Her frown was meant to intimidate. She didn’t understand that she really did look like a girl dressed up for a fair. Her green shirt made her eyes even greener and her blue skirt was the color of the spring sky. “Will you please do me the kindness, Father Colum O’Hara, to get this buggy moving? I know what I’m doing. If I look rich, the dealer will think he can stick me with any old broken-down thing he has. I’ll do much better in village clothes. Now come on. I’ve been waiting for weeks and weeks. I don’t see any reason why the hiring fair can’t be on Saint Brigid’s Day when the work starts.”

Colum smiled at her. “Some of the lads go to school, Scarlett darling.” He flicked the reins and they were on their way.

“A fat lot of good that’ll do them, ruining their eyes on books when they could be out in the air earning a good wage besides.” She was cranky with impatience.

The miles rolled by, and the hedgerows were sweet with blackthorn blossoms. Once they were really on their way Scarlett began to enjoy herself. “I’ve never been to Drogheda, Colum. Will I like it?”

“I believe you will. It’s a very big fair, this, much bigger than any you’ve seen.” He knew that Scarlett didn’t mean the city when she asked about Drogheda. She liked the excitement of fairs. The intriguing possibilities in a crooked old city street were incomprehensible to her. Scarlett liked things to be obvious and easily understood. It was a trait that often made him uneasy. He knew she had no real understanding of what danger she courted with her involvement in the Fenian Brotherhood, and ignorance could lead to disaster.

But today he was on her business, not his. He intended to enjoy the fair as much as Scarlett.


“Look, Colum, it’s enormous!”

“Too big, I fear. Will you choose the lads first or the horses? They’re at different ends.”

“Oh, bother! The best ones will get snapped up in the beginning, they always do. I’ll tell you what—you pick out the boys and I’ll go straight for the horses. You come to me when you finish. You’re sure the boys will go to Ballyhara on their own?”

“They’re here for hiring and they’re used to walking. Some of them likely walked a hundred miles to be here.”

Scarlett smiled. “Better look at their feet, then, before you sign anything. I’ll be looking at teeth. Which way do I go?”

“Back in that corner, where the banners are. You’ll see some of the best horses in Ireland at Drogheda Fair. I’ve heard of a hundred guineas and more paid.”

“Fiddle-dee-dee! What a tale teller you are, Colum. I’ll get three pair for under that, you’ll see.”

There were big canvas tents that served as temporary stables for the horses. Ha! thought Scarlett, nobody’s going to sell me an animal in bad light. She pushed into the noisy crowd that was milling around inside the tent.

My grief, I’ve never seen so many horses in one place in my life! How smart of Colum to bring me here. I’ll have all the choice I need. She elbowed her way from one place to another, looked over one horse after another. “Not yet,” she said to the traders. She didn’t like the system in Ireland at all. You couldn’t just walk up to the owner and ask him what he wanted for his animal. No, that was too easy. The minute there was any interest one of the traders jumped in to name a price that was way out of line one end or another and then badger buyer and seller into an agreement in the end. She’d learned the hard way about some of their tricks. They’d grab your hand and slap down on it so sharp it hurt, and that meant you might have bought yourself a horse if you weren’t careful.

She liked the looks of a pair of roans that the dealer shouted were perfectly matched three-year-olds and only seventy pounds the pair. Scarlett put her hands behind her back. “Walk them out in the light where I can see them,” she said.

Owner and dealer and people nearby all protested furiously. “Takes all the sport out,” said a small man in riding breeches and a sweater.

Scarlett insisted, but very sweetly. Catch more flies with honey, she reminded herself. She looked at the horses’ gleaming coats, rubbed her hand over them and looked at the pomade on her palm. Then she caught expert hold of one horse’s head and examined his teeth. She burst out laughing. Three-year-old, my maiden aunt! “Take ’em in,” she said, with a wink at the dealer. “I’ve got a grandfather younger than them.” She was enjoying herself very much.

After an hour, though, she’d only found three horses that she liked both as animal and as a good buy. Every single time she had to coax and charm the owner into letting her examine the horse in the light. She looked enviously at the people buying hunters. There were jumps set up in the open, and they could get a good look at what they were buying, doing what they were buying it to do. They were such beautiful horses, too. For a plow horse, looks weren’t important. She turned away from the view of the jumping. She needed three more plow horses. While her eyes accustomed themselves to the shaded interior of the tent, Scarlett leaned against one of the thick tent supports. She was starting to get tired. And she was only half done.

“Where is this Pegasus of yours, Bart? I don’t see anything flying over the jumps.”

Scarlett’s hands reached for the thick support. I’m losing my mind. That sounded like Rhett’s voice.

“If you brought me on a wild goose chase—”

It is! It is! I can’t be mistaken. No one else in the world sounds like Rhett. She turned quickly, looking into the sunlit square, blinking.

That’s his back. Isn’t it? It is, I’m sure it is. If only he’d say something else, turn his head. It can’t be Rhett. He’s got no reason to be in Ireland. But I couldn’t be wrong about that voice.

He turned to speak to the slightly built fair-haired man beside him. It was Rhett. Her knuckles were white against her hands, so tightly was she holding on to the post. She was trembling.

The other man said something, pointed with his crop, and Rhett nodded. Then the fair-haired man walked away, out of her sight, and Rhett was there alone. Scarlett stood in the shadow, looking out to the light.

Don’t move, she ordered herself when he started to walk away. But she couldn’t obey. She burst from the shadows and ran after him. “Rhett!”

