Normally the sheer crush of folks would keep him well away from the lights, the barn all lit up like Christmas. Still, there was something about a fiddle singing that tugged on a man's soul, pulled him where good sense told him not to go.

"Well, Red Farr. I'll be. I never reckoned to see you in decent company." Terrance Wickers and his woman Jess were standing by the door, Jess dressed much like them -- lawn shirt and homespun trousers. Like any of them fine dressed farmers' daughters and prissy smooth handed boys would accept a one of them as decent.

He found Terry a smile though, and a nod for Jess. Lord knew Terry'd fought the good fight same as him and Jess had lost man and home, child and stock to the aggressors. "Music's fine."

Red peered in, looked up to the man calling square -- Old Pete, with his one last tooth and dead arm. Remy the Frenchie worked the banjo and his brother Michel was making the Jew's harp go. The fiddle player though?

That man wasn't from these parts, nor the trail, neither.

He was tall, square, his heavy coat making him seem thick, though the face and the hands told Red he was just the opposite. From the distance he couldn't see the man's eyes well, but they looked like holes burnt in a blanket under the wide brim of the man's hat. It was the hands that got him. Long fingers, rough skin, two twisted silver wire rings glinting in the light, those hands played that fiddle like it was a lover, like it was the most important thing on earth.

It made him hot inside like that first sip of morning coffee and Red let himself spend a minute dreaming. Weren't no one that could hear his thoughts, that could know the sinful thoughts he had in the dark. Stood to reason he could put a stranger's hands in those thoughts and have them standing in the shadows.

The stomping and clapping and dancing came to a crescendo, and the music stopped, everyone whistling and hooting. Looked like he'd gotten there just in time for the food. He wondered if the fiddler would stay about to play after.

Red stepped back away from the crowds and the lights, heading out to pasture to check the horses, make sure things were settled for the night. All the crew was here; they deserved a little break, a little civilization, a little rest.

'Sides, from the pasture he could hear if the music started up again.

He hadn't been out there long when he saw the flare of a lucifer match, the tiny light of a cheroot being lit. And it was headed his way. ENDEXCERPT