Put your arm around me before Barnaby reaches the porch," Adella said from the porch bench as her brother's buck came over the dry ridge beyond the corral. Wilbur Jennings did not waste time asking why. He stepped over the coiled rope at his boots, sat beside her, and settled one heavy arm across her calico shoulders just as 10 children spilled through the ranchhouse door. One toddler climbing into Adella's lap while the others crowded the cedar steps between Wilbur's saddled bay and the black and white stock dog under the rail. "Is Miss Hart staying for good?"
Uncle Wilbur 7-year-old Martha asked, and the brave little smile Adella had fixed for the road faltered before Barnaby's wagon had even stopped. Wilbur felt the hitch of her breath beneath his hand. He did not tighten his arm. He simply stayed where she had placed him while Barnaby pulled his team to the rail. Barnaby sat with his hat pushed back, taking in the porch.
Children pressed around Wilbur and Adela, the bay geling at the rail, the stock dog under the steps, and the high blue mountains beyond the meadow. Wilbur knew better. 10 children were settled only in the way a box of nails was settled until somebody kicked it. Barnaby climbs down. Adella.
His merchants's coat was grayed with road dust. Your last letter said you were teaching at a cattle ranch. It did not mention you had taken up keeping house for a bachelor and 10 children. Adella's shoulders went still under Wilbur's arm. I am not keeping house.
The Valley trustees engaged me for a six-w week summer term so the children would not lose another season of schooling before the district term begins. And Jennings owns the ranch. Wilbur let his arm fall when she stepped forward. Wilbur Jennings, he said. Barnaby looked him over.
At 40, after nearly 18 years in cattle work, Wilbur had little use for being measured by a merchants's coat. He nodded toward the wash stand instead. You're welcome to water your team and wash the road off. Toby, take the team to the trough and slack the traces. Martha, put your slate back inside.
Clara, set another cup at supper. The children moved without confusion. Wilbur had spent eight months turning grief into routine. Boots by the wood pile, tin cups at the wash stand, chores divided by age. Adella had not rescued the household.
She had added books, quiet lessons, and a kind of warmth he had not known how to make himself. Barnaby watched all of it before he followed Adella inside. The reason for his visit came out before the coffee had cooled. Aunt Clara has had another spell with her knees, he said. Mother says the house needs another pair of hands before cold weather.
I came to take you back to Pueblo. Adella set the sugar bowl down with care. Aunt Clara has three grown daughters within a street of her. They have households. So do I.
In a manner of speaking. Mine happens to pay wages. Barnaby frowned. A school mistress's wages are not a life. You've been boarding from one county to the next for nine years.
There is no sense wearing yourself thin for strangers when your own family has need of you. Wilbur saw Adella's fingers close once around the coffee cup handle. In two weeks he had never heard her complain about the ranch or the children, but he had seen how carefully she kept her own letters, wages, and hours. Nine years of boarding in other people's houses had taught her the price of being useful. She rose.
We can discuss Aunt Clara after supper. My pupils are waiting. Later, Adella found Wilbur at the woodpile. She waited beyond the swing of the axe until he planted the blade in the block. My brother intends to stay 3 days, she said.