She walked into the shed and knelt beside him. He cradled his wounded hand. The pristine white bandage Dr. Martin had wrapped around his head was now crumpled, bloody, and loose fitting as though Clay had discarded it and retrieved it without care.

He heaved a melancholy sigh that sounded as mournful as the wind that preceded the first storm of winter. "I wasn't the only one who wouldn't carry a rifle."

He opened his eyes, and Meg fell into the dark brown depths, which had aged considerably since yesterday. Lightly touching the white wisps of hair at his temples, she understood at last that it was the harshness of other men that had aged Clay, not the passing years.

"They hung some men by their thumbs to convince them carrying a rifle was what they should do," he said hoarsely. "I listened to those men scream, and I prayed they wouldn't hang me by my thumbs. I was afraid if my thumbs were pulled free of my hands, I wouldn't be able to hold my tools, I wouldn't be able to carve when I got home. A damn selfish thing to pray for, but they never hung me by my thumbs."

She trailed her fingers along his roughened cheek. She wanted to shave him, trim his hair, prepare him a nice warm bath, and never let anything harsh touch him again. "They hurt you in other ways," she said quietly.

She watched his Adam's apple move slowly up and down. "They deprived me of sleep, deprived me of my mother's letters, and branded me a deserter."

"Dr. Martin said they'd planned to execute you."

"Changed their minds. They wrapped heavy chains around my ankles and kept me prisoner at a fort instead."

"Is that where Kirk visited you?" He nodded slightly. "You'd written him that my ma and pa had died. He thought if he showed your letter to the officer in charge, he'd send me home."

She felt the anger swell inside her at the injustice. "But he didn't release you."

"I asked him not to show him the letter." Stunned, Meg sat back on her heels. "Why?"

"Your letter was four months old. Lucian was coming up on the age when they would have wanted him to enlist Figured since I hadn't heard from him, that maybe he was content where he was. Our parents' deaths gave him an honorable reason not to enlist-"

"It gave you an honorable reason to return home." He shook his head. "I wasn't sure how Lucian felt about the war, but I took his silence as a plea not to come home. Maybe that was wrong on my part, but they'd already done all they were going to do to me. After Gettysburg, I stayed with Dr. Martin and helped him tend the wounded till the war ended."

"Why didn't you tell me all this sooner?"

"What difference does it make? You're no different than the Confederate officers. You want a man who's willing to kill. I won't. I told them I'd tend wounded, but Captain Roberts had gone to West Point with Robert E. Lee's son, and by God, every man under his command would carry a rifle."

"But you didn't."

"No, ma'am. Figured if I held a rifle, the day would come when they'd order me to shoot it, so I never gave them the chance."

She touched her fingers to the scar that marked him as a deserter. "I'm so sorry they did all this to you."

"Arc you, Meg?"

She felt as though a frozen river had just traveled along her spine. "Of course I am."

"I'm not so sure. I may have figured out why you wanted me to make the monument."

"What are you talking about?"

"Why did you ask me to make the memorial?"

The reasons raced through her mind: her reasons in the beginning were vastly different from her reasons

now. She'd planted the seeds for retribution, and they'd flourished, but the harvest in no way resembled

the bitter fruits she'd expected. She knew she'd waited too long to answer his question when his eyes

dulled and one corner of his mouth lifted mockingly.

"You place a man's dream within reach, and then you do all in your power to see he never touches it. That's why you wanted the marble instead of the granite, why you came here every day. You didn't want to watch me carve the monument, you wanted to see me fail."

"Perhaps in the beginning-"

"And when you realized I wouldn't fail, you decided to make me suffer-"

"No!"

"You just happened to be here last night-"

"I was here because you didn't meet me at the swimming hole."

"If I'd been at the swimming hole, would they have taken their vengeance out on my brothers?"

"I don't know."

He glared at her. "Is that why you made love with me the other night? So I'd know exactly what it was

I'd never have?"

"No!"

"I could have done it, you know. I could have given you a monument to honor Kirk, Stick, your brothers,

and all the other men who sacrificed everything in the name of honor."

"You still can. You can finish the monument-"

He shook his head, his dark brows knitting together over the bridge of his nose as he squeezed his eyes

tighter. "I can't close my hand.""Because it's bandaged.""I took off the bandage.""The pain-""I fought the pain. I can't close my hand.""Once it's healed-""It won't make a difference." He struggled to his feet. "They say you reap what you sow. Well, take a good look at your monument, Mrs. Warner. They took away my ability to finish it, and they left you with

nothing but shadows to honor those you loved."

Chapter Seventeen.

Meg crawled through her bedroom window. She walked to the washstand and splashed the cool water on her face, but it couldn't wash away the dark circles beneath her eyes or the heaviness that had settled in her throat.

She needed to cook breakfast, and all she wanted to do was crawl into bed and cry, long and hard, until

she was so exhausted that she'd sleep without dreaming of Clay.

Lethargically, she walked to the kitchen and took a pot off the wall. Her father and brother would have to be content with porridge because she didn't have the energy to fix anything else.

She heard Daniel coming down the hallway whistling "Dixie." Perhaps his hatred toward Clay would be less if her father had let him leave and be the drummer boy for the Confederacy that he'd wanted to be.

Unfortunately, drummer boys had died as well.

"Mornin' Meg." He came up behind her and put his hands on her shoulders. "What are you fixin'?"

"Porridge."

"Sounds good."

Smiling, she looked at him over her shoulder. Porridge was his least favorite meal. "You seem awfully

happy this morning."

"Yes, ma'am. You don't have to worry about that yellow-bellied coward touching you no more."

Meg's heart constricted so tightly she thought it might stop beating. "What?"

He released her, dragged a chair out from the table, and dropped his body into the seat. "We took care

of him last night. Didn't we, Pa?"

Meg spun around. Her father averted his gaze as he took his chair. "That's right," he said quietly.

Daniel planted his elbows on the table. "He won't be touching any of our women any time soon, that's for

damn sure. My brothers would have been proud of us."

Meg thought she was going to be sick to her stomach. The room began to spin and tilt.

A hard knock sounded on the door, and Meg took a deep breath, trying to right her world, wondering if

anything would ever feel right again.

Robert stepped into the kitchen, and Meg knew from the sadness in his eyes what was coming before he spoke.

"Mama Warner's taken a turn for the worse."

Easing onto the bed, Meg brushed the wisps of silver hair away from the wrinkled brow. "Were you here with Mama Warner throughout the night?"

"Where else would I have been?" Robert asked.

She lifted her gaze to the man standing beside her. "My father, my brother, and some other men attacked Clay last night. They put a knife through his hand. I think they did it because he touched me after church yesterday."

Robert knelt beside her. "What is Holland to you, Meg?"

She felt the tears well in her eyes.

Reaching out with his thumb, he captured a fallen tear. "So that's the way of it, is it?" He smiled sadly. "I suppose I'd be wasting my breath if I asked you to marry me."

"I love him, Robert. I didn't want to. Things would certainly be simpler if I'd fallen in love with you."

"Would it have made a difference if I had two arms?"

She cradled his cheek. "No."