He looked at her.
“What?”
“You're preparing enough for somebody who says she doesn't know what she's doing.”
Emily straightened a pillow.
“Preparation is what people do when they don't know what they're doing.”
Daniel laughed.
By noon they were on the road to Cheyenne.
The wagon ride took several hours.
Emily wore a brown traveling dress and a heavy shawl. Daniel sat beside her, reins loose in his hands.
Neither spoke much.
As they approached the station, Emily felt her stomach knot.
“What if they think I’m trying to replace Abigail?”
Daniel’s jaw tightened.
“You aren't.”
“They may not know that.”
“Then we tell them.”
“What if Clara hates me?”
“Then let her.”
Emily looked at him.
Daniel continued.
“She has lost her mother and father in less than a year.”
“She is entitled to some hate.”
“Even at me?”
“Yes.”
Emily considered.
“That is either wise or reckless parenting.”
“I’m not a parent.”
“Neither am I.”
He smiled.
“Then we're equally unqualified.”
The train arrived twenty-seven minutes late.
Steam rolled across the platform.
Passengers descended carrying cases, parcels, babies, blankets.
Emily searched every face.
Then she saw them.
The girl came first.
Clara Cole was thin, tall for ten, with dark-brown hair braided tightly down her back and a gray coat that looked one size too small. She carried a carpetbag in one hand and held her brother’s hand with the other.
Samuel was smaller.
Six.
Pale.
Brown hair falling into his eyes.
He clutched a wooden horse against his chest.
Neither child looked frightened.
That was worse.
They looked exhausted beyond fear.
A minister and his wife descended behind them.
Daniel stepped forward.
“Clara?”
The girl looked at him.
“Yes.”
“I’m Daniel.”
She stared.
“I know.”
Not Uncle Daniel.
Just Daniel.
He nodded.
“This is Emily.”
Clara’s eyes moved toward her.
Emily smiled gently.
“Hello.”
The girl did not answer.
Samuel looked at Emily’s shawl.
Then at Daniel.
“Are you our new father?”
Daniel went very still.
“No.”
The boy nodded.
No visible reaction.
Daniel crouched until they were closer to eye level.
“I’m your mother's brother.”
“Uncle Daniel.”
“You can call me Daniel if that’s easier.”
Samuel looked at Clara.
She finally said:
“Uncle Daniel is fine.”
The minister introduced himself as Reverend Hartwell.
His wife, Ruth, squeezed Emily’s hands.
“They've been very brave.”
Clara’s expression hardened at the word.
Emily saw.
She remembered adults telling her she was brave after her father died when she was fourteen.
What they had meant was:
You are making grief easy for us to look at.
She did not repeat it.
Instead she said:
“You must be hungry.”
Samuel looked interested.
Clara answered for him.