The visitor slumped back beside the stove. The woman cleaned and dressed his wound as well as she could, then poured another cup of water. Her husband checked the shutters and reinforced the damaged latch.
When they were finally alone in the small circle of firelight, he looked toward her with a mixture of admiration and anguish.
“You saved us time.”
“I bought us time,” she corrected. “Don't confuse it with safety.”
He nodded. She glanced at the blue gown covering her enormous figure, the same gown she had worried he found unlovable. Somewhere within its folds lay the evidence that might save his former wife and clear his name.
“Now,” she said, “tell me every truth you should have told me before we married.”
He told her the story without trying to make himself look innocent.
He had been young when he married the first time, proud of his surveying work and certain that careful records could protect ordinary families from wealthy land buyers. His first wife had been a clerk in the same office. They shared a love of books and maps, and for a while their marriage had been happy.
Then she discovered forged transfers in the office's private books. Her supervisor paid witnesses to swear that settlers had sold land they had never offered for sale. When she objected, he threatened her. Her husband tried to take the evidence to a judge, but the records building caught fire before he could leave with it.
He remembered smoke, a falling beam, and the terrible warmth of blood running down his face. He woke to hear that she was dead and that he was wanted for her murder. The local men who accused him also controlled the deputies meant to arrest him.
“So I ran,” he said. “I told myself I was staying alive long enough to clear my name. After a year, I stopped looking for a way back. After three, I began believing the story they'd written about me.”
“And after seven?” she asked.
“I met you.”
Her heart hurt at his expression, but she didn't let him hide behind romance.
“You had doubts that she was dead even before the letter.”
“Yes.”
“And you married me anyway.”
He bowed his head. “Yes.”
She had spent a lifetime being made to feel inconvenient. The temptation to apologize for asking difficult questions rose automatically, and she hated it.
“Why didn't you tell me? Not the details about the crime. Just that there were things about your marriage you didn't know.”