too.
She held me very tightly for a while with her arm around me, pressing me
close to her. I could smell the faint sweet smell of lavender which
she wore in her clothes, as well as the smell of her body. I could
feel the rythmn of her heart beat and the occasional shiver that trickled
through her and which made me feel, for some inexplicable reason, frightened.
I looked up into her face and realised she was not looking down at me with
her usual smile, but was staring hard at the wall in front of her, so I turned
my head to look too…but she was not looking at the picture either, she was
just staring, and her mouth was set, as though what she was about to say would
not come through her lips easily
“Are you cold, my sweet?” she whispered
“Not so much now.”
She drew me in closer, almost as though she wanted my body to merge into
hers and become one whole being…then she sighed and looked at the wall
again.
“Jane….I have to tell you something” she lowered her voice, although why
I did not understand, after all, we were all alone in the house and suddenly
that foreboding took shape in my heart again and I clutched involuntarily
at her hand and shivered for her fingers were icy cold. “I want you
to listen and pay attention to what I have to say, darling.”
I nodded, and my eyes fixed upon the gold band on her finger. It gleamed
dully in the glow of the candle close to us on the little table, but I could
not release my eyes from its simplicity, and the wealth of meaning it held.
A thin gold band on a thin worn finger – and I shivered and forced myself
to look away and stare at something else instead. I chose the candle
flame, which danced in the draughts and seemed warm and merry.
“Jane….this is very hard for me to tell you, but …but I am going to go away”
“Go away?” I frowned. I could feel the constriction in my head, and
the furrow over my eyes and the dancing flame of the candle now became menacing
and bleak “Go where ?”
“A very long way away……” her voice was very soft now, hardly discernible,
and I had to strain my ears to hear the words. I felt her tremble again
and drew closer to her
“But where? Where are you going? Can’t I come too?” I
pulled away from her and turned to look into her face, accusing her and begging
her…my eyes searched her face and all I could see was her love for me, and
something terrible in her eyes. “Can’t I come, mummy?”
“No, no, my darling…” she touched my face with her fingers, tracing a strand
of hair with her forefinger, gently folding it back behind my ear. “I can’t
take you on this journey, my sweet.”
“Is it so far away then?”
“Far too far away, precious.” she looked away as though the thought hurt
her, and I felt a tightness in my chest which made my throat ache and hurt
and my head ached and felt a strange prickly sensation “Jane, you are going
to have to be very brave…” and she took hold of my face and turned it towards
her so that we looked at one another very closely.
I remembered the last time she came and told me to be very brave, and that
was when she came and told me papa would not be coming home. We had
sat on the edge of the bed together, just like now, and she had held me and
looked at me and said “You are going to have to be very brave, we both are….”
I took a deep breath and nodded. I knew what she was not going to
tell me, I knew what she would have wanted to say but could not find the
words to say it. I stared into her face and drank in every feature.
My eyes devoured the slant of her eyes, and the deep blue of them, and the
shadows so dark in their sockets. I wanted to always always be able
to remember the funny shape of her nose and the high cheekbones and the soft
silky feel of her hair when it was loose, like this, over her shoulders,
and glowing so pale and creamy in the candlelight. I wanted to hold
the memory of her lips smiling, the shape of them, the fullness of them,
as they were now and the stubborn square of her chin with the little cleft
not quite in the centre…oh, my mummy, I never wanted to forget you….I fell
upon her now and held her close and tried not to cry because I knew that
would make it harder for her. This was the beginning of being brave…..
“On Wednesday you are going to have to leave here” she said very gently
and I could feel her hand stroking my hair, which, like hers, was very fine
and blonde. I closed my eyes and squeezed them tight to keep them dry.
So soon? Wednesday? Two days away…”You have to go on a long journey
too, my poppet. Your Aunt and Uncle are – are going to care for you
and see you are educated like a young lady, and grow up safe and well!”
I knew then I was going to have to be brave all right! Aunt
and Uncle! They had twin boys several years older than myself.
Arthur and Richard. They hated me and I hated them. I didn’t
even like aunt and uncle very much either come to that……I took a deep breath
just to show a little resentment, but that was all. I had to
be brave because – because otherwise I would scream and shout my protests
for the whole neighbourhood to hear and I would sob and cry and cry………what
could anyone expect from a ten year old girl?
“Mummy, are you really sure I can’t come with you?” I whispered as she held
me very close. I could feel her collar bone. It jarred against
my flesh as she held me. I had not realised before how thin she was….”Mummy,
please let me come with you?” and I looked up and tried not to cry, but one
tear eked out and trickled down my cheek
“Jane – Jane –“ she whispered and pulled me closer to her “Oh my Jane, you
are my world, my world. I have to do what is best for you, darling…..understand…try
and understand?”
I tried. In that brief instant of time I did try….I was ten years
old and was soon to leave my home. I was not going to see mama ever
again. I had, only two years before, lost my dearest papa. I
was going to have to live with my aunt and uncle……..and Arthur and Richard.
“Mummy, I love you…I love you…” Oh, yes, I love you…and I squeezed my eyes
so tightly, so tightly, so that not one more tear peeped out to betray my
turbulent heart.
“Aunt and Uncle have everything arranged and you’ll have such a lovely room
and clothes. They said you could have a pony of your own
too….that will be so much better than the pretend one you ride in the wash
room, won’t it?” her voice was brittle with pretend gaity and I hated it,
but I had to hold on and listen because time was precious now. Even
at my age, I knew time with her was very, very precious. “You won’t
have to take anything much with you, just a few of your favourite things….and
daddy’s fiddle!”
Oh, my heart, my heart…it broke and it hurt so! My daddy’s
fiddle…I made a funny odd sound in my throat in an attempt not to cry out
loud and she held me closer and her bones stuck into me
“There will be a letter waiting for you when you get to your uncles” she
said very gravely and then she took my face between her hands and looked
seriously deep into my eyes “Jane Victoria Halcrow…I want you to live a happy
life, a long life, I want you to read books, travel the world, marry and be
happy, and have many, many children. I want you never to forget that
daddy and I always always loved you….” She stopped and I knew she could
not say anymore unless she cried so I put my arms around her neck and held
her close “Good night, darling, may God bless you!”
So I slipped into bed and she left the room and closed the door behind her
leaving the sweet smell of lavender drifting about the room like a wraith.
I closed my eyes and hot tears flooded down my face and I hid my face in the
pillow so that she would not hear me, although I knew for a certainty that
in her room, she was doing exactly the same.
I do not recall falling asleep but I woke up in the morning wondering whether
or not I had had a terrible dream. It was only when I saw my mother
sitting in her chair with her shawl about her and writing endless letters
through out the day that I knew it was something true and something I was
going to have to face, and on my own. I clung to her, sat
by her side, begged her to read to me, asked if I could read to her…in those
last few hours I was a thorough nuisance to her…but I dreaded to give her
up too easily.
And then it was Wednesday.
Chapter 2
Oh the tedium of the journey. Wednesday was a blur. I
sat on my seat on the train with my nose against the window and watched until
mother was gone…until she had disappeared from distance and the smoke and
grit from the trains engines chimney had swallowed her up from my sight.
I sat on my seat and let the tears fall unheeded, blotching my already swollen
unsightly face and my grey worsted coat. I snivelled and sobbed,
and wept and wailed until the conductor came and sat with me for a while and
then had to ask an elderly woman to come and sit by my side and give me some
comfort.
Thursday and I sat all day hugging my fathers violin case and with my eyes
shut trying to remember her face, and my father..and happy times together.
The memories were elusive and I was eventually in tears again. I must
have been an embarressingly awful passenger.
Friday and the train jogged on to its destination with a dogged determination
to arrive with all passengers intact. That included me!
I slept, dozed, and stared out at the views that seemed to flash neverendingly
before my bloodshot swollen eyes. I was a miserable creature,
and must have looked it.
Saturday and we stopped for a long time at some station or other.
Some passengers, including my lady comforter, who gave me some candy and told
me to ‘keep my chin up’, left the train and watching them meant that I did
not notice the new passengers get on board. After a little while
I fell into a light slumber.
“Steady up!”
A firm strong hand gripped my arm and I realised, even as I slowly awoke,
that I was being moved. I opened my eyes and looked up and saw
a boys face looking down at me. In that instant of not being quite awake
and still holding onto sleep nothing seemed real and it was as though I was
drowning into his eyes. Does that sound very strange? I find
it hard to describe, just that his eyes were so captivating, so beautiful
and warm, that I felt as though my very being was drawn up and swallowed down
into the depths of those eyes.
I must have stared at him too long for he gave a little laugh that woke
me up fully and I screwed my eyes up and blinked and then looked about me.
I was still on the train, still jogging along to Princeton, but had fallen
asleep and had, apparently, been about to fall onto the floor, but the young
man, for he was not really a boy, had prevented me from doing so and had lifted
me up more securely onto my seat. My knight errant!
I rubbed my face and eyes and realised that my mouth was very dry.
I also realised that I must have looked very shabby and travel weary and glanced
over at him. He was sitting opposite me, but hidden now from view.
He was reading a book. I screwed up my eyes to read the title
“An Anthology of Modern Poets”.
My eyes travelled downwards…he had long legs encased in very creased trousers,
not too well cut either. His boots were not city made, although good
and sturdy. I had seen some people from the western states wearing
boots like it, when they passed through my home town, which was not often.
I suppose that is why I could recall them so well, as they had stood out so
amongst our local people with their smart well cut clothes. Even the
poorest of us wore clothes that were different from the casual wear of the
westerner.
My eyes now travelled upwards and I thought that his hands were very pleasant.
I liked his hands. The fingers were well shaped and his nails were clean
and well defined. They were gentle strong and capable hands. I
looked up higher and realised that he was now surveying me….but now I could
see his face fully and suddenly my head went prickly again and I thought I
was going to faint.
“Would you like a drink?” his voice was deep, his accent different from
where I came from, but pleasant. “You look thirsty?”
I nodded. My tongue had seemed to have swollen in my mouth.
I could not speak and wondered if I would be able to open my mouth to drink
whatever he had to offer me….as it was I managed well enough and did not spill
any of the cool water that he gave me in a small metal cup.
“The conductor will be here soon, if you ask him he’ll get you something
to drink to refresh you properly!” he smiled and I noticed that his teeth
were crooked. That was good. I liked his teeth. They
were strong teeth and white and clean. Sometimes people had the
most awful looking teeth and although his were a bit crooked here and there,
it was obvious he took care of them. When he smiled it was
nice too, although he seemed a boy who was not used to smiling, for there
was an air of self consciousness about the way he smiled.
I looked at him thoughtfully and nodded, still not trusting myself to speak,
in case the words came out too gruff or maybe, even worse, I might burst into
tears – again!
“I’ll tell you what, how about we both go down to the dining car together
and get something to eat?” he leaned forward towards me as he spoke, his dark
brown eyes looked into my face and I could see twin reflections of myself
looking back at me….it was not a pretty sight!
But what lovely eyes. Soft and golden and brown with deep black
iris’. They made me think of syrup, golden and sweet and dripping
onto the warm toast mother used to make….I swallowed back tears and just bleakly
nodded. He had long lashes. I envied him them.
They were thick and dark, unlike mine, blonde, sparse, and stubby. He
had,like myself, myriads of freckles over his face, but his merged very nicely
into the golden tan of his skin whereas mine, well…so clearly defined that
a child could have counted every single one as easily as winking.
All told he had a very handsome face. It was at the stage of
maturing nicely…but the little boy he had once been was still discernible.
When I did not immediately answer he looked a little confused, as though he
were unsure what else etiquette would expect of him, so he sat back and picked
up his book.
“Yes, please…” I blurted out
He lowered the book and looked at me and smiled again. Just a shy
smile. I didn’t want him to hide behind that book again, so I
smiled back. It was a strange thing that happened. I had resisted
smiling and wanting to be happy for days now, and suddenly I was smiling
at a complete stranger and the whole world shifted and seemed suddenly different.
“I’m glad!” and he nodded as though to emphasise the words “My name’s Adam
Cartwright”and he extended his hand towards me.
It was such a grown up thing to do and here I was, all alone on this train
and about to shake hands with a real growing up boy. I smiled again
and put my hand into his and he shook it, firmly but gently. I withdrew
my hand and looked at it as it returned to my lap as though under its very
own violition. It looked just the same as usual but I knew it was not….something
had happened when his fingers had touched mine. Just a warm tingle that
trickled right up my arm and to my heart.
Someone told me once that the ancient Romans believed there was a special
vein that went from the ring finger on the left hand right to the heart, which
was why they wore wedding rings there…and that was what it felt like…something
warm coursing through that vein and touching my heart.
He was looking at me as though expecting me to speak and I realised that
I had to give him my name, so I did so, very gravely “My name is Jane Victoria
Halcrow” and I took a deep breath and exhaled.
“I like that, it’s a good strong name!” he said thoughtfully, with just
a little crease furrowing above his black eyebrows and he made me smile again,
as though there really was something special about MY name? And
he didn’t say something nonsensical either, like “Oh, what a pretty name…”
like some would, he really sounded interested. “How old are you, Miss
Halcrow?”
I looked into his face and into his eyes, looked to see if he were teasing
me or being patronising as some are, but his eyes were steady, and looked
into mine, as though he understood exactly how I felt and so I told him “I
was ten in January”
He nodded and again his brow furrowed, and a curl of black hair slipped
over his forehead and he brushed it impatiently away
“I have two brothers” he volunteered, in a kind of rush, as though he thought
that would be the best way to start a conversation and I thought, perhaps
he’s shy, after all, he was only a boy! “One is six years younger than
me, so that makes him a year older than you.”
I smiled and nodded, no wonder he understood how to talk to ‘children’,
even if I were a girl, and that explained why he didn’t dress up his words
with pretty and sweet things, but sounded grown up and honest to goodness
straight.
“How olds the other brother?”
“Oh, Joseph? He’s twelve years younger than me…he’s the baby of the
family, we call him Little Joe” he smiled then and it was a sad, wistful smile
and I knew he was feeling homesick for these brothers now, and I wanted to
go and hold his hand and tell him it was alright, he was with me now….”He’s
a scamp alright, keeps us all on our toes all the time!” he sighed and I knew
he wanted, needed to talk about them. He wanted to use words in order
to keep them close and I understood exactly how he felt.
“What’s the other brothers name? The one just a year older than me?”
“Oh, we call him Hoss, because – because he’s so big” he grinned “His mother
was Swedish and his real name is Erik, but we liked to call him Hoss.”
“Was his mother not your mother?”
“No, my mother died when I was born” he delivered it off pat, as though
it did not really matter, just a fact of life, but his eyes showed the pain.
“Hoss’ mother died when he was small so Little Joe’s ma is – was – just his
ma!” his voice trailed off, and I, all of ten years old, felt that he was
really very young.
“My mama is going to die soon!” I said very gravely and he shot me a look
as though he couldn’t believe what I was saying “It’s true!” I could
feel the need inside me to get him to believe me, after all, I had told no
one else, and no one else had told me, and – and telling him was the first
time I had said it, so it was true…and I was going to have to accept it.
“That’s why I’m on this train going to my aunt and uncles with those horrible
boys…..”
“Don’t you like boys?” he grinned, a lop sided grin that made his eyes twinkle
“There are boys and there are boys…” I replied in the way my mother would
have said it when referring to Arthur and Richard, because she had never liked
them either.
“You’d like my brothers” he said then, “You’d get on well with Hoss, being
the same age an’ all…..and he’s gentle and kind, and shy and quiet”
“Is he – is he fun to have around?” I asked tentatively, because to me,
it sounded as though this Hoss were rather boring, I much preferred the sound
of the younger brother, Little Joe.
“Oh yes, great fun!”
“Are they here?”
“What? On the train? No, no……I’m on my way to college.
This is the first time I’ve ever left the Ponderosa for so long as I’ll be
gone…”
“What’s the Ponderosa?”
“It’s the name of where I live. My pa and me and the boys, we live
on a cattle ranch, it’s a big house with over a thousand acres of grazing
land and timber. Close by there’s Lake Tahoe – “ his voice
trailed away and I knew from the look in his eyes that for an instant he was
back there, wanted to be there….his smile was rather shaky when he looked
at me again “We round up and break horses. Do you like horses?”
“Yes, I’ve got one…”
“Really? What’s his name?”
“Sometimes it’s Rufas…sometimes it’s something else….” My voice trailed
off, I had told a lie…I could even feel the heat of the blush that was even
now creeping over my collar and I smiled and looked at him, “It’s not a real
horse though…just one I make from my daddy’s old chair and a broom with a
blanket round it for a saddle.”
He guided me along the corridor to the dining car and we sat down opposite
one another with the little table between us. No one sat with us, for
once the dining car was very empty of hungry diners.
“Has your mother been ill for long?” he asked very tactfully diverting the
conversation away from my pretend horse
“Yes, but she never told me she was ill, it was just I noticed things.”
I felt the tears prick my eyes again and turned away and looked dumbly out
of the window.
Soup was placed in a sturdy white china bowl and I looked down at it and
blinked and two tears plopped into the soup creating in the centre of the
greasy surface two dents which closed in upon themselves whilst little ripples
of grease flowed over the surface of the soup.
Trees and houses flashed by, all in a blur, and I could feel my nose running
and couldn’t remember where I had left my hanky, and the tears were streaming
again…and how kind he was to suddenly be sitting by my side and pushing a
hanky, nice and clean, into my hand.
