FADE IN: EXT. THE SALT ROAD, WYOMING TERRITORY, DAWN The Salt Road stretches west through country that has no interest in the people crossing it. White mineral flats to the south. Low sage scrub to the north. A sky the color of old bone going pale at the horizon. A covered wagon moves through this, pulled by two oxen, their breath showing faint in the cold of early morning. The wagon is not new. The canvas has been patched twice. The wheels are wooden, the rims worn smooth. A BRASS LOCK hangs on a strongbox wedged under the driver's seat, catching the first light. CORA BELL (38) sits on the seat with the particular economy of a woman who has been doing this for months. She holds the reins loose but precise. Her dress is dark and practical, her bonnet pushed back to see the road. Her hands are calloused. Her face has the specific stillness of someone who processes the world inward, not outward. Beside her, ELIZA BELL (10) sits upright with a worn primer open on her lap, tracing letters with one finger. She reads with the concentration of a child who has decided that reading on a moving wagon in the early morning cold is a reasonable thing to do and who intends to complete it. Behind them, in the wagon bed, MARCUS BELL (7) is asleep in a nest of blankets, his face slack and open, one arm thrown over the edge of a wooden box. 1