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wondering what sort of house Titus and Uncle Ben had produced. Should she brace herself for disappointment? Her fears increased when she glimpsed a wretched-looking sod house in the distance, surrounded by sagebrush, a few half-starved cattle, and one weather-beaten old man on horseback.
    "My new neighbors?" she inquired sweetly.
    Ben Avery glanced toward the tiny sod house and savored the opportunity to tease her. Deadpan, he waved to the rancher and remarked, "Bart Croll isn't so bad for a fella missing half his teeth. He rolls cigarettes faster than anyone I've ever seen." Ben poked Titus in the back. "Titus, didn't Bart mention that he's been corresponding with one of those matrimonial clubs in the East—?"
    Titus Pym, a pink-cheeked little gnome who still retained hints of his Cornish accent, took pity on Shelby. He'd been working for Fox Matthews for nearly twenty-six years, before Fox and Maddie even knew they were in love. It was hard for Titus to think of Shelby as anything other than a little girl he was sworn to protect. Now he gave Ben a bewhiskered frown and scolded, "You always were the troublemaker, lad, ever since you was runnin' about Deadwood's badlands in short pants! Don't be foolin' our Shelby. Bart Croll isn't fit to shake her hand, even if he hadn't already found a wife. I heard that he brought a pretty little thing back from St. Louis a few weeks ago."
    "A mail-order bride, huh? Poor thing."
    Shelby felt her panic subside, replaced by outrage as she turned on her uncle. "How could you be so horrid to me at a time like this?"
    Ben laughed and stretched out his long legs, but refused to say more except to assure his niece that her new home would not have a mud roof.
    At last, in a lushly wooded glade near the blue sweep of the river, Shelby caught her first glimpse of the Sunshine Ranch. At the entrance to the lane that branched off the main road was a sort of archway consisting of two tall poles supporting a long wooden sign. The sign had been carved with the ranch's brand: a circle with eight lines radiating outward like a child's rendering of a shining sun.
    Shelby's eyes searched through the sheltering stand of old cottonwood trees until she found the ranch house. As they drew nearer, she felt a great surge of relief, then joy.
    A spacious veranda stretched across the front of the sturdy log house. She was immediately struck by its resemblance to the first home her father had built in Deadwood, a log structure that still stood and was used by Fox as his office. This ranch house had generous proportions and wide windows. To Shelby's astonishment, she found that the roof had even been made of real shingles. Both ends of the house were hugged by mammoth chimneys of river rock and there was a wide, shaded veranda across the front.
    When the buckboard rolled to a stop, Ben Avery lifted his niece to the ground. In early April the weather was still chilly, although the sunshine and the trilling of birds promised that real spring was at hand. Proud of all that he and Titus had accomplished since summer, with the help of good hired men, Ben pointed out the stable, outbuildings, and the bunkhouse that were still going up. There were corrals filled with cattle and wild-looking horses. And, in a sunny area away from the trees, Ben had built a white picket fence around the garden that they would soon be able to till and plant.
    "I know you can't cook to save your life, Shel, but you're gonna have to learn, and fast! Did Maddie give you lessons this winter like she promised me she would?" Ben ran a hand through his thick sandy hair and looked boyishly hopeful.
    Shelby laughed. "Uncle Ben, you know that Mama can barely cook herself!"
    His face fell. "But we were counting on you! I burn everything I touch, and we've got four hired hands to feed—"
    "Oh, for heaven's sake, what a pitiful sight you are, Uncle Ben." She gave him a dimpled smile and patted his wide back. "I can do anything I set my mind to, even