So I sat there, sniffling and sobbing, feeling sorry for myself all over
again, while he sat very close to me and I could feel the warmth of his young
body close to mine and the smell of him, and he smelt of trees, that musky
deep throated smell you get when walking through a forest on a warm summers
day. I must be honest and truthful, but I dragged out that bawling
for as long as it was sensibly possible, just so as not to give up my seat
close to him. For the first time in a long time I felt the security
of having a man – well,nearly a man – close by me. Of course,
that made me think of daddy, and so I had a good bawl for his sake too…..
We ate that meal together in the dining car. Niether of us spoke
throughout. It was as though we had said enough and to say more at
that time would spoil the fragility of our sudden acquaintance.
When he stood up to leave I scrambled out of the seat to follow behind him
and with relief we returned together to take our seat in the train compartment.
He picked up his book and with a sigh, began to read his book of poets.
“I read that two years ago!” I said quickly, not wanting to relinquish his
company just yet awhile.
“Oh, so you know what it is all about then?” he peeked around the side of
the book at me and smiled
“Yes, mummy used to be a teacher and we had a lot of books at home….” Whoops,
my chin was wobbling again so I swallowed hard and concentrated on what I
was saying “Mummy read to me the complete works of Shakespeare and Edmund
Spenser and Milton, and she liked the poets – she said America is producing
the best poets now!” I looked at him severely and he nodded
“Do you like poetry?” he put the book down and looked at me thoughtfully
“Do you?”
“Yes” he said it gravely as though it were something important to him and
the quick flash of his eye made me wonder, child like, whether he thought
my claim to liking poetry was the same as my claim to having a horse.
“We liked John Greenleaf Whittiers poetry – especially Memories”
“The indian summer of the heart” he smiled at me, shyly.
“And Walt Whitman, born 1819 – although sometimes I think I don’t always
understand what he’s saying…” well, one had to be honest, didn’t one?
I looked at him and he was frowning slightly, as though what I had said was
quite interesting, so I was enboldened to go on “ Henry Longfellow, born 1807
– he wrote A Psalm of Life in 1838”
“Do you know it?” he leaned forward and smiled and I, precocious brat that
I was, nodded
“Lives of great men all remind us
We can make our lives sublime
And, departing, leave behind us,
Footprints in the sand of time”
“Footprints in the sand of time….” he murmered, half to himself “Do you
think, Jane Halcrow, that you will leave such footprints?”
“I don’t know…I’m only 10!” I replied, for the question was considerable
and I frowned to consider it.
I sat there feeling smug, with my hands clasped together in my lap,
looking at him and he, sitting there with an odd look on his face, and a question
in his eyes
“Ye are better than all the ballads
That ever were sung or said
For ye are living poems
And all the rest are dead”” I said, thinking that would divert his
mind from any further comment about future footprints.
“Yes” he said in a very quiet voice and with a sigh he picked up his book
and retreated behind its pages. I felt vanquished!!
I felt excluded and alone! I stared out of the window and watched
the houses flash past me and more and more houses crowd in along the land
and I realised that soon we would be stopping, that we were near to reaching
our destination and my travelling companion, my knight errant, would be gone.
I struggled not to indulge myself in tears again and racked my brains to say
or do something to regain his attention. Fear that I had offended him
also niggled at the back of my mind and I could not bear to part from him
knowing or even suspecting that possibility. I leaned forward and touched
his arm
“Mr Cartwright?”
“Yes, Miss Halcrow?”
“Don’t you like Henry Longfellows poem on Children?”
He smiled then, it was like watching the sun emerge behind a black cloud
and making everything just right again, in my world at least.
“It’s one of my favourites, Longfellow is one of my favourite poets -
apart from Shakespeare and Milton!”
He frowned a little and looked at me then, a very deep look in his dark
eyes and I had that odd feeling again, that I was swimming or drowning deep
into his eyes. I swallowed hard, trying not to feel dizzy again.
“You’re very young…” he said in a quiet voice and a slight frown appeared
above his dark eyes and I wanted to reach out and smooth them away, just as
one would smooth out the creases in a piece of delicate paper “but…I
think you’re also very brave.”
“Thank you!” I sat back, shrinking into my seat and thinking to myself that
he wanted to say something else, but what he had said was just an alternative.
I looked at him “Are you going to college at Princeton?”
“Yes…” he smiled, dreamy, as though his thoughts were somewhere else and
my words had jolted him back to the real world again.
“We’ll be stopping soon then….”
“Yes.” He sighed and put his book away, as though had I not mentioned it
he would have continued reading and forgotten to get off at his station.
I wanted to say more…something along the lines of “My Uncles the principal
and no doubt I’ll see you there” but I could not find the words, just something
stopped me. I don’t think it was shyness on my part, just some strange
swimmy kind of feeling.
“Mr Cartright?”
“Yes?”
“I hope everything will be alright for you –“ it came out in a rush and
I could feel the heat from my blushes creeping over my collar again
“Thank you, and I hope everything goes well with you too….” He put out his
hand and very slowly I took it in mine and looked into his face…oh, such a
handsome dear face.
I felt his hand tighten its clasp around mine before he released me and
looked at me as though really seeing me for the very first time, and then
he smiled
I wanted to sound so grown up, but at the same time, I did not want
this serious, shy young man to leave me thinking I was someone to laugh at
– “I do hope you will be happy, Mr Cartwright!” I concluded lamely.
“Happy?” he said with a arch to one of his eyebrows as though being happy
was something not included in the immediate plans and then the whistle of
the train drowned out any possibility of talking anymore…there was the screeching
of brakes and whistles and clattering…a myriad sounds.
He turned as he picked up his baggage and smiled that strangely wistful
smile and I could only think of an expression my mama used when daddy died
– ‘tears in my dreams’
Oh, how I hoped, hoped, hoped to see him again – one day.
Chapter 3
“Dearest Pa, Hoss and Joe
Here I am safe and sound at the college. I have settled in well enough
although it will take some getting used to, having to share a room with another
guy, and it being so small and cramped – the room I mean!
I’m writing this on the evening of my very first day here and shall post
it off in the morning. But, as promised, I shall write every week although
from what my room mate tells me, we shall be busy with studying and then I
have to find work to occupy me and provide some funds when the semester is
over.
The journey seemed just about the longest of my life and the lonliest.
I missed you all so much. It is hard to keep focassed on why I am here
just now because all I keep getting are memories of you all, and thoughts
of what you are doing and how busy you all are keep coming into mind and sometimes
during the journey I just wanted to turn tail and come right back on home.
Everything is so different here. The way they wear their clothes,
even how they ride horses. It’s busy, the place is crammed with
people everywhere, there is constant noise. The only peace
is when I open a book and can read, or immerse myself in thoughts of you
all.
Joe, did you find the little something special I left for you under your
pillow. I remember the day you found this gold flake and that’s
why I inscribed your name and the date onto it….it’s a special memory of a
happy day and the fun we had together then. It may seem a strange
thing to leave for you, but I knew you wouldn’t like a book.
Hoss, I sure could do with you around just now, to talk to and share this
room with instead of this Micheal Hansard! He appears a bright
enough lad but he is from this kind of world and knows more of how to survive
amongst these people than I!
I left a gift for you too, Hoss, something I knew you were hankering
after - Will Cass promised to keep it safe so when you are next in town
just go on in and ask for it, he’ll know what you mean. I know you’ll
like it because you’ve been saving up for it for ages now.
Pa…I miss you but I shall not write too much about that because it is too
hard. But I must tell you about an odd experience I had on the
train.
I had a compartment but decided it was too crowded with folk so went to
look for somewhere quieter when I found a compartment almost empty, just
a little girl who had fallen asleep holding a violin case.
She looked so alone. But when I looked at her it was as though I were
looking at what Inger must have looked like when she was all of ten years
of age.
Well, I hadn’t been there reading for many minutes when she almost fell
into a heap on the floor and I stopped her just in time and helped her back
into her seat. She looked at me with very blue eyes and her eyes
seemed as old as – oh I don’t know how to describe it, except that she seemed
so solemn, and it made me think of Inger even more so, although I doubt if
Inger were ever this thin and frail and vulnerable looking.
We got to talking and she turned out to be ten years old and sent to live
with her relatives because her mother was dying. Her heartbreak
was touching to the extreme. Just imagine it, Hoss,
being packed off somewhere strange and unfriendly knowing your ma was dying
without you near her. With all our history of such losses I felt my
heart tug for her, I can tell you!
We talked a little and then she started to quote poetry…. There I
was feeling sorry for myself and all alone and this little girl starts to
spout poetry at me. Is that just a coincidence or what?
I just felt such a certainty that everything was going to be alright now…as
though she were like my guardian angel!
A funny little angel though….a blotchy face from crying too much, and freckles.
Pale blonde hair and very intense blue eyes and the whitest teeth with a gap
between the front ones…can’t imagine an angel like it? We were
about to part as the station loomed near when she put her hand on my arm
and it felt like – something important and not to be forgotten – significant
almost – and then she said she hoped that I would be happy….what a strange
thing for a child of 10 to say to a complete stranger!
I looked back as I left the compartment and she was just standing there,
so thin and frail and pale clutching her violin case. I didn’t see her
again. I wonder if I ever will? But, just when I needed
some reassurance, some thing to lift my spirits, she was there….
Now I feel as though I am rambling….I just can’t get her sad little face
out of my mind! Makes a change from chasing memories of you all,
doesn’t it?
I shall write again soon, and if I do see my guardian angel again, I shall
let you know
My love to you….your everloving son, brother – Adam”
“That was a funny story” Joe said after some minutes had elapsed
“Kinda sad…poor kid!” muttered Hoss, his mind already drifting to his next
visit to the store to see what Will Cass had waiting for him.
Ben said nothing, but put the letter to one side and held Joe close to him.
To send a child away, alone, its mind on the fact that a loved parent would
soon be dead…he shivered and his hold on Joe tightened even more so.
Chapter 4 - 1848
It’s been six months now since I came here. During that time
I have grown quite fond of my aunt and uncle and realised that my former dislike
was based purely on my own childish fears and assumptions.
My aunt, the sister of my mother, is a kind hearted soul, and seems to want
to only please everyone. An impossible task of course so she often corkscrews
herself into passions of misery when things do not work out as she had hoped.
Whilst my mother was slim and blonde, my aunt is blonde and – well – I guess
to put it plainly, very cuddly and well rounded. Her legs and
feet, when I once saw them in their white stockings with the little red shoes
, reminded me of two plump exclamations marks…for her legs were so chubby
and her feet so small!
She was not of any great intellect, which was a pity because with all her
kindnesses to others she deserved better than the treatment she received.
Uncle was a clever man and once he realised I was not the kind of little girl
who just played with dolls and wanted pretty clothes, but preferred instead
to read his books and talk about what I had been reading as intelligently
as I could to a man of his learning, he was quite pleasant to me. Only
last night he put his hand on my shoulder and said that I had better appreciation
for the classics than some of his students. A fine compliment
indeed.
Arthur and Richard stayed out of my way, and I, out of theirs. They
had reached an obnoxious age for boys, well, some of them. I could never
imagine my Knight Errant being part of their wild group on the campus.
Of course I was not allowed to go onto campus. I was taken to school
in the family coach and the family coach picked me up and returned me to the
private entrance of the Principals house. We had our own garden with
a hgh wall so that none of the students could peek over and see what we were
doing. Life carried a certain amount of tedium with it.
School was much as one could expect from an all girls school – lessons in
the basics, lessons in etiquette, lessons on how to conduct oneself and lessons
older girls taught us about how life really was……not for the faint hearted.
I ducked out of any association with them as soon as I could..
Returning to when I arrived at my aunt and uncle’s home, it was dark and
late and I was ushered up to my room immediately with Sarah, the main, lugging
up my one battered suitcase. My mothers letter was there, sitting
primly by the lamp and I ran to open with such a beating heart that by the
time I had the letter out of the envelope I was feeling dizzy and could hardly
read the writing.
I must have read two sentences before I fainted. Aunt said I fell
flat on to my best feature which was not my derriere, but my nose!
For the first two weeks there I was ill in bed, and the doctor told aunt that
it was shock and exhaustion and uncle told her off for letting me have mothers
letter to read without her first talking to me about it.
For another two weeks I was just so very unhappy and sad. The realisation
that mama had died while I was on that train was really very hard to bear.
It was all just so unreal, so impossible to take hold of in my own mind.
But children of nearly eleven have quite robust constitutions I suppose
and it was not long before I was up and about and playing my fathers
fiddle and generally driving aunt and the servants to distraction which was
why they decided to send me to school.
Six months and I had never seen nor heard about Adam Cartwright.
At breakfast, the only time I saw Arthur and Richard, I would eavesdrop quite
heartily hoping to hear some reference to the westener.from the Ponderosa.
Nothing! Nothing at all!
Snow was falling outside. I sat by my desk and tried to cncentrate
on the book I was reading but all I could do was stare out at the grey
skies and wallow in nostalgia. My head hurt because Sarah had
screwed my hair into rags so tightly to make ringlets, and now the rags were
gone my head felt like it was exploding. I needed to get out and
feel the snow on my face.
If Sarah saw me she would have stopped me so I threw on my coat and pulled
on my boots and ran as fast as I could down the long steep flight of stairs.
So fast that my feet began to run without the rest of me catching up and before
I knew it I had tumbled and was rolling most undignifiedly down the remaining
six stairs.
“Are you alright?”
Strong hands with long strong fingers raised me up and then set me down
very carefully onto the bottom step. His hands held me steady
until I could open my eyes and look at him without my head lolling from one
side to the other.
His brown eyes made my head swim just as before and I looked at him for
too long. He was looking at me with a quizzical, ‘where do I know that
face’ look in his eyes and then he smiled
“Miss Halcrow?”
“I didn’t think I’d ever see you again, Mr Cartwright” I blurted out,
resisting the urge to rub my head and my other sore parts
“It seems we’re destined to meet whenever you are about to take a tumble”
he smiled and his dark eyes twinkled down at me and I wanted to hug him there
and then.
“Did you come to see uncle?”
“Oh, uncle is it?” his brow creased and he smiled “If he’s the principal
, then, yes – I have.”
“I’ll take you.” I smiled up at him, he was already so tall, I could
have got a crick in my neck looking up at him all the time.
One of the joys being just a child and that is being able to do things that
young ladies of 17 would not be permitted – such as taking hold of his hand
and walking along the hallway as though he were the closest friend I had in
the world. Such liberties would not be tolerated in some households
I would think, but uncle was quite tolerant, with me anyway.
“Is it anything serious?”
“I don’t know…it could be…”
I looked at him and could see that he was worried, his eyes had gone darker
and his brow was creased. I stopped and looked at him with my head at an angle
so that I could get him in focas
“Is it one of your brothers? Are they ill?”
“My brothers? Oh – you remembered?”
“Yes, Hoss and Joe. I remembered” I thought it best not to add that
I had remembered every word he had spoken to me that little time we shared
on the train.
“They’re all very well.” And he sighed and was about to continue on towards
uncle’s study but I pulled him back
“What has happened then? Are you ill?”
“No, I’m in good health, thanks.” He laughed, as though my concern for his
welfare amused him, and I must have looked disappointed because he stopped
laughing and squatted down on his haunches so that he and I were eye to eye
“I may have to leave –“
“Already?” I blurted out
“I can’t find any work – this town is full of students looking for work
to keep them going, and my pa isn’t rich – he’s struggled to get me
here, and finance some of the burden of my education, but I need to find
work to keep me afloat. I guess that’s a bit hard for you to understand…”
and he frowned and with a sigh stood up.
His legs seemed to go on forever, and I looked up and felt my neck crick
and shook my head
“Mr Cartwright, you don’t want to leave yet, do you?”
“No, but sometimes what we want to do, and what we actually can do…are two
different things.”
“Why can’t you get work?”
“Because there’s nothing available….” He sighed and continued to walk on
and then knocked on my uncle’s door.
Of course, I followed and before he could speak I ran up to uncle with my
arms outstretched for a hug, and uncle laughed, as he always did at
what he called my exuberance, and he swung me up into his arms
“Well now, my dear, who have we got here?” uncle’s voice was very gruff,
but I never minded that now because I knew that beneath his very clever intellectual
self, he was a very shy man.
“Uncle” I decided to talk as fast as possible before either he or Mr Cartwright
could interuppt “Uncle this is Sir Galahad who came to my rescue on
the train that day when I was coming to you…”
“Ah, yes…” he looked at Adam Cartwright sternly, and the young man looked
as though he wished the ground could swallow him up.
“Please uncle please help him find some work…..otherwise he will leave here
again and I shan’t never see him again!”
Looking back at all this I have to admit to being thoroughly ashamed at
my blatent use of my uncle’s affection for me, and the embarressing way I
handled the whole matter. I don’t suppose there’s another eleven year
old girl in the world who was so brazen as I was at that time!
Uncle looked at me thoughtfully and then set me back down and stroked my
hair
“So, Sir Galahad has a problem, huh?”
I looked up at my uncle and smiled and he smiled and winked and turned me
round and directed me to the door. I looked at Adam, but he seemed
frozen to the spot. Not with fear though, MY Knight errant would not
have known the meaning of the word.
I waited in the hall. I sat on the very bottom step of the stairs
with my chin resting in my hands staring out at the window as the snow
came down ever more heavily. I wondered if Adam Cartwrights brothers
were playing in the snow where they lived, so far away on that place called
The Ponderosa.
Never had a clock ticked away the time so slowly. Patience had
never been a quality that I had found easy to accept, although I was
learning it with aunt! I decided to count so many stairs, and then when
I reached the bottom step he would be coming out of the study…..one.
two. Three. Four. Five. Six. Five. Four. Three. Two. One.
I could hear the murmer of my uncles voice. So I climbed up
six more steps and then back down and then sat and waited. The
door opened and Sir Galahad stepped forward with a smile on his lips and
his eyes twinkling. He looked at me and pulled his features into a
more stern look, one of reproof and had I not known that he was pretending
I would have been mortified…as it was I bounced up from the stairs and ran
towards him
“Is everything alright now? Is it all going to be alright?”
