All through the long morning, Kate’s glance kept wandering to the place where Danny used to sit, now occupied by a fat, spotty-faced boy. It gave her a shock every time she glanced across, half-expecting, half-hoping to see Danny, to see instead the ugly boy sitting at Danny’s desk. She didn’t want anyone else sitting in the place that had been Danny’s. She would have preferred it to remain empty rather than that anyone else should sit there. At playtime she sat morosely in the corner of the playground, refusing to join in any of the games, dreading the end of afternoon school when she must face the long walk home alone.

When the bell clanged for the end of the school day, Rosie skipped and hopped at her side, keeping Kate company as far as the smithy, chattering incessantly. Kate made no reply and finally the younger child looked up and said, ‘Kate, a’ya cross with me?’

‘’Course not.’

‘Then what’s the matter?’

‘Nothing.’

‘Yes, there is.’ Rosie danced lightly around Kate. ‘You bin in trouble at school?’

‘No.’

Silence.

They had reached the blacksmith’s, Rosie’s home, but the child grasped Kate’s hand and tugged at it insistently. ‘What, then?’

The pent-up emotion of the last few days and the loneliness of this day burst out. ‘I dun’t want to go away to school. I dun’t even want to go on going to school. I want to work – like Danny. I want to be with Danny.’

She saw Rosie’s eyes widen and her mouth open, but Kate snatched her hand away and ran, leaving the child standing in the lane staring after her.

Kate ran and ran until she came to the lane alongside the dunes, but instead of following it, she scrambled up the slope, catching hold of the tough, spiky marram grass, and down the other side. Across the flat marsh, jumping the creeks, frightening a skylark into the air to defend its territory against her pounding feet, until she crested the rise of the easterly dunes and came to the beach. Her heart was pounding as she gulped air, her lungs bursting, but still she forced herself onwards, across the soft, dry sand until she came to the water’s edge where she sank down, sobbing and breathless. She pulled her knees up to her chest, wrapped her arms around her legs and buried her face against her skirt.

The incoming tide came closer, receded and then crept closer still, its waves probing with gentle frothy edges until she became aware of its coldness soaking through her skirts. Sudden anger spurted and she smacked the flat of her palm on the encroaching water, sending a shower of salt water over herself. ‘I won’t be sent away. I won’t go – I won’t!’ Now the tears that she had kept locked inside all day long spilled over.