"What kind of God would do this?" she demanded, as if the walls could answer. "What kind of God would consecrate His Mass with gold and velvet while children starve? That chalice alone could carry all four of my babes away from Ireland—could see them safe. But it will sit upon that shelf another hundred years, gathering dust..."
The words trailed into a terrible silence that seemed to clutch about Ashleen's throat, setting her hands atremble. It was as if the huge stone archways flung her words back to her, mocking, taunting, like the devil's tempting.
...that chalice alone could carry all four... away from Ireland... see them safe... safe... if you but had it in your hands... Ash's heart thundered in her breast, her fingers clenching until the nails bit deep into her palms. The gombeen men would pay a small fortune... enough to book passage on a ship, enough to gain them all a start in America's wild lands... an ocean away from famine and fever and workhouses reeking of death.
All she had to do was walk up to the stone ledge and slip the chalice beneath the fall of her habit. Take it. There was no one to stop her, no one to know. Ash caught her lower lip between her teeth.
No one to know but God and her own gnawing conscience.
It would be stealing.
Aye, as if she were stealing from God Himself... and good Sister Agatha, Sister Magdalene... they loved her, trusted her in their way as implicitly as Renny and the others. And yet...
Ash stared at the chalice glowing in the sun’s fading rays until she could nearly feel the metal beneath her palms. Who was to say that this was not her miracle—the one she had prayed for? Who was to say that it was not God's own hand that had brought her to the chapel? That it was not His will that had enveloped the chalice in rays of sunlight—a beacon to guide her, to aid her in saving the children she so cherished.
It would be wrong to take it, a voice within her whispered.Mortal sin.
"Aye," Ash whispered, "yet would it not be a worse sin to allow four children to be carried off to die?" Slowly she stood, her footsteps echoing upon the stone as she mounted the platform upon which the altar stood. She could hear laughter from outside the window, innocent, piercingly sweet laughter as Sister Magdalene herded the little ones back from the glen.
A rainbow of rays from the elegant glass window enveloped Ashleen, warming her as she stood in a pool of light. She stared at the chalice until the pattern of amethysts and ornate engravings blurred. She reached up, her hand brushing gold heated from the sun.
"I'll send back money the instant I can." She promised as her fingers closed about the gold stem. "I promise to repay... repay You. Please"—her voice dropped to a whisper—"let this be my miracle."
Holding her breath, Ashleen slid the vessel from its stone shelf. Yet instead of some invisible benediction, a chill pierced through to the marrow of her bones.
Her heart seemed to cease beating, her breath catching in her throat as she whirled to face the window that had glowed so brightly moments before. But the sunlight that had caressed her had vanished, leaving her lost in cold, gray shadow.
* * *
The sailsof the frigate Windsong snapped in the breeze, surly, unwashed sailors swearing at the elements and at one another as they wrestled coarse lengths of hemp to heave the canvas squares aloft.
Ashleen leaned against the taffrail, the soft gray homespun of her dress billowing behind her as she watched Ireland's coastline drifting farther into the mist-swirled distance. Her arm tightened about Liam's thin shoulders, Shevonne clutching her hand in a grip that belied the girl's unruffled expression.
Renny had already dashed off to watch the men scaling the rigging, the adventure of a sea voyage driving away any thought of bidding farewell the land that had used him so cruelly. And Meggie—she had climbed into a huge coil of rope, as if using the wall of twisted hemp to block out sights and sounds that were strange to her.
It seemed as if an eternity had passed since the night Ashleen had awakened them upon their cots, stealing them away from the convent beneath night's dark cloak. They had stared up at her with huge, confused eyes but had followed her, would have followed her even if she had been leading them down to hell.
Was she?
Please, let me be doing the right thing... the plea echoed in Ashleen's mind as she stifled the urge to reach out over the crashing waves and catch the emerald-skirted hills of the land she so loved.
A tugging on Ashleen's skirt made her look down into Liam's upturned face, puckered now with worry. "When we were at St. Michael's Sister Agatha took care of us. Took care of you, too, Sister Ash," the child said slowly. "Who will take care of us now?"
Ash forced a reassuring light into her eyes as she stroked Liam's smooth cheek. "God will," she said softly. But as Liam blessed her with a trusting grin she turned away, unable to meet his gaze.
God will, the winds seemed to jeer at her.
If He has not deserted you.
Chapter Two
St. Joe, Missouri
Ashleen sagged against the wall of the wheelwright's shop, her eyes sliding closed in an effort to block out the mayhem all around her. The shrieks of the children mingled with the clang of hammer against red-hot iron, the scraping of blade against wood rasping against her nerves until she wanted to scream.
Fear had sharpened inside her with each mile she had traveled away from the convent. Until now she could hardly move, hardly breathe as she surveyed the disaster her recklessness had wrought.
What little money she had managed to hoard after landing in America had been spent long ago, the rickety wagon standing out in the dusty street of St. Joe, Missouri holding everything they owned.
