Belle of the Back Streets

by Glenda Young

Genres: Sagas

Synopsis

A dramatically powerful and romantic saga of tragedy and triumph, perfect for fans of Dilly Court and Rosie Goodwin.

'Any rag and bone!'

Everyone recognises the cry of Meg Sutcliffe as she plies her trade along the back streets of Ryhope. She learnt the ropes from her dad when he returned from the war. But when tragedy struck, Meg had no choice but to continue alone, with only her trusty dog, Spot, and beloved horse, Stella, for company.

Now the meagre money she earns is the only thing that stands between her family's safety and predatory rent collector Hawk Jackson....

Many say it's no job for a woman - especially a beauty like Meg, who's noticed everywhere she goes. When she catches the eye of charming Clarky, it looks like she might have found a protector and a chance of happiness. But is Clarky really what he seems? And could Adam, Meg's loyal childhood friend, be the one who really deserves her heart?

Look out for Glenda's next compelling saga, The Tuppenny Child.

Release date: November 1, 2018

Publisher: Headline

Print pages: 352

Sample

Chapter One



Reunion

Summer 1919

‘Meg! Come quickly! There’s a man in the house!’

‘Is it Dad?’ asked Meg, hardly daring to hope.

Tommy shrugged his shoulders. ‘Come on, we have to run, we’ve got to get home. He might be a thief.’

Meg smiled when she saw the serious look on her brother’s face. ‘Tommy, we’ve got nothing in our house to steal. He might just be a tinker who’s come in from the street to get warm. Evelyn’s mam had a tinker walk into their house once. He sat by the fire and had a snooze, and when he woke up she gave him a bite of stottie bread, a mug of tea and off he went. She never saw him again.’

‘Meg, please, come on! I saw him sitting in Mam’s chair in the kitchen!’ Tommy urged, starting to run now.

‘Did you speak to him?’ she asked. ‘Did he see you?’

Tommy shook his head and his long brown fringe flopped down over his excited face. ‘He was fast asleep. I only saw him from the back door.’

‘Come on then, let’s go and find out who it is.’

Meg gathered the bottom of her skirt in one hand and lifted the heavy cloth above her knees to allow her to run as fast as her brother. In her other hand she held tight to the wicker basket with which she’d been sent to buy eggs from High Farm. She knew Mam wouldn’t be happy if she returned home without eggs, but she’d never seen Tommy so agitated before. He was usually such a calm lad, happy, with a face that always wore a smile, but there’d been a fearful look about him when he spoke of the strange man at their house. She just hoped that there’d be time to get the eggs later, before Mam finished work.

‘Have you told Mam about the stranger?’ she asked as the two of them ran home.

Tommy shook his head. ‘You know she doesn’t like us disturbing her in the pub. The landlord docks her wages when she’s not behind the bar. But what if it is him, Meg? What if it’s Dad?’

‘If it is, then leave everything to me,’ Meg said firmly. ‘I’ll go down to the Albion and fetch Mam. But let’s get home first and have a look at him, then we’ll decide what to do.’

Meg and Tommy ran all the way from High Farm along the main village road. They passed the big house on Ryhope Green, where one of the gardeners, an elderly man who was busy staking a climbing shrub around the front door, called out harshly to them both.

‘Oi! Colliery kids! Get back up to the pit heap where you belong!’

But his words went unheard as Meg raced past with her skirt and basket flying. Tommy ran after her, holding his cap in his hand for fear it would blow off his head. They ran past St Paul’s church, leaving the village behind them, heading up to the colliery, towards the lime-washed cottages laid out in rows like rotten teeth. Their home was in Tunstall Street, right at the end of one of the rows. It wasn’t nestled in the terrace amongst the others, where it would have been cosy from the warmth of coal fires roaring in the cottages to either side. Instead it was stuck on the end, smaller than the rest of the row. Meg’s mam always said she would cheerfully throttle the builder if she ever got her hands on him.

