This time she pulled away. “Oh, Joseph . . .” she whispered, her heart too full to find the words to express herself.

“I love you,” he said. “Most abundantly.”

“Aye.” She smiled. “Your kisses are abundant to be sure.”

He grinned in return. “I did once warn you that I am most reservedly saving my love for only one woman, the woman I plan to marry, and that I shall have an overflowing abundance of affection to bestow on her alone.”

Overflowing abundance of affection. The eloquent words fanned warmth into her veins.

He let his gaze linger on each part of her face, her brow, cheeks, nose, mouth, neck. A smoldering passion and love shone from his eyes. “I vow to you a lifetime of my affection, Mercy. Forever and always.”

Joy pulsed with each beat of her heart. God had indeed taken her on a voyage. Through it all, He’d done a mighty work inside her, changing her, teaching her to truly love, and making her ready for even greater things to come.

She couldn’t ask for anything more.

thirty-three

There you are, sweet lamb.” Mercy rocked the infant, swaying back and forth on her feet. The tiny brown face was delicate and beautiful, even with newborn swelling and redness that would eventually fade. The babe’s mother slept on a cot only a foot away, exhausted after a grueling labor and subsequent surgery. The woman seemed heedless of the cold, cramped, windowless shed that was filled with crates and boxes containing an assortment of medical supplies.

Though everyone else in Victoria’s small hospital wanted to send the native woman away, regardless of her miner husband’s pleas, Joseph had intervened. After assuring the staff that the woman wasn’t infected with smallpox, Joseph had been allowed to bring her into a supply shed outside the hospital, where he tended to her all through the previous night, delivering a daughter at dawn.

The miner had wept his gratitude and had only just left after Mercy insisted he find himself a hotel room to get some much-needed sleep. For all the condemnation the miners received for intermarrying with natives, Mercy had no doubt this one loved his wife dearly. At the first sign of his wife going into labor, he’d traveled tirelessly for miles out of the mountains to bring her to a doctor. He’d gone without sleep for days in his attempt to save her life, along with that of his unborn child.

He didn’t see the differences. He saw only the woman he loved.

She realized Joseph had grown into that kind of man too—the kind who’d learned to look past outward appearances and circumstances and value what was in the heart.

Mercy paused to touch the infant’s hand, which had escaped from the tight swaddle. The tiny fingers were each so perfectly formed, with thin fingernails and dimpled knuckles.