Cold entered the valley quickly.

Within an hour she was shivering.

The rancher noticed.

He said nothing.

Ten minutes later he stopped the team.

He pulled a buffalo hide from beneath the seat.

Then he threw it around her shoulders.

She looked up.

“I’m fine.”

“No, you’re not.”

“I’ve been colder.”

“I don't care.”

She adjusted the fur.

“Your concern overwhelms me, husband.”

“If you freeze before we reach the ridge, I doubt the agency refunds me.”

She stared at him.

Then he made the mistake of glancing at her.

She saw the corner of his mouth move.

“You made a joke.”

“No.”

“You did.”

“I did not.”

“You smiled.”

“Cold does strange things.”

The woman pulled the hide higher.

For several miles, she said nothing.

Then quietly:

“Thank you.”

The rancher kept his eyes on the road.

“You’re welcome.”

Neither knew that three weeks later one of them would nearly die saving the other.

Chapter Three — The Cabin

The rancher’s cabin stood beneath the eastern shoulder of a mountain locals called Widow’s Ridge.

The name did not impress his new wife.

“Comforting.”

“It was called that before I arrived.”

“Why?”

“A trapper’s wife supposedly froze up there in 1859.”

She stared.

“You could have omitted that.”

“You asked.”

“That will become a problem in this marriage.”

“What?”

“Your belief that every question deserves an honest answer.”

He looked at her.

“I thought you valued honesty.”

“I value selective mercy.”

The cabin was larger than she expected.

Still small.

One main room.

A cookstove.

A heavy table.

A bed built against the western wall.

A canvas cot near the stove.

The rancher had hung a thick canvas divider between them.

She noticed immediately.

“You prepared separate quarters.”

“We agreed.”

“You did this before meeting me?”

“Yes.”

“Why?”

“Because you asked.”

Again that irritatingly simple answer.

The first obstacle came at the doorway.

Her traveling chair barely fit.

The rancher removed one hinge.

Then another.

He lifted the door entirely off the frame.

She watched from the porch.

“This is humiliating.”

“No.”

“Yes.”

“No.”

She looked at him sharply.

He leaned the door against the wall.

“A door being narrow is a problem with the door.”

She said nothing.

The rancher widened the opening over the next two days.

He reinforced the porch.

Added a handrail.

Lowered one pantry shelf.

Built a broader chair from oak planks.

He never announced these changes.

He simply made them.

His wife noticed every one.

She said little.

The first week went badly anyway.

She burned bread.

Scorched beans.

Dropped an entire jar of rendered fat.

Nearly set a towel on fire.

The rancher came inside one evening to find smoke filling the room.

He looked at the burned biscuits.