His face was no longer terrified. It was cold and clear, stripped of all doubt. "Get the letters," Eli said. "Pack the saddle bags. We ride now. " Winter did not wait for the calendar.
It fell upon the high plains in late October. A sudden, brutal crushing of the autumn sky. The clouds lowered themselves until they scraped the tops of the mesas. Heavy and metallic, the color of a bruised gun barrel. The wind lost its bluster and gained a razor edge, finding every gap in a coat collar, every crack in a window frame.
On the Kincaid Ranch, survival stripped itself of all romance. It was a daily math of calories and warmth. The cattle already thinned by the drought, huddled in the lee of the ravines, their coats shaggy and frosted with rime. Eli Kincaid stood by the corral fence, his breath pluming in the frigid air. He held his heavy coat revolver in his hand, the metal dull and cold beside him.
Clara shivered, though she was wrapped in two wool shawls. "It is not about strength," Eli said, his voice low and steady against the wind. It is about the line between your eye and the sight. You must stop shaking. Clara gripped the heavy pistol with both hands.
Her knuckles were red and chapped. She was tired. Her bones ached from the cold that seemed to live inside the marrow now. But she did not lower the gun. I am trying, she said through gritted teeth.
Breathe out, Eli instructed. Squeeze. Do not pull. A pull jerks the barrel. Clara exhaled, watching the empty tin can perched on the fence post 20 yards away.
She thought of the man in the mask who had put a rope around her neck. She thought of the way the world looked at her as if she were something to be discarded. She tightened her finger. The gun roared, kicking back into her palms with a violence that shocked her every time. The can did not move.
Dust kicked up 3 ft to the left. Again, Eli said. He did not sound disappointed. He sounded like a man teaching someone how to stitch a wound. Grim necessary work.
I hate this, Clara whispered, thumbing back the hammer. I know, Eli said. He stepped behind her, adjusting her elbows, his chest pressing briefly against her back. For a moment, his warmth was the only real thing in the world. I hate that you need it, but the world has teeth.
Clara, you must have them, too. She fired again. The can spun off the post, claddering into the frozen mud. Eli nodded. Good.
Reload. Do it until your hands stop shaking. They rode for the county seat 3 days later. The journey to Cheyenne was usually a hard two-day ride, but with the weather turning and the horses weakened by poor feed. It took them three.