He squinted up at the sky where already the clouds were burning off. The dogs came bounding around his legs and he ruffled their heads and spoke to them as he walked and Annie knew that, for her at least, nothing had changed.
She showered in his little bathroom, waiting to be seized by guilt or remorse, but neither came, only trepidation at what he might be feeling. She found the sight of his few simple toilet things beside the basin oddly touching. She used his toothbrush. There was a big blue toweling bathrobe slung by the door and she put it on, wrapping herself in the smell of him, and went back into his room.
He'd opened the drapes and was looking out of the window when she came in. He heard her and turned and she recalled him doing the same that day in Choteau when he'd come to the house to give her his verdict on Pilgrim. There were two cups steaming on the table beside him. She could see the apprehension in his smile. 'I made some coffee.' 'Thanks.'
She went over and took the cup, casing it in her hands. Alone together in the big empty room, they seemed suddenly formal, like strangers arrived too early at a party. He nodded at the robe.
'It suits you.' She smiled and sipped the coffee. It was black and strong and very hot. 'There's a better bathroom along the way there if you—' 'Yours is just fine.' "That was Smoky dropped by. I forgot to call him.'
There was silence. Somewhere down by the creek a horse whinnied. He looked so worried, she was suddenly afraid he was going to say sorry, it was all a mistake and could they just forget it ever happened.
'Annie?'
'What?'
He swallowed. 'I just wanted to say, that whatever you feel, whatever you think or want to do, it's okay.'
'And what do you feel?'
He said simply, 'That I love you.' Then he smiled and gave a little shrug that almost broke her heart. 'That's all.'
She put her cup down on the table and went to him and they clung to each other as if the world were already bent on their division. She covered his lowered face with kisses.
They had four days before Grace and the Bookers returned, four days and four nights. One protracted moment along the trail of nows. And that was all she would live and breathe and think of, Annie resolved, nothing beyond nor nothing past. And whatever came to pass, whatever brutal reckonings were forced upon them, this moment would be there, indelibly written in their heads and hearts forever.
They made love again while the sun eased over the corner of the house and angled knowingly in upon them. And afterward, cradled in his arms, she told him what she wanted. That the two of them should ride again to the high pastures where first they had kissed and where now they might be alone together, with nothing but the mountains and the sky to judge them.
They forded the creek a little before noon.
While Tom had saddled the horses and loaded a packhorse with all they might need, Annie had driven back up to the creek house to change and get her things. They would both bring food. Though she didn't say and he didn't ask, he knew she would also have called her husband in New York to lay some pretext for her coming absence. He'd done the same with Smoky who was getting a little dazed with all these changes of plan.
'Going up to check on the cattle, huh?'
'Yes.'
'On your own or…?'
'No, Annie's coming too.'
'Oh. Right.' There was a pause and Tom could hear two and two coalescing in Smoky's mind.
'I'd appreciate it, Smoke, if you kept it to yourself.'
'Oh sure, Tom. You bet.'
He said he'd drop by as previously planned to see to the horses. Tom knew he could be trusted on both issues.
Before leaving, Tom went down to the corrals and put Pilgrim into the field with some of the younger horses he'd started to get along with. Normally Pilgrim would go running off with them right away, but today he stood by the gate and watched Tom walk back to where he'd left the saddled horses.
Tom was going to ride the same mare he'd taken on the cattle drive, the strawberry roan. As he rode up toward the creek house, leading Rimrock and the little paint packhorse behind him, he looked back and noticed Pilgrim was still standing alone by the gate, watching him go. It was almost as if the horse knew something in their lives had changed.
Tom waited with the horses on the track below the creek house and watched Annie come in long strides down the slope toward him.
The grass in the meadow beyond the ford had grown lush and long. Soon the contractors would be here for haymaking. It slushed against the legs of the horses as Tom and Annie rode through it side by side, with no other sound but the rhythmic creak of their saddles.
For a long time neither of them seemed to feel the need to talk. She asked no questions now about the land through which they passed. And it seemed to Tom that this was not because at last she knew the names of things, but rather that their names no longer mattered. It only mattered that they were.