‘It’s as if he finished building Tunstall Street and then thought to himself, I can make more money if I stick a little bit at the end.’

Meg and Tommy rounded the top of Tunstall Street and ran all the way down the back lane to reach their home at the far end.

‘Hey! Meg Sutcliffe!’ a voice called out. ‘What’s your hurry? House on fire?’

Meg didn’t stop running, but turned to see her friend Evelyn’s older brother Adam. He was standing at one of the taps in the shared yard of the back lane, his tall frame bent as he filled a bucket of water. He smiled at Meg, his deep brown eyes trying to catch hers.

‘Can’t stop, Adam!’ she shouted as she and Tommy flew past.

Just before they reached home, one of the lavatory doors in the back lane swung open. When Meg saw who it was, she stopped running and stood stock still. Her breath was coming fast and her face was flushed after running all the way from High Farm. She pulled Tommy protectively to her and put her arm around his shoulders. He too was panting after their run, and Meg felt his body heave under her touch.

‘Is your mother in?’ Hawk Jackson growled.

Meg shook her head.

Hawk let the toilet door slam behind him. Pulling his trousers together around the waist and fastening his buttons, he strode towards them. Meg could smell the ale on him the closer he got to her, and she could see the stains on his jacket and trousers, no doubt from ale too. Hawk was a big man, not particularly tall, but wide and heavy-set. His face ran to an unruly black beard and his small eyes were set deep in dark sockets. The hair on his head was as coarse and black as wire wool.

‘You can tell your mam I’ve come for the rent. And you can also tell her she can pay me any way she likes.’

His face broke into an evil smile that sent shivers down Meg’s spine.

‘She’s at work,’ Meg said quickly. ‘Anyway, rent’s not due until Friday.’

‘I was passing,’ he said, cocking his head towards the toilet behind him. ‘Needed the netty and thought I’d call in on your mam. See how she is, like. I was just about to knock on at the back door for her. I always enjoy my little visits to your mam. She’s one of my favourite tenants.’

He glanced from Meg to Tommy and back again. ‘By, lass, you’re turning into a little beauty, aren’t you?’ he said, walking closer. He reached out a gnarled finger and scraped it across her cheek. ‘Got your mam’s looks, that’s for sure.’

Meg took a sharp step backwards and Hawk’s hand dropped to his side. He glared at Tommy. ‘And what about you, little fella? Got nothing to say for yourself?’

‘Get lost!’ Tommy shouted. ‘Leave us alone! And leave Mam alone too!’

Meg pulled him tighter to her side. ‘We’ll tell Mam you called.’ She nodded to Hawk.

‘Aye, you do that, lass,’ he said, his voice deep and menacing. ‘Be sure you do.’ And with that, he turned and strode away along the back lane.

‘I hate him!’ cried Tommy as he watched Hawk in his big black, heavy coat and boots shuffle away along the back lane.

‘Come on,’ Meg said softly, heading towards the back door. ‘Let’s go and find out who this fella is in our house.’

From an upstairs window in the next-door house, Meg’s neighbour Lil Mahone stood watching. Lil was a small woman, bird-like, with piercing blue eyes that missed little of what went on in Tunstall Street. She had been intent on giving her bedroom a good clean, but had stopped in her tracks when she caught sight of Hawk from the window. And when she saw him reach out to stroke Meg’s face, the sight chilled her to the bone.

‘Not Meg,’ she whispered. ‘Please, not Meg.’

With Meg leading the way and Tommy behind her, they walked into their back yard, past the coal house and the tin bath hanging on the brick wall. Meg turned to her brother and put a finger to her lips. Tommy nodded: he understood. Meg stood on her tiptoes to reach the small window, but when she looked inside, she saw the kitchen was empty.

‘He’s not there,’ she whispered. ‘He’s not sitting in Mam’s chair like you said.’

She pointed at the back door and Tommy followed as she gently pushed it open. She peered around the door into the darkness of the kitchen.

