Blood Brothers
This
story is a “prequel” to the episode entitled “A far, far better thing”;
it deals with Little Joe’s friendship with the Indian 'Sharp Tongue'.
It is a story about difficult friendships and prejudice. As usual, I have
added a few things just for fun. Please
feel free to ignore them or explore them as you prefer.
Chapter
1
Despite it being time for the school bell to be rung at any second, the schoolyard was abuzz with activity, with several different groups of students engaged in various activities. The younger children were playing a game of Red Rover, Red Rover; while the older students were primarily clustered in two groups, boys on one side of the schoolyard, girls on the other side. Both of these two groups seemed to be scanning the horizon, as if looking for something or someone. Just at that moment, the school door opened and the teacher walked out onto the porch and signaled the pre-selected student to ring the bell. With one last look toward the road leading up to the school, the older students began to shuffle disinterestedly into the building. At the door, Miss Lambert was greeting the children as they entered the building. She too, seemed to be looking for someone; someone who was not there. Sighing, she started to turn to head into the building when she saw what she was looking for coming rapidly down the road. Breathing a sigh of relief, she stopped ringing the bell and waited.
Little
Joe Cartwright galloped into the schoolyard, dismayed to see no students
gathered outside. He bit his lip
and shrugged his shoulders; he was late again.
Miss Lambert had cautioned him just yesterday that if he were late one
more time this week, she was going to talk to his father.
He quickly jumped off his pinto, tying her in the shade of a stand of
trees near other horses. Despite
being late, he took time to make sure Cochise had water and room for good
grazing. Patting her on the side of
the neck, he said “Well Coch, I might as well go on in and get it over with.
I will see you at noon.” Patting
her one last time, he headed for the steps of the school building.
He didn’t notice Miss Lambert standing there until he was right in
front of her. He took a deep
breath and braced himself, steeling himself for the lecture he knew he was about
to get.
Miss
Lambert surprised him by saying, “Good morning, Joseph.
I am glad to see that you are right on time.”
Joe looked at her in astonishment, his eyes widened.
Miss Lambert stared back into those green eyes and said, “I called the
others in a little bit early this morning, I am afraid”, and winked at him.
Quick to catch on, he smiled mischievously at her and replied, “Good
morning, Miss Lambert. I am glad I
wasn’t late again.” Miss
Lambert looked at him, her smile slightly diminished and said, “Don’t press
your luck, Joseph. Now get inside
and take your seat”. As she said
this, she steered him through the door. He
stopped to hang his jacket up and put the lunch that Hop Tseng had packed for
him in the cubbyhole, then he sauntered in and took his seat, as if he had all
day to get there.
As
he went in, Miss Lambert heard a chorus of greetings from the other students as
he passed by them. Miss Lambert
stood for just a moment in the anteroom of the schoolhouse, wondering if what
she had just done was the right thing to do.
Sighing, she told herself that it was all right to give Joseph Cartwright
a little leniency now and then. Smiling
ruefully, she realized that there would soon enough be another infraction that
would need to be dealt with. “I
can’t spend all my time trying to change the nature of one
student---especially one who really is bright, capable, and pleasant.”
Then she firmly closed the front door of the schoolhouse, entered the
classroom and headed toward her seat to begin another day of lessons.
The
morning passed slowly for Joe Cartwright. He
completed the assignment Miss Lambert had given his age group and while he
waited restlessly for the teacher to return to his group or for lunch, his mind
wandered to the most special place on earth---the Ponderosa.
He and his father and two brothers lived on the large ranch in Nevada
territory. He had been born in the spacious ranch house where they still lived.
The ranch covered 500,000 acres in all, with mountains, meadows, lakes,
forests, and open range for the cattle they raised.
The whole ranch was beautiful, especially now that it was spring.
His
most favorite place on the entire ranch was the spot on the shore of Lake Tahoe
where his mother was buried. His mother had died nine years ago when he was five
years old. He and his father often went together to the lakeside to sit and
think. Joe was full of questions
about his mother, but something kept him from asking too many questions about
her of his father. He often went
alone and sat there at the lakeside and tried to imagine how his life would have
been different if his mother had not died.
He knew that it would have been different, better.
He had heard his father discussing her death with Adam or others and
heard him say how much he needed “a mother’s touch”, but he wasn’t
exactly sure what that meant. Sighing,
he leaned back in his chair and closed his eyes, trying to picture his mother in
his mind.
Suddenly,
he felt someone poke him in the back and he woke with a start.
He jumped up immediately, wide-eyed, looking for the source of the threat
he felt. Too late he realized that
he had been sleeping in class again and the poke had come from his friend
‘Bec, trying to wake him up. He
quickly sat down, and gave ‘Bec a thankful grin.
“Well
Joseph since you seem to be so rearing to get moving, why don’t you come and
demonstrate how to solve this problem.” Miss Lambert said.
Joe
looked around, trying to think of an escape, but Miss Lambert walked over to him
and handed him the chalk and gave him a gentle push on the shoulders, propelling
him to the chalkboard. Joe was
distressed to see the particular arithmetic problem Miss Lambert referred to.
It was one of those new kinds of problems she had started teaching them
when she got in a new shipment of books from her parents.
It was something she called “Algebra” and he hated it already.
It had no practical purpose that he could see and besides, he correctly
solved a problem and discovered what “X” was, but then he discovered that in
the next problem, “X” would be some other number.
Now she was coming up with problems with Xs, Ys, and Zs to solve.
Joe sighed, and slumped his shoulders and walked slowly to the board at
the speed at which someone facing a firing squad would demonstrate.
He looked at the problem and felt a knot in his stomach initially.
-2X + 2Y = 5
Solve
for Y
When
he first reached the board, he felt overwhelmed by the problem. He
muttered to himself, “I bet Adam could solve the problem.”
He glanced over his shoulder, looking for help from some of his friends,
but he realized that they didn’t know how to solve the stupid problem either.
“Joseph,
do you remember what you have to do to clear a term?” Miss Lambert prompted.
At
first this was not helpful either, but just as he was getting desperate, he
remembered something about doing the “opposite operation to clear a term”.
He spoke hesitantly, “Do the opposite operation?”
“Correct,
Joseph. Very good.
Now how do you think you could clear the term to solve for Y?” she
again prompted.
Buoyed
by her praise, he looked at the problem again.
Again hesitantly he said, “So I have to get rid of the 2?” he asked.
“Excellent,
Joseph. How can you do that?”
Again
he looked at the problem, feeling more like a detective than a math student.
After a few seconds, he thought he knew the answer.
Out loud he said, “Add 2X?”
“Excellent,
Joseph! But if you add 2X, what
else do you have to do?” She
again prompted.
Then
he knew the answer, he replied triumphantly, “Add 2X, then divide by 2!”
“Again,
excellent, Joseph!” Miss Lambert
said. “Now then, all…”
Just
at that moment, the door of the schoolhouse opened.
Miss Lambert looked up to see who was interrupting her class.
She was surprised to see Renfro Carter, the Story County Superintendent
of Schools and Granville Meadows, a member of the school board.
Mr. Carter nodded and indicated that he needed to speak with her.
Miss Lambert nodded and turned toward Joseph and said, “Excellent job,
Joseph. That will be all for
now.” She glanced at the small
clock on her desk and decided that it was close enough to lunch to give them
their lunch break now. “Class
dismissed for lunch.” She announced. The
children, excited to have a few minutes extra for lunch, jumped up and began to
make their way to the door. Joe
stopped at the desk behind his, where Rebecca Larson was putting away her books.
“Joe
Cartwright, how did you know how to solve that problem?” she asked
skeptically.
“Beats
me, Bec” he grinned at her. “Beats
me.”
“Hey,
Joe, My Mama sent you a piece of chocolate cake, since you didn’t get to come
by after church for some yesterday.” She told him mischievously.
