The question appeared casual, but Starbuck was immediately aware that it carried a heavy freight of emotion. Truslow stared defiantly at his daughter, the mark of his hand still across her cheek, but she matched his defiance. Robert Decker looked from daughter to father, then back to the daughter and had the sense to keep his mouth shut.

“The ring’s special,” Truslow said.

“You holding it for another woman, is that it?” Sally sneered the question, and for a second Starbuck thought Truslow would hit her again, but instead he pushed a hand into a pocket of his coat and brought out a small leather bag. He untied the drawstrings and took out a scrap of blue cloth, which he unwrapped to reveal a ring. It glinted in the darkness, a ring of silver, etched with some design that Starbuck could not decipher.

“This was your mother’s ring,” Truslow said.

“And Ma always said it should be mine,” Sally insisted.

“I should have buried it with her.” Truslow gazed down at the ring, which was clearly a relic of great power for him, but then, impulsively, as though he knew he would regret the decision, he shoved the ring toward Starbuck. “Say the words,” Truslow snapped.

Roper snatched off his hat while young Decker composed his face into a serious expression. Sally licked her lips and smiled at Starbuck, who looked down at the silver ring laying on the ragged Bible. He saw the ring was engraved with words, but, in the dim light, he could not make them out. My God, he thought, but just what words was he to find for this travesty of a marriage act? This was a worse ordeal than the saw pit.

“Speak up, mister,” Truslow growled.

“God has ordained marriage,” Starbuck heard himself saying as he desperately tried to remember the marriage services he had attended in Boston, “to be an instrument of his love, and an institution in which we can bring our children into this world to be his servants. The commandments of marriage are simple, that you love one another.” He had been looking at Robert Decker as he spoke, and the young man nodded eagerly, as though Starbuck needed the reassurance, and Starbuck felt a terrible sob of pity for this honest fool who was being yoked to a temptress, then he glanced at Sally. “And that you are faithful to each other until death do you part.”

She smiled at Starbuck, and whatever words he had been about to say vanished like mist under a midday sun. He opened his mouth to speak, found nothing to say, so closed it.

“You hear the man, Sally Truslow?” her father demanded.

“Hell, yes, I ain’t deaf.”