He looked down at me and smiled and I stood still immediately and looked
up at him as if he were indeed Sir Galahad and about to hand me the holy grail….
“Your uncle has suggested a few things –“ he said quietly, gravely
“And?” I tugged at his hand eagerly, like a puppy who longed for his master
to hand him the bone
“And it means I will be able to stay on with my studies”
I laughed. What a little hoyden I was. I laughed and clapped
my hands…and did a little happy dance there and then in the hallway.
“What are you going to do?”
“Well, apparently your uncle has a library that needs to be catalogued and
put into some semblance of order…”
“You’ll like uncle’s library, it has the biggest collection of poetry books,
and …and it is very untidy….it’ll take at least ten years to put it right.”
I hugged myself, wonderful, wonderful uncle….not only was my knight errant
getting his education but he would be coming to the house and I would be able
to see him.
“And I have another job –“
“Really?”
“I believe you have a pony..a real one this time –“ he smiled and his eyes
crinkled.
“Rufas!” I sighed “Rufas doesn’t like me – he bites me everytime I
see him. “
“Have you ever managed to get into the saddle?”
“No.” I frowned and shook my head “He frightens me. I
think he’s so high up there and that it would hurt if I fell off.
It’s different from my Rufas at home…”
He nodded and looked at me and sighed
“My other job is to teach you to ride – “ he squatted again, so that
we were eye to eye “Look, Miss Halcrow, I’ve already made arrangements to
visit my grandfather for a few weeks – during that time do you think you could
try and get friendly with Rufas? It’ll make my job a whole lot easier…”
“But Rufas hates me….” I whined
“You really mean, that you hate him – or is it that you’re afraid of him?”
“He always tries to bite me…” I wheedled, trying to brush aside the accusation
that I was in the wrong here and Rufas, the beast, was the victim of MY dislike.
He looked at me seriously and I had that strange swimming feeling again,
as though I was sinking into his eyes and nothing else existed at all….I shook
my head to get myself re-emerged so to speak…and he smiled and put his hand
gently on my shoulder
“Horses don’t dislike folk, unless they’re mean to them…if you talk to him
very gently, and give him something to eat…”
“He bites my fingers everytime… “ I complained
“Then just talk and let someone else feed him, but let him see that it’s
you who’s providing the goodies….until you feel confident enough to feed him
yourself..then when I get back we can take it from there.”
I thought about it, as we walked hand in hand to the front door, I realised
that if I were not careful I would be talking myself out of seeing him regularly,
even if it were at the stables and with that horse!
“I’ll do my very best!” I promised
He let my hand drop and looked at me and nodded “I’ll see you when I get
back!” he said very softly.
I could only nod my head and watch as he opened the door and walked out
into the snow. Suddenly building snow men and tossing snow balls
no longer had any appeal. I ran up the stairs and back into my bedroom
so that I could look down and watch my knight errant walking back to the college.
Snow fell softly down and mantled his dark head with white petals – perhaps
he realised I was watching for he glanced upwards and paused to look at my
window and I waved and he raised his arm and then swiftly departed from my
sight.
Chapter 5
“Dear Pa
I had a good journey to grandfathers, despite the inclement weather”
Ben smiled to himself at his sons use of such a fine word, inclement indeed…?
“ It was strange to see grandfather and yet he seemed more than pleased to
see me. We sat and talked late into the night, not only that night,
I must admit, but many a night since.
I’m sorry this letter is so long in being written to you. I was very
anxious about the situation with regard to Hoss getting hurt in that timber
yard accident. Your reassurances that arrived last week, were very very
greatly appreciated. Did he get the letter I sent to him?
Will he be alright, pa? No limp or anything like that?
I can understand how upset Joe must have been, it is bad enough when you
see someone you care for in such a situation but when you actually see the
accident take place…well, it must have brought back to mind some pretty bad
memories for the lad.
Another reason for my delay in writing, pa, was because grandfather had
arranged for me to go on a sailing ship with Captain Jackson, who sends you
his regards, having fond memories when you both sailed together with grandfather
as your captain. I sailed on a clipper for a whole week, pa.
Quite an experience. Grandfather says that I would make a good seaman.
What do you think, pa? Would you say that I have saltwater in my veins
and that the sea was calling my name?
I return to Princeton next week. I have some work which will help
with the expenses and grandfather has paid me a salary for working in the
store, which is going from strength to strength.
Oh, that reminds me, I met up with my little guardian angel again…just when
I needed a helping hand although she is a real minx. All of eleven years
old and she has her uncle eating out of the palm of her hand. A pretty
little thing now though….her uncle is hoping to send her to Europe soon so
that she can develop her musical talents, I believe he is hoping that she
will be a violinist. I wonder if she has the temperment!
Ah well, there is grandfather calling again…I shall get this letter sent
on now and await yours at college..your fond son, Adam…”
Ben folded the letter away and smiled once more to himself. He was
missing Adam far more than he would ever acknowledge in any letter of his,
knowing that Adam would be quick to return home had he any idea there was
trouble. He looked about him and frowned slightly, the room seemed just
the same, it was just different….Hoss and Joe were playing chequers by the
fire, outside a gale blew and snows were piled high, he wondered how Adam
had fared in a clipper ship during winter and smiled, knowing that his son
would have viewed it all as a mighty fine adventure.
Hop Sing came from the kitchen and began to place food down on the table
and he smiled over at Ben and nodded, his wise old eyes seeing more that most
could. At the sound of plates rattling, Hoss bounded up, with a smile
creasing his cheeks. He had a slight limp from the accident at the
timber yard, and that would soon go as he had the resilience of youth on
his side. Ben shook his head, if they had not been so short handed Hoss
would have been safely at school,but as it was……….Joe was already seated,
piling his plate high and laughing, teasing his elder brother with his usual
high spirits. Ben sighed, and looked at the empty chair and shook his
head. Perhaps if he just moved the chair away, just for the time
being…….
Chapter 6 - 1850
I galloped at a steady pace. Mainly because Adam Cartwright would
never allow me to go too fast, he would often ride up to my side and draw
back the reins so that Rufas slowed if he thought I was going too fast.
I didn’t mind it now but I recall one morning when he did it and it led to
our very first argument.
“Slow down” he glared at me with dark eyes much darker than usual, and his
hair tousled and looking so much as I would expect my cavalier knight that
I only urged Rufas to go faster. “I told you to slow down.” He shouted
and pulled the reins back and rode his horse right up to Rufas’ flanks so
that he, surprised at this, slowed immediately and then stopped, snorting
in protest.
I slid down from the saddle and glared at the young man who was dismounting
too and we stood staring angrily at one another
“I wanted to ride faster!” I protested
“You were riding quite fast enough for a young lady!” he replied, narrowing
his eyes
“I wanted to ride like Little Joe and Hoss and you ride on the Ponderosa….I
don’t want to be a young lady!” and I stamped my foot down hard to emphasise
the point
“If Joe or Hoss rode that fast I would have stopped them too, and tanned
their hide for being so disobedient and so reckless” he snapped angrily back
at me.
“I wasn’t disobedient and I wasn’t reckless…”
“Miss Halcrow, while I’m teaching you to ride and you are in my care, you
and your horse are my responsibility and under my protection…now if you disobey
me…”
“I didn’t !”
“You did!”
Without another word I pulled Rufas’ reins from his hands and attempted
to remount into the saddle, only to have him grab me around the waist and
haul me back down onto my feet. So, there we were, facing one another
once again, with blazing eyes and thin lips and steam practically coming
out of our ears. The whole beauty of the day had faded from our sight, and
thoughts ..and I realised that I was not so much angry with him, as very
disappointed that he could be angry with me.
“I want to ride Rufas!”
“Only if you ride him as you should…” he held out the reins to me, and I
could see his temper fading and reasonableness coming back into his eyes and
that made me calm down and feel just plain miserable “Miss Halcrow….”
“Don’t call me Miss Halcrow…”
“Now what else am I supposed to call you?” he smiled at me, although his
eyes were still wary, and he crooked one eyebrow which usually made me smile
“Call me Jane”
“You know I can’t”
“Why not? Why can’t I call you Adam?”
“Because I’m a student here and you’re the Principals niece.
It’s the way things are…” he frowned as though he didn’t like it either.
“I don’t like it, you’re not my servant…things like that shouldn’t be allowed…”
I took a deep breath and bowed my head as I tried to think out further argument
in support of my case “We’re friends, aren’t we?” I mumbled, hearing in my
own ears how thin my voice was now.
“I hope so…”
“So can’t I call you Adam?” I glanced up at him and looked at his face and
he sighed and frowned and then his face gentled and he smiled and I thought
I had won but he squatted down and took my hand in his, very kindly and looked
up into my face
“There are other things to be considered. When you are older,
you’ll understand why it’s more sensible to observe formalities like this.
You’re a sensible girl, and far more intelligent than most, so you have to
see that your uncle trusts me to take good care of you, and to make sure that
you’re safe…”
“I only want you to call me Jane…” I whispered, looking at his face and
trying to make my eyes as appealing as possible.
“You’ll understand when you’re older!” was all he said before releasing
my hand and turning to his horse and remounting.
I rode by his side slowly, thinking over what he had said, after all, what
harm was there in using our first names, we were friends, were we not?
And why could I not ride like I always imagined Joe and Hoss riding on the
Ponderosa. I wanted him to enjoy riding here just as he would have enjoyed
it back at his home….I glanced over at him and saw that his face was very
pensive and so I put out my hand and touched his arm
“I’m sorry.”
“I know…” he slowed his horse even more and looked at me thoughtfully and
then began to speak in a sad sombre tone of voice I had not heard him use
before, “Another reason why I want you to be so careful when you ride….not
so long ago, about 18 months before I came here, my step mother was thrown
from a horse. She trusted that horse, ridden him for years, but she
came riding up to the house so fast that it threw her when she tried to get
him to stop….Joe was only five, and I’ll never forget the horror on his face
when he saw his mother fall from that horse.”
I took a deep breath and felt the tears rush to my eyes…I hasten to say
that it was not out of sorrow for his step mother, although I was sad for
Joe, but quite selfishly my tears were out of the thought that his anger
had been as a result of his caring about my safety, and the thought of that
touched me deeply. I had reached that age when girls get emotional
over all kinds of things, and this, to me, was proof enough that he had some
feelings for me, and for that I was more than grateful.
“What –“ he continued “if something like that would happen to you while
you were in my care and under my protection? How could I face your
aunt and uncle to tell them that I had allowed you to be reckless enough
to put your life in danger? And what about Rufas? If you
ride a horse too hard you could break his wind, and ruin him for life…”
“I’m sorry – I’m really sorry” I whispered, the tears trickling down my
cheek and now I did think of his step mother and what a terrible scene it
must have been for them all and I felt utterly ashamed that I could have
been so negligent “I’ll be good, I promise….”
He seemed satisfied and nodded, and then urged his horse into a trot, and
I, mounted on dear plump Rufas, trotted along behind him, much as a squire
would trot behind his sir Knight long years ago.
At the end of the hour we parted as usual and I turned to look back at him
as he rode away, he rode beneath a tree and the early morning mist enshrouded
him and took him from my sight until he rode a little further into the
sun…what a picture it was indeed…one I would never forget.
………….
Time slipped by, seasons came and went, years passed and now I was 13 years
of age. We were approaching Graduation and I knew that Adam Cartwright
was as nervous as any of the other students about his coming graduation day.
His grandfather, Captain Abel Stoddard, was going to come and see him graduate,
but his father and brothers would not, the distance and the expense of travelling
was far too much.
“It’s not just the money,” he explained one morning as we rode side by side
“It’s the time…pa has so much work on at the moment, and there’s only so much
that he can do.” He frowned at the thought and shook his head “He works
too hard, and all the time he would be here he would be thinking of what
should be done back home, and what could be going wrong. Things are
changing back there….since the gold strikes in San Francisco and California
there’s a lot going on.”
I tried to imagine ‘a lot going on’ but it meant nothing to me and
I felt just so sad that he would only have an old man to watch him graduate.
I promised him that I would be there, and that I would sit beside his grandfather
and make sure that we both applauded as loudly as we could when he went to
collect his Graduation papers.
“I reckon that would make my grandpa mighty happy” he said slowly with his
eyes twinkling.
We rode back and I dismounted from Rufas and led him into the stall.
Adam had always told me that I should get to know my horse really well, that
I should be the one to feed it, comb and curry it, and fuss over it.
Sometimes, if time permitted, he would help me to unsaddle and unharness the
horse before I cleaned up, but not this particular morning, although we were
back rather earlier than usual.
“Mr Cartright, did I tell you that –“ I paused as a shadow fell upon the
floor where the sunlight had been dappling it only seconds before.
“Adam?”
He turned, and I could see the colour slowly mantle his neck beneath his
collar and a rather shy, embarressed smile came to his lips as he looked in
the direction of the open door. A young woman stood there, a
pretty girl, and she smiled at him and raised her eyebrows and mouthed a
silent message, but I could understand what she was saying well enough and
scowled at her angrily
“I’ll not be much longer…” he said which meant I had been correct in interpreting
her silent message as “How much longer will you be?” and then he turned to
me “You don’t mind, Miss Halcrow, if I leave you to look after Rufas on your
own, only I have to keep an appointment”
“With her?” I asked, trying not to let my voice betray my feelings
“And some other students….there’s an end of class project that we’re doing
together…”
“Will I see you tomorrow?”
He turned towards the girl who was standing with her hands clasped behind
her back and swaying too and fro, as though growing impatient. Then
he smiled hurridly back at me and walked quickly away. I watched
them go out of the door together, laughing in that intimate way good friends
can laugh when about to share time together.
He never came the next day, only a brief note to say that he had been detained
and was too busy. The next day was the same.
The third day it rained heavily but I, obstinate and determined to prove to
him, as well as to myself, that I no longer needed his help, rode out on
Rufas for my early morning ride.
I thought of the times we had shared riding together, of the moments in
the library when I sneaked in to help him with the never ending task of tidying
uncle’s library. The hot coffee and cookies that were sent up for us
to enjoy in front of the fire as we shared snippets of verse, or prose, from
some of the old books. Well, the library was tidy now, the most
orderly it had ever been. And I could ride Rufas, and any
other horse in my uncles’ stables had I a mind to do so….thanks to Adam Cartwright.
The rain streamed down. It soaked through my clothes and down my neck
and filled my boots. I rode back miserable, wet through and with
a sore throat. Rufas, head down, hated the rain and he was sodden
through as well.
I spent longer than usual making sure he was alright. I combed
him, dried him, curried him….I gave him water to drink and made sure his bed
was dry and comfortable. I cuddled him and kissed him and felt incredibly
guilty – I had been selfish again, and dreaded to think that dear Rufas would
be the innocent victim of my neglect now.
The following morning I was ill with what my aunt described as a heavy cold
but which gradually progressed to something much worse. I became
delirious and feverish and the doctor was called to give his opinion and medication
– at considerable expense. I spent days slipping in and out of
consciousness, aware of my aunt sitting by my bedside and sometimes my uncle.
I thought my mother was there and called out to her, and when I saw my father
‘we’ sang songs from the auld country that he had taught me years yon.
I begged to see Rufas and wept bitterly when they told me he could not ‘be
made available’ – (of course, I laugh about that now) – and I pleaded to see
Adam Cartwright, even if just for a little while. But he never came!
Gradually I improved thanks to what the doctor called my robust constitution
and stubborn personality! I began to take notice of what was going
on around me, to take light meals and to, thankfully, be taken out of the
bed and to a chair by the window. From the window Martin, the
stableboy, paraded Rufas up and down to assure me that he was quite well,
although decidedly plumper.
But Adam Cartwright never came. What did come, however, was
a letter that dismayed me entirely, but one that my aunt brought to
my room with the air of a conquisadore…
“My dear girl, here is some news that will bring the roses back into your
cheeks” she declared with a generous smile on her plump face and she settled
down on the chair by my side and put her hand over mine and gave me a gentle
squeeze “Your uncle and I have been planning this for some time, as
a surprise for you”
“A surprise? For me?”
“Here, read it –“ she held it out and then drew it back and devoured it
with her eyes and then looked at me with loving affection. There was
no doubt about it, she deeply cared for me and that thought helped me considerably
in dealing with what was about to befall me “I’ll read it myself….listen,
dear…” and she read a lengthy letter that, summing up in a few brief words,
meant that I would be leaving Princeton, leaving America, leaving AdamCartwright
far behind me in order to be educated in Switzerland!
“Why Switzerland?” I asked timidly
“It’s a beautiful country, and it’s healthy and the education is wonderful
there. We want you to learn music, Jane, and you’ll be taught by the
very best there…….”
I turned my head away and looked out of the window and could say nothing.
My world was slowly falling into pieces about me and only her presence, happy
and contented soul that she was, prevented me from bursting into tears.
It would be easy to think, from what I have written, that I was a dour soul,
and quarrelsome and miserable all the time. But in actual fact I was
not like that at all, it is just that in writing this little history things
relative to the subjects concerned were, at this point, more negative than
positive.
Chapter 7
Rufas was more than pleased to see me the morning I finally suceeded in
getting to the stables to make sure that he really was alright and had not
forgotten me. I fed him an apple and was leaning against the
bars of the stall when I became aware of someone standing quite close to
me and so I turned to see who it was -
We both looked at one another and I am sure had the same expression on our
faces and that was one of surprise at the changes we saw in one another.
