“Then I suppose your going won’t hurt,” she said to her daughter. “But you be here when your pa comes home for his supper. Tell Mrs. Cogswell not to let you be a bother, and bundle up good-there’s a storm blowing in.”

Sarah ran through the kitchen and into the back room she shared with her sisters.

Mrs. Tolstonadge laid her hand on David’s arm. “Go back to the mine, Davie. Your pa gets himself worked up, it doesn’t mean anything. You’re his oldest-he expects too much of you is all.”

He looked down on his mother’s worn, earnest face and the anger drained from his eyes. “I’ll go, Ma. I’ll walk Sare to the Cogswells’ on my way.”

“You’re a good boy.” She patted his arm. David slipped his heavy coat off a peg near the porch door and she helped him into it. “If you see Sam, ask after that horse your pa thinks so much of. He said it’s off its feed.”

“I thought Walter was seeing to that horse.” His back stiffened under her hands and Mam patted him comfortingly.

“Your brother kind of takes after Sam. He doesn’t think much of mollycoddling animals.”

“Pa never lets anybody ride it. He hardly rides it himself. I don’t know why he keeps it.”

“Your pa always wanted a good horse, a breed-more’n just a cart horse. A man ain’t like a woman, David; sometimes he needs to stand on a box to make himself feel taller.”

David grunted, almost a snarl. “You and the girls don’t have decent clothes for winter. Sarah’s wearing that blue thing you made for her two summers back. And he’s buying hay for a horse that’s too good to use.”

“I don’t mind,” Mam said patiently. “A man’s got to have something. It don’t cost so much. Sam lets Walter work off most of its keep.”

“You never see Pa dragging Walter down into that goddamn mine.”

“David!”

“I’m sorry, Mam.”

“Your brother’s learning farming. Your pa wanted it to be you,” she reminded him, “but you fought with Sam till he went and sent you home.”