Just think it over and let me know in the morning”Steve got up to leave.“Oh, its all above board.” He added. “We’ll have a contract and all ...hat sort of thing. Tax and NI will all be sorted. Its just like a regular job”. Steve smiled and went to his roomI sat back in my chair. It wasn’t what I had planned but I had to give this some consideration. Since losing my job I’d had no offers. It’d been six months and I hadn’t even made it to an interview! I knew I had to accept Steve’s offer. I’d let. As I sit outside drinking my coffee, the same people I’ve seen the past two days walk past me. I sit there and countdown the hours until I see her again. The sun gets lower as each hour goes by. Soon it is the hour when she has showed up the two other times. She is nowhere to be seen. I sit there for another hour. but she never shows up. I take my time and walk down to the beach. As I walk I hope she is down there. When I finally get to the beach…I look up one way but I don’t see her. I walk. My father dwells not here anymore. He left when I came to the manor, being a freeman, having coin enough to marry again and seeing none here he wished to wed.’ ‘That coin was your dower and he does know it!’ This was true enough. Wishing to bed Lilac though he did at the time, he knew full well the men in his company would vie for her still, the more if she had a dowry though he paid them generously. Men of honor did not bed maidens and abandon them, the dowry would leave her choice to a. ’ She decided that it was time to change the subject and tone of the conversation. She racked her brain for another tangential subject. Then she realized that something was missing from her usual Sunday visits. ‘Where is Roger?’ she asked. The question caught Katie unawares. It seemed to come out of the blue. After her initial surprise she recognized the question for what it was, the old ‘change the subject’ gambit. Still, she saw no harm in answering it. ‘He’s out of town on business,’ she.