Martha held his gaze for a long moment. Her hands on the table were very still. Then she said quietly, all right. All right. All right.
Something in her face settled. Not softened, not closed, but settled. The way a decision settles when it has finally been made all the way down to the bottom. I believe you. It wasn't a declaration of anything.
It was something quieter than that, and more important. It was the specific, weighted belief of a woman who has been given very good reasons not to believe. Extending belief anyway. Not from naivety. But from courage.
Sam understood the difference. He had a feeling he always would. Lily appeared in the doorway to the back room. Her copper hair going in several directions at once. The button already in her fist despite having been asleep moments ago.
Apparently retrieved as the first act of waking. She looked at both of them with her standard morning assessment. "Is today the day?" She said. "Tomorrow."
Martha said. "Come here." Lily came and climbed into her mother's lap. And Martha wrapped both arms around her and pressed her face into her daughter's hair. And Sam went to put more wood on the fire because the room had gotten cold while they sat at the table.
And because some moments are not his to occupy. That night Wade made his move. Sam was at the window. The habit had become permanent. An automatic last check before he allowed himself to sleep.
When he saw the light. Not horses this time. A single figure on foot was moving along the tree line, carrying a lantern turned low and heading toward the barn. He had his boots and coat on and the rifle in his hand before the thought was fully formed. He went out the back of the cabin moving fast and quiet through the snow.
Circling wide around the side so he was coming at the barn from the east rather than the front. The figure hadn't reached it yet. Sam stopped at the corner of the barn wall and waited. thirty seconds. Then the figure came around the corner of the fence and stopped very suddenly because Sam was standing there with a rifle and the expression of a man who has been waiting for this and is not surprised. It was Decker.