her way around the cattle business and Garold was just learnin’. Last fall, I helped them with their round-up and she shared that they were expectin’ a baby. Then she asked if I’d be willin’ to help them with brandin’ in the spring too.”
“Of course you said yes.”
He nodded. “I saw ’em around Christmas. With winter and all, it’s easy to stay isolated. After I got back from Doc’s after the blizzard, and knowin’ it’d stranded Jonas in Cheyenne, I decided to see if my neighbors were okay.” His hands tightened on his saddle horn. “I had to hitch the mule up to the sled and ride across the snow on my knees because it was still deep. First thing I saw was Garold sittin’ on the porch with the front door and all the windows in the house open. He didn’t even hear me crunching through the snow or sayin’ his name. When he finally looked up, I’d never seen haunted eyes like that. He had a bruise on his head the size of a biscuit. I asked what happened and he started talkin’ in German. Then he started cryin’ and lord…I knew it was bad.”
“Oh no.”
“Don’t know how long I sat there with him until he spoke English, but I know it was full-on dark by the time he finished tellin’ me what had happened. He’d gone out to the barn to check on the horses when there was just a few inches of snow on the ground. Somehow he slipped, whacked his head into a beam and it knocked him out cold. When he came to, it was night. By then, the blizzard was ragin’ and he knew enough not to try to make it back to the house. So he decided to wait it out until mornin’.” Silas swallowed hard. “Except mornin’ came and it was still snowing and blowing, and he couldn’t even see the house. He had water, and hay to keep himself warm, so he rode out four days in that barn until it cleared. Took him half a day to dig a path to the house. And when he got there…”
Dinah reached over and touched his shoulder. “I’m sorry. You don’t have to tell me any more.”
“No. You oughta know it all. Margaret…” He cleared his throat. “The baby had tried to come durin’ that time. Neither Margaret nor their baby boy made it. Garold couldn’t keep their bodies in the house but he couldn’t just throw them in the snowbank either. He’d spent two days in the house with them, lost in grief, not knowin’ what to do…” From the corner of his eye he saw Dinah pull a handkerchief out of her pocket. “I took him back to my place, dosed him with whiskey until he passed out and then went back to do what he couldn’t.” He paused. “I found a spot over there”—he pointed to a cluster of trees—“where there was a snow break and the ground had some give. Took me a day to dig it deep enough and another day to bury them.”
“Silas. You had a sprained arm.”
“I know, darlin’. It hurt like hell.”
“But you did it anyway.”
“I had to. So that’s why, when Garold’s grumpy, I reckon he’s got a right to it.” He reined around and bit back a wince of pain. “Come on. Let’s get this done.” Then he rode off.
After dealing with his herd and Henrikson’s, they rode to Silas’s place.
Silas purposely didn’t watch her face when she caught her first look at his home. It wasn’t much—and that was just the outside. The barn was a lot nicer than the house, which he supposed said a lot about him.
He dismounted slowly and turned to assist her only to find she hadn’t needed his help. “If you wanna stay a bit, you can hang your tack here while your horse is corralled.”
She fiddled with her horse’s bridle. “Do you want me to stay?”
“Yeah, sugar pie, I do. Very much.”
“Okay then.”
After they dealt with the horses and turned them out, Dinah did a slow spin. “How much of your land did we see?”
“Only the front section. I’ve been workin’ on adding on some fence lines as markers but it’s slow goin’ when it’s just me doin’ the building. I’ve spent a lot of time at Henrikson’s place this winter and spring.” He scratched his neck. “That’s why it took months for me to make it back to Doc’s.”