The first was Mara's cushion collectiona wild assortment of pillows bought in a wild assortment of places and clustered in masses to rival the softest, deepest sofa. Paige smiled at the memory of Mara's wards running and jumpiny, tossinq and turning, laughing hysterically right along with Mara.

The second was her work bench, an old barn door with legs attached. It held books and magazines, mailsome opened, some notand road maps, a basket of fabric scraps, a half-finished pillow, and an instruction book from the quilting class she had been taking.

The third were the photographs that graced every free wall. They were ones Mara had taken and developed under Peter's watchful eye, and whereas one would have expected the pictures to be of children, they weren't. They were pictures of naturetrees, bridges, meadows, animalseach capturing a feeling that was every bit as intense as the emotion on a child's face might have been.

Given her druthers, Paige would have sealed off this room. The memory of Mara was nearly overpowering here, engulfing her with the same disbelief that she had felt so strongly during the first few days after Mara's death. Then came sadness, because the mind knew what the heart still could not accept.

Taking a breath and delving in, Paige cleared the desktop, spritzed it, wiped it down. After fanning several of the magazines on the table, she put the rest, along with the mail and the maps, in the trunk of her car. She arranged the quilting materials as artfully as she could, feeling all the while as though she were fashioning a tribute to Mara.

She took even greater pains with the pillows, arranging them one way, then another, then a third when she felt that neither of the previous arrangements properly caught the spirit of Mara.

And that was important. Paige had promised Mara on the day of the funeral that she would find a family that would love the house as she had, and she was determined to do it. If the realtor's family disliked this room, they couldn't have the house.

Dusk arrived. She switched on lights, moved into the dining room, and began polishing its contents. Mara had bought the long table and chairs at an estate sale. The pomposity of them had amused heror so she had always claimed. Now, rubbing a cloth over the cherrywood, Paige wondered if there hadn't been a deeper attraction. She had seen a set like this before. She could have sworn it had been at the O'Neills' house in Eugene.

The sadness hit her in waves, occasionally so strong that she sank onto a chair until inertia proved worse. So she set a feverish pace in the kitchen. When she began to sweat, she tied up her hair with a piece of yarn from Mara's basket, pulled her T-shirt free of her shorts, opened the window, and pushed on. When her muscles complained, she ignored them. She was willing to do most anything to blot out the sense of emptiness that seemed to have settled over her life.

It didn't make sense, that emptiness. Mara had been a vibrant part of her life for twenty years, that her death should leave a gap was understandable. but that the gap should be so largFand spreadine was unfair.

She was cleaning the oven, scrubbing angrily, when the doorbell rang.

It was just after ten.

She wasn't in the mood for guests, couldn't begin to imagine who was there other than a neighbor curious about the lights. Traipsing through the hall to the front door, she switched on the outside light.

A large form lurked beyond the wavy glass panel. Definitely a neighbor, she thought, picturing Duncan Fallon. He was the gatekeeper type and would be wanting to know who was in Mara's house.

Strange he hadn't recognized her car.

But it wasn't Duncan. It was Noah Perrine.

One look at him, and she groaned.

"Bad time?" he asked in that soft voice of his.

"Yeah." Her heart was poundinga delayed reaction to the surprise of the doorbell, she told herself. "I'm tired and dirty. I'm not up for sparring. Maybe another time?" Then she frowned. "How did you know I was here?"

"Your baby-sitter."

"Did you stop by at the house?"

He shook his head. "Called."

"Ah." She nodded. It was a minute before it occurred to her to wonder why he had come, and then her eyes went wide. "Oh, God. Something happened" "No," he broke in. "Everything's fine."

She pressed a hand to her chest. "I had a horrible image ofofjust a horrible image."

Pills, a car her own imagination couldn't match that of a teenager intent on self-destruction.

But he repeated, "Everything's fine."

"Thank God." The doorknob steadied her. "So, were you just out driving around?" It was a nice enough night. He should have kept on driving.

"Campus was oppressive. I had to get away."

"Oppressive? Mount Court?"

"You aren't the Head there." He took a deep breath, something of a sigh that didn't know where to go. "I get tired sometimes. That's all. So I thought I'd drive around town, but the loneliness of that was as bad as it was at the school. It might have been nice to stop off and visit someone, but the locals I've met since I came here aren't wild about Mount Court. I didn't think they'd appreciate my dropping by."

"To tell you the truth," she hinted, but he was looking beyond her into the house.

"Glad to hear you have a baby-sitter. It wouldn't be good for the little girl to be here this time of night. This was your friend's home?"

"Uh-huh."

"Nice place."

Paige sighed. "The realtor thinks she has a buyer. She's showing it in the morning. I'm getting it ready." She glanced disaparagingly at her shirt and shorts, which were smudged and spotted. Selfconscious, she looked back up.

"You wear it well," he said with a crooked grin. "Can you take a break?"

She shook her head. "Not if I want to finish in time to get a little sleep before work tomorrow."

"Just down the street for a hamburger?"

Paige never ate hamburgers. Between the red meat and the fat, she figured most anything else would be better.

But a hamburger sounded mighty good just then.

Still, she shook her head. "I have a ways to go in the kitchen, and I haven't even hit the second floor." Besides, she was a mess. She couldn't go anywhere without a shower, much less anywhere with Noah Perrine. He made her nervous. He looked too good.

"Let me help, then."

"Oh, no, that's uncalled for."

"Four hands can do a hell of a lot more, faster than two."

"But" She took a step back when he came inside.

"Where should I start?"

"But you look so nice," she protested, feeling slightly overwhelmed.

Noah Perrine was an academician, she told herself, but when she tried to picture him pushing papers around his desk, the image of the construction worker came instead. "You'll ruin your clothes."

"We're not talking feeding the pigs in a mud storm, here. I've cleaned house before. My clothes won't be ruined."

"Really, Noah. I appreciate your offer, but" "You have the guilt to work off," he said, looking her in the eye.