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  For Mum and Dad

  PROLOGUE

  1920

  A warm breeze ruffled the meadow grass as Eli Baker made his way up the hill to his cottage, Ralf the sheepdog close at heel. Grazing sheep raised their heads to watch them pass.

  He heard the singing before he reached the summit, the sound bringing a smile to his face and lifting his weary shoulders. At the top of the hill, he paused. Laying one hand on Ralf’s head to prevent him from barking, he rested against the three-bar gate, gazing fondly on the woman and child in the cottage garden.

  Mary hadn’t noticed him. She was sitting on the doorstep, shelling peas, her chestnut-brown hair tumbling down her shoulders, a bowl resting on her lap. Four-year-old Emily sat beside her mother. Both were singing. It was a lullaby Mary had sung to Emily ever since she was a babe in arms.

  Though it was a song he had heard many times, the sheer purity of their harmonized voices sent goosebumps up Eli’s arms and stirred something deep in his soul.

  ‘Lay down your head, sweet little child,

  Mama and Papa are here by your side…’

  She had a beautiful voice, had his Mary, but even at such a tender age, Emily’s voice was deeper and richer, and Eli shuddered as the flawless purity of her voice stirred something deep within his soul…

  PART ONE

  CHAPTER ONE

  1923

  ‘I’m sorry, Eli,’ Annie Scrivens said softly. ‘She’s gone.’

  Eli Baker let out a low moan and dragged his rough hands through his thick, dark brown hair. He leaned forward in his chair, elbows resting on his knees, doubled over by the weight of his grief. ‘The baby?’ he suddenly thought to ask, his voice rough with unshed tears. Annie shook her head sadly.

  With a grace that belied her bulk, Annie gently laid the stillborn little boy in his mother’s arms and covered them with the sheet. Eli let out a loud sob. Annie looked across at him slumped on the spindle-back chair, weeping unashamedly, and sighed. He was only thirty-two, God love him, but he seemed to have aged twenty years overnight. His rugged, handsome features were haggard, and there were dark purple shadows under his brown eyes.

  Annie had seen more than her fair share of misery and heartache in her twenty years as a midwife, but that didn’t stop her heart breaking for Eli and the poor motherless girl downstairs.

  She laid a large, capable hand on Eli’s broad shoulder. His forearms were taut, muscled from long hours of manual labour. He had worked hard to make a good life for Mary and his little girl. She shook her head sadly at the cruelty of fate.

  ‘I’ll bring you a cup of tea and then I’ll be off.’ She paused. ‘I’ll call in to Alford and Sons on the way.’ Eli winced at the mention of the funeral directors. Annie gave his arm a comforting squeeze and left him alone with his poor dead wife and infant son.

  At the sound of Eli’s wretched sobbing, seven-year-old Emily Rose Baker looked up at the ceiling, blinking back tears of her own. She had been waiting for so long, listening for the telltale wail that would accompany the arrival of her new brother or sister, but instead, her mother’s ever-weakening screams had ended in a deathly silence that was broken only by the sound of her father’s sobs. Even at her tender age, she was aware something terrible had happened. Dread settled in the pit of her tummy like a stone.

  She heard footsteps on the stairs and clenched her teeth, wrapping her thin arms around her skinny frame. She was a slight girl, thin and bony, with a thick mane of chestnut-brown hair that hung down her back in two untidy plaits. She sat in Eli’s old armchair, close to the kitchen range, resting her bare feet on the dog, Ralf, who lay slumped morosely on the rug. For all intents and purposes, the aged mongrel was Eli’s dog, but since puppyhood his canine heart had belonged solely to Eli’s wife Mary. He had been whimpering for the past five minutes, as if notified by some sixth sense that his beloved mistress was no more.

  ‘There you are, pet,’ Annie Scrivens said, her bulk filling the doorway between the kitchen and the seldom-used parlour. Ralf raised his head an inch off his paws, sniffed the air and uttered a long-drawn-out sigh, before resting his head again.

