The dinner table was laden as usual with all the good things the ranch grew, a big stew full of beef and green peas and beans and parsley and potatoes and carrots. Platters of icy cucumbers and red tomatoes and a cut glass tumbler sprouting crisp green onions. Two huge pans of hot corn bread were passed and mounds of sweet butter. Tall glasses that held at least a pint each were full of amber iced tea to wash all the food down. An enormous strawberry shortcake stood waiting in the refrigerator.

The men ate with silent absorption making occasional grunting noises and sighing a little. They wolfed the food as though it might be their last, their faces trickling sweat despite the air conditioner. Kate didn't mind their silence in the least; she had someone to talk with – Gwen Carter – at the other end of the table. The two women chatted gaily with each other and left the men to their eating.

Gwen was their new school teacher and would start teaching in the fall. She was a sweet girl, but Kate felt she was completely out of place here in South Dakota. As the Sutherland woman looked down the table at her petite figure, daintily eating her food, she marveled once again at the Dresden doll quality of the girl. Although Kate was only five years older than the 23 year-old school teacher, she felt as if Gwen were still a high school girl. She was perfect – in miniature! – but like any fragile work of art, pretty unsuited for the rough life of the plains. The girl obviously had come from a green house, sheltered environment, and she frequently blushed when one of the ranch people forgot about her and cursed a blue streak about something. Gwen had said she came to South Dakota for the summer, before the school term began, to learn about "real" people. Kate knew that if the young teacher didn't watch her step with some of the ranchers, Sandy Gayman the Meacham Ranch foreman especially, she might learn more about "real people" than she had bargained for.