“You do not understand.”
Silas placed his hat on the table.
His voice became rough.
“My wife died in a barn with a lantern.”
Maren went still.
“For two years I told myself she was careless.”
Silas looked toward the floor.
“I built a new barn.”
“Made rules.”
“Became angry at everyone.”
“Truth?”
His mouth twisted painfully.
“I was angry at her.”
“Because anger weighed less than guilt.”
Maren listened.
“I was not here.”
“I left her alone.”
“I came home after everything was gone.”
He looked at her.
“And I have spent two years punishing a dead woman because being angry was easier than admitting I miss her.”
Maren’s eyes softened.
Silas continued.
“Then you walked into this kitchen more careful with fire than any person I have ever known.”
“And I never asked why.”
He stepped closer.
“Maren, I saw your arm eleven days ago.”
“I told myself silence was respect.”
He shook his head.
“Maybe I only left you alone with it longer.”
Maren’s face changed.
Nobody had said that.
Not once.
Silas looked toward the doorway.
“If those men cannot eat what you cook, they can leave.”
“You will lose hands.”
“I can hire hands.”
“You cannot replace a reputation.”
“Neither can you by running.”
The sentence hit.
Maren looked away.
Silas softened.
“Stay.”
She looked back.
“As cook?”
Silas hesitated.
He had not yet earned the right to say anything more.
“For now.”
Something passed through her expression.
Disappointment?
Relief?
He could not tell.
Silas walked into the yard.
Three men waited near the bunkhouse.
Everyone knew what had happened.
Silas addressed them all.
“Maren Hale stays.”
Nobody spoke.
“If any man refuses food from her kitchen, he may cook his own.”
Ollie lowered his head.
“If any man calls her firebug again, he leaves.”
One younger rider looked angry.
Silas stared directly at him.
“Questions?”
None.
Maren heard through the window.
She leaned both hands against the kitchen table.
Her arms remained covered.
But something else had become exposed.
Hope.
She hated hope.
It made people careless.
Nine days later, dry lightning struck the east flat.
No rain.
Only one white flash against a black afternoon sky.
Then smoke.
By the time Silas saw it, grass was already burning.
“FIRE!”
Every hand moved.
Wet sacks.
Shovels.
Plows.
Horses.
Men rode toward the draw.
The wind drove flames north.
Toward the horse pasture.
Then the stack yard.
Then the barn.
Maren stood at the pump filling buckets.
Wesley carried water.
“Stay here,” she told him.
The boy nodded.
Another shout came from the fence.
Maren turned.
Smoke rolled across the yard.
When she looked back, Wesley was gone.
“Wesley?”
No answer.
His primer lay on the porch step.
The kitchen door stood open.
Then Maren understood.
The yellow dog.
Wesley had hidden a half-grown stray in the barn tack room for weeks because Silas refused dogs in the house.
Maren ran.
Someone shouted her name.