  Annie regarded the little girl with pity. It wasn’t as if she even had brothers and sisters with whom to share the burden of her grief. Poor Mary had wanted a houseful of children, but Emily was the only one that had lived beyond a few months, not to mention the ones she hadn’t carried to term. And now the poor woman was gone too. Annie clicked her tongue. Life just wasn’t fair.

  ‘Why don’t you go outside and play a while?’ she suggested to Emily, attempting to inject a cheerful note into her voice. Emily raised her tearful gaze to the window. From her low vantage point, she could just make out the fluffy white clouds skimming the crest of the rolling Dorset hills as they scudded across a cornflower-blue sky. The door was open a crack and she could hear the sigh of the wind through the budding trees and the bleating of Ned Sawyer’s sheep across the track.

  She turned her gaze to follow Annie as the midwife busied herself with making the tea.

  ‘Can I go up and see Mama and the new baby?’ she asked in a small voice. Annie’s back stiffened, the heaped spoon of tea leaves hovering above the brown teapot. She cleared her throat.

  ‘Not at the moment, pet,’ she replied without turning around. ‘Go outside. The fresh air will do you good. And take the dog with you.’

  For a moment Emily thought about arguing, but at the sound of her father’s continued weeping, she thought better of it. In mutinous silence, she slid off the chair and, calling to Ralf, slipped outside, the dog plodding dutifully behind her.

  Emily sat down on the stone bench beneath the kitchen window and Ralf settled himself underneath. On either side of the cracked flagstone path, the lawn was awash with daisies and buttercups. Bees swarmed the yellow toadflax sprouting from the cracks in the lichen-covered wall and sparrows darted in and out of the ivy that clung to the side of the old stone cottage. Skylarks and swallows performed an aerial ballet over Emily’s head and she could hear the bleating of the ewes and their lambs on the hillside that sloped down to the Sawyer farm nestled in the valley below.

  Her chest felt tight and it hurt to breathe. A tear rolled down her cheek as she let out a sob. Ralf emerged from beneath the bench to lick her hand and she wrapped her arms around his shaggy neck, burying her face in his warm fur. She heard Annie Scriven’s voice drifting from the window above her, saying goodbye to her father. Five minutes later, Annie emerged from the house in her hat and coat, handbag over her arm. ‘Oh, pet,’ she sighed at the sight of the sobbing child half-draped over the dog. Ralf whined softly. Nudging him gently aside, Annie wedged herself onto the bench beside Emily and put her arm around the shuddering child.

  ‘My mama’s dead, isn’t she?’ Emily sobbed. Annie’s shoulders slumped.

  ‘Yes, pet, I’m afraid she is.’ She held the little girl while she sobbed into Annie’s ample breast, stroking her head and whispering useless platitudes.

  ‘You’ve got to be a brave girl for your father now, pet,’ she said once Emily’s sobs had abated.

  ‘I want my mama,’ Emily hiccoughed. Annie squeezed her tight.

  ‘She’s in Heaven with your baby brothers and sister,’ she said.

  ‘But I want her here.’

  ‘I know you do, pet,’ Annie said sorrowfu
lly. ‘I know you do.’

  * * *

  Eli ran a calloused palm over his chin, the day-old stubble rasping against his rough skin. Unable to bear the sight of his wife and child still and silent beneath the sheet, he turned his stricken gaze towards the window. Wispy clouds drifted across the sky.

  ‘It’s a beautiful day, Mary,’ he said. ‘You can see clear across the vale to Melbury Hill.’ A sob caught in the back of his throat. ‘Do you remember, Mary? It was at the church picnic up on Melbury Hill where you agreed to be my wife.’ His lips twitched at the memory. ‘The vicar was scandalized. We’d only been courting for eight weeks.’ Now his eyes rested on the shrouded form of the woman he had loved since he was seventeen years old. He tried to say more but his voice failed him and he buried his face in his hands. What was he to do with Emily now? How could he care for a child when he worked every hour God sent? He and Mary had both been workhouse orphans, so there were no doting grandmothers or aunties to share the responsibility of raising the motherless girl.

