I have useful things. You've reorganized those same three receipts since breakfast. Across the table, Henry looked up from his arithmetic. Grant turned slowly toward his son. Henry immediately returned to his slate.
Hannah sat down with the bills. Mercer Feed charged you for 70 sacks of winter oats. Yes. You received 68. Grant reached for the paper.
Hannah kept it beneath one hand. You sure? Receipt from the freight wagon says 68. She placed the delivery slip beside the invoice. Grant leaned closer, their shoulders nearly touched.
Hannah noticed before he did. She shifted slightly. Grant noticed that. His gaze flicked toward her, then back to the figures. Could be a copying error.
Could be. How much difference? $3.20. Grant was quiet. Then he pulled another chair out. Show me the rest.
So she did. One account became six. Six became a week of evenings. After supper, Henry worked his sums at one end of the table while Hannah read figures aloud, and Grant checked them against old receipts. Molly usually climbed onto the bench beside Hannah with her rag doll.
Sometimes she watched, sometimes she slept. The first time Molly's head settled against Hannah's arm, Hannah went still. Grant was reading a cattle tally, he saw it. His eyes rested on them for half a second. Then he lowered his gaze back to the paper.
He did not interrupt. Hannah appreciated him for that. By late September, the evenings cooled sharply. The mountains began showing thin streaks of snow high above the ranch, though the valley remained gold and brown. After sunset, pine smoke hung low around the house, and Hannah started keeping a fire in the parlor hearth.
One evening, she entered carrying Grant's coffee and found him reaching awkwardly toward the upper shelf of the glass front cabinet. "You planning to reinjure yourself?" He dropped his hand. I was getting a book. Hannah looked through the glass. There were cattle manuals, an old atlas, two Bibles, and a narrow volume bound in cracked green leather.
That one? Grant hesitated, then nodded. She took it down. The cover was faded, nearly blank. Inside, someone had written a woman's name in careful ink.
Margaret Dalton. Your wife's my mother's. Hannah looked up. Grant took the book gently. She liked poems.
You? He gave her a dry look. I know what they are. That was not my question. Henry glanced over.
Grant noticed. Everybody in this house suddenly interested in my private affairs. Molly said, "Read one." Grant looked betrayed. Hannah pressed her lips together. Grant sighed.
You too. Molly nodded. He opened the book. The silence that followed was almost ceremonial. Grant read poorly at first, not because he struggled with the words, because he seemed embarrassed by them.
His voice, usually so plain and practical, softened around lines about mountains, autumn fields, and homesickness. Hannah stopped mending. Henry stopped pretending not to listen. By the second page, Grant had forgotten to be embarrassed. The fire snapped.