*Yur.' Irritated, Wakelin thought, *I wish ma an't told me to talk to the parson. I can't understand a word he says.' More than anything he detested powdery chitchat. He would rather be tearing around the woods, shooting pigeons. Enviously, he eyed Molly Leiff climbing an elm tree. Other children squealed as they hopped precariously along the pigsty wall.

*It was a wonderful service, parson, although Eppie's still crying,' Martha said, breezing past. *Would you care for another slice of pound cake?'

The parson reached for the biggest slice. *I am used to the ululations of the young, Mrs Dunham.'

Unsure of his meaning, her smile wobbled and she headed into the orchard.

Her geese, their beaks held high, chests swelling, waddled regally from beneath the apple trees where they had been grazing in search of grubs. Wakelin watched them march in single file to the stream. Some daintily scooped up the cooling waters, whilst others dipped their heads or flapped their wings.

The parson was determined to squeeze more than the word *yur' out of Wakelin, if a word, indeed, it was. *Your father tells me that you have been ailing.'

Wakelin glared at Gillow and Henry guzzling from cider flagons. He could tell by the way his father talked in a loud, jolly voice that he was proud of Eppie.

No matter how much Wakelin fought against it, the parson had, for him, a mystical aura, an unnerving authority that made him yearn to reveal his secret. *I must tell him,' he thought. *Get it over with.' Unaware of the parson's gaze fixed upon him, he thrust a thumb stump into his mouth and gnawed. *I'll do it. Tell him I'm sorry. But I ain't. I did it for ma. That must be right by God? To make someone you love happy?'

Molly splashed in the stream, swirling waters sloshing around her bare legs. Dragging his gaze away from her, Wakelin spat onto the grass, missed, and hit the parson's shiny, buckled shoes. *What you said,' he asked, oblivious to the parson's raised eyebrows. *About God wanting to scrub sins away, do that apply to everyone?'

*That is correct.' The parson polished his shoe with his handkerchief. *Christians believe that people, from the moment that they are born, are affected by the transgressions in the world. It is the accumulated sins of past generations - fear, hate, greed, envy and pride - that grind people down and make it hard for them to be good.'

Wakelin was unable to look the parson directly in the eye. *What if someone does summat really wicked, ownee they can't think of no way o' changing things back to what they was?'

The parson looked circumspectly at the back of Wakelin's head. *I would rather think that depends on what he has done wrong. However, if that particular someone comes to his senses then God will show mercy and let him start again.'

*Start again?' Startled, Wakelin gazed into the parson's watery eyes. *Mr Lowford, parson, sir, there's ... ' He took a deep breath. *Summat I've gorra tell ya.'

*Wakelin hold your sister; see if you can peace the child.' Martha thrust the baby into his arms. *I forgot to give the children them crystallized violets. They're mushing in the heat.'

It was the first time that Wakelin had held the baby, really held her. She gurgled and wafted her fists. At him!

*Yes. What is it that you wish to say to me?' the parson asked, intrigued.

Wakelin rocked the baby. *Huh? Oh, nowt o' nowt.' He sobbed quietly at first, then so strongly that he felt he was being torn apart.

CHAPTER SIX.

WILD AND FREE.

Unbeknown to Martha, Eppie had skipped off again, this time to fish from the river embankment before The Fat Duck, a favourite place with many of the village children.

Concentrating on roach darting for breadcrumbs, she forgot Martha's warning that the stony bank was a treacherous place to play.

Scrambling to her feet, eager to discover the source of a rumbling noise that came from further along the lane, she slipped. Her arm plunged into the icy water up to her shoulder. Surging beneath the swift flowing river swept a ghostly figure, its eyes fixed upon her. Seeing it reach out to grasp her fingers, Eppie screamed and scrambled to her feet.

Martha rushed down the embankment. *If you've bumped your head, you've only got yourself to blame; you're forever throwing off your pudding cap.' With her apron, she wiped speckles of blood and smudges of dirt from Eppie's grazed chin. *Besides, I told you not to come here.'

*Wakelin does!'

*He's old enough to look after himself.'

Eppie stared forlornly into the churning waters. *My net's drownding!'

