Chapter Eighteen
Ruth stepped into the kitchen and for several moments, she simply stood beside the table.
The scissors, in her hands, glinted softly in the afternoon light that streamed through the window.
Beyond the open door, she could hear the distant clatter of a bucket in the yard and the low nickering of horses in the barn.
Everything around her carried on exactly as it always had, only her heart refused to settle. She drew a slow breath and pressed her palms against the edge of the table. What had just happened?
She closed her eyes, replaying the moment despite herself. The warmth of the afternoon sun on the porch and the scent of soap and leather. The way he had looked at her. Not with obligation or politeness, but with an openness she had never seen before.
“You are beautiful.”
The words echoed in her mind with startling clarity. She had not imagined them. Nor had she imagined the almost-kiss. It had been the lightest brush of lips, so brief it might scarcely have counted at all. Yet the memory lingered with astonishing force.
Her fingertips rose unconsciously to her mouth as heat crept into her cheeks. But after a moment, she dropped her hand, a lump rising in her throat.
“I don’t know if I’m capable of loving anyone the way a husband ought.”
The admission had not been cruel, but it had hurt. And the look in Henry’s eye, the pain in his voice. It was like a man standing before a locked door without knowing how to find the key.
Ruth’s heart ached for him. She understood grief well enough to recognize it when she saw it. Henry had not rejected her, but rather the hope that love might still be possible for him. There was a difference, yet the distinction offered very little comfort.
She sighed softly and forced herself back to the practical business of supper in an attempt to steady her thoughts.
She gathered onions from the pantry and sliced them carefully on the worn wooden board.
A pot of beans simmered on the stove while she measured flour into a large earthenware bowl for biscuits.
The familiar rhythm of cooking should have calmed her.
Instead, she added salt twice before realizing her mistake. She reached for thyme when she meant rosemary. She stood staring into the oven for several moments before remembering why she had opened it. Finally, she laughed quietly at herself. “You are making a dreadful mess of this.”
The admission hung in the empty kitchen. She rested both hands upon the table and lowered her head. There was no use pretending any longer. Not before God, or before herself, she loved him.
The realization settled gently rather than suddenly, as though her heart had known it long before her mind had dared to admit it.
Somewhere between shared breakfasts and quiet evenings…
Between watching him care for Lola and seeing the grief he carried so faithfully and his awkward acts of kindness and the gentleness hidden beneath his solemn exterior…
She had fallen in love with Henry Foster.
The knowledge filled her with equal measures of joy and sorrow.
Joy, because she had never imagined she could feel this way and sorrow, because she had no right to it.
She had entered his home beneath another woman’s name.
She had stood before Pastor Luke and spoken vows that were not truly hers to speak.
Every kindness Henry had shown her had been offered to the woman he believed she was. Nora Smith. Not to Ruth Turner.
The thought tightened painfully around her heart and a tear slipped down her cheek before she brushed it away.
“No,” she whispered. “I cannot build happiness upon deceit.”
The words were difficult to say, but they were true. She knew that with certainty. After a moment, Ruth turned toward the door.
The biscuits were ready for the oven, and the stew needed only a little longer to cook. So, with nothing else requiring her immediate attention, Ruth made her way down the hallway to the sitting room.
Her Bible rested on the small table beside the rocking chair.
She lifted it carefully, tracing her fingers over the worn leather cover before settling into the chair.
The familiar weight of the book brought a measure of comfort.
Its pages had accompanied her through every sorrow she could remember. Surely, they could guide her now.
She did not search long. Almost instinctively, her fingers turned to the First Epistle to the Corinthians. Her mother had marked the passage years ago with a narrow strip of faded blue ribbon. Ruth smiled sadly as she found it, and then she began to read.
“Charity suffereth long, and is kind; charity envieth not; charity vaunteth not itself, is not puffed up, Doth not behave itself unseemly, seeketh not her own, is not easily provoked, thinketh no evil.”
She paused, the words feeling fuller now than they had when she was a child. She continued, “Beareth all things, believeth all things, hopeth all things, endureth all things. Charity never faileth...”
Silence settled over the room. Outside, the wind stirred gently through the cottonwoods and a mockingbird called from the fence line before falling quiet again. Ruth rested her hand upon the open page.
Love was patient and it was kind. Love sought the good of another before its own happiness. So if she truly loved Henry, how could she continue deceiving him? How could she ask him to build a future upon a false foundation?
She closed her eyes. “Lord...” The prayer came quietly. “So often I have asked You to show me the path.” Her voice trembled. “I think You already have.” Another tear escaped despite her efforts. “I simply do not know whether I am brave enough to walk it.”
