Love's First Bloom by Delia Parr

of the passengers on board would be reporters who had the village of Toms River as their final destination in their search for Rev. Livingstone’s daughter.
    Satisfied when she finally had the canvas bag in place that she could proceed alone and unnoticed, she turned left and crossed the bridge to get to the south side of the river. Although the day promised to be fair, a strong easterly breeze blew across the river, capping brackish waves with white foam, and she tightened her shawl around her shoulders.
    She stopped when she reached the middle of the bridge to finish her morning prayers, a new ritual that seemed to make it easier for her to pray, despite the uncertainty of her father’s trial and her own future. After she folded her hands and rested them on the wooden railing, she raised her face to the heavens and closed her eyes. As the breeze caressed her face, she acknowledged that if she had to be anywhere other than home, she was grateful that He had brought her here to this place and to this particular couple’s home.
    Because Phanaby and Elias Garner were such faithful followers of the Word and solid members of the community, most of the villagers here had accepted her. No one had ever questioned that she was exactly what she pretended to be: a young widow with a little girl to raise on her own.
    Most simply offered their friendship and understanding. She did not know whether it was out of respect or pity, but they had never asked her about where she had lived before or how her husband had died, beyond the brief explanations either Phanaby or Elias had offered to them before she had even arrived: Ruth’s husband, Martin, had owned a small stationery store in New York City, but was heavily in debt. After his unexpected death due to some unnamed illness, she only lasted a year on her own until it was necessary for her to turn to distant relatives for help.
    Ruth sighed, bowed her head, and tried again to open her heart. “Heavenly Father, I come to you again this morning to praise your wisdom and to ask you to help me,” she whispered.
    Unbidden, tears welled, and she paused to blink them away and swallow the lump in her throat. “I don’t understand why you would let my father suffer so cruelly,” she murmured. “I don’t understand why you chose me to protect Lily when I have to learn so much about caring for such a young child. Or why my burden has to get even harder now that reporters are trying to find me, which only places Lily at even more risk of being discovered. Please, Father. Help me to understand. Help me to be more patient. And please touch the hearts of the jurors, that they might truly believe in my father’s innocence and set him free to continue the work he has been doing in your name so we can be together again very soon. Amen,” she whispered and opened her eyes.
    Less than a heartbeat later, she closed her eyes again for just a moment. “I forgot to ask you earlier to bless Phanaby for agreeing to take care of Lily until breakfast each day and giving me a very special place to spend that time. Amen,” she finished before the first hint of golden light burst through the shadowed horizon.
    Her heart began to race with anticipation once she reached the other side of the bridge. She turned down a narrow, sandy path that hugged the shoreline on the south side of the river, which had yet to develop as the village had done. She slowed her pace and meandered her way between the low vegetation that flourished along the river’s edge and a forest of cedar and pine that extended west for miles.
    From here she had an unobstructed view of the series of stately clapboard homes on the opposite side of the river, just below the apothecary, where many of the local ship captains lived with their families when they were not at sea. She had not actually seen Capt. Grant since he had brought her here, but she had seen his ship, the Sheller, anchored in the river or being unloaded at the end of Dock