Giles pondered. "If you'll stay half an hour extra every night, I'll try."

"Windom might not —"

"Lie," Giles cut in. "If he asks why you're late, lie to him. That is, if you mean to make something of yourself. Something other than a charcoal burner.''

"Do you think I can, Master Hazard?"

"Do you?"

"Yes."

"Then you will. The race is to the driven, not the swift."

That conversation had taken place the preceding summer. Through the autumn and winter Giles taught the boy. He taught him well, so well that Joseph couldn't help sharing his accomplishments with his mother. One night when Windom was away somewhere, roistering, he showed her a book he had smuggled home, a controversial book titled Metallum Martis, by the recently deceased Dud Dudley, bastard son of the fifth Lord Dudley.

Dud Dudley claimed to have smelted iron successfully with mineral coal — or pit coles — as Joseph read during his laborious but successful demonstration to Bess.

Her eyes sparkled with admiration. Then the light faded. "Learning is a splendid thing, Joseph. But it can lead to excessive pride. The center of your life must be Jesus."

He disliked hearing that but kept quiet.

"Only two things matter in this life," she went on. "Love of God's son and the love of one person for another. The kind of love I feel for you," she finished, suddenly clutching him against her.

He heard her weeping, felt her shivering. The killing time had whipped out of her all hopes but her hope of heaven, all loyalties but her loyalty to him and to the Savior he was coming to distrust. He was sorry for her, but he meant to live his own life.