“But she said to tell you, that she ought not to do it, after that
stunt you and Billy pulled.” She was laughing by the time she got this out.
Joe laughed and said, “Oh, Bec, you know your Mama thought it was funny
too.” “Well perhaps she did,
Joe, but from the looks on your Pa’s face, he didn’t think it was that
funny.” Joe sobered quickly, “No, Pa didn’t seem to think it was too funny
at first, but I heard him and Hoss talking about it later.
By then he thought it was funny, too.
‘Course he will never let on to me that he did.” Joe said.
Rebecca
laughed and said, “Little Joe Cartwright, you are incorrigible!”
“Hey watch those big words, Bec, you never know, I am liable to look
one of ‘em up in the dictionary one day and find out what you have been
calling me all this time.” He said, giving her a gentle punch on her arm.
Laughing, they grabbed their lunches and headed out to the shade of the
trees to join the others for lunch. The
incident Rebecca referred to had happened yesterday at church.
There had been a brief meeting of the adults to discuss the selection for
the new minister and they had dismissed the children so the adults could discuss
the issue without worrying about keeping cranky children still and quiet.
Little Joe had seen that as an opportunity to escape and he had gone
outside with the rest. His father
had started to make him stay, but knowing how fidgety he was, decided to let him
go.
When
the adults finished their meeting, they came out and headed toward where they
had left their wagons. But soon
there was a confused crowd of adults and giggling children.
No wagon was where the family had left it, instead some other wagon and
team was waiting. In a short period
of time, Joe had the idea and directed the other children to move the wagons
around. There was general confusion
as the adults looked all around the church to find the wagon and team belonging
to them. When Ben Cartwright came
out and saw the confusion, he immediately called out “Joseph!”
Joe had gone and tried to look completely innocent, and he might have
gotten away with it, but Billy looked too guilty and he confessed the whole
thing. Ben Cartwright had made Joe
and Billy go around and help each family locate their wagon and apologize.
The whole episode didn’t take more than 30 minutes, but his father had
rescinded his earlier permission to lunch with the Larson’s and then join the
other children at the lake for swimming. Instead
he had made Joe go home and stay inside all afternoon.
Chapter
2
When
the older students had finished eating, they sat around under the trees talking.
Joe and his friends were discussing their plans for the summer.
Joe was telling them that this was going to be his last year at school if
he could just figure out how to get his father to go along with it.
He knew, as the rest of them did, that it was not going to be easy to
convince Ben Cartwright to let his youngest son quit school, but he had let Hoss
quit even before he was 14 so there was no reason he couldn’t quit too.
After several minutes of big talk about what he was going to tell his Pa,
their conversation drifted to another favorite topic---girls.
Little Joe had recently realized that he didn’t hate girls any more.
In fact, he had decided he liked girls—he liked them a lot.
He had always had friends whom were girls, like Bec and Nancy Coffee, but
now he was finding himself attracted to girls for more than just friendship.
The other boys had started teasing him good-naturedly about how all the
girls liked him. He smiled and
pretended that he disagreed. But
truthfully, he knew that he did have unusually good luck with girls; in fact, he
had always gotten along well with females.
Too
soon, the bell rang again; signaling the end of the lunch break, and the
students began to shuffle back into the school building.
As they were headed back into the classroom, a scuffle broke out between
some students in the rear of the group. One
of the older boys was teasing one of the younger children.
Joe and his friends stopped their discussion and watched.
As the disagreement escalated, Joe went back and looked down at the
younger child and said, “Jeffrey why don’t you go on inside?
I need to talk to Walter.” As
he said this, he firmly pushed the younger boy toward the school building and
stared into the eyes of Walter, the school bully.
“You
stay out of this Cartwright.” Walter said glaring back at Little Joe.
“Walter
why don’t you pick on someone your own size?” Little Joe said, still staring
at Walter.
“Maybe
I will just pick on someone your size, Cartwright.” Walter replied.
“Boys!
Come inside right now.” Miss Lambert called out to them, noticing the
near confrontation in the making. “Right
now!” she repeated more loudly and more sternly.
Finally, Little Joe said, “We are coming Miss Lambert.
We are all done here. Aren’t
we Wally?” Walter grimaced at the
use of Wally, a nickname he hated and everyone knew he hated.
“Yes we are finished here for right now, LITTLE
Joe he said, emphasizing the “Little”.
Joe’s eyes locked with Walter’s for a moment and for a tense moment,
it appeared that nothing could prevent a fight.
But Miss Lambert had walked up to the two boys and inserted herself
between them. Firmly grasping
Little Joe by the arm, she said, “Let’s get inside gentlemen.
Right now.” Little Joe
glanced at Miss Lambert and said, “Yes, Ma’am.”
Then he turned to Walter and said, “After school, Walter.”
Miss Lambert at that moment, decided that Little Joe Cartwright would be
staying in after school that day.
Lessons
progressed very slowly the rest of the afternoon.
Miss Lambert caught Little Joe daydreaming again and before he could
think of a way out of it, she told him he would stay after school and write an
entire essay on what he was thinking when he should have been paying attention.
He couldn’t understand why she became so cross and didn’t give him a
chance to answer the question. He
was daydreaming, but he still had heard enough to keep up with what was going
on. Rebecca Larson had been watching the teacher watching Little Joe all
afternoon and had been puzzled. When
she caught him daydreaming and announced that he would have to stay after
school, Rebecca immediately knew what Miss Lambert was up to, and she gave the
teacher a big smile and a slight nod of her head.
Miss Lambert smiled and winked at Rebecca and turned back to the rest of
the class. Rebecca turned to see a
sullen Joe Cartwright and chuckled softly to herself.
Miss Lambert just saved him from a beating and he had no idea.
“Men!” she thought to herself. “What
idiots.”
At
the end of the day, Miss Lambert said she had an announcement to make and
demanded their full attention. This
was unusual, so everyone stopped collecting their papers and turned to listen to
their teacher.
“Tomorrow
we will have a new student joining our class and I will expect you to be on your
best behavior.” She said. One
of the older girls spoke up, “Is it a boy or girl, Miss Lambert?”
There was a general concern among the girls that there were far more
girls than boys in the Virginia City School.
Miss Lambert smiled and said, “Well it is a boy, Jennifer.”
Jennifer and several other girls smiled.
Miss
Lambert continued, “However, this student is an unusual student and will not
be familiar with all our customs and may initially have some difficulties with
our language. I will expect you all
to help him.”
“Is
it one of them “eye-talians” Walter spoke up, setting off disruptive
chortles among his peers.
“No,
Walter, he is not Italian.” She said, pronouncing the word carefully and
correctly.
“It
ain’t one of them Chinks is it?” he asked again with an angry voice.
Little
Joe spoke up before Miss Lambert could respond, saying angrily, “They are
Chinese, Walter, not Chinks.” He
had turned around and was staring at Walter, his outrage obvious in the tensed
muscles in his face and the hard stare on his face.
Rebecca, watching this exchange thought that Joe Cartwright was very
handsome when he was angry. She
knew that his anger was fueled by his relationship with Hop Tseng.
“Walter,
if you say one more word, you will be sitting in the third grade seats in the
morning.” Miss Lambert said, watching the over-sized third grade boy.
He knew that she meant it, since she had made him sit with the little
kids on other occasions. He
didn’t say anything, but continued to stare at her.
“Now
then, if I may please have your attention.
The student who will be joining us tomorrow is from this area, but you do
not know him. He is 14 years old
and he is the son of the Chief of one of the smaller tribes of Piute Indians.”
Several students gasped and one student dropped a pencil.
Miss Lambert raised her hand to silence the students and continued.
“His name is Sharp Tongue. He
attended school at the Mission school briefly before the school was forced to
close when their teacher went back east.”
She glanced around to see the student’s reactions.
