‘There’s an awful lot you want to know, isn’t there?’ she said. He didn’t have any idea what she was talking about. ‘It’s difficult to know where to begin—’

‘What about at the beginning?’

A crease appeared between her brows. ‘But—’

‘Well, then, what about now?’ he said.

She took in her breath. ‘Right now,’ she said, ‘the whole Stoke family’s in Washington.’ Jonathan’s heart lurched sideways in his chest. ‘Old Mister Shockton – he’s the one with all the money – he’s had a stroke, and they’ll probably stay there until—’

‘I don’t want to hear about this,’ he interrupted angrily. ‘It’s nothing to do with me.’

Her startled look took him as much by surprise as his anger had taken her. ‘Isn’t that what – I’m sorry, sir. I thought—’

‘Why do you call me “sir”? Do I seem so fearfully old to you?’

‘Because – what should I call you? I’ll call you anything you want.’

They stood irresolute for a moment. He turned away from her, sighed irritably and turned back. ‘Forgive me,’ he said. ‘I talked a lot, didn’t I?’

‘People with fevers often do. You did say some things you must have had on your mind a long time. You talked special about George Stoke, a lot.’

‘I don’t remember,’ he snapped, the anger slipping out of control again. She reached out to him – almost involuntarily, or so it seemed – touched his arm, and as quickly drew her hand back. Jonathan studied the smooth skin of her cheeks, pink from the cold air. What could he say to make sense to her, or to himself, either? But her expression, the concern in her eyes, and those gentle, protective movements – maybe sense had nothing to do with what was needed. It came to him then that what he needed was precisely what she was offering him. A gust of wind blew snowflakes into her hair, and because the day was so very cold, a second gust blew them away again. Why did the chicken cross the road? he thought suddenly. To defend? To attack?

‘I’ve lost my faith, Sarah,’ he said.

She bent her head over the fur muff she carried. ‘Everybody has doubts. A preacher has to have them, too.’

‘Did I babble on about this as well?’

‘It’s not important. What’s important is that you can’t really help anybody if you’re too sure—’

‘I can’t help anybody anyway.’

They walked on in silence a moment. ‘Why not?’ she said. ‘Is it blind faith you want? Like an ox?’

‘Loaves, fishes, bodies disappearing from caves. How can anybody believe such stupid stuff? How could I have been taken in? I? Of all people? And for years? I don’t trust anybody. I’ve never trusted anybody. If you believe it at all, you believe it like an ox.’

‘I believe it.’

‘Well, good for you. How old are you?’

‘I’m twenty in January,’ she said. ‘I doubt things, you see, things I shouldn’t doubt—’