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thick, reddish brown hair lay in twisted strands on the pillow, and damp tendrils clung to her waxen cheeks.
    Griffin again washed his hands in the small supply of fresh, lukewarm water that remained and dried them on a thin, scratchy towel. Then he poured laudanum into a tablespoon and held it to Fanny’s taut lips.
    She swallowed the medicine gratefully, in several doses, and then turned her head away, toward the wall. Above, the incessant rain beat out a melancholy refrain on the shingled roof. “It’s God’s vengeance,” she mourned. “God made my baby die because I’m bad.”
    Griffin examined Fanny again, frowning distractedly. There was too much bleeding. “You’re not ‘bad,’ Fanny, and I doubt that God had anything to do with this, one way or the other.”
    Fanny became calm—frighteningly calm. “It’s my sin what made Him wrathful.”
    Griffin took a steel needle from his bag and held it to the dancing flame in the lamp. When it had cooled, he threaded it with catgut and began to repair the tear in Fanny’s flesh.
    God. They always talked about God, lauding Him when things went right, bemoaning their own human nature when things went wrong. If there was a God—and, secretly, because of the order and symmetry apparent in the universe itself, Griffin suspected that there was—He was totally disinterested in mankind. He’d long since gone on to more promising enterprises, probably tossing a benevolent. “You’re on your own!” over His shoulder as He went.
    â€œJust rest, Fanny,” Griffin said.
    But Fanny began to weep softly, even though she could notfeel the bite of the steel needle. “The baby weren’t Sam’s!” she insisted.
    Griffin glanced at the pitiable bundle lying on the chest at the foot of the bed. His heart twisted for the undersized infant boy who would never play tag with a sparkling tide or feel the sun on his face.
    â€œI’m a doctor, Fanny,” he snapped. “Not a priest.”
    â€œT-that man—he’s a devil. We all think that he’s a man, but he ain’t! He’s the devil’s own.”
    Griffin had even less interest in the devil than he did in God. “Jonas?” he sighed, as he tied off the stitches and permitted himself to recall the resemblance in the child’s still little face.
    Fanny nodded, and her sniffling became a soft, hideous wail. “Damn him—damn that man!”
    Griffin, keeping his peace, felt profound relief as his patient slipped into a fitful, restless sleep. Even that, he thought, was preferable to her reality.
    Griffin half-stumbled from the room to find hot water steaming on the cookstove in the kitchen and once again washed his hands. The flesh between his fingers and on his palms was raw from the biting strength of the special soap, and the water stung.
    He helped himself to a mug of coffee from the blue enamel pot brewing at the rear of the stove and went back to the small, neat parlor, where a hopeful little fire blazed, crimson and orange, on the stone hearth.
    Jonas. Always Jonas.
    One shoulder braced against the sturdy mantle, Griffin sipped the strong, stale coffee thoughtfully. He wondered whether the warning he’d given Jonas—to stay away from Becky’s daughter—had found its mark.
    With Jonas, it was always hard to tell.
    Fanny’s labor had demanded all his attention then, and there had been no time to impress Jonas with his sincerity in the matter. There was never enough time.
    Griffin drank the last of his coffee and took the cup back to the kitchen. There, he set it in the cast iron sink and pumped clear water into it until it overflowed.
    All the conveniences, he thought. Jonas provided his women with all the conveniences.
    His mind, snagged on the child in the other room, thrust him into a swirling current of hatred and frustration. He swore under his breath.
    The cottage door