Martha pointed in the direction where Miller's Stream gushed in a torrent down a ravine. *Up there the water's swirly and will drag you down. Promise me you'll never play there.'

*Why does the water want to hurt me?'

*It doesn't, but it would if you fell in. That's where Talia du Quesne drowned. I'm not trying to scare you, only make you understand why I don't want you coming here alone. Wait *til Sunday, when Wakelin's back from cropping. He'll keep an eye on you.'

Wakelin had gone to work as an apprentice lad at a cloth-finishing shop in Litcombe.

Martha cocked her head. *What's that rumbling noise?'

*The hills is falling down!'

*It sounds like wheels.'

Relieved, Eppie put on a brave face. *It's clattery.'

Martha took Eppie into her arms and made her way up the embankment. Reaching the stocks set before The Fat Duck, Eppie wriggled to be set down. A strange machine came into view, and she raced towards the advancing horses.

*Don't get too close, young *un,' the man leading the team warned. *Them wheelers is blind and you being no bigger than a horse bot fly you'll like as not get stood on by one of them front *uns.'

Eppie and Martha joined villagers, following the progression of the draught horses.

So many cottagers gathered before Miller's Bridge that the machine rolled to a halt.

Jacob abandoned his potato patch. *Thar's a fancy thing, no mistake.'

Claire wove through the throng to Martha's side. *It's the new seed drill. Squire Bulwar recently bought one. Henry says Lord du Quesne doesn't want to be outdone.'

Eppie clapped, excited by the festive mood of the crowd. *It's a grasshopper on yellow wheels!'

Gillow strode up, equally fascinated.

Squealing with delight, children swarmed over the drill.

Eppie spied ten runnels, each made up of five interlocking metal tubes. *Mammy, look at these pointy hats stuck together.'

Wilbert Hix, who was two years older than Eppie, scrambled onto the drill. *Don't ya know o't? *em's funnels, where the seeds fall.'

Eppie was embarrassed about her lack of knowledge. Spotting a row of what looked like silvery spoons she was dying to know what they were used for, but kept quiet, afraid of further rebuke.

*It'll save a bit of labour,' Jacob said. *Less seeds lost mean more crops. More crops mean more money for the workers.'

*Our Edmund and Tobias will be better off,' Sarah added glowingly, thinking about her sons.

*Not necessarily,' Gillow answered. *It's cheaper and more efficient to use machines than men's labour. There's talk that Squire Bulwar's keeping his workers on low wages now he's using his drill.'

*Of recent there've been too many changes,' Jacob said. *First it was the land enclosures. Then his lordship ploughed up Fleecy Meadow to grow more corn. Now he wants to rip up our common.'

*His lordship don't give a thought to where we'll keep our cattle and horses,' said Winwood, a farm labourer.

In her arms, Fay held her daughter, Sukey, who was about Eppie's age. *The workers can fight back. That's what Bill said. The farm labourers must demand higher wages.'

*Bill knows as well as any other labourer that it's a capital felony for workers to join forces in pressing their employers for increased wages,' said Gillow. He counted himself lucky. At least he could choose his working hours, not like weavers in Malstowe who toiled in cramped, noisy sheds, never breathing fresh country air.

For the first weeks of March the rain fell steadily.

Fixing a reed into the loom, Gillow glanced out of the window and watched Jem Hedges, the ploughman, tramp along the muddy lane. *It's hinderable weather. The labourers won't have had much use for that seed drill yet.'

Kneeling at the hearth, Martha inverted the three-legged cauldron over the potatoes to be baked and piled hot embers around the outside.

Perched on the stool, Eppie diligently turned the handle of the butter firkin, longing for the cream to reach the desired consistency so that she could give her arm a rest.

*How's it going?' Martha asked.

*I want to game in the lane.'

*It's too wet,' Martha replied, not for the first time. She cast Eppie a tired smile. *Come away. I'll finish.'

Eppie picked up her doll and hugged it.

Making a shed in the warp, Gillow worked wefts into a twill weave. *Is that the poppet Alicia Strutt gave you? What's it called?'

*Elizabeth. That was Betsy's name before she was born an old lady.'

*I never knew that!'

