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“Tired?” Slim asked as he and Jess sat on the front porch quietly drinking coffee and watching the pinks and purples of the western sunset fade to dark. It had been a long hot day and both were glad for the opportunity to sit for a spell.

 

“Nah,” Jess replied. “Jes’ thinkin’.”

 

“Anything particular on yer mind? Somethin’ you wanna talk about?” Slim inquired softly.

 

“Now that you mention it – well, yeah,” Jess responded thoughtfully.

 

“This wouldn’t have anything to do with that old crumpled up letter you keep readin’ whenever you think I’m not lookin’ would it?”

 

Jess chuckled in the darkness. He and Slim held few secrets from each other and it was a relief to be finally discussing this.

 

“Mose gave it to me last week. The postmark’s darned near two years old. Guess it took its sweet time catchin’ up with me.”

 

“Who’s it from?” Slim asked; his curiosity peaked.

 

“You remember me mentionin’ Thad Davis?”

 

“That fella you rode with right after the war?”

 

“That’s the one. He and I first met up just before we mustered out. We were a lot alike back then. Both of us kinda wild and not real good at takin’ orders.”

 

“Not you!” Slim exclaimed in mock amazement.

 

“You wanna hear this or don’tcha?”

 

“Sorry,” Slim said contritely as he sat back expectantly in his chair, boots up on the porch railing. “Go on.”

 

“Well, Thad’s family had this big spread up Bozeman way. His pa, feller by the name of Buck Davis, had built it from the ground up. Somethin’ like three thousand deeded acres – that’s not includin’ grazin’ land - and eight thousand head of cattle and growin’ all the time. Probably bigger now. Thad was the only son and his pa was countin’ on him to take it over.”

 

Slim whistled softly. “Fella’d be mighty proud to be in the way of inheritin’ somethin’ like that.”

 

“Well, that’s the rub. Thad hated ranchin’. I mean not like some days when nothin’s goin’ right and guys like us, we bitch and complain and say we hate it but we just hate it for the moment and wouldn’t give it up for nothin’. I mean he hated it all the time an’ saw nothin’ good in it. Claimed his whole growin’ up his pa just shoved it down his throat until he felt if he had to look at the backside of one more cow he’d about die. He ran away a bunch of times but his pa always sent his hands out after him to bring him back. It wasn’t until he joined up with the army and went east to fight that his pa’s long arms couldn’t reach him any more.”

 

“What’d he want to do if it wasn’t ranchin’?”

 

“Thad loved the great wild open. He’d get all nervous like if he had to spend more than a day or two in town. He’d often disappear for weeks at a time just explorin’ and learnin’ all he could. There wasn’t much he didn’t know about plants an’ trees an’ animals. He could speak with most Indians in their own way. An’ this is goin’ to sound really strange to you but that fella could draw things like nobody’s business. It came as natural to him as breathin’. Some of the paintin’s he did looked so real you felt you could reach right in side them. An’ the way he had with animals – well, I never knew anyone else like him.

 

“One time – it couldn’t have been more than a few months after the war ended. We were breakin’ some broncs for a fellow in Colorado to earn us a grubstake. Well, this one stud managed to get me on the ground and then went after me. I thought that was it but Thad, he comes walking over cool as you please and just spoke kinda low to that crazy horse. That horse stopped poundin’ on me right then and there and just ambled over to where Thad was standin’. He sort of leaned his head up against Thad’s shoulder and Thad patted his neck. Then he opened the gate to the corral, gave that old stud a smack on the ass, and told him to head for the high country and not to let anyone ever get a rope on him again. Oh, Thad and me we had us a lot of adventures,” Jess smiled. “Sometimes he was savin’ my hide an’ sometimes I was savin’ his. Those were good times, Slim.”

 

Slim nodded. “So what finally happened? How’d you two split up?”

 

“Thad read in a newspaper about a group of folks in St Louis who were fixin’ to travel west to homestead and needed someone to guide them. I told Thad that there was a small problem in that he hadn’t ever done no guidin’ before and even though he knew all sorts of useful stuff there was a whole lot he didn’t know. Well, this wasn’t what he wanted to hear and next thing I knew he’d wired them to say he’d do the job and was on his way.

 

“It was a long time before I heard any news of him and when I did, it wasn’t good. Seems he’d accidentally - cause he didn’t know any better - led them north right into Sioux country. They traveled in there eighty strong. Men, women and children. When the smoke cleared, there warn’t more than a handful left alive and most of those not alive by much. Thad lost a hunk of his left leg and a bigger part of his soul.

 

“When I finally found him, he wasn’t the Thad I knew. He was a stranger like. He was angry and bitter and was tryin’ his best to lose himself inside a whiskey bottle. I didn’t know what else to do so I wired his paw and the last thing I knew his paw had arranged for him to be sent back home. That is until last week when I got this here letter.”

 

The two men sat companionably in the darkness for a while, neither speaking. Jess, remembering with fondness and pain, his old friend and Slim amazed as he often was at the strength of Jess’ loyalties.

 

It was Jess who finally broke the silence. “In his letter, Thad said he’d forgiven me for callin’ in his pa and that he and his pa had made their peace. Then he said he’d gotten in some kind of trouble with a fella by the name of Dreb Farley over in a town called Ruby Creek and was worried that this trouble might spread to his family. He said he planned to be leaving soon to take what he called ‘one last long ride’ and was hopin’ that by doin’ that he’d also be leadin’ Farley away from the ranch an’ his family. He was askin’ if I could see my way to ride up that there and make sure his family was okay. To not worry about him.”

 

“Jess, it’s been two years since he wrote that. Whatever was going to happen probably already happened a long time ago. What do you think you can do by goin’ now?”

 

“Probably nothin’,” Jess admitted. “But I gotta know, Slim. I gotta know what happened.”

 

Slim stared out into the darkness for a long moment; his heart heavy with what he knew was to come. “When where you thinkin’ of leavin’?”

 

“Day after tomorrow,” Jess replied sadly. “I want to spend some time with Andy first. Want to make sure he understands why I’m goin’ and that I’m comin’ back.”

 

He then looked towards Slim and said, “You understand don’tcha?”

 

“I’m fine and Andy understands a lot better’n you think. After all, we’ve both had some practice.” Slim gave what he dearly hoped was a good-natured laugh. “Just the same, let’s take the day off tomorrow and get some fishin’ in. No tellin’ when we’ll get another chance.”

 

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Chapter Three