‘What can you see?’ Tommy whispered. ‘Can you see him?’

Meg didn’t reply. With her heart in her mouth, she pushed open the door a little further, this time poking her head all the way around. The coal fire was raging in the hearth, as it always did no matter the warmth of the day, ready to boil up water whenever it was needed. The oven next to the fire looked untouched. Mam’s wooden chair with the sagging seat sat next to the fireplace, her knitting bag with its needles and wool tucked away beneath. The dark, heavy sideboard looked undisturbed and the three-legged cracket stool was in its usual place. On the windowsill stood Mam’s white enamel bowl. Everything was as it should be.

‘He’s not here,’ she said again.

‘Look in the sitting room,’ Tommy suggested, but Meg was already inching her way along the passage. The sitting room door was open and she gasped with shock when she saw the bulk of a man sitting in the chair nearest the window. She sank to the floor in the passageway, indicating to Tommy to sit next to her as she peered around the door.

‘He’s there,’ she told him, her eyes bright with excitement.

‘Who is it?’ Tommy asked.

Meg allowed herself the bravery of staring straight at the stranger, hearing his snores and knowing he was sleeping.

‘What’s he like, Meg?’ Tommy whispered impatiently.

Meg took in the big, heavy brown coat the man was wearing. There were large buttons down the front and its collar was turned up, but not enough to shield his face. There was a gentleness about him, Meg thought, a defeated look, his face soft with sleep and his head slumped forward.

‘Is he a tinker?’ asked Tommy.

Meg looked at his boots, which were polished to a shine. She shook her head. ‘I don’t think so.’

She looked at the man’s hair, the same dark brown as her own.

Tommy shuffled along the passageway to try to peer into the sitting room, but Meg held him back.

‘What does he look like?’ he pleaded.

Meg was silent for a few seconds before she gave her reply. ‘He looks sad,’ she whispered, without taking her eyes off the man. ‘He looks really sad.’

‘Is it Dad?’ Tommy asked. ‘Is it, Meg?’

‘I’m not sure,’ she replied, turning to her brother this time. ‘He looks different to how I remember him, but . . . I thought I’d remember him, Tommy, I was certain I would. But now . . . I’m not sure.’

‘But it could be Dad?’ Tommy said hopefully.

‘Well, he doesn’t look like a tinker,’ Meg said. Just then, a thought struck her and she grasped Tommy’s arm. ‘What if he works for Hawk Jackson and Hawk’s sent him?’

Tommy’s eyes narrowed with hatred at the mention of the name. ‘Then I’ll kill him,’ he spat. ‘I’ll kill him while he’s sleeping.’

Meg held her brother tightly. ‘Don’t be daft, Tommy. You’ll do no such thing,’ she hissed.

‘Well, what are we going to do about him?’ Tommy whispered, his body slumping against the passageway wall.

‘I’ll stay here,’ Meg decided. ‘I’ll keep a watch on him, make sure he doesn’t escape. You go and get Mam. Run like the wind all the way down to the Albion and tell Mam we need her. Tell her we’ve captured a strange man in the house.’

Tommy stood at once and readied himself for a sprint back through the colliery to the village. Meg shot her brother a look before he left.

‘Tell her . . . tell her we think it might be Dad.’

Tommy ran like the clappers all the way along the back lane of Tunstall Street and then down the colliery past the mine. The further he ran and the more distance he put between himself and the pit belching out smoke and steam, the brighter the air became. When he reached the village green, there was even a patch of pale blue sky. At the bottom of the green stood the Albion Inn, the public house where his mam worked serving at the bar. And beyond the Albion were fields giving way to cliffs standing guard over the expanse of the moody, grey North Sea.

Tommy knew full well that the landlord at the Albion, Jack Burdon, wouldn’t be happy to have Mam called away. He had already threatened to sack her when she’d had to give up work to look after Tommy last winter. He’d been playing on the ice with Micky Parks, the two of them skidding down the colliery bank in shoes that were too worn. Both lads ended up falling and smashing into the stone wall near the tram passing place on the bank. Micky had escaped without a bruise, as he always seemed to, no matter what scrape he got himself into, but Tommy ended up with a broken arm.

