When she and Danny had learnt why they could never marry, Kate had gone to Lincoln. It seemed ironic, and yet somehow fitting, that she should go back to the place where her mother had tried to send her once before, and where she had been so miserable. She was wretchedly unhappy again, though it was not, she acknowledged, the fault of the beautiful city where she tried to make her home and build a new life. She found comfort in the vast interior of the cathedral and a melancholy catharsis in wandering the streets throbbing with people; yet she felt she was entirely alone. Nor was it the fault of the kindly people who gave her a home; the Godfreys.

At first, Kate had intended to stay only briefly in the small room that had once been her stepfather’s in their terraced family home. But an affinity and a friendship sprang up between Peggy Godfrey and the young, unhappy Kate, despite the sixteen years or so between them. Whether her stepfather had told them the circumstances, Kate never knew, but the Godfreys never pried into what had caused Kate’s sadness and were gently considerate and made her welcome; indeed they treated her as another daughter. The weeks grew into months and although at first she made tentative efforts to find herself other lodgings, she could see that the Godfreys’ desire for her to stay with them was genuine. She found work in the sewing room of the store where Peggy worked and during the first two years, she returned to Fleethaven Point only twice. She did not see Danny then, but on her third visit, they met accidentally in the lane.

In two years they had changed little in outward appearance, but in their eyes was the sadness they shared.

‘You’re thinner, Katie,’ he had said softly, his brown eyes searching her face.

‘You’re – not laughing so much,’ she’d said.

There had been silence between them as they had stared at one another, each reliving the last time they had been together; that dreadful day.

Then Danny had taken a deep breath. ‘We’ve got to come to terms with it, Katie. Learn to live with it. I dun’t want you staying away from here just to avoid seeing me.’

‘I don’t know which is worse, Danny,’ she murmured, ‘seeing you – or not seeing you.’

‘I know. I’ve done a lot of thinking while you’ve been away. We can’t ever marry . . .’ Although there was a wealth of sadness in his tone, there was also a new strength as if the cruel blow had toughened him into manhood. ‘But, you know, maybe we have a love far greater even than that. The ties of brother and sister, blood ties, can be even stronger and deeper.’