"Yes, it does." She turned to face him. Up close she was younger than he'd first taken her for, early 30s maybe, with dark hair going to loose from its pins and a face that was direct and tired in equal measure. The tiredness wasn't weakness.
It was the tiredness of someone who'd been carrying things a long time and had gotten so used to the weight they'd stopped feeling it as a burden. He knew that kind of tiredness. He had it himself. "What are your expectations?"
She said. "Three meals a day, whatever I've got on hand, nothing fancy." "And the house?" "Just the kitchen."
She nodded slowly. "The board situation?" He thought about this on the walk to the house. There was the old bunkhouse, which hadn't been used in 3 years, which needed work but could be made livable.
He said so. "It'll take a few days to make it habitable," she said. "I've got a spare room in the house in the meantime." She looked at him.
"Just one room," he said. "I'm not—look, I'm being practical. It's October. I'm not going to put children in a bunk house in October."
Something in her face shifted slightly, some small recalibration. "All right," she said. "Then I'll need a few things from Danner's before we settle in." "Make a list."
She already had one. She pulled a folded piece of paper from her coat pocket and handed it to him. It was written in a small, clear hand and covered both sides of the page. He looked at it for a moment and then looked at her. "You had this ready."
"I told you," she said. "I'm careful. I make decisions slow, but once I make them, I'm prepared." The children came out of the wagon one at a time. The oldest was Evan, 12, with his mother's directness in his face and the particular weariness of a boy who'd learned early that things could go wrong and that you should keep your eyes open for when they did.
He looked at the ranch the way his mother had looked at the kitchen, taking stock. "You need help with that fence?" He said to Caleb, nodding toward the south pasture. Caleb blinked. "What fence?"