‘Hey, lad, you shouldn’t be in here. Jack Burdon will have your guts for garters if he catches you in his pub!’

Tommy put his hands on the bar to steady himself after his run. ‘Hetty, where’s Mam?’ he asked.

Hetty was in the middle of doing a crossword, concentrating on it hard with the end of a pencil tapping against her lips. Seeing the state of the lad, she quickly tucked the pencil into her auburn hair that was loosely piled on the top of her head.

‘She’s serving in the other bar,’ she replied. ‘You all right, Tommy?’

Tommy didn’t answer; he just belted through the door that led into the smaller bar of the pub. ‘Mam! Mam!’ he yelled.

Sally turned at the sound of her son’s cry. Her hand flew to her heart when she saw the state of him with his face flushed and his eyes bright. She gripped tight hold of the glass she was filling with stout.

‘Mam! You have to come home!’

‘She’s going nowhere. She’s got work to do.’ Tommy heard a voice behind him and turned to see the tall, thin figure of Jack Burdon, a man who seemed to be made up of long limbs and sharp angles. He stood tall at over six feet, and he was as thin as a lamp post too, with his brown hair always brushed smartly. He rarely had a good word to say about anyone and was never ready with a smile for any of his customers. His dark, heavy eyebrows moved to exhibit more emotion and feeling than he ever spoke out loud.

‘What is it, son?’ Sally asked, ignoring the warning from her boss. ‘Is Meg all right?’

Hetty walked through from the main bar, determined to find out what all the commotion was about. She knew that whatever it was, Sally was going to need some help, as Jack wouldn’t take kindly to any interruption to his business of selling beer and ales.

‘Mrs Sutcliffe,’ he began, ‘I’d be obliged if you could deal with your domestic problems in your own time. May I remind you that while you’re under my employ, you’re being paid to work behind the bar.’

‘Just give her a minute, Jack. You can see the state of the lad. Something’s clearly wrong,’ Hetty pleaded, but she knew her words would have little effect. Jack Burdon was a man of commerce and business who ran the Albion with nothing more on his mind than a healthy bank balance. He liked routine and order in all areas of his life. Most of the pub landlords in Ryhope were welcoming and genial, but not Jack Burdon of the Albion.

‘Is it Meg, son? Is she all right?’ Sally asked again, holding her son by the shoulders.

‘No, Mam, it’s . . .’ Tommy glanced between his mam and Hetty. He hated to tell lies, really hated it. All his life his mam had brought him up to stand tall, be polite and tell the truth. But Hetty’s kind eyes and concern meant he couldn’t, he just couldn’t. It wouldn’t be fair, he thought, if the man turned out to be Dad safely home from the war when Hetty’s son Philip had been killed in action. He didn’t want to tell Mam, not in front of her best friend, that their dad might be waiting at home. He had seen Hetty’s tears and heard her cries after the telegram arrived. She had brought the dreaded piece of paper to their home, where Sally had cried with her over the news that Hetty’s son Philip had been killed in France. Ever since the day of the telegram, lines had settled into Hetty’s features that had never been there before. The grief over losing Philip had aged her.

‘It is Meg, Mam, she’s . . . she’s hurt herself. She needs you,’ Tommy lied. And then, just in case there was a tiny bit of Jack Burdon’s heart that wasn’t as black as stone and might be lenient to giving Mam time away from her work, Tommy yelled towards Jack: ‘And I think she might die!’

‘Oh my God!’ Sally cried.

‘Heaven help us,’ Hetty said, reaching out to hold Sally’s arm.

‘Thirty minutes,’ Jack Burdon said, tapping his watch. ‘You can have thirty minutes to check on your daughter, Mrs Sutcliffe. Thirty minutes without payment, I should add. And you’ll come straight back here to finish your shift afterwards.’

