She loved to haggle with the green grocer, the butcher, the flower vendor, and the milk man. She watched every one of Jay Mac's household accounts as closely as she watched the stock market. In her mind the two were related. The housekeeper supposed that whatever she could save on the front end would be returned to her twofold through her stocks at Northeast Rail. Jay Mac tried to explain once that it didn't work that way, but there was no telling Mrs. Cavanaugh anything once she had her mind made up. To Mary's way of thinking that trait went a long way to making Mrs. Cavanaugh one of the family.

"Your mother's gone shopping," Peggy offered.

"I don't think she expected you before tea." Mary did not let her relief show. The comet of her habit continued to frame delicate, serenely untroubled features.

"And Jay Mac's at his office?"

Peggy nodded, and several strands of dark hair slipped from beneath her dainty, starched cap. She tucked them back quickly.

"Since early this morning, Sister."

"I'm just Mary here." Peggy's hazel eyes were skeptical as they took in Mary's habit from head to toe.

"That will take some getting used to," she said uncertainly.

"I was raised by the Sisters at St. Stephen's. They weren't likely to ask me to call them by their given names." Mary saw Peggy glance upward as if she were expecting lightning to strike. She said dryly, "In my experience, Peggy, our Lord uses more subtle means-at least before tea." Peggy's eyes widened so the whites were completely visible around her hazel irises.

"Oh my, you're just like they said you were." Mary didn't ask who "they" were or what "they" said. Clearly the newest member of the staff had had her head filled with tales.

"I'd like to use my old room," she told Peggy.

"That's fine, Sister.. I mean.. ."

Her voice trailed off as she tried to correct herself "I just finished cleaning it. Mrs. Cavanaugh said you might want to have a lie-down there."

"Thank you, Peggy." When the girl started to precede her up the stairs, Mary laid a gentle hand on her shoulder.

"It's not necessary. I think I know my way." Peggy flushed.

"Very good." She made another small bob and hurried down the hall.

Mary's room was much the way she had left it thirteen years earlier.

Dolls from her childhood crowded the overstuffed chair by the fireplace. Photographs of herself and her sisters as young hoydens took most of the space on the mantel. Her collection of small glass figurines was still on one corner of her vanity. An ivory-handled mirror, a gift for her sixteenth birthday, still lay on the other corner, her initials worked carefully into the pattern of roses on the reverse side. Two brushes, both made of boar's bristles and imported from London, lay beside the mirror. The small cedar box beside them held ribbons and tortoiseshell combs.

Mary's slender fingers trailed lightly over the lid of the box.

Her hair had been her one true vanity, she thought, so it was good that it had been cut. She had had to fight tears as the weight of each long curl was lifted away from her head and lopped. There was no mirror for her to watch the shearing, but a single glance at the floor, at the red-gold carpet of hair surrounding her feet, told its own story. The face of Sister Benedict told another.

"She knew it was my vanity," Mary said softly to herself. Her fingers left the box and ran across the tips of the brushes.

"She took a lot of pleasure in watching it go." Even now Mary could hear the snapping of the shears. There had been no public tears for the loss of her hair, only private ones. And they fell silently in her solitary room as she prayed for forgiveness for being so proud.

"Maybe Sister Benedict knew I would always struggle with pride."

But Mary didn't believe it. Sister Benedict was a small-spirited, spiteful woman who liked nothing so much as making others feel they were not as worthy as she. Mary ignored the four-poster with its eyelet lace comforter and pillow shams. She had not returned to her room for a lie-down as Peggy imagined. She was set on a different purpose this day. Sunshine from the French doors fell across the writing desk and polished floor in slanted rectangles of light. Mary sat at the desk and opened the middle drawer where the ecru stationery was neatly stacked. She had been composing the letters she was about to write for months in her head. Knowing what she wanted to say did not make her task any less difficult.

The first letter was to Maggie. Wise Maggie whose skill at healing often extended to those with no visible wounds. She wrote to Maggie about her decision, what it meant to her, and what she suspected it would mean to the family. Maggie would understand where there would be hurt and where there would need to be healing.

The letters that followed were copies of the first in some of the content, but each missive accounted for the uniqueness of the sister who was going to read it. To Michael, the reporter for the Rocky Mountain News Mary described her decision as writing a new chapter in her life. For Michael's twin, Rennie, a construction engineer for Northeast Rail, Mary wrote in terms of building bridges with her past and the foundation of her spirit. Composing Skye's letter was perhaps the easiest. To Skye, her baby sister who wanted nothing so much as adventure, Mary wrote of just that.

Change was its own adventure, and the change she was planning would give her that ten times over. Each letter was carefully folded, the envelopes neatly addressed. Three would find their destination in different parts of Colorado. One would find Skye months from now in Shanghai. Mary relaxed in the ladder-backed chair and stretched. Her fingers uncurled stiffly. The small of her back curved until she felt the lines of tension ease. There was a tiny popping noise in her neck as she moved it from side to side. She picked up the letters and carried them downstairs. She considered giving them to Peggy to post, but decided there was no one she wanted to entrust with the mailing of these particular letters.

Mary found her shawl and left the house unnoticed, accomplishing her mission by the time her mother arrived home from shopping.

Moira Dennehy Worth was a petite woman who stood only as high as her oldest daughter's chin. That didn't stop her from hugging Mary to her breast as if this grown woman were still a child in braids.

"It's good to see you, darling," she said cheerfully. She took a step back, examined Mary carefully, and pronounced herself satisfied.

"You're looking very well. You've a bit of color in your cheeks this afternoon."

"You just squeezed it in there."

Moira wagged a finger, but she was smiling.

"Don't be insolent."

Mary kissed her mother's softly lined cheek.

"All right." That lifted Moira's dark red brows a notch.

"So agreeable? Are you certain you're not sickening with something?"

"Mother." The dry, level tone was more familiar to Moira. She smiled and rang for tea.

"Come and see what I've bought for your nieces and nephew."

"Your grandchildren, you mean."

"You always were the quick one," Moira acknowledged with a sly smile.

She began opening the packages from A. T. Stewart's and Donovan's which covered the cushions of all the available sitting space in the front parlor.

She paused long enough in her enthusiastic recounting of choosing the perfect dress for Madison to order tea and sandwiches when Peggy arrived. Mary dutifully admired each outfit and accessory her mother unfolded from the tissue-paper packaging.

There was enough ribbon, lace, and bows to set up shop as a milliner.

Every item was quite lovely and obviously chosen with an eye for color and the individuality of each of the grandchildren.

"Are you going to send these out for Christmas?" she asked.

"Actually I was thinking I might get your father to visit Denver before then."

"That's all?" Moira asked.

"Just "Oh'? "Don't you think it's a good idea?" Mary injected the proper note of passion into her voice.

"I think any time you can get Jay Mac away from the Worth building and Northeast Rail, it's a good idea. You'll have an argument, though, since everyone was just together for Maggie's graduation." Moira sighed, surveying the bounty of purchases.

"I know. But that gathering made me want to have all my babies under one roof again."