by soho178
Disclaimer: The characters and situations of the TV program
"Big Valley" are the creations of Four Star/Republic Pictures and
have been used without permission. No
copyright infringement is intended by the author. The ideas expressed in this story are copyrighted to the author.
“Boy, I told you to keep your hands off that horse.” His
hand stopped mid-reach, on its way to petting the horse that stood on the other
side of the corral fence. The grip that spun him around was followed
immediately by a solid right cross that landed the Heath in the dirt. Nick
wasn’t used to having his orders ignored and he sure as hell wasn’t going to
put up with it from that whoreson that his Mother and siblings were accepting
as part of the family.
The horse had been a bone of contention between the two
since it had been caught two weeks before. Nick had tried repeatedly to break
him but was having no luck. Heath was adamant that gentling was the only thing
that would work. Neither man wanted to geld he stallion, as he was exquisitely
built and should make prime breeding stock.
All movement within eyeshot stopped as the hands working
nearby an ominous silence filled the air, waiting to see how this latest
confrontation would play out. Heath had barely gotten to his feet when the
other man grabbed him by the collar and continued.
“I don’t know what the hell ever made you think you could
walk in here and stake a claim on the Barkley name, but I’m telling you now,
that you’ve made a big mistake, I am gonna be your worst nightmare. You hear me
Boy! I’ll make your life Hell!”
Heath shook off the hand that held him in place and turned
to walk away. His blue eyes had taken on the sheen of steel. He clenched his
jaw, fighting to keep his breathing calm and measured in the face of his
growing rage.
“Don’t you walk away from me!” The hand that reached out
to stop him managed to grab only a fistful of blue chambray and pull it back
sharply. For one brief instant it stopped Heath’s forward motion, but then the
worn fabric gave way under the force.
The sound of the ripping fabric seemed to hang in the air,
its memory overlaying a silence so profound that not even the horse stirred.
Six pairs of eyes raked over his exposed back, taking in the thickened,
twisted, ropes of scar tissue that trailed from side to side. Layer upon layer,
one over top of the other, they reached across the broad expanse of his back,
leaving almost none of the clear smooth skin that must have once been there.
Heath’s rage seemed to fall away with the cloth that hung
at his waist. He turned to face his half-brother, and gave a bitter laugh and a
parody of the half-smile that occasionally graced his face. “I already know
what Hell looks like Nick, and it ain’t you.” With that, he bent to pick up his
hat from the dirt and walked into the black recesses of the barn.
* * * * * * * *
Heath’s disappearance broke the spell binding the other
men. Duke McCall was the first to speak. “You men, get back to work.” He looked
at Nick. “Don’t imagine you want him walking through the house that way. Best
go get him another shirt, boy.”
Nick nodded silently to his Foreman and started towards
the house. Out of view of the crew working the around the barn, he doubled over
and lost the contents of his stomach.
Knowing that Heath would still be there, Duke entered the
barn carrying the shirt Nick had brought.
The young man had only been at the ranch eight weeks, but it was clear
his deep love of horses was a source of both joy and comfort to him. He’d spent
a lot of time in here after one or another confrontation with Nick Barkley.
It only took a few seconds to locate him grooming and
soothing a mare awaiting her first foal. “There you go girl. It won’t be long
now, will it? You’ll be a Mama soon.” The horse nuzzled him, enjoying the
gentle hands and soft voice of the man whom she had grown fond of over the last
few days.
The older man cleared his throat to announce his presence.
Heath stepped out of the foaling stall and took the shirt that was offered.
“Thought you might want this.”
“Thank you.” He hadn’t had time to consider how he was
going to get past Victoria Barkley without displaying his back for her or the
rest of the household to see. He wondered, briefly, how the shirt had come to be
in Duke’s hand.
Reading his face, McCall’s eyes crinkled in amusement. “I
made Nick go get it. He may be the Boss, but he’s still Tom Barkley’s son and
I’ve seen him in diapers. Tanned his hide mor’n a few times when his Daddy
wasn’t there to do it, too. Don’t reckon things have changed all that much
since then.”
A small grin crossed Heath’s face at the thought of the
older man acting as surrogate Father to a young and hot-headed Nick. But there
it was, those word’s summed it up. ‘Tom Barkley’s son.’ That was the crux of
the matter. Both were Tom Barkley’s sons, but one represented the fall of an
idol. Heath wasn’t responsible for the circumstances of his birth, but that
wasn’t stopping Nick from taking them out on him instead of the one person who
should have been present to answer for his own actions. Tom Barkley was dead,
and someone had to pay for Nick’s disillusionment. That someone turned out to
be Heath.
“It’s none of my business, son, but if you ever want to
talk about it, I’ll listen. You just come find me.” Duke turned and left Heath
to change in privacy.
