But above all things I care for thy happiness and well-being, and so I must also respect thy wishes. There is an expedition leaving in a few days’ time for Spanish Florida and beyond, and I have been invited to join the company. It will be a difficult two or perhaps three years before I return to this part of the world. Every day I will think of thee and pray that thou might find fulfillment and joy in thy life. To honor thee, I can do no less.

With all my heart, my love

Gabriel

After a long time, when she was calm, Elizabeth reached across the table and covered Curiosity’s hand with her own.

Chapter XLI

Late that night Elizabeth lay sleepless beside Nathaniel, her thoughts dashing one way and then the other. Daniel, Martha, Curiosity, Ethan, Callie, Curiosity. Jemima. Curiosity. Curiosity.

Nathaniel rolled onto his side and said, “I can hear you thinking, Boots. Talk to me.”

“We’ve been talking all day,” she said, her voice wavering. “Do you think another conversation would help?”

He smiled sleepily. “I do. This is me you’re talking to, and nobody else listening in. No need to hold back.”

“I haven’t been holding anything back.”

“No?”

Elizabeth tried to gather her thoughts. “Do you mean about Curiosity?”

“I’d say the fact that you brought her name up so quick means something. That story she told, that’s not something you can hide away and forget you ever heard.”

Elizabeth recognized the wisdom in this, even if she wasn’t particularly eager to pursue the discussion.

“I think the thing that surprised me most was the way she looked at me when she had finished. She truly believed I would turn her away and never speak to her again.”

“Sixty years holding that story back, I don’t doubt she was worried. And maybe rightly so. Talking about what happened so long ago has raised ghosts, is all.”

“She’s thinking about my mother.”

“And Gabriel. Boots, do you think your mother was unhappy?”

Elizabeth closed her eyes and sent her mind back to her ten-year-old self, just Birdie’s age. That last good summer before the sudden illness that took her mother’s life. She had so many clear memories of those few months. Over the years her mother’s face had faded, but still Elizabeth had a sense of her expression. Always calm, often cheerful. A poor relation, Quaker, an odd American with strange ideas but still valued and respected in Aunt Merriweather’s household. She had been the voice of reason and logic tempered with kindness, and all the children had come to her in times of hurt and uncertainty. Never once had Elizabeth heard her mother complain, but she had often heard her laugh.

“I don’t think she was unhappy, but what do children really understand of adults?” Elizabeth said. “Perhaps she wept every night.”

“She had the chance to come back here, but she stayed where she was. I think that means something.”

“I’ve wondered about that too,” Elizabeth said. “What a shock it must have been when her husband showed up, wanting to claim his wife and daughter both and take us back to Paradise. I wonder if she felt anger or only sadness. I think the fact that she conceived Julian during that visit is evidence enough that she struggled with guilt and remorse.”

“If she had brought you back here right then, we would have grown up together.”

“That’s an odd idea,” Elizabeth said. “I wonder what would have become of us.”

They were quiet for a long minute and then Elizabeth realized that Nathaniel had drifted off to sleep. As if to say, where else could we possibly be, but together in this bed, with children and grandchildren sleeping soundly nearby. Because neither of them could imagine a life without the other in it.

Chapter XLII

When they had been husband and wife for two days the rains stopped and the sun came out with a fierce purpose, and so Daniel and Martha started for home at dawn. The puppy slept in a basket tied to Martha’s saddle, apparently unruffled by the bumpy road. The plan was to reach Paradise by early afternoon and to go directly to his family at Uphill House.

“There will be some sort of party,” Daniel said, as if she might not like the idea. In fact, Martha did find it a little disconcerting.

“I suppose there’s no avoiding it.”

“Not if you want to stay in Birdie’s good graces. She dearly loves a party.”

“Just family?”

She felt him looking at her. “Today, yes. I can’t promise what will happen tomorrow at school.”

“Oh, that I don’t mind,” Martha said. “You don’t think it will be awkward, me taking over the younger students?”

“Hell, no,” Daniel said. “It’ll be a lot easier all the way around. A new bride puts most people in a cheerful mood.”

“I hope you’re right.”

He squinted at her.

“Is there somebody specific you’re worried about?”

“Let’s just say that I don’t have many admirers among girls my age.”

“Aha,” Daniel said. “Alice LeBlanc?”

“Among others.”

“They’ll get over it,” he said.

Which was certainly true, but how long it would take and how awkward the process might be, those questions seemed not to interest Daniel. She had finally found one thing in which he and Teddy were alike.

Maybe, she reasoned to herself, this disinterest had to do with the fact that male friendships were never quite so intense or close as those females forged. Or, a less charitable interpretation was simply that now that they were married—she still stumbled over that idea—she didn’t need anyone else in her life. She had him, and his family, and what else was necessary?