Their silence was unexpected, and she felt it was a worse sign than if
they had been noisy. She knew that
she had not gotten through to them, but she didn’t really know what else to
say. She was still shocked over the
decision herself. “This is not
going to be easy.” She thought to herself.
Outloud she said, “Class dismissed.”
As
the students began to rush out of the room, they recovered their voices and she
could hear the shock and the disbelief in their conversations.
She knew what would be the major topic of discussion at the student’s
homes that night. She turned
and went back to her desk and sat down. The
intensity of the reaction to the announcement had made her temporarily forget
that she had required Joe Cartwright to remain.
He was sitting at his desk, watching her.
He spoke up softly, “Miss Lambert, was this what Mr. Carter and Mr.
Meadows were here about? “
She
looked at him and half-smiled and said, “Yes, Joseph.
They had already made the decision.
It is up to me to make it work, however.”
“Miss
Lambert, people around here won’t like it.
Don’t they know that?” He
asked incredulously.
“Well
Joseph, they will just have to accept it. It
is out of our hands.” She said.
“Now
then, Joseph, what were you day-dreaming about in my class earlier today?”
He blushed slightly and replied, “I was just thinking about how pretty
it is up by the shore of Lake Tahoe on spring days like today.” He answered
truthfully. “But Miss Lambert I
was still listening, at least some.”
“I
see, Joseph. So do you think when I
am teaching that I only want you to listen to me “some”?” she asked.
As she was talking, she had moved in a circle around the room, looking
out the windows on both sides and then she went to the front door of the school
building to see if Walter or any of his friends were still hanging around.
Seeing none, she walked back to stand by Joe’s desk.
“All right, Joseph, I am going to let you off easy this time, but I
expect you to listen to me 100% when I am teaching you.
Is that understood?”
He
looked at her, almost afraid to believe that she was letting him off the hook
for the second time in one day, but he was taking no chances.
“Yes Miss Lambert, I understand.” He replied.
“All
right then Joseph, if you hurry straight home, you may be able to get there on
time and not have to explain to your father why you are late again!
You may go now, if you promise to go straight home.”
Joe
jumped up, grinned and said, “I promise.” And headed for the door, grabbing
his hat and green jacket as he went by. She
went to the door and watched him gather his horse and jump on the horse without
putting his foot in the stirrups. “Such
energy and enthusiasm…and such heart.” She thought.
She watched him until it was clear that he was indeed heading straight
for the Ponderosa. Then she turned back into the school building and began to
get ready for tomorrow’s lesson.
Chapter
3
All
the way home, Little Joe was thinking about the news Miss Lambert had given
them. He was excited about meeting
a real Indian, especially one his own age.
“Sharp Tongue” he thought, “wonder what that comes from?” He
wondered what he would look like and if he would be wearing Indian clothes.
In his imagination he could see the Indian boy in full warpaint, with a
long ceremonial headdress, buckskin loincloth, and carrying a knife, tomahawk,
and bow and arrow. “That ought to
make school more interesting.” He thought.
In his mind he could see the Indian boy at the chalkboard solving algebra
problems in full Indian gear. His
reverie made the trip home go much more quickly than usual and he reached home
on time, despite the short delay after school.
He still had no idea why Miss Lambert had reacted as she did, but not one
to dwell on potential problems; he didn’t try to figure it out much either.
Hoss
was in the barn when he went in to care for Cochise.
“Hey
half-pint, how was school today?” Hoss asked, slapping him on the back, with
considerable more force than he intended. Little
Joe however, was used to Hoss’ mannerisms and had braced himself to prevent
being flung halfway across the barn. He
grinned and said, “Fine, Hoss, fine.” Hoss
looked puzzled and said, “I was sure you were gonna be late again today.”
Then he frowned slightly and said, “Little Joe, you didn’t run that pony all
the way to Virginia City, did you?” Joe
assumed his best insulted and offended look and said “Why heck no, Hoss.
You know I wouldn’t do that to Cochise.”
As he said this, he was unsaddling the pony and beginning to give her a
rubdown. He carefully rubbed her
down, then checked her feet for any rocks or stones, or any other problem.
Finding none, he emptied out her water bucket and went and refilled it
with clean water from the pump. He
was very particular with Cochise, the pinto pony his Pa had given him for his
twelfth birthday. He had loved
pinto ponies from the very first time he had seen one on a cover of a book about
horses. He still had the book and
it was one of his treasured possessions. Hop
Tseng had put the book away, along with some other mementos of his childhood, in
the cedar chest that had belonged to his mother.
“Hey
Hoss, guess who is coming to school tomorrow?”
he asked enthusiastically. Hoss
had no idea who might be coming to school but he wanted to play along with his
little brother, so he thought for a minute and said, “Some new purty gal?”
Joe grinned and said, “Not even close big brother.”
“Well let me see then, if it ain’t a gal and you are this excited, it
must be someone important. Let me
see who could it be?” After
another few seconds he said, “I got it! Must
be one of those wild west shows with the fancy shooting and ridin’!”
Little Joe considered this for a second and said, “No that would be
fun, though.” He said finally,
“You will never guess in a million years, Hoss!
Do you give?” “Well
yeah I guess so half-pint, ‘cause you look like you are gonna bust a gut if
you don’t tell me soon.” “Sharp
Tongue” Joe said excitedly.
Hoss
looked at him closely, trying to see if his little brother was pulling his leg
again, but he could tell from his expression that he was serious.
“The Piute Chief’s son?” he asked incredulously.
“Yep.” Joe affirmed, “the Piute Indian Chief’s son.
Not Winnemucca’s son though, one of the other tribes.
“Joe, are you sure you ain’t just makin’ this up?” Hoss asked,
still not ready to accept this information.
It was against the law for Indians to associate much with white folks,
even if they wanted to, which most of ‘em didn’t.
“No, Hoss Mr. Carter and Mr. Meadows came and talked to Miss Lambert.
Guess what his name is Hoss? You’d
never guess---his name is Sharp Tongue and he starts tomorrow.
Do you reckon he will wear a headdress, Hoss?”
Joe continued talking excitedly to Hoss, asking and then answering his
own questions faster than Hoss could respond.
As he talked he and Hoss finished the chores, Hoss did most of the work,
but he didn’t mind because he enjoyed listening to his little brother.
Joe was lively and entertaining, and kept things from ever becoming
boring.
When
they were almost finished with the chores, Adam came in and Little Joe started
all over with his news about Sharp Tongue.
Hoss was amused because he noticed that the more Joe talked about it, the
more animated and excited he became. “Reckon
by the time Joe gets to tell Pa, he’ll really be worked up into a right
state.” Hoss whispered to Adam when Joe had paused for a second to get his
breath. Joe heard what Hoss said,
but didn’t pay it any attention as he resumed where he had left off telling
Adam about the visitors coming into the room while he was doing algebra on the
board. That proved to be the wrong
way for Joe to start his tale because as soon as Joe mentioned algebra, Adam
immediately became more interested in his algebra problem than he was with the
news about the Indian.
Adam
put both hands on Joe’s shoulders and stared directly into Joe’s eyes to get
his attention. Joe tried to
continue talking, looking around at Hoss to see if he was listening, but Hoss
was laughing out loud by this time. Finally
when Adam made no response and continued to stare at him and hold on to his
shoulders, Joe stopped speaking and said, “What?” with a surprised
expression on his face. At
this both Adam and Hoss burst out laughing and their laughter was joined by that
of their father. All three
Cartwright sons looked around to see Ben Cartwright entering the barn.
Joe regained his voice first and started out by saying, “Pa guess who
is coming to school tomorrow. You’ll
never guess…” Ben Cartwright
interrupted his son’s tale by teasingly grabbing his youngest son from behind
and putting his hand over his mouth. Adam
and Hoss were howling by this time, and Little Joe was still squirming trying to
lose his father’s grasp and continue talking.
“Joseph!”
