The Union Jack, as he sat at his typewriter, fluttered over the roofs of houses each side of him. He began putting words into the mouths of the women he saw, with their breasts muffled in bathrobes, as they stood outside hanging the washing on the lines. Their hoarse voices, as they harangued their children, seemed to emerge from the middle of the head at the point where the inner nostrils entered the skull. The sound was male and phlegmatic. The women were gruff and scolding and full of cheerful morbidity. The men, some thin-faced, others small and stout, sat on deck chairs reading the Sporting Chronicle and the Sun. They grew vegetables in every available plot and drank tins of Tennants lager. Poorly clad, they shuffled to and fro on the edge of the Empire, waiting to be summoned.

On Sunday mornings, sporting the particular mien of Protestant, Methodist or Presbyterian, the women donned their false mink and fur, and arranged fruit and feathers on their heads; the men wore quiet suits, Russian hats and loud ties; then speaking a broad aristocratic patois they came down the side streets to church. Often from his desk by the open window, Jack would hear their voices raised in song that swelled like a powerful demonstration of defiance against despair, that then became ordinary, and finally sweet.

Their songs had the same exultation he’d heard from churches in the back streets of Brixton, and like the West Indians, the Belfast church-goers would emerge, gossipy and bantering, and walk the footpaths that ran through the grounds with a busy nonchalance. The children in bright suits and sombre dresses went by in straw hats. A few white-faced males would stand within the gates of the church, whispering to each other like men, who, wary of bankruptcy, had once again survived the uncertain fate of being human.

On weekdays huge trucks drove past, which made the small houses shake.

Then at night would come, in the middle of a dream always, the sound of a single speeding car.

He’d take a bus into town and go shopping at the Chinese supermarkets. Every time he visited the city centre he’d find that a new French or Italian café had sprung up. In them hordes of women in groups ate pasta with their own cheap Italian or Spanish wine which could be brought in at no extra charge. The men filled the bars drinking lager and gin. The light on the streets was the same as that found in north of England cities – cold, industrial, grey. On Sundays, everywhere was closed. The shutters came down over the pubs. Winds charged up side streets. Rain fell, breaking and reassembling the light above the blue roofs. At the end of some streets sat distant mountains. At the end of others were the peace lines – paint-splashed walls constructed from bare concrete blocks.