Marion wondered what it was that she and Alice had eaten that had made them so sick. Perhaps it was the scrapings of the bean pottage that she had eaten at noon the day before, of which Alice had had some too. The beans had been cooked with the end of a bit of bacon, mostly rind, to which she had added more beans several times in the last few days. It was all finished now – just as well. They had all had a bit of bread and cow’s milk for their supper last night, given them by a neighbour whose cow was still in milk, but it could not have been the milk that caused the sickness, for Peter and Peterkin were unaffected.

Her thoughts became less coherent as she dozed again. She felt what a kind husband she had, how unusually lucky she had been to have such a gentle, unfussing man – no, not quite: he fussed about the quality of wood and about meticulous craftsmanship, and how his tools were kept. But he was always good to her, not fussy about what he ate, kind to his children – no, not quite: kind to the girls when they were little, critical of the boys at any age – a strange, mixed man, but she had never much wished she had married anyone else. She had always known, in spite of loving him, that she could never have married Dick Shepherd. Her Peter was a very able carpenter. Although he had rights to strips of land in the fields, as almost all the other cottagers had, he spent all his time in the carpenter’s shed in the village and one of the Hall’s servants ploughed his strips for him. Long before Marion had married him it was realized that Peter was too short-sighted to plough.

‘Put his hand to the plough and he can’t see the ox’s tail!’ said one scornful man. ‘His furrows are like the paths of a hare – he wouldn’t even notice if he’d ploughed his neighbour’s land instead of his own!’ Yes, short-sighted, but everything within his arms’ range was very clear to him, even to the finest markings on his measuring stick. So others ploughed his land and he made the ploughs. Marion sometimes thought he was the happier man for it, for he saw the work of his hands in enriching use whereas many of the villagers saw the work of their hands beaten down by wind and rain or wilting under unknown pests and curses.

Kind Peter, thought Marion, and warm feelings of gratitude filled her dazed mind, and with gratitude came sleep at last.

Marion heaved herself up on to an elbow. Both halves of the door were open and it was broad daylight. Peter and Peterkin were gone. She peeped into the cradle. Alice was still asleep. The fire had been rebuilt with three logs and was smoking, the trap door in the roof was propped half open.