“Trying to get rid of me?”
“No.”
“Then stop selling his ranch.”
Lou went silent.
He bent over the wagon tongue again.
She stood there longer than necessary.
Then asked:
“You staying?”
Emmett hammered once.
“Until you tell me not to.”
Lou walked away before he could see what those six words did to her.
Roy broke his collarbone two weeks later.
A young horse spooked while he was closing a gate.
The boy hit the dirt badly.
By sunset the doctor had wrapped him, scolded him, and ordered six weeks without riding.
Lou stood outside the bunkhouse afterward staring at the horizon.
Two weeks remained before the cattle had to start moving.
Four hundred head.
Perch still could not ride a full day.
Roy could not ride at all.
Emmett found her in the feed room after dark.
She had spread figures across an overturned grain barrel.
Distances.
Water stops.
Estimated herd speed.
Available riders.
Every calculation ended badly.
“I’ve got you and me,” she said.
Emmett leaned against the door.
“And four hundred cattle.”
“You’ll find men.”
“I’ll find drunks and boys.”
“Then we’ll take drunks and boys.”
She looked up.
He shrugged.
“And we’ll get there.”
Lou laughed without humor.
“That’s your plan?”
“Yes.”
“It’s terrible.”
“I’ve worked worse.”
“I haven’t.”
“Good.”
“Good?”
“Means you still know terrible when you see it.”
She stared at him.
He stepped closer.
“Lou.”
“What?”
“We’ll get there.”
Something in the word we unsettled her.
Not I’ll help you.
Not you can do it.
We.
Lou had spent three years hearing variations of the same advice.
Sell.
Lease.
Remarry.
Find a partner.
Let a man handle contracts.
Take less.
Attempt less.
Risk less.
Emmett simply placed himself inside the problem.
We.
She folded the papers.
“You always this stubborn?”
“Usually worse after supper.”
“We missed supper.”
“That explains everything.”
She laughed again.
This time it was real.
Emmett smiled.
Then left before the moment could become anything she would have to understand.
Lou discovered why he hated leaving during the night they saved the mare.
The horse began rolling just after dusk.
Colic.
Bad.
By midnight Lou and Emmett had walked her for hours, administered what medicine they had, kept her from throwing herself into the stall wall, and argued about whether exhaustion or fear would kill them first.
At nearly two in the morning the mare finally passed the obstruction.
Lou sat on the barn floor.
Emmett sat beside her.
Neither spoke for several minutes.
Rain tapped gently against the roof.
Lou rested her head against the stall board.
“You’ve done this before.”
“Yes.”
“How many ranches?”
“Worked?”
“Yes.”
“Nine.”
She turned.
“Nine?”
“In twelve years.”
“Why?”
“Bad judgment.”
“All nine?”
“Some mine.”
He looked toward the mare.
“Some theirs.”
Lou waited.
Emmett rarely volunteered history.
She had learned pressing him only made silence more determined.
Eventually he spoke.
“First place sold after two years.”
His voice was quiet.
“Second owner died. Sons hated each other. Split the herd, sold the land.”
He counted on his fingers.
“Third winter killed half the cattle.”
“Fourth?”
“Owner liked cards more than livestock.”
Lou smiled faintly.
“Fifth?”
“Foreman and I disagreed.”