Visiting their neighbour, Mr Parker, she finds him unconscious in the farmyard, having drunkenly fallen and cut his head.

She discovers his hat is stuffed with cash, and, despite his curmudgeonly attitude, volunteers to clean and tidy his filthy, chicken-ridden house.

His sexual interest in Dulcima is aroused when she arrives for work on a warm day with her blouse top open and revealing her cleavage.

Later, on an impulse, Parker rushes into town as the shops are closing for the day, and buys a wedding dress for Dulcima and puts it into a gift box.

Parker smashes up the living room, including the new TV, and tears up the unwanted wedding dress, but then remorsefully pleads forgiveness through her locked bedroom door.

[2] The Canadian television film Dulcima (1969) was based on the same novella, with the setting transferred to a small town in Ontario.

[4] Dulcima was announced as part of his initial slate of productions with John Mills and Frank Nesbitt attached from the beginning.

[11] Carol White called Mills "one of my all-time favourite actors" and prior to filming "spent hours each day going over my part and even studied the scenes that I wasn't in.

But by the time filming commenced, I had found my way into the heart of the character; the lines all filed into place and had started to feel whole again.

"[12] Bryan Forbes later wrote that the director "showed great promise in his handling of this melodramatic, bucolic tale, shot entirely on location.

"[16] Sight and Sound said "the script swerves uncertainly between women’s mag sentimentalism and brooding tragedy, and the prettiness of the locations does much to dissipate both moods.

"[17] Filmink later wrote "Dulcima, like Hoffman, was an inexpensive drama, which had been previously filmed for TV about a horny older man going for a younger woman... everything has to come off for it to work (script, casting, handling).

The magazine added, "I can’t imagine why Forbes wanted to make one drama about a creepy middle aged man who chases after young girl let alone two.

"[19] Mills' biographer argued "the story suffered from neither relationship being believable; nor did the two young actors have the weight to carry the abrupt and melodramatic climax which was straight out of a Victorian novel... What Dulcima really needed was a French treatment by Marcel Pagnol and a director like Claude Berri.