Emily touched his arm.
“Wait.”
“She knows something.”
“Yes.”
“She’ll tell us when she believes telling is safer than hiding.”
Daniel stared at her.
“You sound like a schoolteacher.”
“I was.”
He exhaled.
“All right.”
Days became weeks.
The ranch settled into a rhythm none of them had chosen.
Daniel rose before dawn.
Emily made breakfast.
Clara woke before everyone else but pretended not to.
Samuel asked approximately four hundred questions before noon.
Why were mountains blue far away?
Why did chickens swallow rocks?
Could coyotes climb trees?
Did cows know their names?
Would his mother know where he was?
That last question came while Emily was kneading bread.
Her hands stopped.
Samuel sat at the table carving nothing in particular into a scrap of wood.
“Do you think Mama knows?”
Emily wiped flour from her hands.
“I don't know.”
He looked disappointed.
Most adults would have offered certainty.
Emily could not.
“But I think if there is any way for people who love us to keep loving us after they are gone, your mother would find it.”
Samuel considered.
Then nodded.
“That sounds like her.”
He returned to the wood.
Emily turned away before he saw her crying.
Clara was harder.
She did chores without being asked.
Too many.
She made her bed perfectly.
Washed her own clothes.
Refused help.
When Emily offered to mend her coat, Clara said she could do it.
She could not.
The stitches were terrible.
Emily let them stay for three days.
Then one evening Clara found a needle, brown thread, and a patch placed beside her sewing basket.
No note.
The next morning the coat had been repaired.
Clara said nothing.
Neither did Emily.
At church, the first insult came.
Mrs. Hattie Fennel was not intentionally cruel.
Those people are sometimes the most dangerous because they believe curiosity grants permission.
After service she cornered Emily beside the wagon.
“So these are Abigail’s poor little ones.”
Emily smiled tightly.
“Yes.”
Mrs. Fennel looked at Clara and Samuel.
“Providence is mysterious.”
Then at Emily.
“And perhaps merciful.”
Emily knew immediately.
“What do you mean?”
The older woman lowered her voice as if kindness required secrecy.
“Well, given your condition.”
Emily went cold.
Daniel was speaking to Reverend Poole twenty feet away.
She wondered how Mrs. Fennel knew.
Then understood.
Her aunt in Laramie.
Gossip traveled farther than trains.
Mrs. Fennel smiled.
“You may not be able to give Mr. Mercer children naturally, but now the Lord has provided two already made.”
Emily’s entire body tightened.
Clara was near enough to hear.
Samuel too.
Emily looked directly at Mrs. Fennel.
“These children were not provided to replace anything.”
The woman blinked.
“I only meant—”
“Their parents died.”
“Yes, but—”
“That is tragedy.”
“Not convenience.”
Mrs. Fennel flushed.
“Of course.”
“And my body is not church conversation.”