Russell had written one name across the top of the page, in shaky but careful letters: “Hannah Pruitt Dunlap, Head Hand.” My throat closed. Our sixteen-year-old stood beside the fire with ash on her cheek, and she did not yet know. I carried the notebook across the corral and put it in her hands. She read it twice, then looked at her father, and her chin trembled.

Walter Pruitt took off his hat. “Young lady,” he said, “your father asked me last winter who should run this place when he could not. I told him I had already watched her do it.” Before Hannah could answer, the pickup on the gravel lane started its engine, and then it turned slowly into our driveway.