Marigold tattoo on a shoulder

The ovens were lit at half four this morning, and Mr Ogden still hasn't forgiven me for the butter. You'll remember the marigolds you dried on the back sill in August. I took the last of the petals and steeped them in the warm milk, the way Mam used to, until the whole churn turned the colour of a Seville orange. He stood over it with his arms folded and said nobody in Hallam Street had wanted butter that loud since the coronation.

Still, by six the shop smelled of it. The cottage loaves came out gold at the shoulders, and the yellow edges of the crust caught the lamplight the way the petals did in the field behind the mill. Mrs Pryce bought two before the bell had stopped swinging and told me the colour made her feel she'd been let off something.

Here is what I didn't tell Mr Ogden. The marigold seed you sent came up in the window box after all, four stubborn heads of it, leaning out over the cobbles. This morning one had opened fully, orange gone to gold at the rims, its centre full of little pale threads like a bit of lace somebody dropped. I cut it for the counter and it lasted the whole day in a jam jar.

Come at Christmas and I'll show you. Bring the apron you left on the hook last time. I've kept it smelling of yeast for you.

Yours, with flour on my cuff, June