‘Go on, love,’ Hetty told Sally as she gathered her shawl around her shoulders and took Tommy’s hand. She followed mother and son to the door of the Albion. ‘And you know where I am if you need me,’ she said.

Sally and Tommy raced across the main road and headed up the hill to the pit. Back inside the Albion, Hetty squared her shoulders and then raised both hands to the back of her head, where her long auburn hair was coming loose from its pins. She tied it back, then stormed across the bar to where Jack stood, his face like thunder.

‘By, you’re a hard man, Jack Burdon,’ she told him. ‘My mother always said I should never have married you. I wish to high heaven that I’d listened to her now.’

Jack pretended to ignore his wife’s words, but they cut deep within. Since the telegram had arrived, since Philip’s death, he and Hetty had drifted further from each other with each passing day. His only solace now was the Albion. He might not have been able to keep his only son alive, but by God, he was going to keep a tight ship at work. It was the one thing left in his life over which he had some control.

‘Mam . . . Meg’s all right. I had to tell a lie,’ Tommy confessed as soon as they were out of the pub. ‘I had to make it sound more serious than it is to get you out of work.’

Sally slowed her steps. ‘What do you mean, son?’

‘No, don’t slow down, Mam. We have to get home as fast as we can. Meg’s there, but she’s all right. She’s not dying. She’s not even hurt. But she’s keeping watch on someone, there’s someone in the house – and we think it might be Dad.’

‘Oh, bloody hell!’ Sally muttered under her breath, but not quietly enough.

Tommy turned and stared at his mam. He’d never heard her swear before. She glanced at him as the two of them picked up their pace again, walking as quickly as they could back up the hill to Tunstall Street.

‘May God forgive me,’ she said as they passed St Paul’s church.

His mam’s anger confused Tommy. He wasn’t sure what he’d expected her to think about Dad coming home from the war, but he certainly hadn’t anticipated such cross words from her.

‘Have you spoken to him?’ Sally asked carefully.

‘He’s asleep,’ Tommy replied. ‘He was snoring and it might not be Dad . . . but it might be, and what if it is, Mam? What if it’s Dad come home from the war?’

Sally pushed a strand of her long fair hair behind her ear and started striding faster still.

‘If it is, then just mark my words. He’s got some explaining to do.’

Back at Tunstall Street, Meg was still in her place on the passage floor. She had barely moved, transfixed, watching the sleeping stranger, who looked out of place, too big for their sitting room, too heavy for their furniture. She turned when she heard footsteps out in the back yard.

‘He’s here, Mam,’ Meg said, not caring to whisper any longer, for surely Mam would have to wake up the man now.

Sally paused in the passageway before allowing herself to look into the front room. She was still wearing the green-checked pinny that Jack Burdon insisted she and Hetty wore for work in the pub. Her hands flew over it, smoothing it at the front, then she pushed her hair back from her eyes and walked straight into the room, determined to face whatever was to come. She stood in front of the sleeping man, took in the sight of him and then gave a sharp nod to her children.

‘It’s your dad,’ she said matter-of-factly before turning to Meg and Tommy, who were hovering at the doorway, not daring to enter. ‘Now then, you two, make yourselves scarce for the afternoon. Meg, did you get the eggs like I told you to?’

‘No, Mam.’

‘Well, go and get them now. Tommy, you get yourself back to school for the rest of the day. See if they can teach you something useful in the last few days before term ends. Something that’ll save you from a life working in the hell of the coal pits like the rest of them round here.’

‘Yes, Mam.’

‘And both of you, listen now. I don’t want anyone knowing that your dad’s back, all right? Don’t go telling people just yet. If anyone saw him arriving, well, the news might be out. But I want to tell folk in my own good time, all right?’

‘Yes, Mam,’ they chimed.

Sally reached out and placed a hand on the brown coat that her husband was wearing. ‘I just want to get used to having him back for a while,’ she said, more softly. ‘Before everyone comes calling.’

