“My insides are not curdled, thank you,” Alice said stiffly, then added, after a moment, “But I would be very interested to see the article.”

“Article?” said Pastor McIntosh.

“That you mentioned. Where it says a woman shouldn’t ride a horse. For fear of ‘jiggling.’ It’s not a medical term I’m familiar with.”

The two men looked at each other.

Alice dragged her knife across a piece of chicken, not looking up from her plate. “Knowledge is so important, don’t you think? We all say at the library, without facts we really do have nothing. If I’m putting my health at risk by riding a horse, then I think it would be only responsible for me to read the article you’re talking about. Perhaps you could bring it with you next Sunday, Pastor.” She looked up and smiled brightly across the table.

“Well,” said Pastor McIntosh, “I’m not sure I could lay my hands on it just like that.”

“The pastor has a lot of papers,” said Mr. Van Cleve.

“The funny thing is,” Alice continued, waving a fork for emphasis, “in England, nearly all well-brought-up ladies ride. They go out hunting, jumping ditches, fences, all sorts. It’s almost compulsory. And yet they pop out babies with extraordinary efficiency. Even the Royal Family. Pop, pop, pop! Like shelling peas! Do you know how many children Queen Victoria had? And she was always on a horse. They couldn’t pull her off.”

The table had grown quiet.

“Well . . .” said Pastor McIntosh “. . . that is . . . most interesting.”

“It can’t be good for you, though, dear,” said the pastor’s sister, kindly. “I mean, strenuous physical activity is not good for young women at the best of times.”

“Goodness. You’d better tell some of the mountain girls I see every day. Those women are chopping firewood, hoeing vegetable patches, cleaning house for men who are too sick—or too lazy—to get out of bed. And, strangely, they too seem to have all those babies, one after another.”

“Alice,” said Bennett, quietly.

“I can’t imagine too many of them are just floating around, flower-arranging and putting their feet up. Or perhaps they have a different biological makeup. That must be it. Perhaps there’s a medical reason I haven’t heard of for that, too.”

“Alice,” said Bennett, again.

“There is nothing wrong with me,” she whispered angrily. She was furious to hear the tremor in her voice. It was what they had needed. The two older men exchanged kindly looks.

“Oh, don’t you get yourself worked up now. We’re not criticizing you, Alice dear,” said Mr. Van Cleve, reaching across the table and placing his plump hand over hers.

“We understand it can be a disappointment when the Lord doesn’t bless you straight off. But it’s best not to get too emotional about it,” said the pastor. “I’ll say a little prayer for you both when you’re next in church.”

“That’s most kind of you,” said Mr. Van Cleve. “Sometimes a young lady doesn’t always know what’s in her own interests. That’s what we’re here for, Alice, to mind your best interests. Now, Annie, where’s that sweet potato? My gravy’s getting cold here.”

* * *

• • •

What did you have to do that for?” Bennett sat beside her on the swing seat as the older men repaired to the parlor, finishing off a bottle of Mr. Van Cleve’s best bourbon. Their voices rose and fell, punctuated by bursts of laughter.

Alice sat with her arms crossed. The evenings were growing cooler but she positioned herself at the far end of the swing seat, a good nine inches from the warmth of Bennett’s body, a shawl around her shoulders. “Do what?”

“You know very well what. Pa was just trying to look out for you.”

“Bennett, you know that riding horses has nothing to do with why I’m not getting pregnant.”

He said nothing.

“I love my job. I truly love my job. I will not give it up because your father is under the impression that my insides are jiggling. Does anyone say you play too much baseball? No. Of course they don’t. But your bits are jiggling all over the place three times a week.”

“Keep your voice down!”

“Oh, I forgot. We can’t say anything out loud, can we? Not about your jiggling bits. We can’t talk about what’s really going on. But I’m the one everyone’s talking about. I’m the one they think is barren.”

“Why do you mind what people think? You act like you don’t care for half the people around here anyway.”

“I mind because your family and your neighbors are harping on about it all the time! And they’re going to keep on unless you explain what’s going on! Or just . . . do something about it!”

She had gone too far. Bennett rose abruptly from the swing seat and strode off, slamming the screen door behind him. There was a sudden silence in the parlor. As the male voices slowly picked up again, Alice sat on the swing seat, listening to the crickets and wondering how she could be in a house full of people and also in the loneliest place on earth.

* * *

• • •

It had not been a good week at the library. The mountains turned from lush green to a fiery orange, the leaves forming a coppery carpet on the ground that muffled the horses’ hoofs, the hollers filling with thick morning mists, and Margery observed that half her librarians were out of sorts. She watched Alice’s uncharacteristically set jaw and shadowed eyes, and might perhaps have made an effort to sway her out of her mood, but she herself was antsy, still not having heard back from Sophia. Every evening she attempted to repair the more damaged books among their haul, but that pile had grown to a teetering height, and the thought of all the work, or all those wasted books, dismayed her even more. There was no time for her to do anything but get back on the mule and take another load out.

The appetite for books had become relentless. Children followed them down the street, begging for something to read. Families they saw fortnightly would beg for the same weekly allowance as those on the shorter routes, and the librarians would have to explain that there were only four of them and they were out all the hours of the day as it was. The horses were periodically lame from the long hours up hard, flinty tracks (“If I have to take Billy sideways up Fern Gully again I swear he’s going to end up with two legs longer than the others”), and Patch developed girth sores so that he was off work for days.

It was never enough. And the strain was starting to show. As they returned on Friday evening, mud and fallen leaves treading in on their boots to add to the mess, Izzy snapped at Alice after she had tripped on Izzy’s saddlebag and broken the strap. “Mind yourself!”