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entirely agree with her logic.
    As if to confirm her thoughts, he came in through the kitchen door and raised a surprised eyebrow at the table, which was neatly set with the remains of last night’s beef cut into wafer-thin slices, pink in the centre shading to a light brown on the edges, various jars of homemade pickles, butter from Cherrybrook Farm and bread baked by Florrie’s own hand. The kettle was singing on the range, and Florrie glanced up apprehensively as she made a pot of tea, for never had she served the master a meal in her kitchen!
    She need not have worried. A slow smile pulled at his mouth and the slight doubt in Rose’s mind was dispelled as he beamed cheerfully, ‘What a good idea! ’Tis good and cosy in here, and that dampness outside gets through to the bones. I can hardly believe it after yesterday.’
    â€˜The weather had to change some time, sir,’ Florrie observed, for though she was officially a servant, her position as one of the family allowed her to speak freely. ‘Now you just get a cup of this yere hot tea down you, and you’ll soon warm up.’
    Henry obediently sat down at the table, winking a bright blue eye at his daughter as he did so. Rose felt her shoulders relax as she cut slices of the delicious-smelling mouth-watering loaf and passed the plate to her father. They both tucked in, Florrie ensuring they had sufficient quantities of boiling water to top up the teapot, for though they were eating in
her
kitchen, she would not dream of sitting down to her own meal until they had finished, and the master had gone back to work.
    It was as Henry was pouring himself a second cup of the steaming liquid that they all heard it. Rose snatched in a sharp breath and held it as her eyes snapped wide, every muscle frozen rigid. Her gaze met her father’s across the table, and for a split second, his motionless face was inscrutable.
    It was Florrie who broke the silence. ‘Saints preserve us!’ she cried hysterically, throwing her apron over her head in what Rose had always considered a ridiculous habit.
    She didn’t have time to think it now. She and Henry were already on their feet, and Henry had shot out of the door, knocking the freshly poured tea all over Florrie’s snowy white tablecloth in his desperate haste. If he noticed it, he did not pay any heed, and neither did Rose as she sped out of the house after him, grasping her shawl from the hall stand as she hurtled past. Horror shuddered through her body, leaving her heart thumping in her chest. She ran behind her father, for though he was turned fifty, he was fast on his feet, and when he stopped abruptly at the point along the track where the numerous stone buildings opened up before them, she nearly collided into his back.
    â€˜Oh, God, this is all we need,’ she heard him hiss between his teeth, and dragging her eyes from his grey face, she gazed across the gently sloping valley where the Cherrybrook played peacefully along its rocky gravel bed. They were both staring instinctively towards the three incorporating mills high on the opposite slope, spaced well apart for safety reasons but linked by the raised water-launder that snaked from one to the other in turn, and drove the huge central waterwheel in each building. Incorporating, or finely blending the three separate ingredients of the gunpowder, was the most dangerous process and the obvious site for an explosion, but as father and daughter narrowed their eyes at the massive stones that formed the solid walls of the mills, over six foot thick in places and now half shrouded in a dank grey cloak, they could neither of them make out any signs of mishap.
    â€˜â€™Tis the corning ’ouse, sir!’ someone called, and then agitated men, emerging from every door, began running towards the corning and dusting house on the near side of the river. It was uncanny, unreal, as so many feet made no sound in the muffling echo of