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amount to anything. Just some grit in the fuel-line filter. She's on her way now."
    Corbett's eyes moved back to him. "Nobody sent you?"
    "No."
    "Sorry."
    "It's okay."
    Still wary, Corbett removed a handkerchief from the rear pocket of his jeans and took off his cap long enough to mop perspiration from his face. He had very dark hair, barely threaded with gray.
    "Did Anna give you something?"
    Anna. Her name was Anna. Busy assimilating that information, Jack didn't catch the rest of what Corbett had said. "Come again?"
    "Did you come out here to get some money from me? For the time and trouble you spent fixing her car," he added, when it became obvious that his meaning hadn't clicked. Jack replied with a terse "No, sir. I was glad to help her out. I came here to speak with you." Corbett's guard went up again. "You selling something?"
    "You could say so."
    "Well then you've wasted your time. I can't think of a thing I need."
    "How about me?"
    "Huh?"
    "I need a job. You need a hand. My services are for sale."
    Corbett looked as though he were waiting for the punch line. Finally he said, "You're serious?"
    "As death and taxes. I could start right now by helping you string that fence." The rancher moved a few inches to his right, placing himself between Jack and the coiled strands of barbed wire, either to block them from Jack's view or to protect them from his interference; Jack couldn't tell. What was all too apparent was that Corbett didn't take his proposal at face value.
    He responded with chilly politeness. "I don't think so, Mr. Sawyer. But thanks all the same." He returned his handkerchief to his pocket and his cap to his head and his attention to his chore.
    "You haven't heard me out."
    "I don't have a hand."
    "That's obvious." The remark brought him around again, as Jack had hoped it would. "No offense, Mr. Corbett, but your place needs some work. Looks to me like this whole fence needs replacing, not just this section. That entails digging holes, setting posts—"
    "I know what it entails," Corbett snapped.
    "So you know it's too much work for one man, especially when daily chores have to be done, too. Your barn door is loose. That trough in the horse corral is about to collapse, and two of the horses need shoeing. That's just for starters. A place this size, it's more than even two men could do efficiently."
    "My son and I held it together."
    "But he's no longer around, right?" Corbett glared at him hard. Quietly Jack added, "The boy told me his daddy had died."
    "That's right." Corbett assumed a tight-lipped, stoic expression. "Now if you'll excuse me, Mr. Sawyer, I'd like to get back to my work. I'm not hiring. You or anybody." Stalling, Jack looked down at the ground and dug a little trench in the dirt with the riding heel of his boot. He hadn't known how he was going to approach Corbett. The idea of asking the man for a job hadn't occurred to him until he heard himself proposing it. Now it seemed the logical course. Good thing he had observed and made subconscious mental notes of the needed repairs. If the ranch had been in tiptop shape, this would have been a tougher sale.
    "I'd be willing to give you a hand with that fence anyway," he offered. "No obligation." Corbett looked at him with irritation and seemed ready to order him off his property.
    "I'm a good worker," Jack said.
    It was Corbett who finally relented with a shrug. "Suit yourself. Got some gloves?" Jack removed a pair of leather work gloves from his hip pocket and approached the fence. "Want me to hold the post or wind the wire?"
    Pride wouldn't let Corbett do the easier job. "I'll handle the wire." They worked in silence. Jack held the post in place while Corbett pulled and stretched the barbed wire taut around it, then nailed it into place. They moved to the next post. Then the next.
    "How many acres have you got?"
    "Six fifty. Just over a section."
    Jack whistled. "How long have you had the property?"
    "All my life. I inherited it from my