Luke Jensen 1: Bounty Hunter by William W. Johnstone

Author:William W. Johnstone [Johnstone, William W.]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Westerns
ISBN: 9781599509327
Amazon: 1599509326
Publisher: GraphicAudio
Published: 2013-01-02T06:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER 19

Over the next few days, Luke struggled against the impatience he felt as he looked for another sign that his legs might be improving. Any time he was alone at the cabin, he moved them as much as he could, sometimes unconsciously straining his other muscles until he was breathing hard and sweat popped out on his face. He rubbed his legs and then pounded on them in frustration when they failed to respond as much as he wanted them to.

One day he lifted himself out of the chair with his crutches, then let them fall to the sides in the hope he could force himself to stand.

He fell on his face.

And struggled hard to push himself up with the crutches to get back in the chair.

He didn’t give up. He worked at it every day and would continue as long as it took.

He didn’t say a word about his efforts to Emily or her grandfather. If he failed — again — he didn’t want them to know about it. There would be time enough later to fill them in if he was successful in learning to walk again.

Emily continued to exercise the muscles in his legs, massaging and working them back and forth.

Several days after his fall she noticed a change. “It may be my imagination, Luke, but it seems to me like your legs are getting stronger rather than weaker.”

“Really? Well, that’s good, isn’t it?”

“Yeah, real good. I knew it was just a matter of time before you started healin’ up.”

He thought she was just trying to be encouraging, but maybe she was more right than she knew’. Whenever Emily and her grandfather weren’t around and Luke was on his crutches, he let more of the weight of his body rest on his legs.

At first they had buckled, but as the days went on he was able to stiffen them and partially support himself more than he could before. He still didn’t say anything to Emily or her grandfather. Hope and resolve filled him, but he was wary.

One evening while Emily was inside cleaning up after supper, Luke sat in the rocker on the porch and the old man sat on the steps. Peabody filled his pipe and lit it, then said quietly enough that Emily wouldn’t overhear, “I spotted some fellas on horseback watchin’ the place today.”

Luke tensed, hearing the worry in the old-timer’s voice. “Soldiers?”

“Nope. Civilians. I didn’t get a very good look at ’em, but I could tell that much.”

“What do you reckon they wanted?”

Peabody shook his head. “Don’t know, but Bud Harkness come by today and talked to me. Bud’s got the next farm over. He says there’s some problem with the taxes and he might lose his place.”

“Didn’t he pay them?”

“He did . . . but the judge the Yankees put in charge of such things says that Bud didn’t pay enough. It’s a blamed lie . . . but he’s a judge.”

“What’s this fellow Harkness going to do?” Luke asked.

“What can he do? He can stay and fight, or he can leave.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.