Summary: Part sixteen (conclusion) of A Battle of Wills
Word Count: 1500
A Battle of Wills
“He who has not tasted the bitter does not understand the sweet.”
–Proverb
Chapter 1
“Where is everyone?” Joe asked as he walked into the parlor. He had finally scrubbed the filth and coal dust off him and changed into fresh, dry clothes. Joe was totally exhausted from everything that he had done in the last few hours.
He couldn’t believe that in addition to everything else that had happened in the last day, by the time he came back to the O’Mara house he found out that Kate was in the middle of giving birth with some strange doctor, Andrea’s friend Doctor Smith, in attendance. Joe really wanted to lie down but he was far too excited to relax.
“Amanda and Andrea are upstairs with Katie and the doctor and everyone else in the dining room having some dinner. Pa won’t let go of Eric and is trying to figure out if he is able to eat and hold that baby at the same time.” Adam answered. He had a bandage wrapped around his head and he also had cleaned up.
“Emily is in there too, Joe.” Dennis added, “I suspect she saved a seat for you right next to her.”
“I’m starving!” Joe grinned broadly and walked into the next room to see his Pa with his first grandchild and take a chair as close to Emily as propriety and a room crowded with the O’Mara children cheering Robert would allow.
Adam stood with one leg propped on the fireplace hearth tiredly staring at the flickering flames. “What time is it Dennis?”
”About thirty seconds later than the last time you asked me.” Dennis chuckled at his nervous friend. His partner, cool calm Adam Cartwright was quickly falling to pieces right before his very eyes. “Adam, it’s only a baby.”
Adam paced the floor behind him, while Dennis sat calmly in a chair, a brandy snifter clutched in his big hand. The amber liquid shined in the flickering gas light of the O’Mara parlor. The silence grew and lengthened as Adam strained to hear what was happening upstairs.
“Are you sure everything is all right?” Adam asked. “It’s been an awfully long time.” Dennis watched as his friend raised his right hand to his tired face and pinched the bridge of his nose with his index finger and thumb. It was one of Adam’s regular habits when he was weary and troubled.
Dennis smiled “Not to worry, just sit down and wait. That baby will come in its own good time and you wearing a hole in my parlor carpet with your big cowboy feet isn’t going to speed anything up. Why don’t you just sit down and relax. You shouldn’t be walking around on that twisted knee so much any way.”
Adam sat down on the settee and leaned forward trying to listen to any sound from upstairs. He stood up, and then sat down again. “You did this eight times? How did you wait and do nothing while Amanda gave birth?”
”Hey this isn’t a ranch where you go out and do what ever you do when the cows have calves or the watch the chickens hatch or whatever the horses do when they have puppies,” Dennis teased. He was trying his best to distract Adam but was having little success.
“Foals…” Adam corrected seriously totally missing the joke.
“Foals, kittens, canaries, who cares. The father’s job was done months ago. In Boston, the father just sits around politely and waits drinking brandy and passes out cigars when the baby is born. Drink that brandy I poured for you. It’s still sitting over there. And I have a box of cigars in my desk in the library just waiting for you.”
Adam eyed the glass and shook his head.
“How long do you think this is going to take?” He sat down again on a chair and stood up for a minute thinking he heard something from upstairs but it was just the children chattering with Joe in the dining room. He was telling them about being locked in the coal bin and how he stole Mr. Jansen’s surrey with Emily and then how he found Andrea and baby Eric in the Preston Law office. Mr. Preston had taken Laura’s note from where Joe had hidden it in his filthy cast and rushed it to the judge. Will would be released from jail in the morning.
“And then we will take Will home with us and I’ll start school.” Adam heard his son add, as if it was the end of a fairy tale with “they all lived happily after”.
“Maybe you better pace a bit, Cowboy.” Dennis laughed.” I think I can take that better than you jumping up and down.”
Adam reached over to the snifter of brandy and downed it in one gulp. “I changed my mind.”
Ben Cartwright walked into the parlor holding chubby little Eric in his arms. He rubbed his cheek against the baby’s sweet smelling blonde hair and kissed Eric’s soft neck. . As nervous as he was about Kate’s progress upstairs, he had a broad grin on his face. Ben finally was holding the missing baby in his proud arms.
“Adam, don’t you think you should stay off your feet? You took quite a knock on your head and shouldn’t be jumping around so much on your bad knee either.”
“I don’t know. I just thought this whole thing would go faster than this is going” Adam quietly mumbled as he sought out his father’s face for reassurance. Ben put his hand on his son’s shoulder.
“Adam, everything is going along fine. Andrea said Dr. Smith is a fine doctor. Look at the good work he did last time he delivered a Cartwright baby,” Ben swung smiling baby Eric up in the air with delight. The chubby baby squealed with joy as if he had known his grandfather his whole life.
Dennis nodded in agreement. “I think you’re right, Ben. Go sit down Adam.”
Adam finally sat down on the arm of the settee. He stood up a minute later and resumed his pacing. He was limping and pacing. He started doing laps moving around the rooms and going into the dining room and then down the hallway. His father, still holding the baby joined him. Soon little Ethel O’Mara hanging onto Ben’s coattail joined the parade singing a song to “her” baby Eric. They did three loops around the house and stopped in the front hall.
Adam turned to look again at the wide staircase, listening in vain for a sound to indicate something was happening. He walked back into the parlor and stood looming over Dennis while Ben walked back into the dining room with the baby with Ethel bringing up the rear.
“Dennis, don’t you think we ought to get up there and see what’s going on?” He called to his partner who was still sitting calmly in the parlor drinking another snifter of brandy. Before Dennis could answer a newborn baby’s shrill cry split the air from the second floor of the house. Adam dashed out of the room and ran up the stairs.
A minute later a second older baby started crying from the dining room as Eric Cartwright greeted his cousin to the world.
Chapter 2
The three men started up the stairs, taking care to keep their feet as quiet as possible. As they reached the top, Ben stopped and tried to hand Eric to Joe who immediately blanched and pulled back. Joe waved his cast at his father and said “Pa, I might drop him. I don’t know how to hold a baby with two hands no less one hand.”
Dennis laughed and took the baby from his grandfather, a soft smile forming on his face. He knew how desperately the Cartwrights had sought that baby and now he and his mother were finally together with the Cartwrights. Ben took a few steps forward. His finger moved to his lips and he turned to gesture at the doorway. The two younger men crowded up behind him and peered over his shoulder. Joe started to say something, but was hushed by the other two. Ben tiptoed forward, crouching in front of the figure of his oldest son. Adam had fallen asleep in the chair next to Katie’s bed, the newborn baby cradled in his arms. Ben recalled Adam holding Little Joe the same way when he was born.
Sam was sleeping across the foot of his mother’s bed and Kate sat wide-awake smiling at the three of them. Amanda sat quietly next to her friend. “So, you finally came up to say hello and meet Elizabeth Miriam Cartwright.
The End
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