  He heard the front gate bang and crossed to the window in time to see Annie scurrying down the muddy track. Leaning over the sill, he looked down on Emily’s bowed head. She had one thin arm slung around Ralf’s neck and was picking frantically at a loose thread on her pinafore with the fingers of her other hand. With a weary sigh he made his way down the stairs and out into the warm spring sunshine.

  Ralf greeted him in a subdued fashion before flopping wearily at his feet. The flash of hope he saw in Emily’s eyes as she looked up cut him to the quick. He sat down heavily and pulled her against him, breathing in her comforting scent. She smelled of sunshine and fresh bread.

  ‘I expect Annie Scrivens told you your mama’s gone to be with the Lord?’ he began, his voice gruff with suppressed emotion. He blinked. ‘It’s just us now, pet. You and me.’ He kissed the top of her head. ‘We’ll be all right, won’t we?’

  Beside him, Emily stirred and nodded. Her face was pale and blotchy, and it broke Eli’s already shattered heart that there was nothing he could do to spare his daughter this heartache.

  * * *

  Edwin Alford, the undertaker, and two of his five sons arrived just before noon. Emily and Eli stood and watched solemnly from the doorway while they carefully loaded Mary and her infant son into their horse-drawn wagon.

  Annie Scrivens had spread the word and the first callers began to arrive soon after the undertaker left, bringing with them covered dishes of food along with their words of condolence. Ned Sawyer’s housekeeper, Molly, arrived to oversee the making of endless cups of tea, and Emily was kept busy at the sink washing cups and saucers for the seemingly never-ending stream of visitors.

  The sun was setting by the time Molly wrapped up her apron and set off on the short journey down the hill to the farmhouse to make a start on Ned’s supper.

  Without the hum of conversation and the rattle of crockery, the cottage seemed unnaturally quiet. It was now that Eli felt Mary’s loss most keenly. She would have been preparing the evening meal, lifting the rafters with the sound of her singing. She’d had a beautiful voice, had his Mary, and, young as she was, it was abundantly clear that Emily had inherited her mother’s talent. Only last week the vicar had promised Emily a place in the church choir as soon as she turned ten. Nothing had given Eli more pleasure of an evening than sitting in his favourite armchair listening to his wife and daughter singing together.

  Unable to be in the house, father and daughter huddled together on the stone bench as the sinking sun set the sky aflame and twilight crept across the hills.

  CHAPTER TWO

  Warm sunlight streamed in through the open doorway. Eli stared morosely at the bowl of lumpy porridge he’d cooked for himself and Emily. He had no appetite for the grey stodge and neither, it seemed, did Emily. He watched her as she pushed her porridge around listlessly. Poor mite, Eli thought with a sigh. She’d been up crying for her mother most of the night. No wonder she looked so washed out this morning.

  He ran his hand through his thick, wavy hair and stifled a yawn. He’d barely slept himself. At midnight he’d given up on the bed, which was too cold and empty without Mary’s presence, and moved to his armchair in the kitchen. With Ralf sprawled across his feet, he’d sat staring out of the darkened window until dawn.

  He pushed his bowl aside and picked up his mug. His employer Ned Sawyer had, somewhat begrudgingly, granted him the rest of the week off to grieve. Eli had debated sending Emily to school but decided against it. Without work to take his mind off his grief, the empty day stretched endlessly before him and he’d be glad of her company.

  He drained his mug and glanced at his pocket watch. It had been a gift from Mary on their first Christmas as man and wife. The hands stood at a quarter to eight. The vicar was calling at ten to discuss funeral arrangements. It wasn’t a visit he was looking forward to. Eli’s heart contracted painfully at the thought of laying his beloved Mary in the cold dank earth of St James’s churchyard.

  He scraped back his chair, rousing Ralf, who was dozing in a shaft of warm sunlight, and carried his bowl and mug to the sink.

  ‘Can you manage at least a spoonful or two?’ he said to Emily, nodding at her bowl. Shaking her head, Emily pushed her bowl away from her. The lump in her throat made swallowing difficult. She missed her mama so much. She pressed the heels of her palms against her eyes as they filled with fresh tears.

