Sarah was very excited and played with her peg dolls in her little house, as she called it, and Thomas snuggled down with his favourite knitted blanket. Ellen had also brought along a picnic of jam and bread, cheese, a cake that she had bought from the baker and a metal jug that she had filled with hot milky tea and tucked inside the straw to keep warm.

The sun was sinking behind them, leaving a fiery red and golden-streaked sky in its wake as they reached the periphery of Holmpton. Harry emitted a relieved sigh as he drove into familiar terrain. The mare picked her way carefully between muddy potholes as if trying to keep her feathered fetlocks dry, and he resolved to wash and trim them before driving back to Hull again. She was a dependable beast, who had plodded on at a steady speed causing him no anxiety, and she deserved a little special attention.

‘Here we are,’ Ellen breathed as they entered the village.

‘Home again,’ Harry said, but she answered quietly, ‘No. Onny visiting. Our home is in Hull now.’

‘Aye, I suppose so,’ he murmured, and she knew that he still missed his former home. She did too, but she had accepted the inevitable change in their fortunes and wondered how long it would be before he too settled.

She had sent off postcards to her mother and her sister-in-law Meg to tell them they were coming but would only stay for the one night. Harry was to sleep at his parents’ house and she and the children would stay with hers.

To her delight, Mary was watching from the window for their arrival and waved eagerly from beneath the lace curtain she had lifted to drape around her shoulders before disappearing to emerge at the door, weepy with happiness. Ellen wrapped her arms about her and hugged her tight, and then it was Sarah’s turn to embrace her sister. Both jumped up and down exuberantly until Mrs Snowden urged them all to come in and keep the draught out.

‘Is there no hug for your dada?’ Harry said to Mary, opening his arms. Mary jumped up so that he could swing her round in the confined space of the warm kitchen, which suddenly seemed to be much smaller than Ellen remembered. She wondered how her mother had ever managed in it in her younger days.

She took off her coat, bonnet and shawls and then relieved Sarah and Thomas of theirs. ‘It’s good to see you, Ma,’ she said. ‘Where’re Da and Billy?’