Lizzie

by Lena Kennedy

Genres: Sagas; Romance; Historical Romance

Synopsis

No matter what life throws at her, she refuses to give up . . .

Tiny, warm-hearted, and totally devoted to her charming rogue of a husband, Lizzie mothers her brood of nephews and nieces through the perils of the war-torn capital. As she struggles to make a home for them in the busy bomb shelters of underground London, she helps launch them on the roller-coaster of life and stands by with help and encouragement.

For Lizzie is a survivor, an irresistible heroine with the unquenchable optimism, the great heart, the indomitable courage that sum up the true spirit of the East End.

Join Lizzie and her family as they negotiate the trials and tribulations of life during the Second World War in this beautifully heartwarming tale of perseverance and fortitude.

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What readers are saying about LIZZIE

'A win, hands down' - 5 STARS

'Heart-warming, soulful, joyful - I loved it' - 5 STARS

'I enjoyed this book from beginning to end' - 5 STARS

'A real page-turner' - 5 STARS

'Lena Kennedy is a real gutsy writer . . . very very good' - 5 STARS

Release date: January 1, 1988

Publisher: Futura

Print pages: 400

Sample

1

Grass Roots

To overseas tourists our city of London is a grand sight. They see the Houses of Parliament and the splendour of Westminster Abbey. They pass down Whitehall and emerge onto Trafalgar Square to view the statue of the great Lord Nelson, looking down the Mall from on high, as if reviewing his fleet. They may even admire the setting sun as it shines down the Embankment, gilding the shadowy dome of St Paul’s and lighting up the gold flash on top of the Monument.

But if those travellers had come before the Second World War they would have stumbled with some surprise upon a maze of small slum streets which twisted and turned through houses built so close together that they seemed to fall over one another. Here there were houses with shiny slate roofs and smoky chimneys, for this was before the age of demolition and before the Blitz, as the Londoners called the hail of bombs that tore the heart out of our great city.

It was in this area of back-to-back houses and long narrow market streets hemmed in by the river that Lizzie grew up. Here, amid the city office blocks, the shopping crowds and the market stalls which sold commodities to the working class folks who inhabited this noisy and colourful district. The buying and selling went on from early morning till as late as ten at night, when huge paraffin flares would light up the stalls and the ragged-arsed kids still scavenged under them. Lizzie was a Coster, a true cockney, born within the sound of Bow bells in a little house just off the market street, address number four, Brady Street, The Nile, N1.

Her mother was the local flower seller. On weekdays she sat in the market with her big basket of blooms, and on Sundays outside the hospital in the main road she would cry out in her hoarse voice, ‘ ’Ere yer are, lidy, luverly blooms. Nice flowers very cheap.’ Her drooping shoulders were wound very tight in a black shawl, a flat battered old hat hid her wispy hair, and her face was florid and weather-beaten, for she plied her trade in all weathers.

From her ears swung little gypsy earrings made of tiny turquoise stones framed in gold that matched her hard, shrewd, blue eyes. Lizzie would sit beside her mum and carefully wrap tissue around the flowers she had sold. She had nice curly blonde hair and deep brown eyes, but even in her teens Lizzie was very small, frail-looking and rather timid, and she never strayed very far away from her mum.

‘Lizzie’s the last of me litter,’ Mum would often jokingly remark. She had brought up a big family, but Lizzie was different from the rest of Mum’s husky brood and was kept firmly under her heavy wing.

When she was fourteen Lizzie had started as a junior at the local Black Cat cigarette factory in the immediate locality. Now, at seventeen, she had adjusted to her working class way of life, trudging back and forth every day to the factory and helping Mum at weekends. On her way to work each day she would pass the spot where Bobby Erlock lounged. Hands in trouser pockets, cap on the back of his head, he nonchalantly whistled a popular tune as he kept a watchful eye out for the law to come prowling down the narrow street. For Bobby was a bookie’s runner, recruited from the out-of-work population of the Depression. Betting was strictly illegal, but most of the street corner bookies made a very profitable business.

