alone.'
'That was my pa who brought you here.'
'Where is he now?'
'He rode off a while ago to see if any of that Pine or Vanbergen bunch was close to our cabin. He said he'd be back before sundown.'
'How bad is my wound festering?' Frank asked, reaching for his left shoulder.
'It has blood-poisonin' streaks. I changed the bandage a while ago.'
'I've got to get out of this bed,' he groaned, trying to lift himself off the mattress. Somewhere near the foot of the bed, Dog whimpered.
'You ain't goin' no place, Mr. Morgan,' Karen said with a firm note in her voice. 'You lost a lot of blood. Drink some more of this whiskey.'
'I won't turn it down,' Frank answered, blinking to clear away the fog from his slumber.
Karen handed him the jug, helping him hold it to his lips until he took a swallow.
'That stuff burns,' he gasped, letting his head fall back on the pillow.
'It's supposed to. Pa says that's what makes it good for an ailin' body.'
He tried for a smile, admiring the smooth lines of Karen's face. While he was in no shape to be courting a woman, he found Karen Waite to be very attractive.
A gust of wind howled through a crack in the log cabin and he heard snowflakes falling on the roof. 'I take it the storm hasn't broken yet.'
Karen set the clay jug on the floor. 'Pa says it could last for a couple of days ... a squall, he calls it.'
He gazed up at the sod roof of the cabin. 'I've got to get back on my horse. Vanbergen and Pine could slip away under the cover of this snow.'
'You can't sit a horse in the shape you're in, Mr. Morgan,' she said.
'I sure aim to try,' he told her, flexing the muscles in his left arm, wincing when more lightning bolts of pain shot through him.
'Not till Pa gets back,' she said.
'You don't understand. I've ... ridden a long way to have my revenge against Ned an' Victor for what they did to my wife and to my son a few weeks ago.'
Karen stood up, leaving the whiskey beside his cot on the dirt floor. 'Wait till Pa gets back. It's nearly dark now anyhow. Nobody in his right mind is gonna go anywhere in a snow storm like this.'
Frank surrendered to her logic ... for now. 'Okay. Just don't let me drift off to sleep again.'
'Rest'll be the very best thing for you right now, Mr. Morgan.'
'Why don't you call me Frank?'
'Wouldn't be proper. We ain't acquainted.'
He grinned. 'Then let's get acquainted. Tell me why a pretty girl like you is living up here in these mountains with her father.'
'He needs me.'
'It has to be more than that. Buck seems like he's able to take care of himself.'
'All we've got is each other,' Karen said quietly, moving over to the woodstove to add more pine limbs.
'Why did you come up here with him in the first place?' Frank asked.
'To be away from folks. Pa had a hard time durin' the war an' he didn't want to be around so many people. Nothin' up here but deer, elk, an' grizzly bears, besides the smaller varmints along the creeks.'
'Don't you ever get lonely?'
'No. I like it up here.'
Another blast of wind screamed around the eaves of the small cabin.
'But you're miles from any settlement.'
She turned away from the potbelly to stare at him. 'When we feel the need to see folks we can ride down to Glenwood Springs, or over to Cripple Creek. When we don't, there ain't nobody who bothers us up here.'
'Sounds peaceful,' he said, reaching for the whiskey with his right hand.
'It is. Pa wants it that way.'
'Why?'
'On account of the war. He said he's seen enough of what men can do to each other.'
'I understand that,' Frank said, taking a big swallow of corn whiskey.
'You sound like pretty much of a loner yourself,' Karen said as she closed the stove door.
'I am. I reckon it's for the same reasons your pa likes it up in these mountains. It don't take long for a man to get enough of civilization.'