She remained there for several minutes, the Bible open upon her lap, but the words did not change. Neither did the truth they carried.
When at last she rose, she felt no lighter. The burden remained, but beneath it lay a growing certainty. Love did not cling to lies because it feared the truth. Love trusted God enough to be honest, whatever the cost.
As she returned to the kitchen, the aroma of supper greeted her from the stove. She lifted the lid from the pot and stirred it slowly, her thoughts no longer upon the meal.
Instead, they rested upon the difficult conversation she knew was drawing nearer with every passing day. And for the first time, she prayed not that God would spare her from telling the truth, but that He would give her the courage to speak it.
***
When Ruth returned to the kitchen, the stew bubbled gently over the fire, filling the room with the comforting aroma of beef, onions, and herbs.
The biscuits had risen beautifully in the oven, their golden tops just beginning to brown.
She was reaching for the basket of freshly washed towels when light footsteps hurried across the kitchen floor.
“Nora?”
Ruth turned to find Lola standing in the doorway, clutching a faded blue ribbon. The little girl’s dark hair had escaped its braids during the afternoon and now hung in tangled waves around her shoulders.
“What is it?” Ruth asked gently.
Lola held up the ribbon. “My hair keeps coming undone.” She hesitated. “Will you fix it?”
Ruth smiled. “Of course.”
Lola climbed onto one of the kitchen chairs and turned her back obediently. Ruth picked up the brush resting near the washbasin and began working patiently through the child’s hair. It was thick and soft beneath her fingers.
“Does it hurt?” she asked.
Lola shook her head. “No.”
“Tell me if it does.”
“I will.”
Working slowly, Ruth divided the hair into three even sections.
“Did your mother braid your hair?” Lola asked.
Ruth’s hands paused for only a moment. “I never knew my mother,” she said. “She died when I was born.”
“Oh.”
“I never had the chance to know her.” The words still carried a quiet sadness, though time had softened their sharpest edges. “My father wasn’t much for combing little girls’ hair.” A faint smile touched her lips. “Truth be told, he scarcely noticed whether it was brushed at all.”
“So... who taught you?”
“The minister’s wife.” Warm memories stirred unexpectedly. “Mrs. Harper, back in Devil’s Hollow.”
She could picture the kindly woman as clearly as though she stood in the kitchen beside them, her silver-streaked hair always tucked neatly beneath a bonnet, her flour-dusted apron, the gentle hands that never seemed too busy for a lonely little girl.
“She had three daughters of her own,” Ruth continued, “and every Sunday morning before church she’d line us all up on stools in her kitchen. She’d brush our hair until it shone and braid it while telling us Bible stories.”
Lola smiled. “What stories?”
“Oh...” Ruth chuckled softly. “Daniel in the lions’ den. David and Goliath. Joseph and his coat of many colors.” She paused, remembering. “And she always said a girl should sit still while her hair was being braided because patience was a fruit of the Spirit.”
Lola giggled and the warmth of the moment settled over Ruth like sunshine after rain. For the first time that day, the weight on her heart eased, if only a little.
Lola reached back and gently touched the ribbon again. “I wish I could’ve met your mama.”
Ruth swallowed. “So do I. But the Lord gave me other women to help me grow.” She rested a gentle hand upon Lola’s shoulder. “Sometimes, God sends people to love us when the ones we long for are no longer here.”
Lola turned to her then. “Will you be leaving?”
She looked into the little girl’s hopeful face and found she could scarcely breathe.
She did not know what tomorrow would bring, whether Henry would ever forgive her when he learned the truth or if she would still be living beneath this roof by the end of the week.
Still, she did not wish to lie to Lola, or to frighten her.
“I hope not,” she said softly.
Lola searched her face for a moment, then smiled. “Good.”
Ruth returned the smile. “Why do you ask?”
The little girl looked down at her shoes, suddenly shy. “Because...” She scuffed the toe of one boot against the floorboards. “I like you.”
The simple words struck Ruth more deeply than she could have imagined and her throat tightened. She reached out and gently squeezed Lola’s hand. “I like you very much, too.”
Lola’s smile broadened. Then, with the quick change of subject only a child could manage, she announced, “I’d better feed Buttercup before Uncle Henry says I’ve forgotten again.”
She darted toward the back door, her braid swinging happily behind her and the screen door banged shut.
Silence settled over the kitchen once more but just then a movement out of the corner of her eye caught her attention.
Henry stepped in from the hallway and she had no idea how long he’d been standing there.
“Henry,” she said. “Is something wrong?...”
Ruth’s voice trailed off as he took a step forward.
“We need to talk,” he said.