For a woman who had spent many years surrounded by people anxious to impress her, those small acts felt unexpectedly rare.
At the top of the ridge, Evelyn stopped to catch her breath.
Andre looked at the sky.
“We should rest somewhere out of the wind.”
“Would that delay you further?”
“Only a little.”
He pointed toward a weathered building near a grove of trees.
“There’s an old homestead up ahead.
The roof still holds.”
They reached it a few minutes later.
The house had been abandoned for years.
Its windows were empty, and part of the porch had fallen away, but one sheltered corner remained dry, with a wooden bench beneath the overhanging roof.
Andre brushed away the dust and invited Evelyn to sit.
She lowered herself carefully.
“Thank you, young man.”
He leaned his bicycle against a post and removed the small tin flask from his satchel.
The tea inside had gone lukewarm, but it was still better than nothing.
He handed it to her.
“Have some.”
She took a sip.
“That tastes wonderful.”
Andre laughed.
“It’s only tea.”
“Sometimes that’s enough.”
He sat beside her, leaving a respectful distance between them.
For several minutes, they watched the wind move through the dry grass.
Beyond the ridge, a train whistle sounded faintly in the distance.
Evelyn turned her face toward the sound.
“When I was a girl, hearing a train meant the world was getting closer.”
Andre looked at her.
“What do you mean?”
“Before the railway came through, people waited weeks for letters and supplies.
A broken wagon could leave a family without flour for days.
Then the tracks arrived, and suddenly places that felt impossibly far away were connected.”
Andre nodded.
“My grandfather helped lay some of the fencing along the first rail roadbeds.”
“Did he?”
“Yes, ma’am.
He came here when the town was mostly wooden sheds and a few ranch houses.”
Evelyn smiled.
“Then our families may have walked these roads at the same time.”
“Maybe.”
He imagined his grandfather as a younger man, working beneath the same wide sky.
Their family history had always felt close to him, even when the people themselves were gone.
His grandfather had built the house board by board.
His mother had filled it with warmth.
Now Andre was trying to hold it together.
Evelyn seemed to sense the weight behind his silence.
“Do you have family waiting at home?”
“My little sister.”
“How old?”
“Eleven.”
“Does she like school?”
“Very much.
Especially reading.”
Andre smiled.
“She finishes books so fast that the teacher sometimes lends her extra ones.”
“That’s wonderful.”
“She wants to teach someday.”
“Does she?”
He nodded proudly.
“She says children shouldn’t have to go without books just because they live too far from town.”
Evelyn looked pleased.
“She sounds determined.”
“She is.”
“And what about you?”
Andre gave a small shrug.
“What about me?”
“What would you like to do someday?”
The question surprised him.
It had been so long since anyone asked him about his future that he almost did not know how to answer.
He looked at his hands.
“I’d like to keep working.”
“That isn’t quite what I asked.”
He smiled awkwardly.
“I know.”
Evelyn waited.
At last, Andre spoke.
“I used to think about studying how ranches work.
Not just riding horses or fixing fences, but the business side.
How grain gets shipped.
Why some farmers can sell their crops for a fair price and others can’t.”
“That is a worthwhile thing to learn.”
“Mr.
Sullivan lets me look at his books sometimes.”
“Do you enjoy it?”
“Yes, ma’am.”
His expression changed as he began talking about something he genuinely loved.
He described the grain warehouse beside the railway, the way freight costs could change between towns, and how a poor harvest sometimes left ranch families paying more for supplies than they earned selling cattle.
He spoke carefully, without pretending to know more than he did.
Evelyn listened with growing interest.
“How did you learn all that?”
“Mostly asking questions.”
“Good questions?”
“Probably too many.”
She laughed.
“There’s rarely such a thing.”
Andre looked down.
“My mother wanted me to finish school and find work where I could use my head as much as my hands.”
“And why haven’t you?”
He rubbed his palms together.
“Things changed.”
He did not need to say more.
Evelyn looked toward the far hills.
“A person’s dreams don’t disappear just because life makes them wait,” she said.
Andre wanted to believe her.
He truly did.
But dreams seemed like luxuries when there was a house to keep, a sister to feed, and a winter that refused to end.
After a little while, Evelyn returned the flask.
“Thank you for sharing this with me.”
Andre tucked it away.
“Ready to keep going?”
“Yes.
I think I am.”
He helped her stand.
They left the abandoned homestead and continued toward town, where smoke from chimneys was beginning to rise against the pale evening sky.
Along the way, Evelyn asked about the people who lived there.
Andre told her about the blacksmith who repaired wagons even when customers could not pay immediately, the schoolteacher who purchased books with her own money, and the church women who made blankets for families living in poorly heated cabins.
He also spoke about the ranchers who struggled after the previous summer’s dry weather.
Some had lost cattle.
Others had borrowed money for feed and were waiting for better prices before they could settle their accounts.
“People help each other when they can,” Andre explained.
“But sometimes everybody needs help at the same time.”
Evelyn nodded slowly.
“That is often the hardest kind of trouble.”
He glanced toward her.
“You sound like you’ve seen it.”
“I have.”
She did not elaborate.
Andre sensed there were many things she could have told him, but he did not press her.
They crossed the final rise just as the first lamps began glowing in the town below.
Evelyn stopped.
“Oh, there it is.”
Andre smiled.
“Told you we’d find it.”
She looked over the settlement.
The railway station stood beyond the main street, its windows bright against the gathering dusk.