Meg screamed, tripped over the object, and fell flat on her face. Breathing heavily, she rolled over and stared at the man in the doorway, silhouetted against the approaching dawn. She heard him swallow his laughter. "Damn you! What are you doing here?"

Lazily crossing his arms over his chest, Clay leaned against the door jamb, "I live here."

Meg scrambled to her feet, brushed off her backside, and angled her chin. "You said you were going to take the oxen back to Austin. There is no way that sorry mule of yours could have gotten you back here so quickly."

"You're right about that. Lucian offered to take the oxen back to Austin."

"How generous of hi. I wouldn't have expected him to do you a favor."

"I don't think he saw it as doing me a favor. I think he saw it as an opportunity to get off the farm for a few days." He uncrossed his arms. "It does help if you open the windows."

He disappeared from the doorway. She heard him tell someone to help him raise the shutters. She groaned. Obviously, the twins had been waiting nearby to discover who was inside the shed. As though she were a small child, Meg wanted to run home and hide her face beneath the pillow. Moaning and creaking filled the shed as cracks appeared in the wall. Slowly, the morning light filtered through the widening crevice.

Pulling a rope, Clay became visible on one side of the window. Huffing on the other side, the twins strained to raise the window covering.

When they'd opened the shutter fully, they secured the rope on the outside. Then the twins leaned in

through the large open window. She wondered if all little boys had grins that reached from one ear to the

other.

"We surely are glad to know it was you we saw, Miz Warner. We thought you was a spook. Nearly scared us to death."

Meg wished she was a spook so she could him into a mist and disappear.

Clay patted the boys on the shoulders. "Come on, let's get the other sides up."

They raised the shutters covering the windows on the remaining two sides. A breeze wafted through the

building, and the sun chased away the shadows.

Along one wall, stone peered out from beneath tattered blankets. Shelves lined the lower walls of another side of the building. She could see now that she'd stumbled over an extremely short stool with four broad

legs attached to a square top. It came no higher than her knee. She couldn't imagine that it served much purpose.

"Does that help?" Clay asked from the doorway.

She wondered if he was this polite to all trespassers or only those that amused him. She wished he'd

release that smile he was fighting to hold back and be done with it.

"It helps immensely." Rising onto her toes, she pivoted slowly, her arms outstretched. "I almost feel as though I'm outside."

"Pa built it so we'd have a place to work. Seems people always die when it rains, and Ma didn't like all

the dust that cutting on rock stirs up." He turned to walk away.

"Where are you going?" she asked.

He glanced over his shoulder. 'To finish our chores and leave you to do whatever it was you tiptoed over

here to do."

"I only came to look at the granite."

His smile broke free. "Yes, ma'am, I figured as much."

He walked away with the twins following close on his heels.

Meg sat on the short stool and stared after them. Clay had the most beautiful smile she'd ever seen.

His small smiles of amusement had been distracting. His smile of pure joy was devastating. She'd have to

pay more attention to her actions and make certain she gave him no further reason to smile.

With that resolution tucked away, she rose from the stool and looked at the rock. It hadn't changed.

She was no longer certain why she'd come or what exactly she'd expected to see. She narrowed her

eyes. The monument was buried somewhere within that stone.

She touched the rough surface, anxious to see Kirk again. Maybe Clay was as eager as she was to see the monument completed and would be willing to begin work today instead of waiting for Monday. After all, they were both here.

She strolled to the house, stepped on the porch, and, unnoticed, peered around the open door. Clay was crouching before the hearth. As though they were matching bookends, the twins squatted on each side of him.

"Did Miz Warner's husband kill people?" one twin asked.

Clay took a deep breath. "Yes, he did."

"You reckon he liked killin' people?" the other twin asked.

"He didn't like it at all."

"Did he tell you that?" Meg asked from the doorway.

Clay shot straight up, banged his head on the stone mantel, swung around, jerked off the apron he was

wearing, and waved the poker at her. "I had a tool in my hand!"

The twins rolled on the floor as though they were little bugs that curled into a ball whenever they were touched. Their guffaws echoed around the house.

"I couldn't see beyond your back. I didn't know you had anything in your hand. Besides, I thought you

were referring to carving tools. I didn't realize I needed to make certain you had nothing at all in your hands before I ever spoke to you."

One twin stopped laughing. "Hey, Clay, you're bleedin'."

Blood trickled slowly along Clay's temple. He touched his fingers to his head and winced. "I'm all right."

Meg walked into the house. "Let me see."

He wadded the apron and pressed it against his head. "I'm fine."

Both twins stared, concern clearly reflected in their young faces. "Let her look, Clay. We don't want you to die on us."

"I'm not gonna die." Scowling, he moved the apron away from his head.

"You're too tall. You're going to have to bend down so I can see," Meg said.

"Maybe you're just loo short."

"No one's ever complained about my size."

"No one's complained about my height"

"How many people talk to you7"

He bent his head but not before Meg saw that her teasing had cut him deeper than she'd intended. She'd

assumed that he wasn't bothered by people in the area shunning him. He continued to attend church, but other than that he kept to himself much as he had before the war.

Kirk's mother had always used silence as her weapon whenever she was angry at anyone. Meg

remembered how much it hurt the first time the woman refused to talk to her. She would have preferred

yelling to the ominous quiet. She had assumed that the pain ran deeper because it involved family.

Perhaps Daniel was wrong. Clay didn't need to have their fists pounded into his face to feel their hatred.

Their silence pummelled him just as effectively.

Gently, Meg parted his hair until she could see the wound. "That's some gash. Do you have a needle and thread? I could sew it up."

He straightened. "It doesn't need to be sewed."

"You could use the needle and thread Clay was usin' to fix the hole in my shirt," one twin offered.

"It docs need stitches," she insisted.

He tightened his jaw. "Fine." He walked across the room, dropped into a chair at the table, crossed his arms over his chest, and sat unmoving as though he'd become one of his statues.

The twin rushed to a sewing basket beside a chair and proudly produced the needle and thread.

"Which one are you?" Meg asked.

"Josh," he said, his face beaming.