"Only when we didn't want to do something we didn't like."

"I don't like the attic. I don't want to go there."

Jacey grinned. "I figured that out."

Bridget gave a long-suffering sigh. "Why do we gotta go there?"

"Why do we have to go there?"

"That's what I want to know!"

"To sort through your mother's things." You need to ken that she and I are two different people.

"I have her special book." Bridget pulled Jacey in the opposite direction. "C'mon, it's in my room. You can have it."

"Not so fast, my wee beguiler. Attic now. I'll read your mama's book to you later. How's that?"

"It's not that kind of book." Bridget dragged her feet, catching the toes of her shoes on every step to slow them down.

Jacey bit her lip. She hadn't had such fun in years. "Your papa and I used to play here when we were young."

"I never saw my Papa. What did he look like?"

Jacey stopped. "I mean, your stepfather. What do you call him?"

Bridget shrugged. "Nothing."

No wonder the letter. Bridget barely talked to him.

The attic, a jaunty jumble of junk spoke of secrets and bygone days. Jacey stood Bridget on an old trunk at a round window. "See those turrets. That's Lockhart Towers, where your mama and I grew up. Oh, and there's your stepfather's carriage rattling down Parson's Hill." Jace turned to Bridget. "Why don't you call him Papa-Gabe. He wouldn't mind. He loves you, you know."

"I know." Bridget undid several of Jacey's buttons. "He calls me Cricket."

"That's how you know he loves you?"

Bridget nodded and touched Jacey's hair.

"Not by his hugs and kisses or the way he keeps your blankets tucked to your chin at night?"

Bridget finger-combed Jacey's hair, until her bun came out and hair fell over half her face. Bridget's eyes twinkled with mischief.

Jace caught her breath at the child's beauty. She hugged her, kissed her cheeks, lifted and twirled her. "I love you, I love you, I love you!" Jacey shouted.

Bridget sobbed, her arms around Jace's neck, her face pressed there.

Jace sat them on the trunk and sang: "Oh dear, what can this sadness mean?

Jacey too fast with the flair?

I promise to find you a basket of puppies, A garland of lilies, a kitten and candy, A dozen bright ribbons, all colours and dandy, To tie up thy bonnie silk hair.''

Bridget sat back and watched, transfixed. "Mama used to sing."

Jace guessed singing fixed everything, because Bridget scrambled off her lap and over to a trunk in a sunbeam, its dust motes like dancing fairies. "Do you want to see how tiny I was?" Bridget asked.

The first item, a soft, yellow bonnet, made Jace catch her breath.

She'd made a yellow embroidered nightgown and bonnet for her baby, which her mother buried the babe in. Jace knelt beside Bridget.

"I used to be this small!" Bridget tried it on, but it sat like a cone, and the ribbons didn't meet beneath her chin. She tossed it in Jacey's lap. "Wait till you see my favourite dress. It has pink roses and-"

Jacey crushed the bonnet made of the same yellow fabric. She remembered her mother saying she split the bolt and sent half to Clara in Wales. Clara was expecting Bridget at the time, a baby for her married daughter to show off. Not one to hide, like her unmarried daughter's.

"What's this, lovey, making a mess for me, are you?" Mac bustled in and repacked the baby clothes. "I thought you were looking for Clara's trunk," she said with a piercing look.

Mac carried the small trunk downstairs, claiming something without definition that Jacey wanted without reason.

Ten.

Disappointed for no reason, Bridget's bonnet fell off her lap. Half expecting Nanny to grab it, Jace slipped it in her pocket.

Bridget stared into Clara's open trunk as if it held a nest of vipers. Jacey pulled her close and kissed her head. "Show me your favourite of Mama's dresses."

Bridget shook her head, swallowed and sniffed.

"Oh, Cricket, don't cry."

"What's this?" came a familiar voice. "Is somebody crying?" A puppet peeked around the doorjamb.

Bridget gasped and approached it, stopping a distance away. "I'm not crying. The smell inside my Mama's trunk itches my nose and makes my eyes ... wet." She wiped her face with her sleeve. "What's your name?"

"I'm Harry the Handsome Hedgehog but I'm lonely. Can we talk?"

Bridget nodded, and Jace wondered if Suttie saw around corners.

"What's your name?" Hedgehog asked.

"Bridget. My papa, but not; he calls me Cricket."

"You have a papa, but not?"

Bridget nodded again. "Papa Gabe."

Jacey worried about Gabriel's reaction to the name.

"Oh, that papa. Well, Cricket, I think something's bothering you. Maybe I can help."

Bridget sighed, raised her arms and dropped them in defeat. "I want to keep Myjacey and I'm afraid my Papa Gabe won't let me," she said in a rush.

"And who is Myjacey? A kitten, a puppy?"

