It was hard, parting from the family and the farm, but Glenys had no intention of getting into trouble through overstaying her leave. Mo and Jimmy insisted on accompanying her to the station, but it was not until Glenys had climbed aboard the train and got herself a corner seat that Jimmy voiced what was probably on his sister’s mind as well as his own. ‘Glenys, you do know our dad has been desperate unhappy ever since you ran away?’ he said, his voice a growl one moment, a squeak the next. ‘Have you and he made friends again?’

There was a short pause whilst Glenys felt her face gradually getting hot. She glanced round apprehensively; the train was full of service people saying goodbye to their own friends and families, so with Jimmy’s eyes and Mo’s fixed upon her she gave an embarrassed little nod. ‘Yes, you could say that,’ she admitted. ‘But your dad was about to go aboard his ship and I couldn’t keep Jane waiting, so . . .’

Mo gave a squeak of excitement. ‘Next time you come home perhaps Dad will be back from wherever it is he’s gone,’ she said excitedly. ‘Did he give you a cuddle? Jimmy says people who cuddle aren’t friends, they’re in looove; is that true?’

‘Sometimes,’ Glenys said bluntly, just as the guard blew his whistle and the train began to move.

‘Jimmy, Jimmy, gimme a lift!’ Mo shrieked. ‘I want to give Glenys a goodbye kiss.’

But she was too late. The train steamed out of the station whilst Jimmy was still struggling to lift his sister up – he was not the only one who had put on weight – so Glenys simply waved and waved and shouted that she would be sure to come back to the farm whenever she could. Then she collapsed into her seat and settled down to watch the passing scene as the train steamed on towards Liverpool.

Cyril – now Ernie – climbed into his bunk and lay there unmoving for a moment, waiting for the warmth of the Navy blankets to overcome the terrible cold. As it did so, he reflected sourly that he had made the worst decision of his life when he had taken on another man’s identity.

Oh, it had seemed a good idea at the time – it was a good idea – it was just that ever since becoming Ernie Beaver he had had the most appalling luck. For instance, no sooner had he returned to sea after the meeting with his mother than HMS Pinewood had been sent up to the north of Scotland and then, laden with ammunition, food and God knew what beside, to the Russian port of Murmansk.

And by God, it was cold! If he had had time to pity anyone but himself he would have pitied the pathetic creatures, many of them women, who unloaded the Pinewood, who despite the snow, gales and general appalling weather were clad in rags, and so thin and gaunt that many members of the Pinewood‘s crew saved a part of their own rations to throw down to the skeletal workers on the quayside below.