Evangeline had no viable alternatives. Even if another coach came through, she hadn’t nearly enough money left to buy passage all the way back to Pennsylvania. Mott would send funds, if she wrote to him contritely, but that would take months and besides, he would want her soul in return, as well as her body. Nor could she rightly impose further upon the hospitality of the McCaffreys. They had been kind, even generous, but it simply was not their responsibility to look after stranded women and their children.

That left traveling to the Circle JW and settling in to wait for Mr. Keating to return from whence he’d gone. At least, she thought gamely, she would not have to change her name when she remarried. Abigail would have a warm, safe home and, presumably, plenty to eat. And the prospect of having an entire winter to prepare herself for the duties of a wife was not without a certain appeal.

If indeed she could trust Mr. Wainwright—an impression she would most certainly verify with the McCaffreys before leaving the station—the arrangement might be considered a blessing, heaven-sent.

“How,” she began, “would we make this journey? I noticed that you only brought one horse.”

Wainwright smiled, as though she’d said something humorous. “Jacob has a sleigh. We could borrow that, along with a couple of mules. It’ll be a long, cold trip, though, so you’ll want to bundle yourself and the little girl up real warm.”

“Are there wolves along the way?” Abigail asked. Her eyes, large in any event, were the size of stove lids. Evangeline wondered if her daughter had somehow picked up on her own private comparisons between Wainwright and those fierce predators roaming the woodlands and plains.

“They won’t bother us,” Mr. Wainwright answered confidently, laying an idle hand to the holstered .45 resting against his right thigh. It was the first time Evangeline had noticed that he was armed, and she did not know whether to be reassured or frightened. She did not like guns but at the same time she understood that they were something of a necessity out here, where wild animals, bandits and hostile Indians were not uncommon.

“You’d shoot them?” Abigail asked.

“I wouldn’t like to,” Wainwright admitted. “But if the situation called for it, I reckon I’d rather the critter died than me.”

That answer seemed to satisfy Abigail. She sat on the bench beside the next table, letting her tiny feet swing while she pondered the adventures that surely lay ahead. Other children might have nightmares after such talk, but Abigail had the soul of an explorer and would no doubt be gravely disappointed if she grew to adulthood without encountering at least one life-threatening situation.

Evangeline suppressed a shiver. If left to her own devices, she would have chosen to remain in Pennsylvania, war-torn as it was, living out her days in peace, working hard at a good man’s side, raising Abigail, bearing other children. It still amazed her to find herself starting over, in this new and foreign place, far from everything she’d known. She missed the rolling hills and gentle fields of home very sorely in those moments.