Then he had a stroke of luck. After they’d moved to Sparkhill, he met the Lawler brothers. They were twins, though not identical, and Catholics from the neighbouring parish in Balsall Heath. They ran their own business, Lawler’s Coal and Coke Deliveries.

‘I think Father Daly must have put in a word,’ Patrick said when he’d been with them for a time. ‘They’ve been very good to me, God love them.’

The work suited him: it was outdoors and physical, and Seamus and Johnny Lawler were able to tolerate his occasional absences. They had a younger brother, Dougal, who was the ‘special’ one and not quite all there. He didn’t have a proper job, but helped out a bit when Patrick didn’t turn up. So he had been working for the Lawlers now for several years and would drag himself along there, however bad he was feeling now, to repay their kindness to him.

It was in his ‘fast’ moods that he was more likely to disappear. Katie liked it best when a ‘fast’ mood was building up, because Uncle Patrick would be full of energy. He would fill the house with noise coming from his room, pacing and talking, and now and then a muffled shriek, as if he was letting it all out into his pillow. There’d be endless talking and recounting of stories, tales of his childhood in Ireland and anecdotes about Uganda. Katie learned about some of the children he remembered and about miraculous healings, like the woman who had a gigantic growth in her body. To cure it she decided to carry her rosary beads everywhere with her, praying to them and kissing them morning, noon and night, and within a few weeks the growth shrank and withered right away. There were all sorts of stories about animals and snake bites, and then his money-making schemes, and after a time Katie would stop enjoying the mood because the twitching and talking and pacing increased until he was like a loose wheel that was about to spin off. And that was when he would disappear, for two days, three – even a week once – and come home bony, dishevelled and exhausted, his chin stubbly as a doormat, his shoes in need of a cobbler. And already he would have begun to sink.

Even in all this, his wild moods, she had scarcely ever felt afraid of him. Katie had spent quite a lot of time with Patrick during her childhood. Almost every Saturday, unless he really couldn’t manage it, they went swimming.

They had gone to the baths in Nechells, and now to the big brick building on the Moseley Road. Katie had taken to the water like a fish and was now a strong swimmer, so that Patrick didn’t have to tow her along by her hands, telling her to ‘Kick your legs now, Katie – that’s right, nice and strong.’ She liked going into the echoey old baths with their little cubicles for changing along the side, and it always felt like a treat. Uncle Patrick had an ancient costume, or ‘togs’ as he called it, which covered him top and bottom, its baggy blackness only highlighting the scrawny whiteness of his arms and legs. Katie’s costume was a dark-red knitted thing, which got so heavy when wet that it felt more of a hindrance than a help. But they both got in eagerly and swam up and down as best they could, amid the other earnest swimmers and dive-bombing lads. To anyone who gave them funny looks, she’d give one right back: she felt protective towards Uncle Patrick.