“Oh Caesar!” Bliss called sweetly, turning the wooden latch on the wire gate and opening it wide. “I’m here to gather the eggs!”

He appeared from out of nowhere, flapping his wings and carrying on fit to scare the devil himself, but Bliss was ready for him. Swiftly, she lowered the upended washtub, trapping the nasty rooster beneath it.

Dog yipped in delight, running round and round in circles, and Bliss hummed as she gathered the eggs, leaving Caesar as he was when she went inside the house. The bird needed time to consider the error of his ways.

She was aproned and squinting at the words in the cookbook Jamie had given her when she heard a wagon coming up the road. Dog dashed toward the front of the house, barking uproariously.

Bliss was certain that Jamie was back from the sheep camp. She dropped the cookbook and ran her hands over her flyaway, tumbledown hair, wishing that she’d taken the time to put it up. . . .

She ran out of the kitchen and along the hallway to pull aside a curtain in the front parlor and look out. If Jamie turned toward the barn instead of coming directly to the house, she would have time to dash upstairs, exchange her flour-dusted dress for a clean one, and wind her hair into a ladylike coronet.

The wagon lumbered toward the house, but the driver was not Jamie; Bliss had never seen the man before. The woman sitting rigidly upright beside him, however, was all too familiar.

It seemed that Peony Ryan had come to call.

Tight-lipped, but determined to be mannerly, Bliss opened the front door and went out. Dog stood just behind her, growling uncertainly.

Peony was pale as death. “Is Jamie here?” she asked in a faint voice as the driver pushed the rig’s brake lever into place and wrapped the reins around it.

Bliss shook her head and, after a sharp word to Dog, started down the stone walk. She was no longer self-conscious about her wild hair and floury dress, as she had been a moment before.

Something was terribly wrong.

“Peony, what is it?” she asked as the strange man leaped down from the wagon to walk around the other side and extend his arms to his passenger.

Peony closed her eyes and went a shade whiter. “I must see Jamie,” she said, clinging to her escort’s arm for support as he guided her toward the house. “Where is he, Bliss? Will he be back soon?”

Bliss hurried ahead, racing up the steps and across the porch to hold the front door open. “He’s in the sheep camp, with Cutter and the others,” she answered breathlessly. In her anxiety over Peony’s obvious state of ill health, she’d forgotten all the reasons why she disliked the woman.

The man led Peony into the parlor, helped her into a chair, and then went back outside, without a word, probably to fetch her baggage.

Bliss gazed at her visitor in puzzled concern. “Please,” she said, “what’s happened to you?”