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know about that. I didn’t see any of their worship services. What difference does it make to you anyway, Hope? What they do. You thinking about joining them?”
    The man laughed. “Not me. I can’t see me dancing nowheres excepting maybe in a tavern somewhere if I was in my cups.” His smile died away. “But I got a wife and daughter who went to the Shakers. You see, I just come back to this part of the country to see if my girl had growed up all right, and they tell me that she’s part of this bunch of Shakers.”
    “She’ll be well cared for and brought up decent enough, I’d guess. But if you wanted to know about them, why didn’t you just go straight to the Shakers? They may not welcome people like us into their village, but they don’t lock them out either. They would tell you whatever you want to know.”
    “Well, I would have, but you see, when I took off to work on the river some years back, I sent my wife word that I was dead. I thought Martha could marry again that way, that I’d be doing her a good turn. I’d have never guessed she’d do something so crazy as join these Shakers.” Hope raised his hands up and let them fall back to his lap. “I don’t know that they’d even let me see them now. I mean thinking I’m dead these many years and all.”
    Brice set his coffee down on the table. “Let me get this straight. You deserted your family years ago, and now you’ve taken a notion to come back to claim them.”
    “No, no. You got me all wrong, Doc. I don’t care what Martha does. I wasn’t never right for her. But I loved my little girl. She was always something extra special. That’s one reason I left. To give her a better chance. Martha had this uncle over in the settlement that was an important man. Had some money. But he hated me. I thought if I was out of the way, maybe he’d sort of adopt Gabrielle, and she’d have a chance of being a real lady like she was meant to be. But it just ain’t right, her being with those Shakers.”
    Brice’s eyes narrowed on the man. “Did you say Gabrielle?”
    Hope nodded. “I think it was Martha’s ma who named her that. It always was a mouthful, but it seemed to fit her even when she was just a bit of a babe.”
    “The young sister is your daughter?”
    “Young sister? I don’t reckon she’s no sister of yours, Doc.”
    Brice frowned. “I mean Gabrielle.” Now that he knew who the man was, he could see a likeness to the young sister in the color of his eyes, but the deep blue had been dimmed by age and hard living.
    “You know her then? You saw her at this Shaker place?”
    “I saw her.”
    “Then you know it ain’t right her being there.”
    “I couldn’t say about that.” Brice thought of how the young sister had looked when they met on the path as he left the Shaker village. Perhaps such a combination of beauty and innocence was better sequestered from the world. “She seems satisfied with her life there.”
    Hope made a sound of disgust. “It’s just that she don’t know no better. Tell me, Doc, is it true what they say in town about the folks out there? That they don’t hold with marrying?”
    “That’s what I’ve been told.”
    “That just ain’t natural. It ain’t the way the good Lord intended either. Me, I never claimed to be a religious man, but I know enough about the Bible to know Adam and Eve got together often enough. And there’s that part about cleaving to your wife or some words to that effect.” The man stared at Brice, waiting for him to agree with him.
    Brice looked down at the coffee in his cup. “They hold different ideas than most of God’s people.”
    Hope rubbed his chin a minute before he said, “Some of the folks in town believe they dance to the devil in their meetings. That there ain’t nothing religious about it. Some say they even strip off naked when they’re dancing.”
    “I don’t believe that,” Brice said.
    “You ever been to one of their meetings?”
    “No.” Brice