The Weathers: Chapter 3

Chapter 3
Stephen and Jasen had quietly sneaked their horses out of the corral, neither one wanted to be there when Ma played her game, the game that interfered with everyone’s life, if of course you wasn’t hitched yet. When they got their horses on down the road a little ways, they silently got on their horses, intending to head to Hollom or anywhere as long as it was away from that notion she had in her head. When they started to ride off, Ma heard them and came running out the door, she was hollering and throwing anything she could get a hold of. Over the sound of their galloping horses, they heard her holler "get back here right now you two!"
Last time Jasen had been to Hollom it was just a small town, about the same size of Ikeville. As they were riding into Hollom, they passed the saloon, delivery stables and then they rode past Janet and Polly’s dress store. It was a regular store that had two different rooms one for the dress store with dresses, material, hats and feminine things that men just didn’t like to talk about, and everything else was in the other room and the way Ma talked, it looked like they were doing pretty good at it too. Janet always did have a mind for business.
On down the street, they saw the Sheriff’s office, and the Sheriff knew the boys personally. Way before Travis Thompson took the job of being the Sheriff of Hollom. He has been their sister Janet’s husband for over 23 years. Then they rode past the post office which was the telegraph office too. The Post Master did both jobs worked with the U.S. Mail and used the telegraph machine There was also a little building where you could eat and an Attorney’s Office, which the sign also read Mayor of Hollom too, and on the other side there was a Dentist’s Office. Jasen was amazed at how much the little town has grown! Hollom now seems larger, with more businesses, than Ikeville.
Stephen looked at Jasen and said “While we’re here I think I will go on back and wire Marshal Jones and ask him to come on down here.”
Jasen nodded and said “meet you at Janet’s store later?”
Stephen agreed they would meet there after he finished with his wire.
Jasen went on into the dress shop he turned his head and saw a pretty young lady. She had long, curly, light brown hair that came down to the middle of her back, it was pulled back and tied with a yellow ribbon, most women kept their hair up in a matron’s bun, but not Polly, she was strong willed and had a eye for fashion. She was in the regular part of the store she was wearing a pretty yellow dress with roses and daisies on it, the green leaves that was on it brought out the green specks in her hazel eyes, she was very trim and fit. She really didn’t look like a Weathers until of course you make her mad, then Ma’s personality came out in her.
Jasen smiled to himself, as he watched the scene in front of him, there was this young man who was trying to court his baby sister, he had short blonde hair that was kept regularly by a barber, this man was about medium size, kind of stocky, his feet just reached the floor from the stool he was sitting on, and his clothes that he had on was something else, they must be some city slicker outfit. Jasen knew he would never wear such a getup. They were atrocious, his pants was puffed up at the calves of his legs, and they were as brown as the dirt outside, almost like he took them off and stomped them in the dirt and the shirt was a store bought shirt, it looked almost like a woman’s shirt with ruffles and lace, and the shoes were hideous, they were shoes not boots like real men wore, they must be the eastern shoes he heard about.
Jasen listened to what the young man was saying, you should of heard the words that was coming out of his mouth like "your hair is the color of the dusk of day, and your skin is as beautiful and spectacular as ivory. I would very much appreciate it if you would do this old aching heart some good and honor me with your presence, by my side for dinner today at my humble abode we’re having roast duckling smothered in brown gravy with all the accessories.”
Polly was mesmerized by all the fancy talk; they didn’t even see the small hand from behind the counter, all he could see was a small arm attached to the hand it was trying to reach the jar of candy sticks, so Jasen reached in, and gave the little fellow one and off the owner of the small hand didn’t stick around to thank the generous stranger, he just raced to the other room. Polly didn’t notice anyone except the city slicker, Jasen was listening to the way he was talking it was enough to make a real man sick, he was thinking; buddy, just kiss the girl and get on with it. The young man was still telling Polly about the heavenly meal that was being fixed at his house, my goodness by the time he has finished explaining it all, poor Polly will be starved to death.
