River of Dust by Virginia Pye

"Please, don't blame yourself."
        He groaned as if she had struck him a blow. "But it is, and I do."
        She pushed her fingers through his hair more firmly now. Then she touched around his unshaven cheek and rough jaw and lifted his face to hers. "The baby inside me will also help us to heal. This one is going to make it. I know he will."
        The Reverend must have seen the doubt in her eyes, or heard the quiver she tried to keep from her voice. He looked at her with a tender expression, and she felt tears rise up behind her eyes. He brought her to him and kissed her on the lips. Grace thought she might faint, she was so happy to be in his embrace again. She had feared she had lost him forever.
        But his lips were dry, and they did not press for long against her greedy ones. He pulled back and looked away out the open window.
        "I have a sermon to prepare," he said. "You will come with me to chapel tomorrow?"
        "Of course I will come with you."
        "Bless you, my dear." He turned and began to leave the room. Then he paused and stepped back, closer.
        Her heart could not help fluttering with hope that he might bestow upon her another kiss.
        But he simply added, "Do not be surprised to see that our ranks have swelled. I seem to have sparked a revival of sorts. Most strange, but positive for our cause, I believe."
        She looked at him, waiting for more, but he bent quickly and merely kissed her on the forehead before stepping away.

Seven
    G race cherished the Reverend's firm grip on her elbow as he steered her up the aisle, but she hated the moment when he placed her in her seat in the front pew and moved away. It took all of her self-control not to turn to him before the assembling congregation and beg him to hold her a moment longer. She watched him rise to the platform behind the simple podium. Then she looked down at her lap and ran her fingers over the fine lacework of her dress stretched tightly across her growing belly. She hoped that no one would spot the tears gathering behind her eyes and prayed she could make it through the morning service without causing a stir.
        But, quickly enough, she and the other missionaries and the usual Chinese faithful were distracted by a racket at the back of the chapel. Grace turned to see what the disturbance might be. A cart had pulled up out front, and from it climbed more than a dozen men. A second cart followed closely behind, and another after that. While Grace couldn't see all that was happening beyond the open double doors, she gathered that a steady stream of congregants was clamoring toward the little chapel.
        She recognized none of the peasants' faces that entered through the door. She heard the rattle of more carts arriving, and the influx continued with no sign of abating. In the seven years that the Reverend had lived in Shansi, the mission had grown slowly and steadily in numbers that were nothing to be ashamed of. But as she glanced up at him now, he must have sensed her eyes upon him, because he glanced back and raised a single eyebrow, as if to say that he, too, wondered what the Lord had wrought.
        The service began a full half hour late because the new congregants had to pack themselves into every pew, some sitting on each other's laps. More stood at the back and along the sides. Others filled the central aisle and edged out the door. The faces of those who could not enter pressed against the windows.
        Grace peered around for her young lady friends with whom she had lost touch during the recent difficult months. None of the not-yetwed missionary teachers appeared to be in attendance. The night before, when Grace had pressed Mai Lin to tell her about the changes to the congregation to which the Reverend had referred, her servant had alluded to the fact that the chapel now belonged to the Chinese. Grace surmised that this recent change was the reason the young ladies now