Frightened, I ran to fetch some water from the dining room. Returning quickly as I could, I thought I heard a low murmur of voices as I drew nearer to the room, and I stopped upon the threshold of the scene. Susannah had awoken, though Mr. Gilroy still held her fast in his arms. She lay below, looking up into his worried face as he bent over her, and she slowly smiled. And he leaned farther down and kissed her. I stepped into the room then and came to my sister’s side, leaning over her to put a damp cloth upon her forehead, and without a word, she reached up and covered my hand and held it there upon her brow. A glad sob rose in my chest at her unexpected touch. Hayden held her for a moment more, and then he gently lifted Susannah up to a sitting position, where she placed her arms around me then and laid her head against my shoulders. With a pained look at me, he rose from the place and started for the door. But he could not leave, so turned again, with this to say:

“Your mother”—he cleared his throat quickly—“thinks me to be someone other than the man you see before you.” And then he opened the door and passed through.

We sat together on the carpet and listened to him gather his bags in the hallway, heard the front door open, then close behind him, his boots descending slowly down the porch stairs. Then came the quiet.

The two of us remained on the carpet, Sue’s arms about me and my cheek against the top of her head for a time. The sun stretched across the room to us along the gray floorboards, nearly reaching to our hems. I felt Susannah’s fingers loose their grip from off my shoulder and she put her head into her hands.

“I never loved him, Sue.”

She shook her head. “You have teased me unmercifully.”

“Nay.” I leaned in and tried to open the gate of her hands.

“Yes.” She dropped her hands and looked up at me. “You have.”

“I only meant to tweak you at times, Sue.”

She shook her head again.

“You angered me,” I said simply.

“I?”

I smiled despite myself. Susannah drew herself up to her knees, adjusting her skirts around the crumpled bustle. A bit of lace was caught on one of her back buttons, and I reached round to help her guide the fragile stuff off the shoals of bone and iron.

“Nell …” Sue sat still while I unhooked the buttons.

I did not answer.

“Do you think he loves me?”

I paused. She turned her head round to see me. I looked at her.

“Yes,” I answered truthfully.

She crossed her arms and whispered, “Then it is all made fine.”

“Nay, Sue.” I let go the buttons and moved to sit in front of her, but she would not meet my eyes. “Now say it, Nell,” she uttered very slowly. “Say the one true thing: that Mr. Gilroy loves me, and all your other thoughts about Mother are but fictions.”