Jasen figured since his sister still hadn’t noticed him being there, he would not bother them now, so he walked into the other room and Jasen saw lots of fancy dresses, that was quite fetching and hats that had fruit and birds on them and some were alright, they were plain and simple enough there to keep the sun off. The material, that he seen was all different colors and textures. I guess it was all kinds of goodies to keep a woman in there all day and dream like they didn’t have enough to do; like feeding their men and working in the crops like Ma did, you wouldn’t find her in a place like this even if her daughters did own it. Then Jasen almost stumbled into the catalogs laying there neatly on the small table so the woman folks can dream some more and bother their men folks. Why don’t they want something special like a better gun to protect their young ones or a good cast iron skillet or kettle to feed their families now that is the way us men think, don't waste your thinking on silly stuff.
Jasen looked around the room until he spotted Janet, he was thinking she sure didn’t look older than him but if he was thinking right, she was 2 years older than him, and still one of the most attractive women around. Her hair was a little darker than the rest of the family, but with the stress of her husband’s job and running after her kids there were gray strands starting to show, the other one that had the dark hair too was William.
Janet looked like she had on one of those store bought dresses too and it was the same color as the grass outside but shinier, it didn’t have any designs on it, it was just one color that had a shiny cast to it, that color sure was pretty. Maybe some day if he could ever find a wife, he would talk to Janet about a dress like that.
Jasen thought it looked like she had her hands full she was snapping at the same little fellow he had seen earlier. Jasen looked at him closely he was a fine looking young lad, his blonde hair was actually long, it could have been cut a little, he couldn’t of been over 6 years old. He had his lip stuck out; he was pouting and eyeing the candy stick his mother had in her hand.
Janet said “young man where did you get that candy stick" he looked at his mother straight in the eyes and said" a man gave it to me Ma honest.” and he took off, after he had grabbed the candy stick, he was a smart lad.
Janet took off behind him hollering at him to come back, it reminded Jasen of Ma if she were 25 years older, he would have thought Ma was here, then Jasen heard a smack and he quenched and automatically shielded his head, Jasen was thinking about the poor little fellow, and hoped that he didn’t show her who gave it to him.
Janet looked up and saw Jasen standing there, at first she started to blush from scolding her child in front of a stranger, then she saw who it was and her eyes went from aggravated and frustrated to simple pleasure and enjoyment at seeing her brother that she hadn’t seen for over six years, she asked “Jasen, is that you?”
Acting innocent, Jasen sheepishly said, “hi Janet, poor little fellow, what did he do?” Jasen looked around at the boy and winked; the little one smiled and went back to eating his candy.
Janet smiled and said “Mark acts just like you and Stephen.” then all of a sudden she got a suspicious look in her eyes and asked Jasen, “You didn’t by chance give a blonde haired little boy a candy stick did you?”
Jasen looked shocked and said “I just came in the door.”
Janet looked at him knowingly, with one eyebrow arched and her hands on her hips; Jasen looked away hurriedly and started in the other direction.
Janet asked “Jasen has Polly spotted you yet?”
Jasen replied, “No, she was too busy being courted by some city slicker quoting Shakespeare or some right pretty words.”
Janet said “Oh that must be Sam.”
Jasen asked “who’s Sam?”
Janet said “You know if you came around more, you would know he is our new Mayor in town and he got his law degree in Boston, and is very good, he really likes Polly, but she only likes him as a friend.”
Jasen smiled and said “all them fancy words for nothing.”
Janet looked at Jasen and scolded him, “Jasen I know that smile, and you had better not do something mean to him. Have you seen Travis yet?”
Jasen replied “not yet.”
Janet got a worried look on her face said “listen Jasen, Travis is having a little problem right now there has been a killing and I heard the crowd is getting pretty worked up over at Clearwater creek. Travis and his deputy are over there now trying to bring the prisoner in.”
Jasen could see now why the worried look was there, a lynching mops is not too pleasant or healthy, if you don’t play your cards right you can get seriously hurt.
Jasen heard the little bell go off in the other room someone else just walked in; it didn’t take long to figure out who it was. All of a sudden he heard, “hello my dearest Polly.” Jasen thought Stephen was here now they could go help Travis now, of course after Stephen goaded Polly, after seeing her beau with his getup, Stephen wouldn’t let it pass. Jasen grinned and thought this was going to be fun.
