Wade Mercer stopped beyond the grazing horses and took off his hat. He had been doing that to Ruth since she was fourteen and considered it an apology for interrupting her work. Once it had made her feel grown.
Now he looked past her toward Carmela and the children.
“You never came to breakfast, Ruth.”
“We brought some,” Ruth said.
“Carmela left enough for six men. I wondered.”
Benito stood beside his saddle. The pistol at his belt wasn't drawn, but he had moved his coat clear of it. Mateo sat up. Ruth rested a hand on the rifle in its scabbard and hated how quickly the three of them understood one another.
Wade put his hat back on.
“Harlan's sore.”
“He's bound to be.”
“Asked me to come first.”
“Where are the others?”
He glanced toward the rise. He wasn't a good liar when he didn't care to bother.
“Coming.”
Carmela lifted Eva and carried her behind the packs. Teresa followed with Inés. Luis started toward Benito until his father pointed at the kettle.
“Bring that.”
The boy brought it. Wade watched the movement. Ruth could see him measuring distances and remembering exactly how good a shot Mateo was with the old gun.
“He'll put this behind him,” Wade said. “All of you back tonight, the stock too. Ruth, you can finish your buying. He says he won't make trouble over it.”
“And Luis and Inés?”
“I wasn't sent to settle that.”
“We talked yesterday.”
Wade rubbed his mouth.
“You've took sixty horses. You know what that is.”
“I counted them.”
“This isn't a joke.”
“I haven't laughed.”
He looked at her for a long moment. Behind him Moth nipped at a gelding, sending it two steps away. The ordinary quarrel seemed indecently loud.
“I taught you better than this.”
Ruth remembered his hand over hers on a rein, his patience after she fell, the day he made her sit on a quiet horse backward because she was ashamed of being afraid to mount. She could feel that horse beneath her now, as clearly as she felt Lark's warmth beside her arm.
“You taught me how to sit a horse,” she said.
Wade's face closed.
He turned toward Carmela. “You know what he'll do if you keep going?”
“I know what he does if we stay.”
“I came because I know you. Don't send me back with nothing.”
“You brought food last time,” she said. “Do you remember?”
He looked away first.
“I remember.”
“I do too.”
The fire had burned down. Ruth could hear Eva whispering a question and Teresa telling her to wait. She wanted Wade to dismount, to accept coffee, to become one of them for long enough that she could speak to him without the rifle between her hand and his attention.
He stayed in the saddle.
“Tell him we're not coming,” Ruth said.
“You go to Reed, he'll skin you.”
Her hand tightened.
Wade saw it. “Oh, Ruth.”
“He owes me.”
“So do half the men you meet. Doesn't mean they pay.”
He turned his horse. Benito took one step forward.
“Did you come for his horses or us?”
Wade didn't answer. He rode toward the rise, and after a while Ruth saw three more riders appear beyond him. One was Harlan. Even at that distance she knew the set of his shoulders.
He didn't come down. He sat and looked at the herd, then at her, and turned back.
“They'll wait until dark,” Benito said.
“We'll watch,” Mateo told him.
They set the night in pieces. Ruth and Mateo first, Carmela and Benito next, Teresa and Ruth before dawn. Luis offered to take a watch by himself. His father told him he could help while an adult was up, and if he wanted a man's work right now, the horses needed checking for loosened shoes.
After supper Ruth walked Lark toward the outer grass. The mare wanted to graze but kept lifting her head. On the ridge a man struck a match. The little flame showed a face for an instant and went out.
Ruth brought the rifle across her knees.
Mateo settled beside a bush with the shotgun. He had folded his coat under his leg. For a while neither of them spoke.
“He won't want a fight among the horses,” Ruth said.
“Good.”
“He thinks Silas will turn us back.”
“Will he?”
She looked into the dark where Harlan had gone.
“He owes me,” she said again, and this time she could hear how little it was.
Mateo shifted his leg with both hands.
“Then let's get there and ask him.”
The horses tore grass. Somewhere beyond the spring a night bird called. Ruth listened until every small sound had become a footstep, then listened longer.