I had been ill for six weeks and in that time had grown taller, much thinner,
with a few curves whereas he – well, he looked sad and drawn and haggard,
dark shadows smudged the sockets of his eyes, which seemed dull as they looked
at me.
“Are you better?” he asked softly, approaching closer so that he could stroke
Rufas and fuss him.
“Yes, thank you” I tried to sound more formal than usual for my disappontment
in not hearing from him for the whole of six weeks was keen and sharp, and
the pleasure I had felt at seeing him was almost a betrayal of the mood I
had wanted to view him.
“Did you get my letter?”
“What letter?” I frowned and looked at him with a feeling of discomfiture
growing in my stomache “No – I did not receive a letter from you.”
He sighed and shook his head and ran his hand along Rufas’ back whilst he
looked him up and down as though he were at an auction and considering
purchasing him
“I gave Richard a letter to give to you the day I left here “
“I didn’t know you had left Princeton”
“The day after you were taken ill – “ he leaned against the bars of the
stall and crossed his arms over his chest and looked at me with a slight
frown furrowing his brow “Did you really think I would leave here without
letting you of all people know why and where I was going? Ah well,
as it is, I had to go and see my grandfather, he was taken very ill and asked
for me to go to him. He died just a few days after I had got there
and I had to make all the arrangements for his funeral” he shuffled
his foot through the dirt of the stable floor, moving it into a little mound
and then flattening it down again “He left me all that he had….quite an inheritance
it seems!”
“I am sorry that he died, Mr Cartwright” I knew I sounded rather lacking
in warmth, but I was only 13 and I had no real idea of how to deal with such
a situation, had I been older, and were I allowed to be less formal with him,
and if it had been at all possible to show how I really felt, even then, about
him, then I would have taken him into my arms and held him close and wept
for him, with him. “I really am very sorry” I said again, and
put my hand gently on his arm.
“And you were so ill – “ he looked at me with his deep brown eyes looking
less sombre now, and I nodded and looked suitably helpless “You should never
have gone out in all that rain, you –“
“I know, it wasn’t fair to Rufas was it? Thankfully he was fine, probably
all the fat he carries on him!” and I smiled and stroked Rufas’soft velvety
nose “At least you got here in time for Graduation Day”
“I guess!” he murmered and sighed, as though it meant nothing to him now
“You’ve your diploma’s and things to collect, everyone –“
“There won’t be anyone now..”
“I’ll be there” I smiled brightly encouraging him to smile again which he
did “And you never know who else might turn up!”
“That’s true” he laughed then, and I thought perhaps he was thinking of
the girl who had come to get him from the stable, whilst I was thinking of
someone entirely different. “I guess I should have realised that Richard
would not have given you the letter, but as I stressed how important it was,
I thought he would have done the decent thing…”
“Richard doesn’t know what it is to do the decent thing-“
“I just wanted to apologise for leaving you so abruptly and to explain why
I had to go away, and to wish you a speedy recovery” his eyes glanced up and
down my now differently shaped body and he bit his bottom lip as though slightly
perplexed “I’m sorry you were so ill”
“I’m sorry you had to lose your grandfather, I know how much you cared for
him”
We stood there, in the stable, standing close to one another but not close
enough. He was so tall and during the three years he had changed from
gangly adolescence to lean masculinity. When looking at his face
one could see the man he would be whilst still able to see the boyish vulnerbility
of who he had been. He had the face of one who knew his own mind,
who was strong and dependable, loyal and brave.
We said nothing for a little while, just enjoyed the smells of the stable,
the warmth there, and the friendship we knew we shared together. Then
he stepped back and sighed and the spell was broken and I knew he had to go…
“You’ll be there tomorrow?” he asked as he walked towards the door
“Yes”
“’Til tomorrow then”
I could only nod, tomorrow meant goodbye.
…………
Everything was so busy and time flew by in a confusion of people rushing
around organising things. The dias, the flowers, the chairs, rows and
rows of them, and all the time people arriving. Students milled
around in an attempt to sort out their own parents and relatives from the
myriads that seemed to be poring out of the woodwork to be there to see their
offspring graduate.
I stood at the window and watched. There was a cool breeze and aunt
had said I was to stay indoors until just before the ceremony. So I
stood there and watched and waited and looked….although I was not sure who
exactly I would be seeing!
And then there they were…..a tall man with greying hair and the fiercest
black eyes imaginable, a man who stood out amongst the crowds of people there,
not only because of his westernised clothing, but because he was the kind
of man who would stand out in a crowd whether it were in Paris or London or
Eagle Station (now called Virginia City) or whereever. The three
of them cut a swathe through the crowd as the people just stepped back and
they, looking niether to the left nor the right, strode on forwards towards
the young man I could see standing alone and lonely by his chair.
The two figures that flanked the older man were boys…but I knew who they
were, Hoss and Joseph. What a strapping lad Hoss Cartwright was indeed,
as tall as his father and bigger. His blue eyes shone like stars
in his face that was all over smiles and he was the first to reach his brother
and wrap his arms about him and lift him off his feet …and I felt a tear as
it trickled its way down my cheek because I can’t find the words to describe
the joy on that young mans face when he saw his brothers and father .
What fun Joseph looked to be…he was prancing about around his brothers rather
how I imagined a monkey in a zoo would cavort about had it a chance to do
so. He was so handsome too, and his eyes were lovely….I think
he was about 8 years old then, but he was as slim and pocket sized as Hoss
was – well – quite the opposite!
I watched them, I watched them laughing and crying and hugging and shaking
hands and found myself smiling just for the pleasure of seeing them altogether.
I doubt if I could remember a time when I had seen Adam Cartwright talk so
much….
………..
The ceremonials were over…the students had mounted the dias, taken their
diplomas and returned to their family groups. I felt as proud as could
be when Adam went up to claim his and I clapped so hard that my hands tingled
and aunt leaned forward and gave me a reproving look, to remind me that young
ladies do not applaud that enthusiastically!
Now people were mingling and talking and I knew that soon he would be taking
his family to his room and gathering up his things, his belongings….packing
them away ready for his departure. In my own room things were
packed as well, ready for my leaving Princeton in a few days time.
I stood away from the crowd, the small square of paper with my letter to
him clasped between my fingers and I waited and watched.
Finally they approached, and I felt myself suddenly timid for the father
was so fearsome, so tall and so big…with those fierce black eyes that must
have seen so much in his one lifetime. I looked down and tried
to think of some other way of getting my little note to him when I heard him
talking and looked up and there he was, smiling down at me
“I clapped as hard as I could…” I mumbled before he had a chance to speak
“So did I” the boy Joseph said quickly
I looked at him, I’d never seen such a wild looking boy, albeit such a handsome
one, and he grinned so merrily at me that I just had to return the smile and
then Adam was introducing me to them and they were shaking my hand, all of
them very gently but I was so awed that I couldn’t even hear what Adam was
saying, it was only when Mr Cartwright spoke that I seemed able to hear properly
again….
“I am glad we had the chance to meet, Jane” he said in the deepest
voice I had ever heard “to thank you for writing..and giving us the chance
to get here to see Adams graduation …it’s been quite an experience!”
he looked fondly at Adam, and it was obvious that he was proud of him, if
anyone had looked at me like that I would have been floating on air, as it
was, Adam actually blushed and looked immensely pleased with himself.
“I didn’t expect to see them here..” he said to me, and his dark eyes looked
directly into mine and I just smiled and nodded
“I’ve never been on a long journey by train before…” Joseph said and Hoss
gave him a playful nudge with his elbow and they both began to laugh although
I don’t know why…
“Can I give you this –“ I turned to him quickly, suddenly longing to get
away, swamped by the feeling that I was the intruder steading precious time
from this family and so I pushed the little letter into his hand and then,
standing on tip toe to reach him, I planted a kiss on his cheek “Good
bye, Mr Cartwright….”
“Goodbye?” he frowned and looked at the envelope and then at me, but I was
already backing away, longing for the safety of my own room “But,Jane…why
good bye?”
“I’m leaving for Switzerland in a few days…I have a lot to do…Goodbye Mr
Cartwright..” I shook Ben Cartwrights hand and nodded to the two boys who
were staring at me rather thoughtfully, and then I almost ran from them in
the direction of the house.
“Jane” he caught me by the elbow and turned me round “You can’t leave me
so fast – there’s things I want to talk to you about….”
I looked at him and thought that if I stayed any longer I would probably
faint, something that seemed to happen to me at the most inconvenient times
since I had been ill. He must have realised my distress and hopefully
put it down to my illness for he released my arm and leaned forward and gently
kissed my cheek
“Make fine footprints on the sands of time, Jane..” he said quietly
I shivered, he turned and walked back to his family and I turned to find
myself firmly gripped by my aunts hand on my arm, and gratefully I was assisted
back to the house. I knew I would not see him again and I wondered
if he would smile when he read my letter and whether or not he would think
it an odd co-incidence that I, also, had mentioned his leaving good footprints
on the sands of time.
Chapter 8 – 1861
My first glimpse of Virginia City was through a haze of dust and grit which
billowed all around us as the stagecoach fairly rocketed through the towns
main street. It finally stopped and all of us passengers were
jostled against one another in a very rude way…but we finally righted ourselves,
adjusting our hats or bonnets and straightening our jackets.
The two men stepped out first, one turned and politely held open the door
for myself and the other woman, a rather elderly plump woman who came from
London,England, and was called Clementine Hawkins. An amazing woman
who talked almost non stop even when the two men fell asleep, which I thought
very unfair, as it meant I was her sole captive victim.
So I stepped down and looked around at this mushroom gold rush town.
I was not looking at the stores or the banks but rather at the people who
happened to be there just then…I had convinced myself that after all this
time I would look around and the first person I would see would be him and
he would recognise me and walk towards me and say “Jane-“
I read too much! And I had convinced myself too easily that
he would be there and everything would fall into place perfectly, just like
a dream, or a fairy story. It was not to be, so I picked up my luggage
and looked around again, this time for the sight of a hotel or boarding house.
“I’ll help you with that if’n you’d like, little lady”
I looked around, thinking to find myself looking at the depot porter but
instead found myself looking up into the bluest eyes which twinkled down at
me with such a pleasant sincerity about them that I just passed over the luggage
as naturally as could be…
“Whar you headed, ma’am” he juggled the bags and cases about and stood there,
a human mountain with a broad pleasant smile on his beaming round face
“The Hotel please”
“Er – which one?”
“Which one would you recommend?”
“Follow me…” he smiled and lumbered down the sidewalk, his feet thudding
down onto the boards and making the dust billow like little dust devils around
his ankles.
I trailed behind him, holding onto my hat and keeping my skirts from getting
too soiled in the dirt. All the time my eyes darted too and fro,
scanning the faces of the people as we passed them by, constantly searching……..
“Hey, Hoss, where ya goin’?”
I stopped abruptly, if I had not I would have collided into Hoss’ back,
and both he and I turned and looked at the young man lounging on the street
corner, chomping at an apple
“To the hotel Internationale…this little lady kinda looked lost!” he indicated
me with a nod of his head and the younger man turned and looked at me and
smiled, taking off his hat he tossed the apple away, to the gratitude of a
mule tethered nearby who set to chomping at it with the same enthusiasm he
had been moments earlier.
“Wal, let me help” he offered immediately
“Thanks, little brother” Hos muttered, handing over a suitcase for his brother
to take hold but Joe merely took hold of my elbow and began to lead me through
the streets, his eyes twinkling and his mouth smiling whilst he left Hoss
behind re-arranging the suitcases all over again
“You’ll like the Internationale, it’s pretty classy” he glanced over at
me and looked me up and down and must have decided I looked classy enough
to be accommodated there for he smiled “I’m Joseph Cartwright from the Ponderosa…that’s
my brother, Hoss…” he jerked his thumb in the direction of his brother who
I could hear pounding along the sidewalk behind us.
“I know…I remember you both from the last time we met”
“We met someplace before?” he glanced at me, narrow eyed, as though I was
making fun of him someway
“At your brothers graduation in Princeton”
“Adams?” he frowned and looked at me again, and then shook his head “I’m
sorry, I can’t recall meeting you before, I’d have remembered had I done so.”
“Oh, I was only a young girl then, Mr Cartwright, I’ve changed a lot since
then”
“It was some time back….about ten years I’d reckon.”
I smiled, how young he was, and yet how full of confidence, some would say
arrogance, but I doubted that, he was just one of those yongsters who loved
life and people and found it easy to get the very best out of both….he looked
at me again
“Are you Jane?”
“Yes, that’s me…just plain Jane….”
“Shucks, miss, I’d never have said that you were in any way plain….”
His hazel eyes twinkled as they looked at me again, and his lips parted into
a smile then he turned and stopped Hoss “Hoss, do you know who this is?
Why, you’d jest never guess….”
Hoss looked at his brother and then at me and sighed and shook his head
and Joe laughed and slapped his brother on the chest in a friendly way
“Hoss, it’s Jane Halcrow….Adams little angel”
“Shucks…is that true?”
Two pairs of eyes bore into me as they looked me up and down, and I, well
I was lost in the expression Adams little angel….had he really called me that?
“I should’ve recognised you…” Hoss said apologetically and shaking my hand
as he did so “But you’ve changed a mite…”
“You sure have……” Joe drawled and then he gave a lop sided grin and jabbed
his brother in the ribs “How about we take Jane for a meal once we’ve deposited
all her gear at the hotel, huh, Hoss?”
“Aw,I dunno, little brother, we got some things to do for pa and …”
“Hey, they won’t take but an itsy bitsy moment of our time…” Joe grinned
his face lighting up with the thought of time away from chores and responsibility
“How about it, Jane?”
“It’s alright, I’d rather just rest once I get booked in. But we could
go another day, when you have no chores for your father”
“That’s it settled then” Joe snapped his fingers “Tomorrow lunch time…Del
Monico’s?”
“If you say so..” I laughed, it was easy to laugh with these two, they were
so friendly, and so kindly helpful and I saw Hoss go a little pink in the
face and grin sheepishly as though he were pleased but too shy to say so”Thank
you, I shall look forward to it very much indeed.”
“So shall I” Joe said, tucking my arm into his and leading me off, with
poor Hoss trailing behind with the luggage “Don’t worry about Hoss…”
“Yes,well…I did think…”
“Aw, don’t think, Miss Halcrow, don’t ever get to thinking!” he chortled
and looked as merry as a cricket so that I stopped thinking about Hoss immediately
“Every year, see, we have the Founders Day fete…you’ve just missed out on
it – and Hoss enters the wrestling and the arm wrestling and the strongest
man competitions….so all in all, lugging that luggage of your’n around is
jest doin’ brother Hoss a great big favour and helping him keep in shape for
next year.”
“How did he do this year?” I laughed
“Came first every danged time!”
“And what competitons do you enter, Mr Cartwright?”
“Me? Oh, various ones that necessitate skill beyond belief…” his eyes
twinkled and he chuckled again “Did Adam send for you?” he asked,
suddenly serious
“No, he didn’t!”
“Does he know you’re in town?”
“No, he doesn’t!”
“Do you want us to tell him?”
I looked at him, behind the serious exterior I could see a twinkle of mischief
lurking in his hazel eyes and then I looked at Hoss who just smiled and looked
as innocent as the day was long…I frowned slightly and then shrugged
“That’s up to you” I said finally and the way he glanced over at his brother
I just knew that Joe was thinking up something wicked!
“You can call me Joe” he said
“I thought I had been…….”
“I noticed you slipped into the Mr Cartright mode of address…..that may
suit older brother Adam, but I like to feel more comfortable about things….less
formality you know…” he paused now and stopped in front of the Hotel
and pushed open the door, stepping aside to let me enter and following in
behind me, with Hoss close behind with the luggage.
“Thank you both very much..thank you, Hoss, for helping me with the luggage.”
I put my hand on Hoss’ arm and it was like touching metal and steel…he had
not even worked up a sweat!
“It weren’t no trouble, ma’am” he said gently, and smiled
“I’ll see you both tomorrow then…at Del Monico’s?”
“Don’t you want us to help you to your room?” Joe said, holding his hat
to his chest and his face registering wholehearted willingness to be of assistance
“I think they may have people who get paid to do that….” I reminded him
with a laugh.
“We’ll see you tomorrow then, Miss Halcrow.” Hoss nudged his brother, rocking
him a little on his feet, and nodded over to the door. Obviously Hoss
had more regard for his fathers temper than Joe and more respect for the responsibilities
placed upon him and so, with a sigh, Joe nodded and with a final smile the
two of them left the hotel.
I was still smiling when I went to the hotel clerk and booked my self into
a room. There was a long mirror in the room and cautiously I stepped
before it and surveyed myself thoughtfully, critically.
I was not overly tall, being a few inches over five feet, and I was slim with
a pleasing enough figure. I had an oval face, high cheekbones,
very blue eyes and long lashes (at last), my nose was much like my mothers
in that it was rather an irregular shape. I had a wide mouth, well shaped
lips and my teeth were all my own and all still where they should have been!
My chin was square and as my aunt often reminded me, stubborn. I was
not a beauty by any means, but I was not plain nor unattractive.
I had small hands and feet. My hair was blonde, a dark honey
blonde which went into golden streaks in the sunlight and I wore it long
and in the French fashion, a chignon.
After looking thus I went to the window and looked out at the street and
the scene before me…of stores, banks, a library and a blacksmiths, all higgly
piggly bunched together on a wide and dusty main street. I stood
there lost in day dreams for some minutes until I saw him….and my heart froze
and stopped a beat.
A girl of about seven years old, carrying a doll and wearing a chequered
shirt and blue pants, was walking by his side, her free hand holding tightly
onto his and she was looking up at him, talking and laughing.
