"Not if she brings the mountain to the match, he wouldn't run. Not if she had two heads and a tail."

Hawkeye drew up suddenly, a hand to his chin. "Aye, you're right. But if she's half as smart as I think she is—and set against marriage to boot—she won't let herself be auctioned off like that. And" Hawkeye grinned now, his face a mass of wrinkles—"it weren't Richard Todd she was starin' at with her eyes all shiny, every opportunity."

Nathaniel inclined his head but said nothing.

"Your ma was strong—willed like her." Hawkeye paused again, and when he spoke there was a loss in his voice that Nathaniel knew well. "You won't be sorry for it, in the long run. Although she'll tire you out in the chase."

"I haven't made up my mind to take up the chase."

"You tell yourself that," Hawkeye said, laughing softly. "See if you can make it stick. I don't think you can.

Chapter 4

Although she went to bed dispirited and unhappy about the possibility that her plans might be met with her father's reluctance rather than his help and goodwill, Elizabeth awoke on Christmas Eve morning refreshed and with her resolve restored. It was very early, the sun just coming up over the mountains, and the deep cold of the night had not yet begun to loosen; nevertheless Elizabeth could not stay in her bed, so she washed and shivered her way into her clothes, and ran down the steps to the kitchen.

Standing in the doorway, she was greeted by a blast of warm air from the hearth where a crowd of pots hung from a complex assortment of cranes and trivets. The whole room glowed with the reflected firelight in copper and pewter swaying from hooks in the ceiling beams. Against the far wall, baskets of flax and carded wool waited by a spinning wheel, and next to that a young girl worked a loom with the quick and automatic motions of the practiced weaver.

Another young woman stood at a rough wooden table peeling potatoes while Curiosity kneaded dough, her dark skin dusty with flour to the elbows. She looked up to see Elizabeth standing there and grinned.

"An early riser! Yes, I knew it, an early riser. You must be hungry. Breakfast won't be for a while yet but come sit down and Daisy here will do her best. Daisy is my second oldest. Daisy! Say g'd day to Miss Elizabeth. Over there that's my Polly on the loom. And that there is Manny, just on his way out now to see to the firewood, weren't you, sweet thing?"

Manny was a strapping youth with a wide grin, but Elizabeth barely got a good look at him before he disappeared at his mother's bidding. She turned her attention to Daisy, who smiled at Elizabeth without a bit of shyness. She was slightly built but wiry, not quite so dark as her mother, but with a great abundance of hair tucked up into her cap. On one cheek there was a red birthmark in the shape of a flower, and Elizabeth realized that this must be the source of her name.

Daisy wiped her hands on her apron while she considered Elizabeth.

"Biscuits and honey, that should tide you over. And fresh milk."

"That sounds lovely," Elizabeth said, "but I would like to take a walk first—"

"A walk in this cold weather before you have good food in you?" Curiosity shook her head.

Uncertain, Elizabeth glanced out the window. It had begun to snow, and the sky was leaden.

"Paradise ain't going no place, before you have some breakfast," Curiosity stated, and in response Daisy began to butter biscuits.

There was a high stool at the table and Elizabeth took it, waiting for Curiosity to protest that she should eat in the dining room, but there was no such complaint; Curiosity went back to her bread dough and Daisy to her potatoes. The rhythmic thump of the loom made a nice counterpoint to the steady hiss of the fire in the hearth.

The biscuits were delicious and the milk was fresh; Elizabeth realized suddenly that she was very hungry indeed and she worked her way through the plate quickly. Her appetite and appreciation were not lost on Curiosity, who set her dough to rise and poured Elizabeth more milk. Elizabeth thought of asking Curiosity to sit and eat with her, but she realized that the older woman had probably been up for hours and had eaten long ago, and that she had many hours of work ahead before she would find time to sit down again. Elizabeth was thinking about Curiosity when a back door opened in a flurry of snow and Galileo came in, stamping and whooshing with the cold.

"My Lord!" he said, dumping his load of firewood onto the hearth. "But what a weather. Good morning, Miss Elizabeth!"

Elizabeth returned his greeting but he had already turned to address his wife.

"And I suppose you still need those supplies, and I suppose I still have to hitch the team and go down to the village in this snow." He shook his head.

"And I suppose snow is nothing new and I suppose it's Christmas Eve and I suppose you don't want me serving up beans and pickled cabbage for dinner, do you?" Curiosity answered in staccato. But they were grinning at each other, and Daisy did not seem in the least perturbed, so Elizabeth assumed that this tone was an everyday one.

"Are you going into town?" she asked Galileo. "May I come along?" She had already slipped down from her stool. "Please do wait, it will only take me a minute."

It barely seemed worth the effort of hitching the team, for the sleigh brought them into the village in just a few minutes. Elizabeth wished that she had walked, for the village fairly flew by: scattered cabins, the church of raw wood, its windows shuttered and the little steeple without a bell. The parsonage stood off to the right, a somewhat finer building of board and shingle rather than logs, but small and with only a few window sashes. To the far left, a finer house of field stone and brick; no doubt it belonged to the doctor. There were a smokehouse, stables, and black smithy She noted, although she tried not to, that each cabin had a dooryard cluttered with stacked wood, farm tools, and dark icy patches where dishwater had been tossed. Here and there laundry had been hung out and shirts and trousers and sheets seemed to be standing sentry, frozen into awkward contortions. There were few people to see: outside a cabin of squared logs a woman wrapped in shawls drew water at a stone well, an old raccoon cap on her head and a baby strapped to her chest with a leather belt. Down at the edge of Half Moon Lake, surrounded with tree stumps like beard stubble, there were men out on the ice fishing with nets. Boys pushed a ball with long sticks, shouting and tussling.