Jasen and Janet went into the other room and Jasen saw Stephen and was fixing to tell him about the trouble Travis was in when he saw Stephen gaze over and looked at Sam the Mayor. Stephen asked puzzled, “who are you?”
Sam puffed out his chest proudly and said “Well I am Mayor Sam Hutch at your service.”
Stephen looked at him with an amused shocked look, he started with the top of his head and went all the way down to his feet, and he straightened up from leaning on the counter and asked the man, “When did they let you go from your other job? You know the carnival; you forgot to get out of your clown’s outfit.”
Polly quickly said to Stephen before he could say anything else. “Hello Stephen I’m so happy to see you.” She came over and hugged him and whispered, “You better be nice, I mean it.”
Janet said “Polly look who else decided to come and see us.” Polly looked around and then run over to where they stood enjoying the scene that just happened, Polly excitingly grabbed Jasen around the neck and said, “Oh my goodness Jasen, the last time I saw you I was a little girl, but we always get to see Stephen a lot.” She threw daggers from her eyes at her other brother, she would not forget the remarks he made to Sam.
Stephen replied, “That’s because I have to watch over my baby sister, you never know what kind of idiots she will attract.” and he winked at Jasen. Jasen knew Stephen was getting in way over his head now.
Jasen spoke up just in time, Polly was going towards Stephen, Jasen said, “Sorry Polly you will have to kill him another time, Travis is in trouble and we have to go help, we’ll be back as soon as we can and spend a little more time with you all.”
Polly said" Can’t wait” and gave Stephen a death look.
Stephen and Jasen hugged both girls and said “We’ll see you all later” and Stephen looked at Polly and winked. Polly smiled and hollered at him as he was walking out the door “Stephen you will never grow up!”
And the men got on their horses and headed towards Clearwater creek. Laughing as they was riding off.
When Jasen and Stephen got to Clearwater creek and went over to Halsey Ranch they found Sheriff Thompson and his deputy in front of a crowd of angry men and he heard Travis telling them “Gentlemen, Calm down you know I have to take this man in to stand trial, it’s my job.”
A huge man with a red beard, who looked like a miner, was one of the one’s in front that seemed to be causing the most trouble, the man must of stood 6'6" and he could have easily weighed over 300 lbs and it looked like he was rock solid, there didn’t seem to be any fat on this fellow. Yes, he looked and sounded like the leader here, because he was doing most of the talking he bellowed out. “That scum bag killed Eric and he is going to hang right now for his crime. Don’t try to stop us Sheriff we don’t want to hurt you or your deputy. We have no quarrel with you.”
Travis looked at the big man who had walked to close to him. He was at least 7" taller and outweighed him by over 120 lbs, Travis looked at the red bearded man and said “Now look here Mister, I don’t want any trouble, but I am taking my prisoner with me, and you will be the first one I shoot, since you’re brave enough to get in front of everyone else.”
Well this seemed to infuriate the man; his face went several shades of red.
Sheriff Travis Thompson was not a big man he stood 5'11" and he weighed no more than 180lbs. Jasen was watching Travis and he saw he was starting to show some gray on his sideburns, but other than that he did not look like he was in his middle forties. Janet had kept trying to get Travis to quit being Sheriff many times, but every time they got another Sheriff, they would either run off or be killed. So then the entire town’s people would go back and beg and complain to Travis about having no law. “We have to protect our wives and children, we need you Sheriff Thompson,” they would say and he would always take the job back. Janet then would get mad and tell Travis “You know you’re four children will someday be without a father, think of Wendy, Cindy, Mark and John for awhile” and she would stomp off, but really knew there was nothing she could say that would keep him from protecting the town’s people.
Wendy was 22 now she was married with a little one of her own named Jodi, her husband Terry Clark and she lived in Hollom. Cindy was not married yet she was 18, and John was 12 and the youngest named Mark was 6.
