Up until now, Charleston was the largest city she'd seen, but New York wasn't anything like Charleston. As she walked through the noisy, bustling streets, she had to admit there were some fine sights. Beautiful churches, elegant hotels, emporiums with great marble doorways. But bitterness kept her from enjoying her surroundings. The city seemed untouched by the war that had torn apart the South. If there was a God, she hoped He'd see to it that William T. Sherman's soul roasted in hell.

She was staring at an organ grinder instead of paying attention to where she was going, and she bumped into a man hurrying home. "Hey, boy! Watch out!"

"Watch out yourself," she snarled. "And I'm not a boy!" But the man had already disappeared around the corner.

Was everybody blind? Since the day she'd left Charleston, people had been mistaking her for a boy. She didn't like it, but it was probably for the best. A boy wandering alone wasn't nearly as conspicuous as a girl. Folks back home never mistook her. Of course, they'd all known her since she was born, so they knew she didn't have any patience with girlish gewgaws.

If only everything weren't changing so fast. South Carolina. Rutherford. Risen Glory. Even herself. The old man thought she was a child, but she wasn't. She'd already turned eighteen, which made her a woman. It was something her body wouldn't let her forget, but her mind refused to accept. The birthday, along with her sex, seemed accidental, and like a horse confronted with too high a fence, she'd decided to balk.

She spotted a policeman ahead and slipped into a group of workers carrying toolboxes. Despite the tart, she was still hungry. Tired, too. If only she were back at Risen Glory right now, climbing one of the peach trees in the orchard, or fishing, or talking to Sophronia in the kitchen. She closed her fingers around a scrap of paper in her pocket to reassure herself it was still there, even though the address printed on it was permanently stamped in her memory.