THIS IS THE CHAPTER I PUT UP IN ERROR BEFORE CHAPTER 12 - OOPS! THANKS TO THOSE WHO POINTED IT OUT

There is a matter still to resolve but Margaret and John take a loving step in the right direction. And - Milton Fair is here!

ooOoo

See! the winter is past
the rains are over and gone
flowers appear on the earth
the season of singing has come

Margaret took a walk on the hillside around lunchtime; the world was more beautiful the higher one climbed away from it. She had not wanted to be around others today; she was restless and marking time and longing for John's return but there were many hours to wait.

Over breakfast her mother-in-law had asked her, with sharp eyes, how she was, and seemed to be waiting with rather more attention on her reply than such a routine question required. Margaret knew she had not answered well, with halting words, but thankfully, although for a moment it looked as if the older woman had been going to say more she had thought better of it, confining herself to a remark that if Margaret had any questions or worries she would do her best to help her with them; which might have meant about a wife's household duties, or might not.

She turned from a dreamy contemplation of a pretty wildflower patch in the rough, spiky grass, to see the best sight she could have had in all the world – her husband John Thornton striding quickly up the hill towards her in his black waistcoat, gold watch-chain swinging, rolled white shirtsleeves. Behind him the greys and blacks of Milton, spiked here and there by tall smoking chimneys, lay like a spreading bruise punched on the Earth's natural greens.

"John!" she smiled at him with simple joy. He came to her and gave her a little answering smile - letting her know with his look that it was all right between them.

"Mother said you'd come up 'ere. I'd half an hour to spare so I thought I'd come an' see you."

"Instead of taking food, I expect," she chided him, but the truth was she was so glad to see him, and he was just the same as he always was, not cold, not resentful, not desperately sad as in her imaginings this morning she had thought he might be. He even took her hand in his as they turned to walk back down. They were alone on the hill; moved by a sudden impulse she brought his hand to her lips and kissed it, with great love. His smile for her was very private and very warm as his eyes dwelled on her tenderly.

She remembered something nice she had to tell him. "Oh – John. I had a letter from Mr Bell today – Father's friend from Oxford. He is my godfather, though I have rarely seen anything of him since I was a child."

"I know Bell," Thornton answered shortly.

She slid him a look. "Of course you do. He is your landlord, I had forgotten. He has given us a most generous wedding gift. You will have to look it over but it seemed a very large amount to me. Some fifteen thousand pounds."

"Has he, indeed." His brows drew down over his eyes, darkly calculating.

"More than that, he is leaving the Mill to us in his will." She had hoped this would make her husband happy – how could it not? To own the mill he had worked in for so long, taking profit but always on uncertain terms, under the threat of eviction any time if he failed - but instead he fell into a frowning reverie.

"Does he not trust me to look after you?"

Margaret felt alarmed. Clearly there was a sudden storm whipping up in her proud husband; she had not seen him look this way for so long she had forgotten the thunderous whiplash, the lightning-flash of temper he could summon up in a moment.

"He meant it as a nice gesture for us both, since he could not be at the wedding, and as Father's oldest friend he wanted to give us something worthwhile, and meaningful to us. I thought you would be pleased."

Looking at her, her troubled little face, his brow slowly smoothed out. Here she was bringing him a gift she had thought would please him, and he had coldly pushed it away. The irony of that did not escape him, but as always, he could not bear to see her sad.

This had not been the best of starts to their married life, but he knew he could do better. He would do better. From now on it would all be well. How could it not be, when they loved one another so much?

He drew her close to him and kissed her cheek. "That was not very gracious of me, was it? I'm sure he meant it kindly. We will have to think about it; but that money is yours and yours alone. And with luck Bell might live on for years, before we have to consider the Mill."

Since he seemed happier about it, Margaret decided not to tell him Bell's other news, which was that he had been given a poor prognosis, but that he had married a South American widow and was enjoying his last times in happiness and as many adventures as could be managed in the months left to him. From the sound of it, it would not be long before they owned the Mill.

They stood there a moment longer together, a little uneasy with one another, which they had not been in so long. There was something he must say...

"Margaret... you do know you have nothing to worry about, don't you?" he murmured to her. He had no wish to go over the events of last night, far from it, he had not wanted even to bring it up... but he could not bear her to be anxious, wondering, dreading every night to come. "We can just be... as we were. Just hold my hand like this, and let me kiss you sometimes... an' I'll be so happy..."

He tried to invite her eyes to engage with his and gently dance, but she would not look at him. An enormous dive took place inside him, like the crashing of a great cliff into the sea.

"Margaret," he said, lonely, desolate, "You'd not ever leave me, would you?"

She looked up at him then, incredulous, wild. "No!" she cried. "Never. Never. Never!"

Her little fists pummelled his chest in a fury along with her words. He bore it for a moment then took her wrists in his hands, wrapped her arms around him and his around her, and pulled her to him in a fierce embrace.

"Then that is all right," he whispered to her, "Nothing else can hurt me."

And they stood there for some moments, her brown head and his dark one, her lemon dress and his black and white, a couple unmistakeable to anyone seeing them from afar, chuckling fondly, "Master an' his new wife! Can't keep their 'ands off one another! New-wed y'see and mad for love."

He stroked her cheek so tenderly – "Now walk back wi'me? You can come look in the Mill. They've bin askin' to see you. You can make a daily visit, like the Queen inspectin' guards outside the palace."

She bit her lip, unable to say to him what she felt, which was that he might be able to bear that his marriage was not all he had hoped it would be, but she would always know he had been cheated, and it was worse that however devastated he was, he had too much pride in himself and too much love for her to ever betray it by a word or a look.

It frightened her that she just did not know what to do.

She could go along with it, whatever it was - John, I've changed my mind - just let it happen, bear it without complaint, for his sake. But he would know. He would be insulted and hurt by what he would see as her sacrifice. It would be a worse rejection of him than not taking him at all.

She managed a smile at him. "Yes. Yes! I'd like that, John."

Hand in hand they began to walk down the hill. Margaret noticed a change in the familiar landscape – "Oh John! What is that?"

He followed her eyes. "Milton Fair. Comes once a year to the fields east of Mill. You've not seen it before?"

"A fair!"

She seemed captivated by the tents and pavilions, each topped with a bright flying pennant in red, or blue, and... a tiny, far-off, toy-sized carousel, glinting in the sun!

"Do you want to visit it?" he wondered.

"Can we?" her eyes was so big, astonished and excited.

"If you've a fancy to. In Milton there's no shame in it. Anyone can go. Different in Harley Street, I'll wager," he said, lightly sardonic.

"My aunt would never permit Edith and me to go to the fair in Hyde Park, though we begged and begged!"

They would be approaching the alley to the mill yard in a moment or two. He bent over her hand and pressed his lips to it.

"Well, now you are married to me, Miss Margaret, you shall have anything you want, if it's in my power to make it so."

ooOoo

No-one can be unhappy at a Fair. Not with toffee apples, and a carousel, and Morris men, and a devastatingly handsome husband who keeps winning things... :) - and that's for the next chapter.