RDR2: Taciturn

Chapter 7

It was another few weeks before Arthur was back to normal again. I had tried to speak to him, but he wasn't the most talkative with anyone. I hadn't spoken a word with him since the first day he was awake, as he had snapped at me almost instantly, much to Dutch and Hosea's shock as they had run to the tent to see what the commotion was. At that point, I just nodded and let him be.

I didn't blame him. He had been kidnapped and tortured by O'Driscolls, it was enough to make anyone irritable. But it still upset me.

"Hey kid," a voice made me jump as I sat on the dock, kicking my feet absentmindedly.

I looked up at Arthur, not wanting to speak in case he snapped at me again. I merely nodded at him before staring across the water again.

"I'm sorry," he scratched the back of his neck, standing awkwardly, "I shouldn't have snapped at you when you came to see me. There was no reason to, you were just checking on me like I would have you."

"It's fine," I said softly, "I'm not mad. How are you feeling?"

"Better, much," he settled down beside me, staring in the same direction as I was, "Hosea told me how worried you were when I didn't come back, how you tried to get them to look for me. Thank you."

"You would have done the same," I shrugged.

"And he also told me you spoke to him," he continued, "I'm proud of you, kid. That's a big thing, you should be proud of yourself."

"I wasn't thinking when I spoke," I shrugged slightly, "I was so worried about you, when I saw you I couldn't help but yell. Then when Hosea came back over, I had to know if..."

I trailed off, sighing slightly.

"Whatever caused it, I am proud of you," he offered me a smile before leaning forward slightly, "Anyway, to make up for snapping at you, I wanted to ask if you'd join me on a job. Dutch has asked me to meet Bill, Micah and Sean in Rhodes, I wouldn't mind having you along as extra insurance."

"I'd love that," I grinned at him and he smiled even wider, standing up and offering me a hand.

"Let's get a move on, then," he laughed, leading the way to the horses.

We rode into Rhodes, I was chatting incessantly but Arthur didn't seem to mind. He was aware I hadn't spoken more than a few words the whole time he was bedridden and let me get things off my chest, even if half the time I was just talking nonsense.

The other boys were waiting for us when we arrived. Micah gave me a look when he saw me, obviously disagreeing with the choice of taking me, but said nothing, turning instead to Arthur.

"Been waiting for you, Morgan," he said, standing.

"Well, I'm sorry to have kept you," he said sarcastically.

"Come on, let's get going," he ignored him and lead us to the centre of town.

"What's the plan?" Arthur asked.

"We're meeting a couple of the Grays over at the saloon," Micah told us, "They spoke to Bill about a job... needing security."

"After the farce of stealing the horses for them, why are we doing this?" Arthur asked angrily. They had stolen the Braithwaite's horses to sell for a great profit as directed by the Grays, only to discover they had been tricked and the horses were hardly worth that much.

"Cause we need to stay in with them..." Micah explained, "And they're paying."

"So what kinda security they want?" Arthur asked, I stared around the town. It was strangely empty of regular people, the only folks in sight were men who were staring at us strangely.