I watched as he looked down at her, the same look on his face that I recognised
seeing so often when he had been with me all those years ago….a tenderness,
a kindliness that softened the handsome features that I could see now had
that same rather ruthless look that his father wore. He leaned
down to her level, squatting on his haunches, explaining something to her
for she was listening intently, and nodding and then, child like, she put
her arms around his neck and hugged him, and he, standing up, carried her
up with him, and held her in his arms.
So, he was married, with a child. Why had Joe and Hoss not mentioned
it? Was that look of mischief on Joe’s face at my expense, and
not Adams as I had imagined? I followed him with my eyes.
He was taller, bigger built that the youth I remembered, darkly tanned, matured….he
held her easily in the crook of one arm while she had her arm across his shoulders
and her doll in the other.
I had thought that he would see me and our eyes would meet and he would
walk towards me and say “Jane”…………now I knew it would never happen that way
after all.
I leaned closer against the window and watched as he stopped by a wagon
and swung the girl onto the back seat and then he turned and took off his
hat and smiled at the woman who was coming out of the shop – she walked towards
him and smiled and when she had reached his side she put her hand on his chest
and then on his arm, that slight possessive manner women have when they approach
their men.
I observed her closely as he helped her up onto the wagon seat and settled
her comfortably. She was tall, thin, nervous looking. Blonde,
almost that silver white blonde men seemed to love so much, I could well imagine
her eyes were blue with that colouring, but her face was small, thin, pinched
looking and her eyes seemed too big for her face and her mouth was small
and tight. I asked myself the question every woman asks when
the man she wants looks elsewhere….I asked myself “What does he see in her?”
I had, in my curiousity, held back the curtain, and now I moved to drop
it back into place and that was when he looked up…the movement was instinctive,
he put his hand to his gun handle and paused, scanned the window with his
dark eyes, saw nothing and relaxed. I watched as he stood and talked
to her for a moment or two, she nodded once or twice, and then with a flick
of the reins, the wagon rolled away ….he watched it go, as men often turn
to watch their women when they are going from them and his face was contemplative,
pensive.
I could almost hear him sigh. His back moved as though he had exhaled
a deep breath. He then turned and casually glanced back up at the window
where I stood, but I stood back in the shadows and did not touch the curtain
again. He walked towards a horse, mounted it with the ease of long practice,
and galloped, oddly enough, in the opposite direction to the wagon and its
occupants.
Chapter 9
I was dressed early the next morning, mainly because I had found it so hard
to get any sleep during the night anyway. I had had a light meal in
the restaurant and then gone to my room and tried to do a number of things
without much success in any one of them. Now after a scant breakfast
and plenty of coffee I decided to clear my head by walking around the town.
This was the first time I had been in a town like this one, a town with little
history, where the false fronted buildings gave the impression of something
grander.
Cowboys, miners, ranchers, farmers….all dusty from riding and working, all
work weary and grimed from the day to day toil of life.
Businessmen, in fancy suits and with gold chains hanging across their vest
fronts, stepped down from their carriage or buggies, wealthy men who own large
mining corporations in the area, strolled down the street with gold topped
canes and looking as elegant as though promanading in Philadelphia’s main
city square. There were Chinese with their long plaints and running
gait, gabbling at one another in shrill excited voices and there were other
voices, accents, languages - all indicative of the American life, welcome
to all, make the best of whatever you can get.
Saloon girls, dressed in loose fitting garments lolled against the balconies
and watched as life passed them by. Upright and uptight matirachs
pounded the sidewalks with their dark clothes and grim faces, young wives
and mothers strolled from shop to shop, gossiping and laughing and chattering.
Children ran in and out of the crowds with their books and lunch packs in
their hands.
I had been greeted by many with friendly smiles and nods and greetings.
They were used to strangers in their town, and often the strangers stayed
and became their neighbours, so they obviously liked to get on a good footing
from the beginning.
I recognised the rig outside the General Merchants and paused for a moment,
wondering what to do now. I had been thinking of returning back
to Sacremento that day, but at the same time had felt that by doing so I was
running away from something I had to face, a wound doesn’t heal unless it
is properly lanced and treated.
This, I told myself, was an opportunity to see just what kind of woman Adam
had married. It was somewhat devious but she would never know…..and
if, of course, it were Adam in the store, then – well, we would have to meet
anyway and a public place was no doubt the best place.
The bell tinkled and a womans voice said “Be with you in just a moment”.
I looked about me and saw an elderly man placing groceries into a box and
talking to a woman with three grubby children clinging and wailing at her
skirts. I watched him for a moment as he nodded and smiled but his eyes
seemed strained and sad,as though he had been touched with tragedy and had
never managed to shake the shadow from his shoulder. He had that kind
of haunted look, as though he were afraid to look behind him…just in case….but
he was kind for he was assuring the woman that she did not have to pay him
for the groceries not until her husband had secured himself a job.
The gratitude on the womans face was sobering in its misery…no one likes
to accept charity, it removes a layer of self respect. He patted the
children on the head and gave each one of them a sticky jaw breaker to chomp
on while he continued packing up the womans order.
The young woman serving was obviously his daughter, pretty and blonde and
blue eyed. She was checking ribbons with the other woman, Adams woman.
The girl, still in her check shirt and pants, was leaning against the counter,
kicking her heels against the wood until her mother turned and took her by
the shoulder and pulled her away
“Peggy, how many more times do I have to tell you not to do that….”
“But I’m bored and I want to go outside…”
“We’ll be going outside soon, just be patient…” she turned and shook her
head and resumed her conversation with the girl at the counter, their blonde
heads nearly touching as they checked one roll of ribbon with another.
The girl, Peggy, wandered off and stared at the other three children who
stared back. They stuck out three very red tongues at her and giggled,
she stuck out her tongue and turned her back on them and walked away.
Which brought her to me. She looked up and frowned, then smiled
“Hello”
“Hello” I smiled at her, there was nothing about her that reminded me of
Adam Cartwright at all.
“I’m Peggy Dayton…how do you do?” and she struck out her hand which I took
in mine and shook politely
“I’m very well, thank you and how are you?”
“I’m bored and you’re supposed to tell me your name as well…” she looked
at me with piercing eyes and I smiled again
“Shouldn’t you be at school?”
“Not until next week…I’ve had a cold” she turned her head and looked
over at her mother who was oblivious of her daughters departure from her side
“That’s my mother, her names Laura”
“My name’s Jane”
She looked at me again and frowned and then returned to her mother and tugged
at her sleeve, Laura shrugged her away and then looked over at me.
“Ma, that lady is called Jane…” the girl Peggy informed her.
I immediately became the scrutiny of two pairs of blue eyes as Laura and
the other girl looked over at me. Then she smiled and walked over to
me
“Jane Halcrow? Why, I was going to come and see you at your
hotel…..” she turned to the other girl and smiled “Sally, this is Jane
Halcrow….a friend of Adams …isn’t that right?” she turned to me again,
her eyes were demanding an answer and I nodded.
I had lost any advantage I had hoped to gain from my little reconnoitre.
She was in total control. She took my arm as though she had known me
for years herself and brought me closer to the counter
“Sally Cass …Jane Halcrow”
I shook hands with Sally Cass and smiled, and received a pleasantly friendly
smile back. I hadn’t yet said a word and yet this Laura person was in
complete control of my immediate future …I listened to her as she told Sally
that I had been at Princeton, and then suddenly there was a silence and they
were both looking, expectantly, at me…not only them, but Peggy and the man,
Mr Cass….and I realised then that this Laura had a voice that could send
you to sleep….the kind of whining drone that makes your ears involuntarily
close up and your thoughts wander and suddenly she would pounce on you with
a question and trick you into revealing your rudeness in not having digested
a single word she had said.
“I am sorry…but I have to admit I am rather overwhelmed by such a welcome…”I
wondered if my voice sounded as lacking in confidence as I felt “Ma’am, I
don’t even know you….and it’s nice to make your acquaintance, Miss Cass,Mr
Cass!”
“Gracious me, how silly…I forgot to introduce myself, didn’t I? I’m
Laura Dayton …Mrs Laura Dayton” she stared deep into my eyes then, challengingly
deep, and although her lips smiled her eyes certainly did not “Adam Cartwright
and I are engaged to be married….”
I smiled and congratulated her on her good fortune. I wondered
what had happened to her husband and I especially wondered why she had looked
at me like that…and why the oh so friendly overtures towards me?
“I was about to come over to see you, to introduce myself.” She grabbed
Peggy by the shoulder and forced her to her side as we left the shop,leaving
the little bell ringing and the two Cass’ staring after us.
“That’s very kind of you, but why…”
“Joe and Hoss asked me to, they were supposed to be having lunch with you?”
she smiled again, walking by my side and guiding me back to the Hotel “But
Ben wants them to get the fencing repaired before they start on mine tomorrow.
So I said I would call in and see you and explain and then Ben said that as
you were such an old friend of THEIRS that you should be persuaded to
stay at the Ponderosa, not at an hotel in town, but then, I said, how
could she …a single lady on her own with four men in the house…not including
Hop Sing of course…” she trilled out a laugh and I wondered where exactly
this conversation was headed “Then Joe said why not ask you to come and stay
with me? Well, ain’t that just the best idea yet? So I said I would
come and ask you today….” She turned and looked at me and smiled again “You
will, won’t you?”
I opened my mouth to say no, but then realised that this was not so
much an invitation as intimidation…..Peggy was looking up at me and she smiled
and took my hand
“You will come,won’t you? It gets mighty lonesome out there on our
own!”
“Except when Adam and the boys come…that is…” Laura Dayton laughed and I
realised then that I had no choice in the matter, that everything was totally
out of my control. If I stayed at the hotel what would Adam think
of me…churlish and rude to say the least! “Adam will get such a surprise
when he sees you…”
“Doesn’t he know I’m here?”
“Oh no….Joe and Hoss were teasing him last night about you….but they never
said that you were actually in town…that’s all part of the joke!” she laughed
and squeezed my hand “You will come and stay while you’re here, won’t you?”
So she obviously didn’t want me to stay for long…and Adam didn’t know I
was here…so I could still leave by todays coach for Sacremento…I took a deep
breath and smiled at her with as much charm and sincerity as I could muster
“I’d love to …” (said between gritted teeth)
Chapter 10
Once in the little room I beat the dust out of my clothes and tried to straighten
myself into some semblance of order. That lady could certainly talk
but she had no more idea on how to drive a vehicle than – than an infant!
If the horses had not been so keen to get their noses into their feed bags
I should imagine we would still be rambling down some track or tumbled into
some canyon.
I leaned against the window cill to catch my breath and to try and recollect
my senses which were scattered to the four winds now. What had
she talked about? How kind Adam was, how gallant, how hard working
and patient, what a wonderful father he will be to Peggy who doted on him.
Yet she had said nothing about her husband. She had talked about
her aunt who had been the match maker, realising that she, Laura, needed to
be loved and protected by a strong man, and when Adam came to offer his help
with getting things organised with the ranch, he seemed the ideal man.
Peggy had sat in the back with the sacks of groceries watching us both with
her little narrowed eyes and I wondered what she was thinking about as she
listened to her mother talking. Occasionally Mrs Dayton threw me a question
which meant I had to keep alert in case I missed an opportunity to say something.
The questions were always about Adam..when had I met him, where had I met
him, what did I think of him! Most of the questions she surely
already knew the answers to, as she had already said Adam and the other Cartwrights
had discussed me the previous evening.
She sent Peggy up to tell me coffee was ready and to hurry because she had
to prepare lunch for the boys. I wondered momentarily how
many boys she had, then realised she meant Adam and his brothers.
The thought made my stomache quiver mainly because I had lain awake at nights
planning our first meeting and how I would approach him and what we would
say….now it was all out of my hands and I was in a situation I had never envisaged,
which shows how stupid a person could be!
Peggy had disappeared by the time I found the kitchen. Mrs Dayton
turned and smiled at me and indicated the chairs and table whilst she turned
her attention to baking cookies and biscuits. I watched her for
a moment or two and then looked around the room and admitted it was pretty
enough. Then she came and put down the coffee cups and sat opposite
me and looked at me as though I was a prize mare…..I just felt like a prize
fool!
“Jane…you don’t mind me calling you Jane, do you?”
“Well, actually…”
“It’s just that Adam always refers to you as Jane….when he gave Peggy her
pony he said ‘You ride your pony just like Jane used to…’ Really,
I should be quite jealous of you!” she pinned me to the chair with a bolt
of lightning from the blue eyes and the small mouth seemed to button up tight
before she smiled again.
“I don’t think…”
“When my husband died…”
“I’m sorry, I didn’t realise …was it very long ago?”
“No, not really. That’s why we don’t intend to marry just yet
awhile…although my husband …” she paused and looked down at the cup and stared
hard as though trying to get her thoughts into order “He wasn’t a good
husband by any means, but one has to observe the proper way of doing things.
I was married when I was very young…very young…it was such a stupid thing
to do, but I thought I loved him….you know how it is…but then …may be not
after all…”
“I do understand, Mrs Dayton, I understand only too well, I was married
too – once…”
She stared at me and I could see the colour mantle her cheeks and her eyes
went round and I could hear in my head the tick tick of her brain as she weighed
up the information I had just given to her….it was a strange and stupid thing
but in the short time that I had known her, even had she not been involved
with Adam, I knew I could never have liked her, that behind that prattling
busy little person was a very manipulative lady. Whether she
loved Adam or not, I was in no position to know or say, but I asked myself
constantly how could he possibly love her?
“Oh then, you’d understand…how hard it is at times. He never loved
me, of course, made a fool of me, humiliated me, and then when he got killed…”
“Killed?”
“He got drunk and fell off his horse, cracked his head right open.
Died rightaway the doctor said. Of course, that left me with all
this and debts too…everything such a mess and I jest had no one to turn to,
and then Adam came and offered to help and it all seemed so right somehow…getting
married to him…”
She talked on and on, I don’t rightly know even to this day what she was
saying, but I sat there and listened, even when she got up and started cooking
the lunch she talked. Never once did she ask me about my husband,
whether he was alive or dead, whether we had loved one another ….she was one
of those women who, if you broke your arm would spend an hour telling you
how much it hurt when she got a splinter in her finger!
“…..here they come!” she said and her face flushed a pretty pink,
and she straightened her hair and glanced over at the table to make sure
everything had been set out right.
I listened to the sound of horses approaching, they sounded like the echo
of my heart beats. Voices called out greetings to Peggy and I
heard Adam say “How’s my special girl?” and she squealed his name as the door
opened and they entered the room.
“Adam” she said quietly and smiled at him, and received an answering smile
from him, Peggy was in his arms doing a fair imitation of a limpet on a rock,
Joe and Hoss came in right behind their brother and behind them came Ben Cartwright.
“Adam…guess what – I mean – who’s here?”
He looked at her with his eyes slightly narrowed and a small smile played
about his mouth before he turned to look around the room and then he was looking
at me
“Jane Halcrow?” and he smiled, put Peggy down and walked towards me with
his hand outstretched and his eyes showing sincere pleasure at finding me
there in his fiancee’s kitchen.
“It’s not Jane Halcrow” she laughed ‘sweetly’ “It’s Mrs…something or other…isn’t
it?” and she looked over at me with her blue eyes twinkling with triumph.
“Jane Duncan” I replied, looking only at him and feeling my stomache drop
to my feet and then leap up into my throat, the dark eyes were looking too
intently into mine, and I felt that odd swimming floating into them happen
again and hurridly turned away to smile, and it must have been a rather strange
smile, at Joe and Hoss and Mr Cartwright.
“Oh..and is your husband here too?” he asked, his hand, warm and firm, taking
hold of mine and shaking it for just the right amount of time before he released
it again.
I just knew that to look at him again would be the worse and most awkward
thing to do, so I simply addressed myself to his shirt buttons
“No, he isn’t, he died six months ago….”
There was a murmer of sympathy from them all, it coughed itself into an
uncomfortable silence and so, addressing the shirt buttons again I continued…
“We knew he was dying when we were married so – we were prepared and he
died happy, very happy” my voice wobbled and then trailed away, whatever
else, thank God, Andrew HAD been so happy when he died.
I felt a gentle firm hand grip my elbow and turned and confronted Ben Cartwrights
dark comforting eyes…it was strange, I had the most overpowering urge to just
put my arms around him and sob my heart out. Everything was just so
upside down and wrong side about…and out of my ability to handle it all of
a sudden.
“Hey” Hoss exclaimed pulling out a chair “Something sure smells good…bin
cooking, huh, Laura?”
She smiled and with a trill of a laugh turned and began to usher them into
seats and then get the coffee organised and I, after a thank you smile at
Ben, turned to the stove and began to help her…anything other than have to
look at those politely kindly sympathetic faces.
“So, Jane ..” Ben’s voice wrapped around the room like deep rich brown velvet
“I’d just like to say how glad we are to have you here with us, and I hope
we’ll be seeing more of you than last time…”
They all chuckled and I turned to him with a smile, recalling how hurridly
I had bolted away from them when they had come to Princeton for Adams graduation
“I’m sorry, that was rude of me…but I’d had bad news and what with one thing
and another…” I allowed my voice to trail away and buried my face into the
steam from the pots on the stove.
“Did you go to Switzerland for your music training?” Adam asked, and I sneaked
a peek at him and saw him smiling affectionately at Laura who was handing
him a plate of the stew.
“Yes, I did….”
“How’d you get on?”
“Three years hard work and I got a place in the string section of the Viennese
orchestra and then six months later ….” I ladled stew into a plate and carried
it over to Hoss who greeted me or the stew with a huge grin “I was in a traffic
accident which broke my wrist so I didn’t qualify anymore. I became
a tutor at a college in Lucerne for a while….” I thumped a plate down in
front of Joe, who gave a smothered snort – whether of derision or mirth I
couldn’t say.
