"If it's not too much trouble," Kim said. "I do have some news I want to tell."

"About Wesley?" Leah asked eagerly, following Kim up the stairs.

"You haven't heard from him?" Kim asked, eyebrows raised in speculation.

"Have you?" Regan interrupted, leading the way into the small parlor as she ordered tea from a servant.

"Not often," Kim said modestly. When they were seated, she spoke again. "I want to be honest about

everything and I was, to say the least, very upset at what happened last year. I couldn't bring myself to

even hear Wesley's name for months afterward."

Leah toyed with her fingers in her lap. She had given so little thought to how this woman must have felt at losing the man she loved.

"As you know," Kim continued, "it was planned that Wesley and I, with my brother Steven, would travel to Kentucky together and I'd looked forward to going to a new state with* with*" She stopped as the tea was brought in.

When the servant was gone, Regan spoke. "You didn't come here to tell us about last year's plans, so

why are you here?"

Big fat tears clouded Kim's pretty eyes. "Since that day in church my life has been awful, just dreadful.

Regan, you really can't imagine what it's been like. I'm laughed at constantly. Every time I go to church someone makes a remark about how I was* jilted." She glanced at Leah, who was still looking at her hands. "Even the children are making up rhymes about what happened."

She buried her face in her hands. "It's too awful. I can't bear it any longer."

In spite of herself, Regan felt her heart go out to the woman. "Kim, what can we do? Maybe Travis could talk to the people or."

"No," Kim said. "The only way is to leave. Leah," she said, pleadingly, and Leah met her eyes. "You

don't know me, but I want to ask you to do something for me, something that will save my life."

"What can I do?" Leah asked seriously.

"In Wes's last letter to me, he said he was returning at the end of March, then the two of you and my

brother would start the journey to Kentucky."

A month! Leah thought. In just a month Wesley would be home and she would really be his wife.

"Let me go with you," Kimberly was saying. "I could travel with Steven and the four of us could go

somewhere where no one knows what's been done to me. Please, Leah, I have no right to ask anything

of you, I know, but it was because of you that."

Regan stood and cut off Kim's words. "I think you're asking too much of Leah and I don't think she should."

"Please, Leah," Kim asked. "Maybe I can find a husband in Kentucky. Here everyone laughs at me. It's miserable, really miserable and you already have Wesley, the one man I've ever loved and."

"Yes," Leah said firmly. "Of course you may go with us."

"Leah," Regan said, "I think we should discuss this."

"No," Leah said, looking at Kim. "It's my fault that this has happened to you and I'll do what I can to give you back some of what you've lost."

"That's not your responsibility," Regan began, but Leah gave her a look she'd never seen before.

"Would you pour?" Leah said to Regan, and Regan sat down and obeyed her.

Chapter 5.

Leah put the last stitches in the border of the coverlet, a blue and white Irish chain pattern, and smoothed it in her lap. She looked up at Janie's laugh.

"Is it my imagination or are your hands shaking?"

Leah returned her smile. "I think they are a bit." She paused. "Was that the bell?"

Janie laughed harder. "I'm afraid not."

"You don't think they'd forget to ring it, do you? I mean, they wouldn't let Wesley arrive and not tell me."

"Leah," Janie said, her hand on her shoulder, "Travis and Regan are waiting to see him too. The minute he's sighted, they'll ring the bell."

At that moment came the loud, excited clang of the bell by the wharf.

Leah didn't move but her face drained of color.

"Don't look so scared," Janie said with a laugh. "Come on, let's greet him."

Slowly, Leah rose, looking down in doubt at her dress. She wore a deep rust-colored silk twill that brought out the auburn in her hair, and the high waist was trimmed with black silk ribbons, with more ribbons entwined in her hair, which was piled on her head in a mass of glossy curls.

"You look beautiful," Janie was saying as Regan rushed into the room.

"Are you going to stay here all day?" Regan demanded. "Don't you want to see him?"

"Yes!" Leah gasped. "Oh yes!" And together the three of them left the loom house at a run.

Two weeks before, Travis had received news from Wesley saying that he and Steven were returning around the second of April; today was the third. Travis had sent someone upriver to watch for the men, and the moment they were seen the big wharf bell was to be rung so everyone could come to greet the returning men.