‘Up and dahn, double stakes, any back glad of it,’ was a favourite cockney expression, meaning that you could back a horse both ways but would be lucky to see any of your money back. On the day of a big race like the Derby or the Grand National the excitement would be intense as all the threepenny and sixpenny bets were placed and the population waited expectantly for the results. Then suddenly the coppers would come out from the Police Station in the main road in all sorts of disguises: trilby hats, dark glasses, raincoats, even overalls, anything to confuse the runner and catch the bookie with the pay slips in his possession. The alarm would go out and the runner would tear off down the street with the coppers chasing him, while the bookie sneaked into the greengrocer’s and hedged the bets – that is phoned them off to a big up-town bookie so that all the money was not lost.

In most cases the runner was caught, fined or did twenty-eight days. The bookie would compensate him when he came out and usually looked after his family while he was away. And because of this system Bobby Erlock had spent most of his youth in and out of the nick, as the cockneys called prison. He had grown very big and was as tough and hard as nails. But so tall and good-looking, that Lizzie held her breath with excitement every time she passed by, always hoping that he would notice her as he hung about that corner every day, chatting up the factory girls. Then one day he said:

‘Howdy, blondie,’ and she was too thrilled to reply.

‘Wanna come up the flicks on Saturday?’ he asked the next day. She gave a coy little smile that lit up her pale face and nodded assent. Bobby was no stranger to her. He had always lived in a funny little house at the end of her street which backed onto a yard full of old lumber. His father was well-known locally as ‘Old Tom the Totter’ who pushed a coster barrow around the streets crying out, ‘Any old iron, any old rags, any old lumber’. Lizzie remembered Bobby as a long-legged barefoot lad, who raced along beside the barrow knocking at the street doors to collect the lumber, then sat outside the local pub when his day’s work was over while his father got drunk.

Now this tall young man with the charming smile and a mop of brown wavy hair had actually asked her out on Saturday night. He had been Lizzie’s dream lover for a long time. She could not believe her luck. Saturday night did not come around soon enough. Lizzie put on her best outfit, a navy blue dress and a tammy hat, and was there on time. They went to the cinema in the City Road. He put a rough arm around her shoulders in the darkness and planted a wet kiss on her cheek. Then, having done what he considered was expected of him, he concentrated on the cowboy film.

While they were walking home, he suddenly picked her up in his arms and exclaimed, ‘Why, you’re like a little old dolly! So small.’

Lizzie’s Mum, spying through her window, confronted Lizzie as she went in.

‘Lizzie,’ she declared loudly, ‘don’t you go out with that lad any more. Why, he is twice your size!’

Yet in spite of Mum’s warning Lizzie still continued to meet her Bobby. Then one Saturday night he called for her. He smelt of brown ale and his cap was set very jauntily on the back of his head. It was a cool, dark evening and they walked to Bunhill Fields – part of an ancient cemetery where lovers could be found sheltering under the huge grave stones most nights.

When they got there, Bobby said, ‘Now Liz, if you really want to be my regular girl you must let me love you.’

So they sat down on the grass and she allowed him to fondle her, to touch her breasts and to put his hand up her skirt. She had never allowed liberties and was so totally unprepared for the shock and the pain of losing her virginity that she fainted away in fright.

Afterwards Bobby held her close and whispered, ‘I’m sorry if I hurt you, Lizzie, but now you are really my very own girl.’

The next week Bobby went off to do another stretch in the nick, and this time, because he had clobbered the copper, it was six months’ hard labour. Every day on her way to work Lizzie passed the corner that Bobby had occupied, and wept. But it was not for several weeks that she began to worry about the queasiness which now attacked her every morning.

It was only a matter of time before Mum heard her vomiting and waylaid her as she came out of the outside toilet. Peering into her eyes, she dragged her into the bedroom and felt her stomach with her hard hands.

Oh my gawd,’ cried Mum, ‘not our Lizzie!’

That there was such a thing as cockney pride might really astound some of us, but there is no doubt that a kind of built-in stiff pride did exist in that small slum area. Troubles were shared, but only within the family circle, and so the coster family crisis was handled under a veil of strict secrecy. Once it was known that young Lizzie had got herself in the family way the heavy mob descended on one of its infrequent visits to Mum’s. The mob consisted of three brothers, one of whom owned a shop, the other a transport depot; and the third brother who lived locally.

They all gathered in Mum’s front parlour to discuss the crisis and eventually agreed to chip in and give Mum the money to get Lizzie’s baby aborted. They were true born costers and owed no allegiance to any church or religion, but even so the decision was a hard one. In those days abortion was considered a terrible disgrace. Normally when a young girl got into trouble she would have the baby and it would be raised in the family – often with grandma taking charge.

