The moon shown bright through the tiny window of her room. The night sky never looked like this in Poplar - the smog and the city lights muted the brilliance of nature - but out here, in the countryside, it was the clearest thing. A luminous beacon that made her aching, feverish head throb. She longed for a foggier moon, a more shrouded night. The moon of home.

Ill again, Sister Bernadette rested her head against the cool tile of the bath, thankful for that minor relief. The TB treatments made her feel nauseated and tired, and yet unable to sleep. She was so used to being active, not just physically, but mentally, too, and not being so now made her restless.

In Poplar, her mind had always been able to find some occupation. No matter the season, there was much to do - figuring out the best care for a nervous mother, teaching the younger midwives how to handle a breech birth, searching and searching until she'd found the proper cure to make a patient well again.

Sometimes she wondered if she'd ever be well again, and when she was - what then? Before she'd come to St. Anne's for treatment, she'd thought it was time for her to leave Poplar, but now that she had been forced to leave, she missed it desperately.

So if she recovered, what then?

The letters from her fellow Sisters and the nurses provided brief distractions from this question, but they spoke only of the mundane goings on at the convent and trivial gossip. There was nothing in them to occupy her mind, no problems for her to solve. Rest, they told her. It's all being taken care of. Don't worry.

But today, another letter had come. From him.

She'd been in the corner of the common area, resting and idly listening to a record with the other patients. She'd heard the song before, she thought, but she had never taken the time to really listen. The voice singing was deep, reverent and calm, like a prayer.

May the good Lord bless and keep you
Whether near or far away
May you find that long awaited
Golden day today.

May your troubles all be small ones
And your fortunes ten times ten
May the good Lord bless and keep you
Till we meet again.

"Lovely, isn't it, Sister?"

She opened her eyes. Nurse Peters approached, holding a small stack of post.

"Yes," she said, with a smile. "Who is it? Do you know?"

The nurse frowned. "What this? Oh, this is an old one. Jim Reeves, I think." She held out an envelope. "Some post for you today. Looks like a new one." She winked, and then strode off to deliver mail to the others on the ward.

Sister Bernadette glanced at the handwriting and felt her heart skip in her chest. A letter from Dr. Turner? A giddy grin bloomed across her face and she had her finger under the envelope flap, eager to tear it open and read, before she stopped herself.

It was wrong that she should feel like this from just a letter. It had been wrong in Poplar and it would be even more wrong now, to give him and herself even a shred of hope for a happy outcome.

This was the path she had chosen, and she must follow it until its end.

But she kept the letter. She could see it now, sticking out of the pocket of her dressing gown hanging on the door. Perhaps she would read it when she felt stronger. When she knew where the path led.

It was kind of him to write, and exactly like him, too. She could imagine what the letter might say. Unlike the letters from the nuns and nurses, it would probably be full of talk about his latest patients or new treatments she might find interesting. He'd write about Timothy, too, of course. How were his violin lessons progressing? What were his latest interests? Before she'd left, he'd been fascinated by the ancient Egyptians, but he might be studying something completely different now. He was growing up so quickly.

The letter might finish with wishes for her speedy recovery and return to Poplar. They'd parted as friends, she thought. She hoped. She prayed, every day.

The moon had gone behind a cloud now, and the aching in her head eased. She made her way back to bed, her body and mind finally exhausted enough for sleep, and crawled under the quilt. She drifted off to sleep, her last thoughts a prayer.

May the good Lord bless and keep you
Whether near or far away
May you find that long awaited
Golden day today.

May your troubles all be small ones
And your fortunes ten times ten
May the good Lord bless and keep you
Till we meet again.

She'd been busy, planning the wedding and helping the Sisters find a new home, and reached the ward too late that day, long past visiting hours. The matron let her in anyway. After that first mistake on the day of Timothy's polio diagnosis, she and Patrick spoke with the hospital staff and since then, no one else had dared stand in Shelagh Mannion's way.

Timothy was already asleep, so she left the school books and a new puzzle on his bedside table and began collecting the discarded comics and straightening his blankets. She hoped he'd have a restful night. His physical therapy tired him out, but the pain in his weakened muscles also frequently woke him, making good sleep elusive. She could see the dark circles under his eyes, and he still looked too pale.

But he was alive and breathing, and the doctors assured her and Patrick he was progressing well. That was more than enough to be thankful for.

She watched him sleep for a few moments more, to reassure herself, and then bent to grab her pocketbook. She'd visit earlier tomorrow, and maybe even be able to help him during his physical therapy.

"Shelagh?"

She looked up at the sound of his sleep-softened whisper. "Shh," she hushed him. "It's all right. Go back to sleep. I'll be back in the morning, I promise."

A frown crossed his thin face. "You were humming."

"Was I?" She hadn't noticed; she'd been busy tidying up. She did hum sometimes when she worked. In the convent, it had usually been bits of Evensong. But she couldn't recall what she'd been humming just now. "I'm sorry I woke you."

"S'all right. It was nice," he said, with a wide yawn. "Sing some more."

"You need your rest."

He pouted. "Please? It'll help me sleep."

It was hard to turn him down when he looked so pitiful and still so weak. Her little boy.

She scooted her chair closer to his bed. "All right. Close your eyes."

Softly, so only he could hear, she sang the same song and prayer she'd said for him and Patrick every night she was away.