“So when did you meet your husband?” Adam asked, his voice sounding
a trifle strained so I glanced quickly over at him and met the full force
of the brown eyes once again. I lowered my eyes and promptly told the
top shirt button
“I met him in Lucerne, his children were students there…he came to a concert
the college was performing and that’s where we met.”
“He was older than you then?”
“Yes, fifteen years older” I informed the third button down
“Hey, did we come here to eat or to talk?” Hoss demanded, relieving me once
again from what was becoming a rather difficult situation for me.
So we all gathered around Laura’s little table, Peggy sitting almost on Adams
lap and my knee rather embarressingly pressed up against Mr Cartwrights…it
was a small table for long legged folk!
Everyone ate well, and there was little doubt about the fact that they were
hungry men, who had been working hard. They smelt as though they
had been labouring, of perspiration and dirt, and their hands looked work
worn and their nails split and torn. I hazarded a swift look up at Adam
while he was talking to Peggy and compared him to the mental picture I had
carried of him in my mind for so long.
How can one compare a man with a boy? A handsome boy becomes, presumeably,
a handsome man, more rugged, stronger, more masculine. He was
bigger built, with a thicker neck and broader back. His eyes looked
wearier, and I noticed he had a scar on his upper lip that had not
been there when I had last seen him. I glanced down at my plate quickly
when he turned towards me
“So – you’ve no children of your own, Jane?”
“No” I glanced over at Hoss “More bread, Hoss?”
“Yeah, don’t mind if’n I do….but I’ll have to eat and run, we’re gitting
behind schedule”
“S’right, if we don’t get a move on, we’re going to have problems
finishing this job in time to start Laura’s fencing tomorrow morning.” Little
Joe murmered, stuffing a wedge of bread into his mouth that would not have
disgraced his older brother.
Adam nodded and put Peggy to one side and began to stand up, he looked
over at Laura who was smiling fixedly at her daughter
“You did remember to tell Hanson to bring the wire over to the Creek road,
didn’t you?” he was standing up now and picking up his gloves “Laura?”
“I – I guess I forgot” she replied very quietly and glanced anxiously at
him, almost timidly, as though afraid of him “I was so excited about
getting Jane here, that it clean went out of my mind!”
Adam said nothing, but he looked at her rather thoughtfully and then frowned
slightly, it was Joe, scratching his head and frowning that spoke up
“Shucks, we need to have that wire there, and Hanson only carries a limited
supply. We can’t afford to take time out today to ride into town to
ask him to bring it along….”
“Can’t afford to delay tomorrow either….Old Man Trafford said he’d be bringing
his cattle through on Saturday, and it’ll take all of the three days to finish
that section of fencing…” Ben said quietly, picking up his hat
“Well, does it matter if it’s a day later? I can’t go into town
again today, I’ve the Parsons wife calling in for tea…..” Laura stuttered,
her face reddening.
“Every hour counts if you want that piece of land fenced in….” Adam said,
a trifle harder than I had expected and I glanced at Laura who seemed close
to tears “It’s important, Laura,” he said, his voice softening a little
“Your husband may not have thought so, but if you want an efficiently running
ranch then these things have to be dealt with properly. If we
lose time and don’t get that fencing done…”
“…I know, Mr Traffords cows will come and eat up all the grass and there’ll
be no winter feed for our animals” she sighed, twisting a napkin in between
her fingers.
“He gave you notice so that the fencing can be done…” Adam continued, seemingly
oblivious to his future wife’s growing distress
“I know that….and you said that you’d be able to get it done in time” her
voice raised just a pitch and Joe glanced over at Hoss, who clapped his hat
on his head, and both did a really good disappearing act out of the house.
I looked over at Ben who put a hand on his sons arm
“Perhaps if one of us rode into town now…” he murmered
“That’ll leave us a man short to finish our own section of fencing….” Adams
lips thinned.
“I’ll go.” I heard myself say and immediately became the focas of four pairs
of eyes, I swallowed hard “Just write a note to Mr Hanson and I’ll get it
to him…”
“I don’t want the horses used again today, they’re tired enough as it is…”Laura
protested.
“If there’s a horse I can borrow….I can ride, I had a good teacher “ and
I actually mustered a smile, directed at Ben …
“Can I come with you?” Peggy asked, tugging at my sleeve
“It would help a lot if you could, Jane” Adam said, leaning on the table
and scribbling something down on a piece of paper which he passed to me “Tell
him to deliver it as soon as he can!”
“Adam…” she caught his arm and together they left the house, the murmer
of their voices could be heard through the door and Ben smiled at me
“Thanks for doing that, Jane….er …look, how about you coming over to the
Ponderosa Saturday evening? Laura and Peggy usually come, don’t you,
young lady?” he smiled down at Peggy who nodded and smiled and then looked
over at me
“Can I come with you into town?”
“I don’t think so…if you have had time from school it’s hardly right for
you to be taking jaunts into town…” I smiled and excused myself from the room,
and hurried up the stairs to the little room allocated to me.
I flopped onto the chair and felt drained with emotional exhaustion.
Oh what a mistake to have come here, I thought to myself, I should never,
never have come….but then a stubborn little voice at the back of my head said
“Whyever not?”
I glanced out of the window and looked down and watched as they mounted
their horses and galloped off, Laura was waving good bye, a fixed smile on
her lips. I shook my head, and took a deep breath, one thing was for
sure, Adam could not love her. But I knew now how she had hooked him….
She looked me up and down thoughtfully when I re-emerged, and then smiled,
rather primly
“Goodness, I’d hardly have recognised you” she remarked
“I could hardly ride a horse into town dressed in my frock…” I replied,
looking over at Peggy who was sulking in a chair
“You can ride the brown filly, her name’s Maggie”
“Thank you…I shan’t be too long!” I looked over at Peggy and attempted
to get a smile from her, but she just turned her head away, scowling.
“It’s just too bad of Adam” she mused, as though to herself, but knowing
full well that I was there “He just doesn’t understand what it’s like for
me….my husband never cared that much about the ranch, he was a – a waster
- , and as he never cared for it, so he never showed me what to do about the
place…..all he wanted was a little woman to come home to, who mends his clothes
and cooks his meals…not someone who’ll go around ordering barbed wire and
remembering to scythe in the grass in time for winter feed…..Adam just expects
too much at times, he doesn’t realise…” and she promptly burst into tears
and buried her face into the smallest square of handkerchief I’d ever seen
“I do try, and I’ve tried so hard over these past months, but I can’t always
seem to remember everything he tells me to do….and when I do, it never seems
to be right, anyway…..”
It was odd. No matter how much she irritated me, at that moment of
time, I really did feel very, very sorry for her. She was trying,
and if her husband was harsh to her, it would take time to realise that Adam
never would be like that, even if he did come over stern at times, it was
never to cause her distress….not intentionally. I put my arm around
her shoulders and gave her a hug, and she continued to weep for a while and
then, blinking, looked at me with bleary blue eyes
“I’m sorry, Jane….please forgive me…it’s silly to carry on like this, but
my husband….and …sometimes I forget that Adam wouldn’t be like that….only
…only I am trying,believe me….”
I nodded, and sighed too. Peggy gave a strangled snort and disappeared
out of the door which was slammed vehemently behind her. Laura sighed
and shook her head
“Peggy adores Adam, she always sees things from his point of view, of course.”
She dried her face and smiled at me “Sorry!”
“That’s alright, I do understand.” I turned to go, and glanced over
at her and sighed again, yes, indeed, I knew exactly the hook she had used
to snare Adam. I had just seen its effectiveness on me!
Thankfully, being a woman, and in this case, a jealous one, I still didn’t
like her.
Chapter 11
The following day Laura, Peggy and I bundled ourselves into the wagon with
enough food and drink to feed a battalion (well, a small one) and drove to
the boundary line where the Cartwrights were working on putting in the fencing.
It was hot enough to fry eggs on rocks.
The relief on all their faces at seeing the wagon and anticipating food,
was almost funny. Down went the tools and over they came, wiping their
hands and faces and necks on their neckerchiefs and then throwing themselves
down onto the long grass for relief.
“Oh boy….I feel like a barbequed piece of steak!” Joe groaned
Ben looked so tired that I wondered exactly how a man of his age could possibly
consider working alongside his sons as he did, how much better it would have
been for him to act in a supervisory position and I wondered why his sons
had not suggested that to him. He greeted Laura with an affectionate
peck on the cheek, he ruffled Peggy’s hair much as I could imagine him ruffling
his boys in times past, and he smiled at me and winked before settling down
on the grass and gratefully taking the glass of cool lemonade from Peggy.
“Don’t drink it too fast” she said sternly
“No, ma’am, I won’t!” and rolled his dark eyes as though she terrified him,
and this made her squeal with delight
Adam sat beside Laura, opposite me and some distance away, whilst Hoss came
and plumped himself down by my side. For some time we ate in silence
and washed everything down with cool lemonade…Laura certainly did excel in
the cooking department that’s for sure.
I looked over at the work they had been doing and noticed the holes that
had been dug out and those that had already got posts set into them.
Wire had already been fixed quite some distance and glinted evilly in the
sun.
“Barbed wire doesn’t look very pretty, does it?” Adam remarked and I realised
that he ze
“No,. but it serves its purpose” I replied without looking up at him.
Joe glanced up at the sun and then yawned and stretched and stood up also,
whilst Hoss dipped into the basket to rummage around for the last doughnut.
“Time to get on…” Joe muttered
Ben sighed and looked thoughtfully at his half empty glass and shook his
head
“Seems this half hour break only lasted five minutes” he groaned, and clambered
stiffly to his feet.
Laura began to clear the things away, flapping the tablecloth and looking
busy and efficient. I stood up and walked over to Ben and smiled up
at him
“Could I help, Mr Cartwright? I’m strong, you know, and can dig a
good hole when I need to….”
Out of the corner of my eye I saw Laura freeze, as though I had uttered
an unmentionable word, then she glanced over at Adam and scowled, her small
mouth puckering in protest.
“Can I too..?” Peggy immediately demanded.
“You have things to do at home” Laura said immediately “Jane, didn’t you
want to write some letters?”
I could feel the heat rising under my collar and turned to look at her and
shook my head
“I can write letters anytime, besides I don’t know how much longer I will
be here so they may not be necessary anyway.” I looked at Ben Cartwright
again “I won’t get in the way, honestly!”
“A willing volunteer is better than ten pressed men!” Adam muttered as he
walked past us and returned to the fence posts that were stacked ready for
use.
Ben smiled and offered me his arm, as though we were about to take the boards
and dance. Laura called out
“I’m leaving now…Jane, you’ll have to come, how will you get back?”
“I’ll walk!” I replied with total confidence in my ability to do so after
digging holes in the scorching heat.
“We’ll get her back…” Adam said and I looked over at him but he had not
even turned to look over at us but was already dropping a post into position
for Hoss to whack into the ground.
…………
I worked as hard as I could alongside them, or, to be more exact, alongside
Ben. He and I soon got into a good rythmn and although it was too hot
and too dusty and too much like hard work to talk, it was companionable.
Joe was the first to abandon his shirt which flew in the air and got stuck
on the top of a pole, so that it hung limply like a long abandoned flag.
Hoss suddenly gave a whoop and his shirt shot past us, rolled up into a ball
and tossed with significant force…Ben smiled and winked at me, but thankfully
kept his shirt on his back, as did Adam who left his unbuttoned and flapping
open .
I had dressed that day in a clean white blouson shirt and loosely tailored
pants, and wore my hair in a single braid down my back. By the
time they called for a coffee break Joe and Hoss were gleaming with perspiration
streaked with dust and dirt, and the three of us were finding our shirts sticking
to our bodies…my hair was a damp straggly mess.
“Jane, you’ve done a good job…we’ve done far more than we expected today.”
Ben raised a water canteen to his lips and gulped some down, then poured some
over his face. He then passed it over to me.
“Have you done this before?” Joe asked, waving his cup in the direction
of the posts Ben and I had managed to get set in over the past few hours
“Yes, at Andrews ranch…”
“Andrew? Your husband?” Adam glanced over at me, with an eyebrow
raised.
“Yes…” I raised the water canteen to my mouth and took several long
cool gulps. It tasted delicious.
“Well, seeing we’re ahead of ourselves, how about I take Jane home…?” Adam
glanced at the three others, daring them to say anything to the contrary and
he took my elbow and turned me in the direction of the wagon
“I can do some more…” I protested
“No,I think you’ve done quite enough….and Laura would want you to freshen
up before she has her guests come for tea…”
“That was yesterday” I pulled my arm free
“Laura always has someone coming for tea…” he murmered and looked down at
me with a slightly sardonic look on his face and his dark eyes seriously very
dark!
I looked down at myself and sighed and nodded, I looked a mess, and quite
honestly, what had been the point of it all anyway? That I wanted
to be spared Laura’s company, yes…that I thought I could be helpful for Ben
who looked so tired, yes again….that I was as good as them (well, not as good
as Hoss) at digging holes and putting in fence posts, certainly yes, but
now I just looked a mess and whatever time we had gained I was about to be
the cause of them losing it.
“Don’t let me hold up your work, Adam…it’ll be a shame to lose what advantage
in time you reckon we’ve gained!”
“Do you want to walk?” he put his hands on his hips and looked down at me
and smiled, his white teeth very white against the tan and the dark smudges
of dust and dirt on his face.
“I could…it’s only a few miles…” I said, addressing the empty space just
above his shoulder.
He shook his head and narrowed his eyes and again grabbed my elbow and propelled
me to the wagon, I could hear Joe and Hoss chortling and felt the colour rush
to my face as I tried to free my arm from his grip.
He lifted me up onto the wagon seat and was beside me before I could clamber
back down. We drove some few minutes in total silence, both of
us staring ahead of us, and the reins loose in Adams hands. I
allowed myself a lingering look at his hands and thought how strong and attractive
they still were, despite the cuts and grazes that had resulted from the work
we had been undergoing. I took a quick look at my own hands and frowned
at the sight of the blisters running across the palm of my hands. I folded
them neatly into my lap and tried to think of something to break the silence.
“Jane?”
“Yes, Mr Cartwright?”
A pause and a sigh and he looked at me thoughtfully before turning his attention
back to the road
“Do you think you could talk to me during this ride…I mean…not to my shirt
buttons or the air over my shoulder? “ he glanced over at me then and his
eyes were twinkling at me and I smiled and nodded. “Tell me about
your husband, Jane….was he a good man to you?”
“Yes, he was a very good friend. He loved me very much and ..” my
voice trailed away and I looked down at my hands.
“You say he was older than you?”
“Andrew was fifteen years older than me and had a son and two daughters.
He wanted to marry me soon after we met…..but I refused him…”
“Why?”
“Because I didn’t love him”
“So you grew to love him, is that it?”
I could see the pucker between his eyebrows as he concentrated on what I
was saying, and when I didn’t reply immediately he looked at me again
with a frown
“You didn’t love him?”
“No.”
“But you married him?” his lips thinned slightly and his fingers tightened
on the reins.
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“Andrew was dying, he had a very short time to live and he wanted, begged
me to marry him. He had loved me constantly for two years, he’d been
kind, patient, an intelligent companion who loved art, music, poetry, and
he wanted to protect me, give me some security. He wanted to die knowing
that I would have some measure of that….”
“And so – you married him out of pity?” he looked at me, a strange look
of reproach and sadness.
“No, if you had known Andrew you would know that it was impossible to pity
him. I never pitied him, he was far too alive a personality for that…he
deserved to be loved, but he knew I never would love him, but I thought of
him as my best friend and we had a very happy few months together.
He’d bought a ranch in Oregon some years back, and decided to go there, to
build it up so that his son would have something to inherit when he died.
So for the last months of his life we worked on that ranch….dug holes, and
sunk fence posts – that kind of thing”
“Didn’t he mind your not loving him?”
“He said he would love me enough for the two of us….he knew …well, he knew
that had he been healthy I would never have married him.”
“And if he had made a complete recovery?” he smiled thinly
“I’d have had the marriage annulled…..” I swallowed the lump in my throat
and looked at him, trying to find some kind of condemnation in his brown eyes
as he looked at me “We had a kind of marriage, a meeting of minds…that was
all…it was a marriage in name only in all other respects.” Again I
looked down at my hands, the blisters were beginning to feel sore “I
would never, never recommend anyone marrying someone if they did not truly
love them. It’s wrong and contemptible…”
“But you can if they’re about to die, huh? That makes it alright,
does it?”
“Andrew and I were always totally honest with one another, Mr Cartwright.
When he was dying I cared for his needs with all the care a wife would give
him, should give him….I was not completely devoid of affection for him.
Looking back now, I owe him so much – the love he gave me, the way he was
– that in some ways I did love him.”
“And he was happy with that?”
“Yes, he was very happy with that…” I looked at him again, rather angrily,
feeling hot in the face “We had a wonderfully happy few months together, we
laughed and enjoyed life and when he was dying, in my arms, he thanked me
for marrying him and making him so happy, and I thanked him…for loving me.”
I felt the tears pricking against my eyes and closed them quickly and turned
away.
He drove on a little more in silence, and then nodded as though happy with
the conclusion of whatever he had thought upon the subject. I looked
over at him and decided it was time to change the subject
“You never became an architect then?”
“No….I’ve designed some buildings for Virginia City and some other towns…but
I never got to stay East and sit my life away in an office….” He smiled slowly
at the thought and his eyes crinkled
“I always thought tht if you didn’t become an architect you would go to
sea, like your grandfather?”
“Oh, you remember all that nonsense I talked about, huh?”
