the Bible, only to have it taken from her grasp. She looked up, startled.
'It is too hot a day for a lady to be carrying even so slight a burden,' David said with a grin. 'Allow me.'
Rachel smiled. 'And so you should carry it,' she said, 'as it is on account of you that I need it. It seems that you told Mrs. Perkins that Ruth has a whole book to herself in the Old Testament. I have agreed to begin it today.'
David stayed in the main room of the house for a while, talking to Mr. and Mrs. Perkins. He had two good reasons to be back at this house for the second day in succession. One concerned these two people. He had spoken to the Earl of Edgeley, he explained to Mr. Perkins, and his lordship was very willing to take him on as a footman, a job that would require a minimum of stooping and lifting. The job would be different, of course. A man who had spent his life working outdoors in the fields might find the rules and restrictions of life in a great house confining, and he might find the wearing of a grand uniform irksome. But the work was respectable and within his capabilities. He would be able to support his large family again without assistance.
His other errand concerned the elderly Mrs. Perkins. He had brought her Communion since she could no longer go to church. It seemed that his predecessor had done so only on special occasions, and no more than two or three times a year. David had pledged himself to bring Communion to all the elderly people once a week. He stepped quietly into the doorway leading to the inner room.
' 'And they said unto her,' ' Rachel was reading, ' 'Surely we will return with thee unto thy people.
' 'And Naomi said, Turn again, my daughters: why will ye go with me?' '
She read with an eagerness that made the story sound very immediate, David thought. Why did so many people reserve a special, very sober voice for reading the Bible?
' Intreat me not to leave thee, or to return from following after thee: for whither thou goest, I will go.' '
Naomi gave in to the pleading of her daughter-in-law, David thought. She was convinced that Ruth would be unhappy following her into a foreign land to live a life that was outside her experience, yet when she had seen that Ruth's heart was set on going, she had given in to her. She should have stayed firm. Ruth would surely be unhappy with her decision. So the voice of wisdom would have said. Yet Ruth had settled in her new country, made a good marriage, and become the great-grandmother of King David, and thus an ancestress of Jesus himself.
So much for caution, for wisdom, for common sense.
'I shall read the rest of the book next time,' Rachel said, then looked around sharply and saw David standing in the doorway. She got hastily to her feet. 'I shall leave you with the Reverend Gower.'
David had had a third reason for stopping at that particular cottage that morning. 'Will you wait for me?' he asked as Rachel turned to leave. 'I wish to talk with you.'
'There is going to be a storm, Reverend,' Mrs. Perkins said when Rachel had left. 'Make sure her ladyship gets home before the rain.'
David smiled. 'I think you are right,' he said. 'But I believe it will be night before the storm breaks.''
'She is very pretty,' Mrs. Perkins said, giving him a shrewd look that stopped just short of a wink.
Rachel had missed David at the picnic the afternoon before. She was very conscious of the passing of each day. After tonight's ball there would be only one more day before the departure of all the guests. David would leave soon after that. In fact the whole of life would then change. She would tell Algie that she did not after all think it wise for them to become betrothed. And she would begin living without either of the two men she loved so dearly.
She held herself firm against panic. There were still a few days left. She must enjoy them to the full. The future was so very unknown that it would serve no purpose to try to look ahead. She must enjoy today and tomorrow and then face the future one day at a time.
She was afraid. If she allowed herself to think, she was terrified. But she should not be. It was a long- ingrained habit always to fear that life's yawning emptiness would claim her. Her new certain knowledge that it would not do so had not yet had time to take root in her unconscious mind. She did not know what her future would be. She did not believe that she would ever marry, though it might be a childishly romantic notion to think that one would mourn the loss of one man for a lifetime. She did not know for sure that she would stay at Oakland. Perhaps Papa would wish to remove to his principal seat of Greenslades at some time in the future. He frequently talked of doing so. Perhaps she would beg him to take her there if she found that her friendship with Algie was no longer the comfortable thing it had always been.
Of only one thing was she certain. She was going to allow the pattern of her life to unfold without resistance. She was going to put her faith in a higher power than herself. David had been quite right. She had done much thinking about what he had said in the nursery at Singleton Hall. And he was right. There was nothing restricting or dreary about accepting and living a religious faith. She had already started to do both without even fully realizing the fact.
And she had told David the truth. Her mornings were the happiest part of her days. The happiest part of her life, in fact. There was meaning in doing things for others. It was only in giving that one could receive. Jesus Himself had said it. What she had given over the years and especially in the past few weeks was paltry in return for the happiness and the friendships she had gained.
So for the first time she had abandoned herself to life without fear. And she had hunted through the New Testament until she found the passage she was looking for: 'Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow; they toil not, neither do they spin: and yet I say unto you, That even Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these.... Take therefore no thought for the morrow: for the morrow shall take thought for the things of itself.'
And Rachel had known a measure of peace during the days of hectic activity that would culminate in the ball of that evening.
She was stooping down listening to one of the Perkins boys explain the significance of the crisscrossing trails marked out in the dust before him when David came out of the cottage. She stood up and held out a hand to him.
'Lord Cardwell told us yesterday about Lady Wexford,' she said. 'I am sorry, David. I liked her and I know she was someone very special to you.'
He took her hand. 'She and Lord Wexford were like grandparents to me,' he said. 'Generous and indulgent. Even though I have not seen her often since I grew up I shall miss her. Thank you, Rachel. May I walk along beside you? What I wish to say to you concerns my godmother.' -
'Oh?' Rachel made no effort to persuade him to climb into the gig with her. There were too many bad memories of the last time they had ridden together. Instead, she walked beside him, leading the horse by the bit until David took her place.
'Shall we tether the horse to that tree,' David suggested a few minutes later, when they were out of sight of the cottage, 'and stroll out into the pasture? What I have to say is of some importance.'
Rachel glanced at him in curiosity. They said nothing until they had climbed a stile into one of the pastures of the estate and strolled along one side in the shadow of a high hedge, where they were partly sheltered from the oppressive rays of the sun.
'I have the chance to change my life quite radically,' David said, breaking the silence between them abruptly at last. 'I am in a position to ask you to be my wife, Rachel.'
Rachel stopped walking instantly and spun to face him. Her face looked stunned but her eyes widened. 'David?' The word could scarcely force itself past her stiffened lips.
'It is true,' he said, laughing at her expression. 'I can marry you, Rachel, if you will have me, and provide you with the sort of life you are accustomed to.' He took both her hands in his when she continued to stare at him.
'If I will have you?' she whispered then. Her face lit up and she snatched her hands away from his and threw her arms around his neck. 'If I will have you? David! David, what a very foolish thing to say. You know I will have you under any circumstances you might name. I love you. Oh, how I love you.'
David wrapped his arms around her and held her tight against him. 'Rachel.' He lowered his head and buried his face against the side of her neck. 'Rachel, my love, how could I contemplate life without you? You are my life, my inspiration, my joy.' There were tears glistening in his eyes when he lifted his head to look down into her eager face. 'I love you.'
The heat of the day was such that the touch of another body, even the chance brushing of hands, should
