A Child of Secrets — Mary Mackie

The adopted daughter of the rector of Hewinghall, Lily Clare has never been able to resist taking in whatever waifs or strays come her way: hungry cats, broken-winged starlings and, one day, a filthy girl her own age whom she finds collapsed and exhausted in the Hewinghall woods. For Jess Henefer, the rectory is a haven and it becomes her home and the source of her employment as a scullery maid. But as the two girls reach maturity it is Jess who becomes the protector of Lily. For, with her strange-colored eyes, mysterious parentage and thirst for love, Lily Clare was always a child of secrets who has never quite belonged in the smug middle-class world of Victorian Norfolk society…