Three ornate dragonflies in a vertical stack

Mr Pargeter has finally let me take the Chantilly pattern off the frame by myself, so you can stop telling Mother I will ruin the family's good name. The bobbins click like a clock when the lamp is low, and I keep thinking of your three dragonflies pinned above the sideboard, the ones you drew on the back of the ration book. You said the wings were lace the insects had grown themselves, and I told you that was nonsense, but I have started to see your point. Every hole in the net has a swirl curled round it like a fern just unrolling.

Tuesday a woman came in from the mill with a pair of gloves that had split along the knuckle. She sat on the stool and watched my hands the whole time, then asked whether we could copy the pattern from an old handkerchief she had kept from her mother. The handkerchief had a dragonfly stitched in one corner, its wings hatched so fine I needed the magnifier. I told her we could, and she cried a little, which embarrassed us both.

I am sending this with the wrapped parcel, the little brass pin shaped like a body with three segments. Mr Pargeter says it is only scrap, but I have set it in the cabinet beside the spare bobbins. When you come home at Christmas, mind the third stair, it still creaks like it did when you were nine and sneaking down for sugar. Write back and tell me what the sea looks like at Harwich, and whether the gulls there are as bad as they say.

Love, Margaret