He stopped awkwardly, Rhett who was never clumsy, and he spun around. An expression she couldn’t recognize flickered on his face, and his dark eyes seemed very bright beneath the shading bill of his cap. Then he smiled the mocking smile she knew so well. “You do turn up in the most unexpected places, Scarlett,” he said.

He’s laughing at me, and I don’t care. I don’t care about anything as long as he’ll say my name and stand near me. She could hear her own heart beating.

“Hello, Rhett,” she said, “how are you?” She knew it was a foolish, inadequate thing to say, but she had to say something. Rhett’s mouth twitched.

“I’m remarkably well for a dead man,” he drawled, “or was I mistaken? I thought I glimpsed a widow at the dock in Charleston.”

“Well, yes. I had to say something. I wasn’t married, I mean I didn’t have a husband—”

“Don’t try to explain, Scarlett. It’s not your forte.”

“Forty? What are you talking about?” Was he being mean? Please don’t be mean, Rhett.

“It’s not important. What brings you to Ireland? I thought you were in England.”

“What made you think that?” Why are we standing here making conversation about nothing at all? Why can’t I think? Why am I saying these stupid things?

“You didn’t get off the ship in Boston.”

Scarlett’s heart leapt to the meaning of what he’d said. He’d taken the trouble to find out where she was going, he cared about her, he wanted to keep her from disappearing. Happiness flooded her heart.

“May I assume from your cheerful attire that you’re no longer mourning my death?” said Rhett. “Shame on you, Scarlett, I’m not yet cold in my grave.”

She looked down in horror at her peasant clothes, then up at his impeccably tailored hacking jacket and perfectly tied white stock. Why did he always have to make her feel like a fool? Why couldn’t she at least feel angry?

Because she loved him. Whether he believed it or didn’t, it was the truth.

Without planning or thought of consequences, Scarlett looked at the man who had been her husband for so many years of lies. “I love you, Rhett,” she said with simple dignity.

“How unfortunate for you, Scarlett. You always seem to be in love with another woman’s husband.” He lifted his cap politely. “I have another commitment, please excuse me if I leave you now. Goodbye.” He turned his back on her and walked away. Scarlett looked after him. She felt as if he had slapped her face.

For no reason. She’d made no demands on him, she’d made a gift of the greatest thing she’d learned to give. And he’d trampled it into the muck. He’d made a fool of her.

No, she’d made a fool of herself.

Scarlett stood there, a brightly colored, small isolated figure amid the noise and movement of the horse fair, for a measureless time. Then the world came back into focus, and she saw Rhett and his friend near another tent, in a circle of intent spectators. A different tweed-clad man was holding a restless bay by the bridle, and a redfaced man wearing a plaid vest was swooping his right arm down, in the familiar motions of the horse trade. Scarlett imagined she could hear the slapping palms as he exhorted Rhett’s friend, and the horse’s owner, to come to a deal.

Her feet moved by themselves, marching across the space separating her from them. There must have been people in her way, but she was unconscious of them, and somehow they melted away.

The dealer’s voice was like some ritual chant, cadenced and hypnotic: “. . . a hundred and twenty, sir, you know that’s a handsome price, even for a beast as grand as this one . . . and you, sir, you can go twenty-five, isn’t that the fact of it, to add a noble animal like this to your stables . . . one-forty? Sure, you must add a little reasonableness to your thinking, the gentleman’s come up to one twenty-five, it’s only the way of the world for you to take a small step to meet him; say one-forty’s your price down from forty-two and we’ll be making a deal before the day’s out . . . One-forty it is, now see the generous nature of the man, you’ll prove you can match him, won’t you now? Say one-thirty instead of one twenty-five and there’s only a breath between you, no more than can be for the cost of a pint or two . . .”

Scarlett stepped into the triangle of seller, buyer, and dealer. Her face was shockingly white above her green shirt, her eyes greener than emeralds. “One-forty,” she said clearly. The dealer stared confused, his rhythm broken. Scarlett spit into her right hand and slapped it loudly against his. Then she spit again, looking at the seller. He lifted his hand and spat into the palm, then slapped once, twice against hers in the age-old seal of deal made. The dealer could only spit and seal in acquiescence.

Scarlett looked at Rhett’s friend. “I hope you’re not too disappointed,” she said in a honeyed tone.

“Why, of course not, that is to say—”

Rhett broke in. “Bart, I’d like you to meet . . .” he paused.

Scarlett did not look at him. “Mrs. O’Hara,” she said to Rhett’s bewildered companion. She held out her spit-wet right hand. “I’m a widow.”

“John Morland,” he said, and took her grimy hand. He bowed, kissed it, then smiled ruefully into her blazing eyes. “You must be something to see taking a fence, Mrs. O’Hara. Talk about leaving the field behind! Do you hunt around here?”

“I . . . um . . .” Dear heaven, what had she done? What could she say? What was she going to do with a thoroughbred hunter in Ballyhara’s stable? “I confess, Mr. Morland, I just gave in to a woman’s impulse. I had to have this horse.”

“I felt the same way. But not quickly enough, it seems,” said the cultivated English voice. “I’d be honored if you’d join me some time, join the hunt from my place, that is. It’s near Dunsany, if you’re familiar with that part of the County.”

Scarlett smiled. She’d been in that part of the County not so long ago, at Kathleen’s wedding. No wonder the name John Morland was familiar. She’d heard all about “Sir John Morland” from Kathleen’s husband. “He’s a grand man, for all that he’s a landlord,” said Kevin O’Connor a dozen times. “Didn’t he tell me himself to drop five pounds from the rent as a gift for my wedding?”