Erin had also been taughthealing by the willow, although she had not been as good a student atRuth had been. But Ruth was confident that she knew enou...h to heal thelocal people, if not those who travelled from the cities to be healed.She took Erin into the house to meet her family, and to make finalpreparations to leave. Her mother gave her a sack of food, including twoloaves of bread, cheese and some dried meat. Ruth accepted. Her familyno longer was short of food.After tearful hugs and. Without warning, Marcus then came right over to me and grabbed the bottom of my jumper and pulled it off over my head, then the same to my tee-shirt. By this stage i knew what was going on and had started to get out of my jeans. I was physically trembling, and Marcus could see i was nervous. Once i was naked he sat down beside me and said 'don't worry Steve, you look great, and i won't do anything with you that your not comfortable with'. I was partly relieved but also partly sad. by now i. It you really don’t get on why do you go over and stay with her each summer?’ ‘Simple, for my girls… they really enjoy their holidays there and Nikki really isn’t that awful when she is at home, Andre seems to have a calming influence on her and I can spend my time riding with Lucinda and Lauren and we usually take a trip to Paris for a couple of days…. And Nikki is their only living link with their father so I feel that I need to keep trying to build bridges for their sakes.’ ‘Is there. .. can you imagine?" she giggled again and gestured grandly at the street, full of shoppers and families."Summer ends; they all go home. Gets boring 'round here come September. So I try to have fun while I got people to have fun with. Want to?" She winked at me and grinned, showing perfect white teeth against her coral lips." ... to what?" My heart skipped several beats. She didn't mean..."To have fun, silly! C'mon. I'll buy you a drink. There might even be something new at the theater."There.