Now, as Leah was running, she touched the gold coin pinned to the inside of her pocket, the coin Wesley had given her so long ago. Would he be pleased with the way she'd changed? As they drew near the wharf and she could see Travis talking to someone, she stopped running. I will make you the best wife in all the world, my Wesley, she vowed. You'll never regret having lost your Kimberly.

Leah was behind the gathering crowd as everyone pushed to greet the returning men, but as people moved about, Leah had her first glimpse of him. He'd put on some size while he'd been gone and now stood as big as Travis; covering his broad shoulders was an outrageous costume of pale leather, fringed about the shoulders and down the sides of his pants legs. Crisscrossing his shoulders were straps to a couple of pouches, one decorated with an intricate design of tiny beads. On his head was a broad-brimmed hat that looked as if it'd made the journey back and forth to Kentucky tied to the bottom of a wagon wheel.

Leah looked at him and felt her heart begin to beat faster, her throat closing in anticipation. She'd waited for this moment for years and years.

"Here she is," Travis was saying, slapping his brother's shoulder.

As he said the words, Leah saw Wesley's face turn from the joy of greeting to one of coldness, and she hesitated.

Regan came forward and took Leah's arm. "Come on. He doesn't even recognize you."

Hesitantly, shyly, Leah stepped toward her husband.

"She's changed some, hasn't she?" Travis was saying with pride. "Could have knocked me over with a feather when she cleaned up so pretty."

Blushing, but very pleased, Leah looked up through her lashes at Wesley. He was looking toward the fields over her head.

"You have to tell me how last year's crops were," Wes was saying. "And I'll need some seed to take back with me. Ah!" He smiled. "Is that Jennifer?" he called to Travis and Regan's five-year-old daughter who was running toward her uncle. "Excuse me," Wesley said and made his way through the crowd to greet the child.

For a moment everyone was too embarrassed to speak, but as they cast looks of sympathy toward Leah, the crowd began to break apart.

Leah, stunned at Wes's lack of greeting, watched as he and Jennifer walked toward the house.

"That bastard!" Travis began, but Regan put her hand on his shoulder and shook her head. "I think I'll talk to him," Travis said and left Leah and Regan alone on the wharf.

"Leah," Regan began.

"Leave me alone," Leah snapped. "I don't need sympathy from anyone. I was stupid to think there could ever be anything between us. I'm just a poor girl from the swamp of the river with a whore for a sister, so why should he even bother to look at me?"

"Stop it!" Regan commanded. "Wesley isn't like that. Maybe he was shocked when you were so pretty. After all, he's never seen you looking as you do now."

Leah gave her a look of contempt. "I am not quite that stupid."

"Let's go to the house," Regan urged. "Travis will talk to him and find out what's wrong." She took Leah's arm. "Please," she pleaded.

Leah allowed herself to be pulled along by Regan, but she held her head high as everyone they passed gave her a look of pity.

They were barely inside the house when the sound of shouting came to them, and both women stood paralyzed at what they heard.

"You expect me to stop hating her merely because she cleaned up pretty?" Wesley was shouting. "I've hated her from the moment I married her, ever since she made it impossible for me to have the woman I loved. All winter I worked long, long days trying to sweat out my hatred of her, but I couldn't. I wouldn't even sleep in the house knowing that the slut was going to be living in it. She's ruined my life and now you expect me to fall all over myself merely because she's washed her face?"

Regan didn't allow Leah to hear any more, except for a few crashes as a fight between the brothers seemed to break out, before she shoved Leah up the stairs to the room Leah was to have shared with her husband. Regan leaned against the door, so shocked and hurt that she couldn't move.

Not so Leah, who went to the wardrobe where her new dresses mixed with Wesley's suits. "I won't take much," Leah was saying. "But I'll need a few clothes. Perhaps you can sell what's left and the money will help repay what you've given me."

Regan took a moment to react to Leah's words. "What are you talking about?"

Leah folded two dresses, her hands and body shaking. "I'll go back to the farm. I worked it before and I can certainly work it enough to support myself. Maybe I can still have the loom Clay gave me and sell some weaving."

"You're running away?" Regan gasped.

The face Leah turned to her was filled with fury. "All of you may think I'm nothing, that because I grew up without the finer things of life that I'm not worth much, but I have my pride and I'll not stay here where I'm hated."

"How dare you!" Regan seethed, her teeth clenched. "No one before today has treated you with anything but respect and how dare you insinuate that we have!"

The women were practically nose to nose before Leah turned away. "I'm sorry," she whispered. "Please forgive me."