They had just sat down to dinner Monday afternoon when there was a knock at the door. Mary opened it, but almost the whole family had come into the living room to see who it was. The man gave her a quick hello before bypassing her and hugging Ruth, who was careful not to let the hug linger.
"I didn't get a chance to tell you after church yesterday, Ruth," the man said, "but there's still plenty who think this witch malarkey is nonsense and I'm one of them."
"Thank you, Mark," she said, giving him a grateful smile.
Kid wondered if the man was a cousin. There were lots of relatives he had yet to meet.
"Ruth is married now," Mary said with a pointed look and frown, which quickly put to rest the notion that he was just a cousin.
Kid wanted to pick that little woman up and hug her. Was she beginning to warm up to him or merely trying to uphold propriety in her house?
"So I hear," was the man's blithe answer.
Kid's fingers curled into a fist, a fist that wanted desperately to plant itself into the man's face.
"Mark," James exclaimed like he'd found a long lost friend, having come to see what the holdup to his eating was. "Stay and have dinner with us."
"I reckon I could if I wouldn't be imposing," Mark answered, the sound of eagerness in his voice stronger than the polite reserve he was trying to project.
"Not at all," James answered for everyone.
As the family began heading back to the table, Kid took a hold of her elbow to signal to her to hang back. When everyone had cleared the room, he said outright, "He is in love with you."
"He was sweet on me at one time—" she began.
"Was? That man is sweet on you," Kid corrected.
"Well, it don't matter if he is or he isn't, you're one I love. If I'd wanted to marry Mark, I wouldn't have left."
"Does he know that? It's not you I doubt, it's him."
"I'm sure he does." She gave him a side hug. "But you're cute when you're jealous."
He followed her in, wearing a frown. Mark had wrangled a seat directly across from her, but Kid still had his seat beside her.
He didn't like the way Mark watched Ruth's every move as if he was committing it all to memory and as if she were the most fascinating being he'd ever met. He stabbed the meat and potatoes on his plate with a vengeance.
There was polite chatter all around the table, none of which included him as per usual except Ruth's occasional attempts to include him.
"Remember the time we snunk into the old haunted cabin and scared Joan Campbell out of her wits by making her think the place really was haunted," Mark asked Ruth.
She chuckled. "Very well. Momma tanned my hide good for that one, but that girl was as mean as a snake. Still, we oughtn't to have done it, but maybe we did her a favor teaching her not to believe in ghosts."
"She's still got a lot to learn. Her disposition ain't much improved now," Mark said. "And I think she's as superstitious as ever least ways she acts as if she believes in witches."
"Well, certainly there are folks that think they are. I rode a ways in a stagecoach with a fortune teller and I think she really thought she could predict the future."
"Well, anyhow, we oughtn't to be talking about Joan like this," Mary said, "when she ain't around to defend herself."
"You're right, Momma," Ruth agreed. "The Lord loves her as much as anybody sitting here at this table."
Mark launched into more childhood reminisces and private jokes causing Kid to feel more like an outsider than ever, which no doubt had been Mark's intention.
As if she could read his thoughts, her hand reached over and rested affectionately on his knee under the privacy of the table. She also smiled at him and he felt his mood begin to lighten, at least until Mark's next comment.
"Mother wants to have you over for a visit," he said, stealing Ruth's attention again.
Most mothers in the community would have cringed if their son had been interested in Ruth as a prospective wife given her tomboy reputation and what to them seemed like radical Christianity, but Mark's mother had always liked her. "That's sweet. I'll try to stop by if I got the time, and I'll definitely be sure to say hello next church meeting," she told him.
The dinner felt like an eternity to Kid as he stewed over Mark. When they all went back to the living room for more conversation and the warmer room, Kid pulled Ruth aside again.
"Try telling me now that man isn't overly fond of you."
She couldn't deny it this time. "I'll talk to him."
"Alone?"
"I ain't planning on running off with him if that's what you're worried about," she teased.
He rolled his eyes. "You got 3 minutes to explain things to him or I'm coming in there and explaining them for you."
They rejoined the family.
"Mark, can I see you in the kitchen alone for a minute?" she asked.
He took no time in joining her there.
"You made a plumb fool of yourself tonight; you know that, don't you?" she asked right off.
His face colored. "Maybe I did, but can you blame me? I thought you weren't going to get married, at least that's what you told me when I proposed, and then you come back hitched to a man that seems downright dangerous. I mean he carried a gun with him into church for goodness sake. How am I supposed to react?"
"I didn't lie to you. I didn't think I was going to get married, but sometimes God has other plans for us. And about Kid, he may seem to have a threatening, intimidating presence at times, but he's really the gentlest soul I've ever met."
Mark sighed though he didn't seem to believe that last statement. "Is he good to you? Are you happy with him?"
"Very. The Lord knew what He was doing when He sent him my way."
Mark smiled. "Does he know how lucky he is?"
She grinned. "Of course. We did have fun growing up together, and you'll always be a dear friend to me and a brother in Christ."
"Just not your husband. I'm coming to terms with it," he said with another sigh.
They went back to the living room and from the doorway they had the perfect vantage point to see out the front window and what they saw was black-colored smoke twisting and curling up from where the barn was located near the bottom of the hill.
"Fire!" shouted Ruth and Mark simultaneously.