‘Yes, he was,’ Hilda’s eyes were on the hills now, ‘days and nights there in his little gorse hut, or out in the starry wind, and my thoughts flew to him – up there in the hills, up there in the dark – a thousand times in the night, or in the day.’ Her shoulders hunched and her head bent down. In an undercurrent of thought, Marion saw the dough was being oversqueezed with Hilda’s emotion. Hilda lifted her head again and looked straight at Marion.

‘But now,’ she said intensely, ‘my thoughts dash out of me, up the hills, away, away, over the forests and on and on for ever, till I stagger for there’s no resting place for them. My thoughts unwind from me like a thread from a spool, pulled out further and further for ever. I stagger with giving out – giving out – there’s no end to it, no end, Marion,’ and a slight tremor in her voice made her clamp her mouth shut and continue to knead with taut fingers.

Marion was perplexed and silent. It was not only contrary to village custom to describe one’s feelings, it was beyond most people’s ability. The villagers would only have used a few phrases so well worn that all personal flavour had long been rubbed off. ‘It’s a hard sorrow,’ would be said at the death of a young husband or wife; ‘It’s a cruel day for her,’ at the death of a baby or little child; ‘Ah well, it has to come,’ at the death of an old person. Marion felt a mixture of compassion and rebuke, overlaid with a strange sense of experiencing new intensities of feeling. The conventional phrases did not fit Hilda, as indeed conventional attitudes had never fitted Dick. Marion wondered for the first time whether Hilda’s strange thoughts and unusual words had been what had so attracted Dick to her – for no one ever had thought freckled Hilda pretty – and Marion had a glimpse of unknown bonds made of thoughts and words that could perhaps bind two people together even more tightly than could sexual passion and its resulting children.

Hilda lifted her tearless face, again looking into Marion’s eyes. ‘You’ll think I should not talk like this – perhaps I should not. I just say how my thoughts go. I think you know how thoughts really go when you find yourself torn apart. Saying things like, “cheer up now” doesn’t mean anything at all – or “your children will comfort you.” They say that to me – Joan does. The girls are good children, but how is a little girl to comfort for a dead lover? You know that, Marion – don’t you?’

Marion nodded slowly. ‘Yes, I do know,’ she said. ‘There is no curing such grief, no telling others much about it,’ and her thoughts went to Nolly.

Hilda clenched the dough, and her voice was tense as she said, ‘I can’t talk ever, here. M’Dame is all right, stiff but treats me well, and cuts down on blaming me for anything not to her liking just to be kind to me. Joan is just a chatterer. Tom’s kind, really kind, but he’s always busy. Milly’s always looking for something to grumble about – I’m quite alone.’