“No!” Fanny was screaming. “No! No! No!” She had blundered into the stream, too, and was trying vainly to reach Cyrus and the paper, but the water was deeper here and was pulling at her skirts and she was staggering, shoes slipping in the mud and slime of the streambed.

Roger kicked off his own shoes, waded out, and grabbed Fanny around the waist.

“It’s all right,” he was saying urgently, dragging the girl through the current toward shore. “It will be all right!” But Fanny, who knew perfectly well that it wouldn’t be, went on shrieking, struggling mindlessly to reach the last remnant of her sister.

Dear Lord, show me what to do … What was there to do? he wondered. He set Fanny down, and the girl sank to her knees, curled up like a dying leaf, and went dead silent, bar great shuddering gasps for air.

“Daddy, Daddy!” Mandy, who was strictly forbidden to cross the creek alone, had just skipped over the stones like a cricket and now grabbed Roger’s leg, whimpering in panic.

Voices from uphill. The boys had heard the screaming and were running through the—oh, bloody hell—

“Get out of the garden!” Roger bellowed. The crunching noises of feet through turnips ceased instantly, and he dismissed the potential damage from his mind, needing all his attention to detach Mandy from his soggy leg while trying to say comforting things to Fanny.

Fanny was breathing like a winded horse. Worried that she might hyperventilate and pass out, Roger squatted down next to her and laid a hand on her narrow, heaving back.

“Fanny,” he said gently, “you’re soakin’ wet. Come inside. We’ll get ye some dry clothes and something hot to drink.” He put an urging hand under Fanny’s elbow, trying to get her to rise, but Fanny pressed her crossed arms tighter against her curled body and shook her head. The deep gasping had lessened, though, beginning to give way to sobs.

Squelching noises announced the hesitant approach of Cyrus, and Roger looked up at him, tall, gangly, and dripping, his face dead white.

“Mistress …” he said, and swallowed, having no idea how to go on.

“It’s no your fault, a bhalaich,” Roger began, but Cyrus shook off the halting words and collapsed to his knees in front of Fanny.

“Mistress …” he said again, tentative. Fanny ignored him completely, but he reached out his closed hand and opened it slowly under her nose.

The paper was little more than a soggy, crumpled ball in his palm. Roger heard him swallow again.

Fanny made a sound as though he’d driven a spike into her belly, snatched the remnant of paper from him, and cradled it against her chest, sobbing as though her heart would break.

I suppose it already is broken, poor little thing …

“Mo chridhe bristeadh,” Cyrus whispered, his face crumpled with misery. “B’fhearr gu robh mi air bathadh mus do thachair an cron tha seo ort.” Shattering is my heart. I would that I had drowned before I allowed such evil to come upon you.