Charity was still barracking the darts players across the pub. ‘Give it a rest, now, Ted, or else I won’t play again!’

‘You play darts?’ Ray asked. His words had come out rather slurred. But honestly, was there nothing this girl couldn’t do?

She laughed, throwing her head back. ‘Not darts, silly!’ She jumped neatly off the bar stool and pointed to a dark corner of the pub. ‘That!’

‘Oh yes!’ Bill said, rubbing his hands together, all thoughts of leaving apparently gone. ‘They’ve got an Aunt Joanna!’

One of the silent pipe smokers at the bar came to life. ‘Play for us now, will you, love?’ he asked Charity. ‘Go on! You’re ever so good.’ He gave her a gummy smile. ‘Remind me of Deanna Durbin, you do.’

She glanced at her watch. ‘Go on, then, seeing as you asked so nicely, Fred. But not for long, mind! I have a ten o’clock curfew and an early start.’

The eyes of every man in the pub were on Charity as she settled herself on the piano stool. The darts players emerged from the smoky end and came closer, clutching their pints. Ray looked at them warily.

‘It needs a good tune, I’ll warn you now,’ she said.

Ray didn’t know anything about music. He wasn’t sure what he was expecting but whatever it was, it had to be better than opera. He arranged his face in what he hoped was a thoughtful expression, which wasn’t easy because his lips had gone numb.

Charity looked up and grinned at them and then her long fingers struck the piano keys, deftly, assuredly, as good as anything Ray had ever heard. She thumped out the chords and belted out the song for all she was worth and in moments, all the men in the pub had joined in too.

‘There’s a garden, what a garden

Only happy faces bloom there

And there’s never any room there

For a worry or a gloom there …’

By the time they were on the final chorus of ‘Roll out the barrel, we’ll have a barrel of fun …’ and Bill – smirking and singing his heart out – had nodded at him encouragingly at least a dozen times, Ray was singing along too. Well, if you couldn’t beat them, you might as well join them, as his old man used to say.

It wasn’t any different from a night in an East End pub or a ding-dong down in the Underground. In fact, it was better. Perhaps it was the beer turning him soft but Ray felt a sudden swell of fondness for good old Bill and for Charity too. It wasn’t a bad life, if you could forget about the war for a while. When the men from the village were singing and smiling like this, they didn’t seem so bad, after all. He could almost imagine he was among friends.