Alinor let her gaze slip away from Mr. Miller’s crestfallen face to the creamy rosy sky over the harbor, glanced towards her son, Rob, waiting at the gate and wished herself home, with her children at the dinner table.

“You do,” Mr. Miller said sulkily.

“So, I think it’s best left to me and them, isn’t it? Without any man coming in and wanting extra payment for ‘pretty’?”

Mr. Miller had been defeated twenty years ago by the iron determination and chronic bad temper of his wife. “I was just saying—”

“Best not to say anything,” Mrs. Miller advised him smartly.

“Feeding the horse,” he said, as if to himself, and turned towards the stable.

“And we have to go,” Alinor said smoothly.

“Old fool that he is,” Mrs. Miller said.

“Good night, Mrs. Miller. We’ll see you tomorrow at church,” Alinor said.

“Good night, Mrs. Reekie,” she replied, recovering her temper now that she had won. “And God bless you tomorrow, Alys.”

Alinor and her two children walked down the track to the ferry crossing, where Rob ran ahead like a boy to ring the chime.

TIDELANDS, FEBRUARY 1649

The wedding was to be simple. Alys and Richard would be married before the usual Sunday morning congregation at St. Wilfrid’s Church, Alys in her best gown with her new white apron and new white linen cap. Richard would wear his best jacket, and Ned would lead the bride to the altar. The service would follow the new style as ordered by parliament: Richard would make brief promises, and Alys would assent to her own vows. After the wedding in St. Wilfrid’s, they would all cross the rife, take a goodwill drink at the tide mill, and then go on to Stoney Farm for the wedding feast. There would be good food, and healths drunk, and finally the young people would go to bed in the big bedroom under the thatched eaves.

Alys did not sleep until the crowing cock from the barn told her that the night was nearly over, and then she turned on her side, sighed with anticipation, and slept deeply.

The morning of her wedding day was freezing cold but clear, the ice on the harbor so white that the seagulls whirling above it were bright against the blue sky and then invisible against the blanched landscape. Alys, waking late and tumbling down the stairs to eat gruel at the kitchen table, swore that she would not wear her cape but would go into church in her gown and new apron and cap.

“You’ll freeze,” said her mother. “You have to wear your cape, Alys.”

“Let her freeze,” Ned advised. “It’s her wedding day.”

Alinor granted the one liberty that Alys had set her heart on. “Oh, very well. But this is what comes of a winter wedding. And no flowers to be had but a posy of dried herbs!”

“As long as I can wear my new pinny,” Alys stipulated.