“I didn’t think it was nonsense, nor did you, then –“
“Well, things happen to make a man change his mind.” He drew the horses
to a stop and looked in the direction of a half made house and then looked
at me “What do you think of it?”
“Whose is it?”
“It’s the house I’m building for Laura and me….once it’s finished we’ll
be married “ his voice trailed away and his neck reddened a little “Do you
like it?”
“It looks like it’ll it a grand house when it’s finished.” I said very quietly
He smiled thinly, and then with a sigh turned the horses round and rode
down into the track leading to Laura’s present house. I sat awhile
thinking and wondering why he had shown me the house he was building and
heard myself say
“Why are you building a house here? Laura isn’t interested in ranching…”
“Did she say so?”
“No, but I thought it was obvious….she has no interest in staying put here
at all…”
“Her husband tried his best with this place, it’s Peggy’s inheritance!”
I opened my mouth to say more, but closed it tightly. There
was little point in saying more. I could tell from the set of his jaw
and the way he had narrowed his eyes that he wanted the subject dropped.
Suddenly he took my hands in one of his own and pulled back the fingers and
looked down at the blisters and frowned
“No more fencing for you!” he said sternly
“I can wear gloves. My hands have gone soft, that’s all…”
“You always have to argue, don’t you, Jane?” he smiled then, and looked
so much like the Adam I had known in the past, the Adam I had loved for so
many years now, that I could have thrown my arms about him and kissed him.
“I’m sorry, I don’t mean to…but I would like to do something, it would be
a little thank you to Mrs Dayton for having me stay!”
“I’m sure Laura’s been more than pleased to have you stay!” he replied slowly,
and he sighed and then smiled “Do you like it here, Jane?”
“It’s very beautiful…what I’ve seen of it.” I replied honestly
“Not too savage, or primitive…?”
“No more so than Oregon.”
He said no more but glanced ahead of him, and we saw Laura standing at the
door way,
her face pensive and anxious. It was then that he realised he was
still holding my hands.
Chapter 13
The atmosphere in the Daytons house dropped to freezing. Almost
by token agreement even Peggy refused to have eye contact with me and avoided
talking unless absolutely necessary. Eventually Laura sent her into
the garden to play with her scrap of a doll. I felt apprehension
well up within me and, never being very good at confrontations, I excused
myself and tried to gain sanctuary within the guest room.
“Jane, I think we need to talk!”
I turned and faced her as she stood at the foot of the stairs, her hands
folded in the lap of her skirts, and her head held high on the slender stalk
of her neck. Her blue eyes looked like ice and inwardly I shivered,
although I forced a smile onto my lips and turned and followed her in to her
neat little parlour.
“Do sit down!” she pointed to a chair as though I were some rebellious child
at school and she were the teacher in charge, however, I did as bidden and
took my place without demur. She took a deep breath “What are
your feelings for Adam?”
I swallowed the rush of emotions that came to my throat and looked at her
steadily, as steadily as I could, whilst I could feel the colour rushing to
my face. I think even were I a six foot man I would blanch or blush
beneath the steel of that blue gaze…I took a deep breath and looked at her
and tried to see, to read, some other emotion other than indignation in her
face.
“Laura, there’s no need for you to worry about my feelings for Adam, after
all, you’re the one getting married to him”
“You mean, you do love him then?” she said this with a slight gulp, as though
she had hoped for some other answer, and her eyes flickered, as though suddenly
she could not maintain the steel within them
“Laura, how I feel about your fiance is really nothing for you to
be concerned about….it’s really how your fiance feels about you…isn’t it?”
I tried to speak as gently and as kindly as I could, although I know my voice
sounded a trifle harsher than usual, mainly because I wanted to shake her
hard and gt her to tell ME exactly how SHE felt about him!
“Adam loves me. He’s an honourable man and doesn’t give away his feelings
lightly….to tell me he loves me…is sufficient for me to know that he would
not feel any other way for you, other as a friend…an old friend from the past…”
she paused “a friend who is not going to be staying here very long!”
I nodded. Well, there was nothing to keep me here, and I would have
had to have been blind and deaf not to realise that I was no longer welcome.
I stood up and she looked me up and down, as though she had just finished
interviewing me for the position of governess to her daughter and was convincing
herself that she had made the right decision…that I was, indeed, found to
be wanting!
“Laura,may I now ask you a question?” I stood up as proudly as I could,
with my chin up and my eyes on her face and I saw the little blush touching
her cheeks and wondered if she anticipated my question “Laura, do you love
Adam?”
“I wouldn’t be engaged to marry him if I did not!”
“That’s no kind of answer….”
“It’s the only answer you’ll get.” She replied, and she compressed her lips
tightly and turned her head. “Now,if you’ll excuse me I have to go out.
You ought to clean up….” She looked at me again, and shook her head as though
she found the sight too distasteful for words “You’ve ruined that blouse….what
were you thinking of….what lady …”
“Laura, this is a new world out here, ladies have to do things that ladies
do not normally have to do….if they want to hold onto their self respect and
the respect of their men. Besides, Mr Cartwright was tired…. “
“You talk like Adam….” She lowered her eyes and turned away “I’ll see you
when I get back.”
“You don’t mind my staying another evening?” I was surprised, having
expected her to tell me to leave before her return, and then I realised,as
she stood there, dithering, hesitating, wondering what to say, that she had
no reason to offer Adam for my leaving tonight, and it would not have met
with his approval were I to go so soon.
“I don’t know when I’ll be back…Adam and I have things to do….”
She passed me quickly, twitching at her skirts so that they would not touch
my soiled clothes. I heard her calling Peggy and eventually they
were driving out of the yard and I was on my own.
I boiled water, poured it into the metal tub and bathed. It
was good to feel clean, and the blisters did not look so bad once I had removed
the layer of dirt. I cleaned the wash house once I had dressed
and braided my hair, leaving it to hang down my back. Then I returned
to her kitchen and began to prepare coffee and something simple to eat.
I was so deep in thought that when I heard the light tapping on the door
I was close to dropping the cup and plate onto the floor, but when Ben Cartwright
stepped inito the room, sweeping off his hat and smiling at me, I could have
laughed out loud with relief.
“Are you alright?” his black eyes looked into mine, and I could see the
kindness in them. He may have been a hard man, exacting in his requirements,
strict with his sons, but towards women and children he was as soft as putty.
A woman could sense that so easily, no matter how arrogant or ruthless he
could look at times, nor how gruff his voice could bark orders….”You look
as though you had seen a ghost?” he came nearer to me, and placed a gentle
hand on my arm, then took the cup and plate from me and set them down on the
table.
“I wasn’t expecting anyone to come!” I explained, “I got lost in my
thoughts, and when you knocked it made me jump”
“They must have been very involved thoughts, I’ve been knocking on your
door for about five minutes….”
“I’m so sorry….you must have thought me very rude” I turned away from
him, knowing that if I had to look into that gentle face again I would cry.
He had the same manner about him as Andrew, and that disturbed me.
“If you’re making coffee, I would like to join you…if I may?”
“Of course.” I brought another mug down from the shelf and began to
pour out the coffee and set it down upon the table, then pulled up a chair
and sat down.
“So? How are you getting on with Laura?” he glanced at me over the
rim of the mug and I lowered my eyes
“Well, as it happens, not too well. I shall have to move back
into town in the morning.”
“She can be a little – er – cool! Probably feeling a trifle
defensive, seeing how much Adam thinks about you….”
“Does he?” I glanced at him quickly, and then felt the colour flushing up
into my cheeks again.
“My dear, why did you come here? Was there any particular reason?”
I couldn’t reply immediately. The reply had to be thought out carefully,
I needed time to think and sort out my feelings, and to speak about them to
this man, made me feel very vulnerable. I took a deep breath
and stared hard at the coffee pot.
“So you were married? Were you happy, Jane?”
“As happy as anyone could be in the circumstances.” I replied honestly,
picking up my cup and drinking the hot beveridge.
“What circumstances were they?” he asked quietly
“Well, Andrew was a lot older than me…..”
“That’s right, I remember you saying something of the sort, and he was ill?”
“Yes, he had a very short time to live. We both knew that…..when we
married.”
“It takes a special person to marry under circumstances like that…”
I looked at him and frowned, and thought of Andrew…
“He was special, Mr Cartwright, I was not….”
“Why do you say that?”
“Because he was a very passionate man, he loved life, art, music, and his
children…he was generous and kind, and he loved me despite…”
“Despite?”
“I did not love Andrew. I mean, I did love him in some ways,
but I could not love him as a wife should love a husband. He knew that
from the first time he asked me to marry him.”
“He was persistent then?”
“Yes, over the course of a year he proposed six times!” I smiled at the
memory, dear sweet kind Andrew “He had the same reply every time.
I offered to be his housekeeper, when we knew that his illness was so serious,
but he wanted to marry me, to keep me safe, he said, from predatory men!”
“I can understand that…..I would have done the same….”
“Would you?” I looked at him thoughtfully, wondering why he had said such
a thing. He smiled then and placed a gentle hand on mine, much as his
son had done not so long before…
“Jane, some men love…despite anything, everything, they love in the fullest
sense of the word. He must have loved you very much…”
“Yes,he did.” I could feel the tears welling up in my eyes and fumbled for
a handkerchief, “He told me that he wanted to give me security for when
he was gone…but I told him he had his children to think of first, and that…as
I would never be a real wife to him…”
“I’m sure you were everything he needed you to be ….”
I felt the tears fall, and trickle down my cheeks faster than I could dab
them away…I remembered the separate rooms, his polite knock on the door evenings
and mornings when he came to bid me goodnight, and good morning.
I took a deep breath and forced myself to stop the tears, whilst Mr Cartwright
stared politely at the table and drank his coffee.
“We had a very good friendship, Mr Cartwright. I think he knew that
I respected him, and cared about him, very, very much!”
“Yes, I know…”
“Do you think I was dishonest? Was I wrong in marrying him?”
“He was happy, wasn’t he?”
I smiled slowly, remembering the laughter that had been in our marriage,
the theatre trips, the restaurants, the parties…then there were the times
in Oregon, when we worked together, played like children as we worked,
yes, it was a wonderfully, happy time…and he had died in my arms, smiling,
happy, his eyes on my face…and he saw my tears….
“So, Jane, why are you here?” he said quietly, placing his cup gently in
the saucer
“Andrew told me to come.” I replied simply, honestly “One evening
we were sitting together before the fire, it was a cold night, and he was
dying, and he took my hand in his and we just sat together staring into the
flames…”
“And he said to come here?”
“He thanked me for marrying him. He said that he realised that had
he not been so ill, I would not have considered marrying him although he knew
also that I had not agreed to his proposal out of pity….” I looked at Mr
Cartwright and searched the expression in his eyes “I did not pity him, really,
I did not…”
“I don’t think he would have married you had he thought for a moment that
that was the feeling you had for him……..”
I closed my eyes for a second, and felt a weight lift from my shoulders.
The fact that he understood meant so much to me….
“We talked a little then, about his first wife…she had died from consumption
some years earlier. He had loved her passionately, which made
it all the more remarkable that he could claim to love me as well…..”
“Believe me, it is possible, I have loved – and lost – three women whom
I have loved, still love, very much!”
“You do understand, don’t you?” I smiled and he smiled back and nodded.
“Then he asked me to tell him about the man I loved…so I told him and he said
that when he died, I should go and find …find him…this man I loved…”
“And so?”
“He said I needed to see him again, to lay the ghost and get on with living,
as he put it. I said, after all these years he could be married with
a family…..”
“And what did he say?”
“He said then if that were the case I could get on with my own life, but
if the man were single, was not involved ….perhaps I could be happy in finding
him, perhaps he would love me…”
“Do you think he would have done?”
“Who?”
“This man you were looking for, do you think he would have loved you, had
he been single?”
I stared at him for a moment, and then turned away, and stood up from the
table and picked up the cups and saucers
“I’m sorry, Mr Cartwright, I should have offered you some cake or something
to have with your coffee….” I mumbled
“Jane….sit down, dear…” he reached out and touched my hand, and I sat down
and looked at him and he looked at me and then he smiled very gently “Jane,
you love Adam, don’t you?”
“Yes. I’ve loved him since I first saw him….when I was very small,
very alone… I looked up and he was there, and I felt myself drowning in his
eyes….I knew then that he was someone I would always love…my heart was filled
with my love for him…”
“And you still feel that same way?”
“It would be much easier, Mr Cartwright, if I did not!”
“Do you think Laura loves him at all?”
I paused a while and looked at him, saw the concern in his eyes that must
have been for his son, and I shook my head
“No, I don’t think she loves him….perhaps she feels for him as I felt for
Andrew, so I have no right to comment, not really…..” I bit my bottom lip
and frowned, thinking that perhaps my answer was not very satisfactory “If
she makes him happy…..”
“Adam is not a man who is soon to die…and he is a man who will need a great
depth of love….reassurance…compassion….”
“Mr Cartwright, Adam has promised to marry Laura, and he has told her he
loves her….it is none of my business to comment any further ….really….”
“And so – you’re leaving..?”
“Yes, that’s what Andrew suggested, that I find Adam again, and then get
on with my life….and that’s what I’ll try to do….although I shall always love
him, always!”
He said nothing for a while, then he sighed heavily and looked at me as
though I were a child in need of protection, which corresponded very much
with how I felt, so I gulped a bit and I think my chin began to wobble
as I fought the tears. He sighed again before leaning towards me and
asking the question I was dreading
“My dear, why did you leave it so long to come back and find him?”
“Oh Mr Cartwright…you don’t know how much I wish I had done so…you just
don’t know how much…” I struggled to keep composed, after all, I had
always thought a woman in tears looked so unattractive and I’m sure
men only conceded points to them because they found it so embarressing….I
had always told myself to act in any situation with logic and a sense of
my own worth. The problem was that this situation called my own
worth very much into question “I – I went to Switzerland to be educated at
my uncle and aunts expense. I never heard from Adam, and the few letters
I sent to him always returned unopened.”
“He never received letters from you, nor from anyone in Switzerland…but..”
he smiled wryly “we did not have the mail delivery of the Swiss here I’m afraid!”
“I lack confidence in myself, I am not brave nor adventuresome….and I had
somehow convinced myself that had he ever thought of me, as I did of him,
he would come and find me…just like Sir Galahad had sought the holy grail…”
I sighed and shook my head “Of course, I know I was just trying to avoid facing
the truth, that he did not, could not, love me. I didn’t want
to come here and face it! Now I have….”
“It isn’t too late, Jane. Why not tell him how you feel….”
“I could not do that, Mr Cartwright. He would not respect me for doing
that, not now. He loves Laura and Peggy, and he wants to marry
Laura…it would be wrong to say anything now!”
He looked at me intensely for a while and then stood up and took hold of
my hands and looked into my eyes and kissed my brow
“My dear, I would have been more than happy to have had you as my daughter…”
he said very quietly and seeing the tears trickling down my cheeks he gently
brushed them aside with his finger “God bless you, child” he whispered and
then he left, very quietly, closing the door gently behind him.
I cried then. I cried so much that it left me weak and my throat ached
and burned from the effort.
Chapter 14
I was still on my own, thinking over my conversation with Mr Cartwright
when I heard the sound of horses galloping into the yard and upon opening
the door, saw Hoss and Joe about to dismount. My
first reaction was to close the door and run upstairs and hide. The
horror of having to face them with my puffy face and swollen eyes!
“Hey, Jane…” Joe laughed as he raised his hand in salute and almost ran
towards the house. It was impossible not to smile when Joe was
like this, laughing and his eyes twinkling. He did not seem to notice
the state of my face but grabbed me by the waist and twirled me round and
round, so that I had to laughingly push him away to make him set me back
down on my feet again “Works over for the day, there’s still a coupla
hours before sunset, and its doggone hot…how about coming with us and playing
hookey for a spell?”
“I got some grub….” Hoss held up a sack, heavily laden I could see…”C’mon,
Jane, climb up behind Joe and let’s go have fun!”
Have fun?
I was about to protest, plead a headache, beg time out to be alone to do
some packing…but Joe grabbed my hand and was soon hauling me towards his horse
and then he grinned and looked me up and down and without a word lifted me
up and into the saddle before mounting up himself behind me.
If this was being kidnapped it was done very pleasantly and with many guffaws
and giggles (from me, I hasten to add) and chortles we were soon riding away.
Who would have thought I had only an hour earlier been crying so heartily?
Joe smelt of sweat and dirt and earth and sunshine. Sitting
in the saddle leaning against him – quite unavoidable – I could smell his
body and feel the warmth of him. I could feel the rythmn of his heart
beat that jogged along to the same beat of his horses hooves….I could feel
his excitement and joy of life. It chased my miseries away like snow
before a furnace.
We stopped in a valley where the grass swayed to slight breeze and poppies
and other wild flowers bowed their drowsy heads in tune to the grasses movement.
It was like a rhapsody of music. Below the grass line was a beach
that sloped into the lake which shone like blue zirconite and diamonds in
the sun light.
“One of my favourite places” Joe said as he lifted me down onto the
ground
“I can see why” I looked about me and took a deep breathe and closed
my eyes, it was so beautiful that it hurt. Sometimes a view can do that,
it can touch the depth of ones heart to see the way our God has traced out
the sea and the sky, and formed the clouds and the sweet flowers that graced
the earth.
“C’mon, I’m starving…” Hoss threw himself down on the ground and opened
the sack and out came the most delicious food, which he passed over to us
generously, but not that generously I noticed.
“Do you often come here?” I asked, spraying crumbs over my skirt and nearly
choking with laughter when Joe started to laugh at me
“Only when we get the time…not too often lately.” Hoss frowned “Seems
we’re as busy working at Laura’s place as we are on the Ponderosa.”
