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handsome girls. You could do worse.’
    ‘Well, Miss Rees,’ Josi told Nano later that morning, ‘May Malcolm is travelling all the way from London especially to see you on Friday evening. If you approve of her then I’m prepared to give her my blessing and Lowri’s. Perhaps Hendre Ddu will have its first English mistress in its long history.’
    ‘You won’t hear me say a word against the English. There are plenty of Welshmen, and women too, who are far from perfect.’
    ‘I agree with you there. I myself am one of them, but after a long period of remorse I am striving towards some form of inner peace.’
    ‘You’re a decent man, Mr Ifans, though I never thought you were good enough for my dearest Rachel.’
    ‘I haven’t slept a wink,’ Tom confessed the next morning. ‘I’m just not good enough for her. I’m sorry to be putting her through the ordeal of coming here and meeting us all.’
    ‘What’s wrong with us? We’re a fairly civilised family and we have a lovely home. And I made it clear that you merely want to see her to resume your friendship. What sort of ordeal is that?’
    ‘Oh, Catrin,’ Lowri said, ‘I think she’s very brave to travel down here. I don’t think I could do it even if I was in love with Mr Tom.’ Lowri blushed as she realised what she’d said.
    ‘I think you were a little in love with me once, Lowri,’ Tom said, ‘but then in my absence, my father stepped in and captured you for himself.’

    On Friday morning, Graham Andrews joined them after his visit to Miss Rees. ‘She’s a different woman, this morning,’ he said. ‘She tells me that she means to get up in the afternoon to make some Welsh cakes and a few loaves of bara brith.’
    ‘And will she?’ Josi asked him.
    ‘No,’ he said, ‘but it shows that she’s rallying. She may last the summer yet. Of course you can depend on me to meet the seven-fifty train. Catrin, try not to over-do things today. With all the work I have in the hospital, I simply won’t have time to deliver a baby this week. Take it easy, don’t walk too far, don’t eat too much and remember, nothing spiced.’
    He kissed his wife and left them.
    ‘I can handle the supper without any help from you,’ Lowri said. ‘We’ve got new potatoes and new beans and I’ll start baking the ham – in brown sugar and honey – Nano’s old recipe, later on this morning. Would you like to order a pudding, Tom? Maudie assures me she can manage the pudding.’
    ‘Strawberry cheesecake and cream, I think,’ Tom said after some serious deliberation.
    Josi broke in. ‘Tom, Graham’s been having a word with me. He is adamant that the only way for you to stop having such dreadful nightmares is to share some of the horrors with us. I beg you to try, Tom. Not one of us is strong enough to put up with those terrible screams. It mustn’t happen while May Malcolm is here. Why don’t we go to sit in the orchard and you can try to talk things over with me. I’d like to help you, son, if I can.’
    ‘Thank you, Father, but I think it’s too soon,’ Tom said. ‘I’m going to try to fill my head with lovely country scenes today; the men haymaking, the women carrying out the tea trays and the larks singing. I don’t believe in war today. When the bad times come again, as they will, I may well be glad to take up your offer.’
    Mari Elen piped up. ‘When you had that bad dream, Tom, I heard you and wet the bed. Father wasn’t too pleased but Lowri said he was to go downstairs to fetch me a cup of milk and two biscuits. But he didn’t bring the ones I like, the ones with pink icing on the top. It’s not so good for me now that you are here and Miss Rees is ill.’
    ‘Hadn’t you better visit Miss Rees?’ Lowri suggested, ‘but remember you mustn’t wake her if she’s asleep.’
    ‘I wonder if she would like some of those biscuits with pink icing on the top. Shall I look for some for her?’
    ‘By all means,’ Catrin said, ‘Two for you