Their eyes met and the young priest shook his head sadly as he threw a couple of Parish coins into the apron pocket of the old village midwife. “Far better he were stillborn” he mused. There were two adults in the plain-whitewashed bedroom of the “Tilers” Cottage, the old woman cradling the screaming, new-born baby with the wildly rolling eyes and the priest, plus the dead mother on the bed. The priest had concluded his work of administering the last rites over the dying girl and he stopped now in the doorway for a final word with the woman holding the child. “I suppose father is unknown?” without waiting for the obvious answer he continued, “didn’t she have relatives in the village, an older sister and her husband?”

The midwife nodded.

“Well, I’ll call round and see if they’ll take the baby, though why they should I don’t know, as he’ll never amount to anything.”

Rufus and Melinda were the relatives of the dead girl, Beverley Mullins, and were at home when the priest called with his grim news. Rufus was a middle-aged man, the village blacksmith and lifeboat volunteer, but who now walked with a limp after being severely injured during a dangerous rescue attempt. He listened patiently as the priest explained the baby was born with brain damage. Melinda was a kind-hearted soul who had no hesitation in sharing their meagre accommodation with her sister’s baby and said they would willingly solve the Parish’s difficulty. Rufus was like-minded and so the baby was brought to live with them.

Toby was to grow up strongly in the East Anglian village of Little Weeping by the Sea, but declared incapable of learning and so spent most of his young life assisting uncle Rufus in the old Barn. Farm implements were brought in for repair and Rufus would tell the young lad tales of countryside folklore as they worked together, although he was sure very little was sinking in. The lad was a willing helper but spoke very little and kept his head down most of the time. Occasionally he would break out in a loud bark-of-a-laugh at nothing, and then his head would be back down again as if in concentration. One of his favourite tales was about the ruined windmill on the cliff top at the edge of the village. In 1863 a violent gale had struck along the coast, smashing down homes and causing many shipwrecks and loss of life. The Miller had looked out from his windmill and observing a ship in distress, being cast on the nearby rocks had commandeered a large rowboat and single-handedly rescued most of the crew, going back out repeatedly in atrocious wind and rain, braving mountainous waves to win through. After his final success in bringing the mariners back to safety he’d retired to his windmill home and there had expired of a strained heart. Toby asked for this tale so many times that Rufus finally gave up, saying the windmill had become derelict since that time as they were ten-a-penny along that coast and would never run again.