"Margaret threatened to call you herself. I figured I'd spare us both."
Dot poured coffee without asking and gave Walt a look that said the whole town would know by noon. Walt ignored it. They talked about nothing urgent—weather, cattle prices, a song Ruth was trying to finish that kept refusing its chorus. He asked if she wanted to see the ranch sometime. She said yes before he finished the sentence.
That afternoon she followed his truck down the gravel road to the Harlan place: white house with a porch that sagged a little on the west end, barn older than both of them, windmill still singing when the wind found it. Walt showed her the west pasture and the stubborn fence and the stall where the thunderstorm calf had lived. Ruth stood in the barn doorway and played three notes into the empty space, just to hear how it answered.
"Good bones," she said. "The barn and the man."
Walt laughed, surprised. "I haven't been accused of good bones in a while."