But Lizzie’s mum was too old and the father was missing, so finally the brothers decided to get young Lizzie out of trouble and settle with Bobby when he came out of the nick. Without a murmur of protest, Lizzie went with Mum a few weeks later to visit the local back street abortionist: a woman known as Crochet Hook Kate.

Lizzie always recalled the morning when she went cold and trembling to Crochet Hook Kate’s smelly house. Kate was middle-aged, a kind, cheerful, chatty woman, always smiling, whose front teeth stuck out and were very discoloured. She had a strange, upturned nose clogged with brown powder, for Kate was addicted to snuff, and on her head she wore a grubby grey turban. ‘Come on in, gel,’ she said cheerfully.

Lizzie sat nervously on the edge of a wooden chair in the slovenly kitchen while Kate and Mum disappeared to the next room and talked in loud voices, just as if she were not there.

‘She’ll be all right, it won’t hurt her.’

‘I don’t like the idea,’ said Mum tearfully. ‘But what else can I do?’

‘You can’t watch them all the time.’

‘He’s a rogue, never have been any good to her.’

‘Bloody shame . . . in the nick of time . . .’

A period of whispering.

Then Kate said loudly, ‘Well better get on with it. Cost yer a tenner, but I knows me stuff. She won’t come to no harm with me.’

All this time Lizzie sat listening and shivering with fear. In a moment Kate came bustling in, cleared the dirty dishes from the draining board and produced an enamel bowl. She began to slice huge chunks of red soap into it with a big carving knife, poured in some bright yellow liquid from a bottle, then a kettle full of boiling water. Lizzie sat watching. She was absolutely terrified. Mum hovered in the background in a very nervous manner. Kate busily rinsed her hands under the cold water tap, then stirred up the contents of the bowl with her hands. Lizzie felt sure she would vomit, but sat perfectly still, too afraid even to move.

‘Yer wanna pee?’ asked Kate.

‘No thank you,’ whispered Lizzie.

‘Yer’d better go and empty yerself out,’ said Kate, holding open the back door for Lizzie to use the outside toilet.

So Lizzie got up and did as she was told. When she returned to the room a stool had been placed in the middle of the room, and on it was a white china chamber pot. Kate rolled up her sleeves.

‘Come on, luv,’ she said, ‘cock yer leg over that. Now take orf yer drawers, silly cow.’ Mum stepped forward to help Lizzie off with her knickers. Lizzie cried out in alarm.

‘Now keep still, there’s a good girl,’ said Kate. ‘It won’t take a minute.’

Lizzie felt a sudden sharp pain and fainted right away. When she came round she was sitting on a chair, Mum was passing smelling salts under her nose, and Kate was busy clearing up the scene of her crime.

‘Now get her home quick before she starts,’ she instructed Mum.

As soon as Lizzie stepped out into the air, a dreadful, searing hot pain shot through her. She hung desperately onto Mum. Behind them Kate closed her front door with a definite slam, her job over.

All that day Lizzie lay in bed, rolling and screaming in pain. Poor old harassed Mum sat weeping beside her, awaiting the abortion of her grandchild. Mum heaved a sigh of relief it was over, but for Lizzie the suffering was just beginning. Many a young woman in that district had died at the hands of Crochet Hook Kate. But such was the code of the cockney that it was stumm. Finger to the nose and no one dared tell. Our Lizzie survived, but only a pale shadow of her former self. She was more retiring than ever, and absolutely terrified lest anyone learn about her misdemeanour.

When Bobby finished his sentence, her brothers gathered to beat him up, as was the custom. But Bobby, being Bobby, compromised and offered to marry Lizzie. So they were wed one Saturday morning just before the war at Shoreditch Register Office; big, tough, rather uncouth Bobby, and tiny, pale, nervous Lizzie.

Mum wept very loudly, crying repeatedly, ‘You will rue the day you wed that oaf, Lizzie.’

But Lizzie was very happy. They moved into Mum’s back room upstairs and Bobby went back to his spot on the corner to keep a weather eye out for the law. He brought in very little money. What he did earn went back on the gee gees, so Lizzie kept her job at the Black Cat. In this way, they got by. The only cloud was Lizzie’s fear of sex. Ever since the abortion she had had an absolute terror of lovemaking. But even that didn’t really matter because Bobby seemed temporarily to have lost interest.