Meg picked up her wicker basket from where she’d dropped it earlier, and she and Tommy headed out to the yard. They paused at the back door, hoping to hear their dad speak, to prove it was definitely him.

‘I think I’d recognise his voice,’ Meg said. ‘I think I’d remember it.’

‘I can’t remember much about him,’ sighed Tommy. He kicked the wall as he walked out of the back yard and scraped one of his old, battered shoes along the bricks as they headed slowly along the back lane, walking in silence past the shared wash houses and netties and the taps where water was collected each morning and night. Dark clouds hung above them, cushions of coal dust and muck from the pit.

‘I remember . . . I remember the horse he used to have,’ Tommy said at last.

Meg smiled. ‘Davey Scott’s got it now. I see it sometimes when he takes it out with the cart selling his fruit and vegetables.’

‘It was brown, wasn’t it?’

Meg shook her head firmly. ‘Black.’ She touched her nose. ‘With a white patch just here. Dad always said the white patch was the shape of a star. That’s why he called her Stella.’

When they reached the edge of the village green, Tommy said ta-ra to his sister and turned to walk through the doors of the school. He braced himself for a telling-off from Miss Barnes for disappearing at dinner time without so much as a word. But he’d promised his best friend Micky he’d return the comic to him that Micky had loaned him earlier that week and he’d had to run home at dinner time to fetch it. Now he’d have to think about what to tell Miss Barnes to explain his absence, and his stomach twisted when he realised he’d have to tell another lie. And to top it all off, in all the commotion over finding the strange man at the house, the comic still lay forgotten under his bed. Well, his mam had told him not to tell anyone that his dad was back home, and he had to keep her secret. It was one thing to get on the wrong side of Miss Barnes, but Tommy knew from experience that it was much, much worse to get on the wrong side of Mam.

After Meg waved off her brother at the village school, she continued on her way to High Farm to collect the half-dozen eggs for Mam. But as she walked towards the farm, she saw Micky Parks by the wall of the cattle market, scrapping with a much taller boy she recognised as one of the Finlay lads. She ran up to them, threw her basket to the ground and shoved her arms between them to break up the fight as best as she could.

‘Stop it!’ she yelled. ‘Just stop it!’

Ron Finlay took a step backwards, taken by surprise. Micky used the opportunity to dart to one side, away from Ron’s fists.

Meg turned to the bigger boy. ‘What’s a lad like you doing picking on someone the size of Micky Parks?’ she demanded. ‘And you . . .’ she said to Micky, ‘you should be in school.’

‘He started it,’ Ron snarled, spitting on the ground.

‘No, I didn’t,’ Micky said. ‘I was on my way back to school after dinner and he started on me for no reason when he came out of the Albion.’

‘You’ve been drinking?’ Meg asked Ron. ‘And then you start picking on school kids? You Finlays are all the same with your fighting and drinking. You should be ashamed of yourself. You were a waste of space back when you were at school with me, Ron Finlay, and you’ve not changed for the better now. And you, Micky, get yourself back to school now, go on.’

Micky quickly glanced at Ron and then looked pleadingly at Meg.

‘But they’ll all know I’ve been saved from a fight by a girl. He’ll tell everyone.’

Meg shook her head. ‘He won’t be telling anyone, will you, Ron? Not if he wants his secret keeping about being out drinking when he should be at work in the pit.’

She bent down to pick up her basket, pushed it on to her arm and squared her shoulders. ‘Now go on, get yourself home,’ she told Ron.

He spat again before slowly turning and walking away, back in the direction of the Albion.

‘Thanks, Meg,’ smiled Micky once Ron was out of earshot. Then he ran off towards the school, leaving Meg to continue to the farm.

In the kitchen at Tunstall Street, Sally put a kettle of water on the coal fire to boil, leaving Ernie sleeping in the front room. She’d spotted what her children hadn’t seen: four ale bottles – empty bottles – lying on the floor. She made no effort to be quiet about her preparations; if the noise woke Ernie up, then so be it.

