Page 78 of Caroline’s Compass

“I can promise steady employment.”

She closed her fingers around the compass and his hand beneath it. “Yes.”

Thomas drew her toward him carefully, hindered by his ankle, the chair, and his refusal to drop the compass. Caroline solved two of those difficulties by setting the instrument on the crate and kneeling beside him.

Their first kiss since the quarrel carried relief, promise, and the quiet certainty that neither had reached the end of a road. They had merely chosen to travel the next part together.

A twig snapped behind them.

Lucy stood three feet away with both hands over her mouth.

Caroline stared at her. “How long have you been there?”

“Not long enough to hear whether he proposed.”

Thomas said, “I did.”

Lucy spun and ran toward camp. “They are getting married!”

Seven voices rose at once. Caroline rested her forehead against Thomas’s.

“We had perhaps three seconds.”

“A generous private interval by Whitaker standards.”

She laughed, picked up her compass, and went with him to meet the celebration coming toward them.

Lucy reached the first fire out of breath and delivered the news in stages. “Thomas asked—Caroline said—the compass was there—and they kissed.”

The older Mrs. Bell set down her cup. “Which occurred first?”

Lucy had not prepared for chronology. “The asking.”

“What did he ask?” Grace demanded, arriving behind her.

“Marriage.”

“What did Caroline say?” Martha asked.

“Yes.”

Rebecca folded her arms. “Then why are you telling it as if someone fell from a cliff?”

“It felt urgent.”

Mr. Avery fetched his fiddle. Charlotte fetched the family record. Lydia fetched Caroline's blue ribbon without permission. Eleanor remained beside Nathaniel and smiled toward the dark edge of camp where the couple would appear.

“Give them a moment,” she said.

Everyone agreed and moved three steps closer to the path.

Nathaniel shook his head. “This family interprets privacy geographically.”

“They are improving,” Eleanor said. “Last month they would have gone to meet them.”

Lucy started forward, reconsidered under seven looks, and returned. By the time Caroline and Thomas entered the firelight, the company had arranged itself with such false casualness that no reasonable person could have mistaken it for anything but an ambush.

Lucy's announcement gathered inventions as quickly as it gathered listeners. By the time Caroline and Thomas reached the nearest fire, Mr. Avery believed Thomas had proposed while delirious, the older Mrs. Bell believed Caroline had proposed during the rescue, and Samuel Turner believed the compass itself had chosen them.