‘It’s the stuff they put in the tea at the nick,’ he would complain.

But Lizzie was pleased and did all she could to avoid close contact.

Then one day Mum came in, and putting her basket of flowers in the sink for the last time, she sat down in that rickety chair and went into her last deep sleep. Lizzie was devastated, but consoled herself with the thought that now she had her big husband to cling to. She and Bobby became the tenants of Mum’s little house in The Nile and settled down. Lizzie went out to work and Bobby tried to keep out of trouble.

10

The Accident

On Saturday night Bobby was back at Clapton, catching up with old acquaintances, and the tic-tac boys signalled all around the track, ‘Look out, Bobby is back.’

Bobby was exceedingly happy when his dog called Irish Mick romped home at ten to one. It was a nice home-coming present, a little packet of lolly to give to Lizzie. She seemed remote lately; he thought that perhaps he might try to get round her, boost her up a bit. She was strange, was his Lizzie, there was no comparison between her and the glamorous Dinny, but at least he was sure of Lizzie. She did belong to him.

He began to turn over in his mind the recent events in Ireland, the conversations late into the night with the often well-boozed but gentlemanly Edward O’Leary. Now, there was a bloke who had made it. How long had it taken him? Bobby wondered.

‘I don’t know much about racing dogs,’ Edward had said in his clipped accent, ‘I am essentially a horse man myself.’

Bobby replied, ‘Well, it’s a working man’s sport; not for the likes of you.’

Edward had lost his cool for a second. ‘What exactly do you mean, Bobby? “Not for the likes of me”, I’m not sure I like being categorized.’

‘Well, no offence, but I reckon you’re the guv’nor, like in the army. You couldn’t be mates with an officer no matter how you liked him. It’s kind of a fence – and that I learned when I was just a kid and in trouble with the law. That’s how it is with dogs and horses. We both make the lolly from the mugs of punters but mine are my own kind.’

‘I see you are also a good judge of character,’ Edward had smiled at him and, relaxing a little, added, ‘You know I love a well-bred animal. I wouldn’t give you sixpence for a mongrel dog no matter how pleasant its nature was. And strangely enough that’s how I like my women, a bitch that strays I’d shoot sooner than keep her.’ There was a kind of wariness in his tone.

Completely sober, Bobby did not miss the insinuation. He was quite sure that Edward had meant his wife, Dinny, and was thus giving Bobby a kind of warning.

‘Yes,’ said Bobby to himself, as he turned the matter over. ‘Edward is not such an idiot as Dinny thinks he is.’ As for himself, he might be a mongrel, but he was no bloody fool. He had sussed that one out, so perhaps it was just as well he had hopped it back home. But it had been a grand experience, and he would remember it all his life. For a while after this the scene in Mortimer Road was cosy and domestic. Bobby still objected to Sallie and would often holler, ‘Keep that fat cow out of my sight.’

But Sallie had mended her ways, got herself a job at the sweet factory, and kept to her own quarters when Bobby was home. She came home at four o’clock and Lizzie minded the little boys all day. They were company for Carol, who in turn bossed them around and played games which they called muvvers and farvers. Carol would ape Lizzie and order the two little boys about, and they loved her and fought each other for her favours. Sallie brought them back sweets which she had quietly dropped in her bag on her way out of the factory, and the small kids would run to greet her.

‘Oh well,’ sighed Lizzie. ‘It’s an ill wind that blows everyone harm, and Carol is so much more content with Paul and Derick to play with.’

‘It might be a bloody miracle,’ said Bobby, ‘but it wouldn’t surprise me if she started again off to the pub or bingo.’

At the weekends Sallie helped Lizzie to clean the big house, something Lizzie never seemed able to get around to doing. Lizzie was always washing and ironing all the pretty things and titivating herself. She always cooked a good meal. But for dusting and cleaning she would never find enough energy. Luckily Sallie was full of it, and on Saturday mornings she would scrub and dust all down the stairs even to the front doorsteps, singing and humming to herself as if she thoroughly enjoyed it all.

Sallie was always nagging Lizzie about her thrifty ways.

‘Why don’t you get a vacuum cleaner? That old carpet sweeper has had it.’

‘No, I could never stand all that noise,’ Lizzie would reply.

