“You’ve offered three times since the train.”
Tomás opened his mouth.
She continued.
“You told me the truth in the wagon. I made my decision.”
“You barely know what you decided.”
“Neither did you when you answered my letter.”
That silenced him.
Gideon coughed.
“I’ll go find oil.”
Clara looked at Tomás.
“Are we going to save the cattle or discuss my train schedule?”
Tomás stared.
Then nodded.
“Cattle.”
“Good.”
They worked until midnight.
One sick cow died.
Two survived.
Clara did things Tomás had never expected from the woman whose letters had contained neat handwriting, occasional dry humor, and almost no detail about fifteen years in Chicago stockyards.
She restrained animals without fear.
Recognized signs of dehydration.
Knew when an animal was too far gone to torment with treatment.
When the dying cow began convulsing, Tomás reached for a rifle.
Clara put one hand against the animal’s neck.
“Wait.”
“It’s suffering.”
“I know.”
She looked into the cow’s eye.
Then nodded.
“Now.”
Tomás fired once.
Afterward, Clara closed the animal’s eye.
No drama.
No flinch.
But when she stood, her face looked older.
“You hate that.”
Tomás expected her to deny it.
“Yes.”
“Then how did you work slaughterhouses?”
“Because hating something doesn’t always mean you can afford to leave.”
The sentence stayed with him.
At one in the morning, Gideon rode home.
The surviving cattle were secure in the dry corral with clean hay.
Tomás and Clara stood outside the cabin.
Moonlight silvered the yard.
The air smelled of dust, cattle, and the faint sweetness of alfalfa he now hated.
Clara looked at the small house.
“So.”
Tomás swallowed.
There it was.
The part he had avoided all day.
Marriage.
Bedrooms.
A stranger under his roof.
When he wrote the advertisement months earlier, he had imagined something different.
A ranch that worked.
Dinner.
A clean shirt.
A woman arriving to a house he had repaired.
Maybe embarrassment.
Maybe awkwardness.
Not seven dead cattle lying in poisoned grass before she unpacked.
“The house has one bedroom.”
Clara raised an eyebrow.
“I assumed married people often share one.”
Tomás nearly choked.
She looked almost amused.
“We’re not married.”
“Not yet.”
“The minister comes Sunday.”
“If I stay.”
Tomás’s stomach tightened.
“Yes.”
Clara looked toward the barn.
“I’m staying tonight.”
He nodded.
“Of course.”
“You take the floor?”
Tomás stared.
“It’s my house.”
“Then I assume you know where the floor is.”
He laughed.
He could not help it.
Clara’s mouth finally curved into a full smile.
It transformed her face.
Tomás had noticed at the station that she was not beautiful in the way advertisements described women.
Not delicate.
Not fashionable.
Not small.
Now he realized the thought itself was inadequate.
Clara’s face was alive when she smiled.
Warm.
Sharp.
Almost mischievous.
He looked too long.
She noticed.
“What?”
“Nothing.”
“That usually means something.”
“I’m tired.”
“So am I.”
Inside, Clara unpacked only enough for one night.
A nightgown.
Soap.
A comb.
A small leather roll.
Tomás watched the roll.
“The thing you carried from the train.”
“Yes.”
“What is it?”
“My knives.”
He stared.