Walt Harlan stepped through the open barn doors just as the high E string on Ruth Callahan's fiddle snapped with a bright, ugly ping that cut through the soft murmur of the nearly empty hall. The sound hung for a second beneath the wooden beams, then died against the hay bales stacked along the walls.
Ruth lowered the bow and looked at the broken end curling from the pegbox like a silver question mark. "Well, that's a sign."
Walt's hand found the coiled spare in the pocket of his sheepskin vest before he had decided to speak. He drew it out—bright wire wound neat as a promise—and held it toward her under the glow of the string lights. "Sign says I came prepared."
She regarded him with the careful suspicion of a woman who had learned not to take kindness at face value. Long auburn waves framed her face; brown smoky liner softened the edges of her eyes, and glossy terracotta lips pressed together as she studied the string, then the man offering it. Cream prairie dress with a lace collar. Cropped suede jacket. A fiddle still warm from her hands. "Why does a rancher carry fiddle strings?"
Walt shifted his brown Stetson, clean-shaven jaw tight, short dark hair greying at the temples catching the lantern light. Brass belt buckle. Pressed denim shirt under the vest. Thirty-seven and suddenly sixteen again. "My wife played. Old habit."
Ruth took the string. He stepped closer and helped her wind the peg, his fingers steady where hers were not. The barn smelled of hay and cold air from the frosted field beyond the doors, of coffee from the refreshment table and the faint sweetness of pies somebody's aunt had brought and barely touched. "She'd want you dancing, not tuning."