“Yeah, it’s been a busy few months. Laura’s husband just let
the place go – Adam wants her to be secure, and Peggy too…” Joe
rolled onto his back and sprawled out in the grass. He closed
his eyes and let the sun bathe him.
“He works all hours, here, and at Laura’s, and then on that house he’s doing…”
Hoss frowned again, bringing some darkness into the light of the moment.
“Yeah, work, work and more work…..and Laura, whinge, whinge and more whinge!”
Joe yawned
“Hey, Joe, that ain’t fair, you shouldn’t say things like that about Laura.”
He paused and looked over at me “She’s just highly strung, needs gentle handling”
“Oh yeah!” Joe snorted “She needs to be put over someone’s knee and given
a good spanking, that’s what I reckon!”
Hoss bit his lip, and glanced away, then he looked at me and shook his head
“Sorry about that, Miss Jane, jest that we ain’t got used to the idea of
Adam marrying Dayton’s widder”
“Aw, let’s stop this jawing and go for a swim!” Joe said abruptly and pulled
off his shirt and boots and socks and jumped to his feet “Coming, Jane?”
and he laughed, his green hazel eyes more green that I could ever remember
seeing them before….then he turned and began to run to the lake and with a
loud hurrah he splashed and dived into the water.
It took no time at all for Hoss to follow suit, his boots were flung to
the left and right of him, and then his shirt flew in the air mid way
to the lake and then he also was diving into the water, sending up a cascade
of sparkling diamonds as the water streamed upwards.
I drank a little of the raspberry cordial and then lay down upon the grass
and stared up at the sky. This was pleasant, very
pleasant. The sun was warm to my face and body, and the smell of grass
and flowers was rich to my nostrils. I could hear them laughing
and splashing like two little boys at play, but it seemed as though it were
coming from a very long way off. I felt as though I were floating…….
“Sleepy?”
I woke up, startled, confused. I looked about me and then up
and my eyes met the full force of his dark brown eyes looking down at me,
very close. I felt that strange sensation of swimming into the
brown pools and my stomach lurched and I felt sick…I closed my eyes and pretended
to myself that it was just a dream.
“Jane?”
I opened my eyes again and looked up but he had moved away, and I could
feel and sense him sitting close at my side and so I sat up and,blinking
rather like a bemused old owl, looked at him. He was hot, perspiring,
even now he wiped the sweat from his brow with the back of his hand.
He was dirty and tired, I could tell from the way his eyes seemed sunk in
their sockets that he was very weary
“Why don’t you go and swim with them?” I asked “You’ll find it very refreshing!”
“Rather than sit here and talk with you?” he grinned, his white teeth gleamed
against the dark tan of his skin.
I looked over at the lake and watched for a while as the two brothers swam
side by side, and smiled at the efforts Joe made to keep up with Hoss, and
the efforts Hoss made not to pull away too easily from Joe.
“Jane?”
“Yes?”
“Laura told me that you were leaving tomorrow. Is that true?”
“Yes” I looked at him and tried to catch his eyes, but this time he looked
away from me. I could only assume the worse. He really did
not want me around after all.
“Couldn’t you stay for the wedding?”
“No!”
He looked at me sadly. I looked again at Joe and Hoss and refused
to look at him. How like a man not to sense the mortal wound he had
inflicted upon my bruised heart! Stay for the wedding! His wedding…and
hers….oh no, no.
He said nothing for a while and then cleared his throat to speak, I looked
at him and waited
“Remember when you were a little girl, how we used to quote poetry all the
time when we were riding in the mornings?” he smiled gently at me and I nodded,
remembering the times all too well “Do you still read poetry?”
“Yes.”
Joe and Hoss were coming out of the water now, dripping spangles of water
as the drops caught the fast fading sun
“What’s your favourite just now?” he leaned upon one elbow, a stalk of grass
between his fingers and looked up at me.
How easy it would have been to have leaned forward then and kissed those
lips!
“Maud Muller…” I said woodenly
“Oh…I’ve not heard of her…”
“There’s one verse I recall….”
“Tell me what it is?”
“’For of all sad words of tongue or pen
The saddest are these: ‘It might have been’”
The silence hung heavy between us. His brown eyes looked intensely
into mine and I held his gaze challengingly….then Hoss descended in a wet
heap beside his brother and slapped Adam on the back
“How come you left off work so early, brother?” he said, with his usual
bright smile as his hair dripped water down his face.
“I needed a break………” Adam said and then stood up, surveyed the sky and
sighed “I guess I had better get back and finish off for the day…..”
“Hey, Adam” Joe’s voice wafted up the hill, preceeding him “Why not stay
and play hookey with us!”
“Is that what this is?” Adam smiled and looked at me and winked
“Yep, that’s what this is…” Hoss chuckled, picking up the flask of cordial
“Hookey….freedom….respite….here, have some raspberry cordial”
He hesitated, then shook his head. We watched him gallop
off, back in the direction of the house and Joe sighed
“Never knew a fella so anxious to put his head in a noose before….” He sighed.
“Don’t you like Laura?” I asked
They said nothing, but glanced at one another meaningfully.
Then with the utmost politeness Hoss offered me the biggest slice of gooseberry
pie! This at least was an offer I could accept, so I did…..the
look of disappointment on his face is something that I can still smile about
down to this day!
Chapter 15
In the morning I carefully packed my things and borrowed the rig and
rode back into town.
I was walking back from the booking office when I saw Ben Cartwright walking
hurridly to the hotel, and when he saw me, he took off his hat and hurried
forwards, cupping my eblow in one of his large hands he looked down at me
and smiled his gentle smile
“Were you really going to leave us without saying good bye, Jane?”
His voice was deep and tender, and his eyes dark and comforting and I felt,
once again, the urge to sink into his arms and hold him close and weep.
I dredged up a smile instead
“I am sorry, Mr Cartwright…but I couldn’t stay…”
“When are you leaving?”
“In an hour…” I looked back at the coach and frowned, perhaps I had been
overly hasty, but I knew what my heart had told me…I looked at him and smiled
“Thank you for everything, Mr Cartwright.”
“Jane…” he paused and looked at me thoughtfully, for some seconds
he said nothing and then he drew me closer to the wall of the building and
looked at me intently again “Jane, I know how you feel about Adam, we all
do, apart from Adam…” he smiled slowly “If you feel for him, as you do, why
leave now? All’s fair in love and war after all?”
I looked at him again and frowned, and I shook my head
“I’m not very good at fighting, Mr Cartwright. And anyway, Adam
isn’t the sort of man who would respect me for trying to undermine his loyalties
to Laura.”
“Don’t you think he loves her?” he raised a dark eyebrow quizzacally and
I shook his head
“He doesn’t love her, but he’s loyal, and stubborn, and very protective…if
I tried to ..to play those sort of games with them…he would never respect
nor trust me…and I couldn’t bear to lose that…”
“But if you won him…”
“I wouldn’t though…I might destroy his relationship with Laura…..and then
he would have nothing…he wouldn’t want me.”
“Are you that sure?” he lowered his head, the black eyes staring into mine
and I nodded
“He’s not like Sir Lancelot, you see…” I sighed
“Sir Lancelot? What was so wrong with Sir Lancelot?”
“He had flaws….he was disloyal…”
“All men have flaws, my dear.”
“I know!” I smiled slowly and sighed and thought to myself that my knight
errant, dear Sir Galahad…no, he had no flaws, not to me anyway!
I turned at the sound of feet on the boards of the sidewalk and saw the
three men hurrying towards me, behind them came Laura and Peggy, who held
a bunch of dedraggled flowers in her hand
“Leaving without saying goodbye, Jane?” Adam scolded, sounding so much like
his father that I was actually able to smile.
His eyes held mine for a moment, just as his hands took hold of mine gently
and it reminded me of the lines in Paradise Lose when Eve looked at her husband
and said “God is thy law, thou mine; to know no more is woman’s happiest
knowledge and her praise. With thee conversing, I forget all time!”
Joe angled in, pushing his brother out of the way and then Joe kissed me
and asked me to come back soon, and then Hoss came and swung me up into the
air which made Peggy giggle and even I managed to laugh.
“You come back right soon” Hoss said, with his blue eyes looking intensely
into my own.
Laura shook my hand and smiled and said “It’s a shame you’ll miss the wedding,
Jane” but I turned away and took the flowers from Peggy and kissed her cheek.
“Jane…”
I turned as Adam came and put his hand gently on my arm, he smiled and slipped
a small book into my hand and then leaned down and kissed me. Just a
kiss on the cheek. As friends.
“Goodbye…” I managed to say and turned away and hurried into the hotel to
collect the last bits of my baggage. I looked at the book he had given
me, a worn copy of An Anthology of Modern Poetry and then I fell upon the
bed and sobbed my heart out.
That was such a long hour, getting from the hotel to the stagecoach and
waiting for the driver to tell us to clamber aboard. The Cartwrights
were there, amidst others who had come to see friends or relatives depart.
I waved, distancing my self from them evenso. A tall dark man
was elbowing his way through the crowd, handsome with twinkling eyes, and
over the crowd of chattering people I heard him call out “Uncle Ben…hey thar,
it’s Will…” and then Hoss said “Dadburn it so it is…” and the driver cracked
his whip and yelled “Git along thar….”
Dust eddied up and obscured them from view, momentarily I saw Adam raise
his hand in farewell, his dark eyes looking into mine, but they were not the
eyes of a man about to be wed!
Chapter 16 – 1866
We sat there cheek by jowl as the expression goes.
My cousins, their wives and children, friends and other relatives of my late
uncle. We sat in that small, claustrophobic little room and listened
to the lawyer as he related my uncles final bequests.
Each waiting for their name to be mentioned, each watching the other.
I, dressed in my black crepe, felt out of place, like the forgotten and embarressing
poor relation hoping for the proverbial penny to be tossed their way.
When my name was mentioned I saw eyes dart in my direction, some filled with
envy and malice and others with pleasure for my sake and my uncles.
Later the lawyer delayed me so that he could glean a few ‘relative details’
in order to tidy up the loose ends as he put it and thereby ensure my receiving
the modest allowance my uncle had left me.
I was not poor, but I was isolated. I had spent the years travelling
from country to country, in Europe. Then the larger cities in the South…I
had experienced Atlanta’s destruction, fleeing from the fires with only my
clothes that I was wearing and my beloved violin. I had never returned
to Neveda, nor enquired about any one there….my heart was alive only because
of my love of music, and memories.
I trailed my way from the college grounds, away from my cousins and the
remnants of the past. Finally I found somewhere, a pleasant park, to
sit down and to think over the past few days, eversince the letter had arrived
at my apartment, telling me that my uncle was dead, and would I kindly attend
the funeral. It was Arthur’s handwriting and not particularly conciliatory.
It was a warm day, pleasant to sit in. I opened my purse and took
out my worn little book of verse and opened it at one of my favourite pages
and with a sigh began to read…..
……………..
(Narrative of Jane Halcrow Duncan ends. Narrative of Adam Cartwright begins….Princeton
1867)
…………….
I will never know why I dragged myself to that funeral, perhaps the feeblest
excuse would be to pay my respects to a fine man, perhaps the greatest hope
was that I would see her there.
Jane…Jane Halcrow…how she had haunted me all these years. The memory
of her had lingered at the back of my mind, and deep in my heart from the
time I had first seen her…a little girl with red rimmed eyes clutching her
violin case.
I was on the verge of making a decision in my life. I had made several
major decisions such as this one…once when I went to college to study architecture
and then, three years later, instead of achieving fame by designing fantastic
buildings, I returned to the Ponderosa and helped my pa build an empire.
Then next….to leave the empire and strike out on my own, what had I to lose?
Nothing! I needed that time away from the Ponderosa and like a fool
I seized the chance to go to sea, like a hungry man grasping for bread, for
water…
I say, like a fool, because looking back I can see that all I had done was
to lose something more precious than what I had gained. I lost my brother!
Nothing, nothing in the world, had prepared me for the loss of my brother.
I had, in some befuddled reasoning at the back of my mind, thought that when
I left the Ponderosa, it would be cocooned, kept safe, waiting as though suspended
in time, until I eventually returned. I forgot that such things do
not happen, and that life goes on…or ends!
Eric ‘Hoss’ – would I ever forget the sheer size of him, the way he
filled my life from his birth onwards. And in the end, I failed him.
I was not there to help him, nor save him, and it does not matter that my
father and Joe say that no one could have prevented it from happening, it
just does not removed the guilt and the pain.
Had I been running away? When Laura married Will and they left Neveda
to make their lives together, had my heart broken? No, no…again, fool
though I was, I had lost something more precious than I had gained.
I gained freedom but I had lost Jane.
I had dragged myself to that funeral and searched the faces that thronged
the church and the burial ground. Faces of women obscured by black veils.
I recognised no one!
I walked about the town. Perhaps I reasoned to myself that the time
had come to give up this search..to just give up and begin my journey home,
back to the Ponderosa. The sea had been my life for four years, but I no longer
had that yearning to be anywhere, other than home, with my family…with my
land…land that had been borne from our blood, my fathers, and my brothers.
I found myself, eventually, at a park. Pleasant enough and the day was warm.
I walked down the pathways between flowered borders until I saw a woman sitting
on her own reading from a book.
Sometimes when I had been in foreign places I had thought I had seen her
face..and rushing up had surprised, and even frightened, the woman as I seized
them and said “Jane” only to find I had been mistaken after all.
So, this time, I was wary…and approached slowly, watching her carefully as
she turned a page of the book and with an intense look on her face, continued
to read.
I stopped now. Just a few paces from her and saw her turn another
page and sigh. She held the book closer to her, the page touched her
mouth and she closed her eyes and sighed again. Then she looked up
and slowly turned her head towards me….her eyes, blue as ever they were,
became bluer with the intensity of her gaze. Her colour just drained
from her face and I stepped forward hurridly, catching her just as she seemed
to fall forward…
“Steady up there…” I whispered
She said nothing, but held onto me as though I were the lifeline to life
itself, and then I realised she was crying, silent, deep tears.
“Jane?”
She looked up at me and her eyes were luminous with tears unshed now, her
lashes were spiked with them and her face was grave and then suddenly, transformed
as her lips smiled
“I thought I was dreaming” she said and moved away from me, and yet held
onto my hands, and I realised that she was trembling with emotion “It is you,
isn’t it? Adam?”
“It’s me…as you see…” I smiled, my head spinning round and round as I searched
for something sensible to say, but how can anyone be sensible in a situation
like this one? “Jane, I looked for you everywhere…I wrote to people
whom I thought would know your whereabouts…but you seemed to have dropped
off the face of the earth….I couldn’t find you…don’t you realise you broke
my heart when you left?”
She looked at me, puzzled and confused, her head to one side and her blue
eyes searching my face, as though she half expected me to be joking.
How lovely she was..to me..more lovlier than anyone in the world.
She would have said then, as she says now, that she was not ever pretty nor
beautiful, but to me….oh indeed, yes she is, was, always will be.
“But you were getting married…to Laura…”
“She married my cousin, Will.”
“Will?” she looked away, staring back into the past and then she nodded
and then she shook her head and then she laughed, almost hysterically, and
I took her hands and looked at her until she had calmed down “Oh, what I fool
I’ve been…why didn’t I do what your father suggested..had I only stayed a
few more days, or weeks….”
“We could have had a double wedding….I got the house finished!” I said as
light heartedly as I could, as I brushed away the tears from her cheeks.
“But…all these years…wasted…gone…”
I looked down at her and thought of the years…they seemed suddenly like
nothing at all, all I knew, and was certain of, was that the years ahead
would never be wasted again. I smiled down at her and drew her into
my arms and held her close and kissed her lips.
“When I go home…” I said later, as she stood by my side with her hand in
mine “I want to take my wife with me…”
She looked at me and smiled and put her head upon my shoulder, and
I slipped my arm around her waist and held her close. She was
a slender woman, as she had been a slim girl, and her oval face was as sweet
as it had been when she had looked at me in that train compartment when she
was all of ten years old.
“Do you think you’ll be getting married then?” she said with the lilt of
laughter in her voice.
“Certainly.”
“But maybe your future wife would not want to be married to a seaman…and
spend even more time away from you?”
“I’m leaving the sea…I couldn’t bear to be apart from my wife more than
I have to be…I don’t want any more wasted months, weeks, nor days between
us, Jane”
She smiled, I could feel her lips moving in a smile against my own….I had
never known, never tasted, never touched someone I loved so much in all my
life and the feeling rocked me from head to foot.
“My fairest, my espous’d, my latest found,
Heaven’s last best gift, my ever new delight”
CONCLUSION by Jane Halcrow Cartwright
I sit at the table and look about me – at my side sits my husband as tall
and handsome as ever. How I love him, how I have ever loved him.
Shall I ever forget the day when he approached me at the park in Princeton?
Never, never!
He told me later that he loved me from the first moment he saw me at ten
years of age. He was lonely, homesick, frightened of what lay ahead….and
then he saw me, a little girl clutching a violin, crying and sad, but pressing
on with whatever lay ahead. He said my courage had given him courage…how
strange, and I had thought it was all the other way around!
And now time has passed….we have our home on the Ponderosa, and Joseph and
his wife live with Ben in the original house. We have a son Ethan,
and a daughter, Elizabeth and Joe’s wife is expecting their first child within
a months time.
I have never been so happy…in fact, we can laugh now at the wasted years,
although it often used to break my heart to think of the times wasted….had
I only stayed when Will had breezed into town! How different things
could have been….and perhaps the empty chair at the table on the Ponderosa
would still be filled….
I look at my children and my husband, my dear father in law…yes, indeed,
we can make our lives sublime…and departing, leave behind us footprints in
the sands of time.
The End…………Krystyna Woollon
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