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to Cooper. The old man’s responses were punctuated with deep coughs that even pulled Miss Jenny up straight.
    Her worried eyes focused on Chester.
    When he caught the worry in Miss Jenny’s eyes, he set his fork aside and clasped his hands together to indicate she should pray. His aunt had coughed like that right before she died, two years before he’d left to make his own way.
    “Yes, I have. It’s just so much easier to worry than to pray.” A sigh escaped her lips. “Do you believe, Chester?”
    The question took him by surprise. His mother had believed, her rich alto caressing the words of the old hymns she used to sing in the late evening after hours of washing laundry or spent tending the garden, or the hundred other tasks of day-to-day living. His father loved to hear his mother’s voice, but he never joined in, and Chester often suspected that somewhere along the line his father’s belief had been snuffed out.
    Where did that leave him? Did he believe in God? Of course. He never once doubted an omniscient Spirit who created the world and everything in it. But he knew Miss Jenny’s question went deeper than that, and he didn’t know how to respond. At one time he’d been a good man who tried to respect his mama’s God, but Sam’s betrayal had shaken him. Watching the master fall, witnessing the blood … It had been too easy to hate since that moment.
    His hesitation must have answered the unspoken question, but Chester shrugged and pointed to his heart then to the Bible.
    “Would you like me to read it to you?”
    To read. Wasn’t that the world Marylu had promised to open to him by teaching him letters? And now a white woman was willing to read to him?
    Marylu bustled back into the room. “That man is the most ornery critter I’ve ever encountered.” She stopped and shot him a glance. “Make that the second orneriest critter I’ve encountered.”
    Chester’s grin was huge.
    “I was getting ready to read the Bible, Marylu. Will you join us?”
    “I’m thinking we need to go in to the room with Cooper. Read something about hard hearts or that talking donkey of that Beulah fellow.”
    “Balaam.”
    “Him, too.”
    Jenny rolled her eyes.
    Chester swallowed hard on a piece of chicken just before his laughter reached full pitch. Jenny joined in. “Oh, Marylu, what am I going to do with you?”

eleven
    Truth be told, Marylu had never felt like she felt sitting next to Chester and watching him drink in every letter and vowel. His quick mind pleased her greatly. Yet she wanted to hear him speak. If he never tried, did that mean he couldn’t?
    As he bowed his head over the slate and worked on a couple of simple words, she went over the alphabet in her mind, paying close attention to how her tongue curled and worked around every letter. If she could teach him how to use what was left of his tongue, it just might work.
    When he lifted his head, she inhaled a deep breath. “Let’s work on your speech.”
    Chester flinched.
    “It can be done. Some letters you’ll have a harder time with, but the rest you’ll catch on to quick-like.”
    He nodded slowly, and she saw the smear of disbelief tighten his forehead.
    She reached out and touched his fingers. “We can do it. Together.”
    His eyes fell to the place where her fingers covered his. She followed his gaze. Beneath hers, the squareness of his hands dwarfed her own. She imagined the power in those hands from all the sanding and hammering, and she wondered, too, if the pads of his fingers would be rough from working with wood or smooth and … She snatched her hand away and cleared her throat. “Best we get started.”
    Chester’s eyes searched hers, and she saw a challenge there. Yet she hardly knew this man and had no right to feel anything other than friendship. Not this soon. He’d come to town, the label of “murderer” hard on his heels, and other than working for Mr. Shillito and knowing Cooper, fixing him some food and cutting his