He was teasing yet there was an underlying seriousness. They were deciding their future and he cared about her happiness.

She nodded. ‘Oh yes, it’d suit me. I could still do dressmaking at home if I wanted.’

‘We’d only be tenants, mind. Mebbe he’d let us have Rookery Farm. Tom Willoughby’s getting on a bit now and he’s no family to carry on after him.’

Kate was doubtful. ‘It’s more acreage than our farm. Wouldn’t you be better staying on the Squire’s estate? Maybe one day you could be bailiff.’

She leaned her head against his shoulder as they sat beside a stook, nestling against the sweet-smelling corn and hidden from the inquisitive eyes of the other workers. Danny slipped his arm around her.

‘I suppose it wouldn’t be a bad job, though I’d sooner have a place of me own. It’s not easy to be put in charge of other folk, specially people ya’ve known all ya life. Ya can soon lose friends.’

She twisted her head to look up at him. ‘No ambition, that’s your trouble,’ but she took any criticism out of her words by planting a kiss on his cheek.

He rested his cheek against her hair. ‘I’ve only one ambition,’ he said softly. ‘To marry you and live happily ever after . . .’

They sat quietly, watching the sun sink slowly behind the horizon, streaking the sky golden-red.

‘It’s ya birthday in a couple of days, in’t it? Ya eighteenth.’

‘Yes. Why?’

‘Shall we get engaged on ya birthday?’

Kate sat up and looked at him, her eyes shining. ‘Yes, oh yes!’

‘Then,’ Danny said slowly, ‘we’ll have to tell them.’

Some of the joy left Kate’s face as they regarded each other solemnly. ‘Right,’ she said firmly, for it was she who had the most difficult task and they both knew it. ‘I’ll do it tomorrow night when I get home from work.’

‘I’ll tell my folks, too, then they’ll all know at the same time. Okay?’

Kate nodded, feeling the churning of apprehension in her stomach.

‘No. No! No!’ Esther Godfrey’s voice rose to an hysterical scream. Kate gaped at her mother, while four-year-old Lilian ran to her father and climbed on to his knee as he sat in the wooden Windsor chair at the side of the range in the kitchen. She flung her arms around his neck and buried her face against his shoulder. Automatically, Jonathan patted the child’s back comfortingly, but his attention was not on his young daughter.

‘Esther, love, steady on.’ To Kate’s ears his concerned tone also held a kind of warning. But her mother was in no mood to listen to the voice of reason.