* * * * * * * *
Riding the fence line gave Nick the solitude he needed.
The fight this morning had only served to make bad situation worse. He’d lost
his temper for no other reason than the desire to take another shot at Heath.
He knew he’d acted like a child, knew he was making a fool of himself even as
he did it. Sure, some of the crew probably admired him for standing his ground;
a few had made it clear they resented Heath’s acceptance and rise in
circumstances. More to the point, Nick had done nothing to encourage them to
get over their resentment, in fact, he’d encouraged it. In the end he’d
humiliated himself in front of Duke McCall, a man whose respect he valued as
much as that of his family, and discovered that this supposed half-brother of
his had a far more disturbing past than any of them had considered.
His stomach churned as he remembered the sight of Heath’s
back. He had no doubt that the man had indeed been to Hell. There weren’t too
many places where a man could get whipped like that. It was clear Heath had
spent time in prison, and that he’d done something, caused some trouble, to
deserve harsh punishment. Nick wasn’t at all sure he wanted an ex-convict near
his family, particularly one who had such a gruesome history.
And yet, he had to admit that Heath wasn’t like any of the
other men who he’d seen walk out of prison. There wasn’t any of the latent
anger boiling under the surface, none of the resentment of the Law or grasping
determination to get everything they’d missed.
For all his claiming to be a Barkley, Heath hadn’t actually asked for
anything. The boy had been with them two months, worked hard, and he hadn’t
even bought himself new clothes. It hadn’t been hard for Nick to pick another
shirt from Heath’s closet for him to wear. There’d only been one other hanging
there.
He’d gone further, invading the man’s privacy, and
discovered that Heath Barkley, after two months of living at the ranch, owned,
two pairs of pants, the boots he wore, his hat, horse, and a few meager
personal possessions, including a picture of a lovely young woman. Nick
presumed it was Leah Thompson.
He turned his horse and headed for Stockton.
* * * * * * * *
“Brother Nick, what brings you here in the middle of a
working day?” Jarrod’s pleasure at seeing his brother mixed with curiosity at
his unexpected appearance at the law offices.
Nick paced the room, unsure of how or where to start.
Finally he asked the question that had been foremost in his mind. “Jarrod, did
you ever have the Pinkerton’s investigate Heath?”
The Lawyer sobered, anticipating another in their endless
arguments over Heath’s presence at the Barkley mansion. “Why, Nick?”
“Did you?” the question demanded an answer.
“Yes.”
“What did you find out?” To Jarrod’s surprise, the tall
dark-haired cowboy’s face reflected panic and uncertainty rather than the overt
hostility he’d become accustomed to seeing there.
“Sit down Nick, and tell me what this is about, then I’ll answer
your questions.” He gestured to one of the handsome leather armchairs that
occupied the space opposite his desk. While Nick settled himself, his older
brother rose and poured the two men each a scotch. Finally, when they were
settled and he’d instructed his secretary to insure there were no
interruptions, Nick began his tale of the morning’s events.
When the last detail had been told, Jarrod understood the
reason for his younger brother’s sense of urgency.
“Jarrod, I’ve never seen anything like it. I don’t know
how a man survives the kind of beating that must have caused those scars.” Even
now the whiskey churned in his stomach at the memory. The look on Nick’s face
made Jarrod dread the day he was ever confronted with the sight.
“Nick, I’m not going to minimize your concerns. I think
we’d be wise to keep an eye on Heath. But think about this. He's been with us
for two months. There has been ample time and opportunity for him to show his
true colors if he’s hiding anything. I’m not sure any man would be able to keep
that kind of a facade day-in and day-out for that long. I honestly don’t think
there’s anything to worry about.”
Nick nodded, focusing on the logic of his brother’s words,
trying to damp down the panic that had settled in his heart when he’d realized
what the cowboy’s back implied. Heath
had never given a hint of being violent. In fact, he’s spent a lot of time
walking away from the confrontations that Nick and the hands seemed intent on
provoking. The only time Nick had seen him give in to anger was when Nick had
implied that Leah Thompson had been a prostitute who’d used a night spent with
Tom Barkley to tarnish the great man’s reputation and try to claim Barkley
heritage for her son.
It had happened a week after the man calling himself Heath
Thompson had come to stay in the big house. “I can’t believe you’d take some
whore’s story over our Father!” The words had been intended to shock his family
into realizing just exactly what they were saying about Tom Barkley. They’d
been laid out there right in front of Heath who had been dismissed by Nick as
being unworthy of acknowledgement or even the barest courtesy.
The words had barely passed into hearing when Nick Barkley
found himself slammed against the solid wood paneling of the Library, hoisted
half a foot off the floor and held by a steel grip around each arm. He gasped
to regain his breath and his startled eyes looked into crystalline blue ones
that reflected pure rage.
