Chapter 15
“So?”
“So the date in your ledger is February.”
He glanced at the notice. “This is January.”
“Yes.”
Snow hissed across the entrance.
Calvin took the paper from her and stared at it.
His brow tightened.
Henrietta could almost see the pieces shifting behind his eyes.
“That could be a clerical mistake.”
“It could.”
“You said my books were full of mistakes.”
“They are.”
“Then why does this matter?”
“Because yours are sloppy mistakes.”
He looked offended even now.
Henrietta ignored it. “You forget to carry sums. You put feed purchases under equipment. You record a payment on the day you remember making it rather than the day you made it.”
“I work cattle. I’m not a bookkeeper.”
“I know.”
“Then—”
“But these are not your mistakes.”
He stopped.
Henrietta pointed to the notice again. “These figures are too exact. And the dates move in the same direction every time.”
“What direction?”
“Against you.”
His eyes narrowed.
Henrietta felt the cold recede from her mind as numbers took its place. Numbers she trusted. Numbers did not sneer, pity, hesitate, or look away. Numbers could be hidden, but they could not be persuaded to become something else once placed correctly beside one another.
She reached for the paper again.
Calvin let her have it.
“The five thousand dollars,” she said. “When did you pay it?”
“Three days after the wedding.”
“And Vane accepted it.”
“Yes.”
“Gave you a receipt?”
“Yes.”
“Where is it?”
“At the ranch. Desk drawer.”
“Which drawer?”
“Top right.”
“Locked?”
“No.”
“Of course not.”
“Henrietta.”
She looked at him sharply. “Did he ever send you a written notice saying the default had been cured?”
“No.”
Her pulse thudded in her ears.
Calvin’s face had gone still.
“You think this paper means something else.”
“Yes.”
“What?”
Henrietta hesitated.
She wanted the ledgers in front of her.
She wanted her pencil.
Her clean sheets of paper.
She wanted dry fingers and lamplight and six uninterrupted hours.
Instead she had a frozen ravine, a husband with a shattered leg, and a bank notice damp with melted snow.
Still, the numbers were the numbers.
“The date,” she said. “Calvin, look at the date.”
“I see it.”
“No. Look.”
He did.
She tapped the paragraph concerning acceleration. “This was issued before our marriage. Before Silas Vane could possibly know whether you would raise the five thousand.”
His eyes shifted.
Henrietta continued. “The document authorizes pursuit of the entire balance. Not merely the delinquent amount.”