She studied him. He didn’t look like trouble. They never look like trouble, she thought. Pete hadn’t looked like trouble when he started courting her when she was sixteen. He seemed fine enough and a good choice when they first married, until two weeks later, the night she had a cold and didn’t want to bed him and he made her, and made her many times thereafter.

She put her hand in her pocket. She was glad she had the gun.

“You two hoboing?” the man said. “Don’t see many women on the road.”

Sunset said, “We’re not on the road.”

“That’s good. You’re a good bit away from the rails.”

“So are you,” she said.

“Guess I am.”

The man wore a crumpled wool hat. It looked too big for him. He took it off and smiled at her. She noted he was nice-looking and maybe not as young as he first appeared. He had a little sack tied to his belt. Over one eye was a small black bruise.

“I’m looking for work. Some bo’s told me there was a sawmill hiring.”

“I don’t know if they’re hiring,” Sunset said, “but you follow the creek west a ways, and you’ll see it.”

She started to say he would have to talk to her father-in-law, Mr. Jones, or the Captain, but she couldn’t make the words come out. He wasn’t her father-in-law now. She didn’t have anyone but Karen and Karen hated her. Well, maybe she had Marilyn. The whole thing with Marilyn hitting her, then hugging her, had not quite registered yet.

“That girl,” he said, “she ain’t dead, is she? You didn’t shoot her? I seen you put that gun in your pocket. You ain’t gonna shoot me, are you?”

“That’s my daughter. She’s sleeping. We had a storm come through. Tore up our home.”