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right hand had been when he passed out.
    “What on earth are you doing, mister?”
    “I lost something.”
    “Is this it?” Nelly asked, and her hand came from behind her dress holding the Arkansas toothpick by the tip.
    “We didn’t want you stabbing us,” Jayce said.
    “Hold on to it if you don’t trust me,” Fargo suggested. Just so he didn’t lose it like he had lost everything else. He made it to his knees and then to his feet and swayed like a reed in a high wind.
    “Are you dizzy?” Nelly asked.
    “Some.”
    She stepped in close. “You can lean on me if you need to. Just be nice is all I ask. Some of Sten’s men aren’t so nice, and I don’t like them very much.”
    Fargo took note of that. He took a step, and a second, and smiled, thinking he could do it on his own. But at the next stride his head went into a whirl, and it was all he could do stay upright. He put a hand on her shoulder and waited for the vertigo to pass.
    “You’re not doing so well, are you?”
    “I’ve done better,” Fargo admitted.
    “You haven’t told us who you are or what you’re doing in these parts. It isn’t often we get visitors.”
    “Except for Cud Sten,” Jayce said.
    Fargo remedied his lack of manners. But he didn’t tell the complete truth. He left out the part about scouting for the army. “I like to explore new country, and the Beartooths are as new as country gets. I didn’t think there was anyone living within a thousand miles of here.”
    “There’s just us,” Nelly told him.
    Fargo took note of that, too. He had gained a little strength, and he started off again, leaning on her as lightly as he could and still stay on his feet. “What about the Indians?”
    “What about them?” Jayce rejoined.
    “Are you on friendly terms? There are a lot of hostiles in the mountains, and they’ve been known to lift white scalps now and then.” Fargo regretted saying it the moment he did.
    Both children got that fawn-in-the-glow-of-a-lantern look, and Jayce glanced anxiously up and down the valley as if afraid a war party was about to swoop down on them.
    “We worry about Indians all the time. Pa used to say they’d leave us be if we left them be. And once he gave one of our cows to them.”
    “Now that he’s gone,” Nelly said, taking up the account, “Ma is afraid they might take us to live with them.”
    Fargo could see that happening. Now and then warriors took fancies to white women. “Why don’t the three of you leave?’
    Sister and brother looked at each other, and Nelly answered, “You’d best ask Ma. It’s not up to us.”
    “I’d go if we could,” Jayce said. “I’m tired of always having to be on the lookout for Sten and Indians and bears and whatnot.”
    Fargo was mildly surprised. Most boys his age would gladly live in the country rather than in a settlement or town. Boys thrived outdoors, running barefoot and fishing and hunting and catching frogs and snakes.
    “I’d love to go through a day safe,” Nelly chimed in. “I can’t imagine what that’s like.”
    “You make it sound awful bad here.”
    That was when Jayce, who was struggling in the deep snow, twisted his head around. “Say, mister, didn’t you say you killed those two wolves?”
    “As dead as dead can be,” Fargo assured him.
    “Then how come one of them is chasing us?”

4
    Fargo stopped and half turned and a chill ran down his spine. One of the wolves was closing on them with surprising speed, given that its coat was spattered with red from the stab wounds he had inflicted. There was a grim intensity about its expression. Every dozen feet or so it staggered for a few steps, but then it came on again.
    Fargo took the Arkansas toothpick from Nelly, who was staring at the wolf in terror. “Run.”
    Jayce faced the wolf and balled his fists. “We’ll help you fight it off, mister.”
    “No,” Fargo said. Stricken as it was, the wolf was still formidable. “Get to your cabin. Let your ma