Innocence and the Outlaw

Epilogue

Epilogue

June 1934

"Grandma! Grandma!" Two twin girls with swinging pig tails cried out as they ran onto the porch and threw their arms around either side of Leah's neck.

Leah smiled proudly and then Chase was grabbing them and pulling them onto his knee.

"Did you not see, Grandpa?" he asked with a raise of his gray brow. The girls giggled and kissed his wrinkled and weathered cheeks.

"Of course we did, grandpa."

"Yep." Caroline, the more outspoken of the two five year olds replied. "But you usually give us candy so we were saving the best for laugh." Chase glanced over at Leah but she just smiled and shook her head. He kissed his great grandchildren's hair, handed them some peppermint candies from his pocket and then watched them run back off the porch and begin chasing the dog through the yard.

"Stay away from that pond!" Sarah, their mother, yelled out. Chase waved his hand at her.

"You worry too much. They have Caldwell blood in their veins so there is nothing to worry about." Sarah, named after her great grandmother smiled as she walked up onto the porch.

"How do you both feel today?"

"Alive." Chase replied.

"Is that it?" Sarah asked with a grown.

"At our age what more can we ask for?" Chase countered and Sarah's husband Grant laughed as he too came onto the porch with a crock pot in his hands.

"Let's get in there and get this food ready. We got a big crowd here this year." he stated.

Chase and Leah continued to rock side by side in their matching wooden rockers that Chase himself had built nearly fifty years before. Their family, all three generations, plus Chance and Jane's children, grandchildren and great children gathered here once a year to reconnect.

The family had certainly grown. It had become bigger than Chase had ever imagined it could. With more than one hundred people in total here today.

Chase and Leah had had five children themselves. Two sets of twin girls and a single boy who had been the start of the gray hairs on Chase's head. From those five kids there had been a total of thirty grandchildren and from those thirty grandchildren there had already been ten great grandchildren.

Times had certainly changed as well with everyone arriving in shiny automobiles and calling each other on telephones. Chase wasn't sure that everything that was happening was good but it didn't effect he and Leah much.

They lived their simple life in their paradise. They had a phone but only so they could keep in touch with their loved ones. They did not have an automobile and still rode on horseback or in a cart when they needed to make the two hour trip to the nearest town.

Chase still managed to grow and hunt for nearly all the food they needed and Leah's hands were still nimble enough to sew most of their clothes.

He looked over at his wife and felt his lips curve in a smile. Chase had been right all those years ago when he had thought he could simply look at Leah forever and never get tired of the view. She was still just as beautiful as she had been before and he loved her more now than ever.

Her face was soft and wrinkled. The laugh lines around her eyes and mouth were the deepest. Her dark hair had become snow white and her body had softened but still she was the most breathtaking sight he'd ever seen. He knew that he had changed as well.

While he still had the same lean body, it had grown a little softer. His long hair was gray instead of black and the lines on his face attested to the rough way of life he had lived for so long.

But life had been good with Leah. They had already shared fifty good years and Chase looked forward to more, though he knew that every single day was a blessing in itself.

He was thinking about all the ways he'd been blessed when a voice broke through his sentimental thoughts.

"Well tarnation, you two!" Jane exclaimed as she held Chance's arm and helped him up onto the porch. "I do believe the four of us bred like a couple a wild rabbits!" She added as she looked at all the children and adults scattered throughout the yard.

"Wild rabbits?" Chase asked with a frown as he looked at Leah.

"I tried." Leah shrugged. "My mother tried... It was easy to make the outside look like a lady but the mouth...."

"The mouth is all Jane." Chance confirmed with a nod as he sat down in the porch swing to ease his shaking legs. "We're old, Chase." Chance stated quiety and Chase shrugged.

"Not ready for the pasture yet." he countered.

"Grandpa!" One of his oldest great grandchildren, ten year old Travis exclaimed as he ran toward him. "Did you hear about that thing they invented?" Chase shook his head. It seemed they were inventing new things every single day. People just were impossible satisfy nowadays.

'What new thing?" Leah asked.

"It's called a radio! You should get one grandpa! They play all kinds of shows like comedies and dramas on it! You can actually hear people talking!"

"That's nice." Chase said. He didn't want to show his grandson how uninterested he was yet at the same time he simply could not get caught up in the bouncing boys excitement.

"Nice?" Travis asked with a frown. "It's awesome. Everyone needs to get one!"

Chase just shook his head and took Leah's hand in his. He looked out over their sprawling land, still untouched by civilization and at their family covering it. He looked back at his great grandson and smiled.

"I have everything I need right here."