‘Don’t understand you. When was the last time you got your hair done? And what about these bloody old-fashioned dresses? Why, Lizzie, he gives you good money, I’ve heard you say so.’

Lizzie smiled in her gentle way. ‘I like to put some away for a rainy day, Sallie. I’ve had bad times which I can’t forget. If I can make do I will, as long as the kids don’t go short.’

‘All I can say is that you are bloody mad, and that one day you’ll be sorry. I’ve had more rainy days than dry ones and I don’t worry. That bloody Bobby don’t miss nothing,’ she muttered.

Lizzie pretended not to listen. Often her miserly habits would annoy Bobby. She would hide money everywhere, and the Toby jug remained empty because that was too handy if Bobby ran short of ready cash. Bobby spent money like water, treated the kids to all they wanted, and took himself out to the gambling clubs up West on Saturday nights.

That year, when Carol was five, the legal adoption papers were signed and at last Lizzie had a child of her own. Bobby loved her, she was so pretty with her dark blue eyes and black curly hair. He would lift her high into the air and say to her, ‘Say Daddy.’

‘No, Uncle Bobby,’ she invariably said, ‘put me down.’

Bobby was not offended, he laughed uproariously. ‘She’s got a mind of her own,’ he would say proudly. ‘Come on, kids, let’s all go over the fields.’

Robin was tall and very active and Maisie still plump and very precise in her manner, while Sallie’s boys Paul and Derick were two terrors. They had lost their pale and spindly look and really filled out.

Lizzie would watch proudly as they all went with Bobby to the Highbury Fields, but she did not once offer to join them.

Bobby carried Carol on his back and galloped along like a horse on his strong, long legs, his hair blowing in the breeze.

‘He’s such a little boy at heart, my Bobby,’ Lizzie said fondly.

Sallie replied suspiciously, ‘He’s a big boy everywhere else, or haven’t you noticed?’

But Lizzie would not let her mind dwell on such things.

That year the three youngest children went to school. Lizzie would escort them all to the door, then give them all a kiss and go off to do her shopping. Once back home she would make rice pudding and suet pudding and have their lunch ready at twelve o’clock. Then she would bring them home at four o’clock, and in this way her days were very full.

Maisie would say, ‘I’ll take the kids, Aunt Lizzie. No need for you to trot up to the school.’

‘No dear, I like going, and I’m afraid of the roads. You know what Paul and Derick are.’

Lizzie would trot along in a leisurely way with all the kids around her and she became a kind of landmark in the district.

Every Tuesday she stopped off at the Post Office on her way home, put Charlie boy’s cheque in his account, bought savings certificates for the children and then posted Bobby’s pools.

Lately Sallie had been going out at night. She had bought herself new dresses, long earrings and lots of make up.

‘I’ve got to have a bloody break, Lizzie. It’s all right for you. You seem to keep busy. I feel like going mad stuck up in that poky set of rooms all the evening.’

‘Please yourself, Sallie; the boys are all right. I never leave the house after dark.’

The boys played their mother up. They tormented her, wreaked havoc with her beads and earrings, put lipstick on their faces and played cowboys and indians. She often chased them downstairs, screeching, ‘Bloody little gits, wait till I get my hands on you.’

Lizzie would stand severely before her. ‘Sallie, you don’t put a hand on them children while you are in my house.’

‘Oh get on with spoiling them, the little bleeders.’ And Sallie would flounce back upstairs.

They were a couple of imps and badly needed to be chastised. A note was often sent home from school with them complaining about their fighting. They tore wildly around the house making more noise than any of the other children, but Lizzie, by some strong sort of instinct, was able to handle them, and they loved her.

Bobby was down on his luck once more. He had sold two of his greyhounds, had one in litter, and the only runner was a loser most nights, so Lizzie hid her money more carefully than ever and doled him out a few pounds at a time. Bobby was a trifle disheartened.

‘It’s only temporary, Lizzie. My luck will turn soon,’ he said.

‘I’m glad you think so,’ she replied a little bitterly.

Then one night, at the Clapton dog track, someone handed him a note that had been left at the office for him. It was addressed in a nice neat hand and written on perfumed stationery. Who else could it be from but Dinny? ‘Dear Bobby,’ he read. ‘How are you? We are now back from the States. It was a good trip. I wondered if you would be at Aintree in a few weeks time. Edward is taking a party over; you would be most welcome to join us. Love, Dinny.’

