The Feltham hills grew greener by the week.
The cool bite of spring had given way to warmth, and the workers heading into the fields now wore wide-brimmed hats and loose short sleeves. Flocks of sheep moved steadily across the pastures, the grass thicker and lusher each day beneath their feet, while children too impatient to wait any longer were already wading in the river with fishing lines. It was late spring.
A season of rapid growth and restless energy — and yet Feltham remained, as it always had, a quiet and unremarkable village where people went about their business in peace.
But not this year.
"Everyone rushing to Blissbury again? No pride whatsoever," Eloise said to Abigail, who had dropped in for a visit.
"Every last one of them, baskets full." Abigail accepted the teapot Emily brought through with a grave expression. "Julia is so determined to cook a turkey that I've taken to counting our birds every morning, and it isn't even a holiday."
Eloise looked at her friend's face and understood perfectly. One of the Ogilvy family's turkeys was living on borrowed time.
"What a fuss," Abigail muttered, shaking her head.
---
It had all started with Mrs. Harrison's trip to Cambon.
She had run into Mrs. Parker — who managed Blissbury's kitchen — quite by accident at the grocer's. Mrs. Parker was always brisk and full of energy, but that day a deep unhappiness had settled across her face. Alarmed, Mrs. Harrison steered her straight to the nearest tea shop.
"Since Sergeant Thornton arrived, he has barely eaten a thing. And I don't believe he sleeps either — the light in his window burns until past midnight and only goes dark in the early hours. Sometimes he is out walking the fields alone before dawn. Sometimes he doesn't leave his room until midday. The horrors of war still have hold of him."
She had tried every recipe she knew. Every dish she could think of. And still he ate almost nothing. What would become of him, she asked, if he collapsed before summer even arrived?
Compassion for a young man broken by the war came naturally enough. The fact that he was a distant relation of Baron Stanford did not hurt matters.
Mrs. Harrison consoled the weeping Mrs. Parker and set off home.
She recounted the meeting at tea with the village ladies.
That particular gathering ended unusually early. Several women excused themselves, citing urgent matters, and departed in haste.
Strangely, almost all of them had daughters of marriageable age.
From that evening on, Feltham smelled of cooking.
Smoke poured from chimneys. The scent of freshly baked bread drifted from every house, spiced meat sizzled in courtyards, and kitchens that had not seen such activity in years were suddenly running at full capacity. Mothers called for their daughters to come and help. Grandmother's recipes, kept in handwritten notebooks and barely touched for decades, were spread across worktables. Long-neglected picnic baskets were aired out, lined with fresh cloth, and filled.
The faces of those heading toward Blissbury — some in carts, some on horseback — were bright with something between hope and determination.
Because what everyone was thinking was the same thing.
A young soldier, unable to recover from what he had seen. Sergeant Thornton was hardly the first. How does one come back to oneself after watching comrades die — people you were speaking with an hour before? The pride of having served one's country is a fragile thing in the face of that kind of memory.
Many find their way through eventually. Sergeant Thornton would too.
And how much more beautiful the story would be if someone helped him along the way.
And if that someone happened to become his companion for life — well. The story would be very beautiful indeed.
All of them, wanting to comfort him, wanting to be that someone, drove their carts as though in quiet competition.
That had been a fortnight ago. From what Abigail said, the women's race showed no signs of slowing.
"He still refuses to see anyone. Cites poor health. And from what Mrs. Parker reports, not a single dish has been touched."
"Ha-ah..."
After the village girls began flocking to Blissbury, there was naturally only one question anyone cared about: whose cooking would finally suit his taste? Feltham was a small but prosperous village on fertile land, and prosperity, generation after generation, produces recipes worth keeping. The young women's trips had quietly become a competition with family honour running beneath the surface.
*If Sergeant Thornton is any kind of man, surely something will appeal to him,* the village said — and bets were placed.
There were no winners yet. Sergeant Thornton expressed gratitude for every offering without ever indicating a preference. Had he refused outright, the girls might have felt the sting of embarrassment and quietly stepped back. But his polite, unreadable thanks only sharpened the fighting spirit — not just of the girls themselves, but of their mothers and even their maids.
Eloise shook her head and refilled her cup. Abigail, understanding perfectly, nodded.
"No winner yet, but Julia is the clear favourite. Our mother is so excited she's been sending orders to Cambon every day."
"Julia is the favourite? What does it matter who the favourite is if he isn't eating anything?"
"The thing is..." Abigail paused. "Julia is the only one he actually agreed to receive. He offered her tea. And he asked her to come back."
"Is that true?"
Eloise's hand stilled over the teacup.
She pictured Sergeant Thornton. Then Julia beside him.
She disliked them both — but she couldn't deny, if she was being fair, that they made a striking pair. Julia was beautiful in a way that commanded attention, and she knew it; she dressed impeccably, moved with confidence, and used every advantage she had. And next to her, Sergeant Thornton — clean-shaven, neatly turned out, ideally in his dress uniform—
"Lady Ogilvy must be beside herself."
When Mrs. Severton had first mentioned Sergeant Thornton, Lady Ogilvy had been the most immediately interested of anyone. It was said she had decided on the spot that heaven had sent him expressly for her second daughter — whose previous engagement had come to nothing — and that she had even attended a thanksgiving service on the following Sunday.
"Our mother is already choosing a wedding dress. She says the one they prepared last time is a bad omen and has written to all the relatives."
Julia's voice surfaced in Eloise's memory, unhesitating and certain: *I will be the mistress of Blissbury.*
She had told herself she would be glad to see Sergeant Thornton settled with any of the village girls. She found now that "any" had limits.
"What's wrong with your face?"
Abigail was looking at her with interest.
"Shall I be honest?"
"Always. Bear in mind I've kept silent for years about how you climbed into a well to rescue a duck."
"That's true." Eloise hesitated for only a moment. "I don't want Julia and Sergeant Thornton to end up together."
"Oh?" Abigail's eyes lit up immediately. "Are you in love with him?"
"If I were, would I have spent our last conversation telling him exactly how rude he is?"
"Why not? I read once that a strong denial is simply a strong feeling in disguise. Perhaps you're drawn to him precisely because you deny it so vehemently."
Eloise looked at her friend, whose expression had taken on the particular shine it got when she was deep in a romance novel, and shook her head firmly.
"That's quite enough. Take Julia's handkerchief when you leave."
"Julia's handkerchief? She was just crying about losing it — so she left it here?"
Eloise sighed and explained what she had overheard from behind the bushes.
Abigail listened without surprise, though a faint flush of embarrassment crossed her face. Whatever she thought of Julia's behaviour, it was not something she could be proud of either.
Looking for somewhere else to rest her eyes, Abigail noticed the stack of papers on Eloise's writing desk.
"What's all that?"
Eloise's hand came down over the papers at once.
"Nothing."
The movement was so transparently suspicious that Abigail, leaning on her crutch, was already on her feet and crossing the room.
"Nothing special!"
"It looks very special indeed. What are you hiding?"
A brief and undignified struggle followed — one unwilling to show, one determined to see — and in the middle of it, a single sheet slipped from the pile and drifted straight to Abigail's feet.
She dropped her crutch and snatched it up.
Read what was written on it.
Her eyes went wide.
***"Lieutenant Colonel Ryan Wilgrave."***