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Back Plough the Furrow
Chapters (53)
  1. Cover
  2. Title page
  3. Dedication page
  4. One
  5. Two
  6. Three
  7. Four
  8. Five
  9. Six
  10. Seven
  11. Eight
  12. Nine
  13. Ten
  14. Eleven
  15. Twelve
  16. Thirteen
  17. Fourteen
  18. Fifteen
  19. Sixteen
  20. Seventeen
  21. Eighteen
  22. Nineteen
  23. Twenty
  24. Twenty-one
  25. Twenty-two
  26. Twenty-three
  27. Twenty-four
  28. Twenty-five
  29. Twenty-six
  30. Twenty-seven
  31. Twenty-eight
  32. Twenty-nine
  33. Thirty
  34. Thirty-one
  35. Thirty-two
  36. Thirty-three
  37. Thirty-four
  38. Thirty-five
  39. Thirty-six
  40. Thirty-seven
  41. Thirty-eight
  42. Thirty-nine
  43. Forty
  44. Forty-one
  45. Forty-two
  46. Forty-three
  47. Forty-four
  48. Sow the Seed
  49. Reap the Harvest
  50. About the Author
  51. ALSO BY MARGARET DICKINSON
  52. Acknowledgements
  53. Copyright page

Would he ever know, Esther thought, just how much more he had lost?

Following the coffin out of the church as chief mourner, with Kate on one side and Will Benson on the other, Esther paused in the aisle as she came level with Beth. She felt a soft sigh run through the congregation and knew they were watching herself and Beth in this moment.

Esther glanced at Robert Eland – this compassionate man who had borne so much in the face of his wife’s love for another man. Yet even now she read the silent consent in his eyes to her unspoken question. She put out her hand towards Beth and Danny and gestured that the Eland family should take the place in the funeral procession directly behind herself, Kate and Will.

It was a gesture she knew might find censure amongst some and would certainly cause gossip amongst many. But as always Esther Hilton flouted convention, cared nothing for how things looked or what others might say or think. She owed this to Beth and to Danny.

Most of all, she owed it to Matthew.

The two women in his life, who had loved him each in their own, but very different, way, stood side by side as the coffin was lowered into the ground.

Esther heard a sob and she reached out and took Beth’s hand in hers. It was like ice. She held it between her own, trying to warm it, trying to comfort the woman at her side. There was nothing she could say that would lessen Beth’s pain, nothing that could turn back time and make everything different.

The vicar intoned the words over the grave and then Matthew’s family and friends threw handfuls of earth on to the top of the coffin.

Danny and Kate stepped forward, their faces solemn, feeling the importance of the moment. They stood close together and Esther saw Danny take hold of Kate’s hand. Together they bent and picked up a handful of earth and together they threw it on to the top of Matthew’s coffin. They stood in silence for a moment and then Danny turned to look at Kate, concern for her on his young face.

They were only children, Esther told herself fiercely, and yet in that look there was something she had feared to see. There was a closeness between them that had grown innocently, unaware as they were of their blood relationship.

It was a closeness that put dread into Esther’s heart.