“Let me fix you up,” she said to Arbuckle.

Lady Mae rose and went to the kitchen. In the cupboard was antiseptic and cloth bandages. She grabbed her kit, too; he might need a stitch or two as well. When she walked back into the room, Arbuckle was holding his head in his hands.

“Now hold still.” She opened the antiseptic and placed the cap on the table in front of the sofa. “This is going to hurt. I ain’t gonna lie.”

“Go on now,” he said.

She tipped the brown glass bottle and poured out a small but steady stream of the liquid onto the cloth. Arbuckle winced when she touched his face, his cheekbones, above his brow. But as she cleaned his wounds, he stared at her.

“How long them outcries been going on?” Arbuckle asked.

“Don’t know; a year, maybe. Two.”

She stood and went around to the back of his head, blotted his neck where the antiseptic had dripped, wiping and pressing a small towel to his skin. Even though there was a layer of fabric in between, she could feel his strong muscles. She stared at his skin, the small, tanned sliver that showed between his collar and hairline. There was the sudden urge to lean down and press her lips upon it, to wrap her arms around his shoulders and breathe in.

“They always kill them?” Arbuckle asked.

“Aye.” She cleaned around the wounds as best she could. She put the rag down, opened her kit, and took out the string and scissors. “Just a stitch or two. Need anything first?”

“No,” he said. “What they done, anyway? Them residents on the scaffold?”

“Blasphemy—at least that’s what they say. I tried to tell you, but… I just. I didn’t. Don’t know why.”

“I knew you weren’t telling me the whole truth.”

“Oh? How is that?”

“I could see it. Read it by your hand. You can’t lie to me no more than you could’ve lied to your mama.”

“Why didn’t you say nothing then?” She squinted and thread the string through the needle, cutting it off at its end with her teeth. Then she put her hands on either side of Arbuckle’s head to still him.

“What good would’ve come of that?” he asked before falling silent.

They had both tried to protect the other knowing that, no sooner had they put onto paper their suspicions, the Deputies would have come. They would have intercepted the letters and walked to her shack in a small group, their tall hats bobbing along the horizon, the same way they had nearly six years before. They would have knocked quickly at Lady Mae’s door waiting only but a few moments before bashing it in with their clubs and shoulders and feet. They would have come for her first in an effort to lure Arbuckle back to the settlement so that they would not have to search the hills and mountain. They would have made him come to them where they would be waiting with their chains and torches. No, she would not tell Arbuckle any of it.