Mercy’s hands shook.
She clasped them.
Count.
Something to count.
Porch boards.
Fourteen visible.
Fence posts.
Nine.
Windows.
Six.
Caleb watched.
“You’re counting.”
Mercy closed her eyes.
“Your father told everyone my secrets.”
Caleb took her hand.
For the first time since he was nineteen, Mercy saw the boy who once told her she would last one week.
“He’ll be okay.”
Mercy looked at him.
“Don’t promise things you can’t know.”
Caleb swallowed.
“Fine.”
He squeezed her hand.
“We’re here.”
That was better.
Samuel came outside.
Not a heart attack.
Probably severe angina.
Thomas needed rest.
Actual rest.
Not Thomas Bell’s definition, which included inspecting cattle from horseback.
Mercy entered the bedroom.
Thomas looked at her.
“You look angry.”
“I am deciding whether killing you would be redundant.”
He smiled weakly.
“Romantic.”
Mercy sat beside him.
Then her composure broke.
Not loudly.
Tears simply came.
Thomas’s smile vanished.
“Mercy.”
She took his hand.
“Don’t.”
“Don’t what?”
“Make me do this without you.”
Thomas squeezed her fingers.
“You did plenty before me.”
“That was different.”
“How?”
Mercy looked at him.
“Because I didn’t know what I was missing.”
His eyes filled.
Mercy leaned down.
Forehead against his.
For several minutes there was no cooperative.
No Western Continental.
No ranch.
No sons.
Only two old people frightened by time.
Thomas recovered slowly.
Mercy withdrew from the cooperative vote.
Not permanently.
For a week.
Harold Whitmore visited the ranch.
Mercy expected strategy.
Instead he brought oranges.
Real oranges.
Expensive in Wyoming in March.
“For Thomas.”
Mercy looked suspicious.
“They aren’t poisoned.”
“That is exactly what a poisoner would say.”
Harold laughed.
Then became serious.
“I heard what happened.”
“He’s improving.”
“I’m glad.”
Mercy nodded.
Harold looked toward the house.
“We can postpone the vote.”
She studied him.
“You don’t need to.”
“It would look ugly if we forced it while your husband is ill.”
“Is appearance your concern?”
“Partly.”
His honesty surprised her.
Then:
“And partly because I actually respect you.”
Mercy softened slightly.
“Dangerous habit.”
“Yes.”
He started leaving.
Mercy called:
“Harold.”
He turned.
“If you lose the vote, what happens?”
“We continue competing.”
“No retaliation?”
He smiled.
“Mrs. Bell, I am a businessman.”
“That wasn’t an answer.”
Harold laughed.
Then gave one.
“No retaliation from me.”
Mercy believed him.
Not completely.
Enough.
The vote happened without her.
Thomas insisted she stay home.
“You’ve spent twenty years telling them they’re capable.”
Mercy paced.
“They are capable.”
“Then stop acting like civilization ends if you miss one meeting.”
“It might.”
Thomas pointed toward the chair.
“Sit.”
Mercy glared.
He looked delighted.
“Enjoying this?”
“Enormously.”
At seven that evening, Caleb returned.
Mercy stood before he reached the porch.
“Well?”
He took off his hat.
“Eight to four.”
Mercy’s stomach dropped.
“Which way?”
Caleb stared.
Then grinned.
“Against.”
Mercy hit his arm.
“You horrible child.”
“I am forty-one.”
“Still horrible.”
She hugged him.
Hard.
Thomas watched from the chair.
The cooperative remained independent.
Western Continental stayed in Lark Crossing.
That mattered.
Mercy had no interest in victory through disappearance.
Harold opened a warehouse near the railway.
Competition forced the Exchange to modernize.
They bought better trucks.
Updated accounting.
Negotiated stronger contracts.
Published prices.
Western Continental lowered theirs.
Ranchers benefited.
Neither side won completely.
Mercy considered that the healthiest possible result.
Two years later, Harold Whitmore joined the Exchange board as a nonvoting industry representative.
Mercy nearly resigned out of spite.
Thomas stopped her.
“You like him.”
“I absolutely do not.”
“You argue with him every Tuesday.”
“He is wrong every Tuesday.”
“You look forward to Tuesdays.”
Mercy stared.
Thomas smiled.
“Four pencils.”
She threw one at him.
By 1954, Thomas’s health had stabilized but slowed him.
He accepted it badly.
One evening Mercy found him standing beside the saddle rack.
“What are you doing?”
“Nothing.”
“With a saddle?”