It had been four years since she’d last seen him. Four years in which worry lines had settled around Sally’s eyes and a heaviness had crept in around her once carefree face. Four years since he’d been called up for war to serve with the Durham Light Infantry. And in all that time, he hadn’t been in touch once with a letter, not once. Oh, there had been cards, cards that the army had provided him with, that they provided all the soldiers with who didn’t know what to write, or didn’t have the time or inclination. All that the soldiers had to do with those cards was cross out the bits that weren’t relevant to them.

I am quite well, Ernie’s cards always said in official military print. Underneath that, but thankfully always crossed through in pencil, was I have been admitted to the hospital. Then, infuriatingly, another pencil line through the card’s final words too: Letter follows at first opportunity.

There never had been any letters and Sally doubted that it could have been because of lack of opportunity. Other wives she knew, other mothers, sisters even, had received letters from the front. But nothing came from Ernie Sutcliffe. All that had arrived at Tunstall Street, twice a year, three times at most, were the small postcards with their standard words crossed through or left untouched, depending on what he wanted her to know. His signature and the date were at the bottom of each card, but he never added the words love from, and never the X of a kiss.

When the kettle had boiled, Sally prepared a pot of tea in the heavy brown teapot that had been handed down from her mam, covering it with a red knitted cosy, one that she’d made herself. When the tea was ready, she poured two mugs and took both into the sitting room. She placed Ernie’s on the table beside him, then sat down in the chair opposite, taking in the full extent of him, wondering what to say to him when he awoke.

Ernie had been handsome once, making Sally the envy of her friends when she’d first met him. He wasn’t smooth handsome like the movie stars who smiled out from the posters outside Ryhope’s Grand Electric Cinema, but rough-hewn and rugged. The man that Sally had fallen for was a strapping fella, broad-shouldered and powerfully built. He looked thinner now, thinner than she ever remembered, his face sunken and worn, his mass of dark wavy hair clipped short.

Ernie woke with a hacking cough that Sally was sure could be heard all the way down to the next village at Seaham. He didn’t look at her at first, as his body convulsed with the barking and coughing. When it finally eased, he stood and walked to the kitchen, where she heard him spit into the fire. She followed him and found him slumped in her kitchen chair with his head in his hands. She stood in front of him with her feet wide and her hands on her hips. ‘Slept your hangover off yet, have you?’

Ernie lifted his gaze. ‘What sort of welcome home’s that supposed to be?’

‘I saw the bottles, Ernie. One or two beers I could understand. But four? I daren’t even think where you got the money from. That’s money that could’ve bought us some ham for tea tonight. But instead I’ll be boiling up bones again for soup with a bit of stottie bread.’

Ernie’s head dropped and his body rocked again with the cough.

‘Have you seen a doctor about that?’ Sally asked.

‘Saw the quack at the army dispersal centre. He said it’s bronchitis. It’s the pit air here, makes it worse. All that smoke and muck pumping out like black vomit. I thought things would’ve changed while I’ve been away. But it’s still the same old mucky Ryhope that it always was.’

He stood, and Sally took the tiniest step backwards as he reached his arms out towards her.

‘Anyway, never mind all that,’ he said. ‘I’m home now.’

‘And you stink of booze.’

‘You’re not going to deny me a celebration drink, are you? Not today of all days.’ He pulled her close, kissing her neck, but Sally didn’t respond.

‘You never wrote, Ernie. Four years and not one letter from you. You never asked about the bairns, you never asked about me, not one letter, not one lousy letter.’

‘I sent you the cards, didn’t I? You know I’m not good with words, Sal. But I can show you now how much I missed you. Come on, let’s go upstairs.’

Ernie pulled Sally towards him and wrapped his arms around his wife. Sally tried to resist, but her husband’s touch proved too much. It was the first time she’d been held by a man in years, and she gave in