The words came out with a deadly calm, barely audible to
the others in the room. “Call me what you will, but never…I repeat NEVER…speak
of my mother again in that way. If you do, I will kill you.”
In that moment, held aloft by a man who he should be able
to physically best in any fight, incapable of defending himself, Nick found
himself afraid. He had no doubt but that Heath was fully capable of what he
threatened. Jarrod had interceded, rescuing the moment, and Heath had left the
house to spend hours riding across the
open range. The moment had receded as weeks passed by, but now circumstances
revived the memories caused Nick to wonder.
“Nick.” Jarrod’s words broke his reverie.
“Nick, I did ask the Pinkerton’s to look into Heath’s
background. I have no idea what they’ve found. I’m expecting a preliminary
report in the next few days. Until then, I’d suggest you take reasonable
precautions, but not worry overly much.” Jarrod pinned his brother with a
stare. “I’m usually a pretty good judge of character, and I don’t think that
Heath is a danger to anyone, except maybe you, if you don’t stop doing
everything you can to goad him into something.”
* * * * * * * *
Work on the fences and moving the herds to fresher
pastures kept most of the crew away from the main house and barns for the next
few days. Nick made sure that he was always knew where Heath was working, but
avoided any more contact with him than necessary. Most of the hands did the
same. Word of what had happened and what lay beneath the ever present blue
shirt had spread almost instantly through the bunkhouse.
“They’re scared of me, ain’t they Duke?” McCall was one
the few who exhibited an obvious ease with the blond-headed cowboy.
“I reckon so. Least ways the crew. They’ll get over it.”
“Nick?”
McCall eyed him speculatively. “Scared? Yeah, for his
family. But mostly I’m thinking he’s not quite sure what to make of you
anymore. Don’t make no sense, but maybe some good come out of those scars you
carry.”
“Nothing good has ever come from Hell, Duke.”
“Well, at least they’ve let up on you. That’s gotta feel
better.” The weathered face broke into a small grin.
“I suppose.” A small grin lifted the corner of his mouth.
When the crew returned to the ranch that evening, Nick
made his way up to his bedroom to clean up. He’d made a point of claiming first
rights to a bath and all the hot water since the day Heath had moved into the
house. It had been just one more way of getting his point across. Heath
followed, in no hurry, assuming that today would be no different. It had
shocked him, half an hour later, to find that Nick’s door was still closed and
the bath was his.
Nick had been sidetracked by the brown portfolio that lay
on his bed. He’d opened it, wondering what could be inside, only to be
confronted with the report that Jarrod had received from the Pinkerton Agency.
It consumed twenty pages and presented the barest outline of Heath’s life. Here
was the story of a man who had been born out of wedlock and spent his entire
youth paying for it.
Born eight months after Tom Barkley had left Strawberry,
Heath was shunned by the town and his only blood relatives besides his mother.
He’d worked from the time he was six to help put food on the table. Small for
his age, he’d been a charge boy in the mines. Later, when he’d grown big enough
to handle horses, he’d taken on a second job at the livery in Strawberry. None
of that left time for schooling, even if the town fathers would have let him
associate with their children. So Heath was educated at home, in the few hours
of free time that his work allowed. He was, by all accounts intelligent and
literate. Leah Thompson had raised the boy to be polite, respectful, and to
value honor. She’d taught by example, spending the better part of 20 years
doing manual labor, washing other people’s laundry and cleaning their houses,
rather than take the easy way out and become a saloon girl.
When the mine had played out and the town had begun to
fail, Heath Thompson had taken the only path his 14 year old mind could
conceive of. He’d lied about his age to join the Union Army and fight. At least
he would be able to send money home to his mother. A proficient horseman and
sharpshooter, the boy had been assigned to an elite corps of marksmen. In the
end, that would prove to be his undoing. Captured while on assignment to
assassinate Rebel officers, Heath Thompson had found himself consigned to the
Hell that was Carterson Prison, for the last eight months of the war.
The stories of Carterson, and other camps on both sides of
the conflict, had emerged along with the few dozen survivors and the thousands
of corpses. Torture, murder, disease and starvation had been the norm. Heath
had lingered in a Union hospital for almost a year before he was deemed fit to
be released. The final insult had been the letter denying him any recognition
of his service as he’d lied about his age to enlist.
The rest of the report lay unread in Nick’s hands when
Jarrod came upstairs to fetch him for dinner. He wasn’t surprised when his
younger brother begged off. “I need to be alone right now. Please tell Mother
that I’m going to sleep.”
Jarrod rested his hand on his brother’s shoulder and
nodded his sympathy. He’s been able to read the report in the privacy of his
office, where there was no one to interrupt while he came to terms with the
information.
“Mother, Nick has asked to be excused, he’s not feeling
well.”
