Page 76 of Valley of Dreams

“Biddy’s Mary is keeping an eye on the little ones.” Maura nodded toward the corner of the room where a blanket was spread out and a couple of children about Lydia’s age played with Mary. “Lydia’ll be out of your hair without being out of sight, pleased as a mouse in the cheese with the wee ones.”

Katie had already set Sean among the children. Eliza did the same with Lydia. The girl was small for her age, but even so, she was getting too big to be carried all the time. She simply had to find the girl some shoes or resign herself to be tending cuts and splinters and other injuries if she continued to run around barefooted.

Lydia watched her with that look of betrayal she always wore when Eliza left her anywhere.

“Play with your doll and your hankie,” Eliza said. “Mary’ll look after you.”

Lydia stayed put but pouted enough for everyone in the room to know she was none too happy about the arrangement. Eliza returned to the table. She was given a wooden pestle and a large metal bowl filled with berries. Her task wasn’t difficult to guess. And, fortunately for her, mashing berries was also not difficult todo.The other women had jobs, as did Tavish. They worked quite well together. This was obviously something they’d done many times before.

Maura worked beside her, also enlisted as a berry masher. “Lydia finally has a doll. I know you’ve been wanting one for her.”

Though there was nothing untoward or truly embarrassing in the doll having come from Patrick, she found herself hesitant to explain. She tried to clamp down the blush she suspected was deepening on her face.

“She loves it. She didn’t even know how to play with it at first, but she warmed to it.” In large part because Patrick had shown her how, bless him. “It and her hankie are never out of her hands now, even when she’s sleeping.”

“What a sweetheart.” Maura smiled over at the little girl. “I suspect if our new addition is a girl, Ryan will simply smother her. He has such a soft spot for children.”

The women and Tavish laughed and teased, shared stories from years past. They worked easily together, and she was readily and immediately welcomed among them.

She pretended she wasn’t listening even more closely any time Patrick’s name came up, but she was.The way he’d held her and caressed her face told her that he felt something more than indifference, something more even than friendship. But he’d held back and closed himself off. There had to be a way to get past his fortified walls.

“Did Patrick grumble your ear off during your outing on Sunday?” Biddy asked.

“He was perfectly pleasant.”

“We’re speaking of PatrickO’Connor?” Tavish’s look of confusion was too exaggerated to be anything but jesting.

“I told Eliza already that I suspect she may be a witch, seeing the way that porcupine becomes all soft fur and smiles when she’s nearby.” Maura tossed Eliza a teasing look.

“Oh, there’s a spell being cast,” Tavish said, “but it hasn’t a thing to do with witches.”

The rest of the family at least attempted to hide their amusement.

“You be nice, lad,” Mrs. O’Connor said. “Eliza’s helping you, and you’re teasing her mercilessly.”

Tavish met her eye. “Patrick used to do that. The funniest of us all, he was. Teased everyone. I don’t suppose you’ve seenthatPatrick lazing about.”

She continued with her mashing, though her arm was getting sore. “He makes an appearance now and then.”

“Truly?” Mrs. O’Connor’s shock was mirrored on the others’ faces.

“Even in the stagecoach, he had moments of humor—dry as a desert, but humor all the same.”

Mrs. O’Connor handed her wooden spoon to Mary, her oldest daughter, and moved beside Eliza. “Have you any idea why he’s so aloof? Feels like none of us can get through to him.”

“He’s told me some things in confidence,” she said. “I’ll not break that trust.”

“Please.” Mrs. O’Connor set her hand imploringly on hers. “We’ve lost him once before. I feel like we’re losing him all over again.”

Eliza knew in her very bones that sharing the secrets Patrick had told her would send him into permanent isolation. They were all watching her, hope and expectation hanging heavy on their expressions. If they knew his burdens, they’d be far more likely to get through to him. But she couldn’t violate his trust.

“I can tell you only this,” she said, “when I burned my hand, he was nowhere nearby, but he apologized. When Lydia didn’t know how to play with a doll because she’d never had one in the time before we met him, he apologized. When the Archer girls were bickering a bit with each other when he dropped by a few days ago,heapologized.”

“But none of those things had the least to do with him,” Ciara, the youngest of the O’Connor sisters, said.

Eliza kept her gaze on her work. She couldn’t tell them more than she had.

It was Cecily who pieced things together quickest. “He’s blaming himself for things that aren’t his fault,orhe is convinced the rest of us blame him for those things.”

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