CHAPTER 59

Sixty seconds in a minute.

The sun beat relentlessly upon James’s back as he busied his hands with the already-tight wire fences, with the polishing of the already-gleaming saddles, with the endless chores that he completed and restarted.

Sixty seconds in a minute. James counted each one. Over and over again, he counted—each endless second a tiny wave pushing the steam liner, his heart, across the Pacific. And each second, he knew, Alex was with her.

Sixty minutes in an hour.

The minutes of the day were torturous, but the minutes of the night were inhuman with infinity. The minutes of the night reminded him that Alex would share her bed. The minutes wondered if Alex would touch her. The minutes grew malicious and promised that Leonora would forget him, forget what had happened in the barn, forget that they were meant to be together.

Twenty-four hours in a day.

Twenty-four hours of held breath. Twenty-four hours of waiting. Twenty-four hours of ripped insides missing her.

Seven days in a week.

Four weeks in a month.

One month of agony and Leonora would still not be on America’s soil.

Two months.

The telegram was brief and did not list a sender.

I love you.

The letters were bold against the open space of the paper. James read the three simple words again. I love you. He could live through the seconds and the minutes and the hours and the days and the weeks and the months until Leonora returned to him. I love you. And it was enough.