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B ess’s puckish face peeked out from the chicken coop as Ophelia hurried out of the barn, hands fisted into her pockets.

“Oi,” said Bess cheerfully. “Looks like you could use some good news. Guess what I’ve got here,” she said, gesturing behind her back.

Ophelia chuckled and stopped to look.

“Think it might be a double yolker!” Bess chortled, revealing a large creamy egg with a theatrical flourish. “Maybe we can talk Mrs. D. into a pudding for pudding.”

“The luxury!” Ophelia laughed.

Bess slipped the egg basket onto her arm and fell into step with Ophelia toward the house. She was quiet, but Ophelia could feel her questions like an embodied presence.

“Go on, then,” she said quietly, “I know you’re dying to ask.”

“Lord,” said Bess. “That obvious?”

Ophelia huffed and said, “You’re not obvious, Bess, but the last good gossip we had was Mr. Bone losing his temper at the county subcommittee chair and calling him a hog in armour.”

“The look on the man’s face was worth sitting through every minute of the meeting though, wasn’t it?” Bess tilted forward, her lilting laugh shaking her shoulders and the mass of her jet-black hair. Subsiding, Bess said, “Go on, then.”

“Well, there’s not much to say. We became friends the summer after the war began, before I had any idea of joining the WLA or anything, really.

His family hold the tenancy on my family’s estate, have done for generations, and well.

..” She trailed off, feeling uncertain.

She and Bess had shared many conversations about their backgrounds, and Ophelia was getting used to Bess’s frankness when it came to the poverty she had grown up in, but she still felt gauche describing a life of ease to the other women who came from working class backgrounds.

She couldn’t truly understand what it meant to be poor, and that made her uncomfortable, suddenly aware of the sheer luck of her life, which she had always considered full of misfortune.

She felt humbled by her lack of experience, by her realisation, so late, that other women her age were capable of caring for themselves, made decisions regarding their living and working arrangements that Ophelia had always been instructed were the concern of her father.

She understood that Hannah and Bess had faced things that would have ruined her in the eyes of her father and polite society, and she had begun to understand that those things could make a woman as much as destroy her.

She wanted to tell Bess about Silas, all the things she had enjoyed about him, all the futures she had imagined for them, but she couldn’t find words that didn’t feel girlish and silly.

So when Bess said, “Go on, Ophelia, I’ve been privy to a few heartbreaks,” Ophelia tried to explain what the summer had meant to her.

“He enlisted. He left a note explaining where he had gone, but it was so sudden. I had never met anyone like him, Bess. He was so alive, so honest, somehow. The men my father wanted me to marry felt cold, calculating, which makes sense. I mean, marriage is a transaction to men of the class. But Silas was, I don’t know, somehow so warm and alive. He made me feel that way, too.”

Bess was watching her, listening.

“I was so na?ve, still am, I know,” she corrected when Bess huffed a laugh.

“But I don’t think I had ever realized that I could be not lonely .

.. being friends with Silas opened a door to conversation and laughter and kind heartedness that I’d never experienced.

He was from a family that loved him and the simple fact of our being friends meant that they loved me, as well.

I have felt alone for most of my life and that was intoxicating. ”

“Aye, knowing you are loved makes all the difference, doesn’t it?” Bess mused. “Must have made that summer special for you.”

“It did,” Ophelia said. “Perhaps it was that, even more than his looks, that I found myself falling for ... I think I was half in love with him by the time September came. I was such a schoolgirl, I’m sure he didn’t feel the same, for him it was friendship, but I felt like every moment together was precious.

” She smoothed her hands over her breeches, feeling the disappointment of what came next, even after all this time.

“More so because I knew my father would forbid it, and sure enough when he caught wind of our spending time together, he was in a state. One night over dinner he threatened all sorts of punishments if I continued to visit the Larke house.”

“Nothing like a little Romeo and Juliet to sweeten the longing, eh?” said Bess, ruefully. “I’ve seen it often enough amongst my friends, the forbidden fruit tastes sweetest and all that.”

“I’m sure it was that, too, but also I’d never had the least interest in marrying anyone, and I’d always assumed it was because my only choices were men my father had chosen.

I’d hoped not to be in a position like my mother, married to keep the family or the estate afloat, but I suppose I’ve always been too odd for people to offer for me out of genuine interest. But that summer with Silas made me wonder how else marriage could be.

Made me wonder if there were men worth hoping after.

But it wasn’t like that in any case; we never even held hands.

” She glanced over at Bess wondering if the next part would sound melodramatic, a scene from a gothic novel.

“It came to nothing, of course, because he enlisted. I swear something about it felt odd, and I did try to see his mother, but she only said that he had been caught up in all the patriotic fervour, and there wasn’t anyone else to ask.

My father had gotten his way again, just like always. ”

Bess was quiet for a moment then said, “So the way you felt about Silas made you wonder if you were truly opposed to marriage or just one version of it?”

Ophelia nodded, thinking. “I don’t know if I had ever really thought about it at all, honestly.