Ben said loudly, finally managing to get his son’s full attention. He slowly
removed his hand from his son’s mouth, but continued to hold onto him.
He said, “Joseph, I am anxious to hear what has got you so excited, but
you have to slow down and get your breath before you pass out, Son.
The news won’t be any less exciting if we wait a few minutes ‘til we
get in to the dinner table before Hop Tseng gets mad and throws it all away,
will it?” At this question, Hoss
got a concerned look on his face and said, “Now dadburn it little brother,
there ain’t nothin’ that can’t wait ‘til dinner time is there?”
Little Joe looked at Hoss and said very seriously, “Shoot yeah, Hoss
there is one thing that won’t wait ‘til dinner time.”
Puzzled, Hoss asked, “What is so all-fired important that it can’t
wait ‘til dinner time, Half-pint?”
“You!” Little Joe replied, laughing.
His laughter was joined by that of Adam’s and Pa’s initially, and
then after a moment, by Hoss’. “Well
come on in then, boys before we have a seriously mad Hop Tseng to deal with”
Ben said, pulling Little Joe along with him and heading for the house.
The
conversation for the evening meal was primarily centered on the addition of the
new student tomorrow. Little Joe
was too excited to contain himself and his father and brothers were too
indulgent to try to stop him anyway. Despite
his proclivity for getting into trouble, the youngest Cartwright added joy and
merriment to the house that his father and brothers cherished.
Adam
was able, with much effort to return the conversation to the subject of algebra
and got the basic information out of Little Joe about the kinds of problems they
were doing. Adam was pleasantly
surprised that Miss Lambert had included algebra in the curriculum and was glad
to hear that Little Joe seemed to have an inkling about it.
“Joe if you need any help, I’ll be glad to help you” he offered.
Joe shrugged and tried to turn the talk back to the new student, but his
father adeptly redirected his attention. “Joseph,
do you have any algebra homework tonight?” he asked his son intently.
“Yes sir” Joe mumbled. “Excuse
me, Joseph, I didn’t understand you.” Ben said, which was his polite way of
saying, “Stop mumbling, Joseph.” “Yes
sir.” Joe repeated. By this time,
they had finished their dinner and Hop Tseng had begun to clear the table.
"Well,
Joseph, you go get your books and you can do your homework and Adam can
supervise it,” Ben said. “But
Pa, can’t Hoss and I play some checkers first?” Joe asked, trying to weasel
out of doing that homework, “supervised by Adam”.
His father would not be deterred, however, and the look that he gave him
made that quite clear. “Yes,
sir” Joe replied as if he were facing the firing squad.
He trudged ever so slowly up
the stairs to fetch his books, causing the three older Cartwrights to laugh,
though they did manage to stifle it until he was out of earshot.
Joe returned after taking an inordinately long time to retrieve his
books, after doing everything he could think of to post-pone the inevitable.
“I shoulda kept my mouth shut!” he said to himself as he walked
slowly back down the stairs.
Adam
took Joe’s book and looked at the assignments, “Oh, linear algebra!
That will come in very useful if you decide to become an engineer,
Joe.” “I ain’t gonna become
an engineer, Adam. I’m a rancher
and all I am gonna become is an older rancher!
Linear algebra or any other kind of algebra ain’t gonna help me.” Joe
said irritably, more for his father’s benefit than for Adam’s.
No matter whose ears the barb was intended for, it fell on deaf ears, as
everyone chose to ignore the comment entirely.
For the next hour and a half, Joe worked on algebra, grumbling the entire
time about Xs and Ys and quadrants. Finally,
Adam was satisfied that Little Joe could do the problems and was satisfied with
the accuracy of the ones he had completed for the assignment.
“All right, Joe, is that all the homework you had?” he asked.
“Yeppers” Joe said, snatching his books and closing them before Adam
could decide to do more than he had to.
After
the homework, Hoss and Little Joe played several games of checkers, of which
Little Joe won all but one. He was
just fixing to set up for another game when his father interrupted and said,
“Joe, you’d better get on up to bed now, Son.”
“Ah, Pa” “Joseph,
would you just go to bed one night without an argument?” Ben said with mild
exasperation. Joe started to argue
further, but then he paused for a second and said, “Just one night, Pa?
Does tonight count if I go now?” Ben
looked at him in surprise until he caught his eye and saw the twinkle and then
he laughed and said, “No, Son, tonight wouldn’t count.
Perhaps you could try again tomorrow night.
Now up to bed. I’ll be up
soon.” “Okay, Pa. Good night,
Adam. Good night, Hoss.
Night Pa.” Joe said and turned and ran up the stairs.
Ben opened his mouth to admonish him for running in the house, but
thought better of it. Instead he
looked at Hoss and Adam and shook his head, all three of them chuckling at the
energy of the youngest.
Shortly
Ben and Adam and Hoss headed up to bed too.
Ranching was a hard job that began early and they were an early to bed
and early to rise family. With Ben
and Adam and Hoss this was their natural inclination; Joe, however was the
direct opposite in sleep and wake cycles, so it seemed that he and his father
were always at odds over going to bed and getting up.
Joe had taken after his mother, who also liked to stay up late and sleep
later in the morning. Ben smiled as
he thought of Marie; Joseph was so much like her.
He knocked softly on his son’s door and was not surprised to get no
response. Joe was in perpetual
motion when he was awake, but if he got still, he could be asleep in nothing
flat. Marie used to call it the
sleep of the innocent, but Little Joe was frequently far from innocent.
Yet there was an innocence about him that all the practical jokes and
devilment he got into couldn’t destroy. Ben
cherished that innocence.
He
opened the door and entered the room. Joe
was asleep, lying on top of the covers, with his pajama bottoms on, without the
shirt. Apparently sleep had
overcome him sooner than he had anticipated.
Ben thought about waking him to tell him to finish getting dressed, but
decided it wasn’t worth the effort. Instead
he maneuvered him onto his side and then managed to get him under the covers.
He pushed the hair off his forehead out of habit, smiled and whispered
“Good night, Joseph. Sweet
dreams.” And started to snuff out the lantern that was burning on his chest of
drawers. Just as he was about to do
that, he heard a voice coming somewhere about 2/3 asleep say, “Leave the light
on Pa.” Ben looked back at Joe,
who for all appearances was sound asleep and said, “All right Son, I’ll
leave the lamp low.” He adjusted
the wick to turn the lamp down to the lowest flame possible and left it on.
Later if he woke up for some other reason, he would come in and douse the
light. If not, it would burn all
night.
Chapter
4
“Joe---seph,
Joe---seph. Time to get up,
Joseph”. Little Joe heard the
sound coming from somewhere far away, but he fought to block out the sound that
was pulling him out of his dream. He
snuggled down into his bed and pulled the covers over his head to block out the
sound, without even knowing exactly what it was disturbing him.
He was just settling back into a deeper sleep when suddenly, he was
confronted with bright lights and louder, more insistent voices---this time
there were two of them. He opened
his eyes to face the assault and when he saw what it was---he yelled “Leave me
alone”, but alas, that was not to be. Adam
and Hoss Cartwright were standing, one at the foot of his bed and one at the top
of his bed. The bright light
had been caused by their pulling the covers off his bed.
Quickly they each grabbed him, Hoss by the shoulders and Adam by the feet
and began swinging him back and forth, telling him they were gonna throw him out
the window if he didn’t say “Uncle”.
Aggravated by being so rudely awakened, he was not finding this very
amusing and was not inclined to cooperate with the teasing by his brothers,
although he usually wouldn’t have minded.
“Say uncle, Little Joe and we will put you down,” Hoss said as he and
Adam continued their swinging. Little
Joe was getting dizzy and was just about to capitulate when he saw a shadow come
to his door and instead he yelled “Pa!”.
Adam chuckled and said, “Nice try, Joe. Pa is in the barn though and he
can’t hear you. Now do you give in or do we swing you some more?”