  ‘Leave it then, pet,’ said Eli gruffly. He turned his back to her, hiding tears of his own. ‘Why don’t you go collect the eggs?’ he suggested, a noticeable tremor in his voice.

  Wordlessly, Emily pushed back her chair and slipped outside. With Ralf trotting close at her heel, she rounded the side of the cottage. The chicken coop stood between a hedge of blackberry and hawthorn bushes and a disused shed in which the half-feral farm cats had made their home. Emily unlatched the door to the wooden henhouse and half a dozen chickens spilled out of the hatch, clucking and pecking at each other in their impatience to be free. Leaving the chickens to scratch contentedly in the grass and holding her breath against the sharp tang of chicken manure, she groped through the dank straw, finding six smooth brown eggs. She was about to return to the cottage when the sound of approaching voices caught her attention. She recognized the speakers immediately. It was the Tucker sisters, Edith and May, and they were talking about her.

  Emily pressed herself against the cottage wall, breathing in the scent of the honeysuckle that clung to its stone walls. It mingled with the smell of damp earth and the ripe odour of cow dung wafting from the field next door.

  ‘What will happen to the poor mite, do you think?’ Edith, the older of the two sisters, said as she paused outside Barrow Hill cottage to remove a stone from her shoe. She was a large woman, big-boned and weathered, her iron-grey hair hidden beneath a woollen shawl. ‘Eli works long hours. He can’t manage the child on his own,’ she added, gripping her sister’s arm to retain her balance while she slipped her shoe back on.

  ‘He’s a good-looking man,’ May said as they set off again. Five years younger than Edith, she was slimmer, her complexion smoother and paler. Her greying blonde hair hung down her spine in a thick plait. ‘And he’s still young. He’s bound to marry again, and quickly.’

  ‘Of that I have no doubt,’ Edith remarked. ‘But will the new wife want the burden of another woman’s child?’ She shook her head sorrowfully. ‘No,’ she continued, answering her own question. ‘It’ll be the workhouse for the poor motherless soul.’

  Emily stared after them, her mouth falling open in shock, but May’s reply was lost on the breeze as the two sisters descended the track into the copse heading for their cottage further along the lane. A steel band tightened around Emily’s chest. Would her father really send her away? Her heart beat rapidly and she blinked back the sting of tears. Sensing her distress, Ralf nudged her hand. She stroked his head absently, her vision blurred with tears. She missed Mama so much. How would she bear it if she was sent away from her fa
ther too?

  ‘Emily? What’s taking you so long?’ Her father’s voice startled her. Suddenly her churning emotions were too much to bear. Bursting into noisy tears, she let the egg basket fall to the ground as she ran to the shed and flung herself onto the dirty floor. A large ginger tom cat eyed her warily from the cobweb-shrouded rafters as several others slunk quickly into the shadows.

  ‘Emily?’ Her father filled the doorway, blocking the light. Ralf barked and licked Emily’s wet face. The next moment, she was in her father’s arms as he lifted her off the floor, brushing stray bits of straw and dirt from her pinafore. ‘Oh, my precious child,’ he murmured, cradling her tightly against him, feeling helpless in the face of her grief.

  ‘Are you going to send me away?’ Emily asked Eli tearfully as he carried her into the cottage.

  ‘What?’ His dark brows knit together in confusion. ‘Send you away?’ He set her on a chair and crouched down in front of her. ‘Whatever gave you that notion?’

  ‘I heard Miss Edith telling Miss May that your new wife won’t want me.’

  ‘New wife?’ Eli barked, blanching at the thought. ‘What new wife?’ He raked his hand through his hair. ‘And your poor mother not even cold…’ He cursed under his breath. The Tucker sisters were nothing but gossipmongers and troublemakers. Having been left comfortably off by their widower father, they had nothing better to do than meddle in other people’s business.

  ‘Take no notice of anything those two say,’ he told Emily. ‘I’m not inclined to find myself another wife and, even if I was,’ he assured her, ‘no woman would ever come between you and me, all right?’ He handed her his handkerchief. ‘Now, wipe your eyes and wash your face. We’ve got the vicar coming in an hour.’

  * * *