CHAPTER 1

September 1951

The siren on top of the Dalton, North Dakota,fire station howls, as it does five days a week at this hour.Its wail frightens into flight the starlings that roost on thestation roof every day yet never learn how fixed and foreseeableare human lives. The siren tells the town's workingcitizens and students what they already know. It's twelveo'clock, time for you to fly too. Put down your hammer,your pencil; close your books, cover your typewriter. Gohome. Your wives and mothers are opening cans of soupand slicing bread and last night's roast beef for sandwiches.Come back in an hour, ready to put your shoulder to it,to add the figures, parse the sentences, calm the patients,please the customers.

Most drive to their homes, but a man with the widthof the town to travel, from Ott's Livestock Sales out onHighway 41 to Teton Avenue in the town's northeast corner,walks. The sun is warm on George Blackledge's back, andhe carries his blanket-lined denim coat over his shoulder.But on his way to work that morning in the predawn darkhe followed the plumes of his own breath and passed signsof the season's first hard freeze. Blankets and rugs coveringthe late tomatoes and squash. Windshields needing tobe scraped. Thin spirals of smoke rising from chimneys.Now only in a house or building's western shade or in theshadow of a shed or tree does any white remain. Grassblades and weed stalks that earlier were frost-bent andflattened rise again. Ice skins that grew over gutter poolsand alley puddles have melted away. When George entershis house, he notices the lingering smell of hot dust andfuel oil, the stale breath of the furnace that came on duringthe night for the first time in the season.

But on the kitchen table are not the bowl of tomatosoup and the summer sausage sandwich that George hasrightly come to expect. Instead on the oilcloth are opencardboard boxes filled with the food that recently has beenin their cupboards, bread box, and refrigerator. The house'swindows are closed and the curtains drawn, banishing sunlightand, so it seems, sufficient air to breathe.

Into the kitchen comes Margaret Blackledge, aboutwhom people invariably say, Still a handsome woman.Her steel-gray hair is plaited and pinned up. Her chambrayshirt is tucked into snug-fitting, faded Levi's. She'swearing boots that have been patched, resoled, and re-heeledso many times they'd rebel at any foot but hers.Those heels make her taller than most women. Drapedover one kitchen chair is her wool mackinaw, and on thespindle of another chair her hat hangs by the leather loopthat she used to tighten under her chin when she wasready to mount up and ride.

George tilts back his own hat. So this is why you wantedthe car today.

You said you didn't mind the exercise.

I don't. But Jesus, Margaret. You really mean to do this?

I do. Margaret Blackledge's eyes have not lost theirpower to startle—large, liquid, deep blue, and set in a facewhose planes and angles could be sculpted from marble.

With me or without me?

With you or without you. It's your choice. Margaretthrusts her fingers into the back pockets of her jeans andleans against the cupboard. She's waiting, but she doesn'thave to say it. She won't wait long.

She nods in the direction of their bedroom. I packed abag for you, she says. Depending on what you decide.

Nothing fills the silence between them. The Philco onthe kitchen counter, which usually squawks livestock pricesat this hour, sits mute. The coffeepot whose glass top usuallyrattles with a percolating fresh brew is emptied, washed, andstored in one of the boxes.

On his way to the bedroom George passes through theliving room and he steps over the blankets Margaret haswrapped and tied into tubes to serve as bedrolls.

In the bedroom doorway he pauses, his gaze lingeringon both what is there and what is not.

The white chenille bedspread rises over the mound ofone pillow but then slopes down to flatness on the otherside. The alarm clock ticks on the bedside table. If he stayshe'll need reminders of hours and obligations, while she'llbe traveling to where time obeys human need and not theother way around. On the top of the bureau the perfumebottle sits, as full as the day she took it out of its gift box.Her brush is gone. So is the framed photograph that oftenmade him pause. His son or his grandson? Did they reallylook so alike as two-year-olds? Or did they confuse himbecause they occupied the same space in his heart? DidMargaret even hesitate before she packed the photo? Didshe ask herself, Who needs this more, the one who goes orthe one who stays?

His suitcase yawns open on the bed, and he walks overto paw through its contents. Clean socks. A few shirts. Twopair of dungarees. Underwear. That old plaid wool railroader'svest. A bandanna. The bottom layers are cold-weatherwear—a wool scarf and knit cap, gloves. His sheepskin-linedcoat. Long underwear. He leaves the suitcase openand turns back toward the kitchen, a distance that suddenlyseems more exhausting than the miles he's alreadywalked today.

In the kitchen he looks over the contents of the boxes.Canned goods, flour, beans—dry and canned—oatmeal,evaporated milk, sugar, coffee, potatoes, apples, carrots.Two cans of Spam and a box of Velveeta. Cups, bowls,plates, forks, knives, and spoons, and that all these are inpairs tells him that she's made all the provisions for him togo. And not much left for him if he decides to stay—she'spacked the cast-iron frying pan and the coffeepot, andGeorge Blackledge loves his coffee. A washbasin. Kitchenmatches. A can of lard.

What do you mean to cook on? George asks.

Margaret shrugs. An open campfire, if need be. I've gota few camping things set out back. Including that old wiregrill you used to set up on rocks over a fire.

With this speech her voice quavers but not with emotion.For years Margaret Blackledge has had a tremor thatcauses her head to nod and her words to wobble. Harmless,a doctor has called it, but it's unsettling in a woman whoseems in every other regard as steady as steel.

George pushes the kitchen window curtain aside.Yes, she's backed their car, an old humpbacked HudsonCommodore, out of the garage, and a few more suppliesfor her journey lie in the grass.

You pulled out that old tent, George says. You find thepoles and stakes too?

I believe all the pieces are there.

I could set it up, he says. Let the sun burn some of themildew smell out of the canvas.

I'd just as soon get going.

George walks back over to the chair where her coat andhat wait. He lifts the collar of her mackinaw and rubs thewool between his fingers. I see you've got the long underwearpacked too. You planning on being gone right throughthe winter?

I'm not planning on any length of time. I plan to go,that's all. And stay gone as long as it takes.

What if Lorna says no? George asks. Any motherwould.

Margaret says nothing.

You have money?

I went to the bank this morning.

Leave any in there?

A little. Not much.

There wasn't much to begin with.

Margaret's suitcase is waiting by the back door. Whenshe glances in its direction, George feels his eyes smart andhis throat tighten.

Think this through, Margaret. What you're aimingto do—

I'll do. You ought to know that by now.

What finally made up your mind, if you don't object tomy asking?

Not only can...