He drove another quarter mile through the dark. The horse knew the way home well enough that his hands could be easy on the reins. The trunk. He said it was wool, she said. Wool has uses, Miss Finch.
It was my aunt's work, she said. I know that, but my aunt was a practical woman, and what she would have said about wool going to waste when children needed dresses is not something I need to guess about. She paused. She would have cut it herself and done a better job of it than I did. You did well.
I made mistakes. The left sleeve on Bess's dress is slightly longer than the right. Nobody noticed. I noticed," she said. He drove.
The cold was the kind that pressed rather than cut a Wyoming winter cold that insisted on itself without drama. After a while, he said, I should have seen it. The clothing? Yes, she said simply. He had been prepared for some version of absolution.
Woman, sometimes offered it, even when they shouldn't, because it made the conversation easier. Odora offered him nothing of the kind. She said yes and let it sit. I'm going to fix it, he said. She turned to look at him.
Not a long look, just a glance. Fix the clothing. Fix what I've been not seeing. He said it came out rougher than he intended. The way things do when they've been sitting a long time before you say them.
The girls what they need. I've been He stopped. He was not a man who articulated interior states with any fluency. He'd spent 3 years not having to. You've been keeping the ranch alive, Odora said.
That's not enough. No, she said it isn't. But it's what you knew how to do. He had nothing to say to that because it was accurate and she had not said it cruelly. The lights of the ranch came up through the dark.
He said, "Thank you for the dresses. You said that this morning. I'm saying it again." She looked at the lights of the house. Then, "You're welcome again."