When she opened her eyes the next morning, he was already gone, probably chasing mustangs again. He was good with horses, and meant to train the ones he captured to harness, then sell them to the stage line, through Jacob. In typical Scully fashion, he never doubted that the enterprise would work, and Evangeline knew his confidence was justified. He was like Abigail in that way; when he put his hand to something, it usually came right.

It was a quality Evangeline envied. She was intelligent—uncommonly so, in fact—but she always had to work hard at things before she got a proper grasp on them, and she usually failed a number of times in the process. On the other hand, once she really mastered a skill, it was hers for life, and she could ply it unerringly.

She got up, found the floor warm and both fires going. There was water, too, she discovered, when she checked the reservoir. Scully had filled that and brought in two more buckets besides. A note scrawled on Abigail’s lesson slate said he’d done the morning chores, and he’d be back before sundown.

There was a new snow on the ground, and flakes were still falling, but Evangeline took a sort of cozy joy in that. She would plan supper, ready up the house, and spend the rest of the day sewing. With luck, she could finish the shirt she was making for Scully, to surprise him at Christmas. It was the least she could do, she reasoned, giving the man a simple shirt, when he’d bought all those yard-goods for her and Abigail.

Evangeline was fully dressed, with her hair brushed and pinned up at her nape, before she noticed that Abigail was wide awake, staring at her with over-bright eyes.

“I don’t feel good, Mama,” she said. Her voice was small and raw-sounding, and Evangeline was instantly alarmed, though of course she made every effort not to show it.

She laid the backs of her fingers to Abigail’s forehead and found it hot to the touch. Her mind raced with all the things that might be wrong—she wasn’t given to worrying overmuch, but childhood illnesses were not to be taken lightly. She’d seen whole families of children wiped out, in the space of a day, by a raging case of scarlet fever, diphtheria or whooping cough. She forced a smile, no more likely to hold than a thin layer of dried clay.

“You are a bit warm,” she said, as though that was not an unexpected development. Abigail had always been healthy, vitally so. Evangeline considered that her own best blessing, as well as the child’s. “Shall I make you some broth?”

Abigail shook her head slowly from side to side. “It hurts to swallow.”

Evangeline sat down on the edge of the mattress, resisting the primal urge to drag her daughter into her arms and run madly out the door, in a vain search for help. Not Abigail, God, she prayed silently. Please, please, not my Abigail. “I’m sure your throat is sore,” she said, in the most normal tone she could manage, given that she was in a state of inward panic. “Still, you need something in your stomach. How about some hot water with honey and—” here, she lowered her voice conspiratorially, “—just a very little of Mr. Keating’s whiskey?”