‘You look tired,’ Ivy remarked when Holly arrived home late that evening.

‘I am tired.’ Holly dropped onto the nearest chair and wiped her weary eyes. They felt as if they were full of grit and her legs ached from being on them all day.

‘I’ll go an’ make you a nice hot mug of milk. It’ll help you sleep,’ Ivy volunteered kindly.

Holly snorted. ‘Thanks, but I don’t think I’ll need any rocking off tonight. I reckon I shall be out like a light the second my head hits the pillow.’ She eased her feet out of her shoes and wiggled her toes as she waited for Ivy to come back, then noticed that Ivy didn’t seem her normal cheery self.

‘Is Alice all right?’ she asked as she sipped at her drink.

‘Oh yes, she’s fine, tucked up safe and warm but …’

‘But what?’

Ivy sniffed. ‘Walter came round earlier and I heard him telling your gran’father that he thought Marcus might be thinking of enlisting.’

Holly wasn’t surprised. Marcus wasn’t the sort of young man who would want to be seen as a coward. ‘And would it bother you very much if he went?’

Ivy considered for a moment before nodding. ‘Actually, yes, it would. I mean I know I’m being silly thinking anything serious could ever come of our friendship. He’s from a well-to-do family an’ I’m just a maid wi’ an illegitimate daughter into the bargain … and yet I’ve grown fond o’ him. I didn’t realise quite how much till I thought of how I would feel if he went away.’

‘I think the war is doing a very good job of doing away with class distinction,’ Holly pointed out. ‘But what about your feelings for Jeremy? You were so devastated when he left you.’

Ivy shrugged. ‘I think I just had my head turned by all the attention an’ flattery he gave me,’ she admitted. ‘I’d never really had much to do wi’ chaps until he came along an’ he just sorta swept me off me feet. To be honest, I think I always knew he weren’t the man I’d thought he was, but by the time I finally admitted it to meself, Alice were on the way so I didn’t know how I could walk away from him.’

Holly smiled at her sympathetically. It seemed that the path to true love wasn’t going to be a smooth one for either of them. Her hand unconsciously rose to touch the ring hanging on the chain about her neck beneath her blouse and she sighed. She’d accepted that Richard was a part of her past, but it didn’t stop her missing him and somehow she couldn’t bring herself to take it off even though her relationship with Harry was slowly developing into something a little more than friendship. He was a good man and she knew that more than a few nurses at the hospital would have given anything to be in her position, yet still she couldn’t feel for him as she had for Richard.