“Be that as it may,” Scully said, narrowing those intensely blue-green eyes a little as he regarded her, “there aren’t many folks around these parts, but there are some, and this is your chance to meet up with them. I’ll teach you the steps to a reel directly after supper.”

Evangeline stared at him, utterly confused. It was against her better judgment, letting Scully hold her, even for the purpose of dancing, and yet she found the prospect too compelling to refuse out of hand. “You’ve barely been speaking to me since Christmas,” she pointed out. “Now you want to teach me to dance. Why is that, Scully?”

She’d been hurt that, after a wonderful day, after the tree and Abigail’s ribbons, after giving her a silver vanity set, he’d withdrawn from her so thoroughly, so abruptly. He’d gone to bed her friend, on Christmas night, and gotten up the next morning as a stranger who was just passing through, sparing her as few words as he could and doing his best to avoid her at every turn.

“You know why,” he said.

Behind them, next to the hearth, Abigail could be heard prattling to Hortense and the wooden horse in her sing-song fashion. She was playing teacher, and the cat and toy were her pupils. There was something comforting in the sheer Abigail-ness of that.

“No,” Evangeline said honestly. “I don’t know. We’re barely acquainted anymore, Scully. What happened?”

“It’s not what happened,” he replied. “It’s what’s going to happen. Soon. Big John will be here in a few weeks, Eve. You and I have no business being any more to each other than we have been. But I want to dance with you, I want a reason to hold you before I have to let you go.”

Tears, merely a possibility before, became an immediate threat. Evangeline turned her back and drew a deep, tremulous breath, dabbing at her eyes with the hem of her homemade apron. “I can’t bear it,” she said, the words barely more than a whisper, carried away by the spring winds.

He touched her, something he hadn’t done since before Christmas, laying his hands to her shoulders, turning her around to face him. “I’m sorry, Eve,” he said. “I don’t mean to make this harder. I just wanted—”

“Don’t you think I want that, too?” Evangeline cried. “I need more than a dance, Scully. I need for you to stay—”

Scully laid an index finger to her lips and tilted his head to one side, to remind her that Abigail was nearby. “It can’t be that way,” he said. “We’ve settled that already. The dance is meant as a celebration of Big John’s return, Eve. Jacob will expect to marry the two of you up proper while you’re there at the station.”

“I don’t care what Jacob expects,” she hissed, “or Big John, either! All this seemed—well, possible after Mr. Keating died and Abigail and I had to leave the farm, but now, when it’s really about to happen—”