But some, traumatized by their fear of what might have happened if they had remained in homelands that had rejected them, exhausted by their flight and their travel into the unknown, decided to stay in this town that had welcomed them to its shores, and put down roots of their own.

CHAPTER ONE

1854

It was a late afternoon in August. The sun was losing its heat, but it was still warm enough for Ellen to put her face up to the golden rays and know that her nose would freckle. She had made her monthly visit to her mother and father in Holmpton and shared Sunday dinner with them and her brother Billy, and was on her way to call on her friend Polly, one of six sisters, before she returned to the large farmstead a few miles away where she worked as a general maid.

She was humming softly to herself and gently swinging the basket containing a cake from her mother when she turned in at the Randells’ gate and there was Harry, Polly’s older brother, with a foot on a spade, digging over a patch of earth. She stopped and he looked up.

He had always lived in this remote part of Holderness close to the sea, as she had too until starting work for Mrs Hodges. She’d often seen him when she was growing up, for this was a small population of less than one hundred souls and everyone knew everyone else, but they’d never had a proper conversation; just a quick nod and a greeting, which was the usual thing for the lads in the village, who were mainly tongue-tied in front of girls. Since he had started work as a farm labourer she had seen less of him, but she recognized him at once.

‘Hello,’ she said. ‘Is Polly at home?’

He’d taken his foot off the spade to look at her and with a quickened breath she thought that she hadn’t realized how fair he was, his long hair bleached blond by the summer sun and tied at the back of his neck by a bootlace, and his eyes as blue as the sky.

‘Erm, yeh, I think so.’ He cleared his throat. ‘Just go on in.’ He indicated the house door, which was wide open. ‘I think they’re all there.’ He chuckled and she saw how his eyes danced. ‘Sometimes I lose count.’ He came towards her, carrying the spade. ‘I know you,’ he said hesitantly, and with what she thought was a shy smile, ‘but I forget your name.’

‘Ellen,’ she said. ‘Ellen Snowden.’

‘Not Billy Snowden’s little sister? No, you can’t be – not that young bairn!’