It was what was expected, and even though I didn’t like my father’s choices, I don’t think I truly knew that there was an alternative.

Aside from being a spinster, reliant on others for everything.

” She tried to think back to the summer with Silas, if there had been anything concrete in her thinking about marriage.

She didn’t think so, only upset with her father and relief for a few hours of freedom when it could be arranged.

“Is that what made you decide to join the WLA? Not wanting to marry?” Bess asked.

“I don’t think so, or not entirely. I was at loose ends when I was given the flyer for the recruitment meeting, and attending felt a bit like throwing a cat among my father’s pigeons.

But when I listened to Hannah speak that night, it suddenly seemed possible that I might have another bigger choice for myself.

Irritating my father seemed like such a small thing to do compared to war work and choosing an entirely new life.

So I joined up. You know the rest,” she finished.

“Hannah can be quite the firebrand, can’t she?

I was already desperate to sign up when the parade came through Bristol, but seeing her standing up on the back seat of that motor car, her voice ringing out over all our heads.

Well, it was thrilling, is what it was.” Bess shook her head.

“Couldn’t get my name down fast enough.”

They both smiled, taking a seat on the bench outside the house. “Thank you for letting me ramble about all this business with Silas. I’ve never really had any friends to talk about things like this.” She grimaced and hurried to change the subject. “How have things been with you the last few days?”

Bess had been the subject of some amount of gossip when she had arrived at Mrs. Darling’s farm, and one or two of the more ignorant villagers continued to question her work ethic.

Weeks back, she had mentioned to Ophelia that one farmer in particular had taken issue with her assignment, but whether he opposed it on the basis of her being Irish or a woman, Bess couldn’t say.

“He hasn’t bothered to show his face at the farm this week.

And he never has the nerve to say anything in front of Mr. Bone.

” Bess blew out a breath and turned to Ophelia.

“I’ve thought about your offer to speak to Mrs. Darling about it and while I appreciate you asking, I don’t need you or her to speak up for me.

I can stand up for myself, I’ve plenty of experience dealing with bullies, been doing it for most of my life.

Most don’t ’ave the stomach for going toe-to-toe. ”

“Right, of course,” said Ophelia quietly, thinking that she had experienced few bullies, outside of her father, and certainly no one thought less of her because of her ethnicity or skin tone, though she had always been treated as inferior by virtue of being a woman.

“I’m sorry, that was presumptuous of me, Bess.

I know you’re capable of dealing with these things. I hate that you have to, though.”

“Well, it’ll take more than one fancy lady like you standing up for me for things to change, but I do appreciate the offer,” Bess said, leaning into Ophelia’s shoulder with a friendly bump. “It’s what I deserve, but oftentimes not worth the effort of asking, if you see what I mean?”

“I think so,” Ophelia said.

Bess had popped to her feet and reached to pull Ophelia up by the hand, saying, “Let’s see about tea now, I’m famished.”

“Be right in.” Ophelia smiled.

Alone, she rolled her shoulders, trying to ease the tension that had settled in between them, partly the result of the strain of working the horses, and partly the result of Silas’s arrival.

Speak of the devil. Ophelia caught sight of him leaning on the rails of the main gate looking out over Bottom Field.

Hidden from view by the back wall of the house, she took the opportunity to look her fill.

He was still unreasonably good looking, she thought petulantly.

The late afternoon sun lingered in his golden hair, catching the longer bits in its warm rays.

His braces stretched to accommodate the broadness of his shoulders, pulling his trousers tight against his firm backside and long, muscled legs.

He shifted to look down the long drive to the lane, and Ophelia caught a glimpse of the cording of muscles in his forearms where his shirt sleeves were rolled to the elbow.

Tilting her head back to rest against the wall of the house, she allowed herself to remember how capable he had seemed three summers ago, how she had surreptitiously admired his strong arms, his long, nimble fingers, and how the intensity of their friendship that summer had allowed her attraction to him to feel somehow safe.

A rough sound caught her by surprise, and Ophelia found herself looking up into Silas’s face. She blushed and shot to her feet.

“Sorry, didn’t mean to startle you, thought you heard me approaching,” Silas said.

“No, lost in my thoughts,” Ophelia blurted, brushing the dirt of the day from her work jacket. “I, um, shall we go in?”

Silas watched her with disarming frankness.

Eyes intent, he seemed to be taking in the sight of her in breeches, and finding it a pleasing revelation judging by the flush of colour in his cheeks.

Well, that’s unexpected . Her hands stilled mid-brush.

It had been a long time since she had felt Silas’s approving glance, and the reminder filled her with pleasant warmth, quickly doused by the knowledge that these feelings would make working together awkward.

She reminded herself that she was dedicated to this farm and the work that needed doing here, and nothing, not even Silas, could come in the way of that.

He cleared his throat again, and meeting her eyes, said, “Right, yes, of course. I s’pose it’ll be dinner shortly.”

“Mhmm,” she agreed, going into the house.

She thought she heard an intake of breath, as though Silas was about to speak, but he said nothing, only stooped to undo his boots before following her into the kitchen.