“I can tell it doesn’t taste like copper, alkali, spoiled carcass, or kerosene.”
Tomás frowned.
“That leaves a comforting number of possibilities.”
The corner of her mouth moved.
Then her eyes shifted toward the field.
“Show me the hay.”
“They haven’t had hay since I put them here.”
“The alfalfa then.”
“It’s alfalfa.”
“Show me.”
Tomás stared.
Clara met his eyes.
“You asked a woman to cross half a country to marry you.”
“Yes.”
“Surely you can survive letting her inspect your grass.”
Despite everything, a strangled laugh escaped him.
It felt almost offensive with dead cattle behind them.
Clara did not smile.
Not fully.
But something between them loosened.
Tomás led her farther into the field.
The alfalfa had remained green because it sat in a low strip beside the creek and received overflow from the spring-fed irrigation ditch upstream.
He had guarded that field all summer.
He had watched cattle lose weight on brown pasture while keeping the alfalfa untouched.
Saving it.
Waiting.
A man with one bullet in a rifle does not fire at shadows.
The alfalfa had been his last bullet.
Now six animals lay dead in it.
Clara pulled several stems.
Examined the leaves.
She moved ten feet and pulled more.
Then again.
Tomás watched.
“What are you looking for?”
“Anything that isn’t alfalfa.”
He almost said there was nothing.
Then stopped.
Clara crouched.
Parted the plants.
Her body blocked his view.
“What?”
She reached deeper.
Pulled free a low weed with narrow leaves and small dried seed clusters.
Tomás frowned.
“That grows everywhere.”
“Maybe.”
“You know it?”
“No.”
That irritated him.
“Then why are we looking at it?”
“Because your cattle are dead and it’s mixed with their feed.”
She placed it aside.
Pulled another.
Then another.
Not many.
But enough.
Clara stood slowly.
“Was this here before?”
“I don’t know.”
“You said you saved the field.”
“I didn’t crawl through it counting weeds.”
“No.”
Tomás wiped sweat from his face.
The sun had lowered toward the hills, turning the ranch golden.
It should have been beautiful.
Instead it made the dead cattle more visible.
He looked toward the seventh steer.
Still standing.
Barely.
“I need the livestock doctor.”
“How far?”
“Dry Creek. Twelve miles.”
“You have another horse?”
“Yes.”
“Go.”
Tomás looked at her.
“You’ve been here twenty minutes.”
“And?”
“You don’t know where anything is.”
“I know where the house, barn, well, cattle, and loaded wagon are.”
She pointed.
“I’ll probably survive.”
“Clara—”
“Go.”
He hesitated.
She looked directly at him.
“Tomás.”
It was the first time she had used his first name without formality.
“Bring someone who knows poisons.”
He mounted the bay gelding and rode.
The livestock doctor was not in Dry Creek.
Of course he was not.
The clerk at the feed store said he had gone thirty miles north to treat a rancher’s horses.
Tomás felt himself unravel.
“Send someone.”
“We don’t have anyone.”
“My cattle are dying.”
The clerk looked uncomfortable.
“I’m sorry.”
Tomás hated that phrase.
Everyone was sorry.
Bank manager sorry.
Feed merchant sorry.
Neighbors sorry.
Sorry had never paid a note.
A voice came from behind him.
“How many?”
Tomás turned.
Old Gideon Pike sat outside the store.
Gideon had worked cattle for fifty years and looked as though every one of those years had personally tried to kill him.
“Six dead.”