“If any of you know cause or just impediment why these two persons should not be joined together in holy matrimony, ye are to declare it.”

“Does anyone ever stand up and declare an impediment?” Alys whispered to her mother.

“No,” Alinor replied. “Who would try to make a bigamous marriage on Sealsea Island where everyone knows everyone else’s business?”

“The marriage will take place next Sunday,” the minister declared.

As they left the church Alinor knew that she must go and pay her respects to Sir William and meet James before the curious gaze of the entire congregation. With Alys and Rob on either side of her, and Ned following reluctantly behind, she walked across the frosty grass and curtseyed to her landlord, keeping her eyes fixed on his expressionless face.

“Mrs. Reekie.” He nodded at her and at Ned, but had a smile for Rob. “How now, Robert?”

“I’m well, sir. Going to Chichester tomorrow.”

“All arranged, is it?” Sir William looked over his shoulder to Mr. Tudeley.

“Yes, the boy’s expected, and I will go myself to pay his fee tomorrow, when his mother signs his articles.”

“We’re very grateful,” Alinor said.

“And here’s your patient. D’you think he’s looking well?”

Alinor dropped a curtsey to James and finally turned towards him. She felt physically shocked by the warmth of his smile and the intensity of his gaze. She felt frozen as if she could not step towards him and fall into his arms, nor could she run away. She swallowed, but she could not speak. She felt his baby heavy in her belly and could not believe that he did not know that he had fathered the child that she carried. She wrapped her shawl closely about her as if to shield her swelling belly, and said, “I’m glad to see you look so well, Mr. Summer.”

“Hello, Mrs. Reekie,” he said. “I am glad to see you again. And how is my pupil?”

Rob grinned. “Keeping up my Latin,” he said. “Sir William lets me borrow books from his library. Have you seen Walter, sir?”

“He’s very grand now that he’s at Cambridge,” James laughed. “But I hope to visit him after term starts.”

“And you’re to be married?” His lordship nodded at Alys. “Young man from Sidlesham parish?”

Alys turned and beckoned to Richard, and he came up and made a respectful bow to Sir William. Alinor noticed the carefully graded deference: Richard Stoney was the son of a freeholder, not a Peachey tenant, and he would never forget the difference.

“Wish you happy,” Sir William said without much interest. He nodded to Mr. Tudeley to give Alys a shilling, and then turned back to Rob: “You can come for dinner.” Pointedly he did not extend the invitation to Alinor or Alys, who were out of favor as the women in the household of a roundhead. Clearly, he was not going to even acknowledge Ned, who stood to one side, hat in hand, stubbornly not bowing.

“Thank you,” Rob said easily. “And I will write to you, sir, when I start work at Chichester.”

His lordship nodded and turned away, ignoring Ned. James glanced back for one look at Alinor, and then followed his lordship, while the congregation, released from deference, crowded around Ned to ask him more about the trial, about the execution, and about the parliament, and what about London itself, now that it was a royal city without a king anymore?

Alinor and Alys walked back to Ferry-house along the bank of the harbor with Ned following behind them, accompanied by people walking part of the way, to ask for more details of the trial and execution. Ned answered everyone patiently. His own sense of pride in having been a witness to great events made him glad to tell his story over and over again. Nothing had ever been heard like it in the tidelands. Nothing like it had ever been heard in England. It was the end of one sort of world and the start of another.

The sea was coming in, so the people from the mainland, who had earlier walked across the frozen wadeway to church, now wanted the ferry across the rife, and Alys let Ned take the fees and pull the ferry across.

“D’you remember how to do it?” she taunted him. “Haven’t your hands gone too soft for the rope?”

“I swear I’d forgotten how cold it is,” he replied.

He came into the house blowing on his fingers and stood by the fire as Alinor raked the embers and put on a big log of driftwood.

“Before I went away,” he said quietly so that Alys, upstairs in the bedroom, would not hear, “you said that you would need my help and you would tell me when I returned.”

Alinor did not know what she should say. Clearly, she must speak to James. They would decide together what to do, and how the news should be announced.

“It’s Alys,” she said. “She’s with child.”

Ned was not shocked. In the country, especially in areas as remote as the tidelands, many couples married in the old way: a promise to marry, and then a long time of courtship and lovemaking while finding a house or saving for marriage. Many brides carried a big belly on their wedding day. Some had a child or even two walking behind them to the altar.

“Did they promise to each other before God? They hand-fasted and prayed together? It’s a godly union? She’s not been light or wanton? He didn’t force her?”

“Oh, no,” Alinor assured him. “They’re sure of each other, fully betrothed. And he’s given her a ring. It’s the dowry that they’re waiting on. That’s my worry. The parents insist on it. That’s why we’ve been scraping around in such a rush.”

“Why the hurry?”

“Alys wants to have the baby in the Stoney farmhouse that he’s to inherit. She’d like him to be born into the family, with his father’s name.”

“I’m sorry I’ve not come home any richer,” Ned said. “It’s a place of terrible expense, London. But she’s had the fees from the ferry. She can add it up and tell us if she’s short. I’ll come with you to Stoney Farm tomorrow and talk with them, if you need me. And didn’t young Richard promise his inheritance?”

“Yes. I’d rather we didn’t take it, but, she says Richard will see us right.”

Ned chuckled. “Lord! That girl! She’s borrowing her dowry from her betrothed?”

“It’s the only way she’d find it. They asked for a fortune. We’ve earned all we can. He’s making up the difference. She’s determined that the wedding goes ahead next Sunday.”

He smiled. “Well, it’s good that we have a new life coming into the new world that we’re making. If it’s a boy she could call him ‘Oliver’ for old Noll!”

“She could,” Alinor agreed, thinking that James would never allow it.

“D’you like living in your old home again?”

“Of course,” Alinor confirmed. “But if you ever find a wife you want to bring back here, I’ll be happy to go back to my cottage. Or somewhere else.”

He laughed at her. “Not I. And anyway, where else would you go?”

Alinor smiled. “Oh, I don’t know.”

James thought that the easiest way to see Alinor would be to walk back with Rob after dinner on the hidden tracks through the harbor, as the sky darkened to the early dusk of winter. He said that he needed herbs against the return of his fever.