“PUT
YOUR BROTHER DOWN, SONS” Ben Cartwright bellowed to be heard above the
sounds of Joe’s fussing and Adam and Hoss’ laughter.
Immediately, they unceremoniously dumped Joe on the bed.
He sat up and for effect, grabbed hold of his head ostensibly to stop the
reeling. In reality he was fine and
was watching his brother’s reactions to being caught out of the corner of his
eye, enjoying it immensely. “Huh,
‘bout time they got caught instead of me” he thought to himself.
“Well, Adam, Hoss if you are finished torturing your younger brother,
here, Hop Tseng has breakfast ready.” Ben
said, looking at them sternly. “Ah
we was just funnin’ him, Pa. We
didn’t hurt him. Did we
Half-pint?” Hoss asked, his blue eyes looking very remorseful.
They all looked to Joe for confirmation.
Joe had started putting on his shirt and when he looked up and they were
all staring at him, he said, “WHAT?” Then
realizing what Hoss had said, he rubbed his head one more time, to show that
they had really done him a grievous injury, then grinned and said, “No Pa they
were only funnin’ me.” And then he giggled and said, “Adam I sure wish you
could have seen the expression on your face when Pa told you to put me down.”
Adam shrugged and said, “I wish I could have too, Joe.”
They all laughed and then the older Cartwrights left the youngest brother
to dress. “Now hurry up Little
Joe, you have to eat breakfast and you have to hurry so you won’t be late for
school.” He hesitated and then
added, “Again.”.
Breakfast
was typical for the Cartwrights. Ben
used breakfast as a time to keep up with everyone’s activities for the day and
to discuss any ranch activities that needed to be done.
Although it was not intentional, Joe generally felt left out of the
conversation, since he had to be in school and wouldn’t be taking part in the
daily activities. His father made
an attempt to include him by asking about his school activities and reminding
him of chores he had to do after school, but this only served to accentuate the
fact that he had to go to school and was not considered to be able to help with
the “real” running of the ranch. This
frequently resulted in making Joe touchy; his family never figured out the
cause. This morning was no
exception.
Little
Joe had attempted to participate in the conversation about the ranch, but his
father had brushed aside his remarks and asked Adam for his opinion regarding
the issue under discussion. After
several minutes when that topic had been decided, Little Joe broached the
subject of the new horses they would soon be getting ready for sale to the army.
“Pa,
I think we ought to keep that roan horse. He is built solid and is fast and
strong. I think he would be good to
keep. I’d like to break him and
train him as a backup for Cochise.” Joe said.
Ben looked at Joe momentarily, nodded, then turned to Adam and said,
“What do you think, Adam? Which
one of the new horses do you think we should keep and which should we sell to
the army?” Adam responded and then Hoss contributed his opinions.
Joe sat there, fuming, and began playing with his food.
The longer the discussion went on between his father and his brothers,
the madder he got. After a few
minutes, he said, “I have to go.” And started to leave the table.
Ben looked at him and said, “Joe, you didn’t eat your breakfast, you
need to eat son.” “I ain’t
hungry, Pa. I have to go or I’ll
be late.” He said irritably, rising from the table.
Ben sighed and said, “Very well, Joseph, but get your lunch from Hop
Tseng before you go.” Joe said,
“yes, sir” and headed into the kitchen where Hop Tseng had his lunch waiting
for him. His father called him back and said, “Joseph, I didn’t hear you
tell me or your brothers good bye, son. You
will not forget your manners, no matter how late you will be.”
Joe rolled his eyes, but managed to say “Good bye” with no emotion,
so that everyone could tell it was not his idea to do so.
As he left, Ben said, “That boy gets grouchier and grouchier every
morning doesn’t he?”
Chapter
5
Joe
was fuming when he left the ranch. His father didn’t even give him an answer.
“He thinks I don’t know anything ‘bout horses.
He always has to ask Adam or Hoss.” He said out loud to Cochise.
“Cochise you’re the best horse on the whole Ponderosa and I trained
you all by myself, but they still didn’t even listen to me.”
He reached over and patted her on the side, as if to prove that she was
the best. “We’ll show ‘em
Coch. One of these days, we’ll
show ‘em all.” The long ride
into Virginia City served a good purpose this morning, as he rode through the
green meadows and past Lake Tahoe and the rushing streams, filled to overflowing
with melted snow from high in the mountains, be couldn’t hold on to his anger.
It was impossible to ride through the peaceful, breath-takingly beautiful
scenery and not be affected by it. He
loved every square inch of the Ponderosa and by the time he reached the school
he was no longer angry. His
moods typically changed rapidly; his anger came in a flash and it departed just
as suddenly.
When
he entered the schoolyard, he was relieved to see that the students were still
relaxing outside, meaning he wasn’t late again.
He took his customary time tending to Cochise.
Some of the other students teased him about how he treated that horse,
and he had gotten into several fights over it at first, but by now it was
commonly accepted. He knew
that his horse was much more valuable than the other’s horses and he knew that
fueled part of the teasing. He had
been so glad to get Cochise and loved her so much, that he would risk any amount
of teasing to make sure that she was well cared-for.
After
settling Cochise for the day, Joe walked over to where the boys were talking to
see what they were up to. He heard bits and snatches of a conversation about the
“injun” and how he would scalp the little ones if they weren’t careful.
Joe realized that Walter and his cronies were scaring the little kids for their
amusement. He walked up to the
crowd and said, “Howard, Walter is just teasin’ you.
The Indian boy won’t be here to scalp you.
Besides, Howie, you don’t have enough hair for a self-respecting Indian
to fool with.” He said, trying to reassure the young kids.
As he talked, he glared at the bigger boy, remembering that they had
unsettled business to attend to. Walter
hadn’t forgotten either and he said, “But you got lots of it Cartwright.
Bet that injun would be able to trade for a lot of furs and skins for
your scalp.” At this several of
the younger kids and several of the older girls gasped.
Again the ringing of the school bell interrupted their skirmish.
Joe let himself be pulled into the classroom by Billy and one of the
other kids, but he kept his eyes on Walter.
He vowed that he and Walter would settle this before long.
Joe
was disappointed to see that there was no new student in the classroom.
“He probably changed his mind,” he thought, figuring that was
probably better in the long run. Still
he would have liked to be able to meet an Indian his own age.
He was caught by surprise when he heard his name being called out loud.
He looked around, startled until he realized that it was just Miss
Lambert calling the roll and he answered “here” in as deep a voice as he
could. Just as roll call was
completed, the sound of horses approached the building and shortly thereafter
the door of the schoolhouse opened. Everyone
turned around, expecting to see the Indian boy; but it was the school
superintendent again. Then they
noticed there was someone else standing just to the left of the door to the
classroom.
Mr.
Carter motioned for Miss Lambert to join him, so she quickly asked Rebecca to
lead the others in reciting the Preamble to the Constitution. Miss Lambert knew
she could count on Rebecca to stay calm and in control of the situation.
Rebecca stood and led the others in recitation of:
We,
the people of the United States, in order to form a more perfect union,
establish justice, insure domestic tranquillity, provide for the common defense,
promote the general welfare and secure the blessings of liberty to ourselves and
our posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution of the United States of
America.
Most
of the older students were turned trying to get a good look at the Indian boy,
just out of sight to them. Miss
Lambert and Mr. Carter conferred briefly, then Mr. Carter exited the building.
Miss Lambert, waited until the students were through with the Preamble,
then she walked to the center of the classroom and spoke quietly but firmly.
“Class
our new student is here. As I told
you yesterday, his name is Sharp Tongue and he is a Piute Indian.
I know that you will make him welcome.
Come Sharp Tongue. Joseph,
you have no one sitting by you, would you please make room for Sharp Tongue?”