Bridget took Jacey's hand and dragged her before Hedgehog. "She's my mama's sister and I want her to stay. Can you talk to my ... to Papa Gabe for me?"

"Myjacey's your aunt, then?"

Bridget looked up at her. "Are you?"

Jace tweaked Bridget's nose and nodded. The lump in her throat made it impossible to speak.

"She is my aunt!" Which clearly pleased her.

Hedgehog bowed gallantly. "Hello Aunt Jacey."

"Nooo, it's Myjacey. Nanny Mac said so."

"Ach, sorry. Well, do you smell that?" Hedgehog's nose crinkled with a sniff. "I think luncheon is ready. Tattie drootle and tipsy custard, I'd say. Cricket, tell Papa Gabe how you feel about Myjacey. He cares very much about you, and Myjacey, and he wouldn't want either of you to worry. All right?"

Bridget sighed. "All right." She stepped into Jacey's arms after Hedgehog left. "Do we havta go through Mama's trunk?"

"No. Do you want to give me a tour of Kirk Farm after lunch?"

An hour later, hand in hand, Bridget explained every outbuilding from buttery to bower, dovecote to stable, as if Jace had never seen it before. When they passed her favourite climbing tree, she helped Bridget perch in the lowest, widest fork of its branches beside her. With a storybook tucked in her pocket, Jace opened to Snow White.

"I might have known," Gabriel said a short while later, hands on hips. "Tree climbing, first day."

Jacey gave one of his arms a playful shove with her foot. "Climb up," Jace said. "It's cosy."

Bridget scrambled into her lap, which clouded his expression, but the tempest cleared when Bridget said, "Shh," with a finger across her lips. "Pay 'tention."

He tapped Bridget's nose. "Quiet as a Kirk mouse."

He kept his promise, except for the "speaking" glances directed her way, while she became alive to details: her rasping voice and dry lips, the trembling hand she hid in the folds of Bridget's dress, her death-grip on the book, Gabe's thigh pressed to hers, him stroking the hair on the sleepy head against her breast.

Jace read slow, so the fairytale wouldn't end.

Eleven.

That night, after she gave Bridget a bath, Jace took her down to say goodnight.

Gabriel raised a brow. "Bridget, you look lovely. Jace, you look like you lost a fight with a flapping duck."

Bridget cocked her head.

Had she never heard him say anything playful?

The task of putting her down for the night was Gabriel's. But after Bridget took his hand, she grabbed Jacey's and tugged her along.

A child between her and Gabriel, as should have been, but Nick offered to be her scapegoat, so she said he was the father. Gabe didn't lose his family parish. Her mother didn't get to throw him out, since the Lockharts owned the parish living.

In Bridget's room, Gabe shed his jacket and threw it over a chair. Bridget knelt on her bed to unbutton his waistcoat, undo his cuffs and roll his sleeves to his elbows.

He winked over Bridget's head, lurching Jace's heart. "Cricket likes buttons," he said.

Like a child, nose to the window, Jace gazed on a family scene she aspired to join.

Bridget freed Gabe's cleric's collar and tucked it into his breast pocket.

"Now, Myjacey." Bridget motioned her forward.

Jace got the bow at her bodice and her top three dress buttons undone, then she got a hug. Jacey masked her emotions and laid her cheek on Bridget's curls. "Thank you for a splendid day, sweetheart."

"I love you," Bridget whispered.

Gabriel went pale as chalk for the second time that day.

"I love you too, Cricket," Jace whispered, sad for him, elated for herself.

"Mama said you loved me," Bridget added, surprising them both.

Gabriel and Bridget knelt by her bed to say her prayers, but when Bridget started, Gabriel touched her arm, took Jacey's hand and pulled her down beside them. "Now you may begin, Cricket."

"Bless Mama and Papa in heaven," she said. "And make Papa Gabe let Myjacey stay. Amen."

After offering Gabe her rosebud lips, Bridget settled on her side. Gabriel tucked her blankets to her chin and kissed her brow. Jacey watched, until Bridget opened one eye. "Myjacey, you're s'posed to kiss me goodnight."

Jacey bent to her ear. "I didn't know I was allowed. See you for boxty and jam in the morning. Happy dreams."

A hand at her elbow, Gabriel guided her from the room.

"I'm sorry," she whispered the minute Bridget's door shut.

"What for?"

"Gabriel Macgregor, I know you better than you know yourself. You'd give your right arm to have her say she loves you, but I walk in and she says it to me."

Silent, he walked her to her bedroom door. "I fell in love with her, Jace, the first time Clara put her in my arms. You should have seen her. A wee tiny thing, even at two, with a thick crown of raven curls. She used to love it when I played with her, Clara egging us on. I'd pretend I was tired, but Bridget would laugh and beg for more."