‘Oh, the olive branch; she wants to make it up.’ Bobby was jubilant. Even if his luck was out with the dogs, it seemed it was in with women. ‘Oh well,’ he thought, ‘slow dogs and fast women. The story of my life.’ He grinned to himself and immediately began to turn over in his mind plans for a trip to Liverpool. It was the Grand National. Must be up for that. The Irish came over in boatloads; it would be a good week.

‘Might take a chance on the National, Lizzie,’ he said that week. ‘Can get a job as tic-tac man up there. I know a few people.’

Lizzie had grown used to him always popping off somewhere and had no idea where Aintree was. ‘How long will you be gone?’

‘About three days. Back on Sunday night,’ he assured her, and packed his travelling case with the expensive after shave and his silk pyjamas.

‘Pooh!’ said Robin, sniffing around as Bobby packed. ‘Don’t that stuff pong.’

‘In my day,’ said Lizzie, ‘men smelled like men.’

Bobby was grim and silent, determined not to be discouraged from taking this trip. He kissed Lizzie on the cheek. ‘Bye, duchess, got all you want? I won’t be long.’

Lizzie’s brown eyes had tears in them. Was her Bobby at it again? Still it was no use worrying about him; she had too much to do. She sat down and wrote a long letter to Charlie, telling him that they would all be welcoming him home. Then she went to get the kids from school, and posted her letter.

The next morning she was a little down-hearted, so she decided to start moving the two boys’ things out of Charlie’s bedroom, which they had occupied since they arrived. She decided that she would move them into the small room to share with Robin, for Maisie really must have her own bedroom now that she was growing up. With these thoughts in mind, she kept herself busy cleaning. She painted it, she washed the curtains and spent most of Thursday making the room look nice for Charlie to come home to.

On Friday morning she hit a snag. She had decided to move the big old-fashioned wardrobe which the last tenant had left behind, so as to make room for another bed for the small boys. She pushed and pulled the huge piece of furniture and slowly it moved towards the door. Sweat was on her brow, but she would not give in. She had just succeeded in getting there when it got wedged in the doorway, trapping her in the room. It was nearly half past eleven; she must get up to the school. Panic-stricken she pushed and pulled, then suddenly it gave and fell on top of her, jamming her arm in the lintel of the door. With a gasp of pain she fell down, her breathing getting shallower as she faded into unconsciousness.

At twelve o’clock Maisie came out of the girls’ school. The young children were still playing in the playground, but Aunt Lizzie was not there.

Aunt Lizzie was never late, so when Robin arrived, Maisie said, ‘I am going to take you all home.’ She marshalled the small fry in her most authoritative manner.

When they reached the house, everything was very quiet. Maisie pulled the string on the latch and went in. No lunch was on the table and the fire was nearly out. Where was Aunt Lizzie? They all trooped upstairs and saw poor Aunt Lizzie’s arm sticking out from under the wardrobe. All the younger kids started to cry.

‘Take them downstairs, Robin,’ said Maisie. ‘I’ll run up to Mr Blew to get help.’

Mr Blew always had time for Maisie, and when she burst in, shouting, ‘Our Aunt Lizzie’s had an accident. She’s under the wardrobe,’ he acted at once.

‘I’ll come along, but first let me telephone for an ambulance.’

Mr Blew went round to the house and waited while the ambulance men took Lizzie away. He then stayed with the children until Sallie came home.

‘Oh my God!’ cried Sallie, on hearing the news. ‘She’s not dead is she?’

‘Not as far as I know,’ replied Mr Blew. ‘I could see that her arm had been badly damaged and may be broken.’ He turned to Maisie. ‘Well, I hope you’ll keep in touch, Maisie,’ and he patted her cheek.

‘Thank you very much, Mr Blew.’

But Sallie said, ‘Come on, kids, we had better try to find out how she is. So Robin, you can stay at home and mind the children, and give them some tea.’

Sallie took Maisie up to the Grays Inn Road Hospital to see Lizzie, but the nurses were noncommittal.

‘Your sister is in Intensive Care. It could easily have been fatal. Did you know your sister had a weak heart?’

‘No,’ wept Sallie, ‘but our Mum used to say that Lizzie was not very strong.’

‘Well, she’s recovering. Except for a broken arm she . . .