May the good Lord bless and keep you
Whether near or far away
May you find that long awaited
Golden day today.

May your troubles all be small ones
And your fortunes ten times ten
May the good Lord bless and keep you
Till we meet again.

The reedy cry of a newborn broke through the night and Shelagh jolted out of sleep a third time. Angela.

Next to her, Patrick groaned and stretched. "Shelagh?"

"I'll get her." She slipped out of bed and moved toward the cot in the corner of the room, where her daughter - her daughter, she still marveled at the phrase - only a week old, lay. Angela's tiny, red face scrunched up with tears for reasons Shelagh couldn't fathom, and her heart crumbled.

"Shhh," she hushed her, scooping her up and cradling her to her chest. "It's all right. It will be all right. What's wrong? Hmm?" Shelagh glanced back at Patrick, already fast asleep again and then down at Angela whimpering in her arms. "Come on. We'll let Daddy rest."

Shelagh quietly let herself out of the bedroom and swayed toward the sitting room, humming as she rocked Angela. Her mind ran through the reasons for her daughter's distress; she'd been fed only an hour ago, and her nappy was dry, but still she cried.

"You just want to be held, don't you? That's all you want, isn't it?" She settled down on the sofa, the autumn moon through the curtains providing just enough light for her to see her child's face. After a few moments, Angela's cries softened into teary snuffles and her wide, dark eyes opened and fixed on her mother. Shelagh's breath caught in her throat and she traced the downy blonde hair.

"You've had quite a week, haven't you? So many new people and places."

The first day, the day they'd brought Angela home, had been a whirlwind, and even though Shelagh had been exhausted, she'd been too enamored with her new daughter to sleep much. Angela must have been exhausted too, for she only woke a few times to be fed and changed, then drifted back to sleep. A little angel, just like her name.

But then today, she only been restless, whimpering when she was held, crying when they put her down. She and Patrick had spent most of the day passing her back and forth, each trying some new way to quiet her. Even Timothy tried to help, but when Angela's crying stretched into the afternoon, Patrick pushed him outdoors and told him to go play.

"She's been moved around so much in such a short time, Patrick. From the hospital to the children's home to here," Shelagh said, during a brief moment of peace after Angela finally dozed off for a nap. "All these new faces - poor wee thing probably doesn't know where she is." A frown crossed her face. "We're strangers to her."

"Not for long," he reassured her. "Give it time. It's a new life for her too. She'll figure it out - just like her mother."

"I'm your mummy," Shelagh would repeat to Angela throughout the day, like a prayer. And this is Daddy and over there is Timmy, your brother. And we love you, so, so much. We wanted you for so long. Sometimes it didn't help; Angela would just keep crying until Shelagh thought she might burst into tears herself. But every once in a while, Angela would go quiet at the sound of her mother's voice and stare back at her, fascinated. We're a family. This is where you belong.

She could feel her daughter's tiny body tensing again, preparing for another good cry, so she stood and shifted her. The moon was probably too bright in her face. She began swaying around the sitting room again, almost like a dance.

Shelagh smiled softly - had it really only been a week ago when she and Patrick danced in each other arms around this room? They'd talked about adoption and plans for a new child then, but only in the abstract. It hadn't seemed real until she'd stood outside the door of the children's ward, her heart beating in her ears. All the days before that - her and Patrick's argument and their reconciliation - seemed like another life now. But she'd no doubt there would be more love and more dancing to come in future.

She began humming, the first song that came to mind.

May the good Lord bless and keep you
Whether near or far away
May you find that long awaited
Golden day today.

May your troubles all be small ones
And your fortunes ten times ten
May the good Lord bless and keep you
Till we meet again.

Angela's cries tapered off, she buried her face into her mother's neck and finally, slept. Shelagh breathed a sigh of relief.

"Jim Reeves. Perfect."

Shelagh stood over the cot, tense and watching, counting each breath the baby took. Her pulse was steady, but she wouldn't eat, and her body - well, like Patrick said, such a disfigurement couldn't only be external. She would slip away. It was only a matter of time.

Poor wee thing. How could this happen?

When she'd first saw the child, she'd been so shocked, her first and only instinct had been to shield the mother from seeing the baby. To protect them both by keeping them apart.

But now she wondered if she hadn't been wrong in that. Every mother deserved the right to see her child and this baby most likely wouldn't live to see the morning. Shouldn't they be able to spend the few hours they had together?

If something so terrible had happened to Angela or Timothy, she would have wanted - she would have demanded - to see them. She would not let them be alone or feel unloved.

There were protocols the nurses followed in the maternity home, in regard to the infants, to prevent coddling or favoritism. It wouldn't do to get too attached to a patient. But Shelagh Turner was also a mother, and that part of her longed to hold the tiny girl and apologize.

I'm sorry. I'm so, so sorry.

The baby began to fuss a little and Shelagh reached out a hand to cover its tiny body. She'd prayed all the prayers she knew and thought of all the possible scientific reasons - hard, awful reasons - that this could happen. Her frayed and exhausted mind felt empty, as it often had when Angela was still very young, and she'd been up at all hours caring for her. She found herself humming one of the songs she used to sing then as a lullaby. It was all she could offer now.

May the good Lord bless and keep you
Whether near or far away
May you find that long awaited
Golden day today.

May your troubles all be small ones
And your fortunes ten times ten
May the good Lord bless and keep you
Till we meet again.