Travis thought maybe it was time to tell the town to get a new Sheriff, but he knew he would have to move away and not let anyone know he ever was a lawman, besides he wasn’t no famous lawman like Janet’s brother, Jasen or a big name bounty hunter, like Stephen, both of the Weather’s men were legendary and he knew anytime he had trouble all he had to do was send someone to the Weather’s place and Ma would get enough people to help. Man how he loved that old woman many times her and Pa had gotten him out of some bad situations. No wonder them boys were the way they were they were Weathers and proud of it. He just wished he had someone to go get them now.
Jasen and Stephen got off their horses no one even noticed the two riding up because of all the excitement and Jasen walked straight up to Travis and got next to him and flashed his badge Jasen said “gentlemen I am a United States Marshal and this party's over. Sheriff Thompson’s going to take his prisoner and we’re here to make sure he does.”
Travis whispered, “You two must have read my mind.”
Stephen had headed towards the direction of where the big man stood while Jasen went up to address the crowd.
The big man with the red beard looked at Stephen, and it was kind of funny to Travis and Jasen, because he started to say something and Stephen came up to face him and his fighting spirit left, he was nice as could be after that he even shook Stephen’s hand.
The man looked around then said “let’s go boys the Marshal and his deputy here will make sure justice is served.”
Ralph said, “but Robert what about Eric.”
The bearded man said “boys, we do not mess with the government, you will be in all kinds of trouble.” And then the crowd started dispersing very quickly.
Travis looked at Jasen and Stephen, “you boys came just in the nick of time, and I was kind of getting worried there.”
Stephen said “that red bearded guy got quite when I walk over to him. Guess he didn’t want to fight after all.” They all laughed and left with their prisoner, they headed back into town.
When the next morning arrived they said their goodbye to their sisters. Polly gave both of her brother’s a hug, after hearing how the boys helped Travis out, she let Stephen off the hook for now. They headed back to Ma's, which neither one was ready to go back after sneaking off the way they did.
Ma was working in the field when they arrived and she asked, “You boys hungry?”
Stephen said “No Ma’am, we ate over at Janet’s today.”
Ma replied, “You boys go inside, I will be there in a minute.”
Ma came in and stood next to them and told both of them, “Michael is suppose to be in today on the stage, mostly I need you both to behave when you go get him.” Stephen said “Ma you know we’ll behave. The only reason we got into a fight was Jasen tried to trick me.”
Ma pulled out a shoe box that was half full of newspapers clippings and she pulled the top one out and she said “this is a recent one of you two smashing up places because you two are into it.”
Jasen said “Ma where did you get that at?”
She said “don’t you worry about that, you two need to cut this nonsense out your way to old to act like this.”
Stephen and Jasen were trying to look in the box to see who sent her all this information. Ma looked at both of them and started to cry, and Jasen came closer to her being very careful.
Ma said “I worry so much about you two. Jasen you and Stephen have so much mischief in you I honestly thought when you got older you would calm down, but I think both of you got worse.”
Stephen kept looking in the shoebox, while Jasen was hugging his mother trying to calm her, and then he saw the name on an envelope that had been sending her stuff about them.
Yes it was Michael, he had thought right, that weasel how could he do this? He was a traitor, why would he worry his mother like that? All they were doing was blowing off steam. Why really nobody got hurt, they always seem to tie. Jasen and I will go weasel hunting today.
All of a sudden Stephen’s mind came back to Ma, but too late, he heard the crack, and felt the pain in the top of his head. Jasen started laughing. Stephen looked on the floor and half the spoon was broke on the floor and the handle was still in Ma's hand she was furious looking at Stephen and she was saying “I’m trying to put some sense in you two and you’re not even listening.”
Stephen by then started laughing along with Jasen. Ma looked at Stephen and actually slapped Jasen she said “I’ve had enough of you two disrespecting me, now go get Michael.” Both said “yes Ma, we will be happy to go get Michael.”
Ma said “that fine school teacher, Kimberly Barton, came here for dinner last night and neither one of you showed up and I do not really know if I can bring her back again so soon after the disgrace you two did.”
