Eric stood and laughed. ‘No, I do not. I’d come out smelling like a French tart’s boudoir, thank you very much. It’s the barber for me.’

‘Oi, cheeky bugger,’ said Cindy, laughing. ‘Come on, Biddy, sit down. I’ve got time.’ As she took the cup and saucer from Eric she said, ‘Don’t you be forgetting what I said, will you, now?’

She gave Eric a knowing look and Eric replied quietly, ‘No, I’ll bear that in mind, Cindy, I will. I might just take you up on it,’ knowing that he would never in a million years have the nerve to tell Gladys he was off to the pub. The consequences would be too great. Gladys would purse her grey lips and her serpent tongue would do its worst.

Cindy smiled and held his gaze for a moment. ‘You do that. Even if you just pop in for a quick pint with us, it would be lovely to see you, Eric.’ She turned to Biddy and said, ‘Come on then, give us your coat, Biddy. And shall we give it a quick set? I can blast the dryers on full? Don’t mind me if I faint from the heat, I always come back round.’

Biddy began to giggle. ‘She’s a case, that one is, Eric. Get away with you Cindy. Only if you have time, and it’s no trouble.’

‘See you then, Eric,’ Cindy called out and he was back on his cart and halfway to the dairy before he realised that Cindy hadn’t paid and Gladys would want to know why he was short when she cashed up the takings.

Chapter Fourteen

It had taken seven long days for Harry to land back on safe shores, during which time Maura had been warned a number of times by the doctors at the hospital that he could lose one of his arms or even his life.

‘The poison has travelled high and fast, I’m sorry to say; he has septicaemia and he’s a very sick little boy,’ the doctor had said and the expression on his face held no sign of hope.

Maura hardly slept but sat by her son’s bed for all the hours the hospital would allow her and fretted and wept for the hours they would not, her rosary beads never leaving her hand. On the eighth day, after twenty-four hours with no temperature, Harry ate food for the first time. Now he was almost ready to be released.

‘He was asking for you and little Paddy as soon as I came on duty today,’ Maura’s favourite young nurse said as Maura sat down beside her son’s bed. ‘I gather he was awake long before dawn which is why he’s sleeping now! I’ll fetch you a cuppa from the kitchen. Did you get a lift here?