Free The Silk Factory by Judith Allnatt

back. The girl stood surveying the muddled debris. ‘Oh, they will all be bruised!’ she said, as much to the air as to Jack, and, pulling a basket from the mess, she began picking over the flowers, discarding those that had been crushed and reassembling new posies from those that were still good.
    ‘Come, let me help you.’ Jack hooked Maisie’s reins over the gatepost and then lifted a fallen basket that was still closed and intact and put it down to one side of the still teetering pile. ‘Shall I set these straight first?’ he asked her.
    She nodded with tears of vexation in her eyes. ‘I’m to wait for the carter. He’ll be here directly; the blooms have to reach market before noon.’
    ‘Don’t worry; we’ll soon set all to rights.’ Jack took down some baskets and started to straighten those beneath so that they sat more firmly. ‘Who buys all these snowdrops?’ he asked, to draw her into further conversation, and then, more daringly, ‘I dare say they’re posies for sweethearts?’
    Effie glanced up at him quickly, thinking him rather forward. ‘Certainly not,’ she said briskly. ‘They go to the big houses and hotels in the town in time to grace their tea tables.’ She closed the lid of the basket she’d tidied, even though it wasn’t completely full. She would have to share the good flowers between the baskets and hope no one would notice that each basket was a little short. If the load were a whole basket light it would certainly be missed.
    Jack took it from her, stacked it and then bent opposite her to help gather up the flowers. ‘They’re so delicate,’ he said. He looked straight at her. ‘Very pretty.’
    Effie blushed and bent her head low. Her hands moved quickly and efficiently over the snowy ground. Jack saw that her fingerless gloves were sodden and her fingers red and chapped. He found himself wanting to cover them with his own and warm them; he hated seeing her hands so raw with cold. He imagined holding them between his palms, blowing warm breath upon them or kissing them back to life …
    The sound of hooves and wheels turning into the lane reached them, and Effie worked even more quickly, tucking bunch after wet bunch into the last basket. The slow rumble grew louder and she closed the basket and pushed it towards him, saying, ‘Quick! He’s here!’ She scooped up the remaining squashed flowers, broken stems, snow and all, into the lap of her dress and ran back into the nuttery to hide it behind the nearest tree, while Jack hefted the basket up on to the stack. He took Maisie’s reins to steady her as the carter turned the other horses in through the gateway and drew them to a halt with a creaking of leather and a jingling of harness. ‘Good morning to you,’ Jack said.
    ‘Where’s Talbot’s girl?’ he said gruffly, looking Jack up and down with suspicion. Jack nodded towards her, his heart lifting as he recognised the name of one of the local farmers – not a gypsy then; she must be settled here, maybe living somewhere nearby.
    The carter climbed stiffly down and began to load the cart. Effie joined him but when Jack stepped forward to help too, she shook her head behind the carter’s back. When the load was on board she stood on the far side, as if to distance herself from him as much as possible. As the carter counted the baskets he looked curiously from one to the other and Effie seemed to shrink further from him, crossing her arms and tucking her hands inside her shawl as if she would fold herself away completely. At length, the carter wrote a receipt and handed it to her. She nodded, tucked it into the pocket of her dress and set off down the lane without a word to Jack.
    Feeling foolish, Jack stood waiting as the carter drove further into the nuttery entrance to turn the cart and, with much muttering and cursing at the horses, finally drove away with a backward glance and a scowl in his direction. As soon as the carter looked away and touched the horses