"Shh," Leah said, waving one hand as she used the other to hold the conch sh.e.l.l up to one ear. "I can hear the sea! Did your mamm find it on the beach in Sarasota?"

"No, she bought it in a local shop," he said, looking like he hated to admit it. "But there are others on the beach to pick up, and the weather is so warm there right now, compared to here."

"There's a letter in here, too," Leah said. She held it up for them to see, then unfolded it and gave it a quick scan. "She's inviting me to come for a little vacation."

"You should go. She misses you."

"Oh, I don't take vacations," she told him. "That's not the sort of thing I do."

"It would be good for you," Daniel said.

Leah got a faraway look in her eyes. Mary Katherine and her cousins exchanged another look.

"Why don't you?" Anna piped up as she picked up her knitting needles again. "You were just saying that you felt-"

"Like I need to go finish the deposit," she said, quickly getting to her feet.

As she moved quickly toward the back room, Naomi turned to Anna. "Why did you do that?"

Anna's needles stopped and she looked at Naomi with wide eyes. "Do what?"

Naomi rolled her eyes. "Sometimes I think you're still a little girl," she muttered. "You were about to say she felt old and tired."

"Well, she said it!"

"To us, not for us to say to her."

"Well! You just have to fuss at me for the least little thing," Anna said, getting to her feet as well. "I'll just take myself off into the other room so I don't say something else you don't like!"

With that she flounced out of the room and shut the door to the back room smartly behind her.

Daniel watched her, and then he looked back at Naomi and Mary Katherine.

"She hasn't changed a bit," he said, and they all laughed.

"I think I'll go turn the sign around and lock the door," Naomi said as she glanced at the nearby clock. "Daniel, you're welcome to stay and visit until we leave."

"Nee, danki," he said. "I have to be going. I'm having supper with some friends tonight."

"When do you leave for Florida?" Mary Katherine asked.

"The closing on the farm is in two weeks," he said. "Maybe we can have lunch sometime before then?"

"Schur, I'd like that," she told him.

He said goodbye to Naomi at the door, and, just as he was leaving, Jacob appeared at the door. They greeted each other, and Jacob walked over to Mary Katherine.

"He's still here?"

"He said the closing is in two weeks."

"Has he been visiting you much?"

Something about him caught her attention. He seemed casual, but she thought from the stiff way he held himself and the intense look in his eyes that he was waiting expectantly for her answer.

"I haven't seen him since the three of us had lunch that day," she told him. "Why?"

He shrugged but seemed to relax. "No reason." But he glanced at the door where Naomi was talking to Daniel. "Is he interested in Naomi?"

"It wouldn't matter," Mary Katherine told him as she got up from her seat before her loom. "She's been going to the singings with John Zook."

"I see."

"So what are you doing here?"

"I know this is last minute but I had to come in for my seed order, and I decided to stop by and ask if you want to have supper with me."

"You're celebrating your seed order?"

He stared at her for a long moment, and then he laughed. "Very funny. Just for that, I'm going to tell you my ideas for crop rotation as we eat."

Mary Katherine shuddered. "You're a cruel man, Jacob. I had no idea."

But over supper she was the one who talked, and she probably bored Jacob. But she had to admit he hid it well, asking her questions about the talk she was going to do at the college the next day and about how she was so nervous about it.

He listened, and then he said, "You'll do just fine. When you love what you do, it comes out."

"So you say."

Jacob grinned. "Yes, so I say. So it will be."

Mary Katherine remembered his words the next day as she walked onto the campus. True to her word, the professor had sent her work-study student to give her a ride and help carry the things Mary Katherine wanted to show the students.

Everyone seemed to be in a hurry. Students rushed here and there, carrying their backpacks and chattering a mile a minute. The building looked huge, totally different from the little one-room schoolhouse she and Jacob had attended.

Students filed into the room as the professor helped her set up the fabric samples that she had brought. Mary Katherine placed her note cards on the podium and then sat down and waited for the professor to introduce her.

She was used to being stared at by Englischers, so it didn't bother her that they were staring and whispering to each other. Some of the girls were dressed like Jamie-with a flair for the creative with their colors and contrasting fabrics and styles. Secretly, Mary Katherine thought it might be interesting to dress like that. She wore Plain dresses and that was fine, but there was such a limitation on colors, and of course the fabrics were always solid, not patterned.

She looked for Jamie, but her friend didn't show. The professor took attendance and quietly asked Mary Katherine if she knew why Jamie wasn't there. Mary Katherine shook her head.

"I thought she'd be here." Mary Katherine's shoulders slumped. She'd hoped to see her friend at the cla.s.s . . . well, she also had an ulterior motive: she wanted to use her for what Jenny had called "kind eyeb.a.l.l.s" as she spoke. She'd just have to call Jamie later to find out why she was absent.

With an eye on the clock, the professor started the cla.s.s and handed out an a.s.signment sheet for that night's homework. It had something to do with little squares of fabric and a color wheel. Then the professor introduced her.

Mary Katherine did what Jenny had suggested: she focused on one or two of the students who gave her "kind eyeb.a.l.l.s." That relieved her anxiety a little-she could then look around the room as she gave them a little background about herself. Then she told them about seeing a woman weaving one day at a county fair and how fascinated she'd been. An aunt did some weaving and gave her lessons. That led to her saving her money from a part-time job until she could afford a loom of her own.

She didn't tell them that her father had scoffed at her, that he'd proclaimed it a waste of money and a vanity. Instead, she described how she'd started making woven fabric and creating decorative pillows and throws and totes and all kinds of products at St.i.tches in Time.

A student raised her hand. "I know that shop. I got some material there for my cla.s.s project."

"My grandmother buys her quilting supplies there," another said.

