“No need to freeze here,” he said. “Let me in.”
“No.”
His smile strained. “Still sharp.”
“Still uninterested.”
He surveyed the hill, door, chimney smoke. “You’ve made quite a spectacle.”
“I’ve built a house.”
“A house boasts rooms. This is a burrow.”
“Then why are you here?”
His gaze settled on her. “Because Jacob’s ready to forgive your tantrum.”
Hazel nearly laughed. “Is he?”
“Lydia’s near her time. The household needs help. You return, apologize, and after the child arrives, we discuss arrangements sensibly.”
“There is no arrangement.”
“There could be.”
“I’d rather sleep in snow.”
His expression shifted then, the charm yielding to something flat and hungry.
“You believe this claim shields you,” he remarked.
Hazel’s fingers curled within her gloves.
He stepped closer. “A girl cannot prove land alone. Not truly. Accidents occur. Papers vanish. Men testify. Ministers insist. Clerks misremember. You’ve made folks uncomfortable, Miss Maynard. They seek comfort anew.”
Now she understood Reverend Keene’s flicker of surprise.
“You and Jacob schemed this.”
Laurence smiled. “Jacob has debts. Lydia’s expectations. I have resources. You own a claim better situated than you realize.”
“What do you mean?”
His gaze drifted past her, towards the lowlands where winter grass broke through snow.
“Ask your mother.”
“My mother’s dead.”
“Then perhaps ask why she filed before confiding in her husband.”
Hazel’s heart pounded.
Laurence tipped his hat. “The cold deepens post-Christmas. Pride’s easy in mild weather. When ready for reason, send word.”
He departed.
That night, Hazel searched the Emerson again.
She found no new revelations—no second letter, no map, no answers. Only the first letter, the money now transformed into walls and roof, and her mother’s warning:
Weak men do harm while telling themselves they had no choice.
For the first time since building the dugout, Hazel barred the door before dusk.
Christmas arrived, quiet and white.
Hazel roasted a small hen Nell Grimshaw had bartered for mending. She read from Emerson, as her mother often did, then from Job, feeling less generous. She sang a solitary hymn, halting halfway as her voice faltered.
Near dusk, Everett Langley appeared with a parcel.
“Merry Christmas,” he announced.
Inside lay a small brass thermometer, finer than her old one.
“I thought your arithmetic deserved proper instruments.”
She turned it over in her palm. “I’ve no gift for you.”
“You permitted me to witness the most captivating building in Willow Creek. That suffices.”
She hesitated, then spoke of Laurence.
Everett’s expression hardened.
“Crowther controls freight contracts,” he noted. “Half the town owes him.”
“Jacob too?”
“Likely.”
“He mentioned my claim is strategically placed.”
Everett glanced at the frozen creek below. “Rumor suggests the railroad may survey near the river within years. Land with water access and sheltered grade might prove valuable.”
“My mother knew.”
“Sounds like she suspected.”
Hazel folded her arms. “So they didn’t just covet marriage. They sought erasure.”
Everett didn’t soften the truth. “Yes.”
Oddly, his honesty steadied her.
“What should I do?”
“Survive winter first,” he advised. “Legal battles favor the living.”
Two days later, the trader arrived.
Gideon Cade had trapped, hauled, traded, and fibbed across the Dakota Territory for decades, though his weather sense was astute. He stopped at Hazel’s dugout near sundown, his mule steaming, eyes on the western sky.
“A bad storm threatens,” he warned.
“How bad?”
“Forty below if hell keeps tally. Wind fierce enough to strip paint from a preacher’s pride.”
“When?”
“Night after next, maybe sooner.”
Hazel glanced skyward. It bore a strange metallic hue, the horizon bruised green-gray under the cloud.
“You telling everyone?”
“Who’d listen. Most men take weather warnings for insults.” Gideon eyed her door. “You should head to town.”
“No.”
“Girl, I admire gumption, but I don’t worship it. This storm kills.”
“If this house can’t hold, neither can theirs.”
He studied her a long moment before nodding once.
“Keep your chimney clear. Bank snow by the door, but don’t seal it shut. Melt water before it’s needed. And if you hear tapping in the walls, don’t panic. Frost moves earth like knuckles.”
Hazel’s gut tightened. “That’s a thing?”
“Sometimes.”
“Comforting.”
“Truth seldom is.”
After he left, Hazel prepared.
She hauled extra wood inside. Filled every barrel. Set beans to soak. Checked chimney draw, door bar, roof beams. She moved the chickens into a crate near the front wall, ignoring their indignant clucks. Tied a rope from the door to a willow stake outside in case whiteout blinded her. Cooked cornbread, wrapped it in cloth, stacked it near the stove.
Then she sat at the table, writing in the blank back pages of Emerson.
December 28. Thermometer outside reads 4 below at sunset. Inside 61 with low fire. Wind southwest, rising. If I die, I want it known the house did not fail for lack of thought.
She stared at the sentence.