Jasen said “Ma, we don’t want to meet anyone, when we do it will be on our own terms. I’m sorry but both Stephen and I feel the same way I guess we’ll head on over and get Michael now.” Ma looked at her two boys in amazement; they might just be growing up after all, now they will need her to get them wives. Ma’s mind started turning with excitement, now who could she get for both boys now? She would hook up Miss Barton with Michael, since the other two didn’t even bother to show up last night; yeah Michael is better suited for Miss Barton anyway.
They got on their horses and grabbed a spare one for Michael, Jasen was on his powerful white horse, Lucky and Stephen was on his prevailing black horse, Sassy both horses looked about the same size.
A few miles up the road Stephen started telling Jasen what he saw in Ma’s box and the envelope he found. Michael was telling on them like they were little kids. Stephen said “we need to confront Michael about this.”
Jasen said “I have a better idea.” Jasen told Stephen his plans as they were riding into Ikeville.
Michael got off the stage and looked around. He didn’t see anyone there to pick him up. He hoped that William or Stuart would be there soon, he kept looking around and all of a sudden his mouth dropped. There in road was Jasen and Stephen with an extra horse, not a buggy but a horse, how was he going to get his luggage on a horse.
Michael was very uneasy with these two, because you never knew what was going on in their minds and together they were worse. Many times he had gotten them out of jail and out of trouble with the law and here they were together again, well he was not going to help them here if they get in trouble.
Jasen rode up to Michael and said “hello Michael, Ma sent Stephen and me to fetch you and bring you home.”
Michael said “where is the buggy I cannot put all my luggage on a horse, I have too much.”
Stephen looked at Jasen and said “Ma didn’t say anything about a buggy; she just said to come and get you. Surely with all that lawyer pay you make, you can get your own buggy.”
Jasen and Stephen turned around and left with the extra horse
Michael was fit to be tied; he was dragging his entire new set of luggage, he had just bought through the dust. He thought these two will never grow up and I can not believe they just left me here. Then Michael thought again and said “yes I do believe it.” Of course it is the normal behavior of two barbarians like them. Michael kept dragging his luggage and finally got over to the stables; he rented a buggy and was heading out of Ikeville. He was thinking as soon as I get to Ma's I’m going to let her know what her welcome party did.
Michael was feeling pretty sorry for himself by then and didn’t see to masked men riding from the trees until it was too late. Michael started to run, but the buggy was to slow. When the men got next to the buggy Michael said “I know it’s you two.”
One of the masked men snatched Michael from the buggy.
Michael said “you two idiots are so dumb you didn’t even change your horses.” Right then the other man jumped in and within two minutes Michael was tied up and hanging up side down from a tree.
The other bigger man smacked the rump of the horse and sent the horse and buggy back on its way to the delivery stable.
Jasen and Stephen started riding off and Michael was still hollering at them “I will press charges. You two let me down out of this tree, when I get to the house you two will be in a lot of trouble. You know you will.”
Jasen looked at Stephen and said “why didn't you remember to get us two different horses, you idiot.” Stephen looked at Jasen and told him you’re the idiot.” That was all it took, they lunged at each other and both men were rolling on the ground trying to be the one on top, while all this was taking place, no more than 150 yards was Michael hanging up side down from a tree he was still hollowing at them he said “I mean it you two get me down right now.”
Stephen grabbed Jasen and said “stop we got to go.”
Jasen looked around and jumped on Lucky and had the horse on a dead run with Stephen on Sassy, right on his tail, they couldn’t have been riding no more than 5 minutes when they saw 7 riders riding toward Hollom. They stopped Jasen could tell William was on one of the horses and Matt and Todd on a couple more. Jasen and Stephen rode up to where they were.
William said “Travis just sent a message by that gentleman there; William was pointing at a nearby rider. Hollom’s bank just got robbed and he asked for you two to come too”
William looked around and said "didn't Ma sent you two after Michael"
Jasen looked at William and said “he wasn’t on the stagecoach; I guess he will be here tomorrow.”
Before William could ask anything else Jasen and Stephen started heading toward Hollom. William rode up to Todd and said “go look for Michael on the road, check and see if he came in or not.”
Todd said "yes pa” then turned his horse around and left.
William hollowed back at Todd he said "after that is done, find us in Hollom", with that they rode off riding different directions.