“Oh my, Heath, did he say anything to you?”
“No M’am, he seemed fine riding back in today.”
“I think he’s just tired Mother.” Jarrod was trying to
assure his brother as much privacy as he needed.
Eventually, Nick had fallen asleep, but it wasn’t a
restful one. His dreams had been filled with visions of the tales he’d read
about the prison camps during the Andersonville trials. And in all of them,
he’d seen the face of Heath Barkley, starved, in pain, horribly sick, but with
those piercing blue eyes staring straight into his conscience all the time.
Nick awoke, gagging on his own gorge.
It was late, Heath had stayed up to watch the fire and to
contemplate his future. Leaving was beginning to look like a good alternative.
The sounds of retching coming from the bathroom stopped him midway down the
hall. Knocking, he opened the door and was surprised to see Nick hunched over
the commode, consumed with dry heaves. His face was horribly pale and sweat coated
his forehead and arms. Without thinking, Heath wetted a towel that hung on the
rack and pressed it to the other man’s face.
“Take it easy Nick. Just ride ‘em out, then we’ll get you
back to your room.” Eventually the spasms subsided and he guided the sick man
back down the hall. “You need any help from here?”
“N n noo, I’ll be okay.”
Heath nodded and turned to leave.
“Heath?”
“Yeah?”
“Thanks.”
The blond nodded and left for his own room.
* * * * * * * *
The next morning found the family gathered for breakfast.
Victoria Barkley surveyed her middle son and judged that he was tired but not
seemingly ill. “Nick, are you feeling better this morning?”
“Yes Mother. “ He smiled and she returned it with a look
of concern that warmed his heart.
Jarrod spent breakfast, stealing occasional glances at his
brother, as if to assess what changes last night’s reading might have
wrought. Eventually, as the meal was
drawing to its close, Jarrod rose to leave the table. “Brother Nick, may I
speak with you in my office?”
“Sure Jarrod.” The two men left as Heath headed out to the
barn to begin the day’s crew assignments.
“I suppose it’s too early to offer you a drink?”
The two merely exchanged glances.
“Did you know, Nick, that when you get scars that young,
they have to be cut periodically, so you can grow. Scars tissue doesn’t stretch, so you either cut it, it tears, or
you become twisted.”
Nick had no answer for that.
“What do we do now, Jarrod?”
“With what we know? Keep it to ourselves. I don’t think we
have the right to tell this to anyone, not even Mother. Heath has been badly
used enough as it is.” He looked at Nick and received a nod of agreement in
return.
“What do we do about him?”
“Do you still have doubts?”
“That he’s dangerous? No. That he’s a Barkley? I suppose.”
“Does it make any difference to you that after this
report, and seeing all the little bits of Father in him, I’m even more
convinced?”
I don’t know what to think Jarrod. If I admit he’s my
brother, then what does that say about Tom Barkley?”
“That he was imperfect. That he was human and just as
frail as the rest of us. That whatever else he passed to us from being here to
raise us, we’re all made of the same stuff that could let a 14-year-old boy
live through Hell on Earth and come out the other end with his humanity intact.
That’s no small legacy.”
Nick seemed to stare at the titles ranged in the shelves
that lined the room, as he digested what his brother had said.
“I suppose you’re right.” Nick’s eyes contained a sadness
the likes of which Jarrod hadn’t seen there since the days right after Tom
Barkley had been murdered. “These days I wonder how much of that I’ve really
inherited.”
“Nick, we all do things we regret. It doesn’t make us less
worthy. If you’re feeling bad over how you’ve punished Heath for Father’s
actions, then I’d say that you inherited as much of that legacy as the rest of
us.”
Nick looked at his brother, grateful for the vote of
confidence. “I guess I’d better get to work.”
Jarrod reached out to grab Nick’s arm as he walked past. A
nod of his head directed the cowboy’s attention out the window, to the corral
where the Black had been let out for another attempt at breaking him.
Heath was standing at the rail, talking to the animal as
it nuzzled his hand. The two men watched as the jet black animal ran the length
of the corral and then returned to stand with his human companion once more.
Nick watched for a few seconds more, then nodded his head
as if in silent conversation. He turned on his heal and left Jarrod standing
there, watching.
Heath was lost in thought, so focused on the horse that he
never heard the jingle of Nick’s spurs as he approached. The ranch hands
standing in the area took a collective breath, waiting for the explosion to
come.
Nick placed a hand on Heath’s shoulder. “So you gonna show
me how to gentle this horse?”
Jarrod stood watching, mesmerized by what was happening.
Nick leaned against the corral fence, equally rapt.
In the center of the corral, horse and man stood face to
face. Each looked the other in the eye. Slowly, tentatively, the cowboy reached
out his hand and offered it to the horse, waiting patiently for the offer of
friendship to be accepted.