Mountain Homecoming by Sandra Robbins Page B

Townsend to buy what I need.”
    â€œBut you’ll be here tomorrow night?”
    â€œI doubt it. I may leave tomorrow.”
    â€œHow many days you think you’ll be gone?” Simon asked.
    â€œAbout three, I guess. I want to be back by Saturday so I can be here for Granny’s birthday.”
    Anna smiled. “Good. And try to get back in time to help us celebrate her family birthday Saturday night.”
    He nodded. “I will.”
    They turned and disappeared through the doorway that led into the kitchen. After a moment Matthew entered the room. He walked to the shelf and trailed his fingers across the books’ spines as he read the titles. The Count of Monte Cristo, The Three Musketeers, Moby Dick .
    Matthew smiled. So Simon and Anna had a son who liked adventure and read about what was happening in other parts of the world. But their daughter seemed very different. She appeared to be more concerned about what was happening to the valley she’d lived in all her life.
    He sat down on the edge of the bed and let his gaze travel over the small room. It came to rest on the lamp Simon had lit. A round, clay bowl streaked with orange and black sat on the table next to it. He picked up the container and stared at the arrowheads it held inside. He could imagine Simon taking his son on a walk through the fields as they searched for remnants of the Cherokee people who had once lived in this valley.
    He held up one of the arrowheads to the light and studied it before he placed it back in the bowl and set it on the table. There was no doubt in his mind that Simon and Anna’s son had lived a happy life here with his parents. Nothing like what he had endured at the hands of his father.
    He undressed, lay down on top of the patchwork quilt, and put his hands behind his head. As he stared up at the ceiling, Rani’s face drifted into his mind. Ever since he’d encountered her at his farm, he hadn’t been able to get her out of his mind. It was as if she had some kind of hold on him, and he didn’t understand it.
    Maybe what he needed was a good night’s sleep. He might feel differently in the morning. Like his mother always said, you never could tell what a new day would bring.

Chapter 4
    A nna read back over her journal entry for today. She closed the book and rubbed her hands over the smooth leather cover. How many journals had she filled with her thoughts since coming to Cades Cove over twenty years ago? She smiled as she remembered how the first one had contained Granny’s instructions about the medicinal uses of herbs. In the years since, she’d written of her life with Simon and their children. Someday she would pass them all to her grandchildren.
    Smiling, she laid the book in the desk drawer and pushed herself up from her chair. She walked to the bedroom door and peeked out to see if Rani and George were still talking. The low buzz of their voices drifted from the front room. Smiling, she closed the door and walked back to sit on the edge of the bed. As she pulled the brush she held through her long hair, her gaze traveled over Simon in the chair next to the lamp table.
    For the last fifteen minutes, he’d been absorbed in the Scripture passage he was reading. She liked this time of night when they could be alone in their bedroom without the normal distractions of family life.
    The muscle in her husband’s jaw flexed as it did whenever he was concentrating, and a slight frown puckered his brow every so often. Through the years she’d come to know and love all his little mannerisms. His facial expression told her that he was committing something to memory. Probably a passage he’d use in his sermon next Sunday.
    Her gaze traveled to the gray streaks in the hair around his ears. She smiled softly in spite of herself. He had been concerned when the first ones had appeared, but she assured him it gave him a more distinguished look. To her he would always