Jaen — Betty Burton

When Dan pushed the wedding ring onto her finger, Jaen Nugent felt as though it had always been there. Pregnant by the first man she made love to, marriage to Big Dan Hazelhurst was her only option â€" and that meant putting up with the entire Hazelhurst clan.

Jude hovered at the edge of the ceremony, her pale face pinched and angry. Her sister's had been the only other warm body to lay beside Jaen's, and now the demands of a stultifying rural marriage would separate them forever.

As the guests crowded into a narrow cottage in Croud Cantle for the wedding feast, the Hazelhurst Boys were already growing rowdy. Jean tried in vain to imagine the years ahead. Beyond her village in Hampshire, a whole world lay, a world that seemed to offer the promise of joy...