The Long Trail (The McCabes Book 1) by Brad Dennison (microsoft ebook reader .TXT) 📗

Josh found a sudden wave of defensiveness rise up. After all, she was talking about Pa. “Like what?”

“It’s not for me to tell, but I think you might be finding out about one of them quite soon.” She took a sip of tea.

Josh hated it when she did that, acting like she knew something you didn’t, then not letting on any further. He knew it would be fruitless to prod her for any more information, though. She would reveal only what she wanted, and then, only in her own good time.

She continued. “One thing about your father’s mistakes. He never fails to learn from them. You see, Joshua, a mistake is only a mistake if you don’t learn from it. If you do learn, then it’s not a mistake but a lesson. Now, you might have erred in judgment, but not in your responsibility. In fact, it’s your sense of responsibility that’s causing you to be so unsettled about this.”

“It’s just that I was trying so hard. I wanted to do right so bad, to make Pa proud of me.”

“And why do you think you might have made your mistake?”

He shrugged, was about to say, I don’t know. Then it dawned on him. “I was trying too hard?”

She smiled. “Living in San Francisco, I had the good fortune to meet an occasional Chinese person. They have an interesting saying, ‘More is less. Less is often more.’”

“More is less,” Josh repeated. “That’s just what I did, wasn’t it?”

She took another sip of tea. “And Joshua, your father is proud of you. Very proud.”

“How do you know?”

“I see it in his eyes whenever he looks at you, or talks about you.”

Bree called from outside. “Aunt Ginny! Josh! Pa’s home!”

Aunt Ginny returned her cup to the saucer, and rose from the table. “Come. Let’s go say hello to your father.”

Josh stood, sliding the chair back and away as he did so, still clutching his coffee. He felt so much better, like a heaviness was gone from him. He realized he was smiling.

PART FOURTHE MARAUDERS FOURTEEN

Josh felt his chest swell with pride as he watched the rider approach. Tiny in the distance, not quite to the wooden bridge a quarter mile away, but still unmistakably Johnny McCabe. Josh supposed every boy felt that way about his father, but Josh might have felt it even moreso.

It was not just any boy’s father men talked about around campfires, or in saloons over a beer, telling of the time he took down five Comanches with as many shots. Some of the stories told were not true, or had been stretched so thin you could see through them, but the one about the Comanches was true. Pa and Zack Johnson had been with the Texas Rangers, and they had been ambushed by Comanches. Zack had taken a bullet, and still carried the lead to this day. Pa’s horse had been shot out from under him. Pa then scrambled to his feet, drew a pistol as five Comanche horsemen bore down on them, and emptied his gun. Five shots, five Comanches. Two more Comanches were coming up behind the first five, so he did a border shift, and with a fresh pistol in his right hand stood waiting for them to come into range. But they reined up, sat in the saddle staring at him for a moment or two, then wheeled around and rode away.

Pa’s horse was dead, and Zack’s had ridden off. Zack had a bullet in his leg. Pa tied a bandanna about the leg to choke off the bleeding, then carried Zack the entire ten miles back to the fort.

“Just lucky shooting,” Pa had said. But Josh knew luck had nothing to do with it. Practice, and raw nerve, were more like it.

Pa rode a chocolate colored stallion with a black mane. A tall animal, more than sixteen hands. Its legs were long, like a Kentucky bred race horse. It loped along casually, yet its long stride ate up the distance quickly.

Pa rode easily, as though sitting in a saddle were the most natural thing on earth. He rode more easily than most men walked. He didn’t bounce in the saddle, and yet he didn’t give the appearance of clinging tightly to the animal. He simply moved with the horse, as though they were one.

At this distance, Josh couldn’t yet make out his blue eyes, his square jaw, or the deep lines under his chin or alongside each eye that came from a lifetime of riding into the sun and wind. But he could see the wide brimmed brown stetson, the gray jacket. And the twin pistols, one at each hip.

Aunt Ginny stood at Josh’s side. Bree was at the railing, the wind fluttering her hair.

As Pa drew within shouting distance of the house, Bree bounded from the porch, and ran to meet him. Pa reined up Thunder and swung out of the saddle, and Bree jumped into his arms with a squeal of, “Daddeee!”

She then took the trailing rein, and walked beside Pa, leading Thunder behind her.

Josh could hear her babbling. “We missed you so much. We’ve got so much to tell you. What took you so long? We expected you a couple weeks ago.”

“Got me a little side-tracked in the mountains, that’s all,” he said. “You know how I am, out there alone in the hills.”

He stepped up onto the porch. Aunt Ginny extended her hand graciously, like she was a Queen, Josh thought, meeting one of her subjects. But her face was alight with a smile. Johnny took the hand.

“Welcome home, John,” she said.

Pa then turned his sky blue eyes to Josh. Pa stood taller by a couple inches, and Josh had to look upward a bit to meet his gaze. Josh shifted the coffee to his left hand and reached out with his right, which Pa grasped. His grip was strong, his hand rough.

“How were things while I was gone, son?”

Josh smiled. “I kept things together, I guess.