Eppie gazed adoringly at the doll's green eyes, painted onto the wax-drip head. Its face was the colour of whisked egg white and it had extremely red cheeks. Hoops were out of fashion, so the dressmaker had given the doll to Eppie. Eppie loved its beige skirt, shaped like a parasol mushroom. It had an under gown, a stomacher, and a blue ribbon choker tied in a bow around its neck. *When I grow up I'm going to be rich and wear a dress like this.'

*Finery ain't for the likes of working girls,' Gillow said.

In Litcombe, whilst Martha sold garden produce at her market pitch beside the butter mart, Eppie had watched a fine lady quit a carriage. *I saw a lady with a wig like Elizabeth's. Mister Lord's wig is funny; it's full of caterpillars. Does they make his head sweaty?'

*I should think so, though I imagine that, in the summer, Lord du Quesne prefers his head to be shaved to keep himself cool. Folk don't like paying the guinea tax on wigs. Men who use hair-powder are called guinea pigs.'

Eppie ran her fingers through Gillow's wavy, fair locks. *I'm glad you wear real hair.'

By next morning, the rain had abated enough for Eppie to skim over the stream on her swing.

Martha traipsed to the sty with a bucket.

*I wanna do it!' Eppie cried.

*There's a half bucket of barley meal in the wring-shed. You can pour that in with this hotchpotch. Tobias Leiff brought me a bream. I'll go and make a pie with it. After market tomorrow we'll take it to Wakelin. Come and give me a hand when you're through.'

The lane was chock-a-block with sheep, the air filled with bleating. Eppie hopped off to investigate.

Gillow picked his way around spinach leaves, shooing stray sheep that had wandered into the garden.

*Can you never keep your sheep in order?' Martha asked her father. *Gillow, you'll have to fix that gate latch. Years it's been waiting.'

Unless it was imperative, Gillow refused to do the slightest or simplest repairs to the cottage. *Lord du Quesne is the landlord, he can do that,' he would retort at Martha's badgering. Such was the attitude of other cottagers, and so it went on until the cottages were ready to tumble to pieces.

Hurrying indoors, Martha wagged a finger at Eppie. *Remember, no more wandering.'

Fidget, a grey and white sheepdog, dashed in and out of rearmost sheep. Samuel whistled to the dog to keep the sheep in check and they disappeared over Miller's Bridge.

Eppie cast a backward glance at the cottage. Thud-thud Gillow's loom buffeted rhythmically.

She struck off along the lane.

*You've never taken to wandering ag'in?' Samuel called jovially from behind the hedge of Horseshoe Field. His dry skin wrinkled into a furrowed smile. *Our Martha will string me up by me garters thinking I took *ee.' He hoisted her over the gate. *Here, take a gander at this lad.'

*What sort is he?'

*A New Leicester. His lordship bought him off Squire Bulwar. One hundred and sixty guineas *e paid. I'm thinking, come the nights, I'll tuck him in bed with me for safe-keeping.'

*Why'd he cost so much?'

*His lordship has a notion of running him with our scrawny lasses. Come pricey do his services.'

*He's big and fat with glum eyes.'

*And nearly three times the weight of our spindly ladies. When they're interbred there'll be plenty of cheap cuts off them.'

Eppie dug her fingers into the thick wool of the ram's forequarters. *He's like a cannon!'

*Then how's about we call him Carronade? Though we'd best not creep behind him with a lighted fuse else he might explode. Like to give me a hand shifting this lot to Ducker's Field? I'll carry ya. Don't want ya daggling in the mire and spoiling yer clothes.' He prodded woolly rumps with his cruck.

*Here, Fidget!' he shouted as they crossed the field. *That lass is getting timeworn. Twiss was one of hers from years went. I've bred from the Fidget family since I was a lad. I'm training Trumpeter, one of her young *uns.'

*I'm training Twiss. If he sits when I tell him, and if he don't bark I give him a treat.'

*What kind o' treat?'

*I break crimps of pastry off the edges of mammy's pies. She keeps *em in the larder.'

*Don't yer mother notice?'

*She thinks it's the mousies.'

*Well, take a tip from an old plodder, I wouldn't keep doing that. You don't want yer ma upset; especially now she's got another bairn on the way.'