Another student raised her hand, but the professor asked the cla.s.s to hold their questions until Mary Katherine was finished.

A bit embarra.s.sed, thinking she should have known to do that, Mary Katherine dropped a couple of her note cards and had to bend to pick them up. Fl.u.s.tered, she found that they were out of order. She wished she had numbered them when she had trouble putting them back in order. Her palms got sweaty and she felt a moment's panic.

Then she remembered what Jacob had said. He was right, she did have a pa.s.sion for what she did, and that was what she wanted to talk about. Taking a deep breath, she set the cards aside and began telling them how she got her inspiration from nature: how she went for walks in the nearby woods, where she got the idea for a fluffy throw with the delicate green of a fern frond, or a sofa pillow made from wool she twisted into strands of varying shades of brown.

It was a good thing she could see the clock because when she glanced at it her time was nearly up. She concluded by saying that the students were welcome to visit St.i.tches in Time to watch her weave.

The students applauded and then began pelting her with questions. Surprisingly, they were all on what she'd talked about, without any of them asking about her being Plain. Perhaps that was because so many of them had grown up in the community and saw Plain people so often they didn't regard them as an oddity to be questioned, as the tourists did. Or maybe they felt they'd be intruding.

With an eye on the clock, the professor thanked her, and the students applauded again. Exhilarated at what fun it had been, yet relieved it was over, Mary Katherine watched the students hurry out of the room, talking about their next cla.s.s or their evening plans.

"Wonderful job," the professor told her, beaming. "I'm so glad you were able to come talk to my students."

"Thank you," Mary Katherine said. "I've never talked in front of a group before. I was so worried!"

"Well, you'd never know you hadn't done it before. I hope you'll consider talking to another cla.s.s next semester."

"I'd be happy to," Mary Katherine said and meant it.

Students began filing into the room for another cla.s.s. Mary Katherine quickly gathered up her materials as the professor waited, her briefcase in her hands.

"Susan's waiting downstairs to take you back to the shop."

"Danki. I mean, thank you."

"Thank you. I'll be seeing you, then." She sighed as she watched students enter a room down the hall. "I'd better go. If I'm late, the students start hoping that I'm not coming and that they can leave after fifteen minutes."

Mary Katherine watched her hurry down the hallway. Leave? These students had a chance to learn fabric arts, and they didn't appreciate it enough to want to sit and wait for their instructor? Why, what she wouldn't give for a chance to learn about creating . . . she stopped so suddenly a student ran into her from behind.

"Sorry," she stammered, but the student had already pa.s.sed her, a cell phone pressed to her ear, and could be heard talking loudly.

The drive back to the shop was very different from the one to the college. It felt like a great load was lifted off her shoulders. She relaxed in the seat and chatted with Susan.

But when Susan turned down the road that led to Jacob's farmhouse, Mary Katherine couldn't help straightening and looking out her car window. Sure enough, she saw him standing in the fields, looking out at them. She remembered how what he'd said had helped her calm herself when she dropped her cards, how she'd used what he'd said about the pa.s.sion she had for what she did and that the students would want to hear about that. The success she'd had today had happened because of those words.

She wanted to tell him. Thank him.

"Can you drop me off here?"

"Here?" Susan asked, glancing in her rearview mirror and pulling over to the side of the road. "Is this your house?"

"No, it's a friend's."

"You don't want me to drive you back to the shop?"

"He'll take me."

"He?" Susan grinned at her. "I see."

"Jacob's just a friend."

"Whatever you say."

Mary Katherine colored as she opened her car door.

"Need some help with your stuff?"

Her arms full, Mary Katherine shook her head. "I've got it. Thanks!"

"My pleasure. Take care." She checked for traffic, then pulled back onto the road.

Mary Katherine dumped her things on the porch and then went to find Jacob. He was still standing in his fields, just looking out, relaxed and easy, broad-shouldered and handsome. Carefully she picked her way across the frozen ground, avoiding the ice-crusted ruts and patches of snow.

She called his name. He turned and his face lit up. Her feet faltered, and it seemed for a moment that there must be an earthquake, for she swayed, unsure of her footing.

He was a friend, she'd insisted to Jamie, and to her grandmother and her cousins, too. But as she stood there, staring at him, struck speechless, she realized that everything had changed.

He was everything that she'd resisted-a farmer, tied to the land. And he was so sure of his place here in a way that was totally opposite her own uncertainty.

But she suddenly realized that he was beginning to be more to her-so much more.

Jacob knew the minute he set eyes on Mary Katherine that her talk had gone even better than she'd hoped. Her eyes were sparkling, her cheeks flushed with color. He heard it in her voice when she called his name, saw it in the way she fairly danced across the fields.

But then he saw her nearly trip, and she stood there, staring at him like she'd never done before. Concerned, he hurried toward her, but she shook her head and seemed to recover. He wondered if he'd been mistaken about something being wrong.

"What are you doing here?" he asked, peering around her for a vehicle.

"My ride dropped me off. I wanted to stop by and thank you."

"Thank me for what?"

Hugging herself with excitement, she told him about the talk, about dropping the note cards and panicking. Then she described how she remembered what he'd said and how it had helped her.

He listened, but more, he watched how animated she became as she talked. She was an attractive woman, but before his eyes, she seemed to transform into beautiful. Of course, he didn't prize physical beauty over inner beauty, but it was as if her heart shone in her eyes as she spoke.

"And they loved my designs."

"Who wouldn't?"

Her smile faded. "I'm probably boring you. It's not the kind of thing men are interested in. Matter of fact, most men avoid even walking into the shop."

"Well, you're wrong. I enjoyed hearing about your talk. I'm glad you had such a good time. And I think you should do it again if you're asked."

He saw her shiver. "We should go inside so you don't get chilled and catch a cold."