She stood for a moment at the door, listening to Baptiste and Dirty Swallow. She could make out a few words of Salish and she knew he would be a while. She was not surprised that her husband had left her in their wedding room to be with his mother. She imagined the cool breath of his mother’s voice, the stories she would tell him about new brides, the ways of women. She thought of climbing out his bedroom window and going into Perma for a beer or just settling for a pop at Malick’s. She wanted to sit outside as the evening cooled, find a ride with someone she didn’t know, go to a place far from Baptiste, because she already knew that even though she was drawn by Baptiste he could not hold her. She knew her feelings for him were already passing. What had drawn Louise to Baptiste was the hard chase. He wanted her. His wanting her had become all that mattered. Now that he was her husband she waited.

She was in Dirty Swallow’s house. The snakes would be lazy here, without power. She didn’t think they would strike her in her mother-in-law’s house because here it would be like striking themselves. She had married snake’s blood. She checked the window. The wood was rain split; the hinges were tight with rust. She rubbed her finger on the dust-clouded pane; still she could only see a smudge of the hillside beyond. Louise imagined snakes under Baptiste’s bed, uncoiled, sleek, and long as branches, sleeping on the cool dirt floor of his room.

The voices of Baptiste and Dirty Swallow made Louise lean close to the door. She peeked through the keyhole to see a small step stool, some of the wallpaper peeling and yellow, but she could not see them. She thought she could hear her name but the more she strained to understand the more their talk began sounding like coyotes in the early morning. She heard the word “night” twice. She heard her grandmother’s name. The more closely she listened the more their voices resembled wind or water or an animal wheezing.

There was a sad, smoky light in Baptiste’s room. Here and there light seeped through the cracks along the edge of the floor. Small burrowed holes trapped the sun. She thought of prairie dogs and gophers, all the small animals who had been stupid enough to dig under this house, stupid enough to find themselves looking down the tight throat of a diamondback, their instincts failed.