Joe
couldn’t believe his good fortune and replied honestly, “Yes Ma’am” and
promptly slid over on the two-person bench to make room.
All eyes were turned waiting to see the Indian.
The little children and most of the other students were frightened.
They were all shocked at the boy when he finally came out of the foyer
and into the classroom. They
had certainly never expected him to look the way he did.
Joe was very disappointed. Sharp
Tongue was wearing blue denim waist overalls, a short sleeve white shirt, work
boots, and the worst disappointment to Little Joe---his hair was shorter than
his own and he had on no headdress. Except
for his features that looked like the Indians, he was dressed the same or better
than most of the children in the room. No
warpaint, no moccasins, no feathers; he didn’t even have a knife.
“Heck” Joe thought, “he don’t look like much of an Indian to
me”.
Sharp
Tongue walked slowly into the room, truthfully he looked as frightened as the
children did. He swallowed hard and
walked to where the teacher had indicated for him to sit.
When he approached the bench, he glanced at the boy sitting there,
wondering what his reaction would be. Little
Joe looked at him and smiled and said, “Hello, Sharp Tongue.
I’m Joe Cartwright. Nice
to meet ya.” Then sensing the
Indian boy’s discomfort, Joe turned his eyes back to the front of the room
where the teacher had gone. Joe
knew that most of the other students were still staring at him, but he hoped he
wouldn’t notice. He figured if he
didn’t notice and didn’t react, the other kids would get bored and forget
about him.
Miss
Lambert apparently had the same thought because she relentlessly started into
the day’s lessons, without another glance at the new student.
Joe had a hard time paying attention to the lesson, even harder than
usual. He was glad that they
weren’t doing that dumb algebra again this morning. If Miss Lambert had called
upon him to solve a problem, he would have been unable to think it through.
It was hard enough when he was trying to pay attention, which was not
that often anyway.
Joe
would never be described as a scholar; yet he made average or better grades.
He expended the least amount of effort toward his schoolwork that he
could get away with. He never did
any additional study, he waited until the last minute to do any outside
assignments and did them in as little time that he could, never asked for help,
and never did any homework assignment more than once.
Frequently Miss Lambert would ask for the first draft of any paper and
make suggestions for improvement. Joe’s
final paper was almost always exactly like the first one.
Yet he made B’s and Cs on his report card.
Adam, of course always made As and he spent a lot of time on his
schoolwork; but Hoss had struggled to make D’s and C’s.
Little Joe couldn’t understand why his teachers and Pa and Adam were
always on his case about working harder.
At
the first break in the long morning’s lessons, Joe smiled at Sharp Tongue and
said, “It is probably boring to you, being in a class room all morning.”
“I
have been going to school at the Mission; white man’s education is very
different from my people’s, but some of it is interesting.” Sharp Tongue
said in very good English.
“Well
it may not be boring to you, Sharp Tongue, but wait’ll we get to that doggone
algebra. Then you will see what
boredom really is.”
Sharp
Tongue looked at him and said, “What is this algebra?”
Joe
grinned and said, “You don’t want to know, trust me.”
Joe
was a little surprised at the reaction of the class. This was just a quick break
time that Miss Lambert called a “stretch break”, but was really planned so
the younger kids could visit the outhouse.
Generally during this time, several people would come over to Joe’s
desk to talk and kid around. Today,
no one had come over, not even ‘Bec or Billy or Steve.
He had heard loud boastful talk from the back of the room from Walter and
his buddies, but Joe chose to ignore it until he was at a place and time he
could do something to shut Walter up.
Before
their conversation went any further, Miss Lambert was calling class back to
order. This time her attention was
on the student’s who were Joe’s age. They
started off with history with a quiz on The War of the Roses.
Joe groaned when Miss Lambert started passing out the test papers.
Taking tests was such a waste of time.
Who cared about the silly old Roses anyway he thought.
Joe groaned louder when he read the quiz questions and saw how many there
were. The quiz:
1.
Which King
was not involved in the Wars of the Roses?
a.
King Richard II
b.
King Edward IV
c.
King Henry IV
d.
King Henry VI
2.
Who
was the famed "Captain of Calais" during this tumultuous period?
a.
Richard Neville
b.
Henry Tudor
c.
George, Duke of Clarence
d.
Robin of Redesdale
3.
The
battle in which King Richard was killed was....
a.
Barnet
b.
Bosworth field
c.
Wakefield
d.
St Albans
4.
The
families fighting for Royal succession in the Wars of the Roses were...
a.
the Stuarts
b.
the Plantagenet's
c.
the Hanovers
d.
the Windsors
5.
Many
historians believe the Wars began from a private quarrel between...
a.
the Percys and the Tudors
b.
the Cliffords and the Pastons
c.
the Stoners and the Mortimors
d.
the Percys and the Nevilles
6.
The
Kingmaker and his King fell out due to...
a.
different foreign policy desires
b.
an unliked marriage of the
King's
c.
the King not allowing the Kingmaker's daughters to marry Clarence or
Gloucester
d.
All of the above
7.
Shakespeare called whom a
"proud setter up and puller down of kings"?
a.
George, Duke of Clarence
b.
Lord Hastings
c.
Richard, Earl of Warwick
d.
Richard, Earl of Salisbury
8.
The
battle of Teweksbury effectively...
a.
ended the Lancastrian chances for power.
b.
ended the Tudor chances for power.
c.
gave the throne to Henry VIII.
d.
ended the power of the Kingmaker.
9.
The
battle of Towton was...
a.
a Lancastrian victory
b.
a victory for Queen Margaret
c.
relatively unimportant as a minor skirmish
d.
the bloodiest battle on English soil
10.
The
Wars of the Roses were...
a.
Devastating to the lower classes, whose lives were upended
b.
of little historical importance to the growth of Britain
c.
of no contemporary importance outside of England
d.
a thirty year war of which actual campaigning lasted less than two years
Luckily
for Joe, he remembered enough of what Miss Lambert had made him read out loud to
the class to remember seven of the questions.
That left three he didn’t know—those were from material that was a
homework reading assignment and Joe of course, hadn’t read it.
So for the three remaining questions, he figured out one of them from the
information that he had read, although it wasn’t stated implicitly, he was
able to infer the correct answer. That
left two questions that he had absolutely NO idea and he was tired of
concentrating, so he guessed the answers to those.
As luck would have it, he got one of those correct and one wrong---giving
him a score of 90%---much better than usual.
As
the students took the quiz, Miss Lambert spoke with Sharp Tongue trying to
assess his level of prior education and was well pleased.
Although he was not as far along as she would have liked, given his age,
he was much further along than she had hoped.
She thought to herself that perhaps this wasn’t going to be as hard as
she expected. As the students
finished their quizzes and turned them in, Miss Lambert realized it was
lunchtime. It dawned on her that
she had not reminded Mr. Carter that Sharp Tongue would need a lunch and she
wasn’t sure if he had one or not. She
announced lunch and during the noise as the other children started out to
retrieve their lunches and started talking and laughing loudly, she went over to
Sharp Tongue and asked if he had brought a lunch.
“No, Miss Lambert, at the mission school, we ate with the fathers.
But it is no cause to worry. Sharp
Tongue will eat after school.” Miss
Lambert was about to offer to share her sandwich when Little Joe spoke up.
“Miss Lambert, Hop Tseng always packs as much lunch for me as he did
for Hoss. Sharp Tongue can share my
lunch.” Miss Lambert grinned at
the reference to Hoss, he had left the school much earlier, but he had been a
big eater and she remembered the size of his lunches.
“Why thank you Joseph, that would be wonderful.”
With the problem settled, she said, “All right you two get on out of
here and eat. I need some time away
from you!”
Joe
stood up, stretched lazily and said, “Come on Sharp Tongue, I will introduce
you to some of my friends and we can go eat.”
Joe led Sharp Tongue out of the building, after grabbing the more than
ample lunch Hop Tseng had sent. Sharp
Tongue’s eyes widened when he saw the bag.
“What
is this “Hoss” you talk of?”
Joe
laughed and said “That is my big brother, who has a horse’s appetite, as
well as a horse’s name.”
“I
have to go check on my horse before I eat, you can go ahead and start if you
want” Joe said, attempting to hand the bagged lunch to Sharp Tongue.
“I
must also check on my horse” Sharp Tongue said.
The
two boys went over to the shade and found that they had tied their horses next
to each other. They both laughed as
they realized the coincidence---Joe’s horse was a black and white pinto; Sharp
Tongue’s was a brown and white pinto.
They were both fine looking animals and they both tended to them and
patted them fondly. They spent a
few more minutes going over the other’s horse in detail, checking to make sure
that their horse was indeed the best. After
checking, they were both reassured that, indeed, their horse was the best.
After
satisfying themselves that their horses were fine, they decided to sit down
where they were and eat. They sat
and ate. Initially their talk was
confined to horses and lunch, but as the hour passed, they talked of other
things about their life. The
beginning bonds of friendship was forming already and both of them could tell
it, and though Sharp Tongue was wary, they were both also excited about it.
Chapter
6
When
they finished eating there was still food left over from the lunch and Joe threw
it onto the ground in the edge of the woods.
Sharp Tongue eyed him, surprised to see such a waste of food.
Joe
noted his look and said, “What are you looking at me like that for?”
“In
my village, food is sometimes scarce, to throw away so much food seems wrong.”
Sharp Tongue replied.
“Does
your village need food now, Sharp Tongue?”
Joe asked, alarmed.
“No,
in the springtime there is much food, it is just in the winters when food is
scarce---at least until the white man kill all the buffalo and the deer and the
elk. Then there will be much hunger
all the time.”
Joe
considered this for a minute and then said; “Sharp Tongue I know that the
white man is destroying the Indian hunting grounds.
It is wrong. My Pa says so,
too.”
“White
man does not care what happens to Indians, Joseph Cartwright.”
“My
Pa does too care, Sharp Tongue. My
Pa is a good man, why he…” Joe’s
speech was interrupted by Sharp Tongue saying, “ Your Pa is “great Ben
Cartwright”. I know our village
knows of him and some call him friend. But
if he really cared, Joseph Cartwright, he would fight to stop the white men who
break their own treaties, steal our land, and kill the buffalo for sport or for
hides.”
Both
boys were becoming very intense with the conversation and it may have escalated
but just then the bell rang and Little Joe saw that all the other children were
already entering the building. He
thought it odd that none of his friends had come over to see him.
He muttered, “We better go, Sharp Tongue so we won’t be in trouble
for being late.” The two boys
started back toward the schoolhouse.
When
they were about halfway down the hill, Sharp Tongue looked at Joe and risked
saying, “Still, why do you not take food home?
Save for later.”
“Sharp
Tongue if I took home the food I didn’t eat, then Hop Tseng’s feelings would
be hurt and my Pa would think I wasn’t eating enough---and anyway you look at
it---I’d be in trouble. It is for
my own sake that I throw it out. Besides,
see right over there beside that big rock?
See there where that green bush is?
Well behind that bush is a cave---nobody at school knows about it but me.
My brother Hoss and I went in there one day---to get away from school.
And in that cave lives a fox and that fox comes out after we leave and eats that
food. So it ain’t really
wasted.”
“Do
you and your brother, Hoss go there now?” Sharp Tongue asked, thinking that he
would like to see the cave himself. One
that was so well hidden that all these children did not find it.
He was especially interested in caves and even he hadn’t noticed it.
Joe
laughed, “No, I don’t think Hoss could get into that cave anymore.
I can though.”
“Would
you take me there one day?” Sharp Tongue asked.
“Sure.
We would have to do it when school was out though.
I don’t want no one else to know about it.
You never know when I may need a good hideout place.” Joe grinned.
“That
is good, Joseph Cartwright.”
“You
know, about the only time I hear that name is when I am in school, at church, or
in trouble. You are making me
nervous calling me Joseph Cartwright all the time.
How about if you just call me Joe?” Joe asked him.
That
is a bargain. But I do not have
this shortened name that white people have.
I do not know what you can call me, Jos---uh, Joe.” Sharp Tongue said.
Joe
looked at him seriously, then grinned and said, “it is kinda hard to think up
a nickname for Sharp Tongue” he agreed. “Why
do they call you Sharp Tongue anyway?”
“Because
I speak the truth and sometimes people do not want to hear the truth.” He said
simply.
“Hmm.
I guess that would never be used for me.” Joe grinned.
“Let
me see. I know.
How about if I call you ST, like the first letters in your name?”
Sharp
Tongue looked at him and as they walked into the building, he nodded his head
and said, “ST, it will be, Joe, but only to you.
To all others it will be Sharp Tongue.”
He held out his hand and Joe shook it, just as walked to their seats and
sat down. Many of the other
students were watching the two with widened eyes, shocked at the sight of Little
Joe Cartwright shaking hands with a heathen.
Chapter
7
The
rest of the afternoon classes passed fairly quietly.
Miss Lambert had graded the history tests during lunch and she
complimented Joe on his grade. He
accepted the compliment gracefully, without telling her how he had achieved such
an outstanding score. He had
learned a long time ago that sometimes the truth was better left unsaid.
Not that he would outright lie, but he had learned that sometimes you
could avoid telling some things just by strictly answering the question asked.
Finally when the agonizingly slow lessons were over, Miss Lambert
dismissed the class.
Joe
immediately threw all his books in his desk and said “Come on S.T. I’ll
introduce you to my friends.”
S.T.
closed his desk and followed Joe out of the schoolhouse.
Joe was again surprised that none of his regular friends came over to
him. He turned and saw Rebecca
watching him. He pulled S.T. along
and said, “Bec, this is Sharp Tongue. Sharp
Tongue this is Bec. She is
great---she can run almost as fast as me.”
Bec
smiled at Joe and Sharp Tongue and said, “It is nice to meet you Sharp Tongue.
I hope you will enjoy coming to school here.
And just for your information---I can beat Joe Cartwright running any day
of the week and twice on Sunday!” The
three laughed at this.
“Hey,
Bec’, do you want to go riding with us?” Joe asked.
Bec
smiled sadly and said, “Oh, Joe I can’t.
My Pa said I had to come home and help my Ma today.”
“Well
maybe tomorrow then” Joe said. “See
ya, Bec.” He and Sharp Tongue
headed out the door. Joe was
confused when they came outside; none of his friends were there.
But Walter and his friends were there, waiting.
“Uh
oh” Joe said out loud. “This
may be the time for that fight that Walter’s got coming.”
However
just at that time, Mr. Carter the county school superintendent rode up, along
with Mr. Meadows.
“Hello,
Sharp Tongue. We have to go
near your village and thought you might ride with us to show us the way?”
Sharp Tongue was hesitant at first, he had been looking forward to riding
with Joe Cartwright and racing his horse against the black and white pinto.
But his father trusted this man so he felt it would be dishonorable for
him not to assist him. He turned to
Joe and said, “Tomorrow we race our pintos and you will see how fast a real
Indian pony can run.”
“Yeah,
that pony of yours can run all right, if she doesn’t mind the dust from
Cochise and me. I’ll see you
tomorrow.”
After
Sharp Tongue and the two men had ridden off, Joe Cartwright turned to face
Walter and his two sidekicks. Walter
was much older and bigger than Joe was. Walter
only attended from 2 to 3 months of school per year because he was needed to
help out at home. His father
didn’t believe in education but his mother did, so she made him come when he
wasn’t needed on the ranch. Unfortunately
Walter was not a particularly bright student and couldn’t make up the work he
missed, so he invariably failed time after time.
He was now close to 17 years old but was technically only a third-grader.
His Ma had promised him that he didn’t have to come any more after this
year, but she wanted him to finish this year so he would have at least finished
the third grade work. She had
little understanding of the school system and did not realize just how
embarrassing it was for Walter to be doing third grade work.
His
two friends were in about the same situation, though they were not as far behind
as Walter, nor were they as strong and big.
He used them for support and they hung out with him because it made them
feel important. They got
their fun by harassing the other kids, stealing lunches, lunch money, stealing
and breaking toys or other possessions, and teasing the other children.
Joe and Walter had been involved in several fights, but usually Joe’s
friends were around to at least keep it from being so unfair.
The last fight they had gotten into had been because of some mean rumors
that Walter was spreading about one of the older girls in the school.
Joe had walked up on Walter and his bunch when they were attempting to
blackmail her, telling her that it didn’t matter what the truth was—by the
time they finished telling everybody their story, no one would believe her.
Joe immediately challenged Walter and the two fought furiously, but Joe,
despite being much smaller, was quicker and smarter.
Joe won that fight, but in that fight his friends had been there to
prevent Walter’s pals from interfering. Joe had not gotten into too much hot
water over that, because his friends were there to back him up and tell what
Walter was doing. Still his father
had been angry that his temper got the best of him and that he didn’t try to
resolve the issue peacefully.
Joe
looked around and saw that Walter and his friends were waiting for him.
He considered his options; or rather he tried to, but quickly decided
that he had no options. With Sharp
Tongue gone, Miss Lambert either gone home or busy in the school and none of his
friends in sight—he didn’t see many options.
He
thought to himself, “Well Pa, the only peaceful solutions I can see is running
and I ain’t about to run from Walter!”
Thus,
he started walking unhurriedly, but directly over to Walter and his friends,
knowing he was in for a rough fight and then on top of that, probably a lecture
or worse from his father for fighting. “Oh
well some things a man can’t control” he told himself.
When he reached Walter, he stopped just a couple of feet away and looked
him directly in the eyes.
“You
waiting for me, Wally?” he asked.
Before
he got the words out of his mouth good, Walter ran at him.
Joe, anticipating this, dodged Walter’s punch and slammed into him with
his full force, knocking Wally off balance and making him fall to the ground
with a thud. Before he could get
up, Joe landed on top of him, punching and pounding him with his fists.
Joe had clearly surprised Walter and his size was serving as more of a
disadvantage against Joe’s quickness and strength.
The two wrestled, exchanged punches, and struggled against each other for
a few minutes, with no reaction from Walter’s buddies.
Finally when it looked like Little Joe was going to get the best of the
bully, Walter caught the eyes of one of the other boys and gave motioned for
some help. Immediately both
boys grabbed Joe’s arms and pulled him off Walter and despite his struggling,
the two of them were stronger than he was.
And of course since they hadn’t been fighting they had plenty of breath
left, Joe didn’t.
They
held the struggling Joe upright, his arms behind them while Walter slowly got
up, brushed himself off and then walked up to Little Joe.
With no warning, Walter punched him as hard as he could in the
midsection, taking Joe’s breath away.
Walter landed a few more strategic punches while Joe was unable to
recover his breath. When he was
satisfied that Joe was unable to defend himself further, he signaled the others
to release him. As they turned Joe
loose, he fell to the ground, lying on his side, looking up at Walter.
The three boys then circled around him and said “Cartwright this is
just a warning. We ain’t having
no injuns or no injun-lovers in this school.
This is what your new best-friend is going to get tomorrow and every day
until he gets outta here and goes back to that reservation he come from.
If you are smart you will stay away from ‘im.
If you ain’t smart yore beating is gonna get worse everyday.
This was nothin’. You
ain’t seen nothin’ yet.”
Walter
kneeled down close to Joe’s head and grabbed hold of his hair and pulled it
tightly to the back, so that Joe was looking him eye-to-eye.
“Do you understand what I am saying, rich kid?”
Joe at first said nothing, just glared at Walter.
Walter pulled his head tighter and said, “I said do you understand,
boy?” Joe looked at Walter and
with every bit of strength he had in him he said, “Get outta my face,
Wally.” Walter, enraged, pulled
his right arm as far back as he could and landed a blow directly on Joe’s
face, causing his head to snap back. He
then released his hold on Joe’s hair and let him fall, unconscious to the
dirt. Summoning his pals, they
ambled off toward the seedy part of Virginia City to see who else they could
find to bully, laughing and talking like they had just come from the church
social.
Chapter
8
Joe
slowly regained consciousness and found himself lying in the same place, on the
dusty schoolyard. He sat up slowly,
becoming dizzy and feeling nauseated as he sat up.
He sat there, leaning back against a rock that he apparently had hit his
head on when he fell. He sat for a
few minutes, dazed trying to remember what had happened to him.
The last thing he remembered was talking to Sharp Tongue and seeing Mr.
Carter and Mr. Meadows ride up and talk to Sharp Tongue.
He couldn’t remember exactly what had happened between then and the
next thing he remembered was fighting with Walter.
He couldn’t remember what had precipitated the fight. Although he
didn’t know this, the blow to the head had caused a temporary loss of memory
of the events immediately prior to the blow.
As he contemplated what had happened, he remembered that he and Walter
had proposed a fight a couple of days ago and he figured either he or Walter
must have decided to do it today. He
was a little surprised because Walter and he were always talking about fighting.
As
his head cleared and the dizziness decreased, he looked at the sun and realized
he was late getting home. Late
already, with a long ride ahead of him. He
forced himself to stand up, though the motion caused his head to reel and he
felt extremely dizzy. He made it
over to Cochise and checked her cinch and loosened her reins.
Before he mounted the horse he took down the canteen and took a small
drink, then splashed the remainder over his head and face to try to clear his
brain. Feeling a little
better he put his left foot in the stirrup and climbed aboard his horse.
Cochise turned her head to look at him out of the corner of her eye to
make sure it was her boy on him because of the ordinary way in which he mounted
up. She had come to expect a fast,
gentle, even plop into the saddle with no pull on the left stirrups, rather than
a longer strained pull on the stirrups and reins, followed by a slower
distribution of weight into the saddle. (Ok
this was just for fun!)
Joe
rode as fast as he dared to on the way home, but he was still feeling dizzy
enough that he couldn’t run Cochise to make up any lost time.
He was more concerned about what his father was going to say than the way
he felt. He wished his father were
away on a business trip or something. But
he knew that even if he were, Adam would just assume his place and he would
still get the interrogation. However,
usually Adam could be counted on to not tell his father about things.
But all that was futile thought, because as he rode into the yard he saw
his father’s horse being led into the barn by one of the hands.
Joe shrugged his shoulders and rode Cochise directly into the barn,
hoping to at least have a few minutes to try to get his wits about him before
facing his father.
When
Joe walked into the barn he immediately got off Cochise, jumping off the way he
normally did. He wished he hadn’t
as the movement sent new pains through his side and his head.
He moved as quickly as he could so that Cochise was between him and the
other worker. He began to unsaddle
Cochise and carefully curried her, fed her, and got her fresh water and left her
in her stall. He then went to see
if his evening chores had been done and found that they had.
That could be good or it could be bad, depending upon who had done the
chores. If Hoss had done them, it
would be a good thing. Hoss often
did his chores for him and never got testy about it or tried to make him feel
guilty. Adam was unpredictable. He
might do the chores and not tell Pa, he might do them but tell Pa Joe didn’t
do them, or he might not do them and tell Pa that Joe didn’t do them.
He wanted to get up to his room without being detected to get cleaned up before he had to see anyone. He was hoping he would be able to get to his room without being seen. After finding that his chores had all been done, he decided to sneak up the outside stairway to go to his room rather than go through the main door. When he decided what he was going to do, he started to move quickly to the barn door. Unfortunately his attempts at rapid