In late September Tom rode Pete into Hilldale. Happily testing and sorting the various human scents in the road, Smoky ranged ahead. They broke out of the forest and into the little town’s outskirts. Not since riding out on the day he had returned to the mountains had Tom been back to Hilldale. Pop Halvorsen had brought their supplies out, and feed for their horses.
Nothing had changed, but Tom was not surprised. A tendency to change was not one of Hilldale’s most pronounced traits. There were the same houses, the same stores, and the same loafers sitting on the same benches in front of them. Shortly, when the weather became too cold to sit outside, the loafers would go inside and do their whittling around potbellied wood stoves.
Smoky trotted sorrowfully along, head down and the tips of
