All Roads Lead Home

Consciousness grew slowly on Jess Harper. It began by nibbling at the edges of his fever jumbled dreams. A soft worried female voice, a deeper reassuring male voice – distant laughter of children – the sense of a cool wetness on his forehead. It intensified with random jolts of pain as though the devil was jabbing him with his pitchfork. His long dead mother’s face swam towards him and slowly dissolved into the face of another beautiful woman – one he didn’t recognize. All too quickly that face disappeared as well to be replaced by Slim laughing at a shared joke and this in turn faded into the background to return as the leering visage of Poke. He was offered water, which he drank too fast. He was shortly thereafter aware of his head being held as he was violently ill. He tried to apologize but sleep again overtook him. This time it was deep and dreamless.

 

When he finally awoke completely, a late morning sun was streaming in through the bedroom window. He lay still, staring at the ceiling as he gathered his wits and bearings about him. From what he could see in his very limited peripheral vision, it was a comfortable simple yet well-appointed room. Not a woman’s room – he felt he could be pretty sure of that. No frilly doilies or vases of flowers as far as he could see. But a large spacious chamber obviously belonging to an important member of the household.

 

Then, carefully and with as little movement as possible, he cataloged the damage. His left eye was apparently swollen shut and he could feel the weight of a heavy bandage just over it. His teeth were all in place but his jaw ached terribly. His head and chest hurt fiercely and taking a deep breath was impossible due both to the pain involved and the tape binding his ribs.

 

Despite all this, he found he was reasonably comfortable as long as he lay perfectly still. He guessed that was a good plan and was preparing to go back to sleep when he caught a small movement out of his right eye. Turning his head ever so carefully, he found himself staring into the solemn faces of two small tow-headed children. Obviously brother and sister – the boy appeared to be about eight and the girl a year or two older. They peered intently at him as though he were a firefly caught in a jar.

 

Finally the little girl stepped closer to take a better look. “He sure doesn’t look dangerous,” she told her brother seriously.

 

“Well he is,” the boy insisted. “I heard Fiona tellin’ Rose that he was a honest to God outlaw and he’s killed over 300 men – maybe more.”

 

“If he were really dangerous,” she lectured patiently, “he’d be out in the bunkhouse and not right here in Uncle Thad’s bedroom. Then, putting her nose practically up against Jess’ she pronounced,” he’s just a cowboy – a beat-up sick ol’ cowboy.”

 

Jess had to admit to himself that her description of him very accurately described how he was feeling.

 

Just as he was about to introduce himself to his new friends, a large dark hand clamped down on the shoulder of each of the children. They jumped in unison, startled and then with great difficulty tried to restrain their gleeful giggles at being caught.

 

Jess turned his good eye up as far as he could without moving his head. He was barely able to take in the sight of a very tall, very distinguished looking black man in a frock coat. He had high cheekbones and was graying at the temples. Although he was trying very hard to be stern with the disobedient children, his eyes were twinkling and the corners of his mouth twitched.

 

“Now what did I tell you hellions about keepin’ quiet and not disturbing our friend here?” he demanded.

 

The children did their best to look contrite.

 

“Now you two run along and tell Miz Abigail that our house guest has decided to join us.”

 

The children ran clattering from the room, leaving the two men alone.

 

“I – I was tryin’ to find the Davis Ranch” Jess croaked. Awkwardly he continued, “Did I, ah, find it?”

 

“More like it found you,” his companion remarked chuckling. “Some of the men came across your horse and figured you might be wanting some help. From what they said, they got to you right in the nick of time.”

 

Jess soberly considered that for a moment and shuddered. After another moment of thought he suddenly brightened, “Then you must be Joshua.”

 

“And you must be Jess Harper.”

 

“Thad told me all about you. Said if it weren’t for you he’d a’never managed to make it past the age of twelve.”

 

Joshua smiled sadly, “And he told us a story or two about you – you’ve got some wild tales to live up to.”

 

“How is Thad?” Jess asked tentatively.

 

Joshua suddenly became very busy checking Jess’ dressings and plumping his pillows. “I think that’s something you best talk about with Miz Abigail,” he mumbled in a barely audible voice.

 

“Who’s Miz Abigail?” Jess inquired.

 

“She’s the lady what owns this place now. She’s mean an’ she’s old an’ she’s ugly,” Joshua intoned deeply drawing out each adjective as though telling a scary story to a small child.

 

“I heard that, Joshua,” came a soft feminine voice from just outside of Jess’ field of vision.

 

“Ah know,” Joshua replied. “That’s why ah said it. Jess, allow me to introduce you to Miz Abigail Davis.”

 

The tall slim handsome woman who swept into Jess’ field of vision may very well have been mean but old and ugly she certainly wasn’t.

 

Resting a hand affectionately on Joshua’s shoulder, she leaned down and met Jess’ eyes with clear intelligent dark green ones that radiated kindness, good humor and more than a little sadness.

 

“Welcome to the Davis Ranch, Jess. I feel like we’ve been waiting for you for a very long time.”

 

Jess looked at her in confusion. “Thad never mentioned a sister – are you his wife?”

 

Abigail exchanged a brief glance with Joshua before replying, “I’m neither, Jess,” she looked directly at him and continued, “I’m his step mother.”

 

“Oh it’s not what you think,” she interjected quickly seeing him stiffen. “I practically grew up here. My father owned a horse ranch just west of here – my brother Zack runs it now. Thad and I were like brother and sister back when we were kids. The big difference was that I loved ranching every bit as much as he hated it. While he was busy running away from it, I was running back to it - back from every fancy back east finishing school my father ever sent me to. I think after a while he just gave up and let me be. I took to following Buck everywhere he went trying to learn from him and trying to be just like him. I think he finally married me just to keep me in line.”

 

“Now that really worked!” intoned Joshua darkly.

 

“Hush, you!” Abigail admonished, cuffing him lightly on the arm.

 

“We married a few years before Thad came back here. Before the, ah, incident, when you wired us. We were happy together and I miss him. I miss him every day,” she concluded simply.

 

Looking closely at Jess again, she said seriously, “This is a good place we have here. Good people, good land, strong values. It’s true that we’ve suffered great sadness as well but we will grow beyond it and in the end we will be stronger for it.”

 

Hardly daring to know the answer, Jess asked, “So what of Thad and his pa? You talk of them as though they aren’t here any more.”

 

She looked back at him, head cocked to one side, “Didn’t you know?”

 

“No,” Jess replied. “I never heard a thing until I got a two year old letter from Thad a few weeks ago.”

 

“This one?” Abigail asked, holding up a tattered and crumpled envelope. “Don’t worry, I didn’t read it although I was certainly tempted to. I found it in your shirt pocket.”

 

“Yeah, that one. Go ahead and read it. It says all I know.”

 

Carefully extracting the letter she read it slowly and then read it again. Then she looked at Jess with the barest hint of tears in her eyes. “Jess, he probably sent this to you just a few days before we found his body. Buck and I were together when we found him. He’d been shot in the head. The sheriff said it was suicide. Neither Buck nor I believed that. It was in the fall. That winter Buck caught the fever and died. But it really wasn’t the fever that took him. Truth is, his heart was broken. To have gotten Thad back – I mean really gotten him back and then losing him a second time was more than he could bear.”

 

Jess listened intently but was rapidly losing the battle to keep his eyes open as exhaustion overtook him. A fact that didn’t go unnoticed by Abigail and Joshua.

 

Drawing the covers up and gently brushing back the hair from his forehead, Abigail said softly, “I’m so sorry to have been the bearer of such sad news. You rest now and we’ll talk more later.” With that she patted